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shadowsndaisies · 4 months ago

Text

codename: nightingale- auld acquaintances

reference: young justice season 1 episode 26

wc: 10.3k

synopsis: well shit gets real, conner yeets ng and robin, all while, ng reminds us why she’s the best, and the otp(s) get their shit (collectively and respectively) together

main masterlist

codename: nightingale series masterlist

a/n: I CANNOT BELIEVE I DID IT. you guys and your support have carried me though this process and the many YEARS it took me to get to this point. I have loved writing this since the beginning and I still do. Thank you for loving this story and the characters as much as I do. Enjoy!

MOUNT JUSTICE

December 31st, 03:12 EST

The cave was quiet as you zeta’d in. You’d only managed a few hours of sleep before you woke up in a fit. Ollie’s penthouse was silent though. And a quick check through the security system told you no one but you was home, in fact no one had come home, since you had. The team had made the decision to host a debrief at 0730, the next day, allowing everyone (mostly you) to recenter.

Given that the penthouse was empty, you decided to head to the cave early, if you were lucky, you’d be able to check the logs and see if Ollie, Dinah, and Roy were still up in the Watchtower or not.

“Recognized: Nightingale b-14,” the computer’s voice echoed in the darkness of the cave, and a couple of light flickered on in response.

“Computer, pull Zeta logs for the last 24 hours to the Watchtower, Nightingale Access delta echo charlie zero six,” you call out your code after a brief look assures that you’re the only one around.

“Access Denied,” the computer’s response throws you off guard as you pull up a screen, but you’re treated to a red screen.

“Under who’s authority?”

“Designation 0-2.”

“Batman?” you whisper the answer to yourself, but you can’t understand why. You’ve had access to the Watch Tower logs since Ollie and Dinah told you about the tower. You couldn’t get there without them, but you could access the logs to see who’s there currently, and you could usually see the calendar to know when Dinah and Ollie were scheduled.

“Computer, Canary Override: charlie romeo yankee seven eight nine three,” you attempt.

“Override denied.”

“What? Why?”

“Override denied per designation A-0-4.”

“A-0-4? Who is A-0-4?”

“Access Denied.”

“Oh, fuck’s sake!” you shout.

“Perhaps yelling at our computer system is not the best use of your limited time to rest?” a new voice interrupts.

You frown as you turn to look at Kaldur, “it won’t let me access the Watch Tower logs,” you huff, pointing at the red message glaring back at you.

“Why are you looking to access the logs?” he asks, brows furrowed as he looks between you and the screen.

“No one came home last night, K. I needed- I wanted- I just need to talk to Dinah, after everything that happened? I just wanted Dinah or Ollie, and they weren’t home. I passed out on the couch waiting, and when I woke up, they still hadn’t come back. I just wanted to see if they were still there,” you explain.

Kaldur’s lips pull into a frown, “They may be pre-occupied, the League, as you know, better than most, can be demanding, even at the best of times, and with the best of offers,” he states.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” you defend, sensing his double meaning.

“You mean to tell me, my King is but a liar?” he challenges.

You’re quiet for a moment, Kaldur knew better than anyone, just how much you respected King Orin, “what did he say, exactly?”

“That you were also accepted into the League, that you were by far the best candidate off all those who were inducted, and yet, you were the only one who has said no to date,” he admits.

Your voice is quiet as you look at your friend, before you sigh, “how long have you known?”

“Since the meeting in November.”

“You didn’t say anything…”

“Neither did you, I decided it’d be best to follow your lead. You would have said something when you were ready to,” he shrugs.

“I’m not ready. I don’t feel ready, to be there, at that level,” you explain.

“You owe me no explanation, old friend. I have always had faith in your decisions, I won’t start questioning them now,” he assures you.

“Thanks, K,” you sigh. “Did he really say I was the best candidate?”

Kaldur smiles knowingly, and gently places a hand on your shoulder, “Come, M’gann stress baked cookies last night upon our arrival. We can indulge in those while we watch something?”

“Yes, please.”

You both got settled on the green sofas with a plate of cookies on the coffee table before you, and two mugs of tea. You were flipping through the available options when Kaldur spoke up again.

“I watched when you were barely in double digits trying to learn how to sort through your feelings and emotions,” he began and your grip on the mug tightened, while your hand with the remote dropped. “I watched as you turned it into a motivator, a strength. I watched how you learned to center yourself and be objective, even with only a decade beneath you. What you feel now, how you feel now, might be stronger, but you know how to utilize that, you know how to sort it. But until you can, until you’re able and ready, I hope you know I will be here to temper it. Just as I was before,” his tone is firm, as he expresses himself.

Slowly your gaze moves to him, and you take him in. This Kaldur was nearly an adult, he had given up the Conservatory, and trained with King Orin. This Kaldur taught you Atlantean, he helped you learn how to open yourself to magic.

“Kaldur…”

“We used to spar, do you remember? You were so full of rage and I remember the Queen sending me to spar with you one day. Garth and Tulla thought it would be unfair, they thought that with my age, my size, my magical and home advantage, you would be unable to compete. Fitting, that you knocked me down in mere minutes, despite being slowed by the water, despite being in a new place, despite your age and size. It was then that we all realized that you hold so much raw power, much more than you ever seemed to realize yourself.”

“You’d think you would’ve learned your lesson after Wally,” you scoff, sniffing to yourself and recalling the first time you met the boys.

“Oh, I did. Which is why I asked for you to be included in our studies, it’s why you studied with me, specifically, at the conservatory. You needed an outlet, then. So, you studied with us, trained with us, and despite not being naturally adept at magic, despite being out of your element, you held your own, you beat us several times. You mastered skills quicker than we ever did. You needed the distraction, to let go of all that you had been forced to carry at such a young age. I just hope you can trust me to help you with that again.”

“You were my first true friend, Kaldur’ahm. I had Roy, but he had always been introduced as a brother, you were a friend. You saw me, the realest version of me, rageful, angry, upset, scared, all of the negative emotions and you still decided that you would help me. You have always looked out for me, and you have always had my trust,” you’re resolute in your answer, no one had supported you through the hard parts like Kaldur had, because he was right. He had seen you at your angriest, he’d watched you fight as an outlet, seen you train yourself to the brink of exhaustion just to be free of the rage, even for a minute, and instead of telling you that you were wrong for your methods, he instead offered you new outlets, new opportunities. He lent you his strength and stability when you had none.

“I am honored to hold that title, my bird. We made a promise, you remember? A piece of our histories intertwined,” he states, smiling at you as he tugs a gold chain from under his shirt. Your gaze lingers on it for a moment before dropping to the ring you’d been subconsciously fidgeting with.

The ring that had allowed you to breathe underwater, the one that allowed you to live in Atlantis as if you were an Atlantean yourself, it was obviously special. But what made it so treasured was not the gift it gave, it was the who the gift was from. The ring had belonged to Kaldur’s mother. It had been she, who when King Orin asked for a volunteer, a home for the girl from the dry world, had stepped forward. She had opened her home, and had offered the ring to be enchanted for you. She became your advocate while you lived in Atlantis, she treated you like you were one of her own. When it was finally time for you to return to your home, over a year later, she had told you to keep the ring, “I’d always hoped to pass this ring to a daughter,” she’d said, and you cried as you hugged her one last time.

On Kaldur’s first trip to visit you, merely a month after you’d gone back to Star City, you’d given him a chain. It had belonged to your father, and he’d worn it his whole life. Something that had been gifted to him when he was young from his father, who got it from his father before him. There’s a small pendent that hangs, your family’s crest, just like on your ring, they were a set technically.

You’d managed to enchant the item with your limited ability just in time for Kaldur’s first visit. “It’s meant to be passed to sons. I’d really like it if our histories were intwined. If I’m going to carry such a meaningful part of yours and your mom’s history, then I’d really like if you were to carry this of mine.” As far as you know, he hadn’t taken it off since you gave it to him almost three years ago.

The frown reappears on your lips as you look at the chain, and then at Kaldur. “Sometimes… I wish I was still there. It was easier living with you. There were no secret machinations, just you and me, and Garth and Tulla. I- I was hurting, I know that, but-”

“I understand,” he promises and you can’t help but let out a watery laugh.

“Of course you do. You’re Kaldur’ahm, no one ever seems to understand me as well as you do,” you smile.

“Rest, my friend, you have earned it. Our debrief with the Batman is 0730, however, I suspect he will be here early.”

“0700?” you ask.

“See you then,” he promises, tossing you a pillow and a blanket.

“Thanks, K, for everything,” you smiled, plopping back.

“Anytime, my friend, anytime.”

MOUNT JUSTICE December 31st, 06:30 EST

When you wake up again, it’s to Conner staring down at you with a quirked brow.

“Shit, Conner, why are you just staring at me like that?” you groan rubbing at your eyes.

“I wasn’t expecting to see you yet,” he admits, one hand rubbing at his neck.

“Yeah, I came earlier this morning. Canary and GA were at the Tower all night long. K, sat with me for a while.”

“Well, since you’re here… maybe we can talk about-”

“About your dad?” you ask, staring up at the roof of the cave.

“Don’t. Please don’t call him that. There's so much to figure out, but he’s not… not my dad,” you haven't turned back to him yet, but you can hear the tension in his tone.

“Genetic Donor then?” you offer turning back to him with a lazy smirk before adjusting yourself to lean against the arm of the sofa, tucking your legs beneath you.

“Genetic Donor works,” he sighs, sitting down in the now empty space on the sofa with you.

It’s silent for a minute as you both process, and then you're giggling. Conner’s eyes blow wide, as he stares at you. You cant help yourself though. Your giggles soon turn to full blown laughs, tears forming in your eyes.

“NG… nightingale… (y/n)!” Conners tone grew increasingly harried with each call to you.

“I’m sorry, I- I just… he killed my parents. I’m an orphan… be-because of Lex fucking Luthor, and he’s the only reason you're even here. He’s the reason I’m here!” you’re still laughing.

It has to be some sort of break, your mind finally deciding it's had enough.

That's when the laughs trail off, and you're left with tears.

You stop heaving and you take a deep breath, everything grows silent, you shut your eyes and center yourself. When you open your eyes you're staring at Conner again.

“I don't know how to fix this,” he admits.

You offer him a weak smile as your shoulders droop, “you can't,” you relent and Conner sags back into the sofa too.

“What now?” he asks.

“We be honest with each other, and the team. You and me, we're bonded by something now. I didn't realize it when we freed you from your pod, or when you helped us escape, but we are.”

“Allies against Lex?” he offers, holding out his hand.

“Allies against Lex,” you confirm, shaking his hand.

A not so innocent piece of you takes advantage and reads his emotions. You're reassured by the feelings of honesty, compassion, and belonging. You stare at Conner for a moment before letting go of his hand.

“What time is it?” you ask, stretching out a bit.

“You have about 15 until debrief.”

“Okay, thanks,” you sigh, standing up.

“I’ll see you in the cortex?” he asks, standing up as well.

“Yeah,” you confirm before heading to the locker room.

You're all standing in a line when Batman finally zetas in. You hadn’t had a chance to talk to Rob, or anyone else from the team about yesterday before he arrived.

He starts by asking for a rundown of events. Which we oblige. We explain everything from start to finish, the reveals, the truths, the plan for Santa Prisca. Everything leading up to the moment of Lex Luthor’s escape.

And when all of that is said and done you swallow your fears down hard before stepping forward, “Additionally, after defeating Bane with Robin and Zatanna, when I became aware of Luthor’s escape-”

“She was a little upset, which I’d argue is completely warranted considering everything we found out yesterday,” Wally cuts in, interrupting you before you can admit to how you lost control.

“Yes, but-” your second attempt is interrupted as well.

“Which is why we would like to request that the development of a case against Luthor be a Team priority,” Robin’s the one to cut in this time, proffering an official request on behalf of the team.

You risk a glance at the Team, and you don’t need M’gann’s abilities to understand what they're trying to say. So you shut up, and step back in line, waiting for Batman’s response to the debrief as well as the request.

He doesn't say anything for a minute, and then Kaldur is stepping in, “We have reason to feel proud of yesterday's victories. But one thing has not changed,” he alludes.

“Somehow, the bad guys are still getting intel about us,” Robin offers.

“Yeah, but at least we know none of us are the mole,” Wally counters.

For the first time that morning Batman finally speaks up, “That's correct,” he confirms, and he does so with serious conviction.

You want to be reassured by his confirmation, but something about the whole briefing was throwing you off, and it wasn't the discussion of Luthor.

“The mole,” he begins again, “was Red Arrow.”

Theres a brief silence as Roy’s image is displayed before everyone explodes.

“Roy?” Robin repeats disbelievingly.

“No way!” Wally’s voice had pitched up in his rebuttal.

You on the other hand, felt as the first of the strings holding you up snapped. Kaldur places a hand on your shoulder as if he knew, before turning back to the Dark Knight, “Batman, that cannot be. He was Green Arrow's protégé. We have all known him for years.”

“Unfortunately, the Roy Harper we have known for the last three years is another Project Cadmus clone,” Red Tornado explains.

You have to fight to catch your breath, this couldn’t be happening. You’d known Roy longer than that, you would've realized!

“We've learned the real Speedy was abducted and replaced soon after becoming Green Arrow's sidekick,” Batman explains and you finally step forward.

“No,” the seriousness of the word echoes in the cave. “I’ve known Roy longer than that, its been way more than three years! I would have noticed if CADMUS had substituted my own brother in front of me!” your argument is urgent, something had to be wrong.

“Unless they took a self fabricated opportunity to substitute the clone in a time of chaos. Where Speedy’s patrol partner and closest confidant was… gone?” Batman paints a picture but you're so hyper-focused on the Roy of it all you miss what he’s hinting to.

Theres a sharp intake of breath behind you, when you turn you see Kaldur, his eyes wide as he stares at you, “You came to Atlantis almost four years ago, you were gone from the surface world for over a year…” he reminds you, and you feel another string snap.

“No.”

“You said everyone seemed different, you were different, you were re-adjusting, it’d be reasonable to assume you wouldn't have noticed,” Kaldur’s tone is soft.

“No! Don't you understand?” you shout, turning to the team. “If that's true, it means the riot where they escaped was planned, they meant to cause a distraction, to throw us off guard so that they could switch-”

“Switch their Roy for ours,” Wally finishes, green eyes full of remorse on your behalf.

“And they waited almost year to put that into action, capitalizing off of the disarray of Star City's heroes,” Artemis tacks on.

“I would have noticed!” you argue, voice cracking as you try to reign in your emotions.

“The clone was pre-programmed with a drive to join the Justice League,” Batman intervenes, continuing to provide the information he had at hand. “Which is why he was so angry over any delays to his admission and why he refused to join the Team. This Roy Harper had no idea he was a clone or a traitor. And his subconscious programming drove him to become League-worthy. So he struck out on his own as Red Arrow.”

Your head was spinning, heart beating so fast and loud in your ears, it was a miracle you were still standing up. Something was wrong, something had to be wrong. Where was Dinah and Ollie? If this were true they’d come to tell you in person, they would. How could Ollie have not noticed? How could Dinah? Something had to be wrong.

“When he was finally admitted, his secondary programming kicked in and he attempted to betray the League to Vandal Savage.”

Your stomach flipped, Savage?

“Fortunately, I had already deduced Red Arrow was a clone. We were prepared.”

He had what?!

“I think I’m gonna be sick,” you whisper, Conner and Kaldur seem to be the the only two who hear you as they offer you mildly concerned expressions.

“Savage was subdued but Red Arrow escaped. He is now a fugitive, armed and dangerous,” Red Tornado continues.

“If you guys hadn't rescued me from CADMUS...” Conner trails off, eyes jumping from me to Kaldur.

“What happened to the real Roy?” Rob’s the one to voice the question and your heart stutters. Real Roy as if the one you'd known since your return wasn't real in some way. They were both real, at least they were to you.

“We don't know. He isn't at Cadmus. We have to face the possibility that the real Roy Harper is dead.”

You can't stop it. The bubble of grief, pain, and guilt. It bursts out of you, and of course Kaldur’s the one to catch it. His hand lands heavily on your shoulder, and you take deep breaths to center yourself. They don't know, you remind yourself. He could be alive and on ice somewhere, you repeat. You're forcing thoughts of hope down your own throat, hoping something will be digestible.

The last thing you're expecting is for Robin to grab ahold of your hand, not in front of Batman, and not after yesterday’s incident. Today, however, he doesn't waver or flinch back like he had the day before, so you can't tell if he can feel what you are right now. He simply snags your hand and tightens his grasp, until you're squeezing back.

“The clone Roy. The Team will find him,” Kaldur decides, his tone leaves little space.

Yet, somehow, Batman blows it wide open, “Negative. Red Arrow's a member of the Justice League now. Leave him to us.”

There's an argument forming on your lips, but a beep from his comms forces you to shut up.

“I'm needed on the Watchtower. Tornado, stay with the kids,” Batman decides and Robins hand slackens a bit. Kids? Since when did Batman call you kids?

The zeta lights up a second later, “Recognized, Batman, zero-two.”

You turn and run to the closest bathroom, you can hear as a few people shout after you, but you’re focused on making it to the bathroom. Your knees hit the ground hard as you all but collapse and then your heaving up the little that’s in your stomach. The protein bar and cookies that Conner had swiped from the kitchen for you, the orange juice Kaldur had poured for you, and the the blueberries that you’d scarfed down as well.

There’s a hand on your back, another keeping your hair back. “Wally?” your voice is a hoarse whisper.

“It’s me,” he affirms.

You nod and close your eyes for a second before you’re heaving again.

“I got you,” he promises, gently rubbing circles into your back.

You knew that, Wally’s always got your back. You know he probably didn’t hesitate to chase after to you, and that he most likely told everyone else to stay back. “I would have noticed,” you repeat.

“(Y/n)…”

“I should have noticed,” you say, sliding back, wiping at your mouth and leaning against the wall before turning to your friend.

“That’s not on you,” Wally argued.

“He’s my brother, my responsibility,” you shoot back.

“C’mon, let’s get you back before Rob starts panicking,” he huffs, pulling you up.

“I need to bru-” before you can finish Wally disappears and reappears with the toothbrush from your locker and a tube of toothpaste.

“Your teeth?” he asks cheekily.

You shake your head before quickly brushing your teeth. When you and Wally get back it’s to Kaldur’s awaiting stare. You offer a nod and he turns to face the rest of the team before looking back at you. He gives you a look signifying that it was your move this time, your call. Your stomach’s still unsettled but you swallow down your nerves and confusion before addressing the team.

“Clone or no clone, Red Arrow was one of us. For three years, he was ours. We will go after him, and we will figure this out, on our terms,” you decide.

You had planned to say more, but the sudden sounds from Red Tornado force you to stop. He freezes about a foot and a half away from you. Then, it's like he shut down. A sound as if he was being powered down, as the entire armor freezes, and his head tilts down.

“Tornado!” M’gann’s shout is slightly panicked.

“What happened?” Conner’s squinting.

“He's powered down,” Wally notes, tone slightly curious.

“All functions off-line,” Robins got a frown as well, analyzing Red Tornadoes stats on his wrist-computer.

“Something doesn’t feel right,” you note, staring between the stats as well as Tornado.

“Guys, I'm sensing a low-level mystic force at play. I don't know if it caused his shutdown, but… now that I think about it, I was getting the same buzz off Batman,” Zatanna admits, and your frown deepens.

“Batman,” Robin repeats. “He called us kids. He never does that.”

You step forward, analyzing every aspect of Tornado that you could, Wally comes up behind you and does the same.

“Look,” Wally’s call pulls your attention. When he straightens up you can see something in his hands, “One of those bio-tech chips we confiscated off Cheshire.”

“Nightingale is right, something is not right,” Kaldur agrees. “Robin, Kid, Zatanna, Rocket, see if you can get Tornado back online,” he directs. “The rest with me to find Ro... Red Arrow.”

The team pauses despite Kaldur’s clear instruction, and slowly they look from him, to each other, and then to you. You know why they paused, even Kaldur seems frozen as he stares at you. His decision would put you into the field, it would allow you to look for Roy, to be there when the Team finds him. Going with them would also separate you from both Wally and Dick.

You must’ve stayed silent too long, “Birdy,” Wally’s voice seemed to echo as he called out your name.

“Sorry,” you mutter, looking up. “Kaldur’s right, we.. uh, we have to split up.”

Wally and Dick look at each other and then they look at you.

“It’ll be okay,” you tell them. “I have to find him, my brother, my responsibility. Plus, who knows him better than me?”

No one has an answer and you nod.

“Suit up,” you confirm once more before the team nods, and disperses accordingly.

Wally, Dick, and Kaldur hang back. The three of them don’t speak, but they’re exchanging looks with each other and with yourself. No one says a word, but you offer a look of your own, and then roll your eyes at them. They pause and as always, Wally’s the first to crack. He throws his hands up looking at the two other boys and then gesturing to you. When that doesn’t get the response he wants, he throws his hands up again, waving them around.

You smile softly, hands coming to Wally’s shoulders. You offer a forced lopsided smile, tilting your head to the side. Wally responds by shaking his head, and you tighten your grip. You give him a pleading look, Wally’s face scrunches but he finally stares at you head on. You nod, gently and he sighs before nodding back.

You pass along a feeling of comfort, trying to make him understand that it’ll be okay.

“Yeah,” Wally confirms, before walking off.

Kaldur offers you a nod of his head and you nod back, before he walks toward the bioship.

You pause for a second and take a breath, and then there’s a hand on your shoulder and you’re hit with concern, longing, and a need to protect. You take another breath and turn to face Dick. He’s staring at you for a second, he opens his mouth and then closes it. In the end he stares at you making a closed fist with his right hand and rubs little clockwise circles on his chest. Your ASL was passable, a skill that Dinah and Ollie thought was important to learn for the streets, it seems like Bruce thought the same for Dick. Sorry, that’s what he was saying.

You know what he’s sorry for, you knew it the second he grabbed your hand. You take your right hand, rub a circle with your palm against your chest, and then with a flat hand swipe above your temple with your fingertips, I know.

He shakes his head, the barest of a smile on his lips.

You offer a soft smile at Dick one last time before walking towards the locker room. You’re quick to grab your gear, and you’re silent until your in the bioship, and in the air.

“Old friend,” Kaldur’s voice is soft inside the bioship, but you’re forced to pay attention to him regardless.

“I know what you’re going to say,” you sigh.

“Oh?”

“It’s not your fault, you couldn’t have known,” you trail off.

“Wrong,” Artemis interrupts.

“Am I?”

“Yeah, we were all going to say it,” Conner scoffed.

You soften at that.

“That’s where you’re wrong,” you say sadly.

“How so?” M’gann’s voice is as soft as it has always been.

“Because I did know, a piece of me did, at least,” you tell them, gaze focusing on the clouds as you pass them by out the window.

“What?” Conner’s accusation cuts clear.

“I knew something was wrong. I could feel it. Ever since my abilities… he would get angry, over things he never used to. I just wrote it off, I- I knew it was wrong, it felt wrong, it didn’t feel like natural anger, it was sudden, it was triggered but not by anything I could see. I should’ve said something, should’ve told someone,” you admit to them.

“You had no reason to suspect ulterior machinations,” Kaldur countered. “And though I know it bothers you, you both had grown apart since the foundation of the team.”

“Yeah,” you nod, fingers tracing over the ring dagger you’d been fidgeting with, “maybe.”

WASHINGTON, D.C. December 31st, 09:06 EST

“Logs indicate Red Arrow zeta'd to the Hall from the Watchtower,” Artemis stated, “But he could be anywhere by now, I also was only able to read the Hall logs, the Watchtower ones have been classified,” she adds on.

Kaldur clears his throat and turns to you expectantly, “So, I kind of didn’t appreciate how Roy tried to cut ties with everyone when he went solo, so I might’ve done some digging…” you trail, typing in new coordinates.

“Digging?” Conner asks.

“Okay, fine, investigating, and tailing, and the whole package pretty much. I found his main apartment, and discovered that he had installed equipment caches in several major cities,” you relent.

Conner coughs out, “stalker,” before clearing his throat, and you roll your eyes.

“One is here,” you continue as the bioship comes to a stop over an apartment complex.

“So… who’s going down, because, uh… not it,” Artemis muses weakly.

“I am,” you assure her.

“We are,” Kaldur corrects.

You nod and you both stand, you readjust your utility belt and pull a sweatshirt over the top of your suit, and then you pull your leather jacket on as well. It looks inconspicuous enough, at least as much as it would ever for your needs.

You and Kaldur drop to the roof, the access door was unlocked and you made your way down one floor. Roy had gotten an apartment on the top floor. When you come upon the door you crouch down with your lock picks, but between your latent anxiety, and the need to find Roy, your focus is slightly skewed.

“Perhaps, this is not the time for stealth?” Kaldur offers sagely.

You sigh and hang your head, hiding your lock pick tools in their place under your sleeve once again, “yeah.”

“Shall I? Or, would you like to?” he asks, gesturing to the door.

“I will,” you nod, standing back up.

You take a breath and stare at the door, and then with a heafty amount of force you kick down the door, you manage to put in enough force to rock the door off a hinge, and when it clears your vision you’re greeted by Roy holding up his bow with two arrows notched.

You notice the way his hand dips a second as he realizes it’s you he’s got an arrow focused on, “How’s it hanging, Roy?” you ask, but there’s a tough edge to your tone.

“You know, business as usual, Birdy,” he huffs out, but he retrains the arrows on you both.

“We have not come to harm nor apprehend you,” Kaldur cuts in. “But the Team requires answers-”

“Me first,” Roy interrupts. “Tell me something you haven’t told anyone else… tell me who broke your heart.”

Your jaw drops, “Roy!” your tone is more chastising than it was before. You know why it’s necessary, but it’s a low blow for Kaldur, a very low blow.

Kaldur places a hand on your shoulder, “Tula. The girl I loved chose my best friend Garth over me,” he answers, and you can hear the fight to keep his voice level. “While the man I consider by best friend on the surface world aims an arrow at my chest.”

Roy moves and suddenly both arrows are pointed at you.

“Roy-” Kaldur’s tone turned dangerous, but to your credit your eyes narrow and you tilt your chin up at him daringly.

“E.T. phone home,” Roy says, and you don’t need to touch Kaldur to feel the confusion rolling off of him.

There’s a pang in your heart, Roy, this Roy, was pulling on one of the earliest decisions you all made, code phrases. Methods to promise sanity, self, but also a warning when necessary. They were all movie phrases, famous enough to remember, but mismatched enough that no one would be able to guess. You’d both decided on them after you’d returned from Atlantis and Dinah let you return to patrol.

“Toto, I’ve got a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore,” you whisper.

Roy’s entire body sags. The bow and arrows clatter to the floor as he drops to his knees, and you’re quick to drop with him. You land on your knees right in front of him.

“You’re killin’ me, Smalls,” you whisper once again to him.

“As if,” he shoots back, and you crush him in a hug.

The both of you clutch onto each other, you grip him tight just for the minute being. You hug him tight and he hugs back, and you revel in it. In it’s familiarity. He might have not been the Roy that was brought home to you, but he is the one you spent the last three years with, he is still your Roy. The one who helped you readjust to being back in Star City, the one who would drive you to school, and would tap you gently when you’d accidentally slip back into Atlantean. The one who would reassure you that life was going to be okay, who would sit beside your bed, who would hold your hand, who watched your back, he was your brother. Your brother, your responsibility.

Slowly you both re-centered, and then you hauled him up to the roof, and then all three of you were pulled back up into the bioship. It’s quiet when you’re all back.

“We’re clear,” you say quietly and there’s a collective breath let out.

Everyone settled into their seats and soon enough we were back in the air.

Kaldur doesn’t waste any time, “We were told you were the mole,” he explains and Roy puffs out a breath.

“But we have reason to doubt,” you quickly inserted.

“Forget doubt. I was the mole,” Roy states, and you let out an audible groan, staring up at the roof of the ship.

“Batman and Tornado said you’re a CADMUS clone, like me,” Conner admits.

Roy turns to look at you, and you offer a slight nod, “That explains it,” he nods with a sigh that makes him seem more tired than surprised. “I was a sleeper agent, pre-programmed to infiltrate the League…. I think Sportsmaster was my handler. He had a key-phrase, Broken Arrow… that could shut me down, put me in a hypnotic state to steal secrets for his superiors, or incorporate further programming. I'd then carry out all orders subconsciously completely unaware of what drove me.”

Roy paused and you stared back at him, “take me back?” you whisper to him and he shut his eyes and nodded once more before turning back to the rest of the team, specifically the three seated behind you.

“I think one of those orders was to focus suspicion on the three of you. I'm sorry,” he adds on.

“How did Batman discover this and prevent you from betraying the League?” Kaldur asks.

Roy pauses, and looks at you, “He didn't.”

“Fuck,” you sigh.

“Birdy,” Kaldur’s voice is level, and there’s a request in it to make sure you remain so as well.

“So what happened?” you ask, pulling yourself together.

“The entire League’s been put under mental domination via those chips you guys found,” Roy sighs, scrubbing at his face.

“The ones we got off Jade?” Artemis cut in.

“Yeah, he called ‘em Starro-tech, an alien bio-organism infused with nanotechnology and magic,” Roy explained.

“Nanotechnology and magic?” you repeat. “Artemis, in the Bayou, you said you saw-”

“Klarion, the Brain, Gorilla Mallah, and Professor Ivo,” she answers.

“If there was ever a trust that could pull something like that off…” you trail.

“What do they do? The chips?

“It shuts down the mind’s autonomy, allows the controller to reprogram the individual to suit their needs,” Roy explains.

“Wait…” Conner calls interrupting. “You said He called them, who’s he?”

Roy grimaces, looks around the ship and then straight at you, and you already don’t like where this is headed, “Savage,” he says and you don’t even make it a second before you explode.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” you shout. “VANDAL SAVAGE? WHAT THE FUCK!”

“Language,” Roy says automatically, and then he twitches, like he hadn’t meant to say it. “And I knew you weren’t going to like that.”

“But this chip, it affected everyone?” M’gann asked, and you had no doubt she was thinking about her uncle.

“This Starro-tech, it worked on super-powered humans, four flavors of alien, an android, even Doctor Fate,” Roy explained.

“Defeating all of you without a fight?” Conner asks.

“Indeed. A remarkable achievement. One not easily countered,” Kaldur points out.

“I'm sorry, but how is it that you are no longer enslaved?” M’gann’s the one to ask and your body tenses up.

“No Starro-tech, for starters. Just my CADMUS programming, and once I had satisfied its last parameter, my mind began to clear,” Roy admits. “I'm sure Savage planned to Starro-tech me, but he paused to bask… I escaped.”

You turn in your seat and look back at M’gann, urging her to understand, and luckily, she does. She nods at you with a gentle smile, “I promise, I can clean any residual programming from your mind,” M’gann says, reassuring you, despite the intention being directed at Roy.

“Linking both squads and de-camouflaging,” M’gann’s voice suddenly echoes in your head and you spot the super cycle as it moves into docking position.

“Great. Because we really need to compare notes,” Robin’s voice has an edge, and as you come face to face with him and the other half of your team, you spot Wally’s frown and notice Dinah.

“What the fuck?” your voice takes on it’s own lethal edge as your gaze jumps from your unconscious and tied up mentor to the rest of the team.

It took some time but eventually both halves of the team had been caught up, now the only think left was to figure out the next move.

“What if we reverse engineer the starro-tech?” Wally’s the one to make the suggestion and it has all of you pausing.

“Great idea, but how?” Artemis’ tone is dry but she makes a valid point.

It goes quiet and that’s when you have an idea.

“ti tha ginótan an rotoúsame ti vasílissa?" (what if we were to ask the queen?) the question echoes across the link but only one person can understand.

Kaldur blinks slowly and in a hesitant tone asks, “*Rota tin gia ti akrivos?*" (ask her for what exactly?)

Your lip quirks a bit, “*an boroúme dioikitís Giatrós V?*" (if we can commandeer Doctor V?)

You’re not sure what you were expecting but you’re not sure why you were surprised, Kaldur’s always backed your plans, “Pistévete óti o Red échei akóma ton arithmó tis Roquette?" (Do you think Red still has Roquette’s number?)

You offer a lopsided smile, “**Tha chreiastoúme óli ti vo��theia pou boroúme na pároume**." (We’re gonna need all the help we can get.)

“Would someone like to clue those of us not fluent in Atlantean in?” Conner’s tone cuts through your conversation.

You share another look with Kaldur.

“It’s your plan,” he prods.

“Wally has the right idea, we have to reverse engineer the chip. We don’t stand a chance if we don’t,” you remind everyone.

“But you have a plan that will address that,” Robin realizes.

“Of course she does, when it comes down to it, our girl’s always got a plan,” Wally snorts, but by the way he scrubs at his face you realize he’s on edge.

You nod, “what do we know about the staro-tech?”

“Alien bio-organisim infused with nanotechnology and magic… what are you thinking?” Roy trails.

“I think you have the number for a nanotechnologies expert who owes us a favor, and I happen to know a few individuals who specialize in magic and science, in fact they run a whole conservatory, that teaches kids like us, well, like Kaldur,” you hint to everyone else.

“Doctor Roquette and Queen Meera,” Robin realizes.

“Alongside Doctor Vulko, who runs the Atlantean Science Center, he’s the Minister of Science for the kingdom,” Kaldur adds.

“Doctor Spence too,” Connor adds, “She worked for CADMUS, she probably can help reverse engineer the chips.”

“Which means there’s also three people we need to pick up, ASAP,” you point out.

Another silence fils the ship, Wally’s already shaking his head, and Rob’s still staring straight at you.

“We have to split up,” Rocket’s the one to state the obvious.

“Again?” Zatanna’s voice wobbles a bit.

You bite down hard on your lip to keep yourself focused.

“We have to, the quicker we get them, the quicker we fix this. We have to fix this,” you say, voice level.

“How do you want to handle it?” Robin’s the one to ask, his own voice level, but you can see the twitch in his hand.

Your lips tug down as you prepare to answer, because there’s only one possibility, “Superboy and Miss Martian will pick up Dr. Spence. Kid Flash and Robin will escort Red Arrow-” you don’t mean for your voice to crack but it does. “Will escort Red Arrow and retrieve Dr. Roquette.”

“You’ve got to be joking,” Wally’s scoff, clearly depicts what he thinks of your decision.

“Dude,” Robin’s quick to cut him off.

“And Aqualad and I will take the super cycle to go to Atlantis,” you finish. “Artemis, Zee, and Rocket will play support, and keep tabs on Canary. Please do not lose my mentor. Plus they can run background with RT.”

You’re met with silence.

“This is the plan, if someone has a better idea, speak up now, otherwise, you know what you have to do,” you swallow back the anxiety, and focus your gaze on Kaldur, you can’t look at anyone else, not right now.

You remember his words from earlier, to lean on him, and to allow him to support you. It was all so overwhelming, it’s all too much, but staring at Kaldur reminded you of the little girl who was barely 10 when she was dropped in Atlantis. The girl so full of rage she couldn’t sort through her own emotions. Kaldur knew how to help that girl center herself, taught her how to cope and handle things.

“Well if no one else is going to say it; I have some thoughts,” Wally scoffs again.

“Trust me, we know you do, Wall-Man,” Artemis’ dry tone actually puts a smile on your lips, a small quirk of a thing, but it works.

“I’m only taking constructive criticism at the moment,” you tag on, and your gaze finally flickers to Wally who is simply glaring at you.

You offer a shrug in response, and you can feel the heat of Wally’s glare, the discomfort radiating off of Dick, but you don’t have it in you right now to address it.

ATLANTIS December 31st, 13:13 EST

“Our friends are… displeased,” Kaldur notes cautiously once it’s just the two of you on the supercycle.

“I know,” you nod, and you did, you felt it in the air, rolling off your teammates, your friends, as you and Kaldur geared up to split off.

“What are you thinking, poulí?” the question weighs heavy on you.

“I am thinking that this is my only plan, K. I don’t have a back up if we should fail this time around,” you admit.

“Then it’s good we trust in your planning, old friend. Your plans have never led us astray thus far,” he muses.

“Define astray,” you scoff back, Kaldur lets a smile slip, and then a hand lands on your shoulder comfortingly.

“They believe in you, and so do I,” he reassures you. “This idea, utilizing our resources, it is a good plan.”

“Vandal Savage, Kaldur, it’s a big play we’re chancing at here,” you sigh, twisting your rings nervously.

“Yes, and we are making the most educated choices we can. Believe in yourself, poulí, just as we do.”

You nod silently doing your best to absorb Kaldur’s reassurances. Soon enough the Super-cycle begins to descend. It pauses part way submerged, and you reach out with the ring clad finger to touch the water. Kaldur is silent beside you as you ground yourself. You feel the current, the pull of the ocean, and firmly you say, “anapnéo,” the ring made from atlantean metal glows, and then with a tap to the Super-cycle it submerges completely.

The first breath is always a bit nerve wracking, it feels like you’re entirely out of practice, and therefore not prepared to breathe. But you do. You cautiously, slowly breathe in, and when it feels as normal as it does on land your body relaxes.

“pos niótheis poulí?" (how do you feel, Birdy?) Kaldur’s question jars your wandering thoughts back into the present.

“étoimo na cheiristeí ó,ti prépei na cheiristeí ,” (ready to handle what needs to be handled) you assure him and he nods.

Minutes pass and then you are confronted with the city of Atlantis, beautiful in all its glowing magic and technology. You smile at the city fondly and catch the wanting in Kaldur’s eye, this was him home, and for a year it had been your own. The two of you had developed your friendship in this city, it will always, without a doubt, be a very special place for you.

As the cycle passes through the gates and toward the conservatory, you push the melancholic nostalgia away, and do your best to focus in on the mission at hand, there was too much as stake to be distracted by memories of the past. As Kaldur disembarks, you follow, and the two of you make your way into the Conservatory of Magic.

MOUNT JUSTICE

December 31st, 15:42 EST

“So you need us to develop something that will work against, whatever magicked up alien technology that Mr. Big Bad, Vandal Savage is using against the Justice League?” Roquette’s tone was the same as it was when you first encountered her, and you share a look with Kaldur when you both notice it.

“The heroes have come to us for help, should we not so long as we are able?” Dr. Vulko, ever the voice of reason, and forever on the side of progress is the balm you didn’t realize you’d need.

“I agree, this is an opportunity to do good with the knowledge we have acquired over our years,” Dr. Spence’s agreement catches you off guard, but the pride and satisfaction rolling off of SB tells you this is exactly what he’d hoped for.

“It’s simple, Kaldur’ahm and Poulí told us what’s wrong, you’re either here to help, or they can show you the door,” Tulla’s blunt and to the point, and you have the choke down the snort as you stare appreciatively at the redhead, you notice that Kaldur’s doing the same, some things, you imagine, would never change.

You’d all regrouped at the Cave, scientists and specialists in hand. Tulla had been Queen Veera’s contribution and envoy as she could not leave Atlantis without a sane monarch, and especially not in a time where the King had been compromised. Each recruit had been given the details during their travel, but once they were all together, the gravity had seemingly begun to set in. Dr. Rouquette was as vibrant as she had been when you’d first met, despite that though, they had begun a prompt discussion on how the chip works, and a prefatory analysis on the confiscated chip.

“So do we think this is gonna work? Or should we be considering a back-up plan?” Rocket’s voice echoes though the open link and while the specialists continue their discussions, the team sends knowing looks to each other.

“this is the plan, the only plan,” you tell them seriously.

“Wait, seriously? You always have a back-up?” Artemis’ surprise is evident, and your lips twist down in response.

“Figures, considering her go-to has also been compromised,” Wally’s judgement is clear and your eye twitches in response.

“Sorry about that,” Zatanna’s voice is meek in response, and you catch the way Artemis, punches Wally in the arm, and his accompanying wince.

“So not your fault,” you finally cut in. “And I don’t hear you offering something else up, Wall-Man?” you state bitingly, shooting him a glare at which Wally winces again.

“To be fair, this was originally his idea,” Conner cuts in.

“Semantics,” Robin disagrees, “plus, Birdy’s the one with the connections to make it happen.”

“Gee, thanks, Rob. My genius and l feel so appreciated,” Wally scoffs, rolling his eyes.

“Right, so… back-up plan?” Rocket asks again.

“I don’t know! Short of contacting any non-affiliated heroes, or intergalactic organizations, I’m not sure what else we can do,” you sigh, a hand coming up to pinch at the bridge of your nose, while you work to secure your emotions and constrain your frustration.

“Intergalactic organizations?” Rocket repeats.

“OA,” the response is echoed by Wally, Rob, Roy, and Kaldur, you can’t help but notice this is the first time Roy was participating.

“OA,” you confirm, and then catching the confused look, on Rocket and Zatanna’s faces you add, “The Green Lantern Corps.”

“Oh,” Zatanna’s understanding is soft, as her eyes widen.

“We have a line to them?” Rocket asks, surprise evident.

“…We have potential avenues,” Robin supplies, defending your point while making eye contact with you.

“We do?” Artemis’ question is fair, and you hesitate, but your eyes lock with Roy, and then with Dick.

“Earth has another Green Lantern,” You remind the team.

“Is he not a part of the league?” Zatanna squints.

“…There were some concerns about his attitude and maturity,” Dick supplies cautiously.

“But they let Roy in?” the dig slips from Artemis’ thoughts, and by the look on her face you know she didn’t mean to project that particular thought.

You can’t help the very audible snort, and a hand comes up over your face in embarrassment as everyone turns to you.

You catch the small smirk on Dick’s face, and Wally’s chuckling a little bit too. And when Roy turns to you, betrayed, you can’t help but start to giggle, and when your avert your gaze, they land on Wally. Which really was the worst move because then you’re both laughing.

“Okay!” Roy huffs. “Laugh it up, Birdy,” he scoffs.

“Sor-” you try but burst into another fit, until you’re practically leaning on Kaldur to stay upright.

When you finally get control, you catch the small smile on Kaldur’s face, and even Roy’s scowl has faded a bit.

“Sorry,” you say seriously, bitting your lip and straightening up.

“Should we be worried?” Rocket asks, wide eyes on you.

“No, sorry, I just… whew, I needed a laugh, thanks Artemis,” you smile.

Artemis blushes a bit in response, “What were you going to say about the other Lantern?” she prompts, pushing the conversation back on track.

“Right, Guy Gardner,” you share. “Kind of a bully based on Canary’s files, it’s the reason he hasn’t been inducted. But he is a Lantern, and the ring did choose him. He’s based out of Baltimore, Maryland. If we fail here, we just need to get word to him, hopefully he’ll take it seriously,” you shrug.

“Reassuring,” Rocket laments flatly, and all you can do is shrug again.

“Kaldur’ahm, Poulí, I think we may have come to an understanding,” Vulko’s voice booms across the room, and your head snaps to him immediately.

“What do you need?” you ask, setting your shoulders, as the rest of the team turns to face the brain trust.

THE WATCHTOWER December 31st, 23:16 EST

Infiltrating the Watchtower was not something you’d ever thought you’d have to do. However, somehow, you really can’t find it in you to be totally surprised.

Dinah, now freed from Starro-Tech’s control, along with Roy and Red Tornado had gone in as a distraction, allowing the team to handle the rest. Part of you had been hesitant to let Roy out of your sight after finally finding him. Not to mention Dinah. You’d twitched a little too violently, when she volunteered to go back, and Roy and Dick had both given you cautious looks as a response.

The waiting was the worst though.

You watched as M’gann, Kaldur, and Connor broke through the wall where the Bioship had docked. Robin kept an eye on the alarms and scanners the entire time, covering the Team’s tracks as he went.

Eventually, it was time.

“RT did it. Wirelessly bypassed security for us as soon as he arrived. Savage shouldn't know we're here,” Robin confirmed, once we’d all regrouped inside the watchtower.

Aqualad nodded, before casting a quick glance at the rest of the team, “move out.”

“Currently tracking five League members between us and Savage,” Robin shares as you and Kaldur begin leading everyone though.

“Which ones?” Artemis’ tone is dubious, even through the link, and you can’t really say you blame her.

“Plastic Man, Hawkman, the Atom, Captain Atom, and… well,” Robin pauses on the last one and you turn back to look at him. “Green Arrow.”

The team pauses, as they wait for the next move. There were nine of you, which meant almost everyone could double up, almost.

A quick glance at Kaldur tells you he was thinking the same thing.

“Here’s the plan…” you speak first, “We work quietly and quickly. Take every opportunity to knock as many of the Leaguers out as we can before Savage and his cohort baddies realize what’s happening. Artemis and KF, you two take Plastic Man. SB and Rob, Hawkman. Zatanna and Miss M, the Atom. Aqualad and Rocket, Captain Atom. Leave GA to me,” the team nods, but once again you notice their hesitation.

“What?” you press.

“Are you sure you want to handle GA? One of us can do it,” Wally offers tentatively.

“No. He’s mine. But Rob, I could use a favor…”

Armed with one of Robin’s recording birdarangs you split off from the group. You’re following your map to where GA’s icon is moving, and periodically you get updates from the rest of the team.

First it’s KF and Artemis.

“Plastic Man in gassed, and chipped,” you can practically hear Wally’s smirk as he reports in.

You turn another corner.

“Hawkman’s chipped too,” Robin reports.

“Probably going to be out for a bit. I might’ve hit him a little too hard,” Superboy admits.

You pause when you hear Oliver’s footsteps. Spotting the crates, you launch yourself up. Walking on the balls of your feet, you climb up, silently.

“We got the Atom,” Zatanna confirms.

You catch sight of a support beam, a few feet above you, and launch yourself up with as much strength as you can muster. You manage to grab hold, and then you pull your body up, until you’re balanced on your feet, walking the beam.

“Captain Atom is incapacitated, but chipped,” Kaldur’s the next one to confirm, which just left you.

You pull the chip from your belt, as well as the birdarang. Following Oliver’s path ahead, you toss the birdarang, it lands solidly in the wall.

A beat passes.

And then a second.

And then-

“Ha, Ha, Ollie, over here!”

Your giggle echoes down the hall, and Oliver’s quick to turn to the sound.

“NG, status?” Robin’s voice rings through the link but you ignore it.

You take your grapple line and wrap it around the support, making sure it’s snug in place, before attaching the line to your belt.

“Birdy, you copy?” Wally this time.

Oliver’s almost in position, and so you count.

one.

two.

three.

You hold your breath as you lean back.

For a second you’re falling, and it’s so quiet you could hear a pin drop. Luckily, the speaker starts again.

“Ha, ha. Ollie, over here!”

The recording covers the sound of the grapple going taught.

“Nightingale, report in!” Kaldur, and he’s serious.

You get about two seconds before Oliver realizes the birdarang’s what’s making the sound, and you’re suspended in the air, halfway between the ground and the support beams of the Watchtower.

The chip, which you’d been flipping around your finger’s is poised between your index and middle fingers, and right as Ollie turns, baring the side of his neck, you toss it. You throw it the way Dinah taught you to throw a shuriken.

The balance had practically been the same.

It hits Ollie and there’s a second when he turns to you, arrow drawn.

And then he collapses.

You tug on the grapple cord and it slackens. You land on your feet, twisting the cord back into your grapple as you walk up to the downed Green Arrow.

“GA’s chipped,” you finally say, tuning back into the link.

“We’re not splitting up anymore,” Wally says quickly.

You roll your eyes.

“Don’t be ridiculous, KF-”

“You didn’t answer us!” Artemis cuts in.

This time you scoff.

“They have to realize by now,” Robin speaks up.

“He’s right, we need to move. Zatanna and Miss Martian, you two head for the dock Zeta, Rocket and I will join you,” Kaldur decides. “The rest of you head up.”

“On the way,” Zatanna confirms.

You’d started making your way back up, sticking to the support beams as much as possible, so far, you’d avoided any further League interactions.

“That’s Dr. Fate, Icon, and Captain Marvel taken care of,” Zatanna speaks up, and you pause for a second.

“Too bad Cure-tech doesn't work as fast as Starro-tech. We could use these guys,” Rocket huffs, and your lips quirk up, she’s not wrong.

“It is a small miracle Queen Meera and Doctors Roquette, Spence, and Vulko were able to re-engineer a cure and vaccine at all,” Kaldur reminds her.

“And their combined 8 PhDs,” you muse.

Before anyone can respond to your joke, KF interjects, “If you guys aren't busy...”

Your breath catches, but Kaldur’s already on the move, “On my way. You three rendezvous with Robin and Superboy.”

You pick up your pace as well, and are only partially paying attention when Zatanna gives her confirmation.

“Uh, I'll be right behind you,” she offers.

You manage to arrive at the main deck in time to Batman hit Robin.

“I am so not turbed,” is how you announce yourself, as your jump down from the level you’re on, using your grapple to loop down to the one where Robin is.

“Yeah, me neither,” he promises.

You’re on your feet in time to fall in step with both Superboy and Robin, both seem to be smarting a bit after taking on Batman and Superman, understandably.

“We're not gonna beat them one-on-one,” Robin finally announces.

“Plan B, then,” Superboy confirms.

“And I thought my contingencies were drastic,” you manage to joke out before taking Connor’s hand.

Conner grabs a hold of you with one hand, and Robin with the other. Using his strength he spins you both, before launching you one after the other at Batman.

You land first, grabbing a handful of his cape to pull him with your momentum.

Robin’s body crashes into you both a second later, and then the three of you go into the wall. You can feel your bones rattle from the impact, but when you slide down, you manage to grab a hold of a chip as Robin hold’s Batman steady.

You place the chip, before changing your stance to drop into a roll. You pop up on one leg, escrima sticks in hand, and Robin lands crouched beside you.

You barely have a second to catch your breath before you hear Superman and Superboy go into a wall of their own.

You both take off and you hesitate when Robin reaches to his belt.

“You sure about this?” you ask as you both run up to them.

Superboy manages to grunt out a, “Just do it!” as he strains to hold Superman in place.

You grab hold of another chip while Robin opens a box.

The green light reflects off their faces, and you watch as it seems to drain them both. Conner and Superman both start sliding down, neither of them fighting anymore as they go.

As soon as Superman falls, you’re quick to place the chip, and once you do, Robin’s shutting the lead lined box tight.

You sit back on your ass and let out the breath you didn’t realize you were holding, turning back to check on Conner, who was pulling himself up to sit against the wall beside you.

He lets out a groan, looking at you and then at Robin, “Ugh. Kryptonite… hurts,” he admits, and you can’t help the scoff that slips past your lips.

It brings a smile to Robin’s face though.

“Which is why,” he begins, offering a hand to Conner. “Batman keeps it in an overwhelmingly impenetrable vault at the Batcave,” he explains, pulling SB back to his feet.

“Overwhelmingly impenetrable, huh?” you smirk up at the two.

Both boys smile down, offering you a hand.

“Well, more like a whelmingly penetrable vault,” Robin corrects.

You snort, taking their hands, and they’re quick to put you back on your feet as well.

“Let’s go. Vandal Savage awaits,” you remind them, and the two nod at you, before the three of you take off toward’s the main viewing deck, where the main Zeta point was for the Watchtower.

Unfortunately you get there just in time to watch Vandal Savage, Klarion, and his familiar, Teekle, disappear through a portal. Wally skidding into where they had been not even a second before.

You redirect yourself over to where Dinah and Roy are unconscious on the floor.

Wally whizzes up to you and grabs your spare de-programing chips, placing them on the leaguers who were up here, before sliding back up to the rest of you.

“Congratulations, Team. You have won the day,” Red Tornado announces, and you let out a tired chuckle at the thought.

None of you have an opportunity to respond though, because in the next second, a holoscreen appears.

“Happy New Year, Justice League,” the computer announces.

You don’t catch what Wally said, but when you turn to him, he’s holding Artemis, and they’re kissing.

Your lip twitches up, and then Connor and M’gann too.

“I’m liking this Team more every day,” Rocket decides, smirking as she kisses Kaldur’s cheek.

You roll your eyes and gag at Robin and Zatanna, both of whom smother their laughs. Zatanna looks away as she tries to keep her composure, but Robin stares back at you.

“Milkshakes?” you mouth to him while no one’s watching.

“Definitely,” he mouths back.

“Human customs still elude me,” Red Tornado announces in response to the kissing, and you can’t hold back your snort.

THE WATCHTOWER January 1st, 00:42 EST

It took some time, but eventually the Leaguer’s began to wake up, and slolwy they all arrived back in the entry deck.

“Everything I thought I knew about myself was a lie. I'm not a hero or a sidekick. I'm a traitor, a pawn,” Roy’s tone was low, dejected, in a way you’re not sure you’d ever heard it.

Dinah reaches out, placing a hand on his arm, “Roy, it'll be all-”

You wince when you watch Roy pull back from her. Bitting too far into your lip and tasting blood.

“I'm not Roy! I don't know what I am. All I know is I need to find the real Roy. I need to rescue Speedy,” he counters.

You’d been too anxious to sit when everyone else had. electing instead to stand across the table from Roy while Ollie and Dinah took the seats on either side of him.

“We’ll help you. The team I mean. And if not, then I will. We’ll find him,” you cut in, licking over your split lip.

“Guardian is already searching Cadmus,” Batman add, reassuringly.

Ollie had been unusually quiet.

“We should take Ro- Red Arrow, home, at least, for now,” Dinah decides.

You caught her slip up, everyone at the table probably did, but no one commented.

“Of course, all four of you can go,” Batman nods.

You catch the tonal shift, and you hesitate.

You’re not sure you would’ve noticed it if not for the rest of your abilities, but you know there’s something else.

“I’d like to stay,” you announce and everyone turns to you. “Just for a bit,” you backtrack, “I want to make sure the Team’s set, and I need to speak with Aquaman about how we deconstructed the chips,” you expound.

Roy looks like he wants to bolt, not that you balme him.

Ollie’s holding himself stiffly.

Dinah looks a little queasy at leaving you here on your own.

“I’ll be fine,” you reassure them.

“I’ll escort her, to Arthur, and then back to the Zeta’s,” Batman offers, and you notice as Dinah realxes, but only a little.

“Not too long,” she adds, though it’s perfunctory, you can tell.

“Promise,” you nod.

She smiles once more at you, weak and strained, before she and Ollie take Roy toward the Zeta’s

You wait until they’re through before you turn back to Batman. Robin and Kaldur had taken the seat on either side of him, and the four of you were the only ones left in the room.

Your hands land on the table with a loud smack that echoes thorough the room, and all three sets of eyes shift to you.

Yours, however, are focused on Batman, “Something else is wrong,” you say.

You’re not asking, you’re not, because you know.

Batman hesitates, looking to Robin for a second before turning back to you, and then nodding.

“The entire League was under Savage's spell for just over a day,” Robin begins, sharing a holoscreen with you. “We've accounted for most of that time. But these six went missing for a full 16 hours we can't account for.”

You stare at the screen. Batman, Superman, Green Lantern; John Stewart, Hawkwoman, Wonder Woman, and Martian Manhinter.

Powerhouses, all six. Each in their own right, different skills, different tactics. It’s terrifying to think what they could have accomplished for Klarion and Vandal Savage in sixteen hours, the implications were limitless.

“Sixteen hours,” Batman repeats, “what did we do?”

STAR CITY January 1st, 02:04 EST

It’s another hour or so by the time you make it back to Star City. You’d talked with King Arthur, shared with him how you and Kaldur had gone to Atlantis, and that Queen Meera had been appraised. And then you’d circled back to the cave to shower and change.

It’s two in the morning when you make it home, and frankly, you’re surprised to see Roy still up.

Dinah and Ollie weren’t around so you assumed they’d gone to bed. They probably thought he had too.

“Hey,” you greet lamely.

“Hi,” is all he offers back.

You drop your gym bag down by the door, and replace the lock before walking over to the sofa. You drop down beside Roy, but you leave a healthy space, not wanting to crowd him. You turn, tucking one leg under you, so that you can face him better.

“I know it’s a stupid question, but I’m going to ask anyways,” you begin, but he doesn’t look at you, focused instead on something just past your head. “How are you?”

He lets out a snort, but it’s dry, and sad, and you can hear it for what the answer it offers. Stupid question.

“I don’t know…” he says after a minute of silence. “But… I don’t really know anything anymore,” he adds on.

You bite on your lip again, wincing when your teeth make contact with the split lip you’d forgotten about.

“Fair,” you offer, agreeing.

“It’s fine,” he huffs, shrugging you off.

Your eyes narrow at that, it was a lot of things, fine isn’t one of them.

“Roy-”

“Don’t call me that!” he hisses, and you pause.

“Okay,” you concede, swallowing thickly. “What should I call you?” you prompt instead.

“I- I.. I don’t know, just.. I’m not Roy Harper, I’m not!” the last words come out as a sob, and you flick the piece of you that wants to give him space the recesses of your mind, scooting closer and wrapping an arm around his middle the best you can.

“How about Red, at least until we figure it all out?” you offer instead.

“Stop,” he cries. “Stop being nice, and understanding, I replaced him!” Roy’s voice is low, and sad, and you know he wants to make his point, but seems not to want to wake up Dinah or Ollie.

“She’s asleep so I’m going to say the bad words she tries to keep me from using,” you begin, delighted when it gets a wet snort out of the redhead. “But fuck that,” you say seriously, and he snorts again.

Finally turning to look at you, though he’s stuck with it, seeing as you’re practically pressing into his side.

“Look, I’m not blaming Ollie but I’m sure as shit not blaming you either. And I think it’s okay to acknowledge the fact that what you went through in the last few days has been harsh. That it was thirty-one flavors of traumatizing. God, Red! I’d be a fucking mess if it were Dinah coming after me, but it’s not your fucking fault or theirs!” you huff out.

“You owe Dinah at least $20, for just the last minute alone,” is all he says in response.

You scoff.

“Look, Roy or not, you’re my brother too. You have been for the last three years, and just because you’re a clone, it doesn’t make it less true,” you say seriously, and he goes quiet.

You let out a long sigh.

“You should get some sleep, tomorrow’s gonna be a long day,” you finally offer after the silence stretches.

“Yeah,” he huffs, standing up.

You stand after him, tugging him into a tight hug, that he doesn’t seem sure of how to respond to.

“Goodnight, Red,” you say gently.

“Goodnight, (y/n),” he whispers, before peeling you off of him, and walking away.

STAR CITY January 1st, 10:22 EST

You slept horribly.

The worst ever, actually.

Okay probably not, but it was still pretty bad.

The light at the end of the tunnel where the two hours of no questions you’d managed to wrangle out of Dinah.

You were already in a booth when he walked in.

Sat with your eyes closed, leaning against the linoleum seats, and when the overhead bell of the entry door rings, you blink them open in time to see Dick find you.

You offer him a muted lazy smile, and he gives you one in return.

“Hey,” he greets.

“Hey,” you say, sliding down.

He takes the invitation, settling down beside you instead of across from you.

The two of you fall into a comfortable silence. It seems you both were talked out after the events of the previous day.

Eventually, Mrs. Lenetii brings out a milkshake for you both, cooing over you, before siappearing to take care of another table.

Your head lands on his and his fingers interlace with yours.

“Bad night?” he asks after you’d both been ignoring your milkshakes for too long.

“yeah,” you nod.

“Yeah,” he repeats.

Slowly you lift your head.

You’re close, the two of you. His face is right there, his lips.

He’s staring at you with the wide blue eyes, and you wonder if he’s suddenly as nervous as you were.

You thought of Wally and Artemis at Midnight, of M’gann and Conner, even Rocket. But they were all older. You and Dick were the youngest on the team. It had never felt like it more until right now.

“Um-” he stutters out. “I… uh.. Can I?” he trails off.

“Have you.. ever?” you question back.

Neither of you have moved apart though.

“No,” he admits. “You?”

“No,” you share.

He offers you a shy smile, and it’s the first one in almost forty hours that doesn’t feel strained.

When he tilts down, you move up. There’s no fireworks. And your noes’ bump, and you giggle. And then your teeth clack, and he laughs. It’s awkward and kind of strange, and not at all what the movies make it sound like it’ll be, but it was your first kiss, and it was his too, and it tastes a little like the chocolate and strawberry milkshakes you’d both been sipping on, and all of it together makes it kind of magical in an of itself.

No matter what happened next, what came next, you had Dick, and you knew he had your back.

everything tags: @butterfly-skinnylegend

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cnng taglist: @babymango-writes @smile-more19 @bruiscdlikeviolets @truly-dionysus @farfromjustordinary @sometimeseverythingsucks @dweeb-central @lucy-roo @casedoina @cipheress-to-k-pop @anonomano @seninjakitey @whelmedparker @officiallydarkgeek @midnxghtblue @unini @blackwhiteandshadesofgradient @dontmesswithbeebo @raggedyoldwitch @bouqet-of-gay @duckmylife18 @kendallambrosio @notslaybabes @torchbearerkyle @cynthiarose07 @mono--moonchild @emo-space-tea @notsostraightweeb @sassyspanishartist @ahyeonah @acceber1313 @onepieceformeplease @whatislifeandhowdoidoit @luvelyxp @lovelyartemisa @evermoore580 @mischiefmanaged71 @cryingnotcrying @aces-tattooartist @we-flower-fan @awkward-youtube-trash @laurcad123 @sanovr @feverish-dove @lolsnacks

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pinkiemachine · 2 months ago

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Kon x M'gann HC's Part 2 Pretty Please with All the Fixings?

Loving the story.

Alrighty! Part 2!

So, to start off, I’ll just ramble a bit more about M’gann and Kon’s dynamic, then finish up the story :) Also posting this again because I think it turned out SO GOSH DARN CUTE! X3 (P.S. listen to “Bewitched” or “Serendipity” by Laufy. I feel like it captures the ✨ vibes ✨)

So it’s no surprise, after reading part 1, that Kon’s biggest flaw is that he’s very immature. He can get pouty and possessive when M’gann is paying attention to someone else, or when she’s gone for a while. He’s also a bit of an attention seeker, and he loves compliments and positive reinforcement of any kind. The first time M’gann gave him a kiss on the cheek, his world changed forever. Pretty sure it took the other guys about five minutes to snap him out of it. But, thankfully, as the story goes on, Kon gets a crash-course in a lot of things, including curbing his immaturity. He learns that you’re not supposed to roughhouse with girls (unless they’re comfortable with that sort of thing, and even then, don’t hurt them—super-strength and all), and he learns that sometimes M’gann is gonna pay attention to other people or go away for a little while and that’s normal and he doesn’t need to be overly upset about it. (He still pouts and misses her, though. It can’t be helped.) But the thing that he still has a problem with, to this day, is being a bit too aggressive when it comes to defending M’gann. The first time they met another Martian who was horribly rude to her, Kon almost brought out the laser eyes! Like, that dude would have been dust in the wind if the other TT hadn’t stepped in. Kon just can’t stand the idea of anyone hating M’gann, and for such a superficial reason no less! She’s beautiful and should be treated like she’s beautiful! (His words, not mine :) Ultimately, Kon HAS to keep himself in check on that account or else he risks starting an interplanetary war, but boy it’s hard.

M’gann sometimes falls back on her old habits and becomes a ��yes woman,” agreeing to everything Kon wants to do even if she secretly wants to do something else. Cassie and Steph are the first to take notice of this behaviour, and help teach her to say “no.” If she’s uncomfortable, Kon isn’t gonna realise it on his own unless she tells him. She’s got to learn to put her foot down on things or she’s gonna be miserable. So M’gann practises this and other types of conversation in front of her mirror at night, and the first time she ever said no to one of Kon’s ideas, she felt so proud of herself! She wouldn’t stop smiling for the whole day! Kon had no idea why she was so happy, but when she was happy, he was happy, so it was a good day all the way around.

The dates they like to go on involve taking long walks around Earth. Neither of them had ever seen an ocean before, so they went to go see the ocean. Neither of them had ever been to a cheese factory before, so they went to go see a cheese factory and got free cheese curds on the way out. Then they went to a real baseball game and ate real hotdogs—they went to a museum (which M’gann liked more than Kon did, but they made it fun in the end)—they went on hikes, marvelling at all the different types of trees and bushes and butterflies and spiders and ants and birds and they even spotted a deer in the distance—and all the while, they would take pictures. So. Many. Pictures. M’gann has this old-school Martian camera and puts photo albums together of all the stuff she and Conner do together, like they’re already an old married couple. lol. Then, of course, when both of them are too tired to go out anywhere, they curl up on the couch and watch some of those old sitcoms M’gann grew up on. M’gann’s favourite is “That Girl” and Kon’s is “Hogan’s Heroes.”

Okay, now I’ve thoroughly set up how much fun they had together, time to make it all come crumbling down.

In the last post I said that Kon kept M’gann’s secret about being a white Martian and her past from the NTT and the JLA, but there was one person he was obligated to tell: Lex Luthor. Being that he was secretly working for the bald maniac, and it was his job to report in with any new information he’d learned, he had no choice. Even when he tried to lie or exclude details, Luthor grew suspicious of him and forced the info out of him. So when the reveal of his betrayal happened, it was so much worse for M’gann. Lex used what he had learned to help take her down, and also create a rift between her and Kon, because he wasn’t supposed to be getting attached to M’gann anyway. Kon was ordered to forget about her because he was never going to see her ever again, and M’gann wanted to forget Kon for sharing her most sacred secret. Not to mention, he had been lying to her from the start about his past, about his intentions, and who knows what else. Had he been using her to get information about the Justice League? About her uncle? Yes, he had, and he wanted to tell M’gann that he was ashamed of what he had done, but Lex wouldn’t let them be in the same room, so M’gann was left to think all sorts of awful things about him. It was a dismal day. This event is covered in full in another post which I will link below.

Now, of course, this story has a happy ending (because happy endings are the best kind of endings). Lex is eventually defeated, Kon is freed from him and LexCorp, and for once he gets to call the shots in his life. The first is going to M’gann and trying to make things up to her in any way he can. Now, at this point, M’gann knows that Lex was twisting Kon’s arm to a certain extent, so her anger is a little softened, but she still feels like an idiot for trusting him so easily, and she’s nervous about trusting him again. He’s still such an immature person—who knows what kind of big mistake he’ll make next?

Kon plucks up his courage and makes a traditional Martian apology to her—the big ceremonial kind meant for state officials and royalty when they’ve severely messed up something BIG—and begs her to give him one more chance. He knows full well that he’s a bit of a dunce when it comes to girls and Earth culture and even being a good person (again, his words) but he wants to be a better friend, he wants to be a good hero, and more than anything else he wants to be the best boyfriend he could possibly be for her. When he was making his decision to finally stand up against Lex, he was afraid of what Lex would do to him… but then he thought of M’gann. He remembered how much she meant to him, and that Lex was planning on hurting her as a part of his evil scheme, and even if it meant Lex would go ahead and terminate him and make another clone, he didn’t care. M’gann mattered more. And she always would. So, with all of this before her, M’gann was quite stunned, to say the least. For a moment, she didn’t know what to say. Given the fact that Kon had partaken in much of Lex’s plan willingly, the JLA agreed that some form of punishment was only fair, so it had been decided that Kon would spend a year on the Kent farm, essentially doing community service by helping them with all the chores. He would be confined to the property during all of that time, too, so the two of them were going to spend the next year in different places. M’gann hesitantly answered Kon’s apology with a “Maybe… I could write to you… and we’ll see where it goes from there.”

Kon was so happy. He plowed through all his chores on the Kent farm each and every day—Ma and Pa, and sometimes Clark when he had the time—would teach him things and show him to do stuff, like carpentry. And then, every day he’d go and check the mailbox, waiting for a letter from M’gann, and when he’d get one, he’d race up to his room (Clark’s old room) and read it ten times over. Then he’d grab a paper and pen and write his response, filling her in on all the things that had happened on the farm the last week or so. They wrote to each other non-stop that year, eagerly, patiently waiting for Kon’s sentence to be up. And when it had been a full year, and Kon came back to the city and the NTT, he and M’gann went for a walk in the park, and without saying a word, they both knew… there was no one else they’d rather spend the rest of their life with.

(Then the picture is from a little party the gang threw in celebration of their victories over all their villains, including Lex, and everyone was encouraged to wear their home country’s traditional garb, and maybe even bring some traditional food or a traditional party game. It was a fun night, and M’gann and Conner got to see each other dressed up for the first time (probably. I haven’t written out each individual episode for the NTT yet, but I like to imagine this is the first time ☺️))

Part 1 👇

Kon’s backstory is included in this post… 👇

#art #fan art #dc #dc comics #teen titans #the new teen titans #m’gannxconner #m’gann m’orzz #miss martian #conner kent #kon el #superboy #miss martian x superboy

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romancemedia · 3 months ago

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Not Even Death could tear apart these true loves🩷🥀

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couldeatthatgirlforlunch · 7 months ago

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*assistant reader and the JL kids watching disney movies, Princess and The Frog edition, I invite you beloved @couldeatthatgirlforlunch and other anons to do other funny little movie thoughts*

-------------------

Reader: Tiana and Lottie are so cute, I wish I had a friend like that *sigh*

K'aldur: She seems... energetic.

Conner: Forceful and tactless you mean?

Mrs. Martian: *frowns and hits Conner in the arm* You don't get her character. Lottie they could never make me hate you.

Robin: She has a good heart! She might be spoiled but that doesn't overshadow her kindness, she loves and respects Tiana, plus for someone who was raised in money she is pretty understanding of others struggles and- *extremely detailed analysis of the character*

Kid Flash: *smirks and looks at reader suspiciously* is that why you like her?

Reader: That and having a platonic sugar mama who is also fun to be with sounds amazing... anyways I need money, BATS! *gets thrown cash and starts counting it*

The super kids: .....

Reader: ... I said platonic and fun would be nice, don't judge.

---‐--------------------------

I'm watching Princess and the Frog, cause it's a masterpiece and goddamnit I love Tiana and Lottie.

I LOVE THEIR FRIENDSHIP SO MUCH!!! As soon as Lottie appears, you think she's gonna be a mean girl, but she's so nice!! And she's not just a character who's friendly with Tiana, she's an actual good friend!!

And Reader's so real for that, ideally, you just need a rich and generous friend, but sometimes you just have to settle for a vigilante yandere who you're scared of...

Too many gifs bc I couldn't decide

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downthe-f4ndom-rabbith0le · 5 months ago

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Always Been You (Dick Grayson x Reader) - Chapter 7

Always Been You (Dick Grayson x Reader)Reader Insert: she/her pronouns Word Count: 5017 Warnings: death, violence, fighting, bloody wounds, angst, infuriatingly oblivious love interest, slowburn Spoilers: Young Justice Seasons 1-3 plot partially, but it ended in 2022 so catch up.

Y/N Prince - miracle daughter of Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor - and Dick Grayson - first adoptive son of the Batman himself - have been best friends since day one. They went to school together, trained together, kept each other's alter ego secret from everyone else, and they founded the Young Justice alongside their friends together.

But as time progressed, Y/N and Dick grew up and Y/N found herself wanting more than friendship with Dick. But he never seemed to indicate that he reciprocated her feelings. And when Wally died and Dick abandoned the team, Y/N realised he never would. So she heads to the one place she knows will help her become a stronger warrior so that one day she can take her mother's place: Themyscira.

Two years after his leave, Dick reaches out to his old friends to help him with a mission. But when he finds out Y/N left too, he chases after her in the hopes to bring her back.

However, when the two finally reunite, it isn't as warm as he hopes. Not to mention Themyscira becomes under siege as they go to war against Echidna, the Mother of Monsters in Greek Mythology, and her army of monstrous children.

Will Dick and Y/N be able to put their past behind them and save the Amazonians' homeland? Or will they fall, unable to tell one another their true feelings?

~~~

T-minus 1 day until Echidna's War.

'All right, everyone!' Y/N called out to the group, forcing them to stop sparring in their pairs and look at her. 'That's enough for today. Go, shower and get ready for our feast. You deserve to enjoy this night before tomorrow.'

'Yes, Princess!' the warriors said in unison, then quickly dispersed, leaving the training grounds to head back into the city to prepare for tomorrow.

'You should get ready too, Princess,' Calliope said, looking after her sisters-in-arms chatting and walking down the stairs to their homes. Y/N's heart pulled at the thought that she'd never see such happy smiles again after tonight.

'In a moment, Calliope,' Y/N answered, looking around the remaining groups that were finishing up their drills. Her gaze fell on one particular acrobat who was teaching the group blocking techniques and some acrobatic manoeuvres to avoid an opponent. All the while doing so, Dick was smiling, encouraging the women to keep trying.

'He's not too bad,' Calliope said with amusement. 'For a mortal man, that is.'

Y/N turned to Calliope only to see a knowing smile on her friend's face. Only then did Y/N realise she was smiling stupidly wide, and made quick work to get rid of it. 'I guess so. But he's stupidly naive and impulsive. He'll get himself killed because of it.'

'Maybe,' Calliope said thoughtfully as she looked back at Dick for a moment before facing Y/N again. 'But isn't that how a true warrior should die? In battle fighting for what's right?'

Y/N didn't like the thought of Dick being clawed open or beheaded by monsters, so she quickly said, 'It's not his battle to fight in, though. He shouldn't be here.'

'But he is, Y/N,' Calliope insisted, coming to stand in front of Y/N so she had no choice but to make eye contact. 'And that's what makes him even braver. He's here helping us save our home; a home he had never seen until a few days ago; a home that has no connection to him whatsoever but he is here trying to save it.'

Before Y/N could protest, Calliope gripped Y/N's hands in a manner that was desperate and insistent. 'You should tell him. Before it's too late.'

Y/N furrowed her brows in confusion. 'What are you-'

'Oh, don't play dumb with me,' Calliope interrupted. 'I see how you look at him. You're worried about him. Which means you care, despite everything you say to convince us otherwise.'

Y/N went to deny it but couldn't find the words to do so. Her heart was being torn in so many different directions any time she thought about Dick, she didn't know what exactly she felt for him. It was hard to put into words what he meant to her, the good and the bad.

When she remained silent, Calliope patted Y/N's hands gently then dropped them as she too walked away, leaving Y/N standing frozen in a battle with her head and her heart.

Y/N could've been standing there for one minute or an hour for all she knew, until someone waved their hand in front of her face and broke her from her trance.

'Y/N,' Dick said, his brows furrowed in concern. 'You okay?'

Y/N took a deep breath in as she came back to the moment. 'Yes. Yes, I'm fine. Just...'

'Worried?' Dick offered, and Y/N was grateful for the change in subject. 'Well, I wouldn't be if I were you. These women are stronger than some of the heroes back home.'

Y/N raised a playful eyebrow. 'Only some?'

Dick chuckled. 'Okay, all of them.'

The two shared a quiet laugh, and it brought Y/N a sense of normalcy and nostalgia that warmed her heart.

She looked around as the remaining warriors finished their trainings and made to leave for their homes. Y/N could almost name each and every one of them, and there was the possibility that after tomorrow she would never see them again.

'Echidna is the one who should be worried,' Y/N said, her voice slightly shaky with anger and determination. She knew that if death were to come tomorrow, Y/N wouldn't be able to save them all. But she'd be damned if she didn't try to.

A warm calloused hand tentatively enclosed her fist, and the touch was enough to cease Y/N's shakes. 'I agree,' Dick said, two simple words seemingly echoing around the quiet training ground. His smile was smooth but genuine and Y/N could've believed they were eighteen again and back on the mainland and with the team. Back when his smile eased all her problems, back when Wally and all their lost friends weren't gone. Back when it was just them, and everything in Y/N's world made sense.

But now Y/N felt like she was on another planet, and they were about to go to war with the Mother of Monsters and nothing made sense anymore.

Y/N slowly pulled her had away from Dick's and cleared her throat as she stared straight ahead. 'We should probably get ready for the feast. Could be the last one we have in a while.' Or ever, she wanted to add, but Dick was an optimist and would ridicule her for thinking such thoughts and she really didn't want to keep talking with him.

'That's right,' Dick said, eyes brightening up at the thought of food. 'I bet you guys put on the best meals, as well.'

Y/N just rolled her eyes as they made their way across the training grounds to the stairs that would lead them back into town. 'A true boy. Only ever thinking about food.'

'A true girl. Turning every compliment into an insult.'

Y/N shoved him and he shoved her back and the two couldn't hold back radiant smiles. It astounded Y/N how easily they fell back into old habits. How familiar and safe Dick was.

'You should tell him. Before it's too late.'

Tell him what exactly? Y/N could hardly discern what mixture of emotions was running through her, let alone wheedle down to a specific point what her true feelings were for Dick. She'd been upset for so long, then angry at him. But the past three days he'd shown himself to be the Dick she'd always known and come to love. Kind, brave, funny, strong, compassionate.

It all lead her to a very confusing fork in the metaphorical road of her heart.

Even so, there was something she felt for him...

Just as Dick took a step down the stairs, Y/N found herself reaching out to him this time, bringing him to a stop with her soft grip on his shoulder. 'Wait.'

Dick looked over his shoulder immediately, his piercing blue eyes glued onto her with curiosity and wonder. 'Yeah?' he asked.

Y/N took in a deep breath, calming her racing heart as she said, 'I'm sorry.' When Dick only frowned with confusion, she elaborated. 'I'm sorry for doubting you. For being... well, I haven't been the most welcoming of people have I?'

Dick didn't say a word, but he turned fully around to face her, his face as serious as it was the other night on another staircase. Y/N's hand dropped to her side, and she found she could not look away from Dick's eyes as the words started falling out.

'I guess... I just didn't think you cared about us anymore,' she said. 'About the team, about me. And it made me so angry, but then you came to the one place I thought I could finally find peace again and I just couldn't accept that you were here for me. But I see now I was wrong.'

'No, I was the one who was wrong,' Dick said with a shake of his head. 'You had every right to be angry with me, in fact you still do. You were right, I was ignorant and only thought of my pain in those years I was away. I didn't think how coming here would affect you after everything I've done.'

Dick returned to the landing, now towering over Y/N, and took her hands in his and said in a gentle voice, 'I know I am far from forgiven, but I promise you, I will spend whatever time I have left on this earth trying to make it up to you.'

Y/N could hardly breathe with the way Dick was looking at her. It was almost dream-like, and suddenly all of her teenage emotions came rushing back into her bloodstream. The adoration, the awe, the love - it had remained all this time, she'd just repressed it in her time of pain and loss.

And it could've just been her, but something flickered briefly across Dick's face - the slightest arch of his brows, the minuscule twitch of his mouth. An emotion Y/N had no time to discern before Dick was the one stepping back and resuming his journey down the stairs, a careless smile on his face like the moment never happened.

'The showers await us, Princess,' he jested as he waved her after him. 'Wouldn't want to be late for the feast!'

Y/N stared after him for a moment, trying to process what just happened. He was serious, he would do anything to make it all up to her. And that look on his face...

Y/N shook herself out of her imagination. Probably just seeing things, she told herself as she followed Dick down the stairs. She wouldn't get her hopes up again.

Not for Dick Grayson of all people.

~~~

When Dick Grayson arrived back at his room, he drew himself a bath and allowed himself to relax if only for a few minutes. The first night in his room he'd been affronted to find a group of women ready to bathe him like a child. He'd argued with Y/N about them, her saying it was their tradition and all. Eventually she caved and dismissed the women from his room. He laughed at the memory, thinking beneath his own anger that she looked cute riled up.

There it was again - the thoughts he had never thought before.

He couldn't deny Y/N had grown into a beautiful young woman, one who stood by her values and always fought for the right thing. She'd stuck by the team when he couldn't, and for that he would always admire her.

But then again he had always admired her. That's part of the reason she was his best friend. She was this strong and loving individual that had always stuck by him and the others. She had the most infectious smile, and her laughter was like music-

Dick bolted upright in the bath, his heart racing at a million miles per hour as an alarming thought entered his mind. Do I like Y/N?

Well, it wasn't a matter of like. Of course he liked her, she was his best friend after all. But they'd never... she'd never implied...

He recalled when they were younger how many people - including their parents - said that he and Y/N would end up together. They were each other's better half, and honestly part of the reason he ended up breaking up with each and every one of his past girlfriends. Because they couldn't see how important Y/N was to him.

That didn't mean he liked her like that... did he?

Dick splashed his face one last time before leaping out of the bath to get ready for the feast. Maybe all the training he was doing was making him tired and delusional. After all, even if he truly felt that way for her, she'd never feel the same. Maybe once - though there was no telling so - but certainly not now.

However, they'd had a moment on the stairs this afternoon, and something felt... different. The way she looked at him had sent his gut rolling with something akin to a roller coaster, and the vision of her hair in the golden rays of sun had taken his breath away completely. Dick couldn't remember the last time he'd felt that way - completely and utterly entranced.

Dick dressed himself in the only set of clothes he'd come in and opened his door to find Calliope and other guards standing in the corridor.

'We are to escort you down to the feast, Mr. Grayson,' Calliope explained. 'By order of the Queen herself. You will be seated at their table tonight.'

Dick found this surprising as he usually sat with the soldiers of the group he'd trained that day, getting to know them and laughing with them. But he was to sit at the royals table, which consisted of Queen Hippolyta, some generals, and Y/N.

When they entered the dining hall, the feast had pretty much begun as hundreds and hundreds of women were already seated at long tables that ran almost from the door to the dais where the Queen sat chatting with other generals at their own long table. Dick made sure to greet any woman he knew as he was guided up to the royals' table.

'So nice of you to join us, Mr. Grayson,' the Queen said as Dick was seated.

'The pleasure is all mine, your Majesty,' he replied politely, then noted the empty chair between him and the Queen. 'Is Y/N not down yet?'

'She is usually late to these sorts of things,' the Queen replied defeatedly. 'She always fights with the maidens about her hair and dress. In that respect, she is very much her mother.'

As Queen Hippolyta turned back to the speak with the generals, a quiet voice leant in behind him and quietly said, 'Eager to see the princess are we?'

'W-What?' Dick exclaimed to Calliope. 'No, I'm not. I just... I'm just making conversation, that's all.'

'Whatever you say, mortal,' Calliope teased, her smile knowing and irritating as she remained by Dick's head.

He turned to her, annoyed. 'What do you mean by that?'

Calliope just shrugged. 'Nothing nobody doesn't already know.' When Dick just stared blankly at her, she rolled her eyes and said, 'You cannot tell me you do not feel for our princess. Do you not?'

It was like she was reading his mind or something. It was a little freaky and off-putting. But Dick was used to off-putting questions - journalists used them all the time on him when Dick did press interviews with Bruce.

So he calmly sat in his chair and looked out to the busy hall in front of him. 'Well, I still have the bruises from our first sparring match when I first got here so I guess I do feel something because of the princess.'

Calliope chuckled and shook her head. 'Avoid the question all you want, mortal. But Truth always has an interesting way of making itself known.'

Dick didn't like her know-it-all tone, and so finally turned around and said in a quiet but hard tone. 'My relationship with Y/N isn't up for debate here. She is my best friend, and the only thing I'm interested in is restoring her trust in me and saving your island.'

'How noble...' Calliope started, but her attention turned to the opening of the hall's doors and so Dick's eyes followed. He was struck still at the vision he was met with.

It was Y/N, draped in a flattering arrangement of white cloth that was synched at her waist with a golden chain. Her H/C hair had been put up in a loose bun, held together by golden pins. Plain sandals covered her feet as she made her way towards the dais, the many bracelets and arm bands adorning her arms flashing golden in the firelight.

Dick knew he was gaping, but he couldn't help it. No one could it seemed, as Y/N greeted many women along the way, and whispers of her beauty echoed throughout the hall. When she drew closer, her eyes connected with Dick's, and instead of the cold or distant expression she'd given him since day one, she offered him an embarrassed smile.

That brief interaction sent his heart in motion. It reminded him of the time they had gone to prom in their junior year of school. It had been the first time Dick had seen Y/N with makeup and in a dress. She'd given him the same embarrassed look, and he had been just as transfixed.

Dick felt someone lean in to his ear as he continued to watch Y/N make her way to the dais. 'But are you sure there is no other reason that you are here?' Calliope finished with a whisper.

She stepped back into her position before Dick could respond, not that he knew what he would say anyway. His gut was rolling so much with indecision that he thought he might throw up.

He was brought out of his thoughts as Y/N took her seat between him and the Queen. 'Grandmother,' she greeted coolly.

'Y/N,' the Queen responded, a kind smile stretching her lips. 'You look beautiful, my dear.'

'Thank you, but I still do not understand why I must wear this to every feast we have,' Y/N argued.

'It is tradition, and you are Themyscria's princess,' the Queen explained, tapping her granddaughter's hand in comfort before returning to her previous conversation.

Y/N sighed in mild defeat as she sat back in her chair. After a moment, she clocked that Dick was looking at her and sighed again. 'Not a single word from you, Grayson.'

'I wasn't going to say anything!' Dick retorted, quickly collecting himself.

'I can see it in your eyes that you're going to laugh at me.'

It took Dick a moment to realise she wasn't joking. She fidgeted with the loose cloth that draped over her body, eyes flickering from him to the crowd and back. She genuinely thought she looked ridiculous. If he was sixteen still, maybe he would've made a comment or two.

But sixteen was a long time ago now.

'No, I wasn't,' he said, and his answer must've surprised him as she turned to him with a perplexed expression on her face. 'You look... You look beautiful, Y/N.'

Y/N's E/C eyes scanned over his face, possibly searching for any kind of lie or detection of amusement. But she obviously didn't find anything, as she smiled at him, her eyes shining with surprise. 'Thank you. I would offer you the same compliment, but you've looked the same as you did the day you got here.'

'Ruggedly handsome?'

'Hmm, I'd say a bit worse for wear.'

Dick let out a painful groan as he slapped a hand across his chest where his heart was encased under. 'Wow! Way to wound a guy.'

Y/N just laughed, and Dick joined her, genuinely happy to see her smiling as they used to together. Once the laughter died, he said, 'But seriously, Y/N, you look great. And... I'm just glad you're not calling me Nightwing anymore.'

'Well,' Y/N started, fiddling with one of her bracelets, 'I figured you deserved that much after all your help.'

Help. That's right. He was helping her save her new home and new family. It wasn't because she'd forgiven him and were suddenly best friends again.

'I'm sorry to interrupt,' a young girl said, coming to stand on the other side of the table. 'But I just had something to discuss with you, Princess.'

'Of course,' Y/N answered, turning all her attention to the girl. 'Go ahead.'

Throughout dinner, Y/N was kept busy by other conversations with warriors and young girls and teachers alike that all had questions for their princess. Y/N answered every single one of their queries with enthusiasm and grace, not batting an eye as she ate and spoke and listened.

She was a natural and a pro. The whole time she spoke, Dick couldn't help but think about the two years he'd been gone for and how many times Y/N had to soothe a fear, had to deliver a confident speech that would encourage the team to keep going no matter how bleak the future seemed.

It saddened and pained him to think he'd forced that responsibility onto her in his absence. But she'd done it, held the team together and she was doing that right now as well for her people.

Upon the conclusion of dinner, the Queen called for silence as she rose to address the hall. 'Evening everyone,' she started, her voice radiating composure and control. 'Tonight, we are in the presence of our own history in the making. Tomorrow, we face Echidna, the Mother of Monsters.'

The mention of the goddess sent whispers of fear rattling throughout the crowd, but they were quickly silenced by the raise of the Queen's hand. 'I know some of you, if not all of you, are fearful of the coming events. Echidna is a foe that will not be so easily defeated. However, this is what we have trained for. This is what us Amazons are built for.

"Think of the young women, young girls and infants in their houses sleeping peacefully right now. Think of the women you grew up with, of the friendships and sisterhoods you have forged in those years. Think of the woman beside you now. That is who you fight for when Echidna comes. Not ourselves, but the women" - the Queen made a pointed look at Dick as she continued - "and man that reside on this island tonight. They will need you when the fight comes. So are you ready?'

The entire hall exploded with cheers and whistles of eagerness, and that brought a bright smile to Queen Hippolyta's face. 'In that case, enjoy tonight. Dance, eat, drink, sing. Be free.'

By the flick of the Queen's wrist, the band in the corner Dick hadn't seen started playing beautiful music and the tables were moved to create room for a dance floor.

'Princess, you must join us for a dance!' Some young girls came around the table and gently pulled Y/N from her seat, to which Y/N just laughed as she allowed them to drag her to the dance floor. Dick watched Y/N join the other women, watched her smile stretch wide and bright, watched her embrace and let herself go as she danced.

When was the last time she'd done that?

'...when we last spoke, she sounded like she didn't want to be found. That she would come back to us when she was ready...'

'Maybe she doesn't want to see you, have you considered that?'

Kaldur's words haunted him, had been since he left M'gann and Connor's house. He just hadn't taken his friend's warning seriously until now.

Kaldur was right.

Dick rose from his seat and quickly excused himself from the party, suddenly overwhelmed by the music and the full room. He escaped to one of the balconies nearby and was relieved that he could finally hear himself think. And yet now he could hear it all in the outdoor silence - the conflicting emotions and thoughts running through him.

Did she really belong here or back home?

Did he mean as much to her anymore as much as she meant to him?

What did he truly feel for her?

What will happen when Echidna strikes tomorrow?

So many issues and so little time to solve them all.

He didn't know how long he stood there, looking out over the mountain and ocean, over the flickering lights of those who feasted in their homes. It could've been hours, and yet the full moon barely moved.

'What are you doing out here?'

Dick was knocked out of his mind at the sound of the sweet voice, and he turned to find Y/N standing on the steps that lead back inside to the bustling party, an exhausted grin adorning her flushed face. With the firelight behind her and the moon shining onto her dress, Dick could've sworn she glowed divinely.

'S-Sorry?' he called out, confused as to why she was out there in the first place.

'I asked what are you doing out here all by yourself on such a beautiful night?' Y/N repeated, walking down the steps before making her way over to him at the balcony's edge. 'You're usually one for parties if high school was any indicator.'

Dick tried to laugh, but it came out as a weak cough. 'Yeah well, we're a long way from high school, aren't we.'

'What's going on with you?' Y/N asked, and Dick could feel her stare on him. 'You've been oddly... quiet this evening.'

'I just don't feel well is all. Don't worry I will be fine for the battle tomorrow.'

'That's a load of crap, Grayson and you know it.'

Dick didn't reply, just looked out over the ocean in the hopes that she would leave. But she didn't and Dick finally turned to meet her stare. It was like she was undressing him, but not in the physical sense. In the way she'd always been able to read him and say silently that she knew he wasn't okay.

That one stare made him feel more vulnerable than being naked, or doing flips off a podium twenty metres in the air with no safety net to catch him.

'I just... I've been doing some thinking,' he started, 'and I think that... if we both survive this... that you should stay here. On Themyscira. If that is what you want.'

Y/N scrunched her brows in confusion. 'So... you're giving me permission to stay here if we all live through Echidna's war? Seriously?'

Dick turned to her fully. 'No, I mean yes- But no you don't need my permission to stay, I just... I'm sorry this is coming out all wrong.' He took a calming breath before starting again. 'What I mean to say is, I came after you for the wrong reasons. I was being selfish and stubborn. But I want you to be happy. And seeing you dance tonight with the other women... well, I can't remember the last time myself or any of the team brought you that kind of happiness.'

'What about your mission?' she asked, her voice distant, almost scared.

Dick flashed her a casual smile. 'Don't worry about it. I'll manage. I never should've come here in the first place. I'm sorry.' Dick gestured back to the stairs and started back-tracking towards them. 'Let's go rejoin the party while we still can, huh? You're right, I do love a good party.'

Just as he turned his back, Y/N called out. 'I'm not.'

He paused for a moment, then looked over his shoulder to find Y/N looking at him with an intensity that almost sent him staggering. 'What?' he asked.

'I'm not sorry you came,' she answered, taking a deep breath in to maintain her composure.

Surprised by her answer, Dick turned back to her. 'You're not?'

She shook her head, then started fidgeting with her dress and looked down. 'Am I angry you came? Yes, initially. Am I still hurting because of what you did, and is your presence just a daily reminder of that pain? Most definitely.'

That last one struck him deep. He had never wanted to be the cause of so much pain. Not to her of all people.

After another deep breath, Y/N finally looked up at him. 'But that doesn't mean I didn't miss you.'

There it was again, that look she'd given him on the stairs earlier, in fact she'd given it to him many times before, he realised. Not just on Themyscira but back home, back when they were sixteen. It was the look of truth and honesty, of adoration and care.

His heart thumped so heavily in his chest he swore Y/N could hear it, and while he didn't understand what the thought of Y/N missing him implied, he knew how it made him feel.

'I missed you too,' he said honestly, returning to stand in front of Y/N. He didn't know why, but it felt right to reach for her hands, and she didn't push him away as he enclosed his fingers around hers. 'A-And being here has made me realise something else, too.'

'What's that?' Her breath fanned his face they stood so close, closer than what simple friends should. But he didn't care, it felt right, it felt natural.

'That I... I just...' He couldn't get the words out, they were so heavy with meaning they got stuck in his throat. Both afraid and excited to say them aloud, he couldn't decide what fate would be worse. Be honest and rejected, or be honest and see if she felt the same.

'You what, Dick?' she whispered, eyes never leaving his.

They both realised that it was the first time she'd called him by his first name since he'd landed on Themyscira. And if that wasn't a sign, then Dick didn't know what would be.

'I just...' Dick started, but a shadow crossed over Y/N's face and he quickly turned to find a a giant winged creature with fangs and a humanoid body reaching to him with its claws.

'Get down!' Dick cried as he turned and dove to the ground with Y/N. He felt the talons of the creature brush against his back as he partially covered Y/N out of natural instinct. The creature screeched as it soared high above again, disappearing into the darkness despite the moonlight.

'Are you okay?' Dick asked as he helped Y/N to her feet.

'Yes, I'm fine,' Y/N said, her eyes trained on the sky.

'What was that?' Dick asked, trying to spy the creature but there was no sign of it anywhere.

'That was a harpy,' Y/N answered, then her eyes locked on to something in the sky, her face paling with fear.

Dick followed her gaze and found himself frozen with fear himself. The harpy had come back but with more of its kind. Many more. So much so they blocked out the moon and engulfed the palace in darkness.

'Echidna's war...' Y/N breathed out in disbelief. 'It has begun.'

---------------------

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patsywrites · 1 month ago

Text

Skin Tight Spaces

Robin!Dick Grayson x OC

Summary: Six months after the team is infiltrated by The Light, 14-year-old Penelope Ward and 15-year-old Dick Grayson go on a mission together, despite the fact that they usually can't stand each other. The mission doesn't end the way they hope, though. Forcing both of them to see the other in a new light.

Warnings: On-page panic attacks, Claustrophobia, trapped in small spaces, memory loss, references to physical abuse.

Author's Note: Guys...this is the longest chapter I've written so far. I didn't anticipate it being this long but it kept pouring out of me, and I didn't want to split it into two parts. I really like how we get to see Penelope & Dick's relationship unfold (and I am an absolute SUCKER for two people who don't like each other having to comfort each other). We also get to see Penelope's suit and her hero name (it took me so long to settle on a name for her but I'm happy with this for now). Also, this takes place in between season 1 and 2! Okay that's all I need to say. I hope you enjoy! Love You!

Word Count: 5,369

“I need your help.”

“Fuck no.”

It was a gloomy week in Happy Harbor when Dick asked for Penelope’s help. It had been over six months since the Justice League was under The Light’s control, causing six of its members to be off-world for sixteen hours with no recollection of that time. Since then, no answers had been found but things had relatively quieted down. Recently, members of Penelope’s team had been going on various missions, patrolling their home cities, and were desperately trying to uncover more about The Light.

Penelope, who had just recently turned fourteen, had gone on several missions recently with various teammates and liked to patrol in various cities. She had worked closely with all of her team members except for Dick Grayson, otherwise known as Robin, which is why it was so weird that he was asking for her help now.

“Trust me, Penelope, I wouldn’t be asking if there was anyone else who could help.” The Boy Wonder grumbled. He only ever called her Penelope. Everyone else called her Nellie, but he basically refused. In fact, if it wasn’t for him, she’s almost certain that she would never hear anyone call her Penelope ever again. She once asked him why he didn’t call her Nellie when everyone else did and he told her that nicknames were for friends.

The blonde rolled her eyes, “I find it hard to believe that no one else can help you.” The two of them working together was bound to be a recipe for disaster; they managed to tolerate each other on group missions and during briefings for the sake of their teammates, but the two of them alone together? She would rather throw herself down a set of stairs, thank you very much.

“What’s the job?” She asked, focusing her already growing frustration with him on the pizza dough she was currently rolling out.

“I just need you to go into this lawyer’s office and steal some files,” Dick explained, “It’s simple, really.” He took a seat at the kitchen island, staring at her with an intensity that she did not appreciate.

“If it’s so easy, why can’t you do it yourself?”

“His office is in a series of townhomes, he has a client tomorrow night at six thirty, I’ll need you to sneak in behind the client while invisible -”

“Zatanna can turn invisible -” she interrupted, still not sure why exactly he needed her.

“Jesus Christ will you let me finish for once?!” Dick barked. She looked at him, both of them were pissed off at each other, which was their problem ninety percent of the time. There was a beat of uncomfortable silence as they stared at each other, both silently daring the other to piss them off even more.

“Fine,” Penelope conceded, “finish your plan. I’m listening.” She motioned for him to continue.

He sighed, “Once you’re inside, you need to stay invisible until the lawyer leaves for the evening, after that I’ll have you retrieve some of his files, and then you’ll meet me in the abandoned townhome four buildings down from his office.”

“Again,” she started, “Why exactly do you need me specifically?”

“The guy has a security guard at both his front and back door after hours, but there’s an old vent that travels from his building all the way to the one I’ll be staking out in. The problem is, the vent is really narrow. I did some calculations and you’re the only person on the team that’ll fit.”

Penelope was one of those kids that used to be tall for her age, but then she just stopped growing. When she was ten years old she was five feet flat, the doctors thought she would grow up to be six feet tall. But one day she blinked and all her friends had surpassed her and she hadn’t grown an inch. So, she was fourteen years old and still the same height she was when she was ten. She didn’t really care though, and no one else did either.

“Ugh,” The teenager groaned, “I don’t really have a choice, do I?”

He smiled at her, and it wasn’t necessarily friendly, “You’d kind of be a shitty teammate if you don’t help me out, Penelope”

“Why don’t you call me Nellie?” She groaned.

He ignored the question, “Are you gonna help me or not?”

“Fine. But you owe me.”

The next night, Penelope slipped on her suit. The light purple material hugged her body in a way that comforted her. Her light blonde hair was cut short, just touching the tops of her shoulders, so there wasn’t much she could do with it besides put it in two short ponytails at the base of her neck. She had a nagging feeling in her chest that she was growing too old for this hairstyle, but she chose to ignore it. Putting her lilac domino mask on, she walked out of her room and met Dick, or Robin since he was in his suit, by the zeta tube.

“Aurora.” He greeted her. Aurora was her alter ego when she wasn’t a regular teenager and was instead doing dangerous stuff like protecting the world. Or, in this case, breaking into a lawyer’s office.

“Robin.”

“C’mon, it’s 5:30 now, we gotta get there soon.” Dick said, and she followed him into the zeta tube.

“Where are we going, again?”

“Gotham.”

“So, who’s the lawyer and what information does he have that you want?”

They were sneaking into the abandoned building that Dick would be staking out in for the night while Penelope risked her life. Well, that’s a bit dramatic but she was annoyed so she was going to be theatrical if she damn well pleased.

“He represented Lex Luthor in a case a couple years back, but before the case was settled he quit. He had to change his name and move to Gotham to continue practicing.”

“You think it had something to do with The Light?”

“I’m not positive, but it probably means that this guy learned something he shouldn’t have and had to flee for safety. It could be a fruitless search but I want to try.”

It had been like this ever since the Justice League and their team had been infiltrated. Everyone was doing research on The Light and trying to find out as much as they could. Most of the time, the missions and research led to nowhere, but no one was willing to give up.

“His name is Michael Anderson, but he goes by Allen Roberts now.” She was surprised that her temperamental teammate was providing more information without her asking.

Once the two teenagers were inside the building, Robin started setting up. He handed her an earbud, her comlink. He pulled out a computer, on the screen a blueprint of the townhomes and their infrastructure.

“This is the house we’re in,” Dick started, pointing to the house on the farthest end of the street, “This,” He pointed to the house on the opposite end, “Is this one you’re sneaking into.”

“Where’s the vent?”

“Here.” Dick pointed to the top floor of the house on the screen.

“No, dumbass.” Penelope chided, “Where is it in here? Like, the literal vent that I will be crawling through.” Dick was rolling his eyes at her as he swore under his breath. He had a growing sensation that asking her to do this was a mistake.

He led her up the stairs to a circular vent in the bottom left corner of the wall.

“Here,” He answered, “Any more stupid questions?”

“No.” She grumbled.

He handed her a small black microchip, “Put this somewhere in your suit; it's so I can track you.” She begrudgingly did what she was told and slipped the device into a small pocket in her belt.

“You gonna give me a good luck kiss before I go, Birdie?” She teased. He kept his face neutral but she could see the blush blooming on his cheeks.

“Just go, Aurora. Don’t do anything dumb.”

As she was crossing the threshold of the abandoned building, dusk already falling upon Gotham, she turned herself invisible. Invisibility was something she had started to develop when she was eleven, Barry Allen having given her the idea. At first, she could only do small objects and only for a few minutes at a time. Now, she could turn her entire body invisible and for hours. The longest she had ever gone was nine hours, she was exhausted by the end but she was super proud of herself.

“Aurora,” She heard in her ear, “Can you hear me?”

“Yes,” She responded in exasperation, “I’m not even half way down the block yet, why are you already checking in? Miss me?”

Dick didn’t respond to her playfulness, so she kept walking. At a quarter past six, she reached the Lawyer’s office and waited for his client to arrive. The townhouse was cute; red brick exterior with vines crawling their way up the side. There were potted plants on the windowsill. The plaque by the door read, Allen Roberts; Attorney at Law.

Suddenly, a young woman approached the stoop of the red townhouse and rang the doorbell. The woman was tall and frail, she had a busted lip and dark purple bruise on her left cheek, green and yellow bruises trailed her neck. She had a tissue in her hand and looked as if she could cry at any moment. Penelope’s heart broke for the woman.

After about thirty seconds of waiting, a man who she presumed was Allen Roberts (or Michael Anderson?) opened the door. He was an older man with a mop of gray hair on his head, and a bushy gray beard to match. He was wearing brown corduroy pants and an old woolen sweater. His eyes, adorn with half moon spectacles, were kind.

“Ah, Miss Mulligan,” He greeted the woman warmly, “Come in, my dear.”

He grabbed her gently by the arm and led her inside, Penelope following just behind. The woman almost instantly began to cry at the relief of being inside his warm office.

“Thank you for meeting me, Mr. Roberts,” Miss Mulligan sniffled, “I know we talked about this over the phone, but I can’t pay you much, I don’t really have anything of my own -”

The man raised a gentle hand to stop her, “Don’t you worry about the money one bit,” his voice was graveled but soothing, “Let’s just focus on getting you somewhere safe, come on, let’s go up to my office, would you like some tea?”

Penelope made no move to follow them. It was clear that Miss Mulligan was in desperate need of help, likely coming from some kind of abusive home or relationship, and it felt intrusive for Penelope to listen in on their conversation. Besides, Dick made no mention of that when he was briefing her on their mission earlier.

Taking a look around the room, the downstairs portion of the house seemed to act as Mr. Robert’s waiting room. Comfy sofas and chairs circled a coffee table, which housed magazines and newspapers, as well as a pitcher of water. There was a brochure display filled with pamphlets on abuse awareness, Planned Parenthood, LGBTQ+ youth resources, food pantries, animal shelters, and more. In the corner of the room was a large basket full of kids toys, stuffed animals, and coloring books.

He doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who would work with Lex Luthor, Penelope thought.

She took a seat on one of the chairs, noting with pleasure at how comfortable it was. She figured she would wait down here until they were done with their meeting and sneak up there once they left. She wondered how Dick was possibly staying entertained without her pleasant company.

“Are you inside, Aurora?” Dick asked through the comlink.

“Yes, Robin,” She sighed, “I’m in. I gotta say, this guy doesn’t look like the type of guy to get caught up with Lex Luthor.” She was speaking softly so as to not alert the people upstairs of her presence.

“Just because he turned over a new leaf doesn’t mean he didn't work for bad people in the past.”

“Sounds like he’s doing work pro-bono.” She mused.

“It doesn’t matter,” Robin snapped, “Just focus on the mission.”

She made a mocking face even though he wasn’t there to see it.

“I saw that.”

She had forgotten that he had hacked into the security cameras.

It took about an hour and a half for Miss Mulligan and her lawyer to finish their meeting.

“Thank you so much for agreeing to help me,” The feeble woman told the old man, “You have no idea what this means to me.”

“It would be an honor to represent you,” He told her while grasping her hands softly, “Here’s some money for the bus, I don’t want you walking home this late.”

She thanked him again before leaving. Then, Allen Roberts went back up to his office for another forty-five minutes before finally leaving the building and saying a cordial goodbye to his security guards at the front door.

Finally, Penelope thought, Now I can get whatever the hell Dick needs and get out.

She creeped up the stairs, no longer worried about making herself invisible. She could smell bergamot and lemon as she reached the top floor, no doubt from a candle that was burning not long ago. Approaching the office door, she turned the handle.

“It’s locked, Robin.” She spoke.

“Don’t tell me you don’t know how to pick a lock.” He was teasing her.

Penelope rolled her eyes, “Of course I know how to pick a lock,” She retorted, already pulling out her lock picking kit and getting started, “I just wanted to complain.”

She finished picking the lock (easy work) and, once she was inside, she took in the room. It looked just as warm and inviting as it did downstairs, an oak desk atop an afghan rug, two red chairs on the opposite side. There was a large window on the far side of the room, and huge bookshelves and filing cabinets on the other.

“Okay,” She said, “I’m in, what exactly am I looking for?”

“Go to his computer and type in the following password, GE1012H.”

“Done.” Penelope declared, having finished the task. It was useless to ask him how he knew his password, Dick probably wouldn't waste time telling her.

“Good, look for any files dated before 2003.”

Penelope started the search. She was smart, but she wasn’t nearly as tech savvy as Dick was, so this proved to be a challenge. She filed through a lot of random stuff on Allen Robert’s computer before finding his client files.

“He’s doing a lot of stuff for victims of abuse.” She noted.

“Like I said earlier, that doesn’t mean he’s not a bad guy.”

“Why do you have to be so negative all of the time?”

After going backwards chronologically through the files. She finally found something that could be interesting.

“There’s a file from 1997 covering a man named Sahl Gural. And one from 2001 for a man named Lyle Thorx. Both look like they’re written in code. It would take me some time to decipher it but we could probably figure it out.” She didn’t know why she was offering to help him when her end of the deal was supposed to be over after she downloaded these files and met him at the other end of the vent, but she was excited to figure out more about this mysterious lawyer.

“Aurora,” she heard Robin suck his teeth, “Those are anagrams for Ra’s Al Guhl and Lex Luthor.”

She felt stupid for not realizing it right away, “oh.”

“Just download them so we can get out of here.”

Feeling a little deflated, Penelope pulled a small usb drive out of her belt and began downloading the files. She chose to ignore the thought at the back of her brain telling her she wasn’t smart. She knew that was a lie. She was incredibly smart; she just always managed to feel like an idiot compared to Dick. In fact, she felt inferior to him in a lot of ways, which is why she found herself frustrated with him all of the time.

Once the files were downloaded, she shut Mr. Robert’s computer and put it in the precise spot it was when she arrived. Taking one last look around the room, she sent up a silent prayer that whatever Robin was going to do with this information didn’t put the old man at risk. Penelope wanted him to continue to help people, and she would feel guilty for the rest of her life if she was part of the reason that he couldn’t.

“Okay,” Penelope addressed Dick, “I’m done.”

“The vent is at the end of the upstairs hallway, I’ll be on the other side.”

“Are there people in the buildings in between us? Won’t they hear someone crawling through their vents?”

“They’ve all been turned into office buildings, all of which are closed for the evening. You should be good.”

Satisfied with his answer, she made her way to the vent. The floorboards of the old building creaked as she walked. Crouching down, she pried the cover off the vent.

Damn, this thing is narrow. She thought to herself.

“I won’t be able to turn around to put the cover back on once I’m inside.”

“Don’t worry about it, he’ll probably be suspicious but there won’t be any security camera footage for tonight so he won’t be able to prove anything.”

“Sounds like a foolproof plan,” Penelope chided, sarcasm dripping from her voice, “Okay, I’m coming down the vent now.”

Did she mention it was narrow? Because it was narrow. Now she understood why Dick needed her for this, up until now she thought he was over exaggerating how small the vent was, but he definitely wasn’t. She could barely squeeze herself into it, the walls of the vent touched both sides of her body, as well as her stomach and back. She would have to army crawl the whole way through and she couldn’t lift her head up all the way, so her neck was at an odd angle. She had no doubt that this was going to absolutely suck.

Oh, Penelope thought to herself, He owes me big time.

As she started her trek through the vent, she thought back to a mini-series on cave diving on the Discovery Channel that she had watched with Kal a couple of months ago. This started to feel remarkably similar to what she imagined cave diving would be like. Sweat was already beading her face and neck, her arms were already cramping from the effort it took to crawl her way through the tight space. Why on Earth people chose to do stuff like this as a hobby? She had no idea.

“How long is this vent?” The blonde asked, irritation in her voice.

“About eighty-eight yards.”

“Holy Shit.”

“Already chickening out?”

“Fuck you, Birdie.”

She continued to crawl and crawl, but it was becoming increasingly more difficult. She started finding it more challenging to take steady breaths, a tight knot of panic rooted in her chest. She couldn’t remember a time in her life that she had felt claustrophobic before but, then again, she couldn’t even remember the majority of her life to begin with. Is she claustrophobic and just can't remember? But she’d been in small spaces before on other missions and never felt like she feels now, so why did she suddenly feel like she was going to vomit? Then again, none of the small spaces she’d been in during her time on the team had been this small. This felt like trying to fit a marble through the eye of a needle.

As Penelope was asking herself these questions and wrestling with what was potentially a new-found phobia, the panic was settling into every crevice of her mind and body.

“Robin,” She rasped, panic seeping through her voice despite her best effort to conceal her fear, “Is this vent getting narrower?” She kept crawling, trying to ignore the fear gripping her like a vice.

“No?”

“It feels like it is.” Penelope’s breathing was coming in shorter, ragged strides. There was a pregnant pause on the other end of her comlink.

“Are you claustrophobic?” He didn’t even try to hide the annoyance in his tone.

“No!” She grunted. As she said it, she knew it wasn’t true. Suddenly, she saw a flash of a memory.

She was trapped. All she could see was light yellow wood in front of her, the smell of pine all around her. The only light was coming from her. A soft glow radiating off of her entire body.

A much younger version of herself was screaming, “Let me out! Please! I won’t do it again, I promise!” But no one answered her pleas. She felt the scratch of pre-sanded wood on her arms and legs. She began clawing at the walls encircling her, trying to force her way out. Her fingernails broke, blood spilled from her hands and stained the prison of this box. Wood splintered her palms, her eyes were stinging. No one came to get her.

“Aurora!” She heard Robin shout, snapping her back to reality, “Stop messing around and keep crawling, you’re fine.” His words provided her no comfort. At this point, she was having a full blown panic attack. She felt like she was going to die in this vent, no one but Dick Grayson there to witness her passing.

“Dick, please,” She was begging, tears flowing freely down her cheeks, “I can’t do this. I feel like I’m gonna die. I can’t breathe.”

It took her calling him by his name for him to take her panic seriously. Team members almost never called each other by their civilian names while suited up; if she was using it now, it meant things were seriously wrong. He could hear her trying to inhale oxygen, but her breaths were sharp and short. Suddenly, he was worried about Penelope, despite his resentment towards her.

“Nellie, listen to me,” He spoke softly but firmly, wanting to reassure her but still be kind, “You’re going to be fine. I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”

“Can you get me out of here?” Her voice came out a broken sob, and Dick’s chest constricted.

“I can’t fit through the vent, remember? You have to keep crawling forward, that’s the only way out.”

“I don’t think I can,” She was still breathing erratically.

“Yes, you can.” Dick told her, and he meant it. He wasn’t necessarily her biggest fan by any means, but Penelope was tough and smart, he had never seen her take on a task she couldn’t complete. So, he knew without a shadow of a doubt that she could do this, even if she was scared the whole way through, “Focus on your breathing. Your brain won’t let your nervous system calm down if you’re not getting enough oxygen. Breathe in for five seconds and out for five seconds.”

She did what she was told, breathing in and out. She heard Dick in her ear breathing with her, instructing her on what to do. Despite the fear choking her, she kept crawling forward, maintaining a steady pace.

“You’re over the halfway point,” Dick encouraged her, noting the point on his map that her tracking device told him she was at. She didn’t respond, not trusting herself to speak.

She was still crying, her heart still pounding like a drum inside her chest. Breathing was still hard, but it was getting easier. All she could focus on was crawling forward, desperate to get out of here. She tried to distract herself from the tight space she was enclosed in, thinking of books she needed to read and about how she was going to kill Dick when she got out of here.

“What’s your favorite recipe to make?” He asked her, his voice gentler than she had ever heard it. Penelope knew he was trying to keep her distracted.

“Umm,” She pondered, voice still thick with tears, “I like grilling. Burgers.”

“We should do that soon, since it’s started to warm up.”

Penelope thought it was kind of him to ask, but it wasn’t really helping much. Her breathing was picking up again, panic finding its familiar seat in her sternum.

“You’re almost done,” She clung to the sound of his voice, “You have about ten yards left to crawl and then it’s over. I’m waiting right outside the vent.”

The adrenaline rush at the idea of being in open air again only made Penelope’s breath come out even sharper. Her hands were slick from sweat and the tears that had fallen on them. She was focusing on escape and not so much on trying to stay calm. It was hard to lift her head to see in front of her, but when she tried to peer up a bit, she could see Dick at the end of the tunnel. Penelope was fighting hard to get to him, until she felt the teen reach into the vent and pull her out.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit,” Dick exclaimed, worry etched into his words, “C’mere.”

Penelope threw her arms around his neck, gasping for breath, body racked with sobs. He held her on his lap as they sat on the floor of the abandoned building. With his arms wrapped around her trembling figure, he felt the weight of her panic crush him. Tears sprung to his own eyes, but he wasn’t entirely sure why.

“I- I’m…sorry, I didn’t - I didn’t kn-know,” Penelope was trying to apologize through her sobs, feeling guilty for almost jeopardizing the mission.

“Shhhh, Shhhh, Nellie,” Dick soothed, rubbing comforting circles on her back, “You’re okay. I’m right here.”

The two of them sat like this for a while. Penelope was clutched to Dick, and he was holding tightly onto her, too. He didn’t know why, but he wanted to make her feel better, to make her feel safe. Penelope kept trying to talk, to apologize or explain, but everything was getting caught around the lump in her throat, and all she could do was cry. She didn’t know why she had thrown herself onto him the second she was free, but she chalked it up just to needing comfort and him being the only person available. Penelope thought for sure that he would have peeled her off of him by now, but he didn’t. Instead, he stroked her hair as he rocked her back and forth, whispering softly into her, telling her she was safe and reminding her to breathe.

Eventually, after the girl’s breathing had become steady and her sobs were reduced to nothing but sticky cheeks and a lingering headache, Dick helped her up off the floor. They took each other in, something different than it had been at the start of the evening. He had helped her, a fact that Penelope couldn’t ignore despite how much she didn’t want to like him. And, ultimately, she had helped Dick, too. The raven haired teen couldn’t ignore the fact that she had crawled into that vent, and kept crawling, despite the panic and fear. She had gotten him the information he needed. Even if the files she downloaded led to nowhere, she had helped him.

This understanding hung in the air between them, the sounds of Gotham lingering in the streets. Between the wooden slats on the boarded up windows, light from a nearby streetlamp and the sound of distant sirens flood the room.

“You did good,” He told her while helping her get dust out of her hair and off her suit, knowing that she needed the gentle praise to reassure her.

“Thanks,” She said softly, not exactly sure what to do with the knowledge that they couldn’t hate each other anymore. She wordlessly handed him the USB drive.

“C’mon,” Dick said, “let’s go.”

They walked in silence to the nearest zeta tube. There were several scattered throughout Gotham and, luckily, the closest one was only about a ten minute walk. The silence was awkward and tense.

“I remembered something,” Penelope told him after several minutes of silence. Dick stopped dead in his tracks. In all the years he had known her, Penelope couldn’t conjure up a memory from her past life once.

“From before?”

She nodded in response. A tentative expression on her face.

“Has that ever happened before?” He asked, despite already knowing the answer.

“Not really,” She replied, “sometimes things seem familiar, like a certain smell or song, but I’ve never had a memory pop up.”

“What was the memory?”

And she told him. She told him about the box made of wood, how she screamed for help, how she tried to claw her way out until her fingers bled. He listened intently, never once interrupting her (a rarity for their conversations). She wished she could remember more. She wished she knew who had put her in the box, who she was screaming at, what she had done to be put there. Penelope told Dick this, too. Confiding in him so easily, though she didn’t understand why. He didn’t try to provide an explanation, because he knew he didn’t have one. He wanted to puke at the idea of a smaller version of Nellie, scared for her life, trapped in a box and thinking it was her fault that she was there.

They kept walking, approaching the zeta tube. She knew that he was likely just dropping her off, seeing as he could go back to his own home in Gotham for the night. She loved Mount Justice, but sometimes she wished she could have what Dick had; a home to go back to.

“Are you coming back to the mountain tonight?” She asked him, already anticipating him declining.

But, to her surprise, he said, “I will if you’re making breakfast in the morning.” She tried not to show how happy it made her. A smile replaced the sad frown she had been wearing for the latter half of the night. She loved cooking for people she loved. Not that Dick was someone she loved, of course. But still, she was pleased as punch at the idea of cooking for him.

“Of course I’m making breakfast!” Penelope perked up, “I always do!”

Dick laughed, “Okay, I’ll stay the night then.” He was looking down at her, an emotion that Penelope couldn’t quite place misted his eyes.

After going through the zeta tube and arriving back at Mount Justice, Dick walked Penelope to her room. He made the excuse of having to pass by her room anyways in order to get to the closet that housed the blankets and linens for guests, but, really, he just wanted to make sure that she got there safely.

“Thank you,” Penelope looked up at him, craning her neck to make eye contact, “For helping me earlier with, you know.” She was blushing, embarrassed about her panic attack.

“Of course,” He wiped some dust off of her cheek, “I won’t tell anyone, just so you know. About your claustrophobia… or your memory.” He meant it, too. He thought she should tell their friends on her own, and only when she was ready.

“Thanks,” She smiled gratefully, “and I won’t tell anyone that you called me Nellie instead of Penelope, twice!”

With that, she turned around and closed the door, heading to her cozy bed where she could sleep for hours and deal with her resurgent memories and fears in the morning.

In the guest bedroom across the hall, Dick couldn’t sleep. Distracted by the thought of the blonde girl in the room several doors down. He kept picturing her as a kid, small and scared. And then he was picturing her as she had been tonight, shaking and holding on to him like her life depended on it. He was confused by his new found appreciation for the girl, and his lingering concern that she would be okay. When he did fall asleep, he dreamt of her and the promise of breakfast in the morning.

20 notes · View notes

tiramiiswu · 1 month ago

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ᯓ࣪ ִֶָ☾. desiderium

0.1 Independence Day & Fireworks

⋆.˚ young justice x genshin impact ⋆.˚

✦ masterlist || next ✦ young justice x adeptus!reader ✦ word count: 13.7k ✦ warnings: none ✦ originally posted on quotev (may 18, 2023) ✦ a/n: purely writing this to appease the goblin in my brain. ✦ tide caller is supposed to be written with an ambiguous/unstated gender as to help with projection and will be referred to with they/them pronouns respectively. i kind of go on autopilot when writing and type out the wrong word without thinking so if anyone catches me slipping and accidentally using the wrong pronoun please let me know and tell me where you caught it so i can change it asap :'D sometimes my hands type a little slip of the brain and i never catch it until it's too late ^^;;

✦ (3/12/25) edit: fixed some formatting issues with my dividers, i didn’t check to see how they’d look on mobile and had to adjust their length 😭

☆ ꧁ ═════════ ⋆✦⋆════════ ꧂ ☆

Washington D.C.; July 4th, ??? CDT

“Okay, I’m officially whelmed,” is the first thing to fall from Robin’s mouth as he and his fellow sidekicks—Aqualad and Kid Flash—stood in a stunned silence staring at what towered before them.

Lined up in several rows and columns were several vertical cylindrical containers that pulsated with a strong electrical energy, illuminating the expansive room with an eerie neon blue glow and a notable hum sounding in the air. And to think it was all kept several dozens of stories below ground, completely unnoticed by anyone above ground.

The real Project Cadmus.

Upon a closer inspection the three noticed the very inhuman shapes within each container. They were large, insectoid looking creatures, almost akin to fireflies, though their legs were longer than a human arm (one pair looked more like long protruding horns due to their placement) and their wings were short, almost spine-like along their backs. A large bulb of sorts hung off their back and down their back legs and gave off a bright, cyan glow.

Kid Flash began walking forward, taking it all in, “This is how they hide this massive underground facility from the world. The real Cadmus isn’t on the grid, it generates its own power with these… Things.” he stops, gesturing to the imprisoned creatures surrounding them. “Must be what they’re bred for.”

“Even the name is a clue, the Cadmus of myth created a new race by sowing dragons’ teeth into the earth.” Aqualad stated.

Robin notices a computer console to the side of them, “And this Cadmus creates new life too. Let’s find out why,” he extends a wire from the holo-computer in his glove and connects it to the console. He begins hacking the Cadmus database for information on the strange creatures the boys had discovered. He relays the information he sifts through to the others, “They call them Genomorphs… Woah, look at the stats on these things! Super strength, telepathy, razor claws— These are living weapons!”

Kid Flash leans over his shoulder, reading the seemingly endless scroll of information recorded about each Genomorph created at Cadmus, “They’re engineering an army, but for who?“

Aqualad moves to stand behind them as something on the holographic screen catches the Boy Wonder’s eyes, “Wait there’s something else, Project Kr, a-and a new input as recently as this month, Project Riptide. The files are triple- encrypted, I can’t—“

He’s cut off as a new voice booms from across the room, “Don’t move!” The three sidekicks jolt up, startled by the new presence in the room. Before them was a tall man in a dark blue jumpsuit wearing a gold helmet with a strong looking build. He wielded a shield and was covered in some other gilded armor pieces alongside his helmet.

The three noted the extra company he brought with him. Surrounding him were smaller elf-like Genomorphs, an even smaller one sitting passively on his shoulder, like a monkey. They all shared a similar humanoid body that was a sickly gray in color, a pair of beady red eyes and striking red veins apparent on the arms and ribs of each creature. The smallest Genomorph had a pair of tiny horns protruding from its forehead.

Surprisingly though, the helmet-donned man seemed just as shocked to see them there as well. “Wait. Robin? Aqualad? Kid Flash?”

Robin seemed to snort a little, making a quick jab at his speedster companion, “At least he got your name right.”

Aqualad ignored them as he spoke up, recognizing the man, “I know you. Guardian. A hero.”

“I do my best.” Was the quick reply he received.

“Then, what are you doing here?” Kid Flash inquired, squinting at him accusingly.

“I'm chief of security. You're trespassing.” Guardian stated matter-of-factly. Though from his next statement he didn’t seem too apprehensive of the three now that he recognizes them. “But we can call the Justice League. Figure this out.”

During this exchange Robin had been quietly downloading all of the contents they uncovered from the Cadmus database. Quickly retracting the USB cord from the console while his friends had been keeping Guardian distracted. “You think the League’s gonna approve of you breeding weapons?!” He shouted accusingly at the man.

The helmed man seemed taken aback, genuinely shocked to hear such a thing, “Weapons? What are you… What have I..?” He trails off, raising a hand to hold against his head. He repeated, confused as his eyes began to close. As something flashed across his expression, as if a fog was starting to lift from his head. “Ugh, my head…”

The clarity seems to fade, and the fog quickly creeps back to cloud his mind as the little Genomorph on his shoulder lights up it’s horns to relay a message to Guardian. His eyes snap back open, hardened into a glare and looking more determined than before, “Take them down,” he ordered. “No mercy!”

The Genomorphs sprung into action with an animalistic snarl, making a charge towards the three teens with lethal intent. Robin jumps forward and drops a smoke bomb in response to is sudden attack, using the obscured field of view to shoot a grappling hook above to a beam hanging overhead to make an escape. An alarm began blearing during the disturbance.

Kid Flash manages to dodge the razor claws and gnashing fangs of the Genomorphs while blitzing them with extreme speed, taking down several of them in his wake.

One of the Genomorphs had launched itself onto Aqualad’s back, though he managed to rip the creature off of him before Guardian came barreling towards him. The two traded several blows before the Atlantean intercepted a strike from Guardian’s shield, sending shockwaves through the metal and rendering Guardian and the miniature Genomorph incapacitated on the floor.

The two notice Robin’s absence and find him by the elevator, his holo-pad out as he attempted to hack the industrial elevator for them to escape through. Kid rushes over to him, skidding to a stop before giving him an sarcastically irked, “Wait to be a team player, Rob.”

To which the younger boy says: “Weren’t you right behind me?”

Seeing two Genomorphs tailing after him, Aqualad books it to the elevator, barely making it in after tucking and rolling into the metal chute. The three heard a metallic THUMP from the other side as the Genomorphs collided against the now shut elevator doors.

Glancing at the elevator’s floor screen, he’s unable to contain his utter disbelief as the sub level numbers displayed above the door began increasing, “We’re headed down?”

Kid Flash turns to the other masked teen, “Dude, out is UP,” he shouts, pointing upwards to the ceiling.

Robin seems to give him an incredulous look in response, “Excuse me? Project Kr is DOWN, on sub-level 52.”

Before any sort of fight could break out between the two Aqualad steps in, placing himself between them, “This is out of control,” he states, he seemed stressed by the course of events that had just occurred, at least as stressed as the stoic Atlantean let on.

“Perhaps,” he sighed. “Perhaps we should contact the League…”

The three fall silent for a moment, fully realizing just how deep they had gotten themselves into (both literally and figuratively).

That is, until the elevator makes a ‘ding’ to indicate they’ve arrived at their destination.

The elevator doors open to reveal a disturbing sight. The once cement walls and flooring have been replaced with a soft, flesh lined tunnel, only accompanied by several pods lined in rows along the walls that acted as a macabre decor. There was a division in the path that followed ahead of them, leading to two unknown rooms.

The atmosphere became eerier, and it only cemented the reality of what the three had stumbled into by complete accident when investigating a simple building fire.

Robin is seemingly undeterred by the disturbance in their environment, quickly taking initiative as he dashes out of the elevator. Kid Flash is silent for a moment before making a half-assed attempt to reason with his remaining companion , “We are already here…”

Aqualad just sighed, defeated by the curious nature of his two friends, “Which way?”

Their shorter companion scoffs, “Yeah, bizarre-Iooking hallway one or bizarre-Iooking hallway two?”

They didn’t have to spend much time deciding however as a stern voice calls from behind them with a quick, “Hold!”

The three boys are quick to noticed the horned individual appearing down the first hallway. Standing there is a tall, slender man with blue skin. In addition to his strange complexion, he bore a pair of aforementioned horns, lacked a nose, his ears were notably pointed and fin-like, and two ribbons of flesh, originating on his cheeks. He was adorned in plain white hospital apparel.

The strange man then raised his hand, his horns began to glow like the small Genomorph from before. A few crates lying behind them in the hall began to float in the air before exploding above the sidekick trio’s heads. Robin threw an exploding birdarang towards him before the three began escaping down the second hallway.

Kid Flash runs ahead of them, though when he turned a corner he nearly crashes into a Cadmus scientist. He slides past her, tripping her in the process. He looks back from where she had come from and saw the gradually closing door that read “Project Kr”.

He turns back to his companions who were approaching at a significantly slower speed than the closing door. He then spots a few air tanks placed near the door and quickly thinking picked one up to then lodge in the door, preventing it from closing. “Hurry!” he shouts to the others before he jumped between the gap and into the chamber, Aqualad and Robin following shortly after.

The former looks through the gap and sees Guardian and his Genomorphs closing in on them. He steps back and kicks the air tank out of the gap which causes the doors to snap shut with a loud CLANK!

Robin had been typing something quickly into his keypad, when he finished he announced to them, “I disabled the door. We're safe—“

“We're trapped,” Aqualad had corrected, more stressed than ever. Though before any debate on what happened could start, Kid Flash drew both their attention to the matter at hand, “Uh, guys? You’ll wanna see this.”

Standing before him was another Cadmus computer console, though this time it was only attached to a single tank. Kid Flash pressed a button on the console that activated several lights near the center of the lab room. Now illuminated the boys could see what was contained within the stark white pod, a sleeping boy. He appeared to be close to their age, with dark hair and a fair complexion. He slept peacefully unaware of the chaos that had just occurred outside his pod. Above him were three of the small monkey-esque Genomorphs like the one Guardian had on his shoulder.

Though the most startling thing about him was the skin tight suit he donned, it was an equally as stark white as his pod, the lighting and lack of contrast made it reflect a blinding light. On his chest was a bright red shield with a large S dead in the center

The symbol of Superman.

Kid Flash walked in a slight stupor towards the pod, reading the label on the lower part of the glass aloud, “Big K little r, the atomic symbol for Krypton!” He turned to the other two, his brows furrowed somewhat. “Clone?”

Aqualad immediately turned to their more tech savvy friend, “Robin, hack.” He ordered.

“Right, right,” he whips out his holo-pad again and connects it to the console with the extending wire like he had done before. After bypassing Cadmus’s security once more he began reading the newly uncovered information about the project. “Weapon designation Superboy. A clone force-grown in— 16 weeks?! From DNA acquired from Superman."

“Stolen from Superman.” Aqualad corrected with a scowl.

“No way the big guy knows about this.” Kid Flash agrees.

“Solar suit allows him to absorb yellow sun radiation 24/7.” The Boy Wonder continues.

Aqualad gestures to the sleeping creatures above him—Superboy, “And these creatures?” He inquired.

“Genomorph-Gnomes, Telepathic, force feeding him an education.”

A grimace starting to form on Kid Flash’s face, “And we can guess what else, they’re making a slave out of… well, Superman’s son.”

“And now we contact the league,” Aqualad states firmly. There was no room to argue at this point with what they’ve discovered. He presses the Atlantean A symbol on his belt while the others attempt to activate their comms.

“No signal,” Robin says.

Kid Flash looks to the other two, “We’re in too deep. Literally.”

After a few minutes of contemplating their next move, the three notice the G-Gnomes horns lighting up above the Superboy. Kid Flash looks to Aqualad and Robin, “This is wrong.” He says grimly.

Robin agrees, nodding, “We can’t leave him like this.”

Aqualad takes another moment to think, before coming to a decision, “Set him free,” he looks to Robin, firm in his decision. “Do it.”

Robin takes to the console, quickly typing out a command to the pod for it to open its lid. The air compressed within the pod hisses as it escapes into the open room, the glass lid lifting upward and the metal plates around it sliding open.

For a moment the boy inside remained still, peaceful even. Then they saw his hands stretch out at his sides, the knuckles of his fingers cracking before forming into a fist at his side. His eyes snap open, and the trio watch as he springs to life, immediately jumping to attack them.

He attacks Aqualad first, he tackles him to the ground before raising his arms and bringing them back down in a violent manner, punching the Atlantean boy repeatedly before Robin and Kid Flash come to intervene. They attempt to restrain his arms as well as try to snap some sense into him—

“Woah! Hang on Supey!”

“We’re—on your side!”

—But to no avail. The Super-clone shoves Kid Flash off of him, flinging him back into a glass container. He crashes into it before falling and knocking himself out after his head collided with the ground. He falls over limply and lies still.

Robin pulls various items out of his utility belt and throwing them at their assailant,, attempting to spray him with gas and even tasing him before Superboy slammed him into the concrete and stepping onto his chest, attempting to crush the smaller boy beneath his foot as Robin struggled beneath him, feeling his ribs crack under the pressure.

Aqualad looks to see Robin struggling against the clone, taking out his water bearers and taking an aggressive stance, forming a solid hammer in his hands before charging at him, “ENOUGH!” He manages to knock Superboy off of Robin, sending him spiraling against the pod which leaves a large dent in the metal due to the force. Aqualad then tries to help Robin stand to his knees, but the poor boy simply falls back down onto his back, rendered fully unconscious due to Superboy’s assault.

As Superboy regains his footing he begins walking menacingly towards Aqualad, who attempts to stop him, saying, “We... are trying... to help you—!” Before the clone’s expression twists into a snarl and leaps towards him again to engage in an exchange of blows once more. This exchange stopped momentarily as Aqualad manages to get behind him and interlocks his arms behind him in a restraint before shocking him with a strong electric charge.

This however only causes his opponent to yell before leaping back first into the ceiling, slamming Aqualad into the hard unmoving surface in an attempt to shake him off. When this doesn’t work he starts slamming him repeatedly against the roof before Aqualad detaches from behind him and falls unconscious.

Superboy assesses the situation and sees that all three of the sidekicks had been defeated by his hands. Calmly, he began walking to the entrance of the lab.

He punched the metal door until it flew open, falling shortly in front of him. Behind it were some scientists, Guardian, and several Genomorphs. A male scientist with long brown hair tied in the back in a pony tail stepped forward. His name was Dr. Desmond. He wore a standard white lab coat, glasses, brown sandals, he had slight wrinkles on his face and streaks of white in his hair. He had smiled in a pleased way when Superboy emerged from the lab, and he inspected his weapon’s success. Simply giving him a brief, “Atta’ boy.”

☆ ꧁ ═════════ ⋆✦⋆════════ ꧂ ☆

In a stark white room were seven large monitors, on each screen was the silhouette of an obscured individual. Dr. Desmond entered the room lacking the confident superiority he tended to have beneath the surface of the Cadmus facility. He now stands before each monitor. A voice emits from one of the screens, “Dr. Desmond. You require an audience with the Light?”

“Yes. Very sorry to disturb you at this late hour—“

Another cuts him off, “Just make your report.”

“Of course,” the scientist cleared his throat. “Well, we had a small fire here at Project Cadmus. The origin of the incident is still unclear… but it seems to have attracted some unwanted attention. Three sidekicks, Robin, Aqualad and Kid Flash...breached security.

“They found and released the weapon. The Superboy. Of course, the clone is under our telepathic control... and, as ordered, turned against his would-be liberators. The three are contained and we don't believe the League knows they're here. Uh... What should I do with them?” He was unsure as to what he was supposed to do now, more worried about losing his job (or worse) for allowing such a blunder to occur in the first place.

There was but a beat of silence before they spoke again, “Clone them,” the second voice says. “Add them to the current cloning schedule, alongside Project Riptide.”

The first voice agrees, stating, “The substitutes will serve the Light. And only the Light.”

“And… the originals?” Desmond inquired.

“Dispose of them. Leave no trace.”

For the first time since he entered this meeting room, an evil smile crept its way back onto Dr. Desmond’s face.

☆ ꧁ ═════════ ⋆✦⋆════════ ꧂ ☆

A calm, yet stern voice rang through the barely conscious minds of the three sidekicks, attempting to rouse them, “Time runs short. You must awaken.”

When they did not stir the voice became more demanding, and a force jolted them awake, stating, “You must awaken now!”

The three had awoken startled, finding themselves inside a more industrial looking pod than the one they had freed the Super-clone from. They were strapped against a metal plate by steel bands, restraining their wrists and ankles against the plate behind them.

What Kid Flash noticed after realizing his current predicament was the piercing stare of the backstabbing boy standing below them.

Superboy stared intently at him, it was hard to tell what he was doing whether it be examining him or simply trying to kill him with a single look, but Kid Flash was up to his limit with him, “What? What do you want?!” He spat, though it didn’t seem to deter the Kryptonian clone. “Quit staring you’re creepin’ me out!”

“Uh, KF, how ‘bout we NOT tick off the guy who can fry us with a look?” Kid Flash turned to his right to find Robin in the same position as him. He could swore there was something next to Robin, another tank, but from his limited field of vision it took an excessive amount of neck craning in order to check. To to the left of him was Aqualad, “We only sought to help you—“

Distracting himself from the fourth pod, Kid Flash cut in to chew the clone out, “Yeah, we free you and you turn on us! How’s that for grati—“

“Kid, please. Be quiet now,” Aqualad cut him off, trying not to escalate the situation even further than it already had. “I believe our friend was not in full control of his actions.”

Then, surprising the three captives to no extent, the clone spoke, “What if I..? Hn… What if I wasn’t?” His voice was low, somewhat rough and rasped from a general lack of use. It was as if he had spoken for the first time since his creation (and judging by his general timeline of living it probably was).

Kid Flash was the first to react, “He can talk?!”

This earned him a glare from Superboy, who found a much stronger voice that was laced in irritation, “Yes… he can!”

The Atlantean and Boy Wonder each gave Kid Flash an unamused side eye, to which he sheepishly replied, “It’s not like I said ‘it’.”

Aqualad seemed to catch on to the rising tension, hoping to steer it away from the premature death of his speedster companion he focuses his attention back to Superboy, “The genomorphs taught you telepathically.”

He nodded somewhat, it was a bit difficult to see but it was enough for Aqualad to see. “They taught me much,” he said curtly. “I can read, write. I know the names of things.”

“But have you seen them?” Robin pressed. “Have they ever actually let you see the sky or the sun?”

“Images are implanted in my mind,” he seemed to shrink somewhat, regretfully admitting, “But, no, I have not seen them.”

Aqualad frowned, “Do you know what you are? Who you are?”

This question seemed to strengthen his resolve, though not exactly in the way Aqualad might have been hoping. He watched Superboy’s poster straighten, and in a tone that felt preprogrammed he stated firmly, “A clone made from the DNA of the Superman. Created to replace him should he perish. To destroy him should he turn from the Light.”

Aqualad’s companions shared a nervous glance while he responded carefully, “To be like Superman is a worthy aspiration.” He told him. “But like Superman, you deserve a life of your own. Beyond that solar suit. Beyond your pod. Beyond Cadmus.”

This irked Superboy, it seemed to trigger a newly characteristic anger he’s shown since his awakening, “I live because of Cadmus. It is my home!” He growled.

Robin looked at him in what could only be described as pity, “Your home is a test tube, we can show you the sun.”

“Uh, pretty sure it’s after midnight. But we can show you the moon,” offered Kid Flash, trying to add something helpful into the conversation.”

“We can show you, introduce you to Superman.” Aqualad offers him.

This catches his attention. The three watched his expression soften, his eyes shining with a glimmer of hope. It had been the softest expression he’s shown since they discovered his serene expression sleeping in his pod.

This tender moment was cut short by a snide voice coming from the entrance of the lab chamber they were in. “No, they can’t.” Desmond approached them, Guardian and the scientist Kid Flash tripped from before—Dr. Spence—flanked his sides. “They will be… otherwise occupied.” He turned to his subordinates and began to order them to work. “Activate the cloning process!”

A genuine alarm spread across Robin’s face, “Pass! Batcave’s crowded enough!” He exclaimed, attempting to cover up his alarm with his usual witty banter.

Desmond ignored him, “Add them to the schedule set for Project Riptide,” glancing at Superboy the scientist grew agitated. “And get the weapon back to its pod!”

Despite the circumstance Kid Flash seemed to pout at hearing this, “Hey, how come he gets to call Supey an it?” He asked indignantly.

Guardian placed his hand on Superboy’s shoulder, though with one final glance at Aqualad (and another plea for help from him as well) he shrugged him off. Desmond seemed to catch onto this exchange rather quickly, “Oh, don’t start thinking now.” He groaned, a G-Gnome hopping from his shoulder to Superboy’s. Condescendingly, he began speaking down to him. “See, you're not a real boy. You're a weapon. And you belong to me. Well, to Cadmus. Same thing. Now get back to your pod.” He commanded.

Without another word, Superboy obediently turned around and began walking out of the lab.

Desmond then turned back to Spence, “Where’s Project Riptide?” he inquired, irritated.

Spence had input something into the console before her and in doing so caused a light to turn on in a pod placed to the right of Robin. There was a fourth person strapped to one of the machines the boys were hooked up to (this came as somewhat of a shock to the three of them) however it was hard to make out any discernible features due to their slumped over posture indicating they would not be conscious for the next step of Cadmus’s plan. What they could see though was that rather than a solar suit like Superboy’s they were wearing some very outlandish clothes that had several intricate details and patterns with an otherworldly feel to them.

Desmond stared at the fourth pod for a moment before turning back to Dr. Spence, he nodded. This acted as an indicator for her to continue and she put another sequence of inputs into the console. The three sidekicks began to writhe and scream as they felt an excruciating pain shoot through them. Several metal probes jab them in the chest, simultaneously electrocuting them and extracting blood into tanks attached to the machines.

Desmond says something to his subordinates over the din, “Where’s Dubbilex?” Before being startled by the sudden appearance of said Genomorph stepping out of the shadows of the room, standing beside Desmond. “Lurking as usual… Get the G-Gnomes downloading their memories. When that's done, delete the source material.”

During this exchange Aqualad managed to bite back his screams, and over the nearly deafening sounds of his friends anguish he spoke under his breath, attempting to speak to the Kryptonian boy via the presumption he indeed had super-hearing, “Superboy, you live. That gives you the right to follow your own path. A weapon or a person? The choice is yours. But ask yourself: what would Superman do?”

There was a beat. Maybe two passed. And as the sidekicks writhe from the extraction process, the door of the lab is promptly kicked open by the individual on the other side, propelling it into the large computers across the room. This shuts off the DNA extractors and alleviates the trio of sidekicks of any more pain from said machines.

Desmond is furious, immediately turning to his creation to bark out, “I told you to get back to your—!” He’s roughly tossed to the side by Superboy alongside Dubbilex and Guardian who both attempted to get in the Kryptonian’s way.

Superboy glowered down at the bespectacled man, “Don’t give me orders.” He growled, before continuing his stride towards the sidekicks.

Having recovered somewhat from the machines torture, Kid Flash is the first to acknowledge the sudden turn of events, “You here to help us or fry us?”

Superboy narrowed his eyes at the redheaded speedster, as if thinking something over. “Huh, I don’t seem to have heat vision. So I suppose helping you is my only option,” he says with a small smirk.

In this moment Robin’s pod began hissing to life, the metal door sliding open as he slipped out, wringing his wrists in his hands, “Ugh, finally. Lucky Batman isn't here. He'd have my head for taking so long!” It was then apparent he had been attempting to pick the lock of his wrist cuffs since he woke up.

“Seriously? That’s what you’re worried about?” Kid Flash deadpanned. “The whole League will have our heads after tonight!”

Robin ignores him as he throws a pair of bolas at the only remaining scientist in the room, restraining Dr. Spence. He then walks over to the console she was occupying and types a new input, this opens the other pod doors open with a hiss. Then he directs some of his attention to the clone, “Free Aqualad, I’ll get Kid Mouth.”

Superboy didn’t take too well to receiving another order from someone, “Don’t you give me orders either,” he growled out, but nonetheless he leaps up to tear the cuffs off the Atlantean. Robin picked the locks for the cuffs on Kid Flash.

Aqualad thanks him as the three sidekicks descend to the ground with Superboy about to follow. That is, until he remembered the unconscious fourth captive. He looks to the pod on the other side of the row, its lid open but its inhabitant still hanging from their restraints. To anyone else they could assume they’re unconscious state was caused by death, they hadn’t stirred this whole time. But Superboy could hear the faint, methodical sound of their heartbeat beneath the whirring of the machine. The sidekicks called out to him, but he had made his decision. He maneuvered his way from Aqualad’s pod to the other and began tearing their cuffs off as well. If he was being freed tonight, it’s only fair he helped free his fellow Project. They fell forward limply as he caught them with his arm. Realizing they weren’t going to wake just, yet he supports their body with his and leaps back down to join the others.

Desmond sees the four of them (plus his new Project) begin to race out of the lab, “Y-You’ll never get out of here! I’ll have you back in pods before morning!” He shrieks from the ground.

“That guy is not whelmed, not whelmed at all,” Robin muttered, only stopping momentarily to throw some birdarangs into the DNA containers and triggering them to explode, destroying any of their DNA collected by Cadmus.

“What is with you and this ‘whelmed’ thing?” Kid Flash asks as Robin rejoins them. They race down the fleshy hall, passing by the pod-like inserts in the walls as they begin to glow an eerie red.

“We are still fifty-two levels below ground,” Aqualad states. “But if we can make the elevator—!”

He’s cut off as several ginormous Genomorphs emerge to block their way, the smaller Genomorphs they had fought before against Guardian begin emerging from the pods behind them, snarling and growling like wild beasts.

During this, Project Riptide began stirring awake. Superboy was startled to feel them move, even more so to feel them shove him away from them.

☆ ꧁ ═════════ ⋆✦⋆════════ ꧂ ☆

You groaned, holding your throbbing head with a gloved hand (the others took notice of the strange blue pendant embedded into the top side of your wrist) “What… What happened?” before opening your eyes to see an absurd sight before them, snapping your eyes wider and frantically looking around, “Where am I? What the Hell is this place? And what the Hell are those??”

They don’t have time to answer them as one of the large Genomorphs raised both of its fists in preparation of crushing them. You all manage to duck out of the way, though Kid Flash is very much caught off guard when you begin to pull a spear out of literally thin air. It was a long, double pronged polearm fading from a dark navy to a brighter blue by the tip. At the end of it was a teardrop shaped pommel with a decorative end in the shape of a small anchor. He stared at you in bewilderment, “Where did you get that—“

You ignored him as you began to pull back your spear before hurling it like a javelin at a frightening speed into the neck of one of the smaller Genomorphs, the force pinning its now limp body into the wall next to it. Before he could ask again you seemed to have moved so quickly it looked as if you had teleported over to your spear before ripping it back out and making another dash to a different Genomorph.

The other sidekicks had made their way to the elevator, however their newly liberated companions seemed to be preoccupied in trying to eliminate the Genomorph threats to follow them. While you dashed to-and-fro around the Genomorphs, slashing them with your spear, Superboy had launched one of the lumbering Genomorphs into the wall. This impact ran a crack up the wall and started to cause parts of the ceiling to break off and come crashing into the ground, “Superboy! The goal is to escape, not bury ourselves here!” Aqualad shouts.

This seems to peak his already heightened aggression, “YOU WANT ESCAPE?!” He challenged, before swinging one of the larger Genomorphs by the arm and swinging it into the horde of others. He then grabs your wrist abruptly—startling you—before regrouping with the others by the elevator.

Aqualad tears the elevator doors open to reveal the dark empty chasm of the shaft. Kid Flash and Robin each make their way into the elevator, the former jumping onto the wall of the elevator shaft while the latter uses his grappling hook. Superboy takes Aqualad into one arm and tries to do the same for you as well, however before he could grab a hold of you, you managed to step away from him as you began to arch your polearm up before launching it into the side of the shaft wall. The two watch as you take a big leap up before grabbing onto the spear end sticking out from the wall. You then began to scale the elevator shaft with now notably clawed hands, your spear dissipating into gold particles.

Now only having to worry about one passenger, Superboy tightens his hold on Aqualad and takes a powerful leap into the air. He and Aqualad soar several stories up, making it all the way to about SL-9, before suddenly losing momentum, the two suddenly beginning to descend downwards, “I-I’m falling,” he realizes in somewhat of a daze.

You had seen the two boys pass them while you continued climbing steadily up the side of the chute, though you were very shocked to see them suddenly pass them going down this time. Groaning somewhat they lept off of the wall and descended downwards in order to catch up to them right as Robin looked up and threw one of his birdarangs into the wall above. Once you had caught up to them they grabbed Aqualad by the arm, causing him to tighten his hold on Superboy, before a pair of false wings deployed from around your shoulder blades. They were then falling slower, though the extra weight of two more passengers still caused the wind glider to drag down faster than it was supposed to while you heaved them up with you.

Once you glided near the birdarang embedded into the wall you heaved the two over by the dark skinned boy’s arm, helping him latch onto the new protrusion in the wall around SL-15. You in turn latch onto the wall beside them, observing the conflicted expression cast over Superboy’s face. He wore a crestfallen expression, and he began to question himself, murmuring, “Superman can fly… Why can’t I fly?”

Kid Flash pipes in suddenly, drawing your attention from the one currently having some form of an identity-crisis to the level below, “Don't know, but it does look like you can leap tall buildings in a single bound... Still cool,” he reassures, offering to help the distraught boy up to the small ledge beside him. Aqualad hopping down beside them.

Still a little dazed he manages to thank the speedster before Robin alerts them to the imminent danger they were about to be in, “Guys! This’ll have to be our exit!” He shouts as the high speed express elevator makes its quick descent above them.

Aqualad and Superboy take out the elevator door, the latter taking one final swing to it before you all dive out of the way from the rapidly descending elevator right before it slammed all of you into the void. You weren’t given much of a break however as a group of Genomorphs came down the main hallway, attracted to the sound of the destroyed metal doors, causing the five of you to break out in a run.

As you were running down the halls, Superboy suddenly directs the group, “Go left! Left!” The group listened, mostly as there wasn’t much room to try and press him about where you were going. Then another call, “Right!”

However, upon following his directions this time, you found yourself at a dead end, the only thing of note being the sight of a single vent near the top of the wall. You gave him somewhat of a cross look , “It’s a dead end,” you stated lowly.

Kid Flash was the second to jump on him, “Great directions Supey,” he says sarcastically. “Are you trying to get us re-podded??”

“No. I… I don’t understand,” he seemed genuinely confused at this outcome.

Robin nudged Kid Flash to the side, a wide grin breaking out across his face as he excitedly stated, “Don’t apologize, this is perfect!”

They work to get the vent cover off quickly, then after discarding it to the side the boys assist each other in getting up and crawling into the vent itself. Robin led the charge while Aqualad, you, Kid Flash, and Superboy followed shortly behind.

It was during this escapade through the vents that Kid Flash (who was currently crawling right behind you) decided to mention the elephant in the room, “By the way, uh, who are you exactly? We never really had time to get your name.”

You wanted to look back and glare at the redhead, however your current circumstance prevented you from doing so, “Is now really the time for this?”

Robin piped in from the front, “So far we’re not sure if there’ll be any time in the future, so now is definitely the time to ask.”

You rolled your eyes, “If it quells your incessant probing then so be it. For now, you may call me Tide Caller.”

“What? No first or last name?”

“None that I feel like telling you at the moment.” You did not feel like informing them of anything aside from your adeptus title until you found out just exactly what was going on around here. “Now I get to ask you some questions: What is going on? And what exactly is this place?”

“It’s a bit… complicated. Short answer? We’re in an underground research facility hidden from the rest of world that’s focused on cloning and creating living weapons, which were the creatures chasing us from before, that are called Genomorphs,” Robin explains, though he as a bit preoccupied with following the layout of the ventilation system to guide them to an exit. “We came to investigate a fire that started in the building above ground but upon further inspection we ended up going way deeper than anticipated, eventually we found Superboy and later you and the rest is history.”

You blinked owlishly at his explanation, “I… have no idea what half of the words you just said means, but it’s enough for me to know that this place is bad news,” you take a few cursory glances between the boys in front of you and the one behind you. “Who are you three anyway?”

Wally balked at this question, “Wait seriously? You don’t know who we are? Robin, Aqualad? Kid Flash? No, not ringing any bells?”

“No, not really… Am I supposed to?”

“Seriously? Dude, what kind of rock have you been living under?”

You scoffed at his question, “Forgive me if I’m unable to recall a group of such strangely dressed individuals and their equally as strange titles,” you grow silent for a moment before a follow up question comes to mind. “Why are you all dressed like that anyway?”

“Oh, as if you aren’t—!”

“Enough! Now is not the time to start arguing.” Aqualad shut you both down before you could start a fight while you all were still traversing the vents.

You could hear Kid Flash grumble something under his breath behind you. After some time he started to complain, “Ugh, at this rate we’ll never get out.”

Superboy stops suddenly at the end of the line you’ve formed, shushing the group as he looks behind him. “Listen.” Unbeknownst to the rest of you, his super-hearing had picked up some movement far behind them within the vents. If he focused he could hear the quick, clambering sounds of claws against metal as several Genomorphs began to scurry through the vents in an attempt to close in on them.

The group began to advance further, Robin leading you down a certain path as you all crawled after him. He kicked open a vent cover at the end of the path and jumped down, Aqualad followed in order to help the rest of you down from the top of the wall. Robin was typing something frantically onto the holo-pad on his wrist, “I already deactivated the internal security cameras during the trek in the vents, now if I just…” he trailed off somewhat as he hooked up his glove to the wall. A moment later he looked triumphant, “I hacked the motion sensors.” He states with a smirk tugging at his lips.

Kid Flash was the one to respond first with a cheerful: “Sweet.”

“Still plenty of them between us and out.”

Kid Flash seemed undeterred by this information, pulling down his goggles, saying, “But I’ve finally got room to move,” before barreling out the door and down several flights of stairs, clearing a path for you and the others by knocking several Genomorphs down in the process.

You stared at his abrupt exit in awe, “I take it the ‘Flash’ in his name refers to his speed?” You wondered aloud, earning a small laugh from your shortest companion as the rest of you followed in tow.

Robin, who was still in the process of hacking as you ran, called out to your group, “More behind us!” Once you had all passed him, Superboy came to a stop on the platform behind you, slamming his foot on the connecting stairs. This caused the remaining stairwell as well as all of the horde of approaching Genomorphs to come crashing down.

Kid Flash continued to speed up the winding column of stairs before skidding to a stop once spotting the door indicating his destination to be Sub-Level 1. Before he could reach the door, racing towards it as we speak, a blaring alarm pierced the air, causing a pair of heavy-duty doors to automatically slam shut. Kid Flash couldn’t stop himself before crashing into the closed off exit, muttering an “Aw man,” before colliding with the doors head first and falling abruptly to the floor a few feet away, landing on his butt.

“We’re cut off from the street,” Aqualad grumbles, and you were all so close to freedom.

“Thanks. My head hadn’t noticed,” Kid Flash says sarcastically while rubbing the back of his head from the impact with the floor.

You came up from behind them, staring blankly at the doors, “Can’t we just break them down like before?” Superboy must have been thinking the same thing as he stepped forward, passing the fallen speedster and attempting to knock the door down with a punch. Though his fist didn’t seem to even leave a dent. He then tried to pry the door open, Aqualad even joining him but to no avail, it had been shut tight.

Robin was below you, grumbling in annoyance as he typed rapidly into his holo-pad, “Can’t hack this fast enough,” then noticed a pair of Genomorphs reared around the corner, growling at the sight of you. He then sees a door to his right, “This way!”

He kicked the door down and led the rest of you through the corridor but stopped when you saw the rest of the Genomorphs waiting for you, alongside Guardian. Each of them had a small G-Gnome resting on their shoulder.

You immediately summoned your spear as Aqualad formed a pair of dual swords out of his water bearers and took a fighting stance.

One of the G-Gnomes’ horns began to glow, then another, and another. Suddenly all of the G-Gnomes were glowing red like beacons, seemingly set off in a chain reaction. You felt a sharp pain in your head, an echoing mental rattling as you and your companions fell to the ground. You couldn’t make out the sounds outside the ones reverberating through your skull, leaning heavily onto the side of your polearm, breathing heavily and ragged in an attempt to stay upright as the rest of your companions lie limp on the floor.

☆ ꧁ ═════════ ⋆✦⋆════════ ꧂ ☆

Superboy had fallen to his knees after the G-Gnomes triggered this telepathic attack on him and his newfound friends. It was only when a voice echoed through his head, through his mind, that he felt the fog lifting somewhat, “Perhaps for the sake of all Genomorphs, our brother Superboy should make up his own mind.”

Superboy looked up to see the Genomorph from the lab—Dubbilex—as he came to a realization as to where he heard this voice before, eyes widening, “It was you.”

“Yes, brother,” he confirms. “I set the fire and lures your new friends to Cadmus, woke them when they were in danger—”

“And guided me,” he finished for the older Genomorph, before questioning him and his motives. “Why?”

“Because you are our hope,” Dubbilex relays to him. “The Genomorph hero. You will blaze a trail for all our brothers, showing us the way to freedom.” He then glances at the dazed, slumped over form of Tide Caller, impressed by their mental fortitude being strong enough to keep conscious even under all of the pressure the G-Gnomes were putting on them and the other teens. Though it didn’t seem like they were able to focus on much else, “And for you to help to guide this displaced soul during their imminent travel into the unknown…”

Suddenly, the G-Gnome perched on Guardian’s shoulder hopped off its spot, deactivating whatever control it had over the man. He groans, gripping his head in pain, “What’s going on..?” As Guardian gradually began to come to his senses, the sidekick trio and Tide Caller began to stir.

“What is your choice, brother?” Asked Dubbilex, staring stoically at the young clone. Superboy for a moment looks down in contemplation, before lifting his head with a fire in his eyes.

“I. Choose. Freedom.”

☆ ꧁ ═════════ ⋆✦⋆════════ ꧂ ☆

You groan as the weight over your mind lifts. Sluggishly lifting your head to see the Genomorphs now standing passively around you. The Genomorphs had ceased their hold over Guardian, you, and the sidekicks alike, “Feels like… a fog… lifting,” Guardian mutters, hand to his temple as he feels a newfound clarity forming in his mind.

Aqualad looks to the dazed hero, still a bit apprehensive of the man, “Guardian?”

Guardian had looked at them with a determined expression, and with conviction he told them, “Go. I’ll deal with Desmond.”

A voice cuts through the air, “I think not,” as Dr. Desmond reveals himself, the Genomorphs parting their wall for him behind Guardian. In his hand he holds a strange blue vial. “Project Blockbuster will give me the power to restore order to Cadmus.” He declares, downing the mysterious glowing liquid, dropping the empty glass vial shortly after.

He fell to his knees, head slumped into his arms, veins pulsating under his skin. His body rips through the fabric of his lab coat and undershirt. Robin and Kid Flash watch him undergo this horrific transformation. Desmond growls as he jerks his head up, the whites of his sclera turning into an ink black while his eyes turn a bright red. His skin tears into scraps as his body grows larger, stronger, the layer underneath such a grotesque display turned thick and gray.

He rises from the ground with a guttural roar, scraps of skin and tufts of hair still clinging to his head and body. The thing standing in Dr. Desmond’s—Blockbuster’s— place turned to the group of heroes, breathing heavy. He sneered down at them with thick, sharpened teeth.

Guardian puts his arm out towards you and the teens, defensively ordering, “Everyone back!” Before charging at the hulking goliath. You are greatly unamused to see Blockbuster sweep Guardian aside like he’s a mere toy, watching the golden helmed man fly into the wall a few feet away.

Superboy was next to act, charging at the monster and striking him across the jaw. This however hardly affects him as he retaliates by punching Superboy downward, targeting his shoulder and upper back. Superboy turns and tries to hit him again, this time with an uppercut. He lands a few more hits, at one point being knocked back onto his shoulder before rolling back onto his feet, before Blockbuster reacts in turn by launching the boy as Superboy attempted to leap into the air to strike him by catching him and throwing him violently into the ceiling, following him up to the next floor shortly after.

You all stare in disbelief at the massive hole the two had made, Robin being the first to make a comment on it, “Okay, that’s one way to bust through the ceiling.” He then pulled his grappling hook out and shot it through the opening the hole formed.

“You think Lab Coat planned that?” Kid Flash asked as he grabbed onto Robin in order for the shorter boy to propel them upwards.

“I doubt he’s planning anything anymore,” retorts Aqualad who crouches down in order to help give you a boost before following shortly after, jumping through the hole in the ceiling next.

☆ ꧁ ═════════ ⋆✦⋆════════ ꧂ ☆

Above them was an expansive room with railings on the sides and upper stories in order to separate the two stories, the open hall lined with pillars acting as support beams. The four of you watched as Blockbuster made an attempt to restrain Superboy by pinning his arms to his sides, though it proves fruitless as Superboy manages to break his hold on him. Before he could take a swing at the gargantuan man, Blockbuster had grabbed a hold of Superboy’s ankle and flung him into the group you and the sidekicks had formed. Robin and Kid Flash managed to avoid getting hit by the body of their friend, you and Aqualad however weren’t as lucky as he came crashing into you.

The yellow speedster dashes over to the entanglement of you, and the other boys, Robin following shortly after him in order for you to group up again. You pull yourself up using your spear as leverage while Kid Flash and Robin help Aqualad and Superboy back on their feet as Blockbuster starts to charge towards you.

Kid Flash charges quickly at Blockbuster before needing to drop into a slide underneath him as the goliath attempts to squash him. Though he still kept Blockbuster’s attention long enough for Superboy and Aqualad to perform a unison attack, landing two solid punches to Blockbuster’s face to knock him back and over as Kid Flash had crouched behind his legs in order to trip the monster, “Learned that one in Kindergarten,” he informs you smugly as Robin jumps over him, throwing two of his projectile disks (though the impact of this quip is lost on you as you instead chose to ponder what exactly a Kindergarten was… a garden of children?).

Blockbuster swings his arm, deflecting the two incoming projectiles before they could do any sort of damage aside from stagger him momentarily. He rolls only to see Superboy standing before him, making a gesture that led you to believe he was taunting him into wrestling. Blockbuster however is faster than the Kryptonian boy, grabbing him and shoving him forcefully into a nearby pillar, cracking it under the sheer force of his assault, though Superboy doesn’t seem to fazed by it as he continues to unleash a combo of punches to the hulking creature as it pulls away. That is until Blockbuster performed a cross strike that shattered the pillar behind Superboy due to the impact.

He goes for a second strike but is interrupted by a water whip coiling around his arm, restraining him back. Aqualad pulls him forward, propelling himself up high enough to land a jab to Blockbuster’s face using his knee before landing on the remaining pillar above Superboy and turning his water bearers into a mace, readying it to swing. Blockbuster intercepts this single-handedly before tossing the Atlantean to the side as he holds Superboy down with the other. Aqualad lands on the floor with a pained cry, the floor beneath him cracking beneath the pressure while Blockbuster’s grip on Superboy grows tighter before flinging him violently into a segment of another pillar near the second story of the building. The Kryptonian falls somewhat unconscious, his arm then buried beneath piles of debris from the breaking pillar.

Kid Flash rushes in to help his friends as Aqualad manages to dodge Blockbuster's attempt at squashing his head with his foot. The yellow speedster had managed to grab a hold of the monster’s wrist and using his momentum he turned it to face back first towards Aqualad. It opens it’s fisted hand which allowed him to grab a hold of Kid Flash’s wrist when he lost his grip. Blockbuster then intercepts another one of Aqualad’s attacks by swinging Kid Flash like a sack of flour into the Atlantean. This sends each of them flying, Kid Flash sprawled against the ground by a different pillar while Aqualad slumps against the pillar from before.

Blockbuster comes in to deck him with an uppercut to the stomach that hits like a truck, destroying the remainder of the pillar before he then pins Aqualad to another pillar, his hand around his throat.

You felt the building begin to shake as the pillar cracks where it’s seen joining the floor by one of the corners, blockbuster continuing this relentless assault while you and Robin watch from a safe distance away from the action. “Of course!” your shorter companion says in realization, activating his holo-pad to look at the floor plans of the room. Then calling out to Kid Flash who had been slowly recovering, “KF, get over here!”

The speedster recovers his footing and zips over to the Boy Wonder as Aqualad changes his water bearers into a circular shield to defend himself from another uppercut from Blockbuster. As the monster stumbles on his feet, Superboy charges at him, targeting the area below his ribcage before jumping and hooking the goliath from behind in a chokehold. This enrages Blockbuster as he tosses Aqualad to the side in favor of trying to get the clone off of him before flinging him into the pillar again, destroying it.

Robin had been showing something to you and Kid Flash, a simulation of sorts playing in real-time on the holographic screen, “Got it?” He asks, directing this query to the speedster who nods in confirmation, parroting the words before the Boy Wonder gives him a command, “Go!”

You watch as Kid Flash dashes away, speeding to the right of Blockbuster to direct an attack at his face. When this doesn’t seem to faze him in the slightest save for tearing some of his stretched skin from his face, he dangles it tauntingly, “Got your nose!”

This manages to draw his attention from Superboy to begin targeting the talkative speedster, he barely misses him when he goes to strike him in two downward attacks. Before Superboy could get on his feet again to attack the beast, he’s called over by Robin, “Superboy, Aqualad!”

Kid Flash continued to taunt the raging goliath as he came to a stop in front of one of the remaining pillars, shouting: “Come and get me you incredible bulk!” before zipping out of the way as Blockbuster lands a devastating punch to the pillar. Some of the debris had flown out and hit the speedster in the shoulder, which knocked him off his feet.

He barely dodged another incoming attack from Blockbuster as Robin finished explaining his plan to You, Aqualad, and Superboy, “This one, and that one,” he says pointing to the remaining pillars he needs you three to destroy. The two of them gave him a nod of affirmation before charging back out. Robin takes out a few of his exploding disks to throw at his own targets, before turning to you momentarily, “You’ll be able to help Aqualad with that uh… Vision? Of yours? Th-the thing on your wrist.” You gave him a silent nod before joining the others.

Superboy breaks his pillar with ease, landing a single blow to the base of the pillar while Aqualad forms his mace with his water bearers to destroy the second one, his tattoos glowing a bright electric blue.

Kid Flash dodges another attack from Blockbuster and moves to his right, tricking the creature into weakening another pillar, chuckling, “Sorry, try again,” before bolting away once again.

Robin drew an X onto the floor with chalk as Aqualad used his water bearers to form a puddle on the ground. You helped him in creating the field by activating your Vision, water forming from your wrist and swirling up your arm before creating four missiles made up of water and launching them at the ground next to you. In the spots you targeted, small, semi-translucent whiskered serpents made of Hydro sprouted from the ground, looking at you as they awaited your orders. You crouched on the ground near them and then pointed to the X Robin had drawn, “See that X? I need you to target that spot specifically.” The four Hydro serpents gave a tiny nod before turning to shoot small bolts of Hydro at their intended target, adding to the puddle that Aqualad had been forming.

Kid Flash skids through the puddle and obscures the X as Superboy jumps into the air, hitting Blockbuster hard enough to knock him to the ground landing straight on the target Robin laid out for him. Your Hydro mimics had dissipated by the time Aqualad channeled a current of electricity from his now glowing tattoos, channeling the crackling electro power from his hands and connecting it to the puddle formed beneath him that trailed all the way to the massive puddle Blockbuster currently resided on. Once he touches the water Blockbuster is immediately electrocuted.

After stunning Blockbuster, Aqualad relinquished his hold on the current as Robin called for everyone to move out of the way, the three remaining pillars he had stuck his exploding disks which began blinking red and green rapidly and emitting a frequent beeping sound before they exploded.

This causes the building to collapse, the five of you barely avoiding the now caving in roof. Superboy managed to grab you and Kid Flash in an attempt to cover the two of you from the falling debris while Aqualad covered Robin as the whole building came crumbling down.

☆ ꧁ ═════════ ⋆✦⋆════════ ꧂ ☆

For a moment there wasn’t a single sign of life beneath the rubble, that is until Superboy had punched a large potion of debris from over your group, tossing a slab of concrete somewhere to the side. You used your polearm as a crutch, leveraging yourself into a standing position, the others began to rise slowly, standing shakily next to you. Their clothes had been ripped and they all breathed heavily as the adrenalin escaped their bodies.

Aqualad came to his senses first, almost in disbelief at the events that had just occurred up to this point, “We… did it,” he pants.

Robin was panting just as much, “Was there… ever any doubt?” He questions as he gives Kid Flash a high five, though both of them dropped it immediately as a sharp spike of pain shot through them due to the injuries they received during this whole adventure.

Superboy had stepped out of the rubble, he looks to the incapacitated Blockbuster. You joined him momentarily, taking in the strange environment you seemed to be in. There were towering buildings in the far off vicinity near the destruction. They were tall, taller than the buildings of Liyue Harbor and the windmills of Mondstadt. They were more industrial looking as well, uniformed. The lack of notable details in their architecture made it hard to determine just where in Teyvat were you. Though a little nagging voice in the back of your mind told you that you were very much no longer in your homeland anymore.

Kid Flash called out to Superboy, “See?” He says, drawing both his and your attention from where you were directed towards, jerking his thumb towards something in the sky. “The moon.”

You both looked to the sky, Superboy stared in awe at the celestial body, taking it all in. He finally got to see it in person, to feel the moonlight and the breeze against his skin, no longer wondering what it felt like when he envisioned the image of the moon in his mind when educated by the G-Gnomes fed him mental pictures. To him it was mesmerizing.

Meanwhile you were startled to find that (aside from the moon) you couldn’t make out a single constellation in the sky that you recognized. Missing were the familiar sights of Bestia Iustitia, Sinae Unicornis, Alatus Nemeseos, or Lapis Dei. Not even the sight of your own constellation. The stars held no meaning to you now, and the distance between you and your loved ones felt even more unsettling. Now that you were above ground you could feel the distinct lack of touch with the elements, surrounded by an unnatural amount of Geo and not enough Dendro to make it feel less jarring.

Before he could answer you, Superboy noticed something in the distance, something approaching from the sight of the moon. He squints at it, trying to decipher what he was seeing. It grows larger, the shape forming that of a man. He was donned head to toe in a bold blue, accented by a red cape flowing behind him. He bore a striking resemblance to the boy standing next to you. Kid Flash walked up to the other side of Superboy, “Oh, and Superman. Do we keep our promises or what?” Though he seemed just as surprised as the boy next to him.

You squint at the man in the gradually closing distance, “Is that man… flying?” You wonder aloud, before then coming to a small (rather delayed) realization. “Wait… do you mean ‘Super’ as in… in relation to Superboy?” This caused one of the other boys behind you (Robin you presumed) to let out a small laugh, though due to your current conditions it sounded more like a cough.

You activated your elemental sight, and it seems he was flying without the need to use Anemo (unlike a certain god you had met before).

Suddenly, more figures began to form in the moonlight behind this… Superman. All of them unfamiliar to you, and all of them dressed in just as strange of outfits as your saviors. Many could fly without the need of Anemo—like Superman—though you noticed some of them needing to be lowered down on glowing green platforms created by some of the airborne heroes. They landed above you on the rubble before lowering their more grounded companions to the rubble below. Next to the now landed Superman was a man dressed like a bat wearing a dark suit and a cowl who flanked him on one side, to the other was a man in all red who appeared at an astonishing speed similar to the yellow speedster you’ve become acquainted with.

There was a moment of silence as these… heroes stared passively at the sidekicks, Superboy, and you. You could see a familiarity in their eyes when they scanned over the sidekicks, though it vanished when they landed on you. You straightened your back to stare as intensely in return, despite the soreness of your body screaming for you to just fall over and rest.

You watched as Superman narrowed his eyes upon sighting Superboy who had begun to take a few steps forward, as if sizing him up and taking in the similarities the two had, almost suspiciously. The younger of the two then lifts the torn flap of his suit, showing the matching shield symbol on his chest with a small smile. Identical to the one that the older man wore across his broader chest.

However that is where the similarities stopped as Superman’s expression went from one of disbelief, and almost as quickly turned into one of anger. You glared at this shift in tone as you began to shift closer to Superboy’s side, polearm still in hand as you began to take a protective stance alongside the now confused, almost disappointed expression of the clone.

The man dressed as a bat—based on these naming schemes you guessed his title was something like “Batman” or something—was the next to speak up, though you didn’t take too kindly to the tone he used when he said, “Is that what I think it is?” While staring at the boy beside you.

Kid Flash put a hand to the side of his mouth, as if trying to whisper, “He doesn’t like being called an ‘it’,” before Superboy suddenly rose to anger, his eyes hardened into steel as he announced firmly: “I’m Superman’s clone!”

The heroes surrounding you, save for Batman and Superman, all seemed taken aback by this declaration. Batman redirected his gaze to Robin, and with a slight glare demanded him to, “Start talking.”

As the three sidekicks were explaining the situation to their mentors, they remembered your presence, turning to you suddenly. You were tuned out of the conversation up to that point, too busy watching all of these strange people work on clearing damage and assessing the situation. Not a single one of them seemed to have any sort of elemental traces on their person, save for the blonde man speaking to Aqualad (you swore to the Archons and Celestia above if that man was simply dubbed “Aquaman” you would hurl yourself off the nearest mountain peak).

You felt a hand on your shoulder as you turned to face the group of sidekicks and adults. They all stared at you with inquisitive looks, Aqualad giving you a silent cue to introduce yourself. Sighing you looked the scowling Batman in the eyes, he seemed the most distrusting of you or your origins as you began to explain, “I am one known as Tide Caller, an… an adeptus from Liyue Harbor and former servant of the Geo Archon,” you were hoping this was explanation enough but none of the words you had just said seemed to spark any resemblance of recognition from the heroes who all glanced to each other in confusion.

It was Robin who helped come to your rescue, “Tide Caller was there with us when we woke up in the pods in Cadmus, one of the scientists called them Project Riptide’. They were about to be cloned as well, but Superboy got them out after coming back to rescue us.”

Kid Flash rubbed the back of his neck, “Yeah what Rob said, they don’t actually seem to be a clone of any sort like Supey’ here. Actually, they don’t really seem to be aware of what Cadmus is or how they ended up here at all.”

You nodded, “I come from a land known as Teyvat, a place ruled by gods which harness the ability to control the elements under the eyes of Celestia, as well as provide mortals living within Teyvat the potential to achieve godhood by granting them the powers of one of seven elements via that of a vision, Teyvat is a dangerous place to traverse without any means to protect oneself, Visions are granted to those who are recognized by the gods and act as a conduit for whichever element resonates with a chosen allogene,”

You raise your wrist to show them your vision, still glowing to indicate the stored energy within the cerulean gemstone embedded into your wrist guard, small traces of Hydro rippling around your hand when called upon. “My Vision is that of Hydro, representing the divine ideal of justice. Alongside it are Visions are that of Anemo, representing the divine ideal of freedom, Geo representing contracts, Electro for eternity, Dendro for wisdom, Pyro for war, sometimes passion, and Cryo, which was once represented by the divine ideal of love… though, I have heard in more recent times that that ideal has changed since then.

“I am accustomed to fighting monsters roaming my homeland, but when I had awakened we were faced with a horde of creatures I have never seen before. During our escape, Kid Flash and his companions attempted to question me as well, but none of the information they had managed to share before trouble stirred once again made any sense,” you then looked to the skies, observing the new star patterns littering the backdrop of the moon sadly. “The stars of this land are equally as unfamiliar to me. I cannot make sense of any of it, and I fear I am much farther from my home than I had anticipated.”

The older heroes seemed to sympathize with you, however the more commandeering of the three continued to stare at you analytically, as if trying to suss out any falsehoods from your revelation, “What’s the last thing you can remember before waking up in Cadmus?” He presses.

This caught you off guard, a slight headache forming from the start of your recollection. You’ve been wondering this since you had awoken, though distracted due to being thrown into the fray upon coming to your senses, so with a hand now pressed against your throbbing temple you relayed such information to them, “If I’m being honest I am… having some difficulties recalling such information. Though, the last thing I remember before waking here was… the feeling of falling. A-And feeling as if I had been dropped into a pool of ice water,” you looked up tiredly to the unwavering expression of the man in black.

He made some noise of acknowledgement after some moment of silence. During this moment of contemplation you took notice that Superboy’s attention was elsewhere, and following his gaze you saw the man in blue and you felt your eyes harden, much different from the former’s curious expression. He was speaking to a woman in a tiara and a warrior’s garb and a man dressed in black and blue (though the most striking thing about him was the fact that his skin was green).

The latter looked over his shoulder to see the inquisitive stare of Superboy and promptly put a shoulder on the other man’s shoulder, this caused Superman to meet the curious gaze of his clone. You watched them have a small exchange of averting their gaze before sheepishly looking back for a moment before the older Kryptonian began to approach the other. Superboy crossed his arms as the older male started to speak, “We’ll, uh, we’ll figure something out for you. The League will, I mean.” He manages to correct himself in what you took as him trying to distance himself from the situation. “For now I better make sure they get the Blockbuster creature squared away.”

And with that he takes off into the night, following the two men who had created the platforms from before—the Green Lanterns, as you had overheard them be referred to as—had formed a sphere around Blockbusters still immobile body, while a silver man with red gloves and boots as well as two winged heroes with maces flew alongside them. He just flew off leaving the poor clone feeling hurt, confused, and abandoned.

The sidekicks watch this exchange as well, though you aren’t sure if they feel the same bubbling anger as you from witnessing such a thing. Before you could make any biting comments directed to the departing figure, Batman draws all of your attention to him, “Cadmus wil be investigated,” he states. “All 52 levels, but let’s make one thing clear—”

He’s interrupted by the Flash who pipes upo in a whine, “You should have called.”

You’re starting to realize where all of the younger speedster’s childish antics seemed to come from.

The Batman glared at his counterpart before growling, “End results aside, we’re not happy. You hacked Justice League systems, disobeyed direct orders, and endangered lives. You will not be doing this again.”

The three of them looked down for a moment, before Aqualad spoke firmly, “I am sorry, but we will.”

His mentor attempts to commandeer him into silence, “Aqualad, stand down.”

“Apologies, my King… But no.” Aqualad puts his hand to his chest in reverence to the older man—you are shocked at hearing such a title be directed to such a man—an action of which causes the blonde man to raise his brow as to question such an action. He looks to his mentor—his ruler—before firmly stating his mind. “We did good work here tonight, the work you trained us to do. Together on our own we forged something powerful, important.”

“If this is about your treatment at the Hall, the three of you—”

“The four of us,” Kid Flash corrects, not hesitating to cut off his mentor. “And it’s not.”

Robin had already taken a step forward, the next to speak his mind and step up against his mentor, “Batman, we’re ready to do what you taught us, or why teach us at all?” He’s the quietest out of the three, but his voice doesn’t waver.

Superboy finally let his irritation bubble over, spitting out a curt, “Why let them tell us what to do?”

You nodded, supportive of their cause, “Where I come from, the noblest of heroes do not wait for the gods to acknowledge them first in order to pave way to a better future. It is their ambition that will guide them to Celestia.”

“It’s simple,” Superboy passes you, then the sidekicks, all of which stood proud and tall as they defied their mentors, “Get on board, or get out of the way.”

☆ ꧁ ═════════ ⋆✦⋆════════ ꧂ ☆

Mount Justice; July 8th, 8:04 EDT

You watch as one of the Green Lanterns and Captain Atom fly around carrying large pieces of metal equipment around the inside of the hollowed out mountain you and the rest of your newfound team were within. Alongside you in the center base of the mountain’s interior were an assortment of heroes in addition to your team who were dressed in civilian clothes over the colorful getups they had worn when first meeting you.

Robin wore a black jacket over a hooded sweater and a pair of black running shoes in addition to a pair of “sunglasses” as they had told you they were called.

Kid Flash—or you should say Wally, after informing you of his secret identity a few days prior—was wearing a long sleeve shirt under an unbuttoned short sleeved button-up in addition to dark blue pants and running shoes. He kept a pair of goggles in his pocket.

Aqualad—known as Kaldur’ahm—wore black sandals, black pants that were baggy enough to allow a comfortable room for the fins on the backs of his calves, and a two-toned blue and black jacket with a turtleneck style collar as to hide his gills. When you asked about his physiology he had informed you he was not in fact human, but rather Atlantean, which he described as a race of people who lived underwater and bore aquatic-type physiology due to their subversive nature, showing you the webs between his fingers and the shark like fins on his legs.

Superboy donned a simple short sleeve top and fit him snugly, it was black with the signature red shield of him and his predecessor. In addition to this he wore a pair of dark pants and black combat boots.

The boys had taken to explaining to you that they can’t be seen in their hero uniforms everywhere they went outside missions, so they took to their civvies (civilian clothes). Additionally they had to explain to you that the attire you’re used to seeing back in Teyvat is considered more “old-fashioned” or fantastical.

That being said, you still didn’t have much of a “modern” wardrobe outside your usual adventuring getup as they put it so you were still in your usual attire from the night they discovered you. They had been surprised at how well the fabrics of your clothes held up from all of the chaos that occurred at Cadmus.

“This cave was the original secret sanctuary of the Justice League,” Batman informs your team of heroes. “We’re calling it into service again. Since you five are determined to stay together and fight the good fight, you’ll do it on League terms.”

All of you watched as he began to walk away from the center of the room, leaving the floor to the two other heroes standing by. “Red Tornado,” the red, metallic, being with a cape you were startled to discover lacking any organic signs of life to. “Volunteered to live here and be your supervisor. Black Canary,” the beautiful blonde woman in the black, one-piece bustier-leotard combination under a blue lapelled jacket. “Is in charge of training.” She also wore gray stockings with seams up the front and back, as well as black, heavy, calf-length boots, black fingerless gloves, and a black choker.

He had introduced them before swiftly bringing the attention back to himself, “I will deploy you on missions.”

Robin seemed excited by this part of his exposition, “Real missions?” he inquires.

“Yes, but covert.” Batman confirms.

The Flash was next to speak up from behind Kid Flash’s shoulder, “The League will still handle the obvious stuff,” he then starts tapping the lightning bolt symbol on his chest. “That’s why we have these big targets on our chests.”

Aquaman continues after him, “But Cadmus proves the bad guys are getting smarter. Batman needs a team that can operate on the sly,” he says before redirecting the conversation back to the stoic man in black.

“The six of you will be that team.”

Robin is the first to react, very excitedly going, “Cool!” Before catching the part of his mentor’s statement that felt off. “Wait, six?”

Instead of answering him, the Dark Knight simply looks over Robin’s shoulder as a new pair enter the room. You and the boys turn to see Martian Manhunter stepping from the shadows with a young teenage girl with green skin and a coppery red hair (the explanation that the reason the two were green was due to his origins as an outlander—as a Martian, took a bit longer for them to explain that you’d like to admit). “This is Martian Manhunter’s niece, Miss Martian.”

She was a bit shy at first, giving them a small wave and a cute smile, you noticed she seemed to have a more human-like facial structure than her uncle. She greeted you all with a small yet nervous, “H-Hi.”

You noticed how Kid Flash gives Robin a look as he puts his hand on his hip, the shorter male glancing up at him in turn, “Likin’ this gig more every minute,” he says with a small smirk before turning his attention back to the redheaded girl. “Uh, welcome aboard! I’m Kid Flash, that’s Robin,” the aforementioned boy gave her a little ‘rock on’ gesture with his hand (you only recognized it from your time with Xinyan who took the time in teaching you about the gesture she tends to make when performing). “Aqualad,” who gives her a silent nod in greeting.

“It’s cool if you forget their names.” He follows up nonchalantly.

“I’m honored to be included,” she says with her hands clasped in front of her as the former sidekicks moved closer to greet her.

You followed shortly behind them, raising a hand to your chest in a slight bow you had grown accustomed to doing when meeting new people back home, “And it is an honor to meet you as well, Miss Martian. I am Tide Caller, I hope our time together shall be memorable,” you state calmly. She seemed to fluster somewhat at your formality.

You and Robin seemed to have come to a similar observation as you both had looked back to see Superboy standing off to the side by himself. Robin had taken the initiative however, noticing his downcast expression as he called out to him, “Hey Superboy! Come meet Miss M!” To which he complies.

As he approaches, you watch as Miss Martian’s shirt seems to shift and warp into a new shape, changing from a solid white with a red X across her chest and a cape into a black t-shirt with the same red X, as if mirroring Superboy’s black top, “I like your t-shirt,” she admits albeit shyly.

Superboy smiles softly which in turn causes Robin to nudge him in the chest with his elbow, a small smirk across his face. Kid Flash zips to the other side of him bearing a bright smile.

Robin then looks to the Atlantean teen, both of them seemingly coming to a similar train of thought as Aqualad proudly states, “Today is the day.”

☆ ꧁ ═════════ ⋆✦⋆════════ ꧂ ☆

While all of this occurred at Mount Justice, there was something stirring within Cadmus once more.

Below the currently under renovations Cadmus, “Cadmus changes today,” Guardian spoke directly to Dubbilex and Dr. Spence, the latter he turned to next, “Dr. Spence, you’re Acting Chief Scientist. No more G-Gnomes suppressing our wills, no more secret breeding projects. This is a kinder, gentler Cadmus.” He declares.

Dubbilex ensures to Guardian, announcing his his full support, “Then I will of course help in any way I can, brother.”

Despite this promise to make a new and improved Cadmus, free of corruption and secrets galore, something sinister was brewing beneath the surface.

Guardian’s conversation was monitored by a group of unknown individuals, “Can the Light afford to leave Guardian without the G-Gnomes?” A masculine voice asks, the screens lined up as they all review the security footage currently playing this live feed.

“We have subtler means of control,” another reassures. “What concerns me is the children. We now know the League is employing young Heroes to do their dirty work. Tch. That’s a dark twist.”

“Yes, but one that can be played to our advantage,” a third, much deeper voice says.

A scoff is heard, “You should be more worried of the loss of not only one, but two weapons,” A feminine voice chided. “You may be able to recover from the clone, but what about the Tide Caller? That was not an easy acquisition to make, their impromptu dive into this world was difficult to plan, how do you expect to get them back after such a blunder.”

"Even the temporary loss of the weapon and the Tide Caller may prove useful,” reassures the last voice, before ending the exchange with finality. “Eventually, everyone sees the Light.”

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