Chapter 1: Meet Kate
A/N: Do you really think I own Young Justice? 'Cause I don't. I do, however, own Kate.
The members of Young Justice appeared with a poof in the middle of a forest.
"Where are we?" asked Wondergirl.
"In a forest?" responded Impulse.
"You know, he just might be right," said Superboy.
"Anyone have any USEFUL idea of where we are?" asked Robin.
"Why the frag would we?" interjected Lobo (A/N: for simplicities sake, I'm just going to refer to him as Lobo because slobo is stupid and li'l lobo is too much work. You can pretend he's whoever you want.)
"Well, I wouldn't know. Why don't we look around. The forest is dense enough it's probably better if we don't split up." Said Robin, assuming the role of heroic leader.
A few minutes later, they were just as lost as they had been before.
"This is pointless," complained Superboy.
"I'm bored," whined Impulse.
"This place is fraggin' useless." Moaned Lobo.
"Will you all just SHUT UP!" yelled an annoyed Wondergirl.
"Yeah, mon," added in an equally ticked Empress.
"Though this IS boring," said Secret.
"We're not accomplishing anything doing this. Why don't we sit down somewhere and figure out what to do next?" said Robin.
"Sure, why not?"
Five minutes later, a cat girl fell out of the tree tops with a scream, landing in the middle of Young Justice, which were sitting around in a clearing.
Shocked silence fell. The cat girl sat back up.
"Owww..." she moaned. Then, "Whoa. Who're you?"
Empress teleported over and grabbed her, holding her still.
"Who are you and what are you doing here?" hissed Robin, annoyed. "Okay, scratch that. Who are you and what are we doing here?"
The girl looked guilty. "Well, I think when I tried to summon help from the gods I accidentally mis-specified and got you instead of a demi-god. Sorry about that."
"So send us fraggin' back!" yelled lobo, obviously ticked off.
The girl looked even guiltier. "Ummm... I can't. Not until I die or succeed. It's in the specifications of the summoning. And I'm not really very powerful... Why the tribe left it up to me to save all of them is utterly beyond me. I think a god musta yelled at them a lot to make them do it... anyways, if I return to get help to return you they'll ritually hack of my limbs then burn me to cleanse the village."
"Living in your tribe must be exciting," commented Empress.
"You have no idea. Mind letting me up?"
Empress let the girl stand up. She was tall, maybe five feet ten inches, with dark brown cat-like eyes, mostly covered in fur, with a tail. She was wearing a tunic and pants of some sort, made out of brown cloth mottled with moss green, apparently as camouflage.
"I'm Kate. What's your names?"
"These are Superboy, Wondergirl, Empress, Secret, Impulse and Lobo, and I'm Robin."
"Nice to meetcha. Sorry 'bout this."
"It's okay, it sounds like an accident. We'll help you, right?"
Most of YJ nodded, except for Lobo.
"I vote we frag her. She said if she died she'd be sent back home."
"No. Absolutely not." Stated Robin.
"Watch it, Lobo," said Empress warningly. He grumblingly fell quiet.
"My home is over this way. Come on!" put in an unfazed Kate.
The members of YJ followed her, having nothing else to do. She brought them through the forest, past a small stream and into a glade filled with absolutely HUGE trees, trees hundreds of feet tall and easily several dozen feet thick at the base of the trunk. Up in one of the trees was a small house, set into the crotch of two giant tree limbs. The girl looked up at her house, then at her guests, then frowned.
"Don't know how you're gonna get up... I climb with my claws," she said, casually popping out five claws on her hand, one at the base of each finger, "but I don't think you can... I could probably help some of you up..."
"I can climb, and Superboy and Wondergirl can fly, and Empress and teleport, and Secret can float... but I don't know about Lobo..." said Robin.
"Yeah... he's too heavy for me to support, and there's no branches for the first fifty feet for him to climb...I think I can get a rope to let down, though... Yeah, that'll work! Hold on!"
So saying this, she scampered straight up the tree, leaping to the hut, where a rope shortly uncoiled itself and rolled down. Everyone made their respective ways up to the treehouse, which was actually quite big, extending into the hollowed out trunk of the tree.
"We can talk in the tree, first room on the left as you enter. I'll be there in a second!" said Kate. The members of YJ filed in, curious. The inside was cozy, with light coming from a single window. The floor was covered in a woven rug, and cushions were scattered everywhere. The teens all looked at each other, shrugged, then flopped down.
Kate reentered, carrying a plate of sandwiches, which she stuck on the ground, then grabbed one. "Have a sandwich. Okay, so here's what's happening: my people, the cat-people, are being attacked by demons. We used to live pretty well together; we had the treetops, they had the forest floor; they had the nighttime, we had the daytime. They're insectile, can fly, have a hive-mind, and didn't bother us. There was even occasional interaction. But another person, someone unknown, developed a way to control the central mind. They've started killing off our people, scaling our trees into our houses. The only chance we have is to get through the forest, around the Greater Lake, into the demon mound, then figure out who or what is controlling the mind, then kill or remove it. I'm your only ally—the others have been evacuated. I'm left here for I don't know why, but probably a god or something commanded them to pick me as their representative."
The other teens stared at the cat girl.
"Are you sure that's all we have to do?" said Secret weakly.
"No." came the comforting answer.
A/N: End part 1. More soon! Please review, for my sake at least. Just think; a minute could make my whole day!