As the heavy fog in Jake's head slowly receded, a cold, sharp feeling took its place.
No, he wasn't feeling a single shred of remorse for killing Girder.
Not even a damn drop.
That arrogant, iron-plated bastard had practically begged for death the exact moment he decided to pull Jake and his friends into his pathetic little mess.
Melting him into a steaming puddle was just simple pest control.
What actually made Jake's skin crawl was the unnatural, heavy drowsiness that had washed over the area—and the fact that every single civilian in the amusement park had hit the pavement like a sack of dead weight.
The more his mind cleared, the more his dragon instincts and magical lessons clicked together.
Pixies.
It had to be.
Those insidious little freak-shows were notorious for this kind of subtle, cowardly trickery.
Their pollen could knock out an entire crowd in seconds, lulling them into an artificial coma.
And considering Jake himself had almost succumbed to the sleep spell, the sheer concentration of magic was alarming.
There weren't just a couple of pixies floating around Central City; there was a damn swarm of them.
FOOOOOOSH!
Before Jake could fully process the thought, a sudden, blinding yellow blur tore through the amusement park.
A localized tempest of dust, dead leaves, and shredded trash kicked up in its wake as the figure skidded to an abrupt halt.
Standing there in a yellow and red-streaked suit with his hair flying loose was a teenager practically vibrating with the energy of a squirrel on cosmic-grade steroids.
Kid Flash.
The Flash's bright-eyed, obnoxious little sidekick.
"HOLY SHIT! WHAT IN THE SEVEN HELLS HAPPENED HERE?!" Kid Flash yelled, his voice cracking slightly as his eyes darted around the desolate fairgrounds.
Civilians were sprawled across the asphalt, sleeping like corpses, while scorch marks, smashed booths, and shattered iron littered the ground.
Kid Flash's sharp gaze snapped over to Jake, who was the only one, standing tall with a bare, ash-stained chest and burnt holes in his jeans.
The young speedster narrowed his eyes, studying Jake's face until recognition hit him like a freight train.
Robin had briefed the team about this guy.
The fire-breathing, dragon-themed psycho who had brutally incinerated Mammoth back in New York.
That bloody incident had gone viral overnight, sending shockwaves through the hero community and putting the Teen Titans under massive pressure from the public and the Justice League alike.
Batman already had the intel, and Robin had passed it down:
Dangerous. Unpredictable.
And certainly not shy away from killing.
And now, that exact same walking disaster was standing in the middle of Central City.
Trouble hadn't just followed him—he'd brought the whole damn circus with him.
In less than a millisecond, a crack of thunder echoed as Kid Flash closed the distance, stopping mere inches from Jake.
Jake didn't flinch.
He didn't even take his hands out of his pockets.
He just stared down at the speedster with bloodshot, irritated eyes.
The two stood in a tense, suffocating standoff—Kid Flash with his arms crossed tightly over his chest, his jaw set, and Jake looking like he couldn't give a smaller shit about the superhero standing in front of him.
"What the fuck are you doing here?" KF demanded, his tone laced with venom. "Weren't you supposed to be terrorizing New York? And... god, what is that utterly repulsive smell?!"
Kid Flash gagged, covering his nose and mouth with a gloved hand as a rank, nauseating odor hit him.
It was thick, chemical, and distinctly wrong.
He tracked the stench to a smoking crater a few feet away.
Inside was a bubbling, metallic sludge—a pool of melted iron that smelled horribly, indisputably like burnt, liquefied human flesh.
"What... what is this?" Kid Flash stuttered, his fast-talking bravado faltering for a fraction of a second. "What the hell did you do?"
Jake didn't answer.
He just let out a heavy, exhausted breath and turned his back on the speedster, ready to walk away.
He was way too pissed off to deal with a sidekick in spandex.
"Hey! I asked you a fucking question!" Kid Flash snapped.
A yellow flash hummed, and suddenly Kid Flash was standing directly in Jake's path again, blocking his exit.
A low, guttural growl vibrated deep within Jake's chest.
His eyes flashed an incandescent, reptilian gold, and his fangs extended past his lip.
"Get the fuck out of my way, squirrel," Jake snarled, his voice carrying the dangerous weight of a dragon reaching its limit.
Kid Flash flinched slightly at the sight of the fangs, but he held his ground. "Not a chance in hell. Not until you tell me what happened here! I was tracking Girder's signature to bust him, and now he's gone, and everyone in this park is knocked out cold like it's fucking sleeping beauty land!"
Jake pinched the bridge of his nose, exhaling a thin wisp of smoke from his nostrils. "Listen to me very carefully, sidekick. I just put down a colossal asshole, and I am not in the mood to trade punches with a teenager. I have people I actually give a shit about to check on."
Jake pointed a clawed finger toward the smoking crater. "You want to know where your buddy Girder went? He had a bit of a meltdown. Literally. As for these unconscious people? The trick is pixies. Their pollen is toxic if left in the lungs too long. So instead of wasting my fucking time, use that super-speed of yours to start hauling these civilians to a hospital before their brains turn to mush."
Kid Flash looked from Jake to the pool of glowing, flesh-scented iron, and the grim reality finally hit him.
His face went completely pale.
His stomach violently turned inside out as his brain processed what he was looking at.
This bastard hadn't just defeated Girder; he had literally melted him alive down to his cellular level.
KF slammed a hand over his mouth, suppressing a hard dry-heave as his throat burned with stomach acid.
"You... you fucking monster," KF choked out, his voice trembling with a mixture of horror and pure disgust. "How could you do that to a person?"
Jake just shrugged indifferently, stepping past him. "Forget about it and go do your hero job. Move the bodies."
"Don't you dare tell me what to do, you psychotic fuck!" KF screamed after him, his fists trembling.
He wanted to throw a lightning-fast punch, wanted to tear that arrogant, unbothered smirk off the guy's face and drag him to a maximum-security cell.
But he looked around at the hundreds of helpless, unconscious citizens lying on the cold concrete.
The priority was saving lives.
Heroes didn't leave people to die.
He'd save these people, contact Flash, and let the League hunt this murderer down.
*********
Ignoring the screaming speedster behind him, Jake leaped up onto the padded roof of the nearby souvenir shop.
Sprawled out on the vinyl roof were Trixie and Spud.
Both of them were out cold, wrapped around each other in a frantic, subconscious embrace like a pair of terrified lovers.
Under any other circumstance, Jake would have burst out laughing and taken a photo to mock them for the next six months.
He gave a soft snort, but the humor instantly vanished when his eyes swept the rest of the roof.
It was empty.
His breath caught in his throat.
"Haley?" Jake called out, his voice tighter than before.
Silence answered him.
Just the distant hum of the city and the rustle of the wind.
"Haley! Stop messing around, squirt! This isn't funny!" he warned, his tone growing sharp, desperate.
Nothing.
No clever comeback, no bright dragon squeak, no sign of life.
"HALEY!"
Jake roared her name at the absolute top of his lungs, a wave of icy, paralyzing dread flooding his veins.
It all made sense now.
The drowsiness.
The pixie magic.
Girder acting as a loud, stupid distraction.
It had all been a trap.
Haley was the actual target all along.
While he was busy dealing with that iron idiot, some unseen bastard had crept in under the cover of the sleep spell and snatched his little sister.
He had failed.
He had sworn to protect his family, and he had let them walk right into an ambush.
Seeing red, a wave of pure, unadulterated rage washed over Jake's mind.
He snatched Spud and Trixie by their collars with one hand, dropped off the roof, and hit the ground running toward the entrance of the park.
Kid Flash was already zipping around at blinding speeds, stacking unconscious civilians near the gates.
Jake marched up and dumped Trixie and Spud right at the speedster's feet.
"Take care of them," Jake growled, his voice deep, dangerous, and echoing with dark magic. "Ensure they get to an ICU immediately."
Huge, crimson dragon wings burst violently from Jake's back as he prepared to launch himself into the air.
"Hey! Don't boss me around, you motherfucker!" Kid Flash yelled, wiping sweat from his forehead as he glared at the monstrous wings. "Where the fuck do you think you're going?!"
"To find my sister!" Jake screamed back, blasting off into the midnight sky with a sonic boom that shattered the glass of every nearby food cart.
Kid Flash shielded his eyes from the sudden gust of wind, watching the fiery crimson streak disappear into the clouds.
He gritted his teeth, cursing loudly under his breath before grabbing another pair of unconscious park-goers.
"The crazy bastard has a sister...?" KF muttered, a chill running down his spine as he realized just how terrifying Central City was about to become.