The cargo ship wasn't much of a site at first glance, but then again, that's at first glance.
In reality, most of Gotham's cargo ships were just drug shipments, and everyone knew that, yet no one uttered a word about it.
Something had felt off to Lady Knight since she had found out that the thugs they had been fighting against were hired guns, but she didn't read much into the feeling until now, where she had a moment of silence on the platform that Robin had had them jump to.
Then, she heard it. She couldn't identify it at first, but she heard the sound of wailing and drumming. No, not drumming, Lady Knight realized, but pounding.
She put one hand out, and held the other to her lips, and listened. This caused Robin to give her strange looks but he didn't ask questions and just listened, as she had wanted him to.
"Hear it?" Lady Knight asked quietly, and then pointed to the cargo crates that were sitting in a line by the edge of the boat, where the pounding noise was coming from.
"-Tt- Of course I do. I'm not deaf." Robin scowled, "But those sound like children. But why would they need children?"
Lady Knight shrugged, "Child trafficking I guess. But why would Penguin pay me to stop a child trafficking ring?"
Robin didn't seem to be listening, he was muttering things under his breath while his eyes scanned whatever was on the screen of his holo-computer before he turned to her, "This might have something to do with all the disappearances of street kids in the past 3 or 4 months."
Lady Knight nodded, before remembering something she had heard back in Central and Star the last time she had worked a job there, which wasn't too long ago, "Central as Star city are having the same problem. This is one of the largest organized trafficking rings in a while if these disappearances really are connected, but what are they doing with them? Putting children in shipping crates isn't exactly what child trafficking usually does when they plan to sell to the highest bidder. They usually want the kids in peak condition."
Robin frowned at her, and gave her a 'are you dumb' look, "Obviously it's a large trafficking ring. And new player, new conditions. Maybe this guy doesn't care about roughing the kids up."
Lady Knight nodded thoughtfully at his response, purposefully ignoring the confidence and rudeness in his tone. "I guess we'll just have to find out then!"
Hopping up onto deck, which wasn't too far above her head, Lady Knight spotted a few crates that had been filled with rotten apples, that were placed against the side of a the Captain's room wall, a perfect vantage point for her to scope everything out while no one would spot her.
"C'mon, let's not waste time," Lady Knight whispered to Robin, before silently making her way over to the Apple crates and jumping on to the roof.
She didn't exactly pay attention to what Robin was doing, only because she trusted he would stick to his word, and he had enough skill to pull off why she was asking of him.
Robin did come crouch beside her and looked where she was looking, which was at the crates of children, before tapping a few buttons she didn't even know we're on his mask, probably allowing him to see inside the shipping crates.
This reminded Lady Knight of the X-Ray mode on her own mask, which she tapped and scanned inside the crates. "35 in total...There we're 76 missing case files, they must've delivered the other children already..."
Robin, for once, didn't respond to her comment and just nodded in agreement. They sat in silence, both trying to analyze the situation they had gotten themselves on, when a snippet of a conversation that seemed to be in the room under the roof they were sitting.
Lady Knight didn't say anything, just gave Robin a look and put her ear to the roof. It must've looked stupid, but Robin followed her lead and they caught an important part of a muffled conversation.
"We need to get these kids to the boss, ASAP. He says they need to be trained as soon as possible, and we all know how boss gets when he's angry."
"I know! But we have to be cautious, I thought I heard something's outside and boss will skin me alive if the Bat doesn't already."
"Just hurry up! The sooner we finish this, the sooner the kids turn into soldiers, the sooner we get to go free-"
By then, both vigilante and mercenary had stopped listening. "What the fuck do they mean, ',the sooner the kids turn into soldiers?" Lady Knight asked quietly, her mouth parted in shock.
"Only one way to find out." Robin responded, his posture showing his determination, as well as his ego.
"And that would be?" Lady Knight snapped impatiently. People seriously could just get to the point, she didn't like it when they didn't.
"We go with them." Robin answered, "And not as this. Civilians would work much better."
"That would involve revealing identities." Lady Knight pointed out in a duh tone, "And I still don't like you very much."
"-tt- I'm not a fan of yours either, but it's revealing identities, or going in costume and getting caught and imprisoned the moment we arrive at whatever the destination is." Robin explained, already making a move to take his mask off.
Lady Knight presses her lips into a fine line, thinking of the pros and cons of the situation Robin was implying. There were no pros, but that just made her gut tell her to go along with the deal, "Fine."
She herself reached for her mask, when Robin removed his. "Damian Wayne? I don't hear much news, but I think I head of you somewhere. Honestly, I'm not surprised this happened..."
Lady Knight was muttering all this, while she removed her mask. Her mask was also a domino, so it was rather easy. Not a quality she enjoyed. "Not really nice to meet you, I'm Skylar Elliot. Now, let's go and pretend to be helpless children who escaped the crates only to be captured and thrown into a crate!"
Robin looked down, seeing the costume, "Forgetting something, Elliot? We can't exactly walk out like this. I hope you have a spare change of clothes..."
Skylar knew it was a good idea to have brought her civilian attire with her that night. Opening a pouch inside her cape, she pulled out a wrinkled gray T-shirt and a pair of skinny jeans, before jumping into the platform they had once been on, that Damian couldn't see, to change.
By the time she came back, Damian had changed into a black turtle neck and black jeans, but had messed up his hair to make it seem more realistic. Actually, the only reason the freshly pressed clothes seemed 'kidnap' ready was because Damian was already covered in both dirt and grime from their fight with the hired guns, and Damian must've gotten that dirt and grime onto the clothes as he out them on.
"-Tt- I simply cannot believe I have to act as merely a child..." Damian muttered in disgust, right as both him and Skylar were about to get in position to begin their basically thought up on the spot plan.
"If I may remind you, Wayne, we're both like 13, technically we're both still considered children," Skylar pointed out, matter-of-factly, before getting into position, basically sitting by the rotten Apple crates, and pretending to cry and seem exhausted.
"Idiot..." Damian replied before he too, got into position, which was him sitting by Skylar and pretending to be exhausted and beaten, which caused a guard to come over.