Moving In...

Today, I was moving in. Which was good because I really wanted my straight razor, some shaving butter, my pillows, blankets and tablet. Not because I had some important information on the IPad but because I was bored as hell in my cell errr-room I meant room.

I also really needed my personally made tooth cleaning powder made from charcoal, roasted pearls, and eggshell ashes. Then my mints. I never liked the feeling of a toothbrush in my mouth and was used to the powders of the 1800's. Really, my teeth get knocked out so much and regrow I almost don't even need to clean my teeth.

Then there were my clothes. Jesus. I don't have any more jackets like the last one I had. Now I might have to wear my old Sack suit. Last time I wore that was to the World Fair in 1904 in St. Louis. (Geronimo was a nice guy and Jack Daniel's made his whiskey wayyyyyy better back then.) God, I can't wear a cravat anymore can I? Ohh, do I still have my WW2 bomber jacket? Or my WW1 doughboy trench coat?

"What you thinkin' about back there?" Cyborg asked, breaking me off my train of thought.

"About my mastermind plan of escape." I drawled half-heartedly.

"No, you'd never escape me punk."

"Is that a challenge?" I said, a smile forming on my face.

"Raven also insisted on coming to but she's dead asleep."

Raven was riding shotgun and sounded drunk when she slurred, "Huh?"

"Nothin' little bird," I said, "go back to sleep."

"I'm not a bird," she slurred before falling asleep again. Today she wore a hoodie with raven designs (naturally) and jeans. I guess she wore outfits screaming her namesake in a weak attempt at blending in. I'm not one to judge though since I might have to dig up clothes that'll make me look like the Count of bloody friggin' Monte Cristo.

"So where is your secret fortress? A volcano? A nondescript hotel?"

"It's next to the Grant family museum."

"Why am I not surprised?" Raven said, eyes still closed.

"Let me guess," Cyborg said, "the abandoned apartments?"

"Yep." I admitted.

"Alright," Cyborg ordered, "we're gonna park over in that parking garage and start walking. The T-Car attracts too much attention in this part of town."

"And my suitcases?"

"He's got pocket dimension things that will help." Raven said stretching.

"Can I say goodbye to some family and friends at the museum?"

Cyborg looked to Raven and she said, "Yeah, it should be okay."

I gave Raven a pouty look through her seat and asked, "You're not in my head right now are you?"

"I don't need to be in your head to know if you were up to no good."

We stopped in the garage, no conflict or invading zombies, and I followed Cyborg and Raven. Hitting the street, I felt this chill come over me. As if something were amiss. I looked around for snipers because… I don't know, I used to do that all the time and there was always snipers.

I just wanted to hit the deck as a whopping sound drew closer. Looking towards it I knew what was happening. A helicopter was flying overhead but I steeled myself. It was just a regular helicopter, no Vietcong here. That was years ago but the chills were all over my body.

Raven even turned and asked, "Kevin, you ok?"

"Yeah, last time I had a flashback a belt slipped in my washing machine. Laid out on the floor with my M1 for an hour before I figured out what was wrong." (<-A/N: Inspired by true PTSD story of Nam)

"Well hopefully we won't get any action today." Cyborg commented, "I can use a day or two to reboot. Robin still isn't tip top yet either."

"Let's just keep going." I said.

Walking into the building, the first few floors were bare. I rarely used the door, and normally entered through the fire escape but I didn't feel like climbing ladders today. The dust on the abandoned floors almost kicked up into a cloud after we walked over it. The dust was so thick I'd bet a thousand bucks if we were running we'd be coughing right now.

As soon as we hit my home floor the tiles were waxed and the walls were clean. I opened my door and called out, "I got company!"

"Come in!"

Stepping inside, an elderly woman was knitting a quilt. No TV was blaring, no loud music, just nice and quiet. I never liked reporters ever since the slanderous muckrakers and the like lying about Captains of Industry in the 1880's. They exposed the Robber Barons though so there was that.

"Where's my great distant nephew? At the museum?"

"Oh? Yes, Wilford and Tom are at the family museum."

"Thank you Sharon. Um, you got coffee ready?"

"In the kitchen Kevin."

"Yes!" I ran to the kitchen and got two mugs while Sharon asked,

"Are you going to introduce me to your friends?"

"Um," I gulped, "Cyborg and Raven."

Sharon, poor girl, she was half my age but blind as a bat. She swirled to the door in her chair and reached down, "A-are you in some sort of trouble?"

"Don't try to pull the shotgun from the couch cushion. It won't help any. But no, I'm not in too much trouble."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm… moving out though."

"Why so sudden? You were the best man at our wedding!"

"I'll still visit, Sharon. Tom will keep you guys safe as well. Just-sit tight while I pack."

"But Kevin-"

"Woman, remember your place," I growled, and with that she locked up and I added, "Now make our guests feel at home."

After pouring coffee for me and Raven I asked, "Victor, want some coffee?"

"I'm good." They stood at the door awkwardly, as if they just watched a family dispute. Maybe they kinda did.

I offered the cup to Raven and she tried to refuse, "Nonono I'm fine."

"I know that you like coffee and you're a guest, it'd be rude to refuse." There wasn't hostility in my voice and I added, "This is how I have operated for decades. I'm old fashioned, I know; just take some free coffee."

She took it, murmuring a thanks and Cyborg followed me to my room to help pack. I dug around in my closet and was going through my outfits. Slipping off my hoodie I grabbed a dress shirt and started putting together something my style.

"So…" Cyborg asked, "you believe a woman's place is in the kitchen?"

Tucking a red ascot into my shirt I replied, "I believe in balance. There are times and places for everyone and everything. I believe family life is the natural course of human life. When you are young, you might party until you grow out of it and settle down. There's a problem with that… if you are immortal."

"In two hundred years you never tried to start a family?"

"Not biological, no."

"What if people don't settle down?"

"There's a yin to every yang. I can't settle down, heroes really can't either and villains? We make them settle down so they don't disrupt the balance of society. Once the balance is thrown off we get the byproducts."

I slipped on black breeches while I added, "We've heard 'oh, that criminal was just a product of society'. Society is made up of families and families: individuals. When more and more people become corrupted by this cycle it snowballs and we are trying to stop the curve. It's weird, it's complex, but I believe in balance."

I buttoned my tailed suit and started packing up my things. Besides my clothes that haven't rotted away I had a projector and some gaming consoles. Why get a screen when a projector can make the image as big as you want? My other electronics consisted of my tablet, 8-track, laptop, and vinyl player. I was digging through something and found my old pager and sighed,

"I need to get rid of some of this stuff."

"You're so retro and I love it dude." Cyborg said as he watched me.

"I bet I got my Atari or Magnavox Odyssey and Pong somewhere around here. I tell Tom and the others to never touch my things."

"Mind I ask why you remind me of a grumpy old grandpa?"

"Well I lived through a time when you could call someone's wife a cum busted garbage disposal from hell and then go to work with them on the Hoover Dam the next day. Man…" I shook my head, "I kinda regret telling him that. He fell in the cement mix that day."

After that, things got awkward and I finished packing in silence. I stepped out of my room with a 1942 Army bag full of dimensional pocket things and grabbed a soda before we departed. Raven and Sharon were going over my pictures, Jesus Sharon why?

"Sooo you know Theodore Roosevelt." Raven asked.

"Oh yeah, we went to Cuba together. We were good friends."

"Did you know FDR?"

"Don't you utter the name of that Commie loving, racist waste of a man. Stalin hugging piece of trash! He knew Hugo Black was part of the Klan, had hundred of Commie spies in his administration! If he had just left the market alone like the Depression of 1919 why I-"

"Kevin," Sharon said sweetly, "you're fuming again."

"I had friends die because of that idiot's policies to slaughter pigs by the thousands when people starved to death. Then he 'cut unemployment' but you know that soldiers count as employed right?"

While I ranted about stuff from over fifty years ago, Raven and Cyborg had notifications pop up on their phones and they both turned pale.

"Kevin…" Raven said quietly, "we need to get back to the tower."

"Why? What's up?"

"There was a Kahndaqi terror attack on a school." Raven said.

"That's tragic but that's pertinent to us because?"

"Batman is coming to the tower," Cyborg answered, "because the leader of Kahndaq is Osiris' adoptive father."