Renegade flew silently from rooftop to rooftop in the direction of the Red Sharks' main base, the words of Lady Shiva and Cheshire echoing in his head.
"Just because you have a virtually unlimited healing factor this does not mean you are completely invincible and immortal."
"Why must you needlessly put your life in extreme danger every time? You are not immortal, Renegade. It often seems to me as if you forget that you have a fatal weakness and it also often seems to me that you willfully seek out virtually impossible and suicidal missions and contracts."
"He will get himself killed if he continues at this rate."
"I know. And I'm afraid he knows it too."
The acrobat let out a sigh.
They will never understand. No one will ever understand.
No one will ever understand what it is like to be tortured and killed in every worst possible way every day for three years from the time you were seven years old until you feel no more pain.
No one will ever understand what it means to have been brutally trained every day for three years by one of the best and cruelest and most brutal assassins in the world.
No one will ever understand what it means to have been dehumanized and deprived of free will to the point of being an empty shell every day for three years by evil people without any moral restraint.
No one will ever understand what it means to have been forced to kill everyone they ordered every day for three years without distinction between criminals, civilians or innocent children.
No one will ever understand what it means to be a living zombie who does not even have a heartbeat.
No one will ever understand what it means to have a virtually unlimited healing factor.
No one will ever understand what it means to be killed and revived so many times that you lose count.
No one will ever understand what it means to hold back your own emotions in public to keep your eyes from glowing an unnatural color.
No one will ever understand what it means to have grown up dying every day for three years to the point that death has become a mere daily occurrence.
No one will ever understand what it means to have been raised and trained as the most dangerous, lethal, deadly and efficient weapon in the world.
No one will ever understand what it means to be the most dangerous, lethal, deadly and efficient weapon in the world.
The Court of Owls started shaping the above-mentioned most dangerous, lethal, deadly and efficient weapon in the world for three years. And this weapon was then refined, finalized and perfected by Deathstroke The Terminator, League of Assassins, Lady Shiva, Katana, Richard Dragon and Wildcat for seven years.
No one will ever understand what it is like to know all the martial arts and to have mastered them all so expertly that the brain and muscle memory learned them permanently to the point that Dick would never forget them.
No one will ever understand what it means to be literally the best in the world with every kind of weapon: from every firearm to every cutting weapon to every explosive weapon to every defensive weapon and every other kind of weapon.
No one will ever understand what it means to have more than excellent, perfect and infallible aim until the body and mind have instinctively and automatically learned to hit every single organ of a human being, from the most vital to the least vital, to knowing exactly where to hit to kill or not to kill a person and knowing exactly how long it will take the person to die based on the area of the body hit.
No one can ever fully understand this.
Not even Slade can understand this.
This because neither he nor anyone else has experienced on their own skin all that Dick has experienced and consequently no one can ever fully understand it.
However, Slade was the only one in the whole world who fully knows that Renegade was currently the most dangerous, lethal, deadly and efficient weapon in the world. This is because he not only trained said weapon but also lived with him and raised him for the past seven years, being as much a parent to Dick as John and Mary Grayson were, if not more so.
Slade personally witnessed every relapse that Dick experienced as a result of the brainwashing that the Court of Owls did to him. He was thus able to witness a fraction of all the atrocities and horrors that the Owls inflicted on Dick and the consequences on his psyche.
Just because in the past two years Dick had not relapsed into his old habits this does not mean that he was well both mentally and emotionally. It was literally impossible to completely overcome all the trauma that the Owls inflicted on him -he still has very bad nightmares, although with less frequency than in the past- and his psyche -or at least part of it- had been irreversibly damaged.
Slade Wilson was the person who knows Dick better than anyone else in the whole world and that means he knows that his son was the most dangerous, lethal, deadly and efficient weapon in the world and he was infinitely proud of that, in spite of everything.
Slade knows that although there were obviously living beings far more powerful than Renegade not only on Earth but in the entire universe, his son will still have a chance -even a small chance- to kill them.
This was because Renegade represented the greatest living danger on Earth, although he would never hurt an innocent person.
Being the most dangerous, lethal, deadly and efficient weapon in the world obviously had consequences.
One of them was that Dick can never be fully human, scientifically speaking. And although with the great modern technological and scientific development surely it would have been possible to develop something that would counteract the electrum coursing through his veins, the acrobat had come to terms with something years earlier.
Dick no longer wanted to return to being a normal human being.
This was because Talon's physiognomy and abilities always made him feel that he was really powerful and consequently in control of the situation. And although he did not even have a heartbeat, Dick still felt alive and he was sure that he would not feel the same way if he ever became a normal human being again.
Moreover, being practically immortal was virtually Renegade's main characteristic.
And speaking of immortality, this represents a very controversial point.
It was true that his healing factor makes him virtually immortal and almost impossible to kill and that the electrum flowing through his veins would permanently stunt his growth in his early twenties, according to his and Slade's research, studies and assumptions.
This could be seen as a blessing.
In reality it was a real curse.
The fact that Dick could be resurrected from any mortal wound implied that he could be tortured to death hundreds and hundreds of times and resurrected every single time only to be killed in the worst possible ways until he managed to escape, kill his captors, or someone rescued him.
Unfortunately, Dick already experienced this personally on his own skin when he was only seven years old for three fucking years from the Court of Owls.
And Dick would not have wished this on even his worst enemy.
Besides this his immortality and eternal youth had another downside, much worse according to the acrobat.
Dick would have been forced to watch all his loved ones die one by one and would have been completely helpless, unable to do anything but watch them die as he himself went on with his miserable life.
Dick would have witnessed the death of his little siblings, his older sister, his uncles and aunts, all his friends and acquaintances and even much of the hero community.
This was because the electrum had made him immune to natural death and literally the only way to kill him permanently was by beheading him and removing his head from his neck otherwise his head would reconnect with his neck, causing him to be resurrected.
He did not yet know whether this last thing also applied in case a certain amount of time had passed since his head was separated from the rest of his body but at least for now he did not want to know.
Now Dick did not know whether the super serum gave his father not only superhuman abilities and an very good healing factor but also made him immune to natural death in the same way the electrum had done to Dick himself. The Talon hoped for this with all his heart. Having at least his father by his side would make his life better and help keep him from driving him to madness.
Because yes, there was a risk that Dick would become insane by helplessly witnessing the death of all his loved ones.
And that was one of the worst and most depressing things that could ever happen to a human being.
It was literally the worst curse ever.
There were two possibilities that Dick had already thought of once all his loved ones would inevitably die: either the pain would be so great that he would decapitate himself -and he was sure he was capable of doing that- or he would drown in the pain and continue his mercenary career until someone could kill him permanently.
Or he would continue to live his life if he managed to find good reasons to go on despite the pain, although this possibility was more remote than the others.
All of this together allowed Dick a few years earlier to come to a conclusion.
He would die carrying out his crusade as Renegade.
Being Renegade was one of the best things that could have happened to him in life.
Being Renegade was one of the few things that made him feel truly alive, despite everything.
Like he was doing something positive and useful for humanity.
Being his own mercenary with his own morals, namely to kill the worst scum of the Earth, made him feel alive and like he was doing the right thing.
He fully believed in what he was doing and in his own reputation as an anti-hero mercenary.
Just as he had told Wonder Woman.
And no one could have convinced him otherwise.
He had witnessed literally the worst of the worst of human scum. He had endured the worst atrocities and tortures that left scars on his skin but especially on his psyche. He had gone through hell and was somehow still alive, despite everything.
All that was just described was going to paint a definite picture.
Namely, the fact that Dick, being the most dangerous, lethal, deadly and efficient weapon in the world, having the most brutal, complete, extensive, efficient and deadly training of all and having superhuman abilities -practically unlimited healing factor, immortality and eternal youth included- he felt in every fiber of his being the moral obligation to do his best to try to change the Earth for the better through the killing of the worst scum.
And that in turn meant accepting missions and contracts on the worst people, mafias and criminal organizations that no one else could accept, no matter how extremely risky they were or how impossible or suicidal they seemed.
Renegade would always accept any mission and contract that would result in the elimination of people who deserved to die and who would not be missed, no matter the level of risk he would take.
And that is how Dick came to the realization that he would most likely die as Renegade and he did not care at all. He did not care at all whether he would die tomorrow or in a few months or years or even centuries.
This was because not only did he not fear death at all -how could he after all the times that he had died and risen again?- but mostly because he would be satisfied.
Satisfied that he had done his best to make the world a better place, albeit with methods that were certainly illegal but in his opinion of undoubted moral rightness.
Why did the innocent and good people have to suffer the most while criminals lived the good life?
Where was the justice in all this?
And if, at the end of the journey, Dick helped to make his planet a safer place and to save indefinite lives, albeit with unorthodox methods, then he could have been satisfied with himself and his work.
This was the least Dick could, should and would do.
And no one could have persuaded him to back down.
No one.
Dick strongly suspected that Slade had already realized that he would never retire as Renegade and would continue to be a mercenary until he was permanently dead and if so, although his father could not know exactly the motivations behind the acrobat's final decision, he had not yet told Dick anything.
In any case, even his father would not have been able to dissuade him.
Renegade would carry out his crusade, his mission, his life purpose until his final and ultimate death.
The Talon dispelled all thought from his head when he realized that he had almost reached the Red Sharks' main base of operations. He moved forward with one goal in mind.
Annihilate them violently and brutally until no one was left alive.