Chapter One: Fury, Hanna, and Identity

Terry looked at the clock. It was one thirty in the morning. He had been lying there trying to get to sleep for the past three hours. After a final attempt to fall asleep he finally got out of bed and began to quietly put on a shirt, pants, socks and shoes. He grabbed his jacket and then snuck over to the window. Making sure to open it carefully so as to avoid too much noise, Terry slipped out the window and down the fire escape to the street below. Once at the bottom, Terry made his way towards the other side of town.

As time passed by and the seconds became minutes, and the minutes became hours Terry thought about the person who he was going to see. She was such a beautiful girl. He had met her six months ago and ever since then couldn't stop thinking about her. Her name was Hanna and as far as Terry knew she had moved in from Chicago just a few days prior to their meeting. She liked soccer and Chinese food, and her favorite pastime was reading a book or chatting online. She also liked to spend her time with Terry. There seemed to barely be a moment when the two of them weren't together, leastways, when Terry wasn't busy saving Gotham. He really truly thought that he loved Hanna.

When Terry reached the gate he slipped through it and began the walk through the cemetery. He was close, he knew it, he had walked this cemetery so many times he could draw a detailed map of it. When he saw the tombstone he stopped.

Hanna Thompson February 5, 2022-March 7, 2039

Loved by all who knew her,

Her presence in this world will

Most assuredly be missed.

Terry pulled back some weeds that had begun to grow in front of the tombstone and revealed the final message.

I will always love you.

Tears threatened behind his eyes but they did not fall. The same tears had been there since the day it happened. Six weeks to be exact. Ever since that day Terry wasn't the same. He had more adrenaline when fighting, as if he believed that the villains Bruce Wayne sent him out to fight against were he ones that had killed his beloved Hanna. But Terry knew that that wasn't the case. Hanna had been killed by a man that Terry had never seen before, and who he was yet to meet a second time.

Terry clenched his hands in anger. How could someone do something like that? Why would anyone want to kill Hanna? Terry didn't care what the police report said; the killing had been no accident. Hanna's death happened for a reason and Terry was going to find out what it was. He remembered the story in the papers the following day. That he and Hanna had been out walking home from a movie and a man tried to rob them. Terry fought him off and in the process Hanna was killed.

The story was only partly true, although Terry had never bothered to tell the papers so. The man hadn't tried to rob them. No, he had gone after Hanna with a purpose, Terry saw it in his eyes; the look of accomplishment that one gets when finishing some sort of task. It was as though the man had been hunting her down for one reason or another.

The orange brightness of the sun began to reflect in Terry's eyes and he made his way back home. When he arrived he climbed back through his window changed out of his clothes and had just laid his head on the pillow when his alarm went off, telling him it was time to get ready for school. He hit the alarm lazily, waited a moment, and then pulled himself out of bed.

Bruce Wayne checked his watch. Terry was ten minutes late already. He hadn't been on time the past six weeks and Bruce was beginning to worry. Before the accident with Hanna it was a seldom, every now and then kind of thing for him to be late, but now it was consistent, every day, as if he didn't care.

"No," Bruce said. "It's not that, he's got too much adrenaline in each fight for it to be that, but what then?"

Just then Terry entered the cave. His eyes had bags under them and he was even paler than the day before. Bruce acknowledged his arrival. "You're…"

"Late," Terry finished. "I know."

The two were silent. Bruce sighed. "Terry," he said. "I know that you've been distracted the past six weeks, what with Hanna's accident…"

"That wasn't an accident Bruce," Terry told him defiantly. "And I'm gonna find the guy that did it and get some answers."

"And what are you going to do when your interrogation is done? Are you going to let him get away? Or are you going to get revenge, make him pay for what he did?"

"I don't know," Terry said. He turned his back to Bruce and shoved his hand in his pockets.

"Revenge is only going to ruin you. The pain you inflict upon the person that killed Hanna will not even be half of the pain you inflict on yourself."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Bruce shook his head. "Never mind," he said and then turned to the computer. "We've got a new comer to the crime employee list in Gotham." He pulled up a file with a picture of a man with tan skin and shades. "His name is Rush Fury. He wears the shades to hide his eyes, which are the color of lemons. If you stare too long at them it'll hypnotize you just long enough for him to attack you and if he gets you once, there's no guarantee you'll be able to stop him the next time."

"So I've gotta make sure I don't make eye contact then," Terry said.

"That's right. He's currently robbed two banks and a grocery store just down the street from your school. At the moment he's holding up at a warehouse just north of here." A map filled the screen. A blinking red light marked Rush Fury's location."

"I'm on it," Terry said. He grabbed the bat suit and as he was getting into the Batmobile Bruce said, "Be careful, and don't lose your focus for one minute."

Terry gave him a thumb's up and then took off. Bruce watched him fly away, a look of sadness possessing his face. He wished there was a way he could help Terry with whatever it was that was bothering him, but the best he could do was be there and not push him.

Terry reached the warehouse just ten minutes after leaving the Cave. He checked the perimeter to see if Rush Fury had any little bodyguard friends but found no one. He landed quietly on the roof of the warehouse. He then snuck to a door leading to a set of stairs that would take him to the ground floor of the building.

Once he reached the bottom Terry moved swiftly and silently, searching out his new adversary. The place reeked with the smell of stale air. Terry remembered reading an article that said this place would be torn down due to its instability. He just hoped it would last long enough for him to get this guy.

There was the sound of footsteps behind him and Terry quickly turned. There was nothing there. When he turned back around he came face to face with two bright yellow eyes. Forgetting Bruce's warning Terry stared into them, mesmerized at their color. After a moment he began to have the most fleeting feeling, as though he just got on a drug high or something. The world around him seemed to melt away and it was as though he was the only thing that existed in the entire universe.

That's when the attack came.

Terry flew back and hit the far wall. As he tried to stand Rush Fury reached him in the speed of light and knocked him down again. Terry's head began to spin and he collapsed onto his hands and knees. Rush stared down at him.

"Pathetic," he said. "And people told me you were the best. Ha!" He karate chopped Terry smack in the center of his back causing him to lie on his belly, the concrete floor cool to the touch. He felt a sharp pain in his ribs as Rush kicked him. Terry thought he heard one of his ribs start to crack. He reached out and pulled Rush's leg out from under him. He didn't hesitate one moment to stand before Rush's senses came back to him. Rush lunged at him but Terry dodged his hit causing his opponent to run his shoulder into the wall.

What happened next made Terry realize why he was called Rush Fury. Quick as a flash metallic claws erupted from Rush's suit and slashed Terry across the chest.

"Ahh!" Terry cried out. As he did so he had fully anticipated Bruce's urgent response and demand to know what had happened. Then he realized that his com-link had been turned off when he hit the wall. He ducked behind a row of metal shelves and turned it back on quickly.

"Terry! I've been trying to get a hold of you! Did you make it to the warehouse?"

"Yeah," he said, his voice filled with pain. It was quiet on the other end.

"Terry, are you alright?"

Before Terry could answer a nearby row of shelves came down with a crash. Luckily for Terry the row hadn't been his own, but it wouldn't take long for Rush Fury to get to him, and so he began to move through the maze of shelves trying to find a place where he could somehow apprehend Fury.

"Terry, what's going on? What was that crash?"

"I screwed up," Terry said. Somehow saying the words out loud felt like he'd been stabbed in the heart, although that wasn't much of a comparison seeing as how five claws had slashed him across the chest. Tears were threatening to fall, but he tried to hold them back.

Bruce had noticed the slight tremor in his voice when he'd said it. Something about those words had sunk deep into Terry's emotion mechanism and Bruce knew he was beginning to lose focus. "Terry," he said catching the attention of the teen. "Don't lose focus. What happened?"

"I looked in his eyes. I was walking and I turned around and he was just there. I couldn't help it Bruce, I'm sorry."

"Don't worry about it Terry, just find somewhere that'll give you an advantage over him. You're doing better than others have done."

Terry looked around and saw some large crates. He quickly climbed to the top of them and leaned against the wall. His torso ached, his head was pounding, and his brain was getting all muddled up and confused.

The sound of crashing shelves reached his ears and Terry withdrew further into the shadows so as to avoid Rush Fury's line of vision. Just a moment after doing so he saw him. The look on his face showed that of absolute outright anger and for once Terry was afraid he wouldn't make it out of the building alive.

"Terry, have you positioned yourself?"

"Yeah, I'm just waiting for him to get close enough."

Terry watched Rush carefully. It took nearly ten minutes before he was finally standing next to Terry's crate. Terry positioned himself ready for the pounce.

"I've got him,' Terry said. He didn't wait for Bruce's response before jumping onto Rush and knocking him to the ground. The two wrestled with each other, Terry watching Rush's hands very closely so as to avoid another razor sharp attack. However, what happened next was something Terry had not been expecting.

From within the workings of his outfit, Rush withdrew a small device that sent an enormous shock of electricity through Terry's body. Terry let go of him and before he could act Rush's metallic claws gashed him across the back.

"AHH!"

"Terry! What's happening? Are you alright? TERRY?"

"Bruce," Terry said weakly, but he collapsed to the floor unconscious before getting the chance to finish his statement.

Rush stood over him. "Heh," he said. "To think, I'm going to be the one to tell everyone that I took out the Batman." He raised his hand into the air ready to strike Terry one last time when someone caught a hold of his arm. Before Rush could react he was thrown across the room. The impact he made with the wall caused the entire building to begin crumbling. The unknown individual that had just saved Terry's life picked him up, slung him over their back and hurried outside.

Bruce sat in the Cave worrying all the more about Terry.

"Terry," he said again. "Are you there? Terry answer me!"

After a moment of silence Bruce was just about to get up and find out what happened to him when a voice came over the com-link.

"Don't worry about your friend," the voice said. It was slightly distorted, so Bruce could not make out if it was male or female, let alone if the voice was familiar to him. "He's in good hands. I must say that you'll want to conceal his means of transportation however."

The transmission cut off. Bruce thought about what had just happened. Had Rush Fury been the one to say that? No, Bruce just knew it wasn't him. But who then? Barbara? No, she was out of town.

Whoever it was, Bruce had the inexplicable feeling that Terry was in good hands.

Terry drifted in and out of consciousness. For a few of the seconds that he was conscious he saw a person standing over him. They had impenetrable green eyes that seemed to stare right into your soul, and long brunette hair. Those were the only details he could make out before losing consciousness again.

The sound of machines alive with beeping confused Terry greatly. His eyelids seemed so heavy and as his senses slowly came to him he noted that he was in a bed. While it was comfortable the position he was laying in was not. He began to stir, but as he did pain seared his body and he stopped moving.

"Terry?"

He knew that voice. Terry slowly opened his eyes. He found himself staring up at a ceiling. He turned his head and saw his mother sitting beside him. Tears filled her eyes.

"Mom?" Terry mumbled still not entirely certain of how he got where he was. He looked around the room some more and realized that he was lying in a hospital bed. He tried to recall what happened after the fight against Rush Fury, but the only image that came to mind was those green eyes…

"How long have I been here?" he asked.

"You've been here about three days," Mrs. McGinnis said. "Matt went down to get something to eat from the vending machines. He should be back…"

Just as she was saying it Matt entered the room. He saw that Terry was awake and immediately his face lit up. "Terry!" he exclaimed. He rushed to his elder brother's bedside and would have hug him but remembered the injuries he had. "We were so worried!"

"What happened?"

"Well," his mother began. "You were on your way back from working with Mr. Wayne and that infamous Rush Fury ran into you. He gashed your chest and back, as well as broke one of your ribs. Lucky for you someone came by in time to prevent him from doing more than just injure you."

"Who was it?"

"They don't know," Matt said. "Some mysterious person wearing a black hooded cape. They said it sounded like a girl, probably in her teens, but they weren't sure. Funny thing is, when she brought you here you weren't wearing the clothes you wore to Mr. Wayne's. Of course, she did fix you up a little, and so she probably thought it best to bring you to the hospital in something decent rather than your shredded up clothes."

"Yeah, probably." At that moment Terry had a realization. It struck him so hard that he could feel the blood beginning to drain from his face.

"Terry?" Mrs. McGinnis asked. "Are you alright?"

"I'm just…tired."

Mrs. McGinnis kissed him on the forehead. "We'll let you sleep."

Not even a full sixty seconds after they left and started down the hall, Bruce Wayne came down the hall from the other direction. Mrs. McGinnis and Matt had turned the corner before Bruce had a chance to ask them about Terry. So, he went into the room.

Terry was sitting in the bed practically pale as a sheet. He was trembling slightly and Bruce wondered what had shaken him.

"Terry?" he said. The young man looked up at him. "Are you ok? You look a bit shaken up about something."

"The person that brought me to the hospital…"

Terry paused still trying to consume the whole idea.

"Yes?" Bruce said encouraging him to continue.

"They know who Batman really is."