Brick Ballads
Chapter One: "Who I Am"
Breathing heavily, Batman ducked behind a rock formation and tried to formulate his next strategy. In his short time in the mask, Matt had never faced anyone this good before. Terry's rogues' gallery and the occasional League villains were tough, but this was a lot more than he'd expected. The other training sessions had been bad, but not like this. This was the last night he had the chance to train. Tonight, Terry was taking out all the stops and forcing him to prove his skills. And who better to test the substitute Batman's skills than the man he was standing in for?
I did not count on this, Matt reflected. Terry had already backed him into a corner twice, practically wiping the floor with him with his signature style of street fighting and various martial arts. Matt had blocked a lot of the kicks and landed a few he'd managed to learn during these intense training sessions, but Terry knew how to take a hit. Then, when Matt tried the batarangs, Terry had expertly dodged them with what looked like very little effort, barely even seeing them but knowing where they were coming from. And after that, he'd retrieved them and was currently using them against his younger brother. It was fifteen years of experience against a few months of sporadic on-the-job training, and Matt was running out of ideas.
Peering around the side of his hiding place, Matt was lucky enough to catch Terry's sudden movement before the flash bomb came, blinding him and startling the bats that shared the cave with them. With his eyes watering, he was barely able to deflect the batarangs thrown his way, so he quickly flew up and used the suit's electromagnets to hang upside down from the steel-reinforced ceiling. He pointed two fingers toward the ground, listening for Terry with the audio receptors as he resisted the urge to wipe his tearing eyes. As he was learning firsthand, he wouldn't have the luxury of doing that out in the field.
The receptors picked up the slight sounds of Terry making his way to Matt's right. Trusting in his sense of hearing, Matt allowed a batarang to jettison from each of the holders on his wrists. Once he heard Terry making another move, he threw them both. One hit the electric batarang Terry had just thrown, deflecting it harmlessly into the cave wall. The other hit him square in the chest, as Matt noticed once he could see properly. With Terry knocked off balance, Matt swooped down and engaged him immediately in hand-to-hand combat. Terry caught his punch and flipped him over his head, but Matt grabbed his wrists and pulled him to the ground. As Terry got up, he aimed a kick at Matt's head, but Matt got him in the stomach, sending him staggering back a couple of feet, obviously impressed with his brother's technique. Matt glided to him, remaining in air to kick, but Terry held up both arms to block him. Matt bounced off of him, but flipped in midair and threw a surprise electric batarang in Terry's direction. Having missed it, Terry was unable to prevent it lodging in his lightweight body armor and fell to his knees from the shock. Matt got into a fighting stance when he landed, watching as Terry removed the batarang from his clothing, prepared to throw it back…
"All right, you two, that's enough," interrupted a voice. The brothers turned to look to the staircase, where the soon-to-be Dana McGinnis stood. "Who's supposed to be training anyway, Terry?"
Terry smirked and deactivated the batarang. "You're right. Matt, we'd better get changed."
This time, Dana had the quirky grin. "It's about time. It's three hours until the ceremony, and I'm not going to be late for my own wedding. Neither are you, Batman or not."
Matt removed his mask and stripped down to the extra layer of armor he was wearing under the suit to cover up for the fact that he didn't quite have his brother's muscular build. With the armor, the general public didn't suspect that someone else was in the suit, although Terry's rogues' gallery had noticed something was off. More than once, a criminal had asked Batman if he was feeling all right, wondering why his reflexes and wit weren't as sharp. It was somewhat amusing, but he was a little concerned that someone would realize that he wasn't the "real" Batman; he was just filling in during the real guy's honeymoon.
They returned upstairs, with a satisfied Dana behind them. Bruce Wayne sat at his desk nearby, watching them with an eyebrow raised. Terry matched his response and commented, "You put her up to this, didn't you?"
"I didn't have to," Bruce replied. "You managed to find the one woman in Gotham who won't let even Batman stand in her way." He and Terry stared at each other for a moment before finally, Terry sighed.
"And now I see why you stayed single," he muttered, receiving a joking slap to the shoulder from Dana. "Come on, Matt."
"Yeah," he agreed. "The last thing we want to do is make you late for this."
The wedding itself had been as small as they could make it. While the ceremony was held at a local church, the reception was at a hall they'd booked almost immediately after they got engaged. The rings were intertwined bands of gold and platinum—one precious metal and one twice as precious, symbolizing something few of the attendees could ever hope to understand. But the press would never report on it. Despite the raving media attention they'd received in the three months leading to their marriage, Terry and Dana had managed to keep a comparatively short guest list limited to family and close friends. Thanks in part to moving the wedding up a few months than initially reported and with the help of Commissioner Gordon's excellent security force, the service remained private. Granted, a few reporters tried to crash the party, but they were "kindly" escorted out by the groom's brother. And as Matt returned from throwing another reporter out onto the sidewalk, he shared a grin with Terry. Being trained in Batman's unique combination style of fighting definitely had its uses outside the suit as well.
"You look like you enjoyed yourself," commented Max Roberts. Maxine Gibson, Terry's best friend from high school and one of the few people that knew about his secret life, had married and moved to Central some four years ago to work in journalism. Her response upon hearing that Terry and Dana were getting married was the same as Matt's: "It's about time."
Matt took a sip of champagne before answering, "I can't believe how many reporters in Gotham can really be that stupid. No offense to your career, of course."
"I understand," she answered. "Just like a lot of other people, some journalists just don't know that no means no." In a lower voice, she added, "So how's your temp job going?"
In the same low tone, Matt replied, "Could be better, could be worse. I think it's pretty clear that I'm not Batman, but it's not so obvious that everyone in Gotham has figured it out."
"And your day life?" Max added. Matt's responding look indicated that he did not want to talk about it. "Don't worry about it. You'll find your niche. I never expected to become an investigative reporter when I graduated high school."
"Funny. From the way Terry mentions how you figured out nearly every secret he had, it was pretty obvious."
Max rolled her eyes. "Never try and offer advice to a McGinnis man. They always manage to throw it back with plenty of sarcasm." Matt grinned. "But really, I mean it. You'll find something you're good at and you like. In Terry's case, he was really the last of Bruce's kids and the only one who bothered to stick around. It helped keep Wayne Enterprises in the family, in a way." Matt looked at her from the corner of his eye. Max wasn't in on this particular secret because of his and Terry's sensitivity to the subject; had she figured it out on her own? But she replied, "You know what I mean," and he set his fears aside. Just an innocent comment he'd taken the wrong way.
"Yeah," he answered casually, forgetting his suspicions. "Another part of that whole destiny thing Terry complains about from time to time."
"Anyone who's in on his other life is bound to hear the destiny spiel when he's pissed off," Max assured. "I must have gotten it at least every other month back in college. And I pity Dana for all the times she must have heard it."
"From what I heard, he stole the suit to begin with," Matt commented. "I don't see how he can say that Bruce was forcing his destiny on him."
"He thinks with his heart and not his head," Max explained. "Granted, it helps him trust or distrust people based on intuition alone, and his hunches on cases usually turn out to be right, but when he loses his temper, there's no reasoning with him. Dana's really the only one that ever managed to talk him down when that happened." She laughed. "Now I pity their kids." Matt couldn't help but laugh at this thought too. His future nephews and nieces were going to have the strangest family life ever.
Guess there's no surprise there, considering where we come from, he mused. Pushing that sobering thought aside, he walked out to the dance floor and found his date, Cassie Jenkins, rubbing her feet. "Tired already?"
"A little," she admitted. "But mostly it's these shoes." She took them off and placed them aside. "Ah well, who really needs them anyway? Just don't step on my feet or you're a dead man."
"I won't," Matt promised with a laugh. Cassie was a girl he'd been dating off and on for a little while, and Terry had given him the okay to invite her as his date. Their relationship wasn't anything serious—just dating around until they found the right person.
Of course, unlike Matt, Terry had been lucky enough to find the right one his first try.
"Something wrong?" Cassie checked, noticing the slight irritation on his face.
"Not really," he answered. "Just cursing my brother's luck at everything." He smiled, showing that there were no actual hard feelings, and she laughed.
"Who knows?" she replied. "Maybe good luck runs in your family." He really didn't want to think about what ran in his family, so he just shrugged, smiled, and kept silent. That had been his secret to dealing with women for a while now. He liked to think it was working well.
They stopped when Cassie's feet started aching again. As he went over to get her some champagne, Matt passed Bruce and Commissioner Gordon, who were talking about the guests. They didn't stop talking when he came near them, so he assumed it wasn't too private a conversation.
"I'm a bit surprised Tim made it," Bruce remarked.
"He feels like he owes Terry his life," the Commissioner reminded him. "He wanted to see him have something good come out of his." She was silent for a moment before adding, "So Dick didn't respond?"
"Dana handled that," he replied, "so I don't know."
"He's never even met Terry, but he won't just because of his connection to you," she added. "It's a shame these things have happened." She looked up and caught Matt watching them. He started to get nervous as she walked over to him, but she didn't look like she was upset. Still, she was serious, so he didn't let himself relax.
"Um, hello, Commissioner," he started weakly. "Is something wrong?"
"Don't worry, kid," she assured. "You look just like your brother when you do that, only he usually did something to deserve that look. You're not in trouble. But I do have something important I want to talk to you about." The look on her face said that she wasn't going to let him walk away without this talk.
"Can I just drop this off for my date?" he asked. When she agreed, he gave Cassie the champagne flute and excused himself. The Commissioner took him to a small room just off of the main hall where the reception was being held. The privacy only reinforced her earlier statement about this being important.
"Terry and Bruce told me that you've agreed to be a permanent substitute for Batman," she stated.
"Yeah," Matt answered.
"You do know what that entails, right?" He nodded grimly. "If anything happens to Terry, you've agreed to take over the protection of Gotham City. This means that not only do you have to fill in for minor things such as him being out of town for a week for business, but you have to be ready to become the third permanent Batman if he is severely injured or dies."
He nodded again. Of course he understood; the full meaning of this had hit him the night before, and he'd been unable to sleep because of it. In a best-case scenario, Terry would be injured but able to return to work after an extended period of time. In the worst-case, he would die without having any children that could train to take over, and Matt would have to completely take over the legacy, to the point of training his own children. He'd realized that it would be beyond Batman Beyond, and that thought had been bothering him ever since.
Commissioner Gordon seemed to know what he was thinking and added, "I know you hate thinking about Batman Beyond, but you have to realize that this is exactly what Waller intended for Terry. But you don't seem to be in the plans, so you have a choice. There's still time for you to back out if you're not sure. Bruce and Terry can keep the legacy alive until the next generation comes. You don't have to do this."
"But I do," he insisted.
"If this is about you repaying a debt to Terry, then that's not a reason," she argued. "This entire city owes a massive debt to him, and they're not going to this extreme. You heard what Bruce and I were discussing about Tim Drake: Terry saved his life and sanity after fifty years of us being unable to. Tim repays his debt by watching out for Terry the same way I do. We check to make sure he's not getting himself into too much trouble, we offer to help when things go wrong and he needs more than who he has with him now, and we celebrate with him when things go right." She removed her glasses and started cleaning them with a handkerchief. "I suppose I'm notorious for trying to talk people out of this job. I even tried to tell your brother to quit when he first started. I looked for every way to keep him out of investigations, and I berated him for every tiny mistake he made. But he proved that he was determined to go through with this completely. I guess, in your case, I want to be sure that you're doing this for the right reasons. Bruce did it to clean up the mess that caused his parents' deaths. Terry started out for revenge, but then started doing it for redemption and because he knew he had the power to once again clean up the city and make it safer for all of us. If you're doing this out of gratitude, then this isn't what you should be doing."
"Trust me, that's not it," he replied. "I told Terry that, but now I'm not so sure that's why I originally agreed. I don't have a future; I can't find anything that makes me think, 'That's what I want to do with my life.' But those first few nights I filled in, I felt more self-satisfaction than I ever had before, and I found that I was liking the detective work, trying to solve the puzzles and everything. Even if being Batman isn't my fate, I think I'm getting closer to finding what it really is." As the words came out, he suddenly realized that this was another test, one of the Commissioner's own. She'd trusted in Terry's judgment to the extent of his brain, but she wanted to see for herself about his heart.
Finally, she nodded, and said, "He's leaving Gotham in good hands, then," and walked out of the room. Matt smiled to himself at the realization that he'd passed this one.
It was one or two when the party ended and everyone left for home or a hotel. The mess was cleaned up, and soon the reception hall showed no signs of there ever having been guests there. The streets were relatively quiet because of the security detail making one last patrol to ensure the guests got home safely. Everything was suddenly normal, with one major exception.
Terry and Dana grabbed their luggage back at the Manor and headed off for their honeymoon, and Matt was left with Gotham in his care. As he walked around the mostly empty mansion, he hoped that babysitting their kids would be less nerve-wracking. There was so much for him to do, so much that he could easily screw up… It was hard for him to concentrate on the fact that Terry trusted his ability to handle the situation because the situation was suddenly so much larger without his brother around to keep everything in order.
Sighing, he opened the secret door behind the antique grandfather clock and walked down to the Batcave. He wasn't trying to keep silent—Bruce would know he was there anyway—but he still tried to stall as long as he could. He didn't know why he had to ask this, but he couldn't go without finding out. Maybe Terry couldn't ask, but he could. At least, he thought he could.
Bruce didn't even turn from the computer when he informed, "Everything's set for you to patrol tomorrow."
"Thanks," Matt answered. It had been decided that Bruce wouldn't monitor him, after the near disaster of his first patrol. During a battle against some of Aquagirl's rogues, Matt had nearly drowned when he couldn't handle hearing Bruce's orders at the same time as Warhawk's. It would probably better if he trusted his own judgment.
"Is there something else?" Bruce asked. He turned around this time, and Matt was suddenly completely aware of how frightening the old man could be even when he wasn't trying. He realized how stupid his question was going to sound and wondered why he'd come down here to ask. He knew he couldn't have the same relationship with Bruce that Terry had—why was he doing something then that Terry wouldn't even try?
The last part of that question was the answer whispered in the back of his mind: Because Terry wouldn't try.
Matt took a deep breath and managed to speak, surprising himself with his directness. "How did you know that Terry and I were your kids? He said you probably knew the whole time, but he never asked."
The hard look Bruce always seemed to have on his face softened somewhat, giving Matt some ease of mind. Calmly, he replied, "When your father was killed, his picture was all over the news. Terry didn't look anything like him, but I didn't think too much of it. That sort of thing happens often." Matt nodded. "Sometime after he went home after his first battle, I got a call from Amanda Waller."
"And you figured it out from there?" Matt guessed. Bruce nodded.
"On some level, it didn't surprise me what she'd done. She'd done it before: Supergirl, the Ultimen… I was about to insist that he return the suit the next day, just as I'd been planning to tell him, but I knew that he needed to be able to do this."
"Because you did?"
"No." Matt was somewhat taken aback by this, so Bruce continued, "Don't be fooled into thinking that your genetics determine your path. I looked up Terry's record that night. He came close to losing himself to what other members of his old gang had. He needed to find himself, and he did that night. I couldn't take that away from him. I'd already done that with my other sons." His eyes drifted toward the glass cases in the back, and Matt immediately understood that he was talking about Dick Grayson and Tim Drake, the former Nightwing and Robin. He'd heard the stories, and now everything was starting to make sense.
"I think I get it now," he decided. "And I'll keep in mind what you said, that my blood doesn't determine my fate."
"Good," Bruce replied. "I'll see you tomorrow before your patrol."
Matt nodded and made his way out, taking one last glance at the four costumes in the cases against the wall. Each represented a hero from the past whose legacy was strong enough for him to still feel now. But his attention was on the fifth case, the empty one closest to the exit. It represented a hero of the present, whose legacy was already beginning to show. It also represented a man who was not yet a hero and whose fate had not yet been decided. But it didn't seem to matter as much right now. Right now, he had answers to a few of the questions of his life, and that was slowly bringing him to find who he was.
Warning note ahead of time: I am crazy about symbolism, so keep an eye open for anything of that sort that I might put in. I apologize ahead of time if it gets to be too much. Fighting techniques borrowed from the "Chase Sasuke" arc of Naruto. Also the name "Cassie Jenkins" is based on a pseudonym given out by Angel in Big O. Nothing else really in the way of major references. As a future note, however, I will not actually be bringing in Dick Grayson, though I will manage to have Matt come to terms with that part of the past. Feedback is appreciated, as well as any suggestions.