Chapter 392: The Executioner
The ancestral temple bore no resemblance to anything above ground.
While the city of Wakanda was a place of tall glass and precise technology, the temple was something far older -- buried beneath the royal city's foundations, accessible only through the underground waterways. T'Challa had led Venom Robin through the sewer network for most of an hour before they reached it.
It had been built from enormous sections of stone, fitted together without mortar in the manner of something constructed before such conveniences existed. The surfaces were carved with heavy, unrefined lines -- symbols that radiated outward from every face and every edge, all of them converging at a single point at the apex of the structure, where the accumulated lines resolved into the unmistakable outline of a black panther.
"This is the safest place in all of Wakanda." T'Challa stood before the entrance and looked back at Robin. "Without exception. You can stand down."
Robin yawned extensively, waved a hand, and told T'Challa to stop explaining things and go commune with his ancestors or eat the herb or whatever it took to become the Black Panther.
T'Challa shook his head without speaking. He still hadn't resolved how to categorize Robin's relationship with Batman -- partners, student, ward, something else entirely. Whatever it was, Batman had trusted Robin with this assignment, which meant Robin could do it, and that was sufficient for T'Challa.
He stepped inside.
His father T'Chaka had been waiting. The spirit had preceded him by days.
Robin rubbed his eyes. He watched T'Challa cross the threshold and disappear -- not walk into the interior, simply disappear -- and immediately jogged over to see where he had gone.
The moment his foot came down inside the temple entrance, the structure changed. What had appeared ordinary and dormant a moment ago now produced a thin purple mist that gathered beneath Robin's body and lifted him with surprising gentleness. It carried him back to the exterior and set him down.
He tried again.
The mist returned, lifted him, deposited him outside.
He tried six more times. The result was identical each time.
After the eighth attempt he stepped back and looked at the temple from a distance. The purple mist that kept removing him was not an independent phenomenon. It was part of something larger. He could see that much if he wasn't standing too close.
He stepped further back.
When enough distance had accumulated between himself and the structure, Robin could see it clearly. A vast black panther crouched atop the temple, its body so thoroughly permeated with purple mist that it blended almost completely into the dark. The mist that had been lifting and depositing him was its paw.
"Hey. Panther." Robin planted both hands on his hips and addressed the enormous guardian from below. "Where did T'Challa go? The guy who was just standing next to me."
The giant panther gave him one disinterested look and returned to its vigil.
"Don't speak English?" Robin switched languages. "Ou est T'Challa? Did the temple lead somewhere else?"
The panther continued to ignore him. After another minute of this, it appeared to grow mildly annoyed. Its long purple tail descended soundlessly from the temple, looped around Robin without ceremony, and launched him several meters to the side.
"Do that again and I'll call Batman to come and fight you," Robin said.
The panther remained exactly where it was.
Robin sat down on the ground and studied the creature.
He was fairly certain it wasn't the Black Panther God itself -- more likely one of the ancestral guardian spirits charged with protecting the temple. But when the tail had wrapped around him, the force it applied had been something he couldn't work against. Eighty tons of strength and he hadn't been able to move a single centimeter against it. The force was enormous but precise, the way you'd expect from something that had been doing this for a very long time.
"Panther. How long before T'Challa comes back?"
Silence.
"Say something."
Silence.
"Did you ever attend school?"
Silence.
Robin had learned from his earlier attempts and now kept his distance, calling out from several dozen meters away. He ran through questions idly, without expectation.
He was in the middle of asking how long the panther had been guarding this place when the creature moved.
It came off the temple in a single fluid motion and placed itself in front of the entrance, its full body now blocking the opening. The enormous tail began striking the ground in rhythmic impacts. Its claws emerged from their sheaths. Its eyes fixed on Robin's position with the specific quality of a cat that has stopped being merely annoyed.
"Oh, you want to fight?" Robin was on his feet immediately.
At the same moment, Batman's voice came through the encrypted channel. Four words.
"The Black Panther God is in danger."
Robin didn't have time to process the message.
A voice came from directly behind him. Rich and sweet, like something poured slowly from a jar.
"Little one. This isn't where you belong."
Everything went dark.
Less than a second. The darkness came and then withdrew before Robin's mind had fully registered it, and the purple glow from the great guardian's body was visible again, along with flames that had appeared around the temple's exterior.
The voice went quiet for a moment.
"Hm?"
Then its source stepped around in front of him.
It was the Enchantress -- the same woman who had pulled Batman into a constructed palace and tried to hold him there. She was still wearing the green crown. Still wearing the green outfit. She crouched down to Robin's level with the ease of someone accustomed to making herself appear approachable.
She couldn't understand why the illusion hadn't taken hold. She had tried it, and this strange small creature had thrown it off in under a second, apparently without noticing. She filed the question away. Asgard's finest sorceress had other tools.
"Look at my eyes, little one," she said softly, and cupped Robin's face in both hands.
Robin looked up at her green eyes with the open expression of someone who had temporarily stopped thinking. His crimson tongue lolled at the corner of his mouth.
The great black panther roared.
It launched itself from its position in a single explosive movement, closing the distance to the Enchantress with its jaws spread wide. Its fangs caught the purple light as it moved, and its trajectory was perfectly aimed.
One meter from her.
The Enchantress lifted one hand from Robin's face and drew a single line in the air with her finger.
The air split along the line. Through the gap, a blade of cold light erupted -- and it was attached to a weapon. A double-bladed greataxe, enormous in its proportions, emerged from the tear in the air and swung in a single brutal arc at the panther's head.
The guardian twisted mid-leap. It couldn't clear the weapon entirely. The axe caught its tail instead of its skull, and the long purple tail separated from the body in a clean severance, dissolving into mist before it hit the ground.
The axe's owner stepped through the gap he'd cut.
He stood two meters tall, dressed in armor of dark green. His hair was cut in two close strips running front to back along his skull, pressed flat to the scalp, the edges sharp enough to resemble the blades he carried. His eyes were already fixed on the panther with an expression that suggested he found this assignment straightforward.
He rested the axe on his shoulder.
"Executioner," the Enchantress said, not looking at him. "Finish it."
The man turned toward her. The predatory cast of his expression gave way to something considerably more eager.
"My Amora." His voice softened with the request. "I've been meaning to ask -- I'd rather you used my name. Skurge. Not just Executioner."
"Of course, dear Skurge." The Enchantress raised one eyebrow. Her tone was silk. "Now go."
"Anything for you, Amora. Anything at all."
He turned back to the panther. The softness left his face instantly. What replaced it was something older and simpler. He lifted the axe off his shoulder and launched himself at the guardian with everything he had.