| Stealing a Star | |||||
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| What: Batwoman and the Thing try to catch a thief | |||||
The Star of Quraq is one of the largest star sapphires in the world, and it is on loan to the Gotham Museum for the moment. Naturally certain private collectors would give a fortune to acquire such a gem, but the government of the owning nation refuses to sell a national treasure. That is where Nocturna comes in. The person who wants it contacts her through criminal channels, she tries to obtain it...and takes no pay if she fails. It is not like she really needs the money that much, but she loves the challenge. Typically she tries the theft without using her vampire abilities, that way it looks normal to the police investigation. She has had trouble with heroes a few times lately though, so it has become known that she can apparently turn to smoke.
Benjamin J. Grimm is cunningly disguised so that he blends in with the Gothamites. A huge raincoat covers his massive frame. A fedora pulled down over his head. His everlovin' blue eyes covered by sunglasses. No one could possibly recognize him right? Of course, Ben doesn't know his way around Gotham very well and finds himself coming up the steps of the Museum well after it is closed. "Ahh.. nuts." Ben says as he grumbles 'under his breath' which actually carries pretty durn far in the cool night air. "Don't take a cab I said! You can find yer way around Gotham I said!" He takes off his glasses and cups a rock hand over his eyes as he tries to look through the front doors, "Maybe there's a night watchmen I can talk into letting me in. I really wanted to see that Frank Frazetta exhibit!"
It's Gotham's typical and infamous weather: cold, rainy nearly stormy and its no fun at all to be outside during such condition, but Kate did choose this part of her life by free will and while she stands on the head of a stone gargoyle on a near building, the chilly air blows into her long flaming hair and her long black coat. Her bike is parked around the corner, and Kate does not seem to be in a hurry at one, 'Gah.. " she starts to curses quietly, even white clouds of her warm breath forming in the cold air, "Why didn't I opted to be become a lawyer?" she now regrets and puts up her binoculars, checking on various approving vehicles in direction of the famous museum, but none of these looks like one of Joker's comical ones, "At least its all quiet." she is happy.
Nocturna has been here before, so she has met the chief of security and museum director before, and left them with a willingness to see her again so that she can hypnotize them and find out what is new in the security system and plan a way around it. She has to admit though, the Howard Stark robot that they hired as a security consultant is something she cannot influence, and is very good at setting up security. His best trick is the double bind security lock, if you try to turn off the alarm, it sets off an alarm...and it also sets off an alarm if the alarm does not report regularly. It means that she can not turn off the alarm on the board. She will have only the time between when the alarm goes off and when the guards come to get away.
Kate notes a large bulky man in an overcoat walking around the museum.
And the bulky lumox wraps on the reinforced glass of the Front door as he sees a passing guard. "Hey! Hey buddy! Help a guy out maybe? I came all the way from New York" Which is, allllll the way across the bay, but to New Yorkers this sounds like a big deal. "C'mon Be a pal?"
"What the f.. the King Pin?" Kate stammers as her view hits the bulky mountain of a man, "Stars, please not him!" she knows about the power of the gigantic crime lord and does not want to witness any troubles in _her_ town. Batsie always calls it his, but she has the same rights to call the city her own play ground. Kate nibbles on her lower lip, colored in the same red flashing crimson color like her hair, trying to make a plan. she knows she needs first a real identification of the man, not wanting to be scolded afterward for calling more arms for nothing. A check on the roof top and her long wig is removed, as the black cape follows.. luckily the girl has a spare LBD in her utility where Batsie has his anti-shark spray and not much later - with the use of a grappling gun, a pretty red head comes out of the shadowed alley and heads on high heels toward the main entrance, not drawing as much attention as a full masked Bat Woman would do.
The guard comes over and says through the glass, "Sorry sir, but we stopped letting people in half an hour ago, and the last people left over fifteen minutes ago. If you want to schedule a private showing, I can give you the number of the museum director." It is plain the guard does not have the authority to let Ben in. Ben hears someone walking up towards him. Now that she is closer, Kate notices the person's hands have only three fingers as he puts the one he knocked with back in his pocket.
Nocturna has played this number before, but came in through the air vents this time,not through the upper story windows. She knows they will have placed wires through the glass on all the windows now, so cutting them would set off an alarm. She could diver the ventilation fan and the alarm on it long enough to get through...and use magnets to cling to the top of the duct so as not to set off the pressure sensors at the bottom where those are set. Her special glasses let her see the beams from the electric eyes, lasers, and motion detectors...though she does not set them off she avoids them as if she would...and she puts a tape loop on the cameras after sneaking in to the security maintenance room. It is only the last little bit that is a problem...this time they put up a retinal scanner. She cannot fool it, so she will have to bypass it...THAT is when the alarms will go off. She has everything ready, so she checks her schedule...the guards are at their most distant points from the display, so GO. She hits the switch on the bypass she had set up, the lock is now accessible, but the alarms go off...
Kate Kane feels that something is fishy here, the small scanner in her ear does not pick up any alert yet, but then.. nobody would be so stupid to try a hit here and now? Kate is finally right at the large man's back and as her eyes fall for a brief moment on the man's hand she lets out a sigh, being happy not to meet the King Pin today, but who else is THIS Thing? she wonders and even steps with the best seducing smile beside the man and faces the guard, "Oh please, Officer, I am sure you wont send a tourist away, who only come to see Gotham's most famous museum." she purrs and with her voice a 100 dollar bill is discretely offered, "We just want in and I promise we will be out before the bell rings for closing."
Ben makes a sad, defeated sound, "Awww shucks...." And then suddenly. There's a smoking hot red-head next to him. He double takes between the guard and the woman, and then the woman again. Almost as if his brain suddenly catches up, "Oh um yeah.. what my um friend said! I can look super quick! I promise."
The guard starts to say, "The museum closes at..." when the alarm goes off. He heads to the desk, turning his back on Ben and Kate as he looks. He picks us a phone and speed-dials, "Yeah, Gotham PD...we have an alarm at the Museum, looks like the same style as the attempted painting theft two weeks ago. Possibly you can catch her this time..."
Nocturna takes the copy of the key from her belt, turns that and enters the combination, the case snaps open and she grabs the gem. Now for the hard part, getting out before the guards arrive, preferable without using any Vampire powers...
Kate Kane curses as she notices the alert starts to ring the same moment as the guards, at least the large man beside her can't be the thief... but maybe he is hired to make a safe exit for the thief? she asks herself and doesn't wait any further second but tries to rush inside, only to get the glass doors shut close against her nose, "HEY WATCHOUT!" she angrily yells to the guards inside, "You can't close the doors, there are still people inside!" she tries to argue, her nicely manicured fingers hammering against the closed entrance.
And then the Alarm goes off and Ben exclaims, "Ah C'mon!" he looks up into the rainy night sky and says, "Really?!?" He looks then to Kate and says, "Nice Lady, I really appreciate you trying to help me out.. but you better get home. In this city, someone robbing a museum could means someone's about to unleash some kind of insano-gas on the city or somethin' Thanks for being nice despite being from Gotham though, I have it on good authority that's rare." And that said the big man turns from door and runs to where there is some columns that he can get a hand hold on. You wouldn't think it to look at him, but Ben is an excellent climber. His rock coarse skin can get a hell of a grip. Ben starts ascending the building to the roof. Because Roofs is where thieves escape. He sees that on TV all the time.
About half way up, Ben finds himself climbing past another gargoyle. "What is with the all the Gargoyles in this town?" Ben shakes his head and continues, "This whole city needs Paxil."
The guard ignores Kate, but hits a button that seals all the emergency exits. Last time the thief got out through a fire exit. The fire marshal can complain later. Kate sees the man in the coat start to climb the wall of the building after giving his speech. Looks like she can change without anyone paying attention...
Her exit is planned, not through the roof though. Before she entered, she put a rope up connecting to a neighboring building, just above a power line so it looks like another line. She is headed up the stairs to the room in the east wall where the window exits on the ledge. She will have the thermite tape ready to burn the window open...the wires make just breaking it difficult.
Kate Kane “what”s and just wanted to protest to the large man about who is here the one in need for help and who the one helping others... but then the large man does really start to climb up at the wall of the building, letting Kate only back , shaking her red hair, loudly cursing about her own stupidity for removing her Batwoman gear for her LBD... she looks at the other building where she hide her stuff, it would take too much time for rushing back, again dressing into gear and coming back.. No time for this, especially with the gigantic human fly atop of her on the wall. But then a woman never leaves home without her small bag of goodies and even with a grappling gun of the size of a lipstick, its strong enough to lift the woman's body up into the sky, letting her grin as she even passes the climbing man, "meet you o the roof!"
"What the....." Ben watches as the hot red head zips past him. "How do you have one of those.. WOAH!" he quickly averts his eyes as she zips past him then to avoid being ungentlemanly. Taking a deep breath Ben finishes his assent to the top of the roof, and as he mantles over the ledge he shrugs out of his massive overcoat and throws it down. Yup. he's a dude that looks like he's made out of dense orange rock. "Ok Lady, What gives. You're not one o' the people robbing this place are yah?" He looks around for signs of the thief's escape plan. "Ok... um... I'm gonna
Thermite tape along the window...zip burn...clank as the glass falls out. Out the window onto the ledge, place roller onto line...
The security gets another alert as the contacts in the glass are broken...If someone happens to have a radio on a common security company frequency they might hear he guards being alerted...
Kate Kane smirks, "Of course not!" she smirks and quickly pulls in the fine wire of the small grappling gun and rolls it together to store it away again, "If I would have been the thief, I would have been inside already!" she frowns and looks carefully at the man, "But you are no ordinary tourist, are you?" she wonders and tries to get a better view on the man's face "Well but whoever else is just trying to steal something in my city, he gets into real troubles!" she promises and is even able to find some small half mask in her bag, not wanting to give out her Id too easily, "I am Batwoman." she tells to the man. " "Well of course you are. People call me the Thing...." He says looking to the now masked woman. He looks to the edge of the building and looks around, "Ok... Batwoman, I'm gonna bow to your wisdom. Where is this thief. I got nothin'" He says as he jogs over to the look over the edge of the building on the alleyway sides. Trying to see if he notices any kind of cunning escape set up. But as poor Batwoman has probably realized by now. Of the things Ben Grimm is. A Detective he is not.
Nocturna hears someone some to the edge of the roof and freezes, hidden in a shadow. She can only stay here so long though, the guards will reach the window in three minutes.
Kate Kane ooohs, "It's you , this thing..." she finally gets a clear view on the man's face and blushes at once behind her half-mask, "Oh.. Mister Thing?" she wonders how to call him correctly, "Well, less talk and more Action!" she grins and simply points to their feet, "We have to get inside, quickly!" she even adds, "The GCPD is alarmed, so they will arrive in a few minutes, unless the Joker runs loose on the other side of the city." she frowns, "Gotham is not such bad." she tries at least to leave some good impression of her home to the tourist, "You can open the roof window?" she wonders and points to the closest one.
"Yeah...." Ben says turning away from the edge of the roof and going to open the window that Kate indicated. He grips the edge of the window and pops it open. The bolts that hold it in place tearing free of the metal, "Hey! Did the thief get sumthin'?" Ben asks, matter of factly looking down at the guards gathered around the display case. "Do yah know which way they went! We ain't seen them on the roof yet." See? Ben's helping!
The guard frowns, but recognizes Ben when he shines his light up at him, "Check the east side, we had an alert from a window on the third floor." The guard does not ask what the Fantastic Four is doing in the area, just is happy to have the help.
Nocturna hears Ben retreat and makes her way to the zip line, sliding across to the next building and starting along the ledge there.
Okay, blame it on Kate's lack of sleep in the last days always being on patrol and playing the spoiled girl during days, but she just can't get her brain to do the simplest logical task for now, 'first look, then shoot' how her father always teaches Kate. But she can't help but grin as the guards even do help the two heroes and after waving a thanking gesture to the guards beneath them , Kate turns to the east side of the roof, only to watch the thief escaping to the next building, "Oh damned, not THIS one!" she is angry, as she had just stayed here and the thief would have run into her open arms.
"She ain't got away yet!" Ben says he he turns and makes a running jump trying to reach the roof of the next building. He's not able to jump for miles the way that green knucklehead can.. but he's can clear a pretty impressive distance thanks to his raw strength. Still he can't pursue the thief into the building at least without causing way to much collateral damage.... "Um... ok... I think.. Yeah she's in there!" he says, helpfully' pointing to the building he is standing on.
Nocturna reaches the corner of the building and drops a smoke bomb, as the smoke covers her she turns into mist and vanishes carrying anything within a hand's breadth of her body...including the gem...