AN: Shout outs to reviewers! Wow you guys really made my day!
MechaBunny: Thank you so much I am so lucky to have you reading! There are lots of fishy things just starting to happen.
TheWritingGirl23: Right on the spot you are! That is exactly what I had in mind, X-Men Evo and Batman The Animated Series. Though I picture Batman/Bruce in here to look more like the version in the newer cartoon The Batman, though Dick like TAS one. Good call on the Selina thing. Also you're right about the Scott and Harley part being rushed, but I applaud you for having the observant/open mind to give it a chance of not being implausible. I do love the Batman villains, but I think right now Scott is focused on his schooling. Thanks for your honest review!
rayman0411: Haha you bring up a very good point, Nightwing is cooler! timing is definitely right. Thanks for your opinion I really appreciate it.
Dick Grayson, Boy Wonder, and Batman's secret sidekick, tied a red bow tie to his white shirt collar and snapped his suspenders in place, he had to be on his guard today.
He had crushed on the elusive Selina, Emma Frost's roommate ever since he had moved into the Gotham Golden Hall Dorms. Tonight was finally the night he made his move and got to talk to her out in the open, she was always shut away in the dorms with her cats, Dick itched to finally get his chance. He had recently graduated from being Robin, the boyhood persona he had lived out heroically at Batman's side, but since college began, he had been trying a new thing, independently working from the dark knight. He turned in the red t shirt and tights for a new, darker, older-looking uniform, one that meant he could tackle crime on his own too. As the older, bigger Night Wing, Dick had been feeling unstoppable lately, possibly like even how his mentor Batman felt. Going on a date with a girl was one of his first steps of independent manhood, Night Wing was different and even braver than Robin.
Gelling his night black hair back, he met with his roommate, Scott in the hallway.
Scott had chosen to wear a black button up shirt tucked into black pants with black shoes, his brown hair neatly combed.
Scott cleared his throat quirking a brow at Dick, and knocked on Emma's and Selina's door.
Emma came out looking excited for once, and whispered to Scott, "It took all day, but I did some good work on our floor's reclusive cat lady."
Scott opened his mouth to answer, but caught sight of Emma in a white evening gown that ran down her frame like ivory milk. She slanted her eyes cruelly and jovially at him, digging her nails into his thigh and pinching him through his black pants, "Since I'm doing you and Dickie a favor and made Selina into an acceptable date, you better make tonight's date for me extremely convincing."
Scott turned to her, too hypnotized by her to notice when Selina stepped out, quietly shaking hands with Dick who was taken by the results of Emma's make over.
Emma had set Selina's hair down, tumbling it into thick soft dark brown waves that set off her dark cat-eyes which twinkled sassily without thick spectacles covering them up.
Dick gaped at Selina's sculpted leg protruding from her black leather dress, which laced up in the back. "Selina! Dick Grayson...I've glimpsed you before, but never got to show myself. You're even jazzier in person than I thought!"
Selina beamed, "Charmed, Dick Grayson." She complimented his cuff links, "Are these real gold?"
They set off into the night for their dates, setting out for dinner after a late night Gotham University stand up show.
They were at an upscale restaurant, waiting to be seated in a crowded waiting room.
A wave of people began pushing past them, camera flashes going off.
A broadly built man with black hair and a square jaw, and a roughly cut nose arrived through the mass of people. He wore a tailored suit and had an international figure skater and a foreign supermodel on either side of him. The owner of the restaurant ushered him in enthusiastically shouting, "No wait for you Mr. Wayne!"
Dick sprang forward, yelling indignantly, "Hey, we've been waiting forever!"
Scott muttered, "Just because we're piss broke college students doesn't mean we can't eat here!"
Selina narrowed her large orbs of cat eyes at the man, "Bruce Wayne, prince of Gotham. He's the richest man, he practically owns everything. What a sleaze! Lots of money and treasures though!"
Dick laughed, "Look at that lucky bastard! He can get any woman he wants. Would you girls say no to a billionaire like that?"
Emma laced her arm through Scott's as they were finally seated at a table, "I don't need any more wealth, and that kind of power has stopped interesting me. I'm actually not so sure I could be with an older guy that much older than me. It'd be icky. I used to think it was an exciting idea but now I'm not so sure."
Scott cracked up, "When were you age-appropriate ever?"
Selina darkly grinned as she sipped from her glass, in the candlelight her smile looked fanged, her thick curled lashes cast a spiky shadow over her cheeks,"I've been with an older man, I love it. I assume he was older, but I don't know much about him. So much mystery and uncertainty. He was very unavailable." Scott noticed how Dick could maybe find Selina attractive, as he marveled that there was indeed a decent older girl under her facade of ponytails, spectacles, and large shirts with prints of cats on them. Who knew taking glasses off could make such a difference, and hair!
This was a shock to Scott, who had assumed Selina was a lone girl who never left her room or had had relations other than with her cats. What should have been a less mobile form turned out to be an intensely toned body in a leather dress with suggestible straps. Scott definitely thought Emma must have picked the dress, though it did do justice to Selina's normally hidden body. Her lips were luscious and painted a dark magenta, Scott still couldn't believe this was the same creepy roommate.
He announced, "Dick's got a cat named Powder back home! Show her pictures, Dick."
Dick began to sweat slightly and laughed nervously, "Aw I don't wanna bore her with my snap shots!" Selina eagerly darted forward, her hands curled over his forearm, "Oh please do show me! I love kitty-cats! You're a cat-guy?"
Dick shrugged, "I had a pet cat growing up, and when my parents died I kept it."
He took his wallet out, showing her the thumbnail pictures of his cat.
Emma turned from Selina admiring the pictures, "Tonight's going well I'd say."
Scott bowed his glossy brown head at her, "Yes, thank you again Emma, Dick's so happy."
"I suppose this is what having friends is like. I never thought it would be like this, can't say I don't like it though, with you as a friend. Did you know I went throughout preschool and high school without a single friend besides my brother?"
Scott considered her for a moment, "Get out, I don't believe a queen bee like you ever lacked lackeys. Between you and I, I was the same way, orphanages didn't make for friendly places. You're the kind of princess who put guys like me to shame, ever since you were old enough to push a boy off the swings on the playground."
Emma shook with peals of laughter, "Those are some childhood memories I want to go over with you more vividly later. Some Freudian way of explaining why you don't trust me so much?"
"Emma, are you serious? You really have to ask me? Have you lost your powers or something? Regardless, it's obvious, you're an ex-villain, of course I don't trust you by default. But I think I've shown you I do, by trusting you as my friend."
By knowing his mind, Emma confirmed that this was also a reason Scott really did not see her as a romantic option either. It was not just that she was platonic to him exactly, but he had such a deep moral code that he separated bad guy associates in his head so clearly, despite who they were or whether they looked like Emma Frost.
She did not know what to even think about that obstacle in his brain that neutralized her.
"The other X-Men wouldn't be as trusting and nice to me as you."
Scott replied, "The X-Men's policy is pretty forgiving, I try to uphold that policy."
"Harley was associated with a villain, why do you find her attractive?" Emma had to know. The perky and cutesy mentally unhinged girl was the last person someone like Scott would look at, yet he was so struck by her apparently adorable charms. Scott shrugged, "She wasn't my rival, and I wouldn't really count her as a villain or bad. She was just having some fun with a crazy guy who took advantage of her, she barely knows what she's doing. She's a really smart girl, this guy just knew what to say to people that would personally trigger them. He showed her a false friendship and made her laugh, she was really lonely at the time. She's past that though, I make her laugh and I return her calls." Scott smiled proudly, as if this was something to applaud.
Emma laughed in his face, "You make me laugh all the time and you don't mean to. You're into clown fetishes you sick hunk. Hooking up with a girl who wears a clown suit is risque."
"She doesn't wear that anymore! I don't like clowns, they creep me out, and we have not taken our relationship that far yet. Harley's hot! I don't get why you can't see that, she's nice to look at right away."
Emma hid her face to Selina and choked trying to contain her laughter. "All that going for him and he's still such a nerd!"
A nerd who liked other 'hot' nerds.
As the four ate their dinner, Emma's white heeled foot shifted and swept up Scott's leg. He kicked her under the table gently.
By the end, Selina had Dick totally charmed, and the two stared into one another's eyes, lost in their own worlds.
Dick mumbled out, "...Could get lost in your eyes."
Selina snickered, "Yours are like midnight, my favorite time. Could have sworn you batted for the other team."
Emma hid a smile behind her hand.
Scott chuckled, "Look at those two lovebirds."
She answered, "Makes you feel kind of gooey inside, right? You should be paying more attention to your own very lonesome and neglected date."
He mockingly put his arm around her shoulders and squeezed her neck softly between his arm, fondly. "Don't pretend to be so glum Emma, you can get any guy you wanted, you're just playing with me."
The group left and strolled down the dark streets of Gotham. Night entertainers and beggars made for a colorful freak show sporadically lining the street.
A short man on a stool on the sidewalk with a dummy on his lap was yammering out through the dummy's mouth, "Nice night, eh cap'n?"
The short man hollered, "Don't jinx it yet Sal!"
The dummy's small painted head rotated, his large glassy and vacant eyes following the four students.
Scott flashed his dorm key pass up to the glass entrance of their dark granite building.
It beeped and let them in.
They came up to a hall, engraved on a shiny granite wall, a silver metal plate read: Gotham Golden Hall.
Dick swiped his key and lead the way to their rooms.
As Dick said his goodbyes to Selina at her door, Emma leaned against Scott against his, and had her arms around him, stroking the fuzzy soft part of the back of his neck, she pouted in a playful tone, a swanky saxophone tune playing outside the window with a late night jazz band on the streets. "You'll call me won't you, Batman?"
"Pretty, deadly little thing like you? Not a chance, Poison Ivy."
He grinned sharply back down at her, darting his chin forth and crossing his arms.
"What's with you and Poison Ivy? It's a redhead thing isn't it. Or the crazy part." She swatted him. He grinned, "I had fun Emma, 'night."
She leaned in closing her eyes for a kiss, he pushed her face away and shrugged helplessly when she squinted at him though his fingers.
Dick saw Selina into her room and then came back to his, grabbing a bag. He looked down at his cuffs and hesitated, "That's funny, both my cuff links are gone!"
Emma arched an eyebrow, "Maybe they fell off? Or...Selina does have a klepto tendency."
Dick laughed out loud incredulously, "She's stolen my cufflinks...!" That night, she had also stolen his heart from under his nose.
"I uh gotta go." Dick said quickly.
Scott unbuttoned the top of his shirt and frowned, "This late? We just got back, where are you off to again?"
Teasingly, Emma hinted, "Am I being kicked out of my room tonight?"
He blurted out, "Um, yeah! Emma you can sleep in here for the night, I won't be back."
Dick ran out and slammed the door in a hurry.
Emma smirked, "I didn't expect Selina to be that fast." She leaped over Scott's legs to reach the drawer she had kept her belongings in.
Coming out to the steps in front of Gotham University's geometric Astrophysics building with the birds chirping and afternoon sun shining, Scott checked his phone for messages.
Harley Quinzel had texted: Daytime date?
Eagerly, he texted back, briskly going out to meet her, she had mentioned wanting to take their relationship to the next level recently, and Scott felt more than ready, tonight he would ask her to officially be his girlfriend, before anyone else could claim the girl. He had been careful and cautious with her, understanding she was coming out vulnerable after a slew of events in her life, and also out of respect for his loyalty to Jean. However, being apart from the world he knew and discovering the new world of Gotham and his university, his perspective shifted and adapted.
After being guided by a campus guide, into the strange and twisted sinister city's University, Jean Grey walked up a straight steep block-cut granite staircase, surrounded by high dark gray shiny marble walls. Her steps echoed in the lonely, vast and hollow hall of the huge dorm building she was given a room number to find her fellow X-Man Scott in.
A couple Gothic kids stared ominously at Jean, holding poetry books, as she hurried by with her suitcase in hand, and a scarf wrapped about her neck.
It was a strange and desolate place but it was impressive and magnificent nonetheless with a strange variety of people.
Coming up to a door with Scott's name plate on it, Jean knocked hesitantly.
Some jocks and athletic preppy girls with Gotham University sweaters on over polo shirts bustled by, waving their golf clubs and lacrosse sticks around,toting 36 packs of beer under their beefed up arms.
A pair of guys followed shortly after them, books tucked in their arms, wearing striped ties in sweater vests.
One of them stopped and asked, "Are you looking for Scott Summers?"
Jean nodded, he shook her hand warmly, "Hi, I'm Dick, his roommate, I'll let you in."
He reached into his pocket for a key and opened the door.
The dorm room was clean enough for two boys living there.
A thin platinum blonde girl stirred from within Scott's plush navy blue bed.
She was stacked underneath the layers of thick blue comforter, wearing lacy light pink lingerie. When Jean and Scott had gone college shopping in New York, she had picked those sheets out for him.
Emma Frost, the former White Queen whom Jean last saw attacking the X-Men, was in Scott Summers' bed in lingerie and fast asleep.
She certainly looked different and less frightening without that manic power-hungry glare on her face, but it was an odd sight nonetheless.
Emma had gone to sleep wearing one of Scott's large GU shirts, but she had gotten hot and discarded it on the floor.
Jean's blood ran cold.
Dick announced, "Scotty's in class now, he should be done soon, or he might be getting lunch, I can call him if you'd like."
Not taking her eyes of Emma who blearily sat up, her sparkling pale hair mussed up, Jean replied curtly, "Please."
Emma got up, grabbing Scott's shirt off the ground and throwing it over herself, hanging barely above her thighs.
She pulled open a drawer and grabbed a pair of lacy underwear out of dozens, and a change of clothes before daintily rushing for the restroom.
Jean questioned, "She has a drawer here? Girls keep their underwear at Scott's? College really has changed him."
Dick snapped his fingers, "You must be Jean! The girl Scott can't shut up about. He pines for you nonstop."
Jean shifted uncomfortably, she was the same with Scott, but she had gone on a date or two with Warren, which she knew would have bothered him. They hadn't been very fun dates, but Jean tried to branch out more for college.
She wished Scott had not moved so far out, but she knew she was just being selfish.
Emma returned in a white tank top and white shorts with white sneakers and white ankle-high socks.
Wickedly looking at Jean, Emma explained, "We meet again Jean Grey! Dick and my roommate exiled me from my room last night and Scott has been kind enough to let me sleep in his bed. He slept in Dick's though of course. The same roommate has sticky paws so I like to keep my more valuable things in here, Scott's been a wonderful sport about it. Not to worry though, I haven't corrupted your X-Men or anything, I'm not his girlfriend."
Jean incredulously wondered, "Scott has a girlfriend?"
Dick threw his hands up, "Pretty much, it seems like its going that way. She's kind of a loon though. I can't really imagine how he finds her appealing."
Emma sighed, "The boy's taste is the most confusing aspect about him."
Jean contacted Hank telepathically who thought that he would meet her right away.
Jean asked, "Well I need to meet Hank at some Cyber Cafe, can someone let me know how to get there?" Now that she was in this new place without Scott to confirm her arrival and surrounded by strange unfamiliar faces, she longed for a familiar face.
Emma remarked, "Ah I'll go with you! I do need to chat with Hank."
The redhead's face strained and she said tonelessly, "Great."
Dick rubbed his stomach, "I'm hungry, I'll tag along. I'll see where Scott is."
Hank forked a green sausage into his mouth, scarfing down a meal before his next lecture.
Jean drank her fruit juice from a carton and caught up with him, as Dick shoveled down mac n cheese and a sub.
Emma had ordered a late breakfast of eggs and toast.
As the sun set, the sky over Gotham turned a dark red.
Scott stared up at it, from his opaque red shades and appreciated the calming darkness of it all around.
Harley leaned over the balcony they stood on and dreamily sighed, "Would ya look at that? The sultriest sunset if I ever saw one. Red. What a color."
Scott stood behind her, hugging her, "It's definitely your color." Harley twisted her neck to look back at his chiseled face. "Our color. It's lovely on you too."
They kissed, silhouetted against the bloody sky and orange sun. Harley's leg popped up, as the sun sank lower, and she stained Scott's mouth with smudges of the deep red lipstick she wore, her big round glasses reflected white, obscuring her closed eyes.
He stated, "I want to be with you indefinitely."
She hugged him close feverishly, "Scott I want to be with you too. I'm ready to take the next step with you. I know it's unprofessional of me as an OT but goodness me, I need you!"
He took her hands, "So you'll do it? You'll be my girlfriend?"
"Girlfriend?! Why, is that what you thought I meant?"
Scott blinked, "Yes?"
She kissed him delightedly, "I didn't mean that, but, oh, oh yes!"
She hugged him and Scott patted her back, quirking a brow wondering what she meant.
The young man gallantly dipped her in his arms, as they kissed once more.
Over them, leaping off the rooftop to a neighboring building, a figure in a dark all-black suit with a blue bird emblazoned on the chest, wearing a black eye mask tossed a ninja star at a slender figure in a black leather cat suit.
"Where's the big boy? Batman? I miss him, he hasn't been around as much." She mewed, as she slung a treasure box she had just confiscated from the museum about, cattily.
"I'm Nightwing! Robin is dead, Batman doesn't need a sidekick and I don't either. This way we can deal with more scum like you at the same time! Give back the box, Catwoman. We've done this hundreds of times."
She slunk towards him, her claws forward. "Will you give a message to Batman for me? Tell him old Catwoman's getting lonely these nights, and can't wait around forever."
She dropped the box carelessly at his feet, the ancient artifact splintering.
Night Wing cried out, as she trailed a claw up and down his cheek, digging in, ripping his skin open.
She stuck the tip of her sharp tongue out from her face-concealing pointy eared black leather mask and flicked it over the bleeding line, then flounced down the rooftop, disappearing down the pipes.
He held the box up, gritting his teeth when he saw that the box was empty and unlocked. She had taken the treasure and jewels inside.
Jean waited impatiently when Scott had finally replied to her and Dick's calls, Dick had waited with her after lunch but fled when he got a message on his phone.
Hank had to go to his class and Emma left for similar reasons.
Spitefully, Jean drew a mustache with one of Scott's sharpies, on a poster of a pin up of Poison Ivy Scott or Dick had set up on the adjoining wall. She noticed a theme in the Batman poster above Dick's bed, it seemed the local hero was supported by college students as a political trend. A car calendar hung over Scott's side of the room, along with a sports team's flag as well as a picture of him and the X-Men, and one of him and Jean.
She heard the door open and Scott came in, letting out a startled, "Jean! I'm so sorry I didn't look at my phone until just now, I had no idea you'd be coming today!"
He had red lipstick smudges all over his mouth, giving him away along with his usually impeccable, rumpled brown hair.
She scowled, "Red's a pretty shade on you, and all over your face."
Scott wiped at his mouth, gasping at the lipstick that came off on his hand.
"I met someone. Her name's Harley Quinzel and she's a junior, she's nice to me though and there's something about her I like."
"I guess we're back to being friends again then." She smiled wryly.
Scott's face fell slightly and he apologetically said, "I'll always have a special place in my heart for you, I don't know how to deal with not being with you."
She agreed, "Long distance isn't working. It's so hard to be apart and when I do see you again, it's so easy, but maybe...after this we shouldn't see each other for a while, until we're ready."
Scott sighed, "You always have the mature answer to everything."
"I try. I'm disappointed in your choice of friends though. That house bunny Emma?"
Scott blushed, "I never expected to be friends with an X-rival, but I can't avoid her she lives right across from me and she's close with Hank. I could never go for her though, you know that, she was a bad guy! How's um, Warren?"
Curtaining her face with her hair, Jean said, "He's good. He's been around a lot more for his accounting courses. He told me about some places I should try in Gotham, he's been here for business before."
Scott spread his arms, "I'll take you out tonight, my treat. Wherever you feel like. I'll even invite Hank if you want. You have to tell me everything about school so far."
Dick burst in, slightly red and perspiring, he had a band aid over a cut on his face. His tie was crumpled. "Good evening lady and gent! Woof, those stairs do kill me every time!"
Scott asked, "What happened to your face?" Dick exasperated, "Shaving cut!"
"Looks like you got mauled by a cat", Scott boldly hinted.
Dick pointed at his face, crossing his eyes and sticking his tongue to the side, shot back, trying to throw Scott off, "Looks like you got mauled by a nutty Ms. Harley Q."
Scott fiercely rubbed his lips with his sleeve.
Nightwing's heavy boots crunched on the layer of ice covering the ground in Arkham Asylum.
A mangled, frozen security guard's corpse lay on the ground, thawing.
Water dripped from the higher staircases, as ice melted off.
He shone his bright hi-tech flash light at an almost invisible, camouflaged pure black figure with pointed ears and white sharp eyes.
The figure unfurled its consuming black cape and Batman stepped forward, "Mr. Freeze got out, there was a leak in the lines connecting to his freezer cell."
Nightwing shone his flashlight around, "Any other inmates escape?"
Batman, "Not accounted for yet, but I would keep on a look out. This might be a two-man job."
Nightwing shook Batman's gloved hand firmly, "It's a partnership."
"Your roommate's kind of skittish. He's in and out a lot."
Scott brought Jean to the University's advanced gym, with state of the art equipment.
They mounted two machines side by side and began a work out. Scott commented, "Dick's kind of mysterious, I think he's just a nocturnal guy he stays up all night studying or working, maybe he's just more productive then. He's nice, and he doesn't go out too much, and neither do I so it's a good fit. I think he lives in the library though."
Harley, in a mint green shirt and black shorts, and her blonde hair up in pigtails, round glasses slightly askew on her nose, slouched in an electric cycle with a magazine to her nose and her legs up, cycling.
She noticed Scott and skipped over, smacking a kiss on his lips.
Scott grinned happily and put his arm around her, he gestured, "Harley, this is Jean, my best friend from home I told you about, Jean this is Harley, my, I guess, girlfriend."
Jean bravely put a smile on and took in Scott's new girlfriend, a cute and pretty, feminine slim girl with nerdy round glasses and adorable pigtails. She had the incriminating red lipstick that set off her pert lips.
She certainly was not what Jean would have expected Scott's girlfriend to be or look like. When she spoke, she sounded intelligent and sane enough, she was definitely attractive, but also out of Scott's comfort zone.
After their exercise, they walked out into the quad. A guy in a slurpee costume waves flyers around, "Come to Freezer Burns' for an everything flavored Slurpee 3/4 price off!"
Some guys and girls leaving the gym, jogged towards the slurpee store ditching their power drinks. A buff jock pushed the slurpee mascot over.
Harley was explaining her internship to Jean, "I explore the intricate minds and roots of super criminals and what drives a person to be pushed that far, or if they were already thinking a certain way different from what society expects. Some of these people were abused and neglected like any other person, or maybe more. It's not too different from your medical studies, except I see how to determine if the mind is sick, not the body. These masterminds are fascinating!"
Heavy chunks of jagged ice rocks broke out into the quad, exploding behind the slurpee shop.
Students screamed, a hippie who had been strumming on his guitar stopped and stared bug eyed at the thick flow of ice spreading all over the shop.
A stream of ice shot out towards the people passing by, Scott shot out an optic beam, crushing the ice extending over the people so it crumbled uselessly.
He and Jean and Harley ran away from the crumbling ice bergs on the ground, shielding themselves as Batman appeared, with Nightwing by his side, facing a pale blue man in a glass contraption who bellowed, "Freezer burn for all of Gotham! Mr. Freeze is back."