luke henry ; robin (notjustsidekick) wrote in musingslogs, @ 2011-01-27 19:23:00 |
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Entry tags: | robin |
Who: Luke
What: Looking for Thomas (a narrative).
Where: Various locations around Seattle.
When: Days 1 - 3.
Warnings: None.
Luke didn't waste any time after he left the parking garage. He had a single goal in mind, which was finding Thomas, and everything else was just unimportant white noise. The comm in his ear was meant for that off chance that Max or one of the others might find something that he didn't, but at the moment the only person he trusted fully was himself. The crime scene mentioned in the voice log was his starting point so he headed there first, barely even touching down on rooftops as he grappled from building to building.
He spent the hours until dawn scouring every inch of the scene without any luck, but he refused to be discouraged. There was still the surrounding area to search as well as the bar Wren had been watching the night they met, and anyone in sight was fair game for questioning. He checked in with Max so she knew she was still alive and kept an ear out for any news, although more caution was required in the daylight hours despite the APB no longer being in effect. The first day crawled by with minimal progress, full of searching buildings and alleyways and anything in between, hoping for leads that never appeared.
When night fell he turned his attention to the physical aspect of his hunt. The Bat was certainly a memorable sight and wouldn't easily be forgotten, not even by the most reluctant of witnesses. He lurked about the initial crime scene and focused on isolating individuals, looking for those he'd noticed the night before in the hopes that they frequented the area enough to be useful. They didn't fear Robin, these criminals, and it was evident from the moment he dropped down and shoved his first target - a pimp that was actually semi-familiar - up against the brick wall with an arm against his throat. Luke asked him if he'd seen anything suspicious in a dangerously calm voice, and the man laughed at him. He asked if he'd noticed any of the masks, familiar or not, around recently, and the man refused to say a word.
That was when he withdrew his staff. To the untrained eye it was simply a collapsible metal staff, nothing special, but what wasn't initially obvious was the fact that the ends were electrified. He could control the voltage much like a taser. The man discovered this when a shock was delivered to his abdomen, sending him into a fit of furious cursing. Luke asked his questions again in a low growl devoid of patience and increased the voltage when he still received an unsatisfactory response.
The man learned quite quickly that Robin was not to be underestimated.
The night passed in that manner, questioning those who lurked in the shadows and extracting bits of information through both the threat and use of an electrified staff and violence. It was a painfully slow process that didn't offer the answers he wanted, but at least he was getting something. Names of those who might know were common although their reliability were questionable. If he hadn't been so pressed for time Luke would have thought of it as progress, but every minute that ticked by was another minute Thomas could be succumbing to an injury or dying of a lack of both hunger and thirst. There was just no time.
Before dawn he was forced to sleep for a couple of hours and grabbed something to eat as well, managing to justify it by telling himself that he'd be no good to Thomas if he was weakened from exhaustion and hunger. He needed to keep himself strong enough to handle whatever was thrown at him. The second day involved more searching, more following of the pitiful leads he did have and trying to think of where the mask killer might take refuge when he wasn't out in his mask. He questioned a few stragglers about the killer specifically, giving the description he'd learned from Thomas' voice log, and he was simply directed to the bar Wren had been watching.
No one ever mentioned having seen the Bat. He didn't know if it was fear or something else, but not even the threat of electrocution could give him any specific direction in that sense.
That afternoon and night he scoped out the bar itself, doing everything short of actually going in himself, although he was tempted to do just that. Nearly every person exiting the bar was stopped, male and female alike, until he was satisfied that whatever information (or lack of it) that they gave about the man the mask killer was during the day was the truth. Luke learned that he wasn't by any means a regular, not the sort who came every night or even every other night, which was discouraging. He was hoping to have had some kind of pattern to work off of, something he could use to weigh the chances of Thomas being alive against the chances of him being dead. The last thing he wanted was to give up hope, but time was running out.
By the start of the third day his determined focus was beginning to wane. No one else had anything of substance, three days had passed, and he still didn't know where Thomas was. He didn't know where the mask killer was. Desperation replaced hope, and he found it harder and harder to believe that Thomas would be found at all. He didn't stop trying - he never would, not until he found him one way or another - but those worst case scenarios he fought to keep from thinking about were now all he could think about.
Luke paused on a rooftop, looking out at the grey skies and the city below, and tried to imagine life without Thomas. Without Batman. Hopelessness washed over him as he fell to his knees, burying his head in his hands as he finally allowed his composure to drop for the first time in days. He stayed like that for what felt like an eternity, silent and unmoving, before stirring back into motion and getting to his feet.
He couldn't give up. Thomas would keep looking until the end, and he was going to do the same.