Waking Up
Bruce looked down at the three open pods. Beside him, the boy, Jebediah stood. From the frequent micro-tensions along his jaw, Bruce could tell that he was biting back a flurry of words, most of them probably not very nice. He couldn't blame him.
The children in the pods seemed to be dead. If not for the slight movement of their chests and the faint breath from their nostrils, even Bruce would have been convinced. Jebediah had said that they'd been put in stasis because they were prime research materials at the cusp of flowering. From the bitter, sarcastic tone, he could tell that Jebediah was parroting someone else's tone.
Bruce felt that he would like to have a private conversation with whoever that was.
The first two children were close to Jebediah's age, perhaps a couple of years younger, about thirteen or fourteen. Jebediah looked like he was in the same age group as Barry's kids. The last kid was young, looking like she was barely into puberty.
"Sol," Jebediah pointed to the older girl who had a golden mane of hair, "and Kuro." He pointed at the boy with dark mocha skin.
Bruce frowned.
"Not like that," Jebediah said. "It's because of their bases. The story rumored is that there was a fight between two beings, one light and one dark. They were taken by surprise, and before they could escape, samples were taken." Jebediah shrugged. "I heard that they escaped, but you never know."
Trolli, sitting on Jebediah's shoulder squeaked. Jebediah turned his head towards her, his expression thoughtful.
"I don't know who the last one is. She's not one of ours," Jebediah said. He consulted the datapad he held in his hands. "The notes says that she's called Kathryn. Interesting. We've never had a 'Kathryn' before."
Bruce's fists curled. He had a violent urge to punch someone. They were just children, even Jebediah with his clinical dry voice, still hoarse from his injury.
"I asked if you knew about magic because that's what their bases purportedly used. There's a video of their bases, but it has no sound. Clearly they said something before firing off some kind of weaponized energy, but I have no clue. Thankfully, neither did the previous scientists," Jebediah turned away from the pods and crossed to one of the jars on a nearby table.
"This used to be Alvin. He could generate shocks," Jebediah said, holding it up. "He could also absorb electricity, but we never told."
He moved the jar with its gruesome contents closer to the pods before thumping it on top of the console of Sol's pod. Jebediah jumped back as electricity flared and arced around the jar. A few seconds later and it went dark, the inner glass covering pulling back. Jebediah covered his nose as gas hissed out, causing Bruce to quickly slip on his mini gas mask.
"It's not dangerous, but it might make you sleepy," Jebediah said, cautiously moving the jar over to Kuro's pod.
"Sleepy could get you killed today," Bruce responded. He captured a sample for further analysis. Between this gas and the weird, poison belching tank, he was gaining a new appreciation for the bioweapons that the aliens had concocted.
The girl, Sol sat up, rubbing her eyes. Curls of honey gold cascaded around a youthful, pretty face, framing shy blue-green eyes. Those eyes sharpened as they darted between Bruce and Jebediah. Then she twisted around, searching. Her mouth opened in a silent exclamation at the sight of Kuro laying in a pod next to hers. She swiveled her head towards Jebediah, insistently pointing.
"He's fine. You're both fine from what I can tell," Jebediah said, picking up a wandlike instrument from another table. He waved it over Sol. His datapad beeped. "See?" He said, showing her the datapad. "There's no sign of any tracking devices or controls embedded."
Bruce stepped back as Kuro awoke. Instead of the slow, sleepy appearance Sol had shown, he was immediately awake, examining his surroundings. Kuro sat up, his eyes fastened on Sol who turned to him with a happy smile. He cocked his head in query to which Sol shook her head.
"Jebediah woke us up," Sol said simply. Her voice was soft and melodic.
Kuro nodded once in Jebediah's direction and then looked at the girl still sleeping next to them. He frowned at the sight of the jar Jebediah was using to open the pods. Then he turned to Sol who nodded.
"Yes, we do need Carol to come and burn all the remains up," Sol said in agreement.
Bruce felt a brief sense of familiarity as he studied Kathryn. He was reminded of a friend he hadn't seen in a while. The last he'd heard, Zatanna was headed on a tour of Europe. Something had happened which she didn't want to talk about a few years earlier, and he'd assumed that she'd gotten a lead on whoever the perpetrator was and was looking to bring them to justice.
Looking at the child, he had a sick feeling in his stomach about the event she didn't want to talk about. Zatanna hadn't been her usual cheerful self for a long time afterwards. Bruce, dealing with Gotham's byzantine collection of criminals, hadn't paid that much attention. He was regretting it now.
When Kathryn woke up, she slid to one side of her pod before slowly inching herself upright, eyes warily scanning the room before landing on Jebediah.
"You're Jebediah," she breathed, looking shocked. She glanced around again. "Am I going to be Disassembled?"
"No,' Jebediah said. He followed her scan of the lab. "I've never done Disassemblies anyway. Those are all research subjects." He shrugged. "Well, they are," he told Kuro and Sol who were glaring at him.
"Then are we escaping? Is that possible?" Kathryn asked. She paused as Jebediah waved the wand over her. "Am I tagged? Embedded? Oh, oh, did they sterilize me?"
"You have an interesting query line," Jebediah replied. He tapped on his datapad. "You're all clean. Now, Mr. Batman, any clue on how to use magic?"
Bruce examined the children. Sol and Kuro looked similar despite their differing genotypes, like two sides of the same coin. Kathryn reminded him strongly of Zatanna when they were children. He pointed at Kathryn.
"She can probably cast spells by saying things backwards," Bruce reluctantly said. "The other two…" He let his voice trail off as a recent incident came to mind.
After the dossiers had been released, someone had tampered with the Batsignal. When he'd gone to investigate, a smudged note had been pinned to the side with a spire of rock. It had said 'if you meet a kid and are unsure, 'Shazam' is always the cure.'
He'd dismissed it as a stupid prank of vandalism. Bruce hadn't been sure how they'd gotten on and off the precinct's roof without being seen, but he'd done the same thing innumerable times.
"How about you two try saying 'Shazam?'" He asked.
Sol and Kuro exchanged baffled looks. Then they shrugged in tandem and opened their mouths.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Tashady
Tashady Don't mind me as I cackle in this corner over here... ^_^ Happy 4th of July, everybody!
I'm still wrestling with chatbox UIs...it's not as bad as it sounds. Turns out I was misunderstanding something fundamental... par for the course... *sigh* On the plus side, once undersood, it's yours forever!
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