Veronica Grey's pov
Mount Justice
Saturday, December 4th, 2010
They said there would be a mission, so here I am, training with Kaldur in full costume. My hair is in a tight braid and my lips are painted black to give an illusion of intimidation. Every little bit helps when you are as scrawny as me. As I train with Kaldur, I fight with ferocity and speed. I found that when I hold a little extra charge, I can move even faster. Not like Kid Flash, but it helps in a fight. It also helps how easy it is to move in my shorts and boots. When I land a heavy kick in Kaldur's chest with a thud, he stumbles back a bit. I don't acknowledge the achievement, I just keep fighting. Kaldur sweeps my legs and I hit the ground. The simulation ends and he offers me his hand. I take it and he pulls me off the floor.
"You're bouncing back a lot faster than anyone anticipated." Kaldur comments as the two of us look at our scores. His is a whopping two thousand and seventeen. Mine is just seventeen hundred and ninety-three.
"I just try not to think about it." I comment in a low voice, touching my domino mask to make sure it is still secure. I hear the cave interface recognize Green Arrow and Red Arrow zeta-ing in. This is actually kind of confusing.
"Roy! What are you doing here?" KF runs in, right in front of the two archers.
"You'll find out when the rest of the team is here." Green Arrow says. Roy looks a little apprehensive about the situation. I walk up to him and pull him aside, receiving confused glances from Wally, Connor, M'gann and Dick. I see out of the corner of my eye that Zatanna has a small smirk on her face. He takes my hands into his.
"How are you feeling today?" He asks in a hushed tone, trying not to expose my business to the others. I step closer to him.
"It was a little rough earlier but I'll manage." I whisper. He gets a smile of satisfaction before discretely kissing me on the forehead. We separate when we hear the cave interface recognize Artemis. Green Arrow steps up.
"Artemis! Just in time. Look who's agreed to join the Team." GA gestures to Roy and Artemis gets this look.
"Finally!" Wally gets super excited. She begins to get aggravated.
"Sure, Team's needed a real archer." She snarks. Something's got her in a mood and it might not turn out well. Everyone else around us sees it too. Wally gets a face of worry, just like I am.
"Okay, people. Listen up." Green Arrow walks over to the holocomputer and starts working. "The Dynamic Duo's on a case in Gotham, but Batman gave me a heads up. Sportsmaster was spotted coming through Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport." He begins to brief us all. The fact that we are being briefed about Sportsmaster seems to strike a nerve with Artemis. Roy and I walk up to the computer, he looms over me with his arm and side of his torso touching my back.
"In full costume? Nervy…" Zatanna infers, staring blankly at the large, blown up picture of Sportsmaster.
"In street clothes." Green Arrow clears up. "Facial recognition software picked up the ID. Find out what he's up to." He orders. There seems to be a unanimous conclusion floating in the air.
"All of us?" Superboy questions. "Seems like overkill for a shadow job." He voices what we all are thinking.
"Perhaps a small squad? Miss Martian's camouflage abilities seem ideal." Red Tornado adds his thoughts to the pot for mission planning. But the look on M'gann's face suggests that she would rather be around with Connor than on a mission.
"Thought the sidekicks, sorry, ex-sidekicks could suit up on this. Aqualad, Kid Flash, Red Arrow." Green Arrow says, Roy, Wally, and Kaldur getting looks of self satisfaction and excitement. They haven't been able to all three work together in a while.
"Good. Stakeouts make me crazy." Connor says emotionlessly, looking back at M'gann.
"We could use the night off." M'gann smirks, but Artemis looks up.
"I want in." Is all she says at first. Green Arrow gets ready to interject, but she comes up with her own reasoning and defense for coming of the mission. "With M'gann and Robin out, no one's logged more hours piloting the Bio-Ship." She get's a look of solidarity and an angry sense of self confidence.
"Artemis, are you sure?" Green Arrow asks her. He seems to be trying to get her to back off. We all know that she doesn't necessarily get along with Roy.
"Absolutely." She gets a new low tone of voice, her sharp mood may or may not be getting the better of her. Roy steps up.
"I'm all for it, but if Artemis is coming, I think Tesla should come too. We all know a technopath could come in handy for stealth with security systems and cameras." Roy tells Green Arrow. I'm taken aback that they want this to be my first mission, especially in my emotional and mental state. Green Arrow seems to think about it for a minute.
"Fine, you're right. It would be helpful for her to come along as well." Green Arrow gives in. Wally gets a big grin on his face.
"Yeah, Tesla. Finally running with the big dogs!" He laughs in celebration. Artemis snorts.
"I hope that doesn't mean you, wall-man." Artemis snorts as we all go and prep for the mission. Wally suits up in civvies and the rest of us just pack ours in a bag before we all go and board the bioship. It's weird for me to be inside a living machine. I've been learning to communicate with it with M'gann, so far it's been listening to my mental commands, but only when I have physical contact without any barriers like clothing. Artemis takes her place in the center and pilots us out of the bay doors. After a while, Roy, Kaldur and I go in the back, leaving Artemis and Wally in the main cabin. I help Kaldur and Roy move one of the motor cycles into it's dock to secure it.
"I gather you did not join the for the camaraderie." Aqualad infers as the bike locks into place.
"And not to please GA either. There's a mole on our Team, Kaldur. You don't wanna face it, so I will, and suspect number one is Artemis." Roy states in a low tone to avoid it reaching the main cabin. I sigh.
"You're still hooked on the mole thing?" I look at him. Kaldur does the same.
"We have to protect the team. If there is a mole, their activities need to be put to a stop." Roy reasons. I just let it go and we make sure all the other cargo and equipment is secure. We all return the the main cabin for the remainder of the flight. After a bit, Roy and I suit up in civvies. When the ship finally makes it to New Orleans Parish, we stationed ourselves accordingly. Roy and I are at the top of a hill in some brush. He spots Sportsmaster getting on a boat.
"Target's heading North." He reports into the radio as he and I sprint down the hill and get on our two jet skis. "Pursue. But maintain a discreet distance. And that goes double for you, Artemis. Sportsmaster's proven adept at spotting Martian camouflage, when in motion." He orders. It seems that Roy has taken the lead instead of Kaldur. We ride, staying far behind but still keeping Sportsmaster in sight. Kaldur is tailing the boat from beneath the surface of the water, Wally is on a motorcycle on the road along the bayou water and Artemis is flying after us in the Bioship.
"He's stopped." I report into the comm. Roy and I stop as well, watching Sportsmaster walk through the shallow water to shore.
"Hold your positions. I'm moving in, for a closer look." Roy declares, getting closer to Sportsmaster. He slings his bow and arrow onto his back and perches in a tree, watching the assassin. I notice a movement of blonde hair in the trees. Artemis is out of the Bioship. I can see her taken by surprise by something higher up in the trees. As soon as Artemis starts firing arrows, I climb off my jet ski and run to her aid. I recognize the assailant as Cheshire, but I only observe for a moment.
"Nice Canary teach you that?" Cheshire asks as she regains her footing. Artemis takes aim. "Bet you run out of arrows before I run out of sword! Unless you plan on breaking out the pointy ones, to use against your own sister." She taunts Artemis. I'm in shock by the revelation from Cheshire, but it's not my time yet to intervene.
"Why shouldn't I? You are working with Sportsmaster!"Artemis snaps, getting ready to fire her bow again.
"Not my choice! Not my call!" Cheshire retorts angrily. She gains a new stance with her swords. She remains in place.
"Then whose call is it?" Artemis interrogates as she gets a tighter grip on her shot at her own sister.
"Sorry Just because I know your secrets doesn't mean I tell you mine." Cheshire taunts. We all notice the sounds from Roy. He shoots a net at her and traps the assassin against the tree. "Why, Arrow. If you wanted another date, you only had to ask." She flirts as Roy loads another arrow. I'm starting to get irritated by her.
"You two are dating?" Artemis nearly screams at Roy, lowering her bow. But Roy just smirks.
"If I was dating Cheshire, someone would have noticed." He gestures to me. I give him a smile before returning to my glaring at Cheshire. She just groans in aggravation.
"Why deny the attraction? After all, Arrow, you're here." Cheshire taunts. I feel a radio wave coming from her mask. It's transmitting to Sportsmaster.
"I read you. Keep 'em busy." Sportsmaster replies, his position is by the train tracks.
"Roy! She's a distraction! Sportsmaster is at the tracks!" I alert him. He begins running without question. I detect a droid for a moment, maybe at the train. Cheshire escapes her trap and and attacks.
"Really, I'm so fond of you, both. I couldn't' bare to hurt you... much!" She throws her sword into the ground. She leaps forward and knocks Artemis on her feet. She throws little bombs at me but I deflect them by repelling the metal. I leap forward at Cheshire with my hands charged. I manage to get my palms to her temple and releasing a small enough charge to stun her. She crumples to the ground, twitching with energy. She must have a high tolerance if she is still conscious.
"Souvenir!" Wally calls as he runs up and picks up one of Cheshire's swords.
"Artemis, tracing arrow on Sportsmaster, now!" Roy yells as Sportsmaster makes his escape.
"He's out of range." Artemis gives up before even taking the shot.
"I got it!" I pull two discs from my belt, instantly designating them as trackers. I throw them as hard as I can and use my magnokinesis to make sure one lodges itself under the motor of the boat and the other attaches to the back of the boat, visible to be a decoy for the other.
"You're abandoning?" Artemis yells as Roy gets on his jet ski and begins pursuit of Sportsmaster.
"I'm prioritizing!" He yells as he follows the assassin. I see a briefcase on his boat so I try and focus on the contents, trying to identify it if it's technological. Just so happens that it is, but it's a small containment unit of something, organic.
"Aqualad: target's on me. So I'll take a dive. He'll think he's in the clear, and you can track him from below. We'll be right behind, using the tracer." Roy orders. I see Aqualad below the surface, trailing the boat. Sportsmaster throws an explosive at Roy and they just miss him but he takes his dive as planned. Soon, the boat stops and Sportsmaster walks to the back. He picks off the decoy tracer and drops it in the water to Aqualad, also dropping explosives. I do my best to keep the explosives away from Aqualad before they blow so it'll only look like a success. The boat speeds away but with my hidden tracker still on board.
"Aqualad!" Roy yells, hoping that the Atlantean is all right. I hold my breath, hoping I protected him well enough.
"Here." Aqualad says as he breaches the surface of the water next to Roy. Before I know it, Cheshire is waking up and attacking us.
"Tesla, Artemis, Kid, listen." Aqualad starts in the comm as we fight Cheshire, she dodges us mostly but she ends up focusing on Kid Flash.
"Leave him alone!" Artemis runs at her sister, swinging her bow in attempt to stop her. But she gets kicked away as quickly as she swung. Kid Flash runs up to her to make sure she's okay.
"Artemis!" He begins to worry, helping her sit up like she fragile or something. I see how worried he is, just like I would be for Roy.
"Forget me! What about-" Artemis freaks out before she realises her sister is gone. "Cheshire…" She looks around but there is no trace of where she went.
"Did you…?" Wally gets worried about our awol assassin. Even I didn't see if she got a tracer.
"Tracer's on her sword?" She gives a rhetorical question with a smile, Wally grabbing her shoulders.
"Brilliant! I knew you could-" Wally is cut off by the sound of Roy and Kaldur returning to location. "Oh, hey, there's the guys." He runs off to meet them. "So, we threw the fight, as ordered. After Artemis planted the tracer." I reach out in my range to detect the tracers. But there are three signals. Mine is heading south along with one of Artemis's, but she has another one heading north.
"Cheshire's heading North." Artemis is lying. Maybe to protect her sister? I should say something but I chose not to. She has a very good reason for lying.
"Sportsmaster was headed South." Roy seems to realize something is up. "Kinda like this mission." He is getting a bit irritated but I just calm him down with a hand to his shoulder.
"Maybe he'll double back, maybe she will." Artemis tries to cover her tracks, but I know what's up. I'm going to find out what she is trying to do, but either way, she is treading into rough waters with the rest of the group.
"Either way, they'll rendezvous, and we'll find them." Wally unknowingly is trying to defend Artemis and her tracking skills. He has a lot of faith in her and I'll do my best to keep it that way.
"We had better. Sportsmaster acquired an attaché case, we need to learn what it contained. If you had stayed aboard the Bio-Ship-" Aqualad tries to acknowledge our mistakes but Artemis cuts him off.
"I saw Cheshire sneaking up on him." She points at Roy, he tenses up and I don't think I can turn him back this time without getting vocal.
"Then you radio a warning." Roy snaps at her, but I stand in front of him ready to tell him off. He's been rude to Artemis from the beginning of the mission.
"They could have hacked our frequency, Red. She was trying not to blow our cover. Same reason why I placed a second tracker on Sportsmaster's boat and didn't say anything in the radio. He is still heading south but we'll know if he doubles back or if he keeps on going without Cheshire." I'm bitter with every word. He gets so angry and serious every time he puts on that quiver and has a bow in his hand. He seems to relax, understanding every word.
"It is true. We have come to rely on M'gann's telepathy over our radios." Aqualad supports my defense of Artemis. KF steps up.
"So let's stop looking to place blame and start looking for Cheshire and Sportsmaster." He urges for us to get the mission back on track.
"Here." Artemis holds out her tablet, showing the movements of one of the tracers, the one heading north, that means Cheshire the unknown tracker heading south, trailing Sportsmaster. "Since, clearly, I can't be trusted. You track her." She is bitter about Roy's distrust, but she is lying. He has the right to be suspicious but not the right to be angry and condescending to his teammate. Wally takes the tablet and hands it to Artemis.
"Artemis," he tries to get her to take control and do what she started by placing the trackers. But she just sighs.
"It's fine, I'll follow in the Bio-Ship." She leaves without taking the tablet.
"Go, Kid. Arrow, Tesla and I will return to the river, and we will all follow, as originally planned." Aqualad orders. We all move out, Kaldur back in the water and Roy and I back on our jet skis. I can't keep up from going North and tracking Cheshire when it's a fake tracker. I pull into the radio frequency and block Artemis.
"We have to head south. There are two tracker frequencies, one on Cheshire and one on Sportsmaster. The third is a decoy going north. It's on the train." I finally give her up, I can't withhold information that could sabotage the mission.
"You're lying! For all we know, you could be the mole and you're trying to sabotage us!" Wally tries to defend but I keep calm.
"After all that's been done to me, you really think I would be the mole? Besides, you should listen to me on this, I pushed and had the trackers emit electric pulses like sonar. The two heading south are Sportsmaster and Cheshire." I confirm without telling why Artemis lied.
"Why would Artemis do this?" Aqualad questions but I just say.
"I know why, but it's not my business to tell. It's a very good reason so it doesn't mean you shouldn't trust Artemis, but you should have her back in this." I say in a commanding tone. They all stay silent. I reach into my range and find that Artemis is already heading south. When we reach a warehouse, Artemis is already inside. Roy goes ahead to try and sneak in, but I sport Sportsmaster on the roof and nudge KF.
"Red, don't look now but Sportsmaster is above you on the roof." Kid says into the radio. We are still blocking Artemis out. I run up to help him with the keypad on the door, but the whole door explodes.
"Red!" I yell, running to him, but when I find that he is alright, I help him up. Before anything else, everything around me slows down and I feel a surge of energy repeating over and over in another part of the building. Everything speeds back up as Roy, Kid, and Kaldur run into the building. I run back around and find a new entry point to find the surging of energy. I open a window and perch of one of the metal support beams in the ceiling as who I recognize as Klarion zaps a containment unit with red energy. Professor Ivo and the brain are here as well. I reach out and find something absurd. The thing in the containment unit is a surviving piece of an ancient sea star, and they are infusing it with technology and sorcery for the command interface.
"All done," Klarion smiles as Sportsmaster closes the containment unit back in the case and Artemis bursts through the door.
"Freeze!" She orders them. I drop from the ceiling as the monkey android laughs.
"Don't be absurd With what we've created tonight, I could-" Professor Ivo begins but Klarion cuts him off.
"Why waste such power on her?" The witch boy asks. "Do what she says! Freeze!" He says as he bursts with energy, all of them disappearing and being replaced by statues of ice. In the looming disappointment from the mission, we all head back to the bioship and head back to the cave. Upon arrival in the mission room aqualad steps up with a very aggravated demeanor.
"Let me be clear. We the Injustice League is in custody, their allies still scheme, and we have learned nothing of their plans." Kaldur grumbles as he tells the rest of the team and Red Tornado.
"Actually, I got a read from their little experiment." I speak up. Everyone looks at me in shock. "They were using techno sorcery on a piece of an ancient starfish that should be at Star labs, but apparently, they have it. The interface responds to Klarions sorcery and it is integrated with a kind of fog like Dr. Serling Roquette's. It's prone to replicating and can be applied to external systems and organisms. I don't know what it does but what I do know is a start." I inform the rest of the Team.
"Ronnie I could kiss you!" Kid Flash get's excited about my small success within our failed mission. Roy gives me a look with a little smirk.
"We found out Sportsmaster was working for Brain, Klarion and Ivo." Aqualad continues our intel.
"Yeah, great intel! Except Ivo has been in Belle Reve the whole time! And the guards just checked. It's the real Ivo, not a robot." Roy sasses. I make a mental note to make sure this aggravation doesn't follow him home. That's never a good thing.
"I must report to Batman." Kaldur gets ready to walk away. "The rest of you, get some sleep." The room clears for everyone but Artemis, Roy and I.
"You're not who you say you are." Roy says as we gets close to Artemis. "This isn't over. Not by a long shot." He gets a threatening demeanor before walking off with me to the Zeta-tube. I head back to his apartment with him in Star City.