Another Way

Bruce sat listening to Jim Gordon explain why his whole world seemed to be disintegrating. The words seemed to follow the hypnotic rhythm of the beeping from the heart monitor, attached to his friend's chest.

Bruce wiped his hand over his face and his haunted eyes fixed on Gordon. "Reynolds said this was a drive by gone wrong. Just an unfortunate situation, Alfred was in the wrong place at the wrong time. "Bruce muttered.

Leslie's eyes lifted from her husband's face and focused on Bruce. "There's a lot of that happening!" she said bitterly. "Bruce, your father was looking into drug smuggling in Gotham and he ended up dead. Alfred was trying to find out who wanted Thomas' dead and this..." her hand closed tightly over her husbands as her voice choked off, "for me that's just too much of a coincidence."

Bruce nodded. "So what are the police doing about it?" Bruce asked.

Gordon eyed the young man carefully "Nothing; as far as Reynolds is concerned your father's case is closed as they have caught the suspect. And they're classing Mr. Pennyworth as an unfortunate bystander in a gang motivated drive by shooting. The official line on which is, we are still investigating, or in Gotham police department speak... case closed" Gordon added bitterly.

Bruce, looked from Gordon, to Leslie then to the figure laid on the bed, "No way is this case closed! I'm going to speak to Reynolds."

"That won't do you any good; Reynolds is in their pockets!" Gordon said bitterly.

"Then I'll speak to the Mayor!"

"Bruce," Leslie said quietly "you haven't been listening. They're all in on it. This goes too deep. Too many people have a finger in the pie!"

"So we just let them get away with murder and attempted murder? They killed my father and nearly killed your husband! Are you seriously telling me we should do nothing?"

Gordon looked at the young man with pity. "Bruce, there's nothing we can do! All official channels are blocked."

"There has to be another way!" Bruce insisted "How about central government, the FBI?"

Gordon shook his head, "Bruce, this is being covered up by the whole Gotham establishment. Unless those responsible are caught red handed; actually with the drugs in their possession then we have had it!"

Bruce walked out of the hospital room in a daze. He shook his head he'd spent his entire life in Gotham and had never understood a single thing about the place. For God sake, he'd never understood anything his own family, lest of all his father. Now he was head of Wayne Enterprises, a multi Billionaire and he was lost in a sea of corporate corruption and covered up murders.

What he had discovered was his father had worked hard to keep Wayne Enterprises honest. He'd surrounded himself with trustworthy men at the top. Men like Lucius Fox, head of finance; Lucius was guiding him through the company's complexity.

Lucius who had started as an office boy. With no qualifications, other than a determination to better himself. A young man who had one morning been caught asleep, over a book, by his boss at Wayne Enterprises and fired. When as a frightened sixteen year old he had been taking his few meager belonging out through the doors he'd tripped up scattering his ragged collection of second hand books, on business management, across the sidewalk. He'd heard laughter from the door man and the security guards who had escorted him out. Tears of despair had been flowing down his face. He'd dreamed of getting out of the ghetto, becoming a man of business, being someone! Office boy had been his first step, now it was all gone. Someone had picked up one of his books and was looking at it. Lucius saw a hand pick up another book. Then a soft voice had asked, "Do you find Fletcher's theories on a corporate finical model sustainable?" Lucius had looked up, the tall man wasn't mocking him he was interested in his view. "No," he'd answered "his view on self perpetuating income flow seems to make no sense at all!" The man had laughed. "Young man, we should talk, it's nice to find someone who can read this great tome and not get mesmerized by the rubbish it contains." Lucius had started that day being thrown out of his job as office boy and ended it as a junior executive enrolled at Gotham State Business School. Thomas had even taken him to his tailor and bought him two new suites. Lucius Fox owed everything to Thomas Wayne, and Thomas and his son had his complete loyalty.

Bruce had spent half the night going through Alfred and his father's papers. Two names kept cropping up, but nothing concrete against either man. On Alfred's jotter the name of a ship; the San Mari Polo, was underlined three times. Bruce called up the information on the ship, "Due in Gotham next Friday" he muttered "Carrying car parts, car parts from Afghanistan!"

Lucius listened to Bruce without commenting. His face registered pain at the mention of Thomas' murder and anger when he was told about the possible link to drugs. Anger but not disbelief, Bruce was relieved to see. Bruce mentioned the names of his key suspects and Lucius brow creased in thought.

"Paul Zacarius and Donald Laraby are both board members. Paul is Phillip Zacarius' grandson. When the old man died he inherited his grandfather's seat on the board. Donald joined us after the take over of Laraby Shipping. His seat on the board was the sweetener for the deal. You're sure it has to be one of those two?"

Bruce nodded.

"Then I'll do a full financial check on them. See what little secrets the money trail throws up. It's hard to cover up every trace of money movements. Take heart Bruce, after all it was a money trail that finally nailed Al Capone."

Bruce returned to the hospital around lunchtime. Nurses were in Alfred's room changing dressings. He wondered down to the relatives' room. Two young children were sat watching a video. Claire had been sat watching them. She lifted a tear stained face towards Bruce. "Pity he isn't real," she said nodding towards the TV screen, "if we had the Raven on the case maybe we'd get truth and justice as well." Bruce hugged the young girl to him and watched as his boyhood hero once again donned hood and black cloak as he headed out into the night to achieve what the police couldn't, Truth and Justice for all. Suddenly Bruce's eyes opened wide, no... it was a silly idea. Or was it?