The Doom Patrol

All Fall Down

by Starsky Hutch 76

“So in our last session, you were saying you believe the accident could have been avoided,” the portly therapist said.

“If not for my own stupidity,” the immobile man laying in the bed finished hoarsely. “I still don’t quite understand it.”

“You said the helmet was untested. Was placing a new, untested and potentially hazardous device on your head the most logical choice?” the therapist asked.

“There was no need to test it!” Steve Dayton exclaimed. “I knew the schematics of the old helmet inside and out. I invented the damn thing! I should know whether it was safe or not!”

“But it wasn’t….”

“No, it wasn’t,” Dayton said grimly. “The new model was supposed to stop any of the kind of feedback I had experienced with the old one. Instead, it was even more volatile. The damn thing exploded!”

“You could have been killed. Most people didn’t think you would ever come out of your coma. Even your doctors. For all purposes, you were considered dead.”

“I might as well have been for all the good my so called recovery has done me,” Dayton said. The therapist noticed his patient eyeing the water glass on the night stand and held it up for him, guiding the straw up to his mouth. “What kind of life is this? I can’t even feed myself anymore.”

“There seemed to be a disturbing trend in the missions you took leading up to your accident,” the therapist continued.

“They were all hazardous, Doctor. Every one. It goes with the territory.”

“True. But there was a steadily greater chance of your not coming back from them,” the therapist said.

“What are you getting at?” Dayton said suspiciously.

“Is it possible that perhaps you didn’t want to come back from them?”

“Perhaps…..” Dayton sighed. He closed his eyes wearily. “I miss Rita. You’d think it would get easier over time, but it doesn’t. I miss her just as much today as the day she was taken from me.”

The therapist looked at the portrait facing them on the opposite wall of the bedroom. “She was very beautiful.”

“And that was just the surface,” Dayton said. “You hear the term ‘the beautiful people’ thrown around a lot in Hollywood. But she was the only one I’ve ever seen come out of there that I’d describe as truly beautiful, both inside and out. Living without her is agony. I haven’t felt complete since.”

“So perhaps all this was an attempt to be with her again,” the therapist offered.

“You don’t know what it’s like… to lose someone like that…” Dayton said.

“I might have some idea,” the therapist said. “I’m a widower as well. It’s probably why I was recommended for your case.”

“All you say about me might be true,” Dayton said. “But what good does that knowledge do me? In the condition I’m in, paralyzed from the neck down, it’s not as though I can forage ahead… carve out a new life for myself, as the saying goes.” He turned to his therapist and said, “Tell me, what do I have to live for now?”

The therapist looked stricken. “I can’t answer that for you.”

“I thought not,” Dayton said, staring at the ceiling. “I suppose it’s hard to convince a patient he has something to live for when you don’t believe it yourself.”
***

 

Steve Dayton lay motionless in his bed wishing he were dead, as he had so many nights. It was a wish he knew not likely to come true. After all, how was a man paralyzed from the neck down supposed to commit suicide? He didn’t have the working arms to shoot or hang himself. Nor the working legs to jump from a ledge. He was trapped in the world of the living, just as he was trapped in a useless body.

His only hope was to find someone willing to put him out of his misery, but it wasn’t much of one. Posing the question to visitors made them fidget uncomfortably and gradually stop seeing him. The only ones who still visited him regularly were Cliff Steele and Garfield Logan. Cliff, because he was probably the only one who could understand what he was going through, and Garfield because he sometimes lived there.

Posing this question to his faithful butler had nearly cost him his services. He’d threatened to quit if he ever asked such a thing of him again. Dayton had become too dependent on him to risk losing his services, so he stopped asking. All he could do was lay in bed reflecting on the hell his life had become and curse the day he’d decided to redesign his helmet.

Sleep was a long time in coming, but eventually, its embrace was inescapable. It was a time he dreaded. In his dreams, Rita was alive, he was whole again, and all was right with the world. Upon waking, when he would discover none of it was real, he would enter a crushing depression much like that of an addict coming down from a high.

This night, sleep had something else in store for him. As slumber claimed him, he seemed to float out of his body and through the roof of his mansion. He took to the skies, experiencing freedom such as he’d never known… even when not paralyzed. Even, …dare he think it?… when wearing the helmet of Mento.

As he soared through the sky, he felt light as a feather. The world lay spread out before him with beacons of light shining up from the landscape. They seemed to be calling out to him, not with words but with an emotional pull. He realized these beacons were people. Their souls, to be precise.

As he flew through these beacons, he was flooded with sights, sounds, experiences, and most of all, feelings. He found himself drawn from one beacon to the next, fascinated by this window into the souls of others. The ones that called out to him the most were the souls in need. In them, he found an emptiness that matched his own. It was a connection of sorts.

Steve Dayton awoke with the same feelings of disappointment and sadness he always did when he found himself back in his bed. He stared up at the ceiling and sighed. He had come to know every dimple of its stucco surface intimately. There was something different about it today. Did it seem… closer?

“Good Lord!” came a startled cry from his manservant, Questor, at the doorway, accompanied by the dropping of a sterling silver tray with his breakfast.

Startled by the noise, Dayton fell several feet down to his bed beneath him, along with several floating objects from around the room that came crashing down as well.

 
***

 

“You should have seen the look on Questor’s face,” Steve Dayton said as he recounted his recent experience to Cliff Steele. “I thought he was going to have a stroke. And he’s seen some pretty strange things while in my service.”

“It sounds pretty wild,” Cliff said. “So you made yourself and a bunch of stuff around here float?” He looked around the room noticing the absence of several object that had been there at his last visit, including vases and lamps. “It would appear that way,” Steve said. “Apparently, what I thought a dream was quite real. The accident with my helmet did more than paralyze me. It changed my brain somehow… enhanced it.”

“The chief always talked about taking away a little triumph out of tragedy. Being the master of your own fate,” Cliff said. “Maybe this’ll help you do that.”

“Exactly!” Steve said, a wild look coming into his eyes. “After the accident, I figured my days of adventuring were behind me because of my condition, but now….!”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa there!” Cliff interrupted, holding his hands up. “Lets not get carried away here! You aren’t seriously suggesting going back into action again? Are you crazy?!!”

“What? You don’t think I have what it takes anymore?” Dayton said. “That I’m not strong enough?”

Cliff Steele suddenly jerked and rose to his feet involuntarily. “What the hell?”

His metallic arms and legs began to move of their own accord and he began to dance like a robot marionette. “What… what are you doing?”

“Just giving you a demonstration of my new abilities,” Steve Dayton said. “I believe Garfield calls this one the ‘Cabbage patch’.”

“Well, knock it off will ya?” Cliff exclaimed, watching his own movements in dismay. “Yer creepin’ me out!”

“As you wish,” Steve said, releasing control of him.

“Whew!” Cliff exclaimed, sitting down. “Do me a favor and never do that again. If I ever decide I want to go on Soul Train, I’ll let ya know, OK?”

“As you can see, I’m not exactly helpless,” Steve said with pride.

“Yeah, whatever,” Cliff said. “The fact still remains that you’re paralyzed. I’m sorry to be blunt here, but it’s the truth. And someone in your condition has no business going back into action. I’m sorry.”

He rose to his feet and said, “The power you’ve been given is a gift that will make what’s happened to you easier to live with. Take it as that and nothing more.” With that, he turned and left.

As the door shut behind Cliff Steele, Steve looked up at the ceiling and said, “You’re right, Cliff. I have been given a gift. But I don’t believe that it’s merely a gift for me alone.”

 
***

 

Using the mouth control of his electric wheelchair, Steve Dayton carefully guided himself into the enormous hanger/lab located on his sprawling estate. His gaze drifted around the large room, stopping on different parts, which then took to the air and floated towards him.

Dayton’s body rose and hovered above his seat as his wheelchair came apart and the pieces moved to allow space for the others that came to join them. All the pieces moved through the air below him as if part of a well choreographed routine. Then, suddenly, they moved inward, connecting into their new form.

Once this necessary task was completed, Dayton lowered once more into his chair. The hangar doors opened as a windshield rose out of his enhanced chair to cover him and wings sprouted out from the sides. With another mental command, the chair rolled forward and then took to the air.

Dayton’s Super-chair landed on the darkened bridge, rolling silently to a stop. His gaze drifted around, seeking out the person he was looking for. His eyes stopped on the shapely silhouette of a woman standing on the wrong side of the safety railing.

A spotlight rose from the back of Dayton’s chair and pointed at her, instantly bathing her in light. She whirled around in shock and Dayton stifled a gasp as he was confronted with a face he was totally unprepared for.

In the time since his accident, he had watched far too much television, which included documentaries. Her face reminded him of one such program on a fashion model who had been disfigured in a fire. There were still traces of what her face must have looked like at one time, but her nose was too pointed and upturned, her cheekbones way too prominent, and her eyes and mouth too wide and expressive from unnatural looking skin that seemed ill-suited for her face.

“Who are you?” she called out. “What do you want? Leave me alone!”

“I’m afraid I can’t do that. Not when I know what you were about to do,” he said, starting to roll forward.

“You don’t know anything,” she said with emotional outrage. “Look at me!” she gestured to herself, which made Dayton take in the full expanse of her body. It appeared to be divided in sections, each representing one of the elements. Even her hair was elemental, having the appearance of long grass. The look of her was familiar to him and he tried to place it.

“I’m a freak,” she said in a voice cracking with emotion. “What kind of life do you think I have, huh? Do you think people want to have anything to do with me?”

He hadn’t been trying to spy on her thoughts, but one memory was so strong it practically leapt at him and grabbed him by the throat. She had been having dinner in a restaurant with a young man. It had taken her months to work up the courage to agree to it, but he had sounded so kind over the phone whenever she would call in to ask about her disability check. During the course of conversation, the silicate false face she had generated hardened earlier than expected and fell into her linguini, revealing her real appearance to him. Seeing the expression on his face as she struggled to stammer out an apology was too much for her and she ran from the restaurant in tears. That was what had led her to the bridge.

“I’m lucky if people don’t scream and run when they see me,” she continued, stepping over the railing to face him. “Do you have any idea what that’s like?”

“Perhaps,” Dayton said, rolling closer. “The best emotional reaction I get these days is pity. The worst is disgust. So I can relate somewhat to what you’re going through.”

“That’s not the same,” she said.

“It’s not?” Dayton said. “No, I guess it’s not. At least you can walk on your own two legs. At least you can move your own arms. After my accident, I truly felt I had no reason to live. I wanted to die, but because of my condition, even the option of suicide was denied me.”

“It’s been like that for me, too,” she said. “I… I’ve tried almost everything. Nothing I do works. I… I… don’t think I can die.”

“So you were going to try drowning?” Dayton said with disbelief.

“Not exactly,” she said. “I was going to turn into salt or something that might dissolve in the water.

Dayton shook his head. “I know… I know,” she sighed, sitting against the safety rail and resting her head in her hands. “Really stupid. I was desperate.”

It suddenly hit him who she looked like. Her blatantly female figure, the hair, and even the purse she carried had thrown him. “Metamorpho….”

She looked at him quizzically. “What?”

“You used to work with him for a short time, didn’t you. I remember reading something about it. He has the same condition you do and he’s leading a very full life.”

“He was lucky,” the Element Girl said. “He already had somebody before he was changed.”

“Sapphire Stagg,” Dayton said. “I’m familiar with the family.”

“I had hoped he and I might eventually come together, since he and I had so much more in common, but that never happened. Somehow, they stayed together despite everything that should have torn them apart. I’ll never know love like that.”

“How do you know?” Dayton asked.

“I know.” She reached into her purse and pulled out her government ID. The name on it read “Urania Blackwell”. The picture showed an extremely beautiful blonde, blue eyed woman. “If I didn’t find it when I looked like her, what chance do I have now?”

“Sapphire loved the man Rex Mason was,” Dayton said. “Somewhere, there is someone who will love you for the same reason. My power allows me to look inside you and see the person you really are. And from what I see, that picture doesn’t even begin to do you justice.”

With these words, whatever barriers had been keeping Urania Blackwell’s emotions in check were broken. She fell to her knees, latching onto him, and burst into tears as she was wracked with great heaving sobs. “It’s so hard,” she cried. “Some days I just start to cry and cry for no reason and can’t seem to stop.”

Dayton was dumbstruck. He certainly hadn’t meant to get this reaction from her. Even before his accident, he hadn’t been good at dealing with the complexities of human emotion. It was one of the reasons he and Rita had wasted so much time before Cliff had had to finally and literally knock some sense into him. Now here he was with someone who needed to be comforted… and held… and he couldn’t even raise his arms.

Dayton reached out with his mind and her luxurious green hair began to move as telekinetic fingers stroked her head reassuringly. It seemed to soothe her and in that moment, he realized he’d found a new reason for being. “I want you to know, Urania, that you’re not alone anymore. As long as you need a friend, I’m here.”

“Rainie….” She said, fidgeting contentedly against him as a child would while adjusting to make herself more comfortable her father’s arms. “My friends always called me Rainie.”

“Rainie it is, then,” Dayton smiled. The windshield rose and lowered itself over them as the wings extended and the chair took to the air once more.

 
***

 

“Are you out of your ever-lovin’ mind?” Cliff Steele exclaimed, pacing around Steve Dayton’s living room.

“Frankly, I’ve never been more sane,” Dayton said.

“You don’t know a thing about this girl!” Cliff said.

“On the contrary, I know quite a bit about her,” Dayton said.

“Including that she’s a government spook,” Cliff quipped.

“Retired. They tricked the poor girl into becoming their super-powered agent and stuck her with the consequences when they felt like they didn’t need her anymore.”

“She’s a grown woman,” Cliff said. “She knew what she was doing.”

From what I understand, Triangle left quite a few details out when they gave her orders before her transformation,” Dayton said. “Particularly, what it would do to her appearance. Frankly, it’s a wonder that she’s still sane.”

“How do you know she still is?” Cliff asked. “When you found her, wasn’t she about to jump off a bridge?”

“I’ve displayed some suicidal behavior recently, too,” Dayton said. “I didn’t realize you were ready to lock me up.”

“That’s no fair, Steve,” Cliff said. “A lot of people have been concerned about your well being. We still are.”

“I’m fully capable of taking care of myself,” Dayton snapped.

“But you’re….”

I’m far from your typical invalid,” Dayton said defensively as he rolled forward. “And if I feel this is something I should do, then I’m going to do it, then there’s no force that can stop me.”

“Steve, Please!” Cliff pleaded.

“Look, if you’re feeling some instinct that’s telling you to nurse-maid me, then you’re going to have to do it in the field, because that’s where I’ll be.”

“Steve, I…”

“So are you with me?” Dayton interrupted. “Because if you’re not with me on this, the best thing you can do is just try to stay out of my way.”

“I…. I’m with you,” Cliff sighed.

“Great,” Dayton smiled. “Then welcome to my new Doom Patrol.” He extended the thought controlled hand of his hyper-sophisticated wheelchair and two robot hands met in a handshake.

 
***

 

The room was musty and unclean. The walls were covered with senseless sayings scrawled in God knows what. Debris was scattered on every surface. “What a dump,” Cliff Steele said from beneath a mask disguising his robot appearance.

“Hey, it ain’t the Ritz Carlton, but he ain’t exactly payin’ what they charge, either,” the landlord said. He stepped inside and saw what Cliff Steele was looking at and said, “What the hell?!! Who’s gonna pay for this?!!”

“I’ll make sure you’re compensated,” Steve Dayton said, rolling in behind him. “Cliff, pay the man, would you?”

“Sure, Chief,” Cliff said, pulling Steve Dayton’s wallet out of his own Jacket pocket and handing the man a wad of cash.

“I trust this will take care of all damages and whatever else he may have owed you.”

“Certainly!” the landlord exclaimed, his eyes bugging out at the money. “…. Thank you,” he said, grinning from ear to ear as he left.

“I don’t know about this, Chief,” Cliff said.

“That’s the second time you’ve done that,” Dayton said.

“Done what?”

“Called me Chief.”

“Oh. Just seemed natural, I guess,” Cliff shrugged.

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Dayton said, rolling further into the room. “What don’t you know about?” he asked.

“Well, look at this place,” Cliff said. “Not exactly the sort of place you’d expect a hero to live in.”

“It is odd,” Rainie Blackwell said, stepping into the room. “But none of us are what you’d call typical super heroes.” To all appearances, she looked normal. Her true features were hidden by a silicate face she had generated earlier. “…or even just typical for that matter.”

“Hey, who wants to be typical?” Cliff said, chuckling. After a pregnant pause, a look passed between them. “Yeah,” he said with a mock cough. “Maybe so, but this is really what you’d call not typical. None of us has ever decided to do redecorating like this!”

The redecorating in question was writing that covered that walls forming stanzas, symbols, maps, and bizarre equations. “Weird,” Rainie said as her eyes ran across the walls. “Hasn’t this guy ever heard of paper?”

“What the hell is this?” Cliff said. “None of it makes any sense.”

“It’s the work of a schizophrenic mind,” Steve Dayton said. “Look closely and you’ll begin to see a pattern to it.”

“I don’t think I want to look at it too long,” Cliff said. “I’m liable to wind up as crazy as the guy who wrote it.”

“What’s the wall that weeps?” Rainie said, looking at the bizarre writing.

“Who knows,” Cliff said in a dismissive way as he stared at another wall. “Maybe it has something to do with this crying pool he’s going on about over here.”

“I wouldn’t be too quick to disregard everything from him,” Steve Dayton said. “During his clear moments, he’s quite the detective.” As if to punctuate his sentence, a camera on a mechanical arm shot up from the back of his chair and began snapping pictures of the scrawling on each wall.

“Th… thank you,” a voice rasped. Startled, all three of them turned in its direction to see a man stirring as the rubbish he had buried himself in fell away.

“Why were you hiding in garbage?” Rainie exclaimed.

“I … I had to hide myself from the man who walks through ages,” the man said. Holding his legs and rocking back and forth. “Couldn’t let him find me…. Couldn’t let him find me.”

“Couldn’t you have found a better hiding place than your own apartment?” Cliff said.

“Like I said,, during his lucid moments, he’s a genius. This just isn’t one of them,” Steve Dayton said. “Cliff… Rainie… allow me to introduce Carl Stoner … aka the Odd Man.”

“Odd Man is right,” Cliff muttered.

“Couldn’t let him find me,” Stoner repeated.

“Mr. Stoner, you haven’t been taking your medication, have you?” Dayton asked.

“Couldn’t take it,” Carl Stoner said. “had to be at full power.”

“You mean you wanted your dementia?” Robotman said, shocked.

“The medication would not only dull deductive reasoning in a detective like Mr. Stoner, but there’s also the matter of his other ability. He’s an empathy,” Dayton said.

“I’ve heard of that,” Cliff said. “Not exactly sure of what it means.”

“It’s being able to tune in on the emotions and perceptions of others,” Rainie said. “We had a few of them working at the agency.”

“In Carl Stoner’s case, he can also make others share his feelings and perceptions,” Dayton said.

Cliff straightened in surprise. “You mean he….?”

“No…” Rainie gasped.

“Exactly,” Steve said. “The Odd Man struck fear into the hearts of criminals and drew confessions when they suddenly found themselves in a world where the rules of reality no longer applied. Up was down. Sounds were seen, and dimension had no meaning. It was thought that he was simply using some sort of invention of his on them. In actuality, he was simply sharing his dementia.”

“This is who you want to add to the team?” Cliff exclaimed. “Look at him! The guy can’t even function!”

“Correction,” Steve said. “He can no longer function solo. He needs our help.” He gestured to Carl Stoner. “And that’s a big part of what this new Doom Patrol is about.”

 
***

 

Cliff Steel gave a hesitant step, leaving the airship for the ground of the Louisiana swamp. Seeing the way Rainie’s foot sank into the muck, he imagined himself sinking into its depths, never to be seen again.

“Don’t worry,” Steve said. I won’t let you sink.”

“Hey, were you prying in on my thoughts?” Cliff exclaimed.

“I didn’t have to,” Steve said. “Your body language gave you away.”

“Good to know one thing is still human about this body,” Cliff said. He stepped out with both feet and neither sank so much as an inch. He turned back and looked towards his friend levitating from the hovering airship in his super chair and realized he was holding him aloft.

They caught up with Rainie and Carl, who was on his knees with his hands in the mud. Rainie had stopped walking and was watching him as he scooped the thick mud and piled it and molded it with his hands.

“Knock off the crazy stuff, will ya?” Cliff said. “Daddy Warbucks will buy ya some play dough when we get back. Right now we got work to do!”

Steve Dayton looked down at the bizarre face Carl Stoner had created. He tried to place the style. Was it Mayan? Incan? A camera shot out from the back of the chair and snapped a picture and then quickly retreated.

They continued to walk further into the swamp and Cliff noticed something unusual. “Hey, I can understand the mosquitoes leaving me and Rainie alone, but why are they letting the two of you off easy?” he said, indicating Steve and Carl.

“Just a simple command to stay away,” Steve said. “Even mosquitoes have minds that can be influenced.”

Eventually, the trees parted and they came to a small clearing. Ahead of them a familiar, large moss covered figure. “Swamp Thing?” Cliff said, leaning into Dayton’s chair. Nice choice, but he’s not exactly what I’d call a joiner.”

“Not him,” Steve Dayton said. “His guest.”

Swamp Thing stepped to the side to reveal a second, smaller figure. One that was decidedly female. “Wow,” Cliff said, clearly awestruck at the sight of her. “Who’s she? Swamp Thing’s pretty kid sister?”

Pretty was one word to describe her, though an extreme understatement. Another would be breathtaking or even magical. She looked like nothing less than a mystical creature brought forth from the pages of a fairy tale. She was like an exotic woodland nymph who had stepped out of legends and into the modern age.

As they stepped closer, her appearance only grew more exotic in detail. Like Swamp Thing, she was a plant in the shape of a human being. Unlike Swamp Thing, who this state made horrific, it gave Blossom an unnatural beauty impossible by human standards.

As they approached, Steve Dayton saw that every inch of her seemed to be made of flowers. Her pale pink skin had the texture of a flower petal. Flower petals even made up the long flowing tresses that fell over her shoulders and down her back in a facsimile of hair. The tiniest of flower petals also comprised her eyebrows and eyelashes. Her full, luscious lips were like rose petals. Strategically placed flowers also protected what little modesty she chose to preserve.

As he grew closer, he saw what else she had in common with a flower: the intoxicating fragrance she gave off. For the first time in weeks, he found himself in turmoil internally at the injustice of being trapped in his chair. He wondered if she had that effect on all men. With his two companions, it was impossible to tell. Cliff was in the body of a robot and Carl Stoner was… odd.

“Be… very… gentle with her,” Swamp Thing cautioned, placing a mossy covered hand on Mento’s shoulder. “She..has… had…a … hard time.”

“Is that true,” Steve Dayton asked her. “Why is that?”

“Because.. Blossom doesn’t know who Blossom is,” the flowery creature said in an anguished tone.. “Blossom… thought she Mayflower, but then she come back. Then Blossom thought she was plant elemental like Swamp Thing. But he a person first…. Alec Holland. If Blossom not Rachel Green, then who Blossom is? Is Blossom even real person?”

“Of course you are,” Steve said. “You have a soul the same as the rest of us. A Human soul. I couldn’t be here if you didn’t.”

“How you know?” she asked.

“A slot opened on the super chair and a mechanical arm shot out holding a file which he handed to her. “This is the medical file of Rachel Green from Project Rehab. You have her memories, so you remember the headaches she used to have. What you don’t know is what caused them. ”

Dayton pointed to a spot on an X-Ray of Rachel Green’s head with the robot hand. “When the doctors x-rayed her head, they found a mass of bone, tissue, and extra brain matter complete with a second smaller hypothalamus gland. An operation was scheduled to remove this extra bit of matter, but before it could take place, the Floronic Man arrived and caused Mayflower to transform into Blossom.

“Eventually, she returned to her old self. Shortly afterwards, the headaches returned and the surgery was rescheduled. That’s when she and Blossom split in two. When Rachel Green’s head was X-rayed again, the mass was nowhere to be seen.

“What the doctor’s came to realize was that the mass of tissue, bone, and brain matter was once intended to be a twin but it never fully formed. Instead, it lay congenitally joined, lying dormant inside her head. The headaches began when somehow the activation of her powers had started it to grow again. Jason Woodrue’s experiments then gave it the means to come to the surface and then eventually form a body all her own. That twin is you, Blossom.”

“Blossom… Rachel’s sister?” she said.

“That’s right,” Dayton said. “In truest sense, you do have a soul. And thanks to Woodrue, a chance for a real life.”

“Blossom does?” she asked, wide eyed.

“Sure. What I don’t quite understand is… from these pictures, you still looked very human when you split from Rachel Green. Not that you aren’t quite lovely now. You are.”

“Blossom thought she was just a plant,” She said. “What the point of pretending to be anything else?”

“I … can relate to that,” the Swamp Thing nodded.

“In one sense, you are a plant,” Dayton said. “But your mind… your soul… is human. Blossom, you’ve never had a chance to explore your humanity. There’s room on our team if you would like to take that opportunity. We could be there to support you while you make that journey.”

Blossom looked up at Swamp Thing fearfully and squeezed his hand. “Alec….?”

“Go with them,” Swamp Thing said wistfully. “Go…. Discover… the world… and yourself. I …will be here… when you are ready… to come back to me.”

Blossom rose and threw her arms around his neck. “Blossom will come back. Blossom promise.”

“We’ll take good care of her, Dr. Holland. You have my word on that,” Dayton said.

“You … had better,” Swamp Thing said.

As the group began the walk back to the airship with their newest member, Swamp Thing watched them leave. Once they were out of sight, he turned and walked back into the woods and returned to the solitude that he had come to know all too well.

 
Epilogue

 

Steve Dayton seemed uncommonly peaceful as he stared out of his window at his estate’s gardens. He turned at the sound of footsteps. When he turned his chair with a mental command, he saw his manservant as he entered the room.

“Questor! How are our guests?” Dayton asked.

“Miss Blossom is, of course, in the green house as usual,” Questor said, bringing a smile to Dayton’s face.

“And the rest?”

“Miss Blackwell and Mr. Steele are partaking of your movie collection in the theater. Mr. Stoner is in the library. He seems particularly lucid this evening and is pouring over his case files. He seems to be very intense, sir.”

“He has to be,” Dayton said. “He has no way of knowing how long these moments will last. And what he’s working on could affect us in the near future.”

“Sir?”

“I believe we are about to re-encounter an old foe.”

“You seem very excited about the prospect, sir,” Questor said.

“Oh, I am,” Dayton said. “I haven’t felt so alive in month. Years even. The house seems alive again. It … It hasn’t felt this way since Rita’s death… The way it felt when She, Garfield and I were a family.”

“I know, sir,” Questor said. He brought a handkerchief up to his master’s eyes and wiped away the tears. He had performed this task many times since the accident. It was nice that for once, they were tears of joy.