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It was a typical day for the Justice League, you know, fighting giant alien monsters that leave a lot of goo behind that now need to be studied to be safely disposed of, and normally this shouldn’t be a problem; usually J’onn would have done the analysis.
Usually, this was supposed to be a usual day for the League, except that Martian man Hunter was on Mars, sick, because of an epidemic and now he was stuck on his home planet.
Right now on the Watch Tower there was him, a pilot and a Green Lantern corp, Barry, a forensic scientist and speedsters, Ollie, a billionaire and archer, and Batman.
Wait, a forensic scientist!
‘Barry!’
‘Yeah?’ the speedster asked, confused ‘You’re a forensic scientist! You could analyze the goo to clean it!’ the speedster looked at him strangely ‘it doesn't work like that! I could analyze it but I wouldn’t know how to clean and safely dispose of it!’
The three of them stayed in silence thinking while Batman was finishing writing the report of the attack, after a while Ollie proposed ‘Why not call Oa? They usually work with alien stuff, no?’ Hal looked at him as if had gone mad ‘are you joking? the lantern corp doesn't usually work with this type of stuff’
‘Why not?’ Barry asked confused ‘We’re not some type of cleaning agency, we’re more like… like’
‘Police?’ Barry offered ‘Yes, more like police, we deal with diplomatic and military stuff, not mysterious alien goo that doesn't seem to be wanted to be cleaned’
And after a while of the three of them started arguing, and Bruce, finished his report
‘I can call one of mine to analyze it’ the three turned to the Bat ‘Isn’t Red Robin good with technology? Why would you call him for this?’ asked Barry, and he was right, none of the bats, at least as he knew was into Biology or chemistry outside the normal detective and medical use for science ‘Not Tim, I meant Peter’
‘Wait, isn’t Jason a literature major? Or at least Roy told me so’ Ollie asked
Batman glared at them ‘I said Peter, not Jason’
‘But isn’t “Peter” Jason's second name? You know, Jason Peter Todd, you told me when you adopted him!’
Hal never thought he would ever say it, but Bruce, THE Batman, the brooding and always glaring Bat, looked confused.
‘Spooky, are you ok?’
‘I’ll just call him, we don’t have time for this, the sooner we dispose of that stuff the better’ and with this Batman exited the meeting room.
‘What was he talking about?’
‘I have no idea Barry, I have no idea…’
‘Maybe he adopted another one?’ Flash and Arrow looked at him strangely ‘What? Isn’t it like his thing? Adopting random strangely competent children?’
‘He’s not wrong’
‘Thank you Barry’
An hour passes before the Zeta tube activates ‘B09 Spiderman’
The three heroes look at each other before sprinting towards the tubes, by the time they arrive Batman is already there talking with a red masked guy with a spider on the chest
‘So you’re Peter!’ Barry chimes in and before he starts talking non-stop Batman introduces them ‘Peter, this are some of the members of the Justice League’ and by indicating each of them ‘Green Lantern’
‘You can call me Hal’ he continues before Bruce glares at him ‘when off duty obviously’
‘Flash, no, not the same one you see with Nightwing’ Spiderguy lowers the finger he was raising ‘And Green Arrow’ Ollie interrupts him to speak directly in front of the kid face ‘When did Bruce adopt you?’
‘Uhm… it’s complicated’
‘What do you mean by it?’
‘It’s a long story’ and before Ollie can continue to talk Bruce interrupts him ‘Spiderman, come with me, I’ll show you the lab’
And with this the Bat goes towards the lab followed by the spider, wait since when does batman allow metas in gotham, is the kid a meta? Hal starts to have doubts
‘Guys, is it me or the kid is a meta?’
‘A meta? What, nah, otherways Bruce would kick him out of Gotham, right?’
‘Well, he doesn't have all the armor and belt the other bats have’
‘Isn’t Signal also a meta?’
‘Who’s signal?’
‘I think he’s referring to the kid Bruce is fostering, or at least I think so, I didn’t know he was a meta, or that he was a vigilante, never saw him on missions’
‘Wally told me about him when he was visiting Dick, apparently now Gotham as a Day-Vigilante, a morning bat you could say’ Barry said winking at Hal, even though you couldn’t really see it with his mask ‘So you heard about a day vigilante, named Signal, but not about this kid?’
‘No, and you Ollie? You go to the galas, didn’t you meet him at one of those?’
‘Usually Bruce kids rarely go to those, and they take turns to go to the ones where another member of the family is needed, and I don’t go to all the parties or gala Bruce goes to, so maybe I never ended up meeting him, but I didn’t hear any news about another new added member to the Waynes, so it’s strange’
‘Maybe spooky didn’t adopt this one, or is still in the process’
‘Why not ask him directly?’ Barry proposed, the three of them looked at each other for a minute before heading for the lab, they found Batman outside of the door with a tablet and immediately started interrogating him.
‘Hey Spooky, since when does Gotham have spiders ?’ he asked with a smug ‘It’s a long complicated story, and Gotham it’s not your business.' The Bat answered with a glare ‘Relax Bruce, it’s just that you usually don’t allow metas in Gotham’ the glare deepened ‘With obviously some exception, especially for family!’ Barry continued saving Ollie.
And after a second the archer continued ‘And we were asking ourselves, because recently there was no news about a new member of the Wayne family, and I never met any new kid of yours at any gala I’ve been to, so…’
‘Who’s the Spider-kid? Spooky c’mon, we’re your colleagues, your friends! You can tell us!’
Bruce stopped glaring, and looked at them more tired and almost exasperated. ‘Listen, for the last time, it’s a long and complicated story.’ and before any of them could interrupt him he continued ‘Oliver, you didn’t meet him, or saw any news because he doesn't want to be seen by the public for now, you have no idea how annoying and difficult it has been this past few months especially, to make sure no paparazzi or the Gazette got any shots of him. He doesn't always stay at the manor, in the past few weeks he stayed more but he hopped between one of Jason safehouses, like once every few weeks in Bludhaven with Dick and another place in Gotham he stayed before coming with us. And even if he doesn't let it seem he’s still adjusting. So please, for the love of god, leave him, me and Gotham in peace. Did you understand me?’
The three of them in chorus responded with yes, and right after the lab door opened with the kid exiting and immediately talking ‘Hey B, I’m done, I left the notes on the analysis on the table next to the goo, and wrote some suggestion on how to effectively cleaning it, now I’ll go. It’s movie night and it’s my turn to choose. You’ll come with me?’
‘Later, I’ll update the report with your analysis, and then I’ll head down to the manor in time for the movie night, ok?’
‘Ok, I’ll tell the others, just a heads up, we’ll do a marathon of the original trilogy of Star Wars tonight!’ and with this the kid headed towards the Zeta Tubes
‘Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a report to update’
—
At the next League meeting Green Arrow, Flash and Green Lantern told the rest of the founders about the new Bat, or you would better say Spider
‘You mean Peter? Yeah, he’s a mighty warrior, and really athletic, almost like Nightwing’ Diana told them after they finished telling the story
‘You already knew him?!’
‘Yes, we met him in Gotham when B was trying to figure out what to do’
‘You too Supes?!’ the two members of the trinity looked at him ‘Well… J’onn met him too if you really wanna know’
‘WHAT?!’
‘I had to read his mind for confirmation of some information. with both his consent and Batman’s’
Hal was stunned by this information, and together with Oliver and Barry, they were gonna start to complain, but Batman entered the room before they could do so ‘Jordan, I already told you to mind your own business, and if you continue to chit-chat maybe the three of you might need some more training, if you got so much time on your hands’ no one dared to talk back. And Batman looking Smug continued
‘Good, we can start this meeting, J’onn please, tell us about your report on the situation on the infection on Mars’