15372/Trespassers Will Be...

Trespassers Will Be...
Date of Scene:	13 July 2023
Location:	Dykstra Residential Warehouse, Happy Harbor
Synopsis:	While celebrating the completion of their new place's renovation, the Dykstras are targeted by The Hand who has found their place to be very suitable for their needs. They very soon learn the error of their ways. Another ninja also gives a hand.
Cast of Characters:	Caleb Dykstra, June Connor

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Caleb Dykstra has posed:
Happy Harbor, Dykstra Workshop. Nightime.

Preparations have taken a while, but Caleb and his family are finally settling in Happy Harbor, having reconverted a warehouse into their workshop, with home arrangements in the upstairs floors. So as a celebration, the family is all here gathered, Caleb and Sheila having obtained a special permit for them to be here tonight instead of being in the Happy Harbor High School dorms.

And they're happy, celebrating with Big Belly Burgers - is it odd that nobody wanted to go for pizza, given they had problem with the Gotham mob? Plus, Big Belly Burgers is the game's main franchise, but that's breaking the fourth, and we're no Deadpool.

"So dad", Caleb asks, "You'll start hiring some help tomorrow?"

Caleb's father, Preston, a man with a mishapen hand and hair that is starting to go grey, nods, "Yeah, and don't you get any ideas, young man. I want you at school hitting the books."

Caleb nods, "Yeah, I..." He sighs, "Yeah, you got me. I guess I'm just used to being around, you know?"

"And now, you get to be your own man", Preston replies. "You both do." He looks between his kids.

"Well, I'm not a 'man'", Sheila replies with a witty remark."
fAnd to that, both men in the room chuckle.

"Person", Preston corrects, "Your own person."

And they all reach for burgers...

June Connor has posed:
    The Hand had plans for this warehouse before the Dykstra's acquired it, and they aren't unaware of the current mob problems that the family has in Gotham. So it's a good opportunity to lean on the new lien for the location in Happy Harbor. The front door opens up with a kick, four scarlet garbed ninjas filing in, katanas drawn. Some folks just can't get a break, can they?

    Meanwhile, outside, June's been watching this team of aggressors, in a black form fitting suit of her own, a tac vest and shozuko to hide her identity. She doesn't know the purchasers, she was going to just observe and report tonight as she pushes open one of the elevated windows.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
And just as the trio was planning to get a great celebration meal, they are interrupted. Yep. Makes sense.

Now, on the ninja's side, they should've read the warning sign by the entrance that said 'BEWARE THE HELLHOUNDS - TRESSPASSERS WILL BE FLAMBEED!'. Why? Because, as soon as they decide to break the customary gate door, they are greeted by the sound of dogs snarling, howling, roaring... And an improvised sprinkler system that rains down on them.

...Except, when it rains, it rains flamethrower fire on them!

(What? The warning was right there!)

The three heads immediately perk at the sound that echoes through the warehouse, and they look between one another.

Preston gulps, remembering his time of torture by the mob, but looks at Caleb, resolute. "This is it, then..."

"Stay cool, keep quiet and low", Caleb tells Sheila. He reaches for an armory closet, grabbing weapons for all of the family.

Preston heads for the main junction box, "Night masks on... Now!"

A click... And the lights go out!

June Connor has posed:
    "Oh shit," June says from her perch. She starts checking the window near her for booby traps, just in case she may have missed any at her first approach.

    Down at the door, the ninja in front rolls forward and out of the way, flinging a smoke pellet at the trio to make visibility difficult. The one behind him wasn't so lucky, and is engulfed by the flames. There's screaming and rolling as he desperately tries to put himself out. The other two dive to either side, and manage to only catch some of the fire, taking a few moments to pat out the flames.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
And, it's at that point that trespassers also get their share of... Well, there are sparks coming from the steel 'welcome mat', followed by the grid flashing with high voltage.

(Well, the warning sign didn't say extra crispy... But there was no more space to write, okay??)

In the meantime, as Caleb starts coming down the stairs, he moves towards a pannel at the end of the stairs, and turns it on. "Okay, we got... four assholes coming through the front door, tehy tripped the 'welcome mat'." He looks at another section of the screen, "In the back we got..."

June Connor has posed:
    In the back there's another team of four. These don't enter directly, though. They throw their grappling hooks up to grab one of the windows on the third floor, and begin to climb, going in for a different entrance.

    The welcome mat misses the one that dove in with a smoke pellet prematurely, since he dove forward and over it, not aware that he just saved his own life, and he moves to find cover.

    The two that are patting down fire aren't as lucky, the electric plate crisping them immediately as the electricity coarses through them.

    June winces. "Kevin McAllister eat your heart out," she breathes, listening to the mess happening inside. She carefully makes her way across the roof, looking for any booby traps she might unintentionally trip herself.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
One of the things good about the Dykstras, is that they keep an open-door policy inside their house. Which means, when the ninjas decide to ninja their way into the windows of the third floor, Caleb can actually see them climbing in.

"Uhm, Dad...?"

"Yeah, son...?"

"We're supposed to lower the bars when it's night, right?"

"That's right. Why?"

He presses a knob by the screen, and the aforementioned metal bars, pointy and sharp at the tip, come falling down.

"Oh, nothing. Just checking if you knew."

Preston looks at Caleb, and frowns.

He shrugs, then turns to Sheila, "And this goes for you too, kiddo!"

He readies himself for some actual fighting now, pulling out a sword - and Sheila does the same, her posture clearly practiced.

June Connor has posed:
    June looks in through a window on the other side as the Dykstras prepare to fight the Hand coming to invade them. She recognizes Caleb, and her eyes widen a little. "Oh shit, if his dad doesn't fight better than he does, they are screwed." She bites her lip, and pulls her hooked swords from her back. "This does NOT make me a hero," she tells herself. "I owe him, it's just fair."

    She grabs the roof's edge with the hooked blades, and starts making her way toward the Hand ninjas.

    The first up is the first to take a spike to the shoulder. It keeps them from closing all the way, though, and soon his allies have reached the metal bars, struggling to raise them so they can get through the window as he bleeds all over them.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
The Hand soldier that's forcing the bars up will find that the system is in fact automated; the bars don't just lower, they offer resistance at being moved up - which could well prove to be an impediment at going inside. And, just as the Hand soldiers struggle to make their way in - not unlike a shooting gallery, here - Preston, grabbing a shotgun, walks into the room the soldiers are coming through, and... *BLAM!!* Buckshot!!

And this is quickly followed by him stepping a hidden switch on the floor by the side of the door, where a metal plate jumps from the base of the door, providing cover for him to shoot again if he has to.

Now, if it all checks out, the Hand that survived the entrance traps should be coming up the stairs, so Caleb hides behind the wall, and gestures Sheila to keep quiet. He grabs a flash grenade, presses the trigger, and throws it down the stairs...

June Connor has posed:
    June watches as the first shot drops the Hand soldier who was closest, and he falls from the building to the ground. The second caught part of the blast, and is soon dangling from the bars. The last two of that group scamper off to the sides, and up to the next floor, this time trying to be more discreet before breaching.

    The one on the first floor pulls a flash pellet at just about the same time that he finds a flashbang coming down toward him. He throws his own flash device up to the room, and then covers his ears and closes his eyes. It still hurts and sends him into a disorienting fit, but he isn't blinded, though he stumbles back a couple of steps, grabbing the handrail.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
"Get down! Close your eyes!", he adverts as he pushes and covers Sheila to spare her from the flash pellet.

He expected a bang, and a rush of air that would knock them down, but that doesn't happen.

All the better, then.

He takes the moment the ninja is disoriented to grab a smoke grenade of his own and throw it at him...

But, instead of having a disorienting effect, it is much more vicious: inside, this one is filled with powdered lye. And, when in contact with the wet soft tissues of the body... it burns.

But there is really no other way with assassins, is there? Caleb suspected a day like these would come, and he was not about to make it easy for them.

The Hand soldiers that did not come in will have a hard time finding an entrance, since all the windows have now been closed down with the same kind of bars.

But would that be enough to make them give up on their mission? Caleb suspects it's not that easy...

June Connor has posed:
    The ninja on the stairs retreats with a groan of pain from the lye, finding his way back into the first floor of the warehouse, to lick his wounds no doubt.

    As for the other two? They...seem to have disappeared. It grows quiet outside.

    June makes her way around to the direction they moved, and she herself is baffled. They are gone. She makes her way up to the roof instead, trying to locate the last two ninjas. Surely they didn't just give up...

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
"The calm before the storm...", Caleb comments. He heads towards the monitors, and starts going through them. "C'mon, c'mon... Where are you, creeps?"

June Connor has posed:
    June makes her way to the roof, and looks around, and soon finds where the two went. The ventilation duct leading from the air conditioner into the building is now ripped open. They just went in through the ducts.

    Inside, the two drop down into the top floor, and quietly start to make their way down toward the Dykstras on lower levels.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
Not in any camera, so...

"The vents!", he warns. Ant the one spot that has them is downstairs, so he points to the stairs.

Preston lines up with the wall, preparing the shotgun. Sheila is hiding, but keeping her katana close. Caleb remains crouched, beyond the line of sight from the stairs. The sword he drew ready in his hand...

June Connor has posed:
    June hops down the vent, and finds that she has caught up to the Hand ninjas a little too quickly. The two there turn to her, and she winces. "Hi," she says. Down the stairs, the sounds of ringing steel against steel can be heard as the fight starts. They found someone else to cross swords with, both metaphorically and literally.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
And now, there's the sound of clashing metal, which has become all too familiar for Caleb over the years. "Wait...", he warns the others. "There's somebody else here."

"Sounds like they're fighting...", Sheila says, having observed sword sparrings at the Themysciran Arts Center.

"Sounds like it... But who?", Preston says. And he takes his cellphone out, and takes a picture of the stairwell to see what's going on...

June Connor has posed:
    The picture reveals the inexact picture of a dark figure in a form fitting uniform struggling with two red clad hand ninjas. There's a snap of multiple blades being fit together, and the grunt of an impact. June's hook swords have caught the blades of both of the Hand ninjas, and all four sharp edges are now knotted together between them, and she delivers a kick to one to knock him away from the fight and toward the stairs.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
Caleb keeps his guard up, in spite of things seeming to be looking for the better, "Let's wait..." He sees the picture. "Whoever it is, it's only helping us, diminishing their numbers." He looks at his family, thinking it over. "Perimeter check", he says. "In case we're missing something."

Preston looks for anything out of the ordinary in the security cameras...

June Connor has posed:
    June's kicked target hits the stairs, though he doesn't quite fall down them. She takes the moment to twist and pull, shedding her opponents blades out to the sides. Her standing foe now disarmed, she makes short, yet horrifyingly graphic work of him as she brings the hook sword back in and catches him in the side. She pulls, and it rips him open, dropping him with a scream to the ground.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
"Okay, whoever it is, is painting the walls red", Preston says.

Perimeter check is handled by Sheila, who cycles through the cameras like she's done it more than once. "I don't see anyone or anything else so far."

Caleb takes these things into account as he keeps his ready stance. "I sure hope whoever's down there is on our side..." He says nothing, not wanting to reveal his position to any leftover enemy.

June Connor has posed:
    Breathing heavily, June spins back to the ninja on the stairs who is pulling a kunai. He throws it, and it catches in her thigh. "Shit!" She grunts, going to one knee. The hand ninja leaps forward at her, and suddenly is upon her. They roll across the floor as the other ninja continues to wail in pain. It isn't a quick death he's experiencing. A moment later the struggle stops when June manages to pull her own kunai, driving it into the back of the last foe's head.

     She pants a second, then shoves the man off of her. She gets to her feet, and moves to the other ninja who moans in pain. She spares him the rest of his suffering, a short yelp for mercy cut short as she stabs him in the eye with the already used kunai, and she rolls back against the wall to catch her breath and check her thigh which has a blade still sticking out of it.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
Hearing things going extremely silent now, Caleb decides to go in. He gestures for the others to keep quiet, and he silent and stealthily descends the cold metal stairwell down to the lower floor and have a look at who took out the remaining two ninjas. He looks at all the spots and corners - even the ceiling - for anyone hiding.

June Connor has posed:
    June readies her bloody kunai as Caleb appears, and the eyes behind the make go a little wide. "Shit, it's you?" she asks. She looks back at the kunai in her leg, then grips the fabric around it, and tears so that she can get a better look. "What the hell are you doing here?" she questions, not showing her own face as she looks down to her injury.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
"I reserve the right to reverse that question, given how it's - oh, I dunno - my house!?", he raises his voice at the end to a more aggressive tone, given how June has his face covered. "Your voice sounds familiar..." He looks at the two ninjas she felled. "These two - your handiwork, I presume?"

June Connor has posed:
    "Nope," comes the smart alec response. "I just was walkin' through and found'em here and tripped on a fuckin' blade." She doesn't look up from her injury, and pulls a large adhesive bandage from her tac vest, ripping it open. "So you go pissing off Hand ninjas for fun or something with your Home Alone house from hell?" she asks, not actually answering the question of who she is.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
"That doesn't explain why you're here", he approaches, "Or why you took them down. Maybe thanks are owed, maybe not."

"Besides, they invaded the sanctity of my home. Me and mine, we just defended ourselves." He lowers himself, looking at the kunai. And a hand is lowered over the kunai, which he hovers over the handle - maybe to pull the kunai out... or hammer it further. "Now, I'm going to hazard the guess that you know why they were here. So please...?"

He waits for an answer patiently.

June Connor has posed:
    "Because you bought a place they wanted?" June sounds like she can hardly believe that Caleb wouldn't already know. She pulls out a small vial and pops the top off. "Hand doesn't screw around with that stuff," she says. "They want a place, they take it. You went and messed up some deal they had for coke house or whatever shit they had planned." She grabs the kunai and pulls it free with a hiss, and then grunts as she pours the vial on the wound. It fizzes, hydrogen peroxide. The bandage is slapped over the wound, and she flexes her leg a few times to see if it stays put. Blood seeps through the bandage to stain it a bit. "I'm usually in the mood to piss them off, they pissed me off first."

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
Caleb takes a hand to the bridge of his nose, and massages it. "First Vittorelli, and now this. Will we ever get a fuckin' break...?" He moves on to a question, "Okay, so... Where are these guys located? Should we expect more of these assholes coming in...?"

June Connor has posed:
    "Probably," June says, pulling herself up and testing her weight. "Look, I didn't come here to be your babysitter," she says. "But youse gonna die if you decide to stay around here. They probably will just keep coming. And next time they'll come ready for your traps. Dope as hell, but when these guys don't return to base, they are gonna try to figure out what went wrong and take better precautions next time."

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
Caleb can't help but squint his eyes at the statement - and you can notice his jaw and temples tense. And he asks, with all the resolution he can muster, "Where's their base located?"

And by the sound of his voice, it seems like he's thinking about doing something really stupid...

June Connor has posed:
    "At the corner of hell and hell no," June answers. "Look, you seem like a decent guy. I get it, you wanna protect your own. But you walk into one of their bases, you ain't comin' back out. You can't even take a kick, how you gonna take on a whole army of them? If you're smart, you'll just bail on this place and take the L."

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
"I look like a decent guy, sure", Caleb says. "But I didn't say anything about walking into one of their bases. I have this little thing called - oh, I dunno - C-4, a duffel bag large enough to fit eight heads and extra space for about 20 pounds of the stuff. And that is if I don't get creative and find out ways to shove a few pounds more."

His eyes squint again, "Now, only a select few know about that kick thing..." And, it dawns on him - the Hand tattoo on the shoulder, he'd seen it before. "June Connor?"

June Connor has posed:
    Yeah, she probably should have lef that comment off. But she already tipped her hand. She reaches up to pull the shozuko off. Her face is a bit red, hair damp with sweat. "Shit," she looks a little displeased. "Well just keep your mouth shut, okay?" she warns. "Or I'll be the one coming back to kick your ass before they do. And how do you plan to get the next prime time news story into their base to set it off? You think they won't take you out long before you get there?"

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
The teen takes a moment to review his idea, and finds that June's logic is sound (damn her!!). "Well, regardless", he says, "ever since I got out of fuckin' Gotham, I wasn't without making my own share of connections. One of those being strong enough to arm-wrestle heavy-hitters like a certain guy in red and blue." He pauses. "I also met Wonder Woman, wonder if she'd lend a hand..." He ahs, "I also met someone from S.H.I.E.L.D., go figure." He makes a face, "I wonder if the Hand would be up for facing this much heat." He shrugs, "It might just get burned..."

June Connor has posed:
    June smirks, limping around a little, reaching into her vest to pull a cloth to clean her blades. She starts wiping one down. "You gonna count on a superhero to help you? Good way to end up dead. Superheroes suck dick. Go about showin' their asses in tights to get people to look at them. And S.H.I.E.L.D. is government, can't trust them to do shit, locked down in their paperwork deciding whether people's lives matter or not. Why do you think The Hand is so strong? You think that people don't beg for help from heroes and from the government? They die waiting for that help that's never gonna come." She aggressively snaps the cloth off the edge of the blade and refastens it on her back, then moves to the second to start cleaning it.

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
"Well, either that...", he says, "Or maybe people haven't really tried. And besides...", he pauses as he reaches for his phone, "...I got a source of information on them right here." He pulls up a chair, "So, what can you tell me about them?"

June Connor has posed:
    June pauses as she cleans the sword. "Oh, so I just tell you all I can, just like that, and then you go tell Superman and he'll come in and save the day. Youse two are really tight like that, are ya?" She gives a mean laugh of incredulity. "I know they are all over the stupid planet. I know that you'll never figure out how many there really are, and they are a frickin' cult and half of them will die for their leaders." She wipes the blade clean. "And I know that the harder you kick that hornets nest, the harder they will come at you to make an example out of you. Superman can't babysit your ass forever."

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
"Never said Superman, but I'd take all the help I can get. Maybe my friend's friends..."

But who is he kidding, really? He's flying high on the chances he can overcome this and let's face it, there's really no guarantee. To believe he can is just being... childishly naive.

"So your suggestion is...?"

June Connor has posed:
    June's pierced brow raises on one side. That critical unbelieving stare as Caleb tries to defend his position. "Told you. Sell this place, or just bail, do whatever you gotta do to get lost. Move to some shit town in Kansas and work in some boring-as-hell office that nobody ever will notice." She returns her second blade. "You grew up in Gotham, you think it'd be different in New York?"

Caleb Dykstra has posed:
Caleb sighs, and idly turns to the side of the stairs - and that's when he sees Sheila peering over the corner.

He points up, brusquely saying, "Upstairs, now!"

"I-is everything ok..."

"Now!!", he replies angrily, to which she winces a little. "Please", his voice mellows in response; he'll beat himself for being a jerk later on. "Everything's ok, just stay there and tell dad to reset the traps."

"I grew up in Gotham, I hoped it'd be different where I ran off to", he says after the girl runs upstairs. "I guess I was wrong."