Chapter 5: The Missing

Afternoon: September 18th

Silence encircled the League waiting to see if something came out of the surge. The silence seemed to flow threw the building.

"Well I guess that-" Superman started before snapping his head to the left

"What?" Wonder Woman asked

"You'll hear soon enough." Before the words fully left his mouth a sound began, low at first then it multiplied with the echoes. At first no one could make out just what it was, until it became horrifyingly clear. What they were hearing was screams; the screams of the missing.

"Great Hera," Wonder Woman cried, "where is it coming from?"

"I can't tell. This building is so large it's being echoed everywhere." Superman replied. Batman tensed, the screams were becoming more clear-so clear his ears could now pick out Nightwing's voice among them. It sent a chill up his spine, and that's a thing that doesn't happen to Batman often.

"Then just pick a direction and run!" Batman yelled and took off to the left. Superman followed him, Wonder Woman went right, and Lantern went straight. They went threw the abandoned offices and hallways like they were in a giant maze, the screams always following them, always at their heels. They each pushed a door open and entered a large room where they stopped stared at each other. They had all entered the old cafeteria. And the screams had stopped.

"Is that a good thing?" Lantern asked

"Something tells me no." Superman said

A soft mechanical whirl filled the room; they looked over. A secret door was being raised for an entrance into the room.

"The air seems better now," a figure said, outlined in the light behind him. "It doesn't feel like I'm breathing it in for the last time anymore."

"Who are you?" Lantern asked

"What? You don't recognize me?" The man said stepping into their view, "I guess I should be pleased that it worked so well."

"What are you talking about? Who are you? Where are the boys?" Superman fired off the questions like bullets.

"I am Professor Raymond Crayshrek." Said a young man with jet-black hair slicked back to his head, his gray eyes shinning with delight and smugness.

"Impossible, Crayshrek is an old man." Wonder Woman said

"Was an old man my dear." He replied

"How is that possible?" Lantern asked

"Amazing what the life force of six young men can do for an old man." Crayshrek sneered.

"What does that mean?" Superman asked. Batman didn't wait around for the answer, he ran past Crayshrek and into the room the scientist had left. Crayshrek barely noticed Batman run by...after all he wouldn't be much of a problem. He faced the rest of the League and smiled.

"And do you know what the best part is?" he grinned, "I got some extra surprises." In one swift movement he leaped over them and landed as quietly and as gracefully as a cat. Superman took a sharp intake of breath. He had seen that move before, they all had. They had seen it whenever they happened to be fighting side by side with Nightwing.

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It was a cold white room with dirty, unpainted walls. The lights from the free hanging lamps in the room were ten times brighter then the rest of the building, Batman had to blink several times before his eyes adjusted. He almost wished they hadn't; in the room were the missing confined to oval cages like lab animals. He ran over to one of the ovals and looked in, it was Jake Jud. Looking down Batman realized that there was a heart monitor on the bottom of the oval. And it was flat lined.

"No..."

He ran down the row looking for Nightwing, sweat starting to form under his cowl. Coming to the last oval in the row he found his son's expressionless face.

"Nightwing!" he yelled pounding his fist on the blue glass afraid to look down at the monitor. "Look at me! . . . Nightwing! God, God. . . don't do this to me, Nightwing!" Dropping his head down he saw the thing he never wanted to see, the flat lined heart rate. He was dead, his son was dead, murdered. Anger was climbing inside of him; his whole body was beginning to shake with rage. He spun around unable to look at Dick anymore, only to see Flash. Flat lined as well, Damn! Despite everything, and all that Flash had annoyed him, he was a good kid and was developing into a fine hero. He didn't deserve what happened to him, and Dick certainly didn't. None of them deserved it. Crayshrek would pay, Batman vowed on his son's memory that Crayshrek would pay. He turned back to face Dick and placed a hand on the blue glass, rage and guilt fighting for control of his emotions.

"I'm sorry." He said then quickly whipped away the one solitary tear that had slipped down his cheek.

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"What ever you did to them . . . you took their abilities!" Superman exclaimed

"A quite unexpected thing actually, but most welcome." The scientist replied.

"Don't get used to it!" Lantern yelled. He created a large green pole with his ring and swung it at Crayshrek, who disappeared a moment before the pole stuck a support beam that had been behind him. Lantern, a bit mystified by the move, stared at the man.

"Flash's powers did take a while getting used too but I'd say I have them down pretty good, wouldn't you?" then his image blurred as he raced back to the support beam and pushed it. The beam, having been cut by Lantern's light, had been carefully balanced. Now it fell down to the ground to a bang knocking Lantern unconscious and trapping him beneath it.

"That's enough!" Wonder Woman yelled and went to grab him by the collar of the shirt. Crayshrek back flipped out of the way then raced around her to kick her in the back. She fell forward to her knees surprised and very angry. "You little weasel!" she screamed. He just laughed and beckoned her forward.

"Lets say we try a little team work." Superman said to Wonder Woman. She nodded. Wonder Woman lifted into the air and tried to pull Crayshrek off his feet, but he ran; as they thought he would. Superman knew what to do, how to stop him. He had used this move so many times with Flash before. He calculated the time that Crayshrek would pass him and at the right moment he heated the floor with his heat vision enough to melt Crayshrek's rubber soled shoes to the floor. Crayshrek's body pitched forward, after his momentum had been so suddenly stopped dead, and he fell down face to the floor. Superman stood over him.

"Not so great as you thought you were huh Crayshrek?"

Crayshrek huffed. Twisting quickly he slipped out of his shoes and turned on his back. Grabbing one of Superman's arms and placing a foot on the Man of Steel's stomach, he successfully flipped the surprised hero over and into Wonder Woman.

"Well that was very Nightwing like." The Amazon mumbled pushing Superman off her. Crayshrek laughed shrilly.

"Don't you see? I'm unstoppable now! Only time can take it's toll on me and we already know that can be remedied!" He laughed again and again. In fact he was enjoying the sound of it so much that he didn't hear what Nightwing's senses should have picked up: Batman slowly approaching from behind.

WHAM!!!

The board impacted Crayshrek's head with a sickening thud. Stars danced before his eyes as he collapsed to his knees

"Forget about me!?" Batman yelled furiously. He grabbed Crayshrek by his shirt and flung him against the wall. The room almost shook with the impact, and the mad man fell once more. "Get up!" Batman yelled, and grabbed the man by his shoulder plucking him from the floor. As soon as the scientist was standing Batman punched him in the face and sent him back to the ground again. Crayshrek tasted the blood that was flowing from his now broken nose. He was too stunned to fight back, to dizzy to gain enough balance to run . . .

"This isn't what I planned! You're ruining everything!" He screamed at Batman.

"Not used to murdering free men?" Batman hissed, "You need your victims to be locked up don't you? You piece of scum, you murdering waste of a human!" He then heard a gasp and it wasn't from Crayshrek. The detective didn't need to turn around to realize that Superman, Wonder Woman, and Lantern, who had been freed and was back to conscious, were behind him.

"What did you say Batman?" Superman asked. Batman narrowed his eyes.

"Figure it out."

Superman looked back toward the white room, then at the now young scientist.

"Their not..." he trailed off

"Don't worry, they gave their lives for the pursuit of science," Crayshrek said laughing un-remorsefully. After hearing that Batman slammed him against the wall and wrapped both of his hands around the man's neck. Ignoring the rest of leagues presence he sneered-

"They didn't give their lives, you stole them! And now, I'm going to kill you. Hope you enjoyed the youth and power while it lasted." he tightened his grip.

"Batman!" Wonder Woman cried, "You can't!"

"Yes I can!" he yelled back, although still staring Crayshrek in the eyes, "I have the right to kill the man who murdered my son!"

"There all gone? All 6?" Lantern asked his head spinning

"Yes." Batman replied.

"But still-" Wonder Woman started

"No!" Lantern yelled back clearly enraged at the fate of his best friend, "Let him do it, I'd do it if Batman didn't already have him. And that bastard deserves it." Superman, who had been staring at the floor, suddenly spoke up. "Reverse it." He stated. Wonder Woman and Lantern looked at him curiously. Superman didn't even seem to notice and walked up to the pinned man who still was alive at the moment. He looked him in the eye. "You're a man who obviously is afraid of death, reverse it, or I let him kill you. Do you understand?" The man nodded.

"Batman let go."

Batman snapped his head to the side intent on giving Superman hell for ordering him around at a time like this, but when he saw the look in the alien's eye he let go. Crayshrek fell to the floor gasping for air.

"Is that possible? Can he reverse it?" Wonder Woman asked

"For his sake it better be." Lantern said coolly

Crayshrek was still gasping on the floor when Superman pulled him roughly to his feet.

"No tricks Crayshrek." He told the scientist, "Now get moving." The man trudged his way to the white room aware that Batman was just inches behind him. He could feel The Dark Knights breath on the back of his neck; it was making his hair stand on end. The other three were close as well. There was no positive, 100% escape possible, but he wasn't willing to give up what he had worked so hard for. There had to be a way. Superman pushed him forward and told him to move faster. They entered the white room.

"By the Gods." Wonder Woman said sorrowfully

"Gods had nothing to do with this." Batman mumbled turning his back to the oval confinements. He didn't want to see them again.

"Crayshrek-" Superman started

"Yeah." He hit some buttons on the consul. "You'll be happy to know that those confinements they're in have also been holding their bodies in suspended animation just-" he scoffed, "just in case things went wrong."

"So you can reverse it?" Wonder Woman asked

"Of course I can, I didn't know how much energy I could take. It might have been necessary to reverse the process if I couldn't take it."

"So why don't you stop talking and just do it?" Lantern snapped from where he was standing beside Flash.

"I am." Crayshrek hissed. Batman glanced at the consul, his eyes widened

"No your not!" he yelled

Crayshrek smiled

"Oops." He slammed his fist down on a button and a gray gas began to fill the room. Wonder Woman and Batman started to cough violently. Superman signaled to Green Lantern, who was protected from the gas thanks to his ring, to go after Crayshrek, Superman himself had to take care of the gas. He took a deep breath inhaling all the fumes, then flew up and threw the ceiling to dispose of it into the air. The gaping hole in the ceiling let waves of fresh air inside the stuffy room quickly clearing away the rest of the poisonous gas.

Crayshrek raced from the building; soon he would be long gone. Man he loved running at this speed, but wait! What was this green wall in front of him? NO! Crayshrek spun around. Lantern was close behind him, spreading out a wall of green that blocked the entire horizon before of him. Then at the ends of the wall sides emerged, and from the top and bottom covers! Lantern was making a box around him to trap him inside! Crayshrek gathered up all his speed and took off toward the shrinking opening. But he wasn't moving as fast as he should. He was. . . hungry. He didn't have the speed to make it though! The box closed in front of him then contracted. In seconds the box was so small that he could hardly breath.

"You're a poor imitation of the original." Lantern sneered and carried him up into the air. Crayshrek began to fail about wildly inside the tiny structure. "Keep that up and you'll run out of air faster." Lantern informed him as he flew down into the room from the hole that Superman had made in the ceiling.

"You can't make me do it!" The man screamed from inside Lantern's cell, "I'd rather die then be that dilapidated old man again! You hear me? Kill me!"

"Don't tempt me." Wonder Woman hissed

"We don't need you to do it now anyway." Batman said from the consul, "your design was simple enough, I already figured it out."

"What-? No..." But when Crayshrek looked around he found that Batman had already turned the machines on and had the scientist's hidden compartment already out of the wall.

"What we do need though, is your body." The Dark Knight finished

"NOO!!!!" Crayshrek screamed as Lantern released him and Superman threw him in the oval. All the smugness was gone from his voice; it was just sheer terror. Superman strapped him down and gave a thumbs-up to Batman. "NOOOO!!!!!" Crayshrek screamed again and struggled in his restraints. Batman turned slowly and walked over towards him.

"What's wrong Crayshrek? Scared?" The man stared at him questionably "Scared of dieing? Scared of getting the life drained out of you? Hum?" he tapped on the glass, "Scared?"

"Yes!" the mad man cried finally, "yes okay? I'm scared."

"Good. Now you know how it feels, what you made them feel!" he yelled pointing at the six ovals. "Now you can live the rest of your life, however short it may be, knowing what kind of pain you caused to six young men who did nothing to deserve it. NOTHING!" Crayshrek averted his eyes from Batman. "May it haunt you for the rest of your days." Batman mumbled and turned back to the consul.

"Is there anything we can do?" Wonder Woman asked Batman as he worked at the panel.

"Just pray." Superman answered for him.

Batman closed his eyes, took a deep breath and pushed the finale button.

() More reviewer praise!!!
Doppleganger- Wow! You read right into my foreshadowing! Awesome!
Trecebo- smiles do they stay dead? You'll just have to read to find out! Thanks for the review! K.R.- quickly digs a hole to hide from her Please don't kill me Rose!!!
Louie Pastiche- lol again! How about I leave the Ultra Humanite plot line to you, I'm sure you'll come up with something great! Thanks for your thoughts!
N. L. Retentive- Oops!!! kicks spell checker Thanks for catching that! It's changed now, sorry about that everyone!
Chapter 6 is coming up soon! ! !