But we left a good tip." I quipped.
I strode down the stairs, while Freddie hung back and left. It's an old routine for us, focus on the big bad supervillain, please, and ignore the unremarkable thug. Albeit one that should hopefully be made a lot easier by my new and eye-catching attire.
Though, apparently a routine of limited utility against Harvey Bullock and the sharp boys of the major crimes unit, as they keep him carefully in sight. Then, at least parts of the GCPD know Freddie has superpowers, if not the extent of what he can do. I think they think he has some low-level magnetic powers, maybe some extra strength. If they only knew...
Still, it's not like they can't be wrong in their priorities. Bullock is intent on the two rings on my left hand, not the glove on my right. Still, not looking for a fight. I have the luxury of letting them make the first aggressive moves, since Freddie can stop bullets if he's ready for them.
Harvey steps up, big guy in a trenchcoat and hat, like he was the Thing on walkabout, and makes a show of squinting at my face.
"Bookworm? Why, I hardly knew ya. Nice digs, by the way. Out for a night on the town? Got out of Arkham and you feel like celebrating? Maybe have a fireworks display?"
I smiled.
"Officer Bullock! I simply came out to dine to celebrate my early release from.... from the service of the state." Which technically doesn't work with Arkham being an asylum and not a prison, but shut up, the Blues Brothers was too much a part of my childhood to pass up the opportunity. Besides, Harvey here makes a great straight man. "That done, I was thinking it's a nice evening for a walk. See the city all over again, enjoy being a free man with freedom and an exhaustive list of rights. How about you?"
I gesture at the door.
"Are you and all your work buddies eating out? Or did you just drop in to harass poor honest citizens?"
Harvey visibly relaxes. You never quite know what's going on in that guy's head, but I'm guessing he just realized we won't be fighting. He doesn't lower his guard, exactly, but he does pull out what I think is a half-smoked cigar and stick it in his mouth. Is that a thing people do? Save half a smoke? He doesn't light it though.
"Harass? Now would I do that to you?" Having just put the stogie in his mouth, now he pulls it out. Of course! "We're just checking in, providing a cautionary word to keep your nose clean. Be a real shame to send you right back to Arkham when you've just got out. Besides, people around here, they get nervous when they see someone dressed up like the circus. You might want to watch that. Still, I'm serious. Love the suit."
He gives a glance and a nod to one of the officers off to the side, and the police start slowly packing it up.
Hmm....
Wasn't exactly the plan, but there's a news crew right there. A couple, actually. Perception matters now. Well I try and avoid making decisions out of pride as a rule, I don't think I can let him get the last word and slink off and still be a viable candidate. Time to change the script then.
"Actually, could I have your attention please?" I called out to the news crews some distance back. They already have cameras pointed out me and a couple of people with mikes, but thanks to people in Gotham's automatic reaction to the unusual, I'd say I now have their undivided attention. I climb a couple steps back up on the building, to stand over them and be seen.
"My name is John Binder. Some of you know me, some of you don't. But that doesn't really matter. All of you know what's been going on in this city. You know that the jobs are leaving, but the rich are getting richer while the average person just gets hungrier. You know that exceptional criminals can terrorize and murder us in job lots, and six, seven months later they escape, they get released, and do it all over again. You know that a colorful, rotating cast of politicians have promised to make things better and delivered nothing. Bupkis. Goose egg. Cero.
"I cannot abide that. Any of you who know me, you know for a man who keeps his word, who's smart and who's tough, and who has trouble standing by when real problems come around. Well, I'll tell you, we have real problems. Yes, I've made some mistakes before. But every one of those was my doing something. Caring, and trying to make a difference. The only people who've never made a mistake are those who never even tried. By that standard, people like Mayor Hull have a great track record, because I've never seen him try and change one thing in this city.
"And that is why, I'm proud to announce, I will be running for mayor this year.
"We're lucky, you know. We live in an age of wonders, where gods walk the earth. We're the first generation to know, for a fact, that aliens exist. That magic exists. That time-travel, and alternate realities exist. The new discoveries made in science and technology in the last twenty years outstrip anything done in the last century.
"So we have to ask ourselves, why hasn't life gotten better? Cheap steel, the train, the car and the plane created thousands of new jobs when invented. The camera, the phone, computers, refrigeration and air conditioning all started as expensive toys of the idle rich, but eventually were available to all of us and improved our quality of life. Making these things, shipping these things, turned our city from that tiny island to a global metropolis. Why is it today's wonders, and things discovered twenty years ago, are still the toys of the rich only? Why?
"I tell you, this has to change. And it will change, if we're smart and we're tough, we can do anything. I am- as far as I know, I am the first open and public wizard to run for public office. Now, magic can't solve all of our problems, not by itself. But you'll be amazed how many problems it can solve, or make easier, or just drag to the level of being solvable. So if you're tired of living in a city where nothing changes, where your vote doesn't matter, one politician is just like another and the Joker can gas you at any moment, if you're sick of running through life like a man late to an appointment, afraid to look forward or back, at least think about voting for me.
If you want a future to look forward to, if you want real change, think about it. If we're smart and if we're tough, most of all if we come together, there's nothing we can't do. Thank you!"
I stepped forward and down. Nobody seemed to feel like asking questions. Though I did clearly hear Harvey talking to his partner, pitched to be heard.
"Mayor Bookworm? Now I have seen everything. How does a freak with a rapsheet as long as his figure to get elected?" I think the other cop said something, but I couldn't hear what.
"Oh well, the Commish will get a laugh over it."
....
I guess I really did let him get the last word in, it being beneath the dignity of my presumed office to respond. So I walked back towards the car trying to look confident while thinking furiously.
How did I expect to pull this one off? I had a detailed plan, of course, but first night and I was already way off-script. This had seemed so much easier in my padded cell at Arkham. Do you want to go back?
No!
So cease your womanly mewlings and ask not if you can succeed, but how you will succeed. Alea iacta est.
"Nice speech, boss." Freddie spoke up from right behind me, startling me a bit from my inner dialogue. "But should we really go home right after it?"
That's.... a fair point. Three things in this life are inevitable. Death, taxes, and after a big public display by one of our crowd, Batman will find them.
I'm pretty sure he knows all about the Burnely place, it's in my own name, for crying out loud! But I don't want Batman in my apartment, looking at my books and rifling through my things. I don't go starting shit at "Stately Wayne Manor," do I? So I expect the same courtesy. Even if Batman has no way whatsoever of knowing what I choose not to do to him.
My feelings don't have to make sense to be valid, okay? Particularly regarding who is and is not allowed in my home. Also, I'm not crazy, you're crazy.
I feel confident in stating that your sanity is far more precarious and questionable than mine. If you're so concerned for your abode, and I cannot imagine why, why not absent yourself from the place?
Good idea. He might still look there, but it will be quick and less intimate.
"Freddie, put that phone of yours to work and see if you can get me a room, preferably a suite, at the Claridge."
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Thirty minutes later, I was in my room, up on the 40th floor. Nice view over most of Diamond, I can see the fancy yacht marine from here, the Ferris wheel and some of the roller coaster at the amusement mile, and that tower must be the new Gotham S.T.A.R. Labs!
I... kind of wrecked the old one. In my defense, they had completely earned that response from me. I gave them U-99 for peace, in case they might need it someday to save the day, not so they could weaponize it's unpleasant effects!
Though, later research revealed that S.T.A.R Gotham had always been a weapons research facility, so maybe that's still on me for just handing it over and trusting them to do good with it. Still the last time I plan on working with S.T.A.R Labs.
Well, enough enjoying the view, it's time to go to work.
Dealing with the Bat is 85% about planning and preparation, controlling the space so at every juncture he's forced to choose between the couple of options you've allowed him. It's speed chess, with a fair bit of improv as he finds the holes in your plans. You have to be able to think like the Bat.
He won't come in the front door and up the elevator. Service entrances are possible, but unlikely this high up. His first choice will be roof access. I can cut that off with some "Bouncing Betty" mines, let some blend in, and a few stand out for easy notice. He could disarm or circumvent them, eventually. But it'll be easier to come in through the window, or in through a nearby window and through the door, adjacent wall, ceiling or floor. Most likely the door or the walls, if he's not planning to take me down with the first strike, but you can never entirely tell. With more time, I could buy up the adjacent rooms and trap them, but
So, holographic decoy in that armchair. I'll be in the corner using the ring for invisibility and open with the Nightstinger- no. Nonlethal only, and I didn't pack the Hand of Thrawn books. Paddle-beamer? Also unavailable. Okay, well enough time should have passed to heal the source of my preferred sidearm, the Type-II Phaser. Simple, intuitive controls, aims amazingly well considering it has no sights, empowered perhaps by years of debate on eye-following technology, can level a small building, melt through rock, vaporize or stun. Lots of options, in this case wide-angle, medium stun.
That will betray rough location. Follow-up immediately with Inescapable Netting if possible. He'll expect invisibility from me and will most likely try and 'even the odds' with smoke-bombs. Fine by me, I'm pretty sure that more than blind fighting skills, he uses these directional mikes to fight in the dark, and that should only make him more vulnerable to the sonics in the glove. Will need a breath mask too. Disorient if I can't stun or net him, hold KE rings in reserve, follow up with the melee option, a personal shield and the Full Ax should-
Wait.
I actually, genuinely want to talk to Bruce before doing anything rash. Like covering the roof of a hotel with mines. All this crazy fortification.... was that you, James?
Preparation is the key to success in any endeavour. You should meet the detective from a position of power and security, or at least have a backup plan.
Okay, yes. But in this case, that sends the wrong message. Plan A is still to show that we're a healthy, civic-minded individual. If we treat this like a battle, so will he.
There's a certain amount of mental grumbling, and a lingering annoyance at everything, but I'm used to ignoring those by now. Instead of forting up or giving him the chance to wake me from sleep, I make a glass that's more ice than water, drag the comfy armchair in the middle of the room beneath the light fixture, then pull out one of my new books to read.
Hey, it's only prudent to keep up with people's ideas. And if I don't distract myself, why I'll be a bundle of nerves waiting to meet the Bat again. Better to just read and not worry about anything.
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"In other news, a supervillain is running for mayor in Gotham City. Faye Dillard is reporting from the scene..."
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Whew. Speechifying is worse than dialogue, even for a distinctive character like Detective Harvey Bullock. But I made it, and if it's boring and terrible, I apologize but it's what I have.
This was originally all going to be in chapter 3, but I broke it up when I realized just how long it was going to be.
Points to the couple of people who guessed I'd make Freddie a Mistborn. Have an internet cookie. Really, it's a reflection of just how much John trusts him.
All the new magic came near the end, let's see.
U-99, or Uranium 99, is a super-rare isotope from the obscure sci-fi novel the Centaurus Project and sequels. The radiation from U-99 causes spatial warping, except in lead, which can have a variety effects, mostly causing particularly gruesome death as people's organs expand or dwindle into nothingness, or their bones twist into M.C. Escher drawings. However, it also stabilizes, normalizes or suppresses abnormal or artificial space-time warps, sealing those rifts, ending that time-stop and primarily in the story, as part of the semi-titular Centaurus Device, stabilizing wormholes to be safely traversable. Obviously, John thought that was the kind of hole card the good guys might need someday, and was outraged when it was turned into a particularly horrific sort of death ray. So he reclaimed and destroyed it, and things got a little rough along the way.
The mines are from the second Posleen War book, A Hymn before Battle. They can camouflage and hop up a meter on proximity and generate a momentary forcefield, creating the effect of a blade for something like thirty to fifty feet. Then they move, each has juice for ten uses, IIRC. Of course, he doesn't have that book on him either.
The Xerrol Nightstinger and Ssi-Ruuk paddle-beamer are both from the Star Wars EU, sorry, Legends. One is a blaster that's considered the crappiest sniper rifle with only one virtue, invisible bolt. The other is a wide-beam stunner.
The personal shield isn't from Dune (not trying THAT against Batman again) but the Foundation.
The Full Ax is from another Irish Fairy Tale, the Knight of the Full Ax. Who wields the titular ax becomes the strongest man in the world. And as the cloak suffers from people, especially children, not grasping how fast wind can get, the Ax benefits from the general knowledge that in this world "world's strongest man" is a very high bar indeed. And people can't help but bring that in when they imagine the tale...