Act 1

On any ordinary summer night, the Tombs Gotham Waterworks would be silent as the broken stones of their namesake, save for the gurgle of water passing through to the City of Fog.

A hallway of large pipes. Sharp shadows hide the nooks and crannies. The hint of a cape—or wing?—around the corner, through the mess.

But not tonight, for the Scarecrow is on the loose and the Caped Crusader hunts the darkness!

Scarecrow [slowly]: “What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow / out of this stony rubbish? Son of man, / you cannot say.”

Flash to Batman, eyes asquint, watching an empty corridor intently for come what may.

Scarecrow [chanting]: “There is shadow under this red rock, / come in under the shadow of this red rock…”

Batman lunges, swinging on a batarang, crossing from catwalk to catwalk, hiding under a dock.

Scarecrow [loudly]: “I will show you something different from either / your shadow at morning striding behind you, / or your shadow at evening rising to meet you…”

Batman freezes, silhouetted against a cathedral-like circular window by a floodlight. That light was new.

Scarecrow [softly]: “I will show you… fear in a handful of dust.”

Scarecrow blows downwards, gently. The powder mixes in the multitudinous pipes, making the green one red—swirls and spirals and drains—and is gone, leaving a smell of almonds and a stain like rust.

Batman: “Scarecrow!”

Closeup. The mask of the Scarecrow, stuffed with straw—a hollow man draped over a nest of open pipes and knobs, his costume.

Back to Scarecrow. He looks like your favorite uncle or college professor, in another life, perhaps. He has lifted up his palms to his face as if he were praying (were it not for the indelible traces of umber on one).

From out of nowhere the Masked Avenger plummets downward—POW!—roundhouse punching the Scarecrow, sending him flying. Robin leaps, and ties him up.

Batman [angry]: “What have you done‽”

Scarecrow throws up his bound arms in exultation. The new floodlight catches the straw fringe of his sleeves and throws his long shadow across Batman and his twilight kingdom.

Scarecrow [triumphant]: “You’re too late! This is the center of the water network. The fear amplifier toxin is already spreading through the city. Gotham is done.”

Closeup. He is too late, and angry. Batman scowls and shakes his head.

But Batman knows the Scarecrow is right. The dose would spread in minutes, especially with this heat wave—he fears the worst!

The vigilante’s cowl suddenly lifts.

But then a thought strikes Batman! The Scarecrow was a consummately careful researcher before he went bad…

Batman kneels, rummaging through the bags, hurriedly searching… searching… finding!

Would he really have created a fear amplifier toxin—without an anti-toxin?

The Scarecrow staggers up, receiving a gut punch for his trouble.

Scarecrow: “Wait—wait, no—ugh!”

Ignoring his self-serving cries, Batman holds two bags of blue power at arm’s-length, and empties then into the same pipe.

“One to negate the fear toxin, and one for good measure.”

Batman: “Pray this reduces the damage, Scarecrow.”

Scarecrow: “You fool. You have no idea what you’ve done.”

Batman: “I’ve saved the city.”

Scarecrow: “No. You’ve destroyed it.”

Act 2

The Gotham skyline.

A well-dressed businessman looks at his cards in an elegantly scarlet underground casino, elegantly suited thugs in the background.

Dan Sparrow didn’t get where he is now by not taking risks or by indulging when he needed to be sharp, no sir. Just water for him, thank you. Tonight, he feels good about his luck with the cards—very good.

A Mustang streaks through the empty streets. A closeup of the speedometer in the danger zone. It swerves around a corner, almost flipping. Gripping the wheel, a young man grins a crazed rictus.

After a quick dinner, Rick Starling decided to run an errand across town. Usually there is time for decisions and revisions at the yellow light, but not tonight. There’s so little traffic that he wonders—Do I dare? Yes—he punches it up… and up… and up some more. The young man feels like a god behind the wheel and is exhilarated—what could be better than this? Driving through the sky while the stop lights streak by like dying stars?

The inside of a cozy apartment. A young housewife is relaxing with her tea & talk show on TV; through the door we see a bath with steam rising and a small child in it, and flames licking a pot on a stove in a kitchen through the other door.

Mary Willet is juggling cooking dinner with a hot bath for James and watching Johnny Carson; one must be so careful these days. She pauses to watch one bit on Russia. How funny! Why not watch a little longer? There’s nothing to worry about.

A middle-aged man stretches out in a lounger on the roof of an apartment building, glass of tomato juice in hand, smoking a fat blunt, the Hudson a dark ribbon below.

Ever since he was a child, Gus Swift dreamed of flying like a bird, a king of infinite space—but he had bad eyes. Idly, he sees a cardinal fly from roof to roof, and remembers.

A small bare hotel room, lit by a single hanging bulb. A not-unattractive woman in a dress contemplates the debris of makeup, cups, and a dead bottle of Old Crow on her night stand.

Ofelia had nothing to live for after Hammond left her. She’d have crossed to that other undiscovered kingdom long ago, but to go alone into the dreams beyond had always puzzled her nerve. Now she looks at the Tylenol with direct eyes.

Outside on the streets. It is a sultry hot summer night, and Gotham is a pressure-cooker.

Even the young men, strutting in their crimson Converses to their boomboxes, lack their usual insouciance and are restless tonight. A group of gangsters dancing in the water of a fire hydrant they’ve ‘borrowed’ look at each other. Switchblades flick. They move out. They’ve remembered unfinished business elsewhere.

City skyline.

Across Gotham, weary men and women are realizing, for the first time in their lives… they live in a world without fear. They’re not worried about crime, retirement, or being damned to Hell. But what they don’t yet realize about this world is…

They’re already in Hell.

Act 3

The outside of the Tombs. Dark, without a star in the sky.

The night is long.

Inside. The Scarecrow lies silently in front of Robin, looking at Batman hunched over the pipes.

Robin: “I can hear a siren. Sirens.”

Robin looks uncertainly at Batman.

Robin: “Shouldn’t—shouldn’t we do something?”

Batman turns away to look at Robin, the Gotham sky behind him now tinged slightly red.

A siren wails close. Batman’s hand moves to his grapnel gun—and falls away.

Robin starts for the door. Batman does not follow.

Robin: “Batman?”

Closeup. Batman is smiling?

Batman: “No, Robin, old chum, I’m… afraid… not.”

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