Meanwhile, in the Wayne mansion in a hidden security room, Bruce Wayne was lazily going through the night's video surveillance.

"So, Master Wayne, is everything going as you hoped?" His life long butler Alfred asked.

"I believe so. No one seems suspicious, except a few who think I drank for 7 years straight." Bruce chuckled a bit. He felt a little creepy going through hours and hours of video footage of his own party but if he was going to help his city, he needed to make sure his Bruce Wayne image was stable first. "There's one thing that's bugging me. Lex Luther showed up dramatically late and when he said hi to be he seemed extremely distracted. The Luthors bug me on a number of levels. Could you take a note of all the times he's seen in the footage? I have some work to do in the cave."

"Of course. Be careful…" Alfred responded, with a voice of concern.

"You know me, I'm all about safety first." Bruce responded. After discovering the caves underneath the mansion, he had been spending a lot of time trying to build some kind of secret getaway – a place where his 'alter' ego could live. In addition, he was trying to figure out who this alter ego would be. His greatest fear was that he would be treated comically rather than seriously. He couldn't handle the idea of being booed out of his own city.

For the last couple of days now, he had toyed around with the idea of dressing up like a bat. Sure, it's a little costumey but besides that, it was would allow him to be stealth and instill the fear he sought to control. He knew how people often felt about people taking the law into their own hands – they tended to be both skeptical and fearful. He didn't need the people's support – Bruce just needed to be able to do what needed to be done.

After a successful field trip to the research and defense division of Wayne Enterprises following his return, Wayne felt he had all the tools he needed to successfully and safely begin to bring order back to a mod run city. All he had to do was perfect the theatrics and he could finally begin something truly meaningful.

Wayne sat in the cave, wielding small bat shaped boomerangs and enjoying a light mist from the nearby waterfall when he heard Alfred yelling down the elevator shaft.

"Master Bruce! There is something you'll want to see…" Alfred yelled, hoping Bruce would hear him and he wouldn't have to go down to the cave himself. Bruce yelled back that he was coming back up and immediately hoped back on the lift to head to the makeshift hidden security room. "There." Alfred pointed at Lex in a secluded hallway:

"Yes?...I know Gotham is a big city, I want you searching anything that could remotely concern Chloe Sullivan. Her cousin has been flying here at least once every other month. Look. She's here…Use all my resources if you have to. Find her!"

"I'm offended, here I was thinking Lex missed me!" Bruce said with obvious amusement. "As creepy as this is, I'm pretty relieved Lex's last minute RSVP has nothing to do with me or the company."

"I agree sir." Alfred stated, still appearing a little worried. "I do feel bad for this girl though. He really does seem intent to find her."

"So do I. Would you mind looking her up? As a rule, I've always believed if a Luthor is interested it usually can't be good." Bruce asked rather passively. He looked at his watch and raised his eyebrows, "huh? It's getting pretty late. I think I'm going to spy on some bad guys. Ill see you in the morning."

"Indeed I hope so." Alfred responded with a grim tone.

Even without a full blown costume, Bruce figured he could at least find out as much information as he could. To the average person, Bruce looked like a common thief – dressed up and down in black with a home made ski mask on. However, a closer look would reveal a state of the art Kevlar suit and numerous small but effective devices to help him see and hear conversations he wasn't supposed to.

Wayne found a nice snug spot where he had a good view (through binoculars) of Falcone. After attaching a small device to his ear and turning the volume up, he patiently awaited, hoping to hear some if any worthwhile information. At first, it was incredibly boring. For a mobster that an entire city fears, Falcone was required to have a lot of incredibly boring conversations with bland and stereotypical mob-like people.

About an hour and a half of recording small time mob business, a man showed up in a deep black trench coat and aviators. Immediately, Falcone sent the few underlings hanging around away and Bruce tensed up and paid close attention.

"You know, the sunglasses at night are a bit much, And-" Falcone started before he was cut off.

"Don't say my name. I may trust you, but I don't trust Gotham at night. Do you have the drugs?" The man asked with a sense of urgency. Though he tried to hide it, Bruce could sense his fear. So could Falcone.

"Don't worry about it. Of course. I assume you have the money?" The man nodded and handed Falcone the money. The mobster whistled for two of his heavier guys to come and help deliver some ummarked boxes to who Falcone called his "new friend".

Bruce stared with his eyebrows furrowed. The entire exchange had been vague and unhelpful. The one thing that made Wayne uneasy was the mystery man's intense secrecy – it suggested that he was someone of importance whose name would carry meaning. Where were these drugs going? Nothing about the exchange seemed normal in how drug runners usually did business. Something else was going on, and Bruce hoped he could figure it out before it go to late.

At around 2:30, Wayne felt himself yawn and was about to pack up when he heard Falcone say something to what seemed to be his personal assistant. "Anders, I need you to keep a special eye on Ms. Laura Smith. Sources tell me she's trying to dig where she shouldn't." Falcone said without waiver.

"Do you want me to send her a message?" Anders asked almost a little too excitedly.

"Unneccessary. I know she won't go to print. I just wan't to make sure she keeps her trap shut. Won't help us if Gotham is mourning over its star reporter." Falcone explained.

Wayne raised his eyebrows and thought to himself how civilized Falcone was being. Then, he realized that it wasn't so much that he was a softy but that he simply didn't need to kill the girl – he had so much power the girl was irrelevant. The thought sent a shiver down Wayne's back.

After he returned home, he found a folder with all the information he would need on Chloe Sullivan. He left a note for Alfred to get information on Laura Smith and to run a check on all men about 6 ft 2 with dark brown hair who have recognizable names in Gotham. Considering the night a success, Wayne literally passed out and enjoyed a dreamless night of sleep.

Laura vaguely heard the sound of three loud bangs on her door. She immediately pulled the comforter over her head and whispered 'go away' hoping the noise would hear her. Unfortunatly, the bangs kept coming only louder and faster now. Frustrated, Laura yanked the comforter off and yelled 'just a minute' before stomping off to grab her robe and answer the door.

"You look absolutely lovely this morning." Victor said with a glowing smile.

"Victor!" Laura exclaimed, excited to see her favorite cyborg, "Sorry about the slow rise, I didn't get to bed until 3:00 AM, I couldn't help myself from trying over and over to hack into the manor's security system." Laura said with an obvious look of disappointment.

"Hey, don't worry about it. He's rich, and probably paranoid after drinking for 7 years straight and invested in some fancy new system. Luckily, you have me now – I was literally built for this kind of job." Victor said patting Laura on the back and giving her another tooth filled smile.

"Alright how about you get started and I get coffee?" Laura suggested, leaving victor by her computers while she went into the kitchen to start a batch of coffee. When she got back her jaw dropped as Victor was already sifting through some of the video footage from the night before. Chloe sat down and handed Victor who absentmindedly started siping it. About seven minutes later, he paused the screen, smiled, and said "I found it!"

The two watch the same footage Wayne checked out from the night before. When it was over, Victor pressed pause and turned to Laura.

"That was it?" She asked. Sure, she didn't figure Lex would reveal his deepest darkest secrets in the confines of Bruce Wayne's house but she hoped they could get a one up on his Gotham excursion. "I mean, did that tell us anything?"

"Well, it told us despite Lois's 4 stop visits to Gotham, he still figured out where she was going." Victor pointed out, with an overall sympathetic yet unsure of what to do look on his face.

"Yeah, he probably has someone keeping an eye on Lois since she has a bad habit of sneaking into Luthorcorp facilities on a week by week basis. But anyways, Oliver and I kind of assumed that why he thought I was here anyways. I was hoping maybe if he had a lead he would say something…I don't know. I just don't like being hunted down." Laura let out, exhausted.

"We know another thing now – he's using the public security act to find you." Victor said, with a slightly devious look on his face.

Laura chuckled, "All those cameras were a stupid way to try and make Gotham a safer place. I love how Lex is going to use them to aid in his sinister plots."

"But we know! Now we can block out any footage that could find you." Victor pointed out. "And…if this blows over it'll be another tiny charge we can add to the growing pile at his trial."

"Alright, that's well in good but for the most part, I don't do anything suspicious. I mean, I guess you could check to make sure there aren't any images of me and Lois together but for the most part when she came, we sat on the couch all weekend and ordered pizza." Laura responded, rather annoyed.

"Okay okay. So you're right, we don't have much to go on. But neither does he. All he knows is you're in Gotham, and he's already seen you and looked the other way! Just keep up your day to day activity. I know Dinah's back in Metropolis monitoring Lex practically 24 hours a day and hopefully this will all blow over."

Laura sighed, "Yeah, you're right. Besides with all this excitement, I practically forgot about the villains closer to home."

"Who?" Victor asked, a little curious.

"Carmine Falcone. And unlike Lex, everyone knows he's the bad guy. Only in Gotham could a mobster be so well known yet so well protected. Everyone's afraid of him – I mean, he practically runs the city." Laura explained.

"I've heard of Falcone but what have you got on him?" Victor asked.

"Well, I've been trying to figure out how a person can go about acquiring so much power. So far, I've found connections from him to the judicial system, the police, I've even discovered his goons working in the Gazette. The problem is, my editor doesn't want to go anywhere near the story – he's afraid if it even touches a computer a bomb will go off. And he's probably right too. With all of Falcone's connections, the worst thing is that you don't know who to trust."

"Why don't you go to the feds with it?" Victor asked, a little surprised.

"Same problem. They're either afraid or in league. I swear, this guy's a genius. He's worked out a system where he has all the control and can therefore rake in all the profits." Laura grimly pointed out.

"So, if your editor won't let you work on the story, what are you doing with it?" Victor asked the nest obvious question.

"Well, I figure that one day the city might grow a back bone or something will happen to elicit change and I want to be right there when it happens. I've been cataloging all of Falcone's illegal activity that I can hoping that maybe someday he'll make a mistake or get himself involved in something to big for him." She added thoughtfully.

"Sounds like you've got a lot of work to do – trying to save the world." Victor told her with a small smile. Here Laura was in the nastiest city in the US and she was trying to save it from imploding in on itself.

"Just doing what I can." Laura shrugged, looked at the clock noticing it was already 8 AM, "Uh oh, I've got to be at work in an hour. Alright, you can stay here or- ya go where you –" Laura stampered on.

Victor laughed, "Laura, calm down. I'm going to head back to my hotel. Call if you need anything?"

"Of course." Laura smiled and hugged her friend goodbye.

He wasn't sure what it was – maybe an animal? All he knew was that there was unwelcome pressure on this left shoulder. Bruce tried to swat what he believed was probably an alley cat away when he noticed his silk sheets and realized there was probably not an alley cat in his bedroom at Wayne Mansion.

"I'm sorry Master Wayne, but "chooing" me will not make me go anymore." Alfred said with an amused smile. Bruce hopped out of bed and looked over at his clock. He sighed – it was already noon.

"Thanks for getting me up Alfred but I can take it from here." Bruce told his butler before putting on a robe and heading to the study. Their awaited not 3 folders – one on Chloe Sullivan one on Laura Smith and an incredibly thick one that appeared to have just about every man in Gotham in it. Bruce sighed and began with the folder on Chloe Sullivan.

Born: May 17, 1987 in Metropolis, Kansas. Went missing about 5 years ago.

Bruce frowned. This girl was 26 years old – what did Luthor want with her? The next few documents in the folder were records of employment, education, etc. Finally, he got to one that stuck out.

FBI: Confidential

Concerning: Chloe Sullivan

Knows vital information concerning the terrorist known as Green Arrow. If found, apprehend.

He continued to stare at the simple sheet. He noticed the date was about two months before she went missing which led him to believe that either she ran or the FBI caught up with her. Then, he noticed the last document that sent a chill down his spine.

Confidential

Subject: Chloe Sullivan

Ability: Healing

Priority: High

Bruce was now very glad that he took the time to find away into Lex's most hidden files. Although the few lines didn't reveal much, something about it made Lex realize he didn't wan't this Chloe girl for her own benefit. However, the question still remained why did he want her. He had heard rumors that the Green Arrow was somehow messing up his business but how? And how far was he willing to go to find her? Would he tear up Gotham just for this one kid?

He frowned and placed all the information back in the folder. While he still had a lot of questions, the more he dug, the more he thought that maybe this wasn't his fight. If it became more of a problem, he would take it from there. Afterall, he wanted to save Gotham and he couldn't do that if he spent all of his time and resources trying to solve the mystery of one girl.

Out of the two folders that remained, the one on Laura Smith interested him most. If this girl had really rubbed Falcone the wrong way, than maybe she knows something that could help bring him down. Wayne pondered the possibility but also knew that it would be dangerous to involve a reporter in his quest for justice.

Unlike Chloe Sullivan, Laura Smith led what appeared to be an unextraordinary life. She grew up in a suburb outside of Star City, went to Star City University and got a prestigious internship working in the research division of Queen Industries – directly under Oliver Queen himself. After she completed her internship, she was offered a full time position at Queen Industries but chose to follow her passion – journalism. Her first choices in newspapers denied her so she came to Gotham where she chose to make the best of a sticky situation.

Bruce sighed. The biography only confirmed what he believed – this was a bright girl who knew how to get a story but more than less likely would be no match for the underworld of Gotham. He would have to be just a little bit less amiable and a bit more stealth about retrieving what she knew.

"Master Wayne," Bruce looked up expectantly as Alfred entered the room, "the remainder of your costume has arrived. I believe it is all as you wished it to be." He informed him in a way that was both polite but also reminded Bruce he didn't wholly approve of what he was doing.

"Thank you Alfred. I'll be there shortly." Wayne responded.

Before going down to the cave, Bruce chose to take a quick glance at the third and final file. There were a total of 142 men between 6 and 6 ½ ft tall with black hair with name recognition in Gotham City. Bruce sighed and figured he would have to start narrowing down his search until he could come up with a reasonably number.

"Perfect." Bruce said while admiring the helmet that appeared to be bat ears.

"You know, with just those on, you look quite adorable if I may say so." Alfred said quickly, trying hard not to laugh. Within a few moments, Bruce had the entire suit on. "On the other hand, you look awfully frightening." He corrected.

Bruce began walking around the room, mock fighting and testing out the flexibility he had in the suit. All in all, the suit afforded him the comfort he would need to be able to fight without worrying about ripping a seam. He looked at his watch: 3 PM. Bruce was anxious to test out his new set of armor but he didn't exactly want to run out while the sun was still up. He figured he would test out his suit by breaking into Laura Smith's apartment and discovering what she new about Falcone.

After a rather bland afternoon of confirming Laura's addressing and creating the tools to disable her alarm system, Bruce sat through a long dinner with the current CEO of Wayne Enterprises and eventually found himself back in the cave. For the first time all day, he felt a rush of excitement as he put on his costume and prepared to grace Gotham with his presence for the first time.

He really did only intend to go to Laura's and get the information he needed. Unfortunately, things never go as planned. As he got off his motorcycle about 4 blocks from Laura's apartment building, he heard the cries of a woman screaming.

"HELP HELP! HES MUGGING ME" She yelled for dear life.

"Hey Lady – this is Gotham, even if they hear you, no one's gonna care" the mugger responded coolly while holding the knife to her neck. From where Bruce was standing, the woman was well off and didn't want to depart from a necklace. Without really thinking, he sprinted to where the mugging was and tore the man off of her. He got up and began to point the knife at Bruce when he found himself knocked out cold on the ground the a small bat symbol lying next to his head. The lady looked as though she thought she was dreaming. She turned to Bruce, who was standing their awkwardly.

"Thanks." She told him and grabbed up her purse and walked away.

"Of course." Bruce said once she was out of ear shot. Taking in the surge of adrenaline from saving a women's life or at least her well being, Bruce took a moment before continuing on towards Laura's apartment. Finally, he reached it and began climbing the fire escape to the fourth floor. He recognized the apartment based on the blueprints he had found earlier that afternoon. After wirelessly disabling her alarm system, he jimmied the window upon and slowly but gracefully slid inside.

"Freeze" was all he heard as he realized his plan wasn't going so well. Although all the lights had been out for over an hour, apparently she was still awake? But even so, his entrance was so quiet it should've been mistaken for the wind.

"Sorry, but I can't do that." He responded in a raspy voice. He moved to grab her right wrist and disable her when she beat him to it and had him slammed on the ground – taser right next to his neck. Bruce simply stared. He hadn't expected this girl to have any fight in her, let alone be able to bring him to the floor. Sure, he could've stood his own but he hadn't been treating her like an enemy but like a small 110 pound girl.

"Who sent you?" She asked. It was obvious she was trying to appear calm but nonetheless fear seemed to penetrate her voice.

"No one sent me lady. I've obviously come to the wrong place." Bruce responded, hoping to distract her. Suddenly, a noise came from behind her and the momentary distraction allowed him to quickly sedate her. He lay her on her bed and went to where the noise was coming from. What he found was a hidden walk in closet with an array of computers and monitoring screens.

"Who is this chick?" He asked himself in wonder. Then he noticed what appeared to be a panic button on so he realized he didn't have time to check and merely grabbed a massive binder titled "Falcone" and ran for it. As he slid into an alley next to her building, he looked up to see the lights in her apartment go on and panicked voices accompany it. "Quick", he thought to himself. Not one to stick around, he jogged to his motorcycle and drove off.