Dinosaurs Strike

The phone in the command room rang.

Commissioner Gordon's heart skipped a beat.

With a jolt, he shoved back his desk and stood up. His footsteps thudded as he walked to the phone, snatched up the receiver, and said:

"Hello, Commissioner Gordon speaking."

A bad feeling rose in his chest, and it soon reached its peak.

"What? Didn't we agree to cover the area with artillery fire? Are you kidding me?"

Cold sweat immediately broke out across Jim Gordon's forehead.

"Why are you throwing the remaining twenty thousand men in all at once??? That's completely meaningless—it'll only cause more casualties!"

He slammed his hand onto the desk. "Mayor Carlo and I already made a decision. Whose orders are you relaying?"

"I'm sorry, Commissioner Gordon, but those are the orders I received," the communications officer on the other end replied politely. "And Commissioner Gordon, you've been relieved of command. The troops must depart immediately and head to..."

"Damn it, I'm going to see Carlo!"

"Has the Joker gotten into his brain!? I will never allow such a stupid ord—"

With a bang, the door was shoved open. Two broad-shouldered soldiers entered, assault rifles slung across their backs.

The two armed intruders put everyone in the command room on edge. Quite a few Gotham police officers put their hands on their waists.

The communications officer continued through Gordon's receiver:

"...and I'm very sorry, but to prevent you from doing anything rash, we must..."

The two soldiers finished for him:

"...temporarily take you to the holding cell. We're very sorry, Commissioner. This way."

Commissioner Gordon took off his glasses. He was no longer young. Wrinkles had already appeared on his face, and gray had quietly crept into his temples.

The muscles that had once filled out his body in his youth had withered with time, and even his height had shrunk a little.

"Don't stop me." Gordon removed his glasses and stared up into the eyes of the two tall soldiers. "Carlo told me..."

"These are Mayor Carlo's orders," the soldier interrupted him, polite but firm. "And the mayor's orders are that he doesn't wish to see you. I'm sorry, but we're only following orders, Commissioner."

The two of them unslung their assault rifles and held them in their hands.

Gordon took a deep breath.

"Keep an eye on Bane's three subordinates."

He gave the instruction to his men.

And so, as Jim Gordon followed the two soldiers out of the temporary command room, he saw squads upon squads of soldiers running forward beneath their officers' shouts in the setting sun. Tanks and armored vehicles rumbled, while the heads of fully equipped troops filled the long street as far as the eye could see.

"That's right, no matter how strong he is, he's only one man!"

"One! Two! Three!"

"Capture Bane alive!"

"Third column! Third column!"

"Don't worry, soldiers! We're all human. There are so many of us that even if each man spat once, we could drown Bane!"

Gordon regretted it somewhat.

Mayor Carlo's decision was absolutely abnormal. If only he hadn't argued so strongly for Batman to avoid the National Guard back then; if only Batman were here now...

He watched the regular army flowing forward like a tide, filled with worry.

Could they really defeat Bane?

"We have tanks." One of the soldiers beside him noticed his concern and couldn't help speaking up. "An army of twenty thousand men, plus countless armored vehicles and twenty tanks. I heard that Bane guy is some kind of superhuman, huh?"

"How many divisions can a superhuman fight?"

The soldier beside him chimed in, "The previous two thousand men couldn't take him down, but twenty thousand still can't capture him?"

What else could Gordon say? He sighed again.

"I hope so."

"Batman, are you planning to make a move?"

Robin swallowed.

In the distance, a loop of vines had wrapped around Ms. Vick's foot. She had driven her two katanas into the ground, but it was useless. Amid a burst of screams, she was finally dragged into the air.

Welding Dog charged forward, tightly clutching the dead dog he had somehow pulled out again. But the next second, he was sent flying by a plant fist rising from beneath Plant Master's feet. He rolled dozens of times across the ground, his limbs twisted grotesquely, yet the next moment he climbed back up as though nothing had happened and charged forward again.

Robin quietly said to Chen Tao, "Don't think I don't know, um..."

Robin had originally wanted to say, "Don't think I don't know you can turn into a dinosaur and a car now," but he quickly realized that the Batman before him was not the Bruce Wayne he had known before, the one skilled at beating people up, but an entirely new personality.

So he changed his question. "Are you planning to get involved personally?"

Over on the other side, Plant Master took another bite of Swamp Thing's tuber. Countless trees and herbaceous plants madly converged on his body, becoming part of him. His already nearly two-meter-tall frame gradually swelled, becoming ever less human.

Chen Tao thought for 0.1 seconds, then decisively said, "I have never been fond of fighting."

"Help! Batman!!! If you don't come help soon, I'm going to die!!! Once I'm in hell, I'll curse you for all eternity!!!"

With Dizzy Earl and Deathshot assisting her, Cheshire Cat was fighting Plant Master alone, and she truly could not hold on any longer.

Seeing Batman and Robin standing leisurely to the side, pointing and whispering to each other, even chuckling now and then, like elementary school kids on a spring outing, she could not help but feel rage rise within her.

"I'm going on strike!" she shouted. "I'm a cat! Not a donkey!"

She yelled, "If you still won't help, I'm leading this big guy straight over to you!"

Ms. Vick finally swung her blade and severed the vines that had grabbed her legs and dragged her into the air.

She lay sprawled on the ground, gasping for breath, without a trace left of a British noblewoman's elegance and composure.

"Exactly!" she loudly agreed. "We need help!"

She planted her katana into the ground, then leaned against a tree in utter exhaustion, panting heavily. "I really can't do this anymore. My head is spinning. The thing I hate most in this world is roller coasters! Bleurgh! I feel like I'm about to—"

Before she could finish, she vomited up a disgusting lump at the tree's roots, perfectly demonstrating the truth that even beautiful women vomited.

Wait.

A tree?

As Ms. Vick screamed again after vines dragged her into the air, Chen Tao let out a long sigh and slowly stepped forward.

His bearing was so extraordinary, his expression so composed, that Plant Master could not possibly ignore his presence.

Plant Master stopped what he was doing. Ignoring Cheshire Cat, who had retreated to the side to gasp for breath, he fixed both eyes on the man before him.

"Ah, why do I have to be the one to step in every time?" Chen Tao sighed.

He took one step!

In an instant, silvery-white phantom particles roared and moaned across his body, and his frame abruptly shot upward.

Second step!

Sharp fangs and claws replaced his ordinary limbs. The silvery-white particles curled back, forging golden arm guards over his arms.

Third step!

A massive green, bat-suited dinosaur appeared where Chen Tao had just stood and threw back its head in a furious roar!

The scene, like a Gold Saint transforming, left Plant Master dumbfounded, so much so that he did not even think to attack during the transformation.

"The Red?"