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SAILOR SCOUTS visit GOTHAM

(yeah, you read right!!!!)

A fanfic crossover by Jennifer A. Wand (Sailor Newbie/NetBatMovie Spoiler)

some continuity notes:

This is written with some in-jokes to the Sailor Moon/Power Rangers story I read about a year ago. In that story, the Power Rangers went on an exchange to Tokyo and the Sailor Scouts helped them defeat Lord Zedd there. They don't appear in the story, thank goodness, but they do help set it up.

In Sailor continuity, English names are used but otherwise continuity is as faithful as I could make it to the original series. It is set during the Zoycite/Malachite arc, after "A Crystal Clear Destiny." I guess I did keep some things from the American series, because I know it better than the original. So don't be too picky with me. :)
Specifics: 1) Zoycite is male, to please the purists and for the sake of one line in Part 4!! 2) Mars's scroll attack is "Evil Spirit Begone!" not "Fireballs Charge!"

In Batman land, the story is in Animated Series continuity (with some fun in-jokes to comics!)

*********

"O boy o boy o boy o boy! This is so coooooool!" shrieked Serena, so loud the whole room shook.

Luna looked up warily from her comfortable spot on the bed. "What is it now?" she groaned, for Luna was used to things being so cooooooool. "No, let me guess. New guy, new video game, new comic book?"

"Wronnng!" Serena gloated, kneeling to grin knowingly in the gray cat's face.

"Umm... old video game, new high score?" Luna shrugged.

"Wrong again, Luna!" Serena grabbed her cat and spun her in merry wheels around the room. Luna meowed in surprise and dizziness. "We are gonna go to the U. S. of Aaaaay!"

After surviving spinning, shrieking, and squeezing, Luna managed to pull herself free of the hyperactive teenager. She regained her bearings. "Now. Serena. Did I hear you right? Now start at the beginning and tell me what this is all about."

Serena tried to calm her rapid breathing, and sat on the bed. "Well, ya remember those kids who came here on exchange last year?"

"I certainly do," said Luna seriously. "Those were no ordinary kids."

"You're telling me," breathed Serena, starry-eyed. "Tommy and Rocky were sooooo cute!"

"You know what I'm talking about," insisted Luna.

"Yeah yeah... they were Power Rangers and all that," droned Serena. "Who cares. Not like they were any help to us."

"This is true," Luna conceded. "After watching them grunt and flail their arms, and those horrible clumsy robots of theirs, I swore I'd never reprimand you again."

"Yep, you're pretty lucky to have me around," Serena said flippantly.

Luna snarled and gritted her teeth. "Don't... push... your luck."

Serena knew she'd better get on with the story. "Anyhow... so since they came to our school, we were supposed to go to their school, except that ugly guy we fought went and tore down the place again. So they're rebuilding, and now some rich guy is letting some high schoolers go to this other city. Er... Gotham I think is the name. And he said I could go, and so is Lita, and so is ... er... **Rei***," Serena fumed for a split second. "Anyhow, I'm psyched!!!" With that, she embarked on a series of hyper shrieks that could have leveled a china shop.

"I wonder if America can handle this girl," Luna groaned.

*********

Malachite sneered as he approached the throne. "This plan cannot fail, my queen," he said, offering Queen Beryl a reverent bow.

"It had better not," she replied sharply, waving her hands mystically over her black crystal ball. "You must stop those Sailor Scouts from interfering."

"They shall not get in the way this time," Malachite told her.

"His plan is pure genius, Queen Beryl," added Zoycite from a few inches behind Malachite. He looked up admiringly at his handsome lover.

"Since Lord Zedd attempted to attack Tokyo, thus avoiding the Power Rangers, I thought we might follow his lead and gather energy from America, where the Sailor Scouts will not be there to stop us. There are superheroes in America, but they are too concerned with petty crime and are not familiar with our schemes."

Queen Beryl pondered. "You plan sounds most promising, Malachite. We will need energy to seize the Silver Empyrean Crystal from that Sailor Moon, and I need time to win Prince Darien over to our side. But America is a very large continent. You must find a location with the most energy available for your taking."

"I have anticipated your concern, Queen Beryl," Malachite said confidently. "We have found a place called Gotham City. It is rife with what humans call seedy bars, strip joints, and crime families."

"And if that's not enough," Zoycite chimed in, "There is an asylum, filled with maniacs who constantly escape to terrorize the people. The hysteria and fear they create will provide us with much energy, and dark energy at that. It will be most effective when applied to releasing the Negaforce."

"Very good," said Beryl. "Now get to work, you two. And Zoycite--don't forget this is your last chance to redeem yourself for trying to destroy Tuxedo Mask. Do NOT disappoint me!" She waved her hands impatiently, dismissing the pair.

"Your majesty," cried Malachite urgently. "I must tell you of one possible risk, a crime-fighting duo who..."

"Enough!" snapped Beryl. "I am sick of your worrying. Go, and do not fail me this time!"

*********

"We are now approaching Gotham International Airport. Please return your seats to their..." The message repeated itself in Japanese. Serena blinked sleepily and gave a huge yawn, stretching out her arms and legs in the cramped airline seat.

"OW! Ser- EE-- na, watch it!" Rei grumbled next to her. "You almost poked me in the eye!"

"I was STRETCHING!" Serena said defensively.

"Why don't you stretch AFTER the plane lands!" retorted Rei.

"Oh come on, Rei... I've been stuck in this awful seat for practically a year, next to a total grouch, it's three PM and I think it's three AM, and I'm about to land in some weird country. So why not just give me a break!?" Serena ranted, ending her monologue with a familiar flood of tears. "Waaaaa!"

At the window in front of them, Mina looked down with a face full of wonder. "It's great!" she breathed.

"Isn't it?" Ami echoed effusively. "I just can't wait to see all the sights! The museums, the historical buildings..."

"...the nightclubs, the arcades, the guys!" finished Lita. Ami was about to protest that she wasn't going to finish her sentence like THAT, but from behind them came a yell of pain and a fume of anger, followed by a defensive "I was just trying to get my bag!!" Luckily, the plane hit the ground with a loud bump before many sparks were able to fly.

*********

"This way," Mina groaned as her friends scampered through the halls of Gotham International. Serena was singing an off-key chorus of "I want to be in a-MER-i-ca" in heavily accented English, and Rei was constantly asking "Hey, Mina, what does that sign say? What about that one?" Mina was glad when they reached the luggage claim. Finally, the girls could do something that didn't need a constant interpreter.

Rei, Lita, and Ami pulled their suitcases off the conveyor belt. When Mina got hers, Lita suddenly said, "There's something moving in your bag!" Indeed there was... something wriggling in one of the large extra pockets.

Mina was unsurprised. "Well of course! I wasn't about to leave our friends behind. Would you?" Lita looked confused, but grinned when Mina unzipped the pocket and out popped Luna and Artemis!

Luna crawled wretchedly into Ami's arms. "That was, without a doubt, the most unpleasant eight hours I have ever spent," she moaned.

"What, you didn't like my singing?" Artemis quipped, although he looked a little green himself. Luna hissed at him. "Seriously," Artemis said, "we thought we'd help you out with getting around here." He did a tiny backflip across Mina's shoulders, and five sets of shining gold earrings appeared in the five girls' hands. "These are translators," he explained. "They'll help you speak and understand everything you hear. Just a little bonus from the two of us."

"Wow, thanks!" Serena grinned, putting the earrings on. "They're way too cool looking too! Look at me, I'm an American now!" She did a little model-turn, the gold earrings flashing. Suddenly her expression changed. "Ack! That's my suitcase!"

The scouts laughed as Serena tore after the runaway bag. When she got hold of it, the weight was too much for her to pull it off. Serena ended up flying down the conveyor belt, shrieking, attached to the handle of a renegade suitcase. The wild ride ended when she crashed against a green turtleneck who picked up her bag and said jokingly, "Should have traveled light, eh, Meatball Head?"

Her head spinning, Serena looked up and saw a fuzzy dark-haired figure with a cocky smile. "Darien?" she murmured confusedly. Had he escaped the Negaverse and come back to her? Her cheeks started to flood with color and she smiled joyfully.

But as the fuzziness faded and Serena regained her head, she saw that the figure was not the annoying boy she loved to hate and had learned to love. "Hi," he said. "My name's Dick. Dick Grayson. Are you okay?"

Serena turned bright pink. "Um, uh, I was just um.. well, yeah..." She let her voice trail off and just concentrated on staring at the stud. Was she floating on a cloud? If she didn't know better, she might think he was Tuxe... but then she remembered something. "Scuse me," she said, straightening up. "Did you call me... MEATBALL head?"

Dick grinned. "Well, yeah. That is what ya look like, Meatball Head."

Serena hear a snicker from behind her. Fists flailing and eyes flaming, she ranted, "I am NOT a meatball head! Am not am not am NOT!" Dick suddenly wished he had brought an umbrella to escape the shower of tears.

"Chill out," he said hastily. "It was just a joke! What's your name?"

"I'm.. uh... Serena," she said, struggling to remain sensible in the face of such studliness. It must have been the goofy look on her face, because she definitely heard Lita tell the others to pretend they didn't know her. So Serena said audaciously, "And these are my friends. Ami, Mina, Lita..."

"And I'm Rei," the dark haired girl said flirtatiously, stepping forward. She batted her eyelashes while Serena looked on glaringly. "So tell me, Dick, are you from around here?"

Serena butted in angrily. "And this," she grinned through gritted teeth, "is my cat Luna. And Mina's cat is Artemis. We've all come on exchange from Japan!"

"Wow, your English is pretty good!" exclaimed Dick.

Serena fiddled nervously with her earring. "Yeah, well... we've worked pretty hard at that." She elbowed Rei just in time to knock the snappy comment out of her.

"If you don't mind me asking, " Dick wondered as he petted Artemis, "how did you manage to take two cats on an international flight without cages or...?"

Serena saw her chance and pointed at Rei. "Ask her about that. In fact, ask her about anything that seems a little suspicious. It's probably her fault anyway."

Rei was about to answer when Lita cut between the two. Ami and Mina grabbed the growling girls' hands and led them away while Lita babbled hurriedly, "Jet lag, you know, they can get kinda cranky, we need to get them to bed, see ya 'round, BYE!" And she dashed away.

**

The Joker played cat's cradle with an empty piece of air in his cell at Arkham Asylum. He'd asked for a piece of string, but the guard had refused, thinking the maniac might strangle the messenger. "Now would I do a thing like that!?" the Joker chuckled to himself, as his fingers held the imaginary web... a web to catch a bat maybe? Bat's cradle? "I'd never do anything like that... I'd do JUST that!" The clown erupted in maniacal laughter. "Ya ha ha ha ha hee hee hee hee hee ha ha... hunh?" Cautiously, he turned around, and then exploded in giggles again. "Imagine that. The NERVE of this place. They won't give me a silly piece of string, but they let floating swamis in here! Just goes to show ya what's wrong with asylum management these days..."

"Listen," Zoycite yawned, for he was floating a few feet off the floor of the Joker's cell, "You're my last stop today, and I want to relax with my boyfriend tonight, so let's get this over with. My name is-"

"I know!" volunteered the Joker, raising his hand eagerly. "You're... Neron, and you want me to sell you my immortal soul! Ya ha ha ha ha ha!"

Even Zoycite giggled. "Sounds like a really bad comic book... But anyhow, no, you're wrong. My name is Zoycite and I'm going to set you and all your friends free. All I want is for you to wreak a little havoc, and I'll feed of the energy of your victims. I'll even throw in a little Negapower."

"Hmmm..." the Joker fell backwards off his bench and hung upside down in thought. "Sounds like too good an offer to pass up... now the real joke would be if I passed it up anyway!"

Zoycite stared in disbelief as the clown giggled at that absurd idea. Then he smiled deliberately. "That's your choice, but it would be a shame. You'd be passing up the chance to play some great jokes on everyone out there. Especially with the Negaforce to aid you."

"Ya know, yer right." The Joker stood up. "Okay, Mister Chop Suey-cide..."

"That's Zoycite," he glowered.

"Whatever." The Joker waved the issue away. "All right. I'll take you up on your little deal. Shake on it?"

**

Andy, walking through the maximum security wing on his daily round, heard the sound of a joy buzzer and a yell of surprise. But the hefty guard was barely able to grab his walkie talkie when a piercing "Zoy!" echoed through the halls, and all hell broke loose.

**

It had been a day and a half, and the still jet-lagged but excited girls were headed home for the evening. "This is TOO amazing!" cried Serena. "I mean, can you BELIEVE this place? It's out of this world!"

"I don't know," Lita said, looking around suspiciously. "Maybe it's just me, but this town gives me the creeps."

"Me too," mused Rei. "Not Negaverse-type vibes thought. More like... this place is just always scary."

"Oh, you guyyys!" Serena drawled, puckering her face into a patronizing grin. "It's just a big city, and personally, I think it's cool."

Ami and Mina looked at each other and shrugged. "Whattaya gonna do," Mina smiled.

The fivesome turned a corner, and the cold shadow of a brick building fell on them abruptly. Serena pressed her lips together, and her eyes glistened nervously. Ami shuddered and wrapped her coat tight around her small frame.

"Don't you know girls aren't supposed to walk around Gotham alone at night?"

The voice came from behind them. Everyone whipped around. In the dim light, they could make out the figures of three punks with leather jackets and snarling expressions, and in their hands glinted slivers and one cylinder of silver. "Oh jeez..." stammered Serena. "I wanna go hooommmme..."

Lita glared at the hoods, her adrenaline racing. "What is that supposed to mean? You must have never met girls like us before!" Her hands clenched into tight fists. One of the hoods approached her menacingly.

"Please..." Serena tugged on Lita's sleeve. "This isn't Tokyo, we don't know who they are, let's just go..."

Lita shook her off. "You think you're so tough, big boy?" she growled impulsively. Ami tried to step forward to tell her this wasn't a good idea, but found herself knocked flat on her back as the hood charged Lita. He rammed into her hard, toppling her over, but she rolled to her feet and threw him to the ground with a defiant "Ha!"

This small victory sent Rei into full warrior mode, and she delivered a powerful blow to Lita's opponent as he was about to get up and grab the brown-haired fighter around the legs. Then, Rei let out a small cry and dropped, when the punk managed to graze her leg with his knife.

Lita gave a gasp as two sets of hands grabbed her arms. The two other punks held her still, despite her wildcat-like struggles. One raised a gun to her temple, and she grimaced and squinted sideways at it. "Now," the guy sneered, "are you girls gonna behave?"

Rei, kneeling on the pavement, clutched her wound. Her eyes blazed. Serena looked at Ami and Mina, and saw the decisive look in their eyes. No way were street punks going to take out the Sailor Scouts. Serena looked ahead determinedly, spread her fingers wide, and began to cry, "Moon Pr..."

A sharp object whizzed by. Serena drew her hand back quickly. The thing clanged against the punk's gun. As both gadgets dropped to the ground, Lita found her chance and elbowed her way free. The five girls and the three flustered punks looked up to see where the strange bat-shaped thing had come from.

"Ohh," said Serena, her jaw dropping.

On the roof above them sat a mysterious caped figure. His dark cap and mask reminded Serena of someone back in Japan, but underneath the yellow lined cloak was a brightly colored red and green costume. The stranger gave a smile and nodded, his dark hair ruffling. "Don't you know how to treat a lady?" he said tauntingly to the punks.

They seemed to recognize him, and backed away. "Who IS he?" Serena mouthed, eyes starry with wonder.

Mina was equally lovestruck. "Bet he's called... the Traffic Light Knight!"

Serena was about to utter a clueless "Huh?" when a whoooshing sound whipped through the air. She drew in a ragged gasp. It was hard to tell in the dim light what happened next, but a huge caped figure swooped down from behind them, and there were sounds of grunts and punches. Another whoosh, and the five girls were alone on the sidewalk once more.

"What was that?" Rei gasped.

"Beats me," answered Mina, "but the... uh... Traffic Light Knight is gone." She looked dejected.

"Guys!" shouted Ami, wild-eyed. "Look!"

Four heads turned. Hanging from a broken streetlight was a pinata of three wriggling punks. The package was bound tightly in wire and knotted around a metal device shaped like a bat.

**

Disheveled and exhausted, the girls trudged up the stairs to their bedroom. "I can't believe that," Rei fumed, as Serena flopped down on the bed with a loud thud. "I thought they told us this trip was going to be safe! We should sue them!" Rei ranted on, as Serena groaned and rolled over.

"Stop your yakking," she said sleepily. "At least that rich guy Wayne or whoever paid for us to stay in a hotel. Maybe he should have found babysitting for you, though!"

Lita, in the meantime, had turned on the television. A red-haired newswoman was speaking briskly and looking intensely out from the screen. "I'm Summer Gleeson, and you're tuned to Channel 6 News at 11. The rash of strange robberies continues in the wake of the Arkham Asylum breakout. No casualties so far, supposedly due to the Batman's intervention, but there have been several injuries. Despite those reports that the Batman has been sighted at crime scenes, none of the criminals have been apprehended so far. Witnesses describe unusual abilities in Gotham's all-too-familiar criminals, from increased strength and weaponry to even the supernatural. These reports are unsubstantiated, and police assure the public that these descriptions do not fit with the perpetrators' usual methods. We'll be back in a moment with a live report."

The screen faded to commercials. "What in the world?" Lita muttered. "I wonder..."

"Oh, haven't you had enough crazy people for one night?" Serena yawned. "I wanna go to sleep!"

"No, she's right," Luna said, coming out from underneath one of the beds. "Something smells fishy about that report."

"You don't think... the Negaverse?" Lita turned on Luna.

"That is precisely what I think," Luna answered.

"And what did they say about that... Batman?" Rei mused, leaning forward and furrowing her brow.

"He's a crimefighter here," Ami asserted from the other side of the room. "The Batman, they call him, and his partner Robin. I made sure to study a little bit about this city before we came here. I thought it might come in handy."

"Whooo cares?" droned Serena, burying her head in her pillow.

"I do," said Mina suddenly. "Look!"

They rushed to the window. Lighting up the smoggy night and the dim flicker of streetlamps was a huge circle of light that seemed to envelop the whole sky. It was only eclipsed in the middle by a dark shadow, all swooping curves and angles, shaped like a bat.

Serena turned around immediately and dove into her pillow again. "This is too weird, I wanna go home, I don't like this..."

Ami gasped. "Hey. Doesn't that look like the thing on the end of the rope before, the one that tied up those muggers?"

"You know, you're right," said Lita, recognition dawning on her face. "Wonder what it is."

"Bet it has something to do with that Batman."

"Oh Rei, if it has a MAN in it you're desperate to find it."

Sparks and pillows flew. Ami ducked under the crossfire, and dug a stack of newspapers out of her bag. "I've got it!" she cried, and both warring parties stopped in mid-throw to stare at her. Mina sat down to listen, and Lita looked thoughtful. "Rei, you were right. It's called the Batsignal. They say that when the city's in trouble, or when there's a dangerous criminal on the loose, the police use that to call him. No one knows who he is, so they have to shine a light over the entire city to let him know they need him."

Serena suddenly collapsed in a fit of giggles. "This is too weird! As IF! You really believe this?"

Rei retorted, "I used to know this crybaby who somehow got superpowers..."

"All right, all right," Artemis declared, crawling out from under the bed where he had taken up temporary residence. "Enough of this. Somebody should check it out."

"Yeah! Let's go!" Mina said, jumping up excitedly, but Artemis shook his head.

"Nope. Luna and I will take care of it. A few stray cats are a lot less conspicuous than five girls in sailor suits."

Mina grumbled. "You've got a point." She opened the window as Luna and Artemis leapt up to the windowsill. The two cats jumped out onto the head of a gargoyle, tripped across a clothesline, and disappeared into the city night.

**

Commissioner Gordon drew his coat tighter around him, sucked in a breath of cold air, and waited. Beside him, the burning Batsignal glowed, but it didn't help ease the chilly night's bite or the tough old cop's mind. He had seen plenty of strange things in this town... heck, he was waiting for one... but he was at a loss for words tonight. Everything familiar and predictable about these maniacs had disappeared. None of their weak spots were weak anymore.

"Jim." A deep voice behind him.

With a start, Gordon turned around. "...Oh. It's you. Why I'm not used to that by now I don't know." He pushed his glasses up on his nose and, with a grunt, pulled the lever down to extinguish the huge spotlight.

"I assume you have a riddle for me," his companion said.

"You figured out it's Nygma already," Gordon said matter-of-factly. "That I'm not surprised at. Yes, I suppose I do have a riddle for you." He uncrumpled the scrap of paper in his hand and cleared his throat.

"On bended knee Matt offered me
and grabbed her hand to hold her
But she kicked him round
And threw me out.
Find me, Batman, if you dare,
Because this pinhead's got news to share."

"A ring," the deep voice stated immediately.

"I know," said Gordon. "But it's hardly enough to go on. He could be robbing a jewelry store, a circus, heck, even another ring of mobsters. There's got to be more to it. But-"

"Hang on," the other said urgently. Gordon was about to stutter "What?" when he heard it too-- the scampering of light footsteps. He made a grab for the gun at his side, turned around quickly, and then let out a long sigh of relief. Two cats scampered across the rooftop, one white, one black. They leapt onto another roof and vanished.

Gordon chuckled. "Well. So will you get back to me about that... Batman?" He turned back around to face an empty roof. "Yeesh. Don't ask me why I'm not used to THAT, either."

**

"A ring," said Ami.

"We know. We heard him solve the riddle," answered Luna. "But it's not much."

"I'll tell you what bugs me," said Rei, her eyes in suspicious slits. "'News to share.' Reminds me of what they said on the news tonight... about them being stronger lately."

"I have a baaaad feeling about this," groaned Luna.

Lita, who had been facing the window, suddenly whirled around. "Wait a minute," she blurted out, "There's another clue hidden in that riddle."

They stared at her blankly.

"Think about it! I was thinking why the guy in the riddle was named Matt, and then I thought Mat! Listen... knee, mat, grab, hold, kick, throw, pin, round... they sound like wrestling terms, don't they? What if the ring is a wrestling ring?"

"Yes!" Ami chimed in. "And there's a wrestling championship going on right now! I saw it in the paper. Midnight Wrestlefest."

"Wrestling. Oh, GREAT," Serena yawned. "Why can't we just let that Bat guy handle this? It's his city!"

"Not if the Negaverse is involved," Luna said seriously. "Come on. Let's get to that contest."

The girls rushed out the door. "Anyone got any Moon Coffee Power?"

**

"Ladies and gey---yentlemen! It's time for the Midnight Wrestlefest!"

The unruly crowd erupted anew in cheers. Curses and styrofoam beer cups flew in the packed auditorium. A disgusting, classless, brawling madhouse, and in Gotham there were countless such places.

"In this corner, wearing the red and black... you better confess your sins because he IS our champion, the Avenging Angel, Azrael!"

The musclebound blond flexed for the roaring crowd, and grabbed the mike. "I AM the champion!" he snarled. "And that challenger better watch out, because I got a SYSTEM and I am gonna PUNISH him!"

The ref snagged his mike back. "And in this corner," he said, crossing the ring, "our challenger, wearing green. You wanna talk about a mystery challenger, he's the one, the big question mark himself! Ladies and gentlemen, the Master Maniac of Mystery... the Riddler!"

Boooos broke out as the figure in green shedded his coat. This was not the short, lanky fellow they saw pictures of in the tabloids. Same height, maybe, but this one was pumped up, muscular, like a steroid-saturated version of himself. He advanced on the ref and snatched the mike. "Don't believe it's me?" he said in his usual calm tone. The crowd booed on, not bothering to listen. The Riddler lost patience and screamed into the mike, practically breaking it in his huge, clenched fist. "HEY!"

Feedback flooded the amps and the Riddler's voice resounded. The mob settled down, and he went on. "Don't believe it's me, eh? Neither do I sometimes, but I like it! Well, riddle me this, you brainless buffoons. When does the challenger win before the match begins? When he's stolen all the prize money beforehand, of course! Sorry, Azzy." He looked at the fuming wrestler with a face full of melodramatic sympathy. "But don't worry, folks, you're still going to get a show. You see, I sent a little invitation to a friend of mine, and he should be showing up pretty soon. Can't wait to try out these new muscles on Batman!"

The crowd went wild. Frenzied cheering resounded. In the chaos, no one noticed the strange things happening on the fringes of the madness... two figures creeping stealthily along the rafters, far above the arena... five agile girls vaulting over the entrance gates... a small-boned man smiling wickedly, slitting his eyes and nodding in approval.

The Riddler had begun to tease the audience, calling a singsong "Riddle me this, Batman, where are you hiding?" But in the meantime, the wrestler Azrael had gotten up and was growling in the madman's direction. Just as the Riddler was rambling, "and riddle me this! What kind of person breaks us out of Arkham and tells us to go cause trouble? He'd sure be the Bane of Batman's existence..." Azrael slammed the unsuspecting brainiac to the ground!

"You may have the dough," he said through gritted teeth as the crazy roaring surged yet again in the audience, "but I'm still the king around here, bub!"

"Are you, now?" retorted the pinhead coolly, leaping to his feet and throwing Azrael backwards.

But the seasoned wrestler was up in a flash, and gripped Riddler. "You lissen to me!" he slurred angrily. "I am Azrael, the avenging angel, da Champion a' dis ring and da Champion a' justice, and for your sins, Mr. Riddler, I will PUNISH you!" He snarled and choked his victim harder.

"Hey! That's my line!"

The voice was small, but fierce, and the audience gasped. Two swirling capes, about to make a downward spiral into the thick of it all, stopped abruptly.

Five girls leapt into the wrestling ring. Each wore a sailor costume with a shining gold tiara and a colored skirt. In the front of the group was a beautiful, young-looking blonde with pigtails that reached practically to her toes. She grimaced at the stunned pair and raised her arm above her head dramatically. "I am Sailor Moon!" she cried, making a series of powerful gestures with her white-gloved arms. "The REAL Champion of Justice! I know about you and your new powers, and on behalf of the moon... I will punish you!"

There was a moment of blank silence.

Then, with a flourish, two caped figures swooped down from the ceiling. Huge winged shadows enveloped the room. The audience drew in a collective gasp, then broke out into clamorous shouting. "It's Batman!"

Screaming down like a dark lightning bolt, the Batman, a monstrous tower of strength and intimidation, shot like an arrow down onto the Riddler. As the maniac hit the mat face first, with a loud "Oof," Batman grimaced and pinned him down with one navy-booted foot. Almost simultaneously, a streak of color flew onto the other wrestler. Someone shouted above the din, "It's Robin! Wow! What a show!"

Robin grabbed the arms of the angry Azrael, restraining him from attacking any of the eight uninvited guests. At the same time, he turned to the girls with an angry expression. In a hushed voice, he scolded, "I don't know who you think you are or what you think you're doing, but you just ruined a perfectly good plan. Batman and I WERE going to watch for a while and see just how strong the Riddler had gotten. Now, thanks to you, we're fighting blind. We haven't got a clue what we're up against. So I hope you're satisfied with your little hero routine."

Sailor Moon looked like she was on the verge of tears, but Sailor Mars shoved her way forward and glared in Robin's face. "Listen, Mask Boy, you're right, you DON'T know who you're up against, and you ARE clueless. We're the Sailor Scouts!"

"I don't care if you're the Eagle Scouts," Robin fumed.

"Robin!" called a grimacing Batman, struggling with the Riddler on the wrestling mat. "Don't bother. They're not worth it."

Sailor Mars turned on him. "Oh aren't we?" she began.

Batman gave her a dark look. "Whoever you are, you don't know Gotham. And nothing is going to help you here, no fancy moves, no Scouts, nothing. You're dead unless you know this place."

"But..." Sailor Mars interrupted.

She was cut off by a loud *BONK* as a beer bottle flew up and hit Batman squarely on the back of the head. He lurched forward and shook it off, but by then the Riddler was up. Batman recovered and lunged at him. The Riddler could have sidestepped the blow, but instead he grabbed Batman's arm and held it squarely. Batman struggled. Robin looked concerned, but was still restraining the other wrestler. "Never thought I'D do this to you, did you, Batman?" the Riddler said arrogantly. "I was always the brain, birdbrain, but I could never match you for strength. All you had to do was grab me, and I was done for. I think you were just jealous because I was smarter. A 'grass is always greener' type of thing. Well, I hate to tell you this, but now the joke's on you... har har har! News flash, ladies and gentlemen!" He turned to the crowd, still maintaining a firm grip on the frustrated vigilante. "The Riddler is now a match for Batman brain for brain and brawn for brawn!"

The Riddler next faced the Sailor Scouts. "And you, Sailor Whatever You Are-s, I can't make heads nor tails of you. But tonight's my night, and nobody's stealing my thunder!"

Sailor Jupiter drew her hand back and shifted into a fighting stance. "I am Sailor Jupiter!" she cried confidently, "and I don't want to steal your thunder... in fact you can have some of mine! I call upon the mighty forces of Jupiter to cut this weirdo down to size!" The air seemed to darken around the Sailor Scout, and a gust of wind tangled her hair. From her tiara extended a small gleaming gold rod.

With a crack, lightning burst in through the roof of the arena, and gathered in a sparkling staticy haze around Sailor Jupiter. She leapt into the air and tucked her body into a tight ball, then extended her limbs in a powerful gesture. "Jupiter Thunder... CRASH!"

Bolts of lightning and thunder shrieked through the air, and the loud rumbling shook the entire auditorium. The wave hit the Riddler head on, and he let out a cry. Batman took advantage of the moment to wriggle free, and he rolled across the mat to a safe corner. Once there, he stared in disbelief at the triumphant Sailor Jupiter and her victim, who seemed caught in a painful ball of static electricity. The charge made its way into the ground, however, and the Riddler was free, but weak and gasping.

"You should have listened to me," Sailor Mars said, smiling smugly. "You may know Gotham, but WE know why all your criminals have become so strong. So don't forget us just yet."

"I wonnn't," murmured Robin, looking admiringly at the five teenagers in their amazingly short skirts. His face broke into a silly grin. The two blonde Sailors were equally dazzled.

Then, abruptly, Robin's enamored face changed to an even more vapid expression, as he was knocked senseless by the wrestler he had forgotten to keep restraining. In anger, Batman leaped to tackle Azrael, but lost control of his foe. The Riddler scrambled away. "Well it's been a half a laugh, Batman, but I gotta fly! You know us Arkhamites, always bumbling off to somewhere or other. Till tomorrow!" He dashed away.

Sailor Moon growled. "Not so fast, fella! Moon Tiara Magic... catch him!" Gripping her tiara between her thumb and forefinger, the girl hurled it with an easy motion towards the escaping Riddler. As the ring flew, it began to sparkle, until it became a lasso of light entrapping him tightly. The Riddler wriggled, but he couldn't break free of the magical bonds.

"Ha!" Sailor Moon gloated. "We got 'im!"

"Maybe so," muttered the Dark Knight knowingly, "but he's only the beginning. Harley Quinn, Two-Face, Poison Ivy, and the Penguin are ALL going to pull stunts before long."

"Hunh?" the girl warrior said, "How do you know that?"

"He TOLD me so," said the square-jawed hero, slitting his eyes. Sailor Moon's jaw dropped. "The Riddler hides clues in his every word. His fancy speeches have hidden meanings, and it's my job to figure them out."

"Enough of that," snapped Robin, who had recovered from his pounding and had apparently injected Azrael with a sedative (since the wrestler was now sleeping like a pussycat). He snarled at the girls. "I want to know who you are and what you know. Now."

The five Scouts looked at each other, and something clicked into place in each of their minds. They seemed to melt into a dramatic, battle ready position, and they looked straight at Batman and Robin, but seemed to act as one. Sailor Moon stood in front, and began: "Our planet is under attack by an evil empire called the Negaverse."

Sailor Venus went on: "They feed on negative energy, like fear and confusion and anger."

"We have defeated the generals Jadeite and Neflite," Sailor Mercury popped in, "but we are still battling Zoycite and Malachite."

"They're here to collect energy for their scheme to capture the Empyrean Silver Crystal," Sailor Mars declared.

"They are using these criminals to create negative energy," continued Sailor Jupiter, "but we're not going to let them succeed... because we are..."

"...The Sailor Scouts!" they finished in unison. Five voices tumbled into each other: "On behalf of the moon... and on behalf of Mercury... on behalf of Mars... and of Venus... on behalf of Jupiter..."

"...we will right wrongs and triumph over evil!" Sailor Moon cried triumphantly. Five eager pairs of eyes flashed with a satisfied sense of completion.

There was a moment of silence.

"Um, wow," said Robin, "Do you guys rehearse that?"

"Naw.... It's just natural, I guess!" Sailor Moon stammered, giggling. The other Scouts looked at her, peeved. She broke out into a huge, embarrassed grin, then abruptly swallowed her smile as Batman turned and advanced toward the group.

His cape swirling, he faced them. "It's obvious you have supernatural powers that work on this enemy, and you know their tactics well. But let me warn you: Gotham's maniacs don't care for pretty speeches. They'll shoot you before the second word comes out of your mouth. So leave this to us."

"I don't think you get it," retorted Sailor Jupiter. "The Sailor Scouts EXIST to fight the Negaverse. Our powers are the only way to stop them."

"There's ALWAYS another way," said Batman shortly. Grabbing a tiny rectangular mechanism from his side, the Caped Crusader wordlessly shot several feet of line up into the rafters. It caught on some steel beam, and the line retracted, carrying him up into the stratosphere. He disappeared like a black raven flying into the night.

Robin looked briefly up at him, then at the Sailor Scouts. He opened his mouth to say something, cracked half of a flirtatious smile, then swallowed it hastily, shutting his jaw tight. He shot his own grapnel up and flew away.

**

Amidst the crisscross of beams high above the arena, Batman and Robin were free to talk. "Was that ever weird," Robin said, shaking his head confusedly. "Their powers are amazing!"

Batman threw a brief, wry smile at his partner. "You're thinking of their skirts." Robin shrugged and grinned. "Back to business," Batman said as the twinkle of humor disappeared from his dark eyes, "I get the feeling they're not going to leave well enough alone. So while I keep up my surveillance on the Arkham escapees, I want you to watch them. They're bound to show up when there's trouble. And I know you like looking at them."

"Well, you're kind of cheery tonight!" Robin said, stunned. It wasn't often Batman smiled twice in a minute. Batman shot him a look, and Robin shrunk back. He wasn't supposed to say things like that, reminding Batman that his dark walls might be breaking down. Now, for the rest of the night, Robin knew he could only talk business. "I..." Robin started hesitantly. "I wonder if they are who they say they are. The Sailor Scouts. Hmm."

"I'll run a computer check in the Batcave later," answered Batman, climbing down through a maze of railings. "But their powers seemed to restrain the Riddler, and their story checks out so far."

"I'll say!" murmured Robin in surprise, and Batman followed his gaze down toward the arena. The Scouts were gone, but the wrestling ring was still crowded with people. In the shock of their meeting, neither the Sailor Scouts nor the Dynamic Duo had noticed why the audience had gone so suddenly quiet. But now they could see why. Everyone in the arena was unconscious, heaped on top of each other, and totally still. They looked as if the energy had been drained right out of them.

**

SAILOR SCOUTS IN GOTHAM (Part 2)

Serena looked deep into Tuxedo Mask's eyes. "Ohhhh..." she moaned happily. "Is it really you, Darien? Have you come back to me?"

"I love you and only you, Sailor Moon," the hunky hero declared. Slowly, he reached up to his elegant white mask, while Serena stared on with starry eyes. The mask floated away in the wind, and Serena faced a stunning Dick Grayson!

She smiled and leaned toward him, but a voice from behind her called, "Wait!"

She looked around. "I love you more, Sailor Moon," said Robin, walking towards her. "Wait till you see who I really am!" His voice sounded like Andrew's... and he began to take off the mask...

"Se-re-NAAAAAAAAAAA!"

Eyes bulging and head pounding, Serena shot up like an arrow from her comfortable position on the bed. Once she saw that it was Rei, she snapped back into bed like a rubber band, pulling the covers over her head. "Go away."

"It's eleven o'clock, meatball head! You told me you would get up by nine!"

Serena snuggled in closer to her pillow sleepily. "Now when did I tell you a thing like that?" she yawned.

Rei, standing impatiently over Serena's bed, retorted, "The first three times I woke you up, genius!"

"And you BELIEVED me?" Serena said incredulously. "Okay, okay, I'm up, I'm up." She lazily slipped out of bed, and gave a tremendous yawn, stretching out her arms (and nearly knocking Rei over.) After blinking her eyes several times, she finally was able to make out the figures of Ami and Lita, sitting on a bed, all dressed and ready to go. "Ohh. Hi guys."

"Hi, Serena," said Lita, grinning. "We have some good news for you. We've finally found someone more annoying than you are in the morning!"

"Oh yeah?" yawned Serena, rubbing her eyes. "Who?"

As if on cue, Mina came out of the bathroom, waltzing with a towel, whirling around the room. She collided with Serena, but faced the grumpy lazybones with a disarming smile. "Oh, hi there, Serena, you're up! I had the most wonderful dream last night... about the Traffic Light Knight! Da da da..." She danced away, blonde hair and pink bathrobe flying.

Serena looked at her, then at her friends. They nodded knowingly to her. "Scary stuff," Serena said. Then a look of total panic crossed her face. "Oh no! We're gonna waste the entire day!" She began a whirlwind path around the hotel room, tossing clothes everywhere and bumping into walls and doors. "Ack! It's almost noon, and we haven't even gone out yet. Why'd you let me sleep so late, Reiii? Ack..."

Rei, Ami, and Lita, as they were so used to doing, just looked at each other and shrugged.

**

"Where do we even go FIRST," murmured Mina, starry-eyed. Five Japanese girls were very, very lost in giant Gotham city, and loving every minute of it. Steep walls and sharp angles rose in every direction into the smoggy sky, while gleaming white and brown automobiles, left over from a half-century ago, chugged along the wide streets. Three-card-monte dealers tempted naove tourists with a wicked smile and a flick of the finger, while harried executives hurried into office buildings. A glistening skyscraper bore the huge placard, "Wayne Enterprises." Not far away squatted a gritty brick building with glass doors.

"Police headquarters," Ami said suddenly, and promptly got four very confused looks.

"Wha--? Where did that come from?" Serena wondered, following Ami's gaze to the building. Then she saw the strange cauldron-like spotlight positioned on the top. "Ohh," she breathed.

"Besides," grinned Ami, "there's a donut shop across the street." Artemis, tucked in Mina's bag, stifled a snicker.

"Let's remember where that is," said Rei matter-of-factly. "We may have to return there tonight. Come to think of it, we should be on our guard today. No telling when things may start to get ugly."

"But Rei, I want to go shopping!" Serena wailed, then fumed, "Oh, I'm gonna make that Negatrash pay for spoiling my vacation....."

Her expression changed for the third time in five seconds when she saw a passing box of donuts. She followed the retreating sweets with hungry eyes until they had disappeared behind the trenchcoat of a short and overweight man with an air of slobby arrogance. He was walking alongside a tall, lanky Spanish woman in a police uniform, and turned to her with a mouth full of donut. "Hey Montoya, you hear the word 'bout those girls last night?"

"Yeah, before we picked up the Riddler again," she answered briskly. "I dunno, I heard a bunch of stories, but the Commissioner can't seem to get any confirmation from... you-know-who."

"Probably parta the wrestlin' show. Either that, or those jerks got so drunk they couldn't see straight. Yeesh, lady superheroes, Batgirl was bad enough..." His voice faded as the two turned the corner.

The five girls looked at each other and giggled. "Do you think we made the news here?" Lita said. "Bet they've never seen anything like the Sailor Scouts before. Should be a hot story, don't ya think?"

"Let's go see," answered Rei, approaching a nearby newsstand. The group crowded around a copy of the Gotham Gazette, reading the cover story about the Riddler's capture. Then they let out a collective "Awwww," of dismay, for nowhere in the article did it mention Sailor Scouts. The man behind the counter looked up briefly from his tabloid, squinted through his glasses, and munched on his cigarette confusedly.

Serena looked up, coughing. "Ugg! Smoke! Hey Mister, if I get lung cancer I'm gonna-- hey!" Before any of her friends knew what was happening, Serena had made a flying leap, reached across the counter, and snatched the magazine from the man's hands. At first everyone was bewildered as to what had just happened, but the girls finally snapped out of it and began a barrage of screaming at Serena.

Moments after, the fellow behind the stand kicked his chair out from under him, reaching across the counter at the eager girl. "Hey! You gotta pay for that, kid!"

Serena looked at his furious face, then at the embarrassed glares of her friends. "Hee hee hee," she giggled, humiliated. "I'll give it right back, I promise!" She broke into another fit of nervous giggles, while the rest of the group just groaned.

"So what's it say?" Rei asked anxiously, craning her neck to see above Lita's tall figure. "...Hey, that's disgusting!"

Lita grabbed the paper and threw it across the counter. It collided with the angry man's face, sticking fast. "Honestly. Sexy wrestler girls team up with Batman?"

"Forget that," Rei growled. "We're stuck in the corner of page one, taking second place to a story about alien babies with human mothers?"

"Oh well," lilted Mina, shrugging. "What do you expect from a paper called the Gotham Inquisitor?"

"ForGET it," rang out a voice from behind them suddenly, and they whirled. Serena was perched atop a mailbox, looking as if she was about to leap into battle. "Fear not, my friends," she cried, as they looked on in surprise. "If this town doesn't know enough to acknowledge the Sailor Scouts, that's their loss! As for us, we have more important things to do!" She raised her arm high above her head, pointing to the sky. "When the going gets tough-" Her pointing finger swerved towards a huge building decked with "Sale" banners and display windows. "-The tough go SHOPPING!"

**

Gotham Fifth Avenue suddenly burst with the sounds of girlish laughter. A perfume clerk dove underneath his counter as a blonde girl in long pigtails made a mad grab for a bottle behind him. "Oooh, yummy," she said, spraying herself generously and giggling. Serena sat on the glass counter, basking in her new elegance.

Ami walked by and took a good whiff of that very elegance. It sent her into a coughing fit. "Whaddaya think?" Serena said luxuriously, tossing her head and whipping the hapless clerk with the end of one pigtail. "Only fifty nine ninety nine! Hmmm... how much is that in yen?"

After recovering her breath, Ami took out her tiny blue computer. After some calculations, she said briefly, "Too much. Considering it's the same stuff they sell at the drugstore back home for cheap."

Serena looked put out. "Well... could we fight the Negaverse with it? Stink bombs maybe?"

"Well, *I* like it," said a cheerful voice from behind them, and Serena hopped off the counter. A blonde college girl stood there, leaning idly on the glass, her purse swaying vaguely. "My name's Cindy."

Ami could see that two kindred spirits had met. She slinked off as the two other girls gabbed. "Nice to meet ya, Serena. You know, there's this guy who I am kinda interested in. He's really hot and he's around here SOMEwhere..."

Shrugging, the short-haired girl put the small aqua machine back in her pocket and strolled on. Craning her neck to see above the rows and rows of fancy clothing, she smiled at the sight of Lita's familiar ponytail, a beacon in the midst of the men's section. Ami wriggled her way through, and found Lita and Mina comparing men's shirts. Lita looked around and waved hello to Ami.

"These suits are way cool," the tall girl grinned enthusiastically. "Just my size, too. I wish I could wear one of these jackets to school instead of those awful uniforms."

Ami laughed. "But if you came to school in one of those, people would think you were a teacher!"

"Wouldn't that be something?" Mina giggled. "I bet you'd give the whole school a day off..."

Her daydreaming was interrupted by a trumpeting voice. "Honestly!!! Bruce WAYNE!" The three girls poked their heads through a rack of jackets to spy on the society folks.

A red-haired lady, dressed elegantly in a smart suit and a huge hat, was standing by a three-way mirror, looking critically at the man in front of it. He was tall, solidly built, with a handsome (but vapid) face and a twinkle of clueless embarrassment in his eye. "So that's the guy who sponsored our trip here!" Lita whispered.

"I wonder if we should go thank him," Ami wondered.

"Naw. It'll be much cooler to just spy on him and see what he's like!" answered Mina mischievously.

Bruce put up his hand in a mild gesture of protest. "Now, Veronica," he said mildly, "there's no need to make a scene. It's just a suit."

"In that thing, Brucie, you'd make a scene without me!" retorted Veronica, going up to him. "Tell me, when are you going to learn the way a jacket is SUPPOSED to hang? It's not as if you have anything better to do with your time." Annoyed, she fussed over his clothes like she was swatting away a pesky fly. "You seem to enjoy wining and dining, you might as well learn how to impress the ladies with your looks as well as your checkbook..."

"Brucie" just stood there and blushed, taking Veronica's lecture as if it were a dose of bitter medicine, and listening as if he were a naughty six-year-old caught making mud pies by his mother. Mina laughed softly at the comical scene. Then, she turned at the sound of a brisk young voice behind her. "Veronica Vreeland. Something, isn't she? Looks to me like Mr. Wayne needs to be rescued."

Leaning against the coat rack was a red-haired girl with a sassy smile and a green backpack. Stray sheets of paper were popping out of the overstuffed pack, surrounding a gray teddy bear with one eye. The girl straightened up, sending her hair flying behind her in one red whoosh, and extended her hand with the grace of a ballerina. "I'm Barbara Gordon. You must be new here. Everyone who lives in Gotham is used to Veronica and Bruce."

"Yes, we're on exchange from Japan," said Ami, and the three girls introduced themselves to the radiantly friendly young woman.

"Oh, really?" Barbara's eyes widened at the mention of Japan. "Wow, I bet my friends would love to meet you." She propped herself up on a post, rising gracefully above the rows of racks. "Hey, Cindy!" she called. Ami giggled knowingly.

As if on cue, two blonde girls emerged from the forest of fashion, and uttered a synchronized "Hiiii!" that streaked up into the stratosphere.

"You guys already know each other?" Mina said incredulously.

"Aw, c'mon," Lita grinned. "Is it really a surprise?"

"Barbara, this is Serena. She's also part of our exchange," Ami said pleasantly.

"Nice to meet you," Barbara said, extending her hand to Serena. "But... if you don't mind me asking, what IS that thing on the back of your head?"

The other girls looked around and promptly burst into a fit of giggles. Serena pouted and said, "It's a hat. C'mon. I've seem them in all the magazines, they're supposed to be totally cool!"

"I dunno," shrugged Mina, "Why anyone would want to wear a cauliflower on their head is beyond me."

In reply, Serena's melodramatic mode kicked into full gear. "It represents the beauty of nature!" she crooned, posing like an avant-garde performance artist.. "Mother Nature provides us with beauty and loove, so if you wear one of her creations, you will be beautiful tooo!" She finished in the coluratura of a diva, shrieking, "Ta-daaaa!" and flinging her arms up in triumph.

Diva Serena's final downbeat came too soon, though, when her hand flew into a face behind her and provoked an annoyed "Oww!" She hastily drew back her hand and began to turn around, when the male whine of pain turned into brash laughter. "Wow! Guess you got some salad to go with the main course, Meatball Head!"

Serena whirled. It was Dick Grayson again, standing there with the same arrogant grin and with the same irresistible twinkle in his eye. Her clumsy hands fumbled to lose the gaudy hairpiece, and at the same time she caught a sideways glimpse of Cindy, who was staring at Dick, enraptured. So this was that guy she was talking about! Great minds think alike...

Serena's face alternated between wrath and embarrassment, and finally decided on the latter. "I ... I was just trying it on 'cause it was so silly!" she grinned hastily, clapping her hand to the back of her head to mask the offending vegetable.

Dick shrugged, nonplussed, and began to walk away, but Serena wasn't about to let him. Snatching the creation from atop her head, she hurled it with a powerful motion at the retreating figure. He turned before it hit, in time to see the discus wheeling towards him at lightspeed, and the girl behind it following through with her toss, her arm and hand outstretched. Instinctively, his hand whipped out and snatched the makeshift weapon securely between two fingers. Dick's eyes locked with Serena's, and something flickered between them, something between suspicion and recognition. The hapless hat, meanwhile, slipped through Dick's fingers and fell to the floor.

Cindy didn't like this wordless connection that seemed to be developing, so she was the first to break the silence. "You two know each other?" she asked in an incredulous tone.

"We met at the airport," Dick explained. "And I see you and your friends have met up with Babs and Cindy..." He looked around. "Hey, where's that friend of yours, the one you said I shouldn't trust? Her name was, uh... Rei?"

"Over here, Dick," called a throaty female voice, and sequins flashed as a figure moved into Dick's line of sight. Rei sauntered out of the dressing room and towards the flabbergasted bunch, decked out in a form-fitting gown that seemed in danger of slipping off any minute. Her dazzling smile glittered above the red sequins, and she reached up to toss her black-violet hair flirtatiously behind her shoulders. "What do you think?" she said, fixing her eyes on him.

Dick hesitated and cleared his throat, while two blondes growled like angry bulldogs. "Uh, Rei, hi," he stammered uncomfortably. "You look... nice." Rei threw a smug grin to Serena and Cindy, who stood there turning red and green.

Mina, the only one who wasn't flustered or doubling over laughing, came to Rei's side and put her arm around her friend's bare shoulders. "Hon, it was a great idea," she counseled quietly, "but I'm not sure you have the... er... willpower to hold that dress up." Rei looked down at herself, and adjusted the dress embarrassedly. "And it's bunching a bit down here..." Mina kneeled down to tend to the dress, and Dick took the opportunity to squeeze his way out of the corner. He turned and shrugged to the others, who were having quite a laugh at Rei's expense.

"Pretty direct, isn't she," grinned Dick. "I don't think I'll ever understand the fairer sex..."

"Who are ya calling fairer?" Lita retorted jokingly.

"Could have been worse," Barbara shrugged, smiling. "He could have called us the weaker sex, but I know you wouldn't do that Dick, RIGHT?" He shrugged innocently. "Anyhow, what are you going to do, we'll never understand each other... For the record, though, I think Rei wanted to stand out, and not just be one of the girls from Japan."

"Barb, you're the best," said Dick. "What would I do without you explaining these things to me? You're a real Oracle, ya know that?"

Barbara waved away the praise. "No, it's just common sense. You know what they say, Men are from Mars and women are from Venus..."

Mina looked up, startled, and Rei began to protest angrily, but checked herself and just stood there with flaming red cheeks. Lita smiled knowingly and said, "I don't know about that..."

**

The girls returned to their hotel later that afternoon for a much-needed nap. Serena was pooped from shopping, and the other four knew they needed to build up their strength. After all, tonight would be a Sailor night, if anything Batman said was true...

After dinner, the girls held a conference with Luna and Artemis in a crowded arcade. Ami briefed the others on each villain that Batman had named: Harley Quinn, the bubbleheaded wacko who had a thing for the Joker; Two-Face, the ex-D.A. with a fixation for twos, doubles, and absolute randomness; Poison Ivy, a deadly temptress who loved plants more than people; and the Penguin, a sneaky criminal underlord and the only sane one among the group, but still a figure to be reckoned with.

"What about the Joker?" asked Rei. "If Harley Quinn is on the loose, could the Joker be too?"

"Possibly," said Luna. "And even I've heard stories about him, so you girls had better be careful."

"Right, Luna," continued Ami. "The Joker is by far the most dangerous criminal in Gotham. While the other psychoses at least have patterns, the Joker is completely erratic and unpredictable."

"If anybody runs up against him tonight," Luna warned, "you are to call the rest of us before getting involved. Nobody is to handle the Joker alone."

"Speaking of getting involved," said Artemis, licking his paws leisurely, "What is the plan for tonight? I thought we should split the girls up and have them each investigate different parts of town, and notify each other if there's any trouble."

"Right," the other cat nodded. "Artemis and I will do our own investigations, and report back to you tomorrow morning." She glanced at Artemis, who had now begun rubbing his own back, ruffling the white fur. "Do you HAVE to take baths in public?" she blurted out.

"Well, I'm ready to go," said Rei impatiently, standing up and nearly knocking over a nearby pinball machine. "How bout the rest of you?"

"Right!" called four voices in unison, and the girls dispersed into the crowd. Luna made a scoffing noise and leaped up onto the windowsill, with Artemis grumbling behind.

**

Ami made her way uptown, towards the Gotham Museum of Fine Arts. After all, thieves were more likely to go after expensive targets in the upscale portions of town, right? Oh well, it was a good enough answer for the rest of the group. As for Ami, she just knew she had endured Serena's shopping sprees all day, without ever getting time to visit what SHE wanted to see. Finally, she was alone and free to soak up some American culture.

If only Serena wasn't such an airhead! Ami thought angrily, stamping her foot. She had just reached the museum, and it looked very closed. The building, designed like a Greek temple gone bad, had shrouded itself in shadows as black as the windows. Now she would never get to go inside! Frustrated, she jogged at full speed up the steps, and sat on the cold stone patio outside the entrance. Her blue skirt folded around her knees with a rustle, and the windy night got chillier. Ami looked around. Sparkling stars lit up her eyes from the glitter-lined trees across the way. "It must be the plaza in front of the opera house," Ami said to herself. "And down the street there, that park with the dim lights... must be the zoological gardens." Ami smiled... perhaps the promise of adorable bunnies would entice Serena to let them visit the zoo tomorrow. Then Ami might have a chance to see their collection of rare and exotic birds.

A low and guttural sound rolled weakly from behind a pillar. Ami turned in surprise toward the black shadow. The sound repeated, and this time it was clearly a groan. Worried, Ami got up cautiously and approached the column. "Who's there?" she asked timidly.

Slowly and painfully, a seated figure moved itself into the light. It was a security guard, probably a night watchman for the museum. A dart jutted out from his coat, undoubtedly piercing his skin. Ami bent down and held the man's shoulder still while she removed the dart. He grabbed her shoulder in a feeble motion. "Drug on the tip... knocked me out," he groaned. "Just woke up... so weak." Ami began to promise she'd call the police, when the poor guard uttered one final phrase before leaning back against the stone column, exhausted. "It was... the Penguin."

The guard was still watching this petite nymphlike thing, who seemed to be tinted in shades of blue. (No police. This is Sailor business.) Surprised, he saw her expression change abruptly and her eyes make a determined dart towards the front doors. Wasn't she going to call the cops? (I better transform. This guy is too out of it to remember what I looked like, and who knows what new power the Negaverse has given to the Penguin.) The girl looked straight at him and said in a strangely firm voice, "Don't worry. I'll take care of it." Then, as if by magic there was a blue rod in her hand, and the guard's eyes widened as she thrust it into the air and yelled, "MERCURY POWER!"

Waves of blue color enveloped the girl, melting her clothes and obscuring her form into blue sashes and stars. The guard was dazzled. The air seemed to turn to water, and ripples distorted the morphing figure. With an explosion of tiny bubbles, the girl's shape came back into focus. Only now it was not that timid little thing, but a young woman in a sailor suit, skirt and boots, the jewel in the center of her gold tiara just as blue and flashing as her eyes. She drew her arms to her sides in a sharp pose.

As the poor befuddled guard looked on, not sure if he was underwater still, the sailor-suited warrior touched the side of her tiara. A blue visor materialized over her eyes, and she scanned the building with piercing eyes. "I thought so," she said in a satisfied tone. "The alarms have been turned off. Don't worry, sir. Sailor Mercury is here!" Bursting the doors open with a powerful kick, she rushed into the museum. The guard gave up trying to understand, and fell unconscious again.

Sailor Mercury heard her footsteps echo in the huge marble lobby. There were no lights, but her visor bathed everything in a dim blue glow. "Scan for life," she said softly, and a white blip flashed against the right corner of her visor, pointing to a nearby hallway. Mercury hurried into the corridor.

Once there, she traded the loud clip clops of her boots for stealthy tiptoes. The Penguin could be anywhere, and she'd rather see what he was up to, then take him by surprise. She followed the muted blinkings of her computer, and stopped short outside a huge, airy gallery. Inside, a drill whizzed and an intellectual voice barked orders. Sailor Mercury touched her tiara again, and her visor retracted itself into nothing. She slipped into the room, staying to the shadows, and discovered happily that there was a balcony a floor above, lining the four walls and looking down on the gallery. With a single fluid motion, she leapt up.

The second floor foyer, in daylight, provided a sensational view of the gallery's main attraction: the prow of the Viking Eagle. Viking ships were not known for their adornments-in fact most were bare masses of dark wood-but this craft had become legendary for its jeweled prow and intricate etchings of birds in flight. In fact, most historians weren't sure if the so-called Viking Eagle was real or mythical. So its recent discovery sparked interest everywhere and led to a whirlwind world tour, sponsored by the Wayne Foundation.

"Ah, my magnificent seabird," mused a voice with a quirky mechanical ring. The sparks from his drill lit up the Penguin's face, the light reflecting viciously off of his monocle. "With you in my talons, I will have conquered the elements. As a bird I am master of the air; as a thief I own the earth. As for fire..." He gave a low chuckle. "Well, let's just say this bird has never been hotter. And now, my lovely eagle, we'll have triumphed over the aquatic realms as well."

One of the heavyset buffoons on the job, after waiting to make sure the Penguin had finished his soliloquy, asked hesitantly, "Uh-boss, what are ya gonna do with it? I mean... yer gonna sell it, right?"

"Fool!" One rap of the Penguin's umbrella on the marble floor silenced the clueless stooge. "You may be interested in mere monetary gains, but not I. My ambitions fly much higher than your feeble brain may comprehend. Indeed it is not the promise of mere wealth and luxury. As Hamlet once said, 'I could be bounded in a nut shell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.' And so would I, for if I live in a penthouse or in a penitentiary I shall still be the criminal emperor of Gotham City!"

"It will never happen, Penguin!" a valiant young voice declared in the darkness.

Cut short in mid-rant, the melodramatic miscreant looked up in alarm. "...Batman?" he said, peeved. "Who taught you to sing soprano?"

His gang laughed raucously-it had been a girl's voice!-- but they were blinded into silence when all the gallery's lights lit up, filling the place with a dramatic glow. All eyes turned toward the second floor balcony, where a small figure stood poised on the railing.

"You have abused the great works of Shakespeare by quoting them with evil intent!" cried Sailor Mercury forcefully. "I will not stand for this! I am Sailor Mercury, protector of all great works of art. In the name of the planet Mercury, I will not allow you to get away with this!"

"Won't you?" said the Penguin patronizingly. "You love pretty words as much as I do, my dear, but I doubt you're even out of kindergarten. In fact, I don't think you even know what it is you're trying to protect."

"It's the Viking Eagle," answered Mercury calmly as she made a giant leap down to the main floor. "And you'd be surprised how much I know." She assumed an angry battle stance.

"Really?" The Penguin was mildly surprised, but nonplussed. "Do you know..." His pointed beak nodded at the waiting heavies. "...how to break out of a headlock!?"

They rushed at her, three lumbering hulks intent on grabbing the small girl. But Sailor Mercury moved as fast as her planet's namesake. Between dodging punches and slipping out of awkward grabs, she called out to the Penguin, "I know who broke you out of prison. And I also know that they gave you new powers." With a series of swift kicks, she knocked her assailants to the floor. "And here's something you don't know," she went on as the mooks lay stunned on the floor and the Penguin chomped on his slender pipe in frustration. "As a Sailor Scout it is my destiny to fight the Negaverse. Which means you're going down." She scowled determinedly.

The Penguin had begun to realize he'd underestimated the girl, and he took a nervous step back. Sailor Mercury advanced towards him, but suddenly the crook brandished his umbrella and opened it wide. Behind his shield of canvas, the Penguin snickered. "Perhaps, my dear... Sailor Mercury, or whoever you are... you are smarter than you appear. But I still know one thing that you don't." He walked a tight circle around her, and she pivoted slowly to face him at every moment. "You know I have a new power, but you don't know what it is. Maybe I can fly or turn invisible or bend steel bars with my bare hands. Or maybe I can just catch a mean fish." He wrinkled his nose and the monocle glinted dangerously behind the open umbrella. "But just to be fair, I'll give you till the count of three. If you can stop me in time, Miss Mercury, then good for you. But you won't."

"Ready?" She nodded. "One..."

Without a moment's hesitation, Sailor Mercury leapt into the air, folding her arms over her chest. Buoyant on a sudden stream of rushing air, she spun round as if she were underwater. And just like in water, bubbles foamed in her wake and hovered around her in thick clusters. She flung her arms outward. "Mercury Bubbles.... Blast!"

The cascade of bubbles streamed forth just as the Penguin had cried "Three!" In an instant, he gripped his umbrella tighter as its tip let out a gigantic ball of fire! He cackled in triumph, but it was short-lived, as Mercury's bubbles enveloped the fireball and quenched its flame with a loud hissing sound. The bright light burned out and disappeared, and suddenly it became very quiet. A heavy fog settled over the room.

The Penguin gave an incredulous cry of outrage. "What! ! How did you know to do that?" With another grumble, he attempted to look around the room. "Where did you go? What's going on here?" His eloquent speeches had been reduced to awkward stammers of disbelief. Groping around the gallery and trying vainly to clear away the thick mist, he coughed and called out angrily. The only response came from his henchmen, who were complaining of the intense cold. "Shut up you buffoons," growled the Penguin. Then, abruptly, he felt a rope tighten around him.

Holding her lasso of energy tight around the felon, Sailor Mercury approached from behind the Penguin. "You claimed to have conquer the elements. The only one you hadn't explained in your speech was the power of fire. Too bad Mercury controls the power of water, and I was able to short you out. Now come on, you have an appointment with the Gotham City Police until my friend Sailor Moon can cleanse the Nega-energy right out of you."

*********

SAILOR SCOUTS IN GOTHAM (part III)

**

"It wash nine p.m. and I wash walkin my beat in the Gotham Schity park," narrated Marvin to himself as he sauntered down the path. "Everything wash quiet. A little toooo quiet..." He broke out of his Sam Spade dialogue to realize that it WAS too quiet... but not in the way he'd like it to be. Every other cop in Gotham saw action with costumed freaks and car chases. As for Marvin, who had graduated the Police Academy but still had the heart of an eight-year-old boy, the action he got to nose in on mostly came from oversexed teenagers out too late in the park. "Not excshactly my cup a tea," he muttered.

As he walked through the dim greenness, coughing to himself about "what they shoulda told me when I shigned up for the Forcshe," a cold breeze came rushing at him with sudden intensity. Marvin turned around, his knees knocking for some strange reason, although cold nights in Gotham were the norm. He laid a protective hand on his flashlight and, swallowing his unease, ventured off the path into a dark tree-lined grove. The chilly air thickened, as if clouded by some foggy manifestation of evil. Shuddering, the policeman reached for the switch on his flashlight. But just as he was about to flick it on, cold fingers slapped his hand and whisked it away. Marvin jumped. After a frozen moment, he turned around very slowly, with every inch expecting a musclebound mugger or some other maniac. Opening his tightly squinted eyes wider, he faced his assailant. "Okay, you..." he began, and then stopped in utter shock.

A snaky green vine waved hello with the leaf on its tip and promptly gagged the policeman before he could shout or move. Tendrils creeped up from all around and bound him tightly, then jerked him inwards toward the grove. Marvin lost conciousness. Meanwhile, a young girl with thick dark hair noticed a funny movement in the shadows as she walked along the path...

"Well, well, well," Poison Ivy mused, looking at her new prize through sleepy, sultry eyes. Marvin jerked and squirmed, but the plants held him fast. "Aren't you the nosy one." She flicked a finger across his sweaty face, moving a loose strand of hair. Even in his captive terror, Marvin gulped at her touch. He watched the sexy redhead through a cloud of pheromones.

A strand of vine slithered up Ivy's leg, and she patted it affectionately. "Well trained, aren't they?" she said to the hapless cop, as the green snake crept around her waist. "You know, for the longest time, my connection to plants was strictly emotional. I understood them, and they understood me, but we still didn't speak each other's language." As if cued by her annoyed expression, a thick latticework of stems reached out from the nearby trees, folding themselves under Ivy to create a natural hammock. She reclined several feet above the ground, yawning. "Yes, I had to do all kinds of experiments and hormone treatments with my darling babies before I could get them to do what I intended. Ahh... but all that's changed now," she continued with a smug smile. "You see, I met the nicest man the other day... and you know I don't take too kindly to men." A scowl flashed across her face, and the vines holding Marvin squeezed him harder. "But this Zoycite, well, he helped me out." She leaned forward toward the guard, flashing him the most seductive and deadly of smirks. "Now I really can tell my babies what to do. I just have to order them in my head, and they do my bidding." Ivy tossed her red hair triumphantly. "And we're going to war!"

"I don't think so!" rang out a strong female voice from behind them.

Ivy wheeled around in sharp annoyance and surprise. "Wha--?"

Poised in the clearing stood Sailor Mars, with her dark hair rippling in the chilly breeze. She pointed a white-gloved finger at the villainess. "Your army of weeds will never take over this city, because I am Sailor Mars, and on behalf of the planet Mars, I will protect helpless men from your feminine wiles!" She extended her arms in an angry motion.

Poison Ivy laughed out loud and walked slowly toward the warrior. "Wait a minute," she said nonchalantly. "MY feminine wiles? You're the one in the half-inch long skirt. Don't your legs get cold?"

"Who are you to talk, Miss Spandex?" Mars retorted, her temper flaring.

"At least I wear tights," Ivy replied with a sassy grin. "And as for men, at least I've figured out they're not worth the trouble. How many have YOU tried to snag lately, Sailor... Mars, is it?"

The color in Sailor Mars's cheeks changed from angry red to embarrassed crimson. Her eyes flickered to the floor as she thought about Dick and Darien. But a triumphant chuckle from Ivy roused the girl. "Hey! I don't have to take this from you! Hahh!" And in an instant she was flying towards Ivy with a fist full of rage.

The punch sunk into Ivy's gut and she cried out angrily. "That was a bad move," she said through gritted teeth. After wiping her frowning mouth with one delicate wrist, Ivy straightened up. With an aggressive motion, she cried out in a voice that rung throughout the clearing. "Attack!"

Silent huddled masses of branches and limbs began to slither out from their shadowy hiding places. Gaining momentum, they launched themselves into the air and flew straight at Sailor Mars, who turned and ran to the far edge of the clearing. Yet her escape was short-lived, for as fast as she ran, they kept after her, like living javelins headed for their target. But by the time they reached her, Mars was ready.

Clasping her hands together, Mars extended her second fingers and pointed them at the advancing plants. An orange nucleus of heat formed at the ends of her fingers, which grew into a huge ball of energy. Closing her eyes and focusing her energy, Mars uttered in a low voice, "Mars Fire... Ignite!" And the ball burst into brilliant flame, spiraling its way towards the plants. The smell of burning leaves filled the area as the fire spread from one branch to the next, until they had all fallen, charred and withered, to the ground. Firelight danced on the grass.

Ivy looked as if she was about to cry. "You -- MURDERER!" she screamed in hysterical rage. "My beautiful branches... but never mind that." With these last words, the villainess swallowed her fit and cocked her hip, becoming the cold-hearted mistress of men and maples once more. "Nice move, but you guessed wrong. Because I can control ALL the plants here. So there's no way for you to escape."

Mars gulped in terror. A long, slow chuckle came from Ivy, who was standing triumphant atop her hammock of vines. "Looks like I'm in control now, Sailor Mars." She punctuated the Scout's name with disdain. "Trees, let's put a little scare into her." With a tiny wave of her hand, Poison Ivy brought the circle of trees to life.

Groaning viciously, the hypnotized masses bent inward, branches darting past the raven-haired girl dangerously. She gulped and dodged as the giant oaks taunted her, slapping her back and forth like a tennis ball. Behind her cries and ouches, the evilly low voice of Poison Ivy chuckled in slow motion. "Scared yet?" she whispered through pursed lips.

This goad was more than Sailor Mars could take, and between breathless narrow escapes she cried out, "Not even close! If you think a bunch of vines scare me, when the Sailor Scouts have fought off three airplanes at once..."

Her eyes locked with Ivy's. Of course! Jadeite had also had control over those planes, and Luna had warned the threesome to remember that he, not any of his puppets, was their enemy. With a stunning jump, Mars catapulted herself over the approaching tendrils and somersaulted through the air, landing a few feet from Ivy. Heedless of the attacking trees, she closed her eyes and held one hand in front of her face. Between that hand's pinched fingers appeared a small white slip of paper, inscribed with strange Japanese characters. It wavered as a slight hot wind rippled over the area.

As Sailor Mars chanted, energy built up around the tiny parchment. "I call upon the power of Mars... Evil Spirit, Begone!" And with a lightning-fast motion, she pressed the paper fast to Ivy's forehead!

Ivy cried out. "What did you do to me? I can't.. move..." As she stood there, paralyzed by the force of the spell, the possessed branches and trees drooped to the ground, motionless plants once more.

Mars grabbed a thick vine from its grassy resting place and bound the stunned Ivy tight. "I sucked the Negapower right out of you and your helpless slaves," she said triumphantly. "I'd have thought a smart lady like you would know better than to play with fire. Especially the fire of Mars."

Marvin, who had wriggled free of his now-limp bonds, stumbled to his feet. A long sigh of befuddled relief escaped him, but turned into a cry of surprise as Ivy stretched out one long leg and hooked it around his ankle. She turned her green eyes on him and gave an adorable pout. "Hey, you know if you let me go, I'll make it very, very worth the trouble." Her extended leg rubbed up against his, and for an instant the cop looked like he was about to give in. He gulped and looked down at her, then back at Sailor Mars, who gave him an exasperated glare. Marvin reached for the radio at his belt. "Call for backup..."

Finishing his call, he took another glance toward Sailor Mars. But the raven-haired heroine had disappeared. A small circle of flame died on the grass.

**

Alfred Pennyworth was on his way home with the groceries, muttering to himself that Master Bruce had better eat this time before he went "out." He peeked over his bundles at the sidewalk, and barely managed to shout "My goodness gracious!" before he was knocked off balance by what looked like a giant blonde squid. The butler stepped backwards into a sidewalk crack, and wavered dangerously for fear that his eggs (or his skull) might end up cracked on the pavement. A few awkward moments and panicked "Oh"s later, the British butler regained his balance and breathed a sigh of relief. "Lucky for me I already know how to handle large, unpredictable animals," he chuckled, and headed homewards to fix dinner for a Bat and a bird.

The squid was actually a pair of pigtails bouncing furiously down Adams St. They had a girl attached to them, but she had been too engrossed in store windows to notice her collision course with a lanky British man. She skipped lightly down the street, ooh-ing and ahh-ing at every skirt and necklace. "Ooh, that reminds me of something I saw at Molly's mom's store. Molly would love that!"

Serena smiled as she thought of her friend, the adorable stubborn redhead. She could just hear her voice now, in that funny accent she had picked up from her dad, who was born in Brooklyn. "Oooh, Seree--na, that's just goawww-jus!" Serena echoed the strange tones of the last word to herself and skipped on down the street.

Reaching the corner of O'Neil, she ducked round the corner to look at the other half of the Kinsolving Fashions window display. "For the grownup who wants to be a kid again." Serena spoke the company's slogan to herself. "That would be me. Except Rei would say I never grew up in the first place..." Her rambling mouth and roving eyes both stopped their wandering, and she gave a small squeal of infatuation.

The centerpiece of the Kinsolving Fashions display was a formal ballgown, glittering red and black in the window's dim lights. Laced with sequins and material so sparkling that it seemed to be alive, the elegant dress swooped from a chiseled neckline to a floor-length Cinderella skirt, all alternating reds and blacks into a dark and sparkling mesh. And best of all, this creation was not just made of long sheets of cloth. The dress was composed entirely of red and black *smiley faces*... overlapped and fastened together in long chains and sheets of grins that formed a dress that was certainly suited for a happy occasion!

Serena squealed again, and closed her eyes tight. "I want it!" she giggled, and pictured herself parading down the stairs in the joyful gown, towards a bevy of admirers, each one grinning at the dress's radiance and it's wearer's beauty. Dick and Andrew both swooned after her, while Batman and Robin on the other side gazed in silent adoration. Finally, the princess in her smiling gown reached the end of the hallway, where her Tuxedo Mask was standing. "My darling, your dress, like you, brings smiles and sunshine to the faces of everyone around you. Dance, my love?" As her dream escort removed his mask, Serena realized with a sinking heart that Darien was still lost in the Negaverse. She sighed sadly and asked a silent question of any stars that might be granting wishes beyond the Gotham fog.

Her thoughts scattered at a small but distinct noise that could only be labeled as a "Sproing!" Surprised and amused, Serena looked around for the source of the sound. Her eyes scanned the window display, and locked in wild shock at the mannequin in the center. The beautiful ballgown was gone!

The girl shivered. "It was just here a minute ago... oh, I've got a BAD feeling about this...!" She felt a wave of sobs coming on, but suppressed them. "No. If this is the Negaverse I have to face them. Too bad Rei isn't here to see how brave I'm going to be." After a moment of peeved and frightened grimacing, she raised her hand to the sky. "Moon Prism... POWER!"

The girl's eyes sparkled with the sudden glow of a thousand tiny stars that careened around her, transforming her body into a silhouette of pure energy. Her gold locket, the only thing still unchanged, seemed to sprout as a seed into vines of ethereal ribbons. They wrapped around Serena's luminous form. Her costume appeared where the ribbons had landed: suit, gloves, boots, skirt, rippling blue collar. As the figure morphed back into human form, a bright crescent moon glimmered briefly on its forehead. Then the moon spread into a golden tiara and two red hairpieces that gleamed sharply. Serena raised her hand to the sky in a salute, and smiled. She was Sailor Moon.

With a giant leap she was on the store's roof. A skylight sat shattered, and Sailor Moon dodged the shards of broken glass to jump through the thief's entryway. A few seconds of dark falling, and she landed with a small "Oof" on the carpeted top floor. Sensing the dark energy of the Negaverse, she careened down unmoving escalators to the first floor and headed straight for the dressing room.

There *was* someone there, Sailor Moon noted happily, proud of herself for being this gutsy. A nasal humming noise emanated from the dressing room, whose lights were all on. She burst into the hallway and cried to the rows of stalls, "Stop right there!"

The humming made a question-like dip and stopped abruptly.

"Some teenage girl is saving her money to buy that dress in time for her senior prom, and you're not going to shatter her dream! I am Sailor Moon, the champion of justice, and on behalf of the moon, I won't allow you to steal dresses from store windows! So come out and face me!"

There was a blank moment. Then a familiarly nasal voice whined, "Aw, c'mon!! Let me just try it on first!"

Sailor Moon blinked. "Uh, okay, sure, but after that, I will punish you!"

"Whatever, whatever," answered the voice from behind one of the doors, where the rustling of material whispered behind the conversation.

She yawned and leaned against the wall, closing her eyes sleepily. "I'll just be a minute!" called the voice again, and the heroine's eyes blinked open in sudden surprise. She knew the voice sounded familiar... "Molly?"

A stall door opened, and out peeked a round face with blonde hair in two short pigtails. Blue eyes sparkled cluelessly at Sailor Moon, who for a moment thought she was looking in a mirror. "Who's Molly?" she wondered with a disarming smile. "Never mind. I'm not her. Ya ready?"

Sailor Moon nodded, breaking into a wide grin.

"Here I... COME!" And the blonde sauntered out, raising her arms above her head to toss her hair. Sailor Moon was stunned. The woman looked nothing short of magnificent in the spangles of red and black, and her gleeful grin outshone all of the thousand smiles. She played model against the three-way mirror in the hall, turning and flashing grins at invisible photographers. "Whaddaya think?"

"It's totally GORGEOUS!" Sailor Moon cooed. "Oh, it's totally perfect for you!"

"I saw it in the window the other day and I just HAD to try it on," the woman said leaning toward Sailor Moon as if they were the closest of girl pals. "Ya know, black and red are my colors ANYhow..."

"Oh, they totally ARE!" Sailor Moon echoed. "You look sooo great!"

"And..." The woman lowered her voice a little, and her grin widened. "Well, there's this guy I'm with.. and he's one of those guys who's got STYLE, ya know?"

"Yeah, I know," Sailor Moon answered with a bit of regret. "My guy has style alright... but he's bad."

"So's my puddin'!" the woman shrieked happily, smiling infectiously at the younger pigtailed blonde, who couldn't help but smile back. "He's the worst! Nobody knows how to have a good time like my Mistah J.," she boasted proudly.

"Jay? Great name! So tell me, what's he like?"

"Oh, he's a party guy. An entertAIIner!" The blue eyes gleamed. "The minute he walks in the room, he can bring a smile to everyone's face. My puddin' just loooooves smiles!"

"Oooh!" squealed Sailor Moon. "Lucky you! He's gonna love that dress then, ...er..." she floundered cluelessly on the edge of her sentence.

The woman realized she hadn't introduced herself. "Whoooooooops. Sorry." She extended a hand. "Harley Quinn," she said with a flourish. "Pleeased ta meet ya."

"I'm Sail..." She stopped short. "Harley... QUINN?" The other nodded. "So your puddin'... is the Joker?"

"Yup!" swooned Harley, oblivious to her galpal's shocked expression. "Gotta love him... it's great having a famous boyfriend, we get to go to all the fancy parties..."

"Yeah, and crash them," Sailor Moon finished flatly. Harley began an enthusiastic nod, but then opened her eyes warily and saw that Sailor Moon was frowning seriously. The girl warrior continued. "Sorry, Harley... as much fun as this was, you're still Harley Quinn, and I'm still Sailor Moon!" Gloved fingertips stretched to the sky. "I right wrongs and triumph over evil, and even if you're lots of fun, that means you!"

Harley pouted. "Oh yeah. Right. We gotta fight now?"

Sailor Moon nodded. "'Fraid so."

"All right, then just let me change. I don't wanna fight in this dress, might tear it up ya know." Harley ducked into the dressing room, and the next thing Sailor Moon knew, she was facing a thief clad in red and black spandex, patterned kind of like a clown suit. Two ridiculous pom poms covered the pigtails. Harley grinned from behind her mask. "All right... let's get to it!!!!"

"Right! Yahh!" Sailor Moon charged at her adversary with a face full of determination. But Harley's quirky smirk remained plastered on until the very last moment, where she drew a plastic flower from within her glove. Sailor Moon only had time to open her eyes in surprise, when the flower leaped up out of Harley's hand and bit the vaulting Sailor on the nose!

"OWWWW!" wailed Sailor Moon as she crumpled to the floor, her hands over her swollen nose. The plastic flower leapt back into Harley's outstretched hand.

"Wanna play a game?" Harley snickered, and she closed her hand briefly and reopened it. The flower had disappeared, and in its place was a small yo-yo on which was painted a wicked smile. Sailor Moon gaped and shrieked as Harley sent the thing spinning toward her in a vicious game of Walk the Dog. The smile gnashed its teeth hungrily, and Harley yawned. "Ya know," she remarked to no one in particular, with her wrist still idly spinning the carnivorous toy toward Sailor Moon, "this superpower stuff is fun, but it takes all the challenge outta life. Still, it is kinda funny to see you running from a yo-yo," she finished, turning to Sailor Moon, who was retreating towards the three-way mirror.

The yo-yo struck like a cobra, and Sailor Moon dodged it by a hair. For a split second its expression changed to one of horror as it saw its approaching reflection in the mirror. Then, with a loud *K-RACK*, it hit the mirror and fell broken to the ground.

"Heyyy!" Harley looked close to tears. "He was one of my favorite new tricks, and you broke 'im!" She scowled and looked hard at the cowering Sailor Moon. "That's it. You're a cool babe and I don't want to hurt ya. But when you break my toys, you've gotta answer to my BABIES!"

Her shriek echoed off the glaring mirrors and faded into deep rumbling... no, Sailor Moon realized as she slid down to a crouch against the mirror. It's *growling.* Eep.

She turned her head one way-- growling from that side-- and then another. More growling. No way to get outta there. Sailor Moon swallowed hard.

Two shadows crept out from behind a rack of clothes. Sailor Moon cringed in her corner, watching warily in the mirror. Her eyes widened as the figures moved into the light, their hairy snouts plastered with almost human grins. Grins baring what seemed to be a million bladelike teeth!

They continued to approach slowly, licking their lips. Above the approaching hyenas, Harley stood with a satisfied, interested smile. Her arms were crossed. All at once Sailor Moon snapped. "Nooo puh-LEEEEEEEZE don't let 'em eat me!" she babbled, her silent terror having been stretched like a rubber band, then released. "Lissen. I'll let you get away with the dress. Heck, I won't even tell anyone. Reeealy. Did I mention I really don't like slobbering animals? Well I don't. I really-really-really don't. I'm more of a cat person myself, ya know."

"CAT person?!" echoed Harley shortly, as if stung. The animals snarled.

Sailor Moon tried to wave away the comment. "Whoa. Sorry. Didn't realize I hit a nerve, really! Forget it." Harley's "babies" drew closer. Sailor Moon started to hyperventilate. "Hey... you don't REAAALLY want to do this to me, do ya?" she wheezed, forcing a smile. "'Course not. Remember when we were having FUN together 'n' stuff? Talking 'bout our clothes-- our guys-- and all that." The animals were nose to nose with her now. "We could do that again, no problem, it's not your fault the Negaverse is... ... ... ... hey, waitaminit..."

In a spurt of inspiration she forgot all her fear and panic, and WHAM, out kicked two red boots into the hyenas' faces. They reeled backwards and stumbled straight into Harley. She fell against a stall's doorframe with an "Oof," and the animals collapsed, whimpering, at their mistress's feet.

Sailor Moon leaped to a standing position. "Ha! Now let's bring back the babe withOUT the bad vibes!" She raised an empty hand high in the air, but her fingers closed around a pink rod, topped with a silver crescent moon. In the centre of the semicircle rested a huge gemstone that sparkled with an energy all its own: the Empyrean Silver Crystal. Sailor Moon lowered it to her eye level, and sparks of energy and light in the air began to plummet in a whirlpool towards the crystal's centre. It gleamed its readiness.

The young warrior seemed to be suspended a half inch above ground. She slowly drew the wand away from her face and pulled it in a large circle around her body, sparks of moondust falling away from the wand's tip in a glittering trail. Her voice rose and fell with the movement of her arm. "Moon.... Healing.... Activation!"

The circle of dust shot out from around Sailor Moon's body, and each speck flashed with light as it invaded Harley's weak figure. She gave a long shout of pain as the healing energy suspended her in midair for a minute, her arms stretched up to the sky. Then she collapsed on the floor. The dark energy escaped her body and dissolved into the night air.

Sailor Moon, still gripping her Crescent Moon Wand, went over to the still figure. "Harley? Harley, hon, feeling better?" No response from the drained villainess. Sailor Moon bent down and laid a gentle hand on her shoulder, bringing her face close to the other girl's. The hyenas loped about meekly. "Harley?"

Then there was a sudden gust of motion and a shock of pain, and the next thing she new, Sailor Moon was sitting helplessly on her very bruised tailbone. Harley was standing on the sill of an open window, holding her dress triumphantly in one hand. The hyenas leapt up and out the window as Harley called out, "Thanks for the fashion tips, Sailor babe. Seeeeeeeee ya!"

The clueless girl blinked and stammered, "w...w...wait a minute! I healed you. You're supposed to be good now, I took the dark energy out of you. You're suppOSED to be back to NORmal!" She wavered dangerously on the verge of tears.

Harley laughed loudly. "I am! Don't have any funky li'l gadgets anymore, maybe, but I'm still the one and only Harley Quinn, the Priestess of Pranks, the queen of hearts with an ace up my sleeve!" She gave a flourish as if there was a trumpet salute ending her words. "And this time Sailor Babe, the laugh's on you!"

A jump into darkness, and Sailor Moon was alone in the dressing room again. She sniffed. "Aw, I try and be brave... I do all this great stuff all by myself... and then the bad guy gets aWAY!!!! Rei's gonna be on my back for WEEEKS! Why can't I do ANNNNything right?" And she was lucky that Harley had already disabled the alarms, because otherwise the motion sensors would have gone crazy with the building-shaking force of her "WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!"

SAILOR SCOUTS IN GOTHAM: Part 4

**

Harley leaped from the fire escape. "Another score for the one and only Harley Quinn!!" she cried triumphantly, bounding onto a windowsill, then a gargoyle, then a series of rooftops leading into the heart of the Gotham night. The dress glittered smartly for a few instants after his figure had darkened into the blue smog, then its light too winked out of view.

The air hung still and heavy for several moments.

Then, a limber silhouette emerged from the shadows, so grey and weightless that is seemed to be their child. The figure, poised for the edge of a second, fixed its sights on the just-departed flash of red, leaning further and further forward as if it had no fear of toppling over onto cement rooftop or fifty feet of nothing.

The shadowy form reached the breaking point, but instead of falling, it tripped itself into the air and across the gap between buildings. Moving like quicksilver, it leapt roof-to-roof in the wake of Harley's path. It tripped and glided in an effortless contrast to Harley's enthusiastic skips and bounds, melting several times into the shadows. The figure finally came to a stop across the street from a dimly lit warehouse. It perched in a crouch on the roof's corner, and listened.

To anyone else there would be nothing there to listen to. But this apparition could hear very clearly the subdued snarls of wild animals, some lumbering dumb conversation over an arm-wrestling match, and a nasal woman's voice crying "Hey, puddin'! Look what I got!" At this, the figure's face was caught in a moment of shifting light. It bore the beginnings of a female smile. The woman adjusted her earpiece and listened on.

Several moments passed. The spy crouched perfectly still on the gargoyle's nose. Then, with a sense of satisfaction, she shook the transmitter out of her ear and pocketed it in an invisible compartment of her gray-black glove. "So..." she said in a low voice. "That's it."

"That's it WHAT?" came an older female voice from behind her, with a quiet but insistent tone.

The woman whirled. "Who--" Her eyes widened slightly. For staring intently at her on the rooftop were two cats.

"Oh," she chuckled, smiling. "You must be new around here, because I don't believe I've met you before. Have I?" One gloved hand reached out in greeting to the two animals.

Luna, the crescent moon on her forehead glowing dimly, hesitated. "You heard me, Catwoman," she said. "What were you listening to down there?"

Catwoman's eyes shimmered softly behind her grey mask. She smiled. "When I..." All her senses stopped abruptly, and she coughed on gulped air. "I must be going crazy," she said with a flat edge of sarcasm. "Either that, or you just talked to me.. and I wasn't surprised."

"I'm not surprised that you aren't surprised," said Luna, feeling as if she were addressing a trusted older sister. She drew closer to Catwoman and accepted a friendly pet. "It seems to me you're tuned in to feline energy. It's strange for a human, but perhaps it has something to do with genetics or even..."

"Enough of this!" Artemis sliced through Luna's musings like an arrow and pounced on Catwoman. She took a step back and attempted to shake off the impatient furball, but Artemis held on tight. His claws scratched against her catsuit dangerously. "Just tell me," he cried angrily. "What are you after, and what's your new power?"

The woman's green eyes widened and locked with the feline's blue ones. Then she laughed.

Artemis, puzzled, made a threatening swipe with his paw. "You KNOW what I'm talking about. Do yourself a favor and give up before our friends the Sailor Scouts get here. They're doing a number on the rest of your Arkham pals!"

Catwoman burst into chuckles as if this were the funniest thing she'd ever heard. She gasped for breath, and ran two seductively clawed fingers over Artemis' fur. "I thought you'd have the smarts of a cat, especially one that talks," she cooed patronizingly, Artemis arched and hissed. "Please, give me more credit than that. I don't have any new powers-- because I didn't escape from Arkham. I've never BEEN to Arkham. I've never been to prison." She tapped his nose with one pointed claw. "Period."

Artemis stared. Slowly, the bristles on his back melted into fuzzy marshmellow fur. The cat gave a small embarrased grimace and leapt down to the rooftop below, pausing silently for a few seconds. Then he whipped around at Luna. "WhatareYOUlookingat!?" She answered his bellowing accusation with just a twitch of the whiskers and a smug smile.

"I like to take trinkets. That's no secret," snapped Catwoman. Then her voice softened. "But I don't hurt people unless they get in my way. And when the city's in this kind of chaos, it's no good for me or for anyone else."

She sat back and relaxed. "When the boys from Arkham take this town for a ride, the Joker's always at the steering wheel. So I've been watching his pigtailed sidekick, knowing she would lead me to his home base. Now that I know his plans, I'm going to Batman about it. Don't look so surprised." She scratched Luna behind the ears affectionately. "After all, I do owe the big guy, and mine's a debt that I'll enjoy paying up." Her lips curved upwards in a seductive smile.

Luna cleared her throat. "Well. We are the guardians of the Sailor Scouts, a fighting team that is here to combat these evil forces. We know who staged the breakout and why the escapees have new powers. You must tell us what you know about the Joker's plans."

Catwoman arched an eyebrow suspiciously, then smiled. "All right then. Here's what I heard..."

**

Heads turned as the tall brunette sauntered down the boardwalk. Her green eyes gleamed as she threw flirtatious winks at the local boys, who stood transfixed by her presence. Her hands in the pockets of the black leather jacket, the mystery woman coolly took in her surroundings. One boy, obviously the centre of attention, turned away from his group of friends to gaze at her. Their eyes locked and the girl, equally dazzled, whispered, "He looks just like my old boyfriend..."

"Yeah, right!" Lita cut her romance novel fantasy short by kicking an obstinate pebble into the murky river. The squalid docks were hardly so cool as her "boardwalk," though they were every bit as shady. Warehouses, most of them condemned, crouched in dark pools of shadow, and figures lurked in their doorways. The occasional crowd of rebellious teens passed by Lita on their way home from arcades or clubs, or just congregated around a wooden post and shook cigarette ash into the river water. The only second glances she got were startled reactions to the loud K-r-u-nch of a soda can, flattened under Lita's angry foot.

Boredom was Lita's archnemesis, and it finally spurred her into action. She started to sprint down the docks, growling. "Split up, says Luna," she muttered to the deep syrup beneath the wooden slats. "Okay, so we split up. Why? To find the action, but noo--" her feet pounded the boards harder with each syllable, "no, no, NO! No action for Lita. What a major DRAG!"

Ahead of her appeared a huge pile of wooden crates, awkwardly stacked against a warehouse wall. "Drag!" she cried as she leapt onto the lowest of the creates. "No--" she bounded to another one-- "need--" another-- "for--" another-- "Lita!" She stomped angrily onto a red stamp reading "This End Up."

A startling crash echoed her landing, and Lita jumped. It had come from inside the building! Seeing a dusty little window above her, Lita jammed one foot into a crevice between splintery shingles and pulled herself up. The rusty frame came off in her hand, and the whole windowpane with it. Lita set the cracked sheet of glass aside, and hoisted herself through the opening.

She tasted dull wood. Her reckless catapult through the window had thrown her onto a creaky catwalk up in the rafters. The dusty wood stung her scraped knees and fingers, and it was a few moments before she cautiously raised her head to look down. Color flooded to her cheeks. "Tell me this isn't my imagination again," she grinned to herself.

The room was piled floor to ceiling with huge boxes. None of them looked as if they had been touched for years, but beneath the dust balls on each box was an official-looking seal. The molten shadows lay in deep pools, but through the pools moved darker figures, lumbering ants moving the boxes one by one and opening them, searching through their contents. In the centre, half-lit and half-obscured by shadow, someone was growling orders in a voice like muddy sandpaper. Whatever was going on down there, it wasn't legal.

Lita saw a spot where the boxes towered up to the catwalk, creating a hiding place. She scrambled over in spy fashion, lying low against the floor, and relaxed. Grumbling, she rubbed her scraped knee. "Boxes, boxes everywhere..." The bored brunette descended the mountain of crates, in search of a better view.

"Come on you mooks! We haven't got all night!"

The voice barked so sharply that Lita jumped. She was now sitting at the bottom of a pile, watching the proceedings out of the corner of her eye. In the patchy, uneven light she could hardly see anything but silhouettes and an occasional flash of silver in the hand of the ringleader. He turned to point something out to his men. Lita could see his profile for an instant, and she blinked. "He looks like my old boyfriend... only older..."

"Lita?"

The word was whispered, but Lita started. A blond-haired silhouette put a finger to her open lips. "Shh!"

Lita pushed away the cautioning hand. "Mina!" she whispered. The brown tendrils bounced around her face. "What are you doing here?"

"I could ask you the same question," Mina grinned, squeezing her friend's hand in greeting. "Anyhow," she continued in the same hushed tone, "I stumbled across this place on my way home from the harbor. Saw this guy and throught he might be worth checking up on. See if he knows anything about the..."

"Oh, come off it, Mina," Lita teased. "You're here for the same reason I'm still here. You're here to watch the cute guy."

Mina's eyes lit up. "Who? Which one?"

"The leader, of course," Lita whispered slyly. "Who did you think I meant?"

Mina leaned toward her friend incredulously. "You've got to be kidding me! The BOSS? Cute?" Lita returned her stare with a clueless blink. "But Lita, I SAW his face! Earlier, from across the room. He's ugly as sin! Looks like he has warts all over him or something."

This time it was Lita's turn to gasp. "You sure it was him? You saw his face?"

"Well..." Mina looked pensive. "His profile at least..."

The two girls stared at each other silently for a moment. Then they both turned, looking through the gaps in the boxes at the room's center. After a few moments of waiting, Lita and Mina finally got a good clear look at the man in charge. Two voices started out as whispers, growing steadily as they headed for a nearby door...

"Jupiter..."

"Venus..."

They burst from the shack as their shouts filled the air with stars and lightning.

"--POWER!"

**

"These... are... the... wrong... ONES!"

Two-Face growled out of the bad corner of his mouth as he shoved an open carton to the ground. Its contents clattered as they struck the floor or the skull of the poor henchman pinned underneath it. He struggled to wiggle free. "But Boss, this is the part you asked for, the one to activate the laser cannon!"

"The DOUBLE laser cannon!" fumed the half-deformed supervillain. "Mark 2-X-Y-2! I've only told you twenty times." He calmed, and said in a more measured and more chilling voice, "Maybe I should let the coin decide whether you're really an indispensable part of my team. Eh, Junior Jr.?"

He brandished in his hand a small circle of silver. It glinted dangerously. Panicking, J.J. started to babble. "No, boss, hang on, gimme another shot, I know it's here somewhere!" He flashed what was usually a disarming smile. "Second time's the charm, right, boss!"

Two-Face paused to consider this, but before he was able to reply, a sweet voice echoed overhead. "Sorry, boys, but your fifteen SECONDs of fame is up!" As the gangsters lifted their heads, the room flooded with magical brightness, and a figure appeared atop a rafter. Another, taller form emerged a moment later on the opposite end of the beam. A henchman mumbled, "What the--?"

The blonde figure leapt from the rafters and careened down as in slow motion. "I am Sailor Venus!"

"And I am Sailor Jupiter!" A moment after, the other person jumped from her position. She crossed in front of Sailor Venus in midair, and they landed a few feet from each other.

"It takes two to tango," Jupiter continued, moving with Venus in a series of battle stances, "and we're the dream team all the way!"

"On behalf of Venus and Jupiter," Sailor Venus chimed in, "we're sending you back where you belong!" Both voices cried, "Sailor Scouts' honor!"

"Hmm," Two-Face snarled, without missing a beat. He was clearly up to the challenge. "Boys, take a breather," he said as he waved away his henchmen. They filed out the door. "And as for you... I can't decide which one of you to get rid of first. Might as well FLIP for it!" A quick flick of his thumb, and the infamous double-headed silver dollar was in the air. But instead of boomeranging its decision back to Two-Face's hand, it continued to wheel upwards-- growing larger and larger with every turn!

The Sailor Scouts were frozen. The coin toss seemed to occur in painful slow motion and at the same time too quickly for them to do anything about it. The next thing Sailor Venus knew, she was making a terrified leap in the air, escaping the giant coin which had very nearly landed on her!

"Yipe!" she squealed, heart pounding. The coin, meanwhile, had bounded back as if a trampoline lay beneath the floor. It retraced its arc from Two-Face's hand, shrinking back to its original size as it flipped over and over. The now-tiny coin fell with a plop into the mobster's cupped hand.

Sailor Venus gasped. "I thought he flipped a coin to make decisions!" she breathed in horror.

"I do," snickered Two-Face with the wickedest of smiles. "Just a flip of the coin-- and all my problems are solved!" His voice scraped like gravel across a low road, meaner by the minute. "Let me demonstrate." And the coin went flying again!

"Well--" shouted Jupiter, between frantic jumps as the coin flew again and again from Two-Face's hand toward the two girls. "At least--" *CKRASHT* "we know--" *KRAHHKT* "what his new--" *SHHAKKT* "Nega-power is!" A close call knocked the words and the wind right out of her.

Seeing the coin about to bounce back, Sailor Venus suddenly pivoted. "Enough of this," she cried. A gust of wind moved her heavy cloud of hair as the blonde warrior extended her arms in front of her. The fingers of one hand rested in a "v" on her other wrist. "Venus Crescent... aaaaahhhh!" The coin was too quick. It flipped in and out of Two-Face's hand before the Scout could finish her attack, and knocked her over.

Sailor Jupiter, meanwhile, had leapt atop a crate and was crouched there looking quizzically at Two-Face. He felt her stare, and the chaotic leapfrog ended as his fingers closed around the lucky coin. He glared back, trying but failing to intimidate the girl. She just stared back with pensively puckered lips. Finally, his unease burst forward with a growl. "What are you staring at?"

She acted as if she'd been jolted from a daydream. "Hunh? --Oh. Well, it doesn't seem right, that coiin... but never mind." Behind her, Sailor Venus sensed that her friend was putting on a show, but hadn't a clue where it was going.

Two-Face looked insulted. He gave an angry snarl. "What do you MEAN not right? The coin's always right. Because it's always just plain random." His attention turned (as most villains' attentions do) to explaining his unique philosophy. "The two Sailor Somethings threaten me... and I hate a pair of fools. So the coin offs 'em."

"But there aren't two of us," spoke Sailor Jupiter boldly.

A bullet might as well have hit Two-Face, for he stumbled backwards, bewildered. "What... did you say?" he rasped.

She continued flippantly. "There aren't two of us. Changes the whole situation, doesn't it?"

Two-Face looked at the coin in his hand and mumbled. "Yes, I suppose it does..."

Jupiter took a long breath in, and hung on the edge of her first word before plunging into a hyperspeed soliloquiy.

"Wellllllll...

"There are five Sailor Scouts total, right? And Sailor Moon is our leader. Now the question is, which one of us should you try to knock off? I mean, it's hardly a victory unless it's a double whammy, right? Now Sailor Mercury was the second scout to appear, unless you count Sailor Venus, who operated solo before Sailor Moon arrived. In which case Sailor Moon's number two. But since Sailor Moon's the leader, that makes Sailor Mars the second member to actually JOIN, if Sailor Mercury was the first. Or if the Sailor Scouts were actually born AFTER Sailor Mercury joined, which makes it a team, then Sailor Mars was the first to join, which makes me the second to join. And Sailor Venus is the only Sailor Scout that's gone by two different names, and she has an attack that uses two crescent moons..."

Venus, who had gotten the drift, now jumped in to challenge her final sentence. "And Sailor Jupiter was the SECOND to last to join the Sailor Scouts, not to mention she always has her eye on at least TWO guys at once!"

"And Venus reads TOO many romance novels," Jupiter growled.

"Now, Sailor Moon and Sailor Mars both have two attacks," prattled Venus with a blindingly charming smile, "unless you don't count Moon Healing as an actual attack, in which case it's only one, or if you count that amazing thing she did a few weeks ago at the Starlite Tower, in which case it's three. But Sailor Mer--"

As the girls chattered, Two-Face slowly backed away, his hands on his aching head. The Scouts were inflicting severe sensory overload on the tormented criminal. "Too many twos-- too many choices-- they all sound right-- but what do I choose, what... do... I ... DO??" His frustration finally built into a scream of outrage that cut Sailor Venus off in mid-babble. Unable to do anything else, he flashed open a tight fist and unleashed his coin once more.

It flew towards them, but this time, Sailor Jupiter was ready. She lashed out with the fury of a typhoon. "Jupiter... Thunder... CRASH!"

The crackling blast of energy hit the coin head-on, sending it flipping back towards Two-Face. Stunned, he flailed his arms in front of him, trying to catch the unruly weapon. It collided with his outstretched hand. He gave a yell of pain as electricity surged from the coin and sent shocks through his body. Sailor Jupiter gave a nod to Sailor Venus, who pointed her finger right at the coin. "Venus Crescent Beam SMASH!" A sharp ray of golden energy cut right through the coin, leaving it a blank silver washer with no center. Both the faces were burned through.

Two-Face collapsed onto his knees and wailed pitifully at his coin. "Noo..." The last jolts of electricity passed down through the floor, and he stared at the now-useless piece of metal in his shaking hands. "My coin..."

Venus looked at Jupiter. "Maybe that was a little rough of us.... after all, he is kind of dependent on the thing isn't he?"

Jupiter shrugged. "I'm sure the doctors at Arkham will make him a new one." She grinned at Two-Face triumphantly. "Hey... at least it'll buy you a pretty decent donut!" Her friend laughed, and the two walked towards the door. "Nothing like Scout power, eh, Venus?"

"You better believe it!" the blonde Sailor answered, smiling enthusiastically. "You know, it's too bad... for a moment there I though maybe there WAS a cute gu..."

She stopped short. Sailor Jupiter looked alert as well, and opened one closed hand. In it sat a tiny purple calculator, so solid and real that one would think Jupiter had been holding it the whole time. In truth, though, it was a special communicator, one of the many magical objects that simply appeared when the Sailor Scouts needed it. The device was emitting a small but firm beeping, and at the touch of a finger, the circular display filled with static. Then the static melted and Luna's face appeared.

"Hey, Luna, what's up?" Jupiter spoke enthusiastically into the communicator. "We just trashed this guy good over here..."

Luna's serious expression halted her babble. The cat spoke earnestly. "You girls are needed in Gotham Square right now. The Joker's about to drain energy from the whole city!"

**

SAILOR SCOUTS IN GOTHAM (part 5)

***************************************

Shadows. Smoke and noise. A darkened alleyway beating with the ardent pulse of a frenzied city. Someone's crooked curtains casting a triangle of light upon the rotten concrete ground. Two pairs of footsteps pounded through the patch, kicking up pebbles and dust. Above them, the sky lay heavy and luminous, yellow light accenting the grey clouds. The Batsignal sprawled fat across the sky.

Elsewhere, someone else rushed earnestly down the street, long hair flying and catching golden sparks in its purple web. From another direction, a slight girl wove her way through an obstinate crowd, not letting anyone slow her down. On a rooftop, two cats scampered as fast as their paws would take them. And at a busy intersection near Gotham Square, a girl took a running leap and vaulted over the traffic jam to land on the other side. Finally, five serious Sailors gazed at each other, standing in a loose circle on a rooftop.

Luna paced in the center. "Listen up, girls," she said slowly and seriously. "The Joker has hijacked a new public address system that broadcasts sound throughout Gotham Square. Somehow, he's going to use that system to attack the whole town. Now I don't know exactly how, but you can bet the Negaverse has made him stronger. So you girls have GOT to be on your guard. We have to stop him."

"We're going to have our work cut out for us on this one," Sailor Mercury said with a purposeful stare. "The Joker is not just someone who's been put under Zoycite's spell. He's dangerous anyhow. And we don't know how he operates."

"That's right, ladies," said a deep voice from above them. There was a chilly fluttering of wings. "Which is why you're going to listen to me."

The Sailor Scouts looked up. A deep blue cape shot down towards them, much darker than the reddish Gotham night's smog. Wearing the cape, the most huge and terrifying of figures, black and solid and ominous. Sailor Moon stuttered, "Batman!" as his freefall came to a stop, and he stood powerfully in the center of their circle.

The two cats scampered behind their mistresses, and looked out from behind red boots and orange shoes. Batman turned in a slow circle, staring at each girl for a long and terrifying moment. The ends of his cape flickered in the chilly breeze. No one dared speak a word to him.

When he was ready to speak, he did. "The Joker wants me. He doesn't care about you. So I'm going after him. You five will try to stop his plan from working. Disconnect the P.A. system. And look after the citizens. Don't go after Joker." The low, brusque voice stopped as abruptly as it had started. The Sailors still stood, awed and silent.

It was Sailor Venus who first got the courage to speak. "So... you're allowing us to help?" she said, in a strangely bold voice. Her eyes looked deep into the fiery slits of the Batman's mask.

"It's not as if he's got much of a choice," said a lighter voice from behind them. Venus wheeled around, took in a sharp breath, and then lit up like a Christmas tree. "We've been watching you," Robin continued as he leapt down from his perch. He landed next to a thrilled Sailor Venus. "And we've been checking up on you too. Looks like the Sailor Scouts are the real deal after all."

"We sure are!" affirmed Sailor Moon insistently.

"Sailor Moon," said Robin, walking towards her. "We hear you stopped a bank robbery a few weeks back. Saved some window washers from falling too. Not bad work." Across the circle, Sailor Mars started to giggle. Robin looked curiously around at her, and then at Sailor Moon, who had developed a very nasty scowl. Mars attempted to restrain herself. Robin asked, "Care to share, Sailor Mars?"

"Oh... sorry..." Mars replied, trying to swallow her smiles. "It's just that..." Sailor Moon scowled, and Mars shrank, but the silly face only made her laugh all the harder. "...Well, it wasn't even her."

Robin raised an eyebrow, and looked doubtfully at his senior partner.

Sailor Mars smiled coyly at the cape-clad crusader. "It's truue though! It was that sleaze queen Zoycite. Can you believe it? A cross-dressing Nega-general was a better Sailor Moon than she was. Now if you're looking for someone to fight evil..." she went on as Sailor Moon's face slowly reddened in anger. The Dark Knight stared down at the raven-haired kid who was now batting her eyelashes like crazy and giving him the sweetest of smiles. "If you're looking for a real fighter, I'm your girl. Don't you think?"

Robin's cackle interrupted her flirtatious story. "Hahahahahahahahahaha! A cross dressing general from the planet Nega? Sounds fishy to me. Tell me another one. No, wait, I've got it. A cross dressing Amazon with a FISH on his stomach! Now that's a fish story..." His chuckles were like music to Sailor Moon. She silently thanked him and hoped that the Dynamic Duo didn't know the truth.

"Now come on," Batman continued, motioning slightly to Robin. "We have to go." A moment later, the sculpted ends of his cape were all the Scouts could see of the Dark Knight, as he plunged over the roof's edge.

Robin ran rapidly after his partner, waving briefly at the five girls. "You stay out of trouble, got it?"

"Oooh, we will!" enthused Sailor Venus suddenly. "You bet, Traffic Light Knight?"

Robin stopped dead in his tracks "...Whuuut?" the other girls groaned and looked away embarrassedly.

Venus, now a unique shade of pink, sidled up to her "Knight" affectionately. "Um, Traffic Light Knight?" she said in a voice dripping with sweetness. "Could you... maybe... give me a li'l kiss for good luck?" The enamored Scout ended her sentence with a disarming smile.

"Well..." Robin felt very weird, but he also didn't mind hanging out with five lovely teenage girls. He shrugged. "Couldn't hurt, I guess!" The four spectators and two felines gaped as Robin brought his head down towards Venus'. Three endless seconds as he moved closer... closer... (Venus's head swam)... closer...

And then his lips brushed her cheek, and time snapped back into focus. Robin barely had time to straighten up as he was accosted by four squealing girls, each demanding their own good-luck kiss. The clamor on the building was ridiculous. Finally Luna shouted, "EnOUGH! We've got to get a move on!"

The superhero separated himself from his fan club and took a step back. "I really DO have to go," he said apologetically. Five faces fell with a disgruntled groan. Robin reached for his grapnel.

"Waiiiiit a minute!" Sailor Moon snapped suddenly, giving a determined little grimace. "I'M the leader, and I-I-I deserve a kiss for good luck! If you kiss me, it'll be good luck for ALL of us." She threw a look back at Sailor Mars. "And it'll save the rest of you the trouble."

Mars turned her back. "You can have him. I've got higher ambitions." She posed decisively on the rooftop. "I'm going after Batman!!!"

Jupiter cracked a smile at the scene. "Yeah. Right. I'd like to see that."

Sailor Mars wheeled and opened her mouth, but Robin interrupted. "I'm sure you'll do fine." His grapnel caught on a distant crevice, and in a flash the caped hero was off the building. As he swung away, Robin turned back for a half a moment, saluted, and shouted, "Catch ya later, Meatball Head."

Her eyes pie plates and her mouth wide open, Sailor Moon ran towards the roof's edge. But Robin was already gone.

**

"Ladies and geee-yEN-tle-men!!!"

The voice resounded off a thousand rooftops. The glass panels of a skyscraper vibrated slightly.

"Live, from this bee-you-ti-ful city of Gotham, coming at you direct from the flashing lights (and flashing perverts) in glamorous Gotham Square..."

Even for the Square, with its religious zealots, and Rolex hawkers, this was loud. A few people came to their apartment windows curiously. Tourists and theatregoers looked behind them and up at the huge TV screen that towered over the district.

"It's the loudest, lewdest..." There was a slight pause. People went along their way, chalking the voice up to some unseen street show. That is, until the amps shrieked.

Gotham Square vibrated with the force. "Heyyyyyyyy!" screamed the disembodied voice, as if hurt. "I go to ALL this trouble and you're not even listening? I'm CRUSHED! I'm SHATTERED!" A sly chuckle. "And you know what they say... turnabout is fair play!! Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha..."

Glass on nearby office buildings began to quake quicker and quicker, as the loud hysterics continued. A potted plant fell off a twentieth story balcony, cracking over a young mother's head. Her baby played with the soil that fell into his stroller. A seven-foot-tall wooden barricade toppled over, the huge "X" in "TIX*TIX*TIX" landing squarely on a car. Slowly, the city began to fall apart.

"Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha!" Railings on balconies came unglued. Car windows shattered. People lost their balance and fell to the ground. Families huddled together in stone doorways. A gargoyle rumbled ominously on a cathedral wall, his sharp beak threatening to take a nose dive. Through it all, that hideous laughter, bouncing off a thousand billboards and shrieking through the city's night.

And then, it stopped.

The voice paused, a few fading chuckles wobbling through the air. The city was intensely quiet. Even the stony-faced cab drivers had poked their heads out the window to see what would happen next.

The mysterious speaker cleared his throat. "Ahem, much better. Much better. All right... and NOW, for the first time ever... the loudest, lewdest, crudest, rudest, sadist broadcast ever to HIT the Gotham scene..." At the word HIT, a glass window fell from its frame and shattered dangerously on the pavement. "...Ladies and gentleman... it's the Joker show!!"

Spotlights flipped on and circled the sky maniacally. Other spotlights, from the top of the tall centre tower, shed their light on the frozen spectators and the unmoving streets of Gotham Square. Circus music trumpeted through the speakers. One searchlight, bearing the shape of the Batsignal with a huge line through it, hit a cloud, disappeared, reappeared in another part of the sky, turned off and on again several times, always in a different places.

As the light show progressed, the Joker's voice returned. "And here's your host, on W-N-U-T, the man who puts the FUN in dysFUNctional... yours truly, theee Joker!! Thank you, thank you, thank you," he said to himself as canned applause echoed behind him. "You know the funniest thing happened to me while I was breaking out of the asylum the other day... there was this guy, just kind of floating there! No kidding folks, I mean he was floating... Called himself Mister Homicide I think. Or Mister Suicide. The weirdest thing though, he didn't even want to kill anybody, he said he was a lab mouse trying to take over the world, I think Pinkycide? I don't remember. Anyway, yeesh! Taking over the world! Who'd WANT to? And they call ME crazy! Hahahahahahahahaha!"

The dreaded shrieks erupted through the street, causing a hundred more windows and balconies and stones to fall. A panicked wail rose up from the street.

"Whoo! Anyhow, well, confidentially, the guy was a NUT," Joker continued in a teasingly condescending voice, "but he taught me how to throw my voice. Well, not like that Ventriloquist fellow. But now, when I laugh, the whole world laughs with me! Hahahahaha!" And just as he said, the whole square vibrated in reaction, sending a million more pieces of debris crashing down onto the people below. "Or, at least, they sure hear me, don't you? Well, you guys are being a great audience, because unless I miss my guess, he's down there right now collecting energy from you. Oh, did I MISS that part? He's collecting energy? Joker, he said to me. Yes? I said? I want you to go out and wreak a little havoc, he said. Oh, Noooo sir! I protested. I just want to entertain! To make people smile. To loosen UP this Godforsaken town! And he said, that's JUST what I want you to do... hunh?" His voice wavered, as if hearing something strange. "Oops, just a moment folks, technical difficulties..." The amps made a choked noise, then it let up. "...Aw. It doesn't matter. So. Anyway. This Pinkycide fellow said, "I'm just going to collect energy for the Nickle-verse or something... Nega? Nega-worse..."

"The Negaverse," announced a triumphant girl's voice, through the same speaker. Her tones resonated more pleasantly through the area, and people looked up in surprise. "And you're NOT going to win!" At that moment, that one searchlight turned off and on again in a different direction. But its beam of light bent, fragmented, because five silhouettes stood in its way.

"Uh, is this thing on?" the girl in the center looked confusedly at the microphone she was holding. Another silhouette gave her a thumbs-up signal. The searchlight switched off and more spotlights turned toward the team. In an instant, the Sailor Scouts were the main attraction.

"I am Sailor Moon, the champion of justice! And I may make a lot of noise myself, but nothing like this! And I'd definitely never do it for the evil forces of the Negaverse. Be prepared, Joker, because the Sailor Scouts are here!"

A ball of fire shot up. "I'm Sailor Mars, and I know how to warm up a crowd!"

A crash of thunder crackled the speakers. "I'm Sailor Jupiter, and when I'm around, the applause is thunderous!"

Bubbles sprayed forth, covering a billboard in mist. "I'm Sailor Mercury, and everyone says I'm too cool!"

A beam shaped like two crescent moons hit the cloud right next to the shattered searchlight's ray. "I'm Sailor Venus, and I know how to steal the spotlight!"

The five warriors spoke in unison. "We're the Sailor Scouts, and we'll punish you!"

The Joker said, "Mmmmm..." in a confused, wavering way, and then spat, "Wait a minute, YOU'RE not Batman!"

"Smart guy," Sailor Jupiter quipped into Sailor Moon's microphone. The innocents, made hopeful by the heroines' appearance, chuckled a little.

"ForGET it then," the Joker fumed angrily. "I only tangle with Batsy. Not small-time schoolgirls with Mercury bubbleheads. Shoo!"

"Actually," Sailor Venus grinned, "Mercury has the bubbles, but Sailor Moon's the bubblehead."

"Am NOT!" Sailor Moon whined. "Well, maybe a LITTLE, but..." Another laugh came from the street.

"STOPit!" the Joker finally screeched. "They're supposed to laugh at ME!! Not YOUUUU!" Buildings rumbled and debris fell. The Sailor Scouts scattered, leaping from their positions to stem the damage.

"Jupiter Thunder, Crash!" resounded, as a huge lightning bolt reduced a falling gargoyle to sand. A wooden balcony was consumed by a bright fireball before it could hit the ground. Sailor Venus cut open a car with her Crescent Beam and grabbed up the two small children inside it, leaping to safety with them. Sailor Moon vaporized a falling windowpane with her tiara. The Joker's protests and screeches couldn't cause the damage fast enough, as the five resilient Scouts protected the innocent. Finally, Mercury grabbed the microphone.

"That's all for you!" she shouted, and with a touch of her hand, activated a shimmery blue visor. After a moment of examining the mass of equipment, she plugged her computer into it all and punched a key. With a huge shriek, the amps cut off the Joker's "Wha--?" in mid-cry, and sat benignly buzzing once more.

"Ha!" cried Sailor Moon, jumping towards Mercury. "That's that!"

"Not quite," muttered Sailor Jupiter, looking up towards the tower...

**

"--a - a- a-t??"

The rest of the Joker's scream went unheard by the people of Gotham City, but high atop Gotham Square Tower, his henchmen were sure getting an earful. The Joker whirled and grabbed the nearest stooge. "Find out what's going on! What did that Sailor twerp do? NOW!" He threw him backwards, and the thug ran out the door hurriedly.

A fellow wearing a pair of headphones looked ardently at the computer. "It seems that girl patched into our frequency, with the aid of a microcomputer, and managed to redir--"

"I don't CARE about that, man!" the Joker raged. "Save the technobabble and get me my VOICE back, or I'll shatter this studio just as easily as I did that whole city!" The headphone man turned back to his control panel urgently.

The Joker paced. He wrung his hands and pulled at his hair. "Sailor Scouts, Shmailure Scouts, blah, blah, blah," he ranted. "Stealing my show. Don't they know? NOBODY steals my show! And nobody talks that way to me! Only BATMAN gets to talk that way to me!! Batman's the only one who's allowed!"

"In that case," said a dark voice, "I will, thank you."

A pair of eyes glowed in the darkness.

The Joker turned and stared, then cracked yet another evil grin. "BATsy! Darling! So kind of you to.. *finally*... show up. I hope your Boy Wonder and Bat-Girlfriend are doing something about those anNOYING pests down there. Really, they came and ruined a classic scheme, and I was JUST telling Rocco and Henshaw over here," he rambled, waving at two burly henchmen. "I was JUST telling them that nobody gets to spoil my fun like you. Definitely not those silly seagoing scoundrels!"

"Actually," Batman said, walking into the light carefully, "I invited them to help."

"Whaat?" The Joker looked shocked. "And here I thought you had a better sense of rivalry than that! You don't bring outsiders in. This is our fight! So, speaking of fight, now that I've had my chance to say hello..." He stood, hands on an office chair with wheels. "...Time to say goodbye!"

The chair went flying towards Batman, who grabbed it and picked it up. The Joker flew out the door, a ripple of laughter escaping his lips. "...Yahahaha!" At this sound, a TV screen above the control panel smashed an inch from Batman's feet. The floor shook a little.

Rocco and Henshaw leapt for Batman, and each got thrown sideways. They stumbled to their feet and made simultaneous grabs for him, and despite frantic attacks with the chair, Batman couldn't shake loose. He struggled. Another musclebound thug came up from behind, baseball bat in hand, and raised it dangerously over Batman's head. He swung the bat down, but it flew in an erratic arc-- and the thug followed it! He crashed to the floor painfully.

Rocco and Henshaw looked around, and there stood Robin, foot extended to the side. "Whoooops," he said apologetically to the figure on the ground. "Did I trip you?"

Like a lightning bolt, the Batman was out the door. He threw himself over banisters, dropping from floor to floor like a night shadow. Lower in the tall stairwell, the Joker's feet pounded rhythmically down the steps. He giggled gleefully as he fled, and with each cackle the building trembled and Batman clung to the column's unsteady frame.

The Joker exploded out of the building, grinning in triumph. "Tough luck, Batsy!" he called out, turning his head. "But now it's time to bring the house down! Yee hee hee hee hee..." With a huge rumble, Gotham Square Tower started to collapse.

Stones crumbled to pebbles, and the building fell in on itself. The people still lingering in the street watched in awe as the centre pinnacle of Gotham Square seemed to melt, like a volcano disintegrating brick by brick in a cloud of red-brown dust. The Batman was nowhere to be seen.

The Joker jogged backwards, enjoying the show and applauding merrily. As the dust clouds settled, he finally turned around in mid-step, and found himself face to face with an outstretched hand.

"Way to go," said Sailor Jupiter flatly, as the clown blinked at her hand and then up at her. "You just put on quite a show."

With one purple-suited arm, the Joker pushed Jupiter aside. "Don't have time for amateurs!" he muttered. But as he got set to hightail it out of there, Sailor Mars appeared just inches away.

"Too bad you're not the star of this act," she said, scowling. The Joker wasted no time in pushing her away as well, but right behind Mars was a frowning Sailor Venus.

She chimed in. "The great Joker, just a sideshow. Killing Batman, just a stunt." This statement stung Joker's ego, and he plunged head-on towards Venus. But she moved away just in time.

Next in line was Sailor Mercury. The Joker whimpered. "What is this, bowling for Sailors?" Mercury shook her head.

"The newspapers tomorrow will have banner headlines, but they won't say anything about the Joker. He'll be stuck in a sidebar on page twelve," she said seriously, and moved to the side just as the others had.

"Face it," declared Sailor Moon from her triumphant position: in the centre of an arc of Sailors blocking the Joker's path. "You're just a stooge for the Negaverse. Kind of a letdown, huh?"

The Joker let out a long breath of frustration. But his showman smile returned. "Ladies, ladies," he said courteously, removing his top hat and making a deep bow. "Once again, you underestimate me! But here's a little souvenir for your trouble." He reached into his hat. "One Joker-bomb, hold the mayo, coming right up!"

The Scouts readied themselves.

But the TNT and grinning plastic face did not appear when the Joker pulled his gloved hand out of the hat. Instead, to his and everyone's surprise, his fingers had closed around a stretch of straw-colored hair! The Joker made a face and pulled harder. He gave a confused whimper, as the hair revealed itself as a ponytail... which came attached to a full head of hair... which popped out of the had with a burst of cherry blossoms. It was Zoycite!

He floated out of the top hat, which fell from the Joker's hand and thudded to the ground. The funnyman was dumbfounded. His jaw dropped to the floor and his eyes bugged out quite comically. After a few moments of slack-jawed staring, the Joker came to his senses and promptly burst out in a flailing, diva-sized temper tantrum. "Bah-- bah-- bleaugh! What in Bartholomew Cubbins' name are you doing inside my HAT, man? Don't you know that's the way you get LICE? In my hat? How dare you?..." The Scouts, meanwhile, just shifted into battle positions.

"Sorry," Zoycite sneered, and burst into his trademark giggle. "But the Sailor Scouts have a point. I've been keeping my eye on you, Joker, and I know you're a glory hog." The Joker muttered something under his breath. "You seem like the type who stirs up more trouble than you're worth, so I'll remind you: You're working for the Negaverse now, and believe me--" Zoycite paused and lowered his eyes slightly-- "you DON'T want to anger Queen Beryl."

"Then you picked the wrong man for the job," said a deep voice from behind them. Sailor Moon smiled broadly. Sailor Mars dropped her battle stance like a hot potato and waved happily.

"Look, I don't know who you are or why you're doing this to the people of Gotham City," said Batman, his dark figure looming huge and fierce atop a pile of rubble. "But the Joker won't stand for anything less than a starring role. And as for me," he continued, scowling deeper and locking his eyes with Zoycite's, "I won't stand for ANY of it."

Seeing Zoycite and Batman's staring contest intensify, the Joker took advantage of the moment to tiptoe away from the circle and escape. That is, until a pair of black spheres on a whirling string locked around his ankles. It was his "Oof!" as his chin hit the ground that alerted Sailor Moon, and she looked around with a grateful smile at a flickering yellow cape and a green-gloved thumbs-up.

Zoycite just looked at Batman, his brown eyes probing the hero's ominous scowl. It wasn't enough to scare the general, but it was enough to freeze him. Especially so because Zoycite was still feeling vulnerable from unwittingly reminding himself that this Gotham adventure was his last chance.

Comfort came to Zoycite in the form of a gray cloaked figure that materialized a few feet above him. Its sudden presence caused Batman to step backwards, and all the Sailors to gasp. Malachite floated down to join his beloved.

"It doesn't matter anymore," he said in a voice like cold steel. "We have all the energy we need, especially after the Joker's broadcast. The whole city is just reeking with dark energy now." He put a hand to Zoycite's chin and raised his face up to meet his own gaze. "All we need to do now is collect it."

"Don't let them, Sailor Moon," urged a familiar feline voice from behind the Sailor Scouts. "If the Negaverse takes all this energy, they'll be a thousand times more powerful. We've got to stop them."

"I know, Luna," Sailor Moon answered in a low voice. By the time she looked up, the evil couple were already floating up towards the sky, ready to drain the energy from the entire town! Sailor Jupiter tried to jump at them, and Venus took an ardent step forward, shaking her fist. Mars frowned, and Mercury stood, intently pensive. All four whirled when Sailor Moon suddenly cried out, "I've got it!"

Everyone looked surprised. Mars said skeptically, "You do?"

"Sure!" Sailor Moon leapt toward the podium where they had stood earlier, behind the giant spotlight. The other Scouts followed her as she jumped around, grabbing the microphone and finding loads of unattached cable. "Sailor Mercury, crank these speakers up to full volume. We're going to bring this whole city back to normal!"

Sailor Mercury got to work, and the others handed her equipment and stood ready. The sky was slowly turning blood red, and up in the sky hovered two people and a gigantic ball of energy, slowly growing as greenish energy waves floated up from the city. Luna shouted, "Hurry!" The Batman suddenly bolted into a nearby building.

"Put a move on it!" said Artemis. "They're draining more and more energy every minute!" But Sailor Moon was ready. She stood proudly in the center of the podium, near a microphone held by Sailor Venus. Mercury's computer was patched into the sound system, and she sat with her VR visor on, staring intensely at the screen. Sailor Mars and Jupiter kept a wary eye out for trouble on the streets or in the skies.

Then, with a flutter of wings, Batman reappeared. He had set up several pieces of equipment around Sailor Moon, microphones and transmitters. Sailor Moon paused, waiting for the condescending phrase of warning the Batman was sure to give. Instead, he simply said, "Anyone watching TV or listening to the radio right now is going to hear your voice. Do it." His trust flowed through Sailor Moon like new strength. She nodded.

"Moon... Healing... Activation!"

As the energy radiated from Sailor Moon's crescent wand to the microphone, and her voice reverberated through the enchanted speakers, the moondust trail expanded into huge balls of light, exploding out of the speakers and pouring out of windows in spectacular torrents. The figures in the sky winced and rippled, then flickered out like two gray candles. The golden light overpowered all the tainted green energy, and explosions lit up the sky where they met. In a shimmering snowstorm, the stolen power floated back down to earth, and the blinding light dimmed and faded. More powerful than any clamorous noise, a hush rose up over Gotham City. The silence hung still and silver in the air.

"Oh, draaat!"

It took the Joker's plaintive wail to bring his foes' gazes back down to Earth. He looked up at them all from his sorry spot on the ground, a ruby red pout on his lips. "Humph!" he sniffed haughtily. "I just shall not stand for such shoddy treatment. Imagine, the nerve! I'm not going to let you seafaring super-simps steal my headlines. I may be heading home to jolly old Arkham, but I won't let you five take me there!"

Batman turned to face his rival, and opened his arm just enough that the bluer lining of his cape caught a speck of dying light. "That can be arranged," he said. Silver handcuffs glittered in his hand.

The Joker crawled miserably over. "Never thought I'd be glad to see the Batcuffs. Whoaboy..."

**

"Do we really have to leave so soooon?" whined Serena as she set her overstuffed backpack down on the airplane floor. A Sailor V doll and a Gotham Knights baseball cap fell out, as well as several Batman trading cards.

"You know we do," said a voice from inside Mina's carryon (who just wouldn't settle for the luggage compartment this time!) "This was just a fluke. Negaverse bases all its attacks in Tokyo, and... uh... Central Control says we've got to go back and protect the people there." Luna shared a snicker with Artemis as they heard the girls quiet at the mention of their 'authoritative source.' Little did they know the cats were winging it, and that Artemis' source of information was a late night romp to a cyber-cafe.

"I'm actually excited to come home," smiled Ami. "I can't imagine how much studying I'll have to catch up on." Serena glared, and Ami quickly added, "Er, I've also brought some presents for little Jenny Anderson, the girl I babysit."

"She's gotta miss you," said Mina, smiling. "Half the time I call her sister, you pick up with your sweet little 'Anderson residence!' I'm starting to think you're part of the family."

"Ami Anderson," mused Ami. "What a strange name that would be."

As the plane readied for takeoff, the girls chatted and giggled. A brunette stewardess came by and stood in the aisle next to them, demonstrating safety equipment and being completely ignored. Finally, the airplane rose into the sky, taking the Sailor Scouts far away from Gotham City. Rei had a misty moment. "I never got the chance to be alone with him," she said, forlornly looking out the window.

"Hey, we saved the city," Mina shrugged. "That's important, I guess. Even if we never get to see them again." The stewardess came by with drinks, moving slowly down the aisle. Clouds brushed the plane's window, sprinkling moisture like tears on the glass. The wing's flaps shifted, and Gotham City became a very small dot far behind them.

The moment was broken when Serena suddenly shouted "Ooop! My ears popped!" Chaos ensued, and the brunette stewardess smiled slightly. She brushed a renegade strand of hair to the side, and looked at her watch as she entered the secluded alcove between sections of the plane.

"Father... those girls who demonstrated the healing power... I believe I have located them. They may serve your purpose after all. They have just left Gotham City, and I believe they were with my beloved... the detective...."

END
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