Teen Titans Presents; Renegade – Prison Break – Break Out!
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Chapter Two: Meet Your Neighbors; and Your Handsome, Case Lawyer?
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Dick was led back to his cell and recognized no one person on his block. He saw a man with a five o'clock who was leaning casually against the walls of his cell, a more plexi – design for rats in a lab, yet this was a high security monstrosity. Anything could and would be monitored on the big screen for the warden to read through on her lunch break.
If she even stayed put; Waller was no slack jawed worker bee. She was the queen of this hive, and if you crossed her?
Dick looked down as he was set back into his cell. His cuffs stayed, blinking rapidly before sticking to red.
"Wait it out…. just…" He saw a bed in the corner, no extra bunk. Must have been due his age, or someone mentioning something behind closed doors.
Dick sighed and went to sit on the mattresses, cringing at the lack of ample support, checking it for –
"Psst…. psst! Hey, you. Kid?"
Dick raised his unmasked eyes to the sound.
Ah, the air holes in the glass over his cell front. Dick groaned softly and got up to follow it, knowing he shouldn't try to get cozy. One more call, one more time to get B's attention while he wasn't being hunted…
For the moment.
It was the arm of what looked to be his…cell block neighbor; Dick thought the man with the aftershave issue.
"Oh, good. Hey, listen. You are way too itty bitty to be in Belle, Kid. Whatcha in for? I'm a sure shot – just so ya know. Got instincts of a bronze tiger – he was here for a bit; they moved his ass outta the way."
Dick clicked his tongue. "So?"
"So…what ya here for? They don't send the good guys to play big house."
Good…did he know then??
"Don't know. I ran from my dad. Ex – military brute. Got helped by the wrong kind of bunch, ended up in –
"Lying isn't a crime, but that should be. Did you see the newsflash?"
Dick blinked. "What news flash?? I'm –
"You're a kid assassin. Saw the whole thing, kid. They locked you in for treason and you had better learn to fly." The man had Dick gasp in a breath before turning away…Did…. he had knocked out a few, sure…But Bane was the one who -
"Did they tell you about the accomplice? The guy you tried to blow off? Bane was big when they took him back to Blackgate Pen. Dude can't have any fun there…. but you? You can really pack a punch –
"Who told you?? Who?" Dick seethed raw embers through the wals of his cell. "I'm under…. I'm not able to get back to how I was…but that other merc I was with has to be stopped."
"Cause, yeah kid." The five-o clock male interrupted Dick's anxiety fueled ramble.
"He's the best, an' you got in the way of a hit. Were you even aware a' Deathstroke??"
"You…I wasn't, no…he didn't come clean but he came after my family." Dick wasn't lying. "Said he'd kill them all if I didn't do what he wanted…"
"Killer's code my ass." The five o'clock block mate shook his head, a sad tale.
"I have a message from the boss; I'm like her informant around these parts and SHE knows more than I do, like how you are totally innocent and need to get your case across ASAP. I can look after you here, but you may have to play along –
"Why would I trust you, when you just told me…that you work for Waller."
"You know our big mama?? Really?"
Dick bit his lip. Too much info, this guy was a single-minded rat in the walls.
"I'm working on reducing my sentence, that's all. Don't owe Waller anything. And you'll be scot free if ya release the name of your boss –
"Can't do that." Dick pulled away from the frame and sunk onto the ground with his head in his arms, folded in like a kid. His breathing was becoming difficult since the earlier outburst. Slade still scared him, and this guy…he had no idea what this was really about. What if Waller somehow "remembered" Slade? What if he knew the way in? He was a mastermind incognito! She couldn't have forgotten his face…
If, was the question as the five o clock went quietly away. The rattling of bars and people hooting at the new guys in the block below had him a bit worn out. Dick closed his eyes, imagining Raven's hand on his arm, Cy's palm to his back reassuringly with Star; arms swung around him like a chimp - and chimp Beast boy doing the same…
Did they even look that hard? Did this all seem to be a useless endeavor where the bad guy finally beat the hero? Clash of the Planets style?
Dick whimpered softly into his folded fame as the lights went off throughout the entire block.
Night had fallen, but never so late for a certain winged creature of it, Dick prayed as his dreams involved screaming Titans and whips with chains…
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There was a clacking sound and a droning buzz as Richard was made to shift a bit on the floor, the guards with the man in charge of said division staring at him from above.
"Trouble sleepin' last night, boy? Our hospitality not good enough for ya, brat? Up! Git!"
The man nearly nudged his arm to fall onto his side, Dick's eyes blinking wildly before his focus was on a slightly unattractive man of the academy. This commando was wearing a super trooper's get up as his boots looked ready for combat either way you squashed it.
"Ya have your case to go over if you ever wanna see ma and pa again, son. Up, it's late an' I got drills to run round this whole complex! Hut to!"
Dick was sure the man didn't like kids, let alone crooks by his scowling face. He was lead into a room that looked like a safer place than an interrogation room in the GCPD. His cuffs were kept on as the door slid shut, locking him in until the limit ran out.
A man with dark hair and a rather tall stature; pressed in a black and charcoal grey business suit, sat at the table where a packet was slid across to the teen's side. His head moving for the boy to sit right across from this dashing man of twisted principals. Not since Harvey Dent did Richard trust the most crooked of workers.
And the most troublemaking for vigilantes' cases in the court of law.
"Hi, I don't bite. My name is Charles Babcock. I'll be observing your case."
"Who hired you." Sitting meant committing to breaking a law that wasn't his to know. He could, but he'd been forced to and was technically a minor. What was he doing in Belle? Where were the C.I.A and F.B.I when you needed the big guns brought in??
"Can you help me, I mean this is bigger than you can imagine. I'm still a target for the man who –
"Why don't we talk about that. You're…Renegade, right? Rick Wilson?"
Dick definitely felt his lip twitch.
"My cover name. He took my real one and threatened to reveal my family's secrets if I don't cooperate…"
"If that's the case…"
Dick raised a brow before his mouth opened too far a crack.
"LET ME OUT! IT'S HIM ! HELP! HELLO!!?"
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The door to Waller's office swept back.
"Deadshot." She turned to face the man behind the sniper rifle. His masked expression was revealed as "five o'clock" as he waltzed into the lioness's den. Hands held up with nothing to hide but his comradery.
"You almost got him skittish." Grumbled the woman in charge of Belle's top many for her program. And Deadshot? He was an illuminati of the program.
"Bats was keen on investigatin' the kid's case but you won't budge on the issue."
"He's not a renegade, that's why. And as for non – metas being in this prison under the age of eighteen, it's a travesty if that kid turns out to be just who we suspected from his DNA taken at the scene.
"The Prince of Gotham." Deadshot's alter nodded. "Which I wonder if that drop out DS is onto us."
"Of course he knows." Huffed the warden in her moment of woe. "He's a hunter and was trained to wean out any missing leads or bad apples from the bunch. We think he's already attempted to get in touch with the hero inside of our facility since his arrival."
"I think he's already here." Deadshot shook his head, disagreeing slightly.
"Kid's not talking. Looks like he's gotta button that lip –
"It's the mastermind Slade is Jump California he's keeping under lock and key. He has no choice if the Titans' lives are at stake. There were news casters saying the heroes were holding back after fighting their own in that mercenary's colors."
"You think he's legit? As in….not guilty?"
"We both know it." Waller frowned. "Batman has to have figured it out, but the line to cross over and save his ex partner isn't so cut and dry I'm afraid.
"Then, can you work your hand in this at all, Waller?"
"I can't." She put her hand to her desk with a current inmate's name on the front.
"Though, we have a few names to pick from that can snag that confession right up. The boy is under Deathstroke's influence if not legally, then as a threat to fellow vigilante in his field." She spoke with knowledgeable words to give.
"Even if we did the trial, got the kid home and….he'd still be better off with Belle's officers than in his city."
"Correct, which is why I want you to keep to your role and to find out more about what he intends to do with his time in cuffs. That boy's a one man SWAT team. Robin was behind the Renegade mask, and if word gets out, Deathstroke will recind his rights to let the Titans continue. You'd wanna be at that funeral, Cap?"
"Not on any kid's career, no ma 'me." Deadshot nervously waved his answer to A. Waller.
"Poor kid….I guess I can push my pals like –
"Do NOT bring that ban of misfits into this operation." Waller suddenly turned back to face that target practicing intel dealer.
"Harleen is on her best behavior and we want to see her cured of her killing streak. King Shark needs therapy but is otherwise very self sufficient in his….scales, and Boomerang? I won't say more about Dr. Psycho…" she rubbed her temples furiously. "His ego is so thick that he can't even see the other end of the wading pool to KNOW that Deathstroke will kill all of them. He's not one to take light, and you can do it."
"No, no I can't." Five o' clock admitted with a bow of his head. "I do need someone better to get through to that kid."
"Then, tell me?" Waller raised her dark and finely kempt brow at the crooked sharp shoot.
" Who can get inside that hero's head to Give to us Deathstroke ?"
/
Bruce had seen the news and he turned to solid rock. Not only did Jason and Alfred stay away from his office in the manor – heck, Jason was already in trouble for HOTWIRING the Batmobile and up in his room sulking all week long… Alf had said it was a phase, yet Slade had crossed wires before and Bruce knew the man's mark by that present he'd left atop Wayne Enterprise's Jump City division.
"Did you see the news, B!"
"How are you watching television, Master Todd! You're supposed to be grounded in your room –
"But Alf! It's Dick!"
And so, as far as he knew it, Jay loved his older brother more than B had originally guessed. When he'd met the pro - hub - cap stealing little miscreant, Dick had actually been the one pouting.
They got better at chatting about teen things, despite being a year or so apart. Dick was fifteen going on sixteen and Jason was fourteen in a few days. He also had started to become more anxiousin that week the big attack of Wayne's California location had gotten to the League's ears. First Wallace West and then to Speedy in Star city, only a few cities from Jump.
"I'm going to be present before and during his trial." Bruce told hisson, who still looked over in a scrutinizing way that had Alfred clear his throat. "Master Jason? Why don't you come into the kitchen to help with preparing supper for this evening as a part of your reinstated punishment?"
"I'd rather eat dirt –
"Jason Todd, you apologize to Alfred this instant."
Bruce was cross with Dick too, but that wasn't why he'd begged to have his own niche in the California sunshine. He was, collectively more composed than Jason. The boy looked ready to gut his enemies wth that cold stare, all for the sake of saving a single life.
That, was something they'd have to work on. Joker was already flaunting his amusement with the baby bird, and Bruce wanted to be sure that Jay wouldn't take the bait from his father's worst nemesis, like Slade had done to Dick.