18049/Cave Blues, blood, & You

Cave Blues, blood, & You
Date of Scene:	24 May 2024
Location:	Batcave
Synopsis:	Bruce gives people marching orders. Everyone finds out he had a batcave designed to fight Vampires. Alfred is the hero we deserve.
Cast of Characters:	Bruce Wayne, Tim Drake, Cassandra Cain

---

Bruce Wayne has posed:
Late in the morning, well after patrols have ended, Bruce is seated at the Batcomputer in a ritual of imputting any new information collected over the night. From himself as well as from the others under his charge. Seated in the high back chair, it's one of the few times one might catch the Dark Knight slouching. Braced on his elbow, hair damp from sweat is easily combed back out of his face, and he sports a pronounced five o'clock shadow. The dark rings around his eyes from the camo-paint he wears beneath the cowl, which is hanging down the back of his shoulders.

Two fingers tug at his bottom lip, blue eyes moving right to left over whatever piece of data he'd just entered to the, near endless, information servers. One of the most comprehensive databanks in the world. It likely rivals that of the U.S. Governments.

Alfred, dutifully, sets a cup of tea beside him on the console. "Thank you, Alfred." The butler simply nods and turns the tray beneath his arm as he steps away towards the stairs leading back up into the Mansion.

Tim Drake has posed:
Tim's reports were in first because of the overachiever built squarely into his soul and heart. Updated throughout the night if there were any changes or mistakes that he caught during the revisits during patrols. If any were made then they were fixed in the proper procedure and marked as such to make sure that anyone looking them over didn't think he was trying to pull one over on them. Besides, if he can help someone learn from his mistakes in addition to himself then that's twice the work done in less the amount of time.

His arrival into the Batcave is one that is quiet. Mainly because he's doing that thing where he's focused on his wrist computer for the moment and taking care of a few final things. He has a lot of intel to pour through and not that many hours to do it in. Which is why, the moment he's finished reading some reports from the Outsiders, he's slinging the feed over to one of the other stations-- his favorite one-- so that he can continue working. Just because patrols are over doesn't mean the job is done. Tim's job is never done.

"/You're/ slouching?" Tim's sarcasm is almost shocked as he pulls up to the chair of his console. "You must've beaten up an extra wave of petty thugs tonight." He's kidding, of course, but he hasn't had a chance to read Bruce's reports yet. He'll get to those. And to the coffee. Eventually.

Cassandra Cain has posed:
Cass's reports were...well, newly updated. Her first had detailed her first encounter with the vampires in town, her tracking of them, discovery of them, how she'd faced a horde of them and came out on top. No bragging, no embelishment, just the pure and simple facts as she'd been taught by her father, and likely encouraged by Bruce. Unfortunately, the -follow-up- report she'd more recently posted was a little less positive, she'd been targeted, ambushed, injured and...well, bitten. It seems that the new 'blood queen' had held a grudge, and the fact that Cass had managed to outwit her and escape when she'd been so close to being added to the woman's 'collection' probably wasn't going to make her -less- mad.

So what had Cass been up to? Well...quarantine. Finally having been cleared by Alfred that clearly being just 'bitten' thankfully wasn't enough to earn her own fangs, the young woman returned to the Batcave, costume worn save for her mask as she entered the cave.

Here to restock it seemed, though she paused as she spotted the pair at the computer.

And of course, the hot beverages Alfred was serving.

Bruce Wayne has posed:
A fresh mug of coffee suddenly appears infront of Tim because Alfred is the hero Gotham Deserves. As well as a cup of tea for Cass, as if he knew both were on their way. That or he's got these things prepared at all times. Bruce had to have gotten that trait from 'someone', afterall.

Bruce doesn't immediately drink from his own cup, but brings it to his nose to let the aroma wash over him in a slow inhale. "It's rude to point these things out, Tim." He chides, in a cool voice that still somehow manages to convey the humor inherent in what he says. "Good reports." Slap the hand, then put candy in it. That's his modus oporandi. "You misspelled a word. I'm not telling you which."

Then shit on it.

It's Cass' entrance that truly draws Bruce's attention from his own work, peering over his shoulder at the silent, unmasked, viglante recently released from Quarantine. "How are you feeling?" Alfred dips his head and makes his way towards the small area serving as his personal terminal. Likely keeping tabs on the others who may still be out on patrol into these late hours.

Tim Drake has posed:
"..."

Tim barely has time to thank Alfred for the coffee because now that he's sitting at his console and Bruce has hit him with the backhand of a lifetime, he's completely freaking out. He's keeping it together on his face but internally he's screaming. There's a huge chance that those that are paying attention to body language can tell that he's now much more tense than he was when he arrived but that could also just be Tim. Still. Now he won't ever get to his coffee because he has to find a mistake.

"... I triple checked." is mostly whispered as he swipes his own team's reports off the screen so that he can get back to his own.

Cass gets a small glance with a nod before Tim is back to paying attention to his screen and pouring over every single rope with his own eyes. His custom tweaked grammatical software has failed him for the first and final time. It will be uninstalled with a twisted vengeance. Later.

Frown. "... /triple. checked./" -- he's going to be at this a while.

Cassandra Cain has posed:
"Fine." Cass offers perhaps characteristicly taciturn, only to pause as her own drink was taken in her hands. Alright, she'd wait a little longer before going out.

Of course she could see Tim's tension, it didn't take Cass' level of insane body language perception to pick up on it. Unfortunately, the near-illiterate superassassin wasn't going to be particularly helpful in finding the typo and Babs wasn't here, so Tim was on his own.

"It didn't even leave a lasting mark. Probably by design." Cass finally adds, eyes watching the Bird and the Bat over the rim of her cup. "I will be ready for next time, now that I know she's hunting me...unless it was just pure chance. Doesn't matter, I'll be prepared."

Bruce Wayne has posed:
Bruce would probably call this a 'teachable moment', but he's never been much for admitting when he's giving a lesson. Which is, itself, part of the lesson. Was he being cheeky? Was there really a grammatical error in Tim's reports? He'd posted a lot of reports tonight. It could take a while to find a single misspelled word. IF there even is one. That'll teach Tim not to comment on Bruce's slouching.

He turns to full face Cassandra, arms laid across his still armored thighs with his fingers laced together. Attentive. Though he takes this moment to accept a moistened warm towel from Alfred to clean his face of the smear makeup around his eyes. Again thanking the dutiful Butler with a clipped nod. "Thank you, Alfred." One might wonder how often he actually says that in a day. The answer is: a lot.

Pragmatism.

"Now that we know she's specifically targetting you, we can use that to our advantage. Lay a trap of our own. Aside from your reports on these creatures, we have precious little information about them and I've let this go on uninvestigated for far too long." He knows her well enough to know she wouldn't have much issue playing bait in this regard.

"Tim, I need you to get with Barbara. These creatures are, as far as we know-" He looks to Cassandra for clarification on this point, "-undead. Which means they should be fairly easy to track. We need to capture one alive, find out the mode of transmission and the anatomical changes to the physiology of victims so that we can properly inoculate against infection. Including an effective, wide spread, vector for dispursement."

Tim Drake has posed:
Tim's in full on word search mode and it looks like he's going to be there for a while. Tim submitted way more reports than he needed to because he's thorough and that seems to be coming back top bite him right now. It's just part of the way his mind works and now he's going to have to deal with the consequences of his own actions. His own obsessive actions.

That doesn't mean he's not listening to what else is going on in the cave. He's always listening. It's half of why he's so good at what he does. He's always listening, observing, recording... if he wasn't Tim he'd be paranoid. Or Bruce. Is there a difference?

"Sec." Tim marks where he is on report number one and flips screens with the ease to pull up what he's been researching and investigating about the vampires in the city already. Not only that but there's a section on vampiric lore -- including prevention and combat tips and some myth based information on potential cures and chemicals that may potentially counter the effects of such a disease. There's also a bit across the entire report that explains how he has not personally encountered these particular types of vampires but he does plan on catching one. For scientific purposes. Anyway, all of this is sent to the Bat-Monitor that's not currently being used. "It's not done. But that's what I have so far."

With that done, Tim's screen is back to his own reports and now it looks like he's working even harder to make up for the lost time of having to stop and swipe that file over so that the others can see that he's been on top of that too. Kind of.

"Understood." Tim still manages to respond to Bruce. His secure BatPhone is on the console and he flings a text in Barbara's direction:

'Meet. Vampires. Science. When?' Send!

"... where is it." is mumbled next. He will Find. That. Word.

Cassandra Cain has posed:
"She has a lot," Cassandra offers, taking another sip and setting her tea down. Taste had 'soured' in the face of such seriousness. "A swarm of bats turned out to be her own little...minions?" she speaks, the last word asked with a look towards Tim as if questioning the man if she'd used the correct word.

"If she isn't seeking me out and it was just happen-stance? There's still plenty of them still in the city and people are in danger."

Her report had documented what she'd quickly worked out, what had helped Cassandra best (or survive in the case of the second encounter) the vampires. Their senses were a boon, till you used ultrasonics and flashbangs...but a cure? A vaccine? Well, she couldn't help with any of those.

"Are you sending us hunting for vampires to take alive?"

Bruce Wayne has posed:
Bruce had no doubt of Tim's capability to multi-task or he wouldn't have given him the impromptu assignment of finding grammatical errors in his reports. He remains leaning, hands clasped together betwixt his knees. Blue eyes dancing between the two as they share small glances regarding Cassandra's word choice. It's good to see them with that level of comfort and familiarity. He'd never say as much, nor would it be present anywhere in his expression or body language, but there was no small amount of pride for his team.

One thing is fighting together, quite another thing is to lean upon each other in social settings. Specifically for Cassandra.

He nods to her, "There is." A lot of people still in danger, "And if we can cure them, that would be better than having to put them down." Because he's not certain how that affects his rule against killing. Since they're already dead. "Which means we need to study them. Which means we need one alive.. But given the nature of what we /do/ know about vampires from Tim's research-" Because he cast a glance over at the second screen where his former protige had thrown what he'd dug up, "-there may be some level of telepathic connection between master and swarm."

He turns back to the computer, "I'm going to open access to an offsite batcave which we'll specifically gear towards this investigation." He runs his fingers over the keys, bringing up a occular scan. "Project Mausoleum Beta Alfa Nine seven oh nine one seven, active."

Did Batman have an entire batcave designed for fighting Vampires?

... He didn't /not/ have one.

"We'll need to update some of the files on what we /do/ know. Change some of the equipment to be effective against these creatures." Obviously some of the equipment will be outdated, useless, or need to be adjusted situationally, but to say Batman is prepared for /everything/ is quite an understatement.

"Cass, I want you to work with Jason and Damian on finding a suitable location for a trap. Once Barbara and Tim have put together a means to track these creatures to their nests, we'll come together and root them out of Gotham, entirely. Reach out to your contacts, see if anyone outside of Gotham has heard or seen anything." His expression remains impassively stoic as he sips the cooling tea. "I'll create a comprehensive data package to share with the Justice League Dark, Avengers, and others within the supernatural community."

Tim Drake has posed:
Maybe Tim was prepping all of that information to see if he could get access to to that Batcave. Maybe it one of the files that he could not actually get into no matter how hard he tried. Maybe he knew something was behind that ninth firewall but couldn't punch through-- or he ran out of time. But regardless the opening of such information has made it so that Tim has forgotten (for the moment) all about the impromptu mistake finding assignment in favor of... new things! Shiny new Bat things!

It's like Christmas.

In one of Drake's best stealth moments, Tim is over near Bruce and committing the access code to memory. His eyes are on the screen in hopes of catching any glimpse or details about Project Mausoleum. This is where Tim's bread and butter lies so this is where he's ready to shine. He's gone into complete fanboy mode and calmed down the more neurotic parts of his brain in favor of just being in awe of his mentor slash adoptive father.

"I knew you had something. I couldn't find it." is muttered mostly under his breath but loud enough for Tim's 'i knew it but i'm still impressed' tone. It's a tone that Bruce probably knows oh so well.

"By the way, the word was Happerstein not Happenstein. I typo'd while climbing on my bike." Apparently, not obsessing over the mistake has made it easier for Tim to find and correct. "I've adjusted it correctly." Tim is now kind of light slapping Bruce on the shoulder. "Can I?"

Please, let him sit there and dig into the Project Mausoleum stuff. /Please/.

He doesn't even need coffee anymore. Third Wind? Activated.

Cassandra Cain has posed:
Find a place for a trap, hope the vampire was still angry, resentful or infatuated enoungh to take Cass as bait. What could possibly go wrong?

Still, she nods her head, Orphan adjusting her gear and sweeping to finish her restocking of the throwing devices she'd used in her last skirmish. There'd been no audible acceptance, but it was clear that she'd agreed just as it was clear that she still intended to patrol as normal. Muggers, rogues and other criminals didn't seem keen to take the night off at the moment.

Bruce Wayne has posed:
Bruce always has an ace. It might not always be up his sleeve, but he always has one. With beings like Blade running around cutting the heads off vampires, it made sense to be prepared should there ever be an outbreak of undead. It's all based on what limited information he could dig up, mostly when he was younger, so some of it is decades old and likely has little to nothing to do with current trends. It'll give Tim something to update. Keeping him busy.

Which opened his mind up to finding the misspelled word.

Bruce dips his head in a nod and slides out of the tall back seat so that the data oriented former Robin can take his place, still wiping at his face with the warm towel which comes away covered in black smears. Alfred is there to take it, holding out a tray that Bruce set it on after grabbing his black rimmed glasses.

Obviously Gotham doesn't stop being Gotham because they're going to be hunting vampires. So it goes without saying that patrols will continue as usual. Alfred reminds him that he has to visit Harvey in the hospital and he dips his head in a single nod. It means a sleepless day. With nothing further to add or receive about their current circumstance, he makes for the elevator that leads to the Manor proper. A shower, a change of clothes, and a dozen or so meetings.

It would be a busy day.

Now everyone has their marching orders.