Nightwing: The Ultimate SI

[Tomato]

Why on Earth does he think they believe literally any of his lies? He's ridiculously suspicious even to people who aren't at the level of Bat people.

Just go for memory loss.

 

[MoonyNightShade]

Selina's parting words in the cave had done more than just give me dating advice; they'd given me a mission plan: to win, you couldn't just be better than your opponents, you had to be willing to play a dirtier game.

The penthouse had been transformed into a war room over the past week. Holographic displays flickered across every available surface, casting blue-white light across walls that had once been pristine and minimal. Financial charts, shipping manifests, and architectural blueprints covered my dining table like the battle plans of a general preparing for a two-front war.

Which, in a way, they were.

I stood in the center of it all, my expression cold and focused as I studied the data streams flowing across my laptop screen.

One variable at a time. LexCorp first – silent, surgical, undetectable. Get the intelligence I need about Project Prometheus, confirm the timeline, verify the performance specs. Then Penguin – loud, chaotic, devastating. Cripple his shipping operations just before the quarterly reports come out. Create the market conditions I need.

The plan was elegant in its simplicity. Lex Luthor's Gotham R&D facility had been developing advanced drone technology for the past eighteen months – technology that would revolutionize urban logistics and make early investors very, very wealthy. The Penguin's smuggling operations, meanwhile, controlled a significant chunk of Gotham's import/export business through a network of legitimate shell companies.

What the financial markets didn't know yet was that LexCorp was about to announce a breakthrough that would make traditional shipping methods obsolete virtually overnight. What they also didn't know was that one of the largest shipping consortiums in the city was about to suffer a series of catastrophic "accidents" that would tank their stock price right before the announcement.

Information asymmetry. The oldest game in the book. Buy low on the companies that are about to soar, short the companies that are about to crash, and retire to a private island with enough money to impress ancient Egyptian warrior goddesses.

I pulled up the LexCorp building schematics one more time, tracing the route I'd memorized through the ventilation system to the sub-level server room. Security was good – excellent, even – but it was designed to keep out corporate spies and curious journalists, not someone with Dick Grayson's particular skill set.

Twenty minutes to get in, five minutes to download the files, fifteen minutes to get out. Plenty of margin for error.

The Penguin's warehouse would be different. Messier. Oswald Cobblepot was paranoid, violent, and surrounded himself with people who shot first and asked questions of the corpses. But he was also old-school in his approach to security – lots of guns, not enough technology. He'd never see me coming.

And when I'm done with both of them, I'll have everything I need to make my first fortune in this new life.

I closed the laptop and began suiting up, my movements precise and methodical. Tonight wasn't about heroics or justice or protecting the innocent. Tonight was about taking what I needed from people who could afford to lose it.

Time to get to work.

The LexCorp building rose into the Gotham night like a chrome and glass monument to corporate ambition. Forty-seven stories of cutting-edge architecture and bleeding-edge paranoia, all of it designed to project an image of unstoppable forward momentum.

Perfect. The higher they built their towers, the more places there were for someone like me to hide.

I crouched on the edge of a neighboring building's rooftop, rain pattering against my suit as I studied the target through high-powered binoculars. Security patrols moved in predictable patterns around the building's perimeter. Camera placements were textbook standard. Motion sensors covered the obvious approach routes.

All of which meant they were expecting someone to come through the front door, or maybe try to scale the building from street level like an ambitious cat burglar.

They weren't expecting someone to drop in from above.

Thirty-seventh floor. Maintenance access to the ventilation system. From there, it's a straight shot down to sub-level three.

I holstered the binoculars and activated the grappling gun built into my gauntlet, feeling the familiar weight of Wayne-tech engineering in my palm. The line shot across the gap between buildings with a whisper-quiet thrum, magnetic clamp finding purchase on LexCorp's external maintenance platform.

The swing across the gap was pure poetry – that perfect moment of weightlessness followed by the controlled impact against the building's outer wall. My magnetic grips engaged automatically, and within seconds I was scaling the rain-slicked glass toward my entry point.

Movement is life. Hesitation is death. Bruce's first lesson, and still the most important one.

The maintenance hatch yielded to my lockpicks with barely a whisper of resistance. Corporate security focused on the obvious threats – armed intrusion, cyber attacks, industrial espionage through conventional channels. They didn't plan for someone who could pick a lock while hanging upside down forty stories above the street.

Amateur hour. Luthor's paying for premium security and getting mall-cop thinking.

The ventilation shaft was a maze of brushed steel and humming machinery, but I'd memorized every twist and turn from the stolen blueprints. Left at the first junction, straight for thirty meters, then down through the vertical shaft that connected to the sub-levels.

The real challenges began when I reached the secured zones.

The first obstacle was an electronic lock on the access panel leading to sub-level three – a quantum-encrypted system that would have stopped any conventional hacker cold. But Dick Grayson's toolkit included a few items that weren't available at the local electronics store.

Wayne-tech cipher device. Good thing Bruce believes in giving his kids the best toys.

The device attached to the lock's housing with magnetic clamps, its processors working through encryption algorithms faster than any human brain could follow. Thirty seconds later, the lock disengaged with a soft chime that sounded almost apologetic.

One down.

The corridor beyond was a sterile white hallway lined with biometric scanners and pressure-sensitive floor panels. Motion detectors tracked heat signatures from multiple angles, creating overlapping fields of coverage that would detect anything larger than a mouse.

Anything that moved like a normal person, anyway.

I pressed myself against the ceiling, using magnetic grips and sheer upper body strength to navigate the hallway like a human spider. My movements were slow, controlled, designed to avoid the motion sensors' tracking algorithms. What looked like an impossible security system became just another acrobatic routine.

Twelve point seven second cycle on the laser grid. Pressure plates calibrated for anything over eighty kilograms. Child's play. The real challenge is going to be the server room's quantum encryption.

The final barrier was a thermal sensor guarding the server room entrance – a system designed to detect the body heat of anyone trying to gain unauthorized access. I reached into my utility belt and withdrew a small cylindrical device, one of Bruce's more exotic gadgets.

The cryogenic pellet detonated silently against the sensor housing, flash-freezing the detection array and creating a localized dead zone in its coverage. I had maybe ninety seconds before the system's self-diagnostics detected the malfunction.

More than enough time.

The server room was a cathedral of humming processors and fiber-optic cables, racks of quantum storage devices that contained more computational power than most countries possessed. And somewhere in that digital maze was the information I needed.

Project Prometheus. Advanced autonomous logistics systems. Urban delivery drones with AI navigation and adaptive cargo management. Market disruption potential: total.

I connected my portable drive to one of the primary terminals, watching as progress bars crawled across the screen. Five terabytes of technical specifications, performance data, and projected deployment schedules. Everything I needed to time my investments perfectly.

Seventy percent complete. Come on, come on.

A soft chime echoed through the server room – the sound of a silent alarm engaging as the building's security system finally detected my presence. Automated countermeasures would be initializing, security teams would be converging on my position, and my window of opportunity was rapidly closing.

Ninety percent. Almost there.

The download completed just as I heard the first sounds of footsteps in the corridor outside. I pocketed the drive, activated a signal jammer to cover my electronic tracks, and moved toward the ventilation grate I'd entered through.

Clean extraction. No evidence, no confrontation, no complications.

By the time LexCorp security reached the server room, I was already three floors up and moving toward my exit point. They'd find traces of the intrusion eventually – frozen thermal sensors, bypassed locks, accessed terminals – but they'd never find the intruder.

Mission one complete. Time for the loud part.

The Penguin's warehouse squatted on the Gotham docks like a malignant tumor, all rusted metal and peeling paint that reeked of fish and corruption. Even from my vantage point on a nearby crane, I could smell the distinctive cocktail of rotting seafood, diesel fuel, and human desperation that characterized Oswald Cobblepot's business empire.

Target acquired. Time to make some noise.

This wasn't going to be subtle. Stealth had served its purpose at LexCorp, but here I needed chaos. I needed to create the kind of highly visible disaster that would make financial journalists write breathless articles about the risks of investing in traditional shipping infrastructure.

I studied the warehouse through my binoculars, cataloging guard positions and identifying critical systems. Two sentries at the main entrance, three more patrolling the perimeter. Light security for a criminal operation, but then again, Penguin's reputation for brutality usually discouraged casual interference.

Main power conduit on the north wall. Accounting office on the second floor, southwest corner. Refrigeration units for the legitimate seafood business on the east side. Perfect.

The first explosive charge was a thing of beauty – a Wayne-tech charge designed to disable rather than destroy, small enough to fit in my palm but powerful enough to take out a city block's worth of electrical infrastructure.

Target the systems first. Break their operations, then break them.

I dropped from the crane in free fall, deploying my hidden cape at the last second to control my descent onto the warehouse roof. The impact was soft, controlled, invisible to the guards below.

Phase one: darkness.

The charge attached to the main power conduit with a satisfying magnetic click. I armed the timer, gave myself thirty seconds to clear the blast radius, and moved toward the next target.

The explosion was perfectly calculated – loud enough to be heard for blocks, bright enough to temporarily blind anyone looking in its direction, but focused enough to avoid actual structural damage. The warehouse plunged into darkness as every electrical system died simultaneously.

Chaos theory in action. Remove one critical component, watch the entire system collapse.

The ventilation system was next. I dropped a smoke pellet into the main intake duct and listened with satisfaction as the building's circulation fans distributed a cloud of dense, disorienting vapor throughout the interior.

Disorientation is the goal. Break their systems, then break everything else.

The screaming started almost immediately – panicked voices of Penguin's thugs as they stumbled through smoke-filled darkness, their night vision ruined by the electrical explosion, their communication systems dead.

Time to go to work.

I descended into the warehouse through a skylight, my night vision lenses turning the chaotic scene below into a perfectly clear tactical situation. Men stumbled through the smoke, calling out to each other, trying to organize some kind of coherent response to an attack they couldn't understand.

Seven targets. Standard criminal muscle. Predictable movement patterns. This is going to be therapeutic.

The first thug never saw me coming. I dropped behind him like a shadow, escrima stick finding the base of his skull with surgical precision. He went down without a sound, his weapon clattering uselessly across the concrete floor.

One down. Six to go.

The second target was trying to reach what looked like an emergency radio. I dealt with him using environmental assets – a swift kick to a stack of fish crates that collapsed on top of him, burying him under fifty pounds of rotting seafood and ice.

Two down. And he's going to smell like that for weeks.

The third and fourth came as a pair, moving back-to-back through the smoke with their weapons raised. Professional technique, military training. Too bad they were dealing with someone who'd been trained by the Batman.

I used their caution against them, tossing a batarang into the opposite corner of the warehouse to draw their attention. When they turned to investigate the sound, I was already behind them, escrima sticks moving in a blur of precisely applied violence.

Four down. This is almost too easy.

The fifth thug actually managed to get a shot off – a wild spray of automatic fire that came nowhere close to hitting me but did excellent work ventilating a stack of shipping containers. I responded by introducing him to the concrete pillar he'd been using for cover, at velocity.

Five down. Basic physics: force equals mass times acceleration.

Numbers six and seven had found each other in the chaos and were trying to coordinate a sweep of the warehouse floor. Good tactics, solid execution. They might have even been effective against a normal intruder.

Unfortunately for them, I'm not normal.

I used the warehouse's overhead crane system to my advantage, swinging through the girders above them like some kind of urban Tarzan. They never thought to look up until I was already dropping into their midst, escrima sticks spinning.

Seven down. Time for the main event.

The stairs to the second-floor office were metal and concrete, designed to channel anyone approaching the Penguin's inner sanctum into a narrow kill zone. Under normal circumstances, it would have been a death trap.

Good thing these aren't normal circumstances.

I bypassed the stairs entirely, using my grappling gun to swing directly onto the office's external fire escape. Through the windows, I could see Oswald Cobblepot himself – shorter than I'd expected, but radiating the kind of dangerous intelligence that had kept him alive and powerful in Gotham's criminal underworld for decades.

He was barking orders into a dead radio, trying to coordinate a defense against an enemy he couldn't locate or understand. His umbrella – the infamous weapon that had killed more people than anyone could count – was propped against his desk within easy reach.

Time to introduce myself.

I came through the window in an explosion of glass and smoke, moving fast enough that Penguin's first shot went wide by three feet. His umbrella gun was impressive – definitely custom work, probably lethal to anyone without superhuman reflexes.

Too bad I have superhuman reflexes.

The bola caught him before he could chamber a second round, synthetic fibers wrapping around his expensive coat and binding his arms to his sides. A calculated application of force sent him spinning into the filing cabinets, where he ended up tangled in his own coat like an expensive, profanity-spewing burrito.

One bird down. Time to clip his wings.

I moved to his desk, where stacks of shipping ledgers and financial records represented the administrative heart of his legitimate businesses. The incendiary device was small, controlled, designed to destroy documents without starting a building-consuming fire.

Can't have the insurance companies getting suspicious about arson. This has to look like an electrical fire caused by the power surge.

"You have any idea who you're messing with, you freak?" Penguin sputtered from his position on the floor, trying to work himself free of the bola. "I got connections all over this city! You're gonna pay for this!"

Threats. How predictable.

I set the timer on the incendiary device and turned to face him, letting him get a good look at the Nightwing costume. He needed to know exactly who had just dismantled his operation.

"Heard the shipping business is tough, Ozzy," I said, allowing myself a small, cold smile. "Might be a bear market for birds."

And that's the sound bite that'll end up in tomorrow's newspapers. Perfect.

The incendiary device went off as I was leaving, controlled flames consuming months of carefully kept shipping records. Nothing that couldn't be reconstructed eventually, but the disruption to Penguin's quarterly reports would be devastating.

Phase two complete. Time to go home and count my future profits.

I perched on a rooftop overlooking the chaos at the docks, watching as the first police sirens wailed in the distance. Smoke was rising from multiple locations – the warehouse, the office, the scattered shipping containers where my smoke pellets were still creating atmospheric effects.

Beautiful. Absolutely beautiful.

The operation had been flawless. LexCorp's Project Prometheus data was safely secured in my encrypted drives, ready to be analyzed and leveraged. Penguin's shipping empire was in shambles, his stock prices guaranteed to crater when the markets opened tomorrow morning.

Information asymmetry. Market manipulation. Corporate espionage. And I haven't technically broken any laws that matter.

I looked from the chaos at the docks towards the distant, glittering towers of the financial district, a cold, predatory smile touching my lips for the first time all night. "Phase one complete."

——————————

Author's note:

Sorry been busy, but our boy's gonna make so much dough– it's gonna be crazy.

 

[MoonyNightShade]

The morning news was a symphony of my own secret composition: one anchor was reporting on a mysterious electrical fire that had crippled Gotham's largest shipping import-export business, while another was breathlessly announcing a surprise, paradigm-shifting tech reveal from LexCorp later in the week.

I sipped my coffee – some ridiculously expensive Ethiopian blend that Dick Grayson's kitchen had been stocked with – and watched the chaos unfold from the comfort of my silk robe. The penthouse's massive screen displayed three different news channels simultaneously, each one confirming that my nocturnal activities had achieved exactly the market disruption I'd been aiming for.

Beautiful. Absolutely beautiful. It's like watching dominoes fall, except each domino is worth about fifty million dollars.

The financial ticker running along the bottom of one screen showed Cobblepot Shipping & Logistics down eighteen percent in pre-market trading. Meanwhile, its smaller competitor, Orion Shipping, was holding steady – for now. But I knew that once investors started looking for alternatives to Penguin's suddenly unreliable network, those numbers would change dramatically.

Phase two of the plan is about to begin. Time to traumatize a Swiss banker.

I pulled up my tablet and checked the real-time market data, feeling a thrill of anticipation as I watched the numbers shift in exactly the patterns I'd predicted. Everything was falling into place with the precision of a Swiss watch – which was appropriate, considering I was about to make a very specific Swiss gentleman question his entire approach to wealth management.

11:30 AM in Geneva. Perfect timing. Mr. Klaus should just be finishing his morning tea and settling in for what he thinks is going to be a nice, boring day of conservative portfolio management.

I opened the secure communications app that connected directly to Rothschild & Richter, the venerable financial institution that had been managing the Grayson family's considerable wealth for the better part of three decades. The encryption protocols alone probably cost more than most people's annual salaries, which made sense when you were discussing the kind of money that could buy small countries.

The call connected after two rings.

"Guten Morgen, Rothschild & Richter, this is Klaus Richter speaking." The voice on the other end was crisp, professional, and carried the faint accent of someone who had spent his entire career managing the wealth of some ultra-super-super-rich people.

"Klaus, my man!" I said, injecting as much casual American enthusiasm into my voice as possible. "How's the weather in Geneva? Still all mountains and chocolate and fiscal responsibility?"

There was a brief pause. "Master Grayson," Klaus replied, his tone shifting to the carefully modulated professionalism he used when dealing with clients who might be having what he diplomatically referred to as "episodes." "Good morning. I trust you are well?"

He already sounds nervous. This is going to be even more fun than I thought.

"Never better, Klaus. Absolutely fantastic. In fact, I'm feeling so good that I want to make some changes to the portfolio. Big changes."

Another pause, longer this time. I could practically hear him pulling up my account information, checking the last time we'd spoken, probably wondering if I'd been drinking.

"Of course, Master Grayson. What sort of... adjustments did you have in mind?"

Here we go. Time to drop the first bomb.

"I need you to liquidate ninety percent of the discretionary portfolio," I said, keeping my voice casual, like I was ordering coffee. "All of it. The blue-chip stocks, the municipal bonds, the tech diversification package, even the shares in Wayne Enterprises… actually no, let's keep those."

The silence that followed was so profound I wondered if the call had dropped. When Klaus finally spoke, his voice had a slightly strangled quality that suggested he was trying very hard not to have a professional breakdown.

"I... I beg your pardon, Master Grayson? Did you say... ninety percent?"

"That's right. Liquidate it all. Turn it into cash. Beautiful, liquid, ready-to-invest cash."

Come on, Klaus. Ask me why. I've got such a good non-answer prepared.

"Master Grayson," Klaus said carefully, "the current portfolio is performing exceptionally well. The Wayne Enterprises holdings alone have appreciated nearly twelve percent this quarter. The municipal bonds are providing stable income, and the diversified tech package is hedged against market volatility. Liquidating these assets would represent... well, it would represent the systematic destruction of a carefully balanced investment strategy that has been refined over decades."

Poor guy. He sounds like I just asked him to burn down the Sistine Chapel.

"Klaus, Klaus, Klaus," I said, leaning back in my chair and grinning at the ceiling. "You're thinking like an accountant. I need you to think like a visionary."

"A... visionary, sir?"

"We're not playing for dividends anymore, Klaus. We're playing for a kingdom."

The sound Klaus made could have been a cough, or a sob, or possibly the noise someone makes when their entire worldview collapses.

"Master Grayson, with all due respect, what you are proposing is not an investment strategy. It is a kamikaze attack on your own net worth. The board would have my license for this!"

The board. Right. Because in the world of Swiss banking, there's always a board of stern old men in expensive suits who sit around judging other people's financial decisions.

"Relax, Klaus," I said, taking another sip of coffee. "I'm not asking you to explain it to the board. I'm asking you to do it. You work for me, remember? Not the other way around."

"But sir, the risk assessment alone–"

"Klaus." I let a note of steel enter my voice, the tone that Bruce Wayne probably used when he wanted something done without questions. "Execute the liquidation. Today."

There was a long pause, filled with what sounded suspiciously like weeping. Finally, Klaus spoke in the hollow voice of a man who was prepared to watch his professional reputation die in real-time.

"Very well, Master Grayson. The liquidation will be completed by market close. Might I ask... what you intend to do with the resulting liquidity?"

And now for the second bomb. This one's going to be nuclear.

"I'm glad you asked," I said cheerfully. "Once the funds are liquid, I want you to put every single dollar into one company: Orion Shipping. Yes, the little one from the Blüdhaven docks. All of it."

The silence this time was different. Not shocked silence, but the silence of a man whose brain has simply stopped processing information because the input has become too absurd to parse.

"Master Grayson," Klaus said eventually, his voice barely above a whisper, "are you... are you under duress? Are you being coerced? Should I contact the authorities?"

He thinks I've been kidnapped by financial terrorists. This is amazing.

"I'm fine, Klaus. Better than fine. I'm about to be rich in ways that would make King Midas weep with envy."

"But sir... Orion Shipping is..." I could hear papers rustling in the background, probably Klaus frantically looking up information about my chosen investment. "Mein Gott... it's a penny stock! Their entire market capitalization is less than what you spend on wine in a year! Their main competitor just suffered a catastrophic industrial accident! Investing now would look incredibly suspicious!"

He's not wrong about the suspicious part. Good thing I don't care.

"Klaus, my man, listen to me," I said, putting on my most reasonable, reassuring voice. "Don't think of it as liquidating a portfolio. Think of it as upgrading from a station wagon to a rocket ship. Trust me."

"A rocket ship," Klaus repeated faintly. "To where, exactly?"

"To the moon, Klaus. To the goddamn moon."

Another long pause.

"Very well, Master Grayson. I will... I will execute the trade. Though I feel compelled to note that this decision will likely be studied in business schools as an example of what not to do with inherited wealth."

If only he knew. In ten years, this trade is going to be studied as the most brilliant investment decision of the 21st century.

"You're a professional, Klaus. I trust your execution, even if you don't trust my judgment."

"Thank you, sir. Will there be... anything else?"

Oh, Klaus. Sweet, innocent Klaus. You have no idea.

"Actually, yes. One more thing. In three days, precisely at 11:45 AM Eastern Standard Time, I want you to execute a massive buy order for LexCorp shares. Use the initial profits from the Orion trade."

The sound Klaus made this time was definitely not a cough.

"Did you say... 11:45 AM? Precisely?"

"To the minute, Klaus. Not 11:44, not 11:46. 11:45 exactly."

"Master Grayson..." Klaus's voice had taken on the tone of a man speaking to someone who had clearly lost their mind. "The specificity of that timing suggests... well, it suggests insider trading. Which is a federal crime. Multiple federal crimes, actually."

Technically, it's not insider trading if the information comes from an alternate dimension. I'm pretty sure that's not covered under SEC regulations.

"Klaus, has anyone ever told you that you worry too much?"

"Yes, sir. Every day. It's what keeps my clients from ending up in federal prison."

"Well, today you can stop worrying. I'm not asking you to break any laws. I'm asking you to execute a perfectly legal trade at a perfectly legal time."

"But why that specific time? What happens at 11:45?"

What happens at 11:45 is that LexCorp is going to announce that their Project Prometheus drones just completed a successful test flight that revolutionizes urban logistics forever. But I can't exactly tell him that.

"Let's call it a hunch."

"A hunch." Klaus's voice was completely flat now. "You want me to risk millions of dollars on a hunch."

"The best investments always are, Klaus."

There was once again a very long pause. I could hear Klaus breathing heavily on the other end of the line, probably contemplating early retirement and a quiet life raising sheep in the Alps.

"Very well," he said finally. "Though I want it noted for the record that I advised against this course of action in the strongest possible terms."

"Noted and ignored," I said cheerfully. "Oh, and Klaus? One more thing."

"Dear God, what now?"

And now for the final touch. The cherry on top of my financial sundae.

"I want you to establish a new shell corporation to channel all these assets and future profits. Something clean, something professional, something that sounds like it could buy and sell countries."

"A shell corporation," Klaus repeated. "Of course. Because this day couldn't possibly get any more irregular."

"I want you to call it 'Hall Holdings.'"

"Hall Holdings," he said mechanically. "Any particular reason for that name?"

"Personal reasons," I said. "Very personal reasons."

"I see. Well, Master Grayson, I believe that concludes our... conversation. I shall begin executing these instructions immediately, though I feel compelled to mention that my cardiologist is going to be very unhappy about the stress this will cause."

Poor Klaus. He has no idea that in six months he's going to be managing one of the largest private fortunes in the world. He's going to be a legend in the Swiss banking community.

"You're a professional, Klaus. I have complete faith in your abilities."

"Thank you, sir. That is... surprisingly comforting, given the circumstances."

"And Klaus?"

"Yes, Master Grayson?"

"When this all works out exactly the way I said it would, I want you to remember this conversation. Because I'm going to need you to trust me on the next crazy scheme."

The sound Klaus made might have been laughter, or it might have been the noise a man makes when his sanity finally snaps completely.

"I shall... I shall keep that in mind, sir. Good day."

The line went dead, leaving me alone with my coffee and the glorious satisfaction of a plan in motion. I could picture Klaus sitting in his Geneva office, staring at his phone and wondering how his quiet, conservative morning had turned into a masterclass in financial terrorism.

Sorry, Klaus. But fortune favors the bold, and I'm about to be the boldest investor in human history.

I opened my laptop and pulled up a design program, spending the next hour creating a simple, elegant logo for my new company. Clean lines, professional typography, the kind of corporate branding that suggested serious money and serious people.

I leaned back in my chair, the logo for Hall Holdings' glowing on the screen, and for the first time since I'd woken up in this world, I felt the glorious, intoxicating freedom of my very own money.

——————————

Author's note:

Next chapter will have Robin!!!

 

[Tomato]

The LexCorp bit is extremely suspicious for insider trading, but the Orion Shipping thing is just blatant insider trading. And it's also not how stocks work. It's literally impossible to spend millions on penny stocks. At that point just buy the company.

Stocks aren't just a number that goes up and down.

And I don't even understand why he cares about money in the first place. The attack on Penguin is meaningless (other than taking down criminals).

I'm out, this story doesn't have enough basic logic for me.

 

[Lillie Jones]

Which Dick Grayson SI makes his own personal investment by insider trading Stealthy Superhero style, one unseen by Lex Corp and another by loud chaos in the Peguins Oswald Cobblepotts disrupting shipping company planning.
Besides, Klaus is going to be a rich financial investor in history of the largest private fortune after following Master Grayson plan of Hall Holdings.
Continue on
Cheers!

 

[MoonyNightShade]

Thanks!

 

[MoonyNightShade]

The first sign that I had company was the shadow that detached itself from the ceiling corner of my living room, a feat of stealth so impressive I almost wasn't annoyed that my multi-million-dollar security system had been bypassed by a ten-year-old.

Almost.

I was standing in my kitchen in nothing but boxer shorts and a Blüdhaven Police Academy t-shirt I'd stolen from the evidence locker after a particularly successful bust, eating Lucky Charms straight from the box while practicing what I thought might be a charming opening line for my eventual meeting with Hawkgirl.

"So, Kendra, I know you're probably used to guys who are all about the ground game, but I was wondering if you'd like to take a relationship to new heights–"

"That is possibly the most pathetic attempt at courtship I have ever witnessed."

I nearly choked on a marshmallow rainbow.

Holy shit. There's someone in my apartment. Someone who just critiqued my pickup lines. Someone who sounds like they're about twelve years old and have been personally trained by Batman to judge my life choices.

I spun around, cereal scattering across my marble countertops, and found myself face-to-face with roughly four feet of pure, concentrated disapproval.

Damian Wayne stood in my living room like a tiny, perfectly dressed monument to everything I was doing wrong with my life. He was wearing a three-piece suit that probably cost more than most people's cars, his posture was military-straight, and he was looking at me with the kind of withering contempt usually reserved for war criminals and people who don't use turn signals.

It's him. The demon brat. Robin V. The one who stabs first and asks questions never. He's even smaller than I expected, but somehow more terrifying. Like a very angry, very well-dressed hand grenade.

"Damian," I said, setting down the cereal box with as much dignity as a man in Lucky Charms-stained underwear could muster. "What a... pleasant surprise. Did Bruce teach you that ceiling thing, or is that more of a League of Assassins specialty?"

His expression didn't change. If anything, it got more disapproving, which I hadn't thought was physically possible.

"I am here on behalf of Batman," he said, his voice carrying the kind of formal precision that suggested he'd been practicing this speech, "to conduct a thorough psychological and behavioral evaluation of your deteriorating mental state. You will proceed with your daily routines as normal. I will be your shadow. Do not attempt to impede me."

He's serious. He's completely, utterly serious. Bruce sent him here to spy on me. My adoptive father sent a ten-year-old assassin to monitor my behavior like I'm some kind of dangerous psychiatric patient.

"Okay," I said slowly, "that's... that's a lot to unpack. First question: how long have you been watching me practice pickup lines in my underwear?"

"Seventeen minutes," Damian replied without hesitation. "In that time, you have consumed approximately 200 grams of processed sugar, attempted thirteen variations of the same inadequate romantic overture, and demonstrated a complete disregard for proper nutritional protocols."

Seventeen minutes. He's been standing in my living room for seventeen minutes, just... watching me be a disaster. This is my life now.

"And second question," I continued, "exactly what behavioral anomalies are we talking about here?"

Damian reached into his jacket and produced a small, leather-bound notebook, which he opened with the efficiency of someone who had clearly been looking forward to this moment.

"Erratic emotional highs following combat encounters," he began, reading from what was apparently a comprehensive list of my character flaws. "A sudden and inexplicable shift in dietary preferences from health-conscious to juvenile. The liquidation of a stable financial portfolio for high-risk speculative investments. A newfound and logically unsound obsession with a Thanagarian operative. Decreased sleep efficiency. Increased frivolity in conversation. And what Father describes as 'an alarming tendency toward humor at inappropriate moments.'"

They've been documenting everything. Every joke, every bowl of cereal, every late night spent researching Hawkgirl. I'm living under surveillance by the world's most paranoid family, and they've decided I'm having some kind of breakdown.

"Wow," I said, genuinely impressed despite myself. "That's... thorough. Did Bruce make you memorize all that, or do you just have a really good filing system?"

"I have perfect recall," Damian replied, closing the notebook with a sharp snap. "It is one of many skills that make me uniquely qualified for this assignment."

Of course he has perfect recall. Because having a normal conversation with this kid would be too easy.

"Right," I said, running a hand through my hair. "So you're here to... what, exactly? Take notes on how many times I use the word 'awesome' in casual conversation?"

"I am here to determine whether you remain psychologically fit for duty as Nightwing," Damian said, his voice carrying the weight of absolute authority. "Father is concerned that you may be experiencing some form of mental deterioration that could compromise your effectiveness in the field."

Mental deterioration. Right. If only they knew the truth was somehow even weirder than that.

"And how long is this evaluation supposed to take?" I asked, already dreading the answer.

"As long as necessary," Damian replied. "I have been instructed to observe you continuously until I can provide Father with a comprehensive assessment of your condition."

Continuously. I'm being assigned a tiny, judgmental roommate for an indefinite period. A tiny, judgmental roommate who probably sleeps with throwing stars under his pillow and considers 'fun' to be a character weakness.

"Great," I said, forcing a smile. "Well, in that case, welcome to Casa Grayson. Mi casa es su casa and all that. Just... maybe give me a heads up next time before you appear out of the shadows? I nearly had a heart attack."

Damian's expression suggested that having a heart attack would have been entirely my own fault and probably deserved.

"Your cardiovascular health is your own responsibility," he said. "Though I note that your current diet of processed sugar and artificial coloring is hardly conducive to optimal physical performance."

This is going to be a long week.

——————————

The morning routine evaluation began at exactly 7:00 AM the next day, when I woke up to find Damian sitting in the chair next to my bed, fully dressed and apparently having been there for some time.

"Your sleep schedule is sub-optimal," he announced as my eyes focused enough to register his presence. "Optimal recovery requires seven to eight hours of continuous rest. You achieved six hours and forty-three minutes, interrupted by three periods of restless movement and what appeared to be sleep-talking about 'tiger lilies.'"

He watched me sleep. This ten-year-old watched me sleep and took notes. This is either the most thorough psychological evaluation in history or the beginning of a very weird horror movie.

"Good morning to you too, sunshine. What about your eight hours of sleep?" I mumbled, pulling a pillow over my head. "Any other observations about my unconscious habits you'd like to share?"

"Your REM cycles are irregular, suggesting underlying psychological stress," Damian continued, apparently taking my question as genuine interest. "Additionally, your choice of sleepwear–" he consulted his notebook, "–a t-shirt advertising what appears to be a breakfast cereal and shorts decorated with cartoon animals, suggests a regression to pre-adolescent comfort behaviors."

I sat up and looked down at my Oswald pajama shorts, which featured tiny versions of a safety-conscious but fun-loving octopus scattered across a dark blue background.

Okay, he's not wrong about that one. But in my defense, these are really comfortable.

"They're fun," I said defensively. "Fun is allowed, Damian."

"Fun is a luxury," he replied with the stone-faced seriousness of someone who had never experienced a moment of frivolity in his life. "Discipline is essential."

Right. I'm arguing about pajamas with a child who probably considers smiling to be a tactical disadvantage.

The breakfast critique that followed was even more comprehensive. Damian watched with visible disgust as I poured Lucky Charms into a bowl, his expression growing progressively more horrified with each colorful marshmallow that tumbled out of the box.

"Your breakfast contains approximately forty grams of sugar, seventeen different artificial additives, and virtually no nutritional value," he observed, making notes in his little book. "A proper morning meal for someone in your profession should consist of lean protein, complex carbohydrates, and essential fatty acids."

"It also contains tiny horseshoes," I pointed out, fishing one out of my bowl. "That's got to count for something."

Damian stared at me like I'd just suggested we solve crime by throwing glitter at it.

"You are not taking this seriously," he said.

"Damian," I said, taking another spoonful of cereal, "you're ten years old and you're critiquing my breakfast choices. I think the situation has moved beyond 'serious' into 'absurdist comedy.'"

"I am eleven," he corrected with the kind of wounded dignity that suggested this was a frequent point of contention. "And my age is irrelevant to my qualifications."

Eleven. Right. Because that makes it so much better.

The workout evaluation was where things really went off the rails.

I'd decided to show off a little, using the penthouse's state-of-the-art gym to demonstrate that despite my questionable breakfast choices, I was still in peak physical condition. I launched into a routine that would have made Olympic gymnasts weep with envy – triple flips, handstand sequences, and a dismount that involved bouncing off three different pieces of equipment before sticking a perfect landing.

I turned to Damian with a satisfied grin, expecting at least a grudging acknowledgment of my athletic prowess.

Instead, I got a lecture.

"Your form is adequate, Grayson," he said, not even looking up from his notebook, "but your execution is ostentatious. You waste twelve percent of your energy on unnecessary flourishes. It is inefficient and, frankly, embarrassing to watch."

Embarrassing to watch. I just performed a routine that defied several laws of physics, and he's calling it embarrassing to watch.

"Those 'unnecessary flourishes' are called style, Damian," I said, trying to keep the irritation out of my voice. "Some of us believe that looking good while fighting crime is part of the job."

"Style without substance is meaningless," he replied. "Combat is not performance art."

Says the kid who wears a cape to fight crime. A cape, Damian. That's the definition of unnecessary flourish.

But I didn't say that. Mostly because I was pretty sure criticizing the cape would result in me getting stabbed with something sharp and probably poisoned.

The second-to-last straw came during the gaming session.

I'd retreated to the living room to play some Call of Duty, figuring that even Damian couldn't find fault with my video game skills. It was supposed to be my refuge, my one activity where a hyperactive eleven-year-old couldn't make me feel inadequate.

I was wrong.

"Your tactical approach is fundamentally flawed," Damian observed after watching me play for exactly five minutes. "You're prioritizing aggressive advancement over strategic positioning. In a real combat scenario, you would have been eliminated within the first thirty seconds."

It's a video game, not a military simulation. The whole point is to run around shooting things and having fun.

"It's called 'run and gun,' Damian," I said, not taking my eyes off the screen. "Sometimes the best strategy is to move fast and hit hard."

"Sometimes," he agreed, "but not in this instance. Your enemy has established overlapping fields of fire from elevated positions. The optimal approach would be to–"

Before I could stop him, he'd taken the controller out of my hands and was demonstrating his "optimal approach." Which involved a level of tactical precision that would have impressed actual Navy SEALs.

He beat the level flawlessly on his first try.

"As you can see," he said, handing the controller back to me with the air of someone who had just proven a mathematical theorem, "proper strategy yields superior results."

I have been utterly humiliated by a child who probably thinks 'pwned' is a type of chess move. This is my life now. I live with a tiny, homicidal, and infuriatingly good gamer.

The wardrobe critique was the final straw.

I was getting dressed to go out – nothing fancy, just jeans and a casual button-down shirt – when Damian materialized in my bedroom doorway.

"Your clothing choices are tactically unsound," he announced, consulting his ever-present notebook. "The designer labels make you conspicuously expensive, marking you as a potential target for robbery. The fitted cut restricts your range of motion by approximately eight percent. And the color–" he looked at my navy blue shirt with visible distaste "–provides insufficient camouflage for urban environments."

He wants me to dress like a ninja to go buy coffee. This kid wants me to live my entire life like I'm constantly preparing for a stealth mission.

"Damian," I said, my patience finally reaching its breaking point, "not everything in life is about tactical advantage. Sometimes people dress nice because they want to look good. Sometimes they eat cereal because it tastes good. Sometimes they play video games because they're fun. Not everything has to be optimized for maximum efficiency."

He stared at me like I'd just suggested we fight crime by having a dance-off.

"That attitude," he said solemnly, "is precisely why Father is concerned about your psychological state."

Right. Having fun is a psychological disorder. I forgot I was dealing with a family that considers 'enjoying yourself' to be a character flaw.

I was about to launch into a lecture about the importance of work-life balance when I had a better idea. A much more devious idea.

Time to change tactics. If criticism isn't working, maybe it's time to find this kid's weakness.

I walked over to the main entertainment system and started browsing through the streaming options, pretending to look for something to watch while I got ready. Damian continued his lecture about the tactical disadvantages of designer clothing, but I wasn't really listening anymore.

I was looking for something specific. Something I knew, from all my comic book knowledge, that Damian Wayne had a secret weakness for.

There it is.

I selected a nature documentary about desert reptiles and let it start playing on the massive main screen. Then I went back to getting dressed, pretending to ignore it completely.

"Furthermore," Damian was saying, "the excessive use of hair product creates a distinctive scent profile that could be tracked by–"

He stopped mid-sentence.

I glanced over at him and had to suppress a grin. His eyes were glued to the screen, where a narrator was explaining the hunting patterns of Saharan lizards. His expression had completely changed – the mask of professional disapproval had slipped, replaced by the kind of rapt fascination that only came from genuine interest.

Got you.

For the next ten minutes, I watched Damian Wayne, trained assassin and Robin, stand transfixed by footage of geckos and monitor lizards. His notebook hung forgotten at his side. His posture relaxed from military straight to something approaching normal kid. When a particularly impressive iguana appeared on screen, I swear I saw him lean forward slightly.

There he is. Under all that training and criticism and premature seriousness, he's still just an eleven-year-old kid who thinks lizards are cool.

It was almost... endearing.

Then he realized I was watching him and snapped back to attention, his professional mask sliding back into place so quickly I almost wondered if I'd imagined the whole thing.

"This documentary is factually accurate," he said stiffly, as if that explained why he'd been staring at it for ten minutes. "Though the information is of limited tactical value."

"Uh-huh," I said, not even trying to hide my smirk. "Very informative. Lots of... tactical lizard knowledge."

He shot me a look that could have melted steel, but I could tell I'd found his weakness. Under all that League of Assassins training and Bat-family discipline, Damian Wayne was still a kid who liked animals.

This is going to be useful.

I finished getting dressed while the documentary played, making a mental note to invest in some nature programming for future tactical deployments against my tiny roommate. When I was ready to leave, I walked over to where he was still standing, trying very hard to pretend he wasn't interested in the segment about desert tortoises.

"Don't worry," I said, clapping him lightly on the shoulder, an act that made him recoil as if I'd tasered him. "Our secret's safe with me, little brother. Now, how do you feel about getting a puppy?"

——————————

Author's note:

I've been itching to introduce Powergirl for a bit, but keep getting side tracked. Hopefully I can get to it soon.

 

[DannyPhantom619]

Can't wait to see his interactions with Barbara, Cassandra, Stephanie, Tim, and Jason.