Chapter Text
Black Mask has few faults.
Assuming your moral compass isn’t buried underneath a landfill or two, you’d probably disagree with such a statement fairly heavily. But the morals of such a man are not what is being discussed. Roman Sionis is a man who has few faults when it comes to hard business.
Who else can say that they completely manage Gotham’s criminal underworld on their own merit? So much so that the ‘Knight’ himself can’t touch the empire without burning it down? He put one of his crime-fighting little sidekicks and put her six feet under, and what did Roman gain from it?
Power. Respect. Money. And the one thing that the Bat tried to claim a monopoly on?
Fear.
The police didn’t dare try him. The Batman couldn’t put him away. None of the other big players dared to fuck with his rule; hell, even the Joker was a bit quieter these days on where he hit.
So, where was he going with this?
Well.
“Alright…”
His voice came out raspy and a bit unfocused, normal for a person waking up. Only this was not from a night of good rest, but from having his head slammed straight into his office desk so hard he blacked out instantly. Black Mask was not some average joe in a fight, so for someone to get the drop him without making so much as a sound, it had to be-
“Come on, Batman, I was actually looking forward to turning in for the night.”
His brown eyes try to adjust to the complete and total darkness, but even a bastard like him who operates in the darkness can barely tell where the room starts and where it ends. He knows he’s tied up to a chair but that his feet are free. His shoes are gone, but the rest of his outfit remains.
“You and I both know however much you’re gonna beat me, it’s not gonna do anything but make me crack down on some poor families that don’t need anymore heartache, yeah?” He says this to the darkness, jopong to provoke a response from the man he believes kidnapped him. “Speaking of-”
It is rare that Black Mask interrupts himself, but for the first time his eyes think they catch movement. It is small, likely involuntary, but off to his right there is someone there.
And it is not the Batman.
“Well shit, never mind. Mind turning on a light? Can’t imagine you can see like this.”
His eyes focus on the spot where he thinks he saw movement, and talks to it like there’s a person there. If they went to the trouble of all this, he’s sure they had taken the small knives and pistol he kept on-hand. Chances were low that he could fight his way out of this, so he had to just hope his fuck-up of a crew could-
“They will not find you.”
It’s a girl’s voice that pierces through the dark. It’s fairly deep, and there’s a growl to it that suggests Black Mask probably slighted its owner at some point. He figured as much, but nice to confirm.
“They’re probably on their way, actually.” He says with confidence. “Since you’ve been so rude to me, I’m afraid the boys aren’t gonna be too sweet on you missy. You wanna do me a favor and tell me your name?”
“You will leave here a changed man.”
Okay, that was pretty funny. Sionis has a good, hearty laugh at that despite the vague numbness in his legs, likely from sitting for too long in such an awkward position.
“In what way?”
“You will give up. You will run. You will pay.”
The feminine voice does a good job at staying consistent, he’ll give her that. If he were weak, the conviction might actually scare him.
But it’s all bluster.
“That’s cute and all, little lady, but you’ve barely even scratched me ‘sides from that awful greeting you gave me earlier. You’re not gonna kill me, and I really doubt you’re gonna torture me. Probably just like that idiot cape, aren’t you?”
He suddenly feels gloved fingers on the back of his neck. He can’t hide his surprise, all the hairs on his body standing on edge, but he remains mostly impassive through his expression; not that it mattered in his mind, anyways. Who could see him in this darkness?
…Then again, someone else made their way over to his front. He felt another's gloved hands poke his forehead.
“It is only you and I here. No one else.”
Great. Goddamn speed freak.
“And? Like I said, you're not gonna-”
“Move.”
Sionis is eager to strangle this woman, that much is true. But he suddenly finds himself unable to even try to turn and attack. He is looking down at the ground, and he can visually tell that the ropes binding him have been undone, now pooled around his feet.
But he cannot move.
Internally, a small bit of panic sets in—natural, given the circumstances—he cannot move, and his ability to speak suddenly fails him too. He cannot even move his eyes through this damn dark. His entire body has gone limp, his mind the only thing able to function.
Is he breathing? He cannot feel his chest rise or fall, and his head limply stares at the floor below. He wants to inhale, but-
How?
It is a strange thing, wondering how to do something your body has instinctively done for all of its natural life. But truly, he is in desperate need to relearn how to breathe. He has no idea if he's suffocating either. Sionis also wonders if this is what the dead feel like, then he remembers that he has no interest in the dead and useless.
“You are not dead.” She speaks like she's reading his mind. “You will not die. Today. You will make her laugh.”
I'm not the Clown, he wants to say, but his body rejects the attempt.
“You will bring a smile to her face. You will offer all you have to repent. You will-”
Sionis suddenly feels the strength return to his body, accompanied by a sensation reminiscent of being pinched. The man groggily jumps to his feet and throws a punch at the source of the voice. It connects on what feels like someone's forehead.
It feels like punching fucking titanium. He knows this is likely his last chance, so Sionis rears his other hand back and thrusts it into where he assumes his kidnappers gut Is with all his might.
He cries out in pain when he feels two of his fingers break.
His kidnapper does not care, however. He no longer hears or even see signs that she was ever in the room, and his usual impatience starts to show.
“Will you cut the shit with the doom and gloom?! Cut on the fucking lights, so I can see who-!”
A small shutter from up above opens slightly, allowing just a bit of moonlight in. Now Sionis could tell that he was in a warehouse; stacks of boxes, crates and the bare space gave that away easily.
But no one else was there.
Having dealt with Batman for so long, he couldn't resist the urge to look up. He expected to find a cape, but-
Nothing.
He spun to look all over the warehouse. There was literally nowhere to truly hide, so whoever had taken him had to have powers. Even Batman could not truly-
“Boo.”
The whisper in his ears sets him off immediately. Sionis throws out a backhand behind him, but makes contact with no one.
After all, no one was behind him.
“The fuck is this, you go invisible too?”
Movement in the corner of his eyes. Something black. He turns-
Gone again.
“Invisible? No.”
The voice is right in his ear again, but the moment he turns around there is no one present but him. He feels his heart rate pick up for the first time in a while, and snarls at the open air as if it is to blame.
“But I am always here. You should know what I am.”
A thought comes to his head. But it's too funny to consider, and he's not in much of a laughing mood right now.
“I am what's going to keep you up at night. The thing that makes your skin crawl, what you think you see un the corner of your eye when you're alone. What keeps you second-guessing your own insanity.”
He hears the voice talking behind him again, but Sionis is not fool enough to turn around again. He lets her speak even as his guess starts to seem more and more likely.
“I am the pride of the man who is your better in every way, and the heart of the girl you took from this world.”
Sionis snorts at such a cheesy line coming from someone he was meant to ‘fear’, and so he turns around slowly.
His smile falls when he sees the ‘face’ of his masked attacker.
“The world knows me as Batgirl. But you, Roman Sionis?”
He has not seen her mask up close before. It intrigues him more than any of the other capes have with how fitting it is to her face; he can tell her every micro-expression under it, and the silent rage he sees is enough to make him consider his next move very carefully.
“You will know me as the one who changed your life.”
The lights flicker in-and-out before enveloping the two in darkness once more. For the first time in a long while, Black Mask thinks to himself that he's finally encountered someone more insane than Batman.
He slowly steps back while holding his arms slightly outwards behind him. If he can just touch the wall, it would be easy enough to visualize the entirety of the warehouse and, hopefully, a way out. Sionis hits a solid wall head-on with his back, surprising-
Wait.
“You got powers, missy?”
The ‘brick wall’ he walked backwards into was just a short and angry girl in a costume. He hoped that she was hot-headed and irrational like that one idiot, someone who'd give In and make mistakes after a bit of prodding.
She does not budge.
“Find your way back to the chair.”
Seriously, this kid was funny.
“No thanks, I prefer to stand. Now I'm gonna ask again; you move better than that weak little freak boss of yours, so I figure he's stepped his recruiting game up. Well?”
He only moves a little. Turning his body towards where he knows the girl is despite the darkness, he only intends on goading her more.
Her response is a palm strike to his shoulder blade.
Black Mask handles pain pretty well, much more so than your average man. When you've been hit by superhero nutjobs just for doing your hobby, you tend to build up a resistance.
But he cannot help the loud curse that escapes his lips when the pain sets in.
“Oh, you fucking-!”
He doesn't even get to finish before she roughly grabs his shoulder and, with a few rushed movements, sets it back in place. The pain only intensifies, and Sionis desperately struggles in Batgirl's grip. Though she had already set his arm back, her astonishingly strong grip had descended down onto his wrist. He could feel his bones wanting to snap just to get the pain over with, but it was like she was applying just enough pressure not to while keeping him on the edge.
“I can set it properly and fix your fingers, or I can leave you with more lasting pain. Sit.”
She says it like a command, an order, and Black Mask feels his blood boil at the insult. But he knows when he is outmatched, and this cape is not someone he can casually deal with.
He stops struggling and her grip wanes. Without her squeezing the life out of his wrist, some feeling returns to his hand at long last. He wants to slug the fuck out of this arrogant brat, but the rational side of him wins and he reluctantly walks towards where he believes the chair to be.
“Right.” She calls out.
He grimaces and feels around towards his right side, eventually finding the chair before taking a seat. Moments later he holds back a cry of pain as she sets his shoulder ‘properly’, though he can tell he's never going to be able to aim straight after this without some medical guru helping him.
“Think the Big Bat wouldn't be happy that his Little Bat is being so rough.”
“It is only you and I here.”
That was fucking ominous.
“He doesn't know you're doing this, does he?”
“Doesn't matter.”
Something he can latch onto.
“Ooh, good news for me. Can't say I like being saved by the Bat, but it'll be fun watching him ground his uppity sidekick.”
“Assumptions.”
He believes he hears uncertainty in her voice, and its something Black Mask intends to pounce on when-
“He will not. And…cannot.”
Unconsciously, Sionis shifts in his seat ever so slightly.
“What, out of town for the week?”
“He would not stop me. But if he tried, I would not let him. No one can stop this.”
Great, she was strong, fast, and a rogue cape. He had heard how similar she was to Batman in action, never particularly having a chance to see for himself just how good she was until now. Unlike the thugs he employed, she was likely around Batman constantly; to be this confident against him, he had no choice but to take her seriously.
Ugh.
“Right, right. And how exactly are you gonna ‘change my life’? Not in the mood to give up what I got. You know how long it takes a white collar man like me to get where I am? The hard work it takes?”
“Manipulation. Torture. Murder. Senseless violence. Not hard work.”
“All valid ways of progressing one's criminal career. And that is hard work, making sure someone doesn't fall unconscious or bleed out when you're torturing them. Though that blonde girl didn't need too much to-”
Throughout the quiet of the warehouse, the sound of a slap echoes throughout the empty building. Sionis’ head is forced to snap to the left, having been backhanded by the Batgirl. It stings more so than a punch most grown men could throw, but he finds himself being grabbed by his chin and pulled upwards before he can reorient himself.
“Spoiler will not be spoken of by you. If I bring her up, and give you permission, you may speak. I will break your jaw if you do anything else but agree.”
This close, he can see the vague form of her mask in the darkness; he sees the still rage where her ‘eyes’ are and her tensed muscles, and it takes only a few moments of internal deliberation before he makes a decision.
“Fine.”
“With more respect.”
He makes the mistake of scoffing; the hand on his chin suddenly forces it's way into his mouth, prying it open by pulling down as another gloved hand grabs at the top of his head. Not wanting to find out just what the fuck she was about to do, he-
“WAIT!” He screams out, slightly garbled thanks to the fingers pulling on his jaw. She stops and waits for him to continue. “Fuck, okay, no more disrespecting the dead. As respectful as a goddamn nun. That work?”
Hands still apply pressure on his head and jaw. He cannot help but theorize just what she's going to do, and just how terrifyingly physical it is for a damn cape in Gotham. Thugs with tools or monsters like Croc were one thing, but this was a girl who sounded young enough to be the daughter of a man his age treating him like a doll.
Without warning she throws him back in the chair, wiping his own saliva on his now dirited suit. He cannot protest for obvious reasons, but he makes his discomfort known with a grimace.
“Actually,” Batgirl says as if an idea has just come to mind, “do not speak unless spoken to. Period. That will make it easier to manage your…rudeness.”
He tenses-
“There is nothing you can say to turn this into a negotiation.”
-and exhales a sigh of defeat through his nose.
“Good response. Sit here until I return.”
It takes a conscious effort to restrain himself from verbally assaulting the brat who wishes to play at being his fucked-up therapist. But Black Mask knows when it is time to heel, to stay patient until the time is right. He knows his men are looking high and low for their leader, it's just a matter of when.
Though, if this girl was anything like that idiot, the how was going to be important for them too.
Lost in his thoughts, it takes him a moment to realize that Batgirl said nothing to him after ordering him to sit. The pain in his still broken fingers (what, did she forget?) reminds him to inflict some heinous fucking torture on her and to hang the costumed corpse from the GCPD when this was done, but in the meantime he'd work on getting out of here.
“Fucking amateur…” He says as he stands up. Black Mask slowly tries walks forward, hoping to find the wall and hopefully a landmark of some kind to help him visualize the room.
He does not walk one full step before getting punched square in the chest.
The grown man is sent flying backwards, falling into and knocking over the chair he'd been sitting in this whole time. He cannot get up; Roman is stuck gasping for air, his body racing to remember how it felt to breathe properly.
“You will listen.”
He's not sure how she did it, but unlike before he can now see white eyes in her cowl mere inches away from his gasping face.
“You will learn.”
Roman attempts to crawl backwards, but Batgirl grabs his face with one hand and lifts him up by it. He can feel the tense muscle in it, how easy it would be for the arm to crush him. But more importantly, he can feel how much she wants to squeeze harder and end it.
But she does no such thing.
Instead she walks, carrying him by his face while his legs drag on the ground. She picks up the fallen chair and throws him back onto it without trouble.
“You can do this however many times you like. You will not be free to return to the outside until I deem it okay. I will break every bone in your monstrous body if that is what it takes to remind your soul what it is like to suffer in agony.”
He wants to bring up how uncharacteristically talkative she is for a Bat-kid (save for that asshat in Bludhaven), but he can almost hear her body preparing itself to shatter his collarbone in response.
“Are we clear, Roman?”
He does not respond. He bares his teeth and tries to breathe through his nose, the man's patience reaching it's upper limits-
“Roman.”
“...Clear.”
“Clear who?”
He should be fucking rewarded for the amount of self-control he uses to not flip the fuck out at that.
“...Clear, Batgirl.”
Somehow, he can hear the smug smile on her face through the dark. It is loud, like a constant alarm ringing in his ears.
“Good. Now stay. I'll fix your fingers tomorrow.”
His mind races with anger, wishing he got to the bottom of Spoiler's identity now. There was clearly an attachment there, something great enough to push Batgirl this far. He just had to-
"I do this in her honor." She interrupts his thoughts with ease. "And you are going to help me atone. That is all you need to know. Nothing else."
She makes a flourish of her cape, the sound burying itself into his mind as he's left once again in the silence of his own mind. He wanted to get up; there was truly nothing stopping him from doing so physically.
But he did not stand up.
It was better to wait. Yes, to bide his time.
He was not afraid. Not of the man, and certainly not the girl.
Not at all.