"Down is 1k, after that just 500 a month."

Two men stood in the open warehouse, the man speaking was short with balding dark hair. He wore an expensive suit that barely fit him. His oxford cloth shirt was stretched around his belly, the buttons pulled taught. The gold chains in his wrists made a small sound in the great empty space as he gestured to the western corner where a small wooden structure was built against the wall. "You'd be over in the hut."

The man he was speaking to was tall and stocky, wearing a large gray coat with the collar and lapels popped up covering his ears. The stranger scratched at his overgrown mutton chops as he considered the offer.

Looking around all he could see was abandoned projects. To the north was an old cadillac convertible. It sat on cinderblocks and looked to be more rust than car. About fifty feet away was a half decayed sailboat still propped up on stilts even though the keel had fallen off and laid on the ground under the hull. The whole building seemed to be deserted. The only signs of life came from a small room at the top of a rickety metal staircase.

The room looked like it had been built to be a monitoring station. It was about 40 feet in the air above the rest of the warehouse, and with windows lining the three outward facing walls. It would've been a good view point once, but now each of the two dozen windows were plastered with aged newspaper. A warm light glowed from the room, caused by the paper defusing the brightness that was shining inside.

"Up there lives Claudia, she don't like people," The salesman explained after following the other's gaze upwards.

The stranger turned around looking back at the hut again.

"If you take it, the only rules are no dead bodies. Other than that, I don't give a shit what you do with it, and I don't want to know neither."

The tall stranger looked back grinning, "I'm sold," he stated, his gold tooth glinting in the dim light as he pulled out a wad of bills from inside his coat. He counted off the exact amount and handed it over.

"Perfect," the shorter man replied tucking the cash away into his inner breast pocket. He held out his hand which the brand new tenant took, giving a solid shake. "Pay your rent by giving it to Claudia through the mail slot in her door, she'll make sure it gets to me. Doesn't matter how you pay, cash or diamonds, just make sure you pay," He warned pointing his finger at the other man.

With that the short, well dressed man turned on his heel and headed toward the door, "Oh and if you run into any problems, fix them yourself. I don't wanna talk to you again." He called over his shoulder.

Standing alone now, Captain Boomerang gazed at his new hideout.

It looked like a piece of shit.

He walked up to the opening between boards that served as a doorway, reaching to grab the blue tarp that hung in his way when the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.

Quickly he spun around, looking up to the room at the top of the stairs, catching a small glimpse of a silhouette swiftly moving away from the window.

ooo

It did not take long for Digger Harkness, also known as the infamous Captain Boomerang, to settle in. He didn't have very many personal possessions. The space mostly served as a garage for him to work on his motorcycle and create new boomerangs from the scrap metal he found.

The open floor of the warehouse had shown to be perfect for testing out his weapons. It was a controlled environment where he could watch how they flew and handled without interference from things like trees and the wind. This made it very easy to fine tune his instruments.

Being alone usually made Digger anxious, but he started to enjoy the solitude... a little bit. During the day there'd be a few cars driving by going to the nearby factory or junkyards but at night there was no one around for miles.

Well besides Claudia, but most of the time he forgot she was there. Her lights were always on but he never saw her. Digger couldn't understand why someone would shut themselves away like that. He figured she must look like the elephant man or something.

At the end of the month he walked up the metal stairs for the first time. Each step groaned under his weight, the sound echoing through the warehouse. He stood by the door tapping lightly on the window with the knuckle of his index finger, keeping his ear poised and listening closely for movement on the other side. But he could hear nothing. Crouching down he lifted the small door to the mail slot. He tried to look into the room but it was hard to see what exactly was in there. Grumbling to himself he shoved the cash for the rent into the slot and turned down the stairs. He had better things to do than worry about a hermit anyway.

Digger was ecstatic once he had got his harley up and running again. Though he understood the necessity of it, he hated lying low with nothing to do. He was itching to get back in the saddle and fuck up the day for a few bank tellers. He knew by now he had been kicking dust around the empty warehouse long enough that he could go back out without too much worry of strangers recognizing him from the papers. He couldn't wait to hit up a few of his favorite haunts again. Bubba's Smokey Lounge was always a good place to look for a partner for the his next job. He liked to get someone young, desperate to make a big mark and naive enough to trust him.

ooo

Everything had gone wrong.

It was supposed to be a simple routine robbery but the kid -that goddamn kid- had fucked up everything.

Digger was livid as he paced around his small hut. That kid had said he knew what he was doing but he didn't. The two of them hadn't been 10 feet inside the building before that damn child tripped the first alarm.

That wasn't even the worse part. Turns out he was the son of some mob boss back in Gotham who'd gone rogue to try and prove himself. The only thing he'd proven was how good he was at getting shot. Digger was lucky to have gotten away without any bullet wounds himself. The cops had shown up instantly, like they knew what was going to happen.

Digger roared in fury as he lifted up a discarded porcelain sink that had sat in the dirt, tossing it aimlessly to his left. It flew into the wall, crashing through the plywood leaving behind a splintered hole. He could hear the sink breaking as it fell to the asphalt on the other side of the wall. He yelled again still enraged over the whole mess that night had been. He ripped a loose board from an old pallet and used it like a bat, bashing it against an old car bumper. He hammered on the metal until the board split in half with a loud crack.

He still felt no better. He reached for the pallet to take another board when he heard a voice behind him, "What THE FUCK is going on?!" Digger whipped around, seeing a sawed off shotgun held by a small woman standing in his door way.

"Who the fuck are you?" he asked her, completely taken aback. Who was she to point a gun at him in his home?

"Oh, uh," she stammered, the look of concentration on her face fell to one of embarrassment as she lowered her gun, "I'm Claudia."