The skies bled ash, the air was stiflingly heavy, and the climate was treacherous. But after staggering for days on end through the desert-like terrain, the shadow of the skeletal remains of an old building was a welcoming sight. Eventually his legs gave out, and he was forced to crawl closer to his salvation on hands and knees. His pursuers had water and copious food rations, whereas he hadn't eaten for days, and they wouldn't stop until Roy Harper's bones were crushed to dust beneath their heel.
But after what he'd seen... witnessing a secret that massive... it was no wonder they were going to such lengths to apprehend him. Despite the current life-threatening situation Roy had worked himself into, he actually enjoyed fighting rogue again. The pure adrenaline pumping through his veins, the rush of battle stealing his breath, and the pain of his new war wounds grinding against his skull. Maybe it was selfishness, but he didn't want to share that with anyone.
Except maybe Jade. She understood how intoxicating it was to lose yourself in a fight. But he wouldn't risk both their lives now that little Lian was in the picture. No matter what he'd done, and whom he'd betrayed, he would never condemn his daughter to such a fate. A fate where she would have to live without her parents.
As Roy neared the door, he raised a hand to wipe his face. He found dirt and dust clinging to the grooves of his skin, and a thin layer of stubble along his jawline. He was also sporting a nasty gash on his lower cheek.
The faint echo of voices in the distance gave him enough resolve to stand upright and try the door handle. When the door didn't budge, he hurriedly picked the lock and, in another moment, collapsed inside. He was inside what appeared to be some sort of abandoned hideaway or living quarters.
The walls were peeling away, and the building was little more than a patchwork roof and crumbling mortar, but for now it meant safety. And safety meant home.
Roy locked the door behind him and checked to see that the windows were latched. The glass window adjacent to the front door had fissures and cracks running along it, almost like a spiderweb. It would only take one bullet to shatter it, but if his pursuers weren't yet in the vicinity of the building, then he was momentarily safe.
Upon reaching that comforting thought, he hit the cold floor and knew no more.
He passed in and out of consciousness over the course of the next three hours, before coming to. Roy was still racked with fatigue, but his short rest took the edge off of his aching bones.
"Pull yourself together Red," he hissed to himself. His main priority now was finding sustenance. If there was any form of water or food to satiate his hunger, he would be fine. But if not, then he had another few hours at most before symptoms of undernourishment began to really kick in.
He explored the rooms and quarters of the building, before reaching a pantry. The shelves were practically bare, but he salvaged a bottle of sealed liquor and several jars of honey that had crystallized. Everything else appeared to have spoiled or gone rancid.
Roy made a small meal of what he had procured and felt his lightheadedness and shakiness cease. The danger of his current situation had lessened considerably, but a lingering sense of unease pushed him to make absolutely certain that the house was indeed abandoned.
He braved a set of stairs that looked ready to crumble, but surprisingly did not give out under his weight. Once he'd reached the second-story of the building, he scoured through the different rooms. There was no sign of life, no sign that there had ever been life here. Absent from the rooms were furnishings and portraits and all the simple touches that made a house a home.
Roy slipped his quiver of arrows off his shoulders and was about to set it down, when he heard the low rumble of voices from below. They were here.
"Search the area." The voice that issued the order had a slight lisp to it. But he'd spoken in English. The men who had chased Roy earlier had been natives of Kahndaq, a Middle Eastern country. Which posed the question: just how many were after him?
Roy edged out of the room he was in, straining to overhear the rest of the conversation. He heard a masculine voice speaking in a language he didn't recognize, and then he heard something he did indeed understand.
"Ah, yes. An emptied bottle of liquor. He was definitely here. Search the house. Upturn every table and check every nook and cranny. We can't afford to let this one escape."
He heard a chorus of agreements, and even though Roy didn't understand the Kahndaq native tongue, he figured that they were only happy to oblige.
The creak of footsteps. The slam of doors forced open. The sound of approaching voices. The blast of a fired bullet.
Roy's pulse quickened. He needed to find a hiding spot—there was too much depending on him. He tucked his bow under an arm and felt along the walls of the hallway for hidden passageways. It was unlikely there were any secret passages, but he was growing desperate.
His fear was turning to full-fledged panic when he spied a rectangular patch on the ceiling that jutted out ever-so-slightly.
Roy hoisted himself into the attic, and muffled his coughing fit with his arm as clouds of dust billowed around him. He could only hope that they wouldn't check here, but to be on the safe sight, he slunk behind a stack of crates that littered the attic, further concealing himself from sight.
To pass the time, he silently relayed the conversation he'd eavesdropped on days ago.
Roy had managed to infiltrate an enemy base without being detected, when he'd seen two officers conversing heatedly about... something. It had almost all been gibberish to him, so he'd barely payed attention to their discussion. That is, until he'd heard them each utter a particular phrase. A manifesto that Roy himself had heard before.
They had each raised their left hand above their hearts as they said it. They'd even bowed their heads. But despite that act of solemnity, Roy was still unprepared for what he heard next. It had made his heart plummet in his chest and his blood run cold. "Soon all will see the Light."
Originally, the Team and the League assumed that the Light only went as far as the Injustice League and the League of Shadows. But it ran so much deeper than that. Vandal Savage, the founder of the Light, seemed to have every agency, company, and military dealing in illegal activity under his thumb.
After overhearing that last bit of their conversation, Roy had tailed the two officers, and later came across a folder containing detailed blueprints and instructions. However, he'd been forced to stash the folder in a hiding spot when they'd grown wise to him. The fact that they were still scouting for him meant that that folder was invaluable. Which is why, no matter the risk, he'd eventually have to double back for it.
"But 'e is no 'ere," a man protested in a thick accent from somewhere below, pulling Roy out of his reverie and back to the present.
"Either bring me his head, or I'll have yours."
Roy inhaled sharply, and leaned against the wall. He'd barely had a chance to so much as glance at the contents of the folder, and a significant portion of it would require translating, but he had seen it in action. And it was on a significantly bigger scale than the mind control stunt the Light had pulled almost six years prior. What the Light was preparing now was something that would effect every living being on the face of the planet.
Roy's foot was starting to fall asleep from being in a crouched position for so long. He shifted slightly, and one of the crates tipped over, spewing its contents across the floor. "Ugh," a groan escaped his lips as the wooden crate landed on him.
He gingerly freed his foot from beneath the heavy crate, and collected the papers that, among other valuables, had spilled from it. Roy drew his eyebrows together as he examined them. They weren't just random papers; they were letters.
Dear Correspondent,
you do not know who I am, nor do I know you, but a consort of mine once spoke very highly of you, so you are to whom I shall be writing. Enclosed in these letters are my life story, so I trust you will handle my most precious memories with care. By the time you read this I will be long since dead, but the cautionary tale that has rested on my shoulders will live on through you. Please do not take this lightly. You will be on The Haven's radar before you even finish perusing this letter. That is why I am offering you my condolences now.
Say good-bye to your family but breathe a word of this letter to no one. Before anything else, pack a bag with a few necessities. And pack lightly. Make sure you bring a container for water. And do not carry so much as one coin; the thieves and lowlifes from where you're headed can sniff out money a mile away. I should also inform you that while the days where you're going will be hot, the nights will be cool, so bring a jacket. If you have any gemstones or jewels—jewels I said, not coins—take them now and encase them in cloth. Once you have done that, sew them onto your jacket as buttons. They may come in handy as a bargaining tool.
For now, that is all you need to know. I will provide another set of instructions in my next letter (yes I am really dead, and yes all these letters have been pre-written), and you will receive one monthly from me. Do not worry about how my letters will reach you; I have friends in... interesting places. Until then, do not trust anyone, as the Haven of the Half has eyes everywhere. In fact, do not even trust any letters claiming to be from me unless they contain a similar phrase to the one below:
"The buck has but one eye."
It is a code withing a code, if you get what I mean.
Your sincerely,
The Operative
Written June First
Roy reread the letter. It was written in a hasty scrawl, but there was no way to tell exactly how old it was. He didn't know of anyone who went under the alias 'The Operative', but if what he'd read was true, then the man had already passed.
He fumbled for the next letter and began to read. There was something oddly fascinating about the words of a dead man, like you were getting to walk a mile in someone else's shoes, and getting a glimpse of the past.
The second letter added on from the first, but directed the 'Correspondent' to a post along the border where one of the Operative's consorts was stationed. At the bottom of it, it read "the bear has but half it's claws", along with "written July first" underneath the Operative's signature.
For the hours that followed, Roy completely lost himself in the letters. The Haven of the Half it mentioned sounded as inexorable as The Light. They even had the trademark cheesy villain motto. "Only the strong half will survive." Now that he thought about it, their goals didn't differ much from The Light, either. The Haven sought to purge the world of those deemed unfit to breathe the air; the weak and helpless who couldn't fend for themselves.
There was no doubt in Roy's mind that the concept of the "survival of the fittest" rested on the borders of immorality, but at the same time he could almost understand where both the Haven and The Light were coming from. But he did not condone their means of action. How could he when at this very moment he was being hunted by them?
A pang of hunger jarred him from his haze of thoughts, and he realized that it must have been well into the night. Roy rolled the letters into a bundle and deposited them into his quiver. He was starting to run dangerously low on arrows.
Before existing the attic, he also slipped on a frayed jacket that had been in the crate. He was curious about the contents of the other sealed boxes, but his hunger won out. Besides, his pursuers could return at any moment, assuming they weren't still in the vicinity.
Roy padded along the hallway and snuck out the back door. The sky overhead was studded with stars, and a full moon peaked out from behind wisps of cloud. He crossed over a stretch of sand dunes, slowly letting himself relax. And then he felt it. The heat of someone's gaze boring into to the back of his head.
He froze, completely motionless, until instinct kicked in. Roy fired a volley of scarlet arrows and was prepared to flee, but was stopped by the sickening ping of an arrow meeting its mark. But that wasn't right. Because he'd been fighting trained assassins all his life and he'd never made a fatal shot before. And his adversaries were easily above his level; too good to simply get caught, to get killed.
Liquid lead ran through his veins as he watched passively from where he stood. Watched a man with tanned skin, a hooked nose, and otherwise gentle features crumple to the ground. He watched. He stared. Soon, a bloody puddle seeped forward to caress Roy's boot.
The dying man's breath hitched in his throat. He'd been hit by Roy's arrow. He'd been hit, which meant he couldn't have been fraternizing with the Light. He couldn't have been a villain. He was a civilian. And Roy Harper had killed him.