⌖━━━⌖

THE FOUR OF THEM approached the Cadmus building. Fire trucks were staked outside and men in uniform were holding the hoses towards the tall window.

The young heroes watched from afar, trying to find their best entrance point. "I don't know why we can't just go through the window." Again, Juniper suggested.

"Despite his namesake, this bird can't fly." Wally pointed a lazy thumb in his friend's direction.

"This bird has several ways he can reach that window. Don't use me as an excuse for you not being fast enough to run up the side of the building." With his gloved hands clenched at his sides, Robin didn't take his eyes off Wally as he pointed to the burning building.

"What! I can totally make it. Observe." And he was off. Wally sped at killer speeds in the direction of two lab workers falling to their death from the broken window.

He grabbed both of them and hauled them up to the roof before losing momentum and beginning to fall.

Great.

"So smooth," Robin smugly remarked. Even though Wally had managed to scale the entire building, he just couldn't quite stick the landing so the Batman's apprentice felt no pain rubbing it in—dare he say—his best friend's face.

Juniper took it upon herself to leave the two other boys be, taking off into the air to save her best friend from plummeting and breaking a mass amount of bones.

Her hair levitated around her head, her hands surrounded by red tendrils of magic as her being was propelled into the direction of Wally's dangling body.

By some witchcraft, Robin had appeared out of nowhere—beating her to Wally and safely launching through the broken window and hauling his friend through.

The girl in the red and black suit slowly went in feet first meanwhile the two boys watched in awe.

"It's always the coolest thing seeing you fly," Wally placed his hands on his hips as he jutted them out to the side.

Her lips curled at the corners. "You look like your mom when you stand like that, Mrs. West."

Robin ignored the two of them, taking off to the nearest computer to do. . . Well, to do whatever he does.

Aqualad finally joined the group of them after securing the scientists Wally had disposed on the roof to the safety of the ground. "Appreciate the help." It was funny because Juniper didn't think Kaldur had a sarcastic bone in his body.

Barely sparing a glance over his shoulder, Robin answered the white haired boy. "You handled it. Besides, we're here to investigate—poetic justice, remember?"

So much was happening at once it was hard for Juniper to focus on who she should be following, but Aqualad was as good a leader as any, so she took her chances by taking after him down the hall.

Just as she turned the corner, the boy was standing there dumbfounded. "There was something in the. . ."

Wally sped around the corner and nearly knocked over the girl before she shot out her hands to steady him.

"Elevators should be locked down," The boy in the lightning bolt tilted his head in curiosity.

None of them seemed to notice when Robin joined them again—Juniper getting quite the fright when she saw him suddenly appear shoulder to shoulder with her.

Apparently, Juniper was just in the way because Robin wasted absolutely no time in running ahead of her to the now closed elevator. "This is wrong." He announced.

Pulling up the database on his wrist hologram once again, he started to comb through some information that clearly wasn't making sense to him.

"Thought so," her murmured to mostly himself, but the group of them had joined him already, peering over his shoulder.

Juniper caught the faint whiff of sweat, rain, and oddly enough, mint. She completely ignored what he was doing and focused on the slight goosebumps that raised on his neck where her breath was hitting. Clearly his body was always aware of its surroundings whether or not he himself knew.

"This is a high-speed express elevator. It doesn't belong in a two-story building," his brows furrowed in immense confusion.

"Neither does what I saw." Aqualad walked towards the so called 'high-speed express elevator' and pried open the doors revealing the shaft of what most certainly wasn't two-stories tall.

"That's why they needed an express elevator." Juniper looked over at Robin with an unamused expression on her face. Well duh, thank you captain obvious.

Robin didn't spare her a glance as he shot his grapple into the roof of the elevator shaft and began rapidly descending into the darkness.

Juniper couldn't help be wonder how long his grapple could go for before he ran out of slack.

The two other boys jumped forwards and grabbed ahold of the string of Robin's grapple, playing a  dangerous game of fate by putting all their trust in a piece of string.

Juniper on the other hand jumped carelessly into the pit of seemingly unending black, her body picking up momentum until she spotted the faint outline of Robin's suspended body.

Within a split second, her her eyes lit up in the familiar red hue that always took hold when her powers were in use, and she slowed her body to stop next to the Robin boy.

"At the end of my rope." He spoke loudly enough for the three of his team members to hear.

In front of them was the doors labelled 'SL26'. Juniper couldn't tell if that was the level going up or down but she was heavily concerned with how deep this elevator shaft went.

The boys swung onto the ledge protruding from the base of the sliding doors as Juniper slowly but surely took place against the wall standing on the same ledge as the boys all while Robin hacked away on his database. "Bypassing security. . ."

It was like fighting an uphill battle trying not to look down, and praying that the elevator decided not to show up squish them all.

"There, go!" Robin signalled for Aqualad to pull open the doors yet again.

With his Atlantian strength, Kaldur made quick work of his task and led the group of them through to the safety of. . . Um, not really sure what it is or if it's really safe—but it sure as hell is something.

Juniper stared at the space before her as Robin announced, "Welcome to project Cadmus."

Clearly the team wasn't as coordinated as they hoped because Wally took off without warning and ran straight into an open hallway at the end of the corridor and fell flat on his stomach as he stared up at something.

Aqualad, Myseera, and Robin, all went to follow Kidflash but halted when they heard the steady beats of thumping originating from ahead and then Wally was trampled by humongous extraterrestrial beings. Definitely not humanoid either.

Massive saber-tooth gorilla looking aliens about to crush Kidflash had the young heroes speeding back up to reach Wally as he managed to escape the ins and outs of the crowd creatures.

All of them stood at the sidelines in shock at what they were seeing. To think that people were going about their lives a hundred and who-knows-how-much meters above them.

"No. . . Nothing odd going on here." Aqualad chipping in with his sarcasm yet again.

Once the herd of unknown beings had cleared and left the group without a hassle, the four of the sped towards the nearest panel which just so happened to be next to some super mechanical door.

Robin practically glued his face to the screen coming from his wrist, hacking his way through to the groups next challenge. Juniper could only hope their next one would be as painless and easygoing as their encounter with the herd.

"Okay, I'm officially whelmed." Juniper didn't understand what Robin was referring to when he said 'whelmed', but she chose better to ignore it because less than a second late the large metal door hissed and then slid open revealing one giant room.

Shelves upon shelves of glass cylindrical containment pods were presented on each side of the room, some form or unidentified specie being repeatedly electrocuted.

"Hey, J, remember that time I got electrocuted?" Wally, still astounded by the scene before him didn't remove his eyes from the unknown as he spoke in a nostalgic tone.

"Yeah, and then you blew up the garage we were in, nearly killing us by dropping ten thousand tons of stone on us." She began to walk into the room emanating neon blue from the volts shining through their glass cases. "Oh and then there's also the fact that during that entire experience we managed to create superpowers from scratch, causing me to ultimately abandon my family and run away to San Francisco with a stranger for three years of my life."

Aqualad and Robin shared a look shock.

With one more mumble, Juniper walked towards one of the many glass containment pods and brushed her fingertips against it. "To answer your question; yes, it does sound familiar."

It was good to know that Wally hadn't changed very much over the years, ignoring his best friend's response. His yellow uniformed body bent at the waist as his eyes peered through the glass and his finger gave a quick tap.

"Huh. So this is how they hid this massive underground facility from the world. . ." Wally stood back up and continued walking the expanse of the room.

"The real Cadmus isn't on the grid—it generates its own power with these things," kidflash gestures to the hundreds of scary looking creatures. "Must be what they're bred for."

Kaldur walked up beside the boy in yellow. "Even the name is a clue: the Cadmus of myth created a new race by sowing dragons' teeth into the earth," Juniper was fascinated by her new friend's words, she had always loved all kinds of mythology's—it was a surprise to her that she never heard about this Cadmus one.

"And this Cadmus creates new life, too," Robin stepped forwards to join in on the conversation. His eyes scanned the length of the area, in search of something her could hack into. "Let's find out why."

The dark haired boy flipped open a pocket on the gloves of his that seemed to extend to his forearms to reveal a hard drive connected to a wire.

After connecting it to the computer, another one of Cadmus's holograms flitted into the air above the keyboard, a text box with codes moving so fast Juniper could barely make out the words in between slashes and semicolons. Although she did catch on to a few, seeing project and failed among the lines.

Robin, ever the trained super reader—or maybe just skilled in understanding code—tapped away on the moving hologram while he spoke out to the clueless teens behind him. "They call them Genomorphs."

"Whoa, look at the stats on these things," The super hacker managed to pull open a file on one of the so called 'genomorphs.' "Super strength, telepathy, razor claws—these are living weapons!"

Wally began to squint at the screen. "They're engineering an army. But for who?" His voice dropped an octave in concentration.

A quick blinking caught Juniper's attention. With her chin now resting on Robin's left shoulder and her right hand resting upon his right shoulder, she used her free hand to point at the blinking arrow. "What's that?"

The code didn't seem to be finished, but Robin didn't care all that much as his head turned on instinct to look at the head of auburn hair resting on his shoulder.

Not seeing much of a problem, the girl furrowed her brows going to look right back at the boy. The tip of her nose brushed his chin and all of the concentration Robin had built up immediately vanished the moment he looked into the violent oceans called Juniper Evans's eyes.

He could make out a jagged scar upon her forehead, something very old but must've been very serious if it still held such a mark on her pretty skin. . .

P-pretty skin? No, he didn't say that, if anything it wasn't her skin he found pretty it was the way she was über confident around everyone she met; confident enough to place her chin on his shoulder without a second thought, to look in his eyes and not look down on him but admire him and what he was doing, to him that was pretty, to him she was oh so very prett—

"Y-yeah Myseera is right, there's something else." Robin cleared his throat, dragging his eyes back to the hologram projected before him, squinted at it while he attempted to regain his composure.

"Project Kr." Left Juniper's throat in a whisper, yet again paying no mind as her head tilted to the side in curiosity—temple resting against the batboy's jaw.

"Ugh, the file is triple-encrypted. I-I can't—" the boy who was once hacking away was cut off by the sharp voice of someone interrupting the teens and their top secret mission.

"Don't move!" They all turned to face a man in blue, black, and yellow armour running towards them followed by Genomorphs.

It was The Guardian, Juniper realized. Everyone had assumed he died—at least that's what the Evans girl thought. Unfortunately living with Raven taught Juniper nothing of value towards others, really. Or their personal space. . .

The older superhero froze in his spot once he recognized the group of teens. "Wait. Robin, Aqualad, Myseera, Kidflash?"

The last three mentioned came forward and took guard in front of their teammate who appeared to be back to deciphering the codes upon his wrist hologram.

"At least he got your name right," Robin quipped. Juniper wanted to laugh as she recalled the many times Wally spoke to her over the phone complaining about the citizens of the world referring to him as Flash Boy.

Juniper took a moment to assess the tall man in the super suit. Wasn't he supposed to be on their side?

"I know you. Guardian, a hero," Kaldur's eyes were wide with the shock of betrayal.

However, Guardian didn't blink once. "I do my best."

"Then what are you doing here?" Wally took the thoughts from his twin's mind and put them to words.

"I'm chief of security. You're trespassing, but we can call The Justice League, figure this out." It was utterly irritating how Guardian mocked them like they were disobedient children who were defying their leaders' orders.

Well. . . That's exactly what the four of them were doing, but it still irritated the girl to no end.

"You think the League is going to approve of breeding weapons?" Kidflash countered back in pure anger.

A look of confusion passed over their elder's face. "Weapons? What are you—" Some kind of realization spread across Guardian's features. "What have I. . . ugh,"  it seemed to be the Genomorph perched on his shoulder had some kind of communication with him—causing turmoil in his thoughts.

Guardian's hands held his head. "My head," his complaint was short lasted.

The only female in the room seemed to sense their oncoming assault, readying her muscles for the strain they were about to be put through.

"Ah shit." She grumbled.

"Take 'em down hard! No mercy!" And with Guardians final command, the mini army of Genomorphs charged towards the young heroes.

All it took was a split second of eye contact with Robin over her shoulder and she knew what had to be done. Robin needed more time and Juniper was going to give it to him.

Her body spun in a circle, arms moving through the air in a diagonal strike. The movement of her delicate limbs caused all of her momentum to travel through her arms—next thing people saw was a red wave of solid force crashing onto the enemy.

Juniper's head slumped as she heaved a sigh through her parted lips. She blinked hard, trying to control her breathing from the immense energy the power stole from her small, still growing, body.

"Let's go!" Robin then shouted, alerting his team of the recovering Genomorphs.

A smoke bomb of thrown and Juniper was tugged backwards by none other than Wally.

It was strange because Juniper has never done anything like that before. The only form of power to ever leave her being was the delicate wisps of solid red that she could manipulate to her liking—like a forcefield, or maybe even a wall.

Except all it took was one short look from a boy she knew nothing about and her was body reacting for her.

"Take her!" Wally pushed her frame into Robin.

The vigilante who seemed to be younger than all of them was shorter than his male companions. Juniper, six and a half months older, still lacked a few inches on the boy.

She was fine. At least that's what she admitted in her head. She would have told Robin to back off if she could actually form words through the exhaustion.

In moments when Juniper can recall the dork she saw in her vision all those years ago—y'know, the one she apparently marries—she'll tell herself that he wasn't real, that she got confused between a dream and a vision and she'll never meet that mystery man.

The arm that wraps around her waist asked no permission, and the body that was soon pressed to her own held no familiarity. Robin's free arm shot up to the ceiling with a grapple hook, his eyes took a single momentary once over of the girl in his arms noticing that she was quickly recovering from saving his ass seconds ago.

Grapple hook shot out and latched onto a beam above, with no warning it pulled the two upwards into safety.

She didn't protest. She needed help and Robin was providing it. She needed time to recover and Robin was buying her time. She needed him and Robin was there for every second.

He was stronger than she initially thought, easily hauling her small frame around as they landed atop the shelves. "You've got some muscle in you," she regarded with a thankful pat to his shoulders.

"I was an acrobat in a past life," and away he went, the holographic database was once again pulled up from his wrist once he turned and began walking down the length of the metal shelves, straight towards a vent.

Her head tilted slightly, staring down the boy's retreating figure. "Boy Wonder's got jokes." Juniper's eyebrows raised slightly in an acknowledging manner, pocketing that information.

"Something like that." Was the last mumble she heard uttered from his mouth before his voice became out of range.

The ligaments in Juniper's body were slowly but surely awakening once more and she was ready to fly right back down and help out Wally and her new friend Kaldur.

Just like the elevator, Juniper was prepared to jump down and levitate her body downwards into the awaiting chaos. A quick look to her side confirmed that the vent had already been silently opened and Robin gone without the depths of it.

She inhaled once, gathering her strength before lifting one of her feet to step off the edge. Her body leaned forwards and—

And she didn't get very far. A hand tugging the back hem of the top of her super suit pulled her back onto the safety of the high up shelf top.

Imagining the face of maybe a taller Genomorph, Juniper swung her fist around to hit whoever decided to hold her back.

Robin ducked, not once looking away from the hologram still projecting from his suit.

"The hell are you doing?" She couldn't tell if it was a relived exhale or an annoyed one that then left her mouth.

His eyes broke away from the screen for a single second to look down at her eyes and then going back to his hacking. "Me? I'm wondering why I managed to get all the way to the point of opening the vent only to realize you weren't following me."

"You're being a pain in the ass." She grumbled.

"I'm saving your ass." He grabbed her elbow and started walking, only letting go when he realized that she wasn't going to stray back down to the noise of the fight.

"You're still being a pain in the ass. . . Brandon," she eyed him for any reaction.

Robin stepped into the vent with the girl right behind him. His eyebrows pinched at the name. "Good guess, but no." He continued to multitask.

The unlikely duo mindlessly thumped their way through the metal vent.

"Well, I just figured it was an ass-y name perfect for an ass." A satisfied hum left her throat.

Robin scoffed. "You're the ass."

"Jerk," she mumbled.

"Loser."

Juniper gasped. "Moron!"

Robin wondered how long they'd go back and forth until she'd inevitably say it.

"Geek,"

"Jokes on you, I take that as a compliment." Not wanting to stare at the back of him any longer, Juniper lifted her head and payed him no mind when she passed him—his face illuminated by the subtle glow of the hologram.

"Hah, weirdo." Robin didn't mean it, but he was testing a theory and desperate to prove himself right. The boy didn't know why, but he desperately just wanted her to say it once—just hear it fall from her lips that packed more of a punch than her fist.

Apparently the term 'weirdo' was something that Juniper Evans did not find as a compliment. A gasp tore from her throat. "Dick!"

And there it was. Robin stopped clean in his tracks with a pleased smile upon his masked face, finally giving her the time of day to look at her for more than one measly second.

"What? Do you like being insulted or something?" Juniper was not used to the reaction of pleasure to her venomous words. Quite the opposite, in fact.

"Hopefully you'll never know the reason." The boy turned swiftly on his heel and smacked his palm against the side of the vents.

Some kind of vent opening that Juniper had no idea was there opened up, momentarily distracting the girl from the previous conversation.

Robin threw a glance over his shoulder towards his female companion. "Need any help?" The question was genuine, no judgement to the fact that she may or may not be shallowly breathing. . . slightly.

Nothing Juniper would ever admit.

"All is good in the world of Geeks." This, however, was a backlash at his poor attempt at mocking her.

The boy spared her no words as he hopped through the opening and landed stealthily on his feet.

Juniper followed suit, using her slowly recovering powers to make the jump in a careful fashion. The moment her feet made contact with the floor which seemed to be a million miles beneath an actual floor, a plastic device was tossed into her chest.

She let out a "oomph" from surprise as her hands immediately grasped onto her chest and clutched the item.

In case it was some kind of explosive, the Evans girl was careful when she pulled it away from her person and took a good look at it.

Juniper didn't know why she thought it could be such a thing. . . Maybe it was the time Raven threw an active grenade at a her and expected her to enclose it with a forcefield or she'd die.

Fun times.

"Wally said you like music," the culprit of the thrown Walkman nodded in the direction of the device in her hands.

Wally hadn't told him zilch.

Sure, the speedster went on and on about his best friend. . . But it was mainly about their adventures in the science world and how good she was at school.

No, Robin did his own research the moment she opened her mouth to insult him. He hacked into all purchases she made over the years she was with Raven and found out it had only been one thing. A used iPod that was on it's last straw. After saving up all the birthday money Wally sent her, it was the only thing she could afford since Barry said it was illegal to steal things even for a present.

And from combing through her download history, he knew her favourite song was 'I Think We're Alone Now' by Tiffany. She had a thing for the throwbacks.

Robin didn't understand how his eyes had immeditaly spotted the Walkman and thought of her—and he had no reasoning behind his autopilot actions of tossing it towards her. He needed her to see him as more than Robin, the boy in the mask. . . he wanted her to know him for him without breaking any of Batman's rules.

"Woah," Juniper dragged out in a whisper when she popped out the casette and read the letters labelling it.

Greatest hits of the 80's and 90's. What are the odds.

"Like it?" The boy's voice had more of a hint of desperation for approval than he had originally intended.

Juniper knew it was peculiar how out of all of the science equipment surrounding the two of them in what seemed to look like a labratory of some sort, Robin hadn't decided to toss something else at her. . . Maybe the vibrant red lab coat that hung in the corner of the room—her favourite colour for obvious reasons. She decided to save the questions for later as it seemed that they were running short on time and needed to find an exit to meet up with the rest of their young justice league.

"Good eye, Dickface." A wink was sent into the male vigilante's direction and a smirk coloured his features for an entire different reason than the wink.

Once again, Juniper wasn't one to miss his concerning reaction to being called such an explicit name. "I'll never understand why you find that so amusing,"

⌖

Juniper and the boy shes beginning to consider calling her friend, had been stuck at one of the exits, Robin desperately trying to hack through the sealed door as the alarms blared around them.

The auburn haired girl was leaning against the wall next to the code scanner, not a care in the world for the chaos that surrounded her. Compared to Raven's brutal training, this was an easy going Saturday night.

Well, then Wally and Kaldur appeared from down the hall adjacent to her. Definitely not something that usually happens on her Saturdays.

All it took was for Juniper to bat an eye and Kidflash himself had sped over to her and Robin. "Way to be a team player, Rob!" Wally shouted in his friend's face.

That also gave Juniper a hopeful thought. Maybe his name is Rob, that would make so much sense since his alias is Robin. . . and it's still a douchebag name!

Almost like her could hear her thoughts, Robin peered at her from the corner of his eyes, still mercilessly tapping away at his hacking hologram. "It's not, so don't even think about asking." He stated before getting back to Wally's furious stature. "I got Myseera out, just like you wanted. And I thought you were right behind me."

Both lies, but the group only knew that he was lying about one. No one knew that Robin had acted almost as if on instinct the moment he saw Juniper sway on her feet.

Boy Wonder proved once again that he could beat any of them in any sort of competition involving ones and zeros because the impenetrable steel doors finally slid open at the end of bird boy's sentence.

Apparently Aqualad has dissapeared somewhere further down the CADMUS halls to fight those creatures because when Myseera, Kidflash, and Robin made their way through the opening, Aqualad was pushing petal to the metal to outrun those things.

At last they were all safe once the door sealed the group in what seemed to be an elevator heading multiple stories downwards.

Kaldur was the first to voice his concerns when asking about the direction of the elevator. "We're heading down?"

"Dude! out is up!" Wally berated his male best friend.

Robin cocked his head in a challenging manor. Sure, the two boys that also occupied the space were much taller than him and held more muscle, but they all knew that the most dangerous person in that plunging metal can was Batman's protege.

"Excuse me? Project Kr? It's down. On sub-level 52." Robin reminded them of the group's earlier findings.

Aqualad let out a huff as he began pacing. "This is out of control. . . Perhaps—perhaps we should contact the league."

Uh-uh. Bad idea. This little mission of theirs was already going to cost them annoying lectures and obscure punishments for kids that held their certain knowledge and abilities. If they didn't return with something to show for it, the concequences would on get worse. . . Juniper might be forced to switch from a science major to a—a—an English major! Ugh just the thought of that made bile rise in the young girl's throat.

"Absolutely not!" Juniper cut in with her squeaky voice of utter terror.

There was no further comment from the rest of her companions as the elevator dinged once they made their arrival to the desired floor and they took their stances.

The place beyond made Juniper feel strange to say the least. Strange in an uncomfortable way. . . More like strange in a oddly familiar way. The red and purple hues that echoes from withing the cavernous darkness reminded her bizarrely of Raven and her's apartment—yes she is allowed to call it that.

Sadly enough, this place was nothing like home. It was about to become strange in an uncomfortable way real quickly.

chip speaks !!

THIS CHAPTER IS FINALLY OUT AFTER ALL THE STRESS WATTPAD GAVE ME BECAUSE IT WOULDN'T FUCKING PUBLISH.

also, I know this didn't end at the end of the episode, but I was so desperate to get this chapter out because the reading count for the book has grown exponentially within the past week.

SO this one's for u guys.

get it
cuz i'm batman