Epilogue: Thoughts of Beyond

            “You know Bruce isn’t going to be happy when he realizes I brought you here.” Tim his helmet on the seat and helped the younger boy off his motorcycle. He and Terry had snuck to Titan’s Tower without telling Bruce. With the other boy so small, hiding him under Robin’s cape while they sped out of the cave was no trouble.

            “He’s already grounded me from joining any actual field work until I’m over twenty, what more can he do to me now?” Terry said dryly as he pulled off his own helmet.

            “Be happy that’s all he’s grounding you with.” Tim commented. After Terry’s recovery, Bruce decided to recount the boy’s time in Metropolis and Central before he came into his care.

            “It’s not like anyone died.” He complained.

            “Think of it this way, you’ll have more time to perfect your witty banter.” Tim smirked.

            “Very amusing Tim, where do you get your material?” Terry drawled sarcastically as the other laughed.

Chapter Sixteen: Awakening

            A week ago, he met his grandfather for the first time in his life. A strange experience for him, considering his grandfather was dead since the last time he checked.

            A month ago, he was learning about said dead grandfather. It was the most dreadful lesson he faced. He and his mother were in the Judea desert when he was required to cram in five hundred years worth of information on said dead man.

            Three months ago, he spotted his father on a television set as he walked through the streets of London with his mother. The deadweight was supposedly found, from what the announcement said he was missing for a good while. He recalled the annoyance he felt, his father looked anxious and exhausted. If the man was acting at all, he was a damn good actor, the whole thing looked sincere. It was possible that his father found out the deadweight is his son.

            Six months ago, his father was proven innocent. It was utter nonsense to him that his father would kill a woman in such a manner. A gun was ridiculous considering what the man could do and the greatest detective in the world couldn’t hide a body? Don’t make him laugh. 

            Eight months ago, he ran away from his mother and her League of Assassins to help his deadweight brother deadweight to uncover who had framed their father. They managed to narrow the suspects down before he was retrieved.  

Now, he was on the run from his five hundred-year-old grandfather. His mother tried to protect him, but he doubted she could keep him from an army of assassins. He was drugged, attacked and chased through southeast Asia. It was a pain for him to make his way back to US soil and Gotham.

Chapter Fifteen: The Return

With Superman and Nightwing supplying the distraction for Cadmus operatives, Batgirl and the Flash rushed through the facility and knocked out security cameras, alarms and announcement speakers. They kept everyone busy while Batman searched for Terry. The dark knight had managed to find schematics of the facility, but that alone was not enough to find the cunning little boy.

Chapter Fourteen: Versus

            Terry’s disappearance was not taken lightly. The boy was formerly part of Cadmus and even more so, he had access to the bat-computer’s records. They waited two days for a ransom before filing a missing report to the police. As confident as they were with their own searches, it was not possible to put off Terrance Wayne’s appearance in public for more than a few days. Bruce’s frame-up was still fresh among the public. They needed to keep unneeded questions from rising. That didn’t stop the tabloids from implying that Bruce had killed his own son.

Chapter Thirteen: Revealation

            It had been months since his dad was accused of murder, months since he and his brother joined to hunt the culprit and months since Nightwing and the others realized his dad was innocent. Yet, they were able to do nothing. They could prove Batman was innocent, but not Bruce Wayne. Until his dad’s name was cleared, he refused to return to school. He rather use the time to monitor Gotham and perfecting the video link system on the cowl.

Interlude Two: Thoughts of XIII

            His name was Conner Kent, but he supposed he would respond to XIII as well. Where to start his story? From the start of his productions? From the moment he was awake? Or maybe the short span of a year he spent in Cadmus? No—we’ll start from when he decided to flee. 

Chapter Twelve: Struggle

            Not long after Bruce Wayne’s escape from prison, a missing child report was filed for one Terrance Wayne. The officials believed Bruce Wayne had taken the child after the murder of Vesper Fairchild and attempted to flee the country with his son. Some said he had done away with the child as he done so to Fairchild.

Chapter Eleven: Again and Again

            It’s been three weeks since Bruce and Alfred pursued after Dr. Kinsolving and her kidnappers. In their absence, Tim strained to juggle his duties to the Titans and Gotham. Fortunately, he needn’t worry about the homicidal duo that once wreaked havoc in the manor in the early mornings. Talia had taken Damian before Kinsolving’s kidnap, but he wasn’t sure what happened to Terry.

Chapter Ten: Civilian Life

                Every morning, at 0700 hours he’d wake in preparation for his fight with his brother Damian at 0800 hours. The routine temporarily stopped the morning after their father was taken down by Bane. The two were too exhausted to even wake at their usual time. He expected the routine to resume the morning after when their father’s condition was tended to by doctor Shondra Kinsolving, but it didn’t.

                0800 hours, no sign of Damian.

Chapter Nine: Nightfall

                 “Hey Conner.” Tim greeted his fellow Titan. After two weeks of recovery at Wayne Manor, he was glad to be back at the tower with his fellow Titans. 

                  “YAH!” The Kryptonian clone jumped to the ceiling and clung on humorously.

                  “… Are you okay?” Tim asked glancing up at his teammate warily.

Chapter Eight: Chase Me

                  “I heard what happened to you earlier.” Tim commented as he lowered himself front of the bat-computer. Dick left hours earlier, returning to his duties as Nightwing for Bludhaven.

                  “More the reason why he should be taken out for patrol duty.” Terry reasoned as he plopped down in the main seat. Since Tim’s arm was out of commission, he would help him with the keyboard. “At least you can rest easy without having the threat of him lingering over you.”

Chapter Seven: Familial Relations

                  “Let me go!” Damian twisted furiously, but to no avail he could not free himself.

                  “I wouldn’t do that if I were you. If you fall from there, you’ll die.” Dick warned. His costume was a little worse for wear after wrestling the demon brat onto the stalactite.

                  “You can’t do this to me! Let me go!” He growled.

“I told you I would do something to you won’t like if you didn’t listen. Think of it as a light punishment, compared to what I would do to your spoiled little ass for doing that to Tim!” He crossed his arms with a glower.

                  “You can’t do this to me!” Damian roared.

                  “Never one to repent.” Dick sighed.  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” He activated the batarang that was attached to the boy. A high pitch frequency converged the bats to where Damian was tied. The boy resisted a scream as the flying rodents clawed at his face. His eyes clenched close to avoid having his eyes gouged out. “If you’re good, I’ll let you down early.”

                  “Fuck you!” Damian snarled.

                  “Maybe you’ll change your mind later.” Dick pocketed the remote and headed for the upper levels. 

Chapter Six: Batman and Sons

Beyond woke up blindfolded and tied to a chair. His neck ached from his sleeping position, but he dare not move. From his senses, he could tell he was no longer out in the open. The air was damp with a strange smell and the place echoed with someone pacing about. He wasn’t the least bit worried, as long as it wasn't Cadmus, he didn’t have any reason to fear.

Chapter Five: Survival Initiative

                  Beyond was exhausted, he never expected it to be this cold. Two months since he and XIII ran away. Seven weeks since they separated in an attempt to throw Cadmus off their trail. He directed XIII to the Daily Planet at Metropolis, even if the super clone was a naïve little idiot, at least Superman would be able to recognize him and keep him out of Cadmus’s reach. While he planned for the super clone’s well being, he miscalculated horribly on his own. Rarely did he need to leave headquarters in the past. He had forgotten to take the changing seasons into consideration. Running away with nothing more than the clothing on your back during November, now nearing January was not his best idea.

Chapter Four: The Beginning of a Game

                  “Wake up XIII.” Beyond waited at the door as the guards attempted to wake the sleeping clone.

                  “I didn’t do it!” XIII jolted awake defensively.

                  “We’re not accusing your of anything XIII.” Beyond said dryly.

                  “Oh it’s you Beyond.” XIII yawned as he rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. “What time is it?”

                  “0300 hours.”

                  “0300 hours? Why are we up?” XIII whined, he was sorely tempted to return to his dreamland, but he knew better than to irritate the young advisor.

                  “A mission, what else?” Beyond said bluntly as he turned to leave. “You have five minutes to clean up.”

The super clone groaned. “What mission takes place at 0300 hours? We went to bed at 0100.” He muttered irritably.

Chapter Three: Expendability

            His eighth year in Cadmus was more hectic than the last. It took months before the incident with the missing adults settled. Cities, businesses and people were all doing their best to repair what was damaged and lost during the short few hours during the adult populace’s disappearance. There wasn’t much information on the perpetrator, but the Justice League seemed to know something about it, when they promised there would be no repeats.

Chapter Two: The Voice, The Vision

                  One year since Project Meta’s defection Beyond was assigned to the Special Reconnaissance department. While his age exempted him from active field duty, his technical and detective skills were continually exercised in place. Using the voice changer from the Las Vegas crisis, he relayed intelligence and guidance within Cadmus and occasionally other government operations.

Chapter One: Training Projects

                  At six, he was integrated with another project in Cadmus. One that took in children born with the meta-gene and trained them to be weapons for the government.  

Sons of the Night- Prologue

                  Everyone and everything started from somewhere at some point. With Cadmus, they started on multiple experimentations on eugenics and cloning. The most notable was Project Beyond. Rather than using the genetics from meta-humans or powerful beings like Superman, Project Beyond was created with genetics from Batman. His DNA was easily obtained from battle sites where he left them, but after tampering and manipulating the genetic coding, only half of the original DNA remained. 

                  In a sense, Project Beyond was a son of Batman. Devoid of defects and mutations, the child produced by Project Beyond was solely meant to serve Cadmus whether in espionage or in battle. A child produced with supernatural means would’ve been hard to control, not to mention the hubris of being more than human. Cadmus ensured that he could be eliminated if he was to defect.

                  Project Beyond was officially given life after two years of experimentation. The child produced was male with traits of black hair and blue eyes. At the first sign of comprehension, the start of the child’s education was immediate. From mystery literatures like Sherlock Holmes to the brainteasers and crosswords in the Sunday Times, the boy was trained in the art of investigations and mind work. The goal was for him to obey his superiors and surpass Batman, but it was to be seen whether he was to succeed him or destroy him.

                  Simultaneously, another son of Batman was in the making. Unlike Project Beyond, it was not preceded by Cadmus nor was the goal of the child’s creation to replace Batman. Rather a weapon, this other boy was created as an heir. Ras al Ghul, in his search for the perfect heir, found Batman. Though he was unable to draw the man into his ranks he opted for the next best option. He will use this man to create his perfect heir. With assistance from his daughter, Talia, the League of Assassins managed to obtain semen samples and proceeded with in vitro fertilization. 

                  Like Project Beyond, the child produced was male with similar traits and at the moment of comprehension, he too was drawn into training. However, unlike the other he was not trained in the matters of the mind. Instead, he was trained in body and spirit. Fully capable of killing a full-grown man before he could even read. It was uncertain if he would succeed his grandfather as planned, but one thing is for certain, by blood he and Project Beyond are sons of the night.  

Edits

Welcome to the Sons of the Night and Nights of Tomorrow fan-fiction series that is continually being posted on Fanfiction.net. While the series will be continue on fanfiction.net, the edited chapters will be hosted on this site. I do hope you'll enjoy this series as much as I did in writing it!