Past RP - Birds of a Feather

It‘s been nearly a week since JaK Sage left the Titans in search of his brother Nightmare. He was traveling towards Gotham City, his true home, the only place where his kind belonged. He was almost certain David had gone there. It was just something about that city, it was a refuge for pure evil, for pain, a site for the scum of the entire Earth to congregate at and mass against one figure…Batman. He attracted them all or at least it had been assumed he did. Sage had met him once or twice before briefly, but he didn’t really care for the guy all that much and this trip wasn’t for him. No, JaK was after one thing and one thing only…the blood of his sibling. As he rode into town upon his hover bike, the events at the tower played repeatedly in his mind.

“Here I am….Home. Just how I left you.”

As JaK rode into Gotham, he immediately took the back alleyways, the entire city mapped out throughout his head from all the years he had spent running through it. He was as if an ant in a colony, except this colony was infested with a cancerous virus that spread among all the members like the plague. No sooner had he turned into East Gotham he already witnessed a police pursuit taking place…Figures. Nothing changes, not in this city, during the night time you might as well stay indoors, lock it down, and then pray because not even that will save you in this hellhole. Every night you stay alive here is by the grace of the almighty. Sometimes JaK wondered why people even bothered to stay, was it because they ere attracted to this kind of filth?

Eventually he found a place to stow his bike for a bit, he knew better than to leave it uncovered and laid a bunch of garbage all over it. It would be good until morning when the garbage men came. Giving his previous ventures here it would be better to travel under the radar or on foot for a better choice of words. It didn’t matter, that’s how JaK liked it anyway. Besides, traveling on foot would give him a chance to stroll down memory lane.

“Heh.”

He chuckled at the thought of his childhood; it was honestly just one big sick joke. He hadn’t been a child since the day he became an altered human. Moreover, forbidden to become a man the day his parents were killed…So what was he then? As JaK pondered these thoughts while running through his old stomping grounds he heard many screams and shouts. To a newbie hero in Gotham this might bother them, but JaK knew better. He could fight and stop crime all night and there would be no affect. Nope, there was only one way to stop crime in Gotham and that was to take out all the gang leaders so that the police could beef up security. Although, that couldn’t happen as long as freaks like Penguin, Joker, and Two-Face roamed free, but again that’s not why JaK was here.

However, he did come upon a situation he couldn’t ignore. He was traveling along the rooftops of his old neighborhood now. They had built a new structure over his parents’ old house. So much for nostalgia, but there was something else going on around the place, a girl and her boyfriend were being pummeled by a gang of thugs. Well more so the male, they were harassing the girl and making her watch as the group of thugs pummeled the boy. They appeared to be the sons of Falcone’s men. A major crime family in Gotham and as one could guess the sons of the big honchos tended to do as they please.

“Mark!! Please Danny stop it!”

“Shut up $%@#! You had your chance to be my girl, but you chose this lozaa. Now he’s gonna die just like his dirt-poor father, a bottom feeder, like the rest of the rats here. I dunno why you chose some low life scumbag over me Deena and I don’t care anymore."

“NOO!! Danny, STOP PLEASE. I LOVE HIM!”

While Deena was held back by the other two thugs, Danny grabbed the beat down teen by his chin. Lifting his bloody carcass off the ground a bit before spitting in his puffed up right eye. The socket had been near shattered from earlier boots to the face from Danny's boys. Mark was barely coherent now and didn’t even quite recognize where he was. Meanwhile, Danny threw him back on the ground and pulled a switchblade out of his pocket while smoking a cigarette. Four more of his buddies standing at his back while two others held Deena.

“Here’s an idea, why don’t you go tell someone who gives a damn, eh, like The Bat haha. I’m sure he’ll lend you a hand.”

As Danny spoke, he bent down and moved the blade towards Marks neck, ready to slit the boy's throat until…

“Sorry, no Bat today, just me, but I do think I should lend her a hand.”

As the voice echoed from the shadows, from up above the roof suddenly JaK Sage dropped down and axe kicked one of Danny’s thugs in the shoulder breaking his collarbone. Then the other two thugs left after being taken by surprise by the sudden drop in ate an upper-handed palm thrust to the chin of one of them, followed by a pivoted elbow to the sternum of the other, causing them both to double over. Then within the blink of an eye, JaK ran and dove under the haymaker of a clothesline coming from one of the other teenage goons and rolled in front of Danny. Upon doing so he grabbed the young mobster’s wrist and with the knife in his hand and twisted it abruptly causing him to loosen his hold on the blade.

“Mind if I borrow yours?”

That being said, JaK snapped the boy’s wrist, causing him to scream out in pain as he dropped the blade into Sage’s hand. Upon doing so JaK lunged the blade backwards at one of Danny's incoming friends and hit him in his upper calf. As he dropped to one knee JaK then moved to take care of the other one. Ducking his initial over hand right and landing two hard elbow strikes to his mid section. From there he capitalized by tossing the teen over his shoulder and then spin kicking the other injured thug just as he had removed the blade from his leg. The heel of JaK’s foot catching him right on the temple and knocking him out cold. Meanwhile, Danny laid in agonizing pain on the floor, just watching as the unknown assailant took care of his comrades.

“Who, WHO ARE YOU!?! *AAUGH* SoooOooOO MUCH PAIN!”

“Don’t worry about my name, just worry about if I’m going to break anything else on your body. I hate your kind.”

And JaK wasn’t lying. This Danny reminded him of the bullies from back when he was very young. They always used to cause trouble for him and his brother, but I guess he had to thank them. Without the constant attacks and mugging attempts from people like them, he wouldn’t be able to defend others from scumbags like him today. As JaK was speaking, the other two boys that were holding Deena let go of her and went to aid their friends. Luckily, Deena yelled out as they tossed her to the ground, but still just a little too late to help JaK.

“LOOK OUT!”

As JaK turned, he was tackled down by one of the boys and then as he kicked that one off he ate a boot to the temple from the other. The two then commenced to stomp on JaK just as they had Mark. Each hit resonated with a memory from his history. Like a literal blast from the past, as each shot hit with a booming affect. By this time Danny had gotten back up, still holding his wrist in and anger written all over his face.

“Ya, that’s right, beat him! You son of a $%@#! Do you know who you’re freakin dealing with!? DO you know who my FATHER is?? your dead YOU IDIOT!! Huh, you hear me?! DEAD!”

As Danny spoke he drew nearer to Sage, who was still being stomped out and by this time some of the other teenagers were awakening. Things looked bleak for JaK, but then as Danny went to add his own kick to the beating that was already being put down upon the Teen Titan. Suddenly he again screamed out in pain, upon closer inspection, it could be seen that his foot had been caught by a stone like palm. It JaK‘s hand of course, he had encased it with the cement from the street. As he held Danny’s toes in his hand he squeezed his foot until the bones began cracking, again Danny dropped to the ground wailing in pain. It was at that time one of the thugs who was beating on JaK suddenly went flying as Sage used his now enhanced strength to toss him aside. Then blocked an axe handle from the other one and punched him straight in the chest, nearly collapsing his chest cavity. However, as he stood back up the other boys that he had surprise attacked earlier circled around him with knives in hand. All awaiting round two…

“Ok, let’s try this again.”

As JaK spoke, he clenched his fist, the other arm was now also coated in concrete all the way down to the joint of the elbow. However, before any more brawling could be had, suddenly, from up above rained two shrunken, which nailed two of the thugs in the back. Followed by the figure of a boy pouncing down upon the third. JaK was surprised for a second until seeing the emblem upon the shrunken and realizing exactly who it was…Robin.

Spoiler:

The teen then began moving through the other four remaining guys, yanking out his retractable pole as he dug it into the ground and then spun around it before kicking one of the guys in their sternum. After doing so, he turned and spun it around as if a copter letting the rotating pole hit another approaching thug in the head causing him to drop to the ground. Finally, the last two tried to approach from behind as they did with JaK, but Robin acted almost as if he had eyes in the back of his head and threw two bird-a-rangs that hit both in the head perfectly, knocking both teens out cold.

“Nice. Batman was too busy and sent his pretty bird to help.”

JaK said this sarcastically as he approached Danny and lifted him off the ground with one hand. Very aggravated with the entire situation now that it was over. His friends had left pretty good abrasions on JaK’s face and broken his favorite sunglasses. Sage definitely wanted to hit something and a little bit of rough interrogation wouldn’t hurt either.

“No, NO, P-P-Please keep him away from me!”

“Listen up jackass, now that you’ve made me mad I want answers about your daddy’s crime ring and if you lie to me each hit’s going to get worse than the next. Starting with this one...”

Robin had been busy helping Mark and Deena get away after defeating the henchmen, but upon returning his focus back to JaK and Danny he saw that Sage was about to strike the boy and threw a bird-a-rang at the Titan’s armored hand. The blade smashing into his palm and the ricocheting off, it was meant to get his attention more than to hurt him, but sadly for Robin today was not the day to try and reason with JaK.

“Sage, I’ve read your profile and I knew you were brash, but come on this kid doesn’t know anything that I don’t already. Leave him alone, the fight's over, you won. Gotham’s not your territory, so I would ask you not to tread on my turf, and by ask, I mean I’m giving you a warning.”

JaK’s face contorted with anger as Robin approached him and he dropped the injured Falcone to the ground after the shrunken hit his palm.

“Listen bird boy, you nor your pointy eared daddy gives me orders, GOT IT! I’ll stay here as long as I want, and if you’ve got a problem with that, you can write me a complaint, so I can wipe my ass with it.”

“Classy. You’re a hero of Jump City right? Pfft, that’s pretty funny considering…”

“Considering what?”

“Considering, how inexperienced you are. I caught the end of your um, heroic save back there. You were taken off guard easily; honestly, if I had to gage your level right now, you’re not even worth the minimal amount of effort it would take for me to kick you out of Gotham. I could just let you run free for about a night or two and you’ll probably be either dead or captured by the following morning.”

That being said, Robin packed away his pole and pulled out his grappling hook. He was done with the conversation with Sage. He had more important things and had JaK not been...well, himself. This confrontation might have ended there, nevertheless, of course…this was not meant to be.

“Where do you get off…Huh, just who the hell do you think you ARRRREEE!!!”

JaK was burning with rage at Robins words, this was honestly the very LAST thing he wanted to hear right now. Insulted by a kid his age or maybe even a bit younger and being told to get out of his own hometown. Not to mention having his fighting skills insulted, Robin said he was gaging JaK’s skill set. Well he was about to get a personal crash test with everything JaK could do. As Sage yelled out he charged across the concrete flooring of the alleyway towards Robin, but again the boy’s reflexes proved too quick and within one movement he unsheathed his retractable pole and extended it upwards at an angle behind him nailing JaK in the head. Sage’s vision blurred for a second after connection and then as it returned to him he was suddenly swept off his feet and had the pole placed across his throat.

“Novice mistakes, completely telegraphed your move to me. No discipline at all, what did you do when you learned martial arts? Look at all the cool moves only and try to repeat?”

“GRRRAAAARRRRGH!!”

As Robin held JaK down and began belittling his ability, JaK decided to let him know exactly how dumb it was for the wonder boy to think he could keep JaK pinned. After grabbing both ends of the pole with his hands, JaK quickly pivoted his feet under Robin and monkey flipped the boy wonder over him. Then as Robin landed on his feet and turned around, he did so just in enough time to see a two and a half foot thick clump of rock flying at him. Sage had dug it out of the ground with his enhanced strength and tossed it as a diversion. Robin of course ducked and avoided the clump of cement, but the diversion had worked out just as JaK had planned. For Robin ducked right into Sage’s trajectory as he ran and baseball slid right into where he thought the boy would evade to and hit him with a concrete fist right in his abdomen. Robin nearly doubled over from the hit a bit and tried to counter with a swing from his pole, but JaK blocked it with his other armored arm this time, and then high kneed Robin in the face. Finishing his combo with a shuffle side kick to the sternum, which sent the slightly younger teen stumbling back into the brick wall of the alleyway. JaK then attempted to capitalize with a huge haymaker right hand, but Robin having regained his senses parried it sideways, causing Sage’s fist to collided with the brick and dig three inches deep into the wall. Afterwards, Robin followed up his parry with an elbow smash to JaK’s jugular and a well placed jab to his ribs, which created distance between the two. This was followed by Robin doing a 360 degree turn, in which at the 180 degree point he high kicked JaK right across his face, and at the 360 degree pivot he dropped to one knee and extended his pole into JaK’s sternum, thus knocking him over. JaK hit the ground hard, but knew he still had to keep going. For no sooner did the back of his head collide with the cement, he had to roll backwards to avoid a smashing blow from Robin’s staff, which cracked the ground upon impact. Then the Titan immediately kipped back up to his feet and got into a dragon kung-fu fighting stance.

“*Pant, Pant* And here I was thinking you were just his #$%!, but I see the Bat’s taught you some stuff. Alright, Bat-brain protégé, show me what you’ve got.”

Robin just looked at Sage like he was moronic for actually enjoying this. In addition, he let down his stance a bit, but not fully, in case JaK attacked again.

“Are you kidding me? You just don’t think about the choices you make at all do you? This fight is pointless, and not only that, were on the clock. We were supposed to be taking that mobster’s kid in for medical attention or to a jail cell by now.”

“Sounds to me, like the Robin is actually just a BIG chicken %#!@. Besides he’s not going anywhere, he’s---WHAT!? Goonnne??? Hey, where did he go? How did he go? I broke his freakin foot!”

“So whatd’ya thinks boys?”

Suddenly from the inside of the alleyway and upon the rooftops, multiple guns were pointed at both Robin and Sage. From the alleyway, there were more people with spiked bats and machete’s though. At least eight on the roof and twelve in the alleyway. Then out of the mob in the alley stepped one of Falcone’s officers. Robin recognized him instantly…

“Ricky Slayer. Still think leaving the kid alone was a good idea JaK?”

“Shut up. Now’s not the time for I told you so's”

As JaK spoke he bent down and absorbed more concrete, his entire boy was now covered in the manmade cement. Meanwhile, Robin took out three birdarangs in each hand and put away his pole. They were surrounded, outnumbered, outgunned, and the man approaching them didn’t get the name slayer for being merciful to his opponents.

“How about the both of ya’s SHUT UP! Now I’m down in Central Park shakin down some goons who decided to steal form us, right. When all of a suddenly, I gets a call from my son! He tells me some wise guy and the Bat’s kid beat the living tar out of him and his boys and now he was limping away frightened. Now do you two brats know what happens to a concerned parent when they hear that kind of stuff from their first child? Eh…Anyone at all? Well I’ll tell ya, they feel unadulterated RAGE, AND WANT TO CHOP THE SON'S OF BITCHES HEADS CLEAN OFFFF WHO DID IT TO HIM!!!....Ehem, but seeing as you're just kids, I thought that might be a bit to gruesome. Besides, we gotta leave a message for the bat right? So instead I’m gonna fill you both up with lead and then I’m gonna put a bullet between your eyes paleboy. Then, I’m not even gonna take your mask off birdy. No, ya see, were gonna mess you up so bad that you’ll be unrecognizable, and then were gonna cut off your fingers, toes, teeth, and anything else that can identify you. So that way your secret identity stays that way forever. Oh and then I’m gonna give your fancy belt to my son as a present from yous both, apologizing for being such assholes…Sound good?”

Robin was observing the area the entire time the crime boss officer was talking. He was even counting the number of buttons on his tasteless suit. JaK on the other hand was thinking of clever retorts and finally settled on one right before he finished.

“Hmm, I kinda see the resemblance now. Your son, Danny, he talks a lot too; I heard tiny men tried to talk big to make up for their, erm…insecurities. I guess that transferred to him to, huh? Genetics are amazing…”

“Should have left it alone Sage.”

“Sorry, couldn’t help it.”

JaK and Robin then got into battle positions as the man suddenly clenched his fist and pulled out his glock, pointing right at JaK’s rock hard head from a few yards away. All of his men doing the same once he pulled out his firearm. He wasn’t stupid or that stupid to the point that he couldn’t get JaK’s reference to his how small his most manly organ must be. As he became enraged by the comment, he had decided right then and there, that he now officially hated this punk more than the the Birdboy or the Bat tonight and was going to make sure finish him off personally.

“Boys, turn these two heroes into supa-swiss cheese for me!”

However, upon the utterance of the words from their commanding officer, there were peculiarly no sounds of fire from the rooftops above, just thuds and grunts. This confused everyone down below and then one of the snipers even fell from the roof and landed on the ground. The sickening sound of both his kneecaps buckling as he landed on the unforgiving cement below echoed all around, as the man howled out in pain while everyone else looked on and saw the figure that was known and feared all over Gotham…It was the Batman. In addition, every point man on the roves above had been taken care of, their unconscious bodies laid all around like fresh corpses. At first, no words escaped from his mouth. Instead he dropped down from the rooftop in front of JaK and Robin and landed with his cape covering his entire 6’2 body frame. The only thing moving at this point on him were those white eyes, that just squinted at the frightened men in front of him, meanwhile, Robin spoke from behind.

“I had it under control.”

“Sure you did.”

Is the only thing Batman replied with and the only words that were uttered from anyone’s mouth for nearly fifteen whole seconds, until he finally stood to his full height after assessing the situation and spoke to the mobsters.

“I’m giving you all one reprieve for tonight. Leave….Now. You’re only getting one chance.”

TBC…