A/N: Will you guys please read this one?

I just want to say thank you for everything you guys have done for me. You have read my story. You have favorited. You have reviewed. And all of that I am extremely grateful for. This story started out as something stupid and silly, but you guys liked it. And I just want to thank everyone for everything.

Now, as some of you might notice, this story has reached 300 reviews and I want to do something for you guys. I would appreciate ideas. I was thinking of randomly picking three people and give them one-shots at my expense, but that only pleases them and not everyone. So please leave me what you think I should do. I bet none of you are reading this. That's okay...I'm just gonna cry...

The Moth to the Flame

Artemis was pretty sure that one of these days that she was going to end up cracking her skull against her desk one of these days.

It was hard staying awake during English class. Like really hard.

It was probably just the class. There was something about English that bothered her to no end. It just seemed to be such simple information that they had to get tested on. Artemis knew where commas were supposed to go, so why did they have to spend two weeks doing the same thing over and over again. It was common sense. Most of what they did was just common sense that everyone in class knew and yet they still went over it…again…and again…and again.

Don't even get her started on how much wasted time they spend on semicolons.

The sad thing was that even though they all knew what was going on that the students couldn't just doze off or not pay attention because here at Gotham Academy you get graded on how good you are at paying attention.

Maybe that was why Artemis was failing.

At Gotham North you didn't even have to go to school to even go to school to pass the classes. It was nice. Artemis usually skipped first hour and slept in and still managed to keep a good GPA. It would have been nice to be able to sleep in nowadays considering she didn't get home to two in the morning on most nights.

Also, at Gotham North, she could have at least slept during the classes.

Don't get Artemis wrong; Gotham Academy is a great school. It's very nice, but she misses Gotham North and it's easy ways. But Gotham Academy had its perks. It was nicer. It had better teachers. It was one of the best college prep schools—even though Artemis doesn't really think she's gonna end up going to college considering she plans on doing hero-ing until the day she dies. It was nice.

But it was a Gotham school, which means that at least once a semester some super villain has to try and hold the school for ransom.

Barbara elbowed Artemis in the side to prevent her from falling asleep on her copy of Grapes of Wrath, "Long night?"

Artemis sighed and just about threw the book across the room. Their English teacher, Mrs. Cree, was currently late, which wasn't that big of a deal. She was probably using the passing time to go to the bathroom, you know, since she was pregnant and all. It was a common happening in Artemis' English class.

"I had a lot of gymnastics to practice."

The girls had learned that using them dating to cover up for the fact of their hero-ing was just not going to work anymore, so they decided to use gymnastics as a cover instead. Or at least Barbara and Artemis decided that it was a better idea. Bette was still calling all of their hero-ing rendezvous things "dates". That was Bette though. Once Artemis' explained why Ollie thought that the three girls were dating, she wanted in.

Whatever that meant.

"I have some hot chocolate, if you think that would work," Babs picked up her nice looking mug and handed it to her. "How did you get through your first two hours?"

Artemis twisted the lid and took a sip. It was still hot. "I didn't. French was easier to make it through considering I have Dick making constant innuendos in French to keep me up. He also tried in Algebra II, but…um…I didn't last that long. I feel asleep while he was spraying me with his water bottle."

She was still slightly damp from the annoyance in second hour.

Babs laughed and looked at Artemis' back where there was a wet spot in the shape of a bat on her jacket. "I—" she was cut off when a man walked into the room. Artemis wasn't really paying attention. Her face was dug into her folded arms and she was trying to get some sleep since Babs seemed to finally stop asking questions and Mrs. Cree was busy being pregnant.

"Hey Art?"

"I'm sleeping."

"We don't have a sub today, right?"

"Nah, I saw Mrs. Cree earlier today." Artemis sorta, kinda may have had to turn in a paper that she had forgot to finish the night before, so she knew for a fact that Mrs. Cree is here.

"Then who is that guy?"

Artemis lifted her head to see the guy standing awkwardly at Mrs. Cree's desk. He pulled a USB out of his pocket and plugged it into the computer. He quickly did a couple of things on the computer and then went and stood next to the door.

"It's a merc," she mumbled. She could even see the outline of the gun in the guy's jacket. Other bulges and indentations indicated that there were numerous other concealed weapons.

Artemis sat up in her chair to get a better look at the man. She caught the sight of a communicator in his ear as he shuffled in front of the door. There were definitely more people here. It was a group attack. Most likely a hostage type situation. Artemis wouldn't be surprised if they sent half the kids out of the school so it would be easier to corral the kids and keep track.

In situations like this, Artemis is glad that she's had a different background than say Robin because she knows how the crook thinks and can think ahead of them. It was more than helpful in a lot of situations. Like the Red incident, Artemis could figure out where to escape in a room before Robin could even pull up the schematics to look.

There was a conveniently placed vent in the back of the classroom that happened to be in between her desk and Babs' desk. Artemis always tried to sit in the back of the classroom for this very reason—not that she thinks about escaping from the classroom. It's just a thing she automatically does since she was little. Scope a room for exits and make sure you're positioned near one. It's something her Dad taught her when she was little that she still does out of habit.

She also tries to save people out of habit.

Go figure.

Her eyes locked with Babs, "Don't do anything," she mouthed.

Artemis leaned back in her chair and started to unscrew the screws that kept the air vent in place. Barbara went all wide-eyed, but she didn't say anything.

"Who are you?" one of the kids up in the front of the class asked.

The man turned his attention from whatever was going on outside the door to the classroom. Artemis bit her lip and tried to undo the bolt as fast as she could. The guy raised an eyebrow at the kid before answering, "I'm your sub, okay?"

Like anyone was convinced with that.

The subs at Gotham Academy were always super polite and sucking up to the students in hopes that the students will give them a good review, so that Gotham Academy would hire them again. Gotham Academy always pays the best to get the best teachers.

It makes Artemis want to consider being a teacher.

And then she remembers that kids don't like her and everything starts to get normal again.

The whole class started to look around at each other waiting for someone to do something. Anything. The kids at Gotham Academy were far from stupid and more close to cautious. They live in Gotham. They have to be cautious and not stupid. Being stupid gets you killed.

About five kids take out their phones and start to text their parents or anyone. In retrospect it is a good idea to get help, but the man up front has eyes and he can easily see the five kids. Artemis wants to just shout out something about subtly to them, but she finishes with the bottom screw and moves to the top one.

Always do the hardest one to reach first. It will always come in handy later.

The merc walks down between the row that happens to be the row that separates Babs and Artemis. There's a kid about five seats in front of Babs with his phone under the table, texting. This isn't going to end well.

"What are you doing?" the merc asked. The kid—she thinks his name was Luca or something—looked up from his phone. "There's no phones in this classroom." He reached down and grabbed onto the kids hand and ripped it up. Artemis could swear she heard some sort of crack. "Now, lesson of the day, if there is a strange man in your classroom, do not draw attention to yourself. Don't try to be a hero."

It happened almost too fast for Artemis to even understand what happened.

Artemis hasn't had that happen to her since she was a little kid. One moment something was happening and the next a completely different situation was going on. Maybe it had to do that she was in such a different and volatile situation in a place where that was the last thing she expected.

One moment the guy was just holding the kid's arm and the next the kid had a hole in his hand and the merc had one of his guns out. The blood was splattered against most of the kids behind him. Artemis could feel some of the blood on her brow.

"Now, does anyone else have any questions? You all are gonna sit here quietly while I tell my boss that every thing is all good. No one has to get hurt as long as no one—"

Artemis managed to get the top screw off of the vent and popped the vent off. Its clattering against the floor was a lot louder than she had expected, but it did the trick in distracting the merc. "And what do you think you're doing?"

"Oh, sorry. Was my hero's complex kicking in? I hate it when it does that."

He narrowed his eyes at Artemis, "Don't be stupid, girl."

He stepped closer to her until he was just standing over her desk, "Cause you have that covered, right?" Artemis reached up, grabbed his collar, and yanked him down so his face slammed into her desk. She yanked his arm back far enough so that she heard the confirmation of a pop that she dislocated his arm. All it took was a blow between the junction between the back of the head and neck to knock him out.

The room was silent as everyone just stared at Artemis, "We have to go through the vents to get outside. Luca, come here." Even though she said we she really meant them. She wasn't going to leave everyone in the school without some sort of hope of getting free.

She wasn't kidding about her hero's complex.

Where had that come from? But now that she thinks about it, she can tell that even though throughout her life being taught to just keep yourself alive that now it's starting to get rewritten as something else. Something more heroic and less selfish.

It's weird thinking about yourself changing.

And now all Artemis can think about is tadpoles, which isn't really prudent as she's trying to stop Luca's hand from bleeding all over the place. She ripped off the bottom of her shirt and tied it tightly around his hand as the rest of her class started going through the vent to outside—hopefully.

Artemis didn't know whether to snort, laugh, or sigh when she saw that Barbara was helping guide their classmates into the vent. "There you go, Luca. Just be careful when crawling. You don't want to—"

Artemis was cut off by him pressing his lips against hers in a fast kiss, "Oh-god-you're-so-beautiful-and-you-saved-me-thank-you-Artemis," he stammers quickly before running to the vent and getting in.

Well that was new. That was usually a reaction that Superman or the Flash got—never Batman though. Oh god. Thinking about if a woman suddenly kissed Batman for saving her is extremely amusing and disgusting at the same time.

Hmph, she'd have to ask Dick if that's ever happened before.

Artemis sat there a bit stunned at what just happened, "Should I tell Dick about this?" Babs teased.

Artemis rolled her eyes, "Go."

"No."

"Babs, this isn't up for discussion. Go."

"I can handle myself."

"No."

"You're gonna go off and hero-it-up and I wanna go to. You're not the only one capable of saving a school."

"Batman is going to be here soon."

"So?"

"He's gonna put together who you are." Dick's gonna put together who you are.

"Artemis—"

"Chase. Come in. This is Mike. We need an update on the class you have. Chase. Chase, come in. We will be sending a team if you do not respond."

Artemis and Barbara froze as they listened to the radio of the man who was down. They both locked eyes, "We have to go," Babs insisted.

Artemis nodded and tried to choke down the fact that she actually wanted Barbara with her. This was probably a school wide kidnapping that was actually decently planned. It wasn't going to be take down one guy and everything gets solved. It was going to be much more difficult.

Artemis just loves difficult stuff.

That's why she likes playing Majora's Mask because holy shit that game's difficult.

"I think we can hide in the ceiling. Give me a boost," Babs placed both of her hands on Artemis' shoulders.

She didn't really expect Artemis to throw her into the wall above the air vent. "Why—"

Artemis held up a finger to signal to be quiet. "If you want a secret identity then we have to make it seem like we got caught." Artemis punched the wall beside her and let out a little shriek. They made some more ruckus and then Artemis boosted Babs up so that she could lift up a ceiling tile so they could get into the ceiling. The both quickly went into the ceiling and put the tile back.

They crawled through the school's intricate almost attic like system until they figured they were far enough away from the classroom, so they could talk without worrying about being heard. "What do we do now?" Babs asked.

"We go get our costumes."

"What do you mean there's a couple of costumes in here already?" Killer Moth asked. He was pacing around the main office of the school waiting to hear back from all of the mercenaries that all of the select classrooms had been secured.

"I don't know sir, but there's a guy knocked out in this classroom and it's probably the bat or something."

Killer Moth let out a groan, "I thought we told the police to keep him out of this."

"I guess we'll just have to solidify that example," Firefly said and left the room ignoring the protests of his 'mentor'. He walked through the halls before he found a group of students being corralled by a couple of mercs. One of them spotted Firefly, "What's up?"

"I need a kid," he grabbed the nearest one, a boy probably in his freshman year, and took him to the nearest classroom with an outdoor access.

"W-what are you doing?" the kid stammered and nearly lost his footing as he got dragged through the halls.

"Sending a message," Firefly answered gruffly.

The lights of the police cars could be seen through the windows as they entered the classroom. Firefly threw the kid against a desk before he went to the teacher's desk and wrote a note on a piece of paper. He crumpled it up and put it in the kid's hand. Forcing his hand to be closed tight around the paper, "Is that the message?"

"No. You are."

Firefly took off his flamethrower and lit the kid on fire and pushed him out the window, not staying to listen to the police insist on him to give up.

Even though Killer Moth said this was that this was going to start their careers—be their foundation. Firefly knew this was more. This wasn't just a start. This was something way different.

Commissioner Gordon rushed forward through the crowd after the firefighters managed to put the boy out. There had so far been no progress with the kidnapping situation before this moment. Although, was a boy falling out of a second story window while on fire considered progress? A couple of the medic were trying to get the boy to sit up, but they were only met with a couple of screams of pain.

"Oh god! My legs! Th-They can't—I can't move them!"

His daughter was in there with the monster who did this.

His daughter.

He leaned down next to the boy and looked at the medics, "Is he gonna be okay?"

The medics let out a shaky sigh, "The burns are minor, but it appears he must have broken his legs on the fall."

The boy leaned back into the medics hold while panting, "Some new costume freak," he let out another scream as the medic moved his leg. "Told me to deliver a message."

He slowly uncurled his fist to reveal the untouched piece of paper. The Commissioner took it and quickly unraveled it.

No more costumes.

"Batman!" he shouted and got up, nearly knocking the medics away. "Where is Batman?"

It didn't take long for the Caped Crusader to appear next to the commissioner, "What?"

"You aren't going in! I can't risk anymore kids getting hurt. There's already someone in there. They can take of it."

Batman just raised an eyebrow at that. Someone was already inside the school. There were two very obvious choices, Robin or Artemis. He knows for a fact that Robin has his utility belt and within that he was a spare costume, but he isn't exactly sure about Artemis.

He just hopes that they can take care of a situation like this and that they don't let anymore causalities happen because it's different when you know them. It isn't a normal hostage situation for them. Those are their friends and classmates in there a wrong move means that they will die.

They had to take care of the situation.