Deep beneath the city above, weights lifted and dropped. Gears groaned and clanked. The notches of wheels and the spikes of cogs struck against one another in the dark lair. Steam blew out of vents. The purpose of the massive machines was as mysterious the previous master who built it and his predecessor who now ruled in his place.
Under the dim light, a single darkened figure sat atop a metal throne intensely watching scenes unfold on massive television screens across the cavernous lair. Half of his mask was black; the other half was brown with a single eye slot. It was impossible to read his emotions but anyone misfortunate enough to fall under the gaze of his single visible eye would feel its stare penetrating down to his soul, as if probing for his darkest secrets before forcing it up to the surface.
Slade Grayson continued to watch the action unfold on the scene. His apprentice quickly dispatched the policemen with his combat gear and gadgets before they had a chance to draw their firearms.
Heavy footsteps echoed in the distance. The light from the screen illuminated the outline of a bulky silhouette making its way towards Slade. On screen, his apprentice seizing one of the barely conscious guards, dragged the man toward the facial scanner at the end of the corridor, and pressed his face against it. He then pried one of the guard's eyes open, bypassing the security. The doors opened and he stepped into a room guarded by alarm lasers. The apprentice stopped, uncertain how to proceed. Slade narrowed his eyes.
The approaching figure's long legs quickly closed the distance between them. But so intensely was he gazing at the screen, he appeared to not even notice Cinderblock, his ever loyal henchman, trudge across the darkened cavern and step into the light.
The giant approached even closer, now less than ten steps away from making contact with his master, and stood still.
On screen, the apprentice appeared to be hesitating. He looked about hastily, like a prey animal. Slade Grayson leaned forward slightly, eyes still narrowed in anger.
A low growl broke his concentration. He finally turned his head in the direction of his stone henchman whose head was bowed slightly.
"What are you doing here? You have orders to carry out."
Cinderblock didn't move and kept his head lowered. Slade scowled.
"Go."
Still nothing. Slade leaned back and folded his arms, clearly annoyed. He cared little for his henchman. The slow-witted creature was obviously too dense to speak but seemed at the very least, capable of understanding human speech enough to follow basic orders. He was nothing but a petty thug seemingly created by his predecessor to do his bidding. He didn't know and didn't care enough to find other uses for the concrete creature.
"Did you not hear me, stupid creature? I know speaking is beyond your limited mental capacity. Even if it wasn't, I wouldn't care. You understand speech and that is sufficient for me to retain your services."
Cinderblock slowly raised his head. Instead of the familiar blank red, the holes of his eyes were completely black as if a light had gone out. If he didn't have his master's full attention earlier, he did now. Slade tensed. By now, he had ceased watching the progress of his apprentice and stared uneasily at his minion, uncertain what he was going to do next.
Then Cinderblock opened his mouth and did something that completely took Slade off guard.
"Grayson." He spoke.
What!
Slade shot to his feet. By now, he had totally forgotten about his apprentice as he gaped in astonishment at his normally mute minion.
"Grayson." Cinderblock repeated, louder. Slade did a double take when he recognized language. Cinderblock then raised his head. His eyes were glowing purple.
"You- can speak?"
"Dick Grayson!" The giant boomed, his already loud voice raising by several decibels and his eyes taking on an unearthly glow. Slade shook. Part of him wanted to flee. Yet he remained rooted where he stood, partly out of refusal to show such disgraceful weakness by fleeing, partly out of fascination.
"Dick Grayson!" Cinderblock called loudly and he began to shuffle towards him, zombie-like, purple eyes fixed on him. Slade remained where he stood, frightened and fascinated by this sudden display of intelligence from his mute minion.
Slade blinked and Cinderblock was in front of him. He didn't even see him run up to him. It was as if the stone giant had literally teleported from several steps away to directly where his master stood. His stone hands shot out, wrapping themselves around Slade's neck and lifting him to eye level. Slade didn't even have time to yell. Cinderblock's mouth opened, far larger than its stone hinges would have allowed, growing impossibly long and wide. The darkness within it was swallowing him, till it engulfed Slade's whole vision.
"Robin…" A familiar boyish voice called. Slade looked around but it was so dark he couldn't even see himself.
"Why did you leave us?" Another male voice, deeper than the first, rang out.
"You never came back…."A British accented male voice said. Slade shook his masked head and gripped his masked face with his armored hands.
"Look at what you've become." A sorrowful but motherly voice wept. "You're not the son we raised. You are a stranger to us."
"In a way, I am glad I didn't live to see what I created." A fourth male voice accused harshly. "In a way, I am glad I didn't live to see what I created."
"You destroyed everything." A fifth male voice, much deeper and darker than the others snarled.
The owners of the voices materialized. A small, green-skinned boy. A tall, dark-skinned man with cybernetic implants. An elderly English gentleman in a tuxedo. A couple in circus tights held onto one another, weeping. At the forefront of them stood a tall man dressed in a black cape and cowl. Slade took a step back, his single eye wide, for he knew this man was the owner of the last voice.
"You! How did…" He shouted.
"Look at you." The caped man stalked towards him, towering over Slade Grayson. "You've given yourself completely over to your enemy. In your obsession to achieve victory, you've embraced the very thing you swore to defeat when I led you into this life."
"We will never forgive." The elderly English gentleman joined the caped man, snarling through gritted teeth.
"And we will never forget." The green teenager joined her, also snarling, his teeth turning into pointed fangs and his skin turning so dark it looked more black than green.
"Hell always more room for just one more." The cybernetic man smiled viciously, aggressively cracking his knuckles.
"It's over Robin." The man in the circus tights said. "You cannot win."
Slade whirled around, but whichever way he turned. They were there, looming large over him like jailers watching a cornered inmate. He was doomed. There was no escape.
"We will never go away. We will not stop. Not now. Not ever. We are the things that keep you up at night. The ghosts that haunt the dark corners of your tortured psyche. There will no respite, no release from your nightmares." The caped man snarled as he raised a hand gripping a familiar bat-shaped bladed weapon. Only now, it looked more stone than steel. A dark liquid dripped from its edges. Fighting panic, a desperate last minute thought entered Slade's mind.
"So this is it, Bruce? You've all come back from the dead to exact justice on me? What good would that achieve? What can you take from me what hasn't already been sacrificed?"
The ghosts hesitated. But just as his predecessor was, Slade Grayson was an expert in reading emotions and pressed his verbal attack as soon as he noticed the chink in the armor.
Grayson stepped towards the caped man, right up to his face. "And you still fancy yourself the guardian angel? You've promised never to kill. Now, you choose to take back that famous vow? Now, you come upon me in the wake of your death, threatening me with damnation and perdition in hopes I will realize the error of my ways and hurl myself at your feet in repentance? Do you still believe I will come back to you as a son?"
The ghosts shrank back farther, their hellish anger replaced with surprise at Slade Grayson's sudden defiance of them.
"Now, you fight! For what? Freedom? Justice? Peace? The salvation of my soul?!" Slade challenged loudly. "NOW, you have the gall to approach me as hungry ghosts, blame me for your deaths, and paint yourselves as victimized martyrs? Are you so sanctimonious to believe that death absolves you of all your wrongdoings in your earthly existences?"
Slade advanced menacingly on the ghosts who shrank back, seeming to fade. "I wanted to be this way! I chose this path! Because I am not afraid to see the world for what a hell it truly is! Because the justice and heroism you speak of is a lie! A lie told by thousands of generations who couldn't face they died in vain! For every insignificant life you choose to save, a thousand others worthier of being saved die in vain! Because the same criminals you so adamantly refuse to kill out of a stupid, misguided belief there is a better way harm innocents every day. By what right do you impose yourself on humanity, on me, and declare what is right and wrong as you see fit?"
"I founded the original Titans. I was their leader. I brought them all together. We fought, bled, and sacrificed together as one. And in a single cheated moment, they turned on me, and proceeded to rend themselves asunder in my absence. The so-called heroes and defenders of justice, the successors of the almighty Justice League, destroyed by petty accusing and victimizing over who was to blame for the team's demise! A demise they brought upon themselves moment they expelled me from their ranks!"
Slade's voice rose to a scream. "And in the end, it was I who singlehandedly defeated my greatest enemy, the previous wearer of this mask! With my mind alone, I outlasted and proved myself superior to all my enemies through guile, cunning, strength, and endurance! And I claimed his identity for my own!"
"ROBIN IS DEAD! I AM SLADE! NO ONE ELSE!"
The crescendo of his scream echoed through the darkness like a gunshot. He opened his eye and found himself alone in the darkness. He slowly stood up straight. The ghosts had vanished. The visions of his past were suppressed once more. His mind was as formidable as it ever was, unbroken and untouchable.
The brief feeling of triumph extinguished quickly when he felt something thick and viscous around his legs. He tried to lift one and found he was standing in some kind of tar-like substance. The more he struggled, the greater it sucked at his legs. Trying mightily not to accidentally fall and get his arms trapped as well, Slade didn't notice he was not alone until he heard a voice, the sound of weeping.
He looked ahead and still saw only darkness, until it subsided enough for him to make out the shape of a long-haired, apparently nude woman with her back facing him. The woman was tall with a thin, shapely figure and purple hair. She was sobbing quietly.
A chill ran down his spine. He had a horrible feeling he knew this woman.
The woman's sobs steadily grew louder. She was crying openly now. Her tears splashed loudly in the sticky tar-like substance. The cries rang loudly in the darkness, echoing around them. Then she suddenly choked, letting out a disgusting noise like the sound of someone vomiting, and doubled over. Then before his eyes, she began to change. Her already thin figure now looked horribly emaciated, her bones becoming visible. Her hair grew longer, darker, dragging on the ground and swaying before her. Her fingernails grew impossibly long and sharp, looking more like swords. Her weeping was replaced with the sound of heavy breathing that sounded more like croaking.
"Just… who… who are you?"
At the sound of his voice, the horrible sound stopped. The emaciated, long-haired creature, now no longer resembling a human, slowly faced him. Its head was still lowered so that its swarthy hair covered its face.
The thing raised its head and he saw its face. Slade Grayson instantly recognized whose it was and the very sight of it was more terrible than all the hells, evils, and demons he had faced in his lifetime. But he couldn't move or speak. Like a mortal gazing at Medusa's face, he was petrified before the sight of the face that had plagued so many nightmares and dreams.
And then the thing screeched. The unearthly sound was so great and so continuous that the very sound of it drowned out all his inner thoughts and nearly split his head with sheer agony. Bright lights danced before his eyes and his entire body vibrated as the massive blast of sound struck him. Slade didn't know if he screamed. It didn't matter if he did because whatever sound he could have made was dwarfed by the magnitude of this apparition's mindless shrieking.
"YOU LIAR!" The thing shrieked. It then crawled towards him at breakneck speed, totally unhindered by the tar-like substance. And was on top of Slade in a flash. Slade saw its gaunt face once more. And despite its sunken eyes and pointed fangs, it was impossible for him not to recognize it. It would forever reside in the dark corners of his tormented psyche; it would never rest as long as he lived.
Memories flashed by someone flipping the channels too quickly. He saw it again. Her beautiful figure, flowing red hair, her face young and in love. He heard the laughter they shared, their smiling friends and family standing by. He saw his love for her twisted and warped by his own sensual, wrongful desires. Wanting to dominate her and make her his. He pushed his friends away, pushed her away, tangling them further in his web of lies
That night. She came to him in tears, her very enticing body covered in sweat, desperately confessing her love. He couldn't stop himself. He took her.
He saw and heard their cries of triumph and ecstasy as the human and Tamaranian became one.
Then in the wake of his absence came his replacement, the one who was to take his place, the traitor, who would sow the seeds of his family's destruction. He saw the newcomer's deep blue eyes, blond hair, and a face like that of Alexander the Great. His powerful figure and proud military uniform. Despite everything, Grayson had failed so utterly to see the devil hiding behind the visage of an angel.
The battle. The tower's destruction, her laying bleeding to death on the operating table. Above it all, a single eyed brown and black mask filled his vision, looming over it all like a wrathful deity about to pass judgment. It was always there, since the very beginning. The evil that haunted the dark corners of his psyche even then and now. Now the single eye hole seemed to glow bright red as it witnessed the Boy Wonder's greatest moment of destruction.
"YOU LIAR!" The undead "thing" screamed again and Slade's own now joined it. The sounds mingled in devilish harmony even as the tar swallowed the rest of his body.
Before there was a bright flash of light and a terrible crash. He became aware of a bright light overhead. Slade swore, struggled, and screamed incoherently as crushingly strong stone hands held him firmly. It took him a moment to realize his mask was no longer on his face. Slade flailed his arms and kicked his legs, struggling out of Cinderblock's grasp.
"Master Slade! Cinderblock! Hold him down before he hurts himself!" Wintergreen shouted.
Cinderblock quickly closed the distance and pinned down the human. Wintergreen knelt down, tranquilizer in hand.
Several hours later when Slade had finally regained his bearings, he lay on his bed as Wintergreen wrung a wet towel over a bucket of water. Wintergreen was the only one allowed to see the face of Dick Grayson.
"What... what happened?"
"The boy has retrieved the request item from the vault. He successfully did as you had ordered. But you fainted before you saw the deed done." He placed the towel on Slade's head.
"Cinderblock…."
"Also carried out your orders to the letter. That is when you suddenly convulsed and fainted."
"He spoke to me."
"Pardon?"
Slade turned to Wintergreen
"Cinderblock. He spoke. He said my name. Then he attacked and…. I fainted. I was surrounded by ghosts. Then she came…." Dick let out a shuddering breath and covered his face, trembling.
Wintergreen stared for a moment before regaining composure.
"Cinderblock hasn't moved this entire time. He is still standing exactly where he is as we speak. "
"Are you implying he just walked up to me and I convulsed and fainted for no reason?" Slade tried to sound angry but his voice was too weak. His chest hitched. Wintergreen didn't argue.
"Rest master. Should I ask him to stand guard?"
"Get him out of my sight. He is not to enter this place without orders."
Wintergreen frowned slightly but quickly loosed his expression and bowed his head. "I will deliver your message." He picked up the tray and quietly left, closing the door behind him.
Slade took a deep shuddering breath and closed his eyes, vainly hoping that night's sleep would cure him of all that had just transpired. He knew it wouldn't. Their faces, her face would never stop haunting his dreamscape.
"Till death do us part." He whispered.