Chapter 41: Bruce's Car
Bruce slowly sipped his coffee, his eyes scanning the headlines of the newspaper spread before him. Each one was more staggering than the last.
"Captain America Quits The Ultimates"
"Latverian Borders Hold Firm, Doom Rejects U.N. Proposal"
"Asgard in Ruins: Fallen Gods Litter the Realm"
"New Meta-Human Faction Emerges in Southeast Asia – Motives Unknown"
The world was shifting at a breakneck pace, its axis tilting toward chaos with every new development. Even for Bruce, who was accustomed to disorder, the sheer scale and frequency of upheaval in this reality was dizzying.
He set the paper down, his gaze turning to the window and the sprawling city beyond.
"A world in shambles," he stated, his voice low.
Even seeing it again gives me a headache, Thomas's voice echoed in his mind. His own world had superhumans, but their conflicts were more contained, often drawn into the grand, ancient war between Themyscira and Atlantis. Here, it seemed every empowered individual or group was hell-bent on overthrowing something or fighting someone else. It was entropy in overdrive.
"Guess what the U.S. response will be," Bruce mused internally, directing the thought toward Thomas's cell, a rare moment of speculative conversation.
Thomas was silent. If the American establishment here was anything like the one he remembered, the answer was both predictable and horrifying. He offered no reply.
In the adjacent cell, which had been quiet for some time, a figure stirred. The harsh screech of metal on stone echoed in the psychic space as he approached the bars of his confinement.
SCRREEE—
"He will use nuclear weapons," a distorted, multi-layered voice rasped. "To scorch anything he cannot control." The speaker's form became clearer: a suit of armor, sharp and vicious like shattered glass, painted in blood-red and black. Crimson energy pulsed from the slits of a fearsome helmet. On the chest, a bat-symbol was ripped in half by a bolt of frozen lightning.
This was a Bruce Wayne from a dark tangent. The Red Death.
"With my knowledge," the Red Death continued, a feverish edge to his chaotic voice, "you could preempt it all. Secure order in the shortest time possible."
Bruce ignored him, withdrawing his focus from the internal prison.
"You know it's true!" the Red Death shouted, slamming a gauntleted fist against his immaterial bars. Scarlet lightning crackled around him, contained and impotent within his cell. "In the end, we all make the same choice! CONTROL! OR BURN!"
Bruce took another sip of coffee, the bitter taste anchoring him in the present. The world outside was mad. The superhumans here were spinning out of control, nations scrambling to create their own meta-human weapons with no thought for the consequences. He needed to be ready. He needed tools, contingencies, a way to stand against the tide of chaos.
"I feel I should remind you," Thomas's voice cut in, dry and pragmatic, "that acquiring those 'tools' requires capital. And capital, at the moment, requires you to attend the board meeting that starts in twenty minutes."
Bruce paused, his trajectory toward the hidden elevator to his bunker halted. He had, in fact, forgotten. With a slight shake of his head, he turned, straightening his suit jacket.
The Aston Martin DBS Superleggera shot out of Kane Manor's gates like a silver bullet. When it purred to a stop outside the Kane Group tower, the ever-present tabloid paparazzi—a diminished but persistent breed—sprang to life, shutters clicking furiously. A photo of the enigmatic, wealthy Wick John Cain was still worth a few column inches, especially to certain segments of New York's social scene.
"Make it a good one, Joe," Bruce said with a practiced, disarming smile as he stepped out, acknowledging the lead photographer by name.
"You got it, Mr. Cain! Gotta pay the rent!" the cameraman called back, grinning.
Bruce strode into the lobby, the glass doors swallowing him into the corporate world. The paparazzi's attention, however, was abruptly ripped away by a spectacle unfolding in the sky above the street.
Two figures were locked in a mid-air battle. Citizens stopped, pulling out phones. New York had been oddly quiet lately, making them forget their city's status as a superhero/supervillain battleground. This new Spider-Man—dressed in a stark black suit—was a fresh face.
One figure, clad in purple armor (the Prowler), was slammed down by a web-line, but his trajectory was wrong. He was headed straight for a parked car.
Oh no, Miles Morales—the black-suited Spider-Man—thought, trying to redirect his pull.
He was too late.
CRUNCH-SMASH!!!
The Prowler crashed down, landing squarely on the trunk and rear windshield of the silver Aston Martin DBS Superleggera, collapsing the expensive metal and shattering glass into a thousand diamonds.
A collective gasp went up from the crowd. Many recognized the car.
"Oh, SHEET!" Miles groaned, staring at the wreckage. That was definitely the car that Wick John Cain had just parked.
"Your teacher never tell you to keep your head in the fight?" the Prowler growled, untangling himself from the web and the wrecked car. He didn't care about property damage. The black Spider was a problem that needed solving.
His vibranium claws lashed out, shredding Miles's suit and scoring deep, stinging gashes across his chest. As the Prowler reared back for a finishing strike, gunshots rang out.
Pop! Pop! Pop!
A patrol officer, having arrived on the scene, was firing wildly, his shots going wide. Enraged, the Prowler turned and lunged at the cop, claws raised to kill.
Miles reacted faster. A web-line snagged the officer's belt, yanking him out of the path of the deadly swipe. But in that moment of distraction, the Prowler vanished into the maze of alleys.
High above, in the Kane Group conference room, Bruce stood by the floor-to-ceiling window, having watched the entire encounter unfold below. The meeting had droned on about market shares and European instability.
"So, what are your thoughts on the proposed diversification strategy?" a senior vice-president asked, noticing their young chairman's distracted gaze out the window.
Bruce turned from the view of his demolished Aston Martin and the fleeing, wounded Spider-Man. His face was calm, but his eyes were cold.
"The proposal has merit," he said, his voice cutting through the room. "But it fails to account for a critical, recurring variable. For instance, it assumes stable operations in regions currently experiencing... meta-human insurgencies." He gestured slightly toward the window. "A naive assumption, as today's... traffic incident... demonstrates."
The executives followed his gaze down to the street, where police were now swarming around the wrecked supercar. They swallowed, suddenly understanding his point in a very tangible, very expensive way. They had no answer for the chaos outside. Not yet.
But the man at the head of the table was already thinking several moves ahead. The car was a loss. The data from the encounter, however—the Prowler's tactics, the new Spider-Man's capabilities and limitations—was invaluable. Another piece of the puzzle, another variable to account for in a world hurtling toward bedlam.
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