After turning down a wrong, the trio went down another corridor as Micro called.
"I've been digging deeper into Dr. Young." Micro said. "According to her bank records, there have been multiple payments, starting last April until 2 months ago. Then nothing. The payments came from a company owned by a Mister Jack White."
"One of Joker's oldest aliases." Ladybug said.
"So, Joker pays Dr. Young to create his army and then all of a sudden stops. Doesn't make any sense." Stinger said as they continued on.
They passed through the next area, which was some form of column structures with water running through several places. Rena Rouge tried to use her grapple to scale the building, but Ladybug placed her hand on her shoulder to stop her, shaking her head when she looked at her.
"This area's too unstable. We have to climb." Ladybug explained.
"Ok. I was looking forward to a good climb anyway." She said, jumping to the next platform and climbing up the ledge next to it.
"Alright, so here's something strange. The payments to Dr. Young didn't stop exactly. They were declined. She put a block on her account." Micro explained.
"Sounds like a change of heart." Ladybug said. "She tried to block her payments. Joker doesn't like it when his partners try to back out."
"So, he decided to get himself back into Arkham, find his formula and create the army himself!" Micro deduced.
"If that happens, Joker's threat to kill a hundred cops might be the smallest amount of damage he does!" Stinger said worriedly.
"It won't come to that." Ladybug said.
"Alright, I've hacked into her email account, only two emails stand out." Micro said.
"What are they?" Rena asked, pulling herself up another ledge, before jumping across the massive gap to another platform, trying her best not to look down at the drop to almost certain doom. Her suit might protect her from a lot of things but she highly doubts a high fall would be something she would walk away from, regardless if she could react in time.
"The first one's a resignation letter dated last week. Sounds like she was trying to get away. The second one is a message from Joker, under the Persona of Jack White. It's a pretty long thread." Micro said.
"Can't be longer than this tunnel." Stinger said, looking to see they only made it halfway up to where they were going. This earned a chuckle from Micro before she continued.
"Well, she's begging him to let her stop the experiments, saying it's too dangerous and that he's not listening. Let's see, Random threats to her family, a couple of bad jokes a picture of a dead baby and another threat."
"Go on." Ladybug said, though her and the women's anger spiked a bit at the mention of Joker's notes.
"Well, he then begins with something along the lines of 'I'm coming for you. want what I paid for. A joke about wheelchairs. Lovely. And a drawing of some kind of donkey." Micro finished.
"No wonder she's so scared. We're heading to the surface. We'll find her." Ladybug said as they reached the top of the sewer system.
Stinger started to walk out into the open, but a very bad feeling and sense of danger washed over Ladybug.
"Wait!" Ladybug said, grabbing her arm and pulling her against a wall for cover. Using her Detective Mode, seeing several snipers in the watchtowers around the area. "Snipers. It looks like the Blakegate thugs have access to the armory!"
They silently crept towards the nearest watch tower, out of sight of any of the snipers and grappled up to it, Ladybug sneaking up to the sniper scanning the area, unaware of any other person near him, until the point Ladybug grabbed him and held him in a choke-hold until he passed out. Using her own Detective Mode, Stinger was able to find exactly where the snipers where, quickly popping out and firing at the snipers, catching them by surprise, knocking them unconscious and sending the rifles flying.
"Good work." Ladybug said, before dropping down, Rena and Stinger quickly following. They rushed ahead to where Ladybug's Lamborghini had once been parked, encountering 4 thugs standing there. Stinger fired a round from each bracer to knock down to of the thugs, before rushing at the one in the back, leaving the one with knives to Ladybug and Rena, who easily disarmed them, before knocking them unconscious with a headbutt.
Rena threw a powerful uppercut, knocking the thug into the air and easily knocking him unconscious as well.
"So, which way now?" Stinger asked.
"This way." Ladybug answered, heading toward Arkham East. Much to their annoyance, they ran into another group of thugs.
"UGH! We don't have time for this!" Rena said, rushing in and jumping towards them with her fist raised. All of the thugs prepared to defend themselves, but were caught off-guard and confused when the women simply landed in front of them and prepared to fight. The women were able to take down the thugs, and passed through the door.
Once they entered Arkham East, Ladybug quickly took the lead once again after scanning for snipers. Sure enough, there were more, but they were easy enough to deal with. From there, it was a quick trip to the mansion. Stinger was about to head through the front doors, but Ladybug grabbed her arm to stop her. "No. You and Rena deal with the ones on the tower. I'll handle the ones at the mansion." He told her, pulling out his grappling hook and firing it to reel up to the ledge above the doors of the mansion.
Rena was confused, but confirmed and went up to a different part of the ledge, Stinger pulling the sniper near him over the edge, to be caught by a rope around his ankle while Rena, taking advantage of the second sniper's distraction as he looked over to where his partner apparently fell, punched the poor bastard in the balls, causing him to double over in pain and grab his reproductive system as she pulled herself up, before delivering a swift punch to the face to knock him out as Batman pulled himself up as well.
They looked where Ladybug was as she dealt with two thugs that were on top of the mansion doors and took them down. Seeing that there were no more thugs, they entered the mansion hoping to find Dr. Young.
If I've said this once, I'll say it a thousand times more: try not to expect me to immediately put a chapter out. I know it's been a while since the last update, but be grateful I even continue this.
But other than that, here's the next chapter. Next time, we'll be exploring the mansion, in hopes of ding Dr. Young.
As always, let me know your thoughts.