The

BAT.

1.The Dark Knight.

Gotham City

October 30th, (2000)

Gotham City was a bustling, dark city located in the state of New Jersey of North America, it's population 4,912,032, with blended cultural characteristic traits of Chicago and New York City. It was also rife with corruption, poverty, pollution and numerous crime waves. The city's motto was "Sic Parvis Magna". Gotham was founded sometime in 1724 by a little known architect named William Gotham, though some sources seemed to discredit that account.

On this dark and stormy night, in a suburban Halloween decorated neighborhood on the Chicago cultural side of Gotham, inside the Donovan household, 9-year old Tommy Donovan laid in his bed in his dark bedroom, with the covers pulled over his head, listening to the sounds of the rain and thunder going on outside. His Dad was obviously asleep at this hour and he knew for a fact that his Mom was too. They both had to work tomorrow, just as he had school tomorrow.

A fearful Tommy slowly pulled the covers down from his head, unveiling his long neck-length 80s bowl-cut styled blond hair and blue eyes. It wasn't that he was afraid of rain, thunder and lightening, he'd passed that fear at age 7. No, tonight's fear had nothing to do with the storm that was happening outside all over Gotham. It actually had to do with something scarier. Something way, way, WAY scarier. Or someone. If it could even be labled as that.

As hard as he tried not to think about it, the nursery rhyme that had terrified the children of Gotham for six years sang in his head in the voices of the 10/11/12-year old gang members, who had made up the creepy nursery to scare little kids.

"Beware the Dark Knight, who watches all the time, stalking the city from the shadows, to stop all kinds of crime. He watches you in your house, he watches you in your bed. Commit no crimes, children of Gotham, or The Bat will come for you instead."

That whole rhyme was scary, but the lines that jumped out at Tommy the most re-played in his head.

"He watches you in your house, he watches you in your bed. Commit no crimes, children of Gotham, or The Bat will come for you instead."

Those words made him feel unsafe in his own home and in his own bed, both of which where he was now. In his house...and in his bed. He had never committed a crime as far as he knew, but that didn't make him feel any less fearful. Tommy knew it was just a nursery rhyme the gangs made up to frighten little kids, but it was hard to dismiss the whole thing as just a scare tactic when the one it was talking about was real. Not only real, but here in Gotham. He couldn't help but take it seriously, 'cause...what kid in Gotham wouldn't?

He wondered who the Dark Knight would be coming for tonight. Gotham was filled all kinds of bad guys, so there most definitely would be another encounter tonight as there had been every other night before. He just hoped he wouldn't be him...as he had every other night. He wasn't a bad guy or anything, but...somehow that didn't make him feel any safer.

Tommy then snapped out of his thoughts when he saw a bat/human-like shadow with long pointed ears on the floor of his room coming from the white blind-closed window. His eyes went wide. Had his fears been confirmed? had the Dark Knight come for him tonight, even though he wasn't a bad guy? The 9-year old boy closed his eyes tight and kept them shut for a moment before opening them, revealing the shadow to be now gone.

"(Sighs) Just my imagination." Tommy sighed with relief. He was wrong, the Dark Knight hadn't come for him tonight. A loud explosion of thunder with a bright flash of lightening then scared the boy, making him pull the covers back over his head. It seemed he would be getting no sleep tonight.

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