I frowned at the huge book that was open infront of me. I had only read the first ten pages, and I was already bored out of my mind. There were sixtey-six chapters, and not one of them had a name that suggested it held the info I was looking for.
"Justin?" Asked a voice. I looked over my shoulder, and saw Kenya and Alyssa, standing there staring at me.
I looked around the library in the manor, nope, no one else here. So what where they doing here? "Yes?"
"Are you... reading a book?" Kenya asked, saying the sentence as if it was a completely foreign language to her.
I glared at her, "Yes, for your information, I can actually read books that aren't Grimm's Fairy Tales."
She frowned, "But... you never read books, unless it's homework."
I sighed, letting my head hit the table, and groaning. "I hate this book."
"What book?" Kenya asked, toddling over and pulling herself up onto my lap, and looking at the book, and frowning. "What's that word?" She asked, pointing.
I looked at it, and smirked, "Ye."
"What's it mean?"
"It's another way of saying you."
"What's the name of this book?" Alyssa asked, standing next to me, and pearing at it curiousley.
"The Bible." I growled.
"What's it about?"
I frowned, "From what I can gather, some guy called God."
"Who's He? What did He do?" Kenya asked, touching the page of the book gently.
"So far, He's some kind of superior, all knowing, omnipresent being and He just finished creating the world, everything in it, and then two idiots names Adam and Eve broke the only rule He gave them and got kicked out of paradise." I said. "Oh, and they had two sons, Cain and Able."
"What happend to them?" Asked Alyssa, hopping onto the seat next to me, and Kenya smiled, "Yeah Justin! Tell us the story."
"Well, apparently Cain and Able had to sacrifice ten percent of their profit to God. God called it giving tithe. God told them to give Him the first ten percent of their profit. So Able, the shepard, gave God the first ten percent of his flock. Cain, he was a farmer, gave God the last ten percent of his crops."
"What's a flock?" Asked Kenya.
"A herd of sheep." I said, "So this God guy gets upset by that, since he asked for the first ten percent, not the last. So he accepts Able's offering, but didn't accept Cain's. Then Cain got all PMS-Y and killed Able. Then God banished Cain and his wife from their home, and He put a mark on Cain, so no one would kill him." I paused, "He did that because Cain complained about having to leave saying people would try to kill him, but I think He did it because even though Cain killed his brother, God still loved him."
"Wow." Said Kenya, "What happend next?"
"He had a son and went off and lived in some place called Nod." I brushed off.
"Cool!" Said Alyssa, "Did that really happen."
"Course not." I snorted, "Christianity is boggus." I froze at my own words, and my thoughts drifted back several months, almost a year ago, the day I had died. I hadn't been brought back by the lasorus pit. I had seen my grandmother, talked to her even. She had talked about God, heaven. I had seen the pearly white gates and ST Peter myself. OK, so God was real. I believed that. Jesus, wasn't that God's kid or something? Yeah, he was real too I bet. I still thought Christianity was bogus though. Why?
Well, where was God when I was being tortured physically and mentally in the League of Assassins? Where was God when Joker was beating me with a crowbar? Where was God when Kenya had been nearly killed by that guy I had killed in the alley? Where was God when my Dad had died? I'll answer that for you, sitting up in heaven, twiddling his thumbs, and not caring at all.
Seems to me he cared about these people a lot, Adam, Eve, Able, even Cain. So why not care about us? We must have done something wrong, cause according to this book, God loves all of us. Yeah, what a joke. He probably didn't care because I had killed so many people. Yeah, that was it. Wasn't that one of the Ten Commandments? Thou Shalt Not Kill?
I sighed, and shut the book, and Kenya and Alyssa ran off to go play or something. I shoved the book away, and stared out the window at the front law. Only reason I had bought that book was because I was trying to understand all of this better. That guy I had seen last night in the white leather get up, he was a Christian. So, I figured I should at least try to understand the Bible a little more. It wasn't helping.
AT DR, SNOW'S ROOM:
Snow frowned, taking down a scroll, and opening it, skimming the colums of words, before frowning, and put it back, taking down another.
"Any luck?" Asked Kyler, walking into the room.
Snow looked over at her, and smiled, "No. But let me say, it is nice to have you back on the team again. I'm glad Justin came to her senses and let you rejoin the team."
Kyler paused, "Came to her sences?"
"Yes, Conan and I were very upset that Justin fired you over a personal quarrel with you." Snow said, turning back to the shelf packed full of scrolls.
Kyler blinked, and frowned. She didn't understand, "That's what Justin told you happened, we had a fight?"
"Yes, Conan came very close to quitting the team along with me, and start our own with you as the leader. It was wrong of Justin to fire you over something like that." Snow said, picking out another scroll.
Kyler's eyes widend, Justin had put herself in the line of fire... for her. Why? Justin could have told Conan and Snow what really happened, sure it would have made Kyler's life considerably worse, but it would have been Kyler's problem, not Justin's. Kyler found herself smiling slightly, Black Hood, the bad to the bone vigilanty with the die hard 'I don't care about any one but myself' attitude, had put herself down in her team's eyes, just so they wouldn't know Kyler had almost tried drugs.
Snow raised an eyebrow, "What's the smile for?"
"Just happy to be back." Kyler said plainly.
AT CONAN'S ROOM:
I yawned, streched, and turned off my radio alarm, which had been blasting I Hate Everything About You by Three Day's Grace.
I pulled on jeans, a dark red t-shirt, and floated downstairs, trying to get to the door without Dad hearing me.
"Conan!" He called out. I froze, letting myself drop to the floor, and slowly turned to the kitchen. Dad stuck his head out of the kitchen door, and smiled.
"I made pancakes." He announced proudly.
I bit my lip, and walked to the kitchen, sitting down at the table as he placed a plate infront of me. "Tell me what you think." He pressed.
I timidly picked up the fork, and cut a piece off, and put it in my mouth. I wanted to cry. It was burn to a crisp on the outside, and cold and uncooked on the inside. I chewed slowly, cursing whoever neglected to teach Dad to cook edible food, and swallowed. I felt like I was eating kryptonite, that's how bad my taste buds hurt me.
"Well?" He pressed.
"It's..." I struggled for something resembling a compliment that wasn't a lie. "Warm." I said finally, proud I had come up with something.
He raised an eyebrow, and picked one up, "No wait!" I protested. He bit into it. Too late. He stood still for two seconds, not chewing it at all, before running to the bathroom. I heard him spit, gag, and finally, throw up. I winced, and grabbed the lethal things he called pancakes, and flew over to the trash can, dumping them. I did the dishes, and heard Dad rinse out his mouth, and brush his teeth.
He walked out into the kitchen, sighing, "Those pancakes sucked."
I nodded, "Sorry Dad."
His shoulders slumped, "Can I cook anything edible?"
I thought for a minute, "You make good burgers."
He perked up, "Really?"
"Yeah." I nodded, "Your hot dogs are good too."
He smiled, and walked over to Krypto, scratching behind his ears, "Hear that boy, I make good burgers!" Krypto barked, and licked his face.
I walked around them. "Bye Dad." I said, waving.
"Bye!" He called back, waving to me as I flew out the window. Time to go to DR, and watch Justin brood all day about the new hero who showed up last night.
AT DR, COMPUTER ROOM:
Conan walked in, in her uniform, and looked around the main room, no one in sight. She timidly walked to the computer room, to see everyone gathered there. Kyler was leaning against the wall, fiddling with one of her trick arrows. Snow was meditating, floating in mid air. Justin, of course, was sitting in front of the computer, a bible next to her, and a video of the fight last night play in front of her.
Conan looked over at Kyler, "How long has this been going on?"
"Three hours. She set a record I think." Kyler answered, putting the arrow she had finished fixing into her quiver, and pulling out another.
"Considering who she lived with, probably not." Conan mumbled. She had no doubt Batman had probably spent more than three hours brooding about something.
"I heard that." Justin said, pulling out another book, a Hebrew to English dictionary, and flipping through the pages.
"OK... so... find anything?" Conan asked. Justin's little emo cloud that had been hanging over her all day, got noticeably bigger. "So... no then?"
The emo cloud got even bigger as Justin's hand twitched towards her gun. "I will shoot you Conan."
"Hey, I'm not the one who who's been brooding for three hours straight." Conan said, smirking slightly.
"At least I'm not the one with a ridiculous name. Super Kid? Really?" Justin challenged.
"I didn't choose it." Conan mumbled. "Besides, I'm not the only one bumming off my Dad's name. Both of 'em. Jason and Justin; Red Hood and Black Hood."
"Conan and Conner." Justin shot back, "Besides, I didn't choose mine either, and at least I'm not afraid of needles."
Conan flinched at the thought. Yes, she was afraid of needles, and pretty much hospitals in general. They reminded her to much of the lab she had practically been raised in. Every time she had to go to the hospital, or the medical wing at the Watch Tower, she expected Dr. Carter to walk around the corner, holding Kryptonite.
"OK, OK." Kyler interrupted, "How about we get back to the present causer of brooding? Justin, have you seriously not found anything?"
"Actually, I interpreted what he said. He was speaking in Hebrew, and he was speaking it very well, like he had been born speaking it. However, he sounded very formal, so probably not." Justin pointed out.
Kyler nodded, "Then there's his accent, I've grown up around that accent. He's from a big city, the bad side of a big city."
"Gotham Narrows." Justin said. "And his name is Gabriel."
"So, what was he saying?" Snow asked, who had been quiet this whole time.
"Get out of here you demons, witches and hell-bent messengers of Satan! God commands it!" Justin translated.
Snow nodded, "So if he's telling them to go away, he's a good guy, right?"
"Or he just doesn't want a portal to Hell being opened up in the middle of Star City." Kyler said. "Most villains I know wouldn't want that, and would fight to stop it."
"So villains here, are not all evil?" Snow asked, confused.
Every one was silent for a moment, until Conan said, "I don't think there is such a thing as pure evil." Justin stiffened noticeably, and Conan continued, "No one just wakes up every morning and think 'what can I do that is evil today?'. They really think what they're doing is either right, or justifiable."
"Shut-up." Justin growled, glaring at Conan, "You can't wrap your head around the fact that there is such thing as pure evil because your incompetent clone mind has never seen it!" Justin immediately turned back to the computer, and shut it off. She grabbed the Bible next to her she had been thumbing through, and left, every feature of her portraying anger. In short, she was ticked.
Conan, slightly offended, turned to Kyler, "What was that about?"
Kyler frowned, staring after Justin. "Don't know."
She knew that the only thing that could set some one off like that, to the point where they said something like that to a friend, would have to be closely intertwined with a personal experience. A bad personal experience.
Snow frowned, and went back to meditating. "I believe our friend, has kept great secrets from us." Her eyes started getting a white sheen to them, and Kyler stopped her.
"Don't!" Snow stopped, and Kyler continued, "Whatever's in Justin's past that set her off is none of our buisness, don't go doing the whole 'look into the past' thing. It's an extreme invasion of privacy."
Snow nodded, "Very well."
Kyler knew what it was like to think that some one was pure evil. She knew what it was like to think they were so evil, there was nothing human about them. She had told herself that before she had shot the man who had been beating her younger brother when he had been kidnapped. She could relate to Justin's statement, on some level, when she was angry. When she had a cool head, like now, she knew Justin was wrong.
AT WAYNE MANOR, JUSTIN'S POINT OF VEIW:
I fell down on my bed, after getting home I had grabbed a shower, brushed my teeth, and had put on the pajamas my mom had gotten me. I normally just wore a tee shirt and a big pair of boxers, but since mom got them I had to wear them. They were thermal pajamas, Grinch thermal pajamas. You know, the green muppet-looking guy who stole Christmas? Yeah. Thank God Damian hadn't seen them. I looked at the Bible on my nightstand, and growled. I had finished the book of Genesis, still hadn't found anything about a spell that banished witches or anything about portals to Hell. Though I had found an interesting story about a Flood and an Ark and some old guy names Noah.
I yawned, and rolled over in bed, I'd read more later, even if God had never really had my back, that book had some great stories.
OK, so Justin's been reading? Weird, right? And the Bible at that! OK, so, yeah all those stories from the Bible are really in there, first chapter, the one called Genesis. I know this because I own a Bible and I read it. There are some cool stories in there. My favorite is the one about Cain and Able. By the way, God gave Adam and Eve another son to replace Able since Cain killed him, and they named him Seth. Then Seth had a son named Enosh. Bible scholars say that Enosh was so pure of heart and sinless, that he could walk next to God, literally. See anyone else, it would have killed them because of their sin. So, yeah, cool fact there.
