Not long after Wally's outburst, the JLA had begun to swiftly destroy the soldiers, and not long after that –perhaps a week-, the soldiers had stopped invading. There had been the general nuisance of common villains like the small gangs which kept to the alleys, and the burglars, which obviously weren't too great at their jobs, having been easily taken out by not even half the Young Justice team.
From a month or two onwards, business for our heroes was business like any other day. As Nightwing had ordered, the team had arranged to launch an attack upon the Reach. They had met up, and planned their attack, along with a few back-up plans if anything were to go wrong. But nothing they planned could prepare them for what happened….
They had made their way into the Reach ship undetected, taking out any of the soldiers in sight. They reached the centre of the ship, but hadn't expected it to have been empty. There wasn't even a soldier in sight. Nightwing walked further in, then signalled for the rest to follow. They walked to the centre, on full awareness. Since the Justice League had disappeared, nobody had seen either of the Beetles, even Blue had gone. The Reach Ambassador had also appeared missing, and their scientist presumed dead after a nasty error with Black Beetle. Though the Ambassador had grieved her loss, he couldn't have bothered less, with most of their research completed anyway.
There was a minutes wait until a door opened. The team spun around and stood ready, as a figure appeared. As he came closer into view, the team were surprised to see the Blue Beetle. Impulse immediately ran up to him, and yelled "Blue! Have you been up here all this time?! Dude I thought you were dead!" his beaming smile slowly swept off his face when Blue had stared at him mindlessly. "Buddy?" Impulse took a step closer and went to put his hand on his arm. As he did so, Blue Beetle quickly took an aggressive hold of his wrist, and bent his back harshly, making the boy scream. As the speedster fell to the floor, arm still in the Beetle's grasp, Robin ran in to tackle Blue Beetle but finding himself being thrown into a wall with a heavy, powerful punch.
As the rest of the team moved in to attack, another door opened, and casually strolling in were Black and Green Beetle. "Well done little brother. You have done better than I had anticipated. Now finish them." Black Beetle said. Blue Beetle looked back down at a struggling Impulse, and made a rapid movement which followed with an ear-piercing yell and a discomforting click! as he snapped the speedsters arm at the elbow and fractured his wrist bone. Blue then threw Impulse aside from his wrist, possibly dislocating it completely. Robin ran up to Blue, holding his escrima sticks before him. He whacked Blue Beetle in the back of his head and went to tackle him. The Beetle grabbed the other end of the weapon, and jabbed it into Robin's stomach, making him hunch over.
The team watched in horror as Blue Beetle created a hammer and full-on struck Robin in the side of his head, cracking his skull slightly by his eye. Dazed, Robin stumbled to the ground. Before Blue could do anymore, Nightwing flipped. He yelled and ran for Blue Beetle, cursing and swearing. Yet, he didn't get very far, because Green Beetle had shot him in the ankle and back of his knee, making him fall. Green Beetle was wrestling Superboy and Lagoon Boy, and the remaining members of the team battling Black Beetle.
Making another attempt to get up, Nightwing shouted and had almost cried when he saw Blue Beetle form a sword, and hold Robin up by his head. Looking back at Nightwing, smirking, Blue Beetle slit Robins' throat and threw him to the floor as if he was rubbish. Robin's face softened as if he was sleeping, his eyes closed as blood ran like a small river from the fatal injury which was almost cut halfway through his throat. Ignoring the pain he was in, tears rolling silently down his cheeks, Nightwing ran and tackled Blue Beetle to the ground, aggressively punching him in the face, like there was no tomorrow. But of course, Blue fought back, returning the punches. They fiercely battled, until Blue Beetle kicked Nightwing in the crotch with his knee, flipped him over so he (Blue Beetle) was on top of Nightwing, and dashed the Boy Wonders face into the floor, crafting a gun and pointing it at Nightwing's head as he held him down.
"GET THE FUCK OFF ME!" Nightwing shouted through gritted teeth, shuffling and thrashing about in an attempt to get up. Blue Beetle pushed down harder and fired up his gun. "Wing!" Zatanna shouted and –while levitating- rushed to him. She cast a spell that switched Blue with another team member. "hctiwS htiw diK hsalF!" the magician yelled, just as Blue shot. Kid Flash almost screamed like a girl at the unexpected switch. He jumped off of Nightwing, his cheeks a little shade of red. "Thatwasembarrasing." He mumbled quickly as he helped Nightwing up.
Without even looking at Kid or even saying a word, Nightwing limped as fast as he could to Tim and fell beside him, stroking his younger brother's hair. "I…don't want to ruin this moment for ya 'Wing, but we're kinda getting our asses kicked right now." Kid Flash said as he stood beside Robins' body. He helped a tearful Nightwing to his feet and ran him to a safe spot. "Dude, please, with those injuries, the best you'd manage is a few steps, not even that." KF concerned. "you can probably use some of your gadgets or something but I th-" he was cut off when a raged Black Beetle punched him aside and grabbed Nightwing by the neck and pinned him against the wall.
Nightwing gasped for air and reached into his utility belt for a birderang, in which he forcefully jabbed into his attacker's arm. He choked and quickly moved his hands to Black Beetle's wrist and weakly tried to shove him off as his head was heavily bashed into the wall (ya know, like Black Beetle did with Wondergirl). Black Beetle produced a sword, in which he held to Nightwing's throat. "Be a good bird, you don't want to end up like your brother." He taunted as he turned his head to the side, indicating the poor Tim, who still lay on the floor, his face now completely pale.