Young Justice: Red Beetle

Chapter 48 - Chains

—Jaime

I couldn't do it. I just couldn't do it.

Aiming the plasma gun right at her, with that smile that doesn't belong. It was logical, the Scarab screamed at me to do it.

But I couldn't.

Not only did she get away, we still aren't even one step closer to figuring out how to get Remy off mode.

We're all standing in the mission room, Batgirl is on the computer, still tracking Remy. Impulse is by my side, while Wonder Girl is talking to Robin who just joined us.

"What's the plan now?" Robin asked, after being filled in by Wonder Girl.

"We can only track her down again and— Why is she stopping at the Hall of Justice?" Batgirl stares at the computer intensely. Robin moves to her side to look at the monitor with her. She begins typing furiously on the keyboard.

"What's going on?" I ask, concerned.

"There's a huge electrical energy storm gathering right above the Hall of Justice. It's tampering into all nearby electronics and messing them up. Oh no she's—"

"Come in, Cave." The dark knight's face appears on the monitor. Batman's at the Watchtower. "Something is attacking the Hall of Justice. The energy is—" Then his voice cuts out and there's nothing but static where his image was.

"Oh, no." Robin breathes out.

"What's happening?" Impulse asks frantically.

"All communicate to the Watchtower is jammed. No Zeta tubes, nothing is working up there."

"How is that possible?" Wonder Girl asks.

"I don't know!" Batgirl says, "It should be impossible, yet, somehow, Remy's doing this."

"She's not doing this," I argue. "The Scarab is controlling her, making her do this. This isn't Remy's fault."

"Whatever's going on, it's happening to the Cave too." Robin says, then the Zeta Tubes activate.

"Hurry, get to the Zeta tube! They'll take us to the Hall of Justice." Batgirl says, standing up and charging for the Zeta tubes.

I immediately fly to the Zeta Tubes, we all get through just before it flickers out and disappears. As we take in our surroundings, we're standing right in front of the Hall of Justice. Well, what used to be the Hall of Justice building.

The roof is completely torn off, all four walls barely standing. The skies are twisting towards the center of a dark storm coming from the center of the building. The Reach mother ships silently floats in the skies above the Justice Building. We all charge through the broken doors, and I see Red Beetle standing in front of a large cylinder machine twice as tall as her.

It's covered in glass with four steel tubes lined up on the sides. In the center rests the metal sphere that was stolen from the souvenir room. It currently is being feed clear liquid through tubes at the bottom, which goes through the sphere and out of the top as thick black gas that pushes towards the skies, adding to the violent storms above.

"Do you know what happens to a human when you take the fight right out of them?" Remy's voice says as she turns to face us.

"They become nothing." She smiles, looking right at me.

"What are you doing?" Robin demands, his bo-staff ready in his hands.

She looks at him, her sinister smile on her lips. "The machine will release dopamine polymerase, an addictive brain chemical that induces feelings of pleasure and well-being, an adrenaline inhibitor, which blocks production of adrenaline, a chemical responsible for the body's fight or flight response, and a mitochondrial marker that works as a Meta-Gene tracer."