222. A Hard Act to Follow part 7
Terra was sweating.
Biting her lip, she aimed the pitchfork and stabbed neatly into the clump of hay atop the tractor-hitched wagon. She pivoted on a stool, yanked out a wad of yellow-gold straws, and stepped down. She walked into the barn through the tall doors and dropped the hay in a cluster in the center of the wooden interior. She took a break to breathe, pivoted around, and trucked herself back to the tractor to mount the stool and dig forth another cluster of hay.
She was clad in overalls and a white t-shirt. Her golden blonde hair was hung in a ponytail. Her blue eyes were thin with determination…straining almost, as she did the 'work'.
Halfway through fishing out the next cluster from the bail, she turned about and gasped slightly at the proximity of Kara hovering before her.
"….," Kara smirked. "You're really tense, you know that? You sure you find this 'relaxing'?"
Terra simpered. "I-I just wanted to help. After all…you and the Kents have been kind enough to let me stay here and stuff. It only seems right."
Kara shrugged. "You volunteered. You're the guest. I wasn't about to make you do farmwork. And besides, after so many months in stone…"
"Please, Supergirl…," Terra smiled and shoved her way past Kara with the pitchfork towards the barn. "I've gotten a good wind since I came here all invalid-like. I'll have you know I'm no wimp! I have been and shall always be a country girl…"
"Do tell…"
"Er….though I'm used to the country where there's more cactus than hay…."
"Heheheh…."
"Why do you need all this hay anyways?"
"You complaining already? Some country girl you are!"
"Th-That's not it! Just…."
"We do this every year. Especially around winter. The animals are gonna be staying in the barn a lot more. Especially when it snows. You don't want bovine hypothermia, do you?"
"Uhm….g-guess not…."
"And besides, the hay has this….nasty habit of disappearing magically each year."
"You don't say!" Terra dropped her last cluster with the other strands of hay.
"Yeah. I think it all goes to the same vortex in space and time where left socks run off."
"Hehehehehe…," Terra leaned on her pitchfork and smiled at Kara. The smile soon turned to a playful frown. "Say….aren't you supposed to be milking the cows or something?"
"I know very well what my chores are or aren't at the Kents' farm, Terra…"
"Well? Aren't you?"
Kara shrugged. "Already did it."
"……," Terra blinked. "But that was…..f-five minutes ago!"
There was an anguished 'moo' sound from the distance.
Kara blushed. "Er….yeah. It kinda freaks them out a bit when I do it that fast…."
"Interesting…."
Silence……
"You handle a pitchfork nicely for someone with such toothpick arms."
"Oh…please….pffft….," Terra rolled her eyes and approached the tractor trailer again. "You'd better not start the 'chicken legs' joke that the Titans plagued me with."
"Hahahaha….'chicken legs'? What cruel monster thought that up?"
Terra bit her lip. "Beast Boy…a-actually…"
Kara winced. "Oh….uhm…."
"S'ok. I put a stink-bomb in his boots for it. He doesn't call me that anymore."
"Hehehehe…okay."
"Huh….," Terra, trance-like, paused and stared off in silence. Her lips were parted. "Listen to me…..'he doesn't call me that'…."
Silence.
Kara touched-down and walked gently over to Terra's side. "Feeling like…..seeing your friends?"
"I dunno….," Terra's hands fidgeted on the handle of the pitchfork she was leaning against. "I've been thinking about them a lot lately…..but….."
"…….."
Terra looked up at Supergirl. "Noir….he has a good reason for asking you to look after me here, right?"
"I should say so."
"The same reason….wh-why he isn't with the Titans right now," Terra murmured. "Even if he wants to be…."
Kara shrugged. "I could never fathom Jordan's respect for the Titans. I've never been in his head. Though, I have….felt him in a sense. I know what he's sacrificed. Almost know what he's sacrificed."
"I still can't believe that Robin's dead….," Terra shook her head and murmured. "I'd hate to think that….that…."
"That what, Terra?"
"That the last things I'd ever said to him were……were mean things….," Terra's voice went lower. "Wh-When we fought…."
A bit of silence.
Kara took a breath and said: "C'mere. I want to show you something."
Terra looked at the trailer, then at the barn. "Uhm….but what about….?"
Kara swiftly took the pitch fork from Terra, tossed it into the trailor, unhitched it from the tractor, carried it—floating—to the barn, and dumped the golden straw all over the floor.
Terra planted her hands on her hips. "Show off…."
"Yup!" Kara tossed the trailor aside. "Proud of it too!" CRASH! The Girl of Steel winced, but shook it off. "Ahem…now come on…"
And she took Terra by the hand and practically dragged the amused girl off.
T-T-T-T-T-T-
The attic of the Kents' household was surprisingly lacking in dust. The loft was a place of frequent visits. A sort of cleanliness ordered itself around the trunks, the old wardrobes, the boxes, and other containers of retrospective goodness. The Kents seemed a sort of people to coexist with their memories in the present. It was a wholesome, homely feeling. Terra almost felt like she was being hugged by four pairs of arms by simply stepping up there.
Kara was busy fumbling her strong-as-steel hands softly through a box in the far corner. She opened it, ruffled some paper, and motioned Terra over with a sideways nod of her head. "Come here….take a look…."
Kara drifted over. The thin, round sihlouette of a third story window shone sunlight in and illuminated the two girls.
As Terra walked up, the taller blonde turned about and held forth a newspaper. Old…but still white, without the amber-stained touch of elder years.
Terra gently took it and gazed at the headlines. Her blue eyes thin.
"……."
'SUPERMAN TRAITOR OF THE WORLD.'
'KRYPTONIAN ALLIANCE WITH APOKOLIPS.'
'DARKSEID'S SON REVEALED.'
Terra whistled.
"Wow….scandalous stuff…," Terra tilted her head up and smiled softly. "Good thing they've got editors to scare these jokers off, eh?"
Kara merely blinked. "Wow…you really did sleep in caves….didn't you?"
Terra blushed. "Uhm….am I missing something?"
Kara pointed at the newspapers. "That really happened. Almost two years ago."
Terra's jaw dropped. "Superman….went bad?"
"Mind control."
Terra exhaled as if that somehow put her at ease. "Really…."
The Girl of Steel nodded. "He was zapped during a space mission. Granny Goodness and the Female Furies basically tortured Clark and reprogrammed his head so that he'd fight for….erm….the 'dark side', I guess. While Superman was under the assumption of being Darkseid's son—no pun intended—he conquered one or two planets and busted heads of a few civilizations. And then when he came back here to Earth…..well….," Kara hugged her opposite shoulder, stared off through the dimly-lit window, and sighed. "…it wasn't pretty. The world's armies went against him. Even I…had to fight him. And I didn't know what was going on at the time. It was a tough fight beating back Darkseid with Superman brainwashed that time. And New Genesis couldn't do a thing about it. Some…wacky galactic politick. I guess Earth is a little too unimportant for most civilizations these days."
"Kinda makes you feel small….," Terra murmured. "Earth…that is…."
"Hey, I wouldn't live anywhere else," Kara winked with a smile. "This place rocks."
"Hehehehehe…yeah….r-rocks….," Terra said. A sigh. Her smile faded as she gazed over the headlines. "I feel stupid for never having heard much about this." A pause. She looked up. "I-I'm guessing S-Superman came around…."
"Oh ho yeah…," Kara chuckled. "That's for darn sure. You can't keep a super-powered boy scout down forever. He came back with a vengeance, struck a heavy blow to Darkseid, and Apokolips has never been the same since. But….it was difficult for Clark…er….'Superman' to get a good footing here on Earth again. S.T.A.R. Labs and their leader Emil Hamilton never really trusted him again. Lex Luthor got a lot of political backing for his evil empire. And the international governments started cracking down on vigilantes more. It wasn't really until the Justice League came about that Superman started to get a second wind. But…gradually….people did learn to forgive him. And accept him. Cuz….heroes don't just fade away, Terra. There's something about them that makes heroes…..simply loveable. No matter what."
Terra was biting her lip. "Is that why you're showing me this? To tell me that I'm loveable?"
Kara winked. "What? You couldn't tell from the dozens of times Ma begs to braid your hair?"
Terra couldn't help but smile. Howbeit a thin smile.
Kara pointed at the headlines: "There were nuts out there wanting to burn Superman at a stake. To castrate him. To ostracize any and ALL aliens who'd appear on this planet. But….they all gradually came around. Everyone but Hamilton, perhaps. Freakin' loser….pfft…."
"…….," Terra slowly placed the paper back into the container from which Supergirl had retrieved it. She murmured: "Were the headlines any big when I helped Slade take over the City….?"
"……," Kara scratched the back of her neck. "There were….headlines, yeah……"
"And?"
"…….," Kara smiled gently. She added: "I knew the Titans would come around. But in so expecting…I didn't imagine them beating the snot out of your anything…."
Terra winced a little.
Kara went on: "I couldn't imagine how a former member of them would simply….'turn evil' overnight. That just doesn't happen, Terra. Not in the Balanced world we live in."
"I was never really a hero….," Terra hugged herself and stared off towards a wall.
"Oh?" Kara craned her neck. "You never kicked crime's butt with the Titans?"
"Er….."
"You never carried a bunch of people out of a burning building with a safety platform of stone?"
"I…I-I…."
"Never even rescued a kitten from a tree?"
"I wasn't a hero for long….," Terra bashfully digressed. "Not for long at all…"
"But you were a Titan, Terra," Kara placed a hand on her shoulder. "And there were other headlines. Headlines about the 'Sixth Titan'. And about the good things she did while she was still a fiery extension of this heated, passionate Earth. And I think those headlines mean something. Much like Superman's legacy meant something before he went bad for a time. Heroes aren't perfect, as much as people would like to dream. Sometimes….we are vulnerable. Weak." She gazed off thoughtfully as she inhaled and added: "Tempted to do the right thing the 'easy' way, to our detriment…."
"I was never zombified….," Terra murmured. There was a lacing of anger in her voice. "I was never mind-controlled." She furrowed her brow as she gazed Kara's way. "I chose to do what I did to the Titans. I was evil."
"But were you not brainwashed?"
"……….."
"I can't ever….EVER imagine you doing what you did to the Titans without any provocation, Terra…," Kara said She leaned her head to the side. "When Noir first dropped you off in my and Ma's and Pa's lap, I was a little scared. But now that I've gotten a chance to see you…..well…..no, Terra, you're not a little girl who 'needs saving'. Rather, you're like me. You're strong. You're powerful. But you're also blonde."
"……snkktk….," Terra snickered.
Kara giggled. "And….well…life doesn't always smile on chicks like us, does it?"
"No ma'am…," Terra shook her head with a slight smirk. "It sure doesn't…."
Kara's eyes were thin. "The Titans……did something to hurt you. Didn't they?"
Terra bit her lip.
"Not trying to say they deserved any of the bad things that happened to them, but…--"
"Beast Boy….," Terra breathed. "He said that he would trust me no matter what I did….or what I was…."
"………."
"….and when he found out about Slade and I….when he found out what I had done…..he br-broke his promise. He said I didn't have any friends….," Terra closed her eyes and shuddered. "Didn't he see? I…I was begging for help. Slade did so much for me and my powers…but I couldn't say 'no' to a single thing he said. I wanted the Titans to save me. I was living with them, fighting alongside them, working with them…but I still felt helpless. Slade controlled every little thing I said or did and I just wanted out. Even if it meant no longer being with the Titans. Just….being on my own again. Like I had always been. But when Beast Boy pushed me away……….e-everything that Slade had said about the Titans—every false thing—it all became true to me. And it suddenly made sense why I was trying to destroy them and hurt their feelings in every way possible. They were inferior. Pathetic. Weak. Dishonest…shallow……"
Terra took a sharp breath.
She clenched her teeth.
In an exhale, she looked ready to collapse: "I was so blind….so selfish……b-but most of all……most of all I was scared……," she hugged herself. "Scared of the Titans. Scared of the law. Scared of my powers. And….scared of Slade…….."
Kara listened silently. Nodding a little here and there.
Terra glanced at her sideways and murmured: "I still….fear that the Titans wouldn't want to be my friends. What kind of forgiveness…what kind of CRAZY forgiveness could possibly eclipse th-that?"
"I dunno…," Kara shrugged. "But it worked with Clark and the world. And it worked with me and Jordan." She leaned her head to the side. "I don't see why it wouldn't work with you."
"Heh….cute analogy…."
"Is it really?"
"………"
Kara patted Terra's back: "You're loved, kiddo. Those Titans….I'd be surprised if they didn't tackle you upon sight."
"But I can't try my luck with them," Terra shuddered. "Not now…."
Kara nodded. "Red Aviary—as Noir puts it—is a real trouble. The worst thing you could do to the Titans….the worst thing you could EVER do to them is die. So we gotta keep you safe. We gotta keep you hidden. Hang in there, Terra. Although, something tells me you're pretty good at that…"
Terra smiled nervously. "S-Something tells me….that you're helping me be pretty good at that."
Kara shrugged, a smirk. "I try my best."
Silence.
Terra breathed: "So….uhm……more chores?"
Kara ran a hand through her blonde bangs. "Eh…..I could do that in a heartbeat. I was really just letting you get exercise earlier."
"Oh……"
"………."
"………."
"………," Kara brightened. "Wanna do our nails?"
"Hehehe….sure."
"Last one downstair's a rotten egg!"
"No fair, Miss Speedy!"
"Hehe…you've got powers too!"
"I don't think I should risk pulling Superman's childhood house apart…."
"Good point. Besides, the stairs are made for walking slowly…"
T-T-T-T-T-T-
November 29, 2004.
Gotham City.
3:24 pm
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
"…………………"
Sounds.
Light sounds.
Crying….mewing sounds.
"…………………"
A meow. Close to my head. Purring. Fish breath. Tiny puff of breath. Whiskers. A feline lick at my scarred neck. Another meow. And….
Cat hair.
"……………….," my face tensed. My nose twitched.
Jinx………
"………………."
I blinked.
Jinx………?
My black eyes flew open.
A dark overhang. A cool amber sky looming beyond. The tops of buildings.
I squinted, wincing. My eyes were naked. The sunlight was stabbing. And yet, it could have beeb worse. I remembered that I was in Gotham City. I had survived…..what? A gunshot? An explosion? Chubby monkey space ninjas? God……I can't seem to keep count anymore……
Another meow.
A tail to the face.
Hairs in my mouth.
I helplessly spat and sat up, feeling the breeze of high altitude in the blistering November. Gotham City hissed frigidly at me. And yet…it still wouldn't snow.
Not even a single, blasted flake of white.
"Not a cat person?"
"……….," I turned around. Black eyes thin. I eyed a woman sitting cross-legged on a chair atop the balcony of a loft apartment where we were situated. It was a rather affluent pad. Something you would only find in possession of a rich businesswoman………or cat burglar.
"You look like you'd like dogs more," Catwoman said. The 'Selina Kyle' of newspaper headlines. She sat in her gray jumpsuit of night-prowling sexiness. Her cat-eared cowl was off, revealing a voluptuously adult female with cascading blonde hair and two rigidly green eyes. "I'm guessing….golden retrievers?"
I took a breath.
I hate dogs……
An Egyptian-'styled' cat trotted away from my person and leapt up onto Miss Kyle's knees, rubbings its cheek along her abdomen.
"I guess it's no surprise that you would come here eventually, Mr. Titan," Catwoman said. "Gotham is quite the haven for the dark, silent, and brooding types. Heheheheh….which makes me wonder just what in the blazes I'm doing here every other season."
I nodded dazedly. I wasn't about to pounce upon this woman and handcuff her because of the blatantly criminal acts of burglary she had committed in the well-documented past. After all, Catwoman had just saved my life. And at this point in time, exactly who was I to determine who deserved to go to jail and who didn't?
I sighed miserably. I gazed towards the side with my black eyes dry…
"It's rather stupid of me to be here now to begin with…," she murmured. She was looking over something in her nimble hands, and I soon realized they were my shades. "With so many Gothamites both good and bad dropping like flies. Look at me. I'm the gray end of the spectrum." She glanced at me. "God vomits out the lukewarm, right? I don't stand a single chance."
"………….," I breathed gently.
"But I had to come," she went on. Her hand gracefully petted the head and neck of her cat Isis. "I had to find out just what in this ugly City actually made Batman go into hiding. Or even worse…." She looked pointedly at me again. "If indeed he's…..you know…."
"……," I blinked my bare eyes. Did she expect me to have an answer to that?
Of course not…
"What did I find? A City in chaos. vigilantes, and criminals alike all going into hiding. My old 'buddy' Roland Dagget hit the road. The Joker and the Riddler haven't been heard from in ages…without so much as a demonic titter or a riddle to point us in their nefarious vacation directions. Clayface's escaped and gone missing. Two-Face, Killer Croc, and the Ventriloquist have joined together in a totalitarian regime spreading throughout the country. And everyone who stands in the crossfire of this latest organization and those trying to preserve the old, insidious seeds of Gotham suffer from a Red harrier the likes of which this City hasn't seen since the Phantasm." With a digressing gesture, Catwoman then said: "On the flipside, common citizens are being attacked less and less. You got some people doing the smart thing and leaving town. Though…I must admit…," and her green eyes went sad momentarily. "I miss not being able to get in contact with my old friend Maven. She's so….vulnerable on her own….."
Silence.
Selina Kyle sat up straight and tossed me the shades.
Clutch! I swiftly snatched them in mid-air. I slipped them over my face and adjusted my eyes to a comfortable openness…
She stood up, cradling Isis and then balancing the little feline on her shoulder. She walked over to the apartment and opened the glass doors some. I realized then—with my dark optics working fully—that there were at least a dozen cats lounging about in her apartment. I was afraid to walk in and smell the place. But…for someone as notoriously experienced as Selina Kyle, something told me that she had a way around protecting a household from feline scents en masse.
"Of course, it is not like this only in Gotham City…," Catwoman said. "Metropolis…..Central City….Keystone….something is spreading through this nation like a cancer. You've felt it yourself haven't you?"
"………"
"Heheheh….from all the news programs concerning Las Vegas and Metropolis' Bay, I assumed you had," she let Isis drop down and frolick into the apartment. She closed the doors behind the cat and turned to face me again. "And for that matter…this cancer has had a nasty habit of making you look bad."
"……," I bit my lip. I looked away from her.
"What? Do you think I actually believe you're the Justice League – throttling villain that the papers make you look like? Even that stuff you did in the Daily Planet…..some people have to do what they do in order to get to the center of things. And you are oh-so-rock-solid set in the center of things…," her green eyes narrowed. "Aren't you, Noir?"
I stared back at her.
You have no idea……
"That's why you were there in Vegas when Two-Face's satellite establishment crumbled like a deck of cards. That's why you were there in Metropolis when battlescars sprang up all throughout the City. And that's why you were here…just hours ago…to witness the stroke of death upon the most evil of Gotham's fire-breathing dinosaurs. It takes a lot to kill the Clock King and the Mad Hatter. It takes an awful lot more to scare the living daylights out of the Scarecrow. But you, Noir. You lived through it all. With a little bit of calamitous bumps, sure. But you survived…..and that is utterly amazing…," she leaned her head to the side. "There's something in you that pushes the cancer away. Or…at least…re-shapes it. If there's anything that'll turn Gotham City's malignance up on its head and bring Batman's troupe out of hiding….it's you….."
I take a deep breath. I feel something in my pants' pocket.
Can it bring a flightless bird back from the dead……?
She couldn't answer that.
She drifted forward and said: "And as long as you hold an answer….any answer to this mess, I want to help you."
Naturally……
I sighed. I ran a hand through my black hair. I gestured 'money'.
She smirked: "I only get what I can steal. I don't let people pay me anything. The cat may be a scavenger at times, but it's built to be a predator."
My black eyes narrowed.
"I want to see Batman again…," she murmured. "I want to know that—while his image has faded from the streets and his sidekick has left this mortal coil—he himself may still be alive. And if he is indeed still around, I want to be the one to ultimately help him. I owe him more than even the tabloids can assume."
I fought an urge to smirk.
Have you ever met someone named 'Wonder Woman'?
"Don't get me wrong, I'm no cradle-robber," she winked at me as she walked towards the balcony edge. "I didn't spend all of my nine lives just to find you. I happened to be in the wrong place at the right time. You should feel lucky. But don't think you should repay me. Call this a mutual….operation…."
I sighed.
And just what 'operation' is this?
I've got things to do, lady.
I can fetch mice and tip milk bottles over later……
"Fox….William B. Fox…..you need him for some reason, don't you?"
"……," I blinked. I fervently nodded.
"I may be able to find him," Catwoman slipped on her feline cowl and strapped her whip to her belt. "If indeed he's in the hands of that dissociative, puppet-fetish freak…I'll have an edge. I've dealt with the Ventriloquist before. He's double-crossed me in the worse way. 'Revenge' doesn't even begin to describe the word."
I nodded.
Right.
I can understand 'revenge'.
At least……I think I can……
"But he could be anywhere in the City. The fact that he wants to stay here so much makes me think that he's definitely with Two-Face's troupe to stay."
I…..nodded.
Freakin' duh.
"But no worries….," Catwoman smirked. "I've got…..friends in the streets. Four-legged friends."
"…….," I blinked.
You've got to be kidding me……
"Specially trained. Specially loyal. Each of them is fit with a special collar with a tracking device and a microphone. The soonest one comes in contact with the Ventriloquist in his lair—be that in the Downtown, the South Side, the Bay Docks, the Industrial Complexes…..we'll be sure to find out and work from there. But as it is, such will take a while. So why don't we go for an….afternoon on the Town?"
I walked to the balcony. I gazed out against the cold, biting wind of November. I heard distant siren sounds. I saw the smoke from the Blimp in downtown and from the industrial complexes in the East and North rising up to form the looming, dark smog that haloed the corners of the amber Gotham Sky. And ever on the horizon were the licking tongues of red eating 'day' to a bloody pulp. The city had just suffered an apocalypse of sorts, and yet it crept on stone and slouching with the patience of a hallow mountain full of smokesouls. A volcano that had died and neglected to forget about its lava-induced gag reflex.
"………."
I blinked.
Wait a minute.
I gazed left at Catwoman, curiously.
Night on the town?
"To see if you're a lucky charm, Titan," she winked a green eye under her mask. "If I can't bring the Batman out of hiding, then maybe you and your miracle-making can."
"……..," I bit my lip.
"Heheh…don't worry. As much as I'd love to test your resolve at it, I'm not going to take you out thieving."
I exhaled in relief.
"There's one spot in Gotham just perfect to find Batman…..and I bet if we went there now, we might…might just be lucky…."
I fidgeted. I remembered and felt—like a suddenly huge weight—the chip that Clark gave me, now resting in my pants pocket. I thought about the button on it. The tracking device that would supposedly bring Batman to me.
Nearly twenty-four turbulent hours in Gotham City already, and still I hadn't mustered up the courage to use it. Perhaps because I believed that it was too good to be true. Perhaps because I was just scared…
Scared of what?
Superman and Diana may have tolerated my rogue actions in getting where I was then.
But Batman?
I'd die for sure……
I'd just……
Die.
I shuddered, but managed a convincing smile.
"All right then…..let's dance," Catwoman stepped out onto the balcony and whipped out her…..whip. "Follow the feline….and try not to get distracted," she winked.
I gulped.
P-Protect me?
SWOOOSH! She dove over, slashed her whip out, and swung outward via a gargoyle head on the building front. Quite the suicidal expert.
Nine lives indeed.
CHIIING!
I produced Myrkblade, pulsed murk through my limbs, and blurred out after her.
Across the spires of day-dim Gotham….
T-T-T-T-T-T-
Through the alleyways…
The side streets…
The rooftops, the fence posts, the aqueduct ridges…
The avenues and corridors of Gotham City….
Creatures stirred. Little creatures. Whiskered, fleet-footed creatures. Meandering around garbage cans. Stealing fish from shipyard markets. Fighting, hissing, mating, living.
Existing.
And every once and a while, a stranger would appear amongst the strays.
A cat.
Calico, black, Siamese, Persian, tabby…..
…with a tag around its neck.
A tag with a tiny, gray electronic device. Blinking and shimmering in reflective sunlight.
The afternoon waned.
The amber sky gradually thinned, giving way to the gravity of the red sphere overhead.
And the cats minded their business. Their lonely, petite, finicky business…
Except…
Except when a strange, meandering set of human feet plodded past them in the cement, grass, or muddy puddles. And in such cases, the feline of observance would blink a slit eye, adjust its whiskers, and softly pad after the shoe-steps. Slick and silent in the dark. An angle of mammalian prowling.
Tiny, furred missiles all working on Selina Kyle's beat….
T-T-T-T-T-T-
"Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!" William B. Fox laughed his head off. He leaned back in a plush chair and held his hands behind his back. "And that's when I thought—sheesh, if she's a clown girl…I wonder what else on her body is painted red! HA!"
Mugsy and Rhino winced simultaneously. They cleared their throats and adjusted their collars before looking across a dark-lit warehouse at the Ventriloquist.
'Scarface' sat comfortably in the propped arms of the Professor. His dummy white eyes glared twistedly at the rich heir before his wooden jaw danced and gruff words echoed forth: "Yous either got a load of guts, or you're just anotha crackpot like da rest of us…"
"So sue me!" Fox winked. "I can afford it. I was almost zeppelin zucchini, but I lived to sing, dance, and masturbate regardless. Fancy that? I bet that makes me a god of sorts…"
"It waz pure luck that gots you outta dat mess," Scareface 'pointed' as he writhed atop the Professor's grasp. "Never mind godliness or that sort of crud. Yous got to realize, the boyz 'n I pulled an awful lotta strings to get you out. And it's not so yous could sit 'round and gloat about it!"
"What's to gloat?" Fox smirked. "I'm much more smart or successful than the four of you quackjobs combined! Not to mention decent and richer!"
"Uhm….," Rhino looked at Fox, then glanced nervously at the Ventriloquist before humoringly added: "D-Don't you mean 'the three of you quackjobs?'"
"Ehhh….he's pretty right on," Scareface shook his wooden head. "The Professor here doesn't count."
"Uhm…I-I…."
"You got somethin' to say, blockhead? If so, give me a stake knife and I'll carve it out of ya!"
"N-No need, M-Mr. Scarface!' the old man holding up the puppet gangster shuddered back from his own arms. "I-I've got nothing to say!"
"Good. Now keep your mouth shut and your eyes open," 'Scarface'grunted. "You can keep your lips sealed, can't ya?"
"Um…..," the Ventriloquist sweated…
Fox blissfully interrupted: "Say, if our bosses Two-Face and Dagger aren't too busy, maybe one of them could do the favor of…..erhm…..ya know….killing what's left of the sons of bitches that decided to blimp me to death?"
"Don't ya get it, kid? It isn't in Two-Face's place to kill off them bubs that tried ta smoke yous on the airship."
"Then how did they bite the bullet anyhow? I figured they were all high-strung suicide-machines, but I frankly didn't expect the resulting biopsycohological explosion of their frustrations to take place until they were at home and got friendly."
"Wow, yous really do live under that rock you call yo father's ass, don't ya?" Scarface chuckled, the tiny stub of a cigar dancing in his gnarled, wooden mouth. "Heheheh….why don't you do us a favor of showing us exactly what yous useful for?"
"………," Fox smirked. "Very well. It's being rather fashionable for me to be threatened to death by wyrd-ass social marsupials of dramatic flare nowadays. I'd might as well quit while I'm ahead….quitting while I still have a head. I'm getting the hang of being kidnapped and having my genitalia threatened in various, counter-misogynist fashions. But if I get the hang of that for too long, I won't be hanging much anymore. Now would I?"
At that point, Mugsy shouted: "Just do the damn transfer!"
Silence.
"Sure…why not?" Fox rolled his eyes, jumped out of this chair, and shuffled across the warehouse to a dusty-but-efficiently 'modern' computer console sitting in the shadows. "You're the ones paying for apocalypse. I might as well deliver."
"Say….," Scarface murmured as he was trucked over towards Mugsy via the Professor's grasp "Way to go with your persuasive talents, kiddo."
Mugsy simpered. "Really?"
Th-THWACK! Scarface bitch-slapped Mugsy across the back of his head and neck. "No!"
"Ow! Sonofa….," Mugsy hissed.
"Only I get to make a blockhead out of the brat……you blockhead!"
"Ugh….," Mugsy sighed.
In the corner of the dark warehouse's interior, Rhino chuckled to himself. Mugsy glared at him.
Sooner than naught, Fox was sitting in the lone digital station, and he was typing madly away at the keyboard in such an ear-rattling fashion that it almost appeared to be a talent.
"I owe it all to Pops for giving me those Mavis Beacon typing lessons," Fox smirked. "Not to mention the colt revolver under my pillow and a book of 'Surviving Silicon Valley' on my shelf at home."
"Wow…they really made a book like that?" Rhino blinked.
"Nope. I lied. Just seeing how stupid you guys really are. I must say, it almost impresses me. But there's this one thing I have against nut jobs like you…."
"And what's that?"
"Intelligence, self-taught computer smarts, and about three layers of clothing."
"Heh. Real cute. Don't expect me to go on any pamper runs for you, you oversized billionaire baby."
"You judge me too shallowly, Hippo…"
"Rhino!"
"Do you know why Two-Face and Triangular REALLY pulled me out of the aristocratic mire to help out with things on the parasitic front?"
"Cuz you're the one thing in the 'Fox' family who's minutely less flaccid than your dad's ding-dong?"
"Cute, Walrus, but no. It's because I've lived all my life as a fine-feathered fanatic of my dad's networking. I learned to type on the computer before I could pop a hot chick's bra strap….which—for me—is saying something."
"Uh huh….."
Fox typed and typed and typed. His head rocked side to side in a puppet ecstasy in and of itself. A demonically cartoon grin, and he purred: "Not only have I protected Triangular from all sorts of exterior hackers—'J', 'Isomer', 'the Oracle', I've seen them all—but I've given you the one and only avenue through which to….how should I say….rock and roll?"
"Damn kids….," Scarface muttered. He gazed up at the Professor. "Why must every one of them be an artist these days?"
"Gee….I-I dunno, Mr. Scarfa—"
THWAP!
"DUMMY! I told you not to speak!"
"Y-Yes sir, Mr. Scarface…I-I-I-I mean…."
THWAP! "Grrrr…..," Scarface's wooden head slowly turned about. "You done, Fox?"
"HA!" William B. Fox jammed a key down and grinned wide. "It be donnnnne."
"I trust that's a good expletive?" Mugsy sweated.
Fox swiveled about. "Ladies and gentlemen…..—and the 'ladies' means you, Elephant."
"Bite me," Rhino grunted.
"The stone bitch's essence has entered the wondrous, winding world of red tape….," Fox turned and gestured towards the computer screen. "….wherever the computer glip goes, the vials are sure to follow…."
Ventriloquist stepped forward.
The cold white eyes of Scarface 'narrowed'.
A blinking icon appeared on an eye-friendly program responsible for the inner workings of a convoluted infrastructure. An hourglass spun digitally, and the huge glossy font of bold, gothic letters shimmered in lavish pointlessness.
'Wayne Corporation'.
"In other words….," Fox blew a kiss and giggled drunkenly. "The Son of the Burning Zeppelin now proudly delivers the Bureaucracy Bomb…."
T-T-T-T-T-T-
Outside of a warehouse…
In Eastern Gotham…
Beneath the shadows of smoke pipes and industrial spires…
A brown-spotted cat peered in through a grimy window at three men and an elder holding a goofy, wooden puppet. The feline's tail flickered and danced. After a moment, the cat shook its head and fur, licked its paw, and spun about to trod casually towards the center of the City.
As it moved, a tiny gray device hanging from its collar shook and rattled.
And blinked victoriously…..
T-T-T-T-T-T-
Gotham City.
The tramlines.
The rush hour traffic.
The sidewalk-surging sighs that rose up to mix with the sky-borne smog…
Gotham City was turning darker. Like touchstone laced with crimson. A city that bled so much from so many years that its life juice dried into a perpetual, obsidian blackness.
The grime and the grit overran and overthrew the last traces of amber daylight.
Like an ink spot growing in the center of some patch of skin.
Wrinkled with age, but stretched tight with exhausted glossiness.
Life on a corpse was routine. The harvest field emptied up in the sky. And thus a sunset of blood red came into being.
Like it did every night.
Again….and again…and again…
And again.
T-T-T-T-T-T-
I look up on this City and wonder how Robin could ever have grown up here. Just what was the child beneath that mask? Who was the boy who had to suckle from the breast of some bleeding, granite dragon? Was there something under the gnarled, armored plates of this smoggy leviathan that glittered with a luster that the criminal underground so fought and struggled for? Was there a belly of jewels? A golden egg? What?
What spoiled, decaying thing rolled itself over and spread its pale liquid eyes for Robin to embrace? This City is like a shark that eats you blind where the water meets the blood meets the abyss. It is something so dark…I can almost breathe it. Like the annoying, drifting flatulence of an exhaust truck engine looming ahead of you in traffic. Something that is mildly irritating and yet you know pollutes you a whole lot more than you could ever think.
Robin's days were always numbered. He was born in this City on cyanide pacifiers, and they labored and made love to themselves in his vessels till the inevitable day he'd roll over and cough up his mortality. What good did the Titans do for him? Were they his distraction? The living epithet of what little life he had left to squander on birdarangs and burglary stings?
Could it be possible that Red Aviary was born the day Robin was? And the two were really just opposite poles twisting around the fulcrum of this shihole City till they collided explosively at the radioactive depository?
And if that be true……and since Red Aviary is alive……what or who would make up the other pole? Who in this inverse 'Spectrum' of darkness and further darkness could provide the balance? The red-streaming equalizer?
If Red Aviary comes to consume us all……does that mean……
That Robin is alive?
T-T-T-T-T-T-
November 19, 2004.
Gotham City.
7:32 pm.
-T-T-T-T-T-T-
The madness had cleared away from where the zeppelin crashed.
The fires had gone out.
And—undoubtedly—the blood had been washed out of the streets.
Instead, now the Sky bore the crimson of the nightly scythe.
And in the middle of this maroon madness, a spotlight struck the sparse clouds looming over the land.
A spotlight with a symbol in it. The black, indifferent wings of a sinister bat.
Catwoman and I were perched atop the Gotham City Police Department building in Downtown. The smell of burnt zeppelin filled our nostrils, a queer sensation akin to God ruining a turkey in a huge, celestial oven and opening the steaming window down towards earth.
We stood on either side of the Bat-signal. Per Selina Kyle's initiative, we had aimed the lantern-light sky high and brightened the intensity for a sharp piercing of the night's blackness.
In hopes of summoning….
Just that.
In hopes of 'summoning'.
Catwoman knew whom we sought. She was rambling as we stood patiently forty-four minutes into the strobing spectacle: "It was when he saved me from Professor Milo's rabid formula that I realized just how…uniquely Batman cared about this 'fearless' cat burglar you see before you…."
I squinted my shaded eyes past the bright signal stream and gazed at her.
I wonder……
If I was to randomly drop on King Orin's lap……
Would he too just start talking about his life of fish-slurping just because I'm friggin' mute?
"There was no reason for the caped crusader to have….heh….'come to my rescue'," the masked woman smirked. Her green eyes were vibrant. "I was merely on a mission to retrieve poor Isis from the torturers who had kidnapped her. I was fresh out of police custody, and the whole world knew me as a kleptomaniacal vixen and nothing else. I had no redeeming qualities that anyone could think of….and yet Batman chose to investigate my concerns and risk his own life for me. How does a woman see that in a man and somehow not feel……sacred?"
"…..," I gazed off towards the blood sky.
I once 'saved' Kara. And yeah, she felt sacred. So sacred……it's made her want to roll over and die.
I sighed.
Selina Kyle seemed to not notice. "I always come back here to Gotham just to see him," Catwoman said. "There are lovely things to steal here, yes. And indeed…plenty of industrial psychopaths attempting to suffocate priceless wildlife preserves—the thing that irks me to no end. But it's really all about that man…with that cape…and that cowl….and that dark, dispassionate voice being betrayed with a smile and a quickening of a heartbeat when we used to spar over the rooftops. Like black dust off of concrete mountains….embraced by the cyclone and screaming silent in pursuit of one another's shadows…."
A cold breath of November air.
Still….no snow.
Absolutely no snow whatsoever.
I fought the urge to shake a metal fist at the stubborn lukewarm of it all. I froze…and yet I burned. I didn't want to be there. And yet, I all but hugged to the Bat-signal.
All I want to do……is sleep……
Ana……God……Red Aviary………whoever's out there……
Can I please just get a chance to sleep?
"A thief's life is not as romantic as it may seem….," Catwoman was murmuring by that point.
I took a deep breath.
Neither's a samurai's……
"I really….have no true allies here in Gotham anymore. Not even Maven's here these days…."
Allies?
Don't you mean 'friends'?
"Batman is simply it…in and of the fact that he is not it…," Catwoman said. She gazed sideways at me. "And thus it worries me all the more—in this damnable, dying city—that there is no sign of him." She gestured towards the bright lanternlight atop the roof beside us. "And nothing to say of him answering this 'call'….."
"……….," I felt a hand around my pocket.
I fingered the black chip Superman had 'given' me.
"………..," I exhaled.
Yeah……
Now's the time.
I feel life slipping from this evening already.
Bring on the Knight.
Click.
The special beacon clicked and strobed in my pocket.
Away from Catwoman's sight….
"Don't think that my trust in you is slim, Mr. Titan," Catwoman crossed her arms and gazed outward as she spoke: "But I think it's a bleak happenstance with the only two people wanting to stand up and do something in this City are a whip-slashing burglar feeling lovesick and a sword-swinging rogue traversing both sides of the fence….."
I sighed….
"I
don't know. Seeing you two on my roof spells a recipe for
significance in spades."
"……….,"
Catwoman and I gazed at each other. "…….." We turned and
looked over our shoulders.
Out from the top stairwell and onto the barren helipad of the GCPD Building walked Commissioner Gordon. A certain Renee Montoya was situated at his side. Both gazed at us until Gordon calmly and fatherly said: "First off, let me just say that I would have rather you asked before using our little toy here…."
Catwoman grinned. She gestured towards the bright lanternlight. "Why, Commissioner? It's not exactly yours. Or has it become the 'Gordon-Signal' overnight?"
I was fidgeting. The sight of two police enforcers…especially such powerful ones….
I started to inch my nimble way towards the rooftop.
Montoya's chocolate eyes widened and she reached swiftly for her pistol. "Oye…."
Gordon held a hand out in front of Montoya. "Easy, detective. Easy…."
Montoya's jaw dropped some. She gazed at the Commissioner, then at Selina and me.
After a beat, Gordon himself trodded over. Slow steps in his long, brown coat. He thinned his graying at me as he came within metal arm's distance.
"……….," I stood still before him. Like a frightened jungle creature suddenly overcome with curiosity. But in this case, it was respect. This was the Commissioner James Gordon of Gotham City. He looked at me with his mature eyes. Eyes that had stared down the barrel of many a gun and made many more a criminal freeze in interrogation. And he was looking upon me like a father would overlook his son in a situation that called for more pride than reprimand.
It felt so confusingly good, it hurt….
It hurt like Hell.
"You can and will do anything for a cause, wouldn't you, Mr. Titan?"
"……."
"Or should I say 'Noir'?"
"……."
He paced around me. "I…..talked with Maggie Sawyer. I talked with her extensively during the time following the Terrible Troupe's zeppelin crash."
At the sound of anything remotely indicative of 'Metropolis', my throat went sore. I gulped and awaited his words as he gently circled me: "They've been…coming up with new evidence in recent tours of the battle scenes in the skyrising City. Traces of titanium alloy as if shredded off the metal limbs of some automaton. Erroneous light patterns on the nationally broadcasted entanglement of the Justice League with the 'invading swordsman'. Things that not only have the police department has discovered…but things that the League has assisted in understanding more. Green Lantern himself has theorized for scientists and investigators that something of holographic illusion was present during the shipyard debacle…..for reasons yet unknown…."
A pause.
He stopped moving.
He slowly turned, half-gazing at me. Half….glaring? "The only thing that has no hope of an alternative solution is the event inside the Daily Planet editorial offices. The attack. The unmerited assault on a lonely press worker. That cannot be explained, Titan. Not in anyway….favorable….."
"…….," I took a deep breath. I averted my black eyes from him. But with my dark shades on, he couldn't see much of a difference to tell…
"All my years of dealing with Batman, I've……allowed myself to brush aside some of his ferocious tactics," Gordon said. "It is not so much out of direct respect for the man of mystery as it is contempt for the greater evils of this world. Evils that hold no sway over right or wrong. Evils that can't seem to maintain a balance like the darkness in the Batman's vendetta that simultaneously empowers him and holds him at bay. I think I see in you something, Noir. Something that makes me wonder…..has your arrival here started some sort of confirmed prophecy? Like a prodigal son of sorts entering upon the threshold of a red, all-consuming evil?"
"………."
Catwoman smiled and folded her arms while gesturing: "Good to see you too, Commissioner."
Gordon turned and glared at her. "Scratch that. There're two unexplainable things about this situation. The Daily Planet attack and you."
"Great to see I'm rising to the top….," she winked a green eye under her mask and cat-cowl.
I continued to feel the chip in my pocket. The blinking and pulsing and strobing of it all. Silent but echoing deafly.
Calling Batman……Calling the Dark Knight by the beacon……
Perhaps it was a signal meant only for the ears in fine tune with the clouds of the spectrum.
The voices of the mortals on the rooftop limped on and dragged me down to neanderthalian level: "We have a rendezvous to make."
"Yeah? With whom, Miss Kyle?"
"William B. Fox."
"Lucius Fox's son? What beef could you possibly want with that brat?"
"Not 'beef' in this case. Something more akin to….'processed dead meat'. There are evil things afoot. The son of Lucius Fox is very much a part of it, whether we like to imagine the dirty truth or not. Exactly what it is that he's nefariously doing….well…I'm not one to speculate. But I do land on my feet everytime. And—in a lot of ways—so does this kid," Catwoman gestured towards me with a nod of her softly 'eared' head. "He got far closer to saving William Fox than any of us even managed to gently touch the breath of his name. Noir has been traveling long and hard to get here…this bloody end. And the quest stops with Batman. So if you'll excuse us, Commissioner, we only need your light for just a little bit longer—indeed—and we'll be out of your flax hair."
"Batman will not come," Gordon droned.
"Why not? What is it that you know and we don't?"
The old officer shrugged under his coat. "Nobody knows nothing about nobody anymore…."
Montoya smirked.
"Great….," Catwoman rolled her green eyes. "Now you're starting to sound like one of Dagget's 'brilliantly' hired thugs…"
"There's a great lack of 'brilliance' in this City right now…," Gordon said. "Simply because there has been a great absence of 'the know' as a whole. None of us know where Batman is. None of us know where these dying villains are taking their aching breaths….all we know is that the more we try to know things the more we realize that some unknown group out there knows more than everyone else combined!"
Silence…..
Montoya glanced at me.
And so did Gordon: "But you….you know something, don't you? At least….a lot more than the rest of us?"
"……..," and then Catwoman was staring at me.
I mutely groaned and ran a hand over my face.
I never asked to be the center of bloody attention.
I felt a chill in my metal arm.
"……," I tilted my head up.
Montoya jumped, as if startled by my alarmed stance.
Gordon's eyes narrowed. "What brings you to Gotham City? And what leads you to nearly kill yourself on board that zeppelin?"
I gasp slightly, ignoring the growing chill in my metal arm. I glance directly at Gordon.
He nods. "You were there. Don't try to deny it. We found the sword marks in the building from when you feel off the exploding airship. You saved William B. Fox's life, didn't you?"
"………"
"And something tells me that you didn't exactly want to do it…," Gordon said. "And you didn't want to be in the zeppelin where you were nearly cooked in the first place." He dug his hands into his coat pockets and spoke into the snowless wind: "Everything you did….was against your will. And tell me….where is there more of a villain than a hero in that?"
"………"
"It's not too late to seek help, Mr. Noir….," Gordon spoke. "It's not too late to….make an example of the Titans, whom you once belonged to. Tell us what you know….and we'll tell you what we want to know. And altogether….we might get to the bottom of this nightmare, even if Batman's nowhere to be 'hailed'."
"……..hrmmph….," Catwoman glanced over at me and sensually winked. "Everyone's wanting to hire you these days!"
I looked at her…past her….exhaling….
What am I doing here?
I'm supposed to be doing this alone.
This is all well and rapturous……
But……
Red Aviary is after me, not these burglars and bobbies.
Prowlers and police……
I shuddered. The Batman-summoning chip blinked in time with the light's strobe. Another gust of wind…another chill.
Gotham City is closing around me. The lone trek of a haunted soul becomes polarized and loops itself around other helpless icons.
Is this what happened to the Dark Knight?
Did Batman choose to have Batgirl, Nightwing, and the late Robin on his side?
Perhaps all he ever wanted to do……
Was sleep?
"Don't waste this opportunity, Noir….," Gordon spoke. "I'm not one to extort or intimidate you. You can go out on your own if you want…."
"And maybe we should do just that," Catwoman said.
"But I need you…and you need me. The force would benefit from your input with Batman gone…."
"There's no need to may attention to these chumps. They are utterly…utterly clueless about the death slicing through this City. At least you and I have the upper perch, Noir…."
"Do what the Titans would have you do, Noir…."
"Do what your instincts tell you are right. Land on your feet and keep going forward. Claws barred if you have to…."
I clenched my eyes shut between the three. The light of the Bat-signal had become suddenly blinding. I thought that if I concentrated really hard, I could just sleep there.
But instead, I found myself concentrating murk. For what reason did I let the smoke billow about me? I'm not entirely sure.
But my spatial sense felt it. First it was a chill, but not the Red Aviary chill. Rather, it was the sensation of being watched without a collective consciousness about it. And then….
A laser.
A red laser burning through the smoke vapors dancing above my head.
Perhaps Catwoman, Montoya, and Gordon saw it. Perhaps that's why they were gasping half a second before I spun around in slow motion, unsheathed Myrkblade….CHIIIIIING!……and swirled it at half-a-breath's beat.
THWIIIIISH! CLACK!
I sliced apart something. Something sharp, small, and serrated. It broke apart around me in tiny pinprick shrapnel, barely avoiding my person.
Catwoman gasped.
Montoya instinctively whipped out a pistol and shoved Gordon back towards the stairwell. "Sniper! Sniper!"
Sniper……
I panted. I extended my metal hand out with a curtain of murk and felt for where the laser was coming from.
And just then, a body sailed in from 'where the laser was coming from'. An invisible body that pulsed blindingly at the last second when a pair of feminine legs slammed into my figure.
Pulsed……
WHAM!
I toppled over the bat-signal and flew off the edge of the GCPD building.
"Noir!" Catwoman shouted.
Too late. I fell and fell and plummeted downward towards the streets below.
A pulsing, shimmering form streaked after me before Catwoman could pounce it.
T-T-T-T-T-T-
SWOOOOSH!
I gritted my teeth, flipped my body with billowing murk, and aimed my feet earth-ward before I could see just exactly where they were going….
THWOMP!
SLIIIIIIIIIIDE!
I impacted a rooftop and slid reverse across the gravel till I came to a stop right at the edge.
I held Myrkblade up, panting. Eyes thin and glaring through my shades. Looking for the 'enemy'….
"………"
Cl-Clump!
A patch of gravel parted 'magically' a few steps in front of me.
"……..," I glared.
Show your face.
I know it's you……
TH-THRIFFT!
Two air blasts.
Two streaming projectiles flew at me.
I twirled Myrkblade up and slashed one into small shards.
CRACK!
Half a breath and half a thought later, I blurred my metal hand up and caught the next projectile.
Snatch!
I took a breath. My black eyes refocused on the tiny shard in my hand while the rest of the world turned fuzzy.
And my lips parted some.
A tranquilizer dart……
"……."
Blink. Blink.
But that isn't an assassin's style at all……
FL-FLASH! A blinding strobe of hot light shot from beyond my hand.
My eyes burned. I dropped the dart to the rooftop below me. I stumbled back, wincing all over.
Nnngh………god!
I heard the shuffles of light feet. I sensed spatially her lithe body twirling at me with the butt of an invisible sniper rifle.
I pivoted to the side and shot my arm blindly out.
I clipped her rib cage.
She spun and slammed an invisible foot into my chest.
WHAP!
I slid back. I nearly fell over the edge. I teetered….tottered….and braced myself.
Her body came charging with a spinning kick.
Still blind, I took a sharp breath and flipped forward.
I vaulted over her body and landed with my back facing where her invisible spine was.
I reached back and grasped open air. The open air yielded silky-long hair. With a mute grunt, I yanked at her hair, pulled her weight over my body, and tossed her across the length of the rooftop.
TH-THWOMP!
Gravel flew.
Her powers were jolted out of her.
She winced and slouched visibly before me. Her whole body tensing with heavy breaths.
Pulsade….
I could barely see her, still recovering from her optical punishment.
"You dauntless….mindless git!" she spat. She suddenly jumped up, yelled, and charged at me with the sniper rifle stabbing at me.
I merely swung Myrkblade up.
CRACK!
Tranquilizer darts fell in a shower between us.
Pulsade expertly twirled through the mess with a spin of her platinum blonde hair. She landed against me with a fierce elbow to the sternum.
WH-WHAP!
I stumbled back.
She swept my feet out from under me with a nimble leg.
I collapsed on my rear, almost dropping Myrkblade. WH-WHUMP!
She pulled out a taser and leapt down at me.
I couldn't help but blink my aching eyes underneath her.
Taser?
SWOOOSH-CLANK! Myrkblade flew up and pressed up against her stabbing, holding the sparking weapon at bay. I struggled and strained to keep Pulsade off of me. She inched the taser closer to my chest, panting heavily….almost animalistically in the struggle to dominate me.
What's happened to her?
Her professionalism……it's all gone……
Did I seriously piss the Brit off in Vegas or what?
I gritted my teeth and shot my legs up.
I forced her into a flip over me.
She twirled about and landed on her feet.
I vaulted up into a standing position.
She charged at my back, taser jabbing.
I held my breath, timed it, and teleported in reverse—FWOOOSH!—through her and solidified with a slap of Myrkblade across her shoulders.
THWACK!
"Nnngh!" Pulsade stumbled and ran into a t.v. antenna. She dropped the taser and simply…..leaned there over the metal webbing. Breathless. As if she too had run across half the countryside to get there, only without the aid of murk.
"…….," I stared at her for a few calming seconds before slowly…gently lowering Myrkblade.
She looked at me, sweating. The anger in her eyes had faded some, and a blue desperation twitched beneath a mat of sweaty blonde hair. "Have you seen what's happened to me, lad?" she panted. "I-I can't kill anymore. Everything is wrong….everything is s-so wrong…."
"……," my black eyes narrowed.
I listened….
"This City…this bloody City…this whole bloody land….," she shook her moist head miserably and swallowed. "Death is dividing it. And never did I imagine it getting this bad…even back when I was deluded to think Counter-Red Aviary stood a chance in Hell to sod off the Red Reaper for good….."
"…….."
"You…..you will not give up….," she murmured. "And now you have stolen my edge. You and that…that bloody asian daft with a fungus for a head! Do you know that everything is falling apart now?" She stood up straight and gestured wildly, just short of shouting at me: "Jinx is devastated! After her paralysis, she can barely muster a spirit to see into the fabric of Fortune! Wildebeest has gone AWOL and…there is no sign of everyone's favorite little computer bugger!"
"…………?"
"'J' is gone, Noir!" Pulsade exclaimed. "The little shrimp turned up missing as soon as you disappeared and snatched up Terra somehow. Area 51, huh? How bloody perfect! Tell me, Titan, is Terra with aliens now? For surely they abducted our poor, pathetic J too!"
"……..," my lips parted as the first feeling of regret since Clark Kent's debacle stabbed me.
J is missing?
My god……what else could be wrong in this exodus?
"…….," I ran a shaky hand through my long black hair. Biting my lips.
J……what trouble did you get yourself in now……?
"……."
Come to think of it, Terra IS in the company of an alien……
"Do you really think you can do it, Noir?"
"….," I gaze up at the 'assassin'.
Pulsade's face is desperate. Frighteningly emotional. It sinks in deeper than tranquilizers.
"Do you really think you can take on the full force of Death? There is nothing in this City that will aid you in saving the Titans. This is the lion's den of the proverbial Babylon collapsing all around us and all you can do is dig….dig….dig!"
"…….," I kept gripping to Myrkblade. Eyeing her warily. Allowing her monologue to come and go….as always…
But….with Pulsade? It was very strange. Very strange indeed….
"Only a fool would go balls first into Gotham City when there's so much else to be done. What Michael has led me to see is downright frightening. Noir…we MUST find Terra! We must find Terra NOW! Jinx and I….we can hide her. We can hide her until the storm is over. The REAL storm."
Fat chance……
I frowned at her.
Who are you to tell me what to do? You don't know Terra. I don't know her either, but I feel her a hell of a lot more than you ever would. The Construction that flows through her vessels. The throbbing white power of it all. The Blood of Earth in gold and ivory. Ana's breath and the summer wind. I feel Terra as much as I feel Red Aviary and I'm not about to have a couple of estranged lesbian fallouts induct her into a runaway clan!
I billowed Myrkblade full of murk and shoved it Pulsade's way, forcing her back.
If I choose to go balls first into this nightmare, that's not your concern. As paradoxical a statement as that is……
"You're insane, Noir! Completely off your bike!" she growled. "Do yourself a favor….do Terra and the Titans a favor….back off….back off from the Red…."
I gritted my teeth, frowning.
Don't tell me what to do. This City was built on insanity. I'm no newcomer to the mortal coil being twisted about a serpent's tongue here……
Then at some point, she didn't back away from the sharp tip of my blurring blade. She gazed at me with the tired eyes of a woman suddenly and droned: "Michael….w-was right….don't you understand, Noir?"
"…….."
"I…..," she bit her tongue once, fought off the last of her cold stubbornness, and exhaled: "I-I want to help you……"
I shuddered.
"We need each other. You and I and Jinx and Terra….there are greater things than Red Aviary at work here….this is the shallow waters of a turbulent sea storm to come. Don't you care about…the Gaia Sphere?"
A breath escaped me. Warm. Earthy. Like it was sucked out of me by a raping predator. I shook and nearly caved in on myself.
Gaia Sphere……
I'm……I-I'm keeping track of that……
Aren't I?
William B. Fox……Wayne Corps……Lexcorp……
The essences of Terra.
Dagger……Triangular……
I helplessly wrenched a metal hand over my face.
Wanting to implode….
Names. Names. Names. Name.
I sighed….painfully. Sorrowfully.
Why is nothing ever concrete anymore?
The Titans.
Their hands……
I forget……
I forget…………
"Noir…."
I looked up at her.
Pulsade crept up. Slowly. Sincerely. Her lips parted and spoke with a gentleness I envisioned only being reserved for Jinx prior to then and there: "Let us work together. Let us relax and….escape the deaths together so that we can investigate an even greater terror. Something….that might affect the whole Earth. Something….th-that will ensnare the entire univ…--"
FWOOOOSH! PL-PLANT! TH-THWIP!
A leather whip encircled Pulsade's ankle.
The British assassin gasped.
"….," Catwoman smirked. She snarled and yanked hard at the whip.
Pulsade's body flew up like the weighted end of a mace.
I gasped and half-reached for her--….
FWOOOOSH!
Pulsade was flung off the buildingside. She twirled and landed awkwardly across the top of a semi-truck trailor speeding beneath the buildingside. Weakened from the unexpected toss and impact, the blonde was carried back into the cloaking darkness from which she came.
And her words lingered about me like poison knives hung on strings.
"There….now isn't that a job well done?" Catwoman smirked.
"…….," I found myself gazing beyond the buildingside.
Lingering….
The night hadn't felt so cold for but a moment. Snow was as much a fictitious thing as it was nonexistent.
Hull……what have you told the girls?
What have you told Counter-Red Aviary that you haven't told me?
Is it my right to know?
And will it help me……find out what happened to J?
"Noir!"
I realized that Catwoman was speaking to me directly.
I looked at her.
"Are you all right?"
Why don't you grow your hair out, dye it black, switch to something skimpier and call yourself 'Diana'?
"Do you know who that optical ninja was?" Catwoman folded her arms and frowned like a disgruntled cat. "I swear….things are only getting more and more confusing. You should have seen the look on poor Commissioner Gordon's face…."
Then….
From Catwoman's jumpsuit.
Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep!
Catwoman brightened. She whipped out a plastic device with an LCD screen. She smiled and rang forth: "Success…..Amelia has found something…."
"……..," I stared at her.
She glanced back at me. "Amelia….my cat in the industrial section. Her mic has picked up the Ventriloquist's voice with a vocal recognition of a factor of ninety-five percent."
"……," I leaned forward.
Catwoman breathed: "He's in a warehouse. Industrial district. On the corner of Brilliance Avenue and Squall Street. Warehouse Storage B. It's supposed to be abandoned…..heh…..always a warehouse."
"……," I nodded.
Catwoman walked towards me. "Quick! If we both hurry there, we might find the Ventriloquist in the act of exploiting William Fox. Better yet, we m-might….even find…..f-f-find………..nnngh…..," and Catwoman suddenly slumped forward in a dazed manner.
I caught her with a hooked right arm. My metal arm held up a littered tranquilizer bullet. A tranquilizer bullet that I had stealthily pricked Catwoman's forearm with while she was talking to me. Now she was unconscious, and I was minus a female partner.
Just as well……
Pulsade is right.
I am killing myself.
This mission at the moment is mine and mine alone.
I need not drag anyone else into the line of Red Aviary.
I knew this feeling to be true because—even as I gently lowered Catwoman to the rooftop and reclined her slumbering body—I felt the chills. The shaking and shivering in my metal arm.
He's getting closer.
He knows that I'm learning……and learning more……
Rrrred Aviary……
I took a cold, vaporous breath and picked the plastic sensor out of her hands.
I followed the blinking LCD display across the City.
Blurring.
Hurrying.
I better move and move now.
And the Batman beacon blinked constantly in my pocket….nearly neglected….
T-T-T-T-T-T-
9:23 pm
Industrial district.
Warehouse Storage B.
T-T-T-T-T-T-
CRACK!
I kicked the door down and dashed into the warehouse.
CHIIIING!
I held Myrkblade up high.
I glanced around.
Black eyes peering into utter blackness.
Blackness……
"………..?" I craned my neck.
No lights?
I looked left.
I looked right.
No bulbs were lit.
No candles.
Nothing to rescue the shadowed interior from the red night outside.
The place was barren…dusty….haphazard…wasted….
With no sign of the Ventriloquist or his two favorite goons or Fox.
"………"
What is this? Another trap?
I felt the chill in my arm. But it was haunting. Distant. Not on the back of my neck like so many other times Red Aviary had been. But he was there. Somewhere. In the City. Hunting me down. Foot by foot. Inch by inch. He barely missed me on the zeppelin….I would be a sitting duck in some abandoned warehouse.
And yet, I crept forward.
A frickin' 'reconnaissance cat' can't be wrong……
………right?
Gawd, this City is so crazy……
I crept forward through the shadows.
Nothing but darkness.
Swarming….like opaque mist.
And then….
I nearly bumped into it.
A station. A computer station. Seated for just one person.
"………," I walked around it and gazed at the seat before the dusty desk.
Hmm……
My black eyes narrowed, visually estimating…..
Yes……I suppose it could sit someone Fox's height.
There was a distant sound.
Like rushing wind.
"!" I spun with Myrkblade raised.
Panting.
Who the Hell is that?
My heart was beating heavily. Both Red Aviary and Pulsade I could somehow sense when they were sneaking up on me.
But this?
Who the Hell is this?
"………….," I gazed around the warehouse.
Silence.
Silence…..
Silence…………
"……………."
………………………
SWOOOOOSH!
I gasped.
I spun around.
Someone was gliding down at me in a blue streak.
Gliding!
SMACK!
A fist to the sternum. But not just any ordinary 'fist to the sternum', but an expert fist that struck five nerve joints at once and filled my torso with a gun trigger burning sensation that made me wish I had the vocal cords to scream as ever.
TH-THWUMP!
Before I knew it, I was being tripped and forced—rolling—along the floor of the warehouse towards a moonlit window.
I grunted.
The body was gliding at me again. Landing. Running, jumping, karate-kicking.
THWOOOSH!
I jumped up and flipped over the karate kick. No sooner was I airborne that I felt a strong pair of arms—arms fit to break bricks—wrap nimbly around my upper shoulder like a psychotic ballet dancer and fling me around with two centripetal force swings.
I knew where I was headed. I could feel the breaking glass before my black eyes registered the image of the warehouse window I was being thrown through.
T-T-T-T-T-T-
CRAAAAAASSSSSSSH!
I shattered through the pane and landed on the rooftop of a building partition next to the warehouse.
I was bleeding…bruised…and still burning from the near-paralyzing punch to the sternum.
The blue-streak glided around me.
A rustle of wind, and I sensed the figure landing. Fake 'wings' closed under his armpits. An elastic pair of prosthetics to a body suit.
A human being.
Powerless……but powerful.
A spectre.
Who in God's name?
It wasn't until halfway through trying to stand up on my wobbling feet that I realized the beacon to Batman was no longer blinking in my pocket. It was if someone somewhere cut the signal off on the receiving end.
And then I gasped.
Gazing at the subject before me.
Is it……?
Could it be……?
But no. His voice was different. Younger. Breathier and angstier.
"Looking for death, Noir? It does seem to follow you an awful lot wherever you go these days. But not anymore…."
I shuddered and limped backwards from the shadow.
He emerged in the red aura of the night's sky. Eyemask thin and long black hair fluttering icily in the snowless wind.
"…it's about time justice caught up with you," Nightwing said. "I'm here to make sure of it….."