- That man you saw tonight is the boy that none of us saved. Who Bruce would have been. Who he was meant to be. The city gave him back. This is his reward. This is his afterlife. This is the real Bruce Wayne.
Batman (Volume 2) #43 is an issue of the series Batman (Volume 2) with a cover date of October, 2015. It was published on August 12, 2015.
Synopsis for "Superheavy, Part Three"
Jim Gordon, having just admitted to Bruce Wayne that he is Batman, explains that he needs Bruce's help. Despite Bruce's profession that he no longer knows anything about Batman, Jim shows him the "seed" he pulled from the corpse of one of the recent bioelectrically powered criminals in Gotham City. Someone called Mr. Bloom is selling these small devices in to criminals in the Narrows, and it is imbuing those bad people with powers. Jim believes Bruce can help because he is the only link that Jim has to the real Batman. He developed the Batsuit Jim now wears, and even if Powers, Inc. absorbed Wayne Enterprises, the tech still belongs to Bruce. If Bruce can help Jim reconfigure that tech, he can work privately as Batman, without Powers' oversight. Lawman that he is, Jim knows that Batman needs to work outside the law.
Bruce resists Jim's arguments, insisting that he can't be the man he was again. He is trying to rebuild his life using the most basic building blocks - he doesn't need his life complicated by this. They are interrupted by Julie Madison, who invites Jim to stay for lunch, but he excuses himself instead, leaving the seed with Bruce in the hopes that he'll change his mind.
Outide, Alfred Pennyworth sits parked in his car with Clark Kent, who insists that even if the man he sees through the walls looks like his Bruce Wayne, the man he sees is just not him. Alfred responds that the man Clark sees is the only true Bruce Wayne to ever walk the earth. Clark wonders what happened to the old Bruce, in that case.
Alfred explains that when Bruce died in the cavern collapse, he felt it. He knew that Bruce had truly died. Despite the efforts of the family to recover his body, it was three weeks before his own daughter Julia discovered it - intact. He drove to collect the body and lay him to rest. By the time he'd arrived, though, Bruce had come back to life. The dionesium had healed him from death, but apparently it had also erased all memory of who he had formerly been. Reluctantly, Alfred had told him the truth, talking him through the tragedies of his life. Before he could tell him everything, though, Bruce had stopped him. He explained that he was not this man Alfred had been describing. He cannot feel the loss of parents he doesn't remember having. That Bruce Wayne is not who he is. After hearing the truth, Bruce took two days away and returned with the news that despite not being the man he was, he still wanted to help in his own way - through philanthropy. Soon after, Julie Madison had knocked on the door, and Bruce had an opportunity to help.
Clark insists that if Alfred doesn't tell Bruce that he is Batman, he will. Alfred responds by pulling a Kryptonite ring from his pocket and warning that if he must tell Bruce, he should know that this Bruce Wayne has no combat skills, detection skills, or any of the training he gained over fifteen years. That information is gone as if it was never in his brain - his brain is essentially new. Putting on the cowl would be a death sentence for this Bruce Wayne. Batman was born of tragedy, and that tragedy had been a scar that drove him to become Batman. That scar has healed. Clark still believes that Bruce is Batman, so Alfred leads him away to see a device - Batman's last invention. It is a machine meant to ensure that there will always be a Batman. It would use his DNA to grow clones that age to 27, instil in them all the original Bruce's pain, and all of his memories up to the moment of becoming Batman. Even with all of his genius, though, Bruce had never managed to finish the device. He was never meant to live forever. Batman died, and Bruce Wayne came back. Alfred begs Clark to let this Bruce Wayne - a Bruce Wayne untouched by tragedy - live in happiness. Someone else can suffer for Gotham.
Secretly, Jim steals the Batsuit in the hopes of working outside of Powers' influence - but it must be a suit and nothing more. Regardless of the danger, Jim hopes to learn about Mr. Bloom. In service of that, he is breaking into a Devil Pigs lair. They are one of several rival gangs that have been in the city for nearly a century - so it strikes him as strange that Mr. Bloom could get them all to come to him. As he speculates about this with Julia, he spots surveillance footage showing him a man in a mask with a flower on it, and he wonders who it could be. He is interrupted by Qi Tsu, leader of the Devil Pigs, who considers Mr. Bloom a friend to each of the gangs. When he realizes he's surrounded, Julia warns Jim that she can't get him into stealth mode due to some kind of jammer.
Hoping to buy himself an escape, Jim fires a Batarang gun into the crowd of them, leaping behind cover as they retaliate with automatic weapons. Qi Tsu calls for a ceasefire, and as he and Jim standoff, Jim fires a perfect shot straight into his enemy's forehead, dropping him and driving the other Devil Pigs to return fire again, breaking the glass on their aquarium and causing the mutated sharks within to slip out onto the floor. The confusion allows Jim to take down the others, but Julia warns that Qi Tsu is alive, and he triggers a trapdoor, dropping Jim into a furnace that his suit cannot withstand. Worriedly, Julia insists on coming to help him, as there's no way out, but someone knocks her unconscious.
Meanwhile, Bruce Wayne examines Duke Thomas' file, unsure of why the boy seems to have a problem with him. Julie reminds that while Bruce may not remember his history with Duke, they do have one. After she guides Bruce out, to go home, Duke sneaks into the office and steals the seed from Bruce's desk.
Elsewhere, Mr. Bloom meets with The Penguin, trying to sell his seeds. Cobblepot notes that he has never needed powers to wield power in Gotham. Mr. Bloom responds that he has no intention of giving Penguin himself a seed. Unmoved by the pitch, he has Mr. Bloom shot through the head. Unexpectedly, sharp vines shoot up from the body and pierce through the torsos of Penguin's men, and the Penguin's own gut. Standing on long, gangly legs, Mr. Bloom explains that weeds like him are hard to kill, and grow very fast.
Appearing in "Superheavy, Part Three"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
- Alfred Pennyworth (Flashback and main story)
- Bruce Wayne (Flashback and main story)
- Julia Pennyworth (Flashback and main story)
- Clark Kent
Antagonists:
- Devil Pigs
- Qi Tsu (First appearance)
- Mister Bloom (First appearance)
- Penguin
Other Characters:
- Duke Thomas
- Julie Madison (Flashback and main story)
- Lucius Fox (In a photograph only)
- Martha Wayne (In a photograph only)
- Thomas Wayne (In a photograph only)
Locations:
- Gotham City
- Lucius Fox Center for Gotham Youth
- Wayne Manor (Flashback only)
- Batcave (Flashback and main story)
Items:
Notes
- This issue is reprinted in Batman: Superheavy.
See Also