Delirium | Titans

Chapter 4

Smoke filled the building, stinging Katarina's eyes. Somewhere, sirens blared, barely audible. Katarina stumbled through the burning hallways. The walls were painted with blood and fire and the smell of death coated the girl.

She tripped over something and looked down. Her movements seemed slowed by terror. She came face to face with a burning body. Suddenly the boy's melting face twisted and his skeletal hand gripped her ankle.

"You could have saved us." He rasped, barely audible over the sound of the raging fire.

Katarina stumbled through the door at the end of the hallway. It all disappeared, wiped away and replaced by absolute darkness. She yawned and sat up calmly in her bed. The sunlight shining through her window told her that it was late morning, possibly midday. She had slept in.

She climbed out of her bed and got dressed before leaving her room. Making her way through the hallway, she glanced around the dimly lit area  checking for any signs of the others.

Finding none, she headed into the kitchen in search of food. She found a mug and poured herself a cup of coffee. She found a granola bar and sat down on one of the stools at the island counter.

She was halfway finished with her cup of coffee when Rose walked in. The silver haired girl glanced over at her with her single eye for a moment  before turning back to the cabinets. She finally poured herself a bowl of cereal and sat across from Katarina.

"So, you planning on staying?" Rose finally asked, crunching on the dry cereal.

Katarina shrugged, "Don't know yet." She replied, finishing her granola bar and tossing the wrapper into the trash can.

"So Dick picked you up too. He seems to have a thing for strays in trouble." Rose said, studying the girl across the counter.

"What sort of trouble are you in?" Katarina asked, raising a dark eyebrow.

"Family business. My dad's trying to kill me." Rose replied blandly, as if it were a common occurrence. "You?"

Considering the people they were living with, it wasn't too strange of an assumption though. Nobody in the tower had an award winning family. Most of them had no family besides  the others in the tower.

"Same here. Family business." Katarina said shortly, not elaborating any further.

She finished her coffee and stood up. Making her way over to the sink, she washed out the mug and then grabbed a rag to dry it out.

"Your dad trying to kill you too?" Rose asked, spinning on her stool and following Katarina's movements across the kitchen.

"Never met the man." She said, her voice deceptively calm and set the clean mug back on it's shelf.

"Probably better that way, dad's are assholes." Rose said, still crunching loudly on her cereal.

"Probably." Katarina replied shortly.

She dropped the rag back onto the counter where she found it. Turning on her heel, she walked out of the kitchen.

———

Katarina walked into the control room. Gar was sitting in the chair and typing on the computer while Jason was leaning against the wall and talking to him. She started to listen to their conversation as she glanced around at the computer screens.

"You're amazing Jason, I think we got him." Gar was saying as he stood up and started to turn towards the door.

"Whoah, where are you going?" Jason asked.

"To tell Dick." Gar replied as if it should be obvious.

"I got a better idea," Jason started, "Why don't we check the tunnels? Just to make sure. Because if we're wrong we'll look like assholes." He added.

"Yeah...no" Gar said, beginning to walk away.

"Gar I need this!" Jason said, "To make things right with Dick."

Gar turned back around, listening.

"Show him what I can do, what we can do." He said, gesturing between the two. He hadn't noticed Katarina standing by the door yet.

"He knows what you can do," Gar said, "You're Batman's guy."

"Was." Jason corrected. "I'm saying we go rogue. Just some visual verification. We lay eyes on him and then call Dick."

"Help me out," he said, sounding a bit desperate. "Please."

"Quick look and then we call Dick." Gar grudgingly agreed.

They started to head out of the control room when Jason spotted Katarina.

"How long have you been standing there?" He asked.

"Long enough to know that you guys are going on a little trip to the train tunnels." She replied.

"I mean you can kick ass, why don't you come with us?" He asked.

She shrugged in apparent agreement. The trio headed down the hallway purposefully.

———

The trio made it to the bottom of the concrete steps leading into the tunnel. The light got dimmer as they descended and they stopped at the bottom.

"Alright let's split up." Jason said, he was dressed in his full Robin outfit which Katarina thought was a bit overkill but then again, you can never be too careful.

"No. No... haven't you ever seen a horror movie before?" Gar asked, looking at Jason like he was insane.

"You wanna get out of here fast right? Splitting up will get the job done in half the time." He said before walking away.

"Dark creepy tunnel it is," Gar muttered, turning on his flashlight before walking away.

Katarina parted ways with the other two as she searched through the dark tunnels. A bit of time into searching and she heard the sounds of someone beating someone else up. She ran through the twisting tunnels towards the sound.

When she finally arrived at where she was hearing the sounds she saw Jason in his Robin outfit, beating the shit out of a man that she assumed to be Dr. Light. Suddenly Dr. Light smiled and looked down the tunnel.

Both Jason and Katarina followed his gaze. Without even knowing it, they had found themselves face to face with Deathstroke.