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mithenTitle: The Gotham Screwjob
Relationship: Bruce Wayne/Clark Kent
Characters: Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent, Lex Luthor, Dick Grayson, Jean-Paul Valley
Continuity: Heroes of the Squared Circle, a DC/pro wrestling fusion.
Warnings/Spoilers: None
Rating: PG
Word Count 4200
Summary: In which a contract dispute leads to one of the most important events in the history of professional wrestling.
Looking out at the stunned crowd, I fought the tears that were swimming in my eyes and thought, Don’t you dare give these backstabbers the satisfaction of seeing you cry over any of this! Don’t you dare cry! I worked so hard for him, fourteen years, all I wanted was my dignity. --Bret Hart, on the Montreal Screwjob
The basic facts of what came to be known as the Gotham Screwjob are simple enough:
Fact: The champion, Dick Grayson, was booked to defend his championship against Azrael at the Vigilante Justice annual pay-per-view show.
Fact: Grayson’s contract was due to run out at midnight that very day. After the PPV, he would no longer be an employee of the DCW.
Fact: Vigilante Justice was being held in Gotham that year.
The facts are simple enough.
It was in the clash of personalities involved that the event moved from a banal contract dispute to the modern equivalent of a Greek tragedy, in which everything proceeded inexorably from what had come before, agonizing and inevitable.
Five days to Vigilante Justice
“You can’t ask that of me,” Dick Grayson said to Lex Luthor.
Luthor paused with his hand on the door of the common room, then turned around slowly to look at the heavyweight champion, standing on the other side of the room. Various wrestlers in the middle tried to act as if they weren’t listening intently. “Excuse me?” Luthor said.
“You can’t ask me to drop the strap to Jean-Paul in Gotham,” Dick said.
“You’re leaving the next day to work for a different promotion,” Luthor said. “You are most certainly not taking my championship with you to Lord’s promotion.”
“Holy smokes,” said Billy Batson, dropping any pretense of not listening, “I should hope not. He’d love a chance to get back at the DCW for--”
“--For when you jumped ship and literally dumped his title in the trash, yes,” snapped Dick. He looked back at Luthor. “You know I’d never do that. You know this title--” He lifted the shining belt, “--means the world to me. It’s because it means so much to me that I can’t do what you’re asking. Anywhere else. I’ll drop the strap anywhere but Gotham.”
“If you’d told me sooner you were leaving, maybe. But Vigilante Justice is the next show. It’s our only chance to take it off you before you go. Look, don’t take it so personally. It’s just business, kid,” said Luthor, not unkindly.
“It’s not just business!” cried Dick. He swallowed hard and had to take a moment before continuing. “Please. I’ll drop it to anyone but Jean-Paul.”
Luthor shook his head. “That’s the story we’re telling, Azrael making up for the mistakes of his past. You’ve already forced me to rush the story, I’m not changing the end just because you don’t want to work here anymore.”
“Lex, come on,” said Dick. “I’ve done everything--well, pretty much everything--you’ve asked. Do this one thing for me. I’ll drop it anywhere but Gotham,” said Dick. “I’ll lose to Jean-Paul at the show the next day in Metropolis.”
“Kid.” Luthor’s voice was less friendly now. Clark saw Bruce quietly move to stand slightly closer to Dick. “Your contract runs out the night of Vigilante Justice. After that you’re not contractually bound to hand the title over.”
Dick’s voice was tight with anguish. “Contractually bound? You really think I’d refuse to lose in Metropolis? You can’t trust my word?”
“It’s not that I don’t trust you, but this isn’t some kind of feudal system, Grayson. It’s a business.”
Dick struck the shining belt on his shoulder with one hand; it made a hollow thump that cut across the people trying to keep their conversations going, and silence fell in its wake. “You’re asking me to lose and hand over this championship to the man who said my parents’ deaths were a waste, in the city they died in--in the very building where they died?” Dick pointed at Luthor with a shaking hand. “My parents lost their lives for this promotion, and this is how you honor their memories? I watched their harness fail, I watched them fall, I saw that damn shoddy bolt!”
Clark had jumped to his feet as if he could somehow keep those last, accusing words from leaving Dick’s mouth, but it was too late. Luthor’s eyes went cold and distant, but not before Clark caught the flash of shame and fury within them, shuttered so quickly almost anyone would have missed it.
“The situation is what it is, Grayson,” said Luthor. “We don’t need to keep discussing this in public. If you can find another way out, let me know. Until then, you’re turning over the belt to Valley Sunday.”
He turned and left the room, and everyone looked anywhere except at Dick Grayson and tried to continue their conversations.
Three days to Vigilante Justice
“Pop!” Dick flung his arms around Haley in his black and white referee uniform. “Will you be working the show tonight?”
Pop Haley returned the hug, thumping him on the back. “Lex said I could do a few house shows, see how my reflexes were. If I can get through those, he might let me get back on television again.”
“I’m so glad,” Dick said. “I mean, not just to have you back, but it’s a relief to know Luthor can be reasoned with, you know? That he can compromise a bit. There’s still some hope for the Gotham show.”
Haley smiled. “There’s...always hope,” he said.
One day to Vigilante Justice
“I understand, Kent,” said Jean-Paul Valley, putting down his coffee cup and meeting Clark’s eyes. The buzz of the coffee shop veiled their conversation from their neighbors, but nothing could veil the intensity of Jean-Paul’s eyes. “But you need to understand me as well: This is not only about the redemption of Azrael. It is about my redemption as a wrestler, as a champion. As my father’s son.”
Although he was looking at Clark, but his gaze seemed somehow fixed on a point beyond Clark, some distant infinity.
“My father expected perfection from his sons, and all of them supplied it--except me. I gave up, Kent. I left, I went to engineering school. I was buried in my books as one by one, my brothers died: of drugs, of careless accidents, by their own hand. I abandoned them to bear the white-hot flame of our father’s love alone, and only when the last of them was gone did I realize I had been avoiding my destiny. They spoke to me, Kent,” he said. “I heard their voices and knew that my father too was dying, and that I was the last, and I had to carry on for them. And then I became champion hiding under another man’s identity, and I snapped under the weight of it. I was unworthy of my brothers’ deaths.”
Clark stared at him, appalled. He knew the story of the Valley family, everyone did, but he had never heard Jean-Paul speak of it so openly.
“If Grayson comes up with some satisfactory alternative,” said Jean-Paul, “I’ll be open to it. But he is not leaving Vigilante Justice with the title. Lex Luthor has given me a second chance to prove myself a worthy champion, to let me redeem myself. I will not fail him this time.”
“Jean-Paul,” he said, “Your brothers wouldn’t want you to suffer like this. Your father wouldn’t want--”
A harsh laugh. “Don’t presume to lecture me on what my father would have wanted, Kent,” he said. “You’re not from a wrestling family. You wouldn’t understand.”
He almost smiled.
“It’s ironic, I suppose, that Grayson probably would.”
“Gosh,” said Linda Danvers, glancing back at the common room. “Is it always so, uh…” She waved her hands vaguely. “So tense here?”
It was the night of Vigilante Justice, and the show was due to start in a handful of hours. There still was no break on the stalemate about the heavyweight championship.
Clark smiled down at his “cousin.” Linda was another young transplant from Sparkle, a small independent promotion that Lex had pulled some promising female wrestlers from. “It’s a little unusually tense right now,” he said. “Don’t let it bother you. You and Ursa just go out there and put on a great match.”
“I can’t believe I’m in a pay-per-view so soon!” Kara clasped her hands together and twirled.
“It’s just the pre-show, babe. Chill out,” drawled Ursula Douglas, punching Linda on the arm as she came out of the locker room and caught her opponent’s pirouette.
“Ursa!” Linda threw her arms around her and spun them both around; Ursa tolerated it with a long-suffering look. “Come on, you’re as excited as I am underneath all that cool, admit it.”
“Maybe,” drawled Ursa, and kissed her cheek.
They headed into the locker room together, and Clark found himself smiling as he headed toward the men’s locker room. It was always good to see young wrestlers excited and nervous about their biggest match to date.
His smile dissipated as he walked into the locker room and saw Dick and Bruce locked in an intense discussion.
“--and I’m telling you, I can handle it by myself,” Dick snapped.
“I just think you should have some backup when you go in there,” Bruce said.
“I’m not a child, Bruce. I can fight my own battles without the two of you hovering over my shoulders at every moment. I’m leaving for a new promotion without you, I have to start being my own man.”
Bruce cast Clark a quick look as Clark came closer, and for a second there was a naked appeal in his eyes: Stop him. Help. “They still haven’t resolved the title handover,” Bruce said to Clark. “Dick’s going in to talk to Lex now.”
“This might not be the best time for you to do this on your own,” said Clark.
Dick squared his shoulders. “It’s the only time I have left, Clark. Thanks, but I can handle this.”
And he turned and went into Luthor’s office.
Bruce started pacing the second the door clicked shut. “I should be in there. We should be in there.”
“He’s right, though. You can’t be there protecting him forever.”
“I don’t want to be. I just want to protect him now,” Bruce snapped.
Clark caught his arm as he went by, stopping his furious pacing. “Don’t underestimate Dick,” he murmured, putting his arm around Bruce’s shoulders in a half hug.
Bruce’s shoulders stayed tense under his touch.
Killer Moth and Firebug wandered into the common room, bickering about their workout routines. They saw Bruce and froze, looking for a moment as if they were thinking about slinking out of the room before Bruce saw them. Then they gave each other a look, gritted their teeth, and came over.
“Okay, Wayne,” said Killer Moth. “I know you’re going to want to go over the match one more time before--”
Bruce cut him off with a brusque hand wave. “We’re fine,” he said.
“What?” said Firebug, looking at Killer Moth for confirmation that he had truly heard Bruce Wayne say these words. “You don’t want to lecture us on our psychology one more time and--”
“We’re fine,” Bruce repeated. “You know what you’re doing. We can just wing it.”
“Ha ha,” said Killer Moth, staring at him. “Wing it, I get it. Nice pun.”
“I don’t think he did that on purpose,” said Firebug, pulling him away. He cast a quick look at Clark: Is he okay?
Clark shrugged and Firebug shrugged back as he and Killer Moth headed off to get some coffee.
The door opened and Dick came out. He looked tired, but he was smiling.
“We’ve reached a compromise,” he said in a low voice as Bruce pulled him aside. “We’ve come up with a finish that should work.”
“Tell me,” said Bruce.
“Okay, Azrael is going to get me in the Flying Grayson--” His mother’s submission hold, “--but I’m going to power out of it, of course. When I do, though, I’ll knock Azrael into the ref. The ref will disqualify him, so I’ll retain the title, but he’ll be honorable about it and apologize and I’ll give him a rematch tomorrow night in Metropolis. I’ll drop the strap to him then. See?” He smiled, giddy with relief. “I knew it would all work out. Luthor’s even putting in Pop Haly as the ref, as a favor to me, to show Pop’s forgiven with that botch in the women’s match. Everything’s going to go just fine.”
“But your contract still runs out at midnight,” Clark said.
“I told him I’d even do the show for free, in thanks for everything he’s done for me. I swore that I wouldn’t take the belt with me,” Dick said. “I swore it on the graves of my parents. Luthor knows I’d never break that vow. We shook on it, Clark. He gave me his hand.” He clapped Clark on the shoulder, and there were tears in his eyes. “I’m so sad to be going, Clark. But it’s going to be okay.” He looked at Bruce, blinking hard. “I just hope I can do you proud, Bruce. Tonight, and tomorrow, and everywhere I go.”
Bruce took Dick’s shoulders in his hands, and kissed his forehead with a formal solemnity. “Tonight, and tomorrow, and everywhere you go,” he said. “I’m proud of you. And your parents would be too.”
The match with Firebug and Killer Moth went off without a hitch, and Superman and Batman retained their titles. It was a perfectly fine match, and one that absolutely no one, including Clark and Bruce, would remember later.
“Right,” said Mercy Graves, showing up backstage with a camera crew. “You need to cut your post-show promo against the Bug Squad now.”
“Right now?” said Bruce, frowning. “But--”
“Right now,” said Mercy, gesturing to the cameras.
“It’s just going to be put on Youtube later,” said Clark. “Couldn’t it wait until after--”
“--Now,” said Mercy.
Bruce looked at where Nightwing, belt around his waist, was preparing to go out to the ring, and grimaced. “All right,” he said. “Let’s get it over with.”
It was probably the worst promo the World’s Finest Tag Team ever cut. The Dark Knight’s patter and insults were a beat behind, and he didn’t pick up on some clear lines handed him by Superman. As Superman was explaining that they were the bug zappers that would take out Killer Moth and Firebug for good next time, Nightwing’s entrance music hit and a roar went up that would be clearly audible on the footage.
Batman grabbed Superman’s shoulder. “I can’t--” he said. He turned to the camera. “He’s like my son. I have to go watch this. I’m sorry.”
And he walked out of the promo.
A flustered Superman wrapped up the promo with a couple more insect puns, then bolted after him, leaving a bemused Jimmy Olsen to finish up.
Bruce was standing in front of the monitors when Clark caught up to him, his arms crossed, his eyes hard to read through the Batman cowl as he watched Azrael and Nightwing wrestling. At ringside, Lex Luthor was providing guest commentary. Clark could hear his smooth, urbane voice explaining moves, selling the story, and he remembered that Lex had been a good commentator when he was younger. He didn’t sit at ringside often anymore, though.
“It was good psychology,” Bruce said as Clark came to stand beside him. “The Dark Knight wouldn’t make stupid moth jokes when Nightwing was defending his title. Totally in-character for him to leave like that.”
“Convenient that it also happens to be true,” said Clark, and saw the corner of Bruce’s mouth lift in a near-smile.
The smile vanished as Azrael clotheslined Nightwing, sending the champion crashing to the mat. Bruce drummed his fingers on his arm as Dick staggered to his feet. “I’ll be glad when this is over,” he said.
“I don’t know,” said Clark. “Tonight and tomorrow are his last big matches in the DCW. I kind of want them to go on forever.”
“Leaving is the right choice,” said Bruce. “He’ll thrive in a story-heavy promotion like the Titans. He’ll become his own man, the wrestler he was always meant to be. I just wish--I wish things could have gone more smoothly.”
It was a good match. Dick and Jean-Paul had always worked pretty stiff with each other, and tonight it added an extra layer of brutality to a very personal match. Azrael’s face was grim with concentration, his eyes fixed on his redemption. Nightwing was fighting back, struggling, almost overpowered by the determination of Azrael, but never giving up. Never.
Azrael countered a move by Nightwing and flipped Nightwing onto his stomach, twisting his legs up and back, locking in the Flying Grayson, Mary Grayson’s signature submission. The crowd shrieked with fury and horror as Nightwing struggled toward the ropes, unable to reach them. The commentators went crazy: would Nightwing tap out to his mother’s own move? Impossible!
Nightwing twisted in agony, unable to break the hold. He pulled at his hair. His hand hovered above the mat, irresolute as pain knifed through him. Would he give up?
Clark never knew what it was that Bruce saw, whether it was something in Luthor’s tone of voice, something in Pop Haly’s expression, or whether it was just an intuition of doom. But he heard Bruce breathe “Oh my God. No,” and there was such stark horror in his voice that Clark’s breath caught.
On the screen, Nightwing’s hand wavered above the mat.
And Pop Haly waved his arms and announced that Nightwing had submitted, that the match was over, that Azrael was the winner.
There was a heartbeat of shocked silence in which everything seemed to stop: the crowd, the combatants in the ring, the wrestlers watching backstage. And into that silence Lex Luthor’s voice carried like a gunshot.
”Ring the bell!” Luthor snapped, jumping to his feet. All the urbanity was gone from his voice; it was a hoarse bark, almost panicked. “Ring it! Ring it now, god damn it!”
The bell rang, a strange awkward clank, and the match was over.
Nightwing had submitted to his mother’s signature move.
He had lost the belt.
To Azrael.
In Gotham.
”No!”
Clark turned at the cry, but the space next to him was already empty.
He charged after Bruce, shoving people out of his way as he ran through the Gorilla position and out onto the ramp. The crowd noise swirled and eddied around him--no cheering, no booing, just confusion. Bruce was already ahead of him, Clark was never going to reach him.
He would have nightmares for the rest of his life about that run down the ramp, nightmares in which it seemed to stretch out forever, in which he couldn’t seem to move his legs. Fragments of vision flickered and dimmed around him.
He passed Azrael, who was coming up the ramp holding his new championship belt, his face pale and dazed.
Faces in the crowd. Shocked. Angry. Cheering. Confused. A crying child. A cursing man.
He saw Dick Grayson leaning on the ropes, his face twisted in exhaustion and anguish. He was weeping, not bothering to wipe the tears away, staring out at the Gotham that had witnessed his parents’ deaths and had now witnessed his failure.
Clark had no time to stop and confront any of them, he was running toward Bruce, who was closing on Lex Luthor. He reached out and caught the fluttering edge of Bruce’s cape, but it slipped through his fingers.
Luthor turned to meet the Dark Knight and for a bare second the cameras caught his face, more resigned than triumphant.
Then the Dark Knight punched him, and Luthor fell back against the announcer’s table, clutching his eye. The people nearby in the audience cheered for a second, then looked confused again. It felt too raw, too real, and paradoxically not dramatic enough. Luthor didn’t howl or wave his arms or suffer in any satisfying way, he just gritted his teeth and stood there, glaring at the Dark Knight.
The Dark Knight pointed at Luthor, and his voice was hoarse in a very different way than Batman’s voice ever was. “You’ll pay for this, Luthor. I swear it,” he snarled.
“Br--Batman,” said Superman, one hand on his arm, pulling him back. “Nightwing.”
It was possibly the only thing he could have said to break the standoff. The Dark Knight whirled away from Luthor and went to the ring, where Nightwing had fallen to his knees. Pop Haly was retreating up the ramp and out of the arena, his shoulders slumped.
Superman and Batman climbed into the ring and went to either side of Nightwing. Batman knelt and whispered something in Nightwing’s ear, and Nightwing nodded. Superman and Batman helped him to his feet.
The crowd’s confusion gave way to applause as Nightwing stood before them, supported by his mentors. It wasn’t ecstatic applause; it was warm and loving and sad. “We will miss you!” called out someone in the audience who read dirt sheets, and soon the chant rolled across the crowd like surf, a bittersweet benediction that continued as the three of them made their way up the ramp.
At the top of the ramp Bruce started to turn Dick back around, to face back into the arena. Clark heard Dick sob, once. “I can’t--”
But Bruce turned him back to look at the people waving, cheering, chanting. He kissed the side of Dick’s head and said in a voice that barely carried over the crowd to Clark’s ears: “Say goodbye to your people, champion.”
Mercy Graves already had two police officers by her side when the three of them rounded the corner. “Mr….Wayne?” said one of them, an eyebrow raised. “May we have your real name, sir?”
“You can’t be serious,” said Clark.
“Mr. Wayne just assaulted his employer,” said Mercy. “I think you’ll find the police are not likely to get fantasy and reality mixed up when it comes to what legally constitutes assault and battery.”
“Stop this nonsense,” snapped Lex Luthor, entering at a brisk walk. His eye was already swelling, blackened and bruised. “I won’t be pressing charges.”
Mercy looked more surprised than Clark had ever seen her. “You won’t, sir?”
“Let’s be honest,” said Luthor. “I had it coming. I knew the risks. I decided to do it anyway.” He looked at Dick Grayson, red-eyed and sweat-soaked. “You’ll never believe me, son, but I’m truly sorry it had to come to this. You were a good champion, it was nothing personal, and I wish you the best of luck in all your future endeavours.” A razor-thin smile. “Now clean out your locker.”
Dick took two deep breaths, met Clark’s eyes, and left the room.
“As for you,” Luthor said, moving to stand in front of Bruce. “Get out of my sight before I change my mind and have you thrown in jail. I’ll figure out what to do with you tomorrow.”
They drove from Gotham to Metropolis that night, Bruce’s foot heavy on the gas of his rented Maserati, his eyes far away. Clark clamped his mouth shut and said nothing for a long time, and the silence stretched out as the city lights flickered past.
“So where do we go?” he finally burst out. “Japan? Mexico? Will Lord take us back?”
“We’re not going anywhere,” Bruce said.
Clark gaped at him. “You’re considering staying on and working with him? After this?” He hit the dashboard with his fist; Bruce’s eyes stayed on the road and he didn’t flinch. “You’re willing to swallow your pride and keep working for the guy who did that to Dick, just because he’s top dog--Bruce, I would never have believed that of you. Ever!”
“Have you gotten all that fury out of your system now?” said Bruce. “Because being angry is great and all, but it’s not going to help us.”
“Help us?”
Bruce turned and smiled at Clark, and the city lights sparked across his face and in his eyes. “Luthor had a chance to balance the scales just a little for what happened to John and Mary Grayson, and he failed. He humiliated Dick Grayson. He betrayed the memory of the Graysons, and he violated the sanctity of the ring.”
His voice wavered for a moment and he swallowed hard. When he spoke again it was flat and controlled, inexorable.
“It will take time, and patience, and a lot of luck. But I swear to you, Clark, that we will take Lex Luthor down.”
Relationship: Bruce Wayne/Clark Kent
Characters: Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent, Lex Luthor, Dick Grayson, Jean-Paul Valley
Continuity: Heroes of the Squared Circle, a DC/pro wrestling fusion.
Warnings/Spoilers: None
Rating: PG
Word Count 4200
Summary: In which a contract dispute leads to one of the most important events in the history of professional wrestling.
Looking out at the stunned crowd, I fought the tears that were swimming in my eyes and thought, Don’t you dare give these backstabbers the satisfaction of seeing you cry over any of this! Don’t you dare cry! I worked so hard for him, fourteen years, all I wanted was my dignity. --Bret Hart, on the Montreal Screwjob
The basic facts of what came to be known as the Gotham Screwjob are simple enough:
Fact: The champion, Dick Grayson, was booked to defend his championship against Azrael at the Vigilante Justice annual pay-per-view show.
Fact: Grayson’s contract was due to run out at midnight that very day. After the PPV, he would no longer be an employee of the DCW.
Fact: Vigilante Justice was being held in Gotham that year.
The facts are simple enough.
It was in the clash of personalities involved that the event moved from a banal contract dispute to the modern equivalent of a Greek tragedy, in which everything proceeded inexorably from what had come before, agonizing and inevitable.
Five days to Vigilante Justice
“You can’t ask that of me,” Dick Grayson said to Lex Luthor.
Luthor paused with his hand on the door of the common room, then turned around slowly to look at the heavyweight champion, standing on the other side of the room. Various wrestlers in the middle tried to act as if they weren’t listening intently. “Excuse me?” Luthor said.
“You can’t ask me to drop the strap to Jean-Paul in Gotham,” Dick said.
“You’re leaving the next day to work for a different promotion,” Luthor said. “You are most certainly not taking my championship with you to Lord’s promotion.”
“Holy smokes,” said Billy Batson, dropping any pretense of not listening, “I should hope not. He’d love a chance to get back at the DCW for--”
“--For when you jumped ship and literally dumped his title in the trash, yes,” snapped Dick. He looked back at Luthor. “You know I’d never do that. You know this title--” He lifted the shining belt, “--means the world to me. It’s because it means so much to me that I can’t do what you’re asking. Anywhere else. I’ll drop the strap anywhere but Gotham.”
“If you’d told me sooner you were leaving, maybe. But Vigilante Justice is the next show. It’s our only chance to take it off you before you go. Look, don’t take it so personally. It’s just business, kid,” said Luthor, not unkindly.
“It’s not just business!” cried Dick. He swallowed hard and had to take a moment before continuing. “Please. I’ll drop it to anyone but Jean-Paul.”
Luthor shook his head. “That’s the story we’re telling, Azrael making up for the mistakes of his past. You’ve already forced me to rush the story, I’m not changing the end just because you don’t want to work here anymore.”
“Lex, come on,” said Dick. “I’ve done everything--well, pretty much everything--you’ve asked. Do this one thing for me. I’ll drop it anywhere but Gotham,” said Dick. “I’ll lose to Jean-Paul at the show the next day in Metropolis.”
“Kid.” Luthor’s voice was less friendly now. Clark saw Bruce quietly move to stand slightly closer to Dick. “Your contract runs out the night of Vigilante Justice. After that you’re not contractually bound to hand the title over.”
Dick’s voice was tight with anguish. “Contractually bound? You really think I’d refuse to lose in Metropolis? You can’t trust my word?”
“It’s not that I don’t trust you, but this isn’t some kind of feudal system, Grayson. It’s a business.”
Dick struck the shining belt on his shoulder with one hand; it made a hollow thump that cut across the people trying to keep their conversations going, and silence fell in its wake. “You’re asking me to lose and hand over this championship to the man who said my parents’ deaths were a waste, in the city they died in--in the very building where they died?” Dick pointed at Luthor with a shaking hand. “My parents lost their lives for this promotion, and this is how you honor their memories? I watched their harness fail, I watched them fall, I saw that damn shoddy bolt!”
Clark had jumped to his feet as if he could somehow keep those last, accusing words from leaving Dick’s mouth, but it was too late. Luthor’s eyes went cold and distant, but not before Clark caught the flash of shame and fury within them, shuttered so quickly almost anyone would have missed it.
“The situation is what it is, Grayson,” said Luthor. “We don’t need to keep discussing this in public. If you can find another way out, let me know. Until then, you’re turning over the belt to Valley Sunday.”
He turned and left the room, and everyone looked anywhere except at Dick Grayson and tried to continue their conversations.
Three days to Vigilante Justice
“Pop!” Dick flung his arms around Haley in his black and white referee uniform. “Will you be working the show tonight?”
Pop Haley returned the hug, thumping him on the back. “Lex said I could do a few house shows, see how my reflexes were. If I can get through those, he might let me get back on television again.”
“I’m so glad,” Dick said. “I mean, not just to have you back, but it’s a relief to know Luthor can be reasoned with, you know? That he can compromise a bit. There’s still some hope for the Gotham show.”
Haley smiled. “There’s...always hope,” he said.
One day to Vigilante Justice
“I understand, Kent,” said Jean-Paul Valley, putting down his coffee cup and meeting Clark’s eyes. The buzz of the coffee shop veiled their conversation from their neighbors, but nothing could veil the intensity of Jean-Paul’s eyes. “But you need to understand me as well: This is not only about the redemption of Azrael. It is about my redemption as a wrestler, as a champion. As my father’s son.”
Although he was looking at Clark, but his gaze seemed somehow fixed on a point beyond Clark, some distant infinity.
“My father expected perfection from his sons, and all of them supplied it--except me. I gave up, Kent. I left, I went to engineering school. I was buried in my books as one by one, my brothers died: of drugs, of careless accidents, by their own hand. I abandoned them to bear the white-hot flame of our father’s love alone, and only when the last of them was gone did I realize I had been avoiding my destiny. They spoke to me, Kent,” he said. “I heard their voices and knew that my father too was dying, and that I was the last, and I had to carry on for them. And then I became champion hiding under another man’s identity, and I snapped under the weight of it. I was unworthy of my brothers’ deaths.”
Clark stared at him, appalled. He knew the story of the Valley family, everyone did, but he had never heard Jean-Paul speak of it so openly.
“If Grayson comes up with some satisfactory alternative,” said Jean-Paul, “I’ll be open to it. But he is not leaving Vigilante Justice with the title. Lex Luthor has given me a second chance to prove myself a worthy champion, to let me redeem myself. I will not fail him this time.”
“Jean-Paul,” he said, “Your brothers wouldn’t want you to suffer like this. Your father wouldn’t want--”
A harsh laugh. “Don’t presume to lecture me on what my father would have wanted, Kent,” he said. “You’re not from a wrestling family. You wouldn’t understand.”
He almost smiled.
“It’s ironic, I suppose, that Grayson probably would.”
“Gosh,” said Linda Danvers, glancing back at the common room. “Is it always so, uh…” She waved her hands vaguely. “So tense here?”
It was the night of Vigilante Justice, and the show was due to start in a handful of hours. There still was no break on the stalemate about the heavyweight championship.
Clark smiled down at his “cousin.” Linda was another young transplant from Sparkle, a small independent promotion that Lex had pulled some promising female wrestlers from. “It’s a little unusually tense right now,” he said. “Don’t let it bother you. You and Ursa just go out there and put on a great match.”
“I can’t believe I’m in a pay-per-view so soon!” Kara clasped her hands together and twirled.
“It’s just the pre-show, babe. Chill out,” drawled Ursula Douglas, punching Linda on the arm as she came out of the locker room and caught her opponent’s pirouette.
“Ursa!” Linda threw her arms around her and spun them both around; Ursa tolerated it with a long-suffering look. “Come on, you’re as excited as I am underneath all that cool, admit it.”
“Maybe,” drawled Ursa, and kissed her cheek.
They headed into the locker room together, and Clark found himself smiling as he headed toward the men’s locker room. It was always good to see young wrestlers excited and nervous about their biggest match to date.
His smile dissipated as he walked into the locker room and saw Dick and Bruce locked in an intense discussion.
“--and I’m telling you, I can handle it by myself,” Dick snapped.
“I just think you should have some backup when you go in there,” Bruce said.
“I’m not a child, Bruce. I can fight my own battles without the two of you hovering over my shoulders at every moment. I’m leaving for a new promotion without you, I have to start being my own man.”
Bruce cast Clark a quick look as Clark came closer, and for a second there was a naked appeal in his eyes: Stop him. Help. “They still haven’t resolved the title handover,” Bruce said to Clark. “Dick’s going in to talk to Lex now.”
“This might not be the best time for you to do this on your own,” said Clark.
Dick squared his shoulders. “It’s the only time I have left, Clark. Thanks, but I can handle this.”
And he turned and went into Luthor’s office.
Bruce started pacing the second the door clicked shut. “I should be in there. We should be in there.”
“He’s right, though. You can’t be there protecting him forever.”
“I don’t want to be. I just want to protect him now,” Bruce snapped.
Clark caught his arm as he went by, stopping his furious pacing. “Don’t underestimate Dick,” he murmured, putting his arm around Bruce’s shoulders in a half hug.
Bruce’s shoulders stayed tense under his touch.
Killer Moth and Firebug wandered into the common room, bickering about their workout routines. They saw Bruce and froze, looking for a moment as if they were thinking about slinking out of the room before Bruce saw them. Then they gave each other a look, gritted their teeth, and came over.
“Okay, Wayne,” said Killer Moth. “I know you’re going to want to go over the match one more time before--”
Bruce cut him off with a brusque hand wave. “We’re fine,” he said.
“What?” said Firebug, looking at Killer Moth for confirmation that he had truly heard Bruce Wayne say these words. “You don’t want to lecture us on our psychology one more time and--”
“We’re fine,” Bruce repeated. “You know what you’re doing. We can just wing it.”
“Ha ha,” said Killer Moth, staring at him. “Wing it, I get it. Nice pun.”
“I don’t think he did that on purpose,” said Firebug, pulling him away. He cast a quick look at Clark: Is he okay?
Clark shrugged and Firebug shrugged back as he and Killer Moth headed off to get some coffee.
The door opened and Dick came out. He looked tired, but he was smiling.
“We’ve reached a compromise,” he said in a low voice as Bruce pulled him aside. “We’ve come up with a finish that should work.”
“Tell me,” said Bruce.
“Okay, Azrael is going to get me in the Flying Grayson--” His mother’s submission hold, “--but I’m going to power out of it, of course. When I do, though, I’ll knock Azrael into the ref. The ref will disqualify him, so I’ll retain the title, but he’ll be honorable about it and apologize and I’ll give him a rematch tomorrow night in Metropolis. I’ll drop the strap to him then. See?” He smiled, giddy with relief. “I knew it would all work out. Luthor’s even putting in Pop Haly as the ref, as a favor to me, to show Pop’s forgiven with that botch in the women’s match. Everything’s going to go just fine.”
“But your contract still runs out at midnight,” Clark said.
“I told him I’d even do the show for free, in thanks for everything he’s done for me. I swore that I wouldn’t take the belt with me,” Dick said. “I swore it on the graves of my parents. Luthor knows I’d never break that vow. We shook on it, Clark. He gave me his hand.” He clapped Clark on the shoulder, and there were tears in his eyes. “I’m so sad to be going, Clark. But it’s going to be okay.” He looked at Bruce, blinking hard. “I just hope I can do you proud, Bruce. Tonight, and tomorrow, and everywhere I go.”
Bruce took Dick’s shoulders in his hands, and kissed his forehead with a formal solemnity. “Tonight, and tomorrow, and everywhere you go,” he said. “I’m proud of you. And your parents would be too.”
The match with Firebug and Killer Moth went off without a hitch, and Superman and Batman retained their titles. It was a perfectly fine match, and one that absolutely no one, including Clark and Bruce, would remember later.
“Right,” said Mercy Graves, showing up backstage with a camera crew. “You need to cut your post-show promo against the Bug Squad now.”
“Right now?” said Bruce, frowning. “But--”
“Right now,” said Mercy, gesturing to the cameras.
“It’s just going to be put on Youtube later,” said Clark. “Couldn’t it wait until after--”
“--Now,” said Mercy.
Bruce looked at where Nightwing, belt around his waist, was preparing to go out to the ring, and grimaced. “All right,” he said. “Let’s get it over with.”
It was probably the worst promo the World’s Finest Tag Team ever cut. The Dark Knight’s patter and insults were a beat behind, and he didn’t pick up on some clear lines handed him by Superman. As Superman was explaining that they were the bug zappers that would take out Killer Moth and Firebug for good next time, Nightwing’s entrance music hit and a roar went up that would be clearly audible on the footage.
Batman grabbed Superman’s shoulder. “I can’t--” he said. He turned to the camera. “He’s like my son. I have to go watch this. I’m sorry.”
And he walked out of the promo.
A flustered Superman wrapped up the promo with a couple more insect puns, then bolted after him, leaving a bemused Jimmy Olsen to finish up.
Bruce was standing in front of the monitors when Clark caught up to him, his arms crossed, his eyes hard to read through the Batman cowl as he watched Azrael and Nightwing wrestling. At ringside, Lex Luthor was providing guest commentary. Clark could hear his smooth, urbane voice explaining moves, selling the story, and he remembered that Lex had been a good commentator when he was younger. He didn’t sit at ringside often anymore, though.
“It was good psychology,” Bruce said as Clark came to stand beside him. “The Dark Knight wouldn’t make stupid moth jokes when Nightwing was defending his title. Totally in-character for him to leave like that.”
“Convenient that it also happens to be true,” said Clark, and saw the corner of Bruce’s mouth lift in a near-smile.
The smile vanished as Azrael clotheslined Nightwing, sending the champion crashing to the mat. Bruce drummed his fingers on his arm as Dick staggered to his feet. “I’ll be glad when this is over,” he said.
“I don’t know,” said Clark. “Tonight and tomorrow are his last big matches in the DCW. I kind of want them to go on forever.”
“Leaving is the right choice,” said Bruce. “He’ll thrive in a story-heavy promotion like the Titans. He’ll become his own man, the wrestler he was always meant to be. I just wish--I wish things could have gone more smoothly.”
It was a good match. Dick and Jean-Paul had always worked pretty stiff with each other, and tonight it added an extra layer of brutality to a very personal match. Azrael’s face was grim with concentration, his eyes fixed on his redemption. Nightwing was fighting back, struggling, almost overpowered by the determination of Azrael, but never giving up. Never.
Azrael countered a move by Nightwing and flipped Nightwing onto his stomach, twisting his legs up and back, locking in the Flying Grayson, Mary Grayson’s signature submission. The crowd shrieked with fury and horror as Nightwing struggled toward the ropes, unable to reach them. The commentators went crazy: would Nightwing tap out to his mother’s own move? Impossible!
Nightwing twisted in agony, unable to break the hold. He pulled at his hair. His hand hovered above the mat, irresolute as pain knifed through him. Would he give up?
Clark never knew what it was that Bruce saw, whether it was something in Luthor’s tone of voice, something in Pop Haly’s expression, or whether it was just an intuition of doom. But he heard Bruce breathe “Oh my God. No,” and there was such stark horror in his voice that Clark’s breath caught.
On the screen, Nightwing’s hand wavered above the mat.
And Pop Haly waved his arms and announced that Nightwing had submitted, that the match was over, that Azrael was the winner.
There was a heartbeat of shocked silence in which everything seemed to stop: the crowd, the combatants in the ring, the wrestlers watching backstage. And into that silence Lex Luthor’s voice carried like a gunshot.
”Ring the bell!” Luthor snapped, jumping to his feet. All the urbanity was gone from his voice; it was a hoarse bark, almost panicked. “Ring it! Ring it now, god damn it!”
The bell rang, a strange awkward clank, and the match was over.
Nightwing had submitted to his mother’s signature move.
He had lost the belt.
To Azrael.
In Gotham.
”No!”
Clark turned at the cry, but the space next to him was already empty.
He charged after Bruce, shoving people out of his way as he ran through the Gorilla position and out onto the ramp. The crowd noise swirled and eddied around him--no cheering, no booing, just confusion. Bruce was already ahead of him, Clark was never going to reach him.
He would have nightmares for the rest of his life about that run down the ramp, nightmares in which it seemed to stretch out forever, in which he couldn’t seem to move his legs. Fragments of vision flickered and dimmed around him.
He passed Azrael, who was coming up the ramp holding his new championship belt, his face pale and dazed.
Faces in the crowd. Shocked. Angry. Cheering. Confused. A crying child. A cursing man.
He saw Dick Grayson leaning on the ropes, his face twisted in exhaustion and anguish. He was weeping, not bothering to wipe the tears away, staring out at the Gotham that had witnessed his parents’ deaths and had now witnessed his failure.
Clark had no time to stop and confront any of them, he was running toward Bruce, who was closing on Lex Luthor. He reached out and caught the fluttering edge of Bruce’s cape, but it slipped through his fingers.
Luthor turned to meet the Dark Knight and for a bare second the cameras caught his face, more resigned than triumphant.
Then the Dark Knight punched him, and Luthor fell back against the announcer’s table, clutching his eye. The people nearby in the audience cheered for a second, then looked confused again. It felt too raw, too real, and paradoxically not dramatic enough. Luthor didn’t howl or wave his arms or suffer in any satisfying way, he just gritted his teeth and stood there, glaring at the Dark Knight.
The Dark Knight pointed at Luthor, and his voice was hoarse in a very different way than Batman’s voice ever was. “You’ll pay for this, Luthor. I swear it,” he snarled.
“Br--Batman,” said Superman, one hand on his arm, pulling him back. “Nightwing.”
It was possibly the only thing he could have said to break the standoff. The Dark Knight whirled away from Luthor and went to the ring, where Nightwing had fallen to his knees. Pop Haly was retreating up the ramp and out of the arena, his shoulders slumped.
Superman and Batman climbed into the ring and went to either side of Nightwing. Batman knelt and whispered something in Nightwing’s ear, and Nightwing nodded. Superman and Batman helped him to his feet.
The crowd’s confusion gave way to applause as Nightwing stood before them, supported by his mentors. It wasn’t ecstatic applause; it was warm and loving and sad. “We will miss you!” called out someone in the audience who read dirt sheets, and soon the chant rolled across the crowd like surf, a bittersweet benediction that continued as the three of them made their way up the ramp.
At the top of the ramp Bruce started to turn Dick back around, to face back into the arena. Clark heard Dick sob, once. “I can’t--”
But Bruce turned him back to look at the people waving, cheering, chanting. He kissed the side of Dick’s head and said in a voice that barely carried over the crowd to Clark’s ears: “Say goodbye to your people, champion.”
Mercy Graves already had two police officers by her side when the three of them rounded the corner. “Mr….Wayne?” said one of them, an eyebrow raised. “May we have your real name, sir?”
“You can’t be serious,” said Clark.
“Mr. Wayne just assaulted his employer,” said Mercy. “I think you’ll find the police are not likely to get fantasy and reality mixed up when it comes to what legally constitutes assault and battery.”
“Stop this nonsense,” snapped Lex Luthor, entering at a brisk walk. His eye was already swelling, blackened and bruised. “I won’t be pressing charges.”
Mercy looked more surprised than Clark had ever seen her. “You won’t, sir?”
“Let’s be honest,” said Luthor. “I had it coming. I knew the risks. I decided to do it anyway.” He looked at Dick Grayson, red-eyed and sweat-soaked. “You’ll never believe me, son, but I’m truly sorry it had to come to this. You were a good champion, it was nothing personal, and I wish you the best of luck in all your future endeavours.” A razor-thin smile. “Now clean out your locker.”
Dick took two deep breaths, met Clark’s eyes, and left the room.
“As for you,” Luthor said, moving to stand in front of Bruce. “Get out of my sight before I change my mind and have you thrown in jail. I’ll figure out what to do with you tomorrow.”
They drove from Gotham to Metropolis that night, Bruce’s foot heavy on the gas of his rented Maserati, his eyes far away. Clark clamped his mouth shut and said nothing for a long time, and the silence stretched out as the city lights flickered past.
“So where do we go?” he finally burst out. “Japan? Mexico? Will Lord take us back?”
“We’re not going anywhere,” Bruce said.
Clark gaped at him. “You’re considering staying on and working with him? After this?” He hit the dashboard with his fist; Bruce’s eyes stayed on the road and he didn’t flinch. “You’re willing to swallow your pride and keep working for the guy who did that to Dick, just because he’s top dog--Bruce, I would never have believed that of you. Ever!”
“Have you gotten all that fury out of your system now?” said Bruce. “Because being angry is great and all, but it’s not going to help us.”
“Help us?”
Bruce turned and smiled at Clark, and the city lights sparked across his face and in his eyes. “Luthor had a chance to balance the scales just a little for what happened to John and Mary Grayson, and he failed. He humiliated Dick Grayson. He betrayed the memory of the Graysons, and he violated the sanctity of the ring.”
His voice wavered for a moment and he swallowed hard. When he spoke again it was flat and controlled, inexorable.
“It will take time, and patience, and a lot of luck. But I swear to you, Clark, that we will take Lex Luthor down.”
(no subject)
Date: 2015-11-22 06:52 am (UTC)Dan asked me if Dick was going to spit on Lex and I recoiled, he would never! Dick wouldn't even punch him, Dick's so much more likely to turn that anger inward--the aftermath will be a lot different for him, that's for sure. (He's unlikely to be utterly unable to let it go forever though, that's for sure).
I enjoy Lex so much here, so if it shines through I have no regrets! He's fun and interesting, and I think he loves the business more than he'd ever let on (I think Bruce knows this about him as well, it's likely to come up soon!)