January 14, 2015:
Oracles tower is assaulted…. by Ninjas.
Clocktower - Gotham City
Oracles home base
Characters
![class="image1"](http://cmbeta.wdfiles.com/local--resized-images//class="image1"/medium.jpg)
NPCs: None.
Mentions:
Plot:
A Dark Hold
Apocalypse: Only the Strong
Blood versus Family
Bones Of The City
Breaking the Universe
Cyberdata War: First Strike
Dangerous Esterikos Wonderous Mystikos
Dark Gods & Times
De Oppresso Liber
Demon Lord of New York
Diaz de Muertos
Don't Tell Thanos The Babysitter's Dead
Empire of Tears
Escape from Sakaar
From the Ashes
Gateway to the Stars
Genosha: Rebirth
God Of The Dead
Hacker, Sass-Mastah, Engineer, Spy
Himmel und Hölle in Bewegung Setzen
Mood Music: None.
Fade In…
Oracle is a hacker par excellence and the Bat's go to woman for all things information and support oriented. And for that reason, despite appearances and the worries of a certain Blue, she's quite well protected in the Clocktower with security systems and subtle defenses. This is more than enough to discourage and defeat the average organized crime hit team - even if any were to discover where she lived - or at least let her hold out long enough for help to arrive.
She's been in some odd things lately, however, and she's attracted the attention of players outside the Bat's usual line which is why tonight - as all of her usual resources happen to be engaged in other activities in other parts of town a group of men with some odd climbing gear pull up to the tower in a couple of unmarked vans, get out and begin to - rather improbably - scale the edifice. They're dressed all in black from boots to head, with concelaing cowels hiding their features.
***
Oracle's alarms sounding tell her she has incoming trouble. The video feeds from the building and surrounding security cameras' show just how much. Fortunately, she's made some contingencies for this and a few key strokes on her console and an alert is sent to her teams. Anyone with an Oracle comm will get an automated notice giving the location and a rather oblique reference regarding an attempted breakin. The alert is also sent to a few trusted agents who do sidejobs for Oracle.
***
Melinda May receives the alert, frowns faintly, then pulls her personal phone and hastily types in a message to Jericho. "Msg from oracle, need to get there now." Then she hastily pulls her 'work' gear back out of the locker she's been stowing it in for the night, hides it under her winter coat, and hurries out the door. Hopefully she won't have left Trent waiting for her outside the Triskelion for too long. And she'll get K'Nert all the Ben & Jerry's 'Star Spangled Flan With a Plan' he can eat for this.
***
It's actually K'nert waiting for May. K'nert with apprently explicit instructions to take May to the Clocktower. The hacker knows full well how odd it is for the reclusive Oracle for to reach out to anyone outside her circle of friends. May gets a text back. 'HYDRA hit Lunair. Getting her to ground. K'nert will get you there. Luck. A stepping disk opens for the veteran Agent.'
Outside the the tower there are fully two dozen men halfway up tower. And look for all the world like Babs is about to get assaulted by a team of Ninja.
Which she is.
***
Misfit gets the alert, she may have been laying low since the other night and not going on official patrols. Maybe she was even avoiding Oracle a bit since the whole pasted Hydra.
This alert though gets her attention, it is an aler that means Oracle may actually be in danger nad Misfit won't avoid that. She grabs her gear and gets on her stuff and then bounces >pinkurple> into the clocktower. One moment no one is standing behind Oracle and the next Charlie is leaning to look at the monitors "Ooh… um who are they?" yeah she didn't even register on the alarms as an arrival.
***
This could be bad except she's got safeguards in place for this type of thing. Keying in commands to her console, infrared beams cross the windows in the Clocktower, a safeguard she's installed since Jericho keeps using one of them. Misfits arrival has her slightly more relieved for a second, before she realises how much danger the girl might be in. "I have no idea. I haven't started the searches yet." Looking at the young woman, the redhead looks serious "Do a physical sweep inside, the windows have infrared beams on them, don't go near them, but make sure the cameras have seen everything." She looks around "If worse comes to worse, we delete everything and get out. I have a contingency."
***
Melinda May hurries out of the Triskelion, sees K'Nert waiting there, and looks around to make sure no one notices what she's about to do before she kneels down and reaches a hand to the small demon. This, here and now, is why she'd been giving the little Henson-reject ice cream so freely for so long. She knew it would only be a matter of time before she would have to place a certain amount of trust in the creature. But to help Oracle, she'll do so without hesitation.
***
The trip through Limbo is mercifully short. In, around a rock and back out again. It usually doesn't work out so well. This time though…
The stepping disk opens behind Misfit to admit May, albiet without the usual Jericho or Illyana. At the same moment several of the Clocktower's windows shatter in unison. This is a well organized attack. All possible directions at once. The alarms go haywire. Ninja attacks were probably among the things considered by the Bats in their security systems. One this large… may not have been.
Outside the windows there's a ghostly hawks cry and a flash of glowing blue before something else comes in a broken window out of sight. There's only a moment to prepare before the masked men are here!
***
Misfit mmmms "Ok good because I can't get you out." she hesitates "Am I really the only one who responded." that gets a dark frown. Course she can be there from Mars in an instant if she had to be after all, she was only slowed by grabbing her gear. "Okay I'll go….." and then windows breaking "frak".
She bounces at that point >pinkurple> and starts to really really move, which honestly may be surprising. No one really usually expects being kicked in the back of the head really hard by someone who wasn't there a moment ago, and the moment later is trying to kick your friend at the other window from behind in the spleen really hard.
***
Misfit is the only one to have responded, as far as Oracle knows. She has to assume the ghostly hawks and whatever has come through the window belongs to the enemy. "Misfit, I'm going to activate one of our countermeasures. Whatever you do, DO NOT TOUCH THE FLOOR." Hands moving over her console, Oracle activates the system that electrifies the floor on the levels below. The lift system is disabled and the stairwells electronically locked. The doors themselves electrified. At the same time, an alert is sent to her systems, anyone with an Oracle comm or on those special channels will know which floors are no-go zones.
Mays entrance, has the red head blinking but not for long. On this floor, her refuge, where her work is done… the woman narrows her eyes. She'll delay as long as she can before she destroys it all. "Up May, don't touch the floor." One last set of commands are entered, the floor lighting up with electricity… her chair insulated from it. Oracle turns to face what is coming at her.
***
Melinda May really only has time to mentally shake off the disorentation of K'Nert's stepping disk, drop her coat and brandish the taser-tipped batons from her personal 'arsenal'. Her usual leather-looking vest is on the ground with her coat, so she's lacking the extra bit of protection she'd normally have in this kind of situation. But she's dealt with worse. The first assassins to charge toward her will learn quickly enough to keep their distance.
***
When Oracle warns about the floor, May has just barely enough time to use one of the would-be ninja assassins to throw herself into the air to land on a wooden side table. Everything that had been on the table is now crashing to the floor while May comments flatly, "That could have gotten ugly." Only problem here: The vast majority of May's 'arsenal' including the weapons that could extend her reach is now out of her reach, sitting over there on the electrified floor.
***
Several people cry out and there's additional breaking and shatering sounds as the attackers begin to find ways in from the level above and below. About six of them are down now from the electrified floor. Unfortunately many of them seem to be in rubber soled boots and now that they know the floor is electirified they're being careful about what they touch. They're wielding an assortment of blades, fighting claws, kama and chain weapons. A trio of them comes for Oracle. Another pair comes for misfit. Two drop in from above behind may. Another pair break in from the kitchen… and of that pair one gets a nasty cut across the gut with a balde as a certain masked druid appears from that direction as well. His shotgun comes up, one handed, and belches a blast of wind across the room, hurling a another two from the tower bodily.
***
"DAAAARK VENGEANCE" of course the Misfit yelling that isn't where she was a moment ago. She is also really hard for the two who are trying to approach her.. to well approach. She isn't staying still. The bounce is more like >piiiiiiiinkpurrrrrpleeeeepinkpinkpurplepurplepinkpurple> as she doesn't touch the floor. She is effectively attacking both the Ninjas attacking her. Smiting may be better, she just keeps appearing and disappearing leaving them in smoke and kicking them in the heads, plural moving in and out of the reality to new positioning with the speed of thought-kicks. It's like martial arts for the brain and she is giving their brains a good jogging.
***
As the trio approach Oracle, the red head pulls her escrima sticks from the compartment in her chair and takes her stance. With this many allies in the room, her last countermeasure can't safely be activated… she's going to have to rely on the team and herself. Keeping her eyes on the trio, she moves forward slowly, waiting for one of the trio to move at her.
***
It's rather chaos now. The buzz of May's shock sticks strikes an odd counterpoint to Misfit's nonstop teleporting. Both of their styles are considerably less dealdly though than the Fox's shotgun and blade approach. As of practiced a dozen times the druid breaks the weapon open with a flick of his wrist and, while avoiding a flurry of thrown stars, reloads before recovering in time to parry a blade stroke in at him and return a riposte that probably deflates a lung… followed immediately by a blast of fire.
Oracle is no mean combatant but she's surrounded now by three skilled attackers wielding chain weapons. Not going immediately for a body strike they instead cast at her limbs and weapons to entangle her.
Misfit finds herself the target of a mystic jonin. There's a puff of smoke and a thrown kinfe before he's gone again. Teleport war!
***
Charlie totally takes a knife to the stomach, but then she is gone and fine with a bounce. Yeah the girl really needs her new costume. So it is down to totally cheating. She bounces to where her staff is, where ever that may be, snags the Potents Staff, and bounces back to the Jonin. Thing is, it really doesn't matter where on earth or not-earth he is. She pops in right behind that prick and cracks him as hard as she can with an unbreakable magickal artifact. Certainly not the use it was intended for, but well it is pretty damn efficient all the same.
***
Oracle might now be getting angry, that calm reserve she shows nearly gone but she channels it into meaningful action. She moves fast charging one of her attackers, getting inside the swing of their weapon, but not before taking a blow to her side. Wincing hard, she pushes the pain down and brings her escrima stick to bear, hard on the front of their knee. The assailant crumbles as the red head brings the other stick down on their head. This one won't be getting up very soon. One down, two to go
***
There can't be that many more left. Oracle's cameras only tracked about two dozen of them. But they're still coming, even in small numbers they make the house seem crowded. There's a sudden noise of snarling and a trio of ghostly wolves appear out of nowhere to set upon the ninja. Misfit puts the Jonin down and he tumbles backwards into a filing cabinet. No time to savor it though, two more are on her with blades. The Fox is on Oracle's left fencing with another pair. He's well trained, that much is obvious. Sword to the arm followed by a hilt strick in the thyroid cartiladge downs another. Oracle's attackers move directly on her, now trying to simply hurt her as badly as they can in this losing fight.
***
Poor Charlie, her home laundry hamper level outfit is getting cut to hell and back. The thing actually managed a trip to hell and back that wasn't as hard on it as this cutting and swording. The thing is in this push comes to shove she is doing a great showing despite being bladed in the shoulder before vanishing again. At least the Jonin ended up on his ass on the electric floor. Yisssss sweet currents of revengination.
Misfit reappears well above one of the two Ninjas and thunks down from the ceiling (where she totes pushed off with her feet for more UMMMF) with the quite narrow circular bottom part of the staff right on his head to send him into the electric floor. Then she is gone again appearing on the remaining Ninjas's shoulders. Piggy back rides, though in this case she has the staff in front of his neck and is yanking back to choke a mother F-ing Ninja. Kid fights dirty but non-lethal all said.
***
Oracles assailants do manage to hurt her, cuts and bruises on her face and arms but so far, nothing major as yet though. Letting them get as near as possible, parrying blows as they come, the red head bides her time until finally…. sweeping at legs on the one on the right with her right arm, she blocks the swing from the one on the left. The one on the right hits the electrified floor but still receives a tap on the head for good measure. The one on the left gets her attention now, and the woman narrows her eyes waiting for the opening, she knows will come.
***
The wolves now assailing the few remaining ninjas fight, er, as one would expect wolves to fight. There's going to be a bit of a mess to clean up. Kane's second opponent gets windblasted into a wall and then… well a german longpoint student would be able to tell the moves quite easily. They're textbook. Krumphau as the black clad man overextends. Oberhau to follow up. Nacht.
With Misfit strangling the only one still up other than the last one near Babs, the Fox turns and reloads his shotgun one more time…
***
Sends the strangled Ninja she sleepered to the floor and disappears, only to reappear on a table. She glances at the Monitors "Right… " the girl runs the length of the table and leaps off it, disappearing in a flash >pinkurple> only to reappear on the cameras for one floor down using the momentum and the staff like a baseball bat. The ball in question being a Ninja head from the side… ouch right to the temple. This is going to go on for a while on Cameras.
***
The remaining assailant swings their chained weapon at Oracle and she parries and dodges as best she can. She just needs to get inside the arc… "Is that the best you can do…" she taunts "Can't take an invalid woman down…" a dangerous ploy that pays off. The Ninja runs at the red head…. Oracle swings her chair out of the way, tangling her escrima stick in the chain of the weapon and pulls as hard as she can, swinging the caught Ninja hard into the door. Dazed, the attacker turns on Oracle, but she's already there, bringing that stick down hard on their head. "This is my home… " she speaks firmly as the assailant slumps to the ground.
***
Misfit has… bounced out. Apparently chasing someone who fled. That leaves Babs alone… with as it were, the Fox in the henhouse. He looks around once before wiping his blade off and sheathing his sword.
***
Babs rubs her forehead and winces as she touches the bruise above her eye. "Thank you for your help, were you hurt at all?" The red head turns slowly to look at The Fox and the mess around her. Sighing, she starts moving towards the downed intruders, pulling zip-ties from the arm of her chair and securing them. Her movements are slow and painful, limited by pain and the chair.
***
"No." The man in the masquerade mask watches her for a moment. "Do you require aid? Looks like they got some hits in on you." There's blood on the Fox's leather, but none of it is his. Well, some of it is. Not much.
***
"They did." Babs hands the Fox a handful of zip-ties, purposefully misunderstanding the offer of aid "Secure them please. I need to get them out of here and have the authorities pick them up." She hasn't checked the extent of her injuries and she won't until the mess is mostly cleaned up.
***
The druid shrugs and begins to secure the ones that are still alive. Not all of them are between magical blasts, swordplay and, mostly, wolves. The wolves are still here, incidentally, but watching from the darker parts of the apartment. "Shinobi. Iga Shinobi, if I'm not mistaken. Straight from Japan." He looks up, thinking. "Who'd you upset?"
***
Babs pauses in her work securing the intruder on the floor by her chair and shrugs "Lots of people, it goes with the job description." Japan doesn't ring a bell, but HYDRA has long arms and she's sure there's other agencies that do too. Pulling her tablet from her arm rest, she checks the feeds of the building
"I'm going to turn the countermeasures off in the rest of the building, there may be some we've missed. Can your wolves search?" A few taps on the screen and she nods "They're down." Looking around the room, she sighs. "At least there's not a lot of damage to my equipment." The mess left by the wolves attack have her nose wrinkling, but that's the only sign of distaste she gives.
***
The Fox nods in affirmation to Bab's question but he's already looking at something. A tatto that all of the attackers seem to have as he cuts the left sleeve with a utility knife on all of them. A long serpent winding down the left arm. "Mmmmm. Brotherhood of Ryujin. Mystics…" He stands up, thinking as he waves to the wolves to search the place. "Let's see. Last I heard they were in Freeport, away south… Wonder what brought them to Gotham?" He finally turns to Babs, not noting her distaste. "Your people interrupt any Yakuza operations lately?"
***
"Yakuza?" Babs looks at the bound intruders "Potentially. They're in pretty deep in a lot of areas that I might dabble in." Frowning she starts nodding slowly "I would need to check my files and dig deeper. There's nothing recent that I can think of" Of course, being beaten and bruised right now probably isn't helping. "I need these guys dumped on the street, preferably a ways down the road, so I can call the Gotham PD. Can you help?" She does not want the police anywhere near her tower if she can avoid it.
***
The Fox cants his head. "Yes. One condition. You're going to let me check you over for injuries and heal you. It'll hurt, but you're going to have enough troubles without being distracted and in pain."
***
Babs finally stops moving and faces The Fox, her green eyes meeting his. "I know how much touble I'm going to have." she says quietly "I know how much trouble I have now… this is more than unwanted." Blowing out a breath and setting her jaw, Babs might have been going to argue but instead gives a sharp nod "Fine… do it. It's mostly just scrapes and bruises. I'm not without some skill at defending myself."
***
"Yes, I saw. Quite good, really." Kane knows, if she hadn't been, she'd be dead. There's a moment's pause and the Fox looks around once more before heading out to move some criminals.
***
Babs drags the bound intruders closer to the door whilst The Fox is gone and begins basic cleanup. Pulling her tablet out, she sends a message to Jay asking her to come and do an extra clean with a generous offer for the trade of the service. By the time The Fox gets back, she'll be sitting there considering what to do next.