“Tim? You still up?”

Tim Drake switched tabs on his computer and turned to the door as his father cracked it open. “Hm? Yeah, sorry, Dad. Couldn’t get to sleep.”

Pushing the door open, Jack Drake walked into his son’s room. “Y’know, I worry about you, kiddo. With all of your schoolwork and the fencing team, I just hope you’re getting time to be a kid while you still can.” Tim sighed on the inside as his dad took a seat on his bed. “When your mom died, you were forced to grow up early. I wanted better for you than that.”

“Dad…” Tim started, turning in his chair to face his father. He stopped as Jack held up his hand.

“Look, I’m not going to sit here and do the accusation thing. I’m not going to ask if you’ve been sneaking out and having sex and drinking and doing drugs. I trust that you’d tell me what was going on, if anything.” Jack sighed. “I just want to make sure you know I’m your dad. We’ve been through enough together that I think you know that, but that’s my piece.”

“Dad, I…” Tim paused, thoughts swirling around in his head. Which part could he tell? That he wasn’t really in a fencing club and was just using it as an excuse to spend time away from home working out on a daily basis? That he had half-finished the superhero costume between his mattress and box springs? That he’d figured out the mythical Batman’s identity?

Tim sat down, putting his arm around Jack’s shoulder. “I’m fine. Stressed sure but I’m fine.” Jack’s eyes were betrayed his skepticism, so Tim continued. “I’m just working my butt off because you have no idea how bad I want to get into school on scholarship. It’d make all of this worth it.”
Jack sighed then ruffled Tim’s hair. “I know kiddo. I’m just being paranoid and overprotective.  You have goals, good ones. I just wanna see you still get the chance to be a kid.”

Tim smiled. “I think I’m doing all right, Dad. Promise.”

“Good,” Jack said. “You know parents. We, well, we worry. A lot. Because our kids, the way you grow up is how we judge whether we were worth it or not.”

“Well, you’re doing a fine job, if I do say so myself,” Tim said, cocking an eyebrow. The two chuckled for a moment before Jack stood up.

“Just make sure you get to bed at a decent hour,” he said. “I’d hate for you to be too wiped to dodge the rapiers.”

“Never happen,” Tim said. “G’night, Dad.”

“Night, son.”

Jack shut the door behind him as he left the room. Tim stood there, swallowed by the silence that remained as the door settled into place. Guilt settled in the recesses of his guts, but he swallowed and pretended it wasn’t there. If anything, this was an extra little kick to get him moving again.

Tim went back to his computer and pulled up the bookmark to the Look To The Skies! forum. A GIF image of a spotlight drifted across the screen for a moment before Tim was able to log in. He was ready. He would have to be. He needed to prove to himself that there was a reason for everything he had been doing, for all of the lies. If this produced the results he hoped it would, then it would all have been worth it. From the hours in the gym pushing his body to the breaking point to the sneaking out at night to practice running across rooftops to the lies about the sources of the bruises he’d picked up defending a woman on his way back from the fabric store, all of it would be worth it.

He hit the enter button as he finished his message. It lit up on the screen in pixelated reality, available for all to see. He grinned at the title of the message as it dared him from the light of the screen.

RED ROBIN	BEAST BOY	STARFIRE	BUSHIDO	SPEEDY	RAVAGER

“Do I want to fight crime?”

Gar Logan looked skeptically at the printout he’d been handed by his agent. “What do you mean do I want to fight crime? Does this have anything to do with that Sasquatch guy that everyone’s always talking about but no one’s ever seen?”

“It’s Batman.”

“Excuse me?” Gar looked up at his agent, a young, clean-cut fellow just out of his undergraduate program. His brown hair was slicked back and his suit was slightly wrinkled, but he carried himself with an optimism that would surely fade after more than just a month in the agent business. He had a name, too, though Gar forgot it with a level of consistency that almost suggested he was doing it on purpose. Brady, wasn’t it? Yes, Gar decided. His name was Brady.

“You said Sasquatch. You meant Batman. Both urban legends, but Sasquatch doesn’t fight crime,” Brady said meekly.

“Eh, whatever,” Gar said. “You know, when I was part of Doom Patrol, trouble came to us. We were great, a real family.”

Brady scratched at the back of his neck in discomfort. “About that Gar. I’ve been looking into your contacts about your time on this team and, well… there’s no record of them even existing. Who or what is Doom Patrol? I can’t get you a new job on a fledgling super-team without some evidence of your past heroics.”

Gar crumpled the paper in his hands with a sudden relish. “No evidence? Dude, I have fucking green skin and can turn into any animal as long as it existed on earth at some point in the past five thousand years. If nothing else, show them the video of me spider-monkeying my way to the cat stuck in the tree if you have to. You’re my agent, not my mother.”

“Someone has to be,” Brady muttered.

In an instant, Gar was on his feet. “You wanna know something, Brady? My parents, my real parents died on the same field expedition that led to me turning into Beast Boy. So pardon me when I get my nuts twisted when someone doubts the very existence of my adoptive family. The people of D.P. raised me, not someone barely four years older than me like you.”

Brady breathed. “Look, Gar, it’s been a great experience, but—”

“Go.” Gar sighed. “Just go. It usually ends like this. So just do it, okay? Walk out. You’ll get paid through the week. Meanwhile, I’m gonna find someone who just freakin’ believes me for once.”

Without another word, Brady backed out of the room, only turning his back on Gar once he hit the doorway. For a brief moment, Gar thought about having fun at the guy’s expense, chasing him out of the building in the form of a gorilla, but he decided against it. He already had enough going against him.

Falling back on the sofa, Gar put his arms behind his head and exhaled slowly. What now? Finally, he brought himself to the crumpled paper on the ground. “Do I wanna fight some crime?” Gar asked himself, shaking his head. “Hnh. I wonder what Gotham’s like this time of year.”

Several Weeks Ago

The girl from Tamaran crashed through the atmosphere in a burst of green energy. Somewhere down on the planet, alerts were going off in every space-monitoring facility. Koriand’r thought nothing of this. She only thought of escape.

It would be some time before they caught up to her, she hoped. No one would think to check the backwater planet Sol III for her, because they would have expected her to go somewhere more civilized, more modern. It would be the only thing that would fit a princess of her stature. She would never be able to bring herself to mingle with such a barbaric race, and even if they thought she could, it was a planet so densely populated that even that would buy her time.

Koriand’r changed her trajectory to shift her in the direction of the light side of the planet. In the dark, her lime green energy trail would be a beacon signaling her location. In the light, that was where she wanted to be. Too many months spent in the dank caverns in the depths of the planet Tamaran had left her craving the light. A week in the depths of space had not quenched this craving, and now, with the light from Sol shining so freely on the planet, it was nigh-impossible for her to resist the urge to bathe herself in the sunlight she had craved for so long. It was an association that she had made some time ago. Sunlight meant freedom. Darkness meant captivity. With the feelings of the chains on her wrists still too recent in her memory, sunlight seemed like the only option.

The first day of hiding on the planet Sol III, Koriand’r found herself drawn to a beach in the place called Florida, somewhere that her orange skin was not so unnatural and her clothing, considered revealing by Sol III standards, was not so revealing. She quickly picked up the language of the planet’s dominant species, these so-called “humans,” and resolved to fit into their culture as best she could. How else could she plan on blending in if the foot-soldiers of Tamaran were to come looking for her?

There was something about Florida, though, that Koriand’r couldn’t quite allow herself to feel comfortable about. It seemed to be a place where the humans sent their elderly to die, visiting only to enjoy the sun for themselves. There was something sick about this perception that left her feeling more and more uncomfortable. For a place whose sun symbolized freedom, the places called “retirement communities” seemed much more like the prison she had escaped. There, the humans’ elderly were kept complacent with games that involved the simplicity of shoving ceramic discs along cement with sticks and with driving around poor facsimiles of vehicles called “golf carts.” It was disquieting.

It was the night that she witnessed one of the humans’ elderly weeping after her descendants left from their visit that Koriand’r decided she could no longer stay in this Florida. It felt too much like those descendants had left their grandparent to die in this place that seemed as if it should be much happier than it actually was.

She spent a week in the place called Chicago, the so-called “City in a Garden.” Though its atmosphere synchronized much better with her view of Tamaran, the busyness of it nearly overwhelmed her. Metropolis was no better, and it even lacked the darkness around the edges she had grown accustomed to. New York City had the same problems she found in Chicago. It wasn’t until she sampled another city, one that television suggested she avoid, that she found a place much more to her liking. They called it Gotham. Here, the city was tinged with black from the hearts of its inhabitants. It felt more like Tamaran than anything she had encountered before on Sol III. Here in this city, with its overwhelming architecture and its hideous nightlife, she saw the average Tamaran resident. They were beautiful on the outside, but all carried with them a darkness that came out without warning. It was selfishly gorgeous.

It was her new home, and, reveling in the power that she had over those who would embrace their inner darkness, she would change it in the way she was never allowed to change Tamaran.

“Where do you want these boxes, boss?”

Ryuko Orsono looked to the mover with a look composed of equal parts disdain and amusement. “Cardboard and the wooden crates can go anywhere you desire. The metal lockboxes? Those will go directly to my office.”

He allowed himself a small chuckle at the last word. Though the seventeen year-old could have passed for an up-and-coming businessman back home in Japan in his smart suit and tie, he still found the idea that he would have an office somewhat ludicrous. He supposed it was part of the growing-up process in his case, although shouldering responsibility was a new concept following his mother’s death.

Stepping out onto his balcony, Ryuko’s nose scrunched at the scent of the Gotham City air. He’d chosen an apartment in the upper class side of the city, something to draw the line between his day life and his night life. As he exhaled, he wished that he’d been drawn elsewhere. But then, he also knew a thing or two about not having much choice about his lot in life. That was the curse of the Bushido legacy.

Ryuko made his way into the windowless room that he had dubbed his office. The movers had yet to bring in the rest of the lockboxes, but one, long and thin, rested on the flimsy table he’d set up in the room. He spun the numbers around the dials at the seam, feeling the tumblers click into place under his fingertips. He flipped open the lid to the lockbox. In the dim light, he could see the polished barrel of an aged Type 99 bolt-action rifle, one that dated all the way back to World War II. Ryuko knew this because the rifle had been used when his great-grandfather was one of the soldiers in the Pacific during the great war.

As he held the rifle in his hands, Ryuko could feel the soul of his great-grandfather resonate through the weapon. This was the gift of the Bushido name and tradition. The souls of Bushido past were bound to their weapons and guided the young Bushido through his calling in life. For his great-grandfather, carrying that rifle in the jungles, there had been a sense that he had become part of a great movement that would set him on a path that would elevate his entire generation for decades to come. And now, by coming to Gotham, Ryuko felt that he was part of a new movement with those same intentions.

They would be super-heroes, he thought. He would use the guidance and power that he had been given for the good of the people. Or, as had befallen all who had carried the name Bushido before him, he would die trying…

Mia Dearden wasn’t just accurate. She was speedy.

Her feet pounded up the tarmac, carrying her around an advancing defender without changing her center of gravity. The ball pummeled the ground and back up to her hand in time with her feet. Ignore the fact that the opposing players each had a minimum of six inches on her. Ignore that they had been playing every day for the past eighteen months, rain or shine. Ignore that they were all male. Mia Dearden owned this court.

The ball left her hand on an over-the-shoulder shot that looked like a last-second gambit. For Mia, that gambit was the challenge. She had always been good with her aim, and she was quickly discovering that basketball was no different. Ever since she had taken archery lessons at a summer camp, she’d understood the gift she had for aim. The tinkling off the metal chain-linked net informed her that she still had that gift. The ball bounced as it hit the tarmac. She never looked back at her handiwork, instead walking off the court and grabbing her towel.

“Thanks for the workout, boys,” she said, wiping her forehead. “S’been grand.”

She made her way through the swinging, metal gate that enclosed the basketball court, smiling in the satisfaction that every eye was following her out.

Mia folded the towel up and shoved it into a drawstring bag. She usually skipped the bus, preferring the jog back home to the monotony of public transportation. Too much of her life had been spent in transit, Mia thought. Why voluntarily spend more of her time the same way?

The jog took her through some of the more risky parts of town, but Mia thought she could handle herself if any real trouble came her way. That or she could outrun it. Coach Garner had been on her for two seasons now to join the track team, but it wasn’t her style. Practicing every day at the whims of a man with a whistle? She’d much rather run to the sound of her own music.

Mia continued her run until the path took her all the way home. She entered the apartment complex where she lived with her parents, taking the stairs two at a time until she reached her floor.

“Mia! Is that you?” Her mother’s voice greeted her as she pulled out her headphones.

“Yeah, I’m home. What’s up?”

“I’m in here.” Mia migrated to the bedroom where her mother sat in a pile of old clothes. Mrs. Dearden was a short, fit woman with a permanently furrowed brow and mousy hair. Surrounded by the old clothes, she looked more like a child in the middle of playtime than an adult sorting through old belongings. “Found some pictures. Thought you might want ‘em. If you don’t, throw ‘em out.”

Mia sifted through the pictures. “Mom… these are all of Dad.”

“I know. I don’t want them,” Mrs. Dearden said. “Your call.”

Mia looked at the pictures. “I’ll look through them. I don’t know.”

“Like I said, Mia. Your call.”

If any more was said, Mia missed it. Her headphones were back in. She was in her world once more. Kicking back against her headboard in a room that bore little resemblance to the girl that lived there, Mia looked at each picture, wondering if the happy man and the happy girl and the happy woman were ever meant to be part of a happy family. How long were these taken before her father started using? She bit her lip at the sight of the smiles, crumpling one of the photos and throwing it at her trash can. It sank in against the inside of the metal can.

She never missed. She only missed what could have been.

After a moment, she set the remaining pictures aside and pulled up the internet on her smartphone. The meeting was still on, she thought. The meeting would still happen here she could join others to take a bite out of the undercurrent of drug enabling in Gotham.

Tomorrow, she thought. Everything would change tomorrow.

Today. Everything changed today.

Tim Drake stood on the rooftop, wondering just what he’d gotten himself into. Was this what he really wanted? Everything had led up to this point, sure, but was he sure of what he was about to fall headfirst into? As the first of the respondents to his forum message arrived, he decided he the answer was most definitely no.

“Am I late to the party?” asked the gorilla as it swung up onto the roof from the fire escape before transmorphing into a green-skinned teenager. “I was worried I’d miss out on the super-teaming.” He held out his hand, flashing a show-biz grin. “I’m Beast Boy.”

Tim shook Beast Boy’s hand. “I’m Red Robin. No fast food jokes. Please.”

Beast Boy scratched at the back of his neck. “So, uh, where’s the rest of the party? I assume I wasn’t the only one who got the invite, right?”

The night sky flashed with a bolt of green energy. Koriand’r touched down on the roof, her hair flowing with the wind. Her orange skin clashed with Beast Boy’s green, although Tim would have sworn the sight of Kory made Beast Boy turn red instead. “Is this the gathering of teenage superhumans?”

“Uh, yeah, if that’s the answer it takes to get you to stay,” Beast Boy said. “Hi.”

Koriand’r ignored him, looking instead to Tim. “Because our compatriot is green, I assume you are the Red Robin that has gotten us together. I am Starfire. What will be our mission tonight?”

It was Tim’s turn to look around nervously. “I thought tonight we might listen to the police scanner, see if there’s some crime happening that Batman isn’t around to stop. And maybe, I don’t know, like do some team-building?”

“Oh god. You just suggested icebreakers, didn’t you? Please no,” Beast Boy said. “There are only three of us here. We’re like a cooking club.”

“Sorry I’m late.” A red domino mask capped with a yellow hood popped up over the edge of the fire escape. The bow on Mia’s back weighed heavily as she climbed. “I’m too used to navigating Gotham from the street. Finding a particular rooftop isn’t quite in my repertoire yet.”

Tim held out his hand. “Red Robin. Good to have you join us.”

“Speedy,” Mia said, looking at the oddly-colored assortment of super-powered teenagers and feeling intensely out of her league.
Tim held out his hands. “So, uh, should we wait a few minutes and see if anyone else shows up, or do you think we should get right to the fighting crime stage?”

Beast Boy cocked an eyebrow. “You have done this before, right? This whole fighting crime thing? Because I’m starting to worry every time you stutter.”

“Yeah, I have,” Tim said. “I just haven’t done it before in a group. There’s a difference, y’know?”

There was a small cough from behind the air conditioners. “Excuse me. Is this the meeting of crimefighters?” A Japanese teenager in a loose-fitting white shirt and pants stepped forward from the shadows. Bushido wore the weapons of his ancestors in various slings on his person. “Forgive me for my lateness. Traversing the city by rooftop is more disorienting than I expected.”

“So I’ve heard,” Tim said. “Look, I think this might be all we’re going to get based on the number of responses there were on the forum. And yeah, I know, this is like the shadiest way to meet other people. We’re like the kids who did everything our parents told us not to do online. So there’s that. But, uh, does everyone know everyone else’s codename yet?”

Beast Boy leaned in toward Speedy. “Awkwaaaard.”

The teenagers introduced themselves to the group. “Cool. So… right. I was thinking that maybe we could make this a thing,” Tim said. “We could call ourselves something cool. Like the Teen Titans.”

“Really?” Speedy asked.

Tim shrugged. “It was just a thought.”

Kory stepped forward, the air of royalty behind her. “The longer we linger, the more miscreants are able to get away unpunished into the night. I suggest less talk and more action.”

“I like this plan,” Bushido said. “This is a plan fit for our purpose.”

Tim held up a hand to his ear. “Then we’re in luck. Dispatch just called in a masked assailant escaping from one of the high-rises. I’ve already got his likeliest escape route in my head. Teen Titans go?”

Starfire took off from the rooftop. Beast Boy, following her lead, transformed into a pterodactyl and stayed tight on her tail. Speedy stayed true to her namesake and took off across the rooftop, leaping the alleyways with enough skill to make most long jumpers in the state jealous. Bushido looked at Tim and shrugged, running after Speedy, if not with the same amount of gusto.

Tim sighed before following Bushido across the rooftops.

It was not Grant Wilson’s night.

Too much had gone wrong for the man called the Ravager, and Dad wasn’t going to be all that pleased with his performance. How was he supposed to know that the man he was supposed to kill would have his mistress over that night? Or that she’d be in the kitchen as he climbed in the window? Damn that bitch. She’d screwed everything up.

Oh, the mark was dead, sure, but the whore’s screaming had drawn more attention than would have been favorable for a clean escape. No one was supposed to know Brent Dixon was dead until the cleaning lady found him in the morning. Now he was dashing across Gotham in hopes of reaching his getaway before the police reached him. Normally it wouldn’t be much of a problem. Tonight, it was a different story. Dixon had put up a fight, and Grant wasn’t going to leave without finishing the job. Messy, sure, but it had to be done. The client had paid in advance. They’d expected the Terminator to do the job, not knowing he’d pass it off to his son as a part of his rite of passage.

No, this was not Grant’s night at all.

He ducked behind into another alley, thinking not for the first time that Gotham had more alleys than actual streets. Fortunate, that, because it was the only thing keeping him out of the glare of red and blue sirens. No, now he only had to worry about the mythical Batman showing up, but hey, myths were myths. Just a few more blocks and everything would be okay. He’d be at his motorcycle, unmasked, and it would all be okay. He’d just have to worry about the wrath of Dad instead of the wrath of the police. The thought crossed his mind that the police might be more merciful than the Terminator, but he had to push that out of his head. He was the good kid.

He could see the parking garage where he’d left the motorcycle ahead. Everything was going to be okay.

And in a flash of green light, Grant realized that his night was about to get a whole lot worse.

“Stop, villain!” shouted Starfire, her arm pinwheeling as she sent a blast of energy at the man in the full-body suit.

Ravager deflected the brunt of the blast off his sword, bringing it up to protect his head. He darted into an adjoining alley, diverting from his original path. He looked down the alleyway and pressed himself against the wall in time to take a glancing blow from a green bull charging down the alley. The bull, after missing, transformed into a teenage boy, cartwheeled, and shifted back in his direction in the form of a tiger.

“Think you’re going to be the first big cat I’ve killed?” Ravager asked, bringing his sword forward. There was a sharp clang as the blade was deflected by the force of a weighted arrow hitting the shaft. Speedy stood at the edge of the rooftop, a second arrow already nocked.

Beast Boy lunged just as Speedy let loose the second arrow. The tiger hissed and backed off Ravager, the arrow protruding from its flank.

“Sorry!” Speedy yelled. Ravager flung a bag of trash upward in her direction, causing her to skitter backward onto the roof.

Beast Boy shifted into the form of a bug, watching the arrow fall to the ground. Then he shifted back to his human form. The wound was much smaller now, more of a prick in his shoulder than the full wound it was in the tiger’s body. “I can’t shift up until I heal,” he shouted. “Someone tell Bushido and Red Robin to head him off!”

Starfire flew back to catch Bushido and Red Robin. Speedy shook her head. “I’m on this!” she yelled. She had something to prove after that arrow. She wouldn’t be the one who screwed everything up.

Ravager’s feet pounded the pavement as he redirected himself toward the parking garage. As soon as he was on wheels, he would have a distinct advantage over everyone but the two fliers. He could make it that far, and he wasn’t against pulling out his pistol on the orange-skinned girl if it came down to it. The same could be said for the boy. If he was shot when he was large, he could shrink and the wound would be less severe. If he shot the kid when he was a bird, shifting back to normal would mean the wound increased in size. He was fully prepared to go that far if it meant getting away.

He hit the ramp at the garage and found himself faced with a swordsman.

“On your honor, I demand that you fight me,” said Bushido, hands tight on the grip of his ancestor’s sword.

Ravager shook his head. “I’m not very honorable.”

Sparking a lighter, he tossed it at the vehicle he’d rigged just in case it had come to this. That was one of the Terminator’s mandates:  Plan ahead, even if you never even once need it. Because the time you do, you don’t want to be caught in the cold. Judging from the heat emanating from the car explosion, Ravager wouldn’t be in the cold anytime soon.

Bushido dove for cover, showered in glass and other debris. Ravager sprinted past him, a floor up before he even considered getting up.
Two more floors, he thought, and he was home free.

ed Robin lay in wait, crouched on the ceiling of the parking garage. He’d lodged himself between the two concrete barriers that held the roof level up. The motorcycle under him seemed like the most likely vehicle for anyone trying to get away in a quick fashion. It was dark, quick, and easily concealed once someone reached their destination.

He heard the car explosion and knew that Ravager was on his way.

The steps came toward the motorcycle. Tim dropped from where he was lodged, flipping over and landing in a crouch on his feet. “Stop there, Ravager. Your getaway stops here,” he said, mustering a deep, rustling voice that hurt his throat.

“You know, I’d say you might have a point,” Ravager said, dragging Speedy with his sword blade at her neck. “But as of right now, I think I have the upper hand. What do you think?”

Tim froze.

Bushido crept up the ramp, soot and blood mixing together on his face.

Starfire hovered at the edge of the garage, her arms glowing with energy.

A green raven perched on the concrete ledge.

A single tear dropped from Speedy’s eye.

“Don’t move, kids, or Little Miss Arrow loses her head…”

To Be Continued!