Anubis' "How would you do it?" Thread.

[Anubis]

Cool. Reminds me of Robinson's in-depth history of Opal in Starman. You should do one for all the major DC cities.

 

[Zoken]

More Spider-Girl. Part II of I think III

Cry Havoc, and Let Slip the Dogs of War

Mayday was quickly moved in with the rest of Captain America's secret Avengers. She was intimidated at first, but when the Young Avengers and Scott Lang moved in, she felt much more at ease. many nights she could be seen in the room she shared with Cassie Lang talking late into the night. or she was walking through the halls, hand in hand with Jack Power, even though Rage had taken to flirting with her.

One night, just as Mayday, the rest of the Young Avengers, and Scott Lang finished their supper (Scott Lang had taken to being guardian for ALL the minors staying in the Secret Avenger's base), Captain America walked in.

"We're having a meeting son," he said quietly. "Scott we're going to need you."

Scott nodded and stood. the kids began making their way toward their respective quarters.

"Wait," Steve called. "Mayday, we want you sitting in on this one."

all the Young Avenger's paused. none of them had ever been asked to sit in on a planning meeting before. all teenagers, including Rage and the Power brothers, were always sent to their quarters during plannning meetings.

"S-sure," May replied.

Scott cast looks between Steve and Mayday, trying to figure out why his daughter's best friend was coming to a planning meeting.

Steve pointed Scott to a seat near Daredevil, and then guided Mayday to a seat directly to the right of his own.

Mayday could see she wasn't the only one confused by her attendance. Others around the table were shuffeling and whispering about her, while casting quick short looks at her. She'd never felt more nervous. Not even when she'd gone on her date with Jack had she felt this nervous.

"Alright," Captain America began. "this is a general planning meeting, to update us all on where we stand, and how we plan on surviving the duration of Stark's war."

"Why is the kid here?" asked the Falcon

"Yeah," Mayday finally spoke. "Why am I here?"

Steve hung his head. "May... You have something here none of us at this table has... Experience in this situation. Many of us have had to hide our own identies, had to hide from the law... but none of us have ever been hunted on this level. You have."

Mayday covered her mouth in shock. He was refering to the reality she'd traveled here from. She'd lived for over a year with her godfather, Johnny Storm, in a safehouse after her parents were killed. "Oh god," she whispered.

The table was silent. Steve turned to them. "For those of you who didn't catch her televised statement, May was born in an alternate reality where not only did they pass Super-Human Registration, but they eventually outlawed Super-humans. In her reality, Meta-Humans were killed on sight, hunted down, executed... in short, genocide. She out lived many of them because she was able to hide. We will need her experience in that field... May... Mayday, can you help us with that?"

"I-I think so, Captain Rogers," She replied weakly.

He placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Good girl," he told her. He turned to the group. "We already have false ID's for most of our members, so they can go in public. We've talked about setting up safehouses througout the city, possibly talking to Dr. Strange about using the Sanctum Sanctorum. Can anyone think of anything else we might be able to do?"

"Um..." Mayday raised her hand timidly.

"May?" Steve asked.

"Well, Captain Rogers, one of the things we did was to set up new names," She squeaked.

"Cap said we're already doing that," Daredevil told her calmly.

"No..." she corrected. "I mean... new codenames," she stressed. "They plan their response to our appearance by who we are. if they don't realize who they're fighting right away, they may fight us wrong. For instance, Uncle Johnny would wear jeans and a leather jacket coated with unstable molecules and go out calling himself "Hell Fighter". People thought he was a Ghostrider knock off and it lead to them trying to cast spells that only work agaisnt someone weilding hellfire."

Steve leaned back as he thought about what the girl had jst said.

"Isn't that a bit superfluous?" chided Nighthawk.

Mayday started fidgeting, but then Luke spoke up. "No, it's smart. think about it. I show up in my street clothes, they know not to waste ammunition on me. But, I show up dressed like... say Josiah X, or even like Bill," he gestured across the table at Goliath. "And it might take them a while to figure out I've got different powers. It would let us get what we want done and then get out of there. Meanwhile they're still trying to figure out what the hell happened and who the hell they were fighting."

"But where are we going to get spare costumes," asked Daredevil.

"Kate," Mayday squeaked. as everyone turned to face her again. she explained, "Kate Bishop... she helped the Young Avengers get new costumes... I bet she could get you guys some spares, especially if she doesn't need them designed from the ground up."

Steve nodded beside her, and Mayday let out a breath of relief. "Okay," Captain America said. "We're doing it. Mayday, you are in charge of assigning everyone a secondary codename and getting them a costume for it. I want in done within a few weeks."

Mayday swelled with pride, then looked around the table. This was going to be a challenge.

"I'm covered already," Daredevil smiled, giving her a thumbs-up.

It was a few days later, Mayday was sitting with Cassie in their room, talking about who could become who.

"Well," Cassie said. "Daddy's doesn't plan on taking part in the fighting, he wants to just hang around the base and keep things running, so Mr. Foster could borrow his Ant-Man gear..."

"that's pretty good," Mayday replied. She was about half-done assigning secondary codenames. Captain America was going to be Hawkeye. "By the way... how would you like a green full body suit and wig?"

"Why?" asked Cassie warily.

"I was thinking of trying to pass you off as a gamma-mutant," Mayday replied, showing a sloppy sketch labled "Stomp".

"Works for me," Cassie replied.

"Good then we have..." Mayday's list of those yet to be assigned was cut short as an alarm went off overhead.

they rushed to the warroom.

"We have a major incursion at Roxxon chemicals," announced Nighthawk. "Kaplan, Johnson, prepare to port us all. This is a rescue operation."

"NO!" shouted Mayday.

"You don't have authority to override me," Nighthawk sneered at her. He wasn't a bad person, but he was sick to death of taking orders from a teenager.

"I mean we sholdn't bring both," she explained. "If it's a trap and they're waiting for us, we're toast. plus, how would those here evacuate in case of a raid."

Nighthawk looked between the two teleporters. He hated the fact that she was right. "Wiccan remains here with Hawkeye, Patriot, Hulkling, and Ant-Man. The rest of us are going."

"I'll need rest," Cloak warned them.

"Spider-Girl, pick out a team to protect him once we're there," Nighthawk snapped.

"Mr. Cage, Dagger, and Justice," she called. They nodded.

with a swirl of darkness they were deposited in the middle of a chemical yard. They looked around, a little chilled by the silence.

Mayday's spider-sense suddenly went off. She webbed three darts meant for Cloak. Cage took two to the chest, and they bounced off harmlessly. Justice errected a TK barrier to stop seven of them. Dagger was hit with four when she used her own body to protect Cloak.

"TANDY!" cried an angry Cloak. Tyrone Johnson had never really sorted out what his feelings for his partner, Tandy Bowen, were. He didn't know if she was his best friend, or if she was something more. He often called her "My Love," but only because he knew that he loved her... he didn't know if it was romantic love, but he knew there was indeed love. This is explained so that his violent reaction is understood. Cloak went intangible, drifted through his protectors and absorbed three soldiers directly into his cloak as the battle broke out.

"All Hell Broke Loose" didn't begin to describe this situation. As Mayday, Justice, and Luke Cage protected an unconsious Dagger, Cloak was rampaging around, absorbing people into himself and spitting them out in no fit state to fight.

Captain America was fighting hand to hand against Iron Man. Mayday saw he father engaging several targets. She sighed, aimed, and fired. She covered her father's hands in webbing.

She saw three people enlarged, fighting. Dr. Pym was fighting Goliath, and Cassie was fighting three Thunderbolts. A thought struck Mayday. she quickly swung up to Cassie's shoulder. "Go fight Yellowjacket," she shouted to her friend over the din of battle. "Let Me take care of these yokles."

Mayday dropped onto Mach IV's head, driving him into the ground. She put a web over songbird's mouth. and she turned just in time to be caught by a bionic arm from Dr. Octopus. "Crap, crap, crap," she began to utter.

Stature charged over and drover her shoulder into Yellowjacket's gut. "I've got this guy Goliath," She told her teammate.

"Take it easy," he said, going off to help Captain America.

"I have more experience than you Cassie," Hank Pym chided. "Don't make me hurt you."

"Please," Cassie dissmissed as she caught Hank in the gut with a punch, then a kneed to his chin, then a round-house kick across the face. "Hawkeye, Captain America, and Union Jack all gave me fighting lessons. How about you?" she smirked. While Hank had experience in fighting, it was usually strong people smaller than himself. never people of equal size.

"It is almost biblical," Dr. Octopus remarked as he continued swatting at Spider-Girl. "Daughter against father. He fights in this battle, you know."

"Yeah," she remarked as she flipped backwards over two tenticles. "You need a bath, you know."

"As insolent as your father before you," he bellowed at her. he caught her in the gut with one tentacle, but she flipped over the next.

"Spider-Sense and instinct," she muttered to herself, over and over. She was swinging through his tentacles, not getting closer, but not getting hit either. That was when she heard the commotion.

someone was saying "Thor".

"Oh, I'm going to regret going up against Thor," Cassie remarked as she lunged at the god who was supposed to be dead.

"More than you'll know," replied Thor darkly as he raised his hammer and let go a stream of lighting straight through Cassie's gut. at first she was surprised. then she staggered backwards. She was shrinking slowly.

Mayday had watched, and been hit once, but then even Dr. Octopus was staring in disbelief.

the battle seemed to stop as they watched Cassie Lang sway on her feet, then fall to the ground, all the time still shrinking. the first sound, after Thor's blast, was Mayday's voice crying "CASSIE!"

she and the rest of the Young Avengers quickly rushed to their fallen comrade's side. Mayday patted Cassie's shrinking cheek, trying to show that she was there.

"Daddy?" came a sob from Cassie's throat, accompanied by blood. Cassie's eyes became unfocused... and with that last word, Cassie Lang, Stature of the Young Avengers, died.

She was roughly seven feet when she'd stopped shrinking. Mayday hefted her bestfriend's head into her lap. "Cassie!" She continued to cry. he repeated screamings of her friends name seemed to eventually merge into one long wail of pain and sorrow.

Mayday didn't even know how things had turned out. She didn't know that the Invisible Woman had errected a forcefield while Cloak teleported them all away. All but Cassie. Rage had picked her up and pulled her away from her friend, and turned her into Jack's waiting arms. All Mayday could do was cry. Cry, and wail for her lost friend.

A few hours passed, and she had stopped wailing. now it was a silent steady sob. She sat curled on her bunk, her knees clutched tightly to her chest as she sobbed.

"Mayday?" asked a man at the door. It was Steve Rogers. He walked in and put a hand on her back.

"How do you do it?" she asked him suddenly.

"Do what?" he asked gently, rubbing her back as she sniffled her question.

"Live with the fact that... taht you sent your friend to die," Mayday explained. "I told Cassie to fight Yellow Jacket. if she hadn't done that... she woudn't have been the closest one to that... that Thor-thing. She would be alive." she looked up at him. "How do I live with the fact that I killed her?"

Steve held Mayday close to his side as he stroked her brunette hair. He'd never had a daughter, but Mayday thought he would make a natural father. "You tell yourself that it was necessary," he said, though his tone of voice didn't suggest that he expected it to help. "You tell yourself they would have done it anyway. YOu tell yourself that they are in a better place. You tell yourself that... that it was meant to be."

"Does that help you?" She asked.

"No... but it's supposed to," he answered honestly. "I guess the only real reason I can do it and... and still look myself in the mirror in the morning is... well it's that at times like this, when those horrible decisions have to be made, we don't have time to blame ourselves. We don't have time to fall apart, because there are others that need us, that need to see us strong and resiliant. They need us to tell them that that person didn't die in vain, even if that's all we see. They need to believe that there are people made of steel, even if it's just a lot of shiney paint... does that make any sense?"

"Yeah," She said quietly. "I guess it does."

Repost...

 

[The Question]

Cool. Reminds me of Robinson's in-depth history of Opal in Starman. You should do one for all the major DC cities.

It wasn't that in depth. I mean, if I really wanted to get in depth, I could have gone into the history of it's organized crime, it's reaction to the draft riots in the 1860s and the race riots in the 1960s, etc. But, that would have taken a while and I'm lazy. In any event, I'll durther expand on my Ultimate Batman universe later, and I probably will go into the histories of the other cities when I get to the characters they corispond with.

 

[Anubis]

Zoke.....that was freakin' awesome man. I teared up a little.

 

[Zoken]

Thanks, I was worried. That's my proudest peice up here lately. I thought: One, Cassie would make sense to send it becuase of her power, and Two: Her death will cause more ripples than Bill's

 

[Anubis]

It was really quite good Z. The best I've seen you write.

It wasn't that in depth. I mean, if I really wanted to get in depth, I could have gone into the history of it's organized crime, it's reaction to the draft riots in the 1860s and the race riots in the 1960s, etc. But, that would have taken a while and I'm lazy. In any event, I'll further expand on my Ultimate Batman universe later, and I probably will go into the histories of the other cities when I get to the characters they corispond with.

Hey, Opal was fleshed out over the course of 60 some odd issues. I got the gist of what you were going for in like, three or four paragraphs. Don't sell yourself short.

 

[Zoken]

How was the Cap-May interation at the end?

 

[Anubis]

Sad and inspiring. The way Cap should have been written in CW.

 

[Zoken]

I'm trying to figure out how to keep this going. The next part is obviously going to be an invasion of SA on 42... of course it will be a small party: Cap, Mayday, Spidey, Dusk, Rage, and Justice. They will be expecting no Super-human guards, thusly this team will be "Sufficient". They aren't expecting Captain Marvel and the Nega-Bands (That sounds like an AWSOME rock band). Justice and Rage are the only ones who can go hand to hand with him, but they don't have the skill of Cap or Pete... So Rage, Justice, Cap, and Spidey are caught... Mayday and Dusk are able to escape to a nearby planet, where they recognized Dusk's outfit. Tony's forces are using the planet for "Shore-leave" and they want them out... uprising ensues... God, you guys help me so much!

 

[Anubis]

Sweet, can't wait.

 

[The Question]

It was really quite good Z. The best I've seen you write.



Hey, Opal was fleshed out over the course of 60 some odd issues. I got the gist of what you were going for in like, three or four paragraphs. Don't sell yourself short.

Thanks. Anyway, I've already got the history of Metropolis more or less mapped out. For the sake of simplicity, I made my Ultimate Metropolis and the real world Metropolis, Illinois one and the same. The history of my Metropolis was exacly like that of the real world one, up until about 25 years ago, when Lex Luthor initiated a massive project to make Metrpolis the jewel of the midwest, buying out the land around the small city and building over it, creaying a large urban environment with a great deal of easily afordable housing in nice, clean, safe locations to encourage people moving to the city. What makes Metropolis such an oddity is that Main Street was left completely unchanged by Lex's urban renewals. So, you take the right turn in Metropolis, and you find a small, rural, midwestern town in the middle of a massive, busy city. This is also used to explain why Metropolis, in terms of geography and landmarks, greatly resembles New York, as Lex used New York as a template for the city, albiet with a fairly unique sense of architecture, blending futuristic motifs with a sort of 30s retro feel, drawing inspiration from the German film Metropolis. It is said that the city of Dubai was inspired by Metropolis during it's urban renewals.

It is pretty obvious that much of Metropolis' history in the past 25 years is almost directly tied to Luthor. Even it's organized crime. You see, Luthor predicted that as the city grew, so would it's crime rate. So, using his old friend Morgan Edge, a known con man with ties to various criminal dealings, Lex brought together the handful of street gangs active in Metropolis before it's growth, and created Intergang. These days, Intergang runs Metropolis' organized crime quite firmly, dealing with gambling, prostitution, and protection rackets, and following Lex's initial orders to the letter. They never deal with drugs, prostitutes are checked for diseases and aren't beated, and protection rackets actually put emphasis on the "protection" part. They act alot like a more classical gang that actually tried to protect it's neighborhood. This annoys some newer members, like Bruno Manheim, who see "off limits" buisness ventures like drugs to be more profitable. Intergang is Lex's way of keeping crime, or at least organized crime, under his control in Metropolis, and none of the members besides Edge know that Lex is really calling the shots.

On the other side of things, most of the high ranking members of the police force and the D.A.'s office are in Lex's pocket, enabling him to keep a firm control over the city and allow some crimes to go unpunished for what he sees as the greater good. In a sense, it's a bit like a massive version of Stamford from Hot Fuzz, with Lex doing whatever it takes to keep Metropolis the "last hope for civilization" that he sees it as. Lex also has enough senators and federal agents in his pocket to keep the state and the feds from realizing everything that's going on in Metropolis. It isn't until Lois Lane and Clark Kent start investigating that everything starts to unravel.

 

[Anubis]

Brilliant! That's the kinda Lex I like to see.

 

[The Question]

Brilliant! That's the kinda Lex I like to see.

Thanks. But I was at least expecting a"Lex is NOT judge judy and exicutioner! "

 

[Anubis]

What do you mean?

It's a really cool way to present Lex. A super smart individual who has built this city, his city, into a.....Metropolis. Planning ahead for everything that could come his way. Controlling Crime from the start. Hands in every aspect of the city. It makes the arrival of Superman even harder for him to take. He built this city. It is his city, and everybody loves this idiot running around with his underwear on the outside. I got no complaints. As long as you remember that Lex should be a true genius. Not just in business, but science, economics, everything, I'm happy.

 

[The Question]

What do you mean?

It's a really cool way to present Lex. A super smart individual who has built this city, his city, into a.....Metropolis. Planning ahead for everything that could come his way. Controlling Crime from the start. Hands in every aspect of the city. It makes the arrival of Superman even harder for him to take. He built this city. It is his city, and everybody loves this idiot running around with his underwear on the outside. I got no complaints. As long as you remember that Lex should be a true genius. Not just in business, but science, economics, everything, I'm happy.

No, I was just saying that because I mentioned Hot Fuzz.

Anyway, my idea for his response to Superman is simply that initially, he tries to get Supes to work for him. And actually, at first, he does. Superman does all sorts of missions for Lex, using Lex's resources to do more good than he could before. But then he finds out about all of Lex's dirty dealings, and severs ties to him. And that get's lex very angry.

 

[Anubis]

I.....haven't seen Hot Fuzz yet....

 

[The Question]

I.....haven't seen Hot Fuzz yet....

YOU FOOL!!!!


But, seriously, see it. I've seen it twice already.

In fact, I saw it a month before it came out at a free screening hosted by Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg, and Nick Frost. t:

 

[Anubis]

Nice.

 

[The Question]

Nice.

Yes. Yes it was.


Anyway, as I was saying:

When Superman first shows up, Lex investigates him and tries to get him under his employ. After seeing all of Lex's resources and hearing a very convincing arguement, Clark agrees. Lex begins using his resources to give Clark heads up on disasters that could use his attention, and uses Clark to clean up terrorist cells and criminal organizations that Lex would normally have had to send in men who would have been killed doing so. Lex also uses his intelect and resources to help Clark try and figure out where he came from. Everything goes well until Clark stumbles across some evidence of Lex's dirty dealings, and he severs all ties to him. Lex gets very angry, and devotes a considerable amount of effort in getting rid of this particular loose end, creating Metallo and Bizarro in the process. He also helps form the Elite as a replacement for Superman that are more in tune with his philosophies, and he uses them to try and kill Superman a few times.

 

[The Question]

Also, another bit about Ultimate Gotham's history I just thought of:

With a history of violence and poverty as extensive as Gotham's, it stands to reason that the city wouldn't have been unfamiliar with vigilante activity before Bruce decided to vent his frustration through recreational violence. Which brings me to the Ultimate version of The Reaper. The main change with the character is simply that he wasn't active 20 years ago. He was active 120 years ago. During the 1880s, The Reaper prowled the streets of the East End, protecting the innocent and dispensing rather harsh justice. His greatest acheivement is his defeat of "Pontious Pilate," a misogenistic serial killer with a pechant for irreverence, who would crucify his victims and, once they'd died, put their bodies on display in the city streets. Turns of that Pilate was a local history professor who had been raised by abusive nuns, giving him a duel hatred of strong women and the church. The Reaper came across Pilate trying to kidnap a victim, and recognised him from a charity event they'd both been at. Pilate escaped him, but The Reaper soon afterwards broke into his apartment and uncovered his plan to blow up a church with 500 pounds of stolen dynamite during a Women's Suferege meeting. The Reaper, instead of calling the police, tracked Pilate down himself and threw him off the churchbell tower onto a police car, which had been called to the scene to respond to the fight. Pilate was sent to Arkham, and ended up becoming it's most famous inmate. One night, over 30 years later, Pilate awoke in a frenzy, atempting an escape and killing several gaurds and orderlies before he was stopped. A half dozen gaurds cornered him in the mess hall, and shot him to death. Before he died, he screamed "I was just the begining. The master of this house will be made flesh."

 

[Anubis]

Not bad. Masked vigilantes, an American Jack the Ripper, and pork chop side burns. Fabolous. I want more tails of Gotham's colorful history.

 

[The Question]

Not bad. Masked vigilantes, an American Jack the Ripper, and pork chop side burns. Fabolous. I want more tails of Gotham's colorful history.

Thanks. You did get that Pilate's final words were a prediction of The Joker's coming, right?

Anyway, I've been thinking that to add realism to Batman's adventures and villains, I'd draw more historical allusions. For example, while Harvey Dent as a whole would be a confused mental case, the Two Face persona would be heavily based on the real life vigilante/gangster, Bill The Butcher, who was the basis for the villain in Martin Scorcesi's "Gangs of New York." He wants to protect his city, he wants to preserve his values, but he will go to any lengths necessairy to acheive that, and he is still very tempted by and even somewhat corrupted by the allure of money and power that comes with the circles he works in. Two Face represents everything Harvey secretly wanted to be but never let himself be. He's a badass, no nonsense anti-hero who knows what he wants and doesn't let anything stand in his way.

As for the rest of Gotham's history, I'm not sure. Now that I've mapped out the basics, I'm more interested in Bruce's jounry from an angry teenager to a tortured, violent ant-hero who's more interested in venting his rage than doing any real good, to someone who's honestly trying to help his city, bothe by doing real good as Bruce Wayne, and by giving people hope on a symbolic level as Batman. I also had a cool scene for the big climax of my Ultimate Batman run where he shoots Ra's Al Ghul with Alfred's winchester and then pushes him off the top of Wayne Tower. But I'll go into that later.

 

[Anubis]

Thanks. You did get that Pilate's final words were a prediction of The Joker's coming, right?

I figured that was a reference to something else you were planning. So, he predicts the coming of a psychopath 120 years before? I take it there's more to this?

Anyway, I've been thinking that to add realism to Batman's adventures and villains, I'd draw more historical allusions. For example, while Harvey Dent as a whole would be a confused mental case, the Two Face persona would be heavily based on the real life vigilante/gangster, Bill The Butcher, who was the basis for the villain in Martin Scorsese's "Gangs of New York." He wants to protect his city, he wants to preserve his values, but he will go to any lengths necessary to achieve that, and he is still very tempted by and even somewhat corrupted by the allure of money and power that comes with the circles he works in. Two Face represents everything Harvey secretly wanted to be but never let himself be. He's a badass, no nonsense anti-hero who knows what he wants and doesn't let anything stand in his way.

As for the rest of Gotham's history, I'm not sure. Now that I've mapped out the basics, I'm more interested in Bruce's journey from an angry teenager to a tortured, violent ant-hero who's more interested in venting his rage than doing any real good, to someone who's honestly trying to help his city, both by doing real good as Bruce Wayne, and by giving people hope on a symbolic level as Batman. I also had a cool scene for the big climax of my Ultimate Batman run where he shoots Ra's Al Ghul with Alfred's Winchester and then pushes him off the top of Wayne Tower. But I'll go into that later.

Ra's has survived worse.

 

[The Question]

I figured that was a reference to something else you were planning. So, he predicts the coming of a psychopath 120 years before? I take it there's more to this?

1) It's actually 90 years before, as Pilate dies 30 years after his incarceration.

2) Well, yes and no. The point of it is to play up on the idea that Gotham is cursed. That it's inherently evil and isn't worth saving, to the extent that the rise of it's monsters like Pilate, Falcone, The Joker, and so on is predestined. And it's up to the likes of Bruce Wayne and Jim Gordon to prove that theory wrong. Also, it's meant to be foreshadowing.

Ra's has survived worse.

I know. But that's not exactly the point of the scene. It will make more sense when I spell everything out, but let me try and explain:

At the begining of Bruce's Journey, which will be scene through flashbacks after he arrives back in Gotham, he has no purpose. He is simply traveling the world to try and understand it and himself. When he finds his way to Asia, he meets Ra's Al Ghul, who takes him under his wing. While Bruce had already become an excelent fighter under the teutilege of Ted Grant, Ra's teaches him something more important: How to be a warrior. He teaches him how to take control of his surroundings, something Bruce has always longed for. How to think tactically and make hard descisions. How to use stealth and trickery to his advantage and gain victory. Ra's takes on the role of Bruce's mentor, as Ted Grant had before. Bruce even falls in love with Ra's' daughter, Talia. However, eventually Ra's' camp is atacked, and Bruce sides with his teacher to defend it. During the fight, Talia is shot and killed, and in his greif Bruce picks up a katana and slaughters the men who killed her. Soon afterwards, he learns that Ra's is a wanted terrorist, and that the men he (Bruce) had killed were agents of Interpol. Ra's is revealed to have been a sort of false mentor, and Bruce is heartbroken. He ventures off on his own again, barely surviving from day to day. Eventually, half starved and sickly, he is found by Henri Ducard in Paris. Ducard takes him in, feeds him, cleans him up, and makes Bruce pay him back by serving as his assistant. Ducard, you see, is a private detective and bounty hunter. In Ducard, Bruce finds a new mentor, and learn about tracking, forensics, criminology, and how to thinking like a detective. This gives Bruce new resolve, and when he has repaid Ducard in full, he heads back to Gotham.

There, inspired by seeing the movie "The Mark of Zorro" on television, and decides to become a sort of vigilante/super hero. He dons the mantle of the bat, and takes up his vigilante crusade. However, at first, he doesn't end up doing much. His first few nights, nothing happens. He simply wanders around the East End looking kind of stupid. However, eventually, he comes across a mugging, and the savage beating he gives the fellow is enough to get him noticed and give him a reputation. Soon, a few more "bat attacks" are reported in the East End and The Narrows. However, he's not completely flawless, and his arrogance almost gets him killed by The Irish Mob once and on another occasion when he decided to try and single handedly break up a meth lab in The Narrows. He soon realizes that he can't do everything himself, so he puts aside his stubbornness and decides that if he comes across a crime that he can't deal with himself and doesn't require imediate attention, he'll simply call the police. He does, however, bug the offices of several organized crime figures, the police commisioner, and the D.A. However, he's still not really helping the city as Batman. Really, he's just making himself feel better. Alfred notes this on several occasions, stating that he could do more good as Bruce Wayne than he ever could as Batman, but he doesn't listen.

He really gets his act together, however, when he meets Gordon. Gordon initially tries to arrest him, but realizes that he could be an asset if Batman grew up a little bit. The two begin working together, and Bruce starts doing some real good by less than legally investigating and gathering evidence on organized crime figures and corrupt officials, and handing the evidence "anonimously" over to Gordon. However, Alfred's still not pleased. So, he tells Bruce about an emergency company meeting that doesn't actually exist, and then takes the car into the East End. There, he takes Bruce on a forced tour of the decadence of Gotham at it's worst, and says "With all your money, all your resources, you could help to cure the disease. But all you're doing by dressing up like you did when you went to Rocky Horror Picture Show in your youth and violently assaulting people is easing the symptoms." Afterwards, somewhat reluctantly due simply to his stubbournness, Bruce begins using his wealth to help the city. He starts the Wayne foundation, giving money to soup kitchens, schools, and hospitals, organizing neighborhood watch groups and self defense classes, sponsoring entertainment and the arts, starting youth sports and artistic groups to keep kids occupied and out of trouble, and so on. While he's still Batman, because it makes him feel better, he actually becomes serious about saving the city.

Anyway, eventually, Ra's shows up with some big terrorist plot as he always does. Big fights, explosions all over the city, cops fighting off terrorist ninjas, even a cool scene where Gordon saves Robin from a group of ninjas, only to get surrounded and have his ass saved by Montoya, Bullcok, O'Harra (yes, I have Ultimate Cheif O'Harra), and the rest of the GCPD gang. The big climax of the storyline and the series itself is Bruce, not Batman as he isn't wearing the mask, but Bruce facing off with Ra's atop Wayne Tower. And Bruce shoots Ra's in the chest, twice, with Alfred's winchester. Why? Because it turns out that Bruce never really needed Ted, Ra's, or Ducard. He already had a mentor. He had Alfred. While Ted taught Bruce to be a fighter, Ra's taught Bruce to be warrior, and Ducard taught Bruce to be a detective, Alfred taught Bruce how to be a man. So, it's fitting that Bruce comes full circle and saves the day with something he got from Alfred, and not from any of the other three. And of course, Bruce then pushes Ra's off the tower, all of Ra's' ninjas look up, Bruce puts the mask back on, and there's a badass shot where Batman is highlighted by a flash of lightning and all the terrorists run scared.

 

[Anubis]

Freakin' Sweet.