—CHAPTER ONE: THE CAT—
Selina Kyle
The feverish rhythm of Selina's black boots pounding against the icy cement on the rooftops helped her ignore the damp chill that kept the black leather of her body suit stuck against her skin. The frigid midnight air stung her lungs with every quick breath, her longer exhales billowing into clouds that faded into the hazy snowfall surrounding her. Selina's motto was to never look back but her bright, emerald eyes glanced over her shoulder and into the thick veil of mist that was always only an arm's length away, seeing nothing, hearing only the howling of the icy winds like a pack of wolves closing in on their hunt. She wanted to hear something more from the mist. She wanted to hear a second crunch of the ice follow her as she catapulted herself from the rooftop's edge, a second light thud that matched her slender frame rolling as soon as she landed, maybe something a little heavier if it were a man, anything to justify the rush of adrenaline tightening her leather-clad and steel-clawed grip around the metal handle of the small steel suitcase clutched against her body.
As a stalker in the night, Selina knew better than to trust the silence. She felt the weight of unseen eyes on her shoulders, her own alert glances darting left and right before she sprung off the next ledge. Her breath was caught in her throat for a second— it was a longer fall than she anticipated, gritting her teeth as she rolled into it, a sharp jolt of pain shooting from the top of her shoulder and down her arm holding the case. She couldn't stop, in the split second she took to rise to her feet and wipe the snow and dirt from her sleek yellow goggles, the whistling streak of heat from a silenced bullet grazed her knee and cracked the rooftop.
"Give it up already," she spat under her breath, springing forward once again and hearing the rumbling of her steps across the wooden planks that marked the beginning of the harbor. They also marked the start to a mad dash as her silence had been broken, the salty winds coming up from the docks thinning out the mist and allowing her to see the rows of little shacks and stores along a descending and winding path that widened into a single dirt road running along the beach. Despite the cowardice she attributed to the gunmen in the dark for not showing themselves, her heart told a different story as it beat out of her chest- she was out in the open now and could feel them closing in like the pale grip of death as every shot grew closer.
She vaulted over the wooden railings to go from level to level of the harbor shops. Head-sized chunks of wood burst into splinters from the resonant cracks just inches away from her heels and the trail of lead forming behind her compelled her to race even faster, the bitter taste of iron settling on the back of her tongue as she turned sharply onto the dirt road. She looked forward, seeing the cold, white streetlights of a village of warehouses sitting right by the water, a dockyard dotted by empty metal storage containers that brought a brief moment of warmth to her features paled by fear. Her rapid pulse beating in her ears drowned out the growing rain of bullets that sent wet specks of dirt flying behind her, others pinging off the metal of the containers that she desperately sprinted toward. Misses grew nearer, the heat of whistling death almost claiming one of her nine lives extracting a sharp yelp from the cat as the chunk of rubber and leather that formed the left cat ear on top of her mask fell in front of her, but with the first bounding step under the lights of the dockyard, the hail stopped. She didn't stop running, however- she made a beeline for the central warehouse with a "#3" engraved just above its massive shutter door. "Open the door!" she shouted at the two pinstriped sentries in gray posted on the sides of the door, a submachine gun resting in each of their grips. The brims of their fedoras cast shadows over their eyes, neither replying to the cat at first. "I said, open the damn door!"
"We gotta tell the boss you're here," one replied, wholly disinterested despite the fear cracking Selina's voice. "Then, if he gives you the okay-"
"Move!" she snapped, nearly flinging the door off the handles as she rushed the entrance. She didn't notice, or simply didn't care, that the barrels of their guns followed the back of her head inside. She slammed the door in their faces before they could say anything else and flattened herself against the opposite wall, the thumping of her heart in her ears beginning to fade. Her legs burned as they allowed her to slide down to the cold floor, her fists still shaking with the briefcase held so tightly against her chest that she had to drop it to her side in order to finally breathe. The color came back to her face with the stress knotting her body slowly beginning to unravel. It was a dingy warehouse crawling with men who at one point or another had all tried to kill her- and she felt safer in here than out there with whatever was waiting for her in the dark.
She heard the boisterous laughter of men echoing from the room behind her, and a different feeling gripped her chest. The dirt-covered mirror propped against the opposite wall gave her a look at the fading fear that had crept onto her features, a long scratch traveling down from her lip to her sharp jaw leaving a black streak of her lipstick against her warm olive skin. her mouth left open for a few more moments from the last few heaving breaths she needed to take before she got herself together.
Her brows furrowed, expression wrinkling into a tight-lipped scowl as she rose to her feet. She turned the corner into the open floor of the warehouse, cargo crates stacked against the walls and forklifts scattered around the floor. Cheap, round tables hosted games of dice and poker, gangsters beating the cold with copious amounts of alcohol. A wolf-whistle from one of the dogs in suits signaled the cat's entrance, just another element in this game that made Selina's hackles rise as she walked to the table in the center of the room. She slammed the flatter side of the briefcase onto its edge. Hands flew away from the table to avoid getting crushed, piles of chips falling over and spilling onto the floor. "I have half a mind to claw another identity right into your skull, Two-Face," she hissed, silencing the chatter among the goons, all eyes in the room falling upon the Cat.
She could never completely gauge how he took her jabs. One half of his face showed a cool smirk tugging at his fair-skinned features, a brown eye glimmering playfully at her before looking down at the case. She'd find his sharp, clean features charming if it wasn't for the other half of his face, seared skin in scabby shades of red, purple, and black with necrotic patches creeping past the bridge of his nose, almost daring to infect the good half of his face, with a pungent stench of rotting meat that no amount of his sandalwood cologne could cover up. The skin on his cheek was made up of two disconnected flaps that laid over each other with open holes revealing the ligaments underneath, the exposed and blackened teeth leaving that half of his face stuck in a furious grimace. The skin around his eye had turned to cinders, with the eyelids gone he was always peering through anyone he faced. A combover of wavy, brown hair tried to hide the charred and fleshy scalp. In one hand was the pair of spades, and in the other was a coin, a single scratched and rusted quarter that rested right on the nail of his thumb. It was double-sided with heads, but one side had a cross carved through the head, acting as its tail. He flicked it up into the air, letting it flip freely before catching it on his palm. He placed it on the table. Heads. He chuckled to himself and slid a chunk of chips into the center of the table, ignoring the gangsters on the other end of the table picking up their chips.
"It took you long enough," he said dryly, his voice gravelly and deep. He let out a single chuckle, looking her up and down. "What's the matter? Don't tell me the museum guards spooked you with a couple of big dogs. You look like you've seen a ghost."
"I might as well have," she said, noticing the other eyes among the table falling upon it. She kept her claws curled around the handle, daring one of them to take it from her grasp. "I had snipers trained on me the minute I left the exhibit, good ones too- I never saw any of them."
The brow of Two-Face's good side rose at that. He took the coin in his hand again, flipping it before he answered. Heads. "Another raise. Were you followed here?" he asked nonchalantly. More chips slid into the center, only matched by the player at his left, keeping his head down in his hand.
"Did you forget who you hired?" Selina said with a scoff. "No. I shook them before I got to the docks. My problem is that there wasn't supposed to be anybody waiting for me at all, that dusty artifact has been sitting in a glass case for decades, and the minute I take it, I'm dodging bullets halfway across the city?"
His decaying side twitched as he finally looked up from his hand. "So you did your job, you're alive," he said, condescension creeping into his voice, "and you're still getting paid."
Selina raised the case from the table. Two-Face narrowed his eyes at the move, watching it hang at the Cat's side. "What you're paying me isn't going to cover the chase- or the suit. You owe me an ear, Harv."
The last word triggered a throaty growl from the boss. The mobsters around the table reached for their sidearms, but a single sharp glare from the second face of their boss made them all stand down.
Selina cocked a brow, folding her arms. She wasn't intimidated by him, not like his henchmen. "Go on," she dared him, "I'm right here."
A sudden burst of strength from her client flipped the table onto its side, knocking the henchmen sitting there to the ground. Glass bottles crashed and spilled their runny amber contents all over the floor, shards swimming in the puddles resulting from it. All but one of the players around the table stood up, weapons drawn as the boss stepped into the cat. He was only a few inches taller than she was, but a broad man hiding a fit physique beneath a white suit, a handkerchief sloppily folded in his pocket that was the color of the pus slowly oozing out of one of the many open sores on the burnt half of his jaw. It took all of Selina's self control to not gag once the scent of death struck her nose, keeping her sharp, bright glare on his and refusing to yield. "You barge in here without our permission, interrupt our game, bitch about running into a little heat, and you expect me to pay you more?" His voice had changed, the gravelly quality was colder, beastly and snide, barking at her like a spitty dog.
Selina rose a clawed digit, poking him right in the center of his chest. "I expected you to do your research before sending me in front of a firing squad," she argued, narrowing her eyes as she matched his rage with a sardonic coolness, "so if you want what I came here to give you, I'll take an additional 25 percent to cover the risk. I still haven't heard a 'thank you' for bothering to bring it at all."
"Twenty-five?!" he shouted. "Nothing is stopping us from tying you in a sack and drowning you in the fucking bay, I haven't heard any gratitude from you over that!"
Selina let out a single laugh, refusing to back down yet never raising her voice. "Harvey, please." With the fear from her earlier ordeal gone, the silky timbre of her voice carried an arrogance justified by the hesitation in Two-Face to act on that threat. "You'll point those guns at me, threaten me, yell at me, but until you can find someone who can do what I do, you'll just be talk." The other men were trembling, all except the man priorly seated next to Two-Face. Selina spared a glance over to him, seeing him watching the exchange with an amused curiosity on his face. "Even if you did give the order, you and I both know I'd get away with your score and you'd be down six men to boot. I'm cutting you a deal."
Two-Face yanked a pistol from a shoulder holster hidden beneath his suit jacket. The warm end of the revolver was shoved into the cheek of the cat, the barrel angled up so the bullet would splatter her brains all over the floor. "The case, Catwoman," he rumbled.
Selina's free hand slowly fell to the black whip coiled around a loop on the side of her suit. The lock on his eyes was unwavering, the venom in her stare intensifying. Two-Face's hand trembled. Sweat beaded down the face of his better half that looked at her in horror at what he was doing, teeth clenching so hard that she could see them grinding from the holes in his cheek. "Take the shot, Harvey," she said softly, a light purr overlaying every word. "You won't get this chance again."
The tension in the room was poked at by a quiet giggling coming from the only man still in his seat. It rose into a high-pitched chuckle muffled by his hand, a raspy laugh coming through his fingers until he dropped it and stopped. He cleared his throat. "Sorry." His accent wasn't easily placeable, somewhere between French and German by Selina's ears. Despite the gun in her face, she broke the staring contest she was holding with Harvey to take a look at him. He was dressed oddly, looking like he had just stepped out of a jungle with his cargo shorts and safari shirt, a pair of combat boots wet with melted ice and now the alcohol spilled everywhere, and tattoos covering his sunburnt skin from head to toe. He was well-built too, a lifeless stare behind blue eyes on a rough, angular, and scarred face. He was probably a soldier at one point-it would make sense of his graying buzzcut. "She's got bigger balls than most of your mooks, Two-Face. 'sides- an extra 25 won't hurt you. You know that."
The gun dug into Selina's cheek. "Who are you to tell me that?"
"The man who knows what's in the case," the guest replied punctually. "You'd be killing her over a drop in the bucket."
Harvey didn't reply. Rather, he let his free hand maneuver his coin so that it balanced on his thumb, keeping his soulless eyes fixed on her as he flipped it. Selina's eyes followed the coin until it landed in Harvey's palm.
Heads.
Selina held back a sigh as the gun dropped from her face. She used the back of her hand to rub the crease and bright red mark made just under her cheekbone. Harvey raised the gun again, instead letting a single shot off into the ceiling. "Everybody, get out, do your patrols," he ordered loudly, his growl more subdued. "I have some business to take care of." He turned around, glaring at the six henchmen still shaking in their dress shoes. "And pick up after yourselves, have some damn class."
The table was set upright by a pair of fedoras and shards of glass feverishly scooped into leather-gloved hands before Harvey's entourage made their way out. Only Catwoman, Two-Face, and his guest remained around the table, Selina taking the seat that kept her equally as far from both the men on the other side. She held the case on her lap, glaring at Harvey to ignore the curious stare from the third party. "When Two-Face said he hired a guy to do a heist for me, I didn't expect his guy to be, well-" Selina felt her skin crawl, fleeing from where it felt his eyes land. "It's kinda hot. Really fits the whole, er-" He mimicked claws with his fingers, scratching through the air and mouthing a 'meow.' "-vibe."
"Charmed." Selina's stare clicked onto his, a subtle disgust present on her face that dripped into her voice. "Two-Face must have been excited to find someone like himself to work with. Do I know you?"
"The case, let's have it," Two-Face cut in impatiently.
She was being studied. His eyes followed every slight movement- she could hold her stare on him, but his eyes were even more deranged than Harvey's. He clicked his tongue. "You're right, where are my manners: most of my associates know me as the Master of Sound," he said, showing a toothy, gold and silver grin from old crowns between yellow teeth, "but you can call me Klaw."
"Aren't I special," Selina replied flatly, "well then, Klaw- show me my drop in the bucket."
Klaw's eyes widened for a moment as Selina brought the case back onto the table. "All business- I like it." Two-Face immediately reached for it, but Klaw's hand met the handle first, holding it in the middle. "She gets hers first."
After a beat of silence, Harvey's hand slithered away. Now, Selina's curiosity was piqued. She carried out hundreds of jobs- but none where the clients held their cards so close to their chests. She had already seen it. Maybe Klaw was going to show Harvey how to look at it. Klaw removed his hand, watching Harvey as if he was daring him to move. He reached behind his chair, a second, larger briefcase covered in the same bulletproof steel, handles the same shade of gray. "Got them together on sale. Pretty neat, right? Makes this operation look more professional." He slid it over to Selina. "Count it, it's all there."
Selina looked up at him cautiously as she clicked open the clasps holding the case shut. She slowly looked down and opened the case, satisfaction tugging at the edges of her lips to give the hint of a smile. The fat stacks of 100 dollar bills were neatly arranged, rubber bands bunching them together so it would be easier to count.
Two-Face turned his glare from the Cat and onto the true client, watching Klaw fish about 30 stacks out of a duffel bag behind his chair and slide it behind the open case. "Are we gonna wait until she finishes counting to a million and change before we get down to business? GCPD isn't stupid but they are bold- seeing a bunch of my guys walking around the shipyard's going to bring us some unwanted attention sooner or later."
Selina had done this so many times that she had finished counting the bulk of her pay by the time Harvey finished talking. She pulled the bonus from behind the case only a few stacks at a time, letting her claw flick through the bills as Klaw answered.
"If it'll stop you from complaining," Klaw said, turning the case around so the latches faced him. Two-Face rose from his chair and let out an impatient huff as he stepped beside Klaw, staring down in impatient anticipation, the gleam on the case from the hanging lights high in the warehouse putting a greedy glint in his eyes staring at Klaw's hands gripping the latches of the case.
With the click of the latches, a dull, groaning buzz from the lights above drew Klaw's eyes to the ceiling. The lights flickered for a few seconds before the light went out, followed by the rest of the grid of hanging lights above. A chilling darkness fell upon the hollow room with only the moonlight from the small skylight above painting a blue-tinted square of moonlight on the table. Selina looked up from the money she was squeezing into her case and around the room. Harvey didn't seem bothered by it, sliding the case out of Klaw's grasp that had become lax. "When you say you're going to do something, I expect you to do it. We're gonna freeze our asses off in here if I don't do something-" Harvey stopped to look at Klaw, a puzzled look now taking over the cleaner half of his face. "-what's the matter with you now?"
Klaw's mouth hung open, eyes wide and bright with a awestruck wonder about them. "Someone's been a naughty kitten," he said, his crazed grin returning. "No wonder they stopped shooting at you."
Selina felt the same unsettling chill from the chase before turn her skin clammy. She and Harvey followed his gaze up to the skylight and the chill now crept into her blood- a slim figure silhouetted in a hazy black shadow loomed overhead like a ghost, a pair of sharp ears on top of its head, and a pair of catlike crimson eyes stared straight through the three thieves below, watching them without a sound.
"It's the Bat!" Two-Face shouted, nearly whipping his pistol toward the skylight as he took aim. "Damn it, Klaw- she led him right to us!"
Selina shoved the remaining stacks into the case and slammed the case shut. "That's not the Bat," she said apprehensively, backing away from the table. She looked down at the light in the center of the table, seeing the case, Klaw's hand curling around its handle, and nothing else. "The Bat leaves a shadow."
Five shots rang out of Two-Face's pistol without a second thought, the echoing of gunfire outside responding to him as the glass shattered. Selina took that as her cue, legs loaded like springs from the tension mounting around her as she bolted for the door. "Whoever it is," he roared, "after I blow his head off, I'm skinning you alive, bitch!"
Klaw quickly hopped back before glass rained down upon him, he looked back up through the skylight as a sharp wind howled through the hole and only saw the moon. "I'll catch up with you later then!" Klaw said, crouching to dig in his duffel bag and pulling out an assault rifle, the briefcase with the score thrown onto the pile of money before he zipped it shut. "She's right though- that's no bat. You're gonna want something bigger than that peashooter!"
The door to the warehouse flew open with a bang. A shrill outcry snapped the three's attention to the exit, Two-Face and Klaw walking past the cat with their weapons raised. A dull groan could be heard over the Selina's bounding steps and soon she saw the source, one of Two-Face's gangsters dragged himself toward the boss, a trail of fresh blood leading out toward the door with four long lacerations splitting his back open and sinking deep into the bone as if he was mauled by a tiger. "What the fuck is happening out there?" Two-Face yelled, seeing the man lift his head. There was another set of claw marks that split open his underling's cheek, his slit throat just barely visible as he raised his head.
He tried to speak, but only blood bubbled out of his mouth, rushing down his bottom lip and forming a puddle of it right at Harvey's foot. Harvey stepped back as his henchman croaked something unintelligible with words mangled as savagely as his flesh. A tear rolled down his bloody cheek and his head fell limp, a single, garbled whimper leaving his throat before he finally expired.
Two-Face looked up and fired his last shot toward the feline taking off with her bounty, desperately scrounging for an extra few rounds from the pocket of his suit jacket. "This is why I didn't want you taking your sweet fucking time, Klaw!"
Selina ignored the shouting behind her and threw herself back out into the cold. She immediately darted behind a storage container to avoid the sprays of gunfire from the thinning forces of Two-Face's men, peeking around the corner to catch a closer look at who, or what, they were up against. The carnage that covered the docks left a breath caught in Selina's throat, eyes widening as she absorbed the scene. Splatters of blood painted the containers in red blotchy streaks, bodies clutching their guns were slumped over, leaned against crates or light poles, others left in the fetal position and trying to hold their disemboweled guts inside their torn shirts. In the center of it were three men, each tall with a slim but muscular physique in white jumpsuits and red goggles, pointed cat ears on top of their otherwise featureless white masks like the figure she saw in the skylight, sniper rifles strapped across their backs and silenced pistols all in white in their hands, with one of them aimed right at her head.
Selina's bones rattled as the corner of the container split open right over her shoulder and she took off in the other direction. She lunged forward and ducked as a white-clawed hand shot out from around the corner, gasping as she heard the screeching of the claws across the metal container. She ran hard, the same fear that clutched her in the mist keeping her only a foot away from the beast in white that sprinted behind her without a making sound, no heavy footsteps, not even the sound of him breathing, and he was closing in, his hand outstretched and inching toward the nape of her neck. ""Klaw! Get over here and cover me!" Harvey shouted, back against a pile of his own dead men pushed against a crate. He popped out of cover to fire a couple rounds at the predators in white, watching in an almost impressed horror as they danced around the yard, cutting down or blasting away some of his best men combining cat-like agility and a deadly precision. "I'm only seeing three of them- my boys took on the entire GCPD in a shootout and sent the bastards running, and now they can't handle a bunch of hired goons dressed in cat suits? Just who the hell are these guys?"
Klaw slid into cover next to him, giving him just enough time to reload his rifle. "You're not going to believe me when I tell you."
"I think I'll have to," Two-Face snarled, wincing with every wet thud made from another one of his men hitting the ground. "I've seen some wild shit in my day- but nothing snatched out of a museum comes with a fucking hit squad. Where's the damn cat? This is her fucking fault."
"Shut up about it, would you? Neither of you were supposed to know about any of this yet," Klaw spat, leaning out of cover to see one of the assassins trailing Selina.
"So you knew about this? About them?"
"I'm the only man in the world who does, barring you," Klaw said, "I intend to keep it that way."
Harvey peeked over the top of the crate. The last of his men could barely keep up with the two assailants who were steadily making their way through them, to him. He shared a wary and bewildered look with the foreigner beside him. "What's in that case, Klaw?" Two-Face asked, coming out as a threat from between his gritted teeth.
"Ye of little faith," Klaw said, "don't get killed, and I'll tell you." With that, Klaw shot out of cover, gun raised and blasting away at the assassin hunting Selina. "Here, kitty, kitty, kitty! Two-Face just wants a word!"
Selina saw only two options ahead and neither were particularly hopeful, she could let her pursuer chase her all the way down through the docks, but the other choice grew on her more and more as a barrage of gunfire elicited the first noise from the white cat behind her, hearing his body thud against the ground with the tip of his claw just barely grazing her neck. Klaw's voice made her stomach turn. "No buyer's remorse now, Harv! You got what you paid for!" She was running along the steel railing dividing the docks from the ten foot drop into the freezing waters below, strong waves from the uneasy bay crashing against them and making the railing slick with ice. "It's been a pleasure doing business with you, boys," she said, hopping onto the railing just as Klaw's bullets bore into the ground beneath her, "but if you survive the night, don't look me up."
The last thing she saw before crashing into the water was Klaw in pursuit, her heart skipping with every bright flash of the rifle's muzzle that followed her down. She dove deep into the water, the muffled impacts of bullets piercing the surface keeping her going despite the intense shock of the cold telling her body to lock up. Her eyes burned as she stared through the murky water, the weight of the money in her hand throwing her balance off as she inched her way back to the surface, but she wasn't letting her take go- she just had to make it far enough from the docks to slip back into the city undetected. There was plenty more for the Gotham City Police Department to focus on than a wet cat, even if she had a million dollars in her bloody clutches, but right now, she was relieved to still be alive. She used the rocks as a guide, pushing on against a chilling current and breaching only when her lungs couldn't stand the burn. She was still a little ways off from the harbor shops, police sirens echoing in the direction of the bright city she frantically swam toward. Selina looked over her shoulder, half-expecting to see Klaw threshing through the water after her, that unhinged grin under soulless eyes greeting her just above the waves to drag her down into the undertow.
She never looked back- but tonight wasn't behind her yet, the sinking feeling that she would encounter Klaw or the assassins again nearly dragging her back into the water as she sunk her claws into the wet sand of the shores. She gave herself a couple moments to cough up the salty seawater that left her entire face burning and her throat raw, but she couldn't stop here, climbing to her feet and beginning to run into the streets past the harbor, not daring to take the misty rooftops again.
All she could do was run, and prepare, for what she was paid to do to catch up with her. She looked up into the misty skies, seeing that now something had managed to pierce the veil. It was a streak of light, brightly cleaving the thick air until it struck the rolling black sheet of clouds looming over the city. The light pooled against the darkness, a symbol forming in its center that allowed Selina an easy breath even as she glared at its shape:
a bat.
Hi everyone!
It's been a long, long time since I've written any FanFiction, and I really hope you enjoy it, frankly I'm just excited to have muse for this hobby again. Your thoughts are always welcomed and appreciated, so please review, and my PMs are always open so say hello (or yell at me, idk). I've crossposted this from AO3, I'm "ScribeOfKane" over there.
Update times will be about every two weeks, but no promises. I will try to not leave people hanging for more than a month. If you have questions about any of my other stories, please let me know. Glad to be back!
:)