Despite his best efforts, Tenko was not able to fully deplete Batman's immense 'to do' list in three days. He slept in his teenage identity, using the CEO's penthouse apartment, in the evenings before patrolling.
The League of Shadows was irritatingly passive, Talia was nowhere to be found, and Arkham's security was untested. Jacob was even beginning to complain, over the phone mind you, that her sequestration was unnecessary and could wait until after Arkham's security was compromised. This was soundly rejected on the basis that she couldn't get enough warning to get behind her defenses before it's too late, and only when the League of Shadows were no longer in Gotham will she emerge from her panic room. Fortunately, the man hasn't gone so far as to lie about their absence, because that would put Tenko in an awkward position.
But he understood the patience required to conduct an extended conflict, so while he had hoped to be able to resolve this before Bruce's return, foisting the whole thing onto the man's shoulders was an acceptable outcome.
In the meantime, there was an awful large backlog of things that was keyed for Justice League Leadership, which in practice meant Batman, Superman, or Wonder Woman. Nominally, the founders all held equal rank, but Aquaman's conflict of interest lead to him passing on anything important enough to warrant being reserved for a leader's decisionmaking, Green Lantern couldn't be bothered, The Flash had lost the privilege of independent decisionmaking, Hawkgirl had been stripped of all authority she enjoyed as a founder, and J'onn simply didn't consider it appropriate for himself to make any sort of decision on behalf of Earth, so recused himself from the majority of such decisions. So only the 'Big Three' as they were sometimes referred to in the media, handled anything that wasn't put to a vote of the founders.
In hindsight, maybe Tenko should have pushed harder against Bruce's paranoia regarding the decisionmaking power of people that weren't him. There needed to be ways for non-founders to join the leadership. Bruce had relaxed a lot since then, he'd likely be amenable.
Nevertheless, as two of the Big Three were indisposed on the most luxurious accommodations that they could secure (it was actually Clark's wedding gift, as he had been given tickets to the place in return for some heroics off in space somewhere, the particulars were not important), and Superman hated administrative duties (as he did anything that shoved his own importance in his face) so if Tenko didn't take some liberties, it would simply not get done.
The first few matters were easy: Final approvals for some new members, budget approvals for some of the side projects, such as the one entreating all the old gods for their contributions when it comes to empowering champions to help defend Earth, or the recruitment programs for people to receive said empowerments (a staggeringly difficult endeavor), a few authorizations for usage of Justice League resources for various things that were kicked up the chain enough times to reach the top, and one very interesting request for an in-person proposal by a representative of an interstellar corporation, who had been waiting days for a reply.
Yurisa Rrab was a very pretty woman with golden skin, pointed ears, and long blonde hair, as she was a Graxosian from the Graxos star system, dressed in what Tenko understood was a fairly typical example of galactic fashion: short-shorts, boots that go up to her knees, what is essentially a sports bra, and a mantle with full cape that added a touch of dignity to the otherwise incredibly brief outfit. It was designed to be worn underneath a spacesuit, with the mantle providing the necessary ostentatious air that any serious discussion required. "Thank you so much for agreeing to meet with me, Mister Batman!" She said in passable English. "I guarantee you you won't regret it!"
"So if I'm reading your proposal correctly," Batman said, glancing down at the screen in his desk, "-you represent a cruise ship company?"
"Yep!" She said peppily. "Stellar Vistas prides itself on the safest, most luxurious tours in the galaxy!"
"While the compliment on Earth's safety is appreciated," Batman began, "What's this about 'unique stellar phenomena'?"
"That's a really funny story, actually!" Yurisa said. "You see, my sister's a Green Lantern. She has this huuuuuge crush on the one for the next sector over, and he's from here!"
"Hal Jordon?" Batman asked, just for clarification.
"That's the one." Yurisa confirmed. "So I was tour guiding for the Central Galactic tour, which has a stop at Oa, and had lunch with some Green Lanterns, Arisia introduced me to everyone, and Hal was kind of dour!"
"Is he not a fan of your sister?" Batman inquired, to be polite.
"No, he has a girlfriend, and he was out of sorts because he said he was missing 'The Eclipse' that she had apparently organized a whole trip to go see." Yurisa giggled. "Naturally, we didn't have a clue what he was talking about!"
"When was this?" Batman asked, curious.
That put her short. "Hang on, I'm going to need the computer to calculate this." She took out what appeared to be a smart phone, input some data, and after a moment, she said. "Uh… according to this, it was four of your years ago."
Batman brought up an eclipse schedule on his computer and checked the helpful map some random website provided. "Did he mention India? Or China?"
"He did!" Yurisa said, "The first one. Of course you know what he was talking about, you're from Earth, how silly of me."
"So the stellar phenomenon you speak of is the Solar Eclipse." Batman stated.
"Yeah!" Yurisa chirped. "You don't know how crazy rare your ratio of apparent solar/lunar size is. On an inhabited planet too? It's absolutely crazy enough to feature on our tours! What I need from you all is whatever paperwork your planet has to allow foreign businesses to operate here, but everyone else just said I had to speak to the top, so… here we are."
Tenko was shocked. This… was exactly what he had been hoping would eventually happen. "Unfortunately, most of our alien contacts have been hostile to some extent, so there's no pre-existing infrastructure or bureaucracy for such matters." Wait, he wasn't being taciturn enough. Batman coughed. "This will take a while to get set up, how much time would you need on your end to get a tour group here?"
The alien's pretty face beamed with delight. She projected a hologram from her phone, showing a series of time blocks that then turned into the Gregorian Calendar. "Our tours last approximately five of your months, and from my preliminary routing, this stop would be in the fourth month. From what Hal said, the eclipses don't even last a day, which will really drive up interest, people love temporary convergences. Routings need to be finalized before they're advertised, way too many planets require that for us not to, and we usually take ten of your months to advertise the trip beforehand. Add on some planning time, and the earliest eclipse we can get a cruise ship here for will be in two years. Well, if there is one then."
"There's at least two per year." Batman said idly, "If you count the ones that are over the oceans or poles. You shouldn't have any issue positioning yourselves for that." He sent a request to the technical staff. "We'll compile an informational presentation on eclipses for your bosses, including a safety briefing and a schedule."
"Please and thank you." Yurisa said politely. "So what's our next steps?"
"Rhine will assign you a point of contact, or take on the job herself." Batman instructed, "In the meantime, compile a list of amenities or other attractions that your tour groups expect to or desire to see from planets they visit besides astronomical events, as we have an extensive domestic tourism industry and can likely provide most of them."
"You sure? Some rich folks can have some pretty… weird tastes." Apparently, Graxosian blushes include ear wiggling. Or at least this one did.
"Rich humans can be rather unusual and depraved as well." Tenko said reluctantly. "We cannot guarantee anything, but when dealing with foreign cultures, clear communication without innuendo is the ideal way forward. I've dealt with criminals for decades, nothing's going to shock me." That was probably tempting fate, but Tenko had a very twisted imagination at times, so while he expected surprises, just keeping his expectations low should suffice.
"This is the start of a beautiful relationship." The too-attractive alien gushed. "We're going to make so much money."
-----------------------
It was on the fifth day of the League of Shadow's arrival that the League made their move. Talia sent a photograph of her with a knife towards the throat of a teenage girl, one who managed to perfect the art of the 'terrified' face so that he could literally hear her say "I'm scared, help!".
…Wait, that wasn't a metaphor. With a slight focus on his demonic truespeech, that expression literally said that, as blatantly as if it was written. It was like interpreting sign language, but… with a bit more cognitive dissonance than he was used to. Weird.
It instructed Batman to walk into an obvious trap, a location of an old pitfighting arena, a warehouse with a few modifications that Bruce had shut down around two years ago. It was notable in that it wasn't able to be snatched up by Wayne Enterprises to be refurbished, but now he knew that it was because the Court of Owls controlled it as a smuggling route. It survived Darkseid's invasion without a scratch, so it was still standing.
The instructions were, of course, to come alone, as any indication of Rhine or any other hero's presence would lead to an immediate execution. So Tenko did what Bruce would do: walk right into the trap, fully confident in his ability to survive it.
Glass rained down as he entered through an upper window, somersaulting through the air to land right in front of the suspiciously unguarded hostage. There was an obvious "bomb collar" around the girl's neck, with a blinking red light and everything.
"Oh look, it's Batman." The girl communicated through her expression alone. She sounded incredibly sad. "Time for the plan. Help me, help me, I'm so scared!" It was really weird 'hearing' sarcasm so clearly when no actual sounds are being made.
With a sharp inhale, Tenko assessed the girl magically. She stank of active blood magic, with the exact same stench as David Cain. The subject of the control spell he had already surmised existed, then. "Brainwashing." Batman said, "I'd say it's a new low, Talia… but we both know that it isn't."
"Wait, you know what's wrong with me?" The girl's expression shouted. "Hold on, does that mean you can fix it? Don't get close to me, I'll kill you!" She had very eloquent fearful eyes.
"You really are the World's Greatest Detective, aren't you, love?" Talia Al Ghul said as she dropped behind the now begging girl. "At least, you would be, if you were my love."
That confirms what he already suspected. "If you knew that, why spring the ambush now?" Batman asked.
"What?" The hostage asked with a raised eyebrow, confused.
"Well, as you know, the League of Shadows doesn't want to kill the Batman." Talia explained, "But we are also an organization of assassins, and I no longer have any reason to refuse a contract on you." She shrugged, as if she was just poor middle management instead of the second in command. "The client was getting impatient. So while I don't know, exactly, who you are, I can present your head for payment either way." It was to her credit that she didn't bother attacking what she knew was a fake until pushed to, but she's still making use of child soldiers compelled by blood magic so he's still going to break her.
"Not that you'll succeed." Batman said confidently, menacingly.
"Unmoved by the hostage?" Talia asked amusedly.
"You're really mad…" The hostage's sudden shrinking away said.
"The bomb's fake." He pointed to the girl's ropes. "She can escape those bindings at any time, she's one of yours." He did not, in fact, know that the bomb was fake. It was a guess.
"You're good." The hostage's eyes said. "There goes that plan. What was the backup again… Oh right. This is gonna hurt."
Batman threw some batarangs to knock the arrows off course, preventing them from severely injuring the fake hostage. It was a good thing that the 'Be Batman' spell helped with those things because he wasn't quite that good with them without it. One more hit the latch of the fake bomb, causing the collar to fall off, and a final one cut the ropes.
"You make a very good impression of my love." Talia complimented, "Flaws and all. Cassandra: Kill!"
"Oh no. I know that command. I have to-" Magic surged around the girl, who was apparently named Cassandra, and her scowl said it all. "Kill the Bat. Kill the Bat. Kill the Bat." Every strike, kick, and lunge just repeated that one sentiment, which was rather distracting. It was like looking at his literal nightmares.
Still, his thoughts were clear: the Batman's legend, through his spell, tempered his rage better than any self control he could normally muster. It was rather ironic, Bruce didn't have this level of control over his anger in reality, but then again, he likely wouldn't be quite so enraged over this, so that was a wash.
Cassandra's attacks were fast, and Batman quickly learned that deflections were the order of the day. She must have some kind of enhancement on top of the control spells, which was unfortunate because he only smelled blood magic. It was incredibly likely that Cassandra would literally drop dead from life force depletion before she got tired, if she was using the spells Tenko thought she was.
Talia attacked too, of course, and she was no slouch in the combat department herself, swinging a beautiful sword perfumed with magic to enhance its killing potential. The good news was that she didn't get the thing blessed, so he could just block with his armor and between his own enchanted equipment and magical reinforcement, he was fine.
Still, this was not a favorable strategic position, so he tossed down his best smoke bomb, a magical trinket that obscured everything within about twenty meters, both light and sound. "Kill the Bat!" Cassandra tackled him as he used his grapple to go into the rafters, but wrestling a man four times her size and equally enhanced quickly turned out badly for her, especially when he cheated by pulling out exactly what he needed from his pocket dimension instead of his utility belt.
Now with a successfully tied up teenage girl hanging off of his back, Batman looked as Talia leapt upwards as well, glaring at him. "This is mine now." Batman declared, hefting the bundle of girl. "You're the worst stepmother." The blood connection they shared was tenuous, but extant. Talia's unborn child was this girl's half-sibling. The fact that they weren't actual mother and child was obvious: While Tenko didn't know Talia's precise ethnicity beyond 'middle-eastern', Cassandra was half-Chinese, if he didn't miss his guess.
Talia's face twisted, offended. "That is a weapon. One of our best, to hear my Father speak of her. I claim no bond except that of weapon and wielder." Talia scoffed. "Any child of mine would be a leader of men, not a disposable pawn like that one."
Tenko's face darkened. "I promised not to kill you." He said, before letting his magic surge to its utmost. "I call upon a demon's hates, the hell-scorched anger this bitch rates, Banish her back home tonight, for her death will come within my sight."
An aura of hellfire emerged from his body, his upside down wings spreading as he channeled the magic. Talia realized that something wrong was happening, and did what was the second-smartest thing she could have done: she attacked. Unfortunately, neither that nor running would have saved her, and Tenko punched her in the face between eyeblinks. She was launched into a portal created behind her, and the shocked face of Ra's Al Ghul met his eyes as the portal closed.
Cassandra continued to attempt to stab past his armor in an attempt to fufill her commands, but with the full liberty to use his magic, breaking the blood command was… okay it wasn't easy, but he knew a lot about how to stop that kind of thing. After a quick relocation to a private rooftop… "What just happened?" Were Cassandra's first… well, calling them words wasn't quite right.
"Can you understand me?" Tenko asked, taking his cowl off.
"Oh crap, he's trying to talk. I can't talk. What is he saying?" Cassandra's body language said it all. It was still weird, but he was getting used to it. "He's concerned, patiently waiting…"
Okay, let's focus on his demonic truespeech a bit more… "Is your father David Cain?" He asked through hand gestures, paying less attention to how he was moving his fingers in favor of focusing on the message.
"I understood that!" Cassandra's face shouted. "Why did I understand that. Uh… Yes. Yes he is." She nodded rapidly.
"I broke the blood magic he had on you," He really needed some kind of recharge… it was strong magic, and breaking it without breaking her was taxing. "No one should have that done to them." Frankly, it was perverse. He wasn't about to go spouting about the sacred bond between parent and child like some kind of magical girl… at least right now, but it made him wish that he knew of a way to sever such connections permanently.
"They're just going to put it back." Cass's shameful look to the side explained, "I've been captured before, they'll just summon me." She continued with a rueful sigh.
"I've got a place that will protect you." Tenko communicated with a fist clenched in determination. "It is well secured against blood magic summoning." The only reason he needed the proxy is because Bruce was gone and he couldn't just wait in the saferoom. He would have set it up anyway as a precaution, but the purpose of it was to prevent him from being stuck in there.
"They were right to fear you." Cassandra's look of awe conveyed. "You really are prepared for everything."
Chuckling, Batman took the still-tied-up girl into the Batmobile. Once inside, a thought severed enough of the ropes that she was able to sit normally, as Tenko was confident that she was no longer a threat.
Well, he already has three siblings, what's one more?
-----------------------
Cassandra was fairly chatty, now that she understands that no matter what she 'said', he could understand her. "What's this button do?"
"That one makes the bottom drop out. Do not touch it." That one flat out didn't function under normal circumstances, so he wasn't concerned.
"This one?"
"Your ejector seat. Do not touch it."
"This one?"
"My ejector seat. Do not touch it."
"This one?"
"Deploys the oxygen masks. Do not touch it."
"Are we there yet?"
"No."
"Are we there yet?"
"No."
"I'm hungry."
Batman took out a nutrition bar. "Do you have any allergies?"
"No. Gimmie." Batman was pretty sure at this point that her brusqueness had more to do with the limitations of the oddities of her method of communicating than how rude she intends to be, so he passed the peanut-infested nutrition bar to the girl, and she devoured it. A juice box was consumed with similar fervor.
After a beat, Cassandra looked out the window, bored. "...Are we there yet?" She asked through the act of glancing at him.
"Yes." Batman communicated with a smirk as he took a sharp turn into the hidden waterfall entrance.
"Wow!" Cassandra's face exclaimed. Once they arrived, she kept a running commentary about what she was looking at, a wide smile on her face.
Once they arrived at the blood magic containment room, the proxy doll smiled widely at them. "Hello!" It shouted excitedly. Ace was back in here playing with it, as they were apparently playing cat's cradle. Despite her being a little old for them, Ace enjoyed childish games as much as Tanya did, so it was a common activity between them when he wasn't too busy. Which was most of the time, until Bruce returns.
"What are you?" Cassandra's furrowed brow practically shouted. "You're worse than the Talons…"
"That's a doll animated with magic." Batman explained with twiddling fingers. "Any blood magic targeting that girl will hit the doll instead of her, and the doll is safely in here, where it cannot be harmed by such spells."
"Oh. That… makes a lot more sense." Cassandra's thoughtful expression said. "You have the room because of her. Who is she, by the way?"
"Me." Batman explained with a thumb pointed at himself, before discorporating his form into shadow, reforming into his most frequently used body. "The real Batman's off planet." Tanya added with a wave upwards, "I'm just a substitute."
Cassandra's 'speech' became incoherently garbled as she glanced upward where Tanya's face used to be and down to where it was now. Eventually, after looking between her and the doll, she managed a "...Wha?"
"Is she a telepath?" Ace asked. "I thought you hated telepathy."
"Ah, no." Tanya said, "I don't actually understand how it works, but she's somehow conveying thoughts purely through body language, which normally doesn't work with my universal translation." Well, sort of. She actually could decipher random hand signs, but only if they were used with the intent to communicate. Cassandra was a downright motor mouth with her body language, it was weird.
"Oh, they're talking again." Cassandra's carefully neutral expression said, "Of course they are."
"As long as you stay in this room, you'll be safe from December using a blood summoning on you." Tanya explained with her hands. "I'm done for the night, let's play a game and have some food." She went to the panic room's fridge and withdrew a snack platter. "This'll tide you over until Alfred comes with an actual meal." Unlike Bruce, Alfred knows that she'd never turn down an after-patrol meal, so while she came back early, that just meant it was on its way instead of already here.
"Ooh! Food!" Cassandra promptly ate half the platter. "...I'm sorry." She meant, bowing her head in apology while still chewing. Her cheeks were bulging as she did not do enough swallowing.
"It's fine." Tanya waved off, "I'm sure you're still hungry, hot food is on its way. "
"So who is she?" Ace asked, annoyed at being left out.
"Ah, apologies." Tanya said, waving her hands in an exercise of free association so Cassandra could also understand her. "This is Cassandra, she was a mind-controlled assassin with the League of Shadows. You know, the thing I made this room to avoid doing myself."
"You what!?" Cassandra's jaw literally dropped, conveying her shock. "Are you another one of Father's children?"
"No, I'm related to December, the blood mage. His sister's daughter." Tanya corrected, "To do to me what they did to you, he needs to break said sister out of prison." Asylum, prison, only in Gotham was this an academic distinction.
"Okay, so you can leave while your mom is in prison, but I have to stay here for the rest of my life?" Cassandra asked with a quizzical tilt of her head. "...Still a step up." She nodded to herself.
"Not for the rest of your life, no." Tanya explained, "Just for the rest of your father's life. That won't be long."
"Tanya? No." Ace said, "Bruce is going to get so mad."
"I only have two days until Daddy's back, so I'm racing against the clock." Tanya said haughtily, stretching a bit. "First thing tomorrow night, David Cain is going to die."
Well, unless he surrenders, she supposed. But hopefully he'll make her night instead.