Chapter 6 - The Cat And The Canary

Half an hour after Cassie and Myst leave, I see them on the news. Myst's still dressed in my original Batgirl outfit and Cassie's changed into her current one. According to the reporter, Batwoman (why would they never call me that?) and Batgirl have managed to foil a bank robbery in East Gotham. What's Cassie thinking? Myst could get herself killed. I try talking to Cassie over her comm-link but she doesn't respond. Probably maintaining her silent routine because she's with Myst.

While Dumb and Dumber continue their two-women purge on crime, I switch my attention to Batman. He's just dug up Hugo's grave as a result of The Ventriloquist's 'The grave and the gold' clue.

"So, did you find anything?" I ask.

"Gold."

"How much?"

"Nearly all of him. The only thing missing is his responsometer."

"They stole Gold's brain?"

"If Hugo is involved, he'll be using the technology for his mandroids, giving them human emotions. This could make them more dangerous than ever."

"Shall I inform the rest of The Metal Men?"

"No point dragging them into things yet - his responsometer may still turn up."

"And if it doesn't, we'll get a fortune for him on eBay."

"Barbara ..."

"OK, I know. You still haven't forgiven me for when I tried to sell your giant penny, have you?"

Batman doesn't reply. A few seconds later I hear a woman's muffled voice coming over his comm-link. Things then get embarrassing as Batman and the woman, who's obviously Catwoman, start to kiss. I've had to put up with this sort of stuff for months: the Cowl and the Pussycat getting hot and heavy. I turn the volume down and look at my monitors to see if there's any crisis I can be helping the JLA with, when suddenly there's someone at the door.

His name's Jack Marshall, he's a computer expect, and I found his name just after Will Magnus' when I was looking through Hugo's computer files. According to Hugo's write-up, along with the independent research I did myself, he should be able to remove all traces of Hugo, if any still exist, from my system.

First I lay down a few ground rules for him, pointing out how secure my system needs to be and how confidential the data on it is. He removes a small device from his pocket, waves it around, and then grabs a chair, climbs on it, reaches into a dark corner, and produces a microscopically small object.

"It's not been very secure so far," he says, handing me the object, that turns out to be a camera of some kind. How long has Hugo been spying on me, I wonder.

"I thought you only knew about computers?"

"I've been moving into all branches of the security business lately. Your security system here could do with a complete overhaul, if you don't mind me saying."

"But I've only just had a complete overhaul," I groan.

"OK, let's check out your system," he says, changing the subject.

While he's fixing my computer system, I turn to the news and see that Cassie and Myst have just foiled some muggers. I try to talk to Cassie but she's still not answering.

Eventually he's gotten rid of most of Hugo's digital infestation. There's still a few files he's not sure about and he asks me, in a groveling and sarcastic manner, whether I'll allow him to take copies of the precious files home to examine. Having taken a look at the files involved, which didn't actually mean anything to me but I wasn't going to reveal that to him, I agree.

"So what did you have to do?" I ask him as he's leaving.

"It's complicated."

"Try me."

"It'd take a while to explain. How about during dinner. Next Wednesday, say."

"OK, it's a date," I reply impulsively.

"Great. Oh, there was some corrupted RAM I found while running my diagnostics tests. I replaced it free of charge," he says smiling.

"Great. Well, see you next Wednesday."

"Bye."

"Bye. Thanks for the memory,"

Once he's gone, I go back to my monitors, smiling a stupid smile, and check out the latest news on Cassie and Myst. They've escalated their war on crime to capturing a few second-string supervillains. This is getting beyond a joke; Myst could get seriously, if not fatally, injured here. "Mistake!" I shout down Cassie's comm-link. "Sure she does, but she'll get used to it," she replies. Sometimes I get the feeling that Cassie's been hanging around me for far too long.


My next port of call is The Batcave. Bruce tells me about his encounter with Catwoman, and about what else he found in Hugo's grave besides Gold. There were two letters, one for him and one for me. The one for him contains a destination he has to take Myst to in the morning if he wants to finally solve the puzzle. I ask him why he should bother solving the puzzle, but he just glares at me. I look at the contents of my letter but it doesn't make any sense to me.

I tell him what my research into Hugo's relations has uncovered. Hugo had had another son, before Bruce, who'd followed his father into medicine and become a surgeon, but, following a car crash, his career had been ruined so he'd turned to alcohol and Hugo had never heard from again. There was also a nephew - an archaeologist who Batman had met previously during his JLA adventures. Batman seems particularly interested in the nephew so I give him all the relevant information I managed to gather.

Batman accompanies me home. By the time we get back, so have Cassie and Myst. They're watching Back To The Future on TV, but Batman has to drag Myst away immediately. There's not much time left if he wants to arrive at the destination in the letter at the specified time. I turn my attention to Cassie but she's still in non-responsive mode.


I wake up early the next day. Not long after, I'm monitoring the Batplane, which is on its way to the destination specified in the letter. An hour into its flight, I'm distracted by an unexpected visitor.

"Hi, Barb. What's shaking?"

"Dinah? I thought you weren't back off vacation until next week."

"I got bored. Missing my action fix. You know how it is?"

"Yeah, I guess so. Anyway, how was the holiday?"

"Boring. Who wants to sit in the sun all day doing nothing? So, what have I missed here?"

"Let's see, what was there? Hugo Strange died. Again."

"Typical."

"And then Batman started investigating the death and ended up discovering Hugo was his father."

"Very Empire Strikes Back."

"And then … did you see my car when you came in?"

"Yeah."

"Don't you want to know what happened to it?"

"Not really. You'd probably just come back with some snappy remark that you've rehearsed in advance."

"Would I do that?"

"OK, so what happened to the car?"

"Nothing really. Some robot was chasing us and wrecked it."

"Very Terminator 2. Who's us?"

"Oh, we found a mystery woman at Hugo's apartment. We're calling her Myst. Cassie's given her my old Batgirl outfit, taught her some fight moves, and all yesterday they were out fighting crime as Batwoman and Batgirl."

"Seriously?"

"Seriously. Myst could have gotten killed. After they got back I had a big argument with Cassie about it. Well, I would have done if Cassie had been speaking, but she's not, and that's all because her new best friend Myst doesn't speak."

"You know what your real problem is, don't you? It's Myst. You're jealous of her. She's doing everything that you should be doing now. She's the Batwoman you never got to become. Also, she's stolen your prize pupil Cassie to be her teacher. You're afraid Cassie won't need you anymore."

"Ah, I thought so. The psychobabble gave you away. Beneath that mask you're really Hugo Strange."

"Mock me all you like, but you know that I'm right. Where's Myst now, anyway?"

"Good question. Batman's taking her to a far-off destination to solve this puzzle that Hugo seems to have set him. If you look at that monitor, you can see the camera feed from the Batplane. They should be reaching their destination any moment ... 3, 2, 1, NOW."

Suddenly there's a blinding flash of light and then the picture on the screen goes black. One call to the JLA later, and they're pulling the submerged wreckage of the Batplane from the ocean. Half an hour later and they still haven't found any bodies. Dinah puts her arm round me.

"They'll be okay. Batman's always okay."

"Yeah, of course he is. He's like his father. He'll be back."


Dinah stays with me for a few hours, but finally, with no progress being made finding the bodies, she has to leave. Not long afterwards, Cassie turns up.

"Where's Myst?"

"Oh, she's out of town for a while," I reply, not wanting to worry her unduly.

"OK. Barbara, can I have some of your old clothes?"

"Sure," I say, and ten minutes later she's walking out with an old red top, a green bikini and some yellow sheets.

"Thanks, Barbara."

As soon as she's gone, I take another look at my letter from Hugo's grave. As with the first time I looked, it leaves me totally confused.


It's late at night and I'm sitting in a noisy bar. A man leans against my table.

"You're sure you weren't followed?" he asks.

"I'm sure."

"Are they both gone?"

"All sensors indicate that they're no longer on this Earth."

"Good, everything's going to plan."