The Way Back #15

"What. Were. You. Thinking?"

The heavyset man let out a startled cry and spun around. From within the shadows, he saw a bat symbol glow eerily in mid-air. As he watched, the symbol came closer and he heard boot-soles padding on the dusty floorboards.

Batman emerged from the shadows. "Well?"

The man retreated several steps. "C 'mon, man. I didn't do nothin'."

Batman strode forward to close the gap between them. "Batman... baked?" He demanded harshly.

"I just..."

"Why?" His voice dropped to a growl. "Do you have any idea how irresponsible that was?" He seized hold of the man's sleeve and half dragged him to the balcony. With one swift motion, he jerked the door open and pulled him outside. "Look!" He ordered. He hauled him several off the ground and thrust him forward so that his head and torso extended over the railing. "Tell me what you see!"

The man struggled frantically. "G-Gotham!" he blurted finally.

"Exactly. What you can't see from this high up is a carpet of shattered glass about a hundred yards long. And you probably couldn't hear the burglar alarms twenty stories down, when a crowd of looters went smashing windows and grabbing merchandise, last night. And do you know why they thought they could get away with it?"

"NO!"

Abruptly, Batman pulled him off the railing, hauled him back indoors, and slammed him against the wall. "I'll tell you then," he said softly, letting go.

The man slid to the floor, hardly daring to breathe.

"They thought that they could go looting because they were under the impression that Batman was dead. Now I can't think where they would have got that idea. Can you?" His voice was deceptively mild. "Maybe? Think hard." He smiled then, a thin, tight smile.

The man flinched.

"Maybe, because some idiot uploaded a home movie to metube!" He bent down, seized his captive by the front of his shirt and jerked him upright. "So, let me ask you again what I asked at the beginning. Why did you do it? What were you thinking?"

"I... I just wanted to get hits." He drew in his breath sharply and tried to raise his arms to protect his head. "No! Don't hurt me! I just wanted people to click on it! That's all! I didn't mean to set off a riot! I didn't..."

Batman turned away in disgust. "You didn't mean to. I'm sure that will be a comfort to the store owners who were affected. How many cameras do you own?" He spun back to face him.

"J-just my smart-phone. I swear!"

Batman held out a hand.

The man hesitated, but finally reached into his pocket, pulled it out, and handed it over.

Batman opened the phone and turned it over in his hand several times, weighing it experimentally. Then he reached into his utility belt and extracted a small straight-edge screwdriver.

The man winced as he watched Batman set the screwdriver against the camera lens. He closed his eyes, but winced again as he heard the lens break. Then Batman held it out to him.

"It would be in your best interest to keep this phone and not replace it," the cowled figure stated. "I'd hate to have to come back here to continue our conversation." He brought his face close to the other man's. "And when I have to do something I hate, it puts me in a very bad mood." He smiled again, this time in a manner that seemed almost friendly. "You wouldn't really want to see me in a bad mood... would you?"

As the man shook his head, he felt Batman take his hand, press the phone into it, and curve his fingers around it. "Well," the vigilante continued affably, "as long as you don't upload any more problematic videos, you probably won't."

He swept past him toward the balcony, his cape sending a gust of cool air into the man's face as he did.

For several long moments, the man sat trembling on the floor of his apartment. Then he got up, went to the balcony, and looked out. There was no sign of Batman.

For a moment, he thought he might have imagined the encounter. It had seemed almost surreal. Then he looked down at the cracked lens of his camera phone and knew that he had not.

He'd never upload another video again.

"I suppose Cassandra's visit last night was your doing?"

Dick's shoulders tensed. He took a deep breath and turned around. "You know me too well." He frowned. "That may have been what was holding you back." He braced himself for an angry response.

Bruce did frown, but he didn't appear cross. He just stood, waiting.

"You hit a barrier," Dick said finally. "You knew it, I knew it. We just... weren't getting beyond combat drills. And I think," he sighed. "I think... you were afraid that if you suddenly did remember it all, well, I never could take you down—not even when I was giving everything I had. I didn't know if your skills had hit a plateau or if you were subconsciously keeping them in check because you were afraid that if you did cut loose with everything and I wasn't prepared, then..."

"So you conducted an experiment."

"Of all the people I could have involved, Cass had the best chance of convincing you it wasn't a test. She moves like an assassin. One look in her eyes when she's on the offensive, and even though you know that taking another life is anathema to her, she makes you doubt it. I did have a concern that you'd catch on to it all being a test—because she was going to have to hold back a little. But..."

"She acted as though she was under someone else's control." Bruce nodded. "Very convincingly, too. Under that misapprehension, I presumed that whatever hesitation I noticed on her part was due to her struggles to shake free. As you planned, I suspect."

"Yeah." He smiled. "You're not angry."

Bruce shook his head. "I... You may have been right about my holding back without realizing it. I wish I'd shared your optimism." He made a face. "My own theory was a bit grimmer: I'd been coming to the conclusion that I'd gone as far as I could on the training front." He smiled sadly. "I'm not twenty years old, after all. It wouldn't be surprising if I just... couldn't come back this time." Dick laid a hand on his shoulder. He covered it with his own. "If you hadn't arranged what you did, when you did, I might have succeeded in convincing myself that it was too late for me."

Dick nodded. "I thought about that too," he admitted. "But I figured it wouldn't hurt to test out my other hypothesis first." He paused. "So... since you've got your old moves back..."

Bruce's lips twitched. "Suit up. I'll wait."

"I won't be long." He smirked. "After all, you're not getting any younger."

"Selina!" Bruce exclaimed sharply. "You can't leave her with me for six hours! What am I supposed to do? I..."

Selina smiled beatifically. "You're a smart man, Bruce. You'll figure it out."

"But..."

"Bruce. Listen to me. Batgirl and I are on patrol, tonight. Tim is off with the Titans—and just because I trust those kids to save the planet doesn't mean I trust them to mind a toddler. Holly has the flu. Dick and Barbara have both told me separately how much they've been looking forward to just having a quiet night out on the town. You, on the other hand..."

"Momma?" a small voice piped up.

Selina scooped up her daughter and handed her to Bruce. "Here. And," she hung a tote bag on his half-extended arm, "here. She can have a snack at seven. Put the juice box in the 'fridge for her. There are a couple of diapers, she'll probably need at least one change—"

"Now, Selina, I..."

"You'll do fine. Put her to bed at eight. Read her one of the storybooks first. I'll be back around midnight..." She clasped Helena's outstretched hands.

"Now," she said softly, "you're not going to give your daddy any trouble, are you?"

"Momma?"

She gave Bruce a quick peck on the cheek. "Have fun, you two." She smirked. "Bond."

She darted outside and pulled the door shut behind her, ordering herself not to laugh until she was back in her car.

She never had been good at following orders.

On the other side of the door, Bruce looked nervously at his daughter. "Well," he said, "I guess you're stuck with me, tonight."

Helena tilted her head up at him. Then she squeezed her eyes shut, opened her mouth and let out a loud wail.

"No, no, don't cry," he said quickly. "It's alright. It's alright."

Helena screamed harder.

Now what was he supposed to do?

"Well," Montoya said, one night later as she switched off the newly-restored bat-signal, "the cause of death was that gunshot wound to the head. ME guesses the guy was dead maybe a half-hour before getting stuffed in there. They found ligature-marks on his wrists and ankles, also bruising—it looks like he put up a fight."

"Were any bindings found on the body?" Batman asked.

Montoya shook her head. "And since he was stuffed in the signal before rigor mortis set in..."

"The shooting must have happened nearby." He doubted that anyone would commit the murder in another city and then fly the corpse into Gotham to stash on the very roof of Gotham Central. "Nobody saw him take the body up?"

"No," she returned curtly. "We're checking into that."

"Ah. If it's Signalman, he used to carry an electronic jammer. That could've affected your cameras."

Montoya frowned. "Maybe. But it still doesn't explain how he carried the body up there. I think we'd have noticed a helicopter touching down. So either he carried the corpse through the building..."

"...Or scaled it from the outside." Abruptly, he walked over to the parapet that encircled the roof perimeter and dropped to his knees to examine the low wall.

"What are you...?"

Intent on his work, he murmured only, "Checking to see if..."

Montoya frowned, but she waited, feigning patience until, some ten minutes later, he looked back over his shoulder, and beckoned her over. "There are a couple of fresh gouges in the concrete," he remarked. "Here and... here. And no," he added. "They aren't mine."

"No offence," Montoya remarked, "but how can you tell?"

"I never come up here before you light the signal," Batman explained. "If I need to initiate contact with you, I'll swing by your office, but your window isn't on this side of the building."

"Okay, point," Montoya said. "But do you always remember the side you arrive from? I don't."

"Well, neither do I, to be honest," Batman said. "But if you'll put the signal back on for a second, I think you'll see the problem."

The police captain obeyed. A moment later, she burst into laughter. "You win," she conceded. "There's no way you'd approach from this side if there're a thousand or so watts shining straight at you."

"At the sky," Batman corrected. "Remember, though: I swoop in from above. If I had to climb up, it would destroy the effect."

"Once a performer..."

"Who stopped?" Then in a more serious tone, "Pity our shutterbug didn't get a shot of the guy."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes." He grimaced. "You got an ID on the victim, yet?"

She lowered her voice. "This is off the record. We're still trying to reach his family to notify them."

"Understood. I'll be discreet."

"Frank d'Amato. He used to work for Aquista."

"Thanks. I'll look into it."

"Any idea why they'd dress him in your suit?"

"That's one of the things I'll be looking into," he remarked, readying his grappling gun.

"Aren't you concerned about damaging that parapet?" she asked suddenly.

Batman half-turned to her and grinned. "Not really," he admitted. "I own that one. Or, at least, he does. Have a good night, Captain."