Realistic or Modern Growing in Gotham

[ireadtoomuch]

A cold breeze whipped through the air, blowing flurries of snowflakes in every direction. Wisteria rubbed her hands together, then put them to her lips, blowing warm air into them. She was standing ontop of a residential building in the Diamond District, adjusting the straps of a backpack on her shoulders before kneeling down and putting her hand to the snow covered rooftop. Vines began to grow from where her fingertips met the concrete and crawled down the side of the building, surrounding the frozen edges of windows.

Her black and green suit was slick with melted snow, helping her blend in with the building as she crawled down the side, peeking inside of each window until she found the one she was looking for. A small tree branch grew from the vines, giving her a place to hang up her backpack, and unzip it with ease.

Wisteria pulled out a small handheld drill, and using the foliage on the building, made her way to each of the four corners of the massive window. She drilled small holes in each one, then used a thicker vine as rope to let herself down to the center of the window. Wisteria drilled another hole in the center, then grabbed her backpack before centering her feet on the window. She pushed off the window with her feet before swinging back into it feet first, the glass shattering underneath her weight. She landed on the marble tile of the apartment silently as glass shards fell at her feet.

Wisteria had been casing this place for weeks, so she'd already known the tenant wasn't going to be home. "It just had to rain tonight." She grumbled before walking towards a glass cabinet in the back, already knowing it was bulletproof. Well, I guess he really is prepared for anything, she thought to herself. She raised her hand up to the finger print scanner, watching as small bumps formed on the underside of her hand, creating a copy of the tenant's fingerprints. "Bingo boingo bongo." Wisteria quoted a CSU from one of her favorite TV shows that she'd seen in Arkham, then regretted it as fast as she'd said it.

As she moved some things around in the cabinet, she prayed that there wasn't some secret alarm system she'd set off, as there usually was with high security jobs like this one. She pressed a small button on the inside of the cabinet that was underneath a tribal mask, and a small drawer opened up. Inside it was a variety of tech, including a USB drive, a laptop, and a prototype phone. She grabbed the laptop and the phone, but when she lifted the drive, a high pitched squealing started to go off around the house. It was high enough that it was barely registering in her ears, but it was annoying as hell. "Shit, no!" She punched the glass in frustration before zipping up her backpack, hoping she could get out of there before anyone showed up.

 

[IndoWriter]

Jason took another bite of the hot dog.

It wasn't completely good, per see, but it wasn't bad either. At least, not completely bad. It was piping hot, despite it taking a few minutes to make in this awful weather and it was thick enough to offer decent quantities of meat for different bites. The hot dog had been seared perfectly enough, but it just had something bizarrely off about it that didn't taste right to his tongue. Sure, someone who knew him could have easily just chalked it up to his taste buds being irrevocably screwed up thanks to his death but he chalked it up to how he cooked the blasted thing. Any normal person would have grilled a hot dog on a regular grill with charcoal or a gas line, which would have warranted a good meal. But Jason had to be the nomad vigilante--the one who couldn't be bothered to carry around one of those small charcoal grills all the time. He had to go on youtube like a little kid and build a coke can grill from a stupid video. So of course his food was a little off.

He glanced at the tiny thing beside him, the only source of warmth to him on top of this dirty roof. His suit was good enough to keep his heat, but it still sucked to not have a bigger fire going. Since thinking over such a tragedy would lead to him internally arguing over the need for a larger grill again, the man merely wiped mustard off his triple-weave kevlar emblem and took another bite of the mediocre hot dog. Food and suits were his only friends on chilly nights like this, where a gun toting guy in a red helmet had no company in his relentless stake out on roof tops and empty parks. They kept him sane somehow, or at least as sane as someone like him could be. The way thugs seemed to disappear around this time of night had him a bit more bored than usual. He would have at least liked to find a car thief to beat up or a J-walker to spook...let alone to find an entire gang meeting.

This sucked majorly.

Licking off mustard from his lips and idly glancing around, Jason surveyed the sight of a city section from a bird’s eye view. All the windows of the tall buildings were dark for the night, and all color was sucked into the cars done below. Now the buildings looked like tall beams of shadows, with nothing to be seen in or on them. Except maybe that figure there on the roof. He looked down at the cars and smacked his lips. There was always some jerk honking at another jerk in Gotham, even if neither of them were jerks to begin with. Hmm, perhaps he could chase someone who ran the red light? Just to spok them and...and…

Jason nearly choked when he backtracked and spotted the figure drilling their way into the building. A wry smile pulled at his messy lips, smelling distantly of mustard and meat. The man reached for a duffle bag behind him, opening it up to reveal a very clunky looking...well, something made of metal. After slinging the duffle bag over his shoulder and clinking his helmet into place, his thumb slid into a sensor on the handle beneath the object. The drone flew forward instantly, carrying him down to the building with the thief with a slow speed. Many had commented that the thing made him look like Mary Poppins. It could make him look like a Disney princess for all he cared--it got the job done.

He arrived just a few seconds after the thief slithered his way in, landing on a gargoyle with balanced ease. His white lenses narrowed into the darkness after the moving theif, where his night vision revealed an interesting aspect of the thief. “Huh.” He whispered to himself as he noticed this intruder was a lot more curvier than most other thieves. Then he took a brief look at the building they were both intruding on. “Huh.” This thief was breaking into Strange's office? What was the gain in breaking into this place, into a nutjob Doctor's office? Perhaps someone was paying money for Arkham records to be edited. This was definitely the kind of fun he--


He winced at the sudden blaring and flashing that suddenly popped up, ringing inside of his helmet. Reluctantly, he hopped inside and set his items down by the window--mentally ignoring the loud noises. He followed in the footsteps of the female thief and paused when he found her once again. He'd recognize that...mildly attractive face and thing for green clothes anywhere.


He tsked openly, having already decided on how to start this off. “Ivy? That you?” His lenses narrowed like squinting eyes, and he placed his hands on his hips as they widened again. “Oh man, that is you. Man, it's been forever since I left you for the cops! Wow. Have you--Have you always been this bad at stealing things?”

 

[ireadtoomuch]

Wisteria slung the backpack over her shoulders, cursing loudly at how loud the alarm was. "YOU'VE GOT THE MAYOR ON YOUR PAYROLL YOU DON'T NEED THIS!" She didn't hear someone enter the room over the alarm, but managed to hear their obvious sound of disapproval. As soon as she'd heard the word 'Ivy' she tensed up, spinning around to look at who had barged in and mistaken her for her mother. Wisteria immediately recognized the red helmet and the symbol on the man's chest. Wisteria had come across Batman and Robin, but never Red Hood face to face. Wisteria had heard insane tales about the Red Hood. He was like Batman, but a trigger-happy, pistol wielding Batman. With better fashion sense. "Are you kidding me? Ivy? Do I look like Ivy to you? I am not bad at stealing things, that alarm would've gone off regardless!" She hollered over the loud noise, trying to look for an opening to escape. There was another window near the kitchen. The kitchen--knives, pans, weapons of opportunity. There had to be a bathroom with a small window, and from what she could easily tell, she was a lot smaller than Red Hood. Then there was the balcony glass door a few yards away. That would probably be her best bet. "It was nice chatting with you, but I'll be off now." Wisteria winks and makes a run for the balcony door, positioning herself so that her shoulder would break through the door. Painful, but better than going straight through the dude with guns.

 

[IndoWriter]

Jason bit back a smirk at the yell she gave, but otherwise kept a neutral look beneath the red mask. When she incredulously asked about whether or not he thought she was Ivy, he couldn't help but peer closer at her through the lenses if the mask. He blinked when he did--yeah, this definitely wasn't Ivy. Ivy may have ben a pretty redhead, but she certainly didn't look around his age the last time he checked. Hid confused stupor allowed him to take note if something else that hr missed before, adding to the list of non-Ivy things. This girl didn't dress nearly as scandalous as her mother dial. In fact, she might as well have been wearing a suit like he was, given how the only skin he could see on her was her face. The actual poison Ivy would have shown up in a skimpy bikini made of leaves.

"Well sorry! You should wear a name tag, like me." He tapped the red symbol for emphasis, but found that she was talking about another subject entirely. He rolled his eyes at her claims. "Right. Sure it would have. And I'm--" She interrupted him by fling a quick line at him and bolting for the door, and his reflexes snapped into reality. In milliseconds he had a combat knife out, slashing the straps of the backpack off and allowing him to snatch it away before she crashed into the balcony door.

"I'll be off now too. Thanks for leaving the pack with me!" He said in the middle of a jog to the window he'd flown in from, snatching up his duffel bag and leaping out.

 

[ireadtoomuch]

By the time Wisteria had gone through the window, the bag was gone. She growled angrily as she rolled over as she fell through the air so that she was facing the sky. Clear blood dripped down her shoulder where her suit was torn, so she prepared herself for the pain of her next move.

A vine extended from her wrist, stretching towards a balcony ledge further down the building, then wrapped around it like a whip. Wisteria tried to swing so that the sudden halt of motion wouldn't rip her arm off, but she could've sworn she heard her shoulder pop as she caught herself. She cried out in pain, then bit her lip as hard as she could to try and distract herself. It took a minute for her to climb the vine onto the balcony, and she collapsed onto it with a groan. From where she lay, she saw Red Hood run off with the backpack in his hands, and she cursed under her breath. Wisteria stood up after she'd recomposed herself, and thick strips of bark wrapped around her shoulder to hold it in place until she could fix it. Now what? She thought to herself while finding the nearest fire escape, and started to climb down it carefully. He's got the phone-- which wasn't important, just a bonus--the laptop, and the USB drive. They both had a plethora of files on them, from bank records and statements to research logs, voice memos, and photos. Bitter from getting her ass kicked, Wisteria called it a night and took alleys and backstreets to an apartment in downtown Gotham. This was officially one of the worst nights she'd had in a while.

 

[IndoWriter]

Well, this was certainly amazing.

It took a few days before he was able to actually get at what was on the phone, the laptop, and the USB. In all honesty, the phone hadn't turned out to be very important to him when he checked it--only a few of Strange's calls seemed to be remotely important, and they looked to be coming to and from Arkham Asylum. If cards were played right with the information on the phone maybe the crazy old doc would be put away for a week. However, the information he found on the laptop and drive....could be very condemning to Hugo should it be revealed.

Tons of evidence thrived in both areas, like an infestation of cockroaches. He spent his time scanning through hundreds of statements and illegal bank exchanges, voice recordings of diabolical tests and plans, and a giant pothole of photos that revealed anything and everything to him. Combined, this would be a giant punch that could send Hugo to jail for an extremely long time. At first, Jason was sure that girl had stolen it for money or for blackmail, but it didn't appear to be the case with so much...amazing evidence.

As he stood there on the edge of Gotham bulletin, staring down at the city, he wondered what the woman's play was. Was it stopping at retrieving the data or continuing to something else?

Where could he find her?

 

[ireadtoomuch]

It hadn't taken Wisteria long to find the other location of the second drive, and it had been fairly easy to steal. Almost too easy. It was in a vault at one of the Gotham Banks, which was known for having a weak security system if you were determined enough. Since Red Hood had the first USB drive and she didn't know what he planned to do with it, Wisteria wanted the back up just in case. She wasn't totally surprised when there was a group of men standing outside her exit, ready to beat her down, but she'd screwed up her arm more than she'd thought from jumping out that window. So instead of losing a fight, she ran.

Hugo, or someone else invested in keeping the drive a secret, must have found out she'd stolen it. It only made sense that they'd set a trap for Wisteria, she just wasn't expecting it to be so soon. The only hiccup with being chased by goons through the streets of Gotham was that she couldn't give them the drive in exchange for her life or freedom. The stupid vigilante had it, but of course if she told them that, they would assume she's lying.

She leapt for a fire escape, climbing it slower than usual as she only had the one arm to use properly. Wisteria could hear the men clambering behind her, so when she got to the roof she backed away from the ledge, moving towards the center of the building. She needed to figure out an escape plan, but where to hide? She could see the Gotham Bulletin from where she stood, just the glowing sign, though. Some other apartment buildings, some condemned some still in use. Wisteria figured she might just have to come up with something on the fly. She hated doing that, but it didn't seem like she had any other option.

When the men climbed up on the roof, Wisteria crouched into a defensive position, ready to kick ass and get her ass kicked. She couldn't lose this drive, too. Even if it meant shoving every one of these guys off of the rooftop.