Disclaimer: This story, though maybe not in this chapter but in subsequent chapters, will have celebrities in it. I have no knowledge of their sexuality and this is not intended to imply their sexuality. This is all from my own mind. Scary!! People actually get a glimpse into my mind!!!
Buffy, the Vampire Slayer, Angel and all related characters created by Joss Whedon. Copyright 20th Century Fox.
Batman, and all related characters created by Bob Kane. Copyright DC Comics and Warner Bros.
X-MEN, and all related characters created by Stan Lee. Copyright Marvel Comics and 20th Century Fox.
Star Trek and all related characters created by Gene Roddenberry. Copyright Paramount Studios.
I don't know for sure if I will use all the above elements, but just in case, I have myself covered.
In this story, which has been floating around in my head most of my life, you will find many universes merging, as the above copyrights reveal. I hope you all enjoy this. I appreciate any feedback that you may want to give. This story doesn't deal so much with sex, sex, sex, but more of my feelings that I struggled with and am starting to come to terms with. Part of his background is mine. I do hope that you enjoy it!!!
jmsotc@yahoo.com
Chapter 22 Enter the Firefly
The night was rather clear but windy. I always enjoyed when the wind blew hard. Just feeling it rush over my body exhilarated me, gave me new life. I decided to head for downtown and see if anything was going on there. The streets were busy with people doing their after-hours activities, roaming to and fro from bar to club, meeting dates, making arrangements for whatever important was going on in their lives. Seventy-two hours ago, I would have had someone on my mind. Now, he's on my mind but the feelings aren't a wonderful when I think of him.
I decided to check out a nightclub and see what was going on. The place was hoping as people were dancing and having a good old time. I could easily spy on the crowd through the skylight. I'm lucky that they have so many skylights in L.A. I watched as five guys moved to the middle of the floor and a song began that was so familiar to me, and that revealed who the five guys were: NSYNC singing "Bye, Bye, Bye".
Bye bye
Don't wanna be a fool for you
Just another player in your game for two
You may hate me but it ain't no lie
Baby bye bye bye
Don't really wanna make it tough
I just wanna tell you that I had enough
It might sound crazy but it ain't no lie
Baby bye bye bye
Tears came to my eyes but I fought them back. "Don't do this to yourself," I told myself. "Don't let it bother you. This happens. Deal with it and move on."
"Well, fancy meeting you here," a familiar voice said.
I turned around to see someone wearing what looked like a fire resistant suit. The head was covered with some type of helmet. The person was holding a gun with a hose that ran to a backpack. "Who are you?"
"Oh, I'm sorry. You probably don't remember me. I'm the guy that kicked your ass at the burned down apartment building. You may call me Firefly."
"Peachy," I muttered.
"What?"
"What do you want?"
"To set fires, of course. And maybe to beat you up again. That was such fun. What do you say? Shall we have another go at it?"
"Sure. I'm not in a very good mood. This should prove educational."
"For you, maybe. It'll be a workout for me." The Firefly placed his gun in a holster on his leg. Then he moved to a defensive stance.
I just stood there, waiting for him to make his first move. He moved closer but then returned to a normal stance. "What is this? Don't you want to play?" He hauled off and punched me, taking me completely off guard. "Did you feel that, Batman?"
I shook off the punch and readied myself. "Shut up and fight." I decided I was going to channel all my energy into fighting him. I wasn't going to let myself get distracted by who was under me.
The Firefly dived at me. I immediately fell backwards, grabbing him in mid air and tossing him over my head. I flipped up as he landed on his feet. "Have you been training? Last time you would've just stood there while I tackled you."
"As a matter of fact I have."
"Not bad."
Firefly swung at me. I ducked and brought my fist up in an uppercut and hit him in the chin. His head snapped back with the brunt of the force. I didn't let up. I swung and hit him in the stomach. Then, once he hunched over, I kicked him in the face. He fell backwards onto his butt.
"Hey! You have been training!" Slowly he got to his feet. "This is really going to be fun!"
He came at me with both arms swinging. I tried to block, and was successful until he swung his fist back and backhanded me. Then he tossed me over his shoulder and I landed full force onto the skylight. I heard screams as I fell and felt the impact on the hard floor. As I got my bearings I heard the noise that sounded a lot like thrusters. I rolled over and saw Firefly floating down from the skylight.
"Are you ready for some more?"
I stood up feeling the pain in my shoulders. "Sure. I've got nothing better to do at the moment."
"Excellent," he said with a laugh.
I noticed wings fold back into his backpack. He swung at me and I ducked. He swung again and I ran under his arm. As he turned around, I did a snap kick and got him in the face. Then I punched him and tossed him into a nearby table.
"Get up," I said walking closer to him.
I tried not to look around. I didn't want to risk seeing Justin, or Lance, or any of the rest of the guys. I thought it might give me away if they were able to look in my eyes. I walked up to Firefly and grabbed the front of his suit, hoisting him up. "What's wrong? No fight left in you?"
The Firefly head butted me and grabbed me tight. "Let's fly." His jet pack activated and he took off carrying me with him. He shot through the skylight and went up into the sky. "What's wrong, Batman? Afraid of heights?"
I managed to work my arms free of his grasp. I grabbed the straps holding on his backpack and pulled. I was able to pull him off course and change his direction. "What are you doing?"
"I'm flying."
I jerked on the straps hard and flipped him over to where I was on top. Firefly let go hoping I would fall. I wrapped my legs around him and held fast to the straps. I steered us through the sky taking risks and dodging objects protruding from the roofs of buildings.
"You're crazy!"
"Maybe," I answered.
I found a billboard and decided I was going to end this flight. I steered us right for it. Firefly looked up and saw the billboard rushing up to meet us. "Ahhh!" he screamed. At the last minute, I jumped and flipped over the billboard as he crashed right through it. He landed on the roof with a thump. I landed on my feet and stood up fully erect. Then I approached him carefully, not knowing if he was able to handle that crash well. He staggered to his feet. I grabbed him and spun him around to face me. I pulled off his helmet and looked in his eyes. He passed out in my arms and I smiled.
"I told you it would be educational, ass."
I dropped him to the roof and walked over to see where I was. Seeing a police car sitting at the side of the street, I smiled. "What luck." I picked him up and tossed him off the roof onto the police cruiser. He landed with a thump. It shouldn't have hurt him much and it didn't damage the car because we were not too far up. The building was one of the smaller ones.
The cops jumped out of the car and looked at him. Slowly he came to. I grabbed his helmet and threw it down, hitting him in the head and knocking him out. The officers looked up to see who threw the helmet and saw me standing there. I didn't wave, salute or anything. I just turned and ran away into the night.
Fifteen minutes later, when I got a few blocks away, I shouted with joy and sat down. I just had a major personal victory. It was very freeing. I didn't think so much about Justin.
"Wow," someone said. I spun around to see the Huntress. "I've just heard the news. The arsonist was caught."
"Really? How did they know it was the arsonist?"
"He was mumbling something about a giant bat attacking him because of the fires he set. He confessed to the patrolmen. Congratulations."
"Thanks."
"I bet it felt good."
"It did. So, what are you up to?"
"Hmm, I'm a vampire slayer so I would say...knitting."
"Don't get cocky," I said with a laugh.
"I'm just patrolling. Want to join me?"
"I don't know."
"Come on. Since we know the training works on people, we should test it out on the undead. Come on, it will be fun."
"All right."
The Huntress and I patrolled for a good half hour before we came across anything interesting. A young damsel in distress by three vampires screamed, probably because she saw the ugliness of the demons. We rushed to her aid. Standing on the rooftop of the small apartment building, we watched the vampires close in on the girl.
"How do we get down there?" she asked.
"Jump?"
"I'm serious."
"Me, too."
"You're Batman! Don't you have any rope on you?"
"If you are referring to a utility belt, no, I do not have one."
"I'm going to see what I can do about that. We've got to get down there."
In our little discussion of getting down to the alley, our minds got off of why we were going down there. A vampire had moved in on the young woman and was biting her neck.
"Will she become a vampire?" I asked.
"Only if she drinks from them."
I took the initiative and jumped off the building, opening my cape. I seemed to be able to control my descent a little and was able to land on one of the vampires. I jumped at the one drinking the young girls blood and pulled him off. He turned and growled at me, and then he pushed me up against the building...that was at least ten feet away!
"Pesky human!" he snarled at me.
I looked over and saw the Huntress leap from the last few rungs of the fire escape and land beside the third vampire. He swung at her but she ducked and punched him. Then she did snap kick and knocked him into the building by me. Pulling out a wooden stake, she flung it at him sticking him in the heart. Immediately he turned to dust...and I had a weapon. She turned to face the vampire I landed on while I tended the one who was feasting on the young girl.
"Who are you?"
"I'm Batman," I answered. I somersaulted forward and, as I brought my legs over, kicked him in the face. Then with a quick thrust, jabbed the stake into his heart. I looked back to see the Huntress staking the last vampire. "Are you all right?" I asked the girl.
She nodded and kissed me full on the lips. Thank God my mask is not the normal Batman mask. My mouth is covered by material so I didn't get any lip contact. And the Huntress, bless her heart, interrupted the girl before she could do any more. Not that I couldn't have stopped her. I was just too grossed out by a girl kissing me.
"Let me see your neck." The Huntress examined the girl and said, "You should get to a hospital and have that checked out."
The girl thanked us and went on her way. As soon as she was around the corner and I was sure no one was watching, I pulled my mask off my mouth and wiped my mouth. "Yuck."
"Yuck? You get kissed and you say 'yuck'?"
"It was a girl."
"So...oh, that's right. I forgot. You don't like girls. This is pretty funny if you think about it." I just looked up at her as I pulled my mask back over my mouth. "I mean, look at all the female villains Batman had in the comic books: Catwoman, Poison Ivy...the list goes on."
"In case you didn't notice, this isn't the comic books. This is reality. This Batman is gay. And I highly doubt I will be meeting any villains who are like the ones in the comic book."
"I don't know. You met the Firefly."
I ignored her and climbed back up to the building rooftop. She joined me shortly.
"Was Firefly the guy who cleaned your clock a month or so ago? Is he the reason you asked for training?"
"Yeah."
"I guess the training paid off."
"It helped. But I was in a bad mood, too. That always helps."
"I know what you mean. If I'm mad about something when I go patrolling, the vampires don't have a chance."
I decided to head back towards the nightclub just to make sure everyone was all right. The Huntress came with me, and when she realized where we were going, she asked, "What are we doing here?"
"To check up on the people in the club."
"Why is that?"
"Because Firefly tossed me through the skylight. I want to make sure no one was injured."
"No one in general or no one specifically?"
I looked over at her and instantly realized what she was getting at. "I'm not checking up on Justin, if that's what you think?"
"If you say so."
"I'm over him, Huntress."
"Are you really over him?" I looked at her. "It doesn't take a few days and butt-kickings to get over someone you love. It doesn't heal a broken heart."
"No, it doesn't. But it sure does help."
"Please, don't go. Let me look in on them. Stay here. I'll go on ahead. It's only a block away." I looked over at her and she smiled at me. "I don't want you to be tormented over seeing him again."
"All right," I replied.
"Good. I'll be back in a few minutes."
I watched as the Huntress ran off towards the nightclub. Deciding to look around, I went to the edge of the building and watched the streets below. People were still coming and going as if nothing happened. It's hard to believe the problems others go through when you have so much going on in your own life. I often thought about that when I was younger. I would look at kids in school and people on the streets and wonder what was going on in their lives. Were they having problems? Did they need that extra hug? That pat on the shoulder? That extra smile in passing? I guess that's what made me such a worrier, well part of the reason. It gave me a greater understanding of others, putting myself in their shoes and try to see from their perspective. This world has turned much colder and darker in the last two decades. If we could learn to love and respect other people, it will get better. But it's not something we can throw on someone if they don't want to. I guess that's the difference in people. Some really want to. Others don't care about anyone but themselves. And those are the ones who feel the need to take from others, to hurt others, to control others' feelings and emotions. I guess that's one of the reasons I'm out here doing this. I mean let's face it; it doesn't pay very well, especially when the girl you save kisses you.
"Yick," I said again in memory of the sign of gratitude the female victim showed me.
"Something wrong?"
I turned and saw the Huntress climbing on the roof from the fire escape. "Just thinking about earlier tonight."
"Oh, the girl." The Huntress shook her head as she approached. "Men."
"What?"
"You are all alike."
I began laughing. "I hardly doubt that. Most straight men would be doing what I'm doing to get the girls."
"Are you doing it to get the boys?"
I rolled my eyes at her. "Everything is pretty quiet. I'm going home." I took my leave of her and went back to my apartment. I got into bed as quickly as I could. Lying there, I realized that my work helped me get my mind off of the break up. I decided to immerse myself in my work for a while, until I was over Justin. And for the first time since Thursday night, I slept well.
To Be Continued...
What did you think of the scene with the girl kissing Batman? Did you enjoy his humorous response? I hope so. It was good to see Batman have a victory since losing Justin. I hope you are enjoying the story so far. Email with your questions and comments. I'd enjoy hearing from you!