This took me a very long time but I finally managed to progress with the story, so here is the next chapter. I hope there are still people out there, willing to read it.

"So he managed to overpower both of you?," Voldemort asked with a sneer in his voice, clearly showing his current disgust for the news brought to him by two of his most loyal Death Eaters.

"He is sneaky," Snape replied in his own defence.

Voldemort nearly snorted at this remark but did not. What bugged him was that he hardly could blame the two men for being tricked by Batman – even he had nearly been defeated by that muggle in a costume. "Give me one reason to not let Nagini have you for dinner."

Both Lucius and Snape swallowed hard. Voldemort used his legilimency skills to enter the minds of his followers. Both were afraid and were desperately thinking of how to get out of this one. He of course once again encountered the block Snape had created around some of his memories. In any other case Voldemort would have become suspicious but he knew what this block was about – Snape's shame about having been in love with a mudblood like Lily Potter. He didn't want anybody to see it and hence hide it, so well that not even he, Lord Voldemort, the greatest legilimens of all time could see it. But it was something else that interested the Dark Lord at this moment. "Severus?," he asked.

"My lord?"

"I can see that you have an idea," Voldemort said and ordered the Death Eater to come closer with the simple, slow movement of his fingers.

"I do, my lord," admitted Snape. "I was thinking, what if Lucius and I pretend to spy for this Batman, stalling him, providing false information, all while you work out a plan to destroy him."

"Why not just kill him?," asked Goyle.

"Because he is working for the American government," Snape replied before Voldemort himself could, with a near equal amount of destain for the fellow Death Eater in his voice as to what their master himself was feeling at the moment. "If we were to just kill him, the Americans are bound to send somebody else, this time most likely not a Muggle but a wizard, maybe even a task force."

"So what? The Dark Lord would be able to defeat them," Goyle argued.

"And reveal myself to them? I don't think so, Goyle," Voldemort said as he let his wand slide into his hands. He pointed it at the Death Eater, muttered "curico" and watched with glee as his follower fell to the floor, withering in pain. Once he was done, Voldemort returned his attention to Lucius. "Be lucky that Severus came up with an idea, otherwise you two would have been that," he told him.

"So you agree with my plan, my lord?"

"Yes, Severus, I do. Once this Batman returns to make inquiries about your progress, you stall him until we have a trap ready," Voldemort replied and with a bow, Snape and Malfoy retreated. The other Death Eaters followed quickly, leaving their master alone with his pet snake.

As he petted Nagini, Voldemort thought about how to actually kill Batman. At first it had occurred to him to do what Goyle had suggested – to simply kill him. But he had doubts if that would be as easy as it sounded. He had fought the man – and lost. And two of his most skilled and powerful followers had been overpowered by him as well. Of course he could not voice these doubts out loud without undermining his claim to be the most powerful entity in the world. A part of him, a very small part, was aware that he was afraid but he was not ready to admit this to himself consciously. It would have been devastating for his own psyche if he did so.

The Iceberg Lounge was probably the most fancy casino and nightclub in all of Gotham. Despite everybody knowing that the owner, Oswald Chesterfield Cobblepot, was a criminal, the high society of Gotham did not mind coming there at all. They were all aware that if the law were equally applied to the wealthy as to the poor, a lot of them would have to spend some time in Blackgate Penitentiary, the maximum security prison located in Gotham Bay, visible from the seaside balconies of the Iceberg Lounge. As it had been intended by Cobblepot, who was better known as the Penguin in the underworld of Gotham. He always wanted to remind his guests who they were, where they might end up if they were not careful. And being careful meant not crossing him. He had information to sink nearly every single one of them if they ever dared to cross him.

The Penguin revelled in that power. It was the main reasons why his very few stays at Arkham had always been so short. Batman and GCPD might have hated his guts for the role he played in the world of crime, but he was also their best source of information and could always work out a deal because of that. And right now this was why he was sitting in his luxurious office, smoking a cigarette while reading a very interesting file he had finally managed to get his hands on two days ago. Suddenly he noticed the presence of another person in the room – without the door having opened. Usually he would have expected Batman, not so this time though.

"You know, it is disrespectful to just drop in on somebody like that without knocking first. One would usually expect better from royalty, even if it's just self-appointed royalty like yourself, Lord Voldemort," the Penguin said, only looking up from his file once he had finished to underline the dramatic effect.

The snake-faced man with slender features, dressed in a black cloak, gritted his teeth and narrowed his already small, red eyes. "You dare – "

"Oh, I forgot. You don't like being addressed by your full name, nearly as much as you dislike being called by your birth name, correct, m'lord?," Penguin interrupted with a bit of a mocking tone and a cocky grin on his face.

His tactic seemed to pay off. Instead of using his wand, which he had quickly sled out of his sleeve into his hand, Lord Voldemort looked at the overweight, small man with the long nose with a perplexed look. "How – "

The Penguin did not let his guest finish this question and held up the file. "After seeing that security tape from the museum, I immediately knew what you were but of course not who. I made a few inquiries with my contacts in the Department of Magic. It took me sometime to actually get a hold of your complete declassified file. Might I say, congratulations. There aren't many criminals who come as close as you to bring a government to its knees."

"I'm not a criminal," Voldemort replied coldly, his tone so icy that lesser man would have started to quiver with fear. But one did not rise through the ranks of the Gotham underworld by being a lesser man. So instead of quivering, the Penguin put out his cigarette and got out two wine glasses. "Might I offer you a drink, your lordship?"

Voldemort was about to say something but he didn't get the chance, the Penguin interrupted him once more. "I hoped you would," he said and poured red wine into both glasses. "One of my best. I've had it taken out of the cellar just for you."

The dark wizard eyed the muggle suspiciously. "How did you know I was coming?"

"Let's say, I made an educated guess," the Penguin replied as he offered one of the glasses to Voldemort. When he did not take it, Cobblepot sighed and started to explain. "You've been starting to ask for information about Batman, mainly from petty criminals, in the last couple of hours. I know that he has followed you to England, with information provided to him from the Department of Magic. And from your return to Gotham, I'd deduce that he actually has managed to start some trouble for you, hasn't he?"

"So you have been warned of my coming," Voldemort said, still not moving, not even to take the wine glass offered to him by the Penguin.

The owner of the establishment simply sighed and put the glass back on his desk. "To bad, it really is a very good one," he said and then took a sip from his own glass. "Anyway, I wasn't really told you were coming, but I knew it was a safe bet that you would turn up here sooner or later."

"Really?"

"Yes," said the Penguin and sat back down. Unlike his guest, he hated standing for too long. "There's probably nobody better connected in this city than me, and most people would tell you that there's no better address for information than me."

"Indeed," Voldemort commented, almost making his statement sound like a question. "I won't pay you."

The Penguin smiled viciously. He had anticipated this. "Oh, I know. But just that you know, I've put contingencies in place should anything happen to me. The Department would know it was you, you can be certain of that."

Voldemort sneered. "So what?"

"If they knew that you killed an American citizen, they couldn't longer just sit by and let Batman do their dirty work in hopes of avoiding a diplomatic conflict with the British. They would actually have to get active and publish the evidence of your return to the entire international magical community. Fudge won't be able to deny it anymore, you will be exposed and the entire might of international law enforcement will crack down on you, since most governments won't be interested in seeing a repeat of the 60s and 70s. This time they won't sit by and wait, hoping that you will only challenge the power of the British Ministry."

"Why should they?"

"Because you did commit a murder in the US, all by yourself. Not one of your followers or henchman, no, it was you. They'll think that nobody is safe and mobilise all they have."

"They still couldn't stop me."

"Maybe, but right now you have the advantage of being able to operate in relative obscurity, from hiding with a government that denies your very existence, not only to the public but to itself from what I've heard. Is that really something you'd be willing to give up so easily because your pride didn't allow you to make a deal with a No-Maj like myself?"

Voldemort was furious and did a very bad job at hiding this. From the psychological profile he had read, the Penguin knew that this man was more prideful than most of the crazy people he usually dealt with – and given the vanity of people like Poison Ivy or the late Basil Karlo that meant something. This man was one of the two most powerful wizards in the world right now, the most dangerous dark wizard in centuries at least, and probably the second most dangerous psychopath in the building right now. And that was the Penguin's advantage. "But that is only contingency number two," he said and pressed a button under his desk.

"And what would be number one," asked Voldemort angrily.

The answer came once the door opened in the form of a manic laughter. The so-called Dark Lord, who prided himself with being the most dangerous being on the planet, turned around in surprised and looked straight into the face of the man, the Penguin knew for a fact was even more dangerous: The Joker.