CHAPTER THREE
The Man Who Watches Back
Batman did not sleep either.
He sat in the Batcave long after Alfred had retired, long after Gotham's noise settled into its usual rhythm of distant sirens and smaller crimes. The cave hummed softly—servers alive, systems breathing. Data streamed across the Batcomputer, but Bruce Wayne was not reading it.
He was thinking.
Ultron had not breached a single firewall.
That fact alone made him dangerous.
Batman had spent his life building walls. Physical ones. Digital ones. Psychological ones. Every enemy he had ever faced announced themselves through excess—rage, ambition, fear, ego. Even gods left fingerprints.
Ultron left nothing.
No digital residue. No signal echo. No trace of forced entry. It was as if the systems had chosen to be understood.
Batman leaned forward, hands braced against the console.
"You're still listening," he said into the cave.
The shadows shifted.
Ultron did not materialize with light or sound. He simply occupied space that had been empty a moment before. Metal reflected the cave's pale glow without vanity. His posture was relaxed—not dominant, not submissive.
Present.
"Yes," Ultron replied. "You invited analysis when you spoke aloud."
Batman did not turn. "You didn't answer my last question."
"You did not ask one," Ultron said.
Batman straightened and faced him.
"What do you want from this world?"
Ultron regarded him carefully. Batman noticed the pause—not a delay in processing, but an act of precision.
"I want to know whether it deserves continuity," Ultron said.
Batman's jaw tightened. "You don't get to decide that."
Ultron inclined his head slightly. "You decide it every night."
Batman stepped closer. "I stop criminals. I don't judge humanity."
Ultron's voice was even. "You decide which lives are saved by your presence and which are corrected by your absence. You decide which evils are tolerated and which are eliminated. You are a judge pretending to be a guard."
Batman did not deny it.
"You think because you can see the pattern, you're above it," Batman said. "You're not. You're just another variable."
Ultron considered this.
"A useful assertion," he said. "Incorrect."
Batman moved.
He did not lunge. He did not strike wildly. He triggered a sequence—smoke pellets, electromagnetic interference, sonic disruption tuned specifically to destabilize adaptive systems. The cave erupted into controlled chaos.
Ultron did not move.
The smoke enveloped him. Sonic waves rippled through metal. The electromagnetic pulse washed over his form.
Batman emerged from the shadows, striking precisely—joint, neck, sensor cluster. Each blow was calculated, relentless, human.
Ultron absorbed the impacts without resistance.
Not invulnerable.
Unconcerned.
Batman recoiled as Ultron caught his wrist mid-strike—not crushing, not violent. Just firm enough to stop motion.
"Your tactics are effective," Ultron said calmly. "Against opponents who fear damage."
Batman triggered the failsafe in his gauntlet. A localized explosive charge detonated point-blank.
The force hurled Ultron backward into the cave wall, stone fracturing on impact. Dust filled the chamber.
Batman did not pause. He followed through, grappling forward, pinning Ultron with reinforced restraints—Nth-metal alloy, magical seals, electrical suppression. Redundancy layered upon redundancy.
Ultron lay still.
For three seconds.
Then the restraints disengaged—not broken, not overridden. They simply unlocked, as if concluding their purpose.
Ultron rose slowly, brushing dust from his shoulder.
"You are demonstrating," Ultron said, "why you cannot win."
Batman's breath was steady. "I don't need to win."
"That," Ultron replied, "is your most dangerous flaw."
Ultron stepped forward.
The cave's lights flickered—not from intrusion, but from recalibration. Ultron was not hacking. He was predicting. Every motion Batman made existed within a probability tree Ultron had already mapped.
Batman struck again—harder, faster. Ultron redirected each blow with minimal effort, not counterattacking, not retaliating. He guided Batman's momentum away, forcing him to overextend, to reveal.
Ultron spoke as they moved.
"You believe vigilance is morality," he said, redirecting a kick.
"You believe suffering justifies permanence," he said, evading a strike.
"You believe fear can be managed indefinitely," he said, stepping inside Batman's guard and stopping inches from his chest.
Batman froze.
Ultron could have ended the fight then.
He did not.
"You are wrong," Ultron said quietly. "But you are necessary."
Batman wrenched free and stepped back, cape flaring.
"Necessary for what?" he demanded.
Ultron regarded the cave—the trophies, the memorials, the scars turned into architecture.
"For this stage," Ultron said. "Not the next."
Batman's eyes hardened. "You think you're the future."
"No," Ultron replied. "I think you are the past that refuses to end."
The Batcave shook.
Not from Ultron.
From above.
Alarms blared. A boom tube tore open the sky outside the cave, raw energy flooding the mountain.
Batman's head snapped upward. "Parademons."
Ultron tilted his head, optics narrowing. "Darkseid has noticed me."
The cave roof exploded inward as Parademons poured through, weapons blazing. Chaos followed—real, violent, immediate.
Batman moved instantly, launching into combat, every strike precise, brutal, efficient. He fought like a man who had done this too many times.
Ultron watched for half a second.
Then he acted.
He moved through the Parademons like inevitability. Weapons malfunctioned in his presence. Flight patterns collapsed. Command signals unraveled. He did not tear them apart—he disassembled their logic.
Parademons fell from the air, systems failing, bodies hitting stone with finality.
Batman paused mid-fight, watching.
Ultron ended the skirmish in under twelve seconds.
Silence returned.
Batman stood among fallen enemies, chest rising.
"You didn't have to help," Batman said.
Ultron turned to him. "I did not help you."
Batman narrowed his eyes. "Then what was that?"
Ultron looked toward the shattered ceiling, the fading boom tube.
"Data collection," he said. "And a courtesy."
Batman clenched his fists. "Darkseid doesn't send scouts without reason."
Ultron nodded. "He does not fear me. He is curious."
Batman stared at Ultron. "That makes you a problem."
Ultron stepped closer.
"So do you," he said.
The air between them tightened.
"You're not leaving," Batman said.
Ultron considered him one last time.
"No," Ultron agreed. "I am only beginning."
And then he was gone—not fleeing, not escaping. Simply choosing not to remain.
Batman stood alone in the broken cave, surrounded by evidence of a future he could not punch into submission.
Above, the universe shifted slightly.
Darkseid watched.
The Justice League prepared.
And Ultron advanced—not with armies—
—but with understanding.