Batman Beyond: Divided Heart .pdf download
Read my cringe!
While structured like a romance and featuring Melanie Walker on the cover, this is not a “Melanie becomes Batgirl” story. This is a three-part novella softly reworking Batman Beyond’s “Epilogue” into something less convoluted and more palatable. Along the way, I give redemption arcs to Mad Stan and Armory. I also introduce three new villains (one an antihero based on Dietrich Bonhoeffer). There’s even a brief Bat Family reunion. The .pdf download is beneath this preview!
“HIPPITY HOPPITY!”
The explosion rocked through the small yacht, knocking Batman onto his back before it even reached him. He stood and scrambled for the stern.
“GET OFF MY PROPERTY!”
Batman dove into the cold Atlantic just as the second bomb went off. Instinctively, he reached for the switch to activate his breathing device. It was already on – though muscle memory hadn’t yet believed it, he’d decided months ago to modify his mask with a breathing apparatus that covered his mouth and nose at all times. It was in case of smoke or noxious gas, but it worked for moments like this, as well.
Firelight pulsed through the violent waters. As what remained of the yacht sank all around him, Batman searched for any trace of Mad Stan. The bomber had never struck him as the suicidal type. But where had his voice come from, if not the boat?
Batman looked up. In the reddening light of dawn, a wedge-shaped shadow teetered over the surface of the water. A second boat! This one was cloaked.
Stan didn’t know what hit him when the hull of his boat was punched open, allowing a flood of seawater and a jet-black, pointy-eared vigilante into the bilge. Stan’s first instinct was to reach for not a gun or a detonator but Boom Boom, the frenzied little chihuahua that stood on his work station. This was the extra second Batman needed to deliver Mad Stan a right hook.
“Talk fast, Stan, and your rat won’t get wet.”
Mad Stan was still disoriented from the punch to the face. “What?”
“Word at Blackgate Prison is, someone is hiring out for a bombing,” said Batman, twisting Stan’s meaty arm behind his enormous back. “Was that your classified?”
“YOU THINK THAT’S WHY YOU CAN SNOOP AROUND MY BOAT, MAN? YOU KNOW I DON’T PLAY WELL WITH OTHERS!”
Stan knocked himself loose from Batman’s grasp and sloshed toward the ladder he’d only just come down. He cradled Boom Boom against his massive barrel chest. Batman leapt onto his back, passing his arms under Stan’s and lacing his fingers behind the man’s neck, just over the atomic bomb tattoo. “If you aren’t hiring, who is?”
“YOU CAN DROWN US BOTH, BUT NOT MY DOG!”
Stan twisted, ramming Batman multiple times against the steel wall of the sinking boat. Batman felt the blows reverberate in his bones. His suit amplified his strength, but his grip loosened just enough for Stan to toss him back into the water. The hulking psycho’s boots pounded up the ladder.
Batman surfaced and gave chase. He found Stan at the bow of the boat just as it glitched, de-cloaked and tipped into the sky. The entire deck was visible now, though sinking. Batman grabbed onto a mast to keep from slipping back into the sea.
Stan smiled back at him. Over the roar of a hovercraft overhead, the roar of the sea, and the shrill yapping of Boom Boom, he shouted: “I GOT NO CLUE WHO’S LOOKING FOR A BOMBER, BUT I WOULDN’T TAKE THE JOB! THE WORLD IS FULL OF CRAZIES!” A rope ladder swung down from the hovercraft. Stan leaped onto it. “IN FACT, IT’S RUN BY ‘EM!”
It only took a thought. The Batsuit’s synaptic controls set off the rocket boots. Batman shot into the air, making a swipe at Stan as he disappeared into the hovercraft. The thing was moving too fast, and it was cloaking, just like the second yacht had been cloaked. Batman touched his belt. The Batmobile soared over the water, opening for him as he fell into it. He gripped the controls and felt the suit connect to the hover car. Glowing red flowed up the circuitry in his arms.
No sooner had he given chase than an alarm went off on the dashboard. There on the radar, and through the windshield, Batman could see a series of missiles streaking toward him.
He abandoned the Batmobile as swiftly as he’d called it. Another explosion hit him hard, shredding the outer layer of the Batsuit and sending him tumbling head-over-heels into the water. He heard the Batmobile crash behind him. A piece of shrapnel struck his shoulder and plunged him deeper into the sea.
This .pdf is also included for free along with these essays.
A character based on Dietrich Bonhoeffer... unexpected and exciting.
This was super fn dope.