We begin where we left off, with this wicked Dr. Adamson fellow in the custody of the Titans, handcuffed to a railing in the bathroom of a Batman safehouse. He insists he’ll only speak to Rachel. Rachel insists on trying to get some information out of him, and the rest of the team – though not fans of this plan – lets her enter the bathroom to see what she can find out. Adamson says she’s something wonderful. Not a monster but a savior that can cleanse/heal the world or somesuch. To demonstrate her healing powers, he finds a glass thermometer, says “heal me” and breaks the glass to slit his own throat. A very disturbing amount of dark, red arterial blood issues forth from his throat and a panicked Rachel lays hands on him and heals his wounds.

He also reveals that her birth mother is alive, and tells her the location where she is being held by the Organization.

When the team gets back together to debrief, Rachel insists they need to go in and save her mother right away. Dick and Kory express trepidation. This is very likely a trap, and it would be a very bad idea to go running into it. However, Gar and Rachel secretly conspire to sneak off to the location revealed by Adamson and rescue Rachel’s mother. When they realize the two younger Titans have gone, Dick and Kory feel obligated to go bail the youngsters out of certain death.

The location is a long-disused asylum (at least outwardly – it seems to have long been in use by the Organization). Upon entering the grounds, Rachel and Gar are immediately captured. Dick and Kory show up and are also captured.

In the asylum all of our heroes are tortured, to see of what use they can be made to the Organization. All the Rachel, who is in Adamson’s office (dammit, now how did he escape?) and he’s going on and on about how she needs to join him and summon her father to fulfill her destiny, etc.

She eventually gets fed up with the mind games and the terror that her friends are being hurt and possibly killed, and Dark Rachel takes over. It seems that her gift of healing can be revoked if she chooses, and Adamson’s throat opens up like a Pez dispenser and he bleeds out on the floor.

Rachel finds her mother and then locates and frees Gar. They are then able to locate Kory, and all three find Dick strapped to a table and staring unresponsive at the ceiling. He’s been subjected to intense psychological torture in an attempt to “break” him and turn him into a tool of the Organization. Rachel is able to summon him out of his stupor with a “we’re in this together, we’re going to take care of each other” sort of speech reminiscent of the one Dick makes in the Doom Patrol episode to summon her back from the brink. The re-assembled crew fights their way out of the Asylum and then burns the whole damn place down.

Stray Observations:

• I purposely keep these synopses pretty light on detail to both A) make it so they end up actually being written and posted in a reasonable time, and B) leave a lot on the table for commenters to bring into the conversation. For instance, my description of them escaping the asylum leaves out everything about the kinds of brutal, murderous acts each member of the team must do in order to save themselves and escape. There is a LOT that can be said about each of these characters facing their own dark selves, so feel free to pick that up and run with it.
• Gar agrees with Dick and Kory when all four are in discussion, but privately tells Rachel he’s totally down with going to bust out her mom. He notes that, having lived with Dr. Caulder, he’s learned how to make things easy on himself by outwardly agreeing with people. As a fan of Doom Patrol – particularly Morrison’s run and the more recent Young Animal stuff – I love every little moment of “hey Niles Caulder is a dick” in this series.

Next week: It’s Donna Troy! Holy crap it’s Donna Troy!