Wayne Manor - The Grand Hall - 05:15 AM
The warning sensors screamed.
INTRUSION DETECTED. SECTOR: ALL.
"They're here," Tim Drake (Red Robin) shouted, vaulting over the banister.
The stained glass windows of the manor shattered inward.
CRASH.
Talons poured in. Not three. Not ten. Fifty.
They clung to the walls like spiders. They dropped from the chandeliers. Their yellow eyes glowed in the dark, unblinking, unfeeling.
"Defensive positions!" Nightwing yelled, extending his escrima sticks. "Don't let them reach the Batcave entrance!"
Damian drew his katana. He stood in front of Alfred Pennyworth, who was loading a shotgun with calm precision.
"Stand behind me, Pennyworth," Damian ordered. "I will not let them harm the staff."
"I appreciate the sentiment, Master Damian," Alfred racked the slide. "But I have been cleaning up after Master Bruce for thirty years. I am quite capable of taking out the trash."
BANG.
Alfred fired. The buckshot hit a Talon in the chest, knocking him back. But the Talon simply stood up, the metal in his blood knitting the wound shut.
"Regeneration factor is high," I noted, watching from the landing. "Standard ballistics are ineffective."
I threw a handful of silver knives. They pinned three Talons to the wall by their throats. They struggled, but couldn't pull the blades out.
"Pin them!" I commanded. "Do not aim to kill. Aim to immobilize."
The Horde
The Talons swarmed.
It was a wave of gold and black death.
Nightwing fought with acrobatic grace, using his sticks to shatter kneecaps. Tim used explosive gel to collapse the hallway ceiling, burying ten Talons in rubble. Damian fought like a demon, severing tendons and hamstrings.
But for every Talon they dropped, two more took their place.
"There's too many!" Tim shouted, dodging a throwing knife. "They don't stop! We can't hold the Great Hall!"
"We need to fall back to the library," Nightwing ordered. "Choke point!"
"No," a deep, mechanical voice boomed from the shadows. "We don't retreat."
The Item Reveal
The floor of the Great Hall rumbled.
The secret entrance to the armory—hidden behind the grandfather clock—blasted open.
A massive figure stepped out.
It wasn't Batman. It was a tank in the shape of a man.
The Thrasher Suit.
It stood nine feet tall. Heavy plating. Powered by a miniaturized arc reactor. And venting clouds of sub-zero liquid nitrogen.
"Get out of my house," Batman growled.
The suit's temperature gauge dropped.
INTERNAL TEMP: -150°C.
Batman charged.
He didn't use martial arts. He used brute force. He punched a Talon, and the impact shattered the assassin into frozen chunks of meat.
CRUNCH.
"Liquid nitrogen emitters active," Batman announced.
He fired cryo-beams from his gauntlets. The beams hit the Talons, freezing them instantly mid-leap.
"Targeting weak points: Molecular structure," Batman's voice amplified. "Sebastian! Keep the flank clear!"
"Understood, Sir."
The Demon's Waltz
While Batman was the hammer, I was the scalpel.
I moved through the chaos. A Talon lunged at Alfred. I caught his wrist and twisted it until the bone snapped.
"Rude," I whispered.
I picked up the Talon and threw him into the path of Batman's cryo-beam. He froze instantly.
"Strike!" I called out.
Batman smashed the frozen statue.
"We make a good team, Sir," I noted, dodging a sword strike.
"Less talking, more freezing," Batman grunted, crushing another Talon with a hydraulic grip.
The tide was turning. The Talons, realizing their regeneration was useless against the extreme cold, began to hesitate.
"They are learning fear," Damian grinned, decapitating a frozen Talon. "Keep pushing!"
The King of the Court
Suddenly, the front doors exploded.
A figure walked in. He wasn't wearing the standard Talon armor. He wore a suit of heavy, ancient plate mail, glowing with a purple energy.
The Grandmaster.
"You rely on toys," the Grandmaster boomed. "And demons."
He pointed a gauntlet at the Thrasher Suit.
BOOM.
A blast of kinetic energy hit Batman. The suit held, but it skidded back ten feet, carving grooves into the marble floor.
"System damage," Batman warned. "Cryo-emitters at 40%."
"He's disrupting the power core," Tim analyzed. "He's using a magnetic field!"
The Grandmaster drew a greatsword.
"I will dismantle you, Wayne. Piece by piece."
He charged Batman. The Thrasher Suit was slow. The Grandmaster was fast. He ducked under Batman's punch and slashed the hydraulic line of the leg.
HISS.
Coolant sprayed out. Batman went down to one knee.
"Father!" Damian screamed.
The Grandmaster raised his sword for the killing blow.
The Butler's Contract
I checked my pocket watch.
05:45 AM.
"My apologies," I said, my voice echoing unnaturally loud in the hall.
The Grandmaster paused.
I was standing on the chandelier above him.
"You are damaging the structural integrity of the West Wing," I said. "And I simply do not have the time to supervise a renovation."
I dropped.
I didn't land on the floor. I landed on the Grandmaster's sword, balancing on the blade edge with one foot.
"What?" The Grandmaster looked up, shocked.
"You possess magnetic fields," I noted, my eyes glowing violet. "Interesting. But magnetism controls metal."
I leaped off the sword, flipping in the air. My shadow detached from the floor and wrapped around the Grandmaster, binding his arms.
"It does not control darkness."
I landed behind him. I placed my hand on his helmet.
" Requiescat in Pace. "
I channeled my demonic energy—pure, entropic void—into his suit.
The purple energy flickered. Then it turned black.
The Grandmaster screamed as his power source imploded. The feedback loop fried his nervous system (or what was left of it).
He collapsed, smoke rising from his armor.
The Victory
The remaining Talons looked at their fallen leader. Then at the freezing Bat-Mech. Then at the Demon Butler dusting off his gloves.
"Retreat," one Talon whispered.
They fled. Like rats, they scurried back into the shadows, disappearing into the dawn.
The Cleanup
Silence returned to Wayne Manor.
Batman opened the cockpit of the Thrasher Suit. He stepped out, sweating and bruised, but alive.
"Status?" Batman asked.
"Minor injuries," Nightwing reported, helping Alfred up. "Alfred has a sprained wrist. Tim has a headache. Damian is... disappointed he didn't get to kill more."
"They fled," Damian spat, kicking a frozen Talon head. "Cowards."
"They regrouped," Batman corrected. "But we hurt them. We showed them that the Bat isn't easy prey."
I walked over to Bruce with a broom.
"A successful defense, Sir," I said. "Though I am afraid the foyer is a total loss."
Bruce looked at the shattered windows, the frozen bodies, and the scorch marks on the walls.
"It's just a house, Sebastian," Bruce said, putting a hand on Damian's shoulder. "The foundation held."
He looked at his family. Battered, tired, but standing together.
"We held."