And Bane was blasted across the room. His smoking body slammed into a wall before sliding lifelessly to the floor. His wheezing breaths fell silent. . . forever.
Batman rose to his feet and turned toward Catwoman, who sat astride the Bat-Pod in the entrance to the lobby. Smoke rose from the bike’s cannons.
“That whole ‘no guns’ thing?” she said. “I don’t feel as strongly about it as you do.”
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
Uniformed cops guarded Gotham Bridge—as they had for months now. Armed sentries manned a barricade on the Gotham side, preventing any refugees from fleeing the city. Signs warned that anyone crossing the line would be shot.
Blake pulled the school bus up to the foot of the bridge anyway. Not wanting to provoke the troops, he parked it safely back from the barricade, and hurriedly unloaded the boys. He led them up the bridge toward the barricade, with Father Reilly bringing up the rear.
Barbed wire and roadblocks barred their way. A rifle-toting trooper, standing on the other side of the barbed wire, raised a bullhorn to his lips.
“Stay there!” the trooper shouted. “What are you doing?”
Blake held up his badge.
“Blake, MCU. I’m getting these kids to safety.”
“Safety?” The trooper stared at Blake as if the young detective had lost his mind. “You’re going to get us all killed. Anyone crosses this bridge, they blow up the city!”
“It’s going to blow anyway,” Blake insisted. “We need this bridge open right now.”
“No one leaves the island,” the trooper repeated. “Orders.”
Blake fought to control his temper. He knew the trooper was just doing his job, but he didn’t have time to explain about the decaying core. Hell, he barely understood the concept himself. All he knew for sure was that time was running out, and these kids were in his care.
“Whose orders?” he demanded. “Bane’s?”
The trooper didn’t budge.
“Police department’s,” he said stubbornly.
“Haven’t you heard the shooting?” Blake replied. “The Batman’s battling it out with Bane—’’
“The Batman’s dead,” the trooper said. “Look, officer—’’
“It’s detective.”
“Well, detective, you take one more step, we have to shoot you. Two more steps, we have to blow the bridge.”
At that moment all Blake wanted to do was throttle the man. He heard the boys whimpering in fear behind him. Some of them were crying already. They didn’t need to hear this.
He turned toward them.
“Wait for me back at the bus.” The terror in their faces tore at his heart. They’d suffered enough in their short lives. They didn’t deserve to have their futures cut short by a mushroom cloud.
If only he could get this stupid trooper to listen!
The tumblers caught up with the convoy on Fifth Street.
Talia let out a sigh of relief as they surrounded the truck that was carrying the bomb. Time was on her side. As long as the core remained undisturbed, no power on Earth could stop it from detonating in just a matter of minutes.
Gotham’s time was almost up.
With that thought, she made a decision. She gestured to the driver, who pulled her tumbler up alongside the cab of the truck, matching its speed. The roof-access canopy retracted and she climbed out on to the angled hood of the tumbler. A biting wind blew against her face, threatening to dislodge her, but she had braved fiercer storms in her time.
She would ride with the bomb until Gotham met its doom.
Talia rose cautiously to her feet atop the hood and gestured. The truck’s passenger-side door swung open. Only a narrow gap separated the vehicles. The jump wasn’t without risk, but it was nothing compared to that final leap from the pit, so many years ago. This was child’s play by comparison.
Without hesitation, she jumped.
Batman and Catwoman had City Hall to themselves. Bane’s smoldering corpse lay crumpled in a corner, but Batman knew that the greatest threats still remained. The bomb…and Talia.
“I need you on the ground, me in the air,” he said. “We have to force that convoy east to the entrance to the reactor.”
She nodded. There was no time for banter now, only action. She spun the Bat-Pod around and went racing down the front steps of City Hall.
Batman hurried after her.
Gordon squeezed through the hatch and into the trailer. He wasn’t sure if the tumblers in the convoy had spotted him yet, but the sooner he got out of the open, the better. He held on tightly to the blinking jammer.
I’m not getting off this truck, he thought. Not while I still have a job to do.
A harsh white glow lit the interior of the trailer. The sudden heat came as a shock after the frigid cold outside. Gordon swallowed hard as he spotted the source of both the light and heat. The core. He recognized the large metal sphere from TV footage of Bane’s grisly invasion at the football stadium, but he didn’t remember it glowing this brightly before. Whatever chain reaction was going on inside the device, it was obviously ramping up in a big way.
Perspiration drenched his face. The glow was bright enough to hurt his eyes.
Guess this is the right truck after all, he thought. A digital timer was attached to the bomb.
Nine minutes.
“Your orders are out of date!” Blake argued. “The situation’s changed.”
“Listen, I’m a cop like you,” he continued. “And I’m walking out there. Please don’t shoot me.” He stepped toward the barricade.
Shots rang out at his feet, sending chips of pavement flying. Blake flinched at the gunfire, but did not turn away. No way was he taking those boys back to Gotham to die.
He kept walking.
The convoy rolled through downtown with its deadly cargo. The Bat caught up with it first, swooping down from the wintry grey sky. They reached an intersection and the Bat swung in low, trying to force the truck and its escorts east toward the river. The truck turned quickly to avoid the menacing aircraft, which darted back and forth above it, careful to avoid the tumblers’ cannons. Seated in the cockpit, Batman worked the controls. His side still burned where “Miranda” had stabbed him, even as his heart stung at her betrayal. But he could deal with that later. If there was a later.
Another intersection was coming up fast. The Bat dived to force the convoy further east. The rear tumbler accelerated to protect the truck, only to be blasted from behind.
Catwoman and her Bat-Pod joined the rolling battle at high speed as she veered past the damaged vehicle, which crashed into the sidewalk, taking out a line of parked cars. Metal crumpled and tore. Burning fuel polluted the air.
Her arrival didn’t go unnoticed. Gun turrets swung in her direction, unleashing heavy fire. She swerved to dodge the blasts. The Bat-Pod lacked armored plating, but it was faster and more maneuverable. Catwoman worked that advantage for all it was worth. Weaving, she closed in on the truck, even as Batman harried it from above. The convoy couldn’t shake either of them.
They made a good team, he mused, but would that be enough?
Blake walked closer to the barricade. Gunfire tore apart the pavement in front of him, but he still hadn’t been hit. He hoped that was a good sign—for the boys’ sake.
“Son of a bitch!” the uniformed guard exclaimed. Panic could be heard in his voice. “Blow it! Before he reaches the line—” His partner armed a detonator. “Get down!” the first cop shouted. “We’re blowing the bridge!”
No! Blake shouted inwardly. Don’t do it!
The ground lurched, and he gaped in disbelief as the bridge blew apart in front of him. A tremendous fireball erupted beyond the barricade, and a roaring drowned out all other sound. He dived for cover as tons of steel and concrete crashed down into the river. Smoke billowed into the sky.
Oh my God, he thought. They really did it. They blew up the bridge.
Now there was no way out.
CHAPTER FORT
Y-FOUR
Lucius fired up the reactor. Alone in the hidden plant beneath the river, he activated the controls and checked to make certain everything was functioning properly, despite Dr. Pavel’s tampering.
Without the core, the reactor was useless, of course —all of its sophisticated safeguards and dampening mechanisms had nothing to regulate. But he had to make it ready to receive the core, should Batman recover it in time. With that thought he glanced anxiously at his watch. Every moment counted. They couldn’t afford any last-minute glitches or delays.
He hastily scanned the monitors and readouts. At first everything appeared in order, but then something unexpected caught his eye. He stared in shock at the flashing display, not quite believing what he was seeing.
No, he thought with dismay. Not that.
* * *
The remaining tumblers stuck close to the truck. Their missile launchers and machine guns fired relentlessly, trying to keep the Bat and the Bat-Pod at bay. Batman frowned at their persistence. Did Talia’s men know they were fighting for their own fiery deaths?
Probably, he guessed. Most likely she had surrounded herself with a cadre of true believers— just as her father had done before her. The League of Shadows demanded absolute loyalty.
The Bat unleashed its own armaments. Diving toward the street, it blasted away the pavement directly in front of the convoy. A smoking crater opened up in front of the lead tumbler. The speeding vehicle tried to swerve away from the gaping hole, but it was going too fast. The tumbler toppled over and came to rest with its rear in the air. Its wheels spun uselessly in the smoke.
That’s another one down, Batman thought. He briefly entertained the hope that the truck itself would be trapped by the pit, but its driver successfully dodged the obstacle. The truck sped on, leaving its capsized escort behind. Another tumbler moved to take the lead vehicle’s place, but Catwoman was on it. Weaving past the scattered debris, she came up behind the tumbler and took it out with her own cannons. The tumbler lived up to its name, rolling sideways across the street until it crashed to a halt. Flames erupted from its undercarriage. Shaken mercenaries crawled out of the wreckage.
Nice work, Batman thought. But there was still one left—and precious little time. A digital chronometer in the Bat’s cockpit counted down to Gotham’s destruction.
Six minutes.
Staggering to his feet, his ears still ringing from the explosion, Blake gazed in shock through the clearing smoke. The once-mighty Gotham Bridge was shattered. Heaps of rubble piled in the river below. An impassable gap stretched between the island and the mainland. You’d need wings to make it across now— and Gotham was running low on angels.
“You idiots!” he bellowed. “You sons of bitches! You’re killing us!”
The trailer swerved sharply, throwing Gordon against the wall. He struggled to keep his balance as the speeding truck buffeted him back and forth. He heard crashes and explosions outside.
What the hell’s going on out there?
The temperature inside the trailer was rising by the moment even as the core glowed brighter and brighter. Did fusion reactors produce harmful radiation? Gordon didn’t know, and he didn’t want to know. At the moment, radiation was the least of his worries. He’d settle for not being incinerated.
Tugging on his collar, his face bathed in sweat, he averted his eyes from the glowing core and felt like he was trapped inside a microwave oven. But he couldn’t let himself think about trying to get away. The jammer was still blinking. For all he knew, it was the only thing stopping Bane from triggering the bomb.
He had to buy Batman time.
The din of battle penetrated the lead-lined walls, as though World War Three was being fought on the streets of Gotham.
That sounds about right, he thought. Here’s hoping the angels are winning.
The Bat would not die.
Talia cursed beneath her breath as the agile black aircraft strafed the street in front of her. Strapped into the truck’s passenger seat, she stared at the battle raging all around her. She had to assume that it was Bruce piloting the Bat, which meant that he had somehow escaped from Bane.
And the woman riding the Bat-Pod appeared to be Selina Kyle, alias “Catwoman.” Talia had no idea why the notorious thief had allied herself with Batman, but she regretted not eliminating Kyle earlier.
No matter, she reminded herself. Nothing could prevent Gotham from burning.
The Bat came in for another run. It blasted the road in front of them, forcing the truck to veer right at an intersection. Smoke and flames burst from the flying debris. Against all odds, a random chunk of concrete smashed through the driver’s side window, striking the man in the head. He jerked, then slumped forward onto the wheel, blood leaking from a fractured skull.
The truck careened out of control.
Talia shoved the man’s body aside and took hold of the wheel. She steered the truck back into the center of the lane. Out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed the Bat banking off into the sky, no doubt preparing for another assault.
Just as well, she thought. She preferred to be in the driver’s seat. At least for a few more minutes.
Blake raced back toward bus. Father Reilly had the boys in a huddle outside of it, praying. Soot blackened their faces. He caught snatches of the Lord’s Prayer.
“Father!” he called out. “Get the boys on the bus!”
The old priest gave him a puzzled look.
“But there’s nowhere to go, son!” Nevertheless, he moved to comply.
A navigation unit was built into the dashboard of the truck. Talia kept one eye on the miniature screen as she sped through the glass-and-steel canyons of downtown. Deserted skyscrapers and office buildings seemed to rush past her on both sides. A concrete divider separated the eastbound expressway from the westbound lanes, which lay one level below. A radio kept her in communication with the last surviving escort.
A glance at the rear-view mirror showed the Bat-Pod trailing her. Irritation flashed across her face. Catwoman wasn’t supposed to be a part of this.
The voice of the driver came over the radio.
“They’re trying to force us onto Grand—”
“Pushing us to the entrance of the reactor,” she murmured. Bruce’s plan was obvious. “They’re going to try to reconnect the core.”
“Can they?” the driver asked.
Talia smiled.
Alarms blared throughout the reactor plant. Indicator lights flashed red.
Lucius raced toward an emergency ladder, praying that there was still time to escape. He reached the foot of the ladder, only to hear the beginning of a thunderous rumble. The sound grew louder and louder behind him.
He turned, fearing the worst.
Here it comes, he realized. The reactor’s last-ditch shutdown procedure, functioning precisely as designed.
Icy water, flooding in from the river above, smashed through the plant, demolishing everything in its path. It poured in from all directions, tearing apart the main reactor unit and destroying any hope of stabilizing the missing core. Lucius winced at the sight, even as a churning wall of white water rushed toward him at heart-stopping speed. Looping his arm around one of the bottom rungs of the ladder, he braced himself for the impact.
I don’t understand, he thought, still trying to make sense of it. Nobody else had the shutdown code except Bruce…and Miranda.
The flood slammed into him like a battering ram.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
Your ass is mine, Catwoman thought.
Hitting the gas, she closed in on the final tumbler. With time running out, there was no point in conserving her ammo, so she let loose with everything she had.
Cannons blasted the tumbler again and again. It flipped diagonally into the path of the truck, causing the vehicle to lurch onto its side. Both hit the divider and crashed down onto the expressway below. They careened across the pavement before skidding to a stop.
Catwoman accelerated toward
the crash site.
Gordon threw open the trailer doors to expose the luminous core. He jumped out of the truck in time to see a masked woman in a tight black suit pull up on what appeared to be Batman’s one-of-a-kind motorcycle. Her description matched Selina Kyle.
Catwoman. Blake had nabbed her for abducting the congressman, right before Bane took over Gotham. He wondered whose side she was on.
“Give me a hand!” he shouted. As he did, the Bat touched down on the expressway several yards away, its backdraft stirring up a cloud of dust and litter. The canopy opened and Batman emerged.
He hurried toward them, his dark cloak flapping in the wind. It occurred to Gordon that he had never before seen Batman in the daylight.
First time for everything, I guess, he mused. Then he turned.
The core was throwing off heat like a blast furnace. Gordon started toward it, hoping to haul it out of the trailer, but even the slightest touch showed that it was too hot to handle. He prayed that that it wasn’t already too late.
“Let’s get a cable on it and drag it out!” he shouted. “Come on, we’re almost there—’’
Bitter laughter interrupted him.
Startled, he stared as Miranda Tate dragged herself out of the crashed truck. Badly injured, she looked past saving, but her dark eyes gleamed with malice.
“Fox showed me how to operate the reactor core, including the emergency flood—’’
* * *
Lucius’s left arm felt like it was broken. He cradled it against his chest as he painfully dragged himself up the ladder, trying to keep his head above the rising tide. Choppy waves pounded against him. The frothing water felt cold as ice, and he shivered uncontrollably, every unwanted movement sending another jolt of pain through his fractured limb.
But he kept on climbing, one rung after another. Part of him wondered why he bothered; with the reactor destroyed, the core would inevitably explode. Even if he didn’t drown, he was doomed to perish in a nuclear blast. If he was smart, he would just let the freezing water swallow him up.