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Batman 1939: The Dangers of Being Cold
Chapter 15: Dodge - An Exit Strategy
In his brief time in the public eye, Batman earned a long list of people who wanted him dead. This wasn't surprising: he had a gift for picking fights in a town where revenge fantasies were something of a cultural pastime. Even scum he hadn't met wanted to dig him a shallow grave on principle. But beyond the legions of lesser beasts who might wish to kill him, the sinister figure of the night who spent the most time actually planning to kill Batman was Batman.
Like a chess student, after long consideration on how to bring about the end of Batman, Batman learned to recognize Batman's endgames - situations that gave the illusion of mobility but stifled his methods and advantages so completely that all options led to defeat. For instance, if Batman was in a small, low building with thick walls and few exits, and if his opposition knew those exits and had the manpower and firepower to cover them indefinitely, and if said opposition tried to capture him alive before but had since been provoked by a bluff that defied the Geneva Protocol, that would be a sound example of an endgame.
As he pondered his options, Batman realized chess was a poor metaphor. There were no secrets in chess, but this game still had a hidden queen.
He glanced thoughtfully at Catwoman.
Then he blinked and looked again; she was stuffing packets of money into her satchel.
Catwoman sensed his disapproval beam and looked over. "Good news. I found a big envelope of cash in the bottom drawer." He frowned. For a guy shot at by the police every other week, he sure had a good cop-face. She shrugged and tossed him a smile. "Think of it this way, handsome. If we let her keep the money, who knows what kind of evil business she'll use it for?" Catwoman struggled to close the latch on hundreds of crisp greenbacks. "This is our - rrrrhh - moral obligation."
"So you intend to distribute that back to the taxpayers?"
"Sure. Boutique owners, dance halls, restauranteurs, the bank, my landlady - all taxpayers."
Batman resigned to pick his battles. They walked out of the office. She scanned the corridor. Twenty-six feet away through the front door, she heard voices and footsteps.
"You know how you sounded so confident a few minutes ago vis-à-vis our escape? What exactly did you have in mind?"
"That depends."
"On?"
"What's in the garage."
Four minutes later.
Colonel Abner Tanner crossed his arms and inspected his troops again. The Army was out of shape; peace and poverty did that to a country. The ranks were cluttered with too many old officers - paper-pushers, most of them. On the bright side, the draft was pumping fresh blood into the system. Wheels were turning the right direction. He just prayed it wasn't too late.
For his own men, Tanner reckoned he had done right. Eighteen troops surrounded the Brick. A wide encirclement at night wasn't the easiest small unit maneuver, but they had the building locked down in short order. Fifty more still patrolled the camp for errant enemy collaborators. It was a start. Waller had already trudged back to the war room. He couldn't fault the lady's intelligence (as often as he tried), but that was all she was: a schemer. When the talking was done and you had to stand in the snow and face the bullets, when you had to act, that took a soldier.
In fairness, they might only be facing one man, possibly one corpse. It wasn't his hardest mission.
For now, the operation waited on gas masks. He had already sent a runner to wake the quartermaster. If the Fort didn't have any, then he would sit another hour and move in regardless.
As he waited by the main entrance, he heard a large engine cough and sputter to life in the direction of the motor pool. Tanner gestured for half his squad to follow and jogged around the side of the building. The garage door was still shut, but a truck inside was revving up. Lieutenant Wilson and seven wary men stood arrayed in front of the tall metal door. The Colonel barked a few commands. The troops fanned out to flanking positions and leveled their rifles.
Twenty seconds passed. There was a loud click, and another motor began to loudly lift the door. As it rose, billows of acrid smoke rushed out. His men shuffled back, keeping their sights trained on the entrance. The Colonel peered vainly into the haze. The lights were off inside, and the shoulder-high veil of smoke blocked any illumination from the exterior lamps. They were blind.
Colonel Tanner was weighing the risks of sending in a scout when the engine inside revved fiercely. Tires squealed. There was a brief disturbance in the center of the haze, then a covered truck raced through, smoke pouring from its exposed engine block. The bulky six-wheeler barreled neatly between the flanking soldiers, skidded twenty yards on the muddy snow, and crashed to a stop with the help of a telegraph pole. The bent pole wavered for a chilly moment then fell over.
The men cautiously surrounded the idle truck. Though the engine had stopped, faint trails of smoke still leaked out. Between this and the dark, the cabin was utterly obscured.
The Colonel raised his voice, "You have seven seconds to get out. Failure to comply may cause an acute case of lead poisoning. Six! ... Five! ... This is your final warning ... Four! ... Three! ..." He paused but saw no movement. "... Two! ... One! ..." Still no movement. "... Open fire!"
A burst of gunfire lit up the the truck. The windshield and windows disintegrated in an instant. Every metal surface was peppered with sparks. A streak of holes stitched low across the material covering the bed. A tire deflated.
He raised an arm. "Hold!"
The shooting stopped. The stench of saltpeter hung in the air. The truck was well and truly wrecked. Lieutenant Wilson crept up and opened the back flap. The cargo bed was empty. He moved to the cabin and pulled open the door. There was no one inside, but a web of cords was tied between the wheel, the stick shift, and the ignition. There was a brick on the gas pedal.
A minute ago.
In the art of stealth, students talked vision, but masters talked sound (a few deviants talked smell but rarely convinced anyone).
Batman and Catwoman understood sound intimately well. They knew that the noise of a large diesel engine with a missing hood completely masked the noise of a man stabbing though four inches of plaster ceiling, pine roof beam, asphalt shingles, and ice with the pry end of a lug wrench.
For the urban set, the skyline of a military camp from atop a single-story building was pretty underwhelming, but for Catwoman it was as beautiful as the view from any skyscraper. The arcs of the distant watchtowers cutting through the snow might as well have been the lights of Paris.
She was very, truly, exorbitantly glad to not be in that pit anymore. The pretentious literary corner of her mind suggested the word Conrad-esque. Feeling the chilled wind and sharp flakes against her face was more than joyous, it was purifying. She would have thrown her arms up into the air and stretched to Heaven except that she was still on a low roof surrounded by an Army platoon (at most).
If Batman felt any jubilation, he expressed it with a stoic work frown. He shrugged to loose some plaster chips from his shoulder and nodded.
Keeping a low crouch, they glided to the far corner of the roof and peered over the edge. Batman half-expected the entire guard detail to have rushed to the noise, but the men were well-drilled. A few still kept their posts at the other walls. This segment of the building was still the least protected, being the furthest from any entrance. There was only two sentries in their path. They stood twenty feet away, looking perplexed towards the distant engine noises.
Privates Cooper and Lockerby stood twenty feet away from an empty stretch of wall, looking perplexed towards the distant engine noises.
Private Cooper rubbed his hands for warmth, having forgotten his gloves in the rush when Sarge mustered them out an hour ago.
"I still don't get it, we should be over there. That's where stuff's happening, right?"
Private Lockerby spit. "Feh. Who cares?"
"I care. Sure as shootin', nothing's gonna happen here. If there's a fight, we ought to go help!"
"What we ought'a do is follow orders, dummy."
"But-"
"Listen, use whatever cobwebbed bucket you have for a brain and think about it. They already have enough boys on the other side to start a baseball team. They have the Colonel with'em. They even have that huge lieutenant who follows Waller around. They can handle it on their own. And if they can't, do you really think a milk-baby like you is gonna make a difference? Save your skin and relax."
"I'm not a milk-baby."
"Just shut up and watch your corner."
Private Cooper turned and crossed his arms. "You're a milk-baby."
Suddenly, a shape rushed towards them in the dark. Private Lockerby pivoted and held out his light. "Hold up there!" He squinted in disbelief. It looked like a lady dressed in some sort of - he struggled for comparison - purple circus leotard? Maybe a classy burlesque outfit? As he came to grips with this, she sprinted between the two solders. He made a grab for her. "Hey!"
She ducked and Lockerby missed, but Private Cooper was a step quicker. He managed to catch the edge of her green cape. It untied with the effort. She stumbled and turned around.
Private Lockerby raised his rifle. "Hands up."
The woman meekly did so. Private Cooper dropped the cape and grinned. "Told you I wasn't a milk-baby."
With their backs turned, Batman had no trouble gliding up behind them. He knocked their heads together. Kunnk. The two soldiers collapsed.
Catwoman reached down and picked up her cape. "Huh. Sounded like coconuts."
He nodded sagely. "They always do."
They set off, speeding through the maze of tents and cabins. Catwoman stopped to check a corner. "You know, it was a little rude assuming I'd be okay with playing the bait. Why don't you be bait next time?"
He checked the other direction. "I don't do bait."
"Why?"
"People tend to shoot me on sight."
"Oh."
In the distance, they heard a tremendous volley of gunfire. Catwoman dived for cover. "I thought we had another minute!"
"They're done taking chances."
"Clearly. Where next?"
"The only other site in the Fort that could store virus cultures long-term is the old infirmary. Other side of the bridge."
They picked up the pace, ducking and weaving through the camp. After several corners, they came to a clearing with a squad of troops looking around. There was no quick detour that didn't leave them in the open. After a moment of observation, Catwoman nudged his arm and nodded above them. Batman looked up. They were hiding behind the leg of a water tower. He followed the path of her eyes, up the leg, along the rim, then a hop from a structural spar to the roof of a shower house on the other side of the clearing. It was a bold leap, a challenge even for his caliber.
They clambered to the top. The metal wavered but held their weight. Tip-toeing along the slush, they reached the short spar. Catwoman took a sprinting step and leaped. The wind caught her cape as she fell through the sky. With textbook smoothness, she landed with a roll on the distant roof. Batman idly thumbed the stitched wound in his side as he watched her land. The squad below was none the wiser. He brushed the snow from his lenses, tensed, then pushed off.
As his feet left the ground, a shock of nausea swept his system. His vision was taken by pins of light. His limbs half-numbed. From the far roof, Catwoman watched in horror as his form went slack. He should have tucked forward his trailing leg now, but instead it flailed in the breeze. A heartbeat later, Batman hit the side of the building like a sack of hams hitting the side of a building.
A minute ago.
The six men of Idaho Squad had been ordered to patrol the clearing in front of the East Shower House. It was a major intersection of the camp; any saboteurs hoping to make it to the bridge would likely come through. The squad wasn't happy. The alarms earlier had put everyone on edge, but they still seemed distant enough. This volley of gunfire coming from the Brick made things all too real. People were shooting at each other. This was war. And someone was waiting in the dark to hurt them.
Sergeant Getty tried to keep his restless boys in line. "I'm telling ya, any second now, they'll send up the all-clear. Rascal jus' got plugged by the Colonel. Threat's over. Jus' keep eyes on your post for a few more minutes."
Private Forez, suffering from paranoia and a runny nose, disagreed. "But Sarge, what if the Colonel didn't see all of them? We can't hardly see ten feet n'front of us now." He wiped his nose with his sleeve. "What if some spies are still hiding?"
"Boy, there ain't no more spies."
"Then what are we watching for?"
"Spies!"
"But-"
"Hush it. We're here to follow orders, I'm jus' saying as the voice o' wisdom an' experience that we'll be done soon. "
Private Trimble piped up. "I don't know Sarge. What if they's, uh ..."
"Spit it out son."
Trimble was the shifty-eyed, nervous sort who had to chase after his thoughts now and then. "This ... well, it, this feels like a Western."
"A Western?"
"Here we are in this fort here, see? We're the Army in a fort. Who always comes tip-toeing around? Apaches."
"You're worried 'bout Indians?"
"Could be Apaches, could be rustlers."
Forez added, "Or banditos."
The other soldiers muttered agreement. Trimble nodded. "Or banditos."
The Sargent was baffled. "What?"
"That's what always happens. They knew how to sneak up on you in the Westerns. Some varmint hides behind a barrel or a cactus or somesuch till Johnny Soldier walks on by. Then he get an arrow in the back. Happens every time."
The other soldiers muttered agreement.
"Private, that's a load of phooey. Get that out of your head."
"I can't stop imagining it, Sarge - some sneaky spy sneaking past out lines. Jumping out the shadows right on our heads."
At that moment, Batman jumped out of the shadows and smacked into a wall.
There was silence in the group. The intruder on the ground twitched.
Sergeant Getty grunted smugly. "See there! I told you nobody was going to hit us in the back!"
Catwoman dropped out of the darkness and hit him in the back.
There was a myth among fans of the more exotic fighting styles that being small was an advantage, either from seeing the underdog win in too many works of fiction or by taking the notion of "the bigger they are, the harder they fall" too literally. Schools did boast that a diminutive practitioner could use leverage to limit the strength of a larger foe. This was true. The fallacy came in projecting that to being actively better than the larger foe, that the tall and hefty were waiting to be toppled like half-cut trees. This was stupid. Anatomy didn't scale like that. If it was true, wrestlers would always win against elephants.
In reality, when two fighters of equal skill met, size won. This was why combat sports had weight classes. This was also why Catwoman daring to confront six men was even more incredible than many would assume.
Batman, for all his dash and theatrics, was a kick-boxer at heart, a brawler made perfect. Catwoman's moves were not so simple; she couldn't afford to be. Her form was her own, it led itself to no obvious comparisons. What could be said? She was liquid. Her balance was sublime on every limb, and she moved between the four with ease. Her attacks revolved around the legs, literally and figuratively, but it would be faint praise to say she kicked. No, she used her feet with a versatility and surety that few had in their hands. Jabs, trips, clubs, feints, winches. Off-the-wall dropkicks. Handsprings into flying rubber guard. And once in range, the claws came out. Her hand speed was phenomenal. As every knife fighter knows, it's not power, it's proximity.
With all this flexibility and skill, Catwoman managed to dispose of two with sheer surprise and knocked out a third after a heated pummeling. But that left three standing, ready and closing in. Speed did only so much against six arms. She played keep-away, let them stumble in the snow. Then one soldier over-reached. In a wink, she ducked the hand and sprung forward, driving a knee into his cheekbone. As he fell sideways, she leapfrogged over his shoulder and planted both feet in the chin of the next soldier beside him.
But the third caught her hip. She twisted away and raked his face, but this one had the tenacity of a farm boy grappler. He pushed forward into a loose shoulder hold, using his deadweight to bring her to the muddy snow. She rolled out of the hold with ease, but her momentum was lost. They closed in. The soldier with the bruised jaw was already on her back, scrambling for a neck hold. She twisted and rolled again to put him in a knee lock, but farm boy was up and getting near. She disengaged and stood, shoving away his next tackle and stepping in for a hip throw.
The throw was flawless, but no sooner had she let go then the stock of a rifle hit her in the small of her back. She cried out and fell to a knee. It was the Sergeant, her first target, one she thought was out of the fight. He limped, and the gash across his forehead wasn't pretty, but he was standing again. In a rush, Catwoman leapt at him, but she was rebuffed. She tried to push past the rifle in her way, but her lower back burned, and her strength left her. The two other soldiers grabbed her. She struggled in a half-nelson, found herself briefly airborne, and crashed face-first into the slush. With every move, the pair only pinned tighter. She tried to claw out, but the rifle struck her arm.
Flinching in pain, Catwoman had a singular moment of clarity. Laying prone, she could see out of one eye (praying the other was only blinded by mud or sweat). Viewed sideways, she saw past the bodies above and into the dark haze beyond. Though the falling snow moved a sinister figure, a demon of the night.
It was over in five motions. Three were strikes into meat. The fourth bent a rifle barrel. The fifth made a wet snap.
Batman helped her up. They heard footsteps approaching and fled around the next wall. Both were keenly aware her slugfest could have been heard by half the camp. A few turns later brought them to a mechanic's shed to hide in.
He eyed her scuffed outfit. "You alright?"
"Yeah." She stretched out her arm gingerly and winced. "Thanks."
He half-nodded. "Thank you. How's your back?"
"Nearly as nice as my front."
They sat in silence for a moment.
Catwoman looked up. "You missed the jump." She said this in a tone like he had tripped over his shoelaces.
Batman's voice was hoarse and quiet. "When I moved, I nearly blacked out."
She scrutinized him. His body language was clinched to breaking. He radiated waves of passionate intensity, all of it a struggle to keep his expression neutral. Whatever that meant, she tread lightly.
"The drugs again?"
He nodded. "This hasn't happened before."
Catwoman grinned weakly. "I'd say there's a joke in that."
He was unamused. "The anesthetic shouldn't be symptomatic now. Could be trauma."
"What do you mean?"
"I was in a fight in the lab"
"The one where you were stabbed with a sword."
"Before I was cut, I took a few blows to the head."
"Someone punched you, then stabbed you."
"I was also thrown and hit a glass container with the base of my skull. That might be relevant."
"Someone punched you, then stabbed you, then threw you."
"It was an interesting encounter."
"You really need a hobby."
"I don't feel concussed, but if I am, head trauma affects medication."
"That's a mild way of putting it."
"Or my medic used an inappropriate drug. Or too much of one. Or some combination thereof."
"How do you feel now?"
"Fine, strangely. The bouts of nausea lasted seconds. But both triggered without warning. I have no idea when it-"
They heard an octet of boots nearby and froze. The soldiers soon passed.
Catwoman rose and looked around. "Whatever comes, we'll deal with it. Let's go."
"We're near the edge of camp, but we'll never get to to bridge on foot. There's too much attention."
"What do you have in mind?"
He looked pointedly past her. Catwoman turned and saw he was focused on a Harley-Davidson motorcycle leaning against a work bench. She put her hands on her hips doubtfully. "Alright, but where's the second one?"
He stared at her evenly. She frowned. "What?"
"July ninth."
"July ni-" She paused in thought. "... Ohhhh, no. Not happening."
Five months ago.
It was a balmy night in Gotham City. The best jazz and swing bands in the world had just started their sets, and all the clubs were packed to the walls. Block parties flooded the streets in every neighborhood. Even the stars seemed to dance. There was a rhythm in the air.
Batman was busy hiding in a packing crate of lima beans. He didn't like lima beans.
He heard a familiar motion and burst out. Catwoman, catching her breath nearby, did a double take. She thought she had lost him three blocks ago on the balcony of the Mansfield Building. In truth, he let her pull ahead and raced around to hide in this riverside shipping depot. Scant yards away, he gave chase once more. She ran deftly up a wall and caught the edge of the southbound elevated railway. She pulled herself up, checking that the six centuries old porcelain Tonkinese of Katmandu was still safe in her satchel, then ran off. Following step for step, Batman chased her onto the tracks. This didn't make sense. There was nowhere to hide up here, just an open path, and Catwoman rarely tried to out-sprint him.
His confusion was answered a moment later as the northbound line rocketed past on the neighboring rail. If this was their first meeting, he would yell to warn her not to risk her life on a stunt, but now he knew better. Indeed, she hopped and caught the top edge of a passing train car with ease. In a blink, Catwoman was whisked in the opposite direction. He grimaced and followed suit. They hung on for a minute, buffeted by the wind. Then she pushed off and rolled down a loose market awning below, braking with her claws. By the time Batman saw her drop, it was too late to follow.
For a moment, it seemed like a lost cause. As cavalier as Catwoman made it look, finding a landing zone for an unscheduled train dismount was difficult. He couldn't just fall to the cement. The next safe point might be twenty blocks away. Then fortune struck: the southbound train sped by. In an arm-straining maneuver, Batman spun from one train to the other. When the awning came into view, he leapt off and - with considerably less grace than she showed - tumbled to the ground.
Of course, she was nowhere in sight. Only eight seconds had passed since she disappeared, but on the street that was a big head start. Still, he had his clues. He knew Catwoman tried almost as hard as he did to stay out of crowds, meaning she would climb something as soon as possible. He hadn't found her newest hideout yet, but he had a strong hunch it was close and east. Finally, he recently figured out that when Catwoman thought she was safe, she liked to take what he could only bewilderingly describe as "the scenic route", meaning he had to rank the nearby views aesthetically.
Two minutes later he found her trail. Four minutes later he caught sight of her. Three seconds after that she caught sight of him. They were climbing sideways on the stone cornices of a tunnel mouth just above one of Gotham's famous raised roads. Then fortune came his way again: Catwoman ran out of handholds. He carefully approached, trying to think of a way to restrain her while they were both clinging to a wall. Just when he was close enough to see her face, she hopped off again, this time landing in a crouch on the pillion of a slow motorcycle. The cycle wobbled a moment but kept on, soon turning out of sight.
The present day.
"Ohhhh, no. Not happening."
"You seemed pleased with yourself the first time."
"I made that guy crash about two seconds after he turned. You know that, right?"
Batman frowned in suprise. "No, actually. I had left."
"Caused a three car pile-up. It took a week for the scrape on my elbow to heal. You make me do the dumbest things, do you know that?"
He scoffed. "I could say the same."
"It's a miracle I didn't knock his bike over as soon as I landed."
"But here you won't have to land."
"At least that bike had a backseat. On this little model, I'd be standing with one foot on the edge your cushion and one on the rear fender. That's, what, four square inches of space? I might as well be standing on your shoulders. We could make a circus act."
"It's the only way."
"I could sit on your lap."
"Even if there was room, I couldn't see."
"I could call out the turns."
"Just balance and hold on. It's a rugged model. I'll be careful."
"Says the drugged guy with a sword wound. Can't we find a car?"
"Fort traffic's been shut down. All cars will be in locked motor pools if they're not being used to search for us. We're lucky the owner had to leave this cycle out in a hurry. You can see he was repairing that crack in the front suspension."
"Oh. Crack in the suspension. Lucky us."
They heard yelling and another stampede of footsteps nearby. Catwoman sighed and tightened her gloves. "Well, I never thought I'd die in so spectacular a fashion."
Batman unhooked the evidence briefcase from a latch on his belt and handed it to her. "Here. I can't drive with this."
You want me to hold this."
"I'd appreciate it."
"So we're clear: not only am I standing on a strip of metal that couldn't fit a chihuahua, I'll have one less hand to hold on to you."
"Yes."
Batman brushed the icicles off the frame of the Harley. He sat and started it up. The bike gave a few dead starts, but soon he had the engine letting out its trademark rumble. She stepped up and planted her feet as best she could; there was hardly room for her toes. She hugged the briefcase close with one arm and slung the other around Batman's neck.
As they eased into the path, Catwoman heard yelling behind them. A bullet whistled by her ear. She was about to turn and look when Batman gunned the throttle.
In the long list of miracles in Catwoman's life, not tumbling off the bike right then was an instant hall-of-famer.
They shot onto a main road. Ahead stood the rear entrance of the camp, a simple gap in the sandbags with a rolling gate across it. Orders said the infiltrators would be on foot, so the gate was open. And as the infiltrators would be on foot, the two guards assumed the approaching engine they could hardly see was a friendly. By the time they knew better, Batman had up-shifted and raced through the gap along the packed slush of a recent tire track. More shots followed and a spotlight tried to keep pace, but in seconds they left the camp behind.
He slowed once they reached the woods and the path got rough. In a few minutes, they saw the bridge. One of the entrances to Fort Morrison was somewhere beyond the other side of this gorge. From here they could see the silhouettes of a few buildings on the other side too, but they couldn't see any soldiers. Batman mused that getting caught in the laboratory had at least one advantage: it gave the commanders a reason to call back the more distant patrols he might have run into here. With luck, it would be a few minutes before the camp could send another vehicle after them. By then, they'd be out of sight.
They were two-thirds of the way across the bridge when his luck ran out. The iron grille path would have been bumpy in perfect conditions. With a sheet of ice on it, it was a skating rink. As hard as he tried, he couldn't stop the cycle from fishtailing towards the guardrail. Finally, the rear tire tapped the rail. The bike leaned. Catwoman, already focusing on staying upright, let go of the briefcase, which fell over the edge. In a blink, she jumped after it. Even swifter still, he dived after her.
Batman hung motionless in the air, clutching the maintenance catwalk's edge with his left hand. His right hand gripped Catwoman's wrist. She swung below him, kicking vainly two hundred feet above the ground.
Incredibly, Catwoman held the suitcase tightly to her chest with her free arm.
Batman's upper body began to tremble with exertion. He inhaled deeply. "WHY…IN GOD'S NAME…DID YOU JUMP?"
Catwoman stared wide-eyed at the expanse of nothing below her. Her wrist felt like a bus had parked on it: Batman had the grip of a machine press. Given the circumstances, she found the crushing sensation oddly comforting. Catwoman raised her voice over the wind.
"WE NEEDED THE CASE."
Batman's shoulders began to twitch.
"SO YOU FOLLOW IT OVER A CLIFF?"
"I KNEW YOU'D CATCH ME."
He looked down in bewilderment. "WHY DID YOU ASSUME THAT?"
"YOU'RE BATMAN!"
He had no response to this, so he focused on their bigger concern. "I CAN'T DO A ONE-ARMED PULL-UP WHILE HOLDING SOMEONE."
"... REALLY?"
"NOT LEFT-HANDED."
"CAN YOU LIFT ME SO I CAN GRAB THE RAIL?"
"IF I BEND MY ARM FROM THIS ANGLE I MIGHT DROP YOU."
She could almost hear his ligaments stretch. The guy was strong, but he couldn't keep this up forever. It was her turn.
"I HAVE A PLAN! HOLD ON!"
Batman wanted to comment how stupidly unnecessary that instruction was, but his lungs hurt.
Catwoman deftly bit the briefcase handle, holding it firmly in her mouth. With that hand now free, she bucked upward and grabbed Batman's ankle. Bucking up again, she wrapped her elbow tightly around it, clinging to his boot.
Now marginally secure, she didn't need him to hold on to her arm. Catwoman shook the clasped arm to indicate this. If Batman got the message, he clearly didn't agree. Somehow, he squeezed even tighter, not trusting that she wouldn't fall. Typical hero. It was sweet in a way, but she had a job to do. Unable to speak with a case in her mouth, she had to find a way to convince him of her plan's finer points.
The seized arm had next to no circulation left, but she still gave a practiced hand flick to unsheathe her claws. From where he held her, her thumb was already pressed against his wrist. Using her scant leverage, Catwoman started to push her thumb inward.
Batman ignored this razor stabbing his flesh for an astonishing period of time, but after several seconds he let her go. She shook her clawed hand to get some feeling back, then reached up and grabbed cape fabric. Batman lifted his own bleeding hand and grasped the catwalk, now holding on with both. Seeing a stable 'ladder', Catwoman swiftly climbed up his cape and back and arms.
Finally standing on the Dark Knight's shoulders, she pulled herself once more onto the catwalk. Batman awkwardly followed her, his arms spent.
She spit out the suitcase.
