Sivana is a canon character in the Shazam! comics/Captain Marvel universe.

Medical procedures are probably incorrect in future chapters. Please overlook their inaccuracies.

Chapter Two: Picking Down Clocks When the Birds Come Out to Eat

When Wally West woke up, his entire body was sore and his arms were handcuffed to the wall above his head. Man, that hadn't happened since… Since before he figured out that he was a metahuman. Since before he started running. Since before he met his new family. Well, not family exactly, but it was the closest thing to it that he'd ever really had for a long time.

The teenager banished the thoughts from his head. He had more important things to focus on, like escaping from these handcuffs.

Okay, handcuffs. He had been in these lots of times. All that it took to escape was a little vibration, and he should be out in seconds. It had never failed before, and he'd been in much worse jams than this, right?

Closing his bright green eyes, Wally concentrated on vibrating his wrists (and ankles, he hadn't noticed that they were cuffed too) at the right frequency to phase through his bounds. It had been way too long since he practiced this particular maneuver, and Len would murder him if he ever found out how out of practice he was.

Shit. Len! He'd been knocked out by those people (had they been Hunters? He couldn't quite remember) before he could see what had happened to the rest of his little group. Giova-James and Hartley would probably be okay-they were smart, but they were also the ones that the rest had an unspoken oath to protect. But he'd pushed Roscoe and Lisa out of the way of the bullet, and hadn't he seen that they were all gone before some dude with muscles the size of watermelons and tattoos knocked him into unconsciousness.

Shit, he'd been shot, hadn't he?

Wally twisted his neck around and tried to see his shoulder where the bullet had struck. His shirt was stained with dried blood, but it didn't hurt very much anymore. The wound had healed like he'd suspected-with the bullet itself still lodged under his skin. Which meant that he was going to have to cut it out later… That was going to be fun.

No, he could deal with that later. Right now Wally had to figure out how to get out of these cuffs.

"Don't bother," a low (but still on the younger side) male voice said from across the room when they saw his seventh failed attempt. "If you do it too many times it'll electrocute you, and it hurts like a bitch."

Man, he was losing his touch. First he got shot, then he couldn't escape, and now he was surprised by someone whose presence he should have noticed the minute that he woke up.

"He's not exaggerating," a second voice, also male, spoke up from one of the corners across from him. "And if you keep trying after it shocks you the first time, the doses will just get higher."

Wally glared in their direction. "Well, maybe I want to get out no matter the cost, did you ever think of that?"

"We all want to get out," the one in the corner spoke up. "But we can't do that if we have no idea where we are."

The boy sighed and leaned back against the cold cement wall, now-adjusted eyes picking up on the humanoid shapes that he had been speaking to. "How do you know that we even will escape? I mean, the Hunters play for keeps."

And that was who had him-them-wasn't it? The Hunters?

A small bitter sound that could have been a laugh came from the one who had spoken first to warn him about the electric shocks. "We don't. Nobody who goes into the Meta-Maxes ever comes out."

And on that happy note, Wally thought wryly. "Well, seeing as how we're probably going to die together, do you two mind telling me your names? I'm Wally, by the way."

The one in the corner huffed in what might have been amusement. "Hello Wally, I'm John. John Stewart."

"Bruce." The one across from him said shortly.

"What, no last name?" Wally teased him.

"Last names don't matter anymore," Bruce said, almost growling.

John bristled slightly. "Don't tell me that you're resigned to death already."

"No, I just learned a long time ago not to sugarcoat things."

"Okay!" Wally broke in. "Who wants to swap stories of how we got caught and compare notes? Because something tells me that we stand a much better chance of getting out of here if we know what not to do." He didn't need perfect night vision to know that the two were staring at him, and he shifted uncomfortably. "What?"

"He's right," Bruce announced. "If we want to escape, then we'll need a plan."

"You want a plan?" John said, crossing his arms as his unusual green eyes flashed with power in the darkness of the cell. "Here's a plan; don't get cocky, don't trust anyone, and don't get caught. If you do that, you can't possibly be caught." The other teenager sounded so bitter that both of the others knew that he was repeating advice that someone else had given him-possibly even someone else who had also been captured.

"That's-" Wally began, ready to tell John that sometimes trusting people was the best (or only) option.

He was interrupted by the door (the one that only Bruce had known was there) opening. The silhouette of a man with a clipboard was standing there, one with an unusually large head and small shoulders. Weird.

"Bring them all," he said, snapping his fingers. Oh, Wally really did not like the sound of that.

Carefully rubbing his injured shoulder (all of the cuffs had been removed), Wally squinted and looked around the room that he and his new cellmates were now it. It was far brighter than the other one, with white walls and several large machines. There was something that looked almost like a treadmill on one side, a stack of weights on the other, a long obstacle course that looked like it would take hours to complete for a normal human, and a large glass box that seemed to be mostly useless.

At least now he got an actual look at his two roommates.

Another one of the doors (this one on the other side of the room) opened, sliding up in front of the people in the same way that their had to allow them access.

There were only two of them this time, both girls a few years older than Wally was-so around John and Bruce's respective ages. The minute that the two laid eyes on the trio of male teenagers, vastly different expressions flickered across their faces. One of them, the girl with sleek black hair and bright blue eyes, looked almost… Relieved. Happy, even. That was a little strange.

But while the other girl had a guarded look on her face and apprehension shining in her strange golden eyes, Wally was a little bit too focused on her wings to care. Yes, wings. Giant, dusky brown hawk wings that were folded on her back. They must have been magnificent when she was younger-now, the feathers were dull and quite a few looked like they were missing.

Still, it wasn't every day that you saw someone with actual fucking wings growing out of their spine.

It also wasn't every day that you got kidnapped, stuck in a cell with two strangers who also had powers (crap, he forgot to ask what their powers actually were), and then 'escorted' (read: forcefully dragged) to what looked like some sort of training room after being shot in the shoulder and then knocked out and dumped in a creepy black van.

The men who had helped the creepy doctor guy 'escort' them down to the white room marched over and herded the two females over. The one without wings immediately slipped in between John and Bruce, the latter of which took a small step to the side that was almost invisible to anybody not looking for it-or anybody who couldn't see in milliseconds-to brush his shoulder against hers. The pair obviously knew each other.

Her sort-of companion, the teenager with the wings, stood a little bit away from the other four. She crossed her arms, wings held slightly away from her back like she was trying to appear bigger than she actually was. Didn't most birds do that when they were threatened?

The man with the strange head (the nametag on his chest read 'Dr. Sivana') stood in front of them with his clipboard in both hands. He squinted angrily at the pair of goons that had brought them there at his orders. "Where are the other two? Your orders were clear!"

The two exchanged nervous looks, and Wally wondered if they weren't just hired muscle after all-all brawns and no brains.

"The boss said not to let them out. One of 'em's a telepath, Doc. We shouldn't bring it out if it's able to use its powers," one of them started to say, sounding nervous. Wally couldn't blame him. Dr. Sivana may not have looked particularly threatening, just really creepy, but he could probably pull a few strings and make their lives hell if he really wanted to.

The doctor growled. "Tell Strange that I will be speaking to him personally if he doesn't let me have them. Now is the only chance for them to be tested together, against each other."

Both of the men paled, all of the blood draining from their faces.

"Yes sir," they muttered obediently at the exact same time. "We'll go do that now," the slightly shorter one added, elbowing his partner in the ribs. Dr. Sivana nodded, curling his lip up slightly.

"Good. Now go."

They were gone in under two seconds, and Wally had to stifle a snicker of laughter. He didn't think that he'd have very many chances to laugh in this place.

Immediately, Dr. Sivana swivelled on his heel to face the redheaded teenager. "You just volunteered to be the first test subject. Congratulations."

Wally bit his lip. Test subject sounded bad.

He didn't notice the winged girl giving him a golden-eyed look that held a mixture of relief and pity. Relief because it wasn't going to be her, and pity because it was going to be him instead.

One of the other doors (how many were there in this room alone, anyways?) slid open, and the two beefy guards returned. This time they had another pair of kids (who were once again older than Wally-he felt as if it was going to be a bit of a recurring theme), one more normal-looking and one that couldn't have passed as human, similar to the two girls that they had brought in earlier.

The boy that looked more normal had black hair and blue eyes like Bruce and his friend.

The one that didn't had green skin and bright red eyes, and was wearing some sort of black collar with red lights on it.

And now that they were both here, it meant that the tests (you know, the ones that Dr. Sivana had said that he would be the first subject for) could begin. Oh, what fun! Wally thought sarcastically.

Dr. Sivana took a step forward in Wally's direction, and the metahuman boy automatically tensed. The doctor was smaller than him, and most likely much less strong, but that didn't mean that he couldn't hurt him. He had had far too many people hurt him in his life to underestimate a potential opponent now.

"Get on the treadmill."

Wally frowned. That… Was not what he had been expecting. Slowly (at least for him), he walked over across the huge room and clambered onto the giant machine. The rest of the teens stayed on the other side, where, in their opinion, it was safer.

"Okay," Wally called down to Dr. Sivana. "What do you want me to do now?"

Before the doctor could answer, Bruce clenched his jaw. He had spotted what the others had failed to see. The treadmill, in addition to being very large and high-tech (and probably built to withstand even Wally's speeds-from the way that he had vibrated his limbs in an attempt to escape from the handcuffs, Bruce could guess that his power was based off of speed), also had a very suspicious looking metal box attached to the front. One with what looked like a lightning bolt design on it.

Bruce had a very good-well, actually it was a very bad-idea about what exactly that box did.

"I want you to run," Dr. Sivana said plainly. "And I don't want you to stop."

"Uh…" The teenager blinked. "Okay, then… I guess."

He half turned until he was facing the front of the treadmill before starting to jog in place. Bruce didn't see when or how Dr. Sivana had turned it on, but he had. As he watched, the younger boy picked up the pace until his legs became a blur.

Someone tapped his shoulder, and Bruce turned. He smirked. "You still can't sneak up on me, Diana."

She smiled genuinely at him, and Bruce remembered why he cared about her so much. "One day, you will teach me your tricks." Diana turned her gaze to where Wally was running on the treadmill. "I'm in a cell with Shayera Hol. She told me to give up hope now so that I wouldn't be disappointed later. Should I listen to her?"

Bruce knew what she was asking-and what she wasn't asking. Diana had never needed his permission to do something, and rarely asked for advice. She wanted to know two things; who was in his cell (and their names/powers too for good measure) and how they were going to escape. One of those things he had an answer to. The other one… Well, he was working on it.

"The one on the treadmill is Wally, and the one next to you is John. I think you can guess what Wally's power is"-he was rewarded with a small smile-"and I'm pretty sure that John can make hard light constructs."

"Pretty sure?" She said teasingly.

"I'm sure. I saw them when he was brought in."

"Shayera can fly," Diana said softly. "But I don't think that she has for a very long time."

Bruce turned his attention back to the treadmill with a small frown. Wally couldn't keep up that pace for much longer by his estimation-maybe if he had been better fed, but the teenager was abnormally skinny. He also likely had an injured shoulder, judging by the way that he had been rubbing it earlier, and probably hadn't eaten in a long time.

So it didn't surprise him to see that the younger teenager was starting to slow down. Over the course of roughly forty seconds, Wally's pace abated until he was slowly (for him) walking on the machine. Bruce narrowed his eyes as Dr. Sivana scowled and marched up to the treadmill. "Did I tell you to stop?"

"N-no, but I can't run anymore," Wally panted. "I haven't eaten in around a day, and I have a really fast metabolism that means that I have to eat a lot more than a normal person or else I can't run and I faint." His voice had taken on a slight pleading quality, and John winced when he heard it.

Dr. Sivana growled and marched up to the box in front of the treadmill. Beside him, Bruce felt Diana tense. "What is that?"

"Nothing good," he said quietly.

Wally's green eyes widened when he saw where Dr. Sivana was going. He moved as if it jump off of the large treadmill, but his legs felt as if they were frozen in place.

When Dr. Sivana jabbed one of the buttons on the machine, the one marked with a lightning bolt, Bruce couldn't say that he was surprised (although that didn't stop the pang of sympathy and pity that went through his chest) when electricity arched up from the base of the treadmill through some unseen mechanism and coiled around Wally's body. For a moment, the redheaded boy looked simply surprised, and he waved a hand through one of the visible humming strands as if it were merely water.

That was when he started screaming.

He fell to his knees in pain, hardly aware of the fact that the high-pitched keening sounds were coming from his own throat. This was the most electricity that he had ever felt in his entire life-even worse than that one day that…

Dr. Sivana was not expecting to be attacked by six teenagers at once.

Shayera, Diana, and John all pounced on him, while the green-skinned boy raised his arms into the air. Several pieces of the obstacle course ripped up and away from their places to hurl themselves at the scientist. Meanwhile, Bruce and the other black haired, blue eyed boy ran for the machine at the front of the treadmill. As Bruce hit the button to shut the electricity off, the other teenager lifted up into the air (Bruce mentally added 'flight' to the small list of powers that he now knew the boy had) and pulled Wally off of the device.

He looked shocked (pun unintended) as he alighted on the ground, staring down at the younger teen in his arms. As Bruce sprang down to stand beside him, he looked up at him with wide blue eyes.

"I-I…" He began, and Bruce felt a sinking feeling in his gut as he looked down at the metahumans limp body. "I can't hear his heartbeat…"

Immediately, Bruce eased Wally out of his arms. He carefully laid the speedster down on the hard white floor, ignoring the sounds of commotion behind him. He pressed two fingers lightly against the redhead's freckled neck. No pulse.

Diana alighted down on the ground behind him right as he started counting chest compressions. Her eyes were wide and she looked afraid, but she knew better than to ask him anything while he was so focused. Especially because of what-who-he was focused on.

Shayera landed next to her, one wing still open. She took a sidestep closer to the other girl, wrapping her light brown wing around Diana's shoulders. The slightly older metahuman reached up to touch one of the still-intact primary feathers on the wing, brushing it lightly with her fingertips. Upon closer inspection, it had several darker flecks that added some nice personality to the huge extra limbs.

"Did you know him?" She asked, and Diana stiffened slightly. She didn't like the way her cellmate it-like the boy, Wally, was already gone.

"No, I don't," she said, putting extra emphasis on the words. "But I know Bruce."

"Which one is he?"

Diana nodded in her friend's direction, but didn't actually look over there herself.

"…38…39…"

"What are his powers?" Shayera coaxed.

"Enhanced strength, speed, and senses, as well as a powerful intellect. He also has a very high pain tolerance, but I don't know if that's a metahuman ability or just plain stubbornness."

"What about y-"

Before Shayera could finish the word, all of the doors slammed open at once. The winged meta jumped into the air and spun, looking for the attack. But it was coming from too many places at once, and she didn't know who to focus on first. The men armed with crackling batons advancing on the boy who had introduced himself in the middle of their fight with Dr. Sivana as John? The green teen who hadn't spoken a word so far who was the only thing keeping Dr. Sivana himself pinned down now that those strange green light constructs were gone? Or one of the two groups that Bruce was too preoccupied to deal with?

Those ones first, she decided, springing into action with a small nod to Diana.

The last thing that she saw before everything went dark was Bruce leaning back from the ginger boy's body.

The last thing that she heard before everything went dark was a small, ragged breath.