Injustice: The Path to Hell

Birds of Prey

Chapter LXI - Beast Unleashed

Sunday 4th July 2010, 20:00.
Washington D.C,
Cadmus Research Facility.

Doctor Mark Desmond was many things, a scientist, a genius, a man who pushed the boundaries of science whenever he could in order to achieve his goals. It was he who had fully utilised the cloning technology to its full potential, it was he that created the clone of Superman and made it a profitable weapon.

It was this achievement that had seen him rise from a simple scientist to the head of the Cadmus Research Facility due to impressing the mysterious board of directors calling themselves, the Light. Their identities were a mystery to him, but he didn't care about that as all he cared about was ensuring he received funding to continue expanding his knowledge of science and things had been going splendidly.

Especially thanks to his new research specimen.

The secrets he had uncovered from studying his body, the experiments he had been able to conduct and the improvements he had made to other specimens as a result of his genetic material were beyond anything he had imagined possible. It was why he was unwilling to let him go, why he had the Genomorphs hunt down and kill the strange mass of shadows calling himself Ignotus, though it was unfortunate there was nothing left to study afterwards.

But then things had been going wrong.

First had been the fire that had broken out, attracting the attention of Superman.

Luckily he had managed to contact the Light who had managed to work up a diversion to keep the League occupied.

However, then the sidekicks of Batman, Flash and Aquaman showed up and freed the clone.

Yet that hadn't even been the worst of it because then he had another team break-in.

A team including Batgirl, Killer Frost and the very same mercenary who had brought Subject Nine to Cadmus in the first place and tried to break in numerous times after then, Ravager arrived. A rag-tag group to be sure, but they had nonetheless torn through the Genomorphs Desmond had sent to stop them and had then teamed up with the rest of the sidekicks.

Now, to top all of this, they were all heading directly towards Subject Nine's pod.

While they had managed to shut him out of his own security system, he had managed to regain some control back, but even then, it was only the security cameras.

Pressing a button, a small hatch opened with a hiss revealing a number of small vials containing a purple-blue liquid reaching out, took one of the vials. 'With the new and improved Project Blockbuster, I will have the power necessary to bring order back to Cadmus. But I have to stop them before they release Subject Nine.' Leaving the room, he looked at the small army of Gnomes he had with him and walked down the corridor, the army following him loyally. 'If Subject Nine is let out of his pod, then he will destroy all of Cadmus! I have to stop them before they do!'

Sunday 4th July 2010, 18:10.
Washington D.C,
Cadmus Research Facility.

Barbara's mind was a mess, it had been ever since she learned of Esau being experimented upon.

There had been anger, so much anger and it had all been unfocused.

No matter how much she tried, there was no real target to aim it at.

All of it had just jumped around in her head, leaving her unfocused and unable to think properly.

Even now, as they rushed down the corridor of floor thirty-four of Cadmus towards where Esau had been detained, she was still unable to focus on the area around her. On a few occasions, she had run into isolated groups of Genomorphs and was saved by one of the members of their group in the nick of time.

Yet no matter how many times it happened, she kept repeating it over and over again.

Eventually, they reached the door, the only one that was still intact on this entire floor, not that she had paid much attention to her surroundings. But the others had, each of them piecing together the fact that something had happened on this floor before they had come here and it had nearly levelled the entirety of it, except for this one room.

Barbara didn't care, only looking at Robin impatiently., he was the better hacker of the two of them and had already tapped into the security systems. "Well?" Nodding his head, Robin pulled up a holographic screen and after a few seconds of typing something onto the keyboard, the door opened with a groan.

As the team pulled in, Killer Frost and Ravager hung back making them the last to enter the room. "They'll betray us when all this is over, y'know?" Killer Frost whispered quietly and Ravager nodded her head, her eyes fixated upon the pod laying in the centre of the room.

It was frosted over leaving its contents obscured from view, but none of them had any doubts as to what was inside.

"I know." She whispered back, temporarily sending a cautious look at the other members of their impromptu team.

Killer Frost looked on as Batgirl moved forwards, closing the distance between her and the pod in a matter of moments. "Can I trust you to at least back me up when that time comes?" While she was confident in her powers, she wasn't stupid.

She had overheard Robin explain to Batgirl who exactly the clone was and she didn't like the odds of facing him, let alone him and Aqualad. Least of all the entire group of young heroes with their varying powers and skillsets.

She'd need help.

Not to win but to at least escape.

"So long as I can trust you to do the same for me?" Ravager shot back and despite their silent agreement, both already had plans in motion to betray the other if it gave them a chance to escape.

At the same time as Ravager and Killer Frost formed an 'alliance,' Robin had moved to the computer as the others stood beside him. Except for Batgirl who had already moved to wipe away some of the frost on the pod and revealed an image of Esau lying there unconscious.

"It's him!" She exclaimed in relief before turning to look back at them. "Robin, open it up." However, Robin didn't answer, too focused on looking through the display screen.

"I don't know about you but I'm getting some serious déjà vu vibes," Wally spoke up, only to quickly shrink away when the clone of Superman looked at him. It wasn't a threatening look, more like a look of curiosity but due to the near-permanent angry frown on the clone's face, it came across as threatening. "Not that it's bad vibes!" He quickly attempted to rectify any insult he made, unknowing that he had done none.

"I agree," Kaldur spoke up, saving Wally the trouble of embarrassing himself anymore. "I believe it would be best if we made sure there are no problems we should be made aware of. Are there any...files?"

"Already searching for them," Robin informed and then with a grin, a number of documents appeared on the screen. "KF, you mind?"

"Not at all." Cracking his fingers, Wally moved forwards and quicker than should be humanely possible, flickered through the hundreds of documents. "Jesus, get a load of this. All that shit we saw outside, that was all Esau's doing. Started off small, introducing some strange genetic structures into his gene sequence. Just basically tore about his DNA and rebuilt it into, well, into something not quite human. I don't even know what they were trying to accomplish, but they succeeded."

"What did they succeed in doing?" Aqualad asked while Robin moved forwards to read through the final document.

"Subject Nine as of the thirteenth of May has been put on ice after the latest incident with his powers. Subject showed superhuman levels of speed and strength, but this increase came at the cost of all his mental capacity, to the point he entered a berserk-like state. Jesus." Robin took a glance at the door where they had entered, imagining what a berserk Esau did and must have looked like when destroying the entire floor. His eyes then turned back to the screen to continue reading, only to spot Barbara crouched down in front of the pod, a small hatch open as she hacked into it. "Batgirl, don't!"

But it was too late, after having been ignored by Robin, her anger and impatience caused her to take matters into her own hand. If Robin wouldn't help her free Esau, she would do it herself and with a smile of victory, watched as the pod opened with a hiss.

She raised one hand to temporarily protect herself from the cold fog that covered her and then rose to her feet. Esau despite the scars on his body – scars he had from his time as Black Hood and in the underground fighting arena – was in perfect health. There was no sign of muscle atrophy as he looked to be in perfect shape and considering he was only wearing a pair of tight black boxers, it allowed her to see every inch of him.

He was the same as she remembered.

But there was also something different about him, a strange enchanting wildness about him.

Something strangely human and yet, not at the same time.

Seeing his blue eyes flicker open, she smiled happily. "Esau, you're okay." But too caught up in her relief, she didn't notice the subtle changes in Esau's body positioning. The others however did, the first sign being the sight of his muscles quickly tensing followed by the sight of his hand flexing to reveal sharp claws.

"Batgirl, get away from him!"

Kid Flash quickly rushed forwards to get Barbara out of harm's way.

But it was too late as Esau's right arm swung round and backhanded her away with enough power to send her flying into the wall. She collided against it with a gasp as her vision clouded and the air rushed from her lungs, she collapsed to the ground, laying there unmoving.

As she attempted to recover her breath, Kid Flash continued to rush forwards hoping to knock Esau unconscious before they had a repeat of today's earlier events. Due to his speed, he only managed to catch a glimpse of Esau's blue eyes turning from blue to a brilliant red, the pupils becoming slits before a roar of animalistic fury came forth, shaking the very room.

So, another chapter is done and I hope you all enjoyed it. Anyway, if you have any questions or suggestions, please let me know.