Apartment, Philadelphia, 8:32 AM.
August 9th, 2010.
“Aiden,” Dinah said evenly.
Aiden frowned, she’d clearly heard already, but he had been the one who’d needed to call them; how annoying.
“STAR Labs Philadelphia has been destroyed by the League of Shadows, they also have all of my information,” Aiden said dryly, “That doesn’t sound at all like the deal we made.”
There was a long pause before she spoke again.
“Unforeseen events do occur, as unfortunate as this has been,” Dinah said calmly, “Robin and Superboy have both spoken well of you; thank you for assisting them.”
Well, she had clearly given up on beating around the bush entirely; she was diving straight in.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Aiden said easily. “What can I expect? Assassin’s coming after me? I’m pretty sure my address, phone number, and a bunch of other identifying information were in those files, along with everything about my unique physiology.”
“It’s being looked into as we speak,” Dinah said reassuringly, “You will be under watch in case anyone decides to make a move.”
“You couldn’t have someone keep watch over Star Labs instead?” Aiden pushed, “I think we need to renegotiate here; clearly, only one of us is upholding the spirit of the deal.”
“That’s quite audacious considering what you’ve been up to-” Dinah said immediately, but he cut her off.
“I’ve been up to nothing. But even if I had been, the deal was I would keep your identities secret, along with letting you study my ship, and one of the things you wanted in exchange was monthly health checkups.” Aiden pressed, “Low and behold now all my information is in the hands of an organization of assassins. Now I may not be a mathematician, Dinah, but something doesn’t quite add up.”
“I’m well aware of the specifics of the deal,” Dinah said steadily before there was a long pause. “Very well, we will send someone to talk to you at your home-how does the 15th sound? It will have to be a night meeting.”
Well, if he had any doubts about the League knowing where his new apartment was, they were gone now.
“That’s fine, I’ll be awake until 10:00 PM,” Aiden stipulated, “It will have to be before than some time.”
There was another small pause as if she was talking to someone.
“Very well, well, send someone around nine then,” Dinah said simply.
Aiden didn’t get a chance to ask who they were going to send before she hung up. He’d find out then, he supposed.
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Apartment, Philadelphia, 8:49 PM.
August 15th, 2010.
Aiden stared up at the ceiling impatiently. Eleven minutes until whoever they were going to send turned up. Usually, he was pretty patient when it came to meeting times, but this one had him on edge, and he wasn’t exactly sure why.
They weren’t going to gank him; at least he didn’t think so; if they tried it, he was pretty sure he could get away from most of the League. The worst-case scenario was that they sent Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Martian Manhunter, or The Flash.
It shouldn’t come to that though; he’d done nothing wrong this time; the ball was in his court, he just needed to apply pressure in the right way.
His phone dinged.
It was Enkidu, inquiring about an immediate patrol meetup. He tossed her a quick message saying he couldn’t do it until later and put his phone back down.
His phone dinged.
Aiden blinked before picking it up again; she was strangely persistent. So he tapped out a stronger response about an appointment at nine. It barely went through before his phone dinged again.
He stared down at it incredulously; she wanted to meet up for coffee, before nine, without masks. What on earth was going on here? She wasn’t flirting with him; he’d dealt with that kind of thing many times, her messages held a tone of almost-panic.
A quick glance at the clock showed it as ‘8:53 PM’; while he could definitely make it to a coffee shop in seven minutes, he couldn’t leave his apartment. He sent off another quick message asking if something was wrong.
The phone dinged immediately.
“Meet me outside now.” Aiden read aloud, completely bewildered.
Was Enkidu actually some kind of freaky stalker? A knock on his door drew his attention, and he dropped his phone on the couch. It dinged again before he got halfway to the door, but he ignored it; she could wait ten minutes for this meeting to be over.
He opened the door and blinked.
“Come to beat me up again?” Aiden laughed.
“Of course not,” Diana of Themyscira said dryly.
“So the League of Shadows stole my stuff,” Aiden said easily, opening the door to let her in.
They moved into the lounge room, and Aiden dropped down onto the couch. Diana sat across from him; she was actually pretty intimidating now that he knew who she was.
“They have,” Diana agreed, “There was an entire server of other information stolen along with it. Is there any reason you can think of that would cause them to target you in particular?”
“I’m not really worried about that at all,” Aiden admitted, “I don’t think they are going to come after me; I have nothing to do with them after all-well they might come after me because of the whole powers thing... I’m upset because they have all my private information, which, by definition, makes it no longer private.”
Diana simply nodded before pausing.
“Do you mind if I check you’ve been holding to the deal?” Diana asked evenly. “We are willing to facilitate your relocation into another city, given you haven’t revealed anything.”
“I thought we were here to talk about how you guy's lost my stuff to a bunch of assassins.” Aiden said dryly, “Fine, stick to the question; same as before, no deviations.”
“I agree to those terms,” Diana said firmly.
It took barely a moment to get the rope around his arm again and ask the question.
“I haven’t told anyone about your identities, and I have no intention of doing so,” Aiden repeated obligingly.
Diana smiled, removing the lasso.
“I’m glad to hear that-” Diana started before the room exploded.
Had he been on guard, he might have been able to react in time, but even with his reflexes, the explosion hit him near instantly; he only managed to bring his Ki up enough to soften the aftermath. Pain rocked him as the building collapsed down on top of him, burying him in a crushing pressure.
Everything went dark, and once the building settled in a massive pile of rubble, Aiden finally brought himself to try and move. It was excruciating; every part of him was in pain; he had something sticking through his right ankle, left upper thigh, and the right shoulder.
For a second, he struggled to find the strength to force himself upwards, until he managed to draw his Ki back up. He let it overflow inside him, and he started pressing upwards until he was digging himself out.
It took almost a minute before he reached the point where he could see anything, and a moment later, he could see the sky. Well, a massive plume of dark smoke that was filling the sky anyway.
Wonder Woman was standing on top of another pile nearby, looking roughed up but mostly unharmed; a couple of bleeding scratches littered her shoulders. Aiden stumbled down to his knees and started coughing, drawing her attention to him in the process.
“Aiden!” Diana called.
“I’m alright, for the next couple of minutes anyway.” Aiden managed, “What exploded?”
“The source is unknown,” Diana said as she approached, and he tried to wave her off.
“Stay over there, I’m still not sure you’re not responsible for this,” Aiden said weakly.
Diana stopped immediately, watching him.
The things that were sticking out of him were pieces of rebar apparently, driven into his hardened body through the force of the explosion. He was covered in blood as well; a gash over his brow was forcing him to brush it away from his eyes.
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“I had nothing to do with this,” Diana said honestly.
“I’m pretty sure your right, but the timing says otherwise.” Aiden coughed again, and this time there was blood. “Fuck, that can’t be good.”
He fought his way into a seated position and got a grip around the piece of metal in his ankle.
“Leave it in,” Diana said quickly, “If you remove it now, you’ll start losing blood much faster.”
Aiden paused with his fingers around it, before letting it go. He really should have taken that first aid course his dad had suggested years ago, something to look into if he was still alive in a couple of days. The fact that she was offering him medical advice tipped him over to completely excluding her as the culprit.
Energy signatures appeared in a block to the north, coming as a fast-moving group straight towards them. They were moving too fast to be normal humans, but not fast enough to be driving in a car; at least he thought so. He recognized one of them as the signature of the Ninja girl who had followed him halfway across Central City.
“Motherfucker,” Aiden groaned, pushing himself to his feet with some effort and a lot of pain.
“You shouldn’t be moving.” Diana chastised.
“We have incoming, several people, all moving quickly; one of them is that ninja chick that attacked Selena Gonzalez.” Aiden coughed before straightening as best he could.
His shock was finally washing away, and in its place was that familiar itch to fight, only it was much, much stronger than before, and this time it had a very convenient target.
“Which direction?” Diana said seriously, moving closer to him.
Aiden pointed it out, but most of his attention was on the heady feeling that was building up; had he been uninjured, he might have been able to hold it back, but he couldn’t fight off both the pain and the urge this time.
The first three dark clothed ninjas came sprinting out from the shadows of the northside of the still-standing ruins of the building's structure. Aiden found himself stomping forward to meet them; pain in his ankle momentarily forgotten.
Each of the three was carrying long thin blades, and just before they came into melee range, he blurred forward and grabbed one of them by the face. He spun on his uninjured foot and smashed the guy into one of the others, sending them both tumbling backward into the rubble. The third ninja stabbed at his head, and he swayed to the side and backhanded the guy away, sending him skipping across the ground.
Then he took another step forward and cringed as his foot flared up in agony. The second he glanced down, three metal stars spiked him in the chest, and he snapped his head up to see a flash of green vanishing behind a crumbling pillar and out of sight. Diana was too busy fighting her own much larger ninja group, so he went after the ninja woman.
He stumbled around the pillar and barely got his arm up to shield his face from a smaller, directed explosion that sent him tumbling to the side. He pushed more KI into his body as the woman's sword stabbed downwards at his chest.
The tip snapped off as it came into contact with his hardened skin.
“Another one?” The woman sighed, “Really?”
Aiden didn’t bother replying, instead flipping back to his feet with a burst of Ki and reaching for her.
The woman slipped to the side and swung her broken sword at his face, but it may as well have been in slow motion. He reached out and latched onto the blade before it could reach his eye and tugged her towards him.
The ninja let the weapon go a second to slow, and by the time she had recovered enough to attempt evasion, he snagged her by the arm; he clamped down on it to stop her from escaping. Instead, she stabbed a knife-hand into his throat, that landed with a winch of pain as her fingers bounced off.
Aiden stared at her in silence as she turned his face to the side with another sudden punch, but made no move to let her free. The urge to let her go and continue the fight was sitting there itching away at him.
“Well, this isn’t going exactly like I thought it would.” The woman said, annoyed. “I don’t suppose you’d let me go?”
He had a vague recollection that she might have been important to the plot in some way, although he couldn’t remember any of the details. Something about that Speedy guy?
“You blew up my apartment building,” Aiden gritted out. “While I was in it-I’ve got metal sticking out of me, and It fucking hurts; I’m doing my best not to turn you into the only one-armed ninja in the city.”
“That sounds painful,” The woman said dryly. “I’d rather keep it if that’s alright.”
Smoke suddenly burst forth from one of her pockets, swallowing them both and reducing visibility to nothing before a dull crack rang out within the smoke.
“Aiden?” Diana called from nearby.
“I’m here,” Aiden said, annoyed, before sending out a burst of Ki to disperse the smoke.
“Well, that didn’t work,” The ninja winced as her dislocated shoulder remained clamped tightly in his grasp. “Ow.”
“Idiot.” Aiden sighed.
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Hospital, Philadelphia, 10:17 PM.
August 15th, 2010.
“Well, this feels familiar,” Aiden sighed painfully. “They wouldn’t have any reason to come after me, huh?”
He was sitting in a room, in a hospital bed, across from Diana. At least this time, he wasn’t shackled to a table. On the other hand, he would have preferred the shackles instead of the searing agony that was his shoulder, thigh, and ankle right now.
“Why did they come after you?” Diana said evenly.
“Capture? Recruit? An experiment maybe, it’s not the first time that one’s happened after all.” Aiden tossed out his guesses, “Who knows, isn’t this your job? I’m just a dude with terrible luck. Besides, the entire reason you even came was to discuss the renegotiations.”
Diana sighed.
“So, now my apartment is gone, the STAR Labs here is destroyed, and the League of Shadows is after me.” Aiden said thoughtfully, “I think I might need to move.”
“Yes, that does seem like a good decision,” Diana said simply. “Do you intend to continue your checkups?”
“Is there any more Star Labs around?” Aiden countered, “I’m fine with keeping the deal, but I’m going to have to ask you guys for some compensation.”
“I’ll discuss it with the others.” Diana said before moving on, “There are many cities where STAR Labs has a business; Boston, New York City, Gotham City, Detroit, and Taos, to name a few.”
“Boston sounds alright,” Aiden said sullenly. “Ugh, I just realized it’s going to take like a month to get my insurance paid out. Looks like it’s back to living in a hotel.”
“I’ll bring it up at the meeting,” Diana promised, “Despite what happened, you managed to capture Cheshire, one of the more notable members of the League of Shadows, that’s a pretty impressive achievement.”
It was a human with a pointy stick, a very skilled and dangerous human, but it wasn’t exactly a fair match up. If they’d had equalized speed, strength and durability, she would have killed him instantly.
“Hurray,” Aiden said unenthusiastically. “Is this where you try and recruit me? I’m not really interested in being a hero; I hear it pays terribly.”
“You could do a lot of good,” Diana said idly, “But the choice is yours if you ever change your mind, you just need to let me know.”
That sounded like a point he could lean on to get something he sorely needed.
“Hey, speaking of help, that fight made me realize that I suck pretty badly,” Aiden said thoughtfully, “Think we could swing some sparring sessions; you looked like you knew what you were doing.”
Diana gave a thoughtful hum before slowly nodding.
“I think we could do something like that,” Diana agreed, “They will be fairly infrequent; however, I am quite busy.”
“Sounds good to me,” Aiden said before wincing again as he jarred his shoulder; the bandages were kind of pulling against the wounds as well. “Might be a while before I’m up to anything like that, though.”