I do not own Young Justice or any of the characters.

Brutality

Cassius watched the Bio-Ship leave, sighing heavily. They were going to stop Queen Bee, dictator of Bialya, from manipulating the ruler of a neighboring country into handing over the entire country to her. Kaldur was helping Aquaman at the moment, so Robin had been placed in charge. While the Team dealt with that, however, Cassius, Cassandra, and Rose, were all going to be going through intensive training under Batman, Superman, and Martian Manhunter. After eleven days of silence, the League had finally reached the decision that they couldn't protect Cassius or the girls, so they would be trained harder in order to get them ready to protect themselves.

"Are you ready?" Batman asked.

"No," Cassius said. "But I don't have a choice."

"Before we begin, have you remembered anything new about him?" Batman asked.

"No," Cassius said. "Nothing. And not for lack of trying."

Batman nodded. "Maybe if you would tell us who you used to be, we would know who it was."

"No," Cassius said flatly. "I'll just take the training."

Batman watched him in silent for a moment before turning and walking back to the Zeta tube, Cassius and the others following.

Cassius groaned, pushing himself to his feet as Batman readied himself again. He was dying. He had to be. He was in more pain than any of his training sessions as a Shadow. However, he also knew he had no choice in the matter, so he readied himself again and charged. He threw a punch at Batman, who leaned out of the way and drilled a fist into his gut. He spun, throwing a windmill kick and received a foot between his legs. He staggered away, then ducked under a punch, only for Batman to drill a knee into his nose. Then, a foot connected with his solar plexus and hurled him backward out of the run, gasping and wheezing. Batman turned away from him, turning to Rose next. She charged instantly, striking viciously and quickly, only for him to beat her just as mercilessly as Cassius, sending her rolling out of the ring within seconds, as he had every round all day.

Cassandra didn't give hi the chance to turn to her before she charged. She slammed a roundhouse kick to the back of his leg, dropping him the that knee before flipping and slamming a kick into the back of his head. He fell, only to transition into a somersault, catching her head between legs and yanking her to the ground. She flipped and twisted instantly, slipping out of his grip before kicking off his chest, flipping backward to her feet. Batman flipped to his feet as well and stepped forward, punching at her, only for her to knock it aside, as well as the next, forcing his arms across his body before jumping and slamming her feet into his crossed upper arms, throwing him away. He landed in a backward somersault and regained his feet just in time to catch a punch and spin, sweeping her feet out from under her before hurling her away. As soon as he let go, he turned, deflecting a punch from Cassius, then slammed a knee into his solar plexus yet again, once again robbing him of his breath. Cassius staggered backward before Batman delivered a handful of punches to his head in a second before spinning and slamming a windmill kick into his chin, spinning him and dropping him on the spot. Rose charged again, but Batman caught her punch and spun, slamming her into the ground in an arm bar. Then, he released her arm and slammed a kick into her side, throwing her out of the ring two feet off the ground.

"You two aren't doing well enough," Batman said before leaping over Cassandra, landing behind her.

As he moved to punch her, however, she used a windmill kick to knock his punch aside, then set her foot down before her other snapped up, slamming into the small of his back and causing his muscles to all spasm at once as she hit a nerve, dropping him to the ground before dropping and holding a batarang to his throat.

"Better," Batman said. "At least one of you can fight well."

Cassandra backed away, putting her batarang away before readying herself again. Then, they continued.

Cassius grit his teeth, straining under the weight on the bar. He didn't want to say Batman was intentionally being an asshole, but Batman was supposed to be spotting him while he bench pressed to test his strength, but instead had walked away to get a lemonade from Alfred, leaving Cassius to try and lift three hundred fifteen pounds alone without resorting to his powers. His arms were shaking like they were having a seizure, sweat was pouring down his beat red face, and the bar was going nowhere, sitting about halfway up.

"Lift," Batman said flatly as he stepped up beside Cassius.

Cassius resisted the urge to snap at him. Doing so would both get his ass kicked and make him drop the bar on his chest. Batman stood over him for several long seconds, sipping at his lemonade before setting it down and walking away, calling Cassandra and rose over to spar. Except, he was even more brutal than normal. The bar began to slowly descend as Cassius glanced at the ring in time to see Batman drill a punch into the top of Rose's head so hard her head bounced off the ground. Then, when Cassandra moved to fight him, he caught her punch, allowed her to punch him with her other arm in order to catch that, then drilled a knee into her gut before swinging her around into Rose. And just like that, fury flooded Cassius and the bar slammed down on its rack with him only barely noticing. He stormed into the ring and Batman turned to him, nodding.

"Better," Batman said. "Now control your anger and attack."

"Oh, I intend to attack," Cassius snarled, lunging at striking, only for a blistering barrage of punches and kicks to slam into him.

Batman was holding nothing back, and within seconds, Cassius was lying on the ground in a heap, groaning and bloody.

"Why do you insist on teaching her to read, write, and speak the hard way?" Manhunter asked. "I could simply use my telepathy to teach her."

"No thank you," Cassius said, not looking away from the paragraph Cassandra had written as part of her class. "Telepaths only had anything to do with Cassandra when they were being used to torture her in order to teach her to resist. She doesn't even let Megan in during missions. I pass messages and orders to her myself. Also, if you used your telepathy to make her be able to speak, there's a chance you might weaken her ability to read people's body language."

"I see," Manhunter said. "Very well. I will leave it to you, then." He looked at the clock. "It is time for more training."

Cassius sighed and nodded, following him out of the library with the others, the four of them heading down to the cave where Superman was going to be sparing with them instead of Batman, partially to see if they could adjust to a new opponent, and partially because Batman was away on a diplomatic mission as Bruce Wayne. Cassius went first, attacking Superman as viciously as he'd been learning to attack Batman, but his strikes were about as effective and as painful as punching a brick wall. Superman was careful not to break anything when he hit back, but his Kryptonian body was solid when Cassius punched it anyway. As he had expected. Still, he fought for as long as he could manage before eventually being flung out of the ring.

"You're using your rage for your power?" Superman said.

"I'm using what Batman's been beating into us," Cassius said.

Superman frowned but nodded and Rose charged next. She did well, but not as good as Cassius. Then, Cassandra went. Her fight was longer, with her ability allowing her to avoid his strikes better than the others, and even though her own strikes were as useless as the others' had been, she kept at it relentlessly until he finally hurled her out of the ring too.

"Rose, Cassius, you two shouldn't be using your rage," Superman said. "I know that's what Batman is trying to teach you, but your your specific previous training, you shouldn't. It's easy to lose yourself to that."

"What then?" Rose asked.

"You both need to find something," Superman said. "Cassandra's found something. She doesn't use her anger to fight."

Cassius glanced at her before nodding slowly. "I'll try."

"I suppose I will too," Rose said. "Using my anger is what my father tried to teach me, too."

"Good," Superman nodded. "Now, the three of you are going to fight me and Manhunter together. Cassius, go ahead and use your goo to enhance your strength."

Cassius nodded, encasing his arms and legs before they all charged.

Cassius groaned as he dragged himself back to his feet. It was the last week of their intensive training. He hadn't noticed any progress, but they'd graduated from being beaten bloody by Batman, to being beaten bloody by Batman, Superman, and Manhunter all at once. It was not as fun as it sounded. He took a breath before charging again, forming his goo around his arms and legs once again, only for Manhunter to fly out of the ground and punch him, sending him flying into Superman's fist. He crashed to the ground and bounced, landing on his feet just in time for Batman to grab him from behind, swinging him backward and slamming him onto his upper back. He groaned and the three Leaguers all moved away from him so that Rose could go. Cassius groaned, letting his strains, bruises, cracked cheekbones, broken nose, and various other injuries would heal before standing just as Batman's roundhouse kick hurled Rose away, the girl completely unconscious. Cassandra charged instantly, and, as always, did well. However, with three of them fighting her at once, even she didn't last very long.

Cassius dropped onto the goo throne with a long, loud groan, Cassandra and Rose both dropping into the two he'd formed for them as well, Rose groaning and Cassandra silent and seeming for all the world to not be in pain, though Cassius knew otherwise. They'd finally finished the training and were sent back to the Cave. Batman had an important League meeting to attend to, Connor had left to walk Wolf and didn't come back, and everyone else was away having Thanksgiving dinner, besides Zatanna and Megan who were splitting their time between Megan worrying about Connor and helping Zatanna make Thanksgiving dinner for the Team. Cassius felt bad for not helping, but he barely had the strength to stand.

"Dinner's almost ready," Megan said, walking into the room. "Are you okay?"

"We'll be fine," Cassius said. "Eventually." He looked over at the door as Zatanna walked into the room. "Zatanna, can you heal broken bones?"

"I can probably reset them, noses being the easiest, but it would be as painful as anyone else doing it," Zatanna said. "No actual healing."

"Alright," Cassius nodded. "Worth a shot."

"Who's hurt?" Megan asked.

"I have a hairline fracture in my skull," Rose said. "And Cassandra broke the bones in her right hand."

"What!?" Megan gasped. "Why!? Who did you fight?"

"I fought Batman," Rose said. "Cassandra broke her hand against Superman's jaw."

"What!?" both girls almost shrieked.

"That's horrible!" Megan said.

"Why would they force you to go through that!?" Zatanna asked.

"Because that guy I fought on Ice Fortress five will do a hell of a lot worse than break our hands," Cassius said.

"I'll see if I can find anything to help," Zatanna said. "I'm sure my dad had something to help people heal faster."

"Thank you," Cassius said, then groaned as he pushed himself to his feet, both of the girls standing as well, Rose also groaning. "Alright. Let's get cleaned up for dinner. You two need a hand getting anything ready?"

"No, we can manage," Zatanna said. "Thank you though."

Cassius nodded and headed for the bathroom with the girls. Once they'd washed their hands, they headed to the dining room, arriving along with most of the others and taking their places around the table for dinner with the Team.

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