The Murcielago drifted down the dirt road at thirty-five miles an hour. A typical speed for a pedestrian thoroughfare but looked aghast when it tossed up such piles of earth. The front half of the vehicle pulled just barely ahead of the plumes of dirt being sprayed by the sports car’s tires, bumping and hopping as the uneven road tossed beneath him. It had been a dry autumn, receding the foliage and rendering the path a coarse, red sand. He had never been to Kansas before, only flown over it on his many trips to the west coast. And while it was a beautiful state, filled with enough open land to satisfy even the most vapid landscape painter, Bruce Wayne could feel no comfort here.
He was dissecting every possible combination of words that Clark’s parents could say. Clark had never told them any Justice League secrets. The only thing they would have heard would have come from their televisions or from their smartphones, which according to Clark they don’t use often. In their words, “we’ve got a landline and a mailbox. If they can’t reach us there, we don’t need to hear from them.”
Bruce wasn’t tremendously familiar with Batman’s reputation outside of Gotham. He hoped it was positive. He was deeply familiar however with the reputation of billionaires, and that was what he was dreading. These Bible Belt, salt of the earth, financially modest, pilgrim values farmers were hard wired to resist big city tech CEOs like him. And these people were supposed to be spending the next several days with him. How cheery.
More than just the need to be pleasant however, there was tremendous social pressure for this evening to go well for the simple fact that they were Superman’s parents. Superman was one of his best friends in the entire world. He was a colleague and warrior that Bruce respected. He was the nicest man anyone would ever meet, and no matter what circumstances there were he was always wonderful to whoever Bruce introduced. Alfred, Selina, Dick, all treated with respect and decency, even with Selina’s checkered background. He owed it to his friend to extend that courtesy to his best friend’s parents. What a shame then that he was just so miserable at it.
He knew he was doing it. He knew he should stop doing it. He was overthinking and ruining his chances at being authentic. It was going to make him slip up and say something stupid just like it always did. So why could he never stop himself from doing it? He rolled the cross necklace he purchased at a gas station a few minutes ago back and forth in his hand, struggling to put it on. He thought it was a smart move to have a cross on him somewhere, but putting it on felt sacrilegious. He didn’t believe in god. Adorning the thing he was supposedly killed on when he doesn’t believe in it felt so disrespectful. Which was then followed by a feeling of embarrassment, and the question of, “if I don’t believe god exists, why am I afraid to disrespect him?”
He chased this internal debate around his head along with the conversation with Clark’s parents like a hurricane of madness. He couldn’t even get passed the introduction. He knew he needed a firm handshake, unless he was shaking Martha’s hand. But what should he say? Most people would say their name, first and last, but he was a celebrity. Would saying his name just be disrespectful? They would know him from his face. Maybe just the first name? Or would that sound non-comital? Was there a specific “hello” he was supposed to use? “Hello” felt to much like an email. He could say “hi” would that work? Or should he say “hey yall?” They might appreciate if he came on a bit more homely. He practiced saying it in the car and realized it sounded anything other than homely in his voice.
“Shit.” He said aloud. “Shit!” He said louder, realizing he needs to cut the impulse to swear before he walks in. He gripped the wheel ever tighter, beginning to panic over these micro-moments.
In the house, Martha and John Kent were found sitting in the living room as they were every Thursday evening this time of year. John was watching football in his recliner, and Martha was in her rocking chair working on proofreading the church’s bulletin message. The tv was facing the eastern wall, and the window was facing the south, meaning John couldn’t see it out of his peripheral vision. Martha however, had her chair facing south, so she could see out it perfectly, and her gaze was lifted by the cloud of dust moving towards the house at spectacular speed. She furrowed her brow and stared at it harder, trying to figure out what it might be. It got close enough for her to understand it was a car, and she voiced this discovery to her husband.
“Somebody’s tearin’ down our driveway, honey.”
John turned his head and beheld the smoking tires of the Murcielago, coming closer to the front door of his humble abode. He had never seen a more embarrassingly expensive vehicle in his life, and he couldn’t understand why anyone would drive such a thing down a dirt road. He too furrowed his brow in contemplation, as it became clear that the car was also painted black. A pitch black onyx that would disappear in the night like a squirrel in a tree, confusing him even more, as there could not be a color more inappropriate to get covered in red dirt. It was an absolute mystery of a development, and he stood up slowly to behold it.
“A sports car?” He asked rhetorically, stepping closer to the window shade. He lowered two of the blinds with his first two fingers and viewed the car the entire rest of it’s journey up the driveway. It became more detailed as it got closer but somehow never made any more sense. Who in the world could this be? The government? Why would they drive such an ostentatious vehicle? Was it a family member? Not one he knew of, nobody related to him could afford that. The unfamiliarity made him nervous, and he gave a warning to his wife.
“Get my gun, dear.” He said, cool and calm.
“You want the 12-gauge?” Martha asked, taking the first steps towards the stairs.
“Just the pistol’ll do fine.” He responded, before releasing the blinds and walking towards the door. He planned to meet this person head on, whoever they might be.
The car pulled directly before the front door, leaving only fifteen feet of space between the hood and the doorstep. The doors of the car lifted open, as Bruce Wayne stepped out of the left side and walked over to the right. He nervously put the cross over his neck and retrieved the bouquet in the passenger seat. He took a few seconds to think. This was the time. He had to decide how he was going to introduce himself. Was he going to use his full name? Was he going to use yall? He had to choose now. He looked up at the house and saw no activity in the window. Sunset was approached and he remembered how old the Kent family was. Maybe he had more time than he thought. After all, if they didn’t know he was here, than he could think at the doorstep for as long as he needed. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.
Suddenly the front door opened and a person Bruce could only assume to be John Kent stepped out of it announcing their presence.
“Hello young man!”
Shit. Fuck. Shit fuck. He’s come out now. Bruce was not prepared for this, not in the slightest. This blew past the handshake completely, and gave him no opportunity for a yall. He was now standing in the Kansas sun as red as a tomato, holding a bunch of flowers, and unprepared for socializing. He stood up tall and turned to face John Kent, trying to stall and read his emotions.
“Hello there Joh…sir….hello sir…” he said, closing the car doors and walking towards the hood. The car’s storage was in the front, and he needed something out of it.
“You lookin for the highway?” John asked, stepping down the aching wooden stairs and approaching the car.
“No I’m looking for you.” Bruce replied, rather shortly.
“Idiot.” He thought. “Why don’t you think before you speak? How many times did you rehearse ‘I’m looking for the Kent residence’ in the car? All for him to break you like this. You have to salvage this, just get the case and move on.” He opened the front storage and retrieved the briefcase from it, then turned to face Mr. Kent.
The men were standing face to face in the Kent front yard, and at this proximity Bruce could tell the man was armed. He had a pistol at his hip, a pretty old one at that. A kind of gun that hasn’t been manufactured since the forties. He had to play these next few steps very carefully.
“You’re lookin for me?” John asked, folding his arms and standing tall.
“Yes…this is the Kent residence?”
“It is.”
“Good. Then yes I’m looking for you. Mr. Kent.”
“You mind tellin me your name? Young man?”
Son of a bitch. It literally couldn’t get worse than this. What was he supposed to say? Why was this so difficult? Why couldn’t he just decide how he was going to introduce himself? He had to say something, and in his confusion and stress he accidentally introduced himself like James Bond.
“Wayne.” He said. “Bruce Wayne. CEO of…well, board member of Wayne Enterprises.”
He extended his hand to shake, but forgot he was holding a bouquet of flowers, so accidentally offered John Kent a bundle of soft pink tulips. John took the flowers slowly and looked up at Bruce in confusion. Bruce was an entire head taller than him, yet every word seemed to make him smaller and smaller. Something wasn’t adding up here. John had heard of Bruce Wayne before. Everyone had. He was the third wealthiest man on the planet, something he or his company did was in the news every third day. And this man certainly matched the profile. But why in the world would he be here? John swatted an insect away from the flowers and started asking his burning questions.
“You’re Bruce Wayne? The billionaire Bruce Wayne?”
“Yes sir that’s me…those flowers are for Mrs. Martha Kent, actually.”
“What in the world would Bruce Wayne have goin on out here? How do you know me and my wife’s name?”
“Its…uh…”
“You know I’m havin trouble keepin the peace out here. Seein as how you’ve come up my driveway unannounced, have information I didn’t give ya, and are strugglin to form words other than your name, which that too I’m strugglin to believe.”
Bruce grimaced at the next conversational steps. It was rapidly approaching time to explain what it is he was doing here, and that would include divulging more information John didn’t give him. He was not here to give good news, he was here to frighten them. If conversations were going so poorly now, when he hasn’t even stepped foot inside the house, how much worse could they get? He tried to come up with something comforting to say, and couldn’t find it in his panic, so he opted to let John tell him what to do.
“I understand it’s upsetting Mr. Kent. Is there any way I can make this easier on you?”
“Excuse me?”
Bad idea.
“Why don’t you start by tellin me what in the hell it is you want? What brings you up my property, and why I shouldn’t call the police and have you trespassed right here right now?”
How? How can he be so inept? He was giving up. It was time to come clean, it was now or never. He braced himself for the impact as he unveiled the real truth.
“Alright Mr. Kent.” He began, releasing a held breath. “I’ll tell you why I’m here. But I strongly recommend we take this conversation inside your house. There are ears everywhere, and this conversation cannot be heard by anyone else.”
“You expect me to let you into my home? After all of this?”
“I do. Because we need to talk about your son, Clark.”
“What about him?”
“I know what he really is.”
John furrowed his brow, swapping the bouquet to his left hand and placing his right on his belt. Fear began to rise in his stomach like smoke from a caldera. His greatest fears were becoming realized. He knew it was only a matter of time before someone from the government showed their true form and turned against his beloved son. And either Bruce Wayne was in on it, or he had been bought out. He felt like a deer, backed against a wall by a hideous grizzly bear. He couldn’t fight his way out, the law would never take his side. But then again, he could never treat this advance as friendly. He knew he needed support, and he knew Bruce was right about ears everywhere. He growled and cracked his neck, before acquiescing to Bruce’s request.
“You’d best come on in.” He grumbled, motioning toward the ajar front door.
The two walked in slowly, Bruce Wayne shutting the door behind him. They took a right and walked into the living room, where the tv was still playing. Bruce quickly turned it off, then set his metal briefcase down and cracked it open. Inside was a collection of drones, no larger than a baseball, with a small touch screen incased in foam to control them with. He waisted no time and started programming the drones immediately. John found what he was doing strange, but he did not interrupt. He thought it would be fruitless to try and stop the man, so all he did was walk towards the kitchen and meet his wife.
Martha had been hiding in the kitchen as she was told. It was advantageously the best place to wait if the house was broken into. She had a 12-guage clenched in her fists in preparation for a battle. She shivered, but didn’t falter, as her husband came closer and announced himself.
“Come on out, honey.” He called. “We’ve got a guest.”
Martha stood up slowly, keeping the shotgun aimed down her sight. She approached with one foot timidly landing in front of the other, then entered the living room and beheld the sight. She recognized the business man right away, she had seen his picture many times on her computer. His image filled her with disgust, sending thoughts of all the young women and expensive cars he filled his time with, and how morally vacuous it would all seem in the end. She doubted Bruce even knew his employees names, let alone what his company paid them. Seeing him knelt over a brief case encoding digits into some hideous machine did not improve his image, or lower her shotgun.
“This is Bruce Wayne.” John said, “Shareholder at Wayne Enterprises. He brought these for you.” He set the flowers down in his wife’s rocking chair.
“They’re lovely.” Martha said mutely. “Tulips, my favorite. How could you have known?”
“Mr. Wayne here says he’s got something to say about our son. Says he knows what our son really is.”
Martha’s heart dropped like a sack of stones. The end was upon her, she could feel it. She felt her spiritual intuition speak to her. She knew to trust it. It had never been wrong before. This man was a coming of ill fortune, doomed to destroy her life as she knew it. Bruce Wayne was a villain, and she had to stand her ground. She mentally began prayed, as she braced herself to open fire.
“My god…” She gasped under her breath. After taking a second to compose herself, she slowly began walking forward.
“So what is this? Huh?” She hissed. “This blackmail? Didn’t have enough money, had to come stealin it from the hands of the weak and vulnerable? Or are you here to lie to us? Say you’re our friend and that you’ll protect us to the end, then with a few small signatures you take our home and our cattle and our lives? You Wall Street boys may be smart, but you aren’t as smart as you think…”
“Shh!” Bruce scolded, as he stood for the first time and activated the drones. The four, round surveillance drones leapt out of the suitcase and began scanning the house, room by room. Each drone had a job. One scanned the open air, looking for radio waves or other surveillance tech that could be found in the open sky. The other checked the walls. It would scan within each layer of drywall, wood and other materials looking for any kind of listening device, or anything else unwanted like a bomb. Another drone flew outside to try and get a view of the room from the exterior, making sure no devices were planted where only the heavens could see it. The fourth and final drone scanned the unseen world. The internet history, the device logs, the microphone activity. Any digital method of tracking whereabouts or conversations were being made known to the drone, and they were all reporting such to Bruce’s touch screen device.
He watched carefully as one by one the drone’s reported the all clear. Anything they found they could handle themselves, scrambling radio chatter and internet monitoring for nearly thirty miles. Once all four had given positive reads, he sent them away to work on the next room in the house. If a listening device was in the kitchen, it would still be able to hear what was going on in the living room.
John and Martha didn’t interrupt. They were too frightened by what was going on to risk interjecting it. They had never seen this kind of technology before. The drones flew so effortlessly, without one wobble or one mistake. It was like they were living things, correcting and darting around furniture with grace and efficiency, so perfectly designed they rivaled human search, revealing all the secrets the Kents ever tried to hide. They hated what they were seeing, but compared to the knowledge of their son’s true identity, their browsing history felt like small potatoes. They waited quietly, shotgun still aimed, for Bruce to finish his search.
The drones assessed one room at a time, and came back positive except for one constant presence. There was a jet flying overhead, listening and watching to the families movements. It was military made, not privately owned, meaning it’s technology was classified and backed with redundancy. The drones alone couldn’t dismantle this. Bruce would need to call for help. He pressed the button on his watch that engaged the microphone, and spoke a simple command to Alfred.
“I’ve got a drone over my head. Shut it down.”
Alfred heard him and uploaded one of Bruce’s more troublesome viruses. They wouldn’t be able to shut it down themselves, but it would run it’s course in a matter of time. The jet was blinded and deafened to the world beneath it, the clock was running. Alfred warned his cohort of this quickly, before returning to his watch.
“It’s done.” He said. “You have ten minutes, Master Wayne.”
The drones returned to their briefcase and powered down, having been commanded so by their master. Bruce put the touch screen down, and took a deep breath. The time was now to toss away pleasantries. He had to come clean. He let go of the mask and became who he really was.
“Your home is secure. We can speak openly.” He said.
“What do you want?” Martha said, her voice cracking like a whip.
“I’m here to tell you that Superman has been compromised.”
“Compromised? What the hell does that mean?”
“His identity has been leaked. People know that Clark Kent is Superman.”
“Who?” John asked. “Who knows about our son?”
“Lex Luthor, chairman of LexCorp. Has Clark told you about him?”
“Briefly.” Martha said. “He’s an atheist.”
“He’s a villain.” Bruce threatened. “Bent on the destruction of Superman and everything he stands for. He is fueled by a black jealousy, a need to be the best the world has to offer, a need that cannot be met while Superman is around. He’s deduced your son’s identity.”
The two Kents looked at each other in horror. There was no circumstance worse than this. They didn’t even doubt what Wayne was saying. They knew in their hearts it was true. What they didn’t know was what to do about it. Bruce continued after letting them have a moment.
“He can’t come after you. Yet. He still needs to operate through legal channels. But Luthor has the White House by the lapels. Anything he wants, he gets. It won’t take long before he convinces the president that you two are a national security risk. And when he does, the White House will come after you with total impunity. Executive orders, secret service, military funding, no amount of resources wouldn’t be allotted to him. He wouldn’t need to worry about probable cause, he wouldn’t care about your constitutional rights, he would just be able to grab you. From wherever you are, or whoever you’re with.”
“Jesus Christ…” John whispered slowly, his mind racing to figure out what to do. Bruce left no time for wondering, and continued his speech.
“I am likely the last friend you have left on planet earth. Me, your son, and Lois Llane. I owe Clark a favor. Many in fact. And he’s cashing it in. I need both of you to pack whatever is most important to you, then get in my car and leave this house indefinitely. You’re not safe here. You need to disappear.”
“Where will we go?” Martha said, her gun shaking as tears approached.
“I’ll handle that. I’ll set you up in a safe house in Metropolis. Everything will be provided for you.”
“How can we trust you?!” John barked, his wife echoing the same statement. Bruce swallowed his pride, then told them the truth. He told them the reason he knew everything about them, the reason he knew Clark’s identity, and the reason he could keep them all safe, in two simple words.
“I’m Batman.” He said, with the gravitas and impact of ordering a chicken sandwich. His words landed on the Kent’s like a water balloon full of spit, and they were not pleased.
“What?!” John bellowed, himself separating his shirt so he could reach his pistol if he needed.
“You expect us to just believe that?!”
“I shut down a military drone flying above your house. What more proof do you need?”
“How the hell do we even know that drone is really there?!”
“Want me to turn it back on?”
“No!” The Kent’s exclaimed in unison.
“How dare you come into our home and make threats like this!” Martha screamed, at the edge of tears and rattling her gun.
“Take a breath, Martha.”
“Don’t call me that!” She screamed. “You don’t know me! You don’t know my name! You’re a stranger in my house, and you’re going to leave right now!”
“I can’t leave, not without you two.”
“You have to the count of three! 1!”
“Slow down, this isn’t helping…”
“2!”
“She’s warnin you, Wayne! Get out of our house!”
“Please, let me help…”
“3!”
Martha fired the shotgun with a blast so powerful it nearly knocked her over. The blast rang out and fired a buck shot straight at Bruce’s chest. Muscle memory took hold of Bruce Wayne, and he arced his body in perfect form. He bent his upper half perfectly out of the way of the shotgun blast, then in the split seconds of reaction time between Marthas next round, he withdrew the emergency batarang from his sleeve and hurled it straight at Martha.
He wasn’t trying to hurt her, he was still lucid. The batarang was well aimed and clearly thought through. The blade wouldn’t hit Martha’s flesh, it would only crash into the handle of the firearm she was holding. With a throwing arm like Bruce’s, and with the frail arm strength of a sixty-two year old woman, the gun would no doubt leave her hand. The projectile smacked forcefully into the gun’s stock and sent it flying out of Martha’s hands. She was startled by the impact and flew backwards trying to dodge. She fell onto the floor, narrowly missing the kitchen table and crashing bluntly onto the tile. John would normally have drawn his firearm and opened fire, but in this case Martha’s gun was a serious concern. She dropped it, almost threw it. It was likely to fire again once it hit the floor. John had to get himself out of the way to ensure that he wasn’t caught in this accidental misfire. He leapt out of the way, sending himself falling to the floor, as the weapon clacked against the floor and pinged as it came just short of firing another shell.
The house stood still. The home smelled of gunpower and wafted with smoke. The two Kent’s arduously worked their way up to sitting positions. In this time of intense need, their only thought was each other.
“Are you alright, honey?” John asked into the smoke, his eyes not yet adjusting to see his wife.
“Yes.” She said, shaky as a dog in the rain. “Are you?”
“Yes I…” The two came to the same thought in unison, them both adjusting their gaze to look across the room. They saw through the haze that Bruce Wayne was standing strong. He was straight as an arrow, firm as a tree. The firing of the shell did not phase him, nor did it lower his guard. He stood mightily over the two Kents, waiting for them to get up.
Martha’s aim was true. The could never have missed, not at this range. The bullet hole in the wall was exactly where Bruce was standing. He had to have dodged it. But how? How could any man have dodged a bullet traveling that fast? The two looked down at the shotgun, and beheld the truth. A batarang, embedded into the stock of the shotgun, reflected light of it’s metallic surface. It would have been thrown so perfectly as to slice between Martha’s opened fingers, without touching her skin. It had to have thrown it explosive force to be able to stick into something so firm. The insignia was laid bare. The strength was obvious. There was nobody more obviously Batman, than Bruce Wayne. Bruce looked down at his watch, then spoke the first words since the gun was fired.
“Pack your things.” He said. “We leave in seven minutes.”