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Birds and Bees	By : defying3reason Category: DC Verse Comics > Batman Views: 2564 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Batman, or any aspect of the broader DC Universe, and I make no money from my fanfiction

Chapter List
- 24
- 25
- 26
Chapter Twenty Five
Miranda Xiomei Hong felt a nervous sensation she couldn't quite explain as she approached the Lotus Light Monastery in the mountains of Zhutan. She'd left her adolescent son Billy at the monastery five years ago for advanced training to help him deal with his extraordinary meta powers.
Up until that very moment, she'd been elated at the prospect of seeing Billy after such a long separation. Now that the moment had finally come, she felt something akin to a subtle dread.
Billy was a gifted individual. The Zhutanese called him the majee: a master mystic who could summon and channel the deity Meshta. Despite Billy's godlike cosmic powers, to Mindy he was first and foremost her loving little boy (even though he'd been taller than her since he was thirteen). Five years ago he'd been sixteen. She was eager to see the young man he'd grown into.
A withered old monk in a saffron robe was waiting at the entrance. He bowed deeply to the mother of the majee, and she returned the gesture. He wordlessly took her through a desolate corridor, unadorned save for the occasional table carrying a vase of withered flowers.
The old monk brought her to a room with a comparatively young monk in it seated behind a desk. This monk was likely in his thirties, like Mindy. The older monk bowed again before leaving.
"Welcome Mrs. Hong," the new monk greeted in heavily accented English.
"Miss," Mindy corrected as she sat down in front of him. "I've never been married."
"Oh." That seemed to surprise him. Mindy quirked an eyebrow, hoping she wasn't going to be judged. This might be a Buddhist monastery, but it was still Zhutan and the Zhutanese had some pretty backwards ideas about the proper role and attitude of a woman. "I'm just…I didn't expect Meshta to select a single American to guard his majee. From what I understand of your culture, you must have much strength."
"At least it's possible to get by in America," Mindy said, though she kept her tone polite. The monk wasn't trying to insult her, as far as she could tell. "If I were in Zhutan, Billy and I would probably have starved to death. May I see my son now?"
"Soon," the monk promised. "There are some preliminaries we must attend to. Now, Miss Hong, you and Billy sought us out so that he could practice a particularly intensive regiment of various meditations-"
"I'm aware. I did bring him here myself."
"Yes. Well, as I'm sure you remember, no one in living memory has attempted such a strict and lengthy ordeal within these walls, and certainly no one with the extraordinary abilities your son possesses. Please don't be startled when you see him."
With that cryptic burst of speech the monk fell silent and would say no more. This particular monastery observed a vow of silence under normal circumstances, with the result that even the monks who facilitated interactions with the outside weren't terribly chatty.
The monk took Mindy through a labyrinth of bland looking hallways and minimally furnished rooms. To Mindy's surprise, they exited the monastery entirely through a back door and went up a steep path further into the mountains. The monk showed her to the entrance of a cave and then bowed, indicating she should go inside without him.
Mindy bowed in return and, glad she hadn't removed her jacket while inside, she made her way into the cave.
Her first thought was that it was beautiful. The walls had all been carved into statues, showing magnificent seated buddhas flanked by scores of bodhisattvas, devas, and attendants. It was absolutely lovely, like nothing she'd ever seen before, and Mindy had seen a lot of religious art in her travels with her son. She was so lost in the sublime works of art that initially she didn't notice the seated figure of flesh among them.
Billy was in the lotus position, eyes closed and long raven black bangs in his face. His complexion was smooth and white, as though he'd seen very little of the sun during the past five years. He was wearing the same saffron robes as the other monks, but they hung loose on his lean, bony frame.
Most importantly, he still looked to be sixteen years old.

Dick looked around his apartment and let out a wistful sigh.
It still felt like he'd just moved in, even though it had been months. He'd rarely been home to enjoy the place, what with all the drama with the kids, and excursions to Keystone to be with Roy, and the usual superhero antics.
He really liked his apartment. It was perfect for him. Nice view of the city, lots of book storage, easy to clean, cozy…but there was only one bedroom.
He strolled around his apartment, letting out a few more longing sighs as he did so, and then he went into the living room to start boxing things up.

Dick went to Gotham with the intention of telling the Waynes about his plans to move (yet again). He got stuck in traffic, and wound up getting in just too late for dinner, so he snagged a plate of leftovers and then went down to the Cave where he expected to find Bruce and Damian suiting up for patrol.
Bruce was sitting by the computer reading some files over. He was in costume, but the cowl was down, a signal that friendly chat was still welcome. "Hey. Where's Damian?"
"Trying on a new costume," Bruce answered.
Dick quirked an eyebrow. "New costume? He updating the Robin suit?" He'd kept it mostly the same since he was ten, but the suit had seen some slight modifications over the past eight years.
Bruce shook his head. "He wants his own identity. New costume, new codename."
"Oh." Dick frowned, surprised by how much that news bothered him (and that it bothered him at all). It made sense. The kid was eighteen. He was a little old to be running around in Dick's old colors, and certainly ready for an identity that fit his personality. If he were going to be honest, Dick was surprised Damian had remained Robin for so long.
But Damian had been wearing his colors…and, once they'd gotten to know each other, it hadn't been inconsequential anymore. He'd been interested in being part of Dick's legacy in addition to his father's.
Maybe that's why he was surprised. Damian was all about legacies. In some corner of his mind, Dick had expected Damian to keep the Robin identity until he was ready to assume the mantle of the Bat.
"When did he decide to do this?" Dick asked.
"When he realized he'd be leading a new team. He wants to make it his own," Bruce answered. "So what are you doing here?"
He looked defensive. Well, really he looked inscrutable other than a minor stiffening of his jaw, but Dick was experienced enough picking Batman apart to know what that meant. It made him wonder what Bruce thought he was there to do.
"I need to talk to you guys for a few minutes before you take off, if that's okay."
"There's nothing pressing tonight, so that should be fine…you're alright, aren't you?" Bruce asked.
Laughing, Dick nodded. "Yeah, everything's fine."
"I'd heard you'd had some bizarre activity on facebook. Something about piercings?"
Dick slapped a hand over his mouth as he snorted, and it took him a second to answer. "That wasn't about me…oh god. I can kinda see how you got there though, considering what I wrote. No, Roy was having problems with Ollie spoiling his daughter." He quickly related what had gone down in the Arrow household, and Bruce listened with apparent interest.
Which was actually a little weird. Bruce rarely liked socializing for the sake of socializing. "Alright, you just let me ramble about the mundane goings on of our acquaintances. Why aren't you bored?"
Bruce smirked. "I don't mind when you share anecdotes about Roy Harper and his daughter."
"Really?" Dick frowned. Was it because Damian so clearly liked Lian, and Bruce thought he should get to know her? Or had he noticed the level of commitment between Roy and Dick…?
"The man's an excellent father. I…could probably use some tips. Now to the point, you said he got her to remove the bellybutton ring through a guilt trip. I've been made to understand that this sort of manipulation is psychologically distressing for the child." Here Bruce leveled a slight glare at Dick, implying that that was his fault.
Dick vaguely remembered screaming something to that effect at a departing batmobile while he'd stood in the cave in his short pants and fairy boots, trembling with suppressed rage.
"Roy avoided negative side effects with his daughter though?" Bruce pressed.
Dick was momentarily dumbstruck, but he gave himself a little shake and nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, Lian just realized she pushed him too far, and then they compromised."
"I see. So he was able to modify her behavior with subtle shows of dislike throughout the week…interesting."
Dick wondered if he should let Roy know that Bruce wanted to do parenting chats. It would either make him feel really proud of himself or terrified.
He was saved the necessity of further discussion of Roy's parenting methods by Damian's approach. For the second time that night, Dick was dumbstruck.
Damian was wearing a skintight black bodysuit with a stylized crimson domino mask. His bodysuit had red markings for ornamentation, mostly across his left shoulder but spreading out in a band over his upper body, narrowing to a thinner line down each of his arms, and culminating in finger stripes.
"Oh holy shit. Damian this is…"
Damian pressed his lips together. His expression had gone blank and stony, which meant he was nervous. "I didn't expect you to be here."
Dick broke out into a wide grin. "You're Nightwing junior!"
"Don't you dare call me that again!" Damian snapped. "I've thought of a new codename for myself. Yes, this costume makes reference to you in light of all the influence you've had on me and the role you've played in my training, but I am not trying to be you."
"Okay, okay." Dick still couldn't stop smiling like an idiot. "So what's your new codename?"
"Shaytun."
"Shat on?" Dick repeated, sure he had to be saying that wrong.
"As in al-shaytun," Bruce spoke up, and Dick jumped. He'd been so focused on the younger Wayne that he'd forgotten the older one was present. "It's Arabic, obviously. I can't talk him out of it. Perhaps you could…" Bruce broke off when Damian glared at him.
"I've told you, I have reasons for choosing this name. Besides, I already constructed the costume around it." He touched the symbol over his left upper body. Dick squinted at it in confusion. "It's taken from the Solomonic seal for wisdom. Shaytun means demon, thus incorporating ceremonial magic into my design."
"I thought ghul was Arabic for demon," Dick said.
"It is-" Bruce started, but Damian spoke over him.
"It is not. Ghul means ghoul, like those little things that scare children. I'm not sure why my grandfather didn't know this when he picked his name, but it's a mistranslation. I've chosen Shaytun for myself to rub his face in his idiocy."
"But you do understand why I'm uncomfortable with you molding your new image around your grandfather's, don't you?" Bruce said, some uncharacteristic emotion presenting itself in his voice. He was worried.
Damian regarded him blankly. "I designed the rest of the costume around Grayson. I'd have thought that would be enough appeasement for you."
Bruce still didn't look happy, and Dick wondered for a fleeting second if he was jealous.
No, that was just ridiculous.
"Hey Damian, I've got the night free. Want me to suit up so we can do a patrol together? We'll be twinsies!"
"You're going to be mind-numbingly horrible about this, aren't you?"
"Of course I am," Dick said with a wink. "And that wasn't a no, so I'm going to get changed. I'll be right back."
As Dick ran off to put his suit on, he heard Bruce quietly remind Damian that he had time to leave without him.
"Don't be ridiculous Father. He'd just catch up with me anyway. You don't think he'll say that twinsies thing when we're actually in the field, do you?"
Bruce didn't answer. He really didn't need to.

Dick was sitting on the ledge of a roof kicking his feet when Damian jumped down next to him. He handed Dick a bag of fast food before sitting down with his own hummus wrap. "You know Shaytun, I'm really going to miss the nights where I used to watch crooks wet themselves in terror when they saw Robin coming after them."
"I assume that never happened when you were Robin?" Damian asked with a self-satisfied smirk.
Dick laughed. "A couple times, actually, but I think it was just because they assumed Batman was on his way. Keep laughing; we already know my old costume wasn't intimidating."
Damian leaned back against a smokestack and let out a sigh. "Father doesn't like my new identity."
"He probably just needs to get used to it." Lord knows Dick did. He felt like he still wasn't pronouncing Shaytun correctly.
"Should I have selected something bat themed instead? I fear I've done something disrespectful."
Dick frowned. "I wouldn't worry too much. What's done is done, and besides, he knows you want to follow in his footsteps. I don't think you really need to be Batboy."
"Then his disapproval really is because of my attempt to thumb my nose at my grandfather's identity. I suppose I didn't pull it off then."
Dick sighed. "Shaytun sounds a lot like Satan."
"That's because they're related words. In the Hebrew Bible ha-satan is a role, not the distinct entity of the devil, and in my home shaytuns are antagonistic entities. And I do intend to be antagonistic to the Ghuls. That's not what Father thinks though. He thinks I'm going to join them."
"No. Damian, he just…" Dick broke off at the expression Damian threw his way. It was one of heartbreaking certainty.
"You're one of very few people who do not think the worst of me. Sometimes I think your faith is based on pure foolishness, but I do appreciate it. I have no desire to be anything like my mother or my grandfather."
"I know. And Bruce knows that too," Dick insisted, though he didn't believe it. Maybe things would be different if Bruce hadn't already seen one of his Robins go down a dark path, but the fact remained that Jason still haunted him as a failure, not only his tragic death but also his painful return. Bruce seemed to have been preparing himself to lose his current Robin from the moment he'd found out about him.
Damian set his wrap aside, clearly having lost his appetite.
"Um…you excited for the first meeting on Saturday?" Dick asked, hoping to break some tension with a lighter subject.
Damian nodded. "Mostly. I look forward to working with Impulse. She's a bit irritating sometimes, but it's all unintentional, and she's very experienced."
"And then there's the new Speedy," Dick teased.
"Who is fourteen," Damian snapped.
Dick grinned. He'd have to tell Roy about that later.
"…did you hear that Jai is to be joining the team as well?"
Dick started. "No, I hadn't. He…what's he going to do? He doesn't have any powers or training."
"Apparently that reformed criminal, the Piper, is mentoring him. He's to be our Oracle." Damian sighed. "He'll be rather good at it, I suppose. I can't begrudge our team his support, I just…I'm not looking forward to seeing him again."
"Yeah, that'll probably be awkward. I'm sorry."
"You've worked with your exes before," Damian said suddenly. "You must have, as you have so many, and from what I've heard most of your relationships end painfully. Can you give me some tips?"
Dick winced, and rubbed at his eyes as best he could around his mask. "Tip one; be careful with your brutal honesty. You're probably going to want to just keep things professional between you and Jai."
"And if…if he doesn't let me do that?"
Dick set his own food aside and turned to face Damian. "Okay, what exactly are you expecting him to do?"
"I don't know. He's unpredictable."
"You don't think he's going to…um…" Dick couldn't think of a way to phrase what needed to be said. "Y'know, um…ambush you-"
"Oh for the love of…he has never been a physical threat to me, just so we're clear."
"Okay. Crystal clear. No physical threat."
Damian was still glaring pretty powerfully. "He's five feet four inches and one hundred and twenty pounds. And he's never been trained to fight. Even if he wanted to sexually assault me, which I don't believe he does, he couldn't."
"Well, I mean…he did kinda screw with your head pretty badly. I'm not trying to insult you, I'm just worried."
"I do appreciate your concern. Frankly, I'm a bit worried myself. But he certainly won't get away with anything of the sort this time."
"Cool."
They slowly resumed their meals, and Dick tried to think of a good segue for what he needed to say. By the time he'd finished his burger and fries he decided there wasn't one.
"I'm moving to Kansas."
Damian slumped back against the smokestack, closed his eyes, and let out a small groan. "You're emotionally exhausting, you know that Grayson?"
"You're going to be okay, right? Because I can still come up and visit, like all the time. I'm still here for you."
"I know. And it's fine." He went quiet, and Dick bit back on a string of awkward reassurances of their continued regular contact. After a few minutes Damian turned towards him with a small, only slightly pained smile that barely resembled a grimace on his face. "It seems…I was wrong about you and Harper. You're very happy together, aren't you?"
"Yeah, we are," Dick said simply.
Damian nodded. "Good. That's…that's good. Shall we finish our patrol?"
"Yeah, I'm ready to get back out there."
"Alright. Let's go."

Roy personally accompanied Lian to Titans Tower on Saturday morning.
The kids had opted to meet in New York City, so they'd had the old Tower remodeled to suit the latest generation of teen superheroes. It had been a lot of work, and was still very much a work in progress, but it was a welcome project for their info jock/tech kid. When Roy and Lian walked up to the building they caught sight of Jai and Piper just ahead of them, hauling in cardboard boxes brimming with equipment.
Roy smiled and nodded at Piper, and watched him almost drop his box as he walked into the doorway. "Oof. Um…hello Roy."
Lian gave her father a questioning look, then shook her head. She decided she'd rather not know. "Hey Jai. How's it going?"
"Pretty good! The power's kicked out on us a couple times, but Piper helped me install some backup generators. I'm still fighting with the Thanagarian stuff the League gave us for the console room though."
"Is the Wi-fi up?" Lian asked. Looking a bit disappointed with the quality of her query, Jai nodded. "Cool beans! I'm going to check my facebook."
"Remember not to tag your location," Roy snapped. He walked past Piper and Jai, following after his daughter while she skipped into the building with her eyes on her smartphone. She looked up in wonder when she got further into the atrium.
"Oh wow. This place is huge!"
Roy looked around and shrugged. "When we first started we just had a little clubhouse. Cyborg's dad hooked the team up with this mess right before he died. Personally I think the Titans were better off with small, nondescript, and intimate."
"Less of a target that way," Lian couldn't help but notice. "Come on Daddy, we'll be fine. Do you think we should wait for everyone else here, or should we head upstairs?" She nodded her head towards the elevator.
Before Roy could answer, Irey zipped into the room. "Heyhowdyheyhaveyouseenthispl aceomigawdit'shugeandfantasticandHI!"
"Hey…that was almost comprehensible in some parts. Wait, what are you wearing?" Lian grabbed Irey by the shoulders and forced her to stand still. "Oh my fucking god, you're Kid Flash now?! When did that happen?"
What was visible of Irey's face turned red. She was indeed wearing the Kid Flash costume that Bart and Wally had worn before her (it was a little odd to see a girl wearing it). "Last night. Bart came over to take a run with me and we talked about the Titans and teams and family legacies and stuff. He asked me if I wanted to take the name, and I said yeah. Did you talk to Mia yet?"
Lian's face fell, and she nodded. "Yeah. She-she's cool with it. She's retiring. Um…I guess she's not really well enough for crime fighting anymore anyway."
They stood in an uncomfortable silence for a moment, and then Irey grabbed Lian's arm and started tugging her towards the elevator. "C'mon upstairs! Damian and X'hawn are already up there. We've just been waiting for you."
"Kay. Um, c'mon Daddy."
"It looks like you've got this. Irey, are anyone else's parents hovering around?" Roy asked with a self-deprecating smirk.
"Well X'hawn's an orphan, and Damian's-uh, I mean, no. It's just us and the peer mentors now."
After some discussion among the parents and guardians of the new Titans, it had been decided that the team would benefit from some outside leadership. Damian was still pissed about the decision, but he'd been firmly outvoted. The peer mentors were going to keep their involvement in the team's affairs as indirect as possible, but everyone (again, except Damian) felt better about the kids having young adults present who could guide them from their own experience if needed.
Cassie and Bart had volunteered for the posts, and they'd been well received by the teens (even Damian couldn't find anything nasty to say about the two of them).
Roy tried to force a smile onto his face, but it didn't meet his eyes. Lian turned away from Irey and ran over to him. She hugged him fiercely, suddenly feeling incredibly emotional even though she'd been looking forward to this moment for as long as she could remember. "I love you Daddy."
"Love you too Peanut. And don't worry, you're going to be awesome at this. It's in your blood." Roy gave her a quick squeeze, kissed her cheek, and then turned and left.
"Ready Li?" Irey asked.
"I think so." Lian pushed her hair out of her face, adjusted her backpack over her shoulders, and then walked with Irey to the elevator. "Is everyone else in costume already?"
"Last I checked it was just me and Damian. Oh my god Lian, you're going to die when you see his new costume. It's really hot, and you know I've never been into Mr. Dark and Scary Batman junior."
"Really? What's it like?" Lian asked curiously.
Irey hit the button and the elevator started a smooth ascent. "It's like Nightwing's, actually, so yeah. Picture Nightwing but angrier."
Lian grabbed Irey's arm as her legs almost gave out on her. "Does he have the finger stripes?"
"Yep."
"Thank you for preparing me. I would have said something really stupid if you didn't prepare me."
Irey giggled. "Like what? Take me now?"
Lian punched her arm, and still giggling, Irey ran laps around the elevator until it stopped on one of the top floors. Then she was gone in a burst of movement. Lian followed after the red and yellow streak and found herself in a large, circular room with a conference table and more than enough cushy chairs for all of them.
X'hawn was standing by a massive window gazing out at the New York skyline with a contemplative expression on his round, pale face. He was wearing the lime green and black body suit that had been made for him at STAR labs to help him with the climate, but it was a fitting enough costume. He'd pulled his long white hair back into a tight ponytail, and it trailed down his back, making him look somehow very serene.
"Hey X'hawn. How goes it?"
"It goes…pleasantly, I suppose. I'm going to be known as Burst from hereon out. I understand you are to be called Speedy?"
Lian nodded. "It was my dad's codename back when he was a Teen Titan. Is there somewhere I can go change?"
"We all have private chambers assigned to us. If you go down that hallway, you should find yours. I believe Damian is in his."
"Thanks X'hawn. Um, I mean Burst." Lian waved at him, then went down the hall he'd pointed to. One of the doors had a post-it note with Speedy scrawled on it, so she went into that room and dropped her bag.
It was a nice enough little room, but it was definitely impersonal. All it had for furnishings was a bed, a desk, and a dresser, and everything was smooth, silver, and modernist. Lian started thinking immediately of pictures she could hang on the walls, trinkets she could bring from home, and maybe a throw rug to tie the room together.
By the time she'd changed into her costume and returned to the main room the rest of the team had mostly gathered. Irey was sitting on the table chatting with Bart (who was wearing baggy red shorts and a yellow hoodie adorned with a red fabric marker lightning bolt), Cassie was at the head of the table looking through a stack of papers, and X'hawn was still gazing out the window. As far as Lian could tell, they were only missing Jai and Damian.
Then Damian stepped out from behind her and she felt her mouth go dry. Irey's teasing hadn't prepared her at all for the sight of Damian in skintight spandex. His Robin costume had always been bulky (as far as superhero costumes went, anyway), and oftentimes obscured by his cape.
She was seized with a sudden urge to sketch his abdominal muscles.
He was flawless.
"I would have expected you to go with a red and yellow costume. Isn't that more the tradition in your family?" Damian asked politely.
Lian stared at him open mouthed for almost a full minute before she realized she was expected to respond. "I, um, I like purple."
Damian frowned. "I'd figured. It suits you, anyway." He walked over to the table, but rather than sit down he stood imposingly behind one of the chairs. Lian meekly took the seat next to him, trying hard not to stare.
She'd just gotten her first rear view of the new revealing costume, and the sight of his ass in a costume that was basically a second skin and nothing more was doing…things to her.
Damn puberty.
"Are we ready to begin?" Damian asked.
"We can't start yet, my brother's not here!" Irey squeaked. Damian scowled and Irey slid down a little in her chair. "Uh…my mom told me to make sure we included him."
"He's tech support. I don't think we really need him when we discuss business," Damian said.
Lian gaped at him. "Excuse you, but if he's a member of the team then he should be here. It'll take Irey literally a second to find him, and not much longer than that for him to get here. You can wait."
Irey mouthed a thank you that Lian didn't see because she was too engaged in staring Damian down, and then she left the room at superspeed.
Cassie and Bart traded a look, and then Cassie went back to shuffling papers. "Speedy and Kid Flash have a point. Even though Tech's going to stay at the Tower most of the time, he is a member of the team and he's going to be playing an active role. We shouldn't start without him."
"Very well." Damian didn't look very happy about being contradicted. He finally sat down in his chair with his arms crossed.
X'hawn swiveled his chair back and forth nervously, looking very young and childlike all of a sudden. The tension in the room was ridiculous. Bart suddenly got up and edged towards the elevators. "I'm gonna go look for Jai too. Be right back." And then he was gone.
Damian tapped his fingers impatiently against the table. Lian was starting to wonder what was up his ass. The team wasn't going to do well if he kept that 'more important hero than thou' attitude. She, X'hawn, and Jai were total amateurs, after all, and he wasn't even always that respectful towards Irey. She refused to be bullied by him, nor would she watch him push anyone else around (no matter how distractingly hot his new costume was).
Then Bart raced back into the room, knocking Cassie's files into disarray. He was clutching a phone in one hand. "So guys, I know we haven't really started yet, but there's a situation that could use some hero help-"
"Bart, are you freaking kidding? We can't offer them a mission now! They haven't done a single training exercise! We haven't even toured the Tower!" Cassie snapped.
"It's just our Rogues. Seriously, it'll be a good fight for a bunch of kids to cut their teeth on."
"Some of us don't need to cut our teeth," Damian all but growled.
"Some of us need to learn how to talk to teammates," Lian said quietly. "What's the situation?" she asked in a louder voice.
"Hold on a sec." Bart started pacing, and a few seconds later Irey and Jai ran into the room and joined them at the table. It was Lian's first look at Jai in his costume. It was definitely an odd look; sleeveless black t-shirt, tight fitting grey pants with knee boots, fingerless gloves, a collar, and green tinted glasses. The glasses made sense, but she couldn't really figure out what bondage-lite had to do with hacking.
"Kay, now that we're all here…" Bart pushed his bangs out of his face. "So the Rogues are having a fight in downtown Keystone. It looks like a bunch of the old standards versus Downpour, and as far as we can tell Downpour started the fight. The other Flashes are occupied, so if you guys don't want to take this one then I'm gonna have to ditch you for it, and I should probably at least take Irey with me for backup."
Lian felt her stomach twist into knots. She wasn't sure she was ready to jump right into a supervillain battle, but then she remembered what Irey had always said about her Rogues. They really weren't that bad, as far as supervillains went. As long as Captain Cold was in charge they had rules, and a certain amount of respect for superheroes. They probably were a good group for her to start with.
She was still nervous.
"I'm in," Lian said.
Damian nodded his agreement, and looking slightly lost, X'hawn nodded as well.
Cassie rubbed at the bridge of her nose. "I can't believe we didn't get the friggin' tour in. Alright, fine. Let's go to Keystone City then."

Mindy folded a t-shirt and neatly laid it on the bed next to a stack of identical black slacks. "I still wish you'd tell me what happened at the monastery."
"I've already told you," Billy answered. He was sitting on the floor of their hotel in front of the window, holding a perfect lotus and with his radiant amber eyes shut. "I went through the prescribed meditations and rituals just as we planned."
"And you didn't age," Mindy said, some irritation creeping into her tone. "Why didn't you age?" The next t-shirt she folded didn't come out as neatly as the others.
"I'm not entirely sure," Billy said with a frown. He opened his eyes and regarded his mother with innocent befuddlement. "I talked to a few of the other monks about it, and they said it's never happened before. But no one's attempted what I did for years, and no one's done it successfully for generations, so there wasn't really a lot to go on. I talked to Meshta about it though."
"And what did Meshta say?"
"He said he needed me to be a teenager for a little while longer."
Finished with the t-shirts, Mindy moved on to the black silk dress shirts Billy had picked out to wear over them. "Did he tell you why?"
Billy stood up and tapped on the glass. Their hotel room had a wonderful view of New York, including Titans Tower. "He didn't say anything, but I've got an inkling."

A/N: Alright guys, I figure most of you are probably wondering who Billy Hong is. He's not an original character, but he is incredibly obscure. He's from the Rogues New Year's Evil special from 1998, by Brian Augustyn, Ron Wagner, and Bill Reinhold. He's the first Trickster's son, and he has loosely defined meta powers tied to the deity Meshta. Zhutan is not a typo; Augustyn created a fake country (likely based on Bhutan) for Billy's cultural background (though he is American). He only got one canon appearance before being mostly forgotten, so most of what you see about Billy will be made up by me.
In regards to Damian's new identity...so I've been sitting on this one for kind of awhile. I studied Arabic while I was at school. During my last semester I had to do some pretty terrible take-home tests, one of which involved writing a three page essay in Arabic (Arabic is much more concise than English, so three pages of Arabic is a LOT of work). I took many breaks from this mentally exhausting assignment, and while I was goofing off with the translator I decided to try to make the iDaafa construct Demon's Head/Head of the Demon. And I couldn't. I couldn't because ghul doesn't mean demon.
I asked my professor about it (he was really surprised to hear that Batman has an Arabic villain), and he was very adamant that ghul isn't demon. He had to puzzle it out for a minute before he could give me a translation though. "No, you have those in English. It's a word that's quite similar too...ghul, ghul...Ghouls! They're little things. Parents tell their children to be good or the ghuls will get them. They're certainly not demons."
I did another project for my religious studies minor on personifications of evil in Islam, Christianity, and Buddhism (I actually posted it as a Bible fanfic; you can find it on my fic list on ff.net), and I spent some time delving into the Arabic words Iblis and shaytun. As far as I can tell from my research, shaytun is the best translation for demon.
And R'as al-Ghul accidentally named himself the Boogeyman's Head/Head of the Boogeyman, which I personally find hilarious.
So...you're going to review, right? ;)
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