You know, this is the first time I've had a story with the preview chapters in The Cauldron cark out, so that means I had to remove the preview chapters, and then post the six chapters of this story in full. Which has probably buggered up my view count and the reviews, but hey.

Now, this one, I was particularly distressed in abandoning and archiving. But the truth is, I'm finding it hard to get the motivation to write for it anymore. Which is a shame, as it had quite a few good gags and some neat ideas. I think part of the problem was that Harry and Luna were too OP compared to Batman. So, I decided, reluctantly, to abandon it and archive it.

YIN AND YANG

CHAPTER 1:

YIN AND YANG

"And here we have the Common Acephalous Thug, hung from a gargoyle by the local predator, who has been playing his favourite hunting game of Dope On A Rope(1)."

Only years of having to deal with the twisted humour of the Joker, Harley Quinn, the Riddler, and other members of his rogues gallery prevented the Batman from laughing out loud when he heard that, the young woman mimicking the distinctive breathy voice of David Attenborough. As it was, a faint smile briefly touched his usually grim countenance. But it fled as swiftly as it arrived. He was here to investigate the latest vigilantes in town. Batman was, after all, rather proprietorial about policing Gotham. Like many predators, he was territorial.

There was a brief moment of laughter from the man, before he said, "Yin, we'd better not hang around for long. The cops will be showing soon if the Batman's been here."

"Just a second, Yang." The woman's cheerful demeanour reminded Batman uncomfortably of Harley Quinn, if she spoke with a British accent rather than a strong New Jersey one. Both of them had British accents. Specifically, the man had an accent suggesting he was from London or the surrounding area, while the woman had an accent suggesting Irish origins, with a touch of West County(2).

The woman then said something that blew things out of the water. "My cousin said she had her goons trying to retrieve something. She was a bit tight-lipped about what, so I'll have to use Legilimency."

Batman felt his blood run cold. The thugs he had just dealt with were under the command of Harley Quinn, while the Joker was incarcerated at Arkham. They were currently in a warehouse where Quinn had been stashing supplies. Batman had dealt with the thugs, only to hear these two approaching. Deciding he had a golden opportunity to observe these new vigilantes, he had moved into hiding on the roof of the warehouse, listening in using a microphone he concealed on one of the thugs he had dealt with. But now, he knew that the woman, at least, was related to Harley.

His fears were a little mitigated when the man said, "Yes, but remember, your cousin is crazy. And not in a good way. Not like you, Yin. Harley's like Bellatrix, only less competent and more of an exhibitionist. Seriously, have you seen that skintight jester outfit?"

"Yep. I can fit into that. Actually, you wanna play dress-up later? I can make you up as the Joker."

"Yeah, that'd be in bad taste. I'd rather dress as the Batman."

"He's not my type. Hey, I've got it, how about you dress up as you are, having captured the vile Harley Quinn, and she seduces you?"

"…I find that I actually like that idea, but less talking about bedroom fantasies while we're on the job, Yin."

Agreed, Batman thought to himself. He thought these two were rather unprofessional, and yet their results spoke for themselves. Yin and Yang had apprehended Scarecrow a couple of weeks ago, leaving him tied up at the reception to Arkham Asylum with the yin-yang symbol, the taijitu(3), on a piece of paper attached to him. Since then, they had made waves in the Gotham underworld. It was said that Yin had impressed the Riddler (albeit grudgingly) with her knowledge of riddles and ability to solve them. Two-Face, given his obsession with duality, had actually tried to recruit them. Their rejection saw him become their second deposit at Arkham.

However, a more disturbing rumour through the grapevine was that they were willingly collaborating with Mr Freeze: they had been seen in his company. Of course, of all the 'supervillains' to collaborate with, they had chosen one of the more sympathetic ones.

"Ah-ha!" Yin exclaimed. "Yang, I've found what I was looking for. According to this guy, Quinn wanted some of the precursor chemicals to the 'Joker Toxin'."

"Great. Chemical warfare for fun and…well, can't be profit."

Batman frowned. He didn't hear any interrogation going on. He remembered that term she used, 'Legilimency'. What was that? He vaguely recalled the term from a conversation he had with Zatanna years ago.

"Well, it's up to the GCPD to dispose of it. Or the Batman," Yang continued. "I dunno how this stuff'd react to our spells."

Spells? The first actual lead on these two. They were mages of some sort, or at least were meta-humans who believed themselves to be mages.

"I think the Batman will have a better way to deal with them." Suddenly, there was a soft crack, like a muted gunshot, and a figure was right in front of him. "Well? Do you?" Yin asked. Another crack, and Yang followed.

Batman was startled by Yin's sudden appearance, but years of experience had him not showing it. Instead, he looked at the two new vigilantes.

They were both dressed in what looked like figure-hugging spandex, the woman wearing white, the man wearing black. Both were wearing helmets with stylised faces, reminiscent of the masks used as symbols of theatre. The man wore the tragic mask, a bone-white effigy with a scowl, and green lenses, presumably those of some sort of enhanced vision goggles. The woman wore an ebony mask with a wide laughing grin, though more endearing than anything the Joker would deign to wear. The lenses were blue. Both had slender, athletic builds.

"Yin and Yang," Batman said. "What are you doing here?"

"Cataloguing the wildlife of Gotham City," Yin said blithely. "Bats, cats, penguins, moths, fireflies, ivy, crocodiles…you name it, we document it."

"Yin…" Yang groaned quietly. "Please don't annoy Gotham's most experienced vigilante. Remember what happened when you told Dent that he had a Wrackspurt infestation."

"He tried to shoot me, I introduced him to the pleasures of testicular trauma," Yin said with what sounded like a smile in her voice. "I want to do the same to the Joker given what he did to Harley."

Trying to get the conversation back on track, Batman said, "What are you doing here in Gotham, aside from 'wildlife'?"

Yang jerked a thumb at Yin. "Yin here told me it'd be fun to be vigilantes here. I got dragged along for the ride."

"Oh, Yang, you have a 'saving people thing', remember?" Yin said. "I'm a vigilante for fun, you're a vigilante because you want to help people, it all works out in the end. Anyway, we'll leave disposing of the Joker's stuff up to you, okay? Bye!" And with another soft crack, she disappeared.

Yang sighed quietly. "Sorry about that. We'll try not to get in your way." And with that, he vanished too with a soft crack.

Batman almost immediately engaged his comms. "Oracle, I need information. I have leads on the identities of Yin and Yang."

"Got it," came the voice of Barbara Gordon, once known as Batgirl, now Oracle. "What do you have?"

"They're mages, and I overheard Yin being capable of some sort of ability called Legilimency, which I think may be some sort of mind-reading. Yang referred to someone called 'Bellatrix', someone comparable in sanity to Harley Quinn. Finally, Yin seemed to say that Quinn was her cousin."

"Okay. Give me a minute," Oracle said. After a moment, she said, "Firstly, I've confirmed Legilimency is a form of mind-reading ability. A particular subset of mages named that ability. I got some books from Zatanna about this. Most mages hide themselves from those without it, with Zatanna, Constantine, and the like being exceptions. In addition, the name Bellatrix corresponds to a criminal British mage known as Bellatrix Lestrange. She died about seven years ago, during something called the Battle of Hogwarts. And even looking at this abstract, it's safe to say she's like if Harley Quinn was kicked up a notch." After a while, Oracle then said. "Oh. I think I know who Yin and Yang may be. It's not definite, but I've run a program to look through the family tree of Harleen Quinzel. Seems that her father had a sister who emigrated to England. Records are pretty patchy to say the least, but Pandora Quinzel married to Xenophilus Lovegood. Pandora died some years ago, but she had a daughter with Lovegood called Luna. She was raised in Ottery St Catchpole, which is in Devonshire, England."

"Anything on Luna Lovegood?"

"Only that she's definitely a mage, and married to none other than Harry Potter."

"Who?"

"If it's a quiet night, Bruce, you'd better come here for the whole story," Oracle said. "It's a pretty long one…"

In a rather expensive apartment in one of Gotham's more exclusive districts, a young woman was taking a helmet off her head, revealing a beautiful face, albeit one with a somewhat dreamy, scatterbrained expression in her large, pale eyes. Her blonde hair was cut shoulder-length to accommodate the helmet. "Well, that went well," she said. "First time we met the Batman, and we didn't get into a fistfight."

"Thank Merlin for small mercies," muttered the young man removing his own helmet, to reveal a handsome, if thin, face, a shaggy mop of black hair partially obscuring a faded scar on his forehead, in the shape of a lightning bolt. His eyes were a beautiful emerald, but they were haunted eyes, eyes with a past. "Luna, being facile in front of him isn't going to go down well."

"He can do with lightening up, Harry," Luna Potter, once Luna Lovegood, said. "That's one of the few things I agree with the Joker on. That, and the inherent meaninglessness and capriciousness of life. I just don't agree with how he deals with that. Plus, he gives clowns a bad name. I like clowns." She then tapped her neck. The skintight costume expanded, becoming so baggy, Luna merely had to wriggle a little out of the neck. Underneath, she was completely naked. With an impish smile, she darted forward, and tapped the same spot on Harry's neck, with the same results.

Harry Potter, once known as the Boy Who Lived, sighed quietly. "Even so, Luna, I'm not sure he has enough of a sense of humour to deal with your own brand."

"I don't care, as long as you have, Harry," she said, smiling that winning smile of hers. Harry smiled back. That humour, that eccentricity, that intellect, and that smoking hot body, those were all what attracted Harry to Luna, though those would have all been for nought if it weren't for the simple fact that she was also a good and caring person.

Luna, ironically, for all her eccentricity, helped keep Harry grounded after the war. In the process, the two grew closer, even as Harry grew further apart from Ginny. Ginny found it hard to get over her hero worship of Harry. Luna didn't have that in the first place. Neither did Hermione for that matter, but she and Harry didn't quite click after everything was said and done.

"Now," Luna said, "I feel like a bit of fun in the shower. Come on." And with that, she dragged him by the hand to the bathroom. Harry, on reflection, was glad they had put up all those sound-dampening wards, or the neighbours would be complaining…

After dealing with the Joker Toxin and leaving the thugs to Gordon, Batman had headed to Oracle's headquarters. He had been hit by a brief pang of guilt, remembering the events that led to Barbara Gordon ending up paralysed. Not directly his fault: the Joker knew nothing about her being Batgirl when he shot her, but even so…

Of course, Barbara adapted. Her already keen intellect was focussed elsewhere, on information gathering and electronic warfare. Oracle and Alfred were the only people he trusted to gather information and intelligence that he couldn't.

The story she had to tell him was, on the face of it, extraordinary. He would have considered it unbelievable, but he worked with mages on the Justice League, and had even been childhood friends with Zatanna. The parallels between his life and Harry's were uncomfortable. In fact, Batman felt a certain small pang of gratitude that he had at least gotten to know his parents and their love before they were murdered. Harry lost his at the age of one to this wizard terrorist, Voldemort. Like Bruce Wayne, Harry had money left by his parents, though he never knew it existed until he was 11, having been left with magic-hating relatives who treated him like a servant. And all of his schooling years at this Hogwarts were eventful, to say the least. He was trapped by fame and celebrity he was nearly born to.

"So, assuming Harry Potter is Yang, and Luna Lovegood is Yin, do you think they'll be trouble?" Oracle asked.

"People like this are always trouble. The question is, who for? I'm wondering what they are offering Freeze."

"At a guess, I'll go for the obvious one: they may have a cure for Nora."

"Magicals may not have a cure for Huntington's Chorea," Batman said. "Unless they keep it to themselves. Then again, maybe Nora Fries was misdiagnosed. Did they ever do any genetic testing for Huntington's Chorea when she was first diagnosed?"

"I'll check," Oracle said. As her fingers danced over her keyboards, she said, "What're you going to do about Yin and Yang?"

"Keep an eye on them. I'll let Tim know about them, just in case. I'll also tell your father. I'm not happy with them doing this, but as long as they keep out of my way and don't cause any trouble, I'll tolerate them for now." He then watched as medical files relating to Mr Freeze, aka Doctor Victor Fries, and his wife, came up on the screen. "…No genetic testing, at least as far as these files are concerned. So either she wasn't diagnosed using genetic testing, or else we're missing it. Or maybe her family had a history of Huntington's Disease, or something like it, and they hadn't bothered to test it because of that."

"If it's a magical disease, maybe they don't know there's a cure because Nora's family are descended from Squibs and they don't know it. Those are people without magic born to those with magic," Oracle clarified.

"If they can help Victor Fries, then that's something. He will have something in his life other than his obsession with curing Nora," Batman said. "He'll still be incarcerated for his crimes, but he'll still have visitation rights with Nora. And maybe there can be a happy ending out of that." To himself, he reflected, there were few happy endings in Gotham. More often than not, endings came in violence and blood. More happy endings were needed, though Batman wondered whether any happy ending could be left unspoiled by a sudden act of violence. Gotham had a surplus of such things, after all…

CHAPTER 1 ANNOTATIONS:

So, here you have it. The first few chapters will be set shortly before the events of Batman: Arkham Asylum. And yes, Harry and Luna will get involved in those events. The next chapter will be devoted to Mr Freeze getting his wife back. I decided to change things slightly so that Nora was misdiagnosed with Huntington's Disease/Chorea (a real-life genetic illness), but actually has a treatable magical ailment.

Batman is wary of these two and not happy with them encroaching on his territory, but for the moment, he'll give them the benefit of the doubt. Plus, he knows who they are, while Harry doesn't know who Batman is. Luna, though? Well…we will see…

1. I actually call the inverted takedown during the stealth sections of the game 'Dope on a Rope' (it's my favourite takedown, if only because it's so funny, and so very Batman), and I have to admit, I laughed when I actually heard a goon use those very words in Batman: Arkham Origins.

2. Evanna Lynch is Irish, and has that accent as Luna, but I thought I'd add something that reflected the fact that Luna grew up in Devon, in the West County (which is where Ottery St Catchpole is meant to be).

3. This is the actual name for the yin-yang symbol.