CHAPTER 47: THE DAMAGED BATTLE SUIT
The basement workshop hummed with a low, purposeful energy. The antiseptic smell of hydrogen peroxide mingled with the sharper tang of ozone from Peter's old plasma welder and the dusty scent of stored fabrics.
Bruce stood on the central platform, a modern-day knight being reskinned. His torso was a canvas of old scars and fresh, expertly stitched wounds—a topographical map of a lifetime of war. The bandages Aunt May had helped him apply were stark white against his skin, a temporary dam against the pain.
He didn't flinch as the platform's articulated arms, guided by May's steady hands at the control console, fitted the new underlayment. It wasn't nanotech or unstable molecules. It was better. It was Peter's tech. A hybrid of advanced polymer webbing, kevlar-spider-silk composite, and flexible impact-gel pads sourced from old Oscorp prototypes Peter had "liberated" and refined.
"The tensile strength is fifteen times that of military-grade ballistic nylon," May explained, her voice a calm, instructional monotone. She was in her element—not as a nurse now, but as an engineer's partner. She'd watched Peter build here for years. She knew what every tool did, where every material was stored. "Peter said it could stop a .50 cal at point-blank range, though he never wanted to test that theory. The gel layer disperses blunt force trauma. It won't stop you from feeling it, but it'll keep your organs where they belong."
Bruce watched in the platform's reflective surface as the sleek, charcoal-gray bodysuit was sealed up his torso. It was lighter than his old suit, more flexible, but he could feel the latent strength in the material. It moved with him, a second skin.
"He was a brilliant engineer," Bruce said, his voice low.
"He was a good boy," May corrected softly, a world of love and loss in the words. She guided an armature to attach the first piece of armor plating—a redesigned, more angular pauldron for his injured shoulder. "The brilliance was just how he expressed it."
The new armor wasn't the monolithic, intimidating carapace of his Earth-Prime suit. It was modular, segmented. Plates of a dark, ceramic-polymer composite overlapped like the scales of some primordial beast, allowing for greater mobility. The bat-symbol on the chest was simpler, sharper—cut from the same material as the Spider-Man insignia mold Bruce found on a shelf, but reversed into a silhouette of wings and ears.
As the chest plate locked into place with a satisfying hiss-click, Bruce flexed his arms. The range of motion was exceptional.
"The cowl," May said, holding up the final piece. It was a redesign. The ears were shorter, more jagged, less like a bat's and more like shattered bone. The eye lenses were a deep, smoked amber, and as Bruce took it and pulled it on, the world resolved into a cascade of data. Peter's stolen S.H.I.E.L.D. firmware, jury-rigged with WayneTech design philosophy.
Thermal overlay. Police band frequencies. Structural integrity readouts. A targeting reticule that flickered and stabilized. It was crude compared to his old system, but it was alive, hungry, his.
He took a breath. The suit's internal climate control whirred to life, cooling his skin. The pain in his back receded to a manageable throb.
"Thank you, May," he said, the modulator lending the words their familiar gravelly depth, but softened at the edges.
She waved a hand, but her eyes were bright. "Just bring it back in one piece. Or at least in fewer pieces than the last one." She gestured to the sad, shredded pile of his old armor in the corner, being discreetly scanned by a small spider-bot for salvageable components.
As Bruce began attaching his utility belt and loading it with fresh gadgets from Peter's surprisingly well-stocked armory—miniature concussion pellets, rebreather spores, cryo-pellets—his mind was already three moves ahead.
Kane Manor was a loss. The "Wick John Cain" identity was now a liability, publicly connected to a terrorist attack. S.H.I.E.L.D. would be swarming the ruins. H.Y.D.R.A. would be in the wind, regrouping. Stark was involved.
And Miles was in S.H.I.E.L.D. custody.
He needed to move. He needed to reclaim the initiative.
You have a base, the ghost of Thomas Wayne murmured, leaning against Peter's old chemistry set. But it's a spider's nest. Literally. You're putting her in danger by being here.
"I know," Bruce whispered, the cowl's internal mic picking up the subvocalization. "It's temporary. I need one thing from the Manor ruins first."
The Batcomputer core. It wasn't a question.
"The core is hardened. The explosion wouldn't have destroyed it. But it will be buried. And Stark or S.H.I.E.L.D. will find it if I don't retrieve it first." The core contained every fragment of data he'd scraped from Fisk's ledger, from H.Y.D.R.A.'s systems, his early schematics, his notes on this world's meta-human landscape. It was the seed of his entire operation here.
It's a trap. They'll be waiting.
"I know."
Let me, the Red Death's voice slithered into his thoughts, accompanied by the phantom sensation of black-red lightning crawling under his new skin. I can be in and out before their sensors ping. I can make it a challenge. A game.
Bruce ignored it. He finished securing his gear. He turned to May, who was watching him, a mixture of worry and fierce pride in her eyes. It was the same look Alfred used to give him.
"I have to go," he said.
"I know." She stepped forward, not hugging him—the armor was covered in sharp edges—but placed a hand on the bat symbol. "Be careful, Bruce. This city… it's already taken one of my boys. Don't let it take another."
The weight of her words, of her trust, settled on him heavier than the armor. He gave a single, slow nod.
Then he turned, activated the suit's new low-light and thermal dampeners, and melted into the shadows of the basement's rear access tunnel—a bolt-hole Peter had installed for emergencies.
As he moved through the damp, narrow passage, his new HUD flickered. An alert. Not from his systems. A piggyback signal on a frequency he'd left open as a test, a digital tripwire.
It was from the ruins of Kane Manor.
A single, repeated ping. A homing signal.
From the core. It was active. And broadcasting.
Too easy.
It was a trap.
Bruce's lips thinned behind the cowl. He emerged from the tunnel into a Queens alleyway, the night air cool. He could see the distant, dying glow of the fire in the north. Sirens wailed in that direction.
He had two missions: retrieve the core, and ascertain Miles' status.
He tapped the side of his cowl, activating a secondary system. A small, spherical drone—one of three he'd taken from Peter's workshop—detached from his belt and zipped silently into the sky, its optical camouflage engaging. It would be his eyes at the Manor.
For himself, he had a different destination. S.H.I.E.L.D. wouldn't keep a teenage meta-human in a standard holding facility. They'd use a mobile unit, or a temporary black site. And Nick Fury loved his helicarriers, but they were grounded with the current political climate.
He needed data. And he knew where to get it.
He grappled upwards, the new suit's servos whirring softly, launching him onto a rooftop. He paused, looking at the sprawling, chaotic jewel of New York City. His city now. A city with two spiders missing, a bat wounded, and wolves circling.
In the reflection of a rooftop HVAC unit, he saw not just his own silhouette, but for a flickering instant, the Red Death's crimson-edged cowl superimposed over his own, a smirk on its lipless mouth.
Tick-tock, Bruce, it whispered. The clock is always running.
Batman turned from the reflection and vanished into the night, a darker shadow against the dark, moving not towards the fiery glow of his past, but into the electric heart of the city's uncertain future. The game was escalating. And he had just been dealt a new hand.
(End of Chapter)
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