Our Time in Reverse- What it Takes

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Chapter 55: Heart Breaker – Earth Shaker

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So, yup. This is it….my cold rebounded so, avoid crowded locations!

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Slade pinned his gaze over to the Titans and their plight on his tall screens. "I should show you. All if you." Slade chuckled with a pace forwards as the Flash was unable to escape this new technology Slade had prepared ahead of schedule. The beam was a tractor; it dragged them in and kept them above, out of reach of any equipment. "My body can in fact descend and seek aid." J'onn Jones told the pompous alpha male with a little too much glee in his step.

"I'm enjoying putting you all to shame, and shouldn't that always have been the case? Eventually, the Bat will see what's left and stake a new crusade. Maybe he'll never hire a third Robin once the other is found in mortal danger." He sounded amused, due to the fact it was a possibility. "Leave the fire fights to the professionals, boys." Slade turned the dial again as time slowed even further. "Wait, and you'll see it. The way I planned for this city to collapse under my watch, was always a follow up to this one."

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Dick pulled his arms under his eyes, yet didn't remember being tied down flat to the bed. The metal operation table, where he saw in his horror, bodies.

Dead ones, corpses as he rose his neck to view the spectacular grizzled appeal that his m…

Dick felt ill as he threw his neck to the side and vomited. He…he was…dying? Sick? What was going on?? It was shock, just…

"M…aster?" Dick pulled at his bindings as his breath quickened, the red of the monitor keeping him there was beeping higher and higher…he screamed and shouted, biting his lip as the manic in him wanted out. "LET ME OUT!! PLEASE! WHAT DID I DO!?? SLADE! SLADE!!"

He wept as the robots only stood around him, their hands full of what had massacred the witnesses. The doctors and staff from before. Slade…had them slaughtered to have his word. Their word, that Dick….

Sniveling like the coward he was, Richard tugged, his legs hiking up as a robot gripped one with iron claws hands. "Let go! Off! Get off! Stop!!"

His please were sadly, not what the robots were pre- programmed to investigate. They just tightened his shackles on tighter and then, they wheeled the table with them, the next door flying open as he shook and yelled for help. For someone's aid, as the dead bodies remained behind, a bed of red and gore for the only witness left to realize that….

Dick's trauma was further exacerbated when a screen came from the person of a robot, the face on it being a withered looking Wintergreen. ~ You've gone through the transformation quite well, yet don't be so relieved just yet, child. Master Slade had orders hours ago to see that you are not located by the enemy. The mission is through, Tara has taken the role of traitor, while you'll be –

The crackle of sound, of electricity hummed and dimmed while Dick tried to breathe. "Will! Will, please…all of this is wrong, Slade doesn't want to hurt…."

Dock looked ahead of the bots and was sure he could be wrong.

Very wrong, in fact.

It was a way out. A way far, from this city. "I…. wasn't supposed to be their Robin…" His hope finally dissolved as Wintergreen stayed silent a moment, the screen breaking up from interference on the surface. ~ You understand. This was an opportunity to know your limits, yet he'll be one to judge you. Furthermore, boy. ~ Will cleared his throat. ~I won't have your disobedience as much as he has. You've been given the training to undo your messes, so I think it best to work even harder if you wish for that seat to remain at Deathstroke's table. Is that clear then, child? ~ Will cared, too much fir Slade and he'd be damned if his apprentice were the death of such a decorated sociopath.

He then, maybe was just as insane for telling the boy that he was a real soldier now. He was far from the spitting image of the Colonel.

~ Allow them to transport you. Don't bring up a fuss, or a word of what we've spoken.~

Wait...

Dick looked at the image with his eyes blearily unclear to the truth in those words. "You…really hate me…" Swallowed the boy. "You never wanted me to-

~ Enough.~ Will frowned, his eyes turning to the mastermind's machinations. ~ Pity has only driven you to stumble. Time and time again, you vied for anyone's sympathies, yet do you ever think, Richard? No, I think not. You were once more willing to go the extra mile, yet that child you were then had been pampered for far too long. This is a war, and that man only wants to build your future if you'll get from that arse and quit sobbing in both our ears. ~

Dick found what Wintergreen had said was based on his own experience in many wars, how he didn't trust this tadpole to pull himself from the muck without drawing in his own tears. Slade was lenient, then he wasn't. The boy was going to get that upper hand, because he hadn't left.

Yet he had, he'd claimed that he was Robin and did so as a cover. At first…

Then, he liked the role so much, that he'd begun to question his master's motives. ~ A soldier stands by their platoon leader at all times. What you did, was what I'd suspect of a child. ~

"I will, make him trust-

~ That isn't what you want. ~ Will huffed back, snobbish, he never acted like this before. ~ You begged for aid. A little pain and you're sense of right and wrong seems to have short circuited. ~ Snorted the elder. ~ Bring yourself back into our circle, earn what you can of Slade back through biting your tongue. I've kept watch over you both, and for now…this, could very well be a short parting, due to your insistence on playing an act.~

/

Dick's vitals were feverish as the hand above his brow saw things, felt them. Raven had done her best to send them spiraling away from their destroyed haven, into the lair where Dick's robot guards were on their backs.

He was working up a sweat via the aftereffects Starfire pinged the JLA, yet Raven had bypassed the concerns if being frozen in time by her own magic. "You got us out of there, but being down here –

Gar slapped a set of gloved hands over his mouth as he walked away from the room that Richard had been operated on in.

Starfire let out a gasp, Raven getting dizzy as her energy was swiped by whatever dreams were turning to hallucinations in Richard's skull. "The serum droves people crazy if they don't pull through. He took the final one, then.. " Cy checked with a scan. "We're too late. That was the last dose, and Richie…"

"Is exactly like Slade, as he had always wished "

"He called out for help." Raven groaned as she leaned into the arm of the metal rolling bed. "Johnny should be putting his plan to action to –

The wild freeze up started to shift as time moved, the walls and the halls lit up. "Did they…disable the –

A rock flew at Bb's head from the darkness.

"You think you need to go back, but you aren't welcomed down here…" Tara juggled large stone bits as she shot them at the tram, more bots coming in as the walls started to quake "I'm the only one who's got any right to bury this place!!"

Tara had only to them what Slade had done to make her into such a follower. In the beginning it was all but vengeance, finding her brother and saving her pride. Now, it was vengeance against the man who had implanted a false hope deep within; the same man that had seen her change into a creep, a killer. A…a …

"Terra!!" Gar leaped at her as she through one more stone, damaging the wall where his skull might have found no peace. "Tara…."

Her hair was dirty, her face was coated in soot and anything that big bang wanted her to feel. She needed to suffer, yet Slade…. he should suffer even more for trusting her to keep this partner stable.

She was a mess because he'd sent her spiraling down.

"T, you're gonna bring this all down, you'll even be crushed. We have ta get home-

"It's not…" She wiped her eye with the back of her glove. "It could never be my home. So, stop lying to the both of us!!"

"NO! THE HALLWA-

Starfire watched out with a screech for a scatter of wires as the place started to self-destruct. Tara shouted, hands up as she pulled back, finding a new door while Bb and the Cy sniffed her out. Pulling back a door, floor was unearthed. Hollow, with the rumble going on for a mile or more towards the lowest levels of Slade's home sweet haunt. "She dug a hole, all the way –

They looked at one another. Gar's ears dropped. "She's going after Slade…." He rasped, anxiously.

/

How the heroes has gotten in, how the device had been tampered with while Slade's attitude had been on hiding the evidence that he could. In that setting, he'd backed up the rest to their next safe house.

Richard was taken from him, but it wasn't forever. He knew that, the boy would not try to flee. He'd fight as he was told to do.

"The probes…" Sneered the madman.

"YOU HAD YOUR MIND SET." He grinned. "On going back, but never forwards…to their DEATHS!" His arm was down as Flash was freed, again little to late as he rammer into the mam, the arm band and controls shot. It looked to be only a part of what made the device tick. The detonator might have failed, yet the Titans…

The heroes cried out, and Slade turned his attention to the five screens in the room above him.

"Feast your eyes." He said calmly. "You…. monster! Murderer!"

Jhonn went after the shouts, the door pulled off its sides as GL didn't want to say he'd failed the Bat and the kids, he was responsible as much as Bruce was for getting trapped on his isle. The only one that those nanos held as, ineffective towards.

Slade saw that the devices in Bruce were gone. He growled, moving as Flash did him a solid, while Oliver aimed the first and only arrow at what looked to be the real control device. A spherical, terrible wonder that glowed hit as the Titans' blood did on those screens. He snarled at Slade, who did the same right back to the archer. "Tell us how to shut it down, or there will be no feasting for your kind, Deathstroke…. now!"

/

The floor battled itself as a roar of stone and concrete had the gears above their heads story to collapse. Slade narrowed his eyes before widening them, finding this wasn't his destruction of the lair – yet another's rage against all he had build atop the base of an old lab. One set here by his enemies.

Blood.

"HERE!!" She launched herself as her suit broke away, the parts revealing red skin and raw nerves below. Her bra and underwear peeking as he only saw her angry eyes and ran, throwing Arrow off as a door in the wall opened. She blocked it. With rocks, as he stood against enemies. Will was off securing his things elsewhere, but Slade…

He had to take off the kiddie gloves and fight. It was a bore.

"My…. parents…" She panted, glowing yellow and gold. "My brother, my country…you helped it to suffer. You told them that you'd train me. Make me evil…yet I….am angrier than I ever was running away! I will go back, but never because you gave me this right." Her accent was sharp on the tongue, more noble than what she had committed to as his servant. His step up in the world. Slade had used a minor, then promised her everything- only to hand it to someone else as HE escaped to freedom.

"DEATHSTROKE!! YOU ARE HEREBY SENTENCED TO DIE IN YOUR CAVE …I AM YOUR EXECUTIONER, NOW AND FOREVER!!"

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The Titans located a crumbling exit as robots crawled and clambered after them. As they found a tunnel that was not destroyed, they took the plunge, seeing a shadow of black shoot through the space at the pace of –

"Titans."

The heroes yelped. Out of the dark was a Cowles face. "The batwing is up top. Come." Batman sloshed through water ways to head them to the last and final hatch as the heroes, the ones that needed to be up top, came. Empty handed as Bruce eyed his JLA company.

Then, the ticking as he called out to them by the manhole cover.

John Stewart put up his shield right before that, with Terra under his arm.

"LOOK OUT!!"

Flast got them away from the multi mine blasts as the lair went down, down. Slade had won the day, but not his apprenticeship. Not Dick, as the boy looked to be fast asleep to the noise, even as he shook within a bad dream. "I'm taking him home." Bruce told the heroes, their eyes lost somewhat between hope and saving a life. "He, it was over then? The contract to…"

Starfire didn't finish. Dick was instructed to destroy them, yet in the end, he wasn't able to accomplish that.

Slade, even in his escape with the old man he carted by, they had not won every detail. The Titans, the city. They weren't to return. Terra coughed up dust and groaned as GL sighed and shook his head. "She wasn't just conditioned to do as he said, he messed with her too. Gave her the serum in his blood and it made her go crazy. The kid already went through a coup, losing her folks."

Cy lowered his gaze as Bb touched her side and wept a little. "Terra…she was so hurt, and we never got a chance to get to know the real her…she…"

"Her act was reckless, and dangerous because of all she'd done to not…but despite that –

"She had things with her powers minimized. She didn't use enough to lose control. Only to target one man." Bruce told the team. "Slade took that lair and built on top of it. Another enemy of the League was in Jump long before he came, yet they left to their headquarters in the Alps."

"Who?" Raven wondered. "Slade's attack felt ideal. Almost as if there were no short cuts."

"There is a lot you don't know about Slade Wilson, Kids." Ollie rubbed his neck and looked at the sky, hoping it would make sense to tell them enough about the mercenary's last threat to the green arrow.

"Slade goes back before my time, but we fought before and he hates to lose. The person he bought this plot from was also the person he wants to get back at. The reason he stayed in Cali next to Star City, was to spite me too. He knew I'd figure it out, and Bruce had to drive miles to get his son back."

"Dick, was originally my foster child after his parents were killed, Slade made Dick want vengeance over justice. So, I never saw him since that day. Not enough close encounters could tell him how sorry I was to lose him. But, this is all we can do. What Slade wanted to do to make that time even farther apart."

"The serum doesn't have a counter cure." The Flash frowned to his team. "We'll do all we can, but in the end, an inhibitor patch or choker might be all we can use to give Dick a normal shot at being a kid again."

"In a way, he didn't lose that, always." Raven looked at the sleeping boy, the memories he had unconsciously asked not to share. "Slade treated him like his own, until…he expected a change in them both. Dick flocked for those times to return, but they didn't. He was afraid of losing those he cared for, because the only person who ever allowed himself to be kind to get what he wanted, was all Richard had."

"That'd be a conditioned response from any Stockholm case." GL huffed. "The kid doesn't know who else could be there for em, because Slade wanted total control of his future. It's not right, and we will track him down."

"Whatever it takes." Cy agreed.

"However, the long that it must." Starfire bobbed her head. The tower was going to need time to be repaired once more. Slade had attacked it more than once, and there was no guarantee he would not choose to avenge his fallen mini empire.

"For Tara, and Dick." Bb nodded. "So they can be happy again without him to mess up their lives anymore. Or ours."

"Amen to that." Oliver said, Flash grinning and the teams pausing before heading down separate paths.

"There is no way to really know, that this was all Slade ever wanted…" Raven wondered to herself as she raised her hood back up. "If making Richard immortal will only worsen his obsession at all…"

~ The man with the iron mask bespoke of power. And thus…~

Raven gasped.

She…she was only thinking it through her emotions. Yet, the voice deep inside, she shuddered.

It was him, and maybe, maybe Slade going down that path, was all due to her earlier vision.

/

Not over, few more recovery chapters to go. Dick goes back with Bruce. Loses half of what happened to not wanting to remember like Terra did in things change. Tara will be as bitter as she can be until her brother is back by her side and her country is freed of her uncle's laws against her returning home.

Raven senses that Slade sought power earlier on and now, she wonders if her vision if the boy in the cloak beside him was a fowl warning if the future, not the past.