Batman: The Chill of Old Ghosts

Superman, The Man of Steel

I.

The stolen car screeches as it barely makes the turn around the corner with three of Gotham’s finest wildly in pursuit. The streets get more and more narrow with every block cleared and the driver of the roaring grey vehicle struggles to maintain the grip of the road and control of the machine. The criminal, along with his accomplice, risks it all with a final turn that will either set their escape or halt it. With the police sirens echoing louder and louder between the narrow corridors of the poorer Gotham street, the driver of the stolen car pulls hard on the handbrake and spins the car nearly 150 degrees. The tires whine under the force applied and the wheels spin in place while the car body rattles. With a sudden jolt, the car catches up to its wheels and it lurches forward violently, too much so for the amateur racing driver to handle. The car skids at an angle towards a side road but fails to complete its turn, crashing instead sideways against the street corner, sending the bricks in the wall crumbling atop the vehicle’s bonnet.

As the engine hisses and the smoke mixes with the debris to fill the air with a thick grey coat, the bundling thieves struggle to escape the wreck, resorting to climbing out of the windows. The smoke turns blue and red now and the police wail draws deafeningly close. As the tires scream to a halt one by one, and the sirens cease, replaced by shouts and commands, the two criminals make a dash down the side road until they find a ladder in a back alley that leads towards the roof. Unquestionably, they take it.

The pair scramble up and onto the roof, seeming to have avoided spotting by the GCPD on their tails. Taking no chances to lie in wait for an escape, they hop across the connected buildings, vaulting over exhaust fans and bundles of electrical cable, until they reach enough of a distance down the road where the police voices begin to fade. They slump against a wall, safely covered by a rotten wooden billboard with no poster fixed that hovers above their heads.

“Geez, that was close. What the hell were you doing?!” one of the thieves, a grey-bearded older man in a stripe-branded blue tracksuit bemoans to his ally. “Can you even drive?!”

“Hey, back off!” the younger responds. He wears a black leather trench coat over jeans and a once-white-now-grey tank top, and black woollen gloves with the fingers cut out. “I had to try and shake the cops, didn’t I?! It’s like I tell ya, bad luck. It’s always bad luck. Why else would a copper be hanging ‘round the garage after hours?”

The two agree that it wasn’t their night and wait out a little longer until the police cars begin to leave one by one. They watch from the distance, peering over the roof wall.

“Hey, I tell ya one thing” the bearded thief begins. “You talk about bad luck, you realise what’s missing?” The other shrugs .“No sign of the Bat in sight!”

“Hey, yeah true.” The younger thief snickers. “Ain’t I glad though... guys a killer now.” He pats around his coat until he finds the lighter in his side pocket. “Hey, maybe we head over to Maury’s place now that-“

An immense red light blinds the pair suddenly and the lighter explodes in the crooks hand, knocking the pair off their feet and the injured man screaming instantly. He holds his blackened burnt hand in his other and wails in horror, the tears, snot, and saliva pouring down his anguished face. The bearded man leaps to his feet in terror. A bullet, he thinks, but from where? Before he can turn again, he vanishes from the scene in a blue blur.

“Hey!! Hey!!” cries the burned young criminal, staring up at his smoking hand and seeing no sight of his colleague. “Where are you, man?!!”

Just then, he feels the building begin to explode and crumble beneath him. The roof shakes and the sound of brick smashing to the earth surrounds him. he scrambles one-handed around to recover and save himself from a certain death. Only he finds the building still stands, the rumble ceased, the roof still level. But he heard the explosion, he wonders?