173/The Dead Travel Fast

The Dead Travel Fast
Date of Scene:	27 April 2017
Location:	Gotham City
Synopsis:	Summary needed.
Cast of Characters:	Batman, 189, Domino, Psylocke, X-23

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Batman has posed:
Darkness has fallen across the land, and the witching hour is close at hand.

While in many ways Gotham never sleeps, it is certainly much quieter at the moment than it usually is; even the number of lit windows seems fewer than usual.

Here in Nantwich, the dark spires of Gotham Cathedral loom over the streets below, its grotesque gargoyles leering into the night.

Above the rooftops, a dark figure glides on outstretched wings--no, it's a cape, which collapses behind the figure as it alights softly on an old tile roof. A pair of sharply pointed ears sit atop the figure's head, and as it passes through a patch of moonlit space, the bat-shaped insignia on its chest can be spotted momentarily.

Derrick Ferguson (189) has posed:
        "She never looks, and she never listens
        Her heart only knows what it feels
        And all that she is, and all that she isn't
        Her every movement reveals"

That's the sound of a busker on the streets. Which might be a bit odd; nighttime is hardly the time to busk. It's pretty dangerous, with the increased crime and less light to see potential threats by. But there he is. At least he's standing under a streetlight, so he can be seen.

He's singing a love song, funny enough, and playing an acoustic guitar. And he's pretty good. He looks like an average guy -- short black hair, pale skin, wearing a white t-shirt, a light black jacket, jeans, and boots. About the only thing noteworthy is he's playing his guitar backwards.

Domino has posed:
Things were a little dry for mercenary work these days. Superheroes simply showed up too fast, and they were getting organized enough that the only use for a soldier of fortune was as an expendable outsource for mission objectives. Not that this wasn't expected, but it was disappointing. Where was the appreciation for someone who could get the job done, be paid, and be out of the way?

Oh right, no one appreciates someone who's 'pay for play'.

It was stupid, a bounty no one expected to collect, which was why the pricetag was so tempting. The risk factor alone made it enticing, and when it came to making a shot, well, all she had to do was point in the target's general direction and point the trigger. Good fortune did the rest.

Two buildings over, behind the roof ledge, a woman in a black cat suit (other cat attributes not included) is lining up that bat insigna in the sights of a kalishnkov, tranquilizer dart ready in the chamber. A gray-haloed blue eye disappears behind the night scope, as Domino prepares to take the shot.

Batman has posed:
On the rooftop, the Batman pauses at its corner, several storeys above the busker down below. One hand disappears beneath his cape before appearing again, a small object in hand. He activates it, and a small electronic display appears like a hologram above the object's surface, the insignia on his chest illuminated once more by the soft green light of the hologram.

In a slow, measured fashion, Batman extends his arm out with the device, doing ... something ... with it far above the singing man on the street.

Derrick Ferguson (189) has posed:
Whatever's going on, the busker on the streets seems unaware of it. Perhaps he's just concentrating on his performance. Either way, he doesn't seem to notice either the woman about to fire the gun or the one she's about to fire on. And anyway, he's just a busker. All this stuff is probably beyond his pay grade anyway, right?

Psylocke has posed:
"You know, you really know how to show a girl a good time," A husky, baritone woman's voice says, dripping with sarcasm. A sweating man, who is clearly way in over his head pulls at his collar. He had been sent to escort the ex-model visiting in town to a place where an "accident" could easily happen.

"W-w-well, you know, this p-place is the diamond in the rough, y'see!" The man says, probably so low-end goon dressed in a nicer suit than he was used to. The woman he was with is certainly WAY out of his league. She is Amazonian tall, with a body to show with it. She wears a tight fitting dark dress with designer high heels. Her odd, purple hair is pulled up into a bun held together with porcelain chop sticks. She is clearly an asian woman, but she carries herself with the austerity of a British aristocrat. She levels her violet eyes on the man in front of her, and her disappointment bowls over him.

Elizabeth "Betsy" Braddock just clicks her tongue, "If this is what Mr. Powers thinks is a good time, I'm afraid I will not be coming back to Gotham." Her eyes flit around to the singer on the street and the general depravity of the area. Her eyes settle on the Cathedral, and she gets a look on her face, before levelling it on the man, who buckles under its weight.

"Are you trying to bring me back to church, little man?" She says, reducing the man to a stammer. Right now, she is oblivious to the Bat or Domino. Or so it would seem.

Domino has posed:
"Hope you're not on the endagered species list," Domino murmurs to herself as the Dark Knight is clearly visible in her scope.

... She takes some extra moments to get a fuller look at him through that scope, dragging it over his form. Just to make sure she's got a clear shot. Not for any untoward reasons that might be caught by the telepath walking down below.

After indulging in eyeservice far longer than she probably professionally should, her gloved finger pulls the trigger. The muzzled rifle gives off no flash, only a soft *phutt* and click, as the tranquilizer dart speeds towards Batman's midsection.

Batman has posed:
As the dart makes contact with Batman's torso, its tip crumples, as if it's made contact with some sort of metal rather than flesh, or even some flexible reinforcement. As the dart bounces off of its target, it falls over the side of the roof and down toward the busker's guitar case.

Batman looks in the direction of his assailant, and then down over the side of the building.

He dives over the edge, head first--and, as he does so, his eyes gleam a bright red momentariily, and an incredibly thin pair of beams, made of scorching energy, hiss through the air in the area of the marksman.

Mid-fall, Batman rights himself so that he'll land on his feet rather than his head, his cape billowing in the air around him.

Derrick Ferguson (189) has posed:
The busker falters, just for a split-second. That it correlates to exactly when that tranquilizer dart was fired is probably completely coincidental, right?

...Maybe not, since the song stops entirely when those laser-type beams head for the marks(wo)man. It all looks practiced and natural, the song ending in a way that doesn't sound too terribly stilted. The busker just starts packing up, putting his guitar away in its case.

Telepathically it's a different matter, though. A mental flash of panic. Gotta do something...! His emotions are incredibly strong; abnormally so, in fact. He's scared and curious both, and the latter is winning out.

Once he done packing up, looping the guitar case's strap on his back, he casually walks into an alley. And a few moments later, a black crow flies up out of the alley. Coincidentally, in the direction of the trouble.

Psylocke has posed:
Silence hangs over Betsy, filling the space between her and the man with her. Eventually, it grows fangs, as her scowl hardens, staring at the man. She partially opens her mouth, as though she were about to verbally eviscerate him, when suddenly Batman seems to fall through the air shooting eye laser beams from his face, and landing several yards away from Betsy. She puts an arm on her waist, raising her eyebrow, stretching her red tattoo.

"HOLY SHIT IT'S THE BAT!!!" The man who was with Betsy screams in a panic. This snaps Betsy out of staring at the fallen Batman. She exhales faintly, and unfurls her mind again. She simply looks at the man next to her.

"Go to sleep," Psylocke commands him with her voice.

Sleep slams into the man with the force of a sledgehammer, and he manages, "Y'know that sounds like a great ideeeeaaaahhhhh..." As he slumps to the ground with a soft thump.

Psylocke turns and begins to walk towards the Batman, "That's a new trick. The reports said you weren't a mutant..." Psylocke squints, trying to read the Bat's mind, but maybe since he is wearing a helmet, he figured out to get something similar to Magneto.

Domino has posed:
Domino kept track on that dart, and watched it crumple against Batman's side. Cursing under her breath, she assumes it's a type of body armor. Her target's 'crazy prepared' reputation preceeds him, and she considered this to be a possibility she'd have to deal with.

It's when he dives and his eyes go glowing read that Dom realizes something is off, or she's woefully underestimated her target. She reacts immediately, throwing herself down to the ground as the eges of the beams scorch the ends of her hair, a near miss to her head by fractions of a second.

She reloads the gun with a clip of armor piercing rounds, standing up to try to see where Batman's gone. "Eye lasers?! That's cheating!" she shouts from above.

Batman has posed:
When he touches down on the sidewalk, Batman twists about in response to Psylocke's voice. "Maybe you just haven't been looking closely enough," he replies, flicking a pair of small, sharp batarangs at the woman.

With his other hand, he lobs a smoke grenade a few feet behind him, attempting to obscure the marksman's visibility, seemingly unaware of the crow nearby.

"I just need to get out. Let me be," Batman growls in a cold voice.

Derrick Ferguson (189) has posed:
The crow flies close to where Domino is, landing on a streetlight above the street. It looks like a regular crow, but it has black eyes. "Awp," it squawks, tilting its head at her. Though the sudden smoke gets an indignant-sounding "CAAH!" from the bird, and it finds another perch. It seems to be watching the events, its head tilting this way and that, strangely intelligent black eyes blinking.

Except the bird has thoughts. HUMAN thoughts.

Psylocke has posed:
"It is possible, men who try to act mysterious aren't all that interesting to me, had my fill of that at the Ha--AH!" Psylocke barely cuts off with a brief scream when Batman hucks two Batarangs at her. Betsy demonstrates that a woman is only as good as her heels.

Psylocke bends impossibly backward, as one of the 'rangs zings over her head. She has to kick her leg out to get the momentum to spin back. Unfortunately, this is not enough to avoid the second as it slices her left arm, and cuts her dress there. She still, however, lands, in a three-point stance, but instead of surprise, she has rage broiling on her face.

"I doubt you realize what you just did," Psylocke says, her rage solidifying her voice into a glacier of hate, "But, now, I'm going to make sure you never have another thought again." Psylocke flexes her fist, and a bright magenta Psi-Knife blossoms from her knuckles, and grows into a full fledged katana.

Using a telekinetic jump, she closes the distance between herself and the Bat, she swings down hard with her first slice, before coming up with a fast feint attempting to bisect the bat.

You've done and gone pissed off a verifiably crazy woman.

Domino has posed:
The sound of the bird gets her attention and she looks at it. "You know, Heckle or Jeckle, this is probably a bad place for you to be right now. We're using guns here. Ever seen that movie with your name? 'Bang bang f--k I'm dead'. One to grow on." Yes, she's talking to a bird. Doing so prevents the smoke from getting directly into her face. How fortunate.

Covering her face and waving the smoke away, she comes to the edge of the building to try to see what's going on, and that's when she catches the batarang-backflip exchange. Domino knows that hair, that ninja reflex, that psionic projection. This is complicating what was supposed to be a simple smash and grab - one dart, one body, one bounty, one paycheck.

"$@*^."

Well, it was dead or alive, right? Dead is less acceptable than alive, but it's still an option on the table. Especially since Batman has apparently stepped up his game and taken notes from Superman about offensive eyeball enhancements. She tosses aside the heavy rifle onto the rest of her gear, leaping off the edge. She doesn't even look as she does so.

Sailing through the air, she peppers Psylock and Batman's position with low-level energy bursts, the strike effect no more dangerous than bee stings on human flesh. Machines might the equivalent of a flickering power surge.

X-23 has posed:
    Betsy's departure hadn't gone quite as unnoticed as she might have expected; one particular young mutant with some minor sleeping troubles noticed the purple-haired woman leaving -- and not having anything better to do herself, indulged her curiosity and followed her from a distance... All the way to Gotham.

    No, she isn't sure why herself either.

     One of the two bat-shaped darts thrown at Psylocke landed close to her place of concealment and she picks it up, bringing it up to her face to sniff for possible toxins. She's about to pocket it and join her teacher against the ominously dressed shadow man when the energy bursts start flying, and she changes course accordingly to intercept the new attacker with a kick, foot spur sliding out in mid-leap...

Batman has posed:
Psylocke's leap takes Batman by surprise, and she slices down into his shoulder several inches before her blade suddenly finds no more resistance at all, swiping easily through his body. Or, at least the space where his body is--but Batman's apparently no longer tangible, visibly taking on a translucent quality.

"As I said," he replies, his voice cold. "I'm not a mutant. I'm not evolving. Merely adapting."

Once Psylocke's attacks complete their arcs, he becomes solid once more ... and punctuates his statement with a left cross at the telepath's jaw.

Unfortunately for him, /precisely/ when he solidifies, Domino's 'energy flak' lights up the back of his head and arms as well as his cape. While the cape sizzles for a moment, Batman's head and arms crackle, and the area on his shoulder where Psylocke had already carved into him produces a wild blue spark that pops--and anyone close enough might see what appears to be circuitry revealed beneath the costume.

"No. No. No," Batman says quickly in response, raising his arm to examine the energy-based wound. "You don't have what I--"

Laura's appearance nearby is unexpected, and Batman looks at the girl for a moment as she attacks Domino.

The dark knight tenses his other arm, and a trio of sharp claws emerge from between his knuckles. "Back away, all of you--now," he threatens.

Derrick Ferguson (189) has posed:
"...Awp?" the crow seems to answer to Domino. So which is weirder, that she's talking to a bird, or that the bird is apparently talking back? either way, it doesn't stop her when she leaps to go into the fray directly. And then someone ELSE joins in, along with the markswoman and her energy blasts, and the woman in the dress doing... whatever it is that she's doing.

This is just getting crazy. Three people against Batman... but that's not Batman, is it? He doesn't smell remotely human. Derrick has no idea what's going on, and no idea of what he ought to do to fix the situation. Outwardly, the bird seems to fly away, perhaps taking Domino's advice.

Though when he's a few buildings over, safely out of sight, the crow lands on a roof and changes back, into Derrick. And then the busker does what any sane person in this situation would do -- call the cops. In short order, a phone is pulled from a pocket, and '911' is dialed in. This is just too crazy for him. Let the cops deal with it. Or whoever they want to dispatch.

Psylocke has posed:
Psylocke is in the zone right now. He first arc carves through Batman's body, even while he becomes translucent. She grits her teeth, turning her sword slightly, as though she were ready to take another swing.

On reflex, she dismisses her Psi-katana, and puts up a tintillating mageneta-colored field above her head as the energy blasts come in. Yes, they likely wouldn't hurt her, but it is hard to take down her ninja reflexes. This brief moment of protecting, causes Psylocke to realize -- this thing isn't human. Psylocke lowers her hands, and stares at Batman, just as Laura leaps through the air at Domino. Psylocke flares her nostrils and puts her hands up in the air.

Two giant magneta hands appear and try to grab both Laura and Domino pulling them apart like two puppies who are getting into too much trouble together.

"Batman, you have exactly three seconds to either explain, or us gals are going to have a field day with your new toy. And not the good kind," Psylocke says somewhat getting control of her emotions. Blood trickles down her left arm.

Domino has posed:
Domino's flight through the air is halted as she's snagged by Psylock's interference, which keeps her from being impaled by Laura while Dom is unable to get away. Mid-air is not a good place to be when you need to dodge, especially if you don't fly.

She can't do anything, she can't move, and her arms are clamped to her sides. She's at Psylocke's mercy at the moment. Batman's claws did not go unnoticed, but when you're stuck, there's only one thing you can really do.

"Logan, is that you down there? Because this isn't funny. It's not even Halloween yet. And I think you're having a bad influence on your younger female fan over here."

X-23 has posed:
Laura flails briefly when her leap is halted in mid-air, then swings her legs for leverage and flips down to the ground, landing in a crouch as she takes in the situation -- especially the 'Batman'.

     Hydrocarbon ketones. Slight overtone of ozone. Faint hint of industrial oils. "... It is a robot," she states, her own claws coming out in response to "Batman"'s threat display.

Batman has posed:
The 911 dispatcher strongly urges Derrick to find safe shelter immediately. "Do you know if there's a fallout shelter nearby you can use?" she asks.

The faint sound of helicopters can be heard--along with the quiet, but quickly growing, sound of police sirens racing toward the identified area.

"Out of time," Batman replies with a shake of his head. "They're coming for me--all because Bruce Wayne needed to die."

He leaps into the air, beginning to fly upward into the night, seemingly under his own power. As he does so, he begins to disappear, as if turning invisible or dematerializing.

"Every Bruce Wayne needs to die for Batman to fulfill his purpose," he says as he fades into nothingness over the rooftops, revealing the stars behind him.

Derrick Ferguson (189) has posed:
"Fallout shelter?" Derrick asks, with a blink the dispatcher can't see. "No, but I think I'll be okay. I'm planning to leave the area immediately," he assures the dispatcher. However, he's still paying attention to the scene. What is this guy talking about?

But he can also see 'Batman' starting to fly. Flying, and now disappearing. Again, Derrick blinks. That definitely isn't normal. "That is NOT Batman," he asserts to the dispatcher. "But it's okay, I think he's gone. He literally started flying, and then disappeared." Maybe some more information for the police?

Either way, with the assurance to the dispatcher that !Batman had left, Derrick will end the call. He's not sticking around, though. Can't have the cops discovering that he's not actually dead. So once the phone goes back in his pocket, he changes into a crow again and takes to the air.

Psylocke has posed:
Psylocke furrows her brows, and when with a flick of concentration releases both Laura and Domino. Psylocke tries to go after Batman by running up a nearby building and leaping off the roof to go after him, but she cannot see him.

She lands back down on the street, and stares at the emptiness left behind by Batman. Her violet eyes are definitely filled with frustration. She whirls on Domino.

"Did you know about this, Domino?" Psylocke says, her irritation almost electric. And then, not waiting for a response, looking at Laura, "And you. I'll deal with you later."

Domino has posed:
Domino lands on her feet. With her target out of sight and also not her target, she holsters her weapons. "No," she answers to Psylocke. "I'm as surprised as you are. Although this explains why the bounty on him got higher than normal." A second glance is cast to X-23. "Laura, huh? He never told me he had kids."

X-23 has posed:
    Laura watches the roBat fly up and away, uncertain how to respond. That was definitely not in what files she'd read on the Batman -- then again, there was very little information on him to begin with and a lot of it was contradictory anyway. She turns to face Domino, her fists still balled in a defensive stance with her claws out, then looks up at Psylocke at the purple-haired ninja's admonishment.

Batman has posed:
Not long after Batman disappears ... Batman swings in on a grappling line, landing quietly on the street. He looks back behind him for a moment, then to the assembled individuals.

"Where?" he asks through gritted teeth. "Where is he? We don't have much time before we lose him altogether."

Between the buildings swing more figures with bat-wing capes. A few seem to be flying.

"There's a Legion of Batmen trying to save reality as we know it, and there's not much time," Batman says, extending a hand out, palm upward, to Psylocke, Domino, and Laura. "We need your help."

The caped crusader looks behind him again, listening for the ever-increasing sound of the sirens. "GCPD are on their way. They're not going to hold back. If you know anything, press the button and speak into this." He tosses a thin electronic device toward the trio. "I'll be listening."

With that, he fires his grappling gun toward the nearby Cathedral, its hook wrapping around a gargoyle's head. Then, Batman takes off into the night, and the numerous other Batman look-alikes follow suit.

Psylocke has posed:
Psylocke almost opens her mouth to respond to Domino with a snarky response, before the Bat lands in front of her again. Psylocke blinks.

Remember Psylocke's date? It's about this time that he wakes up, groggily, looking up, seeing the swarm of Batmen. He promptly passes out again.

Psylock snags the device out of the air, and then watches as Batman flies away. She blinks again.

"What the f--k is wrong with this city?" Psylocke says, staring at the transmitter.

X-23 has posed:
    Laura watches the swarm of Bats pass by, somewhat confused by the way most of them smell more alike than even people who are closely related to each other, then back to Psylocke as she hears the sirens. She's already retracted her claws, and aside from small nicks in her shoes she looks like a perfectly innocent bystander, just a girl out on the town who can't possibly have seen anything useful...