11661/Beacon Dark: The Gotham Angle

Beacon Dark: The Gotham Angle
Date of Scene:	19 June 2022
Location:	Gotham City - The Flipside Occult Bar
Synopsis:	After Phoebe Beacon told Alfred Pennyworth she would be back in time for patrols, the teenaged magician and young Bat-Family member hasn't shown up for several weeks. Batman takes a couple of steps to break down some barriers in his investigation -- namely the door to the Gotham occult bar, The Flipside. Finding enough to start investigating what direction Phoebe went in, the next stop is New York City.
Cast of Characters:	Phoebe Beacon, Bruce Wayne

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Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Three weeks ago, Phoebe Beacon had left the manor telling Alfred she would be back in the evening in time for patrols. She'd taken her old motorcycle and Idu. She was last seen in New York City without either, walking past a bodega. The enhanced pictures had shown the distinctive tattoo around her left wrist while she was wiping at her face.

    Her cellphone and a tracker long ago placed on her motorcycle, likely by Tim Drake had pinged south of Pittsburgh. She'd sent just one message to a dead number on a burner phone saying 'I'm sorry'.

    And then nothing. The phone was unable to be remotely activated to pink or track. The tracker and its redundant tracker in her helmet had been removed, pinging from the middle of the Ohio river and moving downstream very, very slowly.

    There were few people in Gotham who might know what happened to her. She had a trio of friends, Tim had gone LARPing with them and they briefly met Carrie and Damian in a pizzaria in Gotham. She was close with them.

    Her adoptive mother, Caroline Beacon, still lived in Gotham in a fashionable carriage home.

    There was also a small occult bar called The Flipside, formed in the basement of an abandoned house on the EAst Side of Gotham that she and Austin had visited at one point.

    Any number of people could have information leading to where she had disappeared to.

Bruce Wayne has posed:
The Batman would turn over each stone in due course, but as always he went with his instincts when choosing the first. The friends were associates of the unmasked side, which assumed they weren't privy to secrets. Likewise, her adoptive mother had never been a kind or generous soul so why would Phoebe be either in return? This left the Flipside. Her desire for occult knowledge was well-documented, and this was one of the seedy places that it coalesced in his City. Filtering through and gathering at the bottom.

The door at the top of the basement stairs burst open in a hail of splinters and dry, rotten wood. It rained down with the dust on the patrons below, the dominating shadow of the Dark Knight cast over all of them. He moved down the stairs with predatory grace, fists clenched at his sides. There's no immediate violence from him, but there's something that says the beast with the sharp fangs and haunting eyes is lurking in the reeds.

"I have questions. You're going to answer them."

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    All Activity stopped in The Flipside. A couple of inhuman types take a look at Batman, and quietly withdraw to the shadows, not willing to contend with The Dark Knight.

    A man with a spattery apron looks at Batman and hides behind his counter.

    The rest of the place goes quiet, cowering, recovering from having the door splintered on them as the yells die down and they realize that this is probably a Bad Thing.

    The Bat didn't deal with the occult.

    And that's when a figure lights up a hand-rolled cigarette, and draws herself to a stand, dyed pink hair stand-out, wearing all black, black lips and deep olive skin. She brings her blue eyes up to the Bat, and offers herself as the sacrificial lamb.

    "All right. What can we do for you, Batman?" she asks, stuffing her hands in the pockets of her jeans to hide that she was shaking.

Bruce Wayne has posed:
It truly is a worrying time when the Bat pays the supernatural crowd of Gotham a visit. He always watched them, of course, like he watched everyone. But he let them go about their affairs so long as they remained harmless. But now he needed to know.

The Bat rounds on the woman. The distance between them closes quickly, and soon he's looming over her with only a handful of inches between them. He glares down at her with impassive, white eyes and his mouth forged into a grim and humorless line.

"A girl. Black hair. Dark eyes and complexion. Asking about occult rituals. If you've seen her, you'll tell me when, where, and what she was asking about. Now."

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "You're going to have to be far more specific than a black girl with dark eyes." the woman breathes out, though she is visibly shook when Batman closes in on her, and she looks up into the white lenses, the sharp nose of the cowl, and she feels her heart skip a couple of beats. "We get all sorts down here... sir." she swallows. "Your girl got a name? Handle? Sigil? Tutor even?" she asks, motioninig to the side a bit.

    Someone is gathering the splinters up, and bemoaning how much work it's going to take to fix the door. Non-standard sizes make things difficult to replace.

    The woman lowers her cigarette, and breathes out smoke through her nose. "Or you got something of hers we can use? I mean, magic's one thing, but even we can't do things blind--" she states.

    There's something creeping up behind Batman. It's got a heavy footfall, and the scrape of something metal leaving a nylon sheath.

Bruce Wayne has posed:
He does have something of hers. She left more than a few things behind in her room, and it was the first place he'd searched when he began this investigation. But even though he despises the use of magic, he isn't about to make Phoebe vulnerable to it in order to save time. He can do this without mystical aid, he knows it.

"Balm," he explains, "The name she goes by. Sometimes she wears a mask."

He continues, describing the costume she wears as well as the concealing clothing that might typify her non-superheroic wardrobe.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "The one from the angel attack?" the woman blinks a moment, and then she frowns, gives another puff, and then she shifts her weight.

    "Can't be scryed, you're wasting your time." she explains, crossing her arms. "She's got a marking on her left hand that hides her from magical searching, but I know she came in like a month ago, looking for some particulars. Egyptian beeswax. Charcoal made from English Oak from Glastonbury. Some of it's pricy." she states. "I know she used to work outta Hell's Kitchen in NYC."

    And right about then is the time some ill-informed person attempts to make a swing at Batman's head with a metal baseball bat. Guy in his mid twenties, wearing a charred T-shirt with "GOTHAM SUCKS" written on it in Sharpie.

    "BAT-ER UP!"

Bruce Wayne has posed:
The swung baseball bat would meet the Bat's head, were it not for the gauntlet-clad forearm that rises between them. The bat strikes the serrated blades, catching on the hollow metal with a burst of sparks. He yanks his arm down swiftly, tugging the bat free and sending it clattering noisily across the floor.

He turns on the man in his t-shirt, glaring at him with bared teeth. His free hand rises up to catch the punk by the throat with a heavy 'thwack', lifting him a foot off the ground. He drops him in time to meet his knee, rising into his solarplexus viciously. Holding himself up on hands and knees, the Bat finishes him off with a swift boot across the jaw that leaves him broken and unconscious.

"I don't need to scry for her," he tells the woman, no sign of strain in his voice, "What are those ingredients for?"

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
     -- everyone in the room goes quiet as Batman wrecks one of the bouncers. There's yelps. People dive for cover, and they get a better sense of what Batman is capable of when moved to it.

    "Whoa, whoa, whoa!" The woman holds up her hands, showing there's nothign in them as he turns back around.

    "That guy, right there? He's an idiot. And probably fired." she states about the unconcious bat bouncer, who is being slowly pulled to the side by a couple of other guys.

    "Could be for anything. Candles, incense, making wax dolls!" she protests, drawing back, and she stammers a moment before she says:

    "She also got cinnabar and myhrr resins, powdered belladonna! Bat's blood ink! Marking and using to cause or clear misfortune! Also picked up Tuscan Basil oil and Persian Roz oil, which is for dove's blood ink! She was doing something big. She seemed to be in a hurry!"

Bruce Wayne has posed:
The Batman scowls. Not enough information to point him in the right direction, but certainly enough to begin joining the dots. He looms over the woman for a moment longer, looking for a moment as though he may wreck shop as a matter of course ...

But then he turns, pushing past the man gathering up the splinters of the door and disappearing back up the stairs like a sweeping shadow. He knows other mystics he can question about the ingredients, and other locations he can check.

Perhaps New York will be the next stop.