Chapter Twelve: Seeking The Truth (Part 1)

The sound of thunder and lightning roars across the dark clouded sky over the city of Metropolis, a strike of lightning strikes the revolving Daily Planet globe causing sparks to shoot out and fall down to the streets. Within the darkest parts of the city a man franticly races through the streets.

"HELP! SOMEBODY HELP ME!" shouted the man as he tries to out run a mysterious dark figure. The man became even more startled as each step the figure took the ground would shake.

The man franticly continues to escape the dark figure by criss-crossing through the streets and passage ways of the city until he comes across a house in which he quickly runs inside shutting and locking the door behind him. His eye remains glued to the peephole scanning outside for the dark figure suddenly his eyes widened in fear as the dark figure raced towards the door, kicking the door in with tremendous force the man is hit by the door's impact. The man lay bruised and bloody on the floor as he tried to crawl away from the figure, the figure walked slowly behind the man as he crawls but he then stops as the figure corners the man against a wall. The tall, large and muscular shadow of the dark figure overshadowed the man as loud, chilling, scary screams erupt from the house.

Police and crime scene covered the area early the next morning and many of the local residents bombard the police barricades as they try to get a closer look to see what had happened along with the news reporters trying to get descent footage and answers from the police. On the sidewalk across the street a man pulls his jacket in tighter to stay warm from the cold with his hand as he shuffles his bag of groceries with other, and his eyes are drawn to the crowd of people then decides to check it out.

"What happened here?" asked the man to a random local.

"Some guy got beaten to death probably a drug deal gone wrong or mob hit, that's my opinion" answered the local. The man's eyes then shifted to the body being dragged out on a gurney and noticed how the numerous blood stains seeping through the white sheet, he then walks away as more people begin to crowd the barricade.

The man walks down the streets of the Metropolis projects he reaches an old building in which he enters and walking up the flight of stairs leading to hallway of apartments the man continues down to the end of the hallway stopping at Apartment 10. He is startled to notice that the door is open he peeks through to only see darkness he slowly places his bag of groceries on next to the door and pulls out a gun from his upper backside then forwards into the apartment. He makes his way to the living room and then suddenly out if the darkness

"Hello, Gordon"

Gordon aims his gun the direction of the voice, cocks the gun and prepared to fire. The unknown figure then turns on a light to reveal himself.

"Bruce?" shockingly said Gordon as he uncocks and lowered his gun.

After Gordon had calmed down himself and Bruce discussed what exactly was going on.

"What are doing here?" asked Gordon.

"I could ask you the same question, because you're supposed to be dead" said Bruce.

"I can explain"

"Well go ahead explain because I saw you get shot I saw you die. Did you even get shot? And how did you know I was Batman?"

"Of course I did" Gordon pulls down his shirt collar to reveal the scar from his bullet wound. "And I knew you were Bat-" Gordon is then unnervingly interrupted by Tori sudden appearance in his apartment. "Who is she?"

"This is Tori. Jim, Tori. Tori this is Comm- former Commissioner James Gordon"

"Nice to meet you"

"Same here, you look pretty good for a dead guy" said Tori as she made her towards a chair in the back of the room.

"Does she know that you're….you know?"

"Yeah she found the Batcave. Anyways the one thing I need to know is why did you fake your own death? and did they bury an empty coffin?"

"No I paid off the morgue to use one of their unclaimed John Does for the burial" Bruce and Tori both raise an eyebrow "And for faking my death I needed to protect my family and…..you"

"I can understand your family but why me?"

"There's this criminal organisation called The Council and they threatened to kill my family if I didn't expose Batman's true identity. That's why I faked my death, the Joker being there was just a coincidence so I took my chance"

"I don't think it was coincidence because when I was in L.A. the Joker said something that stuck to me"

"Why did you do it?" demandingly asked Bruce.

"Kill Gordon?" said the Joker as he raised himself on his elbows and spat blood which shattered across the ground beside him.

"WHY!?"

"If only you knew" The Joker gives a little chuckle.

"What does that mean?!" said Bruce as he stood beside the Joker.

"Figure it out, hero!" said the Joker as he then began to laugh chillingly and insanely

Bruce pointed the barrel of the gun down at the Joker's head and cocks the gun

"And I thought heroes didn't kill"

"Think again" said Bruce as pulled the gun's trigger

"What do you think he meant by that?" asked Gordon as he leaned forward on his chair.

"I think this Council might have put out a hit on you and got the Joker to do it. If you were going to expose me or not either way they wanted you gone" suggested Bruce.

"And I think the Council knows I'm here"

"What makes you think that?"

"Because lately on the news I've seen that there's been a few deaths around town including one I walked past this morning, it wasn't that far from here"

"Have you got a chance to investigate the deaths?"

"I've tried but I had to keep low and the Metropolis PD aren't gonna give an open case information to a "supposed be dead" former Commissioner of Gotham PD" said Gordon as he got up and headed to the coffee table to pick up a newspaper. "We can talk to this reporter because he's reported on all of the deaths" continued Gordon as made his way back to his chair and handing Bruce a copy last week's copy of the Daily Planet.

"Okay then let's go and talk him, hopefully he'll have some helpful information" said Bruce as he and Tori got up then made their way out of the apartment.

"What's the reporter's name?" asked Tori as she walked out into the hallway.

"Umm….Clark Kent" answered Bruce as Gordon closed his door behind him.

Here it is the first of the special two-part opening chapter for SHADOW OF THE BAT II: ACTS OF DECEPTION.

Bruce and Tori have found "Commissioner" Gordon residing in the city of Metropolis and is at the centre of a bunch of mysterious deaths.

Who or what is The Council?

Stay tuned for Part 2 of Seeking the Truth with a special cameo by a certian mild mannered Daily Planet reporter.