Young Justice Mini Sode

James the Lesser

Dick Grayson puts on a suit he never thought he would need to wear again.

He turns to his wife who holds their eight year old daughter close. "Barb, keep her safe."

She hugs their daughter closer. "Dick, please, you don't have to do this. The Titans are out there fighting him."

He shakes his head before he pulls on the Nightwing mask. "Darkseid will win if we don't throw everything we have at him."

Barb, stuck in her wheelchair, can only pound a fist on the arm of the chair. "Dammit Dick, you're not a god like Superman."

"Wally isn't either and he's out there trying to help."

Barb can't help the tears in her eyes. "He has powers!"

Dick smiles. "We proved time and time again you don't need powers."

His daughter rushes over to him and hugs him tightly. "Daddy, please, be careful."

He musses up her hair. "I will babygirl, I will." He leans down and kisses her on the forehead. "Keep mom safe for me, okay?"

"Yes daddy."

Nightwing goes to the balcony of the Wayne Estate. "Bruce, I hope you're ready old man."

He sees the Batwing come out from a secret entrance. "And come back to our families."

Dick sees the massive ship Darkseid arrived in hanging over Gotham. He also sees the Green Lanterns, Superman, and Wonder Woman.

He flies up to Superman. "Where's Martian Manhunter?"

"Dead."

Dick is shaken for a second. "Four Horsemen? Zatara?"

Superman destroys a missile fired by the ship. "Not sure about the Four Horsemen. Only one of them can truly fly. Zatara made it inside of the ship already."

Dick flies towards the ship looking to help inside.

Screaming fills his ears and he sees a green dinosaur rip a Para Demon apart. "Garfield, where are the others?"

"My sister and brother in law are farther inside. They told me to guard this hole they made so they have an escape route." He bites at another Para Demon.

"Keep it up." Nightwing flies farther inside.

The ship trembles as Nightwing gets closer to the middle of the ship.

He sees Captain Marvel holding a bomb that was about to be dropped on the city.

Para Demons get close and Nightwing throws birdarangs at them keeping them back.

Nightwing falls back with Captain Marvel. "There's too many of them." He throws another birdarang. "And I'm rusty from years of retirement."

Captain Marvel blasts an alien invader. "Darkseid waited so long to strike Earth. None of us are ready for this."

Kid Flash spins as fast as he can sending a bomb back towards the ship.

Aliens fly overhead but he is too fast for them. "Come on, someone get to Darkseid! We can't keep this up forever."

Nightwing sees a door open and drops what he knows is another bomb. "Marvel, get rid of that bomb."

Dick flies up in to the ship through where the bomb dropped to get inside.

He expected to see more bombs. Instead... "Darkseid!"

Darkseid turns and sees Nightwing. "Ah, weak mortal."

At Darkseid's feet is a necklace and attached to it is a pendant with a black stone that gives off a weird unnatural glow.

Next to it is the body of Zatara.

Nightwing pulls out a staff and the ends give off a charge. "Why are you attacking now? Why won't you leave us alone?"

"Because you defy me!" Lasers shoot out his eyes and Nightwing dodges them.

The lasers turn and follow him.

Nightwing leaps and dodges as best he can getting closer to Darkseid.

He knows his staff would be useless against a being as powerful as Darkseid. The only weapon on the ship that might harm him...

Nightwing lands on Darkseid's chest, then does a backflip as the lasers reach him. His staff catching the chain of the necklace and bringing the pendant off of the floor.

The lasers just miss, by nanometers, before hitting the black stone.

The stone cracks, and energy warps around Darkseid. "Fool! You have just sentenced not only this planet but the entire system to death!"

The dark energy expands from Darkseid and touches Nightwing.

He finds himself in emptiness with Darkseid. Now... Do it now...

Nightwing isn't sure what the voice is but somehow he knows what it means.

He floats over to Darkseid and touches him.

His head explodes with pain as he sees all of Earth at once.

The Para Demons of Darkseid collapse.

The ship loses power and falls to the ground below. Crushing everything between them.

Dick knows he has saved Earth. He, of all the mighty heroes like the nigh immortal Superman or Captain Marvel, the great Intergalactic Green Lanterns, the more powers than should be allowed late Martian Manhunter, saved the Earth.

His eyes start to cry tears of blood. It trickles out from his nose and ears.

He blacks out seeing the world rejoice the end of the attack.

When he wakes up he realizes he is naked in a tent.

At first the tent doesn't ring any bells until he sees a coat with a symbol on it. That's the symbol for the circus my family once worked for. Why am I here? Am I dead? Seeing my life flash before my eyes?

He puts the coat on and walks out.

Dick isn't sure what is going on. He sees people walking around in clothes that were definitely not up to date.

He hears a crowd cheering and walks towards a flap that was open in the back of the largest tent.

"Thank you ladies and gentlemen! Up next will be the Amazing Flying Graysons!"

Dick is confused when he hears this. "What?! How?! I must be dead."

He tries to skulk away when he sees a newspaper. This is the day they died. I can stop it!

He puts his training to use as he sneaks around unseen.

He sees the man who would tamper with his parents set up. The man who would murder them. The man who would make him an orphan. An orphan who would be adopted by Bruce Wayne.

Bruce Wayne. Batman. The man who made him Robin, Nightwing.

Nightwing, the man who married Barbara Gordon. Who had a wonderful daughter. Who had just saved the world from Darkseid...

"If I stop him from killing my parents I don't become Nightwing. I don't save the world several times over. I don't stop Darkseid. Darkseid is trying to trick me. He doesn't want me stopping him." He squeezes his eyes shut tightly as it hits him. "No!"

He is torn between saving his parents and saving the world.

Dick feels tears form in his eyes and starts crying as he backs away unseen.

He runs from the tent hoping not to hear the shocked gasps of the crowd as his parents fall...

A man sits and watches television. "I can't escape it, can I?" He watches as an actress plays some one he was once friends with. Fighting someone he once fought. Flying around and punching the bad guys.

He finishes his dinner and changes the channel. "I really can't escape it." A different show, featuring a different actor playing some one he also used to know, slinging arrows at his enemies.

He hangs his head and fights back the memories that has been with him since he arrived.

He is getting ready for bed when he hears a knock at the door. "Who the hell is that? If it was work they would just call me."

He hadn't made any friends where he worked nor none of his neighbors.

When he opens the door he sees a man who looked like someone he once knew just older. "Hello?"

"Hey Barry, long time no see."

The man, Barry, takes a step back. "Who are you?"

The man on the other side of the door laughs. "It's been a few years since you saw me. And I'm not wearing a mask."

Barry is tense as he tries to figure out what is going on. "Who are you?"

"Dick Grayson."

Barry relaxes and smiles back. "That's how you found me."

"Batman trained me." He smiles. "As Jason would say."

"Of course." Barry lets Dick in so the two can talk.

After several hours of catching up and trying to figure out what is going on, Barry sets up the couch for Dick. "If you did create a new world by time traveling after stopping Darkseid who knows if there is a world to go back to."

Dick stretches a little. "After my time here I'm not sure I can go back. We don't exactly have that stone Darkseid had."

"And I'm no longer the fastest man on Earth."

Both share a laugh. "So... I need to look for employment."

"Private detective might work for you."

"Beats sitting in a cubicle all day."

Barry laughs lightly. "Hey, I used to have a cubicle next to the window. I could watch the squirrels play and they were merry. Then they moved my desk and now I can't see them. Then the boss took my Swingline stapler and I thought about burning the building down."

Dick raises an eyebrow. "Over a stapler?"

"The new ones jam all the time but the Swingline didn't. And I got yelled at about the stupid TPS report cover sheets that day too."

The two nod towards each other before Barry walks to his bedroom leaving Dick on the couch.

Over the weeks the two bond over their old lives and new.

Due to time travel issues the two were just a few years apart instead of Barry being much older than he would have been.

The cover story was that Dick was a cousin who moved after a nasty divorce.

He did decide to do the Private Detective route and may have done some vigilante side work when he saw the need.

The two tried to keep their old lives away. It was too depressing to think about the friends, lovers, families, they left behind.

Knowing there was no way back, no way to his old life, Dick has to fight back his past choices.

Years pass, he meets new people, new women, and tries to move on. All relationships fall apart as he couldn't stop comparing the women with his wife.

All but Barry stuck. The only one who he didn't compare to Kid Flash or Aqualad or... Any of the other friends he once had.

With time came aging.

Both retire, both know the end is coming closer and closer.

Dick has one thought stuck in his mind. If I die, will I see those I loved from before? Or will I never see them again?

One night, many years after arriving in the new world, he closes his eyes and never opens them again.

Where am I? He is in a white void.

He sees Earth, his Earth, other Earths, many more.

Some melt away, others remain.

He hears a voice he hadn't heard in what seemed like two lifetimes. "I will torture you, forever!"

"Darkseid!" His head snaps around but he doesn't see any one else.

"Until you succumb and make the right choice, I will be with you."

The Earths disappear and he finds himself in an alley, naked.

He grabs a trench coat that is left on the ground and puts it on. "What's this?" He reaches in to the pocket and finds... "A gun?"

It is much older than any of the guns he had ever seen.

He puts it back in his pocket and walks down the alley and turns towards another.

He sees cars, classic cars. "These aren't classic, yet." I've been sent to another time.

He goes down another alley when he sees a couple walking with their son out of a theater.

It takes Dick only a second to recognize the alley. It is a place filled with memories for... "Bruce."

The young boy looks up.

It is him.

The father steps between Dick and Bruce. "What do you want?"

"Nothing." Oh god, I, if I don't, He feels the gun in his pocket. If I don't kill his parents, he doesn't become Batman. I don't become Robin. I don't become Nightwing. I don't stop Darkseid.

He pulls the gun out and aims it at Thomas Wayne. "I'm sorry." He pulls the trigger and then shoots Martha.

"No!" Bruce throws himself at Dick but is knocked down easily.

Dick walks away from the crying child he knew would one day become his father.

He moves to Central City to avoid Gotham and Bruce. "I can't change the timeline. Any change may stop me from becoming who I am."

He is forced to watch the world be put in peril multiple times. He is forced to watch situations he knew would kill his friends.

It is almost maddening living through it all again. Almost...

When he dies he is back in the white void before the many Earths appear. "Now what will he make me live through?"

He finds himself in Gotham, in his suit, as the city was under siege from the many demons of Klarion. "This is when Barb became paralyzed. He wants me to stop that. He knows how much I love her. He's trying to find some point in my life that makes me change history so he is saved." I want to save her but know I can't. I can't let Darkseid win.

And so he watches the woman he loved, his future wife and mother of his child, become poisoned and paralyzed.

As time passes he gets ideas. Darkseid did a surprise attack last time. This time I can alert the others. Maybe we can have the whole Green Lantern core here. Would they be enough to stop him with out me sacrificing myself? What if some one else does? What if they aren't as strong as I am and are willing to doom every one to save a loved one?

And so instead, he warns no one. He waits for the day he would sacrifice himself.

When that day comes...

He gives Barb a radio. One connected to his ear piece. He will say goodbye to her and his daughter, unlike last time.

"I love you, and Chloe."

"Dick! What are you doing?!"

He cuts the connection as he nears where the bombs drop out.

He knew Darkseid would be there this time and wastes no time. He flis directly at him.

"Weak, puny," Nightwing slams the end of his staff in to the dark stone at Darkseid's feet.

It cracks, and the energy starts to leak out. "Fool! You have just sentenced not only this planet but,"

"Yeah yeah, the entire system. I've heard it before." He waits for the dark energy to envelope Darkseid and then him.

Do it, do it now...

He floats over to Darkseid but stops before touching him. "If I don't touch him, what happens?" He looks around the void. There seems to be nothing else. "I can chill for a bit. I won't let you tempt me with changing history."

And so, floating in space, Dick Grayson stays with an unconscious Darkseid wondering how long he could handle being alone.

A/N Had the idea for awhile but with writing my original work, available on Amazon under Seth Quillet, I never got around to it. Until now while I'm on vacation. Hope you all enjoy!