Chapter Text
Non Quis, Sed Quid = Latin for “Not Who, But What”
Superman was not the first superhero— in fact he wasn’t even one of the first dozen superheroes. By the time that the “Last Son of Krypton” appeared in all his red and blue glory there were at least three colleges which offered classes focused on the history of superheroes. Those classes usually started either with the theory that at least some world religions had started in response to heroes in pre-history, before moving on to legendary heroes who may have just been folk stories or tall tales and finally to the superheroes of World War I and World War II—the first men and women whom historians were confident enough to say were definitely superhuman.
If you asked a historian who the first superhero was you’d get a half-dozen different answers—it all depended on who you asked, if that person went with a “well it’s likely this person was real” or a “she probably wasn’t the first but she’s the first we have any sort of half-way decent evidence for.”
However, if you just grabbed some random person off the street and asked them who the first superhero was… well they’d probably say Superman. The Man of Steel had, in the eyes of the public, come out of nowhere, been the focus of every media outlet on earth and, perhaps more importantly, he’d seemed to be a symbol for other superheroes that it was time for them to step into the public eye. Soon enough there were all manner of superheroes and superheroines fighting crime in dozens of cities around the earth.
Then an alien race known as the Imperium invaded… and were defeated by Superman, Wonder Man, the Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman and the Martian Manhunter. The six heroes had met before the invasion and been in loose contact, but the invasion demonstrated the need for something more then “oh occasionally we talk” when it came to the wider superhero community. A sort of social club emerged which, over the course of a few months, started to turn into something more official. Not just a way to know who was who and who could do what in case of a world wide event, but a way for heroes to call for backup or expertise….
The Justice League officially took shape with the construction of their headquarters— the Watchtower Satellite, made possible through donations of alien materials and technology from the Green Lantern’s Corps as well as support from Hawkman’s off world contacts and Kryptonian records from the Fortress of Solitude.
Before the Watchtower was even one-third finished the heroes of Earth were all but lining up to join the six “Founders”. Green Arrow, Zatanna, Aquaman, Black Canary… the list went on and on. In addition to those heroes who reached out to the Justice League, the League started to reach out to new heroes as they came to light. Soon a system of sorts was founded to deal with potential new members. When a new hero appeared one of the “big names” at the League— usually, but not always one of the six Founders— would investigate. They would run a sort of background check, to ensure that they were dealing with a real hero and not just a vigilante or a crazy person. Once they’d done this, the League member would contact the hero and formally invite them to join the League… and innovation that was always accepted.
So the Justice League’s membership grew and sooner or later Superman met every single member— in fact it wasn’t unusual for the Man of Steel to be either the first or at lest one of the first to spot new heroes. Although Superman focused on Metropolis and largely confined his activities to the United States, he did function worldwide… and when he stepped out of the cape and tights and into Clark Kent’s ill-fitting suits he had access not only to new reports from all over the world, but also the gossip of those reporters. It was rare for a new hero to go a month without meeting the Last Son of Krypton, even if that meeting very often consisted of a simple greeting and handshake before they were essentially passed off to another member of the Justice League for the grand tour.
Since he’d stepped into the sun, wearing a cape and the symbol of the House of El upon his chest, Clark had seen the most unlikely people rise up to fight for what they believed in, in small towns and big cities… but even he was caught completely off guard by the news that a hero had appeared in Gotham.
Gotham was a city that had been tearing itself apart for years and always seemed just a half-second away from falling to pieces. It seemed like crime and corruption had ruled over the twisted streets and gothic architecture for decades. Gotham seemed more like something out of a dystopian novel then a real city— whispered rumors spoke of streets where the light of day was never seen and how little money one needed to bribe the police. Even Gotham newspapers didn’t bother to report on the corruption of the police and city hall, the murders and vicious assaults which seemed to reach some new depravity every other day, or fact that the crime rates appeared to rise very day… but then everything changed.
The first report came from Alexander Knox, a reporter for the Gotham Gazette who had only ever written meaningless puff pieces to fill in the black spaces between the articles people actually read and the ads which kept the papers in business. He’d apparently drawn the short straw and ended up riding along with the police on a drug bust… where they’d found one of the cities’ biggest crime bosses tied to a searchlight, with his goons scattered around his feet, bound and bruised. Knox had listened to the rambling of the goons and the terse replies of the crime boss to the officer’s questions and turned in an article entitled GIANT BAT IN GOTHAM! in which he repeated the crooks’ claims that they had been attacked and subdued by some sort of giant humanoid bat.
Understandably the article had made it’s way around the Justice League and the wider superhero community as fast as the Flash could make his way from New York to Los Angeles. Soon enough bets were being laid—was it really a giant humanoid bat? Was it a hero or “just” a vigilante? However no one made a move to seek out the potential new hero. Instead they waited for more information to emerge, that would help the League figure out if the “Bat” was a hero the Justice League could help or a vigilante the League would need to deal with.
A few weeks passed without any news of the Bat… just enough time for some members of the League to think that the spotlight incident had either been a one off or the “Bat” had died. They were proven very, very wrong when, on a seemingly ordinary night in May, Gotham all but exploded, ensuring that Gotham writers snagged top billing in pretty much every newspaper out there.
Alexander Knox had one of the most popular stories, albeit one with perhaps the most uninspired title— WHO IS THE BATMAN?— but no matter which writer the facts all lined up and formed a fascinating and terrifying story. Gotham had been attacked by an unknown but highly organized terrorist group. The only known member of the group was Jonathan Crane, the head of the Arkham Mental Asylum. Crane had used the Asylum to produce some sort of gas which had been released in the Narrows, one of Gotham’s oldest and most populated areas. The gas had driven thousands of people insane, leading to a blood bath as cops turned their guns on civilians and civilians tore each other apart with any weapon they could find… or even just their bare hands. The “Batman” had not only supplied the police with an antidote to the gas, but chased after a speeding train in order to save potentially millions of lives.
Along with the stories of Alexander Knox and several other Gotham based reporters—some of which had suffered the effects of the gas and all of whom witnessed the aftermath— the events of the night had been caught on film. While even the best footage was … well horrible. The best images had been caught by a security camera in the Narrows. They were dark, blurry and distorted— not only by the gas in the air, but by the movement of the Batman and the four men he’d been fighting. However even before the Justice League enhanced the images you could see that the “humanoid Bat” was a person in a costume of some sort—hence Knox calling him “Batman” It was black, with a cape and cowl that appeared to have stylized bat ears. In the last few frames of the security camera film the Bat could be seen using some sort of grappling hook and launcher to pull himself up and into the train the terrorists had boarded.
Lois Lane didn’t even bother to finish reading Alexander Knox’s article before she was rushing off to Perry White’s office to convince the editor-in-chief to send her to Gotham to get an exclusive report for The Daily Planet. Surprisingly Perry agreed… although he did assign the most muscular photographer the Daily Planet had. Clark had gotten the job of taking over the “Superman beat” while Lois was out of town. He’d been planning on either spying on Lois or tagging along as Superman… but then he’d been called away to deal with a minor crisis off world. While the Last Son of Krypton was off helping J’onn J’onzz to prevent an extinction level event in a solar system whose name had entirely too many Xs and Ys in it, Lois Lane found herself in the right place at the right time to get what, for another reporter, would have been the scoop of a lifetime.
For as long as people could remember, crime in Gotham had been controlled by several “Crime Families”. When Batman tied one the leader of one of those Crime Families to a spotlight it had kicked off a sudden and dramatic shift in the balance of power… which had led to a gang war which was further incensed by the events in the Narrows.
Lois had found herself right in the middle of a brawl between members of the Galante and Falcone Crime Families. She and the photographer Perry had sent to protect her likely would have died, just wo more victims of crime in Gotham… but then the Batman showed up, seemingly paying the reporter and photographer no attention as he dealt with the mobsters.
Despite being rightfully scared for his and Lois’ life, the Daily Planet’s photographer had done his job. Sure, most of the photographs were only slightly better than those which had been taken from the security camera footage. Even if he hadn’t been shooting a chaotic fight, it was night, the alley was dimly lit and the Batman was dressed pretty much entirely in black. Later the photographer would admit he wasn’t even looking at the photos he was taking, just hitting the button and hoping for the best. However for someone who couldn’t see past Clark Kent’s glasses, Lois did have the sharp eyes of a reporter and she noticed something which no article about the Bat or the Batman had mentioned.
Soon enough the last criminal had fallen to the ground, either unconscious or wishing that they were. The Bat was turning to leave when Lois all but jumped out her hiding place, shouting questions and all but pleading with Gotham’s vigilante for just one picture. Who knew if the Bat actually understood Lois’ pleas— her pleas had been quite frantic, there was some distance between the two of them and the Bat’s cowl seemed like it would at the very least muffle sound— but what mattered was that the Bat stopped, glanced back and then turned to face the two employees of the Daily Planet.
One photo showed the Bat turning towards Lois. It was a good photograph, would have been the cover of any number of newspapers… if not for the very next photograph, where the Bat was fully turned towards the camera. A half second after that second picture was taken the Bat was off, all but vanishing into the night as if he had never been there at all.
Neither Lois nor her photographer cared that the vigilante was gone… the two of them were too busy checking to see if that second photograph provided the evidence Lois needed to run the scoop of all scoops. As photographs of heroes/vigilantes went, it wasn’t anything impressive— the Bat stood, feet slightly apart, arms at their sides with their cape flared out behind them, a bruised and bloody mobster lying to one side. Because the Bat wasn’t moving and because of the light, the costume could be seen more closely— revealing it wasn’t just a simple suit like Superman wore, but had what appeared to be armor… but that wasn’t why the photograph was such a score for the Daily Planet. No the reason the photograph was so important is that Lois Lane had managed to prove what the criminals of Gotham knew (or at least suspected) but had yet to even hint at when talking to the police or reporters.
The Bat was not Batman… but Batwoman.
GOTHAM’S BAT A WOMAN Lois Lane’s article screamed. As could be expected this kicked off the usual storm of idiots who thought women couldn’t/shouldn’t be heroes, or that they should only be a certain kind of hero, the Justice League was more focused on trying to figure out what Batwoman’s powers were. Despite the fact that the footage and all the eyewitness accounts hadn’t mentioned any obvious powers, everyone seemed certain that Batwoman was something more than a “normal” human.
Shortly after Lois’ story broke, Commissioner Loeb publicly announced that the Gotham Police Department would be treating Batwoman as a criminal, issuing a warrant for her arrest and kicking off an investigation into her real identity. While some of the members of the Justice League—mostly those who were already convinced Batwoman was a hero— were surprised by this, to Clark it made sense that Gotham was wary. The city had been under the control of crime and corruption for too long to just blindly accept Batwoman like Metropolis had accepted Superman. It also didn’t help matters that Batwoman dressed in black and lurked in the shadows during the darkest hours of the night… the six Founders of the Justice League had created an image of superheroes as modern day knights in shining armor. Batwoman very clearly didn’t fit that mold— but even from the very beginning Clark couldn’t shake the feeling that while Batwoman wasn’t the hero Gotham wanted… she might perhaps be the hero that they needed.
Time passed and slowly more information came to light about Batwoman. She was seen more often around Gotham, captured more frequently on film and in photographs. Articles were written, news reports recorded and each one added new information, told of new exploits and spoke of criminals captured... criminals who either had warrants out for their arrest or who were delivered to the police with enough evidence for said arrest to take place. The next major breakthrough came when Vicki Vale, another reporter for the Gotham Gazette, got a little creative when it came to getting photographs to accompany her article on Batwoman.
It started when one of the crime families attempted to steal from one of Wayne Enterprises’ subsidiaries. Batwoman swooped in, fought about a dozen criminals and left them tied up for the police and sporting some very impressive bruises. Not content with the photograph she had of said criminals being hauled off, Vicki had asked to seethe business’ security cameras… and found that Wayne Enterprises had some of the most advanced security cameras available.
The camera which had captured the footage was mounted on a high fence that surrounded the parking lot of the complex. It showed Batwoman taking down the mobsters, tying them up and then leaving the scene and at first seemed to show her flying off… but a closer look revealed that she was using some sort of grappling hook, the same that she appeared to be using in the attack on the Narrows. However the reason the image (and the accompanying article) kickstarted Vicki Vale’s career was the amount of detail that could be seen of not only Batwoman fighting, but her costume, due to the flood lights in the parking lot.
Batwoman could have powers… but again there was no direct evidence. The fact that her costume had armor indicated that any invulnerability she had was more minor. Her fighting style seemed to be based in martial arts, though which martial arts was had to say since Wayne Enterprises had just released stills from the security footage. In the photographs what appeared to be some sort of utility belt with various pouches, one of which contained little throwing weapons which were shaped like bats. Her punches didn’t seem to pack more punch then a normal human, though she could have been pulling said punches like Clark did with almost everyone he fought.
The most striking photo was the very last one, depicting Batwoman leaving the scene via a grabbling hook. She was being pulled through the air, her cape flying out behind her like Superman’s did when he was flying, revealing that the end of Batwoman’s cape had a sort of ragged bottom, which seemed to be purely cosmetic and made it look almost like Batwoman had bat wings.
Vicki Vale titled her article GOTHAM’S DARK KNIGHT and just like that, Batwoman picked up a title of sorts. It had been clear that reporters were getting tired of writing “Batwoman” over and over again, so it didn’t take long at all for seemingly the entire world to accept the new title for Gotham’s mysterious masked woman, who could be hero, but could just as easily be a vigilante… or something worse.