Chapter Text
Life happens fast. As a superhero, Clark Kent knew that sometimes life happens too fast to even live it, that in some scenarios that mind turns off and the body carries out the action.
Now sitting in his suit and tie in the middle of a busy hospital, Clark’s mind kicked back in, struggling to process the nights events.
The Captain, the lightning, the boy, the blood, the hospital.
Clark sighs, deeply grateful for Bruce’s paranoia and intense lectures. The Bat’s wariness was the only reason Clark had known how to handle the sudden peak into Captain Marvel’s life, the only reason Clark knew to be a Kent and not an El when arriving at the hospital.
Upon catching the bloody owner of the heartbeat from the stadium, Clark’s medical training had kicked in. After checking for dire injuries, Clark flew the unconscious boy (he couldn’t be older than eight or nine) to an alley next to the nearest hospital, where he changed close with all the speed the sun would give him (somewhere inside he knew he needed to stay with this kid).
The sun had been setting when he caught the boy, and now it was starting to rise again. Clark had barely seen the boy since with the near constant flow of doctors and nurse floating in and out of his room. The boy was still getting care now and Clark was waiting outside, staring at the file in his hands.
It had been one of the nurses that recognized the boy as the "orphaned" Billy Batson, apparently she had worked on him several times in the past (Clark tried not to think about that, what else had happened to this kid?). After identifying him, the nurse had made a call, not long after a woman named Mrs. Glover had appeared, Billy's caseworker from CPS.
“It’s always the worst kids that manage to pop back up,” she had whispered, Clark’s super hearing picking up the cruel comment, “Maybe juvie will take him this time…”
Autopilot once again took Clark over and he soon (too soon to be legal) found himself with Billy’s file and a paper to sign to become his foster parent. Once again Clark quietly thanked Bruce’s just in case scenarios.
The file he had was thick, way too thick, he thought, for an eleven year old (Eleven? On what Earth would an eleven year old be so small?). He took a deep breath before opening the folder, preparing for the worst, but that air was forced from him as his eyes found a picture of Captain Marvel on top. He read through the first page five times before his mind finally understood.
C.C. Batson and his wife had died on a trip to excavate Teth Adam’s tomb. Billy had “fallen through the cracks”. Captain Marvel once told him that “the suit doesn’t really come off”. He must not have trusted the league with the fate of his son. Clark would prove to him that he at least could be protected, he would keep the Captain’s secret like his own.
The weight of all that his teammate had been dealing with fell onto him. Captain could not power down to take care of his son, he must have done his best to house the boy, likely thinking that an old stadium was their best bet.
Clark could not quite explain why he had heard Billy’s heartbeat before seeing the Captain, but it was clear what else had happened. Billy had been “home” when the earthquake struck, somehow managing to escape the wreckage despite his injuries. Cap must have been out searching for the boy when they could not get ahold of him, and Clark must have seen him lose composure over the unknown fate of his son.
Clarks comm was in his hand instantly, dialing the numbers he knew would come through to Cap as a “Pick up as soon as possible” message. But time went by and there was no answer. That poor man, Clark thought, must be too busy looking for Billy to check his comm. Part of him wanted to fly out there right now and find the man, but his earlier exploits had proven that that would be futile.
“Excuse me, sir?” A nurse appeared before him, “You can see your son now.”
_________________________
The stadium was a wreck, to put it nicely. A professional demolition crew could not have done this good of a job at destroying the place. There was only rubble and bigger piles of rubble where the rooms had been.
Batman picked his way over to the largest, it was likely where the announcing room would have been. He sighed as he began searching for any clues, with little urgency as the cowl had revealed no heat signatures. He tried to think about the positive possibilities of that, rather than the glaringly terrible one.
He paused as he came across a little clearing, one that didn’t match the pattern of the rest of the rubble. A closer look revealed blood, too much blood, but no body, as if whoever or whatever had been there had just got up and flown away.
There were no trails of blood, not even a drop outside of the space where the kid must have been. The Whiz Kid had made it out of the building, that was clear, but with this much blood left behind it was hard to tell if he’d made it far.
A continued investigation of the area revealed a few little trinkets, like a shattered “World’s Best” something mug, the chip having no hints to the rest of the phrase, the remnants of what must have been the Whiz's radio, and a newspaper, half pinned under the rubble. All that Bruce could see of the paper was Captain Marvel's smiling face. It was chilling to see his cheery teammate peering up from the bloody wreckage.
“Captain! Cap? Come on, man!” Victor’s voice startled him out of his investigation. Instinctively, Bruce moved to be in a more covert place. Captain? So it was more then coincidence that the boy was in Fawcett, and it was for more than Whiz that Victor had been afraid for.
Batman stayed silent, knowing that if Victor had lied to him about his worry once, he would do so again. Likely whatever connection was here was intended to be kept secret. He watched as Victor stumbled across the bloody area of wreckage.
“Oh my god…” the emotions displayed on the former teen titans face were impossible to describe, "Whiz..." Victor had come across the shattered remains of the radio.
“Please pick up…” Victor’s voice cracks as he clearly tries to call the Captain’s communicator, "Cap, come on, we can, we can fix this. Please don't do anything stupid. This was random chance, let me help, please." The message was clearly sent to voice-mail.
The young man stands still for a moment looking at the bloody rubble with fear in his eyes, before he stiffens. From his past of working with the man, Bruce can recognize that he just received some sort of news through his robotic connections, and Victor takes off without another word.
The knowledge that Captain Marvel was involved was both relieving and deeply worrying to the Bat. Bruce hadn’t wanted to admit it but there were no real clues at the stadium, no hints as to where the boy could have gone. It was almost as if he’d just gotten up and flown away. Captain’s involvement meant new leads.
But "don't do anything stupid"? What purpose would that warning serve to a man as invincible to Superman? What harm did Victor think Marvel might commit?
Later at the Batcave
"Oh him? He's a, he's dead. Dead as a doornail. Yep,” the recording of the Champion of Magic's odd comment played over the speakers of the batcomputer for a millionth time. It was clear that something was wrong, the attempt at casuallity majorly missed.
“What’s got you skipping family time today, o’ dear bat-father of mine?” Bruce’s eldest came up behind him. If it had been anything other than a chid’s life at stake, Bruce’s resolve may have crumbled there. He’d not really been home since before the earthquake.
But, his son’s voice brought another idea to mind, “Dick, you still talk to Victor often, correct?” Dick visibly straightened at the question, being good enough at reading the Bat to grasp the severity of the conversation.
“Yeah, all the time.”
“Did he ever talk about any kids that you didn’t know?”
Dick paused to think, clearly sorting through conversations about the other children that had appeared since the Titans had lost their “teen” moniker.
“We talked once about a kid he knew through one of your guys'. He never would say whose, but he talked about a kid threatening to unscrew him, apparently he was mad Victor’d picked him up.”
It was this final piece of information that made something click together for Bruce. Right when Captain and Cyborg started getting close there’d been similar jokes about screwdrivers and dismantling made when they thought no one was listening. Now with a connection, things started falling into place.
Cap’s childlike wonder at certain things, the Whiz’s oddly familiar ways of speaking, Cap's incredible defense of sidekicks and underage hero’s, Captain’s disappearance and weird behavior, Victor’s worry for his friend. Batman had not just been looking for a child, or a teammate’s friend; he was looking for the man’s son.
He turns back to the screen, all thoughts of giving in gone as he raced prevent another Jason Todd.