The Army of the Batman
Seven Months after the Defeat of Ra's Al Ghul
Gotham City is a frightening monster, created from decades of corruption, incompetence, and other such flaws of humanity that a select (criminal) few have exploited successfully since the beginning of the Depression that wreaked the metropolitan region. Of course, even after the Federal government claimed that the "National Emergency" was over, that was true only on paper. While the majority of the city's population (which at the last census, the numbers were above 10 million people) struggled to survive against the terrible economic situation and the infamous crime rate, those of the so-called "American Noble Class" that populated the government, corporate, and the privileged culture of the city could care less….save for one.
The hunter lays silently in his precious invisibility among the shadows that the darkest pits of the city can provide. Since his appearance months ago, at least according to the major papers of the city, the crime rate has significantly dropped up to 10 compared to before the night when he easily dethroned Carmine Falcone from his Criminal Kingdom.
However, 10 is just a number to this creature. He still sees massive corruption among the many police officers and governmental figures that willingly endanger the city's innocent and defense-less just to fuel their materialistic greed. Certainly the same monsters that this hunter decided to prey upon have started to wise-up and conduct their illegal activity in more private actions, for they no longer can openly do their business craft as they did for many years. However, the hunter adapts to his environment, and enemies, at an uncompromised pacing.
That honest cop that the hunter "enlisted" in his War on Crime was right about the "Escalation" that he predicted. As hopeful as both soldiers fighting in the same war but in different theaters were, they possibly underestimated the effect of the rather sudden toppling of Falcone from power. As evil as that villain was, he did keep a firm iron fist over all the mob-factions of the city, from the traditional Italian-American families to the recent aspired street-warlords from Asia and Eastern Europe, and of course the un-calculatedly number of "regular" nobody-thugs and the minor gangs that swear allegiance to no one.
Without a master to govern them, both the "Royal Houses" and the peasants of the underworld scrambled to take advantage of the situation, with some news media figures in the city and in the country actually blaming "The Batman" for the aftermath. Not to mention the number of would-be vigilantes across the United States of America that have sprung up since the night the Narrows were lost have either followed The Batman's example of non-fatal warfare against the criminals of their perspective cities, or followed a more blood-desiring Code of Conduct. The hunter, while dismayed so far at these people that with their public mass murder of gangsters that in his eyes make them no better than those that they are killing, keeps going in his mission to save his city, but is it a futile cause?
The hunter is forced to internally debate that question when with his stealth "eyes" on his cowl, he notices several bodies arriving in their junk-cars to a garage that from the hunter's intelligence gathered recently belongs to the Bertinelli Family. Apparently this garage is a "Chop Shop" used to process and re-sell car parts in the black market, along with other activities that our protagonist isn't sure of occurring within the walls of it. The cars stop, with the thugs exiting, and armed with rather impressive firepower that range from semi to full-on automatic guns, for which have appeared in the arms of those that fear the growing legend and mystique of The Batman. The hunter quickly uses his "eyes" to zoom onto the junk cars, and his suspicion is correct. They simply are rather high-price automobiles that have been made-over as useless vehicles to the distant unsuspecting eye. Who knows of how these animals came to possession of these gold mines with wheels for this chop shop, whatever simple grand theft auto or violent hijackings that possibly have left more than one killed simply for their mode of transportation.
The hunter quickly races among the cement rooftops of this section of the city, and quickly glides with his cape onto the street, without any of the would-be mafia soldiers noticing that their nightmare is only steps away. Crouched again in silence as part of his ninja training with the League of Shadows, he watches these cars driven into the garage, and the armed hoods on alert. With the last of the cars (a BMW?) now in the garage and the entrance for the vehicles now closed, the thugs stay in their sentinel posts around the complex.
A figure approaches the street alley near the Chop Shop, where he quickly disappears into the darkness by a violent force and only a quick gasp of surprise from the victim. The other soldiers quickly, yet silently, run over to the point of this victim's shriek. As quite as they may try, they might as well be elephants to the ears of the hunter. Within five minutes, the mob troops are all knocked-out and lay in the same alley, while the hunter comes upon the last man, who is horribly frightened by what is happening. Without making one single note of noise, he gets behind the man and slightly taps him on the shoulder. The man quickly turns around, only to be aggressively grabbed and quieted by the hunter. Dragged to the alley's brick wall of a dead end, the hunter begins his interrogation, for which has been refined since garnering information out of that corrupt cop months back.
"WHAT is going on INSIDE the garage?" the hunter growls.
"I don't know! Please don't kill me!" The hunter lands a swift gut-punch to his prey.
"MAYBE I should simply bite your NECK and SUCK your blood before you beg me to KILL you!"
"Oh God, Oh God, I'll tell! Oh Jesus Christ...I'll TELL!"
That is when the hunter noticed the smell, for this rather pathetic piece of scum actually soiled his pants. Certainly he isn't the first, nor will he be the last. Considering the tales and exaggerated word-of-mouth that the hunter has generated among these criminals, he isn't surprised that this loser actually believed that he literally was a vampire.
"START singing, or START praying to your helpless GOD!"
After confirming what he already knew, and of the nice little gem of knowledge garnered from his subject of interrogation, he punches the soiled-chap onto tomorrow, and lays him with the rest of his dozing-friends in the alley. He swiftly enters the Chop Shop through a carelessly-open window in the back of the complex, and within thirty minutes the place was cleaned out of all hoodlums, all of which were gagged and tied up and conveniently placed in front of the Chop Shop, destroyed all the cannibalization machines that allow the Bertinelli Family to strip these cars of their black market-useful car parts, and of course, uncovered a nice cache of narcotics that the soiled-loser revealed to him. The cache consisted of several Pounds of marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and other substances that the hunter will leave the police to analyze and label. After a quick anonymous phone call to the narcotics division of the Gotham City Police Department of this "hot spot", the hunter waits with the rest of the unconscious criminals until he hears the approaching sirens of police cars. The cavalry is here. While he shoots his grappling gun onto a fire-escape across from the Chop Shop, he noticed an artwork of graffiti on the wall of a building nearby that was probably drawn up by a prankster of a youthful delinquent. It was of a rather colorful caricature of the hunter himself, which consisted of a bat-like creature with humanoid limbs and razor-sharp teeth, growling as many stick-figures of crooks scram, with a huge sentence underlined above the monster:
"I AM THE BAT MAN!"
After tonight, those scumbags that he defeated probably will describe such an image to the police after their lousy night of shock and awe.