Diana knew she was by no means the best when it came to computers and technology in general but she still decided that as a starting point for her research was to type the name Renegade into the Google search bar. So she flew to grab her laptop, returned to sit comfortably on the couch and typed the name Renegade, finally pressing enter.
The first site that appeared in the search was Renegade's Wikipedia page. Even someone as inexperienced in technology as Wonder Woman knew that the world was pretty much split in two between those who appreciated and found Wikipedia useful and those who did not but in any case she clicked on that site to get at least the general knowledge about the mercenary.
Her eyes were glued carefully to the screen, her brain analyzing analytically every single word written and making a brief summary of what she was reading as she went along.
The first testimony of Renegade's first sighting was more than six years ago and less than seven: she, knowing that the assassin was seventeen years old, easily came to the conclusion that Renegade began his mercenary career at only eleven years old.
She winced slightly at this.
Definitely too young to start being a mercenary, never mind that he has a great healing factor. What the hell was Deathstroke thinking allowing an eleven-year-old to go out and be a mercenary, especially after his first son/apprentice was killed in a contract?
Diana knew she might be a bit of a hypocrite since she has been trained to be a fierce Amazon warrior since she had not even reached double digits of age but at least she was a demigoddess whose father was literally Zeus, dammit!
Leaving that aside, the princess of Themyscira read what Renegade's first contract probably consisted of the assassination of Andrew Reed, a corrupt Chicago politician in cahoots with the local mafia and his bodyguards were responsible for the disappearance and murder of at least seventeen people who attacked Reed's public image. Among Reed's six bodyguards only one survived, himself being the first witness left alive by the mercenary.
Alive so to speak since apparently he, as a result of the gunshot wound that Renegade inflicted on him, was in a coma for about a week and when he woke up he developed a severe case of PTSD -complicated also by having directly witnessed the brutal murder of two other bodyguards-, in addition to the fact that he was later arrested for all the crimes he committed.
The Wikipedia page quoted verbatim the words of the man who in a state of shock stated in an interview:
"I don't know who or what the hell it was. It seemed to be a little bloodthirsty demon. It was definitely not human. No one would be able to pierce a man's windpipe with one punch. I would rather die than see that infernal thing again!"
Besides him, there are only eight other witnesses who sighted Renegade and had their lives spared and all of them agree that they did not see something or someone more frightening than Renegade, who was not a mere human being and was always affiliated with something hellish and demonic.
Diana was sure that, just as Batman had said some time ago in the first meeting he had convened, Renegade had voluntarily left a number of witnesses alive so that news about him would slowly spread, creating an aura of mystery around his figure, without ever giving too much away.
And damned if he had succeeded.
Next there were the various rumors circulating about the mysterious figure of Renegade -one more frightening and deadly than the other, Diana noted- and also several anecdotes concerning the mercenary, especially some of the bloodiest and most gory deaths he caused.
The Amazon opened her eyes wide in shock when she read one in particular.
Apparently more than twenty gunmen were found so brutally, ruthlessly and horribly murdered that the only way to identify what was left of their corpses was with DNA. The place was completely filled with liters of blood, severed heads, decapitated bodies, limbs torn from the rest of the body and more.
It reminded Diana a lot of the extermination of the Red Sharks because of Renegade and the bloodbath -over fifty mobsters brutally murdered in the worst and bloodiest and most gory ways possible- that she and the other founding members of the JL had witnessed and for which each of them surely had had nightmares.
Episode even cited on the mercenary's Wikipedia page.
Moving on, the demigoddess read how different rumors were circulating about the relationship between Renegade and Deathstroke: some claimed that they only had a former mentor/former apprentice relationship, others claimed that Deathstroke was a parental figure for Renegade, others that the man had physically, mentally and emotionally abused the youngest and others that Diana did not even want to consider.
Diana sincerely hoped that Deathstroke had been a good father to Renegade.
Apparently ever since word had spread that Renegade was no longer Deathstroke's apprentice -something also evidenced by the younger assassin's change of armor- the two mercenaries have not been spotted together, although such sightings have happened very rarely before. Diana thought about the possibility that it was all a stratagem to get Renegade to stop being associated with Deathstroke, whether to avoid revealing the nature of their true relationship or for some other reason she did not know.
Continuing to read in the criminal world were unconfirmed rumors about how Renegade collaborated a lot with other world-class assassins such as Lady Shiva, Talia Al Ghul, Katana and Cheshire. Which made sense since Diana recalled how Renegade had claimed that he worked for the League of Assassins.
League of Assassins on which Renegade himself had carried out a coup and permanently destroyed Ra's Al Ghul's empire with his ultimate death, Diana clearly recalled but that was another speech not even mentioned on the internet, which made sense.
The Amazon also read how Renegade's reputation was essentially that of an anti-hero mercenary since he never killed any innocents and this was evidenced by the fact that anyone who tried to hire him to kill an innocent or a hero would be found dead in less than twenty-four hours and this was one of the few certainties in the criminal world.
Although Wonder Woman was already aware of this she still felt lighter than before, for some strange reason that she ignored.
Basically, the young mercenary's Wikipedia page ended there and Diana got out of there and decided to read some other websites dedicated to him. Basically each of them said the same things she already knew and she got nothing else useful from them.
The princess of Themyscira was scrolling through several websites until her attention was caught by one in particular because of the page title Renegade's modus operandi is more effective than those of the heroes . She clicked on it, not quite knowing what she would read.
Diana found out that a journalist had written this newspaper article also published online that stated that Renegade's mode of action was more effective than that of the heroes because the mercenary permanently eliminated criminals, unlike them who instead simply put the bad guys in jail. He also documented his analysis with statistics showing that in the past six/seven years, since Renegade first appeared, the percentage of crimes committed worldwide had dropped significantly.
This was because it was not at all uncommon to see Renegade also operating outside America -although there was no concrete evidence but this was practically confirmed- but he was accepting contracts all over the world, for example even in Europe, Asia and Africa. In fact it was apparently known that the young mercenary was responsible for the permanent dismantling of many mafia organizations around the world and that the Red Sharks weren't his first mafia destroyed at all.
The reporter went on to say that this helped to actually instill fear in virtually all criminals because they feared that someone might hire Renegade to eliminate them, no matter how far away. And the fact that there was special technology to make overseas travel feasible in a matter of seconds helped greatly to spread this fear of a mercenary of Renegade's reputation.
There were also comments at the end of the article and in addition to some that were negative toward the journalist, who was heavily criticized or insulted for his favorable stance toward Renegade's existence and modus operandi and for his criticism of the JL's way of acting -which Diana considered not so much a true criticism but more a set of differences that distinguished the two ideals put into action- there were also comments that were favorable and in agreement with the man.
The demigoddess read surprised how several people claimed that Renegade had saved their lives or managed to give them profound peace because of his murders that took the lives of rapists, blackmailers, murderers etc. who hurt or worse them or their relatives, friends and closest people and, reading some of the comments, hired the mercenary for very low amounts of money or even for free.
And here was an aspect that Wonder Woman had never realized but had just come to.
Many people from all walks of life hired Renegade to kill people who had hurt them or their loved ones in order to grant them an inner peace that they would not otherwise have if the people who hurt them continued to live as if nothing had happened.
And it was amazing how Renegade accepted such types of contracts even at a very low pay or even for free. Diana supposed it was both because the young assassin probably did not need any more money at all -not with many hundreds of completed contracts- but mostly because Renegade wanted to do good in his own way.
Diana herself could not help but find herself agreeing with much of the article, surprising herself when she realized this.
Eventually the Amazon decided that research on the mercenary could end here and after closing each Internet page she turned off her laptop. With a sigh she laid it down beside her and leaned comfortably against the back of the sofa.
Although she had not learned anything new about Renegade other than a few anecdotes, she could still consider herself somewhat satisfied. This was because she had found the article written by that reporter useful and also the comments and all served as a kind of outside opinion on the mercenary.
And most of them were positive toward the young assassin.
Diana could not help but be somewhat fascinated and intrigued by the mysterious figure of Renegade and how he, despite his young age, was apparently capable of doing anything, no matter how impossible it seemed, surprising her greatly on several occasions. It was honestly difficult to admit this even to herself, especially the fact that she felt a desire to want to know as much as possible, if not everything, about the mercenary because, damn him, he was one of the most amazing people she had ever met. She felt a mixture of several conflicting emotions toward the young assassin that she could not decipher at all.
Certainly his flirtation with her did not help at all.
Nor did the bouquet of gerberas placed in plain sight in the living room that she took great care of.
Speaking of that, the demigoddess had done some research on the Internet to find out whether gerberas had a definite meaning in the language of flowers and, unfortunately for her, the answer was yes. In fact, gerberas meant happiness, sensitivity, cheerfulness but also sensuality, innocence, purity and even loyal love.
Now Diana did not know if it was intentional on the mercenary's part but she had the distinct feeling that it was: she could hardly see him letting details like that slip.
And this led her to wonder what the hell Renegade wanted from her.
Why this continuous and incessant flirtation?
Why of all the flowers in existence specifically the gerberas when everyone else -excluding Hal who received yellow tulips, clearly teasing him about his weakness to the color yellow- received the same random flowers?
Did he want to communicate something to her through the language of flowers? If so, what exactly?
The more she thought about it, the more her head hurt. Renegade was simply the greatest enigma she had ever encountered but she would be lying if she said she did not find him intriguing.
In any case, there was an increased sense in Wonder Woman that although Renegade was without a shadow of a doubt one of the greatest threats that existed in all of Earth, he was not completely evil, if at all. A person who killed only the worst scum in order to do good to the innocent and who managed to bring down the crime rate a little bit throughout the world could not be called evil.
It did not fit into the meaning of evil in the vocabulary of the demigoddess.
Renegade simply wanted to do good in his own way and indeed was succeeding since the statistics were in his favor.
Diana could not pretend to disagree with the mercenary's methods since she had killed for her own people before and, if she could, she would follow the same line of thought and action as Renegade.
This was precisely the main difference between her and Batman.
The Dark Knight firmly believed that every criminal had the right to redeem himself and that heroes should give villains practically endless tries, further arguing that the lives of even the worst criminals had the same importance as the lives of heroes, innocents, workers and honest people and so on.
The princess of Themyscira also believed in the redemption of criminals but to a much lesser extent: according to her, it was immediately clear if someone was genuinely repentant of their actions and wanted to follow a path of rehabilitation to become an honest citizen.
There were, however, many criminals who, despite being caught, were easily able to escape from the facilities in which they were locked up to kill hundreds and thousands of innocent lives in a virtually endless cycle, practically the entire Gotham Rogues Gallery, Joker first and foremost. Although the main culprit was obviously the justice system, which undoubtedly sucked, Wonder Woman strongly argued that the most effective solution was to end the lives of said criminals because otherwise they would continue to kill so many innocent people.
Yeah, she did not like Batman's no-killing rule very much because she felt it was not too efficient, especially in the city with the highest crime rate in the world, and she preferred a much more pragmatic approach to dealing with criminals, mirroring Renegade's modus operandi in many respects. And Diana knew that other heroes would also agree with her such as Aquaman, Hawkgirl and Hawkman as they have killed for their respective peoples in the past as she did.
So to make a long story short, Diana did not consider Renegade a dangerous threat to society to be eliminated as soon as possible since he was concerned with killing the worst criminals.
Although definitely Batman and other heroes would not see it the same way.
Diana shook her head, clearing her thoughts, and cast a lazy glance at her phone to see the time, discovering somewhat surprised that it was time to prepare dinner.
But tonight I really don't feel like cooking.
The idea of ordering takeout pizza was not bad at all, she decided.