Children of the Order: Curia Part I

She wasn’t a detective, that was for sure.

Bruce was the detective, he should be the one on this assignment.  But his city was keeping him unusually busy; and besides, he probably wasn’t the best choice when it came to missing children cases as it tended to bring up some of his own personal demons.

There were other, more logical choices, but they weren’t available either.  And so it was that she found herself going from city to city, undercover.  It was something her predecessor had done quite a bit of, pretending to be someone she wasn’t, but not her.  She was new to the idea of donning a disguise, an alternate identity.

Her short, shoulder length wavy brown hair wasn’t an issue.  Her outfit of choice was a navy blue skirt suit with matching heels and a white blouse underneath.  Some of the men suggested hose as well, but she angrily told them off – she HATED pantyhose and refused to wear it under any circumstances, even as part of an alternate identity.

A pair of glasses completed the look; she was amazed, as she got ready to leave, that several of her colleagues didn’t recognize her once she added the glasses.  She never understood how Clark managed to fool so many people with such a simple accessory – until then.

The last part of her alternate identity was a name – and that was an easy choice.  Her adoptive Brazilian mother had named her Denisa, so she would use that name…a name she hadn’t gone by for years.  Denisa Vergara.

Barbara provided her with all of the documents and identifications she would need in each of the cities she would be going to, and she was off.



Her instructions were clear and straightforward: she was to fly from major city to major city, using her manufactured identity to gain access to each city’s law enforcement office, and in particular their missing children cases over the past few weeks.  She would take a photo of each document and each photograph contained in each file; the images would be sent directly to Barbara and the others so they could work on a profile.

Almost as fast as she was feeding them information, they were feeding her back some.  As she got close to the end of her mission, a pattern was becoming clear: the children kidnapped all had dark brown hair, brown eyes, some common facial features, and an interest in the arts.

Very few people were aware of the informational database that Barbara had access to; most people would have regarded it as an invasion of their privacy.  In this case though, it was of the utmost value that she and her team was able to use the profile gleaned from the previous abducted children to figure out who their next targets might be.

As she headed to the last city on the list – Queen City – she suddenly realized why the profile seemed so familiar.  She hadn’t been around for World War II, but Diana had.  She had studied her predecessor tirelessly and she knew her history all too well.  Whoever was behind this, it seemed, was trying to start a new Third Reich.  The children matched the description of the leader of the original Third Reich…

…Adolf Hitler.

There.  She had her suspicions, now she needed proof.  She waltzed into the Queen City Police Department like she owned the place, bumping into a detective on her way back to the filing room and shrugging it off even as he stammered and stuttered.  She found the files she was looking for and quickly started taking photos of everything.

She was just walking out when the communicator hidden in her ear buzzed.  She ducked out of sight quickly.

“Yes, Barbara?”

“You’re still in Queen City right?”

“Yes, I’m fast but not THAT fast.  Why?”

“I’ve ran that profile against every child matching it, and there’s one left in Queen City.  I’ll send you the address.  It might be our best chance to catch whoever is taking these kids.”

“Okay, I’m on it.”  She quietly walked out of the police station as Barbara read the address to her.  As night began to fall, she took to the air, still in her alternate identity, as she located the house where the thirteen-year-old boy lived.  She hovered a few feet outside his second-story bedroom window, waiting and watching.

An hour passed, then two, then three.  As she watched over the sleeping young man, she began to think this lead might not pan out.  Just as she was thinking this, the door to the boy’s bedroom opened quietly.

Two men in masks, wearing black, slipped through the doorway.  One was holding a large pistol, the other a white cloth.  She guessed it was probably soaked with chloroform.  She watched and waited until their attention was solely on the young man, and then she flew to the window, yanking it open, and flew through it, landing solidly before them.

She never saw that there was a third man in the room.  The blackjack connected with the base of her skull, and she slid helplessly to the floor, unconscious before she knew what had hit her.  She had no chance to stop the men as they knocked the boy out; as the two men carried him off, the third man picked up the brown-haired woman off the floor, slid her over his shoulder, and headed out the same way they had come in.