I do not own any of the DC universe Characters. I only own my OC's

Chapter Four

Wilson had been a complete and total bust .

Bruce slid into his car - leather squelching beneath his weight as he slumped against his door frame, and loosened the tie at his throat. The partition between the back seat and the driver's side came down and the no nonsense gaze of Alfred's pierced through him as effortlessly as it had when he was a child through the rear view mirror.

"Where to Master Bruce" Alfred asked in his clipped British accent, directing his attention to maneuvering the thick black body of his Rolls Royce into mid-mourning traffic.

His posture was stiff in his shoulder's and Bruce knew he was waiting on some semblance of good news. Bruce had never once dodge the responsibility of his decisions or backed out of the consequences to his actions. He had a strong moral code - and an iron sense of justice.

But he had seriously botched the current situation to the point where he was sure that he couldn't repair the damage. The pure look of hurt and betrayal radiating from Orel's eyes was enough to haunt him in his sleep. It was like losing Jason all over, like the hurt Tim felt when his parents died, or when Richard had silently departed form his side in cold fury.

It seemed that he had a special knack for mentally damaging children.

He was about to disappoint Alfred and direct him to Wayne manor, when his cell phone vibrated. He pressed the call button and pressed the device to his ear without looking at the caller I.D.

"Bruce Wayne speaking"

"Ah.. Hello - this is Ms. Honeycomb from St. Martha's"

Bruce sighed quietly on his end of the phone. He was expecting this call sooner or later - it was strange for a fifth-teen year old girl to fall completely off the map - especially when her adoptive father was constantly in the lime light . He ran his fingers through his hair and watched as cars fought for inch after inch of asphalt on the jam packed inner city streets, the lie he had prepared already effortlessly moving past his lips.

"Sorry - Ms. Honeycomb - but Orel hasn't been feeling to well and..."

"Oh that's quite alright .." Ms. Honeycomb said cutting off his apology. " When I saw her this mourning to inquire about the reason she'd been absent so much she still wasn't looking to well."

Bruce blinked. He choose his next words carefully - he didn't want to alert her counselor that anything was wrong.

"Yes. As I was saying earlier Orel hadn't been feeling to well but she was restless and really wanted to go to school." He laughed a little bit on the phone." She has me wrapped around her little finger, I can't deny her anything."

Ms. Honeycomb laughed as well and they chatted a bit more about Orel's current grades and school activities. The conversation was only half - hearted on Bruce's part - he was busy trying to formulate the best route to take. It was clear to him that he- as he was , was not going to make it in time.

He politely hung up the phone, then turned his eyes to Alfred who was already eyeing him and waiting for orders.

"Contact Nightwing - and Arson tell them that they need to be at St. Martha's now."

Orel stared hard a the grime covered concrete beneath her scuffed up, and worn out converses and ignored the dull throbbing pain in her scalp caused by thick meaty fingers holding tightly to her dark hair. She exhaled out of her mouth and breathed through her nose - trying vainly to calm herself.

After she'd left the orphanage the sickness had come back on her stronger than last time. Coiling in tight knot inside her stomach- reluctantly Sister Adeline had given her the truth. After this was all said and done - Orel would follow the small lead she had. It was only a name but it was a well known one.

Constantine. John Constantine.

Right now she'd find where Chuck was hiding by using his son. Lucky for her Marcus Lahniuk was a bully and coincidentally attended her private school. It was a dangerous card to play by coming here but time wasn't on her side and Orel needed the quickest route to her goal.

A sharp tug forced her to look into dull brown eyes - Orel grit her teeth.

Marcus had a similar face and build to his father. He was overly built , blonde, and had sort of face that looked like it had been squashed flat. That wasn't the only thing he shared with his father however, he also had budding streak for violence - and sexual assault.

It had almost been to easy to get him to corner her alone. Marcus was nothing more than an animal - all he needed was the right bait.

He quirked his thin lips into a sick little smile and the ink wells in his pupils split over.

A wave of disgust washed over her, he was completely aroused.

Marcus pushed his bigger body against hers and she could feel the brick wall behind her scratch her through her uniform, and his semi-soft member pressed into her stomach.

"I'm going to have fun with you" he sighed against her ear, heavy with meaning.

Something inside of Orel snapped at that moment -how many more girls had he done this to. Her reason was swallowed whole by unbidden rage.

Richard rounded the corner of the old store room buildings on St. Martha's campus - Arson nipping at his heels. He had been on the Watch Tower when he had gotten the call and luckily so had Arson. There was no one who wanted to bring Orel home more than him beside's the red head - they turned a corner and saw Orel holding a boy twice her height and size clean over her head by the lapels of his uniform blazer.

The boy was trembling - the seat of his pants were dark, and his face was a mask of colorless terror. Before he could even take a step closer, Orel's head whipped in his direction, her hair a wild disarray around her face. She pulled her lips back in a snarl bearing huge white fangs. Her expression was familiar - he'd seen it only a few times, like when Raven lost control of her Rage.

Richard was suddenly afraid. Not for himself but for the boy in her hands.

"Orel put him down" he commanded, stopping a few feet away. He held his hands up - palms outward. "We just want to bring you home."

"Home as in that cell in the Watch Tower - or maybe a permanent grave this time" Orel snorted derisively. " I think I'll pass."

They way she looked at him now as if he and Arson were nothing more than the enemy hurt him more than he could imagine. She had every right to feel the way she did - Bruce,him, and all the people she trusted and looked up to had turned their back on her when she had needed them most. And treated her as a common monster when she had been confused and scared.

Orel turned to look at the frightened boy in her grip with a sugary sweet smile plastered across her face. If possible he managed to shrink even more on himself.

"We're done here anyway. Isn't that right Marcus?

Richard watched as Marcus nodded his head vigorously too afraid to talk. Orel's smile widened and without warning she tossed the boy away from her as if he weighed nothing. Arson couldn't even manage to shoot one of his arrows to deploy a cushion to soften his fall, Marcus's head hit the back of the concrete walkway with a vicious thud. He winced at the sound.

When he looked up. Orel had already vanished, wispy clouds of black smoke was all that was left. He went to check the boy on the ground.

"Lets search him find his student i.d., find out why she risked coming here."

He began patting the unconscious boys pockets, grimacing at the strong smell of urine - then he blinked and paused realizing that Arson hadn't move from his position at all. He looked up to find the man frozen staring off with a glazed look in his eyes.

"Arson" Richard bit out harshly , trying to get his attention.

Roy blinked then looked at Nightwing feeling sick. Remembering a promise that he had promised to himself never to break. He realized his promise was shattered at his feet.

When he had gotten hooked on the needle and Oliver had tossed him out without so much as a thought - he'd been hurt beyond his core, it had struck him to the very marrow of his bones, and left him a little meaner for it.

Not only that but his peers had began treating him differently as if he was something fragile that could break at any moment. He'd been disgusted and hurt by it, and even after Oliver sent Black Canary to find him and help nurse him back to his former self , a huge gap existed between them.

Looking at Orel just now - he realized that there wasn't a gap between them but a chasm, with Orel on the other side her back already turned on them.

They couldn't repair the damage and that scared him.

"We did this to her Richard" Arson muttered forgetting to use code names. Richard stood up and placed his hands firmly on the other man's shoulder's and shook him roughly.

"Get a grip we have to find her before she does something to hurt someone."

Arson looked at him with wide incredulous green eyes, and pushed Richard off of him. " What the fuck are you saying. She hates us. Even if we find her what does that change - She will never be our Orel- she will always resent us."

The look on Arson's face was a mixture of fear, desperation, and rage. It caused Richard finally to blow his fuse and he turned a blotchy red beneath his mask.

"Don't you think I fucking know that already... I ... I just want ..." Richard paused, feeling desperation creep up, clawing at his insides. He wanted his sweet smiling, goofy little sister back. He wanted to try and do what he should have done, hold her and tell her that every thing was going to be all right .

Richard looked at Roy - and realized he had accepted a pill just too bitter for him to swallow. Raven had always said to him that he never gave up hope. Right now in this situation that's all he could do. Hold onto his hope desperately until his fingers were brusied, bloodied and broken.

"Let's just try to find her."