Disclaimer: I do not own Young Justice

Third Person POV

It had been a few hours since Red Arrow had stormed out of the Watchtower. No one followed him. Not too long after he left, the main monitor in the Watchtower started to detect a signal from the missing teenagers. The signal was coming from Central City, near S.T.A.R Labs. Needing to stay and monitor the systems, Batman sent Flash to scope out the area and figure out was caused the signal. Martian Manhunter immediately left to set up the medical bay, hoping that another member of the young team would return. A few minutes later the Flash returned, carrying an unconscious Aqualad.

"Martian Manhunter set up the med-bay," Batman said, not letting his gaze stray from the computer.

"J'onn is looking over Kaldur right now. So far it seems like there isn't any major injuries. Before you ask, I checked all around S.T.A.R Labs. There was nothing. No clues, no trails, nothing except for Aqualad," Flash said a few moments later.

"Aqualad has a few minor burns, some cuts, and a few bruises; nothing fatal. There are traces of Ketamine on his blood. My guess is that he will remain unconscious for a small amount of time," J'onn stoically said.

"Thank you J'onn," the Flash replied. Batman remained silent, but nodded his head to signify his understanding.

~A few hours later~

Kaldur slowly sat up, his eyes adjusting to the light. He looked around and noticed that he was in a medical room. Quietly, he got up and ventured outside the room. When he exited the med-bay, he was shocked to see that he was with the Justice League. Everyone was talking to each other, obviously trying to distract themselves from the situation at hand. Kaldur couldn't even begin to imagine what they were all going through. He noticed Batman standing alone, facing the window. He noticed Batman turn towards him slightly, signaling him over. As he walked through the crowd, feeling the stares of the people around him.

"Batman," Kaldur said, "I have failed them. All of them. I was, am, their leader. And I couldn't protect them."

"Kaldur, there was nothing you could have done." Flash said.

Batman remained silent.

"From what I can tell," Black Canary chimed in, "there isn't anything you could have done."

Batman shifted slightly, his focus still out the window.

"The Joker resides in Gotham. Batman, he is your biggest adversary. Do you have anything to input?" Superman asked.

Batman remained looking out the window. "The Joker has had this planned for a while?"

"How can you tell?" Flash questioned.

Batman turned around to face the group of people anxiously waiting for a solution. "Everything is flowing smoothly. Too smoothly. The Joker has been moving everyone around right under our noses. And in such ways that he knows we will never track him until it is too late. He has had the help of others in Gotham, which is not as easy as one would think."

"How do you know that the others weren't too scared to say no to him? I wouldn't have said no to him if he asked for my help, given his track record," Green Arrow interrupted.

"Because that isn't how he works," Batman responded. "He may be crazy, but he is strategic. He always has a plan, and a backup. My guess is that the Joker has been planning this for months."

"Is there any way you can predict his plan? Has he done anything like this before?" Dinah asked.

"Not to this scale. It is not uncommon for the Joker to take a few hostages and keep them in a single location. But, he has never moved them around and slowly released them." The mood in the room changed to a feeling that all was lost. "I have someone working on trying to figure out a pattern and the Joker's movements, but so far there has been little success."

The room remained silent. No one spoke a word, mainly because no one knew what to say. If Batman did not even know how to handle the situation with his biggest adversary, what hope did anyone else have? They had no leads, no clues to follow, nothing. All they had was missing kids and a terrible feeling in their guts.

"So what do we do?" Flash was the one to break the painful silence.

"For now, all we can do is wait," Batman responded.

A/N: I just want to apologize for the delay in updating. I guess a year and a half is more than a delay. Sorry. I know this chapter is short, but I wanted to get something uploaded and I had the end of this written for a while now. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. If you have any questions, comments, or concerns feel free to contact me via review or private message. Thank you so much for reading and I hope to update soon. I do have a rough outline of the story now, so hopefully it will not take as long to update. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed and I will see you next time.

-TheKnightShadowAsh