No, we still don't own them. We do hope they're enjoying this adventure, though.
-X- -X- -X- -X- -X-
Kyle was waiting for her when Donna arrived at the Statue of Liberty. He'd chosen a spot on Lady Liberty's torch and apparently used his power ring to clean the surface. The ring also generated a small bistro table and chairs. On the table rested bagels, cream cheese, lox, and coffee, all very real.
"It's not Mars," he said, "but it's the best I could do at short notice."
"It's amazing, Kyle." Donna landed lightly and looked out over New York Bay toward Manhattan. The city shimmered in the early morning light. "Beautiful."
"We're the first to see this view in almost a century." Kyle turned and gestured toward the gold-plated flame above them. In that moment his profile reminded her of Dick, or maybe it was the grace of his movement. How had she never noticed that before? "Well, outside the maintenance workers who change the light bulbs. The last tours up to the torch were in 1917, I think."
He was trying to be so grown up with that speech -- probably, Donna thought, in response to the things she'd said to him when they'd broken up. Donna shoved the comparison to Dick out of her mind, instead focused on the features that were uniquely Kyle, his caramel brown eyes and loose, easy smile. In the doing, she remembered why she'd been attracted to him. She'd liked his sense of humor, his intelligence. She still did.
They hadn't been apart long, but Kyle had changed, Donna realized. A few more months of experience with his power, with the Justice League, even with the Titans, had tempered him. The new maturity added to his appeal.
"You said it was important, but the world isn't exploding," he said. "I figured we could eat while we talk."
Talk. Right. They had to talk now. Donna found herself afraid to begin. She certainly wasn't going to start with the ambrosia. She had to work up to that. So, she began with, "I've missed you, Kyle."
Kyle pulled out a ring-generated chair for her. His expression reflected his caution though he did look pleased. "I tried to call."
Just like Dick had been trying to call this morning. Why did she keep thinking of Dick? Donna frowned, then quickly pulled her lips into a smile. She didn't want Kyle to think she was disapproving. She was here to show him a different, more relaxed, Donna. From her bag, she withdrew a split of champagne, a small bottle of orange juice, and two plastic cups. "I wasn't ready to listen before."
"A lot of what I said then wasn't worth listening to." Kyle sat opposite her. "I like to think what I have to say now is."
She poured mimosas for both of them and encouraged him to continue. This was good. He could talk while she figured out how to tell him about immortality.
"So, I know I acted immature at times. I've got a lot of explanations for that flaw," he added with a chuckle. "I was still learning how this super-hero gig worked. I was still getting over Alex, honestly. I hadn't completely moved on." He sobered. "But, none of those are good reasons for making you feel like you had to be my mother. And I know I'm at least partly responsible for you feeling that you did."
"Part of that was me overcompensating, too. I'd allowed myself to be carefree and girlish with my husband, and he turned that against me. I was trying too hard to be a grown up with you." This was easier than she'd expected it to be. Donna felt herself relaxing into the conversation. She took a sip of her mimosa and savored it.
"Yeah, well, I was still a jerk. And, I'm sorry for that." Kyle spread cream cheese on a bagel. He might say things worth listening to, but that didn't mean he was entirely comfortable saying them. She understood that feeling all too well. "You were my first friend in New York, Donna. After you left, I felt lost. I'd think of all these great things to create with my ring, just for fun, and there was no one to share them with."
Creativity really was Kyle's life, Donna realized. That made her think of the master smith, Hephaestus. Whatever blessing he'd given the ambrosia, surely it would be best placed in the hands of someone who reveled in art. And not just art, she reminded herself. Kyle's ring could create anything he could envision. On how many occasions had that ability crafted exactly what was needed to win a fight?
"I missed that, too," Donna said quietly. Then, because she felt she needed to say it, "I'm sorry I was such a -- well, such an overbearing bitch."
"I'm debating being a gentleman by saying you were never a bitch and being a gentleman by not disagreeing with you. So I'll just say, take your pick." He grinned at her. "I'm really glad you called, Donna. But you said you had important things to talk about, too."
And there it was, the opportunity that she'd been waiting for, the moment to tell him about the gift the gods had given her. But somehow she still couldn't quite bring herself to say the words. She borrowed a tactic from him and smeared cream cheese on a bagel.
It was so hard to be sure. So far she'd only identified one way in which the ambrosia might bless Kyle. Certainly, he'd appreciate speed and flight, and she couldn't deny that Aphrodite had blessed him. But what about the others?
It wasn't just Hephaestus who governed creativity, she realized. All of the gods who'd given as-yet-unknown gifts did. Apollo governed music and other arts. The moon of Hecate inspired lovers and poets alike. And Poseidon's oceans were long used as a metaphor for the deep wells of creativity that resided within artists such as Kyle. Zeus' words to Diana rang through her -- if she understood and honored the gods, she would choose well. Every god chosen pointed to art, pointed to Kyle.
This had to be the right answer.
So, why didn't her heart lift in relief and joy? Why did she have a sense of foreboding? Had she somehow misread the situation? Donna forced herself to consider Dick's criteria as well as her own analysis. Dick had asked who would be good for her. Her mind refused to answer, but she could see no reason why Kyle would ever intentionally hurt her, or why he wouldn't remain a good companion for all time.
"Donna?"
Kyle's gentle prompt stirred her from her thoughts. She took a bite of bagel, then a sip of her mimosa, and then looked up at him.
"I just had to think how to say it." She leaned forward, rested her forearms on the table and decided to go for broke. "What would you say if I offered you the chance to live forever?"
"I remember this myth," Kyle grinned. "I'm supposed to say, 'add eternal youth and I'm in', right?"
He didn't realize she was serious. She kept her gaze even, allowed a small smile to lift her lips. "You don't have to stipulate. Eternal youth is part of the package."
"Oh." She watched understanding widen his eyes and part his lips, watched the rise and fall of his chest quicken.
"Well?" Now it was asked, she found herself wishing he would answer quickly. She wanted the thing over and done, just to have the burden lifted from her.
He swallowed. "Ummm, I'd have to be nuts to say I'd rather grow old and die. But, why me?"
"You're the right choice, Kyle." The only choice.
Her phone rang again, not the mellow tones of Brian McKnight that had marked each of Dick's calls, but a shrill alarm.
Kyle recognized it. "That sounds like a Justice League alert."
"Did you turn your phone off?" Donna asked, even as she reached for hers. "I mean, why would they call me?"
Kyle checked his. "Mine's fine. And yes, it's on."
"Weird. Maybe it's Diana?" There'd be no numeric display on this call. She had no choice but to answer it. "Yes?"
"Troia? Are you all right?"
She knew that voice, and it was the last one she'd expect to hear on the line. Dick had gotten Bruce to call in his place. She let her irritation show in her voice and, presumably, on her face, given Kyle's frown at her. "I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be?"
"Your conversation with Nightwing earlier was tapped." Batman's voice was cold, clipped, impersonal, as always. "Roland Desmond, Blockbuster, overheard part of it."
She acknowledged Batman's message and concluded the call without really paying attention to what she said or how he answered. Her mind flashed to questions of how much had been taped, by whom. She felt her face redden, before forcing her thoughts to what was said rather than what was speculated. The overheard conversation was probably about the vial. That's what Dick wanted to warn her about.
As villains stacked up, Blockbuster wasn't terrifying, but that didn't mean Donna could afford to ignore the threat he posed. The man was determined, vicious, and possessed super-strength. It wasn't impossible to think he could overpower her and take the vial for himself.
The timing of her decision couldn't have been more advantageous.
"Exploding planet after all?" Kyle asked.
"Not quite." She explained the call as she dropped the phone back in her bag, concluding with, "So, it would be best if I just gave you the ambrosia right away. Once you've taken it, the threat from Desmond is removed."
"Okay."
She reached back into her bag for the vial, only to frown when her hand didn't touch it. Maybe it had fallen to the bottom, beneath her civilian clothes. She pulled the bag into her lap and opened it wide.
A thorough, furious search later, the vial remained stubbornly gone. Then memory flashed -- a coffee table, a box of pizza, and a glittering vial beside it.
"Dammit."
She hadn't realized she'd spoken aloud until Kyle said, "What?"
She needed a plan to salvage this embarrassing turn. She picked the first place that came to mind. "I'll meet you at noon, Temple of Dendur inside the Met. We can eat in the café and I'll give it to you then. Right now I have to see Nightwing. Sorry."
-X-
Slade Joseph Wilson had learned to hunt in the military. He'd honed those skills in Africa, and later as a mercenary. But, he'd perfected his abilities on the very people he now hunted. Slade stepped carefully through Grayson's Bludhaven apartment, wary of traps. There seemed to be none. Grayson always had been too trusting for his own good -- and how a trusting soul could end up in a place like Bludhaven was a mystery, though not one Slade was prepared to spend precious time solving just now. He was on a different kind of hunt.
Desmond had given him a picture, pixelated from over-enlargement, of a sealed glass tube in a woman's hand along with the order to retrieve the same from Dick Grayson's apartment in Bludhaven. The big man balked when Slade informed him the fee would be double standard, but Desmond also agreed swiftly to the payment. That haste, especially given Slade's refusal to explain the extravagant price, made the whole deal uncomfortable. Slade felt curious and edgy. Then again, anything to do with Grayson and his cohorts made Slade edgy. The Titans had never been his favored targets; only his decision to fulfill his son's failed contract had brought him into contact with them. After that first encounter, however, their paths continued to cross, as if bound by an invisible chain.
A cast iron frying pan lay on the floor just inside Grayson's apartment, unusual not just for its location but also the dent in its bottom. Slade had seen enough bullet impacts in his life to recognize the ding for what it was. No telling the caliber of the gun, but whoever had fired it had apparently only gotten off one shot. Slade surprised himself by smiling in unintended sympathy for the unlucky brutes chosen to try to take out Dick Grayson. He himself had failed with that particular target, and he had advantages ordinary hired help didn't.
He took a handkerchief from his pocket and picked up the frying pan. It was heavy and oddly well-balanced. With a chuckle, he put it on the counter and moved deeper into the living room. Grayson didn't live with military neatness, but the apartment was tidy and uncluttered. Except for the pizza box on the coffee table, Slade amended.
He nudged the box open with the tip of his blade and looked inside. Double pepperoni, yes, Grayson burned that many calories in his Nightwing activities -- the very activities which, Slade knew, were becoming such an annoyance to Desmond. Idly, he wondered how much the big man would pay for the knowledge that the "nobody named Dick Grayson" was in reality the vigilante, Nightwing. Whatever the fee offered, Slade knew he would never sell that information. The knowledge of Grayson's identity, in fact all the Titans' identities, was hard won and valuable only so long as it was secret. Slade was good at keeping secrets.
He was, in fact, pleased that Grayson had abandoned his home for the present. Slade had already decided not to confront Nightwing. To that end, he'd worn street clothes rather than his costume and mask, and he carried only a single, narrow sword which he could hide in a sheath on his back. There were other ways to gain the item Desmond wanted.
The woman in the picture was the lynchpin. Clearly, the static image had been taken from a video. The grainy condition and the slight blur proved it. That fact, and Desmond's insistence that he go to Grayson's apartment immediately, made Slade conclude that the woman had brought the prize here, tonight, talked with Nightwing about it, and then left, probably before Desmond's troops could even arrive.
Two grease-stained paper plates rested beside the pizza box. That Grayson had shared the pizza with someone was further proof for his theory. Who was that woman? Not Starfire, Slade decided. The woman in the photo had Caucasian skin, perhaps with a hint of Mediterranean background. But someone from the Titans was a strong probability. Whatever the glass tube contained, it would be valuable. Sharing its existence required trust. The Titans trusted each other as family.
Know your prey, Slade lived by that rule. He'd gone to extraordinary lengths to learn all he could about the Titans when he'd faced them before. Now, he used that knowledge to deduce who was assisting Grayson in this business Desmond found so interesting. Not the mystical Raven, he suspected. That woman had a gauntness that reminded him of his ex-wife, and her hands had always been sharp and bony. There were others on the team, but the name that presented itself was Donna Troy.
Her Amazon blood matched the skin tone he'd seen, as did her closeness to Grayson. Slade remembered reports of many quiet moments between the two from the spy he'd had in the team ranks. Troy was a definite possibility, and that suggested a lot about the artifact he was to recover.
In the kitchen, he noted the carafe for the coffee maker was missing. Nothing else seemed out of place. He headed into the bedroom. There the sheets were tousled. One pillow and a crumpled T-shirt lay on the floor to one side of the bed. Slade raised an eyebrow at the open box of condoms on the nightstand. He'd never heard so much as a rumor that Troy and Grayson had a relationship beyond deep friendship. Troy had even asked Grayson to give her away at her wedding. If Grayson was having sex with her, Slade had to consider the possibility the woman was not a Titan.
He gave a mental sigh as he stared at the room. Grayson was never more formidable than when his emotions were involved. He'd be protecting the woman with his whole being. Slade had hoped to simply take the vial and leave Grayson alone, but the chances of that happening had dropped significantly.
"What're ye doing in Mr. Grayson's apartment, then?"
Slade turned to see an Asian woman -- Chinese, he recognized by the shape of her eyes and bone structure -- standing in the doorway to Grayson's bedroom. He turned slowly, taking care to hide his sword behind his back, and cursed himself silently for not being aware of his surroundings. At the same moment he realized this woman wasn't a threat.
"Looking for him," Slade answered with his best charming smile. The decision to wear street clothes kept him from having to answer more dangerous questions. He didn't want to have to kill the woman.
"And why would ye be looking for him?" She sounded suspicious. Slade couldn't blame her. In this city, suspicion was a survival trait bred deep, and she had caught him in the bedroom.
"I'm his uncle," Slade lied easily. Slowly, he slipped the sword under his jacket in back and up into its hidden sheath. "Haven't spoken to him in years, and when I heard he'd moved to Bludhaven, I thought I'd stop in and say hello."
"He's never spoken of an uncle," the woman said. "Nor mentioned any family."
"We're -- estranged." Slade studied her, and realized that she might be the woman in the photograph. As many times as the image had been enlarged, some color distortion might have occurred. "A situation I was hoping to correct by this visit."
"I see." She still sounded suspicious, but also uncertain how aggressive to be. Not surprising since she was confronting a man over twice her mass. "I'll tell him ye stopped by, and give him any message, but I'll have to ask you to leave."
"Are you his girlfriend, perhaps?" His spy had died in a confrontation with the Titans after her treachery had been discovered, but he'd heard from other sources that Grayson had broken up with Starfire. Since then, he'd heard nothing about Grayson's private life. He hadn't expected to; Grayson knew as much about remaining private as he did.
She smiled. "Worse. I'm his landlady."
Probably not the woman in the picture. Slade nodded. "Of course."
The woman stepped out of the doorway and gestured him to precede her out of the apartment. He went without protest. There was nothing more to be learned from the apartment, but he might yet glean some information from the landlady. "I understand your caution, Miss," he said. "But if you could tell me what time he might be home so I won't waste another visit, I'd appreciate it."
"I'm sure I wouldn't know," she said with a chilly smile. "I'm not one t' watch the comings and goings of my tenants. Only strangers."
He stepped outside. Troy was still the best candidate, so he'd focus his efforts on her. He thought she still kept an apartment in New York. He'd try there next.
-X-
It was just ten in the morning, and not even full summer, but the area outside the Kreder mine already felt like an oven. There were no trees to speak of growing here, only some withered weeds and the occasional thorny shrub added color to the gray earth. Anything unlucky enough to root seemed to lose all will for anything but dying. In the distance, Nightwing saw a ring of woods and the tops of apartment buildings that marked the border of the city. But here, nothing wanted to live.
He thought of Benny with his persistent hack and wheeze. The people Blockbuster had working down in the mine were likely all lowlifes of Benny's caliber or worse, but that didn't mean they deserved to have their will to live sucked out of them in Desmond's quest for some death machine.
For the last fifteen minutes Nightwing had been watching the guards from behind a crumbling wall, probably part of the original enclosure for the mine entrance. He noted their patterns, and was relieved to note they never seemed to call in or patrol the area. After the shift changed, and the transport car departed, he decided to attack. Both men went down without firing a weapon. So far, easy. He liked it that way, but wasn't going to assume it would stay easy.
Nightwing secured the guards with zip-ties and pulled on the hazmat suit he'd borrowed from the Batcave. He clicked the lenses in his mask into place. They'd serve a dual purpose in the mine, giving him low-light vision as well as protecting his eyes from the deadly asbestos dust. At least, it would protect his eyes from normal asbestos dust. He had to hope it would protect them from this weird, moving, asbestos, too. Liquid latex applied to his exposed face would provide a protective barrier between the dust and his skin. Then he pulled on a respirator and strapped a tool belt over the hazmat suit. It contained only the essentials: high-powered flashlight, portable isotope detector, jumpline, zip-ties, and escrima sticks. He'd considered bringing a few small explosive charges, but he knew less about mines than he did about asbestos. It would be the perfect cap to his day if he were to somehow bring the mine down on top of himself.
The elevator creaked noisily down the mine shaft. It had surprised him to learn that this was in fact a shaft mine. Most asbestos mines were open pit. Maybe Kreder just preferred to do things the old-fashioned way.
"'Bout time you relieved us," one of the guards at the bottom of the shaft said as the elevator arrived. Nightwing saw the guard's eyes widen in the split second before he swung an escrima stick at the man's neck.
A second guard threw a punch at Nightwing, who dodged and dropped the man with a fist to the solar plexus. Then, he looked around. This part of the mine seemed deserted, so he took a moment to secure the two guards and drag them into the elevator. No matter that he knew these men were criminals, if he left them down here, they could die. He wouldn't allow that. That went for the workers in the mine, too.
Ten minutes and twenty-odd workers later, Nightwing had filled the elevator with Benny Bianchi-style punks. The hardest part so far had been dragging them onto the platform. He hit the lift button, sending the entire load up. His jumpline would get him safely out when he'd finished.
He withdrew the portable spectrometer Bruce had given him from his belt. Another of WayneTech's prototypes, the device wasn't nearly as fancy nor as powerful as the one he'd used to analyze the coffee, but it could identify concentrations of elements through a contact probe. He held the unit up to the wall of the mine, and turned it on. The reading made him frown.
"Magnesium?" He turned to the opposite wall and tested another location. It also read as having a high concentration of magnesium. "Looks like garden variety white asbestos. Very strange."
He moved deeper into the mine, shining his flashlight along the walls. The exposed ore looked grayish-white in the light. Nothing blue, and certainly nothing moving. For the first time he wondered whether that first sample might have come from somewhere else. Had he actually been stupid enough to be played by Benny Bianchi?
Ten feet into the mine, Nightwing came to a collapse that forced him to the right. The mine was littered with small cave-ins. He'd discovered that fact when he'd swept it for workers. The problem was the mine's design. Coal mines in the northeast were often built in the same fashion with a grid of corridors carved around pillars of rock left in place as supports. However, coal was a lot sturdier than asbestos. Here the fibrous rock shifted frequently by the look of things, and nearly every corridor had been reinforced with heavy timber framing. As the wood rotted, the pillars of asbestos crumbled.
Even if the place weren't full of a crawling, carcinogenic substance, it would be unsafe for workers or anyone else. "Including me," Nightwing muttered. He'd do well to finish his inspection and get out. "Test a few more spots to verify this isn't the right source for the asbestos from Benny, and I'm done."
He circled through the only clear path and caught a glitter on a wall farther in. The only light came from the battery lanterns strung here and there on the ancient timbers, dim as the light in a Bludhaven alley. His memory stirred and he briefly turned off his low-light vision as he moved closer. Was the chalky wall actually bluer here?
The spectrometer reading displayed iron and sodium in a similar concentration to the sample he'd found on Benny. "Blue and white asbestos in the same mine? Seriously weird."
He continued methodically through the mine, tracking his lefts and rights, testing each section of wall as he came to it. The concentrations of magnesium continued to decrease. Sodium and iron rose. It was as if something was converting the asbestos to a more toxic form. But, what could do that, some sadistic version of the philosopher's stone that got bored doing the lead to gold thing?
A feeling of unease scratched at the back of his neck. He became aware of how ungainly the hazmat suit made his body. He noted every creak and groan in the old, dark hole, as if his ears knew he could face combat at any moment. The fact he was quite sure he'd dealt with all the workers and guards made no difference.
The farther away from the mine's entry he got, the darker the asbestos, and the higher the concentration of iron and sodium. The change in the asbestos was a tantalizing clue. It was probably too much to hope that he'd reach the heart of Blockbuster's current scheme at the end of the tunnel. Still, the mystery pushed him forward despite the sense of danger now throbbing in the back of his skull.
In an unlit corner, piles of tumbled wood and rock nearly hid the single passage. The standing timbers there were black with rot and bowed. A glance down that corridor revealed walls as dark as midnight.
Nightwing inched his way in, only to find what appeared to be a dead end. Then, just as he was about to give up, he noticed that the collapse to his right had not been total. A passage just wide enough for his body offered entrance to this second area of the mine. Tentatively, he leaned in, flicked his flashlight beam over the space beyond, and saw the walls move.