Mystery Pyg

February 24, 2016:

Fantomex and Harper search for information in Arkham

Arkham Asylum

Characters

NPCs: EVA

Mentions: Nightwing

Plot:

Mood Music: [*\# None.]


Fade In…

The Blackgate breakout a week ago reminded Fantomex he has some pending business in Gotham City. Business he is reluctant to attend but that E.V.A. reminds him still exists. Like for instance, that a lunatic surgeon is still loose.

He came Arkham Asylum looking for information, spotting Harper here was somewhat of a surprise. But maybe the young woman had the same idea he had. Getting inside the madhouse is not a trivial stroll not even for him, so he waited for the sun to set and the doctors to leave the offices to sneak into one and wait for the woman.

He is also hacking the computer system. Well, mostly E.V.A. is hacking the computer system. Fantomex is being nosy with the files and reports.

Slowly but surely, Harper's arm was getting better. She still had the cast on, which was glittered and decked out by Cullen, yet she avoided her phone calls and other things mainly because of the issue with.. Nightwing. Or as she found out, Dick Grayson. Who was kinda sorta her boyfriend? But kinda sorta not? Who knows. It was all just confusing.

She was still investigating, at least waiting for the glimpse of the mad surgeon but.. nothing. She doesn't even know what he looks like save for an old picture she's found willy nilly.

She settles down into her private quarters (well, meant for maintenance workers, but she scared them enough to get them to leave her be), then picks up a sandwich. Her grease filled hands were nothing, and they marked up the bread as she immediately devoured the food as hungry as she was.

And so, once the maintenance workers end their work period and go home (or stay in the personal quarters, those who stay) Fantomex sneak-sneaks all the way there and politely knocks at Harper's room door. That only her can hear the knocking is irrelevant, but it is true.

The knocking of her door has her frowning, dropping her sandwich down upon her plastic plate as she slides the chair away from her work desk. She stands, stretching, her eyes closing briefly as she slowly strides to the door, her hand reaching forward to snap it open with a slight frown with the shock of white that soon allows her eyes to open wide.

"You.. have got to be kidding me.." She nearly snaps out, taking that slow step back, shoulders raised almost defensively. She has -GOT- to find these secret hiding entrances! This was damn near nuts! Thankfully, her real face was hidden. Her nose was bigger than need be due to prostetics, her hair covered by a wig, eyes covered by colored contacts and lips slightly more fuller. She looked completely different than Harper.. and it was the best that she could do.

"You need to get out of here.."

"Bonjour," greets Fantomex. "That is a good disguise, mademoiselle Bluebird," he adds calmly. He glances at her injured arm. "Body language is quite distinctive, nevertheless. I didn't expect to see you here, and if one of us does not belong, I'm afraid it would be you, hmm?" He winks an eye and steps into the room, deftly avoiding her. "Do not worry about me, I am the greatest escape artist of France. Walls and guards are an amusement, little more. No one will see me if I don't want it."

Harper frowns, dropping her hands down at her sides, taking that little step to keep him right within her sights. Just when he steps in, she reaches out to close and lock the door behind him, keeping it right against her back as she lets out a sigh. "Well, okay.."

She does remember Fantomex. He seemed like a friendly. In fact, she remembers him being there when.. well, some guy in a hood killed a few innocents to put them out of their misery.

"So why are you here then?"

"Same as you, I am still looking for a lunatic with a mania for pigs," replies Fantomex, finding a wall to lean onto. "I heard what your friend said. The Nightwing, oui? All the criminal insane in Gotham end up in Arkham. Alas, I had little luck, so far."

"Professor Pyg, you mean." Harper knew what he meant. She just wanted to show that she at least attempted to have a leg up on the situation. "Nightwing.." She murmurs quietly, looking away for a slight second, then lets out a slight sigh. "Whatever action you were hoping for has already gone.." She finally relents, moving away from the wall to take a step towards her chair, pulling it out to settle down. Her appetite was gone now, par for the course, but she does rub her cheek a little bit then scratches at her chin.

"Maybe.. maybe.. you're a thief. You can help. Though, I don't know how much you can help or even if you could really be trusted.." She watches him, considering her options. "I don't want people to get pissed at me for even considering asking you for help.."

Fantomex shrugs faintly, "I admit I am not to be trusted in most matters, but I will help to stop this killer. He reminds me certain people I want to forget, and my partner is quite… ah… distressed. She is not made for Gotham, I suppose. But one could say this city is barely suitable for human beings, oui?"

"Your partner?" Harper asks.. "I've never really seen you with anyone else but.. well, you." She shrugs her shoulders. "But yeah.. I mean you got that right. But we're born and bred and some people hardly ever make it out alive. No matter how nice and upstanding we are. We just, die here." Harper's words seem glum, but her tone wasn't. It was with conviction.

"Who is your partner and what can she do? What can -you- do? Cause.. Nightwing.. he was hurt and those bastards brought him here. I don't know why and I don't know what for. Maybe.. I don't know, I'm grasping at straws and I haven't been to check on him but.. maybe.. we can find something from where he was taken to.. I don't know."

Fantomex smiles behind his mask, "well, then I will have to introduce you to her. She is waiting outside, working her way through the computer network, looking for data on our porcine friend." He steps forward, though. "Bought here a super-hero? That should be shorted out easily enough without my help, or do you need to pull him out discreetly?"

* OOC Time: Sun Feb 28 14:28:23 2016 *

"Wait, she's doing what? I want access to those fil.." Harper pauses, drawing her fingers up to pinch at the bridge of her fake nose. "Man.. how the hell does Batman do this? Anyways, any access you can give me will be real great." As he steps forward, Harper draws from her chair to move around him, holding her hands outright. "No no no. He's already gone. I helped him. But I want to know where he was taken. From there we can back trace and figure out just what Nightwing was on to before hand. Maybe there's something we can find there that would lead to this bastard."

"The place where he was taken should appear in the records, oui?" Fantomex has a brief phone conversation with E.V.A. and hrms. "Well, E.V.A. is giving you administrator priviledges. However, she thinks there might be missing information, and that not all the Asylum's files have been digitalized. Ah, government institutions. Never avant garde in computer technology. Looks like we need to find the old records rooms."

+MEET: Dick Grayson has arrived via +meet.

"I.. I don't know. I mean I only just started this stuff not too long ago. So I guess?" She was now officially following Fantomex's lead. She was good at that, until it was time to fight. Then it was balls to the walls amazing badassery that likely would get her killed. "Alright.." She mutters, retrieving her phone, using that phone to tap into EVA's access to the files. She was quick, her eyes darting across the screen as she frowns. "You're right."

With a step out of the way, she opens the door to give it a slight tug, drawing her hand out. "We need to take the condemned path to the records room. No one goes that way. Plus no surveiliance. We just gotta watch our step."

Lester lives in the condemned path. He ate his own records two years ago. He lives mostly on stolen pudding and the excess medication that patients spit out into the grates that find their way into the ventilation system. He drinks by licking the pipes hidden in the walls. He is small and scrawny and he smells foul. He lives in the walls and he scrabbles into his hiding place when he hears the door open. Don't let them see, Lester, never let them see.

He's watching you.

Fantomex has a direct link to the files, they only go back so far. And the early years are very sketchy. Incomplete. He is a bit surprised Harper notices so quickly, but nods in agreement. Wait a sec? "Condemned path, mademoiselle? Small wonder they have a poor track record of keeping inmates inside." And there was no condemned path in the maps he studied. He can't say he is surprised about that bit. "Very well, lead on?" He offers.

"Mmhmm. Found it on one of my many adventures here. Haven't had a real need to go through it all until now. Figured all of the old stuff needed to stay in the past." And he pretty much nailed the hammer on the head. So many breakouts usually would lead to the condemned path. If they didn't realize that something there was lurking. "Follow me. And stay quiet."

The door was closed behind them as she carefully leads him through the halls. Stopping at pivotal points where guards linger through, passing casually a row of workers who were either sleeping or reading their books, waiting for the next calls to come out.

But in no time, after a few lights of stairs, they were on the condemned path; the lights were barely working within the long cooridor to the records room, flickering in and out with a buzz. The quiet skittering of rats and roaches nearly echo, and a few busted holes within the floor leads to a drop that no one would really care to find out.

Harper stops for that moment, feeling eyes upon her back, her hands dipping into her belt to retrieve a small flashlight which was flicked on and held close against her cheek as she carefully moves. "It's the door at the end of the hallway. Typical, right? I mean, if I didn't know any better I'd say there's going to be some weird blade that comes down from the ceiling to slice us all in half."

Lester pets his pet rat feverishly. Rocco actually died six months ago, but Lester has lovingly stuffed his carcass with toilet paper and mummified him in the heating system. Or cooked him. Either way, he's dried out, leathery and covered with Lester's dandruff. Lester bites him to keep from squealing out loud.

The door at the end of the hallway says RECORDS in block letters on frosted glass. Someone has drawn what appears to be a clown face with the doorknob as the nose. The doorknob appears to be red. Hopefully that's paint.

If there is an uncharted hallway, chances are there are others. Fantomex is quite familiar with old places that have been rebuilt many times. They are common in Europe, but they are rare in America.

He is a ghost when he follows Harper. Completely silent, and no one else but the young woman can see him. "Unfortunately, it looks like what we are looking for came from a past most want to forget, oui? Let me go first. If I get sliced… well, remember me fondly." Also, he might survive.

"Yeah.." Harper only says, taking a careful step aside to let Fantomex pass. She does look all around her, shining her light into places that there is an absense of, frowning just a little as she sees a thick spider in webbing wrapping a roach for it's weekly meal. "Ugh.." She'd follow along, even stopping to turn around to shine the light..

The floor creaks a bit under Harper's feet, the tiles peeling up at the corners. Despite fears, no buzzsaws or hidden traps appear to menace them, although a close look in one of the corners reveals a noose tied out bedsheets crumpled up amid the dust bunnies. The door to the office opens easily, not even locked. They stopped bothering a long time ago - almost everyone here knows how to pick locks.

Inside, is a jumble. Filing cabinets, shelves overflowing. A few papers on the floor. The leftovers of a cupcake left here about a year ago, the dried icing spelling out "FRED" in neon green icing that's turned hard as a rock.

Lester doesn't touch the cupcake. The cupcake talks to him sometimes. But Lester doesn't listen to the cupcake because the cupcake is a mean bastard.

"Sacre bleu, this could take a while," notes Fantomex at seeing the old records room. He leaves the cupcake well alone. In the World they sometimes talked meanly. Then he goes to the closest cabinet and picks a random file. 1934. "How long has this place been open?" He asks rhetorically. E.V.A. responds. "Over a century. We are doomed."

The smell was a bit musty, but Harper could handle musty. The Narrows had smells all their own that was a lot worse than that. The cupcake was stared at, her phone immediately retrieved to snap a picture, and then she moves on to her random file. "How about you tell EVA to get her ass out here and help. Three heads are better than one."

Flashlight popped in between her lips as she pulls out a file labled 1944. Maybe.. just maybe there'll be some good reads here.

Sorting through the paperwork will take a while, no doubt. But, eventually, fruit is born. The file is labelled 1979, noticeable after a bit of searching because of its bulk. It features a particularly strange set of notations. An intern, originally from Eastern Europe, named Laszlo Valentin had been severely reprimanded and had his privileges revoked to work at Arkham. He had been caught performing experimental lobotomies on some of the lesser-than patients, the hopeless cases, the destitute. Such might've slipped through the cracks normally at Arkham, given its peculiarities and terrible management.

But for the mask he wore, a mask included in the file. Something from the local Halloween store and included in the file itself, bagged and tagged. The eyeholes had been cut wider, but the smile…the smile was hard to forget - http://image.shutterstock.com/z/stock-photo-close-up-portrait-of-a-man-wearing-a-pig-mask-both-funny-and-spooky-86950612.jpg

"Well," considers Fantomex. "she wouldn't fit through the door." Because sometimes a simple answer works the best, and he doesn't even have to lie. "I got to admit she could go through this mess much faster than us. Hmm, and maybe she can. Can I borrow your smartphone?" Meanwhile he keeps checking folders. He doesn't have a flashlight, but he can see fairly well in the dark. And look, "on the other hand it might not be necessary, this Laszlo fellow looks like our man."

"What is she?" Curious is aas curious does. Though as he speaks, she immediately makes her way towards him, using a stool to stand up a little bit taller than him to look over his shoulder. The light was shined on the pictures and writing, her brow furrowing just a little touch. "Can you see if your frie.. Nevermind. She got wifi?" Her phone was retrieved again, flashlight popped into her mouth as she begins to fire off a series of texts. She wasn't any sort of Oracle, but she knew a way around getting information and general fixes that could make things work.

"Searfin fuh infamshin on Wasplow.. Gimbe sex."

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