Age of Heroes

Part seven of a fanfiction by Velkyn Karma

Disclaimer: I do not own, or pretend to own, Young Justice or any of its subsequent characters, plots or other ideas. That right belongs to DC, Warner Brothers, and associated parties.

"This is either madness...or brilliance."
"It's remarkable how often those two traits coincide."
~Pirates of the Caribbean

The inside of the compound was fairly barren, for the most part; like everywhere else on the island it was flat ground with no trees. The only people visible were still more bow-armed guards, who carefully patrolled the perimeter and stood at attention at the doors to the buildings. There were two structures—one large enough to count as a small warehouse, and the other smaller and more compact, looking a bit like a tiny ramshackle cottage.

Roy led them to the smaller building, ignoring the way the guard at attention outside the door saluted him, and waved Wally and Connor through. The inside was relatively spartan, with a single room that was a combination bedroom, living room, and workshop with a few furniture fixtures, a few dim electric lights, and little else. There was an honest-to-goodness solid wooden door at the back of the room, something of a luxury and currently closed and locked, that led farther into the interior.

"I'm guessing you came to see Dick?" Roy asked, watching them through the door. Wally nodded, and Roy added, "He was just finishing up with the generator for the night. I'll go get him; I only left him anyway to see what the commotion at the gate was about." He gave Wally a flat look and added, "Do me a favor and don't antagonize my guards next time, West."

"Hey, she started it!"

"I don't care." Before Wally could argue further Roy had already turned and left, heading towards the warehouse.

Wally snorted, but at Superboy's raised eyebrow he merely shrugged. "Roy's an old friend too," he explained, "but he gets kinda...um...serious about his job. He's nice enough when you get to know him, he's just very, uh, devoted to the cause, I guess?"

"I noticed," Connor said, with the faintest trace of a growl. Apparently he was still smarting from Roy's distrustful questions. "What is the cause anyway?"

Wally tossed his pack into one corner of the room and flopped down on a threadbare, lumpy couch that had seen better days but was still one of the most comfortable things he'd ever rested on in his life. "Oh, Roy's head of security for the whole island. He's the one that handpicks and trains all the guards for active duty here, that's why so many of them know how to use bows. He's also Dick's bodyguard, more or less."

"Bodyguard?" Superboy asked. He placed his pack next to Wally's and gingerly sat down on the other end of the couch, as though afraid it might take his weight. It held, although Superboy still sat kind of rigidly, but he always did that and Wally had long since gotten used to it. "Why does this guy need a bodyguard? I thought the island was secure?"

Wally snorted. "It is, but you'll see why when you meet him. Dick has a knack for getting himself into trouble even when he's not trying. It's sort of an occupational hazard, I guess. Having Roy hanging around all the time helps deter some extra hazards."

Superboy looked a bit skeptical and seemed about to speak, but the door snapped open a second later, and a voice said, "Somebody talking about me in here? That's not polite, you know." And the speaker breezed into the room, smirking, with Roy on his heels. He was fourteen by now, but a lot of hard work and not quite enough to eat made him look a lot younger and skinnier than he should have. He was dressed casually in a worn-looking sweatshirt and cargo pants, the pockets of which were stuffed with a number of work tools, which he calmly began emptying onto the table in the corner a moment later. His hands were calloused, his dark hair unkempt, and there were dark lines under his eyes, but even so the blue irises still sparkled with just a hint of confidence and amusement. This was one person who had clearly taken the challenge of the apocalypse head-on and challenged it right back; no matter how many problems it threw at him he kept getting up to fight it again.

Wally grinned at the sight of his best friend. "Dick! Still scrawny as ever."

"Wally!" Dick's eyes lit up as he caught sight of the visitor on his couch. He finished dumping the tools as Wally hauled himself to his feet. Then he darted across the small room, where the two exchanged an enthusiastic bro-fist before Dick killed the whole 'manly meeting' thing by dragging Wally into a quick hug. "Man, is it good to see you! What's it been, six months?"

"Yeah, I had to winter down in Florida," Wally explained, as he flopped down on the couch again, chuckling a little at Superboy's baffled look as he glanced back and forth between them. "Figured I'd gotten a lead, but it didn't pan out...that entire settlement got hit hard by the zeds ages ago, there's nothing left."

Dick winced as he flopped down on the edge of his cot, apparently ignoring the way Roy settled standing against the wall right next to him. "Ouch. Sorry, man. It wasn't on the network or I'd have warned you off ahead of time."

"S'okay, dude. Wasn't your fault, you did what you could." Wally shrugged tiredly for a moment, before remembering his friend, who still looked deeply confused by the encounter. "Dick, this is Connor. I found him in D.C. going it solo. Figured I'd bring him up here and show him civilization. He also has a...problem...I think you might be able to help him with."

Dick raised an eyebrow at that, but knew better than to question for the moment. There were still guards about, and Wally didn't want this getting too far; better to wait until the area was secure. Instead he glanced at Superboy and said, "Hey, nice to meet you, Connor. Welcome to my town. Hope you've been enjoying it so far?"

"It's been...different." Superboy blinked, and then his eyes widened with surprise as he started putting everything together. "Wait...your town?" He gave Wally a cold look, and said, "When you've been mentioning 'your friend' and 'knowing the guy in charge,' you meant him?"

Wally laughed. "Not what you were expecting?"

"But he's a kid!" Connor said incredulously, gesturing at Dick.

"I resent that," Dick said with a scowl. "I'm fourteen; that makes me a teenager, not a kid. And I'm more capable than pretty much anybody else you'll find on this island." Roy snorted, and Dick rolled his eyes, adding, "Okay, okay, you know what you're doing too, Roy, no need to get bent out of shape about it."

Superboy still looked rather surprised by the revelation, asked, "But...even if you are totally capable, do all these people seriously take orders from a fourteen year old?"

"Technically, they don't," Roy supplied quietly. "There's a small council of adults that manage day to day affairs and handle different aspects of managing supplies and civilians. Officially speaking, they rule the island. But Dick here is the one who designed most of the defense and survival protocols, came up with the rules and regulations...he was even the one to suggest turning Arkham into a stronghold in the first place. He's also the one that keeps coming up with new countermeasures and ways to modify the island so it gets even safer and more controlled. Most of those councilmen will ask for advice or defer to him. Officially he's not in charge, but everybody knows who makes the real calls around here." Roy concluded by giving Dick a rather frigid look.

The youngest teenager did not appear phased by the glare in the least. He merely shrugged, saying with a smirk, "What? I can't help it if I'm a born leader. I'm just that good at what I do."

"I wish you'd be less good at it," Roy snapped in irritation.

Wally raised an eyebrow. "What's with him?"

Dick waved a hand absently in the air, as though shooing the question away. "Not much. Another assassination attempt last week, Roy's still a little on edge. S'why there's so much extra security too."

"Again?" Wally frowned, not entirely happy with Dick's indifferent response to yet another attempt on his life. "One of these days they're really going to get you, man. You've got to be careful."

"They won't if I have anything to say about it," Roy growled. He sounded determined.

Superboy's anger towards Roy seemed to diminish; it seemed he was starting to understand why the head of security had been so harsh. Frowning a little, Connor asked, "Is that why you live way out here? To try and prevent attempts by staying away from the crowds?"

Dick rolled his eyes. "Well, partly. Roy flat-out refused to let me take a makeshift apartment in the mansion with the rest of the councilmen, says it's a security nightmare. But I also stay out here for another reason—the generator."

"In the building next door," Superboy said, eyes lighting up with sudden realization.

Dick grinned. "Yup! One of my early contributions to Arkham Refuge, here." Wally noted, vaguely, that Dick still refused to use the nickname everybody else had given the island. "I've always been pretty good with technology, so I figured out how to rig together a generator to keep the island supplied with regular power. But we had to set up out here for a reason—the buildings are just too crowded with refugees to make any of the old power supplies safe to operate out of, and it'd be really tough to keep control over it too. We have to ration everything, can't have people siphoning power for luxuries right now. So it's here, away from the crowd, where it can be protected. I live on-hand to manage and improve it, and...other things too."

"And people want to kill you because you give them functioning lights, medical facilities, and sanitation?" Superboy asked doubtfully, looking back and forth between Dick and Wally in confusion.

"Think about it," Wally told him. "We've been finding loads of beneficial goods to use as trade, right? Even a few batteries or cigarettes will go for a lot; it's post-apocalyptic wealth. Now imagine controlling the only source of power for miles around; it's like having the entire island in your back pocket. Mix that with having most of the council deferring to you, and you've basically got it made. My buddy here is essentially the wealthiest, most influential person on the island right now. Maybe even in all of New England."

And honestly, that's kind of underselling it, Wally thought to himself. Dick was, quite frankly, the biggest—maybe the only—success story post Z-day, and everybody had their eyes on him. It wasn't just because of the technological innovations, although that had a great deal to do with it; the generators weren't his only improvements, and Dick had gone to great lengths to create solar panels, improve upon manufacturing or reworking tech for supplies and weaponry, and even re-establish communications to a degree.

It was more than that. Dick had been responsible for organizing the retreat to Arkham and turning it into a veritable fortress, effectively saving hundreds of lives by establishing protocols and continually reworking the system for the island's benefit. He was charismatic, clearly caring about the people in his little domain and able to give them hope, something most of the refugees and civilians adored about him. It was not uncommon for him to help out with more menial labor-intensive projects personally (despite all Roy's protests) and he always went the extra mile to ensure everybody had proper health care or food when they needed it, frequently refusing special treatment for himself to do so. And the night he spent in Scarecrow's old cell, just to counteract superstitious talk of hauntings and loss of sanity back when Arkham had first become a refuge and the terrified citizens were afraid to accept it as a shelter, was legend.

Basically, due to his technological accomplishments and innovations, skilled decision-making abilities, likable personality, relative wealth, and what amounted to post-apocalyptic philanthropy, Dick was heralded as a new-age Golden Boy sitting on a new-age empire and rebuilding it all from the ground up. He was frequently and repeatedly compared to Bruce Wayne, and people often commented on how he walked in his surrogate father's footsteps and how he was considered to be a worthy successor. Dick took the intended compliments in stride publicly, and only his close friends could tell just how much each and every word was like a knife in the heart to him, when he was constantly compared to and reminded of his absent guardian.

Wally was one of those close friends, though, which was why he respected his friend enough to not cut open old wounds in front of him. He could explain the full nature of Dick's power on the island to Superboy later; for now, he kept it brief. "It might be the apocalypse," Wally concluded, "but people are still people. Some of them see massive amounts of wealth in the form of both literal and figurative power and they want a piece of it."

"Amongst other reasons," Dick added, almost conversationally. "Some people just don't like that I'm hogging all the power and want to teach me a lesson; they don't understand it has to be rationed. Some people just don't like me being in charge because they don't like my decisions, or they just don't like a fourteen year old effectively calling the shots. And we've even got a small faction of doomsday fans who think the world is supposed to end and they're ticked off that I'm doing everything I can to stop it." He rolled his eyes at the last one. "It might be the apocalypse, but Gotham still seems determined to pull some of the weirdest problems out of seemingly nowhere."

"Least you don't have to deal with the old residents," Wally offered brightly.

"Thank God for that," Dick said with a sigh. "It's not like I'd have time to deal with any of them again on top of all this."

"Again?" Superboy asked, with a raised eyebrow.

Dick waved a hand again almost casually. "I'm from Gotham. Most people here are, you'll get the same reaction from any of them. Probably the same reason it's mostly pretty controlled here...we've always been survivors. After dealing with crazy crowns, frozen fanatics and a menagerie of mutants, what's a few walking dead?"

"Is he always this...nonchalant about the apocalypse?" Connor asked, giving Wally a bewildered look.

"Better than being chalant," Dick said with a grin. "Stressing out gets you nowhere, you've got to keep your head in the game."

"Chalant?" Superboy sounded incredulous now.

Wally rolled his eyes. "Ignore him, he does that," he said with a sigh. "He likes to mutilate the English language, it's a bad habit of his."

Dick's smile turned positively wicked. "Yup, that'd be my personality tic," he said. "Eventually I'll turn it into a full-blown language-slaughtering obsession and then I'll probably resort to lots of word-game related crimes just to blow off steam. I'm thinking of calling myself The Linguist."

Wally's smile turned pained. "C'mon, man, you know where we are, don't even joke about that kind of thing."

"Why not? It's practically tradition and we're overdue."

"Dick. Seriously."

"Alright, alright, fine," Dick said, shaking his head a little in amusement. "You guys are too easy, you know."

"I think your friend is crazy," Superboy informed Wally dutifully.

"At least I'm in the right place."

"Dick." This time it was Roy, who gave his apparent charge a cold look.

"Oh come on, it's like shooting fish in a barrel—" Roy's look intensified, and Dick sighed, "Okay, okay, I'm done for real this time, I promise!"

Wally shook his head a little in exasperation. It wasn't uncommon for people to develop a much more morbid sense of humor (if anything was left at all) these days, but Dick took it and ran with it in a way that was partly trolling turned into an art form and partly genuinely scary. Sometimes Wally really did wonder if the stress of running the place was going to his head, while other times he seemed perfectly normal. Well, at least he had Roy around all the time to knock some sense into him; Dick listened to Roy, at least.

He cast about for a change of topic. "So, you've got Atlanteans in your work for now, huh?"

Dick smirked. "You could say I've opened up negotiations with one of their factions..."

"Dude, by the time you're twenty you're gonna be president of the United States, if you keep this up!"

Superboy frowned. "That's illegal under the grounds of the Constitution..."

"Trust me," Wally said, jerking a thumb at the still-grinning Dick, "If anybody could manage to re-write the Constitution it'd be this guy."

Dick laughed, but added, "The Atlantean alliance isn't set in stone yet, and the faction I'm in contact with is still pretty small. But we're hoping an alliance between our stronghold and their group can provide an example of good relations and maybe foster some additional interest in future relations as well. Even if it doesn't pan out, having Atlanteans manning my harbor defenses is a godsend—they can handle the work way better with a lot less people, meaning I've got more bodies to put to work elsewhere on other things."

"Least things are working out here," Wally noted. "It's not doing so good elsewhere."

"You'll have to give me the details later," Dick told him firmly. "Anything I can pick your brain for to add to the databases. The clearer a picture I have on the state of things in the country, the better I can act on things." He grew more serious. "For now though...you needed my help with something?"

"Yeah, but it's gonna take a serious discussion to get through it all," Wally explained, giving his friend a pointed look.

Dick got the message, fortunately: you need to be sure the place is secure before we can talk about this particular brand of help. "Hey, Roy, can you look into that?" he asked. "I'd like to get this taken care of tonight, if I can."

"And maybe find some snacks while you're at it?" Wally asked hopefully. "You've always got something special hidden around here, don't you?"

Roy scowled. "I've got better things to do with my time," he snapped. "I am a bodyguard, not a butler."

Dick flinched. It wasn't obvious, just the tiniest reaction to the words, and for a moment his eyes seemed to go dull. Wally winced in sympathy, and a moment later Roy seemed to realize what he'd said, and grimaced. "Aw, damn...Sorry, Dick, I didn't mean it like that—"

"It's fine. I know you didn't." Dick's voice was mostly neutral, but there was a sliver of pain in the words. Roy, still grimacing, put an apologetic hand on his charge's shoulder. Connor glanced back and forth between them in confusion, and gave Wally a sidelong glance. Wally shook his head just slightly and muttered, too low to hear, "Later."

"I'll take care of things," Roy added carefully after a moment. "Wait until I get back to start." And after a quick glance at the other two, he headed out of the small cabin. Wally could hear him talking to the guard posted at the outside door, although the words weren't easy to make out.

Dick seemed to have forced himself to recover remarkably fast, but said with just a little too much enthusiasm, "Right, so, in the meantime, anything else I can take care of?"

"Oh...uh..well, I've got something for you, for starters," Wally said, scrounging again for a topic. He recovered his bag from the corner and dug around until he found the abandoned iPhone he'd discovered in the sub-levels of Cadmus. This he handed over to Dick, saying, "No battery power, but it looked pretty up to date otherwise, I figured you might be able to get something out of it."

"Are you kidding, this is great," Dick said enthusiastically. "These came out right before the major outbreaks, the technology in it will be some of the most advanced stuff I can find short of breaking into a military base somewhere." He accepted the phone and flipped it over carefully, examining every inch of its surface. Wally could tell just from the way his fingers twitched he itched to take it apart and start sorting through it for useful bits and pieces.

Superboy seemed confused. "I thought were were supposed to leave all the technology and stuff behind, when scavenging?"

"Mostly, yeah," Wally agreed. "Things like desktop computers and stereos are just too cumbersome to carry anywhere—even if you're strong enough, there's just no feasible way to lug it around without breaking it while running from zeds. But Dick here has a bounty out on pretty much any portable tech you can find—phones, palmtops, laptops, that sort of thing. So if I see'em laying around and it's small enough to carry, I usually grab it for him."

"I use it to supplement my makeshift technology here," Dick added. He leapt up from the cot and headed back over to his piles of tools, starting to sort through them for ones small enough to disassemble the phone in his hands as he finished answering Superboy's question. "Computers were always my thing back before Z-day. I've been building new systems with the parts people bring me—that's why I've got a bounty out on them. It's a slow process and a bit of a crapshoot, because you never know what you're going to get or if the parts are even any good. But it's been coming along, slowly but surely."

"What good are computers now?" Superboy asked flatly. "I don't see how they would have helped us out at all when we were outside your walls."

"They're still useful—if you know what you're doing," Dick told him confidently. "Fortunately, I do. And I use them for a lot of things here. Mostly I use them for communications. That Atlantean alliance? Happened because I was able to get in touch with them. No computers, no alliance, no safer harbors." He started picking at the phone with a tiny screwdriver, adding, "I'm hoping to try and get in touch with somebody off-world, too, if I can. Maybe Mars. Martian Manhunter was friendly enough, maybe we could get some help if we could just connect. Or the Green Lantern Corps, maybe. Or maybe not. I don't know, that's a long way in the future—gotta figure out how to boost the signal enough first."

Connor raised an eyebrow at that, but when he spoke he actually sounded impressed. "Oh. Well. What else can you do with them?"

Dick shrugged, and then smirked as he successfully managed to slip the back case of the phone off. He laid both parts out carefully on the table and pulled up a seat, neatly inspecting the phone insides as he talked. "Lots of stuff. I use one system for the more mundane things here, keeping track of supplies and people and stuff. Data crunching, spreadsheets, search boards, that sort of thing. The other one's a little more high-end, I use it to, uh...keep an eye on the military operations on the other side of the country."

Wally smirked, and said in a conspiratorial (but obvious) whisper to Superboy, "He means he hacks into their stuff."

Superboy looked even more impressed. "You can do that?"

"If you know what you're doing."

"Which you do," Connor pointed out, with a raised eyebrow.

"Maybe," Dick drawled, but the way he winked was a very obvious of course I can. "It took me a while to build a system strong enough for me to manage it, but their stuff isn't all that high-end anymore either, they've been suffering too. Mostly I just use it to keep track of things on the Western half of the country...zed movements, resistance movements, person of interest sightings, survivor news...that sort of thing." He shrugged. "Oh, and satellites, too. A little easier to hack into now, although the military satellites are beyond pretty much anything anybody can break into at this point. Mostly I just hack the weather and communications ones. That way we're prepared for any major storms or abnormalities that come our way, and on good days if we get lucky we can get in touch with other major settlements for a short while."

"Other colonies have electronics and communications too?"

"Not all of them," Dick said. "None of them are as good as mine, either. But sometimes we get lucky."

"Speaking of lucky..." Wally hesitated. He'd been itching to ask this question since he first met up with Dick again, but between the introductions and the explanations there just hadn't been a chance. Now was as good a time as any, and he asked almost tentatively, "Have you...have you heard anything at all...?"

Dick fell still at the table, and after a moment slowly set down the phone casing and his tools. He looked like he didn't quite want to meet Wally's eyes, but after a moment he sighed and glanced at his friend, shaking his head quickly. "No. I'm sorry, Walls. I've been keeping an eye out on entry reports and traffic through this island, but nobody matching your family's descriptions have come through Arkham Refuge at all."

Wally felt his heart sink a little, but there was still some hope, and he asked with undisguised desperation, "What about outside? Any news from any of the other camps you've kept in contact with or...or anything?"

Dick looked deeply, genuinely sorry as he answered, "No...I'm sorry, Wally. I've checked reports and asked around when I can, but I've got nothing from any of my open lines of communication, either."

Wally huddled a little lower on the old couch, and asked in a small voice, "And...my uncle?"

Dick hesitated, eyes flicking to Superboy for a fraction of a second, before saying carefully, "No sightings there either, Wally. And you know I've been putting out all the stops for them. I'm sorry, man..."

Wally felt miserable. His shoulders slumped, his entire body seemed to droop, and his heart felt like it was being squeezed in a vice. Superboy looked concerned, and almost tentatively reached out to put a hand on Wally's shoulder. He was frowning just slightly, like he wasn't even sure if he was doing the right thing or not.

Dick was a little more responsive, bounding across the room to put an arm around his friend's shoulders reassuringly. "Hey, Wally, it's not a total debacle, okay? No news can also be good news. He's still not on my confirmed list, you know that, I would have told you otherwise. And your family's tough, they could still be out there. Stay whelmed, alright?"

"I know that. I just..." Wally took a deep breath, trying to control the whirling mass of emotions and thoughts in his head, and rasped softly, "I just...I hoped, that maybe there'd be something. It's been four years, Dick. Four years. What are the odds that...that after all that time, they could..."

"You're still alive," Connor pointed out.

Wally blinked in surprise and glanced over at his traveling companion. Connor still looked uncomfortable, like he wasn't exactly sure how to deal with emotional turmoil or even comfort anybody, but he was obviously trying and he looked sincere enough.

Dick seized on the words, and he was much better at dealing with people; he smiled, which Wally knew had to probably be fake but it looked very real, and felt infectious. "Connor's right! I mean, you were what, twelve, and you figured out how to survive the crisis? If you can do it, they can do it. You just have to hang in there."

"Cardinal rule of zombie apocalypse survival," Superboy added, repeating verbatim one of the first lessons Wally had ever given him, back at Cadmus. There was a hesitant, tiny smirk on the clone's face as he said it, and between the two of them Wally couldn't help but offer a weak, watery smile of his own.

"Yeah. Yeah, okay, right, Hanging in there still." The weak smile slipped away, and Wally admitted, "I just...I'd been hoping, that at least I'd have something to work with, some sort of sighting or...I don't know." He sighed, rubbed his forehead with the heel of one hand in frustration. "I'm back at square one again. I don't even know where to look anymore."

Dick seemed to hesitate for a moment, and slowly pulled away. Wally glanced up, a little surprised—Dick was rarely if ever one for shows of cold emotion—and could all but see the gears turning in his friend's head. "You know something," he realized, eyes widening.

Dick grimaced. "Not exactly—"

"Dick, if you have any hints at all, anything, you have to tell me. You have to." Wally stared at him, one part pleading and one part accusatory, and added, "You know what it's like. If you know something..."

Dick winced again, but after a moment dragged over one of the chairs from his work table so that he could sit directly across from Wally. He leaned forward, elbows on knees, fingers steepled in front of his face, expression solemn. Wally couldn't decide if it looked silly, like a kid trying to imitate a parent, or if it just indicated how old Dick was inside after all of this. "Look, Wally," Dick said, after taking a few moments to collect his thoughts, "I don't want to give you false hope or anything, which is why I was so hesitant to share this..."

"You do know something!" Wally already felt his spirits lifting. False hope or real, it was still worth it.

"Maybe," Dick said. This time it wasn't a joke; he looked very serious, and stressed the uncertainty of it. "It's all speculation and rumor, Wally. I haven't been able to confirm anything yet, and looking into it further could be very, very dangerous. You need to take this seriously or I'm not going to tell you anything."

"I've never taken anything more seriously in my life," Wally told him, voice flat. "You know that. Whatever you know, I'll be careful. I promise. But you can't keep this from me, you can't."

"I'll make sure he doesn't do anything stupid," Connor added, to Wally's surprise. The clone had retreated back to his corner of the couch, removing his hand from Wally's shoulder, but he sounded absolutely serious when he said it and met Dick's gaze without backing down. Wally might have laughed, if the situation hadn't been so serious; he was the one that usually kept Connor from doing stupid things, not the other way around.

But Dick seemed to accept both of their reassurances that they would be careful, because after a moment he nodded. "Okay," he said slowly, "I've been keeping an eye on recorded scouting and traveler reports recently, trying to get a better lay of the land." Superboy looked a little puzzled, and Dick added mostly for his benefit, "There are lots of other colonies out there that do the same thing I do here—get news from travelers and passerby to figure out how things look outside them. Wally here usually gives me a report on everything he's seen in between trips, for example—where settlements are, or if they don't exist anymore, where possible supply caches are, where there's a pretty heavy zed population...that sort of thing."

Superboy nodded his understanding, so Dick continued. "Recently I picked up a report from a traveler who was passing through the mountains, trying to head west. He was stopped at one of the military bases across the country and they picked his brain, which is the only reason I've even got this intel, and it's questionable at best—their scouts found him half starved, ranting and raving about the dead heads and slipping in and out of delirium. The things in his report might not even be real, they could just be in his head."

"What'd he find?" Wally asked, barely daring to breathe or risk missing the answer.

"He thinks," Dick stressed the word heavily, "that there might be living people in the Saint Francois Mountain range. Possibly around the Taum Sauk peak, but it's hard to say. He reports having seen smoke once, and signs of human life without telltale zed drag marks or destroyed animal carcasses. He also stressed that he decided to steer clear of the area, just in case."

Wally nodded grimly. As a practiced solo traveler, unless he had a reason to inspect the settlement, he would have done the same thing: approached cautiously, or avoided it altogether. Just because there were no zeds did not mean the people were safe. There were roving bands of thieves and brigands these days that largely survived by killing and stealing from their fellow humans. It was not unheard of for smaller settlements with relatively low numbers of people to simply be overtaken, and the thieves to move right on in. It was also not unheard of for wayward travelers to approach these dangerous settlements and never leave them again.

It sounded dangerous...but it was also a lead. He hadn't had a lead in months, not since he checked out that settlement in Florida, only to discover it had been completely eradicated. He'd even checked the bodies that remained there, terrified every time he turned over a truly dead corpse, but he'd recognized no one, and had obtained no answers ever since.

Superboy frowned at the news. "How is it possible that nobody would even know these people are here?"

"Easier than you might think," Dick said with a shrug. "It wouldn't be the first time a smaller group-settlement is found in the middle of nowhere. In this case, it doesn't seem like there's any form of communications in this settlement, if there is one. I did a little poking around, but I'm not picking up any hot spots in the area, near as I an tell. We're talking a lot of square miles and elevation, and Missouri is the 'cave state' for a reason; there's hundreds of places in the mountain range where people could hide. The mountains have running water and feasible game for hunting, and with a little ingenuity they could get gardens growing as well. A close-knit community could be fully self-sustaining and remain isolated from any other forms of society for years, if they had to."

"That range is barely three hundred miles from Central City!" Wally said excitedly. Things were sounding more possible by the minute. "They could have gotten there, in the outbreak—dad used to go camping all the time, he'd know about it, I'm sure—this is perfect! They've got to be there, they have to be—"

"Wally!"

Wally froze in the middle of his rambling to glance up at his friend. Dick was staring at him with a very serious expression on his face, and said sternly, but not unkindly, "You need to deal with this realistically, Walls. I hope they're there, I really do, but don't take stupid risks. There's a really high probability that they aren't there and this is a dangerous zone."

"I know. I know, okay? But I still have to look. I have to try. I can't just not." Wally clenched his fists on his knees, determined now that he finally had a goal again.

"I know that," Dick told him, very patiently, "But that's not going to stop me from worrying, got it? I'm getting sick of watching people I know die, Wally, I just want to look out for you." His expression flickered for just a moment, looking bitter and sad and far too old for his face, but when he spoke again it was more serious.

"Just keep the important things in mind, okay? Even if this camp is there and it is the right one, searching the mountains won't be easy—that's a lot of space to cover, and it's a long trip to get there. Don't get yourself stuck out there in mid-winter. And that's not even taking into account the journey there—you know central U.S. is still crawling with the highest concentration of dead heads. Take things slow, think things out, and don't die."

Wally offered him a weak smile again. "You don't have to tell me to be careful, Dick."

"I know I don't. I am anyway." Dick gave him a firm look. "You still going to go?"

"Do you even have to ask?" Wally snorted. "I'll need to spend tomorrow resupplying, but I need to get out of here as fast as I can. Still need to beat the weather. If I'm lucky I can make it to the colony closest to the mountains before winter—"

"Uh-uh." Dick shook his head firmly at the both of them. "You're not going anywhere for a week. According to my satellite hacks we've got a number of big thunderstorms heading our way. You're holing up here until they've passed and I give you the okay."

"Oh, come on, Dick—"

"Don't come on me. Getting stuck out in a storm like that is a potential death sentence. You know that," Dick told him, with an accusing edge to his voice. "You've got shelter, so you're staying here until I say otherwise. And don't forget—you can't get out of here without my permission. Roy's security protocols are a lot better than the ones they used to use here—you try to leave, I'll know it."

Superboy raised an eyebrow at that. Until now he'd been silent, watching the back and forth between the two. But when Wally spluttered indignantly at Dick's outright order, the clone said challengingly, "Oh yeah? And what are you going to do when you know, huh? Watch him walk away?"

Dick's expression changed, becoming a wickedly mischievous smile, but there was just a touch of a hard edge to his eyes—enough to know he wasn't playing around. "I've still got a detention center here, you know. It did act as a major prison for a while. Most of the cells have been converted to dorms by now, but I've still got ways to make sure you don't wander out and kill yourself."

"You wouldn't—"

"I would, and you know it," Dick said. "Not gonna let you risk your life, sorry, Walls. Or, you can agree to behave yourself and stay here with me for the week, instead. I'll make sure you get as fully resupplied as possible and send you on your way when I say it's safe."

There was a tense moment of silence, but then Wally laughed softly, and the weak smile returned to his face. "I'm always rushing ahead, aren't I?"

"Wouldn't be the first time. You can see why I get worried," Dick said, but he, too, was smirking a little. Superboy looked back and forth between them, not getting the joke and looking rather confused again. "So. You gonna stay?"

"Sure. We could use the break, I guess. Been going non-stop for a while," Wally said, settling back into the couch again. He felt...relieved. Even if he was being forced to wait a week, he had a new objective, a new course to act upon. There was hope again. And that put him more at ease than he'd felt in a long time.

Lots of you have been wondering about Dick/Robin. Well, there he is! And he don't do things by half, no sir.