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consumeconstantly · 4 years

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Bring Me To The Precipice of Victory

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Summary: When Batman departs— just for a short time, just to patch things up in Gotham— things go horribly, horribly wrong in Paris.

He doesn’t know if he can come back from realizing that Marinette and Ladybug are one and the same (and that his daughter has died more times than he can count.) (all biodad bruce are posted in chronological order but can be read as stand alones)

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The moment of peace, of solidarity, that Batman shares with Ladybug up on that rooftop at night means the world.

After a minute or two, Ladybug pulls back, tear tracks down the sides of her face, eye and nose red. She takes another minute of silence,hugging herself in the muggy Parisian air. When she next opens her eyes, Batman can almost imagine that Ladybug never cried at all.

But he knows that's not true. Ladybug seemed so fragile in his arms. He can imagine— he can imagine Dick in her place, broken over Jason’s death. Tim losing his parents. All of his children facing insurmountable odds with no team by their side. Alone.

Ladybug is not alone, but functionally, she may as well be. He’s watched the fights. He’s analyzed them. Ladybug is always, always the leader. She strategizes with Ryuko and Viperion, but Ladybug is who everybody looks to for an answer when things don’t work out the way they want them to. She’s the one with the plan, the backup plan, the out. She’s the one who swoops in to save the day.

She’s also the one who has racked up the most hours on the battlefield. Even Chat Noir, her partner, only has three quarters of the hours that she’s put in. For most of the other members of her team, she puts in double, sometimes even triple of what they do. Over the course of six years, there have been a little under two thousand battles, lasting from under an hour to over five hours. Ladybug has shown up for every single one, without fail. That’s not even counting the patrols that they do; although Ladybug is given a lot of flack for not patrolling as often as Chat Noir, there’s a fundamental difference in how they patrol. Ladybug is methodical, Chat Noir is volatile.

He’s not a bad superhero when it comes down to battle, but the two of them are fundamentally different. Ladybug sees her time as a superhero as a duty. Chat Noir seems to view it as a time to unwind— and while that’s worrying, considering the information he’s gathered on the Miraculous Team so far points to the majority of them beings teens or young adults— it’s not what is needed to deal with the Paris situation.

Perhaps one of the easiest ways to see these differences is during patrol. Chat Noir uses patrol time almost seems to be an outlet for stress. He entices whoever he’s on patrol with to race to random places in Paris with no rhyme or reason. Whenever he comes across crime, he stops it, but Ladybug— Ladybug searches for crime.

Ladybug has a team and she trusts them with her life, but she cannot trust them to be responsible. That is perhaps the worst possible thing that can happen. And through the videos that he’s watched, it’s clear that the hours she puts in do affect her, and fairly heavily.

Whoever she is, she’s young. Too young to be in battle untrained, because they are untrained— despite being in the field for years, all of their basic form lacks and tells anybody with an experienced eye that they’ve never had formal training in martial arts.

When Batman and Ladybug leave the roof, they leave on a better note than where they started. Batman is still upset that Tom and Sabine are dead, but he cannot attribute it solely to Ladybug’s negligence. He admires the young heroine for rising to the occasion when there was nobody else to help. He has no doubt that with the resources and training that he can provide him and his operatives already on the case, Hawkmoth will be revealed in no time at all.

He’s right, but in the worst possible way.

It’s largely a mistake on hiss part-- he gets a notification that the Joker broke out of Arkham again, and Hawkmoth and Pavona are missing for the time being. Though Ladybug has made a mistake in not taking Pavona out immediately, she and her team have won every akuma and sentimonster battle. The logical course of action is to go where the most danger is.

Bruce does not have any predictive powers. There is no way for him to know what’s going to happen. But when he and his team finally catch the Joker and put him away again-- a feat that takes just a little under twenty four hours, extreme concentration, and a good number of injuries-- Batman finally gets a chance to breathe. The adrenaline from facing off against the Joker’s latest scheme fades. Batman reclines in a chair as Alfred binds his wounds and passes him pain relieving pills while he gets stitches in his abdomen.

He checks the news in Paris.

He almost drops the device that he’s using to view the news.

Marinette’s existence has been hidden from his family. With Dick, he was more concerned about his existence as Robin, rather than informing him that he had a sister. As soon as he started contemplating bringing up Marinette, Batman and Robin had a bad break. Then Jason came along, troubled and angry. Bruce didn’t want to introduce Marinette into the mix then because he was volatile.

Jason died due to Batman’s incompetence. Bruce grieved the loss of his ward; Batman was never allowed to mourn the loss of his second Robin.

Tim felt unworthy as the only child Bruce didn’t pick up off the streets, and Damian-- well, Damian was Damian. First he had a superiority complex the size of the Grand Canyon, and once he got accustomed to how they handled things in the Wayne Manor-- though Tim would argue that Damian is still not used to this kind of lifestyle-- he overcompensated every single mission and needed a remedial course on How to Interact With Other Humans 101. Add the overarching concern of Marinette being exposed to his vigilante life style and being unprepared for it, and he was never able to tell his children that he had another biological kid. A daughter.

When the news that Sabine and Tom died reached his ears, he told everybody he had business in Paris without elaborating what. With Wayne Enterprises opening a Paris branch of their R&D specialising in European artifacts, it was easy to draw connections that weren’t there.

“Bruce, you need to relax. Business in Paris can be dealt with later, you need to take the time to heal,” Tim says.

A clip in his shoulder from a bullet, knife wounds on his torso and legs, a sprained wrist. Whatever chemical experiment the Joker got his hands out still pumping through his veins. “I need to go-- it’s important--”

The pain relievers Alfred gave him earlier were also a sedative.

Tim catches him before he passes out.

He wakes up three hours late through sheer force of will.

“Paris!” Bruce jolts upright, still in costume, lying prone on a medical cot in the Batcave.

The first thing that catches his eyes is the red and black flying across the screens.

Ladybug.

His kids are all watching the screens with abject horror.

“Is this,” Tim wets his lips. “The business trip that you were on?”

Bruce drags himself out of bed, adrenaline washing out any residual pain. He doesn’t have the capacity to respond, he needs to get to the zeta tube, he needs to get to Paris, Ladybug is bleeding, the city is in shambles, and Marinette--

One of the news sites up on the screen declares the arrondissements that are obliterated. The one that houses Tom & Sabine’s Boulangerie is amongst their number. An approximate death toll fills the static.

-- Marinette is likely among those lost. He has lost another child due to his inaction. Due to his inability to push through, to look forwards and predict the future and the consequences of his actions. Marinette is another Jason, but if Ladybug doesn’t get it together, she’ll be gone permanently. And Ladybug is little more than a child. She can’t handle it, not by herself, not with her team. She needs an experienced hero, and Batman will be there for her, be the one leading the charge against Hawkmoth as the civilians hide in their homes and pray for her Miracle Cure to reverse the damage.

Dick places a hand on his shoulder. Bruce tries to shrug it off, but his fingers dig into the place where the bullet clipped his flesh. The pain is just a reminder that if he does not get to Paris now, there will be thousands-- no, millions-- more who feel this pain. How did Marinette die? Was it an akuma? Did the rubble of one of the destroyed buildings fall on her? Did Ladybug even try to protect her?

“I need to go,” Bruce growls.

“You can’t. While you were out, the majority of the Justice League prohibited all travel via zeta tubes. Nobody can get into Paris right now.”

Bruce knocks Dick’s hand off his shoulder and turns to his eldest. At the very least, Dick and the rest of his children look solemn. Damian’s gaze is fixed to one of the screens that shows Ladybug. “A city is in danger, millions of lives are at risk, Marinette--”

His daughter is dead. He can’t bring himself to say it out loud.

Standing by idly is the last thing he’ll let himself do.“Who put out the order? I’ll get them to reverse it.”

Dick moves so he’s between the zeta tube and Bruce. “B, you don’t understand. If you go to Paris right now, you’ll get akumatized.”

“I can handle my emotions.”

Jason points at the upper right section of screens that’s replaying past footage. “I wouldn’t bet Paris’ survival on it. Not when more level headed superheroes got on the scene first and failed. They really don’t need any heavy hitters getting akumatized. Not when Superman put three members of their team out of commission.”

Superman arrived on the scene first; it took a matter of seconds for him to get akumatized. He was responsible for razing down three arrondissements in no time flat. Ladybug had to call for a Lucky Charm in order to get her hands on some kryptonite, which forced her to recoup after her time ran out.

Black Canary arrived next. Then Red Tornado.

Both were akumatized in mere minutes.

“After Red Tornado got akumatized, Wonder Woman led the charge to put the rest of the zeta tubes on lockdown,” Duke says, grim. “All we can do now is hope that these Parisian superheroes can pull off a win.”

Bruce stumbles over to get a better view. He remembers Ladybug, small and slight in his arms. A child, crying over the loss of her pseudo parents.

A warrior, bloody and bruised and broken.

She is one of the last ones standing.

King Monkey and an ox themed hero both died at Superman’s hands. The former got in the way of his laser beams, the latter a victim of super strength and getting thrown through two buildings and having their necks snap at an unsightly angle. Chat Noir was also sent hurtling through the air, and the only reason he was still alive was because Ladybug alighted from the sky and grabbed him before he got sent through a building in his unconscious state. Black Canary came shortly after, apparently informed of the Superman situation and carrying kryptonite.

She didn’t last for long either. Almost immediately after helping Ladybug and Ryuko bind Superman in such a way that he couldn’t escape,

Pegasus got hit by Black Canary’s sound waves and Chat Noir’s residual injuries from his fight with Superman forced him into a state of unconsciousness. Queen Bee and Carapace were able to pull off a win against Black Canary, but not without serious injuries. Ryuko faced off against Red Tornado alone, which normally would have been a thing of awe, but in the grander scheme of things, was a huge issue, as without her, the Miraculous Team functionally lost all of their heavy hitters. Rena Rouge and several Miraculous users that clearly had never been in battle before were the ones left to hold their own against the scores of akumatized Parisians.

The only ones left to hunt down Hawkmoth and Pavona were Ladybug and Viperion, and the former was already on her third use of Lucky Charm.

Ladybug pulls out her communicator, dodging an attack.

“Can we get sound on this?” Jason grips the closest table.

Dick shakes his head. “Zatara says there’s already enough interference just trying to get these images. And for some reason, Dr. Fate refuses to get involved with any of this.”

Bruce’s phone rings. He doesn’t pick it up on the first ring, too focused on the ongoing battles. He does take his phone out of his pocket to silence it the next time, but when he presses the sound off, an image comes through.

“Bruce.” Ladybug’s image comes through crystal clear, and it doesn’t make him feel any better. Ladybug, blood dripping from her mouth, costume torn open, hair burnt, wild eyed.

He opens his mouth to speak, but the image goes blurry as she moves to avoid several attacks pointed towards her.

“Before I go, I--”

“Watch out, LB!” Bruce lifts his eyes to the screen that displays Ladybug and Viperion in battle. The spotted heroine gets pushed out of the way of a laser, but the snake themed hero takes the hit.

The ambient noise coming from his phone is strong; he can hear blades clashing in the background as Chat Noir, already on his last legs attempts to hold off Darkblade. Screaming from civilians, a strangled sob from Ladybug. “Viperion.”

Ladybug comes back into view. Blue eyes filled with rage.

“If this doesn’t end in our favor, you need to make sure that Hawkmoth and Pavona do not acquire both the Ladybug and Black Cat Miraculous. Do whatever it takes to prevent that from happening.” She blinks, retreats into herself, and Bruce wonders if he’s seeing the girl behind the mask.

“And If I don’t get to see you again--” If I’m dead, the words go unspoken, “I really did want the chance -- I-- you’re a good man. A good father. Your daughter-- she loves you. She really, really does. Stay safe.”

The transmission cuts off. On the screen in front of him, Ladybug closes her communicator, closes Viperion’s open eyes, and strides to the epicenter of the akumas. Blue fire flashes in her irises, and for a moment, she’s staring directly at the screen. And Bruce knows those eyes. He knows them.

The next second, all of the computers simultaneously die.

Bruce is numb. No-- no.

He is nothing.

All his children-- no, not all his children, Marinette is missing, Marinette is Ladybug, and she’s out on a field that he can’t see grappling with magic forces strong enough to incapacitate Justice League members like their powers and abilities are inconsequential-- stare at him.

“That was… Ladybug?” Tim’s brow furrows. It’s clear that he’s thinking up a hundred different reasons why Ladybug and Batman are connected, why he’s the last person she calls before going into a battle that could very well cost her her life.

“My daughter.” The words are ash on his lips. An existence he’s never acknowledged. Not out loud. Saying it brings a sense of finality to the room. An impending death. “My daughter.”

Nobody asks how long he’s known or when he met her or why he’s never brought it up before. Everything is fuzzy. Floating.

For a while, there’s silence.

“Zatara says there’s too much interference to get the picture back up,” Dick opens his messages, frowning.

Damian still stares at the screen Ladybug looked at directly, frozen.

Bruce picks himself up and moves. He may not be able to use the zeta tubes, but he has a private jet and a license, and he’ll be damned if he doesn’t do something.

It takes two hours too long to get to Paris. He shaved five hours off the flight length due to superior technology, and another hour and a half off due to sheer force of will.

The landing is not a pretty thing, but Paris is already in shambles, and there’s no way that the ATC will approve his landing, so Bruce picks out the flattest looking spot of rubble before his jet meets the ground.

According to Tim and Duke, who stayed behind in case this turned out to be an attack spanning multiple cities, the battle ended mere minutes before they landed. Dick manages to get Zatara to broadcast the image in the cockpit of the jet, and on the screen lay three prone bodies. Gabriel Agreste, whose body type fits that of Hawkmoth, Lila, and a third that Bruce does not recognize.

A bone sticks out of Marinette’s arm, the connected hand crushed and hanging limp. The opposing ankle is twisted almost fully backwards. She is covered in blood and ash and filth. There is no victory in her eyes. Only weariness.

In her good hand, she holds her yoyo.

She raises her eyes skywards-- the roof of the Agreste mansion is blown clean off-- blinks slowly, and throws the yoyo into the air.

“Miraculous Cure,” her lips read.

The corpses in Paris rise from the dead. Rubble reforms into buildings. The ashy haze that covered the city disappears.

Ladybug looks like she wants to disappear, too.

She collapses, instead.

Nobody is there to catch her when she drops to the floor.

@biodad-bruce-month

Maribat tag list(to be added onto this pls send me an ask/dm): @our-precipreciousss @my-dear-friend-anxiety

Who Are You (and what will you become) tag list (to be added here just comment): @anjuschiffer @theunquiet-dead @certainmuffinbagelcalzone @cresentmo0n @allulily @myazael @zalladane @rebecarojas07 @keepingupwiththemalfoys @frieddonutsweets @all-mights-asscheeks @thornalchemist23 @trippingovermyfeet @jiso-lee @redscarlet95 @ira-sairain @screechingflapbiscuitpeach @ramos123 @cutechip @theunquiet-dead @sleep-deprived-aroace @enternalempires @lilkymilky @woe-is-me0 @officiallydarkgeek @miyla-lokidottir @queencommonsense @demonicbusiness

mb for not doing tag list right away i forgot i had these cued up already

#bio!dad bruce wayne month 2020 #maribat #what are dates #what's going in order #time? i don't know her #i'm always late #marinette dupain cheng #bruce wayne #bio!dad bruce #angst

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batfam-rewrites · 3 years

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Batfam During Quarantine: Retirement

Dick pulls up in front of the apartment that Barbara and her family lives in. He takes out his boom box and sets in a cassette tape. He sets the volume to the maximum setting. He holds the boom box over his head as Peter Gabriel’s “In Your Eyes” starts playing.

Dick: BABS!!!!

He waits out there for a few minutes until she opens up the window and leans out of it.

Barbara: You Dick!

The song ends and starts playing “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing” from Aerosmith.

Dick: BABS! I LOVE YOU SO MUCH! PLEASE TALK TO ME!

Neighbor 1: GO HOME!

Dick: I’M DOING THIS FOR LOVE!

Neighbor 2: LOVE IS DEAD YOU SCHMUCK!

Dick: YOU’RE HEART IS DEAD!

Neighbor 3: SHUT THE FUCK UP KID!

Jim Gordon: DICK, IT IS 5 AM! GO THE FUCK HOME!

Dick: FINE!

The next night

Dick walks up to the door to the Gordon family’s apartment. He knocks on the door and Jim opens the door.

Dick: Hey Jim, I was sorta expecting Babs to open the door.

Jim: *looks at the cards in Dick’s hands* Just take a hint kid. You’re making this harder than it needs to be.

Dick: I’m persistent, it’s part of my charm.

Jim: Whatever. *shuts the door*

A minute late Barbara opens the door.

Dick: *holding the cards*

Barbara: They’re facing you.

Dick: *looks down and flips the cards around* “Babs, I know I messed things up by *flips the card* not telling you Helena was staying at the *flips the card* mansion. I want you to know that you are *flips the card*

Barbara: *shuts the door on Dick*

Dick: I still have twenty-something cards left. At least finish reading them.

Two days later at the grocery store

Barbara is walking down the aisle looking for food. The music playing over the speakers as a voice replaces the music.

Dick: You’re just to good to be true. Can’t take my eyes off of you. You'd be like Heaven to touch. I wanna hold you so much.

Barbara starts looking around the store for Dick and sees him leaning against a wall with one of the phones.

Dick: *notices Barbara and points to hear and then makes a heart with his hands* At long last, love has arrived. And I thank God I'm alive. You're just too good to be true. Can't take my eyes off of you. *plays the instrumental part on his phone*

A store employee now spots Dick and heads towards him.

Dick: I love you, baby. And if it's quite alright. *struggles to keep possession of the phone* Get away, you’ll sing next. I need you baby *still fighting for the phone* To warm the lonely night. *starts climbing between the wall and the refrigerated section* I love you, baby. Trust in me when I say.

Barbara starts walking away embarrassed.

Dick: Oh, pretty baby, wait Babs, where you going? Babs? Babs? BAAABBS! LET ME ME LOVE YOUUUUU!

Daily Briefing

Dick: Okay, while things are a bit peaceful now, they’re not going to stay that way forever. Let’s try to plan ahead now and see if we can recruit any former members of Batman Inc. Tim, Steph, and Duke, you guys need to try and convince Luke to come out of retirement. Kate and Babs you go try and convince Bette to join us in Gotham.

Jason: What are the rest of us doing?

Dick: Selina, Jason, Harper, Cass, and Damian will patrol and hand out mask later today....

Harper: Cool, glad I can finally do something!

Jason: Got it!

Dick: And I will be sulking in my room!

Damian: Try again, Grayson.

Dick: I will be on patrol and handing out mask as Nightwing! Julia will be on monitor duty and Helena, tonight you’ll be on sanitation duty.

Helena: *sexually* Whatever you say.

Selina: Oh god!

Duke: Please stop!

Tim: There is a child present!

Jason: *Laughs hysterically* Am I the only one who still thinks this is funny?

Stephanie: Apparently so!

Dick: Alright, let’s get moving.

Tim, Duke, Stephanie, and Luke

Tim: Damn, it’s nice to finally be out of the mansion!

Duke: We were on patrol almost every night.

Tim: Yeah, but as Red Robin, not Tim Drake.

Stephanie: I mean, I guess that’s true.

Tim: *knocks on the door*

Luke: *opens the door* Hey guys, it’s been a while!

Tim: Hey Luke, how have you been!

Luke: Not bad, Tim! What about you guys?

Tim: Could be better!

Stephanie: Not bad!

Duke: Send help!

Luke: Their dysfunction has gotten to you I’m assuming?

Duke: Maybe.

Tim and Stephanie: We’re not dysfunctional!!!

Luke: Relax! I’m talking about the others.

Tim: Kay, coolcoolcool.

Stephanie: Yeah, the others are pretty dysfunctional.

Luke: Anyways, come on in guys. Take a seat in the living room.

All three walk in and sit in the living room.

Tim: Okay I’m going to cut straight to the point, things aren’t going to be so peaceful for so long. It’s only a matter of time until the Joker pops up with a futuristic Batsuit or some dude comes in with a plan to destroy Batman in multiple ways.

Luke: I’m not coming out of retirement, Tim.

Stephanie: Why not?

Luke: Because I can’t stand to go back being some vigilante trying to save the city. I mean don’t you guys get tired of feeling like the weight of this city is pressing down on you every time you put on that mask.

Tim: Yeah, but I mean it’s not that bad.

Luke: When was the last time you slept.

Tim: Like 6 hours. Plus 2 days.

Luke: That’s my point! This is a thankless job that you guys work your ass off for.

Duke: Yeah coming here may have been a mistake. Let’s go guys, Luke’s not coming back.

Stephanie: Why not stay here Duke. I mean, Luke is right. We risk our lives to save some fucks who don’t give two shits whether we live or die. Sure they’d be sad if we did, but they would only be sad because that would mean they’d have to actually defend themselves!

Tim: Yeah, that is a great point!

Stephanie: Woooo let’s get hammered, this is my retirement party fuckers!

Luke: You’re not drinking alcohol! You’re under age!

Stephanie: Whatever! *stands up and walks out the door*

Duke: Tim, let’s go!

Tim: Yeah, I mean it’s probably about time I retired too!

Duke: Damn it!

Damian and Jon

Damian sets up a zoom call with Jon

Damian: Hey, Kent.

Jon: Hey, Wayne.

Damian: Why must you mock me?

Jon: Why must you mock me?

Damian: Goodbye!

Jon: No, wait, I want attention!!!!

Damian: Works like a charm. How’s it going over there?

Jon: Not bad, it’s super boring. I wish I had 50 people staying at my place.

Damian: No you don’t! It is awful. I want to punch Drake constantly, Grayson is always trying to hand out hugs, Todd tried to kill me!

Jon: The hugs don’t sound....

Damian: Row turned my knife into an electric razor...

Jon: How...

Damian: Kyle keeps trying to bond with me, Cain tried to stab me because I stole a waffle from her, Bertinelli and her lust for Grayson is annoying! Honestly, Pennyworth and Thomas are the only ones who haven’t managed to piss me off.

Jon: You know what, I take back what I said earlier.

Damian: Wise choice.

Jon: Hey, remember the time your dad almost adopted me?

Jason: *talking in the hallway*

Damian: That was funny. Hey I got to go, I’m about to go on patrol.

Jon: During the day, I thought you guys were nocturnal.

Damian: No, we are not. We’ll talk later.

Jon: See ya!

Damian: Bye. *rushes to the door to see if he could hear Jason*

Jason: I’ll see you there. *walks off*

Damian: *walks out of his room and sees Selina*

Selina: Hey Dami, you ready to go on patrol?

Damian: Actually, we have a change in plans.

Nightwing

Nightwing: *sees a kid walking by without a mask, he squats down and waves* Hey what’s up little dude!

Little kid: *runs away from parents and hugs Nightwing*

Parent: Hey! Sorry, we’re still trying to get him to understand what social distancing is.

Nightwing: It’s okay, he’s young, he’ll eventually get the idea. I see that someone lost their mask though! Do you like super heroes kiddo!

Little kid: *nods excitedly* Batgirl is my favorite!

Nightwing: Really! Batgirl is my favorite, too! Hey, let’s get you another mask buddy! *reaches into the box of mask he has and hands a Batgirl mask to the parent to put on the kid’s face*

Parent: Thank you so much! *puts the mask on the little kids face*

Nightwing: No problem! Stay safe! *waits a bit longer and puts in an earbud*

Nightwing: *sees another guy not wearing a mask* Hey, how about we wear a mask buddy!

Guy: Piss off!

Nightwing: Come on. Let’s try to think about everyone else.

Guy: Who cares! If I get the virus I won’t die! It’s only the old people who are dying!

Nightwing: Okay, please tell me your joking.

Guy: I mean, you don’t really see much other people dying.

Nightwing: If you pay attention to the statistics you would see that there are other people who are 20, 30, 40 years old and dying from this virus! Can you just put the mask on?

Guy: Hell no, it’s uncomfortable for me!

Nightwing: UNCOMFORTABLE FOR YOU! I HAVE TO WEAR ONE FOR LEGIT MOST OF THE DAY. OUR CITIES FIRST RESPONDERS MUST WEAR ONE TO DO THEIR DAMN JOBS. NO ONE, ESPECIALLY ME OR ANY NURSE, FIREMAN, POLICE OFFICER, ET CETERA, CARES IF IT BOTHERS YOU! PUT ON THE DAMN MASK!!!

Guy: Damn. *starts walking away*

Nightwing: *grabs cologne* Sir, don’t make me do this.

Guy: Do what? Bit......

Nightwing: *sprays cologne all over the guys face*

Guy: pffft. pfffffftt.

Nightwing: I bet you’d like a mask now!

Guy: YOU FUCKING SON OF A

Nightwing: *spays the cologne at his face again* Hey! *throws a mask at the guy* No profanity! There’s kids around. Put on the mask, too.

Guy: *puts the mask on reluctantly and walks away* Stupid vigilante in this stupid damn city. Hate this damn place.

Nightwing: *watches him walk away for a bit* Never thought I’d take a page out of Jay’s book.

Julia: Nightwing, need you over in Gotham Heights. There’s a.... *clears throat*..... situation over there. I’m sending you the coordinates now.

Nightwing: On my way! *takes off firing the grappling hook into the side of a building as he takes off*

Jason

Jason walks towards the house, checking his surroundings to see if any of his “family” members followed him. Fortunate for him, Dick is preoccupied with his thoughts and Damian and Selina left after he did.

He opens the door and walks inside of his safe house. He then sits down, takes off his helmet, sets it down on the table, and turns on the tv to watch Supernatural. Not long after Roy walks downstairs.

Roy: What’s up Jaybird?

Jason: Not much Roy.

Roy then sits down on the couch next to him to watch with him.

Roy: Is it just me or would Jensen Ackles be the perfect person to play you if there was to ever be a movie about you?

Jason: I KNOW, RIGHT!!!! Hey do you want to order some pizza?

Roy: Sure!

Roy begins to pull out his phone when they hear a knock at the door.

Jason: Hide!

Roy: Hey it’s my safe house, too!

Jason: It’s my city! Hide!

Roy begins to hide as Jason looks outside the door to see Damian and Selina outside the door.

Jason: *opens the door* Hey Catwoman, Robin! What are you guys doing here?

Damian: More importantly, what are you doing here?

Jason: Following up on a lead. I saw a very shady guy leave here so I’m looking for some evidence.

Selina: Are those your guns on the counter? And your helmet and phone on the table?

Jason: No.

Damian: Then where’s your guns?

Jason: Okay, I hate to admit it, but I came across a dog and decided to pet it, then it bit the barrel of both guns and ran off.

Selina: Mmmmhhhmmmm and why don’t I believe you?

Jason: Because everyone but Duke has trust issues.

Damian: Give it up, Todd.

Jason: Give what up?

Damian: *walks over to the closet and opens the door*

Roy: Woah, how the hell did I get here!

Jason: *shakes his head*

Tim, Duke, Stephanie, and Luke

Duke: Dude, you broke Tim and Steph.

Luke: No I didn’t!

Duke: Really because we came here to try and convince you to be Batwing again and yet you somehow got them both to decide to retire!

Luke: So, they should! They deserve it. No kid should have to deal with that kind of stress!

Duke: Dude, we live in Gotham freaking City. Stress is literally stuff we learn in 6th grade because our parents need us to get jobs!

Luke: You had to get a job in 6th grade?

Duke: Oh right, sorry I forgot you all are rich! Hey, where’s Steph and Tim?

Luke: Outside somewhere.

Duke: DUDE!!!! WE HAVE TO FIND THEM!!!!!!

Luke: They’ll be fine!

Duke: Whatever. *walks towards the door* If you change your mind, you know where to call. *he walks out the door*

____

Tim: *grabs a helium tank* Hey Steph!

Stephanie: *turns around*

Tim: *pulls down the mask and inhales the helium* I am vengeance, I am the night, I am BATMAN!

Stephanie: O-M-G!!! That is amazing!

Jason, Roy, Damian, and Selina

Selina: So again, Jason, what are you doing here?

Jason: Trying to get away from you people! Do you know how often I want to shoot Dick alone from all of the stupid stuff he does!

Damian: Yes!

Jason: You’re no better. You can not adopt stray animals every week!

Damian: They can catch the virus, too! They need a home!

Jason: They have one! In the wild somewhere!

Selina: What’s your point?

Jason: I needed a place to escape you idiots at the mansion. There’s only so much I can take before I break B’s no killing rule.

Damian: Then why is Harper here?

Roy: Jaybird has been my emotional support person since Kori left Earth for Tamaran.

Selina: I can see that.

Damian: Is this where you’ve been every single patrol?

Jason: Not every one. Only when I get sick of you all.

Selina: Everyday!!!!

Roy: *laughs uncontrollably*

Jason: Not everyday!!! Look, this is why I need this place, because I can’t stand you fuckers!!! Get out of my house!

Damian: How did you even pay for this place?

Jason: I USED TO KILL PEOPLE FOR A LIVING!!!!

Selina: Jason, your not supposed to even be here. We need to leave now.

Jason: Yes you fucking should!

Selina: I meant all of us!

Jason: Good luck with that! You’ll have to drag me out.

Damian: Just watch us do it!

Roy: This is getting a bit personal, I’m gunna grab my bow and leave.

Jason: Stay Roy!

Roy: Okay, I’ll stay!

Selina: How are we so awful? What is it that we do that bothers you so much?

Jason: I don’t want to talk about it!

Selina: What is it?

Jason: You guys make me want to actually be a part of the family! You guys care for me, and make fun of me *starts crying* and make me laugh, and it’s not fucking fair!

Selina: Jason..... I’m.... I’m sorry. Why are you crying?

Jason: Because this shit has always been unfamiliar to me! Family has always been fucked up for me before Bruce. When he took me in I didn’t know how to feel because at that point my life was filled with rage, sadness, and confusion. *sits down on the couch* Then came in Dick, who at first made me feel at home with how much he hated the fact that I replaced him, until a few months go by for him to accept me as a brother he never had. Then I fuckin’ died!

Selina: *sits down next to Jason* It’s okay if you want some time away from us, I understand now that this is new. We won’t ever stop loving you Jason. If you ever need a break from us then I’ll cover for you, just don’t be out for too long.

Jason: Thanks Selina.

Roy: *starts humming Love Is A Battlefield*

Selina: Are you humming Love Is A Battlefield?

Jason: He is so humming Pat Benatar right now.

Roy: No, you’re all just hearing things.

Damian: Who’s Pat Benatar?

Jason: Okay, GET OUT!!!!

Selina: *rushes themselves out the door* Let’s go Dami, we’ve overstayed our welcome!

Damian: But my phone!

Roy and Jason: GET OUT!

Tim and Stephanie

Stephanie: *dancing in a strangers house* Woooo!!!

Tim: *break dancing to “Dirrty” in the middle of a dance circle*

Stephanie: *nudges the person next to her* I’m friends with that guy!

Stranger: Nice!

Stephanie: I know right!

Tim: *steps out of the dance circle* Hey!

Stephanie: How many Red Bulls did you have?

Tim: How many legs does a wolf-tigark have.

Stephanie: What!

Tim: I’m super fucked up!

Stephanie: Same! Wanna have sex?

Tim: Sure!

Duke, Cassandra, and Harper

Duke: Hey, Harper! Do you remember that time you were totally surrounded by the Riddler’s henchmen and I swooped in and saved you, and you were like “Thanks dude! You’re the best! I totally owe you one!”

Harper: Yes, I remember part of that being true!

Duke: Well, I need you to return that favor and you can not tell any of the others. I lost Tim and Stephanie and need help finding them.

Harper: What the hell Duke! How did this happen?

Duke: Well, Luke broke Tim and Steph, causing them to decide to retire, then they disappeared.

Harper: Okay, Orphan and I will be right there after we take down these two drug dealing pimps!

Duke: Thank you!

Harper: *hangs up the phone* Okay, let’s take care of this Orphan!

They both jump down landing a kick to their chest. Harper then grabbed her dudes arm and broke his wrist, finally stomping on his face, knocking the dude out. Cass walked towards her guy reaching down and throwing him against a wall, then kicking his back.

Nightwing

Nightwing: *arrives at the apartment door*

Boyfriend: YOU STUPID BITCH! WHY CAN’T YOU DO ANYTHING RIGHT!

Girlfriend: *through tears* I’m sorry!

Boyfriend: *slaps the girlfriend* SHUT UP BITCH!

Nightwing: *knocks on the door*

Boyfriend: *opens door* Can I help you?

Nightwing: Yes hi. I was walking around the neighborhood and wanted to know if you wanted to donate to the charity of whoop-ass?

Boyfriend: Not interested. *tries to close the door*

Nightwing: *pushes the door open* Hold on, you need to hear the rest of my pitch! *kicks the boyfriend in the chest*

Girlfriend: *still crying* NO! PLEASE STOP!

Nightwing: Wha-

Boyfriend: *tries to throws a few punch at Nightwing’s face*

Nightwing: *drops to the floor and goes for a flare, sweeping the boyfriend off his feet*

The sound of sirens is heard out side.

Nightwing: *temporarily distracted by the sirens*

Boyfriend: *gets up* YOU CALLED THE COPS! YOU UNGRATEFUL GOOD FOR NOTHING BITCH! *tries to punch his girlfriend*

Nightwing: *catches his fist* Not gunna happen. *tosses the boyfriend against the wall and has him put his hands over his head*

Police Officer: G-C-P-D! GET YOUR..... Oh, Nightwing? How random seeing one of you guys here. Like always. *goes in to arrest the boyfriend*

Nightwing: *kneels down to where the girlfriend is sitting and takes note of the cuts and marks on her arms* Are you okay?

Girlfriend: I-*sob* I don’t *sob* know what *sob* I did *sob* wrong?

Nightwing: You did nothing wrong. Everything will be okay. Did he hit you?

Girlfriend: *nods her head yes*

Nightwing: Where did he hit you?

Girlfriend: *looks up to reveal a black eye and cuts on her face* My *sob* face, arms *sob*, stomach. *buries her head in her arms and starts to cry even harder*

Nightwing: Hey, it’s going to be okay. It’s all going to be okay.

Nightwing tries the best he can to comfort the girl before the EMT arrived. After that he stuck around for a bit to give a statement of what happened when he arrived and to make sure everything was fine before he left.

Duke, Stephanie, Tim, Harper, and Cassandra

Stephanie: *wakes up* Ugh. My head! *she looks over at Tim and smiles as she gets out of the bed*

Tim: *starts to wake* Ow! *sees Stephanie* Hey!

Stephanie: Hey!

Tim: *sits up on the bed*

Stephanie: Look about what happened, can we agree it was a drunk mistake.

Tim: Yeah! *rubs the back of his head and stands up close to Stephanie* I’m sorry, I can’t pretend! *he pulls her in and kisses her* I really like you!

Stephanie: I like you, too.

Tim: Wanna crawl back under the covers again for a bit?

Stephanie: Absolutely!

____

Desk Clerk: Thank you, hope you enjoyed your stay!

Tim: We certainly did, thank you! *both Stephanie and Tim walk out the door and see Duke, Cassandra, and Harper*

Stephanie: Hey, you found us!

Duke: Get in the car!

Harper: Spent most of the night looking for you suckers until we saw that Tim used his credit card to purchase a hotel room there!

Tim: We’re sorry you had to go searching for us!

Duke: Also, if you are even still thinking about retiring, you’re going to have to tell Bruce yourself.

Stephanie: We’re not retiring. We probably just thought it was a good idea because we were both sleep deprived.

Duke: Good, because I didn’t want to see Bruce lose his shit!

Dick and Julia/Dick and Jason

Back at the Batcave

Julia: How did it go?

Dick: Rough. That building was well into Harper’s sector though, why did you have me take care of it?

Julia: I think you know why.

Dick: *thinks for a moment* Because of the way I’ve been reacting to my breakup with Bab’s.

Julia: If you stopped thinking of how to win her back for one second, you would see that she is most likely suffering as much as you are.

Dick: I understand. I’m going to head upstairs. Don’t stay down here much longer, that’s an order.

Julia: Are you still entitled to give orders?

Dick: I still get to wear the cowl, don’t I?

Julia: Fair enough.

Dick quickly showers and heads upstairs.

Jason: Hey, Dickwad. Over here.

Dick: Sup, Jay?

Jason: Follow me.

Jason leads Dick to the parking garage and into one of Bruce’s cars and drives to the safe house.

Jason: Welcome, to the safe house. I heard you had a rough day so I thought it would be worth it to take you here. Wayne house free zone so feel free to cry, let out your feeling, whatever you need to do to process this. I’ll wait in the car.

Dick: *crying* Jay.

Jason: Yeah.

Dick: *hugs Jason* Thank you!

Jason: No problem. If you tell Bruce, I will end you though.

Dick: Got it!

While I try to make these stories for the most part humorous and entertaining, domestic violence is a very serious topic. Since quarantine, domestic violence rates have gone up. If you or some one you know is in an abusive relationship or has found themselves in one since quarantine began, don’t hesitate to call the Domestic Violence Support hotline at 1 (800) 799 7233. You can also go to thehotline.org to contact them.

If someone you know has just left an abusive relationship (boyfriend/girlfriend, husband/wife, parent/child) remember to be there for them. Allow them to talk but don’t force them too if they don’t want to. Make sure not to bash the guilty party and respond about them neutrally. Most of all, make sure to let them know that they are still loved, and that they are still the same person, even if they feel that they are not.

I will be reblogging this message on my blog. I ask you to please share and reblog as much as you can.

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curious-menace · 3 years

Note

The rogue gallery members general reaction to encountering the batman who laughs and his creepy ass Robin's.

ok id like to preface this by saying that red death batman straight up crucified riddler and decapitated scarecrow and the batman who laughs is MUCH worse than red death batman.

i want to enjoy the dark knights metal but it is needlessly fuckin complicated with all this multiverse oververse omniverse shit. maybe i just don't have the galaxy brain necessary to get it so i apologize if this is all wrong

(also i know its canon that the batman who laughs has no rogues gallery left, either because he killed them or joker killed them before he turned but hey ho hypotheticals it is)

also no one talk to me about kiss fan lookin riddler from this verse. im not ready.

Penguin

i think his first reaction was to laugh. Batman’s finally gone and he took joker with him. I mean he literally calls him "bat gimp". I seriously doubt he anticipated the fallout of batman becoming some sort of hideous joker hybrid. he still chuckled when he started seeing the news. someone calling themselves “the batman who laughs” and “the darkest knight” then he sees the robins, he even recognises damien and it makes him a little sick. he books the next flight out of goodwin before things get too hot.

shame goodwin was burned to the ground to stop anyone leaving gotham.

with everyone inside.

Twoface

i dont think its an exaggeration to say he was absolutly fuckin horrified. it's rare that harvey and two face agree on something, but this bastard has to go. the murder and mayhem he could tolerate, hell even killing the other rogues, some of them needed to be stopped. but having to look at this creature and know it was once bruce? harvey knows better than anyone its a fate worse than death to be trapped in your own mind with someone else running the show. they do their best to stop the darkest knight, bring all the hired guns they can to the fight but it wasnt enough. Harvey dies, but at least he went out trying to do the right thing.

Poison Ivy

She sensed him coming, her flowers screaming at her to save herself. part of me wants to hope she took one look at that abomination and noped the fuck out of there to slaughter swamp or something. but we know ivy, she stands her ground like a tree planted by a river. she looks people like batman and joker right in the eye and down the barrel of a gun and says “no, you move” Shes not a good person, but in this verse she might as well be the hero of the story, maybe the only meta human in gotham who stood a chance against him. The batman who laughs was scared of her and thats why she had to die. if she’d just minded her own business she might still be here but no. She dares the batman who laughs to come for her, she’s going to take him out. for what he did to her plants, to gotham, to HER home and HER friends. unfortunately for her ivy was one of the first on his kill list. She doesn't go down without a fight. ironically it was her human qualities, the human drive to help people that got her killed. she heard one of the robins crying and went to investigate. the batman who laughs doesn't care about those robins, he’s got a basement full of jokerized kids to throw at people. 1 to trick her and a few more to hold her down while he doused the lot of them with weedkiller and gasoline then poof.

i doubt the botanical gardens will ever be the same.

Scarecrow

part of me wants to say he’s loving this. He’s enjoying all the suffering and sadness and fear as the batman who laughs murders everyone and everything from the dandelions upwards . but he cant, not just because he’s not the one causing it. this is fear without meaning or purpose, this is killing hope so thoroughly that there is nothing left for people to fear, not even death. he’s not so foolish as to think he wont also be on the batman who laughs chopping block. so he makes himself scarce, works on a toxin that might be able to stop him or even slow him down so someone has a shot at it. Jon knows hes going to die, its only a matter of time before that thing calling itself the darkest knight sends one of his minions to his doorstep. He’s been working on something to try and help the rabid robins. he has a small soft spot in his cold obsidian heart for kids and looking at these creatures makes him physically ill.

he thinks hes made a breakthrough, thinks he’s finally got a formula that will effect batman and the joker and hopefully, whatever abomination they’ve become . he decides theres no time like the present to try it out when word of the other rouges deaths reach him. he’s the last one left and thats....well its scary. His surprise attack works, the robins go down without a fight, screaming and scratching at their faces, their throats and each other. regrettable but if he stops the darkest knight now, maybe jon can help them. Just when he thinks he’s got him, scarecrow goes down. so close, he falls at the finishing line, his toxin having as much effect as a gentle summers breeze. Much like the original scarecrow , the batman who laughs likes using guns. For jon however? he makes an exception. poor scarecrow gets eviscerated by his own scythe, pilfered from arkham asylum by the batman who laughs. gotta love the classics, right?

Riddler

Riddler was second on his kill list. only because the batman who laughs knew how much it would annoy riddler not to be at the top. He’s another rogue who stood a chance of stopping him if he really tried. sadly edward is nowhere near as altruistic as harvey, and could never be as strong as ivy. He likes to think his escape is for everyone's benefit. live to fight another day and all that. He learned from harvey and pamelas mistakes, took one look at this new batman and his creepy kids and said “fuck that noise” and tried to run. except he didn't really try. god if he’d only gotten out of the city, he would have been the only rogue that survived. the batman who laughs looks at him like a pathetic insect, unworthy of notice. he’d have killed riddler eventually, maybe put him in a riddle with no answer or a trap with no escape for extra irony points but he wasn't about to stop the little green cockroach from skittling away. but of course, riddlers ego got in the way; he just HAD to try and best this new batman, no matter how much he scared the shit out of riddler he just HAD to try. and of course, pride comes before downfall.

The batman who laughs helpfully provided riddler with some rope to help break his fall.

Harley Quinn

some part of her was happy to have joker back. he was different, scarier but she was used to the abuse. what she wasn't used to were all the kids. she recognised damian wayne but didn't quite put the pieces together to realise it was bruce under there. she thought maybe he was just a random casualty . she tried hard to look after the kids but they act like animals rather than humans, there was nothing she could do.As time went on she found it harder and harder to sit at the right hand of this clown prince of horrors. harley has always been along for the ride, but how are you supposed make the whole world laugh if everyone in it is dead? i dont know what happens to harley in this world. either she leaves and much like joker, the batman who laughs fails to notice, shes killed by him because he was bored or she does when the world is destroyed by barbatos. either way, no happy endings here.

Thanks for this incredibly depressing ask Ghostly T-T

im kidding, im kidding it was fun! it makes me wish i knew what the everloving FUCK was going on with this verse so i could enjoy it properly. the only comic store i know of has been closed since like march of last year and i don't know what im looking for on amazon to actually order them. i have 1 issue of nth metal but it was interesting enough that i want the collection.

if anyone knows what the collection is actually called hmu bc i wanna buy it.

yes i could read it online but i like owning the hard copies.

got something you wana talk about? send me an ask or a dm!💜💙🧡💛💚❤️

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aion-rsa · 3 years

Text

Venom: Let There Be Carnage – The Comics History of the Symbiote Rivalry

https://ift.tt/3APMTrk

Something that impresses me with a superhero movie like Venom is when it doesn’t rush directly into the expected villain. When there are four different Fantastic Four movies, and they’re all about emphasizing Dr. Doom, it’s a breath of fresh air when, say, Man of Steel only makes an Easter egg reference to Lex Luthor instead of going directly for that confrontation. The MCU Spider-Man has yet to meet an Osborn, guys like Thanos and Darkseid started out as ominous benefactors, and the existence of Heath Ledger Joker was merely a cliffhanger tease in Batman Begins.

Much like how the Justice League movie decided to take its time by giving us Steppenwolf of all people, the first Venom movie had Carlton Drake (who hasn’t appeared in the comics since the early 9’0s) and Riot (the most forgettable of all of Venom’s comic children). By letting Venom build himself up on his own, flanked by some rather mundane villains, it gave more meaning to Cletus Kasady showing up in the post-credits. Carnage, Venom’s main villain, gets more fanfare by appearing in the sequel where our hero is fully formed.

Since Carnage’s first appearance in 1992, the idea has always been to make a darker, scarier Venom. Venom was a villain at the time, sure, but he was also on the border of becoming more. Outside of his personal delusions and anger issues, he still claimed that he wanted to help the innocent and punish the guilty. Even when he was able to accept that Spider-Man was good, they couldn’t co-exist due to their different natures as vigilantes. Carnage was simpler because he was full-on evil and had no potential for redemption. He was something so sinister and malevolent that both Spider-Man and Venom knew it was worth it to put aside their differences and take this creep down.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage has hyped Carnage up as being out of Venom’s league and that was the initial push of the character. Over time, the two became roughly equals as Carnage became the go-to bad guy for Venom to punch.

So let’s take a look at the history of Venom vs. Carnage. For the sake of simplicity, I’m going to define “Venom” and “Carnage” as characters wearing their respective symbiotes (excluding Peter Parker), or the symbiotes themselves. I’m not going to count Eddie Brock as Toxin, or Flash Thompson as Agent Anti-Venom or whatever.

Carnage’s Debut

Not counting cameos and build-up, Carnage’s first major appearance was in Amazing Spider-Man #361, starting off a three-parter. Spider-Man came to realize that he wasn’t enough to stop Carnage and he was going to need help. Specifically, he was going to need Venom. This was an awkward decision as Venom was at the time living his best life on an empty island, thinking that he had succeeded in killing Spider-Man.

Once Venom fully understood the situation, he accepted the temporary alliance. In the very first Venom vs. Carnage confrontation, Venom and Spider-Man tackled Carnage, got slammed into each other, then thrown into opposite walls. Carnage then caused a distraction by putting a baby in danger so he could escape. While he was dominant in that very brief scuffle, he still needed to run off, so I’m calling this a draw.

The handicap match continued into the last issue of the arc at a rock concert. In one-on-one exchanges, Carnage had Venom’s number, but Spider-Man was always there for the save. Spider-Man was able to use the sonics from the amplifiers to take out both of them. Technically a draw again, but it’s also a situation where Carnage regularly kicked the shit out of Venom and Venom only survived because he had help.

Maxium Carnage

Insert your Green Jelly cassettes and press play because it’s time for Carnage’s big ’90s crossover story. After the previous story’s popularity, Marvel decided to add more heroes, more villains, and make the whole thing a whopping 14 issues!

As Venom was a San Francisco vigilante at the time, he flew to New York to stop Carnage’s reign of terror. The first fight wasn’t even shown, as after the reveal that Carnage had Shriek and Doppelganger on his side, it cut away. A brutalized Venom was later found passing out while knocking on Peter and MJ’s door.

As Maximum Carnage was filled with so much filler and extra characters, there were various fight scenes of a group of heroes brawling with a group of villains. Venom and Carnage talked smack a lot, but nothing much ever really happened in terms of fighting. The story finally kicked into gear when Venom used a stolen sonic gun and blasted Carnage while Firestar assisted with her microwave blasts. This would have done the job, but Spider-Man got in the way and Shriek simply cut Cletus’ face open, causing his symbiote to respawn and bring him back to 100 percent health. Carnage and Shriek overwhelmed Venom and carried him off, along with the sonic gun.

Venom spent several issues being tortured until coming up with the plan to sneak some of the symbiote into the sonic gun so that Carnage would splatter Venom with more Venom. He punched Carnage down and escaped with gusto, hiding the fact that he was in no condition to fight.

It isn’t until the last issue that we FINALLY got a real Venom vs. Carnage fight. Venom was physically busted a bit, but Carnage was mentally busted. The heroes hit him with some MaGuffin device that caused him to be haunted by those who screwed him up in life. Venom pretty much just kicked Carnage’s ass around the city while Carnage tried in vain to escape. Every now and then, Spider-Man would appear and go, “B-b-but Eddie! Killing is wrong!” for the sake of giving Carnage a second wind.

Eventually, Venom punched Carnage so hard that Carnage’s brain ghosts went away. Knowing Carnage was more of a threat this way, Venom tackled him into a transformer. After the explosion, Cletus was knocked out and Venom got to weakly sneak away. Hey, good for him!

Venom: Carnage Unleashed

Venom was so popular that we got Carnage. Carnage’s initial storyline was so popular that we got Maximum Carnage. Maximum Carnage was so popular that we got a Maximum Carnage video game. Then we got Venom: Carnage Unleashed, a comic based on the popularity of the Maximum Carnage video game. It…wasn’t all too popular.

Still, it did give us the rarely used plot device that symbiotes can travel through phone lines and the internet! Symbiotes really are like pre-Crisis Superman where you can give them whatever power and people will just go with it no matter how ridiculous. As Carnage escaped from Ravencroft and commandeered a security tank, Venom eventually caught up with him and they had a fight on a runaway vehicle through traffic. Carnage eventually won when Venom got slammed by an oncoming train.

Their final battle here is a big pile of “That’s not how any of this works!” The two characters send symbiote tendrils into the internet, which were rendered on the Times Square big screen as the two brawled in cyberspace. Venom destroyed a nearby heatsink, which blasted both and knocked them out of the internet.

Carnage was ready for another go, but his kidnapped psychiatrist set him on fire and caused him to fall out a window. Venom reached through the phone lines and out the window to catch the falling Cletus because dying is WHAT HE WANTS. Which… no, that’s not true at all. Hell, even in Maximum Carnage, Cletus was freaked out about the possibility of dying.

Venom: On Trial

So there was a big Spider-Man/Scarlet Spider/Venom team-up called Planet of the Symbiotes that culminated in a 40-foot-tall Carnage, but there was never a specific Venom vs. Carnage moment, so I won’t go into it. Venom’s ’90s antihero run did have a storyline where Eddie was arrested and put on trial for all of his many crimes. Cletus Kasady was brought in as a star witness, which was an invitation for him to freak out and go on a killing rampage. I mean, seriously, guys. Come on. You should know better.

This story went all-in on Venom wrecking Carnage. Again, Spider-Man would interrupt and give Carnage a chance to turn things around. This time though, Venom decided to ride the wave by sneaking away while Spider-Man and Daredevil took on Carnage. Realizing that the two didn’t have a chance, Venom picked up a couple syringes filled with dopamine blocker and sprung into action. He smacked Carnage around, injected the blocker into his neck, and watched as the symbiote retracted into Cletus’ body.

Venom Triumphant

Howard Mackie wrote Spider-Man comics for a long while and he had an annoying tendency when it came to storytelling. He would come up with an interesting, if nonsensical, idea that would shake up the status quo, but instead of following up on that and using it to tell an actual story, he would just forget about it and move to the next idea that popped into his head. He was one of the main reasons why the Spider-Man Clone Saga was such a mess.

In the 10th issue of Peter Parker, Spider-Man, Venom broke into the prison where Carnage was being held. Despite the legion of heavily armed guards with flamethrowers and sonic guns, Venom killed them all so quickly that the artist didn’t even show it. Cletus, for some reason, figured Venom was trying to break him out of prison, but instead Venom was there to absorb the Carnage symbiote. Carnage barely put up a fight. Pieces of the symbiote were on him, but he didn’t fully transform or try to defend himself. Venom simply pulled the symbiote off of him and ate it, becoming stronger.

After this issue, there was barely any follow-up to this.

Venom vs. Carnage

This miniseries came out at a really weird time for those involved. Carnage was just a couple months away from being torn in half by the Sentry and being written out of comics for years. Venom was appearing in Marvel Knights Spider-Man where Eddie Brock got rid of the symbiote and it bounced around to different hosts until landing on Mac Gargan. Meanwhile there was a Venom ongoing that was more about a symbiote clone where Eddie Brock only appeared for a couple late issues.

In other words, in the Venom vs. Carnage miniseries by Peter Milligan and Clayton Crain, even the creative team had no idea who Venom’s host was supposed to be. Luckily, the story wasn’t about Venom or Carnage, but a new character who would quickly fall into obscurity anyway.

Venom and Carnage swung around New York City, giving the exposition. The Carnage symbiote was pregnant and Venom was explaining that there was nothing to do to stop the creature from going into labor. Venom was all about protecting the new spawn while Carnage wanted to destroy it, immediately. Carnage got the better of Venom by flinging him into the distance. Regardless, the explosive birth wore out Carnage so much that he could only plant the baby onto a nearby cop and escape to rest up.

When the two had a rematch, Venom was there to save the baby symbiote (Toxin) and its host (Pat Mulligan). As if getting revenge for that Carnage Unleashed story, Venom brought the fight to the subway and pushed Carnage into an oncoming train.

And… that’s really all the Venom vs. Carnage we get in Venom vs. Carnage! Once Venom sees that Toxin is a good guy and capable of kicking Carnage’s ass, he gets afraid of Toxin befriending Spider-Man and decides to team up with Carnage for once.

Carnage, USA

Carnage returned from his maiming at the hands of the Sentry, albeit without a bottom half. By then, a lot had happened with Venom. The symbiote was removed from Mac Gargan and joined with war hero Flash Thompson. Agent Venom went on to join the Secret Avengers.

Carnage, USA told the story of Cletus expanding his symbiote to overtake an entire town in the middle of nowhere. When various heroes went to oppose him, the Carnage symbiote ended up taking over Captain America, Wolverine, Hawkeye, and the Thing. When gaining a moment of clarity, Cap called in Agent Venom for help.

Movies

Venom 2 Trailer Breakdown – All the Marvel and Carnage References

By Gavin Jasper

Comics

Venom: Who is Carnage?

By Gavin Jasper

In their first meeting, Agent Venom easily took down Carnage with some explosive projectiles that came with sonic shrapnel. Then when getting ready for the kill – say it with me everyone – Spider-Man got in his face and went, “No! Don’t kill!” Carnage recovered, and overwhelmed Venom with his army of Carnage’d heroes. Then another obscure symbiote hero, Scorn, popped in to run Venom and Carnage over with a bulldozer and bring them into a facility that would blast their symbiotes off the hosts.

While Cletus and Flash had a fight based around the novelty that both were legless, the Venom symbiote latched onto a gorilla and ran for its life against an entire zoo full of animals with the Carnage symbiote. After almost being taken down by a Carnage lion (Spider-Man with the save), the gorilla returned to Flash and gave him the power to bring Cletus into custody.

As for the town-wide Carnage symbiote, most of it was taken out by an airstrike.

Minimum Carnage

Following up on Agent Venom, he had his own team-up arc with Scarlet Spider (Kaine) with the fun dynamic of a Venom who doesn’t want to kill and a Spider-Man who does. The two chased Carnage into the Microverse, where Carnage was able to create an army of symbiote clones. While Agent Venom was able to decapitate Carnage, the villain had attained some level of power where his body is more overall fluid and animated. In this case, Carnage could just reattach his head with no problem.

Although Flash had sedated his own symbiote and lacked the monstrous advantage, he was able to wipe out a bunch of the clones by amplifying his own inner sorrow outward through the Venom symbiote. Strangely, that’s not the first time Venom was able to do that. What’s left of Carnage slinked away, cackling.

Carnage and the clones returned to Earth and Voltron’d themselves into a giant Carnage. As Carnage tried to devour Agent Venom, Venom shoved a sonic grenade down Carnage’s throat and let the blast do the rest, taking out the enlarged Carnage symbiote almost completely. In the aftermath, Scarlet Spider jabbed one of his claws through Cletus’ eye and lobotomized him.

Venomverse

Venomverse is about a series of Venom hosts from different realities coming together to fight beings called Poisons. Under normal circumstances, Poisons are harmless. If one of them makes physical contact with a symbiote and its host, it transforms them into a nigh-unbeatable crystal-like creature with the Poison in control. By this point, Eddie Brock was Venom again and joined with all sorts of random symbiote heroes to the point that he came off as just a regular dude.

With their back against the wall, Eddie came up with an idea. They brought in Carnage from an alternate universe as a ringer. At first, Carnage fought against the Venoms, but they were reluctant to fight back. Once he saw the Poisons and understood that the Venoms wanted him to kill an army of twisted superheroes, he gladly joined their ranks. He just let them know that once he was done with the Poisons, he’d kill them next.

He ended up being a huge help, especially since the Poisons had a hard time bonding to the Carnage symbiote. Carnage died in an explosion fighting Poisons alongside Poison Deadpool (who was able to bypass his Poison’s mental control).

There was a sequel to this called Venomized where the Poisons returned and tried to invade Earth. They kidnapped Cletus, forced him to bond to an alternate universe Venom, and then bonded that to a Poison. While he was referred to as “Carnage” at times, the Carnage symbiote was never involved, so I’m going to skip this one.

But where was the Carnage symbiote during all of this?

The Red Goblin

At one point, Norman Osborn became the host for Carnage to give us a climactic villain to finish off Dan Slott’s lengthy run on Amazing Spider-Man. Knowing that Spider-Man was out of his league, J. Jonah Jameson decided to fight fire with fire by calling up Eddie Brock and blackmailing him into aiding Spider-Man. This led to a brief fight of Spider-Man, Venom, and repulsor-wielding Mary Jane against the Red Goblin.

Venom and Red Goblin brawled for a bit, but Red Goblin appeared to be immune to the usual symbiote weaknesses, so only Venom took damage. While he got some hits in, Eddie was too exhausted to continue. Instead he offered the symbiote to Spider-Man to give him the extra boost. This brief team-up allowed the two vigilante enemies to finally bury their lengthy rivalry.

Absolute Carnage

Now we get to Donny Cates’ bonkers run on Venom. Cletus had been resurrected and turned back into Carnage via a bunch of cultists who worshipped Knull, God of Symbiotes. Carnage then started going around eating the spines of those who were once host to a symbiote, getting stronger by the meal. Dark Carnage first fought Venom in a subway and easily overpowered him. Still, Venom got the win by grabbing onto the third rail while holding onto Dark Carnage. It was enough to knock Carnage loopy while Venom could get away and seek out help.

Venom and Spider-Man sought out Norman Osborn (who believed himself to be Cletus Kasady after the Red Goblin episode) and were ambushed by an army of inmates possessed by Carnage symbiotes. Overwhelmed, the two heroes broke through a wall and swung off into the night.

Venom got involved in another big fight against an army of Carnages and could have killed Osborn, but instead chose to save a wounded Mac Gargan nearby and brought him to safety. The Venom symbiote wasn’t happy with this and later left Eddie for Bruce Banner, giving us a fight between Venom Hulk and Dark Carnage. This turned out to be a dire choice, as Dark Carnage tore into Hulk’s brain, caused him to shrink back to Banner, then ate his spine. Carnage was stronger than ever.

Meanwhile, mad scientist the Maker had a machine that took the “symbiote codex” stuff Carnage was looking for out of former hosts without the nasty “tearing out their spinal column” part. Eddie unleashed the codex collection onto himself, turning him into a more powerful version of Venom. As he took on Cletus one last time, Carnage made note that Venom was screwed no matter what. Either Carnage killed and ate Eddie’s son Dylan or Eddie killed Carnage, which would wake up Knull and drive him to Earth.

Venom summoned the Necrosword to cut through Carnage, destroying him once and for all. For a time, at least.

Prelude to Knull

Wouldn’t you know it, killing Dark Carnage caused Eddie to absorb the Carnage symbiote into himself. Soon he was separated from Venom and stuck on an island while being bonded against his will to the Carnage symbiote. Dylan was able to remotely control the Venom symbiote and transformed it into a giant Venom T-rex. Like it wasn’t even bonding onto a dinosaur or anything. It was just the size and shape of a tyrannosaurus just because.

Eddie and Dylan had a dreamlike meeting in their minds while Carnage Eddie chopped down at the Venom dino. Eventually, the power of familial love was enough to overpower the Carnage symbiote and blow it up. Eddie rejoined with the Venom symbiote, and a little piece of Carnage latched onto a nearby shark to swim off and fight another day.

Okay, then! Phew! Going by every Venom vs. Carnage fight, I’ve judged them so that there have been six draws, eight victories for Carnage, and nine victories for Venom.

Congratulations, black ooze. Here’s hoping your red offspring doesn’t turn the tide at the box office.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage will be released in theaters on Oct. 1.

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bluegarners · 4 years

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If you're taking asks I would love to hear your thoughs about the Ric arc and the current state of Nightwing comics!!!!!!!!!! :))

Oh goodness, where to begin...

To start, I share a lot of the same opinions as @nightwingmyboi and @hood-ex ~~ they have very extensive and well thought out takes on the Ric Arc and the general direction DC has decided to take Dick Grayson with, along with his legacy of Nightwing. I highly suggest you read some of their posts about it, as they are very informative and probably more well versed in explaining opinions, haha!

So, my thoughts on the Ric Arc? Like most fans of Nightwing, I believe it kinda sucked ass. Like, sucked ass in the way where DC kinda just forgot characterizations (again), made it all about Batman (again), and ignored good side characters (Bea). The only thing positive I can really say about that whole arc was the art- I really enjoyed the take on Dick's features in Nightwing #74. I was happy they gave him more ethnic looking features with the fuller lips and the more angular nose. (However, they kinda screwed up with the heights??? Jason was tiny!! Barely 5' 4" it looked like LOL) The colors were pretty as well, Ryan Benjamin is a favorite artist of mine, and most of the scenes were fluid.

Another positive I can say about the Ric Arc is one of the very beginning scenes, where Damian goes to see Dick in the hospital while he's still recovering. It was moving that they let Damian be an impatient child when "demanding" for Dick to wake up, and then follow it up with him essentially fleeing and crying when he's not answered. Of course, Damian isn't really mentioned again after this, but it was still really nice to see this side of his character.

The plot.... where do I start? I don't think I'll get too much into it because it'll only frusturate me more sdfslhf but I'll say this. While I am a fan of Dick Grayson angst, DC made it very... unenjoyable, for lack of a better word. It felt like they just threw in as many villains as possible, what with the introduction of the new "sidekick" for Joker, aka Punchline, the Court of Owls appearing for a very brief time just to screw with Dick's memory more, KGBeast and Bane conspiring to get to Batman through Nightwing BY SHOOTING HIM IN THE HEAD (okay, mini rant here: DC, if you're going to make this comic about Nightwing, please please please actually make it about Nightwing. Make the problem about him, not Batman. I get that Bane is kind of the main motivator here, what with him trying to break Batman by killing his oldest allie and destroying his marriage with Seleina, but surely there are writers at the DC headquarters that can come up with a separate problem that doesn't always involve Batman. Surely that's possible right? Nightwing's whole persona was made so he could be recognized separately from Batman; stepping away from Robin was supposed to free Dick of his restrictive ties to the Bat symbol. By always tying Dick's problems immediately back to Batman or one of his enemies, it defeats the purpose of Nightwing being his own hero with his own villians and his own freakin city with its own dozens of problems!!)

Continuing on with villains, here's what I can remember off the top of my head: KGBeast, Bane, Punchline, Joker, Harely (not really, but I'm going to add her anyway), Talon, and the Court of Owls. Now, this is going to controversial, but I'm also going to add the Batfam as part of that list, and here's why. They didn't care. Plain and simple, they didn't care about Ric, they only cared about Dick and what he could do for them. There were a grand total of maybe three times where the Batfam reached out to Ric to try and reason with him, but before all of that, they re-traumatized an already amnesiac and confused person by showing him get assassinated. Like, Bruce. Wth?? I know a lot of this was mostly character assassination, especially with Barbara, but come on. Barbara was really weird throughout this entire arc, and even after he goes back to "normal", she blames Dick for being mean to her, completely ignoring the fact that he didn't know who she was half the time. And that he was, ya know,

mind controlled by multiple villains for a majority of the comic.

Moving past all of that, since I feel like I could rant for ages about it, I didn't like how abruptly they ended that arc. The crystal being my main problem. DC has many scapegoats, the lazerous pit being their biggest imo, but a crystal? All they had to do was show it to him and BOOM cured??? There was no character development. The build up to it could hardly be called build up, as it was done and over with in the span of a few panels. Nothing felt high stakes anymore, and then after he got his memories back, everyone cheered and was like "yay, he's back to normal! you were a real ass to us, and we're not going to apologize for leaving you homeless and left to fend for yourself against all these villains even though you had no memories! oh, but don't worry! we were watching this whole time, so we just let all that stuff happen to you! wow, so glad you're back- we really need Nightwing, but I guess having Dick back is okay too."

That's a very crass interpretation of what went down, but that's what happened. Bruce's half assed excuse of "I was always watching" was awful because then it just leads to more problems of, oh well, if you were always there, why didn't you rent him an apartment so he didn't have to live out of his taxi? Or get him out of trouble and bar fights? Or stop the Joker from getting him and taking control of his mind? Or any numerous terrible things that happened to Ric? It's just annoying that no one seems to actually try and emphathize with what Dick went through, and it's all getting brushed to the side in favour of, "oh, well, back to work!"

They could've gone down so many pathways with Dick getting shot in the head, but instead they gave him amnesia, trauma, bad reception from the fam, and being passed around from villian to villain just to be used over and over again. It felt like this weird dump fest where the writers just woke up one morning and was like, "how many characters can we fit into this arc to get the most amount of readers as possible? How can we become more controversial?"

I know that in the arc after Ric, we're getting some of the aftermath. I'm so so happy they let Dick cry over Alfred's death (he really needed that release of emotions, poor boy has been bottling them up for the sake of others [again, DC, I know he's supposed to be the emotionally controlled one, but please let him be healthy with his emotions and not a shut in with them]) but they still haven't addressed Damian? Like, Dick and Damian were arguably the closest before shit hit the fan, and Dick isn't wondering where the kid is? Or exactly what happened with Alfred and how Damian witnessed it?? A large part of it is the Batfam not telling Dick any of it and kind of just leaving him to his own devices now that the "issue" has been resolved (sound familiar? history repeats itself yet again....). Something else that bugs me a bit is that everyone is telling Dick what he should be feeling/thinking/doing/etc. No one's letting him... grieve. Like, Dick just got his memories back and he's probably grappling with old trauma that's now fresh in his face. Additionally, everyone is assuming he's just going to go back to normal, as if none of what just happened, well, happened. They're erasing this brand spanking new trauma, along with the news that Alfred was murdered, and the fact that Dick is still trying to do his best for his family because it's whats expected of him. I mentioned earlier that Barbara was being really weird, @nightwingmyboi actually already made a post about it, but when Dick tries to apologize and talk to her about what happened when he was Ric, she just kind of... runs away? Dramatically? Didn't even attempt to hear what dick had to say- she was just so consumed with her own hurt that talking wasn't an option for whatever reason. WHICH IS THE COMPLETE OPPOSITE OF HER CHARACTER. It's frusturating because Dick is doing his best to apologize to people when he should have nothing to apologize for- he wasn't under any of his own control and the things he did while Ric or "Dickie-boy" weren't under his own will. If anything, Dick is the one that should get an apology and a hug; he's been through so much and no one seems to be acknowledging that.

All of that to say: I liked the idea of what the Ric arc could've offered, but the plot fell through and just disappointed a lot of people. I'm hoping a lot of the issues presented in the Ric arc that went unaddressed do end up being properly resolved in the newer arcs coming out, but I'm not going to be surprised if it doesn't. Sorry for the long answer LOL

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vanillawinston · 4 years

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Mad World| Chapter TWO

Joker x OC(Jane Parker)

Summary: Jane was in the wrong place at the wrong time and suddenly her life was falling apart. The past and future of a dangerous obsession which changed his life and destroyed hers completely.

Warning for this chapter: /

Previous part HERE

Next part HERE

3 years ago...

The sun was shining with all her force through the thick blanket of clouds above us, trying her best to let the people of Gotham City take in some sunlight, to feel the warmth, but still, everything seemed dark and dull. The whole city always had been dull, sad and depressing in my opinion. Everyday you were living the same, boring life, could see how the rich got even richer, how the poor people lose everything, and how the number of crimes increased dramatically. I've heard a lot about this so-called Batman who was fighting evil, who was standing up for us people, but I've never actually seen him and so I wasn't completely sure if he even existed.

Who knows, maybe he was just an invention made by the rich to give us poor people some hope? I couldn't tell, but I kind of didn't care. With or without a Batman, the city was lost.

"Jane." Confused I looked up from my path to the girl with the black hair, who was now walking next to me, wearing a glowing, pink rain jacket over her school uniform, even though not a single drop of rain has fallen yet.

"How can someone be so happy this early a day?" I asked when I realized how happy she seemed to be.

"You would also be happy if you knew that your crush wants to ask you out for a date today," Aimee, that was her name, announced happily.

"Brian wants to ask you out? How do you even know that?" I asked excitedly, but Aimee had a crush on Brian for over a year now, and to be honest, I kind of had lost my hope that they will ever be a thing, but the luck was on Aimee's side, finally. "Sara told me that Brian had told it her brother and oh damn... I'm so nervous, but I have to act cool and relaxed when he is going to ask me," she said with excitement and smiled brightly, and I was a little less depressed now that I saw her this happy. I was the happiest when the people I cared about were it too, and Aimee was my best friend, my only real friend, and to see her this cheerful, made my day.

"But if he wants to go and see a movie," Aimee continued to tell me about her ideas of how this date will pass while we entered the school grounds, "Then I have to wear something completely different and... oh no, what does Eric wants from us?" I followed her gaze to Eric, an annoying and slimy boy, who was in our class, and who tried to woo me for months now, but I would prefer to die over dating him, ever. He was the worst. Typical, spoiled boy whose parents had more than enough money, and who therefore thought everyone should adore him. He was a jerk.

"Ladies, I think it would be the best if you won't go all by yourself to school anymore," he greeted us, and I rolled my eyes from his arrogant voice.

"We can take care of ourselves!" Aimee said snappily, but of course Eric couldn't let it be.

"Is that so? And if you meet the Joker on your way?"

"Who is the Joker?" I asked and saw how Eric and Aimee looked taken aback at me.

"You are kidding, right? You don't know who the Joker is?" Eric asked and I shrugged.

"He is a complete maniac," Aimee explained, "Sat the last years in the high security area, but when they tried to move him to the Arkham, he escaped yesterday."

"If he is this famous and dangerous, why haven't I heard from him before?" I asked confused, but his name didn't mean anything to me but with all the criminals in the city it was hard to keep track of who was who.

"You only live here for one and a half year, this is when they got him and locked him up," Eric explained, and we entered the building. Everywhere people were talking anxiously about the Joker, he really seemed to be famous. What did he do to be so well known? It looked like he must be really bad.

"But if he really is such a big, evil person, how did they manage it to lock him up for almost two years?" I asked Aimee quietly, while Eric finally left us, and she began to search for her Brian in hope that he would ask her out.

"No idea. Some people say, he wanted to be locked up, that this is all part of some sick plan of his, but I tell you one thing: If you ever meet him, say your last prayers, because this encounter won't be anything you will survive." Her words kept me thinking. I never was this scared of the city, thanks to my older brother and my father who once was in the military. They taught me how to defend myself, how to handle some weapons, but an encounter with the big maniacs of this city was a number too big for me, and I really wanted to keep as much distance as possible between me and this Joker.

Now...

It was weird to think back to this day three years ago. Back then, I was this normal girl, had no idea about the real dangers of the world and had heard for the first time the name of the man who would change my life completely. The man who changed me. I couldn't stop myself from smiling when I thought about him, about everything that was, considering not all was bad, on the contrary. Without him I would be gone from this world for a long time now, without him everything would be so meaningless. He taught me to believe in something, to give life some meaning, but this place had destroyed all his good work on me. I was nothing but some ruined piece of art. Who knew if there was a chance of ever fixing me again? I had no idea, didn't even know if I should hope for ever coming out of here, and even if all of this is true and I had the chance of getting out, what would happen next? What should I do then? Where should I go? So many questions, and I had no idea if I would ever get some answers.

The loud noise of the door opening fetched me back from my daydreaming, and I looked to Officer Cocksucker, Dan, who seemed to be in a very bad mood. Some days had passed by since my meeting with Amanda Waller. I've tried my best to eat my food, to quit my little strike, but I need the power. I was too weak, needed the food, the energy, so I ate the horrible shit they gave me, wanted to gain some weight again for whatever the mission was. It wouldn't be easy, if it was some nice and easy job, they wouldn't recruit criminals for it. We would all probably die during the next days, but at least we would die in freedom, far away from this prison.

"Well darling, here is your big moment," he said, and I stood up, sighing, was kind of unsure about the whole situation, was scared of what would happen out there.

"What is going to happen now?" I asked carefully and walked to him, but he rolled his eyes clearly annoyed and grabbed my arm.

"You will see," he said simply, and I knew he was this unhappy because he didn't want to lose me, his favourite toy when it comes to torture. Oh yeah, he was pissed about it and he should be. If I really get out of here after this whole thing, I will find him, and I will kill him!

"You can spare me with your bad mood," I said boldly while he pulled me through the corridors, and this was probably the first time I wasn't screaming while he pulled me with him. Making a scene wouldn't help me, I would just make everything more difficult for myself, after all I will leave this shithole.

"Don't think you can become sassy now," he said and turned into a new direction. He wasn't going to the familiar torturing room or the doctor's office, but somewhere new. What kind of room was the destination? The exit? I doubted to be released this easy, they won't just send criminals out there without some necessary precautions. Who was going to be part of this group besides me? There must be others, and from my little encounter with Waller I assume that Harley would be one member for sure. Oh boy. I really don't want to see her again.

"I've always been sassy to you," I mumbled quietly, had no strength for focusing myself on the conversation anymore when we entered a room, which was all white. The walls, the ceiling, the furniture, everything was white in here, and it seemed to be some sort of medical office, which wasn't good. I don't like medical offices, they always meant pain, tests and creepy doctors, it was scary.

"I deliver Jane Parker," Dan said, and before I could realize anything more, he pulled me to some weird device which seemed like you would normally transport beverage crates with it. He tied me to it, and first I wanted to scream and defend myself, but it was probably for the best to behave myself and to act more sane than crazy, to cooperate.

"Good, she will be the last," a woman said and walked with a big needle in her hands towards me, which I faced with big eyes. "W-What are you doing?" I asked her scared, but without answering, she pushed the needle in my neck, and I inhaled painfully, but it was just for some seconds, after that it was bearable.

"Good, bring her to the others," she said to Dan, and I was once again shocked to see how bad they treat you here, like you weren't even human, just some sort of thing, and all because you are some filthy criminal.

"Come on darling," Dan said now a little happier, since he was able to slide me in this thing, had some sort of power over me again. Bastard.

"You know that once I come out of here, you will die?"

"What do you want to do? Go to the Joker? He replaced you, and without him you have no chance against me," he said and I couldn't deny that his words were hurtful, and I swallowed uncomfortably, but I didn't want to rely all my life on some man, and I knew that if I train a little bit more, gain more weight again, I will be able to kill him.

"I will manage it all alone," I said quietly, made a promise, but it didn't matter when we finally left the building, entered some sort of yard and nothing was important anymore because I was outside.

For two years I haven't seen the sky, haven't felt the wind on my skin, couldn't enjoy the heat of the sun, and now I was here, was finally out. I inhaled greedily the fresh air, looked around me with childlike eyes, wanted to explore the new environment and felt how I got Goosebumps from the warm sunlight. This was real and still it felt like a dream, it was too good to be true. I was out, I was really out, away from all the sad walls, the horrible building.

I knew one thing: I never wanted to live without all of this for such a long time ever again. I never wanted to be locked up again and to end up in this prison. To finally be out, it was some sort of miracle. If I had known back then when I was locked up how bad I would miss all of this, how horrible it would be in captivity, I probably would have enjoyed my freedom more, all of this small things around me. I would never make this mistake ever again.

"I bring Jane Parker," Dan said when we reached Rick Flag.

"Jane Parker," Rick said and eyed me again like he still couldn't believe that he really would work with some child.

"Glad to see you, kiddo," Floyd said and smiled. My heart jumped excitedly to see him, even though he was also tied to this weird device, but he was really here, part of this mission.

"Long time no see." "Way too long." "Ok enough," Rick interrupted us, and I saw to all the others, who were part of this thing. There was one guy who looked like some weird mix between a crocodile and a lizard, next to him was some other guy who looked like a typical petty criminal. Then there was a guy who was covered in tattoos and looked a little bit like he was suffering to be here. Next to him was another weird guy, and on his other side was to my deepest displeasure no one else than the bloody Harley Quinn. She had no idea that I was before her the favourite toy of her beloved Joker, that I was the queen at his side, but still we two knew each other.

"So, we finally see each other again," she said happily to see me, and I couldn't do anything but look at her kind of shocked, but what was I supposed to say? She was the new girl at the Joker's side, and it was painful to even look at her and to know that she was special to him, that she was the one with whom he had replaced me. Yeah, he had no idea that I was still alive, but this didn't make all of this easier.

"Yeah, finally," I mumbled.

Rick started talking and explained to us, that we all got trackers in our necks, and if anyone tries to escape, he will blow us up without a second thought. I had no idea if this was real or if he was just talking, but I wouldn't try to find out.

"You will get your old stuff now, so you will be equipped," Rick said when we finally got free from this scary devices, and before I knew what was happening, Floyd reached me and hugged me. It was a weird feeling, but to be honest, it felt nice to be this close to someone again who you actually cared about. I felt better, it was like some weight left my body and I could breathe again.

"I'm happy to see you all good and well," he said when he brought some space between us again. For him this probably also had been the first freely human contact after a long time.

"So, we will go through this together?" "We two and a bunch full of freaks," he mumbled amused, and I followed his gaze to the others who inspected their old stuff, and I almost threw up when I saw Harley being happy over some of her costumes she definitely got from the Joker.

"Your chests," Rick said and brought us our stuff, and I really didn't want to open mine, see my past in it, but I probably had no other choice. The things inside this chest were the things I wore before my life had changed, this was the stuff I got from the Joker, which I wore the last time I've ever seen him.

Slowly I opened it just to inhale painfully when I saw the black dress, I've worn the day I came here, the day everything had changed. I saw to my knife collection I've always worn somewhere on my body, but the real thing, which made everything so hard, was to see the silver necklace with the letter J as pendant. Most people would assume the J stands for Jane, but I knew it better. It was a J for Joker, and I really didn't want to wear this again.

"I need new cloths," I said, took my knives and also the necklace, even though I wouldn't wear it, but I just couldn't throw it away, I had not the strength to do so.

It was a weird feeling to hold some dangerous weapons again, to have so much power in your hands, but it also reconnected me with my past, and I wasn't ready to relive it.

"What is wrong with your clothes?" Rick asked clearly annoyed because of Harley who made a big show by changing her clothes in front of all of them and standing half naked in the yard.

"This is a dress," I said like the problem was obvious, which it was, after all I couldn't fight in a dress, it would be inconvenient.

"I don't believe it," he sighed annoyed, "Bring her some new clothes, some dark clothes, we need to try being more ordinary.

"I think ordinary won't fit us," Harley said, looking to the crocodile man who seemed upset by this. Oh god. One thing was sure, I would lose my mind during this mission, simply because Harley was part of it, and she would always remember me of things I just want to forget.

Aloha :) I hope you like it. Sorry for any grammar or editing mistakes. The gif is not mine. If you want to be tagged, just ask xx

Tag: @xxqueenwxtchxx

#the joker #joker #jared leto joker #jared leto #joker x reader #joker fanfiction #dc fandome #dc #suicide squad

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davidmann95 · 4 years

Note

So... seen the rumors about Superman leading the Authority? Feels like that would’ve been way more interesting with New 52 Superman. I hope they put Manchester Black on the team, I know you don’t dig him but I love him and Black interacting with Supes is always funny as hell to me.

It’s such an odd fit and I feel like it’s either going to be utterly genius or utterly ruinous. Not to Superman himself - if one half of that pair is going to be contorted to fit the others’ image it isn’t gonna be him, so the question is if they’re gonna come up with a good way to get Midnighter to stop killing, or if he won’t be there and therefore who cares (though I’ve heard very good speculation that Tim and Conner might become the new Midnighter and Apollo for this)? But the original take on the Authority formed in the first place as a continuation of the spirit of their worlds’ politically radical Golden Age Superman equivalent in The High, a crucial piece of context that’s often overlooked, and if whoever deals with this keeps that in mind while dealing with it and manages to reign in the obvious issues, it’s not at all impossible it could be really special. If they don’t, I can’t imagine it not crashing and burning hard. If I had to place a bet I’d say this might be where Scott Snyder lands post-Death Metal since DC’s clearly begged him to stay on in a prominent role now that DiDio’s gone and it feels very much in his wheelhouse, in which case...well, in which case it could still go either way. And Black absolutely sticks his head in.

Additional 5G thoughts as of the moment prompted by assorted talks with friends of mine:

* Batman #101 bringing in Grifter basically confirms Superman/Authority for me: Lee’s the big man now, he gets to declare his toys important again and give them another shot at development for mass-media. And lord, they must be kicking themselves about losing Orlando right now. “Whatever, that kid’s too weird and too queer, and besides, who needs him for Wildstorm shit when alongside Fraction and Zdarsky we’re gonna be able to kick this off with Warr-oh shit oh fuck oh no.”

* Speaking of Batman, BC’s absolutely blowing out its ass with “John Ridley Luke Fox Batman has been cancelled because Tynion’s run has been expanded!” for clicks. Tynion’s run has a tie-in Joker War one-shot Ridley’s writing a Luke Fox story for that has no reason to exist other than setting that up, but it isn’t as sexy to bring that back up and admit “it’s probably been pushed back or will no longer be the classic main Batman title now that 5G is its own imprint”.

* Along similar lines, I assume that not everything is literally going to take place in Metropolis like they suggested, but I am looking forward to Jon coming back from the future as the new main Superman to make it a literal city of tomorrow.

* Seems increasingly likely that the other ‘Gs’ will be getting their own titles after all; I could easily see Waid’s big project being a Superman title set before the marriage, and Teen Titans finally getting to be the endless tepid soap opera adventures of Dick and Wally and Garth and Roy and Donna and Victor and Koriand’r and Raven and Garfield that’s all anyone who’s bought a Titans comic in the last 40 years actually wants from it. Heck, they could do worse than to bring all the non-5G stuff under that umbrella. They could have their cake and eat it too played right: standalone stories of the platonic versions of those characters they want in one corner, versions that can age and change and progress in the other, with Black Label as an option for creators who want more substantive runs with the classic takes (god help us, White Knight might be a viable template there).

* Assuming the word that these are intended by WB proper as inspirations for future movies and other mass-media is accurate (and I think it very much is given the main word on the current big screen shared universe Batman is that they want to recast him as an old man about to pass down the mantle), downscaling it to an imprint made up of a few ongoings and probably a number of miniseries rather than the apparently originally planned comprehensive relaunch makes sense from that corporate perspective. They wouldn’t want 50 new books of wildly varying quality banging into each other waiting for decent long-term storytelling to spark, they’d want a bunch of curated self-contained standalone perennials designed for maximum ease of stripmining.

* No one seems to be talking about the additional rumor of “DC’s going to start selling its product in general through Walmart”, which if true would definitely be joined with this and also the biggest thing to happen in comics in decades. The problem is that biggest thing could mean “they market/structure it properly and frontload the good stuff and redefine the industry” or “they don’t and probably destroy the industry given the wasted resources that’d be poured into it”.

#DC 5G #Superman #The Authority #Batman #DC Comics #Opinion

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juliapetertodd · 5 years

Text

Universe Jumping: Gotham - OCs Fanfiction

It was a quite night in Gotham… Well, as quiet as Gotham can be, anyway.

There was the usual hustle and bustle of cars honking, people partying the night away and the occasional gunshots, as familiar in that city as the stone gargoyles that adorned the buildings. But the Joker wasn’t spreading canisters of Laughing Gas throughout the city; Two-Face wasn’t off on some duality themed robbing spree and Poison Ivy didn’t have an army of love struck folks running around and destroying every can of bug spray in the area.

One of the particularly quiet places was Robinson Street, a short little street made entirely of cheap, rundown apartment buildings. The cement pavement was cracked and dirty, some of the walls were covered with graffiti and streetlights were specked evenly along both sides of it. All in all, it was an entirely unremarkable and typical Gotham Street. It just so happened that that night was a remarkably atypical night.

The signs that something was off in Robinson Street were hardly noticeable if you weren’t paying attention. The streetlights flickered with increasing speed and intensity; if you happened to touch some of the metal trashcans outside, you might get shocked; and the animals were restless, sensing the coming changes.

Really, the first noticeable warning came just before it started. At two in the morning, with no living soul around, a single, short and quick spark of red lightning came out of nowhere between two lampposts on the left side of the street, hitting one of them and blowing its bulb, sparks shooting out everywhere. About two minutes later, the same thing happened again. Then again, one minute later. Then 30 seconds later. Eventually, multiple red sparks were buzzing around the street, always shooting from between the same two lampposts. The sparks buzzed and buzzed until the air from which they shot out seemed to shift and changed, almost as if it was trying to open itself up. It stretched and crinkled, more and more, until a sound no one could ever quite describe was heard and a perfectly round circle of light appeared, in between the two lampposts.

It hung in the air for a few minutes, held by nothing, and perfectly out of place in the dark corners of Gotham, until something emerged from it. A single left foot, dressed in a black sock and a black left running shoe (for, after all, the right didn’t fit it) took a tentative and careful step out, moving slowly forward and showing that it was not alone but, in fact, came attached to a leg, dressed in black suit pants. The foot kept pushing forward until it finally touched the ground, tapping lightly to make sure it couldn’t lose its footing. It retreated carefully, but quickly (along with the leg, which went first) and was quickly replaced by a face, which also moved rather cautiously. First came the nose, then the glasses, than the rest of the thing. It looked around carefully, making sure there were no threats, and, sufficiently satisfied, left the portal with confidence, dragging the rest of the body it was attached to forward.

This particular body belonged to a man named Tony, who was tall, a little chubby, bearded and with some noticeable hair loss. He was wearing black rimmed glasses, a t-shirt with some sort of obscure reference, a long, black overcoat, the aforementioned pants and shoes, and, most strangely of all, a multi colored, 4 meter long scarf.

Tony took a few steps away from the portal and looked around, with the sort of face that expressed abundant cleverness and confidence, even if he didn’t exactly have either of those things at that particular moment. After giving a quick visual inspection at the buildings and lampposts around him, he pulled out a curious looking device similar to one of those credit card things you find at stores from his pocket. He pushed a few buttons on it and after hearing a satisfying little “ding”, turned toward the portal.

“You can come out!” he screamed “It’s safe!”

“Are you sure?” a female voice on the other side said. It sounded a little garbled, like it was being spoken through a walk talkie “It might be a trap. You might have landed in trap world.”

“You do know what trap means, right?”

“Something meant to trick and kill us?”

“No, it’s what we call guys who look like girls. They’re traps, y’see. I’ll send you some pictures later. Anyway, since there are no impossibly pretty girls with miniskirts running around, I suggest you get in here.”

Tony looked at the portal for a few minutes when, at last, a female figure emerged. Júlia was her name and she was wearing some fashionable sneakers, blue denim jeans, a Miraculous Ladybug t-shirt, a comfortable looking teddy coat and had a backpack strapped on her shoulders. She was short-ish, also wore glasses and had her striking light brown hair tied up in a ponytail.

“Very sporty” commented Tony “Almost draws the attention away from your caterpillar-like eyebrows.”

Júlia gave him an annoyed gazed in response. “Well, at least my clothes fit me properly. This world better have a lot of danger, cause you certainly need the exercise.” She tapped Tony on his belly.

“Pfff. I look great.” He self-consciously closed his jacket, while keeping his proud look “Anyway, the Dimensional Transporter will take a few days to recharge, so let’s try and figure out where we are. Care to take a guess?”

“Hmm…” She held her chin with her right hand and stepped to the middle of the road, looking around. “Well… It’s a city. A big one, by the looks of it. Very New York-ish. Meaning we could be anywhere from Friends to Escape from New York.”

“Let’s hope it’s neither.” Tony said as his fingers tapped the little device and stepped next to her “Unless I get to threeway Jennifer Aniston and Courtney Cox.”

“Did you start this whole thing, just so you could fuck characters?”

Tony stopped tapping and arched his eyebrows ponderously “Not just because of that”

Júlia sighed, while Tony tapped a bit more and looked intently at the screen “Well, according to the Atmospheric Analyzer, there are no deadly toxins in the air, the water is clean and, by all accounts, this is just like any other city back on our world.” He put the Analyzer back in his pocket and pattered around a bit “I’ve been meaning to find out whether this thing takes us to every fictional world or if it’s just the ones we’re particularly interested in. For all we know, we might be in some cheap romantic comedy.”

He twirled around, amazed at how cool his overcoat looked in the breeze and how fun it was to see his giant scarf, flip flopping around “We might just see a third grade actress walk across that street and bump into some third grade actor, their eyes meeting and the spark of predictably insipid romance is set.”

“Has anyone ever told you, you have a particular knack for taking the fun out of everything?” said Júlia, her eyes rolling so hard, they might’ve actually made a sound.

“Not today, but it’s still early.” Casually, Tony glanced at the sky, and his eyebrows once again shot up “Ah. I think I know where we are now.”

“Where?” But instead of an answer, Tony merely pointed a finger at the sky, and as Júlia looked she instantly realized where they had landed.

That night was cloudy, and on the grey clouds above their heads was projected the shining image of a giant bat.

“Well… The DC Universe… Or perhaps just Gotham. It’s hard to guess at this point, but what say you we take a look-” However, Tony realized he was talking to himself, as Júlia had made a straight run towards the nearest alley she could find on Robinson Street “HEY! WHERE ARE YOU GOING?!”

Júlia looked back and breathlessly answered “To… an… alley…way.”

Tony went after her, catching up when she stopped, far into the alley, to catch her breath. “Why… did…” he said, realizing now that maybe the gym does have its uses “…you… come… here?”

“Because… Because that’s where crime happens in Gotham.”

“Wha… What?”

“Yeah! Don’t you know? Innocent people walking down an alley in Gotham City, a mugger pulls up, and what happens?”

“They get robbed and killed?”

“No, dummy. Batman saves them! Or some Bat related character.”

“So, you want to get robbed, in the hopes of meeting Batman? What if you get killed for real?”

“Pff” Júlia waved him away “When has that ever happened in Gotham?”

“Like all the time! That’s literally the reason Batman exists!” Tony answered, gesticulating wildly

“Ah, we’ll be fine. Come on, let’s keep going, see if anyone’s lurking around.” she answered, as she casually strolled deeper into the dark, empty and quiet backstreet that led off the alley. Tony sighed but dutifully went after her.

“This just seems like a really bad idea, Júlia. I’m just saying.”

“Yeah, well, you’re not the boss of me.”

“I made most of the machine that allowed you to get here.”

“But I helped you build it. So, I own like 40% of ownership.”

“That’s not how that works.”

“Oh, whatever. You just wanna boss me around, cause you wanna act like The Doctor.”

“I… What are you talking about?” said Tony, plunging his hands deeper into his pockets and turning his face away from Júlia.

“Come off it. Magical machine that takes people places? Invites one special girl? Makes a lot of jokes? You’re even dressed like him! I mean-”

But Júlia couldn’t finish what she meant, because from one of the many shadows that consumed the alley came a man holding a revolver. He looked disheveled and dirty, a tattered and filthy shirt hanging loosely in his body, a green coat that seemed to be made out of the skin of an old couch, fingerless brown gloves and a patchwork ascot. In his hand, he held a black six shooter revolver, a relic that seemingly jumped from its original time straight to modern day.

“Gimme all your money” mumbled the dirty thief, waving his revolver in Tony’s and Júlia’s direction.

Júlia shifted a little, retreating behind Tony with the intent of using him as meat shield, while Tony slowly put his hands up as the thief moved closer.

“Now, now… We don’t need any of that…” assured Tony, as he stared at the gun with widened eyes “Say… That seems like a very anachronistic gun, for the time we come from… Can you tell us what year it is?”

The thief’s face contorted into an expression of confused anger, and he waved the gun more fiercely “Now, listen here! Don’t try to… to… patronize me! I’m holding the gun! And I say that you should give me your money! NOW!”

“I… uh… don’t have any money” muttered Tony, fearful and a little embarrassed. After all, it’s probably bad manners to get robbed and not have any money to give.

Confusion had left the thief’s face by this point, but the anger had stayed firmly in place. He held the gun with a tight grip and pointed it straight at Tony’s face. Tony did his best to keep Júlia behind him, and closed his eyes, as he heard the squeeze on the gun’s trigger, expecting that all familiar sound.

KAPOW

“Kapow?” he thought, opening his eyes.

From the pointy ears, to the cape, to the outside underpants, everything about him screamed “I’M BATMAN”. He had come from above, all “I am the night”, and kicked the robber in the face, knocking him against the brick wall. The robber’s head hit the wall, knocking him out.

Batman looked at Tony and Júlia, efficiently checking to see if they had any bruises or needed any medical help. After realizing they were ok, he shot out his Bat Grappler, intent on continuing the night’s patrol and, had these been the regular type of people he usually deals with, that’s what would’ve happened. Except…

“WAIT BRUCE STOP!” yelled Tony suddenly.

Batman almost slipped from his Bat Grapple in shock. He quickly composed himself and, rather swiftly, pushed Tony against a wall, as Júlia watched in shock.

“WHY DID YOU SAY THAT NAME?” yelled Batman, his forearm pressing hard on Tony’s throat.

“I…” Tony tried to gasp his explanations through a squeezed throat “We… Different… Universe… Júlia…”

“Don’t look at me, man! Who told you it was a good idea to antagonize Batman?”

“I want answers.” Batman was getting annoyed at his lack of progress “NOW!”

“We’re from a different universe where you’re a comic book character, Bruce!” answered Júlia, pulling some courage from place she didn’t quite know she had “We found a way to travel here and… uh… we… uh… want to visit the place. And meet some heroes.”

Júlia pointed at Batman awkwardly, as if trying to remind him that he’s a superhero “Like you. Or Jason” Batman scowl deepened and Júlia’s voice fell a couple of notches “Or you. Y’know. Whoever.”

Batman looked at Tony for a little while more, before dropping him. As Tony wheezed and Júlia leaned down to see if he was ok, Batman started asking questions.

“What do you want from me?”

“We want to spend time with you.” answered Júlia, as Tony composed himself “and the other superheroes also.”

“Yeah” continued Tony “and you’re actually the perfect person to help us, since you’re so paranoid and shit, which means you know everyone.”

Batman considered this “What reason would I have to help you?”

“We know the secret identities of basically every single superhero on this planet, as well as the place where they live and their supporting cast/ loved ones.” Answered Tony, as he got up

Batman quickly turned around, with a powerful rage on his face “Are you threatening me?”

“No, no! I’m just saying… uh…” Tony really hadn’t thought that threatening Batman was a good idea and he was desperately trying to back out “Look, man, we just want to meet some people and you have more money than God. Can’t we work something out? Can’t you call out the Batmobile, take us to Wayne Manor and we can talk about it?”

Batman looked at them, pondering. They were both scared out of their minds that Batman would just punch them until they got out of his universe but, surprisingly, he got a little bat shaped remote and pressed one of the buttons. The remote made a quiet beep and, soon after, Batman started to walk out of the alley. Not knowing what to do, Tony and Júlia followed, keeping a safe distance from the Dark Knight.

As they reached the place through which they entered the alley, they quickly realized what the remote had called. In front of them, roared the Batmobile, sleek, black and with a big bat face in the front. Batman clicked another button on the remote, and the roof of the car slid back revealing four seats inside. He jumped inside into the driver’s seat, and our duo awkwardly got over the side of the car to get inside, because the Batmobile didn’t actually have doors. Once they were inside, Bruce closed the top and got the car moving at ridiculous speed.

Júlia was internally freaking out about being in the Batmobile (and, weirdly enough, admiring the comfortable leather seats), while Tony pulled out a notebook and pen, and started asking Batman some questions.

“So, the first thing we want to establish is what version of your universe we’re in.”

“Version?”

“In our universe, you’ve been adapted from a full universe of comic books, to movies, to cartoons, to video games, etc. So, we need to figure out where we are.”

“Alright.”

“Cool. So, who is Batgirl right now?”

Batman looked stiff and unresponsive

“We know it’s either Barbara, Cassie or Steph.” said Júlia “So you can just come out and say it.”

Batman stayed quiet for a bit “Stephanie.”

Tony jotted a few things down “That’s… interesting. And weird, since it’s not current.”

“Current?” asked Batman

“I can’t tell you, sorry. Unless… Say, Batman, have you ever heard of something called the Flashpoint?”

“Yes. It was something that happened to the Flash, some time ago.”

Tony raised his eyebrows “He gave you a letter from your alternate reality dad?”

“Yes.”

“What were you wearing?”

Batman didn’t flinch, but his voice and general stiffness betrayed a certain amount of surprise “What?”

“What version of your costume?”

“Tony, where are you going with this?” asked Júlia

“Just trust me on this.” he answered before turning his attention back to Batman “Let me clarify: At that point, did you costume not have the briefs on the outside, and did it have some weird lines running through it?”

Batman remained quiet for a bit, before answering “No.”

Tony looked at his notebook, inquisitively. “This is weird… This is really very, very weird. Can I ask who the Teen Titans are at the current time?”

“Robin, Superboy, Kid Flash, Supergirl, Batgirl and Blue Beetle.”

Tony’s eyes widened in surprise. “Ho ho… Well… I’ll say this is… Intriguing”

Júlia nudged Tony “What are you talking about?”

“Well Júlia, if I understand this correctly, and I’m fairly certain I do, I think we’re in a version of the DC Universe where the New 52 never happened.”

“What do you mean never happened? Like… None of it?”

“Well, maybe a few plots here and there… Hey, Batman, did you fight the Court of Owls at any point?”

Batman considered. “Yes. Some time ago.”

“Well, there we are. I’d say that wraps-”

Suddenly, the Batmobile came to a sudden stop, knocking Tony and Júlia forward.

“What-” asked Júlia, but Batman interrupted.

“Gotham’s first national bank is getting robbed right now by the Riddler. You two stay here, I’m going inside.”

He popped open the roof of the car and left, leaving the two travelers sitting there, stunned.

Júlia looked around the car. There were all sorts of buttons and levers on the dashboard, but at her feet was some sort of compartment. She popped it open, and inside found a couple of Batarangs, a grapple gun and a Bat Taser Gun. She looked at Tony, and found him staring at the weapons, wide eyed.

“Should we?” asked Júlia.

Before he could answer, both of them heard the sound of broken glass, as the Riddler left the bank through the back.

“Riddle me this! What’s bad as a bat and covered in bruises?” said Nygma, his Bowler Hat slightly askew on his head “The Batman after my henchmen are done with him!”

As he headed out with his henchman, he found himself stopped by two 20 something young adults, wielding weapons.

“Freeze!” said the man, with one of Batman’s grapple guns.

“Yeah” said the woman, wielding a kind of gun shaped apparatus with electricity at the end. “What he said!”

“Hmmm…” said the Riddler “And who might you two be?”

“We’re-uh…” the man thought for a bit “Friends of Batman?”

“The Bat doesn’t have any friends. And if he did I doubt he’d pick such... Riddle me this, what has funny accent, a gigantic ass and two caterpillars instead of eyebrows?”

Júlia blushed heavily and looked down, embarrassed.

“Riddle me this, what’s balding, masturbates far too frequently and sweats like he’s running a marathon when he’s sitting down?”

Tony also blushed (and started sweating) but he answered back “Wow Nygma, you’re a dick. I have literally zero problems with what we’re about to do. Júlia, hit him.”

Júlia, getting over her embarrassment, pressed the trigger on her gun, and shot Riddler with an electric shock straight to the private parts. He fell, in pain, to his knees. Then Tony shot the grappler gun at him, and watched it tie around him. Soon, Batman came from above, gliding down on his cape.

“Hey, we took care of this Bat Boy.” said Tony “No worries.”

As they walked back to the car, Júlia asked “Hey… Do my eyebrows really look like Caterpillars?”

“If they do, they’re the loveliest caterpillars ever.” answered Tony.

“Thanks.” Said Júlia, slightly happier “By the way, the bald look works well on you.”

Tony smiled at her and sat back on the Batmobile, as they both waited for Batman to finish tying up Riddler.

…

Having finally arrived at Wayne Mansion, Tony and Júlia gawked at all the cool shit in the batcave, before going up into the mansion proper.

“Oh.” Said Alfred, when he first saw them coming up with Bruce Wayne (as he had taken off the costume and switched to civilian clothing). “Well, at least the new Robins aren’t children anymore.”

Bruce gave him a sarcastic smile and told him to make tea for the three of them, before taking the two travelers into his dining room.

After a long and straightforward conversation, it was agreed that Bruce would supply them with funds to travel around the country, meeting whatever superheroes they wanted and then leaving promptly when their travelling device was charged. They would leave the next morning for Metropolis, but not before Bruce did them a little favor…

…

Tony and Júlia waited around on the roof of a random Gotham skyscraper, with Batman standing next to them. Júlia looked particularly fretful.

“It’s going to be fine.” Reassured Tony. “He’ll love you. How couldn’t he?”

She nodded, but was still fretting around with her feet, rolling her heel on the floor and playing with Tony’s scarf. Suddenly, they heard a noise, and someone else was on that roof with them. He had on a black body suit, with a brown jacket over it, some guns and, completing the look, a big red mask that covered his entire face.

“So… What’s this all about?” said the man, Jason Todd.

Júlia squeed when she heard him talk, and immediately hid behind Tony, shoving her face hard into his scarf.

“These people are… travelers from another universe.” Said Batman, looking entirely unamused “The girl apparently wanted to meet you.”

“Are you serious? You call me in just for this?”

“Well, they know our identities and apparently are just passing by. I figured, why not? They know who you are, by the way, you can take off the mask.”

“Tsk.” Said Jason, as he took his Red Hood helmet off, revealing his ruffled black hair and perfect looking face. “You know… I have other things to do, I can’t be dealing with whatever fanboy wants an autograph.”

“Well…” said Tony “It’s not really a fanboy… more of a fangirl.”

Tony flipped around and grabbed Júlia by the shoulders pushing her towards Jason. “Come on girl, knock him dead” he whispered.

Before she could even collect herself, Júlia was staring Jason Todd straight in the face.

“I… uh… I mean… You… I…” she stuttered, blushing so hard you’d think she was drunk.

Jason had softened a bit seeing this, and gave a cocky smile, slicked his hair back and began talking.

“So…” he said, getting a little closer to her “Where you’re from I’m a big deal?”

“You… uh… Yeah, you’re a… character from… from comics…” she said, smiling ridiculously.

“Well… That’s pretty cool to know” Jason his arm around her, causing Júlia to smile even more “And I’m your favorite character?”

She nodded.

“Cool cool. So… now that you got me here…” Jason gave her a peck on the cheek and whispered in her ear “What do you want to do with me?”

At this point, Júlia made another, much more pronounced squee sound and promptly passed out. Tony stared at her unconscious body.

“Well… Shit.”

…

Júlia slowly came back to conscience and felt her whole body shaking and vibrating slightly. She opened her eyes and saw Tony in front of her, fiddling with some apparatus. She also realized the source of the shaking: She was on a train, specifically sitting in a train compartment.

“Ah good” said Tony, smiling “You’re finally up.”

“What… What happened?”

“Well, you met Jason Todd, you squeed and then you passed out.”

Júlia remembered what had happened the night before and felt her face brightening with red.

“Oh don’t worry.” Reassured Tony. “He liked you. At least enough to give you this.”

Tony opened a bag sitting next to him. It contained Red Hood’s helmet, with a signature on top that read “To my biggest fan. Till we meet again. Jason ;)”

Tony threw the helmet at Júlia who caught it and held it with care and affection.

“I get the feeling that’s not the last time we’re gonna be seeing him. He really did like you.”

“Yeah…” Júlia sighed wistfully and smiled “I liked him too…”

“Disgusting” Tony shook his head “Anyway, after you fainted, Jason left once he made sure you were alright and me and Bruce carried you to the train going to…”

“Metropolis?”

“Very good, you are paying attention.”

“And you’re playing Doctor again, I see.”

“Let me have this.”

Júlia looked outside the window at the trees rushing bye and wondered.

“Hey Tony?”

“Yes?”

“Why me?”

“What?”

“Why did you bring me on this little adventure of yours?”

“…Because you’re like the only person who’d appreciate it, I guess. Plus, it’s your birthday. Figured you deserved something pretty good, after the decidedly mixed year you had.”

Júlia nodded in thanks, and stared once more out the window, wondering what new adventures awaited them in Metropolis…

SO THIS WAS NOT WRITTEN BY ME, BUT IT WAS GIVEN TO ME AS MY BIRTHDAY GIFT AND HE ALLOWED ME TO SHARE IT CAUSE I LOVED IT ALOT!!! HOPEFULLY YOU GUYS LIKE IT TOO AND HE MAKES A PART 2!!

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violetsmoak · 4 years

Text

no safety or surprise [2/?]

AO3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18035168/chapters/42616919

( See First Chapter for full Disclaimers & Warnings)

Summary: A haunting broadcast reveals the Joker’s final act and sets off a chain of events that will destroy the world. Terry finds himself collaborating once more with the estranged members of Bruce’s former team. As the end nears, however, he and the other Bats are faced with hard choices about survival—and forgiveness.

Rating: T (may change depending on the amount of graphic/details I decide on)

________________________________________________________________

chapter two: laughter is the best medicine

Neo-Gotham, Friday, June 13 2042 9:10 AM

GRAYSON

The laughter hasn’t stopped.

Even as the television whites out, it continues to vibrate through him. Pain slashes across Dick’s hand, hot coffee, and blood from the crushed ug in his hand. The pieces fall to lie, forgotten, on the counter and floor.

Dimly, he shakes the injured appendage, not judging it worth immediate treatment, and creeps closer to the windows of his apartment. The laughter continues to get louder, echoing up from the streets, bouncing off the glass and bricks of the skyscrapers, and mixing with the sound of explosions and people screaming.

From his vantage point, he watches cars veer off-course and masses of pedestrians on the street altering their everyday routes to suddenly teem in every other direction. They crowd together in a frenzy of indescribable movement; there are explosions and more screams, but somehow, it’s all muted by the persistent presence of the laughter, which isn’t just inside anymore.

Whirling around, Dick recoils as Black appears in the hallway, completely nude. She lurches forward, the movement a parody of her usual slinking gait, but Dick’s attention is on her face. It’s pulled into a grin that causes obvious pain, judging by the tears dripping trails of smoky mascara down her cheeks. Her pupils are wide and sightless, and the disturbing giggles rasp like they are being torn from her throat.

“Well, this isn’t good,” he mutters, edging away from the window and automatically looking for a spot in his apartment that has the most maneuvering space.

The minute he moves, Black lunges forward, splitting herself into nine cackling doppelgangers that consume the remaining space of his apartment.

________________________________________________________________

DRAKE

9:15 AM

Tim rocks back and forth, stomach clenched with dread and nausea that threatens to send bile spilling up his throat.

‘Hush little baby, don’t say a word,

Mama’s gonna buy you a mockingbird.’

He stumbles from the kitchen, needing air, needing to escape—

His laptop lies on the floor, a mass of smoking screen and wire, while outside the television is blaring again.

Except no one’s talking.

It’s just the laughter; the blue, humanoid shape has morphed, the identity filter warbled and stretched over a grin that isn’t human.

‘And if that mockingbird don’t sing,

Mama’s gonna buy you a diamond ring.’

His knees buckle, hands clapped to his ears to drown out the echoing memory of Harley Quinn’s mocking singsong. He’s already folding forward in a reflexive fetal position, waiting for the crackle of electricity or the shock of cold water in his face.

He needs to get out, he needs distance, needs a shield—

What the hell do you think you’re doing, Replacement?

Tim startles, hearing a sneer in his mind just as loud—louder than—the other voice. He can almost imagine him standing in front of him—the ancient Robin suit torn and bloody, morphing into the Kevlar armor, red helmet beneath his arm.

The image of white-streaked hair and challenging smirk is the bastion against the monsters in his head.

Tim has never questioned why his mind’s defenses against the pull of insanity took the form of Jason Todd. It makes a certain, lopsided amount of sense—they were both victims of the Joker, both ruined by him,

The Robin who died, and the Robin that went insane.

To this day, Tim couldn’t say which was which.

Are you seriously going to let him get to you again ? The fucker’s dead.

“No,” Tim says out loud, taking a trembling breath and forcing himself to stand straight. He has to keep his head, has to get his wife to safety, has to figure out how all this happened—

“Arlie,” he remembers, though it comes out more like a croak. “Arlie, we have to—”

As he turns, he catches a flash of movement in his periphery, and his long-buried reflexes kick in, allowing him to narrowly dodge the butchers' knife being lobbed at his head. It shatters a red vase of flowers in the living room.

His wife stumbles toward him from the kitchen—when did she come downstairs? —her face twisted into a replica of the one that has haunted Tim’s dreams for decades.

________________________________________________________________

GORDON

9: 15 AM

It’s not just her work computer, but the screen of her cell and tablet as well.

Every screen that she can see—each one she can hear from beyond the thin walls of her office—has been commandeered by the Joker’s likeness.

The video might have paralyzed others with inactivity, but Barbara immediately throws herself into action. Puzzling this out means ignoring that horrible voice, not getting sucked down into a morass of memory and pain.

“Williams! Fillmore! You’d better be ready to trace this thing!” she snaps over the intercom and starts typing commands into her computer, trying to wrest back control of it from whatever has taken over her system.

She might not have been Oracle for decades now, but it’s like riding a bike.

“And get a quad out on the street, now! I don’t want chaos in the streets!”

Especially not after the last Joker-related attack.

She regains control of her system halfway through the video and has started tracking IP addresses even as the clown’s hair-raising cackle and tinny music fade away. On another screen, she pulls up every file that exists on the Joker, his pretenders, the gangs, known snitches—

She will not allow this city to fall into chaos because of a damn video.

Except, maybe she won’t have time to worry about the chaos outside, because it hits her suddenly that the laughing hasn’t stopped. Only now, it’s coming from right outside her office and not from her devices.

Narrowing her eyes, Barbara has her service weapon in hand and the other hovering over her belt where she secretly keeps a Batarang (just in case). She’s barely n her feet when the door to her office opens and there’s one of her lieutenants, shoulders shaking and teeth bared in a pained grin.

She can’t fight the momentary sliver of terror that ripples up her back—

Gunshot. Spilled tea. Falling, falling back. Glass table shattering. Dad crying out—pain. So much pain.

—before returning to herself.

The man in front of her now, his eyes are vacant but there’s enough intelligence remaining that he’s able to raise his own gun at her and disengage the safety.

“Davis,” she says slowly, a warning and a plea despite knowing it’s futile at this point. She doesn’t want to have to shoot him. He has a wife and three kids. They attended his commendation ceremony, the youngest daughter wants to be a cop— “Davis, put the gun dow—!”

BANG!

________________________________________________________________

WAYNE

9:15 AM

There will always be a part of Bruce Wayne that freezes to the core when he hears that voice.

Instantaneous reactions have always been a trademark of Batman, drilled into him by years of training at the hands of assassins and thieves alike. But when it comes to the Joker, there is always that fraction of a second that gives way to hesitation—something born of fear or disbelief, he doesn’t know—before he throws himself into action. Before his brain registers the immediacy of a threat.

Maybe that’s why the maniac got away. Maybe that half-second was all he needed to dictate the entire course of their encounters; his defeats included. The clown always had the same ability to predict several moves ahead, more so than Bruce; sometimes he wondered if the Joker wasn’t a little bit precognitive.

That won’t happen now—that shouldn’t happen now—because the Joker is dead.

Batman buried him.

He destroyed the chip linking him to Tim, he ensured that no one would ever hear that high-pitched, pitiless cackle ever again.

And yet, here it is, filling the underground caverns and startling the roosted bats into a shrieking frenzy as the video feed goes blank.

Bruce starts toward the computer, half-a-dozen plans of action coming together in his head, to trace and deal with whatever this threat is—whoever this pretender is. Before he can reach the command station, however, his field of vision goes brown.

Hundreds of the tiny, flying creatures surround him, screaming; their tiny claws slicing the exposed skin of his hands and face.

He stumbles, hiding his eyes in the crook of his elbow, while his hand digs into his pocket; it’s difficult with the tiny creatures clinging to him, clinging to wrist and fingers and sinking their teeth into him in distinctly non-bat behavior.

Fingers catching on his prize, he takes a deep breath and then depresses the button on the quarter-sized device.

The nerve agent is meant to disorient an opponent or, depending on body weight, knock them out for the few seconds needed to subdue them. For the tiny creatures attacking him, it will render them unconscious for a lot longer.

They drop and tumble around him in a circle, and when he can’t feel anymore slashing at him, he carefully navigates through the tiny bodies and out of the area affected by the nerve agent. Only then does he allow himself to take a breath, considering the strewn bodies around him in concern; they are still alive, but he doesn’t know exactly how the chemicals will affect them.

It makes no sense. The bats in here never attack, not unless he engages the subsonic alarms, which he hasn’t had to do in decades.

Bruce doesn’t believe in coincidences and knows that somehow, there’s a connection between the video and the bats. He just doesn’t know—

There’s a gasping, snorting sound behind him.

He realizes it was hidden by the shrieking of the bats before, but now it’s clearly discernible.

Turning around, he stares in horror as Ace, staggers forward on shaking legs, mouth-frothing and ears pulled back against his head. The dog’s lips are pulled up high over sharp canines in a grin that should not be possible on an animal.

“Ace,” Bruce croaks.

The beast huffs, the sound a painful, morbid facsimile of a human laugh, and then snarls, throwing itself bodily at Bruce.

________________________________________________________________

MCGINNIS

9:15 AM

It’s not the Joker, Terry tells himself, teeth clenched and hand already fumbling around his phone to call Bruce. It can’t be him. It’s just a copy-cat.

But the laugh…he will never forget that sound in his whole life. And that’s real.

“Mom, I have to—” he begins, only to choke when he watches his mother collapse. “Mom!”

He hurries to her side just as seems to go into some kind of seizure.

“Matt, call an ambulance!” Terry snaps, tossing his phone in the vicinity of his brother’s blanket-wrapped body. He is on his knees then, carefully turning his mother onto her side while she shakes and curls into herself.

There’s a gasping, wheezing sound from behind him, but he can’t pay attention to it, too busy trying to keep his mother from clawing at her face. Her skin begins to drain of color as if all the blood in her body has disappeared, and he finds himself seeking some kind of wound that might explain it.

Then his eyes land on her face, and his stomach clenches.

Mom’s eyes have gone blank, her face twitching violently as if there’s an electric current running through it. Her lips part over her teeth, mouth lifting at the corners until the muscles strain to an unnatural degree. Her lips have gone violently red, and her breathing changes from gasping to a stunted, wheezing rattle.

And then there’s laughter.

It echoes behind him and Terry jerks his head to one side, watching in horror as his little brother shuffles from the couch, giggling madly with an identical smile on his face.

Joker toxin, he realizes before something smacks into his face and he tumbles back on his heels.

Mom’s hand trembles—broken thumb, she hit with a closed fist—but she still crawls toward him with an insane gleam in her eye.

She is laughing, and Matt is laughing and—

Then Terry feels hands around his throat, as tiny but strong fingers curl into his throat, cutting off his air supply.

________________________________________________________________

WAYNE

9:17 AM

Bruce has a fleeting impression of teeth and bared claws before the giant body comes down hard on his. It’s only the reflex of a lifetime of brawls with larger, stronger opponents that saves him. He jabs outward with knees as he falls, curving to hit against the backside and shoulders while kicking up into the ribs of the animal. Bruce then thrusts the triangle between his thumb and forefinger into the dog’s throat as he boosts Ace over his head.

There’s a pained whine as the dog hits the ground, but he’s not unconscious, already struggling to his paws with the grace of a sleepwalker and determination of a piranha.

He’s just going to keep coming.

Bruce’s body screams in protest—muscles he hasn’t used in far too long, the incision from the transplant stretching—and he feels dizzy. But he forces himself to focus.

First the bats. Then Ace. Something that just affects animals?

It would certainly cause chaos, which the Joker was always trying for. But this particular trick has been done before.

The clown never revisited his jokes.

And the way Ace’s features are twisted, eyes white and sightless. When Bruce squints at the downed bats, sees that they seem paler, their faces also bent against their natural shape.

Joker toxin. It has to be.

Except, there was no delivery method and it’s not affecting Bruce. Maybe it is just animals.

He hurries toward the lab as quick as his body allows, depressing the panel in the cabinet that keeps his stock of antitoxin safe. Thumbs past vials until he has the right one, and fits it into the modified tranquilizer gun,

By the harsh panting behind him, he knows the dog is bearing down on him once again,

Calculations tear through his sluggish brain, dosages and body weight and differences between human and canine anatomy—

Ace leaps again, snapping at Bruce’s neck, and he fires, aiming for the cluster of muscles closest to the dog’s heart. He doesn’t see if it connects, forced to throw up a fist to protect his throat.

Teeth shred his hand, sending sharp lances of pain through him, but he keeps his arm up, aiming a nerve strike near the solar plexus and kidneys.

The dog continues snorting and snapping at him for longer than he’d like, before going limp.

Bruce struggles out from beneath Ace’s weight, sparing a moment to check breathing and pulse rate and then arrange the dog into a recovery position on its right side. Then he staggers to the comms, grabbing a roll of bandages on his way.

“Terry!” he barks as he wraps his shredded hand to staunch the bleeding; he’ll need to stitch it, and soon—the blood thinners he takes won’t allow it to stop on its own.

Once at the computer, he brings up CCTV footage and any voice recordings from the last ten minutes; at the same time, he repeats, “Terry!”

________________________________________________________________

MCGINNIS

9:17 AM

Terry hears the comms in the cowl go off, but it’s too far away, stuffed into his schoolbag. That, and he’s a little busy dodging his mother’s wild attempts to claw his eyes out while shaking his brother off without harming him.

Their laughter is loud and pained in his ears.

Straining, he finally manages to flip Matt onto the couch while dodging his mother’s grasping hand. He vaults across the room to his bag, digging desperately through it until his fingers close on the utility belt.

He has more than enough sedatives there to put them down. At the last second, however, he pauses, because they aren’t infected with just anything—it’s Joker toxin. Who knows what complications adding unknown sedatives could have on that.

So instead, he gabs the tiny vials he’s been carrying with him since the encounter with Tim Drake’s insane alter ego.

It’s a careful dance of evasion and trying not to break bones, avoiding his mother—and Matt, who even as some kind of mindless Joker automaton has an innate ability to evade Terry’s grasp. Eventually, he manages it and then he’s panting on the floor, mother and brother unconscious heaps beside him.

Heart still beating anxiously, he watches as their faces ease back to normal, free of the sinister rictus.

He’s already shrugging out of his coat as he reaches for the costume.

Looks like test or not, school’s not happening today.

The cowl is on now and his comm frizzes to life.

“—rry?”

“Bruce, what’s going on?” he demands. “Mom and Matt just went nuts. And their faces—it looks and acts like Joker toxin, but—”

“I know,” Bruce interrupts. “There’s no origin, no delivery system.”

“Exactly.”

Terry uses the magnification option in his mask to check his family. “If it’s not airborne, there should be injection points, but I don’t see any.” He does a sweep of the room. “There’s no vents or grates where it could have come in. Air filter's not picking up anything, either.”

“As near as I can tell, there won’t be. This is something new.”

“The word ‘new’ should never be used with the Joker.”

“Hm.”

“So why aren’t I affected?”

“I guess the dermal implant is doing its job.”

“Good thing,” Terry says, swallowing at the idea of what he might have done if hopped up on that chemical. “So, where’s it coming from?”

He grabs a pen and paper from his mother’s desk and jots down a note.

“That’s what we have to figure out. In the meantime, the goods news is the usual anti-venom appears to be working. It’s just a matter of mass-producing and getting out there.”

You guys fainted from the bug going around. Got a medical alert from Mr. Wayne, had to go check on him. Don’t leave the house!

He underlines that last bit and circles it several times before signing his name.

“I’ll be back soon, I promise,” he tells them, and heads for the window, tapping his comm again. “So, what’s the ‘but’? Because with you there’s always a ‘but’.”

“But it’s not just Gotham,” Bruce says, grim. “I’m looking at CCTV feeds from Tokyo, London, New York—it’s everywhere. Satellite imaging’s showing even more conclusive data: the entire planet’s been exposed to this.”

Terry doesn’t even get a chance to swear when a new voice interjects, “And the longer you’re exposed to it, the longer it takes to recover.”

________________________________________________________________

GRAYSON

9:17 AM

Dick grunts as he evades and dances out of the way of Catwoman’s doppelgangers.

“If you even do,” he adds on an exhale as one of them lands a hard blow to his chest.

There are twin intakes of breath across the line.

“Mr. Grayson?” the McGinnis kid asks, sounding choked. Dick doubts it’s about him. He caught the bit about being attacked by his family, and he knows from experience what it is to have to subdue loved ones.

“You’d think after all this time you’d eventually switch frequencies, B.”

“Nightwing,” the old man grunts, voice as inexpressive as ever. “Seems like you used the tech I sent you after all.”

“Only after I made sure you didn’t include any nano-surveillance devices.”

“You’re welcome.”

Dick rolls his eyes.

“Well, it’s working for me, but not for—” Something sharp slices across his chest, sending him flying backward. One of the doppelgänger’s grab hold of him and flips him over with the intention of sending him through the window and a fall several stories down. He recovers in midair, lands on his hands and tosses himself away from the bodies. “Hold that thought.”

He tries to find the original Black, the one who laughs and gasps for breath a millisecond before her doppelgängers. The sound is grating in his ear, echoed everywhere and drifting up from the city center below, in the apartments around him—

“Is there someone there with you?” Bruce wants to know.

“No, I’m alone in my apartment beating myself up,” Dick snaps.

“Who am I to judge what you do for fun?”

“Regular anti-toxin works on whatever this is,” McGinnis repeats like he’s trying to be helpful.

“Well, I don’t exactly carry that around,” Dick mutters, though he knows it’s in the background. Getting there will be a pain in the ass, and fighting in such close quarters with so many opponents, even if it’s technically only one…

It takes several unsuccessful feints and a few sucker-punches before he can grab hold of the original Black, holding her throat in the crook of his elbow while enduring her clones’ attempts to take chunks out of his kin.

Bruce and McGinnis are saying something—to him, to each other, he’s not sure. He blocks them out for now.

Walking backward, he keeps close to the walls of the hallway leading to the bathroom, ignoring the way Black struggles and claws against him before finally going limp.

Immediately, the doppelgängers vanish, but he knows he doesn’t have long. He practically smashes the bathroom mirror going for the anti-toxin, fits it into an injector and jams it into her thigh.

He lets her fall to the floor in an ungraceful heap, panting as he examines the bloody welts on his chest and arms.

“Wrestling with you was a lot more fun last time,” he informs the unconscious woman, before returning to his bedroom and opening the secret space in the closet behind his clothing.

His spare suit is there, and he scowls at it.

“You said this was all over the planet,” he says into the comm as he reaches for the material. “If that’s the case, we’re going to have every living thing ripping itself to pieces within the next few hours.”

“Frag,” McGinnis mutters. “I need to find Dana and Max before something happens to them.”

Predictably, Bruce says, “They’re not priority right now.”

“They’re priority for me, alright?”

“Flexible as ever, aren’t you old man?” Dick mocks.

“We have to focus our energy on reversing whatever happened,” Bruce retorts, unapologetic.

“Yeah, well, we look to our own first, Bats, or there’s no hope of fixing anything.” His tone turns sharp. “And you’d better hope Tim’s okay.”

________________________________________________________________

DRAKE

9:17 AM

Tim is not okay.

He is so far from okay, he thinks he might have lost feeling in his extremities. Which is problematic, since he’s trying to fight off both a panic attack and the wild swings of his wife.

She staring down at him with that horrid grin, gripping another huge kitchen knife in hand.

Tim’s chest feels close, and he wants to throw up, but he also knows he has to help Arlene. And to do that, he needs to calm down and think logically.

There was no gas anywhere, no traps. Joker liked the kind of traps that were showy and made noise.

But there’s no weapon, no delivery system, no broken windows the toxin could have come from. It couldn’t have been the coffee, otherwise, he’d be affected as well.

Why haven’t I? Out of anyone, it should be me.

But no—the dermal implant he helped Bruce design. Apparently, it works, filtering out the toxin before it even enters the bloodstream. It had been a wing and a prayer that it would work, a failsafe only, and now that it has, he wishes he’d thought to make more than the prototypes.

One for Arlene.

“Hon, I’m real sorry about this,” he apologizes, knowing she can’t hear him now. And then he surges forward, swooping beneath the arc of the knife coming toward him, gets behind her and uses a nerve pinch to knock her to the ground.

Outside, he hears cars colliding and frantic cries, turning to laughter and then agonized shrieking.

What the hell is going on?

He carries Arlene to the couch and hurries to his study to locate this last batch of anti-toxin. When the Joker returned, he’d spent hours every day mixing it up, and though he sent most of it back to Bruce and Barbara for their stocks, he kept enough.

It’s quick work to inject his wife; it will take a little longer before she wakes up again.

That done, his brief burst of battle-calm vanishes and the spirit of Robin that prompted him to action begins to fade. He begins to shiver, swallows back a hysterical sob or giggle.

The noises from outside get louder and he sits on the couch, hauling his knees up to his chest and leaning into his wife’s shoulders. He almost relishes the pain of his joints in the unfamiliar movements, trying to counteract the legitimate terror trying to creep upon him.

His eyes catch on the red vase, broken, its rounded bottom lying among the shards. It’s the same shade as a familiar helmet.

What the hell do you think you’re doing, Replacement? Jason’s voice is back, angry and frustrated. Going to curl up and cry? The bastard wasn’t supposed to beat both of us.

Tim swallows and closes his eyes, taking a further moment to ground himself, and then goes looking for his cellphone. He’s not far gone enough to reach out to Bruce—yet—but he’s not the only one who can help.

The speed-dial to Barbara’s personal line rings out.

________________________________________________________________

GORDON

9:17 AM

The gunshot echoes, but it isn’t from the lieutenant’s gun. Instead, a stray shot from behind them both barrels through Davis’ body and into the wall. He crumples, and Barbra whirls around, taking in the sight of the entire police force in the pit, dissolving into madness.

They’re all crazed grins and mad giggling, grabbling with each other and shooting their service weapons with wild abandon.

They’ve all been infected.

Her phone is ringing—not the office, but her cellphone. She spares a moment to see that it’s from Tim, but she can’t answer him right now. Not with the chaos threatening to destroy her building.

Hurrying around the pit, dodging grabbing arms and bodies being thrown in her path, she makes a beeline for the master computer responsible for all automated functions of the department. Fingers flying, she enacts the protocol for emergency safety.

It was original installed to stop another massacre from having in the middle of the police stronghold, and as far as she’s concerned, that’s exactly what’s about to happen if she doesn’t act fast.

“Sorry, boys,” she mutters, opening the panel hiding the lever, and yanks it down.

Instantly blue sparks explode all around the pit, creating a facsimile of a faraday cage. The charge isn’t enough to kill, just to incapacitate; every man and woman in uniform drops to the ground, stunned.

The sudden silence in the wake of the laughter is chilling, but not complete; in the offices and on the floors above she still hears signs of struggle, meaning all she’s managed is a brief reprieve.

Her cellphone is ringing again; this time she takes the call.

“Barbara, it’s not me!” he gasps right away, voice tight with fear. “It has to be a copycat, I swear it’s not met!”

“Never even thought it was,” she informs him honestly.

“What’s going on?!”

“I don’t know. Going to find out.”

“All I can think is that whatever this is has to be airborne.”

“Like a neurochemical attack?”

“Actually, I think it might be more like a virus. Some bacterial strains are still able to evade air filtration technology,” Tim says, taking measured breaths. Having to solve a problem has always been the best way to keep him calm. “Otherwise the city sensors would have detected it.”

“Unless it was a toxin designed specifically to evade those sensors.”

“It’s possible…”

But he still sounds preoccupied.

“Well, it’s a starting point,” she says. “Thanks, Tim. Is Arlene alright?”

“Knocked out on the couch,” he sighs. “I’ve dosed her. The usual strain against Joker toxin seems to be effective, at least.”

“Good to know.” Something outside explodes on the street, and she winces. “Listen, Tim, we’re going to handle it. Just stay put and take care of yourself and Arlene. Call me if there’s anything, but otherwise, keep the line clear.”

“I know. It’s everywhere, isn’t it?”

“It looks like it.” She hangs up, dials Nissa first, but the heir to her cowl doesn’t pick up.

Crown Point’s probably a war zone. Can’t think about that right now.

Next, the Cave. Just as predictably, he picks up on the first ring.

“What the hell is going on, Bruce?”

________________________________________________________________

WAYNE

9:20 AM

“At this point, your guess is as good as mine,” he replies, forwarding the call to the Bat-Computer.

Barbara’s voice is tense. “Is it really him again?”

“I don’t know.”

He navigates through multiple windows on the computer, examining the security footage of the chaos erupting around the globe. Through the comm in his ear, he hears Dick muttering something about his suit, while Terry keeps him updated on his flyover of the city.

Apparently, there are a lot of people falling or jumping off high-rises.

Bruce has a blood sample from Ace in the corner of the screen, running a diagnostic to find any clue how the toxin was spread.

There are differences in composition, which accounts for it working on the animals.

“I’ve got a program tracing the origin, but that’s taking a backseat to deploying an antidote,” he informs her. “I’m synthesizing it using Tim’s program from the last time.”

“Is it just me, or are there too many ‘last times’?” Terry wants to know, sounding winded.

Bruce ignores that, addresses Barbara, “I’ll send the first wave of Bat-drones to emergency service hubs.”

“That’s appreciated since I’ve got a precinct full of unconscious cops right now.”

“Emergency protocol worked, then?”

“Don’t be smug. It’s not a good look on you.”

“Once we’ve restored emergency services, I’ll send a second contingent to help the rest of Gotham.”

And then, somehow, the entire planet.

“But is it him?” Barbara asks.

“No. He’s dead.”

“I don’t think that’s what she meant,” Terry says. “Did the Joker really set all this up? Before he died?”

Bruce glances at another small window on-screen, where he captured a recording of the video that started all of this. “Judging by the resolution, the video footage is archival. That’s definitely him. I’d say it’s from forty years ago. Someone’s remastered it, but there are tells.”

“So why’s it being released now? He couldn’t have known exactly when he was going to die.”

“I suspect something specific happened to trigger its release. Some criterion was met.”

“So the Joker is definitely not back, but this is definitely his work,” Barbara concludes with a sigh. “Any idea on how to stop it?”

“Still looking.”

“Tim thinks it’s airborne. Like a virus.”

Bruce’s fingers pause in their typing, a sudden wave of concern washing over him. “Is he—?”

“He’s okay,” Barbara says. “Shaken, but he’ll hold up.”

Bruce nods to himself, tabling his relief to concentrate on the current conundrum.

“Batman, while I’m perfecting and sending out the antidote, patrolling. Help where you can.” To Barbara, “He’ll need backup.”

“That’s going to be hard since I just had to tase everyone here. I don’t want to know what’s going on with the officers that were patrolling outside.”

Law enforcement is trigger-happy on a normal day; we both know that means there’s going to be a lot of police-related deaths at the end of this thing.

“How much anti-toxin do you keep at the precinct? Didn’t Tim send you a batch recently?”

“Still probably not enough for everyone on the force.”

“Doesn’t matter. Inoculate everyone you can; once I get more of it spread around the city, there’s going to be even greater chaos. Right now, the population is mindlessly violent—once their wits come back, that’s when the real violence starts.”

“Hm.” She doesn’t argue; she knows it’s true.

“This is going to take as many people as we have to pitch in. Keep a comm on you—I know you have one on you. If some poor Jokerized fool takes out the power grid, you’ll lose access to all conventional communication.”

“We have back-ups, you know,” Barbara says dryly, but he hears her shifting around and then the squeaking feedback as she puts a comm in her ear and hangs up the phone.

“Not as good as mine.”

“So what exactly are you expecting I do in the meantime?” Terry wants to know. “Patrol is kind of a broad term.”

“Try to keep the peace as well as possible.”

“…I’d think you were joking, except you don’t have a sense of humor.”

“Oh, he does, kid,” Dick remarks. “But if you haven’t found it yet, better pray you don’t.”

________________________________________________________________

MCGINNIS

9:25 AM

Terry dodges what feels like the hundredth car that’s flipped over an overpass, only just managing to get the passengers out and back on the ground. They immediately start grabbing at his throat and trying to gouge his eyes and he’s forced to take off again.

So far, the short trip between his apartment and the school has taken three times as long as it should have.

And every second means Dana and Max could be…

He doesn’t want to think about it.

Down below, people are actually tearing each other to pieces, scratching and biting and using everyday detritus to whale on each other. There are two many for him to stop them all, and the fact he’s all-but useless until Bruce manages to deploy the antidote doesn’t make him feel any better.

“This is insane.”

“I believe that was the point," Bruce grunts.

“Even if I had enough anti-toxin for the entire city, this isn’t exactly a one-man job,” Terry complains.

“In case you haven’t noticed, you’re not the only one still cognisant.”

“Yeah, but that’s still just a handful of us. And if this stuff is in the air, even any anti-toxin we have is only going to be temporary.”

“Once we figure out what’s delivering this toxin or virus, it’s just a matter of tweaking it to deploy the antidote instead. Until then, be grateful your device is working properly.”

“Is there anyone else out there with one of these, except your chosen?”

“Anyone who had access to the anti-toxin and was able to dose themselves before it took over.”

Terry snorts. “So, maybe three people? Great. I feel so comforted.”

“You shouldn’t. They’ll be out of commission for a while.”

“You’re such an optimist. What about Su—”

“He’s compromised.”

“Compromised like…?”

“Trust me when I say it’s not something you ever want to encounter.”

Terry shivers at the idea of a Jokerized Superman. “I can’t even picture that. I wouldn’t even think it was possible. How did you—?”

“Dumb luck.”

“Frag.”

“Just don’t attract his attention and hope you don’t need to use the last resort.”

Meaning Kryptonite.

“And how do you propose that?”

“Don’t call for help.”

“Of course,” Terry sighs, and then grumbles, “This is not my best day ever.”

It’s another ten minutes of fighting through the smoke of several wrecked cars, stopping a bunch of thugs from beating on a frazzled, confounded kid crying despite her Glasgow smile, before he makes it to Hamilton Hill High.

Probably going to need some help, he decides, remotely activating the Batmobile’s onboard computer to track his location.

It might as well be a warzone, the way the staff and students—kids he’s been in school with for years—are attacking each other. Everyone’s bleeding in some way, a number of bodies litter the ground, some still twitching, some not. Terry tries not to think too closely about it as he speeds through the hallways to his second-period classroom.

Inside, the light panels have been destroyed, creating a strobe light effect that Terry winces at. He adjusts the screen in his mask to account for the light, and looks desperately around.

The teacher’s dead, bleeding from what looks like a shard of someone’s tablet shoved through his throat. His classmates are grouped off in individual melees, all of them laughing hysterically as they beat on each other or take blows.

Chelsea Cunningham straddles Nelson Nash and repeatedly strikes his head against the ground, giggling shrilly as his blood spatters her once crisp white shirt. Nelson’s not quite laughing anymore, making choked-off noises like he’s trying to breathe.

Terry doesn’t think twice about using two of his anti-toxins on both of them—it’s about all he can do—before moving on.

Dana and Max are near the back, seemingly in the midst of trying to choke the life out of one another. Dana has several patches of hair torn out, and Max has an ugly gash down her cheeks from Dana’s nails.

“Okay, time to break up this girl fight,” he declares, materializing behind them and knocking them both out before inoculating them.

The other students have taken notice of him by now, and begin to close in.

“And that’s my exit,” he murmurs, hoisting a girl over each shoulder.

There’s an explosion beside him, as a blast of concentrated fire opens a hole in the ceiling. A cord extends downward and he steps into the foothold, holding tight to his best friend and his girlfriend as the Batmobile yanks them upward and away from the high school.

“Oof,” he mutters once inside the cockpit, laying the girls gently in the passenger seat.

“Everyone alright?” Bruce asks.

“They’ll live.”

“Good. Time to get back to work.”

“On it.” Terry jumps out of the car and hovers beside it for a moment, keying in commands to take it back to the Batcave. “Special delivery. Maybe you can figure out how this thing is spreading to human victims and keep them safe.”

“We’re not a relief center,” Bruce grumps.

“Tough. I’m not leaving them to get ripped apart or rip each other apart here, or in their homes.”

“Then drop them off with your mother and brother.”

“No time to double back,” Terry replies. “And the Cave’s the safest place within two hundred miles. They know about you anyway, so deal with it.”

He considers the school beneath him and dives back in, trying to see how many he can incapacitate before they all kill each other.

________________________________________________________________

GRAYSON

9:30 AM

“Think I’m really starting to like this kid,” Dick tells Bruce as he digs through his medicine cabinet again. A medicine cabinet that’s more of a fully stocked home hospital.

Old habits die hard.

“Where the hell are the reinforcements?” he demands. “You know, the ones hanging out on high?”

“Watchtower’s dark.”

Dick pauses; that actually startles him. “Even for you? How’s that possible? You put so many backdoors into that system.”

“Hence my concern.”

Dick finds the tube he’s looking for, good for a concentrated shot of adrenaline and makes his way back to Black and doses her.

There’s a beat, and then she gasps awake, shooting into a sitting position.

“Sorry,” he says, “but the city’s going to hell. There’s no time to play Sleeping Beauty. Suit up.”

“Sure know how to show a girl a good time,” she groans, accepting his outstretched hand.

"What can I say, I'm the life of the party." While she shimmies into her clothes and checks her gear, Dick asks Bruce, “Speaking of your ‘chosen’, who else have you immunized, besides you, me, the kid and Babs?”

“Who are you calling a kid?” McGinnis demands.

Bruce ignores him. “In an ideal world? The Family.”

“You mean the Family you’ve pissed off and distanced yourself from for the past forty years? That Family? Hell of a time to reach out.” Dick grunts. “What about—”

“Red Robin is fine.”

Dick huffs out a bitter chuckle. “Now there’s a handle I haven’t heard in a while.”

“No real names on the comms.”

“I’m pretty sure anyone we’d have to worry about names with is roaming the streets laughing their heads off right now,” McGinnis says. "Maybe literally."

“Kid’s got a point,” Dick says. “Speaking of people roaming. Who else do we have in our corner? And by that I mean, who’s not dead, geriatric, off-world or part of the Jokerized masses?”

“Anyone with a superior metabolism or who can burn off the toxin before it takes hold. Flash is working Central City right now, but she’s got her hands full. Same for Static out in Dakota City.”

“That's it? What about everyone else?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“And the Justice League still isn’t answering.”

“No.”

Which is…not good.

Black reappears from the bedroom, mask on and hands on her hips. “You ready to roll, soldier?”

“Make sure you take some anti-toxin with you. What I dosed you with will eventually run out, and I’d rather not have to worry about you going after me when you’re supposed to be watching my back.

“I’d love to know how I went from a thief to saving the city on a regular basis,” she quips.

“The first Catwoman used to ask that all that time."

________________________________________________________________

GORDON

9:30 AM

“Whoever’s doing this was thinking ahead,” Barbara says as she goes from officer to officer and injects them with the anti-toxin. “Way ahead.”

She wasn’t kidding when she said there wasn’t enough for the entire force; as it is she’ll be lucky if it’s enough for the ones in the bullpen. The rest are going to have to be put in cells until help arrives.

“Hm.”

“But it also…” she trails off.

“What?”

“It doesn’t feel like the Joker. Besides the video and the toxin, I mean. Other than that…”

“I was thinking the same thing,” Bruce agrees. “The theatricality is him, but the rest…I’m still analyzing the video clip for clues.”

Barbara purses her lips. It should be a relief to hear that it’s not him, but it’s not. The legend of the Joker makes even his imitators a force to be reckoned with.

Just as the first of her officers begin to stir, she pulls out her cellphone and runs an encryption program to secure the line. It’s a program Maxine Gibson set her up with when she expressed a need to get in touch during emergency situations...especially when the new Batgirl doesn’t want her to.

This time, the line connects to the biometric communicator Nissa always carries on her. Barbara waits until her protégé’s blasé voicemail starts playing and listens through the recording.

“I know you’ve probably been hit by the toxin,” she says after the shrill beep, “but that’s going to be dealt with soon. The minute you’re conscious, get your gear on and get your butt into that city. Even if this all gets fixed in the next ten minutes, Gotham’s going to be pulling herself apart for days. We need all hands. Consider this your debutante ball.”

She disconnects and then reaches for her service weapon, checking her ammo, and mentally decides what orders she’s going to give the men and women getting back on their feet. None of them know what’s going on, and it’s not going to be an easy explanation.

Her eyes fall upon the photo of Sam on her desk, and she swallows. There are still two more calls she needs to make before she goes out on the street.

“Sam? When you get this…Just know that everything’s going to be alright. I’ll see you at dinner, hon…”

________________________________________________________________

DRAKE

9:35 AM

When the phone rings again, Tim jumps, having forgotten it was in his hand. He’s been trying not to twitch at every sound from outside when he’s not checking his wife to make sure she’s still breathing.

He knows she is—he’s watching her chest rise and fall—but he keeps having visions of her seizing and dying on his watch.

“Babs?” he chokes.

“It’s me,” she confirms. “The Bats are working on a toxin and doing crowd control. You should have drones incoming within the half-hour.”

Tim exhales. “That’s a relief at least.”

“How are you holding up?”

“I’m managing,” he replies. “Arlie should be waking up soon. Then we’re getting the hell out of Gotham supposing I have to hitchhike.”

“It won’t help,” Barbara replies grimly. “From what Bruce says, this is happening all over. There’s nowhere to escape to.” Tim’s heart sinks. “Believe it or not, Gotham’s going to be one of the safe zones for a while.”

“Gotham is never safe,” he deadpans.

“I know. Tim…I’m sorry you have to go through this, with everything you’ve been through. The best thing for you to do is batten down the hatches. Stay put and stay safe—or as safe as you can manage. I’ve got some of my force up and about again. As soon as I can spare the manpower, I’ll send someone over to protect you.”

“Yeah…”

Tim stays still for a while after she hangs up, staring down at the phone in deep thought.

Something about that bothers him, niggling at some long-buried part of him.

Didn’t you used to make a big deal about people trying to protect you? Jason’s voice wonders. When did you become such a burden, Timbers?

“About the time a lunatic crown tried to lobotomize me,” he mutters to no one.

Maybe. But just because you’re out of the game, doesn’t mean you’re completely useless. You’re not Bruce…but you’ve still got contingencies on contingencies.

He wants to argue that—ignoring the fact he’d be arguing with himself because Jason’s not here—but then he really thinks about it.

He knows his house isn’t fortified, isn’t defensively in any way against his Jokerized neighbors or whatever other chaotic groups will emerge as the Bats try to spread the anti-toxin.

But…I still know where all the safehouses are.

The ones that were built to stand the test of time and outlived the breaking of team bonds. He’s thinking of one in particular—his old haunt beneath his former apartment in the old theater district. The apartment was demolished ages ago, bought up with the rest of the block and replaced with a high-rise parking garage.

But the Nest beneath it was never found, and there are still one or two secret entrances to get in. If there’s nowhere safe in the world to flee, then he must look for safety in the city he knows.

Maybe…I can be Red Robin one last time.

He gets up, plans coalescing in his mind.

As soon as Arlene wakes, they’re leaving.

⁂

________________________________________________________________

I want to know what you think of my story! Leave kudos, a comment or if writing comments isn't something you're comfortable with, as many of these (or other emojis) as you want and let me know how you feel!

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#batfam #batfam fanfic #batman family #batman beyond #batman #fanfic #terry mcginnis #bruce wayne #barbara gordon #tim drake #dick grayson #dc universe #dcau #action #adventure #angst #drama #race against time

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misfitgirlwrites · 6 years

Text

Chapter Six

"He didn't touch you, did he?" Bruce asked as he drove down the street.

"Nope. I'm perfectly fine."

"You're not perfectly fine if you're asking for Scotch." He glanced at her.

"Well, I'm decent." Aniyah shrugged.

"Decent enough to talk about it?" He asked.

Aniyah nodded, looking at Bruce, "I didn't think it was that bad, I mean, it could've been worse. Considering he pretended to be in his straight-jacket the whole time."

"And you said he killed the DA?" Bruce asked.

"It couldn't have been anyone else. Bruce, he gives me the creeps." Aniyah shivered.

"I can imagine."

"He asked me if I believed in love at first sight. I'm worried about that." She continued on.

"Love at first sight? Is that what he calls it?" Bruce glanced at Aniyah before looking back at the road.

Bruce zoned Aniyah out as he sighed quietly. Anything that could possibly happen to Aniyah if The Joker broke out of his cell again ran through his head, making him tighten his grip on the steering wheel, "Think about this, Aniyah," he started.

"Yeah, what's up?" She looked at him.

"If The Joker is serious about his, love at first sight claim, imagine what could happen."

"Yes, Mr. Billionaire, make me paranoid." Aniyah deadpanned, sitting back, "More dead bodies would end up in my car." She mumbled.

"Think worse than that. The Joker doesn't do the same thing twice."

"If he breaks out of his cell again, he might actually leave the Asylum this time and--" Aniyah bit her lip, cutting herself off.

"And come for you." Bruce finished, "I'm not going to force you to do anything. I'm not going to nag you about it either. You know that I care about you and I don't want to see you hurt. So you should really consider leaving while you have the chance."

Aniyah nodded, "I'll consider it. But, since we've hit the caring part of this subject. How long have we been friends, Bruce?"

"Since we were four." He smiled slightly.

"Exactly. And I'll always be here for you. We've been friends for a long time, so you should know by know how I feel about you bottling your emotions." Aniyah sat up in her seat and leaned on the armrest, giving him a stern look, "And honestly, as your best friend, I don't like finding out that Rachel was engaged to Harvey Dent and that The Joker killed her, through research."

"I know you don't." Bruce sighed.

"I know it's a touchy topic, but I know you're not okay Bruce, so next time, come to your best friend for help, or Alfred, because he'll tell me anyway," Aniyah smirked as Bruce chuckled.

"How's Mom doing?" He asked, changing the subject.

"Mom is fine, I guess. She misses you."

"Who wouldn't?"

"Bruce. We're going to fight, okay? You and this cocky attitude." Aniyah laughed.

"Does she know you're here?" Bruce asked, chuckling.

"Eh. No? Not that she cares. I think she's still in Germany working on her art."

"That'll be a conversation I don't want to miss. You sound a little jealous." Bruce mumbled, parking his car.

"Hardy har har. Funny." Aniyah rolled her eyes playfully, getting out of the car.

Once Aniyah and Bruce sat down in the restaurant, she sighed, rubbing her arms.

"I should've brought a jacket." She mumbled.

"Can't say I didn't tell you." Bruce shrugged, taking off his jacket and tossing it to her.

Aniyah rolled her eyes and smiled slightly, putting it on, "Oh, I meant to ask since you pulled me away from my laptop before I could find out myself," She glanced at Bruce, "What happened to Batman?"

Bruce shrugged, "On the news, it says he killed Harvey Dent."

"What? He couldn't have done that." Aniyah shook her head.

"And why do you think that?" He asked as a waiter came with a bottle of Scotch and two glasses. "He did act like he was above the law--"

"But, the law isn't much help when it comes to criminals like Joker. Or else there wouldn't have been a dead body in my car." She pointed out. "And last time I checked, criminals were terrified of Batman, so whatever he was doing, he was doing it right." She added, pouring Scotch into her glass.

Bruce smiled slightly, "You're defending a vigilante who, one: disappeared, two: is wanted for killing a District Attorney, and three: you've never seen before." He stated.

"Honestly, I think Gotham still needs Batman." Aniyah downed her first glass and poured herself some more.

"It's kind of like a comic book. This city is in major need of a hero."

Bruce's smile faltered, letting her words sink in.

"I mean, me and you grew up in Gotham. This place, as fucked up and corrupted as it is, is still our home. You wouldn't want to see this town burn, would you?" Aniyah raised an eyebrow.

"No. No, I wouldn't."

"And Batman felt the same. He was brave enough to take matters into his own hands. He's a hero in my book." Aniyah downed her second glass.

"Let's get you some food before you down the whole bottle." Bruce chuckled.

Aniyah smiled and nodded. ~~~~~~ "You can't take one experience and just assume things like that. She's in Arkham for a reason."

"Yeah, yeah, I get that! But I feel it. Poison Ivy just has a point to prove--"

"And she's proving it by trying to destroy Gotham."

"...True." Aniyah chuckled, playing with the leftover food on her plate, "But still, she seemed interesting."

"I guess you can say that." Bruce put his fork down and grabbed his napkin to wipe his face.

"...Do you really think he'll escape again?" Aniyah looked at Bruce as he stared back at her before shrugging.

"You shouldn't waste your time thinking about what an unpredictable man might do next." He said.

"...So what am I supposed to do? Sit and wait for him to come to me?" Aniyah sighed.

"That, or go back with Michaela."

They both stared at each other. Aniyah sighed, pouring herself some more Scotch.

"Okay, look. We both know you're too stubborn to leave. So why keep bringing it up? The best thing to do is to keep up with everything. Talk to his doctor. Make sure you're safe." Bruce said.

Aniyah nodded, "Okay, I will. But, I'm ready to head home now."

"Too many drinks?"

"Shut up and take me home, Mr. Billionaire." Aniyah chuckled, getting up.

"As you wish, Lady Blueberry."

"You know I hate that, Bruce, stop!" She snorted.

"But you laughed, so I don't really think you hate it." Bruce chuckled as they left the restaurant.

#joker fanfiction #dc fanfic #the dark knight #the joker blogs #fanfic #heath ledger joker #joker fandom #mgwrites

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hysterialevi · 6 years

Text

Lotus pt. 1 (Batjokes)

Author’s note: Well, a lot more people were on board with this idea than I was expecting lmao I’m still kind of testing the waters right now, but I hope you guys like the story anyways and please, feel free to send feedback anytime. Enjoy! -Levi

From Waller’s POV

CITY HALL

“Secure the perimeter!” I ordered, sending agents scrambling all over the place. “Lethal force is authorized. Do whatever it takes to find the mayor. We CANNOT let that maniac kill him! Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes ma’am!”

“Agent Fox,” I called out, marching towards her, “any updates on Wayne?”

She tapped her tablet a few times before responding, concern plastered all over her face. “My drones have scanned the building top to bottom, and it looks like Wayne’s trapped the mayor in his own office. He’s injured him pretty badly, but he hasn’t tried to kill him yet. It’s almost like he’s...waiting for something.”

I rubbed my chin in thought, the gears turning my head. “Why wouldn’t Wayne just shoot him? If he really wanted to kill the mayor, he would’ve done it already. No...this must be a trap. He wants our attention. He wanted the Agency to come here. These theatrics are nothing but bait. Well, we’ll worry about that later. Right now, our top priority is saving the Mayor. Understood?”

Tiffany gave me a firm nod. “Understood.”

“Good. Then let’s get to work.”

Tiffany let out a disappointed sigh, her head sinking with sorrow. I paused for a minute.

“Everything all right, agent?” I checked.

She frowned. “It’s just...I grew up with Bruce. He was always like family to me, and to my dad. I know he’s been mixed up with some shady people in the past, but never in a million years did I think he’d become like...this.”

She gazed up at the night sky in a helpless manner, her shoulders drooping despondently. “God, what did that virus do to him...? What did we do to him? We should’ve just ended his misery when we had the chance. Bruce might not’ve been a saint, but he definitely didn’t deserve this.”

I was silent in response, earning an apology from Tiffany.

“I’m sorry, Director. I know I have to set my personal feelings aside. I can’t let them hinder my judgement when dealing with Bruce, no matter how close we used to be. I just wish it didn’t have to end like this.”

I folded my hands behind my back, softening the tone of my voice. “I understand, Tiffany. I don’t think there’s a single soul in Gotham who hasn’t been touched by Bruce somehow. It’s heartbreaking for all of us to witness what he’s become, friend or foe. Let’s just hope we’re able to put a stop to this madness before it’s too late. Gotham’s already on the brink of war with the Joker running about, and this pandemonium with Wayne certainly isn’t helping. It’s the Agency’s duty to act. Fast.”

“I’m ready when you’re ready.” Tiffany said, regaining composure.

“That’s what I like to hear, agent.”

Before we could continue with our plan any further however, the distant sound of an explosion suddenly erupted from the top of City Hall, causing every electronic within a five-block radius to shut down immediately. Streetlamps, billboards, indoor lights, pylons, all of it -- just dark. We were stuck in pitch blackness.

“What the hell just happened?” I blurted out, my voice echoing eerily. I quickly took out my pistol, checking its condition. The lights were red.

“Dammit,” I cursed, holstering the useless weapon. “That must’ve been an EMP blast. I see Wayne hasn’t given up on his old tactics. We’ll have to do this the old-fashioned way.”

“Wait,” Tiffany said, showing me her tablet, “my devices have EMP shielding. They were able to survive the blast. I can still keep an eye on him while the other agents fetch the mayor.”

A sense of relief washed over me. “Good thinking. Things will be a hell of a lot harder without our tech, but at least we can monitor Wayne.”

Just as we were about to calm down a bit, the screen on Tiffany’s tablet began to glitch suddenly, bringing us back into panic mode as a broken, deformed voice came through the speaker. It sounded like Bruce. He must’ve been hacking her tech from City Hall.

“--Just as you always do.” He fired back, his tone low and stoic. “I figured the Agency would be experts at this by now. All you did for an entire week was monitor me. Watching, and waiting. Standing idly by as I rotted away...don’t deny that you relished it.”

I glared at the screen. “What do you want, Wayne?”

“What do I want?” He repeated. “I’m surprised you ask. You didn’t seem to care back when I was suffering in your secret lab -- when all I wanted was a little mercy...”

A dark chuckle escaped Wayne’s lips.

“But now that I’ve stoked the city’s fire with its own fuel, and sent your own organization crumbling around you...now you care. Because you’re afraid. Because you know what kind of a monster you’ve created, and you know what I’m capable of. Isn’t that right...Director?”

“Enough, Bruce,” I said firmly. “It’s time we settled this, but I want the mayor first. He’s not a part of this. Leave him out of it.”

Bruce laughed, though not in an amusing manner. “Even now, she still makes demands...when I’ve clearly got the upper hand. You’ll have to learn someday, Waller, that barking orders isn’t enough to push through life. Though, it can certainly push some people.”

Bruce sighed in frustration. “Fine. You want your beloved mayor so much?” He was quiet for a second, probably setting something up.

“...then you can have him.”

Splitting the darkness, the upper floors of City Hall were illuminated with a single spotlight as one of the windows slid open from the inside, revealing Wayne himself. It was hard to see what he was doing from this distance, but it appeared as if he was hauling something quite heavy around.

For a moment, I had no idea what that “something” could’ve been, but the minute Wayne hurled it over the window’s edge, and it caught on the rope holding it, I immediately felt my stomach churn. A unanimous gasp could be heard from the other agents, and everyone began murmuring as we tried to process what we were looking at.

Slowly turning to me with a horrified look and all the color drained from her face, Tiffany brought a hand over her mouth, nearly fainting on the spot.

She shook her head in disbelief.

“Oh...oh, god.”

From Bruce’s POV

ONE WEEK AGO - WAYNE ENTERPRISES

Pain. Heat. Anger.

All of these things rushed through my body as I struggled to open my eyes, my vision doubled and blurry. My hearing was muffled except for a sharp ringing noise, and the room around me seemed to pulse in sync with the throbbing ache piercing my skull. It must’ve been from Harley’s hammer.

I rubbed the side of my head, wincing at the touch. Goddamn. She really hit me hard. The woman herself however, was nowhere to be seen right now...and neither was her partner, “Joker.” I guessed they fled after knocking me out, leaving nothing but a trail of death behind them.

Barely lifting my head, I saw the aftermath of John’s attack scattered all over the floor, making me want to gag. Along with the blood splatters and vomit staining the carpet, the room was also littered with fresh corpses -- both from mine and Joker’s side. They were all bleeding from the eyes, nose, and mouth, and a permanent expression of agony was stuck on their faces. It made my insides boil.

I could hardly believe it. Every. Single. One of my colleagues -- even Regina...was dead. Just like that. And for what? To get a point across?

I felt a certain rage bubbling inside me -- the same one from when I first learned of my father’s criminal history. Not only was I angry, but I also felt betrayed. After all the things I gave him, after everything we went through...and this was how John repaid me? If I didn’t have a code against killing, I would’ve strangled the clown myself.

...But deep down, I knew I could never truly harm John. As much as I despised to admit it...I was in love with that freak-show. Something about John just...drew me to him. Like a moth to a flame. He was everything I ever wanted in person, but he was also everything I stood against. And to see him running around with someone else, to know that he did all of this purely because he hated me...to know this was my fault -- it made me feel helpless.

How was I supposed to destroy something I helped build? Or hate something I loved? I couldn’t remember the last time I felt this lost, and to be honest, I just wanted to give up. I wanted to walk away from this city and never look back, but I knew I couldn’t. Not with Gotham counting on Batman. It needed him now more than ever, and I owed it to everyone who had died so far to save this city. Especially Lucius.

Pushing myself up from the table, my body turned out to be much weaker than I anticipated, causing me to collapse right onto the floor with a heavy thud. The fall certainly didn’t help with my headache or the ringing in my ears, but as soon as I made impact, I could hear a pair of frantic footsteps heading in my direction. It looked like a couple of agents, and both of them were protected with gas masks.

“Oh my god...!” one of them exclaimed. I recognized her voice. It was Avesta.

“Blake,” she said, “he’s...he’s alive! Go find Director Waller! We need to get him out of here immediately!”

“Right. I’m on my way.” He bolted out of the board room in a heartbeat, leaving me alone with Iman as she gently secured her arms around me and lifted me into a sitting position. I groaned in pain.

“It’s okay, Bruce,” she reassured, looking into my eyes compassionately. “It’s okay. Waller’s here. We’ll get you somewhere safe. I promise. You’re going to be all right.”

Avesta cursed in a language I didn’t understand, muttering to herself.

“...I thought you were dead. How are you alive...? Anyone touched by the Lotus virus is instantly killed. Could it be that you’re...? No...it must be the gas mask. But wait...”

She leaned forward, observing the mask John gave me.

“There’s a crack in the glass. It couldn’t have saved you. So what did?”

I took a breath, my lungs burning as I tried to speak.

“What...” I coughed, “what are you...talking about...? What’s going on...?”

Avesta hesitated for a second and glanced around the room as if she’d find an answer hiding somewhere, unsure of how to break the news.

“Bruce,” she put a hand on my shoulder, barely able to make eye contact with me, “...I-I don’t know how to say this, and I don’t mean to frighten you, but...you’ve...you’ve been infected with the Lotus virus.”

My heart stopped.

Lotus? As in the one Riddler and Freeze contracted? Shit.

I gulped out of fear, my chest beginning to feel tight as the news finally sunk in.

Oh, shit. No, no, no, NO. That couldn’t be right. Everyone else died the minute the virus was released. Why didn’t the same thing happen to me? I couldn’t be infected. It had to be from when Harley hit me. Surely, that was the reason why I was so weak. I wasn’t infected with...with Lotus...right? They had to be wrong. They had to be. Oh, god. What was I going to do? What was I going to tell Alfred?

“Bruce?” Avesta said, interrupting my thoughts. “...are you okay?”

I snapped back to reality and shook my head, looking at her desperately.

“Iman...please, you have to help me.”

She scooted closer. “Don’t worry, Bruce. That’s what we’re here for.”

“No...” I grit my teeth, the pain increasing with every second, “that’s not what I meant. I mean...you have to...” I trailed off for a moment, wondering if I should even ask this, “...you have to...kill me.”

Avesta almost seemed disgusted at the request. “What?” She backed away slightly. “No! No way, Bruce. I’m not going to do that.”

I persisted. “Look at me. I’m already a corpse, Iman. With the Lotus virus inside me, I’ll either end up dead...or insane. I don’t want to lose my mind. Please, just...just shoot me before that happens. I don’t want to hurt anyone.”

The agent sighed morosely, still refusing to do what I asked.

“I’m sorry Bruce. I can’t. I understand you’re afraid, but the Agency needs you alive. The more we learn about this virus, the higher our chances are of curing you -- completely. I’m just curious about how on Earth you survived in the first place.”

“We’ll figure all that out later,” Waller dismissed as she marched into the room. “For now though, we just need to focus on getting Wayne to the lab. He may be alive, but he’s in a critical condition. And it’ll only worsen if he stays here. Not to mention it’s a risk to us as well.”

Avesta nodded, helping me to my feet. “Yes, ma’am.”

“Good, then let’s get a move on. We have no time to waste.”

Waller brought her attention to the other agents, ordering them around and giving commands whilst Avesta lugged me away from the grotesque scene, both of us still shocked at what’s unfolded.

“I want bio-scans on Wayne as soon as possible,” Waller shouted behind us. “Learn everything you can about the virus, and do NOT let him leave his cell once he’s locked in. We don’t know how fast this virus can spread, and I certainly don’t want to find out.”

I turned to Avesta, croaking out a few words with what little energy I had left.

“...you’re...putting me...in a cell...?”

She gave me an apologetic expression. “I’m sorry, Bruce. It’s the only way we can contain the virus.”

I still wasn’t entirely sure about the idea.

“But the city needs me,” I protested, coughing faintly, “...it needs...B-batman...”

Avesta gestured to me. “Look at yourself, Bruce. You can barely walk, and Batman’s no use to the city if he can’t fight. You need to rest.”

“...but...but...I...”

Before I could even talk anymore, the edges my vision suddenly began to darken once again and the world felt like it had fallen from underneath my feet, swirling around me in a sickly manner. I started to slip from Iman’s grasp.

“Bruce...?” Avesta’s voice bounced off the walls of my head, muffling more and more.

I crashed onto the floor and went limp, a dozen agents instantly clamoring over to me as my brain shut down and everything went black. What was going on? Was I...was I dying? Was the virus finally taking its toll? Had my wish been granted?

I closed my eyes and willingly let the virus’s cold clutch steal me away from consciousness, my entire body going numb as I fell into Limbo. Despite all the panic that was happening around me, I somehow remained calm, and even welcomed this sensation that I mistook as death, greeting it with open arms.

All my fear, hatred, rage, love, everything...it was just...gone. I felt lifeless, and yet, I had never been more alive. It was as if my soul had floated away from my body and was now watching from afar, waiting to see what I’d do next before meeting it on the other side.

I didn’t know what the Agency had planned for me, or how I was going to be affected by this virus, but there was one thing I knew for sure. No matter what happened in the future, or how much torment I would have to endure, Gotham was never going to be the same again. And neither was I.

#telltale games #telltale batman #the enemy within #bruce wayne #john doe #joker #batjokes #fanfic #story #lotus

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justgotham · 6 years

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While the colorful villains may be what many people associate with Gotham, the show’s heart is embodied by one man: Jim Gordon. A good cop trying—and failing—to keep his conscious clean in a city in which the good guys only win by being bad, it’s Jim Gordon that makes an often over-the-top show like Gotham relatable. It’s his story in which we find the message beneath the show’s madness. We might not be able to relate to a green-suited evil genius who holds the city hostage through riddles or a fear-obsessed child of a doctor who terrorizes people while wearing a burlap mask, but we can sure relate to a man trying to avoid losing hope as the world around him seems to be getting worse by the day. We know exactly what it feels like to discover that the road to success may mean compromising our ideals and beliefs.

“There’s always been a sadness to Gordon,” actor Ben McKenzie said recently. “You see it as commissioner when he’s barely holding it together and in desperate need of Batman to keep the city from falling apart. When he first comes in, he’s much more idealistic. What I like is to watch the world beat him down and knock him to shreds, and have to get up in the morning and pick himself up every day. That’s what I always liked about him, and that’s what [Executive Producer] Bruno Heller and I always bonded over—this everyman hero keeping the wolves at bay as best he can until ultimately they need a guy dressed as a bat to save them.”

Last week’s episode marked something of a turning point for Gordon, culminating in a brutal confrontation between the newly anointed captain of the GCPD and the woman who anointed him, the cold-and-calculating Sofia Falcone, that left Gordon injured and Falcone dead. As he recovered, Gordon’s often estranged friend and partner Harvey Bullock squelched Jim’s plans to reveal that he was indirectly responsible for Falcone’s rise and Professor Pyg’s earlier killing spree, insisting that the cops who worked under Jim needed their hero untarnished and that Gordon’s guilt was his to bear alone. It was a surprising statement and a direct inverse of Batman’s decision at the end of The Dark Knight, but it makes perfect sense. Gordon operates within the system. It’s only Batman, who doesn’t yet exist, who finally realizes that to be effective in Gotham requires working outside of it.

“Gordon’s a noirish detective,” McKenzie suggests. “He’s always making mistakes. He doesn’t have the full information, but he’s the smartest guy in the room, and when things culminate with the villain, he’s going to figure out how to get his way out of it. But each time he does it, he pays another price and gets beaten down.”

Tonight’s episode, “One of My Three Soups,” is a very Gordon-centric episode, and one of the strongest episodes of what’s arguably Gotham’s strongest season so far. Perhaps uncoincidentally, it was also directed by the man who knows the character better than anyone else: McKenzie. “One of My Three Soups” finds Gordon and Bullock attempting to stop a recently escaped Mad Hatter from killing thousands of people, while also offering some of the deepest insight yet into the background of Jerome Velaska, the popular recurring villain who may or may not be the Joker. (And as if Jerome and Mad Hatter weren’t exciting enough, the Scarecrow makes a pretty sweet return in it as well.)

With some of Gotham’s most dangerous villains returning to action, Gordon will once again find himself tested. Of course, he’ll rise to the occasion—that’s part of who Jim Gordon is. But with everything that’s happened since he became captain, we’re now witnessing a damaged hero try to regain his way. It’s a compelling journey, and it’s unclear at the moment where it’ll take him or if he’ll have to make the journey alone. Currently, things with his best friend Harvey are a little less than great.

“Gordon arguably has done worse than we’ve ever seen Bullock do onscreen,” McKenzie reminds us. “Harvey knows what Jim has done, more or less. Almost all of it. So, there’s a sort of brotherhood of the dirty. They know each other’s baggage and what skeletons they have in their closets. They’re more true peers now, as opposed to Jim having some sort of moral authority over Harvey. That doesn’t mean that Jim doesn’t keep striving, and it doesn’t mean that Harvey doesn’t keep going, ‘Eh, do you really want to fight this?’ But their understanding is a little different.”

As Gordon is feeling more uncertain than he ever has before, he’ll be forced to confront the newly escaped Jerome Velaska, a villain who revels in that sort of chaos—someone who would probably find the idea of one of the most honest people in Gotham being forced to lie to everyone in his life to hold onto his good reputation absolutely hilarious. Jerome has a plan to either control or destroy Gotham that will play out over the rest of the season. However, before he can get to it, Jerome finds himself unexpectedly confronting his past when he’s reunited with an abusive uncle. It doesn’t go how you’d expect, and also manages to paint the escaped psychopath in a sympathetic light.

“I think the more interesting exploration of [villains] is to push things as sympathetic as you can and to see what people react to,” shares McKenzie. “They know Jerome’s a psychopath. They know he’s a villain. There’s that old saying that ‘hurt people hurt people.’ Well, here’s a good example. Jerome was tortured brutally by his uncle, and yet, the way that he has chosen to handle that is to push that pain out at everybody else. Does that make what he’s doing right? Of course not, but we can understand him a little better.”

It’s this world of damaged heroes and sympathetic, often appealing villains that has always made the world of Batman stand out in comics, film and TV, and Gotham, even without its eventual Dark Knight, is no different. The city is all shades of grey, both metaphorically and often literally. As Carmine Falcone so perfectly said earlier this season, “The sun never shines here.”

As McKenzie puts it, “This is not a sanitized world where everyone always survives and the only people who get killed are people running from the huge superhero monster or whatever down the streets of Gotham. People are dying brutal ways all the time, and it’s just our way of reminding the audience of the tone of the show.”

Over four seasons, we’ve seen what Gotham does even to the best people. Death and destruction are the norm, corruption is everywhere and the bad guys are winning. It doesn’t take a lot to feel that way about our world as well—heck, all you really need to do is check the news. You’re bound to find something you think is awful. But what’s great about Gotham, and one of the reasons a dark show like this can continue to be such good escapism, is that we know that there’s cause for hope for the people of the city. We know that Batman’s coming, even if the characters don’t.

While shows like Supergirl, The Flash and Black Lightning give us a hero to serve as inspiration, Gotham’s approach has always been different. It shows us a world at its darkest, and given us a severely compromised hero, ultimately to demonstrate that even when things are at their worst, we should never give up hope. On Gotham, we know it’ll be Batman. In our own world and lives, only time will tell.

#Gotham #Jim Gordon #James Gordon #Ben McKenzie

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dontfeedthebabytigers · 6 years

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You’ve Got So Much Heart: Chapter 5

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When Batman was able to retrain all of the cultists and confirm that the package was a misdirect, he went to the rooftop, fists clenched and ready to defend his Robin. The sight of the Joker and Red Hood hogtied with grapple wire was not what he had expected. Only years of expert training kept Batman from displaying his confusion, but he almost slipped and showed his relief when his eyes landed on Robin. His partner sat on an AC unit nearby, a quick glance over didn’t reveal any major injuries, maybe some bruising on his cheek that was already clearing. Robin didn’t move towards him, just sat and watched as Batman walked towards him.

“Are you okay?” Robin wasn’t the best of keeping track of his injuries, so the nod he gave didn’t ease Batman’s concern. But just asking Robin was good practice for the boy to observe what his body needed.

“He’s fine.” Red Hood grumbled from where he was tied on the ground.

Batman glared at Red Hood, at the man his son had become. His eyes landed on the guns that were unloaded and disassembled next Robin, and he looked back over to Red Hood. This time felt more like an accusation than the regular contempt that Tim was familiar with.

“You can’t honestly believe that I would try to hurt him?” Even with all the family resentment that grew a little more potent every day he still felt something for the kid, something hard to place and abstract. Whatever he felt wasn’t easy to pull dissect in his mind, and there wasn’t anybody around in the single bedroom apartment that he was squatting in. So, Tim decided there were better tasks to focus on than whatever mess his family relationships had become.

“What are you doing here, Red Hood?” Batman asked with a bite in his tone that Time was used to hearing by now.

“’You’re welcome for the rescue, Red.’” Tim said with a deep growl that mimicked Batman’s before responding in a peppy voice--- not unlike the one he used as Robin. “Don’t worry about, I live to serve.”

“He can handle himself,” Batman said as Tim wondered how anyone thought that Superman was the sanctimonious one.

“That’s a great policy against that lunatic. Must have been why he was seconds away from cutting the kids throat.” Tim smirked when he saw a little twitch of a frown on Batman’s face. Finally, a reaction. “Don’t feel that you’re still three-out-of-four on Robin’s you’ve failed. Now, I never got the chance to finish high school, but if I’m not mistaken that’s still a passing grade.”

Batman had turned his attention to Robin during Tim’s jab, but the Boy Wonder looked anywhere but the white lenses of the cowl. The bravado dropped for a minute, and Batman went over to Tim and cut him loose.

“Thanks, Old man. Now, if you'll excuse me, I think there’s a gang war that needs my attention and thanks to the kid I have to go find some new weapons.”

Tim turned to leave him, but a strong hand grabbed his bicep.

“Red Hood,” Batman’s voice had that weird softness to it that Tim remembered from nights when he had fallen asleep in front of the computer, waiting for his dad to come home.

Every muscle in Tim’s body tensed on contact. He hated those memories and the way they made his gut twist and his trigger finger twitch. The only thing that kept him from ripping his arm out of his father’s grasp was a genuine curiosity of what Batman was going to say.

“Leave the Joker to us.” The Bat said. “Next time, I will have you arrested.”

Typical.

“Yeah, good seeing you too, Old Man.” Tim was about to leave when he stopped and looked at his little brother. “You are okay, right?”

Robin hid his confusion well, but Tim knew he wasn’t expecting any kind of interaction from how long it took him to nod. Tim thought that he may have seen a smile on the kid’s lips, but he called it a trick of the light and shot of his grapple to carry him away.

He was a twisting hurricane of emotions that only got more intense when he ran into Batman and Robin. Nightwing always acted entitled enough when Tim was a child that he could cut himself off and feel little for the loss of their relationship. He didn’t run into Bluejay much--- even after his brother moved back to Gotham--- and their mutual frustrations made up for the tension that had existed when Jason had first taken the title of Robin from him.

Batman and Robin were different. They were a mirror of a happier time, but a cracked and splintered one. Batman was colder now. Thought he had pulled himself together for the de--taloned bird. That ruthlessness only seemed to come back when Batman had to face what Tim had done, the failure he had become.

Tim couldn’t deal with this. He didn’t have the tools to even begin. What he did have was a utility belt and a semi-automatic at ‘home’ that called him. He had the city that killed his blood father and destroyed Tim in so many new and interesting ways. That seemed a good a place as any to start.

Batman, Robin, Bluejay, and Spoiler brought the Joker to Arkham, along with all the Laughing Widows that they could capture. Bluejay didn’t stick around and said something about staying in Jump City for the night, and Spoiler stormed off after hearing how Bruce treated Red Hood. This left Batman and Robin returning home to an almost empty Man. They showered without a word, and the silence was only broken when Bruce caught Dick in an attempt to sneak upstairs.

“Not so fast, chum. You know the drill.”

Dick threw his head back in a dramatic fashion that let Bruce know that not all the performing instincts had been removed from his ward. They went to the Med Bay, where Bruce pulled on a pair of latex gloves as Dick climbed on one of the many cots. Dick pulled off the Gotham Academy sweater--- one that Bruce recognized from Damian’s wardrobe--- with practiced ease.

Bruce got to work testing Dick’s range of motion--- each of his movements televised and in the same order that they always occurred. His ward seemed to be telling the truth when he said that he had no injuries. The light bruising that had been on his jaw was already a pale yellow and would be gone by morning. Physically, his son was okay, but there was something brewing behind his blue eyes.

“That was the first time you faced the Joker in a while. How are you doing?”

Dick shrugged, and other than that motion he seemed indifferent to the events of the night.

All of Bruce’s children had run-ins with the Joker, they ranged from disturbing to unspeakable in their horror. The encounters left his own stomach turning on the best night. He had expected that Dick would be immune to the horrors of the Joker after the trauma he had experienced at the hands of the Court. But the madman had his way of ruining minds. He frustrated Damian, drove Tim to extremes, angered Jason, and, somehow, managed to make Dick wake up in a cold sweat.

His ward would never admit his fear; he didn’t know how. Bruce would worry more if Dick wasn’t so good at bouncing back from the horrific encounters with the Joker. His unshakable optimism was a mystery to Bruce and catnip for the Joker. Maybe he shouldn’t have Robin out tonight, even if it was assumed to be a punishment. Better to be upset for a while then face another criminal intent on destroying his already corrupted innocence. Bruce wondered if Dick would listen to him, or if that would be the last straw. Dick had been a rule-breaker in the beginning, and Bruce was waiting for the day that his ward’s rebellious streak came back.

He would need to consult with the others before any decisions were made about Dick being allowed to confront the Joker. In the meantime, he chose to focus on the nasty bruise that he found on Dick’s shoulder blade.

“I see your nightly activities went smoothly,” Alfred commented on the lack of gaping wounds as he entered the Med Bay with a tray that carried two hot chocolates. “How are you feeling, Master Dick?”

Dick took his mug and held out a thumb up.

“Then there’s cause for celebration. How does blueberry pancakes for breakfast sound?”

Dick beamed at his grandfather that knew that Dick’s all-time favorite was blueberry pancakes.

“Of course, I don’t believe those pancakes would take nearly as delicious when the person eating them is sleep deprived. I shudder to think that any blueberry pancakes might go to waste.” Alfred put all of his Shakespearean training into his performance.

Dick’s sense of theater still needed working on as he was soon staring wide-eyed and worried at Alfred.

“A jest, my lad. However, I must insist you make up for last night with at least eight hours of rest.”

Dick considered, but he soon nodded in agreement.

“Why don’t you head up, chum,” Bruce said, snapping off the gloves and throwing them away. “I’ll join you in a few minutes to lock up the Manor.”

He nodded once, put the sweater back on, and jumped off the table.

Once they were out of his exceptional earshot, Bruce deflated with a curse.

“I take it capturing the Joker did not go as well as I had originally thought,” Alfred said handed Bruce his hot chocolate.

“He separated us, and somehow got the upper hand on Dick.” Bruce took a long drink from his hot chocolate and hoped it would soothe his nerves like the drink had when he was a scared child. “Red Hood was there too.”

Alfred looked down. “I see. How was Master Tim, did he look healthy?”

“He did, just pissed at me for the most part.”

“So, I see nothing has changed.”

“Maybe,” Bruce said. “He saved Dick”

“They were always close.” Alfred smiled as fond memories of laughter from happier times played in his mind.

“yeah, they were.” Bruce meant to say more, as he always did. He had a bad habit of only speaking his mind when it wasn’t necessary or wanted. “I should get up there to him.”

“Best not to leave the lad waiting,” Alfred said, and only when Bruce was near the stairs did he call to him. “Be sure to get some rest yourself, Master Bruce. I would hate if your pancake experience was anything less than sublime.”

Bruce’s mouth twitched in the small smile that he had gotten so good at over the years. He then headed up stone stairs and left Alfred alone as the butler pulled a picture from his breast pocket. It was old, two long creases in it from being folded for years. The photo stayed with him always. The only remaining photo of Timothy Drake that remained outside of the Manor’s attic. He smiled and held on to that sweet sound of laughter for just a little longer before folding the photo and putting it away again.

#you've got so much heart #miranda writes #dick grayson #tim drake #bruce wayne #fanfic

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horrorinthegraveyard · 6 years

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Like I have this au that I want to write that’s like Flashpoint but... idk better imo. like.. okay imma walk whoever wants to read through this, and also for my own benefit in case I actually wanna write it.

Okay so.. y’all know flashpoint was where Bruce died and Thomas and Martha take on the identities of Batman and Joker respectfully. Okay, same premise. Bruce dies, Martha and Thomas are devastated. It’s maybe their first real time being victims of a crime like this and they get to see just how terrible the GCPD is at their jobs.

Thomas’s experience ends up with similar conclusions as his son would have made, with him deciding the police and the city need help beyond financial. They need someone who can work around the law to bring criminals to justice and expose corruption in a way the police can’t. Thomas wants to work along with the system to improve it. He wants this version of Gotham, but better and will work to build that up. While Thomas is building up Batman (how ever he gets the inspiration), he is in and out, absent for long periods of time, either at Wayne Enterprises, or out prowling the streets as whatever version of the vigilante he has at the moment and as much Alfred is comforting and supportive, Martha’s husband isn’t there when she needs him to be.

Martha’s experience is quite different. She’s a philanthropist, she wants to help people. She realizes her son’s case is not unique. She’s realizing that other families are being torn apart in the same way and not getting the justice they deserve and the police are 1/2 the problem. When she brings it up, to the police chief, to the mayor, to her husband, she’s told to just smile for the camera and stop being angry. It’s unbecoming for a lady of her status, they’ll take care of it as much as possible. It’s not too terribly much different than what she did before, always pushing for change, but now it’s aggressive and demanding. She realizes that she can’t keep funding a broken system. It needs to be torn down and rebuilt, but no matter how much money you can throw at a problem, you still need people to want to change.

She starts a group that starts just as an investigative team focused on exposing corruption within the governmental and corporate worlds and ends up bordering on terrorist organization. Thomas goes from aligning with the group as a vigilante to wanting to bring them down, unawares that Martha heads it. At some point Martha stages her death. The group plans on bombing ACE chemicals. They’re dumping chemicals and it is soaking into the ground water, as well as unsafe, hazardous, and abusive working conditions and there’s a belief that they might have been part of the hit that was placed on the Waynes that resulted in they’re son’s death. Thomas is looking for justice, Martha is taking revenge.

A masked Thomas tries to intercept the group and does. He stops them from placing the bomb, but gets into a direct altercation with a masked Martha. Do they realize who is who? I don’t know. What I do know is that Martha falls into the chemicals. Thomas tries to drain the vat, but her body is swept out with the liquid into the Gotham river. She emerges changed, disfigured, and lost, cohesive memory gone. She doesn’t know who she is. Maybe she’s found and sent to Arkham? Who knows but she still has this drive to destroy the institution and build a better Gotham, though it is now a highly corrupted evil thing.

anyway thanks for coming

#fic idea #(g)raveyard posts

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obsessing-stressing · 7 years

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Fun House: Chapter 9

I paced the room trying to figure out how to get passed Jay and Maria. They stared at me, knowing that I was thinking about escaping. I stopped and turned to them, hands on hips.

"Why does he like me? How can I use this to get what I want?"

They looked at each other and Maria cleared her throat.

"He does not know this because he does not remember her. Bliss, you are very similar to his deceased wife. Did you ever hear the story as to why he and the Bat have beef?"

I shook my head.

"Mr. J was once called Jack Napier and he was a humble comedian. His wife got really sick and he could not find any legal means to pay for her medical bills. So he started working for Urin. You see Urin is the leader of Red Dragon and they used to run the streets before Jack became Joker."

My blood ran cold. I knew who Urin was. His name sent me back, years into the past when I was just a little girl. My father worked for Gotham Police. I remember sitting at the door waiting for him to come home, I was six years old. The old lady next door would watch me until he got home and she was passed out on the couch when a knock came at the door. I ran to it hoping to see daddy, but it wasn't him. A man in police uniform stood at the door. I knew who he was. I've seen him at our neighborhood barbeques. He was staring down at me, face ragged with age and despair.

"Can I come in sweetie?"

His voice was deep and even though it was soft it appeared to reverberate around the room. I nodded and stepped out of his way so he could come in. He woke up the old lady, Mrs. Mayberry and spoke to her quietly. When she began to cry, I knew something bad had happened.

"What will happen to her? She can't go back to that woman!"

She cried, grabbing his arm.

I held my police bear tightly when the man kneeled before me. He told me that my dad was gone, but I was too shocked to respond. I did not cry, I just stared at him. He and the old lady paused when I began to laugh. I did not know how to deal with what he was saying. I was a child and trying to process that my dad was gone was impossible. So I began to laugh and laugh. After a few days had passed I could only lie there on my bed. I understood that my dad was not coming back. My mother, as she was the only living relative, came to get me. She seemed sober from all the drugs and alcohol and I began to think that things would be better with her now. I was wrong. A few months later she sold me for drugs. I was in a whore house for several months, until the man who told me my father was killed discovered my location. It was years later that I found out in my mother's final breathes she told him she had sold me and how sorry she was. I never forgave her and despite the police man's effort the system would not allow him to raise me as he was not family and was single. So, in order to get more money from the government they put me in foster care. Things were better here, safer. I went from place to place until I was 16 and they kicked me out. I was a troubled teen, but who wouldn't be. My life was shit and I was going to do whatever I could to get out of here. Over the years the name Urin kept popping up and after I heard he killed the police man who helped me in a shootout I looked him up. That's how I found out this was the man who took my father away from me and left me to rot in hell.

"Bliss, Bliss?"

I snapped out of my daze when Jay began to shake me.

"What?"

"I asked if you were okay, you kind of zoned out there."

I shook myself and stared at Maria. She could see that something was wrong, but chose not to push the issue.

"I'm fine, continue."

"Okay. So, Jack was doing a heist at one of the biggest banks in the city. Urin wanted this rare Japanese Diamond studded dragon pendant, called wait for it Red Dragon. It was an old piece he claimed belonged to his family. So Mr. J and some goons set out to get it. Urin promised that if Jack could get that pendant, he would save his wife. So that's what Jack did. He was able to get the pendant, but Batman got in the way of them getting back to Red Dragon. One thing led to another and due to Batman's stupidity, Jack fell into the acid bath and became the Joker. It was only a little later after her death that Batman found out that Jack was no ordinary criminal. He was just a man trying to save his wife."

I stared at her. This, Urin destroys lives for dumb things like a fucking pendant. I wish him a painful death.

"How do you know this, Maria?"

"I used to be one of Urin's women, until Mr. J kicked his ass and took everything."

"So I remind him of his, wife?"

She nodded.

"I only saw a picture of her once and from what Jack used to say about her personality, you remind me of her. It only makes sense that Mr. J would see it too. Even if he says all his memories are gone, I think Jack is still in there. Yearning for the woman he loved."

I could understand Jokers pain and if the man I saw when his eyes softened was a remnant of Jack, it made sense. I felt terrible for thinking it, but if I could use this to my advantage I could save Antwan and get us all out of here.

Maria stared at me, seeming to read my mind.

"It could work, but are really going to risk everything for this guy? You do not toy with the Joker and if he finds out what you're doing… I cannot say what he will do and I won't be able to protect you."

Jay stayed silent. I guess hearing Joker's story got to him. I know they've all known each other for years, but I guess that never came up.

"I have to try. Antwan should not suffer from these old men's vendetta."

"We will help you."

Jay finally spoke.

Maria snapped her head at him in shock.

"Should we really be putting ourselves in anymore danger, I mean I like you and shit, but If I'm going to die I'd rather it be for a good reason."

Jay pushed her away from the door and began to open it.

"Maria, if saving an innocent guy's life from the fuckery of this world is not a good reason then I don't know what is. From what you said and how Mr. J acted I think we can all get out of this alive. Bliss, if you beg Mr. J not to harm us because we are your friends and show him that you are willing to submit to him-"

"Wait, excuse me?"

I asked, shaking my head.

"Hear me out. Now he wants you. Whether it's the dead guy in his head or the crazy guy inhabiting it, he wants you. If you can sweet talk him into letting us live and leaving with Antwan then we would be in the clear."

"What are you asking me to do here?"

"Well, I mean you know."

"I'm not going to sleep with him, Jay!"

"He has a point, here. If you want to get to get us out, you're going to have to give Mr. J what he wants. Sweetie, that's you."

I smacked myself in frustration. It hurt, but I needed to make sure this was real.

"NO! I will figure something out, but I will not give my body to anyone unless I want to! Do you fucking hear me?"

I screamed.

A man on the other side of the door yelled back.

"Yes mam!"

"That guy gets it! Now, let's fucking go and we will figure this shit out later."

I rushed past them and shoved the door open all the way before they could continue to speak in stupid. They followed suit and when any of the goons tried to get close they closed ranks around me professing that I was going to be getting my mark very soon. The goons were suspicious, but chose to stay clear of pissing off Joker. Maria and Jay led me through a room and I screamed at the sight before me.

"Antwan!"

I ran to him and covered my mouth. He was strapped to a chair and stared at me, eyes wide. His mouth was sewn shut, but the worst part was he was naked and his skin was gone. He was skinned alive and somehow survived it. I began to cry and tried to reach the bindings, but Jay pulled me away. He shook me to clear my racing mind.

"That's not him, Bliss. It's one of Urin's, men. He tried to kill Mr. J and well the guy would not tell us where Urin was after all the torture. So, Mr. J decided to see if taking his skin would soften him up or at least to see what it would be like to use one of his new toys."

"What the fuck! What the fuck! Oh, hell no. You want me to fuck that monster? Who the hell does that shit?"

"Urin taught him everything he knows, Bliss."

Maria said opening a door in front of us. When Jay pulled me through, she continued.

"Jack was gone the moment Mr. J stepped out of the acid. Bat's had him taken to Arkham and he stayed there for years. Shit was a nightmare from what I could get out of him. The things they do to you there. After spending so much time there being "counseled" he learned how to turn people's words and thoughts against them and used it for his purposes. Soon he was able to escape and Urin found him wandering the streets doing some crazy shit to anyone he could get his hands on. He looked like a clown and felt that everyone should look like him so he maimed them. He found it hard to carve their face while they were still alive, but Urin found his work art and began to teach him how to keep his victims alive."

I gagged at the thought. I heard about the clown faced killer. I should have known it was him.

"Overtime, the man we know as the Joker was created. Bliss, he was not always the one on top and I mean that in more ways than one."

I stared at her, wide-eyed. He and Urin were lovers? I shivered in disgust. She nodded at my reaction. Jay remained silent and continued to hold my arm.

"One day, Urin got a little too excited and slashed Jokers face. He wanted to carve a permanent smile on him. So when he fucked him ragged, Mr. J always looked like he enjoyed it. We both know that Mr. J hates his appearance. Can you imagine how he felt when Urin cut his face?"

"I never saw any scars?"

I said, heart sinking at what Joker went through.

"You wouldn't. It was almost twenty years ago. They healed with the proper medicine, but I'm sure you noticed how big his smile is and how he always seems to be grinning? Almost cat like."

I covered my mouth, trying not to cry. Urin was a monster, who created and even worse monster. Jay squeezed my arm and when I looked at him I could see he was enraged by what we were hearing. I could see that he too loved Joker. I could not understand why, though. I get that his past is shit, but how can they love that monster, I thought.

"So in order to get his revenge of having his face marred he bided his time and when Urin was at his weakest, Mr. J took everything. He killed anyone who got in his way and Urin went into hiding. Until recently, we started hearing rumors about the Red Dragon's return. Mr. J thinks, Urin is behind the mayors new found riches and the reason why Mr. J can't touch him."

"So he took Antwan trying to weed him out?"

I asked, pulling away from Jay because his grip on my arm was starting to hurt.

"You go it sister."

Maria stopped at a red door and glance back at me.

"Please tell me you have a plan? Once I open this door, there is no turning back."

Before I could answer I heard blood curdling screams from the other side. I rushed past her and slammed open the door. Antwan was tied to a giant wheel and being spent around while Mr. J was throwing knives at him. I could see that some of them had hit Antwan in various places. Strangely enough not anywhere that would be fatal.

"Joker, stop!"

I screamed and ran until I was in front of Antwan. I heard him whimper my name, but I ignored him and stared at Joker. His eyes were glazed and his head tilted slightly, he seemed to not recognize me. His hair was disheveled and his red shirt was unbuttoned showing a muscular torso. His breath was heavy and he was sweating. If I did not know any better I would say he was turned on by torturing Antwan. From what I just learned about him, I could only conclude that it was so.

"Joker?"

I flinched when he lifted the knife, aiming it at me, but Maria quietly spoke to him.

"Don't do it Mr. J. That's Bliss. You don't want to hurt, Bliss."

He cocked his head in her direction, closed his eyes and took a deep breath. His voice was deep and full of wanton.

"I-I… I told you to keep her in the room. She was safe in the room. Did I not make myself clear?"

He yelled turning and throwing the knife at Maria. Mr. Pearson had moved extremely close to Maria and Jay so he was able to deflect it. She gasped and fell back a step.

"Joker, please don't hurt-"

"Shut up! You don't get to speak. Shut up!"

He started for me, but stopped and grabbed his head. He began to mumble to himself. Instead of moving away I stepped towards him. I did not stop till I was merely inches from him. I knew I was playing a dangerous game, but I needed to get my friends away from him. He flinched when I touched his face, I heard Mr. Pearson clear his throat. When I looked at him he mouthed 'Do not touch his face'. I was being real stupid and ignored him. Joker's face was soft and I could feel some stubble. He groaned when I caressed his face.

"Joker-"

He stopped me again from speaking, but this time it was with his lips. He smashed them against mine. He used his hand to keep me there and used his other to pry my mouth open. The kiss was hot and his tongue tangled with mine. Fear engulfed me, but I also felt a wave of pleasure. It hit me so hard I stumbled, but he grabbed my ass and pulled me against him. His body was so hot and hard and I could feel his dick against my stomach. I tried to pull away because the feeling of kissing and being against him was too intense. My stomach tightened from the lust that consumed my body. He pulled me tighter and lifted me up by one leg, pressing my vagina into his dick. Then he began to walk me forward until I slammed against the wall. The pain of hitting the wall caused me to cry out. He growled and thrust against me. Even through my jeans he was able to hit the right spot and I moaned in pleasure and pain. He rode against me so hard it hurt. His moans were deep and full of blatant desire. It was not until I felt him trying to unbutton my jeans that I crashed back to reality. I opened my eyes to see that Mara and Jay were removing Antwan from the wheel and heading towards the door. My eyes landed on Mr. Pearson, he stared back at me. His eyes were cold and unfeeling.

He tilted his head, some of his hair under his black hat fell to cover one of his eyes, and whispered.

"Do you want me to stop him? You won't like what he'll do to you if this continues."

When I nodded, he immediately ripped Joker from me. Joker roared in rage and turned on Mr. Pearson. When Joker tried to punch him, Mr. Pearson hit him so hard in the stomach that he doubled over. Mr. Pearson though thin in frame lifted Joker up with ease and carried him to a nearby chair. He turned to me, adjusting his hair.

"Leave and do not come back, unless you are ready to take all of him. He won't chase you, but if you return I will not help you again."

I looked at Joker, who lay slumped in the chair. I looked at how beautiful he looked, his face serene. I thought about how it felt to have him against me and how much my body ached for him. It scared me; I should not be feeling this way. He was a monster and abused Antwan for his desire for revenge. No matter the reasons I could list to hate him, I wanted him so much it hurt to breath. I turned for the door and ran towards it, but before I left I looked back at him. When I saw him twitch I slipped through the red door. Running from him and what he made me feel.

#jared leto #jared leto joker #jared leto fanfiction #fanfic

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