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


Checking In

Cassius glanced at Brion as Connor explained that he was being payed to fix the bike. Then, he turned his gaze back to Otto, who he was passing the time with by tossing a baseball back and forth. Off to the side, Rose was sitting with Cassandra, who was helping her around to avoid reopening her newly bandaged and stitched gunshot wound.

"Can you teach me how to control my powers?" Otto asked finally. "I accidentally melted a hole in the ground last night."

Cassius considered for a moment before nodding. "I can, but not here. And we'll need to be careful, because the goo I'm made out of is highly flammable, making your powers incredibly dangerous for me."

Otto nodded, and Cassius walked over to Connor and Brion, who was using a rag to clean a motorcycle part.

"Hey, I'm taking Otto to try and learn to control his powers," Cassius said. "Think I should take the prince?"

"I think controlling his anger should come before controlling his powers," Connor said.

"Well, yes," Cassius said. "But on the other hand, learning to control his powers could help teach him to channel his anger. I mean, when you were starting out, it took you years to learn to control your anger, but you learned to channel your anger within months of being a hero. If that."

"Being a hero?" Brion frowned.

"Yeah," Cassius nodded. "Me and Connor are heroes. Well, actually he's retired, but he's still a hero. Just not an active one. He used to be all rage, too. Hated the entire world, but in time, he learned to be at peace."

"How could you retire from being a hero?" Brion asked, Cassius slipping the spring he was supposed to be cleaning out of his hand before he could melt it.

"I wanted a quiet life," Connor shrugged. "I enjoy a quiet life. Instead of getting shot at, I now fix motorcycles for money. It's calming. It's nice. Being a hero was great and all, and I'm still here if I'm needed, but I wanted to settle down. I wanted to be able to always be there when Megan came home. I wanted to be there for her to come home to. So I retired." He looked back to Cassius. "Take him. I'll finish up here and come out to meet you."

Cassius nodded and gestured for Brion to follow before leading the two of them away from the house, Cassandra and Rose joining them on the way. They didn't have to go far, fortunately. They just went to the remains of Mount Justice, since there was nothing there for them to potentially destroy. As they reached it, Cassius walked to about where the briefing room would have been and turned back to the pair of new meta-humans.

"Okay," Cassius said. "I explained this bit to Otto before we left Markovia. The easiest way to start learning to control your powers is to focus on what you want it to do, and concentrate hard, but to remain calm. For now, I want both of you to focus on forming lava, or plasma if that's what you're actually covered in, Otto, around only your right arm. If it doesn't work, or something else happens, don't freak out, and don't lose your patience. Just remember how it felt and see if you can use that to get it right."

Both nodded, holding their right hands in front of themselves and focusing. Otto's head suddenly began to excrete glowing red plasma while Brion began to melt into the ground again. Brion growled in annoyance, while Otto shouted in surprise before retracting the goo, having burned his shirt off above the middle of the chest. The both tried again, Brion suddenly beginning to release magma from below his knees as Otto's hair turned to plasma, along with his right palm. Brion's growl was louder this time, while Otto hummed in irritation and defiance. On their third try, Otto got his right arm to transform properly and only it. He grinned, until Brion shouted in annoyance, having transformed fully.

"Channel your anger, Brion," Cassius said. "Focus on a single task and direct your anger at it, if it helps."

"Why don't you channel your anger!?" Brion snapped. "All you do is stand there and tell me what to do, when you have no idea how my powers work! You can grow wings, and you are strong! You are not special!"

"You'll find you're incorrect about that," Cassius said, turning into a puddle of goo and back. "I haven't been a human being for decades. I was used in a precursor to the Tar procedure that you two experienced, except that I had shapeshifting powers already. As a result, my powers were corrupted and I became a living mass of Tar. My powers alternate between me needing to constantly focus in order to retain a human form and not permanently turn into a puddle, and then having to focus ridiculously hard in order to use my powers at all. Trust me, I understand how hard it is to control powers similar to yours. I'm not trying to anger you, I'm trying to help you."

"I don't want your help!" Brion snapped, swiping a hand and sending a wave of magma at him and Otto by accident.

Otto transformed fully on instinct, the magma not harming him, and Cassius launched himself into the air, flipping over the magma at a safe distance before landing on his feet again.

"Fine," Cassius said. "Transform back to normal and we'll head back to the house."

"Fine, I will!" Brion snapped, only for nothing to happen. "Why isn't is working!?"

Cassius crossed his arms, waiting patiently. Finally, after nearly five minutes of nothing happening, Brion shouted in effort.

"Otto, knock him out," Cassius said. "It'll deactivate his powers."

Otto nodded, walking over and drilling a punch into Brion's head, knocking him back a step, only for Brion to remain standing.

"What was that?" Brion scoffed. "Don't you even know how to throw a punch? It's like this!"

He drilled his fist into Otto's head, knocking him out instantly, Otto being transformed back to normal before he hit the ground.

"Congratulations, Prince Brion," Cassius said. "You just knocked out a fourteen year old boy. Your father would be so proud."

He flicked a small sphere onto the ground below Brion and it unleashed a cloud of sleeping gas, knocking Brion out in seconds and reverting him back to normal. Cassius sighed, picking up both Markovians and flew back to Connor's house, grabbing a set of clean clothes he'd brought for each of them and enveloped the pair and the clothes with his goo, dressing them in privacy before retracting and sighing, glancing over at his girls as they walked over.

"What happened?" Connor asked.

"Brion lost control and couldn't power down, so I suggested knocking him out," Cassius said. "Otto doesn't know how to throw a punch, though, so to demonstrate, Brion knocked him out, so I hit Brion with sleeping gas."

Connor nodded. "Brion's going to have the worse headache."

"Probably," Cassius nodded, then sighed as his Darkwear lit up and a message from Kaldur appeared.

"We still need to have that talk," the message read. "I can meet you at Megan's house if you have time. I'm sure you'll have a few questions for her as well."

"Is this another Aqualad kills Artemis thing?" Cassius messaged back silently.

"Not entirely," Kaldur responded. "I will explain when you have time to talk."

"I'm at her house with the prince and the plasma kid we rescued now," Cassius said.

"I will be there shortly," Kaldur messaged.

"What's up?" Rose asked.

"Kaldur's coming over," Cassius said. "He wants to talk to us."

"All of us?" Connor asked.

"Me and the girls, specifically," Cassius said. "But I'm sure you could either convince him to let you in, or you could keep an eye on the kids," he gestured at Brion and Otto, "and I could fill you in later if it's important."

Connor nodded. "Alright. That one's probably the better option. How'd they do up until Brion lost control?"

"Otto did alright," Cassius said. "He's a quick study. Brion, on the other hand, struggled."

Connor nodded. "I figured."

Cassius walked over to the bike and knelt beside Connor, who began to walk him through the the motorbikes systems and parts and how to fix different things, for lack of anything better to do. After a few minutes, Cassandra and Rose joined them. A couple hours later, Kaldur arrived and led Cassius and the girls into the house while Connor stayed with Brion and Otto. The talk was short and informative. The split of the Justice League had not been a surprise to Kaldur and Megan. In fact, it had all been a plan. Now that half the Justice League was no longer accepting the supervision of the UN, they could do what needed to be done. Cassius agreed with that part. What he didn't agree with, was the fact that only Kaldur, Megan, Dick, Barbara, Wonder Woman, Batman, and Tim knew that they were still working together, or that Batman Inc. was still serving the Justice League without knowing it.

"You know, keeping secrets like this is what led to the fiasco that occurred with you being undercover," Cassius said. "And when everyone finds out, they'll be mad. If you tell them now, they might be okay with it, but if you let the secret drag on..." he shook his head. "At the very least, Connor, Wally, and Artemis need to be told." He turned to Megan. "If you continue to keep it a secret from Connor, and he finds out later, he'll be mad. If you tell him now, before it becomes a big deal, he'll be okay with it." He glanced outside. "I know Dick, and he's going to turn these two, and Halo, into a team. If he does that, they'll be a part of the Justice League but without UN supervision. But they'll never know, and they'll think they're operating independently. If they find out they've been under the Justice League without being told, they'll feel like they were being used like puppets the entire time."

"You believe we were wrong?" Kaldur asked.

"No," Cassius said. "I believe that keeping it a secret from the rest of us was wrong. Publicly separating to be able to do what we need to is fine. It's a good idea, in my opinion. Especially with Luthor as the Secretary General. However, regardless of what the public believes, the Team, the League, and whatever other teams we inevitably form in the near future...they all should be told the truth."

Kaldur was silent for a few minutes before nodding. "Please send Connor in. We will not tell Brion or Otto unless they join a team, and then not until we know they can keep the secret without letting it slip, either intentionally or otherwise."

Cassius nodded. "And the Team?"

Kaldur was silent for a moment before nodding. "I will consider it, but I promise nothing."

Cassius nodded and walked outside with the girls, replacing Connor and sitting down beside the bike, looking between the two new Markovians. "Tell me about yourselves. Hobbies, things you don't like, that kind of thing. It'll help."

"How will this help?" Brion demanded. "Will it help me convince my brother to lift my banishment?"

"No," Cassius said. "For the time being, you have to get used to the fact that you're not a prince anymore."

Brion stood, but stopped as Cassandra caught his hand, shaking her head.

"He right," Cassandra said. "You...not prince...for now."

Brion frowned. "Is she unable to speak?"

"Thanks to the way her father was raised, she has trouble...getting the words out," Cassius said. "I'm sorry you were banished, but you'll have to accept it until something changes. As of now, you're not a prince. You're a meta-human who struggles to control his powers and who struggles even more to control his anger. I'm trying to help you learn to control both, but you have to work with me in order to make that happen."

"I think Kaldur should tell everyone associated with the League everything," Cassandra messaged.

"I agree," Cassius responded in kind.

Cassius glanced at the house as he heard the hint of Connor's raised voice. Otto introduced himself first and shared bits of information about himself. After he was done, Brion grudgingly did the same. Then, Cassius went, telling them both the shortened version of his story. Brion was far quieter after he'd finished. And Connor returned shortly after he was done.

"So, we're at it again, are we?" Connor asked.

"Apparently so," Cassius sighed. "Hopefully he'll make the right choice?"

"What choice?" Brion asked.

"What to do about the state of Justice League," Cassius said. "What do you think, Connor?"

"I think I have a motorcycle to fix," Connor said. "And I think it's not going to go over as well as it could."

Cassius nodded. "Alright. Brion, would you like to try learning to control your powers again?"

Brion nodded and Cassius led the pair away, Cassandra and Rose staying with Connor this time.


Leave a review.