Chapter 2: Introduction

Keith slipped his bodysuit on, wincing slightly at the painful creak of bones. He smeared his dark red blindfold facepaint from temple to temple and across his eyelids before he nabbed his staff and met Robin on the fire escape.

Robin went grapnel gunning away, which Keith cursed at before he took the pleb route of crossing the street to the other fire escape and very slowly parkouring his way in the same direction.

An hour or so later, he finally made it to Titans Tower, quite awhile after Robin did because his fragile body can't handle vigorous parkour and launching off of rooftops. He stepped into rhe tower to be met by...a guard dog? Said guard dog leaped at him only for Keith to swing his staff horizontally in front of himself and into the side of the dog's head. He didn't see what the dog looked like, so he was surprised when the dog sounds disappeared in favor of human sounds. He switched away from hearing to his speech so he could ask "What or who the fuck did I just hit?"

Robin sighed from off to the side as Keith cycled back to his hearing for the response. "That would be Beast Boy, who may or may not have a concussion now."

A second later, Keith heard a really high-pitch, kinda raspy teen voice go, "Ohhh pretty birdssss is it Friday yet?" Followed by a thump of a teenage body on the floor. Keith stifled his silent laughter and shrugged. Robin sighed and picked Beast Boy up in a fireman's carry to take him back to their medical area.

Keith was soon met with Cyborg, Starfire, and Raven, all in various states of emotion upon meeting him.

Starfire: 'Scary...' She hid behind Raven.

Cyborg: 'Dangerous...but structurally weak?' His eyebrow was raised.

Raven: 'Is...is that who I think it is? Fuck.' She took a breath and then sensed the undercurrent of emotions swirling within Keith. When she was being a normal person, she never used her ability to gauge emotion. As Raven, it was almost constantly active. She almost burst out in her own tears upon feeling a fraction of Keith's demons. She blinked a few times and forced her emotion sensing to shut off. 'No weakness, Rachel. No Weakness.'

Keith crossed his arms, his eyes closed. He was familiarizing himself with their heartbeats and breath patterns before he recognized one. He turned that direction and engaged his sight, his overcast grey eyes setting upon Raven. He hid his surprise well. He switched to speech for a split second. "Well, that makes sense now." His Irish accent rang a bit through the main lobby of the tower. He turned the other direction to see what Cyborg and Starfire looked like, re-engaging his sight. He shook hands with Cyborg, only for his knees to partially buckle when Cyborg squeezed a bit. On instinct alone, Keith swung his legs up and over Cyborg's arm and kicked him in the non-metal part of his face. Cyborg recoiled, and Keith was left to fall hard on his hip. "This...is not going to go...well for me, is it?" He said between grimaces and winces, holding his hand close to his chest and leaning in the direction of his hip to try to ease the pain. The whole team that was there backed off, as Robin came running down the stairs upon hearing a thud and wincing.

The only person in the Batfamily that knew of Keith's fragility was Batman, which made his and Keith's fighting that much harder on Keith. Robin's first instinct upon seeing Keith hold his hand and his hip was to X-Ray, which Keith vehemently protested. But, with how much pain he was currently in, he couldn't do anything about it.

About 20 minutes later, Robin sent the whole team back to their rooms to discuss the X-Ray results. "Bl-...Keith. What the hell happened here?" He asked incredulously, staring at the x-rays of Keith's skeletal structure. Keith didn't answer, he only curled himself up in a painful ball.

On the x-ray sheet, was a full-body x-ray of Keith. Only, this x-ray depicted a skeleton that shouldn't even be capable of standing. His skeletal structure was cracked and fractured across the entire thing, these cracks and fractures healed fine, but his skeleton is littered with fracture scars, break scars, and hairline fractures galore. Both forearms had been broken twice in different places, both upper arms had been broken once, every rib he has has been broken once, his jaw showed signs of having been surgically reconstructed, his thighbones have been each broken once, his shins have both been broken twice, and bone splinters were lodged in more than half of his muscular system. How he was merely alive was a miracle of the human body. Robin shook his head, speechless. "And you beat Batman?"

Keith shrugged. "Bruce is predictable. Albeit hard to counter said predictability." Robin looked at the x-ray again, noting 3 new hairline fractures in Keith's right hand, and a new tear in the cartilage of Keith's left hip.

Robin shook his head vehemently. "You can't help us. Knowing what your body looks like here, I won't allow it." Keith was about to protest, but Robin simply poked Keith's ribs a little hard and elicited a grunt and a grimace. "Get help. Medical help. I won't have your death or paralysis on my hands or my conscience." Keith just hung his head.

This had been a long time coming. He knew he needed to find some way to fix his body. But he just didn't have the money. Robin thought for a second. "I'll talk to Bruce about it. See if he knows anybody that can help you." Robin proceeded to go into a separate room to call Bruce from.

~~~

Bruce was in the Batcave, poring over some evidence and stuff for whoever he was tracking this time of the week. He heard the communicator in his cowl go off so he detached it and shoved it in his ear. Only Batgirl and Robin had access to it. "Go." He said, signaling for whoever was on the other side to start talking. It was here that Robin sent Bruce Keith's x-rays, and simultaneously explained why he needed Keith's help.

"I would love to have his help, we all would for Raven's sake, and Keith would probably be the most brutal towards Trigon which I unfortunately think we need. But in his current state, I can't take him along. Too much of a liability." Robin explained seriously.

Bruce sighed. "Keith is a strong man. Not physically, but mentally he is the strongest I've ever met. He won't back out that easily after he's made up his mind as I think he may have." Bruce thought for a second, spotting his Justice League badge off to the side. "I have a few ideas, but there's something he'll have to agree to if he wants my help."