Gotham Arc #13.
Batman stood between Jake and Selina, cape settling around his shoulders like folded wings. The white lenses of his cowl were blank, emotionless, but somehow they saw everything. Every twitch. Every tell. Every weakness.
Jake had seen him in movies. Watched cosplayers at conventions try to capture that presence and fail. But this? Standing three meters away from the actual legend?
The hero who'd inspired a thousand forum debates. The figure he'd defended in arguments about prep time and contingencies. The reason he'd stayed up late reading wiki entries about Gotham's greatest detective.
That hero was staring at him like he was just another criminal.
His hands trembled. The image of Tommy's broken nose flashed in his mind. Wasn't he one? A criminal?
He stiffened his hands. Not the time.
Batman had just issued a warning.
"Step away from her."
That meant fists and kicks if he didn't.
But what could Batman really do to him?
Jake had the strength. The power. Enhanced reflexes that let him dodge bullets. He could take Batman, couldn't he?
The thought cut through the fear like a blade.
But he hadn't been quiet in Gotham. Batman was a detective first -- the world's greatest. It was possible he knew more about The Spider than Jake assumed.
Harley's chemicals could dissolve his webbing. Batman could have refined them, disabling Jake mid-combat.
Or was he just overestimating him?
No point risking to find out. He had the ring. His mission accomplished.
"You don't have to tell me twice," Jake said, taking a measured step back.
Behind Batman, Selina struggled. Her legs were webbed, but her core strength was absurd. She contracted, rolled, and kicked backward.
She used the momentum to tear at the webs with her teeth, clawed fingers finding purchase. The webbing held, but gave slightly. Just enough to show she wouldn't stop.
Jake's gut twisted watching her fight. Desperate. Terrified. Like a caged animal gnawing its own leg off to escape.
Didn't change his mind. He needed the ring more.
His demeanor hardened. "I already got what I came for."
His wrist twitched, web fluid ready. Time to leave.
"I didn't say you could go."
Batman's voice dropped lower -- gravel scraped across stone, each word weighted with absolute authority. His posture shifted. Shoulders squared. Hands loose at his sides, but ready.
Jake froze.
His pulse hammered. His muscles coiled. Every nerve screamed conflicting instructions: fight, flee, submit, attack.
Was this actually going to happen? Him versus Batman?
The fan in him knew the danger. Batman didn't fight fair. He studied opponents, exploited weaknesses, turned strengths into vulnerabilities.
But if Jake avoided close combat, relied on his webs, kept moving -- he could win, right? Batman was brilliant, but he was still human. Still bound by the same physics that let Jake swing between buildings at highway speeds.
"My mistake. I made you think I was taking orders." Jake's voice came out colder than he intended.
He shot a web from his left wrist.
Batman's jaw tightened.
A Batarang flew, throwing the web off course with its momentum.
Jake's shoulders squared, heartbeat rising.
Batman's cape billowed slightly in the evening wind, making him look larger. Inhuman.
"Gotham's underworld is in upheaval because of you," Batman said, each word measured and deliberate. "First the chaos: Harley Quinn, Pier 49. Dixon Docks." His gaze dropped to Jake's hand. "And now that."
The ring.
Jake's fingers closed around it instinctively, protective. Batman's eyes tracked the movement. Cataloging. Analyzing.
"The Roman Ring."
Jake's shoulders pulled back slightly, head tilting a fraction. Curiosity bleeding through his defensive stance despite himself.
Roman Ring?
Batman's eyes narrowed behind the cowl. "You don't even know what it is, do you? The power it represents? What it could do to this city?"
"Sounds like you do." Jake twirled the ring between his fingers, forcing casualness he didn't feel. "Mind telling?"
Batman paused. Processing. His stance didn't change, but something in his bearing shifted -- recalculating.
"You weren't planning on leveraging it." Not a question. A deduction. "Why take it?"
Behind them, Selina's struggling stopped. Her breathing was ragged, but her attention fixed on Jake. Waiting for the answer.
Jake almost ignored the question. Let Batman stand there wondering while he disappeared into Gotham's maze.
But Selina was watching. And something about that look -- desperate, calculating, curious -- made him answer.
"To survive."
His eyes locked with Catwoman's. "She understands."
Batman's jaw set harder. "But I don't. Not when MY CITY is at stake." He took one measured step forward. "Whatever your reasons, take them somewhere else. Give me the ring. Leave Gotham, and don't come back."
"Or what?"
The air between them crystallized. Heavy. Charged. Every sound seemed to fade -- the distant traffic, Selina's breathing, even the wind.
Batman held perfectly still, keeping the negotiation alive through sheer will. "I'm giving you a chance."
"A warning," Jake corrected. "One I won't heed."
Batman didn't argue -- he moved.
Explosive motion that closed the distance in a heartbeat.
Jake didn't need his instincts screaming. He was prepared.
He threw himself sideways, web-line already firing at a rooftop edge. Batman's fist carved through the space where Jake's head had been, the displaced air whistling.
Jake yanked himself up and away, flipping mid-swing. His heart hammered against his ribs. Too fast. Batman was too fast for someone without powers. Every movement was precision engineered, no wasted motion, violence intended.
He knows what I can do, Jake realized.
Batman's hand was already moving, pulling something from his belt. Jake's spider-sense spiked. He twisted, firing a web-shot at Batman's arm.
The Dark Knight didn't dodge. The web hit his gauntlet, sticking--
--and dissolved.
The webbing hissed like acid on metal, breaking down in seconds into inert black residue that flaked away.
Jake's chest tightened. Shit. He'd prepared.
Batman closed the distance again, using Jake's shock. A calculated strike toward Jake's ribs -- testing, probing.
Jake vaulted backward, firing three rapid web-shots. High, middle, low. Force Batman to choose.
Batman chose none. He dropped flat, letting all three sail overhead, and swept Jake's legs.
Spider-sense saved him. Jake jumped, already firing a web at the nearest building. He swung wide, gaining altitude, buying space to think.
Batman didn't chase on foot. A grapnel fired, the line catching a fire escape above. He ascended with mechanical efficiency, cape billowing behind him.
They met on a rooftop -- flat, featureless, nowhere to hide. The skyline stretched around them, Gotham's decay made beautiful by distance and night.
"You're making this harder than it needs to be," Batman said, already moving forward.
"That's the idea." Jake fired a web-shot at Batman's feet.
Batman jumped, remarkably high, clearing the webbing. He threw another Batarang.
Jake's spider-sense guided his hand. He caught it without looking, felt the weight, the balance. Threw it back twice as fast.
Batman deflected with a gauntlet, the metal ringing like a bell. But Jake was already moving, web-lining to the rooftop's edge, then launching himself at Batman from an unexpected angle.
Batman pivoted, hands rising to intercept. Jake didn't engage. He fired webs past Batman -- at the rooftop surface, the water tanks, the access door. Created an instant web-net that spread like a spider's trap.
Batman recognized the tactic and lunged forward -- trying to get inside Jake's range before the net closed.
Too slow.
Jake yanked all the web-lines simultaneously. The net collapsed inward with devastating force, threads strong enough to hold a moving truck converging on a single point.
Batman.
The Dark Knight tried to dodge, but physics won. The webbing caught his cape, his legs, his left arm. He stumbled, balance compromised for the first time.
Jake pressed the advantage. Web after web, layering them, building momentum. He swung around Batman in a wide arc, firing constantly, each strand adding to the cocoon.
Batman's free hand moved. Chemical spray hissed from his gauntlet: the same substance that had dissolved Jake's earlier webs.
But Jake was faster now. He webbed Batman's wrist, yanked it sideways. The spray went wide, eating through webbing but missing the critical strands.
Batman's leg came up -- impossibly fast, impossibly flexible -- trying for Jake's head even while tangled.
Jake caught the ankle mid-kick.
No time for quips.
He yanked hard. Batman's balance, already compromised by the webbing, gave way. He fell backward, and Jake was already moving, web-lining to a higher perch, pulling Batman up with him.
Upside-down. Suspended by one ankle. The cape hanging down like a shroud.
Batman didn't struggle. Didn't curse. Just hung there, calculating.
No time to gloat. Jake was already firing more webbing.
Behind them, Selina had finally torn free of her restraints, scrambling away from the confrontation and putting distance between herself and the violence. But she didn't run. Just watched, body coiled, ready to move if needed.
Jake focused on Batman. Fast cocoon, before he could--
Clink.
Clank.
Bang.
He should have started with the belt! The thought hit him like a slap, too late. Ripped it out or webbed at it. Whichever disabled Batman's artillery best.
Small cylinders fell from the belt. Smoke grenades. Flash-bangs. They hit the rooftop and detonated simultaneously.
White light exploded across Jake's vision, searing through his lenses. His spider-sense hazed. The sensory overload too much, too many stimuli, can't process, can't--
He went aerial on pure instinct. Web-line fired blind, pulling him up and away. His ears rang. His vision was nothing but white afterimages and swimming darkness.
The smoke was everywhere. Thick. Acrid. Cutting off sight lines, sound, everything.
Jake's mind raced through Batman's options. Fists? Batarangs? Electricity? Where would he aim first?
He forced himself to breathe. Let his enhanced physiology metabolize the flash-bang's effects.
1,2...5.
His vision cleared. Slowly. Like looking through frosted glass that was melting.
The smoke was thinning.
Jake's tunnel vision locked onto where Batman had been hanging.
Empty.
His Spidersense hummed. Not convincing enough.
Jake's head whipped left.
There.
Through the thinning smoke, on an adjacent building's roof, a shadow moved. Cape billowing. The silhouette was unmistakable.
Batman stood at the roof's edge. Perfectly still. Watching.
For one frozen moment, their eyes met across the distance. The white lenses of Batman's cowl reflected nothing. Revealed nothing. But Jake felt the weight of that gaze like a physical thing.
They weren't done. Not yet.
Batman hadn't retreated. Hadn't fled. He'd disengaged.
Tactical decision. Strategic withdrawal.
Jake's hands were shaking again. Not from fear this time.
He had fought Batman. The Batman.
Would he survive him twice?
The Dark Knight's cape snapped once in the wind.
What had Batman learned about him?
Everything, probably.
How he always fired left wrist first. Always. Used spider-sense reactively, not predictively. Relied on mobility over defense. His webs were strong but the solvent worked. Enhanced strength.
A complete threat assessment.
And the Roman Ring?
Still in his hand, safe.
He remembered something. Looked around, unfocused.
Where had Catwoman gone?
His hands still shook from the adrenaline. Spidersense still humming from the flash bang.
Maybe she had escaped. Could she have given up after all that fight?
By the time he looked back, Batman was nowhere in sight. Swallowed by Gotham's shadows.
Early release so I can read all your comments. Rate this chapter out of 10. I wanna know how I did.
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