Chapter 299: The Savage Land
The Hulk had already engaged the dinosaurs inside Baxter Building. The figure who appeared suddenly before Susan, Reed, and Johnny was naturally Batman.
When Reed personally controlled it, Batman couldn't hack Baxter Building's defensive systems due to insufficient computational power in his hardware.
But with Reed unconscious now, forcing his way through the building's security lockdown wasn't particularly difficult for Batman.
Back on North Brother Island, the Lizard Professor had mentioned that some kind of reptilian creatures had appeared inside Baxter Building—creatures whose presence had literally woken him from hibernation.
The building was under complete security lockdown with no signal transmission to the outside world. The Lizard Professor's sudden awakening, combined with the roars Batman had faintly heard earlier...
Everything pointed to chaos erupting inside Baxter Building.
Whatever the situation, saving lives remained Batman's primary objective. The moment he confirmed something had gone wrong here, he'd immediately mobilized both the Hulk and Lizard Professor to respond.
"Batman! That's Batman!" Johnny recognized him instantly—the vigilante who'd been making waves across New York recently. He shouted excitedly.
Batman sat astride the Lizard Professor's back. He glanced coldly at Susan and the others, then raised his hand. Multiple strands of pitch-black webbing shot forth.
Johnny's excited shout caught in his throat.
He realized Batman's webs weren't aimed at the pterosaurs—they were coming straight at them.
THWIP THWIP THWIP!
The black webbing struck all four simultaneously—Ben Grimm, Susan Storm, Reed, and Johnny—adhering to each of them without discrimination.
Batman's arm flexed slightly. All four immediately lost their balance, stumbling as he yanked them toward him.
Before revealing himself, Batman had observed from the shadows for quite a while. His original plan had been to let Hulk handle the dinosaurs while he and the Lizard Professor subdued the primitives near the vortex and examined the full-wave projector.
But Susan and the others standing around like idiots had forced Batman to change his approach.
Seeing these four still showing no sign of fleeing, Batman simply webbed them all up, swung them in a wide arc through the air, and hurled them dozens of meters away.
FWOOSH!
As he threw them, Batman simultaneously fired several web clusters at the wall near their landing point. The webbing expanded on contact, forming layer upon layer of cushioning nets that caught all four perfectly.
"Batman! You need to shut down that projector to stop more dinosaurs from coming through!" Johnny shouted.
"No! Lunella's still inside!" Susan immediately countered.
In the few seconds they spent yelling, Batman had already leaped from the Lizard Professor's back and violently snapped the wings of four or five pterosaurs.
"Lunella?" Batman's voice carried a note of confusion as he looked at Susan.
Sensing Batman's puzzlement, Susan quickly elaborated.
"A little girl! She was abducted by primitive people who came through the projector—they dragged her into the vortex!"
"Save her, Batman!"
In truth, Susan didn't need to ask. The moment Batman heard that Lunella had been kidnapped, he spread his cape and swept like a dark cloud toward the opposite side of the hole Hulk had smashed through the floor.
The Lizard Professor's feet kicked off the ground. He scrambled along the ceiling upside-down, following Batman.
In the blink of an eye, both Batman and the Lizard Professor vanished from Susan's field of vision, racing rapidly toward the full-wave projector's location.
BANG!
It took two seconds to knock unconscious the five or six black-haired primitives near the full-wave projector and bind them with webbing. Batman and the Lizard Professor now stood before the yellow-green vortex.
Dinosaurs continued pouring through continuously. But with Batman and the Lizard Professor present, each dinosaur that stuck its head through was immediately met with either Batman's fifty-ton strength or the Lizard Professor's tail—force still undetermined—smashing into its skull. Heads exploded on impact.
"The sound that woke me is coming from inside there, Batman."
The Lizard Professor's voice came out somewhat stiff.
Having been roused from hibernation, the Lizard Professor's temper was clearly foul. Fighting with Hulk had relieved it somewhat, but now his mood was gradually shifting back toward rage.
Batman couldn't hear the sound the Lizard Professor referenced.
But the Arkham suit possessed functions for analyzing both ultrasonic and infrasonic frequencies. Activating both simultaneously, Batman immediately detected infrasonic waves emanating continuously from within the vortex.
"Professor, want to take a trip inside with me?" Batman looked at the Lizard Professor.
"My thoughts exactly." The Lizard Professor's voice was ice-cold. He was struggling to suppress the violent urges rising within him.
Given Batman's cautious nature, he would never normally do something like charging through a vortex without thoroughly researching it first.
But the little girl Lunella had been abducted. Batman immediately set his usual protocols aside.
No matter when or where, Batman—like Superman—prioritized saving lives above all else.
Superman would cross interstellar distances, traverse time itself, and disregard his own safety to save a single little girl.
Now the same responsibility fell to Batman. Even if the other side of that vortex led to an bottomless abyss opening straight to Hell itself, Batman would plunge through without hesitation to save a life.
"Dr. Octavius." Before entering the vortex, Batman connected to the signal on North Brother Island. "The Lizard Professor and I may disappear for a while. Remember to protect yourself, Professor Morbius... and Robin."
With zero delay, Dr. Octavius responded—clearly he'd been waiting for Batman's message.
"I will, Batman. Do you need any other assistance?"
"No."
"Can you tell me where you're going? What you'll be doing?" Octavius asked.
"Going to an unknown world. Going to save someone." Batman said.
"I'll be here waiting for you and the Lizard Professor to return." Octavius answered without hesitation.
Batman continued his instructions.
"The Hulk is at Baxter Building dealing with dinosaurs. If necessary, you can go to Manhattan's City Hall subway station. On the workbench there, you'll find Protocol Alpha. It gives you access to all my resources to stop Hulk if needed."
"On underground level two are four gamma creatures. If any emergency occurs beyond your control, you can contact SHIELD Director Nick Fury. The communication channel is **"
When Superman left Earth to ascend beyond the clouds, he did so knowing Batman remained on the planet. Knowing the Justice League and other allies stood ready.
But in this world, before Batman departed for an unknown primitive realm, he had to arrange everything for his absence. He needed to prevent accidents as much as possible.
One final matter remained. Someone had to guard the full-wave projector on this side after Batman and the Lizard Professor passed through—otherwise they might rescue Lunella only to find themselves unable to return.
Without much deliberation, Batman opened an encrypted channel to Tony Stark.
"Tony, I need you to get to Baxter Building immediately. Protect a full-wave projector here. It's directly related to my safety."
Tony Stark seemed to be in the middle of discussing something with a model. His voice carried irritation at the interruption.
"Come on, can it wait? Or have Max Dillon do it?"
"I only trust you, Tony."
"Why? I don't trust you." Tony's frown was audible.
"You will trust me. And you'll arrive here within two minutes." Batman said. "Because—"
"Because you're Batman, right? Don't give me that line." Tony Stark cut him off without mercy.
"No. Because I'm Peter Parker."
CRASH!
The phone loaded with Tony Stark's encrypted communication system shattered into pieces. Without even putting on clothes, he abandoned the model posing on his bed and bolted from the bedroom like a madman.
"Jarvis! Fuck! Deploy Mark IV immediately!"
"That idiot Peter! What the hell is he trying to do?!"
"Link to Stark satellites! Activate Rescue One!"