HEY! I'M BAAAAACK!

Once more, I have returned to the land of fan fiction! Beware... here be monsters.

So I'm once more continuing the Ultimate Teen Titans series. Happy happy joy joy. BUT. I have some announcements to make.

I am rebooting the series.

It's like a DC reboot. All of the old stories still apply, and all of the adventures. But... Peter is no longer dating Raven. YES. I'M SORRY. IT WAS NECESSARY. I found that I got them together waaaay to early, and the relationship is going nowhere. So I'm making them both single, with little to no feelings between them. Sorry. It may develop. It may not.

Also, the Batman characters are all Animated Batman, Arkhamverse style. So, Mark Hamill Joker instead of Heath Ledger Joker. No 52 stuff. All new, all different.

Otherwise, everything else is the same. As a recap, Batman is dead, someone is impersonating him... well, now you find out who. Also, the Red X arc still applies. It will become very prevelant later.(i.e., clones.)

So ENJOY! And don't forget to review!

Some years ago…

Deathstroke glanced up.

He noticed he did that a lot recently. Whenever a shadow passed overhead, or the air moved differently, he would quickly search for the source. If there was one thing he learned from this Christmas Eve, it was that Gotham was not safe at night.

Especially if you were hunting the Batman.

He returned his attention to the matter at hand, specifically, the crowd of criminals and thugs that were trying to kill him. Signing a deal with the Feds had granted him immunity, but the first thing they assigned him to do was make reparations for his taking the $50 million bounty on Batman's head.

I'm a mercenary. This is what I do.

Not any longer. He swung his staff in a wide arc, tripping up three crooks at once. These morons kept coming, even when they saw they were clearly outmatched by the stone-cold killer.

Amateurs.

But while he fought and parried with ease, his mind traveled elsewhere. It wasn't that Batman was faster than he, or stronger. Slade Wilson was both. He should have won the fight. But he didn't.

It was the sword. The damn sword. The blade that should have ended his life.

His enhanced reflexes would have taken over, dodged out of the way, possibly intercepting it and continuing the battle. But his eye told him that it would come within a hair span of his nose… in other words, not kill him. This threw him off so much that he was distracted long enough for Batman to take him down.

Which led Slade to wonder… what is he?

He was clearly a man, highly trained, with an assortment of gadgets at his use. It was clear he used tech, because he had taken Slade's own Remote Claw, obviously to put to good use.

His fighting style was varied and experienced. So what was it about him that made him different from Deathstroke?

Suddenly, Slade became aware that the fight was over. One last thug was in front of him, hands over his head, and Slade's staff was swinging for his neck, to delivering a fatal blow.

Time slowed, which was no problem for Slade's 90% use of his brain. He considered the options. He had the choice, in these few seconds, to kill this criminal, this scum, this amateur. Just like Batman had the choice to kill him.

And they he realized it. The difference between Deathstroke and Batman. It wasn't that Deathstroke killed while Batman didn't.

It was that Batman chose not to kill.

I could be Batman. If I hadn't been in the military, I might have been, once upon a time.

The realization was sudden and sobering. He thought about it, and knew this moment was defining. Kill, or not kill? Choice. It was all about choice.

CRACK.

The man lay, dead, his neck broken by the force of Deathstroke's blow. Slade looked down at his body, his breath even and slow.

It was about choice. He made his. He was Deathstroke. Not Batman.

All the same… I know who he is. What he is.

It was an interesting thought. He filed it away for later.

Once again... it's good to be back!