Ghost Spider - Chapter 11-15 (Patreon)

Chapter 11...in other news, the supervillain known as ‘Ghost Spider’ was seen after the abduction of GCPD Detective Renee Montoya...” the newscaster said as a grainy video played, showing Ghost Spider firing a webline into the distance and jumping into the air with the limp form of the detective slung over her shoulder.*thunk*”...the detective was one of several members of the GCPD attacked last night, and while neither Ghost Spider or the police have released a statement regarding these incidents; it is possible that these attacks are linked…”*thunk*”...no demands have been made so far for the return of Detective Montoya, but we at Channel 7 have been asked to remind the public that Ghost Spider is considered to be a dangerous metahuman and should be avoided or approached with caution if absolutely necessary. If you have any information about the location or sighting of this villain, do not try to confront her and call the local GCPD for assistance. Our next story is the potential disappearance of the dau…” The TV shut off.*thunk**thunk**thunk*“If you aren’t going to be helpful, stop trying to destroy the table. I still need it.” an annoyed Renee Montoya growled at the black and white figure next to her as she dug through Captain Stacy’s recovered journals.The newly branded villain rolled her head to the side and gave the detective a pleading look, surprisingly effective when the oversized white eyes made her look rather pitiful, and made a weird whining noise that was a mix of indignation and disbelief. All while gesturing at the now turned off TV.Renee rolled her eyes.“What were you expecting? No one’s managed to actually talk with you after all those incidents you get caught up in and Roman Falcone isn’t an idiot. Of course he’s going to push the blame on you to stop anyone looking at his group. Especially if he really is about to make a big move like you told me.”“You’re sure you don’t want to call into the station and let everyone know you’re fine?” Ghost Spider whined. It might’ve been childish, but she was almost willing to scrap the advantage of having the detective safe and willing to help if it salvaged her reputation. Almost.“I owe you one kid, but I don’t owe you that much.” Renee said with humor. “Besides, it’s only for a couple days at most. We’ll find a way to clear your name then.”Ghost Spider growled but didn’t say anything.It might only be a few days but that would be plenty of time to cement the name ‘Ghost Spider’ and ‘villain’ together.“Fine,” She said mulishly instead. “Is there anything else we can do then? Reach out to your boss or something?”“He probably already knows.” Renee said, turning a page. “He was cagey the last time I saw him and definitely getting ready for something. It's better not to split his focus right now.”“And not let him know his detective is fine and not being tortured or something?”“Oh he knows,” that caused Ghost Spider to blink, “and if he hasn’t asked me to come in then it means he wants me out of sight for now.”“And how does he know that?!”Renee smirked and held up a small electronic device.“Pagers. Hardly anyone uses them anymore and they can’t be tracked. I let him know once we stopped here.”Here being a hotel room that they had broken into. Not exactly a safehouse, but then Ghost Spider wasn’t keeping Renee hostage so that was fine. They only needed to be there for as long as it took to plan their next move and the place had a TV and internet connection.“Huh, that’s...neat.” Certainly not something Ghost Spider would’ve considered but it was a cool trick.“Don’t think only the superheroes have neat tricks, kid. Even normal people might surprise you.” Renee laughed.“I’ll definitely keep it in mind. Will you be fine if I leave you here then?” Ghost Spider asked, getting up in preparation to leave.Renee cocked an eyebrow. “And why would you be leaving me here?”“Whu-Why?!” Ghost Spider stammered incredulously. “The auction is tonight! Falcone is going to kick off a major gang war and I need to do something about it. You aren’t expecting me to babysit you here, are you?”“And what exactly are you planning to do?” Renee asked in return. “Run around the city looking for foot soldiers and hoping to stumble into something big enough to derail their plan?”“...I know a few meeting points they are going to use. I’d probably get a few lieutenants if I was fast enough.”The detective nodded. “Not the worst plan, but that won’t matter in the big picture. Anyone you take out would be little fish. What we need to do is take out a major cog in their operation.”“Would you stick to one expression?” Ghost Spider muttered. “Fine, you have a better idea then.” it wasn’t a question.“I do.” Renee held up the notebook she had been going through. “The police can deal with the small fry. We are going after the specialists.” She pointed at one specific passage where the words ‘Royal Emerald’ had been underlined several times. It was apparently some method of payment for a mercenary that was mentioned in several plans.With the sheer amount of danger the mercenary was supposed to face in each operation mentioned in the notebooks; they were either world-class or a metahuman. A rarity when dealing with the Gotham mob, since the various groups tended to operate old-school and disliked reaching out past their own respective groups unless forced.But then none of them had done anything this ambitious recently either, so maybe it shouldn’t have been that surprising.“I thought of trying something like that too, but I don’t know who the mercenary is or where they would be.” Ghost Spider admitted.“I don’t know who it is either, but you’re thinking too direct. All we need to do is deny them their prize. No merc is going to work for free and if this is the payment then no amount of money is going to convince them otherwise.”“Why’s that?”“Because ‘Royal Emerald’ is the black market slang for Kryptonite.” Renee explained as Ghost Spider’s eyes widened in shock. “Anyone with the skills to work for something like that can make as much money they want without the risks these jobs are expecting. No, if Roman can’t pay with the Kryptonite then whoever this merc is, is going to walk.”“That still doesn’t matter if we don’t know where they are.”Renee smirked. “We might not know where the merc is, but we do have a lead on where his payment might be…”-o-Ghost Spider looked at the five storied gothic building from a rooftop across the street.“Are you serious?” she asked into a short-range headset Renee had given her out of a stashed duffle bag the detective had in a safe location.The building belonged to one of the most prominent art appraisers in the city. Sculptures, paintings, jewelry, poems...if it was art worth anything and hadn’t been (officially) stolen then it passed through here.”Where else would you keep a highly regulated material than a place no one would expect it or has any business poking around in?” Renee said dryly. ”We’ve known the gangs use the Roderick Appraisal building for their more semi-legal art dealings but since they all use it, they have a vested interest in keeping us away, and the Commish hasn’t been able to get around their blocks yet. But a couple days ago, word on the street was that the Falcone had something moved here under heavy guard. I’m guessing it’s our merc’s payment since keeping it anywhere near their personal vaults would be too much heat for them.”Ghost Spider looked over the mini-fortress in front of her. Guards were visible just inside the doors and CCTV cameras covered nearly every square inch of the building.“And you want me to break into it...in the middle of the day...with no idea where in the building it might be…?””Don’t be so pessimistic. The Falcone have a reserved vault -through an alias, naturally- that's on the fourth floor. Our target should be somewhere around there.”Ghost Spider sighed.“I don’t suppose you have a plan on how to actually get in there?”There was a crackle of static that Ghost Spider interpreted as a sarcastic huff. ”Don’t look at me. You’re the supervillain thief here. Not me.”Ghost Spider very pointedly did not reply to that. Instead she started looking over the building more closely, trying to find a weak point in their surveillance net she could take advantage of.She ended circling the building a few times before she settled on a potential option. There was an air vent leading into the fifth floor that was only monitored by a single camera. It was on a bare section of wall and protected by the overhanging ledge on the roof, so there was little chance of it being used easily as a means of entrance...unless you could walk on walls.But first there was a camera that needed to be handled.Ghost Spider quickly crawled down the wall to where she was slightly above the white plastic housing of the camera and held out a hand. A small bump formed on the back of it and quickly shaped itself into a spider. With a small mental nudge the little arachnid scurried onto the camera and positioned itself just off the lens.That should be good enough.Working quickly and trusting her invisibility to hide her from the people on the street below, Ghost Spider removed the screws holding the vent grate in place. With another nudge her spider crawled onto the lens; conveniently blocking the vent from view as Ghost Spider removed the grate, slipped inside, and secured it in place with a bit of webbing.The interior of the vent was tight but still sufficient for Ghost Spider to slip further into the building. Every so often, another spider formed and split off to investigate the rooms she passed. Detective Montoya might have an idea where the Falcone might hide her target but there was a possibility that they could’ve hidden it elsewhere in the building to throw off suspicion.Through her spiders, she was able to investigate most of the fifth floor with no issues. But it seemed there was little chance that anyone would be keeping kryptonite on this floor. Nearly everything was personal offices or filing rooms, with only a handful of people walking about. None of them looked like they might be guarding very expensive objects, so she quickly made her way to the central air shaft and went down to the fourth floor.It was only a single floor, but the difference in security was massive.Pairs of guards stood at the end of every hallway and each room was locked with a metal door and an impressive looking keypad. Even when her spiders managed to find a way inside, Ghost Spider wasn’t always able to determine what was in a room; the contents sealed in airtight containers.“Montoya, any way to narrow this down? I can’t go poking through the rooms without alerting someone that I’m in here.” Ghost Spider whispered into her headset.”You’re already inside!? How...no nevermind, these kinds of buildings need to submit blueprints to the city for safety reasons. There should be a reinforced vault in the middle of the second through fourth floors. You’ll need to check in there.”It took some searching but Ghost Spider found the route to the middle of the floor and the entrance to the vault room. She almost missed it because unlike the display rooms, this one was behind an unassuming wooden door that led to a much more advanced metal one.In fact, Ghost Spider only realised it wasn’t just a janitor’s closet or something like that because of a man and a woman walked underneath her talking about the vault itself.“...will have three seconds to insert and turn your key. Then you will be free to retrieve the contents of your box.” the man was explaining. “As you know we take our security very strictly here so in the event your key does not work for any reason you will be detained until either the fault is found or you are handed to the police.”“Of course, I would expect nothing less from Roderick’s.” the woman replied.“I think I found my way inside.” Ghost Spider whispered to Renee. “Don’t know how secure the vault is, so I might lose reception.””Got it. Be careful.” was the reply.Ghost Spider carefully shadowed the couple, trying to stay close enough to slip in behind them yet far enough away a casual movement wouldn’t bump into her invisible form.She felt her heart start hammering faster when the woman paused and looked behind her, eyes skimming over Ghost Spider and looking down the hallway.The man noticed and paused. “Something wrong, Ms. Franklin?”“...no, nothing.” she said eventually, eyes still scanning behind her. “I just thought I felt someone watching me.”“I assure you, if someone tried breaking into this building we would know about it. We use some of the most advanced security features on the market.” the man replied. “Perhaps that is what is bothering you? Several of our clients have remarked on feeling observed in the past.”“...yeah. That must be it.” the woman didn’t sound convinced at all but dropped it.Ghost Spider silently released a sigh of relief.That could’ve been bad.The three of them entered the door after the man typed in a passcode and swiped a card through a reader. Ghost Spider made sure to memorise the code over his shoulder, just in case, and they entered the vault proper.The inside was about what Ghost Spider expected. Heavy sealed containers lined the room, each one with a pair of keyholes and an electronic display in front of them. Unsurprisingly there were no cameras on the inside, couldn’t have there be proof of stolen goods out there as possible blackmail afterall, so Ghost Spider was able to duck behind one of the containers and decloak. She hadn’t been invisible long so the stamina drain wasn’t an issue, but she also didn’t want to risk getting in trouble because of it. Besides there were only two people in here, they shouldn’t be a problem…Her thoughts ground to a halt when there was a crash and she peeked around the containers to find the man unconscious on the floor and the woman digging through his pockets.“Honestly, this is such a pain,” the woman was saying to herself. “I spent weeks scoping this place out and in the end I nearly managed to walk through the front door. What a waste of time.” she pulled out a key and looked it over before putting it into her jacket. “Of course, now I need to deal with YOU!”Ghost Spider’s eyes widened as her spider sense blared an alarm. In the blink of an eye the woman stashed the key, retrieved a whip from her jacket, and lashed out at Ghost Spider’s hiding spot. On pure instinct, Ghost Spider raised an arm to protect her face. The whip coiled around her forearm and with a sharp tug the woman pulled her out into the open.“Well now, what’s a little spider doing sneaking around here for? I heard that word on the street was that you were trying to play hero.”“Oh, you know, heard this place had some cool stuff and decided to take a tour.” Ghost Spider quipped back. Internally she was studying everything about the woman. Pretty, short black hair, a very athletic build mostly hidden by the formal pantsuit she was wearing, and she knew how to use that whip. Plus, she knew Ghost Spider was setting out to be a hero.She had literally -and depressingly- only told the Batfamily and Detective Montoya about that. And considering the detective hadn’t mentioned knowing someone who could break into this place Ghost Spider doubted she had called this person here, which meant it was someone the Bat Brigade knew…Catwoman!It fit.Appearance-wise the woman matched what Ghost Spider knew of Selina Kyle and she probably had the skills to back it up. That still didn’t tell her why Catwoman was poking around a semi-legal business operated by several mafia families.“Can’t say I’ve been impressed though.” She continued “So far it’s just been offices and some boring display rooms. Not really worth the trouble if you know what I mean, so I guess I’m wondering what brought you here…..kitty cat.”“Aren’t you just a clever little girl…” Catwoman, well, purred. She slowly moved away from the unconscious man but stayed in a combat crouch, ready to react to anything Ghost Spider did. “...but if you know who I am, then you should already know why I’m here.I’m far more interested in what a self-proclaimed hero is doing breaking into vaults. Looking for a career change already?”Ghost Spider debated exactly what she should say. Neither one of them probably wanted a fight, that would draw too much attention to the both of them, but she also didn’t want to just start telling her plans to everyone that asked. She tried the full disclosure approach once and got burned for it.“Let’s just say I’m here for asset denial.” She said eventually. “I really doubt it has anything to do with why you’re here, so why don’t you just grab what you came for and we’ll go our separate ways?”“Hmmm, but now you have me curious. Maybe there’s something here more interesting than a prized statue stolen by a bunch of mobsters. So what is it? C’mon you can tell me.”“Just a fancy rock wanted by some mercenary.” Ghost Spider deflected, she refused to respond to such easy bait. Some jokes were so low hanging fruit they were on the floor, and she was better than that.“I like rocks,” Catwoman said offhandedly. “I’ve got quite the collection too. Why don’t you tell me about this one or things might get a bit tricky for you.”Ghost Spider scoffed. “What, you're going to fight me in the middle of their vault? That just means you won’t get what you want either.” she pointed out.“Not quite,” Catwoman said as she slowly stood up and slid closer to one of the containers. “Afterall I am currently allowed to be in here.” she placed a hand on her collarbone, ”if the alarms go off then I’m just ‘Erika Franklin’, the poor woman that was attacked in their secure vault. You get to deal with security and I’ll just come back later. So why don’t you make it easy and just tell me what you’re after?”That was definitely something Ghost Spider wasn’t exactly thrilled to do. Catwoman tended to be the ‘lightest shade of grey’ when it came to the Gotham Rogues, but she was obviously still a criminal. That, and there was a very good chance word would get back to the Batfamily and she was already going to have to deal with her new villainous image, she didn’t want more complications with that future conversation.But at the same time she couldn’t think of a way to get out of it without risking an alarm being set off. And since both of them knew how little time there was until the auction…Ghost Spider took a mental step back.What if Catwoman didn’t know about it?She hinted that she talked to someone in the Batfamily, sure, but that didn’t mean they read her into everything going on as well. Nightwing seemed prepared to keep everything ‘in house’ as it were, besides reaching out to Commissioner Gordon for support. Which meant...“That's fine. I managed to break in here today pretty easily.” she told the thief. “But it sounds like you put quite a bit of effort into your heist. Trip the alarm and I’ll just come back later, I’m not in a rush.”It was a pretty big bluff-Catwoman scowled but relaxed out of her crouch and turned her back on Ghost Spider, walking over to one of the containers.-but it had a good chance of working.Still, Ghost Spider was practically gaping at the blatant dismissal by the older woman. Even if they weren’t going to fight, turning your back on someone you had just been threatening seemed like a dumb move.“Don’t act so surprised, little spider. We both know we don’t have time before someone notices something going on in here and comes to take a look. We tested each other, we both called a bluff, just don’t get in my way.” Catwoman said as she opened the container and pulled out a fancy but ancient looking wooden statue...which she immediately shattered to reveal several modern day tools. “Now I’m going to get what I came here for. We can continue our conversation after that or you can run off now.”After that, Catwoman seemed content to ignore her and started poking at another container. Ghost Spider wasted a couple seconds just staring at the woman in surprise but eventually shook herself out of it and began looking for her own target.It didn’t take her long. Knowing the properties of kryptonite meant that the container would need to be a certain size and shielded for radiation. Otherwise it would ruin anything else in the vault or build up a charge and douse the next person to open the container in harmful energy. With those conditions, Ghost Spider found the possible containers almost immediately. The problem was determining which one of the five held her target when they were all a featureless white metal with only an electronic lock for clues.“Well you don’t think small, I’ll give you that.” Catwoman said as she came up behind Ghost Spider depositing a golden egyptian cat statue into a bag. “Might not want to mess with these though. They’re alarmed to go off if anyone messes with the casing and I don’t see an access port so you aren’t hacking it.”Ghost Spider looked over her shoulder, one eye enlarged in a parody of a raised eyebrow. “Why are you still here then? You got what you came for already, if you want to get out before the alarms start ringing now's the best time.”Catwoman shrugged, “Call me curious. It’s not often I see someone able to sneak into a place like this without looking in a mirror.”“I appreciate the compliment at least.” the thief nearly pouted when Ghost Spider still refused to take the bait.Ghost Spider didn’t really care and went back to looking at the electronic locks.It was advanced stuff. A LexCorp RAU-1336 model. Sturdy, reliable, and with very few exploitable software flaws Ghost Spider wasn’t going to be able to crack the password for these without a decent computer on hand.“Not to rush you, but time is running out.” Catwoman reminded her. “If you want my help you just have to tell me what you're after.”Ghost Spider ignored her and walked up to each of the five containers and proceeded to yank the touchpad out from it’s housing. While the containers themselves were alarmed to detect tampering, by necessity the panel itself wasn’t and there was a hardware defect she could take advantage of.With quick movements she separated out the grounding wire and cut it after shifting her fingers to resemble wire cutters and a simple application of her super strength. Then she stripped the negative wire and shorted out the system. There was a spark and a flash as alarms suddenly started going off in the background, but more importantly the electronic lock was forced into test mode as the electric surge fried its insides. The locks receded and opened to reveal...a 1809 bottle of wine.“Well done,” Catwoman admitted grudgingly. “But not a rock by the look of it.”“Why are you still here?” Ghost Spider complained, already moving to the next container and repeating the steps. This one was an old book that was nearly crumbling with age.“Curiosity.” Catwoman repeated. Then complained when Ghost Spider said nothing in return. “You’re no fun, kid.”“Little busy at the moment.” Ghost Spider had moved onto the fourth container, “Gotcha!”, and finally found the softball sized chunk of kryptonite. She covered it in webbing and secured the resulting ball to the small of her back.There was a crack of a whip and a thump as a body hit the floor.Ghost Spider turned back to the entrance to see Catwoman dealing with a pair of guards that had come to investigate.“Alright then, time’s up. We have to go.”Ghost Spider was still wondering why the thief was hanging around, especially when she had already gotten what she came here for, but she was right. This wasn’t the time to stand around.The spider themed hero followed her out of the vault and into another group of armed guards. The guards tried to level their handguns at the two of them, but Ghost Spider snared all of them with webbing before they had the chance to fire and buy that point Catwoman was close enough to put them down with a series of kicks and throws that put all the guards on the ground.“This way.” She said and pulled Ghost Spider into another display room.“Hold that door for a bit.” Catwoman ordered and knocked over an antique clay pot.Ghost Spider simply webbed the door shut and turned to see the other woman pulling a whitish putty out of the debris and lining the room’s window with the stuff.“Is that C4?!” she exclaimed as Catwoman pulled out a blasting cap and placed it on the putty.“Yep,” the certifiably insane thief chirped while kicking over a table and crouching behind it, gesturing Ghost Spider to come join her. “You’re gonna want to cover your ears for this.”Ghost Spider wasted no time diving behind the table and covering up as suggested. “Aren't you supposed to be a cat burglar?!” she complained.“Sorry, not that kind of job this time.”There was a click and then the wall exploded. When Ghost Spider trusted it was safe she peeked out to find the window was now just a hole. Catwoman was clearly crazy, but she knew what she was doing. That was the perfect amount of explosive to blow the window and not bring the roof down or kill them with the blastwave.Catwoman was out the hole in a flash, somehow in the few moments Ghost Spider had been covering herself for the explosion, the thief had shed her pantsuit and was decked out in a tight leather catsuit. Not one to be left behind Ghost Spider was right on her tail.The pair quickly made it to the neighboring roofs and took off with Catwoman following after Ghost Spider.After some changes in direction to make sure no one was following them Ghost Spider eventually came to a halt and decided to ask why she was still being tailed.“Still want to know what the big deal is with the ‘rock’.” was Catwoman’s answer. “But mostly it’s because she wanted to talk.” the thief pointed to the other side of the roof where Batgirl had just touched down. In an instant Ghost Spider was crouched and had her back to the ledge of the roof so she could look at both the others.“Hold on! We just want to talk!” Batgirl exclaimed and took a few steps forward, her arm raised in her direction.“Although if you’re planning to run, think again.” Ghost Spider whirled around to see Supergirl floating above her, arms crossed over her chest.Caught between two superheroes and an allied supervillain/antihero. There was really only one though on Ghost Spider’s mind.’Well….shit.’

Chapter 12

“Come on, come on, pick up!”

”Hey, you reached Gwen Stacy. I can’t come to the phone right now, please leave a message.”

“Damnit!” Barbara cursed for maybe the millionth time that morning and threw her phone away in disgust.

How did everything fall apart so quickly?

They had been so confident.  With the information they got from Ghost Spider, the Batfamily had been able to track most of the Falcone’s movements. With a bit of Kara’s help they had tracked nearly every single weapon cache and gathering point. A tip to her father and the entire GCPD could swarm them once he gave the order to the few leaders who weren’t bought and the rest would fall in line to keep their jobs.

What they didn’t plan on was Falcone targeting those same officers the night before. Break-ins, assaults, car crashes. The list went on, but a majority of the people Barbara knew her father could count on were now indisposed for a variety of reasons.

She knew that normally this amount of assault on the police force would call for a major crackdown on the party responsible that no criminal organisation would willingly consider, but the Falcone were already planning to go to war. They knew that they would end up attracting the attention of every cop in the city anyway so they struck first.

While that was a disaster and a half that had kept all of them up for most of the night, it wasn’t the cause of her stress at the moment.

No, that was reserved for the news her father had told her the night before.

Barbara had just gotten an alert that several officers were attacked and received a video clip from Tim showing Ghost Spider hauling off Detective Renee Montoya at the same time. Before anyone could suit up and track down the spider themed meta and find out what the hell she was doing, her dad had knocked on the door and told her that Gwen’s apartment had been broken into as well and Gwen was now missing.

The only reason he told her was because some news vulture had been lurking nearby for a followup article about her father’s murder. The journalist had found the door to Gwen’s place broken and the insides trashed before calling the department. Her dad didn’t know for sure if Gwen had been kidnapped but he didn’t want the first Barbara to hear of her friend’s possible fate to be the morning news.

So while Dick and Tim took over the search for Ghost Spider, even going so far as to let some of their more questionable contacts in the city know they were looking for her, Barbara and Kara had done their best to find out what happened to Gwen but had turned up nothing.

So now Barbara was torn between preparing for a major underworld incident and worrying about her friend.

“Y’know, I was thinking…” a voice broke her out of her reminiscing.

“That’s dangerous.” she replied immediately, more out of habit than malice. Barbara looked over to Kara, who was floating like she was on a couch rather than just hanging midair. The kryptonian was in her superhero uniform, the same as Barbara, although since they were currently in the middle of the Batcave Barbara had left her cowl down, allowing her to look her other friend in the eyes.

“Ha ha. Funny.” Kara rolled her eyes and floated over to one of the computer screens that were automatically troweling the internet looking for any mention of Ghost Spider. So far it was mostly reactions to the news story that played this morning. “Anyways, I was thinking, this kidnapping thing? It doesn’t fit Spidey-girl’s MO.”

Barbara snorted at Kara’s nickname for the new meta. She only wished the new girl didn’t wear a full facemask so they could see her reaction to that the first time she heard it. “Yeah, I know what you mean. Even if we ignored everything she said, so far she’s been spotted at either warehouses or near a bunch of cash. I’d understand if she was hired by the Falcone but if she was then I don’t think she’d have given us all that information.”

“Double agent?” Kara asked, more to help Barbra organize her thoughts than out of real belief.

“Not likely.” Barbara shook her head. “If she was, then they would’ve started prepping to move their gear when we turned down her help.”

“Probably.” her friend agreed.

“I can think of three reasons why Detective Montoya was kidnapped. First, she knew/was involved in something going to happen tonight, so Ghost Spider took her out before then. Not likely, Montoya is one of the people my dad trusts most in the department. Second, Ghost Spider is working with the Falcone… I could kinda see it? If she didn’t believe that we could stop them from starting a gang war she might be looking to get on their good side.”

“And they’d just ignore her dumping the whole plan to you and Dick?” Kara raised an eyebrow.

“Well I doubt she’d tell them if they didn’t know she did that.” Barbara scoffed.

“And third?”

“Third… I think GS had more info than she gave us.” the redhead said slowly. “I know she gave us a lot with that binder, but she knew about the Falcone planning something when no one else had a clue. And what she gave us was mostly just what she had confirmed herself. Who knows what kind of stuff she was looking into but didn’t include? I bet she figured something after our meeting and that tipped her off about the attack on the officers.”

Kara tapped a finger on her chin in thought. “I could see that. But why not let anyone else know? Even if she was mad at us, she could’ve reached out if people were in danger.”

Barbara winced. “After the way Dick brushed her off? I don’t know about that.”

Kara gave her a look and then nodded. “Yeah, I see your point. It’s bad enough when Batman and Kal do that to us. Coming from someone our age? I’d be pissed too.”

Barbara nodded back. Dick had been trying to emulate Bruce more lately to mixed results. It usually worked out but other times it really came back to bite them. Especially with the younger heroes.

“Think she might know what happened to your friend?”

“I think she would be the best person to ask.” Barbara mused. “From what we can tell she was at Montoya’s before anyone else was attacked so she could’ve gotten a message to Gwen also and ran out of time.” she shook her head again. “But we shouldn’t assume that. Let’s just…” she trailed off.

“What?” Kara floated back over to Barbara’s chair and tried reading the alert that had distracted her.

“We just got an alert from one of our friends in the city.” Barbara said as she pulled her cowl over her head and adjusted it. “Apparently Catwoman found GS.”

“Really! Where?”

“The Roderick Appraisal building. She’s robbing one of the vaults there.”

Kara paused for a second. “And how does Catwoman know that?”

“Cause she’s probably robbing the same vault.”

“...right. Why haven’t you guys gone after her yet?”

“Batman has a deal with her. She sticks to only robbing criminals, not that that really cuts down her options, and helps us out by keeping an ear out for anything we’d be interested in. In return we don’t really pay attention to her until she crosses a line.”

“Uh, huh. And it’s not because they’re…” Kara curled her fists and made a bumping motion.

Barbara went scarlet.

“NO! Now hurry up, I don’t want to miss them.”

“Psh, relax. I can get us anywhere in the city in no time.” Supergirl scoffed, but did grow a bit more serious. “How do you want to confront her? She’s apparently robbing places in broad daylight now.”

“Dunno, guess we’ll figure it out as we go. Start good cop, bad cop? If she has a good reason then we can ease up.”

“One one condition.”

Batgirl knew she was going to regret this.

“What?”

“I get to be the bad cop.”

“...we’ll flip for it.”

-o-

The two heroines made excellent time to where they were told to meet up with their thief contact. With Supergirl’s abilities it was incredibly easy for her to just take the end of Batgirl’s grapple gun and tow the other girl through the air behind her.

“They should be here pretty soon. What’s your plan?” Batgirl asked once they set down on one of the taller buildings. Easier to see the others coming that way. Normally she was the one to come up with the plan, but Supergirl had won the flip...

“I’m thinking you get her attention and I come in from behind with the whole ‘disapproving parent’ act.” Supergirl shrugged. “Maybe snatch whatever was so important so Spidey-girl doesn’t just run off.”

A little more aggressive than needed in Batgirl’s opinion, but not necessarily a bad plan.

She would’ve liked a bit more detail but two figures running over the rooftops meant they didn’t have much time. Instead she just nodded and readied to jump down to the lower rooftop where Catwoman and Ghost Spider had stopped.

As she landed she heard Catwoman pointing her out to the younger girl and when she looked up she saw Ghost Spider already tensed up and practically ready to run right then and there.

“Hold on! We just want to talk!” Batgirl exclaimed and took a few steps forward, her arm raised to show she wasn’t about to attack.

Despite this Ghost Spider tensed further and looked like she was going to bolt anyway, so Supergirl made her entrance.

“Although if you’re planning to run, think again.”

However Ghost Spider’s mask worked, it made her eyes ridiculously expressive as they widened at Supergirl’s arrival and narrowed immediately after.

“Look, we’re not here to fight. So can we just relax a bit and talk things out?” Batgirl asked, trying to keep things calm.

“Oh, so now you want to work together.” Ghost Spider snapped. “Cause that’s been really working out for me so far.”

Batgirl winced because, fair, but pressed ahead anyway. “I know, I know. We haven’t really given you a fair shake, but we need to know what’s going on and you seem like the only person who has any info on what the Falcone are planning. That’s why you were able to help with Detective Montoya and saved her, right? You said you wanted to be a hero, so work with us here.”

“They’re working together.” Supergirl confirmed. “I can kinda hear the detective on the earpiece she’s wearing.”

“You don’t do ‘privacy’ do you, you flying cheerleader wannabe.” Ghost Spider bristled.

“Ch-cheerleader!?” Supergirl stuttered. “Says the Halloween reject!”

‘Oh no.’ Batgirl thought. Kara’s temper might be better than it used to be, but she still had a hair trigger for some things.

“Right~. Seems like you girls have some things to chat about. So I’m just gonna go. I’ll call if anything else turns up.” Catwoman said off to the side before slipping off the side of the building.

“I offered to work with you already, gave you a ton of information on top of it, and you told me to get lost.” Ghost Spider ranted, ignoring Catwoman’s departure. “And now all of a sudden you change your mind and I should just be happy and jump on the bandwagon, huh? Screw that! I’m outta here...”

The spider-themed girl started to walk off but was forced to stop when Supergirl moved to hover in front of her.

“You want to leave? Fine. We don’t have time to deal with your attitude. But whatever you stole from the Roderick building stays behind.”

“Screw yo-” Before Ghost Spider could finish, Supergirl appeared behind her and reached out to grab the web-covered bundle. Batgirl watched with surprise as Ghost Spider not only reacted fast enough to keep up with the kryptonian, but also was strong enough to stop Supergirl from casually ripping the package out of her hands.

Definitely some super-strength there, not that Supergirl was putting any real effort into it from what Batgirl could tell. Probably being cautious about breaking whatever was inside.

“What the hell are you doing, Superskank! You have no idea what this is!” Ghost Spider hissed.

“It’s stolen, which means it's staying with us if you're going to run off because your feelings are hurt, Spiderslut.” Supergirl shot back.

“It’s dangerous, you idiot! Let go before-”

“Dangerous to you, maybe. Now are you going to stay and work with us or go cry because Nightwing was mean to you?”

“Girls, come on! We’re on the same side!” Batgirl tried to defuse the situation even as the other two spiraled into trading insults like a pair of teenagers. “We don’t need to fi--”

Batgirl was interrupted when Supergirl grew tired of the stalemate on the bundle and gave it a sharp tug. The bundle was ripped out of Ghost Spider’s hand but she must’ve been using her powers to stick to the webs covering it. The covering ripped free with a loud tearing sound and a near perfect outline of Ghost Spider’s hand could be seen on the main bundle, revealing the glowing green crystal underneath.

Supergirl flinched and dropped to the ground as her powers weakened and cut out. Ghost Spider cursed and immediately moved to get closer. Batgirl, in a move she would later regret, saw her friend getting hurt against all odds and a mostly unknown bearing down on her and reacted on instinct. A trio of batarangs pierced the ground in front of Ghost Spider and an LED started blinking rapidly. Half a second later they exploded sending Ghost Spider tumbling backwards. Supergirl just groaned as the kryptonite was sent skittering past her.

Batgirl wanted to start cursing this whole situation and how things were starting to spiral out of control. She didn’t mean to attack Ghost Spider but she didn’t want her getting closer to her friend when she was vulnerable either. She would apologise after she took care of the kryptonite.

She ran to where the dangerous chunk of space rock had been blown off to and prepared to throw her cape over it, the lining in the fabric should at least stop the radiation from doing more damage-

*thwip!*

-only to have a line of silk snag it off the ground and into Ghost Spider’s waiting hand, where she covered it in webbing once more.

“I-” Ghost Spider said darkly and started walking towards Batgirl. “-am sick and tired of you deciding you’re in charge and getting the blame for your screw ups. So here’s the deal. You-” Ghost Spider jabbed a hand forward and webbed Batgirl’s feet to the roof and her hands together. “-are going to just stand there and not do anything else stupid and I-” This time it was Ghost Spider who was interrupted when a still partially dazed Supergirl punched her in the jaw.

The blonde turned to Batgirl and swayed on her feet, that she was actually staying on the ground was enough to worry Batgirl, and smiled. “Good job distracting her.”

Batgirl facepalmed.

-o-

Ghost Spider groaned and absently ran a hand over her aching jaw.

Again she ran into the heroes and the only thing it got her was more trouble. It pissed her off even more because she knew they weren’t always like this. But whatever reason they had for constantly picking a fight with her, she was done. She wasn’t going to keep turning the other cheek trying to get them to listen to her.

She decided enough was enough, she was leaving.

She snagged the bundled kryptonite and prepared to jump off the building when her spider sense blared.

“Where do you think you’re going!”

“Wait Supergirl, don’t!”

Ghost Spider ducked under a grab, spun, and cracked Supergirl in the nose. The heroine cried out in surprise and pain as her fist connected, but despite being relatively unused to pain Supergirl recovered quickly and punched back.

Ghost Spider wove underneath the fist and connected with a body blow this time, that forced some of the air out of Supergirl’s lungs. Supergirl managed to snag her wrist before it could be pulled back and threw Ghost Spider into a nearby wall of a taller building.

The spider themed girl brushed off a few shards of brick that had fallen on her and snarled at the kryptonian.

“What’s the matter? Can’t handle a fair fight?” Supergirl taunted. With the kryptonite covered she was slowly regaining her strength and speed.

“I’ll show you a ‘fair fight’.” Ghost Spider growled and shot two weblines at the blonde hero. Supergirl instinctively raised her arms to protect against the incoming attack and was surprised when neither one of them hit her.

“Wha-oof!”

Instead of using the silk webbing as a direct attack, Ghost Spider had used them as a giant slingshot to slam herself feet first into Supergirl’s stomach. Both girls slammed into the building on the other side of the roof and Ghost Spider quickly attempted to web Supergirl in place, but the kryptonian managed to bring a leg up and kick the metahuman away.

That set the tone for the rest of the fight. Ghost Spider would use her webs to pin/blind/or otherwise slow Supergirl down, occasionally using them to speed herself up to put more force behind an attack, and Supergirl would tank the hits and try to counterattack when she could. Most of Supergirls attacks ended up missing since Ghost Spider was either agile enough to dodge and use a counterattack of her own or her spider sense warned her ahead of time and she was able to avoid it entirely.

Normally, that wouldn’t be an issue for Supergirl. She could take the hits and win as long as she managed a few of her own, but despite her powers no longer being affected by the kryptonite, she was still much less durable than normal and it was starting to show.

Supergirl was actually bleeding in several places from the stronger hits and was gasping for air. Ghost Spider wasn’t untouched either, holding her side where a lucky hit might've cracked a rib. Still, neither one was willing to give up.

“That all you got, Barbie?” Ghost Spider panted.

Supergirl wiped away some of the blood dripping from her nose. “Just getting started, Shelob.”

In fact, they were getting ready for round two.

Before the two could go back to pummeling each other, a pair of bolas suddenly started wrapping themselves around the two fighters. Supergirl was caught around the chest with her arms pinned to her sides while Ghost Spider tried dodging but was still caught around her wrists.

“WOULD YOU TWO CALM DOWN!!” Batgirl shouted, having freed herself and finally found an opening to intervene.

“In case you both forgot,” she continued when she was sure neither Ghost Spider or Supergirl was going to keep fighting. “There is a gang war about to kick off tonight that could have the whole city go up in flames and you two are fighting each other!”

“Are you serious?!” Supergirl exclaimed, eyes wide and after breaking out of the bolas with a bit of effort, jabbed a finger at Ghost Spider. “She’s stealing kryptonite! You know what that can be used for!”

“Yeah, stealing it from the mob boss trying to take over the city! Great job living up to the dumb blonde stereotype!” Ghost Spider spat back, slipping free of her own restraints.

“Oh my god, will you two just-” Batgirl paused as she felt an alert ping on her communicator. Given that it was set to not alert her for anything less than priority one messages, it caught her full attention. Thankfully the other two picked up on the sudden stop and waited while Batgirl pulled the device from her belt and cursed.

“We have a problem. Catwoman just let me know there’s a helicopter on the way. Falcone’s men and they’re loaded with some serious firepower.” Batgirl said gravely.

“That was fast, but just the one? We could take them.” Supergirl responded confidently.

“News flash, cheerleader, you could take them if you were at full strength. Can you even fly right now?” A quick check later revealed that besides hovering a few inches, no Supergirl couldn’t. “How much you wanna bet you aren’t bulletproof at the moment either?”

Supergirl snarled and was about to respond when Batgirl cut in again.

“Look, I know you’re pissed at us, but we need your help. If we don’t get out of here now that helicopter is going to give us all something to worry about. We can lose it in the city but Supergirl can’t fly and I can’t carry her long enough so if you never want anything to do with us fine...but at least help us get out of here.”

Ghost Spider felt a lot of her anger drain away when Batgirl admitted they needed her help. How much of that was because it was a genuine request and how much was because she knew it was Barbara under the mask was up in the air. But she was right. Making sure the Falcone didn’t have a chance to recover the kryptonite was more important than a fight with Supergirl.

“Fine… I’ll follow you.” she agreed. “Get over here, Barbie. Let’s get this over with.”

“We’re finishing this fight after everything this is over, Spider-bitch.” Supergirl swore. “And next time you won’t get a handicap.”

“Hey! Save the city first. Fight later. What part of that didn’t you two understand?” Batgirl called out. “We need to get to a safe spot. Maybe then we can have an actual talk…”

“”She started it!”” Both blondes yelled at the same time only to realise what the other said and glare at each other.

“Well this is going to go great.” Batgirl muttered, firing her grapple gun at another building and letting it pull her into the air.

Chapter 13

Some time later, the three young women had managed to lose the helicopter by ducking into one of the safe rooms Batman had littered throughout the city. It was just a simple soundproofed room in a building owned indirectly by Wayne enterprises through several clever cutouts. Once they were done with it, it would be cleaned and removed from the list and another one set up nearby. Not that Ghost Spider knew any of that. She was simply glad they had a place they could sit down and relax for a bit after a significantly more exciting heist than she was expecting.

“Nice place, must be great to have places like this when the weather sucks.” She commented as she poked around the room, mostly on the lookout for hidden microphones or cameras. If Batgirl or Supergirl were going to pick a fight, the moment had passed.

“It has its moments.” Batgirl agreed as she collapsed into one of the cushioned sofas. Despite the tired display, she was still ready to react if anything broke out. “But we aren’t here to talk about that right now. Supergirl, how you feeling?”

“Like I have the flu. The kryptonite is covered up again, why am I still feeling it?” the heroine complained sitting down next to the redhead.

“The silk probably isn’t enough to block all the radiation coming off it.” Batgirl guessed. “I think it's doing enough that it isn’t draining you more, but it's stopping you from recovering.”

“Fantastic.” Supergirl groused.

“There’s a lead lined safe in the closet over there,” Batgirl waved a hand in the relevant direction. “Feel like being helpful?” she shot at Ghost Spider, who had given up her inspection for the moment.

“I’ve been nothing but helpful.” Ghost Spider said a touch acidically. The anger that had gone down during the trip through the city started to flare up again. “What I don’t feel like, is just jumping to do what you say. So what do you want so badly and how quickly can I leave before the Cheerleader pukes on me or something?”

“What did you…” a very pale and nauseous looking Supergirl started to rise to her feet before Batgirl pulled her back down.

“Right, my bad.” Batgirl backtracked. “But can you please put the radioactive rock somewhere it won’t hurt anyone?”

As mad as Ghost Spider was at the heroes, she wasn’t mad enough to deliberately make one of them suffer being bathed in harmful radiation just to soothe her own temper. So she quickly deposited the rock into the safe with no further comment.

...then she dragged the entire safe with her back to the others and set it down in front of the chair she claimed.

Supergirl raised an eyebrow and Ghost Spider assumed Batgirl was doing the same.

“Call it insurance, since I decided to hang around you two. Despite the fact the city is going to implode tonight and I seem to be the only one trying to do anything about it.” she said dryly.

“You aren’t the only one. The whole reason we went looking for you is because you know something we don’t and our plan to deal with the Falcone all at once isn’t going to work any more.” Batgirl sighed. “I know that you know something more than what you gave Nightwing. Is there anything you can give us?”

Ghost Spider’s eyes narrowed and tracked between the two heroines. Eventually she threw up her hands and started massaging her temples.

“Fine. Finefinefine, fuck! I had fantasies about you coming crawling back to me begging for help and now I can’t even enjoy it because everything about this sucks!” Ghost Spider ranted.

“We are not begging.” Supergirl snapped.

“The worst part is, I don’t even have that much for you.” Ghost Spider continued, ignoring the outburst. “I found a bunch of operational notes for what the Falcone had planned but they aren’t the original documents, just references to certain things and potential plans. Bad news is, most of them already happened or were covered by my own investigation. Detective Montoya has them now, but unless she found something I missed this,” she patted the safe in front of her, “was the biggest blow I could do before tonight.”

“What were the Falcone hoping to do with a bunch of kryptonite? Its nearly useless against normal people.”

Ghost Spider shrugged. “The notes said it was payment. No idea who, but someone wanted this in exchange for participating tonight. I figured if this went missing, the merc might just head home.”

“Smart.” Batgirl admitted, “So those notes are how you knew to be at the Detective’s place?”

“Yep. I was lucky. I found out what was going on a few minutes before everything kicked off and managed to get there in time.”

“Where is she now?”

“If she’s following the backup plan, she should be going to a friend’s house to lay low and regroup.”

“A friend’s?”

“She said it belongs to someone she knows from work, but there’s no reason for the Falcone to look there.”

“If she has the notes on her we might be able to meet and find something you two missed if we’re lucky.” Batgirl mused. “At the very least we can get her to an actual safehouse. Where’s she headed?”

Ghost Spider told them the address.

Coincidentally, Detective Montoya had chosen Gwen’s apartment as their backup location. Ghost Spider figured it made some kind of sense. It was a location the Detective was familiar with, it should be off the Falcone’s radar after the hit on Captain Stacy, and it would be a good excuse to make sure Gwen was safe during everything.

Given that Ghost Spider was currently not running around in her civilian persona, she hoped the note on the table saying she left for a ‘business meeting’ to pitch an new game design she left out whenever she was out in costume would be enough to convince Montoya to not worry about her for a while. A necessary precaution when other people had a key to your apartment and a habit of dropping by unannounced. Like when they decide to use your place as a regroup point while being on the run from the mob.

“Why there?”

There was a careful disinterest in Batgirl’s voice and an undertone of worry that confused Ghost Spider. Sure, Barbara knew where Gwen lived but there was no reason to suspect Gwen would be in trouble for the time being.

“The Detective suggested it. Why, something wrong?” she asked.

“Maybe. When the Falcone started hitting police officers last night, the department started calling friends and family to make sure no one was targeted through them. You heard about the Stacy murder?” Ghost Spider nodded, getting a feeling where this was going. “That address belonged to him and it was attacked last night. The police have been trying to reach out to his daughter just in case, but no one managed…”

“You think the Falcone tried something and it could be a trap?” Obviously they hadn’t actually done anything to Gwen. But Ghost Spider wasn’t prepared to just come out and say that with Supergirl right there. She was mostly willing to unmask to Barbara if absolutely needed but she wanted to keep that information as close as possible. Ghost Spider also made a mental note to get back to her cell phone as soon as she could just to make sure everyone knew she wasn’t being held captive the first chance she got.

“Could be. We need to get there before the detective.”

“Right, let’s go then.” Supergirl declared, standing up from the sofa. She was still a little wobbly but it seemed most of the effects from the accidental kryptonite exposure had vanished.

“Hold it!” Ghost Spider stopped the two before they could start moving. “What do we do with this? Because I’m not leaving it where anyone could just come in and take it.” she pointed at the safe.

Batgirl and Supergirl looked at the safe, then to each other, then back to the safe.

“I could take it back to the Cave.” Supergirl volunteered. “If it stays in the safe I should be fine and I can get back in a few minutes tops.”

Batgirl shook her head. “Security won’t let anyone without at least clearance level 3 leave something that big behind. And Nightwing and Robin would be cut out of the system until one of us can clear the alert from the computers. I’ll head back. You take Ghost Spider to the address and I’ll meet you there.”

Both blonds scowled at the idea of spending time alone together, but neither voiced an objection. They had an estimated 10 hours before the start of the auction. After that there was no telling how long until the gang war started. They simply didn’t have time for petty arguments at the moment.

The three of them broke up. Supergirl and Ghost Spider traveling low over the rooftops to hopefully dodge any remaining watchers with Batgirl leaving a bit later and heading in a different direction. Thankfully even in the middle of the day not many people had a clear view of the roof tops so even Supergirl’s bright costume was hard to pick out at a glance.

With the departure of the redheaded heroine, both Supergirl and Ghost Spider made no attempts at conversation until they reached their destination.

When they did…

“What the hell happened here?!”

…it was only to wonder at the ruined state of Gwen’s apartment.

Every bit of furniture had been smashed. The cushions were torn to ribbons and thrown haphazardly, cabinets torn from the walls and in pieces, and anything easily broken was scattered on the floor.

Even when the mob ransacked the place looking for her father’s notes the first time they weren’t this destructive about it. Either whoever had done this wanted to make sure there was no chance of missing the notes a second time or they had decided to take out the frustration of not finding Gwen there for the taking.

Ghost Spider shivered a bit at what would’ve happened if it was the latter just a couple months ago when she was a normal girl. She had known how to handle herself in a one-on-one fight, not a forced entry by angry goons.

“Well your friend definitely isn’t here.” Supergirl said, looking around at the mess. “And I checked in on the other residents. They seem calm enough so I don’t think there was a struggle here. Did you guys have a backup, backup plan?”

Ghost Spider shook her head but before she could say anything the half-forgotten earpiece crackled to life.

”Ghost, checking in. No idea if your back in range but the hideout’s a bust. I’m in a car circling the block and I’ll be checking in every fifteen or so.” Renee’s tense voice filtered out. Ghost Spider barely had to turn to see Supergirl picked up on the message, both of them relaxed a bit at the confirmation the detective hadn’t been hurt.

“Detective, good to hear you. We just found out ourselves.” Ghost Spider replied, a hand pressed to her ear.

“Wait who’s ‘we’?”

“Me and SuperSk- Supergirl.” Ghost Spider corrected herself before she could complete the insult. The unamused glare by the heroine told her the kryptonian knew exactly what she was about to say.

”Wait, Supergirl is with you?!”

Ghost Spider furrowed her eyebrows. “Yeah, weren’t you listening over the comm earlier?”

”No, I told you Falcone’s people started combing the area after you got away and was falling back. I guess you were busy.”

“No kidding. Got into a fight with Batgirl and her, then had to run for our lives because Falcone has a hit squad waiting in helicopters.”

”My God, would it kill you masks to do anything without drama?” Montoya asked rhetorically. ”Nevermind, meet me at this location. The Commish is setting something up and he wants everyone there. Spread the word to the bats if you can.”

Ghost Spider looked at Supergirl, who nodded and pulled out a communicator. She would get word to the other heroes.

“Got it. We’ll meet you there.”

-o-

The last time that Ghost Spider had seen Commissioner Gordon had been at the funeral service for her father. The aging silver haired man had seemed so sad and tired as he thanked her for her father’s sacrifice, letting her know just how much her dad had been respected in the department and as a personal friend how much he would be missed.

The man standing at the front of the room waiting while a handful of police officers filtered in was an entirely different person. This man had an iron gaze and a confident air around him. Fitting for one of the few honest people working to actually make Gotham something more than a breeding ground for low level criminals.

“Alright people, we only have a few hours before the city erupts, so let’s do this quickly.” Commissioner Gordan began. “As you know by now, thanks to some of our more colorful citizens,” Gordon waved a hand to the side where the four costumed individuals had gathered. Supergirl, Batgirl, and Nightwing standing close together with Ghost Spider a few feet away. Robin had been tasked with staying at the Batcave and keeping an eye out for any early moves by the Falcone. “we figured out that Mario Falcone is planning on a hostile takeover of the Gotham underworld by launching a decapitating strike during an underground auction.”

Spines all over the room straightened at the reveal of what was happening. Most of them had figured out that something big was happening in the city, but only a handful could be trusted to not sell that info to the various info brokers the first chance they got. But with a deadline of only a few hours, even if they wanted to sell off the info no one would buy it. The window was too small, they would have to actually do their jobs this time.

“Originally we had planned to contain this disaster with a series of coordinated raids at their rally points. With his forces stripped away, even if Mario went through with his plan we could eventually contain the situation.” the Commissioner continued. “But after last night, we no longer have the manpower for that option nor the time to request backup. So we will be taking a page out of their own playbook.”

Once again dark eyes scanned the people in the room, Ghost Spider was actually a little mused to see people straighten up even further when they met the Commissioner’s gaze.

“Here’s the plan…”

Chapter 14Probably the weirdest thing about blackmarket auctions was how little they differed from normal auctions. At least when it came to the mundane things on display like art and rare materials.The biggest difference was the thin anonymity for the bidders that started off as simply assigning a person a number, not unlike a normal auction, all the way to hired proxies who never met the person they were representing and only talked to through text.It was an idle line of thought that Ghost Spider found herself circling back to as time went on. She was stuck in that lovely cycle of ‘hurry up and wait’ that meant that she didn’t have a whole lot to do while the auction started to get into swing below her.“I can’t believe people actually spend that much money on that kind of art.” Ghost Spider muttered as she watched a painting sell for several thousand dollars. “I could probably do better than that.” Seriously, the painting was just a series of multicolored shapes. It wouldn’t be hard to do the same thing.“For these people it’s more showing they have the money to actually buy something like that and not worry about the cost.” Supergirl’s voice crackled over her headset. ”it’s a status thing. Plus most of these relate to color theory and how certain shades complement the other. I doubt you could do better.”“Probably not, I don’t know the first thing about color theory. I’d do better than you though… I can color inside the lines.””Not much of an artist if you think coloring books are something to be proud of.” Supergirl shot back.“And throwing paint on a canvas and calling it a ‘Jackson Pollock’ piece isn’t any better.””Hey, I’m getting good at those!”“...seriously?””Pay attention you two, we think Falcone is going to start once the final auction starts but he could kick things off early.” Batgirl’s voice interrupted the conversation. There wasn’t any hint of censure though, she was probably just as bored as the other two. She just wanted to remind them to stay focused. ”Plus from what I’ve heard both of you have the art skills of an elementary schooler.” that time Ghost Spider could hear a smirk in her voice.“Hey!””Hey!”The three of them continued lightly ribbing each other, a little more aggressively between Ghost Spider and Supergirl, but not enough to distract them from the events going on in the auction. They had reached the middle part of the overall event, where the items were now definitely stolen or illegal but not particularly special. And they still had quite some time to kill, although the chatter did eventually draw comments from the others listening in.”They’ve been insulting each other for over an hour. How can you even pretend to like being around girls?” Robin moaned, showing his youth despite the situations he was often involved in.”Give it a couple years and you’ll know why.” Nightwing commented to the younger boy before addressing the entire group. ”Heads up. Mario Falcone is swapping out with a double. Looks like the main event is starting soon...”That news cut down the joking mood as the various heroes prepared for their roles. The three members of the Batfamily were on the lookout for any high ranking members of the Falcone family and would tail them until the shooting started, then they would try and catch as many as possible, a sort of reverse decapitating strike that the mafia family was attempting. Meanwhile, Supergirl and Ghost Spider would do their best to take out as many of the foot soldiers as possible. Between Ghost Spider’s webs and Supergirl’s speed, they should be able to pin down most of any combatants within a few seconds of the first move.“I’m not seeing anything different on the main floor.” Ghost Spider reported what she could see.”Nothing on my end either.” Supergirl confirmed.”I have a group moving towards the exit, I’m tailing them.” Batgirl said.”Same here, group of lieutenants are heading out.” Robin chipped in.Ghost Spider started searching the scene below her for the tiniest hint of the Falcone’s attack even as she listened to the others over the comms. Once they made their move, she would need to act fast or risk a lot of people getting killed since none of the auction attendees were allowed weapons of any kind.The guests started to filter in and out as higher ranking members of the underworld swapped out with the underlings and proxies. The main event was starting and apparently displaying their wealth and power in the auction was more important than anonymity.A tanned man with bright blond hair walked out onto the stage and gave a microphone a few experimental taps to ensure it was on.“Good evening, Gentlemen.” the man began, “I hope you all have been enjoying the event so far. We have, afterall, gone to great lengths to ensure you have the chance at acquiring only the best money has to buy, even if the items were...alternatively sourced...shall we say?” Some of the crowd chuckled. “But enough about that, all of you wouldn’t be here for just any trinkets. No, you are here for the real game changers, the things rare and unique enough that only the most powerful members of our little community would have the chance to even look at them! So without further ado, let us begin the final auction of the night!” There was some polite clapping at the announcement as the man stepped back.One of the assistants rolled out a large wooden chest from off stage and placed it so a spotlight could light it up, ensuring everyone in the crowd could get a clear view of the object.The man walked up to it and laid one hand on top of the chest. “Our first item is rather special. Over the past few years the landscape of power in the city has changed due to a certain vigilante…” the announcer trailed off and several members of the crowd began grumbling. Obviously Batman had hurt all of their operations. “...but the item inside this chest has the potential to place the owner back on top of the whole pile.” he patted the chest again and threw his arms wide, “Now, many of you might be thinking; ‘if this is so great, why is it the first item?’. The answer to that is simple.” with a hiss of air the chest burst open and the sides fell away. The large rotary barrel of a minigun glinted a bit under the spotlights as it pointed out into the crowd.The announcer grabbed one of the handles and began to rev the weapon up. “It’s the first item because all of you will soon be dead. The Falcone Family wishes you a good night as they take back their spot in this city.”-o-Batgirl silently stalked over the rooftops, making sure to keep the group of mobsters in view the whole time. Early on she had recognised Giraldo Trevisani, one of the Falcone’s underbosses, and had kept an eye one him all night. So when he grabbed a group of henchmen and left the auction, Batgirl had a pretty good idea the Falcone’s plan was about to go into action and Trevisani was going to play his part.She had to quickly jump an alley when the group made a sudden turn but caught up quickly.“...for the signal from the auction. I’ll make the call and then we head for Warehouse 14 to meet up with the others. Grab half the grunts and circle the Iceberg Lounge. None of them get out.”“We got it, boss. Just leave it to us.”Trevisani pulled out a phone and checked the time.“Just a few minutes left.” He commented.If that was the case then Batgirl needed to take them out now before they gave the order to head to the Lounge. Ghost Spider and Supergirl would already have their hands full trying to keep everyone alive with just the people already inside, letting these four send even more people was a guarantee that some people would die.She pulled a batarang out of her belt and carefully lined up the throw. With smooth, well practiced motions Batgirl sent the sharpened shuriken directly into Trevisani’s phone. The mobster cried out in pain and gripped his hand before turning to where Batgirl landed in the alleyway.“Dammit, one of the Bat-freaks. Kill her!” Trevisani shouted at his men before breaking into a run.The henchmen pulled handguns from their holsters and began firing them at the heroine but after dodging the initial shots and throwing down a smoke bomb, Batgirl was able to avoid the rest by hiding behind a nearby dumpster. When the first gun clicked empty she dashed out of cover and charged the group. One of them had been more economical in his shooting, so he was able to put a bullet close enough that Batgirl felt it tug through her hair.That was when she got close enough to smack his gun hand skyward and plant a fist in his stomach. A followup knee to the face had the henchman unconscious and Batgirl using him as a springboard to leap at the other two goons.Batgirl had the privilege of seeing their eyes widen before she managed to get her hands on both of them and slam their heads together. Just like that they were down for the count.Unfortunately the few seconds she needed to deal with the three henchmen had given Trevisani plenty of time to get a headstart on her. Batgirl was confident in taking down a dozen henchmen like the last three at the same time. She was less certain about a nightclub full of them all armed to the teeth. Good thing she wasn’t limited to chasing the underboss on foot.Through liberal use of a grapple gun, Batgirl managed to not only catch up to the mobster but get in front of him. Before he even made it to the nightclub! Maybe her luck was turning around, it certainly seemed like she’d had a run of bad luck ever since Ghost Spider stepped onto the scene. So catching her target before he managed to complete his part in the plan was a definite stroke of good fortune.Trevisani growled as Batgirl landed in front of him. He apparently wasn’t much of a talker when a fight was imminent. He didn’t say anything as he pulled out a silver handgun and leveled it at the heroine. Not that she was going to sit there and just let him take shots at her.A batarang quickly knocked the gun out of Trevisani’s hand, but the gangster was good enough to duck under the followup shock one. It said something about Trevisani’s confidence that he didn’t bother going for the gun but pulled a pair of knuckle dusters from his suit jacket.“You already lost Bat, the Boss’s got people all over the city just waiting for the word. Stopping me does fuck all. And once we’re done this city is going to remember who owns it!”Maybe Trevisani was more of a talker than she thought, that or he was blustering to try and keep her distracted.Either way, Batgirl kept her mouth shut as she ducked under a few wild haymakers. Banter was a good tool to use against Costumes, since they usually had an almost compulsive need to engage in it themselves, but silence was almost always more effective against minions. They got spooked, sloppy, and made way more mistakes when they were up against a Bat and Trevisani was proving it. A wild punch had the larger man overextending enough that Batgirl was able to grab his wrist and throw him face first into a wall. Something crunched under the impact unpleasantly, Trevisani was still tough enough to fight through it though because an unexpected backhand managed to catch Batgirl in the face and knock her to the ground.“Damn Bitch!” Trevisani spat through the blood pouring out his nose and some broken teeth, one hand clawed protectively over his face. “I’m going to break you in half and throw you in the river!”“Let me know how that goes when you stop twitching.” Batgirl spoke up for the first time.That's when the shock batarang she had slipped onto Trevisani’s suit beeped and discharged its entire battery into the man. Sparks of electricity had him spazzing in place for a couple seconds before he fell over, twitching. Trevisani might’ve been harder to hit unconscious than most people, the same didn’t extend to electric shocks.Batgirl groaned and stretched a bit as she picked herself up off the ground, brushed off a bit of debris, and went to handcuff the unconscious gangster. With Trevisani out for the count, Batgirl was sure that she had stopped at least one of Falcone’s plans. Now she needed to hand Trevisani and his three friends over to the police her dad had stationed nearby and figure out what the others were doing.“My group is down and all wrapped up, what’s the word at the auction?” Batgirl reported through her communicator, mentally debating if she should drag Trevisani back to the others or just leave him here.”Well, we managed to stop the massacre…” Ghost Spider’s slightly panicked voice crackled from the communicator. ”...but then Supergirl was put through a few walls. I tied him up for now but...” there were some sounds in the background that sounded like wood and stone splintering and possibly cloth tearing. ”...oh, fuck me.” Ghost Spider’s disbelieving comment was suddenly buried in static as something started jamming the communicator.“Ghost Spider? Hello?” When there was no answer Batgirl tried to contact Supergirl the only thing that came out of the communicator was static. Batgirl started to move quicker to secure the gangsters. If both of them were in trouble then Falcone might still have a way to finish the main part of his plan and might need her help. She could only wonder what the mafia boss had managed to pull to give a kryptonian and a meta that could stand up to one trouble.

Chapter 15The large rotary barrel of a minigun glinted a bit under the spotlights as it pointed out into the crowd.The announcer grabbed one of the handles and began to rev the weapon up. “It’s the first item because all of you will soon be dead. The Falcone Family wishes you a good night as they take back their spot in this city.”“Oh fuck.” Ghost Spider exploded out of her hiding place, one webline latched onto the ceiling and the other snagged the barrel of the minigun. The webbing tore a bit as it got wrapped up on the spinning metal and from the first few bullets, but she was able to redirect it so the majority of the stream of lead wound up in the upper walls or ceiling. Once Ghost Spider was in a more stable position, she was able to send another stream of webbing onto the gun itself, jamming the mechanics and ruining the gun.The announcer clearly wasn’t expecting anything like that to happen so he was actually thrown to the ground when Ghost Spider yanked the now worthless hunk of metal away from him, but he recovered quickly enough.“Don’t just stand around you idiots! Kill them! Kill her!”More men armed with machine guns burst through doorways surrounding the auction and took aim at the crowd; a few even aimed at Ghost Spider, while the auctioneers finally managed to throw off their shock and began panicking. Some rushed for the exits and only the combined efforts of Ghost Spider and Supergirl, who crashed through the ceiling at the first hint of trouble, managed to stop them from being gunned down. Supergirl focused on either tanking the bullets or throwing people out of the way while Ghost Spider worked on disarming the gunmen with the use of her webs.The rest of the Auctioneers did their best to take cover in the various corners of the room, something that many only survived thanks to a red and blue blur that appeared in front of a random shot or to crush a gun followed up by a swift punch to the jaw that knocked out the shooter.Ghost Spider did contribute a fair bit, but she had to admit Supergirl was the one protecting most of the ones that decided to hide.Between the two supers, the gangsters didn’t stand a chance. In short order all of the gunmen had been disarmed and knocked out and only a few injured people remained in the auction hall while most of the auctioneers fled, and even the injured were quickly trying to slip away; they were criminals afterall.Pretty much the only other person in good condition was the announcer, who had gotten back on his feet and was just standing on the stage with a scowl.Ghost Spider dropped from the wall she ended up on and joined Supergirl in the middle of the floor. With everyone else down, it seemed the Kryptonian wanted to do a little grandstanding before taking out the last gangster.“Looks like that’s the end of your little plan, doesn’t it?” Supergirl declared. “If you wanna give up, now's the time.”“I knew this plan was stupid.” the announcer grumbled mostly to himself. “If it was up to me I’d just call the whole thing off, but if it got around that I just quit my reputation would be ruined.”“Yeah, cause Tony over there is in any condition to judge you.” Ghost Spider quipped, pointing at one of the unconscious henchmen.The announcer shrugged. “Professional hazard I suppose.” He started to reach into his jacket for something and Supergirl blurred forward, intending to restrain him quickly so they could move on.That plan failed immediately as the announcer’s hand snapped up and caught Supergirl by the wrist.“Wha-” Supergirl’s surprise was cut off by a flash of green and a thunderclap. The blonde kryptonian flew backwards, past Ghost Spider, and kept going until the sound of her going through several walls echoed throughout the auction hall.Ghost Spider didn’t waste time checking on her. Either she was okay for now or the man in front of her had some way to hurt even a kryptonian and she couldn’t afford to take her eyes off him. She dashed forward and ducked under a retaliatory punch, rising up to deliver a devastating uppercut to the man’s jaw only to have her heart drop from the result.Not only had she barely moved him, the man didn’t seem hurt at all and considering Ghost Spider felt like she was punching a block of metal, she kinda doubted he was faking that.“Ooh, that hurt.”Ignoring the bald-face lie Ghost Spider wove between his punches, determined to not get hit and returning the favor when she could. No matter where she hit him or how hard, he acted like nothing happened. She needed to switch strategies.Shifting around another punch, instead of counter attacking or evading Ghost Spider grabbed the limb and used every bit of her strength to throw the man over her shoulder and into one of the sturdier walls. Then she did her best to glue him in place with a hopefully redundant amount of webbing. Although considering Supergirl still hadn't come back after that hit meant his abilities weren't as straightforward as superstrength so there was no way to tell.“My group is down and all wrapped up, what’s the word at the auction?” Batgirl’s voice filtered through the communicator, breaking the sudden silence that had settled on the hall.”Well, we managed to stop the massacre…” Ghost Spider reported, feeling uneasy as she realised even under all the webbing the announcer was still moving slightly and there were some cracking noises as the webbing pulled on the surroundings. ”...but then Supergirl was put through a few walls. I tied him up for now but...” the small cracking sounds turned into a cacophony of noise. Not because the webbing failed, no, that would have been too easy. The webbing held firm but the anchors were torn out of the wall and floor so there was an odd silhouette of broken wood and stone held in place by the rest of the webbing.Then the man reached up and tore the webs free from whatever they were clinging to. Including his skin!”...oh, fuck me.” Ghost Spider recognised him now.John Corben was one of the horror stories that was commonly thrown about by experts about the dangers of cybernetics and AI and a reason to not release advanced prosthetics until further testing and advancement.The official story was that Corben was either the result of an experiment to upload a human mind or an AI that mirrored human thought that had gone insane because despite his mind being human, his body lacked any true feedback to external stimuli. In reality, or at least according to her new memories, John Corben had been recruited by Lex Luthor in another bid to kill Superman after he had been diagnosed with a fatal virus. With the use of a kryptonite heart and his new cyborg body he actually came close too. Then he discovered Luthor was the reason he was infected with the virus and swore revenge before ultimately failing and being defeated by the Man of Steel. At some point Corben abandoned his name and humanity, taking up the moniker Metallo and working as a mercenary.‘I guess I found out who wanted the Kryptonite the Falcone had.’ Ghost Spider thought sardonically. And it looked like her plan for him to walk away after stealing it failed too, because there was no way the mafia family managed to get another chunk of it on such short notice.“Tempting offer, but I don’t get much from that anymore.” The ghoulish figure replied. The lower half of Metallo’s face had been ripped off to reveal the grinning form of his metallic skull. The rest of his skin hung in tatters across his body in fleshy ribbons. “Of course now I’m going to have to kill you slowly. Not only did you run off with my payment, you did this to me,” he gestured at his ruined face and clothes. “Do you have any idea how expensive this much synth-flesh costs?” the cyborg complained.“Don’t do merc work then?” Ghost Spider offered. “Seems like a bad occupation if you worry about skin care.”That was when Supergirl announced her return to the fight by smashing Metallo through the already damaged wall with an I-beam.“That was for the cheap shot earlier.” She said with satisfactionGhost Spider gave her a sideways glance, eyeing the improvised weapon. “You know those are supposed to be holding the building up.”“Yeah, but I found a better use for this one.”“Just don’t bring the roof down on- Look out!” Both girls dodged out of the way of a green energy blast that splashed harmlessly in the background. Metallo calmly made his way back through the hole he had made, a green crystal glowing in his chest and the last remnants of his human disguise torn away leaving his metal body out in the open.“Back again, brat? I brought Superman to his knees with a rock about this big, do you really think you stand a chance with some insect on your side?”“Still lost didn’t you, you tin can.” Supergirl shot back.“I’m an arachnid by the way.” Ghost Spider felt it needed to be said, though she was ignored by the other two.Metallo shot another blast of energy at Supergirl and dodged to the left to avoid the webline aimed at his kryptonite core. Ghost Spider just used the miss to pull herself through the air and land a punch on the cyborg.All it did was push him back and set the tone for the rest of the fight. Ghost Spider could get in close and avoid any attacks through her own agility or by retreating a bit, but she couldn’t do any meaningful damage and Metallo was sure to keep an eye on her so she couldn’t swipe the kryptonite powering him. Supergirl was forced to play support from a distance. Metallo’s blasts were potent enough that they were an issue for Superman let alone her, the passive drain when she got close would also be a problem so she was forced to use her improvised bat instead. Problem was, she wasn’t used to not being on the frontline and nearly hit Ghost Spider several times by mistake.“This isn’t working…” Ghost Spider commented after a solid hit from Supergirl threw Metallo across the room. She hadn’t taken a direct hit yet, but her arms and legs were starting to hurt from repeatedly pounding into solid metal.“You have a better idea?” Supergirl huffed in response. She hadn’t taken more than a few glancing attacks either but the kryptonite was starting to get to her.“Not really. He’s not letting us get a shot at his core and both of us aren’t doing any damage. Don’t suppose we ignore him for now and grab the others?” Retreating and preparing for an enemy had worked for others, no reason not to use it herself.Supergirl shook her head though. “Too many people nearby. I have no idea what he’ll do if we lose him.”“We need to do something soon then. I’m barely putting a dent in him and you're going to get hit by one of those beams eventually.”“Okay, I think I have an idea. It’s risky but you think you can hold one of his arms down for a few seconds?”“Going for the core? We’ll be in a tough spot if you miss.” Ghost Spider pointed out.“Guess I just won’t miss then.” Supergirl said confidently.“What’s the matter girls? Running out of steam?” Metallo called out. “Give up and tell me what you did with my prize and I’ll at least kill you quickly.”He got hit in the face with a very bent and abused I-beam for that.Ghost Spider wasn’t far behind the mass of metal, leaping closer and doing her best to glue Metallo to the floor by webbing up his feet. The small distraction was enough that he didn’t notice the action until he was covered in enough that a casual effort could rip himself free. Once she was close enough, she grabbed his left arm by the wrist and elbow and did her best to force the limb straight and as far out of the way as possible.“Hah, not going to be that easy.”Metallo must’ve realised what they were after and the armoured plate that normally covered the kryptonite began to close. In a burst of speed Ghost Spider managed to release her hold on Metallo’s elbow and jam her hand into his chest and hold it back. Unfortunately, that meant Metallo was very close to simply overpowering her and she couldn't reach the core herself.“Supergirl, now!”The superheroine didn’t move in a straight line, but circled around to the left so she could avoid an energy blast. She knocked away Metallo’s other arm and went for the core. Just before her fingers touched the crystal though, the cyborg’s chest released a much more widely diffused pulse of energy that sapped most of Supergirl’s strength instantly.What’s worse, Metallo revealed he was only pretending to be inconvenienced by the webs. He freed the arm held by Supergirl, punched her into the ground, and then pinned her in place by literally stepping on her, tearing the webs on his leg in the process.Just to top off the unpleasant surprises, the tips of Metallo’s clawed hands peeled back to reveal sharpened tips of even more kryptonite. He readied his free hand to stab at the pinned heroine and Ghost Spider was forced to release her hold on his chest plate and do her best to hold off both arms so they wouldn’t stab into the vulnerable kryptonian. It was easier said than done and she had to use all her strength to barely hold him back.“What’s the matter, girls, feeling a bit green?” the cyborg taunted.“Graaah!” Ghost Spider could only groan as Metallo pushed down with even more power and forced her to one knee.“Considering you went through all that effort to steal my payment I thought you might as well get a little bit more! Personally, I can’t get enough of the stuff!” Ghost Spider was steadily driven down as the pressure increased. Her muscles were straining under the load and despite her best efforts, Supergirl was too weak to throw Metallo off her.“You have a backup plan?!” Ghost Spider hissed at Supergirl. The strain was only getting worse since Metallo didn’t tire at all.“Working on it.” Supergirl gasped back.Ten crystalline spears slowly made their way towards Ghost Spider’s face and in just a few seconds she would either need to move out of the way or just accept that Metallo was going to pierce through her on the way to Supergirl. His fingertips were less than an inch away from her flesh when there was a sudden sound of compressed gas releasing and a black shape blurred past Ghost Spider’s cheek.A grapple hook ancored itself around the kryptonite core Metallo had left revealed once Ghost Spider was forced to use both hands to stop him from stabbing Supergirl and ripped it out of his chest. Metallo gave a cry of surprise and desperately leaped after it, trying to recover it before he lost power. He moved so fast that he actually managed to rip himself free from Ghost Spider’s grasp but he barely made it three steps before he slouched over on the floor.Supergirl pulled herself off the ground and looked up at where the shot had come from. “Great timing. The rest of the goons taken care of then?”Batgirl dropped to the ground floor, kryptonite safely wrapped in her cape. “Yeah, Nightwing was able to tag Mario and Robin picked up a few Underbosses. I headed back when we couldn’t get you on comms. I think we actually managed to stop the Falcone’s plans before they could do too much damage.”“Good. I was worried they had another surprise than tin man over there. Guess I was worried over nothing.”“So what next?” Ghost Spider asked.“Let’s get the GCPD in here to handle the injured and- Look out!”Ghost Spider’s Spider Sense blared. Her head whipped around to see Metallo leaping at Supergirl, clawed fingertips brandished.With no time to think, she stepped forward and shoved the other girl out of the way. Metallo slammed into her and knocked her to the floor so they were face-to-face with each other.“Well, I wanted to get the Superbrat but getting the thief works too.” Metallo sneered as the light slowly faded from his mechanical eyes. “Nice job saving the day, bug girl. Hope it was worth it.”Completely out of power now, the cyborg locked up. Ghost Spider wanted to push him off but every time she tried there was a searing pain in her chest and she couldn’t seem to get enough air.“Ghost Spider, you okay?! I didn’t think- oh my god!”“What? What happened? Oh, oh shit. Okay don’t move! We’ll figure something out.”Ghost Spider was really confused about why they were suddenly freaking out and staring at her chest. She looked down at herself and quickly realised the problem.“Oh...” She whispered.Metallo’s last attack hit. All five fingers disappeared into the right side of the arachid themed girl’s chest and blood was welling from the edges of the holes. She started breathing faster and harder at the realisation that she had been stabbed and the edges of her vision started going grey.The last thing she saw was the image of a metallic skull grinning down at her with empty eyes and the two heroines trying to reassure her in the background. Then everything went black.