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Chapter Text

Tony Stark flopped down on the couch in his penthouse living room. He was tired. It had been a few months since he and The Avengers had fought to reform the Accords, and ever since then the Council had felt the need to consult with them on everything, and by them Tony really meant himself, and sometimes Natasha, since none of the other Avengers knew anything about politics, or management.

It was what they had fought for and he was glad they had, the potential cost of an organization like Hydra taking control of The Council and running it without any of The Avengers being aware was enormous.

But knowing he was doing the right thing did not make him any less tired. He had been in meetings all day about the Batman. The Council had sent agents (mostly ex-Shield) to Gotham to recruit Batman as soon as the Accords had passed. They initially struggled to find Batman so they got the Mayor to order the “Bat Signal” (what a stupid name, Tony mused) to be lit while the agents were next to it. That time the Bat had at least shown up, but he had refused the offer and promptly teleported away before anyone could say anything else.

That was when the game had changed, once Batman had refused to sign the Accords and without even trying to work something with the law he became a danger and a criminal. The Council pressured the Mayor into ordering the police to stop assisting Batman and form a taskforce to start hunting him. The Council also made changes, recalling the original team and instead sending 20 agents split into four groups with orders to capture The Batman alive.

A few weeks after they were supposed to have arrived they appeared beaten up by the side of the highway a few miles outside of Gotham, they said they had found the Bat but he knocked them out before they could catch him. To Tony it had seemed obvious of course Batman would fight off anyone trying to arrest him, but The Council had seen it as clear evidence of Batman’s viciousness and had reported the event to the media. Two days later the second group of agents ended up in the hospital after being assaulted by civilians while looking for the Bat.

But that wasn’t what the meetings today had been about, no, those had been about the last two groups. Both had been assaulted last night, and both were highly problematic. There was evidence the people that had assaulted the third group were cops and two members of the fourth group had died. Both attacks had occurred in public places, but no one claimed to have seen anything, that is if the police had even questioned anyone. The city was close to rioting and everything was getting out of control. By the end of the meetings the Governor of New Jersey had decided the next step was to send in the national guard to maintain order and reconvene once that was achieved. Tony thought that was sort of lazy, why not make all your plans at once so you know what your goals are, but it got him out of the meetings for the day so he supposed he was grateful.

Tony looked around for something to do, he was quickly getting bored but he was far too tired to do anything actually productive. The problem was that he didn’t really have any hobbies, he didn’t really do anything that wasn’t productive.
Normally when he was in this mood he would hang out with the other Avengers, but they were all at the compound, the only reason he was even at the penthouse was because the meetings were in the tower. Tony made some hot pockets for dinner and turned on the tv to watch some Netflix. But as soon as the TV turned on all thoughts of a mindless night of Netflix and chilling left his mind.

Tony had left the TV on the news channel that morning after catching up on the events of last night, but what he saw now was so much worse, it was chilling.

It was the citizens of Gotham firing machine guns at the arriving National Guard, and the guard was firing right back at the citizens. The news was calling it a riot, this was not a riot, bodies were strewn all over the street, both citizens and soldiers, it was a war, and the National Guard was losing.

Chapter Text

Tony had been watching the reports from Gotham for half an hour unable to tear himself away from the news in Gotham. Somewhere in the back of his mind he should probably be doing something about it or at least calling the council to make sure they were aware, but the footage was so surreal.

He didn’t even think he could find anything surreal anymore after implanting a glowing power disk into his chest and facing down a mad norse god with a mind control scepter, but something about this felt different somehow, like fighting Loki had been so crazy, so absurd, that it was just easy to accept, almost like a dream. But an insurrection in America, less than 100 miles from him, was hard to accept. There were no aliens here or malicious evil would be overlords. This was American citizens deciding to pick up arms against their own government.

He supposed he could be wrong, maybe there was a secret plot hiding behind the scenes, in fact he found himself hoping there was, but it did not feel like it. It felt real.

His musings were interrupted as FRIDAY announced that the council had called an emergency meeting of the American sub-committee. Instantly his mind snapped back online, running through everything he could do. He had a while to think before he had to do anything because he was already at the tower.

The first thing he noticed was that many of the rioters wore bat pins or badges on their outfits, or some sort of logo that looked like an R. So it was clear this was a continuation of the Batman issues from before.

His second thought was about guns; there were a lot of assault rifles in the clips he’d seen. The footage was not clear enough to tell for sure whether they were fully or semi-automatic (the former of which being illegal), but he knew enough about guns from his weapons days to tell by the sound that they were probably fully automatic. Unless everyone using one was a highly trained shooter with a bump stock, semis would not sound quite so smooth. Although what did he know about Gotham maybe they were all a bunch of gun nuts. It’s not like he actually knew how long it took to get good with a bump stock, or how common the skill was.

“Hey FRIDAY how many registered firearms are there in Gotham.” Tony asked.

“There are 32,564 registered firearms in Gotham, Boss.” FRIDAY responded. Tony considered that for a second before realizing he had no idea what that meant in relation to anything. Tony knew a lot about guns but he didn’t really know much about their domestic use. He knew the laws and such, SI had sold some consumer weapons, and he needed to know what he could sell to who. But SI primary income had been from government contracts, so he’d never really kept track of the details.

“Is that a lot, very few, anything notable there? Also how many are rifles?” Tony asked.

“32, 564 is quite low, Boss, in fact all registered firearms are registered police service weapons. When service weapon records in New York, the number of rifles is mostly average if a little high.” FRIDAY responded. Tony shot up from where he had been sitting.

“Are you telling me there are no privately registered guns in Gotham” Tony exclaimed.

“Yes Boss”

“Huh” Tony remembered Alfred Pennyworth had had a shotgun back when Tony used to visit Wayne Manor as a kid. It was hard to believe that the prim british butler would own an illegal firearm; honestly it was hard to imagine Alfred even doing something as illegal as jaywalking he had been so proper all the time. This was a man who had refused to call the kid he was raising as his son anything other than Master Bruce. Man, Tony hadn’t thought of Alfred in years.

He wondered how Bruce was doing with all this chaos. They’d been close when they were kids, Howard used to bring him to Wayne galas and make them hang out together, in the hope that it would ingratiate them with the old money crowd. Howard always had had opinions on who Tony was allowed to be friends with and Bruce Wayne had made the cut.

Tony knew Bruce well enough to tell that this ditzy playboy routine that Bruce did was just a routine, Bruce had always been smart and never been anywhere near as cheerful as he pretended to be. But he understood why Bruce did it, being in the press all the time was exhausting and violating but it was slightly more manageable when they only saw what you wanted them too. Tony had always found being in the spotlight exhilarating but Bruce had always been more private than Tony, and all Bruce usually wanted was to be left alone. If Bruce seemed useless and affable than people were less likely to annoy him, and more likely to go bother Lucius Fox instead.

Tony couldn’t help but worry about Bruce now, revolutions were fundamentally anti-establishment and the Waynes were as established as you can get in Gotham. If the mob decided to go after Bruce now before the situation could be maintained it would not end well for him, Alfred, or the gaggle of kids Bruce had collected.

“Boss the Committee members are arriving now. You should probably head down now.” FRIDAY interrupted.

Right, Tony thought getting up, the best thing I can do for Bruce now, is to sort this out as soon as possible.

Chapter Text

Tony headed down to the meeting room and waited. This was a meeting of the American Subcommittee, all countries could form a subcommittee if they felt the needed one. The sub committees ran the missions in their countries, and decided when and if to allow Accords signers into their countries. They also answered to the Accords Council if something went wrong. The system was designed to prevent the UN from trampling other nations' sovereignty while also allowing the UN to best coordinate between the countries where the heroes live and the countries that need their help. It also insured that no hero would be operating in one country under orders from another, as countries can only run missions within their own borders.

The part Tony and the Avengers had fought for was two-fold, first no signee could be forced to complete a mission and second to insure signees had the ability to utilize the first fairly, all heroes considered for a mission must have invitations to all meetings about said mission. Additionally all meetings must have publicly posted minutes.

Tony was only waiting a few minutes before the 5 committee members arrived together.

Everyone was tired. It was late and they had just gone home after their meetings earlier, so he knew that this meeting would be a lot less formal than usual.

“Thanks for coming Mr. Stark” Chairwomen Myers greeted him. “I assume you saw why we're meeting again.”

“Yes, on the news.” Tony said.

“Good then we are all up to date. Unfortunately I have not received any information other than confirmation that what the news reported is accurate, from anyone. Nor have I heard of any reputable sightings of Batman at any of these… disturbances.” Chairwomen Myers said, as professional as ever.

She had been with the UN longer than any of the other members and Tony knew she had been chosen for her political prowess. She was able to coordinate with the US and the UN very efficiently, and she knew the rules better than anyone, as well as which could be bent, and who to go to to bend them. However she knew next to nothing about mission command or military strategy and was the farthest thing from a spy you could get. It was not really a problem as she was aware of these flaws, and she typically knew when a discussion was out of her depth and kept out of them except to keep the other members in order.

The Chairwomen continued. “Given that we all met earlier today, and that this is an emergency meeting, we can skip the formalities. So let’s begin.”

“I think enough is enough, it’s time to eliminate Batman, his presence is stirring up riots now, he is dangerous...” Ms. Roberts said.

“That was not a riot,” Tony cut in. “it stopped being a riot when people started killing each other, that looked a hell of a lot like Afghanistan looks, war.”

“Yes, right, exactly to my point the Batman has provoked an insurrection, in our country, that cannot be allowed to continue.” Ms. Roberts continued.

Roberts had been against Batman from the beginning. She was the oldest of the group and was both fiery and stern with a history as a district attorney. She had thought that because he was doing clearly illegal things before the Accords he could not be trusted to keep to them. She felt the Avengers, who may have broken some laws, were different because they had done it in the face of an unprecedented crisis. The Batman had broken laws fighting street crime, something she felt did not merit that kind of response.

Tony had defended Batman initially; he’d compared him to Spiderman, who also fights street crime. However Mr. Wright had pointed out that what Spiderman does is almost entirely reactionary and as such is not really illegal to begin with, falling under Good Samaritan laws. Batman reportedly hunts people. Tony was not sure how to feel about Batman now, but he wasn’t a fan of the speed at which Ms. Roberts tended to commit to a course of action, and this was no different. It seemed too early to decide on an assassanation.

“The people are defending Batman, I don't think they are just going to stop if we kill him. It might just make everything worse.” Tony stated.

“If you kill a group's leader, it prevents them from organizing efficiently, plus the movement might fracture.” Mr. Wright stated. “Killing Batman would destabilize the movement.”

Mr. Wright was aligned with Ms. Roberts in most matters but was much less passionate then she was. Tony was aware that an outsider might view him as sort of just following her lead, but Tony had been working with them long enough to know their thought patterns usually just lead to the same conclusion, but that neither would ever just decide to skip the steps and just take the other’s lead for what to do.

“You're assuming Batman is actively involved in this.” Mr. Wood pointed out, “Maybe he is but we don’t have proof of that. You’re right, if he is the leader taking him out would be useful, but Mr. Stark is right too. Killing him will piss everyone off even more. It will martyr him, and if we don't get a gain as that happens we will lose a lot of ground.”

Mr. Wood was the youngest of the members and tended to be a little on the indecisive side; he was far more likely to vote in the minority against a proposal then vote in the minority for it. It wasn't something Tony ever had the patience for but it balanced out Ms. Roberts’ fire, and Tony had to admit was sometimes necessary when Tony himself got a little caught into something.

“Well they are wearing bat symbols on their arms.” Mr. Wright points out.

“I can’t help but wonder,” Mr. Stewart said, “why Batman is so popular. I mean when you're a governing body and you make a move that leads a group of your own people to risk their lives to rebel against you, you have to wonder whether you should have done that to begin with. What about Batman makes the people of Gotham so eager to defend him?”

Mr. Stewart, the final member of the Sub-Committee, was an idealist; he was also born in Bludhaven, Gotham’s sister city. He moved away when his mom died, when he was a kid, long before the Batman had ever come into play. But it was clear he really wanted Batman to be the good guy.

Ms. Roberts scowled, she had no tolerance for Mr. Woods’ idealism. “Well we can’t just keep letting him get away with God knows what, just because he’s popular.”

“That's the real problem here, you know.” Mr. Wood said, playing the voice of reason as ever. “ ‘God knows what’. We don’t know what he’s doing, we don’t even know if this is about him, we’re just guessing. We need to call Agent Phillips and his full report on what he learned before the attacks. And we need to do it before we make any more assumptions about what's going on here.”

Chapter Text

The group agreed to call the agent. Part of Tony wondered why they had started talking before talking to Agent Phillips, but the rest of him was used to politics always doing things out of order. Chairwoman Myers called up Agent Phillips, who was in charge of the 20 agents sent to apprehend Batman, on speakerphone.

"So Agent Phillips, what can you tell us about Batman, and the Gothamites?" Chairwomen Myers said.

"We were not able to get much," Agent Phillips responded. "People would clam up about Batman, as soon as they realized we weren't from Gotham. If we admitted we were Federal agents no one would give us anything, even if we said we were looking for something entirely separate. I know people in low income areas don't want to risk being labeled as snitches, but this was something else. I could tell someone anywhere in the city I was looking into stock market manipulation, but if they knew I was a Fed they'd refuse to even give me directions around the city. Not even cops would assist us any more than they absolutely had to.

"The most obviously notable thing we did manage to learn is that he, it, they, whatever, is not alone. They call them 'The Bats', and I don't know how many there are, but the one that it seemed they discussed the most was called Robin. It also seemed from their descriptions that all the Bats have the same or similar powers"

"The abilities we have on record are teleportation, flight, enhanced reflexes and speed, super strength, and being bulletproof. Is that what you found?" Mr. Wood asked.

"That matches what we heard what we've heard from the population and the team he attacked. It is worth noting that the flight appears to be wing based and that the teleportation is described consistently as melting into the shadows." Agent Phillips responded.

"What can you tell us about how people view the Batman, or the others for that matter?" Tony asked.

"The city as a whole seems to admire them. But, what's interesting is, well, my group spent a fair amount of time in the Park Row area, which is the poorest part of the city, and we would go drink in some of the mob bars. The kind of place the Gotham Underworld would meet to discuss 'business'. A lot of the people there would tell stories about their run ins with Batman or one of 'The Bats' on 'jobs', when they did they would always speak with such anger, as you'd expect criminals to talk about a violent vigilante, and they'd talk about how they'd 'get him next time'. So we would go up to them and say we had been given the job to take him down, we thought they'd jump at the chance to get back at him, but they would get just as defensive and uncooperative as the rest of the city did."

"Thank you for the report Agent", Chairwoman Myers said, hanging up.

"If he's got a whole crew working for him, then he's even more dangerous than we thought. Even more reason to take him out, even if the whole riot is not answering to him, he's still a major threat." Ms. Roberts noted.

"A threat to who?" Mr. Wood asked "He's never acted outside of Gotham before, that we know of, and even when he defended himself from our agents, well, the ones he fought were the least injured of all the agents. Perhaps we should just let sleeping dragons lie. Don't give him any reason to become a real threat, and besides even if we did decide to send the Avengers to kill him, who's to say that they could even find the Batman."

"Wait, what?!" Tony asked, alarmed, "Are you just saying that we should just ignore any danger or harm he does as long as it is only Gotham that gets hurt?! Those people are American citizens. What you're saying might have some merit if it was happening halfway across the world, but this is New Jersey. While I do think it notable that the citizens and cops of the city were more violent than the Batman himself against the agents sent after him, we don't have a big enough sample size to support anything, and the reports that got us into this initially, implied the Batman had a track record of serious violence."

"It seems to me," states Chairwomen Myers, "that there are two distinct possibilities here: One, Batman is holding the entirety of the city hostage, a la mob boss, and that he has made the whole city revolt to protect him. This would imply that the reason that no one was willing to talk to any outsiders about him is fear. In which case we would need to stop him as soon as possible."

"The second option is that the people of Gotham are just genuinely feeling discontent enough with the government, to revolt, for whatever reason, and our pursuing the Batman was just the spark that happened to set them off. They are just choosing him as a mascot for their revolution. In that case none of this is our job, as putting down civil revolts is explicitly stated and equivalent to a war, and as such, not something that Accords signers are allowed to be used for."

Tony huffed, annoyed but he knew she was right "Yeah, and even though Batman might still be under our purview, the Avengers still can't go in now, because the city is hostile territory, and us Avengers, aren't exactly subtle. If we go into Gotham looking for Batman, we will be attacked, and none of us are trained in crowd control. Most of us might be able to use non lethal methods when one on one, but in a group like that it would be a slaughter, and that would put us clearly in a position where we are fighting the insurrection."

"Maybe if the Bats are seen on the frontlines themselves we can get a special provision from the council because that would be seen as evening the odds, with enhanced on both sides. But until that happens, or until someone proves Batman is mind controlling them or something, our hands are tied."

Chairwomen Myers nodded and said, "Looking for Batman might be impossible”. She looked at Tony, “but do you think you would be able to get in and out safely at all? We still need to talk about Wayne enterprises."

Chapter Text

Chairwomen Myers nods and says, “Looking for Batman might be impossible but do you think you would be able to get in and out safely at all? We still need to talk about Wayne Enterprises.”

“Why do we need to discuss them if we cannot do anything about it.” Mr. Stewart asked.

Chairwoman Myers smiled wryly. “Well, if this were occurring in a trade center like New York I’m guessing that the Accords Committee would be happy to allow Avengers interference, regardless of the rules, to avoid global economic effects. For the most part, Gotham is pretty insular, but Wayne Enterprises has international influence and is active in the global economy. It would most likely be overlooked if the Avengers were to act to attempt to stabilize the company. As long as the actions are targeted.”

Tony perked up. He did have a chance to help Bruce after all. He would not even have to stretch the truth. “Well I know a fair amount about WE. SI’s worked with them pretty often; they provide some proprietary alloys and materials for Stark jets. I don’t arrange those things myself but I know most of the general details”

Mr. Wright asked “How Gotham-centric is the company, anyway? Is there a chance that we could just leave it alone and it would be fine?”

“No, absolutely not. The entire board and upper management are located in Gotham. There are probably some important people traveling at any one time, but for the most part everyone's in Gotham. But here is the important thing to know: Wayne Enterprises, despite its size and age, is not a corporation, it is not publicly traded, it is not even privately traded. It is a family business and it is owned, in its entirety, by Bruce Wayne. Gotham or no Gotham, nothing regarding the company good or bad, happens without his consent.”

“That is a lot of power for someone who is so, well…” Mr. Wood stated unsurely.

Even given the circumstances Tony couldn’t help but smirk. “You got a problem with billionaire playboys, Mr. Wood?” He might not actually partake in the lifestyle so much now, he did not have the time, but God help him if he ever actually admitted that.

Mr. Wood blushed “hey, even at your most ahh… active, you were still always recognized as a genius. Bruce Wayne is, well, not. Are we even sure that if we got him out he would be able to handle all that is going on?”

This time Mrs. Roberts spoke up before Tony could. “The way I heard it, if we save Mr. Wayne, he might not be any good, but he has the authority to do something or at least delegate powers to someone who could. If we saved someone else, they couldn’t do anything at all.”

Mr. Wright, as always, stepped in to back her up. “That's not the only factor. Wayne is a public figure, and is Gotham's most prominent citizen. And he is prominent for being a famous airhead, with more money than God, who has never worked a day of his life. He is the perfect target to anti-establishment rebels like these. Other upper management will likely last longer in the chaos, simply because anyone in the city can likely recognize him on sight.”

“Who is actually running the company? We should at least keep an eye out for them.” Chairwoman Myers asked.

“I believe Pepper’s told me the person she's met with has been Lucius Fox, and our deals are big enough to warrant their top person, but I will double check and email you all if it is someone else. But I also think you should not entirely dismiss Bruce himself. I know the press and I can definitely see the appeal of pretending to be dumber than you are, and making people think someone else is making the decisions.” Tony stated. He was bothered by the way they talked about Bruce. He knew it was reasonable, and if he was right it was what Bruce was going for, but it still bothered him.

Chairwoman Myers interrupted his thoughts. “Let’s vote. Who thinks we should send a team to Gotham to rescue Bruce Wayne? All in favor say aye.”

The vote was unanimous.

Chairwoman Myers continued “If we are going to plan an actual operation we need some time to draw up a plan. So let's disband, do our research, and set up proposals. Dismissed, let's meet again at 11:00 tomorrow to make a specific plan.”

Chapter Text

Bruce Wayne sat back in his chair and ran his hand through his hair. He was in the Batcave, at the Batcomputer, watching the same news feed as Tony Stark was in New York.

He sighed.

He should have seen this coming. As soon he heard about the Accords he knew they would send people to either recruit, or eliminate him. And he knew that Batman could never answer to any government authority. So the conflict there was inevitable.

He was sure he could avoid whoever the Accords sent after him for as long as the Accords could spare them. After all, they're not going to assign any Avenger to Gotham permanently, and he was pretty sure he could avoid any ordinary agents indefinitely. Especially with the help of Oracle and just the home court advantage.

He just wasn’t expecting the Gothamites to react quite so strongly. The first attack by the civilians did not really surprise him, but for the police to join in as well did. He also did not expect quite such a violent reaction to the National Guard. But he really should have, after all the US might think of what they are doing as crowd control, but to Gothamites this was an invasion. Plus it is not like the people of Gotham are known for their pacifism.

He sighed again, harder this time, and waited. He’d called a family meeting to discuss what to do next. He was lucky that Dick had happened to be in Gotham for a case, so the whole family was available. The military, or the Gothamites, or both, were likely to block off all passage in and out of the city soon, if Dick had still been in Bludhaven there would have been a chance he would have gotten locked out.

He heard steps and looked over to see Dick, Tim, Cass, and Alfred coming down the stairs. Jason was in the city so he would take a little longer to arrive.

“What's up?” Dick asked, smiling.

“You have not seen the news.” Bruce asked, and it was a question, even if no one from outside their circle would recognise it as one. Bruce almost never inflected his questions in the cave or while wearing the Batsuit. Luckily Dick and the rest of the Batfamily were used to Bruce’s brusque additude. Dick in particular usually just pretended Bruce talked normally, ignored his tone, and then responded accordingly.

“Nope, why, what's wrong?” He asked like a normal person. The others just shook their head in response.

“The National Guard has been called in response to the recent unrest in the city. They are not doing so well.” Bruce brought up the news footage full screen and unmuted it.

“Oh dear” Alfred exclaimed. Cass frowned and Tim seemed to study the footage.

Dick stopped smiling.

They waited in silence, watching the footage, for a few minutes before Jason's motorcycle roared in the cave. The tires squealed as he braked. He hopped off his bike, and pulled off his helmet. He was in full costume, and there was blood on it.

“What are you waiting for,” Jason said, impatiently. “Suit up, lets go.”

Bruce muted the video again and responded, “I’m not sure that that is a good idea.”

“Come on Bruce, you’re supposed to be the Protector of Gotham, and right now Gotham needs protecting. We are being attacked.” Jason was fuming, of course he was, from a certain point of view he was the only true Gothamite in the group.

Tim and Bruce were raised in Bristol, far from the grime of the streets. Even if Thomas and Martha were always careful to make sure Bruce understood that Gotham was his city and what that meant, Bruce never really understood Gotham properly until he took in Jason. Dick, Alfred and Cass, however were not even from Gotham to begin with, although they certainly considered their home now.

“Jason,” Bruce paused, he had to say this right the first time. “We are not people. Batman, Robin, -”

Jason interrupted “Not people, what kind of philosophical bullshit are you talking, this is real life, not Plato’s cave.”

Bruce sighed, he was doing a lot of that today “Jason, just please hear me out before you yell at me okay.”

“Fine” Jason grumbled.

“Okay,” Bruce continued, “Batman, Robin, Red Hood, they are not people. They are symbols. We can do a lot of good as symbols, a lot of good that we could never do otherwise, but we cannot do this. Revolutions must be won by people one way or another. If we fight this battle for Gotham, Gotham will never be accepted as a free independent state. Because all people will see when they look at it will be us. Gotham will become Batman's city, and her residents prisoners of us, in the world's eyes. Because we wear masks, and hide our faces, and stole this city from the beacon of democracy that is America, that would make us the bad guys. They will never believe the people really wanted this unless they fight for it themselves. The only way that Gotham becomes a free state is if its residents get it there themselves.”

“So we just do nothing” Jason complained, but he was already giving in. He might not always agree with Bruce, but he knows that when Bruce says something will happen a certain way, it usually will.

“No” Tim cut in. “Batman may not be a person, but Bruce Wayne certainly is.”

Bruce smiles.

Chapter Text

The next day.

After that morning's Committee meeting Tony finally had approval for the rescue mission. Natasha and Steve had been chosen for the mission. Natasha because of her observational skills, and Steve because the Committee felt that Bruce Wayne was more likely to go with someone who was a recognizable member of the Avengers. Most people could not pick Natasha out of a lineup which was very much by design. Iron Man was also recognizable, and with the added benefit that Bruce knew Tony, but the plan was to go in as quietly as possible and the Iron Man suit was not quiet, so he could not go. Steve and Natasha were heading over by Quinjet from the compound. They read their briefings on the plane.

Steve knew that Captain America was really just a stage name, but it was one he was proud of, and after years of playing America's most American man, he had internalized a lot of what it meant. He was proud of his country, all of it, and the idea that part of it would do what Gotham was doing now, well, it just did not make sense to him. Why would people not want to be part of America? Sure, he knew America had done some pretty bad things in its history, but none of them really seemed to apply here. He’d looked at some census data on the plane, and Gotham didn’t have a larger than average population of Black, Native American, or Japanese people, compared to other large cities, so it couldn’t be that.

He just didn’t understand.

Natasha however was much less overwhelmed. She had worked in countries all over the world, many of which had been in states of unrest; to her this was not that special. She understood why everyone else was so alarmed cognitively; she was well aware of the way people in first world countries idolized their countries and felt immune to certain types of bad situations. But she did not share that perspective. She did love America, it was the country that taught her she could be more than just a killer, could even be a person. She just did not let that love blind her.

Natasha might not know why Gotham was fighting, but she figured that there was a reason, and that was enough for her.

These perspectives showed on their faces as they walked out of the elevator into Tony’s penthouse, and he could see them. Most people wouldn’t be able to unless they were like Natasha, but Tony had been working with them long enough to notice the crack of confusion on Steve’s Captain America face_TM, or the lack of one on Natasha’s.

“Hey Cap, Nat.” Tony greeted. “Penny for your Thoughts?”

“Only a penny Tony? I feel stiffed.” Nat joked.

“Yeah well, I’ll throw in free room and board, how's that?” Tony snarked back.

“Seems fair, I did research online on the way over. Did you know Gotham has its own social media sites?”

“Really, weird, well that should make research easier. Everyone relevant in one place.”

“It would, except it’s only accessible from Gotham.”

“The hell, why?”

Natasha shrugged.

Steve cut in “I don’t get it, why is that weird? Doesn’t it just mean that they don’t want to pay to globalize their service when all their customers are in one place? Why is that crazy?”

“Setting up a website is not like setting up a shipping route.” Tony explained. “It does not cost money to be available to different places. Global availability is the default. To geolock a service like Natasha said they did costs time and money. Which is a crazy thing to spend money on for a social media service. Someone in Gotham is paying real money to not be able to contact the outside world.”

“Plus I could not find any VPN with servers in Gotham, which would be the easiest way to get past a geoblock. I found records of one company planning to set one up, but it never happened.” Natasha added.

Steve started. “That implies this… this could have been planned years in advance. One reason I could think of that one would restrict information this way would be if, say, you were planning an… uprising and did not want anyone from outside the city to be aware of it. Not to mention how useful a confidential line of communication is during a battle.”

Tony’s eyebrows rose. “When I was looking into this at the beginning, I learned that there are no registered firearms in Gotham outside police weapons.”

“That kind of information is very useful in battle, exactly the kind of knowledge you might want to hide.” Steve pointed out.

They just let that sink in for a minute.

Tony, who was not good at silence, spoke up first. “Change of plan, Bruce and his family have disappeared from Wayne Manor. Analysts believe he is likely still alive, as, due to his status it is almost impossible he would be killed quietly. His death would be a point of pride and revolutionaries love making examples. They could be being held for a pending execution or he could have just taken his family underground. But you guys have to be ready to move out as soon as he is located.”

Natasha could read Tony even better than he could her, despite him having his highly refined media face on. Although for her it was less about knowing him and more of an innate skill.
“Bruce?” She asked pointedly. She could tell how concerned he was.

“We knew each other when we were kids, I have not seen him in ages though. We did not keep in touch.” Tony admitted. “And before you ask no I do not know where he disappeared to when he was eighteen. We had stopped talking by then.”

“Do you know anything relevant?” She asked.

“I don’t think he is a dumb as he acts, and don’t assume anything about that. I know how suspicious you are.” he glared at her. “It’s just a media persona, the press can be exhausting.”

“Ok,” she conceded, “Also once social media became a dead end, I looked into the recent graffiti and chants people were using.”

“Find anything useful?” Steve asked.

“Most of it was what you’d expect, ‘long live Gotham’ or ‘free the city’. Stuff like that, but there was other one thing I saw repeated a lot.”

“Oh?”

“Long live the Prince of Gotham”

“Oh that's not ominous at all,” Tony said sarcastically. “Any clue who it is?”

“Not really, I have found some vague references to a Clown Prince of Crime in past records, who seems highly feared. But I can not tell if they are the same person or not, or who they might be.”

“Could they be this Batman figure?” Steve asked.

“Could be, they could be anyone.”

Chapter Text

Captain William B. Miller stood beside his Jeep. He was in the midst of Gotham where his company had managed to gain control of a plaza. The biggest struggle so far had been getting onto the islands. The bridges had caused massive bottlenecking. But they had gotten in.

After the National Guard had failed, the government had sent in the actual military. Captain Miller was real army; he had served overseas, and he had learned to recognize the flow of a battle. For now his men had the upper hand, but that was delicate and he knew how fast the tide could change. He kept a lookout for anything that could cause that change. He had people for that, but you could never have too many eyes.

From behind him he heard screams.

That in and of itself wasn’t particularly shocking for Captain Miller. He’d heard many screams in his time in service. The conflicts he had been in had been bloody and the kind of conflict where it was not all that uncommon for non-combatants to get hurt in the crossfire. He’d heard screams of pain, and of grief, and the muffled shrieks of civilians hiding from gunfire.

But these weren't any of those screams, weren’t quite like anything he’d ever heard before.

They were screams of utter, unimaginable, terror.

He heard them and just knew that this was what every horror movie actor in history was trying, and failing, to emulate.

He turned around and saw a number of his soldiers engulfed in yellow gas. They were the ones screaming; some were firing their guns off into the air, others had dropped theirs and were huddled on the ground. All around him the Gothamites and soldiers not affected froze. But only for a second, then the Gothamites seemed to snap out of it and reached into their backpacks and purses, pulled out what appeared to be collapsible gas masks, and ran, leaving only the soldiers behind.

Captain Miller could have sworn he saw some of them smirk at him before they did.

* * *

In the absence of the Gothamites, Captain Miller’s company was much easier to maneuver and so they formed up with a couple of the nearest units.

It was quiet, now.

It occurred to Captain Miller, not for the first time, that there was not really a path to victory. The people of Gotham had already shown they would risk their lives for… whatever it was they were fighting for. They could not arrest every one who had fought here, there simply was not room. The only other option to “win” would be to kill or permanently maim everyone who fought, but if they did that, there would not be much of a city left. He knew the higher ups were of the opinion that this was like every other riot that had occurred in America for the last few decades. That it would just go away if they just scared everyone off. Captain Miller knew he was not an expert, but he didn’t quite believe that based on what he saw.

His men were jittery after what had happened that morning, and he could admit to himself he was too. The soldiers, and the few Gothamites, that had also been hit had still not recovered. They had all seemed to be deep in hallucinations, and entirely out of touch with reality. They could still respond to movement around them, but seemed not to recognize anyone. Several had attacked the people who were trying to help them, or each other. Several others posed risk to their own safety, in the end a number of them had to be restrained.

He paced through the plaza.

Then, all hell broke loose.

A man with what appeared to be a jetpack, holding a flamethrower, flew in from the east. Another man with something Captain Miller could only call an ice gun, wearing some sort of heavy armor with a glass helmet, attacked from the west. Two separate man that looked like circus strongmen came from the north and south. One had some sort of mask over his nose and mouth with tubes connected to it. The other had weird almost green scaly seeming skin. Several of his soldiers were sniped from a nearby rooftop; when Captain Miller looked up all he could see was a single red light.

He heard a cracking from right beside him. He snapped around to face it, and saw a vine cracking through the concrete beside him. It reached over and picked him up, he tried to reach for his gun, but a branch came off the vine and pulled the gun out of his hand. He was passed from this vine to another, then another before being dropped onto a rooftop. Eyes wide he looked up. He was surrounded.

Surrounded by, it’s worth noting, the most eclectic group of individuals he had ever seen. Were he not scared for his life he probably would have laughed.

There were two men with umbrellas. One was tall and lanky, in green, with a question mark on his hat and and his umbrella shaped the same. The other was short, fat, and bow legged, wearing a tux, complete with tails, and with a slick black umbrella to match.

It was not raining, it had not rained at all that day.

There was a woman, he thought she was the one who had taken him. She had green skin and clothes that appeared to be made entirely of living plants.

One man was wearing two separate suits stitched together in the middle, and had a severe burn covering exactly half his face, and no more. Almost as if it was meant to be that way.

Another man wore ragged, filthy clothes and what looked like a potato sack over his head.

The last person was a woman in a black leather catsuit, literally, complete with leather ears and tail.

“Wah.” Tux guy said. “You really believed you could come in here and take over, and we’d just roll over.”

Captain Miller was a soldier; he did not cower. “We are the US military, we are just trying to maintain order, uh, sir.”

“You can not make us yield, power by force is meaningless without fear.” Potato sack man said. “Gotham has bigger things to fear than you.”

“It’s bad enough you insist that we pay such awful sums every year, now you slaughter our people and say it’s to help us. How purrfectly inane.” Catsuit purred.

“Listen, whatever it is you think is wrong, there must be a better way to solve it then insurrection.” Captain Miller stated.

“What supports law and rulers, what causes king's deaths and taxes?” Question Mark asked.

“Uhhh”

“Idiot.” Question mark huffed. “The will of the people, and the social contract. And you don’t have it.”

“Wah, your gonna tell all that to your superiors, we don’t want your kind of interference here, wah.” Tux guy said.

“Wait let me flip a coin first.” Burnt face says, pulling one out of one of his suit pockets.

Catsuit huffs and gives him a look.

“We can get another guy, if it's tails.” Burnt face adds.

Captain Miller startles. “Wait, are you flipping a coin for my life? That is not how things are done in a society.”

“HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA”

The laugh was high pitched, screechy, and insane, and just at the sound of it, all remaining courage in Captain Miller's body drained out of him.

The fear built as the man walked into his view. The others moved apart almost deferentially, to let him pass. The Captain thought he even saw apprehension in their eyes.

The man himself was as absurd as the others, but there was something terrifying in his eyes, and Captain Miller felt that there was no situation that he would laugh at this man.

The man wore a purple suit with a green vest and matching purple gloves. His hair was green, his face, whiter than death, his mouth covered in something red, that was either makeup, or blood, or scar tissue. It was impossible to tell which.

“Hello mister military man,” said the pale man. “I hope you have enjoyed your welcome, your men certainly seem to be having a screaming good time.” He winked.

Captain Miller could not bring himself to say anything; luckily the pale man didn’t seem to need a response.

The man continued. “Although I feel they don’t yet appreciate what a laugh Gotham can be, HAHA, and what a bad host I would be if I did not entertain my guests. Don’t you agree.”

Captain Miller still didn’t feel like he could move, so the man just reached over grabbed his head and nodded his head for him.

“I’m so glad we’re on the same page; after all nothing good happens to unruly guests.” he said warningly, he then pressed a button on a remote, Explosions went off in the plaza, and he laughed, and laughed and laughed.

And hundreds of voices joined in.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Chapter Text

Tony paced in his bedroom.

“How is she handling it?” Tony said into his phone “Well, she’s tough, but that's never easy the first time. Give her my regards.” He paused. “Yeah, we will be down later today. See you then.”

He hung up, and walked into the living room. Nat was already there on her laptop.

“Hey Nat, Cap off his call yet?'' he asked.

“I don’t think so,” Nat said

Steve chose just that moment to come into the room. “I’ve got news,” he announced.

“About Chairwoman Myers?” Tony asked.

“No, military news from Gotham. What happened with the Chairwoman?” Steve asked.

“You go first, I'll tell you after.”

“The US Army has pulled out of Gotham, following an attack by a group of rather unusual people.”

“Define unusual,” Natasha cut in.

“Well they were costumed, each individually, not like some uniform. And the ones that were seen fighting, did not appear to be used to fighting together, and had widely varying styles. Anyway a handful of them captured one of the officers and told him to tell his superiors ‘to leave Gotham’.”

“So this man saw the group close up?” Natasha asked.

“Yeah, they said they would send along the report when it came, but for now there were two figures of note. There was a woman with green skin who appeared to be able to control plants.”

“An enhanced,” Tony said, “so that makes this our problem again.”

“Exactly. The other was an unusually pale man with an unnatural smile, who seemed to be in charge of the whole operation. It's worth noting that both the paleness and the smile could be makeup, so there is no reason to assume he is enhanced. At the end of his threats he released a gas that caused 217 soldiers to die seemingly of laughter. More than 300 more received a smaller dose and are still receiving treatment.”

“Wow, dying of laughter, that is… a way to go,” Tony said, awkwardly, trying to break the silence.

“Pale face, painted smile, laughter, that could be our Clown Prince,” Natasha said, much more usefully.

“And if he is, him being actively involved in the fight raises the likelihood of him being the same prince the rioters are chanting about,” Steve added.

“Well have got a chance to get some answers now. An hour ago someone shot at Chairwoman Myers,” Tony said.

“Is she okay?” Steve asked.

“Yeah, she is uninjured, understandably shaken up, but uninjured. See, the whole thing was quite amateur. It was done by a Gotham English teacher who happened to be on vacation this week.”

“You mean someone who claims to be a English teacher. With the state of our intelligence regarding the city, I doubt we have been able to definitively prove that is the truth,” Natasha pointed out.

“Yeah well whoever she is, we’ve got her in custody, and we have been invited to do the interrogations. We can finally get some answers.”

Chapter Text

They decide that Steve would do the interrogation with Natasha guiding him though an earpiece. Nat could make better observations when she didn’t have to be playing a persona and so she could communicate her observations with the others real time; But also while she was extremely intimidating, and was incredible at getting information without a target knowing they were being interrogated, her reputation as a cold spy wasn’t ideal for a American police cell, where rights were involved. Steve however was seen as earnest and at the very least well-intentioned, even in other countries. So they decided he would be best for the face here.

As they filed into the observation room, all of them were stuck by how normal the woman looked. She had shoulder length brown hair, was about 5’2”, and in her early forties. She had the overall appearance of a nice, ordinary person.

She was also glaring quite impressively at the one way glass.

“Her name is Susan Tyler, unmarried, and as Tony pointed out, records show she is a high school English teacher,” Natasha read off the file. “She was caught red-handed after firing several shots with an unregistered handgun at Chairwoman Myers while the woman was on her way to a meeting. As I guessed the evidence for her identity is thin and could easily be faked, but that is to be expected given how little evidence we have for anything in Gotham. I don’t see anything that sticks out to me as particularly suspicious.”

Natasha was always suspicious.

But regardless she could not see the play here if Tyler was lying about her identity. Tyler had been caught red-handed so there was no hope of playing innocent. Natasha decided that Steve should play it as if the woman was telling the truth, unless given reason to suspect otherwise.

Tony spoke before she could “I say you go straight in and ask her why she did it. Maybe she will go right ahead and villain monologue us everything we need to know.”

“That is the best way to go forward,” Natasha agreed, “If she is just a normal person fighting for an ideal, she should want to tell us what that ideal is. As much as I object to Tony's use of ‘villain monologue’ as a verb.”

“Hey!” Tony complained, “Who's the English teacher now?”

Nat snorted and Steve was already entering the interrogation room proper.

“Miss Tyler…” Steve takes a dramatic pause, “I cannot imagine what would prompt a civilian like you to do something like shoot up a government official.”

“You really can’t imagine? That Myers woman sent agents after the Batman, she is the reason your military invaded my city!” Tyler snapped.

“Challenge her word choice,” Natasha advised.

“Invaded is a strong word, the military was just trying to keep the peace,” Steve commented calmly. “The people of Gotham were already beginning to riot when the troops were sent in.”

“Yes invaded is a strong word. It is also a perfectly accurate word to describe a ‘peacekeeping’ force being deployed to subdue outside civilians in their own territory,” she responded.

“Outside civilians?” Steve asked, confused.

“Yeah as in none of your damn business.” Tyler snapped.

“I think she believes that Gotham is not American, or at least that is what she is trying to convince us,” Natasha says.

“Do you mean to imply that Gotham was already an independent nation.” Steve said, shocked, “Gotham pays taxes to the US and follows its laws. I- I mean you have a New Jersey drivers license, how could you claim not to be American?”

“Yes we have, in the past followed your rules, you know, to avoid conflict. But you invaded us anyway, so why bother continuing?” she smirked wryly. “Although I wouldn’t exactly say Gotham’s done much in the way of following any laws.”

“Is that the problem, the crime rate?” Steve really needed to know that. Why were they doing this? It had been eating away at him. He had always been taught American Exceptionalism, that everyone wanted to be an American. “Is the crime rate the problem? But Gotham has less crime than Bludhaven and they are not declaring their independence.”

“Fewer.”

“Sorry?”

“Gotham has fewer crimes than Bludhaven. Not less.”

“Miss Tyler, I do not think this is the time for grammar corrections,” Steve said with full Captain America is Disappointed in You Face^TM on, “This is serious.”

“I am aware.” she said dryly. “It was not a grammar correction, less is, grammatically, a perfectly fine modifier for the word crime. It simply was not a statement I agreed with, so I corrected it to something that is factually correct.”

“What do you mean? Tell me why you think less is not accurate.”

“No. if you can’t figure it out on your own, I won’t be the one to tell you. Although I will say that maybe if you had stepped to try and solve that crime rate, before deciding the first criminal you ever gave shit about in Gotham was the one trying to help us, we would not be in this mess.”

“Press in on Batman,” Natasha advised. “ Try ‘you seem to be a real fan of this Batman’.”

“You seem to be a real fan of this Batman,” Steve said.

“A fan,” Susan Tyler scoffed, “Batman is the only thing standing between Gotham and destruction. It is not a matter of being ‘a fan’. It is a matter of self preservation, we’d be dead if it wasn’t for him. Although I suppose you could call it being a fan if you’re trying to live up to the childishness of your PSAs.”

“The only thing, what about your prince?” Natasha says.

“The only thing, what about your prince?” Steve repeats.

“Our Prince cannot protect us, he does not have the power to do so. Only the Bats can. But no matter how hard the Bats fight the city never gets any better. They can only preserve what we have. Our Prince is the only chance we have to get better. The only person that can affect real change in our city. We deserve better and our Prince will give it to us.”

She spoke with passion; it was the first time she seemed to take the conversation seriously. It was clear going in that she knew that there was nothing she could say, or not say, that she believed would change her sentence. At this point, based on what she had seen, Natasha fully believed that Tyler was who she said she was, not any sort of spy, but she still was suspicious that there was some sort of cult ideology at play. The way Tyler spoke, her total faith in her words, it only solidified that suspicion.

“Ask about the clown,” Natasha prompted.

“And this would be your ahh, clown prince, wouldn’t it?” Steve asked.

Tyler’s eyes widened, and she reared back. Her eyes flashed up toward the corner then back to Steve.

She seemed to relax a little, and began, “you really...” She interrupted herself with a sudden incredulous snort of laughter.

She froze, then slapped her hand over her mouth and nose and looked back into the corner. This time Natasha noticed that she was looking at the vent.

Susan Tyler relaxed again and put her hand down. “If you have to ask that you are even more clueless than I thought you were. I will not be the one to tell you anymore than you already know. And don’t bother with your threats, I grew up in the Bowery, I’m not afraid of any American prison.”

True to her word she refused to answer any more questions.

Chapter Text

After returning to the tower the three Avengers met on the communal floor to discuss what they had learned. Totally calmly.

“How can she not think they are American, they can vote can’t they!?! They pay taxes, don’t they!! Who does she think is taking their money every year!?! They live in New Jersey! Gotham is less than 200 miles from Washington!! She has to be delusional. Or maybe in a cult!” Steve ranted, sounding unusually hopeful on that last point.

Maybe it was not so calm.

“Steve. Calm down,” Natasha said. “We cannot dismiss the possibility that Miss Tyler’s opinions genuinely reflect the mood in Gotham, just because you find it hard to accept. Not everyone agrees on where borders are or who has the authority to govern who. I know that first hand.”

“Yeah, but those were regions in turmoil. This is America!” Steve said. He did not have to finish that thought, probably couldn’t if he tried. He tried to make the statement sound confident, but Tony and Natasha could both hear his desperation for her to tell him he was right.

“Sure, regions in turmoil, and I suppose Gotham is the perfect picture of peace and tranquility right now,” Nat responded dryly.

“You know what I mean.”

“Yeah, I do. You mean that America is a magical place that would never run into the issues the rest of the world faces. Which is not that uncommon of a belief here. Similar beliefs are held all over the world in first world countries like this. But we cannot afford that blind spot here. Maybe you're right; maybe this is a powerful cult, or a movement headed by a particularly inspiring demagogue. Neither is that unlikely and both are things we need to consider. Hell, given the world we live in now, maybe this is all just the result of widespread mind control. We need to put our biases aside while considering all possible theories. Alright?”

“Alright, you’re right Nat.”

“Great,” Tony said. “Let's get to that theorizing then.”

They nod, calmer now that they had both gotten their frustrations out.

“Ok,” Tony continued. “First about our previous stars of the show, the Prince and the Clown Prince; based on her reactions it seems fair to assume they are not the same person.”

“We cannot know that for sure, but it seems a safe bet considering how differently she reacted to the names. But did you notice the way she was looking after Steve said his name? It wasn't just random; she was looking at the vents,” Natasha said.

“She was expecting a gas attack,” Steve concluded. “And she relaxed after she checked. That implied she expected to see something. Many poison gases are clear and colorless, however, both gases used in the attack on the military last night were colored. That increases the chance that the pale man seen there was the Clown Prince, it could be his MO.”

“Which puts the both Princes on the same side of the fight,” Tony points out.

“They could be partners, the charismatic, inspiring Prince builds a following and gains an army, while the terrifying Clown keeps the populous in line. That would explain the matching titles. It’s also worth mentioning that Tyler was afraid of the Clown, and she was a supporter of the Prince. That would still work if he is the enforcer within the group.” Nat added.

“Perhaps the Clown was the one who told Tyler what to do to begin with,” Steve said.

“Possibly, but I can tell you she did believe in what she was saying,” Nat said.

“Speaking of motive, what was up with the less/fewer things. It-” Tony cut off. His phone had buzzed: he took it out to check it and paled. “Friday, prep the Quinjet.”

“What happened?” Steve said.

“Bruce Wayne was spotted being escorted by armed rebels to Wayne Tower. Several news cameras and camera crews in the area have also vanished. Intelligence thinks they are setting up for a televised execution tonight. They are probably keeping him in his penthouse. Head out as soon as you can.” Tony said, trying his level best not to react.

“We’ll save your friend for you Tony, don’t worry,” Steve tried to reassure Tony: it helped. After all Captain America was known for pulling off whatever he put his mind to.

If he said he was saving Bruce Wayne, what could stop him?

Chapter Text

The Quinjet hovered over Wayne Tower, cloaked. FRIDAY was flying while Nat and Captain America took a rope ladder to the balcony.
The lights were on inside the penthouse, so it looked like they were right on where the rebels were keeping Mr. Wayne. They peeked through the window; Mr. Wayne was sitting by the bar on his phone, with a scotch at his elbow, while 2 rebels with automatic rifles stood guard at the only exit to the hallway.

Mr. Wayne spotted them, so Steve gave him his most reassuring trustworthy Captain America™ smile, and gestured for him to follow him. Steve might not have been in costume for stealth reasons, but he was definitely in character. After all the whole reason he was being sent was because he was seen as trustworthy.

Mr. Wayne just looked at Steve for a second, then smiled that slightly dopey smile Steve has seen on magazines before, the Brucie^TM smile, and said something to the door guards, before he picked up his glass and headed out to join Steve and Nat on the balcony.

His size was the first thing Steve noticed; for a playboy he was huge. Not in the overweight sense, but bulky. He did not hold himself like any sort of athlete or fighter though so Steve had to assume it was gym weight.

He was as handsome as his pictures too, a fact all the more apparent in what he wore. He was wearing a most likely, ridiculously expensive suit, and when Steve looked closely, what appeared to be make up.

“Hello Captain, Madam. Welcome to my balcony. Do you have a reason for visiting? Oh, did Tony send you?” Brucie greeted.

“Yes Mr. Wayne, he was worried about you, if you come with us we can get you to safety,” Captain America responded.

Steve knew that he was oversimplifying the situation by claiming it was all Tony’s idea, but nothing he said was really a lie, and he supposed that no one was really hurt by understating the more pragmatic nature of the decision.

“Oh he worries about me. Always nice to know I haven’t been forgotten. Thank him for the thought for me will you?” Brucie responded.

“Tell him yourself. We are heading right back to Stark Tower as soon as we go. Come on, it’s best if we don’t stick around,” Captain America said.

A hard glint appeared in Bruce's eye.

“No, I’m good, thanks for the offer,” Brucie responded. “I’d love to talk but I’ve got to be going somewhere soon.” he turned to Natasha and leered. “Although I’d love to get to know you better.” He turned back to Steve. “I don’t think you’d get along with the other people I have business with right now”

Captain America puffed out his chest. “I’m afraid our business is quite urgent. It’s in your best interest to come with us.”

“Oh my god. It’s like watching two polite aliens pretending to be people,” Natasha complained. “Just drop the act, both of you.”

Mr. Wayne and Steve looked at each other.

“Ok,” Steve said. “Mr. Wayne, it’s dangerous here. We have to go now: we can try and pick up your kids if they are nearby, but we have to go.”

“No,” Mr. Wayne said, his smile entirely gone now. “I’m not going anywhere: this is my city. I’m not going to abandon it while it is in crisis. You tell Tony, or your committee, or whoever is making these decisions, that I’m not looking for a way out. And just so you know, any plan you made should have involved my kids from the beginning. I don’t like the implication that I’m the kind of parent who would abandon his kids in a warzone just to save himself.”

“Look, Mr. Wayne, we have reason to believe that your execution is being set up as we speak, for any minute now. If we had a viable plan to save your kids, we would do that, but we don’t know where they are. We only know where you are, and we are running out of time. Do you really want to die for your city?” Steve argued.

Something crossed Mr. Wayne's face too fast to read.

“If that's what staying entails,” he replied neutrally, before throwing his glass hard at the window. “Now leave,” he said forcefully.

Steve and Nat tensed, as armed rebels, alerted by the sound, spilled out of the penthouse and swarmed around Mr. Wayne. Brucie was wearing that stupid smile again.

Brucie lay his hand on the nearest gunman’s arm.

“Don’t worry,” he said louder than necessary. “They were just leaving.”

The rebels shifted nervously but did not fire. Nat motioned to Steve to retreat. They did so slowly, without taking their eyes off the rebels.

Nat climbed the ladder first and right before Steve got on Brucie called, “Hey, tell Tony we should get together sometime!” And he waved as FRIDAY flew them off.

“Come on, Sir,” one of the men said. “It’s time to get downstairs.”

Chapter Text

Tony Stark sat with his head in his hands, in his penthouse. He’d just heard from Nat about the mission's failure.

Not just failure. They were not just unable to save Bruce. He had refused to come with them. At the last possible moment he was offered a way out and he turned it down.

Tony went through possible scenarios. Maybe the rebels offered his kids’ lives in return for his cooperation? Or Alfred’s?

Or maybe he was planning to go down as a martyr. Turning down a rescue just so he could give an epic, passionate speech on live tv, right before his execution, just to prove a point is exactly something Tony could see Bruce doing.

Bruce always was a weird, creepily focused child.

He always devoted himself 100% to a task, even when it wasn’t really necessary, or normal. Not to mention how absurdly dramatic he could be.

“Boss, the missing journalists have begun their broadcast from outside Wayne Tower,” FRIDAY announced.

Tony sighed; he really did not want to watch his friend be executed. But if Bruce really was going to sacrifice himself for a speech, Tony felt like he owed it to him to watch.

“Play it FRIDAY,” Tony said.

The TV flipped on and Tony looked up

“I would like to remind you that this is live and we do not know what will happen next. If there are children in the room we can not guarantee that the contents of this broadcast will be suitable for them,” the newswomen said.

The footage switched to a live broadcast outside of Wayne Tower: the crowd was packed and almost entirely heavily armed.

Then Bruce Wayne himself emerged from the building. He had that stupid press smile on but only about halfway. He was flanked by armed guards, and four people in formal wear. Tony guessed these were his kids. Although Tony had only heard that Bruce had three.

On his right was 20-something who looked like a male model. Tall and slender, he had black hair, blue eyes and olive skin. He wore a blinding smile; It was a show smile, but the show smile of someone who loved the spotlight. Dick Grayson most likely.

Beside Dick was a teenage boy Tony could not identify. He had black hair and blue eyes like the others, and stood like a kid raised in the upper class. He was not smiling; he looked serious, the only person who, in Tony’s opinion, seemed in touch with the severity of the situation.

On Bruce’s left was another young man. He was a little younger and shorter than Dick; although broader, with the same hair and eyes the rest of his family. He looked angry, but mostly he looked like he was always angry, and there was a spark of triumph in his eyes. Jason Todd probably.

Beside Jason was a teenage Asian woman; lithe and small, she smiled genuinely, and innocently. Cassandra Cain, Bruce's only kid without blue eyes.

Bruce stepped up to the podium and all of Tony's theories fell apart.

“Hello Gotham!” The crowd roared. Bruce continued, “I love this city. And I will continue to love it, not because of what it has given me, but despite what it has taken. When I was nine, my parents were taken, not just from me, but from everyone in this city. A loss so profound it helped define the very geography of this city: the road they died on marks the center of the most crime-ridden part of our city; Crime Alley, the dividing line between East End and the Bowery. But I do not hate this city for taking them; I do not hate Crime Alley.

“The man that took my parents, he was desperate, doing what he felt was necessary to feed himself, and his family. I’ll admit, for a long time I did not understand desperation, I tried, I really did, I have always wanted to understand my people. But I couldn’t, not until I met my son, on the very street that took my parents. He told me of desperation, of doing whatever you needed to to feed yourself, to survive. And when I had to imagine my son, starving, I understood.

“Desperation is so common in this city, so deep that people will sign on with psychopaths, and face off against Bats, to support themselves.

“My dream is a Gotham without desperation: we will always have crazies, we will always have Bats, but maybe someday the good people of Gotham won’t have to fight in their battles. Today you took the first step to that dream. Now we have a fighting chance.

“To the world who thinks we are crazy I say this, well, Gotham has always been crazy.

“But this is not a joke.

“We have shown you that we will fight for our freedom, and we have won, we have driven your invaders from our shores. I can guess your move, when force has failed, the world resorts to sanctions, a siege. Let me tell you today if you dare to attempt to cut off our city from the supplies we need to survive, Wayne Enterprises will show you what it is like to live without what Gotham has given you.

“And to our sister city, Bludhaven, I say this, if you feel you belong as Americans, we will lay no claim on you. But if you wish to join us, if you are tired of desperation without change, we will welcome you. You may live under the guidance of my son.” he gestured to Dick. and took a breath.

“Believe it or not, I am aware that I am not the smartest person in this city. As such I cannot swear to always do the right thing for Gotham. But I can and do swear that I will always care, in all the ways that no one has cared before. I swear that I will always do my best for this city. I swear to always put Gotham first. I love this city. Long live Gotham.”

The crowd roared, and screamed out,

“And long live her Prince!”

Chapter Text

Tony sat on his couch, and stared at the wall. He had just gotten his head around the fact that the revolution Gotham was even happening. He certainly was not prepared for his childhood friend to be behind it all, and with a title like Prince, too. What was that? People called Tony egotistical, but to declare yourself royalty seemed the ultimate form of putting oneself above the populace.

Natasha and Steve walked in. Tony pulled himself together and threw on a smile (not his best).

“Well that was a plot twist. Never would have guessed that old Bill Gates over there would be anti-America, eh. Guess he got tired of having to pay people to do whatever he wanted.” Tony attempted to joke.

“Sure,” Steve said. He could tell Tony was putting on a happy face, but he couldn’t see any reason to point that out.

“You said you knew him as a kid; what can you tell us about him?” Natasha asked. She hadn’t pushed when Bruce was just a target for extraction, but now they needed all the information they could get.

Tony knew that, and as much as he wished he could say Bruce would never do this well… “Bruce was a freaking weird kid: he mentioned in his speech that his parents died when he was nine; well, they were murdered right in front of him. I don’t think he ever got over that. But that said, I simply cannot believe he’s power-hungry enough to take over a city.”

“No one wants to believe that someone they know is capable of something like that. But people still do these things.” Natasha pointed out.

“I know that, but, listen, if someone told me that Bruce became an… ecoterrorist, it wouldn’t surprise me this much. It’s not that I don’t think he is capable of bad things, it’s just that I can’t imagine him doing them because of greed. I’d be less surprised if he turned out to be a serial killer than involved in a pyramid scam. As I said, a very creepy, very weird kid. He was raised by his butler after his parents died, and it definitely left him a little off.”

“Are you implying he was weird because he wasn’t raised by a billionaire. You know middle class families raise normal kids all the time,” Steve said, hackles raised.

“No, you're misunderstanding me,” Tony said defensively. “I’m sure Alfred would have been a perfectly capable Dad, if he was trying to be a Dad. But he wasn’t: Bruce wasn’t raised by his parents' ex-butler, he was raised by his butler. Alfred used to call him ‘Master Bruce’ and refused to sit with him for meals. He would take orders from Bruce. Overall it meant that Bruce was very aware of the difference between love and obedience. He loved Alfred and had power over him, but all he ever wanted was a parent. That’s why he would never seek out power, he knows how hollow it is.”

Steve had frozen in surprise. Natasha could tell from Tony and Steve’s reaction how weird of a relationship that was, and that both had feelings about it, but she didn’t really get why this was so significant. She had never really had much firsthand experience with healthy relationships; the Avengers contained every person she had ever had a real relationship with in her life. So in the end, for her, all relationship types just sort of blurred together.

She plowed on, “Do you think he could genuinely believe what he is saying then? That he really thinks he’s what, Gotham’s savior?”

Tony shugged, “That’s the only explanation that makes any sense to me, not that it makes much sense.”

Steve snapped back into debrief mode. “Did you recognize the people behind him?”

Tony raised an eyebrow, “You really need to start reading tabloids: they were his kids. I didn’t recognise the youngest though. He must have nabbed another one when no one was looking. Darn orphan hoarder.”

“Orphan?” Steve asked.

“Yeah they are all adopted. Where do you think he got his bleeding heart reputation from?” Tony responded.

“Boss?” FRIDAY interrupted

“Not now baby,” Tony dismissed.

“I believe you will find this particularly relevant to your current discussion,” she insisted.

“Okay, what have you got?”

“You just got an email invite to Bruce Wayne's coronation gala.”

The Avengers looked at each other.

“Well he did say he wanted to see you soon when we went to talk to him, but I didn’t imagine he meant this soon,” Steve said to break the silence.

“Any conditions?” Tony asked.

“He warns that there will be metal detectors,” FRIDAY responded, “and states that you will be under Prince Wayne’s protection while you are in the city.”

“He is not a prince,” Steve snapped. “This is America, we do not have princes.”

“It would appear that there are a great number of people in Gotham, who would disagree with you on both points, Captain,” FRIDAY stated calmly.

Natasha wasn’t listening, she hadn’t taken her eyes off Tony since FRIDAY first announced the invitation. “No, Tony,” she said warningly. “You aren’t going.”

Steve eyes shot back toward Tony. His eyes widened. “You can’t be that reckless, Tony. There is no way he has good intentions, inviting an unarmed Avenger to a warzone.”

Tony stayed silent, a grin spreading across his face.

“Tony,” Natasha said, trying a different tack. “You’ll never get committee approval to go.”

“Well that's the best part, Kim Possible: the committee doesn’t have any power over what Tony Stark does, just Iron Man. And I’m not even bringing the suit so there is no way to claim it’s an unauthorized mission. Wayne Enterprises and Stark industries are in business together; just a business meeting, no concern of anyone else's. And Capsicle, you always seem to forget I’m not just an Avenger, there are plenty of reasons people want to meet me,” Tony said, smiling mischievously.

“You are going to get yourself killed,” Steve said, knowing the argument was already lost.

“This is going to be fun,” Tony announced, ignoring Steve entirely.

Chapter Text

authors note:
just wanted to remind people that this Story is continued on a new part that is up now, for those who missed it on the last update.