Prologue:

"WHAT WERE YOU THINKING!?" Barbra shrieked. I was stuck in the cave explaining the situation to Barbra. My mind was at GCPD where Selina was being booked.

"I was following a lead. She was helping me." I tried to reason with her.

"She is a fugitive murder suspect, for chrissakes!"

"I was trying to save those people from the cleaners. The two cases are connected, mine and Tim's. Senator Ryan was killed by the cleaners."

"They are connected. Tim can have both of them. He doesn't back you up on this."

"I was doing my job." I growled.

"I'm sorry to do this Bruce. But it's for your own good. I'm grounding you and locking down all activity from you until you get your head right."

"You can't do this! You work for me!"

"Alfred gave me the codes to lock you down before his death. He knew something like this would happen forcing me to keep you from doing something crazy." She turned away from me and typed something into the computer and everything went on lock. My gear and spare suits were all locked away. Only she had the override code. All i had was the suit and the gear i had on me. No access to anything else. Not even the car.

"I would ask you to hand over all the stuff you have with you, but i know you'll just..." She turned around to see me walk away. I knocked over her plant on my way out. "Nice, real nice." She said under her breath.

Fraternizing with the enemy. I had stepped over the edge. The cartoon moment when gravity wait for the coyote to realize his mistake before the plunge. I was mad. At myself, at Barbra, at Selina. Was she worth this? I headed straight for GCPD. Barbra might have put my extra gear on lockdown, but there was no putting me on lockdown. I didn't need the car to get around the city anyway.

I arrived at the police station. I asked to use a detectives computer when i got there. He gave me a confused look but didn't dare to question me. It was all connected, the murder of senator Ryan, the cleaners, the court of owls, Black Mask. I just had to make Tim see it so he'll lay off of Selina.

A cop approached me and asked me if i was here for Robin. He told me Robin was getting a statement from an eyewitness. I walked in on Robin and the witness. He had the witness pick out Selina from a line-up with 3 other women. The witness seemed confused.

"Aren't i supposed to identity any of the guys in the jumpsuits." He asked.

"That's not your concern. Just concentrate on this." Robin insisted. Now i really had a bad feeling about this. Worried that Robin was in on something i wasn't aware of. "Do you recognize any of them?"

"Yeah i'm positive number 3 was there." He said pointing out Selina.

Tim wasted no time to inform the officers. "We're done here. Take them away. Someone will get you once the paperwork is done, until then wait here." Tim saw me standing in the doorway. "I tried to help you Batman. But you didn't listen. Now it's too late." He walked past me. I decided to talk to Tim's witness myself.

"Anything you'd like to add?"

"I was trying to tell Robin about the guys in grey overalls. They sure as hell weren't cleaning the place. But he wasn't too keen on listening to me. But the girl who i just pointed out and the men in jumpsuits got into a serious firefight."

I went over to talk to Tim, he was on the phone with someone. "They're taking the fall, both of them. Batman was with her when she was arrested."

I quickly approached him barking like a mad dog. "Who the hell are you talking to!"

"Barbra's been too soft on you. I was informing the proper authorities on what they should know! This is my case Bruce. Stay aware from it." Tim wasn't backing down from me. I wasn't sure whether to respect him or hit him. He walked over to Commissioner Gordon's office.

Everything had started out as black and white. Somewhere down the road the line went blurry. The colors started to run, got smudged and gray. Tim had been above my suspicion. It felt like a goodbye.

The cells were downstairs, that's where i headed. On my way down i looked at the front door. I thought about walking away. Vanishing into the night. I couldn't do it. I had to stay the course. But in the back of my mind i knew it was a course set to nowhere good.

I got down to the lockup. "I'm here to get a statement from Selina Kyle."

"Catwoman? You lucky dog. I wouldn't mind getting a statement from her. Well maybe not now, that she's killer. You might wanna watch your back with that one Bats. Very basic instinct"

I walked over to Selina. Her face lit up when she saw me. She quickly rushed over towards the bars. "Bruce you've gotta get me out of here."

"You know i can't do that."

"If i stay here, i'll die."

"Isn't that a bit mellow dramatic?"

"Behind bars i'm a sitting duck. Come on Bruce. Anyone of these cops could be in bed with the court of owls. You should know."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You know Sal Maroni. You want answers, call him. He'll verify everything i've told you." I didn't want anything to do with Maroni. But i should have called him the moment the court of owls was mentioned.

With Barbra disabling my coms i had to use one of the phones at the station. The call went straight to his messages. "You've reached Senator Sal Maroni. Please leave a message."

"Maroni, it's Batman. We need to talk. If you ask me, you still owe me one."

Just then an explosion went off upstairs. "The fuck was that?" "A bomb upstairs?" "Everyone upstairs now!" They all rushed upstairs. But i knew something was off.

Selina's words on her being a sitting duck kept playing in my head. The bomb had misdirection written all over it. I checked the security cam footage. The cleaners got inside the lock up and killed two officers. They were looking for her. "Find the bitch! Kill her!" They walked right past her cell. She was hiding under the bed. She crawled over to the cell door and reached out for the keys in the dead cops pocket. She freed herself and took off. Selina had been right. I had to go after her.

I took out all of the cleaners in the lockup. I even put them behind bars in a vacant cell once they were all dealt with. I walked outside into the rain. Selina had vanished into the night. Without her i had nothing to go on. I knew where to find her. A car pulled up next to me and honked. The window rolled down to reveal another problem.

Have no fear Falcony is here. The world was getting too small for comfort. Too many coincidences. He had a finger pointed at me. "Bang! You're dead Batman." I hoped in the passenger seat. I looked in the back to see a replica of the Gotham City Rogue's Macot costume.

"Gearing up for Halloween?"

"Call it my Trojan House for the war that Black Mask started. Speaking of which, any news."

"Just drop me off at Miagoni Island." As we drove i decided to see if he had any useful info for me. "Does the inner circle ring any bells?"

"Nothing mystical about them. Even if they themselves would like to think so. Just one step up the ladder from organised crime. I see where you're going with this. Black Mask has made a deal with them."

"What about Catwoman?"

"Selina Kyle? She's earned a reputation as quite the killer nowadays. I hear she is a stone fox. I would fuck her." Right then i hated this guy even more somehow. "Can i ask you something Batman?"

"Ask."

"Hypothetically, if the only choice you've got is the wrong thing, then it's not really the wrong thing. It's more like fate. You have to do what you have to do."

"It's never that easy."

"Of course. We agree to disagree."