Another three am, another chapter. I actually wanted this to be short, but...Well, you know, it came out longer than expected.

Disclaimer : Don't own YJ, Snow Queen.


Once upon a time, there lived a hobgoblin; so wicked that he was a real demon, for he kept a school to spread his evil and shunned his brethren known for playing pranks on oblivious travelers, yet bore no ill will. One day, when he was in a merry mood, he made a looking-glass which had the power of making everything good or beautiful reflected in it almost shrink to nothing, while everything that was worthless and bad looked increased in size and worse than ever. Even the loveliest landscapes appeared like boiled spinach, and the people became hideous, looked as if they stood on their heads and had no bodies. The glass soon rose to fame till at last there were no person nor land who had not heard of it; even the demons down below and the kings up on their thrones became victims of this cunning invention.

The demon then wanted to fly it up to heavens, but the higher he flew the more slippery the glass became, till it was finally free of his grip, fell to the earth in millions of pieces and rained down upon people...

III. No Sane Man's Land

"...and the stars hail down."

Not much in the hero business surprised Artemis Crock anymore. She got into the line of work knowing what she was required to face day after day, having worked with what she was to expect for a considerable amount of time and while she refrained from voicing, what she was to expect running in her veins took the element of surprise from everything long time ago.

Now however, if she was able to produce any thoughts, she would change her mind. Pounding on Megan's telekinesis mambo-jumbo shield with her fists, in civilian clothing, accompanied by Wally West while emitting "uh"s and "ah"s was not what she had in mind.

"Now aren't they the cutest couple." The Boy Wonder hissed between his teeth, a smirk, painful and stressed, on his lips. Megan was in a similar condition, her brows furrowed, sweat pouring down her face, her once sweet eyes locked on the two offenders in a malicious gaze, her hands up and facing them. Fuck you Robin. Oh Artemis would get back at him, she would.

When she was no longer a zombie, that is.


Hours ago...

"No pranks. No. Pranks. Absolutely no pranks."

It was indeed a rare occasion, for the Batman to be standing in what one could call the living room of Mt. Justice for any other reason than missions or mission debriefing or something that had the word "mission" in it. It surprised-no, it freaked the fuck out of Artemis when the bat-clad guy appeared out of nowhere (Robin apparently got his creepy habit from his mentor) just when the youngsters were lazily laying on wherever available. His appearance just screamed bad news. The archer thought he probably went around spilling red ink on people with little lifetime left in his free time, like that Celtic or Scandinavian legend she had heard from god knows where. Downright terrifying. His teammates, sans the said bat's protege, probably shared her thoughts as they disappeared into wherever after the Bat made his purpose clear.

"Am I making myself clear?"

Did he even have free time? She wondered.

"Yes, sir." The archer and the speedster, standing next to each other, the red-head covered in a brighter tone of red substance, mumbled in unison. Maybe if she didn't show her fear, the bat would go away?

Robin, standing behind his mentor, snickered quietly.

The prank war had been going on for about three weeks, its beginning dating back to that fateful day of Wally West and Sticky Boobs. (Artemis, as promised, did not rat out the Boy Wonder, though it was considerably easy as he avoided the mountain like plague during this period. She still suspected he was behind a few messy pranks however.) They started with small things; plastic bugs (Artemis was too badass to be scared of them), hot sauce in toothpaste, Barbies (It took Wally forever to separate one of them from Superboy) but then they both moved on bigger scales; shave cream filled rooms, undergarments hung on doors with suggestive notes, doors playing extremely annoying jingles when opened, overflowing toilets, shampoo filled condoms scattered as far as one can see, a certain fish boy smelling like sour milk for a whole week...And soon they brought everyone into their game, even Black Canary (after she fell victim to the overflowing toilet, just when she was occupying it) and Megan who thought of it as an earthly custom. Red Tornado attempted to stop them so many times that he would actually lose count if he wasn't an android, falling for a few along the way, until he could no longer take it. And after that, called the Batman as one could guess.

"You two," the Bat spoke, "will clean this mess."

The speedster's mouth hung open with the fraction of shock, "All by ourselves?"

The Bat had, however, already turned behind, walking away into darkness, clearly declaring that the matter was not up for debate. Just as the computer announced his departure and Artemis' tense shoulders fell and the Boy Wonder, in an attempt to mimic his mentor, spoke. "All by yourselves."

Wally groaned in response. "Dude, fuck you." His hand went through his hair, both Artemis and the Boy Wonder stepped back in order to avoid the ketchupy hurricane his act brought. "You sold us out!"

The Boy Wonder raised his eyebrows, though for which matter was unclear. A ketchup covered speedster was worth the surprise . "I called you. An hour ago. I told you Batman was coming."

"I thought he was coming here for a mission!"

The archer rolled her eyes in response. "You can think?"

"Well, unlike you." The speedster spat, moving his bright green eyes on the blonde. "Right, Rob?"

But the Boy Wonder was no more.

Wally and the archer exchanged troubled glances before Artemis spoke. "God, the kid's even creepier than his mentor-"

"Hey, somebody explain me why my doorknob's wearing a condom?" came the said kid's voice from somewhere afar.

While they would both erase the following incident from their memories, the speedster and the archer faced each other, smirked and gave each other a high-five.


After four hours of her afternoon, just as the sun was beginning to disappear behind the horizon, the archer deemed her task at hand impossible and threw up her hands in despair, groaning loudly. The speedster covered a whole fucking corridor with post-its, all of which that said wonderful words such as "ARTEMIS IS A BITCH" and "ARTEMIS HAS SEWER BREATH". (She didn't quite catch him on act, but no other teammate had speed or patience enough for that.) That fucking lowlife. Now how was she supposed to get back at him after the Batman's no pranks, absolutely no pranks?

Life was hard.

She sighed heavily. Perhaps there wasn't any use complaining, unless she wished to invoke the Bat's wrath.

She was pulling off another post-it (on which it said "ARTEMIS NEEDS BOOB JOB") when she felt a presence behind her; sharply turning her head provided her the image of Boy Wonder, cheekily smirking at him with his hands up, probably trying to mean that he meant no harm.

"What." she spat. "Came to help?"

He snickered. "Not in your lifetime."

She rolled her eyes, pulling off another post-it but not bothering to look at it. Even a speedster's creativity was limited.

After a minute of silence she was already getting impatient with the boy's sunglasses-hidden gaze. "Will you just go away or something?"

She expected to find him gone when she turned her head, to do his super secret dark ninja thing, but the boy was still there, his hands in his pockets, his trademark smirk on his lips. "No." the bird sung.

She groaned inwardly. "I thought females weren't in your area of interest."

"Oh. What are you implying?"

"I'm implying you're gay."

The Boy Wonder raised an eyebrow. "And you base that assumption on...?"

She pulled off another one. "Kiddo, I fell on you." she spoke. "You didn't even react."

She expected many things, many different reactions, but laughter wasn't one of them. "Oh, that's what you're talking about? Is little Arty hurt?" She threw him a glare. "Maybe you really need a boob job, huh?" he said, pointing at one of the post-its that hung on the wall.

Goddamn Wally.

"It's the inner beauty that counts!" The Boy Wonder's eyebrows rose up high at her remark. She hissed slowly in return. "Just. Go. Away!"

"'Kay."

With that he turned behind, leaving Artemis to her own freaking painful problems.

"There's one more thing." It was Robin once again that spoke. Artemis turned to face him, her eyes full of fury. "Wally just began to scrape that potato-onion mixture you guys spilled on the main road. He says he wouldn't mind help. You should bring an oxygen mask though, that smell could kill elephants."

Oh. S'ppose that's my way out. She emitted a lonely sigh as she made her way to the exit, using one hand to rub her aching neck as she walked.

"Mind removing that thing from my doorknob while you're at it?"

She didn't stop to look at him, a toothy smirk adorning her lips. "Not in your lifetime, kid."


Once in a while Artemis would regret ever accepting Green Arrow's offer to become his sideki-partner. The guy wasn't like the Batman, he wouldn't carry around shark repellants and breath mints, heck, he wouldn't carry anything (not even a freaking tissue!)but his bow, arrows and a pair of knives; he would just make something out of what he had when the situation called, occasionally looking like an idiot along the way, though he would loudly state he was damn cool if you asked him about that.

Artemis was, in that way, just like her mentor; a pair of knives, a composite bow, arrows, two pairs of her green uniform (she occasionally had to stitch them up when necessary, while she didn't appear so she could cook and sew pretty fine). She would often remember to be a little more prepared about things, often meaning when she was put into a situation she was not prepared for, but then forget about it altogether as soon as things were done.

"God, it smells." She tried to hold her breath just a while longer, to no avail.

Wally did something that resembled an eye roll, but it was lost among the tears that gathered in his bright green eyes. "Yeah, I couldn't tell, thanks."

"Your jokes make me itch, Flashy."

"You sure it's not the onions getting to you?" She smirked slightly, which immediately fell after she felt a tinge of burn in her throat.

God, she really needed an oxygen mask. And a long bath. Preferably now.

It was as if potatoes and onions were the ground and she was mopping away into nothing. She couldn't remember when the road became a garden of rotten food, but she guessed it was around the time Wally put milk cartons into Kaldur's bed, who was fast asleep during the incident, causing him to smell horrid for a whole week(the milk had gone bad before the poor guy even woke up).

It was brilliant. Simply brilliant. Even if it was Wally's work, she couldn't help but admire the...brilliance.

"Hey," she spoke between a fit of coughs, "what exactly did you have in mind when you did..." She crudely pointed at the neverending road of potato and onion. "This?"

"Huh?" He raised his eyebrows, tears cascading down his face. "I thought it was you."

"What the hell." She decided to screw hygiene and spit on the road to clean off that disgusting taste in her mouth, one arm on her broom, using it as a support beam of sorts. "Who did this then?"

Wally seemed to catch up with her train of thoughts. "And why are we cleaning it?"

She glared at her broom, deep inside her mind hoping it would just fucking disappear. "Pretty sure it was Black Canary. She threw me this...smirk when I walked past her just while ago. " She coughed. "Way to be mature."

"Nah." Wally spoke, while he hadn't stopped mopping he had certainly gotten slower. "You should've seen the way Kal looked at me..."

There was a silence, almost dead other than occasional sounds of mopping and coughs, and was considerably eery. Food. Who would be able to get this much potato and wipe it on the-

Who, indeed?

They both spat the word like poison, in perfect unison. "Megan!"

Oh god, she was going to get her. She was going to shove hand grenades down her pants. She was going to feed her her own disgusting cookies one by one until she-

"Whoa."

She looked up, clearly annoyed. Unknown to him, Wally had just shattered that vivid image she had in mind. "What?"

The speedster did not answer, pointing at the sky instead, his mouth agape.

It was a shooting star. No, it was a handful of shooting stars...No, not quite, it was a fucking hurricane of shooting stars!

"Holy hell." She simply dropped the broom with a loud thwack, walking across the rotten food pool beside the speedster.

"Dude, that's odd." The speedster scratched his head, holding the broom (or at least, it was a broom at some point in the past) with one hand, one of his eyebrows high. "New Scientist didn't mention anything about star showers..." She raised one eyebrow. "Do me a favour and pretend you never heard that-"

"Shit!"

Within a second Artemis was doubled over in pain, her hands covering her face from a rather green gaze. That fucking hurt. First she was looking up at the sky wondering if she was supposed to make a wish or something, then there was pain, a horrendous pain, something piercing through her right eye followed by a constant feeling of something, needles, bees, stinging-

"You okay?" She felt his hand on her shoulder, the broom meeting the ground with a loud crack. "Artemis?"

"Y-Yeah..." She looked up, tears pouring down from her dark brown eyes like waterfall, one of her eyes shut tight. "Just got something in my eye..." She roughly rubbed off her shut eye, occasionally glancing up to him.

He eyed her warily. "You shouldn't-"

"Your chest."

He raised an eyebrow. "What?"

She pointed at somewhere on his upper torso. "Your chest is bleeding!"

He slowly moved his gaze down his body...His green shirt had turned quite a dark hue of red where his heart briskly beat, hungrily consuming the rest, he put a hand on his heart -why had he not felt that?- there was a tingling sensation of warmth and dampness, growing stronger each time his heart plunged forward.

"Ouch."


After half an hour of mindlessly pushing the game controller's buttons, Robin decided it wasn't just fun when there was no annoying, lousy speedster around to beat. Behind him Superboy threw him hurt glances-while he had no problem with the clone, he was tired of replacing broken controllers twenty times a week. And not to mention he was really no competition, the guy was indeed good at throwing punches but when it came to throwing cyber ones, he was a real failure.

He sighed. The smell of something burnt told him Megan was up to experimenting for the third time that day. Kaldur, sitting on another couch nearby, glanced up from his book, one of his eyebrows high. "Is there a problem, Robin?"

"Nah." He replied slowly. "When do you think Wally's gonna come back?"

"Probably not until sunrise." With that he went back to his book, Robin was pretty sure he saw corners of the Atlantean's mouth twitch. He raised one eyebrow. "Are you reading The Little Mermaid?"

The Atlantean did not bother to look up this time. "Yes."

"Oh."

He decided to be quiet about it and go back to his game.

Ten minutes of silence other than Robin's occasional groaning later, there was a strange beep echoing through the mountain, causing the Boy Wonder to drop his game controller with a loud thud, his eyes met the Atlantean's for briefest seconds before the three were engulfed by the dark.

"I didn't do anything." came baritone voice of the clone.

Robin stood up slowly. "What is happening?" Kaldur questioned, sounding confused than ever. Was this his first power shortage? Robin mentally snickered.

"I think the power went out." The Boy Wonder replied in a whisper. "And that's not normal."

He could hear the fish boy breathing somewhere near him-he had stood up and gotten closer to him, apparently. He opened his mouth to speak, to tell them that they should go check the main computer and probably circuits, but his ears, along with his thoughts, were devoured by a feminine scream.

"Megan!" The Boy of Steel roared, his roar echoed in his -poor- brain, followed by loud and crude steps.

"Dude, wait!" But the clone's steps were now almost inaudible, growing farther with each thud.

Crap. His hands went to his utility belt, seemingly blindly searching through pockets, although he knew everything in there by heart. A soft click was heard in the dark room, followed by a sigh -a happy, relieved sigh- and then the devouring black void was scared away by the flashlight in the Boy Wonder's hands.

"Never leave without your utility belt." He snickered quietly.

Aqualad's brows were furrowed in confusion and distress, his eyes taking their sweet time to apparently adjust to the newborn light. "We should follow him." He spoke quietly, almost warily.

The bird nodded quickly before the two, the leader and the soon-to-be leader of Young Justice, made a dash into the newly illuminated corridor, darkness making way for the two with each step.

"Superboy!" He called out to the clone – to his friend, as the two drew nearer to the kitchen where the other two were. Where they hoped their friends were.

But there was no answer. He stole a quick glance at the fish boy, who returned it with a worried look.

"OVER HE-" It was the clone's voice, he could recognize that anywhere, but it was quickly silenced -by what?-, suppressed. "Robin!" came a feminine voice as the two made it into the kitchen, flashlight in his hand bringing its occupants to surface.

There was Superboy-there was Superboy with Wally on his back trying to choke him, as the clone used one of his hands to keep the speedster stable on his back, while his other hand had gotten the blonde archer by her collar, said archer now floating mid-air. Behind the three stood Megan, plastered onto a wall, her face screaming shock, horror and pain. He assumed that pile of what looked like dog crap was her cookies.

And Superboy was angry.

"What the fuck is going on?" As the Boy Wonder spoke, the archer made a move-for Superboy's head, using the clone's own hands to stabilize herself while delivering a nice kick to his head. Which freed her from his steely grip, as the Boy of Steel plunged backwards, falling on top of Wally who...who didn't really react, what the hell was that?

He was just going to speak when a heavy punch was delivered to his face, probably cracking his cheekbone though he wasn't in the mood to examine, sending him right onto the ground with a loud thud and a yelp from his mouth, the flashlight in his hand escaping his grip.

"Artemis, please stop this!" She quickly replied to her team leader with a high kick, which was skilfully blocked by Aqualad with his right arm, who then got a hold of the archer's leg and tossed her-pretty much like thrash-onto the ground. She didn't even make a sound and this time Aqualad did notice it, as he warily stepped backwards, clearly unsure of what he was supposed to do.

A rookie mistake, much to his dismay. With a quick low kick the archer managed to dislocate the Atlantean off the ground, whose back heavily met with the solid floor as Megan emitted a sharp scream.

As for the Boy Wonder, he himself wasn't faring too well. Between trying to avoid Wally's freaking godspeed punches and telling the clone to not hit the speedster-whenever the clone hit something, it would break, so he often felt bad for the goons they had to squish during their missions- oh, and he was telling Wally to fucking stop it, but that wasn't faring too well either.

It was right then the archer jumped on him. He doubled over and with a swift move, threw her off his back, right onto the speedster who quickly lost his balance under the weight. The clone behind the speedster had been glued to a wall, not doing anything and just getting punched by the Wall-man - though if there was anything his gritted teeth told him under the flashlight it was that he was very, very mad - the wall that welcomed him had cracked under sheer pressure of the speedster's punches. "You know what," Robin spoke as the Boy of Steel threw him an annoyed look. "Just do your thing."

He nodded, though there was something in his dark blue eyes, something...painful. It was just then the speedster and the archer began floating mid-air. About time.

He turned behind to see Megan, hands held up high, an exhausted - not due to physical activity but emotional stress- Kaldur right beside her. "Barricade." he spoke. The bird pointed at the clone, quickly grabbing the flashlight, the speedster and his companion mindlessly struggling against the telepathic binds as they hastily made their way out of the kitchen, Megan being the last one to get out.

"Hold the door." Robin ordered, pulling out something from his utility belt. Superboy complied just as Megan freed the speedster and the archer, who, after briefly meeting the ground, made a dash for the door. It was quickly – and probably painfully – smashed into their faces by Superboy who spat , "Now what." between his gritted teeth.

Robin glanced up at Kaldur, then gave a quick nod. The two from the other side of the door were still struggling to pull the door open, which at last clarified that they were freaking insane. It was Superboy who held the door close after all.

"Okay." He raised his hand, occupied by something round and grey. "Move!"

With that the clone threw himself backwards, the door plunged open and Robin threw the small bat-get in his hand. It made a quick click and soon the door was hungrily devoured by ice. Behind it he could see Wally move, trying to punch through the ice, though Artemis was unable to do so as it had gotten a hold of her right leg.

Megan spoke quietly, almost like a whisper. "Why..." He turned away from her, as he hated seeing girls cry (he had no idea what he was supposed to do with them) instead resorting to focus his attention on Kaldur. "What now?" Apparently nobody in the team knew what to do with a crying girl as Superboy just focused his steely gaze on nothing and Kaldur just...pretended to not notice. Or something. It was sad to see that Wally was indeed the ladies' man of the team...However that worked.

"We contact the League." The bird nodded sharply before his hands reached out to his utility belt.

"What..." It was the clone. "Happened to them? They look like zomie-som..."

"Zombies." Megan whispered, tears illuminating her face like stars. "Like that movie. Maybe they were infected by a virus..."

Kaldur refrained from commenting, as he had little knowledge on the subject. He had refused to watch that movie anyway (Robin suspected he was afraid of watching scary movies).

Robin rolled his eyes behind his sunglasses. "Don't be ridiculous!" he said loudly. "That only happens in movies." Megan's eyebrows rose up high, her eyes widening, a sigh of relief escaping her lips.

Or so I hope. But he didn't voice his thoughts and was once again glad the alien was...nice enough to not pry into his thoughts.

Another light, this time coming from the device in his hand, blended in with the flashlight's. "Well, that's odd." Static could be heard in the corridor. "It's not...working."

Megan sobbed. Robin knew she tried to be quiet, but it hadn't worked.

Something small radiating in a yellow hue told him that Kaldur was attempting to contact his mentor. "No response." His brows were almost one.

"This makes me angry."

"Yeah, I feel ya." Robin spoke. "We can try the main computer...I have a few batteries and I can get it working, but I'm gonna need time."

Kaldur nodded quickly. "Let's go."

The two led the way, flashlight again occupying the Boy Wonder's hand, as Megan glanced back warily and got a hold of Superboy's tee. She had stopped crying, but it was crystal clear that the alien was horrified, especially about her teammates and friends attacking her. Had she done something wrong? Something so horrible to deserve that?

"Well," Superboy tried to reassure her, quickly sparing a glance behind as he spoke. "At least they won't be getting out of that anytime soon."


"God damn it!" A pale fist roughly met with the machine that housed every system in the mountain. If it was any other time but this, he would've regretted his actions. He loved machines. He loved computers!

Well, probably not anymore.

Behind him he could see Kaldur tiredly massaging his temples, illuminated by screens' light. Megan and Superboy sat even farther, almost hidden by the dark, Megan still sobbing quietly as the clone beside her occasionally glanced up to her, looking pretty confused and embarrassed.

"I can't find what's causing..." the Boy Wonder gritted his teeth. "...this. I swear I tried everything-everything's normal, fucking normal! Why isn't it working?"

"We should just go handle things ourselves." the clone spat.

He turned to face him, his glare hidden by his jet-black sunglasses. "And get effected by whatever hit Wally and Artemis?" He asked, though his question was quickly shot down by Megan's sobbing.

The Atlantean seemed lost in thought, drops of sweat occasionally gleaming on his dark skin. "We must contact the League." Somewhere in the dark, the clone groaned.

"I suppose we can just ride there or something." Robin offered, clearly still unhappy about the computer.

"Can you...show us the surveillance cameras, Robin?"

"Yeah." He focused his eyes on the screens before him, quickly typing away on the keyboard. "Here are...Wow."

"That doesn't look like clear weather." Superboy stood up as Robin warily eyed him. "Well, the weather channel said it was going to be a dandy evening." He stated almost apolitically.

"Well, whatever the fuck it is, it sure as hell ain't normal." The Boy Wonder spat. "It's shining and all."

There wasn't a clear sky, indeed, it was raining, raining something that resembled diamond dust that sparkled in seven colours of rainbow whenever the little lights of surveillance cams reflected on them.

"It's..." Megan spoke softly, almost in a daze. "...raining stars."

And that was just what Robin needed anyway.

The Atlantean crossed his arms as he spoke. "I believe it is safe to assume they are what caused..." He inhaled deeply. "...our teammates' current-"

His words were cut short. There was a feminine yelp, a groan, darkness-the batteries had ran out, leaving them once again in a dark void.

"What, so now we're stuck here?" The clone's brows were furrowed in anger. The Atlantean opened his mouth to reply, but Robin beat him to it. "I think I have an...idea."

Immediately three pairs of different coloured eyes turned on him, unseen to the bird. The clone raised an eyebrow. "Well, speak."

"...I don't think you're gonna like it."


"What is it like in sewers?"

The Boy Wonder rolled his eyes at the clone's question. "It smells. It's wet. It's dark. Satisfied?"

"Are there white crocodiles?"

"No." He spat. Because that only happens in movies..."...Maybe."

Superboy's eyebrows rose up high. "So there are white crocodiles?"

"But that's not normal, is it?" Megan spoke (she had stopped crying just minutes ago). "Crocodiles are green."

"There are no," Kaldur sighed wearily. "no, no crocodiles in anywhere near this area."

The Boy Wonder raised an eyebrow.

"My King and I partake in missions to...protect our environment. " He stated quietly.

Robin decided to shut up and focus on the darkness before him instead.

They walked in suffocating silence for a few seconds, flashlight still in his hand-when had he become the flashlighter of the team anyway?

"Uh." He decided to kill the silence, ignoring the fact that everything was like a world-end-bam-slam-zombie-apocalypse movie and that it creeped the fuck out of him. "So you walk around in sewers with your mentor?"

The Atlantean pursed his lips. "We-"

"Uh, guys."

Robin sighed. "No, Supey, no crocodiles-"

There was a crack. A loud crack. He had squished something with his boot, he looked down (what he had in mind was the shattered skull of a certain speedster by then) to see-

"Ice." He knew what it was, but hearing it from the Atlantean's lips almost froze his veins.

"That...can't be good."


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