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The school was in her sister's memory. Her half-sister, as Nyssa had been sure to emphasize. But there was a pain in the woman's eyes as she asserted that distance between herself and the other daughter of Ra's al Ghul.
Cassandra had once felt a similar, confusing pain in regards to her lost sibling, that Mad Dog lost to memory.
"We will rule the Earth, One Who is All," Nyssa continued to explain, turning with flourish toward the balcony, looking over the sea of acolytes. O-Sensei was the only one who stood among them.
All eyes on her, Cassandra knew what was expected. Her mind was made. She held her breath.
Holding the plated armor of the Batgirl armor above her head, Cassandra felt her heart twist. With a snap, she released her kevlar uniform to the air and shattered it with her heel almost simultaneously.
The Bat broke into a hundred shards. Nyssa smiled. The minions jeered.
Cassandra looked to the Demon's Head expectantly, face void of the swelling emotions just beneath her surface.
The League was foolish. Breaking the symbol on her chest did nothing to change her heart. But, for now, they couldn't know that. Only three people knew where Cassandra's loyalties lied.
Only Cassandra knew how far she would go.
"I am ready," Cassandra said, her arms tightly bound for the spars about to begin.
The guards opened the dojo doors and welcomed Cassandra to the League's newest recruits. Her students. The ones Cassandra had not been expecting.
"One who is all," they called in unison, bowing to her. Cassandra felt her throat close.
When they stood back up, the tallest hardly met her chest.
She turned, furious. "Children?" she demanded.
Never far away, Nyssa stood, cloaked in the shadows. "Children are the best students," she said simply. "You should know this more than anyone."
"But… before…" Cassandra sputtered, mind reeling. Before there had been Tigress and Alpha, the twins… all assassins, yes. But all adults. All of them already had blood on their hands.
They were not younger than seven. They did not have that hollow look in their eyes that her class now did.
"Don't you want to teach them? Don't you want them to learn?" Nyssa prodded. "Or will you be like Batman? Keeping those beneath him dulled and stupid to control them."
Cassandra's eyes narrowed. She knew now -- Barbara had said, Bruce had said, Tim and Steph and Dick and Alfred had all said -- she was not stupid because she could not read. She did not do this, give up her title so that the could be taught to read by the Demon's Head.
She did this to stop them. That was exactly what Cassandra aimed to do.
The former Batgirl would destroy the Demon from within.
"Teach us, master?" a girl in the front begged, her body aching for attention from her new mentor.
Looking around, Cassandra saw much the same. These children -- so young, so broken -- longed for attention and love.
"Yes," Cassandra agreed, shutting the doors behind her.
Three people knew about Cassandra's new mission. It needed to be kept that way.
Even when Cassandra ran into someone who was not in on the mission.
"They're children, Cass!" Tim spit at her, looking as if he couldn't even recognize her. His eyes were watering from the soot over his face and he was struggling to maintain his breath.
Cassandra's foot pressed harder against his kevlar covered chest. She ignored the sting in her own eyes behind the mask, a refashioned kabuki. Nyssa did love for her assassins to carry themes.
"Hush. Robin." she ordered darkly. "I am Cass no longer. I am not Batgirl."
Robin sneered. "No. You're not. You're as bad as Cain now."
Without causing severe damage, she knocked him out as hard she could with a kick. The rage in her strike was barely contained. For half a second, her heart stopped in fear she had gone too far, that she had truly slipped into her cover and was a murderer.
Tim breathed. So did Cassandra.
I am sorry, Tim, she said without any voice. Her eyes flowing free with tears.
She hadn't felt so angry and betrayed since the last time she saw her father. Rotting in jail like a common criminal. She bet daddy was proud now.
"I'm pulling you out," Matches Malone said fiercely. "Nyssa Raatko is too unpredictable. It's too much. You're in too deep."
Cassandra tasted the Assam on her lips as she lowered her cup. Thoughts of Brenda, Blüdhaven, the countless thousands lost swam to the front of her mind. They had let Evil go too far already. It had to be stopped at any cost.
"No," she said simply, eyes burning as she looked at her true father. "It's not your call."
He frowned but relented in his silence.
Cassandra watched as the child pulled to the left, her target falling before starting even the first counter strike. Pride filled the child's face and Cassandra's chest.
"That was to be a finishing strike, One Who Is All," Nyssa hissed from behind her. Cassandra did not even look. "All these months and you mean to tell me your army does not even have the gift of death?"
The League of Assassins had large scale plans. Plans Batman now knew. That the Justice League were sharing with the United Nations in closed assembly that very hour. It was time to leave, Cassandra and all of her children.
She smiled and looked to the Demon's Head almost lazily. "I gave them better," she explained as the children obediently looked to Cassandra rather than Nyssa -- to their mother rather than their enslaver. "I gave them life."