Name: Blending In With the Shadows
Summary: After Richard Grayson's parents were murdered in front of his eyes, everything changed. He was kidnapped by the Court of Owls, trained for five years underground without seeing daylight, and eventually became a Talon. Dick was sure his life was planned out. Then, he was captured by the enemy, and his world became a little more confusing.
Disclaimer: I don't own YJ or any of its characters
Chapter One - Things Taken For Granted
Dick looked at himself in the mirror, almost shamefully and definitely hesitantly pulling his mask from his face.
A part of him still expected bright, blue, happy eyes when he did so. As if the past five years of living in this underground facility hadn't occurred, and he was still swinging from a trapeze with his parents looking up at him proudly as he did another quadruple flip during his practice. It was quickly pushed out harshly by the dark reality as he gazed into his pitch black eyes, it had been the first thing they'd changed when he got here rather forcefully five years ago. He looked down as the memory of his parents was washed away from his mind, a sad pang in his heart as he remembered they were dead. Though his face showed no emotion as he thought of it, years of training down here did that to you.
He remembered being brought here. Well, waking up here, anyway. He had most likely been drugged, because he didn't remember anything except falling asleep in the back of the social security woman's car. How he had been drugged, he never knew. The woman was killed at the side of the road, been stabbed to death if he remembered one of the Talons correctly. He had never left her sight after being handed rather reluctantly to her by Mr. Haley. He had absolutely no idea, he hadn't eaten anything or drank anything, nothing pricked him and he hadn't been walked up to with a chloroform rag.
Dick sighed as he mentally dropped the issue, the Court had mysterious ways that he could never figure out no matter how much he thought about it. Picking the mask back up and putting it back on his face, he walked out of the bathroom linked to his room, glancing at the camera in the corner of his room. He paid no mind to it, it was to make sure he never escaped, but Dick honestly didn't know how it was possible. For fun once he had tried to pick the lock, but found it impossible. You'd need one type of key to be able to unlock it, and it was sealed from the inside and outside by some type of foam that only released if the correct type of key was used. It baffled him to no end, but released it as just another Court mystery that he'd never figure out.
He was closer to the center of the underground facility, so he didn't have any windows. That that they would be that much help, for they were underground. He knew they were also to deep for a skylight to work, so Dick just mumbled under his breath about the stupidly secure place and sighed, jumping onto the thick mattress. At least he got a nice bed, but he was pretty sure it was only because his uncle was a higher up.
At first he had hated that man with a passion, he was the reason he was in here in the first place. But after a while, he had grown to respect him greatly. Even if this place was harsh and cruel, William Cobb had taken him in when he was more than sure no one else would. In fact, William had even informed Dick that he was going to be thrown into the Gotham Juvenile Delinquent Center without a second glance, no one was willing to take the circus boy in, and there was apparently no space left in the orphanage. Dick rolled his eyes at the last part, William confirming his suspicions with the fact they had declined because they didn't want another never-to-be-adopted boy at their grasps.
Sure, William was horrible in the comfort department, but Dick didn't mind anymore. He didn't want him to be seen as weak, and Dick still thanked him for that. Being seen like that in front of the other Talons and Owlmen made him want to shiver, he'd probably had died already if it weren't for William.
Suddenly getting off his bed, he glanced at the clock to reveal it was getting closer to 9:00 already. He was forced to wake up at six every morning by the alarms that blazed, the sound proof walls making sure it stayed in there and didn't stop until he was out of bed. Dick had learned throughout the years to make it a habit to wake up at 5:59 wide awake to make the sound stop sooner. Glancing at the clock once more, he saw it was 8:45. Quickly jumping out of bed and hurried to get his clothes from the drawers. It was his training clothes, and he quickly went into the bathroom to get prepared for his morning training that usually lasted until 12:00 unless William was called by one of the men that's status rank was above his own. That didn't happen very often, so he never relied on it.
Brushing his teeth, making an amused smirk at the fact that the Court of Owls did enforce hygiene before running out of the room and stood at the doorway for William to arrive. Dick was five minutes early, but he had been late before, and that did not end well. He found it much better to be early than to be even a few seconds late, the last time he had been late was over a year ago, and he had ended up with a broken thumb and was still expected to fight at the same level of perfection or they'd make his injuries worse. He'd manage to barely pull it off, and at 12:00 they had ended, William instructing him to go get one of the light orange voiles on the other side of the room. After doing so, Willim ordered him to stick out his thumb and poured the runny orange liquid onto it. Dick had remembered barely stopping the scream of pain that wanted to erupt from his mouth and fought very hard to keep the look of pain off his face, the orange liquid being poured onto his broken bone hurting far worse than the bone itself. After a full thirty seconds of inwardly screaming, the pain vanished, revealing him able to move his thumb again.
He had sent William a questioning look, resulting in a shrug. "It heals minor injuries such as broken bones, our scientist are trying to make less painful versions, but right now this is what we've got."
Dick nodded before giving him an amusing smirk, "if me breaking a bone is a minor injury, what classifies as the most major one?"
William just gave him a frown with a hint of amusement as well, signaling he didn't want to know.
Dick snapped out of his back flash when he heard the foam shrink back. The foam was silent to anyone who wasn't trained, but Dick was very, very well trained in making out noises, even when in the process of remembering something. People who understood how difficult that was were usually very impressed, but he simply shrugged it off. Pretty much everyone knew how to do it here, even the less trained.
Standing in front of William Cobb, his uncle looked him up and down, making sure he had everything before nodding in approval and motioning him to follow to the training room. Standing there was one of the higher ups, which surprised Dick slightly, even though his face was stone. He knew how to make sure emotions never appeared on his face, William had even taugh him to keep guilt off his face. People outside of this place probably didn't know his identity, but if they ever did for an unknown reason, William taught him to show know emotion on his face at the mention of his parents. Even went as far to teach him if they ever tried to make him feel guilty. Going on and on about how his parents would never approve, etc.
At first, he knew it was true, and it was very difficult to not cry. It moved off his face in stages, the sadness was thankfully the first to go. Then the anger at the people who were telling him these things, telling the person to "shut up" was always a dead giveaway that they were getting to him. Eventually, that went away too, and so did keeping emotion out of his voice. Guilt was the third and the hardest by far, someone making him believe his parents would never want this for him, Dick knew it was true, even if he had been forced into this life and hadn't acted on his own accord. William even wanted the part where only he could make out the emotion, in other words, the only part of which only someone really close to him could figure out the emotion in him. Dick learned several tactics about his eyes, too. It was all gone in time, and William had told him he was a little surprised to see how he had done it so fast.
Dick knew William could have told him in any emotion he wanted, or had no emotion at all. When Dick had caught a little pride in his voice, even when he knew William could have easily masked that emotion and kept Dick from ever knowing it was there, it had made him feel proud, too.
He stood aside William as the older man studied him, giving a nod in approval. "I think he's ready, but you're the one that's been training him. Tell me what you think."
Dick kept himself from raising an eyebrow, and instead looked at William blankly. William stared at him, and without even a moment of hesitation, turned to the man with a smirk. "I think he is, too."
When Dick realized it was finally time for him to become an official Talon, he distantly knew what it meant. It was time for him to go out and kill a man.
But Dick wasn't upset, and he most certainly wasn't scared of taking away a life. The reason he had been pacing the room was because he was thinking of what it would be like. He would finally be able to look at the stars and the moon, something he hadn't seen in five years. If it was going to rain that night, he most certainly wouldn't mind that either. Being sprinkled from above was something he had only felt in the shower for years. Looking at the outside of the building would be a plus, too.
He had been given the target's file, who's name was Quentin Lard, and the general location he was going to be. He was expected to kill his men as well, but if he saw Batman, do not kill him and stay as far away from him as possible. Only defend if necessary, and do not get captured under any circumstances. They had other plans for him, and do not need him out of the way.
William had told him quite a few times the Court was not evil, they only killed people who were poisoning this city. Dick had, at first, not believed that. William wanted him to understand, so he quietly told a story.
William was around twenty when this happened, so quite a few years ago. He had been told of a very dangerous, very lethal man who had been killing innocents without reason, the Court told him to take the man down.
He had, at first, started the mission. But when he got there and was seen, the mob boss grabbed a little girl and told her to get behind him. "I was a fool, I didn't see the signs. I beat him up, but let him live. Think of it was a warning." Wiliam had told Dick.
"I found out that hadn't been his really daughter shortly after, she was a girl who had been kidnapped off the streets and had.. Cruel intentions to touch her inappropriately. I was furious with myself when I found the girl dead, the Court had only been trying to protect more innocent people from dying, and I had foolishly disobeyed them. Even if that had been his real daughter, I should have killed him anyway." He said, much to Dick's horror. He quickly continued. "The kids would most likely grow up to see their parents do this, and would be pressured to do the same. Very few escape these lives, and even if they tried to take over once they get old enough, it feels good to know about the hundreds of kids over the years that got the chance to escape their parent's cruel intent for their children, many even grow up to become successful and have well paying jobs and have loving families."
William gave him a smile, surprising Dick. It had been the first smile he'd gotten since he'd arrived. "We never kill the people who don't deserve it, Dick. We aren't evil, and we don't wish for others die. It's just the way it has to happen, and if we could, we would like to stop the kids who end up orphaned like you."
Dick checked around him to make sure no one was looking, which was very foolish since he was in his room, then proceeded to smile at the memory. He was doing a good thing, even if others didn't think so.
Straighting up as he heard the very quiet steps towards his room, he jumped off the bed. He was ready.
Dick took in the fresh air, the first fresh air he'd taken in five years.
Looking up at the stars and the moon, he wanted to cry. It was just as beautiful as he'd remembered it, even more so. The sky was clear and bright, no clouds. Even if he saw a bit of factory smoke, it was worth it.
He couldn't believe that five years ago, he took this stuff for granted.
Faintly remembering his mission, he took in another deep, beautiful breath of air and headed almost reluctantly towards the docs. Running with this wind touching his skin, Dick wished he could run forever. But he couldn't, he had a job to do.
Trained eyes looked into the darkness of the first warehouse sitting on the edge of the docs, but not before looking at the water as it moved in waves along the pier. He heard the sound of the crashing waves before turning his head to stare back at the warehouse. He saw no movement, so he jumped to the other roof. Once he reached pier seven, he looked in and saw movement of several people. He was almost sad, not at killing the man, but at the fact that this meant his mission was almost over, meaning he'd have to trudge back underground. But if he did well enough, he'd get to go out again soon.
Jumping down, not making the slightest sound as an indication he's there, he quietly used his knife to stab the man from behind, right in the heart. He slit the next guy's throat, and moved to the front, his moves were silent and extremely experienced. These guys, for some reason, wore bullet proof vests, but he didn't plan on using his gun for this mission, not until most of the guards were taken down, anyway.
Slitting both of their throats with one movement, he heard a faint thump come from the other side of the warehouse. Dick's eyes widened slightly, he knew Batman was here. He risked getting caught, but he needed to take this guy down, or they may never allow him to come out and breath fresh air again.
With a deep sigh, he grabbed the gun from his utility belt. Even in the darkness, he quickly made out the head of his victim. Trying to keep the fatal thought of getting caught, he shot, and the man fell down. Quickly looking around, six more shots at everyone but Batman and they slumped to the floor. Batman looked around, shocked, and he knew that emotion would only let him hesitate for a few seconds. Running out the door silently, he quickly took a looked back at the ocean before continuing to run, hoping Batman was too far behind to catch up.
Batman had gotten a tip that Quentin Lard was going to be here tonight. That little scum had been keeping a low profile, but had managed to get enough courage to rob a Burger King. It had been easy to make the connected to Quentin Lard, especially when he had ordered at Burger King and used his credit card, which quickly denied it because he had no money in his account. A moment later he pulled out his gun and demanded all the money in the register, and had shot a cop who had been advancing on him.
Somehow he had gotten out of there, money in a Walmart bag as he ran down the street.
Batman had pretty much seen everything in his time as Batman, and even had a way of how things worked. Barely anything ever surprised him anymore. He silently took down the first goon, getting into his regular schedule of how this worked. Knock out the guards, interrogate Quentin, tie him up, send an alert to Gorton, and disappear before the police arrive. He started to advance the man, ready to attack.
That's when the gun fired.
Batman froze, seeing the man in front of him drop dead. He followed the line of shots, each guard being taken down with an expert shot to the head. Realizing what was going on, he moved to protect Quentin, but realized it was to no avail. Another shot right between the eyes, he had also apparently been frozen on the spot, but it wasn't at the guards, his eyes had been at the door.
Batman looked at the door, just in time to see the figure run off. The word assassin and dangerous crossed his mind, and he began to run after the man with the gun. For a split second, his hazy mind focused on what he had seen at the doorway, the shadow looked like a child.
Bruce shook his head to clear his thoughts while running around in search of the man. His mind was just a little shocked, it was playing a trick on him.
Despite himself, he grimaced.
He never played tricks.
Running, he looked up ahead and saw a figure that was hesitantly looking up at the stars. The Dark Knight made one footstep, and the boy looked at him. Bruce almost stammered back, seeing that he was, indeed, looking at a child. But then another thought went through his head, he had looked up when he walked, and he was sure he hadn't made a sound. The only person that was able to do that was Clark, and he had to be focusing intently.
"Who are you?"
"Who are you?"
Dick didn't shiver or look scared, he knew that tone of voice probably worked on a lot of people, he could tell that by the fact that Batman's eyes widened a fraction and for a fraction of a second. Most people couldn't catch that type of thing, but granted, he wasn't in the "most people" category.
Honestly, he was fighting the strong urge to stare openingly at him with admiration. Batman had always been his favorite superhero, while most were debating between Superman and the Flash, he always interjected with "Batman's the best".
There was once a time he was dying to meet Batman in person, sometimes when he was stuck underground he laid a silent wish for Batman to come save him, even though he knew that would never happen. He knew he needed to run and disappear, but something stopped him from doing so. He ignored the man and looked back at the stars.
The Court told Dick Batman's secret identity in case he ever needed to escape, but was only told to use it under extreme circumstances. He knew half of the League's identities, mostly because he had asked William, and he just shrugged and told him, saying he might as well, since he might need to use it one day.
He hadn't known what it meant at the time, and right now he was sort of glad he knew them. He wished he knew who Bruce Wayne was, though. He knew he had heard the name before, and was internally debating whether or not to figure out.
All of these thoughts had been through his head in about a minute, he was already a quick thinker, and it had only sped up since his time with The Court.
Dick looked back at Batman, "like I'm going to tell you that."
Dick didn't know if he was supposed to tell him about the Court or not, and decided against it. Only a few people outside knew about its existence and lived, he wasn't sure if Batman was going to be a special exception or not
Batman glared, and Dick just looked into his masked eyes with boredom. "If it's alright with you, I'd like to leave now."
Batman frowned deeply, "I'm afraid I won't be able to let you do that." Dick scoffed, but didn't make an effort to move, he kept glancing up at the stars though, he wished he would start taking them for granted again, but after five years of living underground, he didn't know if that would ever happen again.
Bruce seemed to be internally debating to ask a question, and eventually the part where he wanted to ask won. "Why do you keep looking at the stars?"
Dick laughed slightly, "let's just say, five years of the most interesting thing was a brick wall really seems to make you love the night sky."
Bruce did not seem to expect that being the answer, because his muscles tensed slightly, but Dick realized it wasn't at him. "You were.. Locked inside for five years?"
Dick just shrugged, "first time I've been outside in a while, and I'm afraid it's time for me to go back." Dick didn't bother hiding the reluctance on his face, but it didn't stop him from running.
Batman's moment of hesitation was enough for Dick to successfully making it to the brick wall in an alleyway not to far away when he and Batman had their little conversation. It opened, and he quickly stepped in, he glanced back longingly as the walls shut.
William waited as Dick trudged down the steps that led back to the underground facility and gave him a knowing look when he had reached the bottom. "Your mission was successful?"
Dick gave him a rare smile.
"Yes."
It's been.. Forever since I put this much effort into a story. I'm sorry for not writing guys, I've been hit with huge writers block, but this story came to me after reading a lot of very bad "Dick is a Talon" stories, and I had just about enough of not being able to relax and read a good Court of Owls story without loudly complaining about the grammar mistakes and such. So, the idea came to me and I decided to use it.
By the way, guys, I'm sorry if some of the things the Court of Owls uses doesn't look possible. I've decided to stop looking for ways to possibly explain it, that sort of stuff isn't in my brain. I also realized it doesn't look like the Court of Owls use guns, but I've decided to explain to you in this story, they only use it as a last resort. They don't want to get noticed, so yeah.
Well, it's 2:00am and I need to sleep. I'm probably not going to, but it's the middle of the night and it's probably better if I try.
So, bye guys! Thanks for all the support you give me, even through the months where I don't update. Oh, right, remember to review! I love hearing what y'all have to say.
Bye!