Something wasn't right. The fighting in the mess hall couldn't be contained and it was spilling out into the rest of Blackgate.
Something like this shouldn't have happened. Bruce knew the safeguards in place for the prison to quell riots, the protocols the guards were to follow should the prisoners try a hostile takeover.
Yet, none of them seemed to be put into effect. The guards should have forced the riot into the mess hall and locked the inmates in. Like a burning flame consuming oxygen, the fighting would go on until the inmates took each other out one-by-one. Eventually the number of combatants would decrease until the guards could safely take control.
That clearly hadn't happened and the fighting was growing instead of decreasing. Even now, Bruce was following behind Bane as he led the way through the prison's corridors. As an inmate ran screaming at him, holding up a lead pipe, the large man slowed to a stop. The moment the pipe was swung at him, he shot a hand out and stopped the attack, grabbing the man by his arm. Yanking it to one side, Bane then threw a massive punch with his other hand, slamming into the man's face. With that same hand, he then grabbed onto the convict's shirt, Bane twisting his body to one side. He threw the man into the wall next to them, a loud BANG! echoing down the corridor as the wall cracked from where it had been hit.
Bruce watched as the inmate collapsed to the floor in a heap, Bane having moved onto another charging prisoner. Glancing behind him, he could see a few other men fighting each other, a swarm of body parts that were punching and kicking each other.
Again, he didn't see the guards. It was like they had vanished. A wild scream rang out and Bruce turned his head back to see Bane with his hands on his latest opponent. One hand gripped a wrist and the other the shoulder. It was quite clear he bent the man's arm in a way it wasn't meant to be bent and the bone had broken. In fact, a jagged piece was sticking out of the man's arm, blood dripping off of the wound. Bane then yanked the man off of the floor, slamming his back into the wall and dropping him.
"Keeping up, Mr. Wayne?" the giant man called out over his shoulder as he kept moving forward.
"So far!" he shouted back. "You're not getting tired, are you?"
"Heh, this little fight? This is nothing," Bane assured him. "These men are nothing compared to the savages in Peña Duro."
Bruce had expected as much, the two men marching down the hallway they were in. "Any idea where we're going?" he asked.
"A safe place for you." Coming up to two convicts wrestling with each other, their arms wrapped around each others' heads as they fought for leverage, Bane just grabbed each man by the back of their collars. He pulled them apart as he raised them both into the air, each one dangling for a moment before they began to reach up to pry the man's hands from them. Bane then slammed the two against each other before he swung them apart, throwing them into opposite walls. "This place is filled with violent people."
Yeah, imagine that.
With Bane taking care of the threats around them, it gave the dark-haired man a moment to think. The lack of guards was nagging at him still and he felt that was the reason behind this riot. He knew Zorbatos was a stickler for obedience, from her men and prisoners. Now, while it was quite possible that her men were trying some unknown tactic to put down the riot, it didn't seem to be having much of an effect.
Or, an even darker reason, they weren't trying to stop it.
Up ahead, there was an intersecting hallway. Bane marched towards it, but gave off every indication he was going to pass by it. However, as he reached it, a mob of men flooded out of the intersecting corridor, ramming into the large man and forcing him into the wall next to him. Each inmate seemed to have a job, a few of them doing their best to keep Bane pinned while a few began attacking him. From where Bruce stood, he saw one man throwing punch after punch into Bane's back and side, kidney shots that caused the Santa Priscan to flinch.
That simply wouldn't do.
Marching up to the gathered mob, Bruce went right for the man sucker punching Bane. He raised up a foot and stomped it onto the back of the man's knee, causing it to buckle. The man cried out as he dropped to one knee, which left him wide open for Bruce to raise an arm up, bending it at the elbow. With a jerk of his arm, he rammed his elbow into the side of the inmate's head, forcing him to one side until the opposite side of his face bashed against the wall. He went limp as he fell to the floor shortly after.
This immediately drew the attention of the convict next to him, who was doing his best to hold Bane still. As he turned his head to look at Bruce, the dark-haired man shot a hand out and grabbed him by the collar. Pulling the man towards him, Bruce threw his head forward, landing a headbutt against his target's nose. There was a crunching sound, blood squirting out of the man's nostrils as he cried out.
That's when Bane managed to wrench an arm up into the air. Lashing out with it, he swung the arm down and towards his back, turning his body so that he could hit as many people as he could. Bruce saw the arm coming and ducked, which was just in time as a convict had moved behind him to attack. Instead, he took the back of Bane's fist to his face, knocking him back and crushing him against the wall, the back of his head bashing against cement.
That's when the large man took over as he began to fight off the mob surrounding him. Bruce chose to back away so that he didn't get caught up in it.
He didn't get too far, however. A hand suddenly touched his back and then the cool touch of metal touched his neck. "Not one move, Wayne," a voice growled from behind him.
The hand on his back suddenly moved, grabbing onto his arm. Bruce felt himself tugged backwards, ultimately moving into the intersecting hallway. The cool metal turned into a sharp edge, alerting him to the blade that was clearly pressed against his throat. He did his best to walk backwards, but his balance was thrown off by the man behind him.
"That's a good rich kid," the man behind him said. "You're coming with me now. The boss wants to see you."
Oh, the boss wanted to see him? Well, Bruce wanted to see him too. And now he had a pretty good idea as to who was behind this riot.
Lady Shiva. The very name sent shivers down the spines of even the bravest of men. She was ruthless, skilled, and deadly. She left only the dead wherever she went, bloody carnage the likes that could not be replicated. She was worshiped as the Hindu Goddess Shiva incarnate, the Destroyer of Worlds.
And she had a wayward daughter she had failed to bring to heel.
This entire time, it had been her. Shiva had covered her tracks well, making her invisible to all. The first clue was the long forgotten bed in the Talon's training dojo. A cot with a made bedspread and knife, waiting there as if a mother had made the bed herself. Perhaps she did.
Her protege, Orphan, the cruelly named David Cain, was beaten. The Birds of Prey had taken him away, whether to the GCPD, a hospital, or their own personal holding cell, Batgirl didn't know or care. She wasn't in the mood to lock him up herself, or see to it he received medical attention.
No, she needed to go pay her so-called mother a visit.
And where was she this night? In a city so large, she chose the scene of the crime, the one that had started this sorry affair.
Batgirl landed on the roof of Wayne Tower. This was where Orphan claimed his master was and he wasn't wrong. Standing at the roof's ledge, a lone figure stood out against the city's skyline. The hem of a trench coat floated in the breeze, ruffling like a flag.
Batgirl wanted nothing more than to storm up to her and deck the woman in the face. She was too well-trained for that; she also knew better than to do that. Shiva would as soon as break her wrist for such an offense, even if it was her daughter committing the act.
So she glided across the roof, just like her father would have and came to a stop a short distance away. The same could not be said for her company. She could hear the tromping of footsteps from her Batclan. There had been insistence from the Birds of Prey on coming the moment they heard that Lady Shiva was back in town, but someone had to make certain Orphan didn't vanish into thin air. They wouldn't be of much help, no matter how much they wished to be. It was no fault of their own either; Shiva was just that good.
There was a reason her father warmed them all not to face her, after all.
"You've finally come," Lady Shiva announced, turning around to face them all. She had her hands shoved into the pockets of her trench coat, the coat buttoned up to hide whatever outfit she wore. Her hair was longer than the last time Batgirl had seen her, allowing her to have it pulled up into a ponytail, one that hung past her shoulders. "And with friends, I see."
"And you should have stayed away," Batgirl shot back. She kept her cape behind her back, showing her entire body to her mother. She wanted to show this woman that she had nothing to hide, nothing she needed to disguise for an advantage. She also wanted to show the Bat Symbol that graced her chest.
"What mother would I be if I did that?" Shiva said mockingly. "I have to check in on my wayward daughter from time to time after all."
"You could have just sent a postcard."
A smirk appeared on the woman's face. "If it is not too much trouble, could you ask your little friends to leave? This is a private conversation."
"Like hell am I her friend," Damian spat back. This earned him a glance from Shiva.
"Oh? And what is the little princling doing here?" She eyed the boy, looking him up and down. "Are the children finally getting along?"
"It is a temporary truce, nothing more," the boy snapped back. "Once you are dealt with, I will finish what I started."
Shiva just looked bemused by this. "This is about to get quite personal for you," she addressed Batgirl. "Are you certain you want everyone to hear?"
Batgirl glanced over her shoulder at the others. Whatever was spoken here, it wouldn't change much of anything for the Batclan. However, as for the Birds…
There were two of the four Birds here, chaperones as Huntress said. Black Canary and Manhunter were seeing to Orphan, which left Huntress and Katana to follow along. They were the only ones that could stand a chance against Lady Shiva, even if it were only for a few seconds. Yet, they did not know who Batman was and he would not want his identity being learned by every vigilante in the city.
"I'm sorry, but could you give us some privacy?" she asked, directing her question towards Huntress.
"And leave you with a mass murderer?" the purple-clad woman responded pointedly. "That's not going to happen."
"They're welcome to hear everything I will say," Shiva called out pleasantly, "so long as you're alright with exposing some very sensitive secrets. Or I can strike them down for you and ensure their silence."
Yes, taunt her still. Even now she was dangling secrets over her head. How was that still an effective weapon? "I have this," she urged Huntress. "I've beaten her once and I will do so again if I need to."
"You beat Shiva?" Huntress looked between the two women, her head going back and forth. "Now this I have to see."
"We will be leaving," Katana announced as she was suddenly at her comrade's side. "But we will not go far."
Huntress looked to the Asian woman. "Since when—"
"This is between family and thus makes it personal," she interjected. "Unless you are willing to tell Batgirl and her Batclan your identity, then we must leave."
The purple-clad vigilante grimaced. "Alright, we'll do it your way." She then looked towards Batgirl. "The moment a punch is thrown, we're back in this, okay?"
She nodded and the two Birds backed away, dropping over the side of the building and out of sight. Returning her sights to Shiva, she saw her mother eyeing Bluebird and Spoiler. "And these two?" she questioned.
"They already know enough," she said. "Nothing you say will change much."
"Oh? That's a surprising level of trust. Did you tell them or did they figure it out themselves?"
"They figured it out. They're smarter than they look."
Shiva glanced at the girls again. "I'll be sure to remember that."
"That wasn't a dig at us, was it?" Bluebird whispered to Spoiler, trying to keep her voice low and not really succeeding.
"Just take the compliment," Spoiler replied back.
Lady Shiva then moved a leg, as if she were about to take a step. She then dropped down from the ledge, touching down on the roof, sauntering towards the Batclan. She stopped in front of Batgirl, gazing at her bemusedly. "I imagine you have some questions."
"Why?" she raspily demanded. "Why did you do all of this?"
"Getting to the heart of the matter, I see." Shiva lost her amusement as her face became stoic. "I wanted to test your resolve."
"So you had my father locked up because of a test?" she seethed.
"I did. You weren't the only one being tested." Shiva closed her eyes for a moment. "I wanted to see how much faith he had in you; if he trusted you enough to free him. I fully expected he would stage his own escape long before now."
"So he passed?"
"He did. As for you…"
"What, did I fail?" Batgirl said mockingly.
"Not yet, but you've taken longer than I expected."
"Not all of us are my father when it comes to investigating."
"I see that. It is a shame he didn't share more of that with you."
"Maybe if you were more involved, you could have."
"Okay, I think we're getting a little off-track here," Bluebird announced, causing both women to look towards her. "We're not here for…whatever this is. We came to bust the big, bad assassin lady."
"Bust me? But you have little to no proof I was involved." Shiva's coyness was back. "You simply cannot link me to whatever crime you believe I've committed."
"Then confess," Batgirl snapped. "That will more than suffice."
"I will not—not without seeing what you've figured out," Shiva replied.
So she wanted to play it this way? Fine, so be it. "You went to Fairchild's apartment the night of the gala," she began. "No doubt she was getting ready to meet my father. Knowing you, you knocked on the door, she answered, and then you hit her with the nerve strike."
A small smile appeared on Shiva's face. "You found that, did you?"
Batgirl nodded. "I've fought your protege, Orphan. He doesn't have the skill to perform such a technique."
"Quite right. Please, do go on."
"After knocking out Fairchild, you got onto her computer and uploaded various entries, ones specifically pertaining to Batman. Then you deleted them. Those weren't for the police so much as for me, trying to make me believe that my father had a reason to want her dead; that he needed to protect his identity.
"Then you took Fairchild to Wayne Enterprises. Wearing her coat and Orphan wearing one from Wayne Manor, you walked through the building, pretending to be Wayne and Fairchild. At some point, you sabotaged the security cameras, making certain they went down after you were seen going into Wayne's office. Once the cameras were down, you then snuck Fairchild into the office and waited for her to wake up.
"When she did, she tried to flee into the bathroom. Either you or Orphan broke the door down and dragged her out, beating her senseless. Then, as she laid on the floor, you turned on the recording app on Fairchild's phone and taped her begging for her life, right before one of you killed her."
"You still have questions on which one of us did it?" Shiva questioned.
"Does it really matter?" Batgirl returned.
"I would think it would. After all, if we were both involved, one of us performed the kill and the other assisted. That is a very stark difference in this country's legal system."
Batgirl stared at the woman. "Based off of the brutality of the beating, I'm betting you let Orphan do it. He's clearly of the same build of my father, so any injuries he caused would be in line with a man of that size."
"Very good, but that still doesn't answer who killed the reporter."
"You're not one to keep your hands clean. I'm willing to bet once Orphan was done with the beating, you were the one to pull the trigger. After all, you had Orphan steal the gun from Thomas Wayne's office, even leaving a partial footprint behind for us to follow."
"Keep going."
"After you killed Fairchild, wearing gloves with Bruce Wayne's fingerprints on it to ensure his were the only ones to be found, you then placed the gun in a plastic bag and hid it in the toilet, ensuring the police would find it and the prints."
"It seems you have figured out a lot," Shiva said approvingly. "Not everything, but most of it."
"That's because she left out the text messages from the cloned phone," Damian interjected. "The same phone I found in my mother's desk."
"So you did find the phone." Shiva actually perked up at the mentioning of the phone. "I imagine Talia was quite distraught when you found it."
"So she was in on it too," the boy pressed.
A coy smile was on the woman's face. "No, she was not. I placed the phone there for you to find."
Damian's face paled. "You… you were…"
Shiva spun on her heels and walked back towards the ledge, but didn't hop up on it. "So far you have laid out a rather convincing version of the events of the murder," she announced. "But you have failed to disclose Orphan's role in this."
"Aside from him being a helper? He was just a red herring to convince us the Court of Owls was returning," Batgirl countered.
"Ohh, so you figured that out as well." Shiva spun back around, a glint in her eyes. "Care to guess where I found him?"
"He was a Talon—" she began.
"Nope," Shiva cut her off.
That caused the girl to frown. "He knew of the training facility. The footprint he left at Wayne Manor led us to the entrance beneath the Powers Hotel."
"The former headquarters for the Court. As you said, they were just a red herring."
So…Orphan wasn't a Talon? Had he pretended to be? After all, he called her traitor.
Unless he wasn't specifically referring to her betraying the remains of the Court of Owls. So who would she be betraying? Her eyes stared at Shiva, which gave her all the answer she needed.
"Orphan called me a traitor," she began. "At the time, I figured he meant I betrayed the Court; now though, he must have meant I betrayed you. Instead of following your footsteps, I chose someone else."
"He said that, did he? How loyal of him." Shiva actually sounded surprised at this revelation.
Batgirl stared at her. "Where did you find him?"
Lady Shiva spared a glance towards Damian. "Perhaps I shall give you that one. I am feeling kind at the moment." She returned her attention to Batgirl. "He was a promising trainee under the Demon's Head."
The Demon's Head… Ra's al Ghul. Damian's grandfather. "You went to Ra's al Ghul? He couldn't have been the reason you went to him."
"Perhaps not him specifically, but I did approach Ra's. You see, he had the resources I needed to carry out this plan and he was quite willing to assist me. However, he did have one condition."
"And what was that condition?" Damian demanded.
"That I also test the resolve of his daughter and grandson. You see, he is quite disappointed that his progeny have not furthered their ambitions beyond what they have." At this point, Lady Shiva was staring directly at Damian. "I would not have made a move against you without his permission; I respect him that much. So with his blessing, I placed the cloned phone in your mother's desk and watched."
Damian's hands slowly clenched into fists. "What have you done with my mother?" he growled.
"Now you care after you fled from her?" she replied mockingly. "I have not done anything to her, aside from damaging your strong relationship, I suppose. At this time, her father is keeping her out of our little game."
"Am I under some test too?"
"Yes, you are. I will admit, I did not expect you to go to my daughter for assistance for as long as you have."
"You know, for once, I'm glad Cullin's my only family," Bluebird remarked. "I don't think I could handle all of this intrigue and assassins."
"Me too," Spoiler agreed.
"That just leaves one last thing," Batgirl announced, trying to get the confession back on track. "So you found Orphan training under Ra's, no doubt trying to find a near match to Bruce Wayne. You then took him, trained him to fight me, and even gave him Venom in aerosol form. Why then, did you have him call himself David Cain?"
"I wanted to see what you would do, dear daughter," Shiva replied. "So now I must ask: did you kill him? Did you kill him the way I would have if I ever met the real Cain?"
That confirmed it. She had suspected it since the chapel, but now she knew that Orphan, this fake David Cain, was designed with the sole purpose of driving her over the edge, making her want to kill him. That was his entire purpose.
Batgirl stood up straighter. "I did not."
"How disappointing."
"That's what he said."
"It seems you have figured everything out then. Now what?"
"Now I bring you in. You'll confess to the police that you did everything and you will free my father."
Shiva gazed at her. Suddenly she hopped up onto the ledge. She hadn't even looked when she did it, which spoke to her sharp awareness of her surroundings. "No, I don't think I will do that."
Batgirl took a threatening step towards her. "Yes, you will."
"Or what? Will you force me to? I believe that isn't admissible in your court of law."
"I'm certain they'll make an exception," she growled.
"Then you will need to earn it." Shiva pulled her hands out of her coat pockets, holding her arms out at shoulder height. That infuriating coy smile was on her face. "Starting now."
And then she leaned backwards and fell over the roof's edge.
Pushing a person didn't help them walk any faster. All it did was make them stumble, throw off their balance, and increase anxiety. If the goal was to make someone walk faster, it failed; as an intimidation technique, it held quite a few possibilities.
That was what Bruce thought as his captor forced him deeper into Blackgate. There were no longer any rioting inmates, just the occasional convict standing guard in the corridor. They would spot Bruce and his captor, watch them pass, and then join in behind. A couple even moved in front of him, leading the way. It was at this point that the blade pressed to his neck was removed.
As the number of inmate guards increased around the dark-haired man, he eyed each and every one. There were no clear weapons on them, though that didn't mean there weren't any, only that he didn't see them. He had one confirmed armed man, who was right behind him. He would have to be the first one to go down if Bruce tried to resist.
Could he take all of these men? Yeah, he could. Bruce Wayne couldn't, but Batman could. However, they wanted to take him somewhere specific, and he wanted to know where that was. Based off of the way these men moved, there was a swagger to their steps, one that was in line with how gangsters moved.
He had an idea of who would be at the end of the journey, so why resist when he was being led there?
Eventually, he was led to a door, one with another man in an orange jumpsuit guarding it. The moment he saw them approach, he opened the door, the group squeezing through. The lights were on, brightly lighting up a rather large room. It looked to be some sort of storage room, one with a few tables placed around, stacks of cardboard boxes placed in the middle of the room.
In front of one of these stacks was the Lion, sitting in a chair, flanked by his goons. Bruce had to resist the urge to narrow his eyes, instead keeping a deer-in-the-headlights look on his face. Behind him, the door was closed shut. "What's the meaning of this?" he loudly shouted. "Why are you—"
"Shut yer trap," the knife-wielding thug demanded from behind him. Then he called out to the Lion, "We're here, Boss."
"I can see that," Calabrese drawled. "Welcome to the safest room in all of Blackgate, Wayne."
There were too many ways to interpret that statement. "Safe? From that riot going on?" he ventured.
"Yes. No one will come to this room, not until long after we've done what we've come here to do."
Well, that didn't bode well. "I'm sorry, but I'm not—"
Suddenly, a foot struck the back of his knee, and Bruce yelped, dropping to one knee. His hands grabbed at the joint, feeling it throb from the kick. The knife was back at his throat, his captor grabbing onto his shoulder to hold him in place.
"I know, you have many questions, so let me get straight to the point." The Lion shifted in his seat as he made himself comfortable. "That riot is of my own making, all so I could bring you here. Consider it a show of force, if you will."
Yeah, he really wasn't liking where this was going. "You arranged it? But how? The guards—"
"Are in my pocket," Calabrese interrupted, finishing the statement for the dark-haired man. "It's not hard to curry favors if you know the right tactics, Wayne. Paying for a medical bill, giving a loan when someone is in a financial jam, so on and so forth. It's a simple matter of asking them to do something less than ethical as payment and then they are effectively owned."
Meaning the Lion blackmailed each and every guard into doing his bidding whenever he pleased. Bruce wondered how the warden would feel if she found out about her guards being indebted to a mobster. "So you started a riot to get me alone? Why?"
"If there is one thing I don't like, it's some pissant trying to muddy the waters, changing the status quo." The Lion leaned forward in his seat, clasping his hands together in front of him. "You had your chance to simply ignore my presence, Wayne, and you decided to throw it away. Unlike my daughter, I prefer to deal with the thorns in my sides rather than let them fester."
So this entire riot was so the Lion could corner him and kill him. That seemed like a lot of unnecessary carnage, but in a way, the riot would hide just who killed him. The Lion had enough loyalty that no one would point the finger at him.
There was just one thing he hadn't planned for.
Bruce leaned forward as much as he was allowed, the knife against his neck the only limit. He watched as the Lion's eyes darted up, no doubt to give his man the greenlight to slash his throat.
That was the moment he struck. Bruce flung his head back, the back of his skull hitting the man against his groin. It wasn't a full-powered punch or kick, but even a gentle graze in this area made most men flinch and that was what happened. His captor yelped as he jumped his lower body back, his upper body leaning over so that he could keep his knife at the ready. The billionaire shot his hands up them, grabbing onto the man's orange jumpsuit. He then promptly pulled his arms down, forcing the man to flip over him and crash face first into the floor. The man seemed to stand like that for a moment before the rest of his body flopped down, his legs landing on top of Bruce's shoulders.
More importantly, the knife was no longer against his neck.
Slowly, Bruce stood up, allowing the legs to drop off of him. "You know something, Calabrese?" he called out. He could see a few surprised looks on his men; clearly, they hadn't expected that. "I can't tell you how many times people have tried to rob me, hold me up, even threaten to kill me. It comes from living in a crime-ridden city like Gotham, something you're quite responsible for making.
"Eventually, a man gets tired of not being able to protect himself, so he learns self-defense." Bruce raised his hands up, cracking the knuckles of one before doing the same to the other. "And I am done cowering in front of men I know I can beat."
His voice then dropped a couple octaves, no longer the high-pitched, jovial Bruce Wayne tone. "So start as many riots as you want; send wave after wave of your goons after me. I'll send them back to you, beaten and broken."
A few of the gangsters straightened their posture, a sign of their offense at that statement. A few of them even pulled out knives and shanks in response. A scowl settled on Bruce's face. He was more than ready for whatever these men were about to throw at him.
A yell broke the silence then, coupled with a loud BANG! on the door. Bruce turned his head, just in time to see the door open, Bane strolling in. Behind him, the convict guarding the door lay slumped on the floor.
"I found you, Mr. Wayne," the hulk greeted him. "I hope I'm not too late."
"No, Bane, you're right on time." Bruce turned his head back to gaze at Calabrese and his men. "You're going to be earning your paycheck this evening, I'm afraid."
"I have no problem with that. I will gladly show them that quality trumps quantity every time."
To Guest: Sounds like you enjoyed the ride lol. Glad to hear it! No, sadly Zatanna won't be making a cameo in this story. Her reaction would be priceless, I'll admit lol
