Friday 1st May 2009, 03:30.
New Jersey,
Gotham City,
Gotham Heights.
The streets of Gotham were unusually empty at this time of day, though in this part of town, it could be considered normal with their more civilised inhabitants. Most were comfortably asleep in bed, content to live in their dream worlds as an escape from the cruel grasp of reality that surrounded them every waking minute.
As a result, it was quiet, not a soul in sight.
Or it should have been.
Alas, it was not meant to be, the sound of breaking glass followed by a screeching alarm broke the silence and tranquillity of the night. It came from a nearby doll shop as a woman dressed in a red and black jester costume, hat included broke the window by throwing a nearby garbage can through it.
Laughing cheerfully, Harley Quinn jumped inside and began to search through the store, darting from one shelf to the next, picking up dolls and throwing them aside with a quick once over. She was looking for something in particular, only for her search to be in vain and so, picked up one doll by its twin ponytail and angry at her failure, ripped it in half.
"You know where he hid it, don't you?" The gravelly voice of Gotham's Dark Knight spoke up from the shadows behind her and Harley slowly turned around with eyes wide, almost like a child who had been caught with their hand in the cookie jar.
"Uh oh." She said looking to see Batman walking towards her.
"Where is it, Harley?" Batman was in no mood for games, that much was obvious.
Harley also knew why, the dirty bomb that Joker had planted in the city was claimed to also contain portions of Scarecrow's Fearless Toxin. It was detailed in Amanda Waller's report and why they were acting in Gotham right now, was because Batman would be too focused on that to react in time.
Still, Harley didn't know where it was and she technically didn't know much about it either. "No idea what you're talking about." She whined angrily like a petulant child before throwing a number of dolls at her feet at him. Each one bounced off Batman's body as he continued to walk towards her unbothered by her 'weapons.'
As he came closer, Harley was once again reminded of how tall Batman was and instead of cowering in fear as some criminals did, she instead rose up to her feet to meet him face to face.
There was a brief moment of silence before Harley used the opportunity to hit him with the doll in her hand. Surprisingly, it actually caused the Batman to stumble as blood came from his still-healing nose. "Back off, Bats!" She said threateningly, whipping out her extendable baton to full length.
Batman himself just looked at her with narrowed eyes, very aware that with his current body's limitations due to not being fully healed, he would have to be careful.
A brief lull formed that was quickly broken when Batman threw a few Batarangs at Harley who used her great flexibility to lean back. While she did escape unharmed, part of her outfit was cut off and she didn't like that one bit. With a shout of anger, she spun on her heel lashing out with a kick that Batman couldn't quite avoid. Yet he recovered quickly avoiding the next few swipes from her baton however a jumping roundhouse kick snuck through his guard and slammed into his face.
Grunting, Batman righted his footing and pushed off rushing to Harley who went to meet his charge with a high-pitched yell.
-X-
Friday 1st May 2009, 4:30.
New Jersey,
Gotham City,
Arkham Asylum.
Tugging at the collar of his blue uniform, Esau released an irritated sigh as he pushed a metal stretcher bed containing a body bag. "Ah come on, lad don't be all bloody moody because you lost the bet." George Harkness joked as they walked down the corridors to the morgue.
"Shut up." Esau snapped angrily causing George's smile to only grow wider.
The reason for his anger was simple, Esau had drawn the short straw and was forced to work alongside Captain Boomerang instead of infiltrating through the kitchen staff, Eric had won that draw. It was safe to say that Esau understood exactly why Floyd didn't like George and it was because the guy just wouldn't shut up.
Before George could respond with a comment which would only make the already sour Esau even more annoyed, one of the guards stepped forwards. "Hold it right there." He ordered as they stopped at the entrance to the morgue. "What are you guys doing here?"
"Delivering a body to the morgue," George said in a way that conveyed both mocking sarcasm and complete seriousness at the same time. So much so, that the guard didn't know whether to be annoyed or sheepish and instead remained entirely serious.
The guard looked to the man behind the desk who shook his head.
"We haven't received any word of a body needing to be taken to the morgue, I'm afraid you can't come through here." The guard informed as another two moved into position, their hands resting dangerously upon their submachine guns, a not-so-subtle sign of warning.
'Guess that means Deadshot's running a little behind.' Esau thought noticing the slight smiling scowl on George's face as he realised what this meant. 'Which is just what we needed, now we're drawing attention to ourselves. Come on, Deadshot, hurry up.'Looking around, Esau noticed another three guards moving up behind them intent on cutting off their escape.
"Come on, look at it, they're obviously dead!" George exclaimed while hitting the head of the body with his fist.
'She'll kill you for that.' Esau winced knowing that Frost wouldn't like that at all and he wouldn't stop her, in fact, if George continued to be annoying, Esau would help her.
The guards watched him unamused by his words and the lead guard just nodded his head towards one of the others behind him. They walked forwards with a pad in one hand and raised it to the body, a tense few seconds followed before the guard stepped back.
"They're dead." He informed and Esau fought to keep himself from showing how impressed he was.
Crystal's internal body temperature was just above normal, but it was masked by the coldness of her skin so to sensors she appeared for all intents and purposes, as dead.
Or so she had said, Esau hadn't quite fully believed it until now.
"Alright." The lead guard nodded his head. "Look, even so, I can't let you through. We haven't received word that anyone needed to be taken to the morgue and we can't break protocol." That was strange to Esau, he unable to stop himself from frowning slightly, since when did Arkham guards care about protocol?
"That doesn't make sense," Esau spoke up. "We were told specifically to bring this body down here. You should have received word that we were coming."
The lead guard shrugged his shoulder. "We haven't received any news, so I'm afraid I can't let you in." He then looked Esau up and down with his eyes narrowed in suspicion. "You know, you look awfully young."
Esau shrugged his shoulders. "Yeah, I get that a lot. I'm twenty-two but people keep saying I'm younger. It makes it really annoying when I go out for a few beers and keep on getting asked for my ID." Esau joked and the lead guard gave a short laugh, his suspicions put at ease.
"Yeah, I imagine that would be a problem."
"Sir, we've just got word through, they're good to go." The guy behind the reception said and the lead guard walked over to see.
"About bloody time," George muttered annoyed.
Esau himself was taking note of the guards that were around him, most had stepped back putting more space between them all and while it certainly put Esau at ease, he still didn't like how they were holding their guns. It made him nervous and he didn't like to feel like that, yet he held off on doing anything, instead taking this lull to calm his nerves.
"Sorry about that." The lead guard said as one of his comrades pressed a button on a panel allowing the door to open. "The system must have had a glitch."
"No worries," Esau replied before George could open his mouth and piss off the guards. "I understand." Pushing the stretcher into the morgue, Esau carefully made sure to keep his head down to avoid getting his face caught in any camera. It certainly wasn't easy to do with the cameras positioned in such a way to capture those images, but Esau certainly did his best.
While Esau pushed the stretcher up to the wall, assisting one of the workers with carrying Frost's prone body onto the dissecting table, George quickly signed a form with a smile on his face. 'Stop smirking, you idiot. You look like a guy who's up to no good.'
"Let's see what goodies we've got." The doctor said pulling his latex gloves tight before unzipping the bag.
Esau himself was leaning against the side of the wall, arms crossed over his chest as he watched the man's surprised look, quickly turn into a leer upon seeing the naked body of Crystal.
Though he quickly jerked away in shock when her eyes opened. "Oh shit!" He exclaimed, his voice rising a little in pitch.
Frost herself just reached out, gripping his shirt and pulling him in for a kiss, his shocked and horrified whimpers quickly being silenced.
His hands which were raised in a moment of instinctive shock, quickly fell limp by his side as his face iced over, leaving Esau shocked and a little worried. 'That could have been me.' A traitorous part of his mind whispered as he thought back to the pleasurable night he and Frost had. Safe to say neither got much sleep, Esau's physical enhancements due to the serum allowed him to keep going to satisfy both his and Frost's sexual needs.
Releasing the man with a smile, Frost rose off the bed, the worker dropping to the ground, his head shattering into tiny fragments of ice as it did so. Her naked chest was still in view for a few short seconds before pulling up her suit as she stalked towards George and the other morgue worker. The distraction of seeing his fellow worker being killed and the sight of Frost in her naked glory left the man unable to move, something George used to his advantage.
A quick punch later and the morgue worker dropped to the ground unconscious and he turned to Frost with a smirk. Esau felt his own lips twitch upwards at the sight of Frost's glare, he knew exactly what would happen next and he was proved to be right.
Her leg swung straight into George's ball and he collapsed to the ground in heap with a cry of pain. "My gullies!"
"That's payback, dumbass." Stepping over his fallen body, Frost walked over towards the door Esau was standing by, a little back entrance leading to the sewers, which was exactly where they needed to be. "Walk it off, Captain Kangaroo." She spat out before turning to Esau, her scowl switching into an alluring smile. "Come on, lover boy. We've got work to do." She teased, blowing him a kiss before walking out the door.
Esau himself looked to see George glaring at her back. "You asked for that." He snarked before following Killer Frost out into the corridor. "So, lover boy?"
"Meh, couldn't think of much else. Besides," she moved in front of Esau, one hand on his chest. "It suits you." She teased and Esau shook his head and continued to walk down the corridor, both ignoring George's confused mumbling about the two of them.
"Come on, we haven't got much time. Deadshot and Harley should nearly be at the rendezvous point. Black Spider and King Shark shouldn't be too far behind either." That's when they heard the sound of an explosion. "Scratch that, looks like Eric's already making his move."