Lost Youth by: Archer83 and Vergil1989 The Crossover King

Summary: When a mission on a Star Lab research base goes horribly wrong, the Young Justice team is separated, presumed dead, but the truth is far more complicated than anyone could ever guess as certain team members find themselves in an entirely new version of reality. (AU, rated T for now.)

Disclaimer: Archer 83; Young Justice and Mass Effect do not belong to us. But we really really wish they did...

Vergil1989; Just our messed up imaginations unfortunately are the only thing that is ours and you can't sue us for those. :P Wouldn't get anything for those anyway lol.

Authors' Notes: This story is obviously going to be heavily AU in nature, especially for the first chapter which is focused on Young Justice. I honestly can't tell you exactly how we came up with this idea, it just more or less came out of a conversation Vergil and I were having one night. Since no one had ever attempted this idea before, (On FF at least) we thought we'd take it as a writing challenge and give it a try ! Hopefully the result will we an interesting and highly enjoyable story for all our readers! Now, Vergil and I proudly present to you our latest literary insanity!

Story Key:

"Dialogue"

"Mental Dialogue"

Thoughts

'Radio communications/comms devices/etc'

Chapter 1: Sacrifices

Washington D.C., S.T.A.R. Labs research base.

September 29th, 18:00 EST (2011)

"Gotta say doc, this isn't very whelming at all... Where's all the cool stuff, like the light sabers and phasers?!" Wally West, more commonly known as Kid Flash, said with obvious disappointment in his voice to Dr. Wesker as he guided their group around the secret S.T.A.R. Labs facility. A grinning Wally was stunned by a quick slap to the back of his head moments later from Artemis. "Ouch! what the heck was that for?!"

"Hey Wally, why don't you just do us a favor and shut up for five minutes?" Artemis asked, although no one but the team knew she had said anything. The mental link that everyone's favorite martian had established for the team before walking in the front door as guests would make things a lot simpler. Unless they came up against Simon or someone with powers like his anyway, chances were good they wouldn't. Luckily this was a simple investigative mission since it seemed someone was stealing technology and hazardous materials out of the labs. For what purpose no one knew, but that's what the Justice League wanted answers to since they were busy with yet another insane plot to conquer the world in, of all places, Australia, the 'sidekicks' had been called in.

Miss Martian had to suppress a chuckle at the thought Robin had inadvertently sent out to everyone since it wasn't the same 'stuff', different day for her per say. Nothing the rest of them usually took for granted had failed to amaze or confuse the curious young alien girl. "Be nice to Kid Flash, he's just easily excited. Being able to visit STAR Labs without having to blast our way through is a nice change of pace."

"I would have liked the 'blast our way through' option better." Super Boy thought, and some of the team wholeheartedly agreed with him since they were bored to tears already. Still, he wasn't about to start a fight just for that reason, not yet anyway. They had a job to do, and he knew better than anyone that rushing in half blind could only lead to disaster. It didn't change the fact that he felt better in a fight however, just that he was willing to play detective as long as it didn't take too long. The brains in their group were already splitting up, looking for anything that would lead them to where the thieves were hiding or at least what they were planning if nothing else.

"We should focus on the task at hand and not on childish banter. Super Boy, Kid Flash, Zatanna and Aqua Lad will go with Dr. Wesker and see if you can figure out anything by going over what's been stolen already. Artemis, Miss Martian, you're with me; I want to interview the lab techs for a while, but I'd rather not go in alone since for all we know this was an inside job." Robin 'thought' spoke in reply, not needing to explain that for all they knew they were walking into a trap already. Batman's paranoia was starting to rub off on Robin, but it had saved their lives more than once already so they weren't about to question his decision as they split up.

"Nice to see you picked the best people for the job boss. Adios!" Kid Flash smirked as he zipped away, catching up with their tour guide while Robin wondered why he bothered at times. A reassuring hand on his shoulder however from Aqua Lad pushed those doubts aside as the Atlantean joined up with the group ahead a moment later.

"How he is still breathing is beyond me..." Artemis 'said' to her two remaining partners. That was a mystery to Robin as well, but it would have to wait until later since the job still needed to be done.

"Is there something wrong with the atmosphere in this building? We should warn them! Oh...that was a joke?" Miss Martian asked, after she realized the looks she was receiving from both Robin and Artemis screamed 'are you serious?!' at her. M'gann had yet to master the strange concept of humor that everyone, except Connor, seemed to understand instantly. She felt her cheeks turn a shade of red at the realization, but it disappeared almost as quickly.

"We should get going, preferably before KF decides he needs another souvenir. I don't want us to end up with a container of anti-matter on his trophy shelf." Artemis's 'comment' earned a small smile from everyone within M'gann's telepathic range, even Wally had to suppress a chuckle even though that had been directed at him. "Shut up Wally!" Artemis tried to come off as imposing, but it didn't work out so well since she rarely had anything nice to say about him.

"Anything to make you happy Short Fuse, so should I start now? Or maybe in ten minutes...or tomorrow? Whatever time is good for you!" The entire group mentally groaned at Wally's all too familiar antics.

"Please let me shoot him, just let me pin him to the ground. I promise I won't hit any vital organs...on purpose." Oddly enough, that thought seemed to do the trick as the speedster suddenly went quieter than a door knob.

It certainly put a smile back on Robin's face as they started their questioning. He quickly ruled out the chances of the thefts being an inside job by the time an hour passed and they hadn't turned up anything relevant to fit that suspicion of his, but they had come up with a few things at least. One of them seemed the most promising, but of course it also just had be to the most dangerous of the projects the scientists had been working on. Aqua Lad and the rest of the team returned with the head researcher a short time later, with a possible plan for some kind of black hole related device.

"Does this look like the black hole device that Vandall Savage used to alter time before we showed up, by chance?" Robin pointed out his suspicions to his less technical minded companions. "It looks like the scientists here were trying to build something similar for a faster than light ship drive...seriously? Have these people never seen Event Horizon? Black holes equal bad things happen. Wait a second..."

The archives they'd been given access to had listed every mission that the Justice League had ever been a part of, even the ones that had possible timeline repercussions and alternate realities thrown into the mix, just to complicate things further. One of them had had their least loved villain, Vandal Savage, making a black hole powered device that had allowed him to change the past and alter the future dramatically. If not for a Green Lantern's ring being in use at the time, the entire Justice League would have ceased to exist when the device was initially activated.

Having a rather bad idea come to mind, Robin had started to re-arrange and re-assemble the design specs on his suit's mini computer. Something didn't seem so simple this time and it wasn't until he came up with an entirely new schematic that he realized just how royally screwed they were.

"Do these people ever learn?! Black holes equal bad, bad, BAD, yet they still feel the insane need to tinker with them! Wait a second...is it just me or does that look like a timer to you guys?" Robin asked as he pointed to a certain part on the schematics they had been able to put together from the list of materials they'd been given. "Please tell me Batman's been rubbing off on me and say I'm being overly paranoid."

"You're not paranoid, today at least. Someone is planning to build a black hole bomb..." Zatanna wasn't anywhere near as tech savvy as some of the others, but even she knew what a timer looked like and the digital readout on display wasn't easy to miss once you recognized it for what it was. "Who would be insane enough to want to destroy the whole planet?!"

"Oh man we are so whelmed if that thing goes off!" Robin had summed up the situation rather succinctly since if that thing went off, Earth would be destroyed in a matter of minutes. They needed to find it, and fast. There was no way that this was just a case of simple tech parts going missing now, someone wanted the Earth gone, plain and simple. That kind of insanity needed to be stopped as quickly as possible.

"Have you found the location of this device Robin? Perhaps it is close by? After all, the parts and materials haven't been missing for more than a couple of days, and they were stolen in bulk." Aqua Lad said, hoping that the device was close, but for all they knew it was on the other side of the globe.

"Luckily some of the parts will give off a noticeable radiation signature that can be tracked. I'm trying to get a lock now. Oh crap...if my math is right, and it always is, the half life of these isotopes, when put together, only gives us a couple hours maximum. They've had the materials for too long as it is, so for all we know we're too late already." Robin only needed a few seconds to calibrate his suit's computer system to start tracing the materials used in the black hole bomb's construction. It didn't take him long after that to start following the trail the device's components gave off. Finding the bomb itself took a little longer since the device had been assembled in a warehouse a few blocks away from the lab.

A few minutes later, they had raced over to the location Robin provided them with, a nondescript looking storage building. "Well, the boring part is over with, at least I get to fight today." Connor grinned widely but one look from Robin stopped him from charging in. He scowled but didn't protest since he understood the need to plan ahead. Even so, a fight was looking likely, and it put Connor in a less brooding mood.

"Miss M, you sneak in and get us the lay of the land. I don't want any surprises. Super Boy, you'll be hitting the front along with Aqua Lad. Cause as much havoc and chaos as you can. Artemis, Zatanna, see if you can either contain them or disrupt their communications in any way. We have to be sure they don't detonate that bomb. KF and I will go in through the back and try to get to the bomb itself ASAP."

Miss Martian phased through the solid wall in front of them and then reappeared less than two minutes later with a concerned look on her face. "Judging from the outfits and the hardware they are packing, it is under heavy guard. Kobra guards... and I think I saw their leader. I'll try to locate the bomb." M'gann's reply wasn't what Robin wanted to hear at all as she phased back inside the warehouse a moment later. There would not be a second chance, especially with the Cult of Kobra running this show.

"That explains who we're up against, but why would Kobra be willing to destroy the entire world?!" Artemis thought as she comically, under most circumstances, waved her arms in the air towards the rest of the team.

"You're right Artemis...it doesn't make any sense! Why would they do something so suicidal?! ...Unless they have a way out..." That wouldn't surprise Robin in the least since they had the genius or the insanity to make a black hole bomb. It wouldn't take much to colonize a new world and shape it in their own image as they saw fit. "I'm going to try to do a scan for any zeta-beam or boom tube tech, but it might be something more traditional like a hidden spaceship for all we know. In the meantime, the plan remains the same."

A moment later, the six of them almost jumped as M'gann practically shouted in their minds. "I found it! The device is near the north western corner of the building in a sealed off area. It's a lot smaller than I imagined actually-"

"How many guards around the device? How well armed are they? Is the bomb itself armed and counting down? These are the things we need to know right now. Now M'gann!" Robin didn't like to yell at his friends but time was literally not on their side. The fate of the world hung on them and he wasn't about to go down without a fight.

"Fourteen guards directly around the device; they mostly have rifles, a couple have heavier weapons. It looks operational, ten minutes and forty two seconds left on the timer. There's zeta beam platforms in the back of the warehouse; that's their way out." At least they had a little breathing room, but that didn't leave them any time to call in reinforcements from the League or any of their allies. It seemed the fate of the world once again rested on their shoulders alone. "I'm going to try and get a closer look at the device."

"Alright Miss M, recon only. Just be careful in there." Robin's scan of the area had confirmed her recon on that point, but he still didn't like their odds. Even so, they weren't going to stand by and let Kobra get away with this if they could help it as Robin stood and looked towards the warehouse. New determination was clear in his voice as he gave the order. "Let's hope they don't activate the bomb ahead of schedule. Move in, everyone move in now!"

Robin kicked in the rear entrance as Kid Flash raced ahead of him to disable as many guards as possible between their tech expert and the bomb. Super Boy and Aqua Lad had already started raising Hell in the front of the building, drawing off many of the other enemies guarding the rest of the place. Explosions could be heard as the two heavy hitters tore into the enemy ranks with all they had. The rest of the team did their best to ignore the sounds outside since any hesitation now could cost them everything. Artemis and Zatanna had quietly made it to the group's small comms center with the distractions provided by the rest of the team.

During all of this, M'gann had decided, perhaps foolishly on her part she had to admit to herself, to attempt to disarm the bomb alone. She just had to sneak past fourteen heavily armed men first...and their leader...who was now looking right at her as if she was visible. M'gann rarely knew true fear as she did then, but she almost breathed a sigh of great relief when the masked man looked away from her and walked away from the bomb without a word. "You can do this M'gann..."

"Wait...what? M'gann, what are you doing?! Stick to the plan!" No one missed the fear in Connor's 'voice'. Even as he slammed an armored truck through part of the warehouse's right wall, scattering a small group of Kobra guards, he was still able to worry about the martian who he had grown the closest to out of the entire group."M'gann, don't you dare do anything stupid!"

"Someone has to try to defuse it, and I'm the closest one here. I'm not throwing away this chance since it might be the only one we get, and you know it." M'gann steeled herself and sighed in relief as the closest guards walked away from the device's main console to aid the others. None of the team protested against her idea, but she knew without having to hear their thoughts that they wished there was another way, or at the least that they were closer so they could help her.

"Here goes nothing..." The martian ceased phasing directly in front of the console and started looking for any way to shut the device off, preferably without it detonating. After a few nerve racking seconds, she figured out how to disarm the bomb, but she lacked the tools. Lucky for her, there was an entire work bench of tools nearby, but she never got close as the Kobra Leader seemed to appear out of nowhere and got the drop on her. All she saw before her world went black was a saber flashing in front of her eyes.

"M'gann? M'gann?! Talk to me damn it!" The worry was palpable in Connor's voice as he lost contact with her, as well as the rest of the team for a moment before using his encrypted comms.

The moment M'gann had gone down, the telepathic field she had set up connecting the team had followed suit. No one knew if the martian was alive or dead. The rest of the team had already switched to regular communication methods, but the potential loss was still felt by them all even as the battle became fully pitched. Artemis and Zatanna, even as they short circuited the communications tower in their respective ways, had been forced to engage the Kobra guards with arrows and magic by that point.

The floor opened up underneath three of the soldiers and dropped them to the bottom of the building as their resident 'wizard' finished her latest spell. Looking into the hole only for a moment, Artemis had to pull Zatanna back as a rocket propelled grenade took out the floor where she had just been standing. "Thanks!"

"Don't mention it!" Artemis said in return, growling in the back of her throat as she fired back. Several shouts were heard before her own explosive arrow detonated among the group that had just tried to take them out a moment ago.

"Pardon me, coming through! Hey watch it lug nuts!" Kid Flash could be heard as he zipped about the warehouse. He was running past several shelves and dodging weapons fire until he caught a flash of green out of the corner of his eye. He had to literally skid to a stop and run back only to see a bleeding M'gann sprawled out on the ground, the Kobra Leader standing over her. Hopefully he hadn't seen him as Kid Flash did his best to appear as small as possible before relaying the information to his team. "I found our daring martian, Kobra has her! She's hurt but I think she's still alive."

"He probably knows you're there, but try to keep out of sight and stay close anyway KF. We're on our way; don't interfere unless you absolutely have to!" It'd take the whole team to take on Kobra himself, or at the very least, half the Justice League.

"I'll try to keep on eye on M'gann while you guys slowly get here...oh and don't forget about the minor problem of a ticking doomsday bomb while you're at it." The loud screams and crashing sounds from Super Boy's comm assured Wally that he'd definitely heard him. I am not getting in Connor's way anytime soon.

Knowing their friend was badly hurt, or worse, the rest of the team followed his example and made a mad dash for the device. No guard foolish enough to try and stop them was still breathing as they cut through them, sometimes literally. There was no time to bother playing nice now, they could regret their actions later, if there was a later at all. Robin was the next to reach the room, followed seconds later by Super Boy and the others not long after him.

"This is it...straight dash to the device. I'm going for the console, the rest of you have to take out their leader, any way you can." None of them needed Robin to spell it out any clearer than that, given what was at stake.

"I know you can hear me out there, foolishly scuttling about like roaches. How many times must we go through the same dance before you realize you cannot fight a living god?" Robin's teeth were clenched at Kobra's words as he had since ascended to the higher reaches of the warehouse, Batman's protege having a pretty good view of what was below him. Kobra holding a still unconscious M'gann at the point of his saber didn't bode well at all. The fact the man's little speech was delivered with that cold, impassive voice of his only made it worse since a part of Robin wondered if there really was a point sometimes. No, he had to push on, if not for the world, then for M'gann at least.

"Keep talking Kobra! We've broken through your defenses, what's to stop us from taking you down?!" Robin waved to the rest to get ready as he head up a three count with his fingers. "You seriously think we're going to let a freak like you destroy this planet? Seriously?" His fingers flicked down to two. "You're just an insane momma's boy who has to hide behind an injured girl to feel safe!" He knew it wouldn't work, but it made Robin feel better to taunt the insane 'living god' if nothing else.

"And so we come to the part where we trade verbal barbs, but I do not have time for such childish gam-"

"Rush him!" Robin shouted as he leaped from the rafters, his lead foot already aimed for Kobra's head.

Even the 'living god' had to move a little from his standing position, lowering his saber to duck below the attack from the young leader. Just in time for Super Boy to tackle the megalomaniac away from M'gann who only then started to stir. Throwing him into the air, Kobra found himself eye to eye with one of Artemis's arrows, but Kobra swept it aside with his blade in one swift motion before he managed to grab hold of the rafters above. Swinging himself around so he was on his feet again, he had to give the young team credit for managing to make him work for his victory. He twisted about as several metal shards, manipulated by their magic user, almost impaled him in the back. Instead, he grabbed one out of the air and tossed it back with a flick of his hand, but Aqua Lad was there to take the hit on his shield. "It's over Kobra. You're finished!"

"Quite right, you are." Cutting the support beams on either side of him, Kobra, rode the debris back down to the ground, but before it hit, he had nimbly jumped off of the piece of falling metal and landed several feet away only to be sideswiped by Kid Flash. "Impressive." Zatanna and Aqua Lad had fallen hard, but they were still in the fight while the rest of the team continued the battle. Suddenly, Kobra screamed in pain as the tip of an arrow appeared, dripping with blood, through his right shoulder as he dropped his saber. That was more than enough of a distraction for Super Boy to pick up the man's sword and ram it through the mad man's chest.

"No one touches M'gann like that and lives!" Connor growled as he gave the sword a vicious twist to the right, finishing the job he had started. "Looks like you get to figure that out the hard way." A disgusted Connor spat on the fallen man then threw away the sword and ran over to check on a now conscious M'gann. "Hey, are you alright?"

"I...am fine, my head hurts but...I'm fine." She replied quietly, dizzily and her head was throbbing, but otherwise she was alright. Wincing as she put a hand to where Kobra had struck her, her fingers came away slick with her blood, but as far as she could tell she only had a minor concussion. She was lucky and she knew it. "Did we...win?"

"Not quite, but I have an idea. We don't have the time to disarm the bomb, but since Kobra has zeta beam tech set up already, we send it off to wherever they were going." Robin quickly headed towards the platforms while the others, mainly Connor, lifted the device and started carrying it towards him. While Robin went for the main zeta beam controls, Connor put the bomb on the closest platform. "Alright... judging by this info it looks like the destination is an uninhabited jungle planet, meaning other than the local wildlife and Kobra goons already planetside, there should be no casualties from this."

"Wait! We're going to destroy an entire planet?!" M'gann looked horrified at Robin's callous decision.

"It's either we destroy them or they destroy us, and I don't have time to reset this machine! If there's another way, I'd love to hear it!" Robin shouted back, hating having to make the decision at all, but something had to be done! The platform was primed to send its cargo, it just needed one more command to activate.

"There isn't." Aqua Lad stepped forward and punched the button as Robin hesitated. It wasn't until the zeta-beam hit the bomb that the plan truly went belly up. Apparently mixing zeta-beam tech and black hole bombs together wasn't the best idea. "Um...I do not claim to be a tech expert, but is it supposed to be doing that?"

"If you mean that is it supposed to be overloading and blowing up in the next five seconds... not really. And if you mean if it's supposed to be looking like a mini nuclear reaction taking place in slow motion, then definitely not." It was only a matter of a single spark which was quickly building up as the unstable molecules in the air started to split apart right in front of their eyes. It would have been beautiful if it wasn't so potentially deadly.

"Wally! Take M'gann and go!" Connor shouted at the speedster in desperation.

"No! I'm not going anywhere..." Connor felt tears in his eyes as M'gann pressed herself to his chest and wrapped her arms around him.

"Wally please..." Artemis started pleading, but one look at him told her he wasn't leaving them, leaving her. Hell would freeze over first and the look in his eyes told the archer as much. "Thank you, Wally." There was nothing else that needed to be said as she surprised him and pressed her lips to his. Wally was more than a little stunned as a goofy grin spread across his face when they came up for air a few seconds later.

"It was nice knowing you guys." Zatanna said next, only cementing the fact that they were in this together, even to the bitter end. She had seen and experienced so much since joining the team, far more than she would have ever done otherwise. They were family, or as close to one as a group like theirs could get.

"You always doubted yourself as a leader Robin, but no one else could have done what you did today. Batman would be proud. It has been an honor knowing all of you. " Aqua Lad's grim smile was all the reassurance the young man needed that he had made the right call as they faced the swirling energy disturbance together, as a team, as a family.

"Thank you, thank you everyone. A guy couldn't have asked for better friends." Maybe not the famous last words that he had always wanted to say, but Robin still felt pretty good about how things had gone up until that moment. Together they had stood, shoulder to shoulder against everything that had ever been put into their paths, and together they had prevailed time and time again. This might have been the end for them, but they weren't about to separate, even as the chain reaction that had been inevitable began, and they were consumed by light...

One Week Later.

The zeta-beam and black hole bomb interaction had not been nearly enough to destroy the Earth, the transport device having contained nearly all of the energy released by the bomb. The rest had been sent to Kobra's new home and that planet hadn't been so fortunate, but no one really cared. Only a few city blocks, which had been mostly populated by empty warehouses and a small park, were utterly destroyed. Still, dozens had been killed, plus seven more. When word got out that the team had been killed in action after an extensive sweep of the blast site the public was hit hard, and that was saying nothing of those that had trained them. The Justice League was hit the hardest since most of the kids were like sons and daughters to them and, in a few cases, the ties were blood thick.

One week after the event, when investigators were still rummaging through the debris of the blast, the world finally realized exactly what it had been spared because of their sacrifice. Not long after, a memorial service was held for all those who lost their lives. Even grieving parents, brothers, sisters, sons and daughters were not greatly bothered by the fact that seven of the lost in particular were on most people's minds.

"Every man, woman, and child on planet Earth still exists today because a small team of sidekicks stumbled onto the most dangerous attempt at genocide in human history. Today, we pay homage to these seven brave souls that gave their lives to protect ours. Now, I believe Batman has a few words." The most reclusive member of the Justice League had taken center stage, standing in front of the nearby blast site. As she moved to sit back down, Lois Lane wasn't the only one wondering what was going to happen next. It was no secret by then that one of the lost was Bruce's adopted son. He had allowed Clark to share the truth with her some time ago, and he was glad he had. It seemed something clicked into place for the reporter as their eyes met for a fleeting moment.

"Hello...I'll try to keep this short. I know a lot of you wish to speak as well. The League has been deeply saddened by the loss of our youngest members, while at the same time we could not be prouder of their actions. It is my honor to announce that Miss Martian, Aqua Lad, Kid Flash, Artemis, Zatanna, Super Boy, and Rob-" The man seemed to hesitate when he reached the final name on his list, but looking to the rest of the League, Batman seemed to find some well of strength he didn't know he possessed even as tears started to roll out from under his cowl. Ripping off the head piece, he continued in front of the stunned audience. "And Robin my adopted...my son Dick Grayson are posthumously awarded full membership in the League. No more lies; Dick is not going to be remembered as a faceless hero just so I can hide behind this mask."

Bruce threw his cowl to the ground in disgust. "He saved... they saved this entire planet in mere minutes when all of us..." He motioned towards the assembled Leaguers behind him on the stage. "...were unable to save you or them. We were busy fighting off rebels, rebels! And seven young teenagers were up against insane fanatics who had been trying to end everything!" Bruce looked down at the podium before him. "I need to do better...we need to do better. For them. And not just for them, for everyone that comes after thanks to them. To do anything less is to dishonor what we fight for everyday, so that all of you can enjoy peace and ignorant bliss. But worse than that, it dishonors Zatanna Zatara, Wally West, Artemis Lian Crock, Kaldur'ahm, Connor Kent, M'gann M'orzz, and Dick Grayson."

As he walked off the stage in complete silence, Bruce hoped that those affected by his outburst wouldn't hate him for doing this before he felt the strength leave his legs and he collapsed to the ground. While most of the League had been surprised by Bruce's public confession since this hadn't been discussed in advance, none of them could blame him. They would support him now, as they always would each other. Helping him to his feet, Diana could only nod silently in approval for what he had done on that stage.

A suddenly not green, black, and white suited Hal Jordan put a hand on Bruce's shoulder after putting his Lantern ring away in his jacket pocket. "Come on Bruce, let's get you out of here." Bruce was too emotionally drained and exhausted to protest as the rest of the League, those with identities they had protected almost as fiercely as those they had sworn to protect, did the same as their mourning friend before walking off the stage.

For all intents and purposes, the Justice League was finished hiding in the shadows. Even Lex Luthor grudgingly clapped as the crowd cheered on the brave men and women who would hide no more. Let the criminals know exactly who they were dealing with. Secrecy had lost them seven of their own, and although they had saved the world in the process, they'd be damned if it would cost them one more.