Chapter 10
The next day Steve gets to work early. Clark’s desk is empty but Steve isn’t surprised, he heard about an Earthquake in Los Angeles on the news this morning. Steve pours himself a coffee and takes a seat at his desk, greeting Perry, and Lois, and Jimmy as they trickle in.
Clark comes in a few minutes late fiddling with his tie and smelling faintly of smoke. He hunches his shoulders to appear smaller, never really standing up straight. Bucky did that sometimes, when too many eyes were on him. It made him look less intimidating, less of a threat. Steve can’t believe what an idiot he’s been and it’s only a small comfort that apparently nobody other than Batman has ever figured it out either.
Steve has thought long and hard about what he plans on saying to Clark today. He has gone over scripts in his head, strategized on how to explain his own dual life, has gotten everything just about perfect, and then chucked it all. This isn’t his secret to know. If Clark didn’t trust him enough to tell him in the first place, than the best thing Steve can do is respect that and keep a lid on it.
All morning Steve works on his art, his eyes drifting to where Clark is talking to Lois and laughing easily. It’s good to know that Superman has a normal life and normal friends. It’s reassuring that Superman can put being a superhero on hold to tell Jimmy how to talk to girls or tell a joke to Lois. That Superman can spend some time just being Clark Kent. Since waking up from the ice, Steve never really had that. The world needed Captain America too much to let Steve Rogers exist.
“Steve,” Clark says, “Ready to got meet with Greks?”
“Right, ready,” Steve says. He brushes away his thoughts, no use dwelling on his past, and grabs his notebook and some pens.
The World War Two exhibit is small compared to the one Steve visited in the Smithsonian. Army Greens are hung in glass cases and there’s a wall detailing the different medals handed out during the war. A black and white film showing a US camp plays on loop.
“Thank you for meeting with us.” Clark says. Steve turns around to see a smartly dressed man with dark red hair and a pair of bifocals.
“I’m happy to Mr. Kent, I’ve been following yours and Ms. Lane’s articles about the network of Neo-Nazis with interest.” Mr. Greks says shaking his hand.
“I’m here to ask about a couple of World War Two era guns, Lugar Pistols. You wouldn’t happen to have anything like that would you?” Clark asks. Steve looks at the guns on display, mostly German guns.
“I’m afraid not. I bought a few for the museum. But unfortunately they were stolen months ago. Along with several other guns from the same era.” Mr. Greks shakes his head, “a shame too. They would have fit perfectly in the exhibit.”
“Did they ever catch who did it?” Clark asks. Steve cocks his head to listen in as he walks around each display. It’s rather odd seeing a museum dedicated to World War Two that doesn’t mention Captain America or even Hydra in passing.
“Nothing. Not a trace.” Mr. Greks says, “I don’t think the police really cared at the time.”
Steve stops, a Nazi flag is stretched out on the wall in front of him. An SS uniform displayed beneath it. A wave of disgust rolls down Steve’s spine. The flag is displayed a bit too proudly as it hangs as a centerpiece to the whole exhibit, it reminds him of marching through Germany.
Across from it is an American Flag with a description that it came from the 107th infantry regiment. Bucky’s old unit. Steve looks away, a swell of homesickness washing over him.
For a museum dedicated to World War Two Steve finds it lacking. There’s little mention of the Pacific front, except for a small plaque regarding Pearl Harbor and the holocaust is mostly confined to one corner. It’s a shame how little funding goes into museums like these, how easily history is forgotten. Though, Steve supposes, he’s a bit biased on these things.
“But you must have your own suspicions? I’m sure the average robber wouldn’t want a bunch of historical guns.” Clark says, “They can’t be as practical as the modern versions.”
“Well,”Mr. Greks hesitates, “I don’t want to get anyone in trouble, but the intern we had at the time was a bit…difficult. I ended up having to fire him not long after.”
“Can you give us his name?” Lois asks but Mr. Greks is already shaking his head.
“I’m sorry we don’t give out employee information, even ex-employees.”
“Understandable, thank you for your time.” Clark says.
Outside Lois, Clark, and Steve reconvene.
“I’ll head back to the office and start making calls,” Lois says, “it shouldn’t be that hard to track down an intern.”
“Good, I’ll—” Clark cuts himself off, tilting his head as if he’s suddenly heard something. A wrinkle appears between his eyes as he frowns.
“Clark, you don’t look so good, maybe you should head home.” Steve says.
“What?... Oh, yeah. Headache.” Clark mumbles before running off.
“Clark?” Lois calls after him, “That’s not even the direction of his apartment.”
She starts to go after him.
“He probably wants to stop at the store for Advil or something.” Steve says hailing a cab, “we should get back to the office. The intern is a good lead.”
“Right,” Lois says, still looking worried as she slides into the taxi next to Steve.
The ride back is spent speculating on how the intern could have gotten the guns without showing up on the security cameras. Steve likes Lois. There’s a fire in her that is reminiscent of Peggy. Peggy would have definitely liked Lois. She was always of the opinion that there weren’t enough women reporters covering serious stories. Usually that complaint was made in a bar shooting whisky back with the commandoes after yet another war correspondent saw fit to comment on her legs while she was trying to update the press on the latest casualty count.
Not that all reporters were bad. Some were out there on the front lines, eating the same sludge that hardly counted as food as the troops. Those reporters were heroes. Steve has a feeling Lois would have been one of those reporters.
Lois starts calling around as soon as she gets back to the office. From his desk Steve can hear her arguing with the temp agency that placed the intern with the museum. He keeps his head low to hide his grin.
Clark shows back up just after lunch, heading to his desk like he doesn’t notice Lois staring after him.
“What happened with your headache?” She asks.
“My what?” Clark says and Steve huffs. Clark needs to get better at lying if he plans on keeping his identity a secret indefinitely.
“Right, my headache. I was feeling better and I really don’t want to miss any breaks in this case.” Clark recovers with an easy smile that Lois accepts without question. Steve shakes his head, Clark is lucky that Lois has such a soft spot for him. It’s the only excuse he can think of that’s allowed Clark to slip past her for so long.
“Good, you can help me argue with the woman at the temp agency.” Lois says.
“Actually, don’t need to. I stopped at the museum on my way back and convinced Greks to give me the name.” Clark says.
“How’d you do that?” Lois asks.
“I managed to charm the name out of him.”
Steve wonders how much of Clark’s charm relied on Superman’s x-ray vision.
“Well there’s no use standing around here and waiting, let’s go.” Lois says grabbing her jacket.
“You coming Steve?” Clark asks, “Or do you have enough material for your art.”
Steve looks at his half-finished drawing. He really should be working. Anything important they learn Steve’s sure Superman will share with the Captain…but being a part of the investigation feels too good. It’s like having a mission again. It feels right.
“I could use a little more,” Steve says.
They stand on the street outside the intern’s apartment door.
“James Weber, age 22. Studying history and political science at the local college.” Clark says. Lois knocks. They hear a thump from inside, like someone has fallen off a couch. A few minutes later James opens the door. There are dark bags under his eyes and his clothing is rumpled like he fell asleep in them after a long night.
“Hello?” He asks. Lois smiles.
“Hello, we’re doing a story on internships and local college students,” Lois says, “we were wondering if we could ask you some questions?”
James stares at them a moment before shrugging, “I guess.”
He opens the door and lets them in. Beer cans sit on top of textbooks and the ground is littered with papers. James kicks a few of them out of the way as he leads them to the couch, and mutters an apology.
“Finals week is coming up. Didn’t have time to clean.” He grabs a few used paper plates from the coffee table and hastily stuffs them in the trash.
“So you wanted to ask me about my internship at the library?” He asks.
“Library, I thought you were an intern at the museum.” Lois says. James’s cheeks go pink.
“No, I…um lost that job.” James says, embarrassed. Lois gives him a sympathetic look, as if she wasn’t already aware.
“I’m sure it happens to a lot of young kids. First time out in the work force, you show up a bit late, a bit hung over, one too many times.”
“It wasn’t like that,” James snaps, “I did take the internship seriously.”
“Then what happened?” Clark asks gently. Watching Lois and Clark work in tandem is a treat, like watching Clint and Natasha fight. Two minds becoming one on the battlefield.
“I got into an argument because Greks is an idiot.” James says, “And instead of admit that he was wrong, he fired me.”
“What did you argue over?”
“Him wasting money, making stupid purchases.” James says, his face flushing in anger.
“What do mean?” Lois prompts.
“He bought these stupid guns. A ton of them, way too many to actually display. We didn’t even need more guns; we have a full wall of them already.” James says.
Lois and Clark share a look.
“And these guns,” Clark asks, “what did Mr. Greks do with them? Did he display them?”
James shakes his head, “Nah, never got the chance. Someone stole all of them. Karma.”
“How unfortunate.” Lois says.
“I’d say blessing in disguise. Everything’s insured. Maybe he’ll use the insurance money to buy things that we can actually put out for the public.” James says, “It was probably the “blessing in disguise” comment that got me fired.”
“Well, it certainly sounds like you got a raw deal and we will be certain to include that in our story,” Lois says.
“Thanks. The school gave me so much shi- sorry, a hard time for getting fired so I’d love to be able to show them your article when you finish.” James says as he leads them to the door.
“Just keep your eye on the paper.” Lois says.
The head back to the office and convene around Lois’s desk.
“So the kid sounded sincere, but I don’t know,” Lois says, chewing on a pen, “Clark, thoughts?”
“He didn’t seem like a liar,” Clark says, “maybe we should go back to Greks and see if he would let us look at the security tapes from the night the guns went missing.”
“If he even still has them.” Lois says.
“This line might be a dead end.” Clark sighs. Steve looks out the window; it’s a disappointing conclusion and one that doesn’t quite sit right with him. Outside he can see an American flag flapping in the breeze. Something clicks.
“The American flag was displayed under the Nazi flag.” Steve says..
“And?” Lois asks.
“It goes against regulations to display a US flag under another.” Steve says, “Trust me, I’ve been to enough museums to know that no self-respecting museum would display a US flag below a Nazi flag. And when I was walking around I also noticed that the exhibit was scarce on details about the holocaust. Maybe it’s a funding issue…but Neo-Nazis also love to downplay the holocaust.”
Clark folds his arms and Lois leans forward, both look intrigued.
“All the guns stolen were German. And James said there were too many to even display. What if Greks bought the guns, intending for them to be stolen?”
“It’s a good cover.” Clark says, “Nobody would be suspicious of a museum curator buying old guns and Nazi paraphernalia.”
“Well, then” Lois says standing up, “Let’s go back to Greks, and see what he has to say for himself.”
“You can’t go in and accuse a man of being a Nazi.” Clark says, “Everything we have is circumstantial. Let me talk to Superman. He can go in and snoop around tonight.”
Lois crosses her arms.
“I’m serious. It’s dangerous.” Clark says.
Lois rolls her eyes, “fine. One night and then I’m interviewing Greks and Superman about it.”
Tonight. It seems Steve’s night just got booked. That suits him just fine. Even if Clark hadn’t decided to check it out Steve would have done his own snooping on the museum. Clark’s collaboration will just make his job easier.
Still, Steve has a few hours between his day job and his night job. There are several ways he could spend it. Jimmy invited him for drinks with him, Lois, and Clark. On another night that would be fun, but Steve already knows what he wants to do. It was rather unsporting of Batman to go after Clark’s secret identity like that, even superheroes deserve privacy. And Steve knows that Batman is tearing through every bit of data he can find on The Captain for a lead on his identity. It only seems fair that Steve returns the favor.
Steve pulls out the notebook he took to Gotham and goes over his list. Intelligent, Eccentric, Stealthy, Antisocial. There were few men that met the requirements on list, even fewer when Steve added wealthy.
Steve grabs a Gotham newspaper and heads to the gossip section. He immediately discounts anyone over the age of forty and younger than twenty, as well as women. That completed he’s left with Oswald Cobblepott, Thomas Elliot, and Bruce Wayne. All three were wealthy enough to make a poor Brooklyn boy blush at the sight of their extravagance. And if one were to believe the gossip columns each was eccentric in their own way.
Steve immediately discounted Oswald. From his pictures he’s at least a head shorter and a bit too portly to be the man Steve met on the roof. He’s left with Thomas Elliot and Bruce Wayne; two men of opposite extremes according to tabloids. Thomas is reserved to the point of secretive while Bruce is the embodiment of the life of the party.
Life of the party hardly matches the description of antisocial. Steve could cross him off the list now, except something Tony had once explained to him. Rubbing elbows with the elite members of society isn’t like interacting with the rest of society. There are different rules. One always needed a persona, a mask of sorts. Steve had seen it too. Tony could be beat to hell coming off a mission and running on coffee and the memory of sleep, but the moment the cameras were on him he’d be smiling and cracking jokes like he was on the red carpet. Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. That was his persona.
Steve flips to the financial section of the paper. WayneTech stock is crushing the competition; it seems that Bruce Wayne isn’t as poor a businessman as the tabloids like to claim. On the front page an article talks about a generous donation made to the Gotham City Hospital on behalf of the Wayne Foundation. Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. Perhaps Steve is letting his association with Tony cloud his judgment… but it fits. Bruce Wayne just might be Batman. Steve looks out the window where the sun is low in an amber sky. It’s a good theory, and one he will have to do more research on before he can be certain, but for now he has business to attend to.