Sell you a Bridge chapter 296

June 15th 2016 Gotham City 2:00 PM EDT

My  first clue this wasn't the right Gotham was the water. My second clue  was the wreckage. My third clue was the enraged red skinned monster with  dripping fangs hurling itself from water next to me. It shouldn't have  been possible really, there wasn't room below the surface, but it  happened and my reaction speed was more than up to calling Tartarus to  rip the thing in half. I heard Zee shout 'Fire" in the background, and  the corpse turned to ash before it hit the ground. I really needed to  pick up some of those spells.

I turned around, sighing.  "Well. Pretty sure that tears it. This isn't our Gotham. Rana, any clue  how we got here or how we get back? I realize this was unexpected for  everyone, but I have nothing really. Whatever B-guy did to the abyss is  well beyond what I can do. I imagine we can go back in, but it'll just  drag us deeper. I say we lay low for a bit and figure out a plan. The  only thing I'm not sure about is where the hell we should go. If this is  a different Gotham than any place we could hole up might be occupied by  another version of us. Any ideas?"

Zee raised a hand. "I  mean...maybe Shadowcrest? Granted some alternate universe version of me  or my dad might be there, but that's two possible people vs. what?  Infinity? I should be able to get through the wards too, at least if  this dimension HAS a version of me. Bloodline and all. If not...fuck, I  don't know. We can reassess once we get there. Work for everyone?"

No  one had a better idea, so we all fell in and let Jim cloak us as we  walked. Everyone was scanning the streets looking concerned, but we  hadn't seen anything since the red monster attacked us. The place was a  fucking swamp graveyard. I leaned in toward Artemis. "You see anything  that might tell us what the actual fuck happened here? Because aura wise  all the dark energy is making it impossible for me to get anything, and  I don't even know where to start anyway." I fished out my phone to see  if I could get a signal, but big surprise, I couldn't find an active  hotspot.

She just shook her head, a disturbed look on her  face. "No. I can't see anything. Kind of wish we could find one of those  stupid newspaper boxes. It might have some information we could use."  Sadly I didn't see one. We might run across it on the way, but our lives  weren't quite convenient enough for th...wait. I gestured for everyone  to stop.

I turned to Tommy."Hey boss man. Quick question.  Do you think you could make it so there was one of those newspaper boxes  around the corner? Wait, do you have those in the uk? The metal ones  with the glass fronts where you can see the day's newspaper for sale? If  we can find one we should be able to figure out what was going on  before...this." I gestured around us at the destruction. "They had to  have been putting out the news until whatever it was happened. At the  very least we can get a clue to what's going on."

He  frowned but nodded after a second. He closed his eyes, bringing his  existential nature to bear, and I felt the world SHIFT. It was  interesting feeling Tommy use his gift after my upgrade. More...quiet.  Like it was less of a change compared to what I'd felt before. I  suspected it was just my relative metaphysical weight changing. A wave  pool is less jarring to a great white shark than a guppy. His eyebrow  twitched for a second, but once it was done, he nodded. "Alright. There  should be one up ahead. The complete lack of people and our lack of  knowledge of this place are making it way easier for me."

I  grimaced but couldn't complain too much. As we came around the corner  another red thing jumped from the water and died just as quickly under  my keyblade. These things were really annoying When we reached the  weathered and beaten blue box we stopped. I gestured to Tommy, who  closed his eyes again. The side of the thing was dented and the whole  box was waterlogged. We couldn't see all of the newspapers though, which  meant there was a chance that one of them was still readable.

He  reached out without opening his eyes and shoved his hand into the box  to grab one of the things, pulling out a shockingly still dry newspaper  and passing it to me. I flipped it open and scanned the whole thing, my  speed reading and perfect memory and excellent fit for this particular  situation. The more I read, the more weirded out I got. Most of the  stories were updates on the crisis happening nearby. Atlantis had  declared war on the land. There were mentions of a series of gruesome  murders of metahumans beforehand, and some society pages about...Bryce  Wayne?

I blinked, flipping through the pages faster.  Nothing too specific, but there were more references to Bryce Wayne, who  was apparently formerly in a relationship with Sylvester Kyle, now  deceased. I blinked and looked up. "Ok. Well...this is weird. So  apparently in this world...genders are reversed? Probably? Bruce Wayne  is a woman, and I recognize a few other names that seem familiar but  off. Like the front page article here was written by Victor Vale, and  there are multiple references to Commissioner Jane Gordon.: I paused.  "Oh, also Atlantis declared war on Gotham and drowned the city."

I  knew adding that as an afterthought was ridiculous, but...come on.  Female Bruce Wayne? She was kind of hot too. Did that mean there were  male versions of the girls? A female me? This place was wrinkling my  brain.

Shaking that off, I started filling everyone in as  we got moving again. Rana took up position next to me to counter any  threats. The two of us were the strongest of the group in a head to head  fight. I even called up my armor. I didn't need it really, but it was  extremely comforting to have my shell around me, and it was so much more  powerful with my new higher base state. Plus it felt good to have the  layer of defense around me. The trip took less time than I'd expected,  probably because there was no traffic to hold us up but within an hour  we'd made the walk to Shadowcrest.

When we came into view  of the place I stopped, raising an eyebrow in surprise. As opposed to  the rest of Gotham, Shadowcrest was perfectly intact. The grass wasn't  even wet. That monstrous old house was just sitting untouched in the  middle of its estate cut off from everyone. Which honestly boded well  for our mission to find...someone. it also might help us track down a  way home from this shithole. Shadowcrest had a hell of a library. There  had to be something in there.

While I was staring in  surprise, Zee stepped up next to me, Sindella on my other side. They  each raised a hand to probe the wards. Sindell, unfortunately, just  shook her head. "Damn. I hoped it would still let me pass, since I  hopefully have a counterpart in this world. Seems as though if I did I'm  not enough like them to get by." She flicked her eyes to her daughter.  "How about you, Zee? Still have access?"

Zatanna nodded.  "Yes, Shadowcrest is the ancestral home of our family. My bloodline  means im always welcome." She paused briefly. "Weirdly, the thought that  any random other dimensional version of me can show up and just walk  into the house isn't comforting. I don't live there anymore but there's  lots of powerful artifacts at Shadowcrest. Remind me to stop by and fix  that when we get home." She adressed that last one to me and I gave her a  thumbs up. Perfect memory made me much better than a note pad.

Still,  she was able to open us a way through with minimal effort. Zee's  casting and magic handling proficiency was monstrous at this point, and  the fact that her new casting focus was a conceptual key the size of a  child probably didn't hurt much either when opening doors. She took the  wards down and let us in, and we hurried across the grounds to the door.  Once we reached the porch she raised the wards behind us to make sure  none of those weird red things followed us through and then raised a  hand to knock on the door.

I wasn't sure why she knocked  until I remembered this place was perfectly defended. It would make  sense if someone was home, and I didn't want to get magic bombed into  dust by whatever this world's equivalent of Zatara was. There was no  response for a minute, and then the door jerked open and a gorgeous  woman with long blonde hair glared out at us. She had a hand in her  pocket, and was looking ready to attack as she raked her eyes over us.  "You lot better have a hell of a reason for showing up at my door."

Her  voice had a familiar british accent, extremely similar to one I'd heard  before. Zee glared at her. "Excuse me? This is MY door. Shadowcrest is  the Zatara family manor, and I'm pretty sure you aren't a Zatara. I  would be able to tell." Zee was tense, and I saw her fingers flex around  the hilt of Star Seeker, which she was still carrying. The blonde  brit's eyes flicked to the keyblade, and he looked a bit uncertain at  the shape and design of the weapon.

She  shook it off fast though, her face hardening as she stared at us all.  "Listen, I don't know who the hell you people are, but the Zatara family  is dead. Has been for a while now. Zachary passed me ownership of the  house before he was killed, so it's mine now. I don't know if you're  supposed to be distant cousins or something, but you aren't taking my  damn house. So if that's what you're here for, get lost. I may not be  able to turn the wards on you, but I have other defenses in place. Ones I  designed myself."

I  stepped forward in front of Zee, still in my armor. It was a testament  to the woman's calmness that she hadn't even acknowledged it. Granted,  Drood armor was a very noticeable gold, and mine was black so she might  just not recgnize it. She hadn't seen it come out of it's torc, so right  now I just looked like a guy covered in black metal. "Ok, let's take a  step back here. We can explain better inside, but I realize we need  introductions before you'll let us in. So why don't I start. My name is  Morgan O'Malley. This is Zatanna Zatara and her mother Sindella."

I  stopped the introductions after those three. There were a lot of us,  and it made sense to see if she recognized the names of those of us most  likely related to the house. The woman's blue eyes narrowed at us, and I  couldn't help but think she looked a bit familiar. "I don't know of any  Zatanna. Sindella either. Zachary used to own this house, he got it  from his mother Gianna." I had to hold back my flinch as she confirmed  what I was pretty sure was the death of this world's version of my  girlfriend.

She  looked around between us, seemingly trying to weight what was going on  but finally gave a grudging nod and stepped back. "Well, my protections  don't just extend to the porch, and you're past the outer wards. Might  as well come in before you start drawing the Dead Waters." She stepped  back cautiously, allowing us to pass under her careful scrutiny. Once  she was inside she pushed the door shut and turned to us. "Oh, right.  Introductions. My name is Johanna Constantine. This is my house now."