Encounter

I wanted to write a story that focused on the perspective of an every day police officer, trying to avoid Batman. Essentially a Batman story without Batman in it.


"We have the resources. Why don't we take down Batman?" Cory Washington asked from behind his desk in the Major Crimes Unit. The tall African American rolled a quarter over his fingers. "I mean, look at it, he's taking our jobs from us. All we've been doing all week is sitting at our desks and helping field agents with parking tickets." Cory's inattentive partner dismissed the overs exaggeration and nodded his head mumbling "Mmm." to Cory. "Man, are you even listening?" Cory asked. "Of course I'm listening Core, am I caring? No." The blond man sarcastically smiled, not looking in his direction, clearly insulting Cory. "Dude, Roger." A serious look spread across Cory's face.

"We get paid by the hour, Cory. Be glad you don't get paid by commission." Roger joked. "Christ, you're so damn lazy." Cory stretched and wiped his face from the sandman's last visit. "I admit it has been slow recently, but that's just because crime rate just dropped 5%. It's normal. You're just trying to find some other bullshit excuse to nab the bat." Roger shook his head, and scrolled about on his computer.

"Excuse me? An excuse? You know how many laws The Batman broke, and you know how many times MCU turns a blind eye to him? Shit, we turn a blind eye to that spotlight on the top of our building every night." Cory stopped rolling the quarter, he flipped it, aiming for his partner's head. Roger dodged it, and tried to find the nearest thing to throw back at Cory, in this case, it was a stack of papers. "Hey what's going on in here?" a voice roared from behind them. Harvey Bullock, had fists resting above his hips, and a cigar, bit down one end, glowing red on the other. "Washington can't control his temper." Roger reported. "Yeah, and that's why you threw a stack a papers at him." Bullock smirked unamused. "Alright, listen up meatheads, the commish is tied up with the Bat down at Robinson Park with some trigger happy wack-a-doos, and we just got a tip on some drug dealer on the opposite side of town. C'mon, let's get a move on! Chop chop!" The detective clapped his hands and moved back to the stairs from where he came.

Cory and Roger looked at each other, grabbed their gear and followed him out the door and into their car. Harvey was in the front driving as Cory and his partner sat in the back.

"Hey, Detective; do you think we should arrest the Batman?" Cory asked, loading his m9, bullet by bullet.

"Of course!" Bullock spat as he grabbed his cigar and toiled it around rushing down the street. "You know how many laws the Bat broke? Breaking and entering? Assault? Excessive force?"

"That's what I'm saying!" Cory enthusiastically agreed.

"Yeah, but you can't ignore the fact that it's because of the Batman that crime rate has been steadily dropping. Plus, what he's doing isn't half as bad as what he does to those he's doing it to." Roger piped up, raising from his seat, ever so suddenly.

"Does that mean that we ignore it and turn a blind eye to him? Wanna know what else is because of the Bats? Super criminals like Joker and Mr. Freeze. We ain't have eccentrics like that before the Batman." Detective Bullock rebutted, taking another rich drag of his cigar.

"Exactly. You get one guy dressing up like a bat and preforming all these theatrics everyone else thinks they can do it too. We buy nine mils, they buy automatics, we get bulletproof vests, they get explosives—his appearance only incites worse behavior." Cory stated, crossing his arms. "He's taking our jobs."

"That isn't entirely true, we're going to bust some drug dealers off the end of West Harlow, aren't we? Who are we meeting up with anyway?" Roger asked, looking out the window.

"Doyle, Ramirez, Bowling, Farville, Palmer, and Merkel are waiting for us. There's supposedly four of them held up in an apartment upstairs. We've been following this lead for the last two months, it's been a buried trail but I think we finally got the sonovabitch in charge. I think his name is Johnson, but it sounds like an alias." Bullock explained, "The drugs they seem to be selling has strange toxins in it, I think they're lethal." The car came to a stop, behind two police cars. "Alright, on your toes, you two. Lets move."

Cory stepped out, his gun out and up, his partner followed his lead as they approached their team. Bullock was greeted by the other cops, tipping their hats, he held out his hand beckoning for the megaphone in one of the cop cars, Palmer, promptly fitted one in his hand.

"Alright, the jig is up, Johnson! We've got you surrounded, you got two minutes to come out with your hands up!" The detective spoke into his megaphone. He always liked going through the motions when it came to a drug bust. "Doyle, finger on the speed dial for SWAT. I want Washington and your partner to be at their door. Everyone else hold your positions."

Cory and Roger made their way upstairs to the room where the drug dealers had set up shop, it's been longer than the two minutes Bullock gave them. Cory gave his partner hand signals: I'm going to kick the door down, three… two… His foot crushed the door knob, the door flew open, the men screamed orders to the drug dealers, three of whom were on the ground, the only one had his back turned to the police. "Hands behind your head! Down on the floor!" The man ignored them, the cops slowly advanced. "I said: down on the floor!" Cory then grabbed the man's shoulder and turned him around to face him, before he could see the man's face; the mystery man emitted a gas from under his sleeve into Cory's face. It was the last thing he could remember.

Next thing he knew, he was looking in a dark room, Cory wasn't sure if he was still in the apartment or not. He did feel his hands tied behind his back as he sat on a metal chair, his legs secured with the chair's. He heard the man's voice talking into a radio, he heard Bullock's voice come back through.

"If you want me to release the two police men with their lives, send your men away. I also require $500,000 in cash."
"We don't negotiate with terrorist: end of story."
"How interesting you use that word. Terrorist. It means to strike terror for political aims. Me? I prefer the word fear!!"
"Crane, let my men go, or we're coming in. SWAT's on their way."
"If you think I'm kidding, you're wrong. Listen to this."

The next thing Cory heard both shocked and deafened him. Then, it scared him. Roger screamed, flailing in his own chair. "Conaway!! Conaway! What happened? Are you alright? What happened?!" Roger didn't respond, he was to busy being in pain to even notice Cory scream at him. That, and the healthy dose of Scarecrow's very own fear toxin.

"You've got three minutes, Detective. Or they're both dead." Scarecrow put the radio on a nearby table wondering if he asked for enough money. Then again he thought about what he could do with it. He snapped to Cory, then his movements began to slow down, he approached him with a twisted smiled spreading across his face.

"Tell me, officer. What do you fear?"

Cory couldn't look away, he wanted to, but he felt that the psychotic would do something while he wasn't looking.

"Tick tock goes the clock, hanging on the wall. Tick tock goes the clock, telling time to all." Scarecrow whispered, but loud enough that his chilled voice filled the room.

"Tick tock goes the clock, it's time for you to go to bed. Tick tock goes the clock, put down your sleepy head." Scarecrow was now nose to nose with Cory, he tried his best to avoid the Scarecrow's gaze, he rested a hand on the officer's shoulder.

"Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock, sounds the clock."

Then a voice from behind, deep, strong, spoke Scarecrow's name. "Crane…"

Scarecrow turned around, his back pushing up against Cory's face, "Dr. Crane isn't here right now, if you'd like to make an appointment…" footsteps in front of the Scarecrow sounded, he heard his partner whimper from the pain, the only thing Cory could see was the burlap back from Scarecrow's costume. "Crane…what have you done?!" There it was again. That voice. "Dr. Jonathan Crane doesn't live here right now…" Scarecrow's voice shook, terrified by what seemed to be his own nightmare. There was a pause. It seemed like Scarecrow was anticipating something as his feet kept backing up, despite the fact that Cory's chair had been already backed into the wall. Then Cory felt a shock, as Scarecrow's body shook in spasm as the sound of breaking bones and flesh meeting flesh bounces in the room for a split second. Scarecrow fell limp, over Cory's body; he heard the footsteps come to the side, a snap and Cory's bonds were free.

He sat there for a second, waited, not entirely sure what just happened, and yet he knew. Cory pushed the unconscious body off of him and looked around the room. It was empty. As he got up he saw a large dark figure exit through a window.

The officer ran up to the window, looking below him, then, out into the sky. Behind him, officers began to file in with Detective Bullock. Cory, still entranced by what just happened kept looking outside; his jaw, hanging wide open. "Quick, get Conaway to a hospital ASAP, someone get some cuffs on Crane, lets set up a crime scene here, people! Washington. Hey, Washington!" Bullock walked up from behind Cory, "Washington, what are you doing?" Still looking into the night sky, he half responded to the detective, "Yeah, I'll be with in a sec." He kept starring up, looking to catch one more glimpse of who saved him, looking up in hope.

A very cool and different perspective on the traditional story! Can't wait to read more : )

Thanks for the support! I enjoyed writing it :3