A/N: We don't own anything except our OC's, the rest belongs to DC and Warner Bros. But hope you guys like this chapter. For me it was really fun to write.

Nat's POV

MOUNT JUSTICE

JANUARY 11TH 07:15 EST

"Nat get up now, before I burn the sheets."

I groaned and pulled the covers over my head, trying to block out Rachel's yelling. I mean, sometimes she was like a tyrannical older sister. The first day of school is terrible, but moving in the middle of term... I've done that once and I do not want to be doing that again. Today though, I didn't seem to have any choice. Rachel hoisted up the one side of the bed, meanwhile I went flying off in a tangle of blankets.

"Ugh whyyyyyyy?"

She ripped the blanket away and yanked me up. I rubbed my eyes trying to fight of the tiredness, and it worked the moment I saw her school uniform. "Well don't you look spiffy."

She glared coldly at me. "It's not funny, Nat. Look, I have to go to school now, but you have an hour to get ready before you have to Zeta to Central City,

got it?" I nodded, then flopped face down onto the bed. She sighed and pulled me back up. "C'mon, Nat, don't make me do this. I can't drag you to school."

I picked up my watch and put it on my wrist. "Don't you have somewhere to be?"

"Yes, so don't make me come back here to find out you were late."

I did a little salute. "Ma'am yes ma'am." She pressed a Post-it to my forehead and left the room. Taking it off slowly I saw a small note. Good luck Nat. "You too Hothead." I took the clothes I picked out last night off my dresser- long sleeve black shirt, ripped jeans, purple converse with one green lace and one black lace, and my favorite green jacket. I took my headband from the nightstand and got changed, pulling my hair into a classic ponytail.

"Tada."

Then I took out my phone from my jacket pocket, pulling up the background. Five year old me with pigtails dressed up as Irey West's Impulse and seven year old Rachel as Cleopatra in a blue toga thing. It brought back so many memories, but one had to admit - I was darn adorable. Smiling slightly I put it back in my pocket, then glared at my book across the room. In a frenzy it flew at me and knocked me down to the ground. "Well, this is just going to be perfect now isn't it?" And now I'm talking to myself. Way to go Nat.

Rachel's POV

GOTHAM CITY

JANUARY 11TH 7:35 EST

I tried to pull my skirt down to no avail. I heard a slight buzzing coming from my bag and pulled out the headphones. Quickly I put them on and pressed a small button on the one side."You sure you're okay going here?" asked Nightwing through the earpiece hidden in the headphone.

"Me? Here? Sure. I've moved, like, a billion times. No biggie," I lied, cracking my knuckles nervously. Who was I kidding? I'd gone to the same school my entire life. Good god, I couldn't wrap my head around going to my old high school with my entire normal freshman class, much less a school for preps with a dress code and everything.

"Alright, he said, and a burst of static told me he had hung up.

I played with the headphone cord, pressing it between my thumb and thumbnail on each hand. Nightwing had given me a map of the school and a list of my teachers (along with advice on each of them), and I studied it nervously. Then I felt someone tap my shoulder and I spun around as fast as I could to find a boy an inch shorter than me with black hair and blue eyes. Putting my headphones back in my bag I said, "Can I help you?"

"I'm Tim Drake, your student liaison for your first couple of days until you get to know where everything is."

I smirked. "Hi Rob."

His jaw dropped. "How... I mean how did you... did any... how do you..." I patted his shoulder.

"Don't hurt yourself buddy. Different dimension, remember? Besides, Nat made me sound off every Robin in the comics when she dragged me to the comic book store. But don't worry, your secret's safe with me, kid."

He cleared his throat nervously. "Well, ok?"

"Yep."

"Well, you've got fifteen minutes to get to class, put all your stuff in your locker, make new friends, etc., etc., but the teachers will be a bit flexible with you, seeing as you're new and stuff. Then - your schedule is in the front page of your binder?"

He was peering over my shoulder at my books. I pulled them closer to my chest. "Yes..."

"Ah, that's weird. We all have plain-faced binders. Move that to the inside, okay?"

"Uh..."

"Nice dress design, too. Have you ever considered going into -"

"Stop looking at my stuff!"

"Alright, alright, no need to go up in flames."

"Don't say -"

"Oh, hey, friends. Your locker's down the hall, to the right, about half down the hallway. Number 130. See you later."

"Uh..." I started, but Tim had already skirted through the crowd of kids all dressed exactly the same.

"Well, shit," I cursed softly, looking around. Although I knew it was probably bad, I hunched my shoulders, shielding my precious art from any prying eyes. With any luck, I might be able to finish the girl I was drawing by the end of the day. I glanced down at her for one second, admiring Nat's idea to have her hair done up in a neat bun rather than a ponytail -

Crash!

Well, shit.

I sat up, rubbing my head. I reached into my lap, looking for my art...

...which was scattered across the floor and now being trampled by cute heels and Nike sneakers.

"No!" I shouted, lashing out for them. I pulled them against me, and counted them. Four? I had seven before I ran into that person!

"Hello? Are you okay?" A hand waved in front of my face, and I blinked.

"Oh - oh, yeah, I'm fine."

"Okay. Hey, these are really good!" She held up a picture and examined it. I couldn't believe her eyes were that black. Really, they had to be contacts. She had a pixie cut similar to the haircut of Matt Smith, and a bright green scarf wrapped around her neck. She smiled at me, revealing her sunburned cheeks.

"Uh, thanks." I grabbed them from her none too gently, and, for the heck of it, introduced myself. "I'm Rachel Pate."

"Cool! My name's Julia," she said, standing up and offering me a hand. As I stood, I saw a folder marked "Band" in her arms.

"You're in band?"

"Yeah. Are you in band? What do you play?"

"I play the flute."

"Oh, cool! I do, too!" I smiled nervously at her, and she beamed back at me. "So, do you have it with you?"

"Uh, no."

"Well let's go to the band room and ask if you can rent out one." This was going to be the start of a wonderful friendship.

Nat's POV

CENTRAL CITY

JANUARY 11TH 7:40 CST

Staring up at the school in front of me it reminded me of two things. I hated the first day of school and I'm short. Pretty freaking short, I mean, even the sixth graders running past me were at least two inches taller. Damn little... no, I was going to try and be positive today. Static sounded through my headphones and I heard Nightwing. "Any questions?"

"No, but maybe you'll help me in Geometry."

I heard him cough - which may or may not have been used to conceal a laugh - and he spoke again. "Well, good luck. Nightwing out." Static again, then silence. I hooked them around my neck and sighed. I wanted to go to the same school as Rachel, but apparently there was a better science program here, but... for some reason I wasn't really convinced. I walked into the school office and saw two office ladies behind the desk and a girl probably in my grade. Her long sandy blonde hair was tied back in a high ponytail, a way that in my old school I tended to avoid those who wore it that way. I walked up to the closest woman.

"Hi, I'm Natalia Hartly, I'm supposed to start here."

She smiled, her thin lips much too red. "Oh, of course, deary. You're the newest eighth

grader. Carrie, come here." The girl walked over. "This is Carrie Cazney. She's going to be your school tour guide. I assume you already have your schedule." I took it out of my bag and showed it to her. "Perfect. Carrie, can you show Natalia to her locker?"

"Sure thing. C'mon." I followed her out of the office, into the chaos that was middle school. "Oh, watch out." She pulled me to the side as a kid flew down the hall on his skateboard, then shook her fist at him. "Pete, sometimes I think you want to be in detention!"

As he turned the corner, he yelled. "Freedom, babe!"

Carrie rolled her eyes. "Pete's, well, pretty much..."

"A bad boy wannabe, that is also an idiot?"

She laughed. "How did you know?"

I smiled. "It's a gift." She pointed to one of the lockers and handed me a piece of

paper with the locker combo. "Uh, thanks."

"Hey, tour guide remember? And you need a friend being new and all." I wanted to say I had plenty of friends, but who did I have besides Rachel? I meant, Gar kinda acted like a little brother, which I'm totally cool with - except when he turned into a monkey and sat on my head while I was trying to sew up my costume. Then Robin just kept to himself, Wonder Girl was perky - really perky -, Batgirl and Bumblebee were a little too mature for their own good, Blue was still just talking to his scarab. The rest?

I shook myself out of my thoughts to see Carrie looking at me expectantly. "Well, sure.

What the heck?"

Carrie showed me to every class - she herself was in nearly all of them - and by the time it was eighth period American History, I was exhausted. I was sat next to Carrie - who had a habit of flipping her hair way too close to whipping my face- and a jock sort of guy named Johnny I think - who had a habit of looking at everyone else's notes. It didn't affect me of course, the teacher was going on about something I had already learned, and I was just waiting out the last ten minutes of the day, doodling. I couldn't draw very well, but it was still better than doing nothing.

It seemed that Carrie could tell I wasn't paying attention, she hit my arm. I flinched, but pretended I didn't care. At last I heard that oh so beautiful last bell and immediately ran to my locker, grabbed my stuff, and made my way out of that blasted school. But just as I was home free to make my way to the Zeta-tube, I heard Carrie again.

"Hey, Nat, wait up!" I sighed, this wasn't going to be good. "Hey, which way are you going?"

This is when my superb skills at lying - not that I used them often - kicked in. "Oh, I'm actually going to pick up some stuff for my mom before I go home."

"Oh, ok. I'll, I'll see you tomorrow then."

I smiled. "Sure thing." When she was out of my sight, I ran down to the Zeta-tube disguised as a call box.

"Recognized. Kinetica, B23." I was transported to the Cave in a matter of seconds, my watch going to the right time of 3:37 EST. Stupid time change. Rachel ran towards me, out of her school uniform, and shook me.

"Well, how was Central City?"

"Could you stop?" She did, and I continued. "It was fine."

"Well, Gotham was cool, you know, despite having those stupid uniforms."

"Uh huh." I opened up my bag, searching for something I grabbed at lunch.

"Nat, are you listening to me?"

"Nope. But keep talking while I walk." I made my way down the corridors to the rooms, Rachel talking about what happened at her school, including making Tim stutter for a good minute and a half. I, of course, didn't say anything until we got to our room, and I hopped onto my bed, still looking through my backpack. How hard was it to...ha!

"There you are, you little bastard." I pulled out my king sized Kit Kat, still intact I might add. I tossed my bag onto the ground. "Ok, now when you talk I'm gonna respond."

Unwrapping my candy bar I basically heard Rachel glare. "And where did you get that?"

"Vending machine at school. And no, you can't have any. I had to deal with a tour guide that was worse that at least seven of you put together."

"You're a terrible friend, you know that?"

"Love you too, Rach." I stood up, breaking off the first bar of the Kit Kat, when you'll never believe what happened. A green monkey shot into the room took my Kit Kat bar I was holding and ran off.

"Gar!" Then I sighed, and flopped back down. "I'm too tired to run after him."

"Ooh, what did you have first?"

I just groaned and ate my candy bar.

"Nat, I can't help if you don't tell me."

I grabbed an eraser out of my bag and threw it at her. "Oh solve your own problems first."

"Like what?"

I bit into another bar, and she glared at me. I raised an eyebrow saying You want me to talk with my mouth full? It was silent till I was done, then I smiled. "You know exactly what problems I'm talkin' about."

"That... that's not an answer!"

"Sure it is, just not the one you wanted." And that's what we did for the next few weeks, and getting to go on patrols, which were really cool.

Rachel's POV

WASHINGTON D.C.

FEBRUARY 13TH 21:15 EST

I sat on the edge of the building overlooking the Mall, and the Hall of Justice. Nat was next to me, doing a handstand. We were on patrol tonight for anything suspicious, and Nat decided on Washington D.C. I knew why, but that still didn't make it fun. "Kinetica you're going to hurt yourself."

"Really, you're pulling big sister act? Shame." She turned so she was perpendicular to the roof, then flipped back onto her feet. "Ha, who says that I don't have coordination."

"Everyone."

She pointed at me. "Exactly, until I got powers. Now, boom, splendiferous coordination."

I rolled my eyes. "Really, splendiferous?"

She nodded. "It's a perfectly good word. Besides, it fits it perfectly. But on a different note, it's nearly Valentine's Day."

"So?"

She shrugged. "I don't know, I was just wondering when Blue was going to turn into your favorite color, because you sure seem to like looking at it so much."

"Was that..."

"A nonchalant way to say that it's obvious you have a crush on Blue Beetle? Yes, yes it was."

"I do not like Blue. I mean, I guess he's a friend, but..."

She sat down next to me. "Please, girl, you have it bad for the beetle. Remember just yesterday when you saw him, you got so red I thought,"

"OKAY!" I cut her off, a blush coming on. So what if he was a little attractive? And you know, nice and sweet? What am I talking about? "Look, I don't like him in the way you're thinking of, that's for sure."

"Uh huh, sure."

"I..."

She raised a hand to tell me to stop, her face suddenly serious. "I think it's time. Look." She pointed down near the Hall of Justice, where the Super-Cycle flew down, with Superboy, Wolf, and Blue Beetle driving. I started to stand, but she shoved me back down. "Hold your horses, Lovebug. Ha, that's a pun in itself." Sometimes Nat was odd like that. One minute laughable and happy about everything, then serious and jaded.

"But they're..."

"I know, but we follow."

I sighed. "This is a stupid plan."

"Yet, every genius plan fails and every stupid plan works perfectly."

I glanced at her. "Then this is a genius plan."

She glared, her smiled dying. "You were a genius plan."

"Really?"

In a snobbish voice she mimicked me. "Really?" Then a huge bang erupted from the Hall. The Appelaxian gollem came from the side of the Hall, and I had to say it was a lot bigger than I thought it would be. We watched as they tried to fight it, but failed, and it flew off with the two Intergang members.

"Now?"

She nodded. "Now."

ARLINGTON

FEBRUARY 13TH 22:40 EST

We tried following close behind the Super-Cycle hoping to go unnoticed, but Wolf quickly saw us and barked. The Cycle stopped and we were caught red handed. Superboy raised an eyebrow at us. "What are you doing here?"

I smiled sheepishly. "We were on patrol, and we saw that thing fly off..."

Nat cut in. "Appelaxian gollem."

"Right, that. So we followed after it and ended up behind you guys."

He sighed. "Fine, get in." The Cycle chirped happily and extended the back seat. Nat took the side, so I was between her and Blue. Well, this wasn't awkward in the least.

Blue spoke up, if only to break the silence. "So what's an Appellaxi-whatever?"

Nat raised her head up, excited that she got to talk about her superhero stuff. "Seriously? It's what brought the Justice League together. The Appelaxians were an alien race of energy beings that took the hosts of those husks that created the gollem. One of them was crystal that could redirect sonics. So when the Justice League came together and defeated them, they kept the husks as trophies."

I butted in. "So, Intergang must've used Apokoliptic tech to reanimate the husks and mold together into one giant gollem."

She nodded. "Exactly." She looked at Superboy. "Did that cover everything?"

He nodded. "Sphere's tracking it's energy readings, we're closing in."

I gave a thumbs up. "Yay."

Nat's POV

We heard the endings of Whisper and Ugly's conversation. "And with dis as my enforcer, I can expand Intergang's reach exponentially."

Superboy yelled out to him as the Super-Cycle lowered down. "Wow, five syllables. I didn't think you knew any words with more than two."

Ugly sneered. "Hilarious, but let's see who's laughin' when I..."

"Hey, Geno-Sphere, block all Apokoliptic signals in the area." The device in Ugly's hand shorted out and the gollem was free of it's control. But, was that a good thing? It hit the two thugs across the valley, then slammed the Super-Cycle out of the air. Rachel and I jumped out, me levitating both of us to the ground.

"Uh, it might be a good time to..." I pointed to her.

"Right!" She light up it orange flames and shot up to attack the gollem. I quickly gave myself long sleeves then used telekinesis to uproot one of the trees and thrust it at the gollem. I wrapped it around the legs and rooted it back in the ground. Suddenly, roots came out of the ground and hit me a good ten feet. I was going to feel that one later.

By the time I was able to sit up, the gollem was already gone to the power plant, and Superboy held Whisper and Ugly by their collars. I walked up with Rachel, Blue, and Wolf. Superboy turned to Blue. "Lock 'em down."

He switched to that stupid staple mode and 'stapled' Whisper and Ugly to the tree. Suddenly he shuttered. "Eeeeww, no."

I glanced at Rachel, then walked after Superboy, leaving them to themselves. The weirdos they are and all. We hopped into the Super-Cycle as Supes yelled. "Blue, fight your inner demons later."

"Demon," he said as Rachel got in beside me. "Singular. One's enough, believe me." Yeah, I knew what he was talking about except for the fact that I had demons. Plural. We took off after the gollem, jumping into attack mode as we were over the power plant. Rachel lit up like a candle.

"Nat, what do we do?"

I shrugged. "I don't wanna hurt it, but until they figure out how to talk to it..."

"Yeah, gotcha." Blue tried to staple it down, but that didn't seem to work. Obviously.

Superboy looked at me. "Can't you take it apart?"

I dodged a huge hand, then yelled down to him. "Am I glowing a bright green? No, so I can't!" A burning Rachel came flying at me, and I put up a shield to block as we fell to the ground.

Blue struggled to get up. "I don't suppose we could ask it to play nice?"

Rachel rolled onto her back. "Now you have the right idea, Bugboy."

"Wait, it's possible?"

She smiled at him. "The scarab knows how."

Rachel's POV

Blue stood up, his one arm transformed into a sonic blaster thingy. "Blue, do it now!" He shot the sonics out and when it reached the gollem, red rings came back at him and he himself glowed a dim red. Superboy was shocked and tried to break the connection.

"Blue, stop before it kills you."

Nat limped over. "It's not attacking, it's communicating."

Blue's eyes went full gold and the voice that sound more like the scarab came out. "We bare the stillness of wood, of stone, of crystal, of metal. All is noise, all is life - is pain. We sense the power in this place, power enough to destroy us, to end the pain. To be still once again."

Nat looked up at the gollem. "We'll help you."

Then a second sonic came from behind, and the Appelaxian was... destroyed. Black Beetle, I remembered that much from this episode. Blue fell down, unconscious, but I caught him, placing his head in my lap. Two guards came and congratulated us on destroying the gollem, but it wasn't worth congratulating.

Ashes rained down, glowing like fireflies I had once seen outside at a family reunion. It would have been prettier if I knew they weren't the remnants of something terribly sad and terribly misused. Blue opened his eyes.

"It was... alive, but now it's gone. Who attacked, who killed it?" I just shook my head. I couldn't say anything, couldn't tell him. Superboy came over holding Nat up as she limped, her ankle twisted.

"Someone ugly," Superboy said, with an angry look at the tree line.

Nat's POV

MOUNT JUSTICE

FEBRUARY 14TH 00:25 EST

We found Ugly and Whisper, but they were... comatose almost. It was weird. We took them to Belle Reve, but I still don't know what happened to them. When we got back to the Cave, it was well after midnight. I sat on one of the hospital beds as Superboy handed me wrapping for my ankle. "Thanks." I had changed out of my uniform into pajamas.

"No problem." I straightened my ankle, grimacing at the pain. Wrapping it up tight, I sighed.

"Thanks for, you know, not telling us to go back to patrol."

"I wouldn't want someone doing that to me."

Standing warily on my feet, I walked over to the Tylenol and swallowed two of them, and noticing Blue and Rachel talking. "Hmm." Two little lovebirds, quite the cute couple. But what to call it.

I got it. They were Firebeetle.

Unknown POV

NEW YORK CITY

FEBURARY 15TH 23:15 EST

I sat at the bus stop, trying to fight away the cold. This was what, the fourth time I had run away from a foster home? The last one had been fairly similar to the others- the pervy dad, prissy mom, and obnoxious children- but somehow it had been worse. By the third month I couldn't take it anymore and snuck out in the middle of the night with a small backpack filled with everything I owned. That was how I had ended up here, shivering in my thin jacket on the dark and deserted bench, waiting for the next bus.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw two men heading towards me. I had lived in the city all my life and knew that when two men approached a girl, there was no way in hell they had good intentions. I slowly got up and walked down the street, not wanting to run and catch their attention. If I hurried, I could make it to the abandoned building down the block before they caught up to me. As I turned a corner and looked back to see if they had followed, a huge form slammed into me. I couldn't make out any features as I fell to the ground only the deep maniacal laughter. I hit the ground head first, grinding my teeth at the pain. The two men from before stood over me, and a third figure loomed behind them. As black dots swarmed my vision, I tried to make something- anything- happen. Nothing did. As I opened my mouth to scream for help a huge black boot slammed into my head, and then the blackness overwhelmed me.

A/N: Hey guys, trivia question! Some of the characters in this chapter are based off of real people. Can you name them all? Sorry there's no prizey thingy, I was just too tired to come up with anything.