After tampering with the security cameras so that they were on a loop with nothing seeming odd, the B group went back into the apartments, and continued their search. There was nothing up top, but when they went down to the floors underground, Beast was able to detect something with a wall at the end of the bottom floor. Thanks to his eyes, he was able to see that the paint of the corners weren't connected. Using his laptop to hack into what was keeping them out, Tim was able to open the wall to show another staircase. This new room that they found at the bottom of said staircase looked to be an office with another room to the right with various crates and weapons on the walls. However, this room ultimately held nothing of particular interest. Still, Tim decided to see what the computer of said office could give them. Thanks to his animal senses, Beast with his feet could feel something off in the room.
"Weird, I'm not sensing a wall behind this book case."
"And how could you tell that, since you weren't an animal just then?" Tim questioned.
"Ever since my transformation of having animal features in my human form, one of them is feeling vibrations through the ground like a snake. And I'm sensing something missing behind this."
"Let me check it out." Stephanie said as she inspected the book case. Finding it, it rolled out of the way to reveal another hidden room filled with black books and cryo pods filled with reanimated talons. "I'm going to cause these to malfunction. We'll pull a fire alarm as we're getting out. Go check Tim on what he's found out." Nodding, Garfield and Cassandra went to Red Robin.
"So, what's the news?"
"Well, hacking into their communication history, I found out why you guys have been targeted. Ever since you guys were promoted to Justice League ranks, you became a threat and wanted to take you guys down. I guess they wanted some irony that the person to take down the team led by Batman's sidekick is Batman himself."
"So now we're being targeted by one of Gotham's most mysterious underground organizations? Huh, talk about respect."
"Try fear." Tim corrected. It was then that three Talons burst through the ceiling and surrounded the superheroes. Beast Boy could sense them coming from the weapon room as well, likely to make the odds further against their favor.
"Get... down." Cassandra said with difficulty, speaking with her rarely used voice.
"Me too?" Tim asked, to which Orphan nodded. "If you say so." He then ducked down under the table."
"I'll let you be." Garfield also gave her space by turning into a pixie fly. The other Talons came into the room to supply melee weapons. Oh, what's a girl to do in a room of six men and women with weapons? Dominate. Some of them charged, but each were stricken down by reflexes they were not used to from their prey, or even themselves. The daughter of Lady Shiva gave a brutal neck chop to the first man that tried to slice her with a sword after a side step, followed by a kick to a Talon behind her as soon if he came within striking distance. She gave a spin kick which was enough to crack his neck upon impact from the point of her boot dealing a huge amount of pressure, and then used her momentum to land on the ground with a spin to knock a female talon off her feet and kick her away with her other foot. One talon tried to attack her while she was on the ground but she rolled away from his dagger in a way her feet reconnected with the ground and did a lunging punch which sent the assassin flying into a wall. Beast turned into a Python and wrapped himself around the man, to which Tim from the desk whispered,
"Bite his neck. They're immortal so you won't kill them."
"Ooooh." The shapeshifter said with interest as he turned into an Inland Taipan snake and bit the assassin in the neck, injecting as much venom as he could. By the time he was able to grab onto the snake, Beast turned back into a fly and moved away. Even with said healing factor, it seemed that the venom was made to counteract the effects of electrum in their blood, as the snake was specially adapted to warm blooded species. And given Electrum is fueled by body heat, this meant the venom in his blood was destroying the body almost as fast as it was healing. The assassin struggled to move effectively as his body went into overdrive in trying to not die from such a potent venom. Ducking under a sword, Orphan grabbed the wrist that went over her and used that as a means to swivel and kick the assailant away first to dislodge the arm from its socket, then switched legs to kick the man away for real this time. Doing a roundhouse kick to give another female talon pause, Cassandra's speed was enough for her to make another spin kick without slowing down and kicked her away before doing another swivel to duck under a mace and grabbed onto the talon's clothes. flipping him over, she slammed the man into the ground before proceeding to break the wrist, elbow, shoulder of both joint and tendons and neck as she was standing on it while pulling and twisting as hard as she could. Kicking him away, Beast went and bit down on him with more of that snake venom. Picking up the mace, Cassandra used it to block two swords one of the women was using. Kneeing her assailant in the groin, that gave her the opportunity to duck under the weapons before proceeding to deliver multiple punches faster than the eye could track and jumped to front flip and land on the woman's neck with her head between her thighs. Pulling the both of them down, Orphan rolled around to painfully twist the assassin's neck before letting go and kicking her head the opposite direction. She too was taken down by Beast's venom. Seeing how much of a danger she was, the remaining talons tried ganging up on her all at once.
Tim, however, decided to take one of them on by ramming into one of them from his desk spot while Beast as a grizzly bear attacked the woman. Which just left one of them for Cassandra as she blocked his kick and they exchanged a flurry of blows. This talon seemed to be actually better than the rest given that he could actually keep on par. Blows were blocked and parried and the neck chop she went for merely moved the tilt of his head as he responded with a successful punch to her cheek. He tried to punch her twice more but she pushed those aside and shoved an elbow into his chest. Each of them tried to use a spin kick at the other dodged. The talon even caught her third kick and pushed her down into the ground as he got a dagger and tried to stab Orphan in the face when she took grip of his wrists. The former Bat-Girl kicked him away and flipped herself onto her feet. While the talon assassin was faring better then his fellow killers, Cassandra's body language reading skills just made her too fast as she was consistently able to get more strikes in, deflect blows more and keep her enemy on his toes. The fight reached its conclusion when she got a batarang out, was able to sidestep a punch and twirled herself around his form to plant it onto his back, and it activated to freeze the assassin on the spot in a cocoon of frost. No longer at a speed he was able to fight at her level, she stabbed a batarang into the back of his neck causing the talon to fall. Taking out two more of the bat shaped projectiles, Orphan threw them at the two remaining members. One made its mark into the last man's face mid-leap while the other knocked a dagger out of the woman's hand just as she was going to stab Beast's neck, allowing him to turn into the Inland Taipan to insert his venom into her neck. Turning back to human, Garfield whistled in an impressed tone.
"Wow girl, you're the most kick-ass ninja I know! That was what, two minutes at most?!" She merely nodded in approval, half of her mouth smiling somewhat. Stephanie walked out of the room containing the frozen talons and looked around.
"Looks like I missed all the fun. Thankfully one of them made my job easier by trying to stab me, and I directed their dagger into the electrical components that needed tampering instead. We should get out of here. I found the crystal we're looking for, so let's get Batman normal again." The group took their leave as the room with the talons started to glow bright with fire and smoke traveled across the ceiling.
Nightwing barged into one of the Court of Owls main chambers. With his teammates handling the rest of the talons, he went on ahead to chase after the Owls themselves. His mask made sure their foot prints were not ignored, and eventually he found them where they regularly convened.
"There's no use running, Court of Owls. There's nowhere you can outrun. You had Batman attack my family, so you're all going down."
"Oh, we think you'll be too preoccupied with one last Talon we have in mind for you specifically, Grayson." One of the Owls retorted. From the shadows above, a figure dropped down. He looked like any regular Talon assassin, but it's what he said next which caught Batman's protege off guard.
"Hello, grandson."
"Grandson? You're a relative of mine?"
"Yes. In a previous life, I was William Cobb. And you have a destiny my boy."
"Why would I have any destiny for the likes of you?"
"Oh, I had things planned out. You were going to be my newest Talon of the Owls. With your skills, the greatest Gotham would have ever feared. But Batman stole you away. He turned you into a vigilante and fought against our interests."
"Then why was I never targeted if I was meant for something?"
"The court believed you had no reason to join. By the time word spread your parents died, you were already persuaded to fight for a cause not aligned with ours. You already had something we couldn't give you. It was supposed to be your destiny to be the Gray Son. My greatest successor."
"Well, sorry to disappoint gramps, but there's no such thing as destiny, and if there was, I only believe in my own."
"Then die with your foolish ideals." The two run towards each other, Cobb tries punching Nightwing, but the former Boy Wonder dodges and tries kicking the Talon. He catches the kick, prompting Nightwing to flip backwards. Cobb punches Richard two times before trying to slam him into the ground, but Dick manages to flip over his arm and punches him back. The assassin tries kicking Nightwing, but the dark knight's former sidekick ducks before back-flipping to avoid a punch. While leaping back, Nightwing throws two birdarangs at his opponent, who lunges and rolls forward to avoid both of them. After they both land on their feet, William continues his forward momentum to take on the young titan in his fighting stance. Talon blocks Nightwing's punches before ducking down to avoid Richard's spinning kick. Back to back, the Teen Titan tries backhanded attacks that the assassin catches. After avoiding another kick, Talon punches Nightwing and kicks him forward into a wall. Richard narrowly avoids William's kick, which cracks the stone. Nightwing tries kicking Talon, but he catches his leg and pins him against the wall. Richard manages to push him back and tries punching him again, but Talon blocks the attack and flips the both of them to pin Dick on the ground between his legs. Talon takes out one of his six knives and tries stabbing it down at the pinned Nightwing. Richard manages to narrowly avoid getting it stuck in the head before using his suit to disarm William. Nightwing manages to turn around and pin his foe, but the assassin's leg manages to block his punch. He barely misses Richard's head when attempting to stab his descendant's head with another knife. Nightwing then bites Talon's hand at a pressure point to make him let go, tossed the knife away and trapped Talon's right arm down with his legs. While the two wrestle on the ground, Richard dislocated William's arm, causing Talon to yell in pain. When he attempts to move, Richard uses his legs to toss his great-grandfather away from him. Talon sort of slowly stands up while Nightwing leaps off of the ground without using his hands. Thanks to his healing factor, William's arm reinserted back into place without needing to be pushed or knocked back in.
"Slade fights better than you." Nightwing taunted as he took out his eskrima sticks.
"A formidable mercenary of his own right, but he's just a pawn like everyone else is compared to the Owls and Talons."
"You want to know something? Slade actually came close to making me join his side, and almost won. You guys didn't even try. I'd say he's the more dangerous enemy than all of you combined. Especially you." While he couldn't see the look of his ancestor's face, he could definitely tell he got under his skin as he became far more aggressive, wielding two knives in both his hands. While the two were just about equal in combative skill, Nightwing's weapons proved to be superior thanks to their farther reach and electrical element, giving minor shocks to the Talon, giving him momentary lapses in movement. Tossing up his right stick to make his enemy look up for a second, Nightwing threw down a smoke bomb to obscure the area. This proved to be for naught unfortunately as he swiped his right knife into Richard's face when he tried to make a sneak attack from behind. All he got was a red line across his cheek, but being countered like that stunned him enough to be kicked in the same cheek, sprawling onto the ground out of the smoke while the Talon pounced on his descendant, his knees pinning the Titan's shoulders and knocking the eskrima sticks away from his hands.
"Too bad. You have the potential to be the greatest, but you are of no use to us." As he was going to kill his great-grandson, an arrow pierced through his head and protruded out of his forehead, causing the Talon to fall to his side while blood drips fell on Richard's face. The Court of Owls went into an outrage of who did this and tried to escape when they found all the doors to be locked. Batwoman and Huntress dropped down with the two women intertwined with their legs as Kate Kane hung on to a grapple as they held a total of three machine guns and shot multiple rounds of rubber bullets at the Owls, spinning around to hit them as much as they could. The Court of Owls were helpless as they screamed and were bombarded by enough rubber to take every one of them down within seconds until the women reached the ground.
"Finally, we got the Court of Owls." Kate sighed.
"I know. This is a great victory." Helena chuckled as the two went to Richard. Huntress pushed Talon off of Nightwing while Batwoman helped him up.
"You alright?"
"Yeah, thanks. How did you find me here?"
"Alfred gave us a call." Kate answered. "He thought Huntress and I could provide additional help and make sure you didn't fail."
"Thank you. What are we going to do with them?"
"We'll tie them up and then wait for your friends to come so that we can transport them to prison. Once their identities are known then their assets will be frozen and Gotham will for once be its own city, the only corruption from individuals or publicly known crime families rather than an underground conspiracy."
"Great."
Placing the crystal keeping Bruce under control, all of the present Teen Titans and Bat family watched as Raven performed her magic, saying her enchantment as she reversed the effects of the crystal as it was being destroyed into not even dust. Seconds passed before Bruce was able to wake up.
"Ugh, what... what happened?"
"Batman, you were under the control of the Court of Owls. But we took them down."
"What... do you mean?" Batman held his head from a headache he was suffering.
"We all helped to get you back to normal. I fought an ancestor of mine and was just about to die but then Batwoman and Huntress saved me. Everyone here helped freeze the Owls so that they aren't controlling Gotham anymore."
"Hmmm, hate to break it to you, but you didn't 'completely' stop the Owls."
"Ah man, there's more?!" Garfield complained.
"Yes. But the good news is that Gotham was essentially their stronghold. So while you haven't disbanded the Court of Owls by a long stretch, you did deal them a big blow by taking down their oldest members. I don't say this often, but I guess I have to say... thank you. You all helped me take down a group I couldn't do myself." Everyone looked pleased that they got actual praise from the Batman, a guy known for being stoic, paranoid and gloomy who isn't known for politeness. "Richard, follow me." Getting up, Bruce led Nightwing out of the cave.
"Where they going?" Cyborg asked.
"Oh, probably just to praise him some more while we don't see." Stephanie chuckled. "We're lucky to get a direct thanks from him like that so we just take them as they come."
"Hmph, playing favorites again." Red Hood gave a dry chuckle.
"Well, one thing we can all enjoy in term of favorites, one big dinner which has all your favorites." Most of the heroes there cheered while some just smiled or nodded. During dinner, the two came around, though the Bat family noticed that the two seemed... happy? Like they're okay being in the same room without putting up a face of tolerance?"
"Master Bruce, Master Richard, what makes you two so beaming?" Alfred questioned with a sly grin.
"Let's just say we've finally come to be on good terms." Nightwing remarked.
"Joy!" Starfire cheered as she went to hug her boyfriend "I am so glad that you are able to overcome your differences with Batman!" However, Richard was gasping for breath from nearly being crushed by the hug.
"Star... can't breathe!" He gasped.
"Oh, my bad. Everyone laughed about how he's lucky to have such a positive girlfriend and that he finally learned about how to talk about his issues positively due to her influence, something Richard grumbled about. The Teen Titans stayed at Wayne Manor for a couple of days before heading back.
Was that awesome, or what?