i feel a little unhinged today so i wanna share a little something with y'all :)))
imagine this scenario, so Batman and the JL accidentally going to another earth, it looks exactly like their earth, but there's small details that change everything about this world
one of them is that there's no Batman, the Martha and Thomas Wayne never died in this earth and thus Bruce never became Batman
this earth's Bruce is cheerful, genuinely happy, he's in a relationship with Clark after they meet at a Wayne gala, they had good chemistry and when Clark asked this Bruce out he accepted it, he's now the Justice League's doctor
Batman has not revealed his identity to his league yet, but he has a crush on Clark to some degree and seeing how happy his counterpart is with their own Supes, leaves a sour taste on his mouth
Batman is not good with romantic relationships, but his heart still aches and he's kinda pissy about the whole situation, trying to go back home as soon as possible, the other JL members with him are a little weirded out about his insistence in coming back as soon as possible and they even send Diana to calm him down
Bruce from this earth notices their tension and decides to host a dinner so they can relax a little bit before going home, because when Batman is antsy everyone else becomes a little antsy too and when this affects his own Supes he sees the need to do something
everyone is eating and chatting away, when Bruce mentions he's turning 35 soon and Batman freezes, he's noticed that Bruce didn't mention Dick or Jason in any point of their conversation (Dick should he turning eighteen and Jason been recently adopted)
so he jumps from his seat and literally steals someone's cellphone and start to look for his children, Dick's parents died, but his boy is nowhere to be found, when he looks for Jason there's only one mention of his baby and it's alongside the news of Willis Todd imprisonment
when he starts to pack up the invisible jet for a trip to Hong Kong so he can kidnap his little girl, Bruce asks him to wait and keep calm, tries to reason with him, about how "You don't even know this children here, this is not your earth"
that's when the illusion falls
no matter how good of a life this bruce has, no matter who he's dating, no matter that he doesn't have the childhood trauma witnessing the death of his parents caused, because even if he's not from this earth, they're still his children. this Bruce might be happy, but Batman wouldn't ever be happy without his children, there's no romantic love that can compare to being utterly bullied by his kids everyday
when the league travels back to their earth, Bruce might be able to try and ask Superman out for a date, but he has to absolutely smother his kids in long and tight bear hugs first, because he can't even imagine life without them
bonus: Batman tracks down every single one of his kids (minus Damian because this earth's Bruce never meet Talia) on that earth and contacts his significant others/exes that are safe enough to raise a kid, but nuts enough to 100% believe that he's from another earth, each of them has their own little kid now
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AU. Ava starts a dumb YouTube channel where she makes complicated recipes badly. Maybe people show up for that, but they kind of stick around for her conversations with her roommate - who stays off-screen. Mostly.
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chapter 3 excerpt:
Autopilot gets Ava as far as the bathroom, but then she’s stuck staring at the towels on the rack: one is navy, and the other is orange and printed with a bunch of little frogs. And Ava has to grab the right one. For Beatrice. Which is. The.
(Any moment now, her brain is going to kick into gear again, and she's going to manage to seem totally normal.)
Which is the navy one . Boom. Nailed it.
She skids back out into the living room, and is confronted once more with the image of Beatrice in the entryway, flushed from her run, her bare arm raised to tug a strand of wet hair out of her eyes.
Brain in gear, Ava reminds herself sternly. Brain in gear, brain —
"Is something —"
"Nope!"
Ava practically throws the towel at Beatrice and then clasps her hands together firmly behind her back — not her smoothest move ever, but a worthwhile investment, because it stops her from doing anything stupid.
(Except all the stupid things that Ava is thinking of are starting to feel smarter by the second. Like, Nobel Prize-winning, MacArthur Genius Grant-getting, world-changingly smart.)
Beatrice wipes away the worst of the rain in a fashion that is completely utilitarian and somehow all the more mesmerising for it. Efficiency is hot . Except that it means this will be over quickly. Ideally, then, Beatrice should be incredibly efficient but achieve nothing, so the two of them can stay here forever.
"Are you just going to stand there and watch me?" Beatrice asks.
"No," Ava denies. She’s a good friend, a respectful friend. She’s such a good friend that her eyes have not even once gone to — nevermind. "Um, yeah."
Beatrice pauses, the towel twisted in her hands. She looks at Ava, just briefly, and it’s not a reprimanding look or an irritated look or even a confused look. In fact, Ava can’t decode Beatrice’s expression at all. Maybe, if she was operating at full capacity, she’d stand a chance, but as it is, too many of Ava’s mental resources are being rerouted elsewhere.
"I'm going to go have a shower. Thank you for the towel." Beatrice points to the counter. "You might want to get your phone."
"Huh?"
"It’s buzzing."
Oh. So it is.
Beatrice’s shoulder just barely brushes Ava’s as she passes by her and heads down the hall.
Ava counts herself through a few deep breaths — not normally something she does unless she’s panicking, and she’s not panicking exactly — and forces all systems back online.
She picks up her phone. A dozen questions are visible in the banner: who was that girl, why was she there, are they friends, is Ava dating her, is she single, is she that much taller than Ava or is it the angle, and on and on and on.
Jesus.
At least it was a Live, which means it’s disappeared off the internet now; at least Beatrice was only in a tiny part of the frame; at least only a fraction of her subscribers were actually watching.
Since she started this whole YouTube thing, Beatrice has been nothing but supportive and encouraging. She got Ava around a copyright strike so that she could still include a bit from Gossip Girl that was absolutely essential for a joke; she taught Ava how to write and add closed captions; she’s helping her research which camera to buy to improve the quality of her footage without cleaning out her savings.
And all Beatrice has ever asked in return is that Ava respects her privacy. She hasn’t even asked , not in so many words; she's just trusted Ava with that responsibility.
And Ava has already fucked it up. She should’ve done the Live in her room, or realised that the storm meant that Beatrice might be back early, or —
She should probably also wait until Beatrice is done with her shower to apologise to her, but the idea of holding out for another five minutes makes her stomach churn, and Ava’s already burned through all her self-control for the day.
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