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The T.V. screen lights up with a crackle.
“Come one come all to Gotham’s very own one stop shop for all your window necessities!” The man on the screen has too much excitement for one man talking about windows. The colours are saturated to all hell, sound effects play every couple of seconds, there’s marching band music that almost completely drowns out the announcer.
It’s a colorful mess of lights, sounds and flashing images, and is one step away from including smell and taste into the mix.
It’s not like you can’t predict the stench of cologne on the kind old man inside the screen and the metallic, alcohol taste it leaves in your mouth when you pass by.
“We’ve got Stained glass!” a loud cheer. “We’ve got sliding windows!” A loud cheer. “We’ve got reinforced, fire-fly proof, toxin sealed glass on all of our windows!” A loud cheer. “What you want, we have, so come on down to our amazing showrooms on the corner of 35th and 14th street! You will be wowed by our windows at,” A dramatic pause “Gotham Glass! No more worrying over your windows being broken by Bane. Say hello to our warranty program and get a replacement for a small fee!”
The commercial blabbers on for a while longer before she picks up the remote from the coffee table and turns off the t.v. with a click.
Those bastards.
Everyone in Gotham knows that they’re run by Marroni’s people. It’s just a way for them to make a couple extra dollars off of the already struggling Gotham population. They have almost entirely secured the window industry in a 50 mile radius, causing the entirety of Gotham to only buy windows from them. Only, their problem is that their cheap, disgusting windows break so often.
The mayor is in their pocket, no one to go up against their corruption and monopoly and shady business practices.
No one can go up against their business if they love their life. It’s a dead end. Any business who tries to give Gotham better quality windows gets mysteriously killed in a back alley way.
It's unavoidable. Gotham has to support Gotham glass. The bats break the windows of every warehouse on the docks once a week and all of them except the yellow guy refuse to go through the fucking door.
They are all just funneling Marroni's operation, while she’s here. Suffering.
Elisa stands up from the couch and throws the remote into it. It bounces off the couch and onto the floor with a clang. Damn it.
She makes her way to the bedroom. It’s a small place. She had to downsize recently. The condo her family has lived in for the last century has gone into foreclosure.
Whatever. It’s not like she had too much use for the place anyway.
Her husband left for Pennsylvania and took her kids with him. He said it was for their safety. She agrees but she can’t leave Gotham. She can’t.
Her family has had a window cleaning business in Gotham since the 20’s. It’s a small business but it’s respectable work. With the amount of skyscrapers that have plagued the Gotham Diamond District, windows have always needed cleaning.
Until, these fucking rogues showed up 10 years ago.
Now every window is broken every other day. That might be her exaggerating, but with the amount of broken windows from Killer Croc slamming himself into buildings while on the run, Harley Quinn smashing them because she’s bored, and Two face insisting that every building should have an even pair of broken and unbroken windows, most of the windows in the city are broken before they can even get dirty enough to clean them.
Theoretically, it shouldn’t be affecting Elisa’s family business so much; they have a loyal customer following that will support them no matter what. But her profits are dipping and the window business is corrupt.
There is only one way for her to get out of this mess.
The only way to clean is if she doesn't mind getting her hands a little dirty.
She finds her phone in the midst of her bed cover and dials the one number that she can rely on when things get tough.
Clay Face.