The Great IKEA Game
Chapter 4: The Three Stooges
AN: At least it hasn’t been two months again 😅. Let’s check in with the other batboys and see how they’re handling Damian and Marinette’s chaos.
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Tim wondered when his day took a solid dive off the cliffs of normal and into the waters of weird.
It probably started when Dick dragged them out of bed at eight in the morning – on a Saturday – piled them into the car, and drove them an hour and a half out of the city to an IKEA. If they had actually been there to shop they would have either burned the store down or killed one another.
Not that those things were off the table yet.
Tim had work, actual work, that he could be doing. But no, instead he was playing a demented game of hide-and-go-seek, which was careening into an all-out war. The destroyed shelving units, shopping carts, and forklift were unmistakable evidence of that.
How had the demon spawn accomplished this in less than a minute?
Bruce would kill them, once he came back from off-world.
That is if Alfred didn’t get to them first.
“Uh, order 177? Shit, my pay isn't enough for this.”
The words shook Tim from his stupor. He walked over to the counter.
“Hi,” he said, flashing his most charming CEO grin. “I have a quick question?”
The server's fixed smile contrasted with his dull eyes.
“I need to know what way the boy who ordered this headed.”
“No.”
Tim sighed, “Look, it’s important. My brother-”
“I mean, no, it wasn’t a boy.”
Tim paused. “Huh?”
“It was a girl, a teen girl. Black hair, big blue eyes, French accent. She was sitting over there,” he waved at an empty table. “But I think she walked away before that happened.” Referring to the giant train wreck occurring a few aisles over.
“Oh,” said Tim. “Thanks.”
“Do you want the order?”
Tim held back an annoyed sigh.
“Sure.”
So that’s how he, Jason, and Dick, sat at the abandoned picnic table, staring at the abandoned meal bought with Damian’s credit card. Jason grabbed a couple of fries and shoved them in his mouth.
“That’s evidence, nitwit,” hissed Tim.
Jason ignored him, stabbing a meatball with the plastic fork. “What? It’s going to go to waste. Girlie obviously ain’t coming back for it.”
“We should be more worried about how a random girl used Damian’s credit card!”
“She could have stolen it?” offered Dick.
“Demon spawn would have broken her arm before getting pickpocketed,” countered Jason, eating another fry. Silence. A weird glint appeared in Jason's eye. He turned to Tim. “What did you say the girl looked like again?”
“Black hair, blue eyes, French accent.”
“Shit,” muttered Jason.
“What?”
“I think I ran into her earlier, about an hour and a half ago. Asked her if she had run into demon spawn – she sounded confused and tourist-like. But maybe…”
“Maybe she’s working with him?” offered Tim.
“Could be.”
“Damian? Working with another person? A stranger?” Dick shook his head. “Doesn’t sound like him.”
Jason shoved another fry into his mouth. “The brat’s a competitive little shit, if he thought teaming up would help him get ahead, he’d do it in a heartbeat.” He pointed a fry at Tim. “Can you look at the security footage?”
“I’m already two steps ahead of you,” Tim said, flashing his phone with the hacked in security camera footage on-screen. Jason and Dick huddled in close as a small girl walk on screen and stood at the counter.
“Yep, that’s her. Can you ID her, Timmy?”
Tim rolled his eyes, “This is a smartphone, Jay, not a laptop.”
“I thought Mr. World’s Second Greatest Detective would be prepared for anything.”
“Well excuse me for not having facial recognition software, on my phone.”
“Guys chill.”
“Shut up, Dick,” Jason and Tim said in unison.
The footage played out and they watched the girl order two meals and pay with Damian’s credit card. They switched to another camera when she left and sat at the picnic table. A few minutes later Jason and Tim walked into frame.
“Look, there! She tenses. Look at her body language, she’s panicking. She knows who you two are.” Dick looked shocked that, yes, Damian had teamed up with a partner.
They watched the girl panic, although she managed to keep her body from reacting too much. She placed her phone to her ear and walked away from her spot.
“Who is she talking to?”
“Maybe Damian was watching out of sight?”
“Shoot, Tim, she’s out of frame. Do we have another angle?”
It took another minute or so, but Tim found the right security camera catching the mysterious girl leaving the food court. As she walked away the image on the screen flickered, and a moment later the shelving units fell.
“Oh crap,” swore Jason. “Do you think she has magic? Fuck, it would be just our luck if demon spawn teamed up with someone dangerous.”
Dick shook his head. “It could be a coincidence. We didn’t see her do anything. The chaos could have been a coordinated effort between her and Damian.”
Tim wasn’t so sure. “Come on Dick, you’ve been in the game long enough to know just because something looks one way, doesn’t mean it's true.”
They watched the girl hurry out of sight, this time it was much more difficult to follow her progress through the store. She would randomly duck in and out of showrooms, coming out differently than how she came in. If the three boys hadn’t been trained in stealth and detection for years, they would have had a challenging time tracking her.
Jason whistled low. “Who is this chick? I’m impressed. She has serious skill.”
Finally, she ducked into a showroom and didn’t come out. Tim couldn’t find a camera giving them an unobstructed view, but it didn't matter. They had a destination.
“This was ten minutes ago, they could already be long gone,” said Dick.
“Or they could still be hiding there,” countered Jason.
“We’ll find out when we get there.” They walked out of the cafeteria and past the closed aisles. The forklift that had been buried under the collapsed shelving unit was being unearthed by a flock of bewildered employees.
“Ten bucks says she has magic,” said Jason.
“Yeah, no.” Tim was good at math and the odds of everything happening just as she left was too big to be a coincidence. “I’m not stupid enough to take that bet.”
“Come on you guys, let’s focus here,” chided Dick.
Walking back through the showrooms Tim kept an eye out for any sign of his brother or his accomplice, but it was as if they had disappeared into thin air. Arriving at the last location they had spotted the girl, they waited for a touring couple to leave before descending on the tiny, boxed room like the detectives they were trained to be.
It didn’t take long to discover the lasered off vent.
“Shit,” groaned Jason. “They could be anywhere by now.”
“Tim can you-”
Tim had his phone in hand, “I’m already on it. I’ll have the vent layout in a minute.” He felt insulted they even needed to ask.
Jason peered into the vent, “Damn, I think we’re too big to follow.”
Dick sighed. “I miss my vent crawling days; they just don’t make them as big as they used to.”
“That’s what she said,” snickered Jason.
“Focus you two,” Tim snapped. “I’ve pulled up the air duct plans.” He flashed the screen to his two brothers who settled down. “This particular vent runs a couple of places. We have one entrance at the back of the store in the storeroom. Then another veering off near the daycare center, and the last which comes out near the unloading dock.”
“I’ll take the one next to the daycare center,” said Dick. “I’m the only one who isn't demented,” pointing to Jason, “or sleep-deprived,” pointing to Tim.
“Hey!” exclaimed Jason.
Tim sneered, repressing a Damian-like growl, “I wouldn’t be so sleep deprived if you hadn’t dragged us out of the house at eight in the morning. I arrived in from patrol at three.” He hadn’t had coffee in hours, and the weight of his body pressed on him like a panini maker.
Dick ignored them. “Jason can take the one at the loading docks, and Tim you’ll be able to bypass security and get into the back the easiest.”
“Sounds good to me,” grunted Jason.
“Alright,” agreed Tim. “The second any of us spots them, text the group chat, will box them in from there.”
They nodded and headed off their separate ways. Despite the tiredness in Tim's bones, there was a heady rush of the hunt thrumming in his veins. Damian, and whoever he had decided to pair up with, were going down.
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