Chapter 377: A Turn of Events
The question of what had happened two years ago was destined to go unanswered for now. Every available thread led nowhere. Batman didn't waste time on it -- the following afternoon he collected the Ebony Blade and the stone fragment from the Metropolitan Museum and made his way to the abandoned shipyard.
Dane Whitman was already there waiting. The moment he laid eyes on Batman, he let out a short, sharp cry.
"Oh God--"
Then he turned and ran.
He made it three steps before walking straight into the bat-symbol on Batman's chest.
Batman hadn't moved an inch. Dane Whitman sat down hard on the ground and held his head, teeth gritted.
"Don't be afraid. I'm the person Peter Parker told you about. Someone like you." Batman's voice was low and even.
Dane Whitman looked miserable. He'd spent all night imagining what kind of person Parker would send -- a business contact, maybe, or some kind of professional fighter. Batman had never entered the picture.
He'd been living on these streets for six years. He knew exactly who Batman was. In the past two months, the most feared presence in New York wasn't the dinosaur invasion, wasn't Garrett and his bombs -- it was the man who called himself Batman, who had a habit of appearing anywhere in the city without warning. Garrett, for all his resources, couldn't level Manhattan. Batman could show up at any moment, anywhere. No sane person wanted to see him, because Batman's appearance meant someone was going to prison.
Dane Whitman was no exception. His instinct was to immediately confess to every burger he'd stolen during his time on the streets, every wrench he'd pocketed from a maintenance worker's kit.
But Batman's words pulled him back. He forced his voice to sound steadier than it was.
"So... what did you want to see me about?"
Batman reached behind him and drew out the Ebony Blade -- the sword Nathan Garrett had left behind.
Dane Whitman remembered then. His family had left him a sword. He'd completely forgotten it a moment ago, too rattled to think. Seeing it now brought it back.
"Oh right. That sword."
He reached for it. Batman moved it behind his back.
"Are you aware this blade carries a curse?"
Dane Whitman went blank again.
"A curse?"
"Nathan Garrett -- as the Black Knight -- never once used this sword in the field. He was afraid of what it carried." Batman said.
"Can I ask what the curse actually does?" Dane Whitman looked at the blade's surface -- the way it shifted, particles moving through the black like something living. He swallowed.
Batman looked at him and said nothing.
Dane Whitman instinctively pulled his neck in. He realized immediately how stupid the question was. The Ebony Blade was a Whitman family heirloom. If anyone should know the nature of its curse, it was him -- not Batman.
"I don't know what the curse is," Dane Whitman said.
"Before Nathan Garrett died, he said one thing: he hoped you would take this sword. Become the Black Knight of the Whitman family. Restore what the name once meant." Batman said.
Dane Whitman stared at the blade for a long moment.
"I don't believe you're ready to take it. Or to face what comes with it." Batman made no mention of the stone fragment -- the possibility that it might lift the curse was Nathan Garrett's speculation, not confirmed fact.
"You have two options. First: after today, forget you ever met me. Contact Peter Parker. Work, build a life, start a family. He'll make sure your future is taken care of."
Batman watched Dane Whitman's expression carefully.
"Second: take the sword. Face the curse of the Ebony Blade head-on. Find a way to overcome it. Become your family's Black Knight. Become a hero. Let the world hear that name again."
He paused.
"If I were you, I'd take the first option."
Batman said nothing more after that. He waited, watching the struggle move across Dane Whitman's face.
Six years of living rough had stripped away whatever sense of belonging he'd ever felt toward the Whitman name. He didn't even know what curse the blade carried. On one side, a straight and stable road. On the other, a narrow path through thorns. The choice was his.
Dane Whitman went quiet and sat with it. The sun moved slowly westward. Two full hours passed before he got to his feet.
"You know what, Batman? Six years out there. I've had more contempt and fists and insults and spit than I can count."
"That fire took me from something close to comfortable and left me with nothing. Every day I spent on the street I knew I wasn't any different from a stray dog."
"I used to tell myself that one day I'd take my fate in my own hands. But now that the day is actually here, I realize how naive that idea always was."
He looked at Batman, and the uncertainty in his eyes had hardened into something else.
"I have to take that sword. Not for Nathan Garrett. Not for the family name. Only so that I can be the one who decides what happens to me."
The words landed. Dane Whitman dropped to one knee and looked up.
Batman's expression didn't change. He brought the Ebony Blade forward from behind his back, and touched the flat of the blade once to Dane Whitman's left shoulder, then to his right.
It was the knighting ceremony of the medieval tradition -- simplified to its bare bones between the two of them, nothing like the full ritual it had once been.
"By my name as Batman, I name you the Black Knight."
---
Somewhere over open ocean, aboard the helicarrier's combat operations center, Nick Fury was issuing orders from his chair. Agent Hill, who normally responded without delay, did not answer.
"Agent Hill?" Fury called again. Still nothing.
In a single movement he was off the chair and flat on the deck, pistol out and chambered.
He moved low along the wall toward the exit, pressed himself against the metal bulkhead, and triggered the door release.
The door ground open. Fury peered out, pistol raised, and stepped through one measured pace at a time.
Agent Hill was on the floor, wrists bound behind her back, mouth sealed with tape, unconscious. Beside her lay a body -- the temple scorched black.
"Hill. Wake up." Fury crouched and slapped her face sharply. No response. He straightened.
This time Nick Fury reached up and removed his eye patch. From the empty socket he retrieved the object concealed inside -- the device disguised as a prosthetic eye -- and closed his hand around it.
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