The Rose Tatoo

Printer Friendly Version
Back

-In the not too distant future, during Ruth’s foul plan,
-A bunch of kids got moved, from a satellite to the can.
-She sent to prison as a ratings bit, expecting them to quietly sit,
-They tried their best to keep face, but they didn’t much like it just drifting in space!

Lizy: Screw you guys, I get to be the star now!

-They read awful fanfics (ooh ooh ooh) Heaven only knows why! (la la la)
-It’s an impulse now they can’t control, but they’ll give it a sporting try!
-Now keep in mind they can control (ooh ooh ooh) When the fics begin and end. (la la la)
-But they have lost their sanity, at least they are still friends!

-Prisoner role-call:

Alex! (What is WRONG with you people?)
Season! (It’s Eevee now, so there!)
Robert! (Yep, still here.)
Anja! (~I get to be the pervert, I get to be the pervert!~)
Lizy! (My world, my rules!)
Allen! (Why didn’t I see this coming?)
Kat! (It’s so nice to be involved.)
Chriiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiis! (*whines* Why am I last?)

-If you're wondering what is going on, and other useless facts.
-I'm telling you this: "It's fanfiction now. Sit down and relax!"
-For Mystery Science Theater 4000!

Somewhere in space the crew formally tortured aboard the Satellite of Love, not that famous one from that TV show but a parody version of it, drifted aimlessly as they tried to pinpoint their location and figure out their next move. This was difficult seeing as how they were not so much on any kind of spaceship but on a sort of drifting prison, the only way on or off being a teleporter controlled solely by a deranged phychopath soil-side who was holding them there as part of a ratings gimmick. It also did not have anything that resembled a navigation system or propulsion system or anything. But it did have internet, and where there is internet, there is always hope.

"So, the plan is to determine our position by comparing stars we can see out of our window with space star-charts on this website of negotiable authenticity," Alex reviewed slowly, "and then what?"

"Well," Lizy looked up from her laptop, "Umm... we will need Ronnie's location, somehow, and then we can, ummm, go to him?"

"How?"

"Ummm... Robert?"

Robert looked up from the marionette stage he painstakingly, and sort of manically, crafted out of scrap plastic and paper plates from the meals Ruth materialized for them. He was in the middle of the second act of The Glass Menagerie starring Peter Spoonhead and Cangirl. "What?"

"Any suggestions?"

He set the dolls down and stood up from his crouch, eyes narrowing, "What makes you think I have any ideas?"

"Well, you did run maintenance when we were on the Satellite, so I thought maybe you knew how..."

"You know how to run Ad-Aware on your laptop, defrag, and run disk cleap-up. Can you take a Speak-and-Spell and make it do calculus?"

Lizy's bottom lip stuck out slightly, "Well there is no need to yell at me about it," she pouted. Sighing she then stood up from her chair. "I miss the MSTs, at least it gave us something to do." Turning on her heels and heading to her room she huffed, "I'm going my room to read questionable fanfiction."

Chris raised his hand, "I propose we go back to our original plan of begging Ruth shamelessly for mercy."

Eevee and Anja rose from their seats and headed after Lizy.

(Door one: The door to Lizy's room. It, umm, has bars on it, 'cause it's in a prison.)

>The Rose Tattoo

Anja: Directed by Daniel Mann, based on a play by Tennessee Williams adapted by Hal Kanter.

>Jay Tryfanstone

Lizy: Or that.

>I own nothing DC Comics are the gods

All: *worship*

>of the graphic universe and own all...

Eevee: You don't own me, you aren't my mother.

>("Why did it have to be so complicated? You and Bruce...all these issues

Eevee: Stupid orphan crybabies.

>...couldn't you have just taken him to bed,

Lizy: Yep, nothing like statutory incest to simplify life.
Eevee: Is that what it's called?
Lizy: I dunno. Whatever it is its gross.

>boy toy?"

Anja: *giggles*
Lizy: Well, he was sort of everyone's bitch, wasn't he?
Eevee: (Batman) Robin, use the Bat-lube!

>"I do."

Anja: Oh, well, the fic is over then.

>Babs snorts in amusement

Anja: Anja cackles in pleasure.
Lizy: Lizy titters in regalement.
Eevee: Eevee snickers in merriment.

>"Well, it made it much more fun." Dick grinned.)

Eevee: What is this fic about again?

>Chapter 1.

Lizy: The hell it is.

>The slow, beautiful curve of a trained body in motion, one heart-stopping glimpse, just the
> barest hint of an elegant, controlled fall that takes him out of sight and camera angle.

Anja: Boy-toy. Is this a screen-play or a fanfic?

>Images on the screen.

Eevee: Mad super villains threatening police with advanced weaponry hilariously made-up to look like innocent childhood play-things.
Anja: Huge kryptonite meteors hurtling towards earth backed by invading armies of winged gorillas.
Lizy: Kryto the Superdog teaming up with Ace the Bathound to stop the Jocker's hyenas from stealing the prize money from the dog show.

>The newsreader, glasses, lacquered hair.

Anja: Green skin, scales, gills.

>"...and caught yesterday evening on amateur videotape,

Anja: They show those on the news now?

>the first confirmed pictures of Bludhaven's very own vigilante -"

Eevee: (newsreader) The Pissinator! With the uncanny ability to control urine of both man and beast he fights for justice in the mean sewers. Faster than a bladder full of Jolt Cola, stronger than a little box reeking of cat ammonia-
Anja: That's enough, dear. You're done.

>Rewind.

Lizy: No! Fast-forward! Fast-forward!!

>Click.

Eevee: Whirrr... Beep!

>That singular grace. The camera doesn't see the line and curve of muscle beneath the
>costume, of the smooth black hair and

Anja: The outline of his penis along his left leg.
Lizy: Eww, boys in tights.

>the callused palms of that body I know as well as my own.

Lizy: *cough* Bat-bitch *cough*

>Rewind.

Anja: Obsessed much?

>Click.

Eevee: Noun, A brief, sharp sound, i.e. the click of a door latch.

>The camera doesn't, can't, show those blue eyes, laughing, the mischief, the glee as he
> made one of those terrible puns.

Anja: (Robin) Holey rusted metal, Batman!

>Rewind.

Eevee: *moan*
Lizy: Again?

>Click.

Anja: Doesn't Batman have villains to thwart, or maybe a company to run, or something?

>It's early afternoon, and already darkening.

Lizy: Welcome to Washington.
Eevee: I'm pretty sure Gotham isn't in Washington.
Lizy: Shut up, I can dream.

>Winter.

Anja: ~We'll frolic and play, The Eskimo way, Walking in a winter wonderland.~

>Across the garden, lengthening shadows start to hide the detail of Alfred's cherished

Anja: Collection of erotic sculptures.

>roses.

Eevee: Or that.

>As always, dark calls to the dark in me: in my belly I feel claws flexing against the night to
>come. But this time is mine. It's only when he has gone that I find this cool centre,

Anja: R-e is the cool way to spell er.

>this heartbeat of space that is mine alone, not Batman's - although he's here, of course,
>how can he not be? - or Bruce's.

Eevee: So, wait, who is this?

>This space is for me, and I've learnt how to give it time. Later, he said that the darkness
>of the Bat was overwhelming, that he felt isolated, that he needed more - more what?

Anja: Sex. Hot gay Bat-sex.

>Affection? Praise? - even love? Now he's gone, it's as if the gap he left was the space I,
>myself, was forced to fill.

Lizy: But what am I? What are any of us? What is the universe?

>So here I am, in this time when I allow myself to be,

Lizy: We can only be what we allow and when we allow. Being is perception. But what is perception?

>watching a four-month-old five point two second video tape on a repetitive loop,

Anja: You know, that’s bad for the cassette.

>with my hand resting on the cutting book

Eevee: What's a cutting book?
Lizy: *shrugs*

>that Alfred politely pretends

Anja: Is a Playboy magazine, like a normal person would have.

>doesn't exist.

Lizy: What is existence?
Anja: Yeah, stop. You’re done.

>Even if every so often I open it and find scraps that the cutting agency missed.

Eevee: What's a cutting agency?
Lizy: If only I knew that sentence might make sense somehow.

>It's a constant battle not to do more.

Lizy: Yeah, I fight my strongest battles against my urges to do things.
Eevee: You just think it's funny because you're a lazy bastard.

>I could set feeders into Bludhaven's protective closed-circuit television system (and
>probably be the only one watching.)

Anja: Why would they have it if no one was going to watch it?
Lizy: I'm more concerned with why or how they could have it when Bludhaven is essentially an industrial wasteland.

>I could place just a couple of bugs in the police headquarters, maybe one just near
>enough to his desk: maybe one in the bunkhouse where he sleeps sometimes.

Lizy: Yeah, sleeping, absolutely riveting.
Anja: (Batman) Oh, yeah, Nightwing, you sound so sexy when you're sleeping. Snore for me, baby, snore for me!

>Then where do I stop?

Eevee: You could try here.

>Cameras on every chimney? Half my life caught up in watching his?

Eevee: He should so do that.
Anja: I'm kinda surprised he doesn't.

>And his privacy ripped open as if I owned every moment?

Anja: You're Bruce Wayne! You could buy and sell every moment on earth if you wanted!

>I owe him more than that.

Anja: Yeah, the taking him and financing his future and training them and all of that doesn't begin to cover the debt he owes to the kid for constantly screwing up, making bad jokes, talking to himself, forcing Bruce to watch sappy movies, and occasionally resembling competence.

>He knew, too, when he came to Bludhaven, that I wouldn't do it. At least I have honour
>left for that.

Eevee: Ahhg... angst, angst, angst!
Anja: When is something going to, like, happen?

>As it is, I feel ashamed of the video and the album:

Eevee: As you should!

>the money I spent trying to trace him over the three years he was gone.

Anja: Why does he NEVER run out of money?
Lizy: He's Bruce Wayne, obviously. His money supply is infinite, despite never actually doing anything to run his company ever and despite spending incredible amounts on gadgets and replacement batmobiles, and despite pretty much financing the Justice League...
Eevee: What about all of those other rich guys? I mean, what is up with the wealth distribution?
Lizy: I suppose you have a point. Between Luthor and Wayne that's about the entire country's wealth, isn't it?
Anja: No wonder the police are so ineffective, they probably have no funding.

>Over the trees the translucent curve of a quarter moon has started to show.

Eevee: On the fifth branch from the top of the tree two trees to the right of said moon and nest of young birds have started to settle down for a slumber.
Lizy: And seven branches below that a squirrel has started to pack nuts into a knothole.
Anja: And on the ground a lowly caterpillar has started to inch its way from a pebble five feet to the right of said tree to a pebble two feet to the right of a tree three trees to the left of the previously mentioned moon.

>I can feel the itch that says, soon, night is coming.

Anja: *snicker* Coming. *snicker*

>I hear the faint, cushioned thud of the front door: Alfred, back from Leslie's clinic with the
>smell of antiseptic still on him.

Anja: Ooooh, you know what that means.
Eevee: Alfred scraped his knees?

>Take the video out, tuck the album at the back of the second drawer of the desk.

Lizy: No one will think to look there.

>Pause,

Eevee: Oh good, whew, I needed a breather there, it was all going so fast.

>one second, to look down into the happy smile of a ten year old Richard John Greyson,

Eevee: Little boys are so cute.
Lizy and Anja: *snicker*
Eevee: What? I like little boys.
Lizy and Anja: *hysterical laughter*

>seated in a cloud of wrapping paper with a brand new

Anja: Vibrator.

>red leather harness

Anja: *snicker* Or that.
Lizy: Eww...
Eevee: Didn't see that coming.

>for Elinore.

Lizy: Oh, well, I guess that's alright them.
Eevee: I don't know about that. Who's Elinore?
Anja: Their whore. They share her, alternating weekends and all that.
Lizy: *sweatdrop* I'm pretty sure Elinore is a horse.
Anja: Eeew! Now that's just wrong!

>When he went, I couldn't bear to see the photographs.

Anja: No? That's terrible! No, please go on, we haven't got enough angst yet.

>Nor could I destroy them,

Eevee: They were made of indestructible GUNDANIUM ALLOY!

>although that first day,

Lizy: ~On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, ~
Eevee: Lizy?
Lizy: Yeah?
Eevee: No singing for you.
Lizy: But-
Eevee: No.

>with the anger stripping my veins like acid,

Anja: Anger, the handy-dandy catalyst you can take anywhere. It cleans up paint, removes nailpolish, destroys rust, and strips veins!
Lizy: Oww...

>I had to ask Alfred to take them down. They've gone back up, of course,

Lizy: Of course.
Anja: ~I get knocked down, but I get up again.~

>the graduation photograph in here, the picnic and party ones Alfred keeps on the larder
>door, the formal portrait in the main sitting room.

Anja: (Batman) The "special" pictures in my armoire.

>I keep some here. It was the picture of Dick with a ponytail,

Eevee: *snicker* Ponytail. What a gay-o-sexual.

>added to Alfred's kitchen gallery that let me know he was still alive.

Lizy: Yeah, sure, that's what it's there for.

>Alfred said nothing, of course,

Eevee: (Batman) But he was thinking it, damn it! He had it coming!

>but I knew by the curve of his back when I walked in the kitchen that something had
>changed. He was tense.

Eevee: By the curve of his back? How massively homosexual can you get?
Anja: Oh, I'm sure it will get worse.
Lizy: Shut up you two, Batman is all man!

>"What is it?" I had asked. He hadn't answered, but I followed his gaze to the bank of
>photographs.

Lizy: Is stuff happening yet?

>I don't know what I felt then. Relief, anger, pain, jealousy: all of these and more.

Eevee: Pssh, that's what you get for having feelings.

>And I know that it showed. Alfred looked shell-shocked. "Master Richard -"he began. I
>hadn't waited to hear anything else.

Eevee: (Batman) I killed him on the spot. With his own feather duster.

>He never mentioned it again.

Lizy: He learned his lesson them. Damn servants, always mouthing off, mentioning things.

>Nor he mention

Lizy: Oh! Oh! Oh! A grammar error!
Eevee: It's hard to be too critical, this beats the pants off most of the fics we have read.

>the small print

Eevee: The small, sexy print.

>of Dick with a group of teenagers,

Eevee: A group of sexy teenagers.

>the camera so focused that nothing could be seen except their

Eevee: *inhales*
Lizy and Anja: No.
Eevee: Aww...

>faces: Dick on a practice mat,

Lizy: I'm pretty sure that is incorrect use of a colon.
Anja: Yeah, a comma would have been more appropriate, especially since it's only a two part list. You would think Jay could have just used the word ‘and.’ Or ‘or.’
Eevee: Now that's just crazy talk.

>the muscles of one arm straining against the weight of a thick-set woman

Eevee: Well we can't all be like those anorexic chicks you see on TV.

>whose face was hidden behind the curve of his jacket.

Lizy: I never thought I would get tired of hearing the word curve, but I think that just did it for me.

>Or the picture of Dick seen from the back, outlined against the white metal curve

Lizy: Yep, defiantly tired of it.

>of a balcony balustrade, in front of him the dark highlights of sea at night. All so carefully
>anonymous. The photographs were hand delivered: bright-faced youngsters

Anja: Bright faced youngsters? Now if that doesn't scream pedophile, what does? He might as well say "strapping young lads" or "soft, supple little boys."

>who'd been asked to pass on a small parcel by other wanderers, a loose confederation
>whom Alfred fed and Bruce bought plane tickets for:

Lizy: Jeez, another colon? What do you want, punctuation master of the year? I could use fancy punctuation too, you know.

>none of them knew more than this address. And, always, the packages came to Alfred.

Lizy: That's a little harsh.

>That hurt, but what more could I expect? It was, after all, my fault.

Eevee: All your fault! Everything is all your fault!

>I feel the creature inside me tense its wings.

Eevee: (Ignignot) That sounds like a personal problem.
Lizy: That sounds like something he should get looked at.

>Time to go.

Eevee: Whoa there, already? You're moving way too fast buddy, slow down a bit.

>For once, it's a relief to be patrolling on my own. Tim's away, gone to visit an aunt in
>Oklahoma.

Anja: ~Oklahoma, where the wind comes sweepin' down the plain,
And the wavin' wheat can sure smell sweet,
When the wind comes right behind the rain.~

>Without Robin, the world seems just a little darker, and tonight that's what I need.

Eevee: Makes you wonder how he can even see anything in all that darkness.

>Dick would have said, of course, that I made my own darkness, and he'd be right: but I
>don't think he realised the colour that he brought into that instinctive, protective night.

Lizy: Now I'm almost certain that colon is wrong. If nothing else it was unnecessary.

>Tim is the partner I want: trustworthy, intelligent, bright.

Lizy: Am I the only one bothered by these colons?
Anja: Yes, now shut up.

>Dick was the partner I needed. And the partner I nearly destroyed.

Eevee: Notice how he doesn't mention the one who got killed.
Lizy: Who, Todd?
Anja: Pshh, screw Todd, everybody hates Todd.

>Tonight, I need to hit something. Hard.

Eevee: (Batman) On second thought, I really need to tap something lightly. Yeah, that'll do the trick.

>I'm in luck: one of the club-land mobs has decided to run a little white powder

Eevee: Flour?

>into the docks, maybe hoping that the cold will deter onlookers.

Lizy: That'll never work.

>It does,

Lizy: WHAT?! No way!

>apart from this one.

Lizy: Oh, whew, I though I was wrong for a second.
Anja: You're an idiot.
Lizy: Anja! That hurt!
Anja: Sorry, without the boys around I'm going through insult withdrawl.

>It doesn't take long to knock some heads together, leave them tied in the back of the
>van, send a message to Gordon.

Eevee: Seems kinda harsh for flour smuggling.

>Small fry, opportunistic smuggling. If I thought it was more, I'd have left them and tagged
>the van and the cargo:

Lizy: Co-
Anja: *glares*
Lizy: Umm... kidney?

>no one runs big shipments through my city with impunity.

Anja: (Batman) Unless I get a lil' off the top, you know what I'm sayin'?

>As it is, it's not enough: night slides across my skin,

Lizy: OK, that is, like, the 13th colon!
Anja: I suppose that is a little odd.

>leaving an ache like fever that asks for more.

Anja: (Fever) More, I demand more!

>I head downtown,

Anja: ~Downtown, Where the folks are broke.
Downtown, Where your life's a joke.
Downtown, When you buy your token, you go,
Home to skid row.~
Lizy: *claps* I love that song!

>pick up a idiot trying his first dime-store raid, a group of kids hassling one of the old men
>from the park.

Eevee: (kid) Hey old man, did you know you could have saved up to 15% by switching to Geico?!

>Homeless he maybe: that doesn't make him fair game.

Lizy: Yes it does.

>I wind up on one the warehouses by the canal, just looking across the dark skyline to
>where, in the distance, the glow from Bludhaven lightens the night sky. Beneath me I
>hear the slow footsteps of someone cruising along the towpath, a silent transaction in the
>dark.

Eevee: A sexy, silent transaction.

>Once or twice I've wondered what it would be like, that dark anonymous sex, quick and
>hot and silent.

Eevee: Oh.
Lizy: So it was a sexy transaction.

>I'll step in sometimes if there's trouble the community can't start sort out themselves.
>There's a couple of barkeeps I know well, down here in the gay triangle.

Anja: *snort* Excuse me?
Eevee: The gay triangle? Is that like the Bermuda Triangle?

>One more reason I don't come down here as Bruce. Besides, it's not the sex. In a way, I
>wish it were.

Eevee: What is he even talking about?
Lizy: *Sticks fingers in ears* Batman is not gay, Batman is not gay, Batman is not gay!

>Nothing happening here.

Anja: (Batman) Hmmm, gay sex, yawn.

>I leave, take a run down to the projects, but all's quiet here too. Then back over to the
>docks

Lizy: Colon

>:

Lizy: Told'ja.

>Gordon's men have picked up the van. The sky's just beginning to lighten as I head back
>to the manor, the horizon a pre-dawn grey seen through the Batmobile screen.

Lizy: Does he sleep ever?
Eevee: Well, some us don't need 10 hours a night.

>In the cave, of course, dark folds protective against the rock,

Eevee: (Batman) I can't stand... the light!

>gathered by the big arc lights around the work surfaces, the practice mats and the big
>bank of monitors. One quick check, and I'll be done,

Anja: (Batman) Maybe he e-mailed me sometime in the last 5 minutes since I last checked!

>although tonight the tiredness doesn't pull and linger on my skin as it often does. Alfred's
>been working on the computers:

Lizy: Forgive me, but I feel the need to mention-
Anja: Yeah, yeah, another colon. Just keep your count to your self.
Lizy: Alright, but I'm taking bets on the final number.

>the satellite image screensaver

Eevee: Heh, he's got a screensaver set up to make his computer look like it's doing something important.

>that he uses flickers down as I sit. Logging on, I set the programme

Eevee: Programme?
Anja: It's British, darling.

>to collect and process e-mail from my accounts.

Anja: (Batman) Let's see, one from Kathy about her next sleep over. Hmm... I'll have to think about that one. Oh, and one from Suzi about her new boyfriend. Dish, dish! And one from... oh my, well, I'll save that one for later.

>Light at the top of the stairs: I look up. It's Alfred, carrying a tray with a steaming cup of
>coffee

Lizy: Because coffee is so much better than, like, sleep.

>and a newspaper: the early edition.

Anja: Heaven forbid variety or something crazy like, "and the early edition of the newspaper."

>There must be something he wants me to check. He looks worried.

Eevee: (Alfred) Your test results are back... that growth on your, uh, you know, the one that looks like cottage cheese...
Anja: Eww.

>"What is it, Alfred?"

Lizy: (Alfred) Your shoes are untied... HA! Made'ja look!

>"Have you checked the news media this morning, Swing, sir?"

Anja: (Alfred) That new-fangled news media, its got all sorts of crazy stories, all the time.... with the... an'... *indistinguishable muttering*

>"No. Is there something I should know?"

Eevee: Well, that growth I was telling you about, seems it's spreading...

>"I think you should check the Bludhaven channels." Alfred's gaze is very direct across the
>tray. He knows perfectly well what happened, of course. But he won't speak of it, and
>neither will I.

Lizy: (Batman) I'm not speaking to you!

>At least he's not dead: Alfred would be halfway to the state line by now.

Eevee: How would Alfred get half to the state line if he was dead?
Lizy: He's gotta be talking about Nightwing, right?
Anja: Jeez, everything's about Nightwing with this guy.

>I turn the big monitor on,

Eevee: (Batman) I'm using the BIG monitor.

>tune into Channel 7 news. Restrained excitement in the anchorwoman's face.

Lizy: (excitement) Get me outta here!

>"- came as complete surprise to the BHPD.

Anja: The Beverly Hills Police Department?
Lizy: Oh! Oh! ~Well the first thing you know ol' Jed's a millionaire,
Kinfolk said Jed move away from there,
Said Californy is the place you ought to be,
So they loaded up the truck and moved to Beverly-
Hills, that is. ~
Eevee: Well, that was pretty unnecessary.

>A spokesperson for the force

Eevee: Well, I guess we can't let that pass without a Star Wars reference...
Anja: (spokesperson, Yoda) Saw him we did, wing of the night he was. Hmm.

>stated that they had no comment to make until all the appropriate procedures have been
>followed, but it's quite clear that, in the glare of publicity resulting from this effective
>strike, federal resources will have to brought into play. We'll be asking the mayor about
>that when he joins us, in approximently twenty minutes time."

Eevee: So, what's going on?

>The newsreader checked the autocue. automatically smoothing down her hair. "Before
>then we'll have an analysis of the political fallout of this extraordinary event from out
>politics and current affairs editor, Mark Chapin. Mark, over to you."

Anja: (Mark) Fuck you.

>The camera cut to an older man, his hair greying."Good morning." he said. "Well, after last
>night's amazing events, it's clear that the city hall is going to face a large shake-up after
>the press and public assess collateral damage from -"

Eevee: What is now being referred to as the big furball explosion. You heard me right folks, literally hundreds of puppies, small kittens, and a few hamsters spontaneously combusted today.

>I cut to Channel Three.

Eevee: (Batman) Bor-ING.

>Here they have sofas, not desks, but the air of excitement and tension is the same.

Lizy: Hypertext can do things we never could do without it.
Eevee: What?
Lizy: I'm being obscure.
Anja: Yeah you are, I have no idea how that is supposed to be funny.

>"- let's see that incredible piece of film one more time, folks.

Lizy: Heh... 'folks.'

>If you've just joined us this morning, the headline of today is the unexpected indictment of
>ten members of the civic council and numbers of employees on racketeering charges. This
>astonishing event was stage managed by Bludhaven's own vigilante specialist Nightwing.

Eevee: Vigilante specialist?
Anja: So, he specializes in vigilantes or he is a specialized vigilante?

>Now, whatever your views on vigilantes, (and we'll be having a phone-in special later,
>folks!) take a look at this spectacular piece of film."

Anja: "Eb-dee eb-dee eb-dee ebdee- That's all folks!"

>In silence, a camera panned across an empty street, in darkness, to the lights and arched
>doorway of a big hotel. There was a crowd outside the doorway, held back by velvet
>ropes and uniformed guards: the occasional white light of a premature

Anja: Ejaculation.

>flashgun.

Anja: Uhg, this is so boring I'm resulting to Jr. High School humor.
Eevee: Heh heh heh... premature ejaculation...

>The camera angles in on the door. Then, suddenly,

Eevee: Ohmigawd, it's all happening too fast!

>spins around to the closed road: a stretch limousine drives up to the red carpet.

Lizy: Ok, the other times were probably technically correct, but THAT is blatant colon abuse. See what you've done, crazy British language people...
Eevee: What are you whining about now?
Lizy: The English declared comma splices OK, you know. Can you believe that? They are mutilating our language!
Eevee: That's outrageous!
Lizy: Exactly.
Eevee: Ummm... what's a comma splice again?
Anja: Comma splices have nothing to do with this!
Lizy: Yeah, well, I had better not find any of them either.

>A uniformed valet gets out and opens the door, but it's no sequinned star that steps out.

Eevee: Oh! Oh! Spelling error!
Lizy: Or is it?
Eevee: What?
Lizy: Umm, I mean, it might be another crazy British spelling.
Anja: No, it’s spelled wrong alright. The funny thing is a spell check would have picked it up. Do you think Jay has gotten everything spelled right so far without a spell check?
Lizy: That is not possible.
Eevee: Psh, not for you.

>One by one, cowed, stumbling, humiliated, handcuffed to each other, ten of Bludhaven's
>most prominent citizens struggle out of the cab. The crowd is silent, gasping a little in
>surprise: the press guns are flashing.

Everyone: Ker-pow! Eh-eh-eh-eh-eh-eh!

> Each of the men carries a large sign around his neck - "Thief" "Embezzler" - and on each
>sign is taped a familiar glinting CD.

Eevee: (Batman) C... Ds? Yes. I remember about those.

>The press are shouting now - "Statement! "Statement!" as the men shuffle and line up on
>the carpet. Unseen by the limousine, the driver takes his hat off, then slips off his coat. I
>notice. I would. But it's a clear shock to the press when the masked man steps in front of
>the cameras.

Lizy: I just know there is a Tuxedo Mask joke in there somewhere.
Anja: ~Rain or shine, I'm happiest,
When I'm with Tuxedo Mask,
He makes me sing, He makes me laugh,
I just love Tuxedo Mask.~

>"Ladies and gentlemen of Bludhaven" he says. His voice has deepened a little.

Eevee: Awww, he's becoming a man.
Anja: Voice cracking? Clothes don't fit? Puberty can be a confusing time, but learning about it doesn't have to be.

>"Each of these men has been carrying out a deliberate and damaging campaign of
>embezzlement and fraud with the City Council. Details and documentation are contained
>within the disks each man holds."

Anja: That seems awfully convoluted. Can't he just give the disks to the police directly and let them handle arresting the guys? I mean, they're white collar criminals, not a psychopath in a robot suit with a freeze gun.

>He looks at the camera. He's got older: it shows in the shadows of his eyes, the broader
>set of shoulders that carry more muscle than I remember.

Eevee: Wait, I thought he was wearing a mask.

>"Copies of these disks have, of course, been mailed to all the major news agencies.
>Citizens, these men have been defrauding our children and our hospitals: I urge you to
>deal with them using the full weight of American justice." He pauses, and I see the corner
>of his mouth twist upwards. "I would like you to know that such crimes will not be
>tolerated in my city. Gotham's not the only place to have it's own crusader. "

Anja: Ooooh, burn.

>He turns, dives into the empty door of the limousine, its darkened windows hiding the
>interior. As the camera zooms in, the car slides away from the carpet, accelerating as the
>press breaks ranks, racing down the street after the accelerating vehicle. He won't be in
>it, of course.

Lizy: He'll be on an all expense paid vacation to Jamaica!

>I wouldn't be. But the camera doesn't pan back, or up, to show him quietly scaling the
>building opposite.

Eevee: (Batman) Awww, that's my little clone!

>The newsreader again. But I've seen enough, for now: I set the machines to tape
>relevant broadcasts, key words - and then I turn and look at Alfred. He offers me the
>paper in silence: the head a bold statement above a still from the film. "Nightwing
>Strikes!"

Lizy: (Nightwing) Better working conditions for vigilantes now! Better working conditions for vigilantes now!

>"Alfred..." I know I'm right.

Anja: (Batman) I'm always right.

>"Alfred, who was driving the car?"

Eevee: (Batman) You've been driving cars for other men, haven't you?!

>He doesn't say anything, but the hand holding the paper shakes a little. Frustration,
>banked up by shock, suddenly courses through my body. I stand.

Anja: ~Get up, stand up, stand up for your right
Get up, stand up, don't give up the fight~

>"How long has this been going on?

Eevee: (Batman) I should have see it sooner, the strange messages on the answering machine, the unfamiliar underwear in the laundry, the post-it notes getting fewer and farther in between...

>Doesn't he know how dangerous those men could be? That's Frank Jordan - he's got the
>shipping union in the palm of his hand! Didn't he think about the risks?"

Lizy: Smoking causes lung damage as well as yellowed nails and teeth. Besides that secondhand smoke can harm your loved ones and an errant cigarette can start fires and be an instant killer.

>Alfred looks at me. "Like you do, Master Bruce?"

Anja: Oooo, oh no he di'ant!

>"Why didn't he ask for help? And then, to step out in front of the cameras like that -"

Eevee: Yeah, they can't be on camera, everyone will find out their dark, horrible secret.
Anja: That they are human?
Eevee: Well, yeah.

>"Master Dick seems to have organized things rather well on his own." Alfred's tone was
>mildly reproving.

Lizy: (Alfred) I'm not angry, just... disappointed.

>"And then to say that -" I can't begin to work out what it means. Does he mean to
>challenge me? That's not the Dick I know. But what is this, other than a flung gauntlet -
>look, see what I can do?

Eevee: (Nightwing) Look at meeee!

>"Why did he ask you?"

Lizy: Ask him what?

>"Why not?"

Eevee: Wait, is Batman asking Alfred, or is it the other way 'round?
Anja: Oh my gosh, is that constructive criticism?

>We exchange looks over the monitor.

Lizy: ~He looked at me, ~
Anja: ~He looked at me,~
Lizy: ~I looked at him.~
Anja: ~I looked at him.~
Lizy: ~He sized up me,~
Anja: ~He sized up me,~
Lizy: ~I sized up him.~
Anja: ~I sized up him.~
Lizy and Anja: ~He looked at me, I looked at him. He sized up me I sized up him.~
Eevee: *cough* GirlScoutsarelame *cough*

>"Master Dick has worked remarkably hard on this case." said Alfred.

Eevee: Heh heh... 'Master Dick.'

>"It's taken him most of the last four months to put together. Everything had to be very
>carefully tied up, all the documentation accredited. I was very proud to have aided him
>somewhat along the way, and when we knew that we would be successful, he asked me
>if I would be there when the case was tied up and er...delivered."

Lizy: I still say the whole thing was unnecessary. I mean, it's cool when Batman leaves bank robbers tied to each other hanging off a building, but these guys are probably middle-aged, balding, beer-bellied, what was the point of tying them up?

>I turn around and walk away. I didn't want to know how long Alfred and Dick had been in
>contact, how Alfred had helped him, how the two of them had been plotting behind my
>back in this dangerous enterprise.

Eevee: (Alfred) So, tonight at midnight I'll leave the door unlocked and you sneak in through the kitchen.
Anja: (Nightwing) Alright, you put up the decorations then, I'll bring the cake
Eevee: (Alfred) Man, this'll be the most wicked awesome surprise breakfast party ever!

>Part of me was terrified. I knew these men didn't get where they'd got without violence.
>And Dick, working with no back up - I didn't want to think about it. Behind me I hear Alfred
>collect the cold cup of coffee and the paper. He clears his throat.

Anja: (Alfred) *cough*Batmanisapussy*cough*

>"Master Bruce-"

Eevee: (Alfred) That little present you left in the toilet will not go down, no matter what I use. The bathroom is flooded and I broke two plungers and a toilet snake. I give up.

>I don't want to. I turn round.

Lizy: Heh, 'round.'
Eevee: ~You spin me right round, baby,
Right round like a record, baby,
Right round round round.~

>"Master Dick, I believe, was hoping you would be proud of him."

>Oh yes. Proud, horrified, frightened, and gripped in the bowels by a pain of desire so
>intense that I'm sure it shows all over my face.

Anja: Ooooh, someone's got a fetish.

>I can't say anything. But Alfred, giving me one cool stare, seems satisfied. I feel as if I'm
>thirteen again, caught with the sheets still wet and sticky: exposed, shamed.

Eevee: Aww, lil' Brucie wet the bed.
Lizy: Eww...

>He sent me an e-mail. I couldn't trace the sender - how does he do that? It's got Oracle's
>fingerprints - figuratively speaking - all over it.

Lizy: Why would he have to 'trace' the sender, doesn't it say on the e-mail where it came from?
Anja: Well, I guess he means he can’t trace the IP address so he knows physically where it came from. The sender address is pretty meaningless because he could send it from a free account and never use it again.
Eevee: Heh, mysterysender@who-the-hell-am-i.com
Lizy: Well, why did he need Oracle for that? Couldn't he have just sent the e-mail from a library?
Anja: Oh, come on. You know he just does it to piss Batman off.

>One word. "See." See what? See that he's as good as me? Dick, I knew that all along. You
>don't have to prove it to me. But at least, one could say, he's speaking to me.

Eevee: Well, I guess that's one way of looking at it.

>I will not go to Bludhaven.

Eevee: (Batman) Hmmf, I don't wanna!

>Bruce Wayne is invited to the opening of the new Bludhaven City Modern Art Gallery.I
>don't like modern art - most of it. I never have.

Lizy: Fuck you.
Anja: Down, girl.

>I don't go to unnecessary social events.

Lizy: That is such a lie! He's always at some stupid thing or another!

>But Alfred has laid out my tuxedo and polished my dress shoes before I mention the
>invitation.

Anja: Well, we know you wears the pants in this relationship.

>So I find myself standing here in this overheated hall, a glass of unwanted and
>unpleasant wine in my hand, making small talk to a group of the same people I make
>small talk with at all the same events in Gotham.

Eevee: Well, if you want to be negative about it.

>We could have been anywhere: same people, same conversation.

Anja: Even Disneyland?

>I make my excuses, head out into the main entrance.

Lizy: He couldn't, maybe, look at the art or something.

>For a second, I tilt my head up to the clear dark dome that covers this vast and circular
>area, now busy with Bludhaven's finest trying to look informed and attentive.

Lizy: Instead of maybe, just maybe, enjoying the artwork.

>There's a flicker of movement at the far edge of the dome. There was half an hour ago,
>too. Either it's not Dick, or he wants to be noticed. I can't decide. But either way, I'm tired
>of waiting. One of the porters looks as if the judicious application of some green paper
>might produce a route up onto the roof for a bored and wealthy man.

Eevee: (porter) Green tissue paper! Score!

>I'm right.

Anja: (Batman) I'm always right.

>There's a back staircase for maintenance. When I get to the top, I open the door gingerly.
>I don't know, after all, who's here. But it is Dick. He's not looking at me.

Eevee: Perfect, he doesn't suspect a thing... Time to hit him with my uber-mega-awesome stinkbomb!

>It's cold.

Anja: The vital information is all coming so fast!

>He's bulked out, and I hope he hasn't lost that limber grace that allowed him to fly.

Eevee: *raises eyebrow* I'm not even touching that.
Lizy: *puts hands over her ears* Batman is NOT gay. Batman is NOT gay.

>As he turns his head light glimmers on the smooth crown of sleek, long hair.

Eevee: Why did he grow his hair out anyway? Wouldn't it just get in the way?
Anja: Well, he grew it out because it is sexy. Only real men can wear ponytails you know.
Eevee: Uk, long hair, how not original. I am so bored with all these long haired guys already.
Anja: Ummm, excuse me? What about Juunanagou?
Eevee: Hmmm... *pulls out an electric razor*

>Even here, in darkness, lit only by the diffuse silver light from the dome, I see the long line
>of his eyelashes as he lifts his eyes and looks at me.

Anja: So he's not in his Nightwing costume then? Isn't he worried about if someone sees him scaling the building in his street clothes? Or was he invited to the fancy art gallery opening.

>I can't tell in this light, but his eyes are the colour of a Mediterranean summer, where the
>sea meets the sky.

Lizy: *hands over ears* Batman is NOT gay. Batman is NOT gay.

>He looks at me.

Anja: ~With these hungry eyes
One look at you and I can't disguise
I've got hungry eyes
I feel the magic between you and I~

>There are three years between us. Three years of resentment, pain, of necessarily
>battened love.

Lizy: Batten down the love, crew!

>"That was some stunt you pulled." I say. He looks at me.

Eevee: (Nightwing, Niel Goldman) Yeah, it was wicked awesome!

>"Must have meant a lot of work." He says nothing. And I can't hold back the words any
>more.

Eevee: (Batman) Dick, your mother was actually a three-toed sloth and I killed your father and peed on his remains for it.

>"Didn't you consider the risk?

Lizy: Promiscuous sex not only puts you at risk of knocking someone up, but also for dozens of diseases that not only affect you, but the ones you love.

>How could you involve Alfred in this? What if -"

Eevee: The bat-toilet overflowed at Wayne manor while he was away? Backed up sewage everywhere, and who’s fault would it be?

>And he moves, pulling back from the dome for a second's exasperated turn, and then he's
>moving towards me.

Lizy: (Batman) Oh shit, cheese it!

>"Hello Dick, how are you? It's been a long time - are you okay? Like the costume - that
>was good work you did there with those councillors. Oh, thanks Batman, the boy blunder
>pulled it off this time. And how are you? Still playing nasty little games with those bat-
>toys, I see. How's the new Robin? Is he as good as me? Do you miss me?"

Lizy: You know, the funny thing is that is exactly what Robin did in the animated series. You know, get frustrated at Batman and talk for him to himself.
Eevee: Yeah, everyone is surprisingly in character in this fic, especially considering it's slash.
Lizy: Trouble is, I am not sure if that's a good thing...

>Oh, he's angry.

>So am I.

>"What am I supposed to say? You disappear for three years, no messages, no
>communication at all-"

Anja: Guys, guys, you're both equally dysfunctional.

>"I sent photographs."

Anja: (Nightwing) Oh, wait, no, I sent those to ALFRED. I forgot, I hate you.

>"And then this crazy, stupid stunt, the cameras, the costume, Dick, what do you think
>you're doing?"

Eevee: Ummm... Batman? Uh... you do realize, that, umm, well... you know...

>"What did you train me to do?"

Lizy: (Batman) Umm, ride across the tightrope on your cute little unicycle?

>"I didn't train you to risk your life in some misbegotten investigation -"

Eevee: Wow, that is pretty harsh.

>"An investigation that succeeded. A stupid stunt that means a good fifteen million dollars
>a year is going to be staying in Bludhaven's coffers, not bleeding out to those vicious
>thieves. An example public enough to put the fear of God into anyone I've missed.

Lizy: Isn’t that kind of thinking exactly why vigilantism is illegal?

>I did just what you trained me to do, Batman, and I did it well, and I did it because the
>application of justice is the quest that was bred into me with the costume and the neat
>toys and the fear of failing. But I did it my way, sweetheart."

Anja: Honey cakes.
Lizy: Puddin' pop.
Eevee: Candied doody.

>He's come fully into the light from the dome now. I can see the symbol on the kevlar
>weave of his costume, a sign that is all his own and yet echoes, so subtlely, my own bat.
>And I take a long breath.

Anja: So he is in his costume? It sure isn't very effective at covering his face, is it? I mean, if you can se his eyelashes...

>"Shall we start again?"

>"Start where, Batman? Do I go back to the puns and the shorts?

Eevee: (Batman) But I LIKED the shorts.

>Do I go back to the time when you were God and I thought you couldn't fail? Or do we go
>back to the time when I'm on my knees and you reject everything we ever had?"

Lizy: Jeez, Dick, what the fuck is wrong with you?

>Oh dear God.

Anja: Well he gets it from you.

>"I'm not that kid any more."

Eevee: (Batman) Hence why I don't want to have sex with you.
Lizy: Eww, that's just unnecessary.
Anja: You are awfully defensive of Batman, you know.
Lizy: Shut up! Batman is awesome!

>"I..know that."

>"Then, for fuck's sake, why not treat me like an adult? This is my city, Batman. I take the
>risks, I play my own games, I make my own choices. I'm my own man, here."

Anja: Heh, ‘for fuck’s sake.’
Eevee: This whole fic is for ‘fuck’s sake.’

>"What do you want me to do?"

Anja: (Nightwing) Drop your pants. Uh-huh, that's riiight baby, don't be shy...

>"How about a moment's respect? Let's start - Dick, that was a good job you did there."

>"Dick, that was a good job you did there."

Lizy: Aww, Batman is getting basic social interaction training.

>"Nice costume. Good name."

>"Nice costume. Like the colours. Good name."

Eevee: (Nightwing) *slap* No ad-libbing bitch!

>"Why don't you come over for dinner sometime, Alfred would be glad to see you at the
>manor."

>"Sunday would be good." I've already run that one. Tim doesn't come back until Monday
>week.

Lizy: Is there some reason Tim has to be gone for Dick to come over?
Eevee: If the two Robins are in the same room at the same time they will both spontaneously combust.

>"Why don't we talk about what happened when you left?"

>"NO!"

Eevee: (Batman) I don't wanna!

>"So we're not going to get anywhere, are we?"

>Silence. I can hear his breathing, harsher now, and it wouldn't surprise me if he could
>hear the beating of my own heart. I feel naked, here in the dark without my costume, the
>padding of cowl and cape and formed protection.

Eevee: Against the syphilis.

>"It's been three years."

>"And you hoped it would go away, shoved under the carpet with all the other things that
>might, just, have been seen beneath that cowl of yours?"

Eevee: Like his horrible B.O. and that growth under his-
Anja: Yeah, OK, honey, that's enough. You're done.

>I owe him some honesty. "I hoped you would...grow out of it."

>He laughs then, but it's a short, a bitter laugh, and I feel it twist at my heart, the beast >within me stir and waken.

Lizy: COMMA SPLICE!!
Anja: No, I am pretty sure that is list.
Lizy: No way, it is so a comma splice!
Eevee: Why do you care?
Lizy: *pouts* Because usually there are all sorts of spelling errors and grammar errors to make fun of. I miss that.
Anja: *shudders* Not me.

>This I don't need, this urge to protect and hold.

Eevee: Yeah, its not as useful as the urge to search and destroy, is it?

>"Did you think you would grow out of it, when you were nineteen? We grow older,
>Batman, we hope we grow wiser, but some things don't change. I don't think Mr. short-
>and-blond was exactly your first."

Lizy: *shuts eyes* Not gay not gay not gay not gay...

>Here I don't want to be, but I am: remembering the absolute despair when I look up from
>that brief goodbye, late afternoon, at the back of the hotel, and see Dick's back
>disappearing up the street. It had been obvious, to anyone who cared to notice. My
>biggest mistake.

Eevee: I still feel a surprising amount of apathy for the dead Robin. You would think getting a young boy involved in fighting crime and then having him get killed would have the honor of being his ‘biggest mistake.’
Lizy: Nah, I figure he’s made all kinds of ‘biggest mistakes.’ He is made of pure angst, after all.
Anja: Besides, no one cares about Todd, remember?

>"Dick, you know I can't -"

Lizy: Walk and chew bubblegum.

>And he looks at me, and he says, "Do you know, I don't think I can, just now, either."

Lizy: (Nightwing) I am going back to Titan’s Tower and getting me some hot alien tail, so there.

>And then he turns, and he's leaving, and I must stand and watch, because if I make one
>move towards him I will never let him go. And that would be the biggest mistake of all.

Lizy: See, I bet he makes a ‘biggest mistake of all’ every week.

>And the grief of it hits me.

Eevee: WHACK!

>"Why couldn't it be me?" asks Dick, three years ago, nearly four, standing opposite me in
>the study.

Lizy: Wait, if he was nearly four three years ago, wouldn’t that make him six?

>"Why not me? Couldn't you love me like that?"

Anja: (Batman) Because I would be arrested, sweetie.

>He's crying, silently, the tears welling slowly out of his eyes and sliding over the smooth
>line of cheekbone and the little hollow under it.

Eevee: Awww, little boys are so cute...
Lizy: Ew.
Eevee: I didn’t mean that! I mean, oh, never mind...

>I had said everything right, of course, because how could I not: my son, my child, with all
>his life ahead of him: not to be tied to this obsessive, black mission, this cold and empty
>place that I fill with the necessary curl of raw justice and power.

Lizy: Agh, so... many... colons... so... wrong...

>I wanted more for him. His is the future.

Eevee: His what?
Anja: His stylish fashion sense, obviously.

>His too is the passion that I spend on the occasional, beautiful, stupid girls and the
>awkward, desperate fucks in hotel rooms with rare, safe men. Airport men.

Lizy: Wasn’t the guy who brought AIDS to the US an airline steward?

>How do I span this mess of love and lust and possession on which he must never tread?
>Did it start when he was sixteen, seventeen, when his wit grew to challenge mine and his
>strength became that of a man?

Anja: ~I am sixteen, going on seventeen.~
Eevee: The only one ‘going on Seventeen’ here is me.

>Or, sickeningly, did it start earlier - although I remember no trace of desire for that
>beloved, small boy's body?

Anja: Yeah, sure you don’t.
Lizy: I bet Eevee would.
Eevee: Ew, Robin? That whiney little shit? I don’t think so.

>He is desperate, lit with a young man's passion that I had known and ignored, but I am
>fighting for everything I hold dear in this world.

Lizy: Good for you!

>I thought his love nothing, a lust of the moment, held against the long years of
>partnership.

Anja: (Robin) Hmmm... I’m bored, maybe I should fuck Batman today.

>I had thought he would accept my decision, would recognise the impossibility of what he
>asked.

Eevee: That would involve him being functional and completely sane.
Lizy: Which would probably involve eight hours of sleep a night.

>"Dick, you know perfectly well that this is impossible."

>"What's so impossible about it? Don't you love me?"

>"Of course I love you - you're my son!"

Lizy: Batman makes a pretty good argument here.

>"But I'm not your son."

Eevee: (Robin) You’re not my real dad, you can’t tell me what to do!

>And for an instant his eyes catch mine, and I don't know what he sees in them, but I
>know that instant flare of heat that charges my body.

Anja: Eww...
Lizy: How can he be attracted to Robin? I mean, Nightwing I can understand, but Robin turns from a hopelessly adorable little boy to the world’s biggest dork in short-shorts. At no time is he sexually appealing.
Eevee: And yet the Teen Titans fanart continues...

>He steps towards me, and now he's sure he's getting somewhere.

Eevee: Good job Robin! Stepping forward does get you somewhere!
Lizy: (Batman) Aww, his first steps! Alfred, get the camera!

>"What's the matter - I'm not your type? Not some anonymous fuck? What are you so
>scared of, Batman? Don't tell me we're risking the love word here?"

Anja: *snicker* Excuse me? The ‘love’ word?
Eevee: Since when did that become obscene?
Lizy: Since, ~L, is for the way you look, at me,
O is for the only one, I see,
V is very, ve-~
Anja: Oh my God stop! That’s enough!

>And the air between us thickens, and I have nothing to say, and he takes one step
>towards me, and another, and suddenly he's on his knees and his head is turning into my
>crotch and I see his mouth open as his hair slides across the fabric.

Lizy: Run on sentence.
Eevee: Sexy, run on sentence.
Anja: Sex? Are we getting sex now? It’s about time.

>Feel all the blood in my body lifting to my cock: feel for one second the warmth of his
>breath, as he, knowing, raises one hand, and before he can touch me I hit out at him, one
>open handed full force backslap that sends him up off his knees and reeling into the
>opposite wall.

Lizy: Go Batman.

>"Never do that again."

Anja: Aww, that’s no fun.

>There is contempt, now, in the blue eyes that stare across at mine. He's bleeding, just a
>little, where my hand caught the skin over his jaw.

Lizy: Wooo, sexy.

>"You liar."

>"Don't do that to us!"

Eevee: Yeah, Robin, what the fuck is wrong with you?

>"It's not me that's doing it, Bruce." His eyes are very steady on mine. "I love you. You love
>me. I want you. And you - as you have just so...interestingly...proved, want me."

Anja: Are we getting sex yet?

>And he has given me the weapon I need.

Eevee: A plasma pulse rifle?
Lizy: A phaser?
Anja: An energy pistol?

>"So I want you. Is that what you want, Dick, twenty minutes of sweaty fumbling, a quick
>fuck against the wall? Oh, I want you all right, but I sure as hell don't love you."

Eevee: Harsh.

>He is shocked now.

Anja: I am shocked we haven’t gotten sex yet.
Lizy: I am shocked you want to see bat-incest so badly.
Anja: Well, come on, someone had to say it. You said ‘questionable fanfiction.’ Does this fic even have sex in it?

>And I feel the rightness of what I am doing, the black power of it take wing, and I walk
>towards him. "Are you ready, Dick? You want to do it now, get it over with? Twenty
>minutes, ten, two? And the rest of it in ashes?"

Eevee: Oooh, so poetic. What a gay.
Lizy: *hands over ears* No no no no no no no no no...

>There is pain now, in the blue eyes that rise to mine.

>"Don't you love me?" he asks

Lizy: ~Do you love me?~
Anja: Yeah, I think we have filled our limit of Girls Scout songs for this fic.
Lizy: Hmm, how about-
Anja: I though I already told you that you weren’t allowed to sing?
Lizy: Oh right, sorry.

>"Do I want to watch the sun set with you? No. Do I want to wake up next to you in the
>morning? No. Do I want to spend my life with you? No. Do I want my cock up your arse?
>Yes. And if you can't take any of that, then get out of this room now."

Lizy: Heh, ‘arse.’
Anja: Is that all you’ve got?
Lizy: What? This is a pretty well written fic, it’s kinda hard.
Anja: Are you paying attention to what is happening here? How Batman just gave up on Robin ever understanding how freaking disgusting it would be for him to have sex with his under-aged adoptive son, and that platonic love would be perfectly acceptable and more appropriate? How he decides instead that it would be easier to sell Robin the idea that he does, in fact, want to fuck him but, despite all evidence to the contrary, actually does not love him at all?
Lizy: Anja, this is Batman and Robin we are talking about here. They are fucked up with a capital F. All of this makes perfect sense. Except for Batmen being gay of course. Batman is all man, damn it!

>For the first time, he raises his hand to the thin trickle of blood that outlines his cheek.

Eevee: (Robin) Shit! You didn’t have to use your fingernails!

>He's still looking at me, but there is something lost in that gaze now, a hurt I want to hold
>and turn against my heart, this knife of pain and hate that is all I have left of him.

Anja: It’s sexy slash in a can! 49% random angst, 47% crypticness, and 4% assorted preservatives and artificial hair color!

>And he stands up and walks, a little unsteadily, out of the room, and I remember to
>breathe, and feel the first, agonising pain rise, and I am gone and out into the night
>where I can hold it at bay.

Lizy: Hmm... agonizing is spelled wrong.
Eevee: And since when can YOU spell?
Lizy: Shut up!
Anja: Besides, it’s British. Those Britons are all about their S’s.

>I didn't expect him to leave. I didn't expect to come back in the morning and find him
>gone. I thought he would know that the love I bear Dick, my son, is far more important
>than the brief lust that was all I offered as a lover.

Anja: Yeah, you would think he would get that, but, hey, what’cha gonna do?

>I lied, of course. How could I not?

Anja: Yeah, man, Robin would never believe the truth, I mean, who WOULDN’T want to screw their adoptive son? You must be crazy!

>Three years later, the pain of it still catches my breath in my chest. Did I do the right
>thing? Yes. Did I do it the right way? No.

Eevee: (Batman) I didn’t bitch-slap him NEARLY hard enough.

>But what is said is said. I turn, slowly, and make my way down the staircase to the half-
>empty halls below. I'm too tired to go home. Gotham will have to look after itself tonight.

Lizy: Well THAT’S not a good idea. It’s liable to self-destruct with out Batman there to baby it.

>And, slowly, I take this body that is myself and Bruce and Batman, and I find a small hotel
>where they don't ask questions and a bed and a cover that I can pull over my eyes and a
>space where, until tomorrow, I am just myself, with a loneliness that centres my heart.

Anja: Waitaminute... why would he need to go to a hotel ‘where they don’t ask questions?’ He is just a regular rich guy in town for a social even who does not want to drive home tonight. He isn’t a drug dealer or a prostitute. Or WITH a prostitute for that matter. What sense does that make?
Lizy: Batman’s become neurotic, that’s all. Makes sense to me.

>I wake, and I know it's him.

Eevee: David Bowie?

>This warmth, this weight on my skin, every muscle aligned to my own, the shape of him
>clear against my skin like a brand, the only man who could do this to me,

Anja: Jonny Depp?

>the little breeze from the window slipping across my fingers where he holds my hands
>outstretched. I don't want to open my eyes. I want.

Lizy: Orlando Bloom?

>But what I want cannot, cannot be allowed to happen. And I open my eyes, and for an
>instant the ceiling is stark across my sight.

Lizy: (ceiling) Don’t look at me, I’m not decent!

>"Are you proud of me, Bruce? "he says, his lips inches from mine: I feel the warmth of his
>breath on my skin. "Did I do what you wanted?" I can't speak. He stretches his body
>against mine, the warmth of skin under the smooth costume.

Lizy: Oh, fresh from patrol and still in his costume.
Eevee: Little does Batman know that moments ago Nightwing was in a wrestling match with a crocodile man in an open sewer.

>Here, in the dark, I can smell the faint essence of the night he's brought with him: ozone
>and starlight.

Lizy: What does starlight smell like, anyhow?

>"Do you want to fuck me yet?"

Eevee: A question for the ages.

>And I am unbearably aroused. He knows it, tilts his pelvis against mine: all the heat in my
>body rushes to that one, revealing point of contact.

Anja: We’re getting sex now, right?

>This point of stillness: and then he groans, so faintly it's just another whisper of breath,
>and moves, once, slowly, and through the sheet and the costume I know he wants me as
>badly as I want him.

Anja: (Batman, Mae West) Hey, is that a Batarang in your pants, or are you just happy to see me?

>I want to touch him so badly, I want to hold him and rub my face in his hair and mark his
>skin, I want to hold him tight and safe and hard against me through the night, I want him
>wanting and gasping and mine. I want the heat and the passion of him around me, on
>me, in me.

Eevee: (Batman) Uhh... I mean, in the most platonic way possible!

>And I must not.

Lizy: Damn straight.

>"Dick-" I managed.

Anja: (Batman) I’m pregnant.

>I raise one hand to push him away, but what was meant to be a violent move, slows, and
>I find myself holding his head in my hand

Eevee: Yeah, good job there, Bat-pussy.

>and he moves, again, and I feel his mouth on mine, his lips moving, hot, so hot. He's
>moving against me, and I can't..not..respond...

Anja: Hey, Lizy, what happened to you insisting Batman was not gay?
Lizy: Meh, I can do that later, this is hot.
Anja: What about your objections to the age difference, or the fact Dick is like Bruce’s son?
Lizy: Eh, whatever.
Anja: And once again, folks, a young girls morals fly out the window as all her feeling rushes to her-
Eevee: Ew, I would rather not talk about Lizy that way. I prefer to think about her as being sexless, like a spayed pet or a stuffed animal.
Anja: You have a point there, Lizy must remain pure to off-set us!
Lizy: Jeez, OK.

>This must not be.

Lizy: Right, must not be, because it’s gross... and stuff...

>And deliberately I think of Dick as a boy, think of him at ten, at eleven.

>A child.

>My child.

Eevee: (Batman) And I got more turned on then I ever was before.
Lizy and Anja: *stare*
Eevee: What?! If I let one of you say it the other would be all smug and say something about how I would be turned on and, ‘oh oh Eevee is a pedophile, funny stuff! Lol, roflamao!’
Lizy: Hey, Ana-chan.
Anja: What?
Lizy: Eevee is a pedophile!
Anja: Lol, roflmao!

>And I can do it. I push myself off the bed, and he falls with me, rolling onto the floor, and
>in seconds I'm safely by the door and he's standing by the bed.

>"I'm not eleven any more, Bruce." He says.

Lizy: Yeah, you’re six, remember?

>"You're still my son."

>He laughs. "Oh yes. And your partner. And your friend. And your lover."

Lizy: Yeah, I am getting the feeling Dick is missing something here.

>"No!"

>"No?" He moves to the window. I can see him now, lit by the streetlights outside. "Don't you want me, Bruce?" He moves one hand, slowly down his body. "It's all yours."

Eevee: (Nightwing) All the gonorrhea you can handle.

>"Dick - you know, this can't be."

Anja: No, he doesn’t.

>"Why not? I was too young, too dependent, too inexperienced. I'm not any of those
>things anymore." And jealousy rushes through me, an electric shock of pain. Who? Who?

Eevee: Oh come on, Nightwing is a man-slut! He has a friggen’ ponytail!

>It must have shown, because he laughed a little.

Anja: (Nightwing) Oh, you were just owned!

>"Jealous? Well, perhaps you do care a little, after all."

Eevee: (Nightwing) So, the word of the night is ‘legs.’ *leer* Let’s go back to my place and spread the word.

>I can't move. I'm terrified that if I move a muscle, I'll go towards him, not away.

Anja: (Nightwing) Yeah, the ladies can’t resist the Night-ster.

>"So which is it, Bruce, that's holding you back now? What excuse are you going to use for
>pushing me away this time? I know you want me. On my skin - "He stops. "I can still feel
>you on my skin."

Eevee: (Nightwing) Do you believe in love at first sight, or should I walk by again?
Lizy: (Nightwing) Do you have a map? I just keep on getting lost in your eyes.
Anja: (Nightwing) Do you have a mirror in your pocket? 'Cause I could see myself in your pants.

>"Sex...isn't the issue."

Eevee: (Batman) It’s... your breath.

>"No? Then come over here." Arousal has deepened his voice, sings through the air
>between us.

Anja: ~The hills are alive, with the sound of music.~

>"I ...can't."

>"Why not?"

Eevee: (Batman) I lost mah legs in the war.

>"Dick, you're asking for more than I can give."

>"Really."

Lizy: (Batman) Really really.

>"I don't love like you like -"

Lizy: (Batman) I like you, but I don’t like like you.

>"No? Bruce, I'm not a fool. Lust doesn't care for me the way you do. Lust doesn't take a
>small boy and care for all the years of his childhood. Lust doesn't count the nights I woke
>up screaming in your arms.

Anja: Really, because it sounds like-
Lizy: I don’t like were this is going.

>Lust doesn't spend three years trying to find one errant sidekick. Lust doesn't put money
>in my bank accounts

Anja: Well, sometimes...

>- returned taxes, Bruce? Or send me odd gadgets and military hardware - mailing list
>mistakes?

Lizy: Military hardware? For some reason that does not strike me as a good idea. Also as a failure on behalf of the Postal Services.

>Love does that.

Lizy: Nothin’ says love like weapons, right?

>I know, now, what you tried to do to us. And I'm not going to accept it.

Eevee: (Batman) *snap* Aww, phooey.

>I don't care how much you pretend to me and to yourself that it's just sex and you can
>dismiss it. You love me. And I love you. You can take Batman's phobias and stuff them up
>the hole in his cape."

Lizy: *eyes widen* And where might THAT be?

>He pauses, and when he speaks again his voice has a thread of fear that, almost, I
>cannot resist. "You're all I've ever wanted."

Anja: (Batman) Young, scared, gay hair-do... can’t... resist... Augh!

>"You're too young."

>"I'm twenty-two."

Eevee: (Nightwing) Old enough to get sloshed and watch porn!

>"I'm too old for you."

>"Is that so."

All: YES!

>"I won't do it, Dick."

>"Why not?"

Lizy: Well, I don’t know, maybe all those good reasons he has given you over and over. Than and the fact he would just be confirming all the bad things people have been thinking about the whole Batman and Robin situation from the get-go.
Eevee: Mid-aged man alone in a cave with a little boy and a super-computer?
Lizy: Yep.

>"I've been fighting crime for longer than you've been alive. I've never counted the crimes
>I've solved: I've never counted the people I failed, or the promises I've broken, or the
>people I've fucked in other people's beds. I'm not doing that to you."

Eevee: (Batman) Wouldn’t want you to end up like TODD after all.

>"Don't you think that's my choice, too?"

Lizy: No, you have pretty much revoked your right to make choices.

>"I can't offer you what you need."

>"No? Isn't that my decision to make?"

>"It's nothing to do with you." And he laughs then. "Bruce, Batman, lover: you think about
>it. I'll see you around."

Anja: (Nightwing) Oh, and I’m no Fred Flinstone, but I can sure make your Bedrock! Ha-ha, I’m good...

>And then he's gone, so quick and fast that in one breath, the room is empty. And I am
>terrified that he's right.

Eevee: (Batman) My scrotal pain and swelling might be a sign I have epididymitis!

>It's half past two. George had said there might be trouble.

Lizy: Curious George meets Batman.

>And it's the best view in the city of the Bludhaven lights. I'm here watching the lights of
>Nightwing's city and keeping half an ear on the men cruising below when I hear someone
>behind me on the roof. They're making no attempt to disguise their footfall,

Lizy: togg togg togg Togg Togg TOGG TOGG...

>and I turn slowly. It's Dick, dressed in jeans and a leather jacket.

Eevee: No shirt?
Lizy: Yum!

>I'm stunned. This is Gotham, not Bludhaven:

Eevee: (Batman) My whole world has turned upside down!
Anja: So, what, is Nightwing not allowed in Gotham now?

>it's been two weeks since that abortive encounter in the Hilton. What is Dick doing here?

Anja: Waitasec... The Hilton was the ‘small hotel where they don't ask questions?’
Lizy: The Hilton Hotel, where all we ask is your credit card number.

>"What?"

All: *applause*
Eevee: Batman, the riveting conversationalist, folks.

>"Good evening."

Lizy: Konban wa!
Anja: Guten abend!
Eevee: Capian ka pa nu Dios si chana'jep!
Lizy and Anja: What?
Eevee: I totally win.

>He's self possessed in the moonlight, almost as if this is where he should be.

Eevee: (Batman) But he shouldn’t be! This is Gotham, damnit!

>In civilian clothes. Above this anonymous towpath. Watching me. "What are you doing here?"

Lizy: (Batman) Didn’t you hear? If you and the new Robin meet face to face you will both explode!

>He's coming closer, walking slowly, deliberately. My eyes skim the curve of his shoulders,
>the gleam from his hair: my heart beats, once, and again. I can't move, and he's coming
>closer. And then he's here: one hand cupping my chin below the cowl.

Anja: (Nightwing) Say, that costume’s very becoming on you. If I were on you, I’d be coming to.

>"Too young?" He says, and I see in his eyes a very quiet determination. "Too
>inexperienced?" He kisses me once, briefly, a quick hard pressure of his lips that sends my
>breath streaming after his in the night. His eyes are very steady on mine.

Lizy: (Batman) Wait, what are we talking about again?

>"Bruce, I'm going to leave you and walk down that alley and find someone to fuck me. And
>then I'm going to find someone else, and someone else again. And I'm going to carry on
>doing that until the great Batman finally decides that I'm good enough to get into his
>bed."

All: *applause*
Lizy: Great plan, simply brilliant!
Eevee: (Nightwing) Or until I am so stuffed with STDs I can’t walk, whichever comes first.

>I can't believe what I'm hearing. Rage, shock: I reach out for him but by now he's gone,
>twisting away and diving over the edge of the roof:

Anja: Drama Queen.

>I'm running, frantically looking for somewhere to anchor the rappel: as I look down I see
>him hit the floor and move away from the building: I'm airborne: the ground takes forever
>to meet my feet. I can't see him: can't hear him: I know which way he went, but that
>means nothing: he could well have doubled back.

Lizy: Iiieee, those colons... all... those... colons... *cries*

>I hear murmurs start again in the silence, the tear of a condom packet and someone's
>choked cry. I cannot bear this, lust and rage spiralling up my body. I see images of Dick in
>a stranger's arms, his back arched in ecstasy: Dick on his knees in front of someone else,
>his long hair sliding over a stranger's cock. No. No and no and no.

Lizy: (Batman, John Hartigan) There’s wrong and then there’s wrong and then there’s this.
Eevee: That’s for sure.

>And then I take one long breath. Why tell me, if he didn't want to be caught? But it's a full
>quarter of an hour before I find him, talking low-voiced with a tall man I recognise from
>one of the bars. As I see him, the man reaches up to touch Dick's hair. It's a casual touch,
>and it's enough to spur all the rage and pain I feel. He didn't know what hit him.

Lizy: Aaah, he just knocked the guy out? That seems a little irresponsible.

>But by then I had Dick in my arms, an instant of startled recognition before I feel his body
>curve against mine.

Anja: Wait! We’re getting sex now? Hot, gay, bat-sex?

>Oh, he knows. And the blood is racing through my body. His hand comes up to pull the
>cowl off,

Lizy: Wow, he doesn’t seem to care much about the innocent guy Batman just knocked out, does he?

>but both my hands are on his the muscles of his ass and I pick him up, take two steps to
>the wall and hold him against it, my mouth on his, hungry, and then as I press close
>against him the tender skin of his neck and shoulder beneath my teeth. I want to mark
>him, want to let the world know he's mine.

Lizy: So Batman really is a vampire!!
Anja: (Maxine McKendry) Of course he's deathly pale, but he's a vegetarian, and they all seem to look like that.
Eevee: That’s true.
Lizy: Shut up!

>Dick's got one hand free, round my neck, and I feel his teeth on my ear.

Eevee: Like father, like son, eh?

>"You're mine." I say to him, and raise my head and look at him while my body presses his
>against the wall, blood beating in my cock, the need for him racing through every vein and
>capillary in my body. "Mine" And he laughs at that,

Eevee: (Nightwing) Ha-ha, I’m the bat-bitch!

>a little choked laugh that vanishes into a gasp when he feels my hands on his skin, under
>his jacket, undoing his jeans. Everything in my body is urging me to completion, but I can
>still, now, spare him a little humour.

Lizy: (Batman) What do you call kids born in whorehouses? Brothel sprouts!
Anja: Bada bum-bum!
Eevee: (Batman) What does a 72-year-old snatch taste like? Depends!
Lizy: Bada bum-bum!
Anja: (Batman) What do a dildo and soy beans have in common? They are both used as substitute meat!
Eevee: Bada bum-bum!
Lizy: (Batman) What do you call kinky sex with chocolate? S&M&M!
Anja: Bada bum-bum!
Eevee: (Batman) What do an airport and a illegal abortion have in common? The Hanger!
Lizy: Bada bum-bum!
Anja: (Batman) What does Popeye do to keep his favorite tool from rusting? Sticks it in Olive Oyl!
Eevee: Bada bum-bum!
All: *laugh*
Lizy: Whew, we really over did that one, didn’t we?
Anja: Yeah we did.

>"I'll do subtle later." I promise him,

Anja: Sure, they always PROMISE...

>but then his hand is on my bared cock and I've loosened his jeans: and I fall to my knees
>in front of him and take his clean cock in my mouth, my hands fumbling with his shoes as
>his tangle in my hair,

Eevee: Yeah, you can’t have sex with your shoes on.

>and he pushes against me and groans: I smell sex, acrid, sweat, excitement,

Eevee: Ass, farts, poopie...

>and suddenly I can't wait, I have to have him, now, and I spit on one hand and reach for
>his arse,

Anja: Oooh, a romantic, this one.
Eevee: (Nightwing, Peter Griffen) Heh heh, gross. I still think you’re neat though.

>and at that he spreads his legs a little, his breath coming faster, and then I know where
>I'm going and I know he's coming too and I rise off my knees and take his weight and my
>cock's pushing into the dark warmth of his arse

Lizy: I know that is supposed to sound inviting, but ‘dark warmth of his arse’ just sound weird to me.

> - try to wait, but he's saying "Yes, yes yes!" and he drags my face round to his and says
>"I love you" as my cock moves in and out of him, mine, caught here in this tangled web of
>love and lust, and he's mine, and I tell him so with each thrust and he has breath left to
>laugh,

Anja: (Batman) You’re mine! *ugh* You’re mine! *oof*
Eevee: (Nightwing) Ah-ha-ha-ha! *snort* Wah-ha-ha-ha hee-heeo!

>yet, and I feel the dark unfurl in me and know I'm coming and I reach for his cock and find
>he's there with me and when I come I'm not alone.

All: *blink*
Lizy: Wait, did what I think just happen, happen?
Anja: An entire sex scene, between two men, and we were not given any penis sizes?
Eevee: *hyperventilating* The world... is coming to... an end! *gasp*
Lizy: Hell has frozen over!
Anja: You don’t read a lot of GOOD lemons, do you?

>When I open my eyes he's looking at me.

>"I love you." he says.

>And I can smile.

>And then I realise where I am.

Anja: (Nightwing) Smile, you’re on candid camera!
Eevee: I thought realize was spelled with a z?
Lizy: *shrug* Maybe it’s another British thing.

>And I feel myself loose all balance, my knees going, turning and sliding down the wall, my
>breath coming harsh as the afterglow of orgasm kicks into a bleak wall of guilt.

Eevee: (Batman) *THWAK* Oww...

>It's never been this bad. I hear myself gasp, the cold air hitting the back of my throat, and
>can hear the rustle of Dick's clothing. He must be leaving now: he's got what he wanted.

Lizy: That would be pretty cold.
Eevee: Well, he was the one who sent all his pictures to Alfred, and then taunted Batman with his promiscuity.

>But in seconds his arm comes round my head, and I feel the warmth of his body against
>mine.

>"Shhh" he says, crooning to me.

Anja: (Nigtwing) ~Hush little baby, don’t say a word, mamma’s gonna buy you, a mock-ing bird.~

>"It's okay, beautiful, it's all right, I'm here."

Eevee: *snicker* ‘Beautiful?’ That seems an odd term of endearment for frikken BATMAN.
Lizy: Well, Bruce Wayne is supposed to be a total playboy.

>My fingers are spread against my face, and his join them, open palmed, and the tears,
>agonising, shaming, seep through our interlocked hands.

Anja: (Dick) Jeez, it wasn’t THAT bad, was it?

>I can't tell what is mine and what his, and at the moment, I don't care. This should not
>have happened. This is disastrous. This is yet another moment in time that, an I could, I
>would erase from all history. But Dick...Dick closes his warmth against me, sits, rocking me,
>his cheek against my bared hair and his voice soothing in my ear.

Anja: (Dick) Was your mom an alien, because you are out of this-
Lizy: (Batman) Would you cut it out already?!

>"It's okay." He says, quiet, sure. "It's really okay, Bruce. We'll sort it out. It's all right."

Eevee: (Dick) I won’t tell the cops, really. This wasn’t all a big scam to sue you for large amounts of money...

>Where does he get this strength, this maturity? When did I give up my sovereignty?

Lizy: When you were invaded by US soldiers?

>I hear someone trip, cursing, and walk forward. "Dick? Richard Grayson?"

Lizy: I never understood why Dick is short for Richard. And why would someone who’s name is Richard wanna go by ‘Dick,’ anyway?

>It's the tall man, and as I tense so does Dick, his arms holding me still.

Anja: You mean the guy Batman clocked for no good reason?

>"It's okay, man, everything's all right."

Lizy: (Dick) Except for the man laying stricken on the floor, but, why worry about that? Oh, that was YOU?

>He's coming closer, but Dick's grip on my body is tensile steel. I don't think I could have
>moved him if I'd been able to hurt him.

>"Are you sure? That was some - oh, shit!"

Eevee: (Leo, Peter Griffen) My duodenum’s acting up again!

>He's tripped on something else, and from the plastic snap I think it's one of the bracers
>from my cape.

>"What is that? Jesus, Dick, who's that?"

Lizy: (Dick) Darkwing Duck! Who does it look like?

>"Leo, it's okay. Leave it."

>"What is he wearing?" I can feel Dick's cheek round against my jaw as he smiles. "Fancy
>dress party. Leo, go away. There's only one person I want to be with tonight."

Lizy: (Dick) I was just messing with you earlier, to get this guy in bed, see...
Eevee: (Leo) So, you toyed with me and set me up to get clobbered, left me for dead, and now you are actually telling me to ‘go away’ so you can go to bed with the guy who knocked me out?
Lizy: (Dick) That’s about the size of it, yeah.
Eevee: (Leo) Jeez, you really are a DICK aren’t you?
Lizy: (Dick) Yeah, man, haven’t heard THAT one.

>"Oh. So that's-"

>"Go away." "I'm gone. But take it easy with this one. You're sure, yeah?" "Leo,
>everything's cool. Honest. Go away."

Lizy: Wait, so Leo knew about the whole thing the whole time? Does he know their secrete identities too? Is nothing sacred?!
Anja: I wouldn’t think about it too hard.

>Part of me wants to smash his face into pulp for knowing things about Dick I have missed.

Lizy: Well, jeez, you already clocked him for touching Dick’s hair.
Eevee: Yeah, talk about over protective.
Anja: (Dick) Batman, you’re SMOTHERING me!

>Part of me feels utterly grateful that Dick has friends who care about him.

Anja: Boy-toy.

>Most of me never wants to leave this spot, never wants to face Dick or Alfred or think
>myself worthy to make any kind of moral decision ever again.

Lizy: Well, it hasn’t worked out so well for you so far, has it?

>But it's Dick who makes the decision, gathering up cowl and cape and wrapping it around
>me, one arm round my shoulders, tugging me to my feet.

>"Come on, I've borrowed a flat a couple of streets away. It's not far. I've got decent
>coffee."

Lizy: More coffee? When do these guys sleep, anyway?
Eevee: Well, I don’t think he even drank that other coffee.

>It's the amusement of that, a thread of normality in this stricken universe that stirs me to
>my feet.

Lizy: What, no colon?

>I'm not sure how we made it to Dick's flat, but we did, and by then at least I was walking
>by myself, although Dick's arm was still round my waist. He took one look at me in the
>sudden light

Eevee: (Dick) AAAAeeech! What happened to your face! You have, like, a giant pus-filled pimple on your nose, gross!

>and pushed me down on the couch. "Stay there. I'm making coffee."

>I shut my eyes. Now was a good time to go. But I was tired of running. He won. I lost.

Lizy: Didn’t take much, did it?
Eevee: (Nightwing) You do realize that Leo is just my hair stylist, right?

>We both lost. I hear the whistle of the cafeteria, Dick, oddly clumsy, clinking china.

Eevee: (Dick) Hey, I’m an acrobat and a tight-rope walker, not a friggen waitress.

>Then the light in front of my eyelids darkens a little, and I feel Dick settle down on the
>floor by my right thigh, where he used to sit so often to talk over the day's events. When
>he was small. But it's this older, adult Dick

Eevee: (Dick) ~I’m big boy now!~

>that wraps my fingers around the warmth of a mug of coffee and then rests his arm and
>chin on my leg. I know he's looking at me.

Anja: (Dick) Peek-a-boo! I see you!

>"Well, hi, Bruce." he says. "Or is it Batman? I find it hard to tell, when you're half and half."

Eevee: Oh, ugh. What is it with these superheros and all their secret identity angst, anyway?

>I open my eyes and look at him. How odd. He looks exactly the same, same eyes, same
>nose, same quirk to his mouth, almost as if I hadn't raped him against a warehouse wall
>twenty minutes ago. His eyebrows twist.

Lizy: Ya’ know, Batman, usually when you rape someone they don’t scream ‘I love you’ at you while you’re doing it.

>"Oh no, don't go there. You know as well as I do that I set you up for this. I just hadn't
>realised it would have such an effect." He held one hand up, and I could see it shaking.
>"On me too."

Lizy: Don’t worry, it’s just the coffee.

>I don't know what to say.

Anja: Oops?

>"You don't need to say anything." He's more serious now than I've ever seen him. "Bruce,
>I've had three years to think this through. You're not the only one with issues.

All: Ya’ think?!

>I've got a Bruce that I love dearly, a Bruce that took me to the pantomime and gave me
>my first bike and played Jedi knights in the bat-cave,

Eevee: Why would you want to be a pussy Jedi when you are already a superhero?

>and I've got a Bruce who can make every part of my body come alive when he walks in a
>room. But I'm willing to bet that you pushed every part of this as far away from your brain
>as you possibly could, while I spent three years working out exactly how I felt.

Eevee: Well, Nightwing, there’s your problem right there.
Anja: (Nightwing) And having sex with a hot alien chick every night. Captain Kirk eat your heart out!

>There's never going to be anyone else for me." He looks away for an instant. "And believe
>me, there was a time when I would have given an awful lot to have that possibility. But
>it's not so." His eyes meet mine. "I love you in every way known to man." he says. And
>smiles. "And then some."

Eevee: Yeah, see, I’m not sure you are supposed to love one person in every different kind of way.
Lizy: (Nuku-nuku) I call those feelings ‘family love.’

>I feel sick.

Lizy: As you should.

>Dick has to put one hand over mine on the coffee cup. I'm shaking so much that liquid
>splashes on the black kevlar.

Anja: Why do I get the feeling he is not going to drink this cup of coffee either?

>"What you have to recognise is that this is a choice I made as an adult, away from you,
>just as I choose to create Nightwing and choose to protect Bludhaven."

Eevee: So, does Britland, like, not have z’s or something?

>He smiles, lightly, looking down at the floor. "It's near enough to commute, sometimes,
>don't you think?

Anja: (Dick, Zapp Brannigan) Oh yeah, I am going to be all over you like a fly on a pile of very seductive manure.

>And you..." He looks up. "I know you haven't thought about this. It's very easy to attack a
>man who's built a wall and forgotten about the foundations. If you'd really decided, I
>wouldn't have had a hope in hell. But Alfred told me about the album, and the video.

Lizy: (Dick) And frankly, it creeped the hell outta me.

>And when you came to Bludhaven, I was very nearly certain I could have you. I was
>right."

Eevee: Well, aren’t you a little ass.

>He looks down again. "Maybe I should have said it straight out. It's always seemed to me
>as if, no matter what we say to each other, there's a bond between us nothing could
>break, a greater truth that isn't Batman or Robin or Dick or Bruce or whoever, but just us.

Lizy: But that doesn’t mean you had to have sex!
Anja: Sure it does.

>I thought you felt that too. But..."

Eevee: (Dick) Look, it’s not you, it’s me, and I have some stuff to work out and my mother has this thing against your mother and I just think we should just be friends...

>His hand tightens over mine. "I'm sorry." He says. "I didn't mean to hurt you quite so
>much."

Lizy: Leo’s the one who got knocked out for no reason! What about him!?

>And we sit there in silence, my eyes closed, my hand on his, on mine, on the cup of coffee,
>the warmth of him soaking into the padded thigh of this Batsuit that he didn't help design.

Anja: Nope, not drinking coffee.

>"I missed you." I say.

Eevee: (Batman) Yeah, they just don’t make Robin’s like you anymore.

>"I missed you too."

>"I was so proud of you, when you unloaded those councillors in front of the cameras."

Anja: He’s not going to mention how horny it made him, is he?
Lizy: I would imagine not.

>"It's okay, Bruce, you don't have to say it."

Anja: Not what he said earlier, is it?

>"I wanted...I wanted you to send those photographs to me." It wasn't quite what I meant
>to say, but he seemed to understand.

Eevee: (Batman) Alfred must die.

>"You could say that I did. There's a whole other set you haven't seen. Alfred has those -
>all the ones with faces and scenery. I'll show you, sometime."

Lizy: So, he didn’t want Batman to see any faces or scenery and so he told Alfred not to show him all the pictures?
Anja: They are both neurotic, aren’t they?

>He lies his face down against my thigh, and I swear I can feel his eyelashes brush down.

Lizy: Through the Batsuit?

>I lean my head back against the sofa, and feel silent, slow tears start again.

Eevee: Wuss.

>His spare hand curls, warm, against my knee, and then he uses it to push away from my
>body,

Eevee: Breaking Bruce’s knee promptly in two.

>a long slow stretch that takes him up onto his heels in front of me. "It's been a long
>night," he said. "I'm going to take you to bed."

Lizy: What is it with these guy and drinking coffee right before bed?
Anja: Didn’t we already have this conversation? I’m telling you, they aren’t actually drinking the coffee.
Lizy: But, that, what?

>And as I open my eyes to glare at him, Dick grins, that irrepressible mischievous Dick grin
>that I haven't seen for far too long. "Don't panic," he says. "I'm saving the anal expanders
>until tomorrow. I'd just like to feel you against my skin tonight."

Lizy: *snort* Anal expanders? Can you just picture Batman’s face?
Anja: I wonder if Dick intends those for Batman or himself.

>And that in itself is enough to send fear dancing over my own skin. But I'm tired, and for
>once, I allow myself to want him beside me, and he reads it in my face and gives me a
>hoist up and we stagger into the bedroom, stumbling and cursing the straps of the
>Batsuit.

Lizy: (Batman) Curse you, Batsuit! *shakes fist*

>My fingers are useless, but Dick is quick and deft,

Anja: *suggestively* In more ways than one.
Lizy: I dunno, perverse insinuations seem out of place in a post-climax lemon. I mean, what can we insinuate that hasn’t already happened at this point?
Anja: Tee-hee! You said ‘climax!’
Lizy: *facefault*

>and in less time than I think is possible I'm lying on the bed with Dick's warm weight
>spooned against my back, one arm flung round me, the other lying in that comfortable
>spot between the pillow edge and my neck that he found instinctively. I have no
>thoughts. I can't bear to think this through, will wait, safe here, for morning.

Eevee: (Batman) And when morning FINALLY shows up, boy is HE gonna get an earful!

>It's the word morning that brings misgiving to mind. I tighten my hand on Dick's fingers,
>lying lax in this pre-sleep warmth.

Lizy: How can he tighten his fingers and lay lax at the same time?

>"What about Alfred?"

Eevee: (Nightwing) Shoot! I forgot all about him! He’s probably still in that birthday cake!

>"What about Alfred?" asks Dick. His voice is more of a vibration in my ear than a true
>sound.

Eevee: Well then how could he understand it?
Lizy: I dunno, bats navigate with echo location so they must be able to interpret sound wave-
Anja: Yep, some people’s brains operate on logic, Lizy’s runs on pure bull shit.
Lizy: *whines* What about Eevee? Her head is more full of bologna than mine.
Anja: OK, you’re both full of it.

>"He'll think -

Anja: (Bruce) I’m having an affair! Oh, wait...

>I must call." Dick's arm tightens.

>"Don't worry.

Eevee: (Dick) I took care of HIM. HE won’t bother us anymore.

>I already did."

>"What? When?"

>"Before I got up on the roof."

Eevee: Cocky lil’ turd, ain’t he?

>There's a moment's silence, and then I can feel Dick start to shake with laughter and I roll
>over and catch him on that spot under the ribs where he's always been ticklish.

Eevee: That’s it! Tickle him into a coma!

>He's laughing out loud and suddenly a chuckle forces its way up from my throat, and
>another, and Dick wraps his arms around me and lays one leg over mine and curls his
>cheek into my collarbone.

Lizy: What? Batman can't laugh.

>"That's better," he says. "G`night."

All: Good night!
Anja: So, how many colons?
Lizy: Fifty-four.
Eevee: Wow, for a prose formatted fic, that has got to be some kinda record.

___

Author’s notes:

I do not want to be a major bother, so I will be quick. This is my first MST and I hope I at least got a laugh out of you. The characters used here are Alex’s, sorta. They are based off of real people, so I suppose they do not really belong to anyone. The plot leading up to this fanfiction is his, anyway, as well as the inspiration to write this. Also on the thank list for inspiration is Megane 6.7, whose MSTs I have been enjoying recently. I would also like to thank Jay Tryfanstone for writing “The Rose Tattoo.” And Anja gets uber-thanks for beta-ing for me, as well as making some good suggestions for riffs.

I would like to do more MSTs in the future, probably building off of this one. I have some ideas I would like to try, and some fics I would love to MST. Time and jokes, on the other hand...

-Lizy

 

Home

Characters

Season 1

Season 2

Season 3

Season 4

Season 5

Extra

Gifts