Episode 9: Batgirl and Bumblebee vs. The Cheshire Cat Gang!

On the other side of the country, in New York City, near Prospect Park, just as night was falling, two of the Titans East were in hot pursuit... of crime!

Batgirl swung on a grappling line and landed on a roof at speed, tucking into a roll and coming back up to her feet in one seamlessly smooth transition, her girlfriend/partner in crimefighting, Bumblebee, flying alongside her. "There!" Batgirl called to Bumblebee over their earbuds, catching sight of the girl they were chasing again.

"I see her." Bumblebee answered. "I'm going up."

"Ten-four, flygirl." Batgirl replied, continuing the chase. The girl they were after was Cheshire, an infamous international thief, assassin, and mercenary for hire. Only, now they could add kidnapper to her rap sheet, couldn't they?

Since she'd come to town, at least twelve teens, mostly from wealthy families, had been taken, their families also the victims of theft. One security guard was dead. Of the parents, one was dead and two were missing. She hoped they were kidnapped too, and not, you know, also assassinated.

She wondered who Cheshire was working for this time, or if she was working for anyone at all? Maybe she'd decided to go into business for herself or something? It wasn't as though it was exactly a bad business model, as far as crimeing went. Still, she'd done her research, and she didn't think that was it. That one assassinated parent? His name had been Charles Lancaster. His family was old money, having made their fortune in shipping and export primarily, though they'd diversified their portfolio over the generations. A few suspicions of piracy on his ancestors' parts, but no hint of lawbreaking in recent history. That was, except for Lancaster's daughter, Cecily. She had an arrest record—sealed, but, according to her research, she was rebellious, hated her dad, and tended to make bad decisions. To all reports, her dad had actually been kind of a jerk, so maybe there was some justification there. Still, it made Batgirl wonder if maybe Cecily Lancaster had been the one to hire Cheshire in the first place, to take out her dad, and if her own kidnapping might not have been a ruse. Just what she might be up to if that was true, Batgirl didn't know. She was keeping an open mind (as all good detectives should). What worried her most though, was the fact that there were rumors, unsubstantiated rumors, that Cecily Lancaster had meta-human powers of some kind...

Above, Bumblebee saw their quarry jump down onto a roof, then duck around a corner. "Putting on some speed, BG, I think she's trying another disappearing act on us." It was just a fact that, even at a dead run, she could go faster in the air than her girlfriend could move on the ground, or even swinging on those grappling hooks she loved so much. She'd been holding back though, because Cheshire was serious business and going one on one with her could land her in some serious trouble if she wasn't careful. Besides, they were a team. Still, Cheshire had been giving them the runaround for days now, and she was in no mood for another night of her getting the better of them.

"Understood, flygirl. Be safe, I've got your back." Batgirl answered back, pushing herself all the more for whatever extra speed she could get. She trusted her girlfriend, knew she was capable, but, well... Cheshire was tricky. There was a reason she'd never gone to jail before, even though she was a wanted felon in twelve countries.

Around the corner, Bumblebee was just quick enough to see Cheshire drop down into a skylight. "Got you this time, assassin girl." Bumblebee said. "Ahead, right. She just went in the Carlisle building, through a skylight." She reported to Batgirl.

"Hold position, I'm almost to you." Batgirl said back.

"As if I wouldn't." Bumblebee smiled, actually liking that BG was protective of her like that. It was sweet.

Under a minute later, Batgirl was standing next to the skylight and Bumblebee was landing next to her. "So, what do you think: lucky break, or trap?" Bumblebee asked.

"With Cheshire, I'm not sure there's much of a difference." Batgirl replied honestly, noting that the alarm system on the skylight had already been disabled.

"Ah, yeah, guess not." Bumblebee had to admit. "So, what's our play here?" She asked.

"You go small, be my backup." Batgirl said, kneeling and opening the skylight.

Bumblebee giggled. "There is just no end of bad puns to be had with my name, is there?"

Batgirl smiled fondly. "The burden you bear." She said. "Bee safe, girlfriend." She told her as she slipped inside, into the dark.

Bumblebee shook her head with a fond smile of her own on her lips and shrunk down until she was around two inches tall and then she quietly flitted in around Batgirl as she entered, disappearing into the shadows as her girlfriend swung down on a repelling line.

Down below, a minute or two before, Cheshire dropped down into the darkened Carlisle building, taking off her grinning Cheshire Cat kabuki mask. Another girl came out of the shadows to meet her and they kissed for a moment or two. Cheshire's heart, already racing from her rooftop run, fluttered a little in her chest at the wildness in the way Cecily Lancaster went about kissing her. She was gasping a little by the time she got air to her lungs again.

"They followed you?" Cecily asked eagerly.

"They'll be here any second, as planned." Cheshire replied. In her line of work, plans were essential. Some people thought they weren't exciting though, weren't sexy. Cecily got it though. She got her. There was nothing quite so beautiful as when a well-made plan came together and the people you planned to kill never saw it coming. It told the world you were cleverer, smarter, and just plan better than everybody else.

"Then we should definitely get our game faces on, don't you think?" Cecily asked, putting on a kabuki mask of her own, one that looked like a beautiful doll.

Cheshire grinned and touched her own earbud. "Places, everyone. Places." She said, slipping her mask back on.

The top floor of the Carlisle building was one big space. It'd been used as a ballroom once upon a time (before the advent of color television and telephones that had buttons instead of a self-resetting dials with finger holes). In modern times, it'd been relegated to use as a place to store old antiques for the auction house that'd taken up residence on the two floors below.

Estimated value of the contents of the room? Several million dollars.

Batgirl dropped all but soundlessly down into the center of the room on her repelling line, leaving it hanging there as she stood bathed in the light from the skylight. She'd be worried about doing this, making herself a target, if she didn't know that Cheshire never killed with guns. No, Cheshire liked up close and personal... also sedative or poison tipped darts sometimes, but since there weren't very many types of bullets that had a chance of getting through the body armor embedded in her Batgirl outfit, she wasn't too worried about darts.

"Here, kitty, kitty, kitty... Here kitty..." Batgirl called coaxingly into the dark, deciding to just be brazen about the whole thing and see if Cheshire would take the bait.

Somewhere in the shadows of the room, a girl giggled at that. "Good one." She said.

That wasn't Cheshire's voice, Batgirl realized. "Is that you, Cecily?" She asked of the darkness, scanning the place with the night vision lenses in her cowl.

"And she keeps up, too. This should be fun." Cecily replied. "I would appreciate it if you'd start calling me by my villain name though...?" She asked, her voice teasing, even as Batgirl caught sight of a spark of what looked like electricity out of the corner of her eye. She turned to look in that direction, wondering if it was Bumblebee using her stingers.

"Oh yeah, and what's that?" Batgirl asked.

Lightning flashed through the air and all the lights came on at once. Batgirl's cowl lenses automatically adjusted, but she had to blink her eyes a moment to clear away the effects of the abrupt light exposure. She tried not to let on.

"You can call me Doll Face." Cecily informed her, just as Batgirl's vision cleared and she caught sight of her, wearing clothes that looked like Cheshire's, except they were blue and her kabuki mask looked like, um, well, obviously it looked like a doll's face (this girl, apparently, was not that big on subtle branding strategies). "Hell of an entrance, am I right?" Doll Face said, offering up her own commentary as she stretched out a hand towards Batgirl and shot a bolt of electricity right at her.

Batgirl dodged and, in the same movement, threw a Batarang right at Doll Face's doll face. "No, no, none of that." Cheshire said, stepping up to protect her employer/new girlfriend, by blocking the Batarang with her metal claws. The Batarang wasn't deflected harmlessly away though, nope, instead it burst into a small cloud of tear gas. Cheshire reared stumbling back, surprised.

"I'm not so easy." Batgirl admonished, throwing more Batarangs at Cheshire, who managed to dodge or deflect those too, despite the tear gas. As this was going on, Batgirl quickly analyzed the room in her peripheral vision, taking note of the fourteen other teens in the room, all dressed similarly to Cheshire and Doll Face. The masks all had somewhat different looks. Some were similar to Doll Face's, others to Cheshire's, and still others looked like other types of yoni (Japanese demons). The count was more than the eleven other missing teens she and Bumblebee knew about, but Batgirl was sure these were them anyway, and the extras were just more recruits that they hadn't known about. "It's time flygirl—make your move." Batgirl whispered to her girlfriend through her earbud, even as she darted out of the way of another ark of electricity from Doll Face.

"You're going to pay for that." Doll Face promised, eyes narrowed in rage on Batgirl for tear gassing her girlfriend. She drew more electricity up through the floor and was about to strike at Batgirl again, when Bumblebee got people-sized and punched her hard with one of her stingers, hopefully teaching her that the protective girlfriend card could easily cut both ways.

Cheshire growled and took a swipe at her with her metal claws, and Bumblebee only just managed to dance back out of the way in time, firing a stinger blast at her as she did.

Cheshire did some dancing of her own, laughing softly as she did, enjoying herself. "Oh, you're so good." She complimented, getting in close and taking another try at tagging Bumblebee with her claws.

Meanwhile, Batgirl was being ganged up on by the rest of Cheshire and Doll Face's little gang. "And who are you all supposed to be?" She asked as they closed in on her, each carrying various types of weaponry.

"You can call us the Cheshire Cat Gang." One girl said, sounding like a thrill-junky, even as she shot at Batgirl with what looked like a high-tech sort of taser.

Batgirl dodged, letting it hit another girl behind her who'd been making a grab for her. The girl went down with a startled cry and Batgirl whirled and delivered an uppercut to a boy's jaw, knocking him down and putting him out with just one hit.

The others backed up wearily at that. "This isn't a game, you know. Keep coming at me, you're going to get hurt." Batgirl dared them, projecting as much menace in her eyes and voice as she could.

"Come on, she's just trying to fake us out guys!" One of the boys said. "She can't beat us all."

"Yeah, he's right!" The girl who'd shot the taser agreed, and they all swarmed her.

Doll Face, picking herself up off the floor from where she'd landed when Bumblebee punched her, scanned the room dazedly. She stumbled and fell back down, catching herself woozily on one knee.

Bumblebee and Cheshire were still sparing, and it seemed like they were pretty evenly matched on the fighting stuff.

All the while, Batgirl was taking down one Cheshire Cat Gang member after another in startlingly quick succession. They may have had the numbers, but she'd trained herself to use superior numbers to her advantage, and these rich kids really didn't know how to fight so much. Pretty soon, there were just three left, two girls and a boy. The two girls looked at each other, then turned and ran away. "Hey, wait!" The boy called after them, turning to run too.

"Uh-uh, not happening." Batgirl said, tossing bolas to tangle up his feet. He hit the floor face first and groaned. Batgirl watched the two girls leave the room, but had to forget them to dodge out of the way as Doll face shot another bolt of electricity at her.

Batgirl saw Doll Face was out of it though, so she headed for her, thinking she needed to take the opportunity to disable her while she had it, then she and Bumblebee could double-team Cheshire... allowing that Bumblebee hadn't taken her down by then, of course (which she would never bet against happening, even given Cheshire's very scary reputation).

Doll Face made a half-hearted attempt to hold her back by throwing more electricity, but it was a clumsy attempt and Batgirl easily dodged. The villain girl looked scared now. "Um, help me?" Doll Face called to Cheshire. "Please?"

Hearing this, Cheshire dodged under one of Bumblebee's punches and threw down a smoke bomb, sending a poison dart at Batgirl as she came up.

Batgirl dodged and Bumblebee used her wings to blow away the smoke, but, by the time it was gone, Cheshire and Doll Face were gone too. "Damn!" Bumblebee cursed.

Batgirl sighed. "At least we made some progress." She said, looking over at the fresh crop of stupid rich kids they'd netted for their troubles tonight.

Bumblebee let out a breath. "Yeah. Pretty impressive how you took'm all on by yourself like that, by the way." She offered.

Batgirl quirked a smile. "Yeah?" She asked.

"Mm-hmm." Bumblebee replied. "I'm just glad you weren't hurt though, really." She admitted, going over to her and giving Batgirl a slow, sweet kiss.

Batgirl melted inside at the kiss, blushing a little when the boy she'd used her bolas on wolf whistled. She sent a glare his way when their kiss parted.

"What?" He said. "You make a good couple." The boy explained.

Batgirl let out a breath and quirked a small smile at her girlfriend. "Yeah... I guess you're right about that, huh?" She had to admit.

"So, um... are we under arrest now or something?" One of the girls Batgirl had taken down asked. She'd been wearing a doll mask; like Doll Face's, but different. She'd just woken up and was sitting there on the floor, looking still kind of groggy and like she thought she'd just danced too long and gotten a speeding ticket; one that, no doubt, her parents would make disappear soon... And who knew? Maybe she was even right. Given that she'd just, to all appearances, joined a gang named after an international assassin and participated in stealing a large amount of money from said parents however, Batgirl had her doubts.

"Yeah. I'm pretty sure that's what's happening next for you." Bumblebee offered.

"Right, well... I'll just be right here then." The girl said, yawning and laying down, using one of her unconscious friends as a pillow.

Batgirl looked at the sleeping girl a moment. "Um, so, I'd say it's adorable how carefree she is—you know, given the situation and all?—but I'd definitely be lying about that." She commented.

Bumblebee snickered. "So, I'm going to call this in, I'm thinking?" She offered, taking out her cellphone.

Batgirl nodded. "Yeah, sounds good. Do me a favor and keep an eye on these arguments against intelligent life on Earth for me while I go have a look around before the cops get here?"

"Sure thing. Just... You feeling okay, BG?" Bumblebee asked her girlfriend. She usually wasn't darkly sarcastic like that. It was a sure giveaway something was getting to her.

Batgirl yawned. "Yeah, I'm okay." She answered, giving Bumblebee a warm smile. "Sorry, just got used to having a team to help us with this kind of stuff, I guess, that's all." She admitted.

"Yeah, I hear you on that." Bumblebee had to admit. "...You go on, I'll make the call and keep an eye out." She offered.

"On it." Batgirl agreed, going off to do her detective thing and search for clues that might tell them where Cheshire and Doll Face might go next, or what their plans for future crimeing might be.

As she looked, she heard Bumblebee talking to the police in the background and she thought about what she'd just told her, about them not having a team anymore. She and Bumblebee did used to have one, a team. They were the Teen Titans East. Their roster had changed a few times since they'd started up though. The team had started out in Pennsylvania, but, when Batgirl had joined and taken over as team leader after they'd fought Gorilla Grodd that one time, she'd made the call to move them to New York, where the attack had happened, figuring they could do more good in the world's tenth largest city (ranked by population).

They'd even built their own Titans Tower, out on an island in Jamaica Bay. As things stood now though, she and Bumblebee hadn't been out there in three days.

Was the team just all over now? She found herself hoping it wasn't. Aqualad had left a while ago though, because he'd fallen for that Speedy boy, and Robin's sales pitch (or, she guessed he was going by Nightwing now). Then, as bad luck had it, three days later, Hot Spot had got called back to Morocco by his family because Gorilla Grodd attacked Rabat (Morocco's capital city, and possible superhero name for the next frog that wanted to be a bat-themed superhero, but didn't want to go the obvious rout and call her or himself Batfrog)...

And why was it exactly Gorilla Grodd was always attacking random places like that in his spare time? She didn't know the answer to that, but she wanted to, oh yes she did.

So yeah, she and her team—her, Bumblebee, Herald, and Hot Spot—had went and played stop the crazy-resentful telepathic gorilla who hates humans for uncomfortably justified reasons game again (some doctor kept him in a cage once and did bad doctorish things to him, so, yes, he got a few sympathy points). Still, he'd needed to be stopped, so they'd stopped him... you know, again.

But, well, then Hot Spot felt guilty he hadn't been there, so he said he was staying, and Herald's his boyfriend, so he stayed too. Batgirl didn't blame him, she'd for sure make the same call for Bumblebee if it came to it. It did leave her and her flygirl without a team backing them up nowadays though, and she'd be lying if she said that didn't worry her sometimes.

Oh, it was fine, them stopping the run of the mill kinda stuff. Even something like tonight; well, the lightning powers could have been a problem, if Doll Face had really known what she'd been doing and been able coordinate her attacks effectively with Cheshire, but she hadn't and they'd handled it fine. The thing was, if, like, Grodd came back and attacked New York with an army of gun-toting gorillas again? ...That'd be different. And, you know, let's face it, it was pretty much only a matter of time until Grodd did that again.

It was a Titans East theme by this point. You couldn't avoid it.

She sighed when she heard the sirens. There wasn't anything here, she was realizing. Cheshire and Doll Face had probably just chosen this place for the ambush and that was all (and, more than that, Cheshire wasn't exactly new at this, even if her gang was; she couldn't rely on them making stupid mistakes). Still, they were far from out of leads. She'd been right before in more ways than one when she'd told Bumblebee that they'd made progress. They now knew Cecily Lancaster was definitely the one behind all this, and that gave them all sorts of exploits they could use.

She went over to join her girlfriend just as the police showed up. It would take a while to get through the explanations and such, but, after that? She really wanted to just head home for the night and go to bed.

And hour later, Cheshire sat looking down at her sleeping girlfriend, consternation clear on her face. Luckily, there was no one there to see it.

It really did not make sense to her: you know, the why?

Why did she like this girl so much? Cecily Lancaster was a spoiled, resentful, entitled, brat of a girl. By rights, the only thing she should feel towards her should be annoyed. The stupid thing was that she was that way with everyone else but her. From the first time Cheshire had snuck into her room at night and woken her up with a knife to her throat... "It's you." Was all Cecily had said, and she'd just gazed into her eyes until Cheshire had lowered the knife. Not that she'd been planning to use it of course, she just... liked to show her potential clients who was on top right from the start. And also, yeah, where a cute girl was concerned, surprising one in bed with a knife was kind of her version of flirting. Not exactly emotionally healthy, obviously, but she'd never claimed to be that. Looking into Cecily Lancaster's eyes that night though, she hadn't felt on top of anything (even though she technically by definition very much had been at the moment).

Cecily had smiled at her then. "So, can I take it you're accepting the job, then...?" She'd asked.

And Cheshire had, of course, said that, yes, she was. Then they'd kissed, and, you know, also had sex. Then she'd killed her dad the next day. Then they'd had sex again, and... pretty much every chance they'd gotten thereafter. It was, well, and she liked that. A lot. She wasn't even actually getting paid anymore. Cecily'd asked if she wouldn't just rather be her partner in crime, and... she'd said yes to that too. She hadn't even really thought about it first, she'd just agreed.

She sighed. So, yes. It was apparent. She was in love.

She really did wish she knew why though.

And, meanwhile, back on the west coast, on the scene of the now concluded alien attack on Happy Times Amusement Park...

Shimmer watched on, hugging herself, as her sisters were sent through the dimensional portal. Her mother had been the first one through. She'd been watching, looking for her twin, but, so far, she'd yet to catch sight of Glimmer at all. She felt sort of guilty for being happy about that. Some of her sisters had gotten away, it'd been unavoidable, what with everything that'd gone on.

After all had been said and done, all of Rose and Jinx's friends had been okay. Or, mostly anyway. The boy called Aqualad had been taken to a hospital. Raven had said not to worry about it though, because he was injury prone but that he always bounced back. The boys were with him. In the aftermath of the battle, Rose and her friends had rounded up all of her sisters they could find, Shimmer had helped (as conflicted inside as she'd felt about it), using stolen sleep ray guns to make them more manageable. There'd been a discussion then, about what to do with them all, because keeping them in jail wasn't something they could do, because it wasn't like they could feed them the unwanted humans they kept in the prisons or anything (it was against the law, apparently). She'd been about to point out that they could just feed them cats, but a glare from Starfire had stopped her cold before she'd gotten all the words out.

Blackfire had been the one to mention that she knew what they could do. She knew about this other dimension that had a Zemral quarantine planet in it. The planet was supplied with a species of animal that reproduced quickly and were nutritious and tasty to her kind. A few of the nearby sentient species, none of whom apparently proscribed to the death penalty, maintained an orbital ring around the planet and ensured that none of the Zemrals got free. Blackfire's dimension skipper hadn't been powerful enough to take more than Blackfire and anyone she was holding hands with through to the dimension they'd needed to get her sisters to though, so Raven had volunteered to make a bigger portal for them to use.

It was a good result; as good as she had a right to expect, Shimmer knew. Still, somewhere in the back of her head, she'd had this fantasy that she could get all her sisters to switch to eating cats too and they could all stay here and live in peace. She looked over at Starfire, feeling hurt and resentful towards her for crushing her dream like she had, and also hungry, because she didn't know what she was going to eat now. It wasn't fair. Earth had so many cats, why couldn't she eat any of them? She felt like she was being discriminated against. Earth people ate all sorts of animals. Bigger ones than cats. Like cows. Why was it okay for Earth people to eat cows, but it wasn't okay for her to eat cats? It wasn't her fault cow meat made her throw up (she had tried it once; she'd tried eating a lot of Earth animals, but only cats had worked out for her so far).

Starfire turned to look at Shimmer again then, weary distrust in her eyes, which softened when she saw the look on Shimmer's face. She felt guilty for maybe being the one who'd made her look that way and walked over to. "Hello, Shimmer." Starfire greeted her, feeling a little shy somehow. "Are you the okay?" She asked, voice gentle.

Shimmer shook her head. "I'll miss them, you know? My sisters..."

Starfire let her gaze wonder over to Blackfire, who was doing the flirty talk with her girlfriend at the moment. "I think that perhaps I do know very well of which you speak..." She admitted. "I and my sister, Blackfire, have been the enemies for the very long times, until recent events healed the hurt between us, and now we are true sisters once again." She looked back to Shimmer. "Perhaps you too will see them again one day?" She asked, trying to look on the optimistic side of things, which was a thing she always endeavored to do in life.

Shimmer smiled, hopeful. "I have a twin, um, her name is Glimmer."

"She is being sent the away though?" Starfire asked, feeling the guilts again, and wondering if perhaps not all of the Zemral sisters needed to be sent the away?

Shimmer shook her head. "She's not here with the others. I think she must have been one of those that escaped." She admitted. "I um..." She met Starfire's eyes a moment and then looked away.

Starfire let out a breath. "You were going to talk of the kitten eating again, were you not?" She asked, shivering in revulsion at the thought, but feeling like, despite her kitten eating ways, somehow, she and Shimmer might be the kindred spirits? "I would be the lying if I said to you I was alright with that, I do not think that I will ever be, but... please, tell me your thoughts anyway? You are friends with my friends, and I... I wish to understand you." She told her earnestly.

Shimmer looked back to Starfire, feeling nervous. "Well, alright. I um, well, when I ran away, I was hungry. I met Wendy though, and she asked me what was wrong. I told her, and she took me home with her. We um, we kissed... and I knew more than ever that I couldn't eat humans like my sisters did, not ever, but I was hungry. I'd tried to eat human food, but it tastes horrible, or, it does to me anyway, and it made me sick. Mostly, it made me throw up, even when I tried eating a dog I found."

Starfire felt regretful at this. She did not much like the puppies, because they were always chasing the kittens, and wanting to hurt them, so she would have been the alright with it if Shimmer had chosen to eat them instead.

"I was scared, you know? Because I didn't know how much longer I could hold out before I had to eat a human. Hunger can make us a little crazy after a while, you know? But um, Wendy's neighbor had this cat, and he smelled really good, so... I ate him, and I wasn't hungry anymore. Ever since then, I thought maybe I could tell my sisters about this and they'd give up eating humans too... I tried to talk to them about it, but they wouldn't listen, and momma was angry at me when she found out what I'd been up to. Glimmer helped me get away, but she said she didn't want to leave home. I guess, I was hoping that now that momma's being sent away, maybe she'd want to stay with me? But if I can't offer her cats to eat because you won't let me, or if I can't find some other Earth animal to eat, I just... what am I going to do?" Shimmer asked plaintively.

"...I would still not be the averse to feeding you the villains?" Starfire answered positively.

Shimmer giggled. "Jinx wouldn't like that, you know."

Starfire shrugged. "We do not always get everything that we want in life. Still, I feel optimistic that my sister may be able to come up with a better way. She is very clever, I assure you." She told her, just grateful that her sister's cleverness was on her side for once.

Shimmer yawned. "Well, I hope she does it soon. I'm hungry." She lamented.

"Shimmer! Shimmer! There you are!" A girl's voice called.

Shimmer all the sudden felt a lot more awake, she whirled and ran over to sweep her girlfriend up in her arms and kiss her for a very long time, feeling her desire for this girl completely overcome her hunger. At least for now.

They parted their kiss and Shimmer sat her down, gazing adoringly into her girlfriend's eyes. "Wendy... You found me..." She said, feeling shy and a little flustered.

"You were on TV. It was easy." Wendy said, looking at Shimmer in that way that said I want to get you alone in my bedroom now please. "What happened?" She asked softly, trying valiantly to stop thinking about Shimmer in her bedroom.

Shimmer let out a breath in a sigh. "My mother and my sisters attacked the amusement park, and I helped the Teen Titans stop them... Mother and most of my sisters are being sent away to a quarantine planet currently. I'm... having mixed feeling about it." She admitted, because she always told Wendy everything. That was one of the things she loved most about Wendy, that she always listened to her and genuinely wanted to hear what she had to say. Glimmer did that (well, more than the rest of her sisters anyway), but Wendy had been the first one to make her feel... well, like she was totally and completely not alone in life. That was such a magic way to feel, really it was.

"Oh, I, um... Glimmer too?" Wendy asked, knowing how much her girlfriend's twin mattered to her.

Shimmer shook her head and smiled. "Glimmer got away. I still have hope." She told her positively.

"You'll find her, I know you will." Wendy told her.

Shimmer felt relieved to hear the words, especially because it was Wendy saying them. "Thanks, Wendy. I think I needed to hear that right now." She admitted.

"Hey, what are girlfriends for?" Wendy asked, giving Shimmer a brief chaste kiss.

Shimmer hummed, her eyes having fluttered closed for the kiss. "Lots of really good things." She admitted, her voice warm and kind of blissful.

Wendy giggled. "Well, that's certainly true." She conceded the point.

Starfire watched this exchange from where she'd stood when Shimmer had gone to greet her girlfriend. Seeing it, she had to admit she found herself liking Shimmer all the more. Jinx came over to stand with her then. "Is that Wendy?" Jinx asked. The rest of their team was providing security for the prisoner transfer, which was still going on. Jinx had gotten bored though, and noticed Starfire and Shimmer talking, so she'd come over to investigate. She liked to be snoopy and collect gossip sometimes, she didn't feel guilty about it.

"Yes, I believe she must be." Starfire answered.

"They look so cute together." Jinx said. "I'm glad she has someone. I really like her."

"...I believe I do as well." Starfire admitted.

And, across town, in Jump City's Coast Side Hospital, Beast Boy, Cyborg, Kid Flash, and Nightwing were gathered around a hospital bed. Speedy was there too, sitting in one of those stiff hospital chairs, gazing down at his battered, bruised, and yet somehow still undeniably beautiful boyfriend, Aqualad. They were carrying on a hushed (and, predictably, also somewhat flirty) conversation.

"I think we should give them a minute, you know?" Cyborg offered, wherein a minute actually meant several minutes.

"Yeah." and "Okay." The others said, following him out of the room into the hallway to give the boyfriends their space.

"So, he's gonna be alright, is what I was hearing back there?" Beast Boy asked. The doctor had just left, but, to his ears, it'd sounded suspiciously like he'd been talking some other language that he was convinced couldn't actually be real English.

"What? Yeah, of course. The doctor was just here. He said that." Nightwing told him, not getting it.

"Oh, yeah, totally. I was just, you know, making sure you got that same impression." Beast Boy explained, trying to play it off.

"Whatever." Nightwing replied, his gaze wondering back to Aqualad and Speedy. "So... You think they'll join back up with us, I mean, once they're back on their feet that is?" He asked.

Cyborg shrugged. "Who can tell?" He said. "I give it a fifty-fifty chance." Provided Nightwing didn't Robin it up of course, he thought but didn't say; which, yeah, probably actually meant the odds were more like eighty-twenty against or something, but he didn't want to get into that right now. This was a hospital after all, and folks needed their quietudes.

"Oh, they'll come back." Kid Flash said.

"Oh, why do you say that?" Nightwing asked, curious.

"Because you're going to tell them how sorry you are for calling them minions or whatever, tell Speedy he's an invaluable asset to the team, and you, know, generally grovel, while I bribe them with a life of luxury... and maybe a spa room." Kid Flash explained.

"Aw yeah, now that's what I'm talkin' bout!" Beast Boy said.

Cyborg whooped and he and his boyfriend high-fived (Cyborg having abruptly forgotten about the quietudes, apparently... In his defense though, spa rooms can do that to a person).

Nightwing had to quirk a smile at that, finding he was really appreciating all this, now that he'd come so close to having lost it. Lost his boyfriend (to nearly being a bacon beacon), anyway. "Yeah, I guess that could work." He confessed.

And, back across the country in New York City, in an apartment in the city, Batgirl and Bumblebee were just getting home.

Batgirl dropped down onto the balcony of the apartment she'd had since before the whole Titans East thing had come along for her. She and her girlfriend had been pretty much living here since their team had broken up. They went out to the tower sometimes, just to check in with the place, but it was just more convenient for them to stay here. They co-owned a tech startup together. It was called Honeycomb, and they made a variety of software and gadgets, partnering with other companies for production and distribution. Her girlfriend was kind of a genius at that kind of thing, while Batgirl herself was pretty darn good at coding apps. What was more, they had great chemistry together, as inventors and business partners just as much as they had as girlfriends and partners in crimefighting.

They had a good team of employees now though, so they just had to get them ideas and they'd run with it. They also showed up for some meetings and kept an eye on the day to day, but that typically meant they only showed up to work for an hour, or even just a half hour each day, leaving them plenty of time for the crimefighting stuff.

It was a good life, she considered, as Bumblebee fluttered down to land in front of her and their eyes caught.

They took a step into one another. Their lips met, and then they were kissing.

They just did that for long minutes, appreciating each other and what they had in life.

Then they parted and Bumblebee smiled to her. "Come on." She said, taking her by the hand and leading her inside, intent on getting them undressed, fed, and in bed where they could do in bed things just as soon as she possibly could manage it.

Letting go of BG's hand, Bumblebee yawned and went to go get something to drink. "Kale shakes?" She asked. With their nighttime activities, eating healthy was pretty much a requirement. Still, they'd managed to find a way to successfully and effectively integrate chocolate into the mix, so it didn't taste bad really.

Batgirl smiled. "Sure thing, flygirl." She agreed, yawning herself, as she started to take off her Batgirl suit for the night, definitely just as up for working off some stress in bed as her girlfriend was, even though they were both kind of tired. It was already three A.M. by this point, so they were for sure going to be sleeping in, in any case; which was another excellent thing about being their own bosses.

Her cowl, cape, and utility belt on the floor, she'd just taken off her gloves, and had sat down to do the same for her boots, when their cell phones, and the apartment phone, rang with a Titans alert. Batgirl reached for her phone, saw it was Raven calling, and turned to look to Bumblebee, who was walking over to join her.

Batgirl silenced the alert by putting it on hold when she saw it was only priority two (meaning it wasn't an imminent or in-progress villain attack or anything, but that it was, nonetheless, high priority and important).

"Wonder what that's about." Bumblebee commented as they went to the living room.

Batgirl shrugged. "It's an alert, so it's gotta be something bad." She said softly. Otherwise, Raven would just call (which she and some of the other Titans West girls did do sometimes).

"Yeah..." Bumblebee agreed resignedly as they sat down on the couch and Batgirl pulled up the call on the big screen, so they could video conference.

"Hey Raven. Hey Starfire. What's up?" Batgirl asked, seeing Raven and Starfire appear on the screen when she put the call through.

"It's Aqualad." Raven didn't waste time. "He's been hurt... Pretty bad, actually. I thought you'd want to know."

"What happened?" Bumblebee asked, concerned.

"A mob of carnivorous girls from the other dimension attempted to consume him as the snack foods." Starfire explained helpfully. "It was quite the traumatic occurrence for him, I think." She explained, cooing to Silky, whom she was holding in her arms for comfort, and also for the because that she was his foster mother and that carried with it the cooing responsibilities (among the many other types of responsibilities, of which she took all of them the seriously).

"...Oh, um, yeah... We're... on our way then." Bumblebee offered. "Right, BG?"

"Huh? Oh, right. Definitely on our way." Batgirl answered, really wishing she'd had a full night's sleep before taking this call.

It was selfish maybe, but... sheesh! Swarmed by teenage girls from another dimension who wanted to eat him like he was a late-night snack?

...Well, she guessed she really should be more surprised. But it was Aqualad.

Things like that happened with him sometimes.

It was part of his charm.

Or something.

Next Episode: Young Justice Go vs BATMAN! (No, Really)

It was inevitable it would happen one day: In our next exciting episode, the Young Justice boys fight a most implacable foe: his name? BATMAN! ...You see, Brother Blood has been brainwashing C.E.O.s (as an entrepreneurial effort, you understand) and, in the process... Bruce Wayne is brainwashed too! (spoiler: Bruce Wayne, C.E.O. of Wayne Enterprises... is, in actuality, BATMAN! Shocking, I know!) Can our plucky heroes possibly defeat this implacable, muscular, oddly giggling foe? And can they also save the Commissioner Gordon damsel who's also been kidnapped during this whole hullabaloo? Maybe! (Hullabaloos can be so unpredictable.) But one thing's for sure! The way BATMAN! giggles like that? While being weirdly amusing, some of our more sensitive viewers may just find it noticeably annoying as well... You've been warned.

Until next time? Have fun in life! (having fun is so underrated—seriously, some people give it three out of five stars, and I just do not get that)