Young Justice: Shattered Mirrors

InfiniteWriter

Prologue: Yesterday, He Died

In moments of sadness and tribulations, I would ask myself the question: could the world be saved? I didn't mean from the small stuff like fires and natural disasters. I'm not talking about invasions and beings from other worlds. When I ask myself this question, I mean salvation from itself. The people want to be rescued from the themselves, the darkness, but when things get to hard, they embrace it. It is a never ending war though the heroes of the world wished it wasn't. This war treats the good to unfairness and tragedy then sometimes to glory and victory. It lets the evil rot, but unknowingly, let them bathe in their own achievements and spoils of war.

The good would be the Justice League and the newly named team, Young Justice. The League didn't see the point of hiding the young heroes and former sidekicks (partners) anymore. The evil is the still unnamed, unnoticed organization of villains and assassins, the Light. The world still didn't believe us when we tried to bring the Light into the open. We give them some credit since we didn't have any solid evidence. The information we did have mysteriously disappeared from our computers. We already knew who was responsible (Lex Luthor).

The unfairness we received was a tough one. The tragedy we also received was a heart-breaking one.

The people we lived to protect don't trust us anymore. We lied and covered things that they thought we should have let them know. We shouldn't have kept the Team a secret. We should have informed them of how short-handed the League was. We especially should have told them the reason the League was short-handed: They, the founding members of the Justice League, attacked and nearly destroyed a planet and were on trial for their said crime.

In the end, behind our glory and victory, we weeped and suffered. Wallace Rudolph West, the former partner of the Flash, sacrificed himself to save the world. In a desperate attempt to erase their presence on Earth, the Reach set their endgame in motion: a series of MFDs (Magnetic Field Disruptors) were placed around the Earth. Once activated, they would do as their name suggested, disrupt Earth's magnetic field. With the deterioration of the Earth's magnetic field, natural disasters toke place around the world. If the natural disasters didn't destroy the evidence of the Reach's meddling then when the MRDs reached critical mass, it would. Upon reaching critical mass, they turn into their "chrysalis" mode which would literally ripe apart the world.

All forty available heroes were assembled. With the unwanted but needed help of Lex Luthor, we deactivated all twenty MFDs. Victory was in our grasp. I could see the future in one moment. Wally and I would rejoin the Team. We would have finished college, went to Paris, and eventually marry. That was snatched away from us. Apparently, there was twenty-one MFDs. The last one was in the Arctic. Ironically, the Flash and Impulse, the fastest men alive, were too late to stop the machine from going chrysalis. The virus Luthor created wouldn't stop it.

But Luthor still had a backup plan, a failsafe. He ordered them to run; run as fast as they could in the direction opposite to the vortex's energy flow. Their speed trails could siphon off the energy of the machine, but a massive amount of kinetic energy was needed. Wally, being the hero was, ran to the nearest Zeta Tube to help his uncle and his first cousin once removed.

Barry and Bart's top speed wasn't enough, but with Wally's own kinetic energy, they had just enough to neutralize it. It worked. The three speedsters were started to stabilize the Earth's magnetic field. But there was a problem. There was always a problem or consequence when you try to save the world. Wally was too slow. Kid Flash's slower speed had turned him into an exit valve for the chrysalis' energy. He was dying. Barry said Wally just faded away. His world ended not with a bang, but a whisper. His finally words was that he loved me and that he was sorry.

Kid Flash died saving the world. The people he saved would never know how much he sacrificed for them.

The Light had won. They had the War World, the Earth, and her people. The people had chosen them. They deemed Lex Luthor as their hero. The one who give his all to save the planet. They rewarded him the position as the United Nation's Secretary General. The rest of Light had their victories and rewards, too.

Young Justice was now a shell of what it once was. It wasn't the comfortable six members that were like family. The original six: Superboy, Aqualad, Nightwing, Miss Martian, Artemis, and Kid Flash, were no more. Nightwing left to do god-knows-what. His reasoning behind his departure was that he, Kaldur, and Wally founded the Team, and without Wally, it wasn't the same. He left without a single good-bye to anybody. Aqualad was stretched to thin. He was tasked with leading the team, figuring out the Light's future plans, and redeeming the League and Young Justice's reputation. Superboy and M'gann were detracted by their on-again-off-again relationship.

I didn't even go by Artemis anymore. I kept my old codename, Tigress, from when I was undercover with Aqualad. The originals said it wasn't a good choice. Tigress was seen as a villain. My answer to that was this: "Artemis was Wally's partner. I need some distance. I need a change. So, let's see how Tigress does."

As I stared at Wally's hologram, I couldn't help but think about how disappointed he would be with how we turned out. Seeing us act like this would have sadden him if he was still here. I especially know he would be sad with me. But I came to realize the sad truth: I didn't care. I didn't care at all. I have lost who I am, and I can't understand why I couldn't go back to being just me. Why all of us couldn't go back to being just us. The teens trying to prove themselves, stepping out on their own, and becoming who they wanted to be.

I couldn't help but go back to a memory when I was undercover. I felt so distraught. I thought I was up to playing the role of an assassin. But I wasn't. Every time I looked in the mirror, I didn't see Tigress; I saw Artemis. I saw myself being something that I tried not to become. It was like I was suspended in an illusion. All I could see was a reflection of a lie.

I felt so guilty. I destroyed the Cave, our home. I captured Gar, Bart, and Jamie. I helped put them through that torture the Reach brought on them. I hurt my friends and family with my fake death. I made my mother go through losing one of her daughters a second time. I promised my mother that she wouldn't lose me to death or the Life. It was the only thing she asked of me. It was one simple promise that I couldn't keep. Because of me, Jade went back to being Cheshire and abandoning her family to get revenge for my death. If capturing Gar, Bart, and Jamie wasn't enough, I captured M'gann and brought her to Black Manta. I knew that I needed her help to fix Kaldur, but she almost die. For real.

With a surge of anger, I punched the mirror. I watched as it shattered right in front of me. What I saw killed me. In the shattered mirror was a women. A woman who was a perfect mixture of Tigress and Artemis. A little piece of Artemis died that day. That was when I lost myself. All I wanted to do that day was rip off that costume and go back to Wally, where I belonged. I couldn't do that now. The only thing I could do was look at the glowing hologram of Wally, the Savior of the Earth.

Could the people of Earth be saved? Do they even deserve to be saved? Humanity can be good and kind, but it could also be so evil and cruel in turn. One moment, it cries for our help. We give it to them. Being the hero, the source of light in the darkness, was what the Justice League and Young Justice do. It is what we give our lives for. After the help is given, the next thing you know, the human race fights against you; saying they didn't want it but obviously, needed it. Then there is the way it rewards the angels and the demons.

"You're visiting him again," a voice asked.

I turned around to face Bart. He was a speedster from the future. He is the grandson of the second Flash, Barry Allen despite our first belief. Time travel was impossible. When he came to the past, he joined the Team under the name Impulse. After his cousin's death, he sadly took on the mantle of Kid Flash. He almost didn't do it, but I made him. Knowing that Wally couldn't live on through him was unacceptable for me. Now, he was wearing the newly tailored Kid Flash costume. It was identical to Wally's with the yellow with red pants, red gloves, and yellow shoes with the Flash symbol on the chest. He even had Wally's goggles.

He was almost a carbon copy of Wally.

"Yeah. It is a good place to think," I replied.

He nodded and sped over to stand next to me. There was absolute silence for the next five minutes. I was shocked that Bart even stayed still that long. He was hyperactive, vivacious and very talkative. He would talk your ear off if you let him. He hasn't been here for a while, but everybody feels like that known he since forever. Bart had that way of wiggling his way into your life. He lost that sense of life, though. That was one thing that separated him from Wally.

"Do you think his proud of me?"

I turned my head to see him crying. Bart was still shaken up about what happened; we all are. I swear that Bart wouldn't release me from his death-hug for a good hour. I tried to comfort him the best way I cloud, but I didn't do a good job. I was in shock, too. All I remembered was him crying into my chest and him saying that he was sorry over and over again. I didn't even know what he was sorry for. He did what he had to do.

"Why would you even ask that," I questioned. "Wally, personally, give you his blessing to take up the mantle of Kid Flash."

He sighed. "I didn't think it would be so soon, though. It was only a couple of hours before the Reach went into their endgame and he ceased," he explained. "I feel like a fraud. When I went out there today, the people didn't even see the difference. They were just excited that 'Flash Boy' or 'Speedy' come back after all this time. They didn't even get the name right!"

"Bart-"

"And you know what else," he interrupted. "Those are the people Wally give his life for. They will never know has close their world would have ended that day. There was even a group of people who said we were traitors. Right in front of the camera and our faces!"

That made my blood boil. Like I said before, the people will never know they were siding with the wrong people. They only saw in black and white; never noticing the grey area in between. Yes, the League could have handed the invasion better, but we did the best we could with what we had. We had some right to privacy. We did what we thought was right. We did what we thought would protect them.

"How can the world be so cruel, Arty," he asked. "How can the citizens we save everyday be so hateful?"

"I don't know," I answered truthfully. I looked back into Wally's holographic eyes. "I don't know."

In one second, he pulled me into another death-hug that sent us both to our knees. My mind flash-backed to the day that he died. How can the world be so cruel, I asked myself. We didn't need to help them, protect them, but we still did. We threw away our lives, our futures, and our loved-ones to serve a greater purpose. We just wanted to save the world from itself one battle at a time. Everyday, we hoped that the war would finally be over. One day, the earth won't need us. But that hope always stood at arm's-length. It was an unreachable feet we strive towards every moment of the day.

Lifting his head, Bart asked me another question. "How do you do it, Artemis. How can you just take their hate and not be angry?"

"I just do," I said, staring him in his green eyes. It sometimes sickens me how similar he looks so much like Wally. "In the end, the world may not want us, but it needs us at the same time."

"The truth is Bart," I continued. "I am angry. We are human, Bart. We can't stop our emotions, only control them. Overtime, you could learn to control them. You can be just like the Dark Knight himself, an emotionless brick wall. Never cracking."

All Bart could do was nod his head in understanding. He wipe his eyes before he asked his question. "If you had a choice Arty to either save yourself or the world right now, would you do it?"

"I don't know."

That answer brought now new tears in Bart's eyes. "Would you do what Wally did," he continued. "Would you willing choose to leave everything and everyone you cared about to sacrifice yourself for the people who can't save themselves?"

I was about to reply when Kaldur called Young Justice into the Mission Room.

"Let's go," I said. We got up from our kneeling positions and fixed ourselves up. Bart rubbed his eyes of their tears and placed his goggles over them.

"It's time to clash the mode," he said, trying to fall back into his normal personality. He ran off in a blur; leaving me behind. I take one last look at Wally's face then ran after Bart. If only you were still here Baywatch.

We did crash the mode like Bart said, but it didn't happened like we wanted it to. I felt the mode. The others never truly felt the aster. Sadly, consequences, either good or bad, come with being a hero. In the end, we all have to face them. Some people won't even get the chance.

Disclaimer: I do not have any rights to the Young Justice cartoon. If I did, Artemis and Wally would of had a better ending. Long live Spitfire!

AN: This is a story that I will be working on for a good while. I have so many ideas and plot lines added in to this story that it is going to be a long one! I no-way near finishing it, but I decide to post what I have so far. Hopefully, I will be inspired to finish writing it. I have a set the plot line to this story, but I am open for suggestions! Read, Review, and/or PM!