A Bat and His Cats
(rough draft)
A Batman fanfic by Raberba girl
Summary: What if Bruce Wayne adopted cats instead of children?
o.o.o
Bruce was forced to wake up two hours earlier then he had to, because his most ornery cat had decided to sit on his face. "Jasooooon," Bruce groaned, trying to shove the brat away.
At this sign of life, the warm weight on Bruce's chest didn't move but started up its usual diesel engine purring. "Yes, good morning, Dick." Bruce tried to go back to sleep, but Jason was now making his enormously obnoxious "FEED ME NOW" meows as he paced forcefully across Bruce. On top of that, needle-sharp kitten teeth were pouncing and biting at his fingers as if Damian hoped that maybe this time they had morphed into his breakfast. "Uuuuuuuuugggggggghhhhhh..."
Bruce finally gave up and dragged himself out of bed, dislodging cats. "I hate you all."
"Mrraghn?" Duke vocalized.
"No, you're right, I love you all, even Jason, but you're still monsters." Bruce went to the bathroom and filled Jason's bowl, which the cat immediately plunged his head into and guarded zealously. The second bowl nearby was filled with kibble as well, and just like every single freaking morning, Damian charged at it, then mewed up at his human with a deeply betrayed expression. "Damian, you know the bathroom is kibble only. You'll get wet food in the kitchen later."
The black kitten continued to stare up at him accusingly until an older yellow cat barged past him, sending him sprawling. "Stephanie!"
Ignoring him, she plunked her head into the bowl. Although she gobbled as enthusiastically as Jason, unlike him, she didn't mind when other cats edged around her to snatch a few nibbles.
Bruce filled the third bowl with fresh water, saying wearily, "Dick, please," when the gray-blue cat wound lovingly around his ankles, forcing Bruce to step very carefully.
The cats lounged or played around the bathroom as he showered, with Barbara as usual enjoying a shower of her own, following Bruce into the stall so she could sit in the warm spray from the showerhead. Damian, also as usual, had scrambled into the stall as well to prove he could do anything the older cats could do, and was now pressed into the farthest corner, yowling in displeasure. "You know there's lots of water in here," Bruce mumbled in exasperation. "Why do you keep coming in every morning...?"
When he finished and stepped out, he waited for the cats to shake themselves, then set down a fluffy towel for Babs to roll herself dry on, carefully scrubbed most of the water off Damian, then set the bedraggled kitten down in front of Dick to finish the job. The older cat happily started grooming Damian, putting out a paw to hold him down when the kitten attempted to worm free.
Bruce shaved and combed his hair. As soon as he was ready to go downstairs, the cats, who had all been pretending to be bored and casual, immediately leaped up and followed him in an eager cluster.
"Good morning, Alfred."
"Good morning, Master Bruce," the butler replied, glancing up from his cooking.
While he worked on Bruce's breakfast, Bruce himself worked on the cats' breakfast. Once again, he had to carefully navigate around Dick practically gluing himself to Bruce's ankles, and now it was Damian making obnoxious "FEED ME NOW" noises at him. "Damian, you have to wait, because I have to warm it up. If I give it to you now like you're asking, you're going to turn up your tiny pink nose at it and wonder why it's cold and gross."
Although Damian's mews were by far the most annoying, most of the other cats were also practically singing with anticipation behind him. Bruce finally started setting down bowls of warm, moist, meaty food.
Damian was the first to reach a bowl, but was immediately bumped aside by Barbara and Stephanie, who both seemed happy to share a bowl. The kitten shrieked in indignation and in turn shoved Dick away from the second bowl. The older cat merely sidled around to settle into munching again. Tim and Duke were amiably sharing the third bowl, and Jason, having already eaten his fill for the morning, had been long gone since before Bruce's shower. Tim soon stepped away to take a long drink of water, and his place was taken by the soundless Cassandra.
Bruce, meanwhile, was chewing his way through his own breakfast. Tim leaped up to the table and stepped lightly around the serving dishes. "Tim, get off the table," Bruce mumbled absently.
Taking no notice, the cat sat down near Bruce's plate and started batting at the newspaper Bruce was trying to read. "Stop that."
bat bat. bat. bat bat.
"Tim."
"Mrow."
Dick hopped into Bruce's lap, turned around a couple of times, then settled down, purring. Bruce winced and pushed the cat into a more comfortable position before scratching him under the chin. Dick raised his head, leaning into the touch, and stretched luxuriously. "Did you finish eating, Dickie?" The cat purred harder.
When Bruce was ready to head out to the car, he took the WE cat carrier down from its shelf. As always, Tim ran up eagerly, and Bruce felt bad about pushing him away. "I'm sorry, Timmy, but I can't take you." Tim loved going to Wayne Enterprises, but was so inquisitive and unintentionally destructive and distracting that Bruce had had to give up. Dick made a much better office therapy cat, but ever since Damian's introduction to the household, the kitten pitched a fit and tore up the manor when bereft of his favorite companion all day, so Bruce had had to start leaving Dick at home, too. Cass tended to be difficult to find sometimes, and troublemaker Jason was out of the question, so Bruce usually rotated between Barbara, Stephanie, and Duke. Today was Duke's turn. "Duke! Let's go to work."
The young brown cat streeeetched, made a show of idly considering, then ambled over and stepped into the carrier. "Good boy." Bruce spent another minute crouched on the floor, scratching furry heads and stroking fluffy backs. "I'll see you all later. Be good." His 'children' meowed at him. "Goodbye, Alfred."
"Have a good day, sir."
o.o.o.o.o
It was an average day, decently productive with no crises. As usual, Duke spent half his time lounging around Bruce's office and the other half ambling throughout the floor, allowing himelf to be petted or held by office workers who needed a break (or a listening ear). At the end of the day, Bruce collected him, fed him a treat, and scratched behind his ears before putting him back in the cat carrier and driving home.
As soon as the car was parked and Duke was let out, Dick and Damian came running up. Dick swirled gracefully up Bruce's body until he was perched on the man's shoulders; Damian meowed insistently at the human's feet until Bruce picked him up and started caressing him between his hands. The kitten struggled to get free (he didn't quite manage it), but the lack of complaining indicated that he felt soothed.
"Time for training," Bruce remarked. He went down to the Batcave and changed into a set of gi before starting on his usual training regimen. Dick always beautifully imitated his flips and rolls during gymnastics; Cass slinked curiously around (and sometimes over) him during his kata; Jason liked to canonball off him as if legitimately attempting to throw off his aim during target practice; Stephanie liked to gallop alongside him when he did sprints; Duke often sat on his back while he did push-ups; Tim made his way across the bar and stepped over Bruce's fingers during pull-ups; and Barbara gazed at him with an unimpressed look while he was lifting weights. Damian simply followed him around the entire time, making ratchety "Pay attention to me!" noises.
The kitten finally got his wish. When Bruce was finished meditating, he spent a few minutes caressing the content Dick and sulky Damian, who had both settled on his lap while he cooled down. The other cats trotted over and meowed to be petted, too, so Bruce did his best to stroke six cats with only two hands. Then he got up and went over to give Tim his share, since the small tabby was too busy trying to take apart a ball of yarn to ask, and then Jason, who was radiating jealousy from where he crouched on top of the computer. He basked in Bruce's arms for a minute, then accidentally let out a purr. He kicked out of Bruce's hold and vanished into the darkness of the cave.
Bruce got dressed, occasionally pausing to rescue bits of his armor from the inquisitive Tim or Barbara; to pet Damian, who was loudly complaining with "Don't leave!" noises the whole time; and caress Dick, who kept doing tricks for attention or curling up in pieces of the Batsuit because he knew Bruce would have to pick him up to get him out of the way. "Shameless little attention hogs."
o.o.o.o.o
Theoretically, none of the cats could leave the manor, Bruce even put trackers on them, yet they still mysteriously managed to get out. He often crossed paths with one or another of them, most often Jason snd Stephanie, while on patrol, going about their own business while he went about his. He had never once actually caught sight of Tim in the city, yet the little tabby's tracker almost always registered near Batman's every time he checked. When Dick had been younger, he'd actually been a significant help to Batman on several cases, and the other cats occasionally contributed as well.
This particular night started out quiet. Batman, after checking in with Jim Gordon, swung away and caught a glimpse of a feline silhouette in the commissioner's office window that might or might not have been Barbara. Batman sighed, ignored it, and continued on to check out the lead on the robbery Jim had given him.
The busywork turned out to be not so minor. Something else had been stolen along with the cash, something that two gangs and a meta from Central City wanted. Batman, realizing the scope of what he'd stumbled upon just seconds too late, was now caught in a deathtrap while a supervillain monologued and a gang war raged outside. "...but you already knew that, didn't you! Oh well. Say goodbye, Batsy!"
The villain punched the button on his remote. Nothing happened. He frowned and pressed it again, with the same result, then looked at the control panel of his death machine.
An ink-black cat was sitting on it, gazing coolly at him.
"Cass! Go home!" Batman hissed softly, worried for her. The young female was even more mysterious than most cats, having shown up on Batman's patrol route one night with human-inflicted scars and such profound silence that Bruce had incorrectly thought at first that her vocal cords were damaged. (She did hiss when she was fighting, and make very soft purrs when she was extremely happy.) She was as invisible as Tim when she wanted to be, but, like Dick, seemed to take a strangely active interest in some of Batman's cases.
She had saved his life more than once, as she did now, peeing on the death machine's control panel (it short-circuited) before dodging the enraged villain's retaliatory blast of power and then clawing at his left eye, landing behind him with a blood-flecked paw before he even screamed.
Batman escaped his bonds before the villain recovered and finished incapacitating him. By the time he looked up, Cass had vanished again. "Thanks, Cassie..."
o.o.o.o.o
It was past three in the morning when Batman returned to the cave. He pulled off his cowl and collapsed into the computer chair with a groan.
Dick instantly leaped onto him and started his usual "I'mma get that icky Gotham street smell off My Human" routine, rubbing his scent glands all over Bruce's chest and neck and face, purring so hard as he worked that Bruce could feel his lungs rattle. He idly caressed the cat as he did so. Then, when the jabs and bites at his ankles got too annoying to ignore (kitten teeth and claws couldn't penetrate the armor, but he could still feel the insistent bumps against his feet), he leaned down with a groan to scoop up Damian and start petting him, too.
Barbara sat grooming herself on a work table, while Duke napped in the basket beneath it and Jason restlessly prowled around the weapons rack. Cass materialized almost out of nowhere, sniffed delicately at Bruce, then disappeared again. When Dick finished his ministrations, he lay sprawled over Bruce's chest and shoulder, still making his happy diesel engine purrs, and Damian had fallen asleep under the slow stroking of his human's fingers.
Bruce used his other hand to work a laser pointer out of his utility belt and start dancing it along the floor, smiling when Stephanie raced to catch the elusive red spot. They played until Bruce felt up to working on his post-patrol reports, so he turned off the light and set a hand on Dick so the cat wouldn't fall when he straightened up to work.
7 Sept. 2018, 03:31
Commissioner's lead on the Cornerstone robberies connected to Neon Dragawewgdk
"Tim," Bruce said in fond exasperation.
The cat continued on a few more steps, garbling the report even more, before pausing to gaze at Bruce, the tip of his tail flicking idly.
"Get off the computer, I'm working."
Tim casually glanced in the other direction, at the computer screen, then sat down right where he was on the keyboard. As his butt summoned a long string of 'd's, he reached out a paw to tap the 'i' key.
'p,' Bruce typed.
'j'
'a'
'y'
'i.' The game, as it had been invented after Tim had been at the manor for a couple of months, was that the cat typed letters seemingly at random, and Bruce did his best to make words out of them.
dipjayinpie, this particular round ended (minus the ten million 'd's in between each letter). "Okay, Timmy, that's enough, I really do have to write this report."
o.o.o.o.o
Bruce threw himself onto his bed in exhaustion, and soon felt the cats gathering (minus Duke, who was more active during the day and had headed off into the manor rather than the master bedroom). Barbara lay down in her favorite cat bed by the desk; Stephanie played with a (thankfully non-jingly) cat toy on the floor; Tim investigated a (thankfully empty) mug on the nightstand that had earlier held coffee. Dick and Damian curled up in their respective favorite sleeping spots, Dick on Bruce's chest and Damian on the pillow near his head.
Bruce fell asleep to Dick's purring. He woke up half an hour later to the almost painful sensation of Jason licking insistently at a spot on his forehead, and pushed the cat away. Jason hissed, plopped down half on Bruce's neck, and started to groom himself. Bruce intended to push the brat away again, yet despite the restless movement, Bruce somehow fell back asleep before he could do more than rest his fingertips against the cat's fur.
Jason eventually settled down. Tim came to lie along Bruce's side, and Stephanie went to cuddle with Barbara. Cass kept watch over her family from her vantage point atop the bookshelf, but the hours before dawn were all peaceful.
o.o.o
A/N: I had this idea ages ago, but didn't know what to actually write for it until the past few days, when my muse was suddenly and randomly like, "YAY BATCATS!" XD
I've been working to organize my notes for The Birds Who Smile! The "John vs. Bruce" arc is so dang complicated and difficult for me, but I'm trying. X''''D
