Risk It All: House Odds (ch. 32) (Patreon)

Beach days made a lot more sense to me in hindsight as we made our way back into the mountain after a long day outdoors. I never really got how splashing at each other in the water for hours on end could be entertaining, but it somehow was. It wasn't about playing in the water so much as it was just hanging out.

The day out smoothed over some of the issues between the team. Not because we addressed them, but because we didn't. The drama and friction between the two halves of the team were bridged over with sand castle building competitions, or volleyball, or small talk as we soaked up some rays. Because of all the bonding, things just kinda clicked into place. I wouldn't say that we were all the best friends that there ever were, but things felt… a step above the hard okay that the team had started the day off with.

Even Conner was smiling as he and Megan spoke more freely and easily. Didn't think they were dating yet, but whenever Zatanna and Megan grouped up, there was a lot of giggling. About what, only they knew, because they communicated telepathically. Overall, I think the day was a pretty solid success. And I was looking forward to crashing at home and spending the number of free roles I had built up for new skills and abilities. And to sleep away my sunburn.

The only ones that weren't a little toasty were Megan and Conner for obvious reasons.

However, those hopes came to an abrupt end when I saw Batman standing in the center of the cave. "The Team has a mission," he informed us, his voice a low growl. He seemed faintly displeased by something, but it thankfully wasn't directed at me. The response to his declaration was sluggish at first, but everyone quickly snapped to attention once the words registered.

"Are we all allowed to go?" Zatanna questioned, crossing her arms and cocking her hip to one side, telling Batman exactly what she thought the correct answer to that question was. Batman offered her a small glance, seeming to think about it for the briefest of seconds, before settling on a curt nod.

"All are expected to partake in the mission. It's a matter of urgency," he informed, and that caught our attention. Urgent?

Since our last mission, we had just been doing mental simulations with the implication that we wouldn't get another real one until the Justice League felt like we had worked through our issues. An urgent mission implied things were fucked to the point that they were breaking that mandate.

I opened my mouth to question what the mission was, only for the Zeta Tube to come alive. "The Wall-Man is here-!" I heard Wally announce himself, blurring forward in what looked like a pair of swim trunks with a liberal amount of sunscreen on his face, only to trip on his loose sandals and send the various beach items flying from his hands -- an umbrella, snorkeling goggles, a bucket, and so on.

He rolled into a heap, a sigh escaping him as he came to a stop in front of us. Artemis started laughing while Robin offered him a smirk, "Smooth."

"Shuddup," Wally retorted, pushing himself up into a sitting position. "Did I miss all the fun?"

"I wouldn't say that. We have a mission," Kaldur informed, making Wally light up. He leapt to his feet, throwing his fists up into the air.

"Sweet! What's the mission?!" he asked, practically vibrating with excitement. It was then that Batman spoke up, making himself known to the celebrating teen, decidedly unamused.

"Settle down, and you'll find out," he said, before making a gesture that caused a hologram to appear. "Dr. Roquette is the leading engineer on nanite technology and is currently employed by Star Labs. However, she was recently kidnapped by the League of Shadows-"

Robin perked up with obvious excitement, while my stomach clenched. Every time I had encountered the League of Shadows they were either working with my family or working for them. "We're fighting the League of Shadows and going on a rescue op?"

"No," Batman informed us, uncaring that he seemed to take the sail from Robin and Wally's sails mid high five. "As of yesterday, Dr. Roquette was rescued before anyone at Star Labs realized that she had been held captive for several weeks. The mission is not a rescue operation. It's a search and destroy. Red Arrow will tell you more." And, as if summoned, the Zeta Tube came to life and an unfamiliar figure entered the Cave.

I don't think there was anyone on the planet that wouldn't recognize Speedy. He was Green Arrow's sidekick for about as long as Robin had been Batman's. As a Gothamite, I had been a Robin fan until I met him. But, Speedy was no less famous. Which is why it had been a shock to learn that he quite being Green Arrow's sidekick and wasn't part of the Team.

I watched him carefully, idly noting that he was tense. His hands were curled into fists, his jaw was clenched and his lips were pressed together in a thin line. He looked pissed, and his tone all but confirmed it when he quickly corrected the Zeta Tube when it incorrectly read his code name as Speedy.

"Red!" Wally greeted Red Arrow with a smile and a wave, earning a smirk from Red Arrow as he regarded Wally.

"Wearing enough sunscreen?" he asked, his gaze searching for something as he looked around the cave. Whatever it was, he didn't seem to find it because the anger bled out of his posture ever so slightly. "Hate to ruin your fun, but we have an emergency on our hands. The League of Shadows got their hands on some really nasty tech when they had Dr. Roquette working for them. It's called… the Fog."

With that suitably dramatic announcement, he detailed what he knew about the weapon. It was a nanite swarm that devoured anything in its path, but that was a secondary ability. It's main function was to consume data from servers or hard drives. A simple thing in reality, but the others quickly realized how dangerous it could be in the hands of a bunch of ruthless assassins.

Auctioning the info stolen from Star Labs, or Wayne Industries, or Lex Corp was the least harmful thing that they could do. Weaponizing the prototypes they discovered to serve their own ends seemed far more likely and certain to end in death and destruction. There wasn't any disagreement that the Fog had to be destroyed.

To that end, Dr. Roquette was developing a virus that would cause the Fog to destroy itself. The only issue being that it would mean that the League of Shadows would know where to find her the moment she went online.

"Are you all prepared?" Batman asked, earning nods all around. "Good. See to it that the Fog is destroyed."

…

Of all the places to stash a scientist on the run from an ancient league of ninjas, the very last place I would expect her to be would be in the computer lab of the Happy Harbor high school. Which, I guess was kinda the point. Still, felt like an odd pick, I thought as I stood guard.

Dr. Roquette was a woman in her thirties, light brown hair and green eyes. Pretty, but in the little interactionthat we've had, she seemed to have a rather prickly personality. I can't say I would be any different if I had been kidnapped and held captive for a couple of weeks. So, fair.

'So, we're bait?' Superboy questioned, crossing his arms with a deep frown on his face. The rest of the team was patrolling the grounds. Beifong was on the roof, using Seismic Sense to pick up any movement nearby. Artemis and Zatanna had joined him on overwatch duty while Aqualad, Robin, Kid Flash and Megan all patrolled the ground.

'Pretty much,' I agreed, talking to Superboy through a private mental connection. 'Need something to draw out the Fog so we can destroy it.'

I heard Superboy grunt, 'You think it's going to work out?' he asked me, earning a shrug as I leaned against a wall in the dark room that was only illuminated by a computer monitor.

'With our track record? No way,' I answered with a frown, reaching up to adjust my mask. There would definitely be a wrench thrown into the plan. 'But, at the very least, we can't let Dr. Roquette come to harm. She's been through enough as it is.'

Superboy grunted an affirmative while we stood guard as she typed away, broadcasting her presence to all those that knew how to find her. Just as we were preparing for the League of Shadows, I had to imagine that they were preparing for us. Because of that, it was hard to let my guard down even if we had a number of watchers -- with Beifong's Seismic Sense, Superboy's senses, and Zatanna's magic, we were pretty well covered. I couldn't see how the League could slip into this room without a fight. But, just because I couldn't see a way didn't mean that there wasn't one.

Frowning, I brought up the Market, tempted to spend some of my free rolls now, while I had the chance. Seemed like a poor time for it, but considering that if the battle started, I wouldn't get the chance to at all…

'I'm going to do my thing for a bit,' I warned Superboy, who just nodded. With that covered, I chose one of my free rolls and the game began. It was a relatively simple one, not too different from candy crush. I could place a bet on a couple of brackets for my total points to reach before a countdown of one minute was reached.

Taking a glance at my total prestige, I felt pretty generous with my bet. It had slowed as the day went on, but I was sitting at a grand total of four hundred thousand points. It was stupid, and I kinda hated it, but I couldn't argue with the results of objectifying myself.

However, while I was feeling generous with my Prestige, I knew better than to walk into that old gambling pitfall. When you had a bunch of money, it was tempting to make higher and higher bets. When you lost a hand, you still had so much so it didn't really matter and with a good win, you can make even more money. But, it was that attitude that made people keep betting until that huge pile of money was slowly drained away until it would take a dozen amazing hands to reach the point that you started.

The sense of winning was intoxicating. I couldn't let myself get drunk off of it, though. Not when those prestige points had far more value than a mere dollar bill.

So, I placed a comparatively modest bet of twenty thousand points on landing the top bracket of points. The game began a moment later, and I quickly realized that it was a wise decision because I underestimated just how inherently random candy crush was. There wasn't a trick to it. I was completely at the mercy of the algorithm and it wasn't great.

I swiped matching tokens, trying to build up a large payoff, but things never lined up well enough. It wasn't like I did poorly, still managing to get the second largest bracket but when I saw twenty thousand points vanish like smoke in the wind, my face twisted as if I had tasted something sour. You won some and you lost some, but that didn't mean I had to like losing.

Itoriyu: 180 Pound Phoenix

T3R1

A slashing attack that strikes with the force of a cannonball.

It was a pretty decent skill, but I found it hard to be happy about it considering I had, in practice, paid twenty thousand points for it. Still, it wasn't bad. Especially when I opened up the skill combiner, and I saw that it easily fit into Moon Breathing Style, granting me another attack that fit in with my signature breathing style.

A sigh escaped me as I crossed my arms, waiting-

My eyes widened when I felt a pang of urgency from Beifong and my reaction was instant. Simple Domain allowed for instant reaction time that I put to good use, placing myself between those outside the building and Dr. Roquette as I drew my longsword from where it was slung over my back. It was a beautiful weapon. The blade was long, three feet of metal that went beyond the durability of mere steel. The blade itself was narrow, with a twisted cross guard that acted as a simple bar. The grip was comfortable in my hand, and as I breathed deeply, crescent moons and the night sky trailed behind the blade.

No sooner than I started to swing my sword, the attack that I was expecting cut through the solid concrete walls, metal lockers, and tables with little effort -- a bright white crescent slash that I would recognize anywhere slammed into my blade, black and white sparks emerging as I stopped the attack cold. Dr. Roquette began to scream, panicked by the sudden assault.

'Leaving her to you,' I told Superboy as I took a step forward, strength flowing to my arms. I was ten times stronger than peak human at a base state. However, with Moon Breathing as high as it could go, I had vastly underestimated how powerful my muscles became. My lungs felt so vast that they could contain all the air in the world, and my body was unyielding before an attack that would have cut me in half effortlessly before.

With a swipe of my blade, I shattered the white slash of Qi, sending forward a wave of the night sky at Jin, who I knew stood outside the building. I wondered if she thought the attack would be enough to kill me. The night sky cut through the stone and metal with just as much ease as Jin's attack had managed, but I flicked my wrist, sending three more slashes at her that carved away the walls and hallways of the school. The hallways collapsed, unable to support their own weight as the walls holding the roof up were toppled.

I kinda just wrecked my school, but it opened up a direct pathway to Jin, which I seized instantly to flash step towards her. At the highest tier, there was no comparing it to all the other times I used the technique. It was near-instantaneous at this distance, letting me arrive just after my attacks, that I saw Jin countered with her own.

I slipped into the Black Heaven and Earth technique, letting my already incredible strength be enhanced further for when our blades clashed with thunderous force, the asphalt street buckling underneath Jin's feet. There was a crazed smile on her face as she pushed against me, pure euphoria in her eyes that was only abated when she saw my weapon.

"A longsword? Really? Don't you have any pride?" she asked me, and my lips thinned. Not just because of the insult, but because Jin was able to match me in strength. It seemed that I wasn't the only one that had received a power-up since we last fought.

"It's a present from Wonder Woman, so you can shut up," I responded, lashing out with a Focus Kick that slammed into the already buckled ground beneath her as Jin dodged. The moment my foot hit the ground, it seemed to collapse in a perfect circle around me, sinking the road a solid ten feet and claiming the sidewalk and a solitary tree that collapsed into the hole. Jin sailed through the air, flipping back so she landed on the trunk of the tree as it crashed to the ground.

As she did so, I saw two wolves begin to step over the trunk. A black and a white one, but even with a passing glance, it was clear that they weren't normal wolves. Both were the size of a large horse, with thick and burly bodies covered in fur. In some places, their skin tore, revealing the iron-band like muscle beneath.

"Like them?" Jin questioned, reaching out with a hand and petting one. "I'll admit, I always kinda looked down on science. Seemed like it was one of those things that people were just up their own asses about. But, I can't argue with results."

I flash stepped back to the other side of the crater I made, making Jin's eyes widen at my increased speed. She wasn't displeased in the slightest. "You're the one that gave Killer Croc the Venom-Buster formula?" I asked her, seeing that the wolves and Killer Croc had a lot more in common than just a growth spurt. Their claws dug into the broken asphalt and concrete like it was play dough.

"Naturally. Did you like my present?" she asked, sounding as innocent as if the present in question had been a box of chocolates instead of a man-eating reptilian man that could punch out Superboy. "Felt like such a shame to keep the rewards all to myself."

"It's the thought that counts," I responded, sinking deeper into the Black Heaven and Earth technique. This was pretty bad. Honestly, this was about as bad as it could get. Way back when we first found that formula, I had a terrifying thought of what would happen if people could just make an army of Superboys. They could take over the world. Superman was tough, but could he win against thousands of Superboys? Maybe, but the rest of the world would lose.

However, now I realized that the only worse thing than that bad end of a future was my family getting their hands on the formula. Because, in all honesty, Jin reaching a point that she could punch mountains away was a rather terrifying thought.

"That doesn't excuse you turning my gift in to the police. I had that all set up just for you, and you didn't even kill Croc," Jin tsked and shook her head disapprovingly as if I had insulted her with my thoughtlessness. "I was going to kick your ass for that. Drive home what our family has to do for power… but here you are…" she mused, a very slow and deliberate smile tugging at her lips, pulling them back until her smile was all teeth. "I wonder, how is it that you're so strong? Do you have a secret that you'd like to share?"

"With you? Absolutely not," I returned, not liking how she picked up on that even if it was very obvious. As I spoke, I directed a thought to the others. 'My cousin is here and she brought friends. Top priority hasn't changed.'

'On it,' Robin replied. Dr. Roquette was the top priority. Both her safety and her work to track and destroy the Fog.

I heard a shout deep within the school, but it sounded like Superboy. He was fine, I suspected, and was proven correct when one of the walls of the school burst out, revealing the body of… a jacked up werewolf. Alright. I guess that's a thing. But, it looked like Superboy had the situation well in hand.

'Dr. Roquette is still working on the virus. We need to give her the time,' Aqualad informed and I narrowed my eyes at Jin, who just wouldn't stop smiling like a cat that had just caught the canary. 'She says it won't take long.'

'Good,' I answered, bracing myself as I felt Beifong's thoughts. He chose to stay with Dr. Roquette, which was the best place for him.

Raising my blade high, the night sky trailed behind it as I prepared a technique -- the one that I had just gained. In that same moment, Jin responded, her two wolves leaping forward at me. Shifting my target, I swung my blade at the dark wolf and it was then that I realized what the name of the technique meant.

A 180 pound cannon ball.

The night sky condensed into a ball that slammed into the wolf's chest, sending it flying back and crashing through a handful of trees. Jin looked vaguely alarmed when her beast flew back, only spared because of Thou Shall Not Kill. Still, it's ribs were busted, but they were all clean breaks it would recover from. Eventually.

At that same moment, I shifted into another technique, one given to me by my mastery of the Moon Breathing Style: Sixteenth form, Halfmoon. In response, the night sky condensed at the tip of my blade and when I brought it down, the crescent moon slammed down into the white wolf, driving it into the ground with thunderous force.

Flash stepping to Jin, I saw her blade shine with a brilliant white light, sending a wave of pure Qi at me. My blade shifted as I sailed through the air, over the crater, and assumed a drawing position -- the longsword was ill suited for a drawing technique, but it was workable. My sword darted out from its sheath, the blade slamming into the white Qi, and shattering it with little effort, letting me continue towards her. It had been a delaying tactic, I quickly saw, seeing Jin retreat back into the forest.

In response, I used the Ninth Form: Waning Moonswaths, sending a dozen attacks after her, the crescent moons effortlessly cutting through tree trunks and causing them to fall. Jin reacted in an instant, taking the path that I had left open for her, letting her approach. Our blades crashed against one another, sending a small ripple across the ground as they collided with more force than the impact of the falling trees.

Raising a fist, I used Tekken, attempting to flatten her nose, but she diverted the blow with a fist of her own, one of her legs coming up to kick me in the side of the head as our blades disengaged. I let the kick land, stealing it's momentum and barely feeling the attack as I spun sharply in the air. Jin seemed to realize her mistake quickly because, for the first time, I saw her go on the defensive by raising up her blade to block the attack that I brought crashing down upon her.

Our Qi ground against one another, sending out a flurry of black and white sparks as I tried to crush Jin under my blade while she attempted to ward me off.

'Zatanna is down!' I heard Megan inform in my head, and for the briefest of seconds, my attention faltered. Jin seized the chance, pushing me back and nearly skewering me with her shining white blade. As I retreated with a flash step, I was followed by a tight beam of piercing qi that nearly poked a hole through me, but I was able to block it with the flat of my blade.

'Do you need help?' I asked, gripping my longsword with white knuckles as I landed on the trunk of a fallen tree in the park. Zatanna was down? Who else was here? Jin, her wolves, that werewolf guy? Who else?

'Lady Shiva got the drop on her, but she's alive,' Robin was quick to reassure.

How the fuck did anyone get the drop on anyone? Did Seismic Sense somehow not work on ninjas? I got a puzzled response from Beifong, telling me he was just as clueless.

"You really need to work on your multitasking," Jin remarked, striking an unfamiliar pose. That smirk ever-present on her lips. "I was really looking forward to showing off some lost arts, you know. Do you have any idea how many centuries it's been since anyone had close to enough power to do High Initiate techniques?"

A very long time, I knew. Near a millennia. Dad gave me some background info while we sparred. How he had walked among vast libraries of scrolls filled with ancient knowledge that was completely and utterly useless, because no one was at a level that any of it was applicable. Instead, for centuries, our family had been trying to make knock-off versions of the high level techniques. And, thus far, even that was firmly out of reach most of the time.

"It doesn't look like you took the Buster-Venom," I noted, not seeing the traditional signs of it. Jin looked as she ever did, even if she wouldn't stop smiling at me.

"Not in a traditional sense, no," Jin admitted with an uncaring shrug, her blade growing brighter with each passing second. "Our alchemy techniques, though, are about as perfect as you can get. I think it's the one thing that's better now than it was back in the day. It had to be since we couldn't afford to be wasteful with the little that we could find for Qi Cultivating pills."

That's what I thought, "You gave the animals the Buster-Venom, killed them, then refined it?" I questioned, wanting to be certain.

"Exactly so," Jin answered. "The time of waiting for Spirit Beasts is over. Now, we'll just make them. As many as we want. Still missing some herbs and roots, but I'm sure that Father will think of something to replace them with too." She chuckled, "I used to think I was cursed for being born in this era. Everyone always told me how far I would have gone in the days of old. Now, I get to see if those words have any merit."

There was a delirious excitement that grew in her tone as she spoke. Something that was as innocent and pure as a child getting told they could go batshit fucking crazy in a candy, toy, and videogame store with an unlimited budget. It was more than a little unnerving, especially when Jin all but confirmed my worst fear.

The age of cultivation had died more than a thousand years ago. Now, it was starting to enter a rebirth, and that scared the hell out of me.

Jin suddenly sprung into action, coming at me in a blur that I could barely perceive even with my enhanced stats. Something that I could only compare to Kid Flash. I heard a crack of thunder as the sound barrier shattered, Jin instantly closing the distance between us. I pulled out all the stops as I went to meet her, a swirling vortex emerging at the tip of her sword.

Instead of blocking, I went on the offensive. I had a similar technique of my own -- the night sky coiled around my long sword, becoming an uncontrollable torrent as I flash stepped towards her, going as fast as I could. The tips of our blades crashed against one another but failed to pass by each other because of the torrents of white and black Qi uncoiling to slam into one another. It made a horrid sound, like two grinders grinding away at each other. The surface of the torrents expanded, trying to overwhelm the other.

Deep chunks of Earth were carved away from the ground around us, sending dirt, stone, and grass flying as we struggled to overcome one another. Gritting my teeth, I pressed forward, finding that I had the edge in raw physical power, but Jin still somehow held me at bay. I couldn't deny that her technique was far more refined than mine. It shaved away at my Qi, blunting my moons and chipping away at the night sky with its pure light. But, the tip of the technique was the place of importance.

And, much like a stick snapping when the pressure grew too much, I sheared through. Her blade warped, letting mine pass through and it tore through Jin just below the diaphragm. My crossguard slammed into her ribs as the technique faded, my blade stained red as I mercilessly swept her legs out from underneath her and pinned her to the ground.

"That's not fair," Jin complained, not at all bothered by the sword skewered through her. "I had a whole thing going, and you totally ruined it. God, you're such a killjoy. Will you heroes only be satisfied when you've sucked up every last drop of fun in the world?"

"Do you always complain this much when you lose?" I asked, making Jin roll her eyes.

"Don't know. I don't usually lose. Plus, you complained way more when I stabbed you," she pointed out. Still, she wore a faint smile. It might have been pretty if, if it wasn't so derisive. And, for some reason, it grew a fraction as I looked down at her.

"What?" I asked her as Jin began to chuckle to herself, finding something incredibly amusing. Something tugged at my attention, a stray thought that went ignored because of the fight. Something that she had said. Something that should by all rights scare the hell out of me, but I hadn't given it a second thought.

As many spirit Beasts as they wanted.

"Jin… what are you planning?" I asked her, a slow horror rising up from deep in my gut.

"Heroes sure have it rough," Jin remarked. "You just have so many enemies. I mean, there's like a dozen villains like me for every do-gooder. You do what you can, but without the initiative, you're stuck in an endless loop of waiting and responding to our plans. Because of that, it's so damn easy to pin you lot down with something that doesn't matter at all while the real plan is underway somewhere else entirely."

They didn't care about the Fog, I realized. They had kidnapped Dr. Roquette, made her build a weapon, and it didn't mean a damn thing to the League of Shadows. Their aim was something else entirely. And way deep down, I knew exactly what it was.

"You can't be serious. Jin, what did you do?" I demand, grabbing her by her jacket and pulling her closer, that damn grin still on her face.

"Me? Nothing. Our family, on the other hand…" she trailed off, and brushing against my hand, I felt some kind of moisture. I might have thought it was rain, but the color was off. And all day, there hadn't been a single cloud in the sky. Holding out my hand, another drop landed on my palm and I saw the color of the drop. It had a faint blue hue.

It was then that I heard it. All around me.

As every animal in the city exposed to the man-made rain of Buster-Venom began to transform into a monstrous beast.

...

Small mistake last chapter -- Ren had two hundred thousand points, not two million.

Also, I fully thought I would be writing more drama with Roy being a dickhead, but I realized it didn't line up. Artemis has already been introduced, so there was no reason for Green Arrow to be there. And because Artemis was already on the team, Wally wouldn't be set against her because she roasted him within seconds of meeting him.