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The Birthday Present	By : Kip Category: DC Verse Comics > Batman Views: 8478 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own the Batman series, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 20
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- 22
They had spent a long and wearing morning, meeting with the specialists; but they were back home at the Mansion now. Bruce headed up the steps toward the front door, only to find Sandy starting to hang back. "You okay, babe?"
Not that he can tell me, even if he isn't… The consultant had been quite clear about that. The consensus of medical opinion was that the neurological damage had affected Sandy's ability to communicate, his hearing had proved to be undamaged; but the blond had yet to regain the ability to make use of the information that was being collected, and it was looking increasingly likely that the situation might well be permanent.
And if it is, then there's nothing that anyone can do. As he gazed at his companion, Bruce saw Sandy visibly flinch.
"I guess you're tired, aren't you? Bit sore too, maybe?" Maybe most of the time it was pointless speaking; but there were occasional glimmers, and besides, Bruce was too used to communicating in that way to simply give up - not to mention too stubborn to accept defeat that easily. A few weeks ago Bruce had given up any hope of Sandy even living. Back then the thought that the blond could achieve even this much of a recovery would have been inconceivable, now it was reality…

"I'm tired too." Bruce admitted. "Come on, let's get indoors."
Beside him, Sandy froze, staring with wide nervous eyes as the front door swung open and a total stranger stepped out.
"What the hell?" Bruce stared too; but in anger rather than unease.
"We've been waiting for you, Mr Smith." The man said pleasantly. "My friends and I have been sent to find the answers to a few questions; but hey, where's my manners? Come right in! You too, Mr Wayne! No sense standing out in the cold, besides, we don’t want no interruptions do we?"
Sandy only stood there, and stared.
The gun that the intruder held in his hand lifted, "I'm serious here, Smith." The man stated. "If I have ta, it won't bother me none to shoot a few holes into your buddy, if you're thinking of arguing?"
"Sandy. Run!" Bruce took a calculated risk and pushed Sandy away, blocking the line of fire with his own body and hoping desperately that Sandy would understand what was needed. "Go!" He yelled.
If they really DO want him, they won't risk shooting at him, will they?
Panicked, Sandy took off in a very creditable imitation of Wally.
Swearing, the gunman tried to push past Bruce; but Bruce was equally determined.
Have to buy Sandy some time to get clear! Bruce was a large man and despite the tactical disadvantages it was a very unequal contest until a glancing blow to the head temporarily reduced his capacity for resistance. The injury bled profusely and it hurt like hell; but as he was yanked forcibly inside the house Bruce had the satisfaction of seeing Sandy pelting off frantically down the path into the woods.
Good! Don’t make it easy for them!

"Mr Wayne, why'd you have to be such a problem?" Not waiting for an answer the thin man glanced around the room. "Nice house. Expensive, I guess?" His gaze fell on a stack of photographs on the table in front of him.
From where Bruce was sitting it was obvious that the stack was composed almost entirely of pictures of Sandy. He frowned at the images.
How long have they had us under observation? And how?
"See it's your blond buddy I want, not you." The other man was telling him.
Seething inside, Bruce kept it to himself. "I'm not going to let you have him." He said tersely, still applying pressure to the cut in his scalp. The bleeding had almost stopped already.
"I only need him to give me a few answers, s'all … Izzat too much to ask?" The man looked around at his snickering workmates. "What?"
There was no reply; but the other men looked away.
Scared of him? Why? Little shit doesn’t look that tough… Then again, appearances were frequently deceptive, weren’t they?
"I don’t negotiate with people who point guns at me." Bruce told his captor coldly. "Regardless of what they say they want."
"Oh come on! You must'a done?" It was obvious that the thin man didn’t believe a word of that.
Bruce shrugged. "Call it a personal foible."
"I'd call it fucking stupid," The man sighed loudly. "Listen, one of our guys is out there right now, tracking Blondie. Our guy's good, and he'll find him sooner or later. When he does, you'd better hope that your 'Mr Smith' is a bit smarter than you are. We only want'a coupla words with him," He shuffled the photographs again, "Or rather, we want'a coupla words FROM him. Easy, or hard, it don’t matter to us."
"Then you're not going to get it." Bruce said sharply. "Sandy can't talk."

"He what?" That seemed to rattle the man's calm.
"Since you've managed to find out where Sandy's been living, presumably you're also aware that he was severely injured recently? That he's not long been out of hospital?"
"What about it? He looks fine now…" The thin man said snappishly.
"Unfortunately, he isn't. Sandy nearly died, and he's got a long way to go before he recovers; if he ever does." Well aware that his friend was out there, alone, in the chilly drizzle, with a potentially dangerous opponent on his trail, Bruce wasn’t going to prevaricate: if these men could be made to see the impossibility of what they were after, perhaps they might leave, ideally without doing any further damage. "Sandy hasn’t made a sound since he woke." He told his captor.
"Then if he can't speak, we get him to write." The other man decided.
"I'm obviously not making this clear enough." While he would have loved to press the point, it was becoming plain to Bruce that these hirelings lacked the brains to be reasoned with.
Or the authority? They had been told what to do, and that was what they would try to do.
To the damned letter...
"The Doctors say that Sandy's lost the ability to formulate thoughts, leaving him unable to communicate with the outside world." He could see that he was still getting nowhere. Any more stupid and these goons would need regular pruning…
"Putting it simply," Bruce tried again. "Sandy can't talk, can't write, it's possible that he can't even think in the same way that the rest of us do anymore. I don’t see how you can reasonably expect to get the answers you want from him, if he even has them?"
"And perhaps that's the problem? Maybe you've been too reasonable?" The thin man suggested, "Some people need a bit of … extra persuadin' ta get ‘em started."
"I don’t threaten invalids." Bruce kept his voice even, with an effort. In a way it was lucky that he was not free to indulge his immediate impulses. The Bat was longing to let loose on these animals in human form …
"Yeah, well when he's brought in, we ain't likely to be so patient." The thin man drawled. "We've got our orders, and we know a lot ways to motivate a person, if you get my drift?" Taking a small knife from his pocket, the other man lifted a photograph from the stack and began to very slowly slice it into pieces. "Me and the boys, we're damn good at what we do, Mr Wayne. Although the shrinks reckon that some of us," He glanced out of the window, "Lack empathy."
He means the man out there tracking Sandy! The tiny thread of patience in Bruce finally snapped as the Bat took over: Sandy was in very definite danger!
Time for action! Ignoring the guns and jamming his hands under the table, Bruce heaved, scattering men and photographs like so much confetti.

Chest heaving, Sandy ran along the path, images flickering wildly through his mind. He and the dark-haired man, who looked grim; but who smelt nice, and generally smiled whenever he was near Sandy, were jogging along this same path. Only then the sun was shining and the day was warm.
Run! Don’t stop!
Why was everything different? It was colder and the leaves were gone from the trees. Off to one side, Sandy could see the sun dropping lower in the sky.
Confused, Sandy responded to his instincts and kept on sprinting along the faint trail.
Another image sprang into the blond's fractured mind: the dark-haired man was standing on the steps of the house and the door was opening.
Danger! The taste of it hung thickly in the air, and there were strangers in the house! Sandy saw the dark-haired man's mouth open and close; saw him gesture for Sandy to go, and go fast! As usual the crackling in his head meant that the noises around Sandy made no sense to him; but instinct alone had been strong enough to send him running into the woods.
Run! Keep running! Adrenaline continued to flow. By now the crackling in Sandy's head was worse than ever and the blond was getting more and more frightened. Though he lacked any form of words to express anything, even in his own mind, Sandy could still feel and see and learn. Very gradually the blond's waking mind was relearning how to reason and to integrate the scattered data coming in through his senses; but what had just happened back at the house was too urgent, too frightening, for him to make sense of things.
Run! And he had; but the weakened body was getting tired now. Running was becoming harder with each footstep.
GO! Sandy stumbled along the path, panting with fright and exhaustion.
Another moment from the sunny day burst into Sandy's fragmented awareness: the rain shower and the hollow tree that he and the dark-haired man had squeezed into, the warm feeling as the two of them squashed together in the narrow space both grinning at the tight fit.
Finally Sandy couldn’t run any more, chest heaving, limbs aching and trembling, he stopped, confused and exhausted. Where was the dark-haired man? The blond glanced around. The big house was long since vanished behind him. The bare trees were unfamiliar now, the path ahead wet and muddy.
Where now? The urge to run continued to dominate; but his strength was ebbing. Something about the way the path curved off to the left seemed to draw him. It seemed as good as any other way, and so Sandy followed the narrowing trail.
As he crested the small rise Sandy saw the hollow tree. Drawing on the last of his resources, the blond made straight for it, and, squeezing in through the narrow entrance, discovered that now he was alone he could fit inside the hollow space quite comfortably. Sandy felt safer here, with the thick wood around him. Breathing heavily, he sank to the floor, exhausted.

Pursued by the sounds of his angry attackers, Bruce headed deeper into the house. The pain in his head made it hard to concentrate and his ears were ringing so loudly that he could barely hear what was happening. Even so, Bruce was confident: this was his home and he knew every inch of the mansion. He was determined to hold out long enough to …
To do what? How am I going to get rid of them without risking anyone suspecting my other identity? He also had other concerns.
How's Sandy holding out, and what did they do to Alfred? What if the thugs had harmed the old man? Or was Alfred merely being held hostage somewhere?
The house alarm! They must have managed to turn it off; otherwise the squad car would have already come to investigate. I can reset it and use it to summon help! Changing direction, Bruce darted back along the empty passages.
Not far now… His hand was just hovering over the recessed button when the breath was knocked out of him.
Damn! Bruce hit the floor hard. Caught! A boot in the middle of his back looked set to make sure he stayed there. The Batman could have fought his way out of it; but that sort of reaction would be dangerously out of character for the foppish Playboy…
"Told ya!" Someone gloated. "Din’ I say he'd come back here?"
"Yeah, shit, dat's five bucks I owe ya!" Another voice agreed.
"Five more bucks, ya mean?" The first man asked.
"Piss off you turd." Apparently the two of them were very close, as the insult failed to provoke any serious retaliation.
Shame. Bruce lay on the floor and contemplated the situation. I could have gotten the drop on them if they had started pounding on each other…
The conversation continued in a similar vein as the pair indifferently manhandled Bruce along the corridors and into the old training room. Shutting the mirror behind them, the two thugs dropped him onto the hard floor.
Silently, Bruce vowed that if another chance arose to get his own back, he would be ready to take it.
In character, or not…
"Great room! Very private! Don’t see how anyone's gonna disturb us in here," The thin man smirked, "So, Mr Wayne … You ready to start co‑operating? Take it from the beginning, boys…"

Outside in the woods, Sandy's healing body succumbed again to the urgent need for rest; as his flesh relaxed, quite another set of senses opened. Between one blink and the next the blond's perception of the world around him changed radically as the inner core of his mind, his awareness, slid clear of his damaged body.
Awake! There were no shiny surfaces for the echo of Sandy to frequent out here; but today that didn’t seem to matter. Dark in contrast with the bruised and brooding sky, the dancing lights within the strange cloud patch span wildly as the seething energy stubbornly forced the solid everyday world to acknowledge its right to exist out here.
Need... With a supreme effort of will, Sandy's untrammelled awareness abruptly resolved into a fully free‑standing column.
Yes!!! The echo of the everyday form automatically assumed the proportions that the blond was accustomed to in his purely physical body.
Danger! The patterns of the world slid into sharp focus. Interacting with the world through radically different senses, new instincts shivering readily into action, the echo of Sandy tasted the flavour of a stranger on the wind gusting from between the leafless trees.
Safeguard... Sending out a tendril of pure willpower, the Echo relocated a fallen tree across the entrance to the sanctuary-tree, concealing the entrance. At an animal level Sandy knew that his hiding place needed to be secured. By now he had manifested in this state often enough to learn to avoid casual contact between this form and his other: he still lacked sufficient experience and control with this form to hold it stable if the two skins touched. It was imperative that his other body not awaken again before he was ready: to do so now would inevitably drag this version of him back into his day-to-day flesh, and this situation needed the greater clarity that this manifestation allowed.
Protect… For this form, to think a thing was to do it. The manifestation that Bruce had aptly dubbed Sandy’s ‘moonshadow’ spontaneously drifted out, navigating the dripping woodlands.
Hunt. The unsolid form flitted weightlessly over the sodden ground, leaving no tracks, as it headed for the nearest source of living energy...

Down in the training room, Bruce was starting to feel like a punch bag. Stronger and fitter than most, he was still entirely human and there was only so much punishment that his body could safely absorb.
Much more of this and I'm going to start taking damage.
The lights dipped briefly.
"Didn’t ya pay your electricity bill on time?" One of his captors taunted.
"Nah, ya know dese rich guys?" The other man said conversationally, while landing a particularly vicious punch in Bruce's kidneys. "Dat's how dey stay rich… by not giving it away!"
"Boys," Their leader interrupted, punctuating his words with occasional flicks of the gun. "Shut the hell up."
In the ensuing silence a cluster of bulbs blew, casting shadows across one long bank of mirrors and leaving Bruce marooned in the last tiny patch of illumination on that side of the floor.
"Now," Ignoring the tantrums of the room lights, the thin man leaned back against the gleaming glass, "Where were we?"

The vibrations that his pursuer was sending into the cooling air meant nothing to the moonshadow; but the emotional taint that this person was broadcasting tasted sour and unpleasant. Sandy instantly mistrusted the man. Cautiously edging closer he watched what the stranger was doing.
"*### *** ~~~ ###" Making active vibrations in his throat, the large man was bending close to the soil, touching his fingertips to the muddy ground. Still vibrating to himself; but to a lesser degree, the man stared intently at the ground and then headed toward Sandy's sanctuary tree.
No! That could not be allowed! No harm must come to the other body; the moonshadow knew it at a level that transcended words. Stepping out from between the tightly packed tree trunks and making this self take on enough extra solidity to be seen, the echo deliberately started leading the man away from the hiding place.
"*** ~~~~" The pursuer roared, sending more meaningless vibrations spitting out into the air, and headed toward him. When the man fell as he attempted to climb the slippery slope, the moonshadow observed the resulting antics with calm confidence. Sandy generated very little in the way of spontaneous emotion while in this form; but even so, he was faintly aware of being somewhat amused.
"~**~**~" Furious, his pursuer raised the gun, and fired.

The outcome was novel…
Free to move at the speed of thought, the moonshadow watched the weapon discharge; noting with great interest the way in which the pellet span as it flew. While not as fast as the red runner who so often sat with him when he was awake in his other shape, Sandy was no longer bound by human limits while in this form.
Fascinated, and sidestepping the projectile with ease, the moonshadow explored the way in which the small metal fragment was propelled by the explosive energy remaining from the initial chemical charge. Sucking the tasty energy out of the surrounding air, the manifestation abandoned any remaining interest in the spent bullet, leaving it to fall prey to gravity.
As the moonshadow slowed back to human speed the gunman frowned. Seeing his intended victim standing there and apparently unharmed, he aimed and pulled the trigger once again, already partly starting to turn back toward the hiding place.

It was more than obvious to the moonshadow that the stranger was not going to give up until he had located the other body, and when that happened the other self would be vulnerable to the man and the weapon.
The stranger must not get there.
The forest floor was wet and the soil soft. The moonshadow was not entirely clear as to how it came to happen; but quite suddenly a dead tree was toppling down across the path. Had it done that? It wasn’t sure. It could have been coincidence...
"~~~##~~~!"
Emitting waves of cold shining horror, the man let out one last burst of vibration before the massive trunk pinned him down in the mud.
While the sounds made no sense, the taste of the hunter's underlying thoughts was quite clear, as was the tang of the scent still clinging to the battered flesh in places. There was blood in the mix and a more-than familiar odour: Sandy's dark-haired man had been hurt, and the person now lying on the forest path had played some part in it!
No way could the man be allowed to do that again. Deliberately the moonshadow concentrated on the ground under the tree, reducing the space to the bare minimum needed to leave this one breathing but trapped. Reassured that the gunman would not be squeezing free anytime soon, Sandy willed his active element to wherever his dark-haired man was now. There might be more energy there, and the moonshadow was hungry.

"Now," Ignoring the fluctuations in the room lights, the thin man leaned back against the gleaming glass, "Where were we? Oh yeah, I was going to blow your brains out. After that, the boys with me are going to go find your dumb buddy…"
Shit. Bruce stared at him, He means it. A chill shivered through him. Was this really the end? Even as Bruce was wondering if and how he was going to get out of this one, his eyes were automatically reporting movement in the mirror.
What the? That’s no reflection... Just as Bruce realised that what he was seeing was not only independent but also person-shaped. As it actively looked back out of the glass at him, his breath locked in his throat.
The moonshadow!!
Across the room another two of the overhead spots dimmed and went dark. Distracted, the two bruisers failed to spot the new arrival.

"I reckon this place needs an electrician!" The thin man grinned, waving the gun toward Bruce as he talked. "But a few seconds from now it ain’t gonna matter, not to you anyway." The gun sighted directly on Bruce. "Yeah, I can tell from your face that you're finally beginning to get the picture, rich boy... Wha'?" The hand that came out of the mirror and latched onto the gunman's hair did so with such startling suddenness that the man had been yanked backwards onto the wall of glass before either of his colleagues could react.
Eewww!!! Bruce couldn’t help but wince as the back of the thin man's head impacted savagely with the mirrored surface, the sickening crunch of glass and flesh all-but drowned out by the crack of the gun discharging harmlessly into the ceiling.
No longer held in place, the unconscious body slumped down onto the floor.
Slick move! Bruce stared at the damaged gunman in distaste. Brutal, though thoroughly deserved! Shards of mirror scattered across the polished stone floor. Curiously, the actual gun was nowhere to be seen, nor was the mysterious living reflection.
The skinny guy'll be out of it for a while. So where's the shadow man gone? Peering around Bruce found the mirror land empty. And what's he going to do next?
The man to Bruce's left swore loudly and profusely.
"Don’t like dis!" His partner-in-crime blurted. "No one said nuffin 'bout ghosts!"
"Or creepy rooms full'a mirrors! I seen dis stuff in da movies." The other agreed.
The pair looked at each other.
"I say we get the fuck outta here now!" One offered.
"Yeah!" His partner was all for that. Panicked, the two ran for the door When scrabbling for the hidden latch proved fruitless, a hard blow with the butt of a gun shattered the mirror glass.
"Dat's how ya deal with these things!" The thug muttered, forcing the panel open.
Stepping hurriedly out into the passage, the pair ran for their lives.

Sandy's still out there! Straining urgently against the ropes that bound him to the chair, Bruce fought to get free.
I have to get to him before anyone else does! The hairs on the back of his neck started to rise.
"What the?" Turning, Bruce realised that he couldn’t see anything even vaguely human shaped, with the exception of his own reflection. There was no longer any body with him – literally!
"So where did the skinny guy get to?" Logically, there was nowhere anyone COULD go, especially not an unconscious person; this room had only one exit and all eyes, including Bruce's own, had been on it as the other two men broke out.
Unless whatever happened to him didn’t have to conform to logic?
From off to his left Bruce heard a curious noise and, even though he'd never heard it before in his life, he guessed at once what it must be. The shattered mirror panels were now totally intact again…
"The sound of glass un-cracking. A neat trick if you can do it." He approved into the still air. "So where are you?"
The dim shape strolled back into view, moving along inside the reflected world as if the panes were merely windows onto an adjoining open space.
"Nice moves." Bruce told it. The moonshadow continued to watch him for several heartbeats. "Okay, what now?" He asked it. In the next second, he got his answer; but not in the way he had expected. Stepping boldly out into the light, the moonshadow emerged into the room with him.
Good god! It looks almost human today! Blurred still… but it walks as if it has mass…
"I didn’t realise that you could do that," Bruce continued to watch uneasily as the remarkably solid-looking form strolled across the polished floor toward him.
Maybe if it can push itself out of a mirror it could pull something else in? And wasn’t that an unsettling thought? Was this thing considering him as its next victim?
If so, I’m damned if I’m going to go easily; hog-tied or not...

"You're forgetting to leave a reflection down there." Bruce remarked coolly, indicating downwards with a nod of his head. If he could distract it, maybe he could get in the first blow?
Or kick, as the case may be… Will it shatter as easily as the mirrors?
Following the direction of Bruce's gaze for a moment, the moonshadow gave the floor a cursory glance before ignoring it.
Damn, it's not buying it.
Tentatively, the echo padded over toward him, stopping at a safe distance.
So much for that idea. Maybe it wasn’t such a good one anyway? Since I don't know what else it's capable of…
Tilting its head the thing hesitated for a moment. Quite suddenly it looked less certain.
It isn’t acting as if it's about to attack now … But what else could it have been planning? Then again, it's never tried to hurt me before, and it could have. It must have had plenty of chances.
Pointing very deliberately at itself, the moonshadow motioned toward the door.
It's trying to communicate!!! But novel as that discovery was, Bruce now needed to concentrate his attention on the message. "You're going to go somewhere?" He guessed.
So why tell ME that? Why not just go?
A frustrated expression appeared on the strange face. Gesturing at Bruce, it pointed back toward the door, this time with a little more urgency.
"You want me to go out there with you?" He pulled against the bindings. "Love to; but I'm a bit stuck at the moment. I don’t suppose that you could do anything about these?"
Closing the gap between them and kneeling at Bruce's side, the moonshadow laid a tentative hand on the ropes. It glanced up at him, the body language uncannily reminiscent of Sandy.
But then it would be, wouldn’t it? It's obviously patterned on him, and connected to him somehow … Is THIS what was keeping him unconscious? Could it have been developing inside him? Is THAT why Sandy seems better each time he lets some of that energy out, could his body be working to reject whatever hold this thing has on him?

"Good god!" Bruce felt a sudden tingle as the creature lent in closer. As its fingers brushed against the ropes, the restraints burst off Bruce with a sensation remarkably like that of elastic bands snapping. The focus of the force was not on him; but the sting of it was palpable.
Standing, the moonshadow gestured toward the door yet again.
"Thanks," Bruce told it, "and I already got that part; but what you didn’t say was where we would be going, or why I should go with you?"
Slamming back into the mirror-dimension and then returning equally hastily, the moonshadow turned on its heels and glared at him, pacing back and forth across the small room, the very image of frustration.
"Tell me what's wrong!" Bruce was also getting frustrated, and worried. "Is Sandy in some sort of trouble?"
Perhaps it’s dependent on him in some way? It needs something from him still?
In answer, the creature nodded emphatically.
Finally they seemed to be getting somewhere!
"Show me what you know!" Bruce insisted, "Give me an idea of what to expect!"
Wrapping its arms around itself, the moonshadow made a rubbing motion.
"You're cold, and you need Sandy?" Bruce guessed, receiving a scathing look in response. "Okay…" He thought it over. The thing's body language wasn’t quite right; but even so Bruce could guess that by now it was getting increasingly frustrated and more than a little desperate.
But why? It seems to have become remarkably independent, from what I can tell…
The creature pointed off again, and repeated the demand for Bruce to go; but this time it ended the gesture by pointing back at its own face.
"I don’t get it," He admitted, "But it does have to do with Sandy?"
The moonshadow nodded, and repeated the face gesture.
"Then if you want Sandy so badly, why don’t you go to him?" Bruce asked. "You obviously know where he is."
When the moonshadow clenched its fists and raised its face to the ceiling.

What's it trying to tell me? Bruce made the breakthrough. What if it were trying to tell him something more abstract?
Not its own face; but …
"Sandy's cold?" He said suddenly, seeing instantly from the way the creature jumped that he was right. "Where is he?"
The moonshadow pointed up, and off to one side.
In the garden? The woods? Where? The curious entity wasn’t the only one feeling the bite of frustration.
"I know he's out there!" Bruce told it. "But the mansion grounds are huge! I have to have some idea of where to start looking!"
The thing only glared at him.
Remembering what it had done to the ropes, and to the man whom it had quite plainly caused to vanish, Bruce re-evaluated the advisability of angering this thing. It might look something like Sandy; but it didn’t share the blond's gentle nature, and for whatever reason it was getting increasingly desperate.
It wants me to do something for Sandy, something that IT can't do, or I'd almost certainly be next on its list of obstacles to be disposed of! The thought was not a comforting one, and it continued to echo through Bruce's head as he headed for the grounds.

In far distant Gotham, an unconscious body fell onto the floor of the police station closely followed by a gun.
"What the fuck?" The young cop standing behind the desk stared blankly at the new arrival.
The desk sergeant looked up from his sheet, and glared at the officer standing beside him, "Mind your language, kid," He warned, "You don’t want the Commissioner hearing you talk like that."
"Yeah, right, sorry Sarge," The younger cop agreed hastily, "But did you see that?"
"No." The desk sergeant shook his head. "I didn’t just see anyone fall right out from inside of the new brushed aluminium door panels rather than actually walking between them like the rest of us need to, and neither did you."
"So we say that he fell through the doors, holding a piece, and just conveniently collapsed?" The other officer worried.
"Yep," The desk sergeant shrugged, "Hey, this is Gotham: weird things happen all the time. For all we know, it could'a been one of the local costumes who dumped him there. Maybe even the Batman?" He frowned, "I could swear I know that guy's face from somewhere, if he hasn’t got form then I'm Supercop."
"I'll bag his effects, cuff him, and shove him in the cells," The younger man said hastily, "If you'll fill in the paperwork?" He grinned, "Supercop, huh?"
"Fine by me," The desk sergeant scratched his belly and took a leisurely swig of his coffee, "Actually I wouldn’t'a minded being a hero when I was your age, kid, if only I'd known how … Much more glamorous than being a beat cop…"
"You really think it was the Batman?" The other officer asked, peering around as if half-expecting to see a hint of black cape; or half-hoping…
"Bound to be," Came the languid response, "Bound to be."
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The Birthday Present