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Chapter 2
Painful Fear
Gordon arrived in his police car outside a museum, where several policemen were gathered. He got out of the car along with Kogasa and asked police officer Harvey Bullock what the situation was. "Dent's got hostages in there," Bullock told him. "He hasn't harm them yet, but who knows for how long. You know how he makes decisions using that coin of his, and if it lands on the bad side..."
"I know," said Gordon with a nod. "Make sure to secure the perimeters and don't let anyone escape. Try to look for an entrance inside and rescue the hostages!" Before he left to deal with the issue, Gordon motioned for Kogasa to remain in place and not do anything.
Though Kogasa didn't understand English, she could tell from what she saw that a crime case must be going on inside. She suddenly had the brilliant idea of sneaking inside to do something that would benefit the police. She didn't know what the situation was in there, but she was sure she could come up with something. Looking around to make sure that nobody was watching, she quietly floated into the air and circled to the side of the museum to look for an open window inside.
Inside the museum were some thieves armed with guns, all of them pointing at museum staff members and security guards that were bounded and at the mercy of the evildoers. Leading the thieves was a man whose left side of the face was disfigured in the way that it looked like it had melted off, thus revealing rotting muscle tissues. Two-Face, had come to this place to steal valuables, especially historical coins that would worth a lot at the black market. In case the police caught wind of this, he had staff members and guards of the place held hostage so that he could bargain his way out of this place. He had also arranged with one of his men to have a helicopter ready so that he could escape by air.
One of the thieves' used a walkie-talkie to get in contact with a comrade, and he told Two-Face that the helicopter was arriving soon, so they should head over to the rooftop to prepare to escape. "Before that," said Two-Face as he took out a double-headed coin that had one side that was rusted and dirty, "I'll let my coin decide the fate of these hostages." He threw the coin into the air and caught it afterwards, and he saw that it landed on the good side. "We'll spare them. C'mon, let's go!"
Two-Face and his men ran up a staircase, and just as they were reaching the top, Kogasa suddenly jumped out from the side and screamed at them with her tongue sticking out. A couple of the thieves were frightened and tumbled down the stairs, but Two-Face and a few others simply jumped a bit and didn't get fazed that much.
Still with her mouth wide open and her tongue out, Kogasa stared at Two-Face for several seconds, and then the latter pointed his gun at her while flipping a coin. Things didn't go well for Kogasa. She had planned to scare them so much that they would all fall down the staircase, but not only was the leader not frightened, he was also pointing a gun right at her face. The karakasa trembled nervously, wondering what to do next. If she didn't think of what do soon, this would likely be the end of her. This made her scared to death. Plus, that guy in front of him had a scary-looking face.
Two-Face caught the coin as it fell back down and saw that it was the bad side he was looking at. Moving his gun closer to Kogasa's forehead, he said, "You should've stayed out of this, little girl."
"YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Kogasa let out a shriek of terror before swinging her umbrella at Two-Face, knocking him down the stairs. The other thieves were surprised by this, and when Kogasa swung her umbrella at them this time, large globs of water were released, hitting them and also sending them down the staircase.
While the criminals were in pain at the lower floor, some policemen came charging into the place from a door and were surprised to see them down on the floor, so they took advantage of this to arrest them. Gordon and some other policemen came in through the front door afterwards and were glad and surprised to see that the situation was resolved in a short time. He saw Kogasa on top of the staircase, jumping up and down happily at her job well done. "Did she get them all by herself?" he wondered.
Due to jumping to close to the stairs, Kogasa accidentally slipped and tumbled painfully to the bottom.
Batman was finally able to obtain information from "lowlifes" out in the streets about Scarecrow's whereabouts. He also took the woman who got beaten up to hospital.
Arriving at a warehouse, the Dark Knight and the two girls quietly sneaked into the building. They entered through a window and carefully made their way across the girders that decorated the top of the warehouse so that they would not be seen. Looking down, they saw several people down below, most of them criminals armed with guns, and some appeared to be scientists who looked unhappy about their predicament as they busied themselves with various things on the tables around them.
Four particular people stood out the most. Two of them were a pair of overweight, balding twins wearing red overalls over yellow shirts, and they were wielding large mallets. The third person wore a sack with eye and mouth holes over his head, and his attire consisted of ragged, brown shirt and pants. He also had a noose around his neck. The fourth and last person wore a green suit and a top hat of the matching color.
Batman knew he was right about Scarecrow being the culprit behind those murders, but he didn't expect the Mad Hatter to be involved. As Batman observed what the villains were doing, Nitori asked him, "Did we get the right guy?"
"Yes," said Batman with a nod. "It's Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter. They're likely the masterminds of this operation."
"So what's the plan? We go down there and beat them up?" asked Nue.
"We need to find out what they're doing first," Batman told her. "Taking them all out shouldn't be a problem, except for the Tweedle Brothers."
"Tweedle Brothers?" asked Nitori.
Batman pointed at the fat pair of twins and said, "That's Tweedledum and Tweedledee. They're usually hired to do muscle work. Their large body builds are not for looks."
"Yeah, I can imagine them being strong, but I'm sure they're not match for kappa strength!" said Nitori with confidence.
The Mad Hatter was looking through a microscope while using a pair of metal sticks to work on whatever he was looking at. He pulled up his head and said frustration, "This won't do! Making nanobots like this without the help of machines is too tough and time consuming!"
"And that is why we kidnapped these scientists to help get the job done!" Scarecrow said to him while looking up from his chemical work. He was obviously making fear gas.
"I hate to say this, but I agree with Mister Hatter," said one of the scientists. "Making something like this is better off done using machines..."
Scarecrow placed his finger underneath his chin and then said, "Then I know just the place where we can get the job done! I'm sure Wayne Industries has something that can help us!"
Batman narrowed his eyes upon hearing this. There was no way he was going to let evildoers use his company's machines for evil.
"It's decided, then! We'll go to Wayne Industries tomorrow night and complete more of these nanobots!" said Scarecrow. "That's it for now! Start packing before Batman shows up! We don't want him to ruin everything now that we've come this far!"
When the people down below started packing up, Nue said, "I think they're getting ready to leave. About time we do something?"
"They're not going anywhere," said Batman as he took out a small device with a button on it. When he pressed the button, the device released an electromagnetic pulse that caused all the lights to go out, thus making the whole place pitch black.
"What the?! A blackout!"
"It must be Batman! Be on your guard!"
Suddenly, there was the sound of crying and people beaten up, not to mention the sound of things breaking. Batman, with his night vision on, had dropped to the lower floor to beat up the criminals before they could get away. He could see through his night vision that Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter had hid underneath one of the tables. He was going to get to them when Tweedledee got in front of him. The Dark Knight punched him in the belly, only for his fist to bounce back. The overweight man lunged forward and belly bounced the Dark Knight into a wall. It was at this moment the lights came back on.
Scarecrow got out from his hiding place and said to Batman, "I knew you would show up sooner or later, Batman! We were just about to leave, but now that you're here, it wouldn't be nice if we don't stick around to entertain you a bit!"
"Right! You can here just in time for tea!" said the Mad Hatter.
"Crane! Tetch! Whatever it is you're planning, I won't let you make use of Wayne Industry's machines!" Batman said to them.
"You can feel free to stop us, once you've survived this night!" Scarecrow said to him.
The Tweedle Brothers approached Batman with their mallets ready, but then Nitori and Nue jumped down before them. "Leave these two fatties to us, Batman!" Nitori said to him. "You go and get the bosses!"
"Out of the way, girl!" Tweedledum said as he swung his mallet at Nitori. She got out of the way fast and then thrust her palms straight into the fat guy's belly. She did it with such a force that he was shot back through the air, knocking down tables as a result, and crashed into a wall. Needless to say, all the others were surprised at her display of strength and wondered how on earth that was possible.
"Why you?!" said Tweedledee angrily as he attempted to hammer Nitori, but not only did the kappa got out of the way when the hammer came down, Nue also used her blade-like red wings to slice the hammerhead clean off, much to his surprise. Nue then pointed into the air, and when Tweedledee looked up, he saw a small, blue UFO floating above him. It fired a beam straight onto his face, turning it black. The fat guy then fell on his back and seemingly passed out.
Batman had to admit that he was impressed by the two girls' feats. The other villains backed away in fear, and Nitori and Nue stepped towards them. "So... who wants to be next?" asked Nitori.
"Impressive! Now I am curious that if you are so good, what is it that you fear?" said Scarecrow. "How about you have a taste of my latest kind of fear gas?" He pointed his arm at them and fired yellow gas from a wrist gun. Batman tried, but was too late, to prevent the two from being exposed to the fear gas.
Nitori and Nue coughed at having gas sprayed onto their face. At first, nothing seemed to happen, but then each of them started to see things. Nitori saw a bunch of humans standing before her, looking at her with spiteful faces. "Oh look, it's that arrogant kappa! That b****!" said one of them.
"We should teach her a lesson for being prideful when among us!" said another one.
When all the others agreed that they should beat up Nitori, she backed away in fear while pointing her hand at them. "Don't come near me! You'll regret it if you do!"
Nue also saw people standing in front of her, but unlike what Nitori saw, they were armed with various kinds of weapons. "It's that monster!" said one of them.
"C'mon! Let's kill her!" said another.
Nue held up her trident in an offensive stance and said, "Don't come near me, I'm warning you! I will kill you if you do!" One of the people thrust a spear at her at a fast speed, stabbing her in the abdomen. When this happened, Batman saw a wound appearing out of nowhere on Nue's abdomen, much to his surprise and confusion. The nue had a look of horror on her face as she saw her body getting stabbed by a spear, and then one of the people intimidating her swung a mace at her face. It was then she flew to the side while coughing out blood. She fell to the floor and cried for her attackers to stop, but they relentlessly beat her with both sharp weapons and bludgeoning tools.
From everyone else's point of view, Nue was thrashing around on the floor, and wounds were appearing on her body with no explanation. The same thing was happening to Nitori; she was on the floor, and injuries were appearing all over her body for no reason, and she kept on crying for unseen attackers to stop.
Batman was confused as to what was happening to them, and then he angrily asked Scarecrow, "What have you done to them?!"
"Heeheehee! Thanks to hypnotism technology invented by Mad Hatter, I was able to create a special kind of fear gas that contains hundreds of nanobots that, after finding out what their victims' fears, will cause harm to their bodies, depending on what it is they're seeing!" explained Scarecrow. "It seems obvious that your girlfriends are having painful visions of being attacked, and thus the nanobots are damaging them from the inside!"
"They're hypnotized into thinking they are really attacked, so they are suffering as such!" said Mad Hatter.
Batman looked at the two girls in shock and concern. More and more injuries were appearing all over their thrashing bodies, and if nothing was done soon, they might die.
"So what is it, Batman? Help your friends and give us the opportunity to escape, or try to stop us and thus give them time to die?" Scarecrow asked the Dark Knight with a smirk.
Batman gritted his teeth angrily. As much as he wanted to punch those villains' in their faces and capture them, he knew it was important to do something about Nitori and Nue first. He did not bring antidotes for countering Scarecrow's fear gas, so the only solution left was to rush them back to the Bat Cave and get them the cure. Nitori was now covered in bruises from head to toe, while Nue had bloody cuts and holes all over her body, which was more or less dyed in red completely.
The Dark Knight hastily picked them up underneath his shoulders and rushed out of the place to go for the Batmobile. It wasn't easy trying to carry them when they were thrashing around constantly, begging for their sufferings to end.
"Heeheehee! A success once again! This Fear Nanobot of ours is going to spread terror and death throughout Gotham and eventually the whole world!" said Scarecrow after watching Batman leave the place.
"Indeed! Nobody will be able to stop us!" added Mad Hatter.
TO BE CONTINUED