StarGirl26: Hey guys, I know it was a long wait, but life just got in the way. So enjoy the final part of this 3-part storyline. And Happy Halloween!

3DPhantom: Hey guys, so sorry for the long wait, but it's here now! And Happy Halloween! Hopefully the next update will be saying Happy Thanksgiving and not Merry Christmas!

Nightfall's Point Of View

"Get….to ship.…..…not going down …..…..need to contain…..… Doctor Fate….….too much….…..critical state…...transfusion…almost there….…hang on…"

Surrounded by nothing but darkness, only a soft murmur was heard, followed by rhythmic beeps. The heaviness was taking over again. NO, he couldn't get sucked back in! He reached out, but the darkness was too strong and kept pulling him further down. Maybe he should submit: He was too tired; why should he fight it? "NO!" the voice said again. It was right, he never backed down before and wasn't about to start now. One last time he reached out with every last bit of strength he had left, but just as he was about to drown into the endless darkness he felt a pair of hands pulling him out. More and more hands joined in the struggle until he left the darkness behind him and focused on the small dot of bright light that was growing as he got closer to it, to the point that the light was so bright that he had to close his eyes.

The rhythmic beeps returned and the soft murmurs turned into words. Still not completely being able to understand what they were saying, Nightfall tried to open his eyes, which felt like two concrete blocks glued on to each other. While his eyes were slowly starting to give in and open, the young boy was afraid to be met with blinding lights, but was pleasantly surprised to see that, after his foggy eyes had adjusted to the room, he still had his goggles on.

Nightfall tried to turn his head, every muscle in his body still sore and largely uncooperative. He noticed that he was in the Med-Bay at the mountain. To his right he saw Miss Martian, Red Arrow and Violet, each one covered in bandages and hooked up to various IV's and machinery; luckily, from what he could see, they were all still breathing. The boy slowly tried to sit up straight, grunting at the soreness that was fighting his every movement.

"Morning sunshine." The young boy was met with a half grin by a certain cheery red-head. "Or afternoon. I have no idea what time it is," Wally said, slightly wincing in pain as he had tried to scratch his head. "M-morning," Nightfall replied in a scratchy voice, only now noticing how thirsty he was. He reached for the glass of water next to his bed, gulping the entire contents in mere seconds. "Wow, slow down buddy. There's enough water," the speedster commented with a chuckle as Nightfall wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He unwrapped the bandage on his left hand where only a barely visible red line was the proof that he had been cut.

He looked back at his teammates on his the other side. The bed opposite to his was empty, next to it lay Kid Flash, then Artemis (who looked worse than the others) and Superboy, who sat at the edge of his bed with his back towards everyone else.

Wally noticed that Nightfall was questionably looking at the seemingly unharmed super teen. "Black Canary ordered for no one to leave this room." The young boy looked back at the speedster. "But why? Sup- some seem better than others." The boy quickly rephrased.

"Because we are fragile, traumatized kids that need council from shrink Canary," Roy said mockingly, trying to get up from his sleeping position.

"Dude!" The younger red-head exclaimed. "I thought you were still sleeping."

The archer stretched his arms, back arching with the movement. "I can't sleep with you two birds chatting it up."

Nightfall was starting to feel anger towards the archer. Because of him his friends were lying here, hurt. He just couldn't understand how people like Kaldur, Wally and Violet considered this hot-headed archer their friend.

"What are you looking at?" Roy said, the phrase coming out more like a statement than a question.

The winged boy had been looking with a scowl at the elder boy. "This. Is. Your. Fault.'' He said in a low voice.

Roy turned to face the boy. "What did you say?!"

"I said: This. Is. YOUR. FAULT!" His wings raised, adrenaline rushing through his body. He couldn't feel the pain anymore, he couldn't think about the consequences, his brain was set to auto-pilot. "Is this what the future of the Justice League was supposed to look like? No wonder I should eliminate them."

Nightfall was taken aback by his own thoughts. Maybe Desmond had influenced him more than he initially thought...

"My fault?" The archer scoffed. "As I recall, everybody was onboard with the plan. That doesn't make it my fault that things went wrong. That's just the hazard of this job. If you can't take it then maybe it's not for you."

Roy noticed the change in the young boy as with each word the boy's wings would drop. The archer was right, they did all agree to the plan and he really wasn't made for this job, but that didn't mean that he couldn't try his best.

"Leave him alone." All three looked over at Superboy's corner, who sat in the same position as before.

"Look who decided to join us!" Roy said mockingly.

Superboy growled.

"STOP IT!" M'gann shouted, clutching her head. She was linked again with the team, but was hit with all these emotions that were too much to handle at the moment. "This is no way for a team to behave."

"M'gann is right, this has to stop." Violet turned onto her back, her hands holding tightly onto her bandaged left side.

"Yes, what happened yesterday was all our faults; we all defied the rules and blindly engaged."

Violet turned to the elder red-head beside her. "Roy, I-I know you haven't quite forgiven us yet, but it was our choice. We felt like we weren't good enough yet and this place seemed like the best place to start, so that things like this…"

The young girl looked around the room at her wounded friends, eyes resting on the still unconscious Artemis... "don't happen again."

"Vi, you're..." Wally pointed at her hands, where blood was starting to seep through the white fabric. "Great," she said with a sarcastic tone before lying back on her other side.

The room grew silent again with the teens deep in thought. A minute or so later the door opened. "Thank you Kaldur," the soft voice of Black Canary spoke. The dark teen walked towards the empty bed that was located in front of Nightfall's bed. He looked over at the young boy. "It's good to see you are well my friend."

"You too," Nightfall answered.

"Nightfall," Canary called out. "Could you come with me please?"

The boy nodded his head and slowly got up. He followed her into a large room with two green chairs and a comforting waterfall flowing down the mountain wall. She motioned for him to sit down.

"So, Nightfall," she began. "What exactly happened, in your own words?"

Nightfall paused, considering his response carefully. The last thing he wanted was to get anyone in trouble….

"We were at the docks, and decided that part of gathering intel should include checking the crates. When Black Mask and his goons showed up, our cover was blown and we were forced to engage. Black Mask used the Genomorphs that were in the crates to…." He paused, not necessarily wanting to say "defeat us" in fear of what the others would think, but that's clearly what had occurred. He skipped ahead. " I used the Bioship to contact the league and then went back down to continue fighting. I don't know if Black Mask escaped or if he got away with the other crates. I assume you're the one who knows about what happened after I passed out." Black Canary nodded lightly.

"The crates were still in the warehouse when we arrived. Black Mask used the time he was given to escape; he wouldn't risk himself or a confrontation with the league for a simple job, especially since he wasn't the one keeping the crates," she answered his implied questions. "It's good that Cadmus didn't get their hands on the League DNA, we're still trying to figure out how they got it in the first place, but retrieving the vials still wasn't worth the team risking their lives over. If you hadn't of contacted the League when you did, some of you would have died."

Nightfall winced, conflicted. He knew it was the right thing to do, contacting the League, but at the same time he felt that the team wouldn't appreciate it.

"You don't agree?" Black Canary asked, sensing his confliction.

"I…. The team doesn't seem to like having you as back-up," Nightfall replied unsteadily. "I think most of them appreciate it enough when it saves our lives, but before the mission they seemed to heavily disapprove of being under League control, and I don't know how they'll feel about it tomorrow either…. Once this has blown over they'll be right back to despising your protection, won't they? Especially since Roy seems to hate it so much…." Nightfall thought back to Violet Wally and Roy: All three of them seemed to be such close friends, closer than he was to any of them for sure and closer than anyone else in the team was to each other. They'd side with him again tomorrow when he brought back up the Leagues over-bearing nature, wouldn't they?

Black Canary hummed quietly. "And what about you, Nightfall? Do you appreciate League protection?" Nightfall met her gaze.

"How could I not? For as long as I can remember, I've never had someone to watch my back, to protect me or who had my best interest at heart." Nightfall backpedaled a little. "Well, I mean, I'm not trying to imply that the League has my interest at heart specifically, I didn't mean to suggest…. I know I'm really only here because I'm a Cadmus experiment and I can't be allowed to just roam free. I just mean it has the team's interest at heart and I know that it still means assistance to me whenever I'm down." Black Canary smiled softly.

"Nightfall, of course the League has your best interest a heart! At the very least, I do. You're not just a Cadmus experiment, you've proven yourself to be quite the capable hero, and a generally worthwhile person." Nightfall blushed slightly. "And between you and me," Black Canary leaned forward some, Nightfall automatically doing the same, as if they were trying to prevent someone else from overhearing, though Nightfall knew that no one else could hear what went on in the room…. "Between you and me, Batman's taken quite an interest in you. He was very impressed by you at training the other day." Nightfall's eyes widened slightly in surprise as they both leaned back in their chairs. "The first medical file he checked when you were all stable was of course his own protégé Violet's, but the second file he looked at was yours. He thinks I didn't notice; logically he should have looked at Artemis' file second since she's the most injured, but that's not what he did."

Nightfall considered all of this new-found information. Was it true, that Black Canary and possibly even the Batman himself cared about what happened to him specifically, and not just how he related to the team? As he looked up at the warm smile plastered on Black Canary's face, Nightfall couldn't help but feel his heart warm slightly. What reason would she have to lie to him? He'd do whatever she told him to do whether or not he felt cared for, so maybe it was true. Maybe he really did have someone looking out for him now….

Nightfall smiled slightly in return, murmuring a quiet "thank you". Black Canary nodded.

"Did you have any further questions; anything else you feel like you need to discus?" Black Canary waited patiently. At first Nightfall was going to say no, that he felt fine and that she could move on to someone who needed her assistance more than him now, but a sudden thought made him freeze and he lost all of the warmth he'd had in his heart moments ago.

"Desmond," Nightfall suddenly said, and only because of Cadmus' extensive training could he see Black Canary's body tense ever-so-slightly. "Black Mask said he was hired by Desmond, but I thought Desmond was a giant morphed monster being held by the League. What happened?" Black Canary nodded slightly.

"Yes, about five days after you were brought here he disappeared. We're still looking into it."

"Why didn't you tell me?" Nightfall asked, sounding slightly hurt.

"We didn't want to worry you, and there's nothing you could have done. The League is looking into it, and for now we are calling it a League problem. There's no reason for you to get involved at this time; you have enough on your plate as it is. Now that the cat's out of the bag though, I can keep you posted on our progress if you'd like. I can't allow you to get involved though, at least not now." Nightfall nodded in understanding; that sounded fair enough. As long as they kept him updated, and as long as the League was searching for Desmond, that was enough for him. Besides, Nightfall hardly thought he would be better at finding Desmond than the Justice League, that would be preposterous.

Nightfall sighed quietly and stood, Black Canary following him to the door. "If there's ever anything else you need, don't hesitate to ask." That slightly warm feeling in Nightfall's heart began to creep back at that, and he paused before the door, a thought suddenly occurring to him.

"Actually, yeah. I was…. I was wondering if you could make a phone call for me? I wanted to get a summer job at a little surf and food shop in town called Ocean Gear and Eats. I talked to the manager already and he said he would hire me if I had a guardian call and say it was okay, since I'm under eighteen. I, kind of told him I was sixteen and here on vacation with my parents." Nightfall rubbed the back of his neck a little sheepishly.

Canary smiled warmly. "Sure, that won't be a problem, but you know you don't need a job, right? I can appreciate you wanting to work, but if you ever need anything, money for clothes or food, you can just ask for it." Nightfall nodded.

"I guess I maybe sort of new that deep down inside," he admitted shyly, because no, he hadn't really considered that before, "but I would still want a job to help kill the time, if anything. I don't have much to do, just hanging around the Mountain all week, except for when we have missions, and it'd be nice to get out for a while on weekdays." Black Canary nodded in understanding.

"Alright. I assume the man asked for a name though, and something tells me you don't want to go by 'Nightfall' at work." At this Nightfall almost groaned and Black Canary looked at him curiously.

"I kind of also told him my name was…. Robin." Nightfall blushed furiously now, mentally face-palming. 'Honestly, why'd I choose such a stupid, weird name as that?!'

Black Canary looked slightly surprised. "That's, kind of adorable actually. How'd you pick a name like that?"

"I don't know, I didn't even think about it. It just kind of came out when he asked what my name was…." 'Adorable? Geez, well, yeah, that's definitely not what I was going for…. I should have chosen something else!'

"Are you sure that isn't your real name then?" Black Canary asked somewhat excitedly. Nightfall stared, he hadn't even considered that as a possibility before!

"Well…. God I hope not!" Was all he could manage to say and Canary laughed in response.

"Alright, well, I'll make sure to give this place a call tonight. Thank you for being so open with me. If you could, send Wally in when you go back out, okay?" Nightfall nodded, thanked her, and headed back to the infirmary room where everyone else was still waiting. He definitely felt better now than he had when he woke up: Roy didn't know what he was talking about, Shrink Canary was fantastic!

Hope you enjoyed the Team's first mission and this small story arc that will lead to a whole lot more...