***Downtown Gotham****
Gotham City is destroyed. The once vibrant city smoulders charred and rank. Fires burn in the distance, the sky a massive haze of smoke. The air is thick, heavy and putrid. The smell of death of dispair clings to his cape. His once perfect posture has long since vanished giving into the weight of the world that he now bears.
Batman stands above the rubble looking for signs of life.
Sky scrapers have fallen, the statue of liberty's battered face is torn in half, her torch long gone. Beads of sweat are visible on his neck. He wipes his dirty gloves across his neck then checks his oxygen level. Not even a bird dares to fly in the polluted sky.
Yesterday life had seemed so normal. Yesterday Gotham appeared so tranquil. Yesterday has seemed so peaceful but that was yesterday.
He tightens his gloved fists. He thinks back to the final hours to what public servants term ground zero. He knows the devastation is inssurmountable. He knows it is worse than that of 2001 on the eleventh.
The president was taken immediatly to a place of refuge but Batman knew he would be carried to many destinations if not staying at a single one for more than minutes. He was the direct target and NY was the second. He was here campaigning for hope and using the Ellis Island as an example of how this country perserveres when the first target was detected.
Batman was part of the elite few who have access to Defcon and to the direct response protocol to those sworn as stand-ins in the case our own president may cease to be. The president and vice president were aware their debut was needed and went nationally discussing their worst fears. Others were briefed over and over again in secret meetings called " golden circle. " They circle were well versed in their duties to perform to run a nation with is very head cut off.
The city was now under Marshall law. People who were able to see the last televised presidential speech were told to stay inside. Newsteams flooded the TV sets with warning banners and the shriek of the promt for must disrupt your viewing for the following urgent message. People were told to remain inside and that military was told to use extreme force. No vehicles but military, medical, fire and emergency were allowed access.
Gotham was going into shut-down. The city sectors were being roadblocked to route in necessary provisions and aid. Only evacuation route roads were allowed exit as the bumper to bumper two lane remained clogged with traffic on both lanes heading out. The miltary urged again that no one would be allowed to leave on restricted roads and to divert to those labled evacuation . A map showed the only two evacuations routes then cut to a shot of the roads filled with vehicles as the people bombarded the bridges honking and screaming to be let out.
Boats and ferries were filled with people trying to escape the Mayhem. Planes were grounded as people were jumping the gates fighting to get aboard the next flight out. Military was called in and ceased all flights out. Fully armed men and women in uniform fought to contain composure staring at the masses screaming and edging nearer to the entrance ramps. Jeeps and groups of enforcement stood guard. All planes severed their boarding ramps and were dispatched away from the airport terminals. Army men and a few police surrounded the tarmack in clusters. Pay phones, land lines, and cell towers beeped no sevice or temporarliy disconnected as Gothamites flooded the lines to speak to their loves ones one last time.
Now the rioters begin to loot grocery stores, pharmacies, pawn shops for weapons, home stores for generators,tools, batteries shovels and axes. All men in uniform grab their gear and those with families say their last farewells as firemen now rush into flames to find most of the waterlines have ruptured.
Batman peers below and clinches his jaw at the sight of people running in the streets angry, crazy, crying, afraid. They stumble for a meaning coughing dragging trash bags behind them. Gunshots ring out as babies cry into the warm ashen air. A vagabond in dirty rags holds a sign up yelling "The End is Near! The four horseman are loose and I have seen the four angels!"
Batman knows his main priority now is to help those trapped under the rubble. The military will have to handle the mobs. He knows his devices are sacred to hunt for survivors. Police dogs tug above the wreckage struggling for their master's to let them lose.