Flashback Chapter 11 Capture and Corruption

Babs shifted in her bindings, hands uncomfortably tied behind her back as she sat on the hard concrete floor she and Dick Grayson were locked in. The boy was still unconscious, slumped against the opposite wall.

He stirred, moaned, and muttered a long string of unintelligible syllables before opening his eyes. "Barbara?" he croaked, focussing on her. "Where are we?"

"We were already here when I woke up," Babs explained. "The boss-type guy said he's sending a note telling Bruce Wayne to pay half a million dollars, and if the police interfere, they'll shoot me."

"'Least they have a use for us," Dick muttered. He shifted, and after a moment had worked his bound hands to behind his knees. He passed his feet through the loop of his arms and stood, coming over to kneel beside her. "Turn around," he instructed, and quickly unpicked the rope on her wrists.

"How did you do that?" Babs asked, working on Dick's bindings.

"There was an escapologist at Haly's a while back," he shrugged. "I picked up a bit, mostly the twisting."

"Oh. What now?" she asked as the last rope fell to the floor.

Dick nodded to the door. "Is that just locked? 'Cause I've heard you can pick locks with hairpins…"

Babs reached around her head and pulled out some bent-wire hair slides decorated with green butterflies from near her pony tail. "These do?"

As neither of them had picked a lock before, it took quite some fumbling before the door lay open in front of them. It revealed a vast warehouse half-full of crates. Along one side were several doors into smaller rooms, like their cell. The kidnappers were nowhere in sight. Gesturing for Babs to stay, Dick crept along, looking in keyholes before opening a door and beckoning. Babs joined him in a small office. Dick pointed to the phone. "Can you call your Dad?" he whispered.

She nodded and picked up the handset, punching in the number for her father's office. After a tense minute of the dialling tone, she finally heard his gruff voice. "Gordon."

"Dad?" she whispered. "It's me."

"Barbara!" Dad exclaimed. "Where are you? Are you alright? Is Grayson with you?"

"Yes, Dick's here, and we're both fine," she replied. "But I don't know where 'here' is. A warehouse of some sort."

"Alright, keep talking. We're just tracing the call now."

"Um…" Babs bit her lip, trying to think f what to say. "The guys who took us said something about losing a target?"

"We pulled some CCTV," her dad explained. "Those men work for a mob boss known as Penguin. One of Penguin's associates turned himself in last week, wanted to make a plea bargain. Bat got him, if you ask me. But his daughter's in third grade at Roosevelt. You were unlucky enough to be in the way."

Dick snorted quietly. "I'd say we were actually quite fortunate. If it were anyone else, they'd be dead."

There was a pause on the other end of the phone. "Is that what you were counting on when you attacked them with a lacrosse stick?"

"Oh, is that what the net-on-a-stick thing's called?" he muttered.

"How do you not know that?" Babs whispered.

"I'm an acrobat, not an athlete," he retorted.

"We have your location," Dad interrupted. "I need you two to hide and not come out until we tell you. Can you do that?"

Babs frowned. Dick grinned. "I've got the perfect place," he murmured.

Catching the kidnappers was easier than anticipated. They were caught completely by surprise, playing poker in one of the side rooms. Just one thing left for Gordon to do. "We need to find the children," he instructed his men. "I told them to hide until we tell them to come out, so it shouldn't be too difficult." They were about to start examining the crates for child-sized nooks and crannies, when a girlish giggle rang through the room.

Gordon looked this way and that for his daughter, but there was no sign of her. After a moment, he heard the Grayson boy's voice. "Told you. No-one ever looks up."

He looked up, and up. Peering back from the shadowy rafters he saw two emerald green eyes and two of ice blue. One of the sergeants voiced the question they were all thinking. "How the hell did they get up there?"

"Do you want us to come down now?" Grayson asked, standing poised on the edge of the beam, at least thirty-five feet up, it seemed.

"No!" Gordon barked, trying not to imagine having to explain to Wayne how he let the boy fall that kind of distance. He started issuing his orders. "You, call Wayne. Tell him the situation. And you lot find a ladder."

The next twenty minutes involved the kidnappers being taken away, the children sulking, and the complete failure to locate a long enough ladder. They were considering calling the fire service, when Bruce Wayne arrived. He took one look, and sighed. "Aren't you coming down?" he asked his ward.

Grayson bounced to his feet. "As you wish," he beamed, and jumped. Speechless, everyone watched in shock as the boy somersaulted, flipped against one crate, pivoted off another, and landed with a flourish. "Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, you've been a wonderful audience," he said, grinning.

Gordon looked from the boy on the ground, to his daughter in the rafters. "Barbara, don't try to do that," he told her firmly, desperately hoping she'd listen and not try to copy the stunt.

"Not gonna," Babs sighed. "Here, Dick." She threw out a rope, and it snaked down to the floor. Gordon stared at it for a moment. If they'd had a rope all along, why didn't they use it to climb down?

Grayson seized the rope, and tied the end to a door knob, leaving the line at a slant. Up above, Babs jumped, sliding down the make-shift zipline with another piece of rope. "That was awesome!" she squealed as she landed. "High five!"

The children slapped palms together, wide grins on their faces. Over their heads, Gordon and Wayne locked eyes. Wayne sighed. "I'm sorry, sir," Wayne said wearily. "But I think he's corrupted her."

AN: Barbara is the daughter of the Police Commissioner (not yet, but soon). A perfectly respectable position in society. So what happened to make her a Bat? Clearly, someone corrupted her. How about a certain young acrobat?

And here ends the mini-arc. Please, please review it. We'll be returning to the present for some time. It's time for a rescue.

See you in Family Ties.

Katara