Another Double Date
Stephen Anselm and Kerianne H.
Summary: Missing persons; implausible thefts; and more going on beneath the surface than anyone suspects. Huntress/Question, Black Canary/Green Arrow.
Disclaimer: Standard disavowal of ownership of all nonoriginal material, especially that of DC.
Historian's Note: JLU continuity, but with some references to character history in print; takes place early in (imaginary) season six
For Gotham's Princess, who gave S.A. his first review, with thanks for Mockingbird
His jacket caught on the sharp edges of the grate's broken bars. He swore, barely hearing himself over the pounding thud in his ears and the low, threatening rush of water from the stream beside and the above-ground tunnel entrance before him. He yanked once, failing to escape, and the jagged metal sliced deep into his right arm, drawing blood.
Least of his worries.
Hearing a cry in the distance he pulled again, and began to take the coat off when it suddenly broke free. He stumbled, scraping his knee on the rough floor, but he stood as quickly as he could and closed the grate behind him. Maybe he'd get lucky and they'd get cut too.
His feet soon soaked in the several inches of drainage fluid on the tunnel floor. The hanging red lights spaced every twenty feet gave him just enough to see by, the grid of their enclosing grills casting graph paper shadows across the floor and walls. That'd be all he needed until he got into the main tunnel system.
They had the numbers. Speed was his only hope now, that and the chance he knew the Dark better than they did.
He'd just reached the second T when he heard the screech of the grate opening. He wanted to spit out the bitter taste of adrenalin, to wipe the salty sweat from his eyes, but there was no time: there were maybe three hundred more feet before the access and only two opportunities to confuse them. He thought about a deke, taking the side way, but even as he thought it he ran towards and past the turn and dared not slow.
Three in or six down, they said.
Three months to learn how to handle yourself. Who to let pass in front of you, who to scorn, who to pray you never met. Who to ask for favours, and who to give them to even if you couldn't spare it. Three months to find out which shelters were worth waiting for, and which were worse than the cold, and which kitchens had the most meat on the plate.
Three months to learn to walk in the Dark.
He'd heard about it on TV once, long before he'd ever seen it: the subterranean network of tunnels and sewers and subway maintenance tubes and weird industrial rooms with pistons and pipes that lay beneath the city. He'd thought it was stupid at first, why would anyone put so much down there? But the show said Gotham was built on top of some cave system, like that big one in Kentucky, and that made it cheap to go underground.. so Gotham had more construction below the surface than any other city in the country. Miles and miles and miles worth. And that didn't count the untouched caves.
The program called it the Aulenbach Complex, after a builder or explorer or someone, but that was a name for books, a name for teachers. Everyone who walked it knew you had to call it by its true name, so that it knew you gave it its due, gave it respect.
"You can honour the Dark," crazy old Pete had warned him that first summer, "or you can die."
He'd laughed in reply. After three years he didn't laugh any more. When he saw Pete last he gave him a pack of cigarettes. Low-tar, so maybe they were better for his lungs, he coughed pretty bad these days.
Funny what you thought about at a time like this.
He took a tight left, out of the view of his pursuers, and saw to his surprised relief a grey oval box beneath a dangling and stuttering light. He made an instant decision to risk it. He ripped open the small doors, flicked the switch within, and tore the switchbox out, severing the wires.
After a long second of consideration the lights in the tunnel faltered and went out.
Now let's see if they can dance.
Like everyone else, he'd slowly taught himself to recognize the sigils and coded messages sprayed on the walls of the Dark. A thousand crossings had taught his feet to navigate the geometries too complicated for his mind, and they told him this drainway led to the old station 17 and after that he could shake the men off in the passages.
He might trip in the blackness, but he wouldn't lose his way. Not in this tunnel. Not tonight.
He heard angry shouts as he took off again, and they sounded farther away than he'd thought. Good.
Fifty more feet down this corridor, and then maybe a few hundred down the next. He ignored the false pulses of colour his eyes conjured up and sprinted, touching his hand to the wall every few dozen yards so he could keep running roughly straight. He fell once, over what felt like some thick electrical cables, but he pushed himself up and found the turn right where he thought it would be. Another minute or so and he'd be at 17.
The echoing footsteps behind him were absent now; maybe they missed the left off the first tunnel after he shut off the lights? There was a dead end right before it..
He could tell by the growing noise that he was approaching the end of the tunnel, with its sloped passage to the station chamber. He saw a hint of white before him, and this time it was real. With a burst of confident energy he threw himself down the descent, sliding down the quickly-moving waters beneath him--
-- but at the bottom he saw too late that the white was from a flashlight, and the figures turned toward him. In a moment, he understood what in his desperation he'd forgotten: they knew the Dark too.
Three in or six down.
It was a tough life, harder than he'd ever expected. But if you had somebody to school you at the start, like he'd had Chris and R and crazy Pete, then if you last three months, maybe you've got a chance. You make it a full season, then maybe you can make it a year.. and then your odds were as good as anybody's. Of course if you don't learn what you need in those first three months, then you're dead, and probably down somewhere the priests can't find you to bury you proper.
After he made his three he got a tattoo on his right shoulder. Half-price, on account of the occasion. Stylized lion with an eagle's head. A griffin, the guy said.
He didn't care. It looked cool, and was more original than the dragons everybody else had.
He thought of the day he left, and the Christmas he almost called. That one hoops game that lasted half the night, the cheers and the trash talk mixing with the insect hum of the three sets of high yellow floods that still worked at the park. The feel of the concrete on his feet, the pleasant ache in his arms from swinging on the rim after he pulled the Vince. They'd crashed at James' cousin's place afterwards, he remembered the smell of the aunt's potpourri, like rainforest or jungle or something. They'd had the leftover curry and the flat warm Pepsi and played X-box until morning.
And Kay was there. She'd liked him, he knew now, but he was all caught up with that new girl, the gorgeous Puerto Rican, the one who barely knew he was alive and was into that guy with the ride. He wasn't even sure of her name anymore. By the time he realized, Kay was already with Steve and they drifted away last year. He heard they found a place in the southeast together. He hoped they were happy.
Mom, he thought, and then there was nothing.