Cat Scratch Fever   The events detailed in this story take place in the three hours after the events in "Catching Up" and "Big Trouble 3" Author's Note: A Retroactive Continuity, or Retcon if you will, is the altering of previously known facts in order for the universe to conform to new story lines. This is mine. This is a retcon of the story of Catwoman's furhter adventures. Detective Comics owns the character of Catwoman, Lex Luthor and Lena Luthor.

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Things were moving far too fast. She got back to her lair she checked her account reflexively, and there was the final payment for the snatch-and-grab of the server. Plus, there were not one but five messages from the PI she sometimes did jobs for. So she checked in with him.

"Kitten! Am I glad you called. There's a call from Lex Luthor out to get in touch with you immediately. Apparently there's something going on. He's going to give someone who can hook him up with you fifty thousand dollars just to do so. I've got some contact information if you want it."

She thought for a second or two. This could be very lucrative. She asked for the contact info.

She called through the suit, to make sure that she wasn't able to be traced, she had routed the call through three different satellites and several different cell towers, making sure that any trace back would find so many different places that she was at, they wouldn't know where she actually was.

"LuthorCorp, this is Mercy speaking. How can I help you?"

She played up the cat theme, purring and drawing out her r's. "Hello Merrrcy, I understand that you and Mrrrr. Luthorrr wanted to talk to me? Rawr... What can I do for you?"

"Ah, Ms Catwoman. Thank you for calling. Mr. Luthor would like to speak to you and possibly hire you, but time is critical."

"Then you must tell me morrre."

"Please hold for Mr. Luthor in that case."

It took a few moments of waiting. She fixed a tuna fish sandwich while she waited.

"Catwoman," said the male voice on the other end of the phone. "Thank you very much for getting in touch with us."

She just purred into the phone. It was a non-committal enough sound.

"I have an offer to make you. It's a break-in and snatch a very precious package and escape with it. Are you interested in that?"

"It sounds interrrresting. Tell me morrrre, please."

"I was contacted earlier by a former employee who has snatched my daughter and is holding her for ransom. I would like you to break into the facility he is at, and extract Lena. Any of my resources you need will be made available to you. I don't care if everyone in the warehouse winds up dead, I want my daughter back safely."

Her eyes narrowed dangerously. "I'm not an assassin, sirrrrr."

"I'm not asking you to kill anyone. I am saying that if in the kidnappers wind up dead, I'll take care of the details and could honestly not care less. Do we have an agreement?"

Her good sense hadn't deserted her entirely. "What is in this for me? I have no stake in yourrrr daughterrrrr."

"Ms. Catwoman, if you do this for me, you can write your own ticket with me and my corporation. Money is no object. More than that, you will have done me a very great personal favor."

That stopped her. The money would be nice, and it was certainly a big incentive, but to have the gratitude of one of the most infamous corporate heads in the world, well, that would be worth almost anything.

"Misterrrrr Luthorrr, I believe we have a deal."

"Excellent. Time is very short and as such I will have a jet ready for you at the nearest airport to bring you to Chicago. All the intelligence we have will be waiting for you. Anything you need please tell to the flight attendants on the plane and you will have it waiting for you when you debark."

"Hmmmmm, I neverrrr bark."

"Of course my dear. May I ask where to have the plane waiting for you?"

"Well, I'm in New York City right now."

"Ah, we have a private LuthorCorp airstrip near there. May I provide a car for you to get there?"

"Hmmmm, that would be helpful. Less questions forrr me. I will meet them at Cleopatra's Needle in Central Park. Make sure that the windows are darkly tinted as I will be in my costume and I really don't want to be detained by the police."

"Of course. The car and driver will be waiting for you."

She purred again and cut the connection. She froze in place and thought things through. She was going to have to really do this right.

She had been developing a poison from tomato leaves and had her first batch ready. She picked up the vials that held her first attempt and slid them into her thigh pockets. She was under no illusions as to if she would have to kill. She didn't want to, but if it came down to kill or losing her freedom, she knew which she would do.

She then grabbed an experimental sheet she had finished earlier rolled it up, and stuffed it into a tubular map case. She did a quick systems check on the suit, put her sandwich down uneaten into the fridge, downed a glass of milk and made her way to the nearest bus stop. Never go on a mission with any food in your stomach. It slows you down.

Luthor hung up the phone and turned to Mercy. "Make the arrangements; plane, car, driver who can keep his mouth shut, everything. Take care of it."

She nodded. "Yes sir. "

He looked seriously at Mercy. "We will not double cross her. She will be given all the help she wants and then she will be paid and let go. A good craftsman like her should be treasured, not contained."

"Yes sir."

He sat back and looked out the window deep in thought.

Once she got to the statue in Central Park she spotted the car. She catfooted her way over to it, and slid into the passenger side of the front. She saw a very startled driver next to her.

"Drive."

He started the engine and put it into gear. Meanwhile, she climbed over the seats and into the back section of the limo. She curled up on one of the seats and made herself comfortable.

The driver asked her if she needed anything that could be provided. He would communicate it to the plane, she didn't answer. She couldn't think of anything she might need at the moment.

Very soon they arrived at the airport. The driver opened up the door and helped her out of the car. She had turned the gain down on her ears so that she didn't go deaf with the jet engines going. Everyone was being so nice to her. There was the pilot at the bottom of the stairs waiting to escort her onto the Lear, tipping his hat to her.

The seats were extremely comfortable, and she reveled in the luxury she found herself in. The stewardess offered her a drink, and didn't blink an eye when she asked for milk.

She found a folder with the information she wanted on the table in front of her. She opened it up and started reading.

An hour later, once she had digested all the folder's contents, she considered how she would assault the building. The intelligence that was included was nearly as complete as she could have wished for. Everything, including satellite images and building plans for the warehouse and surrounding buildings were included. She could only shake her head in awe at the speed with which this had been assembled.

Money could really buy anything you wanted.

She stared out the window for some time thinking. She finally called over the stewardess and started dictating what she would need.

Another LuthorCorp car dropped her five blocks from the target area. She didn't want to take any chances with accidentally being spotted as she approached the area, so going over the roofs were still the best bet. She had digital copies of all the information scanned into her suit's computer, and now she picked out the best route for her to get in.

The best way to get in would be to simply walk in on the power lines. There were a series of high tension and high voltage wires that crossed over the area, about 80 feet up. In a warehouse district like this that wasn't much of a problem. They didn't connect directly with the warehouse, but they passed close enough that gaining entrance that way would be a simple drop.

She scaled the towers easily enough. Soon she was about to step on a line carrying 110,000 volts of electricity. She decided to jump to the chosen wire, after grounding herself out to the line, making her body and that of the line the same charge. Step on the glass insulator which held the line to the metal tower, then move close to the line and she get a nice lightning bolt of static jumping from her to the powerline. "Never knew static electricity could hurt that much," she though. Once that was accomplished, it was easy enough to simply stand up on the line and start walking.

To make it a little swifter, she got down on all fours and started the fast movement like a cat on the line. Soon, she was at the warehouse.

She turned the gain up on her ears and the goggles, zooming in on the structure itself to pinpoint where everyone was. She spotted two people on the roof, and from the rifles in their hands, they were prepared to repel all invaders to the area.

She hooked her feet to the underside of the power line, wrapped her tail around it to make sure she had a good hold, then turned upside down to get a better view of the area. She was looking for any other people who might be part of this gang or surveillance cameras that could be covering her approach. She didn't want to alert them just yet.

The whip came out and soon it was wrapped around the wire, and she released her hold on everything else. She dropped to the end of the 15' length of whip and hung there. She very carefully started playing out the length of her whip, stretching it to its maximum length of 40 feet. From there it was just a two story drop to the roof.

She calculated the force she'd need to jump to the center of the roof. Back and forth, building a slight arc to bring her to the center of the warehouse, away from the sniper posts. She didn't want to miss the roof and land on the ground by dropping straight down. Soon she hit the optimum speed and commanded her whip to release the wire.

She dropped right where she wanted to be. Unfortunately it wasn't as silent as it could be. She hit the ground and rolled to a stop in the shadow of an air conditioner vent. She froze in place while the guards came over to investigate the noise.

When they arrived, she used her radio to tap into their communications. They didn't even have the signal encrypted, although they were using a relatively unlikely frequency for their talk. She soon found out that the guards were in communication with each other and the people inside, so she wouldn't be able to simply take them out and move in unmolested.

Damnit, well, I guess that means I'm going to be fighting them when I come back out. I had hoped to avoid that.

She left them conscious and moved over to the area she had picked out for her ingress. She fell over the side of the wall, and down to one of the windows left over from the "removal" of the second floor. They didn't actually reduce the height of the building, they just took out the second floor and made it a one story building with 30 foot ceilings.

Unsurprisingly, the window was locked. But it didn't take long for her claws to slice a hole in one of the panes. Then she tipped out that glass so it was in her hand. She reached in and unlocked the window, then spent a few minutes feeling around inside for an alarm systems before she opened the unlocked window and slipped through. She then closed the window again. Replacing the glass was simple enough, she took some transparent tape and re-secured the circle of glass she cut out. She wasn't going to make an amateur mistake like leaving a nice spotlight in frosted glass. She wanted to leave nothing to chance.

As silently as possible, she made her way to a catwalk that ran close to a support beam. The beam would give her access to the air conditioner system. The platform at the access had been left so it could still be serviced. These idiots may not use it, but it still needed to work.

She froze into position and held her shape. No use giving them something that would be moving much giving them a target. She needed to do some scouting of the area and that required temporary immobility.

She counted four people inside. One near the front door, two near the big rolling door of the loading dock, and one simultaneously talking on a telephone and using a computer near the center of the floor. She assumed that the person tied into the chair was the victim.

"McGuire," the girl was saying, "you really should release me. When Luthor finds you he won't just slap you on the wrist, you'll end up with a coffin for your ransom."

The guy on the phone hung up. He went over to the girl and slapped her. "Shut up you. I don't want to hear any more of your noise. Your daddy will pay up and when he does, he might get you back."

She spit the blood in her mouth out. "You really are stupid aren't you?"

He stalked off to check on everyone again, going toward the front door. He still had line of sight to the girl and she was sitting in a spotlight. There was virtually no way that she could get the kid away without being seen.

I wonder what he was doing on the computer? She used a couple programs that she found to wirelessly hack into his laptop and look at his screen.

He was checking a bank account. Apparently he was waiting for a deposit to be made. Probably the ransom money.

Soon she had an idea. She called out on her radio to one of the guys she had standing by to get her and the girl out. A few minutes later, the power went out in the warehouse.

The guys down on the floor started panicking. They apparently didn't like the dark. But it was an asset to her.

Quickly she jumped down from her hiding place and landed near the girl. "Shhh. Don't scream, I'm here to rescue you." She quickly slashed the bonds on the chair and grabbed the girl. She ran as fast as she could over to a tangle of shelves near the wall.

The emergency lights came on.

She got the girl to lay down on one of the shelves and Catwoman pulled the sheet from the cargo pocket she had in the small of her back. She hissed at the girl. "This is a sheet of optical camouflage. Stay under it. Don't move. It will project on its surface the setting behind you." She spread the camouflage over her. She then shoved an ear bud into the girl's ear. "That's a radio. You can sub vocalize to communicate with me on it."

Before she was done straitening the camo, she heard the thugs getting upset that the lights were out. She toe-ran to the wall near the shelves and slowly started crawling up it. She had no fear about keeping herself invisible, but she really hoped the optical camo worked.

"Who are you" she heard hissed in her ear.

"I'm Catwoman. Luthor hired me to get you out of here. I'd like to do it quickly and cleanly. Just stay there. We are hiding in plain sight and when they go looking for you, we can get away in the confusion."

"Okay. I just hope you are right."

So do I honey. So do I. When she had gained about 18 feet, she froze in place. She was nearly over the top of where she had hidden the girl. And now she heard the men shouting about how the girl was missing.

Bedlam broke loose. The guy who was on the laptop was apparently the leader, and he started giving orders. The guards up top were warned to keep their eyes open for anything unusual, and soon flashlights were playing all over the inside of the warehouse.

Just to be on the safe side, she took one of the vials out of her pocket and attached it to a small port on the back of her hand. A few seconds later, the vial was drained and she put the empty vial in a different pocket.

These three stooges never tried using a grid search to find where the girl had gone. They started walking, started looking around. First place they checked was the office that was still in one corner, and then they started checking the ladders and catwalks of the non-existent second floor.

One guard each had taken up residence near the entrances, and they were alert and waiting for anyone to come at them. Two more people that Catwoman hadn't seen came into the room from the outside and now there were five people inside and two more on the roof.

"Someone's coming." she heard hissed in her ear.

"Stay calm. Don't move. Freeze. Just stay there, they shouldn't be able to see you. Heck, I can't see you and I know where you are." That wasn't quite true. She could see a lump there with the contour mapping the suit had automatically done, but that was all. In visible light she couldn't see the kid at all. Not even with her infrared cameras.

The goon walked by the racks of shelves, playing his flashlight around. He shone the beam directly where the kid lay under the camo, and kept going. I guess proving something under fire is the best way to test it. The goon didn't see her.

She said, "You're doing great. He looked right at you and didn't see you. He's moving off now. He's turning the corner, and he's going to be coming back by you. Just lay still..."

She tried to keep a litany of soothing things going in the girl's ear. The goons kept looking around, and not finding her. When they got together near where Lena had been tied, the Cat could hear them admit failure.

The thuds of punches didn't surprise her at all. God that guy is an idiot. About as bad as those stupid movies where the bad guy kills the messenger with the bad news just to prove how evil he is. Do that too often, and no one will bring you news.

The thugs moved off to the front door. I think our chance is coming up. She started scaling down the wall again.

"Good, I'm getting cold."

"Did you hear that?"

"Yeah, wasn't I supposed to?"

Must have sub-vocalized without meaning to. Something to correct. Later, once I get home.

She got back to the girl. She grabbed the camo and stuffed it back into the pocket in the small of her back. She took the girl and pantomimed her wrapping her arms around Catwoman's neck. Once the girl was in place, they scaled up the wall and then across the walls to one of the catwalks. Quietly as she could, she made their way back to the window she used to get in. She opened it all the way and slid back outside with the girl.

She triggered her radio to send a coded message on a specific frequency to the extract team. She heard acknowledgment quickly as she got back up to the roof.

"Helicopter is coming. Just a little more waiting." She made her way over to a section of the roof that offered a hiding spot while she heard the hum of the helicopter rotors coming.

Unfortunately, the snipers on the roof heard them too.

She dropped the kid off in the shadows, and used her whip to disarm one of the snipers taking aim at the heli which was coming in. She yanked hard and the rifle was jerked from his hands and came sailing at her. She ducked as it went flying by to crash in another area.

The sniper she'd just disarmed was pretty stunned. He looked over to see her crouched her whip in her hands, and he opened his mouth to yell.

She snapped the whip forward again, on a horizontal plane this time, and the tip wrapped several times around his neck.

His eyes bugged out, his tongue came out of his mouth and he started making strangling noises. It would be only a few more seconds till he was unconscious.

Then she felt a pistol in her left kidney. "Let him go and I won't put a hole in you the size of a football."

Fuck. There goes the quiet extraction. In response, she yanked hard on the whip and the sniper's head started hanging at a very odd angle. The whip coiled back in as she twisted around to get the gun off her body.

It was the idiot on the computer, McGuire. He was standing only a few feet from her and he had a 10 MM Desert Eagle pointed at her.

He frowned and pulled the trigger, just a second too late. Catwoman had already moved out of the path of the bullet. She snapped the whip forward, striking him across the face. His next shot went wild up into the air from convulsively squeezing the trigger.

He shrieked in pain. She smirked. "Compensating for something honey?"

He aimed at her again. "Fuck you bitch." With no more warning than that, he pulled the trigger.

A bullet of 180 grains in weight hit her sternum at well over 1300 feet per second. The computer in the suit calculated the impact and concluded that it would have been a kill shot.

As it was, she was knocked off her feet and into the machinery behind her. That sonofabitch! That hurt!

She lay there, pretending to be dead, and saw him point the gun at the ground and start looking around. The helicopter rotor was getting very loud in the distance. When he turned his attention to the helicopter, and pointed his gun at it to fire, she sat back up and whipped the tip of her whip around his neck. She yanked and he came flying at her, and impacted squarely on her claws that she held out for him to hit.

"Goodbye McGuire. Sorry we couldn't be more... friendly toward one another." She licked his mouth and nose then shoved him away from her with her foot. He stumbled back and she saw five puncture wounds on his chest, where her claws had gone through shirt and Kevlar vest below, penetrating his flesh. Two field tests in one day. She didn't think he was going to live long with poison coursing through his veins.

He looked shocked as he started convulsing and shaking uncontrollably. Interesting effect. I didn't know that concentrating the toxins that much would be so quick. When he lost control of his body, she knew it wouldn't be much longer.

Catwoman took the Desert Eagle, disassembled it, and then broke several small pieces inside the firing mechanism so that it couldn't be used again. She was watching him and moved closer while staring intently as the contents of several days meals came out of both ends of the self-created victim.

Catwoman grinned, and seeing that the helicopter was nearly on top of them, she pulled her whip out, grabbed the girl, snapped the end of the whip around a landing skid and let the copter take them away.

She screamed for joy as they left the rooftop.

Her chest hurt quite a lot from where she was shot. Probably a cracked sternum she thought.

She had to admit, LuthorCorp didn't skimp. They had a room for her in a hotel, clothes for her to disguise herself with, and they left her alone.

Lena was reunited with her father in another section of the hotel. Catwoman ordered Room Service for herself and dined on a very good steak dinner. Some woman named Misty was detailed to take care of her any want or need. Things seem to have worked themselves out.

She lay on the bed in the hotel room and just rested. It was always hard to come down after a job like this, and she needed to get the adrenaline out of her system.

She didn't trust Luthor, or more precisely Luthor's people, any further than she could throw them. She made her way to the bathroom and while walking instructed the nanites to reconstruct her face. There was a low probability of cameras being in this room, but it never hurt to be cautious.

Once in the bathroom, she stripped out of her suit and started the shower. She wanted to get clean in the worst way. She stepped into the shower and brought her suit with her.

She used the shower wand attachment to fill her suit with water to get the sweat out of the inside. She drained it and then turned the suit inside out, hanging it from the towel bar in the shower. She then attended to her personal hygiene.

Once clean again, she took her suit and hung it from a clothes hanger that the big bathrobe used to be on and put it near the blower of the air conditioner. She figured it could air dry easily enough there.

Then she luxuriously stretched out on the bed. She spent some time pulling and tugging at the covers until there was a nice nest of softness, and she curled up and went to sleep.

She only needed a short cat-nap of a couple hours. She was just so exhausted after the excitement of the evening.

When she woke she realized just how vulnerable she was. It may be that Luthor had a reason to keep her hale and whole, but that wouldn't stop others from taking advantage of the situation. The sooner she was back in her Lair the better.

She checked the suit and found that it was all dried. She stripped out of the robe the hotel provided and pulled the suit back on. She felt very exposed without it on. She had finished zipping it up when there was a knock at her door.

She pulled the mask up and made sure everything was in place, and paced over to the door to open it.

There in the hallway was the Mercy girl. "Purrrrfect timing. I was just about to call you. I'd like you to get the plane ready for me to go home."

"Yes ma'am, but first Mr. Luthor would like to speak with you. There's some matters to be settled."

Trapped. Now what do I do? Well, I can play along. I'm pretty safe with the suit on. "Excellent. I wish to speak with him too. Meanwhile please make arrangements for me to be taken home after my meeting. Thank you very much."

Mercy led her down a hall to a conference room. In that room was Lex Luthor and his daughter. They had obviously been talking. Luthor looked up and stood. "Ah, Ms. Catwoman, thank you for joining us. I wish to express my gratitude to you personally."

"It was my pleasure Mr. Luthorrr. She is a wonderful and very brave child."

"Nonetheless, the craftsperson is worth their hire, and it has come time to pay the piper if I can mix metaphors. Is there anything I can do for you to show you my appreciation?"

She didn't want to use the 'favor' just yet, she wanted to keep it in reserve in case she really needed it. So she smiled sweetly at Lex. "Nothing at the moment, I prrrrefer to hold such favors in trust for a while, just in case. You understand, don't you?"

Lex inclined his head in assent. "I do indeed. If you ever think I might be able to help, please don't hesitate to get in touch with me at the number you called earlier. It is a direct line to my assistant Mercy. She will get you in contact with me immediately.

"Now, as to... compensation for your time and troubles tonight. Have you thought about your fee?"

She smiled a bit. "Yes, I think two million dollars will be quite sufficient for my needs." She wasn't expecting to get it, but haggling down to a half million would be more than a victory for her.

"Done. Shall I send it directly to your Cayman account, or do you have another account you wish me to deposit it into?"

She had a very hard time controlling her reaction. She expected him to haggle a little. "The Cayman account will be purrfect. Thank you."

He wrote some things down and handed the note to Mercy. He then looked up at her and said, "I must apologize for the zeal of my subordinates. I told them to get you for this mission, and while the orders were relayed correctly, the method of 'getting you' was left up to the individuals. Apparently someone decided to get thugs and street gangs to capture you. I can assure you that this situation has been dealt with.

"It is possible that I may wish to retain you for an assignment at another time. Is there a way I can contact you in that case?"

She nodded. "Just send a note to my Cayman account. I can pick it up from there. In an emergency, like this was, you may call me at the number your assistant has from where I called her. While it is not my direct number, it will get to me."

Luthor nodded. "Very well then." He stood again and came over to her. He shook her hand and told Mercy to see her to the Airport.

Lena came over to Catwoman and hugged her tightly. "Thank you so much for getting me out of there. I really didn't want Jade and everyone destroying the city just to find me. We can talk at a later time."

"We most cerrrrtainly will. Take care kid. Keep the earbud."

She pulled on the pants and blouse that had been provided for her, and took her mask down to get to the airport. She still didn't want to attract attention.

And this little kitty went "wheeeeeeeee" all the way home.