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Dex-starr was a cat. That was true. He was a house cat from Earth, and house cats weren't generally known to be the most heroic of creatures. Humans didn't think much of them.
Din't think much when they threw him into a river. When they took His Human from him-
Dex-starr was a cat. And currently, he was sopping wet, starving, cold and facing a glowing… trinket. It was talking to him as humans often did, but it skipped the middle ground of his ears and went straight to his brain. Telling him of his rage, violence. Praising him.
Well. He didn't much care for what the trinket thought, and frankly it was annoying him. He reached a paw up to bat it out of the air like a weak little butterfly- only for it to lodge itself over his paw and into that crevice of joint and muscle that he couldn't dislodge it from.
Hold on. Something was off.
He was feeling… strong. Like he hadn't since- well, since His Human passed. How odd.
Dex-starr considered the object trapped around his leg, disdainful. It couldn't be, could it? And it hummed back with knowledge, strength, the rage bubbling in him.
Ah. So it was.
Dex-starr didn't care for humans, and frankly the alien before him wasn't earning much respect either. ‘Atrocitus’ it declared itself, gesturing and boasting and complimenting Dex-starr on his rage.
Dex-starr disliked that.
Atrocitus leant down and offered a hand, a invitation to join him. To return to Ysmault for training with others as powerful as he was, all translated by the ring of course. Offensive, really.
Dex-starr really disliked the offer. So of course, he bit the hand and walked away, tail and head high. Atrocitus tried to stop him, but the cat didn't much care for the little feathery thin constructs in his way. He destroyed them and threw the man far from his territory, watching smugly as the alien tried to come back for him like a mouse climbing out of an oil filled bucket against his own forces.
Dex-starr was very pleased when the being called Atrocitus finally left him alone and he could get back to napping.
Another human down, one who killed one's shaped like His Human had been. Dex-starr stood over the body of his latest kill, studying it's features. The fur around the head was the wrong texture. It smelled of a thin dizzying drink on its breath, not the hot golden fire of His Human’s killer.
Unfortunate. But Dex-starr had no care for such a creature, and was just about to begin the process of clawing it up for a meal when SOMETHING burst through the doors. Babbling at him. Bright red with a shock of yellow on white on its chest.
Cooing? It was making noises the ring couldn't even translate, the intention of ‘come here’ only in the first few words before it devolved into nonsense.
Dex-starr did not think he cared about this human much either. He darted past for the exit and his paws were running on air and he was being constricted.
The Flash held the writhing hissing bundle of fur and claws away from his chest, alarmed. “Woah, pretty kitty! I'm not going to hurt you!”
The cat twisted to try to bite the inside of his wrist for that. His Comm was telling him to bring the cat in for questioning (by J’onn, of course) and Batman snapped to just sedate it already.
“...Actually, scratch that, not me though! We just want to talk-”
Dex-starr stared with unrestrained hatred at the human in red and gold and white as the needle kicked in and he slowly felt himself slipping under in a way he did not miss from the cold-white-chemical place he remembered as a kit.
The Flash was just grateful he only got surface scratches through the body armour from the animal the League wanted as a lead. God this serial killer case couldn't end soon enough…
“Hello. Do you have a name you would like to be called?” Came a soft voice from in front of him, on the outside of the… mysteriously impervious prison cell they had trapped him in.
Dex-starr didn't intend to answer as he hissed and attacked the bars to his prison. But the man hummed thoughtfully. “Dex-starr, is that right?”
Dex-starr was a cat. Cats don't do much talking. Cats talk even less to strangers who can read their minds.
Dex-starr was also a Red Lantern. And reluctantly he had been taught social diplomacy and such human things from the ring in the pursuit of his goals.
“ Exit my mind, green creature” He projected with all the rage filled clarity that could crush buildings to rubble were it not for his prison.
J’onn smiled, glancing over at Batman who was leaned on the wall looking mildly impressed. “We just need to answer a few questions then you can return to your life, little one”
“ Call me little and I shall tear you into such fragments that a mouse could devour your corpse.” Dex-starr threatened, Ring translating heavily. “ You delay my hunts for pathetic conversations ”
“No. For important conversations. We found you at the scene of a crime and you are our first witness.” The cat appeared distinctly unimpressed. “Can you tell us anything you saw?”
“ That human attacked another. It acted cruelly. I stopped it continuing it's actions.” Dex-starr seethed , between biting the weaknesses in the prison box.
“ You stopped it?” J’onn stared. Batman repressed a cough of surprise. What the fuck.
“ It was not difficult. ” The cat sneered. “Rats are smarter than those simple beasts of violence, and better tasting too.”
“...I see.” The Martian appeared not to see, but Dex-starr didn't care particularly much as the two beings in the room left. He had a jail break to do for himself, rage in his chest building.
“Holy shit who gave a CAT a red lantern ring?!”
There was some obnoxious green creature outside his prison, making a ruckus. Dex-starr decided he hated this creature. Dex-starr lifted his head from the floor, and was rewarded with the gaze of a human cloaked in energy that hummed and sang of… Willpower?
“ It is my own, pathetic green one ” Dex-starr snarled, and the green one recoiled in terror. Probably. He figured it was terror anyway.
“Oh shit it talks.” The green one whispered.
Dex-starr was not interested in this being. Dex-stare going to go back to sleep, boredom and anger bubbling away in the small cell, until he caught whispers of something else. Food.
“Yeah, yeah- ugh, how do you operate this air lock thing?” Dex-starr stared dully as the green one fumbled, unimpressed, until abruptly a tray opened in the wall of his little prison. He snarled, coughing up blood onto the floor in surprise as he backed away- and the tray deposited… a bowl of water and some food. It was wet food. The good stuff.
The stuff His Human had given him, by the smell. He glowered at the Green One until they left, and then he stared at the drying dish of food.
He hated the reminder of the past. But he was hungry.
Dex-starr accepted the food.
The Green One came back often, every few days, talking with him. Others did too, but Dex-starr didn't care much about them. They were unimpressive. The Green One angered him in a very specific way he couldn't understand.
“So… What got you your ring? I'll tell you my story if you tell yours.”
“ I hate humanity. Monsters that they are, they do not deserve to live. ”
“So what, you just woke up hating people one day?”
“Humanity is cruel. ” Dex-starr stated simply, not even lifting his head. “ You are a species that does cruelty. ”
“Such as….?” The Green One prodded.
“ Your greying frail ones are hurt by the spry young. The long haired creatures get attacked by the short.” Dex-starr seethed. “ The small ones who depend on large are beaten. I bring their fates back to themselves.”
Silence. And then- “Are you a fucking vigilante cat?”
Dex-starr didn't deem that worthy of a response, curling up in the back corner of the prison.
The beings seemed to think they could teach him the laws of humanity. Dex-starr couldn't care less, but he did get to leave that prison for a second, larger prison when he cooperated. And he got to destroy things with his claws and snarl and bite and scratch.
Dex-starr liked destroying things.
One being that tried very hard to reach him was emblazoned with hope, his ring told him. Dex-starr despised that. Dex-starr especially despised that the Hope wearing creature couldn't be hurt by his attacks. He actually lost a tooth biting it during one particularly frustrating ‘lesson’ and the creature fretted over him.
Pathetic. Just like His Human had fretted.
Dex-starr hated the hopeful one even more for that. He did manage to make him upset by attacking the things on the table and sides, spilling a hot drink over some of the texts of the day and shattering the container.
Dex-starr felt very pleased with that.
Until the hopeful one was holding him like a kit and wiping him down and pulling shards out of him and he wriggled and hissed and snarled and- and he was placed gently into a New Prison with soft fluffy towels and fresh food and the ‘lesson’ ended early.
Dex-starr hated the hopeful one too. It was miserably sickeningly kind .
There was something going on at the complex he was kept at, Dex-starr had gathered. No being had come to give him food at the correct time, and alarms were blaring and screams and blood was in the air. Honestly, it was pissing him off.
And then something came through the wall next to his prison. The Green One. It staggered to its feet, coughing up red blood, and a different larger creature grabbed it. Started crushing it. Mocking it.
Dex-starr hated the sight. And it seemed, finally, the damage to the area had stopped whatever was preventing his ring from working. Dex-starr broke his prison open, flying out in a bundle of claws and teeth and yowling rage.
Really, the creature didn't stand a chance.
“You… you can't be-” It choked, and that voice in his ears finally clicked.
This was the creature that had hurt His Human. It had changed and grown and warped but it was that creature all the same.
Dex-starr ripped out it's insolent throat and started going for the eyes, yowling. By the time the Green One had stemmed its wounds and come over, gently scooping him up, he was a shaking angry mess. But he didn't attack the Green One for its hubris.
On the screen they were showing His Human. Asking him things. Dex-starr stared longingly at the photo, silent. His Human’s long greying hair, her soft smile missing a tooth, the gold in the ears. Occasionally snapping and biting at the creatures that dared to get close... but unusually quiet.
“...You know, she has family still alive.” The Green One said, sitting besides him with a drink. Dex-starr pushed over the drink (it was caught) and stared at him. “That woman was my great-aunt. She loved her cats, all of them… You're Dexter, right?”
Dex-starr pushed over the drink again.
And the Green One smiled.