Teen Titans Presents Robin – Torn Legacy of a Prodigal Son –
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Chapter 64: False Masks – Best Shot Remade to Suit
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~ WARNING FOR "SOMEWHAT" ADULTEROUS BEHAVIOR, PRESSURING AND SEDUCTION AS WELL AS SOAP BAT – DRAMA. I LOVE ME SOME BAT – SOAP BOX ANY DAY OF THE WEEK! ~
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When reproaching the mighty detective, Grant Wilson then vowed with all his mind's integrity to do what he could in saving his former enemy, and in stopping his father and company's corrupt plans. Bruce had trained Jason in a similar manner; he was cocky at first, but this wasn't the same as Ravager. No, not after the abduction arranged by his own father and his enemies.
But an abused and frightened teen, one that was more at a younger age in time and far to…. obedient. Slade did nothing but upset the group more and more by how Grant acted more like Dick or Tim. Completely composed as if possessed not to fail. He still had his minor abilities, but they were weakened through his damaged psyche, so Bruce had to use absolute caution.
Staves were first, a floor build for combat as Babs, Tim and Tara looked on into the new year. "The HIVE can't make you think any less after what you've done. You clawed after their support, just like you are telling me you're ready to turn over a new leaf." Bruce said for all to take notice. "I want to test one thing, if you pass…. you'll be given the right to train as a Bat agent and to give some reason to a transformation only you have the power to predetermine by your actions." Bruce made sure Grant was going to bow, just as all the bat kids did before a spar to test their inner demons out a bit. "Begin."
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Just as Grant had put his faith in one man's sense of justice, Richard Grayson was caged to believe that only one soul knew him far better than he knew even his own heart's wish to fly free. When Slade and his now awake protégé were able to move freely within the compound of Ra's, Dick did not protest. Like Grant's will, his was changed over by what his new found anger was capable of producing, as Slade had lied. Had told him that he'd killed Rogue for his master in an act of mercy.
All lies, yet Dick's fuzzier process of thought was terrible to comprehend the pain. He didn't even look at Jason, who's hood stayed on and Rose, who refused to greet the man who was the cause of everyone's emotional stagnation. Though, Talia clutched his arm rather tightly…it irked both teens.
The one person Dick however saw and had his eyes brighten up over, was young Damian. Talia never hinted whose child he was. She only hung by Slade and they chatted before he came to fetch Richard to retire with him to their rooms for the evening. That, was when young Damian ran his mouth in front of his other two nannies.
"That boy is very odd. Deathstroke is quiet as well…. Did they have a fight, mother?"
She said nothing and moved by him, the boy trying to gain his mother's answer as she just stayed cold to him. To them all, and retired as well.
To Slade's chambers.
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Dick stayed rolled onto his side in the middle of the night, awake and head unable to still of those violent images of bloodshed. Slade was…. preoccupied with the host, both warm and safe together. He heaved a long sigh and raised himself up, the door to his room though stood already ajar. A boy in dark pajamas at only the age of five was holding it that was, looking as Dick sat up to rub the back of his neck. "Mother says you must stay in your room for the night."
"I, might need water." Dick suddenly spoke. Dami blinked and to his oddest response, even if he was not a help in the kitchen, he wanted his mother to think of him as better behaved than before. "Wait right here, I shall fetch you a glass."
The boy went on his way, passing the mercenary's guest room with more to drown out, of sighs and moans, he did not falter to leave it behind quickly in a flash. To the kitchen he drove himself to go; to find a glass that could not shatter, but all he saw were crystalline ones, and it made him quite nervous.
"Need some help with those, little D?"
Behind the young prince was the silver haired vixen in her down gear. She was still holding one short blade at her hip, just in case but her boots were replaced by slippers and so too was her top. "Here, you might cut yourself."
"I, thanks…" Dami blushed and walked with the pitcher instead, strong due to his training as it balanced better while Rose took two extra glasses just in case.
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"Knock, knock." She didn't knock, yet tried to stay at a whisper as Dick's uncovered eyes flew up to meet his old adversary. "Why is she –
"I'm new, just like you, and I don't bite." She told the ex-hero. "Not for a long time. Dami? Get cozy, I introduce us for real this time." Dick scrunched back into the bed with the memory of all the chaos Rose had wrought. For Terra, for Bruce, for the Titans…
"You look stressed, it's just H20, mini detective." She chuckled as Dami did the honor of topping them all off. Rose handed a glass to the kid as he looked up at her with a scrunched face full of confused signals. "You did a good thing; you deserve to stay hydrated too."
He agreed to her sentiment and took a sip quietly as the two rivals, got to see each other in a light not seen for a few years in total. "Slade's second guessing himself by coming here, none if us are safe." Dick put his glass on to the nightstand by his bed and muttered, hair shifting and still not looking as raven as he'd had it before the "experiment."
"You can dye it back."
"No time, training at four am." He chewed his lip. "Did Talia give you some reason to stick around."
"Jason did, maybe." She leaned against the wall and took a sip from her glass, Dami ducking his face as he tried to simply let them know he was listening but understanding very little of the teens' conversation. "He did." Dick brought his knees to his chest and leaned into them on his elbows on the bed, hugging them in close to pause and think back. "Jason isn't a shadow yet."
"It's complicated." Rose frowned, Dami putting up a hand to speak as she allowed it. "Todd is my supposed sitter and body guard; on the rights that we of the Demon's Head shower protection onto these…wanderers."
Dick snorted a laugh, thinking the boy's choicw of words a bit cruel at best. "They can't be tied down." Dick replied. "Jason, he's got his own set of wings. Maybe when you get older, he'll have you ride on his motorcycle. He's a bit of a –
Dick stopped himself. "Anyway…that's all gone."
"No," Rose shook her head and moved a bit closer, glass now resting beside Grayson's. "Dami, could you please give us some privacy."
"Why?"
She smiled and dropped her head a bit. "He's a bit confused right now, and I know what to say to cheer him up." Her white lie was a bit vague and it had Dick's suspicions raised to level eight all too quickly. "Please, your mom would ask the same so…I don't want to tell her you couldn't take orders."
The boy straightened up, slightly taken aback and offended, yet looking over the girl's words in the back of his small mind. "She…she would tell me this as well….very well. Five minutes will suffice?"
"I'll not be long, but make it ten."
"Got it." Dami moved with his glass to the table and left it, his eyes on the door across the way. Good, mother had him snoozing on his back. Dami gave a rather crafty grin at her tenacity against any foe and proudly moved a moment to watch for anyone coming. "I should distract anyone thinking to look…I'll walk a bit. Throw them off our trail if they try to guess where I first was." Smiling at his plan to bamboozle any onlookers, Damian Al – Ghul marched on and left Dick with Rose to…. reconnect as it were.
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"He set Grant up; Blood was told to take my idiot brother, to tell us that you should be his successor at any cost."
Dick nodded. "Sounds like Slade….m… -
"Call him asshole for once!" She moved in quick, her blue eyes shining back and sturdier than his own walls coming down. "Guess what, I'm not your competition, I gave it up and so did Grant. Jason is dying to see you, but now…" She gripped the sides of his bed frame, having Dick shoved at the wall behind him as her fears were certainly realized. "But now, look at what he did to us! I don't hate any of you. Not him, not my brother…not what my father is because, he'll by all means pay. You have to make sure –
"The Titans."
She stopped, pausing as his words rolled out, frightened eyes searching her own. "They are tough, amd Slade can't hold the cards in one hand of his meaty fingers for long." She grinned, getting even closer, her lips as hot as his tears would be. "Rose, I….you won –
"Shut up, listen." She took his face to her and they kissed a bit forced, not too much before she pulled away, then she put a hand to his beating chest. "Hear that?" She smiled while his hands gripped her wrists, lost by how to function for a moment. "This, is something he won't have that you can win by. You're more human than the man that forsook his humanity, because there is no way a hero can be so uncaring. A villain, maybe." She pulled away and sat down to retrieve her glass with a sigh. "He's got you on the clock but you won't be a villain. You hate seeing people suffer. The more Jason taught me and Dami that lives can't be wasted, the more Bruce told me I could do more if I tried to let go…I felt like a fish caught in a damn net."
Dick started to choke, tears mingling as he rubbed them away with the back of his arm. "You had to go that far…to tell me? A, fish?" Sniffled the boy wonder, for his face still proved it. "You can come home anytime, Dick. They won't want you to lose yourself to this mad world that doesn't belong to anyone. You're too real for that, so…" She got up, the grace in her steps changing to something she was destined to know as soon as Damian came to mind. "The rug rat is off on his own, again." She checked a tracer she'd put on him earlier. "If you ever decide to take out your frustration in the gym, come find me. I won't deny you a good time."
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Dick put a hand to his lips that night, thinking back to his crush on Kori. How they'd never gotten a chance to get close enough. He checked the bedroom for wires and thankfully, it was Rose who had been absent in doing her part well before to not alert a soul. He saw the crystal glasses and only one, but it was closer to where –
She'd drunken his glass. His eyes closed sharply at the taste of her determination to sway him back past the rapids of this entire life lesson; to the fakir saving his body, to Bruce helping his heart and the Titans…
Who could eventually free his locked down spirit. Dick lay back down and tried to rest again, this time finding it easier with the taste of apples and cinnamon pooling to his esophagus in one touch.
Had she….had she, become his Catwoman?
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Dami was sure that he couldn't be lost ever in his own Grandfather's home. It was unthinkable, and yet, he followed Slade along as the man walked beside a man looking suspicious enough to pin as someone the boy knew well.
The hood was lifted, as Ra's Al – Ghul greeted the merc with warm welcome.
"My students are not as organized now that Shiva has left the compound. I was hoping you might consider also taking on the role of helping to rear my young Grandson in the ways of a fighter of your caliber and Talia's. She believes to me that this could be so. That young Damian would benefit greatly from your tutelage in the art of war."
Dami stayed silent as a cat in the rafters, no. more a bat as he hung around. This, was nothing as he'd expected. "What of my apprentice?" The man went back to the teen heartthrob as Dami rolled his eyes. From said rafters. "He seems to have taken to my Grandson, as you saw. The boy might even have a secret to trade if he allows us to help him along."
"That all depends." Slade didn't look like he was buying much of Ra's peace offering. "What training in my absence while with the Light would this pertain to? If not, I'd rather he not become a full-fledged shadow." The man told the terrorist lord. "I want to see to his progress, personally."
"He's no child in need of a sitter, as you are well aware." Ra's chuckled at the idea of making the misfit son of Wayne do chores all day with daddy Deathstroke took over another city in the states. "If Jason decides to finally concede, their roles might be better to this; he could watch my child, as long as he is not willing to try and convert any of my children to the side of…an unideal justice." Grimaced the war lord with a sniff. "He won't, as long as I make sure before my return to Star city." Slade replied. "What of my daughter and her companion. Don't you think it odd that they're not running away from your sect this time?"
"I did find this, quite peculiar at the start." Ra's rubbed his chin as Dami put his ear in close from up on high to hear more. "I am sure there are dedicated masters I could call in to keep him limber and spry. Would hate for the boy to go into a dark place all too soon."
"His first kill was unregistered as a means of self-defense, yet…I told him he was doing me a favor. As an act of mercy for the Brotherhood operative."
Ra's simply took in the info, not trying to negotiate a step further. "Very well. Meditation will take place. You should both join in the dojo if you're willing to not remain in the past. Damian will need a teacher grounded in the present." Slade's fists gritted as Ra's had his back to the male. "As my candidate for successor Damian must follow you and Talia until it is time to increase his potential. He won't stay young with the testing, his birth being…. preordained."
"Lab results show he's not anyone's kid…"
Ra's turned around with a fire – lit set of pupils. "Who told you that? Tell me –
"Your daughter." Slade interjected as Dami covered a gasp just in time. "That boy's material, was it provided in actuality by…a, Mr. Bruce Wayne's by chance. Al – Ghul?"
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