The mont the call ended, Nolan sat still.
The burner phone lay face-down on the desk. His hand hovered over it like it might bite him.
His heart was pounding.
Not in the way it did when he ran from cops. Not even in the way it did when the Fighter took over and blood got spilled. No, this was worse.
He'd just threatened the Penguin.
He leaned back in his chair, hand dragging down his face, fingers pressing against his eyelids like he could erase the last ten minutes.
He couldn't.
"Well," ca Kieran's voice, calm as ever. "That went about as well as it could've. Nobody died. We left an impression."
Nolan didn't answer. He swallowed instead, dry throat clicking.
"You need to move," Quentin said sharply. "This location needs so sprucing up. We've kept things quiet, but now the Penguin knows we're real. That changes the stakes."
"You think I don't know that?" Nolan muttered out loud, voice hoarse. "Jesus…"
"You should've been ard already," Quentin snapped. "You're exposed. If Penguin sends anyone sniffing around—"
"Oh please," Kieran interjected smoothly. "Let's not pretend we're paranoid. Let's just call it… appropriately cautious."
"I don't want guns," Nolan said, too fast. "I'm not a killer."
"Neither is a lock on a door," Quentin countered. "But it keeps out people who are."
He stood and began pacing. The apartnt felt smaller than usual. The walls seed too close, the air too hot.
"I'm not like you," Nolan muttered. "I don't want to live like that."
Silence for a mont.
Then the third voice cut through—deeper, heavier, quiet like a knife sliding from a sheath.
"If you won't protect us," the Fighter said, "I will."
Nolan stopped pacing.
He didn't respond. He didn't have to.
He felt it—the cold certainty of that voice. The readiness. The way it had waited patiently in the dark, letting Quentin run ops, letting Kieran smooth over conversations… but always there.
He had no doubt that if it ca to it, the Fighter would do far more than make threats.
Nolan took a shaky breath and turned toward his laptop.
He didn't like this.
He hated it.
But he also didn't want to die in so alley because he was too proud to be cautious.
He pulled up his underground comms board and began sorting through anonymous tips. A na stood out. Then a location. Soone was selling weapons out of a chanic's garage on the Narrows' south end.
Not flashy. Not high-profile. Good.
Thirty minutes later, Nolan walked into the garage.
It reeked of motor oil and sweat. Two guys were inside—one bald, leaning against a stack of tires, the other smoking next to an open crate.
"Who the hell are you?" the bald one asked.
Nolan kept his hands in his pockets. "Looking to buy."
The smoker eyed him. "You look like a damn college kid."
Nolan said nothing. He just stepped closer and nodded at the crate.
"Show
what you got."
They exchanged glances but opened the lid. A few pistols. A sawn-off shotgun. So ammo, poorly stored.
Nolan bent down, inspecting them without touching.
"How much?" he asked.
"Depends," the bald one said, smirking. "Depends how much you got."
Nolan's jaw clenched. He felt it—the flicker in his spine. That shift of weight. That presence rising.
But he held on.
"Price," he said flatly.
The smoker stepped forward. "Three hundred for the pistol. Five for the shotty."
Nolan reached into his coat, slowly pulled out an envelope.
The mont it ca into view, the bald one reached for a tire iron.
Wrong move.
The personality without a na moved.
He rose in Nolan's body coiled, crouched in his bones, guiding his hand without simply taking the wheel it was as if he wrenched it from Nolan's grasp.
Nolan didn't step back. He didn't flinch. He moved forward instead.
One fluid step.
His hand ca up not to strike, but to catch the tire iron in mid-air.
He yanked it down.
With his other hand, he grabbed the bald man's collar and pulled him close—face-to-face, so close their noses nearly touched.
"I'm not who you think I am," Nolan said, low, steady.
His voice was calm, but sothing in his eyes sothing too still made both n freeze.
"I don't like scamrs," he continued, "don't make
do anything you or I will regret."
'This guys dialogue is all movie one liners am I right or am I right?' Kieran joked but it fell brutally flat
He let go.
The bald man stumbled back, breathing heavy. Nolan looked at the guns again.
"I'll take two pistols. No scratches. Clean numbers. Now."
They handed them over without another word.
Nolan paid. Then turned and left without a second glance.
Outside, under the gray Gotham sky, Nolan shuddered and suddenly he was back to normal.
"Good," Quentin said quietly.
"Stylish," Kieran added.
Nolan just kept walking, the weight of the pistols pressing against his ribs like a dirty secret.
***
The old door creaked open and Nolan stepped inside, locking it behind him with a click that suddenly felt far too casual. Too easy.
He slid the deadbolt into place, but that wasn't enough anymore. Not after today.
He pulled the blinds. Every one. The buzz of Gotham traffic outside dulled to a distant hum. His coat hit the back of the chair, the two pistols tucked carefully in his waistband pressing against the small of his back as he moved.
He turned on the desk lamp. Warm yellow light lit the corners of the small, shabby room—the safehouse he'd lived in for the past two weeks. The walls had once felt like protection.
Now they just felt thin.
He grabbed a piece of scrap paper and started writing a checklist.
— Reinforce windows
— Secondary locks (front & back)
— Trap line to door
— Backup burner phone
— EMP-proof box for devices
He sat back in his chair, chewing the end of the pen.
"This place won't hold if soone really wants in," Quentin said from sowhere inside his skull. "You need layers. You need early warning. You need contingencies."
"I know," Nolan muttered. He rubbed his face again. God, he was tired.
But he stood. Pushed himself to move. The adrenaline hadn't quite left yet—just simred now, low and quiet.
He started with the doors.
Extra deadbolts from a lock supply store two blocks over. He took a screwdriver and drilled in silence, thodically. One at the top. One at the bottom. It didn't stop a bullet, but it bought ti.
The windows were next.
He walked to the front one grimy with city dust and pressed his fingers to the corners.
Old as shit.
He taped them in an "X" with thick duct tape to reduce shatter. Not ideal, but again ti.
He added fishing wire to the inside of the door, tied to a cluster of loose washers. If anyone opened the door without disarming it first, the washers would clatter to the floor. Primitive, but it might give him ten seconds.
And ten seconds could be everything.
"You need an exit plan," Quentin whispered. "Every location. Every night."
"Crazy thought you could just move, we have the money to buy a nice house you know?" Quentin offered
Nolan chuckled, "I actually think we are safer in a run down place like this, the penguin is probably looking for so rich cri lord."
"You also need a better coffee pot," Kieran added lightly. "We're practically risking our lives on instant grounds."
Nolan huffed once through his nose. Not quite a laugh, but close.
He moved to the far wall. A crawl space hidden under a loose floorboard. He lifted it and placed one pistol inside, wrapped in a towel, alongside a burner phone, cash, and an old ID under the na "Alex Gray."
Escape kit.
Last resort.
The second pistol he kept. Loaded, but with the safety on. He placed it in the drawer beside his bed. Easy reach.
Night settled around the apartnt like a weighted blanket. Nolan stood in the center of it, his shirt clinging to his back with sweat. The room wasn't hot, but his body hadn't cald down yet. Not really.
He looked around.
New locks. Traps. A gun in the drawer.
His stomach turned.
"What am I becoming?" he whispered.
Silence greeted him.
Then the Fighter spoke.
"Alive. Possibly for the first ti in a long ti you are starting to feel alive."
Nolan lowered himself to the edge of the bed. Fingers steepled. Breath shallow.
He thought of Maria. The way her eyes looked at him, like she didn't quite recognize the person in front of her. Like he was sothing new wearing an old na.
He wondered if she was right.
And for the first ti in a long ti, Nolan didn't know how to feel about that.
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