Disclaimer: Not mine.
www. freewebs. com / catverse
January, 2018...apparently. Good thing this is my last fic to post. Mind is gone. A Matter of Family
Normally, Jonathan Crane didn't tend to drop his test tubes, but he made an exception when the door to his lab burst open and the Captain threw herself at him, babbling so fast he couldn't have made sense of her words even if he'd tried. The glass shattered, coating his shoes with (fortunately harmless) sticky green goo.
He grabbed his henchman's wrists and forcibly pulled her hands away from his shirt. She didn't want to let go; she was actually doing her best to shake him back and forth to get his attention.
"What—"
"JONATHAN, PLEASE!" she exploded. "Please, you have to do something, please help me!" He gave her a sharp push. She went down, landed on her rear, and made no move to get up.
"Help you with what?"
"She—" She started hyperventilating. "She—"
"Breathe," he snapped. If she was going to have an asthma attack, she might at least have the decency to do it somewhere other than his lab.
"Don't—want to—"
Well, it must be serious if it made her this blindly rebellious. Had something happened to Kitten?
Not that he…cared if anything happened to the brat, who had learned to walk a week ago, and to pick locks the very next day. Anything that kept her from breaking into his lab and crawling around behind him with her constant, "Squish-Squish! Me too!" would be…nothing but a relief…as far as he was concerned.
She couldn't have gotten hurt, could she?
"I—I can't—believe—she'd be—so stupid—" the Captain gasped.
Well, that ruled out the baby. She wasn't old enough to take the blame for her own actions, not yet. So either Al or Techie must be the stupid one.
But which one? And what had she done? They both frequently did things that were so stupid as to be noteworthy, in his opinion—but their partner in crime didn't often agree with him. In fact, she was usually in the thick of it, if not the mastermind herself.
"Captain, what happened?" he demanded.
She sniffled alarmingly.
"Before I say—please promise not to hurt her!"
"Hurt who?"
"Promise!" she insisted.
"No." She knew better than to ask him to make a promise without letting him know what he was signing away. If he went upstairs to find that Techie had redecorated his room in shades of lavender and mauve or Al had invited Harley and Ivy over for a slumber party, he didn't want to be expected not to throttle her.
He got a towel and a garbage can, and started cleaning up the mess. After a moment, she joined him.
"It's my sister," she said more calmly. "Now can you promise not to hurt her?"
She wasn't giving up on this.
"Fine. I promise that whatever you're about to tell me will not incite me to seek out your sister and do her any bodily harm." She looked alarmed.
"You can't gas her, either!"
"I don't intend to!" The piece of glass he was picking up sliced into his finger. He dropped it.
How harmless was this half-finished toxin? Skin contact was no problem, but he didn't want it in his bloodstream. He should have worn thicker gloves.
He stripped off the gloves he was wearing and dashed to the sink with the Captain at his heels.
"I'm-sorry-I-didn't-mean-to-make-you-drop-it-is-it-deep-are-you-going-to-die?"
"Captain." He held his finger under the water and winced as it started to sting. "Shut up."
"You're bleeding." She ran for the first aid kit, and managed to spill its contents all over the floor when she returned. She tried to shovel everything back into the box. That made it worse.
"Will you let me do that?" he snapped.
"No!" She was in one of those moods, and no matter how much her hands were shaking, she wasn't going to listen to him. Of course, that didn't stop him from trying.
"I'm a doctor; I can take care of this myself."
"No. Give me your hand."
"No."
"You need Bactine!"
"I do not—"
"Bactine fixes everything!"
"I don't need you to—"
"Hand! Now!"
He gave her his hand. She tucked it under her arm to make sure he couldn't take it back, and lightly spritzed his finger.
"I thought you said duct tape fixes everything," he said, thankful that no one else could see this.
"Bactine fixes everything skin-related. Duct tape fixes everything else." She very carefully applied a brightly colored band-aid to the end of his finger.
"Captain?"
"What?"
He snatched his hand back.
"Why is there a teddy bear on my finger?"
"That's Grumpy Bear. He's Kitten's favorite. She always sits up and listens when Secret Bear comes onscreen, but Grumpy Bear was the driving force behind her first laugh. Didn't you know that? She calls him Squishy-Boo."
"Squishy-Boo?"
"Yeah, she has a little trouble with 'bear.'"
He smothered an irritated sigh. At least she was calm enough to talk.
"This is all very fascinating, but if you'd like to get to the point…" She froze up again. "Spit it out or leave."
"Just give me a minute, okay?" She looked like she wanted to throw herself into his arms. He made himself as inaccessible as possible without physically erecting a barrier, and waited. "I didn't exactly…tell my family what I was doing when I moved to Gotham. I don't know, I just thought they might not approve. Crazy idea, huh?" She hesitated.
"Well, go on."
"Okay…I might have let them think I was part of a cult. Just high enough in the priesthood to be allowed a PO box, but low enough that I couldn't have anything like unlimited contact…because that made things a lot easier." He couldn't help laughing at that.
"You? Middle management in a cult?" Not only was she the next best thing to an atheist, but he couldn't imagine her being taken in by some smooth-talking con man. No, she only gave her trust to people who didn't want it.
"Hey, are you forgetting my theatrical background? I could play a priest."
"High school plays and three years of film school are not a 'theatrical background.'"
"I could pull it off," she insisted. "Besides, it's not that farfetched; I am an ordained minister."
"You are?"
"That's not the point! Squishy, Meimei wants to join my cult! And she called me from the bus station!"
Well, that did explain away a good portion of the panic. But he still didn't know why she was coming to him. Unless—oh, no. She was just going to have to march herself down to the bus station and turn the child around on her own; he was not taking part in some elaborate ruse for her benefit. If she thought she was going to get him to play "Reverend Squish" again, she was dead wrong.
But the Captain continued.
"And that's not even the worst part!"
"There's more?" he said dryly.
"She knows—she always was too smart for her own good—she figured out that the cult thing was just a coverup, and she wants to get in on the action."
"No," he snapped. "No more. No more girls infiltrating my lair. No more giggling, no more chocolate binges, no more movie marathons when I'm trying to sleep. I may be used to you lot, but I'm not having another accomplice joining you."
"Not finished," the Captain said miserably, without meeting his eyes.
"What more could there possibly be?"
"She thinks I'm a superhero. Wants to help me fight crime. Because…" Her voice dropped down to a horrified whisper. "Because she has a crush on Nightwing."
All he could do was stare at her. His faithful henchgirl's beloved sister wanted to fight crime…because she liked the look of Nightwing's tights.
He could only assume that was the reason for this so-called crush. Although if the girl took after her older sister, it was possible she had done her research and come to the conclusion that…
"Does she think he needs a hug and a sandwich?" The Captain's miserable expression lightened to one of cautious hope.
"She didn't mention feeding him, but she was pretty explicit on his need for a hug. Does that mean…you'll help?"
"Of course not," he snapped. "Anyone who puts on a cape and mask is a hero first and your family next. I couldn't afford to treat her gently even if I wanted to."
"Then will you help me send her home? She'll never listen to me alone. Please?"
He thought about that, really thought about it, long and hard. Here was an opportunity to be vicious and cruel. An opportunity to really hurt her without lifting a finger. A chance to regain precious alone time, with no more cost to himself than reproachful eyes—four pairs of them—following him everywhere he went.
How could he possibly take the honorable path in a situation like this?
"Please?" she repeated, reaching out to clasp his hands in hers, forcing them both into a position nearly of prayer. She was making it very awkward for him to try to look anywhere but directly down into her face, which was at its most open and vulnerable. He had seen her upset before, but he had never seen her look quite like this, as if the fate of her entire world rested in his hands, and she was trusting him—trusting him—to handle it well.
He could have sworn there were flecks of gold glitter in her eyes.
He snatched his hands back with a huff.
"All right, fine. I'll see what I can do." She grinned dazzlingly and tried to hug him. He forestalled her the best way he knew how, a palm to the forehead keeping her at arms' length. "Don't make a habit of this. Don't say a word about it. And do not touch me."
"Done, doner, and donest. You're the best, Grumpy-Boo."
"Don't say that!" he called after her as she thundered her way back up the stairs.
No wonder the brat was such an adorable little monster, if this was what she had to look up to.