The city spread beneath the windows like a circuit board.
Lights pulsed in uneven grids. Traffic crawled along glowing arteries. Somewhere far below, sirens wailed and faded, swallowed by Gotham's endless hum.
Nolan stood barefoot on the marble floor, jacket draped over the back of a chair, sleeves of his dress shirt rolled to his forearms. In front of him, the long conference table had been converted into a planning surface.
Projected across it were blueprints of the Continental's ballroom. Guest lists. Catering routes. Security rotations. Vendor access points. Seating charts.
At first glance, it looked like the logistics for an expensive charity gala.
It wasn't.
Nolan rested both hands on the edge of the table and exhaled slowly.
"They sent assassins after me," he said quietly. "They funded Crane. They sabotaged my hotel, my inspections, my licensing. They tested my boundaries and escalated when I didn't bend."
He straightened, eyes flicking over the projections.
"So now I have to give them something they can't possibly ignore."
Kieran appeared near the window, leaning against the glass, arms folded loosely.
"Make it irresistible," he said. "Old money hates being excluded. Especially when new money starts playing savior."
Quentin stood opposite Nolan, already scrolling through security layers.
"We're not just hosting a gala," he said. "We're creating a behavioral filter."
Vey lingered near the table, gaze unfocused, head tilted slightly as if listening to something only he could hear.
"And an emotional one," he added.
Nolan tapped his tablet and a new projection filled the table.
The Everleigh Initiative for Urban Recovery
– City-wide shelter network
– Trauma counseling clinics
– Legal aid for displaced residents
– Job placement and micro-housing
Kieran smiled faintly.
"That'll get applause."
"It'll get resistance," Nolan corrected. "From the right people."
He zoomed in on a line of text.
Not affiliated with existing Gotham legacy charities or foundations.
Quentin looked up sharply.
"You're cutting out Wayne, Kane, Elliot, and the old philanthropic boards."
"Deliberately," Nolan said.
Kieran chuckled under his breath.
"You're stepping on sacred ground."
"Good," Nolan replied, "And don't worry I'll only bring it up towards the end of the Gala my initial announcement will be one of fun. Let them drink and relax."
He folded his arms.
"Gotham's been run through legacy institutions for a century. Every major charitable pipeline flows through the same five or six families. If the Court is what Penguin says it is—old blood, old power—then this initiative is a territorial incursion."
Vey nodded slowly.
"Anyone tied to them will feel this as a threat, not generosity."
Nolan flicked to the next file.
Names populated the projection.
Not celebrities.
Not billionaires.
Not politicians.
Mid-level city officials.
Zoning board members.
Port authority lawyers.
Utilities commissioners.
Real estate clerks.
Historic preservation officers.
Quentin's lips twitched.
"These people shouldn't be anywhere near a gala like this. And yet you want them to mingle with the others."
"Exactly," Nolan said.
He began circling names.
"they'll recognize why these people matter. Anyone who pulls one of them aside. Anyone who leaves early after seeing them. Anyone who starts making phone calls the moment they realize who's in the room—those are our first data points."
Kieran tilted his head.
"And if someone tries to intimidate or buy one of them during the event?"
Nolan's eyes hardened.
"Then they just told me who they are. Remember I want the swiftest fingers on the ground floor. I already asked Dre to send over a list."
Quentin brought up a second overlay.
A rumor map.
"This goes out through our lower-tier criminal channels tomorrow," Quentin said. "That you're planning to buy abandoned buildings tunnel infrastructure under Gotham."
"It's complete fiction," Nolan said.
"But believable," Kieran added.
"And existentially threatening to the wrong people," Vey murmured, "Their base has to be below or else Batman would surely know about them by now."
Nolan nodded.
"I want Marcy tracking shell-company bids, legal injunction attempts, zoning objections, sudden interest in condemned properties. Anyone who reacts to a fake move just told us where their pressure points are."
Quentin zoomed into the ballroom layout.
"One visible mistake," he said. "A loading dock camera outage. Temporary badge-scan downtime. A service corridor without posted guards."
Nolan studied it.
"Anyone who tests it isn't a guest," he said. "They're reconnaissance."
"And if they send another freak assassin?" Kieran asked quietly.
Quentin didn't answer immediately.
Naima's name appeared on the security roster.
Rooftop overwatch.
Counter-sniper teams.
Underpass squads embedded as catering staff.
Rapid lockdown protocols.
Nolan's jaw tightened.
"If they strike here," he said, "they're not subtle anymore."
Kieran straightened, already rehearsing a tone.
"I'll work the room," he said. "Casual. Charming. Dangerous."
He smiled faintly.
"Gotham's been run by the same families for over a century.
It's time someone disrupted that."
Vey's eyes flicked up.
"Anyone who stiffens at that line is hiding something."
"Anyone who agrees too fast is lying," Nolan added.
"And anyone who tells you you're being reckless," Quentin said, "is afraid you're right. we need to be looking at auras the whole gala."
The room fell quiet.
Nolan stepped back from the table.
"I don't need names yet," he said. "I need patterns. Reactions. Behavioral tells. I need to know what kind of people I'm actually dealing with."
Vey folded his arms.
"And if none of them bite?"
Nolan's mouth curved faintly.
"Then they're better than we thought."
A pause.
Then Quentin spoke again, lower.
"They might come for you during the gala."
Nolan didn't deny it.
"If they do," he said, "they confirm everything."
Nolan sent one final message to Marcy.
Flag all shell companies bidding on abandoned properties.
Track zoning pressure.
Monitor unusual police redeployments near the hotel.
He set the tablet down and looked out over Gotham again.
"they won't be able to resist touching something."
****
the cold blue glow of the Batcomputer filled the batcave amongst the eery silence that seemed to fill the atmosphere.
Batman stood in front of it without moving, cape hanging straight down his back, cowl still on. The only sound in the cavern was the low hum of servers and the faint drip of water echoing somewhere deep in the rock.
On the main screen, a single phrase sat at the top of a growing web of data.
COURT OF OWLS
Beneath it: nothing useful.
No criminal records.
No credible urban legends.
No whistleblowers.
No intercepted communications.
No historical references that weren't nursery-rhyme vague.
That alone told him the name wasn't new.
A conspiracy that powerful didn't just appear fully formed. It left residue. Paper trails. Loose mouths. Incomplete erasures.
Unless it had been pruning itself for generations.
Batman's jaw tightened slightly.
He shifted the display, bringing up the autopsy scans of the two assassins he took from where Kieran's people disposed of the bodies.
Bone density well above baseline human norms.
Muscle fibers interwoven with synthetic reinforcement lattices.
Neural pathways altered around the pain centers of the brain.
Chemical residues still present in the blood, designed to suppress shock, fear, and hesitation.
They hadn't just been trained.
They had been built.
He rotated one of the 3D cranial scans. Micro-scarring along the frontal lobe. Surgical marks so precise they bordered on artistic.
WayneTech's analysis software flagged several of the compounds in their bloodstream as partially synthetic carriers — preservatives, stabilizers, and metabolic inhibitors.
He replayed the forensic body-cam footage from the GCPD morgue.
The moment came and went in less than half a second.
One of the corpses twitched on the slab.
Barely perceptible.
He isolated the frame. Enhanced it. Ran motion analysis.
Residual neural activity. A delayed motor discharge.
Not a reflex but something akin to a reboot of the bodies system.
Batman leaned closer to the screen.
"Cryogenic suspension," he said quietly. "Or chemical stasis."
Assassins designed to be stored.
Activated.
Deployed when needed.
That required infrastructure. Facilities. Specialists. Funding. Political insulation.
He brought up every known financial connection to Jonathan Crane over the last ten years.
Charities. Dummy corporations. Shell accounts. University grants. Pharmaceutical research funds. Arkham procurement budgets.
Thousands of entries flooded the screen.
He filtered for anomalies.
Unusual timing.
Legacy banking institutions.
Payments routed through "heritage" nonprofits.
Trusts older than most modern regulatory frameworks.
A pattern began to emerge.
The money didn't originate anywhere traceable.
It terminated.
Funds passed through five or six laundering layers and then vanished into accounts that legally did not exist.
Not offshore.
Not black-market.
Domestic.
Institutional.
Old.
He zoomed in on one entity.
The Tricorne Preservation Fund
Founded: 1883
Purpose: Urban restoration and heritage conservation
Activity: Minimal
Assets: Vast
Donors: Anonymous or sealed by court order
Batman pulled city permit records.
Every major "renovation" project in Gotham's old districts over the last century.
Tunnels. Foundations. Subway expansions. Courthouse basements. Private hospitals. Orphanages. Churches.
The same cluster of contractors appeared again and again.
Different names.
Same shell companies behind them.
Same silent benefactors.
The screen began to populate with a three-dimensional map of Gotham.
Below the streets, red lines slowly formed.
A second city.
Older than the first.
Hidden behind zoning laws, eminent domain rulings, sealed blueprints, and century-old legal loopholes.
Batman exhaled slowly through his nose.
He pulled up genealogical records.
Old Gotham families.
Industrial dynasties.
Political bloodlines.
Judges. Mayors. Commissioners. Real-estate magnates. University trustees.
Dozens of names repeated across generations.
Their public empires rose and fell.
But their descendants always landed on their feet.
Always adjacent to power.
Always just out of reach of scandal.
His fingers paused over one surname.
Powers.
He brought up Powers Hotel.
Renovated seven times in 120 years.
Every renovation approved despite zoning conflicts.
Every permit expedited.
Every contractor tied to one of the same shell firms.
Another name appeared.
March.
March Ventures.
Deep investments in Gotham infrastructure bonds.
Private prisons.
Mental health facilities.
Historic restoration trusts.
Lincoln March's personal donations intersected with three of the same "heritage" funds tied to Crane's money flow.
Batman leaned back slightly, cape shifting.
The Court of Owls.
They were not a gang nor were they a criminal syndicate in the traditional sense.
A governing body.
A shadow board.
One that had been selecting Gotham's winners and losers long before he put on the cowl.
His gaze drifted briefly to a paused frame of Nolan on the rooftop.
Defiant. Unafraid.
Dangerously honest.
"They sent those things after you," Batman said quietly.
Not as a threat.
Not as a warning.
As a conclusion.
He minimized the file on Nolan and pulled up a new one.
GOTHAM — UNOFFICIAL POWER STRUCTURE
Nodes began forming on the screen.
Powers.
March.
Half a dozen other surnames that had never been in any criminal database.
Families that never got their hands dirty.
Families that didn't need to.
Batman folded his arms.
The Court of Owls existed.
That much was no longer in doubt.
And if they had moved openly enough to send assassins into the streets again…
Then something had finally disrupted their balance.
His eyes narrowed.
"…and you're the disturbance," he said to the empty cave.
The Batcomputer chimed softly.
A new notification.
EVENT LISTING — THE CONTINENTAL HOTEL
UPCOMING: INVITATION-ONLY GALA
HOST: KIERAN EVERLEIGH
—
A/N: in no time Batman has found more members than Kieran has. Unfair and cruel!