New Gotham
12:05 am
Barbara stared hard at the screen, beyond hearing Helena or Dinah's concerned attempts to get through to her. What finally broke through her frozen state of mind was when the shadow man raised his hand and tapped his other wrist as a silent reminder. They were on a tight time line. She needed to give the word. Pulling herself back together, Barbara slipped back into Oracle mode and cleared her throat. "Still no sign of Reese or Maza, so everyone keep an eye out for them, but NO ONE is to go into the tunnels after them. Is that clear?"
Helena hesitated the longest before acknowledging the order. "All teams stand by, detonating in three, two, one, fire in the hole...."
On the screen pandemonium broke loose as Oracle detonated the carefully placed percussion charges that Dinah had telekinetically placed around the area. They were specifically designed to create maximum disorientation and still be non-lethal. Anyone within a ten-meter radius was left either unconscious or disabled for a good five minutes. The explosions gave way to the sound of gunfire and shouting.
Oracle took a deep breath, and then began orchestrating her soldiers. She took comfort in the fact that she had the advantage of surprise and information on her side. That, and the dark shadow that moved expertly through the ranks of soldiers. It was clear that nearly everyone he came across recognized him immediately, for most tried to turn and run in fear. Tried to at least.
The mob and the Metas were holding the perimeter without too much trouble, but she could see that Quinn was starting to direct some of his snipers up onto the roofs to try and take them out. "Perimeter One you have incoming, the rooftop just across from you. Snipers setting up shop."
"Got 'em," Rose responded as she and another of her team focused their talents on the men trying to get a shot on them.
"Team Four heads up. You have a man with an ugly on that crane trying to get into a position to fire at you."
"Copy."
"Beta Team be careful you're starting to get boxed in."
Just then the shadow flashed across the screen, and took out the three soldiers who were trying to sneak up and trap Gordon and his team.
"Jesus Jim did you just see that?!" she heard.
She could tell her father was speechless as she watched him merely nod on the screen. "Hell of a time for him to finally show up," he grunted.
Just then her attention was drawn to the entrance of the tunnels. There was a great deal of commotion as people suddenly began fleeing the entrance and Oracle's eyes narrowed.
"Maza or Reese do you read me?"
She waited for a moment and then finally she picked up their signals. "-out...get everyone away from the tunnels....charges...blowing.......thirty sec-......"
"Damn!" she swore. "Alpha Team fall back! Reese and Maza set charges in the tunnels and they're blowing them."
"What?!" Huntress growled in the midst of a vicious fight with a fairly skilled soldier that she had disarmed.
"Huntress fall back now!"
"What about Reese and Maza?" she asked as she knocked the man unconscious and turned towards the tunnels.
"Damnit Huntress FALL BACK NOW!" Oracle shouted at her.
Huntress moved as if to disobey, but Dinah suddenly appeared and she used her talent to literally drag the feral woman several feet back to a point of safety as a low rumbling filled the air. The firing began to slow, as the soldiers turned towards the tunnel entrance realizing something bad was about to happen.
On the screen, Quinn snagged a passing woman who struggled to free herself as she quickly explained what was about to happen. His face filled with rage, but he too began to make a hasty retreat as the dim sound of explosions began to shake the ground beneath their feet. Most of the soldiers seemed to be clear of the tunnels, and what few that were exiting were being picked off by the beta and perimeter teams. Helena was still fighting Dinah, screaming at her to be let go.
Oracle glanced at her monitors, taking in the seismic readings and how severe they were near the small dots that represented the two detectives. "Come on guys, move it," she whispered urgently.
The explosions grew louder, and as they neared the surface, the ground began to buckle. Dust and rubble billowed out from the tunnel entrance and time slowed as the explosions chased the last two people trying to outrun them.
Reese stumbled and would have fallen if Elisa hadn't caught him and used the momentum to keep him running forward. He thought he heard her scream something to him, but it was almost impossible to tell. The ground was heaving under their feet, debris was pelting their bodies, and as the main weapon's arsenal finally blew, a massive fireball roared through the tunnels towards them.
They could see the entrance only a few more meters in front of them, but the air around them had already grown intolerably hot. He and Elisa desperately scrambled the last couple of feet, before a shot took Elisa down. The bullet didn't pierce the body armor, but they had lost precious seconds as the final charges at the entrance began to detonate. Reese was trying to pull Elisa up and further away from the tunnels when a dark form charged the two of them pointing some kind of device at a nearby crane.
"Grab on to me!" he ordered tersely as he fired the device.
Elisa and Reese immediately obeyed and as the blast began to engulf where they were standing, all three figures were jerked off the ground and whipped through the air to a safer range. Seconds later, they were back on the ground and the two detectives looked at the legendary form, stunned.
Castle Wyvrn
Manhattan
12:00 am
Matt looked around the room and almost chuckled to himself. Almost. Maybe if the circumstances weren't so grave, it would have been funny to see such a diverse crowd, forcing themselves to get along with each other for the next few hours. The Xanatos' were of course playing the ever gracious hosts, and the Clan was doing their part to keep things as peaceful as possible. But when you had several groups of long standing enemies gathered under the same roof, it made the tension in the air that much thicker.
Thankfully Glasses and the rest of his crew were keeping to themselves off in one corner. Thankfully Lex and Broadway were distracting the officers that had been assembled, from worrying too much about Dracon's men. Xanatos was wisely avoiding the mutates, and Brooklyn and Angela were seeing to it that Derek was kept on the other side of the room from the billionaire.
Elisa may have grown to tolerating the wealthy ex-con, but it was quite clear that her brother Derek and the rest of the mutates had yet to forgive the man for the twisted experiments he let Dr. Sevarius perform on them. Not that Matt blamed them. Hell, if he had been kidnapped and subjected to what the mutates had been put through, he probably would have put a bullet in the man's skull long ago.
Looking around once more, Matt did a quick head count and allowed himself a small sigh of relief. In all, they had almost fifty assembled. With Xanatos and his family handling the castle diversion on their own, they had a healthy number to take on the army gathering down at the shipping yards.
Looking at his watch he nodded. "Well, it should have started by now," he said announced quietly.
They assembled group quieted and he drew in a deep breath. "Is everyone clear on their assignments and their objectives?"
Heads nodded all around the room. "Good. As soon as we receive word from Goliath that the train has been taken over, each team will head down to the tunnels with their assigned guide. Glasses, Claw there can't talk, can you work with that?"
Glasses looked over at the tiger looking mutate and merely nodded silently in answer. Claw seemed agreeable to the pairing with a nod of his head as well. Derek shifted. "How long until we should hear from Goliath or Elisa?"
"Hopefully we'll hear from Elisa within the next twenty minutes. Goliath probably won't contact us for another half hour to hour. The train won't reach their position for another fifteen or twenty minutes, and then it's how quickly they gain control of the train."
"And what happens if something goes wrong and they don't?" one of the few officers asked into the following silence.
The tension in the air drew tighter. Matt took a deep breath. "Hopefully that won't happen, but it is a possibility that we must prepare for. If we do not hear from Goliath or Hudson in the next hour we still move. The only change in the plan will be that Glasses and his team will be diverted to handle blowing up that train just after it crosses the river."
"What should we do in the meantime?" someone asked.
"Wait....and pray," Matt answered somberly. It was all any of them really could do.
Twenty miles outside new Gotham.......
12:10 am
"Any word on what's going on back there lad?" Hudson asked into the silence.
Nightwing shook his head. "I can only pick up some of the communications from here. It's pretty chaotic, but it sounds like they're holding out ok. I figure the cops should be on their way in right now, so hopefully they'll be able to hang in there a little longer."
"Any word from oracle on the train?"
"I haven't heard from her since the fight started. Figured she's too busy orchestrating everything there. Besides, that train shouldn't be here for at least another ten minutes or so."
Goliath shifted his massive bulk restlessly and Nightwing chuckled. "Trust me, I know how you feel."
"I do not like the thought of leaving all of them back there to fend for themselves."
"Me neither, but we're the only ones who have a chance of taking this train over before it hits Manhattan. Lucky us huh?"
In the far distance the faint sound of a train horn blowing broke through the still night air. All three men froze for a moment, and the adrenaline began to pump. "Hopefully luck will be on our side tonight lad," Hudson commented quietly as they strained to hear more sounds of the approaching train.
Clocktower
12:15
Oracle's hands and eyes flew across the Delphi as she maneuvered her troops against the larger more formidable army. The police were just beginning to show up, but no one was coming even close to the war zone within the confines of the shipping yards. Thankfully, the metas on the rooftops and Hawke's men on the ground were managing to keep the perimeter tightly held, despite a couple of casualties.
The ground teams were having a much more difficult time however. Blowing up the tunnels had been like stirring up a hornets nest. With all of Quinn's troops on the surface and their backs against the water, they were viciously fighting to escape. One of her father's men had been gravely wounded, and James Gordon was desperately trying to drag the wounded man towards safety amid the gunfire that roamed freely about what Oracle was now dubbing Ground Zero.
Huntress and Dinah found their two meta companions, and the four were cutting a path towards Gordon to try and help him extract the wounded man. Reese, Maza, and Batman had become the focal point for Quinn's men, and were now fighting back to back in a desperate struggle to survive.
And then the alarm claxon sounded in the Clocktower as heavy metal doors began sliding down around the Delphi's control room. "Damnit!" Oracle swore as she turned to a bank of monitors off to the side.
On the screen Huntress had ducked behind a row of barrels and had her hand pressed to her ear. "Oracle what the hell is that?"
"The perimeter alarm. Someone's about to knock on my front door," she answered grimly as she began calling up the security feeds to the area around the Clocktower.
"What?"
Oracle swore a little more vehemently as she focused in on two men with shoulder mounted rocket launchers. And then the color drained from her face as one camera focused on the slim figure that stepped out from the shadows and waved towards the camera.
"That's not possible," Oracle breathed as her hands suddenly flew across her keyboard. Within seconds she had hacked into Arkham's security system and stared at the image sitting idly in the clear cell before looking back at the woman standing on the street out front.
"Oracle.....Damn it Oracle do you copy? What the hell is going on?"
"Quinn's here."
"What his men? He sent a team to attack the-."
"Not him....Harley. She's here."
"I'm coming back to the base."
"Negative! You're needed there Huntress. The Control Room is shielded and I should be able to hold them off for awhile longer. Do not return to base is that understood?"
"The hell I'm not! I'm not going to leave you stranded there!"
"Damnit Helena just listen to me for once!" Barbara swore at the younger woman, tears in her eyes. God she wanted nothing more than to have Helena come back, but she couldn't do that. Helena was far too crucial to their effort. Taking a deep breath, the red head regained her composure and forced her voice to fall back into her Oracle mode.
"All teams, this is base. Base is under attack, so I may loose comms in a few minutes. No one...I repeat NO ONE is to abandon their posts to come back here. Continue with the mission as planned and keep in contact with your Team Leaders. Once I loose comms, I'm leaving Detectives Maza and Reese in charge. Does everyone copy?"
Outside New Gotham....
Goliath and Hudson broke their watch on the approaching train as they heard Dick's sharp intake of breath. The Clan leader looked over to see the young men tensely pressing his hand to his ear as he listened to whatever was being said over the comm.
A troubled look filled his eye, and Goliath felt a thread of fear settle in his stomach. "The battle?" he asked tensely.
Nightwing shook his head, swearing. "Barbara's under attack.....Quinn broke out somehow without us knowing. She's just ordered everyone to stay at their posts and not to come back for her. Damnit I can't just leave her there defenseless."
"The lass is hardly defenseless," Hudson reminded him.
"I seem to remember Alfred telling us that she had quite the defense system installed after Quinn's attack last year. If the fight is progressing well enough, one of the others should be able to head over there as soon as the police can rally their forces."
"If it were Elisa over there would you just sit here?" Nightwing asked tightly.
"Elisa is over there right now my friend. Right now I have no idea if she is dead or alive, but I do know that we have a task to complete, and if we don't many more lives could be lost. Barbara knows that and has accepted the risk or she wouldn't have told everyone to stay put."
Goliath put a giant talon on the man's shoulder and looked him in the eye. "We all accepted this burden knowing it could very well be our last...including Barbara. Even if you did leave, how long would it take you to get back? There is nothing more we can do for now."
Nightwing let out a long frustrated breath and slammed his fist on the rock they were perched on. "Your right. God I hope she'll be ok until someone can get back there."
"Aye lad, we all do."
Ground Zero........
Elisa was reloading another clip into her gun, as she listened to Helena argue with Barbara about returning to the Clocktower. She jerked when she heard Barbara place both herself and Reese in charge. Then another wave of soldiers were on them, and she was busy firing at the ones that were armed before taking on the ones that weren't.
She still couldn't believe she was fighting side by side with the legendary Batman. The whole thing was surreal. As she finished up with another soldier, Dracon came running up, his normally immaculate self, covered in grime and blood.
"Hey Sugar, nice little party you guys are throwing here mind if I join in?"
"About damn time you showed up," Elisa grunted as three large soldiers tried to corner them. "How are the lines holding?" Punch, kick, jab, duck.
"We've lost four men on the ground and two of your friends upstairs, but we're managing. The cops are sitting out front wetting their pant though," he panted out as he to fought off his own attackers. "Maybe your buddy over there could encourage them to come help us out a bit?"
"Reese!" Elisa shouted.
"What?"
"PD is sitting out front....we could use some backup right about now."
"I lost my radio." There was a grunt as he took a hard punch to his gut before he returned the favor. "I'd have to get out there personally."
"Go! We need to get this nightmare stopped. I'll cover you while you make a run for that nearest warehouse. Keep in contact with me!"
"Got it!"
Elisa kneed the man in front of her in the groin and then broke his nose and sent him into unconsciousness before his knees even hit the ground. She pulled her gun, pistol whipped one of the two men Tony was still fighting, and shot the other in the leg as she charged by to gain higher ground so she could cover the other cop.
Reese pulled out his own gun, checked the clip, and then began to duck and weave through the violent battleground as he made his way towards the closest building. Being on higher ground made Elisa a bigger target and she took several shots from multiple directions, before she fell from her perch gasping for air and groaning in pain.
"Jesus Maza!" Dracon shouted as he ran up to her. "Damnit woman are you TRYING to get yourself killed?" he asked, relieved to see that none of the bullets had pierced the armor.
"You're far to valuable to be taking risks like that Detective," as deep voice said from off to one side.
Elisa and Dracon both jumped a bit, before they realized the voice belonged to Batman. "Quinn's men loaded up his private yacht with several more cases of the weapons. I saw him starting to make his way towards the slip, and the crew is preparing to cast off. That boat is heading for a second destination in Manhattan."
"How'd you find that out?"
The masked man smirked a bit. "I'm Batman," he answered simply.
"Do you know where it's going?"
"They are to be delivered to Castaway...or should I say Canmore...personally."
Elisa froze for a second. "We've got to stop that boat," she said finally.
"The yacht is docked on the south end of the pier."
"Where are you going?" Elisa asked as she saw the Dark Knight prepare to leave in a different direction.
"My presence here was not part of the plan, therefore I can leave to aid Oracle."
"Good. Someone needed to get over there and stop that bitch," Elisa said grimly.
"Quinn will never bother my girls again," Batman said in a cold tone. And then he was gone.
"My girls?"
"Secrets of the trade Tony...you don't really want to know cause then they'd have to kill you."
"I see...well we have a boat to catch?"