Dark Knights, & City Lights [Vi]

[Violet Schultz]

"Completely," Violet responded, looking Batman squarely in the eye. "The flamethrower's on the fourth level down, in a testing lab of some kind from what I can tell of what the fire's showing me."

She turned to see Batgirl revealing the secret passage, which looked exactly the same as the surrounding wall. It was a cunning hiding place, and she wasn't surprised that no one had noticed it beforehand. She nodded once at Batman's words, knowing that this wasn't the time to get into a leadership dispute. She would follow his orders even though she didn't recognize him as her authority, simply because what he said made sense and was as good of a plan as any. It was likely to get dicey from here on in, and her senses were focused on the passage ahead as she led the way down the passage. The lights were somehow self-contained and not linked to the main power, but there wasn't a maze of passages to follow. The stairs led down to the next level.

The sight that met them upon reaching the next level wasn't especially dynamic, but it was interesting all the same. The nondescript white walls were lined with doors, all of which had a card key slot mounted on the wall to their right, and looking into the first through the long window, she spotted a young girl, maybe five years of age, resting on a cot. Along her spine was a long bandage, stained red with the blood that was clearly still oozing out of whatever wound it covered. There was an IV in her arm, and some yellow liquid leaked into her bloodstream while she was out.

Swiftly moving to the next cell and peering in, she saw another child, a few years older maybe, but in similar condition. His silvery blond hair was wet with sweat, as was his bare skin, visible under the covering of bandages that smattered his body at several places. He was twitching in his sleep, and shivers wracked his body. Crossing the hall just as swiftly, she peeked into the room through the vertical slot and saw another. Was this floor a surgical recovery wing, or had all of these kids been injured somehow?

"There are hurt kids in all of these rooms," Violet said, turning to Robin. "Either that or they just got out of some sort of surgery. What do you want to do?"

She knew that they had to get to the bottom of this, but they were encountering kids who needed help at every step of the way, and Violet knew there weren't enough of the rescuers to get all of them out right away. They were hall hooked up to the main grid, and there was no way of knowing if the keys would unlock the doors or just tip someone off to their presence. If their opening the secret panel hadn't already, that is...

[Tim Drake]

Once they had gotten down to the next level, Robin and Batgirl followed Darkbrand's lead and checked a few of the windows, before meeting back with her at the head of the hallway.

"I can't raise Oracle or Batman on the Com-link..." he said lowly as he looked down the hallway at a simple desk, the scene reminding him of a creepy hospital wing from some old horror movie Beast Boy favored.

Stepping back to the door he suddenly got an earful of static and then Oracle's voice as she spoke to Batman about loosing a lock on the three younger heroes signals...

"I think there's some kind of damping field, to keep the lab safe from sensor probes... I have Robin again, Robin do you read me?"

"I read you Oracle... Can you get the League to send a Javelin down with their best medical personnel? We have a LOT of kids down here who need help and the local talent isn't enough."

"Copy that Robin, I have Martin Manhunter on now, he says that there will be two Javelins down in fifteen minuets or less."

"Robin out."

And with that he went back down the stairs and informed the girls of what Oracle had discovered; "... So that means that if we go deeper, we're on our own... Ideas?" he asked as Batgirl looked down the hallway at the much more obvious door that waited to be opened.

"Getting the kids out won't be hard, but we need to sweep up any and all remaining security forces first... Robin, I think that with Darkbrand leading, the three of us should be able to do so, but we'll have to move fast and hit hard..."
While her voice was still very raspy and strained sounding, the slurring was gone, and as such, the flat and even tone drove home the conviction Batgirl had in moving decisively against the monsters that where doing this to mere children...

"Agreed, Darkbrand?" Robin asked as he shifted the shock disks he held to his other hand and looked back behind them at the door they had come in...

[Violet Schultz]

"Let's do it," Violet said, her eyes hard as she nodded once.

Turning, she continued leading them down the hallway, following the stronger electric current every time there was a fork in the halls. It wasn't long before they ran into some more gorillas on hidelegs... er...guards. Violet took them down as they passed by, the first with a knee to the face and the second with a chop to the juncture between the neck and the shoulder. The third was left to the others as Violet noticed a chart next to an elevator. Skimming through the various levels that were labelled, she noticed that the central control room was on the sixth level. It was a stupid idea to take an elevator, considering that it was so enclosed and automated. She would be unable to control their path if they chose that route. The stairs was a much more viable alternative.

Continuing down the hall to the stairs, she headed down to the next floor, where they found a wall of glass, behind which there were four teenagers running through an obstacle course. The platforms upon which they were moving were constantly shifting and changing shape, and electric charges were rigged to the platforms immediately behind them. When one tripped, he convulsed in agony as the current wracked him. Violet gritted her teeth as she saw the three scientists with the some clipboards, marking impersonally as the children were run through the gauntlet. Turning her attention back to the glass, her eyes began to glow as her fist gained glowing tattoo-like flame patterns.

Taking a firm stance, she slugged the window. From the point of impact, the glass shattered, a winding trail of flame wandering along the surface for a moment before a mushroom of flame extended outward like a shockwave. The glass vaporized instantly, and the teenagers looked over with fear and shock. There was no way to go in and get them. They would have to come to her if anyone was to get anywhere without being subjected to the electric shock.

"Hey, keep going, all of you!" Violet shouted to them. "I'm going to catch you as you pass by, smallest person first, please."

The lead girl nodded, even while the fatigue was clear on her thin and emaciated face. She pulled the kid on her heels ahead of her and moved toward the wall of the circular room. Holding onto the edge of the window, Violet extended her hand and pulled the first boy to safety, handing him off to Batgirl as she prepared for the next. Carefully, she got all of them out of the room, last of which was the girl who had responded. There was a strange item around her neck, with electricity coursing through it, in dangerous proximity to her bare skin.

"Hey, are you alright?" Violet asked her. The girl nodded without responding. Why wasn't she talking? Was she unable?

"Aria can't talk with that stupid shock collar on," the young boy responded, gasping for breath.

"Shock collar?" Violet repeated, looking again at the device. "Why don't you just take it off?"

"It's wired to activate if she tries," the same boy said.

[Tim Drake]

Following her lead, Robin and Batgirl dispatched the last guard she had left for them, Batgirl leveling the poor man with a one two combo that struck him in the solar plexus and the face, whereas Robin emptied his hand full of stun disks down a hallway into a pair of guards who hit the floor twitching slightly, and not knowing just what had hit them either...


Once they where down in the next lab area where some smaller kids and a girl only a few years younger then then three masked heroes, Robin again sent a volley of stun disks, this time aimed at the doctors who where marking up charts and observing what he would personally call, the reckless endangerment of minors.

Not that they could have refuted that, since they also went down like sacks of wet beans from the stun disks, as Batgirl launched a pair of simple throwing darts, bat-shaped of course, at a power box that had a number of large power cords running into the encased obstacle course, a shower of sparks and the suddenly lack of noise from the room allowing one more child to escape out into Robin's waiting arms, a small boy who seemed like he was full of nervous energy and could not sit still for the life of him, his movements abrupt and sudden, a slight blur to his motions hinted to Robin that this was a speedster, but the biggest give away was his heart rate, it was so fast that Tim could hardly make out a pulse...


"Here." Robin said as he looked to Violet and the girl called Aria, then took a small insulated sheet from his belt and carefully slid it under the shock collar onto the girl's neck, then with a flick of the wrist, popped a small chisel like point from under his glove, which made short work of the locking device on the cruel fashion statement.

"There you go... I'm Robin, and this is Darkbrand and Batgirl, we're here to help..." Looking around Robin saw that these four where in pretty good shape, tired yes, but over all not injured badly, which was good, because there where other kids who weren't as well off.

"Okay, see that door? Once on the other side, go to the stairs and then run up them as fast as you can, and don't stop for anyone who tries to stop you until you see Batman, okay?"


"B-b-batman?" the small speedy boy said as he rubbed his arm at a pace Robin feared would cause his skin to combust at, yet he seemed fine.

"Yes, big guy, kinda scary looking, black with a dark yellow belt, pointy ears." Robin pit his index fingers up almost like rabbit ears on the sides of his head, and the boy giggled and nodded in a blur before grabbing Aria by the hand and pulling hard; "C'mon Aria! Hurry, we're leaving now!" and with that he let go and grabbed the other girls hand and then was gone, the slight echo of a yelp of surprise from the small girl with pure pitch black eyes the only clue they had been there a moment or so ago...

"We need to keep moving and sending the kids back, we'll have support teams coming down behind us soon, I know Batman, he's already called Commissioner Gordon and has SWAT and QRT on the way now."

Batgirl nodded then pointed to the door and made a gesture of warning as she approached it, her voice still strained but low; "They HAVE to be onto us now, so we need to get to the control room as fast as we can, before they can try and vanish once more..."


Time was suddenly against them now, Tim could feel it, and they where only on level four of this concrete and brick nightmare.

The looks on some of these kids faces... Haunting didn't even begin to cover the affect they would have on him for the foreseeable future...

[Violet Schultz]

Her hand went to her neck, where there was a series of burn scars and a red line from where the collar had rubbed her neck raw. At the boy's grip, Aria unentwined her fingers with the little boy's and bent down beside him, whispering in his ear for a moment for she stood and he ran off. She turned her pale blue eyes on Robin, who was apparently the leader of the group. Her voice was vaguely musical, like she was about to begin to sing, but her tone was almost nervous. It was understandable, given the situation she was in.

"I'm coming with you," Aria said, her accent decidedly Italian. "I can help you find the rest of the kids, and I know where everything is."

"Are you sure? No offense, but you don't really look up to it," Violet asked, looking at the teenager's borderline emaciated frame.

"Look, you have no idea what I have gone through to protect these kids," Aria said, her dark eyebrows making a hard slant. "I will not leave this place until I know that they are all safe."

Violet held her gaze for a few seconds to determine her resolve and then nodded once. They headed toward the door, and Violet kept an eye on Aria, noting the obvious discomfort in her movements which probably stemmed from the fact that she clearly wasn't fed enough to keep her muscles strong. It was impressive that she didn't let it slow her down.

"There are three emergency exits," Aria said as they went. "The central control room would lock down two of them, but the third is designed as a last resort in case the system is compromised."

"How do you know all this?" Violet asked, confused.

"I've tried to escape many times," Aria said simply. "All of the facilities are built similarly, since they have the same goals and the same needs. Kevin escaped through the surface entrance initially, but it hasn't been possible ever since, especially with that damn collar."

"Kevin?"

"Yeah, my boyfriend. He is the only one to ever escape from the East Coast branch. Speaking of which, how did you find us? The government was very careful to cover its tracks."

Violet's eyes widened as she realized it. Kevin, the man who had been shot down in the Jump City mall, who had first set Robin on the scent to locate this place. He had been Aria's boyfriend when he was here. She looked at Robin, not knowing what to say.

[Tim Drake]

As all the other children left, Robin realized that the girl called Aria wasn't leaving, and when she spoke, she was clearly fatigued, but the fire in her eyes was also just as clear, so he nodded at the info she provided, then paused in his moving away at the mention of Kevin's name...


"Kevin's the one who sent us Aria..." He said lowly before turning and walking for the door that lead to the stairs, the clock was ticking and he knew it, so he needed to motivate these girls into action; "Let's go ladies, they have to know we're here by now, and the more time we waste them better chance they get away, and I don't want to have to do this again someplace else..."

He opened the door and then raced down the stairs, this time damming Darkbrand's lead and just charging into the next main room, this place looking like a control level and containment area all in one, rows upon rows of computers and screens on one side, and rows and rows of what looked to be cells on the other.


And plenty of guards and evil doctors to beat up on dead ahead...

[Violet Schultz]

"I suggest you cover your ears and stand behind me," Aria said quietly, stepping out from behind Robin as they entered the next room.

Violet glanced at her in surprise, noting the angry fire in her icy blue eyes. She stood back, wondering what would prompt her to warn them. Suddenly a noise erupted from Aria's throat which sounded both terrifying and strangely melodic, horrifically loud. The men in front of them clutched their ears, grunting and groaning with sudden pain as blood poured out of their ears. Violet was amazed that neither herself nor either of her two other allies were feeling the effects of it, but considering that this was obviously Aria's power, it was entirely possible that she could control it minutely enough to spare them if they didn't stand directly in the way.

Some of the guards staggered to their feet as the noise ceased, wincing in pain but clutching their weapons. Lavender eyes glowing, Violet extended a no-flame zone to neutralize the firearms and then set to work, systematically taking down those few stubborn guards who apparently had some sort of training to ignore pain. Burst eardrums were immensely painful, and yet they still were willing to fight. The scientists didn't have a chance.

Aria moved to the cells, where the faces of a few children were peeking out of the tiny square windows in the doors of their containment cells, drawn by the distinctive sound that Aria had made. Kneeling by one of the scientists, she pulled a ring with five different card keys out of the pocket of his soiled white lab coat and began to open the doors. The youngest of the children hugged Aria around the waist, but she knelt and spoke quietly to them, pointing the way they had come. As a group, they left, heading for the exit.

[Tim Drake]

At the girls prompting, Robin and Batgirl covered their ears and stood behind her, and once the display was over, they spread out with Darkbrand to deal with the threat the guards tried to give them, but it wasn't long before Aria had set the bulk of the children free, and directed them to the stair well...


Finding the central computer console, Robin went to work, and he noted that the operating system was close to the type used by the lab he had broken Darkbrand out of, and in fact had the same mass storage interface as he had seen on the computers there.

He had been counting on that, so with practiced fingers, he plugged a black box shaped drive the size of a package of cigarettes into the terminal and started a data dump, the drive having a small but effective data compression program built in.


As the data dump progressed, Robin then tapped into the may systems and looked for any security measures, and soon had the surveillance system lit up.
"They've locked down he secondary exit, but the main and street level doors are still open... I'm also deactivating the dampening field, so our ear-buds should work soon... Also, the lower levels are showing... No signs of life... They've flooded the lower floors with liquid nitrogen!" Robin shouted as the dampening field fell, and then his ear-bud sparked to life with static and began chirping at him warning of incoming calls.


"Robin, this is Batman, We're moving the children out now, if you can hear me I'm working my way down, but there's some strange readouts on some of the control panels."

"They're flooding this place from the bottom up with Liquid Nitrogen! Get everyone out NOW!" Robin shouted as he at last grabbed the full drive and then threw it at Darkbrand; "Catch! Now get them OUT!" he yelled as he ran for the stairs, and then lept down towards the rising tide of frozen liquid death.



Time to see if his recovery from that run in with Shiro was all it seemed to be...

[Violet Schultz]

Violet caught the device, her eyebrows drawing together in confusion and dread as he explained what was happening. Even with her fire powers, she wouldn't be able to survive being drenched in liquid nitrogen any more than any other human would. That was why it was so strange that Robin should proceed to head toward the stairs which led further down.

"Robin!" Violet shouted as he dove toward the freezing lower levels.

Her eyes flared as her powers protected her from a blast of icy air which rose from the stairwell. The chill was unlike anything that Violet had ever experienced, but she instinctively kept a wall of scalding hot air in between her and the stairs. How exactly did he plan to survive down there if even she couldn't take the cold that was down there? He had mentioned that the chemicals from the sewer explosion had given him some sort of abilities, but he'd never really elaborated on them and he hadn't really used them before either, that she was aware of. She stared in shock for a couple of seconds before turning and running back the way they'd come, pulling Aria along by the arm until she was up to speed.

"If he didn't know what he was doing, he wouldn't have done it," she told Aria as they ran. "We've gotta trust him."

"You do know that he'll die if he touches that stuff, don't you?" Aria asked breathlessly.

"Robin won't die so easily," Violet said firmly.

For all of her apparent confidence, she wasn't really sure how Robin intended to survive, or why he'd even gone in the first place. What was so important down there that he would take such a risk? The children were all on their way out, and they had all of the data that they would need to expose the people who had done this and find the other sites around the country. What was there left?

[Tim Drake]

Rushing down the stairs, Robin felt the cold wrap around him, and as he got closer and closer to the last set of stairs, he could feel his blood turn cold, and his skin start to go numb, his senses spiking in terror as his eyes saw the fog of freezing liquid roll out the ajar door, frost climbing up the steel door-frame and the door itself, locking it into place, the cold chilling to the bone, the scent of frozen death everywhere, and the lights in the bottom level slowly started to wink out, as the electrical currents shorted out or over heated in the walls...


And then suddenly, Robin felt perfectly fine...


Charging at the door he leveled a punch right at the center of the frozen barrier, and it gave in a super cooled shower of brittle sheet-metal fragments, the boy wonder's forward motion unimpeded by the momentary distraction as he rushed the along frozen floor as if it was high traction carpet rather then iced over concrete, his armored boots having sprouted icy spiked under-soles, which gripped perfectly, and allowed him to run down the main hall in search of his goal.


He found it.


Grabbing a small camera Robin took the pictures he needed, of a half dozen children in a room, bound, gagged, and chained to a wall, forever frozen in a moment of pure terror and sadness, their body's not crystallized by the liquid gas...


Walking back Robin took a black plastic up and cradled it carefully, knowing that if he was to drop it, the things carried inside would not survive for long and that they would soon freeze beyond salvage, and this device, something he had been looking for since he had found Violet, was something that needed to be found, as much as the children, and in some ways, even more, because it could well tip the current balance of power, far and away in the wrong direction, if a means of protection where not found...



Some ten minuets after he had rushed down, the flow of Liquid Nitrogen had been found and stopped and Robin walked back up to the street level, the slight fog of cold barely clinging to his cape, his breath not even fogging, and the tips of his spiked black hair, where white.

"The rest... Are dead..." He said softly as advanced medical team members attended to the children they had saved, a pair of small van vehicles parked at the end of the alley, the Javelins parked on top of a parking garage a few blocks away.


"Robin... What just happened?" Batman asked as he looked at him, and then to Darkbrand and the others assembled about before fixing his gaze on the boy wonder...


"I've gained an immunity to extreme temperatures and elements..." He said softly as a medical- tech walked up and looked at him for a moment, checked his pulse and scanned him for injuries, before Robin waved him off with a gruff; "I'm fine, help the kids."

[Violet Schultz]

Violet and Aria reached the surface again and were met by the sights and sounds of a half dozen ambulances and their staff attending to the terrorized and abused children. Aria exchanged a glance with her new acquaintence before heading over to one. Violet herself kept watch for Robin's return, waving off the techs who occasionally came by to check her out. She felt completely fine, aside from the usual tiredness which came from any good fight. A small relieved smile crossed her face as she finally saw Robin emerge from the building, a camera in his hand.

"Robin, you nearly gave me a heart attack," Violet said, coming over to stand next to him. "You really need to keep me informed about details like that."

She looked back toward the building, thinking about all of the children who would never really leave the place. How were they going to tell Aria and the others that the others had never gotten out? It proved unneccessary, as none of them had known that Aria's abilities were more than just what they had seen. She had heard Robin's words for herself.

"'Dead?'" Aria repeated, coming over from the end of the alley. "All of the kids in the lower levels?"

The look on her face was pure horror, and tears began to roll down her cheeks as she covered her mouth with her hand. They had all been kids that she had known and watched out for, protected whenever she could. She could see all of their faces, now part of the past and of the despicable crime that had been committed here. For her, this nightmare would take a long time to fade away. Violet looked over at Aria and lowered her eyes, sadness in the dark blue depths. How could any monster kill so many children so ruthlessly, so heartlessly?

"What now?" Violet asked, looking back at Robin after a moment.

[Tim Drake]

Robin lowered his head as well, and gave a small shake before he looked back up at Violet and Aria, with a hard scowl on his face, the camera in one hand the case in the other; "Now... We keep looking, keep searching, and we keep fighting..." he said firmly before he tucked the camera into a pouch in his belt...


Walking towards the end of the alley, Robin waved at Violet and Aria to follow him, and then walked until they where on the street corner, near some police cruisers, as the GPD directed traffic away, and helped keep things sorted out as best as anyone could manage.

"Aria..."Tim began looking to the thin dark haired girl, before he looked away and composed himself; "Aria, Kevin sent us to find you, but as I'm sure you know, he sent us to New York, where we found the old lab, and clues to where they had moved you and the others..." he stopped and looked to Darkbrand before he reached out to her slowly, and rested his gloved hand on her slender, narrow shoulder lightly and spoke softly; "He sent us... Because he made us promise to find you all... He made us promise him as he laid dying in the Jump City mall, during an attack on the city by a man named Slade Wilson, a man who has done work for the Lab and the people who own it... Aria... Kevin died saving me, I own him my life... And so do you and all the others... Darkbrand can explain the rest, if you have any questions."


Robin then slowly took his hand back and turned slowly away to walk off, a feeling of loss at last hitting him, as well as a sense of fulfillment, but not totally, because he knew there where others, both Labs, and children, who needed to be found, and that it was fast becoming the main mission for the Titans, to stop the usage of young people with talents such as theirs, from being exploited, used, and even killed at the whim of some dark and hidden company, the evil whim of either one man or many, it did not matter, the Titans again had a clear goal, and a prime mission to fulfill...

[Violet Schultz]

"Mi Maria," Aria whispered, shocked disbelief in her eyes. "That's not true... That can't be true..."

Violet bit her lip, unsure how to comfort her. She would never get used to telling people that their loved ones had been killed, even though she'd had the obligation to do so a lot in her violent past. If Aria and Ferus had been together when they had been in a place this horrible, they must've been the world to each other. She couldn't imagine the pain that it would cause if she lost Will like this, and she didn't want to. The misery on Aria's face was obvious, and all Violet could do was put her hand on the girl's shoulder to remind her that she was there for her. Aria closed her eyes, tears streaming down her face.

"How did it happen?" Aria asked, her voice ragged and unsteady.

"He was shot," Violet answered quietly. "I'm sorry, Aria."

"I don't understand," Aria said, shaking her head. "Kevin could easily avoid bullets. He was trained to be able to avoid them."

"He jumped in the way of one that was going to hit Robin."

Aria's reddened eyes widened and she turned to look at his retreating figure. It made perfect sense now. The only reason that Kevin would have let himself be killed was to save her and the other kids. If he had seen that Robin was the best way to save them, and he obviously was, Kevin wouldn't have hesitated. He was selfless, and that was one of the reasons she had loved him so much.

"Where do we go now?" she asked, looking back at Violet. "Most of us were orphans, and I for one just turned 18."

[Tim Drake]

Once he was at the end of the block, Robin carefully handed the small black case over to Batman with a single nod before he walked back to get Darkbrand, however at her question, he spoke to Aria directly; "The Justice League will likely care for all of you all for the immediate future, from there they will work with various social services to help locate any family they can, from there... Well for you who are older, there are plenty of options, and people who are more than willing to help."


Robin considered the girl a moment, then looked to Darkbrand, and gave the faintest of smiles; "I'd say you're well on your way to repaying your own debt huh?"
Looking back to Aria he then smiled a bit more and rested his hand on her shoulder again; "You have quite the gift Aria, and what you've done to help these other kids here means something, if you ever wish to honor Kevin more than you have already..." He reached into a pouch and pulled a small plastic card out and handed it to her; "Just break this open and dial the number, or if you can, ask the Justice League to contact us, the Titans would be proud and made all the better to have someone like you with us... Think about it."

And with that Robin then nodded and waved Darkbrand to follow him, their next stop, the bat cave to refuel, rest and debrief with Batman and Batgirl, before heading home to Jump to do the same with the other Titans...



There was now a clear threat, and a clear goal for them, and the Titans would see this to the end of the evil that was being done to children such as Aria, and Kevin.