But, tonight, I have met someone who has taken my quest one step further . . .

The robbers had not yet struck at Gotham First Federal Savings and Loan, so I was on stakeout, watching the bank from the rooftop next door. Sure enough, around five-o'clock, two costumed perpetrators burst through the front door of the bank. Nobody ran for the police, though, because everyone minds their own business in Gotham. Those crooks were pretty bold, but I was going to get them by being sneaky.

It was easy to jump across the rooftop to the First Federal Building. The rooftop door was open. I figured the two supervillains were too busy with the money to check the building's security cameras, so in the door I went. I looked down the stairwell, which led to the lobby, as far as I could see. It was only twelve floors high, so I knew I had enough Bat-rope to rappel down. That way no one would be alerted by my footsteps on the stairs.

I rappeled down the levels of the building, through the openings in the staircase, down to the landing of the lobby stairs.

In the stairwell, I could hear the criminals shouting at the bank employees, demanding to know where the money is and threatening the tellers' lives.

I grabbed one of my flying Bat-Mites. With a tiny remote control, I made it fly up to the stairwell window while I hung back a few steps up the staircase. Once it was up against the window, I saw through my remote viewscreen that the perpetrators were my old foe Signalman and some jerk dressed up like a porcupine. I knew they wouldn't be hard to take down, even though they had already seriously injured some of the guards. I called the Bat-Mite back to me and stuck it back in my belt.

There was an office cubicle area near the stairs, so I crept forward until I could see the porcupine guy clearly. I wanted to take him down fast, without any further injuries to the bank's staff.

Even though the guy was covered with sharp quills, he had to breathe out of some part of his mask. The eyeholes in his mask were the perfect target.

I pulled the Bat-Blowgun from my utility belt and put a tear-gas pellet in it. I crept closer, close enough to the Porcupine to have a clear shot at his eyeholes, and I fired.

The pellet went into his mask, impacted against his face, and exploded. The porcupine guy tried to tear his mask off with his quilled hands, but he was too panicky to do it. The guards rushed away from him as some gas seeped out of his costume.

Signalman freaked out, and ran for the door. I raced out into the lobby and threw a Batarang at him, one of my 'rangs with a rope attached.

My aim was true and his legs got entangled in Batarang rope. I hogtied him, and told the bank guards to call the police.

Then I heard a haughty, mocking laugh, from one of the customers, who seemed bigger and more muscular than a businessman in Gotham should be.

"Excellent, Batman, excellent!" he laughed, showing a black, full beard. "It's wonderful to finally see your skills in action!"

The uninjured guards warily pointed their guns at the man, who doffed his trenchcoat and hat to reveal a bald head, and an outlandish hunting costume decorated with leopard spots and tiger stripes.

"I am Kraven the Hunter, Batman. I have chosen you as my new prey."

"Don't think I'm not ready for you. Let's go, right here, right now."

"This bank is hardly the place for us to show each other our considerable skills. Instead, meet me tomorrow night at midnight at the entrance to the Central Park Zoo."

I started toward him. "You just wait a minute . . . "

"I'm afraid I have to leave, Batman. You see, I have to prepare for tomorrow night's hunt. See you then!"

As I dashed toward him, he threw a burlap bag to the ground. It opened, and out slithered a boomslang, a very poisonous African snake. I knew I had to grab it before it hurt anyone in the bank, and Kraven took advantage of my distraction to get away. I would have to wait until tomorrow night to face him.

I had had some experience in snake handling before, so I was able to gather the snake up into the bag without him hurting anyone. Kraven had taken advantage of the distraction to escape.

Kraven the Hunter's identity was no mystery. He was Sergei Kravinoff, emigre at a young age from Russia around the time of the Revolution. There were records of him having lived in England, and reports of his hunts from all over the world. At all accounts, he was counted a great hunter, with superhuman speed, strength, and tracking skills.

Alfred appeared behind me.

"Ah, Master Bruce, here is your dinner. By the way, sir, you might want to note that Wayne Enterprises has just acquired IOpener, one of those Internet startups. It was a friendly takeover, as usual, and both Wayne Enterprises and IOpener's employees will profit considerably from the merger."

"Great, Alfred. That will be all."

"Without seeming too impertinent, Master Bruce, I would humbly remind you, sir, that Wayne Enterprises built this cave, and paid for this tray that I serve you from. You would do well, sir, to pay more attention to your company's affairs. After all, you are the president."

"Yes, yes." I brushed him off. "Thank you, Alfred. Goodbye." He had been pestering me about the company's dealings ever since I started fighting crime as Batman.

I heard him sniff to himself as he walked back up the stairs into Wayne Manor.

So, I would have to be at my best to face Kraven, and after that, I might not come out of the fight alive. There were battle meditation techniques I could use to focus my energy between now and then, to make sure I was ready for him.

"Armor," I said, and an invisible electric force-field flew up over the Batmobile. Even the Batmobile isn't safe in Central Park at midnight.

It was close to midnight as I reached the entrance of the Central Park Zoo on foot. Over the sounds of the night-birds and monkeys in the zoo, I heard a yowling, barking noise that I had heard before, but never in New York City or Gotham.

I smelled carrion, and suddenly I saw two large spotted hyenas were approaching me, their backs both lowered and their teeth glinting in the moonlight. They growled lowly as they padded forward. Kraven walked slowly behind them.

"You were brave enough to accept my challenge, Batman. Let's see if you have the will of the hunter about you, if you can handle my pets. Murder, Mayhem, attack!"

The hyenas Murder and Mayhem leapt forward. I quickly pulled out my Bat-torch and lit it aflame. The hyenas yowled and circled me, but didn't dare to come any closer. I held them off with the flame. Each hyena got closer, and I singed their fur with the flame. I could tell that they were hungry, but not hungry enough to leap through flame to attack. They thought the better of attacking me, and shuffled off.

I could see from Kraven's face that he wasn't expecting me to drive them off so easily, but he soon came up with another idea for attacking me. "Inventive solution, Batman, but altogether too reliant on your technology. Let's see how you fight without your weapons."

He dropped the machete that he was carrying to the ground. "Let's fight like sporting men, Batman," he said. "I won't use my toys if you don't use yours."

"Man to man, then?"

"Man to man it is," he replied. I put my utility belt on the ground next to me.

Kraven and I shuffled a moment, sizing each other up, each of us getting into a fighting stance.

He was the first to attack. I countered his jab to the stomach with a karate block, but he nearly took my arm off with the force of his blow. He kept coming with blow after blow, and I countered him, but it took all the strength I had. Then he started fighting dirty.

Kraven grabbed both my gloves and pulled me in close to him, then butted my head with his chin like an antelope. I reeled from the blow, but managed a sweep kick that knocked him to the ground.

He leapt at me again like the lion whose mane he wore on his costume. Tapping into the spirit of aikido, I used his momentum to throw him into a tree.

He dusted himself off and was clearly dazed.

"Ready to give up, Kraven?" I asked.

"Never, Batman. I tracked you . . . I found you . . . and now I'm going to stuff you and mount you on my wall." He pulled a snub pistol from his vest. "There's always a more expedient way of obtaining one's prey."

I got ready to shield myself with my cape..it can deflect bullets of small caliber. My utility belt and its weapons weren't too far out of reach.

But then there was a small pellet-gun-like noise, and Kraven suddenly looked dazed and surprised. Blood started to leak from his mouth, and as he fell to the ground, I saw that he had been shot in the side of the head.

"Another scumbag put out of business," a voice said from the shadows. "My work is done for the night."

Out from the shadows stepped a tall, thickly-built man with a deranged militant look on his face. He wore a black flak jacket over a black uniform with a white skull on it. He carried a smoking Heckler & Loch pistol in one hand.

"You killed him," I said.

"Yeah. He's not the last, either. All of these superpowered freaks are going down. They've terrorized and hurt people for too long already. It's time for the Punisher to go to work on them."

"But . . . "

"You were doing pretty good against Kraven," the Punisher said, holstering his pistol in a vest holster. "I could use your help, if you wanted to join me. There's a lot of scum out there to clean up."

"Guns are for cowards," I said.

"Well, you don't hear Kraven calling me a coward, now do you? He can't, because I blew his brains out. The right tool for the right job, I always say. We'll see who cleans up more crime in this town, you with your gadgets, or me with my guns. But be careful..the next time I see you in my sights, I might take you out too, for getting in the way."

He looked me dead in the eye with a crazed stare. "Don't try to stop me, either. You'll wish you hadn't."

I waited for the Punisher to turn away so I could jump him and bring him into custody, but all of a sudden we heard police sirens. Someone had heard the shots, or the hyenas yowling, and had called the police. I could see the Zoo night watchmen rushing toward the clearing where I was standing over Kraven's dead body.

The Punisher slipped into the bushes, and soon I heard a motorcycle engine start and him ride off into the night. The cops aren't fond of vigilantes in this town, at least those that don't work for the SuperUnit Police, so I made myself scarce. The coroner would have to figure out what happened to Kraven, and the town would sleep better for having one less maniac out on the streets.

But I would sleep worse knowing that the Punisher was out there, killing criminals . . . and that now he had his sights set on me, too.

"Thanks, Carlton. I love Alfred's cooking, but sometimes, there's nothing like one of Joe's submarines!" He walked inside the deli.

"Bruce Wayne!" a man in a short-sleeved paisely shirt called out from the back of the deli. "Good to see you ain't so high-falutin' that you can't come into Joe's for a submarine!"

"Hi, Joe!" said Wayne. "Can you give me the usual?"

"Yeah, Wayne...whole wheat bun, no mayo, extra peppers, no onions, jack cheese, ham and turkey!"

As Bruce was standing, waiting for his sandwich, his attention was turned by a noise from outside.

"Do you hear that, Joe?"

"Hear what?"

"That buzzing sound from outside...getting louder and louder."

"I tell you, Bruce, working in downtown Gotham, I've learned to tune out just about everything. I'd go nuts if I listened to every strange sound..."

Bruce walked outside where he heard the sound getting louder and louder. He saw Carlton looking up in the sky with his mouth wide open.

"What is it, Carlton?" Carlton pointed and Bruce looked up to see the shape of a jet plane, getting closer and closer to them.

"Oh, God!" Bruce said. "Come with me! Leave the car here! Just get inside!"

They rushed back inside Joe's Deli.

"Gotcha sandwich ready, Wayne. That'll be $5.00 like usual. If you're gonna get somethin' to drink, you better get it from the cooler now, so's I can ring you up...what's the rush?"

"You have a basement, Joe?"

"Yeah, I gotta basement. Where do you think I keep my mayonnaise?"

"No time for talk..." Bruce raised his voice. "Everyone follow me down into the basement! Hurry!"

"Whadda you, nuts?" Joe put down the sandwich and stared quizzically at Bruce. "You're gonna start a stampede or somethin'!"

"Trust me! Come on!"

A few of the patrons followed Bruce, Joe, and Carlton down into the basement while some of the patrons walked outside laughing at Bruce.

Bruce stood at the basement door. "Wait! Where are you going? A plane's going to crash into the sidewalk any minute! Don't go outside!"

Carlton pulled Bruce down into the basement just at the moment that the plane impacted the ground.

An explosion shook the building, blowing the first floor off. The skyscraper across the street had its first floor blown out, then each floor above began to fall sequentially, while people fell out of the windows and smashed on the street below.

Dust and debris from upstairs fell down into the basement where Bruce, Joe, Carlton, and three customers were hiding. "Stay down, everyone!" Bruce yelled. "Stay below the tables!"

The din of the explosion stopped and was replaced by ringing fire alarms and the screaming of dozens of people. Fire engine sirens could be heard off in the distance. After a few minutes, Bruce Wayne and the others crept out from where they were hiding.

"What the heck?" said Joe, uncovering his head. "I'm glad they built this thing sturdy! This cellar used to be a hideout for booze runners back in the 20's! The mobsters used to brag that not even dynamite could get the cops inside!"

"Don't anybody move," said Bruce. "Let me see how bad it is upstairs." He walked up the cellar stairs and felt the door, which was hot. "Everybody stay down here for a minute."

Bruce heard another light whooshing sound, like a small jet engine, then some heavy footsteps.

"Hello! Is anybody in here?" asked an authoritative voice through what sounded like a loudspeaker.

Bruce recognized the voice, but didn't let the others know this. "Yes! There are people down here in the cellar!"

"I'm almost done putting out this fire...OK, it's safe to come out now...be careful!'

Bruce opened the door to see that the entire deli's first floor had been blown away. Standing there amid the wreckage and the charred bodies was a tall man in red and gold armor. He gave off an eerie glow in the light of the small fires that were breaking out everywhere.

"Iron Man?"

"Yes...aren't you Bruce Wayne?"

"Yes. We'll talk later. There are other people down in the cellar, but I don't think they're hurt."

"We should get them out of here, just in case a gas main explodes from the impact of that plane."

Bruce Wayne and Iron Man gradually shepherded the people who were in the cellar out to one of the ambulances that was there to cart the many dead and wounded away.

"My deli...my beautiful deli..." Joe hung his head as he was guided into an ambulance by the paramedics.

"Okay, team, let's spread out!" the leader, who carried a golden shield, barked. "Photon, turn into your light form and go inside the wreckage to see if you can find any survivors. Doc, you and Powerman look through the plane wreckage to see if you can find anyone, too. Black Condor, you look in the top of the building over there to see if there are any survivors. Trapster, come with me so we can talk to the cops who've already arrived."

Some of the people on the street who were being guided away cheered.

"Hey, it's the Super Unit Police!" they called. "Go, SUP!" called others.

"Keep your minds on your jobs, people!", the leader admonished his team. When he saw Iron Man and did a double take. "Hey, super-vigilante! You know you're not supposed to be here! Clear out before we have to cite you!"

Iron Man grumbled. "I'm just trying to help!"

Trapster patted Guardian on the shoulder. "Iron Man has to be here, boss. He's Tony Stark's bodyguard. That was Stark's experimental plane that crashed. He's probably trying to find Mr. Stark in the wreckage or something."

"Hmmm.." said Guardian. "Well, you can help out, but you better not get in our way. That civilian with you... is he injured?"

"No...," Bruce Wayne replied. "but I want to stay and help out. I know some First Aid."

"Well, you go with Trapster and see if there's anybody hidden under the wreckage or still in hiding. What a mess...we've got a lot of work to do."

"Tragedy struck downtown Gotham City today as the experimental Stark C-3100 CleanJet airplane malfunctioned and crashed into the 2000 block of Exchange Street. The explosion rocked the surrounding buildings and killed 600 people, wounding 300 more. It is the biggest tragedy Gotham has seen since Dr. Phosphorous's destruction of the Ajax Chemical Plant three years ago. For more information on the crash, here's Trish Tilby."

"Thank you, Peter. Added to the tragedy of the deaths of hundreds of Gothamites are the deaths of top industrial leaders who were riding on Stark's experimental plane when the crash happened. The remains of six of them were found on the scene: Ted Kord, head of Kord Industries; Morgan Edge, venture capitalist; Scott Lang, head of the Internet startup wholesaler Lang Electronics; Pepper Potts, Tony Stark's personal secretary; Melissa Queen, industrial magnate and aunt of millionaire Oliver Queen, and Will Magnus, inventor extraordinaire. Twelve crewmembers, including both pilots, were killed as well. Tony Stark was also aboard the plane at the time of the crash, but his body has not yet been recovered...."

"I don't know, Tony," said Bruce.

Iron Man took his mask off to reveal the face of Tony Stark. A cold sweat ran across his brow. "I don't know how I'm going to tell the public that Tony Stark didn't die on that plane crash..." He sat down hard in his chair and faced the window.

"How did it happen?"

"The ceremony for the launching of the plane had just finished. We were in the air and heading out from La Guardia toward the East River..I was passing out cigars and getting lots of congratulations from everybody. The whole point of this plane was to travel at great speed with almost no emission of pollution into the atmosphere...it ran really quiet, too."

Bruce Wayne poured a glass of water for Stark and handed it to his friend. "Anyway, we're high up over New York when the engines just go dead. The pilots tried to get it started again, then to guide it into a into a softer landing, but we were going so fast that we just headed straight down toward the street. I used the confusion to go in the back of the plane and change into Iron Man. I opened one of the hatches quickly and flew out. I could hear them screaming as I flew out to try and use my armor's strength to slow the plane's descent. It crashed anyway."

"Was it a defect in the plane?" Wayne asked.

"No, we checked everything before we launched it...someone must have gotten into the hangar just before we took it out and damaged it somehow...."

"Who would do such a thing? One of your rivals?"

"I don't have any that would do something like this...except Hammer."

"Both of us have history with him, Tony."

"If it's Justin Hammer, and he's out to get me, I know where his stooges are going to strike next." Tony put his mask back on. "Let me get some things from my office. We've got to get out to the West Coast...and fast!"

"You know what's in those big boxes down there, Batman? My new PDA's that are supposed to go on sale tomorrow."

"Yeah, those are the hot new thing, aren't they?"

"Well, they were, until yesterday. I wonder if anyone will buy them now that they think Tony Stark is responsible for that tragedy in Gotham City." Iron Man shook the thought from his head. "Anyway, if anyone wanted to damage my company's reputation further, they would strike here...they would do something to these PDA's. I've sent out a publicity leak that I'm seeing to some of Tony Stark's affairs in the Midwest, so no one will think that Iron Man is here waiting for the saboteurs."

"Well, if they're going to sabotage your PDAs tonight, we'll be waiting for them, whoever they are."

Iron Man used his sensors to scan the shipping area floor. "I'm not picking up anything yet...wait! Over there by the shipping dock doors..."

"I don't see anything," said Batman.

"You aren't meant to. They're cloaked against everything but radio waves...but I still have some old countermeasure technology left over in this suit of armor." Iron Man rushes to the door of the security box. Hurry, let's get them before they realize we know that they're here."

Iron Man speaks to his armor's cloaking system. "Full cloak for me and my guest. Jets on stealth mode." He grabbed Batman and they flew out over the shipping area floor, following the path of the two intruders.

Suddenly, a laser blast flew at them. Two figures decloaked into full view. One was clad in blue and yellow armor, and had weapons all over his belt and chest. The other was dressed in red and silver armor, with one eye of his masked made into a gunsight.

Batman recognized the red and silver one. "Deadshot! Watch out, Iron Man! He's dangerous...don't let him draw a bead on you!"

Spymaster threw a smoke bomb to try to cover the villains' escape. "I'm okay, Iron Man! I've got a Bat Gas-Mask!" Batman put on a small mask and attacked Deadshot. After Iron Man placed him on the ground, Batman put his mask on and leapt at Deadshot.

Iron Man flew on at Spymaster and blasted at him with his repulsor rays.

"Sneaking around my boss's factory, now, are you?"

"Your boss is already toast, Iron Man! And soon, you will be, too, thanks to this power surge bomb!"

Spymaster threw the bomb at Iron Man, but the Golden Leaguer easily blew it up with a pulse bolt. "Now to show you a new trick, Spymaster!"

Iron Man generated an energy prison around Spymaster, which stayed around the criminal. "I wouldn't try those bars, Spymaster! You'll get quite a jolt!"

Iron Man called out to Batman. "Got one of them, Batman!"

Batman was busy fighting Deadshot, but he was distracted by his friend's call. "What?"

At that moment, Deadshot fired a round into Batman's side. "That'll teach ya to keep your eyes on me, Batman! Now to finish you off for good!"

"Batman!" Iron Man called. Spymaster wasn't going anywhere, so the Armored Avenger flew over to his fallen friend's side. He started firing pulse bolts at Deadshot, who barely dodged them.

Deadshot called out to Iron Man as he stopped by the shipping dock door. "You may have stopped us this time...but how do you know there isn't something else out there, waiting to blow up any minute?"

"You! You sabotaged Tony Stark's plane!"

"Yeah! And everyone sees it as Tony Stark's fault! Looks like you'll be out of a job soon, chump!" Deadshot turns and runs toward the shipping deck doors. Iron Man fired repulsor rays at him, but then Deadshot pressed a button on his wrist and teleported away.

"Cripes! We only got one of them!" Iron Man gazed at his fallen friend. "I'd better get you to the infirmary, Batman! We're lucky we have a nightime physician there!"

Batman moans. "Don't forget...Spymaster!"

"Oh, I won't!" Iron Man shouted at the trapped villain. "You hear me, Spymaster! I'm going to make you squeal like a stuck pig...you'll tell me who put you up to this!"

Batman motioned Iron Man over just as the Darknight Detective was about to go unconscious. "Call...this number. Ask for...Batman's partner, Robin! He can help us track down Hammer...if this sabotage is his doing."

Iron Man called for the Stark paramedics through a cellular phone wired into his armor. "I'll do that, friend...and then we'll find who did all this, and make them pay!"

"That movie was great, wasn't it, Morgan?"

"Yeah, Zorro sure cleaned their clocks! It would be great to have a sword like his, and go around making my mark on bad guys! I wish cousin Tony was here to play Zorro with us, but Uncle Tony and Aunt Maria sent him off to boarding school."

"At least you get to visit them and hang around with me! Someday, maybe I'll be a cop...they get to catch bad guys..or even a secret agent!"

"Listen to those kids, Thomas," said one of the men, a black-haired, dashing man. He smoked his cigarette in a rakish manner.

The other man, tall, imposing but serene, responded. "Yes, Tony, you'd think that to them, fighting crime was a game, and criminals existed to be toppled down one by one."

"I wish it were that easy," Tony responded.

"Let's hurry home, honey," said Tony's wife. "I don't like the looks of this neighborhood."

"Sure, sweetie," Tony responded. "Let's just duck down that alleyway just down the street here...I think it's a shortcut to where we left the car."

Tony resumed his conversation with Thomas. "Anyway, I just had to cancel something I was working on because of a crime...a big contract...me and my assistant Alex Luthor were almost done with it when I found out our work was going to be used to fire chemical weapons at people."

"That was the big contract you were working on for Justin Hammer! Aren't you going to lose millions from not fulfilling that?"

"It's worth it, if I know that I'm not responsible for spreading chemical weapons all over the world. It wasn't a popular decision. Luthor swore he'd get me someday, maybe fulfill the contract himself. Hammer said that things can happen to people who don't fulfill contracts."

"A threat, then?"

"Perhaps. I'm watching my back. Hammer's a businessman, so he wouldn't strike at me directly, but I've seen a lot of tough characters hanging around his plant. Here's the alley we want. Come on...follow me."

Just as the group entered the alley, they saw two figures waiting for them in the shadows. Another figure followed them in from the street, trapping them in the alley.

A commanding voice called out from one of the figures. "Stark. Looks like you and your friends took a wrong turn."

"It's you! Leave my family out of this, you! Your problem's with me...leave them out of this!"

A voice intruded on the scene.

"Batman! Robin's here!"

"Oh! Hello, Robin! Glad to see you responded to my call so fast."

"Don't sit up too fast, Batman. You need to save your strength," Iron Man advised, walking over to the side of the bed.

Robin stepped over to the other side of Batman's bed. He was a slim nineteen-year-old young man. He wore a black mask, with a red jacket and darker red pants. His lightly armored yellow cape moved aside as he grasped the rail of Batman's bed.

"I was coming back to Gotham anyway, Batman. School is off for Spring Break, so I was able to fly the Batplane right over here, like you asked."

"Good you see you're coming around, Batman," Iron Man said. "Doctor Benson said you have to stay in bed for a couple of days at least to let the wound heal. You were lucky the bullet didn't penetrate anything vital..it didn't take the doctors long to remove it."

"Did you find out from Spymaster about who he was working for?"

"Not yet. I wanted to blow his head off with my repulsor ray, but I thought that would take me down to his level. I can't have my Security branch hold him here any longer...we should turn him over to the police." Iron Man got up and looked out the window. "We'll never get an answer out of him now."

Batman thought for a moment, then smiled. "I know how you can get the confession you need...but not as Iron Man."

Spymaster threw red playing cards from a deck in his hand at two cards that were leaned against a crack in the cell wall. He waited for morning to come and the police to take him away. The worst rap he could get from the judge would be breaking and entering, and Justin Hammer's lawyers would get the sentence down to some cushy amount of time. As long as Spymaster didn't end up blabbing about the CleanJet sabotage, he was almost home free.

Suddenly, a ghostly figure entered the dark hallway near the cells.

"Who's there?"

"You know who it is, Spymaster. You should know who it is after what you did to me."

The figure grew nearer, and was revealed to be a ghostly, almost transparent apparition of a man in a suit. His flesh and clothes were charred, and his arm is bent backwards from being broken, but his face was still recognizable to Spymaster.

"Stark! But you're supposed to be dead!"

"Dead, but not gone. I'm going to haunt you for the rest of your days for what you and Deadshot did, Spymaster. Wherever you are, if you try to sleep, if you're sitting back and enjoying the money you make from killing and stealing, I'll be watching."

"You can't touch me. Go away!" He tried to swat Tony Stark's ghost away, but his hand went right through the apparition.

"Ha!" the ghost laughed. "It's not that easy, Spymaster. You see, I'm a ghost with a mission of vengeance...vengeance for the six people you killed along with me, and the hundreds who died from the explosion of the plane." The ghost moved through the bars of the prison cell and stood right in front of Spymaster. "You never know when you'll wake up in the middle of the night trying to catch your breath with ghostly fingers around your trachea..."

"No! It's not my fault! I mean, it was my fault, but it wasn't my idea! You see, he hired us to pull that job. There was nothing wrong with your plane! Deadshot and me..we were told to stow away...we had an insider as one of the baggage handlers who let us hide in the cargo bay. While you guys were busy flyin' around, we set to work on the plane's engines...and whatever computers we could find to sabotage. Everything was set to go kaput at a certain time after the plane took off."

Spymaster was shaking a little, afraid of Stark's apparition. "The boss sent us. It was his idea, honest!"

"Who is he?" the ghost demanded, drawing closer to the shuddering villain.

"Hammer! Justin Hammer, OK? He said that after we did the crime we had one more job to do at your plant, just to put the icing on the cake, and then we could go down to his island and party with his other goons! Please don't kill me..."

"Then perhaps it is Hammer whom I should haunt...I'll tell him you sent me."

The ghost disappears, and leaves Spymaster cowering in a corner of the cell.

"Great performance, Mr. Stark! Where did you get this thing?"

"Just one of the new designs from the boys in the lab, Robin." Tony Stark removes the fake broken arm from his body and puts his real arm back in his sleeve. "Thankfully, you and Batman are such masters of disguise that you came up with this getup for me. My hologram projector couldn't have done it alone." He put his Iron Man armor back on.

"I'm putting a lot of trust in you, son, showing you my true identity," he states soberly. "But the way you've helped us out ever since Batman got shot lets me know that you can be trusted."

"My real name is Chuck Barnes...I'm related to Bucky Barnes, who was a prominent superhero during World War II. After my parents were killed by Flag-Smasher and his goons, I knew that I needed to carry on my great-uncle's tradition."

"Well, you do your family proud," Iron Man states, clapping the young man lightly on the back. They head for the door as Robin closes the hologram recording program. "Quick, let's tell Batman who's behind this!"

"So, what do we do now?" asked Robin eagerly. "Can we bring him in for conspiracy or destruction of property?"

"We need proof that he told them to blow up the plane and that he paid Deadshot and Spymaster to do it!" Batman reminded his ward. "Otherwise, we'd just be kidnapping him if we brought him to justice!"

Iron Man sighed. "Spymaster probably won't rat out his employer in a court of law, no matter how much we try to force him...Batman, are you all right?"

Batman lies back in his bed and closes his eyes. "Sorry, friends. I'm feeling a little weak..."

"You crossed me big time, Stark. I had a lot of interested parties who wanted what you were paid to develop for me...and you dropped the ball. Now it's time for us to drop you."

"Black Assassin, if you would step forward, please."

A ghoulish-looking man with a light blue hood and a swastika patch on his chest stepped forward with a machine gun in his hands.

"Hag, come forward."

The figure blocking the alley stepped forward. It seemed like a woman, only with a fiendish, pustuled face. She held a thirties-style tommy gun and wore a tattered brown dress.

The speaker stepped forward. Bruce recognized him from the newspapers his father left around Wayne Manor. It was Justin Hammer, with his eyes only partly covered by a fedora hat.

"I'll show you what happens to people who let me down, Stark. Sorry, Mr. Wayne, but I can't have anyone know that this happened, so I'll have to kill you and your family, too."

Young Morgan bravely stepped forward.

"You leave my dad alone!"

"Kill the kids, too. They're old enough to tell someone what happened here. Kill them now."

The Black Assassin and the Hag sprayed their captives with bullets. Anthony Stark went down trying to shield his wife, who was blown away from behind by the Hag. Thomas Wayne grabbed for the Black Assassin, but was cut down, as was his wife, whose pearl necklace scattered pearls everywhere. Bruce ducked out of the way, in deference to his father's last words.

"Find the kid. Kill him, too. We can't have any witnesses."

At that moment, someone shouted out, "Freeze! Police!"

The murderers escaped through another entrance in the alley as pistol shots rang out. A beat cop steps into the scene and is alarmed by the carnage.

"Holy God! What happened!" He bent to examine the smoking bodies as he heard sobs from behind a dumpster.

"Hey, kid! Are you all right? I'm Officer Gordon...come out, now. It's safe."

Bruce Wayne slowly came out from behind the dumpster to see the corpses of his parents lying sprawled across the alley. The Starks and their son Morgan lay dead next to them.

"Don't look, kid. Just come here, just come with me..."

Officer Gordon clutched the child to him as sobs came out of young Bruce Wayne.

"That will..help us, Robin. Can you leave me and Iron Man alone for a moment?"

"Sure, Batman," the young crimefighter said, slightly offended at being left out on the older crimefighters' conversation. "I'll just wait outside until you need me again."

Iron Man was taken by Batman's mentioning of the tragedy. "Why, yes...they were killed in an alleyway by a gang of criminals. You were there when they were killed..you were the only one who survived. The worst thing is that it was just a random murder, just a case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"No, it wasn't. I don't know how this happened, maybe it was the shock of having been shot myself, but now I remember what happened that night. Those were supervillains who cornered us in Crime Alley...and the person who ordered them to kill our parents and your cousin was...Justin Hammer."

Iron Man was so taken aback by the news that he staggered into a hospital chair, almost breaking it with his iron weight.

"You know..." he responded. "I don't want to believe you, but from the way he's always treated me...from the way he's tried to sabotage my every business venture...I've always known he was responsible." He pounded his left fist into his right palm.

"Let's get him, Batman. Let's drag his scaly old rear end off his posh island and bring him to justice."

"Yeah...bullet wound or not, we're both going to get him. We'll need one more to help us..ask Robin to call her, so we can pick her up along the way. We'll rig up a bed for me to sit in in the Batcopter, so I can direct the attack."

"I'm ready to prove myself, Batman. It sounds like we'll be facing some big time bad guys."

"Yes, Hammer has quite a stable of supervillains working for him, from what we've been able to gather from Oracle. But I know you're up to the challenge, Batwoman."

Batman spoke from the pilot's seat, where he sat uncomfortably. Twinges of pain from Deadshot's bullet still intermittently shot through him. "Okay, everybody. We all know exactly what the plan is. Iron Man goes one way, Robin and Batwoman go the other and meet our contact on the island."

Iron Man stepped over to the helicopter's hatch and opened it. "Then let's get going!" He flew out of the hatch with his boot-jets burning low, so as to not attract attention. He accelerated, activated the air-seals on his armor and dived into the sea.

Underwater, he sped toward an underwater hangar, where giant submarines went in and out. He turned on a radar countermeasure to baffle the submarines' sensors.

On board the helicopter, Robin studied a printout of the blueprints for the Hammer Island compound. "I can't believe Oracle found these just sitting out on the Web," he said. "I guess it doesn't pay to bilk your contractor out of $20 million of his fees at the last minute."

They neared the far southern side of the island. Batman motioned to Batwoman and Robin. "Here's where you and Batwoman get off, Robin. Be careful."

Robin and Batwoman each put on a rather unwieldy but light backpack and walked over to the hatch. They jumped out, and as they fell, their backpacks opened and became Bat-gliders. The two heroes rode the sea-winds until they gently landed on the rocks on the southern side of the island. They quickly hid their packs among the cracks in the rocks and ran toward a group of small Spanish-style buildings.

Batman switched the Batcopter into stealth mode and waited for his comrades' signal.

Guards armed with machine guns watched as dock workers unloaded the cargo from the submarine. Iron Man thought to himself that Justin Hammer must be smuggling something on these submarines, something that Hammer would not want the Coast Guard to see. There was no time to investigate that, though.

Iron Man looked up to a raised deck where there stood two supervillains among a crowd of workers.

He recognized Blizzard from having previously tangled with the villain. Blizzard was speaking with a large orangutan-like man, who wore a flak jacket and black pants.

Iron Man quietly crept off the submarine's side and used his boot-jets at a low setting to float over the floor so no one would hear the clang of his armored boots. He was almost at the doorway leading into the building when Blizzard spotted him.

"Hey! That's Iron Man! Get him!"

The guards raised their guns and began firing at Iron Man.

"You're here," she whispered. "You're right on time."

"Just like we planned, right?"

"Yes. You're lucky neither of you are too big to fit in this cart yet. Come on, get in."

Robin and Batwoman clambered into the large laundry cart, taking care to hide deep under the clean sheets and other linens.

"That Mr. Hammer's going to pay for how bad he treats me." The cleaning woman clucked her tongue and slowly drove the cart toward Hammer's mansion.

"We meet again, hero," Blizzard said. "Trying to get revenge for your boss dying?"

"Heh heh heh! Now you're going to die, too!" laughed the orangutan-man. "Man-Ape's my name, and I'm going to hand you your..."

Iron Man let loose at them down the hallway with pulse-bolts that gathered force as they moved forward. One of the bolts knocked Man-Ape aside, but Blizzard had dodged them and prepared to attack.

The Golden Avenger Man ignited his boot jets and was getting ready to fly at the villains when Blizzard froze them solid. Iron Man crashed to the floor.

Man-Ape got up and leapt across the hallway in an amazing bound, landing straight upon the armored hero. As Iron Man tried to get up, the villain picked him up and threw him into a wall. Iron Man fell straight through the wall into an office, where pieces of cement wall fell on his prone figure.

Man-Ape beat his chest and bellowed in victory.

The cleaning woman neared a huge room, Justin Hammer's study, where the businessman was chewing out Deadshot.

"So you screwed up, did you?" he bellowed. "You allowed Spymaster to get captured, and now everyone's going to know I was behind that plane crash."

"He won't blab, boss," replied Deadshot meekly. "He's pretty tough."

"He also was a good employee, Deadshot, and now he's in the hands of the police!"

"Sorry, boss.."

The cleaning woman chose this moment to barge into the room, seemingly to clean out the trash cans in the study.

"Molly, you idiot!" Hammer yelled at the cleaning woman. "How many times have I told you to knock and ask if you could come in before you just barge in here?"

"I'm sorry, Mr. Hammer..."

"Sorry, sorry...everybody's so sorry today. I'll make you all sorry, I will.."

Deadshot fidgeted in the chair in which he was sitting. "You want me to leave, boss?"

"Yeah, I'll deal with you later. Close the door when you leave...I need to talk to Molly alone. Bring in your cart, Molly. I won't have you spend a minute not working, not even when I'm yelling at you."

Molly brought her laundry cart into the study and closed the door. Justin Hammer was too angry to notice a slight movement of the linens in the capacious cart.

"Looks like I broke a spring or something in Tin Man here," Man-Ape laughed. "Time to finish him off."

"I get first dibs, seeing as I fought him before," Blizzard said, stepping up to the much larger Man-Ape.

"Oh, you do, do you?..."

While the villains argued over who would finish him off, Iron Man was charging his armor. He let loose with a repulsor blast from both gauntlets and his chest-mounted uni-beam projector that flattened both villains.

"Looks like nobody got to finish me off," Iron Man said as he got to his feet. He headed toward the elevator. He knew the rest of Hammer's guards would be after him soon.

"Yes, sir, Mr. Hammer..."

"I'm not going to have any more of your slacking off. This is your last chance, Molly. I've had enough of you!"

Molly threw her cleaning rag to the floor, her nostrils flaring. "And I, Mr. Hammer, have had enough of you, too!"

At that moment Robin and Batwoman jumped out of the laundry cart and grabbed Justin Hammer. The fifty-year-old man struggled, but he could not keep himself from being thrown into his chair. Batwoman held him in a head lock, with one hand over his mouth.

"The door's already locked," Molly whispered to the heroes. "They won't be able to get in without breaking it down."

Robin used his Bat-communicator to send a quiet signal to Batman to pick them up. "Batman will be along in a little bit." He looked out of the window, which revealed a steep grade down to a moat below. They could not escape through the windows; they would have to go back out the study door.

"Unhand me..." Hammer could be heard saying under Batwoman's leather gauntlet.

The heroes and the cleaning lady heard the movement of the guards outside. Hammer's men knew something was going on.

He ended up at the hatch for the main floor. He fired a small electronic pulse from his armor that made the elevator doors open.

A group of guards and three supervillains stood near a door down the hall. One of them, a very small man in a green jumpsuit and jetpack, put his ear against the door.

"Something's going on in there,' he said.

"Ja, let's break the door down!" said a large, muscular man who looked like someone turned inside out.

"Don't do that, Plasmus," Deadshot warned. "Hammer will chew you out just like he did to me."

"We don't need to barge in on him to hear what's going on," the small man said condescendingly. "This gadget will allow us to hear what's going on in there. They don't call me Gizmo for nothing, you know."

Immediately, they heard the sounds of the struggle inside.

"Okay, now we can break the door down." Gizmo put his listening device back into one of the pouches in his jacket. "Let's get in there!" he shouted, pulling out a blaster that was almost too large for him.

As the villains and guards readied themselves to burst into the locked room, a blast of energy hit Plasmus in the side. As the large villain crumpled to the ground, the others turned to face their attacker.

"You'll have to deal with me first," said Iron Man.

Bullets from the many guards in the hallway flew at the Golden Avenger as he fired up his boot jets and zoomed toward the supervillains.

Plasmus had revived, and he was holding her leg in his flesh-melting grip.

"Batwoman!" Robin cried.

But the Darknight Damsel reacted expertly. She pulled a tear-gas capsule out of her utility belt and threw it into Plasmus' gaping mouth. The villain coughed and gagged as he let go of her leg.

Gizmo fired his blaster into the wall near Robin and Molly. Robin nearly let go of Justin Hammer.

"You're not going anywhere, boy," said the diminutive villain.

Batwoman surprised Gizmo and pulled him up by the straps on his backpack. She pushed the backpack's accelerate button, and sent him zooming out of control down the hallway into the stomach of an attacking guard. Both were instantly knocked unconscious.

Robin smiled. "Thanks, Batwoman. We'd better hurry, because Batman's coming soon!"

"You can't hurt me," Iron Man sneered.

"Yeah? Well, maybe I can hurt someone else."

Deadshot turned and shot Molly the cleaning lady in the back just as she, Robin, and Batwoman were opening the front door of the mansion to escape to the Batcopter.

"Molly!" said Robin.

Iron Man growled and fired a concentrated repulsor ray so that Deadshot's hand-mounted gun melted. The melting metal burned the villain's hand. Iron Man knocked Deadshot out cold with one blow from his metal fist, and then carried him over to where Robin and Batwoman were.

"Just what you deserved for betraying me..." Hammer said to the dying Molly just before Batwoman covered his mouth.

Robin opened the door to see that the rest of Hammer's guards had gathered at the front of the house. All of them had their weapons pointed at the small group of heroes.

"We're not going to get out of this alive," said Batwoman.

In unison, the guards cocked their weapons and prepared to fire.

Deadshot was still unconscious as Batwoman tied him into place. Molly's body was laid on a makeshift hospital bed at the back of the Batcopter. Hammer began hectoring the heroes as they tied his hands up and placed him into a seat.

"What were you fools thinking when you captured me? I've committed no crime."

Batman handed the controls of the Batcopter over to Robin and Iron Man.

"Oh, really, Mr. Hammer? I have evidence that you've committed a few rather major ones."

Hammer stared angrily at Iron Man as the hero flew the Batcopter. "Stark's stooge, Iron Man! Looking for revenge on me after your boss bit it, are you?"

Everyone stared at Justin Hammer, who had just accidentally admitted his complicity in the Stark CleanJet sabotage. Hammer knew he had blown his cover.

Deadshot, who was coming back to consciousness, had heard what Hammer said. "I'm going up the river for sure this time."

Hammer stammered, trying to explain. "Not that I...know anything about Stark's death." The billionaire suddenly regained his composure. "You have no evidence that I had anything to do with any crime! If you take me to the authorities, they'll only let me go, and your mission will have been in vain."

Batman smiled. "Oh, we'll get you to the authorities in due time, Hammer. But we have something for you to see first."

"Look down there, Hammer," Batman barked, dragging the bound billionaire over to one of the windows.

Ambulances still rushed people away from the crash site. Injured people were being helped out of the wreckage of the buildings that were razed in the crash. Smoke and rubble lay where Gotham's last vibrant business district once stood.

"All I see is the results of Stark's bad airplane design," Hammer snickered. "As I said, I had nothing to do with this happening."

"You did this, Hammer!" Batman shouted, and shoved Hammer's face up against the glass, holding him by the neck. "I should send you hurtling to the ground right from here so your final resting place could be the same as those you killed with your sabotage!"

"But you won't..." Hammer replied, his words barely audible as he struggled to catch his breath.

Batman felt the weight of the disaster, and the thought that Hammer had been present at his parents' murder resurfaced. His grip on Hammer's neck grew tighter, and he pressed his captive's face harder against the glass window.

"Maybe I should..." Batman responded.

"Don't!" Iron Man cried, jumping out of his chair. "I know how you feel, Batman. You don't know what Hammer has cost me. But we have to get him legally, though, or this will all have been in vain!"

Batman thought about Iron Man's words for one tense moment, then let Hammer go. The billionaire gasped for breath and tried to calm himself down, to avoid a heart attack.

"You okay, boss?" Deadshot asked.

"Shut up," Hammer responded as he struggled to climb back into his seat.

Iron Man and Batman looked at each other. They had successfully brought the man who had caused them so much pain to justice.

Iron Man appeared, holding Justin Hammer in one hand and Deadshot in the other. Both villains were handcuffed.

"Just thought I'd drop off the trash," Iron Man said. "Thanks for the teleporter, Deadshot!" Iron Man called out as he disappeared in another flash of light.

The policemen in the squad room gathered around the two captives. "Aren't you...Justin Hammer?" the desk sergeant asked.

"Yes, it's me," he replied. "I'm afraid there's been a misunderstanding. If you gentlemen could see fit to let me go..."

Commissioner James Gordon stepped forward from the crowd of policemen. "Actually, Mr. Hammer, since you're here...would you mind answering a few questions about your involvement in the CleanJet crash?"

However, the judge let Hammer off without any jail time because of a lack of evidence and the fact that he had been kidnapped from his home to stand trial. Hammer may have gotten off this time, but eventually, Batman knew he would bring him in on something...if not just the murder of my and Tony Stark's parents.

Tony Stark reappeared alive on national television before the American public, explaining how he was rescued at the last minute from the CleanJet crash by Iron Man, telling about industrial espionage committed against his company, and officially dedicating a memorial to the citizens of Gotham killed in the crash.

And Gotham was back to normal...slowly decaying, crime-ridden normal...

An elderly couple walked slowly down Agnew Street near midnight.

"Graham, if you hadn't stayed there so long with Hubert watching that boxing match, we wouldn't have to be walking home so late at night!"

"Hush, Miriam...just keep walking." The old man noticed three young men spot them from a doorstep. They began following the old couple, just far away enough for the old man to feel their eyes upon him.

"Keep walking, Miriam, and don't look back."

"Why, dear? Is someone following us?"

"Yeah!" called out a rude voice. "Someone is following you!"

The three young men circled the elderly couple. One wore a blue ski hat, even though it was early summer and it was beginning to get quite warm at night. Another had his youthful blonde beard shaved into a pointy goatee. The third wore a light workout jacket with a large hood that he kept over his head. His harsh young eyes peeked out from under the hood.

"Whaddya doin' out here so late, old man?" he asked. "Lookin' for trouble?"

"Leave us alone!" Graham said. Miriam clutched her purse.

"Okay, we'll leave you alone, you scary old man!" joked the hooded boy. "I think you better hand over your wallet."

"Yeah, and you give up that purse, you old hag!" shouted the one in the ski hat gleefully.

"Oh, we'd better do as they say, Graham! Maybe they won't hurt us!"

"Maybe we won't...but maybe we will!" The boy in the ski hat pulled out a knife and lunged at Hubert. Before the knife could pierce the old man, the boy's hand was pierced by a sharp flying object.

"Aaaaa! My hand!"

The other two boys looked around for their comrade's assailant. Out of the sky dropped a masked figure who seemed to move in a blur. He grabbed the boy with the hood, pulled his arm behind him, and threw him at a dumpster that was in the alleyway. With a clang the boy slammed into the metal dumpster and was down for the count.

The third boy, the one with the goatee, now faced the costumed attacker. It was then that he realized who had attacked his friends. It was the Batman.

"B...B..B..Batman!"

"Go run home, boy. Tell the other kids in your gang what happened to your friends tonight. Maybe then they won't go after old people anymore."

"I will!" He ran away, not looking back once. The boy who had been hit with the Batarang drug his unconscious friend to his feet and trudged away.

"Oh, thank you, young man!" the old woman shouted.

"No thanks needed, ma'am. Just get home. It's too late at night for the elderly to be out walking in Gotham."

With that, Batman shot a grappling hook up to an adjoining roof, and used the line to sail up and away from the street.

As he got to the roof of his targeted building, he noticed a figure watching him from the adjoining rooftop. The figure looked strangely like Batman, except his costume was considerably darker.

"Who?" Batman asked.

The figure twirled his cape around and leapt off the rooptop on to an adjoining one, disappearing from view. Batman stood there for a moment in the red-black glare of Gotham's crime lights, then decided to go on with his patrol of Gotham.

A desperate-looking man with an overcoat that bulged at the chest had insinuated himself into the crowd. He was bald, with a long red mustache and beard, and was muttering to himself as he bought his subway token and milled on to the subway with the rest of the crowd.

A grim figure watched him from a closed level of the subway station. As the desperate man boarded the train, the grim figure sprung into action, moving across the overhead platforms toward the subway car.

"Hello!" He looked around the subway, and repeated himself until all eyes were upon him. "Hello, sinners! It's time for the cleansing! Time for the final cleansing!"

He opened up his raincoat to reveal ten sticks of dynamite hard-wired to a timer he had connected to his chest.

Everyone was so busy watching the maniac that they did not notice the car-connector door open and a dark figure slip into the subway car.

"Say your last goodbyes to each other, sinners, for today is the day I send you to..."

At that moment, the car passed through a dark tunnel. A rope flew out from the shadows, entangling the maniac and bringing him forcibly to where the Batman stood.

Batman grabbed the maniac and pinched him in just the right place to make the maniac's limbs turn to jelly. He took the dynamite from the maniac's chest and quickly disarmed the timer.

A couple of transit cops, both young and burly, entered through the opposite car-connector door. Batman handed the dynamite and the timer to a petite, frowsy-looking blonde teen.

"Give this to the nice policemen, dear. Tell them what this maniac was going to do with it."

When the policemen saw Batman, they began pushing through the crowd to get to his side of the car.

"It's that vigilante, Batman! Boy, would the Guardian be happy if we brought him in!"

"Yeah! Maybe they'd give me super-powers and put me on the Super-Unit Police!"

Batman rushed out the car-connector door and clambered on top of the next car down. Standing on the shaky roof of the next car was the doppleganger-like figure he had seen before.

"You again?" Batman asked. "What, are you following me everywhere tonight?"

The figure laughed a throaty laugh and fired his own grappling hook up into a shaft as the subway made a stop in the tunnel. The policemen on board the car were still trying to get at Batman, although the thankful ravers were passively blocking the cops' movement.

Once in the hole, Batman snaked through a small tunnel to an opening in what seemed to be a floor. Batman popped his head out and took a look around. He was in a room, an abandoned locker room. He quietly squeezed himself up through the hole in the floor and got to his feet.

Batman stepped forward carefully, moving toward a bright light that was coming from the next room. He marveled that this old place, which seemed like an abandoned gym, would still have working electricity.

When he got to the room from where the light was coming, there was someone waiting for him.

In the center of the ring stood a man in a bizarre costume that copied features of those of superheroes Batman had either heard of or worked with. Most importantly, the man had pointed ears on his costume, just like Batman's.

"What do you want with me, stranger?"

"Step into the ring and find out, Batman!"

Batman scanned the room for any goons that might work for the stranger that would try to jump him. Nobody was in the abandoned gym.

Batman climbed up into the boxing ring. "Who are you, and why have you been following me all over town?"

"The name is Taskmaster, and why I've been followin' you around ain't important, mister. Why don't we fight like a couple of men? Can we agree on no utility belts?"

"You ditch your belt first, mister, then I'll see about mine."

"Anything to oblige my visiting opponent." The figure doffed a utility belt that rivaled Batman's in seeming complexity.

Batman carefully took off his own belt and threw it to the floor of the ring.

"I'm feelin' so generous, I'm going to let you take the first shot at me, Batman?"

"I'm touched." Batman rushed at him, then swung around with a karate kick that Taskmaster stopped with a grabbing motion. Taskmaster used Batman's cumulative force to redirect Batman toward the floor of the ring.

"Try again, Bats. I've seen Captain America do that move before."

Taskmaster let Batman get up from the mat. The two opponents circled each other in the ring. Taskmaster faked Batman out with a false karate chop, and let loose with an open-fisted blow to Batman's head that left the hero's ears ringing.

"I guess I still got it."

Batman decided to change fighting styles. He got up, and got into a boxing stance, which Taskmaster copied exactly. As Batman threw a haymaker punch, Taskmaster blocked it and hit Batman in the stomach hard.

Batman coughed as he fell to the mat.

"I thought you were good, Batman. Guess I thought wrong."

Batman tried to keep his vision straight through the pain of the blows the villain had landed on him. To beat Taskmaster, he would have to fight in a way that he had never used against a villain before. Quickly his mind shot through the numerous kinds of martial arts that he knew, that he had been trained in since his youth, to something that Taskmaster would not be able to counter.

Batman gathered his strength and got up again. He ran suddenly to the far corner of the ring.

"What you gonna do, Batman, piledrive me?"

Batman began flipping all over the ring, his foot stamping a rhythm each time he landed. Around and around Taskmaster he went.

"That's a real pretty dance, Batman, but I thought we were here to..."

At that moment, the full weight of Batman's kick went into Taskmaster's jaw, shutting him up. He crumpled to the mat, clutching his mouth.

Batman switched to another form as he propelled his entire body into the air, his legs slamming his feet into Taskmaster's face. The villain went down.

Batman wiped a trickle of blood from his mouth.

"You were pretty good, mister, but no one's as good as me," he said. Batman picked up his utility belt and put it on as Taskmaster groaned in pain. Batman swiftly pulled a sharp Batarang from his belt.

He stepped over to where Taskmaster was lying on the ground. "I am the Batman, Taskmaster." He used the sharp edge of the Batarang to make two swift cuts on the top of Taskmaster's costume.

Taskmaster's faux Bat-ears lay forlornly on the mat.

"Only I wear the ears. I had better not see you with them again."

Batman climbed out of the ring, then turned around and called out to Taskmaster.

"Don't follow me around again, chump, or I'll make you regret it. Again." Batman left the gym to continue his night patrol.

All of a sudden, about twenty young men of all ethnic extractions, wearing t-shirts and sweats, gathered around the ring, coming out of the places in which they had been hiding.

"That, class, is how to fight Batman. Remember, even when you think you got him dead to rights, he's always got another trick up his sleeve."

He spoke to me between bites of linguine with pesto sauce. Li Cheng was stocky, but took care to eat daintily, at each turn using a napkin to wipe the corners of his fleshy face. He wore a white silk suit that was perfectly tailored to his bulky frame.

"Mr. Wayne, it is such a pleasure to finally meet you. Your name precedes you, with your continued support of education and the fine arts."

I groaned a little under the weight of Li Cheng's flattery, but I decided to play along. "Well, thank you, Li Cheng. It's nice to know someone appreciates my efforts." I took a sip of wine, which I savored.

"Yes..I know I certainly do." Cheng took another bite of linguine. "I love Italian cuisine, don't you? I could sing about the wonders of this pesto sauce."

I restrained myself from looking at my watch, but I had to go out on patrol tonight and wanted to get out of the restaurant soon. "Can we get to the point, Li Cheng? Why did you ask me to dinner?"

Li Cheng cleared his throat. I knew I had offended him slightly by getting to the point so soon, but I had a feeling that I knew what he was going to ask me for.

"Well, Mr. Wayne, as you know, I have been active in Gotham's Chinese-American community for almost 30 years, in business, in politics, and in other ways. Now, I want to reward those who have made me so successful." He crossed his hands and looked me directly in the eye. "Mr. Wayne, I would like to build a Chinese-American museum on the border of Chinatown and the Southwestern part of Gotham. This museum would show all who came the rich history of my people, from our origins in China to our success here in America."

Li Cheng had a pretty good idea. There was no such museum in existence in the Gotham borough, and it would help bring some understanding between Chinatown and the rest of Gotham. But I wanted to find out more specifics.

"How would this museum be different from the Asian American Arts Center, or The Asia Society's museum?"

Li Cheng's brow furrowed. "Very good question, Mr. Wayne. Our museum would..."

At that moment, four figures burst into the outdoor section of the restaurant. The leader was dressed in a black shirt with red silk slacks, and had a red bandana-mask that covered all but his black, fierce-eyes and raven hair. His cohorts wore black hoods, with normal street clothes completing their outfits.

He spoke in a snarling voice. "Li Cheng, we are here to bring you a message from Dr. Tzin-Tzin." Instantly he leapt across the table and knocked Li Cheng down to the ground. He stood on Li Cheng's neck as the large man struggled and tried to swear at his assailant. He then scooped up Li Cheng into the air by lifting his head up with his foot, and punched him six times in quick succession. Li Cheng lay on the restaurant floor, gasping.

I would have gotten up to fight, but everyone in the restaurant was watching. There would be lots of questions to answer if they found out that millionaire Bruce Wayne was able to tangle with kung fu experts. The other attackers kept an eye on me, ready to jump me if I came to Li Cheng's defense. I had to stay in my seat.

The head attacker spoke to Li Cheng once more. "This is how those who do not work with Tzin-Tzin are treated. You had the chance to join my master, and you declined. Now he will take over your operations by force. In an amazing move, he focused his chi, then directed it in one sudden blow to Li Cheng's spine. I could hear vertebrae breaking.

Silently, the kung fu master nodded to his cohorts, who gathered around them. One of them tossed a smoke bomb, and the air was filled with the coughing of the stunned restaurant patrons. From the next table, I could hear a toddler sobbing with fear.

I got up and ran to Li Cheng's side. Hopefully a hospital would be able to help him.

I generally left Chinatown alone in my patrols. I didn't have a lot of knowledge of the lives of the people who lived there, even though I had an avid interest in all Asian cultures, especially in the martial arts. I probably couldn't begin to figure out who was committing what crimes, or how the community was handling them, and they probably wouldn't have appreciated my interference.

But the sobbing of that child and the limp, unmoving form of Li Cheng on the floor of an expensive restaurant in South Gotham told me that the war between these factions was spilling out into parts of Gotham that were the Batman's responsibility to protect.

I knew I would get no answers from the police, nor from Li Cheng. When I called the hospital later, I found out later that two of his vertebrae had been shattered, and he had not yet regained consciousness. Obviously, I wasn't going to get any information out of him.

There was another way to find out, though.

"This was hand-delivered, sir. The messenger said it was very important." He placed the letter in my hand.

"I don't have time to read it now, Alfred. I've got a pressing case to crack!"

"Certainly, sir."

I headed into my study and turned the three statues that controlled the lock on the passageway down to the Batcave.

I asked Oracle if he had ever heard anything about any secret business dealings of Li Cheng, either in Gotham or in other places.

While I was waiting, I looked at the letter. It was from someone at the Sunnyland Nursing Home, about 10 miles outside of New York City. I didn't have any relatives in that home, and the letter didn't seem like part of a pledge drive, so I opened it. I began to read the scrawly handwriting in the letter when my e-mail notification beeped.

I had just received an encrypted e-mail from Oracle with the information I needed. I found out that Li Cheng had been suspected of running gambling, prostitution, and extortion rings in Gotham for some time, but no police investigation had come up with enough hard evidence to convict him. And this guy was asking me for money to help build his museum.

After asking Oracle a few more questions, I found out the names of some of Li Cheng's suspected underworld businesses. The kung fu attacker had said that Tzin-Tzin was going to take over Li Cheng's operations by force. I was going to be there to catch them doing it.

The entrance of the Luck Flower was guarded by three well-dressed, tough-looking men in dark sunglasses. I quietly climbed up the fire escape of the derelict building next door, which allowed me to peer down into the main gambling hall through the skylight.

It was a richly decorated place, with soft red walls and repeated Oriental designs bordering the walls. A number of well-dressed middle-aged men stood around a roulette wheel, placing their bets down. A pretty waterfall poured water into a small pond full of koi that lent an almost peaceful quality to the illegal activities going on down there. If I was lucky, Tzin-Tzin's men would strike here tonight.

And they did. I saw the same four attackers who attacked Li Cheng burst into the main gambling hall. I figured that the flurry of fighting would distract them from watching the roof, so I carefully jumped on to the roof of the Lucky Flower, and peered down through the skylight. The closer view revealed a battle going on below.

Five guards had rushed into the hall, brandishing Uzis. The black-hooded tough guys leapt at them, knocking the weapons from their hands. Bullets from more guards flew as Tzin-Tzin's crew dodged and attacked Li Cheng's henchmen. The gamblers and the others visiting the gambling hall poured out of any available exit, their winnings falling out of their pockets behind them. The screams of women intermingled with the groans of dying guards.

The shooting had suddenly stopped. The leader and two of the henchmen stood triumphantly in the center of the gambling hall. One of the henchmen had been shot during the fighting, and lay with his head in the koi pond. His blood mixed slowly with the gurgling pond water, turning it red.

Only the elderly but fierce casino manager stood against them oppose them. He shakingly brandished an ancient pistol as they chuckled at his weakness.

It was time for me to attack.

I smashed down through the glass of the skylight, my flowing cape slowing my descent to the gambling hall floor.

The kung fu master snarled at me. "Get out of here, gweilo. This isn't your fight."

I stood my ground in front of him. "Well, I think it is. Your attacks stop here and now." My defiance of the attackers gave the casino owner a chance to run for help.

The leader stared at me with harsh black eyes. "Then you will die for your interference!" he shouted.

One henchman rush-attacked me from the left, but I rolled with his attack, and flung him into the wall. The other one did a somersault and then a flying kick, but I ducked his attack and he flew off to land on the floor. I rushed him, temporarily paralyzing him with a kick to the spinal column.

The kung fu master had been sizing me up during my battle with his two henchmen.

"You're good..for a gweilo. Those two were amateurs compared to me. Let me show you what real kung fu looks like."

We sized each other up, both of us using the time to look for weaknesses in the other and to gather up energy. My opponent doffed his shirt, brushing his mask aside as he did so. Out of respect for this martial artist, I took off my cape and threw it to the side. Both of us readied for the battle.

He charged at me like a fencer, thrusting with four fierce kicks. I blocked his repeated strikes, but he managed to push me toward one of the walls. I fought back with the kung fu I had managed to learn in my studies in Tibet.

I swung at him hard with four swinging punches. He blocked three of them, but the third got through and hit him above the eye. He backed off, drawing his energy back in.

Then, in a move I had only seen in movies and once during my studies, he forcefully gathered in all of his available chi energy, focusing it toward his chest. If he hit me with that, I was a goner.

So I cheated. I pulled a small Bat-taser out of my utility belt and sent a shock through him that would have knocked a horse over. He looked at me in disbelief, amazed at my dishonor, while he fell to the floor, quivering. As Shang-Chi fell, he seemed as he had been released from some kind of spell. His body became relaxed, as if someone possessing him had lost control.

I waited to let the electricity seep out of his body, then prodded him with a wooden table leg that had been blasted off during the battle. I wanted to ask this guy some questions, but I knew that Li Cheng's forces, or at least the police, would soon be here to check out the ruckus. It was time to get out of here.

I put my cape back on, then grabbed the kung fu fighter and slung him over my shoulder. I adjusted the weight setting on my Bat-ascension gun for two adult males, and fired it. The gun hooked onto the roof and we zoomed up, just as some of Li Cheng's enforcers entered the gambling hall. Once on the rooftop, I spoke into the Bat-radio hidden in my gauntlet.

"Two for the sky in five, rotors."

The Batcopter soon roared out of the sky on autopilot, and then hovered close enough to the rooftop to allow me to load my captive in. We flew away from the Luck Flower Restaurant, over the rooftops of Chinatown, into the skies over Gotham.

"No! Get away! Get away! I won't serve you!"

"What are you talking about?" I yelled from the pilot's chair. The young man struck out, trying to break from the bonds of the restraint chair.

"Calm down," I said, putting the Batcopter into hover mode once we were over an abandoned railyard. No one would hear us, especially with the rotors in quiet mode. "Let's see if you can answer a few questions for me. I walked over to where he was sitting.

"First of all, who are you? Why are you going around attacking people for Tzin-Tzin?"

His brow furrowed defiantly. "My name is Shang-Chi, Master of Kung Fu, and I serve no one! Not my father, not Tzin-Tzin, no one!"

"Well you were serving him pretty well a couple of nights ago, attacking Li Cheng like that."

My captive did not appreciate my attempt at humor. "I don't know what you're talking about," he retorted. "The last thing I remember, I was visiting a man named Tzin-Tzin. He had put the word out on the streets of Chinatown that he needed workers for his business. I had just arrived in America, after having traveled eastward through the Middle East and Europe, doing odd jobs here and there, when I stopped at Tzin-Tzin's shop."

"What do you think Tzin-Tzin did to you?"

"The last thing I remember was him holding up these two orbs that drew my eyes to them...and then nothing."

Any other time I would have dismissed this sudden amnesia as a ploy to get me to let him go, but this man seemed so intensely earnest that I actually believed him.

"So, it looks like you've been forced against your will to fight for Dr. Tzin-Tzin. You've done a lot of damage in the last few days."

Shang-Chi frowned, then looked at me with piercing black eyes. "I suppose you have no reason to use me as Tzin-Tzin has, so I will trust in what you say."

"You want to go and get Tzin-Tzin?" I asked, pressing the button that turned off the chair's energy bonds.

Shang-Chi relaxed, and hunched over, stretching his muscles. "Yes. He will pay for using me like this. And I know just how to stop him."

I had attached a Bat-Mite to Shang-Chi's black belt to monitor him while he was inside the antique shop.

I snuck in through the back entrance, all the while keeping tabs on Shang-Chi's progress over a tiny video monitor I had hidden in the top of my right gauntlet.

"Master?" Shang-Chi called out.

The shadows in the antique shop seemed to collect themselves into the form of Dr. Tzin-Tzin. He was a tall, middle-aged Chinese man, who wore granny-style sunglasses and a stylish suit. Clearly he didn't fit the usual stereotype of the Yellow Peril-era Chinese villain.

"Shang-Chi," he replied in a sonorous, hypnotic voice. "Come here, my faithful servant." Tzin-Tzin's bulky guards let Shang-Chi go by, not knowing the Master of Kung Fu's true mission.

Shang-Chi came forward as Tzin-Tzin led him to a throne-like chair at the top of four steps. As Tzin-Tzin sat down, he gave Shang-Chi a quizzical look.

"You succeeded against the forces of Li Cheng at the Luck Flower, but then you disappeared. Why?"

"I was captured by the gweilo police, but while they weren't looking, I escaped their grasp."

Tzin-Tzin was perturbed by the thought of the police knowing about his activities. "You didn't...tell them anything, Shang-Chi?" He idly rolled a pair of crystal globes in his palms.

"I left before they had a chance to ask me any questions," Shang-Chi responded.

"Good, good," said Tzin-Tzin, smiling with satisfaction. "There is still much for you to do, my son, but before I give you your new orders, let us reinforce our...understanding."

With that, Tzin-Tzin pulled the two crystal orbs that flashed hypnotic circles of light.

I had used Shang-Chi's distractive discussion with Tzin-Tzin to sneak near the entrance of Tzin-Tzin's throne room. Even from my hiding place, I could feel the warmth of the light from the orbs, and I could feel the pull of Tzin-Tzin's hypnotic voice. If I didn't act now, we'd both be under his control.

Silently, I had knocked out the guards along the way, nerve-pinching one, and gas-darting another. I reached Tzin-Tzin's throne room and saw what he was doing to Shang-Chi. From the camera feed from the tiny Bat-Mite on Shang-Chi's belt, I could see that Shang-Chi was really in trouble.

I threw my Batarang directly at one of the crystal orbs in Tzin-Tzin's hands. It shattered, and cut his left hand. He cursed, and gripped his hand in pain.

Shang-Chi broke from Tzin-Tzin's nascent spell and sweep-kicked him onto his throne platform. I jumped into the action and leapt into the throne room. He then focused his chi, as he had when I was fighting him.

"I am no slouch at kung fu, child!" Tzin-Tzin boasted. "My chi is ten times more powerful than yours." He made a sound like a jungle cat preparing to strike its prey.

"You will pay dearly for manipulating me, Tzin-Tzin!" Shang-Chi's chi energy was building with each second.

Both combatants focused their power until they both let go simultaneously, with two murderous blows to the chest.

One was left standing, with his garments tattered and his skin bruised from the fight.

"Shang-Chi! Are you all right?" I ran over to his side.

Although the Master of Kung Fu was still standing, he was quite weak. "Tzin-Tzin may be old, but he's still good at projecting his chi. I need to rest." He leaned on my shoulder.

"We did it, Shang-Chi. You're free now. If you need any help clearing yourself of the guilt for those attacks, let me know."

"I'm probably going to stick around here for a while," he responded. "If another crimelord rises to take Tzin-Tzin's place, I'll be ready for him."

"Make sure to contact me if you need help."

"How will I do that?"

I handed him a tiny remote control. "Push this button here, and a large light I have hidden in the city will point in your direction and show a signal with which I can track you. Only a few people have this signal, so don't let it fall into the wrong hands."

And now, Shang-Chi would be able to begin his life in his newly adopted country.