It was three years. It took three years for Jason to come Gotham unquestioned.
For three years, he swept the drug cartels from Central and South America. His bored servants helped him cleanse them gladly. It was not easy, though. The cartels either were potentates themselves or colluded with politicians or potentates. If he restricted his action in legal and mundane way, it would need more than decades to accomplish it.
Yes, he finished it. After some espionages, brainwashings, sabotages, assassinations, mass-changeling homunculi, orchestrated manslaughters and a puppet show of a government in the bounded field of the scale of a continent later. Le fey-s were a big help whenever he took in rescuees from the cartels. Their knowledge and experience in medicines, care and protection all but cemented the foothold in the areas. Power vacuum it made filled with interrelated enterprises of Atlasia Group. Central and South America were now the clean area of the drug cartels.
It was also when servants found out the length his overworking tendency will go if unchecked. He didn't rest unless either forced or ambushed to do so.
Even Assassin, who detested idleness the most, was appalled by his action full of schedules. More often than not, he had to sneak up on and behead Jason, then let him resurrect himself. Or Morgan dosed his water with tasteless, scentless anesthetic just to make him rest sometimes.
Any other servants could not help them make Jason rest. Because of the dominance over souls of the 3rd Magic, Jason involuntarily forced them to stop making him rest the moment he knew one of them tried. Added to that, Revelation made the work well-nigh impossible. His homunculi servants in the Timeless Temple were not excluded from the influence. His tremendous willpower was harmful to himself in this case.
Thus, Jason had to be dosed or assassinated then resurrect. But he didn't mind it while he was in the frenzy of overwork. He had done 'I'll sleep when I'm dead' in its literal meaning. But truth was, it was necessary for him to overwork. The workload was ridiculously great. To say it was hectic three years was an understatement.
(When he broke out of the frenzy, Caster told him about the dominance. Even though he had not known it, he thought he owed them so much apology for forcing their hands to stop him.)
Now, he came back to Gotham as the president and owner of Atlasia Group, a blind albino young man whose name was Renato Atlasia. He was not actually blind though, of course not. While he made himself a temporary blind man, he could 'see' around him with spiritron vibration that caused mana resonance.
When he got out of the limo, his appearance sure made an impression with the white cane which was actually a mystic code and the black tinted goggle which looked like a protective goggle. Combined with white suits and gloves, the albino man was so white it made others' eyes hurt. Bodyguards in white didn't help either. Only saving graces were the black goggle and the sunglasses the bodyguards wore were.
It was Gotham's rare sunny day, though the most of the sunshine was obscured from the land by tall close-packed buildings. Facing a mass of reporters, Jason found himself brooding over wretchedness oozing out of the city. He had to stamp down antipathy toward the wretchedness.
'Oh, Alaya damn it!'
He knew, he just knew his mortal enemy was the root of all foulness he had felt since the last visit here. Gritting the teeth, Jason ignored reporters and walked away from them. There was no need to answer any of them for now. The speech he came to give at the opening ceremony of Green Oberon would be enough for them. His unseeing, cloudy red eyes behind the goggle glinted angrily.
= Avenger's Rhapsody =
The Batcave at sunset that day, Bruce had been studying Green Oberon's building planning while Tim briefed him about the company and its president. At some point of the briefing, Richard who received call from Tim came to join them.
"──To summarize, it is a green technology company." finished Tim.
"Well," Richard put his hands on his waist, "it seems normal enough."
"How sure are we on 'normal' part?" asked Bruce closing the building planning from the computer screen and open a file about Renato Atlasia.
Richard shrugged shoulders. The answer was obvious: Not so much.
The Atlasia's emergence from Central and South America was abrupt and unexpected. There had been no sign at all that someone like Renato had made a move against cartels. A blind albino man who opposed drug cartels was not supposed to be inconspicuous. But he had been and succeeded in looting out them in the span of less than three years. A perfect, proper Shock and Awe for everyone in the know and connection, that's what it was. No one knew him or about him until it's too late.
The cartels' elimination was strange itself because nobody had known and everyone, including Superman, had been blindsided by it. There were no sounds of gunshots, no scream or no sound of canon fire. And yet, the sites of the elimination were littered with the wreckage of tanks, concrete debris, bullets, blood and scorch marks.
Bruce didn't pay attention at first when he heard of the scheduled mop-up operation from the morning news three years before, thinking it was an electoral commitment. It was the dwindling drug deals and the mobs who were frantic because of the lack of drug supplies that made him investigated the case.
And the result was it: There were no sounds of gunshots, no scream or no sound of canon fire. The cartels got massacred one day out of the blue and their victims were rescued by the soldiers and officers. It was the Atlasia which resolved the crisis the elimination left behind ─ The Atlasia which all the governments of Central and South America answered to from some point of the time.
How was that possible while nobody suspected a thing, Bruce had no idea. All traces went cold and clues were long gone. No witnesses had a recollection of the incident.
The Atlasia's emergence was as abrupt and unexpected as the elimination. Perhaps, it could be natural for the Atlasia to hide themselves until the moment of the victory due to the vindictiveness the cartels were infamous for. It was also true, however, that it was hard to see them unrelated, the Atlasia and the elimination. It was too smooth of a transition from the cartels to the Atlasia.
'Renato Atlasia…...' narrowed his eyes, Richard read the file and rubbed his jaw with the left hand. 'He's quite a suspicious man with the suspicious circumstances, there's no doubt. However, what concerns me is his seeming lack of malice in the action whether he was to be the mastermind behind all or not.'
He looked at his mentor worriedly.
'It's the kind of oxymoron which will rile up Bruce so much that he would not handle it well. Paranoia of his would not let him. Tim was right to be wary of it and call me.'
Tim saw him nodded his head and smiled, and nodded back feeling relieved. He could not bear with Bruce on high paranoia because he called him wrong name whenever he was high-strung. It hurt to hear Bruce call him 'Jason'. He knew Bruce did not mean to hurt him, but it was hard to stand it sometimes. He was overlooked too many times to stomach it.
"It's also true we have no ground to interrogate him, though." Tim rebutted Bruce's statement. "The building planning has nothing for us to see, Atlasia's record is squeaky clean even as he carries out the blood feud with cartels, and he is adored and worshiped by people of South America so much that it will cause some national issues when he makes our interference out of a problem."
His shoulders drooped.
"Ugh! If only we dealt with the disappearance case…..."
Yes, that bloody disappearance case. Bruce and Tim have spent three fucking years on that case but could not solve it. They discovered a pattern of the disappearance very long time ago, sure, but it didn't mean a thing if they could not stop it occurring.
Tabloids of Gotham started to call it 'Disappearing Pandemic' after the first report two and a half years ago when they found out the disappearance because the pattern was similar to a pandemic. And it meant its range and scale became wider and larger as time went on. If a person disappeared one day, anyone who had been in their vicinity would vanish following day or the next. For example, shortly after the first report about the disappearance by Vicki Vale who interviewed a wife of a missing man, she too disappeared after the wife have vanished.
People had gone ballistic when the news of which inmates of Arkham Asylum were not spared from the disappearance came out, blaming GCPD and the Batman for their laziness and abandonment.
It's quite an excessive response even for Gotham standard. Some people had speculated a conspiracy theory which said Villains were behind all those disappearances. Another people had waited silently believing heroes to find a solution. A few people had embraced the metaphor of 'Disappearing Pandemic' in its literal meaning and cleansed their own bodies and house to the near degree of mysophobia. It's understandable, considering the number of missing that reached almost a hundred thousand by the time Vale disappeared.
It had been also what tipped the alarm in the Batman's head because the scale of disappearance was greater than what he had discovered so far.
The homeless, the old who was not strange to find them died of old age, the beggars and the smalltime thugs…...
Gradually but surly quietening streets of night time Gotham.
'I should have known. I should have known! I must have known! What's wrong with me?!' Bruce had silently panicked reading the paper, for he didn't feel unfamiliar with it. Running down to the cave and powering the Bat-computer up, he found out a case file about the disappearance that had been left alone for weeks without even a log of which indicate it had been once read. He had been compromised all along!
The situation in Gotham was so serious already that Bruce had to ask for The league's help. Independence and distance were not worth enough to endanger more lives. It needed to be dealt with swiftly, especially someone or something compromised his mind and Robin's.
It didn't help to solve the case, though.
Zatana, bless her good heart, almost died out of the Black Death trying to help him trace the cause of disappearance. He had no idea where the plague had come from, but from what Zatana found out before she collapsed, there was a culprit behind the case. And the culprit was capable of performing a magic of which kind she didn't know of existence and cursed her the Black Death for her meddling.
Of all the bloody case, magic! Oh, how Bruce hated magic. It's unruly and unstable. Its chaotic tendency was tamed after the shock wave, but it didn't mean it became safe. He is an old friend of Zatana, he knew magic to a certain extent and hated it for forcing its peril and danger on his dear friend just because of what she was. He regretted to ask her magical help.
Clark's help was off the table because since Kryptonians were vulnerable to magic, he would be an easy target for the culprit. John Constantine, who came with Zatana for some reason he wouldn't tell, went missing. Palmer became busy searching for the cure for the magical disease. Green Lantern's ring could not get a clear read about Gotham in general because the thick veil of magic on the city was interfering in it. It seemed helpless.
And all of a sudden, it stopped. It just stopped when the Green Oberon came Gotham. Furthermore, missing men and women started to reappear left and right since the day Renato Atlasia declared that he will stay in Gotham for months. Coincidence? It could be. But any of the heroes wouldn't put it past Renato to have a clue about all the mess.
"Don't forget the Saint Dumas' mess murder case." Bruce reminded Tim.
"Yeah, as if I can get it out of my mind."muttered Tim.
There was a mess murder in the Saint Dumas Church in Old Gotham section. All the victims were beheaded, priests and believer alike. The church was burned down to a crisp by huge dark blue fire in the middle of the night, which impossibly didn't burn any other things including heads and bodies. The case leaked magic vibe, creepy fire and foreboding displays.
What's there to link the case to Green Oberon? Well, it was Renato's personal secretary Beni who reported the fire to the emergency services. Nobody saw the fire except her, and she claimed she didn't remember going to the church. Considering Benzodiazepine was in her bloodstream, the police suspected the murder was a vigilante's work. Why they murdered whole church people was anyone's guess.
The case was closed there. Just like that, the investigation stopped. When Batman confronted Commissioner Gordon about it, he had no idea whatsoever.
"What are you talking about? Fire? What fire?"was confused Jim's exact word. No news papers printed about the church, no record of the report remained in the database of the emergency services, and the secretary left Gotham early in the morning.
It's fishy. Too fishy and obvious. The Atlasia was practically waving the red flag in the hero's face.
A siren suddenly blared.
"It looked like we don't have time to look into the Atlasia today. It's Port Adams, Riddler's on the move."said Bruce going to Batmobile, followed by Nightwing and Robin.
= Avenger's Rhapsody =
Shortly after heroes had left, Alfred entered the cave. His hand was on the forehead, his step was tottering. He was sweating with glaze eyes.
"Master Bruce, I… "
["Long time no see."]
The voice sounded like it's right next to him. But Alfred's gaze snapped upwards without hesitation.
One of the bats in the cave was looking down at him, its eyes blazing red.
And it smelled familiar to him.
"Oh, dear…..." murmured Alfred before all the lights were out all together.
[Postscript]
This chapter was practically a remake compared to the counterpart. Oh well, I'm satisfied nonetheless.
As for Gilgamesh and Nabu, I will address their relations in all good time. The prologue doesn't end yet.
Thank you for Favs, Fels and Revs!
Here's the Assassin's stats
Class: Assassin
Master: Jason Makarov Todd Atlasia
True Name: Hassan-i Sabbah
Gender: Male
Alignment: Lawful·Evil
Hidden Attribute: Human
[Parameters]
SRT: A / END: A / AGL: B+ / MP: E / LUC: E+ / NP: A
[Class Skills]
Presence Concealment: A(EX)
Magic Resistance: B
Independent Action: B+
[Personal Skills]
Battle Continuation: EX
Protection of the Faith: A+++
Evening Bell: EX
Natural Body: C(A)
Uncrowned Martial Arts: -
At The Boundary: EX
[Noble Phantasm]
Azrael(A): Anti-Unit Type