The chanting of the prisoners urged him on. He paused to make sure the safety rope was secure before backing up as far as he could in order to get some semblance of a running start. His bad knee felt like it was on fire, but he willed himself to ignore it.

He took a deep breath.

Here goes nothing.

He leapt for the upper ledge, stretching out his arms as far as they could reach. He arced upward, wishing for actual batwings that could carry him up and away from the pit. His outstretched fingers brushed against the rugged stone edge of the ledge…

Then slipped away.

Gravity seized him and he plunged toward the shallow pool below. He fell at least a hundred feet, accelerating every second, before the rope brutally broke his fall, jolting his already aching spine.

A scream died behind gritted teeth. He swung into the hard stone wall, barely turning his face away in time. The bone-jarring impact knocked the breath from his body. His ribs felt as if they’d been hit with a hammer.

The chanting fell away and the crowd dispersed now that the day’s entertainment was over. Only a handful of inmates watched as the tattooed man gradually lowered his dangling body back down into the pit. Bruce collapsed onto a steel gantry.

The European sighed, unsurprised by the outcome of the climb. The blind doctor listened attentively, then turned away.

“I told you it could not be done,” the European said. He helped Bruce to his feet.

Bruce winced with every step, and his ribs felt freshly bruised.

“You told me a child did it.”

“No ordinary child.”

Older now, the child approached the climbing wall even as the protector fought off the other prisoners— those who sought to halt the climb. Did the crazed inmates wish to prevent the child from escaping, or did they simply want to keep the youngster from dying in a foolhardy bid for freedom? The child didn’t care. All that mattered was seeing what lay beyond the pit— and wreaking his vengeance on the rest of the world.

Scrambling up the sides of the shaft, the child reached the fatal precipice that had killed the hopes of so many other climbers. Determined eyes glanced down at the protector, who was losing ground against the horde of maddened prisoners. They were swarming over him. Knives drawn, they fell upon the protector just as an equally bloodthirsty mob had attacked the child’s mother, years before.

For an instant, the child was tempted to turn back and fight beside the outnumbered champion.

The child stared down at the masked warrior. Their eyes made contact.

Go, the man ordered silently. Now.

The child jumped over the abyss. Desperate hands grabbed onto solid rock. A small body swung up onto the ledge.

“A child born in hell,” the white-haired prisoner said. “A child forged by suffering. Hardened by pain.”

He shook his head sadly at Bruce.

“Not a child of privilege.”