22. Secret Weapons 2
"Who is alive?"
"Who were they talking about?" Wonder Girl, Cassandra Sandsmark wondered as she observed the batwing exiting from the secret mountainside opening.
"Don't know," Oracle, Tim Drake commented. He was busy following the trajectory of the gigantic bat-shaped jet. Suddenly it went of the radar as Batman engaged it full stealth mode. This latest version of the 'wing borrowed heavily from the invisible plane Diana used to have during her days with the League. He was able to salvage its wreckage from covert visits to Themiscyra.
He had kept a constant 'eye' on the Amazonian homeland, a secret known to no one….no one except Shayera. J'onn Jones knew that he had visited the 'dead' island to get all the technological systems they could find for use in the batcave and the new training facility. They had made several such 'visits' to old destroyed factories, army bases, missile silos etc. to arm themselves in their fight for the planet.
After months of effort, they were able to solve the secrets behind the Amazonian technology, having to have to learn Greek to read some of the instructions. That was the easy part. The difficult part came when they tried to modify their other salvaged stuff to work on the same principles. The most difficult one was the invisibility in the super-sonic 'Wonder' jet. That problem was solved when Zatanna found and brought in Cassandra, who by virtue of her Greek heritage and her time spent on Paradise Island, knew something about using their technology. What they finally did was to take out the cloaking system from the wrecked Themiscyrian jet, including all of its wiring and connections and then build the new batwing around it. They even managed to get hold of a similar system to put in the smaller version of the bat-jet. However, instead of providing complete invisibility, that system only brought in sound deadening. The rest of the stealth was conventional systems designed for and used in the previous 'wings.
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"So they won't be coming tonight huhn," Wonder Girl inquired as she played with the midnight black hair of her teammate.
"No, I don't think so," Tim smirked as he lifted one hand off the console, reached up and yanked Cassandra into his lap. "Why? Got anything in mind?"
"Hmmm," the blonde haired beauty pretended to muse. "Mayyy-bbeee," she chirped as she brought her arms to circle around the neck of her younger lover.
Cassandra and Tim had been together for almost two years now. After the world around them collapsed, Cassandra had gone into hiding with the rest of the rag-tag group of resistance fighters that had got together to form a sort of last stand against the invaders. They had bravely made a doomed attempt on one of the four 'war' factories, not knowing the secret behind them. They had been seventy-three of them and had great hopes of dealing a crushing blow to their 'masters'.
It took all of three minutes for the enemy forces to gather and retaliate and another five for them to mercilessly kill the attacking fighters. Those who managed to escape; rushed out in different directions, hoping to reduce the number of their pursuers. Cassandra herself had just barely got out, mortally wounded with three gaping holes on her body, two in her midsection and the third on her right thigh.
She would have died, had it not been for the timely intervention of the mistress of magic, Zatanna.
----
J'onn had been on monitoring duty when one of their hidden surveillance system light starting blinking. Turning that camera on both he and Zatanna watched in horror as the brave fighters were massacred. Within seconds, both of them had teleported to near the battle ground to try and save as many people as they could. Out of the initial seventy-three, only six survived – four humans and two metas.
One of her human teammates died even before they could transport her back to the cave. She herself had lost consciousness, staying like that for over five days. Opening her eyes she had come face to face with Tim and had thought that she had died and left the mortal plane. The fact that Tim looked almost exactly the same as the day he died didn't help things one bit. It had taken the other heroes, specially the still 'scary' Batman to convince her otherwise.
They had informed her that Tim was real and quite alive. He had changed very little, looking only five to six years older than the last time she had seen him, the day he resigned from the Titans and left for Gotham. It had been two days after the League vote. He had made it clear that his allegiance lay with Batman and although any other hero, whether powered or non-powered would be welcome to join him. None of the Titans had joined him, with Speedy, the Titans' Flash taking the same path as the senior hero. He too had left the Titans and gone back home to assist Flash or operate independently. A few days later, Beast Boy, Raven and Cyborg left too, with the first two going over to Batman's side while the third one leaving for parts unknown.
That was the last time she had seen any of them. Three days later….everything changed yet again, when the new League, the Justice Lords or Justice Legion as they had renamed themselves, had attacked an destroyed Wayne Manor and the Batcave under it. It was at that time that she came to know Batman's secret identity. It was at that time that Diana left the Legion. It was at that time that she had lost her friends…or so she had thought.
As soon as she recovered enough to stay awake without tiring out every few hours, she grabbed the teenager and made him tell her his story, of how he was still alive, the reason for his looking so young and for the cybernetic connections and fittings on his right thigh.
/Flashback/
"So, tell me everything," Cassandra pushed herself on her medical bay bed.
"What do you want to know?" the former Robin and current Oracle smirked at her.
"Everything," Cassandra gestured around her. "This, how and when? Who all are here? Who all are alive? How come both you and Batman look so young? And who the hell was that kid I heard laughing upstairs. Or was that just my imagination? My mind weirding our due to the drugs you guys have been pumping into my body."
"That a lot of questions," Tim shook his head. "Let me try to answer them one at a time. First, this," he circled his hand above his head. "This is where we will. Batman made this after the League vote. He prepared for the emergency that only he could have seen coming. After the attack on the mansion, he, Cassandra Batgirl and Shayera moved here. A few years later, they found J'onn and convinced him to join them. That was just before the alien attack. Since then, they fighting them and gathering information to get a solid, failsafe plan to bring them down."
"Along the way, Batman managed to track down and get Zatanna and Wally too. Flash they had to rescue from godforsaken electricity generating prison, while Zatanna is sort of a free agent. She was the one that rescued you. Her and J'onn."
"Oh," Cassandra gave a slow nod. "Go on. Who all are alive?"
"Well, you already know and met all of us. Apart of us, there is Faith, Major Disaster, Beast Boy, Raven, the new twin Arrows and a few others. We are always on the look for others to join us. That's how we found you and your teammates."
"Twin Arrows?" Cassandra's asked in surprise.
"Yes," Tim gave a nod. "Dinah and Ollie's son and daughter. Green Arrow and Black Arrow. When the mansion was destroyed, GA was killed and Dinah was taken prisoner. These two are their children."
"What about Dinah?"
"She died," Tim answered softly. "She gave birth while in captivity. She tried to escape after that, but failed. They threatened her that they would take her babies away, or worse yet kill them. So she stopped and became a good prisoner, but only till the time that the children became old enough so that they could help her. After more than nine years in that place, she got lucky and managed to finally break out. She managed to steal a communicator at the same time and send out a S.O.S. message on the old and no longer used League frequency. However, during all of this, she was shot by one of the soldiers, and by the time we got to her, she was at death's door. She handed over the kids to Shayera and requested her to take care of them and keep them safe. Her last words were, 'Tell them about their dad.'"
"Why didn't she just use her cry?" she asked in confusion.
"She couldn't," Tim lowered his head. "They….they destroyed her voice box. Shot a hole right through it. They destroyed her ability to speak, let alone use her siren."
Both Cassandra and Tim sat in silence for the next few minutes, one absorbing in what she had just heard, while the other almost reliving it again.
"What about you?" Wonder Girl finally asked. "How did you…?" she trailed off.
"Me," Tim gave a rueful smile. "That's something totally different. Ideally I shouldn't even be here. I should be dead."
"What do you mean?" Cassandra asked worriedly.
"Remember the attack on the mansion," Tim asked more as a statement.
"Yes," she nodded gently.
"Well in that attack, many of us….almost all of us died, including me, or so everyone thought. Even I thought the same. One second I am dodging blasts from Captain Atom, and the next I am standing two feet in the snow."
"WHAT?" Cassandra exclaimed.
"Yup," Tim gave a humorless smirk, the memory of Dinah and other lost teammates still occupying his thoughts. "Batman told me that I was hit by some sort of energy beams and I just vanished, vaporized in a second. All that remained was part of my thigh muscle which had just been shot off by the good Captain."
"So what happened to you?"
"Don't know?" Tim shook his head. "We still haven't been able to explain it. Like I told you, one second Gotham, United States and the next somewhere in Austria."
"Austria!"
"Um-hmm….and that is not the only thing," Tim stated cryptically.
"What else can you tell me that can surprise me even further," Cassandra ran a hand through her tussled hair, growing confused by the second. "Don't tell me you became immortal too."
"No, nothing that extensive," Tim gave a chuckle. "Me. I was just sent about seven years into the future."
"WHAT?" this time the cry was louder. "Holy shit. That's why you…." She pointed at him.
"Yup," a real and familiar grin this time. "That's why I look like this. I am still not above legal drinking age, although I should be in my late twenties."
"Yeah, that's me now," Cassandra jerked at herself. "I am older than you now. Now you will have to listen to what I say, follow my orders."
"Sure ol' timer," Tim joked back her. "Old hag."
"Immature pup."
"Senile"
"Milk toothed."
"Buck toothed."
"HEY," Cassandra sat up and punched his arm. "I am not buck toothed."
/End Flashback/
"What are you smiling at?" Tim's voice brought her back to the present.
"Nothing," she rested her head against his shoulder. "Just remembering old times."
"Yeah," her partner gently caressed her upper arm and shoulder. "What about them?"
"Nothing," she leaned up to kiss his jaw. "We are just like this. You know, us Old timers."
"Yeah, real old," he shook his head. "I don't know how you manage to keep moving around."
"I have to thank my young and 'energy giving' lover for that," he lips reached for his. "He is a real charging rod, my boy-toy-wonder."
"Boy-t…mmph," her kiss muffled his words, ending all further talk.
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Meanwhile,
Smallville, Kansas.
The batwing had just landed and the six superheroes were moving slowly towards the abandoned shed, keeping their eyes, ears and minds open for any approaching hostiles.
Reaching the dilapidated structure, Batman, Batgirl and J'onn moved in to check for any traps or bombs.
Come in J'onn's voice sounded through the telepathic links.
Entering through the broken door, they were greeted with the person they were looking for, their mouths falling open at the sight before them.
"Oh, god," Flash fell to his knees as Diana came to stand beside him. "We're too late."
"Great Hera"