Thanks a lot to everyone who reviewed the last chapter! It means the world. Lets keep it going, its great for motivation. Glad you are enjoying the story.
"Do not attack him, it is Gar!" Kory yells
Victor is also about to fire but he stops. "What…?"
The creature lets out another roar as he charges at them again with a raging fury.
He avoids Kory and attacks Nightwing. The hero dodges him moving backwards and moving to Victor. He looks at him. "What do we do?!"
"I… I don't know…"
"Do not hurt him" Kory says as the creature continues attacking the guys who merely try to move away from it, not wanting to engage in combat.
Just then, a black police van pulls up to the park. The back doors are opened as a full SWAT team squad gets out. They get into formation and point at the creature. "Fire!" one of them yells as they all start firing.
"No!" Kory yells. The blasts hurting the creature as it cries in pain. Kory flies up and fires a huge green energy beam in the space between the SWAT team and the creature creating a smoke curtain.
"I can't see!" "Stop firing!" The SWAT team stops shooting, not being able to see the creature.
"We have to get him away from them" Victor says to Nightwing. He nods, an idea coming to his mind. He pulls out an electric disk from his belt.
"We have to put him to sleep. You got the sonic?" Victor smirks and nods, understanding the plan. He runs to the creature and tackles him to the ground.
Meanwhile, Nightwing runs to his N-Cycle and starts the engine driving straight to the creature. The creature throws Victor away from it. Nightwing taps a button, the canons of the bike raising, as he fires a few inches to the side of the creature. The creature lets out another roar as he swats at the bike, Nightwing barely avoiding it as he drives away from the SWAT team, the creature chasing him.
"I think you gained his attention!" Victor yells through his earpiece.
"Stay ready" Nightwing responds. "Kory, continue shooting, you need to buy us time."
Kory nods as she lights up another beam, reinforcing the previously-made smoke curtain.
Nightwing makes an U-turn as he gets back to Victor and gets off with a jump. The creature charges at them. Nightwing throws his electric disc, a second later, Victor fires his sonic canon, hitting the disc just before it reaches the creature creating a huge energy blast that hits the creature, sending it flying backwards.
The creature can barely maintain its eyes open as it falls unconscious. Nightwing, and Victor walk up to it. The creature slowly turning back to Gar, his clothes torn apart. Kory meets them, she looks at Nightwing. They make eye contact. He doesn't say anything, he is pissed, he focuses back on Gar.
"Come on, we have to take him out of here" he says.
A woman is running, terrified, through a dark alleyway. Her frenetic steps stepping over paddles in the floor. Without slowing down she looks behind; it's still following her! "Please, help!" she yells, but there is nobody close to hear her. She takes a turn into another alley and hides behind the wall. A tall shadow passing by. She is out of breath as she tries to calm down, inhaling and exhaling out of control, she covers her mouth with one hand. With the other, she scrambles for her phone. Nervously she takes it out from her pocket, but drops it before she can use it, the impact producing a loud sound. She covers her mouth once again. The shadow stops and turns in her direction. Tears trickling from the woman's eyes. The shadow approaches her. The woman closes her eyes and starts praying. She opens them, there in front of her, four red eyes looking straight at her. She lets out glass piercing scream as the shadow surrounds her.
A homeless man hears the scream and looks in the direction it came. "Who is there?" Cautiously, he approaches.
The shadow turns to the man and panics, disappearing into the darkness.
The man makes it to the woman, he looks down at her. The horror in front terrifying him. "Jesus Christ" he murmurs.
A shirtless Richard is looking at his reflection through the mirror of the bathroom. His attention on the three giant red scars running through his chest. This creature or rather Gar, had really sharp claws. He timidly approaches his hand touching one of them but as soon as they come in contact, he takes it away, hissing in pain. He grabs a piece of cotton, dips it in alcohol and starts rubbing it over his scars, trying his hardest not to flinch away.
With his free hand he grabs his phone and searches for a specific contact. He presses call. It doesn't take long before someone picks up.
"Hello?" Bruce's voice echoes through the phone.
"Hey Bruce, how you doing?" Richard salutes a bit nervous while he continues cleaning the wound.
"Dick, what a surprise, is there anything I can help you with?"
Richard closes his eyes and swears. How does he know? "Yeah, listen, the Nightwing suit got a little torn during a recent fight, I was thinking you could send me a replacement?"
Silence from the other side. Richard closes his eyes preying. "Fine, you should receive it in the next couple of days."
Richard opens his eyes, relieved. "Thanks, also, since the ankle thing happened and I'm not as fast and can't jump as before, I was thinking of a heavier suit that could protect me more, you know, against, knives, claws…"
"Claws?" Richard closes his eyes regretting his last word, he had talked too much. "What kind of claws?" Bruce asks.
"From a dog…?" he says sounding more like a question than intended.
"A dog?"
"A big dog… or a tiger, or something sharp, you know what I mean."
Again, Bruce stays silent for a couple of seconds. "Fine, I'll talk to Fox."
"Thanks Bruce, look now I gotta go, but thanks a lot" he says ending the call. As soon as he does, he lets out a sigh of relief. Although their relationship had gotten better from where it once was, Richard is still not comfortable talking to him about his missions or possible mistakes, after all, he could have handled the Gar situation a lot better. He throws the now-red piece of cotton in the trash, puts on a black t-shirt, and exits the bathroom.
As soon as he enters the dining room at Victor's mansion, he notices Kory waiting for him, a timid expression on her face. She smiles. He doesn't return the smile.
"Are you alright?" she asks.
Richard nods as he turns around, aiming for the descending staircase to the lab. Kory takes a step forward and grabs him by the wrist before he can make it far.
"Can we talk?"
Richard looks at her as if deciding if he wants to have this conversation or not. He finally nods as he crosses his arms.
"Thank you." Kory pauses, thinking how she wants to approach this. She looks at his chest. "How are you feeling?"
"Fine."
"Oh, that is good" she says. Timidly she starts. "About what happened earlier with Gar…"
"It's okay" he says interrupting her.
She looks up at him, confused. "It is?"
"Yeah, it's in the past, I trusted you and in return you lied to me" he says no emotion on his voice as he again turns around.
"But it was not my intention, I did not want to…" she trails.
"But you did." Richard turns back to her.
"I know and I am sorry, it was only because Gar asked me not to reveal his secret…" she defends herself.
"He is a kid, he found himself close to you and told you what happened, its natural he doesn't trust strangers, but you... we are a team, we should trust each other, we…" he says motioning to the two of them. "Couples trust each other, they don't keep secrets from each other... what have I done to earn you lying to me!" he says raising his voice at that last part, his eyes becoming watery. "What do you think I would have done to Gar?"
Kory looks at him, reading his expression. She wasn't expecting this from him, she had really hurt him.
"I thought we had overcome that stage where we kept secrets from the other" he continues.
Kory takes a step forward to him and grabs his hands. She looks at him in the eyes. Green meeting blue. "I am sorry, Richard, I do not have a defense, I took a poor decision, I should have told you, and I do trust you, with my life, my love."
Richard looks at her. Damn she is good. His expression slowly softening until he smiles at her. "I also trust you with my life."
Kory beams a smile for the first time in the day. "I love you, and I promise I won't do it again."
Richard smiles. "I also love you." With that he leans forward, their lips connecting in a sweet kiss. Once they break apart, they look at each other. "I'm glad we could talk about it, even though I didn't want."
Kory giggles. "I believed it was most necessary."
Richard smiles as he nods. "Come on, let's go with Victor, see if Gar woke up" he says as they start descending through the stairs, their fingers intertwined.
Slowly Gar opens his eyes, his eyelids weighing like a ton as he lets out a tired groan.
"Watch it, we had to give you a pretty strong blow to put you to sleep" a voice says.
Gar gets up from a stretcher and notices Victor standing a few feet from him. Currently busy welding his wounds from the fight. "By the way, you might want to cut short those nails."
Gar looks down, feeling ashamed. "I'm sorry."
"Nah, don't sweat it, I've had it worst."
"Where am I?" he says looking around. It looks like a fancy lab.
"You my friend are at the underground lab at my mansion" Victor says standing up and walking up to him.
"My head hurts" Gar says clutching his head.
"Yeah, it may happen after you get sonic-boomed." Gar looks at him not understanding. "When you get hit by my sonic canon and Nightwing's electric disk combined" he clarifies. "Nightwing's idea."
Gar lets out a small laugh. "I bet it looked cool."
"Hell yeah it was cool" Victor yells excitedly. "He looked at me and said, "You got the sonic?" and I knew he meant…" he trails trying to get back on track, this Garfield kid looked like cool guy. "Now how about you answer my questions?" he says crossing his arms.
Gar looks down but nods. Before Victor can say anything more Richard and Kory enter the lab.
"Speaking of the devil" Victor murmurs. That earns him a small laugh from Gar.
"Gar you are awake!" Kory says excitedly as she flies out to Gar hugging him tight.
"Hey Kory" Gar salutes as they break the hug.
"How are you feeling?" Richard asks.
Gar looks at him. "I'm fine, just a little headache. Sorry for that" he says gesturing to his chest.
Richard raises an eyebrow. "So, you do remember?"
Gar nods. "Yeah, but only images."
Richard takes a step toward him. He offers him his hand. "I'm sorry for how we treated you, we shouldn't have been so harsh." Gar smiles and shakes his hand. "Now, how about you tell us the whole story" he says in a comprehensive tone.
Gar nods. "I… have abilities."
"What kind of abilities?" Victor asks. "And don't be afraid to tell us, we all have our thing, except him" he says signaling to Richard, who shoots him a glare.
"I can recombine my DNA to turn into animals."
"What we saw last night was no animal."
"Why do you not start from the beginning?" Kory suggests.
Gar nods. "My parents, they were both biologists, we used to travel a lot, most of the time to this wildlife reserve in Kenya. They had been called about a strange chimpanzee that had been freed from an illegal lab. They said he had suffered some horrible experiments…" he pauses. "I like animals, I always liked them…"
"What did you do?" Richard asks leaning forward.
Gar looks at him. "You must know I always did this with the other animals…" he defends himself. "I got to where he was being treated…"
A younger Gar enters a medical tent, a banana in one of his hands. There in front of him lies a chimpanzee on top of a stretcher, it looks asleep. "I heard they call you Blue Eyes" he says as he approaches it. He looks around, the tent is empty except for the two of them. "You are hungry?" he asks, offering the banana. The chimpanzee opens its eyes waking up. He notices Gar and the banana. Gar makes it to a few feet from him. In a quick motion, the chimpanzee reaches forward, snatches the banana away from Gar and starts eating it. Gar is shaken from a moment but laughs. "I can get more for you if you like." The chimpanzee pauses eating the banana for a moment and looks at him. For the first time, Gar notices the scars on its face. "They hurt you really bad, didn't they?" Blue Eyes continues eating the banana. Slowly he reaches forward his hand trying to touch the monkey. As soon as his hand comes in contact with the chimpanzee's skin, its eyes widen terrified and lets out a loud scream. Gar flinches back but its too late, as in a quick motion Blue Eyes jumps to him and bites him hard in the hand. Gar instantly screaming in pain.
Back in the lab, Gar shows the scar in his right hand to the team. "Blue Eyes died two days later. For my part, I was fine for the first couple of weeks, it was just a bite. When we got back to Jump, I started feeling sick… apparently, he carried some type of virus from all the experiments he had suffered" he trails.
"So, the flu turns you into animals?" Victor questions in disbelief.
Gar shrugs. "Pretty much, I used to have these attacks where my body would start transforming… but I learned to control it, now I can turn into more than twenty animals at will" he finishes proudly.
"Explain the creature we saw" Richard orders.
Gar again looks down. "I… I don't know what that thing was, I had never transformed into that, you have to believe me" he says raising his voice.
"We believe you, Gar" Kory says in a comprehensive tone, placing her hand over his shoulder trying to calm him down.
"The night where my parents... that was the first time it happened."
"Did anything unusual happen that day?" Richard asks, detective mode on.
Gar thinks about it for a couple of seconds. "Yeah, something happened. I was walking from school when I noticed this girl." He looks at the team. "You know, the one that used to work with you."
The team trades glances. "Raven?!" Richard asks. "She is in Jump?!... And what does she have to do with all of this?"
"I don't know, I just remember I was walking, and I saw her from the other side of the street, I thought she looked familiar from seeing her also on TV. I looked at her, and that's when my body started changing without wanting to. I went to my house, straight to bed, there I had the nightmare and the next thing I know, I'm that creature."
The team stays silent, processing Gar's words. The three of them trade glances as if deciding what they should do with him. They should alert the police to him so that they can take care of him, but then again, if Gar can't control his abilities, he becomes a risk to anyone close. They have to do what is right for him. Gar looks at them.
"Please, can I stay with you? Don't make me go back to that house, it's too painful" he says pleading. "If someone finds out about my abilities, they will lock me, experiment with me like they did with Blue Eyes, that's why my parents kept me a secret."
Richard, Kory and Victor look down at him, an unsecure look in their eyes.
Raven wakes up from the bed as she looks around. She is alone in the same bedroom as the morning before, Malchiors apartment; however, she doesn't remember getting here. She tries to remember, the warehouse, fire… suddenly she is hit by a strong headache.
She gets off the bed, for the first time, noticing that she is only wearing her underwear. She widens her eyes. Wait, did she…? Did they…?
Her thoughts are interrupted as a shirtless Malchior enters the room. "Good morning beautiful" he salutes. He has a glass of water in his hands.
"Hi" she answers dryly as she covers herself with the sheets.
"How are you feeling?" he asks as he offers her the glass of water.
She takes it. "Thanks… like I've been hit by a truck." Malchior laughs. She looks at him. "Sorry but I don't remember anything, last night did we…" she trails, not wanting to voice it.
"No."
"Oh" she simply says.
"You did not want?" he asks, a trace of panic in his voice.
"No, no, it's not that, it's just... I don't remember."
Malchior sits in the bed by her side. His eyes to the front, not feeling great with himself. "Then I must apologize Raven, even though nothing happened, I thought that was what you wanted, I'm terribly sorry."
"Then what happened?"
Malchior lets out a sigh. "After you kissed me at the warehouse, me made our way here. Again, I apologize for having misread the situation…"
Malchior and Raven make their way to the bed, their lips always connected in a hungry kiss. They settle over the bed, Malchior on top, the kiss continuing. Suddenly Raven stops, her eyes in blank. Malchior looks at her, confused. "Raven, are you…?"
Without saying a word, she gets up pushing him to the side. Malchior just looks at her as she exits the apartment.
"You came back several hours later and went straight into the bedroom" Malchior says.
Raven looks down, her mind racing with possibilities of what could have happened. "Maybe... maybe it was using my powers that..." She looks at him. "Mal, there is something inside me, something bad, something evil. I feel like the more I use my abilities, the more I lose control of myself" she says sounding desperate. "What we did yesterday must have woken it up... I had never done that" she says referring to the black raven ability she had used.
Malchior grabs her by the hands. "Then you have to do it again, you have to fight it, Raven, you must use your abilities, learn to control them and you will control this other side of you."
"How?"
"I will teach you. Just like I learned to control mine."
Raven lets out a small smile. Maybe he was right, maybe he could help her.
A young cop approaches Nightwing and Victor as they make their way into the alleyway. Its now day, although a thin drizzle is falling over them. A distressed look on the cop's face. He signals to the heroes to follow him as they go deeper into the alleyway.
"I said to myself, I'm not going to screw around with this. Nope. Fuck that. Its still pretty fresh, I also called the medical examiner, he's coming." He stops and turns to them. "When I got to it, I knew, as soon as I laid eyes on it, this is the kind of shit you take care of."
Nightwing nods. "The witness?" After their talk with Gar, they decided they would take their time with the decision, and analyze all the alternatives. No more than five minutes later they had been called about another dead body. Kory decided she wanted to stay with Gar, so that left Nightwing and Victor to look into it. After that, the three of them would go together to the ceremony in their honor at the city hall.
The cop signals with his head to the side where another cop is talking to a homeless man, a blanket over his shoulders, he looks terrified, his gaze lost and hands shaking.
The young cop moves to the side revealing the corpse of woman, probably in her thirties. A pool of her own blood below her, her skin a dark shade of purple, with her mouth wide open and the same protruding eyes sticking out. Nightwing kneels beside her and makes a scan.
"Excuse me" the young cop says before leaving the scene. Its just too disturbing for him.
Victor looks at the corpse. "Same killer as Mark Peterson."
Nightwing nods. "Yeah, both corpses look identical, our suspect, Arthur Light, any news from him?"
Victor denies it with his head. "They still haven't found him." He looks away. "This town is rooting, seriously." Nightwing doesn't say anything. Victor had a point there; this certainly isn't the same city as the one he had arrived over two years ago. He looks carefully at her body, especially her clothes. She has a black leather jacket over a white shirt and jeans on her legs.
"No sign of struggle shown in her clothes" he says.
"Why would you check that?" Victor asks curiously.
"Seeing Lights criminal record, it had occurred to me that if he was the culprit and he struck again, his motif could be... a sex offense."
"Rape?" Nightwing nods. "But Mark Peterson?"
"You said the wife had heard them talking about money, at their hot-sheet hotel and he has a past…" Nightwing rips open her shirt, revealing her naked chest. As Mark Petersons corpse, her chest looks empty. "Her organs also exploded… only her bones left."
Nightwing notices the medial examiner approaching them and stands. "Its all yours" he signals."
Nightwing and Victor walk up to the homeless man seated in the ground, leaning into the alleys wall. Victor throws him a bag with a sandwich in it. The man catches it without looking but doesn't eat it. His hands still trembling, whatever he saw really traumatized him.
Nightwing kneels in front of him. "You saw who did it?"
The man looks at him and nods, scared.
"You saw the man's face?" Victor questions.
The man looks at Nightwing straight in the eyes. "That was no man" he whispers.
"Then who did it?"
For a second, the man looks to the side and back at the hero. "The devil" he murmurs. His hands now trembling out of control, as if the mere mention of it scared him even more. For the first time, Nightwing notices the man has a crucifix between his fingers, clutching on it for dear life.
A bus reaches the bus stop. The driver opens the door as three people in line enter. Each one indicating their destiny and paying. A tall figure in a hood enters. The driver looks at it. "Where to?" he asks tired.
The figure takes its hood off. Is Madame Rouge. "City hall, and I will need your bus" she says with a smirk.
Victor drives his Camaro approaching the newly rebuilt city hall. Nightwing, still wearing his torn suit, by his side and Kory behind. The same light drizzle falling from the grey sky. Kory looks outside, a certain worry in her mind, it's the third day in a row without sun.
As they near the city hall Nightwing gazes outside, the street packed with apparent fans, all of them screaming, his blood chills as he sees a man with a hockey mask holding a sign that reads "Deathstroke was right!"
They park in front of the city hall and get out of the car. Instantly, they are swarmed by fans and paparazzies, cameras flashing. "Richard I love you", "Kory you are beautiful!", Victor, marry me!" are some of the incoherent shouts the mass of people utter. Nightwing looks around, all the people screaming his name. "Richard!" "Richard over here!" Grayson!" He starts sweating, his name, his identity, who he was... He struggles to breathe. "Tough day, Grayson?" "You are weak Grayson" he hears, the screams mixing in with Deathstroke's words. His head becoming dizzy, the crowd smothering him. He looks around. There he is! Between the people, Deathstroke, his black and orange mask on. "Life out of Gotham has cost you, Grayson." He starts making his way to him. Kory notices it and grabs him by the hand. He looks at her. "Richard are you alright?" Nightwing denies. "Deathstroke he is here." Kory follows his gaze; she can't see anyone apart the mass of people. Nightwing continues. Kory grabs him tighter, stopping him.
"Richard, look at me" she says. He looks at her, barely being able to hear her through the screams. "Breathe, Richard, breathe." He nods as he closes his eyes and starts breathing. Inhaling and exhaling. "There you go."
Nightwing opens his eyes, he looks around, Deathstroke is no longer there. He looks at her, feeling a lot better. "I'm okay, thank you." Kory smiles as she intertwines their fingers.
Uncomfortably, they start making their way to the city hall.
"There you are!" Mayor O'Hara says. "My god let them breathe." He signals to his security guards that walk up them, pushing the people out of the way and creating a path. The heroes continue walking, reaching the mayor, who grabs them and poses for a photo, Nightwing and Kory to his right, and Victor to his left. They force a smile as the picture is taken.
They brake apart and they start walking into the city hall. The mayor looks at Nightwing. "I know we had our differences in the past, but I'm confident we can work together once again."
Nightwing looks at him and nods. "You mean to take down Mad Mod?"
"Yeah, I inherited a heavy burden with him, but along with the police we are working hard to put him down, the last two months the crime rate descending from where it was, if we project, we could lower the crime rate by two hundred percent by the end of my mandate."
"You've spent a lot of money on the new SWAT teams."
"I believe this is the way of fighting against the mob. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have more people to greet" he says walking to another group of people.
The team continues walking into the city hall.
Victor is approached by a couple of boys. "Victor, Victor, a selfie?!" Victor smiles as he complies. "Booyah!" he yells while they take the picture. The boys laugh as they also yell. They continue walking.
Inside they are greeted by a child chorus singing, as people continue to flood inside, being restricted to the sides of the city hall, some of them with billboards admiring the heroes. Nightwing scans the crowd. He clocks rifled officers among the spectators to the side and on the upper level. The lieutenant sure had gone all out with the security.
A P.A. announcer starts speaking through a microphone, his words echoing throughout the city hall. "Ladies and gentlemen, thank you all for coming to today's ceremony to honor our heroes." The people start applauding. "As a reminder, later there will be a fundraiser to support the family of the deceased at the opera attack. Those who wish can help with a little donation." Again applauses.
People continue cheering them. Nightwing and Victor smile, it was nice being appreciated once again. A fangirl lifts her t-shirt up, revealing her naked chest. Nightwing turns away but laughs.
"This is nonsense" Kory speaks, a bit of anger in her tone.
Nightwing and Victor look at her confused. "What's wrong?" Victor asks.
"This" she says motioning to the whole room. "All of it."
Nightwing takes a step toward her and talks in a low volume. "Kory, they are honoring us, it's one of our duties as heroes."
"No, Richard, our duty should be helping them, and now that Gar needs our help, we should not leave him alone."
"Kory…"
She interrupts him. "And not receiving worthless medals, I should go with him" she says turning around and aiming for the exit of the city hall.
Nightwing takes a step to follow her but is stopped by Victor placing a hand over his shoulder. "Let her go, she has a point." Nightwing turns around and nods.
They both turn to the center of the city hall. Lieutenant Carson walks up to them and stands by their side. "Grayson, Stone" he salutes with a nod.
Victor and Nightwing nod at him and exchange glances, apparently, he is also receiving a medal. The mayor grabs a microphone and climbs on the stage. Instantly receiving an ovation. Nightwing looks around, they sure love him, then again, he had gained a lot of fame after the attack on the train.
"Thank you, thank you, let me hear you also for our heroes, the lieutenant Carson, Victor Stone and Richard Grayson!" The crowd applauds them too.
Nightwing fakes a smile and salutes a bit awkwardly, why did he have to introduce him with his civilian name? He looks around the city hall when he notices a silhouetted figure standing on the upper level, the people applauding around, but not it. It appears to be a woman, with short hair, could it be...?
His thoughts are interrupted by sudden distant screams. Nightwing turns in that direction. The mayor stops his speech. An awful groaning engine whine from somewhere outside, then sickening thuds. Nightwing's eyes immediately flit up in alarm to the upper level where spectators panicked are seeing something through the windows, everyone turning, all except the feminine figure. Gazing eerily down to Nightwing's direction, waiting for something.
A loud crash sound as the main entrance explodes in a blizzard of glass on concrete as a whole bus rips through the doors, pandemonium, as the crowd scatters, some tossed in the air, the vehicle slamming past guardrails into the seated area.
Victor spins to see a small kid a few feet away, frozen in shock as others flee all around him. He hurls himself at the boy tackling him out of the buses path as it roars past, launching seats over their heads finally crashing into the stage, buckling upward, engine grinding, till it stops.
A surreal moment of quiet, then screams, tears, panic as Nightwing lifts his head and looks at the bus. The doors open. He takes out his esgrima sticks, preparing to engage with whoever that was. Victor lets go of the kid and aims his canon at it. The lieutenant and ten cops surrounding the bus. They are surprised to find actual civilians, timidly, coming out of the bus, their hands raised. The heroes lower their weapon. The driver walks out, his mouth taped as he has a black vest on, he looks scared, tears rolling from his eyes, a symbol on the tape, similar to an S, written in red. The heroes focus on him. It's a bomb! Both heroes widen their eyes.
"Theres a bomb!" the lieutenant yells.
The driver continues crying. The other civilian from the bus run away from him.
Nightwing turns around, the feminine figure already gone. He looks at Victor. "You can handle it?" he asks referring to the bomb.
Victor looks at the lieutenant. "How long till the anti-bomb squad gets here?"
"Already called, they'll be here in five minutes."
Victor swears. "It isn't enough, I'll do it." He grabs his car keys and throws them at Nightwing who catches it. "Not a scratch."
Nightwing smirks and nods. He quickly turns around and runs to the exit. The mayor recompose himself. He looks at a couple of cops. "Go with him!" he orders. The two cops nod.
Victor turns to the bomb and sighs. He walks up to the driver. "Easy, it will be okay, I've done this before" he says to the man with the bomb, he nods, still crying. Victor looks at the bomb, no timer, meaning it could go off in any moment or if they took the vest off the man. Also, a fault indicator with two bars, he can make two mistakes before it goes off. Well, at least that is going his way.
He looks at the driver. "Look at me, its going to be okay, you hear me man?" The driver nods vehemently, sweat all over his face.
Nightwing exits the city hall in a run. He scans the crowd around, all running away from the building. He notices the feminine figure casually walking to a police armored truck, its Rouge. She casually opens the door and gets in. Nightwing turns to the side, Victor's blue Camaro parked a few feet away. He runs to it, gets in and starts the engine chasing the truck.
The truck gets in the avenue and drives away, still oblivious to the Camaro. Nightwing makes a sharp turn, getting in the avenue and accelerates, almost catching up to her. Suddenly the siren of a police cruiser echoes behind them. Nightwing looks behind, two police cruisers joining the chase. Rouge also hears it as she looks through the rearview mirror, noticing Nightwing. She narrows her eyes.
"Fuck, this is not good" Nightwing swears.
In a sudden move Rouge hits the brakes, the truck instantly stopping. Nightwing swerves away avoiding crashing into her. Rouge once again starts the truck chasing him, now she is in behind.
Nightwing looks through the rearview mirror. "Fuck." He drives through the traffic, the armored truck keeping up with him, matching his move for move. She accelerates, bumping into him in the back of the car, Nightwing almost loses control but manages to control the car. "Vic is not going to like that." He takes a sharp turn getting in a thinner street, Rouge turning with him, the chase continuing.
Victor opens the bomb. Three cables inside. Red, blue and white in that order. He taps a button on his control panel, his right hand changing to a scissor and approaches it to the cables. From what he could remember from the train incident, the three cables bombs were fairly easy. The last cable was white, that means that's the one he must cut. He cuts it. One bar from the fault meter disappears. That wasn't it.
"Fuck" Victor whispers. The driver closes his eyes.
Nightwing continues being chased by the truck. He slaloms skillfully through the traffic trying not to hit any car. Behind Rouge just runs over the cars, moving them to the side using its strength. The truck makes it to him and Rouge veers recklessly into him pushing him to the sidewalk.
"You cannot escape" she says with her usual French accent.
"Fuck" Nightwing says as he continues being pushed. Rouge pushes again, the Camaro hitting the side of the building, sparks coming from the contact.
Victor closely inspects the cables. He was sure he had to cut the white one. He finds a fourth cable hidden behind the first one, its red. So, it's a four-cable bomb… and it has one blue cable. He approaches the scissor and cuts it. The timer on the bomb disappearing.
Victor lets out a sigh of relief as he leans back. He takes the tape off the mans mouth. The driver opens his eyes as he also lets out a breath. "Thank you" he whispers.
Victor nods at him. He looks at the tape, especially at the S-like symbol, it looks familiar. He puts on his earpiece. "Nightwing, we good here, how are you doing?"
Nightwing pushes the brakes all the way, the truck passing by. He opens his window and throws a batarang, hitting the back wheel of the truck. A beep-beep echoes before it goes off, the car tier blowing off and the truck flipping over sliding a few feet through the wet asphalt.
He stops the car and gets out. He walks up to the truck and kneels next to the broken window, shattered glass on the asphalt, its empty, Rouge isn't there. He gets up and looks around. A scared civilian points in the direction of the entrance of a shopping mall near them. Nightwing nods in appreciation.
He taps his earpiece. "Victor, I followed Rouge a few blocks from the city hall, track my location and meet me here."
"Already on it, almost there" Victor's voice echoes through the earpiece.
Cautiously, Nightwing walks in the shopping mall. He receives the curious look of various civilians. He continues walking. He notices a scared security guard; with a shaking hand he points to the door leading to the bathrooms. Nightwing nods as he slowly approaches it.
Victor makes it to the shopping mall, he notices Nightwing and runs up to him. "Made it as quick as I could." Nightwing makes a silence gesture and points to the bathroom door, Victor nods.
Nightwing and Victor walk into the bathroom. There, standing casually in front of the sink is Rouge washing her hands, some blood on her temple from the crash. With a stern look, the heroes position each to a different side of her, Nightwing to the left, Victor to the right, waiting for her next move. Rouge looks up and sees them through the mirror. She smirks.
"Children."
Nightwing smirks back before in a quick move he goes in for a punch. Rouge catches his fist and slams it to the sink. Victor sees the opening and punches her hard on the face, Rouge falls to the ground, seems unconscious. Victor walks up to her, a grin on his face.
"Didn't need your fancy sticks."
Suddenly Rouge stands up with a jump and pushes Victor back. She moves to Nightwing throwing two quick punches to the abdomen that he barely has time to block before she kicks him, sending him to the floor. Victor attacks her from the side, Rouge dodges it and elbows him hard on the face, and again for a second time. Now Rouge is the one punching him, before he catches her, grabs her and lifts her preparing to slam her to the ground, but while in the air she shifts her weight inverting the move, and she slams Victor to the ground. She positions on top of him and punches him down on the throat, Victor clutches his throat in pain.
Rouge notices Nightwing approaching and throws a kick to the hero's chest that makes him stumble backward, she then goes for a punch, but he catches it and counterattacks with a blow of his own, trading blow for blow.
Victor gets up. Nightwing punches Rouge and pushes her back allowing Victor to grab her from behind and throw her to the sink breaking it and the mirror. She falls to the ground but quickly gets up and grabs the pipe of the broken sink. She attacks Nightwing before he ducks, the pipe hitting the wall behind and she repeats the move, but Victor grabs her arm and now Nightwing attacks her punching her in the stomach. While being grabbed Rouge kicks Nightwing again sending him back and placing her feet in the wall running through it and shifting her position, and now facing Victor as she gives him a powerful blow using the pipe. Victor falls to the ground.
She moves to Nightwing swinging the pipe, he dodges the first attack, catches the second, and delivers a flying kick making her stumble backwards. He quickly gets up before Rouge jumps to him grabbing him by the neck in a chokehold position. Nightwing struggling against her grip. Victor stands up and walks up to them, his fist raised in a boxing stance. Rouge looks at him. Nightwing takes advantage of the distraction and elbows her in the stomach getting out of her grasp, and Victor again punches hard on the face. Rouge throws another punch; Victor ducks and throws another hard punch to the face and the stomach.
Nightwing takes out his esgrima sticks, charges at them, and hits Rouge with them. The assassin cries in pain as she falls to the ground. In a quick move, he jumps on top of her and puts the esgrima sticks around her neck, preparing for another electric charge if necessary. Victor also aims his canon.
"The attack, what was the purpose?!" Nightwing interrogates.
"The symbol on the guy's tape what is it?" Victor questions.
Rouge smirks. "Wouldn't you like to know."
"Talk!" Nightwing demands in a stern tone as he brings closer the esgrima sticks to her throat.
"Children, I'm a hired assassin, if Mad Mod asks me to do something, for the right price, I do it."
"Why don't I believe you?" Victor comments.
"Believe me or not, your problem, he just told me I couldn't miss because he would hire someone else to do it" she concludes, the French accent never leaving her.
Nightwing and Victor trade glances. Mad Mod had hired another assassin? This couldn't be good. "Who?" Nightwing questions turning to her.
"What makes you think I know?" she asks. "Now if you would excuse me" she says before, in a quick move, she headbutts Nightwing and moves her legs forward kicking Victor back. She jumps up, grabs a metallic sphere from her belt and throws it to the ground, creating a blinding light that forces the heroes to look away, allowing her to escape. Once the light ceases, they look at each other, only the two of them in the bathroom.
A police cruiser parks right outside of a warehouse near the docks. The cops get out and look at it, as if reconsidering their life's choices that had led them here. They look at the place, it looks abandoned.
"Sure it is here they called?" One of them asks with a tired voice.
"Yep" the other answers. He lets out a sigh.
An old lady with a cane approaches them. "I was the one who called" she says. "These younglings will burn the whole neighborhood with their firecrackers."
The cops look at her. "With all due respect, miss, the place looks abandoned…" one of them trails as suddenly an explosion can be seen from one of the windows in the upper level that catches the cops off guard.
"See? I told you, it's a fire hazard."
The cops quickly take out their guns and enter the warehouse. What they see inside completely takes their breath away. Inside there is man with white hair and a poncho somehow throwing fire balls from his hands to a girl, a black energy surrounding her and catching the fire that comes her away, both still oblivious to the cop's presence.
"Everybody freeze!" Hands in the air!" they yell aiming their guns at them.
Raven is startled as she turns to them. She raises her arms obliging. "Please don't shoot."
The cops turn to Malchior who still hasn't moved. "Hands in the air, buddy!"
Malchior doesn't like it. He looks at Raven who seems to have surrendered herself. How could she have done that? They are mere mortals in comparison to her. He can't let them imprison her. He turns to the cops and narrows his eyes.
"Hands in the air or we will fire!" one of them threatens as they approach him cautiously. Slowly, Malchior starts raising his arms. "Yeah, that way, just…"
In a quick move, Malchior lights up a fire ball and throws it at the cops, nearly hitting them.
"No!" Raven yells.
"Fucking hell." The cops recompose themselves and start firing at him.
"NO" she yells again. She focuses and catches the bullets before they hit Malchior. He smirks.
"What the fuck…" one of the cop whispers.
Raven closes her eyes, two pair of red eyes appearing on her face, she turns to the cops. An angry look on her face as she starts floating. The cops look at her wide eye.
"You will pay for that" she says in a deeper voice, clearly not one belonging to her. She makes a movement with her hands and the cops start floating, complete panic in their eyes as they scream, their backs start arching forward, both in deep pain. "The day is coming" she says with the same deep voice. A black vomit comes out of the cop's mouth, their skin turning purple, and eyes start coming out of their places. She makes another movement as their heads go in a different direction than their bodies, instantly breaking their necks. Raven lets them go as they fall to the ground. Their skin a dark shade of purple, their mouth opened wide and both eyes protruded out as they lie on top of their black vomit.
The red eyes disappear, her normal eyes coming back, she looks confused. "What happened?" she asks.
"Raven…" Malchior just whispers.
She turns to him and then to the cop's corpses. "I... I did that?" They are dead, she killed them.
Malchior places a hand over her shoulder. "Its okay" he says, trying to comfort her.
"Get away from me!" she yells moving away.
"Raven…"
"I killed them! Please get away from me" she begs. "I don't want to hurt you."
Malchior takes a step toward her. "I do not fear you."
"You should" she says as she turns away and runs out of the warehouse.
Malchior watches her go, a preoccupied look on his face, until its replaced by a light grin.
That concludes the third chapter. Hope you are enjoying. For this one i reread a manual on deactivating bombs, the same one as for the train scene in the last story. I think that is worth a like and review.