We're taking over the world (catch all)

[theknightshift]

WHO: Bruce Wayne and Friends
WHEN: Early July
WHERE: Across Nova City
WHAT: Bruce is doing recon and setting up a safehouse (or two)
NOTES\WARNINGS: None for now, but will edit if that changes

Closed starters below. If you want one you can let me know on plurk @ tapsters or by PM. Or feel free to write your own!

Comments

[her_own_rules]

[ He's an idiot. But one that's still standing. She's all but kicking herself for not predicting this; things have just been so very different in this place, and all over the place between three of them arriving at once. Batman kicking down a door because he wanted to know something? It's only half-hypocritical to want to roll her eyes at him. How many backdoors has she summarily demolished in the last year? However, delicacy and anonymity weren't shared aims in that same way.

Barbara turns in her seat, tapping buttons and starting to access his data.
Talking easily even as she's starting to throw up extra screens with that, preparing for it. ]

You managed to walk away, so I'm guessing it was just one of them, and not both, who found you.

[theknightshift]

Yes. Just the Batman. Not the Kryptonian.

[ With the state the boys were in, Bruce hadn't trusted any of them to come. Not when they would be a liability, one more variable on a field of unknowns. He couldn't afford the volatility, the unpredictability. An inability to follow orders. So, it'd been better to go in alone. Handle it alone. It wouldn't be the first time. He's quiet, for a moment as the data begins to populate. ]

Clark doesn't exist in their world.

[ A sad, grim assessment. There's a flicker of something beneath it. But Bruce keeps it buried. ]

Zod is his father.

[her_own_rules]

[ If Barbara parses the second line there as what is, a universe without Clark Kent—as well as a commentary on the fact Clark isn't here in this world, this situation with him either—most of that doesn't show through. Unlike the words he says after it, and the momentary pause of Barbara's typing, entirely, that happens right after it.

Her mind racing through so many possibilities connected to those four words. Most of them each worse than the last. She will need to re-examine several files. She doesn't start typing again; one deft movement of one foot on the bottom of her chair turns her halfway to face him. (Behind her, floating digital screens are starting to fill with his data, and one with the single-pov fight. ]

And your plan for when his partner tells him about your little visit?

[theknightshift]

[ A universe without Clark Kent sounded like a bleak one. Even with all of the danger of someone like him even existing, Bruce had never wanted to think there might be a world out there that did not have him in it. It quiets him again, leaves him to brood out the ripple effect Zod being the Kryptonian's father had on the rest of the world.

What kind of man was Hernan? And more importantly, would they have to stop him? ]

I'll improvise.

[ He sets his gaze on the playback of his fight with Kirk, eye critical as each move he makes plays back in his memory, alongside the footage on the screen. Every mistake he catalogues. Every delay. Every missed opportunity. Too slow there. Should have pivoted. He left himself open and I didn't take it. It was sloppy, sloppy work. But at least he could see the pattern in how Kirk fights clearly. It's a rhythm he hadn't quite made out in the moment, but it was there and it was exploitable. Kirk was good, but he wasn't perfect. Next time, Bruce would be ready. ]

Their third member is missing. He wouldn't elaborate on who she is.

[ Likely cause Bruce broke into their house and demanded answers. But that's semantics, really. ]

[her_own_rules]

[ Of course, he will; and they'll all be part of the domino out. Which he knows, and sometimes, also, doesn't think about in the ensuing time until it becomes that specific time while it's being focused on one of the others.

Bruce's staring over her head—all the minute expressions saying for the moment she's lost his focus to a different kind of review—so Barbara turns herself back (careful of Haley underfoot, even without looking; she's gotten used to sharing the space under her desk in the last year). It's not the worst fight he's been in by far, but Kirk isn't lacking in holding his own either. She'll need to dissect his moves later. ]

Vampire Batman,
Heir to Zod Superman,

and one other person who happens to be a woman.
Pretty obvious assumption to be made there.

[ Not a great one either given those.
If their Wonder Woman is like them. ]

[theknightshift]

[ That she was just as volatile as her colleagues? Bruce figured, even without catching anything substantial of her from the records he looked through. He would need to know more before attempting another break in. Besides, he imagines this Justice League would enhance their security with such an intrusion into their files. ]

There was something else. Footage from Krypton's destruction. It was tampered with. There was a cut between time stamps 1.06 and 1.08.

[ There was something in it that they did not want anyone to see. Did the Kryptonian do it himself? Or was someone hiding something from him? Interesting questions to think about regardless. ]

[her_own_rules]

I'll pull it. See what I can restore.

[ She's not all that convinced, even by the comment, that either of the other two has tampered much with it, regardless of it being theirs. More because, at current, she's never seen either of them display anything that looked like a skill in that regard. They could be hiding it, of course, but it's not really a more than small consideration to the balance of the potential scales. ]

And what else can be pulled. If their system is still as unguarded as it was initially.
Since they'll probably see the point and purpose behind earning some points to secure it better.


[ Which means she'll change what she was going to do today, tonight, maybe tomorrow. Copy everything that looks even vaguely like it might be of use for, against, or about those two, their world, and anyone else in it. As well as building herself a well-hidden, long-term backdoor into their computer system that will recognize it as its own programming. In preparation for that same inevitability. ]

[theknightshift]

[ Bruce is satisfied. Oracle’s efficient, no surprise there, and he never doubts she’d have an answer that would help him piece this together in a way that made sense.

Studying Kirk’s move set would come later, once he's back in the Cave and had the time to properly assess what he’d be up against. Because yes, he absolutely plans to go back into the Tower of Justice.

He hasn’t seen everything worth seeing — not yet. And if he’s honest, he wants a closer look at that ship.

There's a beat of silence and then: ]

Have you been keeping an eye on Jason? The younger one.

[her_own_rules]

[ That stops her briefly, and there's a brief wry twist to her tone. ]

An 'eye'? Yes. Though, currently, that's all.

[ Except the way she looks up says it's not decidedly quite 'all.' Especially when she can get someone to agree to something, they haven't quite translated what they've agreed to do for her yet. She glances back at the keypad and reaches out to tap several specific keys, which pop up a new window—a map with specific dots across it, mapping out the movements of one Jason Todd (2.3) across Etraya for that whole time. ]

He and I reached an agreement a few days after the fight with Damian.
He's been checking in on his HUD to report on his concussion every morning.

[ Woe betide the child whose world never had an Oracle except as an egomanical AI and hasn't the faintest clue how much Barbara Gordon can do every single day with someone who has agreed to let her system ping theirs and then to ping hers back immediately. As innocently—and unshamedly—as possible, Barbara gives a small raise of her eyebrows when she looks up again. ] Within reason, I may have used his antisocial tendancies against him.

[theknightshift]

[ Bruce takes his time to study each of the dots, using them to cross reference his own movements which might make tracking Jason himself feel less noticeable. After their last conversation, Bruce doubts the kid wants to see him, let alone provide daily status reports. So once again Bruce finds himself thankful for Barbara's thoroughness.

Even if he doesn't say thank you.

He doesn't. ]

What do you know about him? I haven’t seen any symptoms of Lazarus Pit exposure.

[ There had to be something else. Something to explain his volatility beyond just a fractured relationship with his Bruce. Some missing piece to make the picture finally make sense. ]