Search for the Batman: Episode 13 - Belle Starr, Confessions of an Ark Hunter

Belle Starr, Confessions of an Ark Hunter: Episode 13 – Search for the Batman

Belle Starr had just returned from her South American mission when she was summoned to Ara Shondu's Estate. Belle always thought it the most elegant place in the Bay Area, especially compared to her own little blue trailer in back of The Crater, and Ara the most elegant person in Paradise. Ara was also the defacto Mayor of Paradise, and the diplomat who handled all relations with both E-Rep and the Collective.

As Belle usually did, she entered the back door of the Shondu Estate straight into Ara's personal office. Her memory briefly went back two years ago when she and her VBI boss Karl Von Bach first met Ara here, thinking she was the most beautiful woman in the world. All Castian woman seemed beautiful to Belle, but Ara put all other Castian females to shame. In contrast, Belle at 19 was a lanky pale freckled girl in an ugly bulky machinist's outfit still adjusting to her EGO implant, but Belle always appreciated that Ara Shondu even then treated her with respect and as an equal.

Now at 21, Belle had grown quite a bit in so many ways, becoming a legendary ark hunter, EGO master, VBI associate, and most importantly to her, a hero of Paradise. She had started down the road to heroics by patrolling the highways and byways of Paradise during her off-hours from ark hunting, saving miners and ranchers endangered by Mutants, Raiders, 99ers, Volge, and now Grid. Belle never took reward, but reveled in the gratitude she received from those she saved. With the help of the VBI Public Relations Department, Frontier Corporation News, a subsidiary of VBI, and a popular book about her adventures written by a freelance reporter and published in the Earth Republic, Belle Starr became a celebrity in the Bay Area, and loved it!

Belle had also changed physically, now known as one of the most attractive women in Paradise, although she still saw herself as that skinny teenage girl that arrived in Paradise when the ERS New Freedom crashed. Today, Belle exuded sexuality and was flirtacious in nature, but was never really conscious of it. She wasn't the exotic beauty that Ara was, but the blond haired blue eyed freckled woman now had the body of a model along with the All-American appeal of the girl next door, one that endeared her to all those who remembered times before the Pale Wars. Unknowingly, Belle had enhanced that appeal by adopting the skintight red, white and blue Liberty Trooper Armor as her iconic outfit.

Belle entered Ara's office, standing tall at six feet with her pale hands on her shapely hips, her rose petal lips parting slightly to show her pearly white teeth in the warm and winning smile known throughout Paradise, as she waited for Ara to motion her to a seat. Ara did so, and as Belle leaned backward in her chair, crossing her arms across her ample chest and stretching out her long legs in front of her, she asked in her thick N'Awlins accent, "What y'all need from little old me Ara?"

Belle's arrivals always brought a smile to Ara's face no matter how dire the situation, and Belle had quickly become Ara's friend and confidante. Belle was also Ara's can-do girl, so when Ara had a problem that needed troubleshooting, she came to Belle with it. Belle only had two requirements before she took a job: (1) No innocents would be harmed if it could possibly be avoided. Belle was pragmatic enough to know that innocents sometimes got caught in the crossfires, but not if she could help it; and (2) The job must be legal. Belle had done some jobs for Varus Soleptor when she first arrived and needed scrip to survive, but vowed to herself that she never would knowingly do criminal or even unethical behavior again.

Ara's smile turned to a frown as she looked at the papers in front of her, merely replying, "Atticus Batman is back. He was a vigilante who operated in Paradise about a year ago, known for his ultra-violent solutions to criminal activity. Law Keeper Cooper and quite frankly, I admired his results but deplored his methods. He has suddenly reappeared, killing Grids in the droves, which is not a bad thing in itself, but he is so ruthless and reckless that it is only a matter of time before he is going to see some group of Paradise citizens as possessed by Grid and kill them before he finds out they are not. Funny thing, word on the street is he is doing it in your name, blaming Grid for the brief time you were comatose."

That last statement by Ara got Belle's attention. The fact that it was nano-parasites and not Grid that put her in a coma was besides the fact. The authorities of Paradise thought it was better to blame her condition on Grid than panic the public with the fear of another tech-based epidemic, and Belle had reluctantly agreed to the deception. Anyway, Grid were a very real threat to everybody in the Bay Area and needed to be destroyed - but if innocents could be hurt in her name by this Atticus Batman, THAT could not be abided!

No longer smiling, Belle asked grimly, "What y'all need me to do?"

"I need you to bring Atticus Batman into custody and take him to Law Keeper Cooper for justice. Paradise is not the same place it was a year ago, we are no longer the wild west, and law and order must be respected. There is no longer room for masked vigilantes in the civilization we are trying to build here. Law Keeper Cooper is a good man, but is not up to the job of bringing in Atticus Batman. Paradise needs its hero, Belle Starr, with all her EGO powers and abilities to bring him in, preferably alive, but dead if he threatens the lives of our citizens. Belle raised a blond eyebrow at that statement, for Ara was a reknowned pacifist. Ara had cried in Belle's arms when Belle had told Ara that she had to kill Ara's Brother Nim Shondu, even though his malevolence and endangerment to Paradise was legend. Belle tilted her tousled honey blond head, narrowing her blue diamond eyes and pursing her pretty lips in consideration, before she answered with a curt nod of assent. Belle stood up, gave a quick salute with the slim forefinger of her right hand, then exited for her white Challenger.

Belle opened her car's trunk, turning off the alarms and traps therein, then took out her weapons, strapping on to her belt her Thorn Liro charge blade and Wildcat pistol. Belle then grabbed her VBI SMG-ECC and closed the trunk, entering her car so that she could consider the job she had just accepted.

Although she had never met him, Atticus Batman was a legend in the Bay Area even before she arrived. He dispensed justice in his own way, and as far as she knew, had never hurt an innocent, although the Dawn Patrol crowd he ran with then were very close to being outlaws in her opinion. Ara was right though, that if Civilization was ever to come back to the Bay Area, law and order must be maintained. Belle bit her lower lip as she made a decision.

I'll talk to him first, try to get him to give himself up to Law Keeper Cooper. But first I've got to find him, Thought Belle to herself, then she ordered her EGO device, Correlate known places that Atticus Batman used to hang out before his disappearance with recent sightings of him, and I'll check out the places with the highest correlations first.
Belle started her white challenger, driving it past the curving wall around the Shondu Estate and down the path that led to the main road, knowing she may very well be facing the fight of her life!

If you want to read the rest of this story, follow it on the official Defiance Game Forums at this link: http://forums.defiance.com/showthread.php?141757-Black-Friday-is-over-who-was-open-in-Paradise/page13

If you want to read how Belle came out of her coma, read beginning with Belle’ Starr’s 12/28/2014 entry in the shared story on the unofficial Defiance RP Forum at this link: http://defiancerp.freeforums.net/thread/43/taste-limon-lime