"All right, ladies," Artemis says, holding her helmet against her hip. "Our objective is clear. No patrolling, no stopping until we reach the destination, and I will shoot at you if you step on the brake at any point."
Her full, blood red lips curve into a mischievous grin as her smoky eyes run over the nine women clad in leather, standing in a semi-circle before her.
"We drive in a straight line, we make the world screech behind us, we turn the heads of everyone we pass," she instructs. "At one point, there will be something sledding-like involved, so calibrate your motorcycles accordingly. Iris, Mary, and my mom will join us there."
Artemis whips her ponytail behind her and zips up her green jacket, tucking her phone into a pocket on her calf. She puts on the fingerless gloves with a satisfied grunt as she fastens them, letting her perfectly manicured black nails with golden lighting bolts have their glory.
"We take no prisoners tonight." She smirks, one eyebrow curving. "But if anyone's too chicken, get out now."
"Uh huh; this inspirational speech montage in the making is nice and everything," Zatanna says, "but I wanna feel some power between my legs. And not the kind I have to get off," she mutters to Raquel beside her, who presses a palm to her mouth.
"Hey," Artemis says, pointing her helmet right at her friend. "My party. I talk however long I want."
The magician's hands fly up. "Yes, your highness."
"Ha. Ha. But it just happens that I was out of things to say anyway," the blonde allows, rolling her eyes.
"Then let's ride!" Zatanna hops onto her motorcycle, revving the engine impatiently. "Ooh, yeah, that's the stuff."
"Everyone, let's raise our imaginary glasses to Batman for letting us borrow these!" Barbara urges, flipping a leg over hers. It's a new model, a glider equipped with the latest tech and adaption modes. It's beautiful. "And, please, for the love of Wonder Woman, do not crash it or, so help me, I will bribe Karen to fly up your nose."
"Hey!" the scientist in question protests.
But, deep down, she knows has a price. They all do. And this baby just might be hers.
Rubbing her hands together, Karen examines all the features and parts of her motorcycle, yelping when Cassie breezes past them all on the street, not quite used to the gear shifts.
"Yeah, don't do that," Artemis says, biting her lip at the youngest girl among them who soon doubles back. "Whaddaya say, girls? Let's go have us some fun."
She sticks her helmet onto her head, flexes her thighs to feel the ridged seat between them, and cracks her knuckles in preparation for what will hopefully be a wild night.
The mob of women take off one by one and it takes them all a few minutes to get used to the tech and find their own speed, but then they blast through the streets of Gotham and onto the highway.
Each motorcycle is a different color and, though none of them wear anything but practical clothes—covered up hair to toe—there's not many people who can resist a double take at the ten unmistakable women driving way over the speed the limit and many of them taking hands off the wheel regularly.
They leave a rain of dust in their wake at the city's border, old paper bags flying in every direction.
Conversations via the mental link range from unremarkable to raunchy to classified. All the rite of passage jokes about the perils of marriage are exchanged, Wally is made fun of, and those few who are already married give their own advice.
At one point, when they're driving on a relatively abandoned stretch of road, Artemis asks Zatanna to put a protection spell on her and M'gann to keep an eye on her, and takes off her helmet as well as the leather jacket.
She's left with a snug, stiff fabric underneath that ends right under her belly button and accentuates her breasts perfectly with its low sweetheart neckline, leaving her arms completely bare. After instructing the motorcycle to go on autopilot, Artemis balances the items on her seat and, resting her palms lightly against it, draws her legs up and straightens, standing up in the wind.
She leans down to press play—on one of her favorite tunes that make her feel like a badass—and starts dancing to it, right there on the moving vehicle. Her feet stay glued to the seat, but her hips wiggle and her arms stretch out in either direction, and she lets her hair out to blow in the wind, and it feels better than the Titanic ever looked.
It doesn't matter that it's below freezing out and that she's going at speeds where the wind should claw her bare, bronzed skin off, or that she recently lost her job (as if she can be expected to ignore the League's calls in the middle of meetings), or that she still has a giant bruise on her thigh from last month.
She's free.
After watching her sister for barely a minute, Jade follows suit and jumps up on her motorcycle, giving a middle finger to the world. Two of them, in fact.
Barbara is the next to relinquish control, anchoring her hands on the seat and lifting her legs up into the air as the wind executes chaos around her hair. A few women gasp in her mind at the sight of her balancing herself on one measly hand at eighty miles per hour, but she pays them no mind; she knows what she's capable of.
The redhead stays like that for a full two minutes before jumping upright and joining in the dance party that already features Raquel and Asami.
Even Dinah looks ready to stop being careful and let loose.
M'gann is the only one who genuinely doesn't get the appeal—she can replicate the feeling of wind and motion any time she wishes—and it makes everyone feel less guilty about using her as a lookout for anything that could go wrong on their quest for adrenaline.
It's doesn't take long for the entire nine other women to be standing on their motorcycles, dancing to a popular club song that Artemis has turned up to a volume that should be heard for a quarter of a mile around them.
They get weird looks from the drivers of the opposite lane—is there a circus in town that they don't know about? a stunt practice?—but none of them give a damn… or, really, even notice it.
When they've gotten some air into their system, the women all jump back down to their seats at once, making the current eavesdropping driver gape for five minutes at this sight as she rides back to Gotham.
(They are responsible for when the unknown person decides to get into shape—this time, for real—and ends up the star athlete in her circle of women who've picked up gymnastics in their late thirties. Which happens years after this moment.)
They ride on the highway for a moment longer, but then, when it turns, keep driving straight into the desert-like terrain, leaving a storm of sand behind them. They reach the promised mountains, racing each other down the white hills and keeping their eyes on approaching trees.
It's quite the extreme shortcut to the small town they're going to, but it's worth it.
They make a few circles around the town upon reaching it—to drive a little longer and also to check out the perimeter; Raquel's bridal shower, while badass, isn't exactly something anyone wants to repeat—and then park in front of a nondescript diner.
Artemis guides them to an old concrete building, going around to the back where all it takes is a push of the heavy door and they're in a dark, colorful, loud paradise.
She greets the women already waiting—her existing family and her future family—as she rids her body of the hot, sweaty jacket. Her skin is flushed and her heart is fluttering and her hips move to the beat without her ordering so, and she's not about to let this feeling pass.
She takes whoever's closest to her to the dancefloor, inhaling the thick air that makes her more alert and energetic, and ends up in a dark corner where the discoball rarely shines with Jade and M'gann.
Men brush by them in every direction, occasionally stopping for a number, but they lightly swat them all away. Zatanna comes over with a few martinis in her hand and Artemis downs hers in one big gulp, setting it on a nearby table immediately after.
She feels alive and one with the world and finds, with little surprise, that she feels something similar every day when she's with Wally. The realization makes her unapologetic about using a few men as dance partners when she just needs to have someone opposite her, never touching.
Hours pass by and she never feels the exertion in her legs, but her chest glistens with sweat and she downs whole water bottles at a time, and her lipstick is smeared, hair sticking up in tufts, and her vision is starting to blur in the dark room, and she could not care less about any of it.
Once, a guy she's used as a partner starts hitting on her and she doesn't see the harm in a little back and forth—the kind she wishes Wally was here for.
Oh, Wally. Sigh.
"You're so full of life and energy," he says as they dance. "Plus, you know your motorcycles; I saw them outside. Nice. I can tell you're not like other girls." He gives her a charming grin.
She actually pauses dancing for a second. "Uh… What the fuck's wrong with other girls, buddy?"
Strutting away from his speechless figure, Artemis makes her way to the bar to ask for another water, panting, and watches her party of women engage in an animated—and from the looks of it, chaotic—conversation in their corner, and she smiles.
The bride joins in and spends a great few more hours talking in the company of people she adores, letting the steam wind down a little and then, when she makes her way home via M'gann's bioship—they're all way too tired for the motorcycles—jumps Wally first thing when she walks through the door.
Going out and letting her body do its thing is nice and all—and she ain't gonna stop anytime soon—but this is even better, she thinks as his mouth gets stuck right above the sweetheart neckline of her top.
"Hand me the popcorn," Dick orders from the other side of the couch in the house the engaged couple are renting until they can buy it.
"Get your own," Wally says, shushing him as the salty bits fly into his mouth, one by one.
Bart is sitting nearby with his own bowl and so are Barry and Oliver. Conner stands to the side, talking with Roy, Kaldur, and Rudy, who don't seem to be particularly interested in the movie.
For his bachelor party, the speedster decided he wants to watch the worst action movies of all time and poke plot holes in them while taking a drink every time any character says something cliched. Because strip clubs are overrated or something.
Ten minutes in and Bart's already halfway drunk.
The underage bastard.
"I'm legal to drink where I'm from and most countries in Europe," he reminds Barry and Wally every time they object.
"And you are in America now," Barry reminds him every time.
Then Bart says something like, "And American teenagers never drink. Sure." or, "If some adult who's been drinking with family since the age of ten went to a country where the limit was fifty, would you really deny him that?", or, "The Garricks let me.", and the subject gets dropped until the next time he whips out a bottle, which thankfully isn't often, at least.
Halfway through, the other men stop whatever they were doing to examine the source of shouting, laughter, and so much popcorn on the ground. A little intrigued by the giggling boys' actions, they finally join in the activity and, before long, all men present are tipsy, yelling over each other about the stupidity of everything on the screen.
Soon the movie stops and they decide to play poker which, given that none of them know how to play or currently possess the sharp wits to outsmart each other, turns out to be interesting. They end up making their own rules and changing them halfway through a turn as it suits their whims, and, when they run out of peanuts to bet, someone has the brilliant idea to play for clothes.
It would be a great story to tell their children someday… if they could actually remember any of it the next day.
Somewhere in the middle of the game, they fall asleep on the floor in various stages of undress.
Wally falls unconscious right in his chair and, when the doorbell wakes him up several hours later, he finds that the buzz has already passed.
Stupid metabolism.
Then again, no hangover. And since Artemis stands at his door looking impossibly sexy—seriously, is he still dreaming? 'cause he's never seen anyone, including her, look that hot in all his life—he figures he likes this better as they make their way upstairs, bumping into everything in sight. (Well, out of it, really.)
Yeah, this is definitely better.
