Young Justice Darkest AU

Chapter 3

  Last time: He gave one last look to his friend lying on the white sheets, and left the Watchtower. He would come back after everyone had seen the body, to know that their friend, brother, and leader, was dead.  

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Tim and Barbara-as themselves- rushed into the Watchtower at an unholy hour of the morning. 

If you listened close, you would hear Tim muttering "No, no, not him. Please, God, not him," under his breath, tears shining in his eyes. When they got to the med bay, and Barbara checked for a pulse, she shook her head, and you could hear the cry of anguish from Dick's little brother throughout the entire space station.

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Nightwing woke up with a gasp, covered in a cold sweat. He looked to his left and saw an unfamiliar black wall. He looked right and saw his Atlantean friend. He got Kaldur's attention with a small rasp, then asked, "How long?"

His old team leader looked him dead in the eye, and told him, "If I had waited any longer, my friend, you would not be alive to have this conversation."

"Thanks, Kal. Let's go. You got the replacement?" Nightwing sat up with little difficulty,  and stood, facing his friend. 

It was then that Nightwing noticed a black bag that Kaldur was carrying at his side. Kaldur, wanting to get it over with quickly, unzipped the bag. He and Nightwing pulled a John Doe out of the duffel, placing it on the med table with care. Nightwing stripped his costume off, and, piece by piece, they dressed the decoy in his costume. When it was done, the sheet pulled over the dead man's head, Nightwing turned to the son of Black Manta. 

"Where did you get him?" He gestured to the body on the table. 

Kaldur took him in with a look of consideration and pity for what Nightwing was getting himself into with this plan. "I took him from a hospital in Detroit, no one will miss him. He has no living family, if it makes you feel better."

It didn't.

"Can you hand me the bag?" Nightwing was avoiding having that conversation, Kaldur could tell.

Kaldur handed Dick the black duffel that contained the persona he would take on for the next few months, and Dick got changed.

Dick looked at his friend of six years, and knew, he might not survive this. The persona he had been carefully crafting for months was finally being put into action. He would become the persona of an international Russian assassin, and he was scared. He finished getting dressed, and turned to Kaldur.

The costume was almost all black. He had orange shoulder pads, and knee and shin guards, as well as his gauntlets. The mask was his regular black domino, but was spiked in the middle and on the winged ends. 

"Are you ready to go, Nightwing?" Kaldur asked, eyeing his friends new get up. 

Dick looked at him solemnly. "Not Nightving, I be da Renegade now."

That's it for this chapter, and I was thinking next chapter I could show the team and Bats on earth grieving. In this, Jason is alive and already Red Hood, and he's mad he didn't get told about his older brother's death. I'm on ff.net at Simply Bookworm.