Weapon of Choice
By Ozzallos

Issue #02 – Back in Black

Present Day

"Now I know that Kanazawa is supposed to be the sister city of Gotham," The Caucasian speaker produced a friendly smirk from atop a decorated podium with the observation, speaking to his audeince in fluent Japanese. The crowd waited with quiet enthusiasm as the billionaire continued, exuding friendly confidence as he did. "But I couldn't ask for a better home for the Japanese division of Waynetech than Tokyo. Thanks to Marusha Industrial, we're about to make that happen."

The assembled mass clapped politely with the charismatic business man's remarks as his executive assistant, a beautiful Japanese woman in a black business petticoat and knee high pencil skirt offered him a pair of scissors. The warm smile she offered with them could easily have been mistaken to have a flirtatious edge to it. Bruce Wayne took them both with an appreciative smile of his own before turning back to another suit standing next to him, continuing his speech.

"Though it would be customary for the CEO to cut the ribbon, I believe it would be more fitting for the Japanese representative of Waynetech to do the honors." The taller man handed the golden scissors over with a polite bow, one reciprocated by the recipient himself. More clapping followed as the man turned back to a long golden ribbon that separated the indoor event from a long assembly line of robotics and other machinery.

Snip!

"The Marusha-Waynetech technical assembly plant is now open!" The man effused as the ribbon parted, earning applause. This time it was more energetic than before as the various businessmen and managers amongst the crowd celebrated. Caterers and guides began to move into position along the various robotics lines even as Bruce took center stage once more.

"Please enjoy the open house," He gestured behind him to the assembly line and the caterers setting up along it. "Likewise the food and drink… I'm not taking any of it home with me."

Polite laughter greeted the joke as he stepped aside to let one of his associates handle the details while he mingled with the crowd. Doing so inevitably exposed him to the press and the gauntlet of questions waiting for him.

"Mister Wayne! Do the troubles in Gotham lend any credence to moving your headquarters elsewhere?"

"I doubt it." Bruce shrugged easily as he explained. "Gotham may be rough around the edges, but that's what keeps us innovating as a company."

More camera flashes illuminated the business executive as the questions continued to pepper him. "Do you see Okamura Industries as competitor?"

"While there are certainly some sectors we compete in, I'd consider it more of a friendly rivalry than outright competition." Bruce smiled for the female reported, much to her delight.

"Will the recent trade tax on foreign goods affect Wayne Enterprises bottom line?" Another question was called out and the reporters watched as the Caucasian man shrugged, seeming not to care one way or the other.

"Trade Taxes always affect the consumer in the end." The executive admitted somewhat ambivalently, then gestured to the assembly line behind him. "Something Wayne Enterprises will fortunately mitigate through local production."

"How will the stock market react—"

"No more questions, please." The woman trailing behind him with a tablet advised, stepping around his person to interpose herself between her employer and the press. She directed their attention to a nearby suit. "Mister Takato will be happy to answer any other questions you may have concerning…"

'And that's why you hire beautiful assistants,' Bruce thought sagely as he watched the curvesque Japanese secretary deftly redirected their attention to a more appropriate recipient… that was to say somebody who wasn't earning seven thousand dollars per minute by simply breathing. He smiled to himself, seemingly admiring the woman's figure through the somewhat conservative business suit she wore before turning to mingle with the rest of the crowd as social etiquette—

"Excuse me, Mister Wayne-dono?"

Bruce blinked, stopping short as a new woman stepped out to greet him. She was younger than the type that typically frequented the event he was usually forced to attend himself, but her buttoned black blazer and gray slacks all but assured him she was in the right place. The bob cut of her brunette hair made it slightly more difficult to place her age accurately, but if he had to make a guess, she was either still in high school or recently graduated. One thing she definitely was not was a reporter.

"What can I do for you, Miss…?" Bruce trailed off with the expectation of her name, willing to indulge her with his time if only to clarify the mystery of her presence.

"Nabiki Tendo." The girl bowed respectfully to him, then held out her hand in deference to recognizing his own cultural norm. He bowed to her and took the handshake in kind, smiling for the out of place teen.

"What can I do for you, Miss Tendo?" Wayne arched an eyebrow, genuinely curious. The girl seemed to fidget slightly in his presence, but seemed determined to hold direct eye contact.

"I… I was wondering," She stumbled with her words slightly, but the man admired the way she held her ground against what had to be an intimidating meeting. "What advice do you have for somebody seeking to be as successful as yourself?"

Bruce arched an eyebrow as the ambitious content of her question was analyzed, especially when compared against her cultural. Women weren't exactly regarded as executive material, yet here this one was. He couldn't help but to admire that sort of drive and decided to reward it. "You mean besides having rich parents?"

Nabiki opened her mouth, but found herself blinking for lack of a reply against the man's unexpected humor. After a moment she recovered with a slight cough to mask her own chuckle. "Ahem… Yes. Besides that, Wayne-dono."

The CEO thought about his answer for a moment and drew from his life experiences… Even some learned from a life best left unmentioned.

"Having rich parents is fine, but the world is full of sharks." Wayne continued even as a small number of the gathered crowd noticed the unlikely interaction between the two. "Trust in yourself first, but you can only go it alone for so long without others you can ally yourself with; people who have earned your trust."

Nabiki nodded, noting that somewhere along the way, the man's carefree attitude had faded to seriousness. He was talking to her as a businessman, not the playboy that usually made the headlines. It was something she almost hadn't expect from the billionaire and therefor carefully committed his every word to memory.

"Accept the fact that betrayal is inevitable, but don't let it stop you." The man cocked his head as his gaze gained a distant look for a moment before returning its focus to the middle Tendo sister. "The moment you do so, be it business or life, they'll have won."

"I… I see." Nabiki replied, not entirely sure that she did. But she would, especially if it meant becoming even half as successful as the man in front of her.

"So now my question to you," A bit of the playboy smile returned, once again illustrating why the man seemed to always have arm candy on hand. Money was simply the aphrodisiac to compliment his rugged charm; charm that the Tendo sister wasn't entirely immune to herself. She let a slight smile of her own slip through the nervousness as he plied his question to her. "How many favors did you have to call in to get invited to this event?"

Nabiki's eyes widened as she nearly chocked, recognizing the fact that she was being called out and teased simultaneously by one of the world's most powerful businessmen. In the end, her cheeks flushed with embarrassment as she looked away mumbling.

"Ah, all of them."

Bruce's smile widened to her surprise. "Then don't stop on my account."

Again, the girl was surprised at what amounted to the billionaire's cart-blanche approval of what was effectively a self-invite. By the time she recovered her wits enough to formulate some suitable talking point, his super model executive assistant had stepped to his side, gesturing to the tablet before turning her attention to the younger girl. "I'm sorry, Mister Wayne has a pressing schedule."

The Wayne in question shrugged, favoring Nabiki with a half bow as he turned away, but not before a wink accompanied his final advice to her. "And remember, money may not buy happiness, but it makes life much easier."

Nabiki nodded dumbly at the life truth even as she watched him merge with the rest of the crowd to mingle even as the short meeting was replayed over and over in her brain. In fact, she was still amazed at just how successful it had gone. The high school senior turned away with little in the way of mental direction now that her primary goal had been accomplished. Realistically, there really hadn't been a plan beyond the meeting and now the mercenary was at a loss as to how to spend the rest of her time. Her stomach growled obnoxiously and suddenly the catered portion of the venue sounded like the best short term idea. She scanned the area near the assembly lines watching as the help scurried from the side rooms to helpfully plate the—

Red.

Nabiki's attention snapped to acquire the figure out of the peripheral of her vision. She had been another waitress, though the red mane was unmistakable. The middle Tendo jockeyed for position through the crowd in order to confirm the brief sighting, but whoever it was, she was gone. The Ice Queen frowned at the unlikely conclusion she had been presented with, shaking her head doubtfully.

There was just no way that was who she thought it was.


It was exactly who she thought it was.

Ranma Saotome, heir to the Anything Goes School of Martial Arts was still berating herself with the close call. Whereas Nabiki Tendo had called in every favor she had to get into the event, the martial artist had infiltrated it on his own merits... Or rather her own merits. Those merits specifically included a caterer's uniform and an excuse to justify the need for extra help in order to service the open house.

Playing the audacious flirt when questioned by the manager certainly had helped.

'Perv.' Ranma groused from her rooftop vantage point, now free of the white shirt and black slacks in favor of her vastly more comfortable red silk shirt and black pants. Pervert or not, she knew that the body she wore seemed absolutely suited to exploiting that particular weakness in the men and she ruthlessly used it to her advantage. Instead of walking away with free food, she had departed the event with the name of the hotel her League of Assassins agent was staying at.

The grope she had endured was almost worth it.

For a ninja assassin, however, the man known as Bruce Wayne advertised himself and his wealth to the world as if neither being a ninja or an assassin were a concern. His accommodations at the Imperial was certainly evidence of that, but even she had to admit that hiding in plain sight like that made for great cover even if his very chi didn't read like a normal person. It was, in fact, the same reason she was a curvy redhead instead of the pigtailed gender of her birth at the moment. If the League were as amoral as her father believed, she couldn't afford to have a trail leading back to the Tendos. Nothing was better for that than an identity that could be splashed away with warm water.

And then there was Nabiki.

Ranma glanced back down from the roof at the limo that had ferried her target back to the hotel while replaying the close call in her mind's eye. Spying on her business executive assassin-playboy had been the primary objective; an objective that turned sideways the moment Nabiki Tendo stepped out of the crowd to confront the man. The panic Ranma had felt in that moment had been very real as her own focus shifted from covert observation to the possibility of open confrontation without even the barest clue as to why Akane's sister was facing down a professional killer.

And then she watched the oddest thing happen- The bold, confidence the Ice Queen usually exhibited faltered, melting into…

'…Hero worship?' The redhead postulated with slight disbelief now that she had a chance to analyze the encounter with the benefit of hindsight. The cold, pushy sister was absent in that meeting, replaced by her respectful, if not awed clone. It was so surreal that Ranma herself couldn't help but to stare as the girl interacted with the faux businessman, causing the redhead to hang around just long enough to almost blow her own cover entirely. Even that was inconsequential compared to the fact that she had walked away from the meeting without a scratch, nor had the assassin noticed the person spying on him.

'Might have to think of some excuse for Nabiki, though,' Ranma speculated, all but certain the girl had seen something. Telling her the truth briefly crossed the redhead's mind, but the thought was dismissed outright. Entrusting Nabiki to sensitive information was like entrusting gasoline to fire, and the last thing she needed was another mess to clean up because of the mercenary's overly ambitious tendencies. The martial artist frowned with that particular train of thought and knew the consequences would be much, much worse than bailing her out of a coin operated helicopter.

'Yeah, that's not going to happen,' The pigtailed girl decided, leaning out of the shadows briefly to get a better angle on the room occupied by one Bruce Wayne. It wasn't the best view she could have gotten, but it was the safest given who she was spying on. The curtains were open and she could see the occasional shadow in the room, assuring her of its occupancy. She watched him pass in front of the window for a moment, seeming to take in the view as he loosened his tie.

'What to do, what to do…' Ranma mulled over the choices present to her. The easy answer to her dilemma was to pay the guy a visit now that she knew where he was staying, which in turn struck her as an incredibly bad idea given the stakes. It would certainly be the most preferable in her eyes, but this was one meeting she couldn't afford to screw up. That left the alternatives. She could follow him around some more, but that in itself was a time consuming process. The redhead shook her head, dismissing the idea. 'More chances to get noticed by him, too.'

'Maybe check his room?' The martial artist kicked around the possibility watching as the man tossed the tie to the side and— Ranma blinked, her eyes widening as a pair of distinctly feminine arms snaked around his shoulders from behind. She watched the CEO smile, turning to pull the woman into view.

"You gotta be kidding." Ranma mumbled to herself as the woman- this one also Japanese -applied her entire body intimately to his. The redhead's cheeks pinked slightly as his new girlfriend leaned in to take Bruce's lips for herself in full public view. The martial artist shook her head in voyeuristic embarrassment as the woman's fingers dance down his gray dress shirt, unbuttoning it one after the next. "And they complain about me bein' a Don Juan…"

…Nor was he doing anything to reject her advances. If anything, Ranma watched as he encouraged it, reciprocating the kiss while his hands roams her body. The martial artist sighed and leaned back against the wall, wondering just how long her stakeout would last.

As it turned out, the next three hours.

Ranma Saotome yawned, glancing back out from her overhang and into the night of the skyline. The first hour of her surveillance had been… educational. Educational in a way that colored her face with a semi-permanent blush as the pair ducked in and out of view with fewer and fewer clothes each time. The second hour wasn't as eventful as the first since they had taken their activities back to the room's interior, but the blush returned with hour number three as the redhead watched the fully nude woman pressed into the glass of the window as she rocked in time with the man behind her.

Her cheek twitched with the lurid display and she leaned back into the wall to wait it out even as her mind tried to decide between being annoyed or fascinated by the length of time they were taking. A yawn marked hour four and finally the blue eyed martial artist noted that the apartment window was dark. The skyline had since darkened as well and the neo-girl knew her presence would be missed back at the dojo. Fortunately, she had an excuse for that… Whether anybody would buy it or not was a different story.

A quick glance down at the limo revealed it to be waiting in the well-lit valet parking section of the hotel's premises. When combined with the presence of his female companion, it likely meant Wayne was still in the room

'Probably,' Ranma hedged as she took into account the fact that she was dealing with a ninja assassin. Konatsu hadn't been the first, nor would he likely be the last she would deal with, and all of them had one thing in common—A propensity for tricks and misdirection. Ranma rocked up from her sitting position, stretching to work the kinks out of her muscles as she considered her next course of action. Gaining entry into the hotel wouldn't likely even be necessary.

'Work the wall, hit the balcony and take a peek,' The redhead decided and was nearly ready to abandon her post when a shadow caught her eye. Her head snapped onto the new vector in order to track the movement that would have been invisible from any other angle. It was…

'…Flying?' Ranma blinked, barely able to pick out the black form as it slipped across the skyline and her field of view. The martial artist frowned at the confluence of unlikely events occurring in the proximity of her stakeout. First, the billionaire playboy that was in reality a League of Assassins agent. Second, a shadow who's origin just happened to be the very same residence as that same agent. She watched the glider set down on the next building, tracking the black cloaked figure as it printed across the rooftop.

The redhead's blue eyes followed the shadow as it launched off the intervening ledge for the next building before briefly glancing back to the window representing the billionaire's room, chewing on her lip with minor indecision. 'Scout the room or track his ninja minion?'

In reality, it wasn't much of a decision and Ranma stood up, scaling the ledge of her own lookout, down to the first jump-off point. Bruce Wayne appeared to be pretty well occupied. The martial artist rolled her eyes at just how occupied he appeared to be, but focused on the matter at hand as she took to the fire escape and leapt out into the cold open air, flipping upward to conserve height and momentum. She hit next roof soundlessly and took it at a sprint, managing to reach the next ledge just in time to catch the shadow employ some sort of line and hook to negotiate the larger airspace between buildings, filing the fact away as she continued her pursuit.

'…Maybe even find out what the League's doin' in Tokyo just by followin' this guy,' she thought to herself as she took to some of the lower rooftops in lieu of her own convenient rope and grapple. The route was longer but the redhead was well used to the pace and hopped from roof to roof, keeping the airborne shadow in sight. Cool wind tugged at her meager Chinese silks, but it was barely noticed as she landed again, tucking into a roll before resuming her jog without even breaking stride.

Within fifteen minutes, their destination had become a foregone conclusion as the Tokyo metropolis she had been traversing gave way to warehousing and industrial complexes. Cranes and smokestacks billowing dimly lit clouds of carcinogens into the night sky became a common sight as she pursued the ninja deeper into the Keiyō Industrial Area. Ranma watched the gliding shadow singled one warehouse out in particular, angling in to avoid its lighting, then disappear behind a large neon sign that effectively removed the ninja from existence. Two more rooftop hops brought the martial artist into range of the factory as well, allowing her enough pause to decide her next course of action. The ledge of the adjacent building gave her an excellent vantage point of the property as she picked out the details.

'What the hell's he doing in a place like this?' Ranma wondered to herself as she studied the compound below from her own concealed position. Two layers of barbed wire fencing surrounded the complex; its length routinely patrolled by two man units with enough tactical gear to make her think military, sans the firearms.

'Probably concealed,' the martial artist decided as she studied the property with an appraising eye. Long, jutting poles interspersed along the perimeter accommodated clusters of cameras that seemed to cover every manageable angle, likely tied into some system that would alert every guard in the place to a breach. The neogirl cocked her head, trying to determine how the guarded compound related to the shadowy ninja that had just landed within. Her study came to rest upon the closest two man patrol. They weren't ninjas. In fact, the warehouse they guarded didn't exactly scream 'ninja base!' to her… Which meant absolutely nothing.

'That's what makes it the perfect ninja base, I guess?' Ranma wondered to herself as she plotted her own entry onto the property. Maybe the guys down on the ground didn't even know the place they were guarding was a ninja base. It made sense in a convoluted sort of way the redhead decided and began to move. She didn't have the luxury of gliding in, but entry would be simple and the shadow had the right idea with the rooftop. 'Go in over the fences, scale the roof, pick up his trail there.'

All in all, it represented a formidable defense to any potential intruder… unless that intruder had been raised by an amoral father who tended to incite angry mobs with his thievery while claiming that it was excellent stealth and evasion training. The next patrol passed regardless and the redhead was over the fencing with ease, balancing atop one the camera poles in order to exploit the only angle they didn't cover: Straight up. It served as a convenient springboard into the shadows of the property, allowing her to skirt the wall until finding suitable a point from which to ascend to the roof and return to her ninja hunting unimpeded.

'Almost,' she corrected herself as she slipped around a bank of air conditioning units and nearly into the line of sight of another camera array. Ranma backed off with a slight frown and began to pick a path around it while keeping an eye out for Wayne's ninja minion. Having witnessed his descent onto the roof itself, the redhead carefully moved toward his approximate landing zone and after five minutes, hit pay dirt.

'Gotcha.' Ranma thought smugly as she knelt beside the single open ventilation grate that undoubtedly represented her mark's method of entry. With it came the realization that the building she now stood atop likely wasn't a League of Assassins base since it was tough to imagine a ventilation shaft as the official secret entrance. The thought also cause the martial artist a frown as she considered the alternatives. '…That only leaves theft, kidnapping and murder.'

Thunk!

"Check the west side!"

"Team Bravo coming up stairwell C14!"

"Sweep those AC units!"

Ranma threw herself to the side just as a door slammed open and a high lumen beam of light swept over her position, scanning the corridor of ventilation she had just vacated before locking on to the open vent itself.

"I've got an open grate!" Another voice called out as Ranma listened from the shadows less than five meters from the discovery.

"Two man teams!" The next ordered and the beams of light swept closer to her position behind the air conditioner block. "Stay sharp! He might still have an accomplice up here!"

The redhead cursed to herself, glancing longingly back toward the ledge fifteen meters away and directly within their line of sight. Stealthing her way past the line of men driving themselves toward her position was no longer an option and from the sound of it, Wayne's ninja had pissed off whoever owned the place.

'Another thing to thank the guy for,' She thought in an acerbic tone as she considered her options. Short of dusting off the forbidden schools, her discovery was inevitable and she didn't want to tip her hand unless she absolutely had to. A searching light swept over her cover as the martial artist chewed on the dilemma. Ranma's study scanned her immediate vicinity and stopped with a slight smile as her gaze fell upon a small stone at her feet.

Sometimes you just had to keep it simple.

The rock was airborne almost from the moment she scooped it up, tossed over her shoulder into the dark at random. There was no target, nor need of one. It was bound to hit something and the loud, metallic clank did that, piercing the dark. The sudden clatter had exactly the effect she had hoped for—Flashlights swung away from her position and the martial artist was out, darting across the open space and into the adjacent vent that her assassin minion had presumably used to gain entry into the facility.

The large ventilation shaft easily accommodated her small frame and Ranma slid in and down even as the opening behind her was illuminated once more.

'Too slow,' she smirked mentally as the neo-girl dropped through darkness, occasionally braking her momentum with her feet against the side of the shaft. A dim service lamp illuminated the silhouette of large industrial fan, prompting Ranma to arrest her descent entirely before dropping into it. The martial artist slid lightly onto the ledge above its blades, noting the entire unit had been tangled to immobility by a length of high tensile strength cable. The redhead took a moment to admire the ninja's handiwork before carefully lowering herself through the blades as well.

The ventilation shaft below was a steep slope down into the darkness and represented only a minor inconvenience until a faint voice echoed down the shaft to accompany the dim light from above.

"Fire in the hole!"

The memories of a childhood spent on the road flashed before her eyes, while the words themselves isolated one in particular. Her father had called it 'Hand Grenade Jutsu' and itbore an uncanny resemblance to Happosai's penchants for large pyrotechnic explosions. The general concept was similar to a game of hot-potato, in that the one holding the hand grenade last, lost… And judging by the metallic reverberation from above, the aforementioned potato was tumbling down to kick her ass.

'Shit!' Ranma groused as she considered the only option left available to her before letting gravity take its natural course. She tucked her arms and legs in, depriving herself of the only anchor holding her in place and fell into black even as a small cylindrical objected tumbled less than a second behind her. It rebounded off the tangled ventilation fan like a basketball grazing a hoop before detonating.

Ranma's freefall into darkness was instantly illuminated by a violent flash and a quick glance up reminded her why she hated Hand Grenade Jutsu while a confined fireball raced down to meet her. She bounced gracelessly off the wall as the shaft veered left, finally allowing her a glimpse of salivation in the form of a backlit register vent below. The only question was which would reach her first—The fireball or the vent she'd have to plow through to escape. The redhead winced as both approached all too rapidly.

And to think some people grew up with normal childhoods.


Bruce Wayne appreciated the Japanese culture.

Had anybody asked, he would have told them that he admired the economic grace of its people and their ability to uphold ancient traditions in the modern day, balancing them against the omni present crush of progress. There was an obsessive level of artistry present in nearly every aspect of their society that he appreciated, and it didn't hurt that he had the monetary wealth to enjoy it.

Bruce Wayne was not the one present in the Keiyō warehouse, however. In his place stood someone else entirely; a caped figure clad in black body armor; his identity hidden by a full cowl save his lower face. From the shadows, it would have been easy to mistake the person for a demon, especially within the country he now stood. The sharpened points of his mask superficially resembled horns, lending his appearance more toward that of a mythical Japanese oni than the urban legend he was more commonly known as.

Unlike the Japanese demon of lore, The Batman had not been summoned to Tokyo way by magical circles or human sacrifice, but instead by the contents of the warehouse. There was no artistry to appreciate here, no modern day traditions to be upheld except for one: Criminal enterprise. It was a universal language understood in every nation, and for all its beauty, the Land of the Rising Sun was no different. Here, it was the Yakuza that held sway, plying their craft while the Triad and Bratva nipped at their heels for business.

It was that business that interested the Dark Knight, specifically the business surrounding the cache of crates surrounding him in the dimly lit storage facility. Each one was a sealed steel container whose contents were held secure by an electronic lock…A lock that served as no barrier whatsoever to Batman's access. A small disk slipped between the fingers of his armored glove and he plied it to lock itself, just left of the keypad. A thin LED dial lit up along the device's circumference, its blue glow slowly progressing clockwise. The digital lock beside it seemed to go haywire with its progress, the red numbers of its numeric display flashing through a multitude of combinations before finally settling on a single combination. The circular device deactivated, allowing its owner to retrieve it in one hand while the other proceeded to input the code now helpfully provided by the lock itself. The keypad beeped its compliance and clicked, dutifully popping the two latches that held the pelican case closed.

Batman slowly lifted the containers lid open, revealing the seemingly mundane contents presumably mirrored by the other hundred containers around him. What looked like a high tech hypodermic injection device was safely imbedded in gray foam. To its right sat several transparent cases the size of his hand, and within them, tiny golden dots the size of a pinhead. His hand was just about to remove one of the plastic packs when a door crashed open at his back followed by the furious sound of boots moving into position around him. Japanese language frantically echoed through the warehouse and it didn't take his sort of genius to realize multiple weapons were being training on him.

"Go! Go!"

"That's him!"

"If he so much as breathes…!"

"Three, in position!"

"Find what you're looking for?" A deeper baritone questioned in clipped English. Silence was the only reply to his querie as the caped crusader remained motionless, his back toward the speaker. The unseen voice sighed. "Then at least do me the small favor and remove yourself from the proximity of my merchandize."

"So you don't damage any when your men shoot me?" The deep rumble of the caped crusader's rhetorical question echoed around the warehouse. Moreover, it was in perfect Japanese, causing the man to smile.

"It would be incredibly inconvenient." The man at his back admitted, his tone of voice almost sounding apologetic.

Even unseen, Batman had calculated the position of most of his attacker. There were ten, not including the man he was holding a conversation with. They were all almost certainly armed with firearms regardless of how rare their proliferation was supposed to be in the country he was now visiting. His right hand slipped to his utility belt while the cape on his back covered the movement from sight. Four reflective steel orbs were pulled from one of the pouches as he used conversation to buy time.

"That worried about yabisume?" Batman wondered aloud and he could almost feel the unseen presence at his back shaking his head.

"Oh no," The man- almost certainly the boss of the operation he had penetrated –corrected patiently. "Failure here would be much worse than the loss of a finger."

'Which means your handlers are more ruthless than the Yakuza,' The Dark Knight supplied mentally as he tried to reconstruct the supply chain in his head. His detective work had started at the point of sale in Gotham, back-tracking individual electronic components to Japanese manufacturers. The middlemen and the developers in that supply chain were still unknowns—Unknowns he was hoping to unearth tonight.

"It would be a shame, but I'll take the loss." The voice decided. Batman heard the shuffle of feet as they took more active stances against his position. "Hell, killing you would more than likely elevate my status within the clan."

"Who would go through the trouble to kill a lowly Yakuza lieutenant just for a damaged case of drugs?" The Bat wondered aloud, as if trying to figure it out himself. Of course, those weren't drugs in the case. They were worse.

Much worse.

"Drugs? You must be joking." The man all but laughed, as if reading the Dark Knight's mind. In reality, he had taken the conversational bait and continued talking. "This is weapons testing. Drugs are small time compared to this operation."

'With Gotham as the proving ground,' The cloaked figure surmised silently as more pieces of the puzzle fell into place. Weapons testing implied an organized structure collecting and organizing data. The amount of 'weapons' within reach indicated resources well beyond the Yakuza and at this point, he wasn't doubting government involvement of some sort. A frown was Batman's only visible indication of emotion as he pondered just which government to assign guilt to.

Low mumbling from one of the men behind him caught the Bat's attention, followed by the boss giving intelligible orders before continuing aloud. "And now we have your accomplice pinned on the roof. Today is not looking like a good day for you, Batman-san."

The Dark Knight had just finished detaching his grappling hook from the belt when the news caused him pause. None of the family had followed him to Japan for this mission. Not even the Justice League was privy to the details of—

BOOM!

Fire violently ripped an overhead ventilation shaft apart, finally causing Batman to whirl around to track the figure of a girl in freefall from the inferno. She flipped upright at the last moment, landing in a crouch between himself and the line of Yakuza that had surrounded him while pieces of flaming sheet metal crashed around her. It was as if she had been deposited there by a portal from hell itself, yet she appeared completely unharmed.

Superficially, the Dark Knight noted she was an unlikely mix of Japanese heritage and crimson red hair, while her fashion statement just as unlikely, consisting of black pants and a red silk mao shirt. Neither garment had escaped the blast unscathed, featuring numerous burns and scorches that the redhead was attempting to put out even as she drew up from the crouch she had landed in. The fact that she had survived the fall, let alone the blast didn't go unnoticed either. His initial impression of her aerobatics was that she was at least minimally skilled, while her durability pointed to the distinct possibility that she was a metahuman.

What she was actually doing here was an even bigger mystery, especially since the Yakuza themselves didn't seem to be expecting her either.

"Goddamn hand grenade jutsu…"

Both parties watched her pat down a small smoldering patch eating away the silk of her sleeve, then suddenly pause to look up, as if only now noticing she was being watched. Her blue eye gaze wandered from the black monolithic figure that she had been stalking for half the night to the Yakuza and their bald leader, a man in a business suit and an incredibly complex tattoo of a dragon wandering up the left side of his head. Somehow, it didn't come as any surprise that every last one of them was armed with some sort of firearm, nor the fact they were already pointed in her direction.

The redhead looked back at the cloaked man as if trying to decided what to do, then turned back to the Yakuza with a fake, overacted smile. "I'm not with him?"

If he hadn't been wearing the mask, the skeptical eyebrow Bruce arched would have been readily apparent.

The Yakuza boss simply shook his head. "Enough. Kill them both."

"Shit!" Ranma yelped in alarm, putting her fullest measure of speed into pirouette in order to remove herself from the line of fire even as the black cloaked ninja behind her dropped low, smashing one of the steel balls into the ground. A gout of white smoke aggressively expanded around him even as the first rounds of nine-millimeter buried themselves into the crates behind him. His cape shuttered violently with the impact of a bullet while another glanced off his spinal plating. The light concussive thud of his grappling hook being deployed was muted by the gunfire and suddenly there was nothing left in the cloud to kill.

The shooting continued anyway.

The redheaded martial artist scrambled along the crated, barely remaining ahead of the sheet of lead trying to make a more intimate acquaintance with herself. Sparks and ricochets punctuated each evasive maneuver until she seemed to run out of space between the wall and the cases. She slowed fractionally and the gun fire bracketed her, seeming to abruptly perforate—

-A red shirt.

It floated to the ground, full of holes even as the Yakuza boss and his men stared in disbelief. He glanced back at the dissipating cloud of smoke, not finding a body there either. The tattooed man snarled, dropping the magazine on his gun to reload it. "Spread out! They've got to still be here!"

He was right, of course.

Ranma hugged the profile of a nearby pillar as the boss's angry order to shoot anything that moved echoed through the warehouse, her stricken moa shirt lying I shambles only a few meters away. It had been one of her favorites, but its sacrifice was a necessary one. The white tank top she had worn beneath it was now her outerwear, paying it little mind as her brain whirled with the new developments concerning the ninja. Ranma mentally scratched the warehouse being a secret hideout off her list even as she peeked out from around the pillar, watching as the Yakuza enforcers stalk through the columns of crates while the boss himself warily meandered over to her bullet riddled shirt to inspect it. Whatever the relationship was between Wayne's ninja and the men here, it definitely wasn't friendly with shoot to kill apparently being the order of the day.

'Yay, me,' Ranma rolled her eyes in sarcasm, not particularly appreciating how many of her father's life lessons were being reenacted in the here and now.

The quick glance did not reveal the ninja, however, at least not until she searched upward. The redhead crooked a smile as she found him waiting in the shadows of the steel rafters. His positioning alone told Ranma enough about his next move. A skylight and more ventilation was easily accessible from the ninja's location, yet he had yet to move toward either. He was going to stay.

Which meant she was going to stay as well. Sure, she could leave just as easily, but then she'd still be in the dark as to why Wayne or his ninja were in Tokyo to begin with. Even as she considered the dilemma, he glanced in her direction, making direct eye contact with a piercing stare. Ranma held it just long enough to acknowledge the obvious—Both knew where the other was hiding. The only question now was what to do about it. Sooner the search would bring the gunmen to her pillar and she would be forced to act…

The black clad man above her held his hand out and she almost missed the three silver spheres dropping down into the men arrayed below his position.

'Ninja tricks,' Ranma's brain identified their meaning in the split second of free fall. It also presented an opportunity. If she was going to get answers, this would have to be a private meeting. Without gunfire.

The metallic tick of their impact was barely noticed. What was noticed was the explosive smoke cloud suddenly enveloping their position, reducing visibility to zero. The martial artist smiled. Good thing she wouldn't be needing the visibility. Smoke roiled around her and the martial artist closed her eyes, swinging out from the pillar and into her first target even as a wave front of air pressure was perceived to her right, representing the ninja's touchdown. Ranma stayed low and isolated her first victim. They were all making more than enough noise to precisely locate and the redhead moved into grapple. That handhold was all it took to identify what she had a hold of before locking the wrist and forcing the pistol from his grasp. By the time it was clattering to the deck, she was well inside any guard he could assemble, dislocating his left kneecap with a kick while reversing the arm at the shoulder, sending him through backwards flip.

Metallic click. Danger-close.

Ranma threw herself down and toward the imminently recognizable sound of a firearm being prepped for action, immediately barreling into the haplessly blind solider. Three deafening cracks sounded off, prompting the scream of a mis-targeted henchman even as the girl's ears were set to ringing. Her legs tangled with his in a scissors maneuver, instantly bringing him down to her level and dislodging the rifle from his grasp. Her foot anchored into his armpit and she yanked, dislocating it with a sickening pop. The man attempted to roll out in agony, only to receive a savage open palm strike to the side of his face. Consciousness fled the Yakuza brother abruptly.

By victim number four, the smoke had lost density, enabling her to more accurate gauge the melee in progress. On her right flank, the ninja was making good time. His first strike advantage allowed him the luxury of being able to pick the method of attack and order of targets in advance. Two men went down with his drop, both victims of debilitating strikes aided by the force of gravity behind them. A third was just close enough to make out his shadow and the Dark Knight reached in at his weapon, yanking it and the yakuza man into melee range. His target managed a single squeeze of the trigger, firing of a round before being relieved of the weapon and taking a right cross to the face. The Yakuza thug spun once, then twice before collapsing.

Ranma's intellect was already devouring the details of his style even as she engaged her next victim, batting away his gun before it could play a part in the fight. The ninja used an amalgam of taekwondo, ninjitsu and some other arts that retained a remarkable degree of flexibility in spite of the heavy armor the fighter preferred. The brand of ninjitsu, however, was unmistakable. Memories of a monastery fortress were briefly recalled as she maneuvered her opponent into an arm lock, rolling around behind him while landing debilitating punches into his flank every step of the way.

The Yakuza stumbled drunkenly, barely able to retain his consciousness by the time the redhead allowed him to stagger away… but she wasn't done with him quite yet. Ranma was going to use him to send a message. The redhead lowered her center of gravity and slid her feet into a slightly wider forward stance that implied a more aggressive combat style.

Her fingers flexed into a pair of rigid knife edges and she surged forward.


To say he was impressed was perhaps an overstatement. Batman didn't get impressed. But the girl was certainly capable, which he found intriguing when combined with the unknowns surrounding her presence. There would be time to confront those unknowns later, however. For now, his most immediate concern was the gunman on his flank, just beyond hand to hand combat range. Instead of trying to race the bullet, the Dark Knight abruptly raised his arm to sight a device on the thug. He pulled the trigger as soon as his arm leveled off and two wired probes shot out with a hiss, as if the wired probes they dispensed were snakes in and of themselves. Two million volts later, the epileptic man dropped to the concrete even as Batman's fist found the gut of his next victim.

The red blur.

The caped crusader almost missed his own follow-up combination as his attention was diverted to the redhead. Like himself, she was heavily engaged on her own front, kicking ass and taking names. How she was kicking ass and taking names was now his focus.

'League ninjutsu?" Batman boggled for a moment as he held his own victim in a choke hold, watching as the girl flowed through a lethal combination of pressure-point strikes that instantly debilitated her target. The man lurched over as if hit by a freight train and the redhead was already inside the guard of her next target, dismantling the yakuza brother with a style of martial arts Batman knew all too well.

It only created more questions. If she was with the League, why was she here? The possibility of the shipment being a League of Assassins operation briefly crossed his mind, but ran headlong into the fact that the girl was fighting them as well. Another detail featured prominently as he watched her dispense with another victim.

'She hasn't killed one of them yet…' The Dark Knight observed as she dropped another attacker. That alone was perhaps the biggest discrepancy. League of Assassins Ninjutsu was a quick, violent art distilled through the centuries with one goal in mind—Maximizing lethality. This girl was the very epitome of that: Speed, grace and violence, however unlikely she seemed dressed for it. What she wasn't was lethal. Combinations that should have ended in her victim's death were pulled in favor of disabling blows, diverging further from the League's means to an end combat doctrine.

A blue gaze quickly flicked over to his own, making eye contact briefly before another man within close proximity dropped. Batman couldn't help but to feel there was a message for him in there, somewhere, but lacked the context to decipher it. Odder still, she looked familiar somehow.

Instead of dwelling on it, he tossed his oxygen deprived combatant aside and dropped into a roll, avoiding the sharp crack of gunfire seeking to meet his person. The offending barrel came within reach and the Detective yanked on it hard. The yakuza man predictably declined to yield the weapon which in turn altered his center of gravity directly into his opponent's armor-plated fist. The man staggered, but Batman stayed with him, raining blows into his torso, then promptly dislocating his kneecap with his boot. His opponent fell with a scream until the demon's knee met his falling chin, rendering him unconscious.

A quick glance at back to the redhead indicated that she had run out of bodies herself. Her last challenger pointed a gun in her direction, which she grabbed even before it leveled off, deftly manipulating the weapon's takedown lever and removing the slide from the firearm itself. Her combatant had the presence of mind to pull a long knife from his jacket, only to have the hand intercepted and broken at the wrist. His scream punctuated the knife's fall to the ground while she continued to apply pressure to the break, twisting it until the yakuza thug submitted to the pain and fell to his knees. The girl rolled her eyes at his pathetic squealing, finally releasing this hand.

"I'd haul ass if I were you."

And he did. The crippled Yakuza ran past his shell-shocked boss and made it halfway across the warehouse floor before a batarang arced in from the side, slamming him in the head to render him unconscious. The redhead favored Batman with a putout look, but the Dark Knight had other things on his mind and turned his attention to last man standing.

"Who ordered the testing?" Batman's question came out in a low, menacing tone augmented by the digital scrambling of his voice.

The tattooed boss's gaze flicked from the bodies, to the redhead and back to Batman in fear, prompting him to step back against a wall of bullet riddled cases.

"Fuck… Fuck you!" The leader spat and reached into his coat. The gun Batman was expecting didn't materialize. Instead the man palmed one of the high-tech syringes, jabbing its point into his arm as if to threaten the pair. "I already told you—there are things worse than yubitsume!"

"I know. I'm one of them." The Batman growled and lurched for the man who flinched backwards. Ranma watched the ninja's charge, bodily tackling the tattooed boss to isolate the hand bearing the cylindrical tool. It went skittering across the floor as the Dark Knight hauled him up by the collar, snarling into his face like the nightmare he appeared to be. "TALK."

"They'll kill me!" The boss squealed as he tried to wrench himself away from the Bat. He sent a pleading look toward the redhead, who merely offered an uncaring shrug as she watched. "You have no idea who you're dealing with!"

Batman seemed to care even less than the redhead and began to drag the man over to the nearest open crate, finally allowing his victim to drop next to it. The yakuza boss cowered at his feet as the Dark Knight palmed one of the syringes for himself, popping the blunt end open to load it with the small waffers from the other package. After five, he paused, glancing down at the terrified man.

"My research indicates the nanites enhance the body by forced genetic manipulation." Batman began, staring a hole into his victim before returning his attention to loading more of the tiny chips into the syringe. "The problem is that the more you inject, the less stable the augmentation becomes. Three doses usually guarantees a fatal mutation. The victim suffers a slow, agonizing death through uncontrollable cellular mitosis."

He paused, staring down at the man as if he were the specter of death himself. "I've loaded this injector with twelve."

A slight frown found its way to Ranma's face as she watched the interrogation take place. While she was all for a little ass-kicking after being shot at, torturing people for information wasn't something she signed up for, let alone watch them die a slow, painful death if the ninja was to be believed. Granted, he hadn't killed anybody in the fight, but an unspoken 'yet' seem to accompany the assassin's every move.

A graceless shuffle interrupted her thoughts, drawing her attention to a person behind her. One of the Yakuza henchmen regained consciousness, still very much injured and barely managing to prop himself up into a kneeling position. His left hand had already closed around the injector his boss had dropped, anchoring it to the opposite bicep. Before she could even recognize its significance, the half-conscious man thumbed a button.

"AAHHHHHHAAAR!"

The scream sounded like it had been ripped from the man's throat, instantly interrupting Batman's interrogation as he turned to watch the man's frame dissolve into epileptic seizure. The tremors held for a moment before passing as abruptly as they had manifested themselves, leaving the henchman panting, but in control of his own body. A faint orange glow began to flicker around his body and with it, a malevolent smile. He raised his gaze to meet the pair.

His eyes were on fire.

The teenage neo-girl boggled at the sight, unsure of what to make of the sudden manifestation. None of the fighters she had just so recently faced were anything special, but this one was now generating what looked like a battle aura. Ranma took a quick glance over to the ninja, hoping for a quick answer, but the black clad assassin's attention was riveted on the glowing henchman.

"Yessss..." He growled as literal flames seemed to burn within his very eye sockets. The thug held his arms out and they spontaneously combusted into fire up to his shoulders. He seemed to marvel at his new appendages for a moment before pointing his left hand at Ranma and the right at Batman. His arms flared into brilliance.

"Oh, come on!" Ranma balked aloud, throwing herself to the left even as a winding sheet of flame lashed overhead. Her counterpart chose to shelter in place, throwing the black cape around his body as flames consumed his position. The situation was all too reminiscent of Saffron as she watched the man fully ignite, as if burning alive, but not.

"I'll kill you both!" The man screamed with a hysterical pitch to his voice, using the firestorm to lash at his victims as if he were wielding two individual whips. The redhead ducked behind a stack of crates, only to watch as the top third of its mass was melted away by the writhing pyre seeking to reduce her to ash. She kicked one out toward the burning man, only to watch him induce the writhing fire to change course and intercept the metal container in-flight. It melted to slag within moments and the fire was back upon the martial artist like an incandescent serpent.

Batman, on the other hand, was pinned. Though he had placed a barrier between himself and the unnatural fire, that barrier was only good to two-thousand degrees for a whole ten seconds before it failed. Even now his glowing cape was radiating orange heat into his body like an oven and only four seconds remained before that oven turned into a flamethrower.

A quick glance over at the girl revealed what he needed to do. She was dancing through the coils of fire with impossible grace, thus far untouchable. Like her, he needed room to maneuver. Batman looked up toward the rafters and the second part of his plan formed as he unclipped the cape from his back with two seconds left. He spun around abruptly, hurling it into the now incandescent Yakuza whose jets of fire tracked and melted the garment in flight. That moment of distraction had cost him, however. The Dark Knight was on the move.

He detached three batarangs from his belt as he rolled out of the line of fire, hurling them upwards into the ceiling. Three metallic pings represented their impact and suddenly…

Rain.

While his strike hadn't compromised the entire fire sprinkler system, the three holes overhead was enough to saturate their immediate area with water, causing the fiery man to steam. More importantly, his burning appendages began to lose potency. The yakuza looked confused for a moment before his face took on a look of concentration. His whips flared indecisively as the indoor shower continued to suck away at their strength.

It was the opening Ranma needed.

Suddenly becoming a human torch had caught her off guard and the similarities to Saffron were uncanny, but the man before her was exactly that—Just a man; A thug with a gimmick. Though he seemed to instinctively know how to use his new power, he obviously wasn't especially skilled at it and worse, he was fighting an opponent who had faced both fire and whips far too many times to count wielded by people vastly more skilled in their use.

The martial artist sidestepped the next looping coil, capitalizing on the man's distract state to charge him directly. The surprised Yakuza diverted his incendiary lash from Batman to focus both on the redhead, only to watch her side step one coil and jump through another. The horizontal slice missed as well and suddenly she there in front of him, crystalline blue eyes hanging before him.

"It's called Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire for a reason, asshole." Ranma declared as she floated into range and unloaded. The living inferno never saw the punches that traced their way across his body, each agonizing in their own right. Some were meant to merely deprive her target of oxygen. Others found pressure points with unerring precision. His left arm felt like it had been disconnected from his body even though the girl should have been suffering from first and second degree burns from merely touching him.

The Yakuza staggered and he reached out with a flaming hand to stop her, only to feel a sharp stab of pain as it was broken at the wrist and batted away by another invisible strike. Another pulverized his ribs and his fire flickered, fading out from one moment to the next as he staggered back, barely able to maintain an upright stance.

Ranma stepped back, crossing her arms across her bosom as if to admire her handiwork while the thug wobbled on two legs, then collapsed to one, kneeling. The burning coals that represented his eyes finally guttered out, leaving only a confused expression of fear on his face before collapsing a moment later with steam rolling off his body.

The redhead simply nodded, theatrically brushing her hands off against the other. "And that's the end of today's lesson.

"What do you want?"

The digitally enhanced rumble of the ninja's voice prompted Ranma to turned around, finding him already squared off opposite her position. It was also her first good look at the man beyond his black suit. She had already seen the bag of tricks he kept in the yellow utility belt, for instance, but now the details came into focus. His suit, for example, wasn't the metal she first thought it was, but a series of flexible plates. The black stencil of a bat featured predominantly across his chest, though there was one specific detail that drew the entirety of her attention.

His face.

The majority of it was covered by the same material that protected the rest of his body, save the lower face. His jaw, lips and chin were completely exposed and now Ranma couldn't help but to stare, her gaze narrowing on those features as a series of unlikely connections were made. Wayne's ninja was Caucasian. Bruce Wayne, his League of Assassins master, was as well. In fact, they looked pretty damn similar.

'Can't tell the eyes through those slits,' She admitted, resisting the urge to take a step forward for a closer look. 'Even the build's about right if ya take away all the padding…'

Wayne's ninja wasn't Wayne's ninja at all.

He was Wayne.

It was exactly the meeting she had been hoping for, just not how she ever expected it happen. It also left her at a loss as to what to do with him since the League of Assassins operative hadn't assassinated anybody at all. Like herself, he was using a mixture of martial arts and even though League ninjutsu featured predominantly, he had pulled every last punch just as she had. On the other hand, the Yakuza punks they had dropped appeared to be trafficking some really nasty shit.

Her study wandered briefly to the unconscious- formerly incandescent -henchman, then his boss crumpled up behind the ninja. Still, she had to be sure. Ranma nodded toward the unconscious boss. "Whatcha plannin' on doing with him?"

The masked man seemed to consider the redhead for a moment before answering in the same menacing tone. "Get answers."

In the end, it wasn't exactly something Ranma could fault him for. Hell, she wanted to know why the guy just suddenly burst into flames herself, but this particular meeting was neither the time nor place for that. She was here for one reason and one reason only.

"Not sure what you're doing here, but if the League of Assassins is gonna start something in Tokyo, I'll be back to finish it," Ranma began without preamble, her gaze boring back into the man's own stare. The ninja frowned with her ultimatum. It seemed like the right moment to deliver her coup de gras as she turned to walk away. "I'll be watchin' you… Wayne-san."

The slight stiffening of his body told Ranma she had hit the mark as she crouched, making the leap up into the rafters to balance precariously on one of the supports. She glanced back down, only to find the ninja's penetrating stare riveted on her. Ranma favored him with a cocky smirk and walked the iron like a balance beam to the skylight, throwing it open to disappear into the night.

Now Batman was impressed.


Author's Notes- And away we go! Like I said, I can't help but to love the plot hook, which probably explains my current obsession with this fic. I have to admit to some cheating since I have nearly 40k words on file currently that I'll eventually get around to releasing. Want to see more stuff? Let's talk. wwwfanfictiondotnet/forum/Jusenkyo-Reactor/204450/ seems like a good place, or I'm available at ozzallosatgmail.

Do I really need to explain how you're going to have to parse those addresses out?
And yes, goddamnit I'm back. Like John Wick. Except with fewer guns and less money.

Don Juan- I've never seen a clear answer to this one: What does Bruce do with all those beautiful women hanging around him? Well, you can tell I'm assuming he plays with them as part of his Wayne persona. I've seen arguments where he parties with them and shows the door, or that he drugs them to fall asleep, letting them assume they had a good time. It strikes me that word would get around with either of the latter, leading to my choice even though there's no wrong answer to this near as i can tell.

Hope you're liking this so far, you single chapter hold judgement until there's more doubter type people ;)