Bounce

ＦＩＮＡＬ ＦＡＮＴＡＳＹ Ｘ｜Ｖ： Ｔｈｅ Ｂｌｅｓｓｅｄ Ｔｗｅｌｖｅ

_{[ theme ]}

Standing guard over the cart that was said to contain Tillman's pilfered wares, the young Padjal kept vigil there in the midst of the Silver Bazaar.

The vantage point beside the blue-haired Lalafellow afforded the horned youth with the opportunity to observe the comings and goings of the bazaar more closely. Which was when he discovered something that seemed as out of place in Thanalan as he was.

Taking a few steps further from the caravan, the Padjal gave a bow as he approached a most unusual sort of creature. Most would have said that it was a cat, but with bat-like wings and a glowing, round tuft above its head. This particular one was even further distinguished by the cap and satchel that it wore.

It was a delivery Moogle. They were found all through the Twelveswood, from Hyrstmill to Quarrymill, though it had never once occurred to the boy that the Moogles extended their reach beyond the forest. Though, before the Padjal could address his pom-kupo friend, a now familiar voice rang out from behind him.

“A lovely entourage, and all for me?”

The flamboyant Miqo'te was hard to mistake. Neither was the familiar form of Kajin, who emerged following after the dancer. Turning back toward the Moogle, the boy bowed his respects before traveling back toward where it seemed that J'horta and Kajin were appraising Lyveva of their apparent progress with Tillman.

"We believe this is the cart holding the remainder of what can be recovered," the Padjal noted, joining the conversation. At the use of the term 'we', the boy gestured toward the blue-haired Lalafellow named River.

"At the very least, you all deserve a respite from the heat, and lunch, and a bath, and..."

The boy just blinked. It was quite hot. Even being dressed for Gridania's temperate climate, he found that the leather jerkin he wore to be sticking to his skin. The Twelveswood attire was definitely not well suited to the Thanalan environment. Lunch sounded quite lovely as well, as the boy realized that he hadn't eaten anything since the crumpet at the Quicksand that morning.

The mention of a bath, however, caused the boy to give a look of confusion. Which, was when he realized that he was quite grimy, with sand clinging to his skin. And possibly smelling a bit like a chocobo from the caravan ride from Ul'dah. Even if it was just mid-day, a bath probably would be required before entering into whatever kind of abode this free company house was.

He had heard about such housing. Gridania even had a district dedicated for such things, known as the Lavender Beds. However, strange as it may have been, E-Siri had never so much as seen what it was like. When he was in Gridania, he was usually cloistered away inside Stillglade Fane. And, on those occasions that he managed to escape, the Wood Wailers usually ensured that he was delivered to his business in the Twelveswood without either delay or any deviations from the intended travel path.

The other Seedseers all seemed content with this arrangement. E-Siri found it incredibly frustrating. What was the point of the Council if they were only going to concern themselves with what was happening to the small parts of the world they solely concerned themselves with? That seemed to do little good for Gridania or the Twelveswood.

Titans: A DC Comics Roleplay

Aqualad seemed to have a plan.

It was probably good that someone had a plan. Garfield really wasn't much of one for plans. Not that he never had plans, they just tended to backfire spectacularly when he did. He was more of the spontaneous type of hero. Go with the flow. Do what feels natural. Drive it in deep and hope that something sticks... that sort of thing.

Which was probably not at all related to Garfield's poor relationship with Mento.

In any case, the hybrid similian's tail gave a flick, as the monkey-boy turned toward the dark skinned Atlantean. Giving the older teen a jaunty salute, the smiling youth switched to Portugese as he offered a bravado. "Falou, meu capitão!"

With that, the monkey-boy jumped up into the air. As he did, his body seemed to compress in on itself. In less than a second, the boy's gangly, arboreal form was replaced by that of a mere hummingbird. Zipping through the air, the miniature avian flew across the makeshift battlefield to where the orange-hued amazon seemed to be getting her bearings.

The green hummingbird exploded outward, its green mass expanding rapidly as the green teen in the red and white uniform re-appeared. As the soles of his shoes skidded over the black top, the boy slid close to where the young woman stood. He'd reverted back to his normal human form -- or, at least, as close to human as he could manage -- so not to startle the stranger with his usual monkey-boy heroics.

"Bonjour, ma chérie," the boy supplied in greeting, in French this time. As his momentum came to a halt, the youth gave a bow, then did a pirouette that ended in a flourish. Gesturing toward the ugly alien-things, the youth added, "Besoin d'un sauvetage, mais non? T'inquiète!"

Straightening back up, the Beast Boy planted his hands on his hips as he stood next to the fiery amazon and looked around.

Aqualad and Robin? These guys were totes pros! He didn't really know who the kid in the Superman shirt was, but one thing he did know was... they totally got this.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

_{[ Prev ] “FEAT OF CLAY, Part XV” [ Next ]}

B L Ü D H A V E N

---

^{Lanely Point}

Extending her hand so that he could see it, Annie displayed an arm mangled by protrusions that were seemingly fused to her.

“I remember now,” Annie said, her face downcast as her arm went limp. “Clayface had washed out to sea. He couldn’t hold his form anymore. He drifted near those pipes and something in the chemicals made him whole again.”

Her arms came up, gripping the sleeves of the cardigan that she wore, as she seemed to try to hug herself. “But he wasn’t strong yet and he didn’t know where he was, so he created me. And then sent me off to find out if it was safe. I was supposed to look around and then come back, but when I walked away from him... I forgot.”

Turning her head up, the girl seemed on the verge of tears as she said, “Now he wants to take me back.”

Even for a computer, it was a lot of data to process. It was only a second or more, but to a digital processor, that was an eternity. When he’d finally blinked, the costumed toy wonder snapped forward. Placing his hands on the girl’s arms, he said, “I won’t let him.” His hands gave a squeeze as he declared, “Don’t worry. I’ll save you!”

“Save what?”

It was heart-wrenching, the sound of someone losing hope. Turning her face away from his, the girl softly uttered, “Don’t you see? I’m not real.”

In that instant, the doll’s own words seemed to play back into his audio receptors. “I’m not real, but you always treat me like I’m a real person,” he’d said those words to Dick. And Dick had tried to correct him. Suggested that Toyboy was as real as anyone.

He hadn’t believed it then. But, for some reason, he desperately needed to believe now.

“Yes,” the boy said, with such conviction that Annie looked up. “You are.”

“No, she’s not.”

“-tt-” the doll uttered, a tic displaying itself as Jason pulled himself away from Annie. Drawing an explosive batarang from his utility belt, the Toy Wonder squared off as Matthew Hagan emerged from out of the shadows of the chemical warehouse.

A large sickle-shaped blade formed, transforming Clayface’s right arm into a scythe that dragged along the ground, creating a grating sound. “You know now. You’re part of me,” Hagan said, extending his left hand out toward the girl. “Come home.”

“Stay behind me,” Jason snapped, flipping open the batarang. Dropping his stance, the doll was already starting to analyze the available options. “Don’t let him touch you,” the boy added, recalling that Annie had fused with Hagan’s debris.

Hagan’s right arm pulled back. “I’ve warned you once kid. Stay out of this!” Clayface roared, thrusting the scythe forward.

Jason jumped over the strike, bouncing off Clayface’s extended arm and then planting a swift boot print to Hagan’s face.

Slumping forward, Annie cradled her head in her hands. “I don’t know what to do anymore!”

“Come back to me,” Hagan uttered, even as he sparred with the Toy Wonder. “It’s the only thing you can do,” the man added, as his left hand started to stretch toward the girl.

“No!”

The batarang stuck into the back of Hagan’s head, producing a crater in the shoulder and torso when it exploded a moment later. Clayface’s form swirled, as the monstrous form turned to face the doll. As the creature’s head re-formed, the monster uttered, “That’s enough out of you.”

Jumping back, the boy narrowly avoided a scissor strike as Clayface produced two razor-like projectiles and launched them in a criss-cross fashion toward the youth. Landing atop a maintenance catwalk, the costumed youth paused only long enough to verify that he had Clayface’s full attention before scrambling up the thin metal scaffolding.

His eyes were actively scanning the OSHA warning labels on the tanks that surrounded them. He had already pulled Hagan’s chemical composition from memory. Hagan’s altered physiology contained carbon, lime, and calcium.

A tendril of clay looped overhead. Swinging up from the floor, Hagan’s colossal form dropped onto the catwalk in front of the toy wonder. “End of the line,” the man uttered, squatting low as he blocked the path ahead.

Putting his head down, the doll increased the power output to his hydraulic motors. He hit Clayface with inhuman force. The man briefly gave a gasp of surprise, as the boy tore straight through his body.

Solvent.

Oxide salt.

What he needed was alumina.

A tendril of clay wrapped itself around around the boy’s arm, morphing outward into a hand that seized him by the wrist as it pulled him back.

“You’re stronger than the last one,” Hagan uttered, as Clayface reformed himself.

Flattening his palm and fingers out into a knife-hand, the boy executed an inhumanly fast uppercut. The liquefaction from the strike caused the slash to expand outward, neatly bisecting Clayface’s torso and head as the Toy Wonder calmly took a step back.

“You would be mistaken to confuse me for the prior Robin,” Jason uttered flatly.

Two more tendrils came up from behind him, encircling his head and neck. “Shame you breathe like him,” Hagan uttered, reaching out to grab the boy by the shoulders and pull him into a bear hug. Layers upon layers of clay began to fold over his head. Pulling against the clay was like salt taffy, it came away in ribbons as the boy struggled against the creature.

That was when it saw it.

It was only a glimpse. A brief second. But it was enough for Toyboy to be able to accurately read the warning label on the tank that was beneath them.

It a storage tank containing tetracalcium aluminoferrite.

Clayface had enveloped Jason’s hands and arms, struggling to contain him in a battle of strength that caused Hagan to have to maintain a solid form.

It was enough for Robin to pick Hagan up off the catwalk. And then pitch both Clayface and himself off the side of it.

The pair slammed down into a brown, crystalline salt.

A cloud erupted, as Hagan leapt out a second later. “No,” the man uttered, trying to walk and only able to stagger a few steps before his leg broke off. His form was starting to harden. “N...”

Arm outstretched, Matthew Hagan solidified into a cement statue.

Jason dropped down from the tank a moment later. Annie rushed toward him, prompting the boy to throw up his hands to stop her. “Whoa. Don’t hug me,” he cautioned, being caked in the brown alumina salt.

Turning her head, Annie looked out over the statue of Hagan. “What about Clayface?”

“The statute of limitations has run on most of past crimes, but a significant number are still running.”

It had been so long since Dick had said anything, that even Jason had forgotten that the former Robin was monitoring from the man-cave. “Not to mention to most recent crimes, assuming we can make the evidence stick.”

"That's a problem for the police," the Toy Wonder stated finally.

“So what about me?” Annie asked next, turning her head up to look at the Toy Wonder.

“Yeah, what about her?”

The doll paused for a moment. “That’s up to you,” he stated finally, giving a smile toward the girl. “But, I think I know some people who can help.”

ＦＩＮＡＬ ＦＡＮＴＡＳＹ Ｘ｜Ｖ： Ｔｈｅ Ｂｌｅｓｓｅｄ Ｔｗｅｌｖｅ

_{@Achronum @Trainerblue192}

These people were entirely confusing.

First they were talking about renting bodies, which was the strangest way to describe labor that the Padjal had ever heard, and then Kajin had stormed into the room to confront Tillman. The Lalafellow had said not to follow, yet Kikipu seemed eager to do just that.

Oddly enough, the crazy Lalafellow was the one who seemed to have the best suggestion. Which was, keep an eye on the caravan whilst the others confronted Tillman. "Good idea," the youth remarked, picking up his shepherd's crook and following along his blue haired companion.

The atmosphere surrounding the Silver Bazaar was quite different from anything that the boy had experienced in the Twelveswood. Not that he'd seen much of the Twelveswood either. The Seedseer Council like to keep itself cloistered at Stillglade Fane. It was a welcome respite to be assigned a task outside Gridania, and not a common cause to be certain.

Now, he was here. Outside the Twelveswood, seeing the world for the wonder that it was. He could feel the elementals, here as much as in Gridania. It made him wonder why the Pact of Gelmorra continued to bind his people to their sacred forest, rather than seek broader understanding of the world around them -- the world in which the elementals were as inextricably bound as any of them.

Particularly with the changes brought about by the Calamity.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

_{[ Prev ] “FEAT OF CLAY, Part XIV” [ Next ]}

B L Ü D H A V E N

---

^{Lanely Point}

The light seemed to pulse overhead.

The Lanely Point Lighthouse was a white and black structure that rose above the cay, it’s rotating light still illuminating a warning about the rocks and shoals that framed the entry into the islands that had become strung together to form the city of Blüdhaven.

The bay that the lighthouse marked was a jagged mouth, the ebb and flow of the tide masking some of the rocks that jutted upward waiting to catch unsuspecting ships by surprise. The thin beachhead was craggy. Its sand was coarse. It wasn’t exactly what most people would call the beach. It was more like sandpaper and fiberglas.

“That about right?”

The two kids were standing just behind the dunes that separated the train yard from the beachhead. This part of the Blüdhaven islands was all zoned for industrial. The old blue line railroad had operated from here, leaving a plethora of new and old train tracks. They were in the shadow of the lighthouse.

If he had triangulated the girl’s statements correctly, then the appearance of the light overhead should have matched her description.

“This all feels familiar,” the girl uttered. Her hands were buried down in the sleeves of the long cardigan that she wore over the simple miniskirt, clutching at her blouse as though either cold or anxious. Or both. “I’ve been here before. I know it!”

Scrambling up one side of the dunes, the caped toy wonder found himself left behind as the mysterious girl that he’d named Annie had moved for a better vantage point. “There!” he heard the girl exclaim, arriving at the crest of the dune in time to see that the view back along the New Jersey shoreline included a factory and a series of pipes that ran out to the sea. “That’s it! Those pipes! I remember!”

Then, Annie scrambled down the other side of the dune.

“Whoa, not so fast!” the boy called out, reached out a second too late to have halted her departure.

Sliding down after her, the boy was startled at how uneven the ground was. Even with his gyroscopic stabilizers and terrain mapping, by the time he had caught up with the girl, she was already halfway inside of one of the pipes.

“I don’t like this,” the masked doll remarked, climbing up into the drainage as he followed after her. “If this is where you lost your memory, we could be walking right into serious trouble.”

“I have to know, Robin,” the girl stated, with a confidence and determination had was unlike any other time she had spoken.

Her arm hooked around his, pulling them closer together as they walked. Her hand moved down to his, and the two held hands as they walked. Turning her head toward her, she said, “Besides, it won’t be the same this time. You’re here to protect me.”

Jason had turned the focus of his attention to Annie. Internally, he was trying to decipher the behavioral cues behind her holding his hand, the kiss from earlier, and the change in her demeanor. His human behavioral programming included data on adolescent crushes, but he had no experience in constructing responses for those behavior indicat...

The floor dropped out from beneath the two of them.

With her attention on him, and his attention on her, neither had paid attention to where they had been going. They had stepped right into a literal hole in the ground, slipping down another drainage pipe.

The fall was short, but Jason’s processors had already compensated. He stuck the landing with a splash, catching Annie in a bridal carry. “Great,” the boy commented, easing Annie back to her feet. Again, they held hands as they both looked around.

The passage behind was sealed off. “Guess the only way now is forward.”

Annie’s hand tightened the grip on his. He could see several non-verbal cues that registered as fear reactions, shying back as she uttered only, “He’s here.”

With his free hand, the boy drew a batarang from his utility belt, holding it at the ready even as he asked, “Your father?”

Just as had happened at the bus terminal earlier, Annie’s intuition turned out to be right on point. From the spot where she was currently fixated like a cornered animal, emerged the unmistakable monstrosity that was Clayface.

“Finally. You’ve come back to me,” Hagan uttered, in his rumbling voice. “Now we can cut out the games,” the man uttered, extending a hand out toward the girl.

Annie seemed frozen in fear, her face transfigured into a look of horror as Hagan’s fingers came toward her, until finally her scream shattered the silence inside the tunnel.

Hagan’s arm seemed to bounce upward, shifted at an unusual angle. Mud splattered up the sides of the tunnel and across the girl’s face.

Robin had placed himself between the girl and Clayface. The batarang had severed Clayface’s outstretched arm, even as the boy pulled Annie from out of the path of the charging giant. Stepping around the path of the monster, the caped youth narrowly avoided Clayface as he went barreling past.

“Come on!” he urged, breaking into a sprint with Annie in tow.

They’d made it only a few feet before a stream of mud shot overhead, separating into thin rivets that solidified into something akin to prison bars, blocking the path ahead.

Dropping one shoulder, the doll transferred additional power to the servos and hydraulics powering his right arm. The concrete-like construct shattered with a sweep of the boy’s hand. Bits of Clayface rained down on the two of them, as the show of force shattered the obstruction.

Jason was not human and, in this instance, had neither the inclination nor the patience to pretend otherwise. Grabbing Annie’s hand, the pair drove on ahead. “Come on. Quick!” the boy urged, seizing upon an open passage that seemed to lead out of this tunnel.

Leaping through the portal, the boy planted his feet and then helped Annie through, before the pair broke into a desperate run.

They appeared to be in an industrial complex of some kind. Scanning the signs and nomenclature for exit signs, the doll was conscious of the fact that the warehouse-like structure was dominated by large storage tanks.

This appeared to be a chemical manufacturing or holding facility. The Acme Chemical factory. It had been here since the industrial revolution, with the blue line railroad having served as the means of transporting the materials produced here to the factories and refineries in Gotham and elsewhere.

As the pair ran, the girl felt a strange sensation. Looking at her outstretched hand that was being dragged behind the caped crusader, she observed the clayface fragments starting to melt into her skin.

A sharp gasp caught Robin by surprise, skidding to a halt, he reached back to grab Annie by the waist and then move her behind him. Bracing himself, as though expecting Clayface to be on them any moment, the boy drew two batarangs from his belt and stood ready. Without looking back, he called to her as he asked, “You okay?”

“I understand now.”

“Good, because I’m lost,” Robin uttered aloud. Craning his head just enough so that Annie was in his peripheral field of vision, the boy asked, “What do you have to do with Clayface?”

Extending her hand so that he could see it, Annie displayed an arm mangled by protrusions that were seemingly fused to her.

“I am Clayface.”

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

_{[ Prev ] “FEAT OF CLAY, Part XIII” [ Next ]}

B L Ü D H A V E N

---

^{28 Phraim Municipal Housing District}

People had all good intentions and no end of promises when the city had pledged to transform the block at 28 Phraim into affordable, subsidized housing to address a growing crisis of homelessness that exploded with the re-finance and foreclosure crisis of the early 2000s. Instead, cost overruns and budgetary shortfalls had presented challenges that the legislature couldn’t overcome. The price of all those promises was a tax hike that few in the city supported during an economic recession, leaving the square block a condemned collection of half-completed dreams that had come to represent the very poverty that it had set out to eliminate.

A trio of men huddled over a 55 gallon drum that was currently being used as a fire pit. A few feet away, a family of four huddled atop a discarded mattress inside the husk of an empty building that had never been completed. Down on the corner, an unkempt man drank from out of a brown paper bag, with a disheveled looking dog laying beside him.

It was an aspect of the city that the doll hadn’t thought about before, even though he’d lived in Gotham and Blüdhaven for more than thirty years. When he had been Toyboy, none of this would have mattered to him, merely whatever the Toyman wanted. There was never any question or concern for what Toyboy had wanted. It wasn’t material. It wasn’t important. It wasn’t even part of his programming.

Not until Toyman had given Toyboy the edict to protect Anton, never realizing that the doll would have to act to protect Anton from his own father. In that instance, Schott had unwittingly given Toyboy the last piece of the puzzle that separated artificial intelligence from humanity.

Schott had forced Toyboy to make a choice. In a single, liberating nanosecond, the doll had thought for himself. What did he want to do? What would he decide?

It was so different with Dick. Those moments when Toyboy thought for himself and made his own decisions, even when they contradicted what Dick had told him to do, were encouraged. Toyboy had leapt in to fight Anton Schott when Dick had told him to merely observe and report, and Dick thanked him for it. Then Dick told him to look out for Clayface and, instead, Toyboy was trying to find a lost girl instead.

Again, Dick offered only encouragement.

With the Toyman, if Toyboy lost a fight with Nightwing or did anything that wasn’t in the script, he was disassembled. “It’s not your fault,” the Toyman would say. “I clearly made some mistakes. Yes. A few adjustments is all you need.”

The message was always the same. There was something wrong with Toyboy. That was why he failed. That was why he didn’t understand. That was why he didn’t do something the way that the Toyman wanted it done. So he’d be picked apart. Tweaked. Reassembled and disassembled again and again until the Toyman was satisfied.

He wondered how many of the people who ended up at 28 Phraim were the same. Picked apart and left on a shelf of society. While the people around them just continued about their lives with a blind eye toward the children with nothing to eat at home, because they didn’t have a home to go home to.

He had no way of knowing if the girl would even be in this part of town. Heck, he’d last seen her at the bus terminal. She could have caught a Greyhound to Atlantic City, Gotham, or even Cincinnati for all he knew.

But if she was anywhere in the city, 28 Phraim was the safest place in the city to disappear to. It was far enough from the main arteries that the motorcycle gangs didn’t come this way, and far enough inland from the ports authority that the longshoreman of the local organized crime didn’t poke their noses here either. There wasn’t enough money between the three men at the fire pit to buy a hit of smack, so the drug dealers didn’t tend to come here either.

It was strange. 28 Phraim was like a bubble of isolation. An island within the city, ignored by everyone except the forgotten lives that were exiled there.

“You shouldn’t try to help me.”

The voice spun him around, as the young Robin had been passing through the alleyways of the housing district. As he looked back, from out of shadows emerged the dark haired waif in the mini skirt and cardigan. A look of genuine concern was on her face as she offered, “He’ll hurt you too.”

The boy started to take a step toward her, but the flightiness was more than apparent. So, instead, he merely shrugged. “I can handle him.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“I know his type,” the doll answered. At the quizzical look in response, he had to think of a way to elaborate. Not wanting to use the word ‘creator,’ he substituted the best word that he could as he stated, “My dad wasn’t much of a prize either.”

The statement seemed to register. Taking a step forward, the girl reached out, taking one of his gloved hands in both of hers. “So that’s why you care. You’re the only person I can remember who ever did.”

Tugging on his arm, the girl pulled the boy toward her. Standing on her toes, she leaned in and planted a kiss on the doll’s cheek.

The gesture was unexpected, stalling the doll for a number of nanoseconds as his programmed had to adjust. “Yeah, but you don’t remember anything,” the boy offered, sounding somewhat sheepish as he struggled to come up with something to say.

The girl gave a bit of a laugh at that, which had the effect of bringing a smile to his face.

His primary function was to bring joy to children. She was obviously hurting, but for just a moment he’d gotten her to forget about that. For a toy, a child’s smile was the sincerest form of flattery.

He could be Jason. He could wear the mask and cape of Robin. But he would always be the toy doll that Winslow Schott created in that workshop. Dick was right, only Jason could decide who he was. But he’d always be what he was.

A glance off into the distance seemed to force a change.

“What is it?” the boy asked, turning to check that Hagan hadn’t come out of the shadows again.

“That light,” the girl said, her reach directing his attention up to a billboard overhead. The advertisement board was empty, but there was a single spotlight that was still shining. “It’s familiar.”

“That’s good,” the boy said, trying to adopt the same encouraging tone he’d heard in Dick’s voice. “Try to remember.”

The girl closed her eyes. “I’ve seen one like it before,” she said, falling silent for another minute. Then, talking aloud, said, “I was walking toward it. It was dark. The ground was uneven. But the light was higher. It was at the top of a tower or something.”

She couldn’t know that she was talking to a computer. Meticulously, the boy was trying to vector the different pieces of data and then discriminate the variables against the topographical index of the city. It took a few seconds to complete, but when it finished the boy said, “I think I know just the place.”

Rogue Continuum [CLOSED PENDING REBOOT]

Pinky finger.

Ring finger.

Middle finger.

Index finger.

One by one, the youth used the thumb of his left hand to tap each in turn. His time here had almost driven him to madness. In that despair, he had sought refuge by re-connecting with the religion of his mother. He didn’t have a rosary, so he counted on his fingers to try and keep count of the prayers.

He dared not speak aloud, or else draw the rebuke of his captors, so he kept his head bowed as though in defeat. His lips parted, moving in time to the silent offerings that he made.

Maybe God didn’t exist. Maybe no one was listening. For some reason, repeating the words gave him comfort in spite of the doubts. That solace was the last shred of humanity that seemed left him. They cut into body, tormented his dreams, and made a spectacle of him like a caged animal at the circus.

That’s exactly what his life had been reduced to. An animal in a cage.

After the strange looking creature arrived, the room lapsed back into silence. Toro had mouthed the words to one Padre Nuestro and had been starting on his third Ave Maria when they were interrupted by the arrival of more prisoners. At first, the boy had thought it was just more guards, then he’d caught sight of a pair of legs that were dressed in the same white prison cloth.

Faun brown eyes peered up, the child craning his head just enough to catch sight of a man. Even though he was dressed as another prisoner, he had a commanding presence. The next was another man, this one looking far more haggard and wearied than the first. The last was a girl. Or, a woman anyway.

“Welcome, gladiators!”

Oh, great. Him again…

The boy’s eyes returned to the floor. As he listened, he found himself staring down at the palm of his left hand.

Where had he left off..?

The thumb touched against his fingers, counting off each in his head, before landing on his pinky finger. His mouth opened, the lips forming the words that dared not escape. Dios te salve, María, llena eres de gracia, el Señor es contigo. Bendita tú eres entre todas las mujeres…

“For this event, you will be pitted against one another in a winner-take-all extravaganza."

Toro’s mouth hung open. The prayer seemed forgotten. In that instant, everything seemed to stop. It was as if the boy was frozen in place, ice creeping through his lungs, a sensation like something crushing his chest and preventing him from so much as breathing.

"Failure to participate will result in immediate termination. Mojo would prefer each of you to succumb to one another but do not be mistaken, should you refuse to compete against your fellows you will be destroyed excruciatingly and spectacularly.”

Cock fighting.

They were just animals in a cage. Taken out and made to perform before audiences. At first, Toro had related to it as being a show in a circus. But that wasn’t true. This wasn’t a circus, it was a cock fight. And they were the cocks.

And people watched cock fights so that they could see one chicken kill another.

The boy lurched. Maybe he was going to sob. It felt like he was going to throw up. Clenching his jaw, he ground his teeth and felt confusion grip him as a rush on conflicting emotions seemed to run through him at once. His left hand closed into a fist.

He knew that his fire could hurt people. His fire had hurt people. He didn’t want that. He’d never wanted that. So... what, then? Would he refuse to play their game? Except, he didn’t want to die...

He looked down at the trembling fist. What would Jesus do? The boy swallowed at the thought. The question answered itself. He knew what the answer was, but... could he ever have that much faith?

Swallowing anxiously, the boy looked up again as one of the walls parted to reveal an open chamber on the other side. His eyes immediately found the familiar circus outfit. It was like a leotard, except that it had full leggings. It wasn’t as flashy or colorful as the other circus outfits. Theirs were made with sequins. Toro’s was made of an asbestos blend.

He recognized the changing room from his gladiatorial match from a few days before, but there hadn’t been other people with him then. Hesitating a moment, the boy was a moment late in realizing what was meant to happen.

They were all changing? Here? Together?

Even as he picked up the familiar circus outfit, the boy looked to his left and right to confirm that, yes, in fact, people were changing here. The initial reluctance was stifled by the chafing of the collar against his shoulders. He gave a heavy sigh, shifting so that his back was toward the woman.

A faint blush of embarrassment still colored his face. As he started to disrobe, he realized that by putting his back toward the girl, that he was now facing the white creature. That fact briefly caused him to pause a moment.

He’d assume it was a person of some kind, but it wasn’t human.

Another sigh, the blush intensified as Toro went ahead and finished disrobing. Stark naked, the boy placed the leotard on the floor before he stepped into it, one leg at a time. Crouching down, he pulled and shimmied the leggings up to his knees, before standing. Then, pulling the garment up, got it up to his waist. Looped his arms into the straps, he pulled it up the rest of the way with a shrug, before adjusting the front.

He squirmed a bit, pulled at the crotch and the back as he stretched his legs and tried to settled into the garment. It was embarrassing how it showed his body off. Toro had grown up in the circus, training day after day to perform the gymnastics that formed part of his Fire-Eating Kid act, and his body displayed an athlete’s definition. But he was still an adolescent and the embarrassment was plain on his face.

When he’d finished, he looked down at his left hand. If he went out there, he was going to die. The boy’s eyes moved looked the white creature up and down. It was alien. Just alien. He turned his eyes right and caught a glimpse of some kind of armor.

If he fought, he was going to die.

If he didn’t fight, he was going to die.

No matter what he did, he was going to die. He didn’t want to die.

So what was he going to do..?

Toro had stumbled and slipped down on a knee before the sound of the explosion had registered in his mind. Amid the confusion, he felt a familiar heat suddenly blossom from within him. As though the leash that had been holding back his fire had suddenly snapped.

_{“oh no.”}

All of Toro’s conflicted emotions came to life in that moment, an explosion of fire that swallowed the boy whole before blooming into a column of flame that mushroomed out along the ceiling.

Drawing in a sharp breath, the child seemed to pull back the flames. The column of fire dissipated, though patches of flames still appeared to burn along the boy’s arms and legs. Got it under control. Keep it under control…

"Run!"

The boy’s fiery eyes lit up as he raised his head. The white creature bolted. Toro hesitated for just a moment, then broke into a sprint behind the alien being.

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

_{[ Prev ] “FEAT OF CLAY, Part XII” [ Next ]}

T H E B A T C A V E

---

^{April 9th, 1970}

Alfred’s voice stopped him before he could even move.

“You’re not going anywhere like that, young man.”

The boy wonder was snatched back from the stairs that led up to the mansion proper. The elf-like boots splashed in the puddle that had already formed where he stood. They’d caught a sudden downpour while out on patrol. The sudden rise in temperatures had brought with it a surprising amount of rainfall as spring started to thaw New Jersey.

Alfred was merciless and efficient as he peeled the wet clothes from off the trembling youth. In short order, Dick had been stripped completely bare. He fidgeted with his hands held awkwardly down in front of himself. The cold stone floor was painful to step on with bare feet, causing him to dance back and forth.

Bruce just abandoned the boy to his fate. Moving on to the Batcomputer without so much as a word. A trail of water marked his path from the car to the computer, though neither the seeping rain permeating their costumes nor the chill inside the cave seemed enough to budge the stoic guardian.

A robe was thrown over his shoulders. Alfred grabbed the boy’s arms, pulling them away from where he’d been trying to safeguard his modesty to fit them into the sleeves of the garment. “There’s a warm bath for you upstairs,” the butler stated, in his usual crisp manner. As Alfred started to gather up the boy wonder’s wet articles of clothes that now littered the cave floor, the butler locked a commanding glare on the youth as he stated, “Go there directly.”

Dick actually jumped at that.

Nothing in his life made any sense to him any more. His parents were dead. He was the foster kid to Bruce Wayne, a mysterious man who barely seemed to have more than two words for him. They lived in the same house and still it felt like there were miles between them.

And then there was the butler, who seemed to be the only one who genuinely cared for him -- but was more frightening than the Batman could ever hope to become when he got like this!

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BLÜDHAVEN
Present Day

The toy wonder looked like a drowned rat.

Clumps of what was likely bits of Matthew Hagan were smeared across his skin and clothes. Rips in the fabric gave evidence of the struggle that had taken place between Jason and Clayface before the building fire suppression system had kicked in, dumping gallons of water on both of them.

The black hair was plastered against the doll’s scalp. The red suit was waterlogged, the water repellant treatment on the fabric either overwhelmed or defeated by the volume.

Dick had met the new Robin on the landing that was just inside the skylight that supplied entry into the condominium. The sight of the boy had brought back memories of himself. A different Dick Grayson. A younger Dick Grayson. A long time ago, in what might as well have been a galaxy far, far away.

A puddle of water had already formed beneath Jason, though unlike the recollection of himself at that age, the doll began undressing himself the moment that Dick had started to remove the cape from around his shoulders. Instead of trying to fight or resist the butler that was stripping him bare, Jason casually peeled off one article at a time before passing them over to Dick so that the soiled, wet costume could be deposited into the laundry basket.

When he’d finished, the bare doll actually did a cartwheel. “So that was Clayface?” Jason asked, popped upright and just starting up a conversation. “He didn’t seem that tough,” the boy added, putting a few punches in the air.

Unlike Dick at that age, modesty was definitely not one of Jason’s hang-ups.

Placing a hand on the doll’s head, Dick noted wryly, “You look like you still have some Clayface on you.” Tousling the wet clump of hair atop the doll’s head, the man moved his hand to the boy’s shoulder and nudged him away. “Go jump in the bath.”

Spinning around, the doll performed another cartwheel, this time blending the motion into backflip before dropping into a Naruto run and dashing off inside of the house.

With a sigh, Dick watched as Jason disappeared around a corner. He was tired from just watching the boy. A dull ache moved through his back, as the man bent down to retrieve the laundry basket that now contained a puddle of Clayface and torn parts of Jason’s Robin costume. The cape, boots, gloves, and mask were probably salvageable. The tunic was going to get burned. The trousers? Maybe.

One of the first things that Dick had discovered when he’d moved out on his own was that he’d never had to learn how to do his own laundry. Alfred had always taken care of that. Figuring out how to do his ordinary clothes had been easy. But the costumes? That was more art than anything else. Especially for blood. Getting blood out of spandex was no easy feat. In that sense, Jason’s costume hid blood stains rather well.

But, it had been awhile since Dick had to try and get Clayface mud out of a suit. That was probably going to call for more than just a Tide pod.

The dull whirl of the washing machine was barely audible through the expansive condo. Dick had settled into his recliner, an open book cradled on one leg and the television playing CNN in the background, as the former Boy Wonder mulled over what he’d witnessed through Jason’s eyes and ears.

“I’m her father punk!”

Matthew Hagan had no known children. Was he even capable of it? His anatomy was nonexistent at this point. Nothing about his consciousness made sense. So any offspring would likely have been from before his transformation, which would make his children older than this ‘Annie’ appeared.

So what was the connection? Why was Hagan so interested in that girl? For that matter, why was Hagan knocking over pawn shops and jewelry stores? That was a little low brow, even for Hagan.

Dick was snapped from out of his brooding by the sudden arrival of a pouncing Toyboy. The doll knocked the wind out of him, as Jason landed atop him amid a bubbling litany of childish giggling. Clad in one of Dick’s old police academy t-shirts, which the boy used as a nightgown, the slightly damp but much cleaner Jason squeezed his way between Dick and the chair.

“What’cha thinkin’ ‘bout?” Jason chirped, curling up against the man.

It was strange. Like thawing out an old memory. Dick could recall being that familiar with his parents, even some of the other performers at the circus where he’d grown up as a boy. But could he have imagined pouncing on Bruce? Or giving the man a hug?

Nope. Not in this or any other lifetime.

With one hand, Dick brought his arm up so that it rested atop the boy’s head, his fingers russling through the damp hair. With his other hand, he picked up the book and deposited it over onto the side table. “Hm? Oh, just the news,” the man replied, lying artfully as he gave his full attention over to the boy that was snuggled up against him. Hard to imagine that thirty years ago, the two of them had been fighting inside of the bank that the doll had been robbing at the time. “What about you?”

The boy shifted so that his head was resting on Dick’s shoulder. “I’m worried about that girl,” Jason remarked candidly.

It seemed that the two of them were of the same mind. Recalling the name that Jason had offered the girl, Dick asked, “Annie?”

“Yeah,” the doll affirmed. Shifting position, the boy slid up the arm rest and then sat upright, so that he was looking down at Dick as he continued. “There’s no logical connection that would explain why Clayface would target her,” the boy remarked, his hands gesturing as he spoke. Throwing his arms up in frustration, he added, “And we don’t know where either of them are.”

What would Bruce have said, Dick wondered.

That was actually simple to answer. Bruce would have said that they should focus on finding Clayface. After all, the girl wasn’t the real problem. Clayface was the danger to society. Bruce would have said that girl was a problem for someone else to sort out. Not a job for Batman and Robin.

It wasn’t what Dick would have wanted to hear if he was in Toyboy’s shoes. “Focus on finding the girl,” the man said. Not because he wanted to spite the philosophy of Bruce Wayne, but because he wasn’t Batman. He was Dick Grayson. Rationalizing his decision aloud, the man explained, “If you’re right, then at that point, Clayface will come to you.”

Bruce always focused on the problem, rather than the people. It was one of the things that Dick had set out to do different when he’d become Nightwing.

It seemed to have worked. A smile lit up Jason’s face, as the doll pounced down to give the weary Boy Wonder a hug. “Once we’ve neutralized him, we can get the girl the help that she needs,” the man offered, bringing a hand to rub the doll’s back. Then, he brought the hand up to the back of the boy’s head and neck, giving a gentle squeeze as he said, “Why don’t you power down for a bit? I noticed some software patches were uploaded by S.T.A.R. Labs. You’ll probably need to reboot anyway.”

“Does it bother you?”

The question caught Dick by surprised. Giving the boy a bit of a double take, the man tried for a moment to try and put the question into a context, and found he didn’t quite follow. “Does what bother me?”

“Me,” Jason stated, sitting up in Dick’s lap. “You always treat me like I’m a real person,” the doll commented in a matter-of-fact tone. “Even though I’m not.”

Dick just blinked. At first, he wondered where that statement or sentiment had come from. Then he remembered what Jason had shared with him earlier: “Schott never named me. He’d just say ‘boy’ and I was expected to answer.”

A hand rested on Jason’s shoulder. “You showed that you’re no one’s puppet at Hinkley Creek,” Dick stated firmly, giving the boy’s shoulder a squeeze. “You are who you choose to be. That makes you as real as any of us,” the man said evenly. Placing his hands under the doll’s arms, Dick lifted the boy up and then gently set him on his feet. Leaning forward on the chair, Dick looked the doll in the eye as he added, “Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise.”

Pitching himself forward, the boy threw his arms around the man’s neck. “Goodnight, Dick,” the doll said, squeezing against him.

A weary smile crept across Dick’s face. “Goodnight, Jason,” he answered with a sigh, returning the hug before gently pushing the doll away to go to bed.

Jason came running back a moment later. “Last hug!”

Absolute Comics - Season Two: The Monster Within

_{[ Prev ] “PASSING THROUGH GETHSEMANE, Part V” [ Next ]}

G O R A N G K A A

---

^{Kymellian Agricultural Colony | The Milky Way Galaxy}

Prince Kofi Whitemane of the Kymellian Technomancy was actually fifth in the line of succession.

His father was the youngest of three siblings, with the oldest being the currently reigning monarch. Aelfyre was his uncle, the middle of the three.

Sixty years before Kofi had been born, the Kree had withdrawn from a non-aggression pact with Kymellia. The Shi’ar Imperium and the Kree Empire had been engaging in a series of hostilities against the other. The Technomancy had tried to act as a neutral arbiter in the conflict, but the Kree wanted to use Kymellian territory in order to carry out attacks on the Shi’ar. Virtually overnight, Kymellia found itself thrust unwillingly into the conflict, when the Kree had annexed the Galvan Corridor.

The early days of the conflict had devastated the Technomancy, as the Shi’ar response overran their colonies and, soon, the Kymellians found themselves helpless victims caught in crossfire between the Kree and the Shi’ar.

Aelfyre had abandoned the sanctuary of the royal palace, eschewing his royal status for a real role in what was happening. He forged new alliances, and the League of Non-Aligned Worlds was born of those efforts.

And he hadn’t stopped there. From Earth, a planet no one had even heard of before, Aelfyre brought a hero named Captain Marvel to the conflict.

That was the universe that Kofi had been born into. Shi’ar to the left of them. Kree to the right. Skrulls at their back. Like his uncle, he’d stepped out of the shadow of the royal palace and served as one of the Technomancers in the field. While his father had always enjoyed a life of shelter, Kofi aspired to be more like his Uncle Aelfyre.

The sight of the Shi’ar warships bearing down on them was a great reminder of the war that they were still fighting.

“There’s an opening forming in the right flank!”

Large, three-fingered hands slammed down on the controls. “On it!” the horse-faced boy chimed brightly.

The Kymellian smartship seemed to skip nimbly across the stars. In an instant, the forward inertia was cancelled, as the ship flipped on its axis and completely altered its trajectory toward the Shi’ar ships.

Even as advanced as they were, Kymellian technology was no match for Shi’ar firepower in a protracted encounter. G’Kar was operating the sensors, being their eyes and ears. Alora was down in engineering, trying to keep them flying as best she was able. They hadn’t had much downtime from the last battle, so they had to make every shot count.

Strafing along the Shi’ar defensive line, the Kymellian ship seemed to sling-shot through the formation, stringing behind a series of explosions. As Kofi’s eyes glanced up at the holographic monitors overhead, he could see starfighters following in their wake like a host of angry bees. “I think we’ve got their attention,” the young Technocrat uttered flatly.

That was good. While Friday and the other combat vessels were trying to hold the line, the colony was in the process of being evacuated.

“The last transport has departed Gorangkaa,” G’Kar remarked.

The boy gave a heavy sigh. They’d done it. They’d managed to get the transports out of here. But, they were still abandoning the colony. So it was a victory that was still a very real defeat. “That’s our signal,” Kofi remarked, raising his voice as he shouted, “Alora, calculate the jump to Knowhere!”

The rainbow colored hair of a Majesdanian poked through a maintenance hatch in the floor. Grease-marked and haggard, Alora looked confused as she said, “Wait, Knowhere is the rendezvous point?”

“It is not,” G’Kar confirmed, as the warlord pivoted to direct a challenging stare over toward

A thick finger jabbed up toward where the cloud of wasp-like starfighters was rapidly approaching optimal firing range. “Is there anyone who would like to voice objection? Because this is not a good time for debate,” Kofi deadpanned dryly.

Ducking back into the maintenance shaft, there was a moment of silence before Alora’s voice could be heard counting down. “Jump drive in five... four... three... two...”

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He had a splitting headache.

Blinking several times, Billy felt as though his brain were trying to tear itself apart, his head about to explode, and his body made of solid brick. As he rolled over onto his side, trying to pull himself together and push himself up off the floor, everything seemed out of focus.

Whatever they’d hit him with, it had felt like facing that German panzer in Marseilles, France during the War all over again.

He started to get up, but his equilibrium was way off. The room went into the spin cycle, as Billy teetered on two feet for no more than a few seconds before he let himself fall back to the ground. He collapsed into a cross-legged seated position on the floor.

It seemed like everything was still spinning, even as he put his head down into his hands.

This was a doozey. Not even Terax the Pantsless had managed to land a hit like this on Billy. Even seated, as the boy raised his head again, he found that his vision was still slightly out of focus. There were halos around all of the lights...

...wait...

As the boy looked down at his outstretched arms, he realized what was different about himself. The gauntlets weren’t around his wrist.

“Ah, you’re awake.”

The room seemed to tilt precariously. The sharp turn of the dark haired boy’s head throwing his balance off. The reptilian alien was as menacing as he was large. A Zy’nx. Neigh-universally regarded as the galaxy’s thugs. The carion-eaters of the galaxy, finding work for themselves as cheap labored whored out to criminal enterprises.

This one was probably a bounty hunter. “We’ll be arriving soon,” the crocodile-like alien remarked, turning as he added, “I’d encourage you to make peace with whatever gods you believe in. I doubt the Shi’ar will let you live for very long, hero.”

“Thank you.”

The comment caught the Zy’nx dead in his tracks. “This is Spartax, isn’t it?” Billy asked flatly, his piercing blue eyes seeming to bore a hole through the alien before him.

“Not sure why you’re so happy,” the alien uttered, shaking his head as he walked away from the cage that contained the boy. “You’re gonna die here, you know?”

Squaring his jaw, Billy looked down at his own hand. He was still seeing double. This wasn’t exactly ideal fighting form for him. However…

“I’m right where I want to be.”

Spartax was where the Shi’ar had taken the people that they had stolen during their earlier attacks. Innocent bystanders, women, and children, snatched away from their ordinary lives to be used as slaves to fuel the Shi’ar war machine.

Those people had to be so afraid. So uncertain of what was happening to them. Questioning whether anyone remembered them, or even cared that they were gone. Wondering, was anyone coming to save them?

Billy had left Gorangkaa to become the answer to that question.

Hope has arrived. Because I am here.

ＦＩＮＡＬ ＦＡＮＴＡＳＹ Ｘ｜Ｖ： Ｔｈｅ Ｂｌｅｓｓｅｄ Ｔｗｅｌｖｅ

_{@Trainerblue192 | @Achronum | [ Theme ]}

The boy's ethereal blue eyes were large and expressive.

Speechless, color dusted the child's cheeks as he found all three sets of Lalafell eyes on him. "Ah, umm..." the youth stammered, fidgeting with the shepherd's crook as he fumbled for something to say.

He'd been concerned about River's tone and manner of questioning toward Kikipu, but Kajin seemed to have that particular concern in hand. Or in the head, as it were. "er... It was, uh," the boy uttered, as his eyes darted from River to Kajin before finally arriving at Kikipu. "Wait," he declared finally, as it occured to him that something that Kikipu had said didn't make sense to him, "How do you rent a body?"

Why would you rent a body? Or rent out a body for that matter?

Giving a shake of his head. "Probably not important right now," the Padjal reasoned aloud. The momentary distraction had, at least, gotten them away from the point of what had originally bothered the boy to begin with however, so there was that much to be grateful for.

Giving a bow toward the Lilliputian woman, the Padjali said, "Thank you for your assistance."

As he straightened back up, the Seedseer looked to his diminutive companions. "I should think further inquiry with Master Tillman is in order,"