Not This Again [Batman]

[Nina Stenet]

Evening is approaching, but Nina is still planning on putting in a few more hours at Stenet Labs before she'll call it a night. She's painfully aware that she's, at least in her own mind, about a month behind on her life's work now. And a part of her wants to make up for it, however long that takes, as quickly as possible. Which means long hours at the lab any time she can get away with it.

Sitting at one of the lab tables, the only sounds that can be heard is the faint shifting of the paper she's writing notes on and the sound of her assistant setting up one of the last few pieces of lab equipment they've yet to use at the other end of the room. Nina figures that the place will be considered fully up and running within another day or two - something she's greatly relieved by. She's a researcher at heart and not a business owner, so all the tedium associated with getting the lab set up has been hard on her. But now she can fully focus herself on her work and nothing makes her happier. Well, except Edward during his best moments.

Of course, that assumes that she'll be allowed to work uninterrupted. Since reappearing among the living she's gotten used to someone paying an unannounced visit every couple of days or so, but she figures that it'll have to come to an end sooner or later. The way she sees it, her having more or less come back from the dead is a novelty, but like all novelties it will wear off sooner or later. Sooner or later people will simply move on to thinking about something more interesting than the fact of her being alive - but unfortunately it isn't today.

[bats]

2 minutes and counting. Bruce landed with a thud on the rooftop of Nina Stenet's building, and rolled as he did so, to control the fall. He leapt up and headed straight towards the door that lead to the stairway.

"Message to all, keep Safehouse 3 clear. Consider it occupied," Bruce called into his earpiece as he threw himself over the banister of the stairwell, and hurtled downwards.

As he fell downwards, he fired off his grapnel gun, the grappel striking the roof, and the wire slowly began to unravel, until it went taunt. Bruce's fall was cut short at the 3rd floor, just where he wanted to be, and he swung his line over to the stairwell and flipped over the banister. He dragged the line back in as he burst through the door. He checked his PDA quickly, and the tracker he'd attached to the black van that was hunting Stenet down was turning around the corner onto the street. Stenet's little stunt at dodging death had attracted the wrong sort of attention, and there were some who weren't happy with. They wanted her dead.

He slowed as he reached the door to Stenet's lab, and he slowly opened the door, silently. He slipped in, sticking to the shadows, and kept his eyes locked onto Stenet. He didn't have time to wait and explain everything, he had to get her out of the building before the occupants of the black van arrived to kill her. He was basically kidnapping her. He loomed over Stenet, and moved swiftly, shoving a hand over her mouth, and one around her waist, and began to drag her towards the door.

[Nina Stenet]

Like pretty much anyone, Nina's first reaction to suddenly being grabbed from behind by strong arms is to scream into to hand covering her mouth. But after that is where things get different. Because Batman would only be able to hold onto her for four seconds. One second to find the nerve in the arm around her waist, another to disrupt the signals in the cells there, another to find the nerve in the other arm, and a final one to disrupt the signals there. And the moment she's done, she stumbles away from her attacker only to find that he's "Batman?"

To say that Nina looks surprised is an understatement. There's a long pause as she silently thanks fate that she'd mostly subconsciously decided to go easy on whoever it was. Perhaps it was because her normally sharp assistant had reacted by looking alarmed but not pulling out her concealed gun - Shawty had received strict instructions that Batman was to be treated as a friend. Still, Nina can't help but instantly regret the reflexive use of her power. As understandable as it may have been, given the circumstances, you just don't paralyze the arms of the Dark Knight. Even if it will only last for about ten seconds. But then, maybe he should have known better by now - you just don't grab Nina Stenet.

"What is going on?!?" she asks once she regains her powers of speech. While she sure that Batman wouldn't have grabbed her like that without a very good reason, she'd very much like to hear that reason. Even if he does seem to be in a hurry and probably has a good reason for that too.

[bats]

Bruce felt his arms go numb, and he grimaced in pain, not expecting that. There really was something special about Stenet. It took a moment for him to click back into place, and he soon remembered he had a time limit. He looked up at Nina and gave her a stern glare as his arms returned to normal. He turned to her assistant, and pointed towards the nearest exit.

"Go, hide, and don't come out until you know you're safe," he told her gruffly, before turning to Stenet.

"Quiet, I don't have time to explain. You need to go," he grunted towards her, checking his PDA quickly. They were parking up.

It would only be a matter of moments before they'd have clambered up the stairs or taken the lift up and searched the place. He didn't know how heavily armed they'd be, or what exactly to expect, so he didn't plan on fighting them just yet. He had to get her out.

[Nina Stenet]

Unfortunately for Batman, no amount of bat glare is going to intimidate Nina - already she's regained much of her composure and her normal inexplicably calm demeanor that rarely wavers no matter what is going on. And her assistant, much like her boss, does not take orders from Batman and stays put - though at least the young woman has the good sense to look alarmed and noticeably shifts her attention from simply watching Nina and Batman to giving the doors out of the lab wary glances.

Completely unsatisfied by Batman's answer, Nina demands, "Where? Why? Give me something!" Does he really think that she's going to leave just like that with no explanation at all? Nina is nothing if not stubborn, and she's gotten pretty fed up lately with all these men trying to protect her. In fact she recalls specifically telling Batman not to the first time she met him. Not that he'd listened.

[bats]

Bruce advanced on Nina angrily and stood over her threateningly. He turned his attention to her assistant once more infuriated that she hadn't moved. Was it so hard to just follow his instructions? Surely they knew that they could trust him, why question him?

"People are here to kill you," he hissed to Nina, making it clear that both her and her assistant had to do as he said.

In a flurry of motion, he picked up Nina from around the waist in a fireman's lift, and turned to the door. He hoped that she wouldn't shut down his body like before, hoping that the message had gotten through to her this time. They had to move quickly. He looked at the assistant, his eyes still burning with anger.

"I can't take both of you, but hide, and make sure they can't find you," he told her.

[Nina Stenet]

Nina trusts Batman - if she didn't she wouldn't be completely unphased by his anger and threatening advance. But then, what she trusts is his motivations and not necessarily his actions. She can't - not as long as she's sure he's unhappy with her neutral stance on Edward. Still, even she has the good sense to look alarmed when he finally tells her why he's here. "Not again," she mutters to herself.

Distracted by that statement and the sudden mixture of emotions that causes, she's surprised when Batman grabs her again, though this time she doesn't resist. There's a lot of things Nina would refuse to accept help with, but this is not one of them.

Unlike Nina, her assistant doesn't seem to be as resistant to the angry look Batman sends in her direction, but she doesn't really start to move until Nina says, "Shawty: Edward..."

"On it," the young woman replies, already halfway out of one of the back doors to the lab area and needing no further explanation to know what her boss wants. Somebody has to tell Edward that Nina is safe before he kills someone...

Glancing the way her assistant leaves, Nina comments, "Don't worry about her - she'll be fine." To judge by Nina's tone, she sounds completely confident in that. Nina's assistant is probably as resourceful as she is.