Chapter 2
The third week of integration brought with it a phenomenon the System dryly labeled as "Sensory Overload Management." For Alex, it felt like the world had suddenly been turned up to eleven. The hum of the refrigerator sounded like a jet engine; the flickering of the fluorescent lights in the school hallway was a strobe light show; and the scent of the school cafeteria was an assault of grease and old floor cleaner that made his stomach churn.
[...Integration: 35.2%...]
[...Auditory Processing: Calibrating...]
[...Visual Refresh Rate: 144Hz equivalent achieved...]
He sat at the kitchen table, methodically deconstructing a toaster. His hands moved with a mechanical rhythm that fascinated his sister, Sarah, who was sitting across from him with her sketchbook.
"You've been 'fixing' things for three hours, Alex," she noted, her pencil scratching against the paper. "That's the third appliance you've taken apart today. Mom is going to be annoyed if she can't make her bagel tomorrow morning."
"I'm not just taking it apart, Sarah. I'm improving the heating elements," Alex replied without looking up. He was actually scavenging the high-grade nichrome wire for the thermal-loading system of his prototype suit. "Besides, I'll have it back together before she gets home from the clinic."
Sarah sighed, turning her sketchbook around. She had drawn him again. But this time, the sketch wasn't the soft-featured brother she had grown up with. It was a study of shadows. He looked lean, sharp, and slightly dangerous.
"You're getting too intense," she said. "Even Maya is starting to think you're a robot. Why don't you go outside? Peter's been moping around his porch for two days."
Alex tightened a screw and looked toward the window. Peter.
Uncle Ben was still alive. For now. But the clock was ticking, and Peter was currently a Ferrari with no brakes and a driver who didn't know how to steer. If Alex didn't intervene, the tragedy would play out exactly as the movies dictated. He couldn't stop the 'canon' entirely—the world needed Spider-Man—but he could at least give Peter the tools to survive his own transition.
"Yeah," Alex said, standing up. "I'll go check on him."
The backyard of the Parker residence was a mess of overgrown weeds and a half-finished fence. Peter was sitting on the back steps, staring intensely at a soda can. As Alex approached, the can suddenly crumpled inward, as if crushed by an invisible hand.
"Nice trick," Alex said.
Peter jumped nearly three feet into the air, landing awkwardly on the railing. He looked down at his feet, then at Alex, his face pale. "I—Alex! I didn't see you. I was just... checking the... structural integrity of the aluminum."
Alex leaned against a tree, crossing his arms. "Peter, we've been neighbors since we were kids. You're a terrible liar."
Peter scrambled down, looking panicked. "I don't know what you're talking about. I'm just tired. The Oscorp trip gave me some kind of weird flu."
"Is that why you've been sticking to the walls?" Alex asked casually.
Peter froze. The silence in the backyard was heavy. "You saw that?"
"I've been seeing a lot of things, Pete. You're faster. You're stronger. You're... different," Alex said. He didn't mention the System. He didn't mention the 35% of a future Batman currently rewriting his DNA. To Peter, he had to remain the grounded friend—just a friend who happened to be exceptionally observant.
Peter sat back down, his head in his hands. "I don't know what's happening to me, Alex. I broke the sink this morning just by turning the handle. I can hear the spiders in the attic. It's like the whole world is screaming at me."
Alex sat down next to him. "It's called a sensory spike. Your brain is processing more information than it's used to. You need to learn how to filter it, or it'll drive you crazy."
Peter looked up, a glimmer of hope in his eyes. "How do you know that?"
"I read a lot of science journals, Pete. And I've been doing some... training of my own. Look, you have a gift. Or a curse. Either way, you can't just ignore it. You're going to hurt someone if you don't learn how to control your strength."
"What am I supposed to do? Join the circus?" Peter joked weakly.
"No," Alex said, his voice dropping into a serious register. "You're going to train. With me. In the old warehouse district. Every night after your homework is done."
Peter blinked. "You? Alex, you're just... well, you're big now, but you're not..."
Alex reached out and grabbed a thick, wooden fence post that had been leaning against the porch. With a flick of his wrist, he snapped the wood as if it were a toothpick. He didn't use "super strength"—he used the perfect application of force at a stress point, a technique hardcoded into his muscle memory by the template.
"I've been practicing," Alex said with a wink.
The "training" began that night.
Alex led Peter to an abandoned shipyard on the edge of Queens. It was a skeleton of a place—rusting cranes and hollowed-out containers that smelled of salt and decay. It was the perfect playground for a budding spider and a developing bat.
"Okay, Pete. Rule one: Don't use your eyes," Alex said, standing in the center of an empty warehouse. "Your eyes are slow. They can be fooled. Use the 'buzzing' in your head."
"My 'Peter-tingle'?" Peter asked, blushing.
"Don't call it that. It's a spatial awareness reflex. Close your eyes."
Alex picked up a handful of small gravel stones. Without warning, he flicked one at Peter's chest. Peter didn't move. The stone hit him with a dull thud.
"Ow! Hey!"
"Again," Alex said.
For two hours, they stood in the dark. Alex moved with silent efficiency, his footsteps making no sound on the concrete—a feat made possible by the 38% integration of Terry's stealth protocols. He threw stones, wooden blocks, and eventually, he just swung at Peter with a padded pipe.
Slowly, the transformation began. Peter stopped trying to think and started to react. By the end of the session, Peter was dodging the stones with a fluid, erratic grace that was purely arachnid.
[...Integration: 40.0%...]
[...Observation Bonus: Combat data on 'Enhanced Humanoid' recorded...]
[...Physical Capability: Level C- reached...]
"You're a natural, Pete," Alex said, tossing him a bottle of water.
Peter caught it without looking, his breathing heavy but his eyes bright. "I feel... better. Like the world is finally slowing down enough for me to breathe."
"Good. Now, we work on the 'Hero' part," Alex said.
"Hero? Alex, I'm just trying to not break my bed."
"You have power, Peter. And there's a guy in Manhattan in a gold suit of armor flying around. The world is changing. You can either be a victim of that change, or you can be the one who stands in the gap."
Peter looked at his hands. "I just want to help May and Ben. Maybe make some money to pay the bills."
Alex felt a cold chill. The wrestling match. He knew Peter was thinking about it.
"Money comes and goes, Pete. Character stays. Just remember that."
The next few days were a blur of "normalcy" and "transformation."
Alex's family life was a chaotic backdrop to his secret evolution. His father, David, had started a new project at work, which meant he was home later. His mother, Elena, was preoccupied with a sudden spike in "unusual injuries" at the hospital—people coming in with chemical burns or strange, puncture-like wounds. The city was getting weirder.
Sarah was prepping for her final gallery showing, and the house was filled with the smell of turpentine and the sound of her frantic pacing.
"Alex! Have you seen my charcoal set?" she yelled from the top of the stairs.
"Under the couch! Maya was using them to 'beautify' the dust bunnies!" Alex shouted back from the kitchen, where he was currently synthesizing a batch of high-friction adhesive.
"I hate this family!" Sarah joked, though he heard her laughing as she chased Maya through the living room.
He smiled, but the smile didn't reach his eyes. He looked at the calendar. Integration would be complete in twelve days.
[...Current Status: 45%...]
[...New Feature: Suit Fabrication Interface Unlocked...]
The System began to feed him the list of requirements for the Batman Beyond suit. It wasn't just going to appear out of thin air; the System would use its "Template" energy to transmute raw materials into the advanced tech of 2039. He needed high-grade carbon, specialized polymers, and a power source.
He had been skimming parts from Stark-tech discarded by local labs, but he needed something more substantial.
He decided it was time for his first real "patrol." Not as a hero, but as a scavenger.
He waited until midnight. He wore a simple black hoodie, tactical pants, and the mask he'd been working on—a sleek, ballistic-fabric face shield that hid his features but allowed his "Detective Vision" to interface with the world.
He moved through the rooftops of Queens, feeling the power in his legs. Every jump felt lighter. Every landing felt softer.
He reached a Stark Industries transport hub—a secondary facility that handled "non-essential" waste. It was guarded by standard private security, but to Alex's enhanced senses, they were moving in slow motion. He saw the sweep of the cameras, the blind spots in the patrol routes, and the heat signatures of the guards inside the breakroom.
This is too easy, he thought.
He dropped from the perimeter fence, landing without a sound. He moved like a shadow, a blur of black against the gray concrete. He reached the scrap bins, his eyes scanning for the specific holographic-weave carbon he needed for the suit's wings.
"Gotcha," he whispered, pulling out a discarded wing-tip from an old drone prototype.
"Freeze! Don't move!"
A voice barked from behind him. A young guard, no older than twenty, was standing there with a flashlight and a trembling hand on his holster.
Alex didn't panic. He felt a strange, cold calm wash over him. This wasn't a "Batman" moment—it was a test of the template.
He didn't turn around. He just vanished.
One second he was there, the next, he had rolled behind a stack of crates. The guard blinked, shining his light into the empty space. "What the...?"
Alex appeared behind him. A simple pressure point strike to the neck, delivered with the precision of a surgeon. The guard slumped into his arms, unconscious before he hit the ground.
Alex laid him down gently. "Sorry, pal. I just need the carbon."
He grabbed the materials and disappeared into the night.
[...Integration: 48.2%...]
[...Stealth Skill: Rank Up...]
As he ran back toward home, he felt a sudden, sharp spike of adrenaline that wasn't his own. It was a resonance.
He stopped on a rooftop overlooking the subway tracks. Below, he saw a figure in a crude, red-and-blue hooded sweatshirt. The figure was chasing a car—a black sedan that was weaving wildly through traffic.
"Peter," Alex whispered.
It was the night. The night of the wrestling match. The night Peter would let the thief go.
Alex looked at his watch. If he moved now, he could cut off the car. He could stop the thief. He could save Ben Parker.
But as he tensed his muscles to leap, a message appeared in his mind's eye, glowing in a warning crimson.
[...Warning: Temporal Interference with 'Origin' Event detected...]
[...Probability of 'Spider-Man' erasure: 84%...]
[...Recommendation: Observe. The Hero must be forged...]
Alex's hands shook. He watched the black sedan speed away. He watched Peter, fueled by petty anger and a sense of 'fairness,' let the man pass.
"I'm sorry, Pete," Alex whispered, his voice cracking. "I'm so sorry."
He turned away, unable to watch the rest. He ran back to his house, his heart heavy with the weight of a god's knowledge and a human's guilt.
He slipped into his room and collapsed on the floor, the "Detective Vision" flickering and dying as his energy depleted.
The next morning, the neighborhood was silent. No birds chirping. Just the distant, mournful wail of a police siren.
Alex walked out of his front door to see the flashing lights in front of the Parker house. He saw May, collapsed on the sidewalk, being held by a neighbor. He saw Peter, standing still as a statue, his face a mask of absolute, shattering grief.
Alex walked over, ignoring the police tape. He pulled Peter into a silent, crushing hug.
"I've got you, Pete," Alex said, and for the first time, the "Batman" template and Alex Miller were in perfect, terrifying alignment. "I've got you."
The world had its Spider-Man. And in ten days, it would have its Shadow.
The days following the funeral were a heavy, suffocating blanket over Queens. For the Miller family, the tragedy next door felt like a personal wound. Elena spent her evenings bringing over casseroles that went mostly untouched, while David offered to help with the legal paperwork, his business mind providing a steady anchor for a grieving May Parker.
Sarah had stopped her frantic painting. Instead, she sat on the porch, sketching the empty street with a somber, muted palette. Even little Maya was quiet, sensing the shift in the air, clutching her stuffed rabbit and asking why Peter didn't want to play "tag" anymore.
Alex, however, was a ghost in his own home.
[...Integration: 62.8%...]
[...Cellular Density: Optimal...]
[...Neuro-link: 90% Complete...]
He spent every available second in the basement. The 3D printer was running twenty-four hours a day, cooled by a makeshift liquid-nitrogen rig Alex had assembled from medical supplies "borrowed" from his mother's clinic. He wasn't just building a suit; he was building a legacy of technology that hadn't been invented yet.
He watched Peter from afar. He saw his friend leave the house late at night, a hood pulled low over his face. He heard the distant sounds of sirens following the boy who was hunting a ghost in a leather jacket. Alex didn't follow him. He knew Peter needed this—the rage, the realization, and finally, the responsibility.
"System," Alex whispered into the dark of the workshop. "Status on the thermal-regulative mesh."
[...Status: Fabrication Complete...]
[...Transmutation of Raw Carbon and Polymer in progress...]
[...Warning: Integration spike detected. Estimated completion: 5 days...]
The physical changes were now impossible to hide. Alex stood at a solid 6'1", his frame broad and powerful. His eyes, once a simple brown, now held a faint, metallic sheen in certain lights—the result of the cybernetic optic nerves being woven into his retinas.
One evening, Sarah walked into the basement without knocking. She found him shirtless, his back to her, as he worked on a pair of sleek, black gauntlets. She stopped, the tray of tea she was carrying rattling in her hands.
"Alex?" her voice was a trembling whisper.
He turned, and she gasped. His muscles weren't those of a bodybuilder; they were dense, functional, and covered in faint, silvery lines that looked like lightning scars—the integration marks of the system.
"What happened to you?" she asked, dropping the tray. The ceramic shattered, but Alex moved before the pieces could even bounce, catching the largest shards in mid-air.
He looked at the pieces in his hand, then back at his sister. The secret was out, at least partially.
"I'm changing, Sarah," he said, his voice calmer than he felt. "The world is getting dangerous. I won't let what happened to Ben happen to us."
"You look like... like an experiment," she breathed, stepping closer, her artist's eye tracing the unnatural perfection of his physique. "Is this what you've been doing? Some kind of... super-soldier serum?"
"No. It's technology. It's the future." He stepped toward her, taking her hands. "Don't tell Mom and Dad. Not yet. They have enough to worry about with May."
Sarah looked into his eyes, seeing the weight of his 24-year-old soul behind his 17-year-old face. "You're not just a student anymore, are you?"
"I never was, Sarah."
Three days later, the integration hit 85%.
The world finally stopped feeling like an assault on his senses and started feeling like a playground. He could filter the heartbeat of a bird three houses down. He could see the infrared heat signatures of the pipes behind the walls. He was ready.
He sat on his bed, the basement workshop finally silent. In front of him sat a simple, black metallic briefcase. It didn't look like much, but it contained the synthesized components of the Beyond Suit.
[...Integration Milestone: Template Synchronization...]
[...Initiating Suit Bonding...]
Alex placed his hand on the briefcase. A low hum filled the room. The black material didn't just open; it flowed. Like liquid mercury tinted the color of the deepest abyss, the suit crawled up his arm, wrapping around his skin with a cool, constricting pressure.
It wasn't bulky armor. It was a second skin.
He stood up, the suit completing its circuit at his neck. The iconic crimson bat symbol flickered to life on his chest, glowing with a soft, internal light before dimming to a matte red. The cowl flowed over his head, the white, pupilless eyes snapping open.
"Identity confirmed: Alex Miller," a synthesized, non-sentient voice whispered in his ear. "Systems online. Flight thrusters at 10% capacity. Cloaking inactive. Detective Vision: Active."
Alex looked in the mirror. He wasn't a teenager in a costume. He was the silhouette of a nightmare from a century that hadn't happened yet.
He opened his window and stepped onto the sill. The night air of Queens felt different through the suit's sensors. He could feel the wind speed, the humidity, and the distant vibration of the subway.
"Time to see if this thing flies," he muttered.
He jumped.
For a second, the familiar terror of falling gripped him. Then, the thrusters in his boots roared to life with a silent, blue-white flame. Retractable wings, made of memory-polymer, snapped out from his underarms.
He didn't fall. He soared.
He cut through the sky, a black dart aimed at the heart of Manhattan. Below him, the city was a grid of light and shadow. He felt the sheer, raw power of the template—the agility of Terry McGinnis combined with his own cold, calculated intent.
He landed on the Chrysler Building, his boots magnetized to the steel. He looked toward the Brooklyn Bridge, where his sensors had picked up a familiar signature.
A figure in a makeshift mask was clinging to the side of a moving truck. Peter. He was tracking the man who had killed Ben.
"You're not doing this alone, Pete," Alex said, his voice amplified and distorted by the suit's vocal synthesizers.
He dived from the spire, his wings snapping shut as he went into a high-speed plummet. He was the Batman. And for the first time in two lives, Alex Miller felt exactly where he was supposed to be.
The black sedan screeched around a corner in the industrial district of the docks, its tires smoking. Inside, the man known as Dennis Carradine—the man who had pulled the trigger on Ben Parker—was sweating, his eyes darting to the rearview mirror. He wasn't worried about the police; he was worried about the red-and-blue blur that had been haunting him for the last ten blocks.
Peter was perched on the roof of the car, his fingers dug into the metal. He was blinded by a primal, shaking rage. He didn't see the world as a hero yet; he saw it as a place that had taken his father figure, and he wanted to break it.
"Get off! Get off the car!" Carradine screamed, swerving toward a row of parked shipping containers.
From a thousand feet above, Alex watched the scene through a multi-spectrum HUD.
[...Target Locked: Dennis Carradine...]
[...Threat Level: Minimal...]
[...Observation: Peter Parker heart rate at 180 BPM. Potential for lethal escalation: High...]
"System, engage active camo," Alex commanded.
The suit's surface shimmered, the light bending around the high-density polymers until Alex was nothing more than a ripple in the night air. He tilted his wings, going into a silent, aerodynamic dive. He didn't use the thrusters; he didn't want the noise. He was a shadow falling from the stars.
Just as Carradine slammed the brakes, hoping to throw Peter off, Alex hit the ground ten yards ahead of the car. He didn't tumble; he landed in a three-point stance, the suit's kinetic dampeners absorbing the impact with a soft thud.
The car skidded toward him. Alex didn't move. He reached back, his gauntlet whirring as a small port opened.
"Batarang. Taser-grade," he whispered.
He flicked his wrist. The projectile wasn't a piece of sharpened metal; it was a sleek, aerodynamic disk that hummed with a low-voltage charge. It struck the front tire of the sedan, exploding into a web of electrified wires that instantly melted the rubber and shorted out the car's engine.
The sedan spun out, slamming into a stack of wooden pallets with a bone-jarring crunch.
Peter tumbled from the roof, rolling across the asphalt and springing back to his feet. He looked at the smoking car, then at the figure standing in the middle of the road.
Alex stood tall, the cloaking field disengaging. The black suit seemed to drink the light of the nearby streetlamps, the red bat on his chest pulsing like a heartbeat.
"Who are you?" Peter gasped, his voice cracked and raw from crying. He didn't recognize the silhouette, and the suit's internal sensors told Alex that Peter's "spider-sense" was screaming at him—not because Alex was an enemy, but because he was an unknown variable.
Alex didn't answer. He walked toward the wrecked car.
Carradine was crawling out of the driver-side window, coughing and clutching a handgun. He saw Peter first and leveled the weapon. "Stay back, you freak! I'll kill you too!"
Peter tensed, ready to leap, but he wasn't fast enough to stop a bullet from ten feet away.
Alex was.
In a blur of motion that Peter's eyes could barely track, the black-clad figure was suddenly there. Alex's hand clamped over the barrel of the gun just as Carradine pulled the trigger. Click-CRACK.
The gun fired, but the bullet didn't leave the chamber. Alex had used his thumb to jam the slide back, the suit's reinforced plating taking the heat of the small explosion without a scratch. With a casual twist of his wrist, Alex crushed the metal of the handgun like it was made of tin foil.
He grabbed Carradine by the collar and slammed him against the side of the car.
"Look at him," Alex growled, the vocal modulator turning his voice into a terrifying, metallic rasp. He pointed a clawed finger at Peter. "Look at the life you broke."
Carradine whimpered, his eyes bulging as he stared at the terrifying, faceless mask. "I... I didn't mean it! It was an accident! He wouldn't let go of the car!"
Peter stepped forward, his fists clenched. "You killed him. He was a good man, and you killed him for a few hundred dollars!"
Peter raised a fist, the strength to crush a human skull boiling in his veins. Alex saw the shift in Peter's shoulder. He reached out with his free hand, catching Peter's fist mid-swing.
The impact sent a shockwave through the suit's arm, but Alex didn't budge.
"Don't," Alex said, his voice dropping the growl and becoming something more... grounded. "If you do this, you don't honor him. You just become another shadow in this city."
Peter struggled against the grip, his breath coming in ragged sobs. "He's a murderer! He deserves it!"
"He deserves justice," Alex countered, his white lenses staring into Peter's masked eyes. "And you... you deserve to be better than him. Go home, kid. The police are three minutes out. Let them handle the trash."
Peter's strength faded. He slumped, his hand going limp in Alex's grip. He looked at the man cowering against the car—a pathetic, small creature—and realized Alex was right. Killing him wouldn't bring Ben back.
"Who are you?" Peter asked again, his voice small.
Alex looked up at the sound of distant sirens. He felt the weight of the moment, the beginning of a partnership that would define this universe's future.
"I'm the future," Alex said.
He fired a grapple line from his wrist, the titanium hook catching the lip of a nearby warehouse roof. With a burst from his thrusters, he was gone, disappearing into the dark before Peter could even blink.
Alex slipped through his bedroom window twenty minutes later. The suit retracted, flowing back into the briefcase with a soft hiss of escaping air. He stood there in his underwear, his body drenched in sweat, his heart hammering against his ribs.
[...Integration: 74.2%...]
[...Combat Efficiency: Optimized...]
[...Note: Host stress levels high. Initiating neural-calm protocol...]
"No," Alex whispered. "I'm fine."
He walked over to the window and looked across the driveway. A few minutes later, he saw Peter climb through his own window. Peter didn't turn on the light. He just sat on his bed, his head in his hands.
Alex felt a wave of exhaustion hit him. He had done it. He had taken the first step. He wasn't just a student with a secret; he was a player on the board.
He climbed into bed just as he heard his father's car pull into the driveway. The house was quiet, the Miller family safe and sound, unaware that the Batman was sleeping just a few feet above their heads.
The next morning, the news was full of it.
"MYSTERIOUS VIGILANTE CAPTURES PARKER KILLER," the headlines read. There were grainy photos of a black shape, a red blur, and the crushed remains of a handgun. The police were calling it a "costumed assault," but the people of Queens were calling it a miracle.
Alex sat at the breakfast table, calmly eating his eggs.
"Did you see this, Alex?" David asked, sliding the newspaper across the table. "Some nutjob in a high-tech suit took down that criminal last night. Right in our backyard."
"Looks like something out of a comic book, Dad," Alex said, taking a sip of orange juice.
"It's scary," Elena said, her doctor's mind already calculating the force needed to crush a gun. "That kind of power... who knows who's behind that mask?"
Sarah was staring at the photo, her eyes narrowed. She looked at the newspaper, then at Alex's shoulders, then back at the newspaper. She didn't say anything, but her grip on her coffee mug tightened.
Alex ignored the tension. He was focused on the HUD that only he could see.
[...Integration: 75.0%...]
[...New Template available for preview: ??? ...]
Alex's heart skipped a beat. A second template? Already?
He suppressed the urge to check it right there at the table. He had to be patient. He had to play the part of the student for a few more hours.
"I'm going to head over to Peter's," Alex said, standing up. "He needs someone to talk to."
"That's a good boy," Elena said, smiling. "Tell May we're thinking of her."
Alex walked out the door, the sun hitting his face. He felt the strength in his limbs, the clarity in his mind, and the weight of the briefcase hidden under his bed.
The first month was almost over. The Batman was born. And the Marvel Universe had no idea what was coming next.
The air in the Parker household was thick with the scent of stale lilies and the hollow silence that follows a funeral. Alex stepped inside, feeling the weight of the suit's integration humming at the base of his spine. Every floorboard that creaked under his feet felt like a structural analysis in his mind; he could hear the refrigerator's compressor struggling and the slow, rhythmic breathing of Aunt May from the kitchen.
He found Peter in his room, staring at a small, red-and-blue scrap of fabric on his bed. The "costume" he'd worn the night before was a mess of torn cotton and sweat.
"Hey, Pete," Alex said softly, leaning against the doorframe.
Peter didn't look up. "He saw me, Alex. The guy in the black suit. He knew what I was going to do."
Alex walked in and sat on the edge of the desk. "He stopped you from making a mistake you couldn't take back. That's a good thing."
Peter finally looked at him, his eyes bloodshot. "How do you know? He was terrifying. He moved like... like he was from another world. And that red bat on his chest... it looked like it was glowing." Peter paused, squinting at Alex. "Wait. You said you've been 'training.' Did you see him? Is that why you were at the docks?"
Alex kept his face a mask of supportive concern. "I followed the sirens, Pete. I saw you leave. I was worried." He leaned in, his voice dropping. "People are calling him the Batman. Like the old urban legend, but... updated."
"He told me he was the future," Peter whispered. "What does that even mean?"
"It means things are changing," Alex said, standing up and clapping a hand on Peter's shoulder. He felt Peter's muscles tingle—the spider-sense acknowledging a powerful presence. "It means you're not the only one trying to do the right thing. But you need to be smarter, Peter. You can't go out in a hoodie. You're going to get yourself killed."
"I'm going to make a suit," Peter said, his voice regaining some of its old spark. "Something better. Something that stands for what Ben believed in."
"Good," Alex smiled. "And maybe I can help you with the tech. I've been getting pretty good at 'improving' things."
Alex returned home an hour later, the 75% integration mark finally clicking into place. The "milestone" brought with it a sudden, cooling sensation in his mind, as if a new partition of his brain had been unlocked.
He locked his bedroom door and sat cross-legged on the floor.
"System. Show me the second template preview."
A new window appeared, pulsing with a deep, cosmic violet light. Unlike the gritty, tech-heavy interface of the Batman Beyond template, this one felt ancient and vast.
[...Template Preview: Silver Surfer (Norrin Radd) - Fragmented Stage...]
[...Warning: Current Host Body is 100% Organic. Integration of Power Cosmic requires 'Star-Forged' physical status...]
[...Status: Locked until Batman Beyond reaches 100% and Host reaches Physical Grade B...]
Alex's breath hitched. The Silver Surfer. He wasn't just looking at street-level heroics anymore. If he could harness even a fraction of the Power Cosmic, he wouldn't just be protecting Queens; he would be a force capable of staring down Thanos.
But the "Fragmented" tag told him he wouldn't be getting the full power of a Herald of Galactus right away. It would be a template of energy manipulation, flight, and molecular reconstruction—powers that would complement the Batman's tactical prowess perfectly.
[...Note: To unlock the next stage of integration, Host must engage in 'Real-World Testing'...]
"Real-world testing," Alex muttered. "You want me to go to work."
He looked at his reflection in the window. He was seventeen, a top-tier student, a loyal brother, and now, the guardian of a legacy.
The final week of the month arrived.
Alex spent his days as the perfect student and his nights as a blur of black and red. He began dismantling a local car-theft ring, moving with a silent brutality that left the criminals tied up for the police before they even knew they were being attacked. He wasn't just fighting; he was learning.
He learned how the suit's wings caught the updrafts between the skyscrapers of Long Island City. He learned how to use the "Detective Vision" to track the chemical trails of illegal drugs. And most importantly, he learned how to balance the two lives.
One Friday afternoon, as he was walking home with Sarah, she suddenly stopped him near the park.
"Alex, look at me," she said, her voice uncharacteristically serious.
"What's up?"
"I'm not stupid. I see the bruises you try to hide. I see the way you look at the news. And I found the... the black material in the basement." She looked around to ensure no one was listening. "I don't know how you're doing it, but I know it's you. The 'Batman'."
Alex looked at his sister. He saw the pride in her eyes, but also the crushing fear.
"I have to do this, Sarah," he said, not denying it. "This city... it's about to get hit by things people aren't ready for. I am."
Sarah sighed, leaning her head against his shoulder. "Just... don't die. Maya needs her big brother. And I need someone to tell me my paintings are good even when they're terrible."
"They're never terrible, Sarah."
The night of the 30th day arrived.
Alex stood on the roof of the tallest building in Queens, the wind whipping around his cowl. The moon was a sliver of silver in the sky, reflecting off the red bat on his chest.
[...Integration: 99.9%...]
[...Physical Grade B Achieved...]
[...Finalizing Template Fusion...]
A surge of power, more intense than any before, washed through him. It wasn't just the suit now; he felt his own muscles, his own bones, and his own nerves becoming one with the tech. He felt the knowledge of Bruce Wayne's tactical genius and Terry McGinnis's iron will merge into his own identity. He wasn't a copy. He was the evolution.
[...Integration: 100%...]
[...Batman Beyond Template: Fully Integrated...]
[...Unlocking Advanced Suit Functions: Cloaking, Sonic Distractor, Liquid-Cables...]
[...Secondary Template: Silver Surfer - Initializing...]
The briefcase in his room back home dissolved, the materials being stored in a sub-spatial pocket the system had created. He could now summon the suit with a thought, the nanotech-infused fibers waiting in the "void" to clothe him in an instant.
Alex looked out over the bridge toward Manhattan. He saw a flash of green light in the distance, near the Oscorp building. He heard the faint, high-pitched laugh of a man who had lost his mind to a formula.
"The Goblin," Alex whispered.
He stepped off the edge, his wings snapping out. He didn't use the thrusters this time; he simply glided, a silent predator of the future descending upon the present.
The first month was over. The system was just getting started. And Alex Miller was no longer just a student—he was the shadow that would level up reality itself.