Cold-Blooded: A DC Universe Fanfiction (#Wattys2015)

Chapter 19: Rose: The Litmus Test

Rose had read somewhere that a couple who were likely to last always had a great story about how they met, or at least they made it sound great when they told it together. She had maneuvered to get a seat on her father's blind side the better to watch him while they talked, hopefully without his noticing. It was also her way of asking why Yukie was a noncombatant without asking directly.

She ate her ramen, listened and watched the two of them while Yukie briefly explained how she had promised Mr. Freeze that if he trusted her with handling his finances, she would see to it he never had to interrupt his research for lack of funds again. However, he was already badly in debt, and it was a struggle to keep her promise even when money started coming in. Then she learned that the Jian Wu World Championship was going to be held in Gotham City that year, and decided to take a chance at clearing all the debt at once.

Her father listened too, and the expression on his face was that of someone who had heard the story before but was open to hearing it again. He didn't cut her off or hurry her along—a positive sign.

Yukie said, "..then when I went to place my bets, the bookies suddenly went mad. 'He's here?! Clear the board!', only they were more profane about it. I looked at the screen, and that was the first time I ever saw your father's face." She bowed her head, just a fraction, and looked at him sideways with a shy smile. "There were younger men and prettier men there, but none with a fraction of his presence. He made them look like mooncalves and fledglings. I couldn't stop staring—I had to fight to tear my eyes away."

"Why bother?" He smiled lazily and smugly, with a hint of twinkle in it. "Obviously you liked what you saw."

"Yes, but I didn't want you to catch me staring at you! It would have been horribly embarrassing, and you might have taken it the wrong way. Besides, I was also annoyed with you."

"Annoyed? With me?" he asked, putting on a joking, amazed expression.

"Yes!" Her smile flashed white. "Because you were so bored during the elimination rounds. That was when I decided, if somehow I faced you in the seventh round, I was going to make you take it seriously. I was going to make you take me seriously as an opponent."

"You did that," he chuckled. "That and more."

"Wait a minute—you went up against each other?" Rose asked.

"Eventually," Yukie said.

"But if you want to talk about first impressions, when I first noticed you, it was at the start of the seventh round and you were wringing out your hair."

"Oh! I didn't know that was when you first saw me," Yukie protested. "No, don't tell her!" Her face flushed with embarrassment.

He turned to his daughter. "She was wearing white with a tasteful pattern of fresh bloodstains, and about forty gallons of water."

"To keep from overheating as I did at the tryouts! I didn't want to faint again," she explained.

"Her only accessories were a pair of butterfly swords in carbon steel," he continued as Yukie seized her bowl and began devouring her wontonmen to cover her consternation, "but what I noticed even more than that was that she, unlike most of the women who go into costumed adventuring these days, was serious about it."

"What do you mean, 'most of the women in costumed adventuring'?" Rose asked, offended. After all, plenty of her friends were women or girls who had gone in to exactly that, including she herself

"I suppose your crowd is a bit young for what I'm talking about. A lot of women in the business these days treat it like they're going into the field of entertainment—adult entertainment," he snorted. "Cosmetic surgery, costumes that are more lingerie or body paint than armor, hair, makeup—the works. Sometimes I wonder if they're there to fight or to fu—for a photo shoot."