A/N: Thank you for reading :)
When I opened my eyes, I knew I was in a hospital. I blinked several times. My room was dark, and it was cold. I could hear the beeping of my heart next to me, but as I looked down at myself, I wanted to gasp, but there was something stuck down my throat. I was covered in bandages.
The fire.
The burning.
The hope that I'd died.
But, no, here I was.
I sat up, coughing, yanking the tube out of my throat, gulping in fresh air. I wondered how long I'd been in here. I ached all over, but since I was groggy, I had to guess someone had been nice enough to give me pain meds. I couldn't feel the guilt that usually weighed me down, so I cherished the drug induced state. Swinging my legs over the side of the bed, I began ripping tubes out of my arms. I didn't even register the pain; I just unhooked myself and let my feet dangle above the ground before I carefully set them on the chilly tiled floor. I slowly got off the bed, and, to no surprise, fell to the floor. My legs were weak, and my head was spinning.
I crawled over to the door and used the handle to get myself back on my feet. With shaking hands, I managed to get the door open, and stepped out into the hall.
I glanced to my right and nearly fell over at the sight of the hero, Miss Martian, staring at me. When I could find no words, I turned and tried running away, but she caught my hand.
"Hello there," she smiled warmly at me. I was confused. Why was she here.
"I..." I really didn't know what to say to her, because I'd never talked to any one of that belonged to her team or the Justice League. I was shy, often said the wrong things, and because of that, I rarely spoke.
"You're Arianna, right?" I nodded slowly as she had me sit down beside her in the cold chair. I shivered and rubbed my arms. She noticed and squeezed my hand. "Do you remember the fire?"
It was slowly coming back to me, but the drugs weren't really helping me out here. "I...burning," I mumbled, "I was burning."
I'd wanted to die.
I looked at her, eyes wide as I tried to talk. "Did you pull me out of there?"
She shook her head. "No, Kid Flash and Nightwing did that."
"Someone call my name?"
I jumped at the loud voice that echoed loudly in my ears. I turned to see the Kid Flash himself and tried to make myself as small as possible. That usually worked.
But not today it didn't. What time was it, even?
"Kid Flash, you remember Arianna?"
He grinned at me. "Oh, yeah," he said, making me wince, "me and Nightwing saved you."
I nodded slowly. I felt uncomfortable in their presence. I looked at my hands, and examined the bandages that had been spun carefully over my fingers. Could you usually wrap fingers like this? I shivered again, and took my hand away so I could keep my knees to my chest. I bit my lip, my mind going to my family. Where were they?"
"You okay?" Kid Flash asked me.
I glanced at him, wanting to go back into my room, even though it was ice cold in there.
"Fine," I mumbled.
It could have been the truth; it should have been. But it was always a lie, every single time I'd ever said it was a total lie.
He shrugged and turned to the green girl who was looking at me with concern.
My mind was traveling elsewhere, though, so I kept my attention on her so it wouldn't go to the place it went when my mind was blank.
"So, Miss Martian, Artemis and Superboy want to know when you plan to get back," he said, glancing at me. I averted my eyes, turning my head away, thanking the doctors silently for giving me meds.
The guilt was dormant now, and it wasn't holding me down. I felt light. I had felt this way only once. Just once. I'd been at the circus, seeing the Flying Graysons... I shook myself out of that memory, shutting the mentally made door so I wouldn't have to see it.
To live it again.
"I want to stay with her," Miss Martian said, and I looked at her. I didn't need a babysitter; I needed my family. And why would she stay? Obviously, she had a job to do, and I was pretty sure it wasn't sitting with a girl who was doped up on whatever they'd given me.
"Why?"
They both turned to look at me, and I began to turn my head away from them. I never said anything right, or at the right time. Miss Martian put a warm hand on my shoulder, and I looked at her out of the corner of my eye. "Because you're family... well, don't you remember?"
Oh, right.
They were on vacation, and I had offered to stay here, in Gotham. Stupid, stupid, stupid. How could I have forgotten about that?
"Yes," I mumbled.
"We wouldn't want you to be alone, would we?" she asked me brightly.
I shrugged. "Don't really know."
"Is it okay if we ask you some questions?" Kid Flash asked me, grinning broadly.
I shrugged again.
"Why were you in that toy factory?" he asked me.
"It's...was... my old hideout. I used to play fort there, with a boy I once knew."
One of the Flying Graysons. My heart hurt at the thought of that boy with those happy blue eyes, that contagious laugh and smile...
I cringed inwardly.
Kid Flash and Miss Martian nodded.
"Who set the fire?" I asked them suddenly.
"Some criminal," Miss Martian waved it off.
I frowned, resting my chin on my knees. "My friend, he told me that we ought to play in it before it got burnt down," I said suddenly. "He..." I shook my head.
"Is something wrong?" Kid Flash asked me.
Miss Martian frowned. "She's not okay."
I jerked my head up to look her in the eye. I remembered that she could sense emotions, and that bothered me slightly. But it was one of her powers.
"The meds make it too hard to figure her out, though," she gave me a reassuring smile. I wanted to smile back, but I was just me. Plain old, guilty little me. "That's all we want to ask you for now."
I nodded and made a move to stand up, but fell to the floor. I frowned.
I waved Kid Flash's hand away and used the cold chair to attempt to stand, but I was too dizzy to do it on my own. Miss Martian stood and put my arm over her shoulder. "I can see you want to be left alone," she said, "but we will have to come back."
I nodded.
"So what's the plan?" I heard someone shout. I winced again. I turned my head and was shocked to see Nightwing walking towards us. I wanted to go back into my room, immediately. But I couldn't.
"Not so loud," Miss Martian said to him, smiling at me for a brief moment before turning back to him. "I'm going to keep her company till she gets home."
Nightwing looked at me, his eyes narrowed for the smallest of seconds before it went blank. He held out his hand to me, and gave a small smile. "Nice to see you awake," he said. I took it hesitantly. He dropped my hand while looking at me expectantly.
"Arianna," I mumbled, looking at my door. It was going to be so cold in there when I came back in.
"Arianna," Miss Martian said lightly, making me look at her.
"Yes?" I mumbled. I mumbled more than I should. Maybe it was because of the drugs; I couldn't figure it out.
"Why were you there?"
I sighed, looking at his masked face, wanting to crawl away from all of them. They must have better things to do, I thought, things that didn't include me.
"It was our hideout," I said, "me and my friend's."
"Who is this friend?" Kid Flash asked me, finally getting that the meds made my hearing sensitive.
"He's dead," I said, looking down at my bare feet. The nail polish there, black and blue, had been chipped away. I looked at my fingers, but I couldn't see if the same had happened to them. Guilt wanted me to feel it, but the drugs were keeping it at bay.
"He's dead," I said again, a little clearer as I looked at Miss Martian. "We used to play fort there. He always had the best ideas, but..." I shook my head, a lump forming in my throat. I looked at the ground again.
All three of them were staring at me; Nightwing the most intense. If they kept looking at me like that I was sure that they would see right through me and discover what a horrible person I really was.
"Let's get you back to your room," Kid Flash finally said, nudging Nightwing.
"It's cold," I blurted as Miss Martian's gloved hands reached for the knob.
"Huh?" she blinked.
"It's cold in there," I said.
"We'll turn up the heat if you'd like," Kid Flash offered. I nodded, and let her open the door.
"Wait!" I called out as the two older boys turned to leave. They looked at me. "Thank you," I said, biting my lip and looking at the ground again, "For saving me. Thank you."
"No problem," Kid Flash grinned. Turning to the other one, he said, "I believe she was talking to me."
Nightwing snorted. "You wish."
I watched them leave, and Miss Martian walked me across the floor and set me down on my bed.
"You don't have to stay," I told her as she adjusted the temperature.
"I'd like to," she said softly, sitting down. I laid down and curled up into a ball.
"Miss Martian?" I asked after a while.
"Yes?"
"Thank you." I closed my eyes and managed to fall asleep.
A/N: please review :D