Cake Walking
(Two Legionnaires, plus a deepening mystery involving old foes and old friends alike. Cham/Vi. Begun for Green Earths's Crack Pairings Contest/Challenge. Chapter sections set right after S2's "Edge of Tomorrow" and "Message in a Bottle," respectively. Cautiously rated 'T' for violence, language, implied f/f (plus implied m/f, m/m later on). I suppose this chapter could also be construed as somewhat unkind to B5 fans. If such things bother you, please don't read. Comments and/or constructive criticism welcome. I don't own any DC characters and situations and blah blah blah. )
3008
"...I hear over and over that other planets are too worried at this time to leave the hearts of their own cities unguarded, lest they be the next to feel Imperiex'es power. Well, as we have little of value at our own heart to guard at this time, we would be pleased to provide help for our U.P. Brethren on Earth. To our Legion friends in New Metropolis: Whatever assistance you require is yours for the asking..." - Ambassador Zir Derbai, open voice-com to U.P. Council, Mar 3008.
The red haze of dust, smoke, and various acrid gases remained heavy over most of the city, though in places it had begun dissipating to a sort of rusty pink. Even thinking about it made my eyes hurt. Or maybe that was just simple fatigue.
It had been barely a week since Imperiex and his forces had come from the future, freeing the Legion's worst enemies from Takron-Galtos. Those of us available had fought as best we could, only to be overpowered and locked up ourselves. Our absent teammates had returned from the future with reinforcements and freed us within two days of that. Now here we were. More specifically, here I was at microchip size, sliding around inside a circuit box that was almost a city unto itself. Under normal circumstances, I would have enjoyed this work. Today I was exhausted, hungry, thirsty, and wishing I could be at Medicus One with most of the team; visiting our injured.
If the outer city was still largely in ruins, at least this miniature one was all intact and humming along again. My survey complete, I exited the circuit box. Bouncy was saying something to the Tri- the Duos, most of it lost in the rush of air that always accompanied me when I changed size. They were wrapping things up, replacing tools in their proper cases and getting ready to take a break. Maybe he'd been telling her some awful joke or sharing some ridiculous pun. Whatever it was, Purple and Orange managed to smile. I glanced at them, feeling embarrassed at my own self-pity.
"How are the readings, Bouncing Boy?" I shook out my hair and rubbed my eyes, trying to feel alert again.
"Nice work in there, Shrinking Violet." Bouncy gave me a thumbs-up. "Air purification is back at full power!"
Purple was waving a small hand-held tester back and forth in the hallway while Orange jotted down some readings on a pad. "It's good to have you back, Vi," the Duos said in unison.
"Thanks." I helped them pack up the remaining tools and readers. "Would it be all right if I went upstairs to rest for a few minutes, Bouncy?"
"Sure. Just stay out of the guys' section."
I snorted and the Duos giggled as they merged together.
He looked embarrassed. "No, no, I mean... the guys' side is still pretty trashed, but your side is safe."
"I know." I grinned at him. "Just picking on you. Plus I'm kind of worn out."
"Hey, it was their turn," Duo said. "It's our ceiling that ended up on the floor last time HQ got it in the teeth."
"Thankfully, I wasn't on-planet for the worst of that." I turned towards the the convenient seven-meter-wide hole where our lift used to be. "You know where I'll be if you need me."
They nodded and went off in the direction of the lounge. Most of the guys were bunked there until their own wing could be repaired completely.
Once upstairs, I settled down with my room com and a glass of cold water. At least hydration was safe around here again, even if nourishment was still somewhat unreliable. There were a few holos set into the rack over my desk. Some school friends, my Dad at the medical station not far from Xerengo's orbit. His face grave as ever below the drawn-back visor of his light green nurse's cap. Mom and Ruthel, arms around one another and smiling. I'd snapped that one right before I'd left home for the Legion. It was in the backyard, not far from the old tree-swing they'd built for me ages ago. Also not far from where I'd had an epic blowout or ten with Mom- once upon a time.
My stomach growled. I had a slightly fog-headed vision of Tsalk, the small cakes Mom's partner used to bake for tea whenever she wanted to calm things down between Mom and me. Which at one point was about three or four times a week. Ruthel was a good cook, but unfortunately neither Arn nor Anatj Digby possessed the culinary gene. My advancement from tea and toast to hot cereal was about the limits of my skills in that department. One of these days, I was going to bribe Timber Wolf to take a crack at Ruthel's recipe; assuming that I could think of something to bribe him with.
I'd only just had time earlier to reassure friends and family that, yes, I was out of jail and so were my teammates. Yes, the newsfeeds were telling them the truth about who had been injured. Yes, medics had finally gotten most of the area's hurt and homeless to temporary shelter. The fires and explosions still cropping up were being dealt with by SciPol and firefighters. I tried not to think about them being just as taxed to their limits as we were at the moment.
I opened a message forwarded from the diplomatic corps by our old acquaintance Derbai. She had been promoted away from soldiering some time ago. Though not much older than I, she was a senior by the standards of those remaining alive on her home planet. Grystaad was still dealing with its mine issues and other problems, but they had the beginnings of a real government now. One that interacted with the U.P. and would hopefully be a fully-functioning society again. Sometime soon.
Star Boy had been right about the value of symbols. Grystaad would be sending relief medics and firefighters to us by the end of the week. In a private message she added, ...Perhaps my reasons for generosity are not entirely unselfish. Zir is a name on Grystaad long associated with the Junta. I was the only member of my family to break away and join... Prison is not pleasant for anyone. I am pleased to find that you are free and safe again, my Legion Friend...
Free and safe again.
I was sending a quick thanks to her when my door buzzed.
"Shrinking Violet?"
"Chameleon Boy." I closed the mailbox. "Come in."
He had a makeshift dark blue bag in one hand. Something clicked in my head. It had been sitting on a white plastic chair not far from where the Boys' and Girls' Wings split off from one another. When I'd flown upstairs a few minutes earlier, it should have occurred to me that neither item belonged in the hall. Fatigue and hunger... "Nice to see you. Don't suppose you're to here say that dinner's something besides Day Three of rice sticks and green recovery fluid."
"As a matter of fact..." he held up the bag. "Tonight we've got Xaffi chips and your choice of red or blue recovery fluid."
"Joy. Give me some chips and the red swill. The blue hurts my brain."
"Done." He came up with a small silvery bag and a red cylinder.
"Thanks." I popped open the can. It tasted as awful as I remembered. "Pull up a chair if you want. Unless you're still practicing posing as one. What was up with that, anyway?"
"Oh, just keeping a low profile, in case that hadn't been you coming upstairs before."
I shook my head and took another grimacing swallow. "What did you do now?"
"Kell-El and Brainy got back from patrol, and they'd been arguing the whole time. You could tell. And they weren't gonna' stop, either. I made the mistake of asking Kell when the engagement party was." He smirked as he grabbed a chair and sat down. "Seriously, that guy has no sense of humor."
"Whoa. Perceptive. I guess all that time with those detective holos is finally paying off."
"Uhh, excuse me? You're the one whose idea of fun was recalibrating every scale, rad tester, burner, and measuring device in Brainy's lab." He had an open bag of chips, nearly empty, and he was scraping the last of the crumbs out with one finger. "You missed some of Bouncy's best material that weekend. Just because you wanted to-"
I held up both hands. "Okay, okay. Never mind. Also, you don't recalibrate rad testers. You use them once and then throw them away. Let's move on, shall we?"
"Your face is coloring," he said in a sing-song voice. "Is that from the drink?"
I made a fist. "I could shrink down, sneak up on you when you had night monitor, give you the granddaddy of all ear and nosebleeds, and totally make it look like an accident. I bet I could even find a way to pin it on Kell."
He pretended to pout. "You're so mean. If I beg forgiveness, will you throw this out?" He held out the empty chip bag.
"Okay. This time." I flattened the silvery plastic and slid it under the recycling flap next to my desk. I knew that the sorter chutes and the incinerator were functioning, since I had helped repair them. "By the way, what did that bag used to be? It obviously started life as something else."
He sipped from a can of turquoise blue swill. "Olna-Ctar Academy's blazer. Oh, yeah. Nothing like the sound of that tearing under a Lesser Rigul Dragon's teeth."
I snorted and almost choked in mid-swallow. "Not the claws, too?"
"Please. I didn't work that hard for those stuck-up jerks seven years ago. Why would I start now?"
"Hey, speaking of school, do you ever hear from Delse?"
"Yeah. I think he finished and went to work on some rebuilding project. He sent me some music waves right before everything went to hell around here. I haven't even had time to open them." He stood up. "Thanks for reminding me. I owe him a com as soon as-"
Another buzz at the door. Brainiac 5. He overrode my entry code and slid the door open without waiting for permission.
"Excuse me." His arms were folded. "If you two could possibly interrupt your socializing, I require Chameleon Boy's assistance downstairs, in the basement area." He looked no happier to see me than he ever did back then.
"Anything I can help you guys with?"
"No, thank you."
"But I-"
"Perhaps another time." Brainy turned back towards the door.
Cham looked back and forth at us, then handed me the remains of the supplies. His face and shoulders suddenly swelled into a caricature of a cartoon military man, complete with a huge white mustache and gold epaulets each the size of a small boat. "Take charge of these, Commander Digby!" he boomed. "The very future of our galaxy itself depends upon their safe- Whoa!" A robotic arm snaked out, grabbed him by the collar, and dragged him off down the hall before he could finish. I heard Brainy's voice fading away as they continued towards the lift remains.
"...So with the continual flooding and the dangers of electrical conduction involved, I'll need you to..."
The door closed.
I sighed, returning to my mailbox and my high-class meal. At least Cham had sidetracked our resident genius before he could let fly with some well-meaning remark about how "unsuitable" my powers were. Really, I admired almost all of my teammates except on those occasions when I dearly wanted to kill them. At that time, nobody made me veer back and forth between two poles quite so much as Brainy. As for Cham, I envied him. Maybe he wasn't the smartest person I knew, and maybe sometimes people distrusted him because of his powers. To my mind, being distrusted was still better than being discounted.
Brainy just didn't understand. One of these days, I'd get through to him. The smarter they are, the more they miss.
Free and safe...
Even if it were true and not just the measured kindness of a friend/diplomat, wasn't there more to life than just being free and safe?
I growled like Timber Wolf and tore open the bag of chips with my teeth.
.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.O.
Brainy and most of the others had gone off to rest, or recharge. So I was piloting us back home from Kandor, with help from the computers, of course. It was great actually getting to work with a group once in a while. So much of what I did for the Legion was undercover and in solitude. These days I spent a lot of long, boring weeks trailing suspected Dark Circle sympathizers, or Dominators –among others who were established or potentially new friends of Imperiex. I gathered reams of data, or evidence, and sent them home. Sometimes, I performed a little minor sabotage to test out the enemy's technological advances, or their reaction time. It was important work, but not exactly exciting.
Besides, how often did I get to punch out Validus, or see flying house pets?
"For the dozenth time, no- I'm not saying where! Can't you just read the damn thing the way it's supposed to be read?" I turned around and saw Chameleon Boy stalking into the room, followed closely by Lightning Lad.
"Uh, guys?" I waved a little.
"Violet." They spoke in unison and glared at one another. Garth sat down in one of the chairs near the navigation console while Cham took the seat next to me.
"Do I even want to know?" I asked Cham. He shrugged. Garth was poring over something on a book pad, I noticed. "Garth, what'cha' reading?"
"Constellation J. It's his." He jerked his thumb in Cham's direction.
"Whoa. Mysticism, intrigue, explosions? Beautiful Myar priestess falls for beautiful Naltorian spy and so on? Isn't that supposed to be kind of, uh... grown up?" I looked at Cham.
"Hey, it's historic." He absently surveyed the console and tapped his fingers on the ledge. "That makes it educational." A smirk. "Right?"
"Hah. I've defrosted cooling units that were hotter than this snore-fest." Garth glowered over at us.
"He's just mad because I wouldn't highlight it for him." Cham sighed. "It's a really cool book. One of these days, I've gotta' get Bouncy to track down the holo."
"I'll bet I could reconstruct the cache and find out which pages you reread the most times," Garth said.
"Yeah? Bet you couldn't, Agri-Tech. You don't even know how to destroy that kind of cache, much less how to reconstruct one. Look, just read it or don't read it." Cham rolled his eyes. "Not like I'm charging you for the privilege, y'know."
Garth muttered something under his breath and went back to perusing the pad.
"Can I borrow it when he's through?" I double-checked the co-ordinates on the panel nearest me and made some minor tracking corrections. We'd be back in New Metropolis within half an hour.
"Sure. I thought you hated mysteries, though."
"Well, usually I do. How much will you pay me to not help Garth reconstruct the cache?"
All of sudden, Cham got very preoccupied with the stars outside. "Shut up, Violet."
End Ch. 2
("Cakewalking," is pop goodness from Young Marble Giants. Find it on a collection called Colossal Youth, or a fine cover on Barbara Manning's Under One Roof. Lyrics posted to my LJ. Xaffi, aka Teff, is a real grain. Thanks for reading.)