NOVEL NEXT Chapter 41– Ghost Invasion
Bruce and Matthias, the two Wayne brothers, are currently driving a luxury black sedan on the streets of Metropolis.
A radio song was played; a soft blues song that Matthias picked when he was busy looking for something to hear in the car. The reason being that the drive was extremely silent. Too silent, in fact, it felt deafening to the ears.
“…”
Matthias who sat shotgun as Bruce drives, glanced at his brother who was totally silent, seemingly focusing on driving. But Matthias can’t stay silent anymore, and he asked,
“Bruce… really, what’s going on here? Why do you want me to go back to Gotham?”
As he asked this question, Matthias had an idea that a part of the reason why his brother was trying to take him back home was because of the fight last night; of when Batman confronted Wraith trying to kill the fleeing syndicate members.
Bruce glanced back before returning to look front,
“Metropolis has become too dangerous. I can’t protect you here. But in Gotham…-”
“-… Bruce, I don’t need protection. You know full well how capable I am, right?”
Bruce did not answer, and kept driving.
He then boosts his luck and his focus to maximum, just as a precaution before he asked.
“… is this because of the fight, last night?” asked Matthias. He was considering whether or not he would ask this, but he eventually did.
‘I hope that fight last night did not give him any hints that it was me…’
Bruce eyed him sideways, making Matthias nervous though he did not let it show.
“… So you’ve heard.” Said Bruce.
Matthias internally sighed, knowing that this sentence means Bruce did not yet realize Matthias was Wraith. And so he played along,
“Yeah, they said you beat Wraith, last night.”
“I didn’t beat him, he escaped from me.”
‘Yeah nah, brother, you totally beat me in that fight last night.’ Thought Matthias.
“Listen, brother… you can’t just have me drop out of college like this. I haven’t even finished this semester.”
“You’re not dropping out. You’ll be on a leave until the next semester. Lucius will handle the leave permit.”
“Are you kidding me, Bruce? You’re this paranoid because of the fight with Wraith?”
The car brakes at a red light, and Bruce looks at his younger brother.
“No, it’s not just him. I…”
Bruce hesitated for a while, and his eyes wavers as he continued,
“… I have many enemies, Matthias… I’m afraid those who knows me would get to you…”
In order to get to me, but he didn’t say that.
Matthias could guess that Bruce was trying to hide something from him, but he can’t just let him take him back to Gotham… not yet.
“Bruce, you see, I know you’re being protective towards me, but you need to know who I am. I’m your brother! Heck! I’m the goddamn Batman’s Younger Brother!” said Matthias as he tapped his own chest as an exaggeration. He continued,
“Not only that, do remember that I was the great ‘Vindicator’, the very first modern vigilante of Gotham City. Batman wasn’t even “born” during my time!” – or so he jests.
Bruce looks at Matthias for a while… and smiled lightly, just as the traffic light turns green.
“Hmmm…” he hums and ponders as he drives, “… fine, Matty. I won’t take you home, now. Yet.”
Matthias was fist pumping in his mind.
Then, Bruce returned to his serious demeanor.
“But know this; the moment there’s dangers around you, I will immediately take you back to Gotham…”
Bruce then turned his car around, and drove in the direction to Matthias’ home.
“… I still can’t get over that time when you were young...” he said, softly under his breath but still loud enough for Matthias to hear.
He was referring to the time when the young Matthias was trying to protect a couple of pedestrian against a group of teenage hooligans. The time when Matthias was sent to the hospital all bloody.
“Worry not, brother.” Matthias reassured him. “That will never happen again…”
As they drove silently towards Matthias’ place, he had one thought in his mind.
‘Guess I better finish all my tasks here in this city.’
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Matthias accessed his computer in his safe-house. The screen shows several different windows, but they were all coming from the same place; the LexCorp Tower. The windows were showing the video live-feed from the cameras coming from the Tower’s main security center, the one Matthias hacked the first time he infiltrated the Tower.
Matthias then typed on his keyboard, and then boosts his intelligence and focus as usual as he stared at the screen.
On several of the windowed videos shows several people, dressed in either white lab coats or some safety uniforms, all moving around the building rather freely.
But this scene is not at all something new to Matthias, for he has been watching them since about a week ago, which is when those people in uniforms are all roaming around the Tower. But this time, the amount of these uniformed men in the area seems to dwindle significantly.
Some days ago, there were so many of those engineers as well as scientist in their white coats moving about in the building. But now, “… why’s there only a handful of them?”
Matthias kept watching the screen.
The scientist and engineers who should be roaming around the building were mostly gone, save for a couple of people in uniforms heading towards a certain path, moving to a large elevator that leads towards the underground area of the Tower.
Unfortunately, Matthias did not access the underground area when he infiltrated the Tower so he had no bugs placed there, and the cameras of the main security station did not have the video-feed of the area.
This means… “If I want to find out what he’s been doing, I will need to infiltrate the Tower again…”
Matthias closed the screen and stood up. He then approached his workbench behind him; the several gears, tools, and weapons scattered on it, including his Wraith gears.
He picked up his Wraith mask, and inspected it.
He put the mask down, but his eyes are still glued to it.
“But I’ll use it for the last time to infiltrate LexCorp…”
~ ~ ~
“Luthor!” shouted a man dressed in brownish green uniform and a military hat who walked inside a white sterile lab alongside another one with the same uniform, but with different rank symbol on his chest and shoulder.
“What is the meaning of this?!”
A bald man who’s wearing a dark blue tight suit came out from a certain glass room on the side of the lab. Of course, he’s the one and only chairman of LexCorp, Lex Luthor.
“Whatever do you mean, Colonel?” he asked with a smile.
“You-! You fired all of the scientists and engineers we sent you here!”
“Not all. Some of them are still here.”
“You say some, but there’s only two of our scientists left here, and they were doing fuck-all except watching you fucking around here.”
Lex Luthor’s smile disappeared,
“Watch with the profanities, Colonel. I don’t work for you, and that means you don’t have the right to order me around.”
“You bastard… have you forgotten our deal?!”
The colonel was fuming as his face reddens and his veins on the neck and forehead bulges.
“You are to develop more technologies for the military intelligence, and we help you with a suitable position within the top brass.”
Luthor stared at the Colonel, and scoffed at him,
“‘Military intelligence’, Colonel? Two words combined that can’t make sense.”
He walked towards a certain panel in the middle of the room, the largest computer panel in the middle of other smaller ones.
The Colonel was furious to the bone.
‘What the hell is this guy doing backing out from the deal.’ He thought.
But…
“Despite what you thought, Colonel, I didn’t back out of the deal.”
Luthor typed something on the keyboard, and the panels lit up with several windows and the LEDs on the side beeps several times.
“On the contrary, I expect you and your associates to be able to hold your end of deal.”
Luthor walked away from the panel, and approached a certain area of the lab; a metal door on the end of the lab had the light on top of it flashes as it rotates like a police siren, and the alarm blares along with it.
The metal door opens, and Luthor continued to speak,
“Colonel, sooner or later, you will be needing my help because of an…” he stopped, as if to ponder, then continued,
“… let’s just say, we might soon have a guest from far away, and I have a feeling that they are not friendly bunch.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” yelled the Colonel as he looked at Luthor like how one would look at a madman.
“You’re not right in the head, Luthor. I guess all “geniuses” like you are all nutjobs!”
Luthor did not respond, and he proceeded to enter the room behind the metal door… or rather, he was about to when-
*UrrrRRRRRRRRrrrrrr!*
An even bigger siren noises blared throughout the lab- no, throughout the whole LexCorp building.
{“Intruder Alert. Intruder Alert.”} the A.I. voice-coms chimes alongside the loud alarm.
“What the-! What happened here, Luthor!” asked the Colonel nervously.
Luthor simply smiled, and he looked at his military friends and said,
“Gentlemen, I implore you to please get out of my lab.”
Luthor then proceeded to enter the room behind the metal door.
“I have a… ghost, to greet.”
The Colonel had a weird look on his face, but he was too agitated because of the alarm that he just went out of the lab with his companion behind him.