The Spider Assassin #46.
The old Gotham Gazette building stood like a broken tooth against the smoke-stained sky.
Jake swung past its western face, his right hand firing webbing that caught the clock tower's skeletal framework. The mechanism had stopped decades ago, hands frozen at 11:47 like the city itself had given up measuring time. The glass face was shattered, pigeons roosting where gears should have turned, their droppings painting white streaks down crumbling brick.
His feet scraped against the tower's edge as momentum carried him forward.
Below, the street was empty. Above, smoke from distant fires painted the sky in shades that hurt to perceive through chemical-damaged vision.
'She needs you,' the second voice whispered. 'She's waiting. She's scared and alone and you're the only one who understands what she--'
"Shut up."
The words came out through clenched teeth. Jake released the webbing, let gravity pull him down three stories before firing again. The new strand caught a gargoyle on the building's eastern corner, swung him wide around the structure's bulk.
East. That's what Clayface had said before Jake's hand had twisted his neck with surgical efficiency.
The warehouse materialized through smoke like something conjured from Gotham's fever dreams.
Five stories of industrial decay. Windows bricked over on the ground floor, reinforced with steel plating that suggested someone had invested in making the building difficult to penetrate.
The upper floors showed gaps where fire or explosives had compromised the structure, but the damage looked deliberate. Controlled. Creating sight lines and firing positions rather than weakening defenses.
Jake's feet hit the rooftop of the adjacent building. His spider-sense exploded.
The warehouse lit up in his perception like a Christmas tree designed by someone who hated joy. Every corner painted itself in threat-red. Every window. Every door. Every gap in the brickwork where someone could position a rifle or throw a grenade or simply wait with the patience of professionals who understood that patience was the difference between killing and dying.
'Too many,' his analytical mind cataloged. 'Twelve distinct signatures on the ground floor alone. More above. Overlapping fields of fire. Coordinated positions. Professional military spacing.'
Falcone had fortified this place. Had turned it into a killing box specifically designed for someone trying to force entry.
Jake's right hand clenched. His spider-sense painted paths through the threats, trajectories that might work if he moved fast enough, if his enhanced reflexes compensated for having one arm, if luck favored him over mathematics.
All of them ended in red.
Then the wind shifted.
The scent hit him like a fist through corrupted olfactory receptors. Chemical compound that tasted like yellow and smelled like screaming. Concentrated enough that distance couldn't dilute it, potent enough that his enhanced perception translated it into sensory overload.
Fear toxin.
Not the diluted version Batman had used. This was Scarecrow's personal recipe, the kind reserved for subjects Crane wanted to study rather than simply disable. The kind that didn't just trigger fear responses but rewrote neural pathways, carved trauma into gray matter with the precision of a surgeon who'd forgotten the Hippocratic Oath.
'Scarecrow,' Jake's mind supplied. 'Waiting inside. Part of Falcone's defenses.'
The realization came with perfect clarity. Falcone had assembled his hunters into a coordinated defense. Deadshot for ranged elimination. Bane for close combat dominance. Scarecrow for psychological warfare. Others Jake hadn't identified yet, signatures his spider-sense painted in threat-red without providing names.
And somewhere in that five-story killing box, Harley Quinn waited.
'She's scared,' the second voice insisted. 'Can't you feel it? She needs her Good Night. Needs you to protect her from all these bad men. Who want to take you away from--'
"I've had it with you." Jake's voice was flat. Empty. "You need to go."
'You can't get rid of me--'
Fear toxin.
Batman's fear toxin had weakened it during their second confrontation. Had cut through the conditioning long enough for genuine terror to surface, for Jake Cross to scream through Good Night's devotion.
The thought crystallized with horrible clarity. Scarecrow's concentrated toxin could do what Batman's diluted version couldn't -- burn through the remaining Joker corruption like fire through tissue paper.
The pheromones were already dead, mostly -- killed by the rose's removal and the Kobra-Venom's chemical warfare. But the second voice -- that was pure Joker toxin.
And Scarecrow's fear formula was the antidote.
'Don't,' the second voice said. For the first time, it sounded uncertain. 'Don't do this. We're better together. We survived together. We--'
"You'll stand in the way of what needs to be done." The words came out with absolute conviction. "You know what happens to those who stand in my way."
The dangerous calculus assembled itself in his chemical-corrupted mind. Walking into Scarecrow's trap meant exposure to concentrated fear toxin. Meant gambling that his enhanced physiology could survive the neurological assault. Meant trusting that he truly feared nothing anymore, that Gotham had burned away every terror his psyche could generate.
But the alternative was entering that building with the second voice still pleading for Harley's life. Still trying to make him hesitate at the critical moment. Still capable of turning his hand away when it should be delivering death.
Unacceptable.
🕷️
Time Bank: 00:09:21
🕸️
Nine hours. Twenty-one minutes. Not enough time to steal a canister. Not enough time for subtlety or planning or any approach that didn't involve walking directly into danger he understood.
Jake's right hand fired webbing at the warehouse's roof. The strand caught. He pulled himself forward, let momentum carry him across the gap between buildings.
His spider-sense screamed warnings in colors that tasted like endings. Every landing zone promised violence. His enhanced perception cataloged twelve ways this could kill him before he even entered the structure.
He ignored them all.
His boots hit the warehouse roof with a sound that echoed through corroded metal. Below, he felt the signatures shift. Weapons training on his position. Fingers finding triggers. The building's defenders recognizing that their prey had arrived and was choosing the worst possible entry point.
Perfect.
Jake's right hand found a skylight -- glass long since broken, frame rusted but structurally sound. He looked down into darkness that his enhanced vision penetrated, revealing the warehouse's interior geography.
Five floors. The ground level was open space, support columns creating a maze of potential ambush points. Metal stairs hugged the eastern wall, climbing to upper levels where offices and storage had once existed. Each floor smaller than the one below, the building's footprint shrinking as it rose. At the top, what looked like executive offices, windows intact, lights visible through grimy glass.
Falcone would be there. Had to be. The crime lord surrounding himself with professional killers, trusting them to eliminate threats before they reached his position.
And Bane would be close. The patient hunter waiting for flames worth breaking.
Which meant Harley was up there too.
Jake's chest tightened. The second voice tried to speak but he crushed it down through pure will. Focused on the immediate problem.
Scarecrow.
His spider-sense painted the signature on the second floor. Eastern side. Positioned near the stairs where anyone trying to ascend would have to pass through his kill zone. The fear toxin concentration was strongest there, hanging in the air like invisible fog.
Jake dropped through the skylight.
Gravity pulled him down through darkness that his vision carved into shapes and shadows. His right hand fired webbing at a support beam, arrested his fall six feet above the ground floor. He hung there, suspended, letting his spider-sense map the space.
Fourteen signatures surrounded him. Positioned behind columns, in alcoves, covering every approach to the stairs. Their weapons were raised, fingers on triggers, breathing controlled.
Professional patience.
They were waiting for him to land. To commit to a position. To give them the clean shot they'd been hired to deliver.
Jake released the webbing.
He hit concrete hard, the severed arm's weight pulling him right. His body compensated mid-fall -- left leg extending to catch the imbalance, right arm already firing toward the ceiling to arrest momentum.
The strand caught a support beam. He didn't pull himself up. Instead, he swung his body horizontal, using the web as a pivot point while gravity tried to claim him.
Muzzle flashes erupted from three positions simultaneously.
His spider-sense painted the bullets in trajectories that tasted like copper. The first round would pass two inches left of his ribs -- he let it. The second aimed for his head -- he tucked his chin, felt the displacement as it screamed past his ear. The third was tracking center mass.
Jake twisted on the web-line. His body rotated, the severed arm becoming momentum. The bullet meant for his chest hit the blackened limb instead.
The impact sent crystallized flesh fragments spinning. The arm absorbed kinetic energy that should have pulped his organs. Jake used the rotation, let it carry him behind a support column even as his right hand released the web.
His boots hit vertical concrete. Stuck. Spider-powers keeping him mounted to the column's side like gravity had become optional.
"East column, six o'clock!" A voice. Professional. Calm. "Suppressing fire, move to flank!"
Three shooters broke from cover. Their positioning was textbook -- one maintaining fire to keep Jake pinned, two repositioning for clean shots from different angles.
Jake's right hand shot webbing at the ceiling directly above the suppressing shooter. The strand caught. He pulled -- not himself, but the web itself, creating tension.
Then released.
The webbing snapped back like a rubber band. The recoil was minimal but Jake wasn't trying to hurt anyone with the strand. He was creating distraction.
The shooter's eyes tracked upward instinctively, following movement. His firing pattern interrupted for half a second.
Jake launched off the column. His body flew horizontal, right arm extended, the severed limb trailing behind him like a grotesque counterweight.
He fired mid-flight. The webbing caught the distracted shooter's rifle. Jake's enhanced strength yanked the weapon free as his boots connected with the man's chest.
The impact folded the shooter backward. Jake used him as a landing pad, boots driving the man into concrete with force that cracked ribs. The shooter's head bounced once. Stopped moving.
Gunfire from the flanking positions. Jake's spider-sense screamed trajectories -- both aiming for where he'd land, where momentum would carry him, where physics said he had to be.
But physics assumed two arms.
Jake's right hand found the downed shooter's tactical vest. Gripped. Pulled himself sideways with strength that made the dead weight irrelevant.
The bullets meant for him hit the unconscious body instead. Wet impacts. The meat-shield strategy was crude but effective.
Jake released the corpse. Fired webbing at the nearest flanking shooter -- caught his leg, yanked hard.
The man's knee hyperextended with a sound like snapping wood. His scream was professional -- clipped, controlled, but genuine. He went down firing, bullets stitching the floor in a pattern that meant training overriding pain.
Jake was already moving. His right arm fired at a second support column, pulled himself into a swing that carried him behind cover.
Three down. Eleven remaining.
"Target is mobile! Repeat, highly mobile! Adjust fire patterns!"
The shooters were adapting. Their muzzle flashes came from different positions now - higher and lower, using vertical space Jake's one-armed swinging made harder to exploit.
A bullet clipped his right shoulder. Not deep - tore fabric, grazed skin, kept traveling. His healing factor would close it in minutes but minutes were irrelevant when the next bullet might core his skull.
Jake's spider-sense painted a shooter behind him. On the ground floor, pressed against the eastern wall, rifle trained on Jake's back.
No time to turn. No time to web. The trigger was already pulling, the firing pin already falling.
Jake threw himself backward.
Not jumping. Not dodging. Just letting gravity claim him while his right arm shot webbing straight up at the ceiling.
The bullet passed through space he'd occupied. Jake's web caught the ceiling beam. He pulled mid-fall, converting downward momentum to horizontal.
His body swung like a pendulum. Low. Fast. The severed arm scraped concrete, leaving a trail of chemical residue that hissed and steamed.
He swung directly into the eastern wall shooter.
No grace. No technique. Just forty pounds of crystallized limb colliding with a human body at velocity physics could calculate but biology couldn't survive.
The impact was wet. Final. The shooter's sternum collapsed inward, ribs puncturing lungs, shock stopping the heart before pain could register.
Jake released the web. Landed in a crouch beside the corpse. His right hand was already moving -- grabbed the dead man's rifle, hurled it like a javelin at the nearest muzzle flash.
The rifle hit something. A grunt. The muzzle flash stopped.
Five down. Nine remaining.
"He's using our guys as weapons! Do not--"
Jake's webbing caught the speaker's mouth. Sealed it. The man's hands clawed at the toxic strand as it began eating through his tactical mask.
A grenade arced through the darkness.
Jake's spider-sense painted it in red that screamed DANGER. The trajectory was perfect -- would land at his feet, nowhere to dodge, blast radius covering every escape vector.
His right hand shot webbing at the grenade mid-flight. Caught it. Pulled.
The grenade changed direction. Flew back toward the cluster of shooters who'd thought themselves safely positioned behind cover.
Someone screamed "GRENADE!" with the special terror of professionals who understood exactly what they'd done wrong.
The blast was contained - the warehouse's support columns channeling force upward rather than outward. But the shrapnel didn't care about structural engineering.
Three more signatures went dark in Jake's spider-sense.
Two down from the grenade. One more from shrapnel that found the gap between helmet and vest.
Eight down. Six remaining.
The shooters were breaking. Jake felt it in their positioning -- the way they clustered together instead of maintaining proper spacing, the way their firing patterns became reactive instead of coordinated.
Fear was replacing discipline.
"Fall back!" Someone with authority. "Fall back to second floor! Let Scarecrow--"
Jake's webbing caught the speaker's leg. Yanked him off his feet. The man's head cracked against a support column with a sound like dropped pottery.
Nine down. Five remaining.
The survivors ran. Boots pounding metal stairs, ascending with the desperate speed of people who understood they were outmatched.
Jake let them go.
His chest heaved. His right shoulder screamed from sustained effort. The stump where his left arm ended throbbed with phantom sensation.
But he was standing. Vertical. Alive.
🕷️
Time Bank: 00:09:14
🕸️
Seven minutes. The ground floor had cost him seven minutes of his remaining life.
The shooters were scattered. Demoralized. No longer coordinated enough to threaten him.
Jake's feet found the stairs. Started to ascend.
His spider-sense spiked.
Different signature. Familiar. That same wrong frequency from before that he'd gotten when the dark woman had appeared over Clayface's dissolving corpse.
Jake spun mid-step, his right hand already firing.
She stood at the base of the stairs. Same black form-fitting material. Same masked face obscured by shadow. Standing perfectly still in a room full of corpses with the patience of someone who had all the time in the world.
The webbing flew toward her center mass.
It passed through.
Not around. Not deflected. Through. Like she was projection rather than person. The strand hit the wall behind her, stuck, dissolved.
Jake's mind raced. Hologram? Some kind of phasing technology? League of Assassins had access to-
His right hand grabbed a spent shell casing from the floor. Hurled it.
The casing flew through her torso. Hit the wall. Clattered to the ground.
She didn't move. Didn't flinch. Just stood there, watching him with that patient regard that made his chemical-corrupted neurons scream wrongness.
"Interesting." Her voice came from everywhere and nowhere. Not echoing -- just existing independent of her apparent position. "So you can see me."
Not a question. An observation delivered with the clinical precision of someone confirming a hypothesis.
Jake's spider-sense was screaming contradictions. Danger and not-danger. Threat and not-threat. His analytical mind tried to categorize her -- enemy, ally, neutral observer -- but every label felt wrong.
He grabbed the unconscious shooter's rifle. Aimed. Fired a three-round burst.
The bullets passed through her like she was made of smoke. Hit the wall behind her. The impacts were real. Concrete chips. Genuine damage. But she remained untouched. Unaffected. Still watching with that same infinite patience.
"You're wasting ammunition." Her tone carried something that might have been amusement. Might have been pity.
Jake's right hand clenched. His mind cycled through options -- more creative attacks, different approaches, ways to force physical interaction with something that physics said didn't exist.
Or.
Jake turned toward the stairs. His right hand found the railing. Started pulling himself up with speed that made his shoulder scream.
He didn't look back.
Couldn't afford to.
No need to wast time and effort on someone who wasn't attacking him.
But he felt her watching. Felt that impossible gaze tracking his ascent with the weight of something that existed outside normal perception.
Unnerving didn't cover it.
But he kept climbing.
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