Pebblekit: Hey there, everyone. I apologize again for the delay. Both my editor and I got sick a couple of times and this is my senior year in college – things got a bit insane for a while. But they should calm down now. And I already have chapter ten completed and am just proofreading it a few times. So, this chapter, we find out what happened with Iris during the battle, get a glimpse at the past with Dick and Big Brother Roy, and then come back to the future for plot development. This chapter also heralds the arrival of a character who never appeared in the cartoon, but is prevalent in comics. He's been mentioned in the last couple of chapters and made a brief appearance in my other "Young Justice" story, to which no on openly complained, so I hope his presence doesn't chase anyone away.
Also…I noticed in another chapter that there was an editing note left behind. As odd as it sounds, my mom likes reading this story, but never finished the show. As such, I always put little notes in there for her explaining a few things. Usually, I manage to catch them all and delete them before I post the chapter (or I send it to her after I post it), but it appears I missed one. I was not in a position to fix it at the time and now can't find it. If anyone sees any of these, please let me know so that I can fix it.
Now, on with the chapter!
Disclaimer: I don't own DC comics, Young Justice, or anything to do with them. …But I wish I did. Oh, how I wish I did.
The Antics of Speedsters and Robins
Chapter 9
(Iris West, Central City. 2032.)
They'd been doing pretty well. Really, they had. Iris was certain that she and Damian would have been able to take Mirror Master, Trickster, and Heatwave into custody. As it was, though, Mark Mardon, the Weather Wizard, had made an appearance and immediately sent her tumbling head over heels into an alleyway behind her. Usually, Iris would have been able to avoid the blast of air. But this time, she'd been preoccupied with trying to get to pick up Trickster to get him to the police and hadn't seen Weather Wizard coming out from around a nearby building.
Sitting up slowly from where she'd been sprawled on the ground, Iris looked around her, trying to gauge how long she'd been out. Judging by how she was lying right next to a dumpster and the fact that her chest burned every time she breathed, she figured that she'd probably crashed into it and broken a rib. The pain wasn't too bad, definitely something she could handle without much issue. But fighting through it without causing further damage was something she wasn't looking forward to.
First, however, she needed to finish taking stock of the situation. There was the sound of strong wind coming from the main street, so Weather Wizard was still active. And attacking Robin.
At that thought, Iris panicked slightly. Damian was good. Really good. But Weather Wizard was one of the harder Rogues to take down and the other teenager had no experience fighting him. Carefully (though probably not as carefully as someone in her condition should), she pushed herself into an upright sitting position. Her head pounded slightly with the movement and she blinked, glancing up at the sun over the building across the way. It didn't seem any brighter than usual, so she figured she probably didn't have a concussion. Maybe just a bump.
Slowly, oh so slowly, she managed to stand, grabbing at the left side of her chest as a flash of agony struck through. Yup. She definitely had a broken rib. But she'd have to deal with that later. Damian needed help.
As she took a step forward, she realized something was…off. Missing. It took her a moment to figure it out, but then it occurred to her that Uncle Dick's prototype distortion monitor was gone. Usually, she clipped it inside the collar of her costume whenever she was in the field. She'd never had a problem with it staying on before. But it had apparently flown off with the force she'd hit the dumpster at.
On instinct, she looked around her, patting herself all up and down her torso as she did so to ensure that it hadn't fallen in her suit somewhere and she just hadn't noticed it. Before she could finish, however, she heard a voice behind her.
"Looking for this?"
Iris froze, recognizing the slightly teasing tone. Slowly, she turned to look over her shoulder. Hartley Rathaway was sitting on the dumpster she'd crashed into, garbed in his Pied Piper outfit. It was something of a hybrid between the two she'd seen him wear before. He'd gone back to the tunic shirt of the first while keeping the tights, thigh-high boots, cape, and longer hat of the second. The white polka dots patterning it somehow seemed super noticeable against the dark green of his tunic and Iris idly wondered if maybe she had a concussion after all. She brushed the thought away and threw her best glare at the rogue sitting in front of her as she saw that he was indeed holding Uncle Dick's invention.
If Piper was at all affected, he didn't show it, instead looking at the little machine in his hand. His flute was in the other, a constant threat. He seemed thoughtful, as though trying to work something out, a small smile growing on his face before he looked back to Iris.
"So you think he's still alive, then?" he asked.
Iris blinked, her anger fading within a time period that was fast even by speedster standards. Because…well...
"What?" she asked before she could stop herself, all of her confusion obvious in her voice.
Piper's smile grew more…dare she think 'friendly'. "Your father. Wally. You think he's still alive."
How was she supposed to answer that? She'd known, after all, that Piper had been helpful to the hero side of things more than once in the last few years. She'd even hoped somewhat that maybe he'd reform. But she'd never actually met him in any other situation than a battlefield on opposite sides. It was odd, to say the least. And she still wasn't entirely certain that he wasn't an enemy at the moment.
Due to all of this running through her head, it took almost two full seconds to actually understand just what was implied in the man's words. "You know what that is," she said, sounding more accusatory than she actually felt.
Piper turned to look at the little device again. "Oh, yes. I helped Nightwing and Red Arrow bring Baby Flash back the first time, you know." Of course she did. It had been a raging hot topic in Young Justice and the Justice League back then. Uncle Dick and Uncle Roy had gotten more than a few reprimands from other heroes chastising them for allowing a possible villain to help in their endeavors. He'd also been mentioned a couple of times in their notes. But she hadn't really thought about what that meant from a practical standpoint. How much did Piper know about the distortions themselves?
"I'm aware," she answered instead of asking her own question. If she could get him to drop his guard…Damian would have to make do on his own for the moment. Without the distortion monitor, there was no chance they'd be able to find Uncle Dick and Iris' father. She had to make getting it back her priority at the moment. If it had just fallen somewhere, that would be one thing and she could have come back to find it after the battle. But she couldn't leave it with Piper. That just wasn't an option.
She was positive that Damian would agree and do the same in her position.
But so long as Piper had his flute in hand, she had to be very careful.
Piper, however, didn't really seem to be interested in her at all. Instead, he was still looking at the little gizmo she'd dropped (or that he'd swiped from her – she'd probably never know). Just as she was beginning to think that she should make a desperate lunge for it, he spoke again. "Is Dick still alive too? Is that why Robin is teaming up with you?"
All thoughts stopped. First of all…Piper knew Uncle Dick's true identity. And Roy's too, because he'd mentioned it before. Not to mention, her father's. That probably shouldn't surprise her as much as it did. But did that mean he knew Damian's? What about hers, for that matter?
When she didn't respond, he shrugged slightly and…took his other hand off his flute. Iris almost leapt. Injured or not, she was still a speedster and could move much faster than him. But she froze as he began to fiddle with the monitor. If she hit him the wrong way, he could easily damage it, whether intentionally or not. And she and Damian were still trying to figure out exactly how it worked. They probably wouldn't be able to fix it.
"Huh…" he said as he turned it in his palm, poking and prodding as he did so. "Have you been able to connect this to a computer or anything of the sort?"
"No," she answered before snapping her jaw shut with a wave of shame washing over her. How could she have let something like that slip to an enemy? Sure, she and Damian still hadn't been able to get the Batcave or Mount Justice computers to play nice with the monitor, but that seemed like something that should be kept secret.
Piper just nodded shallowly as his tongue poked out from between his teeth in concentration. "I would think not," he mumbled, probably to himself if his volume was anything to judge by. "This wire came loose…" and he did…something. Suddenly, there was a small, almost indiscernible beep and a small blue light came on that Iris had never seen before. At the sight, Piper positively beamed and Iris had to stop herself from being taken aback.
She'd seen the Rogue smile before, but never like this. The happiness that lit up his face was irrefutable and could brighten even the darkest of rooms. When he looked up at her, his bright blue eyes were positively twinkling.
"That should fix it," he said and, before she'd even registered what was happening, Iris reached out to catch the monitor as he tossed it to her. It was a couple of seconds before she was able to decipher exactly what had just happened.
"I…you…what?" she spluttered unhelpfully. Sometime later, she would be mortified at her apparent stupidity in the wake of such a surprise, but right then, she felt nothing but dull confusion.
Piper laughed at whatever face she was making, but it wasn't a cruel sound. Or a mocking one, like what he usually let out during a heist. No, this one was clear and light. Suddenly, she found herself wondering if this was the first time she'd ever seen the man truly happy.
But why would he be?
Piper stood, showing surprising balance as he teetered on the edge of the dumpster before making a leap to a fire escape ladder on the other side of the alley. He climbed a couple of rungs with his arms alone until he was high enough up to plant his feet firmly on the bottom one before looking back down at Iris again. His flute had disappeared into the bowels of his costume at some point. "That should help you a bit. Find them, okay? If you're anything like your dad and Robin is anything like his mentor, I have no doubt you can. And will."
Just as he started to climb again, Iris finally found herself able to speak. "Wait! Why…why are you helping us? Aren't you on the other side?" Or are you an ally?
Somehow, she found herself dearly hoping her unasked question was the truth over the other.
Piper gave her an odd gesture – something between a shrug and a wince – before answering. "That depends on how you look at it. I'm no hero. After all I've done, I never could be. But…I could be a friend. I'd like to think Dick and Roy saw me as one by the end."
And with that, he scaled the rest of the ladder in a more than respectable time for a non-speedster and disappeared over the lip of the building's roof. Iris looked after him for a couple of seconds before turning her gaze back down to Uncle Dick's monitor. It didn't look tampered with, and nothing seemed out of place…
But she'd ask Damian to help her look at it more closely later, when they had the equipment to do so. As much as she wanted to believe that people like the Rogues could change, that there was good in everyone, she couldn't deny that the thought seemed too good to be true.
As she turned back towards the battle with Weather Wizard in the street (which seemed to have become rather quiet while she'd been distracted – maybe Damian had won?), she added a trip to go see Uncle Roy to her "things to do" list, right under talking to her mom about Deathstroke (for which she'd been trying to find the words to do so).
Maybe he could give her some insight on her musical villain.
(Dick Grayson. Mount Justice. 2012.)
Roy had decided to come over and visit for the day, which was rather unusual for the archer. Of course, as soon as he'd gotten there, it became obvious that the real reason he'd come was to borrow Mount Justice's computers to find Speedy. Dick didn't mind, though. His honorary older brother had been getting more and more obsessive in his search and, quite frankly, the more he was in Dick's view and safe, the better.
It was difficult, though. Dick…had known the real Roy Harper. Not for very long, only for a couple of months. But he'd known him. Seen his smile, watched his slow-building temper almost ruin two of their recon missions, and helped fix a couple of his arrows when they didn't release a sleeping gas correctly. They'd been friends. It was really hard to think that that…was gone now. Had been for a long time. And he hadn't even known it.
He could only imagine how this Roy Harper felt about it all, what with finding out he was a clone. Dick knew, even without being told, that the older boy didn't feel like…well, a person. He felt like a fake, as though he'd stolen someone else's life and taken it for his own.
From a certain point of view, Dick figured that that could all be construed as the truth. But Roy was forgetting, or he chose not to see, that the last few years had indeed been his own life. Not Speedy's. Speedy was the one who had become Dick's friend. Roy had been the one to proclaim himself Dick's older brother. Roy was the one who had stood by his side during mission after mission, risking his own life for Dick's again and again. Roy was the one who had died to save Wally and Dick in Operation Failsafe. Not Speedy.
Maybe Speedy would have done the same if he'd been there, but Dick honestly didn't know.
Contrary to what everyone said, he recognized subtle differences between Roy and his original (and boy, did it make Dick sick to think of it like that). No one was entirely sure when, exactly, the switch had taken place, but Dick had a very distinct impression of the period of time it happened during.
Four months after he'd met Speedy for the first time, the older sidekick (because they hadn't yet called themselves 'partners' back then) had suddenly started talking about how he didn't like his superhero identity. That it didn't feel like his, but rather, something given to him that he didn't feel quite comfortable with.
Even at the time, Dick had found the situation odd, as Speedy had never hinted at feeling that way before. He'd had a temper, yes, but he'd always had a blast out in the field, even if he'd never admit it out loud. Then, suddenly, something seemed to change.
Dick often found himself wondering if that was the point in time that the original Roy Harper had disappeared and the clone one had taken his place. Considering Connor, with his placement issues, it would make more than a bit of sense. Perhaps the clones were, genetically speaking, perfect copies. But it seemed that there was always something that didn't quite fit. Some inkling that they were…wrong. At least to the clones themselves. No one else seemed to have noticed or had a problem.
Not only that, but it was odd that Roy had chosen to speak to Dick about his misgivings, because up until then, Speedy had always been closer to Kid Flash than to Robin. Maybe it was because he'd found a kindred spirit in Dick, someone who understood having to lose everything to gain a retry. Roy had been an orphan and the only reason Green Arrow had ever noticed him was because he'd gone to judge an archery competition that Roy happened to win.
Though the older boy hadn't known Dick's true identity back then, maybe he'd seen something of himself in the small shadow that ambled right at Batman's back.
Whatever the reason, that night was what changed the relationship between the two of them forever.
Now, Dick was listening to a rather familiar conversation. Once again, Roy was telling him that he felt misplaced, wrong, out-of-sorts, and twisted. Only this time, things were much worse. There wasn't anything Dick could do to refute those fears. Honestly, they were all true.
Roy was misplaced, as he'd been dropped right into the center of someone else's life without even knowing it. He was wrong, if only because he wasn't who he'd thought and made himself to be. Nothing Dick could say would change any of that. All he could do was be a supportive shoulder, stay by Roy's side, and remind him over and over again that they were still brothers.
That was becoming harder as the months went on and Roy sank further and further in his despair. Every one of his waking moments were now dedicated to finding Speedy (which was the name the original Roy had somehow become associated with in Dick's mind. After all, it got too confusing thinking of them both by the same name and he honestly knew the clone better).
So, Dick bit his tongue and helped Roy type search parameters into the computer for the sixth time that day.
If anything, at least it kept his mind off of…other…goings on.
Wally, who usually helped them at points like this, had disappeared, which was becoming less and less uncommon. If Dick turned his head to the side, he'd be able to see the speedster talking with Artemis in the kitchen. The couple had been getting closer and closer in the last couple of years, and now they were all but inseparable. Even Roy coming here hadn't been able to pull Wally out of his love-filled daze.
Dick had to fight the urge to roll his eyes in exasperation as Artemis let out a snort (for she would never giggle like most girls their age), followed by Wally's deeper laugh. Such things were normal at this point, both from the two standing in the kitchen and from M'gann and Connor wherever they wound up together. Not to mention Kaldur, who was almost continuously pining over Tula, especially since she and Garth had joined the team. Everywhere he turned, Dick ran into mushy love stuff. There was no place to escape it.
For a while, he was able to distract himself with Zatanna, but that ended almost as quickly as it started. After the threat of all of the Justice League being taken over by The Light had passed, the romance, if it could be called that, between the Robin and Magician had petered out within a couple of months. While both had tried to revive it, it never really worked out.
Zatanna claimed that they just didn't fit. Like crooked puzzle pieces. Dick knew what the real problem was. He just didn't want to think about it. He never did.
But as Wally laughed more heartily from the kitchen and a slight twist ripped through the pit of Dick's stomach in reply, he couldn't really deny exactly what was traveling through his head at the moment.
Something must have shown on his face because Roy actually stopped what he was doing for a second to stare at him. "Are you alright?" the older boy asked, hands still on the keyboard of the computer.
So lost as he was in his thoughts, it took a couple of seconds for Dick to reply. "What?...Oh. No, I'm fine."
Roy looked about as convinced as Dick's words had sounded.
A moment of silence passed between the two of them that was broken only by Wally and Artemis laughing again in the kitchen (and really, couldn't they go somewhere more private?). Roy looked up and over towards them before turning back to Dick, an odd look crossing his face. "I get it," he said, sounding more like himself than he had since his search for Speedy had started.
Dick didn't know what to say. He himself didn't get what was going on with him, so how could Roy? "I don't know what you mean," he said, not able to meet the older boy's eyes.
Roy just shook his head slowly, finally pulling his hands away from the computer. "Wally has changed. Even I can see that, and I haven't exactly been around much." So he was aware how withdrawn he'd become in the last couple of years. "Every time I've seen him recently, he's all over Artemis and you're alone off in a corner somewhere."
Dick wanted to say something, to defend Wally. After all, his best friend was older. Logically, Dick had always realized there was a chance something like this would happen. But…as Roy spoke, he felt an odd emotion rise in him. It wasn't anger or anything like that, but rather something like resignation. As though he knew there was no way out of the current circumstances he found himself in concerning the speedster. That wasn't reassuring at all.
When he didn't speak, Roy gave him a sympathetic look that was all sinew and bone – Dick realized just then how much weight his older brother had lost in the last months – and continued. "It's always hard when our best friends' interests are drawn elsewhere. And Wally has always been oblivious. I'm willing to bet he hasn't hung out with you outside of missions in the last two months."
Actually, it was closer to four, but Dick chose not to say that. This…gentle side of Roy had been rare even before everything in his life had fallen apart. And Dick had been witness several times to how easily it could disappear, and how quickly. The last thing he wanted to do was incite Roy's infamous anger. "I've always known this was a possibility," he said.
Roy gave him a sad little smirk that left his face almost as soon as it came. "That doesn't make the reality of it any easier to deal with. I went through a variation of this. Kaldur wasn't always with Tula like Wally is with Artemis, but I can't tell you how many times she was literally all he'd talk about during our bro time."
That was a little hard to picture, but Kaldur was known for his loyalty and propensity to see everything through to the end. And it was impossible to deny what he felt for Tula.
Dick tried to smile at Roy, but he could feel how small it came out being. "Sorry. I didn't know all of that."
Roy shrugged his apology off. "It's not your fault. But I can't possibly begin to describe how many times I'd smile at him, tell him it was okay that he rambled about her, and didn't complain whenever he cancelled plans to go see her. All while I was seriously fighting the impulse to slam my head into a wall until I knocked myself out."
Despite himself, Dick had to chuckle at that mental image, if only because the sentiment was beyond familiar. "So-sorry," he said at Roy's questioning gaze. "I just…I know how you feel. Felt."
Roy nodded. "I thought so. Wally will come around at some point, but it will probably take a while. He can be dense at the best of times, and I can only see that becoming worse when he's shrouded in a love cloud." He had to stop and smile a bit as Dick couldn't stop a choked snort there. "Until then, just keep your wits about you. Make sure you're there in the few moments that he realizes he needs you, be there at the end of it all, and someday, he'll realize how much of an idiotic jerk he's being."
"I'm trying. But that's all easier said than done."
"Tell me about it."
Silence fell between them again and Dick couldn't stop himself from looking back over towards the kitchen. He could see shadows spilling out from the brightly lit room and surmised that Artemis had probably just fed Wally something. His suspicions were confirmed with an appreciative noise from his best friend.
Before he realized what he was doing, Dick sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. "Do you think it's serious?"
Roy shot him an odd look before shrugging. "You're here far more. You tell me."
"I want an objective opinion. I'm too close to this," he answered, trying to ignore the nervousness rising in him.
Roy stared at him for what felt like quite a while before responding. "Yes. I think it is."
Dick nodded, already having come to the same conclusion himself about a year before. It hadn't been long after that when Wally had started obsessing over his girlfriend. And within months, he'd started pretty much ignoring Dick's presence. "I thought so."
Something in him twisted, but he pushed it aside. He couldn't pay it any mind. Not now. Not after he'd tried so hard to ignore it all this time. It would only cause problems.
Roy was watching him, his jaw clenching and unclenching. After about half a minute, he hit the sleep button on the computer, pushed his chair out, and stood in one fluid motion. "Come on," he said.
Dick couldn't even respond for a bit, taken aback by his brother's sudden movement. Ever since the incident on the Watchtower a couple of years before, Roy had been a ghost version of himself, hardly talking, hardly doing anything outside of his search. Finding Speedy had become the very point of his life, and all else suffered for it. But right then, his whole attention was on his younger brother, who didn't even share blood or a last name with him.
Dick almost felt like he was intruding on something. "What? Where?"
Roy shrugged. "Somewhere. Anywhere. Just so long as it's not anywhere near that," he said, gesturing with a hand just as Artemis and Wally…did something or other in the kitchen that created a ruckus. Dick was trying really hard to ignore them.
"But…why? Do you think you know where Speedy is?" he asked. That had to be it. That was the only thing that would get Roy moving these days.
But his brother just shook his head. "No, I don't. But…I think he'd forgive me if I took a day off. Let's just go. Somewhere. Just the two of us. We can hang out and play video games if we want to. Or go find baddies to take out. Or go see a movie for all I care. Let's just go."
And for the first time in two years, Dick looked at Roy and saw Roy. The boy who had tugged him close on a December night in Gotham years ago and said his gift for Christmas that year was a big brother, whether he liked it or not. The boy that had thrown his hat down and refused to even speak with the Justice League or Young Justice after that Independence Day fiasco only to call at least three times a week to make sure they were okay.
It didn't matter that he'd lost weight, or that there was a dark shadow across his face and deep worry lines carved into his forehead that hadn't been there before.
This was Roy. Not Red Arrow. Or Roy the Clone. Or even Speedy as he had been at one point.
Just Roy. His brother.
Within seconds, he felt the corner of his mouth tug up into its old smirk and his old cackle passed his lips. It felt strained and brittle because it'd been so long since last he'd made them. But they were there. "Alright then. Lead the way, boss."
And Roy did.
(Damian Wayne. Central City. 2032.)
Damian had never been so embarrassed in his life. Jay Garrick had practically carried him away from the gaggle of reporters with Iris following, so at least he didn't have to deal with that anymore. But at the same time, he was more than fairly certain that his…kidnapping (what else was he supposed to call it? Not rescue. Certainly not) had been caught on film by at least one of the news stations that had been present. He could already imagine what his father was going to say once he saw whatever footage had been taken.
But right now, he was more focused on the little mechanism in his hands. Grayson's distortion monitor had a small, blue light that he had never seen before. Iris stood to his side, right within his peripheral vision, wringing her hands and looking nervous, her hair still sticking out every which way with Trickster's gelatinous concoction. Garrick was over to the other side, sitting on a desk with his arms crossed and a thoughtful expression gracing his features. The three of them were hunkered down in a safe house that the speedsters had set up years before.
Damian searched every square millimeter of the monitor, but no matter where he looked, he could find nothing out of place. Nothing seemed tampered with or changed. And yet, something had to have been for that little light to come on. Something small, maybe.
"You're sure he said a wire had fallen out of place?" he demanded, rather upset when Iris flinched slightly at his voice. He hadn't sounded that angry, surely. After all, the girl hadn't really done anything wrong. She'd been unconscious. She'd told him and Garrick immediately about Pied Piper and the monitor (at least, as soon as she could when not having to worry about prying ears). She hadn't gone and assumed that everything was alright. In fact, she seemed just as worried as he did, which was a sort of relief, judging by how hopeful she'd been at her school earlier that day that Piper might have switched to their side. She hadn't really said much about it, but he'd seen it in her face.
The only thing he could fairly fault her with was the fact that she'd put the monitor in a place that wasn't very secure to begin with. Though, even that would be a weak argument, as she'd been the one handling it for the past couple of months and had had no issue until today. Besides, she didn't have a seemingly magical utility belt like he did. The only place on her costume she stood a chance of having some protection in was the compartments on her wrists where she usually kept snacks, but she'd tried that once and quickly discovered that she couldn't feel or hear the thing if it started vibrating or beeping. There wasn't much she could have done differently to make this state of affairs any better.
Damian knew that, logically. He wasn't upset with her, but rather with the situation as a whole. However, as he watched her fumble her words for a couple of seconds, he wondered if maybe he should make this clear to Iris, who seemed to wilt a bit under his glare.
"Yes, that's what he said. The light came on and it beeped while he was fiddling with it."
Damian nodded and looked back down at the monitor. Nothing seemed different than before. If a wire truly was out of place, it would have had to have been a rather miniscule fix. Which left a number of questions he really wasn't sure he wanted the answers to. "Did he say anything else about it?"
Iris thought for a moment before twitching her head up and down in what might have been meant as a nod. "Before he started really messing with it, he asked if we'd been able to get it to connect with any other computer systems."
Damian immediately took a step closer to her and regretted it when Iris mirrored his movements backwards. Garrick watched closely from the side. "What did you say?"
He knew her answer before she gave it, just by judging on how she hesitated. "'No.' I said 'no'."
"Why did you reveal that to him?" he demanded, feeling a bit of annoyance rise. Iris had proven since they'd started working together that she was actually quite intelligent, if not rather competent. Surely she knew that that was a stupid move?
"I didn't mean to. It just…came out." Her voice was very small.
Garrick jumped in then, and his words were rather disquieting. "We're talking about someone who specializes in hypnotism. Is it really that big of a stretch to think that he might have made her tell him?"
Iris looked outright disturbed at this idea, her eyes growing wide. "But…but his flute was in his hand! Can…can he do that? Control people, even without it?"
Damian had to admit that he didn't feel any better about that possibility, and he wasn't exactly happy when Garrick nodded. "I believe he might be able to. No one knows for certain what he's capable of, but he can do his hypnotism with a variety of instruments and, sometimes, other things. Not only that, but Wally once swore to me that he was certain Hartley had gotten him to reveal the location of one of our safe houses with just his voice."
Damian looked at the older man sharply, thoughts going into overdrive. He could understand other instruments and such, providing Piper had built or modified them himself. After all, no one really knew exactly how he built his gadgets. But…his voice was entirely different. "Iris, did it appear that he had a voice changer or something similar on his person?"
Iris shook her head, the frenzied look in her eyes making it obvious that she had reached the same conclusion as he and, going by the worried twitching the older man had just taken up, Garrick as well. "No, I didn't see anything like that. I mean, I guess he could have had something hidden in his cape, but I didn't see anything from the side when he went up the escape ladder."
"Which means," Damian said, realizing his voice sounded a bit more solemn than he'd intended, "we need to assume that Piper's powers are not simply limited to his technology."
Garrick gave him a dark look that was, for once, not actually aimed towards him. "Are you implying that Hartley's a meta-human? About a decade ago, when the public first started getting really worried about people like us, the police started testing all villains as they were arrested for any strange anomalies that popped up in their blood. Piper tested clean. They found nothing unusual. Not only that, but Batman went over the results as well. For all intents and purposes, he's a regular human."
And yet, Garrick didn't sound fully convinced. "Perhaps something changed," Damian pointed out, feeling that this discussion was somewhat obvious. "After all, you, Allen, and West were all born as normal humans. As was Beast Boy."
Garrick nodded. "I thought of that. Which is why I didn't imply that it wasn't impossible," which he really hadn't, now that Damian thought back. "This just means that we're going to have to be very careful with how we conduct ourselves from here on out, especially around him."
Damian nodded, but it was to his eternal shame that it was Iris who realized exactly what Garrick had just said.
"…how…we conduct ourselves? As in, Damian, me, and…you?" the girl asked, face lighting up when Garrick nodded with a small smile.
"Yes, my dear, that is precisely what I meant."
Damian stared at the older man, honestly not sure what to say for once. Because…up until now, everyone else had written them off. Even father. Even Iris's mother. And yet…
"You want to assist us?" he asked, still not sure he was really hearing what he thought.
But Garrick just nodded again. "Yes."
Iris seemed just as doubt-filled as Damian felt. "But…but what if we're wrong? What if we're just wasting time?"
Garrick just smiled wider. "Iris, sweetie, in my long life, I've discovered that anything that involves helping others is never a waste of time. Even if we are wrong, we at least tried. Your father disappeared once before and came back. I see no reason why the same can't be true this time. For Dick as well. And if not, well, then we can finally let their memory rest in peace once we've proven they're really gone beyond a shadow of a doubt. Unless we do so, I know the two of you will live in turmoil, wondering if you could have done more. Wally and Dick wouldn't want that. So, for their sakes, as well as both of yours', I'll help you. I can't promise I'll always be available when you need me, or that I'll make much of a difference, but I'm on your side."
Damian opened his mouth to respond, but found that he had no words. As Iris devolved into happy tears (really? Was that really necessary?), he could have sworn he heard a delighted cackle in his ear. "Well, now, look at that, Dami. You guys aren't alone after all," Grayson's voice said, too quiet for anyone else to hear. There was a slight echo to it, as had been the case since he'd started hearing it. But, of course, when Damian turned to look behind him, no one was there.
Author's Note: And that's it for chapter nine. Thanks for sticking round this long guys! Chapter ten should be up before too long and is about the same length or a little longer than this one. So, as a small…preview? Next chapter, we get a little deeper into Damian's head and insight into his relationship with Dick. Kind of. And then we get a glimpse into the alternate world that Wally fell into when he disappeared in the Arctic.
Thank you to everyone still here. A special thanks to anyone who added this story to their favorite or alert lists. A Super Duper Special thanks to anyone who reviewed!