They slowed down once they made it to the park, with Martha glancing at Bruce, "The chair wouldn't break, go Hulk out.", and Martha took a deep breath before giving the reins to Kel, changing quickly into the She-Hulk, now into tracking mode as the window opened a bit to let the air waft in.
Kel's eyes glowed as she sniffed deeply, and then nodded as she found Poppy's scent, "Got her. Go where they went, on the right. Steadily, Batman.", and Bruce went where the Wonderland truck sped away and turned from the park.
Steadily, Kel kept her nose up, randomly giving direction as she followed Poppy's scent within the Wonderland truck scent, and indeed, like Martha had indicated from the computer overlays of the city map and the searches of the Wonderland truck from the camera shots, they found themselves in the industrial district of the city.
Kel sniffed deeply, "Yep, the truck is really using the district, but they are using switch bouts at this point..Poppy's scent is mixed up with other girls' scents from what I can tell.", as Alfred's voice came on the comms, "There are three roads specifically in the district, the one you're on, the other on your left, and the third one by the industrial docks on the bay. I checked the cameras; they must have been using the alleys between your road and the others as the alleys are dark in the camera department...I swear the police are not very smart to cover the alleys.".
Bruce asked, "Any chance the owner of the truck has an address if you caught the license plate, Alfred?", as he drove into a depleted junkyard lot that wasn't fenced or anything, using the piles to cover the Batmobile in sight, parking.
"Just a minute, trying to find some good angles, the picture quality isn't the best to work with...", Alfred's voice admitted. "Either way, we're certainly right about the area, now it's just a question of if we need to check every inch of the area.", Batman said.
Kel frowned deeply, "We need to narrow down the search. You take the alley on the left; I take the alley on the right. I need to get Poppy's scent straightened out of those other girls' scents somehow.".
"Alright then.", Batman said. "Be careful... last thing we want is these guys to try to burn down all their evidence...", looking at Kel. "I'll keep to the shadows myself.", Kel assured him. "No heroics right yet; just find where they are and then we plan our next move.".
Batman heard the sharp tone, and nodded, "You got it, She-Hulk.", and so, they left the car, with Batman locking it up, and went to the alleys, with Batman using his gun grappler while She-Hulk used her super speed and jumping.
"Come on, Poppy, where are you...?", She-Hulk whispered to herself as she was moving around, trying to hopefully get a true trace on things. Time certainly was of the essence; if what Bruce said about the number 42 being related to Alice in Wonderland was right, she had a bad feeling that means that time was now for sure running out for the girls.
"Ma'am, come in!", Alfred's voice cracked in her earpiece. "Go ahead.", She-Hulk said.
"I think I've finally got a match on the license plate. Quickly accessed files, apparently, it's owned by one Jervis Tetch. If that name sounds familiar; apparently, he's the owner of Jervis Tech, electronic and technology prodigy and his company, while still small, is cutting edge.", Alfred explained.
Martha's voice mentally said in Kel's head, "Wayne Industries has been taking notice of him, especially Lucius...But lately, I heard rumors that Jervis hadn't been seen for at least half a year after a falling out with his board of directors.".
She-Hulk replied, "Any address in the industrial district?", with a narrowing of her eyes, and Alfred replied, "Yep, apart from the main address of his company in the business district and the address of his home in downtown Gotham, got one address in the industrial district. I'm tracking you, Hulk-One, you're in the alley between Vine St and Polk St, yes?".
She-Hulk glanced at the street signs from her position in the dark, "Yep.", and Alfred replied, "Abandoned millhouse, three up north and one across. Batman, you hear all of that? Should be two north from your location in your alley between Polk St and Queens St.".
"Got it.", Batman's voice responded. "Hopefully, we're right on the money with this one.", with the sound of him moving. "Just let me get there and I'll be for sure.", She-Hulk explained before she quickly arrived on the scene. A quick whiff of the air and she almost wanted to tear up as Poppy's scent was very strong nearby; and fairly recent too.
She-Hulk whispered deeply and tensely, pressing comms, "Scent's fresh. And I have a feeling that the building I'm staring at is the millhouse.", carefully getting into the rooftop to look at the millhouse across the street from her, which is an easy jump for her, as Batman's voice quietly replied, "Coming up from the back, turning on thermal vision.", since sunset is finally disappearing, making the night approach from over the skyline and such.
She-Hulk's superior sight made out a very dark shape slinking into the rooftop of the millhouse, realizing that it's Batman, and heard his voice, "Breathing and alive. An adult one at a table with a child one, two other adult ones, one doing some sort of camera shots as I see the heat of lights and the camera, the other one near a mass of children, looking like they're in cages, and patrolling in and out of the front yard to in and out of the millhouse is two guard dogs, you see them?".
"Barely; can't exactly see through the building in most places; but I can certainly smell it all now that you tell me.", She-Hulk said. "So, there's at least three conspirators to all of this.".
"No wonder the police were having difficulties; they were looking for one person, not a group. But it makes sense how quick they were able to accomplish all of this in such a short time.", Batman responded.
She-Hulk replied, "Indeed.", as she heard Batman reply, "Turning to night vision now.", and a minute passed before his voice came back, "Looks like my theory is right. And from what I was told from Fox, the man in the Mad Hatter costume is definitely Jervis Tetch. He looks like he has gone berserks since the girl is dressed like Alice, but not Poppy as that girl definitely didn't have Poppy's nose...Looking at the men behind the camera and on the guard, they look similar yet different, probably dressed like the Tweedle Twins, and their helicopter hats look like they're blinking red, some sort of mind control...The coming in and out guard dogs have the same blinking red dots, really in bad shape, one of them is cruelly dyed to look like the Cheshire Cat if I can tell the shades right, and the other one is probably either Jabberwocky or Bandersnatch. Poppy must be horrified that there's also animal abuse here next to kidnapping, child abuse, and who knows what else.".
"You see her in the cages?", She-Hulk asked urgently, and Batman replied, "The cages are too close and stacked. I am going in to take a better look. I'll stick to the rafters. Comms are turning to low volume now.", as She-Hulk heard the comms in Batman pitching lower and quieter, but not completely gone as his voice, now at a whisper yet heard clearly in her own comms, "I'll tell you when it's time for you to be the distraction, She-Hulk. Wish me luck.", as she watched his shadow slink to the side of the millhouse to go for the windows next to the rafters rather from the above windows of the roof where a jump would be noisy...She hopes that any of the rafter windows are open or at least cracked enough to let a hand in to unlock the window from inside, and of course, to fit him for him to slink into the shadows and such.
"Ugh... I know what Bruce said and all, but if you ask me... as long as he knows where the dogs, the goons and Jervis is, we could easily just break down the front door and charge right in.", Martha argued internally as She-Hulk sighed.
"Yeah, I get that; but we'd probably put that one girl in danger by doing that. Last thing we need is Jervis to hold her hostage...", Kel mentally said as Martha mentally sighed, "Right, right... just pains me that we can't do this the easy way like we've done times in the past.".
Kel mentally replied back to Martha, "It's going to be okay, Martha. And so far, our son is doing a really good job...I'm surprised at his dedication to be like me in his own vigilante way...".
Martha mentally said, "Me too...I really hope Poppy is okay...She better not have been physically abused...or worse...", and Kel mentally growled lowly, "Our daughter is smart and brave.", turning into She-Hulk's tone.
Nodding, Martha mentally replied, "Yeah, yes, you're right.", before resuming her silence, and She-Hulk waited patiently, knowing that Batman is treading slowly and carefully.
Meanwhile, inside her cage, Poppy is trying to find a nail or something from her floor, but nothing, it was like the nails were welded into the cage floor and such instead of being hammered, and she even tried to use the straps of her shoes to work into the ball chain from her leg, zip...
It was like with every escape attempt the girls tried, they made the cages harder and harder to escape, and with ball chains to slow them down in their escapades, it was like they can't get a break of good luck.
Poppy huffed, listening to the distant laughter of the imposter Mad Hatter and #3 who is now the latest Alice, through Bonnie has told her that a bell will sound out the sunset time any moment now, and #3 will be taken back to her cage while the Mad Hatter would turn in for whatever he's going to do upon leaving the premises after checking double sure of the security of the Tweedle twins and the mistreated guard dogs.
At least the other girls, after #3 is done, #4 to Bonnie would have some sleep for the night, through Poppy knew they would have more peaceful sleep if they were rescued, praying that her mama is soon on the job or already is by now. She gazed at Bonnie who is trying to play patty cake with her next-door neighbor who is #38 aka Jennifer Robards.
Then suddenly, a hairpin of black dropped into her lap, and she picked it up, widening her eyes as she realized that she could unlock her leg ball chain and her cage, and then checked her surroundings on the Tweedle Twins at the far front of the cages and the camera before looking up, pursuing her lips as she searched through the rafters past the dim light, seeing nothing before seeing something twitch.
She tried to narrow her eyes, but she still couldn't make out anything in the darkness above. Either way, she wasn't passing up this chance as she quickly got to work with the hairpin, making sure to keep her eyes out as last thing she needed was for the pin to be taken away.
Poppy sticked her tongue out as she listened to the cogs in the leg chain, keeping her eyes out before she heard a click, and she grinned as she came free, rubbing the chafing mark on her leg, and moved to the front of her cage, hearing a quiet gasp from Bonnie as Poppy looked at her quickly, whispering with a gesture of her finger, "Shh!".
Bonnie was wide-eyed but nodded, keeping her eyes out to the Tweedle Twins as Poppy went to work on the lock on her cage, hearing quiet murmurs of surprise, and she looked at her hallway neighbor across from her, mouthing, "Keep quiet.", and the neighbor nodded, whispering, passing the word on the row of cages.
Soon, the lock was freed, but she knew being outside of her cage would grab attention, and she moved to the side of her cage, motioning to Bonnie's leg chain, whispering, "Pass on the word to be quiet and keep eyes open.", as Bonnie rested her leg against the cage bars between their cages, and Poppy reached out and into her fellow captive's cage, putting the hairpin to work as Bonnie nodded, turning around to hiss and whisper the brief order in this row of cages.
Then Bonnie came free of the leg chain, and Poppy grinned, ducking the hairpin back in time when the bell of the clock sounded out, and the imposter Mad Hatter was heard, pouting as he chortled "Oh, snickerdoodle! Looks like teatime is over! Tweedledee, Tweedledum, please take our marvelous Alice to her cage.", as one of the duo turned off the camera, and helped his twin to remove the arm chain, and then dragged #3 to her cage, throwing her in and locking her in, putting her out of harm's way.
Suddenly, an enraged roar was heard, and the imposter Mad Hatter gasped, startled back, "Oh, goodness gracious!", hearing whimpering yelps and barks, crashes of the front yard, "Has a Jabberwocky come to eat us?! Oh, dear! Tweedledee, you first go see what has bothered our Cheshire Cat and Bandersnatch!", with a flash of something Poppy saw, realizing that it must be his hat or a remote in his hand as the mind-controller device, seeing him follow the Twins before suddenly seeing black in the corner of her eye, turning around as she suddenly smiled, yet in awe of the appearance of the Batman out in public for the first time, for she had seen the suit in the display closet in the secret wall of the Cave, but never seeing her big brother in it until now.
Batman walked up before Poppy could finally see him clearly as he started to go for the lock on the cell. "Are you alright?", he asked, obviously keeping up appearances like they didn't know each other.
"Head's still a little foggy with whatever they put me under with, but I'm okay.", Poppy explained. "It's the others, especially the first ones that was taken, you need to get to them first...".
Batman nodded, opening the lock of her cell, opening the door, "I'll check on them, I presume you got this?", gesturing to the hairpin, and Poppy nodded, shuffling and crawling out of the cell, "Oh, yeah, I got this...Are you a hero like She-Hulk?".
"I'd like to think so. She-Hulk asked for help. Name's Batman.", Batman nodded before moving across the aisle to the front cages with the first predecessors of the kidnapped girls, taking out a more refined object, shaped like a bat to work on the locks, while Poppy went to unlock Bonnie's padlock as Bonnie spoke cautiously, "He's kinda scary... Do you really think he's friends with She-Hulk?".
"Maybe not normal friends...", Poppy almost wanted to chuckle at saying that. "But they're certainly helping each other... Are you alright, Bonnie?", she asked as Bonnie nodded, "Y-Yeah... I almost didn't think this would happen...".
"Well, we're not out of the woods just yet...", Poppy reminded. "Come on...", she said as she helped get the lock undone.
Bonnie shuffled and scrambled out of her cage, exhaling in awe for a split moment before Batman came to them with the first two girls from the front, putting them around Bonnie, "Look after each other.", giving Bonnie another hairpin before returning again to the front to get more of the girls out.
Bonnie, realizing the urgency through still in a blur of confusion, went to work alongside Poppy in getting the rest on their row free, with the two freed other girls to keep an eye out, while hearing the imposter Mad Hatter screaming furiously, "Get that green freak! Get her, Tweedle Twins!".
Poppy remembered her earlier escape attempt with the twin duo, and after Batman made another drop-off with a triple girl escape, she quickly told him, "Batman, the helicopter hats on the twins! They have to be taken off hard and far! That freaky guy, he's like controlling them with something, I did it earlier with one of them, and he was like he couldn't remember, and he was confused why he was holding me captive!", keeping up appearances that she isn't scarily smart, just a girl who is trying to help.
"Right, came up with the same theory ourselves... she knows, trust me.", Batman assured her as Poppy certainly hoped so. She then turned her attention back to trying to free the others.
"Knock, knock.", She-Hulk said a few moments earlier when she first broke down the front doors with a single punch; certain to get Jervis' attention and that of his controlled minions. The plan was simple on both ends; she beats the ever-loving crap out of Jervis, frees those he's controlling, while Batman would free the children.