"Screeech—"
The brakes of the truck let out a shrill cry. A black-gloved hand shot out—like it carried the weight of a thousand hammers—and effortlessly wrested control of the steering wheel from Karl.
"Karl Scott."
The voice was cold and devoid of warmth, layered with a gritty, robotic reverb. It sounded like the voice of a demon that had crawled its way out of hell, sending shivers down Karl's spine.
"You know two members of the Falcone family."
"I—" Karl tried to deny it on reflex, but the words caught in his throat. He couldn't bring himself to say them out loud.
The bat's pupil-less eyes locked onto him, and that chilling gaze seemed to pierce straight through to his soul.
But there was no way he'd willingly spill information on the Falcones. After stammering for a moment, he finally croaked out, trembling, "I-I'm just a truck driver…"
"What did those two have you do at 4 a.m. last Wednesday?"
"I…"
"Three years ago, on September 16th, at around dawn, you were involved in a hit-and-run. You hit a woman carrying a child—she died instantly from internal injuries. You got out of the car, watched the child in her arms bleed out, and then fled the scene."
"Two years ago—December 7th and December 25th—you ran over a motorcycle and crushed a drunk lying in the street. Last year…"
As the bat recited his crimes in that flat, mechanical tone, Karl's fear twisted and swelled until it snapped into something else—guilt, then rage, then hysteria. "Enough! I don't know what the hell you're talking about, you freak—"
CRACK
"AAAHH—!"
The black handgun clattered to the floor. Karl's right arm, which had reached for the weapon, now hung limp and mangled at his side, grotesquely twisted.
"Answer the question."
The bat's tone remained calm and icy, as if it hadn't just snapped a man's arm like a twig.
"I swear to god—AHHH!"
CRACK
Karl tumbled out of the truck, screaming. He had tried to open the door with his left hand, but now his right leg had been snapped like a twig.
"I'll talk! I'll talk!"
The searing pain from his arm and leg left him barely conscious. There was no way he could still protect those so-called "buddies" of his now—not if it meant resisting this thing. "I'll tell you everything! Just don't touch me again!"
The bat dropped from the cab and effortlessly lifted Karl up with one hand like he weighed nothing. A cable shot out from his gauntlet, and seconds later, both figures ascended into the sky, landing atop a nearby building.
"Talk."
Karl spilled everything he knew. When the bat finally broke eye contact, Karl couldn't help but breathe a long sigh of relief.
"That's… that's everything. I told you everything I know. You'll let me go now, right?"
But the bat didn't respond. Without so much as a glance, it pulled Karl's phone from his pocket and dialed a number.
"Gotham City Police Department, how may I help you?"
"Tell Gordon to come pick someone up in the Otisburg district. He's a suspect in multiple hit-and-runs and intentional homicide cases. Been on the run for years."
Karl's eyes widened in disbelief, rage boiling over. "No! You can't do this! You lying freak!"
THWACK!
A fist, the size of a sandbag, met his face with a casual backhand. Karl's words dissolved into a gurgle as blood sprayed from his mouth—two of his front teeth landed with a clink on the rooftop. One side of his face ballooned grotesquely, and he fell silent.
"I'm keeping the line open. You can use the GPS to locate the truck."
With that, the bat hoisted Karl up again and chopped the side of his neck with a clean, practiced strike. Karl passed out instantly.
"Send an ambulance, too."
As he finished the sentence, the dark bat spread his wings and vanished into the night sky of Gotham, swallowed by the city's thick, suffocating shadows.
There was always another target.
As always—night after night.
---
"Where the hell did you get this thing?"
"What thing? This baby got me from Otisburg to here in twelve minutes flat. Show some respect for my ride."
"This thing? This unicycle can fly?"
"It's a wheelchair, thank you very much."
Zhaodi casually flipped the vehicle, and the sleek, custom wheelchair returned to its original form. The rainbow-colored LED lights had been switched off—leaving them on indoors would just be visual pollution at that point.
"…"
Derek went quiet for a moment. From his perspective, whether it was a wheelchair or a unicycle, neither really matched his idea of a high-speed vehicle.
Stereotypes, he thought.
"So, all in all, today went pretty smoothly, right?"
"Harvey Dent showed up."
"...There wasn't a fight, was there?"
"You knew what was going down over there!"
"I'm not deaf. I hear things."
Noticing that Zhaodi seemed a bit agitated, Derek quickly tried to calm him down. "Relax. Chill. That kind of thing's a freak occurrence. Harvey usually avoids that kind of mess."
Usually. But when he did show up, things tended to escalate—whether that meant extracting intel or provoking someone into taking a swing.
A year ago, someone actually lost it and fired at Harvey. The bullet hit his body armor, and while he was recovering in a hospital bed, he teamed up with Batman and Commissioner Gordon. They used that incident to gut a big chunk of the Falcone family's gray-market operations—and even nabbed one of their key players.
"And hey, aside from those rare situations, the tips aren't bad, right?"
"Well, yeah…"
At the mention of money, Zhaodi's mood visibly stabilized. The $300 asset points he'd spent today on vehicle mods and fuel came straight from his tip jar.
You couldn't say Gotham's rich weren't rich enough.
The only downside? The perfume from that wealthy cougar he'd chauffeured around seemed almost too long-lasting—he could still catch a whiff of it on the right side of his pants.
Zhaodi sighed, remembering how sweaty hisr hands were.
But hey, man's gotta eat.
That night, he flipped open his system interface and skimmed through a few entries from the day. After all, if you're clocked in, you might as well try. As long as the paycheck came through, Zhaodi always took his work seriously. Reviewing top-tier service tips would only help him raise his customer satisfaction score and earn bigger tips.
After enjoying a home-cooked dinner courtesy of Camila, he took a hot shower, counted his wages, glanced at the poor sap dangling from a gargoyle outside, and drifted off into a peaceful sleep.
This was Zhaodi's third day in Gotham. Aside from running into Harvey Dent, nearly getting caught in a shootout at work, his Wheelchair, and getting chased and sprayed with bullets on his way home by a bunch of dumbasses—
Nothing happened.
Another calm and quiet day.