Chapter Text
Everyone in Gotham knows about the Iceberg Lounge on some level - hard not to when keeping an ear out for the Rogues is a necessary part of survival. Much as Penguin likes to fancy himself as a businessman... well, his name is Oswald Cobblepot and he goes by 'the Penguin' and gets into regular punch-ups with Batman. Even if he's careful to keep his business mostly above board, at least enough to keep him in and out of jail, he's a Rogue on the same level as Two-Face.
Though word on the street is maybe don't put those two names together right now.
Regardless of all that, Penguin is a known name in Gotham. He's not as much of a threat to the general populace as Scarecrow or Joker were in that he's not about to put weird toxins in the water supply, but people know enough to recognize his goons and keep out of their way. You'd think that would extend to keeping away from the Iceberg Lounge, considering it's Penguin's big place of business, or at least that it would only attract the sleaziest of Gotham's underbelly.
It's surprising then to see that the place is weirdly... classy, for lack of a better word. It's ridiculously ostentatious, of course, all draped in gold and velvet and rich, dark colors, with giant ice statues of penguins all over the place, but there's a smartly dressed jazz band providing live music, servers and waiters in crisp suits walking around offering champagne flutes to the guests, the guests are all dressed to the nines in tuxes and sweeping ballgowns, and there's a giant exhibit in the big central room in the middle of everything with a giant iceberg, running water, and actual penguins.
It's cold in the central room, and Stephanie is so glad her suit has some kind of thermal technology to keep her warm.
"Geez," she whispers, looking out over the people gathered, laughing and sharing wine and champagne, gathering at poker tables or various slot machines. "I never knew this place was so fancy."
"That's... a word for it," Crest concedes. She glances over at where he's carefully putting the glass from the skylight back.
"Is it not fancy?" she asks. "Wait you're like, rich rich, I forgot. Is all this stuff, like, beneath you?"
Crest turns to give her a slightly incredulous look. "It's not 'beneath me'."
"It totally is, isn't it."
"It's not beneath me," he says again. "It's just... it's a little ostentatious, for my personal tastes."
"Is it the giant ice sculptures of penguins? It's the giant ice sculptures of penguins, isn't it."
"I mean they don't help," Crest says, climbing along the rafters. Stephanie follows after.
"The penguins are really cute though. The live ones I mean, not the ice sculptures. They're being taken care of, right? Like they're not being abused for entertainment or fed to sharks or anything, right?"
"So, fun fact about Penguin that's kind of genuinely fucked up? He's near the top on a ranked list of individuals who have given most to conservation efforts. The penguins he keeps in the Iceberg Lounge are all endangered species of penguins, and he helps a lot with various programs, taking in penguins who can't survive in the wild anymore and helping with breeding programs."
"You're kidding," Stephanie says, looking back down at the exhibit.
"I'm really not. It's one of his very few good qualities."
"Okay, you're right, that is genuinely kind of fucked up," Stephanie agrees. "You'd think he'd, I dunno, advertise it more, as evidence of his character?"
"He doesn't like the idea of people going after his penguins as a way of trying to get back at him, so he keeps pretty quiet about the whole thing."
"That is. Buck wild," Stephanie says. Crest gives her a little grin as he swings open a vent and crawls through. She crawls in after him, and from there they keep quiet. The walls of the vent are metal and echo each little noise, so they take extra care to be quiet as they move. Crest seems to know where he's going, pausing a few times at junctions before making turns. Stephanie tries to keep them in mind in her mental map of the place. They have to scurry up and down a few inclines here and there, but eventually the reach a stretch with a vent cover along the wall. Crest settles by it and beckons Stephanie closer.
She can see through to a large office room, all done up in rich blues and golds, walls lined with shelves full of expensive looking books and pricey looking statues and artifacts. There's a few glass cases around the room with odd items inside that are hard to see the details of from her position. There's a massive portrait of Penguin on the back wall, looming over an ornate wooden desk and massive, comfy looking chair.
There's no one in the office currently, leaving it just a big, empty, and dark room, only lit up by the light from the aquarium that makes up one of the walls. They got into the security feeds from outside the building and Spymaster looped the footage for them, so they're clear as far as cameras go.
Crest carefully unscrews the vent cover and swings it open. "Wait here," he says, "I'm going to make sure the door is locked." Stephanie nods and watches as he slips out of the vent, dropping to the carpeted floor ten feet below them silently. The office door is already locked, thankfully, and he moves back to the spot under the vent. "Grapple?"
Stephanie pulls out her grapple, swapping the claw grip with a magnetic one that hooks over the edge of the vent and lets her slide down the cord into the room. "Spymaster, eyes on the hallway outside the office?" she checks.
"You're clear. I'll give you a head's up if someone comes your way."
Which will give them plenty of time to get back up into the vent before someone comes in. Stephanie checks with Crest. "Desk or shelves?" she asks.
"Paperwork or secret compartments is what you're really asking," Crest points out.
"Ooh, I wanna check for secret compartments!"
Snorting, Crest gestures for her to go ahead, heading for the desk himself. Stephanie cracks her knuckles and gets to it.
Henrietta the Spy don't fail me now. She runs her fingers along where the shelves meet the wall, checking to see if they're built into the structure or set up separately. A bunch of them are all pressed side by side, but at least the ones on either end are separate from the wall. She starts checking the middle one for catches or books that stand out.
"If I were a secret switch, where would I be," she murmurs.
"Keep Penguin's eye level in mind," Crest advises. "This is his office, so anything important should be within easy reach for him."
"Penguin POV." Stephanie drops down to her knees and starts over, running her fingers along the wood and books. The books down here do look quite a bit more well-worn, and she pulls a few out to flip through.
"Ooh, handwritten ledgers," she notes. "All in cursive, of course."
"Of course. Probably written in fountain pen too."
"Not quill pen? Maybe with a penguin feather?"
"That really would be commitment to the bit, huh." She twists around enough to see Crest searching through the desk. Eventually he pulls out a fancy looking fountain pen and holds it up to shower her. "Pragmatism wins out over aesthetics."
"Boo," Stephanie says, "I'm docking him points for that."
"We're rating the Rogues on a point system now?" Crest asks, putting the pen back.
"Might as well." Stephanie flips through the ledger, but it's all straight-forward numbers and coded notes about what the numbers correspond to. It probably has some good information, but on its own it's not very helpful. She puts it back. "I figure it's a multi-category kind of scoring."
"Mm-hm. 'How well do you do crime and also keep to your bit' kind of thing?"
"Kinda, yeah. Well, sorta. None of them really do crime 'well' since they keep getting caught. I guess it's more 'do you do crime that makes sense for your bit' and 'do you actually get something out of it other than just getting booted back to jail immediately'. Like the Iceberg Lounge, I'm sure there's shady shit going on here all the time-"
"There is."
"Right, but it provides a decent cover for whatever Penguin is getting up to, and it's a legal if sketchy source of income, and it ties in with the whole...." She pauses in opening another ledger to flip through. "...Actually what is his bit other than 'penguins'?"
"Bitching about how the Cobblepots aren't a Gotham founding family anymore, for a start," Crest says.
"Wait the Cobblepots were a founding family?"
"Yeah. They fell out of favor well before our time, then they got into a pretty one-sided beef with the Waynes, and... well."
"Maybe don't rock up to the 'Gotham royal family' when you're at the bottom of the pack?" Stephanie guesses.
"Something like that, yeah. They lost their businesses and the rest of their wealth, Oswald took offense, and he dove into the criminal element when he came back to Gotham."
"How common knowledge is it that the Cobblepots were a founding family?" Stephanie asks, sliding the next ledger back and ducking her head to look at the bottom of the shelf closest to her eyeline.
"Not very?" Crest hedges. "Not by the public at large at any rate. Penguin talks about it, but I don't know how many people really believe him. Those who give a shit about that sort of thing tend to avoid bringing it up. If it's mentioned, it's usually as 'they used to be and now they're not'. Everyone kind of pretends they were never really a founding family, especially not nowadays with Oswald as the heir."
"Is it the crime thing?"
"That and the physical disabilities."
"Oh, right. Rich people."
"Rich people," Crest agrees grimly.
"The crime thing seems a little hypocritical," Stephanie points out, moving to the next bookshelf and feeling along under it. "Considering we're looking into the whole secret murder society angle."
"Rich people," Crest says again. "But also I think if he hadn't been caught it wouldn't be quite as much of an issue. He was starting to get some favor back before Batman showed up on the scene, but once it started getting out that he wasn't just an enigmatic businessman, he lost all of that good will and then some. He never would have been elevated back to the same status his family had before, but he wouldn't be talked about the way he is now, if nothing else."
"So we're thinking a 'no' on the Coo front," Stephanie guesses.
"I don't think the Coo would trust him to keep his mouth shut about them if he were part of them," Crest says. "And he's not really good at being at the bottom of the totem pole. More likely that-"
Whatever Crest was about to say is cut off when Stephanie's finger finds a button on the bottom of the shelf and clicks it. She pulls her hand back quickly as the whole bookshelf slides back and to the side.
"Oooh!" she singsongs. "Think I found a panic room."
"Nice work," Crest praises, joining her at peering inside. It looks like another office, quite a bit smaller and more densely packed with books, binders, and papers. "Spymaster, any alert on the security systems?"
"A signal went out, but I cancelled it out before it reached anyone. Careful going in."
"Roger roger," Stephanie says. She pulls a little can of gas from her belt and shakes it, spraying the doorway in front of them. Starting just above where Penguin's head would be are rows of laser sensors. "Alarm goes out if he opens the door, letting security know he's in trouble, then lasers if someone taller than him walks in."
"Probably to catch anyone snooping around," Crest agrees. Stephanie sprays the floor in front of them, checking for more lasers, but she can't see anything. The floor is carpeted, so it's hard to see if it's trapped.
"Floor is lava?" she asks.
Crest crouches down and peers around. "Those bookshelves look sturdy enough to hold our weight. Should be able to get to the desk from them. One of us stays out here in case someone comes to the door?"
Stephanie holds her fist out, and Crest does the same. After a silent count of three, she gives scissors while Crest gives paper.
"You're up," he says, shifting back to give her room. She's careful to duck under the lasers, shuffling forward enough to grab the first shelf inside the door and haul herself up along the wall.
"Spymaster, can I convince you to play the Mission Impossible theme over comms while I'm doing this?" she asks, shuffling around the small room to get closer to the desk.
"No, but I'll play you the Bond theme."
"Ugh," she says. "If you must." She can't help but snort a little as the Bond theme does actually play over the comms, faint enough not to be overwhelming. "Does this make me Bond?"
"Sure, when you're old enough to drink."
"Does that make Crest my Bond girl?"
"Which one?" Crest asks dryly. "There's like a hundred of them."
"Okay so weeding out the ones who get killed-" Stephanie starts, swinging her leg over to step onto the desk.
"That narrows it down to about ten, so good start there."
"-And the ones who end up as villains," she continues, "and of those the ones who don't end up in bed with him-"
"And now you're down to zero, too far."
"Are there any who fit that?"
"Shocking though this might be to learn, I'm not actually that much of a James Bond connoisseur. You might be better off asking Death or Castellan."
"Okay well in the absence of data, can I call Crest Pussy Galore for the time being?"
"No the fuck you may not," Crest says, and Stephanie can't help but snicker. She carefully looks over the desk, finding the best place to plant a bug. The lamp is heavy and sturdy, and considering the dim lighting in the rest of the room it's guaranteed to stay on the desk. It's also in the perfect place to pick up any conversations happening above and around it. She tucks the bug under the shade.
"Sound check on bug placed?"
"Coming through loud and clear, able to activate it remotely and save the battery life."
"We'll leave a backdoor in the security system, let us know when someone else comes into the office," Crest says.
Stephanie steps onto the chair and crouches on it, bracing herself as she opens the drawers. There are filing drawers on either side, and the one in the middle of the desk is full of various little office supplies, papers and pads and pends (oh my), and a gun. Stephanie leaves the gun where it is and carefully pokes through what she can see of the papers, but tries to leave it all exactly as she found it. There's nothing useful, and nothing about her dad, but she didn't really expect there to be. Penguin is still in Blackgate and has been since her dad got out. They haven't had a chance to talk yet, and the lieutenant who's handling her dad doesn't seem to come into this office.
She checks through the filing drawers next. A quick flip through the first folder shows her it's all in code, most of it handwritten again.
"Give Penguin this, he's not the dumbest criminal out there." She flips through the rest of the folders. There's a fairly thick one in the back, and a quick scan through shows autopsy photos of the Joker. She grimaces and moves on. There's a few pictures of the Arkham Knight, black and white, blurry and grainy, and too hard to make anything out. "Gotta file here with pictures of the Joker's body and the Arkham Knight. Looks like stuff leftover from Halloween?"
"Take some pictures?" Crest suggests, and she lays the folder out on the desk, flipping through it slower and tapping her mask to take pictures. She's not sure if there's anything worthwhile in the folder, but better safe than sorry. As she gets towards the back, she finds more pictures of Harley Quinn, more thugs and henchman in the old Joker uniforms, and pictures of the long-dead Amusement Park.
"Looks like Penguin was looking into Joker's stuff," she notes. "I can't read his notes, but there's a map here with the rough territories of each of the Rogues marked out." She moves it out of the way. "And a map of the Seagate Amusement park, along with its 'real estate' listing." She takes a picture of it. "The city still hasn't figured out what they want to do with that thing? It's been years."
"There's not much you can do with an offshore oil rig turned death trap amusement park," Crest points out.
"Come again?" Spymaster asks.
"Seagate Amusement park, old headquarters of the Joker," Crest explains. "He tricked an oil baron into turning his offshore oil rig into an amusement park for his dying daughter, then had her killed with an overdoes of Titan, then convinced him to leave the property to Joker's alias 'Jack White' and kill himself using an overdose of Smilex."
"...What the fuck," Spymaster says bluntly.
"Shortly after I became Robin he lured me and Batgirl there and tried to kill us because we were getting in the way of his relationship with Batman."
Stephanie can't help the way her head picks up. "Wait did he actually say it like that?"
Crest gives her a tired, thousand yard stare. "I cannot explain how often Joker referred to himself and Batman as 'mommy and daddy' when talking to the rest of us."
Stephanie can feel her skin crawl. "Gross. Gross. Gross. Gross."
"Seconded."
"Anyway," Crest says, "the city hasn't done anything with it because there's not much to do. It's pretty badly dilapidated at this point, and there's no oil left to worry about getting into the ocean, so I think they're just hoping the sea reclaims it."
"So why does Penguin have information on it in a folder?"
"Keeping an eye on the competition, I guess? We've kept an eye on it over the years and the Joker went back a few times, but he never really tried to re-establish it as a base of operations. It's not an easy place to get to and from. I don't think it's even technically within Gotham's limits."
"Hm," Stephanie says, finishing up taking pictures of the file and putting everything back in the drawer. She keeps digging around, trying to see if there are any faces or pictures she recognizes. "Anything in the desk out there?"
"Nothing out of the ordinary. Looks like this is where he keeps most of his legitimate business paperwork. Some gambling debts and IOUs I've got pictures of. Nothing from Cluemaster that I can see."
"Probably waiting until he can talk to Penguin directly," Stephanie guesses. "Everything about the heists is still with the lieutenant is my guess."
"Who probably knows better than to keep anything incriminating in the boss's office."
"I sure hope so, otherwise he's not gonna be a lieutenant for Penguin for long."
Crest hums in agreement, and Stephanie closes up the drawer. She turns away from the desk towards the shelves behind it, poking around at what she can see and what's in easy reach. There's an old leather bound journal in black that's tucked back between several larger books and ledgers, and she tugs it free. The front has a coin-like symbol embossed on the front, proudly proclaiming the Cobblepot name. It's high quality as far as Stephanie can tell, and flipping it open reveals thick, seemingly hand-made cream pages. They have like, little wood chips in them in places and everything.
The font is cursive - of course - but it's much loopier and more elegant than the compact, blocky text in the ledgers.
"Possibly found something. Leather-bound journal with what I'm guessing is the Cobblepot family - ha - crest."
"Ha ha, spoilsport," Crest says dryly, and Stephanie spins the chair enough to turn and glare at him. He gives her a thoroughly disingenuous smile, and she makes a face at him. She turns back to the journal. Looking at it, while it's well made and high quality, it's also pretty old.
"I think this is a diary, actually." Each entry has different dates, the first one dating back quite a few decades. She flips through to the most recent entries, noting how the handwriting gets more and more illegible as time passes. Elegant loops and swirls become jagged and shaky, ink spattering more and more across the page and becoming illegible. The most recent entry is still almost twenty years old. "From someone other than Penguin I mean."
"Someone in the family perhaps?"
Stephanie squints at the writing on the last page. "Probably. I can't make out any of the most recent entries. It's pretty illegible." She checks the date of the first one and does some quick mental math. "Probably due to old age and possible dementia. This thing has been written in for decades." She checks the inside of the covers and finds a sepia-toned picture tucked inside. It's old and brittle, and it shows a woman in her twenties or so with hair pulled completely away from her face, head tilted up and eyes peering down a slightly beaked nose. Her dress has a high collar, puffy shoulders, and sleeves that go all the way down to her wrists. "Spymaster, able to get a look through my lenses?"
"Crystal clear. Running through the Cobblepot line to see if I can find a match." Stephanie puts the picture back in place and starts taking pictures of a few of the entries. "Looks like Constance Cobblepot, Penguin's great-aunt on his father's side. Not a lot of details, but looks like she died a few years after Penguin originally came back to Gotham. She'd left Gotham when he came back, moved off to warmer climates. No real contact between them that I can see."
"So why's he got her diary?"
"Inherited it, maybe? Couldn't say."
Stephanie takes pictures of the last few entries, feeling along the rest of the journal. "Does it say what she died of?" Crest asks.
"Considering she was over a hundred years old, I'd say entropy."
Stephanie finds a page in the very back that feels oddly thick, with something bumpy inside. She flexes the page gently, feeling along it with her nail until she finds a split. "Two of these pages are glued together at the end here."
"What's inside them?"
"Hang on." She teases the pages apart, and the old glue gives up the ghost without too much fanfare. Peeling it open, she pauses at what she finds.
"Uh."
"Uh?" Crest repeats questioningly.
"So, there's a feather in here," she says, pulling it out carefully and holding it up for her mask to take pictures of. "Three guesses the kind of bird it comes from and the first two probably don't count."
"I'm assuming it's not a penguin feather," Crest says.
"Not unless penguins are brown and gray." She turns enough to hold the feather up for Crest to see.
"Without doing a DNA test," Spymaster says, "I'd hazard that's an owl feather."
"A flight feather, specifically," Crest confirms. Stephanie twirls it a little between her fingers.
"Cool," she says. "I'm starting to think we should just give up the ghost, haul Cluemaster into jail, and start working with Firebird and Nightwing."
"It's... not a plan without merit," Crest allows.
"Adding Constance Cobblepot to 'list of Coo suspects'."
Stephanie tucks the feather back between the pages and presses the edges closed as best she can. "Am I absconding with this journal or are we leaving it here?"
Crest blows out a breath. "I still want to know what Cluemaster intends to say to Penguin about the whole deal. If he brings up the Coo directly and Penguin knows about it, specifically if he knows about it from Constance's diary, chances are good he'll want to double-check for the journal."
"And he'll notice if it goes missing."
"Counter-argument," Spymaster says, "he might think the Coo found out and took it back. Might spook him, make him turn Cluemaster down."
"Do we want that?" Stephanie asks.
"We probably don't want Cluemaster to be working with the Coo, or bringing himself to their attention as much as we can avoid it."
Stephanie considers that. Bringing her dad to the Coo's attention will mean bringing her and her mom to their attention. If Penguin is his only door into the whole thing, having Penguin turn him down will cut off that access. If he has another potential in, he'll lead them to it once Penguin turns him down.
On the other hand, spooking Penguin means he'll shut down on any information entirely. If he knows something more substantial, better to keep him comfortable enough to talk about it.
On the other other hand, if they can figure out the handwriting, Constance might have written down something concrete.
"We could take it, scan in the pages and then put it back," she suggests. "Hope he doesn't freak out and try to destroy it?"
Crest considers that. "I don't think the journal would constitute much evidence to turn over to the police either way. For our own investigations it would definitely be good."
"Sounds like we're nicking it then."
"Just to get some pictures of it," Stephanie says, unzipping her suit enough to tuck the journal inside. "We'll swing by after the heist tomorrow night and put it back."
"Sounds like a good plan," Crest agrees, and doesn't that just fill Stephanie with a warm feeling, having Robin agree that her plan sounds good.
She places a few more bugs around the office, installing a tiny concealed camera directly above Penguin's desk before making sure everything is the way it was left. She hops back over to the bookshelf and sidles along to the door.
"Just in time. You've got company on the way."
Crest sticks a hand out for her to step onto and then down to the floor where she can duck under the lasers. They swing the door shut, and Crest scales back up to the vent, squirming inside and out of the way as she follows. They manage to pull the grapple up and swing the vent back closed right as someone works on unlocking the door.
"-st saying maybe the boss should lay low for a bit," a man's voice says as the door opens.
"Sure," a woman answers. "How's about you go an' tell 'im that then, eh? Stroll on up ta Blackgate, knock on 'is cell door, an' tell 'im 'cheers Mr. Cobblepot sir, I think you should stay in prison a while longer whiles Two-Face buggers all your operations sideways'."
The man sighs, and Stephanie watches as a middle-aged blonde woman with short, platinum blonde hair and an impressive rack walks around to the back of the desk.
"That's not what I'm saying," the guy says. "I'm just saying that after Halloween and the thing with the memorial service-"
The woman turns on her heel, glaring at the man. "'e tried to give that snotty little rich boy the send-off 'e deserved!"
"And he did it by high-jacking his own prison transport," the man counters, "barely two weeks after the whole shitshow with Scarecrow!"
"The cops didn't have shit on 'im-"
"He got picked up by Nightwing while surrounded by guns he was trying to smuggle."
"Planted," the woman dismisses. "Prob'ly by that black an' blue bird boy 'imself."
The man lets his head fall back, eyes squeezed shut in frustration. "Tracey," he says with forced calm. "I'm not with the fucking police. You don't have to act like his fucking lawyer around me. I know they were his guns because I helped with organizing that shit. I'm not saying he belongs in prison, I'm trying to say that threatening a judge to get him out so soon after the shit with Halloween and the memorial service is going to draw attention. It's going to draw a lot of fucking attention, and the last thing any of us need, including the boss, is more fucking eyes on us. And that's the public. None of us know where we stand with the Knight anymore or what his game is. Robin and Nightwing have thrown their lot in with him and I don't know if that's because he was playing the long-con before against us, or if he's playing the long-con now against them. And on top of that, there's that new guy Azrael and the one running around in purple, both of whom are completely new players to the scene who we know fuck all about! Other than the fact that they're in with the Knight, so it's hard not to assume they'll be throwing in against us."
The man takes a deep breath, blowing it out in a rush. It seems to help a little, all the same. "And yes, Two-Face is being a pain in the fucking neck, but he's lashing out at whatever target he can get a hold of, which means he's spreading himself thin. If the boss is out, he'll zero in on him and then we'll have to deal with all of him at once. Let him take potshots while we bunker down and regroup. The more he kicks up a fuss, the more of his guys will get put away and the sooner he'll end up in Arkham, like always. He's not burning the boss's empire to the ground, he's throwing a tantrum. Let him tire himself out and then we can bring the boss home. And hopefully by then we'll have a better idea of what the Knight's up to and we can plan accordingly, but right now, the best place for the boss is off in Blackgate making nice."
Tracey hardly seems impressed, and the guy steps closer, reaching out to take her hand. "Look," he says, quieter, "I know you like to play up the bimbo act, but you seem to keep forgetting that I know it's an act. You're not dumb. You know I'm right."
"Do I?" she challenges, but her tone is a little softer now, her expression less dismissive and severe.
"Yeah, you do," he says.
Tracey huffs, and her body sags a little. "Look, Frankie," she says, "you're not... you're not wrong. But the boss hasn't exactly gotten more patient in his old age. An' if I bring this to 'im, I tell 'im to stay in Blackgate longer? It's my fat ass on the line an' my skin 'e'll be taken a stripe outta."
"I know," Frankie says, "which is why I told you about the deal with Cluemaster." Tracey scoffs, and Frankie squeezes her hand. "Listen, I know heists aren't the boss's favorite, but I've kept his name out of it. The guys, the guns, all of it, I made sure it's free and clear of him. He gets the boost from the scores with none of it tying back to him. No one knows he's connected at all so Two-Face can't butt in and the cops can't get anything new to pin on him. It'll help make up for the operations that we've been getting hammered."
"It'll 'help'," Tracey says dryly. "With how much we've lost-"
"That's what the big heist is for," Frankie interjects. "It'll get us back towards the black, take some eyes off us. So long as the boss stays up in Blackgate, he looks clean as a whistle."
"I thought this Cluemaster a' yours wanted t' meet th' boss first."
"He does," Frankie allows, "but I can work around that. I want you to run it by the boss first and get his blessing so I can work things out with Cluemaster, but mostly I want you to use it to sweeten him up for staying in Blackgate until after Christmas, after the heist. If he's got a reason to kick up his feet and play innocent, a timetable, he'll be more likely to keep his cool and bide his time."
"Might be more likely," Tracey corrects.
"Even a little more likely is still more likely," Frankie reasons.
Tracey makes a face, but she doesn't argue with Frankie over this. "Okay, say I do this. Say I your big idea past Mr. Cobblepot, an' for some reason 'e says yes. What then? What's your big plan with Cluemaster?"
"He's a small-time player," Frankie says, "he's barely a Rogue. Last time he made waves was from leaving clues for Batman and getting his clock cleaned. I'll tell him the boss was impressed with how smoothly the heists went, he's keeping things quiet until some heat blows over, but he gave his blessing for the big job. If it goes well, they can talk about a more consistent partnership when he's out of Blackgate."
"You think this Cluemaster'll go for it?"
"He wants to work with the boss," Frankie says, shrugging. "If it's his only way in, he'll take it."
"Why's 'e wanna work with Mr. Cobblepot so bad?" Tracey asks, eyes narrowing in suspicion.
"Because the boss isn't insane?" Frankie snorts. "Because his other options are running a crew on his own, which got his teeth knocked in by the Bat, working with the mobs who try to avoid people with a gimmick, or going to Two-Face who's off his nut. Ivy's playing nice to keep her plants and doesn't like running a gang, Harley's dropped out of the running and her boys are getting scooped up by everyone else, Scarecrow and Joker are dead, and Maskie's on sabbatical after someone kicked him out a window."
"What about the Riddler?" Frankie opens his mouth, and Tracey holds up a hand. "No, nevermind, dumb question."
Frankie snorts in amusement. "As for everyone down, they're not the 'heist' types, and they're not big-time like the boss is. Most've 'em are just serial killers with a costume. Trust me, Cluemaster wants to work with Penguin. He'll get pissed if he's stretched too far, but he ain't gonna back down if he has t' make a few concessions here'n there."
"All right," Tracey agrees with a sigh. "I'll talk to Mr. Cobblepot about it, see what he thinks. But I'm stickin' my neck out for you on this, an' don't you forget it."
Frankie holds up his hands placatingly. "I wouldn't dream of it."
Tracey fixes him with a narrow-eyed look, but she doesn't push it as she grabs a ledger from one of the shelves behind Penguin's desk. "Go get some of your big boys, we've gotta high roller who's been racking up debt and bein' cheeky 'bout payin' us back."
"Yes ma'am," Frankie agrees, stepping back and letting Tracey leave first. Stephanie waits until the door closes and locks behind them, sharing a look with Crest.
"Guess we aren't going to have to use those bugs until after Christmas."