Chapter 4: My Team

Authors Note: Thank you all once again for your reviews and your amazing characters. I am going to be introducing them all in this chapter and the next. So I hope you all enjoy.

Disclaimer: I do not own the JLA.


"What do you mean he isn't Gauntlet?" Sparrow asked. After leaving Firefly to the cops, Shadow had brought, Gauntlet in for interrogation. When their mother heard about this she came down to the holding cells and held up a data pad with all of his information.

"I mean he isn't the original Gauntlet." Ally explained. "He is his son, Cecil Jackson, age seventeen. His mother and father, both Gauntlet and Huntress were based out in Europe."

"Why were they out in Europe?" Shadow asked.

"They wanted to dig up more about Sam's powers." Ally explained. "I also wanted to know more about myself and other Elementals with these powers. When they were in Rome they met up with a group known as the Immortals, people who were selected by the ancient gods and were granted with their power."

"So why is he here?" Shadow asked.

"I don't know, but I do know that Sam told me that he was sending him and Kris out to Gotham. He also gave me strict instructions not to let Cecil wear the Gauntlets of Vulcan." Ally snapped.

"Well he only has one of them on so no harm no foul." Sparrow shrugged.

"Sam knows those Gauntlets, they chose him." She explained. "And if he removed them it was for a reason and if he didn't want his son to wear them than he had a really good reason."

Ally pushed passed her kids and she made her way into the holding cell. Cecil looked up at her with his blue eyes and he merely shrugged.

"You here to yell at me?" He asked in an unimpressed tone.

"What happened to your father and the immortals?" She asked.

"I don't know." He sighed. "I only ever met them once. The leader Midas found my parents and he and my father became partners in their organization."

"King Midas?" Ally asked skeptically. "As in the man who turns things to gold with his hand, Midas?"

"That's him." He stated. "And no, I didn't trust him."

"Where is he, your father?"

"Hell if I know, after Midas passed away my dad became the new leader. I wanted to help him, but know he didn't want me to get involved. So, he sends me back to Gotham with mom and a pair of magic gloves."

"Which he told you not to wear." She reminded him in a stern tone. Cecil stood up and was now face to face with the Shadow Warriors leader. His right eye was twitching, but Ally remained still and calm.

"Someone took a shot at the villa we were staying at and blew it up with my father inside!" He shouted. "My mother was unconscious, I didn't know what had happened, but I was alone and scared and I did what I had to do!"

"Then where is the other one?" She asked he just snickered.

"I don't have another one." He held up his right arm and his left hand. His right arm was a full metal arm and his left hand was a leather metal glove. "They broke into separate pieces. They work, but just different from my fathers."

"Different how?"

"That is none of your business." He said. Ally scowled as he looked over at the door to see his mother. "All that you need to know is that I am on your side."

"Yes, but you are not on my team." She said.

"Rumor has it you don't have a team, just employees." He chuckled. "You know my father did say that you became an ice queen after your husband's death."

"Cecil, enough!" Kris shouted before grabbing her son by his arm and dragging him out of the holding cell. Shadow and Sparrow watched as the two of them left. Shadow glared at Ally while she walks out of the cell.

"What the hell was that all about?" She snapped.

"It was an interrogation." She replied. Shadow took her mask off and pulled her hood down.

"You know what I mean, why did you treat him like that. He is the son of a Shadow Warrior."

"He also disobeyed his father and put on tools no mortal man can wield."

"You didn't see him when he fought Firefly."

"I know what those things can do and in the wrong hands they can be no different than giving a child a loaded handgun."

"Oh my god, you don't trust anyone to do anything do you!?" Shauna snapped.

"I trust myself and my judgement. If you don't like it leave." Shauna was stunned at what her mother had just said to her. She said she trusted herself and her judgement, but her or Jake weren't on that list of trustees.

"You know what, I am done with you." Shauna sighed. "I don't know what happened to you, but you are not the mother I had when I was a girl and you are not the person you were when Dad was around. I'm out of here."

She turned her back on her mother and stormed out of the holding cells.

(!)

"Shauna!" Jake shouted as he caught up to her in the locker rooms.

"What?" Shauna sighed as she packed up her gear. She was now dressed in her purple hoodie and black jeans.

"What are you doing?" He asked in disbelief. "Are you seriously going to leave the Warriors?" Shauna merely snorted.

"What Warriors?" She retorted bitterly. "All we ever do is patrol Gotham. The rest of the Warriors are either retired, dead or off the grid."

"Yeah, but mom she did things outside of Gotham." Jake stated. "She saved those troops in Afghanistan and in Star City she helped to protect it from Slade and his super soldiers. The Shadow Warriors are still helping to keep this world safe."

"And meanwhile we are busting up arms deals and meth kitchens." Shauna groaned. "Things that Aunt Barbara can handle before lunch. Face it we are just the cleaners mopping up the messes. I want to make a real difference. Not this petty shit."

"Those guns needed to be taken care of though we made a huge difference that night!" Jake defended. He didn't like how Shauna was belittling all the good they were doing for Gotham.

"Yes and meanwhile there is a psycho going around cutting off people's faces." Shauna said while checking her magnum. She looked over her shoulder and sported a smug grin when she saw her brother's confused face. "Mom didn't tell you, did she?"

"No, she also didn't tell me that there were these con artists out there posing as a school to kidnap special kids." Jake explained before sitting down on the bench. He let out a heavy breath before looking up at his sister. "At least she wasn't lying. She does only trust herself."

"I use to think it was because she was protecting us, but she was just weary of us." She said as she zipped up her bag. "I'm going to go and start my own team, just like I always wanted."

"What about me?" Jake asked. She just shrugged.

"What about you, come with me and we can be our own warriors." She said.

"What about a base of operations?" He asked.

"I got that taken care of, now are you in or out?" She asked, not leaving much room to argue.

"I'm in I mean who else am I going to work with?" He asked rhetorically.

"Okay, great. Now for our next order of business, recruitment." She pondered this for a moment. "We need new blood, not mom's men they would never allow it."

"Well, there are these twins I met. They are…creepy, but they are talented and I don't think mom is planning on making them warriors as far as I know."

"Yeah, and there is this other kid by the name of Mike, he is a bit unhinged, but I know I can get him to control his power." She said. "Okay, that makes five of us."

"Technically four," Shauna raised an eyebrow at Jake who just shrugged his shoulder. "Stephan and Maria work better together as one and if they separate they go into shock."

"Terrific." She groaned. "Okay, I'll go home and check my list of candidates and I will call you on where we will meet, okay?"

"Okay, I'll see you."

"Yup."

(!)

Shauna walked through the door of her apartment and was greeted with the scent of her favorite Italian dish, lasagna. She set her bags down by the door and tip-toed into the living room and towards the kitchen. She spotted her love, or rather her butt, as she bent down and retrieved the dish out of the oven.

Shauna watched as she set the dish on top of the stove and she quickly made her way over to her and wrapped her arms around her waist. Her girlfriend let out a gasp , but smiled when she saw it was Shauna.

"Hello my dear." She giggled as she felt Shauna rub the tip of her nose into her soft black hair.

"Hey, Tara." Shauna smiled. "Did you make dinner?"

"Yes, lasagna, your favorite." She giggled even louder when she felt Shauna sniff her neck.

"Smells so good."

"I know how you like it." Tara swooned.

"I wasn't talking about dinner." Shauna whispered.

"Neither was I."

Tara leaned forward and pressed her lips softly against her lovers. The two stood there for a moment passionately kissing, but while they kissed, Shauna heard a distinct noise in the background. It was a little faint, but it sounded like opera music.

"You hear that?" She asked as she pulled away from her lover.

"Yeah, some neighbor must have left it on." She sighed. "Come on, let's eat."

"Hey, you're not getting off the hook that easily." Shauna giggled as she tried to grab Tara, but her girlfriend skipped out into the dining room before she could grab her.

After a little more fooling around the two decided finally sit down and eat together. The rest of their evening was calm and relaxing to the point where Shauna didn't even think about her mother or the warriors.

After a while the two decided to go to bed, both stripping to their panties and t-shirts. Shauna crawled behind Tara and wrapped her arms around her, spooning her lovingly. Tara was a heavy sleeper and passed out almost instantly.

Shauna on the other hand had no such luxury. Since her training required her to heighten her senses she could hear almost everything around her. The pipes running every time a faucet comes on or the heat expanding the floor boards and vents, but the one thing that had kept her awake was that freaking opera music. It was playing on a loop too so it would just repeat over and over again.

Those neighbors were starting to-wait they were on the top floor of the apartment building the floor above was just for maintenance. There were no neighbors to annoy them.

She slowly unwrapped herself from Tara and pulled the covers over her. She picked her pants up off the ground and slid them on before walking over to her bag by the door and opening it to pull out her .44 Shepard.

She walked out of the apartment and up the stairs to the top floor and with every step the music grew louder and louder. When she finally made it to the top floor the music was loud enough to blow her eardrums out.

Shauna slowly turned the corner from the stairs and finally found where the music was coming from.

A bright light shined on a body nailed to the wall, like Christ's crucifixion, and it was coved in a pair of pink scrubs and its face was completely wrapped in bandages. The words, 'IMPERFECT' was written above its head.

Shauna pulled her cellphone out and dialed her aunt's phone number.

"Aunt Barbara, its Shauna." She said. "I have a bit of a situation here at my apartment building." She said as he stood before the corpse before her. "How bad, pretty fucked up."

(!)

Around three in the afternoon the next day, Shauna was sitting at her favorite café sipping her cappuccino while looking over her dossiers. She waited for Jake to get out of school so they could start recruiting their troops.

"Shauna!" Jake called out. "I heard about what happened."

"Yeah, it was completely screwed." She snapped. "Which is why we need to start recruiting."

"Did mom call you?"

"No now as for our first recruit." She said as she looked down at her dossier.

"This one is interesting." She explained. "She is a former Cadmus experiment known as Vortex, apparently she was having a struggle paying her rent and decided to do some testing, that 'never happened' in a place that 'doesn't exist'. She is kind of like mom and has the power to control air and create tornadoes and there she goes." Shauna said as she pointed at something behind Jake.

He saw a young woman walk out of the coffee shop, wearing a pink flannel shirt over a tank-top with some torn jeans and grey converse shoes. Her hair was a beautiful light brown and for a moment she glanced at Jake with her hazel eyes and smiled at him.

"Who is she?" He asked.

"Daniella Peters, age twenty-three." She explained. "But how about we go and introduce ourselves."

(!)

"So, wait you two are actually related to Batman?" Daniella asked in disbelief.

"He is our grandfather." Jake explained.

"That also means that you two are related to Shadow."

"I am the new Shadow, so yes." Shauna explained.

"What do you want with me? I don't really use my powers that much."

"And that's why we want you, to use your powers." Shauna said. "I am putting a team together and I want you to be a part of it."

"I don't know, don't you guys kill people?" She asked in an uneasy tone.

"Not always, we've been staying our hand recently." Shauna said. "And you could easily take down people, non-lethal of course, with your powers."

"Hmm, I guess." She said. "I kind of have someone who is after me. I don't want anyone to get hurt because of me, but if he were to come after me…"

"He would regret every second of it." She explained.

"Okay, I am in." She nodded. "And call me Dany, please."

"Sure thing, Dany." Jake smiled.

(!)

"So why are we going after these two…things?" Jake asked in a nervous tone.

"Don't call them that." Shauna said. "These two are definitely, must haves, we need for the team."

"Where do they come from?" He asked.

"I found this file in dad's archives and they were old." She stated before walking into the elevator of the large building they were visiting. "Have you ever heard of, The Outworld incident?"

"No." Jake said as he leaned against the wall.

"Well, back when Grandpa was still Batman, and the JLA was just starting up, they encountered these weird beams of light all over the planet. These lights turned out to be rifts that actually merged our planet with another planet from another dimension."

"Seriously?"

"Seriously, while these worlds merged, the League encountered these beings that were of both enhanced and demonic." She said right as the elevator dinged as they exited the elevator and onto the top floor. The office was about the size of a penthouse with a view of Gotham.

"Anyway, it turned out that Darkseid had also merged with the demon god and became something more sinister, so the League and the Outworlders worked together and defeated them and severed the connection of the dimensions, but not without leaving a few people behind."

"So why are we at Arc-Tech."

"Because I am one of the few that got left behind." A new voice chuckled.

The two looked behind the in shock to see a young man around his mid-twenties with brown eyes and short black hair. This man was nothing like the images they have seen on the television and holograms.

That man was an older gentleman with an expensive blue suit, but this man was wearing a blue hoodie and black jeans. He was currently munching on a donut before strolling over to his desk. Shauna assumed that is was a cover since he was immortal, people would wonder how a seventy year old man still looks like a twenty five year old man.

"Name's Thomas Roger." He introduced before sitting at his desk. "And since you two are here I am to assume you are Shauna and Jake?"

"Yes." The both said in unison.

"You both are lucky that you are related to Batman, otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation face to face." He said as he nodded towards the two. "So what do you want?"

"You, actually." Shauna explained as Thomas raised an eyebrow. "My brother and I are putting together a special team for the good of Gotham and we could use a man of your talents."

"Why would I help you, actually why should I help you? He asked. Shauna started to get nervous. "I am a billionaire and immortal believe it or not, so why should I help you beat up purse snatchers and drug dealer."

"Don't forget splicers and arms dealers." Jake informed.

"And let's not forget the other psychos that are cutting off people's faces and posing them up on walls." Shauna said a little defensively. Thomas narrowed his gaze at her and listened more intently. "Look, I have read your file and I know your past. I know you were an assassin from your old world before being stuck here and I need your help."

"Well, you raise some valid points, but what is in it for me?" He asked in a smug tone. Shauna merely shrugged.

"Self-worth, redemption or mainly a reason to get up off your ass and do something." She rolled her eyes before handing him her number. "Just give me a call and let me know what your decision is."

Shauna and Jake turned to leave his office, but before they could leave Thomas had stopped them.

"Wait," He called out. "I'll join, but only if my brother can join too. He's been looking to do some good."

"Sure, we were looking to recruit him as well." Shauna stated before turning towards the elevator. "The more the merrier."

The elevator doors closed and Jake's cellphone started to buzz. He looked down at his phone and grinned.

"Cecil just texted me, he's in." Jake smiled.

"Great."

"Anyone else on the list?"

"Just a couple more, but I don't know if they will join. They usually work for the League." Shauna commented. "It doesn't matter I have my team and it will be the sword that cuts down all the evil in Gotham." Jake was starting to worry about his sister. She was more worried about being better than their mother than protecting Gotham. He would need to keep an eye on her.

(!)

A lone figure walked into the cell block of S.T.A.R labs and slowly approached the control console. His hands rapidly tapping in buttons as a cell slowly approached him. He looked up at the name, Black Stone and smiled.

"I heard about your work." The figure said. "And I share you beliefs."

"What beliefs?" A male voice grumbled from inside of his cell.

"That fate didn't turn us into gods, just to do the bidding of man." He opened the cell and a tall young man with messy black hair and unique grey eyes walked out. The figure chuckled at him before tossing a rock at him.

The Black Stone caught the rock and let out a dark chuckle before absorbing the rock into his flesh, turning his flesh into stone.

"I hear talk you are looking for a girl called, Vortex." The figure said. Stone whipped his head at the figure and stomped towards him.

"Where is she?" He demanded. The man turned his back and waved for him to follow.

"Just follow me and you'll find what you're are looking for."