AN: After an inexcusably long delay caused mostly by pressing university obligations, I'm back. As usual, I own nothing. This section of the story ended up expanding, so consider this the first half of the second part a three section arc that will end with Traya being found, among other things. After that, the plot will begin to move even faster. The second half of this chapter is already finished, and I'm editing it now. As always, enjoy, and all constructive feedback is welcome and appreciated.
Robin couldn't help but enjoy the feeling of the wind whipping through his hair as he swung from one building to the next. He would never know what it was like for Cassie or Kon or any of the others that could simply will themselves to soar into the heavens, but as far as he was concerned, this was what it meant to fly. Even in the middle of a crisis he still found the extreme concentration necessary for grappling one of the best ways to clear his mind and refocus when in costume. Just like meditation...except that if you lose concentration you fall a few thousand feet and turn into paste. Hmm...we should be about five miles out now. "You got anything yet?"
The Teen of Tomorrow didn't look away from the horizon as he flew. Robin felt responsible for Helen Sandsmark, too. Of course, he wasn't dating Wonder Girl. "Nothing for sure yet. I'm too far away to get a good look--too bad we can't just rush the damn place."
Robin nodded as he fell into a momentary freefall before throwing another line and swinging around a building. Superboy executed a graceful turn and once again fell in next to him. "We don't know what we'll be stepping into. Rushing in would be--"
"Stupid, yeah." He frowned. "On the other hand, I'm picking up some voices. Sounds like local authorities--not as many as you'd think, only half a dozen patrol cars and a few motorcycle cops." He blinked. "Get this: they were escorting a funeral when they saw the mass evacuation from the highway."
"Most of Vegas' city services are probably hosed. What else?" They were close enough now that if there were any sort of fight going on, even he should've been able to hear it--Reddy's powers were nothing if not loud when he got cranked up. Robin couldn't decide if the relative silence was a good thing or not.
He tilted his head to the side. "Sounds like--yeah, okay--Reddy was definitely here. They're talking about explosions in the basement sublevels. Sounds like Reddy took charge of the evacuation. I think I'm listening to one of the security guards talking to--Captain O'Roarke. Just got on scene and trying to take command. They're pretty sure all the civilians are out, and most of the staff. But Bronzemarsh and his stage crew are missing--that's the magician you said they took Traya to see, right? They're still working on securing the area and waiting for SWAT to show up before they move in. Oh--and the power's been cut too since the building's unstable and they don't want to spark a fire, so they haven't got any idea what's going on inside." He flashed Robin an anxious look. "This is wrong, Rob."
No kidding. Robin felt a chill go down his back. "Yeah." They're not moving in, but have the area secured. They'd back up Reddy if they thought he needed help. If they think the fight's over--
"Oh hell. One of the guards just said Reddy went after the Bronzemarsh guy--they thought he was in trouble. He says--sounds like there was a fight, but no one stayed around long enough to see. He says he saw Reddy send Traya and Kathy off with some guard named Byron. They're buddies, apparently, and he thought it was odd he went off alone." He blinked. "Ah. He just told her which direction they went in." He no longer made any effort to hide his nervousness. "Robin ... Reddy never came out of the building, and Byron, Kathy, and Traya aren't at the evacuation site."
Kidnapping? Or are they trapped in the building somewhere? Robin clamped his jaw down. But that was a while ago. If the fight's over and no one's seen Reddy... He looked at Superboy; thankful he had the mask to hide the fear he knew had to be in his eyes. His friend had no such barrier. "Get us there. Now." He let go of the jumpline.
For a split second in which he was too preoccupied with worry to be terrified, he hung in the air before gravity took him. Before he could blink, Superboy grabbed him with one arm and his vision momentarily flashed blue as the half-Kryptonian extended his TTK to cover them both. It wouldn't do for Robin to be torn apart when his friend poured on the speed.
"Right." They shot off at what some detached portion of Robin's brain guessed to be around 300 miles per hour, all thoughts of flight being relaxing gone from his mind.
Please, God, let them be okay...Sneaking past the police was pathetically easy. Twelve officers simply weren't enough to run crowd control for a thousand people milling in a parking garage. They moved through half the casino floor with no sign of anyone, and found the entrance to the showroom completely caved in. Robin had engaged his Starlight lenses and clipped a portable xenon torch to his belt. Kon stared at the wreckage and scowled. "What's the deal? Half this damn building is made of X-Ray proof material. I can't see a thing."
Robin ran his hands along the wall of debris, gauging its stability. "The Belagio shares a vault with two other casinos--at their busiest, that vault can contain hundreds of millions of dollars. The industry's paranoia when it comes to security is legendary. Robbers with enhanced vision aren't beyond the realm of possibility." Not to mention that some genius stole 160 million out from under them a year ago. "This looks stable enough. What do you think? Can you bust through it without causing a bigger cave-in?"
Superboy stared again, obviously using his X-ray vision. "Yeah. I think. Stand back, though, just in case." Robin nodded. The half-Kryptonian put his hand on the biggest piece of wreckage, and a wave of blue light pulsed from his palm. Robin held his hand under the belt compartment where he kept his flashbangs and unclipped his staff from the small of his back. Another second, and the entire thing--what had to be at least two tons of debris--collapsed into dust and pebbles. Superboy looked quite pleased with himself.
You've come along way, buddy. He peered into the void, the only sound settling dust. "Looks clear," he frowned. He'd been half hoping to see some sign of Reddy or the others. "You see anything?" He could clear the room himself, but he trusted Kon enough to take his word. Saves time.
"It's clear in here. I can't see any sign of a fight or ... bodies, or anything like that. Curtain looks lead-lined, too," he groused.
"Magicians like to protect their secrets from prying eyes." He ran his flashlight over a ruined chandelier.
Superboy gestured at a collapsed balcony that, thankfully, seemed to have been unoccupied when it went down. "What do you think happened in here?"
Robin grunted, pivoting so the flashlight on his belt caught the ground. "They definitely hit the foundation--at least this section. Look how uneven the floor is. It's more sunk than smashed in most places." He began moving carefully forward, Kon floating in an upright position at his side.
"But the building's still standing," Kon frowned. "And Reddy can fly."
"Yeah, but it would've put everyone
stuck on the ground into chaos. Enough that Reddy would be forced to
help with the evacuation and leave Kathy and Traya with this Byron
guy."
"That's gone missing with them," Superboy said acidly.
"Yeah." They'd made it to the curtain. "Ready?" Superboy nodded, Robin rested his thumb over the release on his staff, and they rushed through.
It was only pure reflex that kept Robin standing as his eyes processed the scene before him, his arms flying out to seize on the curtain as bile rose in his throat and his legs suddenly seemed no longer able to support him. "No ... oh God ..."
Kon clamped a hand on his shoulder, but whether he was seeking support or offering it, Robin would never know--his hand shook furiously. "Jesus Christ."
The blood was a dull green in his night vision lenses, and it coated the entire floor, as far as he could see. Arms, legs, torsos, and heads lay strewn about in clusters, islands floating in a sea of death. There was a pile of debris off to one side, and something suspiciously like dried blood streaming down from three holes in one of the walls.
"You must be able to concentrate, no matter how desperate, confusing, or gruesome the situation at hand. Others' lives will depend on your ability to achieve absolute focus. Center yourself, assess your options, and act."
Robin inhaled with a final shudder, pushing all his emotions into a tight little ball somewhere beneath his stomach, willing his mind to consider the evidence at hand. Thanks, Bruce. He frowned. Ignoring what he felt now didn't mean he wouldn't have to deal with it later. He pulled two flares from his belt. "S-Superboy, you with me?"
He nodded jerkily. "Y-yeah. I--oh God--w-what do we do now?"
"Find out who did this," Robin ground out. "We find them, and make sure they answer for their crimes." He took another deep breath. "We need to get a better idea of what happened in here." He tossed his friend the flares; he seemed to catch them by reflex. "Light it up."
Superboy stared at him for a long moment, eyes wide with what could have been awe. Or shock. Or disbelief. Nevertheless, he seemed to regain some of his composure. "Right. God, you're scary sometimes..." he didn't seem to notice he'd said the last part out loud.
"Someone has to be." Superboy just blinked at him, cracked the flares into life, and launched himself into the air. Another moment, and bright, white light bathed the area. Superboy used his fingers to punch a couple holes in the ceiling and stuck them in as if he was replacing a light bulb.
Even with his mind prepared, he still had to work to keep the bile down as he scanned the room. Focus, Robin. Batman wouldn't hesitate. "At least twenty people," he knelt near one of the more intact bodies. "Looks like a bladed weapon--a big one. Only one cut here is actually lethal on its own. The rest look ..." Like whoever did this was hacking away at them for fun, "... superfluous. They're clean, too," he took a small camera from his belt and began snapping pictures, "the killer knows how to handle their weapon." He wiggled one of the man's fingers with his gloved hand. "No rigor mortis. They haven't been dead long." He felt a chill race down his spine. All this carnage. Where was--
"Reddy!" Superboy's scream left Robin's ears ringing, but he was already racing towards Kon. "Oh--oh God!" He seemed to be moving in slow motion; he didn't get there until Superboy had fallen backwards, tears steaming down his face, mouth moving in mute horror.
Oh, no. His mind was already moving to rationalize the damage. They'd practically rebuilt him twice. No matter what happened, surely they could--he finally got close enough to peer over Kon's muscular frame.
He couldn't stop himself as he tumbled to the ground this time, barely noticing when he fell in front of a pool of something far too dark to be human blood. "No..." he rasped. Even as his conscious mind struggled to deal with what he was seeing, his instincts kicked in, working to catalogue the scene before him.
Red Tornado's body lay in a pool of his own coolant, armor shattered and broken. His arms and legs were off to the side, arranged to look like a tic-tac-toe board. The center of the yellow circle on his chest sported a large, rough gouge and was twisted and scorched, as though it had suffered through some sort of very short-range explosion. And the head...
Robin lifted a dented, cubic ocular receptor with a shaking, gloved hand. It was the biggest piece left. Some more detached part of his brain noted that his friend's positronic brain--his memory cores, personality matrix, logic and computational systems--had been reduced to little more than silicon dust.
Dead. The receptor fell from his hand. Red Tornado was built to stand against Superman, and someone had completely demolished him. Tears stung his eyes, and he made only token efforts to stall them. Reddy was one of his mentors. His friend. And now he was gone. Just like that. How would the others react to hearing the news? Cassie was already teetering on the edge of breakdown, Greta treated him like an uncle, Bart still didn't really know how to deal with death in general yet, and Traya--
It was like a lightning bolt had slammed into him. Before he really knew what was happening, he was on his feet, all strength back in his muscles, white noise and a single thought pulsing between his ears.
Traya.
Traya was here somewhere, and Reddy would've fought with everything he had if he thought she was in even an iota of danger. He loved Kathy too, but he was never so driven as when his little girl's welfare was at issue--he'd challenged the entire DEO and APES to keep her safe, without a second thought.
He would've died believing she and Kathy were safe with that security guard. But they were missing. Someone had widowed Kathy and taken Traya's father from her. Again. And he wasn't so stupid to think that by some miracle they weren't in trouble, wherever they were. White-hot anger flooded through him. You will pay for what you've done. I'm going to find them, and get them to safety. And then I'll make you pay. Superboy was rising slowly next to him, horror still seared across his face. "Come on. We ... we've got to keep going."
Superboy gulped, nodding. "Yeah."
Robin crossed the room, stopping in front of the strange holes in the opposite wall.
Kon's eyes widened. "This is human blood."
"Not coolant, at least," Robin nodded. He reached into one of his belt compartments, producing a glassine baggie and carefully knocking several large flakes into it with a putty knife. "Definitely worth running a DNA test on. Could be one of our assailants. Or the one behind it all, if he decided to get personal." He returned the baggie to his belt.
"But, even if it is him," Kon frowned, "This is Reddy we're talking about," his eyes darted to their friends remains, and he shuddered. "He doesn't--wouldn't have ... what? Nailed somebody to the wall?"
Robin repressed his own shudder. It wasn't a pleasant idea. But not impossible. "No," he gestured at the holes, "look. There are grooves here, like something was screwed in." He looked at the floor, and picked up a gore-laden piece of twisted metal half hidden under a piece of drywall. Superboy made a gurgling noise in his throat. Robin ignored his own queasiness. "The way tissue is stuck to this, it was likely pulled out. Reddy wouldn't free someone he'd just impaled." God, Reddy. Who ... what were you fighting that you thought this was necessary?
Kon shook his head. "But why would he--?"
"He must've decided he couldn't incapacitate him," Robin cut in, "and considered this the only option to take him out of the fight." His voice grew grim. "And this guy freed himself and proceeded, after being pierced in the forearms and legs, to destroy him." He growled. "He should've lost so much blood he wouldn't have been able to stand. We're looking at someone with telekinesis or the equivalent--to remove the ... pins--and some sort of very enhanced healing abilities to recover fast enough and well enough to ..."
Kon tilted his head towards the another wall. "What about that rubble pile?"
"Let's find out," Robin's lips fell into a thin line--the closest thing to a smile he felt like he could manage. "Anything under it?" Kon shook his head as they crossed the room. Robin knelt next to the pile. Looks like someone climbed out of it. Maybe Reddy tried slamming him--her? It? --into the wall. Not that it did any good. A patch of glossy black caught his eye, and he fished a piece of material out of the wreckage. "Hmm." There was more blood on it. Test them both. Make sure what's on the wall is from the same person.
Kon stared at it. "Some kind of armor?"
"Not exactly," Robin muttered. "High grade leather. Fire-resistant lining. Leather military shirts are made from this material." He produced another baggie and slid the fragment in, sighing as he finished sifting through the pile. "We're done here. I'll take one more sweep around the room, but I think we got everything of interest. There's something I'd like you to do."
Robin reached into a pouch in his cape and tossed his friend a bundle of white, rolled up bags.
Superboy blinked. "Wha--"
"Each bag stretches to more than double its size, and holds a hundred pounds. We're not leaving Reddy here to be locked up in some police evidence locker or claimed by the DEO for their research." His voice was hard, pumped with gravel, the last word tinged with scorn. "With your powers you should be able to gather the remains much faster than me. There's a smaller bag there. Use it for the ... remains of the head. Come find me when you're done."
Superboy blanched as he took the baggies, but nodded, from the look in his eyes, shock had given way to sorrow--and restrained anger. "Where are you going?" He took a step back as Robin shrugged his cape back, his staff extending with a soft click.
Robin's eyepieces narrowed to slits. "I'm going to find Byron."
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Robin used his staff to push open a door that had already been half-knocked from its hinges, the torch on his belt giving his Starlight lenses more than enough light to illuminate his path. It was easy to follow their trail. Byron had a habit of beating his way through entryways. Obviously in a hurry. Where were you going? Certainly not towards an exit--Robin didn't have to know the layout of the sublevels to know that he was not only moving towards the center of the structure, but down, towards where the vaults would be. No way was Byron trying to get outside.
Reddy handed them off to a security guard so they'd be safe, and he abducted them. If this was a hit on Reddy, the bastard was more than likely in on it. Reddy's not--wasn't--stupid, either; if Byron fooled him he must've had a great disguise. But where the hell is he going He rested a hand over his flashbang compartment. There's nothing down here but storage and locker rooms. For maintenance. No way out, unless, his eyes narrowed, Boom Tube. Damn it! He quashed the urge to start running. If they were still here, rushing into a trap could get them killed.
He finally came to a rather singular door. It was still on its hinges, and properly closed. This has to be it. There aren't any other doors down this hall. He reached for the handle, then stopped. Too easy. Could be rigged. He considered. No matter how anxious I am to get in there, I can't risk blowing myself up now...or something worse. He narrowed the beam on his torch and unclipped it, moving it very slowly around the door from every conceivable angle. He finished with a thorough examination of the hinges, and the spaces under (and with a little effort) above the door. All in all, the entire process took about two minutes. Reaching for his mask, he tapped twice, switching into infrared mode and starting the process again. If Byron rigged the door without tripwires, any traps more than likely gave off some sort of heat signature. Two more minutes of searching, and he again came up empty.
Nothing? It was definitely (more corpses?) a trap of some kind. Byron hadn't been stealthy at all about his path. He wanted to be followed. He backpedaled from the door, tapping his earpiece. "Kon. Where are you?"
Superboy spoke softly, his voice tight. "I ... I'm following the trail of flares you left. Pretty close. I can actually hear you without the communicator. I've ... I have the ..." and his voice cracked slightly, "I've got Reddy."
Robin gulped. "Thanks, Kon. I ... I know that wasn't an easy thing to do."
A long
pause. "No. It wasn't. I think ... I just--God, Rob. When Kathy
and Traya--and the others--What's next?"
Robin knew what he was really asking, and was glad he didn't know.
Who do we find killed or maimed next? He didn't want to have to
answer. Instead, he just sighed. "I need you at the end of the
tunnel. Don't worry about stealth. The path is clear." He
blinked. There was a rush of air. Superboy stood in front of him,
carrying one large white bag, stretched at odd angles, two smaller
ones clipped to his belt. If Robin didn't know better, he would've
guessed his friend was taking out the trash. From the way the bag
seemed to glow, Robin guessed he'd put the remains under his TTK
field.
Guarding broken treasure. "The trail ends here, for whatever reason. This guy obviously wasn't security."
"Kidnapping," Kon grunted. It wasn't a question.
Robin just stared at the door. "I've checked for tripwires and other traps, but I haven't come up with anything. Second opinion?"
Kon stared at the door for a solid minute. "I can't pick up anything. Nothing's standing out in the room, either. It's a big closet. Looks like spare lighting equipment for the casino floor, mostly. Definitely nothing moving." Neither of them was going to say it, but both knew there was plenty Kryptonian X-ray vision couldn't pick up.
Robin nodded. "On three, then." Superboy left the bags in a secluded corner.
"On three."
The door creaked as it opened, Robin entered the room half-crouched as Superboy floated over his head. The Urban Legend quickly rose to his full height as his friend touched down next to him. Definitely empty.
"Light it up?" Superboy asked. Robin tossed him a flare with a nod, and the half-Kryptonian flew up, bathing the room in harsh white light. Robin disengaged his now useless night vision, but Kon spoke before he had a chance to take in the scene. "Oh shit." He stepped away, covering his mouth and shaking his head.
Robin blinked his vision clear and stared after him.
He felt like someone had kicked the wind out of him. The plaster wall sported a vaguely human-sized dent, blood splattered where the head should've been. He shook his head violently, willing himself to remain in control. It was easier this time--after the shock of seeing Reddy, his mind wasn't completely derailed by the comparatively tamer scene. He had to be detached now. He wouldn't be able to accomplish anything if his mind was clouded.
Byron had thrown Kathy--the indentation was too large to be Traya--hard enough to shatter a wall meant to withstand an earthquake. She would be severely wounded, wherever she was. Definitely too strong to be a normal human.
"Kathy." Superboy had apparently come to the same conclusion. "She could--could still be alive, right?" Expecting, almost demanding, the answer he wanted.
Robin found his voice, small but sure. "I--yes, but if she is she'll be in terrible--" his eyes caught a flash of white and drifted down, and he almost bit his tongue. He knelt, tossing aside a fallen piece of wall to reveal a splotch of red, with a tangle of blonde hair and--"No." Kon knelt next to him, looking confused and ready to be sick. Robin produced a set of short, tweezer-like tongs from his belt, and cleared several strands away from a piece of something coated in red and something spongy and wet. It looked almost like broken tile, about the size of a nickel. "No," he ruthlessly crushed the hitch in his voice and blinked until his vision was clear again. "This ... this is a skull fragment, and it's not the only one down here. It's ... it's full thickness, Kon. Her brain was exposed to oxygen." He reached to his face and pulled up on the lower edges of his mask, swiping furiously at the tears now running down his cheeks. "I don't know why Byron took the ... the body ... but--she's gone." Kon covered his face with his hands, shoulders jerking silently. Reddy...Kathy...I'm so sorry. There was a dull buzzing between his ears. Grief, horror, rage, all mingled together and begging for release. He wasn't stupid enough to think he could deny them indefinitely, as Bruce would. But he didn't have to. Just a little longer. Traya. Where are you?
Kon's voice almost made him jump. "Was ... do you think she ...?"
Robin laid a hand on his shoulder, not looking at him, pretending it wasn't shaking. "The shock would've left her unconscious. She wouldn't have lasted more than ... more than five minutes after that," he finished gently. He couldn't help thinking he was just practicing what he was going to tell Traya when they found her. Wherever she was. He started to rise, offering his friend a hand. "We can't stop now."
Kon looked up at him, tears streaming down his face. But his eyes caught Robin's attention. They burned with determination and restrained righteous fury. Never could Robin remember seeing him look more like Clark. "Traya."
Robin nodded. "Traya." He started turning slowly in a circle, examining the room.
"But," Kon dabbed at more tears, "what if she's already--?"
"No," Robin hissed, jaw clenched. His eyes were stinging more and more, and his vision wasn't right, but he couldn't afford to give up. She was depending on him. "I don't--can't believe that. Byron wouldn't have dragged them all the way here just to kill them both. The hotel was already mostly evacuated. Why go through all this if he just wanted them both dead? He's more than strong enough to have just--no. This is too elaborate. We're missing something." Think, Robin. "Let's start from the beginning," he said, stalking back towards the door. Byron would've entered here. You said the witness saw him carrying them in either arm," he stood in the door, facing Superboy, "and he would've made his move fast so neither of them had time to realize what was happening." He glanced to the right. "He threw Kathy in that direction, which means he was holding Traya on his left. Close to this wall." Kon joined him in staring at the offending wall--more specifically the stacked crates of various sizes. There had to be a clue here.
"Well? Aside from being just about the neatest pile of stuff here," Superboy growled, "I'm not seeing anything suspicious."
Robin blinked. Then blinked again. "You're right. The rest of this place is a mess. What makes this stuff any different?"
Superboy took a step back, and stared hard. "They're not lead lined--and there's nothing unusual in them. Just lights and stands and crap." He frowned, rubbing his eyes. "You think...?"
Robin narrowed his eyes. "Let's find out." He backed up as Superboy placed a palm on the nearest crate, watching as a soft blue glow encased every single one. Kon straightened his arm and floated up, lifting the entire collection from the ground and floating a good six feet back. They moved around to the back.
Next to him, Kon growled a curse. The wall wasn't cracked this time, but the small dried rivulets running towards the floor were unmistakably blood. In spite of himself, he felt the dread in his heart diminish. "She's still alive," he said quickly. At least she was when she was taken from here. "There's much less blood here. No damage to the wall, except..." he ran his fingers over a pair of dents, "these." He curved his fingers on both hands, as though he were holding a baseball bat in each, and put them against the wall. "He held her against the wall. His nails cut into her arms." By the last word, his voice shook. "Bastard."
"So she's alive, but some nutcase has her," Superboy hissed, his tone echoing the fury in his eyes. "But, I don't get it. This guy and his buddies have a grudge against us, and that includes Reddy, so I can see where they wouldn't hesitate to ... but why kidnap Traya? They don't seriously think they could ransom her or something like that, do they? They can't expect--they killed them! They've gotta know the second we can we'll come down on them like--"
"They know," Robin said softly. It was all clicking together. This had nothing to do with ransom. His friend looked close to hyperventilating. "Think about it. They don't want to ransom Traya. They blew up every JLA teleporter hub in the country just to make it harder for us to figure out what was going on. You heard that guy. Do you think he would hesitate to orphan one more kid if it meant making our lives just that much more hellish? He doesn't want to fight us directly until he's brought us as low as he can."
Superboy looked ready to vomit. "You're serious, aren't you? How can you be so damn calm about that?"
It was a fair question. "I've seen it before," he said softly. "Bane didn't break Batman's back until he'd done everything he could to mentally and physically exhaust him, bring him down as far as he could. Breaking every murderer, rapist, and maniac out of Arkham wasn't as ... personal ... as what this monster's doing to us, but it's the same tactic. Bane didn't give a damn how many innocents he hurt in the process, and neither does this guy. He's counting on us finding Traya. Once we do we'll have a broken child to watch over, we'll be that much more preoccupied. Traya, Kathy, all those guards at the hubs ... all just tools."
"Monster," Kon ground out. "We're fighting a monster. No better than Darkseid or Luthor."
Yeah. "We'll find him. I'm not going to let us be run into the ground." Robin sighed. "We've done all we can here. We need to find Kathy. Byron wouldn't have hidden her without a reason. We find her, we find Traya." He started moving for the door, Kon at his side. Scavenger hunt. Jesus.
"She could be anywhere, though," Kon frowned. "Where do we start?"
"We're looking for a dead body that we're supposed to find," Robin took one look around, looking for anything else out of place and coming up empty. "We start with the morgues."
Superboy nodded grimly. "Ti--Rob--what ... what do we tell the others?"
Robin felt the now-familiar cold hand clench once more around his heart. "I ... I don't know, but we can't ... we can't tell them this over the comms. Let's go."
Kathy, Reddy, if you can hear me, I swear to you, I'll find her.
It was pandemonium all over again. Dana wondered if any of them would notice if she and Jack vanished into thin air. Well, Greta would. She's been watching us. Dana shook her head. She'd probably cheer if it was just Jack. She hadn't realized Tim could be that dense--he seemed not to understand why the girl didn't like his father. It was obvious enough she adored Tim. She was going to give the cold shoulder to anyone who she considered to be hurting him, no matter who they were.
That's great Dana, but you're really distracting yourself from the issue at hand. Jack leaned towards her ear. "Dana...that boy's really green," Jack breathed, "I thought it was some kind of gimmick."
Dana just shook her head, taking in the scene. A few minutes ago another alarm had gone off. She was sure they were under attack, but Greta had started cheering and Alfred (who had stopped by to check on them, looking grim) was grinning from ear to ear. After getting the new arrivals out of the snow and getting them settled in the War Room and updated on the current situation, he'd returned to the infirmary with just a bit more bounce in his step.
The older Titans had arrived, and they'd brought a friend.
"Easy, Spooky," the messy-haired man known as Snapper Carr grinned at Greta, patting her head as she caught him in a bear hug, "I'm not going anywhere. I would've been here sooner, but it took forever to convince those doctors I didn't have a serious head injury." He was in ripped jeans and a torn shirt with the Flash logo on it, and sported a black eye and a bandage on his forehead. "I act like this all the time."
Dana shuddered. Car bomb. He told Alfred he'd been standing ten feet away when he deactivated the car alarm, and the explosive still flipped him over and blew him through a Sharper Image's front window display. Luckily, he'd landed in a pile of inflatable pool toys. Still, as soon as the hospital had let him go he'd "called in a favor" and gotten a helicopter flight to Titans Tower in San Francisco, and had been helping Raven with the search ever since.
"We were so worried," She stepped back, beaming at him. "Tim and Kon will be so happy to see you." She narrowed her eyes at him. "I thought I asked you not to call me Spooky." She didn't seem annoyed in the least.
"Yeah," he grinned. "You start calling me Snapper instead of Mr. Carr, and I'll get right on that." She just hugged him again and shook her head. He smirked softly.
Dana blinked. Spooky? Why would anyone call her that?
Not far away, the green boy in question, who had introduced himself as Garfield Logan, was sitting on a newly sprung-from-the-wall couch, shirtless, sporting dozens of bruises and scrapes. Next to him (His girlfriend?) Raven, looking very concerned but doing everything she could to hide it, was rubbing his injured shoulder, hands glowing blue. Dana watched in awe as the bones seemed to slip back into place painlessly, and the torn skin began to knit itself at inhuman speeds. Jack's eyes bugged out of his head. After another minute she was starting to sweat, and Garfield gently grabbed her hands.
"That's enough, Rae. Between digging us out and this, I don't want you to burn yourself out." He frowned. "Something tells me we're all going to need our strength. And hey," he rotated his shoulder, grinning at her, "you fixed the fracture and stopped the bleeding. The rest is just cosmetic. Thank you."
"Any time," she rubbed at her eyes and looked away. "No, I take that back. Next time you let a building fall on you, I ... I'll tie you to a hospital bed and force you to eat real bacon." She said this with such a deadpan voice, Dana couldn't tell if she was joking or not. Gar frowned at her a moment before taking her hand.
"Wow. Sounds kinda kinky." Dana looked towards the speaker, who insisted she call him Vic. His smile was forced, almost dutiful, as though he figured they expected him to say it. Combined with his scraped, cracked, and in some places significantly damaged mechanical implants, it made him look rather grim. Even Garfield's swat seemed reflexive. Something in one of Vic's legs sparked. "Aw ... damn it. I'm gonna have to replace this whole joint before I go back out. And my left sonic amplifier." The space between his right shoulder and torso sparked. He groaned, shaking his head. "Whatever. At least we made it."
Bart appeared next to him. "You want some help, Vic?" He vibrated in place, looking hopeful. "I memorized all your schematics--theonesyouputonthecomputer,anyway--if you need an extra hand."
Dana had only met him five minutes ago, but she was quite certain from the look on his face Vic was trying to think of a way to say no without hurting Bart's feelings. He was saved from having to answer when another alarm went off. Bart zipped across the room.
"Guys! Boom Tube in the landing bay. I'mbringingupvid--"
"Superboy and Robin," Raven said flatly, eyes closed. They snapped open just as quickly. "Bart, summon everyone here. Now."
"What happened?" Greta said, so quietly Dana could barely hear her. Snapper placed a hand loosely on her shoulder, looking grim.
"I don't know," Raven said. "But ... something's wrong."
Jack stiffened. "What?" Dana felt a chill go down her spine.
"Your son is physically fine," Raven said, the slightest hint of annoyance in her voice. She stood with Garfield. "No, I fear something worse has happened. He's desperate to see all of you, yet at the same time dreading it. And there's something else..."
"Wait," Greta said, voice firm, "you said Tim and Kon. What about Reddy? Kathy and Traya?"
Dana had never really believed someone could drop the temperature in a room with nothing more than a look, but at the look in the older teenager's eyes, she felt as though she'd been dipped in ice water. "I can't sense them." Bart nearly stumbled on his feet, the older male Titans swearing softly.
Greta shook her head. "That might mean anything. They could've been kidnapped, or hiding somewhere else, or ... anything." Dana thought she sounded desperate, and behind her, Snapper was looking ill and unsure of himself.
Tim. Jack wrapped an arm around her, pulling her close. Bart started paging everyone as Greta pulled away from a stunned looking Snapper to stare at the door, hugging herself. Tim, what happened, baby?
Robin didn't know whether to thank Raven for gathering everyone up, or pull her into an alcove and strangle her. So much for getting ready. He knew it had to have been her--he'd learned to recognize her probes, and she had touched his mind the moment they'd returned, taking a reading and sending a bolt of reassurance down their connection. It did little to improve his mood--she had no idea what they'd seen.
In the end he did neither, too thrilled to see the older Titans and Snapper in one basically whole piece to move. He made a mental note to learn exactly what had happened to them as soon as possible, but--he repressed a shudder--he had other duties to attend. They were all there when he and Superboy stepped through the entryway, either in person or--as in the case of Bonnie, Anita, and Leslie--a floating head on the main monitor bank. Oddly, everyone was silent, gazing at them almost apprehensively.
It took him all of three seconds to register these things, which was fortunate, as it took Greta only slightly more time to cross the room and plow into him, wrapping her arms around his waist, wordlessly laying her head on his chest, if only for a moment. He returned her embrace, feeling all at once more solid than he had since he'd found Reddy's corpse. Even as she once again momentarily overwhelmed his senses, he was dimly aware of Kon racing across the room to catch Wonder Girl in a hug that would crush a normal human. He both loved and hated the mask then--it kept Greta from immediately reading the horror surely lingering in his eyes, so he had a few seconds to bask in her presence without having to tell her the truth. At the same time, a part of him knew he was hiding from her, and that would never do. I've got to tell her. I've got to tell them all. He gulped, readying to speak. His parents were coming up behind her, Dana leading the way with worried eyes, his father looking ... relieved?
But apparently she already knew something had gone wrong; she pulled away and looked up at him, chewing hard on her lip.
She finally seemed to find her voice. "What happened? Where are Reddy and the others? Why ... why aren't they with you?"
She knew. They all knew. He blinked. How? Then it hit him, and he felt like an idiot. Raven. It really was impossible to sneak up on an empath with bad news. He looked across the room to where she was lounging with Gar. She looked noticeably apprehensive. He's probably the only thing keeping her from bolting off to meditate. "Greta," he began softly, Kon and Cassie making their way over on his right, "everybody ... I ... I ..." he'd had it all planned out in his head. He was going to walk in, get their attention, and lay out what he'd found as gently as possible, but he hadn't expected to start out with everyone staring at him like they all knew something was wrong but no one wanted to admit it, and his brain had taken the opportunity to finally overload on what he'd seen.
"Tim? What's wrong, son?" His father apparently found his loss for words disconcerting enough not to have to bite off every word, and to forget they weren't really on friendly terms for the moment.
Kon, who'd just finished whispering something to Cassie, both pale and teary and clutching each other as they floated in the air, opened his mouth to bail Tim out, but another beat him to it.
"Something happened to them. Something bad." It was Greta, and it wasn't a question. She was blinking furiously, and the muscles around her mouth and chin were tight and quivering. Her trembling hand had found his at some point. Or was that he shaking? Or both of them? He really couldn't tell. But the room had gone silent. Everyone was waiting.
As often happened when he was near her, his mouth was moving of its own will. "... Yes." And just like that, the ball of emotions he'd been carefully suppressing burst, and he felt his legs trying to give out from under him again. Greta had thrown herself into him, but it was wrong somehow. She was too shaky and his legs felt like someone had violently ripped all the muscle out. It took all his willpower to hold back tears. We're holding each other up. "It's bad." He pulled off the mask. She took one look at him and squeezed even harder. "Let's sit down. I ... I need to sit down." Everyone was looking at him with varying degrees of shock. Obviously, he wasn't supposed to act this way. "Kon and I will explain everything."
"That sounds like a good idea," Greta said soothingly. For a split second, he was tempted to pretend it was just the two of them, but he knew what'd he would do then. And he couldn't afford to let his emotions run away with him. Not yet.
Superboy nodded. "Right. Uh ... we need a place to sit, I guess. Computer! Big round table, seats for everybody. Now."
Dana felt herself trembling, even as she tightened her grip on Jack. She knew something was wrong with Tim the moment she laid eyes on him, even if she had no idea what. She had seen him in the Robin suit for months, in sorts of moods, but there was always that unshakable aura of control about him when the mask was on. Even when it was off, most of the time. When she stopped and thought about it, she realized that collectedness and restrained drive he exuded had to be a vital part of what made being around him feel like being around a superhero, and not just some kid in a (really nice) Halloween costume.
The more she'd thought about it over the months, the more she came to realize that sort of presence had to be critical to being taken seriously by people he was trying to help. Or trying to fight. Up until burst through the ceiling, she'd never had any idea what that aura might look like when it was in full effect.
Whatever he had seen, that presence had been violently ripped away from him, and he was just her Tim in a mask. Her first instinct had been to run to him--even Jack was starting to move, thank the Lord--but then Tim had noticed them all there, and the look on his face, even with eyes hidden--a split second of fear and panic--was enough to stop them both in their tracks.
Dana blanched at the almost desperate way Tim hugged his girlfriend. He didn't seem to know what to say when Greta had asked him what happened, and that was scarier than she wanted to admit; Tim was never speechless. Jack had managed to find his voice, but Tim had still just stood there looking like a suffocating fish. Then it had hit her--he didn't know how to tell them. That filled her with dread, and he hadn't even been standing there a full minute.
Greta, in another spectacular display of how much better she knew their son than they did (At least someone does...) took one really good look at his face, mask and all, and read him like a book.
"Something happened to them. Something bad."
That snapped him out of it. She heard Jack breathe a sigh of relief even as the two teenagers (They're only teenagers...) sagged against each other, Tim confirming Greta's suspicions.
A dour calm seemed to sweep the room anew--at least, if the way everyone suddenly paled and grimaced as a stainless steel table and chairs suddenly grew from the floor meant what she thought it did. She felt it too, like every bit of warmth had been sucked out of the room. The idea of speaking before Tim completely gathered his wits seemed ... wrong ... somehow.
She had shuddered as they all sat, a single pair of thoughts reverberating through her head.
Superheroes aren't supposed to act like this. Tim isn't supposed to act like this. Every time she'd ever seen Superman or any other costumed hero on the news or in photos, they were always beaming. Ready to take on the world. But the people in the room with her now--the ones that weren't complete outsiders like she and Jack--had suddenly aged twenty years, and all of them looked to Tim like he was a pastor at a funeral. Snapper and Gar, who had earlier seemed incapable of anything but rakish grins, looked especially grim. Bart vibrated so fast in his seat it made her dizzy to look at him too long. Jack's arm anchored around her shoulders like he was afraid she'd float away if he let go. Their eyes ... it was obvious this wasn't the first time they all sat through something like this.
A funeral. They all knew, right then, exactly where their missing friends were. What came next happened only because it had to. The facts had to be laid out properly before everyone jumped to conclusions. Before they could grieve. She didn't understand how Tim could hold it together as well as he had. By the time he managed to start speaking, the sense of unreality was so great she felt sure she'd wake up in her bed at any moment, curled against Jack and wondering how she would get her boys back together.
But Tim had started speaking, after opening a channel to the person he called Oracle with his earpiece and telling him/her/it he had "found something" and to "stand by for details." As she listened with escalating shock and horror as he described what they found, with help from Kon when he got too emotional to speak himself, in painstaking, near-emotionless detail, reality seemed to return. The part of Tim that was Robin seemed to reassert itself with a vengeance; one deep breath and straightened back and the Urban Legend was back, if grimmer and more subdued than before. The feeling of being in the same room as real superheroes, with plans and everything, was back too, but emotion hung around them like fog. Everyone seemed to know it was only a matter of minutes before the other shoe dropped.
Or less.
"... After we cleared the showroom," Robin--even with the mask off, the cold fire and ... something else ... in his eyes made it impossible for her to think of him as Tim--"we moved backstage. That's where we found," he took another steadying breath, moving even closer to his girlfriend as his voice dropped, "Bronzemarsh and the stage crew. All dead. The killer likely had some kind of large bladed weapon, and knew exactly how to kill quickly and efficiently ... though there was a high degree of post-mortem mutilation..."
Gasps of shock and disgust all around. Greta covered her mouth with her free hand, but didn't take her eyes off Tim as he continued. Dana found herself riveted, and from what she could see of him out of the corner of her eye, Jack was too. But she wasn't really thinking about what he was saying--it would be impossible to stay calm if she stopped and thought about how he described the cadavers and their wounds--but rather how he said it: the clinical detachment of a medical examiner mixed with suppressed fury. All around him, the others faced shifted from dread to varying degrees of anger, but he didn't really seem to be paying attention. Or maybe he was. For the first time, even with the mask off, she couldn't really tell what he was thinking.
"...there had obviously been a major fight. We continued to check the room and ... and ..." a deep breath, and Dana and Jack bolted straight in their chairs with Greta as tears ran down Tim's cheeks. He started speaking faster. "There's--there's no easy way to say this. We found the body. Reddy's," his voice hitched, "he's dead. Kathy's--her body's missing, but I found evidence of fatal skull fracture. Traya's been kidnapped, and definitely suffered at least minor wounds."
Silence.
Everyone in the room went slack. Dana felt her eyes start to sting as the murmuring began. Everyone was still trying to find their voice half a second later, she was busy trying to melt into Jack and fight down the bile in her throat, and wasn't sure if it was for the news or the pain in Tim's eyes as he delivered it.
I did it. Robin covered his mouth with his hands as he finished speaking. Not for the first time since this whole mess had started, he was hit with the feeling of how saying something made it impossible to take it back. Babs swore loudly in his ear, and he thought he heard Alfred and Leslie gasp. His eyes darted around the room, looking for reactions. All he could make out was pure shock. Bart wasn't moving. At all. The comforting presence of Greta's hand over his was suddenly gone. She covered her mouth and leaned into him, strangled gasps escaping her lips. Oh, God. What have I done?
"What?" Cassie found her voice first. "What? No! There has to be some mistake. They can't both be dead!" Kon started weeping with her. Cyborg's good arm smashed into the table as he covered his face with his hand, leaving a huge dent that almost instantly began healing itself.
"Great Scott. I've seen him, Martha. Built like a tank..." Jonathan. Low and disbelieving.
"And his wife," Martha breathed. "They orphaned that girl..."
"Dead?" Bart whispered, tears streaming down his face. "But Reddycan'tbedeadcausewecanrebuildhim. AndKathycan'tdiecausewecan'tbringherbackifshedoes. I'mnotfastenoughtogobackandfixitandWallywouldn't--" His voice dissolved into an indecipherable buzz. Dana was close enough to try putting a hand on his shoulder, but gasped when it went straight through.
"Bart," Cissie's strained voice floated gently from one of the monitors. "Calm down, sweetie. It'll be okay. Come here." He disappeared suddenly from his chair, reappearing next to Cissie on the monitor. She whispered something in his ear, and he slowed down enough for her to wrap her arms around his waist.
"No," Beast Boy shook his head. "Not again." Raven took his hand in both of hers, staring at it intently.
"Both of them," Snapper rubbed his palms in his eyes. "She can't lose both of them."
"Shit," Agent Maad scowled at the room. "And APES isn't moving on this. Tactically infeasible my ass. They're probably throwing a damn party."
Anita said something in Cajun French, too low for Robin to decipher. Then, "what now, mon? What the hell do we do now?"
Can't let us lose control. Gotta take charge if before all of us lose it. His own emotions were fighting him again. "Everybody calm down," he said, infusing his voice with as much command authority as he could muster. "We can't let ourselves lose it. That's what they want." God, that sounds so cold.
"Easier said then done, Robin," Barbara's tightly controlled voice whispered in his ear. "They're not all trained like we are."
"How?" Dana stared at him. "You just--"
"W-we have to, ma'am." Greta's watery whisper wafted across the room. She raised her voice, addressing them all. "Tim wouldn't tell us that if he wasn't absolutely sure. It's Reddy and Kathy." She sobbed, and looked at Robin. Violently red splotches had exploded across her face, her mouth twisted into a painful grimace. "You're sure she's dead? I mean...she wasn't there..."
Robin wrapped an arm around her. "I found...someone threw her into the wall. There was--there were pieces of her skull on the floor. Full thickness. She couldn't have lived through that. As for Reddy, I brought the remains back. His neural net's been completely destroyed. We can't ... we can't fix that."
Greta kept sobbing, staring at her lap. "Not fair..." His hand found a specific compartment on his belt and he produced a handful of tissues, pressing them into her free hand. But then she took a deep breath, and stared up at them all. He barely held back a gasp. Tears streamed unhindered down her face, but her eyes--her eyes were lit with anger and purpose he hadn't seen since Darksied deactivated her metagene. "You said--you said that bastard killed them and took Traya. We've got to take her back. She doesn't have anyone else, and Reddy's counting on us. And that means pulling ourselves together, right now."
Oracle whistled in his ear. "That approach works, too. Good girl."
Don't I know it. Thanks for sticking with me, angel. Robin squeezed her shoulders, reaffixing his mask with his free hand. "She's got us." The effect was instantaneous. All around the room confusion and grief faded to the back as focus and determination took the fore. The slightest bit of awe shone in Dana's eyes, and his father looked again like a caveman dropped in New York City.
Cyborg smiled thinly. "Damn right."
"We're with you," Kon crossed his arms, floating into the air with a dour Cassie. The Kents looked at him approvingly. If anything, they always taught their boys to keep cool under pressure.
"So what's the plan, Tim?" Vic asked.
Robin started. Part of him was sure Vic would want to assert his authority. He had every right as a senior Titan.
Apparently, Vic noticed his hesitation. "Hey, man. I've spent most of my day fighting for my life and trying to dig Gar and me out of the gaping hole that used to be our house. Right now, you've had more experience with everything that's going on and I know you've got some kind of plan in that head of yours. Go ahead. I'll let you know if I think you're doing something stupid," he finished with a faint smirk.
"What he said," Gar joined in. Raven just nodded as a wave of encouragement washed over him.
"You heard them, Current Boy Wonder. I'll be monitoring the conference room's audio feeds. Oracle out." She sounded a bit distracted. He figured she was still busy trying to bring her systems back up. She would have announced if she was back in business.
Showtime, Robin. "Whoever did this wasn't entirely careful, and left forensic evidence at the scene. Various blood samples. I started running them through the system before I came up here. We're looking at an hour at least before we know if we have a match."
"That seems a little bit slow," his father offered. Dana glared at him, but Robin nodded.
"Much too slow. Apparently whatever sort of attack was used against our comms and the various civil service networks targeted the DNA databanks as well. All the high-speed links are offline, and taking the backdoor in only slows things down more. I'm also running a background check on the Byron guy I mentioned earlier. Something doesn't add up there. Regardless, we'll have to wait a bit for answers."
"What--what about Traya?" Greta managed.
Robin sighed. This won't be pleasant. "Whoever did this didn't leave much evidence where they were going. Makes sense if you think about it--Boom Tubes are the pinnacle of traceless entry and exit. But Kathy's body is missing. She...wouldn't have lasted very long. It doesn't make sense for them to have taken her to a hospital, so there was no reason for them to move her, unless--"
"Scavenger hunt," Ishido growled.
"Exactly," Robin scowled. "We're dealing with people that
enjoy watching us run around. There's no reason to take the body
unless they want to make us spend time looking for it, especially
considering the way they left the backstage area littered with
corpses. Once we find it, we'll more than likely find clues
pointing to Traya. They want us to find her. She's going to be in
bad shape. If we have to take care of her, so the logic goes, we'll
be less able to fight back. In the meantime, we're putting all our
effort into tracking her down."
"Monstrous," Leslie hissed. "To use the lives of others like
that..."
"Indeed," Alfred shook his head.
Robin pinched the bridge of his nose. "I've set up a search program to scan every morgue in North America for Jane Does matching Kathy's description. She should definitely be in the system by now. We'll have results in twenty minutes. Whoever did this wasn't smart enough to take those databanks' high-speed links out."
"So, we just wait?" Greta scowled.
"I'm afraid so, beautiful. Kon and I went over everything there. There was nothing to indicate where either of them were. If that search comes up empty, we probably won't be able to find her until we can get a better lead on who's behind this, and that'll take far longer."
"But we're not just going to sit here and wait," Robin continued, the final pieces of his plan clicking together in his mind. He clicked his earpiece. "Oracle?"
"Go ahead, Robin."
"I know you're busy, but I need your help. Gar? Raven?"
"Yes?" Raven nodded.
"I need you to go back to the Tower. Find a whole specimen of the attackers--or at least, enough pieces to make a whole specimen. Oracle will be standing by. Make contact and you'll get directions to Jason Blood in Gotham. He'll figure out what makes those things tick. Oracle will make sure he's expecting you."
"Ugh. That'll be a fun conversation. On it. Anything else?"
"Yeah," Robin frowned. "How soon before we have normal communications again?"
"Thirty minutes at most. Longer if Blood is an ass and I really have to convince him. I had to do a complete wipe and re-image. It'll a bit longer than that to figure out what happened in the first place."
"Damn. Robin out." He cut the connection. "Both of you, get moving as soon as you can. Good luck."
"Don't worry, man," Gar managed a small grin as he rose, Raven at his side.
"We'll take care of it," Raven smiled thinly as they turned to leave.
"Vic," Robin turned to the cyborg, "do you need any help repairing yourself?"
"Couldn't hurt," the older man returned gruffly, surveying the room. "Carr. You up for a little tinkering?"
Snapper nodded. "Kon. You think you could show us to a workroom? I always get lost in this place."
"No problem," Superboy said.
"We'll have you back in working order in no time, Vic," Snapper said. "It'll be a snap." he finished, snapping his fingers.
"Ishido?" Robin turned to face him. "How much pull do you really have with APES?"
Ishido raised an eyebrow. "Depends. What do you have in mind?"
Robin narrowed his eyes. "I need to know what they are really up to, at the highest levels. What do they know, and just how far are they willing to go to take advantage of the situation? I don't want to put us in a position to get blindsided. I'm also still interested in those casualty numbers and status reports on all major population centers." It would be nice to know how much of the law enforcement infrastructure is still functioning.
The agent smirked. "You do realize they wouldn't give any of that to you by choice." He shook his head. "I'll see what I can do."
Robin frowned. "For now, we can't really do much more. Everything will change when we start getting search results back." He looked to the monitors. Cissie was still holding Bart by the waist, but he looked far more together.
"Cassie," he continued. "Are you comfortable leaving for a while?"
She looked forlornly across the table. "Mom ... she's still not awake yet. I want to be around when she wakes up, but," her eyes hardened. "I want to get back at these bastards more. What do you need?"
Oh boy. That's not going to turn out well. No time to deal with it now. "Kon has Byron's address. Once he's free, I want you to scout it out. If it looks like you're going to have a fight on your hands, call for back-up first."
"Got it," she smiled grimly. "We'll turn the place inside out."
Robin cleared his throat. "Bart? Are you okay?"
Bart's amber eyes stared into the camera, huge and watery. "I ... I don't know, Tim. What do you need me to do?"
Robin gentled his voice. "For right now? Just concentrate on pulling yourself together. That goes for everybody. I know you feel like the ground's been pulled out from under you--I do too." And soon enough, it's really going to hit me, and I'm going to crash. Gotta keep it together for now, though. "As horrendous as all this is, the only reason it's happened is to make all of us suffer and grieve, so we'll be weaker when he finally decides to really try and kill us. We cannot allow our friends murders to overwhelm us to the point that we're unable to catch the murderers. It's not just about justice for Kathy and Reddy and Traya." Tears, violently swept aside. "Everyone else these people hurt," Cassie lowered her eyes, "and plan to hurt is depending on us." He felt a cold rage building somewhere deep in his chest. "And no matter what, we won't let them down."
Bart blinked several times. "We--no, I won't."
Robin nodded. "Most of you have assignments, and those of you who don't probably have places you'd rather be, so I'm not going to keep you here anymore. I'll call everyone back in as soon as we hear something."
Greta stood up as the room began to empty, a lost look in her puffy, red eyes. "I ... I need to go see my mother." She looked at Robin. "I..."
His brain abruptly shifted gears, and he put on a reassuring smile. "Want some company?"
She nodded, pressing into his side. "Yes."
He wrapped an arm around her. "We'll get through this," he whispered as they walked out.
"I know." Her mouth twitched, a failed smile. "But what about Traya?" She hiccupped roughly. "She doesn't even know her parents are gone. She's all alone."
He felt his chest constrict. "We'll get her back, beautiful. I don't know what'll happen after that, but she'll have us, just like you said." But she'll have to go somewhere. But where? Maybe--he crushed that train of thought. Not the time.
He watched the determination flood into her eyes, felt it surge up within himself. "And we're not going anywhere." She nodded once, and he watched her hair bounce.
"No. We're not."
