Torchbearer Arc 1: Rags and Tatters 6
Location: Gotham City, New Jersey, United States of America, Earth, Sol, Sector 2814, Milky Way Galaxy, Universe-1 (DC-Prime)
Date: Tuesday, March 12, 2002
Fucking finally, I'm here. I'll spare you the hours of walking, freezing my ass off, and having awkward conversations with people at information desks.
Rags 'N' Tatters (looks like I spelled the name wrong when I Googled it) is a humble pawn shop built into a brick building. The shop's title is painted on the window, both outside and inside from the looks of it. The store interior itself is nothing special. It's an antique shop. Old lamps, figurines, instruments, and assorted accoutrements dot the place. There's a glass case in front of the window, not really storing very much beyond some interesting baubles. I wonder why- oh, maybe to make it harder to break in through the window?
I peer inside the window, and I see a bored-looking brunette man leaning on the counter, staring into space. He's wearing a white t-shirt with the name of the shirt written across it. Is that
Rory Regan? I honestly can't tell.
There was never really a good shot of him without the Suit in Shadowpact, and depending on the writer, his appearance changed a lot. I remember he was blonde in his
Suit of Souls one-shot. Can Jews even be blonde? He doesn't look that muscular. Actually pretty skinny, in fact. I remember in the older comics, like
Cry of the Dead, he was a Vietnam vet.
I don't even know if the Vietnam War happened on this Earth. If it did, Rory probably wouldn't be a veteran of it. I move myself over to the front door, an old wooden thing showing signs of rot- looks like he hasn't noticed me yet. The door window is barred.
I hesitate before opening. In some comics, Rory had trouble controlling the suit, the evil souls threatening to overwhelm him. If I run in there... wait, I don't count as an evil soul. I've never murdered, raped, tortured, done anything to belong in the Suit of Souls. Wait- besides those two guys. Oh fuck fuck, please no. That was self-defense. But I don't even feel that bad about it yet! Am I going through shock? Still?
I've gotta assume that I'm not a possible candidate for his suit. Rory worked with people like June Moone and Jim Rook in the comics, and I bet they've probably killed people in self-defense. Assuming that it works the same as in the comics then, my biggest potential problem is Rory himself panicking and attacking me, which I don't
think is a possibility, but could happen anyway.
Rory Regan is a fairly dangerous person, by the standards of a sensible universe, but in the DC Universe, he's downright street-level. Rory Regan, better known by his superhero name, Ragman, possesses an arcane outfit called the Suit of Souls, composed of hundreds, maybe thousands of evil souls throughout the centuries, who reside in a dimension within the Suit and offer their services to the wielder of the Suit, in exchange for eventual redemption in the eyes of Heaven.
Of course, Ragman has to be cautious how he uses the souls, because too much force applied to the souls can permanently damage them, or even destroy them altogether. The Suit itself can be damaged by fire or excessive force. I remember Eclipso ripping into the Suit in Day of Vengeance, and she managed to destroy hundreds of them. Some older incarnations of Ragman also have the souls in the Suit able to influence him. I hope that's not the case here.
Okay. Here goes. I open the door and walk through. Oh man, that sudden rush of heat is fucking nice. I've been walking in the cold for way too fucking long in friggin' sandals.
The man at the desk is a bit startled by my entry, and I belatedly realize he was close to falling asleep when I saw him through the window. He's a pale, lanky white man, a bit shorter than me, with trimmed brown hair, a white t-shirt with the logo of his shop on it, and blue jeans. "Ah, hey! How are you doing? Can I help you?" he says politely, in a mostly Midwestern accent, but with a Jersey tinge to it.
Last chance to back out. It's always awkward talking to strangers and clerks, even when they aren't probably magical superheroes. I hesitate for just a moment, before forcing myself to speak up. Hope his last name is pronounced like the President's name, but I'm not sure. It could be like the comedian. "Uh, yeah. Are you Rory Regan?"
His initial polite smile fades into a suspicious look. "Ah, yes. Yes, I am. Why?"
You gotta ask him, Joseph. Otherwise you'll have virtually no other options than to bother fucking Batman. "Does- does the phrase Suit of Souls hold any significance to you?"
I see a flash of green at his wrists, that disappears almost as quickly as it appears. Uh... fuck. "It doe- who are you?"
I raise my hands, in what I hope is a disarming gesture. "My name is Joseph Winfield. I'm not here to attack you or anything, I'm here to talk and hopefully ask for help. I don't think I have an evil soul or anything, so…"
I trail off. He purses his lips, looking a bit nervous. "O-kay. What... what are you here for?"
"Do you have a lot of time? It's sort of a complicated, long story."
He scratches the back of his head. "You hungry?"
It's been, what, nine, ten hours since I last ate? "God yes."
"I needed to go on lunch break anyway," he says, reaching for a heavy brown jacket, before he frowns at me. "Why aren't you wearing a coat? Aren't you cold?"
"Yeah. It's a long story."
He absorbs that bit of information, before looking towards a door at the back of Rags 'N' Tatters. "You'll have to tell me at the restaurant. Wait here, will ya?"
Rory returns in a moment with a hoodie for me. "Might be a bit tight on you, but it's all I got. I live on my own, so I don't have many clothes."
"It's no problem," I say, slipping it on. It is a tight fit. I'm not fat or anything, but I have a noticeable belly, and this jacket might suit a skinnier guy like Rory fine, but it really does stretch uncomfortably around me. Still better than the alternative, though. "Thank you so much."
"No problem. So, talk on the way?" he says, gesturing towards the door.
"Uh, sure."
He goes first, shoving a closed sign in the windowsill, before opening the door for me. There's a sudden chill, but the hoodie makes it a bit better. "Who exactly are you? How do you know who I am? About the Suit?"
Rory locks the door behind us, and as I begin to speak, he shoves the key back in his pocket. "Ahm, I told you the basics in the shop, but here are the details. They're pretty fucked up and weird, so brace yourself, I guess."
He nods. Should I tell him about the comics? Yes. I'm not the kind of person who can keep that secret, and if he thinks I'm crazy, so be it. I can't come up with a good enough lie for my knowledge anyway, and even if I could, I wouldn't be able to keep it up for very long.
"Okay, um, my name is Joseph Winfield. I'm a college student, eighteen years old, from what I think is a parallel universe," I tell him, and he takes it remarkably in stride. Must be a side effect of living in the DC Universe. Or maybe being a superhero in the DCU. It occurs to me that I forgot to Google Ragman when I was at the library. That would have been smart, wouldn't it?
"Okay," he replies.
"And in that universe you're a fictional character."
He stops abruptly. "I'm sorry, what?"
I follow suit. "Ah, yeah. There's this comic book company where I come from. On, ah, my homeworld. DC Comics. They've been writing comics about superheroes for... seventy years, maybe? Eighty? I don't really remember. But, they write about Superman, Batman, Green Lantern, their best selling characters. And in a universe where magic, aliens, Atlantis, all that exists together."
I point to myself. "I'm a pretty big DC fan. I don't know if that has to do with anything, but my homeworld? None of that stuff. Weirdest thing is our President, honestly. No superheroes or anything."
"So, at like three in the morning I wake up in a warehouse here in Gotham City by the docks, in my pajamas. With some sort of superpowers. They mostly involve light, and they're really obvious, so I'd rather not show them off on a crowded street. I... two thugs arrived in the warehouse a little after I got there. I think they heard the explosion when I blew up the locked door to get out, and came running. They had a gun, threatened to kill me, and I... I panicked. I ran away, stole some clothes from a thrift store, visited the library to figure out what the hell was going on, where I was, and how to find you, and uh, here I am."
"Okay," he says. "Um, wow. Holy shit. So... I guess I'm not a famous character?" he asks nervously, in what I think is an attempt to inject levity.
"No, you're not. Sorry."
"No TV appearances?"
"Actually, yeah. On a TV show about Green Arrow, you appeared in one of the later seasons, your suit being powered by radiation instead of magic. I think you died, like, one episode later, though. I dunno. I never watched the show."
He frowns. "Who's Green Arrow?"
I tilt my head in confusion. "Vigilante in Star City? No powers, but uses trick arrows? Dresses like Robin Hood?"
He looks taken aback at my comment. "What moron would go out and fight crime without superpowers?"
"Batman?" I reply instantly.
His eyes widen. "The Bat doesn't have powers?!"
I whirl around, looking at the people near me. They don't seem to have noticed his outburst, thankfully. "No, just a normal guy- well, not normal, but a baseline human with a lot of dedication."
"Holy shit. That's... almost weirder than me being a comic book character. You... I, um, I think we should continue this at the restaurant."
He starts walking again, and I follow his lead. Wait a minute… "You're paying, right? Because I don't have any of this world's money."