I do not own the rights to the Justice League.

Back Again

Annie's POV

I sat straight up in bed. The dream I had just awoken from, had to be real. I knew this for several reasons. Before the dream in question, I had been dreaming about abstract shapes and ideas. Then I was dreaming about very detailed scenes concerning Suzy. Plus I had been in a Sue state my whole time. At the time it seemed natural. While watching the scenes unfold I was thinking thoughts such as 'Who's that guy with Suzy and why is he going out with her instead of me?' Or, 'Costume contest? How cute!' Then, 'If I had been there, the thief wouldn't have gotten away due to my powers'. And, 'I'm prettier than that Angela person'.

Once I woke I realized a couple things. I had just been in my Sue state for some reason, and it was amazing that Suzy hadn't killed me due to how annoying I must have been. Then again she did need me alive if she wanted the insurance money for her car.

Getting up, I pondered what to do. Ever since Suzy disappeared, I had been feeling so helpless. I don't do helpless. Suzy says it's a sickness, but I like helping people, and when I can't it, I feel frustrated. Even more so when there's somebody I care about in trouble and there's nothing I can do to help them. And after everything Suzy had done for me last year (including not killing me while I slept) the last I could do was repay her by helping her.

It wasn't like I could go to Eugene to talk about it, which is what I would normally do. Once he learned that Batman failed at retrieving Suzy, he had locked himself in his room. It was due to his determination at recreating the device, fear of Gary, and being embarrassed over the situation. He wasn't responding to my knocks on his door, or to all the text messages I had sent him.

Gary was probably the one person who would understand not being able to help Suzy, and might know what to do about the dream. Then again, he might start yelling about Eugene. Perhaps he wasn't the best person to go to after all.

Of course! Why didn't I think of him before? The one person who had been helping all along, and knew more about what was going on than Eugene.

Batman.

"What do you know about Suzy?"

For the past two hours I had stalked Batman through-out the WatchTower. At first I wasn't subtle, and walked right up to him. But each time he somehow managed to get away from. Once I realized that he was avoiding me on purpose, I asked Nikki to get into the surveillance system and tell me where he was. I let him have about half an hour to think that I had given up and he was safe. Then I made my move.

"I already told you everything I know," he denied.

I stomped my foot. "Stop lying to me! If you already told me everything then why have you been avoiding me? And why did I have a very realistic, but informative dream last night?"

"What kind of dream?" he asked, suddenly interested in what I was saying.

"It was weird. I was just drifting off, and then I was in my Sue state. I saw Suzy and some guy having a discussion about how her attacker was also responsible for several thefts from government buildings in the world they were in, and why was he going after a place like that when he could be making off with cash and money from banks, or even other worlds, along with scenes detailing Suzy's stay there."

I paused to let my words sink in. He still wasn't answering, so I felt brave enough to ask a difficult question. "Does this have anything to do with what happened to Superman yesterday?"

"I liked you better when you were an ignorant Sue."

That was his response? Serious events were going on, and he was trying to distract me from the truth by making derogatory comments about my past?

"I'll take that as a yes. What's really going on and I want the whole truth this time. Don't make me go into my Sue state or tell Suzy's mom that she's missing, and the League has information they're keeping a secret."

"You wouldn't."

"Not if you tell me the truth," I said with a smile on my face. Suzy was right, blackmailing was fun when it wasn't happening to you.

"We wouldn't be in this mess if that boyfriend of yours had morals. You should keep a leash on him."

He had a point about Eugene, but he was still distracting. Was that his default reaction whenever people were getting too close to the truth? Didn't he realize that telling me a simple lie would have placated me, and I would have left? By trying to distract me, my curiosity over what he was hiding was simply increasing. Sometimes lying has its benefits.

"Eugene has morals... he just doesn't think of the consequences before he acts. Hey, don't change the subject!"

He sighed. "I have some recent information about a former friend of yours. The next day after Missouri Governor Whitaker lost his re-election campaign the first week of November he pardoned Stuart."

Wait, Stuart was...out? That was the information he had been holding back from me? How dare he! Suzy and I should have been told immediately when it happened!

I took a deep breath to calm down. If I allowed anger to cloud my reasoning, I might revert to my Sue state. And despite Batman's comment about liking me better as an ignorant Sue, I do not think he would be pleased with the change.

"How did you allow that to happen?" I asked as calmly as possible.

"He buried it in paperwork so it would take a while for us to find out. Did Eugene ever tell his idea to Stuart?"

Progress at last. I then considered his question.

"Well, Eugene didn't even tell me till recently, but apparently it's something he's been thinking about since last year... so I guess it's possible."

"That would explain how Stuart knew about the device."

Batman turned to walk away from me, but I wasn't about to let him get away that easily. "Hey, what about Suzy?"

He stopped for a second to say, "If your dream is true, we have bigger problems than getting Suzy back."

Fine then. If he and other members of the League weren't going to help me get my best friend back, I was going to have to do it myself. With some reinforcements of course.

Gardner's POV

Being whacked on the head hurts. A lot. I'm not even sure what hit me. Just that one minute I was talking to Suzy while waiting for Lucy to get out of school, and the next it was lights out. What I awoke to wasn't much better. My feet and hands were duct-taped together. Looking around I noticed that Suzy was next to me, and had duct-taped over her mouth too. I couldn't help but smirk at the sight. Suzy would talk back to her captures. I was actually more amazed they hadn't killed her instead of resorting to duck-tape. That must mean whoever it was wanted us alive.

Whoever it was, wasn't in the room with us. Judging by the decor it was either a crappy hotel room, or belonged to a person with crappy taste.

"Just my luck, the one time I end up in a hotel room with a bound and gagged girl it's not my choice."

Corny joke yes, but it had to be said at some point. Suzy started making unintelligible noises while I continued to annoy her.

"I wish I had known that duct-tape was the one thing that could keep you from insulting me. My life could have been so much better a long time ago."

And cue the unintelligible noises. I said a couple more things to mess with her, but it got old pretty quickly. The only movement I could make was the wiggle worm which wasn't very useful. The only choice we had was to wait. Which Suzy really sucks at doing. Eventually some guy who looked like he would fit into one of my engineering classes came, in joined by two henchmen that looked like they had walked straight out of a comic book. Except, he wasn't some guy, because Suzy's eyes nearly bulged out of her head when he entered the room.

"She was getting rather mouthy so we had to tape her mouth shut," said henchmen number one.

"Yeah, she has a tendency to do that a lot," the not-some-guy said. At that I started to snicker which made him turn his attention to me. "I know it's been a year Suzy Q, but I must say it really hurts to be replaced."

The henchmen looked just as bewildered as I was. "We're not together...wait you know each other?"

"You could say that. We dated for about a year till we came to... irreconcilable differences."

"Oh, you're Stuart, her wacko ex-boyfriend. I thought you were in jail."

Maybe not the best thing to say when said wacko is holding you hostage, but it just slipped out, I swear.

The wacko part didn't sit well with him. "Wacko ex-boyfriend? Is that what you really think of me, Suzy Q? I thought we were more than that. And I was in jail. Then I got pardoned." He said the last part with an annoying smirk.

The whole entire time Suzy had been making more of those unintelligible noises, trying to respond to Stuart. He finally bent down and ripped the tape off her mouth. "That felt good," he said, while she started to cuss him out.

"As heart-warming as this reunion is, mind telling us what's going on? Because this is not how I imagined I would be spending Thanksgiving break," I said, trying to lighten the mood.

"She's here because I want her here. You're not supposed to be here, but I've always been one to look on the brighter side of life, so you're now going to be insurance."

"What do you want Stuart?" growled Suzy. I think the better question was, what did he mean about me being insurance?

"I want a lot of things. Right now I want you to come with me."

"As if," scoffed Suzy, as only Suzy could.

"Let me rephrase that. I want you to come with me, or they," he said pointing to the goons, "shoot him," he said, pointing to me. So that's what he meant by insurance.

"I know you're not that fond of me Suzy, but think of Angela. Think of how Angela would react to my death and knowing she didn't cause it."

I knew Suzy didn't like being stuck with me, and wasn't that fond of my sister with the whole Annie thing. Since I didn't know how she felt about my mother, I went for the next best defense, Angela and her craziness.

Stuart and his henchmen gave me an odd look at that comment, while Suzy just rolled her eyes. "Too afraid to get your hands dirty, Stuart?"

"Not really. But it's been a while since they shot Superman, and they're getting rather bored."

I'm pretty sure at that point, Suzy and I both dropped our jaws. They. Shot. Superman. How was that possible? My knowledge of the DC universe might be rusty, but I did remember enough to know that shooting Superman was like Batman killing somebody: not going to happen.

Stuart could have been a mind reader (and since we were probably back in Suzy's world was an actual possibility) because the next thing he said was, "If you come with me, I'll show how you it was possible. Or stay here and watch him get shot. Your choice."

Suzy just gave him her death glare. "Fine."

**Author's Note**

I would like to thank Loki's Son, Jana Girl123, and AidenSurvival for reviews. Since I can't seem to say it enough, reviews are always nice to get.

I really didn't want to bring Stuart back, since it would be so cliche. But this is the Justice League Universe we're talking about, and villains are always coming back. Escaping from prison, avoiding death, etc... So it may be cliche, but it also had to be done. And hopefully stuff from earlier chapters will slowly start making sense.

Next chapter will reveal Stuart's actual plan for those who haven't figured it out already.

Thanks for reading, and don't forget to leave a review if possible!