Bruce Wayne, his eyes hidden behind a green mask, stood on the rooftop. The very scene the Canary was brought down by Drakon. Bruce could tell the assassin’s handywork. The young detective began down the stares and knelt at the base, finding blood.
She was wounded but no body. Kidnapped? Why? For what purpose?
Bruce heard a noise and turned, quickly getting in a fighting stance.
“Who’s there?!” yelled the billionaire.
Nothing.
“Drakon, show yourself!”
“Not Drakon,” a voice announced. “Good guess, though.”
“Then who?!”
Nothing again.
Bruce surveyed the scene and saw nothing. Only the cascade of the shadows from the moonlight.
“Show yourself!”
“As you wish,” the voice said again and a dark figure emerged from a shadow against the wall. “Boo.”
Taken aback, Bruce stumbled, but not hitting the floor he fell through his own shadow. He get falling and falling. There was no logical explanation for it. How could this have happened? A dream, maybe? A hallucination? Maybe his attacker drugged in?
BAM!Bruce hit the floor of an empty, nondescript room. Well, almost empty.
“Bruce?”
Wayne looked up and saw Canary strapped to the wall. Forgetting the how’s and why’s of how he got there, Bruce quickly began to untie Canary. “Are you hurt?”
“Define hurt?”
Pulling her from the wall, he says, “Come on.”
But before the two could go further they were engulfed in utter darkness.
“Power outage?” asked Canary.
“Not likely.”
“Very astute,” came a voice in the darkness. “Allow me to introduce myself. I am Shade.”
Bruce quickly went through his options in his head, which were very few. Their attacker had power. Somehow he could control the dark. How could they fight someone like that?
There’s a coughing sound to Bruce’s right. “Canary?”
She didn’t answer. Only a constant cough, choking and gurgling.
“Shade!” yelled Bruce. “What are you doing?!”
“Filling her lungs with my dark energies,” answered the villain. “I was hired to make you watch as she died. Something about showing you the ‘error of your crusade’.”
The darkness was then gone and Bruce saw Canary laying on the ground, choking.
“You monster!”
“Nothing person,” said Shade, who was also now in view, “it’s just business.”
Bruce lunged himself at the assassin, but found himself going right through a mist of shadows.
Shade reconstructed himself over the suffocating Canary. “Sorry, hands off, kid.”
Bruce again went over his options. He had little time and... could only think of one option. “Hey, Shade,” Bruce said, throwing up a small bomb into the air, “Light’s on!”
The bomb exploded, no force but an incredible light engulfed the room. When the light faded, Shade was gone and Bruce ran to Canary’s side.
“B... Br... Bruce...?”
“Stay with me,” Bruce stated. “You’re going to be okay.”
“N... no... cough... I’m...” She didn’t finish. Bruce was too late.
***
