Quick reminder Salvage is the episode of Roy's intervention.
Before Salvage
DAGGAT CHINA HEADQUARTERS, SHANGHAI, CHINA
Cheshire POV
"Sensei I'm in position," I tell my master over the communicator.
"Can you repeat the mission?" he asks of me as though I am a novice.
"Break into Daggat Corporation's China headquarters, Retrieve data on their new medical technology, and assassinate their international CEO, Roland Daggat, who is visiting because he didn't pay the League of Shadows for an assassination job."
"I did not tell you about our past transactions with Daggat."
"I have my own ways of figuring things out [giggle] [giggle]" except for the one thing I need to find out for Lian's father.
"We'll see about that," he replies irritated before cutting me off.
I pull out my work mask to scan for heat signatures. An initial look of the building shows that all of the security is in Daggat's office. Huddled together as though they are expecting somebody to barge in.
Well if they want me, who am I to say no.
I move to the front entrance of the building. Daggat's China HQ is a large sprawl with no building higher than 3 floors. Unlike their Gotham World HQ which is a 60 story skyscraper. As I approach the front door I see that they have been left open.
"Why thank you!" I tell no one.
I take one step into the main room and realize why. There are three bodies with blood splattered across the floor. From this angle the blood has spilled into an R shape. I start to walk slowly through the rest of the building. Daggat's office is on the opposite side of the building, two floors up. I just need to check and see if whoever did this also took care of my target.
I walk up to the elevator and press the blood stained button. The elevator takes long enough for me to assume that it came from the top floor. As the doors open I am treated to three dead bodies. But not all of them were guards, one of them seemed to be a scientist. So is this just an assassin with a scope of killing the entire board, or a sociopath that will kill everything in their path. I hold my sword up incase it's the latter as the elevator opens.
"I started a joke"
I hear some music come out of the opening door. I'm carful on my first step out of the elevator, so as to avoid the first body on the floor. There are four more in the hall, all of which lead towards Daggat's office.
"Which started the whole world crying"
The music continued as I walked through the hallway, slowly getting louder. As I got closer to one of the bodies, I saw that it was beaten to death with a fire extinguisher. It then occurs to me that all the other guards were killed with sharp or other useful objects normally in the building. Did this mysterious assassin beat them all to death with their own hands, without equipment or superpowers?
"But I didn't see"
I take the final turn towards Daggat's office and see a door wide open. As I get closer I can tell that there is one person standing in an office surrounded by five dead bodies and a burning mass in the center of the room. As I get closer I see that he is holding a blunt object in his hand. I get closer to have a better look at this assassin.
"That the joke was on meeeeeee-"
The man wearing a hood beat the audio player with a crowbar to end the music. "[SMASH] [SMASH]"
At this point I am standing outside Daggat's office. Close enough to tell that none of the bodies in the room are Daggat himself. Though they are the half of the people who run this facility.
"If you are wondering-" the assassin begins to say. I immediately move into a defensive position. "Daggat's body is right behind me."
He is standing in front of a firey p-
Oh.
I guess the anti-toxin systems in my mask blocked out the smell of roasted-
"Fitting that he would meet the same fate as his empire."
"Are you going to burn this place to the ground?" I ask.
As I say that the buildings outside erupt into an upwards flame. In particular two of them make it seem as though horns are growing out of the hooded assassin's head as he stares upon his work.
"That answers your question."
"One of them," I respond.
"You have more, after I blew up a corprate campus?" he says sarcastically. "That's unexpected."
"Don't get me wrong I like that somebody did my chore for me. But I doubt you killed Roland Daggat out of the goodness of your heart."
"That's part of the reason actually. The corrupt #^$%!^# escaped me in Gotham after causing the deaths of fifty people. There's no way I'm going to allow something like that."
"So are you a superhero?" I ask intrigued.
"I'm better," he says egotisticaly.
"You mentioned that was part of the reason. What's the other?"
"You of course," he says charismatically.
"Why thank you! But I have-" I have a addict. I have a self-hating idiot. I have a wreck of a human being... for a husband. "-someone."
"No because you..." he finally turns around to show that he is wearing a domino mask with a mouth cover that hides most of his face. "Jade Harper are here because you are one of five."
Great is this guy trying to recruit me for a team of some- Wait! Did he just call me Jade... Harper?
"Your brother in law, the directionless Jim who is trying to run away from what he was meant to be in Metropolis."
What is he trying to get at?
"Alongside your husband Red Arrow, who is currently wasting away on whatever gets him by day to day."
He better not bring her into this.
"Of course your daughter Lian-"
My maternal instincts take hold. I jump at him with my sword. He jumps back with a smile and grabs a box cutter off the desk. When I try to run at him again he slides a chair towards me, I jump over it easily. But while I am in the air I am unable to avoid a second chair he threw at me. So I have to cut it with the sword and have the chair go around me in the air. I land on the ground but my sword is too low and stance too poor. I attempt to swing at him, but he uses the crowbar to prevent it from touching me. The assassin lets go of the crowbar, grabs my sword holding hand, brings it behind my back, causing me to drop the sword, and holds the box cutter to my neck.
"You fight as though you have the weight of the world on your shoulders," he says mockingly before whispering in my ear. "But you know your greatest responsibility is currently spending time with her grandmother."
Enraged at his repeated mentions of Lian I attempt to headbutt him. However he steps back, letting go of me without using the box cutter that was next to my neck. I turn around and see that his had had four fingers held up as he stares at me, with a fifth twitching.
"You are here-" he says twitching his thumb. "Jim is in Metropolis-" he says twitching his pointer. "Red Arrow is in Washington-" he says moving the middle one. "Lian with your mother in Gotham-" he says twitching his ring finger as I get back into battle position. "But where is this little piggy?" he says as he stops twitching his pinky finger. "Where is little Speedy?" he mocks me.
"So is that why you brought me here?" I ask him. "To try and answer the question that has stumped so many for so long."
"To try and answer the question?" he replies perplexed.
"Yeah. For whatever reason you think- you need to- find Speedy. Well the Justice League couldn't! Red Arrow couldn't! I-" I say enraged.
"Ha... HAHAHA-" he starts laughing after my rant.
"What's so funny?" I say pulling out my sai.
"You seem to think I need your help to find Speedy," he tells me amused. "I already know where Speedy is," he announces proudly.
...
...
I takes me a second to process what he just offered me. Could he really find- If he did would Roy-
"I can help you save Roy Harper," he offers me. "Both of them."
"Why should I believe you?" I say as I realize that I have relaxed my stance.
"Because I'm better than the Justice League, better than Batman! I can fix the problems that they-HE never could!"
"And one of those is finding Speedy."
"Why stop at finding him when I can save him! And Red Arrow along the way?" He turns around and stares at the flames outside. "Something Batman never could." He said with a sour taste on the Batman.
"Who are you?" I ask. "And why do you care about being better than Batman?" Is... Is this what I have been waiting for. Can I really save-
"I'm his fault." He responds as I stare at the back of his red hood.