by Lisa Yee
“Game?” Harley said, perking up. “I want to play a game!”
“Not this time,” Batgirl said. “This one could be dangerous.”
The music of the Birds of Prey was blasting. Without saying a word, Katana was able to extract the computer chip.
As Katana bandaged Batty up, Beast Boy sang along to the music at the top of his lungs. And in the form of a gorilla, he pounded to the beat of the song on his chest.
Using tweezers, Batgirl held the computer chip under a magnifying glass. With the precision of a master surgeon, she reprogrammed the microchip. Then she nodded to Beast Boy. He stopped singing, but then Katana started.
In an instant Beast Boy went from a green teenaged gorilla to a baby bat, identical to Batty. With care, Batgirl embedded the microchip in Beast Boy Batty’s wing. She signaled for Katana to stop singing and opened the door.
Harley was outside, just about to knock using her mallet. “It’s about time you let me in,” she said, just as another security trap dropped on her. “Hey, I can’t move!”
“Oh no!” Batgirl yelled. “Batty has flown away.”
Katana smiled. She was holding the real Batty as an identical-looking Beast Boy bat soared over Super Hero High. Batgirl watched him disappear. Her heart was racing. Would her plan work? She had created a reverse homing device so that Beast Boy Batty could infiltrate the Calculator’s headquarters.
The computer virus was a full-fledged epidemic threatening to cripple the Internet, and thereby the world. GPS systems everywhere were compromised, wreaking massive—and sometimes dangerous—havoc with traffic on every road. Never had Wonder Woman worked so hard, so quickly. Teamed with Supergirl, the two were able to save numerous lives. Meanwhile, when one HarleyWham met another, they’d hit each other with their mallets, causing two more to appear, quickly creating a small army.
The World Wide Web was getting more tangled by the minute. Even the news crews reporting on the phenomenon were subject to technical meltdowns as their broadcasts went in and out. Cyborg had brought in some of his computers, attempting to circumvent emergency-service website disasters.
Meanwhile, Beast Boy Batty was heading to the Calculator’s lair. “Talk to me,” Batgirl said into her headset.
“Flying over a bridge into deep suburbia,” Beast Boy Batty reported, his signal coming in strong.
Batgirl cross-checked this with the Junior Detective Society map she had scanned into the computer. A tiny red mark was moving across the screen. Beast Boy Batty was headed into the epicenter of the destruction.
There was radio silence from Beast Boy. Batgirl feared the worst. Then the transmissions came back.
“Reporting from a messy room,” Beast Boy radioed.
“Turn on your camera,” Batgirl instructed.
She stared at the computer screen. It flashed on and off, fuzzy at first. Then there was clarity. Batgirl could see rows of computers and equipment not unlike hers. Only in this room there were also empty pizza boxes and half-crushed soda cans everywhere.
“Beast Boy, fly up to the computer screens so I can see what’s on them,” she said.
As Batgirl studied the images, she was startled when she heard a voice that wasn’t Beast Boy’s.
“What? Bat, what are you doing back here? You went dark. I didn’t know where you were!”
Suddenly, the screen went fuzzy again. Batgirl could hear a skirmish. The screen went black.
“Beast Boy?” she called. There was no response. “Beast Boy, are you okay?”
“Beast Boy? Come in, Beast Boy!” Batgirl cried. She began working furiously on the keyboard, trying to regain a video image.
There was no answer. Batty flew over, her wing bandaged from where the microchip had been removed. Together they looked into the blackness while static filled the air.
There wasn’t time to panic. Batgirl turned back to her working computer screens. It looked like Wonder Woman, Supergirl, Bumblebee, and the rest were doing all they could to keep a cap on chaos. Star Sapphire and Big Barda were corralling criminals who had escaped from Belle Reve and returning them to the prison. The school had taught them well. When there was a crisis, even those Supers who didn’t normally get along worked together for the greater good.
Before Batgirl had lost contact with Beast Boy Batty, Cyborg had been able to take screen grabs of the Calculator’s computers. When she began to analyze the data, she was stunned. Nerdy or not, he really was a genius.
Summoning the Junior Detective Society over the airwaves, Batgirl gave them the coordinates of where the next HarleyWhams would hit. “You’re not going to be popular,” she warned them, “but I want you to disable all the computers in Central City before they become infected.”
The Flash looked at Hawkgirl, who looked at Poison Ivy.
“Central City?” Poison Ivy said, sounding uncertain.
Batgirl nodded. “That’s right. Disable Central City.”
Central City wasn’t that close—but The Flash and Hawkgirl could traverse great distances very, very quickly.
Knowing that the Junior Detective Society was on it, Batgirl was able to focus on programming an Anti-HarleyWham code. She would have to move at lightning speed. The intense pressure would have been incapacitating to anyone with less confidence. More than TechTalkTV, this was a true test of her skills.
“Got it!” she finally yelled. Batgirl was hitting the keyboard so fast that her hands were a blur. At last a woman’s strong, calm voice broadcast across the Bat-Bunker: “Initializing antivirus Anti-HarleyWham program. Nine, eight, seven…” Batgirl fell back in her chair, exhausted. “…six, five, four, three…three…three…”
Batgirl sat up. What was happening?
“This is happening!”
The Calculator’s face appeared on AboutFace, taking up the entire computer screen, which moments earlier had been dark. Batgirl gasped. Cyborg stood up.
“You think you’re smart enough to stop me? Well, you’re not, Batgirl!” he said sinisterly.
Batgirl addressed the keyboard, sending a second security code to unlock her initial antivirus solution.
Just as fast, the Calculator shot off another destructive computer annihilation program. And as soon as he sent it, Batgirl was able to intercept it and shut it down.
“Nice catch,” he said, “but what about this?”
Batgirl watched as the Calculator hacked into the government’s test weapons base and launched several prototype smoke missiles.
“Supergirl!” she yelled into her com bracelet. “Get over to Sector 5B ASAP!!!”
“I’m on it,” Supergirl broadcast back.
“Cyborg, can you assist the federal government? Their Internet needs to be up and running.”
“Will do,” he said, taking off from the Bat-Bunker.
Batgirl turned to face the Calculator. Her expression was serious and focused. Back and forth, forth and back, and even sideways, the two teen tech geniuses fought, not with swords or lasers but with their brains. Computers and code were their battlefield. It seemed like everything the Calculator did, Batgirl had an antidote for it. Yet she knew that she wasn’t stopping the Calculator, she was merely reacting to him.
“And now,” the Calculator said, “for my pièce de résistance!”
Batgirl feared what he had planned. She contacted Hawkgirl, who was midflight. “You know what I asked you to do in Central City?” she said.
“The Flash and I covered that and we’re heading back,” Hawkgirl answered.
“Good!” Batgirl said. “Now I want you to do the same in Metropolis and Gotham City.”
“Are you sure?” Batgirl could hear the hesitation in Hawkgirl’s voice.
Batgirl looked at the rows of computers in the Bat-Bunker, each with formulas or scenes from around the world.
“I’m sure,” she said.
“We’re doing what?!” She could hear Poison Ivy talking to The Flash. “Seriously?”
“Hawkgirl,” Batgirl said. “Shu
t everything down for twenty minutes, then turn it back on.”
“You got it!” Hawkgirl said.
Batgirl’s computers suddenly went dark.
Batgirl ran to the vehicle garage. The motorcycle she had been tinkering with the last few months was waiting for her. She wheeled it outside. The moon shone down on her. She kick-started the turbo-upped engine and listened to it purr. Satisfied, she put on her helmet and gripped the handlebars.
“Oh, Dad,” she said to herself and biting her lip. “I know I’m going to get majorly grounded for this.”
With that, Batgirl revved the engine and was off. She pushed the motorcycle to top speeds as she maneuvered the highways and back roads, never looking back.
It smelled sour, like old eggs and dirty socks. Did this guy ever clean his room? Batgirl wondered. In the dark, she could hardly see. Before she could activate her night-vision goggles, the room lit up, momentarily blinding her.
“Oh, looky,” the Calculator said. “Another visitor from Super Hero High.”
When her eyes adjusted to the bright, Batgirl spotted Beast Boy Batty trapped in a laser cage that also appeared to be wired for electric shock. He looked scared. The Calculator casually brushed his finger against the side of the cage.
“Ouch!” he said when he got zapped. “Gee, if that’s what happens on the outside of the cage, just imagine the voltage on the inside! I’ve also got him wired in so that any change in his size will instantly set it off. And…well, bye-bye, Beast Boy.”
Batgirl and Beast Boy locked eyes. They didn’t need to verbalize their worry.
“Please don’t be upset,” the Calculator said, dripping with faux sincerity. “You can’t rescue Batty. Oh, excuse me! You can’t rescue Beast Boy—and my, what a mighty fine fake baby bat he makes…except for being green!” The teen villain launched into a long laugh. “Bwwwahahahahaha—”
It seemed like he could have gone on for minutes, but he was interrupted by a woman wearing handmade sandals and lots of beads over her fuzzy sweater and flowing skirt.
“Noah,” she said, pushing her glasses back up the bridge of her nose. Her light brown hair, the same color as his, was braided. “Noah, dear, your room is a mess. Is this how you want your friends to think you live?”
“Aww, Mom, not now!” the Calculator begged. “Please, give me some privacy!”
“Privacy, shmivacy! You’re always squirreled away in here, even on sunny days. Is it any wonder you’re so pale? And now, finally, you have a friend over and you don’t even invite her to sit down? Where are your manners?”
Mrs. Kuttler waved to Batgirl, who awkwardly waved back.
“Noah, stop playing with your computer! No good can come of this.” She turned to Batgirl. “Nice to meet you, dear,” she said, closing the door behind her.
“Argggh! Parents,” the Calculator said by way of explanation. His face hardened. “And now,” he said to Batgirl. “How’s about you and I have a little TechTalkTV-style competition? Just the two of us. To determine who the true tech champion is.”
Batgirl looked down at Beast Boy Batty. She took a deep breath and locked eyes with the Calculator.
“You’re on,” she said confidently. “Let the games begin.”
It was a test unlike any she had ever taken before. Armed with their laptops, the two agreed to a computer battle—against each other. Winner take all.
Batgirl’s laptop was more powerful than some of the computers used by the US government, the British spy force, and the World Bank. But then, so was Calculator’s.
“Winner take all?” he said. The lights on the mega tech that was woven into his jacket kept lighting up more frequently. “Or how about winner take that?”
He pointed to Beast Boy Batty.
“Oh,” the Calculator added. “If he looks really weak, it’s because he is. You see, you reprogrammed my initial computer chip, and then I reprogrammed your reprogramming. Whenever I hit shift Z on my computer, the poor little bat boy gets majorly zapped, making him weaker every time. How fun is that?”
When he hit shift Z and Beast Boy Batty winced, Batgirl didn’t respond, even though it felt like someone was squeezing her heart too tight. She refused to let the Calculator get the better of her.
“Let’s begin,” she said, knowing that would distract him from harming Beast Boy. “Or are you scared?”
“I’m not scared!” the Calculator yelled. “You’re the one who should be scared!”
The two sat in the middle of the room, back-to-back in high-back chairs. Each was armed with their computer and the same amount of battery time.
“Three, two, one…go!” they said in unison.
Batgirl knew that to bring down the Calculator’s computer, she would first have to locate it. It wasn’t enough knowing where it was physically; she’d have to hack into its internal operating system. As she searched, several firewall alarms went off on her laptop. Clearly, he was trying to do the same to her. Batgirl recalled what her father had taught her about dealing with crisis situations. “No amount of tech or weapons can replace good old-fashioned conversation.”
“Calculator,” she asked as she typed. “Why are you doing this?”
“I never was that into sports,” he said, tapping on his keyboard. “And I was always picked last on teams. Everyone made fun of me.”
Though the goal was to bring down the Calculator, there was something Batgirl needed to do first. She fortified her firewall defense system enough to keep the Calculator occupied for the next few minutes. What if, Batgirl reasoned, she was able to reverse the HarleyWham process?
She had seen the data on the Calculator’s computer screen. Not only had he infected the HarleyWhams with a virus, but he had created a code Batgirl had never seen before. It allowed the holograms to physically manifest by focusing the energy fields inherently generated by computers that had been causing worldwide chaos. Now all Batgirl had to do was log in to his HarleyGram/Wham site and plug in new code to reverse his. But that would take time.
“I didn’t like sports, either,” she sympathized. It wasn’t true. In her Barbara Gordon days, Batgirl had been on the track team, winning state awards. “But computers! Well, yeah! What were your favorite games?”
The Calculator took the bait. As he went on and on about Blasting the Banks, Dino Destruction, and other games, Batgirl began the reverse programming. But the Calculator was not to be outsmarted. As he babbled on about Craft of Warworld, he was beefing up his HarleyWhams, giving them more power. Every now and then, just for fun—ZAP!—the Calculator would hit shift Z, sending a shock through Beast Boy.
It was time for Batgirl to activate the second step of crisis negotiation: empathy.
“Wow, I am so sorry kids made fun of you,” she told the Calculator.
“Yeah, well, they were just jealous of how smart I was,” he told her. “And that I got great grades and that I knew more about computers than even the teachers.”
Batgirl nodded. “I can understand that,” she told him honestly. She was so close to reversing the HarleyWhams, but she knew that if she didn’t get rid of them entirely, the Calculator could figure out a way to bring them back stronger than ever before. Batgirl turned the HarleyWhams back into HarleyGrams, then made them retrace their steps until each computer was returned to how it had been before downloading the HarleyGram. With that done, the HarleyGram would self-destruct into a small, glittery poof.
“What are you doing?” the Calculator asked, sounding annoyed.
“Making the world right again,” Batgirl said. “Remember what that was like?” She moved on to the rapport part of the crisis negotiation. Batgirl knew she needed to gain the Calculator’s trust, then try to change him for the better.
“NO!” he shouted. His big computer screens broadcast scenes of traffic lights turning back on and planes taking off as scheduled….Chaos was turning to calm again all over the world.
The Calculator stood up and kicked her chair. “What have you done?”
“I’ve stopped the destruction you started,” Batgirl said calmly, standing to face him.
The Calculator bent over and clutched his stomach. “Are you okay?” she asked.
“No,” he said. “I have a stomachache, and it’s your fault! I was going to save the world. That was my plan, and you ruined it!”
“I—I don’t understand,” Batgirl stammered. What was she missing here? She thought he wanted to destroy the world.
“My parents don’t understand me,” the Calculator moaned. “They think I’m some sort of nerd who’s out of touch. Actually, they don’t think much of me at all. They’re too busy growing things and taking care of nature. Bah!”
Batgirl knew to be silent. To just let him talk. As he did, she let one hand work the keys of her computer to deprogram the laser cage that had Beast Boy Batty trapped.
“My plan was to create chaos. So much that they would have to take note. And then, when it looked like things got totally out of hand…I’d use my computer skills to save the world!”
“Oh,” Batgirl said, careful not to anger him. “So you’re not a bad guy after all?”
He nodded.
“Let me see if I understand this. You wanted to destroy the world so you could save it?” she said.
“That’s right!” Calculator said.
“But won’t that be weird?” Batgirl asked. “I mean, everyone will know that it was you who tried to bring the world down in the first place.”
An evil smile slowly crossed the Calculator’s face. “Oh, Batgirl, I thought you were supposed to be smart,” he said. “It’s not me the world thinks is trying to disable the Internet and create disarray and destruction. It’s you!”
“Me?” she asked.
“Why, yes. Don’t you follow the news? Everyone knows that you created the HarleyGrams, and hence the HarleyWhams. You are at fault here. I was simply going to clean up your mess.”
Batgirl was about to say something when she noticed the blaster-like Taser in the Calculator’s hand. He pointed it at her. “Now, I can’t have you around disputing all this, so bye-bye, Batgirl!”