JSA: If Looks Could Kill
By Bruce Wayne
DISCLAIMER: Most of the characters portrayed in this story are copyright by DC Comics, an AOL/Time/Warner company. They are used without permission for entertainment without profit by the author.
An Elseworld's story: Stories, situation or events involving familiar characters in unfamiliar settings.
Chapter 9
With Sandman beside him on the other side of the rear opening into the rock- walled monastery, Wildcat stood and waited, straddling the body of an unconscious sentry that The Sandman had gassed with his gas gun.
Sandman glanced down at his watch. It was nearly eleven-fifteen and yet there had been no sounds of battle, no gunfire from inside the monastery walls or beyond on the far side where Batman and Hourman would make their approach.
At eleven-fifteen they were supposed to enter the building, two minutes from now.
"You ready?" The Sandman asked.
Wildcat nodded and licked his lips.
At precisely eleven-fifteen, they started through the entranceway.
***
Batman climbed and got nearly to the top of the winding stone steps of the monastery. He stopped at eye level with the base of the arched opening through the monastery wall. He could see men and women were moving away from him. Gunfire was visible in bright flashes from the far side of the wall. Someone apparently had spotted Wildcat and Sandman.
A man ran past the steps, not looking toward Batman. The Caped Crusader's fist rammed into the man's rib cage. Batman hit the man twice more, and the body fell away.
While the attention of the occupants of the monastery was focused on Wildcat and Sandman toward the rear of the building, Batman moved through the front and began sneaking up behind the evildoers and putting them down.
A man charged at Batman from the shadows of the wall and the masked crimefighter snapped his foot into the center of the man's face. He felt the facial bones collapse beneath the blow and the man sunk away.
Batman began to move quicker toward his colleagues' position.
If False-Face were there, he would be inside the monastery building itself. And if not, at least Blaze Fields would be there. And she would have the information he needed. Batman could feel it inside him.
Either way, he had to search the monastery building.
Batman continued to move through the shadows.
***
"Blaze, what should we do?" shouted one of the men from below the gallery overlooking the ground floor.
"Fight to the death if you must," came the voice from above, "as many of you as possible must reach the planes. Kill the invaders. False-Face has charged us with this duty!"
"To the death," a Frenchman shouted. But False-Face reflected that Frenchmen were always slightly on the dramatic side. It was part of the national heritage, he supposed. He stepped back from the balcony, swathed in Blaze's robe and shawl. He had her voice down perfectly. It was something he unconsciously did with people, learning to imitate them. Unfortunately, it was as far as the impersonation could go for the moment, and he turned from the mezzanine overlooking the chapel and ran back down the hallway, bursting through the curtained doorway and into the room he had shared with Blaze.
There was no way to repair the bearded image he had affected before. The torn wig was all but ruined. Hurriedly, he threw off the shawl that covered his hair and his face and started for the battered dresser, that Blaze had used for some of her things. He hoped she had a wig.
For a moment, he caught sight of his own face in the mirror. The high cheekbones and abrupt, demanding jawline only drew attention to the eyes, which burned with ferocity.
It was a face he rarely saw.
Blaze would have makeup, but only simple things a woman used. Aside from too much lipstick, she wore little makeup -- had worn little makeup, he corrected.
He turned and glanced at her naked body on the bed. He felt nothing.
He looked back to the top drawer of the dresser, but found only underwear and some perfume. He slammed the drawer shut, and continued through the second drawer, then the one beneath it.
"Aha!" he exclaimed. He removed the garments, and held up to view a loose- looking red-velour pants outfit, with a high neckline and knitted cuffs, waistband and ankles. It would fit.
From the drawer above, he took a bra and then took more of the underwear to use as padding for a fake bustline.
"Hair," he muttered. He returned to Blaze's body and roughly rolled her over. He caught up her hair from the nape of the neck. With a shawl, the hair could be used to construct the appearance of real hair beneath it. Blaze's eye color was close to his.
"It will work," he said confidently. He took a switchblade from the hip pocket of his jeans and hacked the hair from the back of her head.
He still had the gum he had used to secure the beard, and there was more wigtape.
Quickly, he stripped away his own clothing.
He kept his legs and chest shaved smooth, and set about crafting the disguise. He expected that the assault force in the monastery courtyard, whatever its composition, would wait approximately ten minutes before penetrating the interior of the monastery.
That would be time enough for a fast change of identities and escape with the help of Blaze's loyal personnel. And when Blaze's body was found, total confusion would overtake his enemies.
"Confusion to my enemies," he laughed, carefully starting to dress.
He studied his image in the mirror. The makeup had appeared to lower his cheekbones and lightened his skin tones. With the shawl in place, what little of the spirit-gummed hair that was visible seemed to show Blaze's hair in slight disarray, as would be expected.
He stepped back from the mirror.
The red outfit was tight but satisfactory.
He grabbed Blaze's purse, taking money, identification and other useful items in quick inventory, then added his own few possessions inside it as well.
He would leave his pistol behind. There wasn't room for it in the purse. Instead, he took Blaze's semiautomatic handgun.
She had spare magazines. He left these in the purse.
He started for the doorway, and gave a last look to Blaze on the bed. The gunfire raged outside and below.
"I look better as you than you did, darling," he said, laughing, then stepped through the curtained doorway. The voice with which he had spoken was her voice.
And now she was he.
***
False-Face picked his way down a wooden staircase in the semi-darkness. A fire burned in the courtyard where an incendiary device had ignited the gasoline that fuelled the generator system. The beacon on the far side of the monastery needed electric lights for guiding the seaplanes to their landing spot.
It was this side of the monastery to which he now ran.
To his left he heard a voice. "Blaze, the power boat is ready for you, and one of our pilots awaits with his engine running. We can get you to safety."
False-Face turned around, his face swathed with the scarf. In Blaze's voice, he answered, "Very good, Franz -- then we must hurry. And the men?"
"They fight well, but it appears the attackers have entered the monastery. They are wearing odd costumes of some sort and have no apparent weapons -- but our men seem to be going down all the same. We must use the hidden staircase to the sea."
"Hidden staircase?" False-Face repeated in a muffled whisper. His thoughts turned to Blaze and he felt himself smile. She had held out one secret from him after all. A hidden escape route. He wondered how many other secrets went to the grave with her.
"Lead the way, Franz," he answered in Blaze's voice. Franz ran past him, and gave him a gentle love pat on his left shoulder.
Keeping his knees closer together than he normally would have and kicking out his heels, False-Face ran. Blaze's run, he thought.
For an instant, as he followed Franz around a twist in the corridor and up a narrow ramp, he wondered if somewhere along the way he had lost sight completely of his own identity. He had only been known as "False-Face" for so long he wondered if he felt more natural in someone else's life, with someone else's visage.
He ran on, the passage taking a turn, the ramp turning sharply downward.
And faintly, very faintly as he ran, he could smell the sea and feel the cold air blowing in off the water.
He smiled again. He knew that victory waited out there for him to lay his claim.
The word "insane" flitted across his mind, but he dismissed it.
***
Batman had boxed himself in just inside the entrance to the monastery itself. Heavy fire from assault rifles and submachine guns came at him like hail from a portico cut into the wall beneath a balcony-like mezzanine that hung over what had obviously been a chapel at one time.
It was a holding action, Batman realized, and an effective one.
Wildcat, Sandman, Hourman and Catwoman raced through the doorway and into the chapel. Hourman was carrying a small wooden crate under one arm.
Batman shouted a warning to them across the stone room, "Here -- look out for the portico under the mezzanine!"
A fusilade of automatic-weapons fire poured from the portico under the balcony, sending stone chips flying from the floor like shrapnel.
Batman dropped to his knees, still in motion and slid across the floor toward Catwoman. He pushed her down and shielded her body with his own.
The Caped Crusader shouted to his three male colleagues. "Come on, I've got Catwoman!"
Catwoman got to her feet and together with Batman, they moved their way to safety.
Batman brought her down beside a flight of low steps on the far right hand side of the entrance and pushed her against the stone. Wildcat, Sandman, and Hourman made their runs for cover.
Wildcat moved faster than Hourman and Sandman. Outdistancing the other two crimefighters, he skidded down beside Batman. "Jeez, how many of 'em are there?" he exclaimed.
"I don't know," Batman answered as Hourman and Sandman finished their run and dropped into a low crouch beside Catwoman. Hourman kept his speed down in order to help Sandman.
"We must eliminate the fire from the portico if we are to penetrate the monastery. I estimate we are outnumbered four to one," Hourman chimed in.
"Encouraging talk like that'll spoil me," Wildcat grinned.
"I nearly tripped over this wooden crate while trying to get here as fast as I could," said Hourman as he opened the box he had carried.
"Hot damn," Wildcat exclaimed. The box was filled with fragmentation grenades, and from the faded color he guessed they might be World War II vintage.
"Those things still work?" Sandman asked incredulously.
Hourman glanced at The Sandman and smiled, "I shouldn't care to withdraw the pin, release the handle, and sit with one on my lap, Sandman."
Wildcat reached into the box and snatched up one of the grenades. He pulled the safety pin and glanced toward the portico, then toward Hourman, Sandman and Batman. "Watcha say the four of us guys try to impress the lady here -- see who's the best pitcher, huh?"
Sandman laughed, and grabbed up a grenade.
Emotionlessly, Batman took one of the grenades.
Hourman then grabbed one.
Catwoman took a fifth grenade. "I'm a liberated woman," she retorted. "I can throw a grenade as well as any of you."
Wildcat started to smile, then broke into a grin. "All right, everybody pull your pins, then when I say so, throw 'em." Sandman, Batman, Hourman, then Catwoman pulled the safety pins in the grenades.
Batman eyed the portico. There were at least ten of the enemy force up there, firing down.
"Count of three," Wildcat murmured. "One ... two ... THREE!" Wildcat's right arm hauled back then snapped forward, his hand letting loose the grenade. His eyes caught dark blurs of motion as the other four grenades were tossed.
Batman threw himself over Catwoman, half to protect her and half because he liked to touch her.
The five grenades detonated almost simultaneously with a thundering roar. Batman's ears were ringing as fragments of rock and centuries of dust rained down on them. He gripped Catwoman tightly.
When the deadly ragged-edged chunks of stone had stopped flying, Batman looked up. The hole beneath the mezzanine balcony that had been the portico was a mass of rock-strewn rubble, and all the firing from the portico had ceased.
Batman was up in an instant, springing onto the stone steps. Across the monastery confines he shouted, "Hurry! Hurry!"
He ran up the steps toward the mezzanine where there was a concentration of criminal gunmen. Off to his right he heard the sound of more grenades exploding against the far section of the monastery confines. Somewhere behind him Wildcat shouted, "Batman, heads up, grenade." The Masked Manhunter threw himself against the wall.
"Be more specific, Wildcat," Batman said to his teammate as he wheeled around.
Wildcat tossed one of the grenades to Batman. The Caped Crusader caught it with his right hand.
Wildcat had a target. He looked at the grenade in his right fist and then looked to Batman.
Wildcat raised the grenade toward his mouth and wrenched at the pin with his teeth. He'd always wanted to try it, ever since he had seen John Wayne do it in the movies. "Ouch -- shit!" he yelled. He'd almost broken his right canine. But the pin was out, and he hauled back his hand, tossed and shouted, "Duck, Batman!"
Batman felt the concussion, then shifted his grenade to his right fist. He pulled the pin with the fingers of his left hand and threw the grenade toward a cluster of six men with rifles at the far end of the mezzanine.
An explosion flashed, and debris poured down. As the dust settled enough to see through, he realized all six men had fled.
"Hurry!" he shouted to his colleagues. Everyone jumped and followed Batman as he ran forward, the gunfire from the enemy positions throughout the stone monastery lighter now, more sporadic.
Catwoman was beside him while Batman took out two dazed criminals who were trying to take aim at them from close range.
A corridor ran off the far side of the mezzanine, and Batman started toward it.
More rifle fire blazed from the far end of the corridor, and Batman slammed against the wall at the corner feeding into the hallway. He dragged Catwoman in beside him and shouted to Hourman, "You take Catwoman back the way we came. Cut back through the courtyard. Wildcat, Sandman and I will fight our way through the corridor here and we can link up, maybe catch some of them between us."
"Agreed, Batman," Hourman nodded. Then he reached into the wooden crate that he carried under his arm. He tossed two grenades to each of his fellow crimefighters. Looking at Catwoman, he said, "Come, woman."
Wildcat licked his lips. They were dry, but his palms were wet with sweat inside his gloves.
Sandman returned from a little recon that he had carried out and reported, "All we've got left are two more guys and they're holding the far side of the mezzanine beside the steps."
Batman glanced at his teammate and nodded.
"You realize, Batman," The Sandman said, "if we had just brought along someone like Green Lantern or Dr Fate we wouldn't had been tied down like this with fifty thugs trying to use us as target practice."
"Are you saying this wasn't such a hot plan?" the Caped Crusader sneered.
"If the shoe fit ..."
"Not now!" Wildcat interrupted. "We've done the best we can. We're winning. It's just taking us longer than we thought, that's all."
"Wonderful," Sandman nodded. He checked his gas gun to make sure it was ready.
Batman reached into his utility belt and pulled out what looked to be a small test-tube made out of glass.
"What's that?" Wildcat asked.
"Smoke screen," the Masked Manhunter replied. "I'll throw this over toward the mezzanine and Sandman can rush in and gas the two obstacles."
Through the gas mask, The Sandman's muffled voice sounded like it had an amused tone to it. "Sounds like a plan to me."
Batman nodded. He then looked toward where he needed to throw his smoke bomb. One of the thugs looked over a pew. Batman then lobbed the glass tube to where he saw the man's head.
Smoke immediately began to fill a large portion of the area where the last two sentries were.
The Sandman darted around the corner and into the corridor. Under the cover of smoke, Sandman depressed the trigger of his gas gun. Knockout gas sprayed out.
It took about a minute for the smoke to finally lift somewhat so the crimefighters could see that The Sandman's knockout gas did the job. The bodies of two unconscious men were laid on the stone floor.
Batman and Wildcat joined The Sandman in the corridor. Dotting both sides of the corridor were openings, perhaps at one time cells for the monks who had lived in the monastery. Looking to Wildcat, he instructed, "You and Sandman hit the far end of the corridor, there's a ramp there. See where it leads. I'll check these rooms and keep an eye on your backs."
Wildcat nodded. He then looked to Sandman. "Ready, buddy?"
The Sandman nodded and they both ran off toward the end of the corridor.
Batman moved along slowly, and stopped at the first opening. A curtain covered it. He reached around from the side of the opening and ripped at the curtain, tearing it half away from where the nails held it in place in the surrounding framework. There was no gunfire, no sound from inside.
Cautiously, he stepped inside. His eyes swept the room and eventually fell upon the bed. He started forward. A naked woman lay face down on the bed, a hint of blueness in the veins in her neck. She wasn't moving.
Batman rolled the body over onto its back, noticing that all the hair from the top of the head and the back of the neck was gone, apparently cut away.
The woman was very obviously dead -- strangled, he knew, from the marks over the center of her throat.
"Hair," Batman whispered. He looked about the room. Drawers in a battered chest were half open, and women's clothing and undergarments fell from them. A few pieces of clothing lay on the floor.
He left the bedside and walked toward the chest. There was a wooden-framed mirror on it, more than big enough for a woman to use to apply makeup. A few open jars littered the top of the chest. He picked one up. It was some type of blusher, a brand of cosmetics he didn't recognize. An eyebrow pencil with the cap off, and an open tube of mascara were scattered around. He pulled off his right gauntlet and touched the mascara brush. It was wet.
Batman walked back across the room and felt at the woman's closed eyelids.
The eyelashes had no mascara.
The hair. The clothes. The makeup.
"My, God!" Batman shouted. "False-Face is Blaze now."
He ran from the room. False-Face was still on the island. He had to be, the Dark Knight told himself.
***
As she jumped over the unconscious body of one of the thugs, she felt the touch of Hourman's hand at her left elbow.
"Catwoman," he said, running beside her into the empty courtyard. "I will take you to a safe place. There are still ..."
"We have to cut off the escape route from the far side of the courtyard," she interrupted. "Batman was right. It's the only way to get a line on the gas canisters."
"But Catwoman," came the stern reply. Suddenly she felt him grab at her left shoulder and pull her back, binding her behind him with his powerful left arm.
Two men had rushed at them and the two men went down quickly after Hourman took care of them.
He turned to her. "It is not ..." he started.
"Safe -- I know," she said, then started to run again, feeling slightly breathless. Fighting temporarily for the side of goodness and light amused her.
She ran ahead to the far side of the courtyard. A quick backward glance told her Hourman was knocking down two more opponents.
Catwoman slowed and let Hourman go first into the exit that led out of the courtyard. She knew he could better handle what might be waiting there than she could.
When it came, it came so fast, she didn't realize it was happening at all. A burst of gunfire flashed from above the monastery and Hourman's body crumpled to the floor. He had been hit in the shoulder and side.
Ignoring the danger, she ran to Hourman's side, shielding him with her body.
She raised his head. "Catwoman ... I ..." Hourman faltered, and his eyes closed.
Catwoman swallowed hard, feeling at the neck for a pulse. He was alive, but quickly going into shock. Her hands were covered with blood as she moved them from his back. Large swaths of crimson began to stain his yellow and black costume.
She looked up to the parapets of the monastery. Silhouetted in the moonlight, she could see one man and a woman running. She watched their path down a track so rugged a mountain goat would have trouble traversing it. She guessed it led to the sea, toward the rear of the monastery behind the pillars of rock.
Catwoman tried to decide what was the best course of action. Should she stay here and take care of Hourman? Should she leave and try to find Batman? Should she pursue the two figures running toward the sea? She felt an obligation to the four vigilantes because they had continously tried to keep her out of harm's way. And now Hourman had virtually sacrificed himself to protect her.
She stood up. "I'm going after them," she said into the night air, her face set and her eyes flashing with revenge. "I'm going after them," she repeated.
In her mind, Catwoman knew the fleeing woman was Blaze Fields, the one they had came after. And the man may be False-Face. She hoped Batman or one of the others would come and help Hourman soon.
But Catwoman's mind was made up. She started to walk forward, breaking into a run after a few steps. She could cut across the rugged terrain and through the stone towers, then down to the sea.
She owed Hourman nothing less ...
***
She waited in the shadows of the rocks. Fire was visible in splotches of dark orange trailing skyward from the monastery, she didn't know the origins. She heard no gunfire, only the roar of the surf, the lapping of the waves and the throbbing of the seaplane's engine perhaps a hundred yards out. There was a launch waiting in the cove, waiting for the single man and the woman who accompanied him down through the rocks as she watched. For a moment, she thought of Hourman, and wondered whether Batman and the others had been able to find Hourman and if they would be able to get him to a doctor. Would Batman leave the island without her? She hoped that he would.
"Batman," she whispered, barely moving her lips in the darkness. It was strange that she should love such a man. He was essentially a policeman. He had been the guardian of Gotham City for a such a long time, tracking members of one of the greatest rogue's galleries any costumed crimefighter could have -- including her.
And now for this Justice Society of America, Batman was chasing potentially the greatest murderer in history, False-Face, the neo-Nazi, the master of disguise, whose real face no one knew.
"And his bitch," she murmured, watching Blaze as she stepped from the cover of the rocks. She was wearing a red high-fashion pants outfit, and a shawl partially obscured her face.
She was a tall woman, but moved gracefully.
Catwoman held her breath, and waited.
The man had straight blond hair, and there was a very Germanic look about him. Perhaps it was False-Face in another clever disguise. Maybe that was his real face -- if it were False-Face.
Catwoman stepped from the shadows, snapping her whip, screaming at the man with the rifle as she ripped his face with the leather. "For Hourman, you bastard!"
The man's body crumpled to the rocks inches from Blaze's feet.
Before Blaze could move, Catwoman kicked at the man's body and he started to roll down off the steep incline of rocks and into the water. Blaze had moved away as Catwoman had taken care of the man. Catwoman, with her whip still in her hand, then shifted her attention to Blaze. "I'd love to kill you," she said to the woman in the shawl. There was now about twenty yards seperating them. "Stay perfectly still and you stay alive."
"Yes -- I will," came the soft reply.
Catwoman walked slowly, cautiously picking her way over the rocks, keeping her whip ready.
Five yards from Blaze, she stopped. "Now drop your purse to the rocks," she ordered.
Blaze obeyed.
"Now, very slowly, turn around. Remember -- any sudden movement and your face will be scarred for a very long time, even the littlest thing," cautioned Catwoman. She almost wished Blaze would move, would give her an excuse to lash out with the whip. But she knew Blaze might be their only link to False-Face.
Blaze slowly turned. Catwoman approached to within an arm's length of her, and started to feel her waist for weapons. Suddenly, Blaze moved, faster than Catwoman had thought any woman could move, the right hand sawing through the air, a knife cutting toward the whip.
Catwoman stumbled back, letting herself fall to the rocks, guiding the whip clear of Blaze's quick reflexes. She swung the whip near Blaze's feet.
Blaze froze.
"Try that again and you'll be scarred for life, so help me." Catwoman slowly pushed herself to her feet. "Drop the knife."
Blaze complied.
"Now, if you won't let me search you for weapons, we'll do it another way. Strip," she instructed.
There was a quiver of movement in what she could see of Blaze's face past the folds of the shawl.
Blaze whispered," "Very well, Fraulein Catwoman."
Catwoman felt a smile cross her lips. "First the shawl, so I can see your face."
Blaze's left hand moved slowly, carefully, touching at the shawl with the tips of her fingers. As the shawl was whisked away, Catwoman screamed. The blond hair came away with it.
A man's face was suddenly staring at her, heavily made up with cosmetics.
She took a step closer and saw the set of the eyes.
It had to be False-Face. In a shaft of moonlight that lit the cove, she could see the ragged shape of a scar beneath his left earlobe.
She was suddenly mesmerized by the scar and the whip sagged in her hands for an instant.
There was a blur of motion, and Catwoman felt a sharp pain and then nothing, except the sensation of falling into darkness.
***
Batman moved quickly over the broken ground, barely keeping his footing.
"Selina," he gasped.
The Sandman and Wildcat were back with Hourman, giving basic first aid. The big guy had multiple wounds across his shoulder and side, but Batman's experience with gunshot wounds led him to think that none of them necessarily had to prove fatal.
Beneath him, heading out to sea, was a motor launch. He couldn't see the occupants, but there was a male shape at the wheel. One of the seaplanes was airborne in the distance, and Batman guessed the plane had taken off during the fighting. Now the occupants of the launch were making for the open sea.
On the cove, there was no sign of Catwoman.
Batman started down through the rocks, jumping from one flat piece to another to save a second here, a second there, running where he could.
Looking at the motor launch, it seemed to hesitate for a moment. Then it exploded into a storm cloud of billowing white smoke and then an orange and black fireball.
"Selina! No!" Batman shouted the words and, heard them echo off the rocks of the cove around him. The aircraft was too far out to have picked up anyone from the launch. Maybe she was already aboard the plane, he lied to himself.
He watched the burning wreckage of the launch settle on the otherwise-calm surface of the Aegean.
She was lost to him.
"Selina," he whispered, for the first time truly understanding the full meaning of her name.
To be continued ...
By Bruce Wayne
DISCLAIMER: Most of the characters portrayed in this story are copyright by DC Comics, an AOL/Time/Warner company. They are used without permission for entertainment without profit by the author.
An Elseworld's story: Stories, situation or events involving familiar characters in unfamiliar settings.
Chapter 9
With Sandman beside him on the other side of the rear opening into the rock- walled monastery, Wildcat stood and waited, straddling the body of an unconscious sentry that The Sandman had gassed with his gas gun.
Sandman glanced down at his watch. It was nearly eleven-fifteen and yet there had been no sounds of battle, no gunfire from inside the monastery walls or beyond on the far side where Batman and Hourman would make their approach.
At eleven-fifteen they were supposed to enter the building, two minutes from now.
"You ready?" The Sandman asked.
Wildcat nodded and licked his lips.
At precisely eleven-fifteen, they started through the entranceway.
***
Batman climbed and got nearly to the top of the winding stone steps of the monastery. He stopped at eye level with the base of the arched opening through the monastery wall. He could see men and women were moving away from him. Gunfire was visible in bright flashes from the far side of the wall. Someone apparently had spotted Wildcat and Sandman.
A man ran past the steps, not looking toward Batman. The Caped Crusader's fist rammed into the man's rib cage. Batman hit the man twice more, and the body fell away.
While the attention of the occupants of the monastery was focused on Wildcat and Sandman toward the rear of the building, Batman moved through the front and began sneaking up behind the evildoers and putting them down.
A man charged at Batman from the shadows of the wall and the masked crimefighter snapped his foot into the center of the man's face. He felt the facial bones collapse beneath the blow and the man sunk away.
Batman began to move quicker toward his colleagues' position.
If False-Face were there, he would be inside the monastery building itself. And if not, at least Blaze Fields would be there. And she would have the information he needed. Batman could feel it inside him.
Either way, he had to search the monastery building.
Batman continued to move through the shadows.
***
"Blaze, what should we do?" shouted one of the men from below the gallery overlooking the ground floor.
"Fight to the death if you must," came the voice from above, "as many of you as possible must reach the planes. Kill the invaders. False-Face has charged us with this duty!"
"To the death," a Frenchman shouted. But False-Face reflected that Frenchmen were always slightly on the dramatic side. It was part of the national heritage, he supposed. He stepped back from the balcony, swathed in Blaze's robe and shawl. He had her voice down perfectly. It was something he unconsciously did with people, learning to imitate them. Unfortunately, it was as far as the impersonation could go for the moment, and he turned from the mezzanine overlooking the chapel and ran back down the hallway, bursting through the curtained doorway and into the room he had shared with Blaze.
There was no way to repair the bearded image he had affected before. The torn wig was all but ruined. Hurriedly, he threw off the shawl that covered his hair and his face and started for the battered dresser, that Blaze had used for some of her things. He hoped she had a wig.
For a moment, he caught sight of his own face in the mirror. The high cheekbones and abrupt, demanding jawline only drew attention to the eyes, which burned with ferocity.
It was a face he rarely saw.
Blaze would have makeup, but only simple things a woman used. Aside from too much lipstick, she wore little makeup -- had worn little makeup, he corrected.
He turned and glanced at her naked body on the bed. He felt nothing.
He looked back to the top drawer of the dresser, but found only underwear and some perfume. He slammed the drawer shut, and continued through the second drawer, then the one beneath it.
"Aha!" he exclaimed. He removed the garments, and held up to view a loose- looking red-velour pants outfit, with a high neckline and knitted cuffs, waistband and ankles. It would fit.
From the drawer above, he took a bra and then took more of the underwear to use as padding for a fake bustline.
"Hair," he muttered. He returned to Blaze's body and roughly rolled her over. He caught up her hair from the nape of the neck. With a shawl, the hair could be used to construct the appearance of real hair beneath it. Blaze's eye color was close to his.
"It will work," he said confidently. He took a switchblade from the hip pocket of his jeans and hacked the hair from the back of her head.
He still had the gum he had used to secure the beard, and there was more wigtape.
Quickly, he stripped away his own clothing.
He kept his legs and chest shaved smooth, and set about crafting the disguise. He expected that the assault force in the monastery courtyard, whatever its composition, would wait approximately ten minutes before penetrating the interior of the monastery.
That would be time enough for a fast change of identities and escape with the help of Blaze's loyal personnel. And when Blaze's body was found, total confusion would overtake his enemies.
"Confusion to my enemies," he laughed, carefully starting to dress.
He studied his image in the mirror. The makeup had appeared to lower his cheekbones and lightened his skin tones. With the shawl in place, what little of the spirit-gummed hair that was visible seemed to show Blaze's hair in slight disarray, as would be expected.
He stepped back from the mirror.
The red outfit was tight but satisfactory.
He grabbed Blaze's purse, taking money, identification and other useful items in quick inventory, then added his own few possessions inside it as well.
He would leave his pistol behind. There wasn't room for it in the purse. Instead, he took Blaze's semiautomatic handgun.
She had spare magazines. He left these in the purse.
He started for the doorway, and gave a last look to Blaze on the bed. The gunfire raged outside and below.
"I look better as you than you did, darling," he said, laughing, then stepped through the curtained doorway. The voice with which he had spoken was her voice.
And now she was he.
***
False-Face picked his way down a wooden staircase in the semi-darkness. A fire burned in the courtyard where an incendiary device had ignited the gasoline that fuelled the generator system. The beacon on the far side of the monastery needed electric lights for guiding the seaplanes to their landing spot.
It was this side of the monastery to which he now ran.
To his left he heard a voice. "Blaze, the power boat is ready for you, and one of our pilots awaits with his engine running. We can get you to safety."
False-Face turned around, his face swathed with the scarf. In Blaze's voice, he answered, "Very good, Franz -- then we must hurry. And the men?"
"They fight well, but it appears the attackers have entered the monastery. They are wearing odd costumes of some sort and have no apparent weapons -- but our men seem to be going down all the same. We must use the hidden staircase to the sea."
"Hidden staircase?" False-Face repeated in a muffled whisper. His thoughts turned to Blaze and he felt himself smile. She had held out one secret from him after all. A hidden escape route. He wondered how many other secrets went to the grave with her.
"Lead the way, Franz," he answered in Blaze's voice. Franz ran past him, and gave him a gentle love pat on his left shoulder.
Keeping his knees closer together than he normally would have and kicking out his heels, False-Face ran. Blaze's run, he thought.
For an instant, as he followed Franz around a twist in the corridor and up a narrow ramp, he wondered if somewhere along the way he had lost sight completely of his own identity. He had only been known as "False-Face" for so long he wondered if he felt more natural in someone else's life, with someone else's visage.
He ran on, the passage taking a turn, the ramp turning sharply downward.
And faintly, very faintly as he ran, he could smell the sea and feel the cold air blowing in off the water.
He smiled again. He knew that victory waited out there for him to lay his claim.
The word "insane" flitted across his mind, but he dismissed it.
***
Batman had boxed himself in just inside the entrance to the monastery itself. Heavy fire from assault rifles and submachine guns came at him like hail from a portico cut into the wall beneath a balcony-like mezzanine that hung over what had obviously been a chapel at one time.
It was a holding action, Batman realized, and an effective one.
Wildcat, Sandman, Hourman and Catwoman raced through the doorway and into the chapel. Hourman was carrying a small wooden crate under one arm.
Batman shouted a warning to them across the stone room, "Here -- look out for the portico under the mezzanine!"
A fusilade of automatic-weapons fire poured from the portico under the balcony, sending stone chips flying from the floor like shrapnel.
Batman dropped to his knees, still in motion and slid across the floor toward Catwoman. He pushed her down and shielded her body with his own.
The Caped Crusader shouted to his three male colleagues. "Come on, I've got Catwoman!"
Catwoman got to her feet and together with Batman, they moved their way to safety.
Batman brought her down beside a flight of low steps on the far right hand side of the entrance and pushed her against the stone. Wildcat, Sandman, and Hourman made their runs for cover.
Wildcat moved faster than Hourman and Sandman. Outdistancing the other two crimefighters, he skidded down beside Batman. "Jeez, how many of 'em are there?" he exclaimed.
"I don't know," Batman answered as Hourman and Sandman finished their run and dropped into a low crouch beside Catwoman. Hourman kept his speed down in order to help Sandman.
"We must eliminate the fire from the portico if we are to penetrate the monastery. I estimate we are outnumbered four to one," Hourman chimed in.
"Encouraging talk like that'll spoil me," Wildcat grinned.
"I nearly tripped over this wooden crate while trying to get here as fast as I could," said Hourman as he opened the box he had carried.
"Hot damn," Wildcat exclaimed. The box was filled with fragmentation grenades, and from the faded color he guessed they might be World War II vintage.
"Those things still work?" Sandman asked incredulously.
Hourman glanced at The Sandman and smiled, "I shouldn't care to withdraw the pin, release the handle, and sit with one on my lap, Sandman."
Wildcat reached into the box and snatched up one of the grenades. He pulled the safety pin and glanced toward the portico, then toward Hourman, Sandman and Batman. "Watcha say the four of us guys try to impress the lady here -- see who's the best pitcher, huh?"
Sandman laughed, and grabbed up a grenade.
Emotionlessly, Batman took one of the grenades.
Hourman then grabbed one.
Catwoman took a fifth grenade. "I'm a liberated woman," she retorted. "I can throw a grenade as well as any of you."
Wildcat started to smile, then broke into a grin. "All right, everybody pull your pins, then when I say so, throw 'em." Sandman, Batman, Hourman, then Catwoman pulled the safety pins in the grenades.
Batman eyed the portico. There were at least ten of the enemy force up there, firing down.
"Count of three," Wildcat murmured. "One ... two ... THREE!" Wildcat's right arm hauled back then snapped forward, his hand letting loose the grenade. His eyes caught dark blurs of motion as the other four grenades were tossed.
Batman threw himself over Catwoman, half to protect her and half because he liked to touch her.
The five grenades detonated almost simultaneously with a thundering roar. Batman's ears were ringing as fragments of rock and centuries of dust rained down on them. He gripped Catwoman tightly.
When the deadly ragged-edged chunks of stone had stopped flying, Batman looked up. The hole beneath the mezzanine balcony that had been the portico was a mass of rock-strewn rubble, and all the firing from the portico had ceased.
Batman was up in an instant, springing onto the stone steps. Across the monastery confines he shouted, "Hurry! Hurry!"
He ran up the steps toward the mezzanine where there was a concentration of criminal gunmen. Off to his right he heard the sound of more grenades exploding against the far section of the monastery confines. Somewhere behind him Wildcat shouted, "Batman, heads up, grenade." The Masked Manhunter threw himself against the wall.
"Be more specific, Wildcat," Batman said to his teammate as he wheeled around.
Wildcat tossed one of the grenades to Batman. The Caped Crusader caught it with his right hand.
Wildcat had a target. He looked at the grenade in his right fist and then looked to Batman.
Wildcat raised the grenade toward his mouth and wrenched at the pin with his teeth. He'd always wanted to try it, ever since he had seen John Wayne do it in the movies. "Ouch -- shit!" he yelled. He'd almost broken his right canine. But the pin was out, and he hauled back his hand, tossed and shouted, "Duck, Batman!"
Batman felt the concussion, then shifted his grenade to his right fist. He pulled the pin with the fingers of his left hand and threw the grenade toward a cluster of six men with rifles at the far end of the mezzanine.
An explosion flashed, and debris poured down. As the dust settled enough to see through, he realized all six men had fled.
"Hurry!" he shouted to his colleagues. Everyone jumped and followed Batman as he ran forward, the gunfire from the enemy positions throughout the stone monastery lighter now, more sporadic.
Catwoman was beside him while Batman took out two dazed criminals who were trying to take aim at them from close range.
A corridor ran off the far side of the mezzanine, and Batman started toward it.
More rifle fire blazed from the far end of the corridor, and Batman slammed against the wall at the corner feeding into the hallway. He dragged Catwoman in beside him and shouted to Hourman, "You take Catwoman back the way we came. Cut back through the courtyard. Wildcat, Sandman and I will fight our way through the corridor here and we can link up, maybe catch some of them between us."
"Agreed, Batman," Hourman nodded. Then he reached into the wooden crate that he carried under his arm. He tossed two grenades to each of his fellow crimefighters. Looking at Catwoman, he said, "Come, woman."
Wildcat licked his lips. They were dry, but his palms were wet with sweat inside his gloves.
Sandman returned from a little recon that he had carried out and reported, "All we've got left are two more guys and they're holding the far side of the mezzanine beside the steps."
Batman glanced at his teammate and nodded.
"You realize, Batman," The Sandman said, "if we had just brought along someone like Green Lantern or Dr Fate we wouldn't had been tied down like this with fifty thugs trying to use us as target practice."
"Are you saying this wasn't such a hot plan?" the Caped Crusader sneered.
"If the shoe fit ..."
"Not now!" Wildcat interrupted. "We've done the best we can. We're winning. It's just taking us longer than we thought, that's all."
"Wonderful," Sandman nodded. He checked his gas gun to make sure it was ready.
Batman reached into his utility belt and pulled out what looked to be a small test-tube made out of glass.
"What's that?" Wildcat asked.
"Smoke screen," the Masked Manhunter replied. "I'll throw this over toward the mezzanine and Sandman can rush in and gas the two obstacles."
Through the gas mask, The Sandman's muffled voice sounded like it had an amused tone to it. "Sounds like a plan to me."
Batman nodded. He then looked toward where he needed to throw his smoke bomb. One of the thugs looked over a pew. Batman then lobbed the glass tube to where he saw the man's head.
Smoke immediately began to fill a large portion of the area where the last two sentries were.
The Sandman darted around the corner and into the corridor. Under the cover of smoke, Sandman depressed the trigger of his gas gun. Knockout gas sprayed out.
It took about a minute for the smoke to finally lift somewhat so the crimefighters could see that The Sandman's knockout gas did the job. The bodies of two unconscious men were laid on the stone floor.
Batman and Wildcat joined The Sandman in the corridor. Dotting both sides of the corridor were openings, perhaps at one time cells for the monks who had lived in the monastery. Looking to Wildcat, he instructed, "You and Sandman hit the far end of the corridor, there's a ramp there. See where it leads. I'll check these rooms and keep an eye on your backs."
Wildcat nodded. He then looked to Sandman. "Ready, buddy?"
The Sandman nodded and they both ran off toward the end of the corridor.
Batman moved along slowly, and stopped at the first opening. A curtain covered it. He reached around from the side of the opening and ripped at the curtain, tearing it half away from where the nails held it in place in the surrounding framework. There was no gunfire, no sound from inside.
Cautiously, he stepped inside. His eyes swept the room and eventually fell upon the bed. He started forward. A naked woman lay face down on the bed, a hint of blueness in the veins in her neck. She wasn't moving.
Batman rolled the body over onto its back, noticing that all the hair from the top of the head and the back of the neck was gone, apparently cut away.
The woman was very obviously dead -- strangled, he knew, from the marks over the center of her throat.
"Hair," Batman whispered. He looked about the room. Drawers in a battered chest were half open, and women's clothing and undergarments fell from them. A few pieces of clothing lay on the floor.
He left the bedside and walked toward the chest. There was a wooden-framed mirror on it, more than big enough for a woman to use to apply makeup. A few open jars littered the top of the chest. He picked one up. It was some type of blusher, a brand of cosmetics he didn't recognize. An eyebrow pencil with the cap off, and an open tube of mascara were scattered around. He pulled off his right gauntlet and touched the mascara brush. It was wet.
Batman walked back across the room and felt at the woman's closed eyelids.
The eyelashes had no mascara.
The hair. The clothes. The makeup.
"My, God!" Batman shouted. "False-Face is Blaze now."
He ran from the room. False-Face was still on the island. He had to be, the Dark Knight told himself.
***
As she jumped over the unconscious body of one of the thugs, she felt the touch of Hourman's hand at her left elbow.
"Catwoman," he said, running beside her into the empty courtyard. "I will take you to a safe place. There are still ..."
"We have to cut off the escape route from the far side of the courtyard," she interrupted. "Batman was right. It's the only way to get a line on the gas canisters."
"But Catwoman," came the stern reply. Suddenly she felt him grab at her left shoulder and pull her back, binding her behind him with his powerful left arm.
Two men had rushed at them and the two men went down quickly after Hourman took care of them.
He turned to her. "It is not ..." he started.
"Safe -- I know," she said, then started to run again, feeling slightly breathless. Fighting temporarily for the side of goodness and light amused her.
She ran ahead to the far side of the courtyard. A quick backward glance told her Hourman was knocking down two more opponents.
Catwoman slowed and let Hourman go first into the exit that led out of the courtyard. She knew he could better handle what might be waiting there than she could.
When it came, it came so fast, she didn't realize it was happening at all. A burst of gunfire flashed from above the monastery and Hourman's body crumpled to the floor. He had been hit in the shoulder and side.
Ignoring the danger, she ran to Hourman's side, shielding him with her body.
She raised his head. "Catwoman ... I ..." Hourman faltered, and his eyes closed.
Catwoman swallowed hard, feeling at the neck for a pulse. He was alive, but quickly going into shock. Her hands were covered with blood as she moved them from his back. Large swaths of crimson began to stain his yellow and black costume.
She looked up to the parapets of the monastery. Silhouetted in the moonlight, she could see one man and a woman running. She watched their path down a track so rugged a mountain goat would have trouble traversing it. She guessed it led to the sea, toward the rear of the monastery behind the pillars of rock.
Catwoman tried to decide what was the best course of action. Should she stay here and take care of Hourman? Should she leave and try to find Batman? Should she pursue the two figures running toward the sea? She felt an obligation to the four vigilantes because they had continously tried to keep her out of harm's way. And now Hourman had virtually sacrificed himself to protect her.
She stood up. "I'm going after them," she said into the night air, her face set and her eyes flashing with revenge. "I'm going after them," she repeated.
In her mind, Catwoman knew the fleeing woman was Blaze Fields, the one they had came after. And the man may be False-Face. She hoped Batman or one of the others would come and help Hourman soon.
But Catwoman's mind was made up. She started to walk forward, breaking into a run after a few steps. She could cut across the rugged terrain and through the stone towers, then down to the sea.
She owed Hourman nothing less ...
***
She waited in the shadows of the rocks. Fire was visible in splotches of dark orange trailing skyward from the monastery, she didn't know the origins. She heard no gunfire, only the roar of the surf, the lapping of the waves and the throbbing of the seaplane's engine perhaps a hundred yards out. There was a launch waiting in the cove, waiting for the single man and the woman who accompanied him down through the rocks as she watched. For a moment, she thought of Hourman, and wondered whether Batman and the others had been able to find Hourman and if they would be able to get him to a doctor. Would Batman leave the island without her? She hoped that he would.
"Batman," she whispered, barely moving her lips in the darkness. It was strange that she should love such a man. He was essentially a policeman. He had been the guardian of Gotham City for a such a long time, tracking members of one of the greatest rogue's galleries any costumed crimefighter could have -- including her.
And now for this Justice Society of America, Batman was chasing potentially the greatest murderer in history, False-Face, the neo-Nazi, the master of disguise, whose real face no one knew.
"And his bitch," she murmured, watching Blaze as she stepped from the cover of the rocks. She was wearing a red high-fashion pants outfit, and a shawl partially obscured her face.
She was a tall woman, but moved gracefully.
Catwoman held her breath, and waited.
The man had straight blond hair, and there was a very Germanic look about him. Perhaps it was False-Face in another clever disguise. Maybe that was his real face -- if it were False-Face.
Catwoman stepped from the shadows, snapping her whip, screaming at the man with the rifle as she ripped his face with the leather. "For Hourman, you bastard!"
The man's body crumpled to the rocks inches from Blaze's feet.
Before Blaze could move, Catwoman kicked at the man's body and he started to roll down off the steep incline of rocks and into the water. Blaze had moved away as Catwoman had taken care of the man. Catwoman, with her whip still in her hand, then shifted her attention to Blaze. "I'd love to kill you," she said to the woman in the shawl. There was now about twenty yards seperating them. "Stay perfectly still and you stay alive."
"Yes -- I will," came the soft reply.
Catwoman walked slowly, cautiously picking her way over the rocks, keeping her whip ready.
Five yards from Blaze, she stopped. "Now drop your purse to the rocks," she ordered.
Blaze obeyed.
"Now, very slowly, turn around. Remember -- any sudden movement and your face will be scarred for a very long time, even the littlest thing," cautioned Catwoman. She almost wished Blaze would move, would give her an excuse to lash out with the whip. But she knew Blaze might be their only link to False-Face.
Blaze slowly turned. Catwoman approached to within an arm's length of her, and started to feel her waist for weapons. Suddenly, Blaze moved, faster than Catwoman had thought any woman could move, the right hand sawing through the air, a knife cutting toward the whip.
Catwoman stumbled back, letting herself fall to the rocks, guiding the whip clear of Blaze's quick reflexes. She swung the whip near Blaze's feet.
Blaze froze.
"Try that again and you'll be scarred for life, so help me." Catwoman slowly pushed herself to her feet. "Drop the knife."
Blaze complied.
"Now, if you won't let me search you for weapons, we'll do it another way. Strip," she instructed.
There was a quiver of movement in what she could see of Blaze's face past the folds of the shawl.
Blaze whispered," "Very well, Fraulein Catwoman."
Catwoman felt a smile cross her lips. "First the shawl, so I can see your face."
Blaze's left hand moved slowly, carefully, touching at the shawl with the tips of her fingers. As the shawl was whisked away, Catwoman screamed. The blond hair came away with it.
A man's face was suddenly staring at her, heavily made up with cosmetics.
She took a step closer and saw the set of the eyes.
It had to be False-Face. In a shaft of moonlight that lit the cove, she could see the ragged shape of a scar beneath his left earlobe.
She was suddenly mesmerized by the scar and the whip sagged in her hands for an instant.
There was a blur of motion, and Catwoman felt a sharp pain and then nothing, except the sensation of falling into darkness.
***
Batman moved quickly over the broken ground, barely keeping his footing.
"Selina," he gasped.
The Sandman and Wildcat were back with Hourman, giving basic first aid. The big guy had multiple wounds across his shoulder and side, but Batman's experience with gunshot wounds led him to think that none of them necessarily had to prove fatal.
Beneath him, heading out to sea, was a motor launch. He couldn't see the occupants, but there was a male shape at the wheel. One of the seaplanes was airborne in the distance, and Batman guessed the plane had taken off during the fighting. Now the occupants of the launch were making for the open sea.
On the cove, there was no sign of Catwoman.
Batman started down through the rocks, jumping from one flat piece to another to save a second here, a second there, running where he could.
Looking at the motor launch, it seemed to hesitate for a moment. Then it exploded into a storm cloud of billowing white smoke and then an orange and black fireball.
"Selina! No!" Batman shouted the words and, heard them echo off the rocks of the cove around him. The aircraft was too far out to have picked up anyone from the launch. Maybe she was already aboard the plane, he lied to himself.
He watched the burning wreckage of the launch settle on the otherwise-calm surface of the Aegean.
She was lost to him.
"Selina," he whispered, for the first time truly understanding the full meaning of her name.
To be continued ...