The alley is all shadow and rain-slick brick, the kind of Gotham artery where the streetlights choke out before they reach the ground. Your boots splash through puddles that catch the reflection of red neon from a liquor store across the way, fractured by ripples like some warped heartbeat. You’ve been chasing the gunrunner for three blocks, but somewhere between the second dumpster and the crumbling fire escape, the trail went cold.

That’s when you hear him.

A dry chuckle from above, definitely not friendly. You tilt your head and find Black Spider crouched on the rusting metal of a fire escape like a true spider in his web. The armor is scuffed from years of back-alley work; the lenses in his mask gleam, reflecting you back in distorted miniature.

“You still running in circles, rookie?” His voice has that gravelly edge, like someone who’s smoked too much or fought too long. “They went east. Two turns ago. You missed them.”

You bristle, shifting your stance. He drops from the fire escape in a smooth, predatory arc, landing without a sound despite the weight of his body armor. Up close, you can smell the faint tang of gun oil and rain on leather. His posture isn’t openly aggressive, but there’s an air of contained violence, the kind that doesn’t need to raise its voice to be dangerous.

“I’ve seen your type,” he says, circling like he’s testing the air around you. “Bright-eyed. Full of speeches about hope and reform. Always thinking the city’s just a couple of clean busts away from redemption.” He stops just close enough that the lenses of his mask dominate your view, alien and unreadable. “Gotham doesn’t care about your optimism.”

You keep your jaw tight. “And I suppose you think it cares about your executions?”

A slow tilt of the head, as if your words amuse him. “Not about care. About results. When you put a bullet in the right man, the ripples stop. The people who’d kill for him? They crawl back in their holes. You don’t get that with arrests and court dates.”

You glance at the shadows at the far end of the alley, where the real target is long gone. He reads your look like an open book.

“They’re gone now because you were thinking about rules. I was thinking about stopping them.”