"Captain America, you're really Captain America from the news, aren't you?"
Before Steve could say a word, the bruised and bloodied man on the ground crawled to his feet like he'd found a savior. Clinging tightly to his leg, he refused to let go.
"Please save me! I'm an American citizen. I'm your fan! Captain, I grew up listening to your stories. You'll protect me, right... right?"
Steve frowned slightly as he looked down at him. He knew this man wasn't innocent. It was because of his greed that, even before he arrived in Gotham, an innocent life had already been lost in some shady deal with the Joker Gang.
Joker hadn't gone into detail, but Steve understood that anyone killed by them wouldn't have died quickly or painlessly.
That poor soul had likely suffered in ways he couldn't imagine. Still, no matter how much he disliked this person, he had already decided to step in. That meant he would protect him.
"Stay to the side. When I leave, I'll bring you to the Gotham police. Don't even think about running. You should know your company isn't anywhere near as powerful as Vought."
"What?! No way!"
The man shouted in protest. Clearly, now that his life was no longer in immediate danger, his greed started surfacing again. He wailed and begged, hoping Steve would turn a blind eye and let him off the hook.
But Steve could see that the man had never truly believed he did anything wrong. He only regretted not getting more out of it.
Right now, though, he didn't have time to waste on him.
Standing in the center of the ring, Steve turned his gaze to the towering brute who had been silently waiting since his arrival.
Over two meters tall, his swollen muscles looked unnatural. Veins bulged all over his body. It was obvious he had undergone some sort of special enhancement.
After he quietly assessed the opponent's strength, Steve lifted his head and looked up toward Joker, who was still watching from the upper platform.
"If I defeat him, I get to leave with that man, right? Alfred?"
This time, however, Joker didn't react to being called Alfred. He simply smiled and shook his head.
"No, no. It's not up to me whether you get to leave. Look around, our friends here are all fired up now. When you can leave depends on when you satisfy them."
Steve glanced around. From every direction, Joker Gang members emerged, all holding bats, knives, and other weapons. The rising hostility in the air weighed down on him.
His heart sank.
"Fine!"
But he still agreed to that condition. Because he was a hero.
Joker grinned when he heard that. With a wave of his hand, Harley brought over the shield they had taken from Steve when he entered the base and tossed it back to him.
"Then let tonight's carnival begin, everyone!"
But before the Joker Gang members, who had been itching to move, could launch their attack, Steve struck first.
The moment the shield landed in his hand, he didn't even pause for a second, and hurled it straight at the strongest of the enhanced enforcers. Using that brief period when the man's vision was disrupted by the flying shield, Steve closed the distance in an instant, igniting the first clash of the night.
Many people like to compare Batman and Iron Man as counterparts between Marvel and DC. But in fact, Captain America shares quite a few traits with Batman as well.
Receiving the Super Soldier Serum, what was enhanced in Steve Rogers wasn't just his physical strength. His mind had also been pushed to the very limits of human potential.
Just as Batman had mastered every martial art known to man. Steve, after becoming a super soldier, had also learned every combat technique in the world.
The difference between them lay in their approach.
Batman focused intensely on individual mastery, blending all martial arts into his own unique fighting style.
On the other hand, Steve combined his comprehensive knowledge of combat with his enhanced brain and exceptional leadership abilities, making him a tactician and commander who could remain calm and adaptable in any situation.
Because of that, when surrounded by over a hundred Joker Gang members in a small arena, he didn't appear nearly as overwhelmed as one might expect.
Most of those who rushed at him couldn't even take a single hit before falling under the force of his powerful strikes.
But there were still a few who posed a serious threat. Naturally, those were the ones whose bodies had been chemically enhanced by Joker.
In terms of raw strength alone, these enforcers had already surpassed Steve, even as a super soldier.
One moment of carelessness was all it took. A heavy punch slammed into his side, and in the next second, his entire body was sent flying like a cannonball, crashing into the wire fence.
'So much force…'
Three ribs, at least, were broken. But the fight didn't end there.
Having walked through the fires of war, Steve had a far stronger will than most heroes. His injuries couldn't be ignored. But every time he got knocked down, he pushed himself back up, and kept swinging his fists at the enemies charging at him.
* * *
By now, the madness on Joker's face had faded. Not because Steve's spirit had influenced him. As heroic as the man was, his spirit couldn't change someone like Joker.
The real reason for this shift was that Reid had already projected his consciousness into the clown's body.
He watched the fight below. He saw Steve get back up again and again, even wearing down those chemically enhanced, thick-skinned brutes until they collapsed from exhaustion.
Reid couldn't help but be impressed.
'If I didn't know the future... if I had been born in this world, I probably wouldn't be able to help liking a hero like Steve.'
But unfortunately, the more he knew, the less likely it was he could ever be friends with someone like him.
Yes, the crises in the Marvel world were often solved by heroes. But how many of those crises spiraled out of control precisely because of the heroes' existence?
Reid was a selfish man. He would do whatever it took to protect himself. Leading LexCorp to take over America, to reshape the world; that was his version of trying to fix things from outside the system.
The stories he'd read had already proven that heroes always showed up after the disaster.
But what he wanted was to prevent disaster from happening in the first place.
And finally, as Steve knocked out the last of the Joker Gang members and single-handedly suppressed the madness spreading through the crowd, Reid pulled his mind out of Joker's body.
'Give him the answer, Joker. I doubt you're interested in someone like Captain America anyway.'
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