"Japan shall be restored, at last!"
The cry was loud, joyful. Very removed from the man who had uttered it, so many years before. Now Lighthearter sat at the small bar in the shanty in downtown Tokyo, sunlight streaming in from the large paned windows, bathing him in golden hues. His black hair was cropped short save for a ponytail at the back, which was almost comically well-maintained. He looked haggard and disheveled, a look of utter defeat hanging in his eyes. An old vinyl record player sat before him, the record spinning almost dejectedly. A curved katana sword in its scabbard lay in front of him beside the record player, a shoulder strap lying around it.
"No one can stop me! The Empire of the Rising Sun is reborn!"
A loud crash of shattering glass emanated from the record player. A gravelly voice snarled:
"Give it up, Lighthearter! I'll never let you win."
"My my, you are the persistent one, aren't you, Batman?" Lighthearter heard himself say. The him of the now dropped his head into his hands even as his younger self smiled thinly and coldly. "You certainly followed me quickly after the events at Wayne Enterprises. A friend in the organization?"
"Hunting would-be dictators like you is my hobby."
Lighthearter stared at his sword. So many times since that fateful day in 1997 he had heard Hara-Kiri calling him. Never had he drawn the blade to take his own life, however. No, some weakness always held him back. It was as if he had lost more then his bid for power to Batman. As if his very honor and Japanese nature had been stripped away. He had been a powerful industrialist then - now he was a lowly man on the street, reduced to common thievery to eat. He grimaced, then poured from the bottle of sake on the counter into the small glass in his left hand.
"Most amusing. Now I wish to inquire as to how you found me?"
"Irrelevant." Batman's voice cut into Lighthearter like a knife every time he heard it. He had played this tape hundreds of times over the years. "Give it up. It's over. Your little coup has failed."
"Over?" Lighthearter's past self replied with that self-assurance that only a fool could posses. "It has only begun, Dark Knight - you cannot stop me! Get him!"
Lighthearter remembered his victorious laughter as the four men had charged Batman, each one wielding a katana and a wakizashi, remembered Batman leaping forward and pounding one into the metal wall. Remembered ceasing to laugh and watching open-mouthed as Batman disarmed another attacker with a single flourish and then clipped him with an elbow strike that floored him. Saw the Dark Knight slam the heads of the last two together with a crack!
"It's done." Batman had said. Lighthearter was lost in the memory now, too lost to even notice the tape, or the knock on the door. Gunshots rang from the tape. The sound of a body slamming into the wall was heard.
"Distract the audience with one hand." Lighthearter crooned. "Perform the trick with the other. Distract the Bat with your henchmen, take him out with your Glock semi-automatic. How does it feel to die?"
"I wouldn't know!" Batman roared, surging up to sweep the gun away.
Bruce Wayne leaned back in his chair as the recorder he had worn that day produced the sound of a missed punch, then a shink! of a sword drawn from its scabbard and the clang! of it colliding with his armored pauldron. Barbara Gordon, the Batgirl, listened avidly, her auburn hair shimmering under the lights in Wayne Manor. The sounds of battle continued.
"I was able to drive him away." Bruce said to Barbara, who looked up. "He was defeated, but I couldn't catch him. Lighthearter has been roaming around Japan for the past six years."
"The damage he could have wrought on the globe with the Empire reborn. . . ." Barbara's voice trailed off as she shook her head in wonder. "He could have ruled Asia. All it would have taken would have been the nice words for the US to hear: 'Security Action' 'Restoring Order', and the like. He could have taken the Koreas quickly, and Indonesia and the Philippines soon after. He could have gotten nuclear bombs for Japan easily!"
"Well, he's defeated now." Bruce said with conviction. "I found him based off the Riddler's little clue. I alerted the authorities in Tokyo, and they should be taking him into custody soon. He'll probably be sent to Arkham where I can keep an eye on him, and unless he establishes a rapport with the Joker that'll be the last of him.
"He's finally done."
Lighthearter heard the knock come again, louder, and his eyes fell to his sword. His right hand almost reverently took the hilt and drew the blade a half-inch. Was it time to do what he had always failed to do? Was it?
A call came from the door: "Police - open up!" When Lighthearter remained mesmerized by his sword and another shot of sake, another cry came: "Tanaka!"
Tanaka kicked the door off its hinges and the armed security team began to move in.
Lighthearter had the katana out in a flash and had backflipped across the entire room, slamming into one of the security men with a double-footed kick that knocked him into his fellows. Lighthearter spun out into the hallway of the tenement with a leap, slashing an officer across the front of his uniform. His sword sliced cleanly through, slaying the man instantly. Lighthearter landed and thrust at a slight downward angle, twisting the blade as it penetrated between the next man's shoulder blades and smoothly pulling it out.
Lighthearter leapt in the air and landed next to a man on the other side of the shocked team, one who was raising an MP5 machine gun. A slash and the man's head sailed off. Lighthearter dropped low and rolled between a man's legs, coming up and slicing his legs at the knees to drop him. A vicious kick to his throat shattered his windpipe, killing him. Lighthearter flipped over the next man as another opened fire, Lighthearter using the armored officer as a shield. Lighthearter delivered a terribly potent jumping back side kick to another's face and used the momentum to flip out the glass window. He hooked his hand on the slight ledge and shot into the window on the lower floor.
He whipped a tiny circular device about the size of a CD from his belt, popped a slight bubbly bulge at the top, and tossed the now beeping device onto the ceiling. An instant later, the bomb detonated, bringing a hail of screaming security officers down with it. Lighthearter barreled in. Four slashes and a thrust later, he leaped up through the new hole and back into his room, tossing another bomb above the door as officers followed. Most were floored by the blast of concussive force and rubble. Three slices rang through the hall, and a single cry of "Mercy!".
Only two officers were left standing in the hall - or the building, for that matter. They raised their machineguns and looked around, fear bubbling from their bodies.
"I'm calling it in!" the senior of the two reported in a voice that cracked for the first time in the twenty years since he turned sixteen. He reached for his radio.
The silver sword sliced out, taking his arm off at the shoulder. In a bloody flourish the blade came back up and took his other arm, then sliced upward across his chest. Lighthearter sailed to the other man, chopped his gun in half lengthwise with a single stroke, then seized him by the front of the shirt, pressed the blade of his katana into the back of his neck, holding the blade reversed, and kneed his in the groin with all the force of an excavator arm. He dug the steel sword in. The officer whimpered:
"Please . . . I have two daughters."
Lighthearter understood now. It wasn't weakness that kept him from comminting Hara-Kiri.
It was the divinely given knowledge that his task was not yet complete. That he had never failed.
"I'm not done yet, Batman." Lighthearter said almost lovingly. The officer's eyes widened.
Lighthearter's stroke severed the officer's neck in a single spray of blood. He stepped over to the window and leapt out from seven stories high. He landed unharmed on the ground like a cat and then slid his unmarred blade into its sheath. He pulled out a small communicator and pressed a central button.
"Harachi - meet me in one hour. You know where. The Rising Sun will dawn tomorrow!"
- Lighthearter
The cry was loud, joyful. Very removed from the man who had uttered it, so many years before. Now Lighthearter sat at the small bar in the shanty in downtown Tokyo, sunlight streaming in from the large paned windows, bathing him in golden hues. His black hair was cropped short save for a ponytail at the back, which was almost comically well-maintained. He looked haggard and disheveled, a look of utter defeat hanging in his eyes. An old vinyl record player sat before him, the record spinning almost dejectedly. A curved katana sword in its scabbard lay in front of him beside the record player, a shoulder strap lying around it.
"No one can stop me! The Empire of the Rising Sun is reborn!"
A loud crash of shattering glass emanated from the record player. A gravelly voice snarled:
"Give it up, Lighthearter! I'll never let you win."
"My my, you are the persistent one, aren't you, Batman?" Lighthearter heard himself say. The him of the now dropped his head into his hands even as his younger self smiled thinly and coldly. "You certainly followed me quickly after the events at Wayne Enterprises. A friend in the organization?"
"Hunting would-be dictators like you is my hobby."
Lighthearter stared at his sword. So many times since that fateful day in 1997 he had heard Hara-Kiri calling him. Never had he drawn the blade to take his own life, however. No, some weakness always held him back. It was as if he had lost more then his bid for power to Batman. As if his very honor and Japanese nature had been stripped away. He had been a powerful industrialist then - now he was a lowly man on the street, reduced to common thievery to eat. He grimaced, then poured from the bottle of sake on the counter into the small glass in his left hand.
"Most amusing. Now I wish to inquire as to how you found me?"
"Irrelevant." Batman's voice cut into Lighthearter like a knife every time he heard it. He had played this tape hundreds of times over the years. "Give it up. It's over. Your little coup has failed."
"Over?" Lighthearter's past self replied with that self-assurance that only a fool could posses. "It has only begun, Dark Knight - you cannot stop me! Get him!"
Lighthearter remembered his victorious laughter as the four men had charged Batman, each one wielding a katana and a wakizashi, remembered Batman leaping forward and pounding one into the metal wall. Remembered ceasing to laugh and watching open-mouthed as Batman disarmed another attacker with a single flourish and then clipped him with an elbow strike that floored him. Saw the Dark Knight slam the heads of the last two together with a crack!
"It's done." Batman had said. Lighthearter was lost in the memory now, too lost to even notice the tape, or the knock on the door. Gunshots rang from the tape. The sound of a body slamming into the wall was heard.
"Distract the audience with one hand." Lighthearter crooned. "Perform the trick with the other. Distract the Bat with your henchmen, take him out with your Glock semi-automatic. How does it feel to die?"
"I wouldn't know!" Batman roared, surging up to sweep the gun away.
Bruce Wayne leaned back in his chair as the recorder he had worn that day produced the sound of a missed punch, then a shink! of a sword drawn from its scabbard and the clang! of it colliding with his armored pauldron. Barbara Gordon, the Batgirl, listened avidly, her auburn hair shimmering under the lights in Wayne Manor. The sounds of battle continued.
"I was able to drive him away." Bruce said to Barbara, who looked up. "He was defeated, but I couldn't catch him. Lighthearter has been roaming around Japan for the past six years."
"The damage he could have wrought on the globe with the Empire reborn. . . ." Barbara's voice trailed off as she shook her head in wonder. "He could have ruled Asia. All it would have taken would have been the nice words for the US to hear: 'Security Action' 'Restoring Order', and the like. He could have taken the Koreas quickly, and Indonesia and the Philippines soon after. He could have gotten nuclear bombs for Japan easily!"
"Well, he's defeated now." Bruce said with conviction. "I found him based off the Riddler's little clue. I alerted the authorities in Tokyo, and they should be taking him into custody soon. He'll probably be sent to Arkham where I can keep an eye on him, and unless he establishes a rapport with the Joker that'll be the last of him.
"He's finally done."
Lighthearter heard the knock come again, louder, and his eyes fell to his sword. His right hand almost reverently took the hilt and drew the blade a half-inch. Was it time to do what he had always failed to do? Was it?
A call came from the door: "Police - open up!" When Lighthearter remained mesmerized by his sword and another shot of sake, another cry came: "Tanaka!"
Tanaka kicked the door off its hinges and the armed security team began to move in.
Lighthearter had the katana out in a flash and had backflipped across the entire room, slamming into one of the security men with a double-footed kick that knocked him into his fellows. Lighthearter spun out into the hallway of the tenement with a leap, slashing an officer across the front of his uniform. His sword sliced cleanly through, slaying the man instantly. Lighthearter landed and thrust at a slight downward angle, twisting the blade as it penetrated between the next man's shoulder blades and smoothly pulling it out.
Lighthearter leapt in the air and landed next to a man on the other side of the shocked team, one who was raising an MP5 machine gun. A slash and the man's head sailed off. Lighthearter dropped low and rolled between a man's legs, coming up and slicing his legs at the knees to drop him. A vicious kick to his throat shattered his windpipe, killing him. Lighthearter flipped over the next man as another opened fire, Lighthearter using the armored officer as a shield. Lighthearter delivered a terribly potent jumping back side kick to another's face and used the momentum to flip out the glass window. He hooked his hand on the slight ledge and shot into the window on the lower floor.
He whipped a tiny circular device about the size of a CD from his belt, popped a slight bubbly bulge at the top, and tossed the now beeping device onto the ceiling. An instant later, the bomb detonated, bringing a hail of screaming security officers down with it. Lighthearter barreled in. Four slashes and a thrust later, he leaped up through the new hole and back into his room, tossing another bomb above the door as officers followed. Most were floored by the blast of concussive force and rubble. Three slices rang through the hall, and a single cry of "Mercy!".
Only two officers were left standing in the hall - or the building, for that matter. They raised their machineguns and looked around, fear bubbling from their bodies.
"I'm calling it in!" the senior of the two reported in a voice that cracked for the first time in the twenty years since he turned sixteen. He reached for his radio.
The silver sword sliced out, taking his arm off at the shoulder. In a bloody flourish the blade came back up and took his other arm, then sliced upward across his chest. Lighthearter sailed to the other man, chopped his gun in half lengthwise with a single stroke, then seized him by the front of the shirt, pressed the blade of his katana into the back of his neck, holding the blade reversed, and kneed his in the groin with all the force of an excavator arm. He dug the steel sword in. The officer whimpered:
"Please . . . I have two daughters."
Lighthearter understood now. It wasn't weakness that kept him from comminting Hara-Kiri.
It was the divinely given knowledge that his task was not yet complete. That he had never failed.
"I'm not done yet, Batman." Lighthearter said almost lovingly. The officer's eyes widened.
Lighthearter's stroke severed the officer's neck in a single spray of blood. He stepped over to the window and leapt out from seven stories high. He landed unharmed on the ground like a cat and then slid his unmarred blade into its sheath. He pulled out a small communicator and pressed a central button.
"Harachi - meet me in one hour. You know where. The Rising Sun will dawn tomorrow!"
- Lighthearter
