Usual disclaimer, I don't own rights to these characters, I made no money on this, yadda. Have fun reading!
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Chapter Four – Skin
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Bruce stood under the scalding hot water, letting it wash away the grit from the workout room, but it didn't seem to him that he was actually getting clean. Scrubbing did not help, and the water simply could not be turned up any higher. The last few nights had been without Robin, and Bruce was starting to admit to himself, his temper was getting out of control. The last meeting with the usual street level thugs had ended with two broken arms and one broken leg on the side of the bad guys, not mentioning that first night with the jewelry heist. Gordon had informed him that the thug in question was going to need reconstructive surgery on his face to fix the multiple fractures to the nose and cheekbones.
Giving up while still feeling grubby, he turned off the spray and opened the sliding glass door. Standing still for a moment, he breathed in the steamy air and then sighed. He was just tired, he figured, or frustrated. No matter how hard he worked, he couldn't seem to get the message across to those that were breaking the law. Stretching for a moment, he reached for a towel from the rack next to the shower, and stopped the motion when he saw something on his wrist.
Wiping the water from his face, he took a closer look. It appeared to him to be simply a rough patch of skin, no larger than a quarter. There was no discoloration and no itch, but it did not look exactly healthy either. Rubbing his fingers over it, there was a feeling of discarded snake skin on the spot. Bruce knew that trying to tell if there was any heat coming from the spot would be next to impossible after the heat of the shower, but he still placed the palm of his free hand over the strange spot. Then he raised an eyebrow. It felt cool to the touch, almost cold. There was no swelling as far as he could feel. The rough patch actually seemed to have less feeling, though he could feel his other hand on it quite well.
Shrugging, he continued his reach for the towels, and finished drying off before shrugging into a robe for the trip to the wardrobe room. There he found Alfred sorting through the rack of suits, humming to himself. "Ah, Master Bruce, there you are. You do realize that you will be late to the office, yet again?" Setting aside one of the pairs of slacks, he continued. "This might all be a facade to you, but there are still clocks around this house, if you care to take a glance at them now and again."
Bruce smiled. "If I show up to the office on time, they might thing that I actually cared about what goes on there. Not good for that mentioned facade of billionaire slacker." He pulled the sleeve of his robe out of the way, and motioned to the spot on his wrist. "Does this look like a rash or something to you?"
Alfred turned from his sorting and took a long look. "It could be a rash, from something touched or rubbed against. Have you changed the lining of your 'work' gloves in the last few days? Or started wearing a new watch to your day job? It could be an allergic reaction."
Bruce rolled the sleeve back down, and started getting dressed for the office. "I can't think of anything that would've caused it, and nothing is new in my gloves."
"It could simply be a reaction to the weather. It has been rather cold and damp in the area, especially when one person spends quite a bit of time sitting in this damp and moldy cave complex for hours at a time. What have you been doing down there the last week, that has your attention so deeply?"
Shrugging his shoulders into the suit jacket, Bruce answered. "I'm about halfway through translating that book that the Scarecrow was so interested in. I've gotten past the basic description of the ritual involved, and it's now covering the skills needed to negotiate with your particular inner fear demon." Pulling on a tie, he continued. "It's all fiction, of course. There are no demons, other than the ones our minds make to keep us working on ourselves. But it does make for some interesting reading." He sighed. "And I don't think the rash is from the cave. I've been down there days at a time before, and there was never a reaction like this on my skin."
Alfred gave him a long suffering look, but went to work on the tie for Bruce. "As you say, you have been down there for days before. I would recommend a good liberal use of skin lotion, and keep that mark out of the sun for a few days. If it is not gone in a day or two, have Dr. Thompson take a look at it, just for safety's sake."
"I can agree to that." Alfred finished with the tie, and motioned to one of the full length mirrors on the wall. Bruce took a token glance, and smiled. "Good enough for government work, I figure."
Alfred nodded. "I will bring the car around."
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Bruce was asleep in front of the Bat Cave's computer where he had nodded off from the ongoing translation of the book, when a sharp pain in his leg jolted him awake. Convinced that there was some sort of insect or spider on his lower leg, he reached down to swat at it. What his hand felt led to a cold sweat.
Rolling the chair back from the computer, he lifted the robe out of the way to take a look, already knowing what he would find. The entire side of his lower leg was covered with the strange rash, but the moment he got a good look at it, the pain subsided. Running his hand over the strange texture, he could feel that it was cold and reptilian to the touch.
Standing up, he headed over to the medial center, and pulled out a biopsy pack. Not bothering with any numbing agent, he took a sample from both his wrist, where the rash had not gone away in a week, and one from his leg. Strangely, the needle did not hurt on either location. Setting the sample on a slide, he delicately set the slides into the computer scanner, and went back to the main part of the cave to wait for the analysis. After a few minutes, there was a small beep from the computer announcing that the scan of the material was completed.
It took Bruce half an hour of clicking keys, but there was nothing that he could find out of the ordinary. The scan assured him that it was not a fungal or bacterial infection, and that the genetics in the samples were indeed his. Another hour of tests left him with the feeling that he was chasing his own tail, as there was nothing out of the ordinary as far as the medical scan could prove or disprove. Running a blood test also gave back empty results.
Frustrated with the results from the various tests that revealed nothing out of the ordinary, Bruce headed back upstairs to his bedroom, to finally go to sleep in something more comfortable than a computer chair, and to bundle under covers. In the past two weeks he always felt a bit cold, though not to the point of uncomfortable chills. Turning off the bedside lamp and deciding to look at it with a fresh set of eyes in the morning, he settled under the covers and fell back asleep in less than ten minutes. If he dreamed, he did not remember it come the rising of the sun.
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Sitting at his desk in the office, Bruce was listening with half an ear to the report that was coming from the conference call. Tapping his fingers on the desk, he motioned with a pen in the other hand, as though he was conducting an orchestra. The mid-level manager sitting across from him was answering the questions coming from the speaker phone, and he was trying not to get frustrated with the occasional question that Mr. Wayne would ask that proved, to him, that Mr. Wayne had no clue what was going on in his business dealings.
Finally the call ended, and Bruce shut off the speaker on the phone by poking the button with his pen. "Well, that was very informative, if a bit wordy. Is that all for today, I have a meeting with a tailor about some really nice slacks."
"That will cover it for today, Mr. Wayne. I'll leave you to your tailor." Picking up his notes from the one sided meeting, he headed for the door.
Bruce called out just before the manager got completely out the door. "Oh, I might be out of the office for a day or two. There's this great get together going on downtown this evening, and I really don't want to miss it. You can handle this, right?"
The manager fought back a sigh. "Yes, Mr. Wayne, my staff can cover this from our end. Have a good evening tonight." Then he headed out the door, back to his own office to complain to himself.
Bruce put down the pen, and tapped his fingers against the desk a few more times. The change in sound made him take interest. Holding out his hand so he could take a look, there was something new in his life that was not there a few minutes before.
His fingernails were now sharp, shaped like the beginnings of claws. They were the color of gunmetal gray as well. Taking a glance at his granite topped desk, he could see pinpoint marks in the surface where he had been tapping out a tune just a moment before.
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