The wind howled like a wounded animal through the shattered windowpanes of the safehouse, where the walls had seen more blood than rest in the past week. Rain struck the glass like tiny war drums, the rhythm of a city on the brink.
Draven stood over a crude table littered with schematics, surveillance prints, and fragments of broken tech. His armor was scorched and dented, the kevlar peeling away from a glancing explosive Pulse had detonated the night before. A splinter of glass still embedded in his side throbbed with every breath, but he hadn't flinched since returning.
Across from him, Evelyn sat cross-legged on a cot, soldering a new comm-link with furrowed brows and smudges of oil on her cheeks. Her gaze would occasionally flicker to Draven, scanning the weariness behind his stoicism. His silence was no longer cold; it was pained.
"How long until Pulse strikes again?" she asked without looking up.
"He's escalating," Draven said. "Last night was a message."
"And the message?"
Draven's fingers tightened around the edge of the table. "That he knows. About us. About the children. About what we're becoming."
Evelyn paused. "Then let him come. This time, we won't be the ones running."
Their eyes met, and in that single exchange, something unspoken settled between them. It wasn't bravado—it was necessity. Gotham wasn't going to save itself.
The sound of footsteps interrupted them. Nyx stepped in from the hallway, her black cloak dripping from the storm. Her eyes, silver and glassy, betrayed something close to fear—a rare thing for the assassin forged in the Project Halcyon black labs.
"They hit Blackgate," she said flatly. "Half the prison's gone. They didn't free anyone... they just killed the ones locked in solitary."
Draven's jaw clenched. "Pulse?"
Nyx shook her head. "Too clean. Surgical. This was... planned. Coordinated. And whoever did it left this."
She tossed a folded paper onto the table. Draven unfolded it slowly. Scrawled in crimson ink were two words:
"HE WATCHES."
The Joker's handwriting. The same ink, the same twisted elegance as the card they found back in the Narrows.
"He's moving," Evelyn whispered. "He's not a puppet."
Draven nodded. "No. Not anymore."
One Hour Later – Gotham Metro Underground
The abandoned subway tunnels under Gotham's West End were no longer empty. Pulse had converted them into a war zone. Traps lined the corridors. Mines, sensors, auto-turrets salvaged from black ops caches.
But Draven didn't come to hide. He came to end it.
The darkness was absolute as he crept through the lower corridor, Evelyn's voice guiding him in his earpiece. "Left ahead. Heat sensors pick up three bodies. They're not moving."
"Alive?" he asked.
"No."
Draven moved silently, his boots barely scuffing the gravel. When he reached the corpses, he paused.
Three men in GCPD tactical gear. Throats slit. Eyes burned out.
Pulse's calling card.
Draven reached for the access panel nearby, hacking through the rusted console. The gate slid open, and heat rushed into the tunnel—artificial, chemical.
A hidden lab.
Inside, test chambers hissed with pressurized gas. Children's belongings were scattered in crates, next to surgical trays soaked with dried blood. Screens showed brainwave data and emotional spikes calibrated to fear.
"They were testing terror," Evelyn said through the link, her voice cracking. "Harvesting it."
Draven moved to the back chamber—and stopped.
Behind a glass wall stood Pulse.
He was alone, shirtless, scars etched across his body like tribal symbols. His skin was pale, barely human, and his eyes—those dead, silver eyes—burned into Draven's soul.
"I've been waiting, Shadow," Pulse said, voice like static laced with poison.
"You're done," Draven said, blade in hand.
"No. I'm just starting."
Pulse struck the wall. A charge exploded under Draven's feet, launching him into the chamber. The glass shattered. Alarms blared.
They collided like titans—blade against gauntlet, bone against metal. Draven drove a knee into Pulse's ribs, but the villain barely flinched, grabbing Draven by the throat and slamming him into a wall.
"You don't understand," Pulse growled. "This city is built on fear. And I... I am the architect."
Draven fought through the pain, headbutted him, twisted his arm, and slammed him to the floor. He reached for his blade—too slow. Pulse struck his wound, reopening the gash.
Blood sprayed across the console.
Draven fell to his knees.
"Now you see," Pulse whispered. "No gods. No heroes. Only evolution."
Before he could strike again—gunfire. Evelyn burst through the doorway, rifle in hand.
"Get off him!"
She unloaded a clip into Pulse's chest. He staggered—armor cracked—but stood.
"Cute," he hissed.
Draven surged up, using the moment. He drove his blade through Pulse's side, pushing until it pierced the console behind him. Sparks erupted. Electricity surged into Pulse's body, and he screamed—an unholy sound that shook the lab.
"Run!" Draven shouted.
Evelyn hesitated—but then grabbed his hand. Together, they escaped through the collapsing lab as explosions tore through the tunnels.
Hours Later – Safehouse Rooftop
The storm had passed. The sky was bruised purple, the city below quiet for the first time in days.
Draven sat on the rooftop, bandages wrapped tight across his ribs, his cape folded beside him.
Evelyn joined him, handing over a cup of stale coffee. He took it with a quiet nod.
"You saved me," he said after a long silence.
She smiled faintly. "Just balancing the scales."
He glanced at her, the hardness in his expression softening. "I thought I was supposed to be alone in this."
"You were wrong."
The air between them was different now—heavier, charged. She leaned in slightly, brushing a hand against his.
"I don't care how broken this city is," she said softly. "I'm not letting you fall with it."
Draven looked at her then—really looked—and saw not just an ally, not just a voice in his ear... but someone who believed in the man behind the mask.
He leaned closer.
Their lips met—slow, uncertain, but real.
In a world falling apart, it was the one thing neither of them expected.
Hope.
Meanwhile – Elsewhere in Gotham
In a crumbling theater lit only by dying bulbs, a man in a white lab coat stood before an old projector screen. Monitors displayed images of Pulse's defeat. Of Draven and Evelyn. Of fire and blood.
A slow clap echoed behind him.
"Amateurs," a voice giggled from the shadows. "Pulse was always so... theatrical."
The man didn't turn. "You orchestrated this, didn't you?"
The figure in the shadows grinned, eyes glowing behind green-tinged lenses. "I merely nudged the board."
The Joker stepped into the light, slow and grinning. "Let them think they're winning. Let them kiss. Let them believe in hope."
He leaned down to the monitor, licking a finger and drawing a smiley face in the blood splattered across it.
"Because when they fall, it'll be so much more delicious."