Author's note: Just wanted to give Kendra's mace a little more screen time...or at least, that's how this started out. Inspired by one of Justice League Unlimited's Hawkgirl's lines, and my attempt at giving Kendra a Shiera moment. Mick volunteered to help. Spoilers for episode Leviathin. Betaed and bettered by helloyesimhere! And none of these characters are mine.
Kendra Saunders wanted to scream. She wanted to throw something, cry, hit something, hit someone, anything to calm the rage boiling up inside her. She'd nearly beaten a man to death. She'd wanted to do it. What did that say about her? She'd never considered herself violent, but she'd willingly pounded Savage to a bloody pulp. If seeing the current Carter as Savage's loyal, brainwashed soldier hadn't shocked her back to reality...
Destiny gave her the task of killing Vandal Savage but it also seemed set to make it as hard as possible for her to kill the man, screaming at her that Carter was the priority and that he needed to be restored to himself. Destiny was messing with her head, dragging another Carter back into her life just when she thought she'd figured out what she wanted for the future, and was beginning to learn how far she was willing to go to achieve it. She was so sick of dealing with it all.
It hadn't even mattered that he wasn't "her" Carter. He had just slid into place like an interchangeable part (and wasn't that encouraging, to know you're replaceable, and any number of alternate incarnations were just waiting in the wings to take your place if something happened to you? She wanted to believe that she was different from all the other Chey-aras and this new "Carter" was uniquely himself as well, rather than just the next one on the assembly line. It was growing harder to believe.) Which left her with what, exactly? Carter—the man who had loved her enough to die for her many times over—now wanting to kill her while Vandal Savage held his memories hostage; Ray Palmer—the man who loved Kendra Saunders for who she was now, not for the collection of past lives she had stuck inside her head, who wanted to spend his only lifetime with her—struggling to know where he stood with her, and she hated that she'd left him with such uncertainty but she wasn't sure she had any answers herself; and...the desperate need to break something. And with her usual sparring partner Sara gone with Rip and Snart, to coordinate with Savage's daughter to see if there was the slightest chance Cassandra could find and relocate Rip's family to somewhere out of Savage's reach (since Kendra hadn't been able to follow through with her part,) she was having a hard time finding an outlet.
Which was why Mick Rory found her in the Waverider's hold, pummeling a punching bag to death. With her mace.
She glanced up from her workout, deeply dissatisfied with its outcome, to see Rory smirk at her. "Feelin' angry, birdie?"
Kendra sighed in frustration. "Do you want something, Mick?" She hefted the mace again, prepared to continue giving the bag the beating it didn't deserve.
Mick watched her for a long, uncomfortable moment. Kendra tried ignoring him. Suddenly he grabbed her arm, stalking towards the exit and pulling her along with him. "Let's get out of here."
"Mick, what are you doing? Let me go!" Kendra fought against his grip, alarmed at his actions. Was a part of him still Chronos? Had the team been wrong to put their trust back in him so quickly after he betrayed them?
"You gonna hit me with that stick of yours if I don't?"
Kendra pulled back, trying to reach for her mace. "If I have to," she gritted out. Why was he doing this? Even if he didn't care about hurting her, didn't he have at least a little bit of a friendship with Ray? "Ray is still on the ship. If you do anything to me-"
Mick snorted, probably at the thought of Ray Palmer being a threat to him. Kendra would have felt insulted on Ray's behalf, if she hadn't been too busy trying to break free from Mick's iron grip. "Relax," he told her. "Don't plan on doin' anything to make Pretty Boy upset. Besides, pretty sure New Carter's already got that taken care of. Just got the feeling you and me need the same thing right now."
The pyromaniac called out to the ship's AI, "Gideon! Got any unexplained building fires in that database of yours? Don't matter what time period."
"I can offer you several locations, Mr. Rory," Gideon assured him.
"Good. Send the coordinates to the jump ship. You can put that fancy stick of yours to use, too," he told Kendra, loosening his grip but still dragging her to the jump ship with him. She sighed, trusting that he didn't intend to hurt her, resigned to accompanying Mick Rory to whatever he had planned to do.
Kendra frowned, staring at the ramshackle barn in the middle of nowhere that he'd brought her to. "I don't think Captain Hunter would be too happy about this." Anyone else would have taken her to a bar...
Mick snapped his goggles in place. "Don't care."
"Does violence really solve anything?" she asked, wincing as she recalled her earlier attack on the hapless punching bag.
"Killing Vandal Savage woulda solved a lot of problems."
Kendra bristled at the reminder of her hesitation. "I couldn't-"
Mick cut her off. "Ain't Dr. Phil here. Just came to burn stuff. Thought you might want to break it first."
She glanced around the rickety building, surveying termite damage and years of wood rot with a critical eye. "This place is probably going to fall down on top of us."
"Don't hit the support beams holding it up."
Kendra raised her mace over a wooden crate, then dropped her arm. "This is barbaric."
Mick growled. "Hawk. Smash," he ordered, jabbing a coarse finger at the box in front of her.
Mentally shrugging, Kendra brought the mace down on the wooden box. She turned her head away as the rotten wood exploded, showering her with splinters. It felt...better than she thought it would.
Freeing, almost.
She shook wood fragments out of her hair and swung around, smashing into the closest animal stall. The ladder was next, and with a triumphant shriek, she let her wings burst out and she flew up to the rafters, pounding away at the railing to the loft. Wood and dust and bits of hay flew in the air as she hammered at the floorboards. She coughed and choked on dust and laughed and shook out tired arms and took her mace to the walls, barreling into them with all the strength she had. Rory watched her from below, heat gun primed and ready.
She dropped back down to where Mick stood, and blinked away tears from the dust she'd kicked up. Mick really had the right idea, wearing the goggles... He watched her for a moment, and she held her head up, meeting his gaze. "Still want to talk stuff over?" he grunted.
Kendra pushed sweaty hair off her forehead. Smashing the place to pieces didn't solve any of their problems. Vandal Savage still needed to die. Her connection to Carter still complicated her life and she still had Ray drawn right into the mess with her. Still, she couldn't stop the smile that spread across her dust-covered face. She couldn't believe it, but Mick Rory was right. "I think I want less talking and more hitting."
He shook his head, lifting up his own weapon. "My turn now."