AN: Alright so... things took a turn for my life, but that's okay because I can vent my thoughts and feelings through my stories like any normal sane well-adjusted adult human person 😁😁

Don't be surprised if there's a sudden uprise in back to back updates, or a much longer break. I'm pretty much just posting the chapters as I finish them, and I really need to vent so yea lol

Bruce couldn't say he was that surprised. Since leaving Amity, he wasn't even sure if Danny had found the communicator or not. Yet, something in Bruce's gut told him that the teen had. It was something in the way that Cujo acted, something told Bruce if Danny didn't find it, than the little pooch would show him. As days ticked by, Bruce reminded himself that.

The communicator was for emergencies, that's why Bruce left it behind. This was a small town crawling with creatures that Bruce didn't fully understand. If these ghosts caused much of an issue than Danny had some back up to call. Even if Amity managed to survive this long, it didn't mean things didn't go wrong. If Danny and the town needed support, Bruce was happy to offer it.

When the first week passed with no contact, Bruce found it harder to ignore. Which only made Bruce all the more dead set on ignoring it. Danny was fine. He has a family, he has support. Batman was like the teen's escape. A low-risk act of rebellion against his parents. That's what Bruce was trying to excuse it as. Despite the feeling his gut telling him that something was wrong.

So, Bruce threw himself into his work. Absolutely anything and everything that could use his attention, it got it. Bruce was limiting the amount of time his brain had to wander. Something he hadn't even realized he was doing. Bruce might be an amazing detective, but he was even better at trying to not notice things. It came with being a Wayne and Batman.

So when Alfred had cornered him in the cave? Bruce had immediately wanted to lash out. But it was Alfred, and he needed to hear the older man out. So he did, and things went well. Well, as well as things could go. Bruce was being forced to pay attention to things he didn't want to. But than again this was Alfred, and Bruce knew if the butler stepped in, than it was called for.

So as days passed, Bruce tried harder. Don't get him wrong, Bruce heard Alfred's words. He knew what Alfred was trying to say, at least Bruce thinks he did. But he doesn't want to think about it, so he tossed himself a bit further into work while trying to include Danny into it. If Bruce couldn't forget the strange teen, than he could try to do good with it.

Except, none of it worked. Bruce found himself getting more tempted to check in on Amity Park news. To do a quick search of Danny's name. To try and find any update on how the teen was doing. But, he couldn't bring himself to do it. If Danny's name, or even his families, was nowhere in the news, that would be a good thing. Bruce wasn't sure how he could handle it if he saw something in the news over there about the teen and his family.

So, in the end, Bruce wasn't doing much better after his talk with Alfred. It would be so easy for Bruce to learn everything he needed to know about the Fentons. Nothing was off limits when you had money and happened to be Batman. Problem was, Bruce wasn't stupid. Doing something like that was bound to only make a mess of an already fragile situation.

He didn't need to know the current situation of the Fenton family. What he did need to know was the connection between the Fentons and Masters. Bruce wasn't going to go digging around for modern news, instead he was going to go digging into their past. And that's exactly what he did.

Bruce started the search on just Vladimir Masters, starting from as far back as he could go. At the start, Vlad seemed like any average son of immigrant parents. First generation American that seemed to be doing everything he could to make his family proud of him. Old news articled of winning competitions, things that many parents would be proud of.

It was somewhere from High school to college that things changed. Vlad's name started to weed out of the local newspapers, his existence settled to essentially nothing. Then college came around, and more articles appeared. A few of them were old college tabloids, poking fun at a ghost hunting club being brought to the University of Wisconsin. One that was founded and created by Vlad Masters, Maddie Walker, and Jack Fenton.

That was the connection. Vlad had been best friends with Danny's parents. Something about finding out how far back the three went did nothing to resolve the weight in Bruce's gut. He didn't like this, not one bit.

That feeling only grew stronger when Bruce hit the accident. A prototype machine had gone haywire in the University's lab, the only one injured had been Vlad. It was clear to Bruce that this had to be Vlad's turning point. There were a few small articles of interviews involving Maddie and Jack, but the whole thing was clearly suppressed. The University, the students involved, everyone did everything they could to keep it all as quiet as possible.

Vlad didn't pop up in the news against until years later, much too many years for a supposedly simple accident. In that time, Jack and Maddie had made their own moves. Their names still popping up in occasional scientific articles, and even a wedding website.

It didn't take a detective to put the pieces together. Vlad Masters had been abandoned by his supposed best friends. Bruce couldn't think of a reason for Vlad's return back into the Fenton family's lives that wasn't malice in some way. So much time had passed, too much time for Vlad's sudden reappearance. It only made Bruce feel worse about the situation, his mind running a mile a minute on all the possible reasoning behind Vlad's actions.

Each thought that raced through Bruce's mind only seemed to be worse than the last. Each one kept coming back to the one common denominator that Bruce had found. Danny. The teen seemed to be the only active link between Vlad and the Fentons. There was a few paper trails of Dalv. Co and FentonWorks being in business together. A few transactional work, Vlad helping fund Jack and Maddie's work.

Except that's were it all seemed to end. Even as Bruce found himself back at the computer almost nightly. Searching for any new activity from Dalv. Co. to FentonWorks, or any other companies not under Vlad's control. Except Vlad wasn't stupid. He knew how to cover his tracks, in a way that made it hard for even Bruce to follow.

As much as Bruce didn't like the idea, he could think of one person that could help him crack the mystery of Vladimir Masters. One person that had pieced together the secrets of Wayne Manor with little to no help. Tim Drake. Tim was resourceful and driven, even before Bruce had any hand in helping train him.

It wasn't often that Bruce found himself turning to his own kids for help. But sometimes a fresh pair of eyes is all it takes to unravel the threads to a web. Tim could reach corners that Bruce didn't have the time, means, or connection to do so. If Bruce wanted to get everything he could on Vlad, before the man even steps foot in Gotham, he'll need some extra help.

Bruce had never felt more relieved that he enlisted the help of Tim on his search. It wasn't just because Tim was bound to bring forward results. It was because Gotham seemed to have other plans for Bruce Wayne's time, instead of cyber-stalking a possible rogue coming to Gotham.

First there was the Joker, always insistent on getting Bruce's attention somehow. A convoluted and complexed partnership with the Riddler that kept Bruce occupied for three whole days. It was something that hit Bruce hard. So many lives had been at risk, so many innocent people put in the line of danger and terror. They managed to save the majority. But that didn't make the blood on the streets any easier to swallow.

Of course, Bruce couldn't catch a break just yet. Not even a day of rest, and suddenly Wayne Enterprise was under attack by the press. A new scandal, a new rumor, the held essentially no weight whatsoever, yet the press was attracted to it like vultures. Bruce was supposedly selling out user data to any one and everyone that asks for it and had the right price tag.

Any person that laid hands on Wayne tech, that placed in their information, was supposedly at risk of losing all privacy and safety.

It wasn't hard to shut down the rumor. A few well placed ditsy moments, a quick glimpse over the security measures put in place to keep customers safe. The recently upgraded security system, a sweep for any leaks, and nothing was founded. His system was perfectly secure, the way he always intended to make it. It took a few days, and massive work on his PR team, before the outrage settled.

The busy days made it easier for Bruce to push a few things to the back of his mind. Like a certain little small town, and impending threat coming into his home. Vlad had barely been a blimp in Bruce's mind during that time. Too focused on Gotham and his company to let his mind wonder. But as the dust settled, more of Bruce's other concerns came back to the surface.

First, there was still the matter of Masters and his mysterious life. Which quickly gained traction the moment Tim had slunk into the cave at an ungodly hour. Of course, Bruce was just as awake as his ward was. Tim barely said a word as he dropped a drive onto the table. Bruce watched Tim paused, taking a large drink of whatever heart attack inducing mixture was in his mug, before speaking.

"That's all I could find. Don't let Masters set roots."

That was more than enough for both of them. The two returning back to their own respective tasks. With Tim's words, Bruce expected the file to be bare bones. Not much more than the things he found out himself. Except, he should have expected more from Tim. He shouldn't have doubted his ability to track down information the way that he does.

The file was more than Bruce could have expected, could have hoped for. It would take him a few hours just to weed through it all. Tim had even gone as far as to leave footnotes of his own thoughts and suspicious. One suspicion Tim had was the same thought that crossed Bruce's mind during his search. Vlad's life had seemed to change the most following his accident. It wasn't hard to assume one thing from it considering Vlad's sudden rise in money and power.

Vlad Masters may very well be a metahuman.

Extra AN: I think this is the shortest chapter so far and I hate it ugghhh

I do want to say I appreciate and read every single comment left on my stories. Even if I don't reply, it's solely because I'm too awkward and anxious to even know how to.

On another note, I do want to make it clear (if it isn't already) that all my chapters are written in the "Unreliable narrator" realm. The character that's mentioned at the start of the chapter is pretty much the character that's recounting everything. Any looks into a different characters emotions, or thoughts, is meant to be essentially an assumption the main character of the chapter is making. There's no knowing for sure unless I give those other characters a chapter.

I do plan to bring in other members of the Batfamily, have them be more involved than just Tim's one liner in this chapter lmao. I just don't think I have a good enough grasp on the way they speak and act, so I apologize in advance if they suck when the time comes. A lot of my knowledge about a good bit of them are the few comics I've read, and fanfiction.

Anyways, hope you guys enjoyed the chapter! Enjoy the kinda of stability because things on Danny's end are a mess.