Dangers in the Dark

Extending the Invitation 5.2

Third Person POV

Like any typical teenager, Bruce had stayed up way later than his guardian would have liked. But unlike your average teenager, it wasn't because he was playing games with his friends, talking to his friends, or even doing schoolwork. Bruce had been up till the early hours of the morning researching more and more about his parent's death and after it all he had found out one thing; there were some irregularities in the outcome of the Arkham Vote.

By 9 o'clock the next morning, Bruce was still fast asleep on the sofa, paper scattered all around him and Alfred was less than pleased.

"Will you look at this shambles?" Alfred muttered to himself, as he saw the young Wayne boy collapsed on the sofa. He then walked straight past Bruce and flung open the curtains. "What would your mother say?" Bruce started to stir as the bright morning sun shone into the room. "You know, I have a half a mind to stick all this lot straight into the bloody fire."

"No fire," Bruce groaned, wiping the sleep from his eyes, as he sat up.

"We'll see about that. Come on. Up you get. Wayne Enterprises is hosting a charitable luncheon tomorrow. I took the liberty of accepting their kind invitation on your behalf, Master Bruce," Alfred informed him.

"Good. Is there breakfast?" Bruce asked, finally looking over at Alfred before pulling some of the files onto his lap and flicking through them again.

"Yeah, I'll make you an egg," Alfred told him, slightly shocked that Bruce had taken this news so well. "Does that mean you'll go?"

"Yes. I have some questions I need to ask the members of the board," Bruce answered.

"What kind of questions?" Alfred asked, genuinely curious.

"About Arkham. It seems likely those gangsters were given their shares in Arkham by Wayne Enterprises," Bruce said.

"Well, that's how business is done, isn't it?" Alfred replied.

"Is it?" Bruce asked, standing up. "My parent's didn't do business that way, did they?"

"No. No, they didn't, Master Bruce," Alfred assured him.

"The board might not know. There's quite a bit of clever camouflage used. Shell companies, offshore accounts and so forth," Bruce explained.

"Right. So you learned all of that from all of this, did you?" Alfred asked, not getting a response, as Bruce had sat back down and taken the file back onto his lap, looking through it with more concentration now. "Fantastic detective work. I still however want to get the whole lot and chuck it straight in the fire."

"Don't put anything in the fire, Alfred. That's an order," Bruce said firmly.

"Right, Master Bruce. Nothing in the fire," Alfred muttered, going to leave the room but he stopped when Bruce spoke up.

"Alfred? Do you think Holly would want to go?" Bruce asked.

Slightly shocked, Alfred turned around and looked at Bruce.

"To the luncheon, I mean," Bruce clarified.

"I'm sure she would, yes, Master Bruce," Alfred nodded, managing to keep a smug smile off his face.

"Good. I shall extend the invitation then," Bruce nodded to himself, looking back down at the files.

"Very good, Master Bruce," Alfred agreed, a smile now present on his face as he left the room.

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Holly POV

As it was a Friday morning we had news round in our homeroom today. This meant that for the twenty minutes we were here, we had to watch the news, whatever it was.