Izurich
Hound55
DeadDrop
Blizz
Theyra
Eviledd1984
Sotiras
NoriWasHere
DionGotham Central
11 PM
Jim Gordon lit up a cigarette and took a deep drag off of it. He was trying to quit, but it felt so good to inhale the smoke and to feel the fire in his lungs. He blew a column of smoke into the air and watched it disperse into the night. The cigarette seemed to rejuvenate him slightly. He’d been at work for over fifteen hours now and was exhausted, running on nothing but caffeine for the last four of those fifteen hours.
He was on the rooftop of Central and listening to the nighttime sounds of emergency vehicle sirens warbling across the city. There was more chaos, always more, he would have to deal with, but that was a task for tomorrow. After he was done up here he’d go home and crawl into bed without even bothering to take his clothes off. In the morning, he’d wake up and go back in for another fifteen hours of punishment. That was what he did. Keep calm, carry on, and pray like hell the next day would be better.
“Smoking isn’t good for your health,” a voice rasped from behind Gordon.
“Neither is sneaking up on a man with a gun,” Gordon said without looking back. “I’m glad you got my message.”
“What have you got for me?”
“There’s a folder on the ground behind me.”
Gordon heard the scrape of boots and the rustle of fabric. He still didn’t look back. It wasn’t fear that made him look away, he’d seen him before after all, it was his own strange sense of morality. If Gordon didn’t see him, then he could at least defend his decision not to arrest him.
“SWAT found a cache of those weapons during a drug raid,” said Gordon.
His eyes tracked an ambulance speeding down a street ten blocks away with its lights flashing and siren blaring. Suddenly the sound cut off and the ambulance slowed to normal speed. He sighed as he blew smoke from his mouth.
“This is military grade hardware. Too high tech for these guys. Who owns the stash house your people raided?”
“Skeevers,” said Gordon. “Which means--”
“Thorne.”
“Or so we think. ATF is working with us on the weapons. They have a likely suspect. You ever go out into unincorporated Gotham much?”
“Not if I can help it.” A pause then he said. “Crusaders Motorcyle Club.”
“It’s sheriff’s territory,” Gordon said as he flicked the cigarette butt on the ground and stomped it out. “And the sheriff is hesitant to take on highly armed outlaw bikers. Can't say that I blame him. Regardless, my hands are tied. But yours?”
“Say no more.”
While he didn’t see or feel any movement, Gordon knew he was gone. That was how all their meetings worked. When he turned around, his suspicions were confirmed. He was gone, along with the folder that had been on on the ground.
“Good luck,” Gordon said to himself. “You’re going to need it.”
---
Gotham Palisades
11:21 PM
Rupert Thorne’s mansion was small by comparison. If Buckingham Palace was your comparison point. Less than five miles away from the Narrows, but it may as well have been on another planet. There was no trace of the junkies on the corner, doing the dope fiend lean as they shot up and fried what little brains they had left. No sign of the hookers who walked the streets, selling their bodies to feed themselves and their children. No dilapidated buildings with its copper piping and electrical wiring ripped out by money hungry fiends looking for a quick payday.
He never felt comfortable out here, given his line of work. The people out here were tantamount to American royalty with their fleets of cars, jets, and boats. Thorne’s people downtown peddled drugs, Thorne’s neighbors peddled Democracy to any third world country with finite natural resources to exploit. They robbed pension plans and left retiring employees penniless. Society condemned guys like Thorne and his men, saying they were the problem with America all the while the guy three houses down from him overthrew governments to avoid paying fifty cents on the dollar for exports. The only difference between Thorne's empire and the empires of business were that those criminal enterprises were deemed too big to fail by the government.
Thorne had a cuban cigar wedged in the fat fingers of his left hand. His right hand cradled the letter that had arrived earlier today inside a manilla envelope. He glanced out the window and could see the olympic sized swimming pool down below. He couldn’t remember the last time he swam in it. There was a good chance he never had. Just one of the many things he collected, a symbol of his status. But it was being used right now. Two of his security guards, muscle bound men just a step above gorillas in the evolution chart, had Arnie Fischer strung up over the water with a clothesline tied around his ankles. Water dripped off Arnie as he dangled in the air. Even from this far away Thorne could see his panicked breathing as he begged for mercy. Arnie was Thorne’s accountant, and this was all his fucking fault.
Thorne looked down at the papers in his hands. Photocopies of financial information that nailed him cold as the crime lord he actually was. Things that the police had been trying to get for years and had never been close to ever touching. Who the fuck had gotten it? The message that accompanied the photos was written on black paper with garish lime green ink. Thorne couldn't tell if the sloppy handwriting was a deliberate measure or not.
Thorne gritted his teeth as he stubbed out his cigar into the letter.
---
Downtown Gotham
12:11 PM
“You come highly recommended, Ms. Kyle.”
Selina looked over her sunglasses at the fat, old man. They were sharing a table on the outside patio of the swanky coffee shop. Thorne looked Selina over like a piece of meat, the old man doing what he thought was a charming smile. She would have been creeped out by it, but he had bits of pastry flake on his tie and it made him more comically sad than anything.
“I do my job well, Mr. Thorne.”
“I can only imagine,” he said with a sleazy smile. “The only thing they wouldn’t tell me was your asking price.”
Selina sipped from her latte before answering.
“Forty.”
“Forty thousand seems steep.”
“Percent. Whatever you want found, I get forty percent of it.”
Thorne frowned “It’s… it doesn’t work like that. What I want is only valuable to me.”
Selina spread her hands “Then forty percent of whatever it’s worth to you. That’s my price.”
“That’s highway robbery!”
“Then call the cops,” Selina said with a smirk. “But if you were able to call the cops, you wouldn’t reach out to a… procurement specialist like myself. And since it sounds like something pretty valuable to you, the longer you haggle the more my price goes up.”
Thorne put his balled up fists on the table. They were squeezed so tightly that they were beginning to turn white. As fun as it was to see him squirm, Selina knew that a delicate touch would be needed here on out if she wanted the job. All these rich, old men. For all their power and arrogance, they just couldn’t handle a woman even appearing to get the upper hand. It was time to put on the motherly concern.
“Start at the beginning, Mr. Thorne,” she said calmly. “Tell me what’s been taken and we’ll go from there.”
Selina listened intently as Thorne told his story. She wasn’t the only one interested in the tale. Inside the coffeeshop, a young man sat in front of a laptop with earbuds in. To passerbys he looked like another would-be writer trying to write a screenplay.
But Bruce Wayne’s earbuds were relaying to him every word of Thorne’s story. The small listening device embedded in the band of Thorne’s wristwatch had amazing sound quality. He was able to perfectly transcribe the details of what Thorne was saying. Since Falcone’s fall, Thorne had become top dog in the criminal underworld. Without the ties to the Italian Mafia, Thorne ran his criminal organization like a business. And like a CEO of a Fortune 500, Thorne kept trade secrets close to the vest. He was too careful. Compared to Falcone and Maroni, Thorne and his men had the discipline of monks. After a year of intense surveillance, Bruce was nowhere near finding any evidence that proved Rupert Thorne was a criminal kingpin.
But now?
Now there seemed to be a path to see Thorne thrown behind bars
He just had to make sure he beat Selina Kyle to it.
11 PM
Jim Gordon lit up a cigarette and took a deep drag off of it. He was trying to quit, but it felt so good to inhale the smoke and to feel the fire in his lungs. He blew a column of smoke into the air and watched it disperse into the night. The cigarette seemed to rejuvenate him slightly. He’d been at work for over fifteen hours now and was exhausted, running on nothing but caffeine for the last four of those fifteen hours.
He was on the rooftop of Central and listening to the nighttime sounds of emergency vehicle sirens warbling across the city. There was more chaos, always more, he would have to deal with, but that was a task for tomorrow. After he was done up here he’d go home and crawl into bed without even bothering to take his clothes off. In the morning, he’d wake up and go back in for another fifteen hours of punishment. That was what he did. Keep calm, carry on, and pray like hell the next day would be better.
“Smoking isn’t good for your health,” a voice rasped from behind Gordon.
“Neither is sneaking up on a man with a gun,” Gordon said without looking back. “I’m glad you got my message.”
“What have you got for me?”
“There’s a folder on the ground behind me.”
Gordon heard the scrape of boots and the rustle of fabric. He still didn’t look back. It wasn’t fear that made him look away, he’d seen him before after all, it was his own strange sense of morality. If Gordon didn’t see him, then he could at least defend his decision not to arrest him.
“SWAT found a cache of those weapons during a drug raid,” said Gordon.
His eyes tracked an ambulance speeding down a street ten blocks away with its lights flashing and siren blaring. Suddenly the sound cut off and the ambulance slowed to normal speed. He sighed as he blew smoke from his mouth.
“This is military grade hardware. Too high tech for these guys. Who owns the stash house your people raided?”
“Skeevers,” said Gordon. “Which means--”
“Thorne.”
“Or so we think. ATF is working with us on the weapons. They have a likely suspect. You ever go out into unincorporated Gotham much?”
“Not if I can help it.” A pause then he said. “Crusaders Motorcyle Club.”
“It’s sheriff’s territory,” Gordon said as he flicked the cigarette butt on the ground and stomped it out. “And the sheriff is hesitant to take on highly armed outlaw bikers. Can't say that I blame him. Regardless, my hands are tied. But yours?”
“Say no more.”
While he didn’t see or feel any movement, Gordon knew he was gone. That was how all their meetings worked. When he turned around, his suspicions were confirmed. He was gone, along with the folder that had been on on the ground.
“Good luck,” Gordon said to himself. “You’re going to need it.”
---
Gotham Palisades
11:21 PM
Rupert Thorne’s mansion was small by comparison. If Buckingham Palace was your comparison point. Less than five miles away from the Narrows, but it may as well have been on another planet. There was no trace of the junkies on the corner, doing the dope fiend lean as they shot up and fried what little brains they had left. No sign of the hookers who walked the streets, selling their bodies to feed themselves and their children. No dilapidated buildings with its copper piping and electrical wiring ripped out by money hungry fiends looking for a quick payday.
He never felt comfortable out here, given his line of work. The people out here were tantamount to American royalty with their fleets of cars, jets, and boats. Thorne’s people downtown peddled drugs, Thorne’s neighbors peddled Democracy to any third world country with finite natural resources to exploit. They robbed pension plans and left retiring employees penniless. Society condemned guys like Thorne and his men, saying they were the problem with America all the while the guy three houses down from him overthrew governments to avoid paying fifty cents on the dollar for exports. The only difference between Thorne's empire and the empires of business were that those criminal enterprises were deemed too big to fail by the government.
Thorne had a cuban cigar wedged in the fat fingers of his left hand. His right hand cradled the letter that had arrived earlier today inside a manilla envelope. He glanced out the window and could see the olympic sized swimming pool down below. He couldn’t remember the last time he swam in it. There was a good chance he never had. Just one of the many things he collected, a symbol of his status. But it was being used right now. Two of his security guards, muscle bound men just a step above gorillas in the evolution chart, had Arnie Fischer strung up over the water with a clothesline tied around his ankles. Water dripped off Arnie as he dangled in the air. Even from this far away Thorne could see his panicked breathing as he begged for mercy. Arnie was Thorne’s accountant, and this was all his fucking fault.
Thorne looked down at the papers in his hands. Photocopies of financial information that nailed him cold as the crime lord he actually was. Things that the police had been trying to get for years and had never been close to ever touching. Who the fuck had gotten it? The message that accompanied the photos was written on black paper with garish lime green ink. Thorne couldn't tell if the sloppy handwriting was a deliberate measure or not.
????
RiDDle ME ThIs:
What KIND of bIRD HAS wiNGs BuT doesn’t FlY?
ANSWER: A jailbirD
$$$$ 40,000 or EveryOne finds OUT WHAT I KNOW
????
RiDDle ME ThIs:
What KIND of bIRD HAS wiNGs BuT doesn’t FlY?
ANSWER: A jailbirD
$$$$ 40,000 or EveryOne finds OUT WHAT I KNOW
????
Thorne gritted his teeth as he stubbed out his cigar into the letter.
---
Downtown Gotham
12:11 PM
“You come highly recommended, Ms. Kyle.”
Selina looked over her sunglasses at the fat, old man. They were sharing a table on the outside patio of the swanky coffee shop. Thorne looked Selina over like a piece of meat, the old man doing what he thought was a charming smile. She would have been creeped out by it, but he had bits of pastry flake on his tie and it made him more comically sad than anything.
“I do my job well, Mr. Thorne.”
“I can only imagine,” he said with a sleazy smile. “The only thing they wouldn’t tell me was your asking price.”
Selina sipped from her latte before answering.
“Forty.”
“Forty thousand seems steep.”
“Percent. Whatever you want found, I get forty percent of it.”
Thorne frowned “It’s… it doesn’t work like that. What I want is only valuable to me.”
Selina spread her hands “Then forty percent of whatever it’s worth to you. That’s my price.”
“That’s highway robbery!”
“Then call the cops,” Selina said with a smirk. “But if you were able to call the cops, you wouldn’t reach out to a… procurement specialist like myself. And since it sounds like something pretty valuable to you, the longer you haggle the more my price goes up.”
Thorne put his balled up fists on the table. They were squeezed so tightly that they were beginning to turn white. As fun as it was to see him squirm, Selina knew that a delicate touch would be needed here on out if she wanted the job. All these rich, old men. For all their power and arrogance, they just couldn’t handle a woman even appearing to get the upper hand. It was time to put on the motherly concern.
“Start at the beginning, Mr. Thorne,” she said calmly. “Tell me what’s been taken and we’ll go from there.”
Selina listened intently as Thorne told his story. She wasn’t the only one interested in the tale. Inside the coffeeshop, a young man sat in front of a laptop with earbuds in. To passerbys he looked like another would-be writer trying to write a screenplay.
But Bruce Wayne’s earbuds were relaying to him every word of Thorne’s story. The small listening device embedded in the band of Thorne’s wristwatch had amazing sound quality. He was able to perfectly transcribe the details of what Thorne was saying. Since Falcone’s fall, Thorne had become top dog in the criminal underworld. Without the ties to the Italian Mafia, Thorne ran his criminal organization like a business. And like a CEO of a Fortune 500, Thorne kept trade secrets close to the vest. He was too careful. Compared to Falcone and Maroni, Thorne and his men had the discipline of monks. After a year of intense surveillance, Bruce was nowhere near finding any evidence that proved Rupert Thorne was a criminal kingpin.
But now?
Now there seemed to be a path to see Thorne thrown behind bars
He just had to make sure he beat Selina Kyle to it.
