The Dawn of John Blake
(Sequel to "The Dark Knight Rises")
Chapter 1
It's been two years since I took over for Batman, and rumors of an alliance called the Suicide Squad are swarming around Gotham like ravaging bees. The worst part is I can never find them in time; I don't even know what they look like! I caught a glimpse of one of their legs last night, but that's no help. I have no idea who they are, how many of them there are, or what their motives are. They attack different types of victims and rob obscure, varied stores every night. So all I can do now is wait in this diner, looking out the window in the middle of the night, waiting for something to happen. The waitress comes over and asks if I need anything, I don't leave eye contact with the street as I reply, "No, I'm fine, thank you."
I could hear the irritation in her voice when she retorted, "You know, you can't just stay here all night." I finally left eye contact with the black streets outside of the diner window. I looked at her in the eyes and saw that she was a beautiful young woman, about twenty-two years old with golden blonde hair and bright blue eyes. Her thick Eastern accent didn't do justice to the full, pouted lips it came out of. Her petite hands were placed annoyed on her narrow hips. One of her thin eyebrows rose at my silence; I guess I was staring for a couple more seconds than I thought. "Well are you going to order anything else or not? I'm a busy lady!" Something odd was in her voice when she said that. I narrowed my eyebrows and looked across the diner.
"Yeah…but, no one else is here. What else do you need to do?" The reaction she gave me when I said this was not what I expected at all. She gave a sly smile and lowered her head.
"I thought you'd never ask, sugar!" And with that, she whipped out some sort of gun from inside of her apron with one hand and another sort of gun with the other. She pulled both triggers at once before I had time to think. I felt a netted material all around me come from one gun, but couldn't see anything because the other gun she shot off must have filled the entire building with smoke, as far as I could tell anyways.
I heard a high-pitched cackling coming from the girl, whom I assume isn't actually a waitress, to say the least. I then heard muffled sounds and voices, and I tried to make out words, but all I could hear was imperceptible voices. Then, I heard footsteps come close to me, and a familiar voice came along with it; the voice of a man. Who can that be? I thought, racking my brain. It's as though I've heard it before… from a terrible nightmare of some sort. I heard two other voices come from behind him; one from a voice of a man I didn't recognize at all, and another from a woman with a smoky, beautiful voice. I still couldn't quite catch what they were saying, but by this point the smoke was starting to clear.
"Put your hands up, baby," the waitress's voice came from among the now mist of smoke, "word on the street is you're working for Batman." Now the smoke was clear enough for me to see the slender woman in front of me; now in a change of costume. From her neck down to her toes, she wore a somewhat jester-like outfit that was patterned with red and black diamonds and squares. It was tightly fit around her small, but somehow still curvy body. Her hair was still in pigtails, but her makeup had obviously gone through a major malfunction during the time the smoke had clouded my vision from her. Now, instead of her light use of brown and black eye makeup, her face was plastered with sloppy white paint and red and black lipstick with smoky, dark makeup or paint of some sort all around her eyes. She looked like a skeleton was attempting to be a clown but failed miserably. She was eyeing me down sinisterly as she swung her hips from left to right, humming jubilantly to herself.
"Actually, my dear," the familiar man's voice came from behind the blonde woman, "word on the street is he is Batman!" Then the man hooted evilly, a laugh similar to that of blondie's. And after that, I saw him emerge from the mist as he put his bony arm around the girl's shoulders. I've heard rumors of this man, but I thought he was killed; that or imprisoned in Arkham. It can't be. Here I am, working as the Batman for the very first time, and I am tied up, defenseless, in front of the face of the Joker.