The hunter sighs in relief that the Dark Knight is down, completely helpless—ready to be unmasked and restrained! He wipes his brow with the sleeve of his jacket and then tosses the whip’s handle casually to the floor. He approaches Batman stepping on Superman’s crimson cape and stands over him. Batman is face down on the metal deck with his black scalloped gloved hands clenching his throat.
It’s half past 11 PM by the clock on the nightstand. Ryan is clothed back in his jeans and t-shirt, and has just finished his whopper and rubbery fries… “birthday dinner,” courtesy of his friend Dick. He wipes his mouth with a paper napkin and looks over at Dick sleeping peacefully in his restraints.
It’s Ryan’s birthday. It is almost 9PM, and Ryan is in Room 10 at the Shooting Star Motel waiting for Dick. On the table is a package that arrived yesterday at Ryan’s PO Box.
Naturally the smug prick keeps me waiting again, thinks Ryan, as he scans the evening paper with Robin’s picture on the front page. Robin! Now there’s a guy I’d like to get in the sack with! I’ll wager he’s not near as big a dick as that swaggering prick, Dick Smith. Smith! And I was not even worth the effort to come up with a better alias! Well, Smith is my cash cow, now!
It is about 8AM. “Vince… wake him… Dick Grayson is leaving,” alerts Shawn with a nudge. Vince and Shawn are parked in a white Escalade backed into a parking space across the parking lot from Room 10 at the Shooting Star Motel. Vince wakes and rubs his eyes as Shawn sips his coffee and watches a tall young man exit the motel room and swagger towards a yellow Honda CBR600 backed up to the room’s door.
It is nearly midnight; Police Commissioner Gordon is anxiously pacing the roof of Gotham City’s Police Headquarters with a narrow FedEx box under his arm. The din rising from the large city below seems to add to the commissioner’s anxiety. He checks his watch again; it has been nearly an hour since he illuminated the large rooftop lantern that is projecting the Bat Signal high against the cloudy night sky of Gotham City.
