NOVEL NEXT Chapter 37 – Hunting the Syndicates (Part 1)
Night time at Metropolis, and amidst the loud busy night of the never sleeping city was a building under construction.
It’s the new Wayne Enterprises Subsidiaries called the Wayne Financial Building.
Although it’s officially still in an “Under construction” state, the whole building was basically already ready to use and open.
“Makes sense since this building was originally one of the Wayne Enterprises office in Metropolis before my brother finally rebuild the internal structures and then rebranded the whole building as the new Wayne Financial Building.”
The building was once a normal tall office building under the Wayne Enterprises contract before Bruce Wayne took control over the whole enterprises.
And now, with the help of one of Bruce’s greatest ally, Lucius Fox, this building became a lot grander and better looking, and might possibly became a great pillar in Metropolis once it’s done, which may one day rival that of the LexCorp Tower.
“Heh, I should convince my brother to just stop becoming the Batman and just focus on becoming the world’s richest businessman. No, actually never mind… I’ll be letting his enemies breathe easy if that were to happen.”
Matthias, who was sitting on top of another skyscraper near the Wayne Financial Building, was actually observing his phone tablet screen that shows the views from the drones he had sent on several different places.
What places are the drones sent to? Of course it’s the places of the criminal syndicates that had set up shop somewhere in the undergrounds of Metropolis.
Thanks to the help of one of his “friend” in Utopia Casino, Matthias has found out the exact locations of the hideouts. All he need to do was to scout the places, and then destroy them.
“Well, I’ll be sure to thank Tony after I’m done.”
After looking on the phone tablet for a while, Matthias then prepped himself.
He tapped his tablet, and the video feed on the screen shows that the drones are moving.
“It’s time for action.”
... ... …
Somewhere in the harbors of Metropolis, there was a place beneath a closed and abandoned storage area that is now used as a hub for a criminal syndicate residing in the city.
This is not the only location, but it is the largest criminal circle in Metropolis, connected with another association within Atlantic City and becoming a main hub for smuggling weapons and drugs, human trafficking, assassinations, and other criminal activities.
At day, the place was used as a gambling site and a workshop as a front, but at night, the front façade disappears all the while revealing its filth within.
…
Inside the spacious storage building in the corners of the Metropolis harbor, a group of men in various clothing are occupying the whole building.
Several men were rounded up on a long metallic table. On the side facing the entrance of the building were several men dressed in thick jackets and cargo pants, while those on the side that came from the entrance were four men dressed in shirts and dark colored suits, one of which was carrying a briefcase.
Seems like a deal was about to be made, tonight.
“Good evening, gentlemen…” one man in the thick jacket group moved closer on the metallic table, seemingly acting as the leader of the group,
“… it’s time we proceed with the deal, yea?”
One man in the group of suits who carried a briefcase walked forward,
“You have what we want?”
“Of course! … but we’ll only show you after we see the dough…”
As the jacket leader ended his statements, the man in suit puts down the briefcase, and turned the side of the flap facing the jackets.
“Allrighty! Let’s see if you deserve our…”
… the jacket leader opened the briefcase…
“Just hurry and give us the weapons.” The man in suit shouted.
“What’s with the hurry, friends? You’ll all get the toys. It’s not like the Superman will somehow crash our party and whoop our asses, right?”
The jacket group lightly chuckled, but the men in suits aren’t, and were just simply looking at each other.
“You forgot the Wraith…” said one of the men in suit.
“… the what, now?”
“Wraith. Don’t any of your people were being hunted down by him, one by one?”
The jackets weren’t laughing anymore, and the suits continued,
“Sure, Superman is also a problem, but he’s only mostly active at day, and also will only strike when a crime is happening. But the Wraith? It’s almost the same story as in Gotham City. A guy dressed in black attacking thugs at night, and disappears at dawn. The only difference is that he sheds blood.”
Fear shows up in the faces of the jacket group. The stories around Gotham about the famous “Batman” attacking thugs, gangsters, criminals, and mafias have been circulating, and they mostly tell of the horrors this Dark Knight have resulted.
With the stories of the sudden lump of darkness swooping down from the skies and voices of horrified and pained screams, and then the next scene were several men, though all alive, are mostly left with broken bones, traumatic injuries, and some were also left hanging upside down on wires tied on their legs.
In fact, ironically, most if not all thugs, gangsters, and mafias are all more terrified of Batman than they are of Superman.
Funny…
And now? There are two terrifying figures clad in black who fought criminals, only this one does not shy away from killing, albeit not every time.
The Dark Knight in Gotham… and the Lurking Wraith in Metropolis.
“… heh, fine.”
The jacket leader gestured his people behind him.
“Get one of the crates on the table.”
The jackets carried a long wooden crate, and then pried it open with a crowbar.
Inside were several assault rifles; ‘Heckler & Koch G36’, military standard.
One of the suits took one of the firearms, inspected it, and then gave a thumbs up to the leading man.
The men with suits closed the lid of the wooden case, and started carrying it.
“We got what we wanted, now let’s- huh…?”
Soon as the leading suit was about to end the deal, he noticed the subtle changes around him; a significant amount of dark mist is filling the entire room of the building they’re in.
“Smokes? Are you burning something?” one of the men suit asked.
“… no, we don’t…”
Understanding the black smokes are not something normal, the group of jackets and suits were all taking out their weapons; the men in jackets were either pulling out handguns or submachineguns, while the men in suits dropped the wooden crate and armed themselves with the rifles.
…
Matthias, dressed in Wraith gear was hiding on the inner frame of the building’s roof, right above the henchmen.
‘So they’ve noticed.’
Matthias has been slowly filling his black mist inside the building. His plan was to completely blanket the entire room before striking, but he has found something that might worth improvising his plan to attack.
‘Time to get creative.’
Matthias pulls out several of his explosive knives from his utility belt and then repositioned himself near the wooden crates behind the group of jacketed henchmen.
There were several piles of wooden crates, but when the jacketed henchmen were to pick up the one with the weapons in it, they had to pick some on top of it, and then pick that certain wooden crate out of the pile.
This means that not all of the piles are filled with weapons, or any kinds of smuggled goods.
Matthias preps his knives, and then he aimed.
*Swish!*
Several knives were thrown, and with thudding noises, they all embedded firmly into the crates.
“What was that?!”
One of them shouted. The noise of the knives hitting the crates are loud enough for everyone to hear, but they still can’t pinpoint Matthias’ position thanks to the black mist his body produced.
Matthias then grabbed something from his left waist; a black tactical sword, the blade is straight unlike the Katana which have a slight curve on the blade. It’s made of reinforced aluminum, and its blade had several hollowed spots meant to decrease the overall weight, increasing swinging speed.
A perfect close ranged weapon to kill.
Matthias unsheathed the sword.
*Shiiiing…* the blade’s metallic screech echoed throughout the room.
Some of the henchmen heard the metallic screech, and tried to pinpoint the source of the noise,
when…
*Psshhhh!*
*Stab!*
“Aaargh!”
Someone screamed in pain as a small harpoon penetrates one of his legs. Matthias had just shot his grappling hook straight at it, and then he pressed a button.
The hook at the tip of the harpoon gripped on the man’s bleeding leg while the wire pulls him upwards.
The man fell face first on the floor, and then got his whole body lifted to the roof leg first.
“Shit! Above us!”
“Where?!”
“I can’t fucking see in this damned smoke thing!”
Matthias put his grappler holstered back to his belt, and jumped down. He had his blade pointing downwards, and he struck at one of the men in suit by the shoulder.
“Graaaagh!”
He fell down sideways as Matthias dropped down on him. Matthias pulled the blade out of his body, and melted together with the mists before the others can have a change to retaliate.
“Shit… how’s he doing that?!”
Everyone’s on guard. Fear plastered on their faces as the sweat drops from their faces.
“Aargh!”
Another one screamed.
“Ooorghh!”
And just as quickly, another one followed suit.
The henchmen were panicking.
“YOU FUCKER!!!”
One of them prepped their weapon with a click sound, and took several shots around the smoke.
*Bang*
*Bang*
*Bang*
*Bang*
Several shots were made in random directions.
“OI! What the hell are you doing!”
One henchman tried to stop the one shooting randomly, but before he can stop it, a knife came swooshing and struck at the shooter right on his left eye.
“Fuck!”
Seeing this horrifying scene, the others quickly aimed at random spot in the mist, and fire.
! ! !
*Bang* *Bang* *Bang*
*Bang* *Bang* *Bang*
*Bang* *Bang* *Bang*
*Bang* *Bang* *Bang*
! ! !
Bullets flying around in the building, all in hopes of hitting their mark.
‘Foolish…’
Matthias overlooked from above. He prepped his sword on his right hand, and a switch on his left.
“It’s time to end this.”
Then he pressed the switch...