You'll All Be Sorry: Disclaimer

LEGENDS OF THE BATMAN AND THE DARK OUTSIDERS: EPISODE ONE
By Brendan "Nightwing" Hockenberry (BHnightwing@Yahoo.com)

ACT ONE: A NEW HOPE

"The world is now a darker place.

"The old heroes will no longer do."

These were the bleak thoughts that swirled like ashen

snow behind the stern, stencilled-on eyebrows and

arched white eyes of The Batman as he stood upon

the high rooftop surveying the angry, hellish streets

of Gotham City, the very city he so long ago swore an

oath over his slain parents' dead interred bodies to

protect, his cape billowing and ears erect (LOL!)

against a really large full moon.

"The world needs... new heroes," concluded the more

dynamic half of the Dynamic Duo. "Yes, new heroes

indeed."

But what would Clark say about this? Or Diana? Or

Kyle? Or Wally? Or J'Onn? Or Arthur? Or Eel? How

would they react?

It wouldn't matter, thought The Dark Knight. They

would not get the chance to react.

The Batman wouldn't give it to them.

Blood dripped/seeped slowly from the flesh wound on

The Batman's skull as he dangled his athletic frame

one-handed from a gargoyle on the corner of the

roof of the Museum of Gemstones. "Ignore the pain", he

thought grimly to himself, and wished, not for the

first time, that his parents were alive to see his

dedication. He wished the way he did everything. Hard.

He wished really hard.

A "gangsta" named "Paco" had gotten off a lucky shot.

Instinct had saved him. Instinct and years of

training. Instinct, years of training, and a Kevlar

hat. He had put the "homey" and his "posse" away,

but now the pain was catching up to him.

He was all right, but right now, all he wanted was one

of his faithful manservant Alfred's quiches and his

own comfortable bed. He could feel his arm start to

throb and he could feel the blood coagulate on his

scalp. The pain was blinding, but his vision was

clear.

But he couldn't leave--tonight was the big gala

charity exhibit. The Museum of Gemstones was having a

grand party to announce the arrival, for one night

only, of the TWIN CAT BIRD diamonds. Call it a

"hunch," call it guesswork, or call it the

finely-honed thinking of a truly brilliant mind...but the Gotham

Guardian expected

trouble--something was about to "go down". But WHAT?

And HOW?

His injury was taking its toll. "I'm not like

Superman or Wonder Woman," the Dark Knight thought to

himself, "Bullets can piece my skin. Bullets can kill

me."

It was time to call in his new team. They were wild

cards. Not the kinds of people you brought to a JLA

meeting or a meeting of the JSA or a meeting of

the ORIGINAL Outsiders or even a meeting of the Teen

Titans. But they could get the job done. Because if

there was one thing the world needed, it was new

heroes.

Using both hands, he reached for his signal device.

He felt the warm electrical vibration against his

trunks that meant his invisible signal was flying

through the carbon monoxide-stenched air, between the

fat blood moon and the gridded mean streets. "The call is going out : ) " thought The Batman as the vibration intensified. It felt good -- -- until an old man's scream exploded the Dark

Knight's reverie to little tiny pieces.

LEGENDS OF THE BATMAN AND THE DARK OUTSIDERS: EPISODE ONE

ACT TWO: THE FALLING OF A HERO

Glass exploded inward, showering the Vincenzo Exhibit

Hall of the Museum of Gemstones with a shower of

sharp, jagged, glittering window-stuff. "It's

beautiful, like a cleansing shower," the Batman would

have thought had he seen it, but see it he did not, for his cape was

thrust protectively over his eyes as he leapt through

the window into Vincenzo Hall. He landed, bat-like,

his cape outstretched like sinewy wings, at the

feet of a prone form of a familiar old man. A

precious gemstone, the O'Neill Sapphire, jutted from

the old man's blood-spitting throat.

The Batman knelt beside the dying man and grimly

pulled the razor-sharp gemstone from the tragic

fountain that used to be his neck. "How dark the

world has become," thought the masked man, "that an

object of such rare

preciousness could be used so heinously, that

lifeblood could spurt under such pressure from the

throat of a man even as charity revellers laugh and

eat 'Or Durves' just a few chambers away."

The dying man tried to speak. "I (gurgle)..."

"Save. Your. Strength." commanded the Leathern

Lawman. But the death-filled old man would have none

of it. He had something to say. Something he couldn't

hold back. Something important that had to be

said. This the Caped Crime-buster could sense.

The Darknight Detective held his pointy ear close to the old man's mouth, listening to the faint voice and the words it strove to say.

"I..."

"Yes?" intoned the Gotham Goliath.

"I... always..."

"You always...?" questioned the Darknight Detective.

"I... always... knew.. it was you... Bruce."

And with that, Commissioner Gordon died.

"NOOOOOOOOOO!" shrieked the Batman at the ceiling,

and beyond it the sky, and beyond it whatever Gods had

abandoned him, his fists balled in horror, his

nosepiece casting a triangular shadow over his

tightly-stretched lips and clenched, white, seamless

teeth as he leaned over the emptied earthly vessel

of the one man on the Gotham City Police Department he

would trust with his very life, and who trusted him

also. This night was supposed to be a beginning...

a beginning of a new kind of hero. Instead it was

the end of an old kind of hero. The gore-filled end

of the good, honest, brave, single-handed cop the

Batman called, when of him he spoke, "friend."

Whatever "perp" perpetrated this made a big mistake, thought the Caped Crook-catcher. *This made it PERSONAL.*

As personal as losing his parents on that hellish

long-agone night, which was traumatic enough without

this. Tears stung his eyeslits as he wondered, what

would he tell brave Barbara, the dead man's daughter,

who once dared the perilous rooftops in the shapely

guise of Batgirl before the Joker crippled

and undressed her and took pictures of her leading her

to now seek a new kind of justice on the mean streets

of the Information Superhighway as a contemporary hero

for an up-to-date world? But Fate (or Providence,

if you wish) would give him no more time to dwell upon

this loss. The Batman heard a sound. The sound of

something beautiful but deadly tip-toeing terribly

toward him in the twilight.

Springing limberly to his agile feet, The Batman saw a

shapely, pulchritudinous figure in the doorway,

backlit, filled in with black. He immediately

"pegged" the statuesque newcomer as a female. With

catlike grace, the well-developed "hottie" extended

an arm lit by a glint of moonlight that ricocheted off

of the razor-sharp gemstone she pointed at him as one

would wield a deadly dagger.

The Batman pointed a long, accusing finger at the

magnificently proportioned intruder and exclaimed,

"YOU! You did this! You slayed Jim Gordon!"

The curvaceous Selena Kyle purred evilly and aimed the

Idelson Ruby at the Caped Crusader's throat..."I

wouldn't reach for your fantastic gadgets, if I were

you, Batman. Unless it's one that ISN'T in your

utility belt!" Her green eyes flashed.

The subtle innuendo was lost on the grieving side of

The Batman. The side that was still human. "Selina,

but why are you...", The Batman paused," Of course!

The Twin *CAT* Bird diamonds!"

Selina laughed, causing her skin to ripple in her

tight-fitting purple costume, "That's right, Batman.

I could never resist...", she looked him over slowly,

"big stones."

The Batman sneered through his cowl. "You're like an M&M, Selina. A hard shell on the outside, soft and dark on the inside. You won't shoot me. You CAN'T. We have too much...history."

The Felonious Feline quavered, then seemed to melt as

she moved towards him with her arms extended, the heat

of her passion overcoming her lust for greed. "Oh. Oh,

BATMAN.", she said as she swooned towards the Urban

Warrior.

Suddenly, a dark whispering voice rang out, "Well,

well, well. Ain't this a pretty picture. Don't let me

interrupt. I'm just here for the TWIN Cat Bird

diamonds! Course, I wouldn't mind shooting you TWO,

since my crimes are based on twos!" and from out of

the liquid shadows of the darkened museum came a dark

figure, like a man standing in front of half of a

funhouse mirror. He had twin "45s" aimed at the heart

of the homicidal feline, and also The Batman's heart

as well. There was an implied threat in those guns.

"Harvey Dent, aka Two-Face, once my former friend and now one of my deadliest foes..." muttered The Dark Knight loudly to himself. Two-Face held the two at bay with his guns and pulled a coin, scarred like his own twisted visage, on one side, from his pocket and began flipping it carelessly, the coin catching the light like some kind of great big metal disk flipping in the sun.

"What do you think, Batman? Should I see how many

lives the pussycat has? Maybe I'll let the COIN

decide...?", Harvey "Two-Face" Dent said, still

flipping.

Flip.

Flip.

Each flip could spell D.E.A.T.H. for Selina, and even

though she had just killed The Batman's best friend

except for his trusted manservant, he couldn't allow

that to happen.

Flip.

Flip.

The Batman's brilliant mind was moving quickly,

leaping from one idea to the next like a skilled

decathlete. There seemed to be no way out of this,

with two of his deadliest foes fighting each other and

him. THINK, Bruce, he thought.

Flip.

Flip.

Flexing his clockwork mind, The Batman knew he was

running out of time. Where was his TEAM?! If he had

to, he knew he could nimbly leap the twenty feet to

where "Two-Face" stood darkly, but the danger to

Selina's sultry form was too great. "The REAL WORLD

isn't like it is in the comics", Batman thought.

"Here, life or death can hang on my every move..."

Flip.

Flip.

"Time for my final flip, Batman. You might want to say

goodbye to the pussy, just in case.", grinned the

malevolent half of "Two-Faces" bifurcated head. The

coin arched gracefully in a up and down motion as

the crescent moon shone down through the skylight and

Batman watched on helplessly, painfully aware of the

beating of Selina's ample heart as she leaned in close

to him for protection. The coin was rotating

crazily as the "Two-Face" snatched it violently out of

the air and slapped it on the fleshy part of his

wrist, making a sound like a snapping turtle might

make if it was hit with a hammer or another big heavy

object.

It was the scarred side up. "Two-Face" raised his guns and aimed at the heaving, generous chest of Selina Kyle...