Hi everyone! So to start off this author's note, I want to say how incredibly thankful I am for all of your extremely supportive and helpful reviews! There are no words to completely describe my gratitude and how excited I was when I saw how much response I got from the last chapter. I guess you all love Bane that much Don't worry, I do too!
So, without further ado, also noting that I do not own anything Batman or Nolan-verse related, please enjoy this chapter
Chapter 7:
Five minutes.
It's been nearly five minutes since John sent his text message to Lucy and he was starting to fear the worst. Call him paranoid, but Lucy never hesitated in responding to messages, especially in dire situations; and while this has been named a hostage situation, John had enough hope in Lucy's wit and skill that she could do little things, like type a simple text message, unnoticed.
But there was the downfall that, perhaps, this was not the case. The thought made John clench his jaw.
"Blake! Get over here! Now!" Foley, who now had to hold his tongue from too many condescending remarks, stood by John's squad car and urgently called to him.
John peered down at his phone once more before reluctantly putting in his pocket. He joined Foley on the opposite side of the car and mimicked his post by unholstering his gun and crouching behind the open door of the squad car, taking aim at the doors of the Wall Street building. John gave a quick sweep of the street and took in the surrounding area. Almost every exit route had been closed off with road blocks, except for one of them where a freight truck was still parked in the way. Besides that, the police were in position and doing all that they could to make it near impossible for the gunmen to escape. This put some part of John's worry at ease.
John faced the doors again and readjusted his hold on his handgun, as his palms starting to sweat out of anxious anticipation. The minutes seemed to tick in his ears as he and the GPD waited in vigilant silence for even the slightest bit of movement from inside.
"I got something!" One of the cops declared minutes later.
At that, every gun came off of its safety and every finger was positioned over the trigger. The front doors slowly inched open and out came a group of stock market workers with their hands held up in a surrendering fashion. The guns lowered an inch or so at this, but no one, especially John, was prepared to fully pull their aim and focus away, no matter if the sight of the seemingly unharmed hostages allowed for some breathing room.
John warily eyed the group as they moved forward little by little. His eyes dissected and picked through the crowd in case the felons try to make a break for it by disguising themselves among the hostages. But also, if there was the slightest possibility that Lucy was in that group, walking alive on her own two feet, then he'd be able to take that small breath of relief.
But that breath of relief was going to have to wait, as John caught a flicker of something moving in the center of the crowd, and apparently, he wasn't the only one.
"Hold on! I've got something! Got something!" Someone started to shout.
No sooner than when that was said, did the sound of engines pervade the former quiet air of the street and everything suddenly took a shocking turn. The crowd of hostages suddenly parted like the Red Sea, each of them diving for cover as motorcycles, bearing the gunmen, tore down the steps. Momentarily stunned, the police didn't react in a very proficient way, letting their guns run loose with their bullets aimed messily at the general vicinity of the motorcycles.
"Stop!" Foley started to shout above the echoing gunfire and waved his arms to get everyone's attention. "Stop! They have hostages on them! I repeat they have hostages! Stop shooting!"
The cops were forced to put a stop to their onslaught as the motorcycles flew by, the panic-stricken faces of the hostages flashing quickly and helplessly in front of them. But amidst all this, John's eyes locked onto only one of the motorcycles zooming past him that held one hostage that could never go unrecognized by him.
"Lucy?" John questioned loudly, afraid to think that the worst had occurred to Lucy. But when the hostage turned her head at the last moment and gave John a straight glimpse of her face, his fears confirmed that it was indeed Lucy staring back at him. "Lucy!"
John felt something kick start in him and he was soon running from beside his car and following the motorcycles as they made their way towards one of the exit routes. Lucy saw him following and it looked like she was trying to shout his name, but it became muted as the motorcycle she was on gained speed and drew farther and farther away. John pushed himself to go faster but found that it wasn't enough for the motorcycles were already escaping off the road blocks like they were simple ramps. He stopped running, as he knew it was pointless to do so now as the motorcycles were racing away too fast for him to chase on foot. He forced himself to look Lucy in her frantic eyes before she was taken too far from him to make any more contact and silently swore to her that he wasn't stopping just yet.
He gritted his teeth together when he saw Lucy nod her head once and turn her glistening eyes away. John turned on his heel with sharp swiftness and booked to his squad car, ready more than ever for a chase.
Lucy was holding on for dear life.
This was no exaggeration, nor was this the proper time to be exaggerating or joking for that matter. Only mere moments ago, was Lucy in the line for a hail of wild gunfire from the very people who were supposed to be saving her and now she was unwillingly still an accessory to a criminal escape. Lucy could only wonder why and where she went wrong.
The motorcycle rumbled loudly beneath Lucy and sent an unsettling rivet through her that reminded her of just how real her predicament was. She felt the motorcycle jerk to the side and Lucy was forced to open her eyes, unaware that she had closed them in the first place.
The air blew up in her face when she turned to look forward, her hair whipping into disarray and her eyes tearing up from a mix of the drying air and a plethora of rattled nerves. She struggled to stay seated, as her hands had long ago abandoned their hold on her bag and were currently clasped tightly on Barsad's forearm and the front handlebars as leverage to keep her steady. But with every jolting twist and turn of the slowly blurring downtown streets, Lucy found this to be even more difficult to do; and soon the blurry streets became the long expanse of Gotham's highway—at rush hour.
Lucy sucked in a deep, uneasy breath and felt the urge to squeeze her eyes shut again, as they started to rapidly switch and merge into multiple lanes, bypassing and weaving through angry drivers and their cars. Suddenly, Barsad took a deep turn and weave that almost made Lucy lean too far and slide right off the motorcycle. She gasped as her boot grazed the pavement and she immediately scrambled to straighten up. In her right ear, despite the honking and rushing of everything else, she could distinctly hear Barsad laughing at her. But Lucy had no time to scowl or even think about that, as the sound of police sirens quickly took over. She looked over Barsad's shoulder and saw police cars turning onto the freeway and running down the streets right after them; and just overhead, a helicopter was trailing behind. For a moment, Lucy felt a glimmer of hope, until Barsad suddenly punched the speed of the motorcycle up again.
How fast does this damn thing go? Lucy thought shakily, as her breaths started to become shallower.
Apparently fast enough to put a good distance between them and the police. Another voice in her muddled thoughts answered her, putting a downer on Lucy's glimmer of hope as she watched the police cars momentarily disappear from her line of sight.
She gulped and closed her eyes, trying to convince herself to think positive for just a minute. But when she opened her eyes again, she realized Bane was no longer driving in front of them, instead, he had dropped his speed and now was level with Barsad.
"Hand me the girl." Bane said, his mechanical voice still capable of sounding imperious and menacing despite the muffling helmet and the fact that they were still driving down a busy highway.
Barsad nodded his head once, disregarding Lucy's wide eyed look and moved so quick that Lucy didn't have time to realize what he was doing next. He immediately let go of one of the handlebars to grab her by the arm and roughly tugged her off the bike. Lucy's breath caught in her throat and her heartbeat lurched in her chest as she thought she was about to make a face plant into the pavement. But as that sick sensation of falling started to swirl in her stomach, a huge hand grabbed her by the underarms and pulled her up.
"Now is not the time to be panicking, little one," Bane's voice echoed in Lucy's ears as he set her in front of him on his motorcycle.
But despite Bane's words, Lucy was far from not panicking. As Bane circled his arms around her to grab onto his handlebars, Lucy could only pray harder that some higher power was going to help her out here; and just as they drove into a tunnel, it seemed Lucy's prayer were heard.
The lights in the tunnels suddenly started to flicker and die out one by one, eventually bathing them in darkness. Lucy craned her neck over Bane's enormous shoulder, but soon realized it was too hard to see anything at all. But she did hear something.
It was an engine, rumbling lowly with a powerful ferocity that told Lucy that this was not a motorcycle or a police car. Lucy squinted her eyes, struggling to make something out, and in a short instant, Lucy caught onto a black mass that was moving after them at an incredible speed and had not one doubt in her mind who it was.
"Batman." Lucy breathed, with a hint of hope in her voice, as it occurred to her that the chase had truly begun.
Bane seemed to have heard her, yet he did not make any vocal response or any visible response for that matter. Instead, he applied a significant amount of pressure onto the gas pedal and surged them out the exit of the tunnel. When they were back on the open highway, Lucy looked behind Bane again, this time only three of his men had made it out if the tunnel with Batman exiting only seconds later. Lucy could only imagine what Batman had done to those left behind.
They dashed down the highway at law breaking speeds, but Lucy was sure it was nothing compared to what the Batman could do. But even when Batman started to gain on their trail, Bane never spared a glance to check how much distance they were losing. Lucy didn't think he could push the speed limit on the motorcycle any more then he already did and seemed sure that this was the end of the line for Bane and his men.
But this thought only rendered Lucy unprepared for when Bane suddenly stepped down on the brakes as he turned around and started to go in the complete opposite direction of the chase. Lucy was utterly confused and nervous now as she watched the rest of Bane's men zoom by them without acknowledgment and Bane started to deliberately drive towards Batman and the police.
Lucy grabbed onto the front handlebars with one, shaking hand while the other rested in a fist on her lap, refusing to touch Bane. She apprehensively looked forward as the black billowing mass of Batman was barreling straight towards them with the police not too far behind. For a split second, Lucy wondered what was running through Bane's mind. If any of this was part of his plan, or if he even had a plan at all. But these thoughts were quickly dispelled, when Lucy heard the sound of the Batpod drawing closer to them.
Lucy felt a rush of hope at the sight of the Batpod pressing onwards down the highway. She thought this was it. That she didn't have to be part of any of this for a minute longer. That she really would be getting out of this alive.
But her hope was shattered when Batman drove right past them. Against all common sense, he simply passed them. He didn't make any attempt to stop Bane or even make a U-turn. He didn't shoot at him or use something from his artillery belt. He just let them go; and the attempts from the police were no better. Even with the mass amount of man power the GPD had on the streets, they completely disregarded them as if they were normal citizens and were heavily bent on chasing the Batman now instead of the real armed robbers.
Lucy couldn't believe it.
The incredulity and shock of it all put her whole mind and body at a standstill, in which all Lucy could think about was the moment she watched Batman, her last hope of escaping this, disappear from her sight. Lucy racked her mind for a something that could explain Batman's actions to her and it soon occurred to her that he was most likely going for the laptop that had the stolen information. But despite how legitimate that sounded, it didn't make Lucy feel any better. In fact, it only made her feel like the prayers she had uttered during this whole ordeal were suddenly thrown up in the air and deemed useless.
But wallowing in self-pity was something Lucy couldn't do at the moment, not when Bane was right behind her, seeming to enjoy watching the oblivious police cars race by on the street a few mere feet away. Lucy shook her head as the blind chase continued and forced herself to look away. But all that stood in front of her was a gaping entrance to an underground pathway with a vaguely unfamiliar stench rising out to greet her.
Lucy could only guess to where it led.
I pray that was good and accurate recounting of the stock market chase where we finally see Batman again. I'll be honest that I am not the greatest proficient at writing action sequences such as these, so this chapter was a particular one that really worked me over some and was thorn in my side for the last three days or so. However, I feel quite satisfied with my work and hope that you are too
So till next time, leave your comment below in that gorgeous review box!
P.S. More Bane in the upcoming chapters.
