Bruce only spots the man because of a flickering sign behind him, but the how doesn’t matter here. What matters is that after four days of chasing ghost stories and rumors, he’s found something that could lead him to Jason. That’s the man that shot Deathstroke. He knows something, and Bruce wants to find out what.
Catching him is, of course, another matter. They stare at each other across rooftops for a few seconds before the man (short, gas mask, red goggles, armed) turns, takes a running start, and leaps off the roof.
Bruce gives chase.
He moves like the League, like Bruce, and while the Militia has had people that move similarly, none of them were quite like this. Unfortunately, Bruce has chased down more than his fair share of, in the words of the GCPD, ‘crazy-ass ninjas’, and he’s not letting this one go.
The chase takes them to a higher rooftop in Ryker Heights and finally Bruce gains enough of an advantage (a place to use the grapnel boost), launches himself skyward and dives back, crashing into the smaller man and driving him through a crumbling skylight. They hit the ground in a shower of glass, but it’s not over yet: the man’s boots have knives at the toes and he’s kicking up and out, squirming free and drawing his firearm.
Then things get worse.
From behind them there’s the WHIRRRRRRRRRRRRRR of a minigun warming up and Bruce has seconds to drop a smoke pellet and dive aside before bullets spit out from the darkness and a deep voice laughs and mocks, “Run, Bat, run!”
The man he was chasing is breathing heavily. The minigunner stalks forward. He’s a big man. There’s been a few like him, too, but he’s bigger still. Unlike the other one, he’s not masked, which means the facial recognition in the cowl can find him.
Trent Ages. Mercenary. Interrogations expert. Extremely dangerous.
You don’t say, Bruce thinks, grappling into the rafters. Lovely. One of them was manageable. Two is…still manageable, but it makes this harder. Minigunner’s the more dangerous one, he decides; that gun will cut him to pieces, and the disruptor will only work a little. There’s a fuse box over there, though. If Bruce can get him over there, he can use that against him–
There’s the crackling of speakers and an unfamiliar voice rings through the office.
“You get one chance to get the hell out.” Man’s voice. Bored. “You gonna take it?”
There. A small, red dot: camera.
He destroys it with a Batarang and the man sighs.
“He’s in the rafters. Fucker broke one of my cameras.”
The minigunner aims upwards.
“I’ll avenge it.”
WHIRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!
Ah.
He swings to a new vantage point, then another, and then one just above the smaller man he’d chased here. Readies the REC gun. Sends the minigunner careening across the room while he drops down, grabs his friend, and grapples back to the roof.
“Where is the Arkham Knight?”
Whatever response he was expecting, laughter wasn’t it. He shakes him before slamming him against a low wall and forcing him back so his head’s hanging over it.
“I’m asking nicely.”
The man only laughs harder and goes slack. He’s not nervous, according to the cowl. He genuinely does not care.
“You shot Deathstroke.” That, at least, shuts him up. “Is the Knight dead?”
There’s a long silence before the man nods. Bruce’s heart falls out of his chest as his vision narrows.
No no no no not again not again–
THWACK.
Bruce is out before he hits the ground.
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