“And what about those murders?” Bruce pressed. He leaned closer to her when she refused to look at him. “Did you really commit them?”
For the first time, she hesitated at this question.
“You were protecting someone, weren’t you?” Bruce asked again. “You took someone else’s fall, admitted to the crimes—you went to Arkham in someone else’s place. That’s why you said you chose to go to Arkham, right?”
“And what makes you say that?” Madeleine’s voice had turned very quiet, reinforcing his suspicions.
“Because you’re far too smart to be caught by the police with blood all over you,” he replied.
The sound of approaching footsteps outside silenced them both. Madeleine straightened; a warning light glinted in her eyes, and she quickly distanced herself from Bruce as the door opened. Two of the Nightwalkers who had previously been inside now returned, and with them came a third person.
Bruce’s attention fixed immediately on the newcomer. He recognized this man. It was the same tall, looming silhouette he’d seen in his house, pointing a gun straight at him—it was the same man who had been wearing a mask and goggles, whose outfit had gleamed a strange metal in the dim light. Bruce recognized the way he walked—easy and dangerous, like a tiger. But this time, the man’s mask was off, and his face was exposed.
Bruce’s breath caught in his throat. The resemblance was uncanny. Same slender dark eyes, same pale white skin, same black hair—although his was short and wild, a thick mess that he now ran a hand through. And unlike Madeleine’s more reserved, calculating expression, this man’s face was full of fire. Bruce didn’t even need to know him to know that his temper ran on a short fuse. But what really caught Bruce’s attention was the gleam of metal against his exposed skin. Bands of what looked like steel lined the sides of both of his forearms, running up to his elbows. His elbow joints were completely metal. That predatory gait he had was possibly due to the enhanced joints in his knees, giving him far greater control than an average human.
Madeleine gave him a wry look, but in it, Bruce saw affection that could only mean one thing. “Took your time today, Boss,” she said, adding a taunting lilt to the final word.
This man—the Nightwalkers’ infamous leader—was Cameron Wallace. Her brother.
Bruce could only stare for a moment as Cameron gave his sister a single, humorless smirk. “Too much fun to be had out there,” he replied, nodding toward the door and the concert hall balcony beyond, and then at the captive guards who were now kneeling on the ground before them, heads bowed. “And in here.”
“What’s going on?” Madeleine asked.
“No thanks to these guys, we hear a few police have managed to make their way through an underground tunnel to be within the concert hall’s perimeters. They have a few rogue drones with them.” Cameron shoved one of the guards hard enough to send him toppling sideways. “If I’d wanted the police to trickle in, I would’ve given you all the order to let them do so. Now you’ve made my life harder.”
“Don’t do it, Cam,” Madeleine said, her voice tight. “We’ve done enough.” But even as she said it, Cameron pulled out a gun from his belt holster and pointed it at the first guard. The guard started shaking his head frantically.
“I did that,” Bruce spoke up. Everyone turned to look at him. “I turned the police onto that underground path you missed. I sent the rogue drones. They’re mine, after all. Not yours.”
“Is that so?” he said, looking between him and Madeleine. “Then that must mean you’re Bruce Wayne. What a pleasure. Remember me? We met at your home.”
“Cam,” Madeleine snapped, the warning growing in her voice.
“Good work getting him here, sis,” Cameron replied. He turned his attention back to the sobbing guard. Then he pulled the trigger.
Bruce flinched but didn’t look away, his ears ringing. The man fell to the floor with a scream as the bullet ripped through his side. Blood sprayed onto the wall. Cameron shot the two other guards in rapid succession—one in his arm, the other in his hand.
“Cam, damn it!” Madeleine jumped to her feet and shoved her brother hard, making him stumble back a step. “We don’t have time for this, and you’re wasting perfectly good people. Your people. Do I need to remind you that we’re in a standoff right now?”
“Cheer up, sis. I’m not putting bullets through their heads because of you.” Cameron scowled at her and swung the gun onto his shoulder. “They’re not ‘perfectly good people’ if they can’t stop a police assault. Now we have cops on the hall’s property.” He nodded for the others to drag the wounded, sobbing guards out of the room. “One bullet for each mistake,” he called out after them. “So make sure you make fewer of them.”
“And now you have three injured guards,” Madeleine snapped back. “What happens if we need to be on the move? Leave them to be caught by the police and interrogated? Drag them along? You’re slowing us down, you idiot.”
“I didn’t say I’d never put bullets in their heads,” Cameron replied. “So drop it.”
Bruce looked numbly at the carpet. There were streaks of blood leading to the door, and on the other side, he could still hear the wounded Nightwalkers’ cries. They rang in his head. So this was the boss—a man who everyone had suspected to be dead, to have died as a boy. Suddenly, the cryptic way Madeleine talked about everything made sense.
As Madeleine fumed, Cameron grinned at her and gave her a nudge. “Have you been enjoying your little date night in here?” He swiveled to Bruce and gave him a once-over. “You have some remarkable reflexes, Wayne. It’s too bad you’re not one of us. You’ve quite enraptured my baby sister.”
Madeleine shot him an annoyed look. Bruce looked at her brother, then back at her. “You told me he was dead,” he said. “I read the obituary online.”
“It’s not hard to fake a death, Bruce,” Madeleine replied. “After Cameron almost died, Mom left the country with his body and got a foreign doctor to perform an experimental procedure that saved his life—hence, the artificial joints you see. He’s been…different, ever since then.” She looked at her brother again with a bitter roll of her eyes. Bruce watched them carefully. Had Cameron’s procedure not only strengthened his body—but also warped his conscience? “Being off the grid is helpful for a lot of things, Cameron. Isn’t it? You tend not to be a primary suspect when you murder people.” There was sharpness in her voice.
“You were the real killer,” Bruce said to Cameron. “You slit the throats of those people, and you made Madeleine take the fall for you.”