Hello! Damn, this one was a pain to finish, partly because I somehow had to stretch the remaining ten minutes of Cold, Cold Heart gameplay into a whole chapter, and partly because I got sucked into Boardwalk Empire and now have a ton of ideas running around for a fic for that. But, it's done! As always, please leave reviews, as nothing makes me happier than reading what you guys have to say.
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Oct 27, 2011 Heart of Ice. Top Contributors: IGNGuides-Stephanie, Stephanie-IGN, AngelBeGood + more. Last Edited: 27 Oct 2011 5:31 pm. Batman: Arkham City builds upon the intense, atmospheric. Gotham Base Jumper: Jump off the tallest building in Arkham City and glide for 1 minute without touching the ground How to Get: Hide And Seek: A deadly game of hide and seek How to Get: Beat Mr. Freeze when he backstabs you I'm Batman: Become the Bat How to Get: Plain and simple, become Batman Intellectual: Rescue the fourth hostage from. For Batman: Arkham City on the Xbox 360, a GameFAQs Q&A question titled 'How do I finish Heart of Ice?' For Batman: Arkham City on the Xbox 360, a GameFAQs Q&A question titled 'How do I finish Heart of Ice?' Batman: Arkham City builds upon the intense, atmospheric foundation of Batman: Arkham Asylum, sending players soaring into Arkham City, the new maximum security home for all of Gotham City's thugs.
P.S. To Leah Tatyana Nicole, who asked if this story was going to have a Laura/Batman/Catwoman love triangle; I can say with absolute confidence that it will not. The one trope I really never liked was love triangles, and while I do intend for Catwoman to play a role in this story and other stories if I actually get as far as Arkham City, and while she and Laura will interact in this story and others, they won't be fighting over Bruce.
'So what's the plan?'
Laura looked over to the caped vigilante beside her, the two of them currently crouched behind a collection of crates haphazardly stacked near the entrance to GothCorp's Propellant Lab. About fifty feet beyond their hiding place stood nearly a dozen of Penguin's men gathered around the massive block of ice in which their employer was frozen, frantically attempting to free the man while said employer spat and cursed at them from his icy prison. Though the thugs were armed with little more than broken pipes and she knew the man beside her was more than capable of handling such odds, Laura was still uneasy about jumping into a fight in which the two were so vastly outnumbered.
'I'll handle Penguin's men,' Wayne told her, reaching underneath his cape to fish a small piece of machinery from off of his utility belt and offering it to her. 'Use this to cut a hole in the ice. Just hold it in place and turn the handle. It'll do the rest.'
Laura nodded and took the offered device, having to use two hands to grasp it due to its weight. As soon as he was sure she could manage the small machine, her companion vaulted himself over the crates, catching the attention of the gathered thugs who rushed towards him, no doubt eager for payback for the Bat's actions on Christmas Eve. Her path to the ice wall now clear, the brunette hurried over to a patch of the wall that was relatively flat and pressed the device against the ice.
'Y-You gonna get me outta this damn iceberg?' Penguin sputtered a few feet to her left, attempting to crane his neck to face her.
She choked back a bark of laughter. 'Don't count on it.'
'What are they payin' ya? Forty, fifty thousand a year?' He asked, spotting the silver shield hanging from her belt. 'Get me outta here and I'll triple it.'
'A tempting offer,' She drawled as a long arm descended from the device, the laser on the end cutting a perfect circle out of the wall of ice as the arm arced around its focal point. 'But I'm going to have to decline.'
'Don't give me that shit,' Penguin snarled, his expression twisting into as much of a scowl as the ice would allow, as half of his face was encased in the wall. 'All you cozzers got a price.'
'Not all of us.'
Laura turned to see Batman making his way towards her, having dispatched the last of Penguin's men. Ignoring the curses and threats spewing from the frozen gangster, Wayne moved around her to stand in front of where the drill was mounted in the ice, appraising the circular cut the machine had made in the frozen wall.
'Get behind me.' He told her, moving in front of the device and hovering a hand over a button on the center of the drill. Laura moved behind the vigilante's large frame, made even larger by the strange suit he now wore. A low whir sounded and the chunk of ice the drill had carved from the wall shattered into a thousand pieces, frozen fragments shooting past her and smashed onto the ground like shards of glass. Peeking out from her spot behind Wayne's suit, Laura peered at the drill's handiwork, the small machine having carved a long cylindrical tunnel out of the ice wall, which the sergeant could now see was just over five feet thick.
She gave a low whistle. 'Damn.'
Wayne didn't respond, instead strolling through the hole in the ice, having to duck his head slightly to keep the two small bat ears on his cowl from scraping the tunnel's roof. Laura followed closely behind, carefully maneuvering around the patches of ice still stubbornly clinging to the Propellant Lab's metal floor. The path forward lead through the remainder of the devastated laboratory and through a pair of large double doors, opening up into a cavernous room that could only be crossed by a narrow metal catwalk. As the two made their way across the metallic structure, a massive tremor shook the building to its foundations, forcing the sergeant to cling to the catwalk's handrails in order to keep her footing.
'Do you have a plan for when we actually find Freeze?' Laura asked her companion, desperately trying to remain upright.
'I'm going to try and convince him to let Boyle go and turn himself in.'
The brunette's eyes narrowed in disbelief, half wondering if he was joking. 'And when that inevitably doesn't work?'
Though the large frame of Wayne's new suit disguised it well, the sergeant could still see the line of the vigilante's shoulder stiffen slightly at her commentary. 'Then I'm going to have to take them both in.'
The two finally crossed the narrow catwalk, entering into a small room with a security console on one end and a ladder leading to the floor above on the other. Wayne hurriedly climber the ladder, pausing once he'd reached the top.
'It's through the vents from here,' He called down to her, pressing a button on his gauntlet and causing a holographic display appear above it, of what Laura couldn't see. 'It's a thirty foot drop on the other end. You'll have to find another way around.'
Laura scanned the room, spying a small metal staircase leading down near the security console she hadn't noticed before. 'I'll figure something out. Just try and leave enough of Boyle to arrest, will you?'
Though he stalked off towards the vents and out of her sight too quickly for Laura to be sure, the brunette could swear she heard the vigilante mutter to himself, 'No promises.'
-X-
As Bruce made his way through the ventilation system of the GothCorp building, he could hear Freeze's flanging voice ringing out from somewhere below.
'Your body core temperature is dangerously low, Ferris. All I want is to get Nora and leave.'
'I'm not giving you the code!' He heard Boyle snarl as he neared the vent grate closest to the mismatched pair of enemies. 'I'll see you both dead before I give you a damn thing!'
'Then join me in my fate and freeze.' Freeze retorted, not a note of sympathy in his voice.
'You're a peon, Victor. A pleb!' The industrialist spat as Bruce finally reached the grate, the man ranting in his desperation. 'What are you without me, huh? You've got nothing. No money, no resources. Everything around you, I built. Without me, you'd still be turning animals into ice cubes! You stole from me Victor! You thought I'd just let that go? Do you know who I am?'
Bracing his shoulder on the opposite wall, the vigilante planted his foot against the grate, shoving with all his strength. The metal buckled beneath his boot, the screws holding it in place coming loose and causing the warped metal to clatter to the floor of the lab below with a loud crash. Bruce vaulted out of his spot in the mouth of the vent as soon as grate came loose, launching himself to the floor of the lab and rolling behind a stack of scientific equipment before either of the laboratory's occupants could take notice of his presence. It was a lucky thing that he did, for as soon as the crash of the grate hitting the metallic floor rang out across the room, Freeze spun around, the beam from his gun tracing an icy trail from the metal fixture's resting place on the ground to the mouth of the now-empty vent, a blast that would have hit him full-force if he had hesitated even a moment longer.
'Victor, you have to let him go.' Bruce stepped out from behind the equipment, his tone pleading but preparing to leap out of the way should Freeze take another shot at him.
'I'm taking my wife!' Freeze snarled, raising his weapon and taking aim, its high-pitched whine filling the air. 'You can't stop me.'
'I know the truth, and so will the police. Boyle will face judgement for his crimes.'
'It-it was an accident!' Boyle sputtered, struggling against the ice that kept him immobile from the shoulders down. 'You don't know what you're talking about!'
That seemed to be Freeze's breaking point, as the suited man reached over and yanked the billionaire out of the ice by the throat, hurling him into a containment pod which sealed shut, locking the industrialist inside. The suited man whirled around, taking aim at Bruce and blasting him with his gun, the vigilante only just able to dodge the beam and diving behind cover. Freeze made his way over to the edge of the platform, pulling a lever mounted on the railing and causing the structure to rise.
'Nothing matters. Do you understand? Nothing matters but my Nora!'
'You've endangered lives all over this city.' Bruce shouted up to him, peeking out from behind his cover. 'Nora would never have wanted this!'
'No,' Freeze agreed, looking up at his wife's containment pod and pensively staring at her frozen figure, laying a hand on the glass. 'What she wants is to live a long life in the warmth of the sun, her hand in mine. But because of him, she'll only feel the icy touch of a man whose emotions run as cold as the blood in his veins!'
Almost as if they were waiting for a cue, Penguin's men poured in from the adjacent room, armed to the teeth. Grappling up to an outcropping on one of the room's steel supports, Bruce's mind raced to formulate a plan. As his eyes flickered from figure to figure, attempting to map out the men's patrol patterns, he couldn't help but hope that Sergeant Anderson would stay safe and out of trouble.
-X-
Laura was in so much trouble.
She had made her way down from the small security station without difficulty, even managing to find her way to the main entrance to the Propellant Lab without encountering any of Penguin's men, but before she could enter the room to help apprehend Fries and Boyle, the platform on which the two men had been standing began to elevate and half a dozen armed men poured in from the next room. As such, Laura was stuck standing out in the hallway, unable to do anything but stand and watch Wayne swing around from the rafters like a trapeze artist, periodically causing small explosions across the room and further antagonizing Fries and his men.
Before she could come up with some sort of strategy, her cell phone began to ring, the unexpected sound nearly causing her to drop her gun. Fumbling to fish it out of her jacket pocket, Laura hastily pressed the button and lifted the device to her ear, wedging it between her ear and her shoulder.
'Hello?'
'Laura, where the hell are you?' Gordon's voice sounded from the speaker, and Laura nearly sighed in relief. 'I got a call from Barbara that you were asking all sorts of questions about Ferris Boyle and hung up on her, and the men I sent over to Wayne Manor said you weren't there.'
'I'm at GothCorp, in one of the research labs,' She explained. 'The guy who kidnapped Ferris Boyle, Victor Fries, is here.'
'Wait, Ferris Boyle got kidnapped? Laura, what the hell is going on?'
'Jim, I don't really have time to explain right now,' The brunette said hurriedly as a massive explosion sounded from the laboratory, a blast of cryo-chemicals slamming into the door and coating the small observation window in a thick sheet of ice. 'The Bat's in trouble, and Freeze is getting trigger-happy with his ice ray. I'm in the Propellant Research Lab on the sixth floor. Send as many guys as you can; we're going to need them.'
'Wait, Laura-!'
Laura hung up and stuffed the phone into her pocket, silencing the frantic voice of her superior for the second time that night. Knowing Jim, after a call like that, he'd have half the force swarming the building within the hour.
Which was exactly what she was counting on, because she was about to do something exceptionally stupid.
With a muttered prayer and a tug at the St. Michael medal hanging around her neck, Laura yanked open the door to the Propellant Lab. The blast of freezing air, putting even the icy climate near the cryogenics lab to shame, hit her like a brick wall, momentarily freezing her in place. With a violent shudder, Laura forced herself through the doorway, attempting to peer through the chemical mist hovering around the room to find the Bat. She caught a blur of movement out of the corner of her eye and turned, just in time to see Wayne swinging from rafter to rafter with some sort of grappling line, hurling what looked to be small projectiles at the massive icicles hanging from the ceiling, sending them crashing down onto the floor below, and from what she could make out of the flanging threats being hurled in the vigilante's direction, directly on top of Freeze.
Momentarily putting the fight aside, Laura quickly scanned the room, spotting a raised platform high above her head. Though most of the structure was obscured by the thick metal floors, through a small section of floor that was metal mesh the sergeant could see a tall cylindrical container with a small viewport attached, inside of which Laura could ever so faintly see movement.
Ferris Boyle.
Glancing around, she could see there was no ladder or set of stairs to the top, and unless she somehow acquired a grappling line like Wayne, there was likely no way to the platform. Laura circled the structure from below, desperately trying to find a way up, when she finally came across the two massive supports for the ascending platform, thin metal beams crisscrossing along the pillars' sides in the form of an 'X', forming a somewhat treacherous pathway to the top. Left with no other option, Laura reluctantly grasped the metal beams and began climbing towards the top.
Despite the freezing metal burning her palms, the sergeant was able to scale the structure, albeit slowly due to the icy patches that dotted the surface of the beams. She'd made it nearly to the top before things started to go wrong, beginning with an alarm sounding across the lab.
'Containment failure in Capsule One. Prime subject, Nora Fries, in danger.'
'Nora, hang on!' Freeze's electronic voice echoed from below, followed by a second blast of chemicals erupting from the burst pipes running across the length of the room. The blast made the structure shudder violently, momentarily throwing Laura off-balance. Her foot slipped, sending her crashing down onto the beam below, the metal fixture catching her directly in the gut, knocking the wind out of her and forcing the sergeant to try very hard not to throw up. She grasped desperately at the beam, trying her best to curl around the hunk of metal so as to not go crashing to the ground below. Gasping for air, the brunette threw a leg over the beam, straddling the metal while she caught her breath. From her perch high above the main floor, she could see Fries on a walkway below, desperately fiddling with some sort of control panel hooked up to a series of screens.
'Cryogenic containment failing. Prime subject, Nora Fries, in danger.'
As Fries muttered to himself as he worked, a loud crack sounded, and within moments the ice layer underneath the suited man shattered, sending him crashing to the floor below. A moment later, the former scientist came flying out of the bottom of the shattered platform as if he'd been thrown, the Bat following only a fraction of a second later. The vigilante's armored fist came down hard on the glass dome topping Fries' suit, cracking the dome irreparably and sending the scientist to the ground.
'Thanks for doing the heavy lifting, Batman.' A voice sounded from above her.
Looking up, Laura found her field of vision blocked by the remaining height of the structure, but she recognized the voice as Boyle's. 'But you shouldn't have stuck your nose in my business.'
All of a sudden, a blast of chemicals shot out from a broken pipe on the wall towards the two men on the lab's main floor. Wayne gave Fries a hard shove, managing to roll the armored man out of the way, but the blast took the billionaire full-force, encasing the vigilante in a massive hunk of ice. The platform began to descend towards the catwalk below and Laura hurriedly made to follow it, determined to end things before the power-mad industrialist could cause even further damage.
'And here I thought I was going to have a problem explaining what happened in your lab.' Boyle continued, oblivious to the figure descending towards the platform. 'I mean, the police are never going to look at me after what you did! And with this bat-freak dead, there won't be anyone left to say otherwise.'
The platform landed in its original slot, clicking into place adjacent to the catwalk. Fries, though clearly too weak to do much of anything, still desperately crawled towards Boyle and the containment pod containing his wife.
'Nora…' Fries gasped weakly, lifting a hand towards her pod before slumping over, the warming temperature of the room taking its toll.
'And that just leaves you.' Boyle concluded, gesturing towards his former employee with both hands outstretched.
'Please…' The scientist pleaded, 'You can save her. You just have to bypass the-'
'No, Victor, she dies!' Boyle interrupted, yanking a small metal rod off of Fries' suit and bringing it crashing down on the man again and again. 'But I'll keep you alive just long enough to see her go!'
Consumed with beating the man who had so humiliated him, the industrialist didn't see the small figure land noisily on the opposite end of the platform. In fact, he was so engrossed in his revenge, that Ferris Boyle didn't even notice as the figure reached to its side, pulled out a small 9mm handgun, and leveled the barrel at his chest. He didn't notice at all, not until a gunshot echoed around the room, the sound amplified by the acoustics of the lab, and he felt a force hit him in the chest and throw him back, followed by a searing pain powerful enough to send him collapsing to the ground, clutching desperately at the source of the agony as he tried to staunch the flow of blood seeping between his fingers.
Once Boyle was on the ground, Laura redirected her attention from the billionaire to the failing containment pod, approaching the control panel on the side as the lab's alarms sounded once more.
'Cryogenic containment failing. Subject termination imminent.'
'How do I fix this?' Laura turned to Freeze, his eyes fixed on the woman contained within the glass.
'The code is ten zero six ninety-four.' The man gasped, and Laura hurriedly punched the numbers into the pod's small keypad. The pod made a low whirring sound, almost reminding the sergeant of the sound her apartment's air conditioning made in the hotter days of the summer, and the once-clear glass of the pod glazed over with ice, the temperature within dropping rapidly.
'Cryogenic containment restored.'
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A crack followed by loud, thudding footsteps sounded from behind her and Laura whirled around, only to see a newly-freed Batman shake off the last of his coat of ice and kneel beside Freeze, inserting a small glowing container into a slot on the scientist's suit. Freeze gasped as the temperature controls on his suit came alive, the tubes racing along his torso glowing the same pale blue as the container. Visibly relaxing as the built-in climate controls reasserted the subzero environment needed to maintain life, Fries slumped over in his suit, muttering his wife's name as he slipped into unconsciousness.
-X-
As Fries fell unconscious, Bruce redirected his attention towards the billionaire hunched over a few feet away, muttering curses to himself between harsh gasps. Boyle had managed to get his suit jacket off and was furiously pressing it against the bullet wound in his shoulder, managing for the moment to stem the bleeding.
'You'll pay for that, bitch.' The industrialist spat, fixing Anderson with a murderous look. 'You'll be hearing from my lawyer!'
The sergeant looked unimpressed. 'I imagine I will,' She drawled, lazily leaning up against the railing of the platform but keeping her small silver pistol in hand. 'Since you're looking at charges for manslaughter, extortion, and two counts of attempted murder.'
Boyle paled at that, though whether it was out of fear or from the blood loss Bruce couldn't be sure. Either way, the aging man fell silent, focusing furiously on his makeshift bandage.
Anderson shook her head at the billionaire's easy cowing, turning her attention to him. 'You heading out?' She asked, one eyebrow raised in question. 'Gordon ought to be here soon, and I know how you like to make a dramatic exit before the cops show up.'
'I don't make dramatic exits,' He corrected, moving from his kneeling position to stand to his full height.
'Uh huh,' The sergeant smiled, clearly trying to choke back a laugh. 'Whatever you say, Bats. Whatever you say.'
Completely oblivious to Bruce's scowl, as she couldn't see it through the XE suit's full face mask, the brunette continued.
'In all seriousness though, thanks. Things would have gone pretty badly if you hadn't shown up.'
After a beat of silence, Anderson rolled her eyes. 'That's the part where you say 'Thank you' and return the compliment.'
The vigilante didn't answer, instead wavering for a moment before reaching into his utility belt and fishing out a small earpiece and holding it out for her to take. He'd seen Alfred slip it into one of the belt's compartments when he'd gone back to the Cave for the XE suit and he had been determined to leave it there, but he had to admit, she had a point.
Their teamwork…hadn't been terrible.
Anderson took the earpiece from his hand and examined it, turning it over in her hands.
'You got me a Bluetooth?'
'It's a satellite-linked communications device with a military-grade encryption that will put you into direct contact with me,' He told her. 'For the next time something like this happens.'
Anderson gave him a look of surprise which quickly melted into the most genuine smile he'd ever seen on her face. It made him feel a stir of…something, though he'd never admit to it.
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'So a Bat-Comm, then?'
Bruce nearly audibly groaned, the growing unknown feeling quickly giving way to irritation. 'Don't call it that.'
The sergeant laughed, putting the earpiece in place. 'Too late.'
Before either of them could say anything further, footsteps sounded from the hallway, doubtlessly the GCPD officers Gordon had sent finally arriving to clean up Boyle and Fries' mess. Anderson turned to look towards the door, the sound catching her off-guard, and the vigilante took the opportunity to make his exit, quickly grappling up to the rafters and pulling himself through the opening of the nearest air vent.
By the time the brunette turned around a few moments later, Bruce had already exited the building and disappeared into the night.
-X-
Laura watched as several officers dragged away the unconscious body of Victor Fries to the awaiting armored transport outside the GothCorp building, the man's dead weight only compounding the already Herculean task of moving his massive suit. The contraption was easily a few hundred pounds, if not more, the hydraulic joints the only reason the scientist had been able to move around with relative ease, though they did little for the men attempting to transport the suit's occupant to Gotham General. Unless Fries woke up and walked himself to the car, which when considering the fact that the suit's ice ray was still operational and would far more likely result in an escape attempt, the men of the GCPD seemed to have no other choice than to try and drag the massive man out of the lab and onto the street below by hand.
As Laura was beginning to wonder why no one had gone for some sort of cart or gurney to transport the man out of the building, someone cleared their throat behind her, catching her attention. Turning around, the sergeant was met with the face of Jim Gordon, which was twisted into a disapproving frown.
'You know, if you want people to stop making you out to be some loose-cannon, one-woman-army, you ought to stop acting like it.'
'Believe me, I'd rather I didn't have to.' Laura sighed. She'd never liked incurring her mentor's ire, always afraid she would somehow make him feel his trust in her was misplaced. 'But I was the only one at Wayne Manor, and I was the only one who knew where Fries was taking Boyle. Like you said, the rest of the force was dealing with riots, and if I didn't do something, no one else was going to.'
'No one?' Gordon asked, nodding towards a small metal projectile lying forgotten on the laboratory floor, its likeness that of a bat in flight.
Laura scanned the room, spying a small metal staircase leading down near the security console she hadn't noticed before. 'I'll figure something out. Just try and leave enough of Boyle to arrest, will you?'
Though he stalked off towards the vents and out of her sight too quickly for Laura to be sure, the brunette could swear she heard the vigilante mutter to himself, 'No promises.'
-X-
As Bruce made his way through the ventilation system of the GothCorp building, he could hear Freeze's flanging voice ringing out from somewhere below.
'Your body core temperature is dangerously low, Ferris. All I want is to get Nora and leave.'
'I'm not giving you the code!' He heard Boyle snarl as he neared the vent grate closest to the mismatched pair of enemies. 'I'll see you both dead before I give you a damn thing!'
'Then join me in my fate and freeze.' Freeze retorted, not a note of sympathy in his voice.
'You're a peon, Victor. A pleb!' The industrialist spat as Bruce finally reached the grate, the man ranting in his desperation. 'What are you without me, huh? You've got nothing. No money, no resources. Everything around you, I built. Without me, you'd still be turning animals into ice cubes! You stole from me Victor! You thought I'd just let that go? Do you know who I am?'
Bracing his shoulder on the opposite wall, the vigilante planted his foot against the grate, shoving with all his strength. The metal buckled beneath his boot, the screws holding it in place coming loose and causing the warped metal to clatter to the floor of the lab below with a loud crash. Bruce vaulted out of his spot in the mouth of the vent as soon as grate came loose, launching himself to the floor of the lab and rolling behind a stack of scientific equipment before either of the laboratory's occupants could take notice of his presence. It was a lucky thing that he did, for as soon as the crash of the grate hitting the metallic floor rang out across the room, Freeze spun around, the beam from his gun tracing an icy trail from the metal fixture's resting place on the ground to the mouth of the now-empty vent, a blast that would have hit him full-force if he had hesitated even a moment longer.
'Victor, you have to let him go.' Bruce stepped out from behind the equipment, his tone pleading but preparing to leap out of the way should Freeze take another shot at him.
'I'm taking my wife!' Freeze snarled, raising his weapon and taking aim, its high-pitched whine filling the air. 'You can't stop me.'
'I know the truth, and so will the police. Boyle will face judgement for his crimes.'
'It-it was an accident!' Boyle sputtered, struggling against the ice that kept him immobile from the shoulders down. 'You don't know what you're talking about!'
That seemed to be Freeze's breaking point, as the suited man reached over and yanked the billionaire out of the ice by the throat, hurling him into a containment pod which sealed shut, locking the industrialist inside. The suited man whirled around, taking aim at Bruce and blasting him with his gun, the vigilante only just able to dodge the beam and diving behind cover. Freeze made his way over to the edge of the platform, pulling a lever mounted on the railing and causing the structure to rise.
'Nothing matters. Do you understand? Nothing matters but my Nora!'
'You've endangered lives all over this city.' Bruce shouted up to him, peeking out from behind his cover. 'Nora would never have wanted this!'
'No,' Freeze agreed, looking up at his wife's containment pod and pensively staring at her frozen figure, laying a hand on the glass. 'What she wants is to live a long life in the warmth of the sun, her hand in mine. But because of him, she'll only feel the icy touch of a man whose emotions run as cold as the blood in his veins!'
Almost as if they were waiting for a cue, Penguin's men poured in from the adjacent room, armed to the teeth. Grappling up to an outcropping on one of the room's steel supports, Bruce's mind raced to formulate a plan. As his eyes flickered from figure to figure, attempting to map out the men's patrol patterns, he couldn't help but hope that Sergeant Anderson would stay safe and out of trouble.
-X-
Laura was in so much trouble.
She had made her way down from the small security station without difficulty, even managing to find her way to the main entrance to the Propellant Lab without encountering any of Penguin's men, but before she could enter the room to help apprehend Fries and Boyle, the platform on which the two men had been standing began to elevate and half a dozen armed men poured in from the next room. As such, Laura was stuck standing out in the hallway, unable to do anything but stand and watch Wayne swing around from the rafters like a trapeze artist, periodically causing small explosions across the room and further antagonizing Fries and his men.
Before she could come up with some sort of strategy, her cell phone began to ring, the unexpected sound nearly causing her to drop her gun. Fumbling to fish it out of her jacket pocket, Laura hastily pressed the button and lifted the device to her ear, wedging it between her ear and her shoulder.
'Hello?'
'Laura, where the hell are you?' Gordon's voice sounded from the speaker, and Laura nearly sighed in relief. 'I got a call from Barbara that you were asking all sorts of questions about Ferris Boyle and hung up on her, and the men I sent over to Wayne Manor said you weren't there.'
'I'm at GothCorp, in one of the research labs,' She explained. 'The guy who kidnapped Ferris Boyle, Victor Fries, is here.'
'Wait, Ferris Boyle got kidnapped? Laura, what the hell is going on?'
'Jim, I don't really have time to explain right now,' The brunette said hurriedly as a massive explosion sounded from the laboratory, a blast of cryo-chemicals slamming into the door and coating the small observation window in a thick sheet of ice. 'The Bat's in trouble, and Freeze is getting trigger-happy with his ice ray. I'm in the Propellant Research Lab on the sixth floor. Send as many guys as you can; we're going to need them.'
'Wait, Laura-!'
Laura hung up and stuffed the phone into her pocket, silencing the frantic voice of her superior for the second time that night. Knowing Jim, after a call like that, he'd have half the force swarming the building within the hour.
Which was exactly what she was counting on, because she was about to do something exceptionally stupid.
With a muttered prayer and a tug at the St. Michael medal hanging around her neck, Laura yanked open the door to the Propellant Lab. The blast of freezing air, putting even the icy climate near the cryogenics lab to shame, hit her like a brick wall, momentarily freezing her in place. With a violent shudder, Laura forced herself through the doorway, attempting to peer through the chemical mist hovering around the room to find the Bat. She caught a blur of movement out of the corner of her eye and turned, just in time to see Wayne swinging from rafter to rafter with some sort of grappling line, hurling what looked to be small projectiles at the massive icicles hanging from the ceiling, sending them crashing down onto the floor below, and from what she could make out of the flanging threats being hurled in the vigilante's direction, directly on top of Freeze.
Momentarily putting the fight aside, Laura quickly scanned the room, spotting a raised platform high above her head. Though most of the structure was obscured by the thick metal floors, through a small section of floor that was metal mesh the sergeant could see a tall cylindrical container with a small viewport attached, inside of which Laura could ever so faintly see movement.
Ferris Boyle.
Glancing around, she could see there was no ladder or set of stairs to the top, and unless she somehow acquired a grappling line like Wayne, there was likely no way to the platform. Laura circled the structure from below, desperately trying to find a way up, when she finally came across the two massive supports for the ascending platform, thin metal beams crisscrossing along the pillars' sides in the form of an 'X', forming a somewhat treacherous pathway to the top. Left with no other option, Laura reluctantly grasped the metal beams and began climbing towards the top.
Despite the freezing metal burning her palms, the sergeant was able to scale the structure, albeit slowly due to the icy patches that dotted the surface of the beams. She'd made it nearly to the top before things started to go wrong, beginning with an alarm sounding across the lab.
'Containment failure in Capsule One. Prime subject, Nora Fries, in danger.'
'Nora, hang on!' Freeze's electronic voice echoed from below, followed by a second blast of chemicals erupting from the burst pipes running across the length of the room. The blast made the structure shudder violently, momentarily throwing Laura off-balance. Her foot slipped, sending her crashing down onto the beam below, the metal fixture catching her directly in the gut, knocking the wind out of her and forcing the sergeant to try very hard not to throw up. She grasped desperately at the beam, trying her best to curl around the hunk of metal so as to not go crashing to the ground below. Gasping for air, the brunette threw a leg over the beam, straddling the metal while she caught her breath. From her perch high above the main floor, she could see Fries on a walkway below, desperately fiddling with some sort of control panel hooked up to a series of screens.
'Cryogenic containment failing. Prime subject, Nora Fries, in danger.'
As Fries muttered to himself as he worked, a loud crack sounded, and within moments the ice layer underneath the suited man shattered, sending him crashing to the floor below. A moment later, the former scientist came flying out of the bottom of the shattered platform as if he'd been thrown, the Bat following only a fraction of a second later. The vigilante's armored fist came down hard on the glass dome topping Fries' suit, cracking the dome irreparably and sending the scientist to the ground.
'Thanks for doing the heavy lifting, Batman.' A voice sounded from above her.
Looking up, Laura found her field of vision blocked by the remaining height of the structure, but she recognized the voice as Boyle's. 'But you shouldn't have stuck your nose in my business.'
All of a sudden, a blast of chemicals shot out from a broken pipe on the wall towards the two men on the lab's main floor. Wayne gave Fries a hard shove, managing to roll the armored man out of the way, but the blast took the billionaire full-force, encasing the vigilante in a massive hunk of ice. The platform began to descend towards the catwalk below and Laura hurriedly made to follow it, determined to end things before the power-mad industrialist could cause even further damage.
'And here I thought I was going to have a problem explaining what happened in your lab.' Boyle continued, oblivious to the figure descending towards the platform. 'I mean, the police are never going to look at me after what you did! And with this bat-freak dead, there won't be anyone left to say otherwise.'
The platform landed in its original slot, clicking into place adjacent to the catwalk. Fries, though clearly too weak to do much of anything, still desperately crawled towards Boyle and the containment pod containing his wife.
'Nora…' Fries gasped weakly, lifting a hand towards her pod before slumping over, the warming temperature of the room taking its toll.
'And that just leaves you.' Boyle concluded, gesturing towards his former employee with both hands outstretched.
'Please…' The scientist pleaded, 'You can save her. You just have to bypass the-'
'No, Victor, she dies!' Boyle interrupted, yanking a small metal rod off of Fries' suit and bringing it crashing down on the man again and again. 'But I'll keep you alive just long enough to see her go!'
Consumed with beating the man who had so humiliated him, the industrialist didn't see the small figure land noisily on the opposite end of the platform. In fact, he was so engrossed in his revenge, that Ferris Boyle didn't even notice as the figure reached to its side, pulled out a small 9mm handgun, and leveled the barrel at his chest. He didn't notice at all, not until a gunshot echoed around the room, the sound amplified by the acoustics of the lab, and he felt a force hit him in the chest and throw him back, followed by a searing pain powerful enough to send him collapsing to the ground, clutching desperately at the source of the agony as he tried to staunch the flow of blood seeping between his fingers.
Once Boyle was on the ground, Laura redirected her attention from the billionaire to the failing containment pod, approaching the control panel on the side as the lab's alarms sounded once more.
'Cryogenic containment failing. Subject termination imminent.'
'How do I fix this?' Laura turned to Freeze, his eyes fixed on the woman contained within the glass.
'The code is ten zero six ninety-four.' The man gasped, and Laura hurriedly punched the numbers into the pod's small keypad. The pod made a low whirring sound, almost reminding the sergeant of the sound her apartment's air conditioning made in the hotter days of the summer, and the once-clear glass of the pod glazed over with ice, the temperature within dropping rapidly.
'Cryogenic containment restored.'
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A crack followed by loud, thudding footsteps sounded from behind her and Laura whirled around, only to see a newly-freed Batman shake off the last of his coat of ice and kneel beside Freeze, inserting a small glowing container into a slot on the scientist's suit. Freeze gasped as the temperature controls on his suit came alive, the tubes racing along his torso glowing the same pale blue as the container. Visibly relaxing as the built-in climate controls reasserted the subzero environment needed to maintain life, Fries slumped over in his suit, muttering his wife's name as he slipped into unconsciousness.
-X-
As Fries fell unconscious, Bruce redirected his attention towards the billionaire hunched over a few feet away, muttering curses to himself between harsh gasps. Boyle had managed to get his suit jacket off and was furiously pressing it against the bullet wound in his shoulder, managing for the moment to stem the bleeding.
'You'll pay for that, bitch.' The industrialist spat, fixing Anderson with a murderous look. 'You'll be hearing from my lawyer!'
The sergeant looked unimpressed. 'I imagine I will,' She drawled, lazily leaning up against the railing of the platform but keeping her small silver pistol in hand. 'Since you're looking at charges for manslaughter, extortion, and two counts of attempted murder.'
Boyle paled at that, though whether it was out of fear or from the blood loss Bruce couldn't be sure. Either way, the aging man fell silent, focusing furiously on his makeshift bandage.
Anderson shook her head at the billionaire's easy cowing, turning her attention to him. 'You heading out?' She asked, one eyebrow raised in question. 'Gordon ought to be here soon, and I know how you like to make a dramatic exit before the cops show up.'
'I don't make dramatic exits,' He corrected, moving from his kneeling position to stand to his full height.
'Uh huh,' The sergeant smiled, clearly trying to choke back a laugh. 'Whatever you say, Bats. Whatever you say.'
Completely oblivious to Bruce's scowl, as she couldn't see it through the XE suit's full face mask, the brunette continued.
'In all seriousness though, thanks. Things would have gone pretty badly if you hadn't shown up.'
After a beat of silence, Anderson rolled her eyes. 'That's the part where you say 'Thank you' and return the compliment.'
The vigilante didn't answer, instead wavering for a moment before reaching into his utility belt and fishing out a small earpiece and holding it out for her to take. He'd seen Alfred slip it into one of the belt's compartments when he'd gone back to the Cave for the XE suit and he had been determined to leave it there, but he had to admit, she had a point.
Their teamwork…hadn't been terrible.
Anderson took the earpiece from his hand and examined it, turning it over in her hands.
'You got me a Bluetooth?'
'It's a satellite-linked communications device with a military-grade encryption that will put you into direct contact with me,' He told her. 'For the next time something like this happens.'
Anderson gave him a look of surprise which quickly melted into the most genuine smile he'd ever seen on her face. It made him feel a stir of…something, though he'd never admit to it.
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'So a Bat-Comm, then?'
Bruce nearly audibly groaned, the growing unknown feeling quickly giving way to irritation. 'Don't call it that.'
The sergeant laughed, putting the earpiece in place. 'Too late.'
Before either of them could say anything further, footsteps sounded from the hallway, doubtlessly the GCPD officers Gordon had sent finally arriving to clean up Boyle and Fries' mess. Anderson turned to look towards the door, the sound catching her off-guard, and the vigilante took the opportunity to make his exit, quickly grappling up to the rafters and pulling himself through the opening of the nearest air vent.
By the time the brunette turned around a few moments later, Bruce had already exited the building and disappeared into the night.
-X-
Laura watched as several officers dragged away the unconscious body of Victor Fries to the awaiting armored transport outside the GothCorp building, the man's dead weight only compounding the already Herculean task of moving his massive suit. The contraption was easily a few hundred pounds, if not more, the hydraulic joints the only reason the scientist had been able to move around with relative ease, though they did little for the men attempting to transport the suit's occupant to Gotham General. Unless Fries woke up and walked himself to the car, which when considering the fact that the suit's ice ray was still operational and would far more likely result in an escape attempt, the men of the GCPD seemed to have no other choice than to try and drag the massive man out of the lab and onto the street below by hand.
As Laura was beginning to wonder why no one had gone for some sort of cart or gurney to transport the man out of the building, someone cleared their throat behind her, catching her attention. Turning around, the sergeant was met with the face of Jim Gordon, which was twisted into a disapproving frown.
'You know, if you want people to stop making you out to be some loose-cannon, one-woman-army, you ought to stop acting like it.'
'Believe me, I'd rather I didn't have to.' Laura sighed. She'd never liked incurring her mentor's ire, always afraid she would somehow make him feel his trust in her was misplaced. 'But I was the only one at Wayne Manor, and I was the only one who knew where Fries was taking Boyle. Like you said, the rest of the force was dealing with riots, and if I didn't do something, no one else was going to.'
'No one?' Gordon asked, nodding towards a small metal projectile lying forgotten on the laboratory floor, its likeness that of a bat in flight.
'You would have rather I let the Batman handle things?' She asked, the hint of a challenge in her voice. 'Don't think I haven't noticed the Vigilante Task Force is still technically in operation.'
'I thought you trusted him?'
'I do,' Laura admitted after a slight hesitation, taking a moment to consider her earlier fears of what the masked man would do if he found out she knew who he was by day. 'I trust him to save people. I trust him to stop guys like Freeze or Joker or Cobblepot. But I don't know him, and I'm not going to trust him with everything.' It would take a lot more than a week of collaboration between the two for her to trust him enough that she didn't feel the need to keep an eye on him, a feeling she had no doubt Wayne shared in turn.
Gordon paused for a moment before nodding, seemingly finding the logic in her words, and turned to survey the damage done to the Diamond District landmark.
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'You know what they're calling these guys on the news? Super-villains, like in some Saturday morning cartoon. Somehow, psychotic clowns and ice rays and guys with jetpacks and flamethrowers has become the new normal.'
'Could be worse,' Laura said lightly, causing the captain to raise an eyebrow at her. 'At least in Gotham, our resident do-gooder is just some guy in a bat costume with a bunch of high-tech shit. My buddy in Metropolis says MPD's been getting reports of a guy running around the city in a blue unitard. Apparently, he can fly and shoots lasers out of his eyes.'
Gordon was silent for a long moment before responding.
'Well, fuck.'
