A/N: Sorry that this chapter came out later than what I wanted it to. I had all these projects due this week in school and I also had rugby practice that takes up a lot of my time. But here is the next chapter! Enjoy!
Disclaimer: Don't own.
Chapter 22 The Good and the Bad
A small, black figure poked his head up over the edge of a roof for a second, as if seeing if his next move would be safe or not. He was in the cover of night, so he didn't have much to worry about, but the city of Lima was most alive at such late hours. People could be anywhere in the dark alleys, so the figure had to be careful somehow.
The lithe figure suddenly jumped down to the cement ground and landed in a crouch. He then bolted out of the cover of the alley and sprinted across the street and hid behind a thick tree in the middle of a small park. He was close to his destination and was sure his adversary had cameras or spies around these parts.
Robin took out a baseball cap and his pair of flip flops from his back pocket. He slipped them both on before walking out into the open so he would be able to cross the park without looking getting spotted by a camera or someone. He tilted the cap down to keep his face in shadows. He casually walked across the grassy lawn and into another dark alley where he threw off the noisy shoes and annoying hat.
The teen knew he was being a bit extreme, but with Slade around, he knew he could never get too cocky. He skillfully jumped back up to the roof tops to see where he had to go next. He then took off as quickly as his bare feet would take him. He jumped and flipped to different roofs as if it was an every day thing for him.
Suddenly a memory flash blasted rudely into his head. Robin clumsily stumbled to a stop on a roof top with a wince of pain. He held onto his head with one hand as he gave a small grunt. Just as fast as it had arrived, the pain left his head in a flash. Robin gave a sigh before pulling himself back together and jumping smoothly to another roof as if nothing had happened.
The boy was still torn between two lives. The mind swipe had done a lot to his brain. He sometimes found himself thinking he was still Slade's apprentice. It bugged the teen that he was so mixed up. There were times when his true self was able to shine through, but most of the time he was just trying his hardest to become the person he used to be. It was taking a toll on his poor brain and it made him feel confused and defeated.
Robin finally made it to where he and Sam hade tracked the call. He noticed the neighborhood was old and run down, and so was the house behind the walls. From the roof top he was hiding on, he could see the yard and pathetic home that looked completely deserted. The only hint that someone was in there was that a car was parked right outside of the walls surrounding it.
A frown came to Robin's face as he studied the structure. It would be hard to get past those walls. Slade had picked a place with a large lawn so that if someone jumped into it, that person would have a difficult time getting back out as quickly as they had dropped in.
Robin dropped to the ground in an alley and slowly crept to the side of the brick building. He was about to run out and jump over the wall, but then somebody suddenly grabbed the teen from behind. A hand covered his mouth and the other hand drug the boy backwards.
"What are you, an idiot?" the ambusher hissed into Robin's ear.
Robin's only response was elbowing the person in the stomach. The guy let him go with a small gasp for air. Robin spun around on his heel while bringing one of his legs up. He swung that leg down sharply and barely missed the mystery guy who had rolled to the side of him deftly.
The person flew out of the shadows and collided violently into the teen. Robin let out a small yell as his head hit the brick building. The man then pinned both Robin's hands to the wall and stuck his face into Robin's.
"Jeez!" James whispered harshly. "I'm on you're side, kid!"
It took a second for Robin's mind to register who this person was. A look of confusion swept across his face as he whispered, "James?"
"Do I always have to introduce myself to you this way so you won't kick my head off?" James asked him with a quiet chuckle. In the faint moon light Robin saw him wink at him. The teen couldn't help but smile slightly.
"Sorry about that," Robin apologized. "I thought you were someone working for Slade."
"No kidding," James muttered while letting the boy's shoulders go. He stole a peek around the corner of the building to look at the house Slade was hiding out in. Robin silently joined him while whispering, "So how did you get away from Slade?"
"It's a long story," James said behind his shoulder. "But I'll tell you it anyways." Robin rolled his eyes under his mask and smiled at the man's actions. He had missed the man's humor. James leaned against the brick wall and told his story in a whisper.
"When you didn't regain your memory on the plane and we had that game of phone tag, Slade caught onto me right away and knocked me out with some gas," James said. He noticed Robin hold onto his head and fight down a wince when he said gas. The man decided to let it pass and continued. "Next thing I knew it, I was captured by the madman and he figured out my plan by the few phone calls I was forced to make with my kids in Pucallpa. When he took me here, he forced me to tell him where you and Sam were by using Abe as blackmail. After that he thought I was no use to him and pushed me off a 20 story building we were on."
Robin nodded while taking the story in silently. "So how did you survive the fall?" he asked.
James gave him a wicked smile before saying, "You by now have to know that I'm a shape-shifter." Robin gave him a skeptical look but let the man keep going. "Well, when I was teen your age I didn't have many friends, so I would practice my powers till I would pretty much pass out. With that much practice, I unfolded all the secrets to my powers." Robin gave him a flabbergasted look that told him to get to the point. "I'm not limited to changing just into humans," James said.
Robin smiled and said, "I'm guessing that Slade didn't know that."
"Yeah," James said. "You should have seen the surprised look on his face when seeing me change into a bird and flying off into the city. He looked so mad. I didn't know that man had that much emotion in him."
Robin rubbed his forehead as more memory flashes continued to go through his mind. "You'd be surprised," he muttered to James.
The man watched the teen with concern and wonder on his face. He then smiled faintly and whispered, "We need to get back to Sam. Right now is not the right time to go spring some surprise attack on the madman. We need to get a solid plan together. How much time do we have? Slade stopped looking for you at the airport and didn't bother looking around the city today. You guys must have prolonged your safety."
"You were at the airport this morning?" Robin asked him, surprised.
"Yeah, but I didn't want you or Slade to see me," he answered with a shrug of his shoulders. "At first I didn't know who you were because of the new hairdo." He smiled when hearing Robin groan in the darkness. They started to jog the way Robin had taken on his way there. "You did an excellent job getting out of there without getting caught," he quickly added.
"Yeah, Sam and I called Abe and said that we didn't have enough money to get a flight and that we were going to take the bus," Robin said with a nod. "We figured that Abe was captured by Slade, so we knew he would be hearing the whole conversation. I'm sure he will be stopping every bus going to Lima now. Too bad he won't find what he will be looking for."
James couldn't help but laughing. "Clever!" he said. "Now that's the Robin I know! You just out witted the master with that one."
"But the question is; how long till Slade catches on?" Robin said. "I say we just bought your son and us at least a day. We need to get a plan together quickly."
"And we need to catch you up to date," James added swiftly.
"I already know what is going on," Robin told the man, perplexed.
"Those memory flashes have got to be getting you down," James said, skipping to a different subject. Robin opened his mouth to say something, but James didn't want the boy to answer. "Yes, I know their annoying, kid," he rambled on. "But I'm sorry to say that has to be the downside to mind swiping big chunks of someone's memory. But I know how to get all those loose ends to come back to you."
Robin frowned while hearing this. "Why do we need to get my full memory back?" he asked James with a hint of frustration in his voice. "We should really be planning something out. My memory can wait, James."
"I've already have thought everything out, kid," James said casually. "Why do you think I was there to stop you at just the right time back in that alley? I was waiting for you for hours! But to answer your first question, the person who don't get their memory back right away might not get it fully back if they delay it all. Some might even experience what the school called limbo, where the person gets confused as to what happened, or in your case, who you're really working for. Understand?"
The teen gave a sigh. "Sure," he answered with another nod. The memory flashes were painful and he always had to stop and put those missing pieces in their spots, which took up to a few minutes sometimes.
"Don't be so enthusiastic about it, kid," James said with his trademark grin coming to his face. "I know they tend to hurt when coming back, but you defiantly need it. You've been a mess for days now. But with this you will be back to that normal Robin I had come to know."
"Yeah," Robin muttered. "We're going to need a lot of ice." James gave a sharp laugh and his bright attitude toward life and their situation let Robin relax a little and smile. They quickly made their ways back to where Sam was waiting for them.
Robin just watched with a warm smile on his face when seeing the father and daughter greet each other with laughs and giggles of joy. Suddenly the boy was bombarded with memory flashes of his real father. This triggered the memories of his mother and the circus. The flashes stopped with the death of his parents. By then his head was pounding and aching profusely. His emotions and feelings from his parents' death were refreshed inside of him and he almost wanted to cry. He bit his lower lip and looked to the floor to try and steady himself.
A few minutes later, James sat next to him with concern all over his face. He put an arm around the distressed teen and asked him softly, "Hey, kid, you okay? You don't look all too hot."
Robin nodded his head with a sigh. "I just had a strong memory come back to me," he answered with his voice coming to the brink of cracking. James didn't say anything else and only sat there with him to comfort the teen with a father's understanding in his actions now. Robin was thankful somewhat to have the man there with him as he tried to decipher through his new set of memories and feelings. This was his first memory flash that came with thoughts over the matter and a swell of emotions. It was hard for him to clean through them, but once he did, he smiled to himself.
He remembered what he was fighting for. Before these memories, he had nothing to go on. He knew he was a superhero and was going by the rules, but he didn't know why he was doing everything. But the death of his parents had opened his eyes to different thoughts and those had told him why he was a superhero. His passion was found and his head was back in the game. He suddenly wanted all his memory back as quickly as possible. He didn't care about the pain anymore.
The day went by as a blur to the teen. They were all tiered from hours of being severely sleep deprived, but they pushed through the day by taking quick naps here and there on the roof top that had became their makeshift home. James had told them his plan and as they perfected it, they would say random words or phrases to Robin to try and trigger memories buried in his mind. Most times he would just smile and shake his head no, but they would hit their target sometimes and it would be their turn to smile at him as he would sit down to concentrate on the new information painfully given to him.
By the end of the day, the three were ready to put their plan into action. They had decided that Sam would be the one who stayed behind and back them up if something went wrong. She would be their last hope if that happened; she just hoped it wouldn't come to her. The two guys were the ones who would have to do the hard work. They were the ones who would have to sneak into the lion's den.
The sun was setting when the two left Sam and headed over to Slade's hideout. The city was covered in a red and yellowish glow from the sunset on the horizon. The wonderful display of colors were never even glanced at by the two guys slinking in and out of alleyways till they got to their destination.
"You first, kid," James whispered to Robin. "Make it last." Robin responded with only a sharp nod before climbing up a drain pipe to the roof of a building next to the wall of Slade's hideout. His face was serious and focused only on his mission. No more mixed emotions and thoughts tortured him. His mind and body was calm for once.
Robin jumped down to the wall surrounding the hideout. His bare feet avoided the iron spikes on the wall. He looked ahead and saw the window of the bedroom before him. He let out a pent up breath before skillfully jumping to the windowsill. He grabbed onto the sill with both hands and let out a soft grunt while pulling his body up.
The windows were not like windows in America. They were shut or locked in a way that someone from the outside could easily open them if they had the right tool. Robin had just the thing. He slipped the phone card into the tiny slot and flipped it up as he balanced dangerously on the small ledge. He pulled the window open and slipped silently into the room.
The room he was now in was a bedroom with only an old queen sized bed in it. Dust covered the walls and floor of the room. Robin made his way to the door and opened it tensely. When seeing no one was there, he snuck down the hallway to the room he guessed held maybe the two kids, Abe and the girl. He stopped at the unguarded door while trying to use his card once again.
He stopped when seeing a shadow cover up his own on the door. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up for a second as both shadows on the door stood there motionlessly. Then in a quick flash, both figures moved like lightning. Slade lunged toward the boy as Robin spun around quickly to block an attack that was sure to be made. Slade still proved to be the quicker of the two as he managed to pin both of Robin's arms to the wall.
"That lie you told was very convincing, Robin," Slade said into the teen's face. A trace of amusement was in his voice as he said, "You're becoming more like me every day."
"It wasn't a lie," Robin came back with another lie. "Sam went on the bus. We split up and I took a plane. I like it how you couldn't find me in the airport even though you had all of your robots with you."
"Another lie," Slade said with an evil smile coming to his lips under his mask. "You're just chuck full of them nowadays. What will be your next one?" The man then lifted his eye to the teen's yellow and black hair and said emotionlessly, "And I disapprove about the new hair color."
"Who asked you, Slade?" Robin said with a small grunt of frustration. He tried to break free from the man, but Slade was just too strong. The teen then brought up both his legs and kicked Slade right in the chest. The man let him go right away and backed up a little as if he wanted a battle between them to unfold.
Robin landed on his feet and didn't even waste a second. He ducked under Slade's legs with a daring smile on his lips and jumped over the wooden banister to the stairs. He landed in the middle of the staircase and bounded down the last few steps with Slade right behind him. With a quick sweep of the teen's eyes, he saw the living room as he ran past it. He stopped at the messy kitchen and quickly turned into the room.
Slade had set up a little camera room in the musty kitchen. Two old TVs were sitting on the pop up table with keyboards and other computer type stuff surrounding the screens showing black and white footage of rooms in the house and places around the wall. He had defiantly known when Robin had gotten into the house.
When Slade got to the kitchen, Robin was brandishing a rusty pan in both hands. Slade narrowed his eye at him as he flung it over his head and took a great big whack at one of the TV screens. The thing was crushed and destroyed on impact. Sparks and smoke filled the air as Robin raised the handle to the pan above his head once again. It was then that the teen noticed that the pan had fallen off its handle and his weapon was now useless.
Slade took the two second confusion to his advantage. He rounded the table and came straight for the boy with a powerful roundhouse kick. Robin ducked with his eyes going wide with surprise. He chucked the handle to the pan at Slade and the man easily dodged it before quickly executing another move. Robin deftly jumped backwards and a flash of panic crossed his face when ramming his back into a counter. He had lost all his room to move!
In an attempt to gain more breathing room, Robin jumped onto the counter and tried to jump over Slade. The man simply caught the boy's ankle and flung him down to the tiled floor. Robin landed on the ground face first with a yell of pain. He grumbled a curse under his breath while quickly trying his hardest to get up off the dirty floor.
"What were you thinking, coming back here, Robin?" Slade asked the boy as he pinned him there to the floor. Robin decided to not answer him as he fought for freedom. His eyes narrowed with hatred as he flung his legs up and skillfully wrapped both of them around Slade's neck. The mini acrobat then brought Slade's head to the ground with a loud battle yell.
Slade let out a small yell of half pain and half surprise. Robin grunted while getting out from under Slade. He spotted the table and grabbed a leg and yanked it as hard as he could before getting to his feet once again. Everything on the table came crashing down to the floor with sparks right between the adversaries.
Robin didn't wait for Slade to catch up. He darted for the front door and started to unlock all the locks on it with his hands slightly shaking from the nervousness. He was on the last one when his luck ran out. A hand shot out and grabbed his hand in a vice grip. He was forcefully yanked away from the door and got a knee jammed into his stomach. The air escaped his lungs as he was thrown into the hallway by the living room.
Slade stood over the boy as he gasped for air on his hands and knees. Robin suddenly sprung forward and wrapped his arms around the man's legs and pulled them together. Slade couldn't prevent going down as Robin managed to tackle the man to the ground. The teen quickly scrambled to his feet and made for the door. A loud yell of surprise escaped him as Slade grabbed his ankle and tripped him. He came to the ground once again with a thud.
Slade came at Robin with various attacks that the teen superhero managed to block or dodge. Once it seemed like Slade was done for a while, Robin came back at him as hard as he could. Once again, their skills were clearly shown when Slade caught Robin's fist after his second punch. He pulled him towards him then grabbed the boy's shoulders and rammed him against a wall. The teen winced when his head slammed into the wall and he saw stars.
"Now that you're here, Robin," Slade said to him as he stuck his face into his, "I can kill off Hess's little pesky kid." Robin glared daggers at him and didn't respond. Slade threw him into the hands of two Slade-bots. Robin grunted in anger while struggling in their grip. He was quickly handcuffed and dragged up the stairs and to the room Abe and Val were in.
Slade unlocked the door and flung it open. He stopped in stunned silence. The room was completely empty! He had been wondering why Robin had been destroying his security system. He had thought that it was nothing and that he was just trying to tick him off somehow, but now it was all too clear. It had been a distraction. But the guards had gone up to secure the door after him and Robin had gone downstairs to fight. The guards were still there like nothing had happened. How could anyone get pass them like that?
"Hess!" Slade growled in anger. He turned around and saw that Robin was smiling smugly at him.
"Surprise!" he said with a laugh. "Underestimating is something you might want to work on, Slade. Think of it this way, you have less prisoners to feed. Just because James still acts like a kid, it doesn't mean he thinks like one. I guess you figured that out when he turned into that bird on the roof a few nights ago."
Slade composed himself and placed his hands behind his back with a relaxed sigh. He had learned long ago how to take mockery. The boy was good at it and would have brought any other person into a rage and he probable would have been spending the night knocked out. But this was like water over a duck's back for Slade. He calmly stood over Robin while smiling down at him till the teen frowned.
"I do have to congratulate you for a clever job, Robin," Slade said smoothly. He lifted Robin's chin up with a hand so they could make eye contact. "But you forgot one thing, my little apprentice. I now have what I wanted this whole time. You."
"Well, Slade, I'm not your only enemy now," Robin said. "You now have a family of CIA members wanting to turn you in, a pissed off teen taking my place in Jump City who now has the freedom to come after you, and last but defiantly not least, four teenage superheroes ready to chew you up. The security on me has got to be stepped up a notch if you want to keep me as your prize."
"Two of those groups will be eliminated pretty soon," Slade said with a casual shrug. "We are leaving…now."
"Now?" Robin asked, surprise in his voice. "Where?"
"Come now, Robin," Slade said with fake sympathy in his voice. "If I told you where we were going, it wouldn't be a surprise. And I know how much you love surprises."
Robin struggled in the grip of the robots as he was dragged back downstairs. This wasn't part of the plan! They hadn't thought that Slade would move out so quickly. James wasn't going to try and track him till two hours later. This was bad! By the time they would try to track him, he would be half way to where their destination was. And if Robin was correct, it would be somewhere overseas. But what could he do?
A/N: We had some good things and bad things happen in this chapter. More detail of their plan will be explained in the next chapter. Thanks for reading! Please give a review!
