Jude was a man of remarkable resilience.
Not the born-legend, stress-rolls-off-him type — that would be flattering and untrue. But after two separate tours of Gotham and one extended stint in New York, minor catastrophes had lost most of their power to surprise him. He'd recalibrated his baseline for disaster the way other people recalibrated their sleep schedules after a long flight.
But this is Central City, he thought miserably, hands moving on autopilot while the rest of his face broadcast pure, unfiltered grief. I came all the way here to get robbed.
His expression was so dramatically at odds with the efficient way he was emptying his pockets that one of the robbers — a wiry guy in a ski mask who'd been riding a nervous high since they walked in — finally broke.
"Why the long face? Your wife die or something?"
"I don't have a wife."
"Girlfriend?"
"No girlfriend."
"Family?"
"No family."
The robber blinked. "So what the hell do you have?"
Jude glanced meaningfully at the duffel bag stuffed with cash in the man's hand.
"I had some money. I just saved it."
A long silence settled over the robber. He stood there with the bag, staring at Jude, something uncomfortable moving behind his eyes. Then, with the slow deliberateness of a man acting against his better judgment, he reached into the bag, pulled out a thick wad of bills, and quietly pressed it into the crook of Jude's arm.
"Sorry, buddy," he said, low enough that no one else could hear. "I was being loud."
Jude looked down. The warmth spreading through his chest was entirely financial in nature. That covers maybe twenty percent of what's in the bag.
"Could I get a couple more?" he asked, keeping his voice equally low. "Even one. I'm not picky."
The robber's expression shifted — warmth curdling into something flat and unfriendly. He reached back and pulled the wad out of Jude's arm.
"Get lost."
They were heading for the door when the sirens started.
"Clyde!" The one covering the hostages — Mark, apparently — snapped upright. "Stop screwing around, the cops are here!"
Clyde, still hauling the second bag toward the exit, shot a desperate look at the money he hadn't finished loading. "Damn it, Mark, we've still got tens of thousands sitting right there—"
"I said move."
Clyde zipped the bag, slung it over his shoulder, kept his gun on the room as he backed toward Mark. "Fine, fine — let's go, let's go!"
Jude watched them retreat through the door with the quiet, forensic detachment of a man doing a professional evaluation.
No wonder it's Central City. Even the criminals were scared of the police. Back in Gotham — pre-Gordon, pre-Bruce's reforms — the GCPD had the deterrent authority of a strongly-worded letter. Bank robbers didn't flinch at sirens. Sirens were background noise. Even mid-tier thieves treated the precinct like a revolving door and Blackgate like a long weekend.
But these two: no lookout, no counter-surveillance on the staff, no accounting for the fact that a bank employee might have a gun under the counter. No knowledge of police response times. Hesitating at the door over loose cash.
Gotham doesn't support amateurs, Jude thought, almost sympathetically. The ecosystem eats them.
Clyde and Mark made it to the car. Mark drove. Clyde piled the bags in the back and reached for the gun in his waistband.
"Hey." Clyde frowned. "Did you take out the security camera when we went in? I think I forgot."
Mark didn't look up from the road. "Shot it twice on the way through the door." A beat. "What would you do without me?"
Clyde exhaled, visibly relieved, and grinned. "You're my brother, man. Who else is gonna look out for me?"
Mark had no answer for that. He turned the key—
—and checked the rearview mirror.
"Damn it. The security guards are coming. Those idiots untied them."
Clyde twisted around. Through the cracked rear window, three bank security guards were running after them, guns drawn and already firing. The rear glass disintegrated. Bullet holes punched through the trunk. A tire blew.
Both men flattened themselves against the seats on pure instinct, and Clyde came up spitting curses, rage overriding everything else.
"You want to die?!" He swung his gun up at the nearest guard still in the window frame and squeezed the trigger—
Click.
Not a bang. A flat, dry, mechanical click — the sound a gun makes when the gun has completely given up on you.
"Are you kidding me—"
He ejected the magazine. Stared at it.
"Mark. There are no bullets in my gun."
"That's impossible, we checked it yesterday—"
"There are no bullets in my gun, Mark!"
The car lurched. The blown tire was making itself known, dragging the vehicle sideways, killing their speed. More shots from behind added fresh holes to the bodywork. Mark watched the police lights bloom in the rearview mirror, jaw tight.
"Throw the money."
"What?!"
"Throw the bag, Clyde — the cop car is right there—"
Clyde hurled one bag out the window with the pained expression of a man throwing his child into a river. The pursuing police cruiser slowed, tangled in the mess. But three more units were already slotting into the traffic behind them.
"Both bags!"
Clyde screamed something that wasn't a word and threw the second bag.
The car surged forward. Mark worked the streets with genuine skill, cutting through alleys and cross-traffic, and after thirty agonizing minutes the sirens finally faded.
They sat in the ringing silence of the car.
"Damn." Clyde slammed the useless pistol into the seat cushion. "Damn. Damn. All of that for nothing."
Mark just stared out the windshield. "...How did your gun run out of bullets?"
"How the hell should I know?"
Meanwhile, Jude stepped out of the bank into the afternoon light, humming to himself, a handful of loose 9mm rounds settled quietly at the bottom of his backpack.
~I'm riding my beloved little motorcycle~