"Master Bruce?"
Bruce Wayne looked out of the window of his private plane, and sighed. Alfred sounded...pensive.
Which wasn't all that rare, nowadays, but...
"I have bad news, I am afraid. - Master Jason's ...biological father has been released from Tennabaum, 6 days ago, sir."
...Oooooooops?
"Well, try to keep track of him, then. I don't want him wandering around either Jason or his mother - he's bad news, you know that."
Alfred sighed audibly.
"I have informed Master Jason about this development already, and he has agreed to stay around the mansion for the time being. His mother, however..."
Bruce grimaced.
"...She wandered off, didn't she?"
"According to her counselors and co-workers, she usually came back on her own in about a week to ten days - once she discovered she wouldn't be fired for slacking off, that is."
Her pay would be docked, but that was another matter.
Darn. Bruce rubbed his face.
"Doesn't she have a mobile? I thought all the hospital employee's were supposed to have those..."
"She turns it off when she goes on her "benders", it seems."
"...Send in some of the security units, and comb the bars. She shouldn't be off on her own right now."
"Very well sir. Master Jason is worried about his mother, of course - "
"Of course he is, just don't let him go wandering off by himself!"
"That would not be...wise."
Alfred allowed.
But when Bruce arrived home, Jason was gone.
On the first day, Alfred fretted while Bruce arranged search parties.
On the second day, they found somebody who had seen Jason's mother at one of the seedier bars around the town. Of she herself or her son, there was no sign at all.
On the third day, Dick came home to help in the search, and they managed to pick up Jason Todd Sr. Who barely remembered that he had any children at all, and couldn't pick Jason out of pictures of a horde of other children.
On the fourth day, Lex Luthor called, with a file with a picture of a grinning rictus of a smile on the top...
On the fifth day, Bruce prayed, all the time barking out orders.
They found the boy and his mother on the sixth day. She was still alive, miraclously.
Her son was not as lucky.
They buried Jason on a rainy and windy day. His mother softy drifted back to her life and job at the hospital, empty-eyed.
Bruce Wayne looked at the clouds streaming across the skies, and screamed.
He seemed much the same after that, though. If somewhat morose.
"Mireille?"
"...What, Kirika?"
"...I don't think we're going to be paid for this job..."
The blonde young woman looked at the scene in front of them, and groaned.
"...Gaaaah. And we were promised so much for this one, too..."
And there was also the little matter that this was one of those jobs they would have taken on for half the price.
"...That one looks familier." Mireille muttered.
"Tall and handsome, with the gun? Hmmmmmm...?"
"Well, I can't recognize the goons from here..."
"I can't fix you so you won't want to torture and kill people, and I can't keep you shut up so you couldn't torture and kill people either - you're just too smart, Mr Joker, and you're proved it too many times..."
The voices floated by on the wind...
"Some Defender of Justice you are, Big Bat.
There was a chuckle.
"Defender of Justice? Me? Don't be silly, do I look like one of those heros in spandex?"
The man did somehow look like a big bat, though, Mireille though.
"I'm just too squimish, Mr Joker - I can't risk leaving you alive, that's all. The blood of all you kill from now on mise well be on my hands if I do that, eh?"
And then, there were gunshots in the wind...
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(Posted Sat, 29 Apr 2006 05:46)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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