War Journal Entry # 234
I Arrived in the latest war zone the other night. My arrival went unnoticed. I've learned that this city has its own set of costumed protectors. They obviously haven't been doing a very good job. The enemy just scored a major victory the same night I arrived. Several of their Criminals escaped from a maximum security facility. I have already tracked one down, and now it's time for Punishment.
It's after 11:00 pm at the Gamma Pi Sorority House at Gotham University.The house is unusually quiet tonight. None of the girls are watching TV in the common room. None of them are chatting with their boyfriends over the phone. In fact they aren't even sleeping. They had a visitor this evening. One they didn't expect. One they didn't want. One they couldn't survive. Sitting on the kitchen floor, Victor Zsasz is searching for a place to cut five new tallies into his body.
"Victor Zsasz," says a raspy voice from out of the shadows.
Zsasz gets up to his feet, the large kitchen knife he had slit the college girls' throats with held at the ready. "That you Bats?" asks the psycho killer.
"You killed five girls tonight," says the voice, "Five girls after God only knows how many."
"Oh, I know how many," says Victor as he points to his tally marks.
"It's time you were punished."
"You gonna take me back to Arkham, Batman?"
"No." "Uh..Why not?"
The man who was speaking steps Out from the shadows, "Because I'm not Batman."
The man is wearing a long black leather trench coat. Under that he's wearing a full suit of body armor, much like what S.W.A.T. officers wear in the field. He has military issue boots on his feet, On his hands he's wearing black Kevlar gloves. The only part of this man's body that aren't covered in black Kevlar or black leather are his head, which is uncovered, and his chest, which has a large white skull painted on it.
Zsasz tries to stab this stranger by bringing the kitchen knife down in an overhead motion. The stranger catches Zsasz by the wrist with one hand, twisting his arm, then striking him in the side of the ribs with his other hand, forcing the killer's arm out straight. Then in one fluid motion, the man brings his elbow down on Zsasz's arm, right above the joint, bending it backwards and breaking it. Zsasz screams in agony. The stranger then knees Zsasz in the gut, doubling him over. Then a quick knee to the face knocks the killer back into the wall. The stranger grabs Zsasz by the throat and holds him pinned to the kitchen wall. He reaches into his trench coat, behind his back, and pulls out a very large, very sharp looking, Bowie knife. "You killed five girls tonight," says the stranger. He shoves the blade of the Bowie knife into Victor Zsasz's gut, just under the left side of the ribcage. Then he pushes down on the handle, cutting the abdomen from rib to pelvis. "That's one," says the stranger. Then he pulls the knife out and stabs him again, this time just a couple inches to the left of the first cut. Once again, he cuts through the abdomen from rib to pelvis. "That's two." The stranger repeats the cuts two more times, until Victor Zsasz has four long vertical cuts going down his abdomen.
"And this," says the stranger, "makes five." And with that, he slashes the killer deeply across the abdomen, leaving him with five lethal tally marks.
"Wh . . . Who . . . are . . . you?" asks Victor Zsasz as the stranger is walking away.
From the Shadows comes the reply "The Punisher."
ALL CHARACTERS AND SETTINGS ARE PROPERTY OF DC COMICS OR MARVEL
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Batman: Punishing Gotham - 3
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