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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
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"The last matter on the agenda is Sandy – I propose that we devote a little time to help him to catalogue his abilities, work with him in exploring them so that he can learn to master them…" Kal looked to his colleagues.
"Our first priority should be to determine whether or not the other version poses a threat to Humanity." The Batman stated grimly.
"And who gets to decide that?" Kal glanced at the cowled crusader.
"We do." The Batman was resolute, "Unless you can think of anyone better?"
"Agreed: we probably are the best qualified in that field." The Kryptonian nodded. "Which leaves the question of what we do if… a threat were to be confirmed?" Kal carefully phrased the question as neutrally as possible.

"If that does turn out to be the case," The Batman sat up straighter. "Then we'll have to find a way to neutralise that threat," He growled, "By whatever means necessary: just as we would for any other rogue meta."
"You can't really mean that!" Flash was horrified.
"Of course I mean it! That's what we're here for! Personal feelings have nothing to do with it!" The Dark Knight snapped, and although he was well aware of the glances that the rest of the committee were sending him, he ignored them. What did they know about being human anyway?

* * * * *

"What we're going to try and find out is what you can do, how you do it, and what your limits are…" Kal was saying to Sandy. "From what we already know, my guess is that you have some sort of electrical ability."
"Which would tally with the damage increasing proportionately to the amount of free water around," Bruce realised.
"Yes," J'Onn nodded. "Salt water would amplify the effect considerably, while in a completely dry atmosphere the result should be almost negligible."
Which explained why Gotham, with its consistently damp weather suited the effects so well … Bruce tried not to stare at his lover; but it was hard not to think about the dead men and worry if something like that was just waiting to happen again…
Not that those bastards didn’t richly deserve it though… None of that would have happened if they'd only left Sandy alone… Bruce pulled himself out of that thought. Just because he had feelings for Sandy didn’t mean that he was about to let the other form get away with anything. If Bruce could find any way for them to be permanently rid of the other self he would take it without hesitation. To Bruce’s way of thinking the manifestation was dangerous, they just didn’t know how dangerous … yet.
"Sandy…" Wally looked at their friend. "You don’t happen to remember anything at all about what happened on the boat, do you?"
"No." Sandy shook his head.
"I would very much like to try to see if I can assist you to retrieve any memories." J'Onn admitted. “Just like last time?”
"Okay," Sandy glanced at Batman.
"Then sit down beside Bruce, and we will explore this together…" The Martian said firmly.

After a while, J'Onn announced that they had achieved as much as either was capable of.
"I have managed to access Sandy's mind, and he continues to be most co‑operative." He told the assembled group, "however I cannot locate anything about the events we have been discussing."
"What did you manage to learn about the manifestation?" Bruce asked.
"It is… interesting," The Martian said slowly. "From the memory trail, as far as Sandy is aware, he IS the other self that you describe."
"He can't be." Bruce was adamant. "The moonsh… the other self," He corrected quickly, "Can walk through walls, it can become insubstantial, and project itself to another location, even become one dimensional. Sandy can't do that the rest of the time."
"What did you just call it?" Kal was curious.
"A moonshadow." Bruce said, slightly embarrassed at being caught using such an unscientific term.
"A what?" Predictably, J'Onn had never heard of the word.
"It means a sort of reflection, one that only occurs under specific conditions," Bruce said quickly, "It's just a convenient label for how I think of the manifestation."
"A most accurate definition then…" J'Onn decided. "As for the abilities of this moonshadow, I can also walk through walls, alter my appearance and density, although I move from point to point in a more conventional manner."
"Oh yeah, like flying?" Wally reminded them. "And of course everyone can do that, huh?"
"I was not referring to my flight ability as such." J'Onn told him calmly. "I was referring to being restricted to observing the normal distance/speed/time ratio."

"I think what J'Onn means," Bruce saw the looks being given to him by everyone except Kal. Which doesn’t necessarily mean that Kal understands it either, it just means that he hasn’t yet realised that he can't. For someone who could move so quickly, Kal could be amazingly slow to catch on at times.
"Is that J'Onn can't just vanish from one place and appear in another … can't teleport, without the technology to assist him." Bruce finished.
"Oh." Wally nodded. "Right."
Bruce noticed that Sandy wasn’t paying any attention at that moment; the blond was still far too fascinated with J'Onn in general to notice anything in particular. The last time they had met the Martian, J'Onn had been careful not to reveal much of his true nature to Sandy, this time things were more informal.
Cute. Looks like Sandy's still hoping that J'Onn'll float through another wall, I guess? Wonder how he'd react if J'Onn changed shape?
'I could. If that would be helpful?' J'Onn projected into Bruce's mind, startling him.
'I do apologise.' The Martian added. 'For surprising you.'
'One of these days I am going to have an accident because you've done that. And I don’t just mean the kind that you only have to change your underclothes after…' Bruce sent back, knowing that J'Onn was still tuned into him and thoroughly enjoying the look of discomfort on the Martian's normally impassive face.
Serves him right if he's going to sneak around in people's heads… Bruce thought to himself. 'If you don’t like what you find in mine, maybe you shouldn’t be looking there.' He added, just on principle.
'Maybe you should not be projecting?' Came the immediate reply.
Before Bruce could come up with a suitably pithy response, Kal suddenly frowned.
Oh dear … the Big Blue Boy Scout has finally caught on … you can almost see the little hamsters running on the wheel… Bruce mused sarcastically to himself. Somewhere off in the back of his head, the Bat started grinning…
"What I don’t understand," Kal said tentatively.
Everyone waited.

"Is why Sandy thinks of the echo of himself as also being him," The Kryptonian continued, "They aren't the same, are they?"
"No." Bruce said.
"Yes." Sandy simultaneously disagreed.
"But then you would say that, wouldn’t you?" Bruce reminded him. "Since you experience events as if the moonshadow were you?"
"I'm confuzzled." Sandy protested. "I am me…"
Wally only laughed. "I think you'd better show us what you mean, Sandy, then we can get some idea of what you're both talking about. Right now we're all as confuzzled as you."
"Yeah," Sandy obviously thought that was an excellent idea, "Now?"
"In a minute," Bruce patted the diagnostic couch. "We're just going to stick a few monitor pads on you first, to keep an eye on your vital signs." He explained, as he and J'Onn attached several custom-built pads to the blond.
Sandy didn’t baulk at the treatment, merely wrinkled his nose as the devices were attached, "Cold," He said meekly, flinching as the chilly conductive gel was applied to various points on his bare skin.
"Yeah, I keep telling them about that," Wally was in complete agreement, "But no one listens…"
"Story of your life then?" Bruce wasn’t about to let Wally start his own pity-party: Wally was here because Sandy responded well to him, and because Bruce was realistic enough to at least consider that he might have need of a high-speed evacuation. J'Onn could take care of himself, and Kal wouldn’t let anything happen to Sandy; but Bruce was only human under the armour, and he had already seen quite a lot of what could happen when Sandy's 'gift' got out of hand.
And if it does, I want the fastest route I can get out of here! Finding out from Commissioner Gordon that the moonshadow hadn't actually been directly responsible for the death of the man in the forest, and that it had delivered the thin gunman into custody rather than exacting direct retribution, had been somewhat reassuring; but it was going to take quite a lot more evidence before Bruce started to think of the thing as in any way 'friendly'; especially since he still suspected it of continuing to stalk him at odd times...
And some of those were VERY odd times…

"Do you have to do anything special?" Wally asked curiously, "To get the moonshadow to happen?"
"Moonshadow?" Sandy blinked.
"The other you?"
"Oh…" The blond shrugged, "No, not now."
"Did you before?"
"I had to wait until I was ready to sleep before." Sandy lay back on the bed and closed his eyes. "Now I can go out whenever I want to." He relaxed visibly and the moonshadow rolled away from the physical form. Standing up, it peered around the room. The free-floating lights within the gleaming skin flickered and sparkled.
Bruce firmly suppressed the urge to shudder as the strange eyes met his.
"Fascinating!" J'Onn pronounced, "These readings show that Sandy has entered an altered state of consciousness."

The moonshadow glanced around, its attention focussed in turn on each of the people standing around the room. Kal waved a hand, and the moonshadow waved back. Wally grinned, and gave it a thumbs-up. Tilting its head the moonshadow regarded the speedster with quizzical amusement.
"Do something at high speed, Wally," Bruce requested, seeing an opportunity. "We need to see how quickly it can react."
The red head stared at him blankly.
"Throw it a ball or something?" Bruce told him and let out a quiet sigh as Wally flickered off, and came back with a tennis ball that he'd scrounged up from somewhere. There were times when it was just like running a computer program, no matter how sophisticated the equipment; if you didn’t keep feeding it instructions then it didn’t have a clue about what to do.
Except Wally's brain isn't artificial; then again it does mostly run on pizza and soda … What do they say in computing circles, about putting garbage in and getting garbage out?
"Wow, you're fast." Wally gave their silent friend an admiring glance. "Not as fast as me or Kal; but way better than a human," He added.
The odd pair played tag for a few minutes, with Kal joining in on the game, until J'Onn declared that he had collected sufficient readings to be able to evaluate the impact on Sandy's sleeping form.
"And?" Bruce waited.
"Nothing."
"Nothing?"
"The activity undertaken by the moonshadow does not seem to have any effect on the sleeping body."
"What happens when it touches Sandy?"
"Bruce." The voice was strange, more a combination of external sounds forced to combine than actual speech. "If you want to know something, ask me."

"Ask…" Bruce nearly choked on the word. "I didn’t even realise that you could talk … I've never heard you do it before."
"I can now." The moonshadow said simply.
"You've learned, because Sandy can?" Of course, that made sense...
"I've relearned, because I AM Sandy."
"We've had this discussion before!" Bruce reminded it sharply.
"No, you've spoken and every one else has had to listen. Now that I can talk, YOU can listen…"
"Say what you like! You're not Sandy."
"You're here to find out what I am, or do you think you know already?" The moonshadow strolled across the room and faced the tense man. "Don’t be so quick to assume that everyone has your own flaws. This me isn't any sort of Bogeyman …"
"Then what do YOU think you are?" Bruce wasn’t going to stand around arguing, not in public anyway. Today wasn’t about him…
"My mind… my awareness … without my flesh," The echo replied.
Bruce only stared at it. "You're saying…"
"That when I'm in there," It gestured to the drowsing form, "That this," It ran a casual hand over its chest, "Is what powers that body."
"His soul…" Wally gasped. "You're Sandy's soul!"
"Maybe?" The moonshadow turned to the speedster.
"Aren't souls supposed to be all light and stuff?" The younger man wondered.
"Have you seen anyone's soul?" Their strange companion asked.
Wally thought that over and shook his head. "Not as far as I know."
"Do you think anyone else has?" The mirror image asked quietly.
"Don’t know." The Speedster admitted.
"Then how can any living person know what a soul is supposed to look like? Let alone whether I'm different." The moonshadow asked calmly. "Besides, I am light." It gestured at its glistening skin.
"No, you're dark." Wally peered at it. "Sorta." He amended. "Like looking at the sun through smoked glass."
"The way that this energy is bound tends to hide its true form." The moonshadow agreed. "I've tried to see what I am; but I can't either, when I look at this me with that me it makes my eyes water."
"You've experimented!" Bruce was livid. "With Sandy?"
"It's MY body…" The duplicate reminded him. "Don’t tell me you've never played any games with yourself?" It smirked. "Although you wouldn’t have been able to watch from outside while you were doing it…"
"Eew…" Wally groaned. "T.M.I., waay too much!" Although it wasn’t clear to whom he was directing the comment. Bruce glared at him, purely on principle, ignoring the insolent way in which Wally stuck his tongue out at him while the speedster thought Bruce wasn’t looking.
Because what very few people realise, including you, Wally, is that I’m always looking...

"Then you are able to touch your … that flesh, without harming it?" J'Onn was curious.
"Of course,” The moonshadow agreed, “At first whenever I touched it, I just ended up back inside my original skin; but, as I've woken up more, it's gotten easier to stay outside," The manifestation strolled over to the sleeping Sandy.
"Have to remember to get a trim. The fringe is really getting a bit long." It said, absently running its fingers through the curly hair, untangling several of the springy skeins.
“Good to see that the scar’s completely hidden now that the rest has grown back properly. I was quite worried about that at first.”
Bruce fought hard not to yell at it not to touch … because if there was the slightest chance that the moonshadow was correct about being Sandy, then it had every right to do what it wanted with that body.
More right than I have, in fact… And how often had Bruce done what he wanted with Sandy?
Too often.

"If you're just energy how do you touch things?" Kal suddenly wanted to know. "How do you actually interact with solid matter?"
The moonshadow considered that. "It's hard. I have to keep remembering to stay in a shape, to be visible, to have weight, be solid, and to make sure that the parts of this me react like the parts of the other me…"
"Can you touch other people? Not just yourself?" Wally was asking.
"I've never really tried." The moonshadow admitted. "Apart from the man who I dumped into the police station, I haven’t had any opportunities to interact with another body. Not that I did much with him either. When I saw him about to shoot Bruce I just knew that I had to act fast.”
“So what did you do to the guy?” Wally wondered.
“Caught hold of his hair and yanked him into the mirror panel.”
“Cool.” Wally definitely approved. “What did that feel like?”
“It was over so fast I barely registered it. I managed to get a grip on his clothes when I was pulling him into the surface, then let him drop straight out the other side. It didn’t even occur to me to try anything more complicated." The moonshadow added. “I just wanted rid of him.”
"But you were on the other side of the mirror, weren’t you?" Bruce recalled. "Or were you on the inside?"
"No, I wasn’t there at all… I can make this self happen on any reflective surface: this is just an illusion of me, not what I really am… "
"I don’t understand." Wally protested.
"I don’t either." Their companion confessed. "Sometimes I just do things, I don’t always know how - anymore than I know exactly what happens when I sneeze in that body, or what goes on when I sleep or dream."
"So what happened to the man you pulled into the mirror?" The speedster was asking.
"I didn’t exactly pull him into the mirror, just pulled him against the surface in the Mansion training room, and let him fall out onto the floor of the police station in Gotham. He was never inside the mirror-glass, anymore than I was: it’s just a way to link two locations."
"You transported him all that way though?" Wally sounded impressed. "Neat!"
"Distance is as much an illusion as this shape. Nothing is as far as you think it is. When you're outside like this, everything is all so clear…" The moonshadow said philosophically.
"I wish it were clear." Kal sighed. "The more I think I've got it, the less I know."
"Do you still want to know what it feels like to touch me when I'm like this?" The doppelganger enquired.
Kal was certain about that part, at least. "Yes. Assuming that you don’t mind?"
"I don’t mind you touching me, Kal, and I'd quite like to know what it feels like to purposely touch someone else."
"Okay." Reaching out and stroking his palm over the gleaming skin, Kal let out a sudden sharp cry of alarm. Snatching his hand back, he cradled it to his chest.

"Kal!" Wally was aghast. "Why did you hurt him, Sandy?"
"I didn’t mean to, Wal! I don’t know what happened." The moonshadow seemed as stunned by the outcome as Kal.
"I felt that!" Kal continued rubbing at his hand.
"Which means that the surface of your … skin … must be practically incandescent," Batman assumed from past experience, squinting at the moonshadow. Taking a probe he held it out. "Please don’t make any sudden moves: I can't heal like Kal does, plus I don’t want to ruin the armour."
"Kal, are you badly hurt?" The moonshadow asked awkwardly, standing stock still as Bruce ran the probe over its arm. "May I see?"
"Uh, it’s okay." Kal told it, just a little hastily. "There's nothing there to see."
Typical! Bruce thought, angrily. It’s only a matter of time before Kal talks everyone into believing that nothing happened, and that he was never hurt at all! Why does he feel that he has to constantly apologise for everything? He was destined never to find out, as someone beat Kal to the apology.
"I'm so sorry, Kal.” The moonshadow cast a guilty glance at the Kryptonian. “I truly didn’t intend for anything bad to happen to you."
"Forget it." Kal said hastily, recovering his normal composure.
"Odd." Batman stared at the readings. "The instruments all say that you're just a little above normal human body temperature; but not that much. At least, not now," He added.
Which doesn’t mean that it wasn’t hotter before…
He turned to look at Kal. "How badly are you hurt, Kal?"
"I … My hand's fine: it was just…" Kal swallowed hard. "The sensation was … overwhelming."
"Then don’t do it again." Bruce was practical as ever, and as uncompromising with others as he was with himself. "What did it feel like for you?" He asked the moonshadow, still attempting to learn as much during their session as possible.
"It felt … good," The other replied, "I liked it, until I knew it was hurting Kal," It hesitated, "As far as I can tell, Kal's skin feels just like yours does…"
"I really don’t think we need to go any further in that direction," Bruce said hurriedly, "What we ought to be doing now is determining exactly how you influence matter and what your limitations are…"

"Is your hand still causing you pain, Kal?" One person had noticed the way that Kal continued to stare intermittently at his hand, long after the rest of the team had turned their attention elsewhere.
Meeting the Martian's eyes, Kal whispered softly, flexing his fingers in evident disbelief, "No; but I felt it, J'Onn … I actually felt it."
"Felt what, Kal? Pain? That is most unusual."
"It's more unusual than that, J'Onn: I felt his skin," Kal murmured softly, "I felt the touch of living flesh against mine …"
As the two aliens glanced at each other, the Martian's red eyes widened in stunned amazement, "But…"
Equally bemused, Kal nodded, "I know…" He went back to staring at his hand.
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The Birthday Present