Clean Sweep Ch. 28 (DC Comics) (Patreon)

(Every character depicted in the story below is a consenting legal adult over the age of 18)

A/N: Cole is making bad decisions right now.

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A woman is dead. And for what? The faintly glowing stone in his palm? No… Cole knows that’s not true. The shopkeeper had died because Raven’s half-brother had come knocking on behalf of her father, trying to get to him so that they could use Raven to end the world.

Obviously, Cole couldn’t let that happen… but he had to admit, even he hadn’t expected his plan to work as well as it did. At first he was just putting on a brave face when he’d challenged Greed directly like that. Initially he hadn’t wanted the half-demon to see his fear or anxiety, nor had he wanted Raven to know he was scared.

It was only as he’d been talking that he’d realized what he could do to even the playing field a little bit. By using his magic, he could disrupt the connection Greed had to his father the same as he’d done to Raven. That said, Cole had figured that the Son of Trigon still probably had plenty of his own power to fight with and that it would be more of a battle than it was.

But no. He’d overestimated their enemy and underestimated Raven… by a lot, really. All of Greed’s power, all of his magic, had come from Trigon. A mere sliver of the Demon Lord’s might had been enough to completely erase a woman and her shop from existence. And yet… take that away and he was nothing.

Well, maybe not quite nothing. Raven’s attack would have likely pulped a normal human being. Flinging him out of the shop and all the way across a street… no human was getting up from that and walking it off. Greed had though, he’d fled by the time they’d gone after him.

So as a half-demon, he wasn’t completely powerless… but he was definitely a whole lot weaker without daddy’s help. That was good to know… but also bad to know if that made sense? On the one hand, Cole felt more secure in the knowledge that he could disrupt the connection between Trigon and his agents just like he had with Raven.

On the other hand, he’d revealed that trump card to Greed way too early. If he told anyone else who might be after them… well, hopefully that wouldn’t happen. But it would still likely mean Greed would be better prepared the next time he tried something. And there would be a next time, of that Cole was confident.

Still, he can’t help but feel… dissatisfied. The death of the woman weighs on him, but Cole knows he can’t let himself take the blame for it… not Raven either. Yes, Greed was only in that shop that day because of them, but it was still Greed’s choice to involve the woman in his machinations and then kill her. Just as it was Trigon’s choice to continue to pursue his daughter as a method by which to gain access to their world and end life as they knew it.

Cole wouldn’t let that happen. He refused. But he also knew he’d need to be a lot more powerful to stop Trigon’s future gambits. The Demon Lord wasn’t just going to give up, after all.

Frowning down at the glowing stone they’d found and glancing back at the emptied shop behind them, Cole huffs.

The right thing to do in this situation would be to report this incident to Zatanna and then go home. The problem with that is… Cole really doesn’t want to call upon the Justice League member at the moment, not after how their morning went. He doesn’t want Zatanna to know he’s hunting other sources of magic either. Especially not so soon after their first lesson together.

Would she care? Would she be upset? Cole doesn’t know… and he’s not inclined to find out. More than anything, he doesn’t want today to be a complete wash and so far that’s what it’s feeling like to him. He wants to be able to say they achieved something today.

“Master?”

Raven’s inquiry pulls him out of his thoughts and causes him to look over to her. Ah, right. He should at least…

“Can you track Greed by any chance, Raven? See if we can follow him?”

Looking chagrined for not having thought of that, Raven quickly begins to cast a spell, her eyes glowing with black power. But after a moment, she shakes her head in dismay.

“… I can’t sense anything demonic Master. I doubt that he left my vicinity though… I suspect he’s cloaking himself.”

Yes, that makes sense. Ugh, Cole had really dropped the ball today, didn’t he? First by letting Greed get away in the first place and then by not ordering Raven to track him immediately, back when his connection to Trigon would have still been broken. Based on Cole and Raven’s own experiences, the application of his magic only lasted a couple of minutes at most…

Cole sighs and shakes his head.

“I don’t know about you Raven… but I’m just not satisfied with this much today. What’s say we stay out a little while longer, yeah? Scry for some more magic for us to hunt down.”

Raven blinks, glancing down at the softly glowing stone in his hand before smiling and nodding. Cole tucks it away as she casts another scrying spell. After a moment, Raven tilts her head to the side, brow furrowing. Cole’s own brow furrows as well since the last scrying didn’t take this long. What is she doing exactly?

Before he can ask, however, Raven pauses and points.

“That way.”

Cole perks up at that.

“Well then, let’s see what we find.”

Raven offers him her hand wordlessly and Cole takes it, allowing her to lead him through shadow. Sure, he would need to report this incident to Zatanna eventually… but it could wait until tomorrow, right?

Of course, the first sign he has that something has gone awry are the alarms blaring when they step out of a shadowed alleyway closer to whatever Raven has found. They sound like security alarms going off and both he and Raven pause and share a confused glance with one another.

Maybe the smart thing to do would be to just dip out there, but with his curiosity piqued, Cole can’t help but at least sneak a glance. Of course, as he does so… he finds himself staring along with Raven at the strangest of sights. There is a woman with chalky grey-white skin and bright pink hair. She’s wearing a short, black, long-sleeved leotard that shows off her long legs and creamy thighs but covers everything else.

She stands in the middle of a jewelry store with the front windows having completely shattered and fallen into a million pieces. Her eyes are glowing pink as she cackles and waves her hands, causing things to go… poorly for those around her. The security guards try to tase her, only to wind up tripping and tasing each other, and as she runs a hand across the displays of jewelry, the glass spiderwebs and cracks, as though finding its ‘one bad day’ and giving up the ghost in the process.

Cole realizes his mistake as he and Raven are watching all of this happen. He hadn’t clarified to Raven that he wanted her to continue looking for abandoned magic. Admittedly, he’d thought it was implied, but looking back on his words and seeing things from her perspective, he could understand how she’d gotten confused.

Searching for abandoned magic had led them to a dinky glowing stone after all. Raven must have thought he wanted something more worth their time. Cole still would have preferred a magical item over a magical woman though. Especially a magical woman in the midst of committing a crime.

… Damn it all, just watching her fucking around, Cole can’t help but feel a need to step in. The sheer mess she’s creating, the damage she’s causing… it’s like Chemo all over again. His feet move of his own accord as he steps out of the alley and towards the jewelry store, his hands curling into fists at his sides.

Raven quickly moves with him of course, and seeing his single-minded focus on the jewel thief, she doesn’t bother waiting for orders.

“Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos!”

Black power warps out, surrounding the chalky skinned pinkette and scooping her up into the air.

“Wha- whoa! HEY!”

Head whipping around, her eyes glow pink for a moment before she shatters Raven’s hold and drops back to the floor, catching herself with a hand palm down before hopping back to her feet.

“What’s the big idea?! Who the hell are you chucklefucks supposed to be?!”

Cole waves a hand and cleans the multitude of glass shards in his and Raven’s path, sweeping it all to the side where it organizes itself into neat, orderly piles despite its jagged nature. Their opponent’s eyes widen slightly upon seeing this ‘display of power’.

“Drop what you’ve stolen and surrender.”

The wide eyed look disappears in an instant, replaced by a mulish expression.

“Like hell! You really don’t want to pick a fight with me, cutie! The name’s Jinx and I will ruin your day, I promise you that!”

At his side, Raven growls and summons more of her magic, shadows growing out of every surface. Letting out a cackle, their opponent, apparently called Jinx, waves a hand as well, summoning more of those pink crackles of hers. At first, nothing seems to happen… and then Cole tries to take a step forward, only to trip over his own shoelaces.

Literally, his shoelaces have untied themselves and then been retied together between his shoes, leaving him to faceplant rather embarrassingly on the ground at the edge of the store.

“Master!”

Raven, of course, is immediately distracted by this and goes down on a knee to check on him, her hand landing on his shoulder. Which in turn is all the distraction that the pinkette thinks she needs. With another laugh, she runs forward and proceeds to hop over both of them, doing a somersault in midair and landing on the other side.

“Sucks to suck! Later los-eep!”

“You’re not going anywhere.”

Cole comes up from his embarrassing pratfall in time to see a very upset Raven has shot her magic out like a whip and lassoed a length of shadow around one of Jinx’s ankles. Before the pink haired villainess can do anything more than look surprised, Raven pulls rather viciously, taking Jinx off her feet entirely and causing her to slam face first into the sidewalk a moment later.

The ‘C-Crack!’ that Jinx’s head makes against the concrete does cause Cole to wince a little bit… but not too much. She’d been the one to start this in the first place, not to mention escalating things. That said, when Raven lifts her hand to do it again, he does reach out and stop her.

“Hold on Raven… I’m pretty sure you already knocked her out.”

Raven blinks, looking to see that he’s correct. What had almost been the second humiliating getaway of the day for them has been thoroughly derailed by Raven’s anger. Jinx is completely unconscious and even bleeding a little bit from her forehead where she hit the street. Hopefully that wasn’t anything too permanent…

The police show up a few moments later, before they can make themselves scarce. Cole finds himself and Raven under scrutiny for as long as it takes the people in the jewelry shop to recover enough to rush out and defend them as heroes who had taken down the villain.

Before long, the one thing Cole hadn’t wanted to deal with today ends up happening anyways… Zatanna Zatara shows up on the scene. It technically didn’t have to be her, but alas… here she is all the same.

At least it’s a little better than if they’d called her in back at the emptied out antique shop. In this scenario, they’re the heroes, the ‘good guys’ who saved the day and beat the bad guy with no casualties.

Not to mention, Cole had done a bit more clean up while they were waiting for her to arrive, getting rid of more of the broken glass so that the police could properly traverse the scene of Jinx’s crimes.

All in all, Cole holds his head high as Zatanna walks up to the two of them with an arched brow.

“How in the world did you two get caught up in this?”

Cole shrugs.

“… We were in the area.”

Zatanna looks around them at that, her expression a bit incredulous. To be fair, this wasn’t really a part of town that Cole had spent much time in or had much reason to spend time in before. So… he comes up with something on the fly and tells a bit of a white lie.

“I was hoping to get this appraised.”

He pulls the glowing stone from the antique shop out of his pocket and holds it up, prompting Zatanna’s gaze to fixate on it with a sudden intensity.

“That… where did you find that thing?”

And now Cole finds himself a bit pinned. Does he tell Zatanna the truth? A partial truth? A lie?

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A/N: Remember to Vote, leave a Like, and let me know what you think!

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Google Doc Link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NGHdn3jWVtrQWb0XNaDLZcrpYmD7ni1q3fmpxe5vvVA/edit?tab=t.0