Batman Begins/Dark Knight 1. Chapter 1

One month. One week. Three days.

Forty one days all together.

It felt like an eternity. Every tick of the clock boring into her skull.

TICK TICK TICK.

All that time alone. She hadn't had contact with anyone since she had gotten out of the sewers. The pantry and refrigerator once filled now bare. Two cans of beans, a can of fruit cocktail and one half empty box of spaghetti were all that remained. It would only last another day or two. She should have started rationing sooner. But she didn't and now she was going to have to face the city outside soon.

It was a different place out there now. The constant stream of reports on the television told the sad tale. Thousands dead, and just as many missing. Complete city blocks were gone. The Gotham City Museum of Art as well. Priceless paintings and sculptures destroyed by a blaze that had set to push the people who had taken refuge in it out into the open, where they were picked off.

After the first week, no one had bothered to try to break in again. She was thankful for that. Six times, six times that first week she sat in the corner of her bedroom, waiting. Waiting for the door to crash in and for her life to end.

But it didn't happen and she was still here. She had wasted most of the day debating, whether or not to leave, whether or not to eat, whether or not she should just end it now. That thought had been crossing her mind more often now, the idea of ending it, here with the idea of it being peaceful and not having it brutally stripped from her when they finally broke in, or when she finally ventured outside in search of food.

That is one of the worst parts of being alone for so long, there is all the time in the world to think.

She needed to pull herself together or she wouldn't get anything done. 'Look at that, it is already late. All this moping around has gotten you nowhere. Go ahead and eat, it is probably just low blood sugar talking.' She thought as she physically shook herself, attempting to rid her mind of the depressive thoughts that had been plaguing her.

Leaving the couch for the first time in hours, her muscles stretched and complained at their lack of use and sustenance. The loud grumble in her stomach, along with the dizzying sway of vertigo told her she made the correct decision. She cracked open the can of fruit salad, and dug in with a fork. The overly sweet pieces melted in her mouth, her headache subsiding as she drank down the last bits of pulp and corn syrup from the can. She opened one of the cans of black beans and set them to soak overnight, deciding tomorrow.

'Tomorrow will be a much better day to go looking for more supplies.' She told herself as she sprinkled some pepper over the beans before heading back to the couch.

She settled in after turning off the single light she had on. The evening was drawing near, the winter sky darkening earlier and earlier. She flipped the channels on the television, stopping on a movie she had seen many times. The characters and plot familiar and friendly enough to watch again. That was the odd thing, in the first few weeks as the city crumbled, the power would flicker and cut out. It was never off for more than a few hours though, and it hadn't gone out at all in last three weeks. It was as though he wanted everyone to have the comfort of electricity as their worlds collapsed around them.

Outside her little apartment on the third floor of the building on Davis Avenue, the sky darkened slowly from a blaze of color into the dark sky of night. The streets empty, no one out in the chilly weather of early December. The only people who roamed the streets were his men, armed with high-powered rifles and smaller submachine guns, their bodies decked out in bullet-proof armor. Anyone who was still left knew better than to roam around at night, it would just give them an excuse to kill you. He had spoke of taking back the city, well scurrying around like rats to avoid getting shot or worse doesn't seem like the people took it back.

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_Hey guys, part 2 is finally here. As a reminder I do not own anything related to this story nor do I profit from it. Shae is my original character and a few others are my original characters and that's about it._


	2. Chapter 2

Shae awoke the next morning, feeling really productive and ready to face the world. Making the bed, she set out a warm outfit to wear, including her winter pea coat. Glancing through the mini-blinds she watched fat flurries drift down from the gray heavens. With that, she grabbed a hat and gloves and tossed them onto the bed as well.

Deciding to get dressed after she ate and cleaned up, she headed to the kitchen. The beans had plumped up considerably overnight. Instead of one cup of food, she now had two and a half. Draining them, she dumped half of them into a frying pans, and left the other half in the bowl after deciding to save some for later as well. As the pan started to heat the beans, she sprinkled some pepper and parsley over them then went to go feed Sampson.

Grabbing his flakes from the top of the TV stand, she moseyed over to the bookshelf .that held his 10 gallon tank. After clicking the light on, she flipped the top, sprinkling a pinch in.

"Good morning Mr Sampson. How did you sleep?" she smiled as she bent down to glance around the

tank to see where he was hanging out. As soon as she saw him, her heart sank. Floating belly up in the corner, his orange and white speckled body bobbed in the light waves from the filter's pump, his big bubble eyes staring blankly into the wall.

"Oh no" Shae whined as tears filled her eyes. She had known he was getting old, and that he couldn't live for ever. It still hurt that he had died when there was no one else.

The tears slid quietly down her cheeks as she went and stirred the beans once before sliding them onto a clean plate. After managing to choke down the bland meal, she tried to figure out what she should do with her sweet little fishy.

Thirty minutes later, she realized there really wasn't anything she could do better than flushing him. As awful as it sounded, there was no where she could bury him, and even if she did, who was to say that something wouldn't dig him up and eat him.

Once his quiet and private funeral was over, Shae sat down on the couch and cried until her chest hurt, sobbing while choking back the gags. The one constant in her life was gone. His little friendly eyes would no longer greet her, she would no longer get to imagine he listened and understood when she talked to him. He would no longer be the bright, happy spot in her little rundown apartment, in her miserable little life.

The day went by slowly, the pep she had in the morning flushed down the drain along with her little buddy. She ate another handful of the beans mid-afternoon before settling on to the couch to mope. Not feeling like reading, she once again flipped channels until she found something she wouldn't mind glazing at mindlessly.

Laying on the couch, sound asleep, a single trickle of saliva dripping from the corner of her lip. Grumbling in her sleep, she tosses the head against the worn out arm, the blanket pulls from of her feet, leaving them exposed to the chilled air. Her freckled nostrils flare with a sharp inhale, twitching once more as her olfactory receptors pick up a scent in the air. A grimace crosses her sleeping features, as a second inhale confirms the scent her body had picked up.

Her blue-green eyes crack open as her brain urges her body awake. It takes her a moment before her consciousness picks up on the urgency.

Her eyes shift to the ceiling, noticing the growing cloud of smoke blanketing it.

Shae is up and moving, the quick burst of adrenaline hits her nervous system quickly shaking off the haze of recent sleep.

"Shit. Shit. Shit" falls from her lips as she runs to the kitchen, her mind trying to reason that maybe she fell asleep with something on the stove.

No such luck, the only thing that lurks in the kitchen is the remnants of the can of beans she set to soak two nights before. Racing towards her bedroom, she finally notices that the power isn't on. Flicking the switch for her lamp proves useless. Slamming two of her bags onto the mattress, she rushes to fill them with the necessities. Several pairs of warm pants, some undershirts and sweaters, socks, two bras and a few changes of panties.

Stripping out of the sleep shirt she had been in few the last few days, she quickly dresses in the outfit she had set out the previous day, remembering to layer to keep warm. After sliding on two pairs of socks, she quickly laces her combat boots before grabbing the worn sneakers, squeezing them into the top of the larger duffel.

Coat, hat, gloves. Check, check, check. She scrambles, trying to think of what she will need, what she might be forgetting. Finally fully dressed with two bags packed, the haze of smoke thickens, steadily filling the air. Jerking the backpack on, she tosses the duffel bag over a shoulder and makes her way back to the kitchen.

The unopened can of black beans goes in a pocket, a water bottle from the fridge goes in another. The black smoke smothering the apartment, coughing and gagging as it burns the back of her throat. The increase in temperature urges her on as droplets of sweat appear above her brow. She finally makes her way back to the living, a smile tugs her lips up in relief as she spies the emergency drop ladder hooked in place under the window.

Pushing the heavy window open, she hooks the ladder over the sill. Pulling the string that held it together, the metal rungs clanged against the building as it unfurled . As the smoke billows passed her head, she glances back at her home, knowing it was going to burn like other parts of the city already have.

Shae eases herself onto the sill, straddling it and then stupidly looks down. Her ladder ends short, she guesses eight to ten feet above the ground. Flames flicker out of the broken windows of the first floor, their burning tongues licking the bottom rung. Raising her eyes to the street, she notices there is no mob of Bane's men waiting to kill her and anyone else who comes out of flaming building.

A deep breath to steady herself, she makes sure both bags are secure and swings her other leg over before slowly, and steadily making her way down the metal and nylon ladder.

She makes it down to just below second floors window, she steadies herself and slips the duffel bag from her arm, letting it drop to the dead snow-covered shrubbery below. Next she drops down her bookbag. She makes her way down the last few rungs, their metal hot, stinging her hands.

The heat is so intense, the flames from the buildings first floor mere inches below her booted feet. Not being able to make it to the last rung she gives up on closing the space to ground safely.

She whispers to herself "You can do this".Her eyes clenched tight, she jumps those final feet, pushing off the rungs while trying to aim for the same dead bush as her bags.

She lands feet first with a thud, the shrubs dry branches snapping from the force of her landing. She sits there, for a moment, catching her breath as the fear subsides. Noting no pain as she gets to her feet, she smiles at her lack of injury and grabs her bags. A thought squeezes in to her mind as she glances back at the flaming building, 'Where do I go now?'


End file.
