One punch to the gut and I was holding my sides, a second hook to my face sent me sprawling backwards. I felt arms wrap around my neck from behind, tightening swiftly like a hungry boa constrictor. This was it. I was going to be choked to death. The blood trapped in my head spotted my vision quickly. I did my best to claw and tear at the arms constricting me, but the man only wrapped his other arm around me lower, pinning my body and arms against him. The blood in my head, the pain from the punches, and the constricting arms of muscle around me- all sources of pain and stress.

And now I was suffocating. It's honestly the worst feeling, suffocating. Our most natural instinct is to breathe. My lungs ached, trying to expand- trying to inhale, and I quickly realized that, despite my violent efforts to get free, I was going to die now, here in this dark tunnel beneath the city.

Down where it stank and where water that mixed with things I don't want to think about rushed through the tunnels constantly.

Yet, in the back of my mind, I was posing only one question to myself: "Would she be alright?"

The little girl's face flashed in my mind. It was only then, hours later- while being strangled- that I realized I'd never asked her name.

I'd agreed to brave the occupied sewers of dangerous terrorists so that I could find someone with enough power to grant this little girl's request. A little girl who's name I didn't know.

At this point, did it matter? She would be left waiting above, on the streets, in an alleyway, her last hope ill-placed. She'd be alone… and scared… She'd never get to see her father again.

And it was my fault.

I quit struggling, accepting my failure. My vision blacked, but I wasn't unconscious. A few more seconds and I would have surely been dead.

But I was saved, for now, as my would-be-murderer released his grip on me, letting me drop to the floor. What now?

"What is going on?" A loud and strangely garbled voice rang throughout the room.

I couldn't see still, and my hearing faded in and out as the blood rushed out of my throbbing cranium. I'd landed flat on my stomach, arms splayed above my head, my face turned to one side. I might as well have been dead.

I tried my best to listen, hoping my ears would fix themselves soon enough.

"Sir, this girl…the tunnels and tried to…caught her, and we're dis-… -Less you say…?" That's all I heard before my hearing returned to regular. It wasn't hard to figure out one of my attackers was telling this newest occupant of the room what I'd done.

Though it sounded he was making me out to be some sort of spy with intentions to kill them. That was far from the truth.

"Does she have information for us?" the voice that had saved me from death (if just temporarily) asked.

"Not that we know of, sir," said one of the other men, "She didn't show any signs of training in combat… or stealth… She just walked in and began talking to us."

The strange voice spoke again, "And what did she say?"

There was an uneasy pause.

I could faintly make out the sound of the men muttering to each other confusedly, when finally one of them answered, "Just something about the police being locked up and…uh..."

He seemed hesitant to say the next part- the important part.

"And?" The voice calmly commanded.

"A-and something about a little girl, I think." The way the man said it made it sound like it was a ridiculous detail to even mention. I could see I'd not gotten through to them at all.

There was more silence, until a pathetic sounding groan filled the room. It took a moment, but I realized it was me.

I heard footsteps approach me. Large ones. As they came closer, I pushed myself up in urgency. It took a sad amount of effort but I was on my hands and knees now. A pair of giant combat boots stood a few feet in front of me.

I lifted my head up, raising my face to see the rest of this person. The one light in the ceiling was right above me, and shined unforgivingly into my eyes. I squinted and blinked, trying to shake off the light somehow.

The large figure before me took another step forward, blocking out the direct light above us. Now, tentatively, I opened my eyes and looked up again.

I was genuinely confused by what I first saw. The face of the man, cast in dramatic shadows from the light above him, was covered in something…

I blinked, trying to tell if it was just a shadow or hair or... It seemed to be a sort of breathing apparatus.

A mask.

He didn't say anything. He just stared.

I stared back, despite only being able to make out a crude outline of his face from the shadows. Whatever was strapped to his face was definitely some sort of mechanism that had affected his voice. He didn't breathe heavily, but I could still hear the discernible sound of breath filtering in and out of the mask.

The air wasn't that bad down here, was it?

It struck me then that I was on all fours, staring up at this person like an idiot. I could feel his importance. And he hadn't killed me yet. He was allowing me a chance to speak. I wasn't going to waste the chance.

Slowly, trying to show I wasn't going to run or attack, I raised up from my knees.

I heard some movement from the other men. One walked around behind me, his gun casually held at his hip, but I could tell he was threatening me.

I'd come too far to really give a shit, honestly.

I tried to speak and coughed a few times, not realizing how crushed my throat was still.

I didn't take any more time to study these men. I didn't try to figure out the best approach to appealing to them. I simply gathered the courage to lift my eyes to meet this man's (what I could make out of them in the crummy light, that is), and spoke:

"I'm here to speak with-" I cleared my throat again, trying to return my voice from it's raspy state, "-someone who has the power to get into… wherever you are keeping the police."

A long silence filled the room. I thought for a moment that he wouldn't respond.

Without an audible inhale to prepare he finally spoke, "The former enforcers of the law are kept contained by the will of the people."

The voice filled the room, though he wasn't necessarily talking loud. He sounded odd. Not just the Darth Vader-like effect his mask had but he talked like he was from another time period… Or like he had cotton stuffed behind his lips.

Restraining an eye roll, I responded slightly more confident this time, "I know that is what most people believe, sir… I understand that is what you are telling everyone, but I.. really need to get someone into where they are."

I could hear at least one suppressed scoff from one of the other men.

"Sir, you don't have to lis-" the goon started, but he was cut off shortly. The man before me swiftly raised his hand and commanded quietly, "Leave us."

There was only a second of hesitance from the men, but all four of them shuffled out of the room quickly after that, even the one behind me.

This seemed like that point in a movie where something really bad happened. But I kept my eyes staring into the dark shadows that covered the man's eyes.

Without the other men pointing their guns at me, I was able to think a bit. Now I was able to notice the rest of the man that stood beneath his darkened, masked face.

My wariness resurfaced as I realized this man filled out his brown coat with an unbelievably large frame. Along with his sturdiness, he was tall. I guessed if I stood next to him, the top of my head would reach his shoulder.

And I'm average height for a female.

I can only forgive myself not noticing all of his threatening physique before because, despite standing right beneath the only light in the room, he seemed to fade into the darkness. Not hiding, just… He held the shadows to him. As stupid as it sounds, he seemed to be the shadows themselves. Which made him seem even bigger- like he took up the entire room somehow.

As frightening as he was, I was sure now that this was the man I needed to be talking to.

"Sir," I began, "I know this is of no great concern to you, but there is a little girl out on the streets. Her father is a policeman for this city and she has no one else."

I would have continued but he simply replied,

"She has you."

I was speechless for a moment, surprised at his assumption.

"Oh, no, she d- I just met her yesterday. She doesn't know me-" I was cut off again by him.

"You met her… yesterday?" He cocked his head to the side.

"Yes…" I wrapped one of my hands around my other arm's elbow, trying to sink away from his imposing presence.

He was silent for moment more, then continued, "You would seek a man of power; face his trained men in the shadows and filth beneath a falling city…"

The man stepped forward, not threateningly, but his energy was dominant and unnervingly calm. He was close enough to snap my neck, and I wouldn't expect him to even blink an eye.

"For a child you only just met?"

I couldn't seem to find the courage to answer him in time.

"That seems hard to believe…" he said, with, for whatever reason, a hint of amusement in his voice. Or perhaps I was reading him wrong. Probably, the latter.

"Yes, I realize now it seems made up, but I promise you there really is a little girl- she's waiting for me above ground. I can bring you to her and-" I was cut off from my frantic rambling.

"Even if I did trust you, what makes you think I would waste my time helping a single person in this dying city?"

The question hit me like a brick to the face. Of course. I'd been so concerned with hoping he believed me, or with hoping he'd even let me live to finish a sentence, I didn't account that this was a hardened leader of killers and anarchists.

Why would he care? Why would he even send one man out to see if I was telling the truth. And even if I was, why should he care if a little girl misses her father? The girl's father was just a prisoner to this man. Why would he let one girl be with her father when countless families had already been torn apart by this uprising?

But… I promised her.

"Sir… I know you have told this city it's been freed, and that as long as no one leaves or tries to mess with this new… 'system', that the bomb won't go off. But I don't… I don't believe that." I didn't wait for his reaction as I said this, I simply clenched my fists at my sides and stared, determined, into the empty shadows over his eyes.

"This city is doomed. I… I can feel it. And I'm not pretending I can do anything to stop it from happening. But this little girl's only family is locked away from her. She's alone, and she's so scared. She just wants to be with her dad-" I had to stop myself from saying daddy for some reason, "She needs to be with her father. However long this city is going to last, please, let her spend the time she has left with the person who means the most to her."

"I will not let him out. He must be contained until he is willing to do what the people ask of him," he said this so coolly, I couldn't tell if he was continuing the conversation just to mess with me or if he was actually hearing my words.

"I know that. She knows that. She asked to be with him. She's aware of the conditions she would be in with her father," I replied.

He waited to speak. He didn't seem to be thinking of what to say next, rather he looked as if he were merely drawing out the length of silence to stress me out more.

"Please," I begged just above a whisper, "I know you have no reason to trust me or her, and there's nothing special about either of us. You probably have people searching you out for favors constantly since this all started, but I promised her that I would do all that I could to find someone with the power to bring her to her father."

The man slowly brought up his arms and crossed them over his bulky chest. He lifted his face up just enough so that I could make out the whites of his eyes and a few more details of his mask. One of his eyebrows raised in question.

"You promised her you would do all that you could… Yet, this is all you've been willing to do?" He gestured to the room around us.

I didn't reply. I couldn't think of what to say.

"You are right to assume I am one with the power to grant your wish. So," he paused a moment and then added, "Why should I show you favoritism? What have you done to deserve your request heeded?"

I stood for a moment, his words racing through my mind, when I realized: He had chosen to believe me, for whatever reason, but he wasn't going to just comply. He needed proof that I truly had promised this girl I'd reunite her with her father. And he needed a reason to care. 'He won't say yes just because I asked' , I thought to myself, '…But he might be willing to strike a deal.'

"What would I have to do?" I asked. Only after I said it did thoughts start to float on the edge of my consciousness; thoughts that concluded I could be getting myself into something very, very bad here. But it was too late. I'd promised her. And it's not like my life was of much value anymore. Her happiness meant more to me, honestly. I didn't really know why, either.

The man's voice broke through my thoughts, "What can you offer?"

My heart noticeably skipped a beat or two. This was not a situation I felt prepared for at all. Was he… could he be asking if I'd…? No. No, no, no. NO.

I forced myself to reply without thinking any more on it.

"I don't have much…" I began, then, realizing I needed to put everything on the table, I added, "But I will give anything I have."

"Anything?"

There was a lump in my throat now, and I hoped my inner discomfort wasn't visible. He sounded so serious and calm, it was unnerving.

The man dropped his arms and took a step forward. I could feel his eyes looking me up and down, analyzing me. I tried to shrink into myself. Surely he wasn't looking in interest.

With my oversized coat that reached down nearly to my knees, I was just a dark blob of baggy clothing with a messy nest of long hair and a plain face. Yet I still felt so threatened.

What did he want?! Could he not just tell me?

His large figure was standing right in front of me now. I had to overcome my instinct to step back and stare at the ground. Lifting my face, I looked into his eyes, still dark in the poor light. He was waiting for my answer. This was it. This was the striking of the deal.

Any chance of changing my mind and returning to my old life slipped away as I pushed words past the lump in my throat.

...

"Yes."

Notes: Heeeey, how did this get here? No idea. I've just been messing with this idea for awhile and figured I'd post it. It may continue, it may not. I don't have a solid storyline set out for it yet but... damn it's fun to write. Dunno if it's any good. Hopefully it can give you fellow Bane fangirls a good kick.. or something. Let me know what you think, I guess?

Sorry for any typos or particularly lazy and/or repetitive writing near the end. I rushed the end of the chapter a bit, since I had just then decided I wanted to post it on here by tonight.

ANYWAYS OMGSH WHAT'S BANE GONNA ASK FOR?! IZZE GUNNA AX FOR THE SEXEYTIMEZ? WHO KNOWS? TUNE IN NEXT TIME FOR THE ANSWER.