The tinted sconces and shaded lamps were dimmed even further via a small dial on the wall, the paint beneath covered by a healthy smattering various comic-related posters, although one or two depicted musicians, what some might call 'drug paraphernalia', and scantily clad women. To further heighten the sensation of being underground - the room itself ironically a good thirty or forty floors above street level - a heavy curtain was thrown against the window to keep the sun out, a slit in the fabric fastened in front of the glass door that lead out to the balcony. A desk was shoved into the back corner of the room, heaps upon heaps of comic books piled high in protective slips all around in precariously stacked columns, and a rather simple king-sized mattress was shoved just opposite of that, dark cotton sheets folded with a matching comforter.

Tendrils of smoke were twisting a smoldering gray path through the air, a sweetly stale smell curling through the oxygen, perverting the air, penetrating the long-abandoned virginity with cruel fingers, the spreading fumes blowing her tantalizing kiss of submission. Lit up in an ornate bong, the burning cannabis was steadily filling the lungs of a teenage boy of roughly sixteen or seventeen, his green eyes glossing with a red sheen. Leaning back in a low, silver-studded armchair facing a sleek HD 3D flat screen, he laughed at reruns of an old cartoon from the seventies. Seriously, that shit was so fucking lame! How the fuck where they ever able to get this shit put out on television?! Jesus, and people bitched about TV nowadays?

Taking another hit, the boy was about to change the channel when the intercom came on, the doorman, ol' who-the-fuck-cares-what-his-name-is wheezing and moaning as the old man was transfered over to his own personal line, cackling from years of smoking when he spoke, "Sir, Miss Vela is here to see you."

"Emily?!" He coughed, agitation at being disturbed simmering when he heard that she was the one calling on him, as opposed to it being some fake-ass mother fucker that was only using him for his father's connections. Emily was different from all those tanorexic sluts (whom he would still gladly fuck, provided the opportunity arose). "Well, what the fuck are you waiting for, shit-for-brains?! Send her up!"

Getting up, he shuffled around his room, cleaning up things he didn't particularly want her to see, such as throwing a towel over the wastebasket by his bed and stuffing the box of Kleenex into his underwear drawer - as for all the other shit, he could care less if she happened upon it. As he had learned early on, she wasn't some prissy little girly-girl that squawked at the most minute of messes, and yet he still felt some archaic need to impress her, and somehow leaving evidence of his lonely-man lifestyle felt a tad bit counterproductive to that inate desire.

Going back to his spot in front of the TV, the young man didn't have to wait long for his surprise guest to arrive, although, while he waited for her, he thought back to how he had first met Emily...

[One Year Ago...]

Among the numerous guests at his not-so-sweet sixteen, a majority being the children of his father's clients and associates, there weren't too many faces that Chris didn't recognize, which was kind of a disappointment, because as much as he wanted to show his father that he could be a success, he kinda hated all of the two-faced cocksuckers. Sure, a number of the future gold-diggers were insanely hot, but their heads were so far up their pilates-toned asses that they still didn't give him a second look, not even on his birthday, at his own house. Fucking cunts. Pouting in the corner like some beaten dog that regularly gets sodomized by its hillbilly owner, Chris had gone outside for air, even before he had the chance to greet all of his guests. Head in her arms as she sat on the thick concrete slabs that formed the upstairs fencing, face turned away from the penthouse as she overlooked the glittering night skyline, a girl had already beat him to the punch of moping.

"Some party, huh?" He sighed forlornly, leaning over the balcony next to his unidentified guest. Pretending to be looking out at all the other buildings, he was peeking over at her, trying to glean just how good-looking she was, but that was kind of hard between all of the hair falling in her face.

Peeking over her shoulder at him, eyes a dulled emerald, she shrugged noncommittally, sizing him up just the same way that he was her. He wasn't the definition of handsome, nor was she the model for beauty, but raging hormones coupled with some small level of desperation really went a long way. "I wouldn't know. I came out here as soon as I could."

He quirked a dark eyebrow, wondering if she even knew who he was. It was hard to believe that she couldn't, but given that he had never seen her around before, it wasn't impossible that she was truly in the dark as to his identity. "You didn't even greet the douchebag throwing the party?"

She returned her gaze to the sky, trying to play that coy figure that everyone seemed to favor, regardless of gender. "I thanked his parents for the invite, but the birthday boy was AWOL when I got here. So I came outside, to the bullshit-free zone. I figured that in another couple of hours, everyone will be so plastered they won't even remember why I was dragged here in the first place, so then I can get away."

"And why were you brought here?" He inquired lightly, crossing and recrossing his arms as if he couldn't decide what to do with his limbs. He wondered distantly where she had planned to go after this, if there was some other dude in the picture. That would just be his fucking luck.

The girl didn't miss a beat as she stood up, her artfully torn up Batman shirt shifting in place over a wine-colored cocktail dress. Intentionally, she stuck out her chest to send the universal signal. "My dad owed his boss, who was hoping that I would hit it off with his son. Why, what about you? Judging from you being out here, I wouldn't say that this is your scene either."

"And what do you think is my scene?" He shifted his weight and leaned to the side of the railing, half trying to be cool and half trying to appear stern and stoic, like all girls loved.

She thought about it, looking him over on a less physical level, "You look nice, dressed in a designer suit and tie, so you want to impress your old man, but your lack of a formal jacket suggests that you also have a streak of independence. The way that you're kind of hunching would either suggest a medical condition or a social ineptitude, and since you're here, I'm guessing that its not entirely on you. The way you looked at my attire would lead me to believe that you are familiar with the concepts of nerds and hipsters, and I think you're trying to figure out which side I'm on, even now as I'm analyzing you."

He blinked, never once having experienced a five-second evaluation before. "That was... thorough."

The girl nodded earnestly, "Like my idol, I want to be a psychologist."

While that made a large amount of sense from her critique, he had never once heard anyone saying that they wanted to be something so ordinary, but then again it wasn't like he was on speaking terms with anyone to know what kids his age talked about being, and even if he had been, he probably wouldn't have cared. "A shrink? Why? Who's your idol? Sigmund fucking Freud?"

She shook her head slowly, realizing that she had said too much and revealed a branding secret, one that already branded her back home (where she had lived with her mother before moving back to the city with her father), thus blowing this one opportunity with a genuinely interesting guy. "No, it's stupid... You'll just laugh at me."

"I won't!" Chris was in no position to pass up a private conversation, no matter how unorthodox the subject matter was, especially when it was with a member of the opposite sex. Sure, there was always the option of a prostitute, but for one his father would probably put his foot down on that shit, and two, when you had to pay for their time, why bother wasting it talking? "Honest."

She gave him a piercing stare, finally deciding that she might as well say it, since she was probably never going to see the kid ever again. "...Harley."

He snorted, thinking that he must have been mistaken about exactly who she was talking about, because she couldn't possible mean the woman he was thinking of, "As in Quinn?"

The girl dipped her head, maroon side braid remaining mostly motionless. "Yeah. Harley was always my favorite Batman villain. I thought it was so cool how she put everything on hold for love, that she was a professional that turned her back on what was socially acceptable to do what she felt was right. I can't think of anyone that awesome in real life."

"What's your name?" Whoever this girl was, she was kind of awesome herself - it wasn't every day that he met a chick that was into comics.

"... Vela. Emily Vela." Her parents had taught her better than to just give out her name like that, but she kinda liked this guy, because he was the first person she had met that didn't judge her for her tastes. That feeling was exceptionally mutual.

*Update: 9-4-13* I don't usually do this, but if you want to read Chris/Red Mist and Dave/Kick-Ass lemon, you should skip to chapter 9/ Red Kick, issue 4. If you don't like that pairing, you should just skip to the following chapter (once it's out). Personally, I hope you don't skip any of this, but I realize that not everyone likes the same kind of stuff, and I respect that. Thanks!

*Update: 9-9-13* To just get to the point, the first five 'issues' are about Chris and an OC, Emily, hence "Chris and Emily". "Red Kick" - chapters/issues six through ten - is about Chris and Dave, while "The Real You" focuses on Dave and Mindy (I anticipate that to last through chapters 11-15). "Black Heart" gets back to the Mother Fucker and Emily.

Ok, I saw both movies multiple times and got caught up on the comics (ok, so as of this chapter I'm on Hit-Girl issue 3 (I should note that I've started it after reading Kick Ass 3)), so I think I've got a fairly good grip on things. Besides being completely obsessed and in love with the property, I think the only other thing I really have to say is that I'm still unsure about which universe to center this closer to, the comics or the movies, so I'm thinking that I'm going for a third, more blended take on things. So, yes, some things might get changed, but really I wouldn't count on a whole hell of a lot being different. Although, I still don't know if I want to go with Genovese or D'Amico for the surname... I'm aware that makes me look really unprepared, but I do have a story up my sleeves, I promise! Oh, and I'm not really used to spraying a butt-ton of profanity in my work - that's just me keeping with the source material. Oh, and the cover is my own painting of the Mother Fucker (film version), but its a first draft piece...

Remember, reviews are always welcome, no matter how nit-picky or simple! So review!

Kick-Ass is the property of Mark Millar and John Romita Jr.