Batman came to a stop in front of the house and the rest of them spread out behind him. Finn kept his lightsaber in hand but off, his eyes moving across the wheat fields on either side. The stalks were moving just very slightly. He could tell that there were more than a few people hiding there.
Ciri had her sword drawn. The Kents stood behind them, Jonathan with his axe and Martha with her blade already raised.
"These are El lands," Batman said. "The League of Shades does not have permission to be here."
The woman tilted her head. "Prince Wayne? I did not know you were here."
Batman's jaw tightened. "Talia Al-Ghul..."
The old man spread his hands wide, completely unbothered by the assembled group in front of him. "The children are ours. A bargain has been struck."
"No bargain has ever been struck with me, Ra's." Batman's hand moved to his sword hilt. He didn't draw yet. "His forces are hidden in the field. All failed abominations from the Lazarus River." He raised his voice enough for everyone behind him to hear. "They are already dead. Do not hold back."
"We will not, My Prince." Martha said from behind.
Ra's Al-Ghul chuckled, and opened his arms wide. When he spoke again his voice had dropped into something that didn't belong in a human throat.
"Gone... gone the form of man... rise... the demon..."
The wheat then exploded on both sides of the group.
Thralls poured out in numbers, men that had sickly green skin that had puss all over. Their movements were off, their joints moving badly, their faces blank.
"...Etrigan."
Ra's suddenly burst into flame from the torso upward, and what came out of it was not an old man anymore. Taller, broader, and fire where its mouth should have been.
Finn instantly clicked the lightsaber on.
The thralls hit all at once and Finn moved into them without much warning. The saber went through the first one before it had closed half the distance, the second he sidestepped and cut down from behind, the third he simply walked through. They were slow by any standard that mattered. He had fought Wild Hunt riders in full plate on a beach before. These were men with bad joints and no coordination.
He cut through them in a straight line and turned around and cut through them going back the other way. One that had gotten behind Martha without her noticing caught the saber before it reached her.
"Thank you," Martha said, without breaking her rhythm.
Ciri was managing two at once on her side and managing them easily, dropping the first with a clean thrust and turning on the second before it had processed what happened to the first. A third came at her from the side and she stepped into it, took the fumbled swing on her forearm without much concern, and put her sword through it.
Jonathan worked through his side with the economy of a veteran, nothing wasted. Martha beside him moved between two thralls simultaneously and neither of them got close enough to matter.
More kept coming from the field but the rate of it was already slowing. There were only so many places to hide in a wheat field. Finn swept through another cluster of them, the saber clearing a path, and by the time he turned around the field had gone quiet on his side.
Across the yard Etrigan was a different problem entirely.
Batman was not having an easy time. The demon hit with a weight that had nothing to do with its size, each blsow landing hard. Batman absorbed one across the chest and slid backward across the road on his boots.
Then Etrigan opened its mouth and fire came out in a torrent.
Batman walked through it.
Not around it. Through it, with the fire washing over his armour and his skin and doing nothing. He drove his shoulder into the demon's midsection. Etrigan moved half a step.
The demon pulled back.
"What?" Etrigan's burning eyes narrowed. "You are not who you pretend to be."
Batman said nothing at first. He raised his sword and moved in again.
Etrigan caught the blade on its forearm, the steel skidding off, grabbed Batman by the chest plate and hauled him up off the ground.
"No, foul demon." Batman said. "I am a monster like you, and I will not—"
Etrigan kicked him before he could finish his words.
Batman hit the front wall of the Kent house hard enough to crack the wood paneling and went through into the interior. The sound of it made Finn turn from across the yard.
Finn cut down the last thrall near him. Ciri finished hers a moment later. The Kents had cleared their side. The field had gone still, except the house itself.
Viktor's voice carried through the hole in the wall. "Are you dead?"
"I am fine," Batman said, from somewhere inside.
"You don't look fine," Viktor called. "You look like a man that just got kicked through a house."
"...Thank you for telling me the obvious truth."
"Do you want help?" Kory's voice now. "Or are you going to stay on the floor a while longer?"
"I do not need help."
Etrigan was already crossing the yard again, fire guttering at the corners of its mouth.
Then the wall came apart.
Something green and winged came through it and the section of wall around the opening simply gave up. Beast Boy in dragon form dropped into the yard and the downwash from his wings sent the last few standing thralls flat. He turned his head toward Batman, who was picking himself up just inside what remained of the wall.
Batman looked at the dragon.
Then at Etrigan, who had stopped walking and was regarding the dragon with something approaching irritation.
"Fine," Batman said.
The dragon hit Etrigan at full speed and drove it back across the road and through the far fence, the wood shattering on impact. Viktor came through the gap in the wall after, then Kory, then Raven, and the handful of thralls still moving in the field found themselves with considerably more to deal with than they had expected.
Batman moved into the gaps Beast Boy created. The dragon kept Etrigan occupied and Batman used every second of it, working the angles that opened up each time Beast Boy drove the demon back.
Then Batman drove his sword into the ground between the demon's feet and said something low that didn't carry across the yard. The earth beneath Etrigan opened briefly and swallowed it. The ground closed. The flame cut out.
The yard went quiet.
Beast Boy sat in the dirt in his own form, hair worse than usual. The remaining thralls were down or gone. Talia Al-Ghul was nowhere. At some point during the fight she had simply left.
Finn let the lightsaber idle and looked at the broken fence. The wrecked wall of the house.
Ciri rolled her shoulder once and sheathed her sword.
"That was almost boring," she said. "Apart from the demon."
"Let's not make fighting entertainment please." Finn finally turned off his lightsaber.
It was then that Batman came up to Finn and inspected him.
"I haven't had the chance to ask." he said. "Who are you, really? You fight well."
Finn put his lightsaber on his belt. "A traveller. Just that. The demon said something about a bargain. What was that?"
"Someone most likely offered the souls of these people as sacrifice." the batman sheathed his sword. He turned to Jonathan. "Who else knows the location of Raven and the others?"
"Someone far away from here, my Prince. John Constantine. He's the one that sent them here." Jonathan answered.
"The Kingdom of Storms…" the batman frowned.
"Yes, The Kingdom of Storms." Richard interrupted. "That is why I am here. I came to bring you to the palace. War is coming, Bruce."
"War? What do you mean?" Martha asked.
"King Jefferson Pierce is dead," said Richard. "His daughter has rallied The Kingdom of Storms and declared war on The Kingdom of El."
"What?" Raven looked surprised.
Richard nodded. "And they're not alone. We've received a message from a Robin from Amazon that Hippolyta's ships are already sailing for our kingdom. Bruce, you have to return to the palace immediately."
Batman paused for a moment. He took off his cowl and looked at it, as if he was looking at his alternate self. "...No. I will not return. I will stay here. I'm sorry, Grayson. But I do not belong with the Els. That much is very clear."
"What?" Richard became half-angry. "You are a prince of the kingdom. And as far as many of us are concerned, you are the rightful king. Do not turn back on us."
Jonathan put his hand on Batman's shoulder. "Hmm… the first one we took in… he was like you. Torn between two worlds. He was the son of a man from land, and the woman of the sea. He also felt that he didn't belong."
"You are not a monster, Prince Wayne." Martha said. "And I don't know what occurred between you and the Els, but I know that any war will involve the death of innocents."
"You have great power." Jonathan said. "And if that power can stop a war… Then you know where you need to be."
Hearing this, Batman clenched his fist and looked at his cowl once again. He sighed, and nodded, before wearing it again.
Meanwhile, Ciri walked closer to Finn. "That was a great speech." she muttered. "I like it."
Finn just chuckled, smiling at her.