Northern India Jungle
As the sun begins to pierce the sky over the trees the team is back at the BioShip, the mission taking a toll out of them as they make their way back.
"What are you grinning about?" Artemis asks Kid Flash, he holds a red beret in his hands.
"One word: souvenir." Kid smiles at the souvenir.
"Two words: gorilla lice." Artemis rains on his parade as he processes what she said.
"Huh? Oh, man!" he takes it off and holds it away from him as he groans. Kaldur removes the collar from a howler monkey, watching as it leaves. Their mission was successful but not without problems, the team separated without Kaldur orders and all got ambushed, they got lucky until Captain Marvel got captured which forced Kaldur to take charge and lead the team. They save Captain Marvel but the villain, the Brain and ally, get away.
"That's the last of the collars?" Captain Marvel asks the tiger, who was experimented on like the other animals in the forest, giving all of them increased strength and intelligence. The tigers growl to Marvel.
"I can count on you to keep the other animals out of trouble?" Captain Marvel checks, the tiger growls again.
"Good. I'll be back for a visit. I promise." Captain Marvel pets the tiger before standing and watching as it heads into the jungle.
"I think I'll call him Mr. Tawny." Marvel says brightly, like a ten year old kid.
The tiger runs past M'gann, Conner, and the wolf on his way out. Conner has an experienced enhanced wolf now.
"The rest of the pack is gone." Conner tells the wolf as he pets the wolf.
"What are you still doing here?" Conner asked him as the wolf went closer to him.
"I think he wants to stay with you." M'gann tells him, seeing the connection Conner has with the wolf.
"Can I keep him?" Conner asks her, sounding like an excited child.
"First the Sphere, now this beast. Dude, you sure make a habit of collecting strays." Wally lets out a laugh in the background.
"Maybe because he's such a stray himself." M'gann said easily with a smile.
"Aren't you?" she asks him telepathically.
"M'gann, I'm sorry. I was just worried." Conner tells her honestly, he being over emotional and over protective of her, which causes more than one issue during the mission. M'gann kneels down beside him, placing a hand on his knee.
"And that's sweet, Conner," M'gann puts her hand on the back of his neck. "But on a mission, I'm your teammate, not your girlfriend. Agreed?"
"Yeah." Conner smiles, with a bit of teasing annoyance in his voice.
"Well, he's gonna need a name." Wally pulls them out of their personal conversation.
"Uh, how's about Krypto?" Wally suggested the wolf growls.
"Pass." Conner says instantly, seeing the wolf reaction to it.
"Besides, isn't that taken?" M'gann asks, remembering some animal already having that name, somehow.
Robin stands on the ramp up to the BioShip, clearly waiting for Kaldur.
"Look, I need to know, why did you keep the Mole-intel secret?" Robin just as Kaldur goes to pass him on his way up.
Kaldur stops and everyone else slowly moves towards the BioShip for the conversation. He doesn't turn away from them as they all wait for the same answer.
"It was Batman who told me about it, Michael received the tip from Sportsmaster." he says simply, remembering Batman giving him the warning about the possible mole.
"What?! You can't trust him!" Artemis snaps, any mention of Sportmaster is a red flag.
"It seemed possible, likely, that he was attempting to divide the Team with false information by giving it to Michael." Kaldur informs them simply.
"And given how the mission went, he almost succeeded. Michael knew first and didn't say anything" Robin realises that he and KF were betraying someone they had known for years as much as they felt betrayed by him. Michael not telling them about the mole makes sense now.
"But you had to consider it might be true." Robin asked,
"Yes, as a leader, I did. In which case, I did not wish to alert the traitor." Kaldur looks directly at Robin as he speaks; knowing that the Team will one day fall to him and explaining this will help him.
"I hate to say it, but it makes sense." Robin says with a one-sided smile.
"I am still prepared to step down." Kaldur says simply, willing to step down if his team wants him too.
"All in favour of keeping Aqualad as Leader?" Wally raises his hand; M'gann, Conner, and Artemis all raise their hands instantly.
As Kaldur turns to Robin, his hand is raised too and he shows a few of his teeth with his smile. The Atlantean nods silently.
"Guess it's unanimous." Captain Marvel says easily as he places a hand on Kaldur's shoulder then removes it and offers a shake. Which the teen takes.
"See you tomorrow." Captain Marvel waves off.
"You're not coming back with us?" Kaldur asks, confused, as the adult hero not follow them
"Nah, gotta fly." the JL member says as he takes off.
The wolf drops his giant head into Conner's hands for a moment.
"So, what are you gonna call him?" M'gann asks as they head up the ramp.
"What's wrong with Wolf?" Conner asks.
"Generic, but acceptable." Wally says from inside the ship.
Kaldur looks down before heading into the BioShip, rattled by the fight they had throughout the mission.
"First thing we need to do is go and see Michael," Kaldur said as everyone turned to them.
"We left him in a bitter mode, I believe we should apologise to him at least" Kaldur said, as the team looked down as their missing member.
"He was right about us not being ready for the mission" Robin said, seeing how much the mission could have turned badly.
"He did save us from the androids" M'gann said, Michael did save them as Conner looks down in shame at what he said.
"We should have trusted him" , Artemis said, not wanting to let down the first on putting trust in her.
"He should have least told us" Wally said, still a little mirth about the betrayal.
"Then will go to him and ask for the truth," Kaldur said, wanting to hear about it from Michael, as he was the first to know about the traitor, everyone nodded wanting to see Michael and get the truth.
LINE
Melbourne Streets
Cold-Blood jumps on the roof to get a better view at the street below, while Cold-Blood does missions for the Justice League it doesn't mean he doesn't do some hero work. While Australia doesn't have as much crime as America it still has more than its fair share of problems.
First fires in the forest were a big issue in the outback, but that's calmed down now but that's not the only natural disaster, Australia has been getting more floods in New South Wales, the East Coast and Sydney.
50,000 residents in New South Wales have been told to either evacuate or warned they might receive evacuation orders, Cold-Blood has been saving people and trying his best to stop the flood water. The Serpent suit ice abilities help keep some of the flood in certain areas and help evacuate those that really need it, his present inspires others to get into action. Cold-Blood uses his Psionics abilities to get people to calm down and try to keep things in orderly fashion.
However lately there has been an increase in criminal activities, some young adults were about to get access to assault rifles and doing gang wars on the streets. Cold-Blood has been helping out the police force every now and then, catching a few people and grabbing their gun before handing it to the officers.
The officer's appreciate the actions Cold-Blood does and give him good PR in the streets. The criminals have been hiding every time they see Cold-Blood in the area, normally it would be hard for a hero to find the criminals hiding but Cold-Blood's Psionics are a big help in pointing and restraining the people.
However this time is a little different, Cold-Blood looks down in the street to see a raging Midget in a nice suit, and he was doing a monologue while showing off his powers. The guy has telekinetic powers, throwing cars as well different types of items with his mind.
Cold-Blood raises an eye at this display, not sure why some super villain is here causing havoc.
"Tell me who I'm looking at," Cold-Blood asked through his earphones as Cold-Blood watched the midget continue to yell and scream about women or something.
"Yeah boss, you're currently looking at Edgar Cizko, codename 'Dr. Psycho', a former psychologist obsessed with telepathy. He began his criminal career after being wrongfully imprisoned due to a frame-up by a romantic rival named Ben Bradley who married his ex-girlfriend. This experience awakened his latent powers of psionic and hypnosis. He used his abilities to bend people, mostly women, whom he resented and to his will, and often fought Wonder Woman more than once." An operator at XCOM he called explains as Cold-Blood narrows his eyes at him.
"How interesting, thank you Jane," Cold-Blood said as uses his Grapple to get down to meet this Dr. Psycho head on.
Dr. Psycho turns to see the new white snake hero of Australia.
"Well well well if it isn't the new blood in town, really like what you did with the place, Australia is a beautiful country" said as more stuff gathered around him with his telepathy.
"Dr Edgar Cizko, a former psychologist destroying the neighbourhood, you seem smarter than just mindless violence" Cold-Blood said, seeing the doctor trying to draw him out.
"Hihih very good, I know you hero types will be drawn to this, now I can see you the one making the noise" said, smiling seeing the snake hero show up as Cold-Blood looks at him, not saying anything.
"My studies of the mind have led me to interesting discoveries, I don't know how but you're the most powerful mind I ever felt" said, seeing Cold-Blood as a new discovery he wants to study.
"Then you know I'm not to be underestimated" Cold-Blood said walking towards the doctor as he got ready. Cold-Blood sees Edgar could somehow sense his psionic might, not sure how but Cold-Blood will find out.
"Oh I am more than ready for you, I bet you don't even know how it works. Your brain will be wonderful to study once I extract it from your head" uses his psionic car to lift up a car and throw it at Cold-Blood.
Cold-Blood sees the car coming at him in slow motion, lifting up his gauntlet he aims at the flying car. Powering up the gantlet, blue like power glowed as Cold-Blood shot a beam of energy that froze the car in place.
The car freezes in the air as it stops in its tracks and falls down. Cold-Blood got an upgrade to his gauntlet, studying the ice powers of all the ice powered criminals gave the Serpent suit an upgrade.
gets pissed, grabbing more cars with his powers and throws them at the snake hero, Cold-Blood keeps freezing each car in the air as more frozen cars fall around him, Cold-Blood hopes these cars have insurances, is there a superhero insurance?.
"You mainly fight Wonder Woman in the U.S. why come here?" Cold-Blood asked, hearing he fights Wonder Woman more than often.
"That cunt will tremble once I know your secrets" growls at the mention of Wonder Woman as a few people gather around and have their phone gasp in shock. Cold-Blood shakes his head as he walks towards the good doctor.
"Now you just been a prick mate" Cold-Blood said walking toward him as looked around to see people with phones recording the fight, Psycho realised he may have stepped too far with his language.
Psycho grits his teeth as he makes psionic arms appear around his head then send them to Cold-Blood, the psionic arms wrapped around Cold-Blood throat.
But Cold-Blood doesn't react, he just keeps walking towards Psycho.
"What the fuck? How can you resist me? Bastard! Piece of shit! CUNAAAAAHH" rant was cut short as he Cold-Blood grabs him by his throat.
"That enough Edgar" Cold-Blood said, having enough of , although the psi energy is impressive it lacks the power. Design over practically.
Cold-Blood walks though ever with the energy arms around his throat, only a little pressure but nothing much, like pulling your scarf a little too tight. Cold-Blood grabs the midget with one hand as he reaches for the newly designed Inhibitor collars.
This one is not designed to look like a dog collar, rather a tight bracelet. Less dehumanising.
Cold-Blood puts the Inhibitor Bracelet on arm, as he drops him to the ground with a thud.
"Owwww that hurt you stupid cold-blooded bastard, I'll kill you" tries to use his powers on Cold-Blood but nothing was happening.
"What the hell? Hey! What the fucks on my wrist!?" tries to pull off the Inhibitor Bracelet but it is not moving.
"Don't bother, that uses the same technology as inhibitor collars, but made less dehumanising" Cold-Blood explains as he grabs the Doctor by the collar.
"Hey, put me down you bastard! Bitch! This isn't how we do it! Put me down!" rants as he tries to get out of Cold-Blood grip, but no matter what he does Cold-Blood doesn't bunch.
Cold-Blood takes the ranting doctor to the police car as they come with cuffs and a car ready to take away.
"Chief Hunter, Edgar Cizko has been detained and power suppressed, the bracelet suppresses his powers, here the controls to the devices, there are the same as an inhibitor collar" Cold-Blood handing the device to the Chief as he looks at it.
"Thank you White Snake don't know if we could deal with each superpower's criminals, ' Chief Hunter said, thankful for the help against the powerful.
"Fuck you, cold-blooded bastard, your mother was a whore and you're a disappointment to your father" called out as the officer escort him to the car but Cold-Blood doesn't react.
"Call me Cold-Blood chief" Cold-Blood uses his Grapple to get away from the officers as he runs across the buildings.
"Jane, get the research from Edgar Cizko, and set up a meeting, before they send him to the U.S" Cold-Blood said, wanting to know what kind of research on psionic and ask him a few questions, gripping his fist as he moves.
"You got it Boss" His operator said as Cold-Blood moves across the builds using his Grapple and Muscle Fiber Density gene mods. He walks on the roof on each building as he leaps over several more roofs, Cold-Blood looks up to see the sun up high, it is nearly noon. Cold-Blood starts thinking about whether he should head home or find a nice place to eat at.
"Michael," a familiar voice called out to him through telepathy, Cold-Blood stops at the ledge of a building. His eyes drift to the sky to see Miss Martian flying towards him followed by the others, Artemis and Robin zip lining from roof to roof. Superboy is leaping the distance between each building with ease. Aqualad is using his water bearers to create a water platform to move from building to building. Cold-Blood turns his head as a yellow blur runs up the side of the building and is soon standing in front of him.
Miss Martian lands next to Kid Flash; Superboy is the next one to land. Robin, Artemis, and Aqualad are the last to land on the building. Cold-Blood stares at them curiously.
"Hey guys, how does the mission go? Did you catch the mad scientist controlling the mutated animals?" Cold-Blood asked, sitting on the edge of the building.
"Wait, how did you know?" Robin asks as Cold-Blood shrugs his shoulders.
"It's pretty obvious, abnormal animals attacking political figures in the middle of a city during an event they sponsor. All the work of a scientist testing their experiments. Did you catch them at least?" Cold blood asked them, none of them looked at him.
"So congratulations at least, you didn't die or get seriously injured, guess you prove me wrong, putting your anger and grief aside in order to complete your mission" Cold-Blood said sarcastically, looking at them but none of them looked him in the eye.
"Alright we get Michael, we shouldn't have gone on the mission" Kid flash said crossing his arms as Artemis elbowed him, shutting him up.
"Michael we want to apologise, you were right about the mission, we were not in our best state and got ambushed" Aqualad said, remembering Michael words about them not being ready.
"Why didn't you tell us about the traitor, you told Batman but not us" Robin asked him as Cold-Blood looked at him.
"The source of that information is not reliable" Cold-Blood mentions as Artemis nods.
"You never trust him," Artemis said with clarification, referring to Sportmaster.
"He could have known about that mission in Biayla, but not because of a traitor" Cold-Blood said, not believing there was a traitor yet.
"How else would he know" Superboy asked, how else would Sportmaster know about their secret mission, Cold-Blood glances at the clone.
"We failed that mission, we broke our concealment, and every soldier we fought including silence P Simon was left alive to tell everyone we were there" Cold-Blood said as a realistic look appeared in the team's eyes. Actually Cold-Blood changed Psimon's memory to not remember Cold-Blood presence, the same with the soldiers with Cold-Blood taking some of the footage with him in it.
"Sportsmaster knowing about it was not due to a spy, Batman was the one that thought we were infiltrated, not me, if anything it could either be rumours about this team or an organisation at rivals the Justice league" Cold-Blood explains, Batman made the theory of a mole in the team, Cold-Blood expects the Bat to assume the mole is either Superboy, Miss Martian, Artemis and Cold-Blood himself, the originally sidekicks are above suspicion do to their original relationship with the heroes.
It could still be the original but no evidence compared to the other.
"I'm sorry for not sticking up for you" Miss Martian said, she looks at Superboy, who mumbles an apology as well, Kid grumbles out an apology.
"Yeah sorry" Artemis gives an apologetic look,
"Me too," Robin says, looking apologetic as well.
Cold-Blood signs, not really expecting this, and not sure what to do with it either.
"While I appreciate the apology that some of you sincerely said, you have to remember these missions are dangerous, like your mission, you all got separated and nearly got killed. Whatever beef or grievous you have outside you need to put it aside, not let it go but just be professional when on a mission, it could make a differences between life and death, not just you but for others as well" Cold-Blood gives them the facts about going the mission and putting their feelings aside when completing their mission.
Everyone looks around, taking in the information as they all look at Cold-Blood. Aqualad steps forward to Cold-Blood.
"You have more experience than any of us put together, would you reconsider joining the team? We could really use your help my friend" Aqualad offers his hand. As Miss Martian smiles at him
"Please Michael, I miss our telepathy talks" Miss Martian said as Superboy looked shocked and dare I say jealous.
"Wait what" Superboy said as Cold-Blood rolled his eyes.
"Only talking super clone, you can do it too when you get over your past time with telepaths" Cold-Blood nits that in the bud before the clone gets jealous over his new girlfriend having friends.
Cold-Blood thinks for a second, right now the paramilitary is only starting and he needs more income to start it up, however Cold-Blood still remembers the Light and what other operations they have, and like it or not the Justice League is the best source of income and information. Cold-Blood takes a deep breath.
"Fuck it, as long as we can at least be profession in missions deal?" Cold-Blood asked them, they all looked at each other and nodded as Cold-Blood shook Aqua hands.
"Welcome back Cold-Blood" Aqualad welcomes Cold-Blood back with the others smiles at the return.
LINE
Watchtower
"Cold-Blood's mental abilities surpass anyone I have ever encountered, some telepaths can shielded themselves against mental attack never have I seen a young mind walk through a mental attack" J'onn J'onzz said, watching a video of Cold-Blood walking though Dr Psycho despite Psycho creating psionic hands to strangle Cold-Blood but he tanks it and subdues Dr Psycho.
Batman, Martian Manhunter and Black Canary all watch the video.
Canary and Manhunter wonder how powerful Cold-Blood telepathic powers are, while Batman looks closer at the bracelet Cold-Blood put on Dr Psycho.
"He is stronger than normal, beyond the peak of physically human beige, I have sparred with him more than once and he was holding back when he take down an opponent, he knows his strength and has enough control to not kill someone with it" Canary recalls fighting Cold-Blood and training him, he strong and could hold his own against her when she not holding back but she can tell he was holding back as well.
"He is smart and resourceful, a new kind of inhibitor collar" Batman looks at the design of the new type of inhibitor collar, looking at the design and everything.
"You believe he created it" Manhunter asked, first time seeing a diversion from the standard design.
"No, his history is unclear, we know he works in black ops for governments, he may still have connections for his gear" Batman figures having researched Cold-Blood history, only to find basic knowledge of an average citizen, he pulls the information on Cold-Blood.
"The government could have put him in a witness protection program and deleted and changed his records," Batman said, thinking about it logically about the information.
"He has history before joining the team, working with mercenaries and using his power beforehand" Batman said, pulling up more videos of Cold-Blood training his powers and working with mercenaries on a mission.
"Makes sense how he works for others and has a few connections," Canary said as she looked at batman.
"Why are we discussing this?" Canary asked as Batman pulled images of Australia.
"There has been an increase in criminal activity in Victoria. We are not the only ones interested in Cold-Blood's capabilities." Batman said as the other tense realising what Batman was getting at.
"You think he could turn on us?" Manhunter asked, looking at the information and coming to the conclusion Batman is getting to.
"Now hold on, we aren't going to go after Michael, he hasn't done anything, and there's no proof he did anything yet" Canary said, against going after Michael without a just cause.
"I'm not saying that, yet, all we know is that Cold-Blood is being targeted, whether it's to kill him or recruit him we don't know, but we need to keep a closer eye on him and make sure that whoever or whatever it is that wants him doesn't get the opportunity, learning about him will help us and him" Batman states, seeing that they need to keep an eye on Cold-Blood in case he is a traitor or something else, learning about his technology could be a big help to the Justice League as a whole.
Remembering the Riot rounds and Blue screen rounds, Batman uses some of the technology to improve his Batarangs, what other technology does Cold-Blood have in his disposal.