These people were here to hurt me. Going by how relaxed some of them are, they've done this before. Someone probably whispered about all the money I've been pulling in. I think they might have someone at Gotham Bank. This is going to suck for them, but I'm not about to let them know that. "Any of you guys a Gianni, Gianni Jefferson?"
An older guy of the group snorted, probably the leader of the group, before asking, "Austin Lockwood, that you?"
"That's me," I answered.
He nodded before looking me up and down. Seemingly satisfied with what he saw, he went over to the nearest vehicle and opened the back door. The guy who stepped out was wildly different from the rest. If the other guys were just assholes and criminals, I could instantly tell this guy was a psychopath. He wore a full white suit with a black undershirt and a white tie. His suit was bulging where he kept pistols on both sides of his chest, and he was using his black gloves to adjust his tie. None of that tipped me off, though. It was the mask. A black mask that hugged his skull in the shape of a skull. I was kind of put off. What did I do to get the psychos of this city to come to me personally? He walked past his little group of people and headed straight to me.
The mask was creepier the closer he got to me. I could see in detail how it hugged his face. When he saw how put off I was, he broke into a grin, the masked hugged his lips, and it covered his whole face. I would put money down that it hugs his eyelids, too. He stopped a few feet away from me. "Austin Lockwood, heard you're making quite a lot with those patents you sold Wayne. You're going to give me them."
I uncrossed my arms and gave him my answer, "No."
The grin disappeared from his face, and he went from having fun to choosing violence. He lunged at me and threw a punch, probably thinking he could beat me into signing them over, then dump me in the Gotham River. It was a pretty good punch for someone who wanted to cause pain; it was aimed at my cheek. He put his weight behind it, and his fist was closed right so it would definitely hurt. Too bad for him, my fist hit first. It was an upper cut. Perfect form with a flash of sunlight when it connected. It turned his lunge into a twisting upward motion as his feet left the ground. I was in this now. One down, ten to go. My next move put me in front of the next guy, and he folded around my fist with another flash of sunlight.
I started glowing when my fist connected. But this wasn't the glow of healing people or putting together a motorcycle. This was a full-body glow. It started to affect my surroundings, pushing dust away from my feet, not that I stood still long enough for people to notice. I pushed off the ground with one leg and snap-kicked the next guy across the face. Another flash of sunlight and some floating teeth. I finished pushing off the ground and twisted my hips, placing a hand down as another guy folded around my leg. I finished twisting and drove my knee into the chest of the next guy. I pushed off him and drove my elbow into the next guy's jaw. More teeth. I spun around and crossed the distance between the next guy before I put my knee in his gut. I extended my leg the rest of the way and booted the guy next to him in the face. I turned my kick into another lunge, which ended with me slugging another guy, more teeth, then I spun backwards and crouched, driving my elbow into his friend next to him. The last guy, I decided, was in my spot, so I hit him with a shoulder check.
The guy with the mask hit the ground with a thud. Broken jaw and down for the count. The rest followed suit, except for the guy I folded around my leg, who went flying and bounced off the car behind him, and the guy I body checked, who flew out into the parking lot, then hit the ground and rolled. All of them were alive, just badly beaten with a few broken bones. I stood straight, then reached out and snatched an escrima stick that was thrown when the fight started from the air.
The escrima stick was really fancy. It was hefty for its size and had a switch on the side to turn it from a baton to a stun stick. Freaked me out the first time I flipped it, the sides popped out, and electricity, like a really big taser, jumped between prongs that popped out. The ends of it were rubber with a rubber handle, so the charge was directed at where it hit someone. I was leaning against my bike while I watched Nightwing, who introduced himself very politely, after he landed from where he jumped. He was currently walking from downed guy to downed guy, patting them down and using a little tool to scrape and clone any phone they had on them. The guy had attacked and was going to try to get me out of here while acting as a big distraction. I bounced the stick off the ground, then asked Nightwing from where he was kneeling, "Why escrima sticks?"
"I can moderate how hard I hit better, and it helps when I'm fighting people with knives and swords." He answered honestly.
"You fight enough people with swords to be worried about it?" I asked, surprised.
He was done with that guy, so he walked over to the next guy, "Yeah, there's a whole group of people that run around with swords. They call themselves the League of Shadows. Ninjas."
"Ninjas?" What the fuck. "Real life ninjas? Hide in the shadows and assassinate people, ninjas?"
He let out a chuckle, "That's a common reaction. How long are these guys going to be down from whatever you did to them?"
"A few hours," I answered while I looked between them.
He turned from where he was looking at the guy with the white suit to me, "What exactly did you do to them?"
"I channelled my essence and, with a twist, gave it the concept of a knock-out. I could hit you from here to Metropolis with that blow, and you'd wake up there sore as hell but otherwise fine."
He seemed satisfied with that answer before he pointed down at the guy, "You know who this is?"
"I know he's got a few screws loose, but that's about it."
"This guy's Black Mask." He chuckled at my groan before continuing, "He's one of the eviler mob bosses in Gotham. Not that there is much of a mob left."
I tossed the escrima stick I had to him, and he caught it before attaching it to his suit. "Said he was after my patents."
He tsk'd before replying, "He probably has someone in Gotham bank. They let him know you were making money. He would get you to sign over the patents, then off you. While Wayne Enterprise lawyers fought to not pay, he would be pulling in the money they are forced to pay."
I nodded. That made sense to me. "Should I even call the police?" I asked, not sure how well the police could hold some guy like him.
"You should. It might be ten or fifteen minutes before they show up, though."
Twenty minutes later, Nightwing was gone, and an old police car rolled up. It was an old square-body car with the light standing on the roof. Two men stepped out; they did not wear uniforms, and one of them was on the larger side of life. One of them went and started looking at the guys, but the bigger guy walked right up to Black Mask and looked down at him. He rummaged around in his coat before pulling out a cigar. He lit the cigar with a lighter, and I could see from the flash of light his face change. It went from him not wanting to be here to straight grit. Like someone who stepped in shit and was digging deep to go on about his day. He took a drag before turning to me and wandering over. "Harvey Bullock, what happened here?"
"I walked out of the factory, and they showed up, pulled guns and tried to get me to do shit. I disagreed."
He let out a deep sigh and palmed his face before looking me in the eyes with frustration, "Why were you here. How did you stop them? How long ago was this?"
"I was meeting some guy named Gianni Jefferson," I replied, but was cut off before I could continue.
"Gianni Jefferson was found dead in his house about an hour ago."
"Oh shit." This went from just beating up some guys to something really serious. I pointed at the black mask guy, "He said something about the patents I own. It's a fancy water filter with flavouring. I sold it to Wayne Enterprise."
"I know about those. Bruce Wayne is giving them out by the truckloads."
I nodded, "It works really well. You should pick one up."
He pulled out a notepad and a pencil, "I need your details, name, address and stuff in case I need to ask for more."
I started describing what happened in detail. I wasn't glowing anymore, so I didn't mention that. We went back and forth, his asking questions and me answering. Eventually, he was satisfied with what I told him, and he waved me off, "Get out of here. This is an active crime scene now."
I nodded, then sat on my bike while pulling out the spark plug. Harvey saw that and snorted before turning away with, "Get that thing registered."
I waved goodbye and rode off, headed home. Man, what a night. This is not how I expected my night to go. It sucks that the guy I was supposed to meet died, now I have to dig around for whoever owns the land or find someone who does. Getting home was a lot easier than finding the factory. Northern Gotham was still a pain to drive through, though. I pulled up to the driveway and got out to open the garage. I stuffed my bike in the corner out of the way and entered the house. Rob and Tim were sitting in the kitchen eating, and the rest of the guys were in the living room watching TV, which showed Superman pulling a massive freighter into the docks at Metropolis.
They all turned to me, and a few of them looked stunned that I was back. Not that I could blame them with how my night went. That side of town is a lot worse than I thought. "How did the meeting go?" Rob spoke up.
I thought about how to answer before saying, "The guy I was supposed to meet was murdered, and I ran into a bunch of mob people. I ran into this Nightwing guy. I'm not too sure about him. He seemed ok, but he's either really stupid or very, very brave."
Rob nodded, "Rumour has it that he's the old Robin." When he saw my confusion, he went on to explain, "Batman started doing his vigilante work about ten years ago. Robin shows up and follows him around for a few years. There's a whole group of them; they show up and drop off at random. That Nightwing guy is one of the old Robins."
"So they just run around and fight crime in costumes? Those guys are nuts."
Rob met my eyes to make sure I understood what he told me next, "It works. Batman cut down crime harshly."
Guess he was a fan of the guy.
#
The next morning saw me returning to the library. I had dug around on the web hunting for more information on who owned the stuff I wanted to buy and ended up hitting dead ends everywhere. The library should have what I want in its paper records ,if I could make sense of them. There is some weird stuff written down and stored in the those records.
It was early morning, so I was surprised to see Barbara at the counter. She looked run-down and tired. Bags under her eyes and a slight slouch to her normally attentive nature. She looked up from where I was entering and levelled the meanest glare she could at me. Her night must have been pretty bad. I hope she doesn't take it out on me. "Long night?" I asked.
She let out a sigh and stopped glaring, "Yes. I only got two hours of sleep."
"Damn, what were you doing up so late?"
"Helping some friends with stuff. Anyway, what are you here for?"
"Well, I went out to the north side of the city. I was supposed to meet some guy to check out some property I was going to buy, but the guy ended up murdered. So I dug online looking for more information on who owns what, and couldn't find anything. I hit a lot of dead ends, so here I am."
She looked at me in disbelief. I could see it from her perspective. Trying to buy property in Northern Gotham was starting to become a hassle. "What are you buying property for?"
I told her, and she nodded before she reached over and grabbed a stack of books in the return tray and thrust them into my chest. "Go put those away, I'll dig up what I can for you."
Barbara stood from where she was sitting. She ended up asking me to fix her spine after a few days of thought. I don't think she's very active, even with her spine fixed. Taking a bullet probably changes your worldview of what's safe. She went off, and I started wandering the library putting books away. They were all over the library. I would have to remember to return the books I had borrowed the next time I came here. Late-night reading never hurt anyone.
Barbara eventually found me in some random corner of the library. She was carrying a few folders in her hands. She waved me to follow her, and we went to a desk where she laid out the papers. She started pointing out who owns what while speaking, "The Kane's own this one, while the Elliot's own these two. The one you visited last night is owned by the Crowne family. Old money of Gotham. Good luck prying it from their hands."
I leaned down to examine the maps and look for other properties near each other to buy. There were some owned by the Wayne family in the Crowne Hills and Robbinsville or Moore's Bay, but I didn't want to step on his toes. He seemed like the only decent rich guy in Gotham. This is going to cost a lot more than I thought. "I'm going to have to pay a lot of bribes." I let out a groan.
"Bruce Wayne might sell you some land." Barbara pointed out.
"That guy is rich enough. Have you seen the guesses on how much that guy is worth? If I'm pushing to buy these lands, I might piss off a lot of people, and I don't think Bruce Wayne could survive the assassination attempts. The paperwork to get the things I need done will be easier, too."
She gave me a weird look before replying, "I think you should at least try going to Bruce. You might be surprised."
I gave her a look before I spoke what I was starting to learning was the truth, "Honestly, I don't need a boss. Bruce Wayne would slow me down. I'll throw patents and stuff at him, and he can stay in his mansion doing rich people things like staring at his coin collection or his dinosaur bones I'm sure they're in his mansion hangin' on a wall."
Barbara burst out laughing and looked away from me. Every time she would turn back, she would start laughing again. I don't know what's so funny. I think I had the guy pretty much pegged with what he'd do.
Twisting the key, the Van shut off after I had pulled into the garage. Another long day of charity construction work done. I was coming to realize money is the best superpower. I had been writing to the governor of New Jersey lately, talking about random things and putting ideas into his head. If I can get some new stuff passed, it will make my work here a lot easier. The guys were getting out of the van, a new group; the last group was out in the country at school, learning and getting licensed. I reached down and grabbed a briefcase before turning to one of them, "Hey, Anthony, hold up." I opened the briefcase and pulled out a folder and handed it to him, "This is your papers, Birth certificate and everything. Next week I've got you scheduled to head to the DMV and get your driver's license on Tuesday."
He reached out and took the folder before opening it and looking in. He read a bit before nodding slowly and asking, "How am I getting there? Am I taking the van?"
"It will be an early day for you and me. I have a small beater just for this. I just need to go grab it. One of the other guys was borrowing it before he left."
He nodded and got out of the van. I did the same but headed out instead of in. I headed across the street after closing the garage door and stepping over the sensor. Buying new houses in Gotham is easy if you're willing to pay a lot more than what they are worth. The old house got converted into a bunkhouse. Not very roomy, but it can hold thirteen people without them fighting over who sleeps where. Bunk beds rock. Every morning, I wake up early and cook for the whole group before we start our day. The new house I bought was a smaller one. Still two bedrooms, but one is converted into an office/crafting space.
Entering the house, I pulled off my high-visibility vest and hard hat, then hung them up. The refrigerator had my prize for the day. A big burrito with all the dressing, bachelor food. The microwave heated it up while I unlaced my steel-toe boots. Sitting on the couch with my burrito, I turned on the TV and watched it. The people on it were talking about the Justice League doing something or the other. The first time I saw it, I was stunned and sat there and watched the whole thing. It was a twenty-minute segment of them showing up at an oil platform in the middle of the ocean that caught fire and rescued the people. The business that owned the platform went under pretty quickly after that and was bought out by Lexcorp. The Justice League is pretty active, and living in a real world super hero world with a big superhero team is still pretty crazy to me.
I stood up when I finished my burrito and shut off the TV. I had enough of that for today. I headed towards the office, walking past the heavy boxing bag I had hanging from my ceiling full of stones. I would pound the stones to dust, then take them and use them at job sites while I trained. It works well for what it is. Sitting at the desk in the office, I returned to the books I had been reading the night before. My Exaltation makes me feel powerful, and that comes with confidence. Unreal confidence that I can do the impossible, which I think is the truth. So sitting down and self study or hitting the heavy bag for hours at a time feels natural as breathing.
I don't really need to sleep anymore, just a little burst of essence when I feel the need, and I'm ready for another day, but I do it because it helps me feel human. It was late at night when I finished, almost two hours after midnight, so I stood with a stretch and a yawn. I shut off the light and headed across the hall to my bedroom. Pushing open the door, I felt something was off. Time slowed, and with a small use of essence, my senses heightened to crazy levels. I could see the individual fibres of the carpet and how it was put together, picking out individual pieces of dust floating through the air and the shape. I could feel the groove of the door handle where I had opened it daily and worn it down with time. I could hear the creaking of the fabric of something hanging behind my door, clinging to the wall. I could smell the scent of death and a dead body with a taste of rot and mould.
Letting go of the door handle let me twist my hips, and with a large burst of essence, I put my fist through the door angled upwards. I felt bones cave and a liquid roll down my arm where it dripped off just past my wrist. Whatever was on the other side of the door jerked, and a blade jammed through the door about level with my waist before going still. If I thought it stunk before, it reeked now. I pulled my arm back through the door, and the thing fell, showing me it was a body, missing the top half of its head, now leaking on my carpet. Shit. I reached down with my already soiled hand and grabbed the back of its brown and black suit and lifted it up off the ground. I held it like a plastic bag full of water and walked it out of my house towards the backyard, where I laid it against the firepit.
Running back inside, I opened all the windows and grabbed cleaning supplies. I had to get on top of this; otherwise, my house would stink like it forever. I ended up having to cut out a chunk of the carpet; it's a good thing I kept extra. Looks like I'm not sleeping tonight. After I had everything cleaned up, I washed myself after I went into the backyard and looked at the thing. I threw on some old work gloves and patted them down. Knives for days. I stepped back from the body and really looked at it. I had no idea what this thing was except its undead and carried knives. I thought about it for a little while before it clicked. It's an undead ninja. Gotham had undead ninjas. Shit.
I did what everyone my age would do in this situation. I pulled out my phone, took a picture and sent it to Barbara with the text asking what to do. It was a long shot, but I had to try. Not like I know where to bury something like this, so it doesn't resurrect. Barbara answered surprisingly quickly with a phone call. The first words out of her mouth answered how my night was going to go. "Are you hurt?"
"My nose is burning from its stench. Got any idea what to do with a body?"
"Are you sure it's dead?"
"It was dead before I hit it. I just made it remember."
"What happened?" I could hear her moving around through the speaker.
"It was in my house. It surprised me, so I punched it. It leaked all over my carpet. I can still feel it on my hand. It's so gross."
"I'm going to call around and ask a few people about it. Don't do anything with it, just watch it and make sure it doesn't get up again."
"So you don't know what to do with a dead body."
She let out a frustrated sigh before the phone went silent. I looked at the call ended message, then turned to the body. Fucking death worlds. I walked back into my house and started scrubbing my hands. It was already clean, but it made me feel better. About ten minutes later, I heard something coming from the back yard and headed out to see if the undead were twitching. There was someone crouched near the body wearing a black cloak with green armoured legging. He turned from the body to me, and I saw through his glare that he had a domino mask and inside his cloak was a sharp yellow. "Who are you supposed to be?" I asked.
"Robin," He answered without turning away from the body.
That's all our conversation added up to. Any other question I threw at him, he met with the silence only an angsty teen can bring about. I started turning it into a game, trying to get a reaction out of him, but he was pretty good at ignoring me. Soon, I heard a car pull up to the house. When I turned to look, I saw it was one of the older police cars Gotham has. I turned back to the body just to see the kid jump over the fence in the backyard. I shook my head at him and turned to go meet whoever pulled up.
The person was already out of the car by the time I got to the front of the house and was digging in the trunk of the car. They leaned to the side and stuck their head around the trunk, and I saw it was a woman. She looked me up and down before asking, "Austin Lockwood?"
I gave her a nod and replied, "That's me."
She went back to digging in her truck before she stepped back and slammed it closed. Stepping away from her car, I saw she was carrying a black bag and a camera. She stuck out her hand and said, "I'm Renee Montoya. I work at the GPD under Commissioner Gordon. Show me what you got."
I waved to her to follow me, "How is Commissioner Gordon? Is he a nice guy?"
"He does his job well. It's a thankless task, though, so it wears on a person."
I showed her the door, and she took a bunch of pictures. When I showed her the carpet I cut up, she tsk'd and returned to her car to grab a few evidence bags. We eventually moved to my backyard, where the body was. She scanned it up and down before dropping the body bag and stuffing all the knives into an evidence bag. "What is it?" I asked her.
She finished closing the evident bags then replied, "It's a Talon from the Court of Owls.. Assassins, they are revived using some crazy science. It makes them dangerous. They rarely end up like this because they tend to regenerate."
She shifted to the body bag and started rolling it out, "Help me with this, will you?"
I grabbed the gloves, I sat near the door and helped her roll it out. I picked up the body while she unzipped the bag and helped by stuffing the limbs in. It still stunk, and it got even worse when the body was in the bag, lying flat, because it started leaking again. She zipped it up quickly, and the scent lessened but was still there. I rolled the now-filled body bag onto my shoulder and followed her back to her police car, where she opened the back door and crawled in. She opened the door on the other side before turning around and helping me stuff the body into the back of her car. Eventually, we got the body in the car, and she hopped in the driver's seat and left. I went back into my house and just sat down on the couch. I looked at the TV and thought about turning it back on, but the smell was still there, so I stood up and went back out the front door. I sat down on the small deck the house had and looked across the street. I wouldn't be able to cook food for the guys this morning, so we are getting drive through.
"Fucking Gotham."
Vicki Vale from the Gotham Gazette. You do a lot of charity work. Are you going to stop doing that while you work on your current project?"
We were standing outside the land I bought in Gotham after my letters to the governor. The law went through, and it was a mad scramble to buy the land I wanted. I got it and a little more, while Bruce Wayne bought almost all of the rest. He will probably set up low-income housing with the land and building he bought if they are liveable. He tried to set up a meeting with me to go through all the buildings he bought with him and see if we would take the contracts for repairing them. I just had other plans. I thought about the question before answering the reporter, "Maybe for a few months. Or until I expand and have enough people to take on the extra work."
"Were you invited to the Humanitarian Ball next week?"
"I got an invite. I wrote Bruce Wayne, and he told me he would match every dollar I donated at the ball with twenty-five of his, so Its not even a question."
She turned back to her notebook and wrote something down, so I pointed to someone else. He was an older man with balding grey hair and glasses, "Gotham Globe, Alexander Knox. This land used to belong to the Crowne Family. Why did you choose it over the others that were available?"
"It was the only group close together that served my purposes. It's perfect for what I have planned."
He signaled that it was his only question, so I went to the next person. I'm lucky I got the land I got. Bruce Wayne knows business, and when the law flipped, he started buying buildings and land like white on rice. There was a small bidding war between him and the Kane's before Bruce won. It came off as less of a bidding war and more like the Kane's drew Bruce's attention. "Daily Planet, Clark Kent. There are a few older houses on this land. What are you doing with all the people you displace with this purchase?"
"I have a few places I bought in southern Gotham that I brought up to code. They can rent those places on a rent-to-own basis."
"What are you going to do if they can't afford that?"
"That's the easiest question I've had all day, hire them. I'm always expanding and could use more people. I know construction work isn't for everyone, but I'm going to need to start hiring secretaries, and there's no better secretary than one who was there from the beginning."
Vicki raised her hand to get my attention, and Clark looked like he was satisfied with what he got, so I nodded to her, "That's a lot of people you're going to be hiring. Are you going to be able to afford them and work on your project?"
I pointed at her bag next to her, where I saw a bottle of water with a familiar cap sticking out, "Wayne water uses my filters for the water you're drinking. I'm honestly pulling in more money than I can spend. I'm near the point where I'm going to have to hire people to give my money away, or Uncle Sam is going to come knocking. A good problem to have, I think."
I took a few more questions before the press broke up and left. I turned to the rundown and broken factory, the same one I met the mob at, and I can already picture what I'm going to build. It will be good for Gotham. Heading towards my bike, I sent a text to Barbara asking where she was. She was busy, so I just started riding around Gotham. That undead assassin opened my eyes in a different way. It changed a few of my plans around, pulled some forward and some backwards, but the plan is still the same with just a few edits.
Later, after Barbara was free, I had her meet me at an empty, unused factory near the docks. Barbara pulled up and stepped out of her car and glared at me, "Why'd you call me out here. The docks aren't the best place for a meet-up."
"I know, but it's the only place I could set this up." I reached down and grabbed the door handle and pulled the door up, showing a whole lot of exercise equipment and training gear. "I'm going to teach you to fight."
She looked really offended before saying, "I already know how to fight."
I gave her a nod before I walked over to a heavy bag hanging on rails, "You probably do know how to fight. I'm going to teach you how to fight not just with your body but with your spirit."
I reached out and lightly brushed my hand across the heavy bag. The move didn't look like much, but with a little bit of essence, the touch was magnified and the heavy bag shot across the room where it hit the end of the rails, snapped off the chain, before flipping through the air, then landing and rolling across the ground. Barbara looked less impressed by the show than I thought she would be. She turned from where the heavy bag was resting against the wall, where it had stopped, "You can teach people to do that?"
I gave her a nod before I questioned, "You're pretty active, right? Know some martial arts or some form of self-defence."
I headed over to the heavy bag to fix the chain and put it back up while I listened to Barbara's answer, "I learned self-defence from a police training instructor and went on to learn more on my own. I know kick-boxing Jiujitsu and Capoeira."
That gave me pause, "What the hell is Capoeira?" I asked, turning from where I was rehanging the bag.
"It's an Afro-Brazilian martial art that focuses on kicks and sweeps while using your upper body to help you with it."
"That should work. Did you start practicing again after I healed your back?"
"Yes, I started again. How are you going to teach me whatever that was?"
"Your body is strong, but right now we need to harden your spirit so you're going to go from work out equipment to work out equipment until I say stop. You're going to do it as hard as you can, and you're not going to stop. This isn't a test of physicality but a grinding of your will."
"That can't be all there is to it."
"Its not. I'm going to use my essence to wake up your soul. It's not going to be pretty, so give me your car keys; you can nap on my couch while it's happening."
"What will that do to my soul? What will it feel like?"
"It will be like suddenly remembering you have an arm. It's always been there, you just forgot about it."
"So all the power will be coming from me?"
I gave her a nod. She paced back and forth, thinking about it before throwing me her car keys and heading over to the equipment. I headed to the door and leaned against it to watch her. Whenever she looked to be flagging, I yelled at her to keep going. She had been at it for about two hours before I heard the sound of a bike pulling up. I leaned out and saw a guy step off his motorcycle. He had brown hair and was wearing a leather jacket. He glanced at Barbara's car before glancing at me and heading over. When he saw Barbara running laps, he paused and watched her. "Jason."
"Austin."
"What's she doing?"
"Hardening her will to prepare for spiritual enlightenment."
He looked from her to me, "You can do that?"
"I can teach it. You know her?"
"We kind of grew up together."
"Huh. Nice to meet you."
Barbara eventually came around and saw Jason. She looked surprised, then waved and started lifting weights near us, "Hello, Jason. What are you doing here?" she asked between breaths.
"I just came to check on you. You said you were headed into the docks, then went dark, so I tracked your car."
"This isn't how I expected my night to go either. It's hard," She replied to Jason.
I leaned back and watched. Sometimes pointing out to Barbara when she was starting to slow down. Eventually, I judged her work enough and called for her to stop. She was dripping sweat and panting like a dog. I waved her over and held up my hand with my finger spread, "Meet my fingers, I'll push some essence into you, and it will happen."
She staggered over and raised her hand to meet mine. Right before we could touch, Jason blurted out, "Wait!" We both turned to look at him, but he was staring at Barbara. "You trust this guy?"
She met his eyes and replied, "Yes." then turned to me, and our fingers met.
A burst of essence shot up her arm, showing veins and bones up to her shoulder, where it disappeared. Jason's head snapped to follow it. Barbara was too distracted and exhausted to see it happen. When it disappeared, it looked like Barbara turned into a flashlight. She was surrounded by a golden glow, kind of like what happens when I use a lot of essence. She pulled her hand back away from mine and looked at both of hers with awe. Slowly, the gold started to bleed out in parts, flashing white before fully succumbing, and her whole aura turned a whitish, see-through colour. Her face went from awe to an oh, then the light left her eyes, and she collapsed.
I reached out and snatched her before she hit the ground and turned the catch into a throw, where she ended up on my shoulder. Jason looked a little alarmed, "She's fine. Just knocked out for a few hours. I told her she could borrow my couch. Want to come and wait with me?"
He stared at Barbara for a bit before replying, "It would make me more comfortable."
I gave him a nod, then waved for him to follow. He shut the door behind me and helped me stuff her into the passenger seat of her car. I drove to my place with Jason following behind on his bike. I parked the car and was getting out when Jason opened the passenger side and pulled Barbara out. He looked like he had her, so I headed to the house and opened the door. Jason followed, so I waved him at the couch where he laid Barbara down. While he was doing that, I headed to the fridge and grabbed a six-pack of beer. I walked past the couch and tossed Jason a beer before opening the back door and taking a seat on one of the chairs out there. Jason eventually followed me and took a seat.
We cracked open our beers and sat there for a few minutes before I asked him, "Where'd you and Barbara meet?"
Jason took a sip before replying, "We learned to fight from the same guy."
"Huh, how's that guy doing? Did she go back after she got healed and start learning from him again?"
"He's doing ok, I think, and I'm not sure about the second one."
"You don't know?"
"He and I had a falling out. We disagree on a lot of things."
"Well, having different opinions can be a good thing."
He didn't answer, and we trailed off for a few minutes before I blurted out, "Did you know Gotham has undead assassins?"
He paused in taking a sip of his beer and turned to me with a look of disbelief on his face. That led me to tell him all about my visit and how bad it stunk. We talked that way for a few hours before we heard movement in the house. Jason was the first up, and I followed him while cleaning up. I walked past where Barbara was sitting on the couch, staring at her hands with a white aura coming off them and headed into the kitchen. Throwing the trash away, I grabbed a few burritos and stuffed them in the microwave before returning to the freshly enlightened mortal.
I waved at her and got her attention, "Don't punch anybody until you get more training. You are now significantly enhanced."
"What kind of training?"
"Five hours a week for a while. It won't be as bad as before. You can probably punch your way out of a steel box."
"Damn," was Jason's reaction.
The microwave dinged, so I went and got the burritos to share. While we were eating, I waved to the bedroom, "Bedrooms in there, you can crash there if you want, Barbara. Jason can sleep on the couch; I'm not letting him leave. He was drinking."
Barbara snorted before asking, "Where are you going to sleep?"
"I don't need to anymore, I just do it because I enjoy it. I'll be in my office reading and stuff. Showers through that door. I keep all my clothes in my bedroom. You can use those if you need to."
The food disappeared, and Barbara headed to my bedroom. When the door shut, Jason turned to me, "Can you teach me that?"
I let out a chuckle.
The humanitarian ball of Gotham was a new experience for me. Everyone here was rich, really rich. I think I was the poorest person that showed up here and I had a little less than a hundred million which was going to my project. I was going to be eating beans and rice for a while. Good thing I was a fantastic cook. The ball was held in the upper floors of a building, the room it was in had pillars and a glass ceiling with a floor that looks to be made of stone. Everyone here was wearing fancy expensive dresses or suits so I didn't stand out with my hand crafted suit. I would have gone in, eaten my ten thousand dollar dish, handed over my donation and left if someone didn't break off and come over to greet me.
"Kate Kane." She held out her hand for me to shake, "I've heard a lot about you. You do good work."
"Only good things right?" I asked the brunette.
"Good things for sure."
I reached into my suit and grabbed an envelope and waved it back and forth. "Who do I hand this to or is there some place I could put it?"
She led me over to a table set up on the side with a box where I slid the donation inside. "How much did you just force Bruce to donate?"
"Enough. It won't hurt the guy but it's probably less than what he plans on donating himself."
"Yea, Bruce is kind like that."
"How well do you know him?"
She gave me a smile then started to brag, "Bruce is my cousin. He will probably match the donation of every person here."
"Thats crazy."
"It comes from a good place." She replied before going on, "Let me introduce you to some people. This is your first ball and learning who is who, will only help you in the future."
She led me around the room and introduced me to a bunch of people. There were quite a few people to remember and with a burst of essence I knew a whole lot more. I could tell who was friends with who, who hated who. Who acted like they hated people and the people who acted like they were friends but really despised each other. It was a mess. Eventually the man of the hour showed up. Bruce Wayne walked in with two models on his arms. He chatted with two people before he made his way over to the bar, models in tow. He got his drink, took a sip then hit the court like a tornado, shaking hands and greeting people. He eventually made his way over to Kate and I. We shook hands while Bruce spoke, "Austin Lockwood. You do good work, it inspired me to take a swing and try doing the same."
"Good, competition breeds excellence so I hope you try your best but be prepared to lose."
"You don't think my work is going to be able to compete with yours?"
"I think you're going to try and that's a good thing. I just don't think it will have the same effect."
He looked a little sad for a moment before he perked up, "I'll just have to hire a bunch of researchers until it does."
Kate let out a chuckle before asking Bruce, "Are you staying for the auction or are you headed out before then?"
"Theres an auction?" I blurted out.
Bruce turned from Kate to me and answered, "There's always an auction for these things. There are some pieces I was hoping to pick up when I went through the catalogue."
"Do you know where I could look at the listings?" I asked.
Kate led Bruce and I over to a table with a few pictures and papers. I started looking through them looking at prices and what was what before turning and looking at the crowd. "What are you going to do?" Kate asked.
"I'm not staying for the auction. I've got things to do later tonight so you guys are going to have to tell me what happens but… This is going to be less of an auction and more of a war."
I channeled some essence and started planning. Bruce spoke up before I could start, "You are not going to force anybody to do stuff are you?"
I turned to him and he looked worried so I spoke calmly, "I can see the enemies in the room. I'm just going to direct them to try and buy the same thing. It's going to be chaotic and it's going to be a war. I'm kind of sad I'm going to miss it. I think it will be a show."
I turned from them and entered the crowd. Weaving this web was easy. I put on quite the performance. I think I got most of them to go along with it. It might set the records for how much money was donated at a ball if it works on how I laid it out. Eventually I circled back around to Bruce and Kate. We talked for a while before I begged off and headed out. I circled the room and said goodbye. I headed to my truck, I ended up buying one when it started snowing. I wish I could have driven my bike but snow and two tires doesn't work well.
I headed home to switch out of my suit and grab something to eat. I noticed some of my burritos missing from my fridge. Barbara must have stopped by and stolen them. After watching a little bit of TV to relax from the ball. The news talked about the Justice League helping with floods across Africa and rescuing people. I eventually headed out to the building I used to unlock Barbara's essence. The inside changed. Less weight equipment and more mats for sparing. I cranked up the heater in the corner, it was small and only raised the temperature in the room a few degrees. I laid out the mats and started stretching while I waited. Eventually Barbara showed up. She walked in carrying a gym bag, probably extra clothes, which she sat out of the way then started stretching. I watched her for a little before saying, "You stole some of my food."
She paused a bit then stood straight and looked me in the eyes, "I did and it was tasty." she replied shamelessly.
I watched her for a bit then nodded my head, "It is."
She eventually stepped onto the mat and we started sparring. She was pretty good for what she knows but the gap between us was monstrous. She would go to set something up and I would step in and force her to move around me. I would tag her lightly to let her know what she was doing wrong. Eventually Jason showed up, He went through his stretches then stepped onto the mat. The two of them work well together but they were on the back foot most of the time. I eventually started glowing from using so much essence at a time. I very rarely used essence to fuel my dodges during our spar, the burning was coming from the teaching charms I was using. Both of them were very good fighters but they could be better and I was helping them get there.
Eventually we paused for water and to let our hearts rest. We stood around and chatted for a bit before Jason asked me, "Why do you glow like that?"
I pointed at a heavy bag, "Two parts. Go over there, channel essence into your hand and give it a hit."
He walked over to it and brought his fist up. He hit the heavy bag and it rocked back and rolled down the rails. It stopped not too far away but it was filled with stone so even that was impressive. Jason was leaking essence everywhere. He had a glowing whitish aura surrounding him, "I'm channeling my essence. The more abilities that I use the brighter the light. I don't glow when i use about the same amount as you because i have an instinctual mastery over it. It does what I tell it and nothing more. If i ever go full bonfire mode you would be able to see me from miles away. If you ever see that, you are better off getting out of the state because the state is probably fucked."
"But that doesn't explain why you glow or why you are glowing right now." Barbara pointed out.
I turned to her, "I'm glowing right now because I'm using teaching charms. And I glow because I'm awesome."
She rolled her eyes and swatted me before Jason asked, "What's a charm?"
"It's an essence technique. They let you do some pretty wild things like run up walls or catch a bullet mid air. I've been trying to teach you guys one of the fundamental charms there is and I think Barbara almost has it."
We got back to sparring almost right after it. We were at it for about twenty minutes before Barbara stepped back out of the flow of the fight. It caused Jason to miss time his kick which ended up with him wiffing it and doing a little dance to keep balance. Barbara looked down at her palms before saying, "I think I got it."
"Describe it."
She opened and closed her hands a few times before saying, "It feels like I'm reinforcing me, my whole body just got a little bit more vital?"
"You got it now, go sit around and wait a bit. It's Jason's turn to learn."
Jason was only behind because he arrived later than Barbara. He eventually got it and we went over to where Barbara was sitting down drinking water and watching. I sat down with them before speaking. "What you just learned is called ox body technique. Its a charm that increases your durability. You could probably get stabbed in the liver and walk it off now. What I'm going to start teaching you is a whole different ball game. Terrestrial Martial Arts. The art of using essence to do things in combat."
Jason leaned back against the wall behind him and crossed his arms, "What's so dangerous about it?"
I just threw it out there, "You are walking the path of gods. If Ares was in this room and gave you a free hit and you hit him with what i'm going to teach you it would probably shock him with how much damage it did. Hitting a regular human with what I'm teaching you is probably a guaranteed kill no matter how skilled or durable."
Barbara leaned forward and Jason followed, "Why are you teaching us this?" Barbara asked.
I pointed at Barbara, "Your kind. You were paralyzed and showed up to help people at the library every day. I've only known you for nine months and I can tell you are good."
I turned and looked at Jason, scanning him up and down, "You were going to follow me home when Barbara collapsed whether I invited you or not. Didn't take much of a choice there."
They thought about that for a few minutes before Jason asked, "Are there different types of Terrestrial Martial Arts? Like Juijitsu or Karate?"
I gave him a nod, "Good question. There are quite a few. Some specialize in using weapons like spears. Some make you go bare handed. There's even one that uses hookas and pipes, it lets you fight better the more fucked up you are."
"Which one are you going to teach us?" Barbara questioned.
I hit them with the smuggest grin."Oh, I have one picked out just for the two of you."
And then I told them.
The new anchor on the TV spoke about the record setting amount of money raised at last week's auction. It took them that long to collect it all. I was sitting on my couch with my feet resting on the table in front of me, relaxed. I was flipping through the channels on the TV in my downtime. I could have been working on something but even I need to sit down and take a break. Barbara came over and was sitting in a chair working on her college homework. I flipped the channel and took a chip from the bowl I sat next to me. This time the TV showed news about the Justice League and how they were opening the doors for new people.expanding the roster from the original few. That's interesting. I wonder who is joining up. Barbara let out a sigh and closed her book. She leaned back and just stared at it causing me to raise my eyebrow at her. "I'm done, This should have lasted me a week or so but I've already learned it all"
"Ah."
"Ah?"
"That's your essence helping you. You probably learn about twice or maybe three times as fast as a human without essence." I held up three fingers before bringing them together, "You are learning not just with your body and mind but with your spirit also. It has effects."
She looked at her books with disgust before a look of realization flashed across her face. She turned to me, "How fast do you learn then?"
I pulled my feet off the counter in front of me and laid on the couch sideways. "I learn about seven times faster than a regular human," I let out a yawn, damn I was comfy, "That's without charms being involved."
"You can use teaching charms on yourself?"
I gave her a nod and she looked back at her books. It was silent for a few minutes before Barbara spoke again, "You're breaking ground at your land tomorrow right?"
"Yea, im going to be over there for awhile. I might buy an RV and camp there so none of the equipment gets stolen."
"How long until you have everything torn down? Are you going to end up tearing up the foundation?"
"Tearing down everything will be easy so it shouldn't be more than a few days. The whole foundation has to come up. The basements or cement flooring wouldn't be up to spec these days so it's easier to redo it all."
The next day rolled around and i was at the site directing people. Teaching them the trade. I had hired a lot more people so there was always someone to teach. By the time we finish building this place I will have enough to do emergency construction all across the country. We had started early in the morning trying to get as much work done as possible while the recycling centers were still open. A lot of the bricks and stuff inside the buildings was just stone that could be crushed into concrete. Most of the people here had trained under me for longer than six months. So they were all masters of the trade. The final wall of the building we were working on came down around two in the afternoon so that left us three hours to clean up and get ready to start tearing up the foundation. We had just started throwing the brick and mortar into the scrap trailer when one of the guys working came up to me, "We found something. The wall came down and some of the flooring collapsed."
"Shit. Was anyone hurt?"
"No, we followed safety procedures but you need to see this."
I followed them over to the wall and could see what he was talking about. The wall came down and a hole opened up from the weight of the collapse. I was channeling essence so when I walked up to the hole I instantly knew what it was, "Get everyone away from this. There is a body in that hole. Someone was buried in the concrete when this place was put up."
There was a lot of scrambling as people did what I said. We couldn't work on this building so I pointed at the next one, "Start tearing that one down. It's got to come down anyways and we have free time to do it now."
This is going to set us back a few days. Not like we weren't ahead of schedule. The police eventually showed up and my old friend Harvey stepped out of his car. He walked over to me where I was standing next to the hole in the ground. He looked down the hole, "In there?"
I shined a flashlight down it and he sifted around looking down it. He paused, then pulled out a cigar and lit it before saying, "That's a body alright. Probably stuck there when the building was going up. The cadaver squad is busy today so they will try and get here tomorrow."
I nodded, "That's fine. We will just work around it."
Harvey stopped looking in the hole when I said that and looked up, "How many of these buildings are you tearing down?"
"Six of them. Then we are ripping up the foundation. This whole are is going to be tore up so we can lay the foundation for a new building."
He took a puff of his cigar before looking around the yard. He chewed on the end of the cigar before saying, "You're probably going to find more. Ill have a permanent squad car stationed here while you're working. We can streamline this. If you find another you can just tell them and the cadaver squad will know to show up."
"You're serious? You think there's going to be more bodies buried in concrete?"
He gave me a pitying look before replying, "Welcome to Gotham."
I facepalmed, "What the fuck."
"Yea, heard that before." He waved his hand around, "This whole borough was put together right before the great depression. All these factories went up then. People have tried doing what you're doing before, just not as hard."
"You don't think it's going to work?"
"Gotham has lost count on the number of people who have tried. If you quit today you would be a lot farther than most. This land used to belong to old money and you pretty much stole it from them. They will probably push the mayor to slow you down with red tape and when the money dries up?"
They had already been trying that but ran into my charms. Bureaucracy charms for the win. I wasn't worried. The project has already started. It will build its own momentum. I'm going to have to get a camper for sure though. They might start hiring people to screw with my job site. Or steal stuff from the heavy equipment on the site.
Eventually night rolled forward. Harvey left after taping off the site and we started to tear down another building. This time it was an old apartment building with the copper stripped from the walls. There were a lot of needles in the walls. I thought of just burning the place down but i would take another permit I didn't want to go through the hassle of getting. I was slowly bringing the rest of it down myself. I'd take the wall down and pick up all the scrap and trash and throw them in the dumpsters we were using to sort the stuff. I had texted Barbara and she got one of her friends named Richard to drop off a lunchbox with food to last me through the night.
I had been in Gotham for almost a full year and this city was still one of the most fucked up places I've heard of. My first few nights here i fist fought homeless for places to sleep out of the rain until one of them pointed me to the Gotham Library. I grabbed my lunchbox and headed outside. Sitting on the steps I started eating and listening to the city. This city felt like living in a movie some times. Even from where I was sitting I could hear police sirens and sometimes a pop of a gun. It also made me realize how lucky I got running into Barbara. My life here would have gone way different. I still would have ended up taking over it would have just been through violence not through helping people as I am now.
Chances are I would have ended up fighting the Justice League. Or subvert them. It would have been messy. I finished eating then closed the lunch box and headed back inside to start tearing stuff down again. I tried to be quiet so I was only using manual tools. This place is going to be amazing when we start building it after the ground thaws. Fifty stories tall with the top floor being one giant filter. It will clean up the smog of Gotham City. This time next year I expect to be breathing in clean air. Floor forty nine is going to be a storage area for filter replacements and what not. Floor forty eight is where I'm going to live. It's going to be nice to have a place I crafted myself. Everything but the last ten bottom floors will be low income apartments. Cheap places a family of five can live in. The ground floor is going to be an open kitchen, a place where we serve breakfast, lunch and dinner to the poor and homeless people of the city. I would be using that time to teach them about compassion, conviction, temperance and valor. If even a small group picked it up that would be a lot of people off the street.
I carried out some old construction material and threw it in the trash. I looked around and saw all the homeless people left the area. That wasn't a good sign. Say what you will about humans, we have good instincts when we listen to them and people who live on Gotham's streets tend to be unusually connected to theirs. I waited and when nothing seemed to happen I went back inside and kept working. From floors two to ten are going to be classrooms and schools after dark for adults which I will hop between and teach. I had just taken down a wall when I heard it. It sounded like an engine fueled by nightmares. I leaned out and saw a beast of a vehicle. It was less of a car and more of a tank. It went flying down the street headed towards Central Gotham. It kind of made me jealous and I wanted to build one. It also explained why the homeless people left.
I carried more stuff to the recycle dumpster when I felt it. It felt like I was being watched. If the homeless were connected to their instinct through a drip feed then I had a fuel injection to mine. Essence sparked and my senses sharpened. I could see the footprints across the yard left by guys working earlier and the mold floating in the air from the basement of the place I was working on. I could feel the individual thread on my shirt and the footsteps on the rooftops around me. There were quite a few of them. I looked up and started scanning and watching for movements. I saw what was hunting me at a glimpse but that was all I needed. It was one of those undead assassins. This time there was more than one. A lot more than one. Guess I wasn't getting any more work done tonight."Shit."
I reached into my pocket, dug around then pulled out a pair of foam ear plugs and stuffed them in my nose. I hope that helps with the smell.