Batman Prehistoric

Chapter 01: Temporal Transference

An early morning breeze swept through my room, its chill touch waking me.

"Alfred, would you close the window?" I asked without opening my eyes. When my butler didn't answer, I sat up in bed and looked around.

Throwing back the covers, I jumped out of bed. The window hadn't been open as I'd previously believed. The entire eastern wall was missing. Hidden behind the green canopy of a thick forest, the rising sun lit the horizon with pale light but failed to reach me.

The neatness of the wall removal was startling. The wood floor wasn't chipped or splintered, and the rug covering it didn't have a frayed edge where the rest had been cut away. One of the windows on the corner of the room had been bisected, but the glass had neither fractured nor broken. It was as if everything beyond a certain point had simply disappeared out of existence.

I wanted a closer look at where the eastern half of my room had vanished, but I didn't dare get closer without knowing which beams under the floor would lack the necessary support with one end no longer anchored on the opposing side of the building.

Moving away from the missing wall, I opened the door to my room and headed downstairs. I flicked a switch on the wall to test it, but the overhead lights in the hallway didn't turn on. Odd. The emergency generator should've engaged automatically in the event of a power outage.  I suddenly remembered the emergency generators were located on the eastern side of the house. Whatever had sliced off half my room might also have compromised the generators.

"Alfred!" I called out when I reached the bottom of the stairs from the second floor. No response. Increasing volume as loud as I could shout, I called for him again. "Alfred!"

Silence.

Deciding to ignore the thick foliage outside the house, I went to find Alfred first. His room was in the north wing, but unless something had chopped off that side of the house too, his room should've been undisturbed.

A firm knock on Alfred's door caused a hollow echo to trail down the hallway, but no sound came from within. I knocked again with the same result. Starting to be concerned, I tried the doorknob and found it unlocked. I opened the door and looked in.  The bed was made, neat and organized like everything else in the butler's room. A glance at the wall clock let me know it was near seven in the morning. Recalling Alfred's habits, I knew he'd be in the kitchen making breakfast.

My pace was fast, and an uncomfortable knot was twisting in my stomach. The kitchen was on the east side of the house, or at least, it had been there last night. Skidding around the corner, I stopped and stared. The kitchen and half the dining room were missing, replaced by tree trunks, ferns, and thick tangles of vines.

Alfred was gone. Wherever the rest of the house had vanished to, my faithful butler was most likely with it. It stood to reason if I found one, I'd find the other as well.

Walking across the spacious entryway, I glanced out the rectangular window beside the front door. The lawn only extended fifty feet before the trees and thick undergrowth blocked everything else from view.

Poison Ivy was supposed to be locked up in Arkham Asylum, but if the mass of greenery surrounding the house was any indication, she was loose and up to her old tricks. Deciding it was best to handle the situation as Batman rather than as Bruce Wayne in pajamas, I headed toward the library in the back of the house.

Stocked floor to ceiling with a multitude of books, the library was a wealth of factual information and fictional adventures. A few chairs and a sofa provided room for relaxing beside the sizable windows. The windows had formerly looked out into the backyard, but a mass of trees clustered together was the only thing visible now. Ignoring the library, I pulled down the pendulum inside the grandfather clock positioned between two bookcases to open the secret passage to the Batcave.