by Michele | Oct 4, 2017 | Chronicles
Damien: Damien Wayne.
The son of Bruce Wayne, The Batman. Heir to the cowl.
Damien stands in front of the glass display cases that holds his old outfit in the Bat Cave, along with his fathers. Looking into the glass at his father’s uniform, he stares at it for a long time. Seeing himself in the uniform in the reflection. Was this how it was supposed to be? Was this Bruce’s plan all along? Surely his father had someone worthier to become the Batman. Richard, in his mind, is the best candidate. But, would he take it?
He knew that the path he was treading was not one set by his father. But someone murdered his father. Someone was able to do something nobody else could have done.
Kill Batman.
Would his father condone his actions? More than likely, his father would be ashamed. Didn’t he understand? Sometimes you had to take the law in your own hands. To make sure that the next Joker can’t be born. To send such a deep chill down the spines of organized crime…that they rather go elsewhere, than to stay in Gotham. Damien had been raised by the League of Assassins. They’re very belief is to purge the world and to provide order to the chaos.
“Why, Father?” asking the uniform, putting his hand on the glass.
“I am your flesh and blood, it is my duty as your son to find who did this to you. My methods may not be what you wished for, but it is all I know.” glancing down for a moment, Damien squeezes his fists as he looks back up staring back at the reflection, seeing himself in the cape and cowl. “I will find who did this to you, father. And I will make them suffer for their egregious crimes.”
Dinah: I’ve been to the Bat Cave many times. Far less times since my return to Gotham City than all the years before that. The first time when I was in High School myself, still hellbent on revenge more than justice and making things right. The state of the police department now doesn’t exactly tell me that I was wrong at the time in thinking it wasn’t good for anything but tearing to the ground. Not that there isn’t good cops still, like Barbara’s father. I’d been brought around to seeing things in a better light though. During that time I’d become a regular here, and I’d done as much training with Bruce as I did training the others. In a way it’d become the home to replace all the other parts that make up a home I had lost.
And out of all of that, all that time spent, would you believe this is probably the fourth time I’ve come in through the front door?
I’d wanted to ride my bike, only to find an enterprising ‘friend’ had demolished it. Oh, I’m sorry, he’s improving it. Either way, it had led to a lot of colorful and ungrateful expletives. I coped with the improvements to my suit. The bike was proving to be another matter entirely. I wasn’t really all that much more excited to be chauffeured up to the Wayne Estate in a limo, either. It’s only Alfred Pennyworth’s charm and the fact that he fed me a better meal than I’ve had in at least two months that has me in my currently sunny disposition.
Given what we’re actually here for, however, I don’t know that it’s going to last.
“You do know there’s much better ways of making people suffer than just killing them, right? Oh, and hello Damien.”
No Hood tonight? God. I had so many great things prepared to say to him. Tim mellowed me out a little on the entire subject the other night though or he’d be getting a lot more sharply pointed barbs.
Tim: For the second time since Bruce’s death, I’m coming home. I’d been here for the official funeral, stayed long enough to talk with Alfred and make some arrangements. Then I’d set off. Dick and I didn’t exactly see eye to eye on the future. Damien and I have rarely seen eye to eye on anything. It made things difficult. Especially once the two of them found out that I was more interested in inheriting the Foundation, than the Bat Cave. I think all they care about is the Mantle. Maybe I’m wrong, but I couldn’t take the chance that I was. Someone needed to protect Bruce’s legacy, while all of us struggle to cope with the loss and worry about Batman’s legacy.
This second trip home? A little less gloomy than the last. Alfred was clearly thrilled to have guests. Even more thrilled to cook. I think he was absolutely Game to turn the Canary’s frown upside down. Especially once he intuited that I wasn’t the real reason for her displeasure. Bike dismantling aside, given that she knows that she’ll be getting it back new and improved. Okay, in the case of the bike maybe that doesn’t help mute her displeasure, but a good home cooked meal and some world-famous crepes have done enough to put the color in Dinah’s cheeks.
For the record? Damien owes me one. If we’d come in on the bikes, I’m half-way certain he’d have been getting a billy club to the head. I’d ruled out the possibility of her Canary’ing him, on account of him not being able to hear the lecture that is about to commence. Waiting for my opinion, I step in off the hidden elevator behind Dinah, with two hands in my pants pockets. Doing my best to ‘back Dinah up’ while being as non-threatening as humanly possible.
“Damien,” giving the other Wayne-son a nod of acknowledgement, before Dinah starts off the festivities. “How is the new helmet working? Does the Heads up Display keep your 360 degree line of sight going, despite the constricting Hood….?”
Oh. Right. That’s not at all why we’re here. Is it? Yikes. I should have taken this a different way. Flashing Dinah a moderately apologetic look, I try to correct course, “I miss him too.”
Damien: Damien doesn’t turn around as Dinah starts. Instead, he keeps staring at the outfit. “Dinah. Timothy.” greeting them the best he can at the moment. Slowly, he turns around, keeping his hands in his pockets. He’s not looking for a fight tonight, well, at least a physical fight. “The Hood is doing great. Thank you again, Timothy. It has been an excellent tool in my dealings with the underworld of Gotham.” explaining as he takes a deep breath, turning his level gaze from Tim to Dinah.
“You are correct, Dinah. I am sure there are other ways.” his tone is level, absolutely level. There’s no expression of regret, pain or anything. But, this was how he always was. When he was younger, he was full of anger and rage. Wanting to take the world and burn it. While, the anger and rage is still there. It’s much more channeled into his dealings with the mobs. “But. I do not subscribe to those ways.” offering as he moves closer to them, but staying out of arms reach of Dinah.
“I know my actions do not sit well with you. It is the best method of getting the information we need, and to keep the mobs, gangsters and other riff raff of this city under control. If you have no noticed, the city is slowly becoming worse. Even while Bruce would do as much he can, even he, saw the inevitable. I am doing what needs to be done. In the mean time, I am attempting to find who killed my father.” glancing to the two of them, but more to Dinah. Keeping his gaze level and emotionless.
“Please. Enlighten me of the information you have found using your methods. I am curious to see what you have uncovered, Dinah.” gesturing slightly as he pulls one hand out of his pocket before sliding it back in casually. Damien had accepted Tim has his brother, even if it may be a strained relationship. “I am glad you are here, Timothy. Our father would be proud of the steps you have taken to continue his legacy.” Damien knew that what he was doing wasn’t the Bat-Family way of doing things, but it had been a very long time since he considered himself part of the Bat-Family.
Dinah: I don’t think I need to actually say anything in response to Tim’s curiosity. The way my lips purse and pull to the side is an expression that he can surely read by now. Besides. I’ve heard that sometimes I’m much more frightening when I’m not being mouthy. It means I’m probably about to express physical displeasure instead of verbal. We have also already had a discussion about the subject, one that he actually more or less managed to bring me around to his way of thinking on. Okay. I wouldn’t go that far, but I understood his reasoning. It’s also why I’ve suddenly found myself back in the role of combat instructor, with two pupils. One of which is significantly better than the other. For now at least.
Believe it or not, I’m actually rather quiet as a whole once I get past my opening jab. Any great ‘discussion’ functions rather like a fist fight, though. You test the mood of your opponent, their reaction, how likely they are to waver or overreact when provoked.
“I have. I also noticed a general state of criminal hibernation while they jointly shoved their heads in the sand hoping that no one would think they were just ballsy enough to have actually been the one that took out the Batman.”
Like a pack of unruly kids sitting in class and wanting desperately for the teacher not to call on them because they didn’t have the answer to the test, and they didn’t want detention. Only the kids are the mob, Joker’s the professor and it’s death instead of detention.
“Up until they realized they were going to have to start defending themselves. And that behaving wasn’t actually doing any good.”
There it is. The inevitable. Trying to turn this back in order to prove that his method works better than hours, because we are lacking results. Which isn’t even untrue, and it frustrates the hell out of me. I know it does Tim, as well. No matter what leads we’ve chased down what alleys, they don’t seem to amount to much. We’d started with the plan of tailing the Joker through Gotham not long after I’d gotten here, and it’s what I’d been doing. It’s why I’d caught onto Damien’s actions, though maybe I should have expected.
“I’m wagering exactly as much as you and your new playmate have, kiddo.”
Tim: There’s no real denying the body language of my being pleased with his new gear working well. I mean, it doesn’t behoove me to make something that is going to fail does it? I realize we’re here to discuss his methods. I know that Dinah is actually right. Hell, I wouldn’t condone his methods myself any other time. But my point still remains the same as it did before and it seems like Damien is seeing it the same way. Doing things his way has at least had a result. My way hasn’t turned up a single clue. Dick’s? Seem to only be benefiting Dick and Babs. If I can assist him, even if only through keeping our Father’s name out of the muck when someone finds out that it’s Damien doing it? Well…
“Thanks, Damien,” shockingly enough I’m a little surprised by the praise. “I’m not ready to be the Bat, but Bruce put a lot of time and money in to making sure that I was ready to step in and keep Wayne Corp moving forward.”
For the most part Lucius Fox is doing all of the heavy lifting. Just like he did for Bruce. I’ve just stepped in to be a figurehead. To give people someone to look to that still has the Wayne name attached to it. Well, that and it allows me to control the R&D division. Which the entire family needs to continue it’s work. But again, I know that’s very much not why we’re here. I also know Damien paid me that compliment for a tactical reason. He does nothing without a measure of tactics involved. It’s what I like most and least about him at the same time.
“Actually, the ‘new playmate’ is one of the reasons that I’m here, Damien,” following up on what Dinah has said, I take a step closer. “When the Joker first showed back up, I asked Dinah if she would be willing to tale him. I didn’t ask her to bring him down. I didn’t send out the red alerts, so that we could all get together and kick his teeth in. I knew what he would do and all I asked was for Dinah to watch him. To tell me, in her own judgment, when Joker was branching out and going ‘too far’.”
“Sounds like I had the same thought as you then too, but… you know we can’t actually work with him right?”
Damien: Looking between them, he simply lifts a brow then narrows his eyes at the two of them. “The Joker is a psychotic lunatic that my father should have killed long ago. I do not consider him a ‘playmate’. At the moment, He lives only because I believe he can be useful. It seems, Joker is mourning. Letting him work the underworld in his own way can be for our benefit. This does not mean I trust him. This does not make him a friend. At the moment, our paths align and I intend on using him as a tool. Once he has outlived his usefulness.” shaking his head.
“Do you two have so little faith in me that you think I would consider Joker a friend? Or, as you put it, Dinah. A ‘playmate’?” asking. Though, the inflection in his voice didn’t change. Pulling his hands out of his pockets, he turns around and gazes at the costume his father once more. “Sometimes you must work your enemy to get to the end result.” licking his lips, he takes a breath. “When I was with father as Robin. There were times we had to work with the enemy. Not out of trust, or friendship. Because it was a means to an end.”
Turning around, he faces Tim.
“I do not think any of us want the mantle. But, I believe Richard should be the one who takes it. Though, I do not believe he will. If you do not want it. Then, I believe it falls onto me.” a shrug. Something he didn’t consider when coming back to Gotham, and to the life.
Dinah: God’s Honest Truth was Tim’s original mission for me, which had been as much my idea as it was his, had been proving so much harder than the one I’ve just gotten back from Metropolis on. I might actually choose picking repeated fights with Superman, even though the trick I used the first time will certainly not work again, over how I’ve been spending a lot of my nights here in Gotham. I hadn’t thought it would be so difficult. Following the maniac around and not engaging. Just watching who he’s crossing off his list, so that we could cross it off ours without getting our hands dirty. There comes a point though, where watching the bloodshed is too much. I know that most, if not all, of his so called victims are the scum of Gotham. But we don’t murder people.
Nor have I ever made a habit out of watching as someone else did it.
“Keeping your friends close, and your enemies closer? There’s a few other sayings that come to mine here as well. Like guilty by association.”
I’m trying to be nice. Well. Not nice. Civil. To at least listen to his side before I decide that yes, my side is right, his is wrong, and he needs his ass beat. It might be cathartic. Damien might give me a run for my money, even. Judgmental or not, with my arms crossed across my chest and my lips pursed, I’m also oddly understanding. He’s hurting. They all are. I am, too. Rage is one thing. Impotent rage has a way of chewing out your soul and then what is it replaced with?
“What if that’s what the Joker wants, Damien?”
Tim: Damien’s question is legitimate. Do any of us really think that he would become ‘friends’ with the Joker? No. Categorically ‘No’ is the only answer that I can come up with. However it’s not the easy. Dinah’s alluding to it herself, but she’s playing a game that Damien is going to win. Keeping this a discussion of ‘What if?’ instead of ‘What is?’ There’s no discussing the might be, could be, probably with Damien Wayne. Even when he was younger there a certain amount of unwillingness to entertain the notions of things being out of his control. What we need to deal with here, I think, is the literal situation as it is.
“Let’s set Sun Tzu aside for just a moment, I’ll discuss that with you later if you want. For now let’s pose this as a different sort of question.”
For that purpose I step in further. Making my way to the encased costumes and closer to Damien. I know that the two of us haven’t always (or even ever really) seen eye to eye in the past. We’ve had differences in ideology. What we’ve always had in common though? Is the family we’re associated with. The ones we’re loyal too. Even more important than the one we’ve lost, are perhaps the ones we still have here and now. I think that’s going to have better traction with him. So that’s where I start.
Putting my hand up on the case with Jason Todd’s costume, for the first time I’m going to tell these two what is on -my- mind, “The truth is, Damien. I want it. When I first came here, it was after your Father brought me here. I figured out who Batman was and I’d tried to force him to let me take Jason Todd’s place” Your Father refused me time and time again. He didn’t want another Robin at the time. He didn’t want to take a risk with attachments. He didn’t want to have a Robin because of the weakness it created in him. He also didn’t think I would live up to the Legacy, because I hadn’t lost my family at that point. He didn’t think I had the drive to be his equal.”
“It took my whole family almost being killed, because I wouldn’t stop investigating crimes. Without the tools to do it safely. Safely for them, not so much myself. He recognized then that I wouldn’t give up just because he told me no. So he offered to let me be his partner, on his terms. To train me, give me the tools that I was missing that would compliment the ones I already had. I wasn’t allowed to leave this cave until I was ready.”
This is when I turn from the case containing Jason Todd’s costume and take the few steps toward Bruce’s. The Batsuit which Damien is nearest dominates the Cave’s museum, as it should. “I want to take this suit and put it on. I want to make him proud. I want to preserve his legacy. It’s what I want with my whole being, Damien.”
“Everything I just said, applies to you a hundred times more than it does me,” there is this small, almost sad, shake of the head. “Can you do it? Yes. You could put this on and go out there as Batman, but would you be Batman? Would you preserve the Legacy that is Batman?”
Reaching out to lightly tap Damien’s nearest hand before continuing with a slightly lowered voice, “You have blood on your hands. Not old blood. Not blood you’re atoning for. You’re getting more blood on your hands every time you put on the Red Hood. There’s only so much blood you can get on them before it won’t wash off. Once you cross that line, Damien, you can’t ever put that suit on. Because you’ll destroy the one thing I know you want to preserve.”
“So. I’m going to make you an offer. Probably the offer I should have made you, instead of giving you the Hood. Help me. I’ll put the suit on, if I must or Dick will, but only until you’re ready. Only until you wash this blood of your hands and you’re ready to inherit the Legacy your father wanted you to take.”
Damien: Looking to Tim, and to Dinah, then finally back to Tim. There was a lot to process. “I do not believe I will ever be worth of the mantle, Timothy.” admitting. “I did not come back home to take the mantle. I may be his biological son. And that would make me the natural heir. But, He did not know of my existence until I was older. By the time I had arrived, I was already trained very well by the League of Assassins. As you, and Dinah knows.” gesturing.
“I came home to see what happened with my father, and to avenge his death. To find whoever did this and make them feel pain that they will never know.” that’s the honest word. “I am unsure if I feel worth of the mantle, due to the blood that I have on my hands, and the continuing blood. I believe he would wish for you, or Richard to take the mantle. You are his pupils more than I ever was. You were brought up with his ideals and his ways. I was raised by the most lethal assassins in the world. My grandfather is one of my father’s greatest enemies. Ra’s al Ghul. The demons head. My mother is Talia al Ghul. His daughter. Together, My education started in blood.
I was seven years old when I first stained my hands with blood.”
Looking down. “I was never meant to inherit the crown, so to speak. If I am to inherent anything, it would be to become the next Ra’s al Ghul.” lifting his head, he looks at Tim. “I wish for you, Timothy, or Richard to become the next Batman.” it was something he never aspired to. “As for the Joker. I have been keeping tabs on him as well. Though, apparently, not as well as you have, Dinah. The Joker is not a force to be reckon with. I propose while he does what he does, we send out tips on how to steer his chaotic nature.
Also, Dinah. I believe you and Helena need to have a chat. She has a contact that may know something, but she is unwilling to tell me. Afraid that I will… scare her away.” like Damien would scare anybody away.
“For the memory and legacy of our father, Timothy. And to our mentor, Dinah. I … will not commit as much bloodshed, as it seems you are wholly against it. But, I do not promise that some may not perish through my interaction.” turning around, he takes a deep breath, turning to look at the costume that makes the Batcave… what it is.
“After we figure out who murdered our father, Timothy. I am unsure if I will stay. But, we will come to that road when we come to it.”
Dinah: “And I was six the first time I shrieked down an entire roomful of people. Just because we started too early in this life doesn’t mean we haven’t, and can’t, learn to control it and aim ourselves better.”
There comes a point, even though I do love to talk, that my love of the sound of my own voice doesn’t trump sense and understanding. I would have made a great detective, if I could have stomached working within the law and the system that I don’t actually have all that much faith in. If it worked? We wouldn’t have needed Batman and the rest of us in the first place, would we? Not because I’m good at chasing down clues, matching them up into threads of an investigation. I am good at those things, but I’m an even betterreader of people. Some of them are easier than others. Our new Superman had more or less been an open book.
I would say that ordinarily Damien Wayne would be more difficult, but pain, loss and the need for vengeance have made him a bit more of an open book. I can rant, and lecture, and scold but the truth of the matter is? I’m an Exile. We have a great deal in common, all of us do, and while we did share a mentor as he says, I’m not one of the Bats. Gotham is my home, it’s where I was born, but I can’t belong here without bringing a whole lot worse on everyone’s heads if I stick around. Which is why tailing duty ‘only’ had been a good call. No reason or excuse to actually loose the Canary Cry on anyone.
Enter Timothy Drake-Wayne. I hang back while he moves in closer, letting the Once and Future Brothers talk without my interruption. A novelty that I hope they will savor and appreciate for its rarity, and how unlikely that is ever to happen again. But it’s the right angle to approach this with. There’s a sharply raised eyebrow at the back of Tim’s head when he offers to put the suit on though. That was maybe the last thing I expected to hear, because I know he doesn’t really want it. That’s not the role he seems himself in, and he’s pretty upfront about that much. Frankly I’d have expected me to have to put it on before he would. And that’s not happening. Far too covering. And I don’t think a cowl would go well with the fishnets anyway.
I’m an entirely good girl, and manage to keep my snark about him scaring people off to myself. And my doubt that someone like him wouldn’t know the line before you’re going to kill someone.
“Thanks for the tip, Damien. I’ll talk to her. And let you know what I find out. I’m not, by the way, opposed to you kicking the shit out of mobsters that have it coming. I’m actually a little jealous. But. As the wise one here said.”
Jerking my thumb at Tim.
“There is a line. And believe me. I know how hard it is not to want to cross it. But your Father pulled me up short of that, once upon a time Damien. I owe it to him to pay that forward a little if I can.”
Tim: “Hold on, I’m not done.”
That’s me calling him off once he gets a head of steam, because I know what he’s saying. Hell, I deal with this all the time. Admittedly I’m coming at this self-depreciation from a different direction, but I’m still feeling the same things and the same way. In a lot of ways it’s surprising to hear him voice the same things I’ve said. I’ve said some of those things recently too. Maybe because of that I’ve got a lot more to say than normal.
“You’re right, in a lot of ways. I didn’t think you were worthy of being Robin when you first came here. For all of the same reasons you just laid out. I was against it, you were against me. So I’m pretty sure this is where I’m going to surprise you, Damien. -I- think everything you listed, everything that had me against you becoming Robin, are the exact reasons that you should inherit the mantle. When you’re ready. The same reasons that I argued against you taking my place as Robin? Are the same things that make me think you’re the one to carry the Cowl eventually.”
“Because I was wrong. I mean. You’re a terrible narcissistic jerk, with a self-aggrandizing penchant for violence and murder. But. You were able to conquer those things. You were able to overcome them for a time. You can again. You need time, I get it. We all do. When the time comes though Damien? Who is going to be better than you? Who is going to be more driven to overcome those challenges? You can’t look me in the eyes and tell me that you’re going to let your genetics dominate you. You can’t tell me that your ‘teachings’ are going to define you.”
It’s this small snort that sounds a bit like a half-laugh that emphasizes my argument to all of this. “Seriously, Damien. Look me in the eyes and tell me that you are still your grandfather’s bitch. You can’t. Your ego won’t let you. It won’t let your mother’s teachings rule you either. They’ll temper you, but you’re too stubborn to let them control you. If anything? You’re going to rail against them so hard that once you get control of yourself you’re going to be the Best of us.”
Taking my cue then from Dinah, I let myself go quiet for a moment. As much looking up at the suit, the cowl, as I am listening to the two of them for a moment. Filing away the information. The Huntress? By all accounts she’d disappeared shortly after asking Dinah to return. Curious that she would have some sort of lead but need to be contacted. Why bring Dinah back to leave her in the dark? That speaks of something a little more nefarious than I’d have wanted to ascribe to Helena. She’s been one of us a long time. Like Damien she’s got skeletons in her closet, but I thought she’d locked the door and thrown away the key.
As Dinah finds her footing and makes her point, I chip back in. Though this time I do it with a studious look at the Man next to me. “You’re actually wrong about a couple things, but one of them is actually important enough for me to argue with you about it. You actually were meant wear the Cowl. No, seriously. When we first met, I went to Bruce and told him I didn’t think you’d be a good Robin. He told me that I wasn’t looking at it clearly. That I was letting my emotions blind me to your actual talents.”
“That discussion with Bruce is when he told me about his plans. He sent me off to school, you became Robin. Dick went off to be Nightwing. He had me travelling the world. Learning the ins and outs of the Business, Technology and Science side of his world. He wanted -me- to be armed with the tools to inherit the Business. He wanted you to inherit the cowl. Because you have those tools. Bruce wanted his sons to work together, Damien. To work together to be better than he was.”
“We have a chance here, to not just protect our Father’s legacy, but to build on it. To further the work he started, not just continue it. So, like I said. I’ll take the cape and the cowl, but only if you promise me that you’re going to be ready to come take it from me.” Pausing for barely a heart-beat, before turning to him more directly. The next bit may sound like a question, but it’s not. “Do we have a deal?”
Damien: Honestly, Damien never really had friends. Often driving the ones he did have, or starting conflicts with them. It was hard to listen to both Dinah and Tim. Showing him that he could change. And at one point, he had changed. Damien never wanted the mantle, but Tim was right. He was groomed to become the next Batman, even if he had initially ran away from his father. To forge his own path. But, the fact that Tim wanted to take the mantle, and then give it over to Damien? That made him wildly uncomfortable, it was a legacy that he wasn’t sure he could uphold. If he was worthy of it. The skeletons in his closet were much more visible.
If he were to become the Batman. The League, his Grandfather and even his Mother could be very deadly enemies. For once, Damien’s level gaze broke slightly as the thought of him honoring his father in such a fashion took hold in his mind. That Tim, approved of the idea. Would Dick? He didn’t know, and he wasn’t sure where this faith from Tim was coming from. For the longest time, they clashed, fought. Sometimes with words, sometimes with fists. Maybe it was because they both have grown and become more mature? Going silent, for once. Damien didn’t have anything to say, he didn’t know what to say. It felt like an eternity before Damien found his voice again.
Instead of going in for a hand shake, Damien instead reaches up to slide his hand along Tim’s jawline. His large hand palming his brothers face as he tilted his head up so that the two were looking into each other’s eyes. To study Tim’s eyes, to determine if the young man was telling the truth. “We are brothers, Timothy. Now, and forever. If you wish for this to happen, then so be it. Father would be proud. I will… work on my habits. To curb them once more. To become someone worthy of the mantle. We have a deal, my brother.”
Then with a hint of a smile as he pulls his hand from Tim’s head.
“But, You are the one to tell Richard of your idea.”
Turning to Dinah, he offers his hand out to her.
“I… realize we have not always seen eye to eye. I wish for us to communicate better. To .. share information.” it was difficult for Tim to admit this, to want to work together with other people. For so long, he’d been on his own. Now, here was this branch being extended to him. “I know you will.. what is the phrasing… ‘Keep me in check?’…And I wish for you to help me with this, Dinah.”
Dinah: This really isn’t how I thought this was going to go. With how good I am at reading people and situations, that’s a little shocking. Sometimes you have to adapt on the fly with what’s in front of you, roll with any punches, and then comes up swinging regardless though. I think we may have just ended up doing the Good Cop/Bad Cop routine, and I didn’t even get to punch the guy in the face or rough him up in the slightest. That’s a shame. I guess I’ve already gotten to yell at someone this week, and that’s as full as my quota is likely to get. Damien’s actually going to try. Which is further than I thought we’d get in one outing. And apparently Tim’s going to put on the Cowl. Which is even less believable than a compromising Damien Wayne.
And yet here we are. Having an actually touching moment. In the Bat Cave. Night of firsts, isn’t it?
I’m actually laughing when I take Damien’s hand, a musical chortle over Tim having to be the one to break the news to Dick. Smooth. Or maybe it’s that I’m mentally hearing a phone call, complete with my roommate using the Batman gravely voice to just reveal it that way. I’m Batman, Dick.
“Oh, you bet I will kiddo. And I’d like that. The information sharing. I’ll try not to yell at you. Too much.”
There’s actually barely any age difference between us. It doesn’t stop me from the mothering nicknames though. Never has. My other hand comes up, no not to punch him while using our clasped hands to yank him into the blow. That would be completely unjustified right now. But to lay over the top of our hands, a show of sentiment if you will. I really dofeel his pain and frustration. Having gotten to deal with and bury mine doesn’t mean I don’t still remember what it was like. Letting go, I take a step back, stretching my arms over head as if I’ve just finished a trying workout, before pointing back the way we’d came.
“Now. If you’ll excuse me for a minute I think I heard Alfred saying the words creme and brulee in rougly the same breath.”
Tim: “This has to happen,” because I think this discussion is the only way to save your soul Damien, I just can’t say that out loud, “A wise man once said ‘Do or do not, there is no try.’ I know you can do this Damien. I know we can do this.”
Maybe it’s this moment of bonding. Maybe it’s the fact that this is the right thing to do. Whatever the case may be? I don’t want the Cowl and I’m only willing to even touch it, if Damien’s giving his word to come take it from me. Soon. In which case I’m nothing more than a placeholder, for the main event. That’s something I can deal with. I’m fairly sure, pretty, maybe sure, that the Cowl won’t crush me in the time it takes Damien to find himself. After all we’ve both grown up at least this much. Here we are having this conversation. Talking to one another without beating one or the other of us half to death.
While he didn’t shake my hand, he did the next best thing. For a weirdo. “It’s all settled then. Sure, I’ll call Richa… wait… I’m not calling Dick. Hold on. Where the hell are you two going?!”
“Guys.”
“Guys!”
The two of them are what? Leaving me here. One of them is going for creme brulee. The other is leaving me to talk to Dick? We came here to save Damien’s soul. That mission seems accomplished, but at what cost? A sideways glance at the Cape and Cowl hanging in the case, before I make a decision. I’m not going down this path without a drink. Creme Brulee my ass. I’m going to need something with a little kick before I do what Damien just said.
Sure enough. There the two of them go. Leaving me here. In the Bat Cave. With one task and one task only. “You guys are dicks.”
by Michele | Oct 1, 2017 | Chronicles
Conner: Ordinarily I should be in class right now. Should be, but that doesn’t mean I am. Being a Luthor, son of the President, comes with a lot of leeway about attendance. Which St. Joseph’s School for Boys is not normally keen on, but they made an exception. The Luthor family has a very long history there. My father, his father before him, so on and so forth. On a good day I attend most of the classes, except for driver’s ed. Most days, I show up in the morning for first period, maybe second, but then spend the rest of the day ‘at work.’ Infrequently there’s also opportunities to cut classes and work, to talk Cassie in to being a bit of a delinquent with me.
Today is not an ordinary day, because yesterday was an extraordinary one. Extraordinarily bad one. There had been no trip to St. Joseph’s. Nor a call in to ‘Work.’ Helena Sandsmark had called multiple times, but once I’d made certain she was in no danger, they went unanswered. Instead of those things, for the first time in recent history? Metropolis had it’s Superman. With all the bells and whistles there in. Armed Robbery on 7th Avenue? A blue-red blur had left the robbers hanging from a light pole. Hostage situation on a Subway car? Ended with only minimal damage, since I had to pull one of the doors off the car to gain entry. Cat in a tree? Not a problem. For me. The Cat will probably have a nervous tick the rest of it’s life from the twelve thousand mile an hour rescue it received.
The Daily Planet is probably going to put today down as a ‘Pretty Good Day’ for Metropolis. Or they will, as soon as I’m finished with… what’s this guy’s name again?
:: …. Metallo! Really, how many times do I have to tell you? I’m Metallo! And you, Superman, pshaw. Are a threat to our…::
“…hey, don’t mean to interrupt your monologue, but is that a suit of armor?”
::.. uh, yes? It’s titanium enhanced, laced with krytonite your mortal weakness Alien!..::
“So. You’re like completely protected by that suit of armor right?”
::…absolutely! You’ve never faced an opponent like me. I’ve downed the real Superm–…::
POW!
That last bit is more in my mind, than reality. I like to imagine my fist hitting the bad guys with sound effects. Because it’s much more fun than the sound real Titanium and Krytonite alloy make when they’re hit with enough force to level a small building. The force of the strike blew out the windows in every car for a City Block. I hope these people have insurance. Well. Except that guy with the Geo Metro. Olsen something. What a dumb ass. Oh, look. Adoring fans. People with questions. I don’t know who this Perry White guy is, but I’m having a hard time stomaching his thank-yous with all that cigar scent rolling off of him.
“No, no. No time interviews. Gotta go wrap up…uh…”
Metallo?
“…oh, right. Thanks Olsen. …wrap up Metallo.”
What the hell kind of name is Metallo, anyway? I mean. Ugh. And that suit of armor he wore. Emerald Armor? What sort of tool-bag wears a green costume. Jesus, these guys are going to need to get a fashion coordinator or something. How am I even supposed to take a man serious, ranting and raving about Alien threats in a little green suit. I’ll have a talk with him while I’m pulling him out of the side of the building he flew through.
Cassie: Superman isn’t the only one that’s ditching class. Some of us just need excuses to get away with it, rather than a sort of general acceptance of poor behavior because it’s just not worth the hassle of dealing with it. My family aren’t heirs to some sort of plastic empire, or from long lines of politicians with deep pockets that they’ve used to line the alumni’s. Nope. I’m a scholarship kid, and what leeway I get mostly only comes from the fact that I’m so far ahead in my classwork, and most of the teachers at least recognize that I probably shouldn’tactually be there. Except my History teacher. He’s the only one that makes me feel bad for ditching, and that’s not even intentional. I’ve just started to actually enjoy, and be engaged by, that hour of my day.
Still. I’ve got a long line of excuses I can fall back on. Cheerleader business. Tutoring responsibilities. Off-site project work with Mom. Conner Luthor pulled up in his red sports car, and please for the love of God just go with him so he stops distracting the student body. Not even a tiny bit of oh, you’re a literal goddess please! Do whatever you want! Grumblegrumble… where is that coming from? I’m progressively more irritated with slights that aren’t even slights lately, because they don’t know. Almost no one does and that’s by design. And apparently the feeling is being returned by basically everyone right now. Mom’s irritated. Conner sure seemed irritated. At least Freddy and Tim aren’t mad at me. Still. As personally affronted as I’d like to feel right now by the world, by my Father, by…everything… after finally checking my phone on the way out of Fawcett, after I’d eaten an impressive amount of food in the diner (which was, in fact, the best I’d ever had), I can’t help feeling like maybe I deserve at least a little of it.
Is it really my fault that Conner is so horrible at explaining anything without coming off like. Well. Him? I don’t think it is. Part of me’s ranting that I shouldn’t feel bad, but the bulk majority of me and my conscience still has managed to stuff that little angry thought bubble down in my brain once again. I’d had my moment of angry rebellion when I’d stayed in Fawcett for the night, making the trip back this morning only took half an hour and that’s because I was going slow. Slow for me anyway. With the supersuit back on, I could just enjoy the flying. And the solitude, though admittedly I didn’t enjoy that part all that much. Too much time to think, and my dreams had made for a not very restful couple hours of sleep.
I’m actually shocked to realize Conner’s out and about working. Not NOWHERE style work, as far as I can tell, just out being… Superman. I almost go to help, except I know he doesn’t need it, and it’s almost comical the speed with which he handles the man in the tacky, terrible little suit. I guess that makes me appreciate that mine’s not awful. Maybe it’s a good thing I didn’t design it myself. I probably would have just gone with jeans and a teeshirt.. I don’t come around the building until Metallo has made his crater in the face of the building opposite their original conversation, dropping out of the silhouette of the still climbing sun.
“Where do they even get those suits? I mean, there’s gaudy and then there’s…”
Standing her, well, hovering here snarking about awful green fashion choices isn’t a me kind of thing to do. That sounds more like I’m channeling my inner M’gan and that’s not what I was actually going for. I suppose it’s not terribly Wonder Woman-ish to be ten feet off the ground, twisting her fingers in knots behind her back and fidgeting because she just doesn’t know what to do with herself right now. That’s because you’re not really Wonder Woman. You’re Cassie Sandsmark, cheerleader and mean girlfriend.
“Can I…help?”
Conner: Where do they get these suits? Good question. In this case the answer is an easy one, though for the moment not a terribly important one. Metallo is a product of the world we live in. A response to the Alien threat that eventually drove the original Superman away. He was one of the originals, that sparked up in response to the Meta-Human rising popularity, then eventual decline. Much like Batman has always kept metas out of Gotham, because the world likes to respond to such things with an equal level of crazy? The original Superman caused people like this, to put their ingenuity to work in ways that they felt were helping their fellow man. He just happens to want to rid the world of the ‘Alien Filth.’ I’m not actually an Alien, but I suppose he doesn’t know that.
“The metallic crystalline structure of this material is actually something I’ve seen before,” I start to explain as I’m hefting the green and orange clad man out of the crumbling building face. “There was something like this in the laboratory where I was…”
Created. Except that I know, I’m not actually supposed to say that in a place where it might get caught. There are news people all over the place, so for once I make a small effort towards good behavior and curtail what I was about to say. Leaving me to tug the man out of the rubble and dangle him there by one arm.
“It’s a little more rudimentary than what I’ve seen before. The Project has existed for a long time, there’s a chance he’s got some connection to it, but I don’t recognize … uh…mootatoe? I dunno. Something like that.” Peering from the ghastly armor of the fallen bad guy, up to the far more sparkly armor of the Girl of Power? Much more pleasant sight. “Whatever his name is, I don’t think I need much help with this one. Need something to tie him up with. Hand me your electron rope.”
“The taser wire? Ahem. Wonder Woman,” harumphing softly to get her to look at me more closely, so that I can gesture to her suit’s belt. “It’s not just stylish, it’s functional. You didn’t read the manual did you?”
Cassie: He doesn’t need to finish. The lab where he was made. I know the truth of his upbringing, and it’s one of the only reasons I give him as much leeway as I do. Before I had feelings for him, that is. There’s a degree of knowing that it’s not all entirely his fault, but sometimes even that gets tempered by my thinking he uses it as an excuse on occasion. That’s not why it’s been brought up right now though. He’s seen a similar material before. Which means that NOWHERE had it, or something like it. What are the chances of NOWHERE project materials getting out into the world to be used by a random alien hater?
Slim. Possibly none. Maybe it’s just my last twenty-four hours that has me feeling suspicious and semi-hostile towards the powers that be, mystical or otherwise, but that purses my lips and makes me a little bit more grumpy than I already was. Are they sending out people, even if it’s in a roundabout way, to bring attention to the new Superman and what he can do? Or is it just a coincidence and powered heroes bring out like powered villains? Well. Except this shmuck apparently had not a snowflake’s chance in Hell.
“Metallo.”
It’s an offhand response, that I don’t actually expect to make any sort of dent in his ability to remember it. I mean. I made up at least twenty different variations on Superboy after we were introduced the first time. I was doing it to be contrary. I think that this Metallo? Just legitimately hasn’t made enough of an impression on Superman for him to have bothered to remember the proper chosen name for the man. I’d imagine he as just as much regard for his name, as he does for the man. Who he’s dangling like a plastic sack that is on its way out to the garbage. His harumph makes my blonde head tilt at him in confusion. The holdup on handing him the belt that wraps around and around my waist hadn’t been because I didn’t understand. I just didn’t understand why he wanted to tie the little green man up in the first place instead of simply carting him off to…
I suppose we’re pretending there’s not an affiliation. Check.
“I wasn’t given a manual. I was given the suit and then pushed off the proverbial diving board into the deep end of the swimming pool.”
But even as I complain, my hands stop fidgeting behind my back so that I can slide fingers into the twists of the rope. It doesn’t really matter where I grab hold of it, which is both elegant and really smart for practical use. It uncoils and responds to my touch, sliding off my hips and into a coil that I can offer out to him.
“I figured it out last week.”
Conner: Even if I’m sour at Cassie, I don’t question whether she knew about the belt or not. It was easier to tease her about than it was to think she was being silly about passing this guy off to the authorities. Once I’ve taken the belt in hand, a little super-speed has him bound the wrists, then again around the waist. Let’s just not talk about when, where and how I learned to tie someone up like this. That virtual reality training did have it’s high points. Especially when I was busy trying to test my boundaries and how far the observers would let me stray before resetting the whole thing.
“Yeah? Did you know it’s made from material we found in Greece? Some sort of old fleece or something. It’s extremely conductive. There was a time when the thought was to distill it down to use for wiring in the big brain super-computer they were building, but it’s got some sort of effect. I don’t know how to explain it, but it’s like whatever make it conductive also absorbs the neurons that need to fire in the brain. So they tried to figure out how to use it for interrogations but.. I dunno. Couldn’t get it to work the way they wanted, I guess. M’Gann said it looked good, so I took it.”
A hand raises to tell Cassie that she should hold on for a second, so that I can pimp-slap the groggily awakening Metallo and return him to la la land. Then I’m floating down and over to the awaiting Metro PD. They’ve dealt with these type of people before, but not for a long time. So I wrapped him up in order to insure that he wouldn’t escape and/or cause more crap, before my N.O.W.H.E.R.E. shows up to take him off of their hands. Which is likely to be at any given moment.
Another round of thank yous, not to mention autograph and interview requests, before I’m back in to the air. None of that pesky ‘getting out of dodge before the cops show up’ that Vigilantes endure. For better or worse, this City has embraced it’s Superman and Wonder Woman. Of course that’s why we came out the way we did. At a comic-con. Where the proper fanbase would be the first to write the narrative. Honestly, it’s not that difficult to work out. I didn’t need to be brilliant to work the Nerds, I just needed to put Cassie in a costume that was as much empowering as it was about drawing the attention. The Fanboys did all the rest of the work, just like I knew they would.
Though my plan worked on the surface, I’m also well aware that it only works so long as we play the proper part. We have to actually be Heroes, because if we’re anything else it opens the door for my Father to further cement himself as the ‘Only Hero, Earth Needs.’ I’m smart enough to know that Metallo there, was likely just the first of many tests I’m likely to endure in all of this. As my Dad maneuvers me in to publicly being his Champion or another Superman to be put down. That’s a risk I’ll accept, because it comes with the boon of his not knowing what to do with Cassie. She’s actually too Apple Pie for him to play that same game with. As long as she can ‘control’ me and he can ‘control’ her through fear of reprisals on Helena? We continue in this Cold War, I started at Comic Con.
Just as I’ve rejoined Wonder Woman, I turn enough to give the crowd a wave before heading up, up and away from the cameras. “You’ll be happy to know that all four of those Crocodile Men are safely in custody. Though, they’re not Crocodile Men any more. Dr. Fairchild tells me they reverted to a human state overnight and that they show no signs of being able to return to the other form.”
Cassie: “…the Golden Fleece?”
I don’t have to pretend to look a little shocked, shortly followed up by affronted. N.O.W.H.E.R.E. found the Golden Fleece and then used it for experiments? I mean, I’m not actually shocked. I probably should be. Oh, the warpath that my Mother would be on if she knew that it had been found, and then subsequently ruined. I might actually go to another part of the country for a while and take Conner with me if she knew. Maybe Gateway is far enough. We can go find the house I lived in when I was a toddler that I have zero memory of whatsoever, outside of the ones you think you have because you’ve seen something in pictures enough to associate it with yourself.
Maybe that’ll be my Hail Mary someday. Unleashing an enraged Helena Sandsmark on the group and standing back and watching the fallout. What else do they have down there that they’ve no right to? You know. Besides living, breathing people. Metas. Aliens. I spend the time that it takes Conner to smack Metallo around again to hang there in the air, still boggling about that particular revelation more than trying to figure out any particular way to actually make use of the thing. If I ever get it back now, that is. Watching him secure the green clad villain, I feel for a moment… superfluous in a way that doesn’t even seem right to me. Maybe I really didn’t sleep enough. So I smile, nod my acknowledgments from up in the air and let him have the bulk majority of the praise, attention and adoration. And maybe that is the right thing right now. The guy needs all the positive feedback he can get.
Especially after my epic fail yesterday. Yeah, he’d explained it in the most jackassed way possible. Then re-explained it not a whole lot better. Fortunately, or unfortunately, his prodigal best friend had sent me all the details. What exactly had happened. Why. I’m not sure if I’m upset I wasn’t warned about the full plan ahead of time or not. It’s done and finished either way. At least, finished until he decides to go see her again. Another grumpy, unpleasant thought to add to my collection I guess. One last bright smile, as Conner rejoins me and waves, and I’m following him up into the sky. Normally it’s incredibly hard for me to be anything but elated when I actually get to fly. The feeling still is tickling at my senses, but it’s not nearly distracting enough to keep my head from roiling through everything else. Neither is rubbing at my forearm that has already turned from angry red to mottled blues and purples. A souvenir from the Crocodile Men that he’s telling me are now safely in custody. Wait.
“…four? There were six.”
Seven if you count the one that got away that I did not mention to them in Fawcett. Though, now as I think about it when we’d been there together there had been six. One had disappeared, which should have netted more attention from me at the time than it had but I was…distracted. I’d also wanted to blame him for it at the time, because I’d seen that red gleam in his eyes and that never heralds anything great. I’d wanted to think it was just because I was angry at him, and not because he’d really just potentially murdered someone. Something? In plain view of everyone else. But now? My tone drops lower, and the words start to come out in a rush before I take a breath and collect myself again. Let him explain, Cassie. Give him a chance.
“What did you do to…? Aherm. Sorry. They reverted? Maybe they’re playing dumb then or… there was an awful lot of weird things going on, Conner. Gods and Monsters kind of weird. In Fawcett City. I thought their biggest problem would be who tipped Farmer Brown’s cow. But. I. Think I felt my…”
I hate using words that are applied to parents normally to Zeus. He wasn’t a Dad, or a Father, but calling him by name just seems so very weird. And some old names have power, as I started to even more clearly learn with my time in the Midwest.
“I felt my Father.”
Conner: By the time I’ve returned to her side there’s a growing crowd. Metallo had apparently taken over the Daily Planet in some sort of scheme to make them print his side of the story. Whatever that was. Holding the whole of the Newspaper as Hostage until his demands were met. Before I’d gotten there, the man had apparently held off authorities with all manner of super human powers. Controlling machines. Firing radiation blasts. Showing off his inhuman strength and lack of fine manners. That report, the old-lady with the nice rack had been the biggest object of his fascination. Demanding that she and she personally write the article that would tell the story of a second alien invasion. Heralded by your’s truly. Ugh.
By the time I had walked through radiation blasts. Let the guy punch me a couple times. Then let him monologue for a couple seconds. I was pretty sure he was harmless. He didn’t think he would be. Seemed convinced that I’d be ‘powerless before his righteous might.’ Idiot. I hope that Olsen guy caught my profile when I clobbered the bad guy. Maybe I should have given the big breasted girl an intervi… ohwait, Cassie’s saying something.
“It was kind of golden. At the time. Originally. Maybe. It was kind of a sickly old and moldy kind of looking. Before they threaded it, I mean. It looks great now. They said to stop by and pick it up at the precinct later.”
What did I do? Well, the one that bit Cassie had it coming. I’m about to tell her so when I realize that she’s taken that tone again. Maybe I should go back and do the interview. This whole lecture Conner thing is getting a little bit old, don’t you think? “Six, huh? Are you sure? Maybe you miss counted.”
“There were five of them that I handed over, but Doctor Fairchild said one of them didn’t make it through the processing. That happens. Some people react badly to being … neutralized… for containment. I know what you’re thinking, that sounds awful. I don’t disagree with you, but when it’s people like that. Dangerous people. They have to have their ability to put good people at risk neutralized. So their abilities are… negated? Is that a better word.”
Once we’re up, far enough, that I’m not worried about being watched or listened to? Then I’m happy to talk with Cassie about what she’s saying. Her Father? Now that’s one little item that I’m not entirely nonchalant about. Zeus. God of the Gods. Or at least, God of the Greek Pantheon. Roman Pantheon too, maybe. I think. I dunno. He’s a pretty big player in mythology though. Big enough that when I got my briefing from Raven, she made me stop playing Angry Birds to listen to that part fully.
“That’s not surprising, to be honest. Fawcett City has been a veritable hotbed of supernatural activity for a while, as I understand it. I was there before, actually. On an assignment. But, Cass, why would your Dad make a showing there? Was it during the Bank Robbery, with Crocodile Men?”
Cassie: “…you can never, and I mean never, mention that again within a five block radius of my Mom. I don’t think she has super hearing, beyond what all parents apparently have but, just to be safe.”
And boy, I won’t lie. I want to go see it. The Golden Fleece? It doesn’t matter that I now logically know all that stuff is probably real. Finding out for concrete fact that it is, and knowing where it’s located instead of lost in some ancient burial site… but I’m also not about to let even that lure me into the depths of NOWHERE’s facilities, where I’d have to assume it is. That would be pretty stupid of me. Sure, they might not just decide to get grabby out of ‘respect’ for Conner, or at least ‘respect’ for how much carnage he’s capable of unleashing if displeased. But then again. They might. What he says about the neutralizing.. ugh. That sounds awful but it makes a great deal of sense, I suppose. Especially if the change is so dramatic that you go from man to giant Crocodile Man. So all my initial response to that is…
“Oh.”
I don’t look happy about it, even if they were trying to kill me, and had actually killed several people before I arrived. Or at least, it seems that the one that bit me had.
“Yes I’m sure. I can count, Conner.”
And there were seven. One ran away. One neutralized. One with shattered teeth that had gone suspiciously missing while we were rounding them up and.. I’m not stupid. I know exactlywhat happened, and the withering look Conner’s getting right now says as much. But I also, miraculously I’m sure, don’t launch into lecturing him about what he can or can’t do in situations like that. Even if someone did hurt me a little bit. I guess I’m picking my battles as we rise through the clouds.
“Really? It seems like the least likely place for that kind of thing. I mean. It pushed even my tolerance for the mundane. Except for the Bank Robbery. Were there Crocodile Men when you were there before? Everything going on in that basement was very… Egyptian. He wasn’t there. Not really, I don’t think but…”
Spreading my hands as I do a lazy little barrel roll in my ascent, like I just can’t quite seem to help myself.
“I felt something so familiar. And then there was a whole lot of lightning. Which is about when I got the freak out. I don’t know if it was supposed to help, or hurt. I didn’t stick around to find out.”
Conner: “Uh. Okay? Does that mean you don’t want your belt back?”
Apparently the old mangy fleece that was used in some small part to make her belt, is in some way important enough that I’m not supposed to talk about it again. Not around the Mom unit. Given that I’m allowed to talk about everything else. Even encouraged to do so. This marks the belt topic as either extremely important or one of those fashion topics that her mother just won’t understand. History? Not my strong suit. I mean, I had to go study up on Cassie just to understand her parentage. Then get some insider information to understand what I’d read actually meant. Immortality being a particular source of irritation for me, if I’m being honest.
Either way, I’m good with not discussing it. Nor discussing my own reasons for including it in to the ensemble of what Cassie wears. Maybe in spite of everything that is otherwise accounted for with me? Her costume wasn’t entirely an act of selfishness. Sure, I wouldn’t allow it to be anything but sexy. Okay, guilty as charged. However, I put a good bit of any favor owed to be in the Project in to making sure that it was functional in every way. Without being a tool of the project itself. As far as I know Cassie isn’t monitored, like I am. The broach at her throat isn’t just some sort of kinky collar, it’s got some sort of warding on it to keep the ‘Gods’ or anyone else from mentally infringing upon her. Then there’s the belt, which we’ve talked about. The gauntlets which are as close to unbreakable as you can find on this planet. She should probably just not ask me what was destroyed to make them those.
“Alright, I know you can count. What I’m really asking is, are you sure you actually want to know? Because I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you even if I know you’re going to be pissy about it. Even if I know you’re going to lecture me about it. I tell you the truth, Cass. I don’t hide stuff from you, unless you’ve made it clear that you don’t want to know. But lately? I’m starting to think I should keep things from you, like you do me. That’s what people do, right? They keep things from the people they love, if it’s going to hurt them.”
Yeah, I’m aware she’s letting me off the hook. I should have taken that out and ran with it, but I’m still a little miffed at being growled at after I did what she’s been wanting me to do! It wasn’t fair and I’m tired of being constantly punished. Especially when, as near as I can tell, I’ve done nothing more or less than what she’s been after me to do for about a year. Hrmph.
Her flittering about in the air is enough to take some of the wind out of my sails as far as that goes. Hard not to actually take part in her joy over flying, even if it’s second nature to me. I find myself struggling to stay on the ground. Like the planet is rejecting it’s gravitational hold over me all the time. It brings me back to earth, so to speak, on to focusing with her on what else she’s saying. The non-nattering, bitching at and lecturing me part. As she speaks, I bring myself to a halt and hover there. Listening, but doing so mostly as I watch her enjoying this aspect of our ‘new lives’ so much. I know, for better or worse, that I did the right thing there too. How can I not when she’s so clearly pleased with flying so care free?
“When I first got out, the Project was fuming at me over destroying their lab. So they sent me on some sort of impossible mission. I was told, later, that they expected one of two outcomes. Either, I’d fail and they’d move on to the next version of me. Or I’d succeed and prove that I was worth all the trouble I cause.”
“So, I get to Fawcett City and I spend the first day there trying to find the thread. It was too much like the V.R., I thought that some how they’d tricked me again. But I couldn’t find a thread. A point where the V.R. isn’t complete. A hole. Something the programmers didn’t account for someone looking at, looking in to or through. Then it happened. The storm. It rumbled in to town. People were scattered, talking about tornadoes and flying cows. I had to go check it out. So I fly out to this old saw mill and while everyone is running and hiding, all over the city? I find this kid. I mean, a real kid. Younger than me.”
“He was just sitting there. Watching the storm. Looked like he’d been in a fight. The whole place was trashed. Smelled of ozone. When he saw me, flying towards him? I don’t know. He called me Adam or something. The next thing I know I’m being attacked by… thunder and lightning. It was crazy. I never did figure out if he was controlling it or not.”
Floating a little closer, I let her take all of that in before I say anything more. She was trying to tell me about her Father. About this familiar feeling. I don’t normally tell her about NOWHERE stuff, especially assignments. Not unless she asks. That’s one of those things I was talking about before. Maybe I should start keeping things to myself, but this seems like something she might need to know. That lightning seems common place there. If it’s tied to her Father, then maybe it explains why she was called there. In the middle of nowhere to fight Crocodile Men? I dunno, never got to ask why she was there actually, come to think of it.
“There were no crocodile men there. Just crazy lightning guy. At the time, I thought maybe he was protecting the kid, but later. After the dust cleared. I got the impression he was the kid.”
Cassie:
“<i>Yes</i>, I want my belt back. I like my belt. I liked it even before I figured out it wasn’t just <i>spangly</i>. But my <i>Mom</i> will be righteous livid pissed about the “desecration of an invaluable cultural and historical artifact that can never be replaced” and… I’m paraphrasing but I’m probably pretty close to the screeches that would come out of her mouth. Seriously. Her head might explode.”
Mine had threatened to do pretty much the same, and I don’t have nearly the same level of reverence for the stuff as she does. Which is saying a lot, since that ‘stuff’ has been all I’ve wanted to spend my adult life on since I was about three. Which Conner clearly didn’t understand. He doesn’t really have a reason to, and I shouldn’t be all that surprised given that’s what I’m technically supposed to be tutoring him in. As used to Conner Luthor as I’ve gotten? Sometimes it’s easy to forget the disconnect and his hangups. Or maybe just easy to forget that he doesn’t exactly parse the world the same way I do. So his question? His leveling with me on the way the lectures are making him feel makes me sigh, closing my eyes for a moment and enjoying the feel of the sun on my face, before I turn it back towards him again.
“Conner. That’s not fair.”
I’d argue about keeping multiple things from him, because I’m not. I mean. It’s kind of a conglomerate of things that I think of as <i>one</i> thing, that all started with Timothy Drake-Wayne asking me to keep Conner, and <i>myself</i> out of Gotham City. His working things out had turned into me trying to work this entire situation, and it feels a little like it’s spinning out of the original scope and scale. But that doesn’t mean I want to, or can, abandon it. I don’t lie to Conner. I recognized a while ago that it’s the only thing that gives me any real power over him and his actions. That he knows I’m going to be honest with him, and not hide things. Tim’s secret was one thing. That’s not my secret to tell. The rest? The rest I <i>can’t</i> tell him, no matter how much I want to right now. Because the truth is, Conner knows so much more about this stuff than I do. About metas. He’d probably be a pretty great source, if I dared to ask him.
“I mean. You’re not wrong. That is why people keep secrets. Or because they don’t want to be caught doing something they know is wrong. I’m trying to do something right. And it’s not that I think it’s going to hurt <i>you</i>. I’m just trying to keep a lot of <i>other</i> people from getting hurt and as soon as I think it’s safe? I’m <i>going</i> to tell you. I hope maybe you might even be half as proud of me as I am of you for yesterday.”
There it is. It may not have been phrased like a traditional apology, but that’s more or less what it was. If I said I was sorry, I’m actually kind of worried Conner might think I was saying the words just to soothe him, and not because I actually agreed with what he’d done. It would mean I was sorry for my reaction, but maybe not that I was fine with how he’d behaved. Honestly? I didn’t actually need Tim to tell me what he had, not about the motivation part. I know he’s trying, and I know why. It’s why he gets so confused when he’s read between my lines and gotten a different message than I was really putting out there. He’s <i>trying</i>. If anything, what had been shocking out of that particular text message was that Tim was saying it at all. Given our last conversation especially. And I <i>am</i> proud of my boyfriend for trying to do something right, for the right reasons, even if he kind of flubbed the landing a little bit.
My lazy twists and loops aren’t really taking me anywhere, they’re just being done because it feels good and it’s a lot more lighthearted an action than this conversation probably merits right now. I want to stop doing it, actually, when he starts to tell me about his last trip to Fawcett. It’s not that the name ‘Adam’ dings a bell in my head, or even the similar storm. Another roll, as my brain starts to put together the things that Freddy had said about ‘the last guy’ and the story that I’m hearing right now. Oh <i>hell</i>. Oh <i>shit</i>. Twisting towards the sun again, I try to alleviate the sinking, sick feeling in my stomach. <i>How could you</i>… No. No, Cassie. How could <i>they</i>. I’m not going to ask him what happened. Because he’s going to tell me. I already know, I think, and I don’t want to hear him say it. Instead I right myself, still squinting towards the horizon and clench my fists.
“I hate that they made you do that. I <i>hate</i> it. And that’s why I can’t tell you the thing I’ve been hiding. And that I’m going to keep hiding.”
He’s a smart guy, and he thinks he’s put it together. I guess he partially has, he’s just not quite got it right.
Conner: “Cass, baby. They didn’t make me do it.”
This works two ways. She doesn’t lie to me. I don’t lie to her. It has been that way since the first time we met. With all of the terrible things that I’ve done, one thing I’ve kept true to is my word on that first meeting. ‘I’ll never lie to you.’ I never have. Sometimes my interpretation of things is different than other people’s, but that’s still not the same as lying. Heck, I even know that my perceptions work a little differently than others. I care about different things. In a way that makes Metallo right about me, I’m an alien in this world. Even if I’m a product of it as much as anyone else.
One thing that is important to me, has always been important to me? Is that if I tell Cassie something, that she can trust it to be the absolute truth as I know it to be. If I say I’ll do something, I will. I don’t even cut corners on that, if I promise to be good I do. If I promise to wait, I do even when she begs me not too. To me this is kind of our deal. Trust exists where it shouldn’t, but flourishes all the same. And the truth? Is that they, N.O.W.H.E.R.E., didn’t make me. They didn’t blackmail me. They didn’t hold something over me to extort me.
“I didn’t know this world, I didn’t know you, Cass. What I knew was a fabricated world that had no consequences. I knew that in this world there were no consequences for me. They wanted to test me, I could have told them to go fuck themselves. What could they do? I mean that. What could they do to me? Whine? Cry? Make threats? Uncork another little me and send it at me? I broke their simulator. Then I broke their mold. I knew their threats were hollow then.”
“They wanted to test me and I wanted to test my limits. So I went and I found the little boy. I’m not too proud to say I read the whole situation wrong. I thought I was flying towards some meta that lost control of their powers. I’d read about weather manipulators. It made sense. The kid wouldn’t listen to me. I don’t even know if he could hear me. All I knew is that the Project considered him to be dangerous and wanted him neutralized. I went there, intending to do that very thing. Except, I got my lights punched out. Like four times.”
People that don’t even know me would know that I was telling the truth right here. -I- don’t admit to failure often. There is always a spin. Something that wasn’t my fault or that was out of my control. It’s not hard to believe me either, because there isn’t a lot of things that I can’t do. So saying someone punched my lights out? Means exactly that.
“The guy was amazing, Cass. It was marvel to see in person. He moved so fast that I couldn’t even keep up, at first. Punched harder than anything I’ve ever felt. His fists crackled with electricity. Somehow he knew what I was, he called me Pinocchio. He just looked at me and knew more about me than I knew about myself. We fought for so long. Let me tell you, I lost more than once that day. I didn’t know I could heal the way I do and I hadn’t been able to store enough solar energy to be at my best yet.”
“He beat me. Fair and Square. That’s the only time I’ve ever needed a medical evac. Except they didn’t come. Not until, I crawled out of that mill. Saw the little boy sitting there… talking to someone I couldn’t even see. I knew it, right then and there, that he was the cause of the storm and that he was crazy. I did the only thing I could. Heat vision melts anything, but I remember the last thing he said. He called his imaginary friend Shazam and told him to run.”
Cassie: That’s not exactly the kind of thing anyone wants to hear, is it? You’ve assigned guilt and blame to someone else, only to be told nah. It was me. I know how things work with the world, at least as much of it as I’ve seen at my age and that’s a lot more than most adults ever have. Maybe ever will. In this case? I don’t actually agree with him. I believe that he thinks that. That it was his choice, and maybe it was Conner’s choice not to refuse to go. But given the situation was there really any other option to pick? And if anyone actually had told him they expected him to fail, they may as well have been pushing a button that would set him on only one course. Revolving slowly in the air, I turn to face him again so that he doesn’t think I’m.. I don’t know. Intentionally not looking at him or anything. Arms folded across my chest and lips pursed, but it’s not judgement on my face.
I mean. I can be judgey, clearly. Conner got to see a whole lot of judgey face yesterday. Even earlier, when I realized what happened to the CrocMan that had bitten me. Even though they were trying to kill me, I could still be displeased about the way it was done. Now. I am surprised to hear that someone knocked his ass out. Not because I don’t think anyone can do that, who knows what’s out there. But to hear him say it. No excuse about how it wasn’t his fault, or they’d cheated, or some other mitigating factor. Just that he’d lost. Surprised. And then furious at them leaving Conner there. Furious about the whole situation that they’d set up even if they didn’t force him to do anything. And if he’d failed, then they would have sent someone else to do the job.
“All that power, and he still didn’t have a chance.”
He sounds like he’d been much more powerful than Freddy is. Or at least, than he is right now. Strength of Hercules. The lighting, the speed. Freddy’s fast, incredibly fast like Conner’s saying this kid had been. But the rest of those powers seem to be with someone else. Can more than one person do these trials at a time? What happens at the end then? Or is there an end? I do know that name though. Shazam. It’s what they’d said there in the bank vault. I still don’t think I understand if it’s a title, or if it’s a person. A being. A much more stubborn expression starts to creep into my features before I let out a soft huff of air. Maybe if he hadn’t been alone. I’m not going to let anyone have to be alone again. Not if I can help it.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have been there, then. But I was. And there was something in that bank that those Crocodiles were much more scared of than they were of me. I mean. I didn’t phase them at all. That lighting was…unreal though. Out of the sky, down through the building…. how asinine do you think it would be to come up here and just start yelling at the sky demanding some answers?”
The twist of my mouth says I’m kidding. Well. Half kidding.
Conner; Oh, I’ve been scrutinizing Cassie’s reaction the entire time. Waiting for what I was anticipating. It only shows through for a second there, but even then I’m not sure she’s mad at me so much as what had happened. The situation. Cassie is very understanding of the things I’ve done. It is one of her most charming traits. It’s also one of the things that bugged me most about yesterday. I’d been trying to do things her way, but it all went to hell. Really quickly. So fast that I’d had to do something extreme to make it work out. I hadn’t considered it extreme at the time, but judging by her reaction…
“No, he didn’t,” there’s a soft, quick, shake of the head. “He couldn’t be controlled or contained and he demonstrated that he wouldn’t play by the rules. Their rules. So he never stood a chance. That’s the only thing I’ll put out there. If it wasn’t me, it would have been someone else. Someone(s) else, until they got the result they desired.”
“But. Until today, I didn’t really question whether that kid was out of his mind bonkers. I mean, I’ve questioned a lot of their missions for various reasons but not that one. Until you called me to Fawcett City and then told me what was going on? About the storm. The lightning. I actually had this one down as one of the Good Ones.”
We’ve talked about this before. N.O.W.H.E.R.E. is repugnant to Cassie, I get it. There just happens to be a little more to the story. Nothing is all good or bad. I mean, look at my Father. People like Cassie’s mother find him repulsive. Yet, he did save the entire world. More than once. N.O.W.H.E.R.E. takes extreme measures with people like Cass, because the alternative is to wait and see if she’ll turn out to be one of those who either can’t control her powers or actually chooses to use them for ill intent. According to Doctor Fairchild, the ratio of ‘Good Missions’ to ‘Bad Missions’ used to slant toward the good more so than the bad. These days though? Since my Father’s rise to power, it seems to tilt the other way.
“I used to do that. Come up here. Maybe even a little higher. Scream at stars. Vent my frustration. They never answered me. Though, you might have a better cellular connection to the ones who might actually pick up the phone.”
Speaking of Fathers though, there is one other thing I’ve been meaning to say. It takes me drifting over toward her before I actually do it though. “So. When I was fighting with that kid’s protector, he was channeling the lightning. Like he was straight out of those Percy Jackson books you were reading. Maybe who ever your crocodiles were afraid of? Maybe he was doing the same thing.”
“Which actually brings me back to the Crocodile Bank Robber Men. ( There has to be an easier name for those guys. ) The Doctor says that she thinks they weren’t really Croc-Men. ( That’s what I’m going with, by the way. ) She has a working hypothesis that they were somehow imbued. We’ve seen that before. Power transferal or sharing.”
Cassie: If it hadn’t been Conner, it would have been someone else. I mean, I’d figured as much. And I know how their recruitment tactics go, so the ‘someone else’ might have been a whole lot less willing and able. Maybe they would have gotten themselves killed instead of just seriously hurt. The possibilities whirl through my head, until with a little grimace I have to push them away. It does absolutely no one any good for me to tear myself up about what happened. I wasn’t there. I wasn’t even involved in the slightest way. Worrying about that day? And that poor boy? Isn’t going to change it. I just have to do what I can to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Because Freddy? Isn’t crazy. He’s not a bad guy either, quite the opposite in fact. I hadn’t just been fluffing his ego or trying to get him to trust me when I’d told him what I saw in that booth in front of me.
This would probably be a much more productive conversation if I felt able to tell him that there’s another boy now. That it wasn’t just me and the crocodiles down there. Or even what they were after. In hindsight, the whole thing is starting to feel more like a failure on my part for not stopping other things besides the devouring of the civilians. Where had Isis gone? Had the lightning given her what she wanted? Where’d the other Crocodile go?
“I don’t think he was crazy. I don’t know. The storm was already there when I got to Fawcett. It just didn’t do anything but threaten until that moment in the bank. Maybe that was Zeus expressing displeasure at what was coming. Or maybe someone was controlling it. I don’t know. I think if it did I could make more sense out of what I saw and felt.”
One blonde eyebrow arches at Conner, because on one hand I find it hard to picture him yelling and carrying on just to get it off his chest. On the other hand… who else did he really have to express frustration to before? I’m torn between finding the mental image sad or funny. I settle for pulling a face at my own predicament.
“That’s kind of what I’m afraid of. That I’ll get an answer. I’ve never wanted one before, or felt like I needed it. Part of me just doesn’t want to give Him the satisfaction of knowing I might need Him.”
I haven’t before. Of course for all I know, he might never have thought or looked in on me again. The timely surfacing of my powers kind of hints to me that isn’t the case, though. Drumming my fingers on the opposite forearms, I mull over what he’s said. I would feel even sillier about reading those books, especially with how on the nose they are, except that I’d read them long before I had powers, or even had an inkling that those Ancient Gods were real. And once I did? The thought of a Destiny like in those stories filled me with a whole lot of concern, and maybe a tiny bit of excrement. Only a tiny, tiny bit though.
“…I was kind of going with Crocomaggia, personally… hrrr.”
Her hypothesis, as conveyed by Conner, makes me cringe and then squint over at him. Chewing on the corner of my lip for a moment before I go back to speaking.
“So. Like if…for example, hypothetically speaking…there was a big leader Croco-Man and he changed other people into them?”
Conner: “Hey, Wonder Woman isn’t afraid of anything. Especially not answers. She likes answers. She craves answers. Especially when she’s the one asking the questions.”
Isn’t that what ‘Wonder Woman’ is? The embodiment of all that Cassie has wanted to be for so long. The one leading the charge. Going out there, in to the world and not shunting part of herself off in to a little corner where everyone else wants to put her. For the first time tonight, I give her a little nudge of a hand. Maybe even a brush of fingertips to move golden hair from her face, so that the world (and your’s truly) can see her for the Goddess she is. I’m about as serious as I am, ever, right now. Maybe I misunderstood, again. But I thought when she told me what it was like to finally be able use her powers in front of the world, that she felt empowered to finally be something to people. Like her whole life had been building to that point.
Of course, I’ve also got to admit that she wasn’t really ready for it when i pushed her out on to that stage. So maybe I’ve expedited the whole idea. Or even forced her to do what was only a whimsical dream. In the end, I still know Cassie to be the girl with all the questions. Never giving up on asking them. “… but I will tell you. No one ever answers me. That’s alright. I don’t necessarily need them to answer.”
“I will tell you though. Raven has tried to coach me on this whole magic thing you’ve got going on about you. Not my bag, really. But your Mom? Your Mom told me that the Gods are kinda… forbidden from partaking in the world of Man anymore. At least not quite so directly as they used too. Your Mom’s kinda awesome, y’know? I figured one of us should eventually talk to her about it.”
Cassie: “That isn’t true. She just has to keep her freaking out on the inside where no one else sees it. I’m pretty sure no one wants to put the fate of the world in the hands of someone running around in circles and flailing like a decapitated chicken.”
But otherwise, he really isn’t wrong I guess. I do want to know. I’ve always wanted to know. Sure, they used to be different questions, and the scale of them was a lot smaller and a lot less personal, but inquisitive and precocious have kind of always been my things. It’s what I’m enjoying so much about my history class, there’s actual answers to questions I didn’t have yet, there. For half a second, I start to compare the time of day, with whether or not I’d be able to go change and get back to St. Mary’s in time to make that particular period. What the Hell, Cassie? You’re flying. No one can or wants to stop you, and you’re sharing it with Conner. The two of you aren’t even arguing right now. Why would I want to interrupt that for anything?
When his fingertips brush mine, my hand darts out to close the little gap and grab hold. I’m not Mercury fast, but hey. When I want something I’m quick enough to go for it, right?
“That’s how it went in Percy Jackson, too. And it was because my genetic donor laid down that law. If he’s doing it, what’s to stop all the rest from trying?”
Rolling blue eyes in an exaggerated fashion, I use my grip on his hand to pull him in to me. Or maybe it’s me over to him. it gets a little difficult to tell when you’re up here and gravity and normal physics quit feeling like so much of a factor in life.
“Ugh. What is it with everyone I know and the not subtle hints to talk to my Mom about things? Want to go save some more cats? She can’t be mad at me when I turn up after playing hookie if I was doing it to save the world. I think that’s a thing.”
Conner: “Wait. That wasn’t a subtle hint to anything. I talk to you Mom all the time. Have you met your Mom? She’s hot. And smart. And hot. Very, very hot. I know where you got the looks portion of the Goddess schitck. Bow wow chicka…”
There’s no need to duck or flinch, I know it’s coming. Normally in the form of an elbow to the ribs. I’m ready for it, but I’m also goading her intentionally. Playfully. She apologized, I let it go by without even pointing out how weak it had been. Now I’m letting her know that everything is ‘Okay’ with us. It’s how I tease, by poking and prodding her to get some sort of reaction. Not always the best ones or the ones I’m looking for, but it tells her that things are back to the state of normal we’ve lived in for the past couple years.
Not all of that is teasing though. I think I talk to Cassie’s Mother more than she does these days. That’s how I get her on my side. I’m also pretty sure the reason she is on my side so often, is because I’m in there talking to her. I talk a lot. Helena Sandsmark is smart. She thinks she’s eliciting information out of me. I’m happy to let her think that, so long as I’m getting what I want out of the deal. Cassie -is- a Cheerleader after all. Whether she wanted to be or not. That’s what I’m buying with my chit-chat! The price is easily paid, if you could see that skirt she has to wear.
“We can’t really go save more cats right now. I’ve been at this since School started. There are no more cats in Metropolis that need saving and the ones that might, are too afraid of my returning to try it again.” That smile of mine is heading towards a smirk though. “How about we go get your fancy fleece rope back and I’ll show you how to tie all sorts of knots with it?”
“Tell you what. I’ll even tell you all about the theory Dr. Fairchild has about your Crocmaggia while I’m demonstrating those knots on you. You more or less got the jist of it though. Did you see the … Crocfather? Did you know… Great men aren’t born great, they’re grown great….” This is one of those weird moments, when you have to realize that I, Conner Luthor, am doing an actual Marlon Brando impression. Complete with the marble cheeked voice and wratcheting eyebrows. “… he coulda been a contenda…”
Cassie: “Yes, I have met my Mom.”
I’d protest the repeated pointing out that my Mother happens to be pretty attractive for a forty year old woman, but I have learned better by now. I mean. She is. I’m not debating it. But any attempt to get Conner to knock it off only results in it being worse, and possibly with me having to watch over dinner while he flirts with her. I like to avoid that when possible. And no, not because I’m not talking to my Mom. I talk to her all the time! I mean. Not today, but yesterday! Things like this are exactly why she likes my boyfriend better than me. He’s a suck up. And for that fact, I don’t deny him a part of the usual reaction. When I drop his hand and give him a shove that displaces me more than it does him.
“Only if you want me to start calling you Boy Scout in public, also I’m much too smart to fall for that trap.”
Because with that smirk, I know better than to agree to this particular offer. Pervert. I guess I’ll just have to settle for my material contribution to his Metallo bust, which I’m sure my Mother will be more than happy to hear all about. For a moment, I think he’s actually asking me a legitimate question. I even start to reply that yes, I think I did see the Crocfather, and that I let him bolt so that I could catch Freddy, and then didn’t hunt him down again afterwards (maybe without all of those details) when I realize he’s not actually asking me a question. He’s clowning around and quoting that movie he likes so much, voice impression included.
How obnoxious. And how weirdly comforting at the same time.
“Oh my God, how long have you been waiting for that opening?”
I don’t wait around for an answer. I’m willing to bet since yesterday, but with a bubble of laughter making its way out of my chest, I tip my head back and then let the rest of me follow. Curving my back and then letting gravity have me as I plummet back towards the buildings of Metropolis below us. I’m okay. We’re okay. And I’m going to make damn sure it stays that way.
by Michele | Sep 28, 2017 | Chronicles
Dinah: All in all? That could have gone better.
Mission accomplished, though. I’d made myself a nuisance, and a sizable one at that, hopefully for long enough to get the job done. I hadn’t exactly gotten a precise timeline for how long I had to keep Superman’s attention pointed at me instead of anywhere else, so hopefully Tim’s friend had skedaddled and gotten on with what she needed to do. I’d anticipated getting back a bit later than I have, but I also figured I’d be taking conventional travel back to Gotham. Or alternately doing a little swimming and then calling for a ride, depending upon how things played out. Getting flown without an aircraft? Not actually something I’d care to repeat anytime all that soon. Maybe because I wasn’t entirely sure the guy wasn’t just going to drop me. Sure, he’d been trying to act good but it could have been just that. An act.
My jacket was still at the nightclub, and along with it everything else like my phone. It meant I didn’t really have any means of radioing in, or calling to let my roommate know that I was okay and I’d done what he’d asked. It also means that once I’ve been dropped off at the harbor? I’ve got a bit of a walk ahead of me. I don’t mind, lets me clear my head and work off the steam I’d build up in Metropolis. Gotham would probably be about the worst place to have to do a walk of shame, but there’s not one ounce of that in me, nor a reason to be ashamed. Plus I actually almost feel sorry for someone that sees this particular skimpy dressed blonde and thinks she’s going to be easy pickins. But being confident in your skills, knowing you’re more than a match for pretty much anything the street has to serve up, doesn’t mean you can be careless either.
The alleys, and back ways are more natural and normal to me than sidewalks at this point. It’s that proclivity that actually nets me a bit of a detour. A detour that sends me up a fire escape, and into the shadows where I can watch unobserved. You see. Normally there’s only really one reaction when you see a crime in progress, or just know there’s about to be one. We’re vigilantes. We do certain things a certain way. But I’m without my gear. More importantly, without the coat of makeup I wear to alter my features to the point of barely recognizable. It’s also not just anybody going into that Public House. It’s the Joker and his Loon Squad. I don’t need to be a tactical whiz kid to know how this is going to go. Even before the screaming and yelling starts.
Do I feel even a little bad about not interfering? No. I know exactly the sort of people that are inside that building. Most days it’d maybe be me kicking the everliving shit out of them. It’s the second party that has my attention and concern. Cocking my blonde head to the side, it doesn’t take me more than a moment to pick what I’m looking for out of the night sky. Once you know they’re there, it’s easy to spot Red Robin’s drones. Well. Guess that means he knows I’m back. Leaning against the railing more as a perch than a real hiding spot, I’m debating going into the building anyway. Just in case he’d needed help. The slow count that I’d begun in my head isn’t finished by the time I see one party…and then the other emerge. I don’t know, honestly, if I’m more relieved, or grumpy. That throttling can wait until another night though. Not that I couldn’t do it in my boots and mini skirt.
Kicking a leg over that railing again, I drop down to the concrete, bending my knees to absorb the impact as I bring my hand up to my cheek like I’m holding something in place.
“Kssssssht. Red Robin, are you aware that Red Hood seems to be making nice with the Joker-over. Kssssht.”
It’s that kind of night, isn’t it? I’m going to keep amusing myself by talking in my imaginary walkytalky the whole way back I think. Because Gotham and Crazy go hand in hand, and I think it’s really damn funny. It’s that or humming to myself.
“Kssssht. On my way in. Also your friend wasn’t very nice to me. Over. KSsssht.”
Tim: To say that I had been worried about Dinah is an understatement. We had done our homework. She had studied up on the target. When I asked Dinah to do a favor for me, I didn’t intend to send her in blind. So I opened the toolbox. Gave her every scrap of information on Conner Luthor that I’d put together, at Bruce’s direction, over the last two years. She went in armed to the teeth with enough tactical knowledge, that I was positive she would survive. Almost sure. Well, it was more like playing the odds. They were in her favor, because the deck -and- Dinah were stacked against the subject of her wiles.
Once the reports from Gotham had come in? I’d feared the worst, for about an hour. In that second hour, I’d begun to formulate multiple plans. From extraction, in case of capture, to vengeance in case of the worst. Not one of those plans, sadly, had involved ‘Pick me up at the Harbor.’ Whatever happened. However it came to be that Dinah was dropped off at the Harbor by the very person she was sent to distract? That’s a story I’m interested in. All I really know is that if the seismic activity in Metropolis was anything bad, she wouldn’t be walking back like she seems to be doing once my pretty little birds actually zero in on her.
Drones. They’ve been circulating around the City for weeks now. A contingency plan that Bruce and I had conceived a couple of years ago. We just never put it in to action, because Bruce thought it violated all sorts of privacy ethics. I’d agreed at the time, but re-thought my position after he was gone. Not because I thought we were wrong originally, but because I needed something to help me find the culprit. As time marched on and I became desperate for answers, I’d turned to the little drone army. Eyes in the Sky, that could help me a little more to be ‘Everywhere, all at once.’ These days, Dinah rarely sees me without a computer going. Constantly sifting through the drones information. Even though there’s very likely an app for that.
“Ugh. We spent millions of Wayne R&D budget dollars on those drones. They simply don’t do static.”
Oh, I’m not talking to Dinah. You see the little drones aren’t equipped with the ability for two-way communication. Although, in retrospect, that might actually be worthy of an upgrade. Instead I’m talking mostly to myself. Stephanie certainly has no idea what I’m babbling about. She hasn’t a clue that I’m listening to my little birds, whom are spying upon Dinah and Damien (not to mention the rest of the Bat-family and any criminal they can find). Now that I think about it though, I’m glad that I can’t communicate directly with Dinah right now. It saves me from having to answer Dinah directly. I’ll worry about that later, when I’m not demonstrating the basics of how to throw a punch.
By way of first letting Stephanie try one of her own, blocking it and then showing her how to do it for real. Over and over, until she manages to do one without locking her wrist. I’ve got some hope for Steph, actually. It’s only taken her the entire night ( of which she has been thrown, punch, kicked, tripped and choked more times than I think I want to admit ) to figure out finally how to throw right hook. Without breaking her own hand, wrist, fingers, or potentially just hitting herself. ( That only happened once, but it now lives on for ever by way of the screens that replay the video every few minutes. On a loop. )
“Take a break. We’re about to have company. The kind of company that might take offense to the fact you’re still not moving your feet the way I told you to four hours ago.”
Dinah: It could have taken longer to get there, but you get to know the shortcuts like the back of your own hand when you spend enough time making use of them to cut off criminals and lowlifes. It’s likely even faster when you use one of those computerized maps like Tim enjoys so much, but it’s cheating and I just don’t like them. Computers are his thing. A memory like a steel trap is mine. I probably should just go back to Pretty Bird’s. At this point in the night, the place will be full and loud and no one is going to notice me going up to my apartment over the bar’s second floor. Except I’m willing to bet what little money I have that it’s not where my partner in ‘crime’ is, and that he’s instead holed up in his little cave. I’m sorry. Roost.
There’s letting yourself in to a secret lair, and then there’s knowing you’re being let in and if you weren’t invited there was probably some elaborately abrupt defense mechanism that would have knocked you on your ass. By the time I waltz in, whistling like I’d been doing since I got bored of my staticy one sided conversation, I’m pretty happy to finally have arrived. Times like that makes you really appreciate your motorcycle for getting around Gotham. I really don’t know how those dummies who do it on foot manage, sometimes.
“Luuuuuucy, I’m home!”
The sashay is only partly for his benefit, the truth is it’s just kind of how I walk and being out at night only makes it worse. Habit. Part of the persona that’s really more me than Dinah Lance is at this point. There comes a point in a life like this where your secret identity is more like the costume than the name you picked out for yourself in the night. Being away for a few years hadn’t changed that, but then, the Canary hadn’t stopped stepping out just because she stepped out of Gotham. It, the strutting, comes to an abrupt halt when I see we’re not actually alone though. The purple clad girl’s slumped against one of the walls like she’s concerned at any moment someone’s going to make her get up again. It doesn’t take that practiced of an eye to figure out what they’ve been doing, and it’s got a lot more to do with punching than it does with anything naughty. Still. Can’t help the teasing. It’s my nature.
“Sheesh, I’m gone five minutes… what is it with you and blondes?”
Tim: The ‘Roost’ (it’s not a cave, damnit), happens to be buried beneath an old Warehouse. Owned by a subsidiary of a subsidiary, of another subdiary’s subsidiary. Once upon a time it was an R&D dump for retired equipment that Bruce either upgraded or did away with. Sometime later, it saw a little used as a backup point to house the Jet, Boat and Mobile. I’ve taken it over as a remote base, because the Clocktower is likely too busy and the Cave just seems… Empty without him there.
Ordinarily the place is little more than it’s original intent; a hidden safe house. Tonight though it’s playing host to Stephanie Brown. Recently it’s seen a bit of a make-over. I’ve been updating the place. While Bruce and Alfred created the place, I’m not sure anyone outside of them and I knew it was here. At least, until I let Dinah in. Then later Damien, so that I could get him outfitted in something that wouldn’t land him on the News as a masse murderer the first time someone with a smartphone got him on camera. Tonight? Well, tonight I put some of the out-dated training tools stored here to work. Much to Stephanie’s chagrin.
“It’s a lot like pok-e-mon, gotta catch’em all,” comes a tongue in cheek reply to Dinah’s teasing, “This is the one I asked you about. The one who is going to get herself or someone else killed if you don’t help her.”
Now that’s an introduction. It also happens to be a means to an end. Swerving Dinah a little off course, so that she doesn’t immediately go in to the litany of discussions we need to have. I need a minute, no more than that, to take stock of her. She looks alright. Better than alright, honestly. Which means that she’s not physically hurt. I have to be honest, with myself mainly, I’m having to stop myself from hugging her. Part of me also wants to apologize. Whether for what ever happened or asking her to go in the first place. Instead of doing that, I give her something that she will actually appreciate far more than a teenage boy’s hug or apologies.
“Wonder Woman made it to Fawcett City, she was able to make contact -and- she somehow managed to stumble upon a bank robbery / hostage situation. Whatever you did with Superman, you did it pretty well. I’d say mission accomplished, but.. um… you got a ride home from your target. I’m not the expert of course, but is that how this sort of thing is supposed to go?”
Dinah: And it also happens to be conveniently close to my Grandparent’s bar, which became my bar when my Grandfather passed. Managed by old family friends, and left to their care. I hadn’t known what to do with the place, and it made me a little sad honestly. It proved convenient enough to come back to though, a place that I could crash anytime I was in the city. That just hadn’t happened until Bruce had died, and Helena had called. Maybe it wouldn’t have for a while still if things had been different. Coincidence on the location? Maybe. But having met Batman I kind of doubt that.
“Hey! I am… not..!”
I don’t need to see be able to see all of the girl’s face to make out the expression she’s got under that half mask, the hood of her cloak is pushed back away from decidedly disheveled and sweaty blonde head. She’d probably be a whole lot cooler and more comfortable for practice if she took it and the mask off, but I’m actually assigning her micro-props even as I judge her on nearly everything else that I can see. If you’re going to insist on wearing something out on the street? You have to be able to fight and move in it. To know what you’re doing enough to not get fouled. Take my high heeled boots. They could be a liability, but I’ve practiced in them enough to make them more a weapon than something to trip me up. I should probably be a little annoyed that she’s here, and that I’ve walked in very much in Full Dinah Face. I have to assume, however, that if Tim thought she was a risk for tattling? She wouldn’t be here in the first place.
And if she does? Well. I know where he sleeps. Leaning over, hands on hips puts me pretty close to nose to nose with Red Robin’s stray.
“Well, hey kiddo. I’m Black Canary. I suggest you eat your Wheaties every morning, because I’m going to kick your ass. And then kick it while you’re down, because if I don’t do it, someone out there will. Difference is, strong chance I won’t make you dead. No one out there’s going to do you the same favor.”
Grey blue eyes, which are about all you can really make out of her face go wide in surprise, and it’s a little comical because she looks like she’s trying to decide if I’m kidding, and maybe Tim had told her before basically the same thing but she thought he was kidding, too. Nope. Not kidding. Not joking. There’s not much of a better motivator than pain. When you’ve got a younger pupil, sure you do things a little differently. Their bodies are still growing and muscle memory is an easier thing. Ted Grant didn’t start out beating me bloody when I was six years old. That waited until I was a teenager, should have known better, and had to get the lessons the hard way. It’s definitely not going to feel like it, but she wants to do this? I’m doing her a favor doing it my way.
The shock is short lived, before a gloved hand is lifted in an A-OK symbol and a chipper voice makes me snort. Well. At least she’s got that going for.
“Sure, no problem, breakfast’s my favorite. Breakfast four meals a day…”
Straightening upright again, ignoring the show I might have just been giving and frankly not really caring. I might be wearing not much but I wear even less a normal night. And I kick people in the face while doing it. I don’t plan on kicking anyone in the head right now. Certainly not Tim, anyway, who I’ve turned on a bootheel to face and approach, leaving his still winded sparring partner in the corner. For her sake? I hope they’d been going at it for hours or I really might accidentally end up killing her.
“I made him an offer he couldn’t refuse.” Waggling my eyebrows demonstratively, and rather suggestively. “Which he was all over and then refused. He then proceeded to try to save me from my life of mediocrity, threatened me with N.O.W.H.E.R.E., had a bit of a fit after I yelled at him for it, then we made very nice and brought me home. I’ve got some additional notes for your little fun files.”
My tone is sing song in relating the bare bones of the evening. I’m all for him interpreting and guessing a little. I might spell it out more, or maybe tease more, if we didn’t have extra company but either way I’m entirely cheery about it as I move to commandeer a seat and kick my feet up on the closest flat surface.
“The suit? Records everything. Also he recovers from double ruptured eardrums disturbingly fast. And while he was with me he was not in Fawcett City, and paying direct attention to me and nothing else, so I’d say that was mission accomplished indeed. You’re welllllllcome.”
“….heh, I love that song.”
“Right? Me, too kid.”
Tim: It’s all too easy to figure out why Stephanie is here. Other than the fact that she needs the help. I mean it, she really needs the help. Like more than anyone I’ve ever met, that wasn’t a toddler. In fact she happens to be a lot like a toddler. Helpless. Drooling. Flailing around blindly. Not really accomplishing anything. But being very fulfilled not to have died while doing it. Yeah, that’s about how I summarize my meetings with her so far.
She also serves as a bit of a distraction. I could have sent her home when I heard the comments about Damien on the drones, but I didn’t. Because this very much keeps the things Dinah verbally abuses me about to a minimum. For now, at least. I’m a little thankful, honestly, once I see her eyes waggle. Offer he couldn’t refuse? But he did? Or he didn’t? What does it even mean?! He ‘report’ about the mission is little more than gibberish, honestly. I’m about to tell her so too, when I pick up something of even more importance.
“You ruptured his eardrums. Dinah, I thought we agreed you weren’t going to beat up Superman unless you had no other choice?” Now it’s my hands on that are on my hips, my tone that takes a bit of a lecturing one and also happens to project just a little more so that Stephanie can hear what I’ve just said. “Okay. Actually, I’m going to assume you didn’t pick a fight with a Superman. Instead, I’m going to focus on … you know what? I’m completely confused. He tried to save you. Then he threatened you. Then he saved you. All the while he refused your overture. Until you made nice, excuse me.. very nice.. and he brought you home?”
“It’s times like these, that I understand why you drink. None of that mad…. holdup… did you say his suit records everything? Or were you telling Stephanie that mine does? Because if it’s the latter, you should know it does actually. If it’s the former? Then it means he’s being monitored.”
Dinah: “I didn’t beat up Superman. Sheesh.”
The scoff in my tone says it would be very hard for Tim to have said anything more ridiculous than what just came out of his mouth. And the way I absently bounce one booted foot, and check under my nearly non-existent fingernails could almost say that I’m playing coy, or even a little shy about what I’ve done except two of us in this room know I’ve got little to no shame, and if I’ve actually done something? I’m just going to own up to it, because I don’t act on something unless it’s really what I felt I needed to do in the moment.
“It’s not like I capitalized on him being down on the floor with his ears bleeding to inflict more damage. I bolted. Or I would have, except he threatened to bring the building down on everyone’s heads unless I came back.”
“What the fuu..”
“Right? I know. And I didn’t feel like I had any other choice. It was go along with what he wanted, or incoming NOWHERE in three minutes. So I acted. I wasn’t going to divulge your little secrets until at least our third date but if that’s what you want we can just all play Truth or Dare right now.”
I’m all over the place, and it’s entirely by design. Mostly because there’s a third set of ears here, or I would have told him that I’d assaulted Conner Luthor, not Superman, just for a little more background to the actual story. Or I might have spelled out further how I’d gotten Superman’s attention in the first place, and how there was an open ended offer for shenanigans that definitely shouldn’t take place when you know that under the suit? The other person’s in high school. Which he still made very clear he wouldn’t be necessarily opposed to at a later date.
“But yes. Bingo. The latter. He pegged me as a meta, but not a recognizable one with their database. He was trying to offer to help put me in touch with someone who could train me …haha right?… and then he was trying to connect my band to his family to protect me… all in all, that intel you gave me kind of left me woefully unprepared for the guy that I actually ran into. Well. Up until the death threats.”
“…I thought Superman was the good guy…”
Dropping my feet to the floor, I lean forward. Propping elbows on my knees to look up at him with a degree of actual seriousness, I start ticking off talking points on my fingers.
“Suit monitors everything, unless he’s up in the stratosphere. And either that girlfriend of yours has Supes wrapped around her pinkie finger so tight that he’s acting against his nature for her…”
“..there’s a girlfriend? Er. Just. Asking. For a friend.”
“… or you’ve pretty seriously misjudged your buddy. Maybe both. I wasn’t actually settled on which option I was going with before he brought me back here to keep me away from the incoming Big Brother Swarm.”
Tim: “My intel is good,” there’s a quick response if ever there was one, without an ounce of offended tone. “He’s self-centered, even self-absorbed. Little or no emotional attachment to the concepts of right or wrong. He acts without thinking, normally, then deals with the consequences by daring someone to put a stop to him.”
Truth be told? I’m torn. It makes sense that Conner’s dedication to Cassandra Sandsmark would play out in to a desire to please her. However I’m a little surprised that someone like Dinah couldn’t persuade him to do something that he would surely be able to get away with. Either she didn’t try very hard or he was a little more dedicated than I’ve given him credit for… or he’s working an angle. Maybe he thought that by rescuing someone, like Dinah, he’d earn some sort of reward. From Luthor or Cassie or both. That sounds more like the Boy that I know. It also fits perfectly in to the mold that I want to cast him in. Which makes me feel just a little bad about it, maybe I’ve not given the guy a fair…
Oh. There it is. Death threats. Right, bringing the whole place down unless she doesn’t run away. That sounds like the guy I’d gone to school with for a couple of years. “Mm. Alright. I’m seeing the pattern here. You made contact. His suit records it. Now he knows that they know. Which means he either had to help you or let you get scooped up. He didn’t have any way to know that Wonder Woman was out of town yet, at that point. So he assumes that she would find out. You put him in to a position where he had to act in a manner fitting to Wonder Woman’s vision of him.”
“It makes sense, but if there’s even a chance that Wonder Woman has succeeded in curbing him?” It doesn’t take an expert detective to see that what I’m about to say takes some work, apparently it tastes bitter. “Then we need to find a way to cement that.”
In that moment I was talking out loud, but not really talking to either of them. This was something that hadn’t truly ever crossed my mind. I thought the super boy was just about as irredeemable as possible. My only hope had been to somehow break the control over him that N.O.W.H.E.R.E. had. Maybe even neutralize that control Luthor had, so that it would in turn take away tools at the disposal of a superman. I hadn’t even really considered that it might be plausible to save the actual Boy himself. If Dinah had seen the things I’ve seen, I’m sure she’d think the same thing.
“He’s dating Wonder Woman,” growled over at Stephanie, on my approach to Dinah so as to put a fingertip upon the tip of a bouncing boot. “You’re good at this. Reading people. Plus, you’ve had time to think about it on the way home. Was my intel bad, outdated or does the girl have her hooks in him deep enough to make a difference if push came to shove?”
That other gloved hand rises in a silent signal to Stepahnie not to make a joke, yet. “Oh and uh, slightly more pressing question. If all of this went sideways, does that mean you’re on the database now? Do we need to get you out of the Country? And, yes. She babbles like that, non-stop, but she’s actually got something. Maybe intuition, maybe luck. Either way, she’s going to get herself or someone else killed working it through.”
“She’s also got a family history, like the rest of us,” lowering my voice to a mere stage-whisper. “Spoiler alert, Canary, her father’s on page three of her file. You might want to skip ahead.”
Dinah: “I don’t doubt that it was. I just think you may have undersold slightly the kind of influence a good woman can have on a royal douchebag if he actually cares what she thinks. Or at least that you didn’t translate that knowledge into concrete words in your files there.”
Really. I need to meet this girl at some point just so that I can truly understand what she’s working with. Maybe it’s the whole literal goddess part, because blonde with a body I’ve already got down. Sass, attitude, check. Not because I want to compete with her, I don’t need to compete with anyone. It’s curiosity more than anything, because I really don’t doubt Tim’s observations. Even factoring his own feelings in, he’s perceptive enough to be able to set things like that aside for the facts of a matter. But I won’t lie, the way he growls at the girl that’s looking like she’s at least recovered some oxygen enough to sit up a little more straight and gather her feet under her in a cross legged position I almostlaugh at him. Almost. My foot kicks a little bit harder under the tip of his finger just to make it bounce once before I subside, and there’s a muffled little mutter from across the room.
“…is he talking in third person now or…oh Superman. Yeah. No. My friend was talking about….nevermind.”
But as to his question about Conner Luthor, our current Superman, and his motivations?
“Look, I may not know him like you do, but I do know bullshit when I hear it, and he seemed pretty legitimately angry because trying to do something her way, and help someone, was backfiring pretty spectacularly on him. And putting her in danger. I think he actually wants to try to believe her way works. Do I think he’s there yet? No. But I’m pretty sure he’s going to do whatever the Hell he has to in order to keep her safe. Even if it doesn’t make her happy. Red, it may have been legitimately the only time I have ever felt bad about screaming in someone’s ear. Especially … er… point blank. I think not disappointing her a real motivator for him. Which works for us, unless keeping Wonder Woman safe is ever going to require working in opposition to us.”
I also legitimately don’t want to make Tim feel bad. Correction. Worse than he probably already feels about having to say out loud he needs to make sure the First Hottest Blonde’s relationship with his psuedo-best friend stays happy, healthy and lasting. But from my run ins with Superman? I think I can pretty safely say Wonder Woman is the only reason we’re not seeing a whole different sort of monster in that Cape right now. You don’t need to see Stephanie’s mouth under that mask to know she was about to say something and is only held off by Red Robin’s hand. But only for a few moments. Long enough for him to finish anyway.
“…She she or she me? I’m so confused…are you complimenting me or insulting me? Or she? Wait. Who’s file? My file?! I should get to see my file! Why do you have a file?!”
At this point, Spoiler’s getting up and with much less wobble in her legs than I might have expected. She is blonde and she is a girl though. Chances are Boy Wonder may have been taking it easy on her like I’m not going to. Maybe that’s why I got recruited for the Fledgling Vigilante Reformation Club. I still more or less ignore her though, to answer the actual important question in what he’d said.
“Yes, but I led him to believe I had a super minor whistling louder than average power with little or no training. The volume part he doesn’t believe, but the no training part he may have. He seemed to think he could handle it by checking up on me. Which means we can plan on a visit in the future…sometime. Might I suggest that by then you cook up one of your little doohickies to block out his suit? I think it’d go a long way for everyone’s interests. Either I can give it to him, or you get it to his girl to pass along.”
What else was there that I’d deemed in my own personal debriefing as I walked across Gotham as important, in between inappropriate ‘radio’ transmissions to his drones?
“Oh. When I told him I’d be safe here, there was a very obvious and clear lightbulb moment and gears turning in that dense skull.” Not even being rude. It is incredibly dense. “He knows he wasn’t supposed to come to Gotham, and now an undocumented Meta thought she was going to be safe from NOWHERE there. I am betting he put two and two together, but he got six instead of four.”
Tim: Ugh. With every single word Dinah says I’m getting a far worse feeling in the pit of my stomach. It’s a really good thing I’ve kept the suit on. That may be the only thing keeping both women from seeing me turn a little green. The irony in all of this is that I like Conner, that’s the truth. The parts of him that are normal, are actually great. There just happens to be so few of them. When we first met, I could not for the life of me understand why Bruce insisted that I visit that particular school. Make those particular friends. If anything, he was a standard Luthor. He was all the things I said he was moments ago, but in Luthor-mode he also intentionally dials all those personality quirks up. His secret identity? Is all about being the worst possible person, so that no one would ever suspect him of being anything good.
Frankly? It works. Because even now, right this second, I’m hard pressed to think of a single redeemable quality about him. He’s a blank slate though or he was. Which leads to that singular saving grace; he didn’t know what love really was. His meeting Cassie had gone poorly at first. Continued that way for a couple months too. Somewhere around Homecoming our first year at St. Joseph’s, the two of them clicked and it stopped looking like a hostage situation and became a Stockholm situation. It was only because of the strict orders from Bruce that kept me from intervening. Now though, right now, I’m once more rocked by how good at this Bruce was. He knew. Somehow he saw it in the cards, forced me to play the hand. Now, if what Dinah says is true, there is a real chance that Cassandra Sandsmark might actually save the world from a threat she keeps from every materializing.
“That’s a puzzle for you to work out,” is the only real comment for Stephanie, as to whether I’m insulting her or complimenting her. “Everyone has a file. You can see them when Canary says you can handle seeing them.”
For a time then I’m quiet. Leaving the ‘Roost’ to the sounds of Stephanie and Dinah, while I look absently at the methodical way my hand bounces under the force of Dinah’s movements. It’s soothing. Having that point of focus as my world spirals out of my pretty little box that I’ve put it in. Damnit. Everything fit so well. Everything had a place, every place had a thing. Now I’m faced with the very real reality, that I’m going to have to sacrifice something important to me personally, to someone that I was pretty sure from the start was a monster. How can I do anything else? There’s a very real chance Dinah’s right and that disappointing Cassandra is something important enough to forge a real Superman out of Conner Luthor. How do you turn away from that possibility? Especially when you know the world just lost a Batman. The Batman.
“Stunting his suit shouldn’t be that difficult, but if they’re monitoring it? We need to do something better than block it. We need to make it so that they’re unable to monitor him, but don’t actually know they’re not monitoring him. Until…” Taking a deep breathe and a step forward, trails that fingertip down her boot until it’s about to touch Canary’s actual skin. Then I give it a gentle nudge off of the computer terminal. “… you think Superman doesn’t need to be monitored. You’re going to be meeting with him again?”
A jerk of the cowled head in Stephanie’s direction, if only to make a point. “If Wonder Woman has her hooks in him and he thinks saving you is a good way to get in to her graces. Maybe you can work that angle. Show him the benefits of doing things Her way. You’re already going to be teaching one Stray, why not two? Reinforce Wonder Woman’s point. Let’s give him as many reasons to buy in to Wonder Woman’s philosophy.”
I’m about to go on, say something more when I find myself staring at Dinah for a different reason. Recognition. She already thought about that, didn’t she? It’s why she had him bring her to Gotham. Because it gives her a chance to follow through on meeting him again. Instead of it just being a ploy before she disappeared. Dinah was working the angle, before I even knew there was one.
“You already think he’s ready to have it blocked don’t you? Huh, he turned down sleeping with you to impress her. That’s not exactly the empirical data, I normally like to work with but… I’ve got to admit, it’s compelling. I’m not sure I would have turned that offer down. Alright. I’ll work something up, you can give it to him. If Wonder Woman gives it to him there’ll be more questions than I think she’s ready to answer.”
“In any case, we’ve got some more immediate problems to work through. I heard what you said. About the Joker. There’s something I think you should know…” She’ll understand then, why I nudged her foot off of the edge of my desk, when I tap in the command to show her the Roost’s internal cameras. Playing back Damien’s visit for her. When he picked up his new suit and hardware. “. . . so . . . this happened.”
Dinah: “Ugh! If I wanted to be confused and yet still soul crushed I could have stayed home and watched K-Dramas…instead I picked fictional study group with Mr. Rogers and the Chuck Norris of vigilantes… not that I’m not grateful for the opportunity to be. Y’know. Beaten up and downtrodden.”
I’m still not paying that much attention to Stephanie, though what Tim had said made me curious enough to want to dig her file up on the computer right now and take a looksie. Family issues, yeah, none of us enter into this business without it. In fact, I can’t think of a single person that I know in this line of work that took it up voluntarily, or not so voluntarily, that has a happy, safe, sane childhood. And frankly at least one dead parent. It’s a little shocking that there aren’t more of us for that reason alone, especially here in Gotham but maybe it takes a certain suicidal bent to a personality to get you here. Or we were just some of the few who were lucky enough, had enough skill, to make it until Bruce took us in. Tim told me he didn’t want this one getting herself killed, and that it’d be his fault if he let it continue. I’m sure that’s true enough. I can’t help wondering if it’s also because it’s what Bruce did.
“I assume I’m the Chuck Norris. I look horrible in cardigans. Covers up everything important and exciting. I’ll remind you how grateful you are when we’ve gotten you a little more trodden though.”
That, however, isn’t something I’m going to ask him. As I demonstrated with my abbreviated, field psych eval of his Superfriend, I don’t really need to ask many questions to put together the pieces and clues that are in front of me. Even if I don’t know the subject all that well, and I know Tim Drake a great deal better than I’d gotten to know Conner Luthor in half an hour. Or maybe he sees something in her besides a utility belt full of optimism and a woefully blank slate. Cocking a thumb and forefinger into a finger gun, I pull the imaginary trigger at Tim as he works out what kind of tech we’d actually need to accomplish what I was suggesting.
“Attaboy. A feed loop of some sort maybe, but nothing to make them think it’s broken and they need to fix it. Long enough for you to finish recruiting Red Robin’s Angels, and there’s enough of them that the scales can be tipped. At least, I assume that’s what the end game plan is here.”
He’s got the information. She has the status, and the ability to proverbially rub that status off on someone else. I assume by being seen with them, associated the same way Luthor was trying to get me to do with him. So that people would notice if they went missing, would ask questions that someone wouldn’t want to have to answer. And they’re going to have to do it at a pace that NOWHERE doesn’t think something is up and act before the setup is secure to wipe them out. That could mean slow and steady, one at a time, or maybe a group unveiling when it’s too late and unable to be spun anyway but what it is. A co-op of heroes, independent of Lex Luthor’s agenda.
“Yes. I don’t know when, but I don’t doubt he’ll turn up again so that he can show he was reporting and they still think he’s in line with the program.”
I can’t help laughing, as my foot hits the floor of the Roost with an echoing thump because I haven’t bothered to slow the descent from anything but a dead weight drop.
“He’s going to be a little confused when I switch tacks from ‘You’re Superman, you can do whatever you want!’ and ‘Is that a sidekick in your tights or are you happy to see me?’ to ‘Great Power and Great Responsibility.’ But I can give it a go. Sorry kid, not going to proposition you and boost your ego anymore. And not you either.”
“Uh.. yeah… boy. What a disappointment but… I think I’m good.”
Waving a hand absently in Stephanie’s direction, as I lean in to look at the monitor Tim’s nudged my boots off of.
“Yeah, I do. There was literally zero reason for him to be honest with me, I just ruptured his ear drums and made his day difficult. None. But he got me where they couldn’t hear, and did. You don’t have a girlfriend that can crush your skull if she’s angry with you. But you do know even better than he does how great I am.”
“…so there’s not a girlfriend…”
“If he doesn’t think he needs to follow NOWHERE’S orders all the time in order to protect Wonder Woman from their attention? I think he’s going to be a whole lot more likely to be…well. Superman.”
I think there’s something you should know. Literally nothing good ever follows that statement. Ever. Deaths. Disasters. Disappointments. That’s what follows. And what he shows me has me inhaling sharply through my nose. For a drawn out amount of time, that might indicate I’m about to use all that air for some lung power. Or, as it turns out, to let out an equally long and drawn out sigh.
“So you’re aiding and abetting even more idiocy? …no offense.”
“…none taken. I. Think.”
“Did you know he was using it to commit murder with the Joker? Or were you just thinking some solo action? Christ. I understand frustration and anger and not having a concrete way to channel it but Jesus. He’s going to get himself somewhere you don’t go back from.”
I’d know. I was almost there once, too. But I never went in on homicide with the other side.
Tim: “You can’t be the Chuck Norris,” said with little more than a wolfish smirk, “You are far too pretty to be the Chuck Norris. But there’s a certain Irony you can work in someone calling you Mrs. Rogers.”
While the clowning has it’s purpose; Distraction. I’m not overly keen on letting it through my thought processes. Which is why I encourage it, but I only indulge a little before I put myself back on the proper track. Making a loop of some sort that would block the true monitoring of whatever Conner was doing? That’s easy. Simulating something; something believable that only the best sleuth in the world would actually uncover as a deception? That’s a real challenge, but the solution rests in what I’ve just said about Irony.
“They raised him in a cloning tube, educated him with a virtual reality program. One of the first things Batman had me do, after meeting the new Superman, was to track down his true origin. It lead me to a little place in Nevada. Where a laboratory used to exist. I say used too, because the place was a heap of rubble. I spent three days sifting through it and by the time I’d left? All I recovered was some trace element programming from the tube that held him. It only survived because it was in proximity to him. It was the virtual reality program that he woke up from. I think, with some modifications, I could adapt it to project that back to his handlers. It’ll take me some time….”
Another look, flicked back over a shoulder to Stephanie, before returning my gaze to the busty blonde in front of me. “Time you can spend making sure she doesn’t get herself killed. I gave her a suit, but it’ll only protect her so far. It won’t likely protect her from herself at all… uh, wait, uh…you told him he could do whatever he wanted? With everything or.. you specifically?”
“I’d like to reiterate that I’m dumbfounded at his refusal,” the shake of the head is paired with the slow exhale of breathe that once more serves as my pulling my thoughts off of a track they’re threatening to go down and back to where they need to be. “Skull-Crushing Girlfriend sounds like either an excellent code name or the finishing move of a terrible professional wrestler. Though, I’m not sure that actually works out if you’re Superman. She can’t crush his skull…”
A quick turn in Stephanie’s direction let’s me take a sum of her recuperation. “She’s talking about Him not Me. I don’t have a girlfriend. Skull-crushing variety, most especially. But, I think she was also talking about propositioning Him and You, although if she were, I would more than willing to surrender the Roost to the two of you.”
“Call me a sucker for idiocy, but I can’t let Damien go out there and get himself killed any more than I can let Stephanie. The difference is that I could tell in a heartbeat that Stephanie’s too stubborn to give this up. Even though she’s so under-trained that she’s more likely to break her own neck on that cape she bought at a Halloween prop-shop, than to get killed in the line of duty. Damien’s almost the opposite. If I didn’t help him, he’d go out there and do the same things. He’d just do them without the Hood. What do we gain by that? Our Father’s legacy drawn in to the mud. Not one step closer to his killers? Plus, there’s a good chance he ends up dead, right along with Br…”
“Besides. You don’t get to lecture me on this one. What did you do to stop him? No, not tonight. I mean when you saw him on your return to Gotham. You just read a guy like a championship profiler, in thirty minutes. Don’t tell me you didn’t know Damien was going to do things the League of Assassins way. It’s Damien. But you didn’t kick his ass and put him in time-out. We’re both equally guilty of whatever he does when we chose not to stop him. I’m just hoping we can get something useful out of Damien being Damien…”
“It’s not just frustrating, to not have any movement. Dead ends at every turn. It’s damning. Because every day we go without a lead, is another day that the rest of the world goes down the tubes while we hunt for those clues. The world isn’t waiting for us to find out who killed our father. It’s moving on. Faster than I can keep up. As demonstrated by how woefully out of date my intel on my Best Friend was today.”
Without warning, I turn, flicking my wrists out simultaneously. Hurling two of the discs off my belt at Stephanie. “Clearly, I’ve been wrong before though. If you think Damien’s actually working with the Joker, as opposed to using the Joker like a rabid dog on a leash. Then let’s bring Damien in. Let’s talk to him. Let’s convince him that there’s another way.”
“But, I’ve got a strong impression that you know I’m at least partially right about this. Our choices are ‘Help him,’ ‘Stop him,’ or ‘Get the fuck out of his way.’ In no particular order.”
Dinah: “Are you telling me, a liberated free woman, that I can’t be anything I want to be? Tch. Someone probably should have raised you better than that. Someone definitely should have raised Superman better than that. There’d be a definite style to using something that used to be used against him to fool NOWHERE. Maybe he’ll even appreciate the irony. If nothing else, hopefully he’ll just appreciate the help, or at least use it for our benefit with no spoken thank you.”
I’ve got the vantage now that Stephanie’s moved to be able to see both of them at the same time without having to turn like Tim does. She’s in the process of spreading her arms out in a ‘hey, c’mon!’ gesture like all this constant dogging is actually starting to offend her a little. Or maybe she’s just unable to passively take the comments. I know someone else like that in this room, and they’re also blonde. Lot less fond of purple though. And while she’d insisted she wasn’t going to get herself killed, she’s also here. And still here after the threats, which tells me two pretty important things; she knows she’s not good enough for this, and she wants to learn. I can work with that. She just may not enjoy the pace.
“Everything, but the me was heavily implied. Especially when he started to pull the well, gosh ma’am I’d love to fuck you right over the … ahem. Children present… moving on… but I really probably shouldn’t. I was pretty flabbergasted myself. How do you know she can’t? Has she tried?”
“…what kind of relationships do you people have!? And that’s …too bad about the girlfriend. I mean. Unless you’re happy about that and… I’ll tell my friend. I’m going to stop now…”
Stephanie’s hands on hips posture has what looks a lot more to do with general awkwardness of not being sure how to stand in a get up like that, while not engaged in anything else, rather than because she’s still trying to catch her breath. I can’t hear her panting anymore, or see any shifts in the face mask that indicate she’s puffing. I take the time to size her up again a little more fully with Tim’s back to me. I actually let him carry on about his reasonings without interruption from me because I think I need to hear it fully to understand.
“…I did not. I borrowed it from school. And I wasn’t actually out to punch anyone…”
The girl may be defending herself but she’s doing it in a glowery sort of way as she folds her arms across her chest that’s coming off as more to herself than justification for Tim, and not meant for anyone else to have to overhear. I’d say we’re both caught flat footed with his sudden turn, only I’m not the one that an attack’s being flung at and she wasn’t expecting it in the least. Arms go up, though her posture prevents her from moving quickly enough to get more than one forearm in the way for the discs to bounce off.
“What the hell was that for!”
“Huh. Not bad. More elegantly avoided if you’d just pivoted to the side and let them go past. Unless you knew they’d just bounce off your suit that is…”
She didn’t know that.
“…yeah I… will read the manual when I go home.”
“It’s Damien. I can’t put him in time out unless all the rest of you are going to help, unless I get to maim him first and I’m not going to do that, and he’d probably only take kicking his ass for encouragement to keep doing the same thing he already wanted to do. And I know it’s hard. I do. With all the tech, tools, and manpower we’ve got working for us to have nothing can make it feel like there is nothing, or that the longer it’s taking the more something that you’ve missed is going to slip away forever.”
My exhale is a lot more resignation than exasperation this time, and I scrub a hand through my wind and walk tousled hair, ignoring Stephanie’s harumph as she pulls her hood back up once again. So much purple…
“I couldn’t see what went on inside. I didn’t have any of my stuff. It could have read like they just picked the same target, cooperated, and then went their own ways. I didn’t stick around after obviously to sort it out. Option three there, I’m afraid, has the very strong possibility of leaving Gotham with two rabid dogs before this is over. And one is difficult to stop as it is.”
Tim: Actually, I would never tell a woman that they can’t be anything they want. Because I believe in that. Anyone that thinks otherwise? Hasn’t met Barbara, the book-smartest person I’ve ever met. Nor Dinah, who can throttle just about anyone (including Superman apparently). There’s no limit to what a female can do, except the societal constraints that hold them down and their own ambition. That said, I’m pretty much in complete agreement with her assessment on the tech problem. Utilizing what NOWHERE used on their Clone in the first place, which kind of gave us our rotten apple, would be the best sort of irony.
“Wait, you mean to tell me that Children being present keeps you from saying what he was going to fuck you over, but not that he was going to fuck you to begin with? I know at least one set of teenage ears that most certainly would have rather had none of that information. Absolutely none of the information about Conner Luthor putting his hands on … all of that.”
There’s a sideways glance at Stephanie once more, but otherwise I’m leaving that alone. For now. The questions and the manner in which she throws them out in her fishing expedition. Instead of that, I let my focus remain on her abilities or lack thereof, for now. “Well your new cape is flame retardant, projectile kinetic diminishing and bladed weapon deflecting. So give them back their terrible bath towel. Because -that- was your first chance to actually use the cape functionally, instead of as a fashion accessory. We don’t wear capes just because they look neat. As Dinah will tell you, if they’re not fulfilling a function then they’re actually a detriment. From now on, if you’re keeping the cape, make it your new best friend. An extension of you.”
“She didn’t know,” following up on something Dinah said, “Even though I told her to read the manuals. She was barely out of my sight before she was changing in to it, the night I gave it to her.”
She’s nailed it. The main reason that I took to outfitting Damien. It’s difficult to be back in Gotham. To face the loss of my Father, for the second time. Knowing that there’s a kiler out there, but not being able to find it would be maddening enough. It’s actually worse than that. I’ve been able to turn up nothing. Not a thing. As far as I can tell, Dinah has turned up nothing. Damien is the same. If Dick has found anything then he’s kept it himself. The only person making any headway in the whole damn city on this case? Is the Joker (and now Damien), because they’re doing the one thing that the rest of us can’t do. Eliminate suspects from the list, by eliminating the suspects entirely.
“Look, I don’t actually agree with the methodology. But we both seem to agree that it’s the only thing that’s gotten any results at all. Maybe we can talk to him. If we can’t stop him, without breaking him, then maybe there’s another option. Maybe we can aim him. Limit the collateral damage. I mean, that’s one of the reasons I gave him the tech in the first place. To keep the collateral damage down.”
Except that I was actually thinking too shallow. I’d been trying to reign in the damage Damien could do to the Wayne name and legacy. I hadn’t considered, even for a moment, that he would actually do something reckless like work with a madman. The City can’t handle two of them. It has barely handled one before and she’s right about that. Batman had a hard enough time controlling one of them. This could turn in to a catastrophe.
“Damien would tell you that you’re highly over-estimating yourself if you think you could maim him. Even with all of our help. Lucky for me, I’m not about to call that a bluff.”
by Michele | Sep 27, 2017 | Chronicles
Conner: When Cassie called, I was in the middle of flying back to Metropolis. There had been only momentary hesitation before answering. After all, I’d been very close to Gotham! Somehow Cassie knew, that quickly! Am I in trouble? Wait-a-minute. Why would I be in trouble? She’s the one hiding stuff. Including a whole city that she’s been micro-managing me out of. There are very few times in my short life when I knew for certainty that -I- am not the one who should be in trouble. So I’d answered that call. In what was, I have to assume retroactively, one of the most defensive voices that I’ve ever had.
“I wasn’t doing anything! She was in danger, so I was flying her home. That’s it, honestly…wait-what?”
It happens to be a little strange, once I take the time to think about it but… I’d actually forgotten that I was in the process of spying on Cassie when the original distraction happened. She’d been out of town, on what had at the time sounded like another trip to a boring city for another tour of a college she wouldn’t end up selecting. At least, that’s what I had assumed she was doing once she started to explain where she was heading. Fawcett City? The only reason I’ve even ever heard of it, is because of my first case out of the cloning cylinder…
Uh, oh.
This looks like a job for Superman! Because I’m sure not showing up any other way right now. Calling it in as ‘Work’ also, at least temporarily, gets me off the hook for the situation in Metropolis. Which is to say, I’m not looking forward in to going back and explaining to Doc Fairchild what happened there. Not the real version. Nor the makeshift cover story. All of it is going to be a hard sell, but if I show up with presents? Hey, maybe she overlooks my not bringing in a low-level Meta like the curvaceous Dinah Lance. She might even be in the mood to accept that I’m intending to see Dinah again, which is why I’m not indoctrinating her in to N.O.W.H.E.R.E.
As much as I normally like to make an entrance as the President’s Son, I’m growing to enjoy -this- entrance as well. ‘Look, up in the sky.’ ‘Oh, shut up Betsy, that’s just a bird.’ ‘That ain’t no man, it’s a plane. You need yer glasses checked, Festus.’ Nope. Wrong on all counts, as Cassie can attest once I come down to a landing atop the county courthouse. She’s made some friends it would seem. Is that a Sheriff standing with her?
“Sorry it took so long,” all of about three minutes, give or take a minute for the time change. Which is roughly ten million times the time investment needed to check Cassie out in her uniform. “When I got your call, I was on my way back to Metropolis. I must have been out of my cell network, because it sounded like you said you needed me to send someone to pick up a crocodile.”
Cassie: Guilty conscience. It’s as much a saying as it is an accusation as it is an actual thing. None of them are something that I have ever, and I mean ever attributed to Conner Luthor, despite the thing that he’s done an awful lot of things that most people would probably feel at least a little bit of remorse over. It would also have to imply that he has a conscience. Besides me, that is. Okay, so that’s a tad harsh because it’s not that he’s totally lacking, he just has a skewed sense of a lot of things. You can blame his upbringing for that. No, not the simulated corn-fed variety but what was actually going on at the time. We’re working on it. He’s getting better. Still. I’m utterly unprepared for the stream of words that come out once I’ve had a minute to get Freddy to safety, work out a meeting for later, and then de-sewer myself.
Maybe the stunned silence on the other end had come off like angry fuming since he doesn’t have the ability to pair a facial expression with it. Or at least, I hope he doesn’t because that would mean he had in fact been following me. Blue eyes had gotten progressively narrower the longer he’d gone on though. She? Who’s she and where was he taking her that he feels the need to excuse himself over it? Conner doesn’t excuse or explain himself. Conner just does what Conner wants to do, typically. And that may just have to be a conversation for a later time because there’s something a great deal more pressing going on here.
Apparently these suits are self-cleaning. Very handy. And something I didn’t know before now. I’m sure the Sheriff would have attempted to be very polite if I’d still reeked of sewage and waste, and I’m also sure Conner would have had comments to make were I naked, but since neither of those would have made for very dignified introductions for the local law enforcement to Wonder Woman? Lets just go with ‘it’s a very good thing I have the suit.’ You know what’s also great? That being able to fly means I can make the short trip upwards to hover on the roof in front of him without removing either of my hands from my hips at any point.
The attitude is maybe a little ruined by the fact that I’m trying very hard not to smile. Maybe no one else would pick it out, or even know, but I happen to love flying. It’s the best part of my powers. It’s also the part I get to use the very least, and here I am. Plain view of any of the loiterers that had stuck around afterwards to sate their curiosity about what had happened at the bank, or for me. And I like it.
“Back from where?” So maybe it won’t wait that long before I have to ask. “And you only partially heard me wrong. I need you to pick up some Crocodile Men. Almost a whole pack of them, actually. They seem to have decided today was a good day to pick up bank robbing.”
Conner: “Gotham,” there might just be a hint of guilt in the admission, but I don’t lie to Cassie and I’ve got nothing to hide! Okay. Maybe a little to hide. “Long story. Cliff notes: A very, very, very attractive lead singer, tried to solicit Superman for her audience. It didn’t go well, but for once? Not my fault, and I actually mean it. I had big plans to tell you how you should be proud of me. I was getting so laid, like I would have needed to redefine what it even means to get laid like you were going to lay me.”
Oh. Right. This isn’t a discussion between Cassie Sandsmark and Connor Luthor, we’re supposed to be someone else. Some thing else, entirely, point in fact. I normally do a better job at hiding my proclivities, but it’s been a very long day. Headed in to a very long night. I’m barely comforting myself by looking through Cassie’s costume as it is. I better not do something else stupid right now. So I just sigh out the rest of the ‘short version’ of events, while taking stock of my girlfriend from top to bottom. Then bottom to top.
“She ended up being a Meta. I tried to offer her a way to avoid … them, since she gave herself away in the middle of Metropolis. Turns out she’s part of some sort of Underground, in Gotham. I think she was trying to recruit me with sex. Or maybe she was distracting me, so that her Underground friends could do something. Distract me, with sex. Anyway, she blew my ear drums out. So I threatened to kill her and everyone who ‘witnessed’ the event, unless she let me save her. She gave in. So I dropped her off in Gotham and came here. Gotham Harbor, just outside of the City.”
Ahem. Well that’s my side of the events. Truth is, I never got really question the ‘Why’ of everything. Nor did I get to really follow up on it like I’d been planning. What with the call to come here and help with. “Uh. Crocodile Men? You got to fight Bank Robbing Crocodile Men and I almost got fucked by a good looking super-spy? I love this job!”
My excitement is only moderately restrained, if that, by the fact that my eyes finally shift from her breasts to the large bruise along one forearm. This isn’t the first time that Cassie has seen my eyes begin to glow faintly with a red hue. No small amount of anger surges through me over her being hurt. Though, I’ll be the first to say it. This ‘Job’ is dangerous. We’ve talked about it before. I haven’t done this for the last few years without my own share of bumps and bruises. Some of our foes have strength on par with our’s. It’s only natural that we’ll get hurt in the process. What infuriates me isn’t even that she got hurt. Someone left a mark on my perfect Goddess.
“We’ve encountered a crocodile man before. One in Gotham actually,” stepping in, allowing the cape to cloak the two of us from prying eyes for a moment, while I take her hand in inspection of the bruise. “Why didn’t you call me sooner?”
Cassie: “You. Were in Gotham.”
It’s not a question. I heard him the first time. I don’t even especially need confirmation, because why would he have said it if that wasn’t what happened. He could have said he was literally anywhere else, and that means he’s not lying about it. He was in Gotham, literally the only place I’ve ever tried to keep him out of. I maybe should be disappointed in him, or even mad, but it wasn’t like I didn’t expect it would happen eventually. I was only doing it as a favor to our friend, and it’s kind of a miracle it’s worked as long as it did. He actually manages to sound contrite about it, and I was on my way to deciding to just let it go for the time being in that instant. Then he continues with his story.
“…I should be proud of you because you were going to get laid?!”
I, also, have forgotten where we are and who we’re supposed to be for the moment, and the fact that sound is going to carry even better from this vantage to the area around us, so I clear my throat. Purse my lips together, unclench my fists and lower my voice an octave or two. I’m not sure if I’m regretting our open and honest policy right now, or if I want to be infuriated that he’s talking about sleeping with someone else while he’s doing what he’s doing with his eyes. Yes. I know what he’s doing. I ignore it most of the time. What happens, after that start of an outburst, is an almost comical series of emotions playing across my face, shifting almost as quickly as he relays his Very Trying Evening. Confusion about this underground in Gotham, curiosity if he actually has figured it out entirely. Puzzling over whether or not I should correct him, and if I could even do so without giving away a secret that’s not mine to tell. Actual concern over whether she really blew his eardrums out, and a moment of checking Conner over, until I cycle right back into disbelief.
“…you did what?! Of course she gave in! That’s what sane people…”
You know what. More bait I’m not rising to. Or not rising the rest of the way to, because it’s not intentional on his part. He’s telling me about his day! It just sounds an awful lot like one of my first times meeting Conner Luthor, and apparently it was with a super attractive other blonde. I’m not normally prone to jealousy, and that’s not really even what this is right now. I’m frustrated. Already was before he got here, and now I just need to focus on the matter at hand. Instead of bickering with my boyfriend while the Sheriff and whomever else watches. Pinching the bridge of my nose, there’s an audible sound of teeth grinding for a moment before I continue.
“Crocodile Men. With clown masks. In suits. Saved as many hostages as I could, but some of them had been eaten before I got there and…”
I’m leaving Freddy out of the conversation entirely. See. We don’t have to talk about other blondes to relate the tale of the night! I’m also not ready for him to be brought to anyone‘s attention yet, or rather I don’t think he’s ready. I’d honestly forgotten entirely about the very obvious line of bruises across both front and back of my arm, at least during out little chit chat here. I remember them when I see the obvious sign of anger in his glowing eyes, and follow where they’re angled. Oh. I wince slightly when he takes my arm to inspect the injury. Not because he’s making it worse, it’s just… gotten easy to forget what it feels like to be physically hurt sometimes.
“I’m not sure that there’s a connection, there. The whole situation was reading a whole lot more Nile than River Monchant.”
Because I didn’t -need- you, is the thought that flashes unbidden and definitely unwanted into my head and the second wince is for my own mind rather than my arm, as I lay my other hand on top of the one holding my injured appendage. Why I’m wanting to comfort -him- when he’s excited about some other chick wanting to do him, and he’s going where I told him not to…
“Because it went from thinking the hostages were deluded, to realizing that they were honest to Goodness Crocomaggia robbing the place, and between getting dogpiled and all the rest there just wasn’t time. I’m okay. It’s done. They just…obviously don’t really have a suitable detention facility in Fawcett city for. Well. Monsters.”
Conner: “Not so much in as on the outskirts, where I dropped her off. After we had a heart to heart. Maybe that’s not the right word choice….”
Okay. So Cassie is not reacting with the amount of grateful pride that I was anticipating when originally planning out how I would regale her with this Tale. Let’s me review what I’ve said to her, so as to better re-state why she shouldn’t be mad at me. Hold on. Did I say that I threatened to kill everyone? Probably another poor choice in wording. Damnit, I said I was giving the Cliff Notes! She’s judging me on the Cliff Notes without reading the book! It’s just like I do at school. When the text books lack the answer to the quizzes! They’re not worth reading.
By the point of her voice raising an octave, I’ve put my hand out to forestall getting lambasted, “Wait. Hold on. She did give in! I was testing her. I didn’t know if she was worth saving or if she was really some sort of Meta-Spy sent to attack the President’s Son. You know what I mean? It could have all been a trap. I didn’t know who she was working for, so I needed to know if she would save lives if they were on the line or not. So, I caused a localized earthquake…”
“Wait. Hold on. So it was more like a tremor. Very small. Barely a risk of bringing down the auditorium. And I did it after she attacked me with this super-sonic voice of her’s, that ruptured my ear drums. Limited my choices at that point, y’know?” How did I lose control of all of this so quickly? I know it too. When it’s out of control. A couple of N.O.W.H.E.R.E. Proctors could question me for days and I’d barely lift an eyebrow at this. Cassie? Has me stumbling over things I don’t even feel guilty about. “You were going to be proud of me, because she offered to have sex right there on the roof. I turned her down. I even offered to introduce her to some people that might be able to train her. She turned me down, so I went in out of costume to try to approach her incognito. Figured if I could get her on the Luthor record label, she wouldn’t disappear for having a super-wolf whistle.”
“Did I mention how hot this girl was? And that I turned her down? Or that I was trying to help her? Or that she attacked me? Or that she was from Gotham?” You see I’m not having any of this side-tracking. Not yet, at least. I want it stated. For the record. That I should still be getting laid. Because I did everything, just the way Cassie would have wanted me too.
Okay. Maybe not the threat to kill everyone. But. Sometimes you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette. “Well, they only managed to bruise your soft-tissue. It doesn’t look like there’s very much penetration. A couple more bites or some gnawing action though, might have done some real damage.”
This? This is a talk that I can handle without fumbling or screwing up my words. This is the job. Not the one with the Cape. Though as Cassie fills me in on just what she was dealing with? As absurd as it sounds, I don’t even question it. In turn that should clue her in to exactly what strange things I’ve dealt with in my short life-span as an Agent of the Project. While she speaks, I let my eyes grace over the bruises once more, before letting them settle upon those big bright eyes of her’s.
“There’s a facility. I can put them there, but there’s going to be questions. I’ll need to have Megan come too. Especially, if you’ve found another stray to hide in Gotham.”
Cassie: “Did she attack you before or after you threatened her? Because that’s probably a decent indicator of whether she was there to attack Conner Luthor on purpose, or if she didn’t find the Man of Steel as charming and doable anymore.”
He didn’t say he’d threatened this woman in quite so many words, but I know the schpeal. I heard it myself once. I also know Conner’s methods of convincing people to go along with the way he thinks they should be going. He’s getting better! Really! Just apparently not in his recruitment speech. I would actually bring up the fact that I’m betting she knew who he was. Not the President’s son, but Superman, both in and out of costume, because it seems awful suspicious to me. Except maybe I only think that way because of her methods of distracting him, because I knew there would be a distraction just not what kind, and that I’m putting a puzzle together I have more clues for than he does.
My mouth opens to protest the ‘localized earthquake’ but he keeps interrupting, rephrasing, and I’m really not entirely sure if he’s digging himself out of a hole, or making it deeper. Somehow I believe he’s managed to simultaneously do both. I let out a tremendous sigh, and push my free hand back through my hair. Mostly to stop from pinching the bridge of my nose again. Okay, Cassie. Lets stick to the important facts as he seems them and not just what he actually did because… he thinks he did a good thing, or he was trying to, and frankly I don’t want him to decide that’s too much effort in the future. Especially since apparently he’s starting to love this ‘job.’ Because chicks are throwing themselves at him.
“You did mention that. A couple times. I’m sure you made a very good effort. It shattered all his teeth when he chomped my arm. So there wasn’t much biting after that fortunately.”
We’ll leave out where I was fairly sure I was going to be a Croco-amputee and that I was pretty startled I wasn’t at the time. Don’t need to add any drama-trauma and make him that much more excited to be sure and be with me next time. Though that really isn’t fair. I actually like doing this with him. It was the only reason I’d started it in the first place. Then I started to realize, and had it pointed out to me, that I could also do something else and more with it. Over all, it’s boiled down into a clearly very weird day for me, and his weird day is connected to mine though he just doesn’t actually realize how. I’m nodding my head in acceptance, even agreement of what he’s saying. I assumed there’d be a place. Of course there’d be questions. It isn’t until he gets to the part about Megan than I purse my lips and wrinkle my nose.
“I’m not actually hiding anyone in Gotham, Superman. Meta or otherwise.”
Conner: “Before. Like waaay before. I mean she blew my ear drums out after I offered her a contract, with no terms. Just to connect herself with Luthor’s name, to save herself from them. Here I am. Offering mega-bucks with no payoff, I’d already told her that I didn’t want to sleep with her by that point. There wasn’t any catch. So she whammied me. Just for spite, I think. Since it turns out that she’s actually not some Agent of Evil Meta-Humans seeking nefarious whatevers.”
“She’s just some well-trained hot chick. Her Grammy was the original Black Canary. She’s got a legacy of Hot Chick DNA.” Even now. When I know that I’ve lost any hope of the pay off that I was actually after, I’m still working the magic. Siiigh. Sometimes, I should really just shut up. It’s better that way. “Seriously. Mega-Hot-Chick. Turned down. Completely. Shot down. Not because I didn’t want her. Oh-no. You’d have to be blind, deaf, and more than a little retarded. I’m talking Corky from Wonder Years retarded. To not want this girl. She was wearing this little number that I didn’t even need to X-Ray to see through.”
“Didn’t even give her my number, Cassie. I’m a one Woman sort of guy. Especially when my Woman is wonderful. Grade A Goddess.”
Sigh. So. Okay then. Crocodile Men. That’s my night now. No sexy blonde singer. Apparently no Grade-A Goddess ass. It’s hard being Superman. Really hard. With that sigh, I’m visibly slumping. Even I can admit that there comes a point when you’ve just got to accept that you’re not digging yourself out of the hole you’ve dug. Not without a scapegoat. That’s what I’m missing. A scapegoat. One prime suspect, to whom all other blame could be assigned.
This is why I’m okay with her putting together a team. More people to take the blame. “You’ve been keeping me out of Gotham for weeks and I just so happen to get attacked by a meta-human. Who says the only place she can think of that’ll be safe from N.O.W.H.E.R.E. is Gotham. It’s alright, Wonder Woman. You keep your secrets, I’ll keep mine.”
“Just remember that the next time you find out that I’ve got to cause an Earthquake to keep the Girls off of me. I won’t even bother you with explaining how I tried to save a Meta instead of throwing them to the wolves. Or how Faithful I was in the face of overwhelming beauty and a siren’s voice.”
With that? I step off the roof, to leave her with those glistening words of my rebuke. See how she likes it! Hah. Why then, do I feel as though, she really doesn’t see how good I was? Ugh. Time to go deal with Crocodile Men. The least confusing part of my whole night.
Cassie: “Okay, okay. But were you doing the thing? You know. The thing you do where you lean in a little and emphasize certain words to make sure someone knows you really mean something else?”
He’s trying really hard. It isn’t that I’m not giving him credit for that part, I’m just not giving him out loud credit for it. It’d be easy to say he’s making up excuses, but there’s a difference in the behavior. I know him. I’ve really only seen him so worked up and flustered one other time, and that was when he tricked me into becoming Wonder Woman in the first place. He hadn’t understood why I was mad, or at least he’d assumed the wrong reason. He thought he was doing good, and what I wanted him to do. I’d just been surprised and taken unaware by the whole thing. It wasn’t what I’d wanted then, but he wasn’t doing a bad thing. Tonight? Well. Frankly it sounds like maybe he did do a bad thing, but he was trying to do something good. And clearly was anticipating an entirely different reaction from me. Except maybe about the part where he was in or around Gotham when I’d told him not to.
“That was probably smart of you. And it’s not what you…”
Think. I could keep talking, despite the fact that he’s just turned his back and dropped off the roof. He’d still hear me, loud and clear, even if I decided to carry on the rest of the conversation in a whisper. The reason a meta would probably feel safe from NOWHERE in Gotham is because there are no metas in Gotham. That fact should probably have been suspicious before since they can possibly crop up anywhere. For there to be such a dead zone for powered people. NOWHERE doesn’t look for metas in Gotham because meta people don’t live there. Only crazy people do, and that’s a perfectly normal and acceptable state of being in this world, apparently.
I’d let him explain poorly. Then re-explain. And explain it again and I don’t even get the chance? I press my bruised arm against my stomach for a moment, like the twinge of the bruises are going to distract me from the way the frustration and unfairness seems to churn and gnaw at me and turn my face skyward for a moment alone with myself, and my grumbling before I push backwards in the air, turning to land once again near the surprisingly calm Sheriff I’d excused myself from for Conner’s arrival.
by Squee | Sep 25, 2017 | Chronicles
Joker
Gotham City is unlike anywhere else in the world. People use catch phrases for their cities, but they’re mostly cute little nicknames that sell post cards. Gotham is the City that Lives. Not because it’s some bright, vibrant crowning point of Humanity. It lives in the sense that it has many working parts. Burroughs. Districts. Each with it’s own little brand of Good and Evil. That happens to be both the best and worst of Gotham all at once. You’re never going to find a dull moment, but you’re as likely to be raped in the high end of town as you are to be mugged in the low end.
For so long now, as long as I can remember and contrary to the psyche reports I remember everything (don’t believe everything you read!), one man has protected all of it. Every square inch of Gotham. Oh. He didn’t always do it alone. He didn’t necessary have the speed of a bullet to get anywhere, at any time. It was more the Spectre of the Batman that loomed over, stretched across the landscape that protected it. You had to gamble, if you wanted to profit from a life of crime. Roll the bones, if you wanted a taste of the sweet life, or sweeter wife next door maybe. Every time you did. Each and every new little trip across the white line of the law, you ran the risk of one day meeting up with the Batman. On that day, he made you pay. He took his pound of flesh and left you beaten. Battered. Bruised. Lucky to be alive.
Just that though. Alive. Very, very much alive.
Some might think that the Batman was a man of truth, justice and the American way. Some symbol of virtue. I know better. He wasn’t unwilling to cross the line. Oh, no. He’d cross that line when he needed too. When he deemed it necessary. Just because he did so rarely and under the veil of necessity doesn’t obscure the simple fact that the Batman was willing to do anything he had to do for this City. That’s why I’m here. You know? That connection. The knowledge that, if he felt that he had no other choice, Batman could have ended me time and time again. He just never did. Some people might think that is because he was proving himself the better man. I say to those people, ‘Hah!’
He needed me! I’m everything about him that he needs to be reminded of. To rebel again. Without me he would have been lost. Alone. A Hero without a foil to measure himself against. Adrift in the Sea of Sloth and Villainy that is Gotham City. I’m alive, because I was his life preserver. Without me he would have drown. The Batman needed me and… now I can’t help the completely foreign, yet inescapable, feeling that… I failed him. He was alone. Left to die without a friend in the world. ….. — “The soul akin to my own. Gone. Snuffed out like….Oh. Sorry. Was that all out loud?! Heehee.”
Who am I talking to? Well that would be the Irish Mob. More or less all of them. They like to get together to eat and drink in a little place called o’Malley’s. About thirty minutes ago, give or take ten minutes of aimless rambling, I walked in with a two heavy set men in gimp-suits and a girl. You don’t need to know where the girl went, I’m sure she’s up to no good. It’s what she does. Once we stepped inside though, I’d ordered a margatia. The kind with the fancy little umbrellas. Only to be told that they don’t serve that swill here. The Bartender is still choking on his own blood, but that got their attention!
“So. You see fellas. My problem here? Is that …. he was mine! MINE. My Batman. Mine. Not your’s. That means. If I didn’t kill’em.. then someone else did. And if someone else did then, I’ve got to have a few words with that person. Now, I’m going to save you a few moments of begging and pleading. Because I know you’re all going to say, ‘I didn’t kill the Batman, Mistah Jokah sir.’ Which might be true or it might not be true. You see the problem. The problem? Is that you’re all lying, cheating, filthy scumbags. Dear to my heart, but liars to the bitter end.”
Now. You can say a lot about the Irish Mob, but generally speaking you can’t call them stupid. They’re not Italian after all. So I’m sure by this point that the writing is on the wall by this point. And if it isn’t, it will be by the time I finish using the barkeeps blood to scribble out the words ‘You’re all dead.’ With a smiley face for posterity. On the bar’s large mirror.
Red Hood (Damien)
Damien had been blazing a trail through the underworld. At first, not even bothering to put on a mask. Using his speed and stealth to conceal his identity. Also, you know that saying, Dead Men Don’t Talk? It’s true. Or, you know, a broken jaw. But, after a run in with the Italians and them beating him near to death, it took him coming to Helena to heal. Anybody else would have given him the third degree. Especially Dinah. She didn’t understand the pure rage that laid at the bed of his heart. Someone killed his father. Murdered. And Damien was going to find out who, by all means necessary. After getting into contact with Tim after the funeral, he had supplied Damien with some.. items to help him. While Tim and Damien weren’t exactly brothers. It was evident that Tim was at a loss of what to do, and decided to help Damien do <i>something</i>.
So, now, Damien equipped with a high tech suit and helmet. He could go on his true terror, make men cry their mothers names in hope that it would save their souls. Nobody in this city was safe. If you so much lifted a candy bar, Damien was going to make sure your fingers would be broken in several places. There was a large shadow to fill, Gotham was going to descend into chaotic mess. Not that his father ever had true control over the city. But he had it organized in a way that the city wouldn’t explode like a powder keg. But Damien felt that while his … ‘family’ … did nothing, something had to be done, and that was Damien.
Today, he was getting in over his head when he targeted the Irish Mob. There was a price on his head when Damien took Duncan O’Brien, one of the Captains of the O’Brien Syndicate, and threw him over the side of a thirteen story building. Busting through the door of a bar called O’Malley’s, Damien was quick to take out one men who was playing pool. The man’s head colliding with Damien’s armored knee with enough force to drive the bridge of his nose into his brain. He hadn’t time to see Joker as of yet, since right behind Damien there was an entire mob of very angry Irish Mob soldiers pouring through the door chasing after Damien.
There was all manner of weapons. From handguns, to bats, broken whiskey bottles, chains, brass knuckles… well, you get it. Jumping behind the pool table to put some distance between him and the mob, because Damien had a half formed plan. Get them all into a space that they can’t move in. But, as he took out a few more of these angry soldiers, Damien jumps onto the table as he looks over to where the bar tender was, only to see the pale face of a man in the mirror writing something on the wall in blood.
“You.” The Joker.
His father’s greatest adversary and just as psychotic as a man can get. The complete opposite of his father. Joker was smarter than anybody would give credit to. After all, he’s outsmarted even Batman on occasion. Right now, Damien didn’t have time to deal with him as men continued trying to swat at him with baseball bats, knives, what have you.
“I’ll deal with you later.” Damien said, pointing at the Joker.
Joker
Now there’s really only one way this is going to go at this point. Bloody. Capital B. We all know it. These idiots are just taking the time allotted for my mindless rambling to determine which of them has the best chance of getting out of here, while the rest die. More than one of them? Probably thinks they like the odds of a stray bullet doing me or my boys in. Of course, I’m crazy enough to not care what they think. Or really. What they do. Because I didn’t come here intending to dodge bullets and fight like some sort of man with Honor and Integrity. Nope.
You see the snarl on my face is the first real sign to these delightfully pale-skinned yokels of just what trouble they’re in for. Or it would be, if not for the distraction afforded them. This is as good a time as any for a couple of them to make their break for the back door. Tut-tut… my little Harley is all aflutter and very likely waiting for the stragglers. Me? I’m pulling off my coat, pulling tight my gloves and getting my suspenders in order for a donnybrook. That’s what these idiots call it, right?
“Ooooh… look at that! I loooooooove the fashion statement. A little bit of old, a little bit of new…”
Armed to the teeth that one. I’d have to be even crazier than I am though, not to instantly recognize… the Red Hood. Equally delightful and appalling, I’ll work out whether I’m aroused by the nostalgia or the way he’s cutting people apart like a buzzsaw. Which reminds me. I was about to kill someone, someones in fact.
It might even be a touch on the surprising side to everyone involved when I’m not immediately drawn to attacking someone stealing my schtick. But. He did promise to deal with me later. I can ponder the significant pontification of that while I’m gutting -my- Irish little friends. Playmates. Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum are here for support. Much like my little Girl, they’ve all got strict orders. Regardless of what happens to me. None of the Irish leave. Little Red Hood did me a bit of a favor, he brought even more to the fight. While the Irish might be known as honorable fighters? I make no such claims. One man who turned his head to the arrival of the Red Hood is the first to have his throat cut. I’m a jealous murderer. Sharing the attentions with another is… Rude!
“Red Hood. Smug. Fights dirty. If you’re here about Mommy’s alimony, keep it quiet!”
Red Hood (Damien)
Right now, Joker was helping thin the herd out, if you will. “I am not here to banter with you, Joker. Focus on the task at hand, then I shall deal with you.” commenting as Damien did a short baseball slide underneath a lead pipe, his foot connecting with another man’s face. Twirling around on his back, he flips up as a man with a machete tries to sever Damien’s head from his body. Landing on the blade, Damien reaches under his coat, producing a tactical dagger and slams the blade down onto the man’s head, then pulls it out and throws it with supreme accuracy to a man who was attempting to sneak up on Joker. The blade singing between Joker’s swinging arm, and his ear before finding its mark in a thunking sound as the man collapses with the blade between his eyes.
“What are you doing here, Joker? I was unaware you had a vendetta against the Irish Mob. Did they attempt to steal a red nose from you?” asking, trying his attempt at humor. “I am unsure what you mean about my mother’s alimony. But, I can assure you that I am not here for that.” Humor escapes Damien most of the time, and especially the Joker’s brand of macabre humor. “I believe as of now, we should concentrate on the task at hand.” offering as Damien jumped off the pool table in time to jump off the pool table, landing in a somewhat open spot. The men were starting to thin down thanks to their efforts.
Who would have ever thought that The Joker and Son of Batman would have ever teamed up? Damien in a way, admired how the Joker moved carelessly in a sort of murderous chaotic dance. It was clear he wasn’t using any kind of martial style, other than unnerving his opponents by using unconventional tactics. For now, the two men complimented each other as they fought to keep themselves above board, if you will. How could Joker fight with such carelessness? How did Batman simply <b>not</b> kill him? Surely the lunatic was responsible for his fair amount of misery within Batman’s life. Both, in and out of the cowl.
Damien was getting lost within his thoughts as he kept an eye on the psychotic clown, listening as he nearly squealed with glee as his blade became more bloodied.
Joker
There comes a point when I have to stop disemboweling one guy, while choking a particularly old man with his own Celtic cross to ask myself: Did he just tell me to focus? No one else gets the joke, I’m sure. But they do get the next few minutes of hysterical laughter that no doubt cements in their mind that I’m exactly batshit crazy as all the stories say I am. They’re right. Of course, but they shoulda known that before I walked in the front door.
Ironically for the little Batspurt, I’m just about as focused as I’ve ever been. Even my Shrink thinks I’ve hit a level of focused that bordered on obsessive. Who would have thunk it? All I needed was a little motivation to get my life in order. Put my ducks in a row. The criminal underworld has always taken notice of me. Feared me. They kept out of my way and mostly profited from the insanity that came of my frequent frolics through Gotham. Now though? It seems that the new Red Hood and I have made some of the same rounds. Since the Italians got to listen to the Black Mask howl for nights as he was slowly treated to a cosmetic acid bath. A few drops at a time. Until he was begging to tell me he killed the Batman. The problem is. He was lying. Naughty. He’s been a very good source of information ever since though.
This Red Hood is especially chatty. Once again I’ve gotta stop what I’m doing to answer him. Who chat-boxes like this while sodomizing a guy with his own shillelagh?! The nerve of this guy. “Hunting. Killing. What’s it matter t’ you Hoodsy? All you needa know is one of these nighean na galla killed him! Or they know who did.”
“Or. They stood by while someone else did it.
“Or. They slowly wore him down, until he lost a step.
“Or. They played diddly winks with the guy, who knows a guy, who fucked a girl, that was with the guy who did it.
By this point, I’ve moved on to doing other, even more wretched things with the old leprechaun’s club. At least it’s with someone new. You might be wondering why I’m not overly worried about being shot? Well, that’s where Tweedle Dee comes in. He’s setup in one of the boothes. Letting the Red Hood and I take all the attention. While he snipes anyone who points a gun in my direction. Tweedle Dee? Well. He’s actually the reason Harley was told not to come in, unless called. Let’s just say. He’s the explosives expert and that fat little transgender midget has gas. Or. Maybe he loves Gas. Whatever the case may be, I sent him to the Kitchen so that we can cook up some Irish fritters in a little bit.
In the moments when Red Hood isn’t babbling like a mad man, he might actually take notice that I’m not shooting anyone. No fancy gadgets. No Joker-venom. No gags. Gift Boxes. Trick poker cards. This is as hands on as I get. The only weapon I use, is the club I’ve stolen for sake of irony and the dagger. Mostly… I beat, bash and/or choke every one I can get my hands upon. Until finally…
“…oh they stole from me, they stole. All of them stole Him from me. Someone did. Someone took him from me and when I find the sunuva…” the next few moments are censored, while I do little more than ramble. “…he was Mine. Don’t you get it? Mine. Until I find out who took him from me? Everyone. Everything. Burns.”
Red Hood (Damien)
It was like Joker was speaking the same language as Damien. There wasn’t any minced words, no double entendres. Damien understood everything the lunatic said. And it made sense, he could identify with that. Damien felt the same exact way. He wanted to watch the underworld burn for taking the one person who mattered most to him. “Then it seems, We are on a similar course and direction.” moving to the side of a fist, Damien grabs the arm and twists it in a way that he first pops it out of its socket, then as the man goes down to the floor crying in pain.
There were just a few misfits left by now. Most dead, dying, howling in pain, or simply decided it was in their best interest by running away. Standing around a mess of dead bodies, Damien turns his sights on Joker. Studying him for a long moment. The HUD providing information that he already knew. Staying quiet, Damien inspects a few of the men who were still alive. Grabbing one, he hauls him over his shoulder and throws him onto one pool tables. The HUD would pull up facial recognition and display the information for Damien.
“I need information.” Starting off, Damien did not have compassion for the man. “Every time you answer incorrectly. I break a finger. From there…” trailing off as he looks down at his feet. “We will work something out.” smiling from beneath his helmet, Damien moves to one side of the man’s body and grabbed his hand. “Do you know any information about the murder of Batman?” asking, his voice cold and electronic.
“Nonono. I swear ta god, I don’t know-” snap, one finger down, a howl of pain, nine more to go.
Joker
Well. The new Red Hood and I have a couple more things in common. Like the intent to question these guys when the fight was beaten out of them. As it was, the Hood brought a couple extras to the party. So there was more than a few left to go around in the end. I’m not interested in the young ones. That isn’t how the Irish mob works. Nor do I want the oldest, again that just isn’t how it works with these guys. While the young are ridden like prime horses and the older generation is revered, even followed when they put their foots down? It’s always the smart ones that really run things. The Irish figured that out in the Wars with England. You don’t gotta be the biggest, baddest, in the world. All you gotta do to win, is be smarter than the rest of the chuckleheads you’re fighting.
That’s why I pick one the ones that had been trying to make their escape. In a twist of gleeful irony, I take pleasure in dumping the ‘smart one’ down across the Bar. Like I’m mimicing the Red Hood. Hah! I’m mimicing the Red Hood. How am I the only one who gets that joke? The chuckling, for only I know what, is likely only making the demented approach of blood scored clown-face all the more terrifying. Much less the way gore dripping gloved fingers gesture to the Hood.
“He’s playing nice. Don’t lie to me. None of you know who killed the Bat. I know that. You know that. Even the wicked little red riding Hood knows that. What you do know, is who stood to benefit most from his … absence…” Do Irish Gangsters lose control of their bladders when having their cheeks licked by insane men drenched in blood? This one seems to have. “…you either get to die quickly for telling me or slowly. Over the course of Days. While the Tweedles use you in a variety of defiling ways. Each of which Harley video tapes. For me to show your family. Friends. And all the children at your Church, during Sunday School.”
Now the question. Really. Isn’t whether the Hood or I get answers. It’s really about what happens to be more important. Broken bones. Or an Irishman’s entire sense of self-worth, family and religion. Because I’m very clearly willing to piss all over all of it. They know me. They know that there’s not one ounce of anything I said that is even unlikely.
A few moments later, when I’m finally stripping off the gloves? “My… assistant… is rigging this place to blow. Call it professional courtesy. Call it nostalgia for seeing someone wearing the Hood. But. Understand me, Hoodsy. The Batman was mine. So whoever took him from me. Is now. Mine. Mine. Minemine mine. Miiiiiiiiine.”
Red Hood (Damien)
The man offered little to no information. Nothing they didn’t already know. Everyone, honestly, benefitted from the Bat being gone. Damien doesn’t even bother to kill the now mostly broken man on the table as he cuts a look over at Joker. “Today. Our paths aligned. I believe they will align in the future. I do not care what you say, about what you claim is yours. Just know that while we are on this path, together, we will find who killed him.” saying as he started towards the door, then comes to a stop, putting his hand on the door frame.
“But, Once this is over, and our paths no longer align. I will kill you. Make no doubt, I will do what he would never have done, and make sure you will die, then make sure you can never come back.” saying, his voice low with warnings and threats. Today was a good day, at the very least. The Irish Mob has been gutted, the O’Brien Syndicate has been nearly wiped out. Today marked one more day in making sure Batman’s legacy is no longer shrouded. Looking over his shoulder at Joker one more time, he steps out of the bar and it’s like he just vanishes.
Damien, in some way knowing that donning the Red Hood would be ironic, considering whom his father is. But, maybe this is how it all ends. It started with the Red Hood and would end with the Red Hood. There’s a part of him that feels guilty for allying with the Joker. Though, if Gotham was at stake, wouldn’t Batman do the same?
Joker
You know what? I believe the guy. Or at least, I believe that he believes that he’ll do those things. In the future. When we find the person responsible. ‘We’ being the operative word. Even in insanity, I’ve never been accused of being stupid. This is what the big boys call a potential lead. Given that so many others haven’t panned out, I’ve got to take what I can get. Which means that for now? The new Hood is right. Our paths are aligned. Perhaps momentarily, as he says.
“Not to be passe, but… you just reminded me of a joke. You see. There’s this man and as he grows old, he wants to pass along something to his son. Except his son is into all the wrong things in life. Try as he might the old codger just can’t get his son on the right path.” Did I forget that I’m choking an Irish mobster to death? Why yes, I did. But the joke is more important. “So. Hee. Hee. Years pass and he’s done all he can to bring his son in the fold. There he is. On his death bed. He says to his wife…”
“I did everything I could! I beat him when he was bad boy. I treated him when he was a good boy. I taught him to drive. How to get the girls. How to get by in life. Where did I go wrong? By golly, the old hag looks back at him and says… well Mr. Capone, I think you taught him everything you knew.”
“Haa. Hah! Everything he knew. What a hoot!” Besides the outburst of giggling, there’s a sort of meandering that brings me closer and closer to the Red Hood, before turning just in time to pick up my suit-coat. “Ya see, Hoodsy. You can’t kill me. The Bat couldn’t kill me either. Not without becoming me. Hee hahaa. You’re already a step in the right direction, Fruit-of-my-loins.”
“C’mon boys. We got work t’ do before the Red Hood kills me. Again. What a maroon.”
