Steph escorts Jason back, through the cemetery, the two of them stumbling under the weight of him and his stonelike limbs, until they get back to the school, to the library.
"Bruce!" Steph yells. "Bruce!"
Everyone in the library looks up in unison, and a deep, impossible silence fills the room as they all stare at the pair of them.
There aren't words to describe the look on Bruce Wayne's face when he sees Jason Todd, nor the sound that came out of Dick Grayson's mouth when he saw his little brother standing there, somehow, impossibly, back again.
It's a joy that is spread heavily with the sorrow and the grief that had underpinned these past few months, a grief that cannot just dissipate, even in the presence of its target.
There are explanations, but so few of them, and so thin that every word of it only raises a dozen more new questions, and if it weren't for the steady glow of Tim's Orb of Thessulah, which Babs had been using as a paperweight in his office, they might be unable to believe the depth of their joy.
But Jason is here, and his soul is also present, and even with no memory or knowledge of how he got there, with no answers and a thousand questions, Dick Grayson and Bruce Wayne fall upon him in a tight embrace that was so intensely personal, so private, that Barbara Gordon took it upon herself to quietly escort the rest of them out of the room, so that the reunion could occur in peace.
Steph does not mind. She already had her moment with Jason, alone in the mansion
Stephanie Brown is going to turn eighteen years old in just a few days.
That's… not something that she expected to get to say.
She became a Slayer when she was fifteen years old. She'd given birth only a few short months before, and weathered her father's wrath for it. She'd gotten her father turned into a vampire and then killed him while listening to him, burning and screaming for her to help him. She'd moved to Gotham, made friends, and gotten killed in that short order.
"Stephanie," Bruce says, when she enters the library, a few days before her birthday. "I have someone important for you to meet."
He looks… nervous. Was that even allowed?
"This is Alfred Pennyworth," Bruce says, gesturing to the man standing next to him. He's old and thin, his hair elegant in its silver state, his suit impeccable, and his mustache refined. "He's the man who trained me to be a Watcher."
Steph pauses, confused, because she always thought it was meant to be a family thing, but she doesn't say anything.
"It's nice to meet you," she says, and, because it clearly matters to Bruce. "Mr. Pennyworth."
The man smiles at her. "Please, call me Alfred."
"How improper," a man says, from behind Steph.
She spins around, reaching for the stake in her backpack, when she realizes the presence behind her is human.
The man's shorter but broader than Alfred, with thinning white hair and a larger, more imposing mustache. His suit looks, in her opinion, to be fancier, but he doesn't wear it as well, and he's looking down his nose at her like she's something dirty on the carpet.
Bruce's voice is very, very, quiet. "Wintergreen. I didn't realize you'd also be in town."
"Someone unbiased needs to investigate this highly unusual situation," Wintergreen says, his lip curling. "As you know, Mr. Wayne, the Head Watcher has… questions, about the way that things have been happening in Gotham."
"Stephanie," Bruce says firmly. "Go to class."
"I—okay," Steph says, edging around Wintergreen. He might be human, but everything about him has her on edge.
The door closes behind her, and Wintergreen turns to Bruce.
"I can't help but notice you didn't tell her to stop her pre-emptive attack," Wintergreen says.
"Stephanie has impeccable instincts, Wintergreen," Bruce says, glaring at the man. "She's never harmed a human being."
"Except her first Watcher," Wintergreen says, his voice harsh.
"Brown was a disgrace to the Council, and abusive to boot."
"We do not comment on how a Watcher chooses to discipline his Slayer," Wintergreen says with a disdainful curl of her lip. "The fact is, she attacked him, and he died as a result of her actions."
"Which was why you sent her to me," Bruce points out, calmly. He's not a young man anymore. He might not have seniority within the Council, but he is a Slayer's Watcher, and has kept her alive for two years now. That's not nothing, despite the insult that assigning him Stephanie was supposed to be.
"Yes, you've kept her alive by coddling her," Wintergreen sniffs. "You've even permitted this second Slayer to remain in the same town; her and her Watcher."
"Grayson is highly capable, and he makes his own decisions," Bruce says.
"Don't play games with me, Wayne," Wintergreen says. "We know that Grayson was your protégé. His affection for you hasn't faded, even with his years away from your damned influence."
"If you were worried about that, perhaps the Head Watcher shouldn't have assigned Grayson to Cassandra," Bruce says, although his heart is racing.
The game here is delicate, with everything dangling by a thread. Years of plans are at stake, and Bruce can't afford to make a single wrong move.
"I'll be evaluating Cassandra," Wintergreen says with a curled lip. "Her first Watcher destroyed her birth records for his own infernal reasons, so we'll have to be a bit more… unorthodox with her. But I expect she'll have no issues passing my examination. Cain always had excellent results."
"And Stephanie?" Bruce says.
Wintergreen raises an eyebrow. "It's her eighteenth birthday soon, isn't it? Pennyworth here will be glad to help you administer her test.
Bruce frowns. "Stephanie has already died when she was sixteen. Surely—"
"Don't be ridiculous," Wintergreen scoffs. "If anything, that only solidifies her as a failure. She couldn't stop the Black Mask from escaping, and had to be revived by an unaffiliated teenaged girl of no potential at all. She consorts with vampires, goes to school, and you have failed to take any of the appropriate measures to break off her contact with her mother or remove her from this undesirable situation."
"She's saved the world," Bruce says, his voice finally rising. "Multiple times."
"She's untrained, undisciplined, and unpredictable," Wintergreen says. "She's irreverent and vanished for several weeks, and you, by your own account, could not get her to reveal where she went. She attacked you when you were foolish enough to attempt to accompany her to face the Black Mask—did you think that would escape our notice?" Wintergreen strokes his mustache. "Wayne, you've done well keeping her alive as long as you have, but it's obvious that she's not suited to be a Slayer."
"You're wrong," Bruce says.
"Well, I'm sure we'll see in a few days," Wintergreen says. "Now, where can I find Grayson and Cassandra? I'm eager to see a proper Slayer in action."
Bruce forces himself to give the directions to the house, where Dick is running Cass through drills, and grits his teeth as the man turns to leave.
"Bruce," Alfred says quietly, once they are sure the man is gone. "You can't seriously be intending to go through with this."
Bruce stares at Alfred in confusion. "Of course I am. That's my duty. I'm her watcher."
"Bruce, this test… by your own account, Miss Brown wasn't raised as a Potential. She was raised as an ordinary girl, and looks up to you."
Bruce looks at him, not sure what he's saying.
"She trusts you, Bruce." Alfred says. "What we're proposing to do is a violation of that trust. You're putting her at great risk, and for what? To satisfy the wishes of a council of decrepit old men who have never so much as seen a vampire in person?"
"It's part of the plan," Bruce says, resting his elbows on his knees. "You know that."
"This grand plan was fine in theory, Bruce," Alfred says sharply. "But we are not talking paper dolls and toy soldiers. Miss Brown is a young woman who has placed her faith in you, and you are proposing to violate it to impress men who you loathe."
"It's not about her, or even about them," Bruce says. His mother's screams echo in his ears. "It's about the greater good. It's about making things right, after everything the Council has done."
Alfred's mouth is a thin, disapproving line, but he says nothing more.
He simply sets the case on the table and leaves.
"You're leaving?" Steph says, dismayed while Dick and Cass pack up the van.
"We've had an emergency in Metropolis," Dick says. "An old friend of Bruce's needs our help."
"Another Watcher?" Steph asks.
"No, Clark's… well, it's a long story," Dick says, looking helpless. "But he's a good friend, and if he says he needs our help, he needs our help badly."
Steph swallows down the bitter "but you won't be back in time for my birthday," that wants to break out. She's almost eighteen years old, and she knows how to deal with disappointments like this.
"Sorry," Cass says, holding the heavy weapons crate on her own.
Steph's shoulders slump, but she doesn't say anything else. The situation needs a Slayer, and she's got classes, so it's not going to be her going to Kansas to deal with this crisis, but she can't help but feel abandoned.
As they drive away, she gets a text from Bruce, asking her to meet him in the library.
She groans when she enters the room to see piles of crystals on the library table.
"Crystals? Again?"
"Since Tim has been working on his magical abilities, it's more likely that you'll be able to deal with threats from warlocks and witches more directly… if you take the time to recognize common magical ingredients," Bruce says sternly. "Now. Three uses for amethyst."
"Uh, healing?" Steph guesses.
He glares at her.
"Focus, Stephanie," he says sternly.
He runs her through each of the types of common magical crystal three times, and each of the uncommon magical crystals once, before he finally hands her the large chunk of pearly blue crystal and tells her to find the flaw in the center.
It takes her forever to find that tiny brown speck, and when she's done Bruce sends her on patrol. "Hey Bruce?" She says, looking over her shoulder as Bruce carefully sets the blue crystal back on the table. "You're coming to my party tomorrow right?"
"Of course," he says, not even looking at her. "St. Cloud Cemetery tonight, remember?"
"Is Jason coming?" Steph asks, hopefully.
"No," he says. "At the moment he and Barbara are work on memory recall techniques to figure out what pulled him out of the hell dimension. Duke, Harper, and Tim are working with them on it."
"Oh," Steph frowns, even though it's dumb. She's patrolled alone before. But it feels like everyone's… busy, this week, which shouldn't bother her, but it does.
She goes out on patrol.
The Gotham Arms was once an esteemed establishment; not the largest or grandest hotel, but a respectable location with historical significance, nevertheless.
It's there, that the Watchers have taken up residence. The building might be old and falling apart, but the rooms are in decent enough condition.
Alfred and Wintergreen have both set up rooms for themselves there, the two men's loathing for each other palpable as Bruce enters the main room, where a woman is listlessly bricking up the door.
"How is he?" he asks her.
"Hungry," she says, looking at him sideways. There's loathing in her eyes. He can't blame her, not if she knows what is going to occur tonight. She's tall, with dark skin and fine cheekbones. Her body is packed with muscle and her hair is shaved, revealing an elegant profile.
"What's your name?"
"Onyx," she says, curt and to the point. She has to be in her mid-twenties, and she looks at him with fury as she bares her teeth. One of her incisors is chipped in a way that looks painful.
A former potential, if she's only offering him one name. He suspected, because the Watchers rarely work with outsiders, and she doesn't have the attitude of a Watcher, or even a Watcher student. She can't hide her disgust, with what is going to happen here, and Bruce wishes he could be as free with his own loathing.
But he turns around and goes to find Wintergreen to make his report, rather than explain any of this to the woman whose life has been left in ruins by the Council he's working for.
"How did it go?" Wintergreen says, drinking a cup of tea.
"The hypnotic state was easy enough to induce. The drug has been administered, and fortunately, Cassandra was called away this afternoon."
"No fortune about it Wayne," Wintergreen says, mild as acid. "Our good friend Mister Luthor arranged for a little cult he's been keeping an eye on to attempt their opening of the Hellmouth for this time period for exactly this purpose. Grayson's contacts in the area would have learned about it and alerted him almost immediately."
"Contacts?" Bruce says, as if Dick's ability to make friends wherever he goes is news to him, somehow.
"That strange creature. What is it the locals call him…the Superman? We have reason to believe that Grayson has been in contact with him."
"I thought the Superman was a local legend. A cryptid of sorts, used to explain away all sorts of local phenomena?" Bruce says, accepting his own cup of tea from Alfred.
"We have reason to believe he's some sort of dimensional creature. Not a demon, exactly, although I wouldn't go so far as some of the archivists. They call him an angel," Wintergreen snorts. "Human enough, and benevolent enough, although Luthor of course wants him for parts. He's convinced that the creature can't be harmed by any mortal means, and that a potion made from his heart would grant that power to the drinker," Wintergreen sighs. "A tiresome man, Luthor. But he has his uses, of course."
"Of course," Bruce agrees, as blandly as he's able.
"One more dosage ought to do the trick. Zsasz has been very excited at the prospect of fighting a Slayer. It has been some time since the Council has selected him for such a test, and vampires do get bored without stimulus."
Bruce keeps his face still as a stone. "Stephanie will perform well."
"I hope so, for your sake," Wintergreen says in a bald-faced lie. "It's always such a shame when a Watcher keeps a Slayer alive until her eighteenth birthday only to lose her to the Cruciamentum."
"Stephanie is creative and quick thinking. The medication only hampers her Slayer abilities. Her speed, her strength, her senses. Her cunning is unaffected, and she's got that in more than adequate supply."
"Yes, well," Wintergreen says. "I'm sure she's very impressive for someone whose training started so young. Unlike Onyx, who you met downstairs." He smiles, and Bruce is reminded of a predator. The man might not have much in the way of physical strength, but he is dangerous in his own way, and his keen eyes are focused directly on Bruce and those in his care. "Trained from the age of three. A perfect stealth operative, if I do say so myself."
"She was one of yours?" Bruce is unsurprised. Wintergreen is a lot like his pupil, the Head Watcher, fond of keeping his former Potentials close on hand.
A Watcher only gets one Slayer in a lifetime, but many of them go through dozens of potentials over the years, waiting to see if a Slayer pops up among them. Rank and prestige come with the more Potentials trained, more for actually training a Slayer, and even more the longer a Slayer is kept alive. Every year when the new Potentials are rounded up, Watchers have to decide if they're going to discard their old, aged out Potentials completely, sending them out into the world with no skills beyond fighting and killing monsters, or to try to use them as lackeys for the Council. It's more work to keep them on hand, but it's also smarter. Former Potentials keep the Council going. They are researchers, assistants, scouts, and smiths, doing any job that requires supernatural knowledge, but no magical ability. And, of course, nothing delicate or prestigious, and certainly nothing to do with the Slayers themselves. Assisting with the preparations for the Cruciamentum is as close as Onyx has probably ever gotten to the Slayer, despite her years of work for Wintergreen.
Wintergreen is many things, but Bruce has never underestimated the man and his cunning. To keep a loyal, clever former Potential on hand is always a good move, if you've got the political clout to get one a position.
Political machinations had kept Bruce away from Potentials for years, but the Council had been running out of excuses, and were going to have to give him one eventually.
Stephanie being called and her first Watcher dying must have seemed like a perfect opportunity to Bruce's enemies on the Council. Untrained Slayers who had never been Potentials never seemed to last long, and after he'd been a Watcher for a proper, called Slayer, he'd never get another Potential or Slayer again. He'd be pulled back to London, placed in a prestigious but powerless position, probably in research or weapon design, and be left essentially locked out of the decisions.
Even Bruce had prepared for this eventuality; it was why he had pulled Dick and Barbara into play, rather than allowing Dick to continue his apprenticeship.
But Stephanie had made it to eighteen, survived multiple apocalypses, and saved the world. She's a strong, capable Slayer.
Bruce is confident that she will be able to survive this.
Steph feels kind of lightheaded when she gets to the cemetery, so she sits down on her favorite headstone to gather her thoughts, fighting down the nausea, which hasn't been this bad since…
Well, since before she was the Slayer.
She doesn't get sick, anymore, that's the whole point, well okay, not the point, but it's a perk, and she hasn't done anything else that could cause this, so what—
The vampire takes her by surprise, which is… well, a surprise. She normally senses them.
Maybe she is getting sick?
The momentum of the blow sends her flying to the ground, and she tries to grab her stake and push him away, but something's wrong, her arms are moving too slowly, her fingers are too clumsy, she fumbles the stake, and—
The vampire snatches it out of her hands, his grin wide and menacing as he raises it up.
"Tell me if I'm doing this wrong," he laughs, and he tries to bring it down into her heart.
Instinct has her rolling out of the way, and on pure instinct she grabs her backup stake—the pencil she used to take the SATs—and slams it into the vampire's chest.
It doesn't sink in easily, she has to use every inch of her strength, and her own ribcage feels like it's constricting, but a moment later she's coughing up vampire dust and collapsing onto the ground, covered in grass stains and shaking.
"Well, you don't have a temperature," Crystal says, brushing her hair out of her face. "Nausea, you say?"
"I'm not… not this time," Steph says. "I can't be."
Crystal looks guilty. "Of course," she says. "Lightheadedness, too?"
"Yeah," she says, staring down at the bruise blossoming under her collarbone, where the vampire had tried to drive her own stake through her chest.
"I'll talk to Bruce," Crystal says. "See what we can find."
"Thanks Mom," Steph says, hugging her mom tightly.
Crystal hugs her back. "Of course, sweetie."
Steph throws up on the next morning, the day before her birthday.
It's thick, inky blackness that reminds of Ethiopia, and she swears, staring at it through watery eyes as she clings to the side of the toilet, that it moves.
But when she's taken deep breaths, rinsed her mouth, and looked again, it's still intimidating and dark, but it's definitely still, and she feels better now, at least.
She goes to school anyway, puts on her favorite purple zip up hoodie and texts Bruce as she walks to class.
Have u ever heard of a curse that makes someone puke black, wriggly stuff?
No.
Oh. Could it be a curse?
It's probably nothing, Stephanie. We'll talk after class.
Onyx was born to be a Slayer.
She's not the only one, of course. She's met dozens of others like herself over the years. Broken, useless women, too old to be Called, trained for a lifetime of nothing but. She knows how to assemble a crossbow blindfolded, can identify any demon species by its footprints, can tell you exactly the amount of pressure it takes to shatter a vampire's ribcage. She's trained for every terrain, can read twelve languages, most of them dead, and can recite the lineage of Slayers going back to the origin of the Council.
All of it is useless, of course. A handful of her fellow former potentials went into bounty hunting, mercenary work, even black ops, but none of them lasted long. They aren't trained on guns, as the weapons are virtually useless against demons, they aren't taught how to interact with people, most of them aren't trained to do basic mathematics, and they're raised to be completely dependent on their Watcher.
Oh, they can survive. She can forage, she can hunt, she can even cook what she catches and finds. She can win any fight, so long as she can see her enemy.
But she doesn't know how to open a bank account, or how to get a job. She doesn't know have a social security number, a passport, or even a birth certificate that she's seen. She doesn't know what country she was born in, or the name of her parents, and the closest thing to a parent she's ever known is the bastard who did that to her.
Of course she stayed, when she turned eighteen and he told her she was never going to be Called, that she was useless and past her prime, and told her that, out of his fondness for her, he'd let her stay on as an assistant, if she wanted.
It was a better deal than many Potentials get. So many of them hunt demons, after they turn eighteen, because it's all they know. Some last. Most don't.
Onyx has her suspicions about that, but she's not a fool enough to ever say it out loud. She's made it to twenty-six, an almost unheard of age for a Potential. Wintergreen trusts her now, enough to bring her to this, the most secret and awful of Watcher traditions.
She stares at the giant coffin, containing the monster the Slayer is meant to face, and wonders if she feels sorry for the girl, the one who has the life that Onyx has always wanted.
She shrugs, because there is nothing she can do about it now, and ignores the sound of the Watchers preparing to go out to fetch dinner.
She turns to fetch the book she's translating for Wintergreen—a text about vampires with souls, of all things—and she almost misses the sound of the hinges on the coffin creaking open.
Almost.
Steph sits in the library, her knees drawn up to her chest, feeling miserable.
"Stephanie, you're overreacting," Bruce says. "Now, focus on the crystal."
"But—"
He looks at her, exasperated. "Stephanie. Whatever's going on, we'll figure it out. It will be okay."
Steph swallows the lump in her throat. "You're sure?"
"Of course," he says.
Steph feels some of the tension flow away, and she does what he asks. She still can't name the four uses of peridot, but by the time they end the lesson with staring into the depths of the blue crystal again, she feels cold and miserable and lightheaded, but calmer, at least.
Bruce has to say her name to get her to focus again, because she zoned out, just staring at that blue crystal.
"Go home, Stephanie," he says with a sigh. "Maybe don't come into school tomorrow."
"Okay," she says, quietly, not even protesting that tomorrow's her birthday, that she might want to be at school with her friends.
She's halfway home when a car pulls up beside her.
It's a blandly nice kind of car, the kind that Twilight fans think are the sexiest thing in the world, second only to khaki skirts.
"Stephanie?" It's the Watcher guy, Wintergreen. "Get in the car. We've had a demon spotted at a nearby hotel."
"I—" Steph looks at the man's stony, unsympathetic face, and swallows down any protests of not feeling well, about the hollowness that seems to fill her entire body. "Okay."
She gets in the car, and texts Bruce about it.
He leaves her on read, which she'd be angry about if she had any energy left, but she's just so, so tired, and she wants all of this to be over.
Wintergreen walks her to the door, the picture of scornful courtesy, and even opens the door for her.
How chivalrous of him, she thinks bitterly, as she steps into the creepy abandoned hotel, turning on the flashlight on her phone so that she can see, even as he closes the door behind her.
She sees a body sprawled out in the middle of the room, and she rushes towards it to see if the person's dead, when an arm wraps around her neck.
She smells something rotting, feels something damp trickle down her neck, feels a knife press against her cheek.
"Hello, dead thing," says a voice in her ear, and then everything goes black.
"Wake up! Girl, wake up!" The voice is deep and has an accent that screams fancy and education, and Steph forces herself to open her eyes, even though everything hurts, and all she wants to do is throw up again.
Now that she thinks about it, that sounds like a great idea, so she rolls onto her side and retches, black, inky, viscous fluid spilling out of her .
"Oh gross," the woman's voice says, "Okay, get it out kid, we need to move."
She opens her eyes and turns to face the voice, seeing a pretty black woman with a bruise under one eye and a gaping bite mark on her neck.
"Are you okay?" Steph says, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand, trying not to stare at the gunk that just came out of her. It's definitely moving this time, and the woman is looking at it, her eyes wide, so she's not imagining things.
"What? Oh, this. I'm fine. Or I will be. I didn't drink back, he just wanted a snack," the woman says, dismissively.
"He?" Steph says, getting to her feet, unsteadily.
"Zsasz," the woman growls. "He was a serial killer before he was a vampire."
"Oh great, just what we need," Steph says. "Damn it, did he take my bag?"
"Must have," the woman says.
Steph reaches around her neck, and finds the necklace that Tim and Harper had given her for her last birthday still there.
A star of David necklace. Steph's not religious, not of any sort, but wearing a cross every day sends vibes, and she's really not about that. Well, at least she's not completely defenseless, even though a vampire that's a serial killer probably isn't going to be so easily deterred as seeing a sacred symbol.
"Okay," she says, taking in their surroundings. They're in a small room with one door and no windows, and the walls are creepily covered in what looks like a series of tally marks. There's no convenient furniture to turn into stakes, which is never a good sign, when stuck in a creepy house with a vampire. "So are you a hunter? What do you know about Zsasz?"
The woman snorts. "No, I'm not a hunter. I'm a researcher."
Steph looks at her, incredulous. The woman's biceps are thicker than Steph's calves.
"I can fight some," the woman admits.
"Okay, we'll deal with your self-esteem issues later," Steph says, trying the door handle. It's locked, of course, and Steph groans, before reaching into her hair to pull out two pins.
Maybe it's a pain, putting her hair up like this constantly, but it's a habit she got into back when she was in California and having to break into (and out of) places her dad didn't want her, and it's a habit she's never quite shaken.
"Where'd you learn to pick locks? Your Watcher teach you that?"
"Pff, he wishes," Steph says. "My ex, Dean taught me. Only useful thing he ever did, honestly."
"… you have an ex?"
Steph blinks at her. "Well, yeah."
The woman's face becomes panicked. "Oh God, you're not—did he grab the wrong person?"
"What?" Steph blinks at her. "Are you okay—sorry, I didn't ask your name. I'm Steph."
"Onyx," the woman says. "You're—are you her? The Slayer?"
"Most days," Steph grimaces as she puts the pin back in the lock. God, her head hurts.
"… and you have an ex," Onyx repeats.
"You're really hung up on that, aren't you? Know much about Slayers?" Steph carefully inserts the second pin, sticking her tongue out as she tries to jimmy the lock open.
"… yes, you can say that," Onyx says faintly.
"Well, I don't," Steph says with forced cheer that she isn't feeling. "Never even heard of them before I got Called." The lock clicks. "There we go!" She pushes the door open.
The hallway is pitch dark, and Steph's cellphone is gone, so the two of them have to grope their way through the darkness, looking for a switch, a cord on the ceiling, or something.
Her heart is racing in her chest, because the nausea is back, and everything seems to be spinning. Her limbs simultaneously feel like limp, weak noodles, but also too heavy for her shoulders. She's stumbling in the dark, groping around blindly, rather than her normal coordination and her decent night vision.
She's powerless, she's helpless, she's terrified out of her mind.
But there's someone else here, and so Steph can't focus on that. She needs to keep Onyx alive, she needs to get her out, and then she can have a meltdown later. Also, possibly, be murdered by a serial killer who is also a vampire.
She thinks about the rotting breath against her neck, and the way he called her dead already, and she tries not to have a panic attack.
The bruise under her collarbone throbs forebodingly.
"What is this place?" She says, to take her mind off her stupid, frail, all-too-human body.
"The Gotham Arms. Some weird hotel, got turned into a Bed and Breakfast years ago, before it shut down."
"Okay, I am writing to the city council to complain about how many creepy abandoned buildings this town has," Steph hisses. "This is ridiculous."
The woman lets out a slight huff of laughter. "You're really… not scared, are you?" She sounds… longing, somehow.
"No comment," Steph says with a lightness she doesn't feel.
"The dead aren't scared," a voice says from between them. "What does a corpse fear?"
Steph screams, despite herself, as hands wrap around her throat.
"She drowned, didn't she, the little corpse?" Zsasz's voice is like nails on a chalkboard. "The Great One drank from her and fed her to the sea."
How did he—
The lights turn on, and Steph tries to scream again.
Zsasz is tall, and bald, and covered from head to toe in tiny little tallies. Most of them are scars, but some of them are newer, barely even scarred.
Steph twists in his grip, even as her breath grows short from the pressure he's applying to her trachea.
"Don't worry, dead girl," Zsasz says, as if he's trying to soothe her. "You'll sleep one more time, and then you'll wake up again, and you'll be like me."
Steph's grasping fingers seize hold of the Star of David necklace and she presses it against the inside of Zsasz's wrist, and he lets out a horrible scream and lets her go, dropping her to the wooden floor.
She can see her surroundings now, can see that they're on a stair balcony, can see the front door, two floors down. And, distantly, she can see the faint light of her cellphone, and the ripped strap of her backpack.
Across from her, she can see Onyx, eyes wide with fear, and Steph knows that she has to do something.
Steph grabs Zsasz and pushes him down the stairs, before vaulting off the balcony in order to try to get to her bag.
She cries out as she lands, her ankles buckling beneath her without the support of her strength and flexibility, and she thinks one of them might be sprained, if not broken, but it doesn't matter, she lunges forward for her backpack, where she keeps her weapons.
"Kid!" Onyx yells, and Steph barely turns around in time to see Zsasz lunging at her, his face barely less monstrous in its demonic form.
Steph grabs her vial of holy water and with a quick twist to loosen the lid, throws it at him like a grenade.
The lid pops open as it strikes his bare chest, and the vampire recoils, letting out a horrible scream as the holy water turns into smoke, leaving the silvery burns.
… smoke.
She looks up, and spots the old-fashioned sprinkler system in the ceiling, and she nearly cries.
Steph charges past him, her backpack clutched in her hands, throwing her second vial of holy water at him as she goes to slow him down, grabbing Onyx by the wrist to pull the woman with her.
"Onyx!" She whispers, as the two of them stumble into a hallway. "You work here, right? Do you know where the water system is?"
"I—yes?" Onyx says.
"The sprinklers get their water from it, right?" Steph says, reaching back into her bag.
"Yes, of course they do, what are you talking about?"
Steph pulls out her rosary, the nice one that apparently was blessed by the Pope or something like that, she really wasn't paying attention to that part, but Jason promised her it would work. "Do you know any prayers?"
Onyx stares at her.
"Put this in the water supply, say a prayer, doesn't matter what kind, then pull the fire alarm. I'm going to hold him off as long as I can."
Onyx grabs her by the arm. "Are you crazy? You don't have your powers, he'll kill you!"
How did she know—never mind. "I'm the Slayer," she says. "Powers or no powers, this is my job."
Onyx stares at her for a moment. Footsteps approach them.
"Go!" Steph yells, shoving the rosary into her hands.
Onyx runs.
Steph pulls her crossbow out of her backpack, readies it, and then spins around and fires just as Zsasz crashes through the door.
Onyx has spent the past two weeks in the Gotham Arms, first preparing it for Wintergreen and Pennyworth's arrival, then preparing the room to house Zsasz's coffin, and then keeping watch while the Watchers talked politics and drank tea.
The first thing she had done was fix the water supply, since even though Wintergreen spent her entire childhood telling her about the value of a cold water shower, he's never really approved of them for him, just for her.
She stumbles into the utility room. In the distance, she can hear Steph shouting and screaming, can hear the thump of bodies and the twang of a crossbow, and she clings to those sounds, because as long as the sounds are happening, that means the stupid, brave Slayer is still alive.
She unscrews the water tank and shoves the rosary in, shouting the first prayer she can think of—it's an Ancient Egyptian prayer to get rid of headlice, but it counts—and then she grabs the fire alarm for the utility room, and pulls.
The scream is awful, and it goes on and on and on.
Onyx runs into the hallway to check on the kid—seventeen, she's seventeen, how had she never put this together, she knew this, she remembered how old she was when she'd become too old, but somehow it had been different when it was her being seventeen, rather than a girl with baby fat on her cheeks who refused to show fear.
Steph is leaning against the wall, her forehead bleeding profusely, but alive, breathing, and with no visible bite marks. The holy water raining down from the sprinklers has soaked her to the bone, plastering her hoodie against her skin and her hair to her head, but she looks tired and pale and oh, so young. Her eyes are closed, but she's still breathing, so that's something.
The Watchers had drugged her, robbed her of her powers, and she had still risked her life on the faint chance that Onyx would have been able to survive after pulling the lever.
There's no sign of Zsasz.
So she was right about that, at least.
The door bursts open, far away, and Pennyworth comes in, holding a crossbow.
"Miss Onyx!" He says. "My goodness—Miss Stephanie!" He kneels down at her side immediately, checking her injuries.
"What are you doing here, Miss Onyx?" Pennyworth says. "You know Wintergreen will be displeased about you interfering in the test."
"I—I didn't," Onyx says, frowning as she puts it together. "I—I was here when he got loose."
Pennyworth goes still. "Were you?"
"… yes," she says.
They're both thinking it. She's the oldest surviving Potential left working for the Council. For some reason, the rest of them never seem to live this long.
"I believe," he says, handing her his crossbow. "You were gone when I arrived. Missing, perhaps, even. Probably Zsasz killed you. It was terrible."
"I—where do I go?" She says, staring at the crossbow blankly.
Pennyworth looks at her with the deepest pity. "In Los Angeles," he says, finally. "There's a woman named Kate Kane. She'll be able to help you."
"Kate Kane," Onyx repeats. "Okay. Kate Kane."
She gets to her feet, but pauses. "Will she be okay?" She asks, looking at Stephanie, who's starting to stir.
"She'll be fine," Pennyworth says, softly. "They can't touch her now. She passed."
Not sure if she can find relief in that, Onyx turns and flees.
"You shouldn't have gone in without my say so!" Wintergreen yells, and Steph winces, as Bruce cleans out the wound on her head.
"She's a child, and Onyx was still in there!" Alfred says. "You know I disagree about the Cruciamentum in the best of circumstances, but I am not about to stand by idly when one of ours was in danger!"
Wintergreen snorts. "She was a failed Potential, not one of us, Pennyworth," he says.
Alfred stares at him, gobsmacked. "By God, man, how can you be so callous? She was your Potential! You raised her!"
"Some of us know how not to become inappropriately attached to our charges, Pennyworth," Wintergreen says. "Martha—"
"Don't you speak of her," Alfred says, his voice dangerous and quiet. "Martha was the best Slayer in generations, and she died due to the Council's—"
"We're fighting a war, Pennyworth," Wintergreen says.
"We're waging a war, Wintergreen," Alfred says. "And we're letting children fight it."
"You always were too soft, Pennyworth," Wintergreen scoffs. "Fortunately, despite your weakness, you managed to raise a Watcher who can handle the pressure."
He holds out a hand. "Congratulations, Wayne. You exceeded Slade's and my expectations completely."
Bruce shakes his hand, and only then does Steph find her strength to speak up.
"… so you did this to me?" She asks, her voice a croak.
Every bone in her body aches, the cut on her forehead throbs, and she feels exhausted and scared and weak. She nearly died, powerless and afraid, and not even to save the world or to do something real.
But because these three men had decided it was so.
"You—you knew what was going on? Why I was sick? Why—"
"It's a simple magical drug, but very rare," Wintergreen says. "It's tradition that on the Slayer's eighteenth birthday, we determine if she is worthy, not just strong and fast. Being a Slayer is more about power. It's about intelligence, cunning, and grit. And you've passed. Congratulations."
"I—but you said—" She looks at Bruce, who doesn't meet her eyes.
"You exhibited extraordinary courage and clear-headedness in battle. The Council is very pleased," Wintergreen says. "Especially considering your background, you've exceeded all expectations."
Steph's mouth closes sharply. "So, do I get a gold star?"
He sighs, as if she's a toddler who's just thrown a tantrum about not getting a treat. "I understand that you're upset—"
"I understand that you should get out of town before my powers come back," Steph says, shaking with rage, or maybe it's exhaustion. Either way, she doesn't care.
He looks over his shoulder at Bruce. "Well, you'll have to try and teach her proper respect, still."
"Bite me," Steph says, baring her teeth at him.
He smiles at her, as if she hasn't said a word. "Congratulations again, Stephanie."
The door closes behind him.
There's a moment of ringing silence, and then Steph takes that awful blue crystal and throws it at Bruce's head.
It goes slightly to the side, becasue her aim is off without her strength, and it shatters into a thousand pieces against the wall with a tremendous crash, and she wants to scream.
He doesn't even have the decency to look away, just turns to face her with that awful, implacable expression, the same expression he'd given Wintergreen, and it's a world away from the man she's known for two years, from the man who'd mourned Jason with her, from the man who had been willing to die alongside her when she was sixteen years old, and she doesn't know why.
"How could you! I trusted you, you—"
She bursts into sobs, and Alfred is there, wrapping an arm around her shoulder, and she shoves him away, because he was a part of this, they all were, what was—
"Bruce," Alfred says, softly.
The doors open, and Duke comes in, carrying a stack of books, and then stopping cold. "Steph? What's wrong?"
"Nothing," Steph says, tears running down her face. "I'm going home."
She starts walking away, but Bruce calls out to her, the first words he's said to her since Alfred had brought her out of that awful place.
"Stephanie. It's not safe for you to walk alone."
Steph doesn't even look back.
"Duke?"
"Yeah Steph?"
She swallows a sob. "Can you… drive me home?"
He drops the books on the floor without hesitation, and wraps an arm around her shoulder.
"Of course," he says.
The two of them leave the library, and don't look back.
Alfred turns on Bruce the moment the door closes.
"What was that?" He demands. "I thought, at the very least, you had warned her about what was about to happen, even if you'd decided to go through with that damned test."
"She would have told her friends, and they would have interfered," Bruce says.
"As is their right! I thought you'd agreed you would never put a Slayer through this!"
"That was before Wintergreen arrived to supervise this personally," Bruce snarls, through gritted teeth. "We could have gotten away with it if only you had come to supervise, but him—he reports directly to Slade, he'd have figured it out, and then the plan—"
"Damn the plan, Bruce!" Alfred snarls. "That girl trusted you. She was your Slayer!"
"Is," Bruce says. "She survived."
Alfred lets out a laugh. "If you think she'll be your Slayer after tonight, I didn't raise you with a lick of common sense." He looks at Bruce. "You've lost her, Bruce. She will never trust you again. And you deserve it."
"I had to," Bruce says, lips numb. "The Council was looking for an excuse to pull me away, to put someone else in charge of her."
"Because they're trying to get her killed!" Alfred explodes at him, in a way that Bruce hasn't seen in years. "They don't need her anymore, they've got Cassandra, who they believe they can control, who they think is the perfect Slayer, because they're damned fools who don't realize that Cain's methods have consequences, or that the girls he raised still can think for themselves, and they know the Slayer line isn't tied to Stephanie anymore. As far as they're concerned, Stephanie is a liability."
Of course they're scared of her. She's clever and creative, strong and gifted… and, most dangerously of all, ferociously independent.
The Council is terrified of her, and they don't even know about Leslie, about Stephanie's pilgrimage to Ethiopia, which Steph had confided in him, but he had elected not to repeat to the Council in order to protect the sacred site itself.
"I had to do it," Bruce repeats.
"You can tell yourself that as much as you like," Alfred says, turning away. "But that won't fix what you've broken, Bruce."
Steph doesn't tell her friends about the test. Doesn't tell them about Bruce, and the blue crystal, and the drug that made her vomit the darkness, the power, out of her own body.
She sleeps through her entire birthday, and when she wakes up, she's eighteen, and her power has come back enough that the cut on her forehead has mostly faded into thin red line, running from the inside of her eyebrow to her temple.
Duke knows more than the others, but he still doesn't know enough to tell, and no matter what the others ask, she's not saying anything.
She's been betrayed by a Watcher before.
She doesn't know why she thought this was going to be any different.
She goes into the library the next day.
"Where's Alfred?" She asks.
"At home, with Jason," Bruce says.
"When do Dick and Cass get back from Metropolis?"
"In two days," Bruce says, frowning at her.
"Where's Babs?"
"Here," Babs says, wheeling herself out of the office. "Steph, is something wrong?"
"Just the Cruciamentum," Steph says, lightly.
Babs goes white as a sheet.
"What?" She whispers.
"Yeah, so do you want to be my Watcher?" Steph says, not looking at Bruce anymore. "Because someone who won't be named drugged me and lied to me and I've had enough shitty father figures betraying me for a lifetime, I figure, if I'm going to go through this again, it can at least be a mom or big sister figure who's going to betray me."
Babs looks lost for a single moment, before she looks at Bruce again, and her expression hardens.
"Stephanie—" Bruce says warningly.
"Whatever, it's not official, it's not like what I want actually matters," Steph says. "But I'm done training with you. I'll train with Babs, or with Dick, or with Cass, but I'm done with you and your hypnotism crystals."
Babs exhales sharply. "I'd be glad to train you," she says. "We can talk more after class, work out your schedule."
"Barbara," Bruce growls.
The first bell rings, and Steph turns to go to class. She stops in the doorway. "I'm not going to tell the others, because Duke doesn't deserve to hate his new dad," Steph says. "But I don't trust you. I'm never going to trust you again." Her eyes are bright with tears she won't shed in front of Bruce.
Bruce looks away, and she feels a sickening stab of victory.
She leaves, and lets the door slam shut behind her, leaving Bruce and Babs alone in a ringing silence.
Babs turns on Bruce the moment Stephanie is out of hearing range.
"You said you wouldn't do it," she says. "You promised us."
"Wintergreen came to supervise personally," Bruce says. "It was unavoidable."
"You're full of it," she says. "There are always options. And what if they decide to do that to Cassandra next? Are you going to let that happen again?"
"They've already declared that Cassandra doesn't need to take it," Bruce says. "A technicality. Apparently Cain gave her a similar test when she was seven, and she passed with flying colors."
"Don't you dare distract me with stories about Cain's horrible parenting," Babs says, so pale that each and every freckle could be counted on her face. "Since when do you care about what the Council wants? You're the one who got me out of that place, who helped my father find me, you've been spiting them your entire life!"
"The plan—"
"The plan's not worth anything if you kill more Slayers to accomplish it!" Babs yells. "What's the point—"
"Dozens of potentials, every single year," Bruce says. "Kidnapped, bought, given willingly, it doesn't matter. Dozens of them, taken from their families, raised to be nothing but fighting machines. You should have seen Onyx—"
"I've met Potentials, Bruce, I was one," Babs says, hitting the arm of her chair with her fist. "I didn't know my own last name until I was eight, because my Watcher didn't think I needed one!" She glares at him. "When you talked me and Dick into this, this life of politics and back dealing, I agreed, because I thought we were helping the Slayers. When you sent Dick to be Slade's apprentice, I didn't say a word, even though we both know that man's a monster, because Dick could protect people there, help people like me, like Cass, like Steph. I didn't even say anything when you cut that plan short and got him to be appointed Cass's Watcher, because you were right, it was important to keep her safe from Slade and Wintergreen and their like." She leans forward, her face stony.
"You've betrayed every single choice I've made to support you," she says, dangerous. "You can't say you're doing this for them—for the Slayers, for the Potentials—if you're willing to throw them away just because it's convenient."
"I knew she would survive," Bruce says.
"I'm sure she didn't!" Babs snaps. "You didn't tell her, she probably thought she was dying—who did they pull out of their collection for her? Which one of those monsters of monsters did they trap her in with? Pyg? Crane?"
Bruce looks away. "Zsasz."
Babs recoils. "So you sent her in there. Let her go in there, scared and unprepared, against one of the worst serial killers in history. Someone who's run the Cruciamentum ten times over the past three hundred years, and won every single time?"
"She defeated him," Bruce says.
"And I'm proud of her, but that doesn't change what you did," Babs snaps.
His face is like stone, and she sees that she's not going to win this. He needs to believe that he did the right thing, that this was a good call, because otherwise, he's lost Stephanie for no good reason.
He'll figure it out in his own time. For all that Steph says she won't tell the others, there's no way this will stay a secret forever. She's going to have to tell Dick, and Dick won't keep this from Jason, and after Jason and Dick both have their goes at Bruce, the odds of the others knowing…
Bruce really doesn't understand, what exactly he'd done.
Not yet, at least.
"C'mon," Steph says, grabbing Cass's arm and tugging her close. "This way!"
Cass flushes slightly, not sure how Steph still doesn't notice the way that the two of them touching sends spikes of electricity through her body.
It's the power within them, it has to be. There has never been so much of it in one place, coursing through two different sets of veins, causing two separate hearts to beat.
The two of them are an impossibility, and everything about it feels so, amazingly strange that Cass doesn't have words for it, not in English or in Cantonese, and so she lets Stephanie Brown lead her further into the cemetery, away from the route that Bruce had wanted them to patrol.
"But—" Cass protests. "Patrol?"
"Yeah, but you feel it too, don't you?" Steph says, grinning in a way that doesn't quite reach her eyes. She's been like this a lot lately, smiling without meaning it, acting as if everything is fine even though she's obviously upset. "There's something weird going on here. And we're the Slayers, not Bruce. He doesn't actually know what it's like."
… that, that is true, Cass must admit. Bruce knows a lot of things, but he knows them from books and from stories. He has killed monsters, but he is not like Cass, like Steph, built for this. He does not feel the darkness in the distance, calling to them, does not understand the thrill of the hunt.
A Slayer is many things, but it is, first and foremost, a predator of monsters.
They hunt them, and the demons all fear them more than anything else. And demons are not used to being afraid.
That is what a Slayer is for, to be the thing that monsters have nightmares about.
Cass lets Steph's hand remain around her wrist as she tugs her towards the strange feeling they're both sensing. Steph is more sensitive to these things than Cass, but Cass can sense it too.
She… likes Steph touching her. It's strange. She shouldn't. The two of them should be repulsed by each other because their existence is an anomaly, a paradox of magic and logic and everything in between. There is only supposed to be one. It's the Chosen One, not a Chosen Two. Whoever heard of such a thing?
It's supposed to be one girl in all the world, not the two of them against the world.
But she likes it anyways, likes Steph's hand in hers, likes the warmth of her body when it brushes against her, likes the way she's grinning at her over her shoulder as the two of them go off the beaten path to investigate.
Cass tentatively smiles back, unsure of any of this.
She's disobeyed her Watcher before, of course. She wouldn't be here if she hadn't.
But… the times she's disobeyed, it's always been… about big things. Important, world shattering things.
Not something as silly as changing their patrol route, which Bruce is being strict about lately, ever since Steph fought that vampire, and came back exhausted, scared, and upset. She was sick, according to Tim, but he says it with a frown. Everyone agrees that Steph was ill, even if she's not telling them everything, and she's clearly still a little weak, so it makes sense that Bruce is being a little controlling, a little strict.
But… Steph is right.
There is something dangerous, and powerful, just around the corner.
But it's about to be facing two Slayers.
It stands no chance.
Cass finds herself grinning broadly at Steph at this thought, and finds herself, without really thinking about it, pulling out of Steph's grip, but only so that she can twine her fingers through Steph's.
Steph's smile is beatific, and Cass's heart races for some reason that she can't place.
They find themselves moving towards the old crypts, even further into the cemetery than Jason's little hideaway. They don't go here normally; there are no recent dead to awaken as vampires, so they don't bother.
Cass finds herself looking around, curious despite herself, and lets go of Steph's hand to do so, even though a part of her wants to cling and never let go.
Steph doesn't say anything, just kneels in front of one grave, then another, looking at the names and checking the grass and flowers, to see if any of them are disturbed.
"Some of these names are the same ones…" Steph says, quietly.
"What?" Cass says.
"The names. Wayne, Kane, Cobblepot, Elliot… I didn't realize how old those families are."
"Small town?" Cass says. "They don't… leave?"
"They do, though," Steph says. "Bruce went to England to become a Watcher, and Thomas Elliot went somewhere to become a warlock or whatever he was…" She frowns, tilting her head. "And I've seen Kanes on gravestones, but I've never met one of them in person." She pauses, looking a bit worried. "I think… hmm. I don't remember."
"Huh," Cass says. "Gotham's weird."
"No kidding," Steph says, getting to her feet and brushing the dirt off her jeans. "Hey, want to try and see if the Mausoleum's locked? I can't get an exact lock on our bump in the night." She makes a face. "I think I'm still feeling a bit wonky from—the bug."
"Sure," Cass says, glancing at the weird little building, made of granite and marble, bleak and foreboding in the moonlight.
She moves forward, reaching for the heavy steel door that will be as light as plywood to her Slayer Strength, when she feels the air move behind her, and hears a thump.
She spins around, just in time to see a vampire standing above Steph's unconscious form.
"No!" Cass cries, rage and fear and concern warring inside her in equal parts, and she grabs hold of the raging darkness inside her and pulls it into her muscles so she can move even faster as she lunges towards the vampire.
The vampire steps aside and Cass goes flying past her, and Cass skids to a halt, her stake held tightly in her hand as she pivots.
The vampire is six inches taller than Cass, with long, flowing black hair, and a dangerous look in her eyes as the barest hint of a smile emerges on her face.
"So it's true," she says, and her voice is almost musical.
Cass doesn't bother to listen to what the woman has to say, and instead she charges again, taking a flying leap.
The woman evades again, rather than taking her own directly, her dark eyes focused intensely on Cass as they enter a dance unlike any fight that Cass has had since she got fast enough to hit her father, but this…
Finally, she reaches into the pool of darkness, the neverending, infinite essence of what it means to be the Slayer, and yanks it into her body to make her faster, stronger, better.
She hits the vampire with her foot after that, and the vampire smiles.
"Finally," she says. "A challenge."
The vampire's first hit sends Cass flying backwards, the force of it making her ache down to her teeth.
"Who are you?" She says, because that's the sort of thing she's supposed to ask.
"Shiva," the vampire says, and finally, her beautiful, proud face twists and warps into its monstrous visage.
Cass's stomach drops.
She knows Shiva. Knows that her father fought her.
Knows that she beat him.
"Come on, little Slayer," Shiva calls, beckoning with her hand. "Your father claimed that he would teach you so that you could beat even me. That he would make you the most powerful Slayer that ever lived, with the darkness herself within your soul. A killer like no other. Show me."
Cass recoils. "I'm not a killer!"
"But the darkness lives in you," Shiva says. "I see it in your eyes. So let us see how your father did, shall we?"
It is Shiva's turn on the offense. Her hands are grasping, each blow like a hammer, delivered so fast that Cass barely has time to breathe between them.
"Pathetic," Shiva snarls, each time a blow connects, and each of the words out of her mouth hurts even more than her punches, than her kicks. "I will leave you broken on the ground, not even worthy to drink. Are you certain you're a Slayer?"
Rage fills Cass, shaking her down to her very core, and she lets out a wordless shout. But she can do nothing but move out of the way of the next blow, because she's still too slow, too weak. So she starts to focus, desperation and anger calling more and more of the darkness into her, until the fog of it is coating her skin, filling her with raw power.
Deeper, deeper than she's ever gone before, pulling it into herself, and it's intoxicating, it's beautiful, and…
She starts to fight back.
Her first punch to connect sends Shiva skidding back, leaving a trail in the grass. Her second has her colliding with the iron door of the Mausoleum with a loud ringing sound.
Steph remains unmoving on the ground through all of this, and all Cass can do is hope that she's still alive.
The power is everywhere, filling every inch of her, and why, why had Cass ever been afraid of this? This is home, this is who she really is. Invincible and more powerful than any demon, stronger and faster than any Slayer before her.
Was this why her Father had been the way he was? Had he seen this power, this darkness, and known that the only way she could touch it was by pushing her, by raising her like that, different than any Potential?
Perhaps, but she doesn't care right now. All that matters is the threat before her, the vampire who is threatening what is hers. Her town, her friend, her position as the most powerful… none of this can be tolerated.
The darkness tightens into coils of smoke around her arms, a second layer, like armor, and she raises her stake.
"Finish it," Shiva says, looking up at her, her face human once more. Her expression looks strangely peaceful. "Do it."
Cass is the monster that monsters fear, the creature that demons have nightmares about. She is the most powerful Slayer that ever lived, and she has just defeated the unbeatable vampire.
She drives the stake directly into Shiva's heart, and Shiva laughs, reaching out and cupping her cheek as she turns to dust.
"I knew… only my own daughter… could beat me."
Cass stumbles back, eyes wide.
"Thank you," Shiva breathes, and she crumples into dust before her eyes.
"Good job," a voice says behind her, and Cass spins, but she knows who it is before she finishes turning.
"Father," she whispers, eyes wide, and the darkness around her melts away in the time it takes to utter that word, leaving her, exhausted and confused and scared, standing in front of the man who made her.
"You're perfect," he says.
And it's true. Of course it's true. He never lies, after all. And he made her, so how could she be anything but perfect?
But then she remembers.
She straightens her spine and shifts into a fighting stance, ensuring that she is between him and Steph. "What are you doing here?" She demands, the Cantonese slipping off her tongue far easier than English's awkward syllables ever have.
"Looking for you, of course," he says, spreading his arms wide. "Cassandra, you did such a good job. I'm so proud of you."
"Don't care," she snaps. "Go away."
"But I need your help," he smiles at her.
"Go away!" Cass repeats, wishing she still had her stake, but it vanished because she'd left it buried in Shiva's chest.
"Cassie—"
"Don't call me that!"
"I'm your father," he insists, smiling at her just like he had when she had been little, and accomplished an amazing feat. "And your Watcher."
"Not anymore," Cass says. She's not sure if she means Watcher or father.
"Come now, don't be silly. Wayne didn't teach you to do your trick. He didn't teach you how to beat Shiva herself." He steps towards her, intent to hold her in his arms radiating from him, and she punches him in the jaw.
He crumples beneath the force of the punch, blood trickling out of his mouth.
"Ow," he says in English, as if he's suprised.
"Go. Away," Cass says.
"Do you think that kind of power comes cheap?" He demands. "Do you think you can reach into the Slayer's Heart because I taught you some meditation tricks?" He laughs, getting to his feet.
He's the same height as Shiva, maybe an inch taller, but somehow, Cass feels dwarfed by him in a way she wasn't before, by the most dangerous fighter in the world.
"I made deals," he says. "For you. To make you perfect. To make you strong. To make you the best." He smiles at her, and touches her cheek, exactly where Shiva had, and this time, she's so stunned she lets him. "The people I owe are collecting, Cassie. I need your help, to pay back those debts."
Clarity returns like a bucket of cold water crashing over her as Steph lets out a groan.
She's alive.
Cass reels back from Cain's hand, shoving him away with both of her hands. "Don't care. Didn't ask you to."
"But you love it," he goads her. "I saw your face. You love what I've raised you to be."
"Was she telling the truth?" Cass demands, switching back to Cantonese as Steph stirs. "Was she my mother?"
Cain smiles, and says nothing, just turns around and walks away.
Cass lets him, her heart thudding painfully against her ribcage, as if it's trying to shatter itself against her bones.