damian calls the shots (forthecowl) wrote in doorslogs, @ 2012-06-05 17:09:00 |
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Entry tags: | damian wayne, red hood |
Who: Jason Todd and Damian Wayne
Where: Let's run away to Atlantic Wonder City
When: Todayish
What: Jason saves little baby Damian :3
Warning: Serious violence
In the middle of the underground Wonder City, between the broken down carriages and closed shops, the Talons put little Damian on display. Behind a glass case that was once used to show off the latest model of robot guardian, he was tied up and drugged, bright blue eyes dazed from behind a black mask. His outfit was different; black and gold as if to make a point that he wasn’t a Robin any longer and intended to shame the Talons out of their own name. Well, that wasn’t working out so well for him, now was it?
Above the case he was preserved in, two Talons in executioner-like masks, black robes and golden goggles watched for intruders. They would let the little Wayne die slowly inside of his glass coffin and then bring him back to life as a Talon, making him the true, mindless leader of their assassin tribe. It was a trick, a backhanded promise for control over the undead monsters. Damian might have survived the maze, might have killed their leader in a battle to the death, but that didn’t mean he could destroy their undead guild. His only choice after showing his worth was becoming one of them.
Damian’s mind swam with disjointed memories. He recalled the maze, the battle, the Talons swooping on top of him like falling clouds. When he opened his eyes to see the glass case they had put him in, he made a sluggish struggle against the restraints like it would make a difference. He tried to scream, but nothing got past the gag in his mouth. “Be still, little Wayne. Glory shall be yours forever.” A Talon whispered from above like a loving mother. He scoffed. Damian was getting really tired of adults who thought they knew best.
Jason had made only one stop before heading for Wonder City - the Batcave. He still knew his way in, and managed to access the computer, although admittedly, that might have had something to do with the fact that Damian had left the thing open to precisely the file he'd been looking for.
Jason wasn't familiar with Wonder City, and he'd never heard of the Talons. All he knew was that the brat had gotten himself into more trouble than he can handle, and now required a rescue. Really, this sort of thing should be Bruce's job - the kid was the new Robin, wasn’t he? And wasn't Bruce supposed to be a responsible father, the sort that swooped in and helped out when his son got in over his head? But Jason knew, perhaps better than anyone else, that sometimes, even when Bruce wanted to swing to the rescue, he couldn’t make it there on time.
Jason left contacting him to the Selina and her girl, and read up just enough on Wonder City and the Talons to get an idea of what he was facing and where to go. An entire city underneath Gotham, built by Ra's. How had he never heard of it before? How had no one ever discovered it? But that was inconsequential, it seemed. He took the path indicated in the file down through the sewers, deep into the dank bowels of the city.
Coming out through a grate into a shadowed corner of Wonder City was awe-inspiring, even for Jason. The place was a moldering, musty time capsule of the nineteenth century, and it had been under the feet of Gothamites for over a hundred years, untouched and unknown. How it had been wiped so completely from the history books was beyond him, but Ra's likely had something to do with it. It didn't escape him that he was being forced to rescue the man's grandson from the center of one of his many grand, insane projects.
Lazarus power. A novel idea, if it weren't so revolting. Would Jason ever get away from the Lazarus pits? Now there were two to worry about in Gotham alone. Finding a way to shut them down was currently making it higher and higher to the top of his priorities list. They were too dangerous, too unpredictable, too loathesome. Damian and the Cat didn't know what they were dealing with. For the good of anybody they were stupid enough to try to pitch into one, and for his own peace of mind, he'd find a way to eradicate them.
But that was down the line. Right now he needed to find Damian, and as he clambered to the top of one of the ruined buildings. The place was uncomfortably quiet, the air damp and close. The Hood helmet presented a simple HUD to his vision, enhancing his sight in the darkness and providing a few other neat tricks for sticky situations. It picked out moving figures in the dark ahead, standing beside the glass case.
Damian. So, he really did need a full tilt rescue, locked up in his little birdcage.
Jason slid around the side of a building and climbed the side, moving as swiftly and as quietly as possible. An old, half-rotted wooden crane extended into an unfinished building close-by, and he crept along its edge, crawling slowly. If he moved too quickly, it would break, but in a moment that wouldn't matter much.
Jason reached into one of the pouches along his belt and pulled out a small black disk. He pressed the center, then threw it into the air above the cage, leaping back off the crane and onto the rooftop as it split and fell under his weight.
Microgrenade. There was just enough time to shout "Duck!", since Damian could at least drop his head to keep his eyes clear, before the grenade detonated and shattered the glass.
Damian was busy trying to figure out how many Talons were watching the case and if they had found the knives stitched into his sleeves for incidents such as this. When the flash of red from above and the hooded voice called, he couldn’t wipe that genuinely surprised look from his face. Roger had told Wren to ask Jason Todd to come, but Damian had a hard time believing the jaded ex-Robin would actually make the trek down to Wonder City. This was one of the few times he was glad to be wrong.
Tucking his head down to his chest with a grin, Damian braced for the blast that demolished the glass case he was behind and blew back the two Talons guarding it. His body fell forward onto the cobblestone path, face pressed against the old stone as he tried to focus. He needed his utility belt. His knives. If they were gone for good, he’d just take whatever the Talons had on them. “Untie me!” Damian shouted with that unintentional bite of the Al Ghul. They had to move fast. The Talons didn’t like their nest being disturbed.
The Hood hit the ground rolling a few seconds later, dropping halfway down the front of the ramshackle building, grabbing a splintering window sill, and then dropping to the cobbles. He hit his feet to the ground and popped up with all speed, sprinting over to Damian and plucking out the knife from the sheath at his leg, slicing it down Damian's bonds so fast that anyone less trained with a blade would have cut a long line down his back. Not Jason. He used the guns whenever they seemed useful, and he pulled one from his waist a second later, but knives were his real specialty, like an extension of his arm. "It's your lucky day, brat" he said, standing in front of Damian, looking up and behind for where the Talons might drop. "Just happened to be in the neighborhood."
Maybe it was a bad sign that they were both ex-Robins with a talent in knife work. Damian tried not to think about it. Luck hadn’t brought Jason here and though it was brief, the little bird’s face looked grateful. “Antique shopping?” Damian asked, jumping to his feet and briefly stretching his back and arms. “Here’s what you need to know about Talons. Super strong, very fast, unbelievably sloppy.” He smirked as the two Talons that were guarding him dropped into view. The blast had ruined their costumes, but otherwise unhurt. The Talons were brutal, but Damian and Jason were taught to look for weaknesses. It was the Talon’s blood thirst that got them in the end, that made them swipe too early or forget to duck.
Both Talons had swords on them (no utility belt to speak of) and Damian silently decided he’d take one of those blades for himself. Waiting for one of them to attack him, Damian carefully went on the defense. He didn’t seem interested in making any blows yet, just waiting for that perfect window of opportunity. Eventually, the Talon lunged too far and Damian snapped the sword out of the man’s hand and proceeded to cut the undead thing up like dinner. He didn’t see the other Talons waiting for them above. Watching the two birds dance.
Jason caught that look of gratitude, his own expression invisible behind the featureless red helmet. "Yeah. I was looking for an antique bird cage, shame I had to blow that one up."
The Talons, as they dropped into view, were a new variety of weird, but he'd seen so many strains in the past that he didn't flinch. They were just one more strain of the same virus he'd been fighting all his life. Damian took the Talon's sword before Jason had a chance to follow through on his instinct to arm him. The brat could take care of himself - even Jason could grudgingly admit that.
The Talon who'd picked Jason for an opponent was cautious after taking the grenade blast, apparently assuming he had more like it up his sleeve. He did, but they were being held in reserve for tougher opponents down the line. True to Damian's word, though, the Talon got fed up with waiting after a few feints and dodges and came in the for kill, apparently assuming the range of its sword would keep it from harm's way. Jason came far into the creature's swing, darting against the outside of its arm and jamming his long knife-blade into the creature's neck with a satisfying sink. Undead, supernatural, or whatever the hell they were, it didn't change the cold fact of how knives met flesh. He ripped the knife to the side, then sliced deep into the creature's torso for good measure, plucking the sword from its hand as it fell.
Sword in one hand, knife in the other, Jason turned to Damian to say some other stupid quip before movement from above caught his eye. "Robin," he said, warning, forgetting his new nickname for the kid in favor of making sure he looked up, and quick.
Damian plunged the sword deep into the Talon’s heart, twisting and turning the blade to make sure the organ was properly demolished. From the corner of his eye, he could see Jason brutally make work of the other Talon and knew Roger was right for calling him in for the job. Batman would try to string every single one of these monsters up. Jason didn’t argue, didn’t question. He just killed. He too would have made a worthy follower of his grandfather, but no one who knew the true selfishness behind that old man would ever sign up for that.
When Jason referred to him as his little bird name, Damian looked up with a heavy roll of his eyes. “I’m not R-” He started, but a swift boot to the head stopped him cold. From above, four more Talons swooped on top of them. All of them angry, bloodthirsty and in for the kill. Damian struggled from under them, sweeping his blade around to knock one off his feet before rolling out of the way. “We have to get out of here.” Damian’s voice wavered a little with a small panic.
“You can not escape,” a Talon’s voice boomed from behind his cowl. “You both shall serve the Council of the Owls for eternity. The streets will run red with the blood of the powerful.” The Talon stepped closer as Damian teetered to his feet. He didn’t want to admit it, but the strain of the past couple days was finally getting to him. All he wanted, more than anything else, was to curl up on Iris’s couch and sleep the summer away.
Jason saw the boot connect with Damian's head, and then more Talons were on them. One came from ahead, and he heard another drop behind, so he darted forward and engaged the first while throwing the knife behind him at the second. There was a sound of impact, but that would just slow the thing down, and he struck hard and fast with the sword, driving in with furious strength and wasting no time on finesse. Bloodlust might be a weakness of the Talons, but he'd made anger a strength of his, and he drove the Talon back with a grim sort of determination.
He brought the sword down on the creature's arm, lopping it neatly off while pulling back, putting the other Talon in front of him. But the thing kept circling, despite the knife sticking out of its shoulder, and he saw it pulling it out from the corner of his eye. Hell. The one that spoke sparked rage in Jason. "I don't serve anyone," he said, voice as cold as the buried, dark depths of the Talons. He had more in common with these creatures than he cared to admit - all dead in one way or another, all up and fighting and killing when they should still be in the ground.
It was clear that while they could hold them off, their odds of defeating them while outnumbered were slim, particularly since the brat was a little off his game - drugged, maybe, and probably at the point of exhaustion from whatever earlier fight had left him here. He slashed wildly into the Talons crowding around Damian, separating them long enough to come up beside him, grab an arm, and start dragging him in the direction of the grate he'd entered through. "Get a move on, brat. I don't know about you, but I'm not going to be anybody's toy assassin."
Damian nodded, throwing the sword wildly at the pack of Talons before taking Jason’s hand and getting on his feet. This had to have been the dumbest stunt he had ever tried to pull off. He could already imagine the lecture he’d get not only from Batman, but Selina and Steph and the entire stupid family. There was even a chance that his father would completely disown him for acting out, but then maybe that was just part of growing up. Jason didn’t turn out like Grayson or Drake because Batman failed him, but what happened when the sidekick was doing all the rule breaking?
He scrambled towards the grate with the Red Hood, prying the metal off before slipping through. The Talons weren’t finished chasing him or the rest of masks in Gotham, but they couldn’t follow the two birds through tiny spaces and underground mazes they hadn’t built themselves. “I’m starving.” Damian whispered childishly after the howling of the Talons was distant enough and the buzz of Gotham could be heard once again overhead.