The second site was smaller, more discreet.
An old truck repair facility just outside Gotham's industrial perimeter, tucked between a drainage canal and a forgotten rail yard. On paper, it had been shut down for years. In practice, the Titans had flagged multiple signals—power spikes, encrypted drone movement, and bio-signature suppression fields hidden under routine maintenance codes.
This time, they came prepared.
Cyborg had scrambled satellite loops to prevent surveillance flagging. Robin analyzed the terrain and building layout the moment they arrived. Starfire and Beast Boy remained airborne in slow circular patrols while Raven kept her senses stretched through the building.
Nothing obvious.
No guards, no defenses—nothing to suggest a lab existed beneath the cracked asphalt and rusted sheet metal.
Which made it more suspicious.
"They knew we were coming," Robin muttered, crouched beside a disconnected circuit junction near the back entrance. "All access points are sealed, but not armed. This place wasn't abandoned. It was stripped."
Cyborg nodded from the other side of the doorway. "All traces of hard storage wiped. Power's still trickling in from an off-grid generator. Could be a decoy."
"Could be a trap," Raven said quietly. She hovered just above the ground, eyes half-closed, focused on something no one else could see. "I feel echoes. Residue."
Robin looked up. "Pain?"
She shook her head. "Not fear either. Something more… controlled. Like routine observation."
Starfire landed lightly beside them. "If they fled, why leave power running?"
Cyborg ran another scan, frowning. "Because whatever they moved wasn't everything. Either they didn't have time to finish or something kept them from taking the full setup."
Robin stood. "Then we look for what they left."
He gave a short signal. The team split into two groups—Robin, Raven, and Cyborg through the lower maintenance tunnels; Starfire and Beast Boy looping from the roof through the collapsed south side.
The corridors inside were tight—narrow, metallic, with faded hazard signs and industrial vents that hadn't been cleaned in a decade. A faint antiseptic smell lingered. Not fresh, but not old either. The air recirculators were still active.
Cyborg stopped at a half-burned access panel and ran a cable from his arm into the port. "They scrubbed logs, but not deep enough. There's a residual pattern in the power draw. They were running biometric containment pods down here. Eight at minimum. Three weeks ago."
"Destination?" Robin asked.
"Blank. Internal routing only."
Raven glanced down another hallway. "I sense something ahead. Lower level."
Robin nodded and moved forward.
They followed the narrow staircase downward, past warning signs and into a reinforced sub-level. Here, the silence felt heavier. Lights flickered once, then steadied.
They entered a room that looked like a storage vault.
Four large frames stood at the back wall—pods, partially dismantled. Tubes disconnected, metal plating still slick with something synthetic. The walls had several small crates stacked along them—unmarked, sealed with biometric locks. Most were empty.
One wasn't.
Robin pried it open carefully with a tool from his belt. Inside were documents—physical, handwritten annotations over schematics and charts. He passed them to Cyborg.
"Looks like movement orders. Batch tags. Sample identifications. Some are location strings."
Cyborg's eyes glowed briefly as he scanned. "Two of these match with facilities across the river. Not labs. Logistics hubs. Could be staging points."
Raven slowly stepped toward the pods, her hand hovering over one of the inactive tubes. Her expression darkened.
"Something was grown here," she murmured. "Something conscious."
Robin turned. "Can you tell if it's connected to what we saw before?"
"I don't need to," Raven said quietly. "This one was active after the first lab was destroyed. They didn't stop. They just split the process."
Footsteps echoed from above.
Robin reacted instantly, stepping toward the stairs and signaling silence.
But it wasn't hostile.
Starfire landed smoothly beside him a moment later. Beast Boy shifted from a hawk into his usual form behind her, brushing dust off his shoulders.
"Perimeter's clear," Beast Boy said. "If there was anyone here, they're long gone."
Starfire added, "We found a data uplink on the roof, connected to a relay tower. It was transmitting encrypted logs until three days ago."
Robin nodded. "They ran when we hit the first lab. They've probably relocated again. But now we've got something."
He turned to Cyborg. "Can you trace the uplink signal path?"
"Not in full, but I can get the last node it hit. Could take me a few hours to work through the noise."
"Do it."
Robin looked over the others.
"We won't stop them here. But we're starting to see how they operate. They set up multiple sites and abandoned them on rotation. That takes coordination. Funding. We need to find where they actually stay, not where they work."
Beast Boy frowned. "How many of these places do you think there are?"
Robin didn't answer.
Raven did. "Enough to lose track of one."
Starfire asked quietly, "And what of the boy? Alexander."
Robin hesitated, then looked back at the opened pod. The wiring, the sediment stains, the scars on the metal where something once lived.
"He found the first lab before us. Someone pointed him there."
"Do you think he's involved?" Cyborg asked.
"I don't know," Robin said. "But whoever built these sites didn't expect him. That alone makes him worth watching."
Beast Boy crossed his arms. "He helped. He wasn't hostile."
"I'm not calling him a threat," Robin said. "But people like that don't just wander into places like this without reason. Someone gave him a push."
Silence settled over the group.
Robin finally spoke again.
"Let's scrub this place clean. I want everything logged. If there's another site—and there will be—we're going to get there first."
---
The transmission from the rooftop relay wasn't direct. It bounced through eight intermediary nodes—most of them disguised as old municipal servers or abandoned satellite towers—before hitting its endpoint.
What made it strange was the redundancy.
"They weren't just hiding the signal," Cyborg explained, his voice flat as the team gathered around the table in their mobile base. "They were testing response time, packet integrity, and reroute algorithms. Like they were watching who followed it."
Robin leaned over the display. "A honeypot?"
"More like a minefield. But I found the last node that responded. It's underground, outside Gotham—an old Cold War listening post. Last listed under a fake utility firm, inactive for decades. It's in the forest west of Route 16. Signal history shows recent activity—last pinged two days ago."
Starfire frowned. "Could it still be occupied?"
"Possibly. But even if they've moved, it's the most solid trail we've got."
Robin nodded. "We go in tonight."
They left the city quietly.
By dusk, the Titans had reached the perimeter of the forest. The sun was setting, casting long shadows between the pine trees. Robin used thermal drones to scout from above while Cyborg rerouted satellite attention away from their path.
The facility was buried beneath a ridge of limestone, almost invisible without knowing what to look for. A faded concrete slab—chipped and overgrown—marked the entrance. Most would've walked right past it.
"Still has power," Cyborg said, tapping a handheld scanner. "Minimal, just enough to keep a basic system running. They're either still using it... or it was left running for a reason."
Robin stepped forward, motioning for silence. He knelt at the hatch and slid a tool between the edges. It opened with a quiet hiss, releasing a faint scent of cold air and oil.
They moved in.
The interior was narrow and metallic—an old spiral tunnel lined with steel support ribs. Rust decorated the walls, but the deeper they went, the cleaner it got. Someone had kept this part maintained.
Beast Boy whispered, "Why does this feel more like a bunker than a lab?"
"Because it was one," Robin replied. "And someone repurposed it."
After twenty meters, the corridor opened into a wider chamber—once a command center, now rearranged into something between a lab and a surveillance hub. Monitors blinked quietly on one side. The opposite wall held equipment—familiar tubes, IV setups, and cages, all empty now. No signs of a struggle.
Starfire moved forward. "These pods... they are like the ones from before."
Robin walked to a central desk, flipping through an open folder.
This time, the contents were more direct: maps, observation notes, subject IDs.
There were photos too.
He paused.
One showed Alex.
A grainy, zoomed-in image of him standing outside the remains of the first lab. Notes beside it highlighted anomalies: "Unregistered bio-signature. Interfered with security lockdown. Possible asset breach?"
Robin passed the photo to the others.
"They knew about him."
"They were tracking him," Raven said.
Cyborg brought up another document. "This isn't just research. These are logistics. Shipping records. Security clearances. Names. Aliases. Timelines."
Robin glanced over. "Do we have locations?"
"One. Just one."
Cyborg zoomed in on the screen. It was a map of Gotham, with a dot marked deep in the industrial zone. "Tagged 'Transfer Site: Umbra 3'. No coordinates, just a designation. But this is the first hint we've seen of any central control point."
Robin narrowed his eyes.
"Then that's our next target."
Beast Boy stepped beside him. "And Alex?"
"We leave him alone," Robin said. "He's not the enemy. But we stay aware. If someone's trying to use him—or if he's deeper into this than we know—we'll deal with it then."
Raven stood quietly at the far end of the room. Her hand hovered above the old wall panel, her fingers brushing the edge of the cold steel.
"There's something beneath us," she said softly.
Robin turned.
She closed her eyes. "Residual pain. Stronger than at the last site. Not recent, but not old either. They kept someone here. More than one."
Starfire looked around the room. "But they are gone now."
"Yes," Raven said. "But whoever did this left in a hurry. I can feel their fear. Not of being caught. Of what they were building."
Robin stepped toward her.
"Then we need to find out what it was."
---
The team began copying data.
Cyborg built a mirrored database on a secure server—one not even the Justice League had access to. Robin wanted it kept off the radar. This wasn't an ordinary operation. Too many unknowns.
"Umbra 3 might be a hub," Cyborg said. "If we hit it, we could cut off a full segment of their operation. But we only get one shot. Once we act, they'll scatter again."
"Then we hit hard," Robin replied. "No warnings. No delay. We move before they know we're even on the way."
He looked around at the others.
"We've chased shadows long enough. Now we hit the source."
---
The next night, the Titans stood on the roof of an abandoned warehouse overlooking Gotham's industrial zone.
Umbra 3 was beneath a textile plant long since closed—its outer walls cracked and its chimneys rusted over, but the pattern of activity below was unmistakable.
Thermal scans showed generators running underground. Movement. Not many bodies, but enough to keep the lights on.
"Power grid says the place is dead," Cyborg muttered, looking at his scanner. "But they're pulling juice from a private line rerouted through shell companies. Someone went out of their way to hide this place."
Robin adjusted the strap on his arm guard. "Entry point?"
Cyborg nodded toward a ventilation duct beside one of the defunct loading bays. "Goes down to maintenance. There's a ladder that'll bypass their main security corridor."
"Any sign of Alex?" Starfire asked.
"Not yet. No trace of his energy signature—assuming we even know what to look for. But if he's here, he's buried deep."
Robin crouched. "We stick to the plan. In and out. Copy everything. Confirm if this is where they're controlling the labs from. We don't engage unless necessary."
"Unless they're hurting people," Beast Boy added. "Then we make it real necessary."
Robin gave a small nod. "Yeah. Then we don't hold back."
---
They slipped in through the vent without a sound.
Once inside, the Titans moved like shadows.
The underground levels were cleaner than expected—fresh metal plating lined the walls, and reinforced glass covered doorways leading to sealed observation rooms. They passed empty rooms with unused equipment, sealed storage closets, and small barracks-style quarters.
Cyborg cracked into a control console, downloading what he could. "These guys were using this site to observe test subjects remotely. Not perform experiments themselves. Look—time logs, subject health metrics, and direct links to five different locations."
Raven narrowed her eyes. "Monitoring them like lab rats."
Robin leaned over. "Anything on who's running the operation?"
Cyborg paused. "Code names. 'Handlers' mostly. But one tag keeps coming up next to the data pulls. 'Origin Node 1.' I don't know what it means yet."
Before he could say more, the hallway lights dimmed.
Something had triggered a proximity alert.
"They know we're here," Robin said. "Form up."
Metal clunked as a pair of automated defense turrets dropped from the ceiling. Before they could fully rotate, Starfire blasted both with twin bursts of plasma. The first exploded immediately; the second sparked and twitched before collapsing.
Robin kicked open the next door. "We move now."
---
They reached the main server room.
It was colder here—lined with humming units and connected cables. A holographic interface hovered in the air, cycling through site statistics.
Cyborg got to work. "If they were planning to bail, they didn't do it yet. Files are still here. And—wait…"
He pulled up a feed.
On one of the nearby monitors, a live video played.
It showed a boy.
Twelve years old. Sitting calmly on a bench inside a locked cell. His face was thin, almost sickly, but his eyes were alert. Watching the camera. Watching them.
Robin froze.
Cyborg pulled up the feed ID. "This isn't recorded. This is real-time. He's in this building."
Raven stepped closer. "That room… it's below us. About three levels down."
Robin turned. "They didn't evacuate. They're hiding something."
Beast Boy transformed into a hawk and shot down the nearby stairwell, scouting ahead. "No guards," he said through the comm. "Just hallways and… a reinforced vault door. This kid must be important."
Robin led the charge down.
They reached the door in less than a minute. Cyborg began bypassing it immediately.
"Encrypted and reinforced. But old firmware. Gimme ten seconds."
Starfire hovered behind him, already powering up a blast just in case.
The vault door clicked open with a heavy grind.
The boy inside stood up immediately.
He wasn't restrained. He didn't speak. He just tilted his head slightly and watched them, his expression neutral—almost too calm.
Robin stepped in slowly. "We're not here to hurt you. What's your name?"
The boy blinked. "Do you know Alex?"
Everyone froze.
Robin's tone shifted. "Yes. How do you know him?"
"He told me not to talk much. Just to wait. He said someone would come."
"When did he tell you that?"
The boy walked forward. "Yesterday. He broke into the lower floor. He left me a message."
Cyborg's eyes widened. "There's no breach on the lower levels in any of the logs."
"He didn't trigger alarms," the boy replied. "He turned them off."
Robin exchanged glances with the others.
The boy kept walking toward them.
"Alex said if you came, I could go with you. But only if you promised not to follow him."
Robin looked him in the eye. "Where did he go?"
The boy shrugged. "Up. He said it's time to do something important."
Robin's jaw clenched. "You're saying he was here… while we were coming in?"
"Maybe. Maybe he still is. But you won't find him unless he wants you to."
Robin turned to Cyborg. "Is the data transfer done?"
"Almost. Got 80%. We leave now or we risk losing the uplink."
Robin hesitated.
They had a choice.
Stay and search for Alex—and possibly lose everything they'd gathered—or get out clean, with proof of the network's reach and a rescued subject.
Raven stepped beside him. "He's not in danger. The kid is telling the truth."
Robin gave a single nod. "Alright. Everyone out. Secure the boy. Pull the rest of the data en route."
---
Fifteen minutes later, the Titans were back above ground.
The building collapsed behind them as failsafes kicked in—Cyborg had rigged the systems to overload once they'd pulled the server core.
They disappeared into the night with one more piece of the puzzle in their hands.
And Alex—wherever he was—had slipped away again.
---
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