Chapter 1

Reassurance

"No."

No way, no how. He refused, point blank. "There is no way on Heaven or Earth that I'm gonna do that."

Ollie gave him a pained look, his grey eyes having a certain fragile quality in them. "Please, Roy, I'm begging you. It should only be for the day, and then I swear we won't ever ask you again."

Roy looked dumbstruck as he turned to Dinah. "Do you honestly expect me to… To babysit?"

Dinah's blue eyes were hard, very unlike her fiancée's. She glared at the younger man, all trace of lightheartedness gone. "Yes, I do, actually. As part of the League, you're expected to accept assigned missions. We can make this a required assignment if we have to, or, you can take it through your own free will."

"Free will?" scoffed Roy in angry disbelief. "That's fricken' blackmail!"

"I'm still not hearing the confirmatory 'yes' or 'okay'," said Dinah, raising a hand and cupping it around her ear. Roy sighed with defeat, marveling at how much more difficult it was to argue with her… Or any other woman for that matter.

"Fine. I'll do it," he grumbled, defeated. Dinah looked marginally more pleased.

"Good. Like Ollie said, it should only take about a day. It can't take longer than that to fight this thing, can it?" she asked, looking at her fiancée, who was slurping his mal thoughtfully, leaning back in his chair.

"Nah, Clark and Bruce don't think it will, and we can't trust their judgment, then I don't know what."

Roy felt a pang of jealousy and stirred his own malt sulkily.

Roy Harper was a superhero. Granted, he didn't have superpowers, but that didn't mean much. The vigilante Red Arrow was more than a match for most idiots and psychopaths out there. Tall, muscular, and serious, with auburn hair and grey-blue eyes, most passers-by didn't bother him, mostly out of fear. Those who did look back at him with interest were mostly girls.

But six little kids versus a monster who wanted to snack on the Congress building in Washington DC? Roy felt he'd rather take on the monster… Alone… And without any arrows. He thought, at least.

Last week, Klarion the Witch Boy had resurfaced on Justice League radar for the first time in several months, and in a bad way. The first people able to respond were all younger than Roy; friends of his, and members of the Young Justice League. Ms. Martian, Superboy, Artemis, Kid Flash, Aqualad, and Robin had all fought valiantly, but when the dust had settled, Klarion still stood, only now with a monster at his side and six children at his feet.

The Justice League had gotten to the fight in the latter half of the battle, but hadn't been able to do much about the outcome.

So now most of the Young Justice League were five year olds, the power of their youth used to create a monster that wanted to eat the US Capitol. Luckily, Klarion had surfaced somewhere in southern Alaska, and had to cover the ground from there to the East Coast on foot, and that would take quite a long time. Unluckily, that time was almost up, and the League's bast bet to defeat the Witch Boy was to prepare in DC.

"Remind me why you're able to expend me rather than one of the others?" Roy asked his former mentor dryly. Ollie pretended not to hear.

"You guys are gonna hide out in one of the League's more homey caches in Central City. Don't ask why that is, Bruce just told us."

Roy shrugged. "I guess I can live with that. What tine tomorrow?"

"Exactly 7 o'clock AM," said Dinah, "We have to be in DC early to prepare.

"Fine. You gonna tell me the address? There anything I need to bring?"

"We'll e-mail the address to you later, and as for bringing something? All of the patience and courage you can muster."

Roy lay in bed in his apartment that night, staring blankly at the address on his phone as he reflected back on her words. All in all, they weren't very reassuring, he thought wryly before he drifted off into twilight sleep, and dreams of tiny children who tried to consume him alive.