Disclaimer: I don't own anything in the Batman universe.
The rumble of Batman's vehicle erupts beneath me. I trail above and behind it into the city. From my high vantage point, I can already see the fog that covers the island.
Batman leaps over the closing bridge in a blast of turbo-charged testosterone. As he emerges from the darkness of the car, I land at his side. He hands me a syringe wordlessly and I jam it into my bicep.
A man with thick, black glasses runs over to us. He barely glances at me, standing at Batman's side with wind-tossed hair and cheeks ruddy from the cold night air. The fear in his eyes is swamped by courage. In the middle of this cold night, with a city falling to pieces around me, my heart warms with hope at the sight.
Bruce, his voice deep and rugged in disguise, instructs the man. As they part, the man finally acknowledges me with a slight dip of his head.
"Ready?" Batman looks down at me. I nod, but his eyes are drawn away from me, and he bounds away like a dog chasing after its bone.
"Br…" I grind my teeth to a halt, and make a move after him, but a baseball bat type object slams in between my shoulder blades. I groan, and crinkle to the ground. A mob of wild-eyed people surround me, their faces chaotic. The baseball bat smashes into my ribs, and I gasp loudly. The bastards. The bastards broke my ribs. In less time than their incapacitated brains can function, I am twirling on my feet, my fists clenched together in a tight ball and my wings flailing out around me. I duck and weave out of the way of their weapons, my muscles working on their own and my mouth hanging open in concentration. I escape the circle, but turn back to them, my hands now as straight and rigid as an ironing board. Everywhere I turn, I see pressure points. People fall to the ground like rain.
I dash away, eager to fight some more. The pain is suppressed by the long years or training.
Another mob is beating on some poor individual. I leap into the center, using the same effective tactics as before. Inflict as much pain as possible. The victim is struggling to stand, I knock away a man twice my size and my first clear sight of the victim reveals a black head with two tiny horns. My attacks increase with renewed vigor. Batman sees me, my visage collapsed upon itself with fury and my eyes almost as wild as those around me, and I think a flash of regret slinks into his eyes, but he is flying through the air before I can assure myself. The train rumbles over us, and Batman is flying underneath it, his grapple secured. I smile and turn back to the stunned mob, my fists rising in anticipation. The fate of Gotham is no longer on my mind; the only thing is the fight.
I collapse against a building, the air ever so slowly clearing up. Everywhere I look, people are lying on the ground, groaning. Most of them are bleeding. Some are dead. My head falls back to rest against the cold brick of the tenement and every ache I have ever had haunts me. I turn my face to the sidewalk and cough, blood spurting from my mouth. The beating I have taken tonight is undoubtedly the worst, worse than all the fights of my youth, worse than my League training.
When my eyes close, Bruce's face is painted on my eyelids. I hope he is okay. I hope he is alive. I hope he will forgive me. I hope he will be happy. I hope he will not save me.
A white light envelops me. Heaven? I think not. A searing smell that can only be described as sterile fills my nose, makes me gag. As my stomach revolts with a sharp jolt, all the pains avalanche in on me. My ribs, my head, every bone in my body. I can't take it. A scream develops in my lungs, but I have not the power to push it out. It stays bottled up inside my throat, burning.
"It's awake!" a voice squeaks excitedly. My eyes force themselves open, and a man is two inches from my face. He has a narrow face, a pointy nose, and big, brown, curious eyes. "Beautiful," he exclaims. No. No, no, no, no, no, no. Let me die now. Let me die. I close my mouth and squeeze my nostrils together, a sad attempt at suffocation. I cannot hold it, no matter how strong my willpower.
"Shh, don't move. Go back to sleep," he urges me. I glance wildly at the table to my right. A scalpel, my savior, fills me vision. I grab at it abruptly, my mere movement shocking the man. My shoulder grinds and my ribs scream. My fingers enclose the little scalpel, making new cuts, and I raise it above me … it won't move. My hand, my arm, my fingers holding the scalpel. They won't move from the table. I am powerless. Panic seizes me, and there is nothing I can do. The scientist, for that is what he must be, snatches the scalpel and on second thought moves the table away from me. He leaves me to wallow in my prison.
Eternities later, a new face enters my vision. A new face, but a familiar face. A face that should not be here.
Bruce's hand grazes my jawbone. Even with him here, the panic holds me tight in its grip. Powerless.
"I'm sorry," he whispers. He didn't. He couldn't have done this to me. I hate him, I hate him. "I never should have asked for your help. I never should have gotten you involved."
"Where …" I sigh, the word raking my throat on its way out.
"You're in a private section of the hospital. Only your doctor and nurse know you're here. I've taken care of the rest," Bruce says. Relief, of a kind, soothes me. I don't hate him. Never could anyway.
He continues to talk about what happened. He stopped Ducard, blew up most of Wayne Tower, saved Gotham, and burned down his mansion. The Narrows is gone to hell, but remedies are being issued and at least the rest of the city is normal.
I, on the other hand, am not so good. I sustained life-ending injuries, and he wasn't expecting me to open my eyes again. He has been here waiting for the past two weeks, while the good doctor tried to bring me back from Hades. Five of my twelve pairs of ribs have been broken, my spine hasn't been full-out broken, thank God, but it is fractured, my liver has been lacerated badly, my stomach has been punctured by my broken ribs, my right shoulder is broken, my left arm is practically shattered, my left leg is fractured, and both my wings have been broken in various spots. The doctor, Doctor Miller, has reset all bones, including those in my wings, which impressed me, and sewed up the hole in my tummy, and performed some sort of surgery to patch up my liver. The technical terms fly over my head. All I want to know is how long I'll be stuck here, if I am ever to escape.
"Doctor Miller says that, based on the surprisingly fast rate that you've woken up at, you should be able to leave in about … one month, and that you'll have to be under surveillance for another three," Bruce delivers my sentence quietly, his eyes fixed on the white bed sheet.
I shake my head wearily. "Don't move," Bruce reminds me, "Would you like to go back to sleep? They can do that. Blink once for yes, twice for no." I blink once. Bruce fetches Doctor Miller, who smiles warmly at me, and blackness reigns once again.