For so long Robin always wanted to know how does Slade looks like behind the mask. Now his wish is coming true as the shards of the mask is falling down. Pale blonde hair was the first thing the Titans saw, then the black eyepatch that's covering the right eye, next is the shock piercing grey eye, and finally the blonde goatee is the last to be revealed. Slade looks to be a middle aged man in his 40's. Robin's jaw drops open to see the resemblance between Slade and… Jericho! That was something Robin didn't expect.
Once the last shard lands on the ground, Ravager roundhouse kicks his father away from him. A loud grunt is heard as Slade lands harshly on the ground. Ravager is panting angrily as he's still bleeding from his mouth. "Aren't you gonna wipe it off?" Cyborg asked. Ravager shook his head with a small smile on his face. Slade gets up with his own blood running down the corner of his mouth, perfectly mirroring Ravager's.
"Now I'll wipe it off." Ravager replied. The Titans circle around the mercenary with their powers activated. Slade looks calmly at each and everyone one of them, with eyeing Ravager a bit more. Then Slade closed his eye and chuckles. This kinda bothers Robin seeing Slade looks so human.
"You always did have a difficult time making friends your own age, son." Slade spoke. Starfire's starbolts glows bigger and brighter as she took a step closer to him.
"At least he has some! Do not let me catch you disrespect my friend like that again!" Starfire threatens.
"Disrespect? Oh no, Starfire, you got it all wrong. I'm in fact respecting him for that." Slade corrected.
"Everyone take a step back from him!" Ravager warns. "When he says something like that, it means he's about to launch an attack!" Slade turns to face his son now with a neutral look.
"You still remember how I work, Grant? You're the same you and I. And that's to be expected since you are my flesh." He said.
"Don't you dare compare yourself to Grant!" Robin roars.
"Oh, don't be jealous, Robin. You are like us as well. If the two of you were to hang out together, people might have thought the two of you are brothers." Slade smirks.
"Enough talk! Let's finish this!" Beastboy declears.
"How foolish are you? You all disappoint me. Especially you, son." Slade shook his head.
"Do not call me that." Ravager growls. For a moment there, everyone saw a sincere smile on the villain's face before pulling out another button from his belt. "Don't tell me!" Ravager gasps.
"It is." Slade confirms. "You honestly didn't think I won't have a backup? I thought I taught you better than that, son." Raven was about to use her powers to get the button away from him when Slade pulls out a device that's attached to his sleeves and activates it.
The button that Raven took away from Slade earlier send out an electrical current throughout her body. She let out an ear piercing shriek before landing on the ground. "No, Raven!" Beastboy yells. He was about to run over to her side when Slade stops him.
"Not so fast, Beastboy. Take another step and I'll level your precious city." He warns.
"What do you want?! And it's better not to kill the Titans since you didn't know I was alive." Ravager asked. Slade narrows his eye at with hate. But the hate doesn't seem to be aiming at Grant, it seems Slade is hating at life in general.
"I do want to kill the Titans, Grant. I didn't want to at first. Hell, I didn't even care for them. The moment I thought I lost you, I was in hell. Everything in my life went wrong: Joey went mute, your mother hated my guts, I lost my eye, and most of all, I lost you. I curse the world and all the Gods that exist. Then I thought, 'why is it my life that's going through hell? Why isn't this city going to hell with me?' That's when I decided I want to destroy Jump City. Everything went to hell the day we moved here. I initially placed bombs in highly populated areas to go off. I was in the roof of the Town Hall waiting to see chaos, but then," Slade's hands clenched as his body shake with anger. His eye look at the Titans with such hatred they ever seen.
"Wait a minute. The bombs that were found at the mall and at main street was all you?" Cyborg asks.
"Oh course." Starfire gasped.
"We stumbled upon them by accident. Cyborg and Beastboy began fooling around the mall. They both got on Raven's nerves and she accidentally set off her powers, breaking a chunk of the mall's escalators. That's when we saw a timer attached to it." Robin summarized.
"And after we disabled it, Cyborg found another frequency by main street altering us of another bomb. After we disabled that one, the city acknowledge us as heroes and our popularity skyrocketed." Beastboy finishes.
"That's right. It took me weeks to plan out that attack. But you children walts to my city and ruin everything I worked so hard to build. That's when I decided you guys have to go. But before I got rid of you, I wanted to see if any or all of you are worthy to allow to live. That's the real reason I send the Hive kids to go after you." Slade reveals. Then his grey eye shrink with madness, giving him a craze look on his face. It's really unsettling to see a man who was calm, cool, and collected, to now be a crazy psychopath. "Since my son seems to value you Titans, I'll allow you all to live as his slaves. After I destroy this city, you'll have no choice but to live with me, Grant. Then I'll find your mother and Joey and bring them to our new home. We'll finally be reunited as a family just like the good all times." He laughs.
"Your twisted vision will not come true!" Starfire cries out.
"Robin, catch my body and don't attack Slade after I trap him." Ravager whispers.
"What?" Robin asked in confusion.
"None of that is coming true!" Cyborg yells, activating his sonic cannon.
"But Cyborg, it already is." Slade smiles. His thumb is hovering above the button, when Ravager whips out his fingers.
He has his thumb, index, and middle fingers in a circle and aims it at his father. "Mind Transfer!"
His spirit flies inside Slade's body and successfully invades it. Grant is now floating in a dark space where only a few lights are shining through. Grant shudders at the cold atmosphere around him. "So, his heart is not all that black." Grant stated, while looking at the few lights. He flies over to the nearest light and touches it.
He's suddenly at a military base where a man and a woman are the only ones there. Upon closer look, Grant realized that the man wasn't really a man, he looks like a teenager his age. And it wasn't just a teenager, he was his father! The woman has a beauty spot under her left eye, so that must mean she's his mother.
"My name is Sergeant Kane!" Her voice booms. "I'll be your mentor the rest of your cadet training!"
"You're my mentor? That's just no way. You're just a woman!" Slade mocks. His mother simply smiles and picks up a gun. She then aims at the practice dummies and headshot them all. She wasn't done yet. This time she picked up a bigger gun and aimed perfectly at the target ranges. "How's that for 'just a woman'?" Addie pured.
A small red tint appears on Slade's cheeks. "When can we start?" He asked.
Grant got himself out of that memory and went back to the cold dark field. "Huh, so Dad wasn't kidding when he said it was love at first sight." He said to himself. "Anyway, next memory." This time, a light came to the young Titan and he was teleported to another scene.
The new place was a cliff not to far from a military station in a foreign country. He sees his parents sitting on a picnic blanket with his mom hugging her knees and staring at it. Slade puts his arms around and began to rub her shoulders.
"Addie, is something wrong? You've been avoiding me and everyone all day. You know you can tell me anything." Slade assures her. Addie looks at him with worried green eyes and then sighs.
"Might as well tell you now since I can't avoid this forever." Addie sighs. She gently takes Slade's hands off her and sat up straight. She tries to look him in the eyes, but ultimately closed her eyes. "I'm pregnant." Addie reveals. Slade's eyes widen with shock and then he smiles. He tilts her head up and passionately kisses her.
"Ew, that's so gross! Did not need to see that!" Grant shudders with disgust.
"That is the happiest news I've ever heard of my life." Slade smiles.
"You're not upset by this?" Addie asked.
"Are you kidding me? The moment I saw you, I knew I wanted you to be the mother of my children. I'm already loving this child to death." Slade stated. Addie smiles and kisses her boyfriend.
"I'm so happy you feel that way. I was afraid you wouldn't be happy and break off what we have." She admits.
Slade pulls her into a hug and place his hand over Addie's belly. "I would never leave the both of you. Never." He vows.
Grant leaves this memory rather feeling bitter. He clenches his fist as he remembers all the times his father's never been him when he needed him. "If only Mom knew what a liar you turned out to be." He glares. "I bet everything was a lie. He never cared about us." Another light appears in front of Grant. He rolls his eyes and touches it since he wants to get out of here already.
Slade changed out of his Deathstroke outfit and into his military one rather quickly. He jumps into a cab where Slade barks the address to the driver. The cab speeds off as Slade rapidly dials a number on his phone. It went straight to voicemail, which let out a series of curses. The cab finally stops in front of a two story house. Slade throws the money at the driver, not caring all the bills were twenties and practically jumps out of the cab.
He burst open the door to see his wife holding his newborn in her arms. Addie tried to give him a smile, but instead gave him a look of disappointment. She sat down on the couch and reached for the baby bottle.
"Addie, I," Slade began.
"You missed our son's birth." Addie spoke, not looking at him in the eye. "Do you have any idea how heartbroken I am? You missed your first child's birth."
Slade states at his sleeping son as his wife talked. The baby is wearing a light blue onesie and is sucking on a pacifier. "Can I hold him?" He asked. Addie didn't answer and removed the pacifier. That's when the baby's eyes instantly opens and he begins to wail. Addie tries to get him to suck on the bottle, but he kept tossing and turning while screaming.
"Please, baby. You gotta eat." Addie pleaded. But still, the baby kept moving. That's when Slade gentle pride the baby from his mother and into his arms. Slade took the bottle and got the baby to drink it. The baby's eyes slowly opened to reveal grey eyes.
"That wasn't so hard, was it, little guy." Slade smiles. The baby kept on drinking it in peace. Slade looks at his son and his wife. "He looks like you, Addie. I'm glad." He said. "When he gets older, girls will be chasing after him."
"Grant." Addie says.
"What?"
"I named our son, 'Grant'."
"I like it. I think it suits him."
"..."
Slade sighs and sits down next to Addie who's avoiding eye contact. "I really am sorry, Addie. I didn't mean to missed Grant's birth. I tried really hard to finish my mission, honest to God, I did. But I'm not offering any excuses, I just want to let you know I'm here to help you raise our son together." By now Grant has finished eating and went back to sleep, making Slade smile on pure happiness. He kisses his son's cheek and began to gently rock him back and forth. "And I promise to always love and protect you, son."
Tears are rolling down his eyes as the memory is now over. Grant touches his wet cheeks and gasp. "What the? When did I started crying?" He questions. He shook his head and covers his head. "All of this are just a bunch of pissed lies! That bastard didn't mean any of what he said! He's been manipulated us from the start!" Grant yells. Another light floats in front of him. Grant smacked it away and shook his head. "I don't want to see any more lies!"
But the same light appears right in front of him and teleported in another memory. All Grant remembers is the huge amount of sadness he felt.