Star City at night was a low hum—sodium lamps, distant sirens, a train grinding steel on steel somewhere past the docks. The warehouse district dozed like a tired animal, all breathing vents and blinking security lights.
Zane lay prone on a gravel roof two buildings over, the wind teasing his coat's hem into a slow ripple. Three scratched monitors glowed beside a car battery, all jury-rigged into a mess that would've made an electrician cry. His cameras—cheapand ugly—watched angles people forgot: gutter corners, the shadowed heel of a floodlight pole, a cracked pane above a loading dock.
Onscreen, a side door popped once then eased open.
Two figures could be seen.
The first was tall and broad, armor paneled in black and white with the kind of swagger you couldn't buy: Sportsmaster.
The second slipped along the wall behind him, a blade's silver grin flashing and vanishing, her signature Asura mask on, it was Cheshire.
Zane's visor brightened a shade. He didn't say anything. He'd been back in Star City for two weeks now.
He'd spent the last week building this net—watching, waiting, letting his cameras suck up patterns. Offloads at odd hours. Men with the wrong kind of boots. Van doors that never opened under streetlights. He kept Artemis out of the loop.
Zane pinched the bridge of his mask, the little tick he did instead of rubbing tired eyes. His metal arm hummed as he flexed the fingers, gyros purring under the shell.
He didnt plan to rely on his Robo-Arm tonight, he had to end things quickly.
Zane slid the monitors off, coiled his cables into a pack, and stood into the wind. The roof grit shifted beneath his boots.
He thought of Artemis, just for a second. She would take this personally if she knew. Not the ambush—who it was. He set that thought down like a hot iron and let it cool.
He crossed to the opposite lip and dropped, coat fanning, absorbing the fall without a sound. He moved along a chain-link fence with a hole snipped two weeks ago by hands nobody saw. He slid through shadow toward the warehouse with the practiced grace.
Inside, a camera showed Sportsmaster pausing under a busted skylight, helmet tilting. Zane pictured the man's smile.
'Hopefully this will send a message', Zane thought.
He palmed the side door and slipped in.
Zane's visor drew clean lines through the murk: catwalk grids, support pylons, two stairwells, one rolling door with a sticky track.
Cheshire was in the rafters to the west. Sportsmaster was center-floor, exactly where Zane knew he'd be, talking into a comm and tapping a staff against his shoulder like a bored drumline.
Zane moved and stopped behind a stack of cabinets, ten steps from open floor.
He breathed once. Twice.
Then he let it in.
The Echo Form didn't burst so much as arrive. Heat slid through his bones, luminous and cold all at once, his skeleton humming like a tuning fork struck in the dark. Ligaments tightened, muscles lengthened and rewove, tendons hardening into cable.
His mask and Robo-Arm already taken off, along with his coat and shoes.
His silhouette sharpened into something leaner, more predatory. Hands ended in curved talons that gleamed like a dark metal.
The first time he'd taken this shape, it had felt like drowning. Now it felt like remembering how to swim.
Sound changed. The hiss of a vent became a drawn breath. He could hear Cheshire's footfalls above—far enough from here.
Zane stepped out from cover.
He didn't announce himself.
Zane stepped from cover without a word.
The shadows peeled back, and then he was moving—an eruption of violet speed across open floor. Air buckled in his wake.
Sportsmaster's instincts kicked in fast. The staff snapped up across his body in a guard position.
Too slow.
Zane's claws carved straight through the composite with a shriek of splintering fibers. The weapon snapped into two useless halves before Sportsmaster even registered the blur.
The assassin's balance wavered. Zane didn't let him recover. He slammed a shoulder into Sportsmaster's chest like a battering ram.
THUD!
The older man flew backward into a stack of crates, wood cracking under the impact. He rolled out with veteran reflex, visor catching light, already reaching for the next weapon.
A knife flashed from his hand, thrown staright at Zanes throat.
Zane didn't sidestep. He caught it. Claws pinched the blade mid-flight, sparks leaping where steel met alien edge. A small twist. The knife snapped like glass, pieces raining to the floor.
Sportsmaster froze a beat too long. Zane was there again, one hand gripping his mask, the other burying his fist into his armored chestplate.
The armor bent. A ragged dent sank beneath Zane's fingers. Sportsmaster's breath exploded out in a ragged cough, blood spraying behind the visor. He tried to jam an elbow into Zane's temple, but the strike barely shifted his head. Zane's grip didn't budge.
"Not possible," Sportsmaster wheezed, teeth bared behind the mask. "Who the hell are you!?"
Zane hurled him sideways into a steel support pillar.
CRACK!
The column cracked and crumbled at the impact. Sportsmaster slumped for a moment, then rolled to one knee, shaking his head. His left hand flicked, and a cluster of smoke pellets scattered across the floor. They hissed, releasing a billow of grey.
Zane moved before the haze could spread. A single sweep of his claws cut the first pellet in half, snuffing it. The rest were kicked back toward Sportsmaster's boots, bursting in his own face. The assassin staggered out of the cloud, coughing.
Desperation now. He pulled an electrified baton from his back and swung in a brutal arc. The weapon crackled blue as it met Zane's guard.
ClANG!.
Sparks leapt as claws locked the shaft in place. Zane squeezed. Circuits whined. The baton's glow guttered out as the battery pack crumpled like foil. He tossed the ruined weapon aside, claws dripping with sparks.
Sportsmaster's snarl twisted into a grin, the kind of grin that masked panic. "You think strength is enough? You're still green, bastard!"
He feinted low, boot sweeping for Zane's ankle, then lunged high with a concealed blade in his off-hand.
Zane caught both at once. His shin absorbed the sweep without shifting an inch, and his claws clamped down on the assassin's wrist before the knife could land. He twisted hard.
CRACK!
The wrist bent the wrong way. The knife clattered uselessly to the floor. Sportsmaster grunted, teeth grinding, but used the pain to drive his head forward in a vicious headbutt.
The blow landed with a hollow thock against Zane's face. Zane's head barely moved.
The Echo Form absorbed the force like it was nothing more than noise.
Zane responded by copying a certain Superman, going for a headbut as well.
BAM!
Unlike his, Zanes attack did way more damage, breaking the very solid maks Sportsmaster wore.
The assassin folded in half, he dropped to one knee, clutching his face that was now exposed and bleeding.
Zane dragged him upright by the throat, one-handed, lifting him so his boots scraped concrete. Claws of his other hand hovered just shy of the jugular.
"You dont know who the hell I am!" Sportsmaster rasped, spitting blood. "Killing me will be you biggest mistake you ever made you son ofa....!!"
He drove his claws clean through.
Sportsmaster jerked once, body convulsing, then went slack. Zane held him in place a second longer before letting the corpse slide down the pillar.
Zane stepped back, exhaled once, and vanished into shadow, slipping out as silently as he'd arrived.
Moments later, the catwalk above creaked. Cheshire landed softly, drawn by the sound of the fight. Her eyes found the body pinned against the pillar.
Her mask hid her face, but the way she froze said everything.
"D..Dad?"
For the first time in a long, she uttered those words she despised.
....
He wiped the nearest camera manually, popping the SD chip and tucking it away. He snagged a second from the corner near the loading dock. The third he left to feed the right story: Sportsmaster dead, cause unknown, timing inconvenient. Let the Light argue with itself.
"Done," he murmured.
He killed the form. It unwound without pain, like a tight collar unfastened. The world returned to normal speed. His coat hung heavier as he put it on, along with his visor.
He thought about the corpse one more time and for a blink he saw Artemis's face where the helmet was. Not because he felt guilty about killing him—but because this act would reach her. Maybe not tonight. But it would.
He breathed, felt the thought try to lodge deeper, and set it down again. There would be a price. He would pay it when it came due.
Now, footprints.
He backtracked his own entry with the kind of precision you only learned by dying wrong.
Beacuse this wasnt the first time he did this. Although he never died to Sportsmaster again, after he killed him he left too many traces.
Which caused Cheshire to track and follow him, leading to all sorts of complications. So he had to Rewind and do it a few times to get the perfect outcome.
Its worth mentioning that he has set his Checkpoint to one Week ago, so he doesn't have to go that far back anymore.
He scuffed a scuff he'd left too deep, palmed a print in dust, stepped only where he'd stepped, and went out the same seam in the fence he'd cut when the week was new.
As he slid through the gap, a sound hit the warehouse's ribs.
Cheshire's voice, raw and wordless, a string cut too close to the bridge.
It wasn't loud, but the kind of quiet that followed told the truth of it.
Zane didn't look back.
He crossed two roofs and found his pack where he'd left it, wires coiled, battery heavy. He slung it and moved, the night folding around him, the district's heartbeat returning to its slow nocturne.
When he was five blocks out, he let himself stop, leaning against a wall. He couldn't help but feel that small amount of guilt, not for killing Sportsmaster, but for how Artemis would react if she knew.
Zane pushed off the wall, deciding not to think about it.
He glanced down at the text message he recieved from Artemis.
[ Bring food. I'm hungry, and some drinks too. ]
Zane let a smile tug at his lips.
Maybe she wouldn't even care to be honest.
[ Sure, but you should watch yoyr weight. Your gaining some fat...lol ]
[ What did you say you %#&#^ %#^#%# #$#$#!! ]
...
Patreaon
/Williamstewart