Things Geeks Say #453: "I liked the Weird Al version better."
Disclaimer: I didn't write the joke that appears above. I did write all the stuff below, but I don't own any of the characters that appear in it. Woe is me.
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Outsider
Chapter 7
Two weeks ago
As they walked down the corridor, Roy was telling Batgirl how a wealthy man's paranoia was responsible for their headquarters. She was listening, but didn't think the information was all that useful. As he approached the heavy blast doors, he bent forward to allow the laser scanner to map his retina. The doors opened with a hiss, and voices echoed from inside.
"I don't care if your day does work for him, the President is an asshole!" A tall woman was arguing with a dark-skinned girl in a blond wig. Both of them glanced at the new arrivals, but Grace Choi didn't let it interrupt her harangue. "Trust me," she continued, "I lived in Metropolis. We're all glad Luthor's moved on to whiter pastures. Hey Roy," she waved a greeting at the redhead.
The darker woman looked away from Grace, glancing at Batgirl, then arched an eyebrow in Roy's direction. "I thought you said you were going to get Nightwing?" To Batgirl, she seemed faintly disappointed.
The grey-skinned man with the apparently malleable flesh added, "With my memory, who knows, but I'm pretty sure he was taller than that. And, y'know, a dude." Reading him was…confusing. She could do it, but it was as if he spoke with a barely intelligible accent. The files the computer had spoken to her on Batman's old team 'The Outsiders' had indicated that Rex Mason, Metamorpho, was able to change the elemental structure of his body. Seeing him in person, he looked more…unstable. More fluid than the photographs suggested.
Roy said jokingly, "This is Batgirl, and she's better than Nightwing. Batgirl, this is Thunder, Metamorpho, and the loud one is Grace."
The aforementioned 'loud one' walked up to her and said, "I don't think your new bat is fully-grown yet," and put her hand on top of Batgirl's cowl, as if to illustrate the height difference between them.
As soon as the hand touched her head, Batgirl was in motion. The rest of the team watched in surprise as she whirled, grabbing Grace's wrist and sending the woman who had nearly two feet in height and over a hundred and fifty pounds in weight on her head over heels. Leaning over Grace, flat on her back, Batgirl said flatly, "Don't do that."
Unhurt, but blinking in surprise, Grace said, "How the hell did you…" Grinning, the larger woman sat up and pronounced, "I like her." Seeing no hostility in her, Batgirl offered Grace a hand up, which was accepted. "Stronger than you look, too. Don't be getting any ideas though. I usually only fall onto my back for guys." Batgirl stared back silently. "Not a talker, eh? Well good. Someone's got to be the quiet one. Even the robot babe in the miniskirt doesn't shut up."
A teal-skinned woman entered, saying, "I am an android, and on average I spent only nine-point-seven-eight percent of a day speaking. I do indeed shut up." Behind her cowl, Batgirl frowned. Where Metamorpho was difficult to read, this android was impossible. She moved only where she intended to.
"You see?" Grace said, pointing at her, "Chattiest toaster I ever met."
"Aw lay off her, Grace," Roy said.
"Why? The fembot doesn't have any feelings."
"Guys," Metamorpho said.
"I do not believe fembot is an accurate description of me."
"See?"
"Guys," Metamorpho repeated. Batgirl glanced in his direction. He was staring at one of the monitor screens.
Roy frowned. "Look, you don't know that she doesn't have feelings."
"I don't care, either."
"Guys!" Everyone turned to look at the monitor Rex was pointing at, which showed a cruise ship barreling into a massive pier, knocking huge chunks of concrete aside, pushing the bow of the ship onto the edge of land. Once the ship had ground to a halt, uniformed gorillas carrying automatic weaponry began pouring out of the ship onto the streets of New York.
"All in favor of putting all bitching aside for the moment and going out and taking care of King Kong's third army?" Grace asked
"Seconded," Roy said, slinging his gear over his shoulder.
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Present
Step one for Dick's recruiting drive was Black Canary. She was the closest, living in Gotham City, and since technically she already worked for Oracle, this was more in the line of keeping her abreast of Barbara's plans rather than recruiting.
He lined up his jump, fired his grapnel and stepped off of the roof, swinging over the streets and landing on the balcony of Dinah's midtown apartment. The instant he did, the balcony's lights switched on. He felt a brief urge to hide, but suppressed it. Dinah (or more likely, Barbara) must have had pressure sensors installed.
The lights were on inside, but drawn curtains prevented him from seeing into her apartment. He waited a few moments for her to arrive. When she didn't, he knocked lightly on the French doors leading into her apartment. They opened immediately. Dinah, dressed in a loose-fitting t-shirt and denim shorts, smiled, "I wonder if whoever it was would knock or just pick the lock. C'mon in, Nightwing."
He chuckled and admitted, "If you hadn't answered, I'd have broken in."
"You want something to drink?" she said, heading towards the kitchen.
"I wouldn't say no to a Zesti."
"Soder okay?"
"That's fine."
"Red or white?"
"Dick blinked at that. "What?" he asked. Glancing into the kitchen, he got an eyeful of Dinah bending over as she reached into the fridge. Embarrassed, he quickly looked away, sitting down on one of the couches in the living room. She returned, carrying a bottle of chardonnay and two glasses. Dick's eyebrow arched behind his mask. "Uh, maybe I'm not as closely acquainted with Soder's product line as I used to be, but that looks like wine."
"I'm pretty sure you're over twenty-one," Dinah said, amusement in her voice.
Dick frowned. This was odd. "Drinking's not a good idea when your ride home is the rooftop express."
Despite his protestations, she set a glass in front of him. "Oh relax, Dick…" she leaned over to pour the wine, her loose-fitting shirt revealing more than a little of what was underneath, "Who says you have to go anywhere, anyway?"
"Dinah?" Dick was on his feet, backing away from her. "What the hell do you think you're doing? You know I…" Scanning the apartment, he caught sight of the laptop computer sitting on her dining room table. It was open, the power light was on, and through the monitor was blank, it (and the tiny camera sitting on top of it,) was pointed directly at them. He glared at the computer and said, "Not. Funny."
"TIME!" Barbara's voice emitted from the computer's speakers. The monitor blinked on, and both of them could see Barbara smiling smugly. "Fifty-seven seconds from entry until discovery. Pay up."
Dinah frowned and said, "You cheated! That little light on the computer is a signal. It's flashing Bat-code or something." The eyebrow on Barbara's visage rose. "Cheater!" Dinah exclaimed.
"It's the power light. It had to be on, because the computer had to be on. You owe me a pint of rocky road. Now, Nightwing, I hope this demonstrates to you that…Dinah?"
Dinah looked around. Neither of them had seen Nightwing leave.
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At the clocktower, Barbara scanned backwards through the recording of Dick's arrival at Dinah's apartment. She saw him back out of the camera's field of view while she had talked with Dinah. The door to the balcony was never touched, so he must have either exited via the front door or, more probably, slipped out through her bedroom window. His communicator had been turned off.
After considering her options, she opened a direct communication to one of Gotham's vigilantes. "R, this is O."
"Just a second O," Robin's voice said, the sound of the impact of a Kevlar-clad fist with a skull audible in the background. "You know, you guys aren't all that good at this," he said amidst the sounds of violence. "Have you considered the lucrative field of non-crime? It's a bit more long-term than you're used to, oof, thinking, but there's a lot less in the way of butt-kickings and jail stints in your future." There was a cracking sound, and he said, "Ok, ready now. What's up, O?"
"You know, if you're going for the 'biggest smart-ass in a Robin costume' award, your predecessors have set the bar pretty high," Barbara said, her voice containing a good deal more rancor than she'd intended.
There were several moments of silence before he asked, "What'd he do?"
"Uh. Nothing, actually…can you let me know if you see him?"
"…This sounds a whole lot like something I really don't want to be in the middle of."
Barbara sighed and said, "Look, just…if you see him, tell him I want to talk to him."
"If he's got his comm. Turned off, he probably knows. I'll tell him though. R out."
Barbara took a deep breath. She barely had time to exhale before Batman's voice came over the comm. "What is it?"
"What?" Barbara said, momentarily confused. 'Get a hold of yourself!' she thought viciously. In her more professional 'Oracle' voice, she answered, "I didn't contact you, B."
"I know," he graveled. "You contacted Robin, trying to locate Nightwing. What is it?"
Barbara blinked in surprise. "You're monitoring my communications?" Not that it wouldn't be just like him, but tapping into her commsys shouldn't have been possible, not without her knowledge.
"I monitor Robin's communications," he growled by way of explanation, "and don't change the subject. What is going on with him?" It took long experience with him to divine Batman's moods from his gruff, gravelly voice, but Barbara could detect a hint of worry there.
"He's not in danger…" she began.
He interrupted, annoyed, "This is personal, then."
She scowled. "Yes. This is personal. Meaning none of your business."
"If it's interfering with the welfare of this city, ti is my business. I don't want a repeat of what happened with Batgirl."
Barbara disconnected the channel and put Oracle on standby. She went to the kitchen to make herself some coffee. When she wheeled herself back into her command center, Nightwing was waiting for her. Before she could speak, he said, "Huntress is on board. Tomorrow I'll head to San Francisco and swing by Chicago on my way back."
"Dick, I was only trying to-" she began.
"I know what you were trying to do Babs, and you're completely missing the point. It's not that the team you've picked isn't capable of putting personal issues aside and getting the job done. It's that we're going to have to. And you're going to get incidents like tonight's, where our personal and professional lives are going to butt heads, and it's not going to be a joke."
His voice softened and his gloved hand touched her cheek, "Neither of us has a great track record when it comes to mixing our work with our personal lives. I don't want to lose you."
"I think you're underestimating me. I know you're underestimating yourself." She placed her hand on his.
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Two weeks ago, (two hours later)
"It wasn't exactly pretty, but all in all it has to be considered a victory," Roy said to the assembled team. "First, I want to thank Jade," he indicated the green-skinned woman who had joined them during the melee. "The bluff with the gorillas worked perfectly, and if you hadn't been along, I don't think we would have survived that explosion. I hope you'll consider working with us on a more permanent basis."
Jenny Scott chuckled, "The idea of a team where the women outnumber the men is a welcome surprise. Less so, given that you put it together, Harper." Assorted snickers followed that comment.
"I do not…'get it,'" Indigo stated, glancing in Metamorpho's direction.
"Don't worry about it," the element man suggested.
"Grace, Thunder…" Roy said loudly, trying to get control of things, "That was quick thinking with the plan. If you hadn't stopped it, hundreds of lives could have been lost." He paused and shook his head. "You're both crazy, by the way."
Thunder grinned, while Grace favored Roy with a more reserved smile (and a less-reserved finger).
"Rex," Roy said, "that methane trick of yours took out a whole platoon of monkeys."
"Mountain gorillas," Indigo noted, not for the first time.
"Does she have an off switch?" Grace asked.
"Which is why I'm not gonna make you clean the monkey-spew off my boots. And you," Roy said before Indigo could correct him, "kept the fully-grown mountain gorillas off our backs long enough for Jade to join the party."
Cassandra found all of this…odd. When it came to team meetings, she was used to a certain professionalism. Sure Stephanie, Dick and Tim cracked wise in the Batcave, but such outbursts were the exception rather than the rule. This was chaotic.
"And Batgirl," Roy continued, moving onto the team's quietest member, "That human lie detector thing you do is going to be no end of useful."
Thunder looked to Grace and said, "I still can't wrap my brain around the concept of a ninety-eight pound girl beating a confession out of an ape."
Roy continued, "Though I might suggest not jumping out of the plane on your own like that unless the situation calls for it."
"Did call for it," Batgirl answered.
"And while I think we all appreciated the peace and quiet, I don't think knocking out the President was entirely wise."
"Speak for yourself!" Grace shouted, "If this girl's twenty-one, I'm buying her a drink. If she's not…well, I know places where that won't matter."
Thunder glanced at Batgirl curiously, "Why did you pop him, anyway?"
"'Cuz he was being a big whiny Presidential bitch?" Grace suggested.
"Maybe," Thunder conceded, "but doesn't she have some Bat-gizmo in her ear to block out the noise?"
Batgirl glanced between the two women and explained, "The President is an asshole."
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Dick's still putting Barbara's team together
Cassandra's still getting used to hers
And what 'incident' was Batman referring to?
In Chapter 8
