Chapter Nineteen: Omen
"So what now?" Beastboy asked catching up to her on the wide open platform of the batcave, wondering how much more his body could take.
"Bit of rest now. Run experiments on senses."
Beastboy stopped dead.
Batgirl turned at the sudden stiffening. Her eyes widened at the sight of his face. His normally vivid green skin had turned an ashen, light lime colour and his eyes were wide and alert, but glazed over in emotion. His hands, she noted, were curled into tight fists at his side and his shoulders and neck was tensed.
She moved quickly to stand in front of him, staring him in the eyes and placing her hands on his shoulders.
"Beastboy. Look me."
Seeming to snap from his trance like state, the emerald eyes of the changeling focused on the deep brown ones of Batgirl.
"Okay?" She asked hesitantly.
He swallowed, throat tightening before answering, "Yeah, yeah I'm fine. Wha-what sort of experiments?" He asked hurriedly.
"Not big. See how sharp eyes, ears are. How good smell is. Reaction time. Small things."
Beastboy's body relaxed noticeably at her words and his breathing lightened. "Ah, okay. Sorry about that." He said, not looking at her and shifting his feet.
Batgirl opened her mouth to ask what 'that' was, but decided once again against it. Batman hadn't wanted to push him too far on his first day and neither did she. "Come, not take long." She said, removing her hands from his shoulders and leading him away.
To Beastboy's surprise, Batgirl led the two up into Wayne manor and into an area of the mansion that they hadn't visited the day before. It was less opulent, more functional and judging from the stronger scents, used more often than most parts of the house.
Eventually the two arrived at an oaken door just like the dozens they had passed before. Without a word, Batgirl walked through and Beastboy followed. And was immediately set on edge.
Everything was white and steel, chemical and cold. Clean, clinical and sterile, it was obviously a lab of some sort, complete with test tubes, beakers, strange liquids, dials and silvery instruments. A particularly shiny one caught Beastboy's eye. 'Wonder what that does?'
He reached out an emerald arm towards it, magpie eyes wide. A hand suddenly appeared gripping his wrist tightly as a slap rang out around the room. Beastboy turned with a guilty look into Batgirl's stern eyes.
"Touch nothing."
She turned and walked over to a glass cubicle in a far corner; Beastboy followed behind with his tail between his legs.
"Alright." Batgirl announced crisply, turning around to face her charge. "Will be blindfolded and put into this. Small or big smells be inserted. Say as soon as smell them. Understand?
Beastboy looked over her shoulder. The glass container was a cuboid, about six feet in height and width and ten feet long. There was nothing inside except a tiny, black box on wheels that was sticking onto the inside on the glass wall. A few white ceramic pipes where attached somehow to the top of the see-though box. "Uhhh, How-"
'Chush' There was a released of air as one square side of the box opened slowly on hinges and let out a rush of air.
"So what exactl-arghhh!" He exclaimed when black cloth dropped over his eyes and fastened behind his head.
"Inside."
He felt a push on his back and found himself on his hands and knees on a cold and odd textured floor. 'Damn, why is she in such a hurry?' Beastboy was feeling decidedly uncomfortable now. Old memories began to surface in him as he tried to fight them down.
'Okay breath, breath. Just breath and it'll all be over soon. She's not going to hurt you, not like she did this morning, not like she…oh God, I'd forgotten about that. Crap, crap, crap! I need out, I need to- hey, what's that smell? Smells like…like… peppermint?'
"Are you eating a candy cane or something?" He asked, scrambling into a cross legged sitting position and resisting the temptation to take off his blindfold.
He heard Batgirl reply, voice muffled through the glass, "No, still full from breakfast. That first smell, good."
Feeling a bit more relaxed at the sound of her voice, Beastboy reached out with his other senses, closing his eyes under the blindfold to help. It wasn't long before a faint odour found his nostrils.
"I smell it. Faintly. Is it…uh, what is it? Umm….Banana! That's it right?"
"Correct, wait for next one."
"Why do I need to be in here?" Beastboy asked, still not entirely at ease with the situation.
"Sterile environment. Can control all air inside. Add chemicals or powders into it. Lots or little. Then know how sensitive nose is. Just smelled ground up banana skin."
"Oh, makes sense I guess." A thought then occurred. "What else is this used for? I doubt Batman built this just to test his sidekick's sense of smell."
"I tested same when joined. But no, built for containment when exposed to chemicals don't know."
"Has that ever happened to you?"
"No, but batman was few months ago after fight Poison Ivy."
Beastboy raised his eyebrows under his blindfold as the scent of ginger filled his nose. "I smell ginger. And did you help?"
"Yes, did most of fighting actually." She continued, seeing Beastboy's mouth open as she manipulated the control panel, adding varying quantities of prepared air that contained different scents into the chamber.
"Poison Ivy has chemical effect on male. Less effective against females. Hard for Batman to fight. Easier for me."
To her surprise, Beastboy burst out laughing, pearly white teeth showing and slapping his knee in hilarity.
"Hahaha, oh man that's fantastic! 'A chemical effect on males,' haha that is the politest way of saying it I've ever heard, haha! And I smell coffee by the way." He said, calming down slightly.
Batgirl was stumped.
'Nothing to laugh about. Serious problem for fighting. What wrong with him?' She frowned as she thought, 'Probably nothing. Probably something wrong with me. As usual.' She stabbed a button on the console with more force than necessary.
The test went on quietly for twenty more minutes. Every detail from amount of scent being injected into the container to Beastboy's first verbal response to head positioning was recorded meticulously by Batgirl, who was focusing unusually intently on the task.
When they were done with Beastboy's sense of smell, they moved onto his sense of hearing. Batgirl activated the small device that was attached to the inside of the tank and moved it silently around Beastboy , where it would give off a sound from a small speaker.
By varying the pitch, tone, loudness, direction and decibels it emitted, Batgirl was able to test how strong Beastboy's sense of hearing was. Again, all the data was recorded by the console computer for later evaluation by Batman.
The two left the room quickly two and a half hours after entering, both of them glad to be out of it. Beastboy hadn't enjoyed the silence after his outburst of laugher and had spent the rest of the time freaking out over his perceived offense. Batgirl had tried forgetting her thoughts, but there hadn't been much for her to do so she had been forced to dwell on her disabilities.
"Right, so what's next?" Beastboy asked trying to get back some of the more relaxed and upbeat atmosphere from breakfast earlier.
"Sight next, follow me. Got movie to watch." She said, appreciating his social olive branch.
Fifteen minutes later, Beastboy found himself in the mansions movie theatre, a computer tablet in his hands, paying close attention to the screen in front of him. The projector was being run by a computer connected to the tablet in Beastboy's hands and the whole thing was being used as a vision test.
After going through the standard snellan chart and a few other standardised sight tests, things had taken a slightly more interesting turn.
"Come on, come on." Beastboy muttered to himself, mouth open and eyes squinted in concentration. On the screen was a ten second looping video of a very busy street, with a headshot of a middle aged man to the right of the footage.
"There! Yes!"
Looking down to his tablet where the same tape was playing, Beastboy located the man in the crowd and tapped on his face. A green tick mark appeared on the screen. The changeling exploded up into victory dance on his seat, "Boom! Aw yeah, go Beastboy! Eyes of an eagle baby!"
His impromptu celebration ended when a beeping sound came and the next visual challenge started. Sitting quickly down again in his seat, Beastboy focused intently on the screen. He was finding this test to just be more of a video game than anything else. He was having a good time with it. The challenges were varied and interesting and reminded Beastboy of his old training with the Doom Patrol.
Eventually, to Beastboy's disappointment, the tests came to an end and he made his way back down to the batcave as Batgirl had told him to. He found her sitting at the supercomputer noisily eating a large burger.
"Why so long?" She asked as he approached.
Beastboy rubbed the back of his head as he stood next to her, "I kinda' had some trouble finding this place again. Ended up tracking our scents back to through the lab to here." He chuckled nervously.
'Have to improve memory and awareness,' Batgirl thought as she stood and finished her snack in one massive swallow.
"Anyway, what's next? I'm ready for anything!" Beastboy said confidently, filled with anxious anticipation.
Batgirl gave an ominous smirk as raised an eyebrow at her new green teammate. Beastboy felt his good mood drain out of his feet as he saw the look on her face. Some animal instinct was warning him that nothing good was coming next.
"Now," Batgirl said as she took a step closer to a clearly edgy Beastboy, a dangerous look in her eye.
"We test reflexes."
Well, hello there.
So yes, I have returned to writing and can only apologise for my lengthy absence. I was offered a temporary job in another country and accepted. Had a fantastic time but felt no inclination to write whilst over there. But I'm back now and eager to get back into writing. Although with a full time job and Christmas coming up, updates may be infrequent.
Anyway, good to be back and stuff.
Not much happening in this chapter I know but wanted to just get something out. Next chapter should be longer with more happening. Back to the titans I think.
Have a good one,
CJB