Chapter 162 - My SI Stash #62 - A Subtle Knife by industrious (Worm/DCU) (1/2)

-A man from our World gets SI to Gotham with Jack Slash's powers~ (meaning he can slash your throat from across the room or several blocks away, needs proper aim though) Check it out!

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Posted on: forums.spacebattles.com/threads/a-subtle-knife-worm-yj-si.342043/page-6#post-17666169 (industrious)

PS: If you're not able to copy/paste the link, you have everything in here to find it, by simply searching the author and the story title. It sucks that you can't copy links on mobile (´ー｀)

-I'll be putting the chapter ones of all the fanfics mentioned, to give you guys a sample if you wan't more please do go to the website and support the author! (And maybe even convince them to start uploading chapters in here as well!)

Chapter 1.1-1.4

July 3rd, 2011, Early AM:

It's more than the constant feeling like your stomach is six inches too high, more than the steady throb at the temples, a regular beat of dizziness and pain, more than the limbs which just don't shake. It's also the knowledge that the next one (and there will be a next one, you know, even as you mumble that it'll *never happen again*) will be even worse - you aren't getting any younger, after all.

What was I even thinking, trying to go drink for drink with Chris? We weren't in college anymore, and he had eight inches and a like a hundred pounds on me.

I kept my eyes clenched shut against the blinding light, tried to think calming thoughts. My skull decided to play percussion anyway.

In the end, though, I had to get up. I had been lying on what felt like a lumpy beanbag chair; one of my nails or something must have slipped, because a foul, redolent smell the likes of which I had only encountered when I accidentally left some potatoes out to rot metaphorically grabbed my nostrils and began to beat me across the face with them.

”Oh, f_u_c_k me…”

...and there went this set of clothes. Five minutes into consciousness and you're already making the greatest life choices.

Shut up, me. Only way to go from here is up. Positive thoughts, my friend. Positive thoughts.

Step One: Get off the ripped bag of garbage you've been lying on since last night's bender.

My feet and legs felt like the jelly stuck to the sides of a jar - I was upright, seemingly in defiance of all laws of physics. At least, until they started to quiver, and I had to lean against what felt like a nearby brick wall to steady myself.

It was hard to do, given the sheer amount of muta crusting them shut, but I wasn't about to rub my dirty, garbage-touched hands on my eyes, no sir. But with an effort of what felt like supreme will at the time, I got them open, bleary, probably red-rimmed, unfocused.

...Yup, it was an alley. Probably the most stereotypical, straight-from-the-pictures alley you could find. The sort of alley that you wouldn't want to meet people you wouldn't want to meet in a dark alley in. And yes, that was a trash bag, how wonderful to find out.

”Thanks, Chris,” I mumble to myself, walking towards the nearest street. ”Ditch me in the sketchiest alley in New Orleans you can find when I come down to visit.”

I blink, and keep blinking to get my vision restored, before I remember that I don't have my contacts in. I fumble around in my pockets for my glasses before putting them on - they're filthy grimy what with the barhopping and sleeping in an alley, but I can at least start to have some detail in my vision…

This isn't New Orleans.

My heart pounds in my c_h_e_s_t as I take in the skyscr_a_p_ers around me. Even the business district of the Big Easy is modern; these look ancient. Weathered old turn-of-the 20th century buildings with Art Deco facades, with tier upon tier of gargoyles gasp downward at the city below. The streetlights look like hangman's nooses, and I stand there, mouth open like an idiot as I see the license plate of a parked car.

No way.

This can't be happening. How could this be happening?

Gotham isn't real.

No way. This has to be a dream or something, except my head still feels like someone's stuffed it full of brain and its beating at the door trying to get out and that was a mixed metaphor, wasn't it?

The people on the street are deliberately moving around me, and I realize how I must look. What had been a dressy tan shirt and jeans was smeared with garbage juice and vomit; still hungover, I had been swaying and staggering from side to side, and...I had been mumbling this can't be real to myself over and over.

I'd like to say that that realization let me snap to more attention. Honestly, though, what did it was the call of nature; I forced back the pounding and fuzz of the previous night's revelry, and ducked into another nearby alley, shaking my head in a vague attempt to clear it.

”I'm...in Gotham,” I said to the empty alley.

”I'm Gotham! With the crime, and the..everything, and...wow.”

I was a grown man, and I was not going to squee like some fangirl.

Nervous, yet somehow jubilant fanboyish giggling, however seemed completely appropriate. Or at least, uncontrollable. I must have looked like a ridiculous sight, my fly down, facing the alley wall.

And because someone up there seemed to have it in for me, just as I'm about to zip back up, someone grabs the back of my head and slams it against the alley wall.

”This is my alley! Mine!”

My ears are ringing, and I'm dazed and holycrapi'mingothami'mgettingmugged.

Can't get killed by a mugger. That would just be embarrassing.

I reach out with my right arm, try to drag myself away, but a boot stomps on my hand and my vision goes all white for a second and I hear the sound of tongue smacking against lips above me.

My other hand fumbles for something, anything to hit him with, to get free, to daze him, to run. I feel the cold glass of a longneck, grab it.

A hand forces its way into my back pocket, scrabbling for my wallet, and I rock myself onto my side, shouting something loud and incomprehensible, and slashing with the oddly light beer bottle and…

Oh my.

My attacker was the sort of bearded, filthy, coat-held-together-by-grime, fingerless-gloves-worn-unironically sort of homeless man that you see in the bad parts of cities, but don't ever look directly in the eye. Was, because there was a long, angry red jagged road across his c_h_e_s_t, and his eyes were wide and unfocused and as he collapses I scrabble back as he hits the pavement and the red begins to pool beneath him and and…

The longneck in my hand wasn't a whole bottle, just the jagged remains of one - I hadn't come anywhere near his flesh, hadn't felt any resistance as I slashed.

My eyes wide but not nearly as wide as the dying man in front of me, I throw the broken bottle against the side of the alley and turn around to flee…

He is there. Of course he is. It's Gotham.

He looks like a giant, a shadow, a creature of the night. I would recognize him anywhere, and somewhere, I dimly appreciate the fear in my veins at his appearance. At the grey body armor, and the black symbol every boy dreams of donning at least once in his life. At that expressionless, pitiless expression on his face; the white lenses (they don't look like lenses in person, they look like inhuman, glowing eyes) that stare through you. I stop short, mouth open in wordless horror.

I don't see how he knocks me out. I just feel pain, and then blackness.

Chapter 1.2

July 3rd, 2011

Whoosy.

In and out.

Blurred.

”...John Doe…”

”...severe bruising…”

Fuzzy…

July 4th, 2011

No, V_i_r_g_i_nia, this is not a dream. Though there may well be a Santa Claus, given that I'm in Gotham. Less than half an hour of consciousness in the city, and I had already gotten assaulted by a hobo and knocked out by Batman. You really can't get more Gotham than…

Yeah, this sort of fond reminiscence isn't going to distract me from the fact that I'm in a jail cell. For the first time, ever. Thankfully, I'm alone in this cell, and from the silence, I don't think anyone else is on this block. I'd wonder why I was put all alone, but...Gotham. They probably have wings of normally empty cell blocks that go unused until there's another crime wave or gang war every few weeks.

I hope that my isolation is because they're being charitable, that they don't think I'm a threat. And, let's be honest here, I don't really look like one. Being shorter than your average human will do that to you; I blame my mother, and the fact that I'd spend most mealtimes with a book in one hand and a fork in the other. And while I had been rail thin throughout childhood and college as a result, my entry into the working world had given me that worst of all builds, that dread combination of ”skinny, but has a bit of a belly, and no muscle.” I swear, I'm going to the gym this weekend. Maybe Tuesday. Honest

Only...let's be honest again here. I am a threat, whether or not the GCPD knows it. I don't know if they'll be able to forensics that bottle, but I know there wasn't any blood on it, despite seeing up close (notgoingtopuke, notgoingtopuke) what it did to my would-be attacker. I wasn't anywhere near close enough to actually hit him.

No, I'm not going to say it. This is a jail cell, and you were taken here presumably by Batman, and there is probably a camera, a mic, and several bat-shaped other mics in the cell with you.

I really want to say it, though.

I settle for screaming it mentally, as loud as possible.

I've got superpowers!

This thought is swiftly followed up by a reminder as to whose powers I presumably have. And then a reminder that I should probably test things to be sure.

The bench I'm seated on is made of concrete; I lie belly-down on it, resting my head on crossed forearms. I've been on vacation the past few days; my nails have grown out, slightly. Slowly, deliberately, I keep my index finger about an inch above the surface, drag it up and down. And then side to side. And in circles. And finally, in a odd squiggle that I've played around with since I was about 9 that originally might have been the letter ”r” in...one of the Elvishes in Tolkein.

Five minutes later, when I've stopped hyperventilating, I have my thoughts mostly in order.

First, I'm in Gotham, presumably somewhere in a DC Continuity. Given I have superpowers, I can assume it's not the Nolan one.

Second, I...have Jack Slash's power. At least, I have one of his powers. The obvious one. Batman isn't superhuman, so the other one wouldn't work on him. Would it work on any DC characters, then?

At this point, I am quietly furious that of all the powers to get, I had to get one of the worst, least-heroic powers of them all. Will had loved Jack's power - his full powerset, mind you - but if I had to choose one power to be stuck with, I'd have gone with Harbinger's. I had made plans for getting intuitive mathematics one day. I had even played as a Number Man expy in that Sentinels of the Multiverse game…Santa's a jerk.

Shaking my head, I stop that sort of thinking immediately. It wasn't productive, thinking about my friends wasn't going to do anything for my state of mind, and I had to accept that I...had the powers of Earth Bet's most infamous murderhobo. Probably. I still didn't know if I had the really important power, the one that made Jack Slash a name to be feared.

Having temporarily exhausted this line of reasoning, I examine myself more closely. The GCPD has confiscated my stuff, put me in the an orange jumpsuit with the name ”John Doe” on it. Which, given that my wallet is now with them, means that either my various IDs are missing, or this is a generic prisoner's jumpsuit. Probably the latter, since they can't just make custom made nametags for every prisoner, even one with a name as common as

I try to say my name, out loud. It should come automatically, a reflex, no thought or effort whatsoever.

I'm not stunned or anything. There isn't any physical reaction. No blackouts. It's as if someone had come in with a pair of psychic scissors and neatly cut my name out from my headspace.

...I hope that my vocabulary hasn't turned into Wormverse slang. I don't even like the sound of the word ”copacetic.”

If I can't say or think my birth name, what about…

”Pac-Man.”

At least I could use my old fraternity name. Though for obvious reasons, it would be a terrible nickname, and I'd probably be sued if I tried to make it a superhero name. Assuming Pac-Man was actually a thing in this universe.

My musings on interdimensional copyright law is broken up by the sound of the cell block door opening. I stand up, stick my nose between the bars to take a look.

As the slightly blue-skinned man in the refrigerated suit takes slow, plodding steps towards the cell opposite me, almost comically large chains at his wrists and ankles, and flanked on either side by two guards with very large and intimidating-looking shotguns, I figure I'm going to know if I have Jack Slash's powers sooner rather than later.

Chapter 1.3

July 4th, Early PM

My high school English teacher was, among other things, a volunteer chaplain at a prison. If we were insightful or ahead of the curriculum, or if he just wasn't feeling like teaching, he tell us about it.

”In the movies, people always ask 'what're you in for',” he say. ”But in prison, nobody talks that way. People don't talk about why they got inside. A lot of them are just trying to serve their time in peace.”

With this in mind, I nod a polite yet vague greeting at the supervillain right across my cell. His eyes narrow as my head bobs.

”So.”

His voice has that robo-distortion that always spooked me as a kid. This version of Mr. Freeze doesn't have the pink gloves, though, so it's probably not the DCAU. Though I know he changed suits at least once after the Animated Series.

”What are you doing in this wing?”

...I guess that my English teacher's advice didn't apply to supercriminals.

”For the same reasons you're being kept here,” I say. ”A simultaneous excess and insufficiency of ability.”

...What am I even saying? I didn't mean to say that - really. I mean, it was better than what I was thinking of saying, which involved stammering, avoiding eye contact, and managing to mumble something when all was said and done, but

Whatever I said, it seems to placate Mr. Freeze; he returns my nod at least.

...And Jack Slash powers, confirmed. Mr. Freeze is accepting my words here. Which came naturally.

Jack Slash had the power to intuitively sense and get information from other parahumans; he knew, at least subconsciously, what they were going to do to him and his. What made them tick.

How to manipulate them.

This is probably going to be really bad for my mental health, but I'm going to need to think of this conversation like he did. Like a game, with carrots and sticks, and a goal to move towards. Limitations to ensure creative solutions. This is already sounding like a terrible idea, but it's better than any other option that comes to mind.

So, what do I want out of this conversation? I'd like Mr. Freeze to...not kill me. While we're in jail. I don't remember him being a violent prisoner, at least, so I think my first comment took care of that. I don't think I can convince him to turn away from villainy in a single conversation, so that's out…

No, what I need is information. About Gotham. About which version of the DCU I'm in. And when in the timeline I'm in.

Limitations? Well, this whole cell block is probably wired for sound. I don't want to come off like a fellow supervillain to the police. At the same time, I don't want to alienate Mr. Freeze too badly, especially since he's seen my face, so…

The glass dome keeping his head cool is cracked.

”The Bat,” I say, half-question, half-statement. A neutral statement for him to interpret as he wants.

”And his Boy Wonder.”

Now that's interesting. Not ”the latest Boy Wonder,” but at the same time, we have ourselves a Dynamic Duo. No mention of a Batgirl, but if there is one, she's probably a redhead.

I shrug.

”It could have been worse.”

”Oh?” Seeing a raised eyebrow without any hair is strange.

I can't keep up this conversation, not while we're probably bugged. Even what I've already said probably makes has me looking more and more suspicious.

I keep my tone light, and playful, with my eyes partially closed. This is meant to seem an idle thought...