AUTHOR'S NOTE: I do apologize for how long it took to get this next chapter up and running, but personal circumstances led to a severe decline in inspiration as well as time to write. Hopefully, I can get back on track from now on.
BATMAN BEYOND:
The Second Rebirth
Chapter 8
It didn't take very long for the Batmobile to arrive above the target building - a tall shopping center that housed, among others, Chesterfield's fine jewelry store.
She abandoned the car around the corner in case the bad guys had posted a lookout, and made a cloaked transit using the suit's flight systems to cover the last couple of blocks.
She knew exactly what to look for as she arrived, stowing the wings and deactivating the suit's stealth systems as she alighted on the roof. Within seconds, she spotted an open panel, and cut wiring. She saw that the primary and secondary alarm circuits had been cut - the primary first, then the secondary after the cut in the primary triggered the silent alarm, which had disengaged when the secondary circuit was cut.
She also noticed that the fiber optic and power lines for the building's security cameras had been cut, meaning there would be no active vid feeds inside the building.
They'd been thorough. Still, the work was sloppy, amateurish. She was almost disappointed.
"If that had been me," she commented to herself with a professional's disdain for inferior work, "the alarm would never have been tripped."
A second later she shook her head, surprised at herself for feeling that way, given that it was a life she had left behind years earlier.
Then she almost jumped as a harsh male voice growled in her ear.
- "That's nothing to boast about."
She bit back a curse. Wayne - she'd forgotten that the paranoid old man would be listening. She'd have to remember that from now on.
- "Who's boasting?" She hissed in response. "I'm just making an observation. Besides, if they hadn't been so sloppy - if they had been as good as I used to be, then you wouldn't have known about that break-in until tomorrow morning's news."
Wayne grunted, unwilling to concede the point.
Melanie, however, had located the point of entry the criminal or criminals had used: One of a row of a dozen flat windows, approximately eight feet square, which formed an enormous skylight on the roof, allowing in what sunlight could enter during the day.
The nearest one to where she stood had been literally ripped off its hinges and tossed aside, the inch-thick safety glass cracked, but not shattered.
It would have taken enormous physical strength to do that. Far greater strength than any ordinary crook possessed. But that's not what bothered her at that moment - she knew that the suit granted her significantly augmented strength, and could hold her own in a fight.
No, what bothered her at that moment was that she had seen something very similar before…
"I've got a bad feeling about this…" She muttered, as she too slipped in.
Inside the store, the gang stood in the main showroom, while their leader dispassionately surveyed the corpses of two security guards who had entered the store, weapons drawn.
It had almost spelled the end of their affair, as the two guards had been in a position to cover almost the entire gang. Wyatt, their newest recruit, had turned it all around, slipping behind one of the guards unseen and stabbing him in the back.
When the second had turned towards his colleague, he had himself used the opportunity Wyatt had created to finish off the hapless guard with a fatal electrical discharge from his own weapon.
Frowning, he rounded on the slightest and youngest member of the group.
"Dregs, Ten!" He snarled, "We've been over this plan for days, and you almost ruined everything! If you'd paid attention, the guards would never have known we were here, and we would be gone by now!"
- "I'm sorry," she said, "I…"
- "Almost failed the family." King interrupted harshly.
- "I'm sorry. It won't happen again." She said.
- "See that it doesn't. Otherwise…" He let the threat hang unspoken. In the corner, the hulking figure of Ace shifted, but nobody moved. Nobody spoke. They all knew the stakes, and the consequences of failure.
"Now then," Robert Alexander Walker, the King of the new Royal Flush Gang, glanced up at where he knew the vault was located, where their real prize waited: The Broken Heart Diamond, a nearly-flawless gemstone of enormous size, perfectly cut. Absolutely priceless.
"Ace? Open the door, please." He said.
Ace nodded silently, then stepped forward. They could have asked Ten to open the vault, but after her earlier blunder, time was of the essence. They had to collect their prize and get out fast - it would be too much to hope that GCPD had not noticed the brief silent alarm, and he expected that cruisers were on the way even as they stood there.
The stupendously strong Ace tore the vault door open. King stepped forward into the vault, a light in hand, and immediately found his prize.
"Exquisite." He commented as he seized the gemstone and placed it in a pouch secured to his waist.
At his side, Queen entered, and saw a second piece, even more magnificent. She gasped audibly.
- "And it looks like we may have struck an even greater prize that we hoped, dear." She said.
He turned, and instantly he knew what he was looking at. It was a famous piece.
- "Ah yes, the Vonalster Fabergé egg. A piece of inestimable value, and with quite a bit of history too - it is said that Oswald Cobblepot himself once attempted to steal this piece, unsuccessfully. And others beside, too."
- "And now," Queen said with a self-satisfied smile, as she took the Egg and placed it in a second pouch, which she secured at her belt. "it too is ours."
Meanwhile in the store, Jack grinned as he shattered the nearest display case and started filling a bag he had carried for that express purpose with everything he could find.
Across the room, Ten did the same.
"Payday, big time." Jack - Wyatt - said, a greedy expression on his face - unaware that he and the others were being watched.
'Damn it...I don't BELIEVE THIS.' Melanie silently screamed as she recognized what she was seeing: The Royal Flush Gang, the very same gang to which she had belonged until not so long ago.
It was like looking into a twisted mirror, as she glared at the new "Ten", whom she guessed was probably a girl her age, if not younger. The gigantic Ace, and even, she observed with a pang, Jack.
She guessed that King and Queen, who were probably in the vault, would be her parents as well. Clearly, they had replaced her and Jack, unless that was him.
She hoped with all her heart that it wasn't her brother.
"Wayne," she whispered, "you're not going to believe this: The Royal Flush Gang are the ones casing the jeweler."
Bruce did the slightest of double-takes as he heard this; he had not expected to hear that - but on reflection he wasn't surprised.
"They must be after the Broken Heart Diamond." He stated.
- "Probably." Melanie assented. "It sounds like the kind of thing Dad would go for." The bitterness in her tone was apparent to Wayne. "Well, time to greet my replacement." She added, then struck.
At the instant King and Queen stepped out of the vault, there was a harsh bang and the entire store erupted into blinding light. King swore, his hands flying to shield his eyes, but too late.
The next second he heard a grunt, the sounds of a struggle. By the time his eyesight started to return Ace was down, struggling against the strong lines that bound his arms and legs.
In the midst of the room, a slender, black shadow. At first, he felt a fierce eagerness as he assumed that his chance for revenge on the Batman was come. Then he saw that the newcomer was...
"A girl?" He exclaimed with some surprise, frowning. "I was expecting the Batman, not some strumpet playing dress-up. Ten - deal with this pretender."
"Gladly." Ten replied, and dropping her bag, she vaulted over the counter and landed gracefully a short distance from Batgirl, immediately going on the offensive.
Melanie parried the first blow with relative ease, but her opponent disengaged and stepped back before she was able to counterattack.
'She's pretty good.' Melanie thought as she felt her heart rate climb, adrenaline pumping. Her opponent struck again, a right-legged dragon kick that Melanie narrowly avoided. This time, she counterattacked with a vicious jab that caught her opponent off-guard, slamming into her face.
Ten struck again, a fast, hard punch which Melanie blocked. She blocked a second punch, then unleashed another jab straight to the other's face, staggering her.
And this time Melanie took the opening, unleashing a lightning-fast, left-leg dragon kick of her own, which struck hard, sending Ten barreling off her feet and slamming into a support column.
She groaned in pain and lost consciousness, sinking to the ground.
'But not good enough.' Melanie thought. She wondered briefly where her father had found this kid, but soon moved on - she had other concerns.
Ace was struggling against the bonds that held him, and she guessed they wouldn't hold all that much longer. She was actually surprised they'd held as long as they had.
The more pressing concern was Jack, who attacked next, and she barely managed to activate the suit's electromagnetic shields in time to deflect three thrown daggers, which were cast aside when they struck the barrier.
She deactivated the shields and once again leapt into action, nimbly jumping over the next knife. A pair of thrown batarangs knocked two knives from Jack's hand, and her two feet slammed into his torso, throwing him back.
He was on his feet in moments, and this time he charged, a dagger in each hand. The three spikes on the back of her forearms extended into cruelly sharp blades, which she used to parry Jack's first strike, and then she wrapped a hand around his wrist and applied pressure, forcing him to release the second.
He head butted her, and she saw stars for a split second as Jack broke away, but thankfully the cowl's insulation, while far thinner than that of the suit itself, mitigated much of the damage.
He tried to stab her in the stomach, but she turned, and the blow was a glancing one, barely scoring the suit's outer layer.
This time she retaliated by head-butting him, and followed it up with a sucker punch to the stomach that doubled him over.
Before he could recover, she slipped around and slammed her fist into the right side of his head, just behind the ear.
He crumpled.
"Two down." She spat, glaring at the two that remained standing, mindful of the stupendously strong Ace, still struggling against his bonds in the corner.
King shook his head, disappointed at the less than impressive performance of his two most junior accomplices. And, begrudgingly, impressed at the speed and skill of this pretender.
"I will admit you have some skill, for some little girl playing at Batman."
She tossed three boomerangs at him in response. The first two were decoys, the third aimed at the pouch on his belt. It was a simple ploy, but sometimes the simple ploys worked.
It almost did, as while he deflected two, the third sliced into the pouch at his belt.
However, King caught the enormous gemstone before it could fall, and attempted to counterattack with an electrical blast discharged from the blade of his sword.
Melanie dodged the attack easily.
"The name's Batgirl." She spat in response.
That was when Queen struck, from the side. Melanie felt the impact of the staff she carried, as a massive electrical discharge coursed through the suit.
In any other circumstances, Melanie would have been severely injured by the electrical shock, if not killed. However, due to the improvements made to the suit a year earlier, it was completely hardened against electrical attacks.
Melanie felt the discharge, but it did not hurt as much as Queen expected it would.
'Well, how about that?' Melanie thought, repressing a grin even as she counterattacked. The first thing she did was to grab ahold of the staff, and literally tear it from Queen's grasp.
Queen gasped at the sudden reversal of fortune, and the next second Melanie slammed the spherical head of the staff into her face. As Queen rose to her feet, glaring at her young opponent, Melanie took the staff in both hands, and snapped it in half.
She saw, out of the corner of her eye, her father move to try to attack from behind, and tossed a batarang his way that sliced into his hand, eliciting a cry of pain as he dropped his weapon.
Then Queen moved in and struck, a viciously fast jab aimed at her face, which she narrowly avoided, countering with a fast blow to the collarbone.
Queen pulled back, then spun and unleashed a lightning-fast kick that Melanie only narrowly avoided by leaping over it, landing with a dancer's grace on her feet behind Queen and cutting loose with a hard kick that connected with her lower back, sending her tumbling forward.
Queen rolled adroitly and came back up on her feet, and this time Melanie struck first. Queen, however, caught her first, then second punch, and then surprised Melanie with a vicious punch to the face, followed by a hard kick that doubled her over.
Before Melanie could break away to make her next move, Queen brought her joint fists down onto the back of Melanie's head with every ounce of strength she could, and Melanie slammed into the ground hard, grunting with pain, which was made worse when Queen kicked her in the ribs while she was still down.
Dimly, she heard the snap of lines that meant Ace had broken free.
"That will do, darling." She heard her father's voice.
Queen looking down at her with cold contempt, shrugged and turned her back on her, as the massive Ace made his way to the unconscious bodies of Jack and Ten and hoisted them both over his shoulders. King and Queen gathered up the fallen bags, and the gang slipped out to make their exit.
Standing atop the large, rectangular hover boards they always used - patterned like playing cards from the suit of Spades - the five members of the Royal Flush Gang - King, Queen, and Ace carrying Ten and Jack - rose through the skylight, when spotlights came on, illuminating them.
"This is the Gotham City Police Department. Put down your weapons now and surrender - you are completely surrounded."
Six GCPD hover cruisers encircled the building at their altitude, and they saw weapons aimed at them.
- "I don't think so." King commented cruelly, as he raised his weapon and fired an electrical discharge at the nearest cruiser that completely fried its control systems, sending it plummeting towards the rooftop, even as he used the distraction to make his getaway, closely followed by Queen and Ace.
Two cruisers peeled off to pursue, while the others focused on attempting to stop the fall of the cruiser and rescuing their comrades. With luck, they'd be able to catch them.
"Mierda." Detective Lieutenant Miguel Alcana swore in his native Spanish, which he usually did when he was especially angry or upset.
One cruiser shot down, two officers injured. On top of that, the Royal Flush Gang was back in town, which meant they were dealing with a burglary, and he had a pretty good idea where they'd hit.
There'd been a brief alert when a silent alarm was tripped in the building. On the off chance, Alcana sent a cruiser to have a look.
When the officer driving the cruiser, an officer he'd met once or twice named Montoya, saw the skylight, she'd called for back-up, and Alcana himself had led the raid.
"Talk about a fuck-up." He grumbled. "Montoya, with me. Let's go down and see what we're dealing with."
Inside Chesterfield's Melanie dragged herself to her feet and made to pursue.
Wayne shot her down instantly.
"You're in no condition to go after them, and GCPD has units pursuing. Get back to the car, and get back here now."
- "Fine." She spat dejectedly. She engaged the suit's cloaking and flight systems, and slipped out.
Seconds later, she saw GCPD offices, one of whom she recognized as the one who'd given her a lift to the hospital on the day of Terry's accident.
She slowly made her way to a window rather than exiting through the skylight, and disappeared.
Later that night, she slipped back into her apartment, still wearing the suit, and stripped it off.
They'd checked over her injuries at the cave, and finding nothing broken, Wayne had dismissed her. She slipped out still wearing the suit - and now she was home.
Still groaning, she slipped into bed and sank into a deep sleep despite her own troubled thoughts...
