Summary: YJ S1 Ep 12 from Dick's POV. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I don't own DC
Dick was...puzzled to say the least. Bruce had told him that he would be sending Artemis to his school on a scholarship he himself provided to her. Dick knew he wanted him to keep an eye on Arty, in case her family should come looking for her, but he was still confused as to his secret ID policy. How was he supposed to keep his cool when a member of his team shared a school building with him every day? Wish he woulda thought of that earlier.
"Hey Barb."
"Hey Dick."
"Where's Luke?"
"Running late. He said he had some emergency. Hey, who's that by Bette?" Dick turned to see his teammate being welcomed by Bette. Well, might as well make the most of this. Dick smirked as he snuck up on Artemis and pulled his phone out.
"We'll laugh about this someday." He took a selfie with her before sneaking off.
"Uh, Dick? What was that?"
"Nothing Barb, just being friendly to the new girl."
"Great job with that. Now she's gonna think you're a stalker." Well, she's half-right then.
The day went by pretty insignificantly, and Dick kept an eye on Arty as she left the school. He went back to the manor to finish his homework, before being given an alert by a camera he had near a Zeta Tube that Arty was getting ready to go to the cave. Time for some fun!
Dick waited for her to approach before making his move. "Artemis?! How random that you're in Gotham City, instead of Star City where your uncle Green Arrow lives!"
"R-robin! I was, uh, just in the neighborhood! Had to visit a friend!"
"Some friend! You Zeta'd 16 miles away from your school in Star City on a Monday to meet with them! Should Wally be jealous?" Arty blushed at that before glaring at him.
"...let's just go to the cave." Got her there!
"Ladies first!" Who says chivalry was dead?
"Your town. You go!" Dick shrugged before Zetaing away. Well, that was fun! Now to meet up with-WHAT THE- Dick jumped to avoid a fireball heading his way. The cave was full of smoke and the attacker was unseen. Dick pulled out his birdarangs as Arty Zeta'd in, and the two immediately started shooting at where the fire seemed to be coming from.
"Who are we fighting?!"
"I don't know, but we're sitting ducks here! Head for the showers!" The two of them ran for the showers, fireballs chasing them. Who the hell is this?! And how did he get in without triggering any alarms? Dick tried to call the Batcave, Aqualad, even the Watchtower, but got no signal. As the pair entered the showers, they turned each terminal on to vent pressure, but that proved to be a mistake, as an unknown force added to the water, flooding them. Dick planted two explosives on the wall to make their escape. "Keep moving!"
Dick and Arty made their way down to a boiler room, where they were met with the fiery being from before. Who is this guy?! The silhouette launched fire at the pair as they attempted to escape. Dick led them to a vent to escape before hacking into the cave's security feeds.
"Ok, I'll ask it again. Who are we fighting?!"
"Let's find out." Dick pulled up security feeds to find the other members of the team get knocked down, one by one. He switched through 4 different cameras before a fire blast destroyed all 4.
"Damn. All 4 of them, dead." He looked to Artemis, whose eyes were wide. Why is she-oh. "The cameras, I meant the cameras! I'm sure the others are fine. Just gimme a sec to find the fastest way back." As Artemis sat back, she tensed up, which Dick noticed. First time?
"Alright, this way." As they exited the vents into the library, Dick explained. "There's a secret passage behind one of these bookcases."
"Seriously? Cliche, much?"
"You should see the Batcave." Seriously. What exactly does Bruce have against Shakespeare? Everything Shakespeare-related in the Manor is just a fake to get into the cave. His books, that bust of him, I mean, I don't exactly love the guy either, but still!
As they looked for the entrance, they heard metal footsteps. Dick snatched Arty's arm before jumping to cover, battle-ready.
"Artemis. Robin." Hold up! That sounds like-
"It's Red Tornado!" Artemis ran out of cover as Dick realized little too late what was going on. That's not RT!
"Yes on the Red, no on the Tornado!" Dick grabbed Artemis as they escaped the lookalike before running into a feminine version. What the heck? Did RT have kids or something? Dick dropped a smoke bomb before grabbing Arty and using the Detective Vision in his visor to find the entrance. They barely escaped from the Reds.
"Did you know Tornado had...siblings?!"
"No." Artemis continued to ramble on as Dick ignored her for the most part, focusing on formulating a plan. Alright, they can control water and fire. This would be a LOT easier if I packed my cryo-bombs! DIck was knocked out of his thoughts as a massive wave overtook the two. Crap! Gotta lose this thing! He undid his cape swiftly as he took out his rebreather. He took a deep breath before taking it out and shoving it into Arty's mouth, continuing on. Artemis only looked on as the kid gave up his oxygen source for her. However, a metal arm grabbed her leg, yanking her back as the rebreather flew out of her mouth. Dick grabbed a stray arrow, jamming it into the bot's eye, picking Arty up, and grappling out of the water. The pair came up for air and noticed they were in the main hanger.
"Look out!" Dick and Artemis barely dodged a fireball as they swam over to Wally and Connor, both of whom were trapped. Huh. Some kind of makeshift coral. Weird. Dick and Arty swam to the stairs to see Megan and Kal trapped in a fire cage.
"Kaldur! Is she-"
"She is merely unconscious! But I fear we cannot hold out much longer!" Dick and Arty ran up the stairs before being surrounded by the bots.
"Distract her! Now!" Dick flung two birdarangs at his bot, both of which bounced off. One of them embedded itself next to Wally's face. Dick shoved Arty into the water before leaping in himself to dodge a fire blast. As they escaped, Artemis started to panic.
"What do we do now!"
"We save them. That's how it works."
"Maybe that's how it's supposed to work, but those things just took out our superpowered friends!" Uh, yeah. Kinda noticed.
"You seem distraught."
"No shit! M'gann is dying, and Tornado's siblings are about to kill the others!"
"Well get traught, or get dead! Stop panicking, it'll only make things worse!"
"How are you so calm?"
"Practice. I've been doing this since I was 8." Artemis looked at him with shock. 8? He was already the youngest one of them all. To think he had been risking his life for so long was shocking to her. And she thought she had it bad. "Okay, we need a strategy. Tornado is one of the powerhouses of the League." Dick paused as an idea came to his head. Well, they DO exist for this reason. But Artemis isn't supposed to know. Nobody other than the League...it doesn't matter right now! He typed a code into his holo-computer.
"Voice activation required."
"User R-G-4. Password, FG-HC-2006." The computer accepted his credentials, pulling up restricted Batcomputer files. Artemis looked confused.
"What's this?"
"This...is Project Knightmare. It's a contingency plan Batman has should any member of the League be mind-controlled or go bad. In our case, it could help save their lives."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Does the League know Batman has a...a kill list on them?!"
"It's not a kill list. Nothing here is permanent. It's all to incapacitate, nothing more. And yes, the League knows. Superman actually gave Bats Kryptonite for it." Dick scrolled through the files, looking for Red Tornado. "Here's RT's file. Alright, let's see. Best option is an EMP pulse. I'm guessing you don't have an EMP in your quiver?"
"Nope."
"Alright, then let's make one." Dick activated the birdarang embedded near Wally's head to communicate with him. He explained his plan to Wally before heading to the med-lab. Wally walked him through designing the bomb, and once it was done, Dick hung up on him. "Alright, we gotta set this up where it can get the most charge."
"Which is where, exactly?" Well... "Great. We gotta go back there."
"Yeah...let's go." Dick snuck up to the top as Artemis watched. Alright, got it set up. Dammin, I need an extension. "Arty, I need some kinda metal extension. Do you have an arrow? I'm outta birdarangs." Before she could radio back, Dick was knocked off the ledge by a fireball. He tried to grapple back, but his grapple was incinerated by the bot. He fell into the water, being suffocated by the hydro-bot before being brought up to the surface. Soooooo not feelin' the aster…
Dick woke up a few minutes later, hearing Artemis yell to Kaldur. "He's okay, too." Huh, we all good? Nice work, Arty. He turned to her.
"Way to get traught." Artemis smiled before helping him up. They got a laser cutter out from the tool shed by Connor's bike before going over to Wally and Connor.
"Quit playing with that thing and cut us out!"
"Hey dumbass! EMP fries all machines, remember?" Dick chuckled before thinking back. I gotta talk with Arty. If she tells the others about Project Knightmare… Dick was interrupted by Red Tornado entering.
"And where the hell were you?" Yeah? Where exactly were you?
"I was forced to cover for Green Arrow's monitor duty. I informed Aqualad beforehand. I made my way here once the Zeta Tubes were reported inactive. Now, what exactly happened?"
"Your...siblings."
"I was not aware I had relations." As he approached the two inactive bots, the laser cutter went off. Crap! DIck turned to Wally, whose eyes were just as wide.
"The pulses wore off!" They looked at Tornado, whose eyes were now glowing red. He suffocated them all with his powers. Artemis watched as Dick fell back down. He was still recovering from being drowned, so he was the first to fall. She didn't last much longer.
Dick woke up in Bruce's arms, jumping to his feet.
"Hey, hey. You're good. It's alright." DIck looked at Bruce.
"What happened?"
"We got here and checked what little feed was left. And we talked with the others." he gestured to the others who were awake, all talking with their own mentors.
"Oh, yeah. How the hell did RT betray us?"
"I don't know yet. We will need more info on it. It is uncertain if he was hacked, pre-programmed, or did it of his own free will. By the way, nice work with the other two bots. Artemis tells me it was your strategy that won the day."
"Yeah...about that..." Bruce gave him a look that said "start talking".
"I, uh, I might've needed to use Project Knightmare." Bruce sighed before nodding.
"I see. So Artemis knows. She seemed fine with it. And I haven't heard anything from the others."
"Yeah, I explained to Arty that the League knows and they're cool with it, but I don't know how the team would react. Hiding my ID is one thing, but these plans are another."
"Agreed. I'll have Canary...explain to the others, eventually. For now, ask Artemis to keep it on the down-low. I don't need them to lose trust in you or me, especially not right now."
"Yeah, copy that." Batman put a hand on his shoulder before walking away to converse with Martian Manhunter. Dick walked up to Artemis, who was talking with Arrow.
"Hey, uh, Arty?"
"Yeah?" DIck gestured to talk in private.
"So, uh, about those files-"
"Relax, I won't tell anyone. I already asked Ollie about it and he was chill, so your secret's safe with me." Dick let out a shaky sigh as he de-tensed. "What happened to 'get traught', bird-brain? Cause you don't seem to be feeling the aster." Dick smirked at that.
"Thanks, Arty. It means a lot. I'll tell them eventually, but for now, Bats doesn't want it to get out." Artemis nodded before playfully punching his shoulder and walking back to talk with Megan. Dick smiled as he went to talk with Wally, who seemed pretty annoyed with what had happened. He noticed out of the corner of his eye that Bruce was talking to Kaldur, but he dismissed it as a debriefing.
I just wanted to give a heads up that I may not be able to post for the next few days due to personal stuff. I'll for sure get back to my regular posting schedule on Tuesday, but I might not post much before that. Maybe I will depending on my time-frame, but don't be surprised if I can't upload before Tuesday. Anyways, review and comment suggestions. Next chapter is Ep 13 of S1 and will be up by Tuesday at the latest, but maybe earlier depending on if I can get enough time to do it. I'm gonna slightly edit the Team's reactions to finding out Kal knew there was a mole, because both Arty and Dick honestly shouldn't have been pissed, since they both hid a lot from the others. But anyways, that's for later. Next chapter up soon.