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“Mr. Wayne! Mr. Wayne! Is it true the body of your deceased son has been stolen!”
Bruce grit his teeth to prevent him from verbally lashing out against the reporter. The woman, who he vaguely recognized as being from the “Gotham Gazette”, was just doing her job. He needed to remember that, but the lack of compassion of these people often infuriated him. But he was in his public persona at the moment, and he had to act the part.
He let out a staged sigh. “I’m heartbroken to say it’s true. The Gotham City PD alerted me this morning.”
As soon as he was done with this interview, he was going to do everything in his power to find what Hush and the Riddler did with his son so he could lay him back to rest. How dare they disturb Jason’s grave? Riddler hadn’t cracked under the original interrogation, but he was going to return and get those answers.
He needed to get those answers. His son deserved to have his peaceful rest.
“Mr. Wayne, I heard a rumor you originally had your son’s body moved to prevent something like this from happening.” This was from a different reporter, a man this time. That information was supposed to have been hidden from everyone, but with Gotham being the way it was, some of the groundskeepers could have talked.
“I had planned to keep that a secret,” Bruce admitted. “I’m sure you could understand that with my reputation and the history of some of the criminal activity here, I had hoped to prevent his grave from being disturbed.” It was okay to admit it now. What he had tried to prevent happened anyways.
“A follow up question. Does the GCPD have any clues as to who might have done it?”
“They are currently investigating it. Right now, they believe that it might be related to the odd events surrounding the recent death of my friend, Dr. Thomas Elliot.” That statement wasn’t even a lie. The Riddler and Hush had purposely made it appear as if Jason had been resurrected. To complete the illusion, they had moved the body.
“Is it possible the body had been taken months to years before this?”
The answer was a resound no. He had sensors put in place to let him know if anyone disturbed the casket. Yet, even with those in place, someone still managed to bypass them. “I don’t believe so. We should have seen evidence prior to this if that was the case. From what the police told me, there was clear evidence the grave was disturbed.”
“Are you sure you just aren’t trying to save face?” A new different male voice spoke up from the crowd. He sounded familiar, but between the coat most reported tended to wear and the fedora brim casting shadows on his face, Bruce couldn’t immediately identify him. “Are you sure you didn’t originally move his casket to forget about him? You certainly replaced him quickly enough.”
Rage flooded Bruce’s veins. “How dare…!” His words died as the reporter pushed up the brim of his hat enough to lift the shadow. He’d seen that face before. It was the same one who stared at him from the graveyard. The same one who claimed to be his dead son, but this time, there was no domino mask over his eyes.
Was it Clayface? That’s who it previously was. But Clayface was currently incapacitated. Was someone wearing a disguise? Had they guessed what Jason would look like using simple age progression data? Or was it someone who looked unnervingly like his son and had been paid off to mess with him?
“How dare I what, Mr. Wayne? Or can I call you Bruce? It was just a simple question.” The man’s smile grew mischievous.
He… he called him Bruce. Whomever this man was, he knew that would be the one word that would cause him to seriously question if it was possible for him to be Jason. Was this another part of the game posed by the Riddler and Hush?
As the other reporters began pestering him for answers, Bruce reined in his temper. He couldn’t go after this reporter now.
Keeping his eyes on the reporter, he carefully replied. “I loved my son. I still love my son and am still grieving for him.” He paused for a moment to allow for him to appear as if he was taking a moment to gather his emotions. “As for Timothy Drake, he is currently my ward while his father recovers. While I care for him, he is not my son.”
“I hear you saying that, but during this entire interview, you’ve never said your son’s name.”
Pandemonium erupted at that statement. The reporters swarmed forward to ask why he couldn’t say his son’s name. They asked about Tim’s place in the manor. How Dick felt about him. How Dick felt about Jason’s death. It hurt. Why couldn’t they leave him and his grief alone?
And then there was that reporter who looked like Jason. Bruce tried to keep an eye on him, but in the momentary rush, he disappeared into the crowd. If he had doubts before, he was now certain the man was planted there by someone to either emotionally compromise him or gather intelligence. Perhaps both.
Eventually, he was able to direct the questions towards what he was going to do to help the police find his son’s body. It was simple, he was just going to help the GCPD in whatever way he can, whether it was funds or information. He told them that he was hopeful they would be able to find Jason soon.
And just to prove that imposter wrong, he made sure to say Jason’s name as he stated he hoped the police would be able to find his body soon. But, something told him that it wouldn’t be that simple. It was never that simple when it came to his enemies.
After returning home, he descended into the cave in order to see if he could find any evidence of the fake reporter. He’d thankfully had the press conference in front of one of WE buildings so there were plenty of cameras.
It took a couple plays of the footage to identify when the unknown joined the crowd as well as when he left. Whoever he was knew what he was doing. With the exception of allowing himself to be visible in the crowd of reporters, Bruce could only track him for about a block outside of the crowd. Even then, he appeared non-distinct and gave nothing away.
The only thing he did that was out of the ordinary was, as he was moving away from the crowd, he removed his hat for a moment, directly looked at the hidden security camera, and smiled. It was unsettling to see someone who looked like an adult version of his dead son toy with him on the security cameras.
He did everything he could to track who this man might have been, but there were no credentials. After putting some feelers out, none of the other reporters recognized him. He tried running recognition software to see he could place the man in or near any of the other WE buildings in the days leading up to incident with Hush. And there was nothing.
It was frustrating. And with Thomas Elliot presumed dead and the Riddler not talking, Bruce would have to go to their other associates during the plot to see if he could get information either about the unknown or his son’s body.
It wouldn’t be too long after that Bruce found out what happened to his son and the identity of the doppelganger. And in his many years in the field, the answer was not something he ever would have expected.