15551/An Unusual Request: Family Matters

An Unusual Request: Family Matters
Date of Scene:	04 August 2023
Location:	Abandoned Warehouse - Chinatown
Synopsis:	Inque and Red Robin meet, and they talk about where she should go from here. Favors are exchanged, and promises are made.
Cast of Characters:	Inque, Tim Drake

---

Inque has posed:
    The meeting place that has been arranged is on the roof of one of the abandoned warehouses in Chinatown. Apparently, Inque's joke that she'd bring Chinese wasn't so much of a joke after all. She's standing there, holding a bag of a local restaurant, filled with take out boxes.

    When Red Robin arrives she turns to greet him with a sultry smile. "Chow mein?" she offers holding out the bag. "I've got some dim sum, too, if you like."

Tim Drake has posed:
    It only takes Red Robin a few minutes on his bike, driving at speeds he'd prefer not to admit, to make it to Chinatown. Well ahead of the time Inque had arranged for them to meet. Now it's just a matter of getting to the place, so he stashes the bike somewhere safe and goes the rest of the way on-foot, keeping to the rooftops via freerunning and prodigious use of his grapple gun.

    As soon as he alights on this specific rooftop, he frowns. It's a puzzled expression, that much is obvious even with his face partially obscured by his domino mask. He definitely wasn't expecting her to be serious about the food. "Oh, uh..." Cue awkward back-of-the-neck rub. "Sorry, I ate earlier. But... thank you."

    He approaches Inque but keeps his distance, his senses on edge and his muscles tensed. But he's here. That has to count for something, right? "You know, if you had just told us what you'd wanted from the start, we could have skipped all this," he says, tone perfectly placid.

Inque has posed:
    Inque's playful demeanor drops with a low sigh. "If I had come out and said that I wanted you to keep an eye on my daughter to... help her not follow the path she's going down, would you have believed me?" She sets down the bag. "Maybe you would have." She looks up to Red Robin and the playfulness is back. "Maybe I just wanted to see you run around. Regardless of whether or not I told the truth, you would have done all this running around anyway, so why not have a little fun with it."

    "So. I bet you're //brimming// with questions," she says. "I'll answer them as best I can, without revealing any more of my shady dealings than you've already discovered."

Tim Drake has posed:
    Red Robin's arms fold over his chest and he shifts his weight, hip jutting out to the side. The smile on his face suggests that, yes, he would have believed it. It's a little smarmy in a way that seems entirely Robin, even though he's older and wiser (and not wearing that costume any more).

    "The Grey Skulls are going down, one way or another. I'll make sure she isn't involved, but beyond that I can't promise you anything. She has to make the decision to change her life, it can't be forced on her."

    He turns, keeping Inque in his peripheral vision as he approaches the edge of the building, looking out across Chinatown and to the rest of Gotham beyond it. "Did you get the package I sent your way?" he asks. Inque's agent hadn't seemed all that enthusiastic about the chances of Inque actually accepting the USB drive, but Tim wants to know from the source.

Inque has posed:
    "Oh, I don't care about her boyfriend," Inque says with a dismissive wave of the hand. "If it were up to me, I would have just killed him and be done with it. But..." she shakes her head. "Even a reprobate such as I knows that wouldn't help matters in the least."

    She lets out a low sigh. "I know," she says. "You have a better chance convincing her to change her life. Show her another path she could go down. I'd only make things worse." She lets out a bit of bitter laughter, "Can you imagine? Your long lost mother who gave you up at birth suddenly appears and is some mutate supervillain."

    "There's precious little I care for in this world," she says. "She's one of them. She's... //most// of them, if I'm being honest. I started this life because of her. I wanted to make sure she was provided for that she didn't have the kind of life I had growing up."

    "I got your little usb stick," Inque says, folding her arms. "I haven't cracked it open yet. Who knows what kind of surprises you hid in there."

Tim Drake has posed:
    "There are resources to help people who're mixed up with the criminal element." Red Robin scans the street below through the optics of his domino mask, though his attention is still tuned to Inque a few arms' lengths away. He picks up on a few low-level gang members out walking based on facial recognition, but all they're doing is just that: walking. Still, he watches them until they've rounded the corner and disappeared.

    He steps away from the edge. "After the Grey Skulls are rounded up, I'll make her an offer," he adds. But then he shakes his head. "Maybe you would. Maybe you wouldn't. But either way, Deanna is struggling with a lot of unknowns in her life, and you could eliminate one of them. I know you probably won't listen to me, but I have to advocate for her. If I were in her place, if there was even a chance I could talk to--."

    Here he stops. Bites his lip. Whatever he was going to say Red Robin apparently decides against it, and he blows out a heavy breath through his nose before he continues on with, "You don't have to meet her in person, but you could talk to her. There are plenty of ways to make contact." He doesn't mention the usb drive again; whatever's on it will have to be surprise, when and if Inque actually plugs it in.

Inque has posed:
    Inque's eyes are downcast, and her arms hug herself. "What would I even say to her?" she asks softly. A bitter snort escapes her, "Hi, I'm sorry I gave you up when you were five months old but I was slowly turning into a puddle of sentient goo?"

    She sighs. "It took me seven months to be able to put myself together enough for this," she says, reverting to her featureless humanoid form. "Twice that to have some semblance of humanity." Her form is back to human. "And even then, I'd never pass for human. Not anymore." She shakes her head. "Taking care of her was an impossibility."

    "I... appreciate your help," she says, as if those words were hard to say. "The circles I run in aren't exactly reputable, and none of them would give a damn about Deanna." She looks up at Red Robin. "I owe you one for doing this for me," she says. "I mean it. A favor for a favor. Anything... well, just about. I'm not about to turn myself in."

Tim Drake has posed:
    Red Robin looks over at Inque, and his head tilts to the side. "I don't know, that's a start, isn't it?" he asks, not unkindly. "There's never going to be a reason that changes anything, but it could give her closure. And a lot of people never get that."

    He holds up both hands, conciliatory. "It's your choice. Just... think about it." After that he drops it, either not willing to press further or just sensing that there's no further reception for what he's trying to say.

    Instead he cracks a half-smile at Inque's thank-you, roundabout though it may be. He nods. "Yeah, of course. We'll do what we can."

Inque has posed:
    Inque is silent for a while, digesting Red Robin's advice. "I'll think about it," she promises. "I owe her that much."

    She lets out a cleansing sigh. "Well," she says, her usual playful demeanor returning. "It's been fun, but I've got places to see, people to meet." She gives Red Robin a wink and a kiss, "See you Bat-Boy." And when she steps back into the shadows, she is gone.

Tim Drake has posed:
    That seems to appease Red Robin to some degree; it's a concession on Inque's part, he knows, and not one he can be sure she'll follow up on. But he hopes she does, for her own sake and for Deanna's. Tim is nothing if not hopeful, willing to see the best in most. Even a villain such as Inque.

    He stays on that rooftop for a while after she's departed, staring out at the Gotham skyline as he listens to the sounds of the city around him. But eventually something catches his attention, whether it's a call over one of the encrypted frequences the Bats often use or something coming up on the police scanner, and he's off at a run, grapple gun unhooked from its place at his hip. His cape flares out behind him as he leaps off into the night.