The affection they had once shared as brother and sister had now become a blade turned against him.
With the veil of familial love stripped from his eyes, Dick naturally recalled more details.
Her pale skin, seemingly chilled by Blüdhaven's night breeze, her repeated apologies along the way, the way she had quietly stepped back when Pandora appeared...
But now was not the time to dwell on those things.
Pandora had already surrounded him with a host of vampires from the Shadow Attendants, and more enemies kept coming.
Having achieved her goal of luring her brother deep inside, Melinda no longer bothered to conceal her appearance. She had clearly been turned into a vampire long ago.
Dick abandoned any illusions.
He had come here to "mediate," leaving his Nightwing gear and usual Kali Sticks behind to conceal his identity and demonstrate his sincerity. Now, he was effectively unarmed.
Dick discreetly glanced at his communicator, only to discover with alarm that its signal had vanished at some point, perhaps because they were so deep underground, so far from the surface.
I got careless.
Dick swiftly scanned his surroundings, pulled a torch from beside him, and snapped it in half.
"I really should've stayed in bed. Or at least put on my uniform before coming," Dick said through gritted teeth.
The vampires lunged at him one after another.
Though they still retained human forms and features, their bodies had long since gone cold, and the blood in their veins no longer flowed.
In exchange, they had greater speed, tougher bodies, more strength, and that terrifying, nearly death-defying ability to regenerate.
Worse still, enemies like these now filled the entire banquet hall.
After stabbing two vampires in the limbs, Dick discovered that even grievous limb injuries barely troubled them. New vampires immediately filled