Young Justice: The Mimic Contingency (A Young Justice Fanfic)

The Magician's Tears (Updated)

METROPOLIS - August 29th

7:39PM

"So?" Desmond asked her. "What will it be?"
Zatanna couldn't help but consider Desmond's offer, but her cold gaze was unrelenting.
"Did you really think I would just run away while you killed my friends?"
A ghost of a smile formed on Desmond's mouth, like he was amused by her answer. That twisted delight stayed there for a brief second before he shrugged with indifference.
"Meh...." he dismissed. "I had a feeling you wouldn't."
He quickly twirled her out of another dancer's path.
"...But to be honest, it was more of a 'let the record' show kind of thing."
"Let the record show?" Zatanna asked distastefully.
"So that when the Contingency is done, I can say that I wasn't a merciless prick."
He snickered quietly as Zatanna smiled sweetly at him, the kind of sweetness that a psychopath makes before they beat your brains in.
"How sweet...." she cooed. "A candle-lit dinner, a beautiful dance and a malicious death-threat."
Desmond returned her fake smile and lowered her to the floor. He found himself holding her down much longer than the other dancers, his gaze fixed on her skin as it gleamed under the chandelier.
Get a hold of yourself..! he thought annoyedly.
"But I might accept your offer," Zatanna said suddenly. "If you can explain something to me..."
Desmond lifted her up, a cautious and curious look in his eye.
"Your metaphor is flawed."
The corner of Desmond's lip jumped. "How so?"
Zatanna readjusted her posture, sliding her delicate fingers up Desmond's arms until they met his neck. For a moment, the latter thought she was playing him, but there was no mistaking that concerned, sympathetic look in her eyes.
Desmond's heart skipped a beat as she opened her mouth.
"Which one of us is the REAL Dantes?"
Bingo. If anything Zatanna had said tonight had left a mark on Desmond, it was that.
"Dantes went to prison," Zatanna explained. "But a prison isn't just a castle or a jail cell, it can also be emotional or mental."
She looked down.
"Sometimes, when a person is unable to escape something, they run further into themselves, not coping properly and building their own prison..."
It might not have been immediate, but Zatanna could feel Desmond's emotional walls eroding away, her words eating at him like acid.
"So is the Team the real Dantes because we can't escape you? Or are you the real Dantes because you can't escape from your 'duty'? From your real feelings-?"
"Don't." Desmond said firmly.
But Zatanna was barely getting started. She was determined to break down his barriers, even if it took her all night.
"You know I'm right, Desmond." she berated him. "A part of you hates us, a big part. But not big enough to overrule the part that loved us...that doesn't want to hurt us..."
She squeezed his hand so tightly that Desmond could feel her sadness radiating from her.
"Let me help you..." she whispered tearfully. "Please, Desmond...It's not too late to come back to us..."
Desmond shared her tearful gaze, but only for a second before scoffing.
"What do I have to come back to, Zatanna?" he spat at her. "I've killed nearly all the Justice League members, mentors and friends of the Team...They would never let me back."
He relaxed his grip on her, the band orchestra reaching a climax.
"Besides...It's not a matter of it being too late for me to come back to the Team. It's that this is how things should be."
He led her into a pirouette under his arm, ignoring the fact that his words had made Zatanna even sadder.
"No it isn't!" she pleaded. "It doesn't need to be that way!"
When she came back into his arms, she clamped her hands onto either side of his face, looking him dead in the eye.
Desmond felt anxious for a moment, but shrugged it off.
"Why?! Just tell me why you won't come back!"
His gaze became more distant as Zatanna's became clouded with tears.
"M'gann...M'gann told me...how when she went after you...after you left the Cave...after the League accused you of betraying us...she told me how you wouldn't stop crying...how you were completely inconsolable that you were kicked out of the Team..."
Desmond was barely able to keep a calm face.
"All those months ago...we thought you were dead. The night before you killed Manhunter...We were all so upset...Dick nearly fell to his knees...I couldn't feel anything...everyone on the Team thought you were really gone! That the last time we ever spoke to you was when we called you a liar and a traitor!!"
"I'm a hateful bastard, Z." Desmond told her plainly. "I had to sell it."
Her hands slid down from his face and clenched tightly around his vest.
"You spared my dad! That meant that your hatred wasn't all there, right?"
Desmond didn't even react to her words. "Would you rather I go back to Greece and finish the job?"
He made a show of igniting his eyes, but Zatanna saw right through it. She could see the hesitance behind his hatred like it was staring her in the face.
"You'll have to do better than that." she told him flatly.
Desmond swallowed slowly, biting his lower lip so Zatanna wouldn't see it quiver.
"And did you really think," she concluded. "That I didn't see the way you looked at me at the Cave? On our missions?"
And at that moment, her words got through.
"Why?" she whimpered. "Just why? Why can't you come back to us?!"
Desmond's teeth clenched, like it was the only thing holding him together.
"Because I hate you." he muttered angrily. "I hate you and the League more than anything on this planet..."
He spun her around again, with much more force than necessary.
"The League had no faith in me...they were frightened of me! They saw me as nothing but an weapon..! A ticking time bomb...!"
His hands were trembling.
"They wanted a monster...and I gave them one!"
He pulled her back, his eyes awash with so many different emotions.
"You're lying..." Zatanna challenged. "Because I know, that on the day you went on a mission with me...the day you went on a mission with Artemis...I never saw that smile leave your face..."
She choked back a sob, her hands trembling with sadness.
"Even when Klarion nearly killed us...When you and Artemis were pinned down and trapped...You never stopped smiling...not once."
Desmond felt a pang of guilt. Here she was, the girl he loved, in his arms and practically falling apar-
He shook his head sharply. Shut up!!
"What do I have to do?" he begged. "What do I have to do to make you hate me?!"
Zatanna shook her head, her face more tears than flesh.
"Did it ever occur to you...that maybe I don't hate you?"
Her hands relaxed on his vest.
"That maybe...I still see the good in you?"
She felt Desmond's hands trembling on her waist. It made her feel like if she said anything more, she would break him.
He maintained his grip on her hands as they danced, but shook his head dejectedly.
"No...." he said quietly. "I can't go back. I just can't..."
Zatanna could barely believe her ears. She had just gone behind the backs of her team-mates, her friends, poured her heart out to her former friend, practically begged him to come back with her and he still rejected her? Had he really cared about the Team? Had he cared about her? Had he cared anyone at all?!
She gave him one final glance, her eyes riddled with frustration and sadness as she turned away from him...
...Before he caught her by the wrist.
"I don't care about the Team..." he whispered. "The League...Or the Light..."
Zatanna looked at him with confusion as he stroked a lock of hair back behind her ear.
"But don't take that as a sign that I don't care for you."
And before Zatanna could react, he pulled her towards him with teary, longing eyes.
And kissed her.
Zatanna's eyes went wide with the initial forcefulness of the kiss, but her resistance melted away, compelling her to put her arms around his neck.
His lips were warm, but she could taste the saltiness of falling tears.
As they pulled each other closer, Zatanna could feel Desmond's emotions conveying themselves to her; emotions of sadness, conflict and rage.
And his loneliness and fragility, finally making themselves known.
"Desmond..." she thought to herself. "I'll never let anyone hurt him again..."
The former leaned his forehead against Zatanna's before pulling away. His face was still washed with sadness, but she saw a shy smile growing on his lips, and felt the heat from his cheeks as they turned pink.
Zatanna smiled back as Desmond wiped the tears from her face, just as the orchestral piece came to a slow finish. If Zatanna didn't know any better, she would have said this was a moment made for them alone.
But just as he seemed to be opening up, Desmond's eyes suddenly went wide.
"Desmond?"
The sound of the dancers' applause for the orchestra was deafening, but it seemed like Desmond couldn't hear them.
"You almost had me fooled." he murmured, his eyes fixed on the upper level.
Zatanna's eyebrows raised. "What do you-?"
But Desmond spun around with an angry roar and launched a beam of green energy from his fist, a great coil that lashed out and wrapped itself around an invisible figure on the stairwell.
"AGHHHHHH!!!!!"
The coil electrified as Desmond sneered. "It felt like I was being watched...ROBIN!!"
The Boy Wonder's beaten figure revealed itself, just as the terrified screams of the restaurant patrons filled the air. The dance floor became a pile of frightened people trampling over each other as they ran for the exits, just as Desmond pulled Robin to the floor below him.
"Robin!!" Zatanna screamed out.
His face twisted with rage, Desmond ignored Zatanna's cries and looked around the room, which was finally empty.
"Come on out guys!" he challenged the empty air.
And in less than a second, all the members of the Young Justice uncloaked themselves, with Kid Flash and Superboy jumping down the railing to help Robin up.
"You bastard!" Superboy spat.
Desmond looked at him coldly, hatred radiating off of him like heat from a wildfire.
"What are you all doing here?!" Zatanna cried out. "I thought you were-"
"In Alaska?!" Superboy snapped. "Our minds are all linked, remember? Do you really think we couldn't hear Desmond on the phone?!"
Zatanna gasped, unable to believe that she forgot such a plain fact. How could she have been so stupid?!
But that wasn't all. If the Team had been watching her all this time, then that must have meant...
"Kissing Desmond?!" Robin growled. "Really?!"
A cold hand closed over Zatanna's heart. Oh no...
She quickly looked back to Desmond, her horrified eyes locking with his.
"Desmond, I didn't know! I swe-"
But his hand snapped out and caught her by the throat, his eyes tearing up.
"Be quiet." he ordered with a jagged gasp. He threw her at Robin, but Superboy jumped between them and caught her, watching as energy gathered to Desmond's fingertips.
The red light in his eyes came to life as every light in the room began to flicker erratically, the pure rage of his power seemingly undoing everything in the room.
"What are you all waiting for?" he chuckled as he hovered into the air. "Come and get me!"
He lifted his palms, a ball of electricity in one and green Lantern energy in the other.
"Let's finish this. Right here, right now..."

Desmond and Zatanna kissed?!
Desmond finally opened up to her?!
But how will the arrival of the Team affect Zatanna's discovery of Desmond's feelings?
Will the Team be able to beat him this time?!
Will Zatanna ever be able to reach Desmond, or is he now lost forever..?

When the battle concludes, what relationships will stay intact?
What paths will the heroes choose?

Who will be left alive..?

One thing's for sure, you will absolutely NOT want to miss the next chapter...

With only ten more chapters to go until 'Young Justice: The Mimic Contingency' reaches it's thrilling conclusion, no chapter should be missed!! :D
Please be sure to vote if you enjoyed the chapter and comment your thoughts and feedback! :D

- Kai-Shiro :D