Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to any aspect of the Batman universe.
A/N: This is a short writing exercise inspired by the "Lighten Up" scene from Batman Begins, and the lines beneath are quoted from William Blake's poem The Tyger.
Fire At Will
It had all happened so quickly—the heady scent of gasoline, the bottle of liquor in hands that no longer felt like his own, the casual flick of a lighter (an impersonal gift from years ago; he didn't even smoke) and the sudden rush of heat as flame met flesh and fiber. Instinct and adrenaline had carried him down flights of rickety stairs, out the abandoned building's unlocked doors—by now clutching his car keys so tightly that they felt embedded into his skin—and into the nearby alleyway where he had parked only fifteen minutes before setting fire to Gotham's new self-appointed fool and watching him burn through his beloved city's night sky.
Lighten up, he had said, and The Bat-man had done just that.
The act had been as absurd as it was exhilarating, and in the safety of his car—palms slick on the steering wheel, his foot on the gas-pedal, and The Narrows miles away—Crane allowed himself a quiet, relaxing laugh of victory.
If only the Bat had screamed, he thought wryly, and his smile flickered in spite of his mood.
Absent-minded fingertips felt burlap rather than flesh when he attempted to wipe the sweat from his brow, and a glimpse in the rear-view mirror revealed that Crane had forgotten to take off his mask. That particular lapse of memory had been occurring more and more often, and he found that he no longer cared.
Crane continued the rest of his drive untroubled, and that night he slept well.
In what distant deeps or skies.
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare seize the fire?