The only indication of sunset is the reddening of the perpetual glow of the sky. He can see glimpses of it through the dense urban fabric, in the splits of the buildings and gaps in the roads as they weave through the evening. Decrepit buildings are strewn about this part of the city and parademons roam the streets. Smoke wisps up from piles of debris, set on fire by the endless battles going on in every crevice of the city. It’s been a struggle and everyone is grasping at the frayed strands of the ends of their ropes. They wouldn’t have come to this if it hadn’t been their last option.
It’s a long flight but the Resistance’s cargo spinner is apt enough to carry them there, expertly self-piloting to their destination. Even through the dimmed windows, K can tell that it’s going to be a smoggy, hazy night. They’ve researched, they’ve prepared, they’ve trained and ran simulations. There are minute differences in the air and they’ve been carefully tracking it all from night to night. Tonight will be perfect for what they need to do. Wallace’s special filtering system routed to the incubation labs opens up on nights like this. The wide mechanical infrastructure will be undivided, allowing them a narrow window to dart through and get where they need to go. The plan is simple enough but K knows that the execution will be difficult.
K dips his chin, tucking behind the high collar of his jacket. Jon sits across from him, eyes mirroring the same weight held in his. Reluctantly, begrudgingly, against all the elaborate programming weaved through every fibre of his being, K had become part of the strong and steady foundations to the resistance. He owed his whole life to them, from physically saving him from freezing to death in the snow, to helping him overcome his programming, to giving him a new purpose, allowing him to focus all that he had the potential of doing to a very specific thing: saving the world. Jon had told him about the past in bits and pieces and K can string between the lines well enough to mesh together the complete image.
Humanity is made of such mistakes and ever since becoming a part of the Night’s Guard, K has started to understand them. All its flaws and emotions make such a perfectly imperfect species, a model that replicants are based on though he no longer believes that they are the more perfect ones. He sits straight, shoulders square against the back of his seat, running a million and one contingencies in his head. His heartbeat’s perfectly regulated, breaths perfectly even despite the weight of the situation.
It’s just the two of them. The plan is so airtight but void of any tolerances. They don’t have room to make mistakes. They need to be fast and alert, quick on their feet to go in and out. A single model in a pre-inception stage is all they need to take back. His eyes hold the slightest amount of wariness as he watches Jon.
“Danni will do a good job.” A beat. His voice is calm, collected, used to operation on this level with Jon. After all, he’s never trusted anyone more. “We just need to focus. We can be in and out in under an hour.”
Edited 2020-08-26 16:51 (UTC)
why yes jane "inherited" her bad jokes from jon LOL and lightsabers are now batfam canon woohoo
Jon had never wanted this. Not just the shitshow happening to the world right now, but this — leading a desperate group of humans and metahumans who have taken it upon themselves to try to save what's left of the world and humanity, and leading them all to their deaths. Until now he still couldn't quite grasp how the mantle of leader had fallen unto him, other than simply as a result of a series of coincidences. He was only human, after all, some politician's illegitimate son and an ex-soldier who'd been dishonorably discharged; he just happened to have gotten roped into the Titans because he'd gone on a murder rampage after his brother's death, and he just happened to be the last surviving (adopted) son of Bruce Wayne, the super otherwise known as Batman. But now he had an entire underground rebel organization looking up to him, people who have put their trust and faith and hope in him, and that, alas made him responsible for their lives, and for their deaths.
How much easier would it be to just give up and lie down and die. The thought had certainly crossed his mind, and on more than occasion.
I am the sword in the darkness. I am the watcher on the walls.
But he'd promised Dick that he would take care of the Titans — they called themselves the Night's Watch now, in honor of Nightwing, and they were the Resistance's special forces unit, undertaking the most dangerous and the most suicidal of missions. Most of all, he'd promised that he would take care of Wanda; they were the last of the Waynes, and they only had each other now as they try to survive hell on Earth and avenge the deaths of the rest of their family.
It's that promise, and numerous other vows he'd made to the stars and the silence of the night, that has Jon sitting in the cargo spinner with K and heading to Wallace's incubation labs. Their mission was simple: get in, grab a single model in a pre-inception stage, and get out. Just all in a day's work, right? They've researched and trained and ran simulations, racked their heads for all possible contingencies and complications, prepared themselves for the inevitability of a tight escape. Nothing should go wrong. Nothing can go wrong.
I am the fire that burns against the cold, the light that brings the dawn, the horn that wakes the sleepers, the shield that guards the realms of men.
But Jon is only human, even if they call him Ghost, even if he's known for his daring exploits and for miraculously surviving multiple near-death experiences. He can't regulate his bodily functions in the perfect manner K and all other replicants can. His body isn't as fit as it could be, as it should be, his years of fighting and getting injured already having taking their toll. He makes mistakes. His mind isn't a machine performing accurate calculations and running a million and one contingencies; he's seen way too many horrors, lived through so much death and loss and grief that he wakes up in the middle of the night in cold sweat and at the verge of a panic attack, that he's had to take medications to quiet the noises and grisly images in his head. And, worst of all perhaps, is that he's a creature of emotion. He may not look like it, not with his broody countenance and his long, sullen face and his deathly quiet demeanor, but he has a big heart, one that makes him unable to resist not doing the right thing, not helping those in need, not honoring his promises.
Sometimes he wishes he was a replicant.
I pledge my life and honor, for this night and all the nights to come.
He meets K's gaze with gray eyes so dark they're almost black, and he nods, almost imperceptibly. They can do this. They have no choice.
He glances out one of the windows of their spinner, and, seeing that they're closing in on their destination, he double-checks his weapons — aside from the usual blasters, he's come to favor the use of what they've come to jokingly call in the Resistance as a laser sword — and the armor he's wearing underneath his black trenchcoat.
"Hey, K," he calls out suddenly. "What's the best job for babies in the army?" He takes a beat, sliding the battery pack of his phase gun back in with a click, and grins. "The infantry."
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@morghon — the future really sucks
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A knife twists at the thought that I should fall short of the mark | @morghon
If it's a seven hour flight or a forty-five minute drive
--
The only indication of sunset is the reddening of the perpetual glow of the sky. He can see glimpses of it through the dense urban fabric, in the splits of the buildings and gaps in the roads as they weave through the evening. Decrepit buildings are strewn about this part of the city and parademons roam the streets. Smoke wisps up from piles of debris, set on fire by the endless battles going on in every crevice of the city. It’s been a struggle and everyone is grasping at the frayed strands of the ends of their ropes. They wouldn’t have come to this if it hadn’t been their last option.
It’s a long flight but the Resistance’s cargo spinner is apt enough to carry them there, expertly self-piloting to their destination. Even through the dimmed windows, K can tell that it’s going to be a smoggy, hazy night. They’ve researched, they’ve prepared, they’ve trained and ran simulations. There are minute differences in the air and they’ve been carefully tracking it all from night to night. Tonight will be perfect for what they need to do. Wallace’s special filtering system routed to the incubation labs opens up on nights like this. The wide mechanical infrastructure will be undivided, allowing them a narrow window to dart through and get where they need to go. The plan is simple enough but K knows that the execution will be difficult.
K dips his chin, tucking behind the high collar of his jacket. Jon sits across from him, eyes mirroring the same weight held in his. Reluctantly, begrudgingly, against all the elaborate programming weaved through every fibre of his being, K had become part of the strong and steady foundations to the resistance. He owed his whole life to them, from physically saving him from freezing to death in the snow, to helping him overcome his programming, to giving him a new purpose, allowing him to focus all that he had the potential of doing to a very specific thing: saving the world. Jon had told him about the past in bits and pieces and K can string between the lines well enough to mesh together the complete image.
Humanity is made of such mistakes and ever since becoming a part of the Night’s Guard, K has started to understand them. All its flaws and emotions make such a perfectly imperfect species, a model that replicants are based on though he no longer believes that they are the more perfect ones. He sits straight, shoulders square against the back of his seat, running a million and one contingencies in his head. His heartbeat’s perfectly regulated, breaths perfectly even despite the weight of the situation.
It’s just the two of them. The plan is so airtight but void of any tolerances. They don’t have room to make mistakes. They need to be fast and alert, quick on their feet to go in and out. A single model in a pre-inception stage is all they need to take back. His eyes hold the slightest amount of wariness as he watches Jon.
“Danni will do a good job.” A beat. His voice is calm, collected, used to operation on this level with Jon. After all, he’s never trusted anyone more. “We just need to focus. We can be in and out in under an hour.”
why yes jane "inherited" her bad jokes from jon LOL and lightsabers are now batfam canon woohoo
How much easier would it be to just give up and lie down and die. The thought had certainly crossed his mind, and on more than occasion.
But he'd promised Dick that he would take care of the Titans — they called themselves the Night's Watch now, in honor of Nightwing, and they were the Resistance's special forces unit, undertaking the most dangerous and the most suicidal of missions. Most of all, he'd promised that he would take care of Wanda; they were the last of the Waynes, and they only had each other now as they try to survive hell on Earth and avenge the deaths of the rest of their family.
It's that promise, and numerous other vows he'd made to the stars and the silence of the night, that has Jon sitting in the cargo spinner with K and heading to Wallace's incubation labs. Their mission was simple: get in, grab a single model in a pre-inception stage, and get out. Just all in a day's work, right? They've researched and trained and ran simulations, racked their heads for all possible contingencies and complications, prepared themselves for the inevitability of a tight escape. Nothing should go wrong. Nothing can go wrong.
But Jon is only human, even if they call him Ghost, even if he's known for his daring exploits and for miraculously surviving multiple near-death experiences. He can't regulate his bodily functions in the perfect manner K and all other replicants can. His body isn't as fit as it could be, as it should be, his years of fighting and getting injured already having taking their toll. He makes mistakes. His mind isn't a machine performing accurate calculations and running a million and one contingencies; he's seen way too many horrors, lived through so much death and loss and grief that he wakes up in the middle of the night in cold sweat and at the verge of a panic attack, that he's had to take medications to quiet the noises and grisly images in his head. And, worst of all perhaps, is that he's a creature of emotion. He may not look like it, not with his broody countenance and his long, sullen face and his deathly quiet demeanor, but he has a big heart, one that makes him unable to resist not doing the right thing, not helping those in need, not honoring his promises.
Sometimes he wishes he was a replicant.
He meets K's gaze with gray eyes so dark they're almost black, and he nods, almost imperceptibly. They can do this. They have no choice.
He glances out one of the windows of their spinner, and, seeing that they're closing in on their destination, he double-checks his weapons — aside from the usual blasters, he's come to favor the use of what they've come to jokingly call in the Resistance as a laser sword — and the armor he's wearing underneath his black trenchcoat.
"Hey, K," he calls out suddenly. "What's the best job for babies in the army?" He takes a beat, sliding the battery pack of his phase gun back in with a click, and grins. "The infantry."