Season of Infamy
It was true, the inhabitance of Arkham didn't always get along. They would, more often then not, try to bump each other off from time to time. It was just the rogues daily game of tit for tat and no one, as a vernal rule held grudges for a long time because it was simply how the rogues interacted with each other. A safe way of proving who was the best. Plus it settled the leader bored and the underworld in some sort of order.
If the littles guys thought they were at the top, then quite rightly so, a game would pop up and true top players would put them back in place.
Their games, to the general public, would be considered dangerous, but it was the only natural thing to do and sometimes it was the only way the rogues could actually get on with each other, sometimes it even formed unlikely friendships. The games they played with each other, known to the criminal underworld as 'rogue games', were a way in which two rogues could openly express their opinions of each other and there would be no grudges held afterwards. Some rogues even used these games as a strange and very dangerous way of flirting with each other, which occasionally happened though both participants would often deny it, sometimes it was just so damn obvious it was pointless in denying. One of these very exchanges which was always said in hush hush, and secret whispered was the fact that when Jonathan and Pamela thought in actual fact it was just them flirting with each other in the only way they knew was safe and given their reputations no one would dare spread said rumour around outside Arkham.
There was always something like this going on, but one thing always stayed the same in every instance. Manners.
Manners, strangely, were always there, no matter what was going on there was always manners.
So when a man pushed in-between Jervis and Fries when they were queing up for their food, naturally there was an argument.
"I say, good sir, you pushed in!" Jervis glared at the tall man in front of him, who calmly turned around to face him.
"I am not concerned about you," the man hissed before he turned to glare down at Jervis, his eyes glowing slightly green. "You are nothing."
"Hey buddy," both turned and looked up at Croc who was standing behind Jervis, an angry snarl on his features as he glared down at the new comer. "There's the back of the que," he growled hooking a thumb behind his shoulder to indicate where he was supposed to be.
"You dare stand against the great Ras Al Ghul?!" the man who had pushed in snarled.
"Can't be that great if you're in here," Croc growled as he leaned down to look at the man in the face. "There are certain rules in Arkham, one of them is don't loose your manners. Ya loose them, ya won't last long in here."
"Is that a threat?"
"Depends good sir," Jervis piped up as he stood his ground and glared up at Ras.
"Depends on what?"
"Depends on weather ya move to the back of the que, where ya meant to be," Croc hissed as he stood to his full height, which was quite tall and would always make everyone listen to him. One occasions there were advantages to being a huge reptilian crocodile man.
"I do not take orders from a monstrosity like you."
"You keep talking like that and the guys in here will eat you alive," Waylon grinned slightly and ran a tongue over his sharpened teeth, amber eyes glowing slightly. "Some of them would do it literal too."
"I would follow his advice," came the dull drone of Fries from in front of him.
As turned and glared at the back of Victor's head, he hadn't even bothered to turn around to speak to him. "And why is that?"
Victor actually looked behind him this time. "Because, you will not live if you got in a brawl with Croc. No one, other then Batman, can."
"I have died many times before," Ras snarled.
"With an attitude like yours I'm not surprised," Fries drawled before he turned his back on him once more. "In fact, I am surprised you have lasted this long."
"Move to the back of the que," Croc growled over Jervis as he glared at Ras. "And maybe, just maybe, you'll last a little longer, little man."
"How dare you!"
"No sir, how dare you!" Jervis cried stamping his foot. "You pushed in front and then proceeded to argue with us, when we have quite calmly pointed out the rules of this game."
"You are not heading our words and are choosing to ignore them," Victor glanced behind him. "Head of the Demon or not, in here you're just like the rest of us. Devoid of emotion and life."
"You know nothing of me," Ras snarled. "You know nothing of my life."
"I doubt you know very much about us either."
"What is there that is needed to know? You are all scum. You're not even worth the air you breath."
"Tell me…" Fries turned fully on Ras. "Have you ever seen a flower die? Watched something that was once so beautiful… so full of life… collapse and rot from within?"
As was silent, as where Croc and Jervis, the two Arkhamites knowing who Victor was referring to.
"I have," Victor explained. "And in doing so… it has left me emotionless. The only thing that matters in this world, to me, is Nora. My sweet Nora and if you think a so called immortal will get in the way of me curing her or even reaching her, you are gravely mistaken."
"I am not getting in the way of you or your wife."
"You are."
"Ya see," Croc spoke up again. "If there is a fight in here, we miss lunch and get taken back to our cells. Victor there is allowed to work on his wife here in Arkham, after lunch and if there is a fight caused at lunch, he can't see her because of protocol."
"What has that to do with me?"
"You sir are very close to causing a fight!" Jervis hissed as he glared up at him. "Because you are rude and highly disrespectful!"
"If you prevent me from seeing my wife," Victor informed Ras as he gripped his arm in an icy and vice like grip. "I shall make sure you never see the sun again or feel the warm touch of the sun's rays. I will freeze your blood and shatter your legs into a million shards of ice, before I'd continue to do the same to the rest of your pitiful existence."
Ras hissed slightly, as the feeling of Victor's cold grip began to burn on his skin, odd to say it was actually incredibly cold.
"My wife is more important to me then anything in this world, her life is more precious to me then yours," whilst the words he spoke told anybody who heard them he was angry, Fries spoke calmly and it was that which was unnerving. His voice was devoid of any emotion. It was cold and heartless, like ice.
"I am sorry about your wife," Ras hissed as he finally managed to yank his arm free of Victor's grip.
"That word holds no meaning to me. My emotions have been frozen from me. A heart of ice can never be thawed and mine will never be warm again. Do not cause any trouble and you will move through Arkham with no fear of an altercation but if you get in the way of my work, I can assure you, the icy cold of death will be the last thing you feel on this harsh planet."
With no more to say Victor turned around and continued to stand in the que.
Ras was silent for a moment before he turned back to the two other Arkhamites who were glaring at him in a way which told him to move and said that he had better.
He would not admit it, but Ras was scared. There was no pit nearby and so far away from the league, it was impossible to say what might happen if he got in a fight with these highly unhinged individuals. Croc was enough to make him reconsider his course of action.
He looked both of them up and down before he moved out of the que, taking his tray with him and moved to the back, which was just behind Waylon.
"Wasn't too hard was it?" Croc snarled snidely at Ras who didn't answer or even bother to answer him as he looked at the floor.
There were rules it seemed to Arkham and it seemed the inhabitance, to say they were insane, followed them to the letter and told the others they must follow them also, no matter what. Ras supposed it was the only way to keep peace between the monsters that lived behind Arkham's cold iron walls, the only way to order the craziness was to lay down guidelines and the main one of all was manners. They all had to have manners about them and could never go against them.
Ras decided he needed to learn more about these rules. Find out what the others were so a confrontation like that wouldn't happen again. Though he didn't know why, it wasn't like he was planning on staying in Arkham long, he was going to break out and get revenge this time, against the Detective.
Little did he know the three inmates he had just encountered had the same idea as he did and by that night they had all broken out.
Ras had seen the other three running from Arkham as he was doing the same and as he watched them take their own routes to escape, he understood what they would be up to, he understood right then and there that they all had the same idea as he.
A smile graced his features as he realised that the Detective would have four more of Gotham's worst to deal with this season, he realised that this season would be a season of infamy.
THE END.
Note: Yeah! Tribute to the season of infamy coming soon to season pass of Arkham Knight! Gotta say... THIS HAD BEEN THE BANE OF WRITING! YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW HARD IT WAS TO GET ALL OF THESE CHARACTERS TOGETHER! I thank you so much for suggesting it I had such a good time trying to come up with ideas to put them all together and then this kinda just worked and came to me after I was queueing for my bus and started chatting to others in said queue it just sprang to mind this is what I could do, so I thank you so much for picking this!
Anyway, requests are still open as per usual and I love a good challenge so yep, even picking characters that don't always get along or are even together will work for me. Even if you guys want to me to write a chapter about how certain rogues first met other rogues in Arkham or anything like that, I am happy to write it! :)
Next up: The last laugh.
