Welcome back to Gotham City.

If you thought Bruce was missing from The Batman, then this is for you.

If you thought women were missing from The Batman, then this is for you.

This is a novel.

The Batman, Bruce Wayne, Alfred Pennyworth, Edward Nashton, Commissioner Gordon, Thomas Wayne and Gotham City (its districts and institutions) belong to DC comics and Warner Brothers. Some of the ideas belong to Matt Reeves and the script team. All other characters, events and ideas are original.

This is written not for profit but for pleasure and for the enjoyment of you, the reader. If you have enjoyed it, please leave a review and flag it up to Matt Reeves!

Prologue

Gotham City, 2016

Wayne Enterprises main board room

The crowd was hostile, angry, chanting death threats and waving placards calling for an end to testing on primates. At the front of the crowd were two very noticeable women; the younger one, eighteen if she was a day, had a lot of pink fading to bright red streaked into the lower half of her long hair. The other one, maybe a generation older, was whipping up the crowd with short speeches and slogans shouted through a megaphone. Many people, including the two women, wore white t-shirts with red streaks down them. Behind the crowd, clearly visible, was the identifying sign of Wayne BioTech, and its recognisable gates, firmly closed. Security guards could be seen behind the wrought iron.

'Thank God they're tall,' the Chief Executive Officer muttered, 'otherwise they would have been in.'

'She used to work here,' the Head of Research said. 'I'm surprised at her.'

'Maybe she was a plant all along,' someone commented.

Bruce Wayne, wearing a suit that was slightly too big for him, looking slightly unkempt, with strands of hair falling over his eyes, watched the footage impassively. Out of the corner of his eye he was aware of the CEO and the senior leadership team of Wayne BioTech carefully watching his face and those of Lucius Fox, CEO of Wayne Enterprises and his senior leadership team.

'Where are the police?' Bruce Wayne asked.

'Standing back, on the other side of the road,' the Head of Wayne BioTech said. 'They don't get involved until it gets out of hand.'

'Do we do it, what they're saying?' Bruce asked. 'Do we experiment on chimps, and the like?'

'Erm, yes, yes, we do,' the Head of Research, said. 'But strictly within Federal guidelines and with strict concern for their welfare. We are absolutely hot on that.'

He looked at her: Kateri Mailloux, a woman much the age his mother would have been, he guessed. Smart, in all senses of the word, and calm.

'But this was just a distraction,' the Head of Security said. He flicked a remote control and changed the pictures to those of a security camera.

'This is the rear of the building,' he explained. 'While those guys were making a noise at the front, these guys were getting in at the back.'

In grainy black and white, two men in ski masks and hoods moved through the corridors of the facility.

'They had to have a key card,' the CEO of BioTech said.

'If they did, we'll find out who gave it to them,' the Head of Security said. 'They will be toast.'

Hadn't they just said that one of the young demonstrators used to work there, so wasn't it blindingly obvious who had given them the key card? Or allowed her card to be cloned. Bruce said nothing, but sighed. Lucius shot him a glance.

There was no opening of doors, no exploring their way, no looking to see what they could find. They went straight to the animal area. The men and women in the board room watched as the intruders cut open the cages and freed the chimps.

'What did they do with them?' Bruce asked.

'They just let them go free. Let them into one of the labs, where they did a lot of damage before these people opened a window and let them out,' Wayne BioTech's CEO said.

'But this was also a distraction,' the Head of Security said.

'So they're running around the streets.' He knew this: he had heard something about it from Alfred.

'We can come to that. It won't be pleasant. People won't like it. But – in all the chaos, they stole something.'

'What?' Bruce asked, because he felt he had to, not because he was particularly interested. Other people ran the companies; he had nothing to do with the day-to-day business of Wayne Enterprises. This would not be his mess to clear up. He tried, not very successfully, to stifle a yawn. Out of the corner of his eye, he was aware of glances passing between the BioTech CEO and Kateri.

'Neural seeds,' Kateri said.

'What are they?'

'Like, little tiny seeds, really, that can be implanted in the brain – '

'But they're not actual seeds – are they?'

'No, they're not. They're like . . . grains of sand, I suppose. Tiny transmitters. We implant them in the frontal cortex.' She rubbed her forehead, between her eyebrows.

'What are they for?'

'They were developed a few years ago, but there were technical difficulties. Our current research is looking at addiction, and someone remembered these seeds and wondered whether they can be used in the . . .'

As he looked up from his watch, he saw that Kateri had noticed his inattention, boredom, whatever she would like to call it. But she continued as if she thought he was bright enough to understand and follow, which was nice of her. Or patronising, but he didn't care which.

'We were trying to find out if we could enhance the dopamine levels with these seeds and manage addiction better.'

'Dopamine. Is that . . .?'

'The chemical that makes you feel pleasure? No, not exactly, although that's what people think when they hear it. But you kind of need it to push you towards the things that do make you feel pleasure. The feeling of pleasure is the reward.'

'Oh, okay.' He thought he got it.

'But the thieves won't be able to use them,' the Wayne BioTech CEO said confidently.

'Why not?' This was starting to sound like a puzzle that might interest him.

'They require insertion into the front of the brain by an ear, nose and throat specialist, with an endoscopic camera. That can't be done by just anybody. Human trials are not yet complete.'

'Oh. So . . .'

'I think,' Lucius Fox interrupted, 'we need to decide on what to do on this, going forward. Howard – your thoughts?'

'We need to shut this down on the PR front. We're already getting calls from Channel Nine for interviews. We don't want this going national,' the CEO of Wayne BioTech said. 'The PR team are already on it.'

'Good. Push the benefits, what the research is trying to achieve, why there is no other way. Try and get in some of the history of animal experimentation – especially the benefit to kids. Dead kids always play well. Get the word out to the hospitals on what to look out for, even though I can't see how an amateur could use these.'

'Could have been stolen to order,' Howard said. 'But we can't think what someone would do with them.'

'Get the word out anyway. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, we are done, I think. Any other ideas, anything we have forgotten, send an email.'

'Send me the footage,' Bruce said.

Lucius and Bruce watched the senior executives file out, clutching their cell phones and folders.

The older man turned to Bruce.

'If you're going to do this,' he said, re-sitting the shoulders of Bruce's jacket and straightening his tie, 'you got to look interested. Don't give them the impression that they bore you.'

'Is that what it looked like? Sorry.'

'Yeah, it looked like you couldn't wait to get back to your games console, or whatever they think kids your age get up to. You got to walk the walk and talk the talk.'

'I know, but . . . '

Lucius put a hand on his shoulder. 'Slow and steady. It will take time. You can't learn all this in a week. We could start with a suit of your own.'

The two men looked at each other. Bruce nodded slowly.

'And learn their names,' Lucius added. 'It all helps.'

'I was just wondering, thinking . . . could I visit the site?'

'Of course.'

'No, I mean like now, before it all gets tidied up. I assume the police are involved?'

'I'll get Christa to arrange it. But you won't be able to go in till forensics are finished. Are you thinking you can solve this?'

'I'm thinking I can try.'

'Let me know what you need.'

'Thanks, Lucius.' In the doorway, Bruce turned. 'And what will happen to the chimps?'

Lucius shrugged. 'I'd love to say we would recapture them and find them loving homes, but. They'll be shot, I expect, most probably by GCPD. Can't have a colony of feral chimps in the city.'

Back in his bedroom, Bruce slowly took off the suit, shrugging himself into a shapeless gray t-shirt and black jeans. He put the suit on to a hanger, and carried it into one of the other rooms. There he slid it carefully into a suit carrier, which he then hung up in a small wardrobe. Briefly he placed his hand on the carrier, roughly where the heart would be on a wearer. Then he closed the door and left the room.

'Good meeting?' Alfred asked, coming out of the kitchen.

Bruce shrugged. 'Lucius says I should get a suit of my own.'

Alfred nodded. 'That's good. It's time, don't you think?'

He held Bruce's gaze for a moment. Neither of them needed to speak. Alfred handed him a lidded cup with coffee, Bruce's smart drug of choice.

'Keep an eye on the time,' Alfred said, watching Bruce set off to the elevator that would take him to the small private garage in the basement of the building. 'Don't forget to eat.'

Down in the basement, sitting at his desk, surrounded by his computer screens and familiar clutter, Bruce let go of the breath he had been holding. Slowly the tension left him. Safe in his own space, he pulled his journal towards him and began to write.