A/N: "Hello, yeah, it's been a while. Not much. How 'bout you?" Yeah, it's been a long time between entries. Been off saving the world, or at least making it safe for democracy.

Disclaimer: The plot is my own. Many characters and locations are owned by others who graciously allow folks like us to use them "fictitiously." Real locations and names are used fictitiously as well. I make no profit, yet. And they agree not to sue.

Conveniently Inconvenient

The Present. Earth. Metropolis. Chloe.

While Clark Kent dreamt of falling girls in tennis whites in his own apartment, Chloe (Cassiopeia) Sullivan sat bolt upright in her bed across town in the Amazon Consulate. Deep shadows crowded her room and cold sweat dampened her forehead: the Lasciel Coin! Could she have been so exhausted by a day that started with a pre-dawn raid in the manufacturing district, continued with emotionally wrenching and intellectually challenging conversations and ended with healing, so exhausted indeed, that she forgot to check on the coin?

Yes.

Cassiopeia wrapped a sheet around herself and crossed the room to her closet. Opening the door, she looked at the top shelf. The small cedar chest with the sigils branded onto it its surface and ancient markings carved into it was missing. Oh my stars. It's gone. The blonde Amazon removed a robe from a hanger in the closet and slipped into it, throwing the sheet back over her bed. She rifled through her jewelry box, her drawers and knelt to look under the bed, but she knew she wouldn't find it anywhere.

She crossed the room to circular mirror mounted at face height on the wall next to her night stand. Depending on where she stood next to look into it, Chloe could see the doors to both her room and her closet in the reflection's background. She had to find out who had taken the coin.

The Consulate had no security cameras. Such technological devices were as easily fooled by skilled disguise artists as they were by creatures of myth. Instead of cameras linked to discs or tapes, that could be hacked or misplaced, the Amazons employed a system of unobtrusive circular mirrors whose interlocking reflections covered all the spaces in their buildings. With a modest Working a practitioner could dial back the hours of reflection and See what had taken place within the mirror's field of view.

Cassiopeia took a moment to center herself and focus her thoughts and her will on the task at hand. For magic to work, the mage must believe both that what she's about to attempt can be done and that it should be done. To determine what had become of the Lasciel coin, she would have to see who had come and gone from her room while she had been at work and traveling to Kansas.

With a clear and certain mind, Chloe spoke the activating Words that would trace the reflection backward in intervals of an hour at a time. There were several sets of activating Words for the reflection spell: for minutes, days, months, years, decades, etc. With her right hand she traced a counter clock wise circle just above the mirror, dialing back the hours of reflection, almost like watching a security video on rewind. While the reflection still showed darkness outside she watched herself get up from the bed, change out of her night gown and into her street clothes, grab her back pack and stride backwards out of the room. Looking back through the night she observed the shadows move back and for the across the room as the ambient light from the window changed according the motion of the moon and the clouds in the sky.

As the Amazon continued to dial back the hours, the illumination from the window brighten from indigo, to violet, to gold and red and day light. Soon she Saw the door open and someone about her height, also blonde but with a diagonal haircut that looked very dramatic walk backwards into the room.

At this point Cassiopeia stopped her hand and said the Words to change the reflection's playback interval to seconds. The interloper wore a beige trench coat with dark boots and carried a satchel. She backed up to the closet door, opened it and stepped inside. Chloe's mirror didn't show what happened inside the closet, because that was out of the mirror's view, but she felt sure this was the person who had taken the coin. The blonde with the jagged haircut backed out of the closet, closed it walked backwards to the room door.

Chloe felt certain that she was about to see the other woman's face as she glanced around the room upon entering. She was not disappointed, but instead shocked. Double shocked, in fact. As the trench-coat clad figure backed out the door she looked around the room and the first thing that struck Cassiopeia was the lines of bitterness and anger etched into the face of the woman trespassing in her room. The second detail that struck Chloe and left her breathless was features that held the bitterness: They were hers! At the same time that she and Clark had been in Kansas visiting his father's grave and fixing his mother's window, a person wearing her face had entered her room and taken Lasicel's coin. How could this be?

A sense of foreboding overtook her and she wondered what forces might be unleashed into the world of men and women... There was nothing for it now, but to finish her night's rest and attack the problem with renewed vigor when the sun rose.

The Present. Earth. Metropolis. Kal-El.

Long before the predawn grays of midwinter began to lighten the skies of Metropolis, Clark Kent rose for his morning meditations and his first patrol of the day. He couldn't shake the feeling of foreboding the dream of the tennis lass had left in his soul. Nor could he part with the certainty that whatever was coming had to do with those strange telescope photos Mr. White had shown him and Chloe. Though why some strange photos of constellations on the far side of the sky should mean trouble for Earth, still eluded his mental grasp. For that matter, he couldn't quite recall learning about tachyon field distortions either.

Clark's memory had always been eidetic. At least since Mom and Dad found me in Schuster's Field after that first meteor shower. Perhaps the hibernation fugue during his recent voyage to Krypton and back had left some of my memories mis-sorted...

Still, I have to figure out what those strange constellation photos and radio telescope data signify for Earth. I'll have to carve out some time later today to visit the Fortress and consult my father's Hologram... maybe have Green Lantern meet me there. Accessing Jor-El's amassed knowledge, we could cross reference with the backup copy of the Book of Oa that I let GL store in the Fortress. That cross-referencing may give me the clues I'll need to figure out what it means and whether it's a threat.

As he flew over Metropolis, Superman glanced down one of the large clocks in Planet Square, and realized it was still the middle of the night on the West Coast in California. He could afford to wait until a civilized hour to contact Green Lantern in Los Angeles: Since the data came from Tachyon field distortions in deep space, chances were the threat was still days away or longer crossing vast oceans of space.

Completing his sunrise circuit of Metropolis, Superman found the city relatively quite. Across the city he saw the armored hero Steel flying on patrol as well. Steel wore grey armored commando suit from head to toe, a dark blue scalloped cape (reminiscent of Batman's cape) and carried a rather large hammer. As they passed each other, Steel brought his hammer to present arms as though it were a saber and Superman returned a three fingered boy-scout salute.

Construction crews repairing damage the city suffered from Luthor's earthquake began to assemble at their jobsites. The morning traffic had about the average number wrecks, and x-ray vision showed only one life threatening injury. Kal considered the situation for a moment: super-hearing confirmed that passersby had phoned 9-1-1, he heard Metropolis Police Dispatch sending units to stop traffic and presently heard the rotors of a life-flight helicopter warming up. If I try to swoop in and fly the vehicle to a hospital, I'll just cause more problems with traffic doing it at normal speed...super-speed could hurt the injured. The Police and the Fire-Rescue Service have this one covered. Besides, it's about time for me to wake Jason up since I have to get him to school early and make the press conference in my red and blue uniform.

Later, Clark Kent joined a stream of commuters climbing the stairs from the subway's C- and F-trains to entrance nearest the Daily Planet Building's main lobby. Clumsily, he struggled with the knot on his tie while attempting to hold his briefcase under an arm. He wished he had grabbed his satchel this morning instead of the brief case, that way he'd have both hands free and this would be no problem...Kent excused himself past some commuters and made his way to the side of the stairs and stood next to the wall, placing his briefcase between his knees. As he continued to fiddle with his tie, he heard the footsteps and breathing of one of his fellow Planet reporters, Steve Lombard from the Sports desk– who fancied himself a ladies man and a bit of an office prankster – approaching from the C-train platform below. Anticipating that Lombard would attempt a prank involving his brief case, Kent reached down and moved it around between his back and the wall.

With a disappointed look, Lombard -who had indeed been savoring an opportunity to prank Kent with his briefcase- called a greeting to Kent. "Didn't see you on the C-line this morning."

"Oh, yeah, I came in on an earlier train and had to change my shirt. I spilled breakfast on it. I should just wear plaid shirts instead of white ones." Kent replied.

Lombard's eyes narrowed. That remark about plaid was a quip he would have used against Kent. The up side of the stairwell had effectively narrowed to a single file as the beefy Lombard stared Kent down."I just came from the men's myself." Lombard continued to stare.

Oh crap. He's going to notice the top of my Superman uniform under my dress shirt. Kent took a deep breath and willed himself to calm as he finished his tie. I've faced down General Zod and changed the course of mighty rivers, even turned back the hands of time to save Lois in an earthquake once, and this barking donkey Lombard makes me nervous?! From where they stood on the stairs, the back of the coffee vendor's cart at the subway station's entrance was visible and Kent devoutly wished he were up there with Chloe now.

Lombard's eyes narrowed. "I'm on to you, Kent. You're a cross-dresser, aren't you."

Commuters started to laugh at Clark's expense, until Polly an awkward intern at the sports desk and the only woman at the Planet who actually liked Lombard, came up to show them something on her phone. She had a News 9 video of Superman at the District Attorney's press-conference cued up. Lombard pulled out his own phone to one-up her...Clark ducked away and climbed the last few stairs to meet Chloe in the coffee line. Lombard showed Polly a video of Superman and the Amazon called Trinity watching a sunset at the top of the Empire State Building from the U-Tube "Super Friends channel".

At the coffee stand, Chloe held up her iPhone to show Clark an amateur video taken by a sherpa at the base of the mountain K2 in New Zealand minutes earlier. "Nice one using oxygen bottles to save climbers from asphyxiating on K2. How did you manage that, with the press conference and getting Jason to school?"

"Oh, you know, faster than a speeding bullet. Things were quite in Metropolis and the rest of the US, and I had a feeling about the South Pacific." Clark muttered around a sip of coffee.

"Well, they may not be this quite for long." Chloe stepped away from the coffee vendor and shivered a bit in her coat. "Someone stole a artifact that's cursed last night. I had it secured in my quarters at the Amazon Consulate, one of the best guarded places in Metropolis. I have a bad feeling about this."

"Go on." Clark moved his glasses to peer over them in Chloe's direction and take the chill off her with heat vision.

"Mmmm. Thank you." The Amazon felt a bit warmer. "Someone or something wearing my face walked out with it while you and I were in Smallville."

"Clayface? J'edd J'orkzz the white Martian?" They took one of the tables that was mid-rif high for Chloe. Leaning closer, they spoke in hushed tones.

"No, Consulate Security confirmed that Clayface is in confinement at Bel Rev and I called J'onn J'onzz. J'onn says that the only Martian mind on the Eastern Seaboard while we were in Smallville was his niece M'gann M'orzz."

"Well, if Consular Security is on it, then it's out of our hands."

"Yeah, it concerns me that someone's out there with my face...and I'm worried about what that cursed coin may unleash into the world."

A few minutes later at Perry White's morning assignment huddle up stairs in the main conference room, the chief barked at the Metro Desk editor, "What are Kent and Sullivan doing here? I put them on the Mount Strolomo Observatory story."

The Metro Editor posed the same questions as Kent and Sullivan had the other day, "Don't we have a NASA guy at the Southern Desk in Atlanta?"

The Chief's glare took in the Editor as well as Kent and Sullivan, "Get out of here you two, bring me a story! And you, maybe I should give Lane a shot at running the Metro Desk..." Everyone chuckled at the Chief's joke about Lane running the Metro Desk. No one questioned their assignments more than she did, especially since Superman's return. When they turned to look following a gust of wind, Kent and Sullivan were gone.

Present. Earth. Santa Monica. Kyle Rayner.

During the lull, between the breakfast rush and the midmorning break rush, Kyle Rayner held a paint brush at one of the large plate glass windows in Radu's Coffeehouse on the first floor of his building. Radu Petrovitch was the proprietor of the Coffeehouse and leased out apartments on the upper floors. Kyle sometimes traded artist services in exchange for rent. This morning he would paint the new logo he'd designed for Radu on the windows, a few months ago he'd painted the logo on the walls. He still owed Radu a revised menu design, but including this morning's work, he was up on his rent. Radu didn't mind that the menu design hadn't come in yet and only Kyle's professional pride was hurt.

Rayner's agent had found him some commercial design work for the new Police Headquarters downtown and he still took photos for the Daily Planet's Los Angeles bureau. He was also a fighter pilot in the Air Force Reserve, so he was fully employed, and then some. Sometimes. Other times, his reserve pay kept the lights on and the fridge full and all he had for rent was bartering.

The bell on the front door rang. A lithe young woman, built like a ballet dancer entered the shop and walked behind the counter, Rayner recognized her immediately as Rachel Roth. Rachel had pale skin and rather dark purple hair but otherwise she seemed quite composed in a long, sleek, black skirt. Other than the hair, only her raspy voice might seem out of place. She was into meditation and martial arts. But this was LA. She fit right in.

Radu came out from the stock room wiping his hands on a towel, "Welcome to my coffeehouse, Miss Roth. Always, I like to start new employees during morning lull. Gives a chance to learn oddities and uniquenesses of imported old world coffee brewing equipments."

"Thank you Mr. Petrovitch." the pale skinned girl spoke with a unsettlingly pleasant rolling rasp.

"You have place to live?" Radu tucked his hand towel into a pocket on his smock. "Mrs. Petrovitch has cousin, just south of here in Venice, who runs rooming house."

Wally and Artemis are renting her a room near UC Santa Monica campus.

"Yes, sir, I do; with some of my friends at university."

"Very good. A student." Radu clapped the girl on her shoulder and looked over toward Rayner, "Did you hear that, Kyle, she is student."

Yes. I nodded in their direction. She studies literature and poetry and hopes to teach gifted students like herself one day. Wait. She doesn't live in this building. It's her first day at work here. Why do I feel like I know her? How do I know all this stuff?

"Mr. Rayner? I admire your work, especially your celestial collection, displayed at Mount Stromlo Observatory in Canberra, Australia, Kennedy Space Center and at the Air & Space Museum, in DC, right?"

I'm painting the celestial collection right now. It's never been shown anywhere. I'd love for it be at Kennedy or the Air & Space Museum. Mount Stromlo, Australia...That's where the ...visual distortions showed up...what? Why do I suddenly have a headache?

Rayner's ring glowed and then his phone rang in his pocket. He made a very solid looking construct of a blue tooth device for his left ear with the Ring. In fact, it was identical to the one he'd left upstairs. As he answered the call, the artist glanced at Radu and Miss Roth and determined that they were rather engrossed in the functions of the espresso machine.

"Green Lantern, this is Superman. I need your help. Can you meet me at the Fortress in an hour?"

The artist recognized the Man of Steel's voice from the day he'd gotten the Ring, from the mission to Persia and other cases. "Yes. Sure. If you make it two hours, absolutely. But I need to know what this is about." Kyle muted the call for a moment and turned to Radu, "I have to take this."

Radu nodded.

Kyle opened the front door of the coffeehouse and used the Ring to step thru to his apartment on the top floor, rather than the sidewalk. "Okay, Superman, I can talk now."

"What was that all about?" Superman asked.

"How did you hear...? Super-hearing, right. Some of us aren't full time superheroes, we have private lives and jobs. I was painting a business logo for my landlord."

"Ok. I understand." said Superman. "Do I have your attention?"

"Yes."

"Good. Visual and Radio telescopes in the southern hemisphere particularly Mount Stromlo Observatory in Canberra, Australia have experienced anomalies that I believe are caused by tachyon field distortions. I need you to meet me at the Fortress to begin deciphering them and try to determine if they represent a threat to Earth."

"Yeah, two hours, no problem." Except I have to finish painting the front glass of Radu's store. Rayner thought about how the windows would look when they were finished.

Kyle opened the door to his bedroom and used the Ring to walk back through the front door of Radu's shop.

And stepped right into Rachel. She almost fell but Rayner caught her. "Where were you just now, Mr Rayner? We heard a sound like metal crumpling and Mr Petrovitch sent me to see if there had been a car wreck. We thought you'd been hurt."

"Well as you can see, I'm fine." Kyle said to the whole store. He looked at the windows and then at his paint cans... that looked like they'd been crushed by the pressure at the bottom of the ocean...or like their contents had been sucked out leaving a complete vacuum. Then he saw that his logo murals were finished beautifully. My Ring must have done this when I was thinking about it earlier.

Rachel smiled; her lips barely moved but somehow her face lit up and her eyes shown. "Thanks for catching me."

Rayner picked up a paint brush and added a few flourishes and then signed it. "Okay, Radu. I'm done. I'll be seeing you."

Radu called something from the stock room

Kyle put his paint cans and brushes in his artist's bag and turned to go. Radu was still in the stock room and the shop's two customers were happily drinking their coffees and reading their tablet computers. Kyle walked over to the barista, about whom he seemed to know a great deal, but could not have met before today. He spoke softly, "Do I know you?"

"Not, yet. But you will," Rachel did that thing with her mouth and eyes where her face shown, but she barely smiled. "It's all going to work out. You'll see."

The artist clapped the barista firmly on the shoulder. "Okay then." He walked back to the door. From the door, he looked back at Rachel, and nodded as a gentleman would to a lady. He meant to say, Miss Roth, but what he said instead was, "Raven, I'll see you." And he was gone.

Radu stepped back out of the stock room and looked at his plate glass windows. "Ah, Kyle. Very talented. Always fine results. But either drags out like Michaelmas or done with amazing swiftness."

Present. Earth. Metropolis. Kent and Sullivan.

As the sky turned indigo in his second floor windows, Clark gathered ingredients for dinner in his kitchen. He'd changed from his red and blue uniform into comfortable cloths: jeans, a flannel shirt, work boots. Wearing a pale Amazon gown, Chloe joined him. She washed the spinach while Clark grated provolone and asiago cheeses and diced tomatoes, green peppers and red onions.

But Clark's collection drew her back out to the living / dining area before she crusted the salmon with basil and oregano. Part of the point of this evening had been for them to cook together and Clark resolved not be jealous of his collection.

Clark prepared the salmon and the vegetables and preheated the broiler whilst Chloe gazed admiringly around his lighted display shelves. She adjusted the gold clasp on her classic Amazon gown and reflected upon how far she had come – how far they had both come – from their former days at Smallville High School. "I'm completely absorbed with your collection out here. You've got African tribal masks, a small Aztec calendar wheel, a miniature Torah scroll, a Crucifix made by Michelangelo, a Buddhist prayer wheel, and then ordinary gray, brown and orange rocks. And that's just the east wall, to say nothing of the prints of Monet, Manet, and Petre on the other walls." She looked over her shoulder toward the kitchen. "And there's this one marine life painting here that I can't identify."

"That's the Rayner." Clark called over his shoulder as he placed the salmon under the broiler's flame in his oven.

Chloe turned toward the kitchen, facing Clark across the table and the bar. "Would that be Rayner as in Kyle Rayner, the photographer from the Planet's Los Angeles bureau, the one who got those dashing photos of you in your final battle with Bizarro out in the Mojave Desert? That Rayner?"

"Yes." Clark stepped out of the kitchen to the wall with his paintings. "It's Rayner, as in Planet International Editor Richard White's wingman from their Air Force days. It's Rayner as in got his first writing byline with me on the 'Green Lanterns Pass the Torch' article few weeks ago. And he's the man my son calls Uncle Kyle." Having clearly defined the painter of the marine life picture, Clark and Chloe nodded to each other and smiled. She turned and eyed the rocks, "Is this Clark's collection or Superman's?" needling him slightly.

He turned to face Chloe confidently. "It's my collection, Chloe. The uniquely Superman stuff is all up at the Fortress, anyway. Well, except for the crucifix given by the Vatican and those rocks."

"A Michelangelo crucifix as a gift?"

"I did foil an assassination attempt against the Pope before the whole Zod thing a while back" before my son was conceived, seems like only a year or so.

"What about the rocks," Chloe picked one up absently, "they from the Moon or Mars or something?"

"Yes, actually. Luna, Phobos and Mars." He smiled as he saw her turn toward him with wide eyes and a dropped jaw. "I want to get some from Ganymede and Titan early next year. Would you go with me?"

"What, go gallivanting across the solar system with you?" She opened one of the cabinets over the bar and took out plates as Clark went back to check on the salmon and get the pita bread ready. The cabinets had clear glass doors on both sides. The Amazon began setting the table.

"Yeah, isn't that what couples do? Take trips together?" Clark took a peek through the stove top into the oven. The salmon was browning nicely and the tomatoes, peppers and onions were toasting well in the olive oil.

"Well, yes." Chloe took the flatware and glasses Clark offered and set them out. "But normally they go to Mt. McKinnley or the Grand Canyon or even somewhere distant with exotic sunsets... like Fiji."

"Have you seen Olympus Mons on Mars?" Clark stood and looked far away... "Now that's a mountain! Or the sunsets on Io? They're stunning especially, when the volcanoes erupt at the same time."

"I only saw things like that watching Carl Sagan's Cosmos on PBS with you when we in junior high." Chloe set out wine glasses along with the water glasses. "A trip. Okay, a trip. How about we go to St. Augustine? There's a lot of history there. But, another planet...it's a little soon for that."

"You know what?" Clark said with only a trace of unpleasantness in his voice, "You're right. And I think it's a little soon for you to be staying over."

"So says the man who slept with me in Smallville while we repaired his mother's house!" Chloe shot back. She was testing boundaries.

"Slept, being the operative word," he parried verbally, "I slept. In my jeans and work boots."

"Touche" she relaxed. "So ... you saw my overnight bag in my car?"

"It was in the backseat of your car when I opened your door for you. It's not like I had to look through the lid of your trunk."

"Are you as observant as an FBI agent?" Chloe looked exasperated.

Clark smiled. "I did take some lessons from Batman."

Chloe laughed at the image of Clark, even as Superman, taking lessons from Batman. "Until a few days ago, I thought he was just an urban legend." She extended her right hand as she walked over toward him. When her hand touched his cheek, she said, "I want to share all of your life with you."

Clark took each of her hands in his ... They just stood together for a moment. Then Chloe continued, "The superhero stuff on earth. The mundane stuff at home. Other planets. Although I'd feel more comfortable going to off world with one of the Space Cop's rings, instead of just this lapel pin here." She let go with her left hand to briefly touch the Reserve Charge above her gown's clasp.

"And Chloe, I do want to share all of your life with you. The superhero work, the chores around the house, the wonders of nature and art. Except possibly for newspapering, sometimes. Lois and I are a great writing team. And we do have a child together."

"Ah, yes, the adorable munchkin.." she smiled fondly, enigmatically, looking into the middle distance over Clark's shoulder. Bouncing lightly on the balls of her feet, she pulled their hands together between them and looked solemnly into Clark's eyes "I want to help train him."

"Sure. Absolutely. We were already planning to have Br...Batman and Diana help. But that was before we knew you were still alive. I'm sure Jason, Lois and Richard would love to keep it all in the family." Clark sniffed. "The salmon's starting to scorch."

Clark went to fetch their dinner from the broiler and Chloe scooped up the plates and followed him. Just then, there was a knock at the door.

Clark set the broiler pans of food onto the stove top and handed a spatula to Chloe. He called "Just a minute" and started to put his glasses back on. He thought about it for a moment. I didn't need the glasses back in Smallville. Maybe I don't need the whole milquetoast routine in Metropolis anymore. I mean if I was on walk about traveling the globe for five years, I should have grown some confidence, some balls, right? No more Milquetoast, but the glasses are my disguise. He put the glasses back on.

Chloe clouded slightly. "We have got to get you some more stylish frames than those."

"Definitely." Clark walked past Chloe and nervously reached down to give her a peck. It landed on her forehead. She looked up at him with one of her trademark 'okay that was loopy' expressions. Then put one arm on Clark's waist. With the other, she switched off the flame in the broiler. Chloe pulled Clark close to her and discovered she had developed another Amazon power as she levitated off the floor to kiss him full on the mouth.

The person at the door knocked again, more insistently this time. Clark resisted the temptation to turn both himself and Chloe around so that he could look through the door and see who was there. He stayed in the moment and just kissed Chloe.

"Mr. Kent are you in there?" A youthful voice, one coming into its own in manhood called through the door.

Clark pulled back, "Oh, God, I know that voice. It's Grayson. What's he doing here?"

"Grayson?" Chloe asked.

"Yeah, Dick Grayson. Ba-..Bruce Wayne's son... ward...whatever." He answered as he walked around the end of the bar, between the stools and the couch, to the door. He removed the chain and opened it.

"Um, hi." Grayson said. "Is Mr. Kent home?"

"Dick. It's me."

Grayson looked up at Clark intently. "Oh. Yeah. I didn't recognize you without the three piece suit."

"What's new in Gotham?" Clark asked standing in the doorway, not quite barring Grayson but clearly not yet inviting him in.

"Yeah about that...I'm transferring to Metropolis University." Dick put his hands in his pockets and looked at his shoes.

"What? Did something happen with you and Barbara?" Clark chided Grayson in good natured way. "Did the Commissioner run you out of Gotham or something?"

"Um. Not exactly." Dick shuffled his feet. "Something happened with B..Bruce. He threw me out."

"Oh, well, come in. We'll set an extra place."

"We? Who's here with you?" Grayson sniffed the air, smelled salmon, pita bread, moussaka and..perfume. "Since when does Clark Kent have a girlfriend?" He pushed past Clark. And gawked. "Mr. Kent. Do you know who that is in there? That's Trinity! " He stopped, dropping his clothes bag on the floor, and keeping his computer bag on his shoulder.

"What on earth are you doing having dinner with Superman's partner after he was just with her? Does he know?" Dick was getting way worked up about this. Probably projecting some of his anxiety about Bruce's decision.

"Okay. Look," Clark began, "I've been tripping over secret identity info all evening. So, let's get this all out in the open here. We're all trustworthy adults. And young Grayson here is a detective."

"Well, at GU I've been double majoring in forensic science and criminal justice..."

"No, Grayson. Bruce can face me down. If he wants to. It won't be the first time. Even this this week." Clark turned side ways so that Grayson and Chloe could shake hands. "Dick Grayson, this is Chloe Sullivan, my best friend in the universe. She is also Cassiopeia of the Amazons and evidently the Tabloids are calling her Trinity." He smiled at Chloe. "I didn't know that the press was actually continuing to use the callsign Trinity after Neo vanished."

"Well what did you expect while you had traded the cerulean suit in for a black one, the crimson cape in for a black trench coat, the red Kryptonian S in for black Oakley sunglasses, and slicked back the trademark spit curl?" Chloe elbowed Clark in the ribs and then shook Grayson's hand vigorously, "Dick Grayson, pleased to meet you. Let me introduce you to Superman, formerly known as Neo, formerly known as the Kansas Blur."

Grayson feigned surprise a fraction late at the info that Kent was Superman.

"And Cassiopeia, meet Robin." Clark put a hand on Grayson's shoulder. "First Partner of the Vigilante firm of Batman, Robin and Co."

Garyson laughed, "Good introduction. Um, yeah...about that. Not Robin any more. I did too much work with the Titans. Green Arrow broke his left shoulder, the one he uses to hold the bow, earlier this year, a while before you got back. The Titans asked me to stand in as their tactical leader on missions. Batman didn't like it that I stayed on with the Titans even after Green Arrow finished rehab."

"How conveniently inconvenient." Chloe remarked.

"Well, I've got a comfortable couch over there, Grayson," Clark extended a welcoming arm, "and you're welcome to it."

"Won't I be in the way?" Grayson queried.

"Chloe has quarters at the Amazon Consulate, under her Amazon name, Cassiopeia." Clark nodded in her direction. He and Chloe would have to keep their hands to themselves in front of Grayson. For tonight at least.

The Present. Earth. Gotham. Wizard Harry Dresden.

Earlier that day, as the sun meandered toward the horizon, Harry Dresden stepped off the bus at the Trailways terminal in Gotham. He was glad he couldn't fly. On a jet airliner, that is (the magical field that surrounded him tended to blow out electronic devices).

The wizard knew that at least some of his kit would have raised the ire of Transportation Security Agents. His staff resembled a hockey stick, until someone looked at up close and saw that brand striping were actually intricately carved runes and glyphs. The current blasting rod resembled nothing so much as a pro-mark marching band style drum stick and the metal stakes he'd brought along in case certain early reports about Batman turned out to be true were in fact tent pegs purchased at an Army surplus store. But the sword...Fideliccus would never have made it through security anyway. Being able to bring along his supernatural weapons of choice almost made up for all the hours stuck in a motor coach. At least it had been an express bus, only stopping in Cleveland and Pittsburgh on the way to the Eastern Seaboard and Gotham. Who ever Batman was he hadn't gone in for the cheap ticket.

Dresden paid a visit to the bus terminal men's room. Before leaving he washed his hands and face. He noticed how many men left without washing their hands and that disturbed him slightly. On man wearing a plain black coat and a nondescript black hat did stop to wash his hands. Dresden decided to dig in his backpack for toothbrush and toothpaste. The man in the black hat appeared to be whispering as he carefully washed his hands. The wizard noted the fringed tassels hanging from the man's belt and then it made sense.

Harry looked at his face before leaving. Two days' growth of beard was alright. He didn't look the forty-seven years that had passed since his birth. He could have easily passed for thirty.

The wizard picked up a tourist map and strode confidently out of the bus terminal. He reached into the pocket of his leather duster with his left hand. Fond memories of how the rune covered and heavily warded coat had saved his life and the lives of his friends so many times over the years drifted through his mind. The fingers of his left hand nimbly gripped the crystal tracking device he'd fashioned in his lab with a fragment he'd hacked off of the bat shaped surkien. He felt grateful that his left hand worked again; it had fully recovered from the burns years ago, and he appreciated it.

The streets were too crowded for him to use the device effectively in a strange place. In Chicago, where he'd invested so much of his heart and soul and faith, so much of his magic he could have made us of it in crowds like these, but not in Gotham. The place was too new.

Orienting the tourist map he struck out for Robinson park.

In the park Dresden found patch of dirt and sketched a circle in the ground with the end of his staff. Closing the circle with his will, the wizard cut himself off from all but the most powerful of external magical influences. He took the tracking device out of his pocket, spoke a phrase in broken Latin and the crystal swung around to a southeasterly to northwesterly orientation. It began to be tugged subtly toward the northwest. Finally it swung around and pointed straight for Wayne Tower.

Wayne Tower? Batman works in Wayne Tower?

Batman has a job? How does a guy who's an urban legend have a job? Dresden had no answers for any of these questions but he knew that someone in Wayne Tower did. At least I won't have to walk all over town or spend all my cash on a cab ride out into the hinterlands and cliffs over looking Gotham Bay.

Dresden made his way up the avenue until he came to the Broome Street Monorail track. He hooked a right at the monorail and walked the final eight blocks to Wayne Tower. Stars and Stones how am I going find the one employee in a place like Wayne Tower? There must be 5,000 people who work in there on any given day.

He walked up to the entrance and stood to the side of the portico debating whether or not throw a glamour over himself and try to search the building floor by floor. Dresden noticed a man in a blazer who looked like Company Security step outside for a smoke.

While training his apprentice, he'd improved his own skills in the finely woven, intricate magic that she was uniquely good at, glamours for instance. She would face the trials later this year. He wanted to give her the extra confidence of having helped the master improve in one of her unique abilities. It also forced them both to analyze the way she applied her magic and the way he applied his so that he could learn how to do what she did the way she did it. Then he tried to find his own way. This reverie, while amusing and encouraging, wasn't getting him any closer to finding Batman.

What? Am I hoping my crystal will suddenly change direction and lead me somewhere else? Do I think some one is just going to—Harry's musing was suddenly interrupted.

"Excuse me, friend. Are you Mr. Dresden?" It was the security guy. Dresden had ignored him while the man smoked. His name badge read Elliot.

"Who wants to know?" the Wizard's mind raced figuring out how to play this.

"The boss asked us all to keep an eye out for someone matching your description." Elliot explained

"Tall guy with dark hair who needs a shave?" When all else fails make a joke.

"No he just said you'd be wearing a long robe and carrying some kind of staff. I suppose a leather duster and a hockey stick are close enough."

Harry switched hands with his staff, "Right you are,"extended his right hand, "Harry Dresden. Pleased to make your acquaintance." The security man shook his hand and then the wizard gave a slight bow.

The security man took Harry inside, lead him away from the metal detector, and didn't x-ray his bag. Good thing too, his magical field would have shorted out the x-ray machine while Fideliccus and the metal tent stakes would have set off the metal detector from ten feet away.

Harry's surprised look gave the guard pause, "The boss said we could skip the searches with you. He trusted you."

"Who? The Security Director?"

"No."

"Mr. Wayne?"

The guard just smiled and led the way to an elevator. Harry touched his staff to the floor to ground his excess magical energy into the earth. While waiting for the elevator, he began some deep breathing techniques to calm the churning sea of emotions within him as these would stir up his magic unnecessarily. Finally he turned away from the Security man and whispered the Latin spell that usually suppressed his magical field for short intervals. It should do nicely for an elevator ride. He'd probably have to renew it a few times up in the office and research levels with a the technology that was doubtless up there in a place like the world headquarters of Wayne Industries.

The elevator carried them up thirty-odd floors without stopping to pick up any additional passengers. After winding walk through a maze of hallways and cubicles, the security man left the wizard in a nondescript alcove with some chairs and a desk that was missing its receptionist. Very little foot traffic passed this area and the best part was the view through the window at the far end of the passage. Thirty-some floors up, the building was somewhat narrower than at the base and the window was close enough to provide a panoramic view from Downtown to the suburbs and all the way out to the hill country that surrounded the metropolitan core. Golden rays of the setting sun made their way in through the window.

Dresden pulled out a paperback Nightside novel by Simon R. Greene. Harry liked the hero of Greene's supernatural detective stories, John Taylor. Taylor was cool. He was a Dude. And Greene was nowhere near as close to the reality of supernatural investigation as say, Jim Butcher. It was downright unsettling sometimes reading a novel by Butcher. Dresden mused that Butcher somehow read his journals or had a hidden camera following him. The adventures of Butcher's principal hero, Barry Tristan, bore an uncanny resemblance to his own.

Double doors opened down an adjoining corridor and the wizard heard twelve middle-aged men and women along with three young turks emerge. They passed by his alcove talking hurriedly and wearing the ubiquitous corporate uniform of dark conservative suit, splashy tie and briefcase or smart phone. Noting the older black gentleman and the hard young executive with a kind face that belied his troubled and driven heart, Dresden returned to his musing.

Not to say that reading Butcher's Tristan was like reading his own biography but Tristan did battle vampires and necromancers, had allies among the Faerie and the White Court, had been drafted into the Wardens and even operated out of St. Louis, not far from Harry's beloved Chicago.

The older gent with the bow-tie and sweater vest under his suit coat exchanged parting words with the executive and headed for the elevators himself. Harry laughed to himself as John Taylor magicked all the bad guys' bullets out of their guys. 'Imagine what I can do with … say the fillings in your teeth or the vital organs in your chest. What if I tried to pull out a pancreas, missed and took out a lung instead.' The bad guys always beat a hasty retreat after that one.

"My father always liked the view from this alcove. One of the last things he did with me before he died was to watch a sunset with me here."

"Mr. Wayne," Dresden stood but did not hold out his hand to shake. The crystal had begun to vibrate. This was his quarry. He summoned up his magic. If the early reports were true...If Batman were truly 'a creature of the night that flew off of roof tops and drank blood...' Smoke drifted up out of the c.p.u. box of the computer sitting on the desk.

Wayne's face twisted for a moment at the smell, but he was to much the gentleman to say anything about it. "Mr. Dresden, I think you'll find after we get to know each other that we're a lot more alike than you think."

"I wouldn't be too sure about that Wayne." The Wizard patted the front of his duster where the pocket holding the metal tent stakes were located. "I mean what could a blue collar working stiff like me have in common with a business tycoon like you?" All he'd have to would be to get Wayne to bottom floor and ground him, run his vampyric energy into the earth. Permanently.

Dresden coming prepared to fight Batman as a vampire was suggested by Metropolis Kid.