Chapter 1408: Trust, Commotion, and a Way to Vent

After saying goodbye to them, Luke stood in front of the wall and put on his Bat suit before he left through the water.

The submarine, on the other hand, automatically floated up and turned into an ordinary yacht, which sent Tony and Natasha back to a small pier in New York.

Watching the yacht turn around and leave, Tony turned and called for a cab.

After he hung up, Natasha asked, “Bruce Wayne – did you find any information on him?”

Tony replied curtly, “No.”

Natasha chuckled. “His face is a nanomask, right?”

Tony scoffed. “Did you think he would use his real face?”

Natasha glanced at him. “You can’t see his original appearance?”

The sunglasses that the tycoon was wearing weren’t ordinary. They had a lot of detection functions, and couldn’t be compared with her equipment.

Tony said, “He’s not that stupid. My equipment can eliminate the influence of the nanomask to a certain extent, but he has other ways to interfere. You didn’t get anything, right?”

Natasha sighed regretfully. “This Batman is really…”

She didn’t know how to describe him.

She knew too well how important confidentiality was in doing dangerous work. As someone who was a target and at the center of attention, Batman couldn’t be any more careful.

If she were in his shoes, she would instantly erase all traces and go into hiding.

She wouldn’t set up a meeting like this.

Tony chuckled inwardly. He wasn’t surprised. On the contrary, he felt that it was perfectly normal.

He had known Batman for so long, and though that face was fake, it was better than looking at the armor.

People were like this: If you lowered your expectations, any small gain would make you happy.

Furthermore, Luke had only poured wine for Tony during the entire meeting, and he hadn’t given Natasha any preferential treatment.

Clearly, Tony, who had been personally acknowledged as a “friend,” had a much higher status than Natasha.

So, even if he truly discovered some secret of Batman’s, he wouldn’t tell Natasha.

Batman didn’t trust SHIELD, so how could Tony? He was nothing more than an Avengers consultant.

He trusted Batman more than he did SHIELD.

…

The next few days were busy in New York. Luke and Selina couldn’t slack off anymore.

NYPD had suffered heavy losses this time. More than a hundred officers had been killed.

Also, most of the police officers didn’t know that Assistant Commissioner Brad had been taken away. Nobody knew where he had gone.

Chief Nelson wasn’t too happy about that.

After Brad left, all the pressure was on him. As the only four-star ranked official in NYPD, he now held the highest position.

Family members of deceased officers needed to be appeased, work needed to be adjusted, and the New York citizens were unhappy. All of this gave him a headache.

But in the wake of crises came opportunities.

After his biggest opponent disappeared, donations started to pour in from many corporations.

NYPD received two large contributions through him: 20 million from Stark Industries and 10 million from Titanium Phone Company.

At the very least, that was enough to cover compensation for the deceased hundred or so officers and medical expenses for the other injured officers.

Chief Nelson dismissed several mid-level executives and dozens of related administrators.

Then, Selina became a level one lieutenant, and Dustin took the position of second-in-command at HQ’s Investigation Bureau. Elsa was promoted and replaced her boss.

The newly expanded intelligence department was also purged, and the newly added personnel were taken away by the FBI and Homeland Security for vetting.

Elizabeth had switched from leading a two-person team to leading a team of over ten people.

Chief Nelson wasn’t fazed as he made these changes.

Brad’s men had been taken down, and he had only gotten a small portion of the benefits. The other NYPD bigshots were also taking advantage of the situation to divvy up the empty positions.

Their fates would be determined via mutual private communication.

Selina and Dustin’s promotions were nothing more than a passing thought. After all, Luke really couldn’t be promoted again for the time being.

Nevertheless, the chaos within NYPD was just a consequence of the attack by the test subjects, and could even be said to be the least of everyone’s concerns.

The public and media were still focused on the thousand or so dead citizens.

Various gory photos and videos continued to spread, which were a huge shock to the audience.

If it was a natural disaster, the people would have nothing to say, and could only try nitpicking emergency rescue services for not trying hard enough.

However, this was clearly a man-made disaster. The numerous voices among the people and in the media basically came down to the same view — someone had to take responsibility for the attack.

Sacks Industries and the Foot Clan were at the forefront.

Various industries were quickly seized, and related personnel were detained or summoned within a day.

Bigshots who were close to Sacks were pulled out and investigated one by one to see who had supported Sacks.

Those who had connections to Sacks did all they could to distance themselves from him.

However, Sacks Industries had been in New York for more than ten years, and many people couldn’t be washed clean of suspicion.

In a short period of time, two New York council members, a judge, two district attorneys, and Brad, the NYPD deputy commissioner, had left office. The investigation which awaited them was another long story.

But that wasn’t enough.

In 2001, a terrorist attack set off a wave in the United States.

Military and anti-terrorist expenditure skyrocketed, along with the FBI and CIA’s authority.

As long as there was suspicion of terrorist activity, the FBI didn’t need conclusive evidence, and could directly arrest and interrogate suspects.

Although not as many people had died this time, the bitterness was no less intense.

Politicians and bureaucrats being turned into scapegoats and punching bags as they were dismissed from their positions wasn’t enough; people needed a way to vent.

The investigation into the main culprit behind Sacks’s attack wasn’t made public. Besides, nobody would believe that it was a business corporation and a gang working together to carry out the attack.

When did gangs stop thinking about making money and start thinking about carrying outterrorist attacks?

The members of the Foot Clan were all born and bred Americans; people might believe that someone in the gang had helped terrorists in exchange for money.

However, nobody would accept that they were the ones who had planned this.

From beginning to end, the authorities never made clear who the culprit was.

Erik Sacks, the CEO of Sacks Industries, and Karai, the second-in-command of the Foot Clan, weren’t good enough to be the mastermind, while Shredder, the leader of the Foot Clan, had disappeared.

At this point, things changed slightly.

Feeling stifled with anger, the people naturally focused their attention on another main character in the attack — Batman, along with his superhero friends..

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