BAE Chapter 78

Stephanie shoves the man to the ground as the knife whistles through the air where his throat just was. Zsasz is not a nice man to work with, for, or against.

Stephanie drops to her knees and puts her hands behind her head. Zsasz is out of knives, which means that bullets are now the most immediate threat, at least until Zsasz reaches her. He’s sprinting across the lobby.

Seeing what she’s doing, the goons move in, encircling her and all but poking her in the face with the barrels of their Thompson guns and twelve gauges. She’s completely surrounded. Twenty feet away is the glass front of the building and the street. The guard whose life she just saved is scrambling up with zip ties.

“No! You idiots!” Zsasz shouts.

In a flash, Stephanie makes her move, knocking aside the barrel of a shotgun, dropping a flash bomb, and launching herself into the air. Everything she learned about wearing a cape, she learned from Batman. But most of what she learned about fighting, she learned from Cassandra Cain. She flattens two goons with airborne kicks to the chest and gets a third man’s head between her thighs on the way down. She sends him flying and rolls to her feet as the flash bomb goes off. The startled goons fire even though they’re in a cluster. Blood flies and wounded men hit the floor as Zsasz throws himself into the melee. He’s counting on Stephanie to be afraid, but he’s not holding a knife. She lets him grab her and slams her knee into his groin, then sends him staggering with a headbutt. She spins into a kick, whipping out a Batline to trip another goon before two more hit her from behind. She’s tackled to the ground and crushed under their weight. Her arm is pinned to her side, but she has a grapple holstered at her hip. She grabs it and fires. The goon on top of her screams as the claw bites into his leg. Stephanie flings him off, punches his friend, and leaps up in time to take a fierce blow from the stock of a Thompson right between her shoulder blades.

She staggers into the plate glass window and Zsasz rams her from behind with his shoulder. Dazed, she elbows him in the face and turns to grapple. Cass taught Stephanie to fight, but Stephanie is no Cassandra Cain. Zsasz drives his fist into her stomach and there’s only so much her armor can do against direct hits like that from strong men. A goon manages to help pin her and another one reaches in to press a pistol to her head. She jerks her head aside with her free hand and grabs the man’s wrist, getting her thumb through the trigger guard and pressing.

The pistol goes off with a boom and the window behind her dissolves, sending them all tumbling out onto the sidewalk, lit by the headlights of the vans.

Red and blue lights join the chaos. Stephanie’s ears ring from the shot but she can hear sirens as she desperately battles Zsasz on the ground. She wiggles free and rolls upright, flinging a Batarang into a goon’s foot to upset his aim. He yells and fires his shotgun into the cold night air instead of into her flank. She skips in and kicks him in the chest, then whirls and does the same to Zsasz. A couple of goons emerge through the broken window, but police cars are skidding to a halt. Half of them are injured, some of them shot by friendly fire. The others are having second thoughts about being here as GCPD arrives.

Not Zsasz, though. He grabs a piece of broken glass and throws himself at Stephanie as a blinding light bathes them.

“Freeze! This is the Gotham City Police Department!” That comes from a bullhorn in the helicopter that’s rather daringly flying low among the tall downtown buildings.

Zsasz isn’t listening. Stephanie dodges and tries to kick him, but he dives in, catching her leg and taking her to the ground. She uses Judo to send him sprawling, but he’s back on his feet just as quickly as she is, moving in with his shard of glass.

A few police are handcuffing fallen goons. Others are covering Stephanie and Zsasz, closing in on them. There are shouts to stop and freeze, but nobody’s wading into a fight between Victor Zsasz and a woman in a purple hood and cape, and they aren’t about fire without a clear shot. They might as well be eating popcorn.

Stephanie knocks a thrust aside with her forearm and slams Zsasz in the face with her elbow, then follows up with her knee in his chest. Ribs crunch, but that’s no deterrent to someone like Zsasz. The shard glitters as he pulls her into a crushing embrace. Stephanie gets a gauntlet up in time to stop the glass. She bashes him in the face with the back of her head, then grabs his wrist and tries to throw him over her shoulder. That’s easy enough to do with the opponent’s momentum on her side, but not through sheer strength. He’s twice her size. Stephanie realizes her mistake and grabs for her utility belt.

Zsasz crushes her to the ground, striking with the glass. If it had been a knife, she’d have been dead. The back of her cowl stops the glass from slamming into her brainstem.

Zsasz grabs her face and jerks it up to expose her throat. Stephanie’s last flash bomb goes off in his face before he can slash her neck. Stephanie grabs his arm and throws her whole body into flinging him off. She rolls upright as he picks himself up, seeing stars. Blood pours from his hand where he grips the glass. He tries to protect his face, and Stephanie kicks him in the groin with full strength. Zsasz collapses to his knees. Stephanie’s left cross sends blood flying from his mouth, and her right makes his eyes roll back.

She stands over him amid the broken glass panting, cape and hood billowing in the wind of the choppers, blinded by the lights. Cops and reporters look on as Zsasz slowly slumps over and thuds to the pavement.

Stephanie’s hands are still curled into tight fists. Blood drips from the knuckles of her gloves.

“Stay right there,” A brave policeman says, advancing on her.

The choppers overhead are blocking clear shots to nearby buildings, and she’s out of grapples anyway. A sudden howl cuts through the ringing in Stephanie’s ears and the cops all look past her.

The Car tears around the corner, screeching to a halt. The cockpit opens.

“Thank you, Alfred,” Stephanie murmurs.

“Not at all, Ms. Brown,” he replies in her earpiece.

With one last glance at Zsasz, Stephanie turns her back on the devastation and vaults behind the wheel. The cockpit hisses shut.