by Greg Cox
“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Bringing the house down,” Batman said. Wrapping the cable around his fists, he tugged with all his strength. He was no Superman, but the compromised structure had already taken a beating. Gritting his teeth, he pulled on the cable until the weakened wall gave way—and toppled down on top of the Talon, burying him alive.
Heal all you want, Batman thought. You’re still trapped.
It was just him and Lydia now. He turned slowly to face her.
Even with the Talons dead or buried, Miss Gotham was blazing hotter with every passing moment, like a chain reaction building in intensity. Her eyes were blue as a welder’s torch. Heat poured off her as if from a blast furnace, forcing Batman to keep his distance and shield himself with his cape. The bright light outshone all else, reflecting off what remained of the polished marble walls. Even with the filtered lenses in his cowl, it hurt his eyes to gaze upon her directly.
“You have to cool down!” he shouted over the crackling flames. “Can you do that?”
She shook her head. “I see only fire.” Her voice crackled like a bonfire. “I bring only the inferno.”
Just as Percy predicted. There was no way her fire could keep building at this rate without reaching some sort of explosive peak. She’s going critical.
“Leave me!” She gestured toward the gaping hole in the floor. “The future needs you. Gotham needs the Bat…”
Batman refused to accept that the future was set in stone.
“Let me help you,” he pleaded. “Maybe we can find a cure, some way to reverse what was done to you.”
His mind chased after solutions. If he could get Lydia back into her sarcophagus, deprive her flames, of oxygen, that could serve as a stopgap until he could have her placed in cryogenic suspension. Victor Fries’s singular experiments in bio-thermodynamics might help, or perhaps STAR Labs could be brought in to consult.
“No.” Her eyes shifted from blue to blinding white as she peered into eternity. “I see Percy, waiting for me. Our future together is…”
Despite the increasingly unbearable heat, a chill ran down Batman’s spine. Were her words just romantic delusion, or was she seeing beyond her own destruction?
“Leave!”
With that command she stalked toward him, the heat of her driving him back through the shattered remains of the Great Owl, toward the gap in the floor he had used for his escape months ago. White flames enveloped her, forcing him to avert his eyes. The burial chamber became an oven… no, a crematorium. His fireproof suit and cape began to smoke.
The Talon remained buried beneath the collapsed wall.
Was there a way to save him?
“I see you, Percy!” she exulted. “Our future is now.” She flared up like an incendiary charge, her face and figure lost behind an expanding ball of white-hot fire that rushed at Batman, making his decision for him. He dove through the gap to escape an inferno foreseen a century ago.
* * *
Harbor House was in flames. The Court of Owl’s property was built over the ruins of the Labyrinth, which was collapsing beneath it. Brick walls and sturdy timbers crashed into the depths.
Batman, Batgirl, and Joanna watched from a rooftop a safe distance away as the Gotham City Fire Department valiantly fought to contain the fire. From what Batman could tell, the firefighters were bringing it under control, although Harbor House was past saving—as were those left behind in the Labyrinth.
“I keep thinking there must be something else I could have done,” Batman said as he watched the diminishing flames light up the night. His shoulders slumped beneath his cape. His hands were bandaged beneath his gloves. “There had to have been some way to save her.”
“Lydia died more than a century ago,” Batgirl said. She stood beside him as they contemplated the dying inferno—the culmination of the prediction they had been chasing for days and nights now. A portion of her cape was draped over Joanna to combat the chill night air. “Her fate was decided long before you or I were born. Her future was never in your hands.”
Despite her efforts, Batman found little solace. “I can’t accept that.”
“You saved Joanna,” she reminded him. “You foiled the Owls. You traced the Burning Sickness to that plasma center, shutting that down. No more innocent people are going to be used as test subjects, and with Vincent Wright gone, chances are the ‘outbreaks’ have been stamped out for good.” She looked over at him. “Take the win, Batman.”
He found it difficult to let go, thinking back to that first night in Professor Morse’s office. So many people, both innocent and guilty, had been consumed by a fire that should have been extinguished long ago.
“If only I had put the pieces together sooner,” he persisted.
“You can’t see the future,” Batgirl said. “None of us can, thank goodness.”
Despite Percy’s best efforts, Batman thought. The century-long quest for his elixir had yielded nothing but violence and tragedy. As with Cassandra, the lure of prophecy had doomed everyone it touched.
“I think you’re right about that,” he replied.
“Wouldn’t be the first time,” she said. “I may go by ‘Oracle’ some days, but actual precognition? That’s a gift I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.”
A thunderous crash reached them as the last of Harbor House tumbled into the ground, sending up a new pillar of flames. Batman doubted that anything remained of the Labyrinth or those who had perished there. Even the bronze replica of Cassandra had surely melted to slag by now. The long-lost formula was gone, if it had ever truly existed.
Which was probably just as well.
“Oh, thank God, I was afraid I was never going to see you again!”
“You and me both!”
Reunited at last back at their apartment in the University District, Joanna and Claire hugged each other fiercely. Batman and Nightwing looked on as the roommates rejoiced in their mutual survival.
“I’m so sorry,” Joanna said to her friend, tears welling up in her eyes. “I never meant to get you involved in any of this. I swear to God, I had no idea how dangerous it was.”
“It’s okay,” Claire assured her. “I mean, it was utterly terrifying, but it’s over now.” She glanced over at Batman. “It is over, right?”
“I expect so,” he said. “With Vincent Wright gone and his search for the elixir proven to be a costly wild goose chase, the Court of Owls has little incentive to pursue a matter that’s already drawn too much unwanted attention. This was Wright’s pet project and obsession.”
The Grandmaster would have received a full report from Vincent’s men on what had transpired in the Labyrinth. The Owls knew now that Percy’s elusive formula had been bait for a deathtrap—one that had cost them Wright and two Talons. Through his underworld contacts, Batman would spread the word that all trace of the formula had been destroyed. That should make the Court as ready to close the books as he was.
Just in case, though, Bruce Wayne would quietly acquire the girls’ apartment and gift it to them. Then he and Nightwing would outfit the place with a top-of-the-line security system.
“What about your thesis?” Nightwing asked, cradling a bandaged arm. He was still recovering from the injuries he’d sustained protecting Claire from the Talon, but had assured Batman that he’d be back in fighting form soon. “Are you still going forward with it?”
“Not a chance.” She shook her head. “I’m not going to push my luck there, let alone risk provoking the Owls any further. Too many people have been hurt already.” She dabbed at her eyes. “Let Percy and Lydia rest in peace. And Dennis.”
Claire looked appalled. “But all of your work…?”
“It’s fine,” Joanna said. “I got the answers I was looking for. More than I bargained for, really. I just want to put this all behind me now. There’s plenty of beautiful and inspiring art out there that’s not linked to crimes and conspiracies. I think I want to study those instead.”
“Good idea,” Batman said. “Let sleeping Owls lie.”
They were his problem, not hers.
* * *
“…today, the unseen was everything, the unknown the only real fact of life.”
Bruce sipped a cup of herbal tea as he relaxed in the garden on the Wayne estate, leafing through an illustrated edition of The Wind in the Willows. It was a cool, clear afternoon, so he was perfectly comfortable in a sweater and slacks. He could have been training or studying down in the cave, prepping for wherever his mission took him next, but instead he had made time to enjoy his mother’s favorite garden for the first time in decades.
Lydia Doyle, preserved in an idyllic moment of time as she reclined by the water’s edge, kept him company.
“Penny for your thoughts, sir?” Alfred joined him in the garden, bearing a tray of cucumber sandwiches, which he set down on the marble bench. Bruce lifted his eyes from the book.
“Nothing in particular, Alfred, which is… refreshing.”
“I can imagine,” the butler said, lingering. “I must say it does my heart good to see you at ease here.” He looked over the scene wistfully. “Brings back memories of simpler times, if you don’t mind me saying so.”
Bruce nodded. “I’d misplaced those memories, until recently.” He regarded the sculpture of Lydia gracing the center of Percy’s fountain. “Not that the past was ever truly as simple as we like to imagine it.”
“Too true, Master Bruce.” His gaze followed the younger man’s. “I hope your newfound knowledge of Miss Doyle’s tragic history will not sully your own cherished memories of this spot.”
“I don’t think so,” Bruce replied. “I was afraid of that at first—that the Court of Owls had contaminated the past beyond redemption, tainting it irrevocably—but I’ve come to realize that is too narrow and defeatist a view. If this case has taught me anything, it’s that the history of Gotham isn’t just the history of the Owls and their victims. It’s also the history of men and women fighting back against the Court, no matter the cost, and finding love and beauty in their lives, regardless of how dark the encroaching shadows might seem at times.”
“A comforting sentiment, sir.” Alfred took Bruce’s empty tea cup from him. “One likes to think that Miss Doyle would agree.”
“Look at her, Alfred,” Bruce said. “That sculpture alone, which we owe to both Percy and Lydia, is proof that Gotham’s past holds more than just crime and bloodshed. Peace and grace can also be found there, and endure for generations to come, long after the sins of the past are dead and buried.”
“And Gotham’s future, sir?”
“That’s up to us to carve out, as best as we can, in hopes of achieving something good and lasting.”
“As did your own parents, if I may be so bold,” Alfred said. “In any event, I’ll leave you to your reading… and your memories.”
“Thank you, Alfred.”
The butler departed, leaving Bruce alone with “Miss Gotham.” A passing cloud dimmed the light illuminating the statue, casting it in a more melancholy hue. Bruce’s face took on Batman’s grimly resolute profile as his memory superimposed Lydia’s blazing final moments on the lovely visage of the fountain sculpture. He meant what he had said to Alfred, about finding hope in the art and elegance Lydia and Percy had bestowed. Yet he hadn’t forgotten their tragic fate—or the unfinished business before him.
You’ll outlast the Court of Owls, Lydia. You have my promise.
* * *
“Report,” the Grandmaster said.
An emergency meeting of the Court had been convened in the wake of Vincent Wright’s disastrous return to the Labyrinth. To guarantee their privacy, the meeting was being held in a forgotten bomb shelter that had been gathering dust since the end of the Cold War, on a night when Bruce Wayne was known to be hosting a charity benefit on the other side of town.
As was custom, the bunker had been swept—twice—for any concealed electronic surveillance devices. Only the highest-ranking members of the Court were in attendance, which suited the Grandmaster just fine.
“Efforts are already underway to ensure that none of Vincent Wright’s illicit activities can be traced back to us,” a masked man said. “His estate and properties will be transferred through a number of proxies and cut-outs, and will end up in our hands. As instructed, we have divested ourselves of any interest in his pharmaceutical enterprises, which are currently under investigation by the authorities. Our contacts in law-enforcement will see to it that our name stays out of the reports.”
“Good,” the Grandmaster said. “Proceed along those lines, with the utmost discretion.”
In truth, there was a silver lining here. Vincent Wright had been taken off the playing field and could no longer challenge her control of the Court. It was probably just as well that his family’s obsessive search for Percy Wright’s lost elixir could finally be terminated. That quixotic quest had consumed enough of the Court’s time and resources over the last century. It was time to move on to new challenges and opportunities.
Percy’s elixir would have been a valuable asset, to be sure, but the Court of Owls had managed to reign over Gotham for centuries without it. They could do the same in the future. As long as their secrets were safe, Gotham was theirs and always would be.
Regardless of the Batman.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Batman has his Bat-Family and other allies watching his back. He would not be able to protect Gotham without the aid of Alfred, Commissioner Gordon, Batgirl, and so many other invaluable team players. In the same way, this book would not have been possible without the generous support and assistance of my own allies. Many thanks are due to:
My editor, Steve Saffel, and the rest of the team at Titan Books, for waiting patiently for this book while I moved—twice—from one home to another. Special thanks to Nick Landau, Vivian Cheung, Sam Matthews, and Natasha MacKenzie.
Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo for creating the Court of Owls in the first place and giving me such great material to work with. Josh Anderson, Amy Weingartner, and everyone at Warner Bros. and DC Comics for providing me with plenty of encouragement and inspiration.
My agent, Russ Galen, for deftly handling the business end of things.
And, as ever, Karen and our cat Sophie for giving me plenty of support on the home front, while patiently listening to me babble on about Batman for days and weeks on end.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
GREG COX is the New York Times bestselling author of numerous books and short stories, including the official movie novelizations of The Dark Knight Rises, Man of Steel, Godzilla, War for the Planet of the Apes, Ghost Rider, Daredevil, and the first three Underworld movies. He has also written books and stories based on such popular series as Alias, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Farscape, The 4400, The Green Hornet, The Librarians, Roswell, Star Trek, Warehouse 13, Xena: Warrior Princess, and Zorro.
He has received three Scribe Awards from the International Association of Media Tie-In Writers as well as the Grandmaster Award for Life Achievement. He lives in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
Visit him at: www.gregcox-author.com.