#idc what you say Terry has to be someone's gay awakening

[lazlolullaby]

Batman Beyond episode idea: fun with fan fiction.

if they just go directly back to high school shenanigans - Batman RPF. Self-shippers. Fangirls and fanboys. The writing club slipped that one of the prompts was "batman" and it just ran wild. I know Batman isn't considered "good" by society but teenagers are like that. Getting attached to "bad role models" and such.

I'm talking full gamut of "batman saved y/n" and "batman is my bf/gf" AUs, and NSFW/Smut.

(teens are allowed to have sexy thoughts. It doesn't mean they're evil or secretly suddenly mature adults. they gotta grow into it. It's natural.)

This almost ends Terry's career as Neo Batman.

With all of this school chatter there's renewed interest in OG Batman and Neo Batman among the teenagers. Compiling sightings, known fights, and personality traits. It comes out that Batman does hang around the teenage spots - Terry and Max will point out about the school counselor AND a coach being Rogues but no one will listen.

Bruce and Terry are worried someone is going to put together the pieces. But the days go on and it's less "who is Batman (under the cowl as a real life person)" and more "Who is Batman (that I can assign a personality to and play around with as a character)"

Terry is immediately singled out for being "un-schway" with talking about either of them. He just - gets flustered, stumbles over his words, never wants to talk about the Caped Crusaders at all.

The idea throws him off. It puts him in position to try and imagine what Neo Batman (and even Bruce!) is like off the clock based on the actions in the cowl. And he just can't, it's not computing for him.

Terry can't separate himself from the Batman persona - at least in personality - and it's just - why are they writing him like that? He'd never kidnap anyone out of misguided love? He'd never have a three way with Dee Dee! stop writing Jokerz romances for slag's sake!

Bruce attempts to help him by trying to imagine the OG Batman instead of himself. He just identifies OG Batman as Old Man Bruce and that's somewhat better. But not much.

He brings it up with his mother and Mary goes to her old records and pulls out a bunch of Zines, some disks/USBs of Batman fanfiction. "Well, if your friends like it so much, you could share." Terry just buries his head in his hands. "Thanks ma." There's even a section for Robin and Nightwing focused stories. Matt almost grabs them but Terry and Mary both have to sort through the right ones for the little kid.

It's all fun and games until teenagers start to get into trouble to meet Neo Batman. Baiting Jokerz. Calling in fake 911 calls made Commissioner Barbara Gordon reach out to the school.

The school attempts to do a crackdown. The writing club basically goes "Not Safe for Work" rules. Anything that you'd get a higher rating than PG-13 just don't bring it. Keep it in your house. Don't ruin it for the rest of us. The school gets even stricter on texting. The writers in class have to resort to pen and paper notebooks that get passed around in lunch/in the halls. Terry interrupts a "dead drop", flips through the book and drops it like he was burned.

It takes some soul searching, but eventually Terry does accept that Batman has to have a separate persona than him. Even if it doesn't feel like it from the inside. So. Terry plays up the "horny teenager" aspect in his response. (thank you billionaire playboy Brucie!).

"Yeah I've been weird about it. We've met face to face so he could stop me from taking revenge or some stupid slag like that. Look, Neo Batsy busted up the illegal weapons project that got my Dad killed. If we ever met again. Fancy dinner at least. I'd kiss him on the mouth if I could find him. A thanks if he doesn't want any of that."

The school paper armchair analyzes and comes back with. "Yeah he was a criminal, maybe his flirting could be considered going after a partner that has a strong moral compass and can fight him if needed."

People start writing "reformed bad boy x Neo Batman" fanfic based on that sound bite alone. "Be Bi, did crime" is another fun meme. Terry as Robin was probably the worst, especially the implications with the OG Batman and the OG Robins.

Like all fads, it dies down after another month. Sure, there's some diehard fans, but they keep to themselves.

(Max keeps a file of her favorites anyway.)