Chapter 37

The Batman visits the gym to find a solution

Things get desperate

Warning: this chapter contains scenes of jeopardy

Late Monday afternoon

Jim Gordon sat behind his desk, shaking his head.

'Warren's not talking, either. When he woke up, he went into shock. He's still in the hospital.'

'Did he shoot Edith Crowne?' the Batman asked from the shadows by the door.

'Looks like it, but I don't think he meant to. He meant that bullet for Detective Madison.'

'Why?'

'Why? She was going to arrest him.'

'So . . .'

'It looks like, from his cell records, that he was planning to leave with Edith Crowne. That they were in a relationship. Or so she let him think.'

'But he was in the pay of Oswald Cobblepot.'

'I know. Confusing, huh? But she liked her games, Edith, didn't she? Who knows if she would have pushed him out of the plane at thirty-six thousand feet. Metaphorically speaking.'

'So he's a dead man walking.'

'Oh yeah, when Cobblepot's associates get hold of him in prison. We might have to send him out of state.'

'Did he shoot Matty Rodriguez?'

'Jury's out on that one. He's a good enough shot, but we can't link him to the murder weapon.'

'And he's unlikely to know anything about the switch.'

'She was very clever. Everything on a need-to-know basis. But didn't she say there was no switch?'

'She wants to bring down Wayne BioTech. No gain for her in telling.'

'You think there is one?'

'I think she wanted to prove her superiority. That's our only hope. Can I check the gym?'

'I'll get you clearance.'

'I'll be bringing someone.'

Gordon raised his eyebrows and grinned, but the Batman shut it down with a scowl.

'By the way,' Gordon said, trying not to laugh as he entered something on his laptop. 'Why did Madison lamp you one? Or was she stroking your face? Anything I should know about?'

Answer came there none. The doorway was empty.

The trail of breadcrumbs. As he drove, he thought about it. What was there left of Edith's trail?

Nothing. Edith was dead; Mercy was dead. He had forgotten to ask about Aphra, but she may as well be dead. That just left Martina. And he had the impression that Martina was just another distraction.

Fire and ice. Was that a connection? Diamonds. He ran through everything he knew about Edith and her elaborate set-up, but with no joy. She had been clever, he had to admit that.

He picked up Kai Arcane a short distance from the nearest subway station. It was rush hour, not a good time to be sitting waiting for someone, but although the car attracted second glances, its driver didn't, for which he was grateful.

Kai's eyes widened.

'Wow, Bruce has sure got some powerful connections,' he said.

'This is police business,' the Batman said.

He had access, granted after Gordon contacted the building's owners and explained it was for special investigators. The rest of the building was closing. Standing in the middle of the gym floor, Kai whistled softly.

'Not here,' the Batman said.

They went up to the admin floor. Major Crimes had not given permission for any clean-up, so it remained a complete wasteland of smashed desktops and damaged furniture.

'Hey, what are these?' Kai asked. Gold circles on the floor, some half-hidden by bits of debris.

'No idea.' Had they been here on his last visit?

'Like the yellow brick road, man. Wonder where they go?'

The Batman led Kai into the corner office. The glass wall was shattered.

'Watch where you step,' he warned.

'Sooo . . . what am I looking for?'

'What can you get from the hard drive?'

Kai swung his backpack off his shoulder and sat at the desk. 'I'm not an engineer, but I'll do my best.'

The Batman left him to it, and explored the rest of the room. The vandals had smashed open the locks on the cupboards behind the desk, so he investigated their contents. In the end cupboard, tucked right away at the back, only visible if you got down on your knees, was a laptop. He drew it out.

It seemed quite new. The gym had not been open long, so if it was obsolete, it belonged to the previous occupants. He put it on the desk and opened the lid. He pressed the on button.

It was charged, so it loaded the lock screen.

'Can you open this?' he asked.

'Are you asking if I can hack this password?'

'Yeah.'

Kai reached into his backpack and produced a small box with a USB connection. It was the work of minutes to gain access. The Batman stood behind him as he studied the home screen and the shortcuts. There was one that looked like a diamond.

'Open that one,' the Batman said.

Here were the breadcrumbs. A trail that led through the files, giving bits of code in each location.

'Wow, this is just like a game,' Kai said.

Producing a variety of snacks from his backpack, Kai settled into his task.

But after a while the trail seemed to be going round in circles.

'Like this is a distraction,' he said. 'One of those dead-end loops you get.'

Was that possible? That even in death, even at the death, she had laid a trail of deception and distraction? In the bottom left-hand corner of the screen they were looking at was a gold disc. At intervals, other discs, decreasing in size and fading in colour, appeared in a diagonal line across the screen from the main one. At the end of the line was a glittering green door, which opened tantalisingly only a little way. It kept opening and closing.

'Wizard of Oz,' the Batman said. 'Follow the yellow discs – '

'The yellow brick road – '

'To a green door – '

'To the Emerald City!' Kai was quite excited now. 'Wouldn't that be cool? Love that movie, man.'

'But why the Wizard of Oz?'

'Does it matter? We sure aren't getting anywhere here.'

But it mattered to him. Edith had been a scientist: precise and calculating. If it was the yellow brick road he should have been following and not Hansel and Gretel's trail of breadcrumbs, there would be a sound reason for it. Did it link back to his father? But he couldn't see how. Unless. Who was Matilda?

While they followed the gold circles across the admin floor and down the emergency staircase, he sent Emma a text:

What links the Matilda Effect and The Wizard of Oz? Kind of urgent

The circles led to the reception desk of the Pleasure Principle gym, in the large entrance lobby. The Batman took a quick look at the shelves below the desk and the drawers in it, but they were all empty. Forensics didn't appear to have missed anything. And no more circles, no arrows to indicate direction, no symbols of any kind.

'Hey, look.' Kai was pulling aside a curtain on the back wall of the space. Behind it was an emerald green door. 'Wow, this is like an escape room, or something – but for real!'

'Just – stay calm.'

He probably shouldn't have allowed Kai to come on this bit. The door opened on a staircase. He made sure he went down first, telling Kai to stay at the top of the stairs, but he could hear that Kai had disobeyed him.

The stairs led to a plant room, not big enough to serve the whole building, he guessed, but maybe half of it. It was also not the control room. It mainly consisted of ducts running along the ceiling, arrays of pipes coming out of walls, running along them for a bit, then disappearing back through them.

The floor was concrete. What looked like a large water main emerged from it. There were a few red-topped stopcocks on various pipes. Ticking noises, humming noises, a few gurgling noises.

There was no signal down here: no reply from Emma, although he hadn't allowed enough time for an internet search, assuming she was free to do it. He tucked the cell away safely in one of the pockets on his belt.

In front of some of the pipes Kai had found a stand-alone cupboard, its door painted green.

'Hey, look at this,' he called excitedly. 'Open it?'

Before the Batman could assess the situation and say yes or no, Kai had pulled the door open. Inside were two white cardboard boxes, the smaller one stacked on top of the larger one, but the larger one was no bigger than a letter-size sheet of paper, although it was two or three inches deep. The Batman grabbed Kai's arm before he could touch anything.

'Let me.'

Inside the smaller box was a heart-shaped cushion, roughly the size of a human heart, in red silk. Taking off a gauntlet and tucking it in his belt, the Batman rolled the cushion between his fingers. The stuffing felt grainy. Pinned to it was a folded note which said:

Give this to Bruce Wayne

Kai's eyes were out on stalks.

'Woh, that's a yikes.'

Kai's eyes were asking for an explanation, but the Batman just shook his head. Carefully he opened the lid of the second box.

Inside was a black box of metal or plastic, with a small screen and switches on the top. It had a small booklet with it. Pinned to the booklet was another note:

To whom it may concern: hopefully Bruce Wayne but probably you, hometown boy. If you have found this, then you have followed the yellow brick road. Congratulations.

Did you really think I would leave all of those people to die? Some of them deserve to, but most don't. This is the switch. Let's hope you get to use it. If not, those deaths are on you. The clock is ticking.

What happened to the Tin Woodman in the book? This is for you, Bruce – Tin Woodman.

Remember the rat

The Batman turned to Kai.

'What happens in the book? To the Tin Woodman?'

Kai shrugged. 'No idea. Only the seen the movie. Who reads actual shit like that?'

The Batman looked up frantically, running his fingers, he couldn't say why, along the top inside edge of the cupboard. Then he found them – the trip wires that had broken when Kai had pulled the doors open.

'What happened to the rat?' Kai was asking. 'What r – '

The rest of his word was lost in an explosion that started to bring down the ceiling on them, lumps of concrete and pipes falling, dust rising. Then another explosion, and another. Kai went down with a groan.

The Batman came to with a ringing noise and the sound of rushing water in his ears. As soon as he had registered that, then there was water actually in his ears, then his eyes and mouth. Spluttering, he managed to drag himself to his knees. The water main had burst: the room was filling. Only one light remained on, hanging from the ceiling by a wire, but it was enough for him to see that Kai was disappearing under the water, apparently unconscious.

Crawling over to Kai, he discovered lumps of concrete that caught his knees and made him pitch forward into the water. Using all his strength, he grabbed hold of Kai as best he could and started the long, painful haul to where the stairs were. It was difficult to lift the inert body over the concrete; no doubt he was doing damage both to Kai's clothes and his flesh, but Kai was a big, heavy unit – more than he could bench-press. His head was aching from a blow or two, his lungs and heart were bursting with effort, but somehow he managed to beach Kai on the stairs.

The water was still rising. He couldn't hear an alarm going off upstairs. No-one knew there was a problem in this plant room. There was probably no-one in the building by now, maybe not even cleaners. He dragged himself up the steps. There was no handle on this side of the door. No way to get a purchase and force it open. He put his right gauntlet back on. Nothing on it that would help lever the door open.

When he realised the door was sealed all round, no doubt a fire precaution, his heart sank. Was this it, then? Was he going to die here, drowning at the top of these steps?

Kai was starting to moan and come round, almost falling off the stairs as he tried to sit up. The Batman had to jump down into the water to get round him. Frantically he waded, tripping and falling, towards the pipes and the red stopcocks, rapidly disappearing. He turned them as best he could, but they made no difference. He let out a cry of frustration, beating the water with his fist.

'No! No! No!'

No. His heart was starting to race; he was struggling to breathe. His life was not going to end here. It was waiting for him out there – life with Georgia in it. A woman who loved him and was prepared to take him as she found him. He would fight to get back to that till his last breath. Edith was not going to take that away from him if he had anything to do with it. He started to do Alfred's breathing exercises. He needed to calm everything down if he was going to save them both.

'Fuck, man. Is this it?' Kai moaned.

'No. Just – let me think.'

Thinking involved inspecting the cupboard for anything he could use to force a hole somewhere. He moved the boxes up to an undamaged part of the top, and hoped they wouldn't slide off. He needed to save the switch as well as Kai and himself. The people of Gotham, those who had taken up the offer of the seeds, were depending on him. He was their only hope. But the water was almost up to his chest now and he was starting to shiver. Kai was dragging himself up the stairs, moaning and shaking as he did so.

He took off the gauntlets and tucked them into his belt. Inside the cupboard, on the far right hand side, his trembling, exploring fingers came across a wire that hadn't tripped. Carefully he traced it. He couldn't see, but his fingertips told him it was probably a sort of limpet mine.

Pulling a (fortunately still-working) slim LED torch out of his belt, he inspected the mine. Alfred had taught him about trip wires and simple mines a couple of years ago. Never did he imagine at the time that he would actually need that information one day.

'What's that?' Kai asked as he started towards the stairs, holding the precious limpet and its trip wire in both hands.

'Our way out of here. Hold it a minute. Carefully.'

Even in the low light he could see Kai go pale and his hands start to shake. It was a struggle to haul himself back on to the staircase beyond Kai, but the thought of Georgia crying at his funeral gave him the strength he needed.

'Okay. Give it me back. Slowly.' Then, when it was safely in his own hands: 'Get back down the stairs. Protect your head.'

'What about you?'

He would have no time to get away from the blast. He would have to turn away as fast as he could, and trust to the suit to protect him.

'Take my chances. No other way.'

The blast was not very big, but enough to launch him off the staircase into the floodwater, which was deep enough to cushion his landing. He surfaced, coughing and spluttering, wiping water out of his eyes so he could look at the door. There was a hole in it, large enough for him to crawl through, if not Kai. But he could hear shouting and agitation. He had got someone's attention.

Grabbing hold of Kai, who was going repeatedly under the water, he hauled him to the steps and pushed him up in the direction of the light that was radiating in from above like a searchlight. Gasping, shaking, all he could think was Georgia, Georgia, Georgia – thank God.