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Then he realized that the ominous black plastic bag was already occupied. Bane unzipped the bag to reveal the body of a stranger, who nonetheless looked vaguely familiar. It took Pavel a moment to realize that the dead man was roughly the same size and age as himself, with the same swarthy complexion and unruly white hair. There was even a distinct resemblance to their faces.

I don’t understand, he thought. What does this mean?

Bane didn’t waste time explaining. He tore open Pavel’s sleeve, then reached into a hidden pocket in his own jacket’s lining, removing a length of surgical tubing. Hollow needles sprouted from both ends of the tubing. Bane kept a firm grip on Pavel’s arm. He palpated a thick vein at its crook.

Wait, Pavel thought. Don’t...

But it was no use. Bane jabbed the needle into his arm, expertly threading the vein on the first try. Pavel winced in pain. He had never liked needles.

What are you doing?

Swiftly taping the first needle in place, Bane inserted the other end of the tube into the arm of the corpse. Dark venous blood began to flow through it toward the dead man. Confused and horrified, Pavel watched aghast as Bane performed compressions upon the dead man’s chest, drawing the blood into the lifeless body.

The scientist felt sick to his stomach.

Less than a pint later, the obscene transfusion was over. Bane withdrew the needle from Pavel’s arm and gestured for him to apply pressure to the wound to keep it from bleeding out.

Meanwhile, an armed mercenary plucked the hoods from his comrades’ heads, then took hold of the first captive and hooked him to a cable. He hung on tightly as it pulled them both up through the cabin toward freedom. Within moments, they had disappeared from sight.

So there is a way out, Pavel realized. Maybe there was still hope for him—if Bane didn’t kill him first. I need to get off this plane before it crashes!

The second prisoner, no longer bound, started to clip himself to a cable.

Bane shook his head.

“Friend,” he said gently. “They expect one of us in the wreckage.”

The other man nodded in understanding. Without a word of protest, he unhooked himself from the life- saving cable. He clambered down toward Bane and clasped his leader’s arm. His eyes glowed with the fervor of a true believer.

“Have we started the fire?” the man asked.

Bane squeezed his arm in return.

“The fire rises.”

They slipped free of the seats, hanging in the chaos, several feet above the cockpit doors and the bodies heaped there. Smoke and blood filled the cabin. Pavel wondered if the pilot was still vainly trying to regain control of the wingless aircraft. Loose bits of ash and debris blew against his face. His ears still rang from the explosion. His legs dangled in the air.

Bane took out a small hand-held detonator, and looked him in the eyes.

“Calm, doctor. Now is not the time for fear. That comes later.”

Pavel stared down at the heart-stopping drop beneath them. The wingless cockpit and cabin crashed into the rugged wilderness, throwing up a huge geyser of dust and rubble. Fuel tanks ignited, triggering a fiery explosion. Smoke and flames rose from the wreckage.

Leonid Pavel, distinguished scientist and engineer, screamed in utter terror as he was hoisted into the sky.

"dead man's chest" lol






also I never thought about the pilot, that is a very interesting observation doctor pavel

This novelization is total gold, not just the opening scene

is this the "junior" novelization?

novelizations are just bad though, they always feel like people are just describing the movie to you and they gotta use these short sentences to describe everything because the movies can show you so much thanks to images

no it's the real one i believe

I like how they add extra character motivations

really makes the characters extra special

yeah even though they only show up for like a few minutes and then die. do we really need to know CIA's motivations, I mean CIA works for the government and Bane is a terrorist so he wants to catch him


although to be fair I was able to infer that he was somewhat selfish based on his behavior but that had to be spelled out in a novelization where you can't see nuances of performance which is another reason why novelizations are bad



like I remember I was at Barnes and Noble and there was a novelization of Godzilla (2014) and I was reading it and I was like nigga how are you gonna make a novelization of Godzilla lol, what made that movie good was the cinematography and scale of it basically it was more of a great experience than a great story how you expect to capture that with words

although it was alright because they decided to focus more on Ford which made him more interesting cuz he was not very interesting in the movie but still idk not something to read. some things should just stay in the movies.

especially in The dark Knight rises because you're cutting from scene to scene and group to group constantly in the movie it's just kinda hard to adapt that. but I know they have to make novelizations for some reason.

only book that I've read not for school that I would NOT recommend was a novelization

what book was that

Star Wars episode 4 a new hope

oh that's the one that says that palpatine was just a puppet emperor right

maybe, it was just badly written and had no appeal