DARKENING SKIES

By David Brashear

“We need to talk.”  Connor Ellis rolled his eyes when the sound of Roy Harper’s voice came from behind him.  He was seated in a chemistry lab, finishing up some homework.

Connor resisted an urge to toss the beaker in front of him at Roy, instead choosing to swivel around on his stool.  Just as he’d expected, Bart Allen was standing beside Roy.  “Well, well, well,” Connor said.  “I should’ve expected it would be the two of you together again.  You know,” he said, dropping his voice. “If you two keep this up, people are going to start thinking you’re a couple.”

Bart flushed red but Roy kept focused.  “Cheshire’s using you,” he said.

Connor smiled.  “You bet she is,” he said.  “She used me about five or six times last night alone.  And neither one of us had any complaints.  Now if you two will kindly clear out, I’ve got homework to do.”

“You need to listen to him, Connor,” Bart said.  “There’s something you don’t know.”

Connor slammed a fist onto the lab table.  “I know everything!” he snarled through clenched teeth.  “For example, are you aware of the fact that Roy’s her ex?”

“I know,” Bart said.  “It wasn’t exactly a secret.”

Connor laughed.  “She’s told me all about how pathetic old Roy was.”

Roy put a hand on Connor’s shoulder.  “I think you need to settle down,” Roy said.

“Take your hand off me or I’ll take it off at the wrist,” Connor warned.

Bart suddenly appeared between the two as they glared at each other.  “Let’s turn it down a notch, okay?” he asked.

“Listen to Bart,” Roy said in a firm voice.  “You don’t want to do this, Connor.”

An instant later Roy saw Connor’s fist flying toward him and he dodged it, only for the fist to slam into Bart’s face.  Bart took a step back with a surprised look on his face that was only exaggerated by the blood that was beginning to flow from his split lip.  Bart touched his lip gently and looked at the red smear on his fingers.  Rage twisted his features.

“Forget it,” Bart snarled.  “You two deserve each other.”  Without another word he turned and stormed out of the room, leaving Connor and Roy to glare at each other.

Tensions were high across the campus as well, where Merlyn had pulled Jade into his office.  She sat idly in the chair before his desk while twirling her hair.  “What is wrong with you?” he demanded, thumping his desk with his fist for emphasis. “You’re supposed to be working on Connor Ellis – not some little loser like Maynard.”

Jade stopped twirling her hair and turned to look at Merlyn for the first time.  She fixed him with a glare.  “Don’t talk about Maynard like that,” she warned in a cold voice.

Merlyn smirked.  “Is the mighty Cheshire smitten by a nerd?” he asked.

An instant later he was lying on his back with Jade kneeling on his chest, a hand twisted into claws that were ready to rake his face.

“I wouldn’t,” he warned.

Jade simply hissed in response.

Merlyn unobtrusively slipped a hand into his pocket and withdrew a small dart.  He jabbed it into Jade’s thigh.  She gasped and fell to the ground, immobile.

Merlyn stood and straightened his jacket.  “Apparently you’ve forgotten that you’re not the only one who dabbles in poisons around here, my dear,” he said.  “You’ll regain movement in an hour or so.  Think about what you’ve done.  Once you’re mobile again, we’ll continue our discussion.”

Without another word Merlyn picked his chair up from the floor, sat down at his desk, and started reviewing paperwork.

“We need to talk,” Karin Grace said.  She shut the door to Rick Flagg’s office behind her and sat down in front of his desk.

“And good morning to you, too,” Rick said, turning from his computer.  “What can I do for you, Doctor?”

“It’s Merlyn,” she said.  She laid a manila file folder on Rick’s desk.  “I’m worried about what he’s up to.  I think he’s planning to hurt these students.”

Rick picked up the folder and thumbed through it, noting that she’d included pictures of several students – Cissie Jones, Roy Harper, Charlie Parker, Connor Ellis, Bart Allen, Donna Troy, and Duela Dent.  “Our group of the usual troublemakers,” Rick said before dropping the folder back onto his desk.  “It’s nothing unusual that Merlyn would want to keep an eye on them.  What makes you think that he wants to hurt them?”

Karin pounded her fist onto the desk, causing Flagg to jump.  “Don’t play those games with me,” Karin growled.  “I know he wants to kill these kids, and I know he’s been putting pressure on you to let him.  Don’t try to lie to me.  You couldn’t when we were married, and you still can’t.”

Flagg steepled his fingers and studied Karin over them while fighting to keep his face and voice neutral.  “There’s no need to be insulting,” he said coolly.  “I’d advise that you remember your position, Doctor.”  He stressed the last word.  “Everything is well in hand.”

Karin’s face was beet red.  She snatched the folder off Flagg’s desk and stormed out of the office, slamming the door behind her.

Flagg slumped over his desk when she was gone.  Although he’d tried to maintain a united front, he still had a gnawing feeling inside him that Merlyn was up to something.  He took a drink of coffee, turned to his computer, and started entering commands.

Maybe it was time to see what Merlyn was really up to.

Charlie and Duela walked through the grounds hand in hand.

“How did it go last night?” she asked in a low voice.

“Not bad,” Charlie said.  “I don’t think anybody spotted me and I got a good look around from the air.  I didn’t try and get off campus, though.  I don’t know what kind of security they may have rigged up.  I can tell you one thing, though – we’re really out in the middle of nowhere.  I couldn’t even see any lights off in the distance.  If we’re going to get out of here, we’re going to need transportation.”

Duela nodded.  “I’ll pass that along to Bart and Roy.  Maybe one of them can get us something.”  Just then Bart slammed into the two of them and kept walking.

“Bart?” Duela asked.  “What’s wrong?”

Bart turned and there was an unusual rage burning behind his eyes.  There were also what appeared to be a couple of drops of blood staining his white shirt.

“Bart?” Duela asked again.  “Did something happen with Connor?”

“Connor and Roy can both go to hell,” Bart snarled before turning and storming off without another word.

Duela and Charlie looked at each other.  “He’s really mad,” Charlie noted.

“I think that it’s going to take guy talk to get this sorted out,” Duela said before planting a kiss on Charlie’s cheek.

“Thanks heaps,” Charlie said drily.  “Your faith in me is overwhelming.”

“Let me know how it turns out,” Duela said.  “I’ve got to get to my literature class.  Good luck.”  She hurried off across the quad toward an imposing stone building.

Charlie sighed, turned, and started after Bart.

Karin Grace sat in her office, staring at the photos of the students she’d taken to Flagg.  A deep feeling of unease was gnawing at her as she looked at the pictures without seeing them.  She took a deep breath as her thoughts returned to the crux of the problem.  She knew what Merlyn’s endgame for these kids was.

The question was what was she going to do about it?

Cissie lowered her bow and smiled.  She’d managed to bulls-eye five out of six of the arrows she’d fired and the one that had missed was barely off the mark.

“Nice work,” Donna said from behind her.  Cissie turned to see her standing in the door of the massive gymnasium.

“Thanks,” Cissie said.  She set the bow down and walked to the target to retrieve her arrows.  “I’ve been practicing.”

“It shows,” Donna said.  She walked to the firing position, picked up the bow, and pulled the bowstring to test it.  “Nice bow,” she noted.  “It’s got a really smooth pull.”

“Roy’s worked with me to improve it,” Cissie said as she approached with a handful of arrows.

Donna lowered the bow and turned to look face-on at Cissie.  “How are you doing?” she asked in a lower voice.

Cissie got a frightened look on her face.  “I don’t know,” she confessed.  She sat down on the floor and dropped the arrows beside her.  Donna sat down on the other side of her.  “I know we have to do this,” she said.  “I know that Danny’s been telling us that Merlyn’s going to try and kill us.  I know that we’ve got to get out of here to save our lives.  But I’m still terrified.”  Cissie sniffed back tears and looked at Donna.  “Does that mean I’m crazy?”

Donna smiled a reassuring smile.  “No,” she said in a gentle tone.  “It means that you’re sane.  We’re all scared.  I’d say that even Connor would be.”

Cissie’s eyes got wider at the mention of Connor’s name.  “Really?” she asked.

“Yes,” Donna said.  “We’re getting ready to escape from the only world that we’ve ever known into something that is completely unknown to all of us.  We’re all terrified.  But as long as we’ve got each other, we won’t fall.”  Donna reached out and grasped Cissie’s forearm.  “Stand with us,” Donna said kindly but firmly.  “We need you.”

“I will,” Cissie said, trying to force her voice to be as strong as Donna’s was.

“Together we won’t fall,” Donna repeated.  “And if one of us stumbles, the rest of us will pick that person up and we will continue forward together.”

“Together,” Cissie said with a smile that contrasted with the tears that still streamed down her cheeks.

However, the fear in her voice was gone.

“You want to talk about it?”

Bart was fuming while sitting on his bed in his dorm room when Charlie’s voice came from the door.  Bart glared at him in response.

“Fine.  You don’t want to talk,” Charlie said.  He walked into the room and studied Bart’s face.  He picked up a washcloth, walked out, and came back with it a moment later.  It was now wet.  Charlie stepped up close to Bart and started dabbing at his lip with it.  “At least we can clean you up.”

“What’s the point?” Bart snarled.  “We’re all going to die because those two idiots are too focused on Cheshire to do what needs to be done.”

Charlie stepped back and pulled a chair out from under what had been Connor’s desk.  He spun it around backwards and sat down.  He still held the bloody washcloth in his hand.  “So tell me what happened,” he said.

Bart scowled a moment.  “Roy and I figured out that Cheshire was using some sort of drug in her perfume to drive Connor crazy for her.  We handed the bottle off to Maynard and he’s got Cheshire chasing him now.  We went to talk to Connor and he took a swing at Roy that nailed me.”

“So are you mad at them because of the situation or are you just embarrassed that they tagged you?” Charlie asked.

Bart thought a long moment.  “I don’t know,” he finally confessed, dropping his head.  “I just wonder when everything got so weird.”

Charlie smiled.  “So you’re a little frayed at the edges.  I think we all are.  You think I like flying recon over the campus at night while trying not to get spotted?  Thanks to you know who, our lives have gotten crazy.  You think I don’t want to go back to just being a normal student whose only concern is where Duela and me are going to eat lunch?  Of course I do.”

Charlie let out a long breath.

“You know, there are times I think I’m going to lose it down on the campus.  I just want to yell out that Merl’s trying to kill us and let everybody know so we’ll all storm the admin building and take care of him.  I want to tell everybody about that Mahkent guy that you guys found in the basement of that old lab building.  I want to do all that and I can’t.”

Charlie’s eyes bored deep into Bart’s.

“We’ve got to lead these dual lives until we’re out of here.  If anybody – Merl or even Flagg – knew what we were up to we’d be done.  Even if they didn’t kill us or drug us out of our minds, they’d be watching us so close that one of us couldn’t blow his nose without getting put on report.”  Charlie took another breath and paused a moment.  “I know it’s hard and it sucks.  But we’ve just got to keep going.  We’re going to get out of this mess sooner or later.”

Bart was slowly nodding.  “You’re right,” he conceded.

Charlie smiled.  “Course I am,” he said.  “Now you need to get that shirt changed and into the laundry before you can’t get those bloodstains out.”

Bart glanced down with surprise at the darkening red drops.  “I didn’t even realize I’d dripped,” he said.

“You never do,” Charlie said as he stood and pushed the chair back into its place.  “Now hurry and get changed.  You’ve got class in five minutes.”

Bart smiled his usual smile.  “I don’t think that’ll be a problem.”  An instant later he appeared before Charlie in a new white shirt.  “Ready to head out when you are.  Here.”  He handed Charlie a textbook.

“You blow my mind sometimes,” Charlie said as he chuckled and shook his head.

Connor’s hand shook in the chemistry lab.  He set the beaker he’d been working with down and glared at the door.  He was still mad at Roy.  That was all.  But why did he feel so weak?

He rubbed his hand across his forehead and it came away wet.  He stared at the sweat on his forehead.

“What’s wrong with me?” Connor asked with speech that was slurring.  He tried to step away from the worktable and collapsed to the floor.  He lay there for only a moment or two before consciousness fled from him and he fell into blackness.

Next Issue: What has happened to Connor?  Can the team come together again? And what happens when a face from the past resurfaces?