In Washington, D.C., you would expect there to be no heroes there. It was after all the government district of the United States. However, in a mountain range situated just outside the city, was a area only a select few knew about. This was Mount Justice: the original headquarters of the Justice League before they moved it to the space station called the Watchtower. Currently, it serves another purpose. It was the base for the Team, a division of the League reserved for younger heroes and sidekicks and partners of League Members.
The Team consisted of 6 members. Dick Grayson, or Robin, the sidekick of Batman, the world's greatest detective, Artemis Crock, aka Artemis, Green Arrow's 2nd sidekick, Aqualad, aka Kaldur, Aquaman's protege, Kid Flash, or Wally West, Flash's sidekick, Miss Martian, aka M'gann M'orzz, Martian Manhunter's niece, and Superboy, or Conner Kent, Superman's teenage clone. Right now, they were sitting around waiting for a mission.
"Ugh! When are we going to get a mission? It's been a full month since Batman assigned us an op and we have not heard anything from him since!" whined Wally. He tended to get bored easily due to his superspeed. Having it usually drove him to live life in the fast lane. Artemis proceeded to give him a smack upside the head. "Owwww!"
"You are an idiot, you know that?" She replied. "Watch the fricking TV. There's bound to be something on."
"Alright, jeez. With all the times you smack me, you'd think I would get used to it."
A voice rang out from the kitchen, "I guess you're not feeling the aster, are you?"
"Shut up, birdbrain. Your butchering of the English language gives us all a headache."
A trio of voices all said in sync, "Agreed."
Wally turned the TV on and started flipping through channels. So far there was nothing good on.
Dick piped up. "Wait, go back to channel 76. There was a special report on. I thought I saw the Joker attacking Metropolis."
Wally flipped back to channel 76 and saw what he was talking about. The Joker was blowing up buildings with an RPG and dropping Joker Gas on the city. An alarm sounded throughout the base and Batman's face appeared on the main computer.
"Team, Joker is attacking Metropolis. We believe he is going for the chemical plant. They are experimenting with an unstable gas to make a new kind of knockout gas. The attack is just a distraction to draw us away from his goal. We'll go after Joker while you protect the gas. Get to Metropolis now." the Dark Knights said.
They zeta tubed to the city and entered the building. Some of Joker's goons were already there, trying to drill into the vault protecting the gas. The team made quick work of the men. KF sped around, repeatedly punching goons and stunning them, while Artemis used an array of trick arrows, mainly taser and smoke, to incapacitate the men holding the drilling equipment. Superboy body slammed into one of the bigger thugs, knocking him to the Boy Wonder's line vision with Robin giving him the gift of a high voltage taser to the neck. Aqualad used his water bearers to command the nearby water from the pipes to wash away all of Joker's men into the wall, knocking unconscious for the time being. Miss Martian, being the team's resident telepath, pried into the mind of one of the men and looked for information that she could use.
Dick asked, "What did you find, M'gann? Anything useful?"
"There's another team of Joker's men at the east end of the facility, and they are going after the other vault situated there," said the niece of the last son of Mars. "Same gas in it as the one right here."
The group of heroes rushed to the other side of the building, only to find at least a dozen dead or dying men with severe electrical burns, burning skin coming off their faces, and a multitude of other heat or electrical injuries. The stench coming off of the bodies assaulted their noses and the team gagged at the unearthly odor.
"Oh my fucking god, what is that smell? It's worse than the animal pens I was forced to clean as a kid." said the Boy Wonder. The rest of the team agreed with him. They had never smelled something this bad in their careers as heroes. A moment later, a loud crash could be heard from the other room and Aqualad motioned his fellow partners to hide behind the wall. They waited for a handful of seconds and two voices broke the silence.
"No, please. I'm begging you, don't hurt me." This was a man's voice, sounding like he was in his mid 30's. And he was scared, more scared than a child at a horror film.
"Tell me what Joker wants this gas for. I know for a fact he always has something up that sleeve of his. TELL ME NOW! Or I will fry your brain so badly you will be rendered as a vegetable." said the second unidentified person.
"Okay, okay! The boss is going to use it for a heist on a bank that's going out of business. We're gonna use it on the people there to knock them out and the gas will do what the normal Joker gas would do, except much stronger. That way no one will question where the money went and the boss gets his laughs at the same time."
The team looked around the corner and what they saw sent chills down their spines. A tall teenage boy, dressed in steel-toed combat boots, dark jeans, a black shirt, black, fingerless biker gloves, and a biker jacket and covering his mouth was a black skull half mask with sunglasses and a snapback hat and with lightning-like tattoos on his muscular arms, was holding the thug against the wall with one hand. He had an arsenal of weapons on his person. A pair of knives were strapped to his legs, along with a standard Five-seven, two custom made MP7s on his back, and a single fully decked out SCAR-H and tons of ammunition to go with the guns. The teen had a murderous look in his eye as he said, "In that case, you deserve what you're about to get." He grabbed the man's face with both hands and sizzling and screaming were heard throughout the facility. When the sounds stopped, the skin on the henchman's face was gone, leaving nothing but a skull in its place. The 6 heroes looked at the kid in horror.
Wally screamed, "Why would you kill him? That's not what we do!" immediately revealing their location to the mysterious teen. He turned around and saw the team emerge from their hiding spot, giving them a dark chuckle.
"Then it's a good thing I'm not one of you." He then punched the doors open to the parking lot and got into a blue and yellow Corvette. Gunning the engine and speeding off into the city, the teen laughed and said, "You can tell Joker I'm coming for him."
Robin sighed and turned on his communicator. "Batman, we have a problem." He proceeded to explain the current situation about the unknown metahuman and how he told them he was going after Joker.
"He's in a blue and yellow Corvette. I think this guy's going to make an attempt at killing the Joker." Robin said.
"Understood," said the Dark Knight. "Batman to League. A dangerous meta is coming for Joker. Apprehend Joker quickly and give him to the police, but supervise it."
Their conversation was interrupted by a screeching sound coming from a car driving down the road at high speeds. It came to a stop and the metahuman Robin previously described got out.
He said a single sentence: "Joker, remember me?" And as he said this, electricity began to visibly crackle and dance around his entire body.
Said villain cackled, "Oh goody! Now I get to kill you just like I killed that girl. With bullets!" The Clown Prince of Crime then pulled his ridiculously long revolver and aimed at the teen. But he held out his hand and magnetically pulled the gun toward him from the clown's hand. And what he did next began to worry some of the Leaguers present. He melted the gun in his hand and tossed it away.
No one was sure who said, but in the midst of it all, someone said, "Oh shit."