"We deserve better than this." Speedy, aka Red Arrow

.***.

They had a PR problem, and it wasn't going away any time soon.

Black Canary and Captain Marvel had been all over it, trying to soothe the press, trying to point out that the heroes would never do anything to hurt their sidekicks, ever. But when asked about the clones and the only response they had was "they were thrown into the sun..." well, that didn't sound like a fake excuse at all...

"They want to see one of you guys come out." Black Canary said, leaning against the door frame that led into the living room. They were at Wayne Manor, in the divide between the spacious kitchen and ridiculously spacious living room. Robin was on the couch, sitting next to Aqualad, Miss Martian, and Superboy. They were playing a card game, and every time Robin went to swipe his cards up from the table he'd wince and think no one noticed. Everyone noticed. "I'm afraid we'll have a court case on our hands if you don't."

Bruce looked over at his too-young ward. "It must have been too much to hope that it would all just blow over."

"Normally it would've," Captain Marvel said earnestly. "Commissioner Gordon's been vouching for you, and the whole town of Smallville's defending Superman. If it was anything but kids people would let it lie. But the moms are involved now. They want to hear something. They're getting scary." Frustrated after days of answering the same questions, Captain Marvel yawned hugely, muttered "Shazam," and turned into tiny Billy Batson, who went to go play cards with the Team.

Batman shook his head at the sight. "They might be right. What were we thinking? This job will always be too dangerous for children."

"Being a meta-human is too dangerous for children." Dinah said quietly. "You don't know what it was like, Bruce. I was tormented every day. I changed schools so often I never kept any friends. I was a freak, and there was no one to teach me how to use my powers."

"Robin is no meta-human." Bruce said, his hand clenching into a fist. "Aqualad would have been safe had he stayed in Atlantis, as would Miss Martian on Mars. Superboy...he never would have been created if we hadn't already had Robin and Kid Flash and Speedy."

There was a rustle of movement, and Bruce turned to see the entire team assembled behind him. They had moved quiet as any ninja, and they all looked serious, right down to the bruises that still marred Robin and Superboy's skin. "Excuse me," Aqualad said, "But I would respectfully disagree. While it is true that, as an Atlantian, my powers are not so different from my peers, if I were not a sidekick to my King all of Atlantis would constantly be in a state of worry. Our King is everything to our people."

"And discrimination on Mars is worse than anything you have on Earth nowadays," Miss Martian said, shifting uneasily. "My life as a white martian was...lonely. If not for my Uncle, I would have faded long ago."

Superboy just fixed Batman with a stare that was so like his old friend Clark's it took Bruce's breath away. "Any life is better than no life at all. I'm proud of who I am, even if half of my DNA donor is the psycho who caused all this trouble int he first place." Aqualad placed a cool hand on Superboy's shoulder and Conner loosened the hands he hadn't even noticed had curled into fists.

"I just want to stay," Robin said, so quietly it was like a puff of wind. "Don't they see some of us have no where else to go?"

That prompted Bruce to do something he hadn't done in a long time, and kneel down with his arms extended, like he used to do when Robin was nine and even smaller than he was now. Robin looked surprised, and at any other time he would have been embarrassed, but he did bury himself in the embrace, tucking his head in the space between Bruce's neck and shoulder that seemed to be made for him.

"Nowhere else to go," a new voice said, "That's a good way of putting it Rob. As a meta-kid, I have to whole-heartedly agree with you. If this media thing keeps up someone's going to try to force me back with my dad, and that's so not cool."

Robin disappeared from Bruce's side so quickly he was left hugging air. He looked up in time to see Robin stop himself from tackling his best friend to the floor. "Nice to see you finally show up KF. The meeting started yesterday."

"What can I say? Being beaten up on the side of the road for all of America to see has its perks. Like being able to sleep in." Kid Flash smiled at the rest of the team, his eyes growing soft as if he'd been worried until just that minute, and all the worry had left him at once. "It's...it's great to see you guys. Artemis swore everyone was in one piece, but that girl lies like you wouldn't believe."

"I'm officially pulling myself from Wally-sitting duty," Artemis said, coming in the living room with a huff. Obviously Kid Flash had run ahead, and even the very fit Artemis had to lean against the wall to catch her breath. "Are you trying to tear out your stitches, Kid Mouth?"

"I'm trying to get something to eat." Wally said, looking around at all of them, his smile huge and bright. And why not? It was the first time since all hell had broken loose that the whole team was in one room. "What's a guy gotta do for some lunch around here?"

Which is how they all ended up at the long table in the back dining room, the table that wasn't used at all anymore but had once been for charity balls. Robin sat next to Kid Flash and compared scars (Joker versus Fake Flash, who would win? From Wally's impressive injuries it would be superspeed every time.) Artemis, Miss Martian, and Aqualad were trying to get Superboy to smile. It was not a new past time and one they all enjoyed, because Conner had an undeniably great smile. But knowing that half of his genes came from the super villain who'd tried very hard to kill everyone in his life made it hard for Superboy to figure out which muscles to move. Still, though he'd never say it, he appreciated the effort, especially from Aqualad, who wasn't good at telling jokes. His slow manner of speaking made the timing off, but he made them all laugh when he messed up the joke about the sea turtle, the walrus, and the mermaid. Billy cut in with his own about a three-legged pig, which was actually funny and made the entire side of the room burst out laughing.

Flash, Superman, and Batman were at the end of the table with Black Canary. "I'm not going to lie to you, our position is pretty bad. Most of the population would like to believe clones are responsible rather than the three most respected League members, but it's the videos that are killing us. Superman's position isn't so bad. There's nothing to talk about except Conner's bruises. Mind you, the picture of him with his shirt off is on every news station in the country. His broken ribs are obvious, and I'm pretty sure the women news anchors don't mind the picture one bit."

"As if we didn't have enough to worry about," Batman said, shaking his head.

"The point is that Superman still looks pretty good. We can recover from that. As for you Bruce, the best part about that video is that you weren't actually in it."

"That was the whole problem," Batman pointed out, his expression a threatening storm. "I abandoned Robin. He still won't look at me."

"Yeah, but at least with you guys it looks like a strategy gone wrong," Flash said bitterly. "Like Robin took off without your backup and you would have come by at any minute. What I did was -"

"It wan't you," Black Canary reminded gently, "Wally knows it wasn't you."

Flash shook his head wearily. "I was talking to Ollie before he went to go speak to Gordon Godfrey. He said social services had been by all day, trying to convince Wally that he was better off with the father who'd tried his damndest to starve Wally to death." Flash looked around at the other League members, looking so lost that Black Canary put a hand on his shoulder. "Iris won't speak to me. Wally won't look at me. And the world is just wondering why Kid Flash lives with Flash instead of his parents. We never formally adopted Wally. We didn't want that kind of publicity."

"If we only had the clones..."Black Canary said, sighing, "I can see why you wouldn't let Guy Gardner into the League."

"He gets the job done," Batman said, "He just doesn't do it well."

"I went to see Lex," Superman said, speaking up for the first time. That got their attention. Even Flash, who was staring morosely down at where Wally was talking quietly to Robin, looked up, surprised. "He had none of his guards. I took no one with me. It was the first time talking to face-to-face like that when we weren't fighting since..."

One day, Batman would learn the unhappy story of Lex Luthor and Clark Kent. But the detective bit his tongue. Not today.

"I...well, eventually it boiled down to me using the only leverage I have. Lex can make clones, but he gets attached. Sentimental. Kon-El was bruised, but not terribly hurt in the struggle only because he managed to incapacitate the fake Superman who was trying to take him out of the house."

He's not the World's Greatest Detective for nothing. Batman sat up straighter, focusing on Superman. "You mean all this was for Superboy?"

"Maybe not all of it. Lex has the taste for the dramatic. And he's a psychopath." This last was said with the quirk of a smile, as if Superman was used to calling this old friend a psychopath. "Why invade Mount Justice? Why kidnap Robin and Kid Flash? Why let them go? Why make clones of every single super hero?" Superman shrugged. "Conner was the prize at the end. The rest of it was the game he played to keep it interesting."

"That's sick." Black Canary said flatly, "That's...they're children!"

"Not to Lex they're not. They're meta-humans with the potential to be great allies. He wanted Superboy for himself, as his own sidekick. His own son. I told him if he ever launched an attack against the sidekicks again I'd kill Conner." Superman looked first at Batman, then at Flash. "It's the only thing he really wants. He'd do anything to protect our son."

"As would you, old friend," Batman said, "He must have called your bluff."

Superman stared at Batman, "This is no bluff. I love Conner - like a brother, if not a son. But when I spoke to Lex I was completely serious. I would kill Conner for the good of the other children. When I told him that I wasn't lying. Lex knows the difference. He'll think twice before attacking again."

At the end of the table, Superboy excused himself, went into the bathroom, locked it, and stared at the mirror. He was crying. He was Lex's son, a clone, and he could do something as normal as crying.

What he didn't hear was Superman speaking so quietly the other League members around him could barely hear. "The worst part is not that I would kill Conner to save the lives of a dozen other sidekicks. The worst part is that I know I never could. After I spoke to Lex I found Conner at my parent's house, sitting in the living room, making sure they wouldn't be attacked. When I saw him there, I knew that even if it meant saving the other Team members I could never kill him. I'd rather die than see him get hurt again. That's why I had to lie to Lex and why I had to make sure he believed me." He looked at Black Canary, eyes so blue that they looked alien (and of course they were alien. So often they would forget that one of Earth's greatest heroes was not of Earth at all) "That's why I'm not sure how hard we should fight this. If Conner was ever killed I would seek vengeance. Then I would kill myself. And none of you can say that you wouldn't do the same."

Flash nodded immediately. Batman looked over at Robin before nodding slowly. Once upon a time he'd lived in a huge mansion with a butler and no one else, but he could never revert back to those old days, not after he'd won the hard-earned love of an orphan boy.

"So we have some work to do." Black Canary counted off on her fingers, a point-by-point list of things that needed to be done. "First of all, you guys have to talk to your sidekicks. Alone. Make Kaldur and M'gann and Artemis go back to their mentors - who are all worried sick, by the way. I think I saw Ollie patrolling the grounds. But you need to talk until they're comfortable with you. Then you need to decide - we all need to decide - if the sidekick program with worth the risks."

"What about the media?" Flash asked, "What will we tell them in the meantime?"

"We've saved the world from countless enemies," Batman said, "I think they can allow us this time to talk to our sons."

.***.

i'm pretty sure this is commonly called a filler chapter. hope y'all have been liking the new YJ season as much as we have. blue beetle has been our favorite since his comic books, so a jaime-centric season was just what we wanted.

as for this story, reviews are the things that keep us going.