Disclaimer: This story, though maybe not in this chapter but in subsequent chapters, will have celebrities in it. I have no knowledge of their sexuality and this is not intended to imply their sexuality. This is all from my own mind. Scary!! People actually get a glimpse into my mind!!!
Buffy, the Vampire Slayer, Angel and all related characters created by Joss Whedon. Copyright 20th Century Fox.
Batman, and all related characters created by Bob Kane. Copyright DC Comics and Warner Bros.
X-MEN, and all related characters created by Stan Lee. Copyright Marvel Comics and 20th Century Fox.
Star Trek and all related characters created by Gene Roddenberry. Copyright Paramount Studios.
I don't know for sure if I will use all the above elements, but just in case, I have myself covered.
In this story, which has been floating around in my head most of my life, you will find many universes merging, as the above copyrights reveal. I hope you all enjoy this. I appreciate any feedback that you may want to give. This story doesn't deal so much with sex, sex, sex, but more of my feelings that I struggled with and am starting to come to terms with. Part of his background is mine. I do hope that you enjoy it!!!
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Chapter 35 Obsession
I was escorted by the Shadows down the corridor to a rather regal room. I was surprised at what the bunker hid. Underneath the ground was a vast network of tunnels and rooms. It almost looked like an underground castle. The room Ra's entered was large and furnished comfortably. A fire raged in the enormous fireplace.
"Have a seat, Detective," Ra's offered.
"No thanks," I replied.
"Infidel!" a large burly man cried. He ran over and pushed me to the couch.
"Please forgive Ubu. He is very devout when it comes to me. He is loyal and loyalty is so hard to find these days. Just look at the world around you. Mankind has been so unloyal to the world that gave them birth. They spoil her, plunder her riches. And what do they give in return? Fewer rain forests. Empty holes dug deep into her skin. They treat her horribly. No wonder the ozone layer has a hole. I would not be surprised if it was retaliation by the earth itself in revenge for the destruction mankind has visited upon her."
"You act as if the world were alive, living and breathing."
"Look around you. Look at the trees and flowers. You deny that these things are live?"
"I don't deny that. What I do deny is your giving the earth a conscious. It's a beautiful planet. But it was created to sustain us."
"And it has been pushed past the point of sustenance. It has no turned to robbery. Mankind is not using her with care. They take advantage of her."
"Again you are personifying an inanimate object. The earth is no more a conscious being than the trees are."
"You have not felt her death pains? You have not felt as she is torn from the inside out? Look at the increase in earthquakes. Look at the rise in tornadoes and floods. The earth is now fighting back."
"And you plan on helping."
"Of course. It is our duty to protect her. It is our sacred honor to die for her."
I rolled my eyes at him.
"You find something amusing, Detective? Or boring?"
"You sound like some red-headed bitch I had the pleasure of beating up a few weeks ago. Goes by the name Poison Ivy. She seemed like a sucker for the earth, too. Maybe you two should hook up." I turned to Talia. "Tell me, has your mother passed on? If so, my condolences. Perhaps Ivy can give something to your dad that he has been missing out on since mums passed away."
"You vicious man!" Talia exclaimed.
Ra's came over and backhanded me. "I'll not have you talk such things against my bride! She was an honorable woman! She sacrificed herself to give me my daughter!"
I looked over at Talia. "Oh. Sorry."
"No matter. You will be the first to witness the destructive nature of the poison. What the screen showed was only a computer-generated enactment. I will show you the real thing." Ra's turned to his hairless servant. "Ubu, bring in the participant."
Ubu nodded and disappeared behind a door.
"Detective, the chemical you see in this bottle is a homemade powder." Ra's opened a small bottle and spooned out a small amount. He grabbed a small glass and poured some water from a pitcher into it. "It dissolves quickly in water and the smallest amount can be quite deadly."
Ra's put the mixture in and stirred it up. Almost instantly the red powder dissolved making the lethality of the water unascertainable. The door opened and Ubu walked in with a Shadow who was not wearing his mask. He held a wet, rag over his nose. The blood on the rag and the way he looked at me let me know I had done the damage to his nose.
"Come," Ra's said to the wounded Shadow.
"Yes, Master," the Shadow replied. He kneeled down before Ra's. "What can I do for you?"
"Nothing really. I wanted to see how you were doing. The dark knight hurt you pretty badly."
"Nothing I cannot survive, Master. You train us well."
"Indeed I do. You should be praised for you efforts." Ra's grabbed the glass of poisoned water. "Here. Drink."
"Thank you, Master. Your kindness is immeasurable."
Ra's smiled at him and moved away. The Shadow took a drink. Seconds later, he dropped the glass and clutched his throat. He was having a hard time breathing. The poison must swell the throat. His eyes began to bulge out of his head and the veins in his temples throbbed. He let out a grunt and fell over, dead.
"I believe that concludes our tests. The poison was a success."
Ra's clapped his hands and several guards came in and took the body away. I stared at him in shock and disgust.
"Something wrong, Detective?"
"You're sick."
"Actually, I'm quite well."
"Especially for your age," Talia added.
Ra's threw her a stern look. There must have been something about his age that Talia found empowering for her and him. He turned to me. "Detective, you have witnessed the power I have and the lengths I will go to use that power for this world. Now you understand the seriousness of my cause. What I do for these children is give them all new hope. I give them a future. How can you deny them their future? After all, children are the future."
"Children help shape our future, Ra's. They live in it and will make the changes that we could not do in our lifetime. Is the world over populated? Does mankind abuse the world we live in? Perhaps. But it is not the job of one man to make the decision on how it's changed. It is the joint effort of every man, woman and child to make the changes necessary to benefit all mankind."
"I see you are not going to be persuaded to think like me. Very well. Ubu...take him to the dungeon where he can rot while we make our plans."
Ubu nodded and came over to me. He grabbed me up off the couch and pushed me toward a door. As we walked down the corridor, I tried to memorize the hallway and the turns we made until we ended up at the top of a flight of stone stairs.
"Go," Ubu said to me.
"After you," I replied. He gave me a hard shove and I tumbled down the stairs. I stopped at the bottom in immense pain from the hard steps. A shadow loomed over me and Ubu entered. He picked me up and chained me to the wall.
"You stay here until the master beckons you."
"Sure thing," I replied.
Ubu grunted at me and left me to hang in the dungeon.
Upstairs Talia moved from her position on the couch and approached her father at a table as he poured himself a drink.
"What are we going to do, father?"
"Stay exactly on schedule."
"What about Mr. McCoy? He is a mutant. He will find a way to escape."
"Yes, he probably will."
"But aren't you concerned he will stop our efforts?"
"Not at all. By the time he gets free, we will already have set up a secure enough barrier to keep him from catching us. It will only be a matter of time before the poison is released and he will have failed. He will watch as the people of the city dies."
"And his lover?"
"Oh, his lover will die, too. And he will know what it is like to fail."
"That will anger him, father."
"No, daughter, that will break him. All that he has sworn to protect will be dead. He will be left a broken man and broken men are easily crushed under foot to make way for the strong."
"Yes, father."
"Do you know of this woman he spoke of who would join our ranks?"
"Who? Poison Ivy?"
Ra's nodded to his daughter. "Yes. This intrigues me, a woman who agrees with our methods. That would be a most valuable asset."
"I shall find her and bring her into our ranks."
"You do that, daughter. Oh and see what you can do about our dear friend, Percy."
Talia bowed to her father and exited the underground castle. She pulled on her robes and up the stairs she went to her waiting motorcycle. She mounts and within moments is cruising down the streets toward downtown Orlando.
Robin makes his way from rooftop to rooftop. He stops ever so often to check his surroundings, hoping against hope that he will find Nightwing or Batgirl, hoping and praying he finds both. As the night wears on and the sky slowly lightens, he realizes it will be impossible for him to find them.
"Perhaps they went home. But how will I know if Batman made it out okay?" Robin stands there with his dilemma, pondering his next action.
Before long Batgirl shows up. "Any luck?" she asks.
"Yeah, lots of it. Both good and bad."
"Do share?"
"Do you know where Nightwing is?"
"Yeah."
"We need to get to him right away. There's something I need to tell you both."
"Come on."
Moments later, Batgirl, Robin and Nightwing are huddled in the shadows of an alley as slowly the sun rises.
"I think Batman may be in trouble," Robin says.
"What makes you say that?" Nightwing asks.
"Because I found the place the teens were taken. Batman and I went back and there was a fight. Batman wanted me to leave to get you. I don't know how the fight turned out."
"I wish there was a way to contact him," Nightwing said. "That way we would know for sure where he is and if he's okay."
The trio stood there for a moment and then Batgirl snapped her fingers. "He may have a communicator in his mask. It looked like it might have one."
"But how do we determine the frequency?" Robin asked. "It would take us several days to find the right one."
"Not necessarily. He knew the Slayer in Los Angeles. According to a report her Watcher posted last, the two worked together. They even designed him a suit. If we search the frequency Slayers use, we may find the one his is operating on and then be able to talk to him."
"And if not, it would be a big waste of time...time that it could take for him to be killed."
"Don't be so pessimistic, Robin," Nightwing declared. "It's a good plan. Better than anything else we've got."
"It is the only one we've got."
"Then let's do it."
"Follow me," Batgirl responded.
The three went off down alley after alley. Eventually, they came to a rather large penthouse apartment building. Through the alley they went to the back where it dead-ended.
"Where to from here?" Robin asked.
Batgirl just smiled at him and went over to a brick. Pushing a sequence of loose bricks, several moved in and to the side creating an entrance big enough for them to walk through. The three headed inside and the bricks closed up.
"That was cool," Robin remarked.
"Thanks," Batgirl said.
"What prevents others from coming in?" Nightwing asked.
"The bricks conceal buttons that form a code. I had to put in the proper sequence or it wouldn't work."
"What if someone else put in the code?"
"There are sensors outside that scans the presence of others. It detected my DNA as well as my heart rate. If my heart rate is up, it will know I'm in trouble and won't work. If anyone other than me puts in the code, it will not open."
"Tricky."
The three walked down a narrow passage that opened up to reveal a vast room. A woman walks up to them.
"Hello, Christine."
"Hello, Kara," Batgirl replies.
"I trust you have good reason to bring these two gentlemen with you?"
"Yes, allow me to introduce Nightwing and Robin. They are helping Batman and I."
"Excellent. Have you found anything?"
"Batman may be in trouble. Do you know how to contact the Watcher in Los Angeles?"
"Why would I need to contact him?"
"Batman may be in trouble. At last report, the Watcher and Slayer in Los Angeles made a suit for him. I wouldn't be surprised if a communicator were outfitted in the suit. We need to try to contact him to see if he's safe."
"I will get right on it."
Kara moved off toward some computers.
"You live here?" Robin asked.
"No. I work here. There is an elevator that runs up to our penthouse apartment. That's where Kara and I live."
Kara comes walking back. "There was no response so I left a message of urgency with Garrett's computer. He should contact us some time today."
Batgirl turned to Nightwing and Robin. "And we can't split up in case he calls back. And waiting here would be most uncomfortable. Perhaps we should wait upstairs. Are you guys hungry?"
Nightwing and Robin looked at each other.
"Definitely," Robin replied.
"Then we should go upstairs. Umm, however, we can't have you parading around in your costumes. Kara, do we have some men's clothes for these two to wear?"
"I'll look and see if we do."
"Since you two already know who I am," Batgirl continued, "perhaps you would be kind enough to tell me who you are."
Nightwing and Robin look at each other. Nightwing goes first and takes off his mask. "My name is Robby Lakewind."
Robin pulls his hood off. "I'm Ryan Brookdale."
"Nice to meet you two out of costume."
Kara comes back with some jumpsuits. "This is all I could find."
"That will be fine. It's just for today."
Nightwing and Robin go into a smaller room and change. Robby has a hard time not looking at Ryan as Ryan takes off his outfit. At fifteen, Ryan is already developing wonderful muscle definition. Ryan's brown skin is flawless and smooth. This stimulates Robby a bit but he is reminded though that he is much older than Ryan. At least he's considered an adult, while Ryan is still a teenager. Then he sees the reproving look Ryan is giving him.
"Are you gay?" Ryan asks.
"Bisexual."
"Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I'm as straight as they come."
"It's okay. I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable."
"No, it's okay. I understand. If Batgirl, or Christine, or whatever the hell her name is, were in here, I would be looking at her."
"Me, too," Robby replies.
"You would?"
"Yeah. I'm bisexual."
"What does that mean, exactly?"
"It means that I am attracted to both sexes. Bisexuals vary in their attraction to the sexes though. Some lean more toward one than the other. But regardless, bisexuals are still attracted to both."
"Which do you lean more toward?"
"Men. But I have had a girlfriend. Even fathered a child."
"No shit."
"Yeah."
"That's cool."
The two new friends donned their jumpsuits and walked out. Christine was putting her hair into a ponytail as they approached.
"You two look a bit more civilized now...well, sort of. Kara went upstairs to order us something to eat. Let's go up and eat and maybe get some sleep while we wait."
The three climbed into the elevator. The doors closed and it ascended to the top floor so they could have some relaxation and rejuvenation.
To Be Continued...
Now we see who is who among the two. Some thought that Robby was Robin. Good guesses. And now we all know for sure who is who. And they know who each other is...with the exception of Batman.
Ra's Al Ghul! What a psycho! I hope I'm doing his character justice. Any Ra's Al Ghul fans out there? Let me know how I'm doing with him and his daughter Talia.
More good stuff to come! Keep reading!