The bioship sped along in camouflage mode. Everyone aboard was silent, Miss Martian concentrating on reaching the coordinates Batman had given her. Kid Flash was full of nervous energy, but he did his best to stay calm and quiet in his seat.
The tall buildings and dark skies of Gotham City came into view as the flight continued. Kid Flash and Miss Martian tensed a bit in anticipation.
"We should arrive in about three minutes," the green skinned girl informed the other two passengers. They didn't verbally respond, but she knew that they'd heard.
They reached their destination two and a half minutes later. Batman instructed Miss Martian to land on a nearby rooftop, as much out of sight as possible. The group of three exited quickly and discretely. Batman expertly used his grapple gun to get down into the alley while M'gann levitated herself and Wally down.
Batman was already examining one of the many squares of apparent confetti that littered the alleyway once their feet touched the ground. They silently walked to him, taking in their surroundings.
"There are remnants of knock out gas in these," the Dark Knight stated after he had finished analyzing a few of the squares.
"Batman, I found this," Miss Martian told him as she walked over, levitating the joker card, knowing better than to actually touch it. "There's…some blood on it…"
Batman wordlessly opened a small zip lock bag and Miss Martian carefully deposited it inside.
"What do we do now?" Kid Flash asked a little anxiously. He'd grown more worried at the mention of the blood. And there didn't seem to be any obvious clues as to where Robin and Artemis hand been taken, so he was beginning to think that they may have hit a dead end, which was not okay at all.
Suddenly, Miss Martian stiffened a little. "Someone is watching us," her voice sounded in their heads.
"I'm aware. Remain calm," Batman answered through the mental link. "Don't turn around yet."
The Dark Knight stood cautiously, careful not to betray his knowledge of the person spying on them. Slowly, his eyes drifted to the right corner of the entrance to the alleyway. To anyone else, it appeared that he was simply scanning the area for clues.
Soon enough, Batman's eyes landed on the spot where he knew the culprit was attempting to conceal himself. A regular person probably would not have been able to spot him, but Batman was far from regular. His cowled eyes narrowed.
At that moment, the man made the mistake of peering around the corner and inadvertently locking eyes with the Dark Knight. His expression was one of instant shock and he hurriedly scrambled to get on his feet and run.
Batman was much quicker though.
Before the suspicious man could take more than a step or two, Batman was upon him and pulling him roughly into the alley.
"Hey-" the guy started to shout, but Batman slammed him against the wall, not hard enough to injure him, but it effectively silenced him. Kid Flash and Miss Martian watched in silence.
"You will remain quiet until I ask a question. Understood?" Batman growled.
"I ain't answering nothin'!" the culprit shot back. Batman tightened his grip, slammed him again, got right in his face, and gave him a fierce bat glare in response.
"You will answer me."
"Y-Y-You don't scare me. I'm not talking," the man replied weakly, clearly fearful.
"You were watching us. Why?" Batman questioned without hesitation, glowering down at the guy.
"I-I-I…" he broke under the Dark Knight's gaze. "The boss ordered me to watch this area…" he mumbled meekly, but Batman heard him nonetheless.
"Who is your boss?"
The man looked up nervously. "I ain't crazy enough to tell! He'd kill me!"
Batman was tired of waiting for answers. Normally he had much more patience with interrogations, but they were pressed for time. "Miss Martian."
She already knew what he wanted her to do. She walked quickly over to the man.
"What are you gonna do?" the culprit questioned worriedly. Miss Martian didn't answer him as her eyes began to glow a light green.
It took her less than a minute to gather the information they desired. She turned towards Batman as she finished. "He was with the Joker. They took Robin and Artemis to a warehouse not too far from here," she hurriedly explained. The images she had seen of her friends made her uneasy, but there was no need to relay that. They were all already worried and the sooner they got to them the better.
"How did you…? What are you?!" They all ignored the man's bewildered outburst.
Batman nodded at Miss Martian in affirmation. He retrieved a device from his utility belt, pressed it, and wires quickly shot out and bound the man they had been questioning. Batman then lowered him gently to the ground so that he was laying on his back.
"H-Hey! You can't leave me here like this!" he yelled, squirming uselessly against the binds.
"The police will arrive for you shortly," Batman informed him. "Let's move out," he told Kid Flash and Miss Martian. They nodded and followed after him.
Just a little longer and they would be able to rescue Artemis and Robin, hopefully before anything too bad happened.
They boarded the bioship and quickly sped off with strengthened determination set in.
A/N: Hey, long time no update. And probably not as good of an update as you were hoping for after all this time, but a necessary chapter nonetheless. I truly apologize for taking such an agonizingly long time to get this updated. My husband ended up getting pretty sick several times after my last update and was hospitalized a few more times. He had a few more surgeries, one of them being a very major one that took over 8 hours to do. He is doing so much better now though, the best he has been since the accident.
Another thing: we are now blessed to be the parents of a beautiful baby girl, who is the main reason I have not been able to update hehe. :) This story has often been on my mind though, and as I promised, I won't abandon a story. I'm definitely not the same person I was when I originally started this story though. And I admit it's a little hard to jump back into writing, so forgive me if it's a little choppy and not as well written as it was previously. I'm trying, I really am.
I'll update as often as I can, but my life does get quite hectic these days. Thank you so much for the continued reviews and alerts! They are the reason I continue. Until next time then.