This far out from the city one could sit in peaceful silence and enjoy the cool breeze of the night as you counted the stars from the clear sky above.

It was the perfect night for a getaway.

The prison truck sped along the narrow road, leaving a trail of thin dust behind it. The police were too far behind to even have a hope of keeping up, but Superman was hot on the trial.

Jason kept enough distance away to keep an eye on the car and also to remain unseen.

There were three men in the truck, four if you count the driver. But the only one that mattered was sitting in the back: Hades.

Jason flew a bit faster to land a few meters in front of the truck, it would only take a few seconds for the headlights to reach him. When the bright lights reached him, Jason didn't even blink. The truck swerved violently around him, nearly hitting a tree, but continued on it's way nonetheless.

The back doors flew open; the first few shots were aimless, just hoping to catch him by surprise.

Jason avoided them easily. He could see that Hades was growing more and more irritated with their incompetence.

"Must I do everything myself?" He could hear Hades say.

The two men parted as he approached the opening carrying a gun. Jason barely had enough time to dodge before Hades pulled the trigger.

A beam of orange nearly grazed him, Jason felt himself drop in the air slightly.

Oh no.

The last time he had faced this, he ended up with a needle in his chest, experiencing a feeling he never wanted to again. At that time they figured the chemical was only in the protype stages, but that had been months ago; with enough determination, it had been plenty of time to reach the final stages.

Well if he made it out of this alive he could tell Nico where that fake kryptonite went.

Jason dodged another shot as he flew to the roof of the truck. As he grabbed on the truck swerved from side to side to shake him off. But Jason refused to let go.

Unknowingly below him, inside the truck, Hades had the gun pointed toward the roof. The shot wouldn't kill Superman, but the blast would still affect him tremendously.

The truck skidded to a halt as Hades blasted a hole in the roof and Superman went flying.

He landed hard on the ground. He couldn't breathe, all the air had been knocked out of him; and he could barely move, gravity felt like a heavy blanket weighing him down. But, he was still conscious, a fact that he was extremely grateful for when he saw that instead of leaving Hades now made his way toward him.

"So," Hades said, staring down at him. He still wore his prison jumpsuit, but that didn't seem to make him any less intimidating. "This is the mighty Superman."

Jason could only wheeze as he struggled to draw air back into his lungs. Hades crouched down in front of him.

"The 'Hero of National City'." Hades' eyes seemed to harden. "You're only a child."

The hand that still held the gun twitched ever so slightly, but Jason's attention was immediately drawn to it. Even if it were still a prototype, a shot this close and Jason would be a goner. He could feel his heart beating wildly against his ribcage, and it was much harder to breathe than it was before.

Hades noticed where Jason's attention had been drawn.

"I'm not going to kill you." Hades said, sounding just a bit amused. "Not today anyway. I have a list of higher priorities, and you're not on it."

He stood then and brushed the dirt off his jumpsuit, as though it were an immaculate suit.

He started walking back toward the truck, only bothering to turn his head as he said bitterly, "Oh, and give my son my thanks."

"What-" Jason gasped, finally having enough air to speak. The blanket was beginning to lose its weight as well. "What does that even mean?"

Hades stopped in his tracks. It took him a few seconds to turn around.

"It means you should stay out of our family business. He shouldn't be associating himself with the likes of you. Especially after everything your kind has done to my family. Count yourself lucky I don't shoot you where you lay." Hades voice was like acid. "You all think of me as a villain, and while that may be true now, it wasn't always."

He turned back toward the truck where the other two men had gotten out and were waiting for him.

"Let's go." Hades told them.

One of them stepped forward, looking a bit hesitant. "Sir, what about him?"

Hades didn't even spare another look back as he continued forward.

"Leave him."

"But boss-" The other man tried, he flinched back at the look Hades must be giving him.

"We're wasting time. He's not our priority right now."

The doors of the truck slammed shut after they all piled back in.

Jason desperately tried to push himself up, to go after them as they drove away; but his limbs still felt like lead.

"-ason? You….-ere?"

Jason looked to the side where the crackling sound was coming from. His earpiece must have fallen out when he landed, and was now covered in dirt and leaves; easily concealed.

Slowly he reached out for it.

"...Thalia."

Jason could almost hear her sigh of relief on the other end. "What happened? Are you okay?"

"He got away...he got away. I couldn't stop him."

"Are you okay?" Thalia asked again. "When you-when we lost contact-"

"I'm okay, at least I think I am."

Or at the very least he would be. Jason managed to pull an arm under himself to push himself up. There was a tree nearby that he could lean back against, once he got situated he told Thalia what had happened.

She told him they were about forty-five minutes out. So Jason waited, either for the effects to wear off or for the other agents to arrive, whichever came first.

The agents arrived first. By that point Jason had managed to stand, but still needed the tree to stay upright.

When they got back to the DEO headquarters Jason was taken to the med area to get checked out. The fact that he was only experiencing the second-hand shot from the fake kryptonite meant that the effects would wear off fully in a couple hours.

Thalia came in just as the doctor left. She didn't even give Jason a chance to say anything as she marched over and wrapped her arms around him.

"You gotta stop doing this to me." She said when she let him go, fixing him with a half serious look, but Jason wasn't looking at her.

"He got away."

"Jason-"

"I could-I should have stopped him! It only took one shot to knock me down!"

"It was krypto-" Thalia tried to reassure him, but he didn't seem to hear her.

"He had me exactly where he wanted me. It would have been so easy for him to-" Thalia placed a hand on his shoulder, and finally Jason looked up at her.

"I was…."

"Scared?" She finished for him.

When he gave a short nod Thalia hopped up next to him on the bed.

"I've never face a villain that could actually really hurt me before. And now we know he has the fake kryptonite, there's no telling what other kind of weapons he has that he can use against me." Jason's hands curled into fists where they rested on his knees. "I hate feeling so helpless."

Before she could say anything there was a knock at the door. Chiron entered a few seconds later.

"Hope I'm not interrupting." He said stepping further into the room. "I just wanted to come by and see how you were."

"I'm fine." Jason told him. "It wasn't as bad as last time."

He nodded slightly as if to say, that's good. "I hear that Hades has acquired the chemical involved in that encounter."

"It's only a mimic of kryptonite," Thalia said. "We've been studying the sample we got from Jason's blood and information di Angelo gave him. We're hoping that since it's not the real thing there might be a way to counteract the effects."

"You trust this information you got from him?" He asked it in a way that required a simple answer; the same way he would ask a question on a mission.

"I do." Jason said and Chiron nodded again, like that would be the end of it. But Jason could feel in his gut it wasn't.

"Well hopefully it will help in any future encounters then." He said. "Speaking of which, did you happen to hear anything about where Hades might be headed?"

"No. But he's got something planned. He talked about a list of priorities; said I wasn't on it, that's why I'm sitting here right now."

"Any leads on how exactly he got out?" Thalia asked.

Chiron glanced over at Jason before speaking. "Nothing concrete, but we have a few ideas."

Ah there it was.

"We know he had to have gotten help, both from inside the prison and out."

"What are you saying?" Jason knew exactly what he was saying.

"Did you know di Angelo has been to see Hades at least three times since his imprisonment?"

"That doesn't mean he helped him escape."

"And that may be true, but in this case we have to look at all possible suspects."

"Has anyone even contacted Supergirl about all this?"

"We've been trying to reach her, but I've been told she's currently off world on another mission. Right now this is up to us."

Jason got up, the effects had worn off enough by now that he could walk without assistance, and made his way to the door.

"Where are you going?"

"Home. It's been a long night."

A statement about Hades' escape aired the next morning.

It didn't matter that Nico didn't associate with his father's people. It didn't matter that he was doing his best to turn his company a different direction. People still saw him as the obvious suspect.

Jason hadn't seen Nico since the gala, which was now a little over a month ago, but they had kept up with emailing each other. So it wouldn't have been a huge surprise for Jason to drop by his office unannounced.

Only today reporters littered the street in front of Nico's building, security doing their best to keep them out. Not wanting to cause a commotion Jason tried to find another way in. Eventually finding an open second-story window around the back.

He made it up to Nico's floor virtually unnoticed, not even the receptionist outside of Nico's office was there.

Where is everyone? Jason thought as he cautiously opened the door.

Nico was standing at the window, undoubtedly looking down at the reporters below. He startled a bit when he noticed Jason out of the corner of his eye.

"Jason? What are you-how did you get past security?"

"Apparently no ones else thought to look for a back door." Nico tensed a bit at that. "Don't worry I locked the door behind me." Jason told him, even though the doors had been locked to begin with. The tension seeped out of Nico's shoulders and he turned his head to look back out the window.

"What are you doing here anyway?"

"I thought you could use a friend." Nico's head snapped away from the glass and he looked at Jason with an unreadable expression. "Nico, where is everyone?"

He looked to the floor for a moment before making his way over to his desk. "I sent them home after the statement aired. They shouldn't have to deal with this too."

Now that he was closer Jason could see that his hair stuck up at odd angles, his clothes were wrinkled and unkempt, and there were dark bags under his eyes.

"When was the last time you slept?"

"Isn't that the question of the day." He practically collapsed into his chair. Nico seemed more stressed than usual and it was painfully obvious that he hadn't slept last night. The same night his father escaped.

"You already knew." Jason said more to himself, thinking out loud.

"What?"

"You knew Hades had escaped before the statement."

Nico sighed and leaned back in his chair. "Of course I knew."

"How could you have known?"

"I had people in the prison keeping tabs on him for me, to help prevent exactly this from happening." He rubbed a hand over his tired eyes. "It was all for nothing it seems."

Jason didn't want to add on to his stress but he felt Nico should know regardless.

"They think you helped him."

Nico didn't seem too surprised by the statement. In fact he just seemed resigned.

"And what do you think?"

The doors opened before he could answer. A few officers entered the room, and then-

"Reyna?"

"Jason, what are you doing here?"

"Did you find Hades?"

"No, unfortunately. We're actually here on official business." She briefly looked at Nico who was glancing between them. "Jason, it would probably be best if you waited outside while I talked with Mr. di Angelo."

"No." Nico said. "I want him to stay."

Reyna looked at Jason for confirmation.

"I'm staying." He told her.

Reyna pulled out a tablet. "The police were given some surveillance footage I wanted to ask you about."

She had the screen turned where both Nico and Jason could see. The time on the screen was just a couple hours before Hades' escape, it appeared to be in a storage warehouse somewhere.

After a few seconds Nico appeared on screen. He entered a code into one of the safes and pulled out several vials, some glowing orange, others green, and a gun.

"This is the weapon that was smuggled in to allow Hades' escape." Reyna told Jason.

"That's not me." Nico said. "I don't know where you got that, but it's not me!"

Reyna ignored him and rounded the table, handcuffs already in hand, reading out the charges.

"Reyna, wait, there has to be some sort of explanation."

"Jason, stay out of it." She said not completely unkind. Like it was more of a suggestion rather than an order.

"It's okay, Jason." Nico said before he was led away, Reyna reading his rights as they walked.

The DEO had access to the video, so Jason spent the next few hours looking at it over and over again, hoping to find something, anything really that would prove this was a mistake.

"It's not going to change no matter how many times you look at it." Thalia said coming up behind him. "I know it sucks and you don't want to admit it but we were wrong."

It wasn't that Jason didn't want to be wrong about Nico; this whole thing didn't feel right.

"He didn't even have an alibi, Jason."

"That doesn't mean he's guilty."

"No. But the evidence is pretty clear." She said gesturing to the screen. "You can't let your feelings for him get-"

"There aren't any feelings!" Jason spun around in his chair, Thalia gave him a look. He sighed and looked away. "It's not like that." He said quietly.

Thalia crossed her arms and waited for him to elaborate.

"He's my friend." Jason said simply.

Jason had gotten to know Nico better through the emails. He wasn't an open book by any means, but he left pieces of himself scattered through each interaction. He knew Nico cared about his father, but he also knew Nico believed he belonged behind bars.

Thalia's eyebrows furrowed, she looked sad for him.

"He got in your head." She said gently. Thalia was rarely gentle with anything. "I wanted to believe he was good too. I really did."

"I don't believe he did it. Not without further proof." Jason got up.

"Where are you going?"

"To get proof."

To the untrained eye Leo's desk was a mess. But in truth it had a very complex system to the madness; Jason didn't know the system so he usually refrained from touching anything, but he couldn't help noticing the magazine sticking out from a pile. It was a gossip rag for the city. It featured an article about the vigilante Jason had fought beside a few days ago. Carefully he pulled it out.

Apparently they had been in a few more fights before Jason's and were calling themself 'Guardian'.

"Jason, hey!" Leo said coming up to him, his expression slipped ever so slightly upon seeing the magazine.

"Why do you have this?" He asked smiling.

"Oh, um, I-I have it because of research!" Leo seemed uneasy.

"Research." Jason echoed.

"Yeah! I mean we don't know a lot about them, and nobody here seems to be taking the fact that there's a new hero seriously. Also they seem really cool! Just look at that suit!" Leo said pointing to the blurry picture. "That suit it probably quality made."

He kept rambling on, a sure sign that he was up to something, but Jason would have to deal with that later.

"Leo!" He said stopping him mid-word.

"What?"

"I need your help."

"Ah, so the time has finally come. You've come to the best for advice." He smiled smugly.

Jason sighed exasperatedly. "I need you to help me prove Nico's innocent."

Leo's smile fell instantly. "What? You...you have seen the video, right?"

"It's not enough for me for me to believe he would do something like this."

"Jason-"

"Prove to me he's guilty then!"

"Well, he did endanger all those people at his party."

"That's why he invited me to protect them!"

"It was still a huge risk to take, any one of them could have seriously been hurt."

Jason took a step back and sighed. "You're right, it wasn't exactly the best plan, but there were good intentions there."

"I don't have to tell you what they say about good intentions, do I?"

"Something about this whole thing. It-it doesn't feel right."

"...Like a Super Feeling?"

"Yeah, it's a Super Feeling."

Leo sighed. "Your gut has never been wrong before, but I guess there's a first time for everything. I'll help you, even if it's just to prove he's not innocent so you'll let this go."

They would start with the surveillance footage first. But Leo would need it from the original source, which meant they needed to get to Nico's computer.

"But this took place at a storage warehouse, not his office."

"No, but like any other person who doesn't have enough time on their hands, he would probably have it all feeding back to one place for convenience. Unless he was hiding something."

Jason ignored that last remark. "What do I need to do?"

"You need to get me access to that computer."

Jason floated down onto the edge of the balcony. He leaned out a bit to get a look inside the room. The doors were closed and it appeared to be empty.

The plan was simple. Jason would connect the device Leo had given him to the computer and leave. It would possibly take Leo a few hours to hack through the firewall, but Leo could hack through almost anything, given enough time. Once he'd done that Jason would return and retrieve the device.

Quietly he opened the glass door and slipped inside; this almost felt too easy. After doing a quick scan of the room Jason approached the computer.

It didn't look as though anything had moved since Nico had been taken away. Papers were still precariously scattered about the desk. Some of them had short strings of numbers, others looked to be inventory sheets.

Jason knelt down to where the computer tower was fitted into a little cabinet inside the desk. The device Leo had given him looked like a simple USB, so a port was easy enough to find.

"Okay." He told Leo through the earpiece. "It's in."

A few seconds later the monitor woke up. A few more seconds later alerts started popping up on screen.

"Uh...Leo?"

"Don't worry about that," he assured, not sounding a bit worried, "it's all part of the procedure."

Part one done, Jason closed the cabinet and turned off the monitor in case anyone else came into the office, and made his way back out the way he came.

The sun was setting by the time Leo finished.

Jason slipped back into the office. Just as he pulled the device from the port the office door opened. Panicking Jason hid under the desk.

"Someone's here." He whispered.

"Okay, don't do anything stupid." Leo told him. "This is a stealth mission, the objective is to remain unseen; your bulging muscles don't exactly double as camouflage."

"I do not have bulging muscles."

Jason didn't even hear Leo's reply as the person walked closer to the desk. Fortunately they stayed on the other side, he could hear them rifling through the papers on the desk. Jason narrowed his eyes slightly as he looked through the desk to see who it was.

Jason took in a sharp breath; it was one of the men that had been with Hades the night of his escape. He tried to make himself smaller under the desk, hoping that the man wouldn't come to the other side. At least Jason knew he could take him in a fight, if it came to that.

The man was mumbling something to himself, but even with Jason's super hearing he couldn't make out what it was. A few papers fluttered to the ground, and the man must have found what he was looking for, as he let out a pleased breath. He didn't linger with his findings, and the man was gone a quickly as he had arrived.

Jason let out a relieved sigh and waited a few more seconds to make sure the man wouldn't return before he left.

"It's fake." Leo said two days later.

"How is it a fake?" Reyna asked. "We checked the original footage at the warehouse."

Reyna had been in a meeting when they'd arrived. When it was done she had took one look at Jason, sighed and ushered them through to her office.

"The original footage was tampered with." Jason explained.

"Whoever did this knew what they were doing, and they're extremely good at it. It took me three hours to even notice." Leo pulled out his laptop and faced the screen where Reyna could see it clearly and played the video. He had it playing on loop, and after a couple times he asked, "did you see it?"

"What am I supposed to be looking for?"

Leo played the video again, but this time a bit slower. "There!" He said and pointed to the screen.

Reyna leaned in closer as Leo replayed the moment; there was the slightest glitch before 'Nico' appeared on screen. "That could just be normal video feedback."

"Exactly, so that's why I went digging deeper." He clicked around and pulled up another video. "That's when I found this."

The video showed just outside the warehouse. A man walked toward the entrance and the video feed switched to inside when he got to the door. When the door opened it was 'Nico' who entered through. Leo replayed the door opening as Reyna looked closer.

"Wait."

"You see it now?" When the door was open enough to show his face it was the man standing there, but when the door opened fully, Nico was there. "The disguise glitches a few more times, but it's really easy to miss."

"Good work, Valdez." Reyna clapped Leo on the back and he jerked forward. She looked over at Jason and added, "you too."

"I didn't do anything. Leo's the one who found it all."

"You didn't give up on him. I'm glad, I was rooting for the kid."

Leo followed Reyna out, laptop in hand, to show the evidence to her superior; Jason waited out in the lobby.

Nearly twenty minutes later Leo joined him.

"Looks like you were right after all. Damn Super Feeling."

"Thank you for your help." Jason told him sincerely.

"Yeah well, now you owe me, and I just might ask for your first born."

Jason let out a small laugh. Leo shook his head.

"They're doing his release stuff now. Are you going to stick around or….?"

"Yeah, I think I'll stay." Leo looked at him as though he were solving a puzzle. "What?"

"Nothing. Nothing at all. I'll see you later." He walked away, already pulling his phone from his pocket.

With Leo gone, Jason stood nearby a bench and waited, not wanting to sit down just yet. Only a few minutes later an officer ushered Nico out. Nico stopped in his tracks when he saw Jason.

"What are you doing here?" He looked conflicted. "Did you…?"

"It was mostly my friend Leo. We proved the video was a fake."

Nico scoffed lightly in disbelief as he finally walked forward, and the corner of his mouth threatened to tug up.

"Come on, let's get out of here."

Nico joined him over by the elevators, adjusting his jacket over his arms. He looked even more tired than the last time Jason had seen him. His hair was slightly greasy from being unwashed, Nico had pushed it back away from his face and most of it stuck there.

He'd never seen Nico look more like Hades than in that moment.

"I must admit," Nico said when the doors shut behind them. "I feel like I should be more surprised you're here."

"How so?"

"I was….confused when I saw you. But then it just made sense." He looked at Jason. "Thank you, for helping me." He looked back to the elevator door, seeming almost embarrassed. Almost. "I've never had a friend like you before."

Jason didn't think Nico had very many friends at all. It was understandable considering the environment he grew up in. He had to be careful who he trusted, who he let in. Jason felt incredibly lucky to be allowed these privileges. But as nice as it was, he didn't want to keep it all to himself.

He thought about inviting Nico to game night, maybe he could share his friends with Nico. Of course he would have to talk it over with the others first, but even given their hesitations most likely they wouldn't say no.

"Well, now you do." Jason said with a smile. "You should probably get used to it."

Jason woke abruptly from a knock at his door. He glanced over at his clock, it was far too early for this. He settled back under his covers, attempting to go back to sleep, but the knocking only became more insistent.

Reluctantly Jason got up and padded his way over to the front door, looking to see who it was as he went.

"This better be important." Jason grumbled to Leo.

Leo pushed past Jason to get inside. He looked nervous.

"Okay, so I might have done a bit more snooping around di Angelo's things than I probably should have." Jason opened his mouth, but Leo stopped him before he could say anything. "Just hear me out before you say anything."

Jason sighed. "Fine." It really was far too early for this.

"This was buried so deep and protected so well that I almost gave up on getting to it." Leo pulled some papers from his bag, laying some on the table, and remained holding the others. "He's building some sort of containment facility. The location of it is a bit vague, but whatever, whoever, he plans to use this for, he doesn't want them ever getting out."

Jason looked over the papers on the table, it seemed to have a protocol for nearly everything. Just looking at the rough numbers Jason didn't think even he could manage to get out, or in.

"Which brings me to the other thing."

"There's more?"

"They were deleted but I still managed to find them." He handed the remaining papers to Jason. "Still think he doesn't have something to hide?"

Jason looked over the pictures in his hand. They all featured the same girl with dark skin, curly brown hair, and golden eyes.