Earth 504

10 March 1954
Gotham City, Night

The Lenape were supposed to have said that there was an evil power that lived on the three islands on the coast. The Danes paid no need to the savages' tales, they only saw three islands and a fine harbor, and there they built the settlement of Christiansted. The English did not care either, and took it for themselves during the Dutch Wars. They renamed it Gotham, the village where supposedly all the men had lost their minds. The Lenape knew better. They knew that when night fell, the evil spirits had free reign.

---

Old Gotham
North Island

@SouffleGirl123
@Fabricant451

Two telephone calls had been placed, one to the Gotham City police, the other to the police in Blüdhaven. The callers' message was simple: John Howell, chairman of Howell Chemical, his wife, and two daughters had been kidnapped from their mansion in Blüdhaven, were being held hostage by the Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter in an abandoned warehouse in Gotham and would be killed if they did not receive $200,000. If anyone other than Commissioner Gordon with the ransom money was seen near the two-story brick warehouse, the hostages would be killed. The police complied, but Nightwing, Batgirl, and Catwoman did not.

---

Abandoned Dockyards
South Island

@KaliW
@scrawls

Ships came into and departed Gotham harbor night and day, carrying both legal and illegal cargoes. The ones carrying more illicit materials frequently came in the night, docking at shadowy piers, unloading their cargoes of drugs, firearms, and occasionally humans. For several nights, the smuggling freighters and the warehouses they used to store their goods had been suffering from robberies and strange fires. The witnesses had described their attackers as wearing purple wetsuits and SCUBA gear - a clear sign Sea Fox had formed a new gang for herself and returned to Gotham to plunder Gotham's illegal trade.

Batman had been spending several nights staking out the waterfront, but in his absence, he had left Robin and Black Bat to watch the docks. They were there to observe, but in the event Sea Fox struck with her gang, they were allowed to bring on a fight and try to apprehend them, provided they were not overly outnumbered.

A freighter had arrived the previous night, bringing a cache of heroin for the Penguin, and now it was a matter of whether Sea Fox would attack the warehouse to make a robbery. The night was dark, and fog hung over the docks - perfect weather to avoid being seen. The stakeout had been uneventful thus far, when the faint sound of water lapping could be heard. It was a small motorboat pulling up to the docks. It was painted matte black, with lights darkened and engine muffled - whoever it was, they didn't want to be seen. Seven figures, a mix of men and women, wearing wetsuits and carrying Tommy guns, jumped from the boat to the pier, heading toward the warehouse. Within a few minutes, they had broken through the locks on the door, and were inside. The Sea Fox had struck.

---

---

Cassandra Cain watched and listened, taking in everything she could, atop a building, looking down at the Penguin’s warehouse. Shrouded by fog and night, she could observe unseen. The color of ships passing through the harbor, the windows of the building, and the blindspots people could have looking out from inside, the gait of every stranger hobbling through the dead of night. Her eyes were particularly skilled at taking in body language, the angle of their steps, the strength of the postures, and all the tiny ways they distinguished their movement from others. Anything could be useful in toppling another person—in killing another person. It is what she’d been trained to do all those years ago by her father. She had to find weaknesses, missteps, minute particularities that could be manipulated for her own success.

She watched a lone dockworker smoking a cigarette, looking out over the warehouse and slowly pacing. Before he finished and walked back inside a building, she’d figured out that he was left-handed but had a weak right knee based on his slight limp. By the way he tossed the cigarette in the ocean, he seemed careless and overconfident. He had broad shoulders, and she could imagine him throwing a massive left hook at her. She could duck beneath, then topple him with a swift kick to the weak leg, then pin him down against the dock and stomp him in the back of the neck—

She was getting ahead of herself. Whenever she looked at someone, tactical possibilities spiraled from their every movement. Their fight or flight instincts, their Achilles’ Heels, in her mind, humans become objects to destroy. It all came cascading unless she tried hard to stop the instinctual flow of information. It was a skill necessary for survival, but one that had made her a weapon, cold and guarded. The others knew that. She wondered if they feared her.

Cassandra glanced at Robin. Did he fear her? She was not a detective like him. She was trying to gather info, but it all felt bloodthirsty, art-less. She couldn’t see the deep intentions or emotions in others, seek clues, and weave together conspiracies as he could. She just saw the pure movements, postures, the possibilities, and she used them in the moment to break those she needed to. Even looking at him, her mind raced with the ways she could beat him in combat. But through the night, she did not voice these concerns. She did not fidget, she did not pace around, and she barely even spoke to him except for brief questions or confirmations. But she couldn’t deny that she felt nervous, yearning to understand him.

The silence of the night was interrupted by muffled, but still audible noise. Cassandra felt her muscles tense immediately, and she shifted from her crouching position upwards but still hidden. The Sea Foxes crew moved quickly. She scanned seven figures hustling, men and woman, armed and dangerous. Seven versus two? That might have seemed daunting for others but as they busted through the locks and made their way inside, Cassandra Cain saw much just from a few seconds of observation. She could make a good guess on who was leading by the way the formation bent to heed the quiet gestures of the figure in the center. She noted builds, bodyweights, and dominant hands, all that she was trained to do. But it wasn’t enough from afar. She hoped Robin would keep track of the rest. Up close, she would become much more effective. Up close, she could decimate.

She looked at him from behind her Black Bat mask, poising herself ready to leap down. She would enter through a side window to apprehend the crooks, he would take the route that he prepared. But she needed him to confirm that they were ready to engage with at least seven dangerous individuals in a split-second.

“Ready. Now?”

Cassandra Cain was ready.

---

---

^{Abandoned Dockyards - South Island}

^{Interactions: Robin - @KaliW}

Cassandra Cain watched and listened, taking in everything she could, atop a building, looking down at the Penguin’s warehouse...

From the inside of the warehouse, there came a hissing sound. Through the greasy windows, a purple cloud was expanding through the building, and shouts of surprise from the few workers inside. The Sea Fox and her gang were using some kind of gas to take them out.

---

---

Cassandra heard the sound of hissing gas and the shouts of surprise. The attack was on. She gave Robin a nod, then lept into action. She knew it would be dangerous to jump into the fray, but when was Gotham ever not dangerous? They couldn't let Sea Fox get a hold of more of these materials. They needed to act now. So Cassandra quickly made sure the gas mask under her Black Bat face mask was secure, then lept from the building down to the fire escape, then jumped onto the side of the warehouse's window. She had scouted this window earlier and found that she could open it easily.

Carefully, she looked inside, then once she saw a quick view through, she pulled the window open and slipped into the upper level of the building, moving like a shadow to avoid detection, her black outfit blending into the shadows of boxes and shelves. Robin would follow his own path. She needed to get eyes above, scope the situation and the Sea Fox crew, then take them down efficiently. She moved quiet, trying to get a view of the intruders.