The howling winds brushed past against my flushed cheeks, further messing up my well-combed hair. In a vain attempt to fix it, I duck under the incoming willowy branch as I run my hands over my head.
“On your left!”
Hearing the childish voice, I hug the tree to my right and use it to pivot around the base of the trunk, evading Bruce’s sweeping kick.
I roll to the side, careful not to remove his form from my sight. My chest, heaving up and down, nearly exploded from the sheer exhaustion of the exercise, but I persevered. Jumping at him with a bent knee, I unleashed a frontal kick to his stomach.
He raises both his hands and skillfully grabs my knee and arm before unceremoniously throwing me to the side. Noticing my impending doom, Dick uses the chance to leap away from the bush where he was hiding and attack Bruce from behind.
Unfortunately for him, he had already given away his position when he warned me. Bruce twists his body, using the force to which he threw me, and slaps Dick’s body away, sending him crashing onto a nearby tree.
But that encounter doesn't end there, for I got up on my feet and drive my fist on his outer left thigh, eliciting a knee-jerk reaction from Bruce as his left leg kicked backwards. The soles of his foot hit me square in the chest, sending me careening down in Dick’s direction.
He taps me on the shoulder, a silent signal we had planned within the last hour as he waited for me to gather my bearings. I nod at him, noting the barely visible red mark located at his left mid-foot.
I rush ahead of him, enlarging my miniscule form while he crouched down as I roll to the side, my hands quickly twisting and throwing a thin circled device at Bruce. But the man is as careful as we have thought him to be as he dodges the device by strafing to the left while jumping over Dick’s body to evade his incoming attack.
We knew we couldn’t let this chance go away, so I push through the pain and rush forward head-first, literally.
I leap forward, bunting my head at his supposedly unguarded crotch. Bruce merely brings his legs forward and uses his knees to deflect my Hail Mary attack.
Dick, seeing Bruce turning away from him, even for just a brief moment, rushes forward and kicks the back of Bruce's knee with his left foot. Bruce stumbles for a second before sending a sweeping kick to Dick’s side and forcing him to crash into another tree.
Dick is down for the count.
The time in which the two of us were thrown happened to be less than fifteen seconds. Now, that would be humiliating in most cases, but for a mere eight and ten years old to last that long against Batman when other adult criminals couldn’t even take a hit? A cause for celebration, I must say.
Unfortunately, our work is not done. I jump back to my feet, a trick taught to me by our very own gymnast, and raise my fist up to Bruce.
I give him a smile, a cheeky one, before running away.
The sparring isn't about beating Bruce, not in the slightest and, even if it is, we would have complained about its difficulty. Our goal this time is to stick an inch-thick plastic circle tracker anywhere on his body. Dick and I had four black trackers with a red center on us. We had three hours and a ten kilometer playground to track down and stick the tracker on Bruce. As usual, Bruce gave us an hour head-start, one that we use to the very best of our abilities.
I run past the thick forest foliage, heavy bushes, and sharp branches that made this rather lovely woods a downright maze for people. Fortunately, I live in a house with a hedge maze which allows me to memorize the paths within the woods, thanks to my superb memories. Jumping up to dodge a large fallen log, I scrape my shoe against the rich soil as I turn to the right where a fairly long and shallow river runs across the forest. At least, to my vaguest recollection.
“Cacaw!”
That was our signal for when one of us got Bruce’s attention. It seems like he’s chasing Dick. An understandable move, given that he’s more athletically inclined and used to swinging around branch-like metal poles.
“Kilato!”
I shout back as I jump into the river and grab a few loose pebbles, just small and thin enough to pass for a tracker in Bruce’s calloused hands. Seeing as I’m already wet, I wash my face and body off the grime and dirt that stuck to me during my various tumbles. I place the stones inside of my pants pocket along with the other three trackers. Carefully crossing the river, I jog towards the inner tree lines while looking for a fairly thick series of bush and foliages. I find one deep enough to hide me behind a few trees, but had a line of sight to the river.
I eventually find a vine thick enough to bind one broken branch and placed it on the ground before climbing up the tree with the other end of the vine in hand. Settling myself in the inner branches of the tree, I pictured myself as nothing but pebble. My breathing stabilized, my eyes hair wildly fluttering against the billowing wind as I entrench myself in this position.
It didn’t take long for Bruce to track me down, not that I had intended him not to. My footsteps and taken pathways are obvious enough for him to find me within ten minutes, a minute longer than I had guessed.
Dick must have given him a bit of trouble.
My shallow breaths allow me to attune my senses and extend it past the limits of my abilities. I inspected Bruce’s form. Although wearing an all black outfit made stark contrast to the surrounding greeneries, the weather in the sky is dark enough to make an advantage of his clothing. He crouches down as he grazes the grooves of my footprint, probably figuring out the force with which I took that step and which direction I stepped next.
His head turns towards my area, causing my breath to hitch up, my lungs suddenly feeling bereft of its life provider. But I don't close my eyes, looking around him and not at him so as to not gain his attention.
'Blast his heightened sixth sense.'
He made a point, the earlier weekend, that an assassin often develops a sixth sense that allows them to know who and where someone is looking at them.
I figured the effect was similar to those kung-fu movies I loved to watch back in the day. Killing intent; that was their term for it. Bruce nodded at my suggestion, noting that one of his martial artist friends, Richard Dragon, had perfected such a technique.
I sever my musings as he draws closer to my hiding area. Steps light as a feather as he scan his surroundings like a relentless hawk, eager to catch sight of his prey. That’d be me, of course, but like hell would I let him catch me or would I? I shift in my position and released the vine causing the floating stone to drop to the ground, emitting a soft sound just enough to attract an inkling of doubt in my general direction.
If I knew Bruce, then he would not underestimate me or Dick and would, instead, run his mind through a gauntlet of scenarios in which we won in every possible way. That’s how he always fights.
He takes out the four trackers, each caught between the webs of his right fingers. A taunting voice resounds across the fields as he tilts his head to gain a new perspective on the tree lines.
“I have incapacitated Richard. You’re the only one left, Edmund.” He says, his foot crunching the leaf below him as he steps forward.
Seeing that I am not answering, Bruce rushes forward and waves his hand around my direction, blowing off the thorny foliages and thick bush like it was paper mache.
I see the slight surprise in his eyes and the inclination in his jaw to look up, but before he could do so, I'm already on my way down. I throw a mixture of stones and tracker at him as I bear my entire weight upon his shoulder, my knee bludgeoning his nape.
He lowers his body, slumping down and twisting his feet and body to position himself behind my falling form before grabbing me by the waist and slamming me to the ground. The pain is nothing to me at this point, so I rolled away from his incoming stomp. Quickly steadying myself, I rush forward as my other hand grabs another set of stones and throw it at Bruce.
While using his hands to brush away the projectiles, Bruce tries to grab me by the shoulder, but I take advantage of my lithe form and evade his agile hands. Of course, I knew I could never completely evade him forever, so I settled for a few seconds. I latch onto his waist, hands steeple behind his back as I cross my legs over his left ankle. I tighten my hold over his waist and ankle, before biting his outer thigh muscles.
He grunts, more in surprise rather than pain before hitting me ion the nape of my neck, as if I'm a very annoying fly. The pain causes me to loosen my grasp on my fingers. He grabs me by my shirt and throws me off of him, sending me tumbling down the bushes.
I hide the smirk from my face as I stand up with my shaky legs, exhaustion wrapping its heavy tendrils around my body. 'But I'm not done yet, bitch, not when I could still see apprehension in your eyes.'
I put up my hands and took an enormous step, cocking back my right fist and sending a punch up his abdomen. My eyes widen when Bruce doesn't even dodge my fist, merely guided the back of my clenched hand with his palm away from his body before hitting me square in the ear.
I stumble back, ears ringing softly as the world around me sways to the invisible currents that sustained life on the planet. I try to attack once more, but my fists are as heavy as a block of concrete floating on the ocean floor. I gaze at Bruce, whose entire form sways under the dark clouds that loomed over the forest. He's speaking about something, an admonishment perhaps.
That when darkness took my sight, my body succumbed soon after, as I barely felt the tickling of the grass on my face and limbs. I fell unconscious soon after.
----------------------------------------
My mind woke up before my body did, allowing me a few minutes alone with myself. A chuckle escapes my thoughts as I digested the information recalled prior to my incapacitation.
Had it not been for Bruce taking it easy on us, we would have bled and strangled to death by the sheer callousness and recklessness of our plans. But, still, it didn’t matter because we won. That’s the only thing that matters in this dangerous world: winning.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
My father, however repellant and abhorrent he is, was right about that one thing. “To win is to live another day.” A mantra he instilled in my young mind whilst he takes his daily dose of Quaaludes. He doesn’t have any associated mental condition that supplements the need for it, he just likes the taste and the unimaginable high from it.
But I digress.
There is one thing, though, that causes father to always harshly admonish me and that is the method of our victory. He, like the bastard that he is, will do anything to win; Cheat, lie, bluff, kill, pirate, and every other action verb that has scummy connotations. I, on the other hand, although had no qualms about crime, would rather not disregard the law of the land. After all, just one wrong move, one mistake, and one double-cross and I’ll be playing blackjack on Belle Reve with the damn Calendar Man.
It’s not just also about the looming danger of Amanda Waller that scared me, the heroes of this world too. Granted, according to my shallow research, they had not formed the Justice League yet and the last superhero team got screwed over by Ronald Regean, their threat still remained a constant and ever present danger to any criminal that dare even look in their general direction.
I would have thought more about this, but, alas, my eyes fluttered open like a yawning butterfly and revealed the bright incandescent lights of the Batcave. The bed which I'm laid upon is soft and squishy, probably newly bought and fluffed by Alfred. Sore as I'm, I stand up from the bed and scan the cave.
Batman, cowl on his head, is busy on the computer as pictures of Poison Ivy appear on newsreels and prison files stolen from Arkham. It seems that the sexy plant lady is trying to use Gotham’s politician to fertilize her plants. Sounds like a good plan; they’re full of shit after all.
Batman hums, having noticed my gaze. “You’re awake.” He says, losing all the tabs on the computer and rolling his chair to face me. “Richard is upstairs, having a drink. How is your body?”
I stretch my muscles, not that I have many. I just have two, one on each bicep. “Ugh, good enough. Though I think something’s bruised too.”
He hums. “Which one?”
“Your ego!” I laugh boisterously, earning a grunt of frustration from the Dark Knight. I stop once he stands from his seat, whiffling my hands in defeat. “C’mon, I was just joking.”
He hides the smirk on his face and hands me a large tablet device that shows an image of a large pentagon that measures my various statistics. From my weight, speed, and test results, all laid bare in front of me. Batman take a seat in front of me, his pure white eyeballs, though no visible point, stares at and through me.
“You have displayed outstanding development in the past six months. You have made me…” He trails off as if to contemplate his next words. “Proud.”
My eyes widened. “I-I do?”
“Yes. Although this training is purely voluntary on your side, you have done well in fully focusing on it.” He taps the device to which it displayed five categories. “I have divided the aspects of your training into five sub-categories.
Physique. This subcategory identifies, correlates, and records, including but not limited to physical strength, striking power, combat ability, and maximum weight distribution. With the base being that of a normal eight year old for which I have designated as 1.0, your initial Physique was 0.8 and nearly dropped to 0.7 during your three-day rehabilitation period after the surgery done by Zatara.”
“Wait!” I interrupt, waving my hand as sweat stings my eyes. “Did… did you do a point system to make it easier for me to understand?”
He hums, nodding in confirmation. “Although, at first, the point system was concocted to promote your juvenile curiosity and ingrain basic deductive reasoning, I have since taken a liking to its rather simplistic, albeit formulaic, design.”
'How could he say that with a straight face? This guy can really do anything.'
“Can I continue?” He asks, before resuming his spiel.
“Celerity. Records speed, agility, dexterity, and other motor skills not necessarily developed by the skeletal and muscle systems included in Physique. Again, with the same base, you had an initial point of 0.9, which is much better than your physique. I surmised that the cause for this is your mother’s pampering, hampering your instinctual response to external stimuli.”
“Hey, I had to, alright? I need not to react when she kisses me on the cheeks or-or-or try to dance in ballrooms.” My face blushes in frustration and embarrassment. “It’s not my fault!”
“I didn’t say that.” He says, returning to his work.
“Vitality. Includes your endurance, physical health, and stamina. Initial score: 1.1. Which is higher than the rest of your physical scores. From what I’ve read and seen from your files, it increased as a result of the blood ritual; I checked and there’s no other harmful after-effects.”
“Willpower: Pertains to your mental capability to resist strenuous physical and mental effects. I admit, it is rather…”
“Pseudo-scientific?” I supplement a word.
He shook his head lightly. “Arbitrary. I compiled a series of diagnostic reports regarding the aforementioned attribute, mostly taking out the less scrupulous methods and leaning on the more evidentiary journals. I suspect that further studies would change the method with which I base the scores, even going so far as changing it entirely. Nonetheless… Initial score: 2.4. This is based on your pain tolerance and short-term decision making in the face of simulated danger.”
He continued. “Reflex. Although you have yet to hone your survival instinct and oft expose a sense of morbid recklessness, your ability to quickly think on your feet and enhance off-the-cuff plans with niche objects will be your strongest point in the days to come. Provided, of course, that you survive your callousness. Initial score: 1.8”
“Rather harsh, methinks.” I say aloud, but Bruce merely carries on.
“Focus. Rote memorization can be achieved with multiple tricks, but, unfortunately, you are as bullheaded as the man in the blue tights. Learn the tricks I have imparted upon you and you will see that plans are not as hard to come up as they usually ought to be. Every other metric, however… you pass. Although I do sense an impending downward spiral past the initial stages of intelligence testing, but nothing to be worried about. My worries are founded upon the normal growth of a kid your age. Clearly… you are not normal.”
I cleared my throat to remove Bruce from his borderline-rant-monologue about my intelligence. “Uh, score?”
“Initial score: 3.9”
“Alright… What about my current scores?”
Batman tapped the device as it showed my current scores.
Physical: [Physique: 2.3] [Celerity: 2.9] [Vitality: 2.5]
Mental: [Willpower: 3.8] [Reflex: 2.5] [Focus: 4.7]
“Cool!” I blurt out as my eyes twinkles under the blue light of the tablet. “But… this is just my score compared to an average eight-year-old, right?”
He nod. “Yes. Your growth has impressed us.”
'That’s weird.' Bruce is sharing my data with other people. In fact, that was very weird. By my calculation, he should be a loner right now and have yet to recognize the fact that teaming-up with other heroes would be for the best of not only his city, but of the world.
“You’ve… been talking to other people about me?” I ask.
His eyes moves from the tablet to meet mine. “Yes.” He answer.
'Cool.'
He continues as if nothing has happened. “Once you grow up and become nine years old, I will reset the scores and test you once more. Do not be complacent, always be on guard, trust your instinct, and respect your rational thought.”
Seeing as these stats were integral to my growth, I can not help but wonder if he had a device–Oh, nevermind.
Bruce soon takes out a small rectangular device, small enough to fit on the palm of my hands, which he places upon my wrist before tapping the surface twice. As if breathed into existence, the device launches six small metal plates on both and, by the wonders of magnetism, latched onto my wrist like a snake strangling its prey.
“Oh!” I coo, caressing the glassy surface of the watch. “Is this connected to my heart? No, is this connected to the Batcave? To Wayne Tech? To your personal satellite? Does it have a TV?”
“Not yet, yes, yes, only the one in Gotham, and it will never have one.” Bruce answers the onslaught of my questions as he returns to his work.
The crusader’s work is never done, after all. My training in the last four months had even cut time for his nightly work, something that I will restitute once my powers–whatever it may be and they better not be stupid–are up and running.
I head back to the manor proper and proceeded to gloat to the now-conscious Dick about how I won the contest and that I had received a reward from the Bat himself.
Just as I had settled a bout of gloating and rested upon my laurels, in came Alfred with a pot of fresh stew. A welcome reprieve to the healthy snacks and fibrous breakfasts he had eaten for the past few months.
“What’s the feast for, sir Alfred?” I ask, blowing the spoon full of the soup. Although Alfred was technically of lower status than me and my family, it would be remiss of me to actually disrespect the only man allowed to have a gun in the house.
'Plus, he’s just a good man. Nothing more, nothing less.'
“It seems you are not particularly fond of watching the news, young master Edmund.” Alfred gives me his usual sassy barb. He gracefully takes out the remote control for the wide-screen televisions set up in the eastern kitchen of the manor and press play.
The screen then launches into a view of a war-torn city, hundreds of skyscrapers, if not fallen from grace, burned into the night. It reminded me of an enormous bonfire, except the wails of the city’s denizens ran contrary to the happy thoughts one ought to have in such a scenario.
Atop the towering inferno of metal and concrete is a figure of flames. No, it was not that it's bathed in flames, more like it is made of flames. The figure’s hands moves like a flickering candlelight, sending blasts of blazing hell to the chaotic streets.
If that wasn’t enough, the fireballs, once subsided, clung to the panicking civilians and engulfed them into the red-hot blaze before ultimately transforming them into a hybrid of man and fire.
<~Harbor is in flames! Jeff, hundreds had already died, some by fire inhalation and others by the burning remains of the building that had collapsed upon them. I-I think no one can stop the~>
The broadcast halted as an explosion rocked the area in which the reporters were standing, saved only by the large billboard before them that took on much of the fireball.
It was clear that staying still was not an option, yet, for all the danger, I could see a sense of stubbornness and responsibility on the reporter. That was when I heard her name be called.
I shrug when I heard the familiar name. Cat Grant is as daring as I have read her to be.
“Oh, man. You think Bruce’s going there?” I ask, a hint of anticipation in my voice.
“Nah, Happy Harbor's like… Where is that, Alfred?” Richard is happily diving into his own pot of stew, not a care in the world.
The broadcast continues as Cat Grant ran from their position, clearly being targeted by the monster’s large fireballs. As another one is lodged towards them, a streak of blue and red whizzes past the camera.
“Looks like the doesn’t need to.” My grin turns brighter.
Hope blossoms upon me, and, I’m sure, so did in the hearts of the other viewers, as Superman, fast as a speeding bullet, soared through the fiery sky and battled with the fire monster. Even from afar, his stately jaw is set with determination as he circles around the large frame of the monster, sucking in the flames before it can do any more damage.
Alfred hums in approval, clicking another button on the remote and changing the channel. Before we can voice our dissent, the picture shows us another set of destroyed buildings. Although the fire had been ingrained as more disastrous, the bloodbath in front of us caused even the normally-gluttonous Richard to stop his meal. Before our startled eyes we see what appears to be a wooden-being tearing apart a human in half, blood turning into a fine pink mist. The torn human lands on the ground and begin to be absorbed by the spiny tentacle-like roots that litters the bloody streets. As it begins to be consumed, the human’s pink flesh turns browner and browner, until it transforms into a miniature clone of the large tree-like monster.
The scene reminded me of the horrors the civilians of this universe face everyday. If that happened to them, what more could happen to me?