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Batman stood tall and dark, a silent sentinel overlooking the glittering Gotham skyline like a nightmare in wait. His cape rippled in the wind, flapping violently this way and that while the man himself remained unmoved. Every so often, the breeze blew against his body and his cape hugged it tightly.
Victor drew a breath of relief. Robin sometimes liked to hide under Batman’s cape and jump out to kick people in the head at the most annoying times. He definitely wasn’t there now, and that meant there was only Batman to contend with. No mean feat, of course, to fight Batman, but an easier one when there were twenty-seven of you.
Victor grinned savagely, and motioned to his men to move in, leaping as quietly as they could across the rooftops towards where Batman stood. This ended now. Victor had had enough of his weapons shipments being destroyed. He had a business to run, after all.
Batman noticed them before they’d even reached his rooftop, whipping his head round sharply, and Victor swore under his breath. Still, no matter. Not even the legendary and mythical Batman could dodge fire from twenty-seven AK-47s.
Just as they reached the edge of the rooftop, having jumped the small gap between the adjacent apartment block with ease, Victor faltered and almost tripped. Somehow, impossibly, Robin had materialised from underneath Batman’s cape, bouncing out to stand at his side with a sharp grin on his little face.
Victor was no idiot. He knew that both Robin and Batman had the stealth skills to essentially almost appear and disappear at will, but there was no way Robin had been under there. Where in the actual fuck had he come from?
‘What’s the plan, B?’ Robin said, casual in the way that Victor knew was deliberate, in order to set people’s teeth on edge. The worst thing was that it was working. ‘I go left and you go right?’
Batman said a few short sharp words too low for anyone except Robin to hear, and Robin nodded. ‘Righty-O.’
He wouldn’t give them any more time to plan. ‘Shoot them!’ Victor shouted, launching forward. He let out a scream of frustration as both vigilantes dropped over the side of the roof. Running to the edge, he saw that they’d already disappeared.
‘Split up! Find them! They can’t be far!’
A few of his men clambered down a fire escape and took to the streets, the others spreading out across the rooftops. A couple stayed behind with Victor, tense. Waiting.
A cut off cry of pain from the man behind him was the only indication of Batman’s presence. Victor spun wildly around, only to catch a fist to the face, hard enough to make the world fade around the edges.
‘It was stupid of you to split up,’ said a child’s voice, Robin’s voice, echoing weirdly. It was almost like it was coming from–
‘We can just pick you off one by one, now,’ Robin said cheerfully, emerging from underneath Batman’s cape at a jog. He was running? How–
Victor didn’t have much chance to think anything else, as he was out cold a second later due to the expert punch of a very small fist.
‘Good job, Robin.’
Clark was doing the mission debrief for the earlier trip (fiasco) in space, feeling as bored as those seated at the table looked. Bruce was the only exception, silent and grim as usual.
‘We’ll have a break in five,’ Clark said, to everyone’s collective relief. He could have sworn Barry actually mouthed “thank you” at him.
As they all got up to leave the room, Clark turned to speak to Bruce, pausing in bewilderment at the sight of seven empty chairs beside him. Hadn’t Dick and the others been on this mission? It was an all hands on deck type situation, after all.
At Clark’s questioning glance, Bruce sighed. ‘I couldn’t stop them.’
He swept his dark cape to the side and let it hang over his arm. Through the fabric, as if it was a door, Clark could see a ring of hunched figures. He raised an eyebrow. Long-sufferingly, Bruce raised an eyebrow back.
Clark marched up to the opening, his best business face on, and poked his head in with as much dignity one can muster when being forced to hunch over under another man’s arm, the top half of you in an unexplainable void.
‘Ah, fuck it. I fold,’ Jason said, throwing his cards down in the middle of the circle of bat children and associated add-ons. There was a wild eruption of cheering from the others as Cass grinned sharply at Jason, laying down her cards to show… The worst hand. Ever.
‘What the fuck!’ Jason roared, then doubled over laughing. ‘That’s just cruel.’
Smugly, Cass pulled an enormous pile of black m&ms (Were those custom made? And did they have bats on them?), twelve of Alfred’s best sandwiches, a batarang labelled “lucky batarang - is responsible for the Spaghetti Incident and Bruce falling over 17 times in a row”, and Damian himself towards her. Damian was screeching horribly.
‘You can’t play for a person! That’s illegal! Father! FATHER! ’ Damian bellowed, surging to his feet and looking ready to sprint. A batarang had appeared suddenly in his hand.
‘Since when did you care about laws? We’re all vigilantes,’ Tim and Steph said to Damian at the same time, immediately high-fiving without looking at each other.
Damian turned away, head held high, going limp as Cass reeled him in by the leg. He was clearly resigned to his fate. Or maybe it was just that there was no escaping Cass. ‘Where’s the familial “appreciation”?’ Damian sniffed haughtily. ‘You all drone on about sibling love as if it isn’t all lies. I was not informed it was dependent on poker!’
‘So you admit it!’ Dick said, with a level of malicious glee so unholy that Clark was impressed he could hold it in his mortal body. ‘You do know we love you!’
‘Richard, you are walking a very dangerous line,’ Damian said menacingly, which was especially remarkable since Duke was taking a selfie with him and laughing unashamedly, Cass pinning Damian’s arms to his sides. ‘And I just said that you’ve just proved it to be lies!’
Barbara, whom Clark hadn’t even known had been at the JL meeting, was filming the group of them openly, fulfilling her role as a secret agent of chaos.
At this point, Clark knew that they’d all noticed him. He couldn’t even find it in himself to be annoyed that he was being ignored.
He was a tired, tired man.
‘Really?’ Clark sighed, looking at them all.
‘Hi Clark!’ Dick said brightly. ‘Shall we deal you in for the next round?’
‘Richard! There will be no next round–’
Why not? Clark thought. Today was already a complete loss. Might as well commit to it – maybe everyone else would be happy to get out of the briefing. ‘Hey, gang. Can’t promise I won’t use x-ray vision to cheat,’ Clark smiled.
‘Oh, good,’ Dick said, ‘you’ll fit right in, then. If you don’t cheat, you lose.’
Eight eerie grins met this pronouncement, and Clark challenged them with one of his own.
‘I know I did it, Alfred! It’s just lost.’
‘Well then, young master, you shall just have to do it again. You should know better than to put things in there “for safekeeping” if they’re not immediately essential.’
Jason sighed. ‘At least it wasn’t just my homework. Bruce put his papers for tomorrow’s meeting in there and we can’t find those either.’
‘He what?’
Jason blanched at Alfred’s furious tone.
‘I’m going to kill that man! Those are important! If Lucius Fox calls this house one more time sounding just about at the end of his rope I’m paying for his therapy myself. Bruce!’ Alfred said, in that special way that wasn’t shouting yet carried throughout the entire house. There was a muffled thump in the distance as Bruce hastened down to the kitchen. No one ignored that tone of voice, after all.
Jason couldn’t quite hide a smile. Alfred saw it, because he saw everything, and didn’t bother hiding his own.
Bruce arrived in the kitchen looking like he’d jogged down but was trying his best to remain dignified. This was a difficult task, because he had chosen a rather… interesting accessory for his business suit.
Jason gestured to Bruce. ‘Love what you’re wearing. Really brings out the tie.’
Bruce snatched the cowl and cape off with an annoyed grimace. ‘I’m trying to find them, Alfred, but it won’t let me in!’ He held out the cape in front of him and did a kind of weird forward motion with his torso into the fabric, almost tripping over the hem.
Jason cackled. ‘You look like an ostrich. I’m telling you, it only works with cool people. Like me,’ Jason added, puffing out his chest.
Bruce simply raised one dark eyebrow incredulously. ‘I distinctly remember you calling Dick “lame” last month and he always manages to get in.’
‘That’s beside the point,’ Jason said, though it most certainly wasn’t, ‘and anyway, it’s not like you ever have much luck. You don’t treat it with any respect,’ he added, in an imperious tone he had obviously adopted from Alfred. ‘Are you gonna let me look for the papers or not? I don’t wanna copy out my homework again.’ He held up the book in his hand, bookmark poking out halfway through. ‘I’ve got better things to do.’
‘Go on then, Mr. Expert,’ Bruce said, smirking.
Jason stuck out his tongue and snatched the cape from Bruce, standing on his tip-toes to hang it on the door.
‘If you’re not out in half an hour, I don’t care if I treat the cape with respect or not, I’m coming in after you. It will let me in,’ Bruce said, suddenly serious. He put a hand on Jason’s shoulder. ‘The papers aren’t that important.’
‘Yeah, yeah, okay,’ Jason mumbled, pink in the cheeks. ‘It wants to help. It’s never hurt us. I’ll be fine, B.’
Bruce nodded and smiled slightly. Jason walked forward and disappeared completely within the folds of the cape. ‘See you in a few!’ Jason shouted, sounding as if he’d walked into a huge, cavernous space. Alfred began to busy himself with dinner, but Bruce stayed by the entrance, tense and ready to fetch Jason at any moment.
A minute later, Jason stuck his head out of the cape, weirdly close to the hem as if there was now a sudden drop and he was stretching himself up to see them. ‘Hey, Alfie, did you leave food in here?’
‘As matter of fact, master Jason, I did. A box of non-perishables in the event anyone became stuck. How far from the entrance is it? Has it moved itself?’
‘It’s hard to tell. A couple of hundred metres?’ Jason said thoughtfully. ‘Gimme a sec,’ he said, disappearing and reappearing again, ‘it’s much closer now. Must’ve moved. Thanks, Cape Void!’
‘Have you seen your homework?’ Bruce asked.
Jason shook his head exasperatedly. ‘No. I found this, though.’ He slid a golf club onto the kitchen floor. ‘This yours?’
‘Ah. Yes it is. I put it there so I would have an excuse not to play golf with Mr. Pearson,’ Bruce said unashamedly. ‘He’s given up on asking me, now, so I may as well have it back. It’s good for getting things out of the attic rafters.’
‘Master Bruce!’
‘Sorry, Alfred.’
Ten minutes later, a faint cry of triumph echoed out into the kitchen. Jason swung himself down feet first, emerging from the top of the cape this time as if everything inside had shifted upwards. He had a sheaf of papers in one hand, homework in his other, and a ration bar in his mouth.
Bruce ruffled his hair with a lopsided smile. ‘Thanks, chum.’
Alfred frowned. ‘Jason Peter! You’ll spoil your appetite.’
Jason swallowed the rest of his ration bar, not daring to talk while chewing. ‘Sorry, Alfred.’
‘Hmph! I’ve heard that rather often today.’
Jason glanced at Bruce and they both looked back sheepishly.
‘You’ll just do it again, won’t you?’ Alfred said. It wasn’t really a question.
Neither Bruce nor Jason denied it.
*
‘Where’s the kid?’ Harley asked, hanging upside down from a fire escape by one of Batman’s bolas.
A little hand extended from under Batman's dark cape, shared a choice hand gesture with her, then retreated again with a haunting giggle.
Harley’s uproarious laughter couldn’t quite drown out Batman’s defeated sigh.
*
‘Where’s the kid?’ Ivy asked the shadowed figure, hunched and jagged at the base of an old beech tree.
‘Gone.’
*
Jason and Bruce’s epic screaming match, compounded with threats of violence and a lot of aggressive gesturing, came to an abrupt halt by the sharp rap and echo of automatic gunfire.
The streetlight glowed orange in the reflection of the rainwater beading on Jason’s crimson helmet, flashing and trembling as Jason launched himself towards the noise with reckless abandon. Bruce had no choice but to follow, mindful of the puddles on the rooftops as they flew like shadows towards the chaos.
It was a typical gang shootout, masked people hanging out of car windows and taking pot shots at each other down the street. It didn’t really seem like their hearts were in it, but automatic weapons were automatic weapons and they were going to kill someone at some point.
Jason didn’t wait, just launched himself into the fray and started firing. They were non-lethal shots since these were low-level criminals, but fired without mercy or hesitation. It was rash, but there was some semblance of tactics there from the way that Jason dodged and weaved expertly behind obstacles and into alleys.
Bruce tossed some smoke pellets into the street and joined the clash. Mere minutes later, the gang members were unconscious, their guns unloaded and tossed into the Cape Void to give to Gordon. Through the remnants of the smoke haze, Bruce could see the tall figure of Jason, silent and grim.
Was this what he’d looked like when he’d started the Batman mission? Alone?
He was torn out of his “unhealthy introspection” (Dick’s words) by one of Jason’s legs giving way under him. Bruce had caught him before he’d even realised he’d crossed the street.
‘Get the fuck away from me,’ Jason snarled, voice tight from pain.
‘I will once you’re safe.’
‘You have no right–’
Jason’s voice was lost to the wind as Bruce hooked an arm around his waist and hauled them both to a nearby roof. Jason hissed as Bruce set him down, already producing bandages from his leather jacket and wrapping a nasty bullet graze on his thigh.
‘Kindly fuck off, then. I’m “safe” and everything, you fucking control freak,’ Jason said, tone dripping acid.
Bruce ignored him and walked off to secure the perimeter. He didn’t think he’d imagined the almost imperceptible sigh of relief Jason exhaled. Jason must have thought Bruce was leaving.
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake!’ Jason growled, as he noticed Bruce coming back. ‘You want a real fight this time?’
Bruce said nothing as he approached, not even when Jason levelled a pistol at his head. Unclasping his cape, he draped it over Jason’s shoulders, who’d forgotten to fire at Bruce in his confusion.
‘Now you’re safe,’ Bruce said quietly. ‘There are sandwiches in the Void, if you want them. Ham and that yellow cheese you like.’
Jason muttered something vicious. ‘I don’t want your pity.’
‘You don’t have it. But you do have sandwiches.’
‘What makes you think I want to go in there? And even if I gave a shit, it probably won’t even let me in anyway,’ Jason said, helmet conveying his disdain well despite its blank surface.
‘It will. It always did, for you.’
*
‘What were you thinking, B? He could use your cape to get into the cave!’
‘He won’t.’
*
Bruce found a cast iron pan full of spaghetti carbonara in the Cape Void the following day, still steaming hot.
It was delicious.
‘Watch this!’ Dick said to Duke excitedly. Everyone else lounging around the cave looked on with glee.
‘If you liked the Cape Void, you’ll love this part,’ Steph said, her grin enormous.
Dick hung up one of Bruce’s capes from a display case, another draped over the open door of a Batmobile. He stepped into the void of the cape on the case, emerging almost instantly from the cape on the Batmobile while doing jazz hands and looking to Duke for his reaction.
‘No way,’ Duke said , running over to poke his head in. ‘That’s the coolest thing I’ve ever seen.’
‘Like Scooby-Doo, right?’ Jason snorted. ‘Best thing that’s ever associated itself with Bruce. ‘Sides from Alfred, of course.’
‘Can you, like, put a cape on the other side of Gotham and fast travel between them?’ Duke asked, already thinking.
‘We tried that,’ Dick replied. ‘But we don’t think the void is infinite. Scanning equipment doesn’t really work in there so we can’t tell for sure, but the exit where the other cape is never shows up if you put it far away. Plus, it only really works if Bruce has worn the cape recently.’
‘I was gonna use it to get a direct route to Five Guys from my bedroom, but we can’t have everything in this hateful world,’ Steph said, flinging her arms out dramatically and wiping an imaginary tear from her eye.
‘Or for pranking Tim,’ Cass added, smirking at him. Tim shot her a betrayed glance from where he was hanging upside down on the training equipment.
‘It’s still amazing, man,’ Duke said, grinning madly and walking into the void. It took him longer than Dick to find his way out of the other cape. ‘Stuff moves around in there?’
Jason nodded at him, a weird expression on his face.
‘It does,’ Damian said, with a smug grin at Tim. Tim somersaulted to the ground with both hands flipping the bird.
‘We played hide and seek in the cave once and Tim had the bright idea of hiding in the Cape Void,’ Dick said, smiling slightly evilly at him.
‘Yeah, that was a weird couple of days. The void demons are nice, though,’ Tim said casually.
‘What?’ everyone said at once, heads snapping towards him.
‘I think we can all agree I definitely won that round,’ he added.
In the half second that the rest of them had turned away to look at Alfred appealingly, horrified, Tim winked at Duke, grinning.
(It was unclear whether or not Tim was joking, and Duke really didn’t want to find out.)
‘So does this extend to your utility belt? Is it actually larger on the inside?’ Wally asked with interest, hands clasping and unclasping at his sides in his effort not to grab the belt and start poking at it.
‘No,’ Bruce said.
‘Only the third pocket to the left of the belt buckle,’ Dick added helpfully. ‘You can fit seven whole footlong subs in there!’
‘He knows that,’ Bruce said darkly, with a pointed look at a now rather sheepish Dick, ‘because he has done it several times without telling me.’
‘It was for science!’
‘And because you banned snacks on patrol. What did you expect us to do?’ Steph said.
‘At least he packed one for each of us. Thanks for that, by the way,’ Tim said.
‘No problemo,’ Dick said, with a flourishing bow.
Bruce was in fact rather impressed at the whole “food in the utility belt” thing, but couldn’t enjoy it because it never worked for him. He knew– he’d tried. Repeatedly.
Maybe it was because he’d been trying to fit Batburger fries in there and the belt hadn’t liked the unhealthy food.
Bruce felt very judged.
It was dinner time and Damian was nowhere to be found. He’d been called and texted to no avail, so Tim had been nominated to fetch him from his room. Tim couldn’t rightly say that he relished this task considering their rather tumultuous history, but he figured the grudging tolerance on both sides would mean he wouldn’t get stabbed or shouted at, at least.
As Tim approached Damian’s room, texting Kon and trusting his feet to take him there without falling, he stopped abruptly at the weird noises coming from inside.
The floorboards in there were creaking ominously, the noise not muffled whatsoever despite the plush carpet. Was Damian moving furniture or something?
There was a particularly loud squeak from the floor, a sound of approval from Damian, and then an... animal call?
Oh, fuck.
Tim knocked on the door, but didn’t wait for a reply before opening it.
Bat-Cow mooed at him, halfway out of the opening in one of Bruce’s spare capes that was draped over Damian’s wardrobe, the other half of her still in the Cape Void. Damian, it seemed, had been in the process of guiding her out of the Void and into his bedroom. He stared at Tim with a kind of deer-in-the-headlights expression, quickly replacing it with smooth impassivity.
Damian cleared his throat. ‘I didn’t want her to feel left out,’ he said, with great dignity, indicating Titus and Alfred the cat on his bed, who were watching the bizarre proceedings with interest. A weird gobbling noise told Tim that Damian’s turkey was also lurking somewhere.
‘No, of course not,’ Tim agreed calmly, his mind a pit of whirling blankness while he formulated any sort of appropriate response.
Damian collected himself, plastering on a scowl. ‘What do I have to do to buy your silence?’
‘Seeing this is payment enough,’ Tim choked out, doubled over in laughter. Bat-Cow lowed mournfully. ‘Actually, can I take a photo–’
‘Do not make fun of her–’
‘I’m not making fun of your cow, Damian, what the fuck,’ Tim managed between peals of laughter, ‘it’s just that this is the best thing I’ve seen in my whole life.’
Tim came further into the room, closing the door behind him. ‘Let’s get her into the room properly, then. It must suck standing like that,’ Tim said.
Damian stared at Tim like he’d suddenly just announced he was going to solve crime in Gotham via knitting plush batarangs. Tim ignored this manfully in favour of sizing up Bat-Cow. ‘So, do we like, pull her, or what?’ he asked.
‘She can walk, Timothy. She isn’t a moron,’ Damian said, looking very much like he wanted to pointedly add “unlike some people” to the end of his sentence. He chose not to for fear of Tim changing his mind and ratting him out. A wise decision.
They guided a very confused Bat-Cow into the room and over to a mattress Damian had dragged in for her. He’d even put sheets on it. They looked new, and had little tufts of grass printed on them. Tim raised an eyebrow. ‘How long have you been planning this for?’
Tim could have sworn that Damian shared a commiserating glance with his dog and cat, before smiling weirdly at Tim and saying, ‘A while.’
‘Okay,’ Tim said, having no choice but to take this worrying fact in his stride since he was leading an enormous cow through a bedroom in the largest and most historic mansion on the East coast so she could hang out with a dog, cat, turkey, and one of the most highly trained children on the planet. There wasn’t much room for anything else in his brain at present.
Bat-Cow sat down on her mattress with what Tim would attest to his dying day to be a relieved sigh. Tim understood the feeling.
‘Why were you near my room in the first place?’ Damian asked.
‘Oh, yeah. Dinner’s ready,’ Tim remembered. ‘Let’s go before anyone gets suspicious.’
Damian patted Bat-Cow on the head, then stood to follow Tim out of his bedroom. ‘What has Pennyworth made?’
‘Tomato and basil pasta.’
There was an awkward silence. Tim took it upon himself to break it. ‘You think Bat-Cow will want pasta?’
‘Shut up.’
Bruce could tell that Clark had a burning question. Perhaps it was the literal hovering and the imploring looks. However, Bruce knew that he would have asked already if it wasn't something completely moronic, so he had elected to ignore him for both the good of the planet and for his mental health.
Sadly, Clark took the plunge. Bruce mourned the next few nights' sleep he was going to lose already.
'So...' Clark said casually, leaning on a wall and sliding down it as he did so, having forgotten he was flying. He adjusted himself with a brilliant grin. 'Have you ever just... fallen in?'
'If this is the beginning of a pick-up line like last time because you're trying to win a bet with Barry, there are worse things in this galaxy than kryptonite and I am in possession of all of them,' Bruce said threateningly, holding up a photo of his children.
'No, no, nothing like that! I meant your Cape Void. It's technically behind you, right? So have you ever just fallen in?' Clark asked, smirking shamelessly. 'You must have done at some point.'
'I'm moving away. Permanently. To the Andromeda Galaxy.'
'Hey, Cass?' Steph said, flopped over an armchair with her headphones dangling around her neck. 'Do you think you could play table tennis against yourself using the Cape Void?'
Cass was on her feet so fast Steph's hair fluttered across her face. 'It would be wrong not to try.'
Several hours later, when it became apparent that playing table tennis through an eldritch void worked only about ten percent of the time, Cass and Steph had managed to rope everyone in the family into the effort and make a party of it. Tim was on the phone to his Young Justice friends while simultaneously skateboarding, Jon had already arrived and was lifting a manger of hay into the void under Damian's careful supervision, and Dick was blasting ABBA and dancing with Kori and Garth.
Someone had found a beach ball larger than Bat-Cow and had squeezed it into the Void with great difficulty, hoping it would be more successful than ping-pong balls due to its large size. It was not, but it did make very entertaining bouncing noises that echoed weirdly from the entrances of Bruce's various capes about the cave.
Jason rolled up an hour later with forty helium balloons and a DVD of the 1995 Pride and Prejudice series, which he set up with reverence on the Batcomputer.
Roy turned up half an hour after that and began teaching Lian how to shoot a bow into the Void with helium balloons attached to the arrows. Jason and Roy's reasoning for the balloons was apparently to see how tall the Cape Void was, but since they were all Peppa Pig themed (to Lian's delight) and there was really no way of telling the true height of the Void, this seemed unlikely. (The next morning, the videos of Red Hood cruising through central Gotham with dozens of helium balloons and a grenade launcher attached to his bike aired on the news, to Jason's uncontrollable laughter.)
Duke and Tim were building something together that looked very much like explosives and had tied it to a skateboard with Damian's shoelaces. From their blueprints, the skateboard's end goal was the Void.
As the night progressed, the situation devolved further. Kon and Bart had put a cape on the ceiling of the cave to see if they could fall out of it when entering from different locations. They had been very successful, as proven by the bruises sustained by everyone they'd landed on. Cassie had at first tried to catch them, but soon gave up and had tea with Alfred, Cissie, Steph, Cass, and Jason while watching Pride and Prejudice. Duke kept drifting over to watch the best parts.
Colin Firth emerged from the pond sopping wet, the audience in front of the computer nodding appreciatively. 'Not in the source material, of course,' Alfred said, 'but one should be able to take liberties if Colin Firth is on hand.'
Jason and the girls nodded sagely at this bit of wisdom.
Bruce walked tiredly into the cave after his flight back from Singapore, took one look at the flaming skateboard, Colin Firth, and the fake mustache on the T-Rex, and walked out again.
Some things were not worth the effort.
The following week was ruined by an Arkham breakout, and then by the worst news yet.
'Joker's escaped.'
‘All alone now, aren’t you Batsy?’ he said, maniacal leer stretched to face paint cracking proportions, gangly, puppet-like body jerking and twitching like some sort of pathetic insect.
‘No, I’m not,’ Batman said, deep and calm as a lake sleeping in winter.
From under his cape emerged multiple dark figures, like wings unfurling, brandishing various weapons with single-minded purpose. Teeth glinted sharply in the twilight and fists strained in anticipation.
‘Would you like a head start?’ Batman asked, cape spilling like ink across the skyline.
Their prey fled, and the hunt began.