The planet beneath my feet was the color of dried blood, all cracked red stone and jagged spires that stretched up into a sky the color of a bruise. Twin suns hung low on the horizon, casting long double shadows across the terrain, each one bending at a different angle so that everything looked doubled, ghosted, like the world itself couldn't decide which reality it wanted to commit to.
The gravity here was brutal, nearly triple Earth's, and I could feel it pressing down on every joint in my body even with my TTK compensating, a constant low hum of resistance that made every movement cost more than it should.
This was Kranus-7, or at least the simulation's near-perfect approximation of it. The planet we'd fought a small war on two weeks ago, back when Nolan had decided that "training" meant dropping us into hostile alien environments and seeing if we survived long enough to learn something useful.
Back then it had been real. The serpent-beasts had real teeth. The atmosphere had really tried to boil the moisture out of our lungs. Now it was just a backdrop, a stage dressed up in memory, so he could beat the hell out of us in a setting that would keep us honest.
I threw a punch, and Mark threw one right beside me, our fists moving in near-perfect sync after a month of doing this every single day. A month of waking up and learning to move as a unit with someone I'd spent the past five years resenting. Nolan didn't even bother blocking. He tilted his head an inch to the side, let my fist pass by his ear close enough that I felt the displaced air ripple back against my knuckles, then leaned back just enough that Mark's follow-up strike sailed harmlessly over his shoulder, close enough to disturb the collar of his shirt.
"Good," Nolan said, his voice completely level despite the fact that two Viltrumite-level combatants were trying to take his head off. "You two aren't holding back as much anymore."
I snarled and spun into a roundhouse kick, TTK humming along my leg like a livewire, funneling extra force into the strike. Remember what Wildcat taught you Caius. Don't just throw the kick. Become the kick.
"Took you both two weeks," Nolan continued, ducking under the kick with the kind of ease that made me want to scream, the top of his head passing so close to my shin that I could've sworn I felt the heat off his skin, "but you're both coming along."
Mark went for a cross, all shoulder and hip rotation, more power behind it than I think he even realized he had, his form tightening with every session, every correction Nolan barked out mid-fight. In the same instant, I dropped low, planted my back foot into the cracked red stone hard enough to send hairline fractures spidering outward, and drove a knee up toward Nolan's ribs, aiming for the same spot I'd watched Mark bruise him in the second week of training.
Nolan caught both of us.
One hand wrapped around Mark's fist mid-punch, fingers closing, and the other palm flat against my knee, stopping the strike dead in the air. Small shockwaves rippled out from the point of impact, kicking up dust, sending cracks spiderwebbing through the red stone beneath us in jagged lightning-bolt patterns.
He looked completely unbothered. Like he was holding two children back from running into traffic, rather than absorbing the combined force of two beings who could level city blocks.
"Not bad," Nolan said, and there was no mockery in his tone. Then his eyes shifted to me. "But Caius, you're not maximizing your Tactile Telekinesis to augment your strength even more. You're throwing punches like a human boxer with superhuman strength behind them. You need to think about layering the TTK into the strike itself, not just reinforcing your skin. The field should be an extension of the mind as much as your body, not just armor wrapping around you. You showed more potential when you were fighting Mark use that same ingenuity."
I gritted my teeth. He was right, and that made it worse.
His gaze moved to Mark. "Mark. Your technique needs more refinement. You have all the raw power in the world and none of the precision to go with it. That's going to get you killed against someone who knows what they're doing. Your need to fight smarter not harder."
I looked at Mark. He gave a tight nod, jaw clenched, sweat dripping down the side of his face despite the fact that neither of us technically needed to sweat this much anymore, it was more habit than necessity at this point, some vestige of mortality our bodies refused to let go of.
Fine. Refinement. I could do refinement.
I focused, drawing my TTK inward instead of just letting it sit as a passive shell around my body. I funneled it toward my eyes, and let loose a blast of golden heat vision, I made them more narrower and hotter than anything I'd managed before.
Nolan's eyes widened fractionally, the most reaction I'd gotten out of him all session, and he released our limbs to dodge, twisting his body sideways with liquid grace as the beam scorched a line across the rock behind him, the stone glowing cherry-red and then white before crumbling into slag.
That was the opening.
"Now!" I shouted, and Mark didn't need to be told twice.
We both moved at once, driving forward into simultaneous kicks aimed at Nolan's center mass, our bodies cutting through the thin red atmosphere with twin sonic cracks. He'd just dodged the heat vision and hadn't fully recovered his stance yet, weight still shifted onto his back foot, and both of our boots connected with his torso at the same moment, the impact point overlapping just enough to double the force.
The impact sent him flying. His body cutting through the air like a missile, trailing a shockwave of displaced dust and debris, before slamming into a distant rock formation hard enough to bring the whole thing down in an avalanche of stone that thundered across the plain like a localized earthquake.
I didn't even get a full second to feel satisfied before Oliver made his move.
His body twisted, folded, expanded, shifting through a horrifying, beautiful transformation, flesh rippling and reforming, until he was no longer a red-skinned Martian boy but something massive and serpentine, all coiling green-black scales and too many teeth arranged in overlapping rows, the exact same beast we'd fought off on Kranus-7 a few weeks ago. Oliver had apparently taken a very personal interest in that creature's biology, studying it, memorizing every joint and muscle group with a child's morbid fascination.
The serpent-form Oliver dove through the dust cloud where Nolan had crashed and wrapped around him in an instant, thick coils constricting his joints with bone-crushing pressure, scales grinding against each other with a sound like grinding gravel.
"Go!" Mark shouted at me, and we both rocketed forward, closing the distance in half a second.
We hit Nolan while he was still wrapped up, throwing heavy, fast punches, one after another, trying to overwhelm him before he could break free, our fists finding gaps between Oliver's coils. I felt the impact travel up my arms with every strike, my knuckles connecting with something that felt more like reinforced steel than flesh, each hit sending vibrations up through my wrists and into my shoulders.
It didn't matter. Nolan broke Oliver's coils like they were made of wet paper, muscles bunching and then exploding outward in a single violent motion that sent scales scattering.
He grabbed Oliver's serpentine body, still constricting around his torso, by what would have been the throat if the creature had one, and with a single violent motion, hurled him directly at us, using Oliver's own considerable mass as a projectile.
I barely had time to brace before Oliver's massive form crashed toward me and Mark, easily fifteen feet of scaled muscle bearing down on us. But Oliver, even mid-flight, had enough control to shift his density, and his body simply phased through both of us like smoke, leaving nothing but a faint tingling sensation where his mass had passed through my chest, like static electricity crawling across my skin.
But Mark and I didn't stop moving. We flew forward together, throwing punch after punch against Nolan, who blocked, deflected, and struck back faster than either of us. His hands moved like they belonged to someone with three times our reflexes, catching wrists, redirecting momentum with minimal effort, landing counter-strikes that rattled my teeth even through the TTK, each one precisely placed to disrupt rather than injure, he was still holding back, even now, even against two of us at once.
The three of us became a blur of motion, strikes thrown and blocked and countered in fractions of a second, the sound of impact after impact after impact echoing off the alien rock formations like war drums, a percussion of flesh and force that seemed to shake the simulated sky itself. Dust rose in choking clouds around us. The twin suns cast our shadows in constantly shifting directions as we spun and struck and dodged.
I could feel it building. That moment right before a real clash, the kind where all three of us would finally collide at full force, no holding back, no restraint, every ounce of power we had crashing together in a single decisive instant....
The gravity let up all at once.
The red planet dissolved around us, the twin suns flickering out like extinguished candles, the alien rock formations dissolving into pixels of light before disappearing entirely, the dust and debris we'd kicked up vanishing mid-fall. We were floating, suddenly, in the massive white void of the Watchtower's training room, our fists still raised, still hanging in the air where we'd been about to throw the next strike, three bodies suspended in the sudden emptiness like figures caught in a photograph.
For a second, none of us moved. We just hung there in midair, breathing hard, staring at each other like we were trying to figure out if the fight was actually over or if this was some kind of trick, some new test Nolan had cooked up to catch us off guard.
Then the door on the far side of the room hissed open.
Nightwing walked in, one hand raised in a casual wave, completely unbothered by the fact that he'd just interrupted three superpowered beings mid-brawl, his boots clicking against the polished floor.
"Hey guys," he said. "As much as I'd love to keep watching you have a slugfest for the next few days, I need Caius for something."
I looked over at Nolan and Mark. Nolan lowered his fists first, his expression settling back into that calm, unreadable mask he wore most of the time now, the very same mask that had slowly, almost imperceptibly, started to crack over the past month.
"It's fine," Nolan said, floating down until his boots touched the floor. "We're about done training anyway." He looked at me and Mark, something almost like pride flickering behind his eyes before he tucked it away. "You're both stronger than you were when this month began."
"Mark," Nightwing said, his tone shifting into something more serious, "we need to talk about Oliver."
"Leave him to me," I said before either of them could get further into it.
Nolan turned toward me, one eyebrow raised, genuine surprise crossing his face for the first time all session. "Excuse me?"
"Let Oliver come home with me," I said, crossing my arms. "Debbie basically lives at my house now, and I think she'd be a good influence on him. Not to mention I'm gonna let Mark introduce him, unless you think you've got the balls to do it yourself."
Nolan went quiet for a long moment. That told me I'd hit something real, something underneath all that careful composure. Good.
"No. I'm not ready to face Debbie. Not yet."
He turned to Oliver, who had shifted back to his natural Martian form, floating nearby with wide, uncertain eyes, small hands clasped together in front of him.
"Oliver, I need you to go with your brother. It's around that time."
Oliver's face saddened. "But I don't want you to go, father."
"You can't stay here, Oliver," Nolan said gently, crouching slightly so he was closer to eye level with the boy. "You need to go with Mark and Caius. They'll take care of you."
He pulled Oliver into a hug, the boy's small body, even if he looked like a teenager, compared to Nolan he was still small, nearly swallowed up in his father's much larger frame, Oliver's arms wrapping tight around Nolan's neck like he was trying to memorize the feeling. When he let go, he turned to Mark, and something in his expression shifted, became heavier, more vulnerable than I'd ever seen on Nolan's face in all the footage I'd watched of him, all the fights, all the destruction. This was something else entirely.
"Mark. I am proud of the man you've become. And I'm sorry for not being a better father to you growing up. For leaving you alone for five years while I started a new family on Mars. For not teaching to better then me."
His voice caught, just slightly, and I watched Mark's jaw tighten, watched him fight against every instinct that probably told him to turn away, to keep the wall up.
"I know a month together won't make up for five years of me leaving," Nolan continued, each word coming slower now, more deliberate. "But I hope we can find a way through this. And find time to start over."
Mark stood there for a long moment, his expression somewhere between anger and grief, both fighting for space on his face, neither one winning outright.
Then he stepped forward and hugged his father.
"I'm not saying I'm okay with all of this," Mark said, his voice muffled against Nolan's shoulder, thick with something he was clearly trying to keep contained. "But I'm glad I got to see you again. So please, don't die. Maybe we can go back to Mom together. Try to make things right."
Nolan nodded slowly. "Of course, son."
Then his eyes turned to me, and something in his posture changed. "Caius, I know you have every reason to hate me. And Mark. But I thank you for choosing to help my family. For working with me despite everything."
I let out a slow breath, feeling the weight of the past month settle over me, the training, the exhaustion, the anger I still carried but had learned to set aside when it mattered. Getting to fight them constantly kind of helped me put some of it to the side, but not all of it. My parents are still trapped. My friends are still dead, and I still get those nightmares.
"Nolan. Just make it back alive for your kids, and Debbie. And the next time we fight, I won't need Mark to help me kick your teeth in."
The corner of Nolan's mouth twitched, almost a smile, the first genuine one I think I'd seen from him. "Fair."
Nightwing cleared his throat from the doorway, clearly trying not to intrude on the moment any longer than necessary. "Green Lantern John Stewart's waiting for you in the hangar bay, Nolan"
Before I could move, the door hissed open again and M'gann floated in, her expression brightening the moment she saw all of us, green skin catching the ambient light of the training room.
"Hey, Caius," she said. "How was the last month?"
I let out a tired breath, feeling every bruise Nolan had left on me over the past four weeks all at once. "Besides constant fights against Omni-Man and space dragons and titans? I'm fine. Anyway, what brings you here?"
"I was asked by the League to give Oliver a mental education," she said, floating closer to the boy, her smile warm and genuine. "Help him understand Earth customs before he's out in the world. Language, social cues, all the little things that don't come with just knowing facts."
Oliver's whole demeanor shifted, brightening immediately as he flew over toward her, the anxiety from moments ago melting away in an instant. "Hello, M'gann!"
I looked between them, something easing in my chest at how naturally the boy gravitated toward her. "Then it's all you."
M'gann nodded, though something wistful crossed her face, her smile faltering just slightly. "Wish I could join the mission with you." Then her expression fell further, the wistfulness replaced by something heavier, something that made my stomach tighten before she even said it. "By the way, you've been on the station for a month, so you probably don't know this yet, but... Eve's been missing. For the past month."
My whole body went still, every muscle locking up at once.
"What?"
Nightwing's voice cut in from behind me. "Cai. I'll tell you on the way. Let me talk to you in private."
I nodded, my mind already racing through a thousand possibilities, none of them good, each one worse than the last. We left the training room, and as we walked down the corridor, the Earth rotating slowly below us through the observation windows, peaceful and blue and utterly indifferent to whatever had happened to one of the people I cared about most, Nightwing finally spoke.
"It happened the same day you started training with Nolan and Mark. Titans Tower surveillance picked up an energy signature we don't recognize approaching the tower at high speed."
He raised his arm, and a holographic panel flickered to life, displaying grainy, high-resolution footage. I watched as a streak of light, too fast, too bright to be natural, moving in a way that didn't match any propulsion signature I recognized, shot toward the tower and slammed directly into what I recognized as Eve's window.
The light flashed, blinding even through the recorded footage. And then Eve was simply gone, while a hole was in the window.
"We examined the room, but found nothing. No trace, no residue, nothing. We've had every Titan on the lookout for her since. Cyborg's run every scan he's got. Nothing."
I stared at the footage, watching it loop, my jaw clenched so hard it ached, the muscles in my neck standing out with tension. Why now? Why during the one month I'd been locked away training, unreachable, unaware, completely cut off from the rest of the world by Nolan's brutal schedule?
I'm not gonna lose my cool, I told myself, forcing my breathing to slow, forcing the heat building behind my eyes to recede. I can't control not finding her. Not yet.
But something in the back of my mind told me this wasn't a coincidence. Somebody had waited until I was gone. Somebody had known exactly when I'd be unreachable, exactly when the tower would be short one of its heaviest hitters.
"But that's not why you called me here," I said, my voice flat, forcing the anger down into something usable.
"No," Nightwing admitted, meeting my eyes steadily. "We actually have a lead on H.I.V.E."
That's when we made our way to the League meeting room. The door hissed open, and I stepped inside to find the room packed nearly to capacity, more heroes gathered in one place than I'd seen since the briefing about Nolan's history.
Batman. Black Canary. Cyborg. Static. Superman. Superboy. Supergirl. Donna Troy. Bumblebee. Omen. Batgirl. Tim Drake. Wonder Woman. And off to the side, a group of women in Amazonian battle armor, their expressions hard and focused, hands resting near weapons they clearly knew how to use.
Nightwing gestured toward me. "I brought Superior. So we've got everyone."
Batman nodded once and tapped a holographic terminal embedded in the center of the table. The room's lights dimmed slightly as data began to project into the air, star-map precision giving way to something far more grim.
"I'm sure you all know why you're here. For the past few years, I've been tracking rumors of an underground metahuman trafficking ring. Mainly teens and children. Pit fights. Organ farms. Weapons testing. Slaves, of every kind imaginable."
The images that flickered across the display made my stomach turn, made the room go quiet in a way that had nothing to do with respect and everything to do with horror. Children in cages, their eyes hollow. Surgical tables stained with substances I didn't want to identify. Bodies too small to belong to anyone over the age of fifteen, catalogued like inventory.
"With the evidence Superior was able to pull from the black box recovered from the Amazo android," Batman continued, his eyes flicking briefly to me, "we've confirmed that the prestigious boarding school known as H.I.V.E. Academy is controlling the operation."
The image shifted to show a sprawling, immaculate campus nestled into a mountainside, all white stone and glass, gothic architecture blended seamlessly with cutting-edge design, the kind of place that looked more like a five-star resort than a school.
"To the public," Batman said, "it's where you send your children. Regardless of whether you're a politician, a king, a queen, or any other nobility. Even the children of Fortune 500 executives. They educate students from age five to eighteen, and anyone who graduates from the academy is considered elite of the elite. They're trained to be leaders. Shepherds of humanity."
Wonder Woman crossed her arms, her expression skeptical, brow furrowing. "We know this, Batman. Themyscira has sent several of our own women there for education, instruction in man's world. They even have metahuman students, if I'm not mistaken."
"You're right," Batman said. "But they also run a scholarship program. They accept roughly five hundred of the brightest children and teens in the world, no matter their background."
I felt it click into place before he even finished, the shape of it forming with sickening clarity.
"Let me guess," I said, my voice cutting through the tension in the room. "At least half of them disappear during their time at the school. Reported as runaways. And since most of them are orphans or came from the streets, nobody's really looking into it."
Batman's expression didn't change. "Correct."
He brought up a new image, a woman, older, mature, with striking gray hair and fair, flawless skin. She had the kind of beauty that felt sharpened rather than soft, dangerous in a way that had nothing to do with muscle or claws, the kind of presence that made you want to trust her even as instinct screamed otherwise. She wore a crisp white dress shirt beneath a gray coat, paired with a black pencil skirt, every detail precise, and controlled.
Batman played the recording.
"Hello. I am Headmistress Good," the woman said, her voice smooth, cultured, warm in exactly the way that made you trust her instantly, the kind of voice that belonged on a fundraising gala stage. "I oversee the special education of the world's most elite students, and teach them all forms of technical and practical education."
The footage cut to classrooms full of attentive children, gymnasts flipping through the air with practiced precision, debate teams arguing passionately over polished podiums, martial arts demonstrations executed with textbook form, leadership seminars where uniformed students took careful notes.
"We prepare the next generation of leaders," Headmistress Good continued, her tone almost maternal, warm enough to make my skin crawl now that I knew what was underneath it, "for the challenges the world will place before them."
I sat there watching, and despite everything, despite knowing this was a front for something monstrous, I couldn't help the thought that crossed my mind: This is a more polished version of what the Teen Titans show ever did. Especially considering this is supposed to be a supervillain academy for teens. Damn, this was good branding. Whoever built this had studied every trust-building technique in the book and weaponized it.
The footage shifted again, showing students in training gear, and I recognized three of them immediately. Different clothing than before, cleaner, more official, but the same faces.
Goliath. Gizmo. Jinx.
"Those are the guys from the convoy attack," Conner said, his eyes narrowing, leaning forward slightly like he wanted to reach through the hologram itself.
One of the Amazonian warriors stepped forward. She had a striking Hispanic accent, long black hair, and sun-kissed olive skin, her beauty matched only by the sharp intensity in her expression, the kind of look that suggested she'd rather be doing something with her hands right now than standing in a briefing room.
"So we know where the enemy is," she said, her voice tight with barely restrained urgency. "Let us attack them, then."
"That won't work," I said, and every eye in the room turned to me. "Unless we know exactly who's connected to this, politicians, board members, anyone with influence over the school, they'll scatter the moment we make a move. Like insects. We'd be starting from zero all over again. We need to infiltrate. Either the school itself or the underground ring."
I glanced back at the frozen image of Headmistress Good, and something about her tugged uncomfortably at the back of my mind. Familiar, in a way I couldn't place, like a word on the tip of my tongue that refused to surface.
Wonder Woman spoke up before the Amazon warrior could argue further, her voice carrying the weight of command earned through centuries of leadership.
"Superior is right," she said. "Charging headfirst into a school full of children, most of whom are likely innocent, and could easily be used as meat shields, and hostages will only turn the world against us." Her gaze softened as she looked at the Amazon woman, something sisterly passing between them. "I know you want your sisters back. But we need to be careful, or we might lose them forever. We will not drag our feet, sisters. I promise you that."
The Amazon's shoulders relaxed slightly, though the fire in her eyes didn't fully dim, banked rather than extinguished.
I turned to Batman. "So what's the plan?"
Batman's eyes met mine. "I don't need Superior for this operation," he said. "I need Caius Dawn."
I raised an eyebrow.
H.I.V.E. Academy- The Swiss Alps (Near Geneva)
The academy sat carved into the mountainside like it had grown there naturally, all white stone spires and glass atriums catching the thin alpine light, the peaks around it dusted in permanent snow that never seemed to touch the campus itself, as though the buildings generated their own private climate of comfort and safety.
Inside, the halls were warm, polished, and immaculate, marble floors gleaming beneath rows of crystal light fixtures, the kind of architecture designed to make wealthy parents feel like they were dropping their children off at a palace rather than a school. Portraits of past graduates lined the walls, young faces frozen in earnest, aspirational poses, gold nameplates beneath each one listing accomplishments that read like résumés for future world leaders.
Students moved through the corridors in their uniforms, crisp navy blazers with silver trim, the H.I.V.E. crest embroidered over the heart, a stylized gold hexagon like a bee hive, heading to their classes. Their posture were too straight, and their conversations were too measured, the whole atmosphere carrying an undercurrent of watchfulness that most of them probably didn't even register anymore, having grown up inside it.
Teachers watched from doorways, expressions pleasant but eyes sharp, tracking. Security cameras, disguised as ornamental sconces along the walls, tracked movement through every hallway, their lenses hidden inside decorative brass fixtures that looked, to the untrained eye, like nothing more than architectural flourish.
Two students moved against the flow of foot traffic, ducking into a quieter side corridor near the west wing, away from the main thoroughfare where a teacher's aide stood monitoring the flow of students between periods. A boy and a girl, both preteens, both with jet-black hair and medium radiant brown skin. The girl's hair was cut short, stopping just at her ears, sharp and practical, the kind of haircut that wouldn't get in the way during a fight. The boy's was was a slight fade, though he kept brushing it back with an absent, irritated gesture.
They kept their voices low, barely above a whisper, practiced at speaking without moving their lips too obviously.
"I haven't found the entrance to the lower levels," the girl said, glancing over her shoulder toward the end of the corridor, checking for the telltale glint of a hidden camera lens. "Where the meta teens apparently train."
The boy's expression was tight with frustration, his jaw set in a way that made him look older than he was. "I got a dead end on my side too. No one's said they've heard of the girl I was talking about. I asked three different students. They all just looked at me like I was speaking another language."
"Is it possible she's not here?"
"No. I heard Grandfather and Mother saying she's here. We have to find her. They wouldn't have sent us if they weren't certain."
The girl straightened, smoothing down the front of her skirt with a decisive motion. "Then let's keep looking." She paused, glancing down the corridor toward a set of heavy oak doors that led toward the administrative wing, doors flanked by two more of those disguised cameras. "Let's meet up at the usual spot. And do your best to avoid the teachers. Especially Headmistress Good."
The boy nodded, his expression darkening further, something wary crossing his young face. "Be careful. I heard Headmaster Blud has returned to the school."
The girl's jaw tightened. "Well, it's a good thing we used our father's name. Not that he even knows we exist."
"Don't worry, Athanasia. Once we find her, we can leave this school. And I'm sure Mother will finally make our father aware of us."
Athanasia's lips curled into something that wasn't quite a smile. "Right. As long as we get to burn this hellhole, supposedly under this school, to the ground."
"Of course," the boy said, his tone flat, certain, without a trace of hesitation. "And I will put my blade through the headmaster and headmistress's hearts myself."