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…Dick…
Dick was bored, tired, and sick of this whole situation. He simply glared at the woman in the cell in front of him. Did she do anything bad? Well not to him and maybe not at all considering what she said about being possessed but still he had been on a goose chase for a week and this was the farthest he’d gotten. He couldn’t help but put all his displeasure on her.
The girl, Isabel, had blonde hair that was a little shorter than shoulder length. Her face was round and had slightly faded natural makeup on it. She looked much calmer than any civilian should be in her position simply humming to herself and sitting on her cot. Looking at her records showed nothing out of the ordinary, a flight attendant with no suspicious money transfers or anything. It made no sense.
Dick was raised by the best detective in the world and despite the fact he wasn’t as intimate with the League of Assassins as some of his other siblings he had much more knowledge on it than most people. These facts along with him owing Zatanna a favour has put him in this position.
…
The call started out completely normal and casual as if Zatanna called him everyday just because. He knew what this call was about. A month ago he got hit with some magical truth serum, he knew it would rub off in a day, knew it had no effect on his health but he still begged Zatanna to come all the way over to Gotham to remove it. In the end he had to give the magician an IOU just because he didn’t trust himself not to spill his identity to civilians and didn’t trust his family to not pry at him for his deepest darkest secrets.
“Anyway, remember that favor you owed me?”
“There it is.”
“Is it really that hard to believe I just wanted to call you.”
“Yes.”
“You bats probably want this on your radar anyway.”
“Go on.”
“Could you do that detective stuff you do and find me the wielder of the All-Blades? Need them for something.”
“Who?”
“That's what I’m hoping you can help me with.”
“Do you have anything more than wielder of the All-Blades?”
“Right, so we don’t know a lot but we know that their a member of a group called the All Caste, and we know that the All Caste has something to do with the league, that's it”
“Can’t you just go to the justice league database?”
“League of Assassins.”
“Oh… Can’t you just, like, magic your way into finding them?”
“They have some pretty advanced stuff protecting them from magic.. kinda why we need them.”
“Great, well I’ll see what we have and call you once I’ve found them.”
“Awesome… bye!”
Dick let out a large groan after she hung up.
…
“I don’t know anything about the All Caste you're either gonna have to let Essence possess me or just let me go” Isabel giggled for the hundredth time. “ I got a flight to catch, and this has been funny but I’m gonna be late”
This was the most confusing part. He could understand the refusal, hell he could understand her possession logic but he didn’t know why she was so amused.
“I don’t know what's so funny”
“He’s gonna kill you when he finds out.”
“Who!?”
“If I tell you he's gonna kill me too!” She said with more laughter than fear or anger.
“Please just help a guy out, I’ve been looking for these All-Sword things for a week! You're the only connection I’ve found!”
“Either let Essence out, let me go, or suffer his wrath.”
He let out an annoyed growl and considered the blood red sword in front of her cell . It would be incredibally stupid, but other Titans were at the tower and he got her in her cell once. Plus, this was important he had no information on the “All-Caste” for all he knew this could be a justice league level threat. In all honesty it wasn’t the fact she might be a threat that was stopping him, Essence, the girl that possessed Isabel, scared the hell out of him, like Jason’s girlfriend's level scared him. While Isabel was all jokes with mild annoyance Essence seemed pissed only letting a venomous smile on her face when he told her what Isabel found so funny.
…
The woman had pale white skin and hair, a major contrast to her ink black eyes and clothes and blood red sword. If his research proved him right this was Essence. It took him five long days of scouring the Leagues paper archives to find out about her existence and two longer days of waiting for her to show up on some security camera. In the end he caught her killing some weird magical creature disguising as a human in an abandoned New York City Subway Station.
Essence turned to him wearing a displeased scowl that could almost compete against Bruce’s. He immediately jumped into action. Could she be a good guy? Maybe but she also works with the league and with how little sleep he was getting with this case that's good enough for him. She doesn’t hesitate to attack back until she sees his suit, which causes her to go on complete defence.
“What do you want, Grayson.”
Great, she knows his identity, of course. She dodges his spin into a kick.
“Information about some All-Blades and something called an All Caste”
“Oh, and you came to me?”
She ducks away from more of his acrobatic attacks with the grace of a high standing league member. Not good.
“Don’t know who else I would go to?”
“Secretive Man Child” she simply mutters under her breath.
He goes more direct now just hoping to hit her once and then his fist collides with her stomach, or at least it should’ve but instead it goes right through her.
“What-“
“Who told you about the All Caste” she interrogates
“Magician friend, wants whoever wields the All-Blades help and I happen to be the one tasked with finding them.”
The smile she gives at that is venomous and somehow mocks him for knowing less than her. It makes him angry and with how frustrating this whole ordeal has been he takes it out on the sword in her hand. He quickly shifts and catches her off guard as he takes the sword from her hand. Suddenly the weak walls he has around his soul alert him of someone and he drops the sword immediately onto the dirty floor. It clatters to the ground but instead of the girl scrambling to pick it up again a blonde woman lays in the place she was laughing her shoes off. While she's down he goes to cuff her and hopes unlike her counterpart he doesn’t phase through her. He's satisfied to find her moved by his hands and unable to get out of the cuffs. He then puts his two escrima sticks into one hand and uses them to balance the sword away from him. He hopes she's untrained so he has a chance to catch her if she runs away as he runs to store the sword in his motorcycle. Thank god I brought it today. He returns to find the girl thankfully waiting patiently for him.
“Look at me, meeting the family” she says as an inside joke to himself.
“Are you aware of what just happened?” He asks her.
“Don’t worry about Essence she looks evil but once you get to know her you find out she's just mean” she says far too casually for her not to have information.
“I’m gonna have to ask you to come with me”
“As long as I can leave by 5:00 I have a flight at 6:00”
“We’ll see”
“Take it he didn’t mention me?”
“Who?”
“Oh, this is so good.”
…Roy…
Roy had gotten to the tower an hour ago and to his dismay still couldn't find Dick. It wasn’t that he wanted to see Dick, ok he totally did want to see him. Ever since he’d gotten back to hanging out with the Titans His and Dick’s relationship had been pretty good. Plus, He couldn’t find Dick anywhere and it worried him. He mentally went over which floors he's been on in the elevator before deciding that the cells were the only place left he could possibly imagine Dick being for any reason.
Roy swayed from side to side scared that when he finally got to the floor Dick wouldn’t be there. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes as he exited the elevator. Immediately hearing Dick’s voice he settled for a moment before opening his eyes.
What.
“Isabel?” Roy asked
“Roy! Finally somebody!” Isabel said in her cell?!?
“You two know each other?” Dick asked
Roy inspected the scene in front of him. Dick looked like shit and was stopped mid pace in front of Isabel’s cell. Isabel looked more bored than anything else and along with her purse stood her Essence’s? Sword right in front of the cell. Jason had caught him up on what happened with Essence and Isabel during the last Outlaws mission just incase of a situation like this.
“Uhh ya that’s Jason’s uhhh…” he responded, not quite sure what she was to Jason currently.
“Ex-girlfriend for the moment.”
“What’s up Dick why’s Isabel here”
Isabel gave a quick smirk before Dick answered.
“Well, you see, I owed Zatanna a favor and last week she finally called it in. So for the past week straight I’ve been struggling looking for this magical ‘wielder of the All-Blades’” Dick said adding extra malice anytime a name was mentioned.
Out of all the answers that could’ve been getting, that certainly wasn’t what Roy was expecting. He couldn't help but burst out in laughter.
“You- You are looking for the wielder of the All-blades?” He asked incredulously
“Not you too Roy! What’s so funny! What am I not understanding!”
Isabel, now laughing too “What should we do Roy?”
“One second, let me just enjoy this for a second, ” Roy said, catching his breath. “You’ve been looking for a week?”
“Yes, Roy, I have been obsessing over this for a whole week! Yesterday, Zatanna texted me to get onto the case because she thought I wasn’t trying!
“God, I’m gonna Facetime Jason he’ll love this.”
…Jason…
Jason was preparing to cook dinner when Roy called him. Roy calling him wasn’t strange but Jason could’ve sworn Roy mentioned he was traveling and settling into Titans Tower today. Along with that Roy Facetimed him which was rare and wasn’t something you do in an emergency. Jason shrugged off his worries and picked up the phone anyway.
The first thing he saw was Roy laughing and smiling like an idiot not good. After he laughed and chuckled out a greeting he shakily reversed his camera to show a very upset and tired Dick Grayson and- was that Isabel in that cell?
“Hi, Jason” Isabel said slightly annoyed
“Uhm what is going on, what’s Isabel doing at the tower?”
“Give him the speech Dick, come on” Roy said with a bright smile on his face.
“I swear to god little wing if you laugh at this,” he warned before taking a deep breath. “ A little while ago Zatanna helped me out and so I owed her a favour. Last Wednesday she called in that favor and for the past week I have been looking for whatever the hell is an All Caste so I can find who ever the wielder of the All Blades is” Dick whisper screamed in frustration
Jason stood stock still, he can see why Roy and Isabel laughed from an outside perspective this would be ridiculously funny, however Jason wasn’t some innocent bystander watching this unfold, no, Jason was Dick’s little brother who had just wasted a week of his life because he never talked to his family, let alone about his time with the league. That wasn’t the only thing that left Jason with a horrified expression. Jason was being sought out by Zatanna for who knows what and not only did Jason want nothing to do with magic but he wanted nothing to do with Zatanna because Zatanna wanted something to do with Bruce and Jason wanted nothing to do with his father.
“D-do you know why Zatanna wanted the wielder of the All Blades?” He asked in a silent voice hoping his luck was better than it had been for his whole life.
“ Whatever the reason , it better be worth a whole week of my time!”
Jason grimaced and wished he was back in his grave, at least that would be a kinder fate than what Dick would make him do for the time he wasted because Jason didn’t talk to him and what Zatanna would do for making her waste a favor from Dick Grayson. While he stood silently paler than how he was on his deathbed he heard Roy and Isabel laughing at his misery.
“Now are you guys gonna help me or not!” Dick asked
Suddenly silent in anticipation the two backstabbers turned to the phone pressuring him into being the one to spill the beans. Isabel suddenly seemed a lot less bored and annoyed and Roy had that shit eating grin he only seemed to wear when making Jason do something he didn’t want to.
…Dick…
Dick watched as the other two in the room faced the phone expecting Jason to answer his question. He wondered what made Jason the one responsible for answering but it probably had something to do with the ‘oh shit’ expression he wore.
“Big wing…”
That’s bad, Jason only calls him that when he's trying to get out of trouble.
“My big brother, dare I say my favorite brother?”
Jason definitely did something.
“You know That time I spent training with the league..”
Dick may be curious but he won’t fall for such obvious bait.
“Well, some of that time I spent training with the All Caste haha.”
Oh?
“And I currently may very well be the last wielder of the good ol’ All-Blades…”
Oh.
“Would you look at the time! I’ve gotta go” he said as he hung up.
A week. Dick Grayson spent a week looking for his brother. Time he could’ve spent saving people, sleeping, or getting some very rare free time but no he was looking for someone right in front of him. He took a deep breath and watched as Roy suddenly went from laughing to being very still.
“I’m sorry to have had to keep you Isabel, I hope this will be enough time for you to catch that flight,” Dick said with a big fake smile. “Nice to meet you”
“You as well,” she said, picking up her stuff before heading out.
“Bye, Isabel” Roy practically whispered with eyes that screamed ‘don’t leave’.
The room was thick with tension as Roy slowly reached to call Jason again. This was completely his fault after all no way was he getting off the hook. Jason picked up immediately, he was smart enough to know if he hadn’t the problem would just get worse.
“Hey guys…” Jason said nervously.
“Roy if a situation like this happens again you tell me as soon as you know, do not laugh or withhold information at my expense, understood?” Dick said sternly
“Yes sir!”
“Jason.”
“Ya…”
“No more withholding major information that could affect our jobs.” Dick starts in a dangerous voice. “If not Bruce I atleast should know connections you made in the league and abilities that may be useful, understood?” Dick scolded as if Jason was a toddler.
“Understood.” Jason said relatively surprised by that lack of punishment. Man they really were getting old.
“Also you owe me an IOU.”
Nevermind.
“Ughhhh, I guess it could be worse.” Jason groaned, accepting the terms. “Can’t say I’m happy about having to get involved in the magic community”
“Good luck little wing, texting Zatanna right now.” Dick chirped.
“Bye! Jaybird” Roy said changing his mood as quickly as Dick.
“Ya, sure you two have fun while you sell me out and force me on some weird magical journey, great, bye.” And with that he hung up with a debt to pay and a bat’s least favorite activity on his calendar.