Puppet Strings

Chapter Three

The iron taste filling his mouth

"I"m so sorry!" He sobbed burying his face into his hands, ignoring the sickening smell as it overwhelmed his enhanced senses. He couldn't bring himself to end the man's misery.

Instead, he kept on stumbling out apologizes as the man lay there in his arms. Phantom faintly remembered the device wirling to life as he cradled the dead man. The nameless man. The man could have had a family and Phantom took him away from them.

Phantom slowly looked up, floating above the man's chest was ectoplasm, floating in place. Phantom fumbled with his belt as he pulled out a glass container, leaning forward he scooped up the ectoplasm and closed the container. It pulsed, seemingly alive.

Phantom stared at it watery-eyed, He felt even worse at the thought that the man would come back as a ghost. A ghost stuck with the GIW. Just like Phantom, maybe he wouldn't be so alone.

Grasping the thought like a lifeline, Phantom slowly stood up, before his eyes shot upwards at the sound of gravel shifting. His breath hitched as he watched the man stare at the body Phantom stood by. His attention slowly turned back towards Phantom. Only to make eye contact with a wall.

Nightwing moved forward, climbing down the building with more agility than Phantom would expect from a human. Phantom floated there for a moment before backing up, he couldn't stay much longer, even with invisibility Nightwing could still find a way to spot him. So Phantom left, shooting up into the night sky.

Nightwing landed on the ground with a sound thump. His eyes scanned the area before pulling up a thermal reading. Nothing, the boy just vanished. How did the boy disappear so quickly? When he arrived, the man was already dead, and the child was sobbing, crying out apologies, and clinging onto the man like it was all he had left in the world.

Nightwing felt his heartbreak at remembering the child's cries. It's how he found the place in the first place. It took him a little bit to narrow down where they were coming from, and by the time he got here, the boy had seemingly calmed down. As much as he could, the boy was shaking so badly, that Nightwing was surprised he was actually able to stand.

Shaking his head, Nightwing moved closer to the body, eyes narrowing at the gaping hole in the man's chest, he didn't notice it before, due to the boy covering it with his own body. The blood, coating the dirty ground, was a little less dense from where the boy was kneeling. He made his way around, careful not to step in the blood.

He stopped behind where the boy was previously kneeling, eyeing the bloody footprints that led away, then just vanished. His lips pressed together before his attention moved to the man's chest, a perfectly circular burn on the man's chest, with an unburned marker in the center shaped like a teardrop.

His finger went up to his ear as he clicked on his comm. Waiting for it to connect. "Hey B-"

A grunt came in response, obviously, Batman was in the middle of something, yet Nightwing continued

"I found something."

"Tt spit it out, Richard." A younger voice came through, obviously annoyed at the intrusion. Nightwing heard grunts before Batman's voice came back.

"Explain."

"I kind of can't." Nightwing tilted his head examining the area. "Your gonna wanna see this yourself."

Silence followed before a sigh. "I'll be there shortly."

A dismayed noise followed before Nightwing disconnected, no reason to listen to Robin argue with the Bat.

Nightwing paced back and forth. Stopping in front of the body and now dried blood. "Took you long enough." He said with a huff turning around to face Batman, who would have just looked like one of the shadows to an untrained eye.

Batman walked past him, kneeling down next to the body, scanning over it. "Report."

"I just started patrol when I heard he a kid screaming." Nightwing watched as Batman's head tilted ever so slightly. "It wasn't a pained scream, more like extreme despair. It took me a little bit to narrow down where it was coming from." Nightwing ignored the disappointment he felt radiating off of Batman. "When I arrived, there was a hooded boy, a white cloak to be exact, with a bloody hand print on the hood, I'm guessing it was from the child in his distress, he reached up and grabbed the hood. The bottom of the cloak probably stained in blood now tha-"

"Nightwing."

"Right, the report. Anyway, the kid was calmer when I arrived, he adjusted the man's shirt and then stood up. I was examining the body and when I looked back to where the kid was he was gone." Nightwing pointed towards the bloody footprints.

"Cameras?"

"All garbled, they were fine until the kid showed up." Nightwing held up a device, playing a recording of the man stumbling into the alley before the video became all fuzzy."

"And bodycam."

"The same thing happened." Nightwing sighed rubbing the back of his neck. "B... what if whatever did this took the kid."

Batman stood up, his cape swooshing behind him. "Send me the autopsy reports." With that, he disappeared into the shadows. Nightwing turned around shaking his head before heading in the same direction.

It had been a long night.

Also, I'm sorry if I get Batman and Nightwing and all them wrong. Again I haven't watched anything or read the comics with the batfam. I literally know nothing about Cass and Duke.

OH also which shows or comics should I watch/read to get a better understanding of them? And for my own personal enjoyment.

Alsoooooo I'm struggling to figure out if things are moving too fast. Does the story seem rushed to you? I really hate it when stories rush and I struggle with finding a way to stretch things out. I have to look over the chapter a few times to make sure it's not too rush.

But then I get a little annoyed at reading my own writing.

Also I'm on tumblr if you just wanna stop by and say hi.

Link is on that little chain button on the bottom of the page.