Chapter Ten: Clear the Board.
Jinx and Beast Boy walked down the corridor in heavy silence. Jinx's natural curiosity demanded that she find out exactly why Beast Boy was so spooked by this place, but she held her tongue for now.
Suddenly, Beast Boy stuck out an arm, halting her progress. Almost as soon as he did so, a rusted circle of metal, easily ten feet tall, and serrated at the edges, rolled lazily out from a hidden partition in the wall. Had it been in working order, it would have been a lethal trap.
"How did you know?"
"I remember."
"Doom Patrol, advance!"
Jinx blinked. "Seriously, what's going on here?"
"Huh. Buzz saws. Just like last time. I'm on this one."
Beast Boy sighed. "I've been here before. Or a place just like it, anyway."
"Negative Man, henchmen! Give Robotman some cover!"
"Do I have to do everything around here?"
"Oh. When?"
Beast Boy sighed. "Years ago. With the Doom Patrol."
"Beast Boy, assist Elastigirl!"
"Yes sir!"
--
"The next member to consider is one Madam Rouge. An elastic Meta of great strength, she provided the Brotherhood with an infiltration expert and general powerhouse.
"'Madam Rouge' is in fact an alias. She hailed from Russia, but adopted the pseudonym, since the Brotherhood's base of operations was in southern France.
"Next, we come to the leader of the Brotherhood, the Brain."
Starfire raised her hand.
"Yes?"
"What was the fate of Madam Rouge?"
"I'll get to that in a moment."
--
Eventually, the pair reached the end of the corridor. A few more traps had been sprung, but they were all damaged beyond repair and easily circumnavigated. With a heave, Jinx slammed her shoulder into the door, which gave with a screech. Without a pause, she grabbed Beast Boy by the wrist and hauled him inside.
"...Holy shit."
"It's over, Brain," Mento declared, with typical melodrama.
"For you, perhaps. Get them." The Brain was as clipped as ever.
"Doom Patrol..."
Robotman didn't wait for the order, instead charging headlong into a crowd of soldiers. Rita followed his lead, engaging Rouge, and Negative Man dropped to the floor as his soul-self assisted Robotman against the grey horde. Mento looked to his left, and slightly down, to see a nervously grinning Beast Boy.
"Well, what are you waiting for? Engage Mallah!"
"Yes sir!" Beast Boy replied enthusiastically, and flew up onto the gangway, where the Brain was observing the battle, guarded by his simian cohort.
"Mallah, if you would..." the Brain left his order clear.
"Yes Master." Mallah lumbered towards Beast Boy, who was still grinning. As the gorilla closed in, Beast Boy mimicked his form and attacked, the force of their collision rocking the metal gangway.
"This is futile, little one," Mallah proclaimed, as he fended off wild swings with a boxer's stance. "Our strength may be equal, but my intellect," here he struck with a low blow, and twisted Beast Boy's arm into a hold, "gives me ze clear advantage."
However, Beast Boy simply shuddered, and suddenly Mallah was holding nothing at all, but a green snake was slithering up his arm, which melded into a shape behind him. Before he could turn around, a huge green fist smashed into the back of his head, sending him stumbling forwards. As he regained his balance and turned around, he saw a green Sasquatch shift back into Beast Boy.
"So I just get stronger."
--
"The Brain was once a scientist, until an unfortunate lab accident reduced him to a brain in a jar. He destroyed all records of his former life, and killed anyone he could find who knew him before his accident. Safe to say, he was a little unhinged.
"He suffered delusions of grandeur. After a while, he considered himself 'intellect incarnate', which is a little inaccurate. Despite what Hollywood B-movies would have you believe, being a brain in a jar does not necessarily make you a super genius.
--
Beast Boy and Mallah duelled back and forth, neither retaining the upper hand. Beast Boy was chaos personified in a fight, but Mallah could adapt quickly to anything Beast Boy could throw at him.
The young hero was tiring. Constant shifting interspersed with combat was instilling a bone-deep weariness that was threatening to overcome adrenaline. In a desperate move, he turned into a bull and charged straight for Mallah.
It worked. The gorilla was caught off guard and knocked flying. Straight into the Brain.
The Brain tumbled and fell, an electronic scream lost in the cacophony of battle below. But to two figures in the gangway above, it was all they could hear. Suddenly, it was cut off, replaced by the tinkling of broken glass.
As Mallah howled as his world collapsed around him, Beast Boy could just make out a series of dull bleeps. They sped up, faster and faster until they were one continuous hum. Then that ceased, and all other noise with it.
In less than a second, the ground floor was an inferno.
--
"Both Rouge and the Brain were killed, along with most of the Doom Patrol, when the Patrol assaulted their home base, a chateau in France. Details of their demise are slim, since no one has admitted to witnessing it."
Cyborg frowned. "Official reports say that all the Doom Patrol was killed that day. You got some different information?"
Robin shared a glance with Raven. This could be awkward.
--
Skeletons. Bodies. Many were indistinct, as if they were out of focus, but four stood out with perfect clarity.
One skeletal figure lay in the centre of the room, a strange helmet on its head. Another was near him, and swathed in soot-blackened bandages. A bronze statue stood amidst a pile of grey-clad bodies, its eye sockets sunken and black. And some way away from the others, a woman, not skeletal like the others, but a body. Her hair was blackened, and partially burnt off, and she was covered in ash. A good portion of her back was missing, but instead of any visible organs, she seemed to be solid skin-tone all the way through, as if someone had made a play-doh woman and then gouged a chunk out. Jinx noted with a shock that they were all wearing a variant of Beast Boy's costume, black with a purple stripe.
Behind her, Beast Boy gave a cry that was positively inhuman, and a clang onto the metal floor indicated that he had fallen over. His breath hitched up madly, and he started crying, great, wracking sobs of pure devastation. Had the situation been different, Jinx might have left him to it; maybe even (in her own unorthodox way) tried to get him to get over it.
Unfortunately, the situation didn't allow for him to bawl his eyes out. Jinx had noticed something that warranted immediate attention.
"...Beast Boy? Beast Boy, get up." No reaction from behind her. "I said get up. They're moving..."
--
Anyone figure out what's going on yet?