Young Justice Season 4 - The Red X Factor

Episode/Chapter 12 - Divided and Fallen

"Have you guys found M'gann yet?" Nightwing asked over the comm.

"Nope. Nothing yet." Superboy replied.

"Same here." Jet replied.

"Darn...this might take longer than anticipated..." Kid Flash groaned. Suddenly, he stopped in his tracks and stood gaping, his face turning pale.

"Wally?" Nightwing said, moving his hand in front of Wally's face, "Wall-man, what's up?" Nightwing looked at his pupils, then looked in the direction they were looking, and soon, he recognized what he was staring at: it was the same place where Wally had died a couple years ago.

"Dick...this is the place... The MFD... June 20, 2016..." Wally looked down at the snow, "for two years, I was on the Reach Ship, being tested on and experimented on for a year, until, to my surprise, you showed up. Seeing you reminded me of the fight we had... Well...the many fights we had in the past. I never really got to apologize for that."

"You don't have to." Nightwing responded, "you being here is a great enough apology. I couldn't ask for anything more. Having my best friend back."

"Thanks man."

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"Uh, Jet?!" Night Owl shouted over the howls of the winds and snow.

"We might have to hunker down. Not really any point in getting through this if we can't see..." Jet responded, as if he knew what she was going to say. Night Owl nodded and they started digging. Finally, about five minutes later, they were sitting in a trench in the snow.

"How long is the storm going to last?"

"Let's hope not long." Jet said and turned on his comm, "Nightwing? Come in!" Nothing but crackling, "dang it. The snow is interfering with the transmission."

"So we're stuck here?"

"Not necessarily. We just wait for the storm to let up, and we're golden."

"What if by the time it's over, they've left already?"

"...." Jet thought for a long moment, "I don't know..."

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"Do you see that?" Superboy asked.

"Uh, the giant black clouds? Yep." Beast Boy nodded nervously.

"Hey Nightwing, we've run into the storm down here." Superboy said on the comm.

"Really? No sign of storm here... Hunker down. How're Jet and Night Owl?" Nothing but crackling.

"They were probably caught in the storm and lost connection." Superboy suggested.

"You're probably right..." Nightwing said.

"Wait! I found something! It looks like some storage building!" Kid Flash said, "it's gotta be the pla--"

"Kid?!" Superboy said, but they had lost connection.

"So what now?" Beast Boy asked.

"Do as we're told. Hunker down." Superboy said, "I hope they find M'gann..."

"Don't worry, Superboy. They will." Beast Boy reassured him as he turned into a polar bear and started digging a giant crater in the snow.

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"There it is..." Kid Flash said and pointed to a small metal base in the snow, "So how do we approach this? The other four were most likely caught in the storm."

"Then we're on our own..." Nightwing muttered as he got onto his wrist holo-computer and started hacking into the base security systems, "I hacked the motion sensors and shut them all down. They shouldn't know we're here."

"So it's good to go in?"

"Yeah. Let me get the doors unlocked..." Nightwng started typing, then they heard a latch unlock in the door about a mile away from them.

"Yeah...way to be obvious..." Kid Flash muttered.

"It's perfectly fine..." Nightwing said as they crept closer to the building, "okay. All cameras should be disabled, too. You can go ahead." 

Kid Flash nodded, put on his red goggles, then ran into the building. Less than thirty seconds later, Nightwing got a transmission from him.

"Hey, I found her. And you're not going to like it. Hurry up." 

"Okay, okay. I'm already headed there." Nightwing said as he ran through the cold metal halls, "where are you?" 

"Uh, you don't have to go too far..." Kid Flash responded just as Nightwing turned a corner and ran into him. Kid Flash shushed him and gestured to the giant room they were standing at the entrance to. 

"Whoa...." Nightwing muttered as they looked at the giant metal room, almost identical to the Light's HQ in the underground sewers of Paris. The walls were lined with cells, all of which were empty except for one, which was at the very top, and there were flames surrounding the cell and the platform in front of it. 

"She's gotta be up there." Kid Flash said. 

"And there's only one way up..." Nightwing said and gestured to a keypad on the wall. He ejected a wire cord from his wrist holocomputer and plugged it into the keypad. He started hacking into the system and trying to figure out a way to get up. 

"I can try running up..." Kid Flash suggested. 

"Yeah..." Nightwing muttered as he continued to hack, but failed, "this guy's defense systems are pretty good..." 

"I'll try that out." Kid Flash said and stepped back to get a running start. Then he ran up to the wall, and about a few feet away from it, he jumped as high as he could jump, but dropped back down, "Darn...that's gotta be at least 12 feet high... I could never make it... At least not without tearing this place apart..." 

"Wait...that's it! KF, you're a genius!" Nightwing said, then he started typing in virus codes to tear the system apart and take full control over it.

"Y'know, I feel like this was too easy....finding M'gann and all." Kid Flash considered. Suddenly there was rapid beeping from Nightwing wrist holocomputer, "What's happening?!" 

"I'm not sure..." Nightwing said and started typing in codes to counterattack wherever caused the beeping. Suddenly, his entire screen turned red, "Crap!!" 

"What?!" 

"His motherboard is far more complex than any I've ever seen! When I reached the core and uploaded the viruses, the core was able to backfire and direct them towards my motherboard!" Nightwing explained as he quickly tried to delete the virus. Then the intruder alarm went off. 

"Just great...chain reaction system... it detects a virus threat and it knows there's an intruder..." Kid Flash groaned, "who is this guy and how does he have all this advanced tech?!" 

"You'd be surprised." A voice said from behind them, and when they turned, the door slammed shut, and they were left inside the room by themselves...with Red X. 

-To be continued!-