Fifteen years ago a showgirl is flattering some nameless high rollers whentheywalk in. She knows them though she has never, and will never, step foot in Gotham City. She knows them by face, by name and by reputation. The Ventriloquist, The Penguin, Two Face and most infamous of all, The Joker. They were celebrating some heist or another, she does not remember the details. What she remembers is the sound of her heart as it nearly burst from her chest. She remembers champagne flowing like water. She remembers dancing with...oh how most of all she remembers the laughter. Laughter that filled the room. Laughter that seemed like it would never end. Laughter so loud, so powerful it drowned out the screams.
Nine months later, a child is born. The woman, her mind shattered by the events of that night is deemed unfit to raise the child and the two are separated. She alternates between hysterical grief at the loss of her only child to forgetting they even exist. As she has no immediate family and with the father unknown and the state's foster homes filled to capacity, it was decided the boy would be quietly adopted by the first interested party. That party would be Manuel & Reyna Machin. The couple had been trying to adopt for a number of years and were more than glad to accept even after hearing the unusual circumstances surrounding the child. Whatever the boys name when he entered the system, he left in their arms as Alonzo Cezar Machin.
It wasn't long before the Machin's realized that they're son wasn't going to be like the other children. Alonzo was reading at age 3 and had reached a 2nd grade reading level by the time he entered kindergarten. The Machin's would be repeatedly offered to have Alonzo placed in schools for gifted students but never had enough money to accept.
Alonzo is never good at making friends. Most kids his age lack the intellect to keep up with him attempts to connect with those older than him go nowhere. One bright spot during these early years is Nael Yazami. Of Xuasusani descent, Nael is like Alonzo in some ways in that he is brighter than his nominal peers. But in others they are very different, where Alonzo struggles to connect with others, Nael talks with friend and stranger alike with an ease Alonzo wishes he could replicate. Their relationship is not always easy. They argue as children are prone to do but Alonzo doesn't truly mind them. They are better than the blank states he usually gets from his classmates and no matter how heated they get Nael is always willing to move on, pulling Alonzo in close with a smile that causes whatever tension is between them to evaporate. A smile that puts in Alonzo's chest a warmth that he doesn't understand but wishes to never leave.
Alonzo and Nael are 8 years old and their intellect and stellar grades allow them to advance to 4th grade. It is here when what will become the defining moment of Alonzo's life takes place. The Yazami family is reported for their undocumented status and deported back to Xausus. Alonzo and Nael try to keep in contact as best they can but Xausus is a poor country and it can be difficult to get messages through. After a year of talking through emails and the occasional video chat, Nael sends a final message. His family has been arrested and he doesn't know what will happen next. He thanks Alonzo for being his friend and says goodbye.
Alonzo begs his parents to do something,anythingto save his friend. Though it hurts them to see their son so distraught they decide the best thing to do is tell the truth. They can't help the Yazami family. They don't have the knowledge or the resources to do anything. In a effort to comfort their son, they tell him to pray for his friend. Alonzo does pray, he prays every night but that is not all he does. Alonzolearns.He's always been good at learning and if a lack of knowledge is preventing him from helping his friend then he will learneverythingthere is too know. So he learns and the more he learns the greater his despair grows.
Xuasus, a country in Southeast Asia, has a tumultuous history and has recently been plunged into violence by the military government that rules it with a iron fist. Lonnie heart is in his throat as he takes in the fact that his best friend has spent the past year in awarzone. He reads about the military government, countless testimony of people whose loved ones have disappeared, stories or murder and other things he can't bring himself to read about. And then comes perhaps the most devastating revelation of all. All this pain, all this suffering, all this death...has been paid for by his own government.
That can't be right. Itcan'tbe. That's not the country he was raised in, the country his papá moved to from Puerto Rico, the country his mga lolo't lola came to with nothing so his ina could have everything. This can't be true!
But it is. Everything that is happening in Xuasus is happening with the express consent of the politicians in Washington DC and is paid for by American tax dollars. His parents tax dollars. He couldn't allow this to happen. He had to save the Yazami family. But first he had to find them. Thankfully Alonzo has an affinity for computers, to the delight of his engineer Papá, and after spending a few weeks educating himself in the art of hacking he begins his search. His Xuas is essentially non-existent but he's learned just enough from Nael to find the file with their name on it.
The video quality is poor but he would recognize Nael anywhere, the smile Alonzo remembered so clearly nowhere to be seen. His sister Laya was fighting back tears while their parents tried to calm their children despite their clear terror. Alonzo will never forget the sight of them lined against that wall, even as he doesn't hear the shots being fired over the sound of his heart shattering. He doesn't remember his parents rushing into his rooms summoned by his screaming. He does remember crying for days. He remembers realizing that his world will never be the same.
Eventually the tears cease to flow and the terrible ache in his heart settles into a dull apathy. And in that nothingness a revelation appears.Never again.This can never be allowed to happen again. And he will do all he can to ensure that it doesn't. But before he can do that he must first figure out why it happened in the first place. So he does what he does best, he researches. And through his research Alonzo realizes the sickness is much more widespread than he could have ever thought. The weapons used to butcher the Yazami family? Made by western corporations and transported on western ships. In exchange the military government opens the country's resources for any foreign company to harvest at will. The minute fraction of profit that makes its way to Xuasus is quickly guided into the Swiss accounts of government bureaucrats.
And it's not just Xuasus. On every continent, in every country, in every city a small minority of the population live like royalty while those beneath them are expected to make due with those at the very bottom make the hard choice between paying rent or buying food. As his studies continue Alonzo begins to notice things he never had before. For the first time he looks at the run down apartments and shuttered businesses of his Park Row neighborhood and sees just how starkly they contrast to the sprawling estates of Gotham Heights. For the first time he lets himself hear his parents as they debate whether to make a payment on their car or the water bill. Meanwhile the news tells him that Veronica Vreeland has purchased her third yacht.
In his studies he comes across a book, "Universe" by Scudder Klyce. Klyce took on the arduous task of compiling all humanity's knowledge -all the knowledge they had in 1921 anyway- and then use it to find the answers to the problems facing humanity. Klyce's work awakens something in Alonzo he has not felt in some time now.Hope.Hope that there is another way, a better way even. Klyce's work leads him to seek out others like him and Alonzo becomes intimately familiar with the world of Proudhon, Bakunin & Kropotkin.
Alonzo starts training. He starts with what he knows, cracking Xuasus' decrepit systems was one thing but if he's going to deal to deal with the problem at its source his current skill level isn't enough. He checks every source he can find to improve his hacking and by 11 he can access any electronic device in Gotham at will. He also commits to learning everything possible from his father. Manuel, excited to share his work with his son, teaches Alonzo everything he knows about engineering, not just how to use technology but even build it. With his father's training Alonzo builds his first computer at age 12.
Another thing Alonzo pays more attention to are the stories of the Batman and his various sidekicks. He's always thought himself a thinker not a fighter but some part of him is drawn to the idea of personally bringing the people's enemies to justice. Alonzo has been taking kid's classes at Wildcat's Gym in the Bowery since he was 6 at his mother's insistence. She said it was a way to meet other kids (plus the classes were free) but he suspects now she just wanted him to know how to defend himself. It was never his favorite activity but now Alonzo commits to it like never before. By 13 he entered the gyms Muay Tai program to diversify his skillset.
Just before he turns 15 Alonzo -he prefers Lonnie now- decides he's ready. Training and planning can only achieve so much. It was time to ignite the spark that would become the flame of revolution. It was time to introduceAnarkyto Gotham City.