A/N: Hello again, my wonderful fans! Just a reminder, for those that haven't yet, please subscribe to my YouTube channel, Sai Blade. It DOES NOT cost money to subscribe! If my channel hits 300 subs, I will start Arkham Knight immediately after this story. So, it will be the difference between getting it when this is done as opposed to December or something. And I'll also play the game on my channel as a bonus! I'm really counting on you guys here.
But for now, let's see Yang and Batman be amazing as they aim to take down the Clown Prince of Crime once again!
After leaving Ivy's place, Catwoman and Neo hid away for a bit until the gang war between Penguin and Joker cooled down. Eventually, things calmed down, at which point the two thieves decided to strike. They approached the vault's location and observed a rooftop from above. Several massive vines and roots had burst from the ground, which was likely only a fraction of what was underground, meaning that anything preventing getting to the vault from underground had been decimated and pushed aside. A TYGER guard was reporting the incident on his radio as a trio of them stood about 50 feet away from the vault. "The vault's been compromised. The attacker was most likely Poison Ivy." The guard reported.
From the rooftop they were standing on, Catwoman let out a mock gasp. "Oh, Ivy! Why ever would you do such a thing?" She asked in a fake shocked and saddened tone, causing Neo to giggle a bit. "But I'm glad we can always count on her to make the Earth move. Let's go, Neo." She said, the two of them leaping off the building.
Catwoman leapt all the way down, landing on one of the guards and sending them both to the ground, where she performed a ground takedown on the poor sap as Neo floated down with her umbrella, landing on her feet on another guard's shoulders, before hopping back a small bit and smacking him on the head with her umbrella and pulling his feet out from under him, before knocking him out with a smack across the face with her umbrella as he tried to get up [1]. The last remaining guard looked fearfully between the two of them, before deciding the best course of action would be to flee. This proved incorrect, as Neo threw and tripped him with her bolas, causing him to fall to the ground face-first, still getting knocked out.
[I hate quitters.] She texted. The two of them made their way underground with a nearby sewer entrance and saw that, indeed, Ivy had tunneled into the vault with her roots and vines. [There's the storage room! Red did a pretty good job.] Neo texted, pointing to the underground entrance to the vault on the other side of a wall, an opening with metal bars stopping them from walking across to it, but allowing them to see where the room was. Fortunately, there was a short enough detour tunnel to the left that would likely get them to the room.
"Yeah. Your mommy really came through for us, didn't she?" Selina teased, bringing up how Ivy had wanted to adopt Neo.
Neo rolled her eyes and pushed Selina lightly, but smiled. [I don't trust her not to turn me into a plant.] Neo typed, before they made their way through a hole in the wall and entered through a door into a security room, a large monitor and several smaller screens showing them the vault and the TYGER guards patrolling it. [Standard patrol, slow and predictable. Too easy.] She typed.
"And there's the vault. It looks like a standard 3 card security protocol. Really, you'd think they would've learned by now." Selina said as she typed away at the keyboard to investigate.
[They're either too stupid or too lazy to make changes until something big happens. Let's hope this is big enough.] Neo typed.
"Right. Hopefully, the keycards are down there, deep in the pockets of those TYGER guards. I'll take one, you get the other two and we'll meet back here. Just be careful not to let them see you. One wrong move and the failsafe will trigger and that vault will lock. Permanently." Catwoman said, surprisingly serious.
Neo rolled her eyes. [Really? Getting all 3 on my own would STILL be too easy.] Neo typed, before they went into action, Catwoman latching to the ceiling and going through a vent at the top of the wall and Neo crouching to go through one on the bottom of the wall near the door. Using her semblance to act like a chameleon and blend into the environment, Neo easily snuck around and pickpocketed two of the guards and made her way back to the security room, getting their at the same time as Catwoman. [Wow. I got two cards and STILL almost beat you here!] She typed with a proud smirk on her face.
"No one likes a show-off, Neo." Catwoman said as they went into the terminal and put in their three keycards. And like that, the vault opened, much to the shock of the guards.
"What's going on?" One guard asked.
"Someone's opening the vault." Another explained.
"Is this a drill?" Yet another asked.
"If it is, no one told us." One final guard declared. "Listen up! This room is hot. Spread out and search for intruders! No prisoners. Move!" He ordered.
[Aww, how cute. They think they can kill us.] Neo typed, silently giggling.
"Let's show them why even trying is a bad idea." Catwoman said, jumping back up to the roof again.
Neo moved silently through the halls, waiting around a corner for one guard, wrapping the handle of her umbrella around his neck and slamming him into a wall, sending him to the floor, before striking him across the face with her umbrella. A couple of guards came to investigate, but Catwoman dropped from the ceiling and grabbed the second one, choking him out to silently knock him out. The fist guard made it to where Neo had been, noticing his ally on the floor. He went to assist his comrade, before Neo approached from behind, stretched her arm and umbrella past his head and deployed said umbrella, blocking his path. He turned around to see her, the mute flashing him a smile, before delivering an inside crescent kick, knocking him to the left, causing him to hit a wall and stagger back, before she delivered a side kick and knocked him to the ground, unconscious.
Not seeing any of their fellow guards patrolling any longer, the two final guards standing in front of the door moved to investigate. From there, it was a simple matter of Catwoman sneaking along the ceiling to incapacitate the guard in the back, then dropping to the ground, her heels clacking on the floor to alert the first guard, who turned and aimed at her, but he was quickly taken out when Neo quickly came up behind him and stomped on the back of one of his legs, choking him out with her umbrella. The two of them then approached the vault and opened it.
But as they were waiting for it to open, they heard a conversation over the intercom. "This is TYGER 54. We have confirmation that Batman and Light Dragon are in the Steel Mill. I repeat: Batman and Light Dragon are in the Steel Mill!" The guard informed.
"Good. Make it our first target. Protocol Ten will wipe The Joker, Batman and Light Dragon from this Earth." Strange declared proudly.
"Target is set." The guard complied.
"Then let Protocol Ten commence!" Strange ordered.
Neo rolled her eyes and typed at this. [I'm about sick of hearing about this Protocol Ten every hour.] She stated, an annoyed look on her face.
"Hopefully, we'll be out of here before we find out what is is." Catwoman said, although she couldn't deny she was a bit concerned for Bruce. But finally, the vault opened and the two were able to enter. "Looks like these kitties got the cream." She said as she approached the briefcases.
As she did that, Neo found Ivy's plant and stormed over to it, pushing it off the table with her umbrella. [I doubt she'd want me to be her kid now.] She typed down.
Catwoman inspected the goods inside the case, before they both sensed a presence behind them, turning to see six guards waiting to attack them. "It appears we have caught our intruders. Teach them a lesson." Strange ordered.
Catwoman lunged forward, disarming the first guard in front of her, who wielded a stun baton, using her legs to deflect a punch meant for her into the shock baton wielder's head, before she zapped the guard with the stun baton and began rapidly beating on a guard wearing body armor until she knocked him out, at which point the guard who had been punched by his fellow guard recovered, moving to attack her again, before she knocked out with a counter move, at which point the guard who'd been zapped was getting back up, so Catwoman kicked him in the head and knocked him out as well.
Meanwhile, Neo had opened her umbrella and swung it at the face of the guard in front of her to disorient him, before smacking him in the side of the head with the closed umbrella to make him stagger off to the side, before she caught the leg of a guard with a shield, tripping him and pulling his shield away, catching the fist of her final guard, pulling him forward and bringing her leg up, kicking him in the head while he was behind her like she once did to Yang, spinning around and smacking him in the head with her umbrella, sending him to the ground. The other two recovered at this point, the guard who had the shield going for a punch, but she deflected the punch with her umbrella, before delivering an elbow to his head to stun him a bit, rolling past the next thug and turning around to jump, catching air with her umbrella to kick him in the chest with both feet, knocking them all down on top of each other and allowing her to deliver a few final swings from her umbrella to take them down.
The two of them turned back and each grabbed a briefcase, before they heard another announcement over the intercom. "All units. The Steel Mill is hit. Batman and Light Dragon are down. I repeat: The Bat and the blonde are down!" A TYGER guard declared.
"Good. Wait until Protocol Ten has completed, then send out a squad to collect Batman and Light Dragon's bodies." Strange instructed.
"Understood, sir." The guard acknowledged.
The two thieves each grabbed a brief case and made their way down the hallway to a split path: to the left, the way they came, which would bring them back to Arkham City, which would no doubt be like walking into an active war zone at this point. And to the right, a path to safety and freedom from Arkham City, but that would mean abandoning everyone in to die. And on the wall in front of them in between the two paths was a large monitor, currently showing Bruce and Yang, unconscious and nearly buried under a bunch of rubble. If they left now, the two of them would be left helpless and at the mercy of any thugs or TYGER agents that would come to finish them off. And with their deaths would come the destruction of Gotham with criminals running rampant. "Bruce..." Catwoman said in horror.
Neo watched the screen for several seconds... then simply shrugged and sauntered off towards the exit. [Screw 'em!] She typed.
But Catwoman quickly reached out for her, grabbing her by her belt and pulling her back. "Oh, no you don't. You know that you care about Yang, too. You would never forgive yourself if you let her die. Just like I'd never forgive myself if I didn't go back to save Bruce. We need to go back and make sure they're okay." She said.
Neo pouted at this. [Since when did you grow a conscience?] She typed.
Catwoman smirked. "Hey, I didn't see you denying any feelings for Yang." She teased, to which Neo gasped, then turned and looked away with a blush. Selina grabbed her chin and turned her back to face her. "Besides, if we don't save Batman and Light Dragon, they can't stop this Protocol Ten, or the Joker. And either one of those is bad for us." She informed her protégé." She pointed out.
Neo nodded in consideration at this. [Okay, let's go save the goody-two-shoes.] She typed.
Shortly after...
Batman and Yang were finally starting to regain consciousness, when they noticed a pair of shadows standing over them. Luckily for them, it wasn't a TYGER guard or one of Joker's goons come to finish them off, but our two lovable thieves, Selina and Neo. "Well, what have we here? Lying down on the job?" Catwoman questioned.
[Lazy butt heroes!] Neo typed.
Yang grumbled at this. "Well, this lazy butt is about to kick yours when I get out of here!" She warned.
[Wow, so rude. And I'm actually here to help!] Neo typed again.
"Alright, that's enough messing around. Let's get this stuff off you." Catwoman said, the two thieves lifting the rubble enough for their heroic counterparts to help lift it off themselves, both heroes standing tall. "Figured you could use our help." She explained to Batman.
"You're right. I think I chipped a nail back there." Batman repeated Catwoman's quip from before.
Both Remnant girls deadpanned at this. [For real?] Neo typed.
"Yeah, even I'll admit that was lame." Yang agreed.
"I'm with them. You stick to the brooding, let me handle the wisecracks." Selina said.
"Hey, what about me?!" Yang asked with a pout.
[She said WISE cracks. Not dumb puns.] Neo typed.
"Well, I guess we all know what Protocol Ten is now. If you're planning on stopping it, you need to hurry." Catwoman told them as she started walking away.
[Later, blondie! Try not to die] Neo typed.
"Oh, don't worry. I'm sticking around until we get back to Remnant and I kick your butt and toss you in jail!" Yang declared.
[It's a date.] Neo typed before the two thieves exited through a giant hole in the Steel Mill, disappearing into the night.
A/N: Another chapter down! I hope you all enjoyed! Also, please remember, I'm STILL issuing my challenge to anyone who is willing: write a story where any other member of RWBY or JNPR somehow finds themselves in Arkham and must fight alongside Batman to restore peace. Heck, it could even be a full-fledged Huntsman like Qrow, or anyone else you want to do. The choice is entirely yours, but I know many of you out there could come up with something amazing!
[1] Think Volume 8.