Catwoman - Tiger Hunt

Chapter Eleven

Bruce Wayne sat in his family mansion's library surrounded by open books in several languages, none of them less than forty years old. There was also a stack of newspapers, many proclaiming a new world order that looked remarkably like the older one, and the Gotham City telephone directory.

According to the Bible, mankind spoke a common language until the descendents of Noah assaulted the ramparts of heaven with the Tower of Babel. The visitors were not welcome. The tower was smashed, and the next morning the survivors had lost the ability to understand each other. Although premeditated murder had appeared much earlier in the book, warfare, strife, and intolerance grew in the ruins of Babel. If the story were taken literally, then the Tower of Babel was a ruined ziggurat in Babylon, now known as Iraq, where warfare, strife, and intolerance were still going strong. If, on the other hand, the story was a metaphor, then the Tower could have been built in many different places, including Bessarabia.

"It's as if all the leaders of the world, all the scholars, politicians, and educators, got together in 1919 and said: The world's too complicated this way. Let's make it simple. We'll pretend these places and these people didn't exist. We'll redraw the maps, change the way everything is spelled, and in fifty years no one will be the wiser."

Alfred acknowledged Bruce's complaint with a disdainful sniff as he adjusted the draperies to let in the early-morning light. Never one to do things by halves, his friend and employer had returned from that inauspicious meeting with Harry Mattheson, gotten a few hours' sleep, and then plunged recklessly into old-fashioned research. Once again Batman had pushed himself to the limit.

"It almost worked," the butler said when golden light flowed into the room. "We had superpowers, and you'll have to admit, everything was very simple when you were growing up. When computers came along, no one paid any attention to the old hatreds and conflicts."

Bruce slapped a book shut. A plume of dust billowed through the streaming light. "But wrong. Here in the United States, we only five hundred years of history---by the rest of the world's standards, that's not enough time to build a decent grudge. The farther back I go, the more hatred I find, and it never goes away. Those men in 1919 didn't simplify anything; they only added another layer of oppression. There are at least three groups of people who oculd be Gordon's Bessarabians, and whichever one it is, they're probably planning on using their weapons on the other two."

Alfred frowned, more at the dust clinging to the books than at Bruce's commentary. "When I was growing up, the big fear was anarchy. Balkanization, my teachers called it. Communism and facism looked like acceptable solutions to the problem. Big powers to keep the little ones in check. I believe I recall that Bessarabia is in the general area of the Balkans."

"That's it." Bruce rose from his chair. He flexed and stretched his shoulders until the ligaments snapped, then loudly closed all the books.

"What is it, sir?"

"All we see is names in books and on maps. We hear about people fighting and killing each other because they want to spell their names with Latin letters rather than Cyrillic. They see independence as the freedom to speak and write the language of their parents. We see it in terms of money. And so we call them foolish, ignorant, and backward. We can't see what they see---or maybe we just don't want to."

"I know I don't want to, sir," Alfred confessed. "It seems so sad, so wasteful. Fighting like that over things that aren't important."

Bruce opened a window and cleansed his lungs with a yawn. "That's only because no one ever told you that you couldn't speak English, or call yourself Alfred."

He took a step back from the window. Alfred hurried forward to close it.

"I'm going to Gotham. I think I know where I can find one of my three potential terrorist Bessarabians. I'm going to listen to them until I understand why they're ready to go to war with their neighbors. No need to make dinner."

Alfred straightened the drapes stiffly. They didn't argue, not after all the years and all the secrets. They knew what could be changed and what could not. And when there was nothing left to say, they said nothing.

"Will you need one of the cars, sir?" Alfred's voice was carefully expressionless.

"No." Which meant that Batman was going, not Bruce Wayne.

"Very well, sir." Alfred paused by the door. "Good hunting, sir."

The Batmobile always drew stares as it cruised down the highway, but here in one of Gotham's peripheral, ethnic nieghborhoods---where Batman did not have a prepared safe house---it drew a crowd. The vehicle was impervious to theft or vandalism; the children who reached out to touch it did not leave so much as a fingerprint on its black matte surface. They retreated when the fully costumed Batman got out, but he had no sooner sealed the doors and set the alarms than he felt a tentative tug on the cap.

"Batman," the dark-eyed moppet said, spreading his arms as he released the cloth. "Drakul."

Batman was more accustomed to being surrounded by armed criminals than grinning children. He smiled awkwardly and looked for a path to the sidewalk. The other children chattered rapidly, then joined the bolest one in holding their arms outstretched. They all jumped up and down, flapping their arms, raising their voices, and drawing the attention of their elders. Feeling a little trapped, Batman imitated their posture, allowing the cape to billow from his arms and shoulders. They shrieked with delighted terror and ran away.

The day's business was not getting off to a good start. Within the costume, Bruce Wayne wished he was without it as well. He was a world away from the docks and slums of central Gotham. His confidence that he could learn anything from these wary immigrants looked like another example of American arrogance.

He heard a woman scream. Trouble sounded like trouble in every language. Without hesitation, he bolted down the sidewalk. The sound had come from a small bakery. Batman took in the whole shop with a single glance as he came through the door. A stocky woman with a bright kerchief knotted over her hair stood behind the open cash register. Her eyes widened when she beheld the dark apparition looming in her doorway. She staggered backward until the racks of fresh black bread supported her. Clutching the front of her blouse, she tried and failed to scream.

Batman saw the kitchen through the bread racks. He saw the open, swinging back door as well.

"I'll be back with your money."

She nodded as he went by, but did not seem at all reassured.

The kitchen emptied into a tenement courtyard fundamentally similar to every other courtyard jumble of concrete and weeds in the city. Relying on instinct and experience, Batman eyed the scene. There were two likely ways out: a tunnel-like alley between two buildings on the far side, and a fire-escape ladder someone had left in the lowered position. There were open windows behind the fire escape; a few were hung with curtains that lowered slowly. Since there was no breeze, Batman reached the obvious conclusion.

Batman climbed weakly, but cautiously, making as little noise as possible, especially after he heard voices on the roof above him. Now he was grateful for the costume and the options it provided. Removing a fist-sized object from his belt, he aimed it at the wall just below the roofline but several yards beyond the fire escape. He thumbed a lever, and a filament hissed out of his hand. It hit the wall with no more sound than a pebble might make. A finger of smoke extended out from the wall as the adhesive coating of the plug bonded with the brick. Batman tested the line, then leaped away from the fire escape.

The filament shortened as he swung. He braced himself for the impact, reaching up for the cement slabs at the top of the wall with his free hand. With a practiced effort, he conserved momentum as he vaulted over the cornice, releasing the filament at the last moment. He landed in an alert crouch.

Time froze.

Three men looked up from a pillowcase they held open between them. They gaped with astonishment. They smiled. The fourth man on the roof, the Batman, decided the order of attack. He folded the fingers of his right hand into a flat-knuckled fist. He'd take the first two with the energy he stored in the bunching muscles of that arm. He'd take the third, the burliest of the men and also the one on the far side of the pillowcase, with a left forearm across the windpipe.

Surging forward with a shout, Batman dropped the first with a hammer punch to the solar plexus; the man never saw what hit him. He took the second with a roundhouse blow to the chin; the victim had time to see, but no time to react. The third dropped to his knees and held out his empty hands; he spoke the same strange language as the children in the streets. Batman ignored him and reached down for the pillowcase. It was heavier than he expected. He glanced in and saw why:

They'd taken the money from the bakery---about forty dollars in small bills and change---but the object of the robbery had been the small, dark painting in a golden frame.

The first thief was beginning to move and make noise. The second remained out cold. Batman indicated that the kneeling man and the groaning man should carry their companion down the fire escape. In the distance he could hear a police siren. He hoped it was coming here. He hoped the officers would be willing and able to ask a few questions on his behalf.

The siren grew louder, then was silent. Two officers met Batman and the alleged perpetrators in the now-crowded bakery. The terrified woman ran upstairs. While the older cop went after her, the younger tried to oblige the near-legendary caped crusader. He fired off a barrage of unfamiliar sounds that were similar in language Batman had heard on the street and roof. But, apparently, not similar enough. Batman suspected the sullen thieves knew exactly what had been said, but they shook their heads and gestured in confusion.

"Can't keep up with them, sir," the fair-skinned young man said, automatically assuming that Batman outranked him in law-enforcement matters. "Used to be just Russians and Poles and they could somehow talk to each other. Now it's everything: Russians, Poles, Bulgarians, Ukrainians---you name it---and they won't talk to each other."

"He understood you, I think."

"I'm sure he did, sir. I wouldn't bet against him understanding everything we're saying. Moscow made 'em learn two languages---Russian and English. We'll take them down to the station and they'll talk. We've got a room down there now that looks straight out of the KGB headquarters. We sit 'em in there for a couple of hours, and they're ready to talk. Old habits die hard, I guess."

The older cop came downstairs shaking his head. "We can take 'em down and book 'em, but what's the use? She won't talk to us. She won't even say the money was stolen from her, or that saint picture. She doesn't want anything to do with the police." The pillowcase, the money, and the picture were spread across the counter near the cash register. He began bundling them together.

The younger cop restrained his partner. "That's icon's problably been in her family a long time. They had to hide it all those years; they could've been imprisoned or sent to Siberia just for having it. And after all that, they bring it here. I know it's physical evidence, Cliff, but if she's not going to press charges anyway... ?"

Cliff rubbed his thumb across the flaking gilt, weighing the charges. "What's this stuff worth, anyway?"

"A lot more to her than to us," the young officer said firmly.

Swearing softly to himself, Cliff put the icon back on the counter. Another car had arrived; backup transportation to the station. "Okay, let's get outta here." He turned to Batman. "You coming too?"

"Do you need me?"

"Nope." The single word contained all the ambivalence the uniformed police felt toward costumed free-lancers.

"Then I'll stay here. Maybe I can convince the woman to go to the station."

"Yeah, sure. A guy in a cape, a mask, and circus clothes. Maybe she'll think it's Halloween."

Batman stood without comment as the policeman and their prisoners left. He was still standing, hoping the woman would come downstairs, when another young man came down instead. He looked to be in his early twenties, and he didn't look at all surprised to see Batman. He was surprised to see the icon. Very surprised. Very relieved. And very quick to hide what he had revealed.

"My mother would thank you, but America frightens her," he said in accented but confident English. "America is not what nay one of us expected. But home has changed so much, too. Where else can we go?" He glanced around the room, obviously looking for something else. He found it---a velvet-covered box carelessly thrown against the wall. Batman had not noticed it before, nor had the police. The youth retrieved the box and carefully fit the icon into it. He held the closed box tightly against his chest.

Things weren't adding up. Batman's curiosity acquired a razor edge. "You're Russian?" he asked with exaggerated doubt. "From the Soviet Union... Russia?"

"This week, the Commonwealth of Independent States; yes. Last week, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Russian, yes, but Russia, no."

Forearmed as Batman was with his library researches, this made sense. "You come from one of the other republics, then. One of the new Baltic countries? Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia..." If the youth had been here any length of time, he knew how Americans loved to show off their limited knowledge of events on the far side of the world. But Batman hadn't chosen this particular block at random, and when the youth shook his head with a condescending smile, Batman knew he'd chosen correctly.

"Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic," the youth said.

"Last week. This week the Moldovan Sovereign Republic." Batman hoped he'd managed to convey the new spelling of the name.

He had. The youth muttered words not included in any orthodox Russian dictionary, then spat emphatically at the floor. "Stalinist pigs."

Stalin was, after all, Georgian, not Russian, and pigs seemed to be universally reviled.

"And the men who tried to steal the icon?"

"Moldavian pigs," the youth announced, using Russian orthography. "My family did not ask to live in their filthy little country, but we came, we built the factories, and we worked in them. It is ours now, and they would take it from us... for Rumania. Stinking Rumanian gypsies."

The mask helped Batman keep his thoughts to himself. Perhaps Alfred had a point about Balkanization. "The police here don't take kindly to immigrants importing their wars with them... or exporting weapons back home, either."

"We send money back, yes. And food. Much food." The youth's expression had grown wary. "But weapons, no. Already too much guns." He eased a step closer to the stairs.

"Tell me about the icon. To whom does it really belong? Not you, and not the woman upstairs who isn't your mother."

The youth's knuckles whitened as he clutched the box tighter. "It is ours. The family that owned it are all dead. That is true. But they were Russian. It is ours, to do with what we want. To give. To sell. Not theirs. We have rights. Americans understand rights."

The youth was one of millions of ethnic Russians forcibly dispersed through the former Soviet Empire---in his case, the parcel of land Western textbooks called Bessarabia. The Moldavians, or Moldovans, wished to erase the artificial border between their land and Rumania. They had a point: The difference between the Moldovan language and the Rumanian language was less than the difference between American English and English English. Except the Moldovans had been compelled, since 1940, to write it with the alphabet known variously as Soviet, Russian, Cyrillic, or Greek, while the Rumanians used Latin letters, just like English.

Bruce Wayne had, however, found three potential terrorist factions beneath the Bessarabian label.

"What about the Gagauzi?" Batman asked. "What rights do the Gagauzi have?"

Crestfallen, the youth relaxed his grip on the box. His knuckles turned red as the blood flowed back to them. So did his face. He hadn't believed in Batman, not really, not the way the swine Moldavians did---thinking he was an incarnation of their national hero, Vlad Drakul. But Batman knew about the Gagauzi. How many Americans knew about the Gagauzi? There were only about a hundred and fifty thousand of them.

"It is"---the youth groped for the word---"like buying and selling, but without money. The Gagauzi have sheep, they have vineyards, they have tobacco. The sheep are... not so good. The wine, the tobacco, these are better than money. The Moldos will try to crush the Gagauzi first. Already they say: learn our language, do things our way. The Gagauzi see writing on the wall, yes? They do not like us Russians very much: Moscow said, learn our language, do things our way. But in the beginning, we had the army, and the army came from Moscow to protect them. Now Moscow is..." He mimed blowing out a candle. "No army. Just us and the Gagauzi. The Gagauzi and us.

"American patriot, Benjamin Franklin, says: We hang together, or for sure we hang apart."

The sheepherders Tiger mentioned on the dock. It all fit together. There were moments when Batman regretted the mask because there were moments when he wanted to bury his head in his hands. Instead he said: "So the Gagauzi give you---the Russians in Moldavia---wine and tobacco that you barter with other Russians---in Russia itself---for... icons... . ? And you sell the icons here, in America, to get money to buy guns for the Gagauzi to fight the Moldovans?"

The youth shook his head. "No money. We give the icons to the scar-faced man. Two already, this is third and last. After that. Nothing. Not for us. Finished. What the Gagauzi do, we don't see, we don't know. Very simple."

A bell rang inside Batman's head---the scar-faced man? There were undoubtedly thousands of scar-faced men in Gotham City. But lightning did strike in the same place, many times. And Batman's heart warmed with the knowledge that he knew where to find the right scar-faced man. He curbed his enthusiasm. There was still more to be learned here.

"And the icon you're holding? The one the Moldovans would have stolen successfully, if I had not intervened?"

The youth's face was as rigid as Batman's mask.

"They know it's still here. You know that they'll be back for it."

The youth began shaking. "So far, what you call down payment. This---this is payment: the best, the most valuable. Somehow, the swine find out. Without I bring the icon, no payment, no exchange. The Gagauzi, they will blame us. Then it is everyone against everyone else."

Alfred definitely had a point.

Batman needed only a few minutes to persuade the youth to tell him when and where the payment was to be made and to entrust him with the icon until that time.

"They will try to steal it from you," the youth said when the box was out of his hands. "They will stop at nothing. They will hire your enemies and send them after you."

Another light burned in Batman's head. "I'll count on it," he said as he left.