Beyond the Limit (DC)

| Gotham City - September 10

Joseph had spent the last several hours in the Mojave Desert, alone, testing his new body after Captain Atom departed on League business.

His body felt heavier. Nova said he now weighed around 670 pounds. The weight came from the dense Nth metal nanites now bound to him on a cellular level. It wasn't an issue for him — his strength and the anti-gravity field kept him moving like he weighed nothing — but it meant some awkward adjustments. Furniture in his apartment was going to start collapsing under him if he didn't reinforce it.

When he extended nanites from his skin, he wasn't depleting the Nth metal-laced ones inside him unless he willed so. Those were finite, too precious to throw away. Instead, he generated new ones from scratch, a synthesized alloy made of carbon based materials and advanced alloys. That meant once he created them — especially in large quantities — they couldn't be recalled into his body. His system could only hold so much mass at once.

He needed a solution. If he could find a way to shrink the nanites after use, he could recycle them. He could also use this to lessen his body's weight. That thought led his mind toward the Atom. If she could shrink herself into the subatomic scale, maybe she could teach him how to apply similar principles to his tech.

The Nth metal now allowed him to absorb all energy that touched his body. Every photon, every volt, every heat signature — stored away for later use. That, combined with his already unique ability to metabolize Nova Force, meant something remarkable: as long as he had Nova Force in him, he could produce unlimited nanites. Though the cost of turning his energy into nanites was high so he wouldn't be spamming it anytime soon.

That also extended his "Speed State," eliminating the cooldown so he theoretically could use it indefinitely as long as he had enough Nova Force stored.

Not that he was anywhere near Flash's level. His bond to the Speed Force wasn't deep enough to pull off phasing, lightning generation, or selectively accelerating parts of his body or mind. But his toolkit more than compensated. Still, he couldn't shake the curiosity: if he were struck by a lightning bolt while in Speed State, would it push him deeper into the Force? That was a question he'd try to answer later during a lightning storm.

He also discovered his sonic scream had surpassed Black Canary's Canary Cry in sheer destructive force. He filed that away as a surprise weapon for opponents with heightened senses — the kind of attack that could overwhelm someone like him or Kori, the way Vanessa Kapatelis had rattled them as Silver Swan.

For now, however, Joseph found himself walking the streets of Gotham City at night, heading toward Selina Kyle's penthouse.

The visit was unannounced, but that was deliberate. Selina had shown up at his place uninvited plenty of times — dragging him out for rooftop training when he was still running petty thefts to make ends meet. She'd even dug through his belongings once to find out his birthday. Tonight, he planned to return the favor.

If she was home, he'd hang out with her. If she wasn't, he'd learn more about his self-appointed older sister — a woman he knew shockingly little about beyond her name, occupation, and the fact she could rob a vault while holding a conversation. That was fine. He wasn't one to judge.

Selina didn't just steal for herself. He knew firsthand about the good she did. She'd liberated a group of trafficked girls from a facility in Sochi, Russia, then used the fortune from selling the Cat's Eye emerald to settle them into safe homes and secure jobs. That was only one example he'd seen.

She had a pattern — targeting the rich and corrupt, funneling the spoils into Gotham's forgotten East End. She had a weakness for the vulnerable. And she'd helped him when she didn't have to. So he would always trust her.

Just like he trusted Gotham to be a shithole.

The city was a perpetual wound, its skyline a jagged black silhouette against the cloudy night. Monolithic buildings loomed overhead, their stone and steel faces streaked with decades of grime. Streetlamps struggled against the darkness, throwing weak, yellow cones of light that barely touched the cracked pavement.

The air was thick with damp rot — the smell of old concrete soaked in rainwater and sewage. In the alleys, shadows hunched over against the cold; the homeless and the forgotten, sleeping in doorways or leaning against graffiti-scrawled brick. Discarded needles glinted faintly in the gutter.

Across the street, a man with glassy eyes stared at nothing, muttering to himself as if to an invisible companion. Joseph knew his ban on hard drugs was in effect in most of East End implemented by the Two-Face gang but distributors from other areas had used this opportunity to fill the void. He'd have to do something about that.

Somewhere far off, sirens wailed — the constant background music of Gotham — and somewhere closer, the low, frantic thump of bass from a club on the next block fought to drown it out.

Things improved slightly in Gotham Heights, where Selina lived—but only slightly. Joseph planned to change that, starting here. Harvey hadn't called yet, which meant the Two-Face gang still needed time to prepare before they could crush the other crews.

The walls of Selina's condo rose ahead, smooth and modern. Joseph approached the access control panel by the gate and tapped the display. Black nanites streamed briefly from his fingertips, sliding into the seams of the device before retracting. The door clicked open.

'Thanks, Nova,' he thought.

The AI's new mechanokinetic reach was proving invaluable. It had always been able to interface with his internal tech — like when it hijacked the Gordanian energy tracker and used it as a backdoor into their systems — but now its reach extended beyond his own body.

Circling to the side of the building, Joseph kept clear of cameras. Then he simply rose into the air.

Nova pinged two life signatures in Selina's penthouse. One was her, the other likely Holly Robinson. Holly didn't know about Nova, but she knew Joseph had been in the same profession as Selina. He decided to play it casual — knock on the window, pretend he'd climbed the building the old-fashioned way.

But before he could knock, his enhanced hearing caught something. Rhythmic sounds. Grunting. His first thought was sparring drills. Maybe Selina was teaching Holly some close-combat moves.

He floated closer, leaned in, and peered through the glass.

Then immediately jerked back.

Too late. His almost perfect memory was a curse in moments like this. The image was seared into his mind: Selina, tangled up in Bruce Wayne, both of them… very much not sparring.

And on the floor beside the bed — Selina's Catwoman suit, and the unmistakable black armor of the Bat.

He blinked, once. Twice. Processing.

Selina mingling with Gotham's elite wasn't unusual — half the city's high society had probably flirted with her at one point or another. But this?

Some kind of billionaire-superhero roleplay?

…Or not roleplay at all.

Scars lined Bruce's sculpted body—marks no pampered playboy would have.

One conclusion hit Joseph like a thunderclap.

'Bruce Wayne is Batman!?'