"WARNING- PERIMETER BREACH DETECTED. TWO TARGETS, INBOUND. DEFENSIVE MEASURES ADVISED," chirped the security system calmly, as the emergency lights continued to flash in a headache inducing rhythm.
"Are you KIDDING ME?" Kid Flash moaned, breaking the silence. "NOW?! Who would be attacking right NOW?! Come on! Give us a freaking break!"
"Worst timing ever..."
Superman quickly climbed off of Superboy and pulled him to his feet. There was a slight bit of chaos- after the horrible spectacle that had just occurred, nobody had been expecting anything as normal as an attack by two random super villains. There had been a lot of revealing going on, and a lot of people were still stuck on that. There was also the issue of Robin and Wren...
The twins themselves seemed to answer that question as they turned to walk away, down the hall and back to the med wing, ignoring the few others that started moving to respond to the alert.
"Freeze!" Batman snarled, nearly teleporting across the room to put himself in their path. Behind his cowl, his eyes were cold and narrowed. "Where do you think you're going?"
"The hell away from here." Wren snapped. "This isn't our problem."
"We're not finished! You have to honour your agreement!"
"The deal is off, and we don't have to do anything. " Robin cut in.
"I never made any agreement." Wren added acidly.
"You owe us your life." Batman hissed, thoroughly irritated by the ungrateful attitude. "Both of you."
"Deal with this yourself! We're out of here."
Batman gritted his teeth. He didn't have time for this back and forth with them. They were about to be under attack. "Look. If you want to choose this path...if you're comfortable with being lonely, villainous criminals, then fine. But at least have the honour and the dignity to pay your debts."
His harsh words finally seemed to have some impact on them. Their eyes flickered with flashes of guilt, and they inhaled sharply, but the venomous retorts stuck visibly in their throats. It was true, however much they hated to admit it.
They stood in that stalemate while the others rushed past and around them, trying to get ready and watch the confrontation at the same time.
"...Fine." Robin growled, looking positively murderous. Wren went red, but didn't protest. Batman gave a curt nod and reached for their arms again, dragging them through the hall like fussy children.
"Wait, wait, I'm coming too! Hold on, hold on!" Kid Flash rushed after them, tailed by a strangely solemn and silent Superboy. Batman was incredibly focused on his mission. He didn't spare the time or words to tell them to go away. They picked up Miss Martian and Artemis on the way.
When Robin looked back and realized the clone was with them, his lip curled into a snarl, but instead of returning his glares, Conner avoided his eyes the instant they met. It was confusing, to say the least, but he didn't have long to think about it before Batman's swift, determined pace found their little group in the league conference room once again.
The majority of the elder heroes were already there, gathered tensely around the long oval table. When Batman swept in, pulling the twins behind him, their muttered chatter ceased. They all were grim and stone faced, even the usually jovial Flash. In the middle of their semi circle sat Robin and Wren's mechanical packs- dinged, charred, and blackened, but still closed and intact.
Superman was the first to stand up. "Bruce, we're about to be attacked." he said. Robin almost sneered at his stating the obvious. Batman only stared. "Yes."
"We need to start putting up defences and securing the mountain. This can wait-"
"No." He thrust the twins into the middle of the room. "We do this now. We've waited long enough." He gestured his head in the direction of the packs and crossed his arms expectantly over his chest. "Go on. Open them."
Wren bristled like an angry cat. "Well damn. No please or anything, huh?" Her anger was a cover for the rapidly growing tide of fear raging inside of her, turning her stomach into an iron ball of sour dread. She shivered as she looked at the packs. This was it. There was no going back to their life after this. Once they opened those back packs for the heroes, and shared whatever secrets were inside, they were officially traitors to their master, worse than dead. No excuse would save them if he ever caught them- or when.
Because they really were fooling themselves, thinking that he WOULDN'T find them eventually. They had run away once, when they were little. Wren had woken up two days later, and Robin three days after that, with a week missing from their memory.
Beside her, Robin was realizing the same thing. His face was chalk white, and his grip was shaking and vice tight on her fingers, almost crushing the delicate bones.
Wren gulped, and her angry bravado faded away. "P-please..please don't make us do this." she choked. "He'll...he'll kill us when he finds out. There's gotta be...there has to be another way..."
A flicker of unease showed itself on Batman's face. For a second, he genuinely looked like he felt sorry for them. "I'm sorry. But there's not. We're flying blind here. The fate of multiple cities- maybe even the world- depends on this."
"B-but-"
"He'll kill you anyway, once he figures out that you owe us."
He was right, of course. Slade would not tolerate apprentices with a life debt to the other side. It was a no win situation.
In trying to save their lives, Robin had bargained them away, and now they were trapped.
Robin squeezed her hand and closed his eyes. 'I'm sorry.'
Wren returned the gesture and ran her thumb gently over his knuckle. 'I know.'
She wasn't angry with him anymore. How could she be? Robin had done something stupid, going back and trying to save her. But she couldn't kid herself anymore, and pretend like she wouldn't have done the exact same thing. They were each other's Kryptonite. And they were about to pay the price for their weakness.
Hand in hand, they strode forward, towards the instruments of their deaths. Wren reached for the pack with the R on it, and Robin did the opposite. Their faces were blank, and void of emotion. They had accepted their fate.
"We tried everything we could think of to get those things open." Wonder Woman mused. "How are you going to do it?"
"Just watch."
They reached under the packs and felt around until a small click was heard. A panel on each pack slid open on the front, complete with a keypad and a scanner. Suddenly, Robin grabbed Wren's wrist, in the same instant she reached for his. In perfect rhythm, they raised their fingers to their lips and sank their canine teeth into their flesh, biting down until they drew blood. Kid Flash winced. "Ugh..."
The action brought a slight flush to Wren's face. She'd bitten her brother before, but never in front of an audience. It felt wrong and shamefully erotic to do it in front of other people, when the action had such a different meaning for them. It was a claim to them, a marking thing. Hopefully the heroes only saw it as a quick way to puncture their fingers.
Robin, being the smartass he was, quickly flicked his tongue along the underside of her thumb, and she resisted the urge to smack him.
They pulled away, and rubbed their fingers together until the pads of their thumbs were coated in red. "It's a DNA encryption." Wren deadpanned, stalling the obvious question. "Robin's pack needs my blood and fingerprint to open."
"And vice versa." Robin added. "That way, if we were ever captured and separated, the info would be safe." He paused, then rolled his eyes. "Haha."
He pressed his bloody thumb into the scanner on Wren's pack. There was a small whirr and a series of shrill beeps as the scanner read him, and with a small hiss of air, the pack simply popped open. The other one followed seconds later.
Every elder hero in the room let out a huge sigh of relief and anxiety. "Finally." Superman hissed. An almost ravenous look crossed his face. Robin and Wren were forgotten, shuffled back against the wall as the sidekicks and their mentors crowded around.
"This is all my fault." Robin groaned quietly. Wren wound her thin arms around his torso and pressed her ear against his, the way she used to do when they were little kids. They crushed the sides of their chests together until the feeling and the sound of their beating hearts merged into one rhythm in their heads, drowning out everything else.
"It's both of our faults." Wren whispered. "But I don't blame you."
"Maybe we'll get one year in Italy before he catches us."
"What about Antarctica?"
"He has a base there. Plus Mr. Freeze vacations there."
"Damn. We are so screwed."
"Yup."
Their whispers went unnoticed by everyone else. Batman was the only one able to decipher the complicated codes on the data pads, and he studied them studiously as the alarm continued to blare and the others shifted restlessly. "Batman-"
"Quiet." His grey eyes scanned the pads, and the lines of his body tightened web irritation. "The codes are rewriting themselves...it's as though they're being edited at this very moment."
"What does that mean?"
"This is being changed...they're not reliable. The information is disappearing by the second."
Wren's breath shortened in her chest. Had they just forfeited their lives for nothing?
Superman suddenly jumped up and seized the pad. "That part was in Kryptonian! These...these are Kryptonian records!" True enough, Kryptonian script was streaming across the screens. "How did Deathstroke-"
"Wait...what in the name of-"
The rest of his sentence was lost in the noise from the sudden explosion that rocked the mountain and shook dust from the ceiling. As a unit, the supers and their sidekicks ran from the room, Wren and Robin being caught up in the tide and carried out with them.
The cause for the explosion was obvious once they reached the main hall. A gigantic hole had been blown in the wall, knocking the front doors right off their hinges. Standing dead center in the middle of that whole were three figures- one in a huge, sleek looking battle suit that gleamed green and violet in the bloody light of the setting sun. The other was smaller, the size of a regular man with a bare chest and green pants. But his skin was shining silver and chrome, and his eyes glowed red.
The figure in the battle suit slowly lowered its arm, and the smoking cannon attached to it. Robin blinked and nudged Wren's shoulder. "Hey...isn't that-"
"LUTHOR." Superman snarled, striding forward like a storm and cutting off his whisper. "How dare you come here like this!?"
The dome of the violet suit rolled back, revealing the shiny bald head of the man inside who grinned coldly. "Hello, Super-moron. Don't mind us, we're making a collection call." His eyes roamed across the heroes until he found who he was looking for.
"Ah, yes. You two." Wren and Robin flushed and tensed in unison. "I'd heard you were seeking refuge with them. You don't still happen to have those handy little backpacks, do you?"
"Nunya." Robin spat. Luthor cocked an eyebrow. "Unfortunate. You might really want to consider that answer. I'll put in a good word to your master if you do." Then he smiled. "From what I hear, you'll need it."
"It was a mistake coming here, Luthor." Hawkman rumbled, gripping his mace tightly. The super villain only smiled wider and gestured to his companion. "I don't think so. Maybe before, but I never take a risk when I have no chance of succeeding. I have a bit of help, you see...a gift, from Dr. Ivo, and made possible by your lovely and incompetent sidekick squad."
Robin could feel the heat from Conner's blush on his back even though the clone was behind him, and it was VERY VERY hard not to laugh, just for the hell of it.
"In any case, I have a more pressing engagement in a little while, so if we can move this along..." Luthor turned to his companion. "Amazo, you have a new objective- Recover Data."
The android lifted its head, and its eyes glowed an even brighter shade. "VOICE RECOGNITION- GUEST. LEX LUTHOR. OBJECTIVE CONFIRMED- RECOVER DATA." It immediately squared off into a battle pose, focused squarely on Robin and Wren.
"Oh-"
"Shit."