Bat Lagoon

Fifteen.

The room was nearly pitch black, and the handsome blonde haired man was pouring himself a drink. "Welcome, Batman," he calmly noted.

NORMALLY Batman could sneak into a room virtually noiselessly. But the physically blind King Snake had trained his senses to an incredible degree, and was one of the few men who could detect Batman coming.

"Sir Edmund," Batman said dryly.

King Snake sipped his drink, "What can I do for you?"

"The Russian Mob in Gotham things you've sheltered Dent and the Twins," Batman said calmly, "they're going to attack you in force."

King Snake nearly choked on his drink. "WHAT?" he yelped.

"You have an hour. Maybe less," Batman silently left.

King Snake gulped down the rest of his drink. "Lynx!" he yelled for his assistant.

The young woman hurried in, "Sir!"

"Call the commanders. We're going to be attacked," King Snake ordered grimly.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"Well, that's clever of them," Balalaika admitted.

"Should we stop it?" Boris asked.

They had just gotten word that the local Russian Mob was going to attack the Triads. Supposedly the Triads were sheltering Dent... which Balalaika KNEW was complete bullshit. But it was clever bullshit.

"Why?" Balalaika answered him.

"Huh?" Boris blinked.

"I have absolutely no interest in the Gotham branch of the Russian mob. Their obliterating themselves fighting the Triads only means there will be two less enemies here when we take over," Balalaika shrugged.

"Ma'am," Boris nodded.

"What I want to know is... now that they've set the Russians vs the Triads, where are Dent and the Twins?" she wondered aloud.

"Do you think they'll stay and watch the mayhem?" Boris wondered.

"Tempting," Balalaika admitted. She, at least, probably would watch the two armies maul each other. It would be very satisfying.

"No," Balalaika decided, "he's not that foolish." She paused, eyes widening slightly, "Of course! He'll use it as cover to flee town."

"How though?" Boris asked.

"Contact our soldiers. We need to cover the docks, airport and motorways," Balalaika ordered, then frowned.

"Ma'am?" Boris asked as she looked thoughtful.

"Call Dutch and the Lagoon Company. I want to know how they would extract him," she added, Balalaika smiling grimly.

"Yes ma'am," Boris nodded, passing her the encrypted phone as he relayed her commands to the soldiers.

"Dutch?" Balalaika said casually, "I need your professional opinion on something."

"Yeah?" Dutch replied.

Balalaika summarized the situation. "How do you think Dent will flee town?" she asked.

"As loyal as I am to my boat," Dutch mused after thinking a few moments, "I'm thinking they'll use a car or train."

"No airplanes?" Balalaika asked.

"Too much paperwork, too easy to track," Dutch said. "Barring someone of enough influence and power getting involved," he added.

Balalaika chuckled, knowing he was talking about her flying in under Russian diplomatic papers. "Trains, though?" she asked.

"Gotham's a passenger train hub. There's multiple trains to all over the east coast, and it's all pretty much not tracked. Buy a ticket, get on and go," Dutch explained.

"Dent stand out, though," Balalaika noted.

"It's not that hard to get a high quality latex mask made," Dutch noted, having done that for a client before. "And even a poor quality mask would do, in a pinch."

"I see. Thank you," Balalaika hung up, then cursed softly.

"Ma'am?" Boris asked.

"We don't have enough people to cover everything," Balalaika admitted.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

The KG Beast lead Russian mobsters in a straight line into Triad territory. But the advance wasn't without problems.

"Do not pass," Batgirl said in her usual awkward way.

The Russian troops looked at the small girl in black, then laughed. "Out of the way, girl!" the leader laughed.

Without warning Batgirl was right in front of him. She gra bbed him then with a twist of her hips chucked him into the other soldiers.

"Ack!" one man yelped.

With eerie, athletic grace Batgirl beat down soldier after soldier. She didn't kill, but each one was injured in such a way that they would be out of action for awhile. And she stayed so close to her enemies that they didn't dare try to shoot her. They'd almost certainly hit their comrades.

"This is insane!" the one soldier yelped, trying to get a bead on her with his rifle.

Batgirl leaped up and over a goon, dropped in front of him and disarmed him.

"GAH," he yelped as she gut punched him.

Finally, the group just broke and fled.

"Well done," Oracle said, "but there's another unit nearby."

"Will do," Batgirl said calmly.

At the same time, Nightwing and Robin were also stopping groups of troops. Each used their own fighting style, and worked to delay the potentially devastating battle.

"Damn it!" KG Beast cursed.

Before he could say anything more, a black clad figure dropped down in front of him. His followers jerked back, but the Beast faced him calmly.

"Batman," KG Beast growled.

"The Triad soldiers were forced to attack you," Batman said to him briskly, "it's a setup, probably by Two-face."

"I know," KG Beast replied.

"Then why...?" Batman actually looked startled a bit.

"It doesn't matter. This is a excuse," KG Beast shrugged, "we will destroy the Triads, then fill the vacuum that Two-face has created in the Gotham mobs."

"I won't allow that," Batman said flatly.

"I look forward to you stopping me," KG Beast smiled wolfishly under his mask.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"Okay, WHERE are we going, Dutch?" Eda demanded.

The rental car was bouncing along, Dutch in the driver's seat. Eda was on the passenger side, while Benny, Rock and Revy were in the back.

"The rail terminal," Dutch said, "Balalaika and her mercs are trying to cover the roads and planes out of town."

"You think they'll take the trains?" Eda asked.

Dutch repeated the explanation he gave Balalaika.

"Sounds reasonable," Eda agreed, and started making a call. "I\ll ask Rotten and his group to help out too."

"We can't cover the whole rail terminal on our own," Benny noted.

"No," Dutch agreed with a sugh.

Rock was frowning thoughtfully, "Benny, if we hook your computer to a phone line, can you contact this... Oracle person?"

"Probably," Benny said dubiously, "They're closely monitoring the Gotham City computer system. If I poke it, they'll respond. WHY tho?"

"Because they control Gotham's systems, right?" Rock grinned, "We can ask them to plug into every video camera in the terminal and look for Two-face."

Benny blinked. "Rock, occassionally you scare me," Benny noted.

"Huh?" Rock blinked.

"Right," Benny continued, "Dutch! When you see a phone booth, we need to stop..."

To be continued...

Notes: In canon KG Beast is as smart as Batman, so after some thought I decided it would make sense he figured out they were being played. I'm never sure where Benny's tech level should be... I figure he needs a phone line at least.