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Batman 1939: The Dangers of Being Cold
Chapter 8: Arguing on the Rubicon
Batman's first trip into Fort Morrison lasted sixteen minutes. He had a lot to do, but a good detective always made time for the details.
For example, isolation and lack of domestic amenities meant families obviously did not live on the base. This was rare; the nation was at peace and military sites were largely settled communities. The Army didn't publish details on Fort Morrison - they hardly admitted it existed – but it was simple for the Dark Knight to narrow down which parts of the regional battalions weren't living with families using public records. He compared these with the patches he spied inside the Fort to determine who was home. This short list became a manpower estimate by counting barracks and latrines.
Batman considered his first trip into Fort Morrison a failure. He never said it was useless.
Best estimate: between 160 and 180 long-term occupants. The remarkable thing was that it was a hybrid camp. While most residents he saw belonged to the expected warehouse units, there were also soldiers from at least two infantry companies, a special G-4 logistics team out of Texas (almost certainly meaning R&D), a military police company, and the Surgeon General's Office, and those were just the insignia he was certain of. This sort of blended operation was next to unheard of for the stratified Army. You didn't cherry pick personnel from across the armed forces to run some tiny pet program in the middle of nowhere. Not without a signed letter from the ghost of George Washington delivered by an archangel. Whoever brought them together had cleared bureaucratic hurdles the size of the Grand Tetons. The perpetrators obviously had major league clout, the kind that could make them untouchable if they saw him coming. Not that he needed another reminder
One of the bigger mysteries in the case was the officer they stuck in charge. The commander of Fort Morrison was a colonel, which on its own demonstrated that the undertaking merited a colonel, a rank that usually commanded thousands. A little research showed that the man had a shockingly checkered past. Scandal had a way of guiding a person's professional options, so this smelled like a rich vein for insight into the Fort's plans. But the colonel, Abner Tanner, had a hand in so many random and disastrous programs over the years that Batman couldn't decide which he was employed for.
As much as this whetted Batman's curiosity, he was keenly aware that the site was still a powder keg: nearly two hundred armed threats in what was effectively a few city blocks. And security only tightened closer to its secrets. The Dark Knight had spent time in a few war zones back in his wandering years. In his experience, soldiers weren't necessarily better sentries than criminals on an individual level; both knew their environment and had the same incentives to pay attention to it. But soldiers were much better than criminals at working as a team. Gaps in the Fort's guards would be few and far between. And they would be exceedingly quick at setting up a perimeter and turning the place upside-down if he was spotted.
With the element of surprise, it was a high-risk venture that demanded the utmost caution and stealth.
Without the element of surprise, well…
"No. No. No. No."
On an scale of alarm from one to ten, with a one measuring him resting in his cave and a nine being shot at while disarming a bomb, the evening had commenced at a low two. There was a brief jump when Catwoman found his protocol stash. Climbing the rock wall in the dark nudged near a solid four. When he saw the Fort and realized something was off, the needle went unstuck and floated loosely upward as he struggled to put the pieces together. When he realized what was wrong his alarm spiked to a seven. He had once skydived with a stuck parachute and hadn't reached seven.
"-All ten watchtowers are operational."
"Isn't that what they do at night?"
"Last time it was two."
He took a deep, meditative breath. This was bad news.
The public thought Batman was invincible. The truth was he was merely very shrewd at picking his battles.
"We've been made. Abort mission."
Catwoman was the epitome of a cool customer; Kitty didn't sweat when the cards were on the table. However, her gut said something was off. She lived by very few rules, but she always followed her intuition.
"We've been made. Abort mission."
The Dark Knight rose to a low crouch and turned around.
"Batman," Catwoman hissed after him. "Wait, Batman!"
"I'll tie a rappel line. Stay down. Watch my back."
It was spoken in his regular flat affect, but Catwoman was getting pretty good at the subtle tones of Bat-speak. For example, those subtle tones were now saying the big guy was worried. This was bad news.
"Stop! Hey!"
Catwoman wasn't as flamboyant as some of her peers on the GCPD's dispatch bulletins (she didn't kidnap the mayor or install vats of acid in her home), but she certainly had a reputation: sly, flirty, easygoing, an eye for the finer things, a well-adjusted sense of humor (exceedingly rare among night-types), world-class gams, and a touch of kleptomania.
Most flirty girls who worked at night weren't brain surgeons. Words like "airhead" were tossed around. Catwoman couldn't care less what random strangers thought about her, but she happened to be a very gifted lady. Even ignoring her technical skills and obvious classical education, no idiot could go toe-to-toe with Batman more than once and get away with it. In Gotham that was a law of physics.
So, being the intelligent sort, Catwoman was more than a tad surprised that the Caped Crusader, a force of convictions so steady one could set a watch by them, was doing the unthinkable and retreating (without consulting her again, for the record). Seeing Batman run away was like seeing a solar eclipse or a lion snorkeling - every fiber of her being screamed it was utterly against the natural order of things.
As for her, one couldn't say quite what made Catwoman tick. A healthy young woman who hid outside a military installation in an animal costume on a whim was not the easiest psyche to unpack. Freud would've had a field day. Or a conniption.
Still, a few issues certainly fed her current attitude. For instance, Catwoman thrived on professional pride. The night she let a few guards and a fence stop her from getting her prize was the night she hung up the claws. Her recent string of rotten luck wasn't helping matters - first the Nelson Stones, then the Ataturk Arabesques, and then that fiasco at the Cairo Exhibition. Her lifetime record still made her Hall of Fame material seven times over, but you were only as good as your last heist. In her mind, a lady made her own luck, and she made it by being so audacious that luck couldn't help but stand and applaud.
The fact that Batman wanted to leave (and was ordering her around in the process) certainly gave her more than enough incentive to be contrary. And if the evening was a success, she could rub it in his face. What greater reward was there?
Besides, she was certainly NOT in the mood to climb down that cliff again. She was just starting to get the feeling back into her fingers.
Okay, and maybe she was angry for the sake of that poor couple who were mercilessly killed by the monsters they were after. She wasn't heartless.
Still, Catwoman wasn't shaken by Batman's change of plans. Nope, not her. The Feline Femme Fatale was cool as a cucumber and confronted her new partner with an eloquence and suavity befitting such dignity.
Batman felt an urgent tugging on his cape. He ignored it. Then he felt a snowball smack the back of his neck.
He turned sharply. "What?"
She hissed in his ear. "What the Hell is going on?!"
Catwoman was either livid or frightened. He wasn't sure which made the situation worse.
"I said it's over. The Fort's on alert. We can't risk it."
"How could they possibly see us coming?"
He grimaced. "Not sure. Doesn't matter."
He returned to work. A gust of wind swirled up eddies of loose snow. Catwoman pulled her green cape tighter and grabbed his shoulder. "Hold on just a sec-"
He curtly pushed her hand away. "Don't worry. You'll get your pay."
Catwoman blinked. Her mouth fell open very slowly. That was the wrong thing to say.
Rage is a funny feeling. Sometimes it froths out all at once, but sometimes the vitriol is so thick it collapses under its own gravity and stays hidden. A bystander wouldn't see anything but mild surprise in her features. A shrewd observer like Batman might have noticed something was wrong, but he was distracted.
She briefly entertained the thought of kicking him off the cliff. It warmed her up a little. But this was Batman. He'd survive somehow, the git. And then she'd have to climb down without a guide.
Batman had taken a knee and was busy forcing a spike into the icy ground. She crept behind him and, in a fluid motion, grabbed his other thigh and pulled it backwards. He flopped onto his stomach in a very un-Batman-like way. He recovered in a flash and rolled onto his back, where she was already crouched over him.
Given the circumstances (and the fact that his head was hanging a few inches over the cliff), she had to admire his poise. He looked up at her coolly. "Fine. What's your concern?"
"You're Batman."
He gave her a look. "And?"
"And wouldn't you remember if someone saw you?"
"... I can make mistakes."
"Mistakes big enough to warrant that?" She pointed behind her at the array of watchtowers. "A week later?"
He paused. "It's unlikely. Could be for an unrelated security breach. Could be a drill. But the consequences are the same. Too dangerous."
"I thought you had guts."
"I did until you sat on them."
Catwoman glanced down at their current ... configuration. She was the furthest thing from bashful, but her point was made. She moved off of him.
"I read your report. You have other ways in, other exits. And they were good! I think we can still do this."
He rose to a knee and didn't respond.
She pushed her point home. "Be honest. If we leave now, what are the odds you can still bring a solid case to the Powers that Be against these wastes of oxygen?"
"The perpetrators are leaving evidence and making enemies with the City," He pondered for a moment. "Given enough time, moderately likely."
"And what are the odds that 'enough time' is before the next nice couple is murdered?"
He stiffened. People under tension normally shift or twitch, but his taunt muscles were perfectly still. Ever so slowly, his head swiveled to meet hers. Catwoman had received countless Bat-glares, but this one was different. It wasn't a glare of suspicion or disapproval or anger. It was a look of hate. Hate to boil the oceans to steam. Hate to melt sand into glass. Not hate at her necessarily (at least she hoped not), but at, well, life - at humanity.
Gotham criminals loved to argue over why the Bat didn't kill, but Catwoman never found the question interesting. The answer seemed obvious to her - whatever inflated altruism gene made him choose to risk his life every night also compelled him to take the moral high ground in everything, as easily as he breathed.
Seeing him now, she suspected that his self-restraint didn't come quite so naturally.
Catwoman crossed her arms. It was easy to miss on the playful surface, but she had a cord of stubbornness in her as deep as the roots of an oak. And it took every inch, but she stood her ground and looked him in the eye ... lense.
"Well?"
His intensity evaporated in a heartbeat, as if it was never there. He responded with typical cold indifference.
"More victims mean more loose ends to tie to the guilty parties. But we can't take advantage of that if we're the victims. We're going home."
Catwoman frowned and sucked in a deep breath of courage. She did have one ultimatum left. She reeeeaally hoped this worked.
"You're wrong, handsome. We're not doing anything. You can drive off in your little car, but I'm going inside."
"You're not prepared for-"
"See this face?" she pointed at herself. "It's the face of someone who doesn't care. It's also the face of the best thief in the business. Get in touch in a few days and I'll show you what I find. Bye."
Catwoman stood up out of the frozen bushes and strode away, following the curve of the chain-link fence. Batman stared after her and muttered something unflattering. Sometimes he really hated night-types.
He turned and examined his rappel spike.
Fifty-seven seconds later.
The pair walked side-by-side along the margin between the fence and the cliff. Catwoman secretly grinned. As they sloshed through the ankle-deep slush, she snickered, "I bet this is the closest thing to a date you've had in a long time."
Batman briefly recalled the hundred and twenty-four evenings spent with female company since the beginning of the year. "Something like that."
They eventually reached one of the maintenance gates: small entrances placed every few hundred yards and locked from the inside.
"Alright. You were eager to be here, now how do you want to get in?"
"I assume we still can't cut holes in the fence and make our lives easier?"
"We leave no evidence."
"Well, I was intrigued by ingress route four."
He frowned in confusion. "We didn't bring a ladder."
"I was thinking of adding a little improvisation."
"There's timber here, but it would take half an hour to build a ladder."
"Are you willfully ignoring what I mean or just much stupider than everyone thinks?"
He grunted. "It's a foolish idea."
"It's the quickest idea."
"Quickest to lacerations."
"You of all people should know what I'm capable of."
He grunted but eyed her analytically, methodically observing from head to toe. She took the opportunity for a cheeky pose: foot turned inward, one hand on a hip, the other behind her head.
"Even for you, the margin of error would be just over a handspan."
"Sounds like my problem."
"Not if you get stuck in the barbed wire. Then it's my problem and your hospital stay."
"Ahhhh, that's sweet. Would you visit me?"
"With a court summons."
"Less sweet. Can't we just pole vault?"
"The pole would stand as evidence. We'll do ingress route nine."
"Please, we'll never find that many falcons. We're doing four."
With that, Catwoman paced to the edge of the cliff, turned around, and learned into a sprinter's stance.
"Catwoman, this is unnecessary."
She took a deep breath. "You better get ready!"
"Stop."
She kicked off.
"STOP!"
Pumping her arms, Catwoman sped forward. In a blink, she was at the fence. Batman huffed in resignation. He had dealt with worse situations. With a swift motion, he bent his knees and anchored his hands at his abdomen like he was hefting an invisible shot put. With her final step, Catwoman leapt forward. For a heartbeat, she stood in his palms. Then Batman pushed skywards with a Herculean burst.
Catwoman, already racing forward at eye-watering speed, rocketed into the air. With balletic grace, she swiveled into a languid high jump pose. Then, gently as a feather, she glided just above the highest loops of the barbed wire, kicked her trailing leg over, cape fluttering in the slipstream, and began to fall.
The way down wasn't so elegant.
"OW!"
"Not so loud."
Catwoman gingerly stood up. Someone was in store for a bruised hip tomorrow.
"I think I landed on a thistle."
"Get the gate."
"I'm going, I'm going."
Catwoman made remarkably short work of the lock on the maintenance gate. Batman stepped through and she relocked it behind him.
"Told you it would work!"
He nodded begrudgingly as they set off.
For the serious infiltrator, there were many advantages to operating in a city. The shadows of elaborate skylines to slink under. Walls and dumpsters to hide behind. The mazes of narrow alleys, abandoned buildings, and forgotten tunnels to pursue or lose pursuit in. A million hidden nooks to lie in wait. Plenty of smog, steam, and smoke to obscure the figure. And a vertical dimension unseen anywhere else.
That said, when it came to sheer concealment per square inch, it was hard to beat the vegetation of a low forest. In the eyes of two masters of the art such as Batman and Catwoman, this was paradise. They glided like ghosts through the icy underbrush - never cracking a branch, rarely shifting a leaf. Neither led the other; they moved as two extensions of the same mind, wordlessly flowing to the smoothest path. A soft and heavy snow began to fall, muffling what little noise they made.
Some might assume their outfits were ill-suited to the task. This was a misconception. The dark greys and blacks of the Bat-suit were actually excellent against white snow, an optical trick known to winter warriors for millennia. Catwoman's violet and green ensemble, though striking up close, was a muted color and fine camouflage in the forest.
After several silent minutes, they came to a dirt trail. They followed beside it, staying several yards inside the woods. As they rounded a curve, they heard voices ahead of them. The two infiltrators instantly dissolved further into the brush and crouched down. The bushes ahead were getting sparse and small, and the lights of the distant watchtowers were growing brighter; they couldn't risk sneaking ahead here. They would have to wait.
The voices were soon joined by bodies. Three soldiers crunched leisurely through the fresh snow. They wore heavy coats and cradled rifles in their arms.
As they passed by, one soldier held up a hand to stop his compatriots. He glanced around slowly. Batman and Catwoman, a stone's throw away, tensed behind their cover.
The soldier put down his arm and nodded. "This'll work."
Without further ado, the soldier slung his rifle on his back, then faced a tree on the opposite edge of the trail and unzipped his trousers.
The sounds of nature commenced.
Batman and Catwoman collectively exhaled. The two unoccupied soldiers looked around idly and began to chat.
"So Sarge, I hear you and Iris split."
"Aye, you know how it is: we starting hating each other faster than we could lower our standards. S'fer the best."
"S'not like maintaining any sort o' emotional bond s'easy when we hardly get a weekend of leave every month."
"Ain't that the God's honest."
"Mm-yep."
The soldier relieving himself spoke up, "And can you believe this now? Triple shifts! Over some bootprint," Batman and Catwoman shared a meaningful glance, "If they wanted to put me in the dirt, I'd prefer a cigarette and a blindfold. Damn that Waller!"
This was met with coarse laughter. "Sarge" had a look of sudden insight.
"That ain't a bad idea, Hershey."
"What, damning Waller? I think that's St. Peter's job."
"No, lunkhead. As Sergent, I order this column at ease to support a tobacco-based morale initiative."
The two not facing a tree chuckled and dug out old, bent cigarettes.
"Need a light, Denunzio?"
"Nah, Sarge. I'm good."
They each pulled out long-stem matches and lit their flames against the falling snow.
Denunzio coughed. "Jeez, Hershey! Was your momma a racehorse? You've been there a minute."
"Shove it up your ear, Denunzio."
The Sarge frowned. "Hey! You boys know the rules. No bringing mothers into things."
"Sorry, Sarge."
"Sorry, Sarge."
"That's right. But he's got a point. Are you all right, Private Hershey? Should I be callin' a medic?"
"Nah, Sarge. I drank two pots of coffee at supper when I heard about the new hours."
Denunzio nodded sagely. "Coffee's gonna mess with your sleep, buddy. None for me. Hate getting up early."
Hershey finished and zipped up. "I thought you grew up on a farm."
"Yeah, and I left!"
"You didn't like waking up early so you left ... to join the Army?"
"Seemed like a good idea at the time. Speaking of, any idea who'd sneak into camp?"
Hershey nodded. "It's got to be Jerry. The Krauts got spies all over, see? Snooping on our science for their war machines."
"For my two cents, it's the commies. No question."
The Sarge shook his head slowly. "You boys's both backwards. Some son of a gum buck private was tip-toeing 'round past when he should'a been and made that print, and now he's too afraid to speak up.
Hershey disagreed, "But Sarge, the boots weren't general issue."
"Well, then I suppose he had another pair of boots!"
"What sort of bad business would a guy want to hide so much that he'd let this happen?"
"I don't know. Maybe ... littering?"
"Littering."
Denunzio interjected, "Yeah, that's the circle of life!"
Sarge scratched his forehead, "Denunzio, what's a 'circle of life'? Is'zat fancy speak for something?"
"You know, the circle of life! People make trash ..."
"Alright."
"Trash ... um ... makes rats."
"Okay."
"And ... rats ... make ... people."
"Rats make people."
"Yeah. People make trash, trash makes rats, and rats make people - circle of life."
Private Hershey scoffed, "Denunzio, shut your pie hole."
"So's your old man, Hershey."
"Bah."
Their grunting and spitting and insults lasted a long while, as men in repose are inclined, until their smokes finally dimmed.
From the beginning of this chat, the Dark Knight forcibly suppressed a headache.
As an unseen judge of the streets, Batman spent many of his waking hours in surveillance. It was a vital task, and his ironclad worldview insisted that vital tasks stood beyond resentment or criticism. He could never consciously admit to anything but complete respect for the job in all its challenges. That said, surveillance was terrible. Catching six seconds of incriminating admission usually meant enduring forty minutes of inane chatter. As a genius and an introvert, he found the casual stupidity of strangers a special kind of purgatory.
One of the subtlest nuances in the mind of the Bat was that, while he was entirely serious, he wasn't entirely mature. The two traits looked so much alike that the distinction was next to invisible (and presently only recognized by a single old friend), but it was there. For instance, while Batman couldn't hate the surveillance itself, he was more than happy to mock the mouth-breathers he had to watch.
As the trio of Nobel laureates talked about coffee or sleeping habits or some other dreck, he gave an exhale of disdain.
Imbeciles.
Catwoman, lying a few inches away, gave a half-nod towards the three.
I know, right?
Batman was briefly stunned. Having worked alone for so long he was used to his thoughts going unanswered. Forgetting himself, Batman enthusiastically lifted his shoulders.
It's ridiculous. Have they passed the third grade?
Catwoman rested her cheek sardonically on two fingers.
If so, this is my tax dollars at work.
He gave the quietest grunt.
Like you pay taxes.
She glared with pointed reproach.
Hey, I'm not an anarchist. Someone has to keep the roads paved and the kids in school. Besides…
They shrugged in unison.
... That's how they got Capone.
She smiled at him bemused and looked away. Batman paused in rare astonishment. He knew abstractly that Catwoman spent time in surveillance, but it never occurred to him that they would ever share gripes about it. That was bizarre. But he had to admit, having someone to heckle with was…well…an unusually welcome experience.
After an interminable wait, the patrol finally ended their smoke break and continued down the trail. Batman and Catwoman waited until the three were well out of sight before they cautiously left cover. Restless now, they slipped through the snowy brush at a bolder pace.
It wasn't long before the scenery rapidly thinned out. They could see a short clearing, and beyond it the main camp of Fort Morrison. The site was surrounded by a low ring of barbed wire backed by piles of sandbags. Lines of tight-set cabins were wedged into a sad mimicry of "streets" which were laid in a grid like a small town. Between the moon, the snow, and the spotlights, the buildings were cast in a sterile gray twilight.
Catwoman whistled, "It's like the love child of Santa's village and a gulag."
Having once been in a gulag, Batman agreed. He grabbed his binoculars and observed the area.
"The sandbags are new."
"What do you think that means?"
"Not sure. Fences and barbed wire are just obstacles to deter trespassers. They presume the guards can win any real confrontation."
"And sandbags?"
"Sandbags don't stop people, they stop munitions. A tactician would only lay sandbags if he expected to be attacked by a force that might outgun his own."
"So someone thinks Fort Morrison is about to be invaded?"
"Evidently."
"Who could possibly be the threat? Canada?"
"I don't know."
Meanwhile.
At the base of the mountain, another squad crunched through the forest with considerably less stealth. Cold and sleepy, they didn't expect to see so much as a chipmunk. This was the second night of patrols beyond the Fort and no one was happy about it.
As the grumpy patrol stumbled down a small hill, a tired private thought he saw a strange glint of color in a stand of evergreens. He called this out and the group lazily halted.
The private pushed aside some heavy branches and peered ahead with his flashlight.
It fell to the dirt. In front of him sat a humble Ford Model 48 hardtop. Beige.
