The Cat saves The Bat By the time the Bat signal pierced the darkness of the night sky, the Batmobile was already racing through the streets of Gotham. Batman thought that putting Joker behind bars would, at least for a while, put his gang out of commission. But it seemed that he was wrong, for Harley Quinn had stepped up more than he had anticipated, starting a rampage all over the city as an act of revenge for the incarceration of "Puddin". She wanted to draw Batman out. He was more than happy to oblige. According to the latest information he had gathered by listening in on the police radio, Harley was currently with her gag in the Bank of Gotham, shooting up the place while stealing all of the money from the main safe. Not on his watch, Batman thought. If Harley was missing Joker so much, it was time for the two to be reunited. In the cozy cells of Arkham Asylum. The Batmobile came to a screeching halt in front of the Bank of Gotham. GCPD had still not arrived, the area around the bank clear, the civilians having ran away at the first sound of gunfire. To his surprise, the building was quiet, with no sound coming from the inside. He had expected a much more chaotic situation at the scene, but still, he wasn't about to take any chance. Grappling onto the side of the building, Batman slipped into a ventilation shaft, using the complex and sprawling system to scout the area inside the bank. The surprises kept on piling. The main hall was completely empty, with no traces of the criminals or any of the staff. It had to be a trap. If he was to reveal himself, the main hall was the one point of entry he had to use, be it the door, windows, or the ventilation. And Harley knew it, which is probably what she was counting on. But it would take more than a simple trap to defeat him. Dropping a few smoke pellets through the grates, Batman waited for the room to fill with smoke, hoping to also force anyone waiting for him into revealing themselves due to the smoke. Now that he wasn't jumping out into the open, Batman kicked the metal cover of the shaft away, and jumped onto the floor below. But as soon as he landed, he heard something on the floor rolling towards him. A few seconds later, a small gas grenade with a large grin painted on it reached his feet, exploding and releasing a cloud of green gas which quickly mixed with the smoke around him. The gas completely surrounded Batman, who couldn't help but take a few breaths as he reached for the gas mask in his utility belt. But before he could reach it, a baseball bat emerged from the surrounding smoke, hitting him in the stomach and forcing him down on his knees. The hit pumped all air out of his lungs, his mouth flying wide open, gasping for air, and inhaling even more of the gas. Harley stood above him, a breathing mask covering the lower half of her face. "Not so fast, Bats. Your gadgets won't help you this time." There was no need for her to hit him again. The gas had already started doing its work. Batman was hardly keeping himself up, even on his knees, coughing more and more as the knockout gas filled his lungs, sapping his strength and clouding his senses. Staying awake and having any control over his own movements was out of the question, as his body grew more and more limb, until finally, the unconscious Batman tumbled forwards onto the floor. Once the smoke cleared, Harley removed the mask from her face, revealing her sinister grin. "Alright boys, pack him up! Time to go!" His mind was a jumbled mess of thoughts and sensations, the knockout gas still having a hold over the majority of his numb body. Despite slowly becoming aware of his own body, Batman still had a lot of trouble piecing together where he was and what was going on, his mind trying to recover from the large gap in his memory which suddenly appeared after his encounter with Harley at the bank. "Wakey, wakey, Bats." Her voice echoed through his head, his eyes struggling to focus and deduce which of the four Harleys he was seeing was the real one. He grunted, struggling to move his tongue and operate his mouth. "Grmp...hmphhh..." As the sedative slowly wore off, piece by piece, Batman began putting together the predicament he was in. With him waking up, Harley was busy with something, having turned her back to him. But for once, she felt it was safe to do so. For she had made sure that there was nothing Batman could do to harm her. The Dark Knight was hanging from a thick lead pipe, his arms chained above his head to the sturdy metal. The entire upper half of his body was naked apart for his cowl, Harley having removed stripped him off his belt and gear to make sure there was nothing on him he could use to escape. His legs were dangling below him, equally bound with thick, metal bonds. There wasn't anything he had to say to Harley, but even if he had wanted to, Batman was not in a position to speak, a large red ballgag stuffed inside his mouth and buckled tightly behind his head, a clown face drawn on the side of the rubber sticking out between the hero's lips, his teeth biting down into the soft, elastic material. Harley ignored the rattling of the chains against the pipe as Batman tested his bonds, hoping to discover there was something he could do about them, some way he could get free. But without his utility belt and the additional gadgets hidden in his gauntlets, his bare hands were of little help in this predicament, despite their raw strength. Grunting into his gag as he squirmed in the air, his movement was finally enough to garner the attention of his captive. "How does it feel Bats? A taste of your own medicine.", she said, as Batman caught a glimpse of the project she was working on behind her back. It was partially concealed behind the preaching criminal, but sticks of dynamite were hard to ignore. Not paying too much attention to the speech Harley was making, about all the wrongs he had done to her and the Joker, Batman focused on coming up with an escape plan. "You'll pay for locking up Mr J, Bats. He'll be so proud of me when he hears I took care of Batman on my own.", she finally said, moving to the side, revealing her grand plan for taking care of the Batman once and for all. Inside a large Jack-in-the-Box was a large amount of dynamite, the box ready to be closed. On the side of it was a timer, the display blinking constantly, waiting to be armed. With a grin on her face, Harley sealed the box, the timer resetting instantly the moment the lid was in place and sealed, the countdown starting at twenty minutes, long enough for her and her gang to be gone from the warehouse, as well as get to a safe distance from where they could enjoy the sight of the Bat being blown into smithereens. "Bye, bye, Batman! Hahahahaha!" Harley's maniacal laughter echoed through the empty warehouse as she left the small room at the back of the building, the echo of her orders reaching Batman's ears. He, on the other hand, was once again busy trying to escape the unyielding chains binding him. The cold, thick metal was tightly pressed into his bare skin, his struggling doing little to disturb it, his wrists no closer to being free no matter how much effort he put into it. His utility belt and gear was nowhere near, Harley most likely taking it with her to remove any chance of him getting his hands on anything which could help him escape, the room completely emptied apart from him and the bomb ticking down in front of him. He tried pulling down as hard as he could, hoping he could pull the pipe he was hanging from out of the ceiling, the loud cry accompanying the tremendous effort he put in muffled by the rubber ball he bit into as he gathered his strength, but again, the metal bolts refused to give in, the strength of his arms coupled with the weight of his body not enough to defeat the big bolts. Time was ticking, and his continuous struggling did little more than exhaust him, drops of sweat sliding down his bare chest as he panted into his gag, his saliva slowly dissolving the clown image painted on it. Suddenly, he heard commotion elsewhere in the building. Screams, yells, and what sounded like whip meeting flesh. A couple of gunshots. More screams. Harley had finally joined the fight. It was hard to make out what she was saying, but she wasn't pleased, in fact, she was extremely annoyed. By the time the commotion died down, with the last thing Batman heard being Harley's cry of pain, the clock was down to ten minutes. And then, the door opened. "My, my, this is a sight I could get used to." Batman sighed into his gag. Catwoman was standing in front of him, leaning against the frame of the door as she rolled up her whip, devouring him with her eyes. After all, it wasn't every day she got a chance to see a half-naked Batman, his arms bound above his head, his muscles flexed from the tension, the sweat of his efforts to escape glistening on his bare skin under the dim light, saliva dropping down the sides of the large, rubber ball buckled in his mouth. It was a sight she could definitely get used to. "Grmmmmphh." She giggled, the sound of Batman growling into his gag one of the more adorable things she had the pleasure of hearing. Catwoman slowly tiptoed to him, taking notice of the bomb next to her. "Oh my Batman, why didn't you warn me!?", she said, gasping to hide the grin on her face as the restrained hero once again growled. It wasn't hard for her to disable the bomb, years of criminal activity granting her some experience with explosives. Pretending to wipe the sweat from her forehead, Catwoman took a deep breath. "That was exhausting, allow me to rest a bit before I free you." "Smmmgphhna!" "Relax, Bruce, let a girl have some fun." "Grrrrrrr." "Why do you always have to be such a stick in the mud!?" Catwoman regretted now having a camera on her, for the sight in front of her was truly priceless, something she wanted for the sake of having something she could use to get on Batman's nerves for the rest of time. Alas, with a heavy heart, Catwoman helped Batman get free, the furious hero unbuckling the gag silencing him, finally able to take deep breath as he spit out some of the color which had entered his mouth from the gag. By the time they were done, Harley was long gone, however, Batman's gear was something she had left behind, wanting to escape in a hurry. Once again, the feline criminal found it heartbreaking to see Batman's chest and abs hidden behind his costume, but she knew that the pretty image in front of her would not last forever. "Thank you." It was more than she expected, the only words Batman spoke to her before disappearing into the night, grappling away. "You owe me one, Batman!", Catwoman yelled after him, her mind already lost in the sea of possible ways for how Batman could repay her for saving his hide.