Worst Case Scenario

Chapter 26: Dichotomy

Raquel walked home in silence.

Icon had zeta'd back to Dakota City with her and offered to fly her home, but she'd said no. She needed more time to think about things.

Not that that wasn't what she'd been doing for her two whole days in the hospital.

The entire team was gone.

Granted, she'd only known them for a few days, but to have them all die or worse on their first mission together...

And of course, there was Zatanna, who she'd failed to save and Red Arrow, who she'd killed with her own two hands.

Finally, she reached her apartment building and was forced to put her thoughts aside to ascend the stairs and put her key in the lock.

No one else was around.

She'd called her mom to say she'd be coming home, but told her it would be fine if she stayed at work.

So the lights really shouldn't have been on.

"Hello?" asked Raquel nervously as she moved forward into the room. After she'd first put on the inertia belt and became Rocket, she'd never thought she'd be scared of a simple burglar ever again.

The door clicked shut behind her and she whirled to find a tall woman with wild black hair and a grinning mask standing behind her.

Cheshire.

Raquel backed up, trying to stay out of reach, looking for a weapon. Cheshire didn't move, but simply stood there, one hand on her hip.

Raquel didn't take her eyes off the assassin until she heard another footstep behind her. Turning around, she locked eyes with a second figure emerging from the kitchen, dressed in an altered version of her old uniform, with a large hunting knife strapped to her leg. Raquel had no difficulty recognizing her.

"Artemis."

Robin screamed.

Pain rushed into his head like a tidal wave, filling all the gaps it could find.

He could feel Psimon's presence everywhere, taking total control.

No...

"You are mine, child" said Psimon. The man chuckled, as if the whole thing was amusing.

It was then that something inside Robin snapped.

"NEVER!" he screamed, pushing back on Psimon with all his will, with all his anger.

"What...?" asked Psimon in pure surprise as Robin's counterattack started to overwhelm him.

For the entire mission, things had been steadily sliding out of control, going from bad to worse to worse than that: out of the frying pan, into the thermonuclear reaction.

And Robin was sick of it.

"Give... in..." muttered Psimon, strain clear in his voice.

Make me thought Robin as he pushed harder and harder, using all of his rage, straining his willpower to levels that even Green Lanterns rarely reached.

And then it was over. Psimon cut the connection and fell to his knees, gasping for breath.

Robin was on his back. Slowly, he felt control of his muscles returning to him and he struggled to get up. He couldn't give a repeat of that anytime soon. If he couldn't take finish off Psimon before the psychic recovered, he was screwed.

"Unacceptable" muttered Psimon, hands on his temples as if he was suffering a sudden bout of vertigo. "I can understand losing to the Martian, or maybe even the Atlantean. But an ordinary human child? What drives you?"

Robin propped himself up with his elbow, too out of breath to answer.

"Well" said Psimon, regaining his composure somewhat "We'll just have to figure that out together." From the inside of his robes he removed what was unmistakably a syringe, which he plunged into his wrist.

Robin had a feeling that this was going to end badly and lunged down the corridor away from Psimon, towards his earlier objective, only to be flattened by a psychic blast.

"Psychostimulants" said the villain, getting back to his feet and tossing the now useless needle away from himself. He smiled.

"Ready for Round 2?"