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Barbara Gordon leans back in her chair rubbing at the bridge of her nose. She turns to Dinah, "I'm worried about Cassandra. I'm not sure this is the best thing she could choose to do. I mean--" she cuts off at rush of sound and light.

All of the computer monitors in the cabin have small blinking indicators "CONNECTION LOST". "Zinda?" her voice is calm, "What just hit us?"

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It shames Dinah how easy she finds it to hotwire the bike, and by the time she's leaving the airport, she's more worried about how guilty she doesn't feel.

"Any suggestions welcome for where I should go, here."

Barbara's still looking, but... "There's a hill, a big one, about a mile east. You can probably see it from where you are. I haven't spotted anything yet, but it's probably the best place to evacuate to in the area, assuming people are still around."

Dinah looks up and spots the hill.

"Gotcha," she says, revving up a burst of speed.

"So talk to me, Babs. By 'more than the city' what are you thinking?"

There is a long moment of silence while Barbara considers not answering. But Dinah deserves to know.

"I haven't had time to sort the data I've got, and I don't have nearly enough, but... Dinah, I can't find an intact city within a hundred miles."

The moment of silence is extended.

There's nothing that can be said to that, really.

"OK, I'm at the road going up the hill now. I don't see any survivors, though."

"It looks like there might be a fairly large camp near the top of the hill. But... I don't see any signs of activity around it now."

"I see it."

Dinah skids to a halt just outside the demolished shelters, ripped tents and strewn sleeping bags around the torn up lookout point.

"Don't try and get a better look."

She's never been more glad for Shiva's diet, because if she'd had that chocolate mouse at lunch she really would be losing it now.

"Wait," Barbara snaps. "I'm picking up something on the thermals. North of your position." She frowns at her screen and says mostly to herself, "That's odd."

Dinah stands up straighter, subconsciously tightening her gloves around her hands, and glancing north."

"Guess I'm about to find out what did this to these people."

"Careful, Dinah," Barbara cautions. "Whatever it is must be pretty dangerous to do this to an entire city." And possibly an entire country.

"I think this is different."

It's the only reason Dinah's not jumping back on the bike and hightailing it.

"The damage to the camp isn't the same. It's more recent, and the corpses are..."

She trails off. The next thing she says would be represented in next as "Holy S#$%!"

"Dinah!?" Barbara's is really starting to get pissed at her inability to keep up with what's going on. "Dinah, what happened!?" She wasn't going to let herself think about whether her friend was alright or not.

"I'm fine!" Dinah says quickly, as the things that devastated the camp finally make their appearance.

"Uh, Ba... Oracle? They're not making a fourth Lord of the Rings movie around here, are they?"

"That's New Zealand, Dinah, this is Australia," Barbara's tone is exasperated. "What does that have to do with anything anyway?"

"Because either I've walked into the extras camp, or that timehole we fell though is more serious than I thought."

Her dilemma is answered when the nearest orc - because orcs they seem to be - leads the charge against her. Then it's a series of grunts and roars, but Dinah's breath stays steady and even through the next action packed few minutes.

After what sounds like a lot more effort on her enemies part than on her own, she speaks again, now sounding out of breath.

"Hey, I have an idea. Can you use those 'thermals' to tell me if there are any humans around, because Warriors and Warlocks is really not my thing."

Barbara knows better, by now at least, than to bother Dinah while she's working. Especially since she can tell by the breathing that it's not going badly at all.

"Interesting," she muses more to herself than to Dinah, "I think these orc things have a different body temp. I should be able to identify them in the future. Maybe."

She's shifted views on her screen again, searching for heat sourcees in the human range. There's a noticable hesitation when she keys her microphone, "Dinah, you're the only human-type heat source on that rock."

Dinah's looking around, and she bows her head when she hears that. "This place is a bust, then. I'm getting out of here."

But first she pulls a piece of torn canvas over the most complete human body she can see, the nearest thing to a mark of respect she can give without burying every single one.

Barbara's silent for several long minutes. "Head back to base, Dinah," she say ssoftly. "We need to figure out our next move."

She's sort of at a loss at the moment.

"Yeah," Dinah agrees, to what was both said and unsaid.

She swings one leg over the bike and looks around forlornly before revving it up and heading towards the airport.

"I feel terrible saying this, Babs, but is there room on the Aerie One for a motorbike? I get the feeling I'll be doing this a lot."

"There's room," Barbara's voice is subdued. "We might need to see about getting some food and medical supplies while we're here too. I... suspect those are going to be both needed and hard to find."

"Oh god, I can't tell you how much I don't want to go looting."

She probably doesn't need to, either. "Do we need fuel?"

"Zinda's on it," Barbara replies. "Just... be thinking about alternatives to looting. Anything we take is going to be something that any survivors" and there have to be some, right!? "won't have available."

"Trade?" Dinah suggests, slowing down a little to give her time to look around. "Do we have anything we don't need we can leave? Or... hey, what about warehouses or something we can get to on the Aerie One that are harder for survivors on foot?"

"We don't have anything to trade. Yet. Warehouse might be a good call. At the least we can probably get to sites no survivors can. That wouldn't deprive them of supplies."

"You'd better have an explanation for what caused this, Oracle."

Partly, Dinah's joking. Mostly she's still shaken from seeing this much death and being unable to stop it.