Title: Betty and the Bat (Ficlet #10)
Fandom: Batman Begins/Ugly Betty
Characters/Pairing: Betty Suarez, Bruce Wayne, and Selina Kyle
Rating: PG
Word Count: 2,894
Summary: Finally, a girlfriend Betty approved of.
Notes: This is the 10th part in a rather unusual crossover which takes place after Season one of Ugly Betty and the end of Batman Begins; it's AU from there.

• Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, and Part 9.





She might not have been a fashionista herself, but Betty knew a well dressed woman when she saw one. What's more, she new a chic well dressed and well acessorised woman when she saw one. She didn't care what the magazines said, black never went out of style, especially when the wearer was a petite, athletically built brunette, who seemed to be the very picture of a Parisian Fashion Week runway. Of course, Betty had never been to Fashion Week in Paris, but she still thought that this woman would have fit right in. Maybe she wasn't tall enough to be a model, but the clothes would still fit.

"I'm here to see Bruce Wayne."

Like she had been with Daniel, Betty was rather protective of Bruce. There was little she could do to stop him from going out with the women he generally chose (blonde, high voice, too much cleavage, and too little brain). She didn't understand why Bruce Wayne couldn't be perceived as anything but a CEO playboy of average intelligence. Showing a level of above average intelligence didn't automatically mean one was running around in a rubber bat-suit. Betty liked to think that she was of above average intelligence and she certainly wasn't an undercover vigilante. As far as she was concerned, Bruce was torturing himself for absolutely no reason whatsoever, going out with his usual dumb bimbo type.

Betty tried not to judge, but she couldn't help but award the woman a +2 in her mind almost as soon as she opened her mouth. She wasn't blonde, and her voice had actual depth to it. Betty looked up over the rim of her book, surprised to have such a woman walk into the office at this hour of the evening. Any woman who walked into the office after six o'clock was typically for dating. "Do you have an appointment?"

"Mmhmm," she practically purred in her black Frye boots that were tucked into tight black jeans. She wore a black cashmere looking tank top and dark her hair was pulled back with a black scarf embroidered in with blue flowers. The blue in the scarf matched the blue gems that sparkled in the long, draping, silver necklace she wore around her neck. "You're Betty, right? I think we talked on the phone."

+1. She remembered Betty's name, and Betty remembered hers. "Selina Kyle?"

The woman nodded, parting pale burgundy lips into a bright smile. "That's right. Six twenty, that was me," she said, watching as Betty ran her fingers down the lines in Bruce's daily planner. "I'm taking him out to dinner."

+2. Not a golddigger. She was taking him out? "Oh, that's nice," she commented. "I'll go let him know you're here, Miss. Kyle."

"Oh, it's fine, I'm early. Take your time. And call me Selina, please," she said. Betty couldn't help but notice how slim the woman was, though her arms were packed with toned muscle. She very obviously worked out and her thinness was likely natural, rather than the anorexic specimens Bruce normally dragged around. +1.

Betty glanced over at the clock on her computer. Selina was early and it appeared it was simply by chance, not to put on makeup or apply prosthetic breasts. The red light on line two of her phone was lit, showing that Bruce was still finishing up business with whoever he was speaking with over at S.T.A.R. Labs. He'd been on the phone about ninety minutes now, and Betty couldn't immediately recall the name of the man who'd called around a quarter before five.

"Are you enjoying that?"

"I'm sorry, what?" Betty asked, looking back over at Selina. She'd been vaguely considering checking her email.

Selina smiled. "The book you're reading," she said, pointing to the book Betty had laid down just above her computer keyboard. "I've been meaning to read it, but I either haven't had time or I just forget to pack it when I head off somewhere. I've heard it's excellent though. Do you like it?"

She… read books? Non-fiction books? Betty did her best not to stare, averting her rather surprised glance to stare at the aforementioned book, Fast Food Nation, instead. "I, um, I am," she answered, stammering just a bit as she tried to get over the surprise. Bruce, going out with someone possibly intelligent? Perish the thought. He had, after all, assured her that the dumb blondes were integral to being part of 'the act'. Betty still didn't understand that.

"You know, Schlosser's writing a book about the jail system next," Selina said, playing idly with her long, draped necklace. "Of course, I'd really like to read this one beforehand. Have you ever read any of his articles?"

"He's one of my favourite journalists, actually," Betty admitted. She pushed her glasses up on her nose and looked over at the phone. The red light was still on. "Well, when he still has articles. They're not always in the Atlantic anymore… I guess since the book and the movie came out."

"That makes sense, I guess." Selina sat down in one of the chairs on the other side of Betty's desk. The younger woman nearly smacked her forehead, realizing she'd not been the best of hosts. Silly distractions.

"Can I get you anything to drink," she asked. "We have water, coffee, soda, probably some tea…"

"Don't bother." She was already digging around in her designer bag and Betty couldn't help watching what came out of the bag while the search was on. A copy of The Economist and a battered version of Northanger Abbey fell out amoung the knickknacks. She took hold of a plain bottle of water, uncapped it, and brought it to her lips. Not Figi, not Evian, not even Poland Spring. It was just a bottle of water and Betty wondered if that was a Walgreens label she saw on it.

+2. "I only have time for magazines these days. And old favourites," Selina said, seemingly in explanation of the things that had fallen from her bag. "I'm a social worker."

Well colour her shocked. The woman had an actual job. "Oh, wow. How did you meet Bruce?" Betty asked, actually somewhat curious about how Bruce had come to find himself dating a social worker.

Selina's lips quirked in a small grin and she gave a soft laugh. "I've been helping to coordinate that damned charity ball," she explained, brushing back a small tendril of her dark hair. "Your boss donated generously and I do believe in repaying favours."

-1. Well, maybe. Betty wondered if she was taking out every generous donator, or just the young and handsome ones. But by the same token, she couldn't complain. She'd been after Bruce to date someone with a brain for ages now, and while there was no proof that the woman was, say, a brain surgeon, she at least read things and that was enough for Betty. +1

"It's a really big deal. Er, the ball, I mean. He's been talking about it for ages." Mostly complaining about Lex Luthor and his involvement in the event. Betty spent a good deal of time simply nodding and agreeing along with him. She didn't know Lex Luthor at all – though she felt she knew his body guard, Mercy Graves, all too well – but from the things Bruce said, she'd decided that he didn't sound like a particularly plesant fellow, no matter what his public image was.

Sometimes being a vigilante's assistant was just cool, Betty thought. Not that she could tell anyone that Lex Luthor was in the process of illegally lining his factories in lead and kryptonite, but, as a budding journalist herself, having inside information was particularly fun.

"We'll raise a good amount of money," Selina said. "I'm involved to make sure the money goes where it's supposed to in the end. Someone needs to."

Betty supposed she could have taken that as an insult, an implication that Bruce wasn't to be trusted with this sort of thing. That he would skim money off the top or put it into his own business dealings instead of giving it to the children it was meant for. But for some reason she really didn't think Selina meant it like that. She was perfectly happy to assume that the woman was talking about Lex, not Bruce.

Maybe, though, Lex could use a bit of it to buy Mercy a dog muzzle. That would be a decent investment.

Passing a smile to Selina, Betty turned to look at her phone quickly. "Bruce is off the phone. I should probably go get him before he gets involved in something else," she said before pushing back from her desk and standing up. She smiled at Selina again, biting her lip for a moment and then reaching back down to her desk to pick up her copy of Fast Food Nation. "Here. You can, um, take a look if you want. I'll be right back."

As Selina nodded her thanks, Betty knocked on the door to Bruce's office. It had been a while since she'd knocked and actually waited for his acknowledgement to enter. They were at the point in their relationship where Betty simply knocked and walked in. It wasn't nearly as dangerous as it would have been with Daniel, where one never knew exactly what would be going on behind the doors. Bruce was well behaved.

She rapped quickly and opened the door.

"Betty." Bruce looked up from his desk, shuffling some papers around and setting a pen back in the cup in the corner.

"Bruce." Betty smiled pleasantly and closed the door shut behind her. "So, I like her."

He raised an eyebrow as she approached and held out three or four papers for her to take. "Hmm?"

"Selina Kyle," she said, her tone indicating that he probably should have remembered the appointment. Well, date, apparently. "She reads books, which, can I say? Is complete one eighty from Darla-with-no-last-name."

"That was tonight?" When Betty nodded, he frowned just slightly. She refused to believe that he, of all people, had forgotten anything. Granted, his nights had been rather busy lately, and that would distract anyone, but she was used to Bruce being more on top of things than she was. It was mere formality that she even read his schedule to him each morning. "It slipped my mind."

-1, Bruce, she thought with a sigh.

"I like her," Betty repeated, walking over to hooks on the wooden wall where several suit jackets hung along with ties to match. She cast a glance back at him before reaching for a silvery blue tie. The green one he wore currently had somehow become wrinkled throughout the day. "She seems nice."

Deftly, she tugged at the tie around his neck, loosening it so that it would easily slip around his neck. "I can take off my own tie, Betty," he said as his fingers beat her to actually removing the thing. He took it off himself and hung it from the same hook she'd taken the newest one from. Alfred would collect it the next morning and perform whatever miracles he did with all of Bruce's laundry. "I'll make my excuses. Do me a favour and schedule her for some point this weekend."

"But she's scheduled for tonight," Betty pointed out, gesturing to the door. That much should have been obvious, given that the woman was sitting outside. "And it's not like you have anywhere else to be. Your schedule's clear for the rest of the night."

He shook his head. "Bruce Wayne's schedule is clear."

"Could you not refer to yourself in the schizophrenic third person?" Betty asked with a sigh. She reached up and straightened the tie he'd quickly done up. "Does Batman have a hot date tonight? I thought the Joker was taken care of? Or, well, that you hadn't heard from him."

"He's not the only one out there," Bruce said, looking down at her. "You know that."

"He's the worst," Betty retorted quickly. "From what you've said and what I've read. If he's hiding, I think you have time to go on a date."

"The Ventriloquist is hiding by the docks, I'd like a look at the warehouses Luthor is lining with kryptonite and lead, which also happen to be by the docks, and there've been a rash of jewel thefts," Bruce pointed out. His voice wasn't superior or anything of the like, but Betty did get the feeling that he was glad to have the chance to be right again. He was always talking about how she and Alfred had an uncanny knack for being sensibly correct at all times.

She sighed, rolling her eyes ever so slightly. "They'll still be there tomorrow, you know."

"They will. But it's entirely possible that the people who get in their ways while I'm out eating dinner won't be. So… excuses?"

-2.

"We can tell her Lucius called and it's an emergency." Betty wasn't much of a liar. She scratched and blushed and then tended to stutter when asked if she was lying. It was the one talent of being an assistant she'd yet to master. She could forge a signature with the best of them, but lying, even over the phone, was not one of her greatest abilities.

"I can tell her Lucius called," he interjected. +1. Likely, he was thinking the same thing about her lying abilities that she was. That they were nonexistent in nature. "It's getting late, anyway. Heading home soon, I hope?"

She nodded, resisting the urge to roll her eyes or smirk. They both mothered each other in their own odd ways. Betty created rules and Bruce was determined to see her on a train every day by the time seven thirty had rolled around. He'd gotten worse since Day Lights Savings Time had gone into effect in early November and darkness began creeping through the city around five thirty every evening.

Betty simply nodded now, giving his tie one last secure tug. Perhaps a little harder than need be. "Yes, I'm going home. I'm going straight to the train station and getting straight onto the train. When I get off of the train I'll get straight onto a subway and then I'll go straight home. I'm not going to talk to any strangers and I'm not going to fall asleep on the train and get mugged or robbed. If I see a white faced clown with green hair on my two minute walk between here and the train station, I run. Good?"

"You're catching on." Bruce grinned and took a jacket from the hook, slipping it easily over his shoulders. "Why don't you head out? I'll take care of Selina."

"Sure?" Betty asked him, though getting out a bit early would be nice. She'd have time to buy a drink from the man with the little stand outside of the train station. She didn't consider that counting as a stop, given that it was just right there. There were no out of the way leaps or bounds.

"I'll be fine. Go ahead," Bruce assured her.

+5. She might have protested other nights, but tonight she was more than willing to head out. If Bruce was willing to make his own excuses to his girlfriends, that was fine with Betty. She'd never savoured that part of her job at Mode. It hadn't come up often, but she'd spend a good deal of time wanting to bang her head against the walls when it had. Anything to spare that pain was just fine with her.

Betty clutched the papers Bruce had given her a few moments ago in her hands as she walked back out of his office. Selina was still there, sitting in the chair and sipping on her bottled water. As Betty began gathering her things she paused to tell the other woman that Bruce would be out in just a moment if she cared to wait. She tossed her planner, her composition notebook, and her wallet into her faux Prada bag. While she could have sworn that she'd left one of Bruce's nice fountain pens on the desk before she'd gone into see him, she couldn't find it now and she certainly didn't feel like crawling on her hands and knees to look for it. She figured if it had rolled somewhere she'd just as easily be able to find it when she came in tomorrow. Instead, she grabbed a normal pen from her desk and tossed it into her bag, as always, a just in case for writing on the way home from the office. It was a train ride long enough for at leas jotting down ideas.

She was throwing on her puffy winter coat when Selina spoke up. "Betty?"

"Yes?" She slung her bag over her shoulder. It didn't look nearly as comfortable there as Selina's had on hers. She supposed the jacket wasn't helping he effect.

"Your book," Selina said, holding out the paperback to Betty. She smiled kindly at her. "Thank you. I really need to actually read it eventually."

"You should keep it," Betty said. Her hand was on the door knob when she looking over her shoulder to smile at the other woman. "You might end up with some unexpected reading time tonight after all."