The Dark Devil Debuts

December 02, 2016:

The Dark Devil, fresh off her latest fight, tests herself against Nightwing and Batman.

Gotham

Characters

NPCs: None.

Mentions:

Plot:

Mood Music: [*\# None.]


Fade In…

GOTHAM.

A city on the edge of perpetual abyss is not an unusual place to hear a gunshot ring out, and it's that very abyss that has a myriad collection of souls stalking the stalkers. Some work in tandem.

Others are oblivious to the greater picture. Some are even just out for a good time.

The sound that follows the gunshot is more distinctive than most - but only to keen ears. The sound of a Batarang - and older one, certainly - preceding a howl of pain.

There are four of them, all shapes and sizes, but they all wear the same skull tattoo across their bald heads and down half of their faces, and as another gun clatters to the pavement backup weapons become the primary recourse of those set upon by a slip of grey and black that moves between them all with an unexpected fury.

The Dark Devil took the first one by surprise, laying him out by landing on his shoulders and forcing his gun to go off. The second firearm fell to the Batarang, and it's owner fell from a punch that draws it's power from a hard planted foot and a perfect pivot of her slender hips. A punch that should not hold the kind of traction or power that it does from such a small creature, but it lands just right: Behind the jaw, cracking the poor goon's head to the side with a sudden, consciousness-stealing snap. The third one is upon her, using size to his advantage, but did not consider every part of her a weapon. When her forehead flattens his nose the rest of her limbs work to power knuckles and elbows and knees across his body to chop him down like a tree.

Then, there was one.

The stare down begins as her bloodied fists curl and her breath pants through gritting teeth.

A shadow looms behind the last thug, even as he tries to rally himself to the fight— fists lifting, trying to adopt a serious fighting stance as opposed to the haymakers and braggadoccio with which he'd armed himself along with his friends. By Gotham's standards, the men are dangerous brigands, armed with collective nationalist ties and a strong sense of identity, as well as drugs and a youthful prediliection for violence.

By Batman's standards, they're barely boys. Reinforced knuckles hit him behind the ear and the man goes down like a wet sack of cement, leaving his shadow standing in place behind him.

White eyelenses conceal the man, and his scowl leaves little information for this strange wild woman to read. Clutched and curled behind a heavy, flowing black cloak, he looks more like a twisted statue than a man, but there's that uneasy sense about him that not only does he straddle the Uncanny Valley, those white lenses seem to look right into a person's soul.

"You have one of my tools," Batman rasps, a bit pointedly, the lenses pivoting to regard the crescent shaped weapon embedded in one unconscious man's wrist.

There is a profound disappointment in her eyes when she sees the last man fall without her intervention, watching him all the way down with a long, exhaled huff of a breath. Her fury re-centers and The Dark Devil stares up and up. It would look positively comical if she hadn't just dismantled those men. Who is anyone kidding? She still looks like a defiant child staring up at a parent while shouting 'I AM THE NIGHT!'

Fingers remain curled and her shoulders heave as she tries to calm herself, but unlike many who wither in the presence of The Bat, she does not. There's one step, then another, and she reaches down to collect the Batarang, one that had long ago been caught mid-throw by an acid-spray from a certain Clown. Distorted and scarred, it still works, and is a fitting representation for the woman who holds it.

"You."

A beat, and then she looks down at the weapon. There's a calm that washes over her for the briefest of moments, a salient reasonable expression finding her mid-thought, and then her fist tightens around it. "Come and get it."

She just has to know. In all her nights stalking rooftops and alleyways, she hasn't seen him but for a light in the sky. If the Devil dreams, it's of meeting the Bat to test his mettle.

"Is this a finders keepers situation or a possession is nine-tenths-of-the law sort-of affair," comes a sardonic voice from the voids of light projected by the myriad structures in the urban city-scape.

Nightwing seems to emerge from the background and move into dim artificial light eschewing the darkness light some brightly colored bird taking flight just before dawn. Somehow he has maneuvered in counterpoint to the bat so that they enclose the Dark Devil in a well-rehearsed pincer maneuver.

"Hi," he continues with a wry sarcasm, "I'm Nightwing. How about we just talk this out instead," he asks, politely.

It's a move they've rehearsed so many times that Batman and Nightwing didn't even need to rehearse it. One or the other approaches, setting up the other for a sudden arrival, which inevitably makes an opening for a sneaky strike. Even hardened criminals are often startled by the arrival of /two/ bats.

In the moment when the Dark Devil looks at Nightwing, Batman closes the gap between them silent as a dead breeze, his cloak flitting behind him. He grips the recurve of the batarang and deftly twists it towards the weakest leverage in the woman's wrist, popping it loose, and it vanishes under the folds of his cloak.

He comes to a stop, cloak flowing still around him again, and examines the bloodied, proud woman standing among four brutally mauled young men.

"That throw you used," Batman gravels. "That's a traditional aikido toss. It hasn't been taught in America for forty years. Where did you learn it?"

When her head turns, The Dark Devil fixes Nightwing with a scrutinizing gaze, and her expressive brows might lift if they weren't covered by a mask.

Hey wait… that mask looks /familiar/. Is that a fleck of green showing under black spraypaint?

"I don't know you. Wait.. yes I do." Her voice is deeper than one might expect, and when her expressive lips curl into a smile it's not the nice kind. "You're his sidekick, right?"

Then the trap closes, and she's left with more than her foot in her mouth.

It's that moment when a cat fails to land a jump and drags everything down with it, culminating in a look of palpable embarrassment. But you know, it just walks it off, as if it never happened. That's what predators do when they're upstaged. Bravado. Swagger.

The Devil Inside reacts much the same way, looking to her empty hand and then back over to Nightwing, and then The Bat. They both asked her questions. She answers Batman first, evoking one of the greatest poets of their time, a Sir Henry Rollins. "Oh, you know, from that guy… who fucked your mother!"

Then she answers Nightwing by diving after her stolen weapon in the most literal sense, fingers curling around brick that had tumbled from a nearby building wall when the bullet hit, and she flings it as she comes up again, a scattershot of one of the oldest tricks in the book. But that's what you do when your utility belt consists of exactly a multitool and a whole lot of hope.

The flurry that will follow is ill-advised, but it will teach the astute that she knows more than Akido throws, a drunken boxer's haymaker comes first, and then a Muay-Thai kick aimed for the back of the knee. She throws her everything at The Batman, stupidly ignoring Nightwing as she lets the fury of her embarrassment and the heat of her previous battle rise to the front.

The last thing she hears between her question and Batman's is, "Actually, I prefer the term 'Bat-Buddy',"

Nightwing serves as the perfect distraction. A casual focus upon Dark Devil and body-language that indicates no stress even at the moment the Batman flies into his target. Yielding no indication of what is about to occur - until it is already over.

When the maneuver is done the amusement upon Nightwing's face is so evident through a relaxed grin that it of someone knew Dick Grayson it might nearly betray his identity despite the white-lensed masked obscuring much of his face. Whatever their personal conflict a 'gotcha' moment always reminds him of how well a master and his pupil read one another - and makes him smile.
The mirth is short-lived so that only the vaguest impressions might be left as Dark Devil regains control of the situation.

What she would clearly detect though is a soft groan that sounds a bit like 'here we go' as the Batman begins dissect the nuances of her combat techniques.
Although she might lose sight of him in her rage he doesn't panic and rush into the fray nor does he gasp in protest. Setup. Takedown. Bruce can handle himself. Nightwing just makes sure he's where he needs to be when he's tagged in.

(REPOSE WITH LESS CRAZY SPACING. WILL EDIT LOG WHEN POSTED.)

The last thing she hears between her question and Batman's is, "Actually, I prefer the term 'Bat-Buddy',"

Nightwing serves as the perfect distraction. A casual focus upon Dark Devil and body-language that indicates no stress even at the moment the Batman flies into his target. Yielding no indication of what is about to occur - until it is already over.

When the maneuver is done the amusement upon Nightwing's face is so evident through a relaxed grin that it of someone knew Dick Grayson it might nearly betray his identity despite the white-lensed masked obscuring much of his face. Whatever their personal conflict a 'gotcha' moment always reminds him of how well a master and his pupil read one another - and makes him smile.

The mirth is short-lived so that only the vaguest impressions might be left as Dark Devil regains control of the situation.

What she would clearly detect though is a soft groan that sounds a bit like 'here we go' as the Batman begins dissect the nuances of her combat techniques.

Although she might lose sight of him in her rage he doesn't panic and rush into the fray nor does he gasp in protest. Setup. Takedown. Bruce can handle himself. Nightwing just makes sure he's where he needs to be when he's tagged in.

Batman's wearing body armor. Dark Devil's got her bare fists. And despite her ferocious mien, she doesn't have the chops— or physique— to deal with the amount of force she's flinging at him.

In fact, he rolls his head slightly away from her punch to keep her from breaking her hand on his cowl. He twists his knee, subtly, making sure her shinbone doesn't break against the armored greaves that guard his lower legs. One gloved hand emerges when she flings herself forward and he flicks a fingertip firmly against the underside of her septum— a very painful, if more or less harmless maneuver— and then jabs her the pocket of her pectoral and collarbone with one blunt, extended knuckle, nearly paralyzing the nerve cluster there.

His feet don't even move from his position. "Are you done?" he asks Dark Devil, in a tone of such dry, withering condescension that the air almost drops a few degress.

The worst part is, she thinks she's making progress, forcing that flinch away from her hand, the Devil Inside roars at perceived weakness. The step back, so subtle, rings of retreat. Her anger rises, and in the subtle chill of the night the air shimmers around her, a snarl of a sound that's nearly inhuman splitting the air when The Dark Knight flicks her nose, but he might be surprised when she keeps coming, right up until that fist slams into her nerve cluster and her left arm slumps. His words should have the same effect on the rest of her body, but The Devil burns so hot she might not notice if Hell had frozen over.

Her free hand comes across, clutching the spot so ruthlessly impaired. "F..fuck." It's almost breathless, as the pain and shock of the injury spreads through her like a religious exaltation. There's a breath, and another, and somehow she raises an arm. And then the other, her limbs quivering against a nervous system that does not want to comply, a nearly inhuman rage combining with adrenaline to keep her on her feet, and her fists curled, like a boxer just short of going down for the count.

"Almost. You're everything they say you are, aren't you? F..fucking.. spectacular. I needed to know. Needed to feel. This is what I came for." Her expression changes, as if she's seeing the face of god, and as her cheeks burn bright she takes another step forward. And another.

Whatever drives her is not letting her down easy.

Nightwing will notice she's all out of tricks, and see the shaking of her small frame from another angle, and all the telltale signs of someone who's almost certainly about to pass out from raw exertion.

"He's worse."

Nightwing's voice moves into the break utterly betraying his positioning but only because he can read her fatigue. Although he only speaks because the threat seems to be resolved there's a familial derision to his tone.

If she immediately gives him any attention, then it's clear where he is from the sound of his voice. If, however, she was to try to find him moments later - after a beat of distraction - he would be some other place entirely and perhaps not even visible without a moment of searching.

The Bats. Separate personalities. Identical training.

Only Nightwing would register the non-expression on Batman's face— surprise. Sincere surprise. The amount of adrenaline the woman can summon, the sheer /damned/ willpower that keeps her going in the face of fighting one of the singular masters of the arts martial.

When she comes at him again, Batman leans left, leans right, dodging her blows by mere inches, moving at the hips to avoid her strikes. One blow he takes full in the belly to absolutely zero effect.

Finally he pivots smoothly, grips her wrist, and with a deft twist, flips the woman into a spectacular throw that seemingly involves him twirling her like a baton, and pins her wrist to the dirt with a boot to the wristbone.

"You're not making much progress. Might be smart to give it up. Nightwing?" he says, inviting the other man to cut into the dance. He backs off a few paces, but is polite enough not to give away Dick's position in the shadows.

Her mask comes off in the flip, her lazy aggression bringing no satisfaction. When she hits the ground it kicks up a cloud of dust. Slowly she looks over at where her wrist is pinned, and blinks. She wants to grab out, take the back of his boot. Take him for a ride, but then he's gone and the pounding in her head marches like the beat of a war drum.

What the Devil Inside says to her is a whisper, a fractured rabble of raw emotion, but whatever it is forces her to swing her left arm out with a sharp crack, unpinching a pinched nerve. The momentum lets her roll to a kneel, and then her feet, one hand going out to press to the brick wall.

Tag, you're it, Dick.

"Don't do this because I'm smart. I do it because I have to. I don't tell anybody because I don't think they'll get it. Never thought about telling…" She slowly looks back, and her pupils dilate, as if sensing some motions in the darkness. There's renewed tension as she squares off, nostrils flaring, eyes darting.

Can she tell where Nightwing is? Feel him circling for a strike?

"…someone like you. Or your… is he your son? He moves like you, but doesn't act like you." It's the dumbest way someone might recognize training in someone else - and she doesn't, not really. The Devil does, though, but it could never really /tell/ her. It's feeling, crawling up her spine, that this is a close-knit pack that's circling her.

'Is he your son?' she asks. He doesn't respond but /GOOD LORD/ does he want to.

Immediately she sees where he is. The space Batman creates is filled as Nightwing simultaneously emerges from the shadows and fills the space that is created between them.

He's not one to sucker punch in this sort-of situation.

"For the record, I did suggest we talk this out." Nightwing says earnestly and then he starts forward to join her in a skilled-spar.

To the untrained eye his style might seem more aggressive simply because of the increased amount of movement. However those who are adept at martial forms would realize the staggering amount of skill both Nightwing and Batman possess it is clear that Dick Grayson fills the void created by a decade of experience with his youth and speed.

Whereas Batman deflects the blows without moving Nightwing seems to move with impossible speed and articulation. He bends past the first few tired haymakers and then repositions with a cart-wheeling flip that seems to toe the line between human capability and superhuman flight.

*CLANG*

A steel baton, insulated and possessing concealed switches to send a current to its tip, rolls along the uneven rooftop between them. If she's detail oriented she would have noted two at his back. Now there is only one and he makes a show of pulling it out - clearly giving her a chance to arm herself.

Batman is silent. Because words don't need to be added here. It's not useful information.

The battle's the thing— the way she engages with Nightwing. Prowling, hungry for a fight. Sensing the way the 'pack' of two closes around her, and the way she responds to them.

Not as a prey. But as a predator sensing two other predators. This one, she's a warrior— a fighter. Batman's interst is visible only to Nightwing, but the subtle change in his posture is a telling statement to his ward about the character of the woman they're dancing with.

Whatever she's on, it packs a punch, and she's back in the fight in earnest. After the the baton drops she snags it in a cartwheel of her own, but she does not wield it like a baton, and the blow that comes descends much more like an Iajutsu Master's sword strike. It is a cutting, lightning fast blow that is meant to cleave someone from collar-bone to hip, and if only she had a real sword, with real reach, and a not-so-quick opponent, she might do just that.

Her battle is a reflexive one now, but there's something else too - with her mask gone, it's easier to read the thrill in her eyes, the wild, unadulterated rush that comes from battle, and no matter if her first blow lands or not, the followup will be a mix of clubbing, whirling passes and much more focused fisticuffs, her unpredictable fury turning the weapon into more of a defensive implement to parry and lead the way for her brawling strikes.

"We are talking."

In her mind they're singing, and no matter how unrefined, how unrestrained, she uses every gift her body has to give in the only way she knows how. The pain fuels her, the chance to meet another super-predator head on is a thrill that will sustain her for weeks, and leaving wanting after, and for now Nightwing is the most important person in her world: Her worthy opponent.

In a situation such as this a few seconds might seem light an eternity.

The sudden and unexpected shift in technique causes a gain in ground. The sound of insulated steel upon insulated steel as he parries and ripostes the worst of her blows. The Iajutsu strikes and burst of adrenaline force him back as he takes purely defensive measures against her.

And then it happens…

He raises the baton in a cross block. She counters with a sharp strike to his wrist.

*CLANG*

Nightwing is disarmed and his baton hits the ground. Immediately he retreats backward raising his dark gloved hands in surrender, "Whoa, whoa WHOA," he says trying to assert his voice into her drive, "I give I give. Mercy."

Beyond the vision of the Devil, Batman palms a stunner batarang. It's primed and ready to fly— odds are good he could hit a bird in flight with it.

But this isn't a test of her ability to survive the fight. That's obvious from the moment Nightwing is 'disarmed', at least to Batman's trained eye. She has the advantage over him— with that baton, she could scatter his brains onto the sidewalk if left uninterrupted.

No. Nightwing wouldn't just 'cave', let alone beg for mercy. This is the moment where Devil either proves out to be another villain to be stopped, a vigilante to be corraled, or a warrior to be groomed.

She wades in.

Victory. The moment before the fall. She can feel the rush she always feels, that urge to make them /stop/. Stop fighting. Stop moving. Stop /breathing/. She always stops herself before that last part, and never before has she fought someone worth stopping before the second.

When she sees his hands go up, one of her own darts in, taking hold of his wrist to draw it down and wide, and then there's another 'clang' as her own baton falls away and an iron grip that curls like a claw suddenly finds Dick's throat.

Impossibly fast. Impossibly /strong/. She lifts.

Even with the height he has on her, she somehow manages to get him a few inches off the ground, the kind of height that would help make for an impressive, driving, skull-shattering slam.

It never comes. He'll be on his feet as quickly as he was off it, and her expression says more to Dick than The Bat could ever see from his angle. The horror of what she is and who she's become, strained and frayed at the edges. "You don't deserve my worst. I'm…uh.. sorry."

If Nightwing lets her, she'll shrink back from any remaining hold she has on him, stumble back to a place to recenter herself. "I should go."

The Devil takes his wrist and then his throat. There is a soft gag as so much pressure goes across his trachea. He puts a hand on her wrist, as leverage.

Dick Grayson. The helpless victim. Her impossible strength leveraged against him as if he were a common thug. In lifting him from the ground she has taken from him the burden of gravity and left his two most powerful limbs - his legs - free. A decade ago crowds across the world witnessed the death defying maneuvers a Grayson can perform mid-air - but no repeat performance shall be attempted tonight.

When the baton and his feet hit the ground he retreats backward, grasping at his own throat, somehow rolling one of the discarded batons under his step so it leaps into his free hand.

"It's okay," Dick's voice is remarkably calming as if to say 'no big deal', "It's not like I didn't egg you on."

He doesn't protest her departure however.

Batman doesn't stop her. He lets the woman flee into the distance, a silent and implacable presence that is merely witness to her retreat, and neither friend nor foe to her decision. Once she's well gone into the Gotham night, he moves to face Nightwing, the white lenses over his eyes sliding aside so they can exchange a look. It's a look that speaks volumes— noting the things she did, could have done, didn't do. The fascination and the natural suspicion that goes with it. The conversation exchanged in tilts of the head and subtle gestures— a flicker of Nightwing's head, a twist of Batman's wrist. It lasts perhaps thirty seconds.

"Put Spoiler on her," he says, finally breaking the silence. "Having another woman might help encourage her to explain herself."

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