2015.02.24 - Flashback: Boy Wonder

"I know what you're asking yourself now."

A voice that's somehow smooth, gravelly, and venomous simultaneously cuts through the dark of the room. His words are slow and measured, as if he's getting a great deal of satisfaction from saying each and every one of them.

"You're asking yourself how you ended up here. It's not an unreasonable question. I'm sure that if I were in your position I'd be doing quite a bit of introspection myself. Looking back on my life, trying to figure out where I went wrong."

The sound of metal scraping against stone can be heard, a noise that's just as carefully measured as the speaker's voice.

"Fortunately for you, your Uncle Slade can tell you /exactly/ where you went wrong: You should have killed yourself the first time you crossed me.

... A Few Years Ago ...

The sound of his boots hitting the gravel and his cape flapping behind him have become nothing more then white noise now. His breath is heavy and can be seen thanks to the cold. He's been running from rooftop to rooftop for almost two blocks now. And the cold is starting to make him cramp, but the running is helping him stay warm. 'Come on Robin.' he says to himself. 'Keep up.'

It looks like Robin is cutting it dangerously close. The world-renowned mercenary known as Deathstroke is just a couple of meters away from making good on his contract. But even while carrying a Gotham City councilman over his shoulder, Deathstroke still doesn't seem to get tired.

Like Robin, he's leaping from rooftop to rooftop so easily that it almost looks as if he's wearing a jet pack. However, unlike Robin, he's doing it while wearing scale-mail armor, about fifty pounds of gear and ammunition, and carrying a councilman who weighs nearly two hundred pounds.

The councilman is screaming his head off the entire time, of course.

"Give it up, Boy Wonder!" Deathstroke calls back as he sprints toward a helicopter in the distance. "You tried, but you'll never catch me this way! Try again when you've hit puberty."

He laughs as he continues sprinting and leaping, clearly having far more fun on this job than he has for quite some time.

Come on. He continues to say to himself. Reaching behind his back and under his cape he retrieves a grapple. Okay set it to low and... !BANG! The sound of the compressed air grapple gun is heard as is the whizzing of the high tensile cable following the hook. With a little training he's able to 'lasso' the line so he can ensnare or even capture a running perp.

Only one more building to go. Slade picks up even more speed, launching himself off of the roof. In just a couple of seconds, he'll be in the helicopter and away with his prize. His victory is all but assured.

Until it's literally yanked from him. The makeshift lasso wraps around the councilman, pulling him back toward the roof. Deathstroke looses his prize, but manages to turn around in time to grab the councilman by the ankle.

Both of them slam down on the roof's surface. Hard. The councilman is knocked out immediately, Deathstroke is merely stunned for a moment.

As he gets to his feet, he can see the Boy Wonder rapidly gaining on him. With his lead lost, it looks like he has no better option than to stand and fight.

"You should have just left it alone, Robin. My contract didn't say anything about killing any kids, but you've become a liability." He pulls a small, club-like device from his belt, and presses a button. The ends quickly telescope, and Deathstroke is holding a fully-functional Promethium bo staff. Leaving the councilman on the ground, he rushes headfirst toward Robin.

Good, the councilman is... Woah! As Robin comes to a sliding stop he looks at the masked man coming at him. "Come on man." Robin starts as he dives out of the other mans way. Handspring after handspring finished off with a flip onto a chimney. Catching his balance quickly he looks at the man. "The rooftops are my domain." He boasts as he tries to get a handle on this guy.

Slade swings, only to miss. Each of Robin's handsprings keep him just out of reach of one of Slade's strikes, sometimes by little more than a hair.

"Huh. You're good, kid. Of course, it's easy to do gymnastics when you aren't wearing any pants!"

The end of Deathstroke's staff charges up with purple energy, and he aims it at the base of the chimney. A Promethium-fueled energy blast is fired directly at the chimney, blowing it all to smithereens.

Everything seems to go into slow motion as soon as the chimney explodes. Feeling the rocking under his feet Robin leaps up high as he can, in an arch over the masked man. As he's up in the air he reaches into one of his utility belt pouches and retrieves a hand full of bat-a-rangs. As time seems to finally catch up to him Robin is hitting the rooftop with a roll and comes up with a single bat-a-rang in one hand and a knuckle full in the other. "Give up now and Im sure you'll get a nice cushy spot in Blackgate or even Arkham if you're lucky."

"You slippery little... " This is a distraction that Deathstroke just didn't need. It's a shame, because the mission was going so well.

He crouches in an athletic fighting stance, his staff held in front of him to deflect whatever projectiles might get thrown his way. But just when it looks as if a fight is unavoidable, his posture relaxes.

With on hand on the staff, the other hand is held against the side of his head, as if he's pressing an earpiece. "Yeah? Yeah? Yeah... understood." He collapses the staff, and places it back in its holster. "Looks like you win kid. My employer no longer wants me to bring the councilman in. He thinks he'd make a much better example."

The motion is so fast that it almost can't be seen by the human eye. Suddenly a shot is fired at the councilman's head, from Deathstroke's rapidly-drawn 1911.

"NO!" Robin screams as he dives for the councilman. As he flies throughout the air he throws all the bat-a-rang's in a quick succession. Hes not sure if any ill make contact, they're more for distraction.

Four out of six batarangs are sent flying off-target courtesy of Deathstroke's armored pimp slaps. Two find their way, burying themselves deep in his flesh. If he were a normal man, he'd probably be wounded heavily enough to require hospitalization.

But, as he's proven over the course of this daring escapade, Deathstroke is not a normal man. The helicopter lifts off of the building across the street, and starts making its way toward Deathstroke.

As he pulls one of the batarangs out of his chest, Deathstroke keeps his pistol trained on the councilman. "Looks like you lose, Boy Wonder. The councilman has less than a minute to live. If I were you, I'd just write him off as a lost cause and focus on taking me down. But we both know you're not going to do that. You're going to try to save a man who is so crooked that I just got paid thirty thousand dollars to off him."

The helicopter continues to increase rapidly in elevation, dragging a cable behind it. Deathstroke grabs the cable as it comes within reach, getting yanked a couple feet off of the roof.

As Robin looks at the dead body of the councilman, he cant help but feel like a failure. That is until his anger switches his gaze to the other man in the helicopter. "Why?!" He asks but doesn't wait for an answer. "I swear I'll make sure you're crucified by the justice system and I'll have you tossed into the deepest darkest dankest hole." He screams at the top of his lungs so the man can hear the promise.

As he's towed aboard, Deathstroke can't help but laugh. As he's dragging behind a moving helicopter, it doesn't take much time for his laughter to be inaudible. But there's a chilling quality to his laughter that lives on far after the actual sound of his voice has faded away.

The councilman twitches reflexively, and blood pours out of the hole in his head. There's no question that he's dead, and inside his jacket pocket is evidence implicating him over a dozen counts of embezzlement. Looks like Deathstroke really was just taking out the trash, even if he got paid quite a bit to do it.