A/N: I'll be perfectly honest dear readers. The reason my updates have been so sporadic and this story has taken years to write is because I've been battling with addiction and depression for quite some time now. I started writing this story as an escape from reality at a time when I was in a really bad place and couldn't get access to drugs, and then halfway through it (around the time updates ground to a halt) I got access to them and started abusing them quite badly to make up for lost time. College hasn't made things any better, FOMO is real and its a terrible thing. A lot of shit has been happening to me including very close calls with the law and one or two chilling moments literally staring down the barrel of a gun, but I basically became a hedonistic prick hanging with the wrong crowd. I lost track of the story, and if you know anything about addiction then you know how your fix can take precedence over everything in your life including health and sanity. I promise to update on a more regular basis from now on. Now that I'm detoxing my brain is starting to work again and my vision for the story has returned, if anything I have very big plans for this story and I think you'll like them. I apologize for being such a lazy piece of shit, and I must thank you for staying with me this long. Its not easy to do, so I must give you credit. Again, I'm sorry for letting you down.

Gotham Docks, Miller Harbor

11:57PM

Batman stood on the edge of a crane's arm, looking down between the rows of huge metal crates being offloaded from a massive cargo ship that had dropped anchor just an hour before.
There were fifteen or so sailors and two crane operators on the scene, making up 17 civilians, far more than he'd have liked but still manageable. As for hostiles, there were eight men in total guarding the shipment.
All of them wore kevlar body armor, two-way radios and earpieces that allowed them to remain in constant communication with each other. Six men were carrying M4 assault rifles, and two very big men each carried miniguns. The team of 8 was spread out all over the area in roving patrols, rather than just walking up and down aimlessly while trying to look tough.
Batman surmised that they were professionals and not your average knuckle-dragging henchmen, probably a private outfit that was hired to secure the shipment. Clearly, the bad guys were getting tired of their 'merchandise' never reaching its intended destination thanks to his efforts, and now they were stepping up their game by hiring mercenaries to do the work their goons were too inept to handle.

Tonight's job was part of his follow-up on the man known only as the Black Mask.

For the first time in a long time, he didn't even have to collect his intel using the cape and cowl.
Shortly after his chat with Zatanna on the situation with her unconscious friend, he'd gone out in broad daylight-despite Alfred's tut-tutting-in his persona of Matches Malone. Matches was the first alter ego he had created, modelled after a small-time thug Bruce had once observed several years ago while studying criminals in their natural environment. As Matches, he could go to seedy spots and blend in with the crowd, sometimes picking up interesting chatter which he used to further his one-man crusade against crime. It was incredible the things one heard in seedy bars filled with glassy eyed day-drinkers, sleazy cops, burned out crack-whores and low-level enforcers. People talked. They really, really talked. Especially when they were drunk. It was best to keep your mouth shut. The loser in the next booth just might be an undercover vigilante.

If his intel was correct, these crates contained a cache of arms which was meant to be the first in many shipments to build an arsenal. From what Matches had heard, it seemed a hostile takeover was in the offing, and Black Mask was arming himself for a massive turf war with the Five Families.
Assault rifles, handguns, and more alarmingly, rocket launchers and C4. He didn't want to think too hard what the last two would be used for.
The middleman who sourced the arms was one Oswald Cobblepot, a world-class shitheel with a cartoonishly bad Geordie accent. His associates were smart enough never to call him by name, rather he was referred to as 'the Penguin', so-called because he ran Iceberg Lounge, a strip-club slash massage parlor slash place where dreams went to die. Penguin was in the 'import/export' business and he was yet another person of interest in Batman's investigations. Aside from gun-running, he hadn't forgotten those horror stories about what happened to the dancers at his club.

For all their vigilance, the heavy rain and dark skies prevented the security team from detecting Batman's presence though he was just a dozen or so feet away. He jumped down to the rooftop, walking across an insulated power cable until he was just above a pair of men smoking cigarettes in the shade of the balcony. He tapped a button on his gauntlet and switched on a wireless bugging device, designed to snoop on handheld electronic devices. With some minor adjustments he was able to tune into their earpieces, allowing him to hear the conversation just as well as if he'd been down there with them.

"...Better off working for a PMC?"

"Nah, this gig is way better, trust me."

"I dunno man. I had a buddy who worked for Blackwater back in the 90s, he was a Sergeant of the Guard. Said he was making bank. He's dead though. Offed himself after his old lady divorced him and took all he had."

"Back when guys were making $150k a year just to pull a personal security detail for businessmen and diplomats working in the Red Zone, things were good for a contractor. These days, its a fuckin' joke."

"$150k a year for a PSD? Why the fuck did you leave all that dough behind?"

"When the goddamn cops started getting into the contracting business they diluted the pool, lowered the standards, lowered the salaries too. PMCs started hiring anybody who was in the SWAT, even if it was SWAT from Bumfuck Indiana. Then it got even worse, guys started hiring criminals. Y'know, bikers, enforcers, all sorts of fucking punks. One firm-and I ain't sayin' no names-one firm even hired these ex-child soldiers from Sierra Leone, paid 'em $300 a week. Those jungle bunnies thought they were making a damn fortune."

"Jesus. I mean, shit, soldiers of fortune ain't no heroic knights, but hiring war criminals is something else entirely."

"Exactly. The job just wasn't worth it anymore, so I quit after my last contract. When I came back Stateside an old buddy of mine tipped me onto this line of work and I've been on it ever since. Its better than dodging grenades, RPGs and fucking suicide bombers and it pays a hell of a lot better too. Who'd have thought, right?"

"Right. I guess guys like us can never really leave this life behind."

"Well its not like there's anything else to do with our skillsets once you leave the service. Only officers get it good when they leave."

"Fuckin' A. You leave the military as an enlisted guy after years of dedicated service and the best you can hope for is manual labor. Fuck that noise."

"Yeah, either that or flipping patties and bagging fries at Burger King while some fucking zit-faced teenage assistant manager eyeballs you. What a load of bullshit."

"I tell ya man, its a goddamn shame how this country of ours treats her veterans."

"Why the fuck do you think I'm doing this job, working for these weirdos? The way I see it, the money I make doing wetwork for criminals is compensation for all my years of blood, sweat and tears shed for a screwed up system that used me like a fucking cum rag."

"Look at you, Mr. Altruism."

"Shut the fuck up Dom, you don't even know what that means."

"Finish up your smoke kid, we need to continue our perimeter sweeps. Boss is comin' in tonight so we need to look sharp."

Batman switched off the bugging device and pulled out his grapnel gun.

He had to act now, while the window was still open.

Firing the line, he swung down and kicked one guard in the chest, knocking the wind out of his lungs and the feet from underneath him. The second guard whirled around too late, and Batman delivered a devastating uppercut that knocked him out cold. The first man, wheezing, attempted to sit up, but Batman dropped down on his chest with the full weight of his body, rendering him unconscious. The whole process had taken no more than ten seconds. He fired the line skyward, pulled himself back up to the ledge, and waited. One of the mini-gunners was coming by.

"What the..." he crouched down to inspect the bodies. Batman landed on top of his shoulders, covering his mouth.

"Mmph." he grunted, pushing backwards, going for the wall. Batman jumped off his shoulders at the last possible moment and landed on his feet.
The gunner slammed into the wall and shook his head in confusion.
Not wasting a second, Batman launched a series of swift, hard strikes on the thugs chest and stomach. He knew he had to work quickly to disable the gunner before he fired a single shot or alerted the others to his presence, but the gunner wasn't making it easy for him, swinging the .50cal's barrel his way in retaliation.
Batman ducked, jumped and weaved with each swing, popping back onto his feet and effortlessly continuing the onslaught of rapid strikes. It felt good to be back in action, back in his element, however briefly he'd been out.
He must've hit him about thirty times before the thug finally started to stagger. Batman jumped onto his chest, grabbed the lapels of his bullet-proof vest and drove his forehead into the thug's face. His head snapped back and his body went slack, collapsing against the wall.

Batman fired the grapnel again, onto the roof of the main building.
This time he switched on the Detective Mode on his lenses, which showed him the positions of the remaining guards via heat signatures, as well as the specific crates containing the weapons. From their vital signs, he knew the men were still unaware of his presence. Normally he'd just set an explosive charge and destroy the munitions in a colorful fireball then vanish in the confusion, but he was hoping 'the Boss' the two guards were referring to was Black Mask. With any luck, he could end this tonight.

Not that he'd been having much of that lately. He had a serial killer on the loose, a new player in Gotham he'd never even seen yet, the Italian mafia stepping up their game in the Narrows to compensate for loss of territory in the city limits, a supersoldier assassin after his head, and a case file open with the FBI. Its like the universe was conspiring to take a giant shit on him.

What else is new?

"Detective Gordon, is your team in position?" he spoke for the first time all night.

"We've got the whole place surrounded. Just waiting for your signal, Batman." came the reply in his cowl's earpiece.

"Alright. Our mystery man should be arriving any moment now. Stand by."

A few blocks away, Detective Gordon sat in an unmarked squad car, waiting for the signal. He didn't know what it was, but he figured it would be pretty obvious.

Gordon had requested for SWAT support but was denied by Lieutenant Marino, the SWAT commander. Marino was actually one of the good cops and he was a hard-charger with a good head on his shoulders, but he also harbored fanatical hatred for Batman and so did the rest of his men. They felt he undermined their authority and made an already difficult job even harder to do. Once Marino figured out what Gordon was driving at he'd flatly refused to offer any assistance, so Gordon had grabbed what tactical gear he could from storage and drawn together the few officers he could find, and they'd set up a surveillance cordon just a few blocks away from the docks. Perhaps it wasn't the smartest move to make given the circumstances, but he'd been in hairier positions, and tonight was one of the few times his specialized military training and tactical experience could be put to good use.

Yeah right.

Gordon wasn't kidding himself, he was no Chuck Norris. Sure, he'd once been a hairy chested Army Ranger kicking down doors and shooting terrorists in the face, but that was ages ago, when black berets were the preserve of Rangers only. When doing 500 pushups, running 12 miles and then shooting Expert on the range was just another Monday morning in 3rd Battalion. There was a reason most Batt. Boys didn't make it past five years worth of combat deployments; himself included. The job kicked the shit out of you and then some. Busted knees, torn ligaments, concussions, gunshot wounds, PTSD...They took their toll on mind and body. Sooner or later you had to hang up the assault gear and walk out that door. So no, he wasn't about to finesse this operation and smoke all the opposition with zero effort. He'd have to rely on muscle memory and luck to survive. Besides, bullets didn't discriminate.

The docks were quiet for now, so he took the opportunity to survey their street. It was quiet too, with only a lone hobo dumpster-diving and loading the good stuff into his rusty shopping cart. Ben & Jerry's, and what looked to be a half-eaten birthday cake. He looked at their surveillance cordon, 4 cars in an L-shaped formation.

Of the dozen or so cops that were here tonight, Gordon was only sure he could trust two: Sergeant Bullock and Sergeant Montoya, both were seated in his car.

Sergeant Bullock was fat and slovenly, with greasy hair and a portly stomach that hung out over his belt buckle. His fingers were always crusted with powdered sugar and jelly from the donuts he was always eating, his breath always reeked of cigars and bourbon. His unkempt appearance might not inspire much confidence but he was much smarter and tougher than he looked, and despite his frank distaste for Batman he was one of the few cops smart enough to realize vigilantes were a necessary evil that were here to stay.
Sergeant Montoya was his polar opposite, slim as a toothpick with not so much as a hair out of place. Her uniform was always perfectly pressed, her black shoes gleaming, just like her severe bun of hair. Montoya didn't talk much and rumor had it she never smiled, but she had a remarkable attention to detail and she was a staunch Catholic; which meant she wasn't on the take. Gordon still didn't know how she felt about Batman, but he sensed it was positive.
Incidentally, both Sergeants were former Marines, Bullock had been a Gunnery Sergeant and Montoya had been an MP.

"We got movement." said Bullock, between mouthfuls of jelly donuts. "Silver Rolls Royce, 3 o'clock."

Gordon raised his binoculars to get a better look.

"Who the hell is that ugly mug?" asked Sergeant Bullock, leaning forward.

"I don't believe it." said Gordon, squinting. "That's Oswald Cobblepot."

"Oh yeah, I thought he looked familiar. I ain't no oil painting, but that guy has a face only a mother could love. He's the one who own's Iceberg Lounge, right?"

"Yeah, that's him." Gordon answered, scrawling something in his notepad before pocketing it.

"I bet he scores free pussy with those fine ass girls of his, being the owner of the joint and all. He's like Hugh Hefner."

"Hugh Hefner wasn't a gun-runner tied to the IRA."

"Allegedly." Sergeant Montoya quipped. "Besides the fact that Cobblepot's family has roots in Northern Ireland, there are no tangible connections between him and the Republican Army. Its probably just a story he encourages to make him seem like a true-born gangster."

"Doesn't matter if its a story, what matters is his appearance here is highly suspect. I'm sure our colleagues at the ATF would be very interested in hearing about the events of this night." he held up a camera and snapped multiple photographs of Cobblepot speaking to the gunmen and inspecting the weapons caches.

"You really want to bring more Feds in this town, Detective? They treat us boys in blue like dumbass flatfoots who don't know their elbows from their assholes."

"Can you blame them Bullock? The GCPD doesn't exactly have a shining reputation for solving crimes, particularly those related to Batman."

"Who?" Bullock asked, miming a hand to his ear theatrically.

Gordon resisted the urge to smile.

It was now common knowledge to everyone at the Precinct that Detective Gordon was working with Batman, but Captain McCluskey and his dirty cop buddies were too scared to confront him; partly because they had no evidence, partly because they feared getting a visit from a certain caped crusader in the night, partly because the last time someone got in Gordon's face he had to have his jaw wired shut.
It had been months since Detective Flass was beaten to a pulp by Gordon, but memories at the Precinct were still fresh, and so everyone just pretended they didn't know that one of their own was working with a vigilante.

"What should we do, Detective?" Montoya asked.

"We wait for the signal." Gordon said. His heart was hammering in his chest. He could just feel something was about to happen. His only hope was that Batman knew what he was doing.

A/N: Read and review.