(Clayface)
If he only had known the name.
It would've been enough to drive the Bat to madness.
There should've been a name connected to the face he was posing as. On the outside, he was the older version of the second–now very dead–Robin, but inside there was no identity to which Matt could play.
And Matt Hagen had been an actor for a very long time. It was in his blood, in his bones, and he knew that if he had been given the specifics of this scene, it would've come around beautifully.
But there was no such luck.
He had to improvise.
And he did so badly.
They've all heard what happened to the second Robin–Jason Todd. The Joker didn't brag about it much to too many people, but eventually word got around that the Clown Prince had managed to kill off one of the Bat Clan.
And he killed him good.
The reality is that no one wants to piss of the Bat. All of them–from Poison Ivy to the Riddler to even himself–have an instinctive fear of the man, knowing from their own experiences and others that it doesn't take much to make the battle suddenly a lot more dangerous.
Then again, though, no one here is the Joker. No one here is a big a monster as the Clown Prince and quite frankly, none of them want to be. While they all have their own brand of insanity, all of them willing to touch off some base of madness to get what they want, none of them go to the lengths as Joker.
Not to the point of killing a boy.
Clayface fights now in the form of a dead boy–or maybe man–now, and as he does so, ducking neatly under the Bat's rage-fueled blows and taunting him as only the Riddler told him how, he realizes that the death of that boy a long, long time ago killed what little naivete the Dark Knight had.
They say that rage started the Bat, and they say that rage will end it.
Maybe this will be the time.
"You are weak, Old Man," he finally says, pivoting to the side as the Batman bares his teeth and strikes out. "I'll always be ahead of you, always win and you know it."
Another punch. Clayface barely moves out of the way before a gloved fist nails him under the chin. He grunts, feeling his teeth bite down on his lip, before swinging back.
Retaliation. The Bat spins and kicks him hard in the stomach, momentarily knocking the wind from him. Clayface snarls.
"Old," he says, breathing heavily. "That's all you're becoming. Old, weak...spineless." he laughs, slapping away one of the hands rocketing towards his face before continuing. "You couldn't even save me, Batman."
It can't be more than a split second, but something happens to the Bat.
Recognition?
Knowledge?
He doesn't know, now, but abruptly the Bat is coming down on him faster, quicker and angrier than Clayface has ever seen from him before, blows spiraling and twisting and slapping and oh, Jesus, he's actually bruising and then...
"You desecrated a child's grave," the Bat hisses, voice like nails on a chalkboard. "You actually–" whump, he hits Clayface solidly on the temple and if he had bones they would've broken–"dare to come here, to me, to my graves and defile the last resting place of a child."
Roles are reversing quicker than what should be deemed necessary. No longer in control, no longer watching the pain flicker across the Batman's usually blank face, Matt Hagen discovers that he made a mistake.
He didn't know the name. The secret identity, the man behind the mask.
To him and the others, it was always the Bat or the Batman or the monster that lurked in the shadows of Gotham.
It was never a man or human being. Never one of the living, breathing creatures that Clayface eventually grew so accustomed to.
The Riddler never gave him that name, that man behind the mask, and now Matt Hagen, body dissolving in the rain and facade falling apart, realizes that he's been played.
If only he had known the name.
