Knight of Wonder

Act II

Scene 4: Paradigm City

The flickering neon screen of the computer was enough to thoroughly dry out Bruce's eyes as he struggled through a haze of fatigue to discern clues in the data. He had been staring at the lights long enough that the rest of the Batcave around him was basically invisible behind the impenetrable veil of darkness. The pattern of crimes committed by Red Hood and his gang were scattered throughout the various boroughs of Gotham like someone had sprayed the map with scattershot. It made the overall plan of the group very difficult to determine. The really intriguing part of it all was that most of the crimes were against other criminals. Yes there were the various altercations with the rival Black Mask gang, but then there were all the known muggers, rapists, fraudsters and corrupt city officials that had either been found murdered or brought to an otherwise unseemly end. Rare was the attack on someone who was not part of the criminal element. Then again, Bruce thought to himself glibly, it really seemed like there were few in Gotham these days who didn't have some kind of connection to the criminal underground.

He set his glasses down and stood up for a stretch. Then he let out a long, exasperated breath as he rubbed his eyes. Maybe Alfred was right and he had been pushing himself too hard, but with Barbra still recovering in Gotham General, it was hard to justify any sleep that was not induced.

Then with little warning, Bruce heard a familiar sounding whoosh behind him. "If you came here for an apology for my absence from the meeting the other day, then I'm afraid you're wasting your time as always," Bruce mumbled.

"You should be apologizing," came a distinctly low feminine voice out of the background.

Bruce stopped rubbing his eyes, looked up with a confused expression and turned around to see the shapely figure of Diana standing just inside the light thrown by the computer screen. Bruce gave a low moan and admitted, "Sorry, I thought you were Clark."

Diana swished her long brown hair back behind the shoulders of her sheep sweater. "Well at least you can apologize for something. You're lucky I'm not Clark, seeing as how he's on the war path right now."

"Isn't he always?" Bruce asked with a barely detectable hint of bile in his voice.

"Not like this," Diana pointed out as she took a few steps in Bruce's direction. "It's almost like he's possessed. I've never seen him so unwilling to listen to reason."

"I have," Bruce declared as he approached the keyboard of the computer and began typing away at a lightning pace. "You weren't around when we first ran into each other. Back then he practically thought he was a god."

Swinging herself into the computer chair next to Bruce, Diana kicked off her moccasin shoes and stuck her feet underneath Bruce's shirt to warm them up. She knew it had to be a particularly unsettling sensation for him, but he didn't even so much as flinch from his typing when she did this. Sometimes he could try to look so macho that it bordered on ridiculous in Diana's opinion. Since he clearly wasn't going to say anything else, Diana decided to venture further, "I've heard all about how you and he tore down about half of Metropolis on your first outing together. The fact is, when faced with a greater foe, you two decided to set aside your differences and work together. A lesson the rest of mankind would do well to learn, but right now, mankind seems bent on setting aside their differences by setting aside the Justice League, and Clark seems perfectly willing to help them to do it."

For his part, Bruce tolerated the stabbing cold of Diana's feet with barely contained agony. He only just had enough self-control to focus on his task and respond, "Now that is unlike him. He was the one who wanted the League so badly in the first place."

"Yes well, apparently the Russians and the Americans have demanded that the Watchtower be dismantled as part of any long term peace agreement, and Clark seems perfectly willing to oblige."

"There you have it," Bruce said. "If there is one force on Earth strong enough to persuade Clark off his God given course, it's that old man in the White House. I'm afraid if you want to tell him otherwise then you've got a tall order. He feels so sorry for that man that he'll do anything he says, no matter how unreasonable."

"I think I found that out the hard way at that meeting you failed to attend," Diana pointed out. "Aren't you worried about what the consequences of such an action will be?"

"I'm sorry to see the Watchtower go, if that's what you're asking," Bruce allowed. "I poured a lot of Wayne Tech. R&D into that orbiting monstrosity."

Diana scrunched her face into an intense frown. It seemed as though no one was willing to listen to her, and if they wouldn't do so willingly, she was beginning to wonder if she was going to have to make them. Bruce could be so self-absorbed and pig headed sometimes. It was the one part of him that didn't drive her crazy in a good way. "Well there's another problem that John warned me about that we might need the Watchtower for…"

"I got it!" Bruce interjected.

"Got what?" Diana asked with as much patience as she could muster.

"The location of Red Hood's next strike. All the data points to Lexcorps' Gotham office on Founder's Island. If I can get there before him and his gang, I might be able to put an end to this war once and for all."

"Bruce have you been listening to me at all?" Diana demanded somewhat forcefully. "You always cut me off to speak your own mind instead of letting me finish my point!"

Bruce turned to her with an apologetic look in his eyes. "I'm sorry Diana but if I don't see to this right away then there may not be another chance."

"No!" Diana declared as she leapt up from the chair and slammed a hand down on the computer keyboard. She watched as Bruce backed up with a start. Diana advanced to within inches of his face, a space she had dreamt of occupying more times than she would care to admit, and delivered a swift rebuke. "I didn't want to have to say this Bruce, but you are acting irrational. I know the loss of your friends in recent weeks has left you emotionally vulnerable, but I thought we had an understanding after your encounter with that Red Hood that you were in over your head and that you were going to back off for a while. You can't go rushing off into the night on your one man crusade to save your city without being able to see the bigger picture, and I hate to say it Bruce but your vision is clouded right now."

Bruce looked into Diana's eyes for a long time before responding. The fire that was behind her look was unmistakable. It was a fire that he hadn't failed to notice a few times before; a fire of deep concern. Yet his path was clear. This was the first time in weeks that the data had finally made sense and he had a viable lead on the criminal enterprise raining terror on the city of his youth. It was with this in mind that he finally said, "You might think so, but I've spent more time on this project than you know. I've calculated the risks and even if I hadn't, I'd still be going in anyway. I have a responsibility to Gotham. If I don't step up to save the city, there's no one who will. I don't expect you to understand."

With that, Bruce brushed passed Diana and walked over to the metallic walkway and took a slow pace as a series of robotic arms ascended from beneath the floor and began fixing the armor on his body.

By the time he was fully armored up and about to jump into the car, Diana decided to get one last word in. "Just make sure you know who you are as a man, before you let the Batman consume what little remains of that person."

Bruce spun around for one last look at Diana. She was looking particularly good tonight, like she had spent some time making herself look nice before coming over; something she never really did on any other occasion. Her hair was down and there were small hints of makeup on her face which was a practice she mostly shunned as decadent and unnecessary. Cleary she had gone to some lengths to impress him and he grudgingly had to admit that, makeup or no, he was touched by her efforts. So instead of a typically bitter response, he simply shook his head and asked rhetorically, "Batman… why couldn't I make The Dark Knight stick?" before jumping into the car and speeding off in a rocket boosted blaze. As he sped out over the ramp and through the water fall leading to the outside world, Bruce had just enough time to look back through the rearview camera to catch the look of supreme consternation on Diana's face. "She'll be alright" he mumbled to himself just before the car landed on the road with a bone rattling thud.

Some fifteen minutes later and Bruce was perched on the ledge of the skyscraper adjacent to the spire of pure glass that was the Lexcorp tower. The windows of the tower shimmered in the florescent lighting that basically turned Founder's Island into a massive nighttime disco ball. The blues and greens of various advertisements reflected off the clusters of the neighboring skyscrapers as a couple of blimps hummed away, hovering unobtrusively overhead. The massive logo of the Lexcorp building glowed a dull yellow for its part, which made for a rather humble contrast to the blazing neon blue logo of the much taller Wayne Tower just off in the distance.

Bruce looked intently through his binoculars, scanning the various floors of the Lexcorp building, cube maze after cube maze, looking for any sign of a disturbance. It wasn't long before his patience was rewarded with the glint of a flashlight and the large black shapes of hooded figures traversing their way up the building, no doubt on their way to the safe in the corporate executive office.

After stowing his binoculars back in his utility belt, Bruce fired a grappling hook to a nearby building and hoisted himself up above the Lexcorp building so he could descend to the rooftop for a stealthier entrance. Gone were the days of dramatic crashes through building windows. Gotham P.D. had started to ask to many questions in that regard.

When he finally reached the floor that the members of Red Hood's gang were on, he immediately set to work. One man he managed to take down easily by clocking him over the head with a desk lamp borrowed from a nearby cubical. Another man went down when he decided it was a good idea to start going through the drawers of a desk in the corner office. Bruce simply swept in and silently shut the door. There was a moment where the man looked up and noticed that the door was shut, but by that point Bruce was already standing behind him. Bruce delivered a swift chop to the man's neck and he went over limp. Bruce then exited the office and tried to sneak up on another target but the woman turned around at an inopportune time and he had to through his cape over her to muffle the noise as he delivered a swift head but that sent her sprawling to the ground unconscious.

A couple more of Red Hood's gang went down in similar fashion as Bruce worked his way in a tightening circle around the room, circling like bird of prey around the executive office where the ring leaders were probably still busy cracking the safe. Bruce lamented the sorry state to which gang members and cult followers had declined to these days. They used to be so much more vigilant and combative, and the lack of both left Bruce a little concerned that he was growing complacent and that perhaps he didn't quite measure up to the brand of his younger, more inexperienced self.

After taking out the last of the group, he rounded the corner and glided into the executive office. He stood up since he was immediately spotted by an expectant looking Red Hood, flanked by two more of his men and a safe cracker toiling away behind him. One of the men flanking Red Hood flipped in the lights and Bruce had to squint a little while his eyes adjusted.

"Ah, Dark Knight, how good of you to join us. I was afraid that maybe you had had enough after our last encounter," Red Hood taunted.

"Drop the game, Red Hood. It's over," Bruce said in the intimidating, gravelly voice of his alter ego.

"Oh no, Dark Knight, I'm afraid it's only just begun," Red Hood teased as he motioned the safe cracker back to his side. Then he pulled a remote out of the baggy cargo pants he was wearing and pressed a button. The safe behind him detonated with a deafening blast that sent debris reigning down and Bruce's quickly outstretched cape. When he drew the cape back, he was surprised to see Red Hood's henchman rushing at him. Bruce reacted instantaneously by ducking low and flipping one of the men over his head and sending him flying through the nearby window to crash down on a car a couple stories below. Bruce took a swing at the next man which was blocked, but Bruce quickly brought his other fist to the man's face and sent him stumbling backward. Then Bruce squared off against the last man and a few quick strikes later he had brought him to the ground as well.

By the time all this had been accomplished, Red Hood was standing near the man sized hole in the window that Bruce had created moments before. Red Hood had a bag slung around his shoulder and a grappling gun in his other hand. "An excellent display as always, Dark Knight, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to cut this short."

Bruce was about to react when he took another look at the grapping gun in Red Hood's hand. Then it dawned on him that it was exactly like the one that he had. "Where did you get that?" Bruce asked as he pointed to the grappling gun in question.

Red Hood clucked his tongue as he shook his hooded head. "Honestly Bruce, you still haven't figured it out? Maybe what they were saying about you was right after all and you have lost your touch."

"Figured what out? What are you talking about?" Bruce said as he took a few steps toward Red Hood.

The gangster sighed audibly and asked rhetorically, "Shall I spell it out for you?" Then he stowed the grapping gun back on his belt, reached up and pulled off his hood to reveal a man with dark hair and a youthful complexion. He was actually quite good looking, with angular facial features that were unmarred except for the squiggle of a burn scar on his left cheek that Bruce quickly realized was the letter "J."

Bruce could feel his jaw grow slack as he struggled to form the name that he knew all too well went with that face. "Jason," he almost wheezed. "But how?" The look on Jason Todd's face was filled with mischief. The same look Bruce had dreaded when Jason was a boy at Wayne Manor, only now he was filled with a very different kind of dread.

"Another story for another time, Bruce. I'm afraid it's bye for now." And with that, Jason reached back for the grappling gun, fired off a new line and went speeding into the night, leaving the devastated Bruce Wayne to fall to his knees in the middle of the office and attempt to comprehend this new paradigm.

2 Chapters this week! Please leave comments! I love hearing from you guys :)