Harvey
Dent was crouched on his bunk in his cell, the moon light the only illumination
in his stone prison. Absently he thumbed
a double headed coin, his signature. One
side was as shiny as the day it was minted, the other charred black and
scarred. He adjusted the collar to his
bright orange jump suit. An enveloped
slid under his door. He gave it a side
long glance, flipping the coin.
Beneath
Arkham lay the flooded basement. Once a
boiler room it was repurposed into a containment cell for a prisoner so
dangerous that not even Blackgate prison could hold him. Something large and powerful stirred the
black water, causing a few bubbles to surface.
From a grate above, a black envelope fell onto the concrete landing at
the edge of the murky, man made swamp. A
vaguely man shaped head surfaced, two red eyes peered that the letter.
Deula
Dent bounced a tennisball off the walls of her cell. She’d been placed at the end of the hall to
avoid disturbing the other “patients” but allowing her the tennisball often
kept her calm and complacent with the guards.
Her short, spikey hair was cropped and pulled away from her thin, pale
face. She giggled quietly to herself as
she bounced the ball, her pixie like frame pulled inward at odd angles. A knock came to her door and she caught the
ball. “Who is it?” she asked. It was too late at night for an orderly,
certainly nowhere near feeding time. Her
feeding slot slid open and a black envelope was pushed through with a flat
black box tied with a green ribbon. She
took the box and envelope quickly and the slot closed shut. She opened the box and, upon seeing it’s
contents gave a wide, wild eyed grin.
Dr.
Johnathan Crane paced his cell. Given
his former stature as head of the asylum, he was afforded a few liberties. His cell was not the same cold stone as the
others. His had a thin layer of carpet
and tiled walls that he kept pristine.
Still, not even the cold comfort of his obcessive compulsive disorder
could calm his nerves. His wriy body was
hunched over as he moved his hand furitively.
An envelope slid under his door.
Nervously he picked up the envelope and opened it. It contained a carefully folded white
paper. As he unfolded it, numbers
appeared. “Three...” he said aloud. “Two...one...” the lights all across the
asylum flickered off replaced by red emergency lights. Claxion alarms sounded as the heavy bolts
that secured the cell doors released.
Guards began racing about as screams of rage and roars of pain emerged
from the inmates. Crane smiled. “Its about time.”
“Mr. Wayne!” Carrie called,
skidding to a halt outside his study. “You
need to see this!” she snatched up the remote off the end table and flicked on
the big screen television. A blonde
woman came onto the screen with a severe expression on her face “We bring you
to the outside of Arkham Asylum where a massive riot has erupted within the
walls. Police and asylum security staff
are struggling to push back the building’s dangerous inmate population. The seige has been going on for approximately
an hour now...”
Carrie
ran out of the room. “Carrie, where are
you going?” Bruce called after her. “Arming
up, sir. It takes an hour to get from
Arkham to here.”
With
that, the front doors of the manor burst open and ten men in inmate uniforms
burst in wielding makeshift knives and clubs.
Five tore up the stairwell upon seeing Bruce. Slashing outward with his shive, Bruce deftly
caught his wrist and twisted him around, planting a foot square in his sternum,
where he heard a satisfying crack. For
good measure, Bruce struck down on the inmate’s forarm with his elbow, snapping
the bones within.
He
kicked outward and sent the unconcious assailant sprawling into the one behind
him. He saw three advancing on Carrie,
but now had two more to deal with, each of them calling out and cursing the
name “Wayne.”
Carrie
hadn’t made it to her firearm yet, but she didn’t need it. She was a graduate of Charles MacPherson
Academy for Butlers and Household Managers, but prior to that had served four
years in the USMC. “Lets get the maid!”
one of the inmates shouted. Carrie, to
her credit, saw red and caught the speaker in the throat with an open
palm. Gagging, he staggerd back and fell
unconcious, unable to breath. The next
one she tore into with a hard forward kick, catching him in the chest and
sending him backwards down the stairwell.
One lashed out with a makeshift club, which she snatched away, spun, and
plowed into the side of his skull, causing his nose to explode blood over the
far wall.
Wayne
moved with speed that belied his age, snatching away weapons and rendering foes
unconcious without regard to how they would function when they woke. If they woke.
One came up behind him bringing a kitchen knife to his throat. Bruce rocked his head back, throwing the
assailant off balance, allowing him to spin in place and crash his forehead
into the thug’s nose. Temporarily
blinded, the thug stumbled back and down the stairs. The comotion brought the others from the
ground level up to fill the ranks of the fallen, but even then they were no
match for the combined might. When one
was left semi alert, he looked blearily at Carrie. “Thats a hell of a maid.” He muttered. Carrie leaned into his face, anger twisting
her face. “I’m the goddamn butler.”
Straightening
her shirt, Carrie turned to Bruce. “Sir...there
is a crisis in the city. I’m afraid I’m
going to have to disclose to you, I know you are the Batman.”
“Was...Carrie. I was the Batman.”
She
looked past him to the pile of half dead lunatics. “I’d say, sir, that you are still very much
the Batman. Gotham needs you.” She walked into the study and turned the
grandfather clock hands to 10:47. The
clock gave a small click and a panel on the wall groaned to life, pulling to
the right and exposing a dark tunnel leading down. Bruce’s eyes darkened.
“I’m
sorry, Mr. Wayne. I know I should not
have pried, but I had my suspicions and after some investigation, well...”
“Why?”
Carrie
didn’t bother asking for clarification.
The dark tone in his voice made the intent of the question very
clear. “You stopped the Joker, sir, but
not before he killed my mother and crippled my father with the Smilex gas. We lived off the parade route, my parents
wanted nothing to do with the parade, but that didn’t stop the gas from
spreading out before you destroyed the balloons.”
Bruce
led her down the tunnel. “There should
be more cobwebs here.” He noted.
“About
that. I’ve been cleaning. I was hired to ensure the whole house was
clean. The crew took care of the rest of
the manor. I handled the cave.”
“All
by yourself?”
“What
did you think I did while you were at Wayne Enterprises all day?”
“Honestly
I thought you slept.” She smiled at
that, and the sound of their foot falls echoed off the thick rock walls. The tunnel swelled out into a massive
caveren. A bank of computer monitors
dominated the far wall. A motorcycle
rested in the center of the chamber, on a massive turntable that bridged the
command center with a long narrow stretch of rock that led into another
tunnel. “We’ll need a new car.” Bruce
mused.
“In
the meantime, the cycle will suffice. We
don’t really have time to re-equip the heavier stuff, but your belt and your
suit are cleaned and ready. I can
coordinate from here.” She danced her
fingers across the keyboard and a red light appeared on the control panel. “The manor is secured. No more unexpected visitors.”
The
Batman spoke from the shadows in a cold voice that it sent chills up her
spine. “Then we need to go to work.”
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