In his high backed chair, shrouded in darkness, Batman sat and watched the police reports scroll down the screens in front of him. His eyes flicked from side to side as he read them, committing each one to memory, isolating facts, forming conclusions. The scrolling stopped, and the screens went blank. The Batcave was blackness, as if blackness was a thing that could be carved into vaulted ceilings, sharply dropping chasms and narrow precipice spanning walkways.
"Lights"
At the Batman's command, lights hidden somewhere in the vaulted ceiling of the cave, sprang into life. Discs of light grew on the floor, touching each other at their edges. They highlighted the central parts of the cave; the lab, the workshop, the garage, the gym, the trophy room.
"Car"
From somewhere below, a place hidden in the blackness that was the cave, the Batmobile arose like a leviathan from the deep. It's long black curves gleamed in the spotlight. It was hungry, hungry to cleave the virgin night in two and leave it quivering behind. Eager to throb and rumble and roar through the streets of Gotham. As Batman approached the engine sprang in gurgling, petrol guzzling life. The roof slid back to reveal the two seater compartment within. Batman jumped in, and waited while the lid slid closed above him. Safely secured inside, he let the autopilot whisk him deep into the throbbing heart of Gotham City. As the car flashed through the night, more data scrolled down the internal screens. Leaning back in his chair, the Batman watched and read and learnt. He learnt of a man who had been stealing some very unusual items. And he began to form conclusions.
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In the Jazz Club, everything was as it was supposed to be. People were dancing, their graceless limbs fueled by alcohol and non-prescription drugs. People were laughing. People were talking. Bodies pressed against bodies in a throng that was just the wrong side of crowded. It was the place to be in Gotham's East Side. This place was becoming a Mecca, and tonight was becoming an event.
In the club's backroom sat it's owner, a rich Cuban cigar in his mouth and a cheap Gotham girl in his lap. On the table in front of him was 30 grand in unmarked, non-sequential bills. He was ignoring the fact that some of them were dripping blood onto his expensive Indian carpets. He was more concerned with keeping his blood were it was; in his thin, cholesterol-clogged veins and pumping through his black heart. On the other side of the desk stood a man who could easily alter the flow of that blood, and Boss Marco was well aware of that fact. He was tall and slim, swathed in a heavy black trench coat. A hat was pulled down over his face, which Marco could see was half covered by some sort of mask. His hands were covered by thick leather gloves and his feet, beneath the coat, were clad in heavy leather boots. Marco knew the sort of person he was dealing with. The families usually stayed away from business with freaks like this; but No Mans Land had been a hard time and in the new climate of opportunity Marco's name didn't carry the reputation and fear that it once did.
"I won't insult your reputation by counting the money" said the Boss casually, as one of his boys swept it carefully off the table and into a sack. "I hope you won't insult mine when we bring in the merchandise,"
The other man crossed his arms over his chest and inclined his head once at the Boss. The Boss snapped his fingers, and through double doors on the other side of the room came two men, hauling behind them two heavy gas canisters. The man from the other side of the desk moved quickly over to them, inspecting the labels which identified their contents. He could not contain his glee.
"Excellent Marco, you have outdone yourself. Your reputation does you justice. When Gotham wants, truly it is you that it comes to." The man's voice was muffled by his mask, giving Marco the creeps even more than he had already.
It was the Boss's turn to nod, and he smiled a thick greasy smile as the man turned his back and concentrated on the canisters. He ran a pipe out from under his coat and attached it to one of the canisters, and with a quick motion, turned the release valve. The gas hissed as it traveled down the pipe and into whatever apparatus was contained within the coat.
"Eh, I thought you wanted that stuff to.."
"Poison someone?" asked the man on the other side of the desk, "Yes that's right." The first canister was empty now, and he connected himself to the second. "But I never explained the nature of my delivery system".
The gas hissed, and something bubbled under the coat that the man was wearing. Boss Marco looked to one of his henchmen then another, and they slowly advanced out of the corners of the room towards the man. Sensing trouble, the harlot on Boss Marco's lap squirmed and tried to slip away, but the hand that had previously lain so lightly on her thigh now held her in place. The room was silent, except for the hiss of the gas.
Then the hissing stopped.
Suddenly the door behind the man fell inwards, ripped from its hinges. For the first time Boss Marco was aware that the sounds of dancing and laughing and singing and drinking had stopped. Somewhere in the back of his mind he was dimly aware that they might have been replaced by screaming. Smoke blew in through the doorway, and the crumpled form of one of Marco's bouncers toppled in and fell to a heap on the floor. The Batman walked in.
"Freak, you got no business shaking me down," said Marco, and with a click of his fingers sent his two goons piling towards the Batman. Batman's history with the criminal underclass of Gotham was well established, but the crime families and their Bosses such as Marco were a different matter. These were not the cowardly, superstitious men that Batman flew down upon in the back alleys of the city. These were a different caliber of criminal; sometimes even more dangerous than the likes of the Joker. Cold, calculated career criminals to whom the suffering of others wasn't even a sick or satanic game. It was just business, just money, just greed.
As the two men approached, Batman reached behind him into the recesses of his cloak. Before they had closed half the distance between themselves and Batman his hands had returned, swinging out from behind him like catapults. He released tiny silver capsules from his hands before the men were within arm's reach. The capsules burst, one in the chest and one in the face, releasing a thick cloud of gas that clung and crept like a thick amorphous creeper. Cocooned in choking gas, the men fell to the floor inches from the Batman. He stepped over their gagging, twitching forms to meet the man who had seconds ago stood on the other side of the desk from Marco. Now he stood between Batman, the desk, and Boss Marco.
The man drew himself up to his full height, which was still a good few inches shorter than Batman. He pushed the brim of his hat back with one of his gloved fingers and the two masked men faced each other for a moment in silence. The man's mask covered most of his face; except for his eyes, forehead and hair. A thin lock of red hair hung down over his one eye, and others poked out from the back of the hat. The mask itself was white rubber, as was the rest of the man's outfit that could be seen under the coat. Only the gloves and boots were black.
"Nice outfit" said Batman, "Who are you?"
The other man smiled, and the rubber of the mask creaked. "I'm the future." he said, "I'm the answer to Gotham's prayers."
"Really?" said Batman. The sarcasm in his voice was evident, as was his contempt for the individual in front of him as he kept one eye on Boss Marco. Marco had pushed his chair back from the desk, and froze with his hand half into one of the desk drawers when he noticed the Batman's eye on him. He slowly removed his hand, holding it up to show that it was empty.
"Well.. Answer, Future, whatever you call yourself.. I suggest you get out of my way, unless you want to spend the rest of the night coughing your guts up like your friends back there." Batman drew closer to the other man, looming over him. He filled the man's vision. He was a shadow now, a huge thing of wing and darkness. He was so close that he could smell the other man, smell his fear. Batman knew the smell of fear, and his nostrils filled with it. He drank it in. He drank it down. He could feel it in his veins. He was in the dark place now, the place where the real Batman was, where the real Bruce was. He could smell the terror. And it was too late when he realized that fear wasn't the only thing that he could smell, and the floor was coming towards him almost as fast as the darkness was closing in.
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The first thing that he sensed was the creaking. It reminded him of the gentle creaking of a ship as it lay idle in calm seas. A pirate ship perhaps, waiting off the coast of Never-Never land for a sighting of Peter Pan and his lost boys. Then there was the swinging, and the breeze. He was drifting oh so gently, the wind on his face. Perhaps he was up in the crows-nest, feeling the breeze, hoping to be the first one to make that sighting. Then he felt the hard, rough rope around his wrists and ankles that pushed through the toughened leather of his boots and gloves. His quickly recovering equilibrium told him he was upside down. He was upside down and he was tied up and he was Batman.
Batman opened his eyes slowly, for the first time realizing that they were painful, swollen and puffy. He was upside down, hanging head first somewhere very dark. Instinctively, he began working his wrists, trying to get some purchase on the ropes. The sudden sharp pain in his right wrist, and the soft gluey feel as he moved told him that his wrist was probably broken. As he twisted on the rope a dull throb that quickly built to a burning pain began to spread from his ribs on both sides. He could taste blood in his mouth.
"They really went to work on you". The voice was behind him, and even though it wasn't muffled like before he could recognize it as the man that he had met earlier. The Future. The Answer. That was what he had called himself. "They wanted to kill you, when they realized what I had done to you."
"The gas," said Batman. His voice was rough, and he coughed forth a mouthful of blood as he spoke. He calmed himself, slowed his breathing. It did no good to show weakness. He would not show weakness. He was Batman, and he was still in control. Ignoring the pain in his wrist, he began working ropes aside again. He had a small knife in a concealed compartment in the lining of his left glove . He need only to reach it.
"Yes the gas. Not entirely my own invention as I am sure you've guessed, or will guess, or at least know by now. Of course, I just told you...." the man was pacing around behind Batman, raving, his feet slapping against what sounded like concrete. "But effective nonetheless, and now tailored with my own unique range of biological cryptograms"
"Viruses.." said Batman. He had been down this road before. If there was one thing more certain than the sheer, helpless, screaming madness of his opponents - it was their megalomania. They could never resist telling him their plans. In some cases it was a masochistic need to be defeated by him, the dark and terrible god, their king of the night. Terrified by their own inner darkness they turned to him to stop them from succeeding when they were powerless to stop themselves from indulging their fantasies. For others it was the intellectual challenge. To defeat the Batman and for him to know that he had been defeated, for him to know with his last dying breath that he had failed the city, and the people that he had pledged to protect. To tear the mask away and expose him as just another frail, mortal, flawed thing like themselves.
For others of course, there was only the madness. They were the worst.
"After a fashion", the man continued. "Batman, it may bring you some comfort to know that I am not going to kill you. No doubt you have already devised an escape plan, and frankly I would expect no less. In fact, I would be disappointed." Batman took no comfort from having a fan. Certainly not a fan with countless canisters of unknown airborne viruses at his command.
One of the ropes slipped to one side, and Batman deftly slipped his thumb underneath it. He held the rope in place, so that it's movement would not give away his plan. He quickly worked another finger free. He did have his escape plan, but it had just been expanded into letting his mysterious assailant lay his entire plan out before him.
"I'm not going to kill you Batman because we are on the same side. We are both creatures of the night, both dedicated to fighting crime, fighting evil, fighting the night things"
"But I don't make deals with mob bosses like Marco". With his one hand free Batman slowly unzipped the compartment in his glove. He felt the hard plastic handle of the knife between two of this fingers. It was balanced for throwing, but would serve to cut the last of the rope away first.
"Sometimes, in the fight against crime it is necessary to delve into it's underbelly. To place our hands inside it's guts. To smell its sweat and stink and spore. Surely you of all people understand that? I do. I understand that you have to know your prey to defeat them. Have to know what's in their minds. You have to know how to make them afraid."
Batman twisted himself on the ropes towards the voice, ignoring the pain which exploded underneath his ribs as he did so. As he swung around towards the speaker he cut the last strands of the rope away with the knife. He let his arms fall free before curling up to reach his feet. He heard the man gasp. For all his talk of how he expected the Batman to be planning his escape, he had obviously underestimated how fast. Or perhaps he had overestimated the ability of Boss Marco's boys to incapacitate the Batman long enough for him to explain his theories on advanced crime fighting technique. The knife sliced through the binding around Batman's ankles and he flipped down onto the floor. Without his cape he was a different shape, more feral, more compact, a thing of tightly bunched muscles and explosively violent intent. He spun around to face the man who had held him.
"Very impressive Batman. Impressive indeed but, as I am sure you are aware, ultimately futile. Just like you, I have been planning my escape since you regained consciousness". Stepping back, the man fell and disappeared from sight. Batman started after him, but his left leg buckled under him. Too long upside down, too long unconscious, his legs were weak and starved of blood. He stumbled and fell, but forced himself back to his feet. He moved forward again, his feet numb, his knees burning. It seemed to take forever to reach that trap door, days and weeks passed in the time that it took for his legs to start responding the way that he was used to. How long had he been unconscious? How long had he been here? How long had he been running towards the door? The distance seemed to spiral away from him as he approached the trap door and long before he got there he knew that his opponent has long gone.
He looked down, and below were just the cold, dark waters of Gotham harbor. Touching a hand to the side of his cowl he activated his radio.
"Alfred, recall the car to my current position."
"Very good Sir, will there be anything else"
"Yes.. get the medical kit ready."
"As always Sir, Alfred out."
"Lights"
At the Batman's command, lights hidden somewhere in the vaulted ceiling of the cave, sprang into life. Discs of light grew on the floor, touching each other at their edges. They highlighted the central parts of the cave; the lab, the workshop, the garage, the gym, the trophy room.
"Car"
From somewhere below, a place hidden in the blackness that was the cave, the Batmobile arose like a leviathan from the deep. It's long black curves gleamed in the spotlight. It was hungry, hungry to cleave the virgin night in two and leave it quivering behind. Eager to throb and rumble and roar through the streets of Gotham. As Batman approached the engine sprang in gurgling, petrol guzzling life. The roof slid back to reveal the two seater compartment within. Batman jumped in, and waited while the lid slid closed above him. Safely secured inside, he let the autopilot whisk him deep into the throbbing heart of Gotham City. As the car flashed through the night, more data scrolled down the internal screens. Leaning back in his chair, the Batman watched and read and learnt. He learnt of a man who had been stealing some very unusual items. And he began to form conclusions.
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In the Jazz Club, everything was as it was supposed to be. People were dancing, their graceless limbs fueled by alcohol and non-prescription drugs. People were laughing. People were talking. Bodies pressed against bodies in a throng that was just the wrong side of crowded. It was the place to be in Gotham's East Side. This place was becoming a Mecca, and tonight was becoming an event.
In the club's backroom sat it's owner, a rich Cuban cigar in his mouth and a cheap Gotham girl in his lap. On the table in front of him was 30 grand in unmarked, non-sequential bills. He was ignoring the fact that some of them were dripping blood onto his expensive Indian carpets. He was more concerned with keeping his blood were it was; in his thin, cholesterol-clogged veins and pumping through his black heart. On the other side of the desk stood a man who could easily alter the flow of that blood, and Boss Marco was well aware of that fact. He was tall and slim, swathed in a heavy black trench coat. A hat was pulled down over his face, which Marco could see was half covered by some sort of mask. His hands were covered by thick leather gloves and his feet, beneath the coat, were clad in heavy leather boots. Marco knew the sort of person he was dealing with. The families usually stayed away from business with freaks like this; but No Mans Land had been a hard time and in the new climate of opportunity Marco's name didn't carry the reputation and fear that it once did.
"I won't insult your reputation by counting the money" said the Boss casually, as one of his boys swept it carefully off the table and into a sack. "I hope you won't insult mine when we bring in the merchandise,"
The other man crossed his arms over his chest and inclined his head once at the Boss. The Boss snapped his fingers, and through double doors on the other side of the room came two men, hauling behind them two heavy gas canisters. The man from the other side of the desk moved quickly over to them, inspecting the labels which identified their contents. He could not contain his glee.
"Excellent Marco, you have outdone yourself. Your reputation does you justice. When Gotham wants, truly it is you that it comes to." The man's voice was muffled by his mask, giving Marco the creeps even more than he had already.
It was the Boss's turn to nod, and he smiled a thick greasy smile as the man turned his back and concentrated on the canisters. He ran a pipe out from under his coat and attached it to one of the canisters, and with a quick motion, turned the release valve. The gas hissed as it traveled down the pipe and into whatever apparatus was contained within the coat.
"Eh, I thought you wanted that stuff to.."
"Poison someone?" asked the man on the other side of the desk, "Yes that's right." The first canister was empty now, and he connected himself to the second. "But I never explained the nature of my delivery system".
The gas hissed, and something bubbled under the coat that the man was wearing. Boss Marco looked to one of his henchmen then another, and they slowly advanced out of the corners of the room towards the man. Sensing trouble, the harlot on Boss Marco's lap squirmed and tried to slip away, but the hand that had previously lain so lightly on her thigh now held her in place. The room was silent, except for the hiss of the gas.
Then the hissing stopped.
Suddenly the door behind the man fell inwards, ripped from its hinges. For the first time Boss Marco was aware that the sounds of dancing and laughing and singing and drinking had stopped. Somewhere in the back of his mind he was dimly aware that they might have been replaced by screaming. Smoke blew in through the doorway, and the crumpled form of one of Marco's bouncers toppled in and fell to a heap on the floor. The Batman walked in.
"Freak, you got no business shaking me down," said Marco, and with a click of his fingers sent his two goons piling towards the Batman. Batman's history with the criminal underclass of Gotham was well established, but the crime families and their Bosses such as Marco were a different matter. These were not the cowardly, superstitious men that Batman flew down upon in the back alleys of the city. These were a different caliber of criminal; sometimes even more dangerous than the likes of the Joker. Cold, calculated career criminals to whom the suffering of others wasn't even a sick or satanic game. It was just business, just money, just greed.
As the two men approached, Batman reached behind him into the recesses of his cloak. Before they had closed half the distance between themselves and Batman his hands had returned, swinging out from behind him like catapults. He released tiny silver capsules from his hands before the men were within arm's reach. The capsules burst, one in the chest and one in the face, releasing a thick cloud of gas that clung and crept like a thick amorphous creeper. Cocooned in choking gas, the men fell to the floor inches from the Batman. He stepped over their gagging, twitching forms to meet the man who had seconds ago stood on the other side of the desk from Marco. Now he stood between Batman, the desk, and Boss Marco.
The man drew himself up to his full height, which was still a good few inches shorter than Batman. He pushed the brim of his hat back with one of his gloved fingers and the two masked men faced each other for a moment in silence. The man's mask covered most of his face; except for his eyes, forehead and hair. A thin lock of red hair hung down over his one eye, and others poked out from the back of the hat. The mask itself was white rubber, as was the rest of the man's outfit that could be seen under the coat. Only the gloves and boots were black.
"Nice outfit" said Batman, "Who are you?"
The other man smiled, and the rubber of the mask creaked. "I'm the future." he said, "I'm the answer to Gotham's prayers."
"Really?" said Batman. The sarcasm in his voice was evident, as was his contempt for the individual in front of him as he kept one eye on Boss Marco. Marco had pushed his chair back from the desk, and froze with his hand half into one of the desk drawers when he noticed the Batman's eye on him. He slowly removed his hand, holding it up to show that it was empty.
"Well.. Answer, Future, whatever you call yourself.. I suggest you get out of my way, unless you want to spend the rest of the night coughing your guts up like your friends back there." Batman drew closer to the other man, looming over him. He filled the man's vision. He was a shadow now, a huge thing of wing and darkness. He was so close that he could smell the other man, smell his fear. Batman knew the smell of fear, and his nostrils filled with it. He drank it in. He drank it down. He could feel it in his veins. He was in the dark place now, the place where the real Batman was, where the real Bruce was. He could smell the terror. And it was too late when he realized that fear wasn't the only thing that he could smell, and the floor was coming towards him almost as fast as the darkness was closing in.
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The first thing that he sensed was the creaking. It reminded him of the gentle creaking of a ship as it lay idle in calm seas. A pirate ship perhaps, waiting off the coast of Never-Never land for a sighting of Peter Pan and his lost boys. Then there was the swinging, and the breeze. He was drifting oh so gently, the wind on his face. Perhaps he was up in the crows-nest, feeling the breeze, hoping to be the first one to make that sighting. Then he felt the hard, rough rope around his wrists and ankles that pushed through the toughened leather of his boots and gloves. His quickly recovering equilibrium told him he was upside down. He was upside down and he was tied up and he was Batman.
Batman opened his eyes slowly, for the first time realizing that they were painful, swollen and puffy. He was upside down, hanging head first somewhere very dark. Instinctively, he began working his wrists, trying to get some purchase on the ropes. The sudden sharp pain in his right wrist, and the soft gluey feel as he moved told him that his wrist was probably broken. As he twisted on the rope a dull throb that quickly built to a burning pain began to spread from his ribs on both sides. He could taste blood in his mouth.
"They really went to work on you". The voice was behind him, and even though it wasn't muffled like before he could recognize it as the man that he had met earlier. The Future. The Answer. That was what he had called himself. "They wanted to kill you, when they realized what I had done to you."
"The gas," said Batman. His voice was rough, and he coughed forth a mouthful of blood as he spoke. He calmed himself, slowed his breathing. It did no good to show weakness. He would not show weakness. He was Batman, and he was still in control. Ignoring the pain in his wrist, he began working ropes aside again. He had a small knife in a concealed compartment in the lining of his left glove . He need only to reach it.
"Yes the gas. Not entirely my own invention as I am sure you've guessed, or will guess, or at least know by now. Of course, I just told you...." the man was pacing around behind Batman, raving, his feet slapping against what sounded like concrete. "But effective nonetheless, and now tailored with my own unique range of biological cryptograms"
"Viruses.." said Batman. He had been down this road before. If there was one thing more certain than the sheer, helpless, screaming madness of his opponents - it was their megalomania. They could never resist telling him their plans. In some cases it was a masochistic need to be defeated by him, the dark and terrible god, their king of the night. Terrified by their own inner darkness they turned to him to stop them from succeeding when they were powerless to stop themselves from indulging their fantasies. For others it was the intellectual challenge. To defeat the Batman and for him to know that he had been defeated, for him to know with his last dying breath that he had failed the city, and the people that he had pledged to protect. To tear the mask away and expose him as just another frail, mortal, flawed thing like themselves.
For others of course, there was only the madness. They were the worst.
"After a fashion", the man continued. "Batman, it may bring you some comfort to know that I am not going to kill you. No doubt you have already devised an escape plan, and frankly I would expect no less. In fact, I would be disappointed." Batman took no comfort from having a fan. Certainly not a fan with countless canisters of unknown airborne viruses at his command.
One of the ropes slipped to one side, and Batman deftly slipped his thumb underneath it. He held the rope in place, so that it's movement would not give away his plan. He quickly worked another finger free. He did have his escape plan, but it had just been expanded into letting his mysterious assailant lay his entire plan out before him.
"I'm not going to kill you Batman because we are on the same side. We are both creatures of the night, both dedicated to fighting crime, fighting evil, fighting the night things"
"But I don't make deals with mob bosses like Marco". With his one hand free Batman slowly unzipped the compartment in his glove. He felt the hard plastic handle of the knife between two of this fingers. It was balanced for throwing, but would serve to cut the last of the rope away first.
"Sometimes, in the fight against crime it is necessary to delve into it's underbelly. To place our hands inside it's guts. To smell its sweat and stink and spore. Surely you of all people understand that? I do. I understand that you have to know your prey to defeat them. Have to know what's in their minds. You have to know how to make them afraid."
Batman twisted himself on the ropes towards the voice, ignoring the pain which exploded underneath his ribs as he did so. As he swung around towards the speaker he cut the last strands of the rope away with the knife. He let his arms fall free before curling up to reach his feet. He heard the man gasp. For all his talk of how he expected the Batman to be planning his escape, he had obviously underestimated how fast. Or perhaps he had overestimated the ability of Boss Marco's boys to incapacitate the Batman long enough for him to explain his theories on advanced crime fighting technique. The knife sliced through the binding around Batman's ankles and he flipped down onto the floor. Without his cape he was a different shape, more feral, more compact, a thing of tightly bunched muscles and explosively violent intent. He spun around to face the man who had held him.
"Very impressive Batman. Impressive indeed but, as I am sure you are aware, ultimately futile. Just like you, I have been planning my escape since you regained consciousness". Stepping back, the man fell and disappeared from sight. Batman started after him, but his left leg buckled under him. Too long upside down, too long unconscious, his legs were weak and starved of blood. He stumbled and fell, but forced himself back to his feet. He moved forward again, his feet numb, his knees burning. It seemed to take forever to reach that trap door, days and weeks passed in the time that it took for his legs to start responding the way that he was used to. How long had he been unconscious? How long had he been here? How long had he been running towards the door? The distance seemed to spiral away from him as he approached the trap door and long before he got there he knew that his opponent has long gone.
He looked down, and below were just the cold, dark waters of Gotham harbor. Touching a hand to the side of his cowl he activated his radio.
"Alfred, recall the car to my current position."
"Very good Sir, will there be anything else"
"Yes.. get the medical kit ready."
"As always Sir, Alfred out."
