Batman 1 - Batman (6 page)

There was a great clang as a bullet ricocheted off a metal railing inches from his hand.

—that is, Jack reflected, if something else didn’t damage him first.

He’d get to the bottom of this, even if he had to shoot Eckhardt personally.

Commissioner Gordon nodded to one of his men. He’d brought fifty along, all handpicked, to make sure this job was done right. His lieutenant punched the button.

Luck was with them. The electricity was still working. The huge, corrugated steel door rose with a metallic groan to show the loading dock of the Axis Chemical Company.

There were policemen on the other side of the door, officers who looked around in confusion at the new opening. Eckhardt was in the middle of the cops. The commissioner wondered what kind of excuse the lieutenant would have this time.

“What the
hell
is going on here?” Gordon roared.

The commissioner marched forward. He wanted the men to recognize him, to stop any accidental gunfire. Eckhardt might be crooked, but most, if not all, of the other men were just regular cops trying to do their job.

Eckhardt had gone too far this time. Not that they wouldn’t have gotten him—eventually. There had been an internal investigation going on concerning certain officers on the force suspected of taking money from Boss Grissom. Eckhardt had been on the top of that list. They had been days away from pinning the charges on him. Now, Gordon thought, they might be able to make those charges stick in a matter of minutes.

Gordon walked quickly through the crowd. Eckhardt stared at him, trying to look angry. But, underneath that anger, Gordon could see the fear.

The commissioner wished he knew exactly what Eckhardt was up to. According to their informer, Napier was being set up. For some reason, Grissom must want Napier put out of the way, and was using Eckhardt and the Gotham City Police Force to do it. Whatever that reason was, it made Napier all that much more valuable to Gordon and the D.A.’s case against Grissom and his associates.

Lieutenant Eckhardt yelled as the commissioner approached. “Christ, what are you trying to do? Blow the collar?”

But Gordon had had enough of Eckhardt.

“I’m in charge here. Not Carl Grissom.”

The anger evaporated from Eckhardt’s face. He looked like a frightened rabbit facing a wolf.

Gordon raised his voice as he turned to the other policemen.

“I want Jack Napier taken alive. I repeat—any man who opens fire on Jack Napier will answer to
me
!”

He looked around. Eckhardt was gone.

If that’s the way you want to play it, Lieutenant, Gordon thought. One way or another, Eckhardt was going to pay for this. Dent and Borg were going to get their new Gotham City, one way or another.

The commissioner drew his gun and walked into the plant.

Jack be nimble. Jack be quick.

Napier almost laughed as the nursery rhyme rattled through his head. He ran down a final set of metal stairs and landed, still alive, on the cement floor of the Axis Chemical Company.

He had always liked little rhymes and sayings. That’s why he had those special words he always liked to use when he killed people.

You ever danced
—

Somebody yelled from across the room. They had spotted him again.

You’re not out of this one yet, Jack boy.

Napier looked around. Time for a little diversion. He had to run a little bit farther before he could jump over that candlestick.

—danced with the devil
—

There were a lot of diversions in a chemical factory. Some of them quite deadly. Jack threw a switch here, twisted a dial there, running all the time. The huge machines exploded with sound. Jack couldn’t hear his running feet anymore. He couldn’t even hear the bullets following him. Everything was drowned beneath the automated thunder.

—devil by the pale
—

Jack turned a corner and hesitated only long enough to throw another switch or two. Or three. The floor was shaking with the noise now. It felt like the whole place was going to fall apart. Jack realized they probably never had all these machines operating at the same time—until now. Giant vats of chemicals spun overhead, spilling their contents into even larger basins on either side of him.

—the pale moonlight?

Machines roaring, acids bubbling, people screaming, bullets flying—it all made a very special sort of chaos. Jack decided he liked chaos. It certainly made it easier for him to get away. And, once he was free, he had a little business to attend to.

Grissom gets the police. The police try to get Jack. But Jack gets Grissom instead. Napier grinned at how tidy a package it made. It was all a little game.

You ever danced with the devil by the pale moonlight?

Machines and bullets and screams and fumes. He wasn’t free yet. And if he didn’t get free, he could never get even. And that wouldn’t be fair at all.

In that case, Jack decided, it was more than a game. Now it was all one big, never-ending joke.

Gordon thought he was walking into hell. The gunfire echoed back and forth through the cavernous room, punctuating half-heard human cries, some of anger, some of pain. The air smelled of smoke and acid. The place was huge, and lit by floodlights some fifty feet above the floor. It wasn’t the best way to light a place this size. The spots bounced all too brightly from the pipes and machines high above the ground, but down here on the floor they did little more than produce a confusion of shadows. Axis Chemical probably thought they were giving enough illumination for their night watchmen. They probably never suspected they’d have to fight a war.

Someone screamed on a catwalk far overhead. Gordon saw the figure slump back against the railing, a gun falling with a clang from unresisting fingers. There were others up on the catwalks. Gordon could see two others silhouetted in the spots, running from their dead companion. He couldn’t see who was firing from the floor. He assumed it had to be some of his men.

Gordon caught the hint of movement farther overhead, the glimmer of light against metal, a flash of yellow in the dark. There was an audible clang as a pair of boots hit the metal catwalk. Someone else was up there now, lost in the shadows between the lights.

The two gunmen must have seen the newcomer more clearly than Gordon could. They didn’t consider him a friend. One of the hoods ran back the other way. The other pointed his gun at the newcomer.

But the newcomer was moving too, lifting a weapon, shooting—but not a bullet. Gordon could have sworn it was some kind of short spear, as it hooked into the gunman’s jacket, spinning him around. The hood lost his balance. He dropped his gun as he grabbed for the railing. But he was slipping too fast. He screamed as he fell from the catwalk—

—and stopped, thirty feet in the air, the hook in his jacket attached to a rope, a rope that went back up to the catwalk, and a man who had stepped out into the light.

“Oh, my God,” Gordon whispered. He could see the new figure clearly now.

It was a man dressed as a bat.

Jack felt as if he had been running forever. There had to be some way out of here. He headed for the far end of the factory floor, hoping to find some kind of emergency exit.

A motor started up in front of him, from a switch he hadn’t thrown. A huge, steel door started to rise not twenty feet away. Jack stopped. Maybe this was his ticket out of here.

He gave up that idea before the door had reached his waist. It was the twenty pairs of legs he saw on the other side that dissuaded him—twenty pairs all dressed in police blue. He heard gunfire on the floor behind him. Where could he go now? He heard the police shouting to each other on the other side of the door.

Jack decided to take the stairs. If he couldn’t find a door, maybe he could find a window. But those cops behind him were awfully close.

Then Jack spotted the fire ax. Maybe it was time for another diversion. There was that skull and crossbones by the stairs, the one on that rusted steel tank that bore the words DANGER! HIGHLY TOXIC!

Yes, Jack thought. This would do quite nicely. He swung the ax with every ounce of adrenaline-pumped strength in him. The blade cut neatly into the tank’s largest patch of rust, and when he yanked the ax free, toxic waste burst forth to flood the floor.

The cops fled, running into each other in their haste to escape. Mission accomplished. Jack threw his weapon to the ground, staring with fascination for a moment at the bubbles that formed as the viscous fluids ate away the ax handle. He climbed the stairs, hidden from the shooting by two more of the great metal tanks.

There was another sound here, besides the guns and machines, a great, whooshing sound—the noise of rushing water. Jack realized he must be near the sluice gates, the place where Axis Chemical dumped those fine byproducts that made Gotham’s East River what it was today. He looked toward the noise and saw an open window.

The stairs and this end of the catwalk were in shadow. But to reach that window, he’d have to pass beneath two spotlights, a real moving target. Jack couldn’t see any other way. If this was all a joke, it was time to get to the punchline. He ran.

And he was at the window. Not a single shot was fired. All of Jack’s diversions must have worked. He had only to climb the railing, and then—

Somebody grabbed him. Black-clad arms snaked around Jack’s rib cage, reaching for his neck. The jerk was trying to get him in some sort of goddamned wrestling hold.

“Jesus!” Jack yelled as he tried to break free. Who was this guy?

“Hold it!” yelled a voice down on the floor.

What now? Jack despaired. He had almost gotten out of here. Then he looked down and saw the speaker was his old friend Bob, with a gun pointed neatly at the police commissioner. Good old Bob.

“Let him go, or I’ll do Gordon,” Bob announced. Good old Bob had always had a way with words.

Jack saw Eckhardt down below. Of course! Who else could Grissom get to do this dirty work? Well, once Jack got out of this, he and the fat boy had a little business.

Jack felt the wrestling hold disappear. He stood again and straightened his coat, then ran a hand through his hair. He glanced around at his attacker.

Now, this was crazy.

The guy was maybe six feet tall, well muscled and wearing some kind of
bat
costume. Maybe, Jack thought, he really was some kind of professional wrestler. The bat had backed off a bit, giving them both some breathing space, but his eyes were fixed on Jack.

Jack grinned at him.

“Nice outfit,” he remarked.

There was no reply. Well, what did Jack expect from a guy in a bat suit?

“Jack?” Bob called up. “Let’s get out of here.”

Jack saw the .38 lying on the catwalk. That was the problem with a messy setup like this—people were dropping guns all over the place. And that’s when he saw Eckhardt turn to leave.

Jack grabbed the gun.

“Eckhardt!” he yelled. “Think about the future!”

Jack fired once. Eckhardt sprawled on the floor, dead, Jack was always good at this sort of thing. He turned the gun on Gordon.

But then the nut in the bat suit moved. Jack glanced over. There seemed to be a question on the bat guy’s face—a question or a challenge. Jack smiled. Nice outfit or no, you didn’t cross Jack Napier.

He fired, point blank, at the bat.

But the bat wasn’t still. He did something with his cape, swinging it forward.

The bullet ricocheted, bounced right off the goddamned costume, straight back to Jack.

He felt the pain in his cheek. Jack’s hand was there before he knew what he was doing. His fingers were covered with blood. He had been shot in the face.

He fell backward, off the catwalk, over the railing. No! His hand grabbed the catwalk’s edge.

He looked down. Below him, on the factory floor, was a bubbling vat twenty feet across. He had to pull himself up. But he had no strength. The whooshing sound was much louder here. He must be close to the sluice gates. His face was burning off.

His fingers slipped from the walkway, but he grabbed a pipe just below instead. A round, slippery pipe. The guy in the bat suit reached down from where he knelt on the catwalk, and grabbed Jack’s wrist.

Jack lost the pipe, but the Batman held him. His grip wasn’t firm; Jack could feel the bat’s cloth-covered fingers slipping away. He tried to reach his own hand up to grip the other’s wrist, but there was no strength left. Even through his burning nostrils, he could smell the fumes below. There was nothing left. Was this the end of the joke?

He felt his wrist slide again, felt the bat’s grasp slip by his fingers.

Jack fell.

He screamed all the way down.

The scream echoed around them as Napier plunged into the bubbling slime.

Gordon shuddered. Nobody, not even Jack Napier, should die like that.

“Goddammit!” he yelled. “We had him!”

But his men weren’t quite so emotional. With Napier gone, they had trained their guns on the Batman. A pair of police officers had worked their way to either end of the catwalk. They had him trapped.

Well, Gordon thought, they’d have something to show for their night’s work.

“Hold it right there,” he ordered.

The Batman raised his hands. The officers approached him from either side.

The bat flicked something at a nearby wall.

The room exploded with light, like an indoor fireworks display. Gordon shielded his eyes. The cops up there had been blinded. Where the Batman stood a moment ago, there was a pillar of white smoke.

“Look!” somebody yelled as a hook and line emerged from the smoke to latch on to a window overhead. Some of the men had started to fire, but the Batman was already shooting upward along the line, lost in the shadows above the lights.

The police stopped shooting into the dark. The bat was gone.

“Who
is
this guy?” somebody asked.

“I don’t know,” Gordon replied, “and until we find out, put a lid on it.”

His men finally seemed to be getting things under control. One by one, the remaining gunmen were giving up. But he had seen the Batman! This night had given Gordon a lot more questions than answers, and, with Eckhardt and Napier dead, there were probably some things he’d never find out.