Snippets, Omakes and Short Stories

The Batmobile. Racing through Gotham's outskirts. A few minutes ago​

"Hold on. Alfred, can you repeat?" Batman said, as Buffy was trying, unsuccessfully, to call Dawn again. "Don't bother, Dawn is in Wayne Manor. The reception is spotty at best there."

"How can she...?" Buffy said, before she realized what had happened "Oh, God, so that's what she meant!"

"What are you talking about?." Batman said.

Buffy took a deep breath before she started to explain

"It’s a long story, but to make it short, there was a prophecy about a Key to open a portal to a Hell dimension, and Dawn fit the bill.” She said, “Well, there was a time limit, and we tried to run, but she was captured and some bozo tried to sacrifice her. We managed to stop it in the proverbial nick of time and she only suffered a couple of nasty wounds.” She put the hand on her temples, as if to forestall a headache “The kick is that a portal really started to open after the blood started to flow. She has never shown signs of having any ability to open portals afterwards, though.”

“Until now.” Batman said

“Yeah, until now.” Buffy said, thoughtful. "She must have opened a portal to Wayne Manor, somehow."

"...Okay." Batman said. He sensed that there were more to the story than what she had said, but he wouldn't pry, for now.

They didn't talk for a while, the Batmobile going through a dirt road until they reached a craggy rock wall, not too far from Wayne Manor. The dirt road ran parallel to the wall for quite a while, but after Batman pressed a button in the steering wheel, a section of the wall, just in front of the turn of the road, opened, revealing an underground access.

"Wow, so your underground base is under Wayne Manor, right?.” Buffy said, “How... Zorro of you."

Batman pursed his lips but he didn't say anything. She wouldn't know, of course, about the movie they had gone to see that night.

His thoughts were interrupted by an alarm that showed in the HUD integrated in the cowl. Somebody had opened the access to the Batcave, and hadn't pressed the button to stop the alarm. Probably Dawn, although he wouldn't discard the possibility of somebody had used the distraction provided by her arrival to enter the cave.

He made a mental note make more difficult to find the right combination, just in case another guest tried to fiddle with the clock, as well as placing some cameras in the passage. Anyway, they would know soon enough, anyway as the car started to go through the passage toward the cave.

Not too long afterwards he was stopping the Batmobile onto the platform. When they both got out, Buffy talked while he was looking for the intruder.

“Now, we’ll see how Dawn takes the news.”

He didn’t answer immediately, looking around until he saw part of an sleeve behind an outcropping of rocks.

“No need for that, she already knows.” He said, removing his cowl to show his face, Bruce Wayne’s face, “Dawn, come here.”

Dawn stood, looking at them.

“Hi.” She said, waving her hand and smiling sheepishly. “Sorry, Bruce, I saw that the clock was broken and tried to fix it…”

“And you accidentally opened the secret passage.” Bruce said, with a sigh. “I need to improve security there.” He sighed for a moment, before adding “I’ll call Alfred, he must be looking for you all over the mansion.” Then he pointed to a zone that seemed to be separated from the rest of the cave by scaffolding, which also seemed to hide whatever was there from view. “If you don’t mind, can you wait for me there?”

The sisters looked to each other and nodded at the same time.

“No problemo, Bruce.” Buffy said.

 

A dirt road, not too far from Smallville, Kansas​

“Where the heck do we go now?” Nick said, as he looked behind, the thing still in pursuit, though not gaining on them despite its efforts.

“How long until your friends arrive?”

“I don’t know. That thing is going to require heavy ordinance to dispose of, if my experience is anything to go by.” Fury said, “It’s not like we have high explosive...” he trailed off as his cellphone rang again. He looked at the number, if he wasn’t wrong it was a number from Fort Myer… “Hang on, I think that the Cavalry is calling.”

“This is Nick Fury, who I am talking to?”

“Hi, Nick, it’s Gabe Jones, it has been a while.” He heard a familiar voice answering. “Carter roped me into helping you with both these messes. I’m about to go to the Triskelion with a pissed off Colonel and a platoon of rangers.”

“I’m more interested in the alien war machine that is following us.” Fury said “I think that it haven’t ranged weapons, at least it doesn’t seem to have used them, but I’m not sure of that.”

“Okay, we managed to get the Air Force involved, an squadron of F-16 from Whiteman is going to attack it in thirty minutes or so.” Jones explained “An squadron of A-10 from Buckley is going to arrive in fifty minutes, give or take.”

Fury thought for a moment. That was all well and good, if they managed to last that long.

“Jonathan, how full is the tank?” Fury asked

“Half full, more or less. Ninety minutes or so at this pace.” Jonathan said.

“Okay, the thing is chasing us.” He looked at the baby and decided against telling it at the moment. “I don’t know why.” He paused a moment to gather his thoughts “Listen, I’m with two locals. The son of Jack Kent, if you remember him, and his wife.”

“Yes, I do. Your father’s last will, I presume.” Gabe said. “And I presume you can’t ditch them.”

“We’d have to stop the car, and that thing is faster than it looks.” Fury answered.

 

“Okay, keep going. Try to stick to dirt roads and secondary roads… and try to stay out of the emergency vehicles way.” Gabe said.

“Gabriel, I know how to do this shit.” Fury commented with an eyeroll.

“I never doubted that, Nick. See you, after all this mess is done.” Gabe said.

“See you.” Fury answered just before Gabe hung up. He then turned to the Kents “Good and bad news.”

“First the good and later the bad, I guess.” Martha said after she and Jonathan looked at each other.

“Okay, the good news are that two ground attack squadrons of the Air Force are on their going to attack that thing.” He said pointing back. “The bad news is that the closest one is going to need half an hour, and the other fifty minutes.”

Fort Myer. Virginia​

After the troops boarded the Humvees, Colonel Sam Lane boarded the one in the lead, that he was going to share with General Jones. After he closed the door, he turned to the odler man and asked.

“And now, sir, can you tell me what was that important to make me miss my first day on leave since my daughter’s birth?” Lane asked. “Beyond the ‘Federal Building presumably taken by terrorists’ thing that we have told the soldiers. I won’t enter into ‘Posse Comitatus’, as I assume that it have been handled over my head.”

“You are right, it have been handled way over our heads. And what we have said to the troops is roughly true, the thing is that there are complications.”

“Such as?”

“The building is the Triskelion.” Jones said, and then added, seeing Lane Blank expression. “SHIELD HQ.”

“…Fuck.” Lane said.

“Pretty much. Contact was lost yesterday night, at 23:48, Washington time.” Jones explained “But as communications in and out the building had been acting up for the last weeks, nobody noticed anything until this morning.”

“Nobody thought to send somebody to check what was happening?.” Lane said.

“As I said Comms have been bad for a few days.” Jones repeated “As soon as the Pentagon got the news, they called the FBI, as it is on Federal land.”

“Teddy Roosevelt Island, isn’t it? I always wondered what was that eyesore.” Lane commented.

“Exactly.” Jones said “The FBI have sent a HRT tactical unit to take a look from a distance, and to serve as the primary assault force, your people are there as reinforcements.” He paused for a moment when he saw Lane expression, “Political reasons.”

“Whatever.” Lane said. He didn't have anything against the HRT, but ge felt that this was one of teh things best handled by teh military.

“They’ll fill us on what they have seen when we arrive.” Jones explained “If they are there, there had been no communication with them since they arrived.”

 

When Bruce arrived, Buffy and Dawn were looking all over the device that was sitting there, with a chair before it. The device looked like a big screen surrounded by smaller screens.

"Bruce, what the hell is this? It looks like a computer, but I can't see..."

"One moment." Bruce said, sitting on the chair, and pressing a hidden button on its arms. A panel slid open, revealing a lens. When Bruce put his eye in front of the lens, it scanned the eye and the main screen turned on, and a female digitized voice said:

"Password: Criminals are..." and it left it hanging.

"A cowardly and superstitious lot." Bruce said, ignoring Buffy's 'really?' reaction.

"Voice recognized. Welcome, Batman." The voice said and a holographic keyboard and trackball appeared before him, at the same time the computer initialized.

"A sweet setup you have here, Bruce." Dawn said with a whistle.

"Don't let Andrew near it ever." Buffy said, and both Summers sisters shuddered.

"Who is Andrew?" Bruce asked.

"Watcher in training, he is an uber-nerd." Buffy said. "He was of great help during the last weeks on Sunnydale, though."

"I presume that Sunnydale's collapse wasn't a natural event." Bruce said, while correlating data on the computer.

"No, it wasn't. Sunnydale was built over a Hellmouth, and yes, a Hellmouth is exactly what it sounds like." Buffy said, "When we managed to close it, the cave system that contained the Hellmouth proper collapsed completely."

"Hum." Bruce said, as he put a map of Gotham City on the screen. Twelve red points appeared over the two worse districts of Gotham, "The Bowery murders, they are quite spread over the district, but if we add the last places where the victims were seen..." other twelve points appeared on orange "...and we add the last places where the people missing during the spikes of missing people were seen last time." A good number of yellow dots appeared, and a pattern had emerged. A good of them seemed to be concentrated over a narrow strip close to the border between the Bowery and the Narrows.

"What is there?" Dawn asked.

"Grant Avenue, that is crosses with state route 39." Bruce said, enlarging the map and showing a map of Gotham county and the adjacent counties with the road highlighted. "On a couple of the victims the forensic department found traces of a kind of clay that appears in a few places in the state, but only one of those places is close to route 39.

 

Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters​

"I hope that we didn't ruin your date, Jean." Ororo said to the redhead who was walking down the corridor with her.

"Not really, I was already on my way back, when I received your call." Jean said with a wave of her hand. "Whatever plans Duncan had, they were ruined by the storm.”

“It wasn’t mine.” Ororo said, before adding with a pensive face “It is a weird storm, though.”

“How so?” Jean asked, curious.

“On itself it isn’t really unusual, other than its suddenness, but there is a straight line of storms from the Mid-Atlantic all the way to New Mexico.” Ororo explained, “Something that we better investigate later.”

“You are the one with weather control, Ororo.” Jean said “So, what's the problem?"

"Cerebro has detected another mutant, but Charles won't be back until tomorrow, and by then the trail will be too cold." Ororo said.

"And as I am the only telepath in the team, and the professor have been training me to use Cerebro..." Jean continued. "I'll see if I can retrieve it."

They finally enter Charles study, where Ororo got the secret panel to open and Cerebro was there. Jean took a deep breath and sat in a chair in front of the device, putting the headset on her head. Immediately she was assaulted by the thoughts of everybody and it took all her training to block it, down. She closed her eyes and focused into following the sign of mutant activity that the machine had detected.

Her mind-self flew, until she found the trail she was looking for, and read the psychic traces associated with it.

"Dawn... Summers..." she said, picking the name from it.

"Dawn Summers, are you sure?" Ororo said.

"Yes... why?" Jean said, still trying to get the location of the girl.

"Because she is Scott cousin, I met her earlier today." Ororo explained, before noticing something, “Jean, your nose…”

“Just… a moment.” She kept reading the traces, despite the pounding she was starting to fell in her head “Portals… open portals… Gotham City… Wayne Manor.” She said and then after a moan of pain, she started to add “I’m going to…”

Suddenly she became aware of a dark presence. It felt asleep, but it was still hungry and malevolent and devoid of anything that could be considered... human. She wanted to get away, but its might and hunger had drawn her to it like a moth to a flame.

She fought, she fought with all her psychic might until she felt something shift in her mind, and a voice that sounded like her own, but crackling in flames said, as she felt like a wall in her mind started to crumble:

'SHE’S MINE!'

And she didn’t know anything else. She awoke, finding herself again in Charles study.

“Jean, what has happened?” Ororo said, “You started to bleed from the nose, you looked like you were in pain, but before I could disconnect Cerebro you glowed like a flame for a moment, and fell down from the chair.”

“I… don’t know.” Jean said, the last minutes of her using of Cerebro having vanished from her mind, as if something didn’t want Jean to remember what had happened.

 

“And nobody else thought to go to take a look?.”

“What do you think we are going to do?” Jones said, “Besides, HRT went quite light on equipment, and if the Triskelion jammers are active, any radio communication, and that includes cellphones, would be impossible.”

The rest of the way they were in silence, until they arrived to the place where the FBI had set camp.

“General Jones? Colonel Lane?” said the man who looked to be the squad leader. As with his teammates, he was clad in black tactical gear, not too dissimilar, except for the color, from the one that the Rangers were wearing.

“That’s us. We come with two squads of Rangers just out of a training course in Fort Myer.” Jones said.

“I’m Agent Garner, leader of the HRT Gold Unit.” The FBI man said “I presume that you want an appraisal of the situation.”

“That would be correct.” Lane said.

“Okay, when we arrived here the building was seemingly deserted, with the gates locked up, and covered by steel sheets.” Garner said

“That mean that they are in a full lock-down.” Jones said, and then explained. “A full lock-down means that the building is completely closed, radio and cellphone jammers are active, and the landlines are cut.”

“Yes, we have been unable to call my superiors since we arrived here.” Garner said “As we didn’t have the right communication equipment, I sent one of my men with a cellphone to call our superiors.”

“Good thinking. We can set a transmitter and cable up here, we brought it, just in case.” Lane said. “What has happened since then?”

“Roughly twenty minutes ago, we observed activity on the upper levels. And by activity I mean fighting, soon afterwards one of the windows on those levels opened and one corpse was thrown out of it.”

“Godammit.” Jones said. “This I must see it by myself.”

Wordlessly the FBI agent gave him binoculars, as well as indicating him where to look.

“Cain Chandler.” Jones said, after getting a good look at the corpse. “That scar in the face is very distinctive.”

“Who?” Lane said.

“Cain Chandler was the head of the SHIELD Internal Security Division, the internal affairs people, basically.” Jones said “What is worse was that they managed to open a window. The only way to open any window if the building is in full lock-down is with the master codes.” He lowered the binoculars, and said “And only three people have those codes: Myself, Chandler and the director.”

“Then Cain was caught and spilled the beans, or...” Lane started to say, stopping himself of saying what was in his mind.

“Or Director Faraday is on it.” Jones said, completing what Lane had been unable to say.

 

"But you just have basically told the FBI guy that I'm not here." Rogue asked.

"Yeah, but Fritz is pretty by-the-book. He'll ask Fred for help and they'll send a few agents to look around and make a general nuisance of themselves in this neighborhood." Ma Hunkel said "With luck, nobody will think to check there. Tomorrow, I'll go there to help you, but don't forget to check that P.O. Box."

They got out through the back door, and Rogue walked down the street toward the pay phone. Ma Hunkel went back to the kitchen to prepare a tea for herself. Just as she was doing that, she looked and saw a black car stopping before the inn, and two men in dark suits with sunglasses stepped out. Ma frowned, there hadn't been time for them to come here from the FBI office. They could have been doing anything closer to here, but the timing was very, very suspect.

The FBI agents were two young men, a crew-cut blond with a bodybuilder physique, while the other was a red-haired man with a swimmer physique and longer hair than his partner...

Something was bothering her about those two. She had talked with a lot of G-men over the years, and these two... something about them was off, and it gave her a bad feeling. Well, thanks to Rex she had something better than long johns and a pot, if things went South. And fortunately the only guest tonight had been Rogue, so she shouldn't worry too much about people getting in the crossfire.

~~~~~~~
​

"What do we know about this woman?" Trent asked, adjusting the necktie of his suit. Looking the part of a Fed irked him, given their part on the death of his father.

"Not much, she is a widow from New York, and she moved to Central City with her family 'round twenty-five years ago." Lang answered, checking his smartphone for the data that have been sent from Central. "Hmmm... strange, it is almost as if she had suddenly appeared thirty years ago with her kids."

"Witness protection?" Trent asked.

"Maybe." Lang said, as they reached the porch of the inn.

After they rang, they could hear a muffled 'coming' from the back, and a couple minutes later, a sixty-something woman, dressed in a maroon robe over bright-yellow pajamas opened the door.

"Ma Hunkel Bed and Breakfast place. What can I do for you?" she said with a friendly smile.

"Abigail Matilda Hunkel?." Trent said, trying his best to sound official.

"That's me." She said, with a confused expression.

"I'm Agent Alexander, and this is Agent Stephens." Trent said, using the names in their fake FBI IDs. "We have received a confidence that a fugitive could be lodging in your establishment."

"Yes, Fritz, from the FBI office in Keystone called me earlier." The woman said, "I didn't recognize the description he gave me, but if you have a picture..."

Trent and Lang looked to each other, clearly thinking the same thing. 'What the fucking hell?.' The real FBI wasn't supposed to know about this.

"Yes, yes. One moment." Trent said, getting his hand into his jacket, but no picture was produced. Instead, Ma Hunkel found herself looking at an 9 mm automatic pistol. "The girl, where is she?"

 

Not too long afterwards, Ororo, Jean, Scott, Kitty and Kurt were all together in the mansion living room.

"So, this Dawn Summers is your cousin?" Kitty asked.

"Yeah, the daughter of my uncle Hank." Scott said.

"If you have an uncle and cousins, why you have never mentioned them before?" Jean asked, curious.

"Jean, you know the memory problems that I had because of the accident." Scott said, shaking his head, "And Hank... well, apparently he and my father had problems, I don't know why. But I'd never thought that he would act as if everybody died in the crash."

"Going back to this, Dawn and her older sister, Buffy..."

"Buffy? I mean, like, really?" Kitty said, which earned her a 'look who's talking' glare from Ororo and Jean.

"As I was saying, Buffy and Dawn had an appointment in Gotham City this evening..." Ororo explained the reason the Summers sisters had gone to Gotham, and why it was likely they were on Wayne Manor. "Have you tried to call her, Scott?"

"No, sorry, I just forgot." He said, taking his mobile phone and calling Dawn to the number she had given him earlier. "It's apparently out of reach." He tried another number. "Buffy's phone is the same."

"Jean, you said that this Dawn was in Wayne Manor." Kitty asked, after having been loking a few things while Ororo had been explaining the situation.

"Yes, the psychic trace was pretty clear." Jean confirmed.

"Well, I have been looking the location of Wayne manor in relation to the nearest cell towers, and it's, like, too far." Kitty explained, "There is not even a Wayne Communications tower nearby."

In the end they decided to visit Gotham the next day, as with the storm raging outside it would be dangerous to drive, not to talk of flying, to Gotham City. When they were going to their bedrooms, Scott made a signal to Jean to come to talk to him.

"Ororo told me what happened, Jean." Scott said, "How are you, really?"

"I don't really know, I mean, I feel well, but..." Jean said, "That memory loss frighten me, because if somebody did it to me that means that there is something out there, that walked through my mental defenses as if they were made of cardboard. And if I did it to myself, that means that I found something that made me take such a drastic measure."

 

The Batcave​

"Buffy, you're the expert in vampires. What should I look for?" Bruce said.

"I'd check if somebody had stopped buying food in that area or close to." Buffy said after a moment of hesitation. "Vampires only need blood to survive, after all."

"But if they're keeping their victims alive, that won't reflect on the charges. Vampires don't have to eat, but their victims have to, if they want to keep them alive for weeks." Bruce countered, finding immediately the flaw in Buffy's logic. "In fact their food orders may have increased, depending on how many vampires we are talking about. Can a vampire put somebody in thrall, like in the movies?"

“You usually only see older vamps doing that.” Buffy said, with a shrug, “But I have met enough exceptions to be wary, why do you ask? Oh, you think that they may be enthralled somebody to buy the grocery list? A person enthralled acts weird enough to be noticed.”

“…bator.” Dawn said, and the sisters collapsed in giggles.

“What was that?” Bruce said.

“Sorry, it was something that happened when one of our friends in Sunnydale got enthralled by this really old vampire.” Buffy said, “He even started to get all Renfield-like, eating bugs and all.”

“…Okay.” Bruce said “Why don’t you give me a primer on vampires? I think that it'd be better than playing twenty questions.”

An old manor near Slaughter Swamp​

Sidney DelVeccio carved another mark in the walls of her cell, and looked at herself. She had lost close to thirty pounds since those people had brought her here, wherever it was. She had been a waitress in a fast-food place in one of the less bad parts of the Bowery, and she had just getting ready for a job interview on Metropolis, across the bay, when those… monsters had caught her in the way to the ferry.

She had been walking toward a bus stop when she heard a van braking noisily and she suddenly felt herself dragged into the van and injected with something. That was the last thing she remembered before waking here barefoot and chained to the wall.

A bit of light entered from a small window, and that was how she could tell the pass of the time as her captors brought them food at irregular intervals. At first she had heard voices, but every time they sedated all of them, with a dart pistol, there was one less voice. Now she was alone, and her turn would come soon. She tried to fall asleep, to see if she could dream again with those girls that fought monsters. It gave her hope, she didn't knew why, becasue the girls ofter ended killed by those monsters.

The Batcave​

“…and that’s all.” Buffy said.

“Interesting.” Bruce said, and keyed a few commands in the computer. A list appeared and Bruce started to add filters to the search; soon the list had shrunk into a single name. “DuBois Manor. It’s close to Slaughter Swamp.”

“A charming name.” Dawn said. “And I suppose that it has a history of weird events.”

“Yes.” Bruce said, as he was looking for info about the manor. “There are several legends associated with the swamp. But DuBois Manor has its share of oddities, too.”

 

“Don’t tell me. It’s supposed to be haunted.” Buffy said, rolling her eyes.

“Yes, but that’s not the weirdest thing about the manor.” Bruce said. “Nicholas DuBois and his sister Dala were run out of Gotham County in 1857 due to something that was hushed over. The manor fell in disrepair, and in 1882, a son of Nicholas appeared with all the documentation to prove it and proceeded to rebuilt the manor, but something happened, and Dubois Junior never came back to Gotham. Since them the manor has changed hands through the Dubois family, where heirs seems to pop out like clockwork.”

“Like the Mayor.” Buffy said, and then started to explain, “The Mayor of Sunnydale was an immortal sorcerer, that…”

“I get the picture.” Bruce said, raising his hand to interrupt her, “There are no pictures of any of the DuBois after Nicholas. And the current Dubois, Louis, controls a modest-sized shipping business in New Orleans, Demeter Lines, and his legal affairs are usually managed by… Wolfram & Hart.” Bruce frowned, while Buffy and Dawn grimaced, “Even if Dubois is not a vampire, I have never met somebody represented by Wolfram & Hart that wasn’t rotten to the core.”

“Of course, they are evil.” Buffy said.

“They are a law firm that seem to be very unscrupulous in their choice of clients, but why are you saying that they are evil?”.

“A… friend of mine in Los Angeles has clashed with them over the last years.” Buffy said, “Apparently the Senior Partners of Wolfram and Hart are demons, and to work there you have to sell them your soul. They have been mixed in a lot of supernatural crap in the L.A. area in the last years.”

“Interesting, but that doesn’t really pertain to the matter at hand.” Bruce said, “Dubois Manor is currently being taken care by a group that started to work there… eighteen months ago. Just when the Ripper murders started.”

“Well, what are waiting for?.” Buffy said. “There may still be somebody alive there.”

“I need some additional equipment.” Bruce said, before turning to Dawn, “You can go upstairs, it’s quite late.”

“And stay awake worried for you and Buffy? Not a chance.” Dawn said.

 

Ma Hunkel didn't panic when the crew-cut blonde aimed at her with a pistol. It wasn't the first time that she had been threatened by a gunman, and frankly, these two weren't all that scary compared to some of the people who had been after her in the past.

She then noticed that the other man had pursed his lips when his partner had aimed the weapon at her. ‘Interesting.’ She thought. It seemed that these two weren’t exactly in the same page.

But it would be better to play along for now, maybe they would let slip something, so she opened her eyes wide and managed to say, faking a convincing frightened tone:

"But... but... I have told you the truth. No goth teenager had been lodged here in the last days." she said, adding a shiver for effect, "A girl came this morning, but she didn't look like at all like that. And I didn’t let her lodge here without a valid ID."

They seemed to have swallowed it, as the blond muscle lowered the gun, before the other talked again.

"How did she look?" he asked.

"Green eyes, bottle blonde, wearing a gray turtleneck, jeans and boots." Ma said, lying through her teeth, “Ah, and she was carrying a backpack.”

“Something else?” the redhead asked.

“No… wait, she mumbled something about meeting somebody mid way or in Midway when she was leaving.” Ma said.

"Midway? In the Pacific?" Blondie said

"No, probably Midway City, in Michigan." the redhead said. "Anything else, Mrs. Hunkel?."

"Nothing that I can recall.” She said, and then added when the blonde raised his weapon again, “Really, I’m telling you the truth!.”

“I believe you.” Blondie said with an ugly smile, before shooting her twice in the chest. She fell on the floor, just before her seat.

“Godammit, Trent.” Lang said. “It was necessary?”

“Yeah, you heard her, she had friends in the local FBI office.” Trent answered, with a shrug, “Better this that having the feds after us.”

“You deal with Trask after this. I guess he isn’t going to be very happy with you.” Lang said, rolling his eyes as he followed his partner toward the exit door.

They left Ma Hunkel lying on the floor, and it was not long before the car left the street. Ma took a deep breath when she heard them leaving and sat on the floor, examining the marks that the bullets had left on the bulletproof fabric. It hadn't penetrated it, but given the pain she was feeling, it was going to leave a couple of bruises.

But at least she already had a name, Trask. She had to call Rex and Carter about this, before she went to join Rogue on Jay's safe house.

 

“Damn it. So whoever is killing people there, has control over all the approaches?” Garner asked.

“Not all of them.” Jones said, after a pause. “There is an underground tunnel, part of a unfinished command bunker complex. During the construction of the Triskelion, Director Carter decided to keep it as an alternate entry or escape route in case of a lock-down. And the more important thing about it is that no one of the current SHIELD leadership knows about it.”

“How is that possible?”

“Long story short: politics.” Jones said, a hint of bitterness on his voice. “You would have to sign NDAs by the wazoo to be told the rest.”

“Okay.” Lane said, rolling his eyes, “Where it is located?”

“That’s the thing, the bunker was supposed to go partially under the Potomac, and the entry to the tunnel is in the other side of the river.” Jones said, “And I don’t know how well preserved it is after... what happened. For all that I know, the roof could have crumbled and it could have been filled with water.”

Inside the Triskelion. Roughly at the same time.​

The SHIELD agent with the deep scar in his face sighed and looked at his companions in this hiding place. He was the only one with combat experience, as most of them were administrative and technical personnel. When everything had gone South, he had managed to get some of the people of his section, where he had been doing administrative work until the doctor confirmed he was totally recovered, out of the way. But their little hideout wouldn’t remain secure much longer.

“We could go to Underground Level Three.” Said one of the paperpushers, a man in his late ‘40s, “There is an old storage area there, full of old files. I don’t think that nobody else had been there in the last decade.”

“And how do you know that?”

“Ah… sometimes I go there to smoke.” The man said, sheepishly. “I keep away from the files, honest!”

The field agent didn’t answer, while mentally reviewing the floorplans of the Triskelion, to see if there was some way to go to the lower levels, without attracting undue attention. He could do it easily, he was already a very experienced spec ops soldier even before being recruited by SHIELD. Though with this gaggle of civilians… he didn’t like the odds.

But he liked less the fact that the butchers that were roaming the corridors right now would shoot first and ask questions later if they discovered them first. He had seen it all the time with his former boss, may he rot in Hell for all Eternity

‘Okay, John, back to the present, the past is the past and you can’t change it. The best option would be…’ he was thinking as he elaborated the plan in his head.

 

DuBois Manor. Close to midnight​

Sidney awoke suddenly when the door to her cell opened suddenly. The Moon light that filtered through the small window of her cell illuminated two people... no, not people, as she noticed the ridged faces and yellow eyes. More like monsters. One looked like a big man dressed in business clothes, who acted subserviently to the other, a black haired woman dressed in a black t-shirt and pants ensemble.

"Pathetic." She said with a sneer, speaking with a southern accent. "You should have fed her better. She'll have to do, though. But I'll supervise personally the next batch, understood?"

"Yes, Mistress Dala." He said, producing a dart gun from a pocket in his jacket.

"No, keep her awake. I want to savor the fear in her blood, when we drain her." She said, licking her lips.

The man nodded and went toward her, taking her by the neck, while with the other he was opening the manacles. After that, with a single movement, he put her on his shoulder and carried her through the corridors until they reached a big room with several people..., no, several monsters. They were in a circle around a dais with chains on it, chains much like the one in her cell.

With a shiver she realized that they were to chain her there, and then the monsters would do... whatever they had done to the others. And given that they were looking at her like she was a piece of meat... she shivered again, realizing that she wasn't going to get out of here alive. She tried to fight against her captor, but the monster chuckled and grabbed her tighter. Even if she had been at full strength she couldn't have get out of the grip, the monster was too strong.

As they reached the center of the dais, the monster put her on the floor, and kept her in place while the female monster manacled her wrists. She scratched with her long, sharp fingernails on her neck, letting out a bit of blood that the female mon... the vampiress, she ralized, licked with her tongue.

"Hmm... fear and despair, I can taste it in your blood, girl." She said, licking her lips. Then she turned to the other vampires and said, "You know the rules, everyone gets a bite, and the one to drain her fully is the one that will bury the corpse, understood? Well, then, fellow servants of our august Master..."

"...bator." said a female voice over them

"Who dares?" she said looking up, only to see two figures jumping in front of the assembled vampires. She recognized one of the figures immediately. "The Bat!"

"And what I am? Chopped liver?" the other figure, a petite blonde woman, clad in a baggy black hoodie, black pants and boots, said in an aggrieved tone, producing two big knives from somewhere inside the hoodie.

 

"And what I am, chopped liver?" Buffy said, her eyes never leaving the assembled vampires.

"The Golden Slayer." Hissed the vampires in the dais.

Batman quickly assessed the situation as he got up from the jump from the hole in the upper floor, there were fifteen vampires. All of them were on what Buffy had called their game face, so they wouldn't hold back. Neither should he.

For a moment, after Buffy's quip, things stood in an impasse, but the innate aggressiveness of the vampires won and they attacked the pair. Buffy found herself facing no less than ten of the vampires, while four others focused on him.

His first hits had not much effect and he barely escaped the hold of one of the vampires. He berated himself mentally, he was not fighting men, but monsters out of nightmares.

"What are you doing, Batsy? We don't have all night!" Buffy said as she was dispatching the third of the vampires that were fighting her, who despite seemingly being better fighters than usual they were only slowing her down.

He didn't answer, but he shifted gears mentally and activated a device in the heavier than usual gauntlets that he was wearing. The short wings on the gauntlets lengthened and sharpened and the next vampire he hit found himself shaking from the electric charge of the built-in tasers in the knuckles, and another had barely time to gasp before the wings cut his neck.


The vampiress looked at the fight, and frowned, ignoring Sydney's struggles to free herself from the chains, and with good reason, as the chains were too strong and were too well lodged onto the floor to even budge a bit with the strength that a half-starved young woman could exert.

The vampiress then turned to her, a calculating look in her face, and smiled. Sydney then realized that this was it. She was going to die here, just when people had come into her rescue. She just knew that it was impossible for her to survive tonight.

And then, the impossible happened. At the same time that in another continent a young woman died by a werehyena before her lover, she heard a voice, the voice of a young woman speaking in a Cali accent, asking her:

'Do you want to be strong?'

"Yes." She said aloud, and she felt... weird, but also, strong, as if she could lift a mountain over her head. She pulled from the chains, and the metal groaned, until, suddenly, the chains snapped.

The vampiress stood there for a moment with an expression of incredulity, looking back between Sydney and the Slayer.

"Fuck it, Nick was right. This changes everything." She said, before turning into a bat and fleeing into the darkness.

 

Keystone City.​

The taxi arrived to the address that Ma had given her, a small apartment building just outside a zone of the city that seemed to be completely surrounded by thick concrete walls. She shrugged and went to the second floor.

The apartment gewas well kept, although the furniture looked to be a bit old, as was the TV in the living room. One of the rooms seemed to be a complete chemical lab, weirdly enough, and the books seemed to be all science related, except for a single and a dog-eared old-looking copy of a book called "Behind the Mask", by a guy called John Law.

She lied down on the bed, thinking about what she had to do tomorrow. The idea of going to Topeka didn't appeal to her, but frankly, with the FBI going after her, she didn't have many options, other than trust what Irene had ready for her. Maybe tomorrow Irene would have sent something. She closed her eyes. It had been a long day, and sleep soon claimed her...

She stood inside a cathedral-like building made of crystal. A young black haired man with the bluest eyes she had ever seen, dressed in a flannel shirt, a burgundy leather jacket, and jeans was talking to her, but she couldn't hear the words, because of the intense cold she was feeling. The man bopped his forehead, and removed his jacket, putting it over her shoulders. When he did that, she felt... safe, and looked back at him with a smile in her lips...

He was gone, as it was the crystalline building, and the jacket. But she was not feeling the cold anymore. She was in a fighting stance against a dark haired woman, who smirked and attacked her faster than she believed possible. She could barely block her and the hit hurt a lot. She braced herself for the next hit…

The girl was nowhere to be seen now, instead she was in a dark corridor, stepping back from some kind of purple… slimy… thing, with glowing red eyes that extended a dripping hand to her. Suddenly the hand was on her shoulder and she screamed…

…Just to awake in the bed with Ma Hunkle trying to wake her.

“Sorry, a nightmare.” Rogue said, and by the light that filtered through the window it was already early in the morning. “What time is it?”

“7:30, and I called one of my sons to take care of the inn this morning.” Ma said.

“Did the FBI agents arrive.” Rogue asked, as they walked to the small kitchen.

“Twice. The first time they were fakes, probably the same people that are after you and Irene.” Ma said, serving herself a cup of tea, “The second time, I repeated what I said them and informed them of the fakes. As they were leaving, Fred called and told me that it had been some hacker sending a fake warning, as the central office has no record of sending it.”

“And you believe it?”

“Well, the fakes seemed to be surprised that I had received a call from the local FBI office.” Ma said, “And you?”

“Fine, actually. What is with the walled area, though? There is nothing inside.” Rogue said, curious.

 

Wanted to do something different this time, looking at how the not-quite-AI of the drone would "think".

---

Kansas cornfields. Close to Smallville.​

The drone had been pursuing its last objective for 29.7 millicycles. The damage sustained in the crash on the surface of the unknown planet had been more destructive than originally estimated and the self-diagnosis programs estimated that it would be 152.7 millicycles of continued activity until the fissures grew to a size that would threaten the structural integrity of the drone.

It revised the estimated time until completion of the task, if no external factors intervened. The primitive combustion engine powering the conveyance that was carrying the objective would consume its last fuel in 59.7 millicycles. The drone would then reach it in 2.3 millicycles. If the primitives carried the objective further, the probe estimated 6.4 additional millicycles until the termination of the objective. The drone AI deemed it was acceptable, but it prepared the infiltration mode for detachment, just in case.

7.8 millicycles passed until the vehicle driver made a sub-optimal decision and steered it too much to the right, causing it to fall into a small body of water. As it seemed that the vehicle engine had stopped, the drone kept its pace toward them ignoring the aerial vehicles coming up at great altitude. It only had a few moments to register the detachment of primitive chemically powered missiles, before they impacted on its surface.

The damage would have been negligible if the probe was intact, but on its current weakened state, the explosions had worsened the damage suffered in the crash, reducing the time until structural integrity failure to 98.2 millicycles, and allowing the primitives time to restart the vehicle and continue the chase. Another pass by the same vehicles using chemically launched metallic projectiles further reduced the operating time to 91.6 millicycles, before they disappeared.

The self-diagnostic subroutines informed the drone's decision program that the attack had damaged its structural integrity, causing it to slow its advance adding another 14.2 millicycles to the project pursuing time. As it was processing this, its sensor warned it that a different group of aerial vehicles was approaching from the opposite direction of the first one, and it would reach the location in another 12.3 millicycles.

If the new group of vehicles was similarly armed to the last, it would severely jeopardize the completion of the mission, so it decided to detach the infiltration unit. Following pre-programmed protocols, the unit would burrow under the surface and activate if the main unit was disabled.

 

DuBois Manor​

Batman's strategy of approaching the manor by foot had been successful, as well as her idea to go first through the clearly abandoned upper levels. Buffy had been ready to launch a silver throwing knife to the vampire leader when she had felt it, the death of a Slayer and the activation of another. And just afterwards, the girl who had been prepared as the main course by the vamps, snapped the chains holding her as if they were made of tinfoil.

The head vampires, after looking both at her and the girl with a confuse expression, had turned into a bat and fled, something that set a Snake-Mayor sized alarm bell on her head.

'I thought that only Dracula could do that.' she thought, just as she dispatched the last vamps. 'Things to check later with Giles.'

She ran toward the newly empowered Slayer, opened the manacles and removed them from her wrists.

“Were those...?" the girl asked.

"Vampires? Yeah, pretty much. And you have been just empowered as a Vampire Slayer." Buffy said, "There used to be only one, but recently we changed the rules.” She looked around for a moment, stopping at Batman who was looking at them with an unreadable expression.

“Do you work with him?” the girl said, a bit of fear on her voice.

“I only met him today, but he doesn’t look like bad people.” Buffy said, before reaching a decision and saying, “Look, I can give you the usual song and dance about how the world is older that you know, and all that jazz that sounds way better said by a stuffy and tweedy Englishman, but that bitch could be coming back with friends at any moment.”

It was with some difficulty, that they managed to get out of the manor, to the Batmobile that had, upon a signal from Batman, self driven from its hiding place to the front of the manor. After accommodating the girl behind the seats, she quickly fell asleep.

“Did you do something to her?” Buffy said, frowning.

“A mild anesthetic gas. On a normal person it would keep them asleep for three to five hours.” Batman said, “I wouldn’t normally had done it, but I need to ask you some questions, and better not to be overheard.”

“She’ll stay asleep for an hour tops, then.” Buffy commented, as she sat on the passenger seat, “Very well, ask away.”

“I was under the impression that when you, as you said, ‘changed the rules’, you activated every Potential Slayer in the world.” Batman said.

“That was our intention, but well, the old Council fucked it up.” Buffy said, “Not a great surprise there.” She took a deep breath before continuing, “Will had to use the spellwork they used to locate Potentials as a base for the activation spell, and it turned out that the Council had put the bar too high in the selection. So, there is a fuckton of Potential Slayers out there, and when one of the Slayers that got activated by the spell, dies…”

“They become newly activated Slayers.” Batman completed, “It is normal to have another Slayer present?.”

“Not at all, I suspect that the Powers that Be are feeling clever again, with this crap.”

“Powers that Be?”

“Lazy, manipulative assholes, who claim to be the Big Good, but leave the footwork of saving the world in the hands of yours truly.”

 

"Lazy, manipulative assholes, who claim to be the Big Good, but leave the footwork of saving the world in the hands of yours truly." Buffy said, "I was the typical Cali teenager, only thinking of clothes, boys and my upcoming sweet sixteen. And then, I was thrust with that responsibility. What kind of madman would think that I was world-saving material?"

"But in the end it worked out."

"Sometimes, it was more luck than anything. Other times, it was the help of my friends." Buffy said, "But at the end it was me, the girl with the power. When I thought that I had everything under control, the world threw me one curve ball after another." She then smiled weakly, "Not to speak of the effect on my love life. My first love? Vampire. My first long relationship? A wannabe Captain America with self-confidence issues. And then I died."

This prompted a raised eyebrow from Batman.

"I got better." She then winced, "That sounded straight from Monty Python, didn't it?"

Batman nodded.

"But it's true. Willow managed to resurrect me, but it was a one-time deal, and it had consequences." Buffy said, "I was near suicidal and very self-destructive for months afterwards, Wills had to deal with addiction problems, Xander and her fiancee broke up just as they were about to marry... I could go on and on."

"The world is never going to be fair, but we fight on regardless." Batman said, "Because every person we save, every life we protect, every children who can grow with their parents, it counts."

"If nothing we do matters then all what matters is what we do." Buffy said, "Angel said that to me, after the sinking of Sunnydale. But enough of the heavy stuff, where are you going to leave her?"

"Leslie Thompkins, an old friend of Thomas Wayne, has a clinic on Crime Alley. She has helped me sometimes." Batman said, "She doesn't fully approve of what I do, but she helps... and there is somebody else I have to call."

G.C.P.D. HQ​

Captain James Gordon was in the washroom, washing his hands, when the "new message" tone from his cellphone startled him. He quickly dried his hands and looked at it. It only said TWMC and Ripper, with no sending address. The Bat has probably found some clue about the Ripper. He really hoped that it was, Loeb was looking for an excuse to get him out of Major Crimes, now that he was proving to be even more of a thorn in the side of the mob that he was before.

He quickly erased the message, knowing from past experiences that the Bat wouldn't have left a trail of what he had just done. Now, what it was TWMC? Ah, yes, Thomas Wayne Memorial Clinic, Leslie Thompkins clinic in Crime Alley.

 

He passed through the offices of Major Crimes to see if Harv was still there, and indeed he was there, glaring at the paperwork in his desk.

But before he could say anything, his cellphone rang. When he looked the Caller ID, it was Dr Thompkins. He suppressed a smile, the Bat was always one step further than everybody.

"Yes, Doctor Thompkins?" he said, playing his part on the charade. "What can I do for you?"

"Less than five minutes ago a girl entered the ER claiming to have been a prisoner for the last six weeks, and that her captors had killed at least six other people."

He frowned. At first sight it didn't seem to have anything to do with the Ripper, but...

"Very well, ma'am. Detective Bullock and I will be there as soon as possible." He said.

They said goodbye, and when he cut the call Bullock was looking at him.

"So, Crime Alley again?" Bullock said, "Sometimes I wonder about you and the good doctor."

Jim rolled his eyes, good natured or not, Harv jibes about his newly found single status after his divorce still stung a little. Besides, the one time they went in a date... it just didn't work, they were better as friends.

“Sorry, Harv, but it’s business…”

While on the way to the parking lot, Gordon explained what Doctor Thompkins had told him, keeping the call from Batman to himself. Bullock didn’t like much the vigilante, although he had grudgingly recognized that he was at least doing more to fight the scum that half of the police department.

Harvey drove them, he knew more shortcuts through the twisting maze of narrow streets, helped by the police siren in the dashboard. When they arrived to Crime Alley, Jim looked to the side, where a small plaque could be seen.

“Yeah, the Waynes were good people, I wonder what they think about their son the playboy, wherever they are.” Bullock said, “He looked like a good kid back then.”

“People change.” Jim said, not wanting to reminisce about those times. The Wayne’s murders had been his first case in Gotham, and he still couldn’t shake the feeling that there had been more to it than a mugging gone wrong.

The clinic was in front of the memorial plaque, and Doctor Leslie Thompkins, a grey-haired woman around Gordon’s own age was waiting for them.

 

Watchers HQ. Scotland.​

Isabella "Izzy" Ferguson didn't look like the usual Watcher. For one, she wouldn’t be caught dead wearing tweed and in fact she rocked a Goth look, although she dyed her hair a vibrant red, and for other, she had treated the Potentials she had been charged with as people, not as potential tools. Of course that meant that she had been given the boot as soon as possible under Travers... and hence, that she had been one of the few veteran Watchers who had survived the bombing.

Naturally, that meant that until the kids got some experience, she was stuck manning the fort on the new HQ. And so, she was the one to answer the phone when Buffy Summers called... or at least somebody emulating the erstwhile Slayer phone.

"Bramsworth Castle School.” she said, using the established cover for the Castle facilities, “Our office hours are…”

"Hey, Izzy, it's Buffy." a voice she knew well cut her, "And don’t get your panties on a twist, Fergie."

Izzy couldn't avoid sighing in relief. She had used the codewords to mean that everything was well, and that nobody was listening.

"Consider my knickers unbunched, Buff." she answered, using her part of the code. "I presume that this is not a social call."

"Nope, I managed to track the Bowery Ripper, with the help of the Batman, and it turned to be a nest of vamps playing musical draining chairs with their prisoners." Buffy said, the disgust evident in his voice, "The thing is that the last prisoner, was Called when we were just there, and you know what that means."

"I'll start to check on all our teams abroad, starting with…”

“Please, start with Xander team in Africa, the girl said something about dreaming with the savannah just before she was carried to be drained." Buffy said, a bit too quickly.

“You’re worried?” Izzy asked.

“Yeah, well, he’s got Faith and Ayesha with him, but I got a bad feeling about this.” Buffy explained.

“Okay, I have been long enough in this business to dismiss a Slayer gut feeling.” Izzy admitted.

"Thank you.” Buffy said, relieved, “Ah, can you get Andrew and the rest of the Geek Squad to check on the Dubois family from Gotham? They should start with Nicholas and Dala, brother and sister, in the 1850s. I think that those two were turned, and now they are pulling 'I'm my own granpa' for real."

"Okay, I'll call them. Anything else?”

“Not right now, but I’ll call you again if I remember something.” Buffy said, “If something comes about what I asked, we can be reached on Wayne Manor.”

Thomas Wayne Memorial Clinic. Crime Alley. Gotham City.​

Jim Gordon walked onto a balcony that opened over an inner patio of the building. He was craving another cigarette, so he took a candy from his pocket. It did help somewhat, although he knew that when he came back to his apartment he had to apply another nicotine patch.

“Rough day, Captain Gordon?” said a gruff voice from above.

“The same as always, Batman. This city…” He said with a sigh, without looking up. “Now, I have seen enough things to know that there was something weird at work here, that the girl is keeping mum about it.”

Batman silence spoke volumes.

“I thought so, and you can’t tell me about it.” Gordon said.

“No, I’m sorry, but I have a source that tells me that it won’t repeat.” Batman answered.

“Not happy about this, but I’ll take what I can get.” Gordon said, “Where was she kept?”

“Dubois manor.” Batman said, “In the countryside. Get a SWAT team with your people, just in case.”

 

"It happened a decade ago. A couple blocks of the city simply disappeared overnight." Ma said, "Nobody knows what happened there. After months of investigation some Federal agency dictated that it would be better to simply wall the zone. Something about radiation."

"And that's all?" Rogue said, "How many people were lost?"

"Too many. All my family was spared, thanks God, but I lost a couple of good friends, Jay and his wife Joan."

"But...“ she started to say, but whatever she was going to say was lost, when the doorbell interrupted them.

They looked at each other, wondering who could it be. Ma went to look through the peephole to see who it was.

"Mercury Messages?" she said, with a confused expression. She left the chain on and opened the door.

"Abigail Hunkle?" said the message boy.

"Yes? Who it is?"

"I have a package for you, from a... Sherrell Moriarty?"

She opened the door, took the package, and signed on the order. After he went his way, Ma closed the door and brought the package to the kitchen table.

"Who is Sherell Mo...?" Rogue said, trailing off when she noticed the name combination, "It's from Irene, isn't it? She loves her Sherlock Holmes references."

"Yeah, and that was the name she was using when I met her." Ma said as she opened the package.

Inside there was another note, a bus ticket and a cellphone. Rogue took the note before Ma could do anything about it, and started to read it silently.


Dear Marie, the Walled Area in Keystone City is something that nobody can resolve in the present. But, don’t worry, the person who will undo what happened will appear soon, like a bolt from the blue.

The bus ticket is for the last bus out of Central City today, take it. And the cellphone has in the memory a few numbers of people who can help you, if you are in trouble in Kansas.

Another thing, this is the last time you will hear of me for a long while. There is a person I must talk with, about something that I have seen in the future, and try to talk him out of something he is planning to do.

Love, Irene

 

Over the Potomac river from the Triskelion​

One of the Rangers squads had entered the tunnel and was in communication with the base camp set in the entry. As Lane was the one in effective command of the Rangers deployed ehre, he was directing the squad through radio, as well as the two members of the HRT team added just in case, and receiving their reports.

“According to my people, the tunnel seems to be well preserved...” Lane started to say, informing Jones of the situation, "Hold on, there is a big steel door at the end, no keypad or anything." Lane said.

"They were supposed to open from inside." Gabe said, thinking, "But, if I remember correctly, there was a quick release mechanism, mounted on the frame. Tell them to look for a maintenance access."

"...They found it." Lane said a few minutes later, "And they have opened it...there is a wall... Plaster apparently."
Lane said, "They are going to try to have a look with a mini camera... There are people inside, armed."

"Can they transmit the signal here?" Gabe asked

"One moment" Lane said, before giving instructions, turning on a small screen, and motioning Gabe to get closer. "Do any of them look familiar?"

"Not really, they look like administrative... one moment, that thin guy, he looks familiar..." Gabe said, getting closer, before opening his eyes wide, and saying, loudly, "Good God, it's John Lynch!"

"Good or bad news?" Lane asked.

"Good. I'm not going to enter into details, because they are very classified, but there is no way that he is part of whatever is happening in the upper levels." he said, obviously relieved, and then he noticed John shifting his stance, "And, if I'm not wrong, he have just noticed your camera."

Triskelion subbasement level​

The room was surprisingly defensible, and once they had rearranged a few file cabinets to provide better cover, he was pretty sure to be able to hold it here for quite a while. They even had managed to scrounge food and water on the way, courtesy of the snack machines in a rest area they had passed on the way here. So, in short, they were ready to resist quite a bit here.

Then, why he was so worried about the back wall? It was a persistent feeling that there was something there, not unlike the 'flashes' that he had got since IO had experimented on his team. He frowned. He was not sure, but he had thought he had heard some mechanical noise from there. And now some scratching noises.

There! An fiber optic camera thrust through a small hole in the wall. It was clear that someone was there, on the other side. He picked a notebook and quickly wote, after signaling the others to take cover, 'WHO ARE YOU?'

As an answers he got a series of knocks. Morse code. A...R...M...Y, and after a pause, another set of knocks, H...R...T. Relieved, he got near the hole and spoke to it.

"John Lynch, SHIELD. Please, identify yourself." he said.

"Lieutenant Somoza, U.S. Army Rangers, with me there is a platoon of Rangers, and agents Wright ans Stokes, FBI." said a voice with a slight Hispanic accent.

 

“Okay.” Gordon said. Something in the tone of the answer, and its own nature, as Gordon always questioned his suggestions, made Batman give him a closer look. His expression made it clear, to him at least, that his mind was elsewhere.

“Jim, you seem distracted.” Batman said. “Something wrong?”

“No, why do you ask?” Jim said

"You haven't even asked why you would need the SWAT team, for example." Batman said

Jim unwrapped another candy before he answered the question.

“Sorry, when I was coming here I got a call from Chicago” Gordon said, "Barbara is coming back to Gotham.”

"Barbara, your niece and adopted daughter, not your ex-wife, I presume." Batman said, unsurprisingly well-informed about Gordon family situation, and prompting a nod from Gordon. "I thought she was sixteen."

"She is sixteen.” Gordon remarked “I always knew she was smarter than anyone else that I know, except possibly you, but it turns out that she is a certified genius. She has managed to skip a couple courses in High School in Chicago, and is coming back here to study something to do with computers.” He then removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes, “Frankly, I don't know what has possessed her to come back here, to the madness of this city."

"Maybe because you are here. She and your ex never really got along, if I remember correctly." Batman said, and added when Jim looked at him inquisitively, "There were a few very public altercations. Add to that the body language when both of them were together, and it's easy to read between lines."

Jim nodded, acknowledging his point. It had been clear since she was a kid that Babs had fully inherited the Gordon temper, and Barbara’s own problematic character didn’t help things.

"I don't have much family left, Batman. Barbara’s parents, Roger and Thelma died in a car crash, my sister Jess is an alcoholic, and she has a son that I have never met." Jim said, "I would prefer to know that Barbara and James Jr. are safely away, than to have any of them here in danger." he paused for a moment before continuing, "But what can I do?."

 

"But what can I do?" Gordon asked, rhetorically.

An awkward silence followed, until James spoke again.

"I heard that you were involved in the Monarch Chemicals explosion tonight." James said, clearly trying to steer the talk out of personal matters. "Alongside a young woman in black. I thought you worked alone."

"It's a one-off thing. She had business in Gotham and we helped each other." Batman said, and then he remembered something, "One of the men caught is a metahuman, he calls himself Blackout. He is faster and stronger than a normal human, and can generate a... cloud of complete darkness around him."

"I'll see if I can make those idiots listen before he manages to escape." he said, "What happened there?"

"A group of chemists and lab technicians from the old plant had set up a drug lab on the premises, and the Red Hood tried to muscle in. We intervened, and it turned out that the Red Hood had always been a decoy, Smilin' Jack being the real brains behind the Red Hood." Batman said, "I chased him to a corridor over the vats where the residues of the chemicals spilled the day of the fire, the one that closed the plant, had been stored, and one of Jack's bodyguards tried to shoot me there, precisely in the place where the air was saturated with flammable gases. Jack, the bodyguard and a hostage were caught in the center of the explosion"

A dead-end, close to Crime Alley
​

Doctor Leslie Thompkins went to take a look outside. She had a hunch on who the woman could be who had helped Bruce in his mad crusade tonight, and wanted to try to talk her out of following him. And there she was, leaning on Bruce's car was a young blonde woman who immediately noticed her arrival, and tried to hide herself further into her hoodie.

"I can see you just fine... Buffy Anne Summers." she said.

With a defeated expression, she lowered the hood and looked at the woman, and did a double take.

"I know you... you were the woman that took our blood, all those years ago."

"Yes, that was me, Doctor Leslie Thompkins. Thomas thought that it would attract a lot less attention if I ordered the analysis, instead of him." she said.

"But didn't you used to have grey hair?" Buffy asked looking at her dark hair.

"Clairol. I was already greying when I was in college. And I dye my hair when I feel like it." She said with a smile, that vanished in an instant, "How did Bruce get you involved in this?"

Buffy looked at her with a confused expression before starting to laughing out loud.

"This is not a laughing matter, girl!. Bruce may be decided to go down this path, but..."

"Do you really think that Bruce put me to this?" Buffy said, mirthfully. "Leslie, I have been patrolling since I was fifteen."

She suddenly jumped impossibly high and landed on the scaffolding over the side door that Leslie had used.

"I have been given this gifts to fight creatures out of nightmares." Buffy said, "Long before Bruce donned the cowl, I was already fighting them."

 

Leslie looked up incredulously for a moment, before sighing, and saying:

"Can you get down? So we can discuss this over a hot coffee?"

As an answer Buffy slid down the scaffolding until she stood before the doctor.

"Let's go." she said.

A few minutes later, they were both in an unused wardroom. Leslie having managed to prepare a passable cappuccino for Buffy, while she got her usual Navy-style black coffee, a taste inherited from her father.

"Not bad, doctor." Buffy commented, sipping from her cup.

"I worked part-time as a barista to pay my career. I mean, I had a scholarship, but it didn’t pay for everything." she said with a shrug, "Your mother loved coffee with cream and a touch of black chocolate... What is she doing now, by the way? Last thing I heard from her was that she was in the hospital, around three years ago."

Buffy closed her eyes for a moment. Time and her own experiences with death had dulled the pain, but it was still there.

"She had a brain tumor. The doctors managed to extract it, but there were... complications." she said, flatly.

"I'm sorry.” Leslie said sympathetically. 'Good job, Leslie.' she thought, berating herself for the faux-pas. "I had no idea..."

An awkward silence followed, until Buffy decided to break it.

"How was she, my mother, I mean, in college?" she asked.

"I didn't know her all that well back then, really. It was more that we had common friends, Thomas and Martha, than anything." Leslie said, "But she seemed to light a room when she entered it, as if she had brought a bit of California with her." She smiled for a moment in remembrance, and then she pursed her lips, "And then Old Man Wayne had to stick his oar."

"Patrick Wayne, Thomas' father, I suppose." Buffy said, "Mom called him Old Man Wayne in a letter she left us."

"Yes. I heard that they called him Old Man Wayne even when he was young, because he was really old-fashioned, 'born in the wrong century' were the textual words." Leslie said, "I never met him, so I can't say how real it was. You should ask Silas about him, if you are interested."

"Silas?"

"Silas Wayne, Patrick's much younger brother." Leslie said, "But this is getting away what I wanted to discuss with you."

"About my gifts." Buffy said with a sigh, "Do you believe in the supernatural?"

'Oh, God.' Leslie thought, flashing back to a rather unpleasant incident back when she was in college.

"Vampires, isn't it?" Leslie said, placing her hand on her forehead, "And, no, I'm not humoring you. I minored in forensics in college, and, well..."

"Oh, yeah, I get the picture." Buffy said, "How bad was it?

"Not very bad, but it was a real scary thing, seeing its eyes open and its face morph into that fucking ridged thing." Leslie said with a shiver "After my professor drove a stick on its heart, he gave me a lecture about vamps, and what I should do if I notice a corpse with those signals."

"Good, good. That professor saved your life, and more." Buffy said, "And yes, well, for thousands of years, there has been a girl given enhanced strength, agility and resilience, as well as more exotic gifts, to deal with vampires and other supernatural pests. That girl is called the Vampire Slayer or Slayer for short."

 

A few minutes later, after Buffy had explained succinctly what being the Slayer meant, as well as her story as such, leaving out some details, like her death and resurrection. Leslie was beyond livid, she was furious.

"Those fucking old men, how dare they...?"

"Because that was the way they had always done things, as stupid as it sounds. Barely any support, beyond a stuffy Watcher, and if you were one of the Potentials that escaped through the cracks, like me, well, tough shit, you learn on the job, hope that you survive the experience." Buffy said, her voice heavy with sarcasm.

Leslie was going to retort something when she noticed something in the way she had phrased things.

“You are talking about them on in the past tense.” She said.

"Did you hear about the club that was blown in London almost a year ago?” Buffy said, and when Leslie nodded, she explained, “It was Watcher Central. The big cheeses and a lot of the middle size ones became dust in the wind in the explosion. I never liked the bastards, but even they didn’t deserve that.”

“But you have some support structure, right?” Leslie said, an idea starting to take shape in her mind.

“You see, the Watchers that didn't toe the line were given a stern warning, and then, if they didn't follow the party line, kicked out.” Buffy explained, “Thanks to all those ex-Watchers, and the survivors from the old Council who agreed to the new status quo, we are establishing a new Watchers and Slayers Council."

"But how did that started out?” Leslie wondered aloud, “Why it is always teen girls?"

"Beats me, even after having talked once with the Shadowmen..." Buffy said with a shrug,

"The what?"

"The Shadowmen. A group of Bronze Age Shamans too full of themselves." Buffy said, and then added, to clear Leslie evident confusion, "Remember what I said about more exotic abilities? Having dreams of things pasts and things to come is one of them." Buffy stood up, and paced the room, "You see, once I dreamed of how the first Slayer was created, and it was not pretty. At least things are better now."

“I can see that with all that many Slayers, any Watcher would think twice of trying to reinstate the old ways.” Leslie commented, “And then you came to Gotham and met Bruce on his 'night job'."

"Yeah, I can see why this city needs somebody like him. But all that gear must have cost a pretty penny." Buffy said, "I wonder if he'll share some of it."

"Maybe, but he can also help openly. I figure that you have some NGO as a cover for some of your activities." Leslie said.

"Yeah, in between learning a completely different system of magic, Willow is helping Andrew and Giles to set the whole shebang." Buffy said, “It’s supposed to be set as a chain of All-Girl Academies throughout the world. We haven’t yet decided on the name, though.”

"Talk to Bruce about it, he could funnel some money into it through one of the charitable foundations that he chairs." Leslie said.