Shadows of the Bat: Enigma
 

Timothy arrived home rather early, with a quick lie hear and there he explained the presence of a young friend who seemed quite unable to wake up. His mother accepted these excuses quite readily and helped as he set up bedding for the small child. After putting the kid in bed he turned the tv on with earphones, not that it would have awoken the boy without.

"Thanks for that report Cindy," Gayle's voice echoed with disdain for the younger prettier girl, she knew that history repeated itself and her job would one day be Cindy's. Timothy had missed the special report on The Blight Rabbits new series of toys from Wayne Enterprises... not that he minded, cause he hated that show. "It seems as if the Interpol Major Case Unit had one busy night, reporting the capture of a large portion of The Discarded including one of their leaders. The Discarded were a local low priority gang, their breakup is another victory for the IMCU against crime.

This victory is somber though, as SWAT Officer Riley was gunned down in the process of capturing a Contact of Scorcher, who had escaped Arkham earlier this afternoon. The services for Officer Riley are still undecided.

On another sad note for the Riley family, Jonathan Riley Co-Captain and Quarterback of Gotham High's Football team was attacked at the local College by the creature known as Amalgamite. It absorbed the watch on his wrist almost removing his hand along with it. The young Jonathan Riley was unable to comment but his families advisor had this to say."

A bespecticaled and vile looking man came into view, "The Riley family has had a very trying day, first they've lost a father and a provider, and their son has more then likely lost any chance at a sports scholorship. Sure a prostesis can be used to replace his hand but such devices are not allowed in college sports regardless of circumstance."

Gayle smiled as the camera returned its focus on her, "A local vigilante known only as Batman was killed In a valiant effort to save the teen. Amalgamite absorbed not only his suit but the majority of his body. Thus far identification of his body has been unsuccessful, Peace officers involved in the investigation are hopeful to find the fingers or teeth necessary to perform an identification.

This marks the 17 vigilante death this year, not including those vigilantes whom have disappeared, including them in the total would bring it to 29, giving this year the highest casualty rate for vigilantes yet. So on the note of safety we would like to end tonights report with a slideshow of those who have lost their lives to protect the city." Timothy shut off the tv before the camera faded, he didn't want to see that. 29 vigilantes so far and the year was far from over.

"What is going on?" Timothy sat awake in the darkness, not sure how he would sleep the rest of the night.

Robyn felt sheepish as she got home. It seemed as if Collateral was figuring out that she went easy on Freeze. Tearing off her costume and hiding it, tears came to Robyn's eyes.

"Dammit! I know that deep down, Kevin is a good kid! He's just misunderstood, that's all. Why can't anyone else see that and try to help him?"

She turned on her TV and ignored the news report as she buried her face in her pillow. Once the news was over, Robyn turned the channel to music videos as she grabbed her plushie Blight Rabbit. She clicked off her lamp as she went to sleep. She had decided in her final moments before rest that she would skip school tomorrow to try to see Kevin.

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As the limo halted at Wayne Enterprises, the driver opened the door for the man in back to get out. As the man put his foot on the concrete outside, he pulled his hat down to completely hide his face in shadow, only his grin could be seen. Grabbing his case, he breathed in the night air. The driver stood still, the expression on his face showing that he felt awkward. The man looked at the pitiful chaeuffer and chuckled.

"Run along now. You've served your purpose."

The Asylum guard got out of the limo and stood next to the man. He whispered something as the driver got back in the car. The man looked over his shoulder, grinning at the limo before he turned back to the guard and nodded. As the driver pulled away, he thought he heard a faint ticking sound. That guy must have left his watch... I'll just keep it! That'll teach that bastard to mess with good guys like me!

The limo made it a block down the street before an explosion was heard in the street. Nobody heard the driver's screams as the limo went up in flames. The Asylum guard already had a car waiting to take him back to his shift. As the man walked, case in hand, to the entrance to Wayne Enterprises, a voice came over the intercom system at the gate.

"Please state your business."

The man chuckled.

"No Cadmium run."

It was definitly late. A lot had happened. Demon sat on the rooftops watching the TV's in the pawn shop across the street. He saw some punk with a young kid on his back. Possible kidnapping, I'll worry about it tomorrow. Demon kept an eye on the TV's. He could go home to watch it, but he kind of wanted to get one kill in before he retired for the night.

After the news stopped, Demon decided to go hunting again. Instead of trying to hunt for vigilance, he would make them come to him. He found a high quality jewelry store, and so he broke in. He kicked in the door quite casually, and tore out the cameras as he found them. He broke the glass and threw everything in the middle. He sat in the corner and decided to wait for a vigilant to anwser the call.

It didn't take long. Some wanna-be punk. He looked like he was still fresh to the whole scene. He saw the jewelry in the middle, and was confused. Before he could do anything, Demon said "You know, if you had done a little more fighting, you would realize that this was a trap." The kid spun around and stood face to face to Demon. Of course, Demon was knealing down so he could scare the kid a bit more than he would standing up.

The kid jumped back, pulling out a bat boomerang and threw it. Demon knocked it aside casually with the wave of his hand and charged. The kid tried to roll away, but wasn't fast enough. Outside of the building, some of the pedestrains turned their heads as they heard screams coming from the store. They scattered immediatly when they saw Demon come walking out. Demon blew a fireball to burn down the building, and jumped to the rooftops and ran away just as sirens were being heard in the distance. I think I am done for the night. He thought to himself as he made his way home.

"What's going on?" a voice asked, but it was muffled and distorted, as if far away and echoing off of something. But the little flame paid no care. He was sleeping. Dreaming even. He'd never dreamt before. He saw pictures of people and places, people he'd not seen with his own eyes, but what others saw with theirs. He saw winged men, giant swords, large red hair, all of which meant Pyros. But then he saw things that he'd seen earlier...

He was hiding again. Not inthe box, but rather a cardboard locket. But the locket was beginning to rip. Black claws tore into the cardboard, shredding it, and a screech was heard. It was a giant black bat tearing at the cardboard, trying to get to it's prize. The bat's jaws lunged for the flame, but the flame did not mind. He felt at ease about it. Happy even. He smiled as the jaws came nearer and the peace that they would bring, but at the last moment the jaws stopped, and the bat dissintegrated into a bunch of tiny little bats that scattered.

He tried to grab the small bats, perhaps in an effort to bring back the big one, but to no avail. They scattered all over the place, filing the air with flapping.

And then there was a laugh. the flame whipped around to see the Joker. No, not the joker. He was dead. But they all wore his face. They didn't wear clown make up but they wore greed and evil. They pulled out their weapons of hate and charged forth, darkening the already dark night.

The scattered bats attacked the villains individually, but being so weak and tiny, they were easily smacked out of the way. They went through the bats like walking through water, inching toward the little flame. At the head, was the flying man from before, holding an eerie gun like before, but this one seemed to be powered by money. They got closer and closer, and the flame cowered back in horror.

Just as they got close, a strange song filled the air, and the nightmares vanished, like mud being washed away by the fresh water. The song soothed and calmed the little flame, and pictures of home and love rocked him gently in the throes of sleep.

Even as deep asleep as he was, he lightly hummed the song as he slept.

Lilika didn't expect to see anyone from the Discarded without handcuffs on his wrists, but yet, here he was. This particular goon was one of those whose name Lilika could recall. Brandon Hymes. Chris's best friend. Brandon was probably the only guy in the Discarded besides Chris who respected Lilika as a woman, not as the girlfriend of the gang leader and not as someone who could hurl things with her mind at lethal speeds. Because of this, Lilika respected Brandon back. She even liked him, and figured he'd be a great choice for her in case Chris never worked out. Even given the recent tragedy, Lilika managed to find it within her to smile when she saw him. Brandon, however, could tell something was wrong, particularly seeing how she was wearing Chris's jacket.

At Brandon's house, Lilika downed a glass of Mountain Dew quickly, somehow managing to hide her inner depression.
"Thanks," Lilika breathed.
"So, uhhh...something is wrong." Brandon began after several seconds had passed.
"Chris got arrested."
"You know," began Brandon, "I was kind of wondering when he'd get arrested. I mean, no offense to your boyfriend, but the guy does have something of a high opinion of himself."
Lilika leaned back in the chair, grinning weakly. "One could argue of the good direction Chris made the Discarded though, but thinking of the final result...anyways, you may have to find someplace new to live. I imagine any of those guys captured will probably point them to you."
Brandon folder his arms. "And definitely to you."
Lilika shrugged. "Agreed. I just don't know what I'm going to do."
"Find someone else."
Lilika kind of understood where Brandon was going with what he just said, but her mind couldn't accept it just yet. Brandon read her weird expression.
"The Discarded are the bottom of the barrel when it comes to criminals here in Gotham. Well, at least they were until you two happened to them, and now they're going to be less than nothing."
Lilika nodded agreement.
"Look, all I'm saying is that while Chris and me are normal people who do crime because we're bored, you have the potential to go so much higher. Hell, the skills you have now are probably only a small fraction of the potential you can unearth, and there are people who will take a look at your powers and will work their asses of help you realize your true potential."
"On the wrong side of the law?" Lilika asked.
"More than ones on the right side. And hell, if you want, you may be able to be forgiven for your crimes and can become some kind of superhero supporting the government. Anyways, why don't you stay here and think about it tonight?" Brandon turned around and went into the bathroom. "After all, it's not like you killed anyone."
"You sound like an old man," Lilika mused.
"Good, then maybe you'll consider my advice more."
Lilika definitely considered it. Her mother spoke of these sudden life-changing events. Only she could make the decision in the end, but Brandon's advice certainly made the paths she could take seem clearer. Lilika laid down, assured that she would know what to do by morning.

Ken was feeling tired. I have an order of specialized shotguns that have to be made... I have to test the teleporter... I have to try to make the shield that botched it's field test into some type of cage... and all the time, I have to find out how to control my Dream... He took a shower and fell into his bed, sleeping the soldiers sleep. Being a "mechanic" and informant isn't the safest job in the world...
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Shadow crept through Gotham silently, finding the warehouse where he tested his equipment. Crouching around buildings, on top of them, and pretty much anywhere else he could find, he swooped into the abandoned relic and took out his new weapon. If that Tinkerer wanted to kill me with this, how would he do it?Probably not using the trigger, but just in case...

Shadow took some thin rope and wrapped it around the trigger. Jumping behind some crates, he pulled the crate, and heard nothing but a metallic thud. Looking out over his cover, he saw nothing extroidinary. Looking carefully, he noticed that a dent was somewhere in the wall. A bullet was lying nearby. Nearly silent... nice. However, he would probably try to kill me by using one of it's special features... Shadow stalked toward the gun soundlessly and played around with it. Finding what could only be a setting adjuster, he fiddled the knotch and aimed. He fired the gun. A beam, not emmiting light, only leaving a dull purple colored line flashed for a second. Nothing seemed to happen, until Shadow investigated where he shot. Perfectly where he aimed at, there was a small hole, not even large enough for a mouse to fit through. Fiddling with his weapon even more, he noticed what seemed to be some kind of screen. Noting a button that blended into the gun, he pressed it.

The screen turned on, and there was only a black background with white text...

"Welcome to the tutorial for your new Assass-omatic Version 1.32

Note: this is not a bomb."

Smiling despite himself, The Phantom started learning about his new toy.

The precinct was dark. Almost every had left, except for the skeleton crew that worked the graveyard shift. In the locker room, sniffling was heard. Alec was inside, head in his hands. He was trying to fight back the tears, and was failing. Riley had been a good man. Now he was dead, and DeRaine had no one to blame but himself. He'd knocked and asked for him instead of just authorizing dynamic entry. Then he'd let his killer live.

Exhaustion had gotten to him, which was coupled with the chase he'd had on Bahls. But that wasn't the hardest part of his day. He'd had to tell that little girl that her daddy was dead, and then he'd learned their son was hurt. Out of sheer guilt he'd offered to pay for the son's prothesis.

It wasn't fair. None of it was fair. The good people suffered while the evil basked in their own deeds. Alec had signed up to protect people, to make the world a better place. Now he found it descending into tragedy because of what he did. After his small bout of tears had subsided, Alec stood up and took off his equipment then hit the showers. He always kept a spare change of clothes in his locker, so he'd just sleep in the on-call room at the precinct. Worst case scenario, co-workers saw him in his boxers. No big tragedy as he showered with the guys and had slept with most of the girls.

Determined to let sleep take him, and thinking of the day to come, Alec went into the room and laid on the bed. He was asleep before his head hit the pillow.

The rest of the night was pretty routine. Rapists and psychos, and much to his chagrin, a few purse snatchers. He saw a lot of people in Arkham Jumpsuits, something was up. He decided to head home first. His apartment building was in his old neighborhood. He had requested it fiercely. The only building that the company owned in that area was one that had studio apartments that all had huge windows facing the streets. He perched himself on the ledge and opened the window, he had never used the door since the first day he moved in. He touched the cane hanging on his wall near the bed, the most important thing he owned, It was black and red with a small Hawk at the top, inside was a sword that had seen more action than he had. His mentor had given it to him back when he was still a normal kid in training. He looked over to his computer, a laptop shaped like a bat. It was conected to the crime database at Headquarters. It was'nt anywhere near as powerful as the real thing but it did have an interesting feature, if you fed it enough info about a person or object it could scetch an image of it. He walked over and typed in all he could remember about the machine that had attacked him, then looked in the database for someone who might have the info he needed to fill in the blanks. He came up with one. Plugged up his communicator and downloaded the info then went out the window again
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In a very nice part of town, a man was sleeping in his house nervously, RedWing loved that about techno criminals, they were so sure about their ability to hide themselves and yet so paranoid, they also had security systems that always relied on one important thing. Redwing did'nt know what that thing was, so he started pulling out anything that would break. Until all the lights went out, except the lights in his lab. He snuck into the normally secure zone. He was already on edge, that was good it helped put the fear in him. he waited until he was in a good shadowed area, one that hid everything but his red eyes. He spoke loudly and filled with a subdued dark mirth "The Tinkerer, or is it... Ken Adams? I've got some things to discuss with you"

The man with the case watched as the gate opened of its own accord, recognizing his code for what it was. The path before him lit up guiding him into the building, he smirked as he moved forward as the lights dimmed gently behind him. Few saw him arrive, even less would recall the event at all and there would be no record of it the next day.

**********

Dawn broke on Gotham, the long night had seen crime with little respite for the innocent. As morning turned to day, Gotham was quiet. Unfortunately as is the way of Gotham that changed. Reagent Valley Mutual's was known for their high interest rates and quick rate of foreclosure. With their incredible security they weren't known for robberies. Today that was about to change.

A cloaked figure stepped into the middle of the room before tossing the cloak aside and bellowing out. "Good day and good morning all! Tis I FanDingo." Gaurds quickly moved in to point their rifles at the large splicer when they were knocked to the ground, they felt the sting of the claws and the low growl of Van and Ringo. "You all remember Van and Ringo?"

"Freeze!" A guard stood out from beside a teller pointing a rather large gun towards the splicer only to hear the sound of a rifle fire, a dart hit him so forcefully in the neck he dropped to the ground like a ton of bricks.

FanDingo's hideous laugh echoed throughout the building, "You forgot about the lovely Cindy. Cindy explain the rules to them."

"Love to darlin." Cindy a clearly human woman holding a fairly large tranquilizer gun was dressed as a zoo keeper and she spoke with a ferocity not befitting her tiny stature. "Listen up, its about 8:05, last I checked my watch anyhow. And that means this here establishment is open for business, that means put the money in the sacks and I don't have loverboy over there rip you limb from limb."

"I'm loverboy." FanDingo giggled incessantly.

"Trying to leave so soon?"
Lilika stopped and slowly pulled the door closed, turning to face Brandon.
"Geez, I let you stay at my house and drink my Mountain Dew..."
"Thank you, I-"
"And you try to leave without further help." Brandon interrupted.
Lilika shrugged. "I owe you a lot already, so I can't possibly ask for your help and-"
Lilika stopped talking when she saw what Brandon had in his hand.
"Oh, I am definitely not taking that." Lilika said.
Brandon held up the object. "Take it. You might just need it."
Lilika wasn't a gun nut, but you didn't have to be to recognize a .38 revolver. She figured it was old enough to be some kind of relic, and it looked well maintained and ready to fire.
"I'm not good with guns, and I don't want to kill anybody." Lilika faltered.
"You may not have a choice."
Brandon walked into the living room, handing the gun to Lilika and a backpack as well.
"Look, the law's probably got all the information it needs from those idiots to come find and capture every one of us. They'll be going to your house, Lilika. They'll be going to the hideout. They'll be coming here, too. We don't have a lot of time to get moving."
Lilika wanted to believe in the captured Discarded, but couldn't find a fault in Brandon's logic.
"I cleaned and loaded it just last night. There's a few speed loaders and extra rounds inside the pack as well as some money. That should be more than enough to get you to where you think you need to be."
Lilika looked at the gun with a fearful intensity, listening carefully to Brandon.
"What about you?" Lilika breathed.
"I'm getting out of Gotham. I should've done it some time ago but...well, there were a few things I wanted to take care of before I left."
"Something like...me?"
"Well," Brandon searched himself for a responce.
"It's all right, I'm just teasing." Lilika said, saving him serious embarrassment and putting the revolver in the pack, knowing she would probably never use it. "Well, let's get out of here before the authorities decide to ruin our day."

Lilika and Brandon stepped outside, Brandon locking the door behind him. "Well, I'll go catch a cab and put this chapter behind me."
"You'll be all right, of course." Lilika said simply.
"You will, too. You do what you gotta do."
And with nothing else, the two separated, Lilika left to ponder her own future. The Discarded was finished, and all it took was a botched job.
"Not a botched job. It had to be an inside tip. Not even SWAT responds that fast to something so sudden. Maybe one of the goons sold us out?"
Thinking about it was silly. Without some serious help, Lilika would never find out how SWAT got there so fast.
"Help is what I need to do just to keep living, now. I have to find someone to work with. The law wouldn't take me in, and Gotham's dark side offers plenty more opportunities for a special person like me."