Sell you a Bridge chapter 117

Doomhollow Hall November 6th 2010 10:00 PM EDT

We  weren't ambushed surprisingly, but that made sense since they wanted to  hire is for a job. However, the gems weren't really useful to us, which  we told them. We arranged to meet up again once they had sufficient  compensation and we would take a few days to think about it. Most of the  restaurants seemed to have a decent enough surplus to run for a few  more days. Luckily Gotham was a nightmare factory and all the eateries  had much larger storage areas than normal in case of partial lockdown or  some kind of attack on the food production industry.

We  made it back to the island pretty quickly, thanks in part to the nearby  teleporter, and called everyone together in the map room. Zee and  Artemis had been awake practicing with their lightning, and Blood and  Madame Xanadu had shown up too. We explained the situation, and everyone  looked like they had a headache. Madame Xanadu bit her lip worriedly.  "Food shortages are going to be a problem. I imagine the large factions  have stockpiles of non perishable goods, or else they wouldn't be so  quick to let the eateries remain open, but Poison Ivy would definitely  help take some of the pressure off."

Artemis  snorted. "Assuming she decides to help instead of actively hindering  everyone. Hell, I'd be more surprised if she didn't. The idea of growing  a ton of plants for people to eat isn't likely to appeal to her. She's  more liable to grow a bunch of plants that eat people instead. Are we  really going to break someone like that out of Blackgate? I mean sure, I  doubt it would be hard with Morgan's shadow jumping but still." Artemis  was a Gotham native, so she knew what Poison Ivy was all about.  Honestly having grown up here I kind of agreed.

Jim  however, just shook his head. "Someone like Talia wouldn't arrange a  jailbreak unless she had the means of controlling her. It just isn't the  Shadow's style. Unfortunately we have a larger problem. Morgan's shadow  jumping most likely won't work in Blackgate. Similarly my own means of  entry will be rendered unusable. I imagine that was the whole point of  hiring us in the first place. Blackgate island wasn't chosen to be a  super powered prison because of it's ominous name. It used to be the  headquarters of the Religion of Crime, and they warded the place to  hell. If we go in we have to do it the slow way unfortunately."

That...wasn't  good. If Jim was bothering to mention it these would be heavy duty  wards too, nothing I could take awaprt or pick a hole in like Zatara's. I  couldn't imagine what would be needed to ward a whole island like that  but I assumed having it meant the Religion of Crime were people we  definitely shouldn't fuck with. Regardless that complicated things.  "That's...good to know I guess. The question becomes then are we really  going to accept the job?" I felt compelled to at least ask, though I  most likely knew the answer already.

Zee,  knowing I was just playing devil's advocate, just nodded. My girlfriend  was easily the most heroically inclined of our little band of  reprobates. "People in town are going to need to eat. We can assume  Poison Ivy will be handled at least until we get out of this mess. The  Shadow's have a reputation for handling their business, they wouldn't  have stuck around this long by making mistakes. The question is are  teleports the only thing the wards will block? Will we have access to  our powers on the island?"

Jim  nodded. "I admit to being surprised you wish to participate but then,  this is more in your wheelhouse I suppose. In any case the answer is  some of them. Non spatial shadow manipulation should still work, though  it'll be a bit weakened. In fact most magic we use will be lessened in  effect inside the prison. Not only is the island warded, Blackgate  itself was constructed with power dampeners and a few other  countermeasures." He sighed, sitting back in his seat. "I'm afraid the  easiest way in will probably be as prisoners. That said who knows if the  police are even still arresting people in this madness, much less  taking them to prison."

I  frowned at that. We had a connection with the commissioners daughter,  but I doubted Gordon would agree to send a bunch of teen thieves into a  dangerous super powered prison no matter how good our reasons. Without  that as an option I could only really think of one way to get it. I  groaned, turning to Artemis. "Did you end up meeting up with Wally when  you went to Archie's place? I was distracted by the meeting thing and  forgot to ask." She raised a questioning eyebrow at that, but nodded. I  sighed. "Can you get in touch with him again?"

She  shrugged. "I mean sure, but what do you need..." She swore. "No,  Morgan. He doesn't know I'm Neith, and if you make me contact him for  you it's going to blow everything. You were the one who convinced me to  give us another shot, you can't ask me to tank my whole relationship so  you can ask him to team up on a prison break." Her voice was hot and  angry, but I could see from her aura there was far more fear in her than  rage. The worst part was I could also see she would do it if I really  asked, she knew how important this could be.

Luckily  it wasn't necessary. I just shook my head. "No need. I was asking if  you were in touch because we can use the map and your recent contact  with him to track him down. I'll approach him in person along with Jim  and Reggie, and you and Zee can stay behind." They looked outraged but I  held my hands up placatingly. "I know. But Zee, the boy wonder is  crushing on you hard and I don't need him fucking up and being an idiot  to impress you or somehow prove I'm unworthy or whatever. This needs to  be clean." I turned to my best friend. "Artemis, you won't be able to  operate properly worrying so much about getting discovered. You two will  be here, acting as overwatch."

I pulled up the island interface and dropped two hundred and fifty points on something I'd been eyeing for a while. Psychokinetic  Sending Stones. Allows long range telepathic messages delivered between  stones via mental sending. 50 points per stone. Immune to most methods  of detection. The stones were pricey. Since they could only  contact each other their usefulness was fairly limited, but the  functionality when combined with the map was incredible, but my major  reason for buying them was that last bit. A mostly uncrackable  communication method that worked over long range was invaluable.

Unlike  with my power, the island didn't bother with theatrics like a door. A  small box of polished wood just materialized on the table in front of  me. At the questioning looks I shared the prompt with my team, Blood,  and Madame Xanadu who all seemed sufficiently impressed. I reached down  to open up the box. The lid wasn't latched or anything and it opened  smoothly, revealing a bed of red velvet with five small black spheres  sitting in depressions in the cushion. Along with the purchase I'd  gotten a bit of info on using them, so I picked one up and popped it  into an ear. I turned to my team. "They're easy to put in, just slip it  into your ear don't worry about getting them back out they can be  summoned to the box."

The  others grabbed them and slipped them in while I explained the function.  "I picked these for a few reasons, they're basically walkie talkies.  Aside from being nearly undetectable and almost impossible to jam or  intercept, they're also sending stones. Since they aren't an active  mental connection but rather a skill that can be engaged with focus and  effort we won't be picking up background noise or accidentally hearing  each others deepest secrets. You have to have intent to send with the  stones. The psychokinetic part I can't tell you anything about sadly, my  best guess is that it uses psychokinetic motion to mimic sound waves  over some kind of psychic field."

This  last bit was mostly for Zee, who loved things like that and was already  gleefully stuffing hers in her ear. She then sent me a series of rather  graphic images of things we'd done in bed together and I blinked. I  amended my earlier statement. "Or maybe not, since apparently these  sending stones can send images too. Regardless it works somehow, and  that's a huge win for us. Hell the images thing will be invaluable, on  the job. Now with this and the girls on overwatch with the map we should  have a solid chance to pull this off right Jim?"

My  mentor nodded. "Quite right, my boy." He leaned over the table, pulling  up the map and zooming in. "This map alone is an exceptional resource,  it seems to be perfectly accurate, and I suspect some of these tunnels  and entrances aren't listed on any modern maps or even known by the  current occupants. A proper set of blueprints is one of the most  dangerous and effective tools a thief can have." He zoomed closer still,  pulling up a nearby island. At seeing my surprise he chuckled. "Yes,  Blackgate is fairly close by. Not within range of the defenses obviously  but within forty miles or so." He began to slowly shift the map over  every inch of the island, studying it closely as he went.

I  turned to Artemis and gestured for her phone, which she handed me  without complaint. I closed my eyes and envisioned a connection between  the map and the data on the phone, and then I cheated. I dumped nearly  sixty points into my demonic magic, forcibly creating the connection  with my imagination based spell. The energy needed was shockingly large  for such an insignificant spell and I fell backwards into a chair behind  me with a gasp before weakly handing Artemis her phone back.

My  friend and girlfriend looked concerned but I waved them off. "It's  fine. Just a little low on power. While Jim plans our entry I'm going to  get the justice bros on board." I checked my points, wincing at only  have forty or so left. "Tomorrow. Aside from being late I also don't  want to put myself in a position where I have to fight them without  points. I mean, I could fucking butcher the whole lot of them, but  that's sort of the point. I'd pretty much have to kill them and I really  don't want to." We had enough problems without becoming the League's  public enemy number one because I decapitated Batman's bouncing baby  brat.

Artemis  chuckled at my obvious overestimation of my own abilities. "Sounds  good. Just...don't overdo it ok Morgan? I know it's tempting to think of  this as a sprint, but I have a feeling we're going to be in here a  while. If you grind yourself down to nothing in the first few days or  weeks we'll be pretty screwed. I think our major goal should be to help  Talia get Poison Ivy and then hole up here for a while to upgrade the  base. We can set up our own food production here right? I mean nothing  large scale from what you said, but even a way to feed just us would be  useful."

I  smiled at that, and, thanking her, switched over to the base building  interface. She was right. Poison Ivy could feed everyone in the bubble  or close to it, but we didn't need to depend on her. The restaurants on  the island could be bought and upgraded with points, so our families  could eat whatever we needed. This would also be a good way to pull in  fringe elements we wanted to recruit. Given a few weeks and offering a  guy a ribeye would be more impressive than giving him a chest full of  gold. I brought up the amenities tab and started to browse with a smile.  We had a way to move forward.