9

Chapter 9: Two's Company

Free and clear.

It was the best thing that Max could have hoped for after everything that had happened to him over time. He no longer had to dwell over the repercussions of his thievery for Deathstroke, nor any of the petty thefts he had committed beforehand.

There was only one thing left for him to deal with after all of that was said and done, and it wasn't exactly something he had been looking forward to addressing. The looming shadow of his own death via miserable 'electro-cancer' hanging over his head.

He had come to terms with the fact that he'd had it, and had been prepared to live whatever time he had left like he had wanted to. No regrets on the deathbed. That was what he had wanted. Before becoming Null, there had been nothing looking up for him to begin with. At least he'd had a hell of a time and put a dent in changing his monetary status before checking out.

Decked out in his full Null suit, Null sat inside of the medic bay of the Hall of Justice. A sample of his blood had been taken so that the person in charge of overlooking his current state would be able to see what was wrong, similar to the person Selina took him to see in Gotham City. Other than getting pricked enough for a decent amount to be taken, he hadn't needed to do anything other than sit around.

He hadn't ventured out of the room he had been left in the entire time, and he had been there for hours. There were always heroes at the Hall of Justice somewhere.

And one of them happened to be overseeing his medical situation. It was the best thing that Null had to describe what it was. He was fairly certain that no one would get the black humor out of calling it 'electro-cancer' that he did. It might have been offensive.

Raymond Palmer was one of the world's most brilliant minds, one of the top physicists in existence. He also doubled as the size-shifting superhero Atom, capable of shrinking himself to incredibly minuscule sizes.

Apparently he had been spending his time in South America and had been called in just for this specific favor. Batman's influence was strong.

Either way, Null showed him the respect that someone trying to save your life earned by virtue of just trying, and sat calmly and patiently. This was superhero central, so making an ass of himself for absolutely no reason wouldn't exactly do him any favors.

Atom wore a blue and red suit with a mask covering his entire head. On the forehead of it there was a red atom design, and around his waist was a blue belt with a buckle that had some sort of apparatus attached. Null didn't know what it was for, nor did he particularly care as long as it wasn't going to be used on him in any way.

Null stiffened up when Atom made his way back over to him after doing who knew what with his blood for so long that he had lost track of time. The grave look on the man's face didn't bode well for him, but Null kept his mouth shut and decided to simply listen. Whatever he had to say couldn't have been any worse than, 'We can't help you'.

He hadn't shown up expecting any miracles, after all.

Suddenly, Atom's demeanor changed as he reached out and gave the teenage thief a pat on the shoulder, "You're going to be just fine. Don't worry about a thing."

Null let out a heavy sigh of relief. That was the best thing he had heard in months. It was almost enough to make him start laughing, "That's great! You figured out a way to fix me then?" He asked, glad that he wouldn't have to start picking out his own headstone or urn.

Atom started to chuckle sheepishly. It wasn't a particularly reassuring thing to hear, even if he had promised moments before that Null would be fine, "Well the thing is, there's nothing to do about it. You're not going to die after all. False alarm."

False alarm? No, no, no. That couldn't be right.

The person he had spoken to in Gotham City said something about his body stockpiling more energy than the human body was meant to contain. Null raised that point to Atom, only to get a knowing smile in return. It made him want to punch the guy. Why did everyone look at people younger than them like that when they knew something they didn't? It was very annoying at a time when all Null wanted were answers.

"Normally your little situation would kill you. You would get progressively weaker as your body focused more on containing your electricity so that it didn't burn you out. That's not going to happen in your case."

"Why not?"

"Because of a little something you have called the Metagene."

Null leaned back, trying to process that word. It was foreign to him, but he could break down what it meant for the most part, "So that's the thing that a lot of bad guys have that gives them weird powers, right? The metahumans?"

It was right, but then again it wasn't quite, "Close," Atom said before thinking of how to go about explaining things, "First of all, not many people have it, and for the ones that do it's just a blank slate. It normally stays that way as well. For it to be activated, a subject with the Metagene has to undergo severe stress and physical trauma, as well as be provided with a catalyst to imprint on the Metagene."

"The suit..." Null said to himself. The stress and trauma thing made plenty of sense. He had been getting a lot of that for quite some time now, "So all of that made my body change because of the Metagene? Is that how this worked?"

Atom nodded, glad that the boy was getting the gist of what he was saying with his first explanation, "You're lucky kid," He said, checking over all of his results on the notes he had taken while studying Null's blood, "Only 12% of people in the world even have the potential for something like this to happen to them, let alone those that actually have it take place."

"Get the fuck outta here!" Null exclaimed, startling Atom enough to get him to look back up from his papers, "...I mean, no way," He then said in a more reserved manner, a tentative hope filling his chest at the news, "So, you mean I'm not going to die? You're sure? Because the first guy I talked to said my body isn't supposed to be able to deal with this."

Something about the human body's atoms only being able to hold so much of an electric charge. Much, much less than what Null's suit caused his body to be continuously flooded with at all times.

Atom gave Null a wry look before responding, "Did that 'guy' have a Ph.D in physics?"

Null didn't know what to answer with. Selina had taken him to see a scientist. He had no idea what the man had actually specialized in.

Atom laughed and shook his head, "The research on your suit's effects on the human body isn't based on any subject with a Metagene. I had Batman check for me after I pulled your results. None of the test subjects had what you have."

Null looked at his hands, as if seeing them in a different light all of a sudden, "...So what now?"

"Honestly, I don't know what could happen to you later, but I can safely say that I'm 90% certain that you're not going to die. You're going to keep letting off discharges though, because you keep having to adjust how much electricity you have. You're always going to build up more of a limit."

"So it'll get stronger?"

"Basically," Atom told him, "From the time frame you gave me and what I've seen today, it won't be long before you'll be a walking transformer field. I know that you helped with Deathstroke. You did well. But you are a criminal. So I have to ask you, what do you plan on doing with all of that power?"

He was a thief, but he was young and had a good heart, even if the head on his shoulders wasn't the best. The amount of power he would end up possessing if things wound up going the way Atom anticipated they would could help or hurt the world.

"I plan on going to college," Null deadpanned in return, much to Atom's confusion. His reaction was something that Null took a lot of pleasure in seeing, "What? You think just because of what I know now, I'm going to try and take over the world or something?"

"…Not specifically," Atom said. Taking over the world wasn't supposed to be the first plan for a teenager. Maybe a small country or a large city, perhaps.

Null snorted back laughter at the thought of him trying to fumble around with any sort of leadership role, "Not a chance. When I'm eighteen, I'd rather have a townhouse to myself, a crappy meal plan, and coeds to fail at trying to hit on," He said, with good humor, "It seems a lot more fun than getting bitch-slapped by Green Lantern or Wonder Woman, don't you think?"

"Some people have a very strange definition of fun."

"I've noticed."

XxX

(Two Weeks Later)

Regular life meant regular school, and Max was grateful for the opportunity to focus on something that didn't have his or someone else's survival hanging in the balance for once. He had grown far too accustomed to fighting for dear life, to the extent that high school now seemed trivial at worst, and a place to relax at best.

To think, this had been the limits of his worries once upon a time. That seemed to be ages ago now, even though it had only been a few months.

Getting what he needed for tests wasn't a problem now after working as a thief and fighting talented adversaries. Teachers literally gave him the answers to everything in advance. All he had to do was pay enough attention to retain the information and bring it up later when it was brought up.

'I can't believe I used to be self-conscious about this place,' Max thought to himself, sitting with his cheek in one hand as he lazily took down the notes that were on the board.

Not that he didn't think it was important, because he wanted to do well, but it wasn't worth the stress he'd been putting on himself in the past. It was child's play, literally. It was just that there was a process to studying for school, and apparently a thief's awareness cracked that code and laid it all out for him.

There wasn't anything to be nervous or apprehensive about in school. There were far better things to be concerned about in the real world, and nothing inside of that building, be it the workload, his student peers, or anything else measured up.

"Are you alright, Max?" Barbara asked as class wound down, squaring the notes she had taken in class away in her notebook for later reference. Her eyes never met her lab partner's, but she had noticed his body language for the entire period, "You look like you have something on your mind," She remarked idly.

Max watched Barbara pack up her notes for a moment before deciding that he had been through things that were infinitely scarier than just being told no, 'You know what? Fuck it.'

With that in mind, he ran a hand through his brown hair and released the filter on his mouth, going ahead with what he wanted,

"Hey, Barb," He said, getting the brilliant redhead's attention, "Would you like to meet up outside of school sometime? I'd really like to take you out one of these days."

He made sure not to make a scene out of it by keeping his tone low enough that it was just between them, but if anyone had been paying attention to Barbara's face they would have wondered why her eyes widened so suddenly out of the blue. She had been caught thoroughly off-guard.

"Really?" Barbara asked in return, still hardly believing what she was hearing.

Max wasn't a bad looking guy, and she didn't have any issues with him. The only gripe she'd ever had was his lack of energy that caused him to underperform in the classroom. That had been resolved months ago. Even so, being asked out by him hadn't been something she had expected.

"Really-really," Max said, not put off by her uncertainty in the least. Once he'd started talking, any lasting tension he'd felt had just melted away. Asking a girl out wasn't anything to be afraid of. A man-sized snake trying to eat you, a cyborg dropping a mansion on your head, or dying unceremoniously of an unnamed sickness, those were the things to be afraid of, "We get along pretty okay. I think it'd be fun, so I figured I'd ask."

Max might not have wound up saying much, but the sheer amount of confidence and comfort he'd said it with sold the offer more than any practiced pitch would have done for him. It wasn't that he was offering his proposal with the kind of belief that there was no way that she would turn it down, it was as if whether or not she turned him down was irrelevant. The important thing was that he had asked, and that was all that mattered to him, just getting it out there.

He had been thinking of a conversation they'd had a while ago, about her having no boyfriend, and that had remained befuddling to him to that very day. How could someone so smart, kind, and pretty with such a bright future have no boyfriend? It wasn't until he thought about it all through class while wrestling with whether he would ask her out or not that he figured why there didn't even seem to be any prospects.

Barbara was gorgeous, and smart enough to see through the b.s. of others, so none of the pretty boys that Max had seen actually get girls before actually tried to go after her, lest she completely strip their image from them with a handful of barbed, well-aimed sentences. Anyone who could overcome that hurdle then had to face up to what she was directly connected to. She was the daughter of the police commissioner. No matter what anyone said about it, that was intimidating. She was related to the man willing to face off with Gotham City's organized crime and its never ending cast of odder villains.

It gave even Max a bit of a scare, and for good reason because of Null, but again, he had faced things that made him honestly shake in his shoes. The mere idea of something by itself couldn't scare him anymore. He had to actually come face-to-face with it in reality now, or at least the chance of doing so had to exist. He doubted he'd be invited back to the Gordon household to meet her damn family after just one weekend afternoon outing... if it even happened.

In this instance though, it wouldn't.

Barbara seemed to consider it for the longest time before her face changed, as though she remembered something vital keeping her from fraternizing in such a manner, "I'm going to have to pass, Max," She told him, "Sorry. I've just got too much going on to spare time for guys."

She seemed legitimately remorseful for turning him down, which was something at least, so his hangdog expression lasted all of five seconds before he let it go, "Alright," It had been all about having the stones to make the attempt in the first place, "At least I tried. Just remember, if you change your mind I'm probably free whenever."

The casual, understanding way he let it go scored him a few points, earning him a smile from Barbara as she keyed his offer away, "I will," She told him, continuing to pack up her notes and books, "What brought this on anyway?"

The bell rang, signifying the end of class. Max stood and stretched his back out before grabbing his things off of the table, "Let's just say, a lot of things have happened to me that are way scarier than just asking out a girl that you like," He said, internally comparing his nerves at that moment to any other time he had been Null. There was literally no comparison, "Later, Barbara."

Despite being turned down, Max had no regrets on the matter. He got her to think about it, so he didn't exactly feel defeated. It hadn't even been a hard no, so it was enough to hang his hat on for the day. Life was made up of the small victories one could take from the minor setbacks after all, and sooner or later they added up to the big wins.

XxX

Max's daily plan had been the same for a while, since he needed time to let everything that had happened with the Kryptonite settle down. He would do his homework, hang out until sometime after dark, and then go hit the streets to continue training for two or three hours. Maybe he would find something worthwhile to plan a theft for while he was out? Even though he should have been stepping away from that life, he could always use some folding money.

As he had admitted to himself already, he enjoyed the feeling of being Null. The trouble that had come with it was something he could have done without, but now with a clean slate he could do his best to try and keep his actions off of that focused a microscope in the future.

Making his way to his apartment complex after school, Max jogged up the stairs to get to his floor and threw the front door open carelessly. Dropping his bag at the door with a heavy thud, he stretched his arms out and felt a few bones pop in his shoulders and back, "Oh man..."

After a long day, there was some kind of refreshing pleasure to hearing your joints pop. Damned if Max understood.

Something felt off as he closed the door behind him. The atmosphere felt as though there were someone else there. Max sighed and walked farther inside, "If Selina broke in here again, I swear to God," He said to himself before raising his voice, "Hey, get out of my room!"

It was the only place someone could possibly be other than the bathroom, and the door to that was open, so by default, whoever was there was in his bedroom. He hadn't expected the whoever to be a particular white-haired assassin.

"Welcome home, Sparky," She said, sauntering out of the back, taking great pleasure in the shocked look on Max's face. He was just as expressive under his hood as she thought he would be, "...Or should I say, Max Gabriel. Have a nice day at school?"

It wasn't a dream or a waking hallucination. The daughter of the Terminator was in his home.

Rose Wilson, known in certain circles as the Ravager, stood front and center in his apartment. His sanctuary. The one place he had been able to keep out of all of the thieving hullabaloo that he had amassed around himself. His safey-safe, as it were.

Not anymore.

For the sake of attracting as little attention as a pretty girl with an eyepatch could, she didn't wear her armored combat gear, instead making her appearance in a pair of blue jeans and fuchsia polo blouse.

She almost looked... normal, which was startling in of itself.

Max found himself at a loss for words before they finally found him, with a vengeance, "Should it bother me that the first person who found out I was Null is an assassin?" He asked belligerently, "How in the hell did you find me when fucking Batman didn't?"

A good question, if ever there was one to lead with. It wasn't even worth denying that he was Null at that point. She was already in his house. Fortunately, there didn't seem to be a sword or a gun anywhere within her reach, but he didn't have his suit on either. If they fought at that moment, he was still sure he would lose.

"Well, you're so small time I have to squint to look at you, and Batman was honor-bound to give up as long as you were a good boy, or so I've heard," Rose said with an almost casual air about her, "Besides, it really wasn't that hard for me. You don't have the resources to cover your tracks in the only place you really needed to."

"Like where?"

"Hospital records, mister gunshot wound."

"...Motherfuck..." Max cursed under his breath to himself, "Really? That was months ago."

Rose laughed and took a load off, plopping down on the bigger of his couches, one leg crossed over the other, "Don't worry about it. After I found what I wanted about you, I erased it. You're welcome."

Figuring that she wasn't there to kill him because of his attempted role in trying to get back at Slade, Max dropped his bag at the door and went for the refrigerator to grab a drink, "Oh, well thank you so much," He said sarcastically as he kept a watchful eye on the trained killer, "So what then? Did Big Daddy Slade kick you out or something?"

Rose lost a significant portion of her bravado, averting her eyes away from her temporary host for the slightest of moments, "…Or something…" She said uncertainly.

Max stopped what he was doing and raised an eyebrow in intrigue. Rose didn't do the whole reserved, demure thing. She was a lot of things, but those two words had never been adjectives capable of describing her in the slightest. He didn't like that. When people stopped acting the way he had expected them to, it meant that something was wrong.

He liked Rose, attempted homicide against him during their first meeting aside, and would continue to do so. If something was wrong, it was difficult for him to just let it go, especially since she was right in front of his face.

She had told him in the past that Slade Wilson, as much of a taskmaster, perfectionist, and a hard man as he was, still happened to be the only family that she had. To not be there, to be however far away from him that she was with him, there had to be a really good reason for it.

Max grabbed a bottle of water and threw it across the room for Rose to catch while he leaned on the kitchen counter to take a sip of his own, "Come on. What's happening? You didn't come looking for me just to give me a mini heart attack."

Rose regarded the bottle and its contents carefully. Max might have been a thief, but he wasn't the type to poison anything. He didn't know she was coming. He didn't even think anyone would ever come and see him at home. She needed the refreshment, and Max was no career killer, so she deemed it safe, taking a few sips of her own before answering the question, "I have to make four million dollars, and I don't know when the deadline is. A few months, I'd say."

Max spat his water halfway across the room out of sheer surprise, "Are you out of your mind? I am not the one to go to for that!" He was a two-bit thief, not a criminal mastermind, "Look at this place? Do you think I'd still be living here if I was good enough to pull down that kind of money?"

"You mean you're not one of those eccentric billionaires who look and live like hobos when they could buy and sell people? *gasp* You just mind-freaked me," She ended her act by brazenly flipping him the middle finger, "I didn't come here to enlist your services again."

If she wasn't going to hire him for anything, Max had no idea what her aim was, "Well what do you think you're gonna get here? This isn't crime central or anything. It's a suck-ass apartment. The most evil thing I've got in here is probably some Cool Whip I've had in the fridge two months past the expiration date."

Rose pressed her hand to her forehead and leaned her head back on the couch, "That's not what I need from you. I just need a jumping off point. That's all I want," She couldn't believe she was about to say this, but it was necessary if she ever wanted to get her point across, "Seriously, Sparks. If I had anyone else to turn to, or anywhere else to go, I would be there. I'll be out of your face before you even know it. Just let me get situated in Gotham first, and I'll split."

So she wanted a place to crash? With him?

If Max didn't know her any better, he would have thought that she was just short of begging. But Rose Wilson didn't beg, and if he brought up the possibility that she might have been, she would find a way to make him eat her katana and live to feel the pain from it. Oh, how amusing it would have been to beat around the bush to try and make her say 'please', but no one had that kind of time. There were only twenty-four hours in a day after all.

"This place is pretty small for two people, but if you really want to stay, fine."

"What? Are you serious?"

Just like that? He wasn't going to ask for payment, or threaten her to stay in line and keep him out of whatever she was into? He didn't even ask her what she needed the four million dollars for.

"I'm not gonna say no," Max said, dropping down on the couch next her, the cushion letting out an audible 'whoomf' as he did, "It shouldn't be that surprising. For some reason I actually like you more than you scare me. So if you can hack it living in a normal apartment, I guess the company wouldn't be a bad thing. It's actually kind of lonely around here."

Finding a sticking point for needling her temporary host, Rose grinned and leaned back in her seat, arms crossed smugly, "Aww, does Sparky want a friend?" She jabbed, despite the fact that she did like being called good company. That was a first.

"Yeah, honestly," Max admitted without much consideration, "I don't really have any."

That took the fun out of picking on him immediately, the fact that he didn't even fight back. Rose could have a nasty temperament when the moment arose, but she didn't have a puppy-kicker sort of mentality, "You are really scraping the bottom of the barrel with me then."

Max grunted and grabbed the remote, turning the television on, "I'm aware of that. It should tell you how bad off I am that I don't care," He told his guest, flipping through channels for anything worthwhile to watch, "It just sucks that I'm going to have to start wearing pants around here all the time."

Rose let out a scoff and shot Max a look, as if to call him a wuss with her facial expression, "Says who? I won't be."

Max turned toward her and stared for several seconds before shutting his eyes and thinking of the image presented to him, "...Well, I've got that to look forward to at least. Could do without all of the crazy that's gonna come with you, but I made my choice already."

"Oh, you like it."

Max gave her half of a look, still trying to find something on TV, even though her comment had stuck with him, "Excuse me? I like what, exactly?"

"This," Rose said, gesturing around him and her, as if to emphasize everything about his life at the moment, "You like this. Mixing it up with heroes and villains."

"What, are you on dope?" Max shot back immediately, leaning himself back as though he were drawing away, "Who would enjoy that crap?"

Rose wasn't having any of that though, "Come on, Sparks. You lived your entire life probably thinking that whatever you wound up doing wouldn't matter much in the grand scheme. Then you found yourself in the middle of something that could have killed you, could have killed actual superheroes, and you survived. You even came out the better for it," Max had to concede that point to her, if nothing else. He was feeling pretty high on life at the moment, "You just can't quit after knowing you can deal with something like that. No matter what you go on to do in your life, it'll always be in the back of your mind, 'I can deal with worse than this,' no matter what."

Max had heard her out, and honestly she seemed to have put a lot of thought into her reasoning. Listening to it had been amusing to say the least, but she seemed to be either missing something important, or didn't have quite the grasp on his personality that he felt she should have.

"You might want to check your armchair psychiatrist license at the door," He said with a saucy smirk, "I'm not so sick in the head that I like getting dropped seven stories or getting thrown through walls by every crazed fuck in the universe."

He liked being Null. What that entailed exactly could be open for interpretation, because he wasn't sure what it meant himself.

"And I'm not saying that you do," Rose purred, slowly leaning closer to Max. She looked up into his face and matched his smirk with a sly, knowing, almost predatory grin on her face, "But you know what you do like? Facing off against something that can do that to you, and then winning anyway. Admit it or not, but you like the danger," She was close enough for the two of them to feel the heat radiating off of one another.

"...Did you come all this way just to try and be the devil on my shoulder?" Max asked her in their close proximity, because if she was, it was doing a good job of working. The girl absolutely had to know how alluring she was, temperament and intimidating family lineage aside.

"Well, I wouldn't necessarily call myself a devil... but thanks for the compliment anyway."

That wasn't exactly a no.

XxX

(That Night – Iceberg Lounge)

The Iceberg Lounge was the lavish face of the day-to-day dream that the Penguin sought to live, a place in his own image that represented who he was in every way. It was a place where only those who felt they were a cut above could go and would be welcome.

Of course, very few ever went there that weren't involved with the criminal element of the city, but it was indeed a legitimate establishment... even if less than reputable things occurred behind the back doors.

Penguin's 'security' force escorted a man up to his personal dining area upstairs where he enjoyed his club in privacy and oversaw everything happening within it. Despite the numbers they had over him, there was still trepidation aplenty in regards to their ability to handle this beast of a man.

An absolute physical marvel, he stood well over six feet tall, a mountain of imposing muscle and ill will.

He wore a black and red outfit with no sleeves, and a connected mask that covered his entire head, save for his right eye. He wore a black glove over his right hand and a belt full of the deadliest weaponry he could carry on it around his waist. His left eye had a cybernetic attachment, and his left arm had a bulky cybernetic attachment, surgically connected from his forearm down.

With a body count that affirmed his complete and utter disregard for human life, this was callous Russian hitman known by alias as the KGBeast.

Allowing himself to be led, despite knowing exactly where he was being taken to, KGBeast came to a stop when they reached an upper area of the club. A private place, where the proprietor of the establishment kept to himself.

Behind a dinner table set up in the lofty position sat a short, round man in a top hat and a black and white suit. Markedly unattractive, he had a long, beak-like nose and a monocle in his right eye.

The man behind the mask opened his mouth and spoke in a thick accent, a telltale giveaway of his home region of the world, "What you want, Penguin?" He said in fragmented English.

Penguin smiled and casually set aside his meal, taking a quick sip of his brandy before saying anything, "Why, you haven't heard the news?" The startlingly blank silence from the other end of the conversation gave him the only answer he needed. That was alright. It was why he had asked KGBeast to come in the first place, "It's open season on Deathstroke's daughter, and she's in Gotham City. Has been for the last few days, actually. It's all over the place."

KGBeast didn't see why this was his problem. He had no issues with Deathstroke the Terminator, other than something of a fringe professional rivalry. He had always wanted to prove himself the man's better and take his business away, but life had sent him down the ladder over the years instead of up, "Why do I care for little girl?"

"By open season, I mean there's a bounty set on her," Penguin specified, "There's enough money on her head to give any ambitious felon a jumpstart on any particular bit of nasty business they might have in mind."

"How much?"

"4 million."

KGBeast's right eye opened in alarm at how much money was being put on the head of a child. A criminal child, but still just a child, "Why are you to be telling me this?" He asked, mistrust and suspicion marring his tone, "You not want collect on price? I not asking for you to be telling me this. I not share money."

The Penguin gestured to his lavish, stylish surroundings outside of his personal office. The Iceberg Lounge was ever-bustling, as it always was after the sun went down, "I've found more productive ways of making myself money that involve less attention-grabbing means. All of that bloodshed isn't for me. That was what I started hiring you for, isn't it? The killing is supposed to be your whole thing."

A gentleman didn't do his own dirty work, and while the Penguin had no issues orchestrating anyone's death, doing it himself was an absolute last resort. There was little style in seeing to your own affairs when there were thousands on the street willing to do it in your stead.

The Russian assassin didn't take that as an insult, despite knowing that it was meant to be one, "Don't forget that."

The Penguin scoffed at KGBeast's superior attitude over his 'skills', for all they had gotten him in recent years, "And don't you forget where your most reliable source of income has come from lately," He said, bringing up the amount of hits he had hired the man to take on his behalf, "To the rest of the world, you may be some feared killer, but as you've found out since coming here, it takes more than fancy training, a few fancy tools, and a catchy name to stand above the pack."

KGBeast's body tensed, the hairs on the back of his neck rising at the slight. All of Penguin's amassed henchmen reached for their handguns while the one standing at his side pulled up his automatic weapon, ready for the man to attack. They knew of him, and were aware that several of them would fall before he ever did. They all just hoped that they would be one of the lucky few to last until the end.

Penguin noticed the atmosphere in the room that could be cut with a knife, but he wasn't too concerned. If anything occurred, he knew how he would make his escape. It would take KGBeast several moments too long slaughtering his hired help to get to him, though he hoped it wouldn't come to that. It was so wasteful, and it would close down the Iceberg Lounge for quite some time afterwards.

You needed more than ruthlessness and the ability to kill whatever was in your way. You needed intelligence. Gotham City was a hard place, full of ruthless cutthroats willing to throw whomever under the bus to get ahead. One-note killers like KGBeast were antiquated, out-of-date relics. They weren't the most dangerous in the grand scheme of the city's machinations, just because they were the most dangerous in-person.

Oswald Cobblepot was no fool. He had no doubts that KGBeast was fully capable of ending his life at any given moment... if the playing field were ever level. But then, it was his responsibility to make sure that this was never the case.

As a man of panache, with a keen, finely honed intellect, it was up to him to stand above the riff-raff, both above and below the law. Yes, killers like KGBeast had their place in the complicated tapestry of violence and corruption that was Gotham City, but it would never be at the top.

KGBeast's posture relaxed, bringing down the tense feeling of impending doom that every living person in the room had been feeling, "When I am have collected on contract, you'll be first to know."

The gentleman criminal smiled smugly as he watched his on-again off-again employee leave his place of business, "I'm always the first to know, my dear man."

The last word of course had to go to the most intelligent person in the room. Everyone knew that.

Ever the violent killer, the KGBeast only knew one way to get his point across; directly, "No. After I am to be killing girl, next place will come will be here, to be killing you," KGBeast threatened before eyeing the Penguin's guards, watching them part and clear a path for him out of the Iceberg Lounge. Good. That was how people should have reacted to him, "Again, Gotham City needs to be learning fear for name KGBeast."

Such a threat wasn't taken lightly, but even so there was a time and a place for everything. That time and place wasn't inside of his club, thus the Penguin let his remark slide. KGBeast wasn't the first murderous brute he had come across in his time. He certainly wouldn't be the last, skill at his chosen field aside.

The Penguin scoffed in dismissal, turning around in his chair, overlooking his club once more as he had one of his henchmen light a new cigarette for him, "Tch. Violence is overrated."

Instead of leaving through the back, KGBeast stalked his way out right through the front, through the restaurant and the bar, past the band playing in the middle of the lounge's pool area. His demeanor dared any of the Iceberg Lounge patrons to stand in his way, even by accident, but no one had any desire to die on that given night.

One of the thugs sitting around the bar let out a laugh tinged with nerves before conversing with one of his neighboring customers, "That's nobody I'd wanna tangle with, in a dark alley or in broad daylight, eh Matches?"

The aforementioned 'Matches' looked like a run-of-the-mill member of organized crime, with nothing too discerning about him. He had messy black hair, a mustache, sunglasses, a tan trench coat, and an unremarkable suit underneath it, "Yeah, you can say that again."

Though it was the eyes underneath the sunglasses that should have garnered attention. Always watching, for anything of interest, anything that could be used, and not quite for the purpose of criminal enterprise.

'Matches' followed KGBeast with his eyes as the hitman left, though he himself remained inside of the club. He had been hearing too much about this lucrative bounty floating around to just up and leave without getting more on the subject. Word seemed to be spreading on it like wildfire. Even so, whatever had that sociopath so focused, it certainly wouldn't be anything good.

It wasn't just him either.

Looking around, 'Matches' was able to spot several other members of his alter-ego's usual lineup of rogues, many of whom were similarly interested in this hefty price that sat on someone's head. He could see the puppet mobster Scarface and his ventriloquist in attendance, as well as Deadshot, Electrocutioner, and several others he could name on-sight.

He truly doubted they were the only ones interested.

XxX

(Brideshead)

Before finding Null, Ravager had taken a few days to get a bit of the lay of the city. She had only been there once before, and hadn't seen much of it outside of what she needed to know for her mission, so a refresher course had been in order.

During that time, she could also think about how she was going to attack the problem of amassing money. If her father had really put a hit on her head, she would probably have to bully some crime families to simultaneously show off the services she could provide and also show them that whatever they could make for killing her wasn't worth the risk. Either way, this wasn't something she expected to have finished in a week.

She didn't even expect to finish the mission while remaining in Gotham City. At some point, she would have to leave, even if everything wound up going swimmingly for her. There was only so much money she could bleed out of this place before it ran dry.

While making her way through one of the seedier residential neighborhoods one could find in Gotham, Ravager took a short reprieve after scrambling her way down a fire escape to reach the street-level again. Pausing, she frowned and checked the time, 'Sparky said he wasn't coming back until three in the morning. He'll probably be asleep for school five minutes after he gets back in.'

She didn't know why she was trying to be cognizant of the time. Whenever Null rolled back into his apartment and whenever she chose to were two mutually exclusive things. Even if he would be resting long before she got back, it wasn't her requirement to be considerate of his sleeping patterns. If he wanted to waste his time in school, that was his business. She wasn't going to change the way she planned on doing things just because she was staying with him. Time was money, goddamn it, and night was the best time to take steps to make it.

"Someone seems lost," The sudden call out to her prompted Ravager to hurriedly draw her sword in response. It took a moment before she realized that the person hadn't meant to surprise her, "I didn't think you would come anywhere near here without your father, and I don't expect him to be back to Gotham anytime soon after the last stunt he pulled here."

Looking up at the fire escape that she had just descended from, Ravager saw Catwoman, leaning against the railing coyly, "Well I'm sorry to disappoint you, but he doesn't keep me on one of those little blue leashes some people put on their kids."

Ravager wasn't necessarily afraid of Catwoman. She was wary, however. There was a difference, and there was a reason for her to feel that way. Catwoman never got involved in anything that she didn't think she'd come out the better for. And for those overconfident enough to underestimate her, Catwoman tended to chew them up and spit them out.

"Well I'm all for raising independent children, but in this case you'd be better off near him," Catwoman muttered before hopping down, once again putting Ravager on her guard. Oh, please. If she really wanted to hurt her, she would have never seen the first move coming, "Look sweetheart, you really have to go. As in leave the whole city. There's a-."

"Bounty on my head? I knew that already," Rose interrupted, already knowing the score when it came to her little excursion into the worst city in America. Having finally realized that Catwoman wasn't going to try anything on her, she put the sword away, "Can't do that though. This is the only real place for me to get what I need."

As in plenty of seedy people needing wetwork done. And when she made a big enough splash doing that, then she would ship out for higher prices elsewhere. She had to establish a name of her own. The brand of just being Deathstroke's daughter wouldn't be enough. It would actually come as a detriment.

Catwoman raised an eyebrow at how much Ravager knew, but how much she was also missing, "There's 4 million dollars on you," She told the teenage girl, "I was thinking about getting a piece of it myself when I realized you were skulking around my neck of the woods. But someone I know is rather fond of you and I'm trying not to give him anymore reasons to mistrust me after I've gotten back on his good side."

She didn't know if she'd have a reason to come across Max/Null again anytime soon, but if she did, she wanted it to be on good terms. She had grown a bit fond of him over time.

Ravager almost wanted to let her curses fly aloud. 4 million dollars? Slade was an asshole. He really put a bounty on her that was worth just what he'd actually sent her out to make? Whatever. It wasn't important now, "That's a chance I'm going to have to take. I appreciate the warning, but I can take care of myself."

No. This was not the kind of place where you left things up to chance, especially when large sums of money were involved. But Ravager was a big girl, and Catwoman wasn't going to break a sweat trying to keep the trollop safe.

"Fine," The cat burglar said, smoothly making her way back up the fire escape to the rooftops again, "I did my public service of the day by letting you know. Anything else that happens from here, just keep it away from Brideshead."

"Noted," Ravager deadpanned, "There probably isn't anyone around here that can pay me the kind of money I'm looking for anyway."

The ill-tempered girl departed, leaving Catwoman to head off on her own, back to her base of operations in Brideshead and her ongoing legitimate business venture, the Tin Roof Club. She hadn't really planned on stepping out in costume for very long tonight, and was glad that she wasn't.

She had become accustomed to the rumblings of her hometown, and didn't doubt for a second that once word got out good and proper, the city would become a warzone. The sickest game of hide-and-seek she could imagine would probably take place, with that girl in the middle of it. And it wouldn't stop with Gotham's finest examples of criminality either. There was no shortage of greedy vultures willing to make the commute for a guaranteed 4 million dollars, all for ending the life of one of the most detestable mercenaries in the game today.

There was going to be a neon bullseye on that poor girl's back. She didn't have the slightest idea what was coming her way. The only reason Catwoman hadn't cashed in herself was because the bounty on Ravager was to be paid strictly with her death. Nothing less. No live captures.

Fortunately, it wasn't Catwoman's problem. After all, it wasn't as though any of this affected her in any way.

XxX

(Meanwhile – With Null – Elsewhere in Gotham City)

Null reached underneath his hood and wiped a few beads of sweat away from his forehead. He was getting a good workout in. He'd gotten the physical out of the way when he'd run his way across the city to a nice quiet place full of heavy metal objects for him to move without touching them.

That was where his real practice of the night came in, and boy did he need all he could find the time to get.

Moving metal crap with his mind was cool and all, but he had to be able to do more than that. After what Atom told him weeks before, Null refused to believe that the limits of all of the power the man said he would continue to come into would only be the ability to mess with metal objects and a great impression of a human stun-gun.

There had to be more to it, and he was going to find out what it was and how to make it work for him. It was more fun than staying at home watching the same old crap on television.

Rose was out and about doing only God knew what. Null sure didn't, and he wasn't certain that he wanted to either. She needed to make money, and the only way he figured she knew how was by axing fools. He didn't want any part of that.

As he continued to train, he didn't notice the figure in the shadows creeping ever closer in the rafters of the warehouse he had chosen to work out of. The moonlight through the open doors on both ends was the only thing illuminating the place, thus when the person stood up, his shadow covered most of the light that came in through the opening.

Null suddenly turned around and looked up, catching sight of the masked figure crouched up above him, quickly realizing who it was from the outline he could make out in the dark, "Hey, I'm being good!" Null said, holding his hands up defensively, "I haven't ripped anything off since the last time, and all of that was wiped clean, so none of you Bat-people have any reason to come after me."

Robin looked down and around at the veritable junkyard around them. He definitely hadn't caught Null in the act of doing anything illegal, other than trespassing of course. But who cared about that, "...What are you doing?"

"Training," Null told him. There was nothing wrong with that. It wasn't a crime to work out, "...I guess it looks like I need to find a new place though if you can find me here."

He idly thought to remind himself to take a new way home once he left. He didn't put it past the Boy Wonder for a second to try and tail him elsewhere to find his hangouts and maybe even discover his identity.

Robin hadn't really thought that Null trained, but shrugged it off and brought up the real reason he had been seeking Null out in the first place, "Null, I came here to ask you if you've seen Ravager," He told him, "She's in Gotham City. Batman heard it himself from the best street source around."

Straight from the floor of the Iceberg Lounge. Batman's Matches Malone cover identity was extremely useful for getting great intel from the underground.

Null inwardly panicked, but realized that again they didn't know who he really was. He could work this, "And you think I know where she is?"

Robin hopped down from the beam he had been perched on, continuing to speak as Null seemed to play off his presence and continue moving things magnetically, "Deathstroke doesn't really have any friendly contacts to check out," The man burned a lot of bridges when he was done working with someone, "You're the only one I could think of right now, so I came to you first."

After trying and failing to move the last remnants of a broken down, rusted car, Null sighed and gave it up, "My last time hanging around with Deathstroke didn't end on good terms. He underpaid me and screwed me over, and I sort of got him back by snitching on him as hard as I could," He said honestly, "But I'll keep what you said in mind."

Robin had been watching him, listening the entire time. He hadn't lied. For a thief, he was remarkably honest. Null's constant use of partial and almost-whole truths still worked for him in regards to masking his earnest intentions when speaking to others.

"Null," The young, masked detective said, getting the would-be thief's attention, "Are you really serious about going straight? You got a second chance, you know."

Going straight. No more stealing. But then again, where would that leave the Null persona? Max loved being Null. The control over his own actions and destiny that being Null represented was something that he had steadily grown addicted to despite the troubles and the danger.

If it was about flying straight and defending justice, that could go straight out the window. Being a hero didn't do anything for your own bottom line, and if there wasn't anything to get out of it, why would he want to be one? The answer was that he wouldn't. He didn't.

He was fine with who he was now as a person, and the dream wasn't dead yet. Null still wanted opulence. He wanted luxury. He wanted a bigger place to stay, and more things. Things he didn't get to have in the past when he'd been worthless. He wanted the piece of the pie that he hadn't ever had the opportunity to carve out for himself until the supersuit had come along.

But that would come with time. He just had to be patient, and never let his eyes get bigger than his stomach again.

"You'll just have to wait and see," Null told him, "I never told anybody I was going straight. Just that I wasn't going to get mixed up in the superhero-supervillain back-and-forth anymore,"

He had lucked out, managing to avoid something that he truly couldn't handle. But that was only through a lot of luck, and admittedly Selina's assistance. For that, he would always hold something of a soft spot for his mentor, whether or not he could trust her as far as he could throw her, or not, was aside from the point. He would have been dead in a ditch or rotting in prison by now had it not been for her.

Still, Robin's question was something that Null had thought about a lot, and he had come to a single conclusion on the matter, "I'll do what I want, if I feel like it's what I want or need to. That's all I can tell you."

It wasn't a confirmation or denial that he was going to do one thing or the other. It was ambiguous on purpose. Though, the better part of his words indicated that he would be sticking to the more frowned upon side of the law for the foreseeable future.

"Well whenever you decide to step your toe back across the line, I'll be waiting," Robin said, less as a threat meant to intimidate and deter. It was more of a promise of what to expect, "And I won't be the only one."

Null let out a laugh and returned to his previously scheduled training, "Can't wait. Wear lots of metal."

Robin took off and left, just as quietly as he had appeared. Meanwhile, Null kept training, not fool enough to speak out loud to himself, lest Robin still be lurking somewhere and listening. Or worse, he could have planted a bug.

'So the heroes know Rose is here?' He thought to himself, 'Why? How? And what street source?' As far as he knew, she hadn't even done anything yet.

Something about this whole thing didn't sit well with him. There was more to the story, and either someone didn't know it yet, or they were leaving it out on purpose.

XxX

(The Next Day – Max's Apartment)

"Why do people already know you're here?" Max asked out of the blue while holding a pair of hitting pads for Rose to punch and kick at. They had moved all of the furniture away from the middle of the room to form a makeshift ring for a bit of practice. A girl had to stay in shape after all, even if she was hiding out, "Batman already heard from people on the street that the Ravager is in town."

Rose shrugged off the question, redirecting his focus as she hit the pads and moved around the ring in-step with Max, "My dad has a lot of enemies. You don't think there would be people talking about me being here so they could take a shot at me?" She asked, giving a hard round kick that knocked Max back onto one of his couches, "Don't worry about it, Sparks. None of it involves you, and when I make my 4 million, I'll make sure you get a nice piece of it. How's half a mil sound?"

Max pushed himself back up and assumed the position to endure more punches and kicks. It was still her turn after all, "It sounds like way too much just for letting you hang out at my place," He quipped, not that he was complaining, "But I won't turn it down. Greed is good, after all."

Rose took note of his words with a twitch to her eye. Fortunately, her long silver hair was loose, covering most of her face for the duration of the practice, "All about the money, are you?"

"No, I want to stay in this hobbit hole for the rest of my life," Max said sarcastically, bracing with his entire body for every thudding impact Rose sent off of the thickly padded training tools, "Are you kidding? I'm getting out of here as soon as my wallet allows, if you know what I mean."

Unfortunately, all of these things made Rose's head work, and not in a good way. The enhanced mental capabilities from the serum Deathstroke had injected her with to give her superhuman abilities combined with the psychosis that the same process also gave her made for a bad combination in regards to paranoia.

As she continued to hit the pads, she thought to herself, 'If he figured out how much he could get just by killing me himself…' She didn't doubt that he would take it in a heartbeat. He always said that he was selfish. He made it a point to emphasize this, likely so no one could say that he surprised them with his actions if they turned out to be wholly self-serving.

She wasn't about to let on that she was suspicious of his possible overarching intentions though. Not for the time being at least. Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer. What better place for either or, than right in front of your face at all times?

"Speaking of getting out of here," Rose said, changing the subject, "Not that I don't love the smell of a teenage boy's house and all, but I'd like some sunlight. I'm not a vampire that likes strictly coming out at night."

With a bit of a huff from the effort he'd been putting out trying to remain upright against all of Rose's serum-enhanced strength. He felt a mark of pride that she had only been able to knock him over once, "Yeah, you can't just stay in here all day long. This place is tiny. I don't need you getting all claustrophobic and stabby."

Rose rolled her eye and walked off to the refrigerator to grab herself a bottle of water, "Shows what you know. I'm always stabby," She snarked crankily.

Max chose to ignore that, and instead chose to dwell on the more pressing issue; namely, Rose getting cabin fever, "How exactly are you going to go out and do… well, anything? Everybody who's after you would know your name already. Probably what you look like too."

Just who did he think she was? She had been training to inherit the will of the world's most dangerous mercenary for well over a year, and she liked to think that she was damn far along in the process, "I have fake aliases. Like, five of them. Don't worry about it so much."

"What about your eye?" Max pointed out, missing Rose's glare as he began sliding his furniture back into place, "Kind of distinctive, don't you think? AAHH!" He cried out as Rose pressed the bottle to his back. For a moment he thought she'd pulled her sword on him and instead of ice cold water it had been the icy touch of steel.

She shook her head at him, wondering why this was the only person she knew of that she could crash with for the time being, "Sparky, seriously, calm down. I'm not going to bring any trouble to your humble little doorstep. If shit really ever hits the fan, I'm gone and I'm not coming back here."

Max frowned, but because he was still facing away from Rose, she was unable to see it.

He hadn't lied to Rose, not for a second. She really was the only friend he had at this point, aside from maybe Supergirl. Maybe. But he didn't even know how to reach her, and the less time he spent anywhere in Superman's field of influence, the better for his health and freedom.

It was kind of pathetic, but it didn't make it any less truthful and significant. If something was wrong, and she really needed help to the point that running with her tail between her legs was her only option, he wanted to think that he could step in.

Of course, at that point his overreaching sense of self-preservation kicked in.

If there was something that could scare that feisty woman enough to make her skip town, what kind of help would he be? Leaving probably would be for the best, and even if it wasn't, Null didn't need to get his name dragged into anymore extracurricular crap that he couldn't justify with selfishness. He was skirting the line as it was just by keeping her with him.

Oh, whatever. He was just getting himself all worked up over a whole lot of nothing. If something did wind up happening, he'd deal with it as it came along. It was just nice to have someone fairly cordial to hang out with again.