BREAKING POINT

By Jason McDonald

The Batcave
Late Evening

Amidst the dripping sounds of stalactites, Alfred could hear the sounds of bats fluttering above as he walked carefully down the stairs to the bottom of the cave, careful to steady the silverware atop the warm dinner plate. He saw Master Bruce hunched over a workstation, studying something with his electron microscope. Atop the table, Alfred saw a neat row of poly-bagged items meticulously labeled and lain out in a straight line.

Even though Master Bruce’s back was turned against him, he could tell that the man was in haggard shape. By Alfred’s reckoning, it had been at least twelve hours since he’d eaten anything, and even then it was most probably one of those dreadful energy bars Bruce kept in his belt to keep his stamina up while on patrol. The trusted butler gripped the shiny dinner plate tersely and set it next on an empty shelf next to the evidence bags.

“Master Bruce,” Alfred said in his heavy British accent. “Do you recall the disturbing event which happened forty-eight hours ago?”

Bruce Wayne grunted, adjusting the lenses on his microscope to gain a clearer focus.

“You did this rather peculiar thing that I still, as yet, don’t understand. Perhaps you could explain it to me.” Alfred cleared his throat. “You, in fact, retired to your bedroom and – with the use of something called a mattress and a blanket – closed your eyes and lay prone for a full three full hours. Webster’s Dictionary defined this dubious activity as something called sleep. Have you heard of it?”

Bruce chuckled, pulling out the slide from the microscope and placing the protective lenses atop to keep the sample clean. He replied with a smile, “Sounds terrible.”

“Oh, it is sir, absolutely dreadful. I’m very glad to see that, in the two frightfully long days since then, you have not succumbed to such madness.”

Bruce rolled his eyes and scratched the razor stubble across his face with his free hand while placing the specimen into a device next to the computer. Lasers whirred and scanned the slide and the computer began accessing the extensive criminal database of the Gotham Police Department.

“There was a partial fingerprint left on the pizza box, Alfred,” Bruce said, pointing down at the sample and continuing to ignore the need for sleep. “It doesn’t match the mother’s fingerprints, nor does it match Victor Zsasz’s.”

“Fascinating, sir, but may I point out that it is difficult to hear your sleuthing over all that growling sound I’m hearing in the air. It may be emanating from your stomach region, sir.”

“Hilarious,” Bruce said. “But I’m not hungry.”

“As you wish, sir.” Alfred pulled the cover off of the freshly-cut, piping-hot roast beef sandwich sitting atop the dinner plate, replete with toasted bread, butter and a butter knife. The butler set the cover down on the second shelf and waited for the smell to fill the chamber.

He watched Master Bruce step forward, cock his eyebrow toward the butler, and down the entire sandwich in three bites. Wiping off the crumbs from his gloves onto his gray bodysuit, he replied with a still-full mouth, “I still stand by my previous statement.”

“Naturally, sir.” Alfred stood, suppressing the singular urge to grin.

Bruce swallowed the meal down – and the delicious slices of buttered toast with it – and continued. “As I said, this partial does not match either the killer, or the mother, and it is the only fingerprint of its kind at the scene of the crime.”

“I see.”

“I’m still trying to put the pieces together. Make some sense of it all but…” Bruce said, suddenly rubbing at his clearly-burning eyes.

Alfred watched profiles and names flash across the computer screen at high speed. Bruce walked over to the computer and placed his hands against the keyboard, leaning his entire weight into the large structure. He could practically feel the exhaustion emanating from the dark knight.

“Perhaps the difficulty in deduction stems from your lack of rest,” Alfred peered at the dark knight, watching the master of the house massage his beleaguered temples with his gloved hands. “I’ve taken the liberty to prepare the master bedroom for your presence as well as set out two Tylenol for your doubtlessly–aching head.”

The detective sighed, shaking his head.

“Master Bruce, you need to sleep.”

“I can’t, Alfred,” Bruce said, determination welling up within his bloodshot eyes. “I have to break this case.”

Alfred Pennyworth strode up to the vigilante and placed a hand on his shoulder. Bruce gazed back and saw the sincerity in his trusted confidante’s gaze. Alfred spoke gently. “You won’t do Ms. Verde any good in such a state. You need rest.”

“Alfred,” The dark knight sighed. “He’s making her kill with him.”

“So you’ve said,” the butler gently patted Bruce’s shoulder and strode toward the massive computer screen. “Master Bruce, I’ve been hesitant to say this for some time now, but since the Verde family murder, you’ve been at this computer like a man possessed. I’ve almost run the gamut of excuses for your disappearance as Mr. Wayne for the past week.”

“You told them all I have the flu. That should last us the next week.”

“Even influenza can only last so long when you’re the multi-billionaire CEO of Wayne Enterprises with the weight of the media attention on your shoulders.”

“The company practically runs itself, Alfred,” Bruce sighed. “I’m not needed there. I’m needed here.”

“People are starting to wonder,” Alfred said, pulling out the newspaper from his jacket pocket and placing it on the table. Bruce picked up the paper and quickly scanned it. Alfred pointed to the latter pages of the document. “Second page, halfway down to the left. Column starts with Billionaire’s Sudden Illness Lowers Stock Prices.”

“I’m not concerned with stock prices, Alfred,” Bruce grumbled as he turned the page and quickly scanned the article. “I’ve had long absences before.”

“And then there’s the matter of Ms. Lavigne.”

“What about Veronica?” Bruce said.

“Since you began your investigation, she’s called eleven times,” Alfred sighed. “Batman will keep. Bruce Wayne needs tending. Your public image, needs tending.”

“But Nemina–”

“She’s already killed once,” Alfred said dispassionately. “It seems Zsasz has already won the day.”

“Never,” Bruce growled through gritted teeth. “She was coerced, tricked into it. She’s an innocent.”

“Perhaps,” Alfred crossed his arms. “Or perhaps you see more of yourself in her than you realize. Perhaps more than is truly there.”

Master Bruce’s slack form straightened suddenly, and the billionaire playboy looked at his butler quizzically. “What do you mean?”

“She was orphaned by a madman, as you were. And she is being trained, as you were trained, except you were trained in the art of being a watchful protector. And she’s currently training in the art of…”

“I’ll never let that happen, Alfred. I won’t let her become like Zsasz. I will not rest until I find her.”

Alfred let out a weary sigh. “Unfortunately, I whole-heartedly believe you won’t. Considering what happened with Master Richard, I feel I must point out–”

“Don’t. Go there. Alfred.”

“Sir?”

PING-PING.

Master Bruce snapped his attention back to the computer screen, which had stopped shuffling through multiple police profiles per second. Instead, it was projecting one profile in particular. Tapping the keyboard, Bruce read the name on the file. “Celeste Trent. It’s a ninety-seven percent match, even for a partial.”

“It seems you’ve got a break in this dreadful case after all,” Alfred remarked.

Bruce leafed through the tabs on the police file, noting the important bits as he searched for the connection. “Narcotics. Possession. Rap sheet a mile long. It says here that she’s had seventeen separate second chances thanks to her father and his well-off law practice. Works at Eddie’s Pizza as a delivery woman.”

“Eddie’s Pizza? Isn’t that the pizza restaurant whose name you found emblazoned upon that pizza box at the Maddock murder?”

“That it is, Alfred. That it is.”

“In that case, I must say sir, that this Trent woman sounds like a keeper,” Alfred smartly remarked, nodding toward the criminal on the screen. “Should I tell Ms. Lavigne that you plan to spend your nights with the pleasure of her company instead?”

Bruce harrumphed, tapping his finger to his chin in thought, “Her prints were nowhere else in the apartment. Just on the pizza box itself. She couldn’t have been with there with Zsasz. There was no evidence of anyone else in the apartment, save Nemina, Zsasz, and his victims.”

“Perhaps she didn’t leave any evidence of her presence?” Alfred pondered.

“Doubtful,” Bruce said, studying the file. “She doesn’t have the training. And according to the profile, she’s far too sloppy for that. Killing does no benefit to her. Her angle is drugs. Those are the only things she cares–“ Batman’s eyes widened, “about–”

“Master Bruce?”

“So that’s how he did it…” Bruce snapped his fingers.

“How who did what?”

“He needed extra time, to set up the cameras. The lack of forced entry. It adds up. He needed the extra time and so he couldn’t simply break in and arouse noise or suspicion. It finally adds up,” Bruce smiled.

Alfred just tilted his head at the vigilante in confusion.

Bruce leveled his eyes at Alfred. “And you’re wrong about Nemina.”

“I do hope so, sir. For your sake,” Alfred grimaced, placing his hands on his hips. “Now I can’t interest you in a night’s sleep after today’s beautiful Eureka moment? Or a warm shower? Perhaps a shave to freshen up before your little jaunt through the city?”

But Master Bruce was not listening to him anymore, already sprinting towards the batmobile at top speed. He pressed a button in his glove and the engine fired up automatically, the powerful thrumming sending a cascade of flying bats shrieking throughout the cave ceiling. The vehicle throttled up and roared out of the cave at extreme speeds, and Alfred was suddenly left alone with the chit-chattering of hundreds of rapidly-calming bats.

“Evidently not,” Alfred sighed. He leisurely turned away from the screen and made his way across the cave floor toward the empty dinner tray.

Eddie’s Pizza
The Back Parking Lot
An Hour Later

Celeste Trent quickly made her way across the back lot toward rusted old Chevy; the night’s delivery’s done. The heavy purse that had been digging itself into the soft flesh of her shoulder threw off her stride; made her steps awkward, off-balance, uneven. The cold penetrated through her small frame, sapping her strength. Combined with the chill of the night, the sweat hurrying down her brow made her shiver further. Celeste retreated further into her thick jacket and pulled it tighter across her chest, for all the good it did her.

The dark parking lot was in the open – the pizza chain’s owner too cheap to spare a single fluorescent light to illuminate the parking lot for his employees for nights such as this. The only light outside here was from a dim streetlamp positioned just outside the lot which that barely made a dent in the inky void that she made her way home in night after night.

Eyes attuned to the darkness, Celeste pointed her keys at the car. The back lights blinked, and the clicking sounds of unlocking doors echoed across the lot. The chilled winds whistled against her harshly, carrying the sounds of the troubled city with them – sounds she forced herself not to hear. She placed her hand on the spray can of mace inside her left jacket pocket as she approached her car.

Celeste heard the scuffs of heels behind her, and her heart pounded. She whipped around, swinging out her purse quickly while unloading the can of mace with her free hand. Celeste panicked as a hand gripped her wrist and kept the spraying off to the side, away from his eyes. He pressed his gloved hand hard against her mouth and prevented a terrified scream from escaping her throat. Another instant, and he forced her to drop the spray with a gentle twist. With a tear streaming down her face, she looked up into the monster’s haunting red eyes.

“Ms. Trent,” the figure said, narrowing his eyes at the young delivery girl. “We need to talk.”

At this distance, she could see the monster in all his glory. His ears tapered up into dagger points above his face. His cape fluttered in the winds, and even in the faint light of the lonely parking lot, she could clearly see the black bat symbol emblazoned upon his grey chest. A singular understanding began to dawn on her adrenaline-fueled mind and a modicum of her fear subsided. The Batman read the quiet in her gaze, and slowly uncoupled his fingers from her dry mouth, listening to her panicked gasps, “I know what you’ve been doing.”

“Doing…? W-w-what I’ve been…?”

“Victor. Zsasz.”

Her eyes widened, sparkling with tears. She darted off to her right away from the dark knight’s gaze when he grabbed her by the arm and pulled her back suddenly, slamming her against her own car door. He placed his fingers against her throat, and clenched his teeth.

“Where is he?”

“W-where is who…I–I don’t…please, I don’t…”

“Where?”

“I don’t know,” she stammered out, tears streaming down her eyes. “He just…he just showed up at my apartment one night, you know? I didn’t…I didn’t know it was him until I saw his picture on the news, he…”

“He’s been paying you to supply him with pizzas and addresses to your deliveries. To gain unrestricted access to homes without having to force entry. And you’ve been covering it up. Lying to the police. Do you know you’re an accomplice to murder?”

“…no, no. I didn’t kill anyone! I didn’t…”

Batman placed a hand over her mouth to quiet her. “Yes. You did. Every single murder Zsasz commits is on your head.”

Celeste’s closed her eyes in grim acceptance of her guilt. “He came to me after he broke out of prison…he said he’d let me live if I gave him the addresses…I swear, I didn’t know what he was going to–“

“Shut your mouth.”

She looked into the contempt in his eyes which burrowed down into her very soul. Wisely, she acquiesced.

“Now,” Batman continued, “he usually removes the evidence of the pizza boxes from each scene, so that the police wouldn’t figure out the connection or his method of entry. But this time, he didn’t. This time, he was distracted.”

“…distracted…?”

“The girl with him, the one on the news. Nemina Verde. He’s been coercing her into murder with him. He was distracted by the excitement he felt from her first kill. He got sloppy. He forgot her handcuffs, and he forgot the pizza box you supplied him with. My question is: Where are you delivering the pizzas and the addresses of his victims?”

“…please don’t take my drugs away, I really, really need…”

“Answer. The question,” he said, grimacing.

She cried and bowed her head. “Some shitty motel near the Criterion District.”

“The Criterion Motel?”

“I– I think so…”

Batman rolled his eyes. “Room number?”

“Three fifty. He tells me…he tells me to knock and then leave it the box outside, with the addresses tucked inside…and then he delivers the pizzas as if he was the delivery person…”

“Instead of you.”

“Instead of me…”

Batman clenched his fists. “You should have come clean sooner. It would’ve saved a lot of lives.”

The dark knight pulled an object from his belt and pointed it skyward. Celeste winced at the loud bang the device produced as it shot a rope at the adjacent building. Celeste watched him disappear into the shadows and felt a shiver burrow deep into her spine. She couldn’t remember how long she’d been standing in the frigid night air by the time she’d collected herself enough to crawl into her Chevy.

She waited until her heart slowed down enough to turn the key and rev up the engine. She pulled a small bag of white powder from her glove compartment and snorted the whole thing into herself to try and calm her nerves. Manic and terrified, she headed home in a sea of muted colors and robust flavors. Beneath the chemical high, she wondered if she’d ever be okay again.

She would find out later that the police were waiting for her there, and that accomplices to murder had a harder time finding their way out of jail, even if they had fathers for lawyers. But until then, she was simply entranced by the sensations, and the feeling of pure bliss.

The Criterion Motel
Room 350
Presently

Zsasz was entranced by the screen, his fingers making their way across the laptop’s keyboard. With each pause in his typing, Nemina listened idly to the tap, tap, tapping of the madman’s knife against the hard wooden table, losing himself in thought. Her eyes drifted toward the table, its once-glossy sheen fouled by the smell of mold and by the misty spider-web weaves of dust across its surface.

The girl scratched at her arm, not watching the grey-blonde haired man’s hysterical excitement as the tapping of the knife was once again replaced by the tapping on the keyboard before him. There was the faint smell of pizza in the air – pepperoni, this time. Nemina was so very hungry, but knew better than to eat the pizza from the box. Zsasz kept telling her never to eat the props, and how it needed to remain unopened for their many missions to be successful.

That was when she heard something that sounded like Zsasz speaking, but it sounded so very far away. No, it couldn’t possibly be happening in this motel room they were in.

“Are you listening to me, you fat cow?” Zsasz snarled fiercely at the lithe seventeen year old girl, stabbing the knife into wood softened with age to grab her attention.

His threats were beginning to wear against the girl’s deeply-frayed nerves. Her body shuddered, muscle memory awake and alive with terror but her shell-shocked mind was lost, misty. Enwrapped in the cloak of a thick, choking fog not even Zsasz’s cruelty could truly penetrate. Her response was sullen and automated; a low shudder that was half whisper and half monotone drone. “Yes, Mister Zsasz.”

“So what. Did I. Just. Fucking. Say?”

A pause. A heartbeat. Distracted mind and distracted lips took their breaths, and prepared an answer that would please him. The seconds dragged into infinity.

Suddenly, Nemina heard the slap of hard knuckles against her soft skin from someplace outside her body before watching herself fall to the ground from the brutal punch. Somewhere outside herself, she wondered what had just happened until her nerves lit up and reminded her where she was. From her bruised jaw, she guided her red tongue to soothe the familiar pain burning inside her bloodied, swelling lip and felt a hot, warm liquid sensation trickle into a light river down upon her chin. She knew she’d had that one coming.

Recovering from the blow, she pulled her hand up to her mouth quickly and wiped away the blood. Her mind still dim, her muscle memory automatically forced her to kneel upon the filthy floor and look up toward him, toward her captor. Forced her to look into his fiery Devil’s eyes and accept his righteous judgment.

“You listening now?”

She wiped the welling tears away from her eyes. “Yes. Yes, I am, Mister Zsasz.” This time she meant it.

“That’s better,” Zsasz said. His smile and its cruelty infected her mind, her heart crushed by the pressure of his molten gaze. Nemina looked up expectantly, her mind brought back to the present, away from the cuts along her arm and that terrible, ominous feeling she couldn’t shake. She came up from the dirty floor and sat back down, awaiting his next sermon.

Zsasz continued, “I’ve done some researching on Google Maps and Facebook, and it looks like the parents at the address we’ve been provided will be getting home by eleven o’clock tonight, and the babysitter leaves soon after. The babysitter will need to leave before we go in, as it will go noticed if she goes missing for any length of time, and we won’t have enough time to do our holy work. Do you understand?”

“I understand, Mister Zsasz.”

“And what is our holy work?”

“It is…to…” She breathed in and out, struggling to remember the point of all this. She knew the wrong answer was to simply to murder people. Her mind reeled, focusing on the copper taste on her swollen lips. “…to free the Zombies.”

“From?”

“From…” She choked down her fears of brutal reprisals with each of her many, many wrong answers.

“From?” He asked again, this time venom seeped into his tone and his eyes leveled at her with a silent rage.

“…from…from…p-point…from pointless lives?” She sobbed, unable to stop the terror and pain from seeping into her voice.

“Yes,” The maniac bit his tongue in excitement. “We are freeing them from the lies in which they cloak themselves. With our blade, we strip back the layers of falsehoods anddeliver them into the Truth. We end their suffering. You are learning, my disciple.”

“…d-diss…disciple…?” she stammered.

Nemina suddenly came to the disturbing realization that she couldn’t remember how long she’d been awake. Mister Zsasz wouldn’t let her sleep most nights, waking her up at irregular intervals during their missions throughout the last few weeks. Or was it days? Reality was beginning to bend again. Things were beginning to fog over across her mind.

“Excellent. For a disgusting little Zombie, you are making rapid progress.”

She watched his face stretch the smile even wider – uncomfortably wide. She fought against the sick feeling welling up within her stomach, knowing the consequences of any untoward actions, in this place, even if the very sight of his sick smile made her want to vomit. Nervous, she started to itch again with fingernails encased in dried blood.

Outside – beyond the wool clouding her vision and the pounding inside her head – there was news coverage of a brutal string of murders occurring in Gotham City. A madman that had slit the throats of entire families – the Maddocks, the Eisenharts, the Winchesters, the Browns, the Booths. The Verdes. The names were all running together. The murderer was apparently staging the victims in grisly family scenes, and making tally marks on his skin with each murder. Who was that man they showed on the screen? Was it really the man next to her with the glint in his eye tapping the blood-stained knife on the table?

Nemina wondered if they’d ever catch this killer, whoever he was. Apparently he had a hostage with him too, some young girl named Nemina Verde. Something inside her almost recognized the picture. But that would make her a missing person, and she wasn’t really missing, was she? She knew exactly where she was. She rubbed at the sensation upon her cheek, the injury already swelling. It tingled gently, like a lover’s kiss. She sighed gently and closed her eyes, still massaging the wound softly.

She remembered the nagging pain in her arm and the memories that pain brought with them. She traced five slices along her forearm – five fresh tally marks. The sixth one hurt the most, made just this afternoon. Nemina itched at the wound absently.

She looked over at Zsasz, papers spread out all over the table in chaotic patterns understandable only to him. She sighed and sat back against her chair, knowing he was busy planning out how to make the seventh tally mark on her skin. And the eighth. And the ninth…

The Criterion Motel
Room 350
Sometime After

It only took the dark knight ten seconds to unlatch the motel’s window and slink in from outside. The room was pitch black – even darker than the moonless night outside.

Batman knew Zsasz’s favorite trick was to hide in the darkness, sticking to the shadows, remaining unseen until he was ready to strike. Bruce knew his suit would go only so far to protect the carotid artery from the knife strike, depending on its sharpness and his speed. He brought a finger up to his temple and tapped a button on the side of his helmet. The black void gave way to a bright pitch of glowing jade light that filtered throughout the cramped motel room. Batman could suddenly see everything – the chair, the bed, the table, and the laptop – in a bright haze of night vision. Batman carefully trod across the room, noticing the faint smell of pizza filling the dusty motel room.

Pepperoni, he thought. The smell is still strong. Could they be close?

Batman heard a rustling noise behind him. He was all motion, whipping around quickly and tossing the batarang at the source of the noise. The metal weapon sliced cleanly through a decorative vase sitting next to the lamp which was still turned off. A mouse shrieked, jumping off the table and disappearing beneath the bed.

Just a mouse, he thought. Lack of food, lack of sleep must finally be getting to me. I should’ve listened to Alfred’s advice after all. No good to Nemina in this shape.

Batman laboriously worked his way through the tiny kitchen and checked the bathroom cautiously, carefully, before returning to the main room and turning on the light. He shut off his night vision goggles, packing them away in his utility belt to recharge.

The dark knight regarded the half-eaten sandwich next to the laptop, which was in sleep mode. It was still warm – he might have missed them by minutes. Batman looked out the window quickly, trying to discern the shapes from the third story window.

No one down there. No, not by minutes, he thought glumly.

He walked back toward the computer and woke it from sleep mode, logging into his quarry’s computer with ease. Cape fluttering in the soft winds emanating from the still-opened window, Batman paged through Zsasz’s recent activity. He came upon an odd entry in Zsasz’s browser window and clicked on it and was horrified by what he found.

Zsaszed.com. Videos recently uploaded. Posted forty-seven minutes ago.

Bruce Wayne felt a new kind of horror clench deep inside his chest as he watched the media files before him. Videos of all Zsasz’s recent murders, uploaded to the horrible site. The Verde murder was centered in the middle of the webpage, playing continuously as a featured video clip for all to see.

Batman’s worst fears had come to life. There was no time left for the Verde girl.

The dark knight’s heart pounded in a fury as he rifled through the wastebasket, finding the greasy piece of paper. Scratched on the paper was the address he was expecting to find – the latest victim that Celeste had handed the murderer on a silver platter. The newest address – Zsasz and Nemina’s final destination.

Batman realized that he needed to find Nemina immediately. Zsasz no longer needed her as a witness. With Zsaszed.com running, the entire world was his witness. He leapt out the window and shot out a line to the next building, swinging quickly to the rooftop and landing in a full sprint. It would take him twenty more minutes to get there, at least, even if he pushed himself to the limit.

Forty-seven minute head start.

For all he knew, Nemina was already dead.

TO BE CONCLUDED!

Next Issue:

Tick-tock.

Tick-tock.

Tick-tock.

The clock is quickly running out for our beleaguered hero. With the villainous Zsasz having a forty-seven minute head start, can even the Dark Knight Detective catch the murderous Zsasz before he fulfills his ultimate masterpiece of murder and mayhem? And why has he started this website in order to showcase his murders? Is Nemina – his unwitting camerawoman – even still alive?

The blade of the madman falls in the pulse-pounding, heart-bursting, carotid-artery-slicing adventure that will leave you simply, “Zsaszed.” Join us, won’t you?