Batman Beyond: Fear Factor
By Alicia Evilstone

CHAPTER 1

A Savage Legacy

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DISCLAIMER: I do not own Batman Beyond or any characters within. Perhaps I may have modified some old characters a little, but all are still created by and the property of the good folks at DC Comics.

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The sun falls slowly over the horizon as it shines golden light over the evening skyline. Busy businesspeople hurry home to whatever loved ones they have and push past the energetic teenagers hungry for fun and excitement. As the light begins to fade the downtown part of Gotham transmogrifies from a place of commerce and into a wild rave.

In the crowd Max and Terry try to push through and are lost in a sea of dancing bodies. They have to jump over heads to see one another. It doesn't matter that it's a school night, the street is packed. Everyone who is anyone and the nobodies as well is there. All of them are gathered to see this one marvelous sight.

"There it is," says Max nudging Terry's arm. "Ashtoreth's Lair, the hottest new arcade in town. It's become more popular than most night clubs, and the games are so intense like you would not believe."

"I have been out of the loop," says Terry. "I didn't know this place even existed."

"Where have you been? Locked in a cave?" Terry smiles at Max knowingly. "Oh yeah, I almost forgot. You have your night duties."

Terry checks his watch. "Speaking of which, I don't have too long before I have to go to work."

"Come on." Max drags Terry to the front entrance. "It'll be fun. This is virtual reality as you've never seen it before. Cutting edge technology way ahead of the market. Trust me, it is so exciting!"

He shrugs, relenting to Max's prompts. "I get enough excitement as it is, but what the hey? How often do I get to spend with my friends outside of school anymore?"

"Nathan!" Max calls out to the front of the line where a young man in his early twenties with long black dreadlocks seems to recognize her. He smiles and waves for them to come to the front of the line. She accepts without hesitation.

"Max! It's been so long since I last saw you!" Nathan throws his arms around her for a friendly hug, then backs away to inspect her. "Wow, you've really grown up since last I saw you. And who's your friend? Care to introduce us?"

"Nathan, this is Terry McGuiness. Terry, this is…"

"…Nathan Hall," he interrupts offering his hand to Terry. "Pleased to meet you. Welcome to Ashtoreth's Lair with my compliments."

Terry tilts his head for a moment, then he remembers. "Wait… Nathan Hall? Hamilton High valedictorian three years ago?"

"The one and only," he adds holding up his hair. "A lot has changed, hasn't it? You'd be surprised how little being a school leader means out in the big, bad world."

Max tries to pull Terry inside, though he seems reluctant to budge. "Come on, Terry. Let's go and check the place out."

He checks his watch again. "Maybe some other time, Max. If I don't hurry now I'm going to be late."

"Let him go," Nathan reassures her. "Terry can come back any time he wants. Though right now it looks like he has some place to be."

"Alright," she relents. "You owe me one, McGuiness."

Terry waves good-bye to them and sprints his way to the car. He yells back, "At this rate, Max, I'm going to owe you about a million!"

"Nice kid," says Nathan.

* * * *

The Batmobile cuts through the night sky at supersonic speed. All that's below are trees whizzing by at an incredible pace. Quickly the Dark Knight approaches the first destination assigned to him on this evening's mission: Arkham Asylum.

Although he's never been there before Terry has heard horrific stories of what went on behind those walls. Most of those tales came back from a golden age when his predecessor still wore the mantle of the bat. Now instead of lunatics he has only spirits of the past to deal with. He can't decide which is worse.

"So what am I doing here again?" The Batman makes sure his mission is clear and spelled out in case the walls overwhelm him going in.

"To visit a Joker," Bruce tells him over the headset. "The oddly named 'Marco Polo', also known to some in his group as 'Video-Head'."

"So what's his damage that he should wind up in here?" Up ahead he can see the gothic mansion fast approaching. He doesn't look forward to what he has to face in there, but he's the Batman and he has a job to do.

"Just today he broke out into a massive fit in the middle of the City Square, screaming and thrashing about and nobody knows why. Doctors at the General Hospital say they can find nothing physically wrong with him, so they assume that the problem is psychological."

"And now the poor guy winds up in here." Terry is silent, almost sad for him. Then he remembers that this is a Joker he is thinking about. "I take it you think there's something else going on that I should know about it?"

"If you mean do I think there's another sinister force at work influencing his current predicament," says Bruce, "then yes. Similar cases have popped up around Gotham in the past month, but none nearly as severe."

"Don't worry," utters Terry. "We'll get to the bottom of this."

* * * *

"No… thousands of them… get them away! They're all laughing at me… ARGH! Please stop… please stop… I want to go home! There's no way out! …He's under my bed! The Joker is under my bed!…The Joker and an army of clowns are under my bed!"

The irony is amazing, ponders Terry to himself. A mad Joker who is deadly afraid of clowns. Just when he thinks he's seen it all something like this happens to put him in his place again. He could laugh if he didn't feel so sorry for him.

"He's been like this for the past eleven hours," states Dr. Archer coldly from one side of the pen's Plexiglas wall. "He's been heavily medicated and this is as calm as he will be. If we sedate him any more the chances are we could kill him. Needless to say, we have been watching him non-stop."

"What do you suppose could have brought this on, Dr. Archer?" The Batman stands beside him watching the patient with arms folded. The doctor takes off his glasses and massages his furrowed brow.

"It could have been anything from narcotics use…"

"He's been to county," interrupts the Dark Knight. "The doctors said he was clean."

"Yes… well," he continues, "what we could be seeing here is either a severe form of schizophrenia or the result of abnormal brain stimulation. A serious mental disorder like that would explain a lot of things in this young man's choice in lifestyle, however, the latter is difficult to impossible to identify in most patients."

"Any idea as to what he was doing before he was admitted?" Terry sounds cold and calculating, just like Bruce in his earlier detective days.

"I'd have no clue. You'd have to ask his friends about that." Dr. Archer looks up to the Batman sternly. "I must say that this is highly unorthodox. Just what is your interest in this young man? I don't even know why I am talking to you to begin with."

Batman's head turns sharply, as if he heard a sudden noise from somewhere unknown. "Did you hear that?" He bolts down the corridor with others following behind him. Looking out the window he can see a number of large motorcycles charging down the dirt path and into Arkham's main gate. "We have company."

* * * *

A phalanx of motorcycles roars into the open pavilion of the asylum. They ride in circles, knocking down old antique statues and shattering front windows from the yard. From among them come the cackling screams of insane laughter. It echoes into the night with the savage growls of loud engines and the smell of burning rubber.

"Hey, Mr. Arkham," cries out the pack leader defiantly. "Can Marco come out and play? HA HA HA!"

Clowns dash about in a human patchwork of red, white, green and purple. They charge and brake, leaving skid-marks over the tiled yard floor. With every passing moment the court becomes all the more savagely misshaped by this act of youthful lunacy. Another Joker screams out, "Give us Marco, or we'll have to break him out!"

From out of the bushes comes a shadow black hand. It grabs a passing hoodlum by the collar and drags him back to where it came from faster than he can say, "What the f…?"

His empty bike turns and slides along the ground leaving sparks in its wake. It hits a stone corner, and turns, this leaving another bike to collide into it and forcing it's riders to go flying into the air. Both of them land painfully in the shrubbery.

The leader stops and looks around a moment, noticing that their numbers are already quickly thinning. "We're not alone, clowns! We have bat trouble! We must flee and fight again another day!"

Quickly taking heed of his words the other punks turn and begin to accelerate to the nearest exit. All make it except for one. The Batman flies down in his path, and stands frozen like a deer in the headlights. The Joker charges, wanting nothing more than to run the Batman flat.

"Where do you think you're going?" In the space of a heartbeat the Dark Knight is on his feet and into the air. He lands and pounces from the front mudguard and executes a perfectly timed blow to his enemy's jaw.

His half-conscious body hits the ground with a thud while his bike careers into a pillar, then exploding into flame. He is now at the Batman's mercy, and in this situation, his bike is the lucky one.

The black silhouette of the bat towers over him, waiting expectantly for him to rise to his knees. "Who are you," it growls, "and how do you know Marco Polo?"

"I ain't tellin' you nothin', bat!" Blood flows freely from his painted ruby red lip. Impatiently the Batman cracks the bones in his knuckles. The Joker's eyes open widely. "Okay! My name is Punch, and I was Marco's ridin' buddy!"

"What can you tell me about his condition?" The Batman waits with frustration.

"I don't know nothin'," confesses the criminal. "All I know is that the guy at the arcade did it! He said he was going to get us, one way or another!"

"Which guy?" he asks angrily. "Which arcade?"

* * * *

For the second time tonight Terry finds himself back here, at Ashtoreth's Lair, though this time under the guise of his dark alter ego, the Batman. Inside, the place is very impressive with a vast array of machines spread all about facility. They all seem somehow uniform, yet he immediately notices the large array of titles available to choose from.

The room is dark and the machines are dead. Terry can feel his heart racing with dramatic tension. He knows that somewhere is what it is he is looking for, though when he finds it that may be the last thing he ever sees. Deep down he knows that it's a risk he is willing to take for the sake of his job. He asked to be Batman and now he wouldn't trade it for anything, even normality.

All around there is nothing in sight except empty consoles and lifeless VR machines. His infrared detects no heat, so no other person can be in the room with him. Batman stands from his alert crouch and scans the room thoroughly. "It looks like the coast is clear," he says to his mentor.

"Stay on your toes, McGuiness," he is advised. "We don't yet know what it is we're dealing with." The Dark Knight strolls down an empty aisle, searching left and right for the office area. "There. At the right corner ahead of you. That's where Hall's office is."

Terry's face tightens into a menacing frown. "Then I'm going in."

"Looking for someone, Batman?" The mysterious voice's lack of origin is almost disorientating. "I knew you'd come snooping around here sooner or later, so I took the liberty of being prepared."

The Dark Knight spins around to see another black figure standing behind him. He has the same long dreadlocks as Hall, though a metallic skull mask covers his face. His left arm is covered in silver armor plating leading to an artificial claw and in his right hand rests a rather large meat hook.

"I know who you are, Nathan Hall." His opponent seems unimpressed. "Give up now and confess. What did you do to Marco Polo and those other kids?"

"I'm not surprised you know who I am," laughs Hall savagely. "In fact, I anticipated no less from the renowned world's greatest detective. As for what I did to those children…"

The villain takes a swipe at the Batman with his hook, as well as a second and a third. Each time he dodges, lunging backwards and then going in for a roundhouse kick. His foe jumps, avoiding the low blow, then sends his fist flying down to the Dark Knight's face. He is blocked. He goes to stab with his other hand, but is also blocked.

"I gave those kids what they wanted. They wanted fun. They wanted an intense challenge. I was willing to give it to them, but to do so they had to pay my price." Hall charges forward, crashing his metal skull into the Batman's face. The next thing Batman can tell is that his nose is bleeding. "You are formidable, Batman. Though I must admit, you are not as hard as I thought you would be."

"I'm not nearly done, Hall," scowls the Batman. "I have a lot more in my bag of tricks to go yet."

"My name is not Hall," he scowls back. "I relinquished that title a long time ago. My name… is the Scarecrow."

"The what?" The Scarecrow raises his arm to the air and stands poised on the verge of another attack. His hand drops and he almost seems to take a graceful bow. The Batman is confused, then he looks behind him to see a large steel bird flying towards him.

The next thing he doesn't know is that he is outcold. Once again it looks like a villain has defeated the new Batman. Now he is helpless at the Scarecrow's grasp.

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NEXT ISSUE: Terry undergoes the Scarecrow's VR torture, and if he manages to break free then his life is over. What will he do? Stay tuned for the next chapter of Batman Beyond: Fear Factor.