Katt Girl & The Harley Kidd: Chapter 13: Orphaned by Chad Sheefel 11/18/19
As Chad and Richard were walking back home, they both kept a good lookout for Jimmy Snipes. Jimmy seemed rather hellbent on getting revenge against Chad. The snow had began to fall much harder than it did earlier that day. Gotham had seen an Indian Summer up until that point. It looked like all of that was about to change as the dark clouds completely blocked out the sun. If you were to look straight up into the sky, all you would be able to see are snowflakes and the darkness. Sounds of sirens, in the near distance, were starting to approach Chad and Richard. Suddenly, five police cars, an ambulance, and a firetruck flew passed them. Richard and Chad were about a mile and a half from home.
"Wow! There must have been a really bad accident." Richard said.
"This is Gotham City kid. There are a million reasons for why you would see cops flying around. Crime never sleeps in this town." Chad replied.
"Yeah, I know, but it's Christmas Eve. Don't they have a family to go home to?" Richard asked.
"You would be surprised if I told you how many people in Gotham were either homeless or an orphan." Chad Responded.
They made it a little further when, all of a sudden, a car flew around the corner, fish tailing a couple times, as it nearly lost control, but managed not to wreck. Then they could hear the sound of sirens once again. There appeared to be a police chase happening. Two police cars were chasing after the car that had almost lost control a moment ago. All of the cars came down the road, heading in Chad and Richard's direction. The cars were speeding as fast as the new fallen snow would allow. Chad and Richard's eyes went into slow motion as they tried to see who the police were chasing.
They saw two thugs in the front seats. Then, as the car began to pass, they caught a slight glimpse of a man sitting in the back seat. It kind of looked like Falcone. It was hard to tell because he was trying to conceal his face as much as possible. Although, the black town car looked a lot like many of the cars that Falcone owned. But, then as the car had already passed by, they suddenly saw a man with green hair and pale skin, that was as white as the driven snow, sitting next to Falcone.
"That's the guy that attacked us!" Richard exclaimed.
Jimmy snipes saw Chad and Richard standing there after they had already flown passed. Then he gave Chad and Richard a huge hyena grin as the car turned wildly, drifting onto another street. Chad got chills throughout his body. He knew that Jimmy Snipes was Falcone's nephew. At first, he thought that maybe Falcone found Jimmy, and they were trying to get away from the police. Chad was hoping that somebody saw Jimmy attack Chad earlier, and called the police. Falcone might have heard it on the police scanner and tried to find Jimmy. Then, suddenly they smell a scent in the air of something that is burning in the distance. Chad instantly realizes what it could be. He hoped that he was wrong. He grabbed Richard and told him that they needed to get back to his place as fast as they possibly can. As they get closer, Chad could tell that the fire was near his house. But a gut feeling is telling him that it could be a nightmare. They made it about a block from the house and then they both suddenly realized that it was Chad's house that was burning. The firefighters were doing everything they could to lessen the blaze.
"Mom and Dad were in there! Richard yelled as they both started running toward the house.
The three police officers that were on the scene, standing on the walkway leading 20 feet back from the house, grabbed Chad before he could get any closer to the fire.
"We can't let you go in there! The fire is out of control!" One of the officers said.
"Where is our Mom and Dad!" Chad yelled.
"We don't know! We can't go in yet! It's too dangerous!" The officer yelled back.
Richard slid passed the guard's legs because he had to see if he could save his family. He ran and jumped through the blaze and quickly disappeared into the smoke.
"Mom! Dad!" Richard screamed out as he saw them lying on the floor.
The police officers were caught off guard when Richard ran into the burning building. This allowed Chad to break free of their grip as he ran in to the house to help Richard. His worst nightmare had suddenly came to fruition. Richard tried to drag his mom out, but the smoke had started to get to him. He began to badly cough. Suddenly, part of the roof started to cave in. Chad quickly picked up Richard and dashed out of the house just as the entire structure of the house collapsed. As the fire continued, Chad had to hold Richard back. Richard gave a good effort, but he finally came to the grim realization that his parents were dead and there was nothing he could do about it. He dropped to his knees and started crying. Chad kneeled down to hold him.
"Why Chad? Why did this have to happen to our family? Richard cried.
Chad knew the reason why. He knew that Falcone must have talked to Jack Napier. Falcone must have found Jimmy shortly after Chad and Jimmy's scuffle from earlier that day. But, Chad couldn't bear to tell Richard about that. He was already heartbroken enough. Chad could only imagine how Richard would feel if he knew it was about Falcone and Jimmy getting revenge on him.
"I don't know for sure Richard. I'm sorry." Chad replied.
They both sat there, holding each other, as the snow fell down, only to be melted by the blazing fire.
A few miles away, at the Axis Chemical cleanup site. Jack Napier made it passed the yellow tape and then scaled over the barbed wire fence. Many of his bandages were still covering his body. He began walking through the rubble. The cleanup crew had managed to get a lot of the toxic waste back into a collected pool like container. He then sat on the ledge of the toxic waste container. He began pulling off as many of the bandages as he could. He screamed as he was pulling them off because many of them had adhered to his face and body. He finally got them off of himself. Then he pulled a piece of broken mirror out of the pocket of his hospital gown. He looked into the mirror and saw something very hideous. Over half of his face had turned pale white, and half of his hair had turned a toxic green. The other side of his face had scars and scratches. One of the scars left his lips looking like they had a constant grin.
"Hehehehe ... hehehehe … That must be why I can't stop laughing … Hehehehe … And here, I thought it was because I had lost my mind. Now, I see that I've only lost half of it." Jack chuckled.
He put the sharp part of the mirror close to the veins on his wrist. He then began to cut. He stood up and removed his hospital gown as the blood squirted out. Then he turned around and said,
"If I can only be either, half normal or half insane, I would rather not be at all!" He said.
Then he plunged backward, with his arms wide open, laughing all the way down, until he splashed into the toxic waste, and sank down to the bottom below.
In a warehouse across town, Alfred, Gabby, and Lola are tied up to their chairs. They had blindfolds covering their eyes and their mouths had been gagged. They began to hear men talking in the other room. They can hear one of the men start to say, "Wake up you dummy! Do you know what the boss would do to you if he catches you sleeping on the job?"
"Alright! Alright! I'm awake for crying out loud! What's the big deal anyway. They are all tied up nice and secure. I made sure of that myself!" The woken man proclaimed.
Alfred had been a boy scout in his earlier days. He was a damn good one at that. He managed to whittle his arms free of one of the ropes that was tied around him. Then he managed to get one of his hands freed up from the armrest of the chair. He then removed his blindfold and mouth gag. He quickly untied his other wrist, then his legs and feet.
He got up out of his chair and whispered to Gabby and Lola. "Shhh … I'm am going to untie you, and we are going to try to figure out a way out of here, without alerting the guards."
He untied them as quickly and as quietly as he could. The room looked like it was an office for one of the supervisors. Outside of it, they could hear the guards talking again.
"Why do you think the boss wears that oxygen mask on his face?" One of the guards asked.
"He got shot with three rounds of bullets to the chest! Don't you think you would need an oxygen mask after something like that!" The other guard asked as if it was a rhetorical question.
"I know that. But, what are all those other tubes doing that are connected to the mask? How many tubes do you need to provide yourself with oxygen? That's all I'm asking. Plus, haven't you noticed that he has gotten a little bigger and a bit stronger lately? That's some weird stuff, if you asked me."
Alfred stood up on the supervisors desk. He began removing a couple of the ceiling tiles away from the dropped ceiling. He still wasn't quite tall enough to look inside, so he picked Lola up to allow her to take a peek up there. She noticed that there might be enough room for the three of them to crawl through and try to escape. Lola began slowly crawling over to the side to allow Gabby the opportunity to come up next. After Alfred helped Gabby up, he also began to try to climb up, but he soon realized that the dropped ceiling could not support his weight.
"You two ladies are going to have to go on without me." Alfred whispered.
"We aren't leaving you Alfred." The girls urgently whispered back.
"I can take care of myself." Alfred replied. "Now go."
The girls began crawling through the ceiling panels as lightly and as quietly as they could. They made it over to the room that the two guards were in. They looked down threw a vent in the ceiling. It appeared that the guards were sitting in a break room of some kind. Then they continued crawling their way through the ceiling panels. One of the guards looked up as if he thought he heard a noise above them.
"Did you hear that? The guard asked. "I don't know. It was probably a rat. This warehouse is full of them." The other guard replied as he shrugged his shoulders.
Alfred tried one more time to lift himself up, but all of a sudden, the panels gave way and he crashed down onto the desk. The two guards heard the noise and entered the room. Alfred had barely gathered himself by the time the two guards approached him. Then Alfred punched one of the guards in the face and proceeded to push him into the other guard. Both guards fall down to the floor, and then Alfred quickly fled out through the doorway. He was suddenly startled and fell down to the ground when he ran into someone else standing outside of the doorway. A man wearing a black oxygen mask, with tubes leading into his back, looked down at Alfred. The man quickly picked Alfred up and threw him back into the supervisor's office. The two guards had managed to get themselves off the ground, just in time to grab hold of Alfred's arms. Alfred struggled a bit to try and free himself. Then the man with the oxygen mask punched Alfred in the stomach.
After that, he lifted Alfred's head up and said, "Where are the two girls!? He demanded to know.
"I don't have the slightest idea as to what you are talking about." Alfred replied.
Then the man with the oxygen mask punched Alfred in the face. Alfred tried to roll with the punch as much as he could but, it felt as if his jaw had been broken.
"I'm only going to ask you this one more time! Where in the Hell are the GIRLS!? If you don't answer me, I will pulverize you into the ground!" He declared.
Alfred could barely hold his head up, as he bravely said, "Do your best old chap."
The man with the oxygen mask became irate. He punched Alfred several more times until Alfred's face was black and blue.
Then, he picked Alfred's entire body up over his head and yelled, "You think you can defy BANE!? I WILL BREAK YOU IN HALF!"
He was about to snap Alfred over his knee, when suddenly, he gets kicked in the back. Bane dropped Alfred as he flew back into the arms of the other guards. Gabby and Lola had managed to make their way back just in time to save Alfred. While Bane and the other two guards tried to regain their composure, Lola and Gabby pulled Alfred out of the room. Bane and the guards began to run toward the door. Gabby quickly slammed it shut while Lola found a bar to break off the doorknob handle. When the men try to open it, the doorknob on their side fell off. One of the guards looked through the hole where the doorKnob used to be. He can see Gabby and Lola carrying Alfred away. Bane pushed a button on his oxygen mask. Fluid started filling through the tubes that were connected to his back. His veins and muscles began to bulge out. Then he picked up one of the guards. He lifted the guard's entire body over his head and then snapped the guard over his knee the same way he was about to do to Alfred. The guards back had been broken. The other guard backed up into the corner with fear in his eyes as Bane approached him.
"I've always been loyal to you! I'm not the one that fell asleep!" The guard frighteningly pleaded.
Bane paused for a second as if he was going to show mercy. The guard felt somewhat relieved.
"Oh, thank you. I would never try to do you wrong boss!" The guard said as he trembled.
Suddenly, Bane picked the frightened guard up, and then launched him through the door. Lola and Gabby heard the sound and tried to make it to a safe place that they could hide Alfred and themselves. Bane walked out of the room and began searching for them.
"Fee … Fy … Foe … Fum … You brats better hide. BECAUSE HERE BANE COMES!"
Gabby and Lola had managed to hide Alfred and themselves in a large wooden crate. Bane looked around and opened some of the crates, but he never opened the one that they were in. They tried to remain as silent as they could. Finally, they heard him walk away. They sat there for almost twenty minutes making sure that Bane had left the building before getting out of the crate.
Chapter Recap: (Blizzard like conditions hit Gotham City. Chad and Richard found out their parents were dead. We find out that The Landlord is Bane. Alfred, Gabby, and Lola escaped from Bane. Jack Napier tried to commit suicide by jumping into the toxic waste at the Axis Chemical cleanup site.)