Chapter 20

Getting across that glacier was much easier with the snowshoes. The cold was also much more bearable with the thick winter coat that Bruce'd been given. All that he lacked was a pair of sunglasses to eliminate the glare from the reflection of the sun on the snowscape. It'd become especially bad at around noon, the intense white glow had almost completely blinded him. Moving at a slower pace through the frozen alpine forest, he spread out his arms to aid him in navigation. Every now and then, he would shield his eyes and peer into the compass, making sure that he was still headed in the right direction.

It wasn't till he began to hear the sound of rushing water that he quickened his steps, excited at the prospect of finding the Ganga River, then the border shared by both countries. But just as he'd gotten his hopes up, a thin whistling sound whipped just an inch from his face, and landed on the side of a tree trunk five feet from him. Even at that distance, he could see that it was a morning star.

He turned around to meet his attacker. Another morning star whizzed through the air. He narrowly ducked the impact, sliding downwards away from the spinning blades. As he straightened up again, he squinted into the brightness and saw a lithe figure dressed in League outfit, with the lower half of its face covered up like a ninja. It was Sandra, that much he could be sure. Her arms were suspended in a kendo stance, another morning star between her middle-finger and pointer-finger, aimed directly at him. "Sandra, what are you doing?" he asked her, even though it seemed her intent had become clear - and that was to kill him.

"Lady Shiva," she corrected him. "You no longer deserve the right to call me by my first name. You're a traitor to the League."

He didn't like this one bit. He'd come to respect Sandra in many ways as his mentor, and yet he found himself now unwittingly pit against her for his own survival. "Doesn't our friendship mean anything to you?"

"We are not friends," she replied, still keeping up her offensive stance. "I was commanded by the master to train you, and I performed my duty. Now he demands you to be destroyed, this is an order I will carry out too."

A third morning star was whisked in his direction. Once more, he dodged its onset, "What about the prophecy? What about me being the chosen one?"

"You forwent that honor when you decided to leave without the master's consent." She pulled out a katana.

He backed off slowly, his hands spread out defensively. "If I die, what will happen to Gotham, and everything that was foretold about its future?"

"You are with the master, or you are not. There are no compromises!" Sandra rushed at him all at once, slashing her sword in his direction. He moved away quickly, just as they'd practiced in the war room - except this time Sandra wasn't wielding a rod, or a dull sword. She had every intent to end his life, and he wasn't even armed.

"Don't I deserve the right to defend myself?" He asked between dodges.

"You deserve the right to perish!" Sandra replied, making a sudden lunge that Bruce didn't anticipate. It clipped the side of his wrist, causing him to take a hasty step backwards. One that he would soon regret.

He could feel the ground tilt at the final moment before his feet began to slide down a slippery slope. They slid off the ground, and caused him to tumble instead - head, back and legs in a cyclic motion, hitting thorns and rocks on his way down. Even though his view was mostly obscured, he could see he was rapidly coming to the edge of a cliff. He knew he had to stop his descent, and stop it fast. His arms grasped desperately for something to slow his momentum. Protruding roots and stones went between his fingers as he raced down the slope. And all of a sudden, his left arm caught hold of a tangled root, that he quickly locked in a stranglehold position. The sudden halt down his rapid descent tore the bone from its joint, causing him to cry out in agony. He let go of that root, and slid down the rest of the way. For a while he braced himself to propel off that cliff, but the jolt he'd endured before had allowed him to slow enough of his momentum for him to gradually slide to a stop without going off that cliff.

Laying face down in the snow with snow in every crevice of his face, he coughed and spat out everything that'd gone into his mouth and nostrils till he could freely breathe again. But even then, the agony in his arm made simply breathing unbearable. The pain put him on the verge of retching, and all he really wanted to do was just to pass out. Unfortunately, he knew that laying there wasn't going to be a viable option when there was still the problem of Lady Shiva trying to kill him.

Drowsily, he flipped himself over to see Sandra attempting to find a way down the slope without suffering the same fate as he did. "Sandra... please have mercy," he pleaded, although it occurred to him that the weakness of his tone together with the direction of the wind would prevent her from hearing what he'd said. Not that he thought anything he said at that point would change her mind.

Oddly enough, it wasn't long before Sandra stopped trying to find a way down. Instead, her attention shifted to something close to his feet. He turned in the same direction, and his heart nearly leapt into his mouth. Just inches from him was a large adult wolf with a coat of silver-white fur, its razor-sharp teeth completely bared down to the last molar. And even though it looked like it would be snarling, it remained as silent as it was when it arrived. Instinctively, Bruce tried to move himself away from the canine, but he found there wasn't much he could do in the horrid state that he was in.

"It seems that nature will finish what I can not," said Lady Shiva, as she put away her katana. "Farewell Bruce Wayne. You were a good student. May you be granted a swift and merciful death."

"Don't leave me here, please," Bruce pleaded again, but it was too late. Sandra turned away without a second glance. And soon she disappeared from view.