batwomans_gotham | Can't run from me.....

"You can't diss my home," she sobbed. "It's all I got. I don't got no other place. I ain't rich. You can't diss my home!"

There was a sudden bump from above, then the sound of something tumbling down the wall. A moment later, out a small hole in the wall, a slightly scruffy, dust-covered kitten wearing a Bat costume of her own appeared, looking out and mewing. She blinked at Bruce, then looked over at Katalyn and bolted for her, meweing loudly in sympathy and licking her cheeks.

Still overcome Katalyn's hands shook as she grabbed the kitty and held her close.

He scowled but didn't say anything else, he felt that he might make her cry more and he didn't want to make an enemy of her, not while they were like this. Even though he was so used to being alone as an adult, as a kid, it wasn't as easy.

"Why's that cat wearing a Bat-costume?" He asked a bit sullenly, chin still cupped in his hands while he sat.

It took her a moment to calm down, but finally she rolled over, holding the kitty and looking at him, still deeply hurt.

"I found her in a nexus," she sniffed, wiping her eyes. "She really liked the Bruce Wayne there, and when I saw her next she was wearing this. But a meanie was picking on her, and so I brought her home with me. I was gonna give her to you, but you're just as mean as that dumb Robin and you don't deserve her!"

He narrowed his eyes at her chastisement. He didn't really care much about animals either way normally, but cats did have kind of a different meaning to them, and he felt surprised at his jealousy that she was keeping the kitty all to herself.

"I don't care," he muttered. "I just wanna go home. I hate this fakey double Gotham." All he wanted right then was Alfred, to go home to his Gotham, his house, his cave.

"Well when Batwoman comes back you can just leave," she shook her head, surprised that she was really upset that he did want to leave.

He looked up, still sullen. "She can't come back. Not yet. She's still really sick, I don't know when she'll get better but it isn't soon." He drew circles in the grime that was on the floor. "And we have to stay together for now. So even though I really want outta here, we're stuck together." He suddenly felt like sticking his tongue out at her, but suppressed the urge.

"You don't like me 'cause I'm poor," she said sullenly.

He gave her a long look. "No, I don't like you because you're actin' like a little kid."

"So are you," she growled. Then finally she pouted.

"If you lived like I had you'd be afraid to. You're dumb."

"You're dumb. Whiny, too. I'm smarter than you." He gave a pout too, and a little scowl, he didn't like her to keep using the 'poor' card, he really couldn't win against that one.

"I am not whiny. 'm smart. If you were really smart you'd be scared, too. And I don't mean your big, dumb, fancy education smart. I mean the street smart you can only get by living on the street. Stuff you can't learn out of a big, expensive book or in your palace on the hill," she spat.

"I am street smart!" He said with a little kid growl. "I've been fighting crime longer than...uh...well, for a long time, anyway. And regular smarts can get you out of a lot more than street smarts can. Like this little problem we have now? We need scientists to figure this one out." He huffed, crossing his arms over his chest.

"We won't survive to find a scientist if we don't respect the dangers out there," she said back, hugging the kitten. "And you were never out here as a little kid. The rules are different for us, now. We can't hit the bigger people."

"I'd hit the bigger people. And I don't care about the dangers out there, I'm Batma..." He looked down at himself, trailing off. Then he scowled up a storm and kicked at the ground. He didn't like the changing of the rules. Well, in that case, he'd have to change with them.

"You can hit them, but they'll laugh," she said, trembling slightly as she recalled her attempts. She hugged the kitten, then looked up. "You can go back to your fancy home in the morning if you're so disgusted with my home. Just don't go out now. That would be really, really dumb."

The scowl on his face could not be scowl-ier. "I'm not dumb. I'm staying here cause I already know that. And it's not my house either. My home's somewhere else. It's her home, not mine."

"You are dumb," she pouted, then rolled over.

"We should sleep," she said, concerened with the time. "If you wanna go out in the morning we'll have to beat the gangs that romp through here in the morning. And we have to be rested... just in case."

"Whatever," he said, even though there were nothing but good ideas coming out of the little girl. He wouldn't admit that even as a grown man. Instead he turned around, using his long cape as a blanket. It covered the small figure, and he shivered slightly.

He didn't like the way he reacted as a child, he felt much weaker and that well...frightened him a little. And he didn't like this feeling of vulnerability. It was annoying for one. He felt very alone, too, in this Gotham. No Alfred. And as a child he dealt with these feelings of loneliness a bit more harshly, all these emotions weren't totally buried yet over years of working at it, and anger, and guilt. He didn't like being this...emotional.

She waited until he'd fallen asleep, then got up, sighing. He'd catch a cold... it was dank and icky down here.

She got up slowly and took one of her comforters, bringing it over as a ghost and covering him with it.

Then she sighed and went back to her bed, curling up, afraid and lonely and sad and mad, all at once.

And then she slowly, so slowly, drifted off to sleep.

Except for blearily getting up to answer Dam's 'call' in the middle of the night, he had slept soundly through the whole thing. Pretty rare, but considering how tired his adult body had been over the past few weeks and how little sleep he had gotten since? Totally knocked him out.

He awoke, staring at the darkness, figuring the had fallen asleep by accident again in the cave. Guess Alfred had put the blanket on him--

Wait...Cave?

"AHHH! Bats!"

He shot up in fear, realizing that:

A: Why would he be afraid of Bats in the first place, and;

B: He wasn't in the cave, anyway.

The memories of the night before hit him. He sighed, feeling a bit sheepish, wondering if his spastic yell had awaken the sleeping little girl near him.

She jerked awake with a scream of terror, instantly turning to shadow.

She blinked, the fell to the floor in a heap, curling up against the wall as the kitten Pika ran around in spastic circles, frightened and mewing.

After a moment Katalyn looked at Bruce, eyes full of frightened tears.

"Don't do that," she whimpered, curling around herself protectively, shuddering.

"I didn't do nuthin'," he glared. Of course a simple 'sorry' would suffice but he didn't even know how to say those words as an adult. He felt a little bad for upsetting the kitten, anyway.

"I didn't mean to yell," he said quietly, it was the closest thing as an apology as she would get. And he wouldn't admit that he had nightmares. He couldn't even remember the last time he had a nightmare, though it could be because he couldn't remember the last time he had slept. Though sometimes even recently he had them, but they were so vivid as a child. So raw, a little too close to home.

She shivered, but understood what he was saying.

"I thought somebody had gotten you," she said softly, then looked away, praying nobody had heard the scream, going to the door and listening for anything happening outside.

He looked at her near the door, surprised that there was somebody out there as paranoid as he was. He felt a little more sheepish, ever since he had become a 'kid' he seemed more reckless, a little hotheaded even, rather than calculating and cold like he should be. Perhaps this is how he originally was, before all those years of experience and tragedy had changed him.

"If anything, I woulda gotten them." A little arrogant as well. A smirk. He turned to the kitten as a distraction.

"You okay now, little kitty?"

She looked at him. He was so recklace... so... ignorant. And being this size brought all her worst nightmares bac from the depths of her memories, maing them seem as if they'd happened only yesterday. And it terrified her to no end.

She didn't say anything as the kitten ewed, then finally caught Bruce's scent and kitty-cheered before she mobbed him, purring and licking his hand, but after reclosing her door she looked up. Her eyes were full of fear, and if anything she needed a real ansewr to her next question, not some stuck up rich boy attitude.

"When... when you get to your big house... can you find out how to make us big again?" she asked, watching him.

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Time Pass

Re: Time Pass

Re: Time Pass

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