Times The Justice League Met The Gotham Rogues

Martian Manhunter VS The B-Team (A Pleasant Conversation)

J'onn was curious. When you had lived as long as he had, and were bombarded with others' innermost thoughts as often as he was, you learned that some things should be left alone. But he was very curious, and very bored, and didn't particularly see the harm in just visiting.

Surely Batman wouldn't object to him being in Gotham if he wasn't actually going to do any superheroing? He knew the answer to that, but he was doing it anyways.

He flew over the city, taking in the sights with a small smile. It truly wasn't as bad as the other Leaguers made it seem. In fact, strangely enough, he sensed a feeling of peace over the general populace. Peace and something he couldn't quite name, something that made his head hurt just trying to comprehend it, something he'd long ago written off as inherent to Batman yet was apparently true of all Gothamites.

He felt more, of course, the full spectrum of human emotion and several things that only plants really felt (and were much stronger than they should be). But, overall, the city felt nice. Excitable. Fun.

J'onn startled, realizing that a rather large cluster of excitement was actually a very close cluster of excitement. He spun around to face the newcomer head-on, spotting–

A pilot woman and a guy dressed like a giant bug, riding a cartoonish rocket?

"Yahoo!" The girl screamed. "Light 'em up, baby!"

The man responded with a cheer of his own, turning on a giant flamethrower, and that couldn't possibly be safe–

J'onn's brain caught up enough to screech FIRE!, which was unfortunately the exact opposite of helpful in his attempt to get away. Before he even thought of phasing, the duo had caught up.

J'onn came to awareness slowly at first, and then incredibly quickly. The reason for the quickness was hard to pinpoint, but then it hit him; his mind was empty. Not in a literal sense, nor even to say he'd lost his mental faculties — though, honestly, he might've.

He couldn't quite say he cared, though, as the fact that he didn't have an entire city's worth of emotions and thoughts running through his head was too soothing at the moment. He hadn't had a break in centuries, not since he'd lived around other telepaths who could control their minds, instead of these unevolved children he now lived with.

He allowed himself to quietly enjoy it for a few minutes before reluctantly cracking open his eyes and taking in his surroundings. He was on a small bedroll in a cage, in the center of a dark, dusty room. Bookshelves took up nearly every visible space, except for a fairly large area around his cage that was cleared enough for a ring of rocks with glowing runes on them.

A chirping briefly drew to his attention to a small, transparent, winged lizard sitting on one of the rocks. It regarded him for a moment, and he regarded it in turn, before it flew off to join dozens of others in packing up the various books on the room's shelves into boxes.

"Ah, you're awake." A man with opaque glasses and a lamp dangling from his hat stepped around the cage, clutching a large book to his chest. "Excellent. Oh, uh, I'm Bookwyrm. Gotham's Librarian Of Lies, or something like that. I'm workshopping it."

"Hello, Bookwyrm." J'onn said slowly. "I am–"

"J'onn J'onzz, the Martian Manhunter. I know." Bookwyrm smiled. "I've read all about you. That's how I knew the runes would block your psychic powers. I read about those, too. In a tome. You'd be surprised how many interesting things you can find in ancient tomes." The man mused distractedly, looking fondly at the many nearby books. 

J'onn was fairly certain that his real name was not in any tome, ancient or otherwise. In fact, he was almost entirely certain that such information could only be found in the JL and DEO databases.

He filed that away for later concern. For now, he decided to contribute to the conversation, perhaps discover why he was here. "I have read accounts more ancient than your species, or even your world."

Bookwyrm looked, for lack of a better term, completely starstruck. J'onn had not started this day expecting to get into a long dialogue regarding intergalactic literature, but this is somehow what ended up happening. He almost forgot he was imprisoned, engrossed in explaining his favorite Martian epic to a man who had a surprising ability to grasp its meaning despite having little-to-no reference for its foundational concepts.

Their conversation regretfully ended when an alert buzzed from inside Bookwyrm's lamp. The man cursed, sighing deeply. J'onn must have looked as questioning as he felt, because he explained "Those two idiots I call roo– teammates just failed. Again."

He stood up from where he'd been sitting crosslegged on the floor, stretching. "Ah, well, I expected nothing less. Hmmm... Do you think Arkham would let me keep this?"

J'onn glanced at the magic book in his hand and chuckled, though not unkindly. "Probably not."

"Yeah, I figured." Bookwyrm chuckled wryly back, shrugging. He whistled for one of his Drakes, handing the book to it. "Make sure this goes to the library to the South, the one by the good burger place. I owe them one."

The Drake nodded, chirping as it and its brethren flew off, carrying boxes of books. Bookwyrm waved to them, calling out farewells until the last see-through tail was out of sight. He hummed as he gathered the few remaining books, harmless classics, into a bag.

Bookwyrm crouched down again, running a hand over the runes on one of the stones, and J'onn could feel the outside world slowly trickling back into his thoughts. Starting with Bookwy– Xavier.

"You aren't going to fight?" J'onn asked, his curiosity piqued again.

"Goodness no." Xavier shook his head. "That's more Roxy and Garf's department."

J'onn got a flash of destruction-frustration-amusement-home from the other and quietly nodded, settling down to wait. It wasn't long before the large double doors flew open, revealing a very put-out Batman with a half-burnt suit, Firefly and Roxy Rocket giggling behind him in the Batmobile.

Batman stalked up to Xavier, looked the grinning man in the eye, and growled. "Stop. Helping. Them."

"But their plans succeed much more often when I do." Xavier said innocently, and J'onn covered his mouth to stifle a snort. He looked thoughtful. "Granted, mine fail a lot more when they're involved, and tend to have a lot more explosions..." He shrugged, perking up. "But I guess that's just the price of friendship!"

"Stop being friends with them." Batman ordered in a tone of voice that suggested he didn't for a second think it would happen but desperately hoped it would.

"That's an option?" Xavier asked.

"No." Roxy and Firefly chorused from the backseat of the Batmobile, returning to the giggly conversation right after.

"Darn." Xavier said, snapping his fingers, though there was no force to it. He strolled past Batman with his bookbag thrown over his shoulder. "Can I sit in the front seat? Garf's huge, and I'd rather not spend the trip to Arkham being squished against a car door again. Promise I won't touch any buttons!"

"Whatever." Batman growled, rubbing his temple. He glared at J'onn, strong flashes of what exactly he'd gone through that night looking for him pouring from his mind.

The martian winced, suddenly overly grateful he hadn't actually dealt with the insane stuntwoman and arsonist for more than a minute. How the Hell anyone felt safe in this city...

But at least their villains were pleasant conversationalists.