catwoman returns - redeux

[PJ]

YAY! Catwoman Returns. Very good stuff.

[The Joker]

Very, very nice build up to Selina returning to the Catwoman guise. I enjoyed how all of this played out. As well as Bruce's and Selina's feelings coming out with one another following Dick's exit. Good stuff. 

[Catwoman]

i almost had it be dick and selina getting it on lol.

[The Joker]

Damn, I would really feel sorry for Bruce if that had happened. I mean, he's the Dark Knight! The Caped Crusader! And what happens? He FINALLY begins opening up to a woman that can match him, and ... she gets it on with his (at this point former) sidekick, named Dick. 

[Catwoman]

see? he's just about hit rock bottom. lol.

[The Joker]

    All that would need to happen then is for Bane 2.0 to run in and break his back and then call it a day. Talk about some mean sauce!

[Catwoman]

chapter 16

under her voluntary house arrest while red claw was at large, selina spent most of her time locked away in her bedroom or sitting quietly in the batcave as bruce worked. no one else in the house, the maids nor dick, knew that selina was still around. as far as they, and everyone else including the terrorist, knew, she had returned home to the midwest until things were safe.

"i wish we could have solved this before thanksgiving," she said to bruce one evening in the cave. "i wanted to enjoy a family holiday so much and i had looked so forward to thanksgiving." "make a date for christmas," bruce replied without looking as his focus was on his work at the batcomputer.

knowing she didn't have his interest and knowing that everyone was most likely asleep, selina silently returned to her bedroom. she sat down on the head of the bed, contemplative of what lay ahead for bruce and her as they battled someone as ruthless as red claw for what, as far as they knew, was the sake of gotham city itself. after a moment, she reached under her bed and pulled out a small shopping bag.

from it she withdrew her old catwoman costume.

holding the outfit out in front of her by its shoulders and studying it from behind, selina was rather taken aback. "how the hell did i fit into that?" she wondered aloud. then she turned it around and lay it onto the bed so she could look at the front of it. she had repaired all of the busted seams and the rips after escaping from the penguin's lair with a new lease on life, though she had only worn it twice therafter before putting it away. in spite of the rather rough stich work, the costume appeared held together well. "not bad if i do say so myself," she said, running her hand along the slick vinyl surface. she stopped as her finger dipped into a hole.

selina sighed and placed her arm up under the costume and lifted it up, folding it over her arm with the abdomen of the suit facing her. she studied the two bullet holes. she had neglected to repair them, along with the other two, leaving them as a reminder of her past life even though she bore strong physical reminders on her torso. when held under the light, the dried blood that had spattered from both wounds as the bullets tore into her was still plainly visible. a faded, yet distinguishable line of crimson ran from both holes downward. selina closed her eyes. she could vividly recall the searing pain within her stomach from that second pair of gunshots max shreck had fired at her.

her mind rewound the entire sequence as though she were watching a video tape of one of the darkest moments of her life from her own point of view.

"four, five," she could hear herself stoically say in spite of the bullet that had just torn its way into the right side of her ribcage, passing through her lung like a hot nail through a snowbank, and the other one that had embedded itself into her left collarbone. she watched as max ducked away from the crack of her whip. "still alive!" she cried.

max raised the pistol once more, this time at a much lower angle. his eyes hatefully settled upon selina's abdomen. her own eyes watched as the barrel of the gun erupted like an volcano, spitting forth max's third round. she could smell the smoke that followed its path. she could feel the incredible sensation of pain as the bullet ripped into her at a point two inches to the right of her navel. she could hear the sickening sound of her insides absorbing the damage of the impact. then the horrible sensory process repeated itself as max's fourth bullet reached its nearby target.

overcome by a kind of pain she had never before experienced in her life, she went to one knee, both palms to the ground, barely holding her up. she gasped in agony as she tried to pull herself back to her feet. finally upright, she took a step toward max, then another. "six, seven," she said weakly in the singsong tone of a homicidal nursery rhyme. "all good girls go to heaven." all at once, the last word left her lips, she reached max, and he stuffed the barrel of the pistol into her left kidney. he clicked the trigger twice as she gasped. nothing happened.

selina could hear herself laughing at max's failure to finish her off, but the sound gradually became distant. the vision of max's horrified expression blurred. the incredible pain she had felt just moments earlier dulled into a faint throb. though she had spoken them herself, the words she threw at max were indistinguishable. then max moved towards her. or did she move towards him? she couldn't tell, and before she had a chance to figure out which it was, a bright light flashed all around her. her lips and tongue began to tingle. what she assumed were max's eyes pulsated, nearly bulging out of his head. the the bright light suddenly became so intense it enveloped her completely before she was swept into a deathly darkness.

selina opened her eyes and sighed. it was far from the first time she had recounted the events of that night seven decembers earlier, and yet every time it was always the exact same. she looked again at the suit, this time at the repair work she had done, and thought of the aftermath. she recalled awaking in a hospital room two days later in a small town quite a few miles away from gotham. she had been discovered hours after her escape lying in a snowbank, nude, clutching the catsuit in her hands as she bled. iv's pumped blood into her arms. she would later learn that over 80% of her blood had been lost. the bullet wounds had been operated on, along with a torn knee ligament she had suffered while apparently walking all that way.

once well enough to walk, selina quickly made her exit from the hospital, clad in her hospital gown with her catsuit again in her hands. she'd been able to sneak out relatively unnoticed because of the hysteria over a bus of passengers on their way to gotham to celebrate christmas that had flipped over and the dead and dying that had been brought there.

returning to her apartment, she patched up the suit, fully intent on taking on a life as a vigalante herself, as a protector of the women she felt batman sometimes neglected. during her very first night, she saw the bat-signal. her thoughts immediately turned to bruce, plunging her into such a deep depression that she would battle alcoholism for two years after retreating from gotham to her native kansas. she returned to her apartment and removed the catsuit, placing it into a shopping bag on her counter and throwing it into her closet.

now, after removing it from the bag for the first time in seven years, she was ready to put it back on and reassume her persona.

catwoman had returned.

[Catwoman]

god damnit.

[johnnygobbs]

Patience...give people time to read your fanfic and then they will comment.  Ok?   

[Catwoman]

they had time. its just frustrating. i feel like we're wasting our time.