Even though General Ross had sealed off the Osborn Group building, dozens of researchers and their teams—over three hundred people in total—had still chosen to show up for work today.
But now, they were all trapped inside. Batman needed to get them out, turning the Osborn Group into an empty shell occupied only by General Ross and his troops.
He was currently on the tenth floor of the Osborn Group tower, clinging to the exterior wall. Thick strands of spider silk shot from his left arm, weaving into a massive web that spanned fifty meters at its widest point.
This web was securely anchored to various sturdy spots on the building's outer wall. Its expansive surface area ensured the wall wouldn't buckle under the strain Batman was about to apply.
"I will arrive in five minutes—"
Batman's message hadn't even been sent when the portable computer strapped to his arm indicated that the connection to Professor Connors's computer had been severed.
"Professor Connors is in trouble. I need to pick up the pace."
Batman sighed and glanced to his right. On the rooftop of the nearest building to the Osborn tower, Oracle AI was assuming control of the driving system.
"Barbara, push the Batmobile to maximum speed and activate the jump function."
Batman whispered the command to Oracle AI while simultaneously tensing his right arm.
His right arm wasn't attached to any spider silk; instead, he gripped a steel cable over a hundred meters long, pieced together from three linked grappling hooks.
General Ross's soldiers were swarming inside the Osborn Group building. The best way to evacuate the researchers was to sow chaos, and this time, Batman had to take a more aggressive approach.
Boom!
On the roof of a building a hundred meters away, the Batmobile—which had climbed up in wall-crawling mode—let out a raw, unmasked engine roar.
Then, under Oracle AI's control, it surged forward.
As it approached the rooftop's edge, the Batmobile didn't slow down at all. Instead, its four wheels suddenly sprang upward, launching the entire vehicle into the air and clearing the edge's safety railing.
At the same moment, two jet propulsion units—salvaged from a glider and mounted at the rear—fired up to full throttle. Twin flames burst from the Batmobile's tail.
Simultaneously, at the front, the three connected grappling hooks reeled in furiously, retracting in perfect sync.
On the tenth floor of the Osborn building, Batman—with one hand anchored to the wall via the massive spider web and the other clutching the Batmobile's grappling hook—suddenly heaved with all his might!
The Batmobile's raw horsepower, its leap from the edge, the ignited thrusters, the retracting hooks—
Combined with Peter Parker's rigorous training over the past weeks and Batman's elite, master-level combat techniques for channeling force!
The four-ton Batmobile rocketed from the distant high-rise, hurtling at breakneck speed straight toward the Osborn Group tower!
This was a feat Batman couldn't have pulled off with his normal human physique alone—but right now, his body was enhanced as "Spider-Man"!
"Seymour, quick—what's that?"
On the tenth floor of the Osborn Group, one of General Ross's soldiers guarding the area eyed the dark shadow outside the window suspiciously and turned to his partner.
"Probably a bird? Can't be Batman. General Ross already figured out that guy's just some ordinary schmuck in a stupid costume back during the day—"
The soldier named Seymour hadn't even finished his sentence when the shadow outside drew nearer, growing larger.
At the same time, the massive engine roar pierced through the window glass, impossible to ignore.
Crash!
In midair, the Batmobile's twin crimson headlights flared to life as it smashed into the tenth floor of the Osborn Group like a predator pouncing from the heavens.
The vehicle skidded sideways across the floor for over twenty meters, toppling countless desks and lab equipment before grinding to a halt.
Before the soldiers or researchers could even process what was happening, the Batmobile's riot suppression mode kicked in instantly.
The grappling hooks snapped free, and the winches detached automatically from the front, clattering to the floor.
Three guns on the left side of the hood, three on the right, plus more on the doors and tires—a total of forty-two firearms in all—bristled like spines on a porcupine, unleashing a storm of rubber riot-control rounds.
"Fu*k!"
"What's happening?!"
"Where the hell did this car come from?!"
Thanks to Oracle AI's formidable processing and targeting algorithms, every barrel zeroed in on General Ross's soldiers, sparing every single researcher.
For a brief moment, the soldiers' howls, shrieks, and curses filled the air in a chaotic symphony—but it faded fast as the close-range rubber bullets struck home, inflicting muscle trauma and knocking them out cold.
Batman casually tossed aside the grappling hook, vaulted through the shattered window left by the Batmobile, and entered the building. He scanned the researchers huddled in terror in corners and under lab benches, then growled a single command in his deep voice:
"Run!"
Run!
None of the researchers at the Osborn Group were idiots.
Once they realized the Batmobile's bullets were only hitting soldiers and leaving everyone else unscathed, it clicked. Then, someone—nobody knew who—yelled out, and the whole group bolted frantically toward the stairs or elevators.
"Stop! General Ross's orders—holy crap, what is that?!"
Soldiers from the ninth and eleventh floors, drawn by the racket on the tenth, came rushing in.
They were about to block the fleeing researchers when the Batmobile's engine revved, grabbing their attention.
"General Ross! Batman just drove the Batmobile straight onto the damn tenth floor!"
"The tenth-floor team is wiped out—requesting backup!"
Batman hadn't used lethal force, but with the soldiers on the tenth floor sprawled unconscious, the reinforcements from other floors naturally assumed they'd been killed.
So, just as Batman had planned, they radioed General Ross for support—and in the process, ignored the researchers slipping away in the confusion.
Thud, thud, thud.
Bullets rained toward the Batmobile and Batman. He rolled to the side, yanked open the Batmobile's door, then slammed it shut, fooling the soldiers into thinking he'd ducked inside.
Then the Batmobile charged at the soldiers, while Batman himself seized the moment of pandemonium to leap back out the window and scale the Osborn building's exterior wall at rapid speed.
"One.
Two.
Three." As he climbed, Batman counted the seconds silently. When he reached the forty-fifth floor, he reached into his utility belt and pulled out two blacked-out pumpkin bombs.
It wasn't quite accurate to call them pumpkin bombs anymore; they'd lost all traces of their original design, now painted pure black with a bold Bat symbol emblazoned on them.
Batman didn't hurl the modified Bat-bombs into the Osborn building. Instead, he let go and flung them outward in three directions away from the structure.
Thanks to his precise timing, it happened almost exactly as the researchers pouring out from the first floor were about to burst free—only to be halted by the soldiers posted outside.
Buzz!
Blinding white light, ear-piercing high-frequency screeching, and a massive shockwave slammed the soldiers to the ground.
Earlier in the day, the researchers had assumed General Ross wouldn't deploy weapons inside the building, but now—with the Batmobile's dramatic crash and the gunfire echoing—these wide-eyed scientists finally grasped that they couldn't stick around any longer.
"Phase one of the evacuation plan: success."
"Now initiating Plan B—the Anti-Hulk Plan."