The Line #131

"Deep breaths..." Gray muttered to no one in particular. He held on to the torch in his hand as he took off the riot gear helmet to breathe while over the unconscious, severely burned bodies of Waller's people.

"Don't do anything stupid... think about the consequences..." He kept muttering, tone growing louder with every word and his eyes glued to Lady Liberty as he spoke, dark thoughts flooding his mind.

Gray wanted nothing more than to wake the woman up and burn her to ashes for her thoughtless actions as she burned the entire bunker to a crisp with no consideration.

Though he didn't expect Waller's people could track him down, Gray still prepared for it and set up a decoy signal leading to another underground bunker, which they unwittingly attacked, hence the current situation.

Waller's attack team attacked the decoy hideout right before Gray's eyes. He reached the area just in time to see Lady Liberty use her torch to engulf it in a giant flame wave. It immediately drove him mad with rage.

Gray was not so foolish as to think Waller or any of his enemies would hesitate for a second before attempting to take his life. However, it was the way Lady Liberty tried it that made him angry, more than he'd ever been until now.

He couldn't help but think what would happen if they'd found his actual hideout. Gray didn't know if he or his lair and everything he'd worked so hard to create would survive, and he didn't care.

He knew the risks and had long accepted the possibility of dying. Gray could also rebuild everything anew and start somewhere else if they destroyed his lair, but there was one thing in the hideout that he'd lose forever.

When he saw Lady Liberty burn the bunker, he could only see the image of a tiny, black cat engulfed in the white flames. Processing the situation took Gray a couple of seconds, shocked as he was. Shock turned to anger, and he reacted accordingly.

Gray appeared before the attack team, and words naturally flew out of his mouth as he tried to get a logical answer to why Lady Liberty would do such a thing, and the reply they gave him only drove him into a further rage.

He activated the torch, fully intent on burning everyone to death, but the slight burden the weapon put on his mind caused him to snap out of it and stoped just in time before they died.

That said, they were all burned beyond recovery, and many of them would spend the rest of their lives disfigured, disabled, or both, especially Lady Liberty, who was the focus of the attack.

Even so, Gray's anger did not dissipate. He continued to struggle to maintain his calm. The chants Benjamin taught him, along with whatever logic remained in his brain, were the only things stopping him.

People have tried harming him, killing him, but never did anyone come so close to destroying one of the precious few things Gray truly cared about in this world.

Though the chants managed to calm and reduce his anger, they did nothing to remove the burning desire to kill Lady Liberty. However, he knew killing anyone right now might end up in disaster.

There were no villains here to blame for the deaths, and any hiccup might send him into a crash course that would ruin most, if not all, of his plans and slowly forming reputation.

Still, he was in a sticky situation. Gray didn't want to stay near Lady Liberty as he didn't know how long he could control himself, but he didn't want to leave either as Waller might send someone to bail them out.

His first thought was to contact Deborah, but that would put her in unnecessary danger, not to mention how long it would take for her to arrive.

He scrapped the idea and thought of contacting Richard, but he didn't want to rely on his teacher as the man had already done more than enough for him.

And if Richard got involved, then Benjamin would as well, which wasn't ideal considering his past with the Suicide Squad, which might complicate the situation further.

However, Gray did not get to overthink the situation as the sound of crisp footsteps echoed from behind, causing him to stop contemplating and sharply turn to face the newcomer.

Nightwing, who had just arrived and had no time to process the situation, barely stopped himself from flinching, feeling the urge to step back as he saw Gray's expression and the visible energy leaking from his body.

Batman had found this particular attack squad and didn't think much of it, but he still asked Nightwing to investigate it, hoping they'd lead him to Mothman's as the latter was hunting down such people whenever they came to Gotham.

"What happened here?" Nightwing asked, his gaze alternating between the half dead, burned members of the attack team and Gray as the latter quickly put on a calm expression and controlled the energy leaking off his body.

"Amanda Waller's people. They came looking for trouble and found it," Gray replied, raising the hand holding Lady Liberty's torch and activating it, causing the white flames to dance briefly before dying down.

"And for once, I'm happy to see one of you bat people," Gray said, storing the torch in his inventory, as he watched Nightwing kneel next to the nearest person to check their vitals as he sighed.

"Throw them over a cliff, put them in prison, do whatever you want. Just keep them off my sight," he added, taking a deep breath as he tried to walk past Nightwing, whose frown couldn't be more pronounced at the terrible state of everyone on the floor.

"Why go this far? You could have knocked them out...!" Nightwing angrily questioned as he hurriedly got up and stood in Gray's way to stop him from leaving before giving an answer.

"They crossed the line..." Gray replied, shrugging as if those four words were enough to justify disfiguring and injuring multiple people beyond recovery, and he seemed to believe it did.

"You said you wanted to stop being a vigilante and do things the right way..." Nightwing firmly said, getting in Gray's way as the latter tried to walk away again. "This isn't right, kid... I don't know what they did, but no one deserves this..." Nightwing continued.

"They deserve much worse. I'm trying to do the right thing by walking away," Gray said as he lost control of his temper, causing his energy to flair again and make Nightwing unconsciously take a step back.

"So unless you want me to get back in there and give them exactly what they deserve..." he continued, taking a deep breath. "I suggest you kindly get the fuck out of my way," he concluded, and Nightwing was speechless as he finally realized the situation.

"You can't keep doing this, kid," Nightwing said with a frown, but he still stepped aside, allowing Gray to walk away. "You need help, and I know where you can get it," he added as he watched him silently leave.

"You know how to find me..." Nightwing loudly concluded as he noticed Gray's lack of reply as the latter didn't outright refuse the offer as he'd expected.

...

New York

Whisper hissed as she bit at an Intergang member's neck, planting her sharp fangs into his arteries and injecting her acid directly into his bloodstream.

She wiped her mouth with the palm of her hand as she watched the man's body spasm and twitch, falling to the ground as it started melting into a pool of red and bright green.

She turned to the side and watched as Abbot beheaded the last Intergang member with a swift swipe of his claws and sighed as the latter reverted to his human form, giving her an 'I told you' look.

"Save it, Abbot..." Whisper said with a bemused expression. "Manheim won't stop with this. We need to keep moving," she added as she turned to leave the alley with Abbot following her.

"We need to find the book and the daughter of Cain before he does. It's our only chance," Whisper remarked as she raised her hoodie over her head to cover her face and serpentine features.

"How are we supposed to do that?" Abbot calmly asked as he put on his fedora, looking down as he followed Whisper. "We don't have any recourses, and even if we do find her, it won't do us any good," he calmly added.

"Then what the hell do you suggest we do...?" Whisper angrily asked as she turned to glare at Abbot, only calming down when she noticed the weird looks the bypassers were giving her.

"Manheim has many enemies. One, in particular, seems invested in protecting Gotham..." Abbot continued. "We only need to convince him that it's in his best interest to help us dispose of Mannheim..." he concluded with a shrug.

"The same one who almost killed you and put us in this situation?" Whisper mocking asked, raising an eyebrow in disbelief at the wolfman's words.

"We put ourselves in this situation... But yes, he is the one..."

...

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