[Smallville
March 23, 12:00 EST]
Dinah had never had a partner before, sidekick or otherwise. She'd never been a sidekick. She'd worked solo from the day she came on the scene, but she knew what it was like to live in someone else's shadow. She knew how hard it was to strive to be worthy of filling someone else's boots and standing as their equal. Her mother had been the first Black Canary.
Dinah was also intimately familiar with the struggle to control your powers at an age where you're also trying to discover your identity. So, when the League had finally come down with a debilitating case of 'rebellious sidekick', Dinah had been the first to volunteer her services when the call came down for a trainer. She was one of the youngest in the Justice League and felt that she was the best one able to relate to the fledgling heroes making their first bids for independence.
In time, she came to care for them like they were family even though they all had their own mentors – all but Superboy, who should have had the most devoted and experienced mentor of all. Conner had been angry, lost, and confused in the beginning. He'd had to deal with being a clone in a world of originals and had to go through the trials – all alone – of accepting that it was okay. He was his own person. Not a copy. Not a weapon. Not Superman.
Conner had overcome much in his one short year of freedom. He'd shed his old Cadmus programming, dealt with Superman's indifference, and denied Lex Luthor's tempting offers of power. Dinah was undeniably proud of him. She considered herself a mentor to all of the young heroes, but Dinah always made sure to go the extra mile for Conner. She'd even offered to be his mentor full time until Superman came to his senses, if he wished.
And Superman had come around eventually.
He'd come to terms with the fact that he'd been cloned and that it was not Conner's fault. Conner was just as much a victim as he was. After Superman accepted that Conner wasn't his responsibility but was still an amazing young man that was worth knowing, it had only taken a few days before he reached out to the young half-Kryptonian and finally became his mentor.
However, that didn't mean that Dinah had gone away. That was how she'd ended up sitting in on Conner and Clark's training session, glaring daggers at the man of steel as a sort of warning whenever he glanced her way nervously. Dinah was happy that Clark was taking an active interest in Conner, but she had no intention of allowing him to screw it up. Not on her watch.
Mama bears had nothing on a Mama Canary.
Dinah was perched on a fence separating two massive fields on the Kent farm in Smallville, Kansas. She had a confiscated Manhunter energy pistol lying innocently on her lap and was enjoying the warm, gentle breeze drifting across the land. It was finally warming up enough for her costume to be sensible again. Dinah really didn't know what had possessed her to decide on fishnets when she knew damn well that winter was a season and it happened every year. Although, this last year hadn't been too terrible. Oliver had given her a couple pairs of fishnet tights that were made of a special STAR labs material that generated its own source of heat. It had been a very practical and thoughtful gift, but Dinah had her suspicions that Oliver's main motives had been to keep her from covering her legs up all winter.
Dinah probably should have been indignant about that, but she honestly didn't have very much room to complain. She'd thrown just as big of a fit when she found out that Oliver was considering shaving his beard off.
She just smiled and crossed her bandaged legs casually as she watched Clark throw Conner down into the dirt for the eighteenth time in a row. The younger hero rolled back to his feet and charged at Superman head on. Clark moved to meet his rush with a devastating punch, but Conner abandoned his attack at the last second, instead dropping to his knees and sweeping Clark's legs out from under him. Dinah had to smile at that. She wasn't jealous of Conner and Clark's new bond. If anything, she was relieved to see it, but it was still very satisfying to see Conner besting Superman with moves that she'd taught him.
She flicked her feet side to side happily and continued to observe the ill at ease duo sparring. To say that the last five hours were awkward would be a severe understatement. Conner wasn't great with relationships, so he already had that disadvantage. If you added how much he'd resented Superman the past year on top of that, it made for an extremely uncomfortable training session with the Kryptonian. One could easily make the argument that it wasn't overly healthy for them to be aggressively attacking each other for their first bonding activities, but it had to be done. Conner needed to practice fighting Manhunters, and sparring with Superman was the closest thing to it at the moment.
Clark got to his feet in an instant and aimed his heat vision directly at Conner, who dodged easily and went in low for another strike at Superman's knees. He was clearly remembering his training very well, aiming for joints and head shots like he'd been taught, but he was leaving his blind spot open again!
Dinah felt her skin crawl with irritation. She snatched up the energy pistol and fired it three times at the back of Conner's head. He was so focused on his target that he didn't even notice the sneak attack until Superman was yanking him out of harm's way and shooting down the blasts with his heat vision.
Hmm… Not the desired effect, but okay.
"Clark," Dinah sighed, not bothering to shout even though they were half a field away. She could've whispered, and they'd have heard it as easily as if she was standing right beside them. "You're supposed to be trying to kill him, not saving him from me."
"Sorry," Clark said rather sheepishly, rubbing at the back of his neck. He and Conner both stood upright to take a break. Conner was giving him an odd look – probably not used to Superman caring enough to look out for him. "That was instincts."
Dinah hopped down from the fence and dangled the energy pistol casually from her fingers as she strolled towards both heroes, "Conner, you're leaving your back vulnerable again. You need to be mindful of your blind spots and make sure that you don't let them become weaknesses, especially when you're fighting multiple adversaries at the same time."
Conner nodded gruffly, brushing dirt off of his jeans, "Yes, ma'am."
"She's right," Clark smiled down at Conner with a shrug. "I used to be really terrible at watching my back. I thought that since I was invulnerable, I didn't have to worry about it. I can't tell you how many times I let myself get knocked out of the sky or thrown into someone before Batman and Flash held an intervention for me."
"Intervention?" Conner asked, returning the smile hesitantly.
"They basically locked me in the Watchtower and told me how terrible I was," Clark laughed at the memory. "That's when I actually started using technique when I fought."
"Why did it bother them so much?" Conner cocked an eyebrow.
Dinah discreetly took a few steps back to give them some room and tried to hold back her smile. It was nice to see them just talking together.
"Well, I think Flash was just worried that one day something would seriously injure me because I wasn't being careful. He's always been really friendly and nice like that," Clark looked like he was thinking hard for a moment. "Batman… I'm pretty sure my fighting style at the time made him cringe, and he just reached a point where he couldn't stand it anymore."
Conner gave a small laugh and then tossed a wry grin over at Dinah. He was probably thinking about how raw he'd been when he first joined the Team. She smiled back and opened her mouth to say something light and teasing when the communicator in her ear buzzed to life urgently.
"Kid Flash to anyone! I need help like right now!"
Dinah felt her whole body tense up in alarm. She whipped her head over to look at Clark, who had also stiffened and was clearly listening to the same thing on his own communicator. Conner seemed to be listening as well with his superior hearing. Wally's harried voice carried over the earpiece, and Dinah could hear him breathing heavily along with another distant noise in the background that sounded like rushing wind.
"We're in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, and-"
His voice cut off right as a loud, supersonic hum drowned him out. Dinah heard the sounds of a violent scuffle and Wally's sharp cry of pain before the transmission dropped out completely into garbled static.
"That's the emergency channel," Dinah felt her body start releasing adrenaline into her system, and she was instantly on high alert.
"Kid Flash, this is the Watchtower," Dinah heard Mr. Terrific's calm but urgent voice over her communicator. "We're tracking your location and sending help now. What is the situation?"
Dinah waited with bated breath for Wally's response, but it never came. She could only hear faint static coming from his end.
"Kid Flash!" she barked, pressing down on her earpiece. No answer. She looked at Superman for orders, deferring to his seniority immediately.
"Kid Flash, we repeat: What is the situation?" Terrific asked again.
Clark didn't wait for an answer.
"We're going. Conner, I need you to carry Dinah," he said grimly, the lines in his face settling into a severe expression.
Dinah didn't say a word or offer up any resistance when Conner scooped her up into his arms bridal style. She just hooked one arm around his neck and tried to hold on as best she could when Clark slipped both hands underneath Conner's shoulders and lifted high into the sky. Dinah shut her eyes to protect them from the buffeting wind and tried not to look down. The last thing she wanted was to deal with vertigo when they landed.
Superman flew through the air recklessly fast, almost assuredly heading west for the Pacific. Conner gripped Dinah's knees and back tightly and mumbled something that might have been an apology in case he'd hurt her. She couldn't hear him over the whistling air rushing by them.
However, she could still hear over the communicator just fine.
"Superman to Watchtower," she heard Clark's forceful voice booming through the link with an echo. "Black Canary, Superboy, and I are on our way. I need Kid Flash's coordinates."
"We're tracking him down right now," Terrific said quickly. "Just keep heading west. I'll give you the coordinates as soon as I have them."
Dinah chanced a glance at the ground and saw the Earth speeding by beneath them. They were already out of Kansas and passing over what she thought looked like New Mexico.
"Come in, Hotshot! Tell us where you are!" That was John's voice. The experienced Green Lantern sounded like he was also flying as fast as he could.
There was still no answer from Wally or the first Flash and Max Mercury. Dinah knew that while the rest of the Team was spending today with their individual mentors training, Wally was on a distance and endurance run. Flash was on the other side of the planet in Egypt with the Hawks following up on a Manhunter lead, so he'd been forced to allow Wally to take the trip with two other members of the Flash Family instead.
"Hotshot!"
Dinah mentally prepared herself for whatever situation they were flying into. It could be anything from the Manhunter attack they'd all been waiting for to a simple bad storm that the three speedsters had gotten caught in. But, she wasn't naïve. She'd heard the sounds of fighting. Wally and his companions were being attacked.
Superman was already cutting across Arizona and Mexico. Dinah could actually see the ocean rapidly approaching them in the distance.
"Can you see them yet?!" Dinah yelled as loud as she could to be heard over the wind. Even then, she could barely detect her own voice.
Both Kryptonians had no trouble hearing her. Conner's eyes were squinted in concentration at the horizon for a moment, but he shook his head, "No. It's too far."
Clark didn't reply, which meant that it was still too far for him as well. He pushed faster.
Then, the satellite delay finally delivered the messages to the Flash.
"Kid!" Dinah's heart wrenched at the frantic distress in Barry's voice. "Answer me! Max! Jay! What's happening?!"
"Watchtower to any available Leaguers," Mister Terrific's voice cut in suddenly. "Kid Flash's tracker has been disabled. His last transmitted location was in the Pacific Ocean. Exact coordinates are 24.833272,-138.999023."
Dinah felt Superman shift his course slightly and continue racing onwards.
"Kid, I'm on my way!" Flash shouted in a frenzied tone.
He was faster than Superman, but it would still take him several minutes to cross Africa and then Asia and the majority of the Pacific. They would beat him there by a good lead. Superman was already over the water and not slowing down for anything.
Dinah looked at Conner to see how he was doing. She knew that he was close with Wally and M'gann and wanted to make sure he was holding up alright.
Conner had almost the exact expression on his face as Clark. His mouth was stretched into a grim line, the muscles in his jaw jumping tensely, and his blue eyes were fixed furiously dead ahead. He was livid.
"Superman, you, Black Canary, and Superboy are the closest out," Terrific informed them. "Green Lantern and Flash are both over ten minutes away."
"I'm trying the private speedster channel, but none of them are responding!" Flash said anxiously. His transmissions sounded like they were being recorded on the wing of a jet.
"We're almost there," Superman said quickly.
Dinah felt Conner's arms tense in anticipation, and she similarly readied herself for whatever they were about to fly into. The Justice League's advanced Martian and Kryptonian medicine had helped her heal far more quickly than she would have normally. Nevertheless, she still shouldn't be straining herself just yet, but that wasn't about to stop her from diving headfirst into a fight when one of her pupils was in danger.
Less than three minutes later, Superman was pulling them to a stop in midair over what looked like a vast stretch of empty, undisturbed ocean. Dinah saw his eyes burn red, and she knew he was scanning the water with his x-ray vision, searching for life. Seconds later, Clark was swooping down to the surface. He took in a massive breath of air and blew it out at the surface with incredible force. Dinah saw the water buckle slightly and then start to freeze solid into an uneven ice floe. Clark spent another second fortifying it with another deep breath, and then he set Conner and Dinah down on it before plunging himself into the ocean without a word.
Dinah hopped out of Conner's arms and watched as he jumped into the water as well. She tapped her earpiece, keeping her eyes glued to the rippling surface that she could see less than an inch down into, "Black Canary to Watchtower. We're here."
"How's Wally?! Is he okay?" Flash's frantic voice cut in before Terrific could respond. He was already close enough to receive the transmissions in real time.
Dinah turned in a circle on the gently bobbing ice floe, scanning the area in every direction, "I don't see him. Superman and Superboy dove in as soon as we landed, but there's nothing here above the water."
"We're prepping the med bay, but Dr. Mid-Nite is planetside," A new voice said brusquely. It took Dinah a moment, but she eventually recognized the rigid, military tone as belonging to Captain Atom. He must've taken control of the Watchtower's communications. "Mister Terrific is going to be filling in. He's getting ready for surgery right now."
Dinah took a deep breath and shifted her weight back and forth between her feet, trying her hardest to keep from diving into the water as well. She'd always been a strong swimmer, but, her current condition aside, she would be more useful on solid ground.
Less than a second later, Superman came bursting out of the water with a broken and bloody figure tucked under his arm. Dinah felt her heart constrict for an instant in fear as she tried to see if it was Wally or not, but the body was too large. Clark landed on the ice floe, sending it teetering slightly, and carefully laid the limp figure out on its back. Immediately, bloody ocean water started spreading out across the ice from where he lay.
Dinah dropped to her knees beside the body, her eyes taking in the sight of mangled and shredded limbs. Both arms and legs were very obviously broken, the left arm was barely hanging on at the elbow by a small piece of skin, and she could see bone protruding through the flesh.
She carefully pulled at the sopping wet costume, trying to inspect the bruised and oozing torso wounds. The long, jagged lightning bolt splashed across the front of the uniform top was ripped and stained with blood, but Dinah recognized it as the first Flash's insignia. This was Jay Garrick.
She shifted closer to his head and pressed her fingers to his neck to find a pulse. His facial features were so bloody and battered that they were barely recognizable.
"I think he's still alive," Clark crouched down across from Dinah and started tearing his cape into long strips. She grabbed one and began tying it around Jay's partially severed arm right above the elbow in a tourniquet. If she didn't stop the bleeding, he would be dead soon.
A hand shot out of the water abruptly and grabbed the edge of the ice floe. Another second later, Conner was heaving Max Mercury's unconscious body onto the ice. Dinah only spared a moment to glance at him before inspecting the rib sticking straight out of Jay's chest.
Superman rushed over to help lay Max out flat. Aside from his right leg, which was broken at the shin, he looked unharmed.
Clark stood back upright and pressed his earpiece again. He very nearly shouted into the communicator, and his voice had that same echo from Dinah hearing him speaking both in person and through her own communicator. "We found Max Mercury and Jay Garrick in the water, but I can't see any signs of Kid Flash."
Dinah tried to smother her feelings of fear over what that meant and instead focused on saving the two retired heroes lying prone on the icy platform. Jay was so much worse off in terms of injuries, and they were running on no time, so she made a difficult decision and abandoned him in favor of helping Max, who had the better chance of survival. She ran across the ice and knelt down beside Max, grabbing onto Conner's sopping wet t-shirt and shoving him towards Jay. Conner had been just sitting there motionlessly, staring up at Superman with wide, shocked eyes when he'd said that he couldn't see Wally. He had next to no first aid training and would only be in the way.
"Before Kid Flash's tracker died, it recorded his position as increasing in depth," Captain Atom said quickly after a minute. "He was sinking. He's definitely in the water."
That was enough for Superman. He dove back into the water a second time at full speed, sending the ice floe rocking violently. Dinah held Max's body still to keep him from sliding and turned to Superboy urgently, "Conner! Take those pieces of Superman's cape and start tying them around Jay's arms and legs."
Conner scrambled to gather up a long piece of red fabric.
"Look at how I did it and copy. You want to tie it three inches above the broken skin," Dinah placed both hands over Max's chest and started pressing down in compressions.
"Watchtower to Superman. You said you found Max and Jay. Are there any injuries?"
Superboy looked up at her, expecting her to give an answer in Superman's place, but she was too busy. She didn't have any seconds to waste. Dinah barked at Conner to keep working before tilting Max's head back and pinching his nose shut. She pulled his mouth open and covered it with hers, forcefully breathing for him. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see his chest slowly rise and fall again. She took another deep breath and exhaled into Max's mouth before sitting upright again and starting a second round of compressions.
"Repeat: Are there any injuries? Superman, Black Canary, come in."
When she chanced a glance at Conner again, she saw that he was already working on tying off his last tourniquet.
"Do you know CPR?" she asked breathlessly. Conner looked up at her sharply and shook his head.
"No. Cadmus didn't really focus on teaching me how to save lives."
"That's okay," she called as evenly as she could manage. "I want you to look at what I'm doing. Put the heel of your hand in the middle of his chest, but be careful; he has at least one broken rib. Then, I want you to push down on his chest thirty times. You have to be very careful not to put pressure on his ribcage, especially with your strength. Only push down about two inches. Okay?"
"Got it," Superboy positioned himself next to Jay after he'd stopped his bleeding. He mimicked Dinah and placed his hands on the elderly speedster's chest and then started pushing down.
Dinah leaned down to breathe for Max again before coming up again and continuing. She could hear the Watchtower and Flash in her ear continually asking her to respond, but she ignored them. "After you do that thirty times, I want you to tilt his chin up and breathe for him. Can you do that?"
"Yeah, I think so," Conner said uncertainly. "I think M'gann had to do that for Wally on a mission one time."
"Just be very careful!" she stressed to him, trying to convey just how imperative it was that he not cause Jay any more injuries than the speedster already had.
Just then, Superman came rocketing out of the water right beside them with a huge spray. He landed on the ice floe, completely drenched and his hair matted over his eyes, with Wally's red goggles clenched in his massive fist.
Dinah didn't allow his abrupt arrival – or the fact that he was alone – distract her from her task. She pinched Max's nose again and expelled another breath of air into his lungs.
"Superman to Watchtower," Clark only coughed a few times and hastily brushed the matted hair out of his face with his arm. "I have Kid Flash's goggles, but he is not here. Do we have another way of tracking him?"
"Negative, Superman," Captain Atom said regretfully. "The Flash only had that one tracer on his partner."
"Then, I'm bringing you Max Mercury and Jay Garrick. Both are unconscious and heavily injured. They can't wait for the others to get here." Dinah saw Clark's face screw up in anger, and his fist was in serious danger of crushing Wally's goggles. She breathed for Max one more time and pulled back to start compressions once again.
Max convulsed violently and erupted in a loud, hacking cough that turned into a garbled cry of pain when he jostled his snapped leg. Everyone jumped at his abrupt revival.
"Easy," Dinah turned Max onto his side while the injured speedster coughed out all the water in his lungs. She patted him hard on the back. "Just breathe, Max."
The older speedster finally cleared his lungs enough to draw in a deep breath and he looked up at Dinah and Clark in confusion. Superman knelt down in front of him and took his arm to help him up, "Max, can you hear me alright?"
The speedster nodded and looked around at the ice raft groggily until his eyes landed on Jay. Then, he fought against Superman's hold to try and run to his friend's side.
"Max, stop!" Superman carefully held him in place. "Your leg is broken. I need you to tell us-"
"Wally!" Max gasped when he remembered what had happened, his voice gravelly and hoarse. "Where is he?! Did you catch them?"
"No," Dinah shook her head solemnly. "He was gone when we got here. Tell us what happened."
"They took him!" he rasped desperately, and Dinah could see his blue eyes blazing fiercely behind his mask. "You need to find him now!"
Max collapsed into a coughing fit, doubling over in agony. Superman acted quickly, slinging one of Max's arms over his shoulder and moving to retrieve Jay as well. "I'm sorry, but we need to get you to the Watchtower for medical attention first. Flash and Green Lantern are on their way. They'll be here in a few minutes, and I don't think you or Jay have that long. I need to move you right now."
Dinah saw Max's face contort into pure rage a split second before he pulled back one fist and slammed it with blinding speed into Clark's jaw, sending him staggering backwards in shock. The speedster shoved him off the ice floe lightning fast, forcing Clark to levitate into the air to avoid toppling into the water. He watched in stunned silence as Max fell to his knees again. Dinah only just managed to catch him before he hit the ice. "He was taken by speedsters! Every second counts for Wally! You go after him first!"
Conner, who previously hadn't stopped CPR on Jay for even an instant, looked up in surprise then.
"I can't. Jay will die if he doesn't get medical attention soon," Clark attempted to board the ice floe again, but Max swirled his arms in circles at the Kryptonian, pushing Clark back several yards with twin tornadoes.
"And, if he survives, I'll let you explain to him why you chose to save him over his grandson!" Max snarled, infuriated to the point that his whole body was starting to vibrate. He shoved Dinah away and jabbed one shaking finger straight at Superman, "Before I blacked out, I saw Zoom holding Wally by the throat. Now, you will go after him first. Right. Now."
As soon as Max mentioned Professor Zoom, all the blood drained from Superman's face, and he paused for only a second before rocketing off to search for Wally without any more protests. Having gotten what he wanted, Max went completely limp in Dinah's arms, his face contorting in agony.
"How bad is Jay?"
Dinah looked over her shoulder at Conner, who was still trying his hardest to save the elderly speedster. She bit her lip and looked back at Max waiting silently for her answer. She refused to lie to him, "He might not make it."
Max looked devastated as he let his head fall back onto the ice with a dull thud. His eyes seemed to go in and out of focus, and Dinah looked down in alarm when she felt warm blood pooling around her legs. Max was bleeding out now too! Using his superspeed had sent the wound in his broken leg gushing blood. Dinah tore her jacket from her shoulders and tied one sleeve around Max's knee as tightly as she could. She cradled the dying speedster's head in her lap and scanned the horizon frantically for help.
"Flash!" Dinah heard Clark's incensed voice booming through her earpiece. "It's Zoom! He has Wally. We need to split the hemisphere between us. I'll take the arctic and Eastern Asian seaboard; you cover Australia to South America. Green Lantern, continue to the coordinates and take everyone to the Watchtower. You need to hurry; they don't have much time!"
"I'm hooking down to the Philippines right now," Flash growled, his very voice crackling like electricity.
"I'm less than two minutes away!" John shouted determinedly.
Dinah was rarely useless in any situation, but that's how she felt right now as Max was quickly fading away in her arms. She could hear Superboy still doing chest compressions on Jay, and she wanted to tell him something else he could do that would help, but there was nothing. So, she scanned the skies helplessly until in the very far distance, coming from the east, she spotted a faint green glow.
Within seconds, John Stewart was directly above them, enveloping the entire ice floe in a protective green bubble and towing them out into space without slowing down for a second. Dinah watched the planet growing smaller and smaller beneath them as they flew towards the Watchtower. She gripped Max's shoulders tightly and prayed that his sacrifice wouldn't be in vain…and that they weren't too late.
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[The Watchtower
March 23, 12:30 EST]
Dick was very familiar with nightmares. When he was small, he used to have them about monsters in his closet or under the bed. Normal stuff. Back when his parents were still alive and he was traveling all over the world with Haly's Circus, he'd just cross the train car to his parents' compartment and climb into bed with them. Sometimes, when the dreams were so bad that he couldn't seem to shake them even in the safety of his mother's arms, his dad would take him 'for a walk' to clear his head. That usually meant climbing up on top of the train while it was moving – they never told his mother; she would've had a heart attack. Dick remembered clutching onto his father's arm while they perched atop the speeding train, watching the countryside going by and feeling the wind whip his hair around and dry the sweat from his face. If Dick had to give an average, he'd guess about one or two nightmares a month – if that. He'd been a happy child, and nightmares had been rare and silly for him.
After his parents died, Dick had them every night. He knew that he hadn't gone to stay with Bruce immediately. He'd had to stay with child services in a foster home for something like two or three weeks while Bruce filed for guardianship of him. During his stay there, Dick couldn't really remember how he'd coped with the nightmares. He guessed that he'd just curled up in a ball in the dark and cried.
The nightmares had been different then. He always saw his family falling to their deaths. Sometimes they were in the middle of their act, sometimes it was his father tumbling off of a moving train, and sometimes the very earth crumbled beneath them. The only thing that stayed the same was the look on his mother's face as she fell, her raven hair swirling up as she plummeted and the fear in her green eyes as she watched him watching her. Until she was gone. His nightmares were full of their last moments, the crunch of their bones when they hit the ground, and the split second looks of shock before they were lifeless.
When he was staying at Wayne Manor, Dick remembered handling the nightmares much better. Or rather, Alfred handled them. In the beginning, Dick never had to scream himself awake and sit up in bed, completely alone in the dark. He always opened his eyes to Alfred gently shaking him awake and placing a steaming mug of hot chocolate into his hands. The butler somehow always knew when he was having a nightmare – Dick supposed it was experience from when Bruce witnessed his own parents' murders. He remembered sniffling and holding the mug close to his chest as Alfred asked him what happened in the nightmare. Dick would recount the entire thing to him, and Alfred would listen patiently, no matter what time it was. Then, the butler would lead Dick into the kitchen and let him help bake a fresh batch of cookies for the next day until he was tired enough to fall back asleep. Every now and then, it would be Bruce that woke him up.
For the first few months, Dick was too shy around Bruce still to really take any comfort in his presence. But, as he became more at ease around the man who had taken him in, Dick found that he coped with the night terrors far better when Bruce was the one to wake him up. Back then, Bruce would sit on the edge of the bed, wrap an arm around Dick's shoulders, and just stay with him until he felt safe enough to fall asleep. Dick had always been grateful for those nights, because it was just dark enough in the room that he could pretend Bruce was his father.
Once Dick learned that Bruce was Batman, and he became Robin, his nightmares changed again. He constantly worried about disappointing Bruce and not being worthy enough to be his sidekick. He stressed out so badly about not being good enough that it reflected in his dreams and tormented him all night long with different scenarios of Bruce turning on him, firing him as Robin, or removing him from his life altogether. Dick never breathed a word of these nightmares to anyone, which turned out to be fine. He became more confident, and the nightmares went away altogether for a long time. Years.
Until he saw his best friend broken and bloody on a surgical table. After that, Wally's dead, lifeless body haunted his dreams every night for three months. Especially his eyes. Dick had wondered why his eyes bothered him the most. Maybe it was because they had reminded him of his mother's. Not the color – they weren't the same shade of green. His mother's eyes had been darker, more hazel. Wally's were the brightest, most vibrant green he'd ever seen. Wally's eyes had reminded him of his mother's because of how dead they'd been and how completely devoid of any spark or life.
Dick was actually stuck in a nightmare right now. He was dreaming that he'd been training with Bruce in the Batcave. He'd been practicing with the weapons that Bruce and Green Arrow had developed to fight the Manhunters when a Watchtower alert had come in through the cave's security system. Captain Atom had come onto the screen at Bruce's computer and told them that Wally had been kidnapped by Professor Zoom and three other speedsters. He told them that both Superman and Flash were out looking for them right now but that there was no sign of Wally anywhere.
The worst thing about the nightmare so far though was how real it was. Minute by minute, the dream seemed like it was actually happening. Every detail about the cave was perfect, and Captain Atom's alert seemed genuine. Dick didn't really know the silver and red clad hero well enough to mentally fabricate him, and the desperation and pure anguish in the Flash's transmissions tore into Dick's chest in a very real way.
Oh God….it was real. This wasn't a nightmare. It was actually happening.
Dick followed after Bruce in a dead run. They crossed the observation deck in the Watchtower and arrived at the monitor womb in minutes. Captain Atom had given them the full rundown of everything that had happened in the last hour.
Five leaguers plus a handful of visiting Green Lanterns that knew Wally personally were combing the eastern hemisphere above the equator. Flash was moving so fast that his responding transmissions were unintelligible without voice slowing software. He was frantic. Anyone could tell.
Dick expected himself to be in a panic as well. After all, Wally was in the clutches of his most deadly and volatile enemy. It was kind of a big deal. Professor Zoom was just as fast as the Flash and criminally insane. And he hated Kid Flash just as much as the Joker hated Robin. But, instead of being hysterical, Dick was angry. He didn't care that Zoom was one of the deadliest villains out there. He didn't even care that Zoom could run a hundred circles around him before he could even blink.
Dick was going to kill him for taking Wally.
Bruce stormed into the monitor womb and marched straight up to the main console. Dick was right on his heels, staring up at the various screens furiously. One screen displayed a geographical map of the Pacific Ocean with nine blinking markers moving all over it. The one labeled Kid Flash was stationary in the middle of the ocean halfway between Hawaii and California. Superman and Flash's dots were darting all over the northern and southern parts of the map while the others were concentrated on Hawaii and the ocean's surrounding coasts.
Captain Atom turned to greet them with a firm nod, "Someone really has it out for this kid."
"You said Kid Flash's goggles were retrieved from the water," Bruce said briskly, not even acknowledging what the other hero had said.
"Black Canary ran them here the second Green Lantern arrived with her, Superboy, and the injured speedsters in the Javelin bay," Captain Atom produced Wally's bright red goggles and handed them over to Bruce, who immediately turned them over in his hands and popped open a hidden compartment. He removed a microchip from the frames and set them aside while he plugged the chip into the console. Another window popped open containing folders labeled audio, video, and GPS tracking. Bruce opened all three and started playing the audio file while he fast forwarded through the video footage that looked like it had been shot from Wally's point of view. Dick didn't know that Wally's goggles had a camera in them – or a microphone for that matter.
He listened to the decidedly light-hearted beginning of Wally's day while Bruce jumped through the video feed several hours and then slowed his searching down when Wally hit the ocean. Dick could hear the sound of Wally's breathing along with Max and Jay bickering in the background while the screen showed Wally's view of the water and his companions moving in fast forward, although it was hard to tell with speedsters. Dick saw them switch the lead around several times and rush at each other all of a sudden – it sort of looked like they were playing tag or something.
Then, Dick saw two blurs rush past either side of Wally and attack Max Mercury. Bruce quickly paused the video and rewound it a few seconds frame by frame until the blurs were actual shapes. It looked like two muscular men wearing matching blue and white costumes that covered them head to toe. Bruce tapped a few keys on the console, and the images of both men were relocated to a second screen. He scrolled to the corresponding time on the audio and synchronized it with the video feed, then hit play.
Dick watched Wally's arm extend into the screen and heard him yell out a warning to the two older speedsters. He saw the two speedsters attack Max and stand atop the surface of the water for a few instants before going after Jay when he yelled for Wally to run. Bruce took a few seconds to replace the pictures of the two uniformed men with better ones that showed their masked faces. Dick heard Wally call out an S.O.S. and then duck as a third speedster attacked him. The camera abruptly went wild, and the world turned upside down. Dick actually caught a glimpse of Wally from the camera, which meant that the goggles had been pulled off him.
The camera jumped back and forth between the sky and the water for a few instants, and then the assailant's finger shifted in front of the lens and partially blocked the video. The screen went wild again, and this time, Wally was in full view of the camera, expression determined and alert. The camera was thrown away from him, and Dick saw the blue and white legs of his attacker right before he heard a feral and very female scream issue from the speakers. The scream was drowned out when the camera submerged underwater. The third speedster fought her way back to the surface with some difficulty and, the camera once again showed a picture of the sky dotted with water droplets. It panned around erratically as she ran, every now and then capturing glimpses of Jay fighting with her and one of the male speedsters.
Then, a yellow blur sped by. Bruce paused the video again to get a screenshot of him and let it play again. Professor Zoom was frozen mid run on the monitor. Dick's eyes burned as he looked at him instead of the video, which was a chaotic jumble again. He glared hatefully at Zoom, eyes roving over his yellow and red costume. It was arguably the biggest insult any villain could give a hero – taking their costume and twisting it into a mockery. The strangest thing about it was how closely it resembled Wally's, minus the gloves and…. Wait a minute.
Dick moved closer to the screen, his eyes narrowing at Zoom's feet. His boots were normally red, but he was wearing dark metal ones here. He focused on the bottom of the boots and noticed that they were glowing brightly. That definitely wasn't Zoom's usual uniform.
The speakers were suddenly playing back much more than the sounds of high speed combat. Dick couldn't see it, but he could hear Jay's grunts and cries of pain along with a flurry of what sounded like fists pummeling a body. Tiny flecks of blood spattered onto the camera's lens. Dick heard a harsh bark of laughter right before the camera was on the move again, and then he heard a dark, manic voice speak.
"Hello, Wally."
Dick's blood turned to ice in his veins. That had been Zoom speaking. Professor Zoom knew Wally's secret identity…
The female speedster holding the goggles zipped up right beside Wally. Dick could see half of Wally's torso and his hips. He gave a defensive jerk in response to something, and then the camera turned perfectly. Dick could see Zoom holding Wally in the air by the throat. They were at a crooked angle, but he could still clearly see the look of shock and fear on his best friend's face. Wally tried to fight back and get out of the hold, but his movements were sluggish. He seemed to be losing consciousness but didn't stop struggling until Professor Zoom slugged him hard in the stomach.
Wally passed out and hung limp in Zoom's grasp. Dick heard the battle in the background go quiet soon after. Zoom hefted Wally's body over his shoulder, and he turned to face the speedster holding the goggles.
The camera moved again and provided a view of the woman's hand.
"Throw those into the ocean. They'll have a tracker in them."
Immediately, the water rushed up at the camera as the goggles were abandoned. After that, they could hear no more, and the video showed nothing but darkness.
"What is the status of Jay Garrick and Max Mercury?" Bruce asked Captain Atom evenly.
The silver clad hero looked at him grimly and sighed, "Mister Terrific took Garrick into surgery the second he got here. I think Max is still waiting to be worked on."
"Robin," Bruce said suddenly.
Dick gave a start in surprise, but turned to his mentor, "Yes?"
"I need you to run to the medical bay and find out everything Max knows that we don't about these new speedsters. Any detail he can remember, do you understand?"
Dick nodded impatiently, already ready to run.
"Try to get as much as you can before he has to be taken in for surgery," Bruce started pulling up his global database of metahumans. He entered the photos of the two male speedsters into the search area and started the hunt for any kind of match or similarity with existing metahumans. "Every second counts."
"Got it," Dick took off out of the room at a dead run. He tore through the Watchtower's hallways with ease – after spending so much time up here when Wally was injured, he was very familiar with the layout – and was entering the medical bay minutes later.
He was rounding the corner to the waiting area, breathing heavily and heart pounding urgently, when the double doors burst open, and Conner darted out. The half-Kryptonian stared directly at him, absolutely covered in blood. He held the door open with one dark red arm. It was stained with dried blood from the elbow down.
"Is Max still awake?!" Dick panted imperatively. He ran past Conner and paused to look around at the different wards.
"This way," Conner grabbed his arm and led him down one of the hallways at a sprint. "He's awake, but one of the medics is about to knock him out."
"We need information from him first!" Dick cursed under his breath. He ran as fast as he could after his teammate until they came to a stop outside one of the rooms. Inside, he could see Black Canary standing by the door with her arms crossed over her chest and a grim frown on her face. She too was soaked in blood. Her jacket was missing, and Dick could see spots of red dotting her neck and shoulders. Her arms, knees, and shins were the worst though. The blood had seeped completely into her own bandages, staining them a deep red.
Max was lying on a surgical table flat on his back. He had his eyes closed and face screwed up in pain, but he was breathing steadily. A female medical technician was cutting away one of the pant legs of his costume and preparing a needle of anesthetic.
"Wait! Wait!" Dick burst into the room and stumbled over to Max, ignoring Black Canary's and the medic's cries for him to stop.
Max opened his eyes at the commotion and looked at Dick with unfocused eyes. The medic leaned across the table and angrily shoved Dick back, "You can't be in here! I need to work on his leg immediately, or it will heal completely wrong. He's already had his first dose of anesthesia anyway. He'll be out soon."
Dick shoved her right back roughly and shook Max's arm to get his attention, "Max! Batman needs to know anything you can remember about the speedsters that attacked you. We saw Zoom, but we need to know about the other three. Was there anything you noticed about them or anything they said that stood out?"
Black Canary held the medic back and clamped a hand over her mouth to shut her up when she started yelling at Dick again. Max frowned at something miles away like he was thinking hard but kept losing his train of thought. Dick waited anxiously for several seconds, just about to lose hope that he was going to get anything out of him before he passed out.
"Russian," Max slurred, wincing in pain when he accidentally tried to move his broken leg. "I heard one of them…saying…something in Russian before I started sinking."
Dick pressed the communicator in his ear hastily, "Batman! One of them is Russian."
He released the communicator and moved more into Max's direct line of sight. The speedster was losing it. "Is there anything else?!"
"They move- how they move was fast…" Max started blinking rapidly to clear his vision. "Too fast."
"What do you mean?" Dick prompted. "Were they faster than you?"
"Faster than Ba-Flash… But something was wrong about them… They weren't right. Didn't feel like real speedsters…. And they could stand on the water."
Dick tried not to lose his patience. Max was clearly fighting against the anesthetic with all his might. "What was wrong with them?"
"They were wild… like animals…but their speed felt wrong too. I…" Max fell back onto the table, looking around in confusion. "I don't…don't know why."
Black Canary released the medic to tend to Max, and Dick darted out of the room into the hallway, relaying everything to Bruce over the communicator. When he was finished, Bruce directed him to stay there in case Max or Jay remembered anything else.
Dick leaned against the wall and held his head in his hands as he slid to the floor. He had to hold it together. Conner came over to sit beside him and stared quietly into the distance. Black Canary closed the door to Max's room and leaned against the wall opposite them both.
"How's Jay?" Dick asked suddenly. Captain Atom had told them that Jay was badly injured but hadn't elaborated beyond that. He hoped that the older speedster would be okay. If not, Wally would be devastated.
Conner stiffened beside him, and his eyebrows turned downwards. Dick watched him in confusion before turning to Black Canary for an explanation.
The blonde knelt down in front of them and put a sympathetic hand on Conner's shoulder to comfort him, "We won't know until Terrific is through. Superboy managed to revive him while we were still in space, so I think he'll live. But…I don't know if his limbs can be saved. One needs to be completely reattached."
Dick stared at her in horror, feeling his body ice over at the thought. Unconsciously, he flexed the muscles in his arms and legs as if to reassure himself that they were still there. What would happen to a speedster if they lost the use of their legs?
"Did they find Wally?" Conner asked quietly. "We haven't heard anything since we got here."
Dick looked at him sadly for a moment and shook his head helplessly, feeling everything crashing down on him like a landslide, "No…"