Back at home later that night, Terry's helping his mom make dinner. He's making the hamburger patties out of ground beef while she's chopping vegetables for a stew. For a while, he manages to forget that he's anyone or anything other than the person he appears to be, just plain Terry McGinnis, and the biggest secret he's hiding is his breakup with Dana. He hasn't told his mother yet, since she's in such a good mood about his graduation and he doesn't want to spoil it for her. She could use a little uninterrupted happiness.
"So, what do you think you're going to study at the college?" she asks.
"I don't know yet. But I've got the whole summer to decide." He finishes a patty and puts it on the plate to his right, then takes another handful of ground meat from the bowl at his left.
"Any idea what you want to do when you graduate?" There's something strange about the way she asks the question, but Terry can't quite pin it down.
"I'll work full-time for Mr. Wayne, I guess."
In the seconds of uncomfortable silence that follow, he realizes that his mother does not like this answer.
"But it's a rough job, Ter. Don't you want to do something a little less stressful?"
It occurs to Terry that his mother has brought up this topic quite often in the past month or so. "I can handle it. And I like it."
There are times when he's convinced that his mother knows more about his job than she lets on. Now is one of those times – the way she's looking at him makes him want to squirm. The uneasy sensation caused by that look lingers on even after she turns back to the vegetables she's chopping. "I'm just concerned, that's all." She picks up the cutting board and pushes fragments of cucumber into the pot on the stove, then puts the board back down and starts cutting up a tomato. "I'm your mother, I have a right to worry about these things." She's trying to make it sound funny, but she doesn't do a very good job.
Terry is saved from the need to respond when the phone starts ringing. Since he's just touched raw meat, his mother answers it first. "Hello, McGinnis residence." Her lips purse slightly. "Oh, Mr. Wayne, I'll give the phone to him in a moment." As soon as Terry hears his mother say 'Mr. Wayne,' he is walking to the kitchen sink to wash his hands. Once they're clean and dry he takes the phone from her. She goes back to slicing vegetables, and though her back is turned Terry is painfully aware of the fact that she's got most of her attention on him.
"Terry. There's something going on at the VibranTech plant at the edge of town. I think it might be sabotage – get down there as fast as you can."
"Yes sir," Terry says. "I'll be right there." As he hangs up the phone, he can feel his mother's eyes on him.
He looks at her apologetically. She shrugs and sighs. "I guess you'll be missing dinner tonight…" So much for not spoiling her good mood.
"Sorry, Mom. I'll see you later, okay?" Terry kisses her on the cheek, which seems to make her feel a little better. He rolls down the sleeves of his shirt as he leaves the kitchen and heads for the front door, then grabs his coat from the hook beside it before heading out of the apartment, still feeling his mother's eyes on him even when though out of her sight.
~***~
Terry, back in the suit and the Batman persona, is at the edge of town, perched on the smokestack of a factory adjacent to the sprawling expanse of the VibranTech building. It houses both the manufacturing plant and the administrative offices of the company. Directly opposite him, on the western horizon, the last red rays of the sun are fading out. The street lights have already been turned on, and more lights are switching on all across the city. As the sun recedes, Terry – or at least the Batman in him – grows more and more comfortable. He can and does go out during the day, on occasion, but the night city is his territory.
He's already left behind the troubles of Terry McGinnis: His mother, his future, Dana, everything. They don't concern him. And the girl's death the night before, the one he could not prevent, still weighs on him, but not as heavily as it did on his other self. He is Batman, and death by violence is a regular part of his world. He can prevent it most of the time, and when he can't he can atone a thousand times over by bringing criminals to justice. The powerless Terry McGinnis can feel grief but can't do much else. But Batman can do something, and whatever he does has a major effect on the rest of the world.
Mr. Wayne has already filled him in on the situation, as well as the background details of the company itself. VibranTech Systems was created about fifteen years ago by a nanotechnology specialist who used to work for Mr. Wayne (he actually designed some of the systems that are installed in the suit, although he never found out that his boss was using them that way). What was initially a small, highly specialized enterprise quickly transformed into a reasonably successful company. About a year ago, the founding father of the organization retired and handed the reins to his daughter, who built the facility Terry is currently concerned with and recently moved the business into it from its smaller headquarters upstate. During the three months since the move, the new company president has taken her father's business to new heights of success, and it's still shooting upward. VibranTech is becoming a major competitor on the business field, and may soon become a formidable rival for the top players.
Right now, though, the company is having problems. As the sun sinks lower and the darkness deepens, all the buildings in Gotham are coming alive with lights. All except for this one, which is completely dark but for the occasional beam of a flashlight. Its connection to the electrical grid went down twenty minutes ago. That in itself isn't a big thing, it happens to manufacturing facilities like this all the time, but there's something suspicious here – federal law requires that places like this have backup generators to keep the lights, climate control, elevator and security systems working when the power goes down. The auxiliary systems should be on, but they aren't. Mr. Wayne says that he has other reasons to suspect that this failure is the result of foul play, rather than an accident.
"Think the competition's trying to shut them down?" Terry asks over the transmitter.
"Maybe. But it might not be a simple case of sabotage," Wayne says. "VibranTech has just developed some new nanorobots for medical use. They can treat in a few hours injuries and illnesses that take multiple surgeries or months of therapy to heal with conventional methods. As of now it's in prototype, but it's due to be released soon." Wayne does not tell Terry how this might be related to the power failure – he'll provide the information if asked, but he wants Terry to figure it out himself.
Terry thinks carefully for a few moments. "Someone might want to make a weapon out of it," he guesses.
"That's just what I was thinking," Wayne confirms. Terry allows himself a brief smile of satisfaction. "With the power down, whoever's trying to steal the data won't have to worry about the plant's security systems."
"Maybe not," Terry says mischievously, "But they will have to worry about me."
The sky has almost completed its transition from day to night. A narrow band of light blue on the far horizon is the only remnant of daylight, and it is rapidly disappearing. Nocturnal darkness secures its hold on Gotham City as its black guardian angel turns on his camouflage, launches himself from his perch and free-falls for a few seconds before unfurling his wings and going into a descending glide. An observer, if there is one, might discern a slight distortion in the air, but he would probably write it off as heat or imagination or his eyes playing tricks on him, unless he's watching for it. And since it's dark, he probably wouldn't see anything at all.
Terry lands on the building's flat roof, which is home to a couple of landing pads, ventilation equipment, some satellite dishes and a couple of broadcasting towers. There's also a door that opens on to a stairway down into the building; that's his way in. He could go in through the massive front gate into the entrance/loading bay if he wants to, since its force field is offline, but in a situation like this the front door is the most dangerous way in. A thought picked up by the suit's synaptic links causes the wings to fold themselves again and merge seamlessly with the material on his back.
It's dark on the roof, but the visual equipment in his cowl enhances the ambient light so that his surroundings are merely dim instead of pitch-black. He goes into a crouch and taps his left temple twice with his index finger. A false-color scheme imposes itself on his field of vision, letting him see a section of the electromagnetic spectrum that the unassisted human eye cannot perceive. Terry makes a careful examination of the roof, noting the local heat sources which are helpfully picked out in shades of red by the equipment in his cowl. Some of the machines up here are still a bit warm, and there are a few pigeons hanging around, but he doesn't pick up anything that might be a human being. Good.
He stands up and turns off the suit's camo (it needs a lot of energy to run), as well as his heat vision. Then he darts quickly to the door. It's got a number-pad lock. The power is off, but the suit can provide the circuitry with enough power to release the lock. Terry extends his right index finger, which sprouts a two-pronged electromagnetic lockpick. In the darkness, the small device crackles with blue energy. He inserts the tiny prongs into a pair of holes above the number pad. The suit's sensors detect that the lock is without power, so it transfers some juice into the wires through the lockpick even as it is using the same device to break the passcode and open the door.
It doesn't take more than two seconds. Terry hears a click and the door opens towards him just a little. He removes and deactivates the lockpick before pulling the door open and stepping through.
Once he's over the threshold, he shuts the door quietly behind him. He's in.