Justice League: Apokolips Crisis

Issue #2 - Hope at World's End

A young blond girl was running in terror from some unseen evil in a dark, foggy laboratory. She glanced back for a moment to see if her assailant was still tailing her, but that loss of concentration meant that she lost her footing and tripped onto the unforgiving, cold ceramic floor.

A black mist surrounded her as she began to sob and hug herself. Two red glowing eyes appeared from the mist behind her. She turned around and with a face of pure terror, began backing away from the eyes.

"N-no..." she stuttered. "S-st-stay away!"

The mist began to form the outline of a figure around the red eyes, with its skin like ash, red cracks visible over its face. It took a few silent footsteps towards her.

"Why do you run from your destiny?" It asked.

"I'm not evil!" She began to cry. "I'M NOT!"

Her scream caused multiple green tubes around the lab to break, flooding the floor with fluids and releasing the unholy abominations in costumes that they held.

"Actions are evil and are only designated as such by those who do not benefit from them..." the figure spoke as the abominations began crawling towards her. "You have a lot to benefit from, young Greta..."

"STOP!!!" The girl's voice sounded much deeper as she screamed. Her cry of horror sent a shockwave around the lab, disintegrating the abominations who were crawling towards her. Though the figure had no facial features other than those horrible red eyes, the girl knew that it was smiling.

"YOU BELONG TO ME!!!" It bellowed.

...

"NO!!!"

The girl screamed as she sat up bolt right. It took her a few seconds, but she eventually registered that what she saw was only a dream.

The very same dream that she's been having for months, before which she never dreamt.

"Are you alright, Greta?" The girl turned to look at the door which led towards her room.

A young man in his late teens dressed in a red and black outfit with a black cape and cowl, a stylized symbol that resembled either a wave or the top part of a bird's head was on his chest.

"I'm fine, Tim..." she replied. "Only a nightmare..."

"You've been having nightmares for a while..."

"Yeah, you know... we're all stressed..."

"I know... it's just that... well... I'm not an expert but I didn't even know a ghost could dream..."

"Can we change the subject already?!"

"Okay okay, sorry..." Tim exclaimed. Though he was willing to let it go for now, his detective senses were tingling, and he was going to get to the bottom of this one way or another. "It's best that you're awake now anyway, Diana called us..."

"Okay... I'll be right out..."

Greta landed on the ground, not noticing that she'd been floating up until that moment. She pulled up her hood and walked out the door which Tim so generously left open for her, even though she could've just phased through it.

Tim couldn't help but feel bad for Greta. Sure, it wasn't his team that found her in that lab and saved her, but she was the only member of Damian's Young Justice to... still be with them, so to speak. He couldn't imagine how lonely she must be feeling at the moment, seeing as how he was the first Robin who didn't have deceased parents once he joined the Bat Family, but after the cataclysm... he didn't want anybody to be alone.