Victor Lipov's last true fight had been eighteen years prior. In the time since he had sparred with the Odmience when necessary and briefly tangled with Cain aboard the Final Offer. But in all of those years, he'd left his lucrative assassination jobs to the boy, to train and toughen him up. Although he had survived careening down the mountains of Poland all those years before, the damage to his figure had been permanent. Under his cloak of self-assuredness and wild schemes, his body was frail. And, as the boy he had trained to be a masterful killer closed in on him, Lipov was paralyzed with horror.
"Nie, nie, zatzymac!"
His terrified, Polish screams brought him nothing. Rafal beat all of the air out of his stomach in a flurry of punches. The boy threw two kicks to his knees and dropped him to his knees. As the pleads turned to cries of pain, Rafal grabbed a handful of his blonde hair and held his head upright so he could pound into it without knocking Lipov onto his back.
From the floor below, Cassandra could just make out the beating that was taking place. She rolled onto her stomach, spat up some blood and bile and clenched her fists. "No."
She had come to save Rafal from his life as a killer. She would not watch him claim another life, no matter how vile. And no matter how much Cassandra, even as she had come to hate rage as much as she had, took a small delight in the vengeance the boy reaped against Lipov.
Gram looked on at the scene in silence, as if he couldn't process what unfolded before him. Cain just laughed and laughed as the boy punched Lipov so hard the handful of hair was ripped right from his scalp and the old assassin's head planted against the floor.
Rafal grit his teeth as his face contorted from the overwhelming rage that boiled within him. Lipov was already struggling to see straight and shake the stars from his vision as the boy reared back a foot and kicked him in the face. The kick threw Lipov's face toward the ceiling as he wretched in agony.
Cassandra used up off the floor with what little strength she had left and called, "Rafal!"
If the boy heard her, he did nothing to acknowledge it. As he raised one of his legs up high Lipov tried to cover his face with his hands, but it didn't protect him much as Rafal stomped it again and again.
"Rafal, enough!"
He looked over toward her for just a moment, the hatred and loathing still clear in his dead, blue eyes. He pulled the wheezing Lipov from the ground just enough as his mouth was wide open and he struggled for breath. Rafal bent low smashed into him again with a devilish uppercut. In an unintentional move, the strike came just as Lipov's tongue slipped between the rows of his teeth. Lipov screamed in pain and twisted horror as blood seeped from his mouth and he spat out the end of the muscle to keep from choking on it.
"Stop! Don't have to do this!"
Battered and through screams, Lipov could do nothing the resist. His words had been rendered gibberish, his please were nothing to his creation. Rafal pulled him into a headlock with one arm and grabbed ahold of the opposite side with the other. Cassandra recognized the hold instantly, the boy was about to snap Lipov's neck.
"Stop it!" Even when he didn't look toward her she continued. "You don't want this, know you don't!"
With a deep, stuffed-up inhale Rafal glared up at her, as if he demanded, "Don't I?" with his eyes.
"Whatever he deserves, doesn't have to be you," Cassandra said. "No more, Rafal. Please. No more killing."
Rafal slowly shifted his leer from Cassandra down toward his mentor. Lipov continued to blubber bloody nonsense in the grip, his once simply scarred face was totally broken. Maybe it was her pleas that moved him. Or maybe he just took pleasure in disappointing his would-be master at another turn. Whatever it was, he released the headlock and threw the battered Lipov to the ground.
"Well would you look at that. Guess you guys didn't even need us."
Cassandra turned toward the entrance of the theater-like space. At the top of the slope stood Batgirl, Robin and Red Robin, the first of whom stepped in with a wide grin on her face. "Batman's a few minutes behind, but it looks like we don't even need him. You guys really cleaned house."
With a clenched fist and a downward gaze, Cassandra remembered the first five Lipov had decided to make an example of. "Not everyone was saved…"
Before Batgirl could ask for a further explanation, a burst of wild laughter overtook the space, amplified by the room's acoustics. Still bound to the chair with a ruined leg, Cain hooted and cackled at the sight of his defeated apprentice.
"So was it worth it, Vic? Was it everything you dreamed it could be? You came all the way back from the dead, kidnapped some kid, spent nearly two decades training him and what happened? Not only did he fail to kill my kid, he didn't even have it in him to kill you! This is the most pathetic thing I've ever seen in my life!"
Lipov's body clenched as he tried to stand, but didn't even have the strength to push up on his hands.
"You sure about that sob story you told me, Vic? Because letting elaborate torture games become your undoing in an assassination attempt is exactly what I just saw! It was just another story, wasn't it? Another load of bull by a whining brat trying to make himself sound important. You're nothing, Vic. Goddamn nothing!"
With a hand that shook with struggle, Lipov reached into his jacket and produced a second remote. He spoke as best he was able without the tip of his tongue. "Always hawve a contingencwy, 'Avid… mine was thwis chwuch."
Rafal only realized the implications of the act after he pressed but the button. Even as the boy stomped on his hand and the older man cringed again with pain, it was too later.
Through his mouth of bloody, gnashed teeth, Lipov spoke. "Mine was a wot of fawlty electwical wiring and gasowine."
Everyone was given pause by his words, but it only took a few seconds for the burning smell to rise from beneath their feet. Though the words probably struck every one of them, it was Gram who muttered, "God have mercy—"
An eruption of fire engulfed the far right side of the room. It followed some invisible trail of gasoline and electrical wires around the back of the stage, consumed the room in a blazing red and swiftly moved toward the ceiling. The captives above screamed as the flames moved ever higher.
Robin glared toward Batgirl. "You were saying—"
"So not the time to be a smartass right now!" Red Robin shouted over him. "Get down to Angel—"
Cassandra turned to them and yelled, "No!" She pointed toward the lighting rig. "Save them first! Can't get down!"
Batgirl tried to respond, "But—"
"Do it!" Cassandra turned toward the burning stage, grabbed Rafal's sword and pulled herself up. The boy himself ran off, she didn't watch for where. She approached a nearly petrified Gram and looked back toward Connor, who still struggled to stand. "You."
Gram snapped back to life. "What?"
"Him." She pointed toward Connor with the sword. "Go. Help him."
The moment Gram processed the request, he ran from the stage as fast as his legs could take him. In the midst of the increasingly sweltering heat, Cassandra approached the chair Cain was bound to and cut at his restraints.
Cain scowled at her when he realized what she was attempting. "What in God's name are you doing?"
She shared his scowl. "Saving you."
"Why?"
"Shut up."
"Thaw's it!" A bitter laugh escaped the beaten Lipov just a few feet away. "Save him, get youwself burned up in the pwocess!"
Cassandra pulled Cain up from the chair and slung one of his arms over her shoulder. As led the broken Cain toward the edge of the stage. Despite her hopes otherwise, he and Lipov shared a last leer before Cain looked upward as the smoke and fire rose toward the ceiling.
"Burn in hell, David."
The flames reached a relatively small, relatively unstable chunk of the roof.
"You first, Vic."
The wooden rafters that held the chunk of ceiling in place was eaten away by the climbing flames. A collection of blazing wood, burning plaster and hot steel fell from above and crashed atop Victor Lipov. Cassandra turned away and didn't look back. She didn't need to see a body covered by all that rubble to know what had become of him.
She led Cain one step at a time off the stage. Every other body within the church worked fast against the growing inferno. Colored in the reds and oranges, Red Robin and Batgirl maneuvered the scaffoldings to the best of their abilities. Batman arrived just thereafter and, without explanation of what was going on, assisted Robin in setting ropes to help Lipov's captives slide down from the lighting rig. Even weakened as he was, Gram made it to Connor and gave him a shoulder to lean on. Cassandra led Cain one step at a time.
"You're going to get yourself killed, damn it," Cain said. "You're wasting your time."
"Told you to shut up."
Another chunk of the building's roof came down, smashed into a nearby scaffolding and reduced the tool to another piece of rubble. The flames glowed hotter and smoke filled the eyes and lungs. Cassandra keeled down and wheezed, tears ran from her eyes, but she just kept leading Cain forward.
His protests grew more frantic. "What do you think this is going to accomplish, huh? When the League realizes I was compromised and I'll never be able to walk again, they'll burn me faster than this fire ever could. I'm already dead, you hear me, Cassandra? I'm already dead!"
The rest of the assembled had already escaped as Gram, Connor and the last of the captives ran through the threshold. With what words she could muster against the smoke, Cassandra shouted, "Have to save you!" Cassandra had been in burning buildings before, but she had never experienced something so bright and so dark all at the same time. Perhaps that was hell looked like.
Finally, she took another step toward the exit, but Cain did not follow. She struggled to go forward again, but he still didn't budge. She turned toward him. "Move!"
On his aged, battered face, Cassandra saw something she had seen before, if only rarely. His eyes were hung downward, his face was clenched tight. He was in the state of pain he engaged the least: shame.
"It wasn't on you to save me." Despite his forceful words from before, these were quiet if firm. "It's a father's work to save his child, not the other way around."
The tears that slid down Cassandra's face had nothing to do with the smoke as she pulled against him again and again, though Cain did not budge. "Don't care what you did, move!"
"You don't care?" Cain guffawed. "All of this is my fault! You, Lipov, that kid, you were all here because of what I did." In spite of all of his best efforts, a few tears ran down his face as well. "Don't you dare get yourself killed for me, Cassandra, I'm not worth it!"
The flames grew higher and the smoke grew thicker. Something above them rumbled. Cassandra kept her hands on his and tugged, despite his words. "Only a monster if you choose to be."
Cain gazed downward for a moment before he looked up and the rumbling noise grew louder. "I'll have done all of two decent things with my life. And the first was creating you."
Cassandra pulled at him and screamed, "Move!"
Cain pulled her toward himself and said, "Goodbye, Cassandra."
With the last of his strength, he shoved her forward as a mound of debris fell from the ceiling and crushed him under the weight of blazing wood and steel.
"NO!" Cassandra ran at the pile of destruction and reached out for it before the extreme heat warded her backwards. Her body shook in anger and horror as she starred at the place where her father had stood.
Misery took her, the smoke and wounds all caught up, she fell to her knees, internally comatose at the sight. More chunks of the ceiling came down and smashed into floor and scaffoldings around her. Outside, her family were taking account of everyone and only just realized she was still unaccounted for. But the flames had grown too great. The whole ceiling would soon collapse. Someone had to go in after her, but it was too dangerous to do so.
Cassandra knelt before the rubble, her body felt too weak to carry her any further, her mind too exhausted to comprehend what had happened. She only regained feeling when a hand clutched her shoulder.
She whirled around and looked upward. The boy she had fought so hard against stood at her side with a hand extended. Cassandra was unsure if it was kindness that was on Rafal's face, but thought it was at least the closest thing he could manage.
She had saved him not once, but twice. It was his place to return the favor.
Cassandra cast a last gaze at the smoldering wreckage that buried David Cain, looked toward Rafal and accepted his hand. With one arm slung over his shoulder, the two trekked out from the blazing inferno.
[[Author's note- Well, twas a deadline that got me this far, even if I'm throwing in the towel and saying I couldn't quite make it. There's only one chapter of the story remaining, where I'm going to attach my mental retrospective as well. Didn't quite finish the story on time, but considering just how hard I've been pounding at my keyboard as of late, I'm still feeling pretty good about all I've gotten done since I got my butt in gear.
Happy Easter everyone]]
