Legacies of Justice

[Dinah]

WHO: Carolyn, Dinah, Azrael, Niki

WHERE: Gotham City Museum

January 6, 10pm. Walking my beat. "Bah. Stick to reading who-done-its girl. That'd be a terrible beginning," Carolyn tells herself as she continues the slow patrol around Old Gotham. A dull evening so far.

"Geez man, where'd they come from????" The gang is running hard...the complainer at the back of the pack because he's wasting breath talking. "In there!" another points toward the museum." The gangers sprint...stumbling and clumsy in their panic.

The whine of a souped-up motorcycle cuts the night, headlight sweeping across the twenty or so toughs in matching jackets. A determined-looking blonde twists the throttle as she rounds the corner, the big bike skidding efficiently before the rear wheel catches again. The long coat is fluttering in the wind, showing her to be wearing fishnets and a black bodysuit beneath it.... cold night for that, really.

She's not so much chasing as herding the gang, and it's been a long drive. For the ones on foot. The group's down to roughly half their number now, unconscious bodies littering the streets all the way back to the site of a would-be fight with a rival gang. That was before the Canary and the Angel descended.

Standing atop the museum already with his wings spread wide open as the angel looks down at the gang that he's been chasing for a few blocks now. Boy are they out of shape. The Angel actually lapped them a few times bu had to turn back when he noticed that he ran too far. And now he's in front of them. Kneeling down low on the roof so they don't catch sight of him. He makes his way over to a skylight. Using the set of lock-picks he keeps in his pouch to unlock the window entrance and since the museum is still open he's sure the alarms haven't been set yet. But just in case he gives the window's corners a careful inspection before lifting it open and just jumping into the opening. OK, perhaps that was a bad idea. Since its a good 5 story drop to the bottom. The angel shifts his weight over and glides towards the tyrannosaurus rex display where he carefully lands on the monster's neck and slides down it's spine and run on down right off the tail he leaps and hits the floor. With a skillful tuck and roll

Yeah well, as per usual Niki just HAPPENS to be in the wrong place at the wrong time as the muggers decide that it's a good idea to hide in the nearly deserted museum, few stragglers lagging behind. Nearly closing time. Carefully standing out of the view of one of the cameras Niki watches, curiously mind you, as the muggers scramble inside trying to hide themselves from someone. She has no knowledge of this mind you, and lets out a cry as they topple into one of the exhibits nearly shattering it. "HEY! Watch where you're running!" She cries.

The gang, the six of them left, crash through the museum doors. So much for caution. Or any evidence of actual thought on their part. The security guard bleats something like "Stop!" and is not just ignored, but run over. He maintains enough presence of mind to thumb the silent alarm, though. A few seconds later a call goes out over the police band. Carolyn leans over to listen to the radio speaker-mic clipped to her shoulder. She keys it, "Owen, responding," she says.

Meanwhile the gang stop in the main foyer, underneath the tyrannosaurus skeleton. "Now what man!?!" one yells at the leader. "You betta get us outa dis!" The remaining patrons in the museum scatter, no longer walking for the exit, they run.

Dinah rides the bike up the front steps to the museum, killing the engine even as she's dismounting. She's well-practiced, and takes a couple seconds to rock it back onto the kickstand before following the gangers into the museum. Funny, how the burly (and armed!) young men are tripping over themselves to get away from the short blonde.

Too bad the crowd doesn't react the same way. Nearly closing time, there's still enough people to qualify as a stampede. And Black Canary knows just how long she'd last in -that-. Muttering curses under her breath, she steps back to the bike and climbs on again.

Azrael slowly gets to his feet and stands at attention while observing everything silently. OK, check.. people are gone. Now only him and the goons. But then the thought that there might be someone else left in here some care-takers perhaps. The angel shoots a glance at the museum cameras an narrows his eyes before backing up into a conveniently placed shadow. Hrm, he could have sworn he heard Black Canary's siren before he entered the museum. So he won't need to worry about any of the gang members making a break for it through the back. Within the shadow a flame suddenly goes off. The angel is holding up his flaming sword as he calls out to everyone, " Know that you have disturbed the peace of this place and this building is under MY protection!" the angel turns his head toward the gang leader, "Give up quietly and I may allow you and your goons live to see the next sunrise." well, he seems serious and of course there are those rumors going around the underworld that Azrael has been known to kill people.

Obviously out of the view of the camera, Niki makes her way up to where the thugs have so decided to run, and try to stumble around and get away from their skinny pursuer. A funny thought if one thinks about it. Well, anyways, moving on, the teen slides behind a large display eyeing what happens to be taking place catching her breath. Well if it isn't tall dark and 'scares little girls to death'. Kill them?! Whatever they did that's not warrant to kill them!

The stream of people running from the museum gets Carolyn's attention. She radios for backup as she starts running as well, toward the museum though. Carolyn slows as she nears the entry. No sense walking into an ambush or anything.
The gang looks up. "SH**!!!" is the general consensus, and they six scatter. As they scatter they haul guns from waistbands or pockets and point them in Azrael's general direction. The staccato bark of pistols adds to the confusion.
With the sound of gun fire obvious, Carolyn draws her own pistol and moves to at least attempt to have some sort of cover. She also speaks into the radio, "Shots fired."

Dinah stays on the bike as the crowd stampedes past, hiding behind the cowl. Sure enough, they part around it. She's just climbing off again when she hears the gunshots. More cursing, and the short blonde sprints into the building. Only to immediately duck behind one of the turn-styles to get a look at what's going on.

Well, there’s good news and bad news, and even worse news. The good news is that all the gang members were able to get off at least one round at Azrael. The bad news is that after all the smoke from the gunfire clears. The angel of Gotham is still standing. Lastly the worse news is that all the shooting accomplished was to piss ff the Angel. The vigilante slowly sheaths his sword. Maybe he's giving up? Nope! Instead the blades in his gauntlets eject and are lit on fire. Now Azrael makes the effort to chase down the fleeing punks who dared to shoot at him, "I'll make you regret that for the rest of your life, both seconds of them!!"

Compelled to be continuously faithful to the museum Niki let's out a bit of a cry, something that sounds like 'No!', or resembling a word along those lines as she stares. They're going to ruin the exhibits. And then what?! And of course what if Azrael really DOES kill them? Then what's going to happen, eh? There'll be blood everywhere, and although they went to unload on him unnecessary death. I mean come on. SHE'S scared of him, he's a scary guy!

The gang members keep on shooting. They're too scared to stop. One of them, crouched by the turnstile, tries to reload, but he's shaking so hard he drops the clip...next to Dinah. The others keep shooting. They're hitting the cieling, the dinosaur bones, lights...they don't have a clue how to hold a gun, and have never practiced, so they're not hitting anything they aim at.
Carolyn edges around the doors to look inside. Not good. Lots of guns, no clear line of sight to see who's shooting, let alone what they're shooting at. No cover to be seen nearby. Staying low, she edges inside, and rolls up against a turnstile...one a few over from where Dinah is crouched.
Carolyn

The beat cop catches Dinah's attention first, the two women crouching just a couple of turnstiles away from each other. "Hey... I'm Black Canary." She offers, by way of introduction. It would have sounded so much more -official- if she'd been able to invoke the Justice League, but she turned in her credentials when she quit. "Oh, and don't shoot the big guy with the flaming blades... he's on our side." Kicking out, she sweeps the dropped clip in the general direction of Cathryn, pivoting and staying crouched low. The next sweep is much faster, aimed at the back of the ganger's knees with the now-empty pistol.

Azrael stops chasing one of the gang members, wow he escaped? No, the angel just let him go so that he may return to where the real action is. The vigilante clad in red and gold armor slowly walks on over to one of the gang leaders. He doesn't look happy and worse yet those flaming blades on his arms are still out and burning. *KA-BOOM* the leader manages to hit the angel directly in the chest with a bullet. OK, no doubt on that point. But all the shot seems to have done was caused him to stager a bit but he's still coming.. he's a demon not an angel!! The vigilante raises his hand and grabs the gang leader's hair, which brings the man to his knees. The angel looks down at his terrified victim before raising his free arm and positioning the blade so that its eyelevel with the man, "Shh..be at ease, I will end your suffering in just a moment." was that an offer or a threat?

Carolyn stares. She'd been told about the costumes. She'd seen the news stories. It's different running across one though. Carolyn scoops the clip, and winces when the ganger gets his knees kicked out from under him, and his head bounces off the floor. She doesn't get any farther before Azrael descends. Oh this is not good. The ganger is petrified...frozen in fear, his eyes fixed on that blade. Being a cop was supposed to be easy: You arrest the bad guys and help the good guys. "Gotham PD," Carolyn calls out to Azrael. "Drop him. And all of you put the guns down."

The gang stops shooting, they might hit their own. One gun clatters to the ground when Carolyn yells. The rest are too busy trying to scatter, let the leader take the dive. The rest are edging deeper into the museum, looking for fire exits.

Dinah rises to her feet after dropping the ganger, blue eyes on the angel with the flaming blade. "Azrael! No!" she cries out, drawing herself up to her full five and a half feet. Not caring about any of the others just now, she runs closer to where the two are at a standoff. Willing her voice to be calmer, she softens her tone and continues. "It's over, Angel. Just set him down, now. The police can handle it from here...." She's slowly approaching as she talks, speaking as she would to soothe a rabid dog.

Azrael is yet again distracted by the voices yelling at him. He lowers his blade at Dinah's sudden appearance. Which gives the gang leader just enough time to get one last round off while the angel is distracted. The blast of the weapon hits Azrael right in the face. The angel goes flying back about six feet from the un expected blast. His body lands in a heap with his masked face smoking from the blast powder. Oh my god! What just happened? the man lays completely still for a moment.

The wail of sirens marks the arrival of the backup Carolyn called for. Officer Owen, however, is carefully edging around the dubious cover of a turnstile, trying to cover Dinah as she goes out into the open. When the gang leader fires, Carolyn hesitates a bare moment, but then her training prods her to action. She shoots as well, but an aimed shot, to the gang leader's "center of mass." Since he's side on to Owen, the bullet slams into his arm, breaking it, and smashing the man to the ground in a welter of blood.

The officer holds still for a moment as the enormity of it crashes down on her. Then training again comes into play, and she moves to make sure the man is no longer a threat to anyone. He's not...his pistol went flying when his arm was broken. Carolyn swallows, and starts to speak, but ends up just closing her mouth.

Slamming doors from outside, and a crackle of radio calls mark the arrival of backup. Carolyn finds her voice. "Everyone just freeze," she manages to say. There's not a lot of force to the command though.

Dinah gasps when the Angel goes down. It's enough hesitation to let the officer drop the gang leader, and then Black Canary makes her choice. She runs to the fallen Azrael's side. Crouching, just as Carolyn commands everyone to freeze, Dinah's fingers check Azrael for a pulse, tears streaming down her cheeks. Yes, she knows what he's told her. And she's even seen him get shot before. But not in the -face-.... She hears the sirens, but they don't register just yet.

"C'mon..." she mutters.

OK, that settles it, the angel isn't human! Azrael actually stirs and sits up after the shot. He looks over to Dinah and raises a hand to wipe away the tears from her cheeks, "Don't cry, I told you. I'd always be around as long as you still need me." his gauntlet wipes away a trickle of blood coming from his forehead. Little does anyone know that the Angel's mask is made of kevlar and the small caliber of the gang leader's weapon only stunned the Angel for a moment. He takes a hold of Dinah's hand and says softly "Com'on Hummingbird I want to show you something." he looks over at the fallen gang leader and then over to the cop, "You should have let me finish him off. But nice shot otherwise."

Carolyn's not saying anything. She just nods. She's shaking a little in reaction, as the adrenaline is starting to drain. The gang leader is just bleeding, and moaning. Shouts from outside, along with the radio traffic indicate the arrival of a fairly large number of officers out front, but so far none are storming the doors. They're busy, the radio patter seems to indicate, rounding up the gang members that fled out the side doors. Officer Owen slowly lowers her pistol and holsters it. "Yeah," she manages to say. "Right." The Book says she should bring these two in for questioning. Somehow that doesn't seem likely.

Dinah lets out a long sigh when Azrael sits up, shaking her head slowly. She fights the urge to swear at him, managing a small laugh instead. Her small hand gives his a gentle squeeze and she nods. "I'll catch up with you later. I'm gonna stick around for a bit...." The GCPD is bound to have questions, and it's never been Dinah's style to flee into the night. Old habits of a Justice Leaguer. "But you'd better go, I think." The smile she flashes is warm, and she takes a slow step back as she releases his hand. Besides, her bike is still outside.

Azrael nods and leans his over and presses his forehead against the blonde's, "I'll see you at home, I don't like questions.." the vigilante slowly gets to his feet and staggers a bit. He careful watches each step. Possible concussion here. The man just ignores the police as they fill the room and even stranger yet. They seem to ignore him as well. The angel stumbles out of the museum for fresh air. OK, the apartment is way too far for him to just hoof it in his injured state. He'll hail a cab or something. If he's not careful one of these days, he really will be seriously hurt. He was just lucky the guy wasn't packing a colt python otherwise he'd be looking for his head right now.

Carolyn watches Azrael stagger out. The police Sergeant comes up to her, "Owen...Hey, Owen!" She looks, and answers, "Yes, Sergeant?" A horde of blue uniforms are filling the room now, and a babble of police. It looks like there might be reporters outside too. "You ok," The sergeant is gruff, but there's real concern there. He glances at Dinah, he knows who she is of course, but his concern is for his officer. "Yeah. Just a bit ..." Carolyn trails off, not sure what she's just a bit. The Sergeant nods. "Fine....go have a seat in my cruiser, I'll drive you back to the precinct." He turns to Dinah as Carolyn goes on out. Paramedics are coming in now, wheeling a gurney toward the shot gangster. "Ma'am, I'd appreciate it if you'd come as well." Any answer gets lost as a couple reporters manage to worm in and start snapping pictures. The sergeant turns on them, and yells at his people, "Get them out of here!" To the reporters, he just shakes his head, "No, no comment other than get back before you're arrested for interfering with an officer!"