It wasn’t rare to see a dark shape run across the Gotham City skyline.
In fact there was even a website for unofficial ‘Batwatchers’ where pictures of various members of the Batfamily were posted by citizens lucky enough to spot one of them on patrol and happened to have a camera ready.
But even if someone had managed to spot the figure gracefully flipping from building to building, they would’ve been clueless as to who it was. Going by the tight fitting bodysuit that completely covered the figure, it was definitely female. The black and white color scheme that seperated the top and bottom halves of the suit helped the figure blend in to the shadows, but stealth was clearly not the main focus, not when the figure had neon blue webbing detailed on the red highlights on her arms and inside the hood she wore. Or the shoes in the same color.
Not that Gwen would’ve cared if someone mentioned the color scheme. This was an outfit she remembered wearing for years and she loved it. It was certainly better than the costume she wore when she first started using the Venom symbiote. It was far too…’tounge-y’ for her taste.
Gwen cartwheeled along the edge of a roof before springboarding off her hands into the side of another taller building and coming to a halt as she simply stuck to the wall.
“I definitely should’ve done this sooner. It’s so much fun!” She declared, reveling in the sense of freedom her acrobatics gave her.
‘Thought I would run into more crime though.’ she mused. While there were plenty of nights where nothing happened in Gotham it was annoying that her first night out would be one of them.
“Hmm?”
Below her a flash of yellow flying above the streets caught her attention. It was Batgirl, swinging from building to building with the use of a grapple hook as she made her way through the city.
‘She seems to be in a hurry. I wonder what the big fuss is?’ Kicking off the building, Gwen shot out a line of silk and started trailing after the female crime fighter.
-o-
The ‘big fuss’ turned out to be an armored truck robbery gone wrong.
A small gang of robbers had successfully stolen the truck, but a damaged wheel caused it to go out of control and crash into a safehouse of one of the criminal groups in Gotham. Now there was a shootout between the cops and the gangsters, though the arrival of Batgirl meant the gangsters were getting knocked out pretty quickly.
‘Staying out of that for now.’ Gwen thought. The last thing she wanted was to get shot at by twitchy cops because an unknown super came out of nowhere. ‘Though, hello. What are you guys up to?’
In one of the alleyways close to the shootout, four men were quickly stripping out of black clothing and into police uniforms. Gwen silently crawled down one of the alley walls hoping to get a better idea of what they were doing.
“Oh man, we’re fucked. We’re fucked man. This was supposed to be easy, that was Batgirl just now. The plan is fucked and so are we!” One of the men rambled as he struggled into the uniform.
“Would you shut up?” another one snapped. “The plan is still fine. We just wait for the shooting to be over and we walk right on outta here. Batgirl isn’t going to start punching up cops. And as long as you keep a lid on it she won’t have a reason to start.”
The four of them finished changing, “Okay, grab the bags. Once the shootout is done we call Gary and the van. Then we’re home free.
‘So they were going to pretend to be cops and walk away with what they stole from the armored truck? Too bad for them I was listening in then.’ Gwen thought.
The robbers dumped their old clothes in a nearby dumpster and went to grab the duffle bags filled with money when a line of silk ripped the bags off the ground with a distinct ‘thwipping’ sound.
“Sorry boys, I’ll be taking this.” Gwen quipped as they spun to face her. “Feel free to hang around for the real cops though. In fact I insist on it.”
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“It's one of those costumed freaks!” A robber yelled out, pulling a gun and snapping off a couple shots.
Gwen’s spider sense let her easily avoid the shots as she dropped in the middle of the group and slapped the gun out of his hand. “Well that wasn’t very nice. I think you should go to timeout.”
Grabbing the man by the front of his shirt, Gwen tossed him relatively gently into a wall and trapped him with a quick burst of webbing. Her spider sense blared and she dropped to a crouch, just in time as another one of the robbers managed to draw a gun and take a shot.
At this point all three remaining goons had drawn pistols and started shooting at the spider themed hero, but she danced through their shots with the grace of a gymnast. Seconds (and several punches) later, all of the robbers were groaning and trapped by silky webbed cocoons.
“Well that was fun. Not much of a start but it’s a start.” Gwen mused as she retrieved the duffle bag from earlier. “What do you even get for...what is this, 100k?”
“Five to ten in prison for starters.” an angry voice said behind her. Gwen turned around to see an unimpressed Batgirl glaring at her. Oversized white eyes widened as she looked at the bag in her hands to the unconscious men in police uniforms hanging from the walls.
“Okay I know this looks bad, but I swear it isn’t what it looks like!”
-o-
Batgirl would never admit to it, but sometimes the best part about her parols wasn’t making sure the streets of Gotham were crime free, it was the stress relief she got by beating up obvious criminals.
It didn’t solve all her problems, but it sure made her feel better!
She still hadn’t managed to talk to Bruce about Gwen’s situation, the league had been called off to face some unknown disaster and Batman had been unavailable since then. With no idea when he would return, Batgirl had been left with a kind of nervous energy that refused to go away. So when the police scanner mentioned an armored truck hijacking had turned into a major shootout she leaped at the chance to workout her frustrations in a constructive manner.
Meaning she went through the criminals like Kid Flash went through a buffet line.
She had just finished with the last of the gangsters when more gunfire broke out in a nearby alley. Confident the cops on the scene could deal with the rest of the gangsters, Batgirl quickly went to investigate.
People doing things to cops that pissed her off seemed to be the theme this month. Though truthfully it was the lack of resolution to the Captain Stacy murder. However corrupt the GCPD- despite the efforts of her father to clean it up -dead cops made the rest of them much less willing to look the other way. Which also meant the smarter criminals would keep their heads down for a bit.
So when Batgirl entered the alleyway and saw four cops hanging from the walls (thankfully just unconscious since she could see them breathing) and a villain rummaging through a duffle bag of stolen money.
“What do you even get for...what is this, 100k?” the villain asked her unconscious victims.
“Five to ten in prison for starters.”
The woman spun around and Batgirl took a second to look over her costume. A lot of the ‘super’ community tended to give hints on their capabilities from what they wore. Tech and gadget users tended to have a bunch of pouches or pockets anywhere they could and metahumans tended to advertise the ‘theme’ of their powers in some way.
The tight costume and spider theme leaned more towards metahuman than tech user, but Batgirl knew from personal experience tight costumes could fit a surprising amount of gear.
“Okay I know this looks bad, but I swear it isn’t what it looks like!”
Batgirl smirked as she slipped one of her batarangs into her hand. “So you didn’t knock these four out and hang them from the walls?”
“Well...no...I did do that.” while the other girl’s mask didn’t allow her facial features to be seen, the surprisingly expressive eyes scrunched up in a way that could only be described as sheepish. “Ah, but there’s a good reason for it!” she said quickly. “I did it to take this from them!” she held up the duffle bag.
Batgirl looked at the villain, unamused.
“Right, that doesn't actually explain anything.” The girl ran a hand down her face. “So introductions. I’m Ghost Spider-” Batgirl was completely unsurprised at the themed name. “-and I saw these four hiding out in the alleyway so I decided to check them out. I got clo-” whatever Ghost Spider was about to say was lost when more police officers ran around the corner and shouted for her surrender, pistols drawn.
Ghost Spider took one look at the drawn guns and Batgirl could see the second when the other girl decided ‘nope, not dealing with this’ went through her head.
“You guys seem busy. I’ll explain later and you can have fun with the fake cops.” and with that she vanished from sight.
“W-what?” one of the officers gasped, and started twitching at shadows. Batgirl was about to suggest that he calmed down before he risked shooting at someone when his hand was suddenly engulfed in thick webbing, a condition soon shared by the rest of the officers.
No webbing was sent at Batgirl but she dodged to the side just in case. When there was no follow up attack she carefully looked for signs of Ghost Spider. The duffle bag was laying abandoned on the ground and no sign of the other girl, but Batgirl wasn’t going to let her get away without figuring out what just happened.
She retrieved her grappling gun and took aim at the rooftop.
-o-
“Well that could’ve gone better.” Gwen complained as she sprinted over the rooftops. Still, she stopped the bad guys. Once they checked the fake cops they would realise what was going on. She could try getting her name out as a hero some other time. Maybe try speaking to Batgirl again after she stopped a few more clear cut crimes?
Her spider sense blared and she quickly leaped over two bat-shaped projectiles. They crashed into a nearby air conditioner and exploded into a quick drying blue foam.
‘Or I could try talking to her right now.’ Ghost Spider thought sarcastically.
“Batgirl! It’s been so long! How’s your night going?”
“Better once I catch you!” Ghost Spider ducked under a batarang fired out of a handheld launcher. A second later she realised it was a feint as Batgirl flew at her at high speed using the attached wire to close the distance quickly.
“I think we got started off on the wrong foot.” She leaned back to avoid getting a punch to the face. “Want to start over?” she ducked under a roundhouse kick. “Talk out our differences like mature individuals?” she rolled to avoid Batgirl pouncing on her and started shooting webs at the heroine. “Or just continue beating on me until you feel better?”
“Do you ever shut up?!” Batgirl threw half a dozen bat shaped shurikens causing Ghost Spider to acrobatically dodge out of the way.
“I do when I’m serious, but not really feeling a need for that here.”
Batgirl snarled at the insult and prepared to rush after the spider themed metahuman but was shocked to find out her foot had been caught in a glob of webbing, firmly anchoring her to the roof.
“Right, not sure what your issue is tonight but I’m just gonna run off.” Ghost Spider stood up and stretched languidly. “See ya around!”
With that she jumped off the building and swung off into the city.
-o-
The next day Gwen groaned in disbelief and collapsed on her kitchen table. A newspaper with the headline New Supervillain Avoids Capture! and an amature picture of her and Batgirl fighting on the roof slipped out of her grip.
Was she just cursed to never have a good start with the police?
She had hoped having the memories of that meant she would get a fresh start. And when she found the person who took that picture she was going to kick their ass!