Bruce suited up and smiled at himself in the mirror. He put up his muscles and did a deep voice.
"You look good today Mr. Wayne." He said.
"Why thank you Mr. Scott." He said normally. He was talking to himself. Acting out of what would happen. "You know Mr. Scott, you are very ugly and nasty in many different ways I can't exclaim. But yet I shouldn't waste my breath telling you that. You should already know that."
"How so?"
"Well you took away Dick. My only-" He paused and looked away from the mirror. He didn't want to see himself cry. He was done crying, he had cried too much. But yet he couldn't get away from the fact that Dick was gone. This incident was like when his parents had died. Bruce had somehow died too then, but when Dick came along, Bruce started to live again. Started to see the world that was in front of him. He started to see, himself again. But this has happened and now he was dead again. Dead to the bone. Nothing was left of his heart. It had been broken. "My only son." He finally finished. Dick was his son. No matter what people would say about it, Dick was his son. His son. But he was going to get him back today. He was going to Social Services and fixing it all out. Two nights of this pain was enough. He was going to speak with Alicia from the SSAC personally. Barbara came to the door of Wayne Mansion and let herself in.
"Hey! You here?" She said. Her voice boomed through the Mansion as a reply came back.
"I'm here. Come up to the closet." Barbara did so and found Bruce in a nice silk tux with a black tie and white undershirt. She grinned and straightened his tie for him.
"I heard you were going to fix this situation up. That's good, just don't kill somebody ok." Bruce looked down and pushed her aside and started to walk off. "Hey! I was just kidding!"
"There's nothing to kid about Barbara! Dick is in some home he's not suppose to be."
"Apparently he is suppose to be there."
"No! My gut and heart tell me he's not. He-he just can't be stuck there."
"Your gut and heart don't talk Bruce!" He looked back and snubbed her.
"Can you not take a joke!"
"Not when it involves this!" Barbara backed up to the wall. The outburst had frightened her. Bruce turned and headed toward the car.
The SSAC was packed with people. Moms and Dads were arguing at each other while other people were crying and sobbing about how they lost their kids. There was a man in front of Bruce with a raggedy yellow shirt on with dirty blue jeans covering it. The smell of hard cold whiskey came strong at Bruce. Bruce cringed and held his nose. The man turned around and stared at him suspiciously. Bruce could tell that the man was surprised to find him there.
"Well lookey hur Maria! It's Brucey Wayne!" The man said in a strong country accent. "So what'cha doin' hur Brucey?" The man said. The whiskey was about killing him. "What'cha cringing for idiot?" The man looked up at him and Bruce couldn't stand the looks of the ugly geyser. That Maria woman turned around and she had the smell of strong Alcohol. Bruce could tell these folks were addicted to that stuff. He looked a little down at the woman and saw that she was pregnant.
"Well, the reason we're here is that we had twins, ones a boy and the other a girl, they took them away." The man looked down and slammed his fist into his palm. "They'll pay for what they did to this family!"
"I can see why they did it." Bruce scolded.
"What did you say about us, fellow?" The woman said.
"Face it, you all aren't exactly the type for parenting. Just the sight of you makes people want to hurl. Your breath is the worse. You're alcoholics." They looked at Bruce then down to their feet.
"You don't understand, we weren't always like this. We used to be a happy family. Then once this man came to our house, he-he." She stopped and couldn't finish.
"He threatened us. He told us that we would all die in a car accident except, it wouldn't be an accident. So I grabbed my gun and shot the man. A cop lived by and heard the sound. He raced to our house. The man called out for help and the cop saw us drag his body across the yard. He just wouldn't shut up! I shot him, and shot him again. My wife hit him with a baseball bat while I shot. She hit him in the head at least 18 times. I shot him about 12. Then he finally died, finally. The cop witnessed it all, he arrested us then and didn't give us a chance to tell our side. They took them away. We got released early for good behavior. Our kids were 2 then, they're 12 now. I regret that incident every day of my life."
"How old was the man?" Bruce asked.
"About 17."
"Did he live near?"
"Yeah, we found out that he was apart of the Scott family across the road. That very day his best friend Derrick had come over."
"Were these two rambunctious together?"
"Yup. They always caused trouble."
"Do you think it was possible that maybe Derrick had dared him to do that. To scare you guys. Don't you think 17 year olds would be a little bad and not think about the consequences?" The man looked away and started to sob. Bruce thought about it and remembered that the man who had took Dick away last name was Scott. Maybe he was this boy's father and wanted another kid finally after 10 years. "What was his full name?"
"Robert Wilson Scott. I'll never forget it."
"Robert? Robert Scott?"
"Yeah, that's his name." Bruce remembered that Robert Scott was the man who took Dick. Maybe it was another man. Then he remembered that on the news they referred to him as Mr. Scott. Was this true?
"Next!" The bell rang and the couple that was in front of him went behind him. Bruce stepped forward and the skinny long black hair woman typed at the computer and looked up. "Hello, my name is Stephanie Myers, how may I be of assistants Mr. Wayne!?" She was surprised to see him there. "Mr. Wayne, what are you doing here?"
"Can you check of Robert Scott taking Richard Grayson?" The woman looked at him and typed in her computer.
"I'm sorry Mr. Wayne but it seems that there are no files of a man named Robert Scott taking Richard. Are you ok because it actually says that Robert Wilson Scott has been dead for 10 years now." Bruce looked out the window. Someone had pulled a prank him? No, that man, he wasn't really even Robert Scott, he was a random man that had took Dick away. Then that Alicia girl wasn't real either. She was fake too.
"Have you had a girl named Alicia before?" Stephanie looked at him again.
"The only Alicia we've had in years was Alicia Hagitay. Butt, she died in a wreck 5 years ago, she was Roberts girlfriend." Bruce knew then. Someone did pull a trick. A trick that they would think was funny. He remembered, the giggles from those two, their attitude, and their smiles. All so familiar. Something that would be a JOKE.
"No." Bruce whispered.
"Mr. Wayne, is there something wrong?" Dick's been kidnapped by Joker and Harley. Bruce turned around and rushed out the door. What tortures things were they doing to him? He contacted Alfred on the phone. His wall paper was of Dick smiling and giving the peace sign.
"Wayne Mansions, this is Alfred speaking."
"Alfred, Dick wasn't adopted by Robert I had really adopted him."
"That's wonderful news Master Bruce! When will Master Dick be joining us?"
"That's the thing Alfred. Dicks been kidnapped, by the joker." Alfred was silent.
"I'll have the suit ready when you get here sir." They hung up and Bruce raced to the cave.