Catgirl: Young Justice BOOK 2 (COMPLETE)

CHAPTER 52

|The Batcave
|December 27 2013, 23:00

It had been a couple days since Robin spent his first 'Wayne Manor' Christmas with Catgirl and Nightwing. They took him to their warehouse in Blüdhaven for the day, teaching him all types of new things- none of which had anything to do with Calico.

Bruce wasn't happy to hear that.

Apparently it was supposed to be obvious that he was to try and get information from them, to report back to Batman.

It really wasn't.

Even if he did know that was the case, there was no way Robin would report anything back- presuming he got anything at all.

Batman made it crystal clear that he didn't have an issue dragging Katherine down with Calico.

It was almost like he wanted to.

"This mission will be top-secret. Nobody outside this team will know what we did tonight. Not even our closest allies will know." Batman stood by The Batcomputer, using the screen to show a picture of a factory.

"That's Calico's newest building." Batgirl stated, pointing at the screen, "My dad's men were investigating it a couple weeks ago. They thought it was a new lab."

"But The GCPD are unable to get close to the factory without first being invited inside by Calico himself." Batman continued to explain, "When they showed, the factory was being used to make soft drinks, none of which had any traces of catnip inside of them. Due to their unsuccessful first search, the court had denied The GCPD a full search warrant without evidence of illegal activity, and Calico has denied them further access to the factory to find any."

"So we're going in there to shut it down." Robin caught on.

"We have to." Batman pressed a button, switching the factory picture to a picture of Calico standing outside the factory gates, shaking hands with a bald man in a suit.

For some reason, the man looked familiar.

"That's Lex Luthor." Batman cleared up Robin's confusion, "He's Calico's newest business partner, and creator of the drink Calico's factory is producing."

"Which can't mean anything good." Batgirl cut in, "That guy is like Metropolis' Calico- worse even."

Worse than Calico?

Yeah, right.

"Lex will be visiting the factory in the morning." Batman switched the picture again, this time to one with just Calico in it, "To make sure the factory is in mint condition, Calico will be visiting tonight. Not only will he be in the open, he will also be unprotected."

"Unprotected?" Robin questioned.

"Yes." Batgirl quickly went onto her phone, showing him a picture of Calico walking from a fancy car to his building, surrounded by bodyguards to the point you could barley see him. "Even if the distance is as little as a sidewalk, Calico's always surrounded by bodyguards."

"Bodyguards?" Robin held back a laugh, "Surely you've not struggled to reach him because of that."

Batgirl put her phone away and scoffed, "His 'bodyguards' aren't exactly your usual bodyguards; they're mercenaries- hitmen- the best the underworld has to offer. They won't hesitate to shoot if you get too close to their client, because they're paid extra for each hit they get."

"Ah." Robin cringed, "Yeah, I guess that makes more sense..." He looked up at Batman, wondering, "Why isn't he bringing his men tonight?"

Batman fell silent.

"That's the thing." Batgirl frowned, "We aren't sure what's different about tonight. You'd think being in the open for so long would mean he'd double his usual security, but he's completely on his own."

"We have to think that he has something else to protect him in there, something even more deadly than his usual defence." Batman looked over at the picture of Calico on the big screen, "Without Catgirl and Nightwing on this mission, it's very likely we may be overpowered."

"Overpowered?" Robin found that hard to believe, "It's 3 to 1, our favour- plus, you're, like, Batman- no way he has something that can take down all you, me and Batgirl."

"I too believe it could be a bluff." Batman reluctantly admitted, "But we must go in regardless. This may be our only chance to get to Calico for a long time."

Robin looked over at Batgirl for her opinion on this.

She must've thought this was a bad plan.

"What Batman said is true." She glanced at the screen, "Calico could totally be bluffing, but we need to keep our minds open to the theory that he could have something worse awaiting us."

"Worse than a dozen professional killers?" Robin shivered just thinking about how dead he'd be if he ran into even one of Calico's men.

"Possibly." Batman said, quickly adding, "But you won't even see Calico tonight. Your role in this mission will be strictly covert."

"Covert?!" Robin protested, "That's just like the team!" I thought I'd get to go on real missions with you."

Batgirl laughed, shaking her head at him, "You're not even allowed on team missions-"

"And you're not even on the team." Robin argued, "If you can play a real part in this mission, why can't I?"

Robin took one look at Batman and knew what was coming.

"Because you aren't ready for that yet."

Again with the 'not ready' bullshit.

How would he ever be ready if they didn't give him the chance to prove himself?

"Whatever." Robin didn't want to get benched for disagreeing, "I'll stay covert."

**********

Obviously the staying covert thing was a lie.

After staying with the queen of lies herself, you got really, really, really good at lying.

Like, lie to Batman and get away with it good.

Batman and Batgirl had gone into the factory without Robin, trusting him to stay lookout; that was just asking him to jump down from the roof the second Calico arrived to take him out solo.

If that didn't prove he was ready, nothing would.

And at the end of the day there wasn't a real solid plan anyway. As long as Calico got taken down, it didn't really matter who did it or when. As far as anyone was concerned, Calico was a supervillain, catnip factory or not. Belle Reve would take him for any of the many other operations he'd been running in and out of Gotham for the past three years.

Easy.

"Robin, come in."

The only thing that made Robin leaving his post to go through with it difficult would be the check-ins Batman was asking for every other minute.

"Still here." Robin rolled his eyes, "Walked in circles to avoid my legs cramping, if that counts as moving-"

"Good. Stay put. Calico should be arriving at any moment." Batman let the comms channel fall into silence again.

'Stay put'.

Pfft, yeah, right.

Word Count: 1124

A/N: This may be the last chapter I'm able to post for a while as I'm expecting to have no wifi for a bit. Whatever uploads I miss, I will post them when I come back. I don't know how long I'm going to be away for, but it's hopefully not going to be long! Thanks for reading and I hope you wait for me to return! <3