S A O P A U L O

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The view was incredible.

Dick couldn’t be certain, but he was starting to imagine that Themyscira was a magical place indeed.

“There’s a city you could be looking at.”

Donna Troy was a goddess. Or, a demi-god at the very least. The rumors surrounding the shapely brunette was that she’d been formed out of clay. And, oh, to be the hands that shaped that. “Sorry, I was just thinking that top looks nice on you,” Dick managed smoothly, making certain to look up at her eyes as he said it.

It was more of a struggle than one might have imagined. The Amazon had her bust squeezed into a bikini top. A sheer fabric blouse hung off her athletic frame, adding a certain air of mystery and seduction to the woman. Even the cargo pants she wore managed to hug her curves in such a way as to make her seem more beautiful than any legend of Helen of Troy.

The pair were just coming off the boat. Just a pair of tourists. A married couple enjoying a cruise down the Brazilian coast.

The passport he presented gave the name Fabrizio Dinardo. The customs agent stamped the visa in the back of the European Union issued document as the pair went strolling out onto the streets of Sao Paulo.

The cascade of dark curls fell like a waterfall in black as the woman glanced his way. “How’s your Portugese?” she asked, adding to the illusion of their assumed lives by intertwining her arm in his and drawing close to him as they walked.

They’d been at this for nearly two years. And he’d known Donna longer than that. But she could enchant him like a succubus with those eyes. Nevermind the rest of her. “Terrible,” he admitted glibly.

Spanish had always been more his thing. A lot of people in the circus had come from Latin backgrounds or spoken it. Bruce had insisted that he pick up some Mandarin and Russian, and he could swing some bad French or even worse Cantonese if he was in a pinch, but Portugese? Honestly, it hadn’t even been on his linguistic radar until today.

If things went to plan, they wouldn’t be needing it.

They were meeting with their contact, picking up the hard drive, and then departing again on the cruise. Next stop, they had plane tickets back to Langley.

At least so far, this hasn’t been a mission as much as it had been a vacation. Forced to share a port-side cabin with a balcony on a South American cruise, food and drink paid for, with an Amazon whose body was inspired by Aphrodite herself?

If stories of this ever got out, S.H.I.E.L.D. would have a never-ending supply of recruits.

Dick managed to hail a cab, handling over the task of providing directions to the talented tongue of his teammate. Twenty minutes later, they were dropped off in front of a flat in a somewhat questionable part of the port town of Santos.

Not that port towns were ever shady.

They went in the front. Made their way up the stairs. Nothing out of the ordinary. Just an apartment in one of the busiest cities in the Americas.

The door cracked open at the end of the hall changed that.

The butt of the compact Glock felt surprisingly comfortable now, Dick drawing it from out of the soft holster under his lightweight suit coat. Donna dipped into her purse and produced a subcompact that was chambered 9x19 parabellum. Small velocity projectile. Not nearly enough stopping power.

There was a man on the floor, just inside the door. A pool of blood framed his head and shoulders. Another was down inside the bathroom.

_“Shit.”

Their contact was slumped down in a recliner. His clothes soaked through as he struggled to breathe through a sucking chest wound.

With a nod of his head, Dick motioned for Donna to check out the wound. Returning the pistol to the holster, he instead produced what looked like a Bluetooth earpiece.

Except this thing had satellite reception.

“Wilson’s been hit,” Dick announced, as soon as the piece was in his ear. Bending down, the former acrobat was shuffling through the papers and items that were up-ended and strewn throughout the sitting room.

He came up with a laptop that had been smashed apart. A rectangular piece obviously missing from the puzzle-like design. “The hard drive’s gone.”


An uncharacteristic flash of anger ran through him. He bit back the response that came to mind, instead, going to the windows and looking down into the alley below.

There was a black Audi squealing out on the road as it seemed to be in something of a hurry. “Hang on, I may have a lead,” Dick uttered cryptically, as he started to wrestle with the locks on the window.

“Dick, what are you...”

But it was too late.

The leather soles of his shoes slid across the roof tiles. Tucking into a somersault, the man went clean off the edge of the building. Bouncing off the adjacent building, the lithe gynast controlled his descent by rebounding off either side of the alley. Then, hitting the ground in a roll, he came up in a sprint out after the car.

He could see it, making a turn that would take it out of sight.

Barreling down the sidewalk, the former Nightwing was fast approaching where a delivery boy was getting off a moped. The teen and whatever he was carrying went airborne, briefly, as he was clipped by the passing of a Flying Grayson. Dick landed atop the moped, kicked the stand up and revved the lawmower-sized engine for whatever it was worth. And then he was after the Audi.

It wasn’t the Redbird.

But it would have to do.