~ After being horribly injured by the new menace to Gotham crime, AKA Batman, young Selina Kyle seeks shelter with her old friend and long suffering paramour, Bruce Wayne.
Batman, still on the hunt for the elusive and dangerous cat burglar, has no idea he had been harboring the enemy in his home.~
DISCLAIMER! I don't own Batman, Gotham, Catwoman or Selina. I'm a huge fan of the show and the casting was amazing! Except Barbra. Eww! Cameron and David are so cute and I think they will rock as Selina and Bruce.
Shelter from the Storm.
1.
~ Pain, burned like white fire along Catwoman's hip as soon as she hit the ground. She gasped at the sharpness of it. The pain was like a knife being plunged into her and twisted.
She looked up at the ledge where she had fallen and couldn't help but let out a feeble cry. That freak, dressed all in black, had chased her off the rooftop and down to a less reliable escape route.
She knew Gotham like the back of her hand, but the rain had made her world too uncertain. It didn't help that the city had yet to fix some broken street lights, or that the freak had caused such an imposition.
He had come out of nowhere. His footsteps as silent as her own when he snuck up behind her. He had cut a very menacing figure in the darkness. No wonder the street criminals all feared him. It was like he was made out of shadows. He seemed to appear and then vanish in total silence. Catwoman couldn't help but admire the freak for this.
It was a trait she would have to adopt if she wanted to return the favor for his interference.
He had caught her coming out of the jewelry shop. It was a break in she had been planing for weeks now and had timed the sensors, and pressure point down perfectly. The roof access gave her the only ingress and she had dropped down from a cable into the store without ever touching her feet on the floor.
Motion sensors were never tripped, alarms never sounded. Even now, there were no police sirens. GCPD wasn't on it's way. She had all the time in the world to steal millions in untraceable diamonds.
So how did the freak find her?
She had been dangling, inverted, from her rope just five feet off the ground when there had been a hard pull and she almost dropped the diamond bracelet she had been holding. That bracelet alone would fence her enough to keep Rilo off her back for a long time. Now, she had nothing for him and she was hurt on top of it.
The rain was pouring down on her in this filthy alleyway. The freak, the phantom, the shadow, the darkness, whoever he was, had given chase after she fought back.
As soon as he had pulled her out of the jewelry shop and on top of the roof, she had shown no mercy. She slashed at the intruder with a blade she neatly kept hidden. The darkness of the rooftop, showed her very little of what or who was around her. She could see in the dark very well most of the time, but not tonight. Tonight, it was like she was blind. Even her night vision goggles didn't help with all the rain and the reflective light from nearby buildings.
She slashed out at the figure and he hit her. His punch almost knocking the breath from her lungs. She hadn't been hit that hard since she left the state home for children.
For a moment, that fear had come back to her. Her inner child, scared and in tears told her to cower. Maybe he won't hit her again if she backed away.
But a rage took over her. She was quicker than the freak. He was a man, she could tell by the sheer breath of him. His body was strong and she felt especially fragile in the face of him.
But he was slower than she was. He played defense when she seized a large wrench from her tool belt and heaved it at him.
She thought she might have hit him on the face, the darkness seeming to have swallowed him up again, she was quick to turn and run.
She ran like she had never run before.
She wasn't sure what the freak was capable of, but she wasn't ready to find out. Stories had already spread of this guy. Who knows what he did to street people like her?
She jumped from roof top to roof top and she knew he was in pursuit. The sound of the rain drowned out the noises of feet landing hard from a long drop. She knew he was just behind her, always ready to catch her.
It was like a dance, only she wanted it to end. A flash of lighting distracted her and she caught a glimpse of her pursuer. His face… his face wasn't a normal face at all. It was all black and his ears… he was covered in blackness. He could easily be mistaken for one of the grotesque gargoyles that perched around the older buildings of Gotham.
In horror, she lost her footing and fell. Her instincts eating her to slow her fall by grabbing a hold of a fire escape. Her hands slipped off the slick metal and she fell again, quickly she was able to tuck and roll as she hit the ground.
She was hurt now. Her body protesting as she dragged herself off the alley and behind a dumpster.
She could hear him. Hear the freak jumping down fire escapes and landing, more gracefully than she did, in the alley.
She managed to pull herself up to a standing position and spotted the little window that belonged to the basement of an old bakery. It would still be unlocked, she was sure. The bakery had long been out of business and she and Ivy used to stay there until the rats took over.
Without concern for the rats, or her injury, she dove for the little door. Her hips were somewhat wider now than when she was young. It took her slightly longer to squeeze in, but she managed to vanish in the darkness.
Quick as a flash, she slid an old wooden crate over the window and pressed herself against the wall.
From the street view, it would hopefully look like the window was boarded up from the inside. She stopped breathing when she saw him. He detached himself from the darkness with the help of a flash of lighting.
With wide eyes, she watch his feet, clad in high end all terrain boots, walk carefully past her hiding spot.
She was holding her breath as she watched him. The lighting had only been for a second, but she saw the rumors were true, this guy wore some kind of mask.
A squeaking noise diverted her attention for a moment and she saw the rats had never abandoned the old bakery. They were offended by her presence there and were brazen enough to come right up to her.
She looked back out the little window and saw the freak had gone.
'He might still be outside.' she thought worriedly. 'Waiting for me to think it's safe.'
She winced in pain and threw off a rat who had come too close.
She tried to relax her body, but the pain, now more insistent refused to let her go.
~ Bruce was annoyed, but his face never showed it. His face was always calm and composed. His mask was always on, even when it was off.
"Whoever she was, she got away." he muttered to Alfred before his long time friend had a chance to say a word.
"I see." the older man said. "Any chance she's known to the police?"
"Most likely." Bruce said bitterly.
He had finished undressing from the cumbersome, yet lifesaving body armor her wore on patrol, bandaged the wounds he would forget to tell Alfred about and redressed in plain clothes.
"High end B and E. Female. The list is long in Gotham." he sighed. "She's a professional. Didn't even trip the security sensors. She was most likely working for a larger organization. It's unlikely she would be able to do this on her own. She would need information and equipment to pull this off. Also a buyer in line for the diamonds. A search into burglaries among the organized crime families would take too long."
Bruce opened the high tech computer screen that was becoming his best friend these days. Tonight had been a total bust. He had stopped the theft, sure, but the culprit had gotten away. She had just vanished into the storm like a ghost. He had looked for hours in the rain until he was sure all traces of his prey were washed away by the unforgiving storm that flooded the streets and made everything cold miserable.
"Master, Bruce?" Alfred interrupted.
What is it?" Bruce asked with a sigh.
"It's very late, I think you would want to get some rest." Alfred said.
Bruce shook his head at the notion. Miserable or not, he never felt more alive than when he had just come back from patrol. He couldn't explain the rush, the natural high he got from wearing the body armor, the mask and black cape that camouflaged him on those rooftops.
He was finally free when he was on patrol. Couldn't Alfred see that?
"What you're doing is admirable, but you must have a life." Alfred said gently. "It's summer now, but what happens when school starts back up? University and night patrols don't exactly go well together."
Bruce said nothing. His invisible mask was back on again. He was in his junior year at his father's Alma Mater, and college life didn't suit him.
He couldn't stand his peers, wherever he was. This had alway been true. People his own age, from his own social standing lived in this bubble and seemed to be blind to the rest of the world.
"Alfred." Bruce said sadly.
"No!" Alfred snapped. "Don't you dare."
"There is no reason for me to continue with school." Bruce said.
"You're parents would be appalled if you dropped out!" Alfred almost barked.
Bruce was about to argue when his cell phone rang.
"Who the bloody hell is calling at this hour?" Alfred spat.
Bruce ignored him and looked at his phone. He naturally paid extra for a service that showed where the call was coming from anywhere in the world. Even unlisted or blocked numbers.
"Gotham General." Bruce muttered.
Alfred looked disapproving.
"Hello?" Bruce said with a polite and airy voice.
"Umm." A female voice come over the line. It rang with fear and uncertainty.
"Who is this?" Bruce asked gently. Only a few people had his number and it felt like a strange violation for someone to call him on his cell phone.
"Bruce?" a sad, distant voice asked and he already knew who she was. Memories, soft, wonderful and cherished warmed his body up from this cold night better than any fire or fresh change of clothes could.
"Selina?" Bruce almost chocked. "Where… where are you? Are you okay?"
He hadn't seen her in so long. They had such a terrible falling out the last time she had been in his life. They had both been so angry. So many walls were up. So many hateful words thrown at the other.
Bruce could still remember the tears in her eyes. Tears she never shed, but stayed in those eyes of hers like they were afraid to come down.
"Bruce." Selina gasped. Her breathing was labored. "I'm sorry to bother you. I know we haven't talked in a long time."
"Selina, I'm coming to get you." Bruce said sharply into his phone.
"I haven't even told you were I am." she said weakly.
"Caller ID, genius." Bruce teased her. It was an old game he used to play with her. Days gone by, when he had been too trusting, too naive. She had often questioned his genius IQ.
"Oh." she breathed.
"Don't worry, Selina." Bruce said. He ignored Alfred's curious look as he pulled on a jacket. "I'm on my way."