Chapter 09: Saving a Croc (Part 3)

[Clock - 01:13 | 01:13 AM]

[Calendar - 13/01/2003]

[Location - Arkham Asylum - Gotham City, New Jersey]

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POV Change

Atlas

'Quick.' Was all Atlas could think of- His first thought was to see if there was a way to unlock the chains holding Waylon's arms up high, but he quickly dismissed such idea when he heard the alarm of the building blast. 'Shit.' He quickly moved his fingers and casted [Fire Bolt], [Acidic Bolt], [Acid Splash] and [Acidic Blast] in quick succession at the four deactivated cameras in the four corners of the room. The acid formed by the [Acid Splash] cantrip split up in three different spheres, one of the solidifying into this small green crystalline dart that shot out towards a camera before the other two hit two different cameras, with the last one being blasted by a bolt of flames. He got rid of the cameras first because he knew damn well Batman would investigate this shit, in fact, he must be getting the alert right now! 'Quick!' Looking at the two chains, he decided to go big or go home! "Sorry if this ends up hurting you, Waylon!" The acid from the ground and on the cameras flew out into his hand, forming this pea sized green dot that floated between his two palms facing each other, and he aimed-

"[Waylon Jones (Confused, Surprised, Concerned): Wait, what-?]"

-and a beam of acid shot out of his hands, 5 feet thick and wide, and 30 feet long. He aimed the beam so as to not splash as much of it on Waylon, and thankfully his aim was not far off. Although a little bit of acid had splashed on his left arm (Atlas aimed for the left chain), the majority of the acid was corroding and breaking the chain apart, but not fast enough! Repeatedly, he used [Acidic Blast] against the chain, and sure enough, it melted faster. "Sorry, sorry- I promise I'll try to learn how to heal, I'm sure I can." Apologizing, Atlas repeated the process with the right chain, castin [Acid Stream] once more and this time aiming properly and making 90% of the acid splash on the chain and not on Waylon's body, although some of it still slid down the chain and touched his scaly hand. "I should've learned some sort of metal melting spell, fuck." In total, it took him about 2 and a half minutes to get Waylon free, and to his anxious self, that was an eternity.

All the time he was breaking the chains, Waylon was saying something, but Atlas was too focused on his task at hand that he ignored him and instead focused on what to do next. They were about 67 to 70 feet up in the air- thankfully he has learned [Feather Fall] for this exact occasion or occasions similar to this one. "Okay, I think if we jump now I can cast [Feather Fall] and make us fall slower and glide down to the wall, unless you wanna go high up to the floor then we can jump and maybe glide over the wall and into the sea where we can-" Atlas' head snapped back to look at Waylon when he heard the chains snap off, and with a heavy and animalistic grunt, Waylon was free from his containment.

There was a joke there about a crocodile in a containment facility that also involved acid and escaping said facility, but Atlas wasn't sure it applied here. 

"[Waylon Jones (Surprised, Confused): Wait, you're here... why are you here? Do you know where we even are- kid, you need to leave before the fucking Bat gets here-]" Waylon closed his jaws shut when Atlas turned around to look at him with a grin, lifting up the black leather jacket that he had given him a week ago before he left the hideous hideout that they were setting roots in to start that ridiculous idea of a kingdom that somehow, for some reason, was very important to him. "[Waylon Jones (Confused): My jacket? You came all the way here to give me my jacket... no, why did you come here? To save me? Well, I could've escaped literally any time I wanted to so I guess thank you?]"

"Well, Mr. King Croc Big Man Sir, you made a promise you didn't keep." Atlas looked down- security was starting to gather up faster and faster: "-so I had to come here and get you. You're literally the only person I know in this god forsaken, devil loved- no, scratch that, Lucifer doesn't like Gotham at all or else he'd have a club here or something -cursed fucking city, so you better step your game up because I came here to save you. So, which way? Up or down?" His two hands shot out in different directions, one up and the other down, while he looked down at the crowd of guards- seriously, who would even work in this place? Just being here and he can feel the heavy magical aura of this insane asylum, and it is changing his behavior a bit, seen by the way he is acting more anxious.

Oh, it's the magic! Sure, he has some anxiety, but this place is really fucking him up because he's sensitive to magic. That explains the unreasonable and almost fun desire of blasting the guards up with acid.

"[Waylon Jones (Confused): Huh, up or down?]" Getting closer to the edge of the hole (having to duck, because he's about 6'6 feet tall for God's sake!) and looking down, Waylon frowned: "[Waylon Jones (Frustated, Annoyed): There's too many guards down there, there's no way we can get out without me killing a bunch of them and you getting shot at least once... I guess we're going up then.]" Without having to wait for a request, Waylon picked Atlas up and threw him over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes ("This is so King Kong core") and ignored Atlas' comments as he easily broke through the hole made by him- it was quite impressive, especially now that it downed on him that Atlas knows real magic. Waylon is just a little bit surprised by Atlas' magic, he has grown up in a circus where the fake magician was in fact a real one, and although he never used dangerous magics for the circus' entertainment, he has had shown Waylon once how he could turn a card into a bomb as strong as a grenade. He was surprised by Atlas' magic because the magician- his name was Mr. Modo the Magnificent or something like that -said that even turning single card into a bomb was tiring enough for him to be unable to do it more than twice, while Waylon felt and saw Atlas shoot out an entire beam of acid at his chains.

This kid must be crazy powerful.

"Going uuuup-" It was crazy how Waylon made climb up a 90 feet tall building with only your bare hands seem easy. It was also crazy how Atlas was able to hold on to Waylon's body while staring right down at the many guards that were- oh, they were shooting them! "-fuck fuck fuck-" He desperately tried to duck, but as a bullet hit his arm, he paled- only to sigh as a glimmer of energy materialized between the bullet and his skin as [Mage Armor] acted. This was the only Abjuration spell that he had time to learn, and it has been proved useful! "-ah, damn." It took them less than a minute to get to the spire-like top of the building, and from up here the could see their destination: "Okay, Waylon, you gotta trust me here- Run, open your arms, and jump!" The big crocodile was confused, a hint of mistrust flashed through his eyes before he steeled his resolve and did exactly as Atlas told him, he ran towards the opposite direction the guards were gathered at, opened his arms and stretched them out almost as if he was going to fly, and he jumped-

The thrill of the fall was short lived, as weightlessness overtook his being, and they were falling slowly and gliding towards the wall. Waylon felt Atlas sitting on his back, hiding from the guards that noticed them and were shooting at them from below, and with his hands held down he began to spew this greasy brown colored liquid that splashed down like oil in a trail from the bottom of the Arkham Asylum and it formed a large puddle. Waylon was about to ask what that was when he saw a spark of flames flicker and soon the oil-like liquid was on fire, and the guards were screaming.

Not because they were set on fire- Atlas didn't want to murder people today -but because there was fire! They're shouting for people to get the fire extinguishers.

"Okay, okay-" Atlas sighed, a weight seemed to leave his shoulders: "-Waylon, we're approaching the wall... We might be able to cross it over, I'm not entirely sure." The 10 feet tall wall that separated Arkham Asylum from the rest of the desert Arkham island was approaching quickly, and Waylon knew exactly what to do. The moment they were within reaching range, he grabbed the upper portion of the wall and threw himself over it, and that was when he started spinning while Atlas held onto him like he was going to fall- well, he almost did.

With a soundless sploof, Waylon settled down on the ground, about 23 feet away from the wall.

Without an ounce of hesitation, he grabbed Atlas and ran- The bridges to leave the island were out of question, but thankfully he was a big crocodile of a man. He was more worrie about Atlas though, the kid was showing signs of being tired- I mean, throwing spells around willy nilly must cost more energy than he thinks -towards the water. His impressive strength also translated into an incredible pushing force, and although it took him a while to gather speed once he got going it was necessary something solid to stop him. He has used this to run through walls many times, it generally works! In half an hour later, they were on the other side of the island, complete opposite of where he would've gone if not Atlas telling him to come here.

"[Waylon Jones (Out of Breath): W-why... Did you tell me to come to this place?]" They were by the D'iangelo Sewage Treatment Plant, why would they even come here? Atlas simply pointed out towards a side of the place, and once he got there, he was surprised to be guided by Atlas until they found a flask of something, tucked away behind a wall and hidden inside a black suitcase... A chemical. "[Waylon Jones (Concerned, Confused): How did you know this was going to be here- you're not working for the Joker, are you, kid? I might just kill right now.]"

"Seriously Waylon? I don't work for the Joker." Rolling his eyes, a white book manifested right between his open palms, and written on a page were the words [Joker's Toxin of Madness and Silly Whimsical Shenanigans, Prototype N°3. Owned by the one and only Clown of Gotham, created by the Mad White Faced Demon known as Joker. Consuming this chemical will cause severe muscle tissue damage, mind numbing pain, damage to internal organs, and madness of the Joker variety. Please do not open the lid, thank you~] written in cursive. "Special magical powers, finding shit is not that hard for me... Now, I took us here because this is what will buy you some time, after all, Batman will focus his attention on the clown and leave you alone for enough time that you might be able to hide." Taking the suitcase, Atlas moved his fingers a bit as he cast the spell [Illusory Script] on top of the suitcase to write [Don't Open - Made by The Joker, for Batman. Signed: Me.] And with that done, Atlas motioned for them to leave- Leaving the island was easy. Waylon could swim really quickly, and Atlas simply had to cast [Alter Self] to make himself able to breathe underwater and done.

They were out of there before Batman found them.