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Ted Kord
Feb 16th, 2013, 09:59:13 PM
Crest Hill was where the rich folk lived; people like Luca Inzerillo, who was the owner of this particular Bristol mansion, according to the chattering voice of Agent Holt in his ear, and the text scrolling across his cell phone screen. He was being provided with all kinds of information about the apparent mobster and where he sat in Gotham's mafia hierarchy. It was probably pretty interesting stuff; just not particularly useful at this point.

Inzerillo wasn't the one they were after. They wanted whoever had tripped his security.

Normally, getting a warrant to hack security systems was tricky. Normally it involved so much hoop-jumping through channels that were probably riddled with corruption and informants that for normal law enforcement it wasn't even worth the effort. Not so for the DEO. They didn't give a damn about what Inzerillo got up to in the confines of his mansion home: but they did give a damn about anyone who might be the Batman. The theory went that the Batman was someone connected and wealthy - someone likely to have been at the charity event Oliver Queen had thrown this evening. Ted didn't know who had made it happen, or how they'd pulled it off, but they'd secured warrants for pretty much every electronic surveillance trick in the book, on every single male individual of the right height and build at the party.

That was how they'd found out about Inzerillo's silent alarm even before the police had. Monitoring his phone lines had shown the automated SOS; shown it going to a private number, rather than the police. That was always suspicious. Then Ted had heard it, right from the mouth of one of Inzerillo's lackeys: just a glimpse caught on a security camera, but enough to know it was someone in a costume.

This wasn't the plan. This was better than the plan. The plan was to watch everyone at the party; wait for something to go down, and then see who flinched first; who left under suspicious circumstances. Ted had made enough covert exits from parties in his day to know what he was looking for. Now though, they didn't have to wait: this was a crime in progress, and they could get there before the vigilantes; stop the villains and bag the would-be heroes, all with one stone.

Perhaps the helicopter was overkill. But it was fast, and that was what mattered. They'd leaked the break-in to the police as a lure for the vigilantes, but they needed to get there first: needed to beat the squad cars, and the mobsters, if they wanted the thief to wind up in their interrogation room instead of a cell or a ditch. Besides, rich people flew around in helicopters all the time: the locals probably wouldn't even bat an eye.

Inzerillo's mansion loomed beneath them. Anticipation got the better of Ted, and his fingers fumbled through the gear box in front of him; hauled out a rope and attached it to the helicopter's innards with a stout knot. He spared a brief glance at his partner, just long enough to utter one word - Stay - before fumbling with the door latch, and leaping into the night.

The ground rose up to meet him, the rope looped around his body just enough to slow his decent. It wasn't a big deal; he'd done stupider things as a vigilante, wearing a much stupider outfit. That was the advantage of vigilantes over veterans: when you didn't have health and safety getting in the way, you grew the balls for all kinds of things.

He met the ground a little heavier than planned, but nothing that a roll into the manicured lawn couldn't absorb. In an instant he was on his feet, a pistol that looked more like a child's toy than anything dangerous clutched in his hands. He tapped at his earpiece, turning it on and leaving it that way. "Set her down and cover the exits; I'll flush them out."

In quick, low, stealthy strides he advanced to the house, tugging the cell phone from his pocket once more. A few clicks and scrolls brought up the video feed from the helicopter's infra-red camera; his eyes picked out the silhouette of a figure through one of the curtained upstairs windows.

He pocketed the phone and stepped up to the door, another device retrieved; a blinding light sprang from one end, and the sharp stench of ozone cut through the air as he sliced his way through the lock and latch. He gave the door a gentle tug and it swung open; a mild sense of disappointment rippled through him that it hadn't posed more of a challenge.

He advanced through the house, as quietly as a man of his size and build could in a building with so many unfortunate creaks. The stairs swept the perimeter of the hallway on both sides; he chose the left, hugging the wall as he trained his pistol on where the thief would - by his calculations - be coming from.

A door lay open in the distance; beyond it a bathroom, and an open window. Point of entry, but not the right room. To it's right, another door was ajar; he crept closer, senses straining to hear any sound from beyond -

"DEO!" he shouted, shoulder slamming into the door and throwing it open, practised motions training his pistol on each potential hiding place in turn. "Nobody -"

His mind stalled as his eyes settled on the room's only occupant, and more specifically on the physique that her choice of outfit did very little to conceal. His arms levelled his pistol at her, but not with the same level of commitment they might have if he'd been confronted with the kind of burly burglar he was no doubt expecting.

"- move?"