Chapter IX
The stench of blood, sweat, and soil fouled the evening air. There too was another element in the atmosphere, just as potent as the rest. It had no image, though all present could see it. It had no odor, yet they could just as easily smell it.
Hate, in its rancid majesty, had closed in, not unlike a fog, around them, blinding their every action.
Arriving on scene, Impulse stomached the jarring visual of Wondergirl and Secret lying unconscious as Robin clawed to his feet. After successfully redirecting the current of the fog, Impulse and XS decided to reconvene with the rest of the group, with Bart checking on team one and XS team two.
To his ardent displeasure, Impulse raced towards the girls' prone bodies and viewed just how wounded they were. "Whoa, what the episode of Friends happened here?"
In vengeful reverie, Robin commanded Bart, "Impulse, get the hurt back to the infirmary in the Justice Cave!"
"…But what about Harm?"
"NOW!" boomed Robin, unsettling Impulse as well as himself to a degree. He then shifted his battered, but no less acute head in Harm's direction, and added gravely, "I'll handle Harm."
"You sure, cuz by the look of things, you…" and as Impulse continued to speak, he noticed Robin did not, and maybe could not, hear him. Instead, the insistent drubbing of settling the score with Harm dwarfed any and every other sound. At that moment, Bart Allen yielded, seeing full well that Robin was as dangerous a man as he had ever encountered.
"…Yeah, sure Rob, whatever you say." A bit alarmed by his normally easy going friend's radical change in disposition, Impulse backed away from him and tended to the girls. Under his breath, Impulse murmured, "What is this, yell at Impulse day? …At least I'm not the one who got handled by a super-villain who probably still lives with his parents."
Meanwhile, halting her mesmerizing speed, Jenni Ognatz approached Superboy and the fallen body of Spoiler. Puzzled by what had happened and eager to help her friends, Jenni asked Superboy, "Are you two alright?!"
In no mood for her kindness, Superboy exploded from off is knees into the air, bent on catching up to Harm. "Superboy, wait!" Despite her words of warning, the Kid had no interest in anything other than Harm's face splattered against his knuckles. Dismissing her, he shouted, "Get her back to the infirmary and check on the others! Harm is mine!"
"Wait!" XS screamed a second time, but her plea was soon lost in the dust of Superboy's unalterable course. As he darted further into the forest, Jenni had no recourse other than begrudgingly do as he had said. He, much the same as Robin, had left no other option.