ONE-NINE-HUNDRED Gotham Stories by Mary 1 Disclaimer: No copyright held, no profit made, no affiliation with the copyright holders is implied. This is a non-profit fanzine. All recognisable characters and locations property of their respective owners. Please, please, please don't sue. Front cover art by Red Eft Back cover art by Audrey Fox Words in the middle by Mary B. Find us all at http://evenrobins.net/info/site.html A MonkeyWench production 2 LOST There are so many people here that he just wants to clap his hands over his ears and scream until they all leave him alone. People who shake his hand, or ruffle his hair, and say they're sorry like they mean it. A woman who looks enough like Jason himself that she's probably an aunt or a cousin clasps him on the shoulder and calls him kid and lets him bum a cigarette off her. She says she's sorry, just like everyone else is, and tells him that his dad was a hell of a guy. She calls the Batman a fucking bastard and a murdering scumbag and Jason keeps his mouth shut, even though he wants to tell her that it wasn't the Batman's fault that one of the other guys on the museum job tried to shoot him and hit Jason's dad instead. Later, when everyone's getting drunk, another woman finds him sitting on the edge of the swimming pool. He wants to dip his feet in, but thinks he's probably not supposed to take his good shoes off. He's only been to this house once before, back when his dad started working for Two-Face. It doesn't look quite so big this time. He's never been to a wake before, ever. This new woman says that his dad was a hell of a guy, too, but doesn't offer a sorry so Jason likes her better. She says her name's Shiva, and asks where Jason's mother is. "She... the hospital," he manages. "After we found out about dad, she got sick." He'd found her with the needle still in her arm. 3 "You ever need a place to stay, you call this," she says, and gives him a card. It's blank apart from the phone number on one side. "I owe your father that." He tucks the card in his pocket, but doubts he'll call it. She looks at him like a teacher looking at an essay. By the time that everyone's really drunk, and telling stories about his dad, Jason just wants to go home and sleep until everything's normal again. A kid about his own age, a girl in a dress that looks about as comfortable as his suit is, comes over and sits next to him. She dips her fingers in the pool water, now lit up with those underwater bulbs that always make Jason think of electrocution accidents. "My dad says your dad was -" "A hell of a guy?" Jason guesses. She shakes her head. "A real jerk, but otherwise okay, actually. He told me that they were buds in prison. Art and Will, two things that'll change the world." Jason smiles, a little. "I'm Stephanie. I'm supposed to ask if you want to come stay with me and my family, while your mom's sick." She makes a face. "But you'll have to share my room, so you'd better not fart too much or anything." "Some friend of Two-Face's is picking me up later. Or his valet is. I didn't really pay attention," answers Jason, his voice sounding dull and tired to his own ears. "Well, you can come stay with us if he's not cool, okay?" "'kay. Thanks." 4 "Wanna go swimming?" she asks suddenly, kicking off her patent strap-shoes. "C'mon." "These are my good clothes..." "So? Who cares?" Jason doesn't. Not about anything. He shrugs his jacket off, and jumps in after her. The driver who picks Jason up doesn't say anything about the fact he's soaking wet, even though the car's a real expensive looking one. Jason could work out the make and model if the light was better and he wasn't so tired, but just watches the lights go past outside the window and wonders how long it'll be before he has to run away. A teenage boy meets him at the new place. He's friendly and sympathetic-looking and Jason just wants to go to sleep. "Hi, I'm Dick. Bruce is out of town at the moment, but he'll be back as soon as he can be. Do you want anything to eat before you go to bed? We've got a room set up for you." Jason realises abruptly that he's really, really hungry. He hasn't eaten anything all day, not even any of the classy-looking catering at the wake. Alfred, the driver, turns out to be the cook as well. He makes them both sandwiches and chocolate milk. Jason wishes Stephanie was there to hear his world-class burps, but Dick seems amused enough by them anyway. "So what's this Bruce guy do? Is he in protection, or gunrunning, or fixing?" Jason asks as he gets stuck into his second plate of sandwiches. "If it's cars, I can help out a little. I'm good with tires." 5 Dick shakes his head, looking a little disturbed by the question. "Bruce isn't involved in anything like that." Jason snorts. "Fine, don't tell me." A rich guy who's buddy-buddy enough with Harvey Dent to offer to take in a dead henchman's kid, and he's not into crime? Jason'll be believing in ghosts, next. Someone's arranged for all his stuff to be brought over, which would be cool if it didn't remind Jason that he'll never be going home again. Even if his mom survives, she won't be in a position to look after him. He peels off his wet funeral clothes and crawls into a bed that's too big and too soft. It's obvious that Wayne's into something; there're rooms Jason's not allowed to poke around in, and Dick keeps pausing or talking cryptic when Jason gets in earshot. The more time Jason spends watching Alfred, the more his brain wants to scrub out 'butler' as the word which springs to mind and replace it with 'wetworks'. Something about the way the guy looks so cool no matter what he's doing. Jason once told his dad that he wanted to be a hitman when he grew up. His dad had looked kinda funny, like he was sad and proud at the same time. Jason doesn't really want to be that, anymore, but isn't sure what else he'd like to be instead. He likes history; the French Revolution with all those gross bodies with no heads and the heads collected in baskets, or the Crusades. But 'liking history' isn't a job. He doesn't bother poking around to find out the house's secrets, because he figures he'll find out 6 when he's meant to. They'll need him for something, right? Otherwise they wouldn't have taken him in. The one thing he doesn't get is Tim. Tim lives down the street, and he's even younger than Jason is, but he comes over all the time and hangs out with Dick like they're best buddies. Tim's a rich kid, but -- unlike Dick -- Jason's willing to buy that his family's wealth is legit. According to Tim, he met Dick when he was a really young kid, when Dick's real parents got killed. It was an extortion thing, which makes Jason feel bad for Dick. Money is a crappy reason for someone to die. So Tim met Dick, and wanted his parents to adopt Dick, but this Wayne guy did instead, and Tim just kind of stuck around. Like he wanted to make sure Dick was okay. Jason wants to say that it all sounds really gay, except that he understands. He thinks about Stephanie, sometimes, and sort of wants to check that she's okay, too. Maybe he's feeling the same thing Tim was. One afternoon, when Dick and Tim are off doing one of the things that Jason's not supposed to know about (and doesn't care about, because if they want to have their shitty little secrets then he doesn't care), Jason thinks about calling Shiva. At least she seemed to want to do something with him. Instead, he goes through the stuff still in boxes in his room until he finds his dad's address book. There's only one guy listed who could be an Art, like Stephanie said her dad was. Arthur Brown. 7 It's the first time he's used the phone at the house, and the dial tone makes his throat go dry. Every time he's heard it ring, he's been sure it's the hospital to say his mother's died. She's still in a coma. Jason tries not to think about it, but that doesn't work as well as he'd like. Eventually someone picks up. "H'lo?" "Is Stephanie there?" The guy swears loudly. "That little bitch. No, she ain't here, and if you know where I can track her down you'd better tell me quicksmart, kid.