AN: Not sure what to call this one. It's a Young Justice x Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha cross. I really like this idea, though I'm not quite certain what line to draw between DC's never kill anything unless it's obviously nonhuman, and the literal soldier AI war machine, never mind the more nebulous matter of what would be realistic if this was not a fictional setting that demands we ignore such thoughts.

MGLN magic has the awesome ability to be set to nonlethal, which makes it perfect for most DC universes. That way no matter how huge a laser you shoot someone with they will survive and become your friend, because that's how friendship lasers work! So once the differing morality issues get sorted out and assuming the mage in question is a power house you've essentially got a magical Green Lantern, which is nothing to scoff at.

Let me know what you think, and especially let me know if you have any ideas for an actual name for this snip, because I've got nothing for this one.

"Great, now, where are we?" A boy's voice distracted me from my thoughts.

"How should I know?! This whole place is like a giant maze. Lava pits, endless ice fields and now a massive library! It's crazy!" A girl responded angrily.

No way. I must be imagining things. After twenty some odd years stuck in this stupid cage was there finally someone besides that ancient jackass here?

"Look there has to be a logical explanation for all of this. Once we figure it out it should be simple enough to find Kent."

"Will you just admit it already?! Face facts KF, the tower is magic!"

"Hey! Hey, can you hear me?!" I grabbed the bars of my cage and shouted for all I was worth. "Please, you have to save me from the crazy old lunatic!"

For a moment everything was silent. Then the boy spoke up quietly.

"Please tell me you heard that?"

"This place just gets worse and worse." The girl's voice responded almost too softly to be heard.

"Please! I've been locked up here for more than twenty years! The old guy barely even uses this room, never mind talking to me. I just want out!"

"I'm going to regret this. I know I'm going to regret this." The girl trailed off as she rounded a corner and I finally got a look at my potential rescuers.

The boy was a redhead, and the girl was a blonde. Both wore what I thought might be casual clothing though I wasn't familiar with the style.

"What?" The girl asked, looking completely lost.

"It's a foot high, blue haired guy, with dragon wings." The boy answered blankly.

"Thank you, captain obvious. I meant what is it doing here and why is it locked in a bird cage?!"

"It has a name, and would like to be referred to as he at the very least." I growled. "Now would you please let me out of this stupid cage?"

The boy moved forward as if to help, but the girl threw out an arm to block him.

"Nuh uh, no way. We are not unleashing the tiny monster trapped in the wizard's tower just because it asked. I've read that book, and seen the movie. It never ends well."

"I'm not a monster! I'm a Unison Device, and my name is Kibo! That jackass Kent locked me in here after I crashed on this planet. It's not my fault the Dimensional Sea spat me out on his front lawn!"

"Wait, what? Dimensional Sea? You're from another dimension? And what's a Unison Device?" The boy moved around the girl and crouched down to be at eye level with me.

"I mean, yeah, Dimensional Transference isn't exactly easy to begin with. And considering the shockwave we were trying to get away from… well, we were lucky just to not get ripped apart. But my Lord didn't make it, and that just left me stranded on Kent's lawn with my dead Lord." The poor kid had been just a fresh faced recruit. We'd only been partnered together for a few months. He hadn't been ready for that at all, but with how the war had been going… It was a miracle either of us had made it. And it'd still taken a while for my self repair functions to get me back to one hundred percent.

"Then the bastard locked me up here because he was convinced I'm a threat. He refused to believe anything I told him because he couldn't figure out how I worked."

"How you work? Does that have anything to do with you being a Unison Device?"

"Sort of? Unison Devices are artificial intelligences meant to be partnered with a person, our Lord. We assist them with casting and can Unison with them to drastically improve their capabilities… if they are compatible."

"Wait, wait, wait. Casting, like magic? If you're an AI how can you claim magic is real?! That's fantasy, not Sci Fi!"

I looked to the girl for clarification, but she only rubbed the bridge of her nose in obvious frustration.

"Magic is the ability to alter reality through the use of Mana and Spell Formula. Devices like myself are used to offload the majority of the calculations required for casting because most humans are incapable of doing such complex mathematics mentally. Never mind using them in a combat setting." I gave him a bare bones explanation hoping that would answer whatever it was he was trying to ask me.

"So, wait, you're from a culture that took mysticism and turned it into science? Mana is just some kind of energy, right?" He seemed really excited.

"Uhh, I mean yeah, Mana is a type of energy, but mysticism? Maybe on developing planets, but Belka? That stuff was lost to ancient history for us and the rest of the empire as far as I know. And history really isn't my best subject." Not entirely my fault. I didn't really care about history all that much, but mostly I'd been too busy learning different military roles. Be it retirement, injury, or death, I'd never kept the same Lord for more than a few years. The constant bouncing around taught me a lot, but I'd never earned the sort of reputation the big names got by being a generalist.

"Look if you want to quiz me on magical theory, I'll answer whatever I can, but could you please let me out. You might be my only chance before Kent dies of old age and leaves me trapped here forever." I could hibernate indefinitely if I absolutely had to, but I'd much rather get out and see this new world I'd landed on. In theory I should be trying to get back to Belka, but I doubted there was much left to get back to. Not if both sides had been resorting to the kind of attacks that blasted me to wherever the heck I'd ended up. You don't start eradicating planets and expect things to go well in the long term. After twenty years? Yeah, no.

Even if they were still there, I was sick of losing Lords. I might as well just make the most of my situation. Maybe help the locals establish a formalized style of magic as opposed to whatever Kent had used to keep me trapped in such a flimsy looking cage.

"KF, we have no way of knowing if he's telling the truth." The girl spoke softly.

"Maybe, but you can't tell me leaving him here would be the heroic thing to do? He's not wrong. If Kent dies, and he's bound to eventually, there's no telling how long he'll be stuck here."

The girl bit her lip and reached back to play with the end of her ponytail for a moment. "Damn it." She crouched down next to the boy and stared me straight in the eye. "OK, but if we let you out, you stay with us for now. Nothing personal, but we don't really have any reason to trust you. You say Kent locked you up without any reason because he couldn't figure you out? OK, sure, but for us that doesn't mean he was wrong. So, you stay close, and don't cause any trouble until we can get to the bottom of this. Deal?"

"Deal!" It was a risk, but any risk beat staying trapped in this stupid cage.

"And in the meantime," She pulled out a set of lock picks and went to work, "we still need to track down Kent and his stupid golden helmet before the lunatic with the cat gets it.'

I froze for about three seconds. "The helmet? You mean that crazy Unison Device that wants to take over its Lord and use them like a meat suit?!"

"Wait what?" The boy blinked and leaned in close. "The helmet is a Unison Device, like you?"

"Hell no, it's not like me!" I protested. "That thing is just freaking weird. It's stuck looking like a helmet and can't interact unless someone wears it, and if anyone does that it Unisons with them. And it thinks it's a Lord of Order, whatever that even means. Kent seemed to think I was like the helmet and wanted to puppet my Lord's body. Because that's supposed to be what the helmet wants, but that's wrong! Unison Devices are supposed to work with our Lord's. We're only ever meant to take complete control if somethings gone really wrong. Like if our Lord got knocked unconscious mid battle."

"So, Kent thought you were going to body jack someone and locked you up to stop that from happening. But you're only meant to do that if everything goes to crap. No wonder he locked you up. But why didn't you just set him straight." The girl asked before cursing at a series of quiet clicks from the lock.

"He didn't trust anything I told him." I shrugged. "For the first few years he came by a lot and would say a bunch of gibberish while waving his hands around. But he always left frowning and muttering about how nothing made sense."

"I get it." The boy muttered, rubbing his chin. "If whatever Kent does and however you work are all on separate principles, than anything he could have worked out about you would have seemed like gibberish."

"And if he couldn't understand how you work and wasn't willing to take you at your word…" The girl picked up the train of thought. "Then he just decided to keep you locked up until he figured things out. But he never did."

I just nodded. "If you're planet hasn't figured out how to make even basic Armed Devices then looking at my systems wouldn't make any sense. Though that makes me really curious about where he got the crazy helmet. I suppose it could be a lost artifact from another dimension like me. Some kind of proto Unison Device maybe? Though that wouldn't explain how it got to this planet."

Then again if it was some sort of war machine and whatever civilization birthed it went the same way Belka had… Or maybe it's a Belkan experiment from who knows how far back that had failed and gotten tossed into the Dimensional Sea for one reason or another.

With a sudden click the lock came undone and a moment later I busted out of the cage with a whoop, finally being able to stretch my wings and fly again.

"Suck it, Kent, you geriatric jerk! I'm finally free!" Doing a loop of the room I gave my prison a drop kick that knocked it clear off the table before breaking out into a haphazard victory dance on the now clear table.

The amused snorts from my rescuers broke me out of my glee and I snapped to attention giving the pair a crisp solute.

"Belkan military unison device, Kibo, medic first class, mechanic and engineer second class, bombardment ace second class, close combat specialist third class. Currently without a Lord and capable of B class spell casting on my own."

The boy whistled, apparently impressed with my list of qualifications.

"I'm Kid Flash, and this is Artemis. We're superheroes."

"... What's a superhero?"

"We're a bit like law enforcement." Artemis answered. "Only we have nonstandard skills or abilities, so we have to act independently. Mostly because if we didn't our families and friends would get targeted by criminals with super powers."

I nodded slowly as I worked through that. I wasn't entirely sure what they meant by super powers, but if they were similar to Unique Skills and most of the population lacked the ability to cast even basic spells… That might explain things. Maybe. Either way I'd likely find out soon enough.

"Thank you again for freeing me. I'll do my best to help out however I can."

Kid Flash grinned. "Well then, let's get going! We've got an old guy to save, bad guys to smash, and a helmet to find!"

{}{}{}{}

"Artemis… how did we get separated from Kid Flash? We went through exactly the same door, ten seconds after him. Tops."

"I'm really starting to hate this tower." She growled as she paced ahead of me through the elaborately decorated hallway. "You're supposed to be magic right? Can't you sense when it's going to pull crap like this?"

"You're joking right? Kent had me trapped in a birdcage for two decades. I tried everything to get out of there and analyze the effect, but I still have no idea how your planet manipulates mana, there's no sense to any of it!" I threw my hands up in exasperation.

I wasn't kidding either. I'd tried reverse engineering the spell calculations hundreds of times, but it always broke down somewhere along the way. Like there were gaps in the math they decided to fill in with poetry and interpretive dance, and yet somehow it actually worked. Maybe a dedicated spell researcher could piece it together, but for all the hats I'd worn over the years, spell research was never a field I'd gotten much practice with. Sure, I could tweak spell formulas to refine their effects, and even piece together brand new spells if I had the time. But reverse engineering an entirely undocumented style of casting with no reliance on any kind of device? Whatever they were doing had to be a workaround they'd come up with to make up for the lack of computing power, but I couldn't for the life of me figure out how any of it worked.

"I was afraid you'd say something like that. Any chance you could… I don't know, scan for my friends?"

I closed my eyes and spun out a spell formula meant for search and rescue operations hoping I might get a return showing any living people. What I got back was a confusing jumble of warped and distorted space. The tower seemed to be an ever changing jumble of pocket dimensions. Not something I hadn't encountered before given just how much tech was crammed into even the simplest Armed Device. Dimensional folding was a must. But the tower wasn't stable. It seemed to fluctuate and rearrange itself at random. Worse, it was confusing my readings to the point I couldn't pin down any signs of life.

"No luck, this place is playing hell with my scans."

"Right, why wouldn't it. Hey tower! I need to get back to my friends so stop screwing around and make us a path back to them!"

I blinked and gave her a confused look. "Umm, are you expecting the tower to answer or-" I stopped talking as a door off to our left opened to show a group of teens… one of whom had gills and another had green skin. "Never mind. Of course the crazy tower responds to voice commands. Why wouldn't it."

"Artemis!" The green girl cheered as she flew towards us. "You're alright! But where's Wally?"

"We got separated by the tower after ending up in a library and rescuing this guy. Meet Kibo, everyone. Kibo, this is Miss Martian, Super Boy, Robin, and Aqualad."

"Good to meet you all." I responded with a wave as I flew over to inspect the green girl. She looked human, and a quick medical scan showed her biology was aesthetically similar but seemed to be mostly for show. Her DNA was like nothing I'd ever seen before and was definitely not human. Weirder still, she was flying without magic, somehow. Truly this world was determined to drive me insane.

Before I could start asking questions though we were interrupted by an idiot with a goatee who seemed to think people would like seeing his hairy chest. Or at least that was the impression I got from his unbuttoned white shirt. He lost even more points with me when he started blasting away at all of us with lightning.

"I knew retirement wouldn't stick." I muttered. "That's fine though. I've got some anger to work out and some rust to shake off." I bared my teeth in a vicious grin. Even if most people never looked close enough to notice, my canines followed the same trend as my wings, and I liked showing them off.

"Really, what was the League thinking, sending children? Not that I'm complaining mind you, it makes things so much simpler for me." He stopped talking long enough to blast Super Boy with more than enough electricity to stop someone's heart. And that was all I needed to see to stop thinking and cut loose.

My Lords and I may have never been the kind of heavy hitters that sent entire enemy squads falling back in fear, but if there was one thing I had learned and mastered better than any other Unison Device it was self sufficiency. I'd pushed myself to the limit of what I could do without a Lord, because when you weren't a Legendary team, and your partner got injured badly enough to end unison… What else could stand between my Lord and the Enemy? I'd lost my first Lord because I hadn't been good enough, and I'd sworn then and there, never again. None of these teens were my Lord, but they were my allies. They had freed me. I would not dishonor that kindness.

"Hey, jackass!" I spun up the equation for plain mana bullets, utterly bog standard and generic; they were nevertheless a good opening move when unsure of an opponent's capabilities. "Eat this!" His attention now firmly on me I let rip a dozen blasts of light blue mana.

A translucent shield sprang up between him and my attacks at a gesture catching my attacks. He responded with another blast of lightning. I was already moving before he attacked and easily dodged the forking electricity.

The field wasn't magic. Condensed and hardened air held together by some means I couldn't immediately identify. Interesting.

I shot out a half dozen homing bullets to my left and right. Their paths arcing around the forward facing shield to hammer my opponent from the left and right. He responded with another shield, this one wrapping around his body in a bubble. That was fine though, it kept him stationary. I launched a trio of high explosive blasts. More energy intensive than the standard but highly effective against energy shields.

The shield shattered and the residual blast wave sent the enemy tumbling back. He looked a bit ruffled, but not truly injured. Not good enough. I alternated fire between armor piercing and high explosive shots, looking to bring down the shield and tag him immediately after. Unfortunately, he had wised up and started to supplement his shields by actually dodging. I threw in some standard homing bullets just to try catching him off guard from an unexpected angle as the attacks arced around thanks to the odd directions I fired them at. Instead it gave him enough time to counter attack with more lightning. The counter caught me by surprise and forced me to throw out a shield of my own which easily handled the attack. How annoying, I really must be rusty if this ground bound clown was able to counter attack.

My new allies didn't let the opening I'd created go to waste. Several thrown projectiles landed at the man's feet before exploding. As he stumbled back a couch launched by someone, I wasn't sure who, slammed into his back. It tossed him to the ground. I took my shot.

My anti personnel attack, the one my second Lord had not so jokingly nicknamed Shredding Shot, ripped through the man's chest. It left behind a six inch jagged circle of empty space with long erratic fingers of ripped and shredded tissue arcing out from the wound.

I floated down a few feet off of Artemis's shoulder and treated her to my toothy grin. "Enemy combatant neutralized, should I be prepared for other threats?"

Artemis, rather than looking relieved that the threat to her life was neutralized seemed decidedly pale. Even nauseous. A quick look around showed that her friends seemed similarly ill at ease. Was this their first taste of combat? What idiot decided to send a team without any veterans into combat? That was just asking for unnecessary casualties.

"Ah, maybe, there was supposed to be one other villain, but for now let's just worry about finding Kid Flash." She spoke oddly. Like she was choosing her words with care. I gave her a concerned look but otherwise shrugged it off. I was a stranger. If they needed someone to talk to about this fight and the realities of combat it would be better coming from their actual superiors. Though I'd be sure to mention they needed said talk when I met said superiors.

{}{}{}{}

Debriefing to Batman and Red Tornado went more or less how I was used to. Though the teens kept shooting me looks. I really hoped they had a councilor on hand. The realities of combat always hit hard that first time. Since they didn't seem to be fighting a war, they'd likely have time to properly decompress.

I was highly curious about how, what to all my scans, were a normal man and some form of intelligent robot could be in command of what Artemis described as Unique Skill wielding law enforcement agents. Then again neither Artemis, nor Robin, appeared to have any sort of Unique Skill. Unless it was something subtle I was missing at any rate.

Finally, when all the reports were finished Batman turned to face me. For the most part he was inscrutable behind his mask and cape, but there was clear tension in his posture.

"What were you thinking, killing a man like that?" I blinked and rose a foot in the air to be on eye level with the man.

"He was an enemy combatant using lethal force against a group of allies. At least one of which was unarmed, and Robin was barely armed. He was a threat and I neutralized him to protect my allies."

Batman's mask went narrow eyed in a glare. It was an interesting trick. A none magical material or mechanical system capable of mirroring facial expressions. Even if it was limited to his eyes it was still impressive.

"Hero's do not kill."

I snorted. "Don't be ridiculous. No law enforcement agency would insist on limiting their people's response like that. No one would be crazy enough to agree to work in conditions where killing people who are trying to kill you is unacceptable. Never mind how that kind of system would encourage criminals. I mean if the criminals know they won't be killed then that's the same as telling them they can do whatever they like so long as they can avoid capture or escape prison."

Batman along with several of the other people in the room either flinched or twitched. Then Batman redoubled his glare.

"We are not, technically speaking, law enforcement."

"Wait… What?" I turned to Artemis. "But you said-"

"We work independent from law enforcement." Artemis said as she looked away from me. "Technically we're vigilantes. What we are doing could be considered illegal but regular law enforcement just isn't up to the job of dealing with most super villains. Never mind the occasional non terrestrial threats. They just learned to work with us out of necessity."

"... You all… are vigilantes?" I glanced around the room and was greeted with various nods and grunts. "But law enforcement works with you?" More nods. "... I'm sorry but if that's the case why haven't you just formalized that relationship and become a legitimate form of law enforcement?"

"The reasons are many and varied." Batman cut in. "If things here are resolved to my satisfaction that may be a discussion for another time. But the matter at hand is that you killed a man." The glare was back in force. I crossed my arms and glared right back.

"I'm not from this planet. I have no idea what kind of crazy rules you operate under. I spent the last twenty years locked in a cage because Kent wanted to poke at me until he understood how I worked. Prior to that I was a member of the Belkan military. Our response to the use of lethal force is lethal force. That idiot was trying to fry people under your command, and you are angry at me for protecting them? If you are their commanding officer then you need to get your priorities straight before you get them all killed."

The teens were all wide eyed at this point. Staring at me like I'd done the impossible. Or maybe like they thought I was insane. I wasn't quite sure. There must be some kind of context I was missing here. Batman's already squinty glare intensified as his eyes narrowed to thin white slits.

"I take the safety of this team and all its members very seriously, but your methods are a risk to the tenuis status quo. Not just between heroes and villains, but between heroes and civilians. By killing that man, you threaten our standing. Actions like yours could see us all returned to the days when vigilantes are hunted like criminals."

"Beyond the fact that I had no way of knowing any of that, all I'm hearing are more reasons you should not be working outside of the law."

"If you insist on acting in such a manner, I will bring you in."

"On what charges, vigilante? If defense of self and a third party isn't a viable legal defense on this planet you have bigger issues to worry about than whatever my presence might mean. And unlike you I'm not afraid to work with the government." After all, I had plenty to offer them. Like a way to empower their law enforcement to the point they could in fact deal with people like the one I'd dealt with earlier. The fact it might just put this overly entitled jerk out of a job was certainly a good reason to do just that.

He looked ready to say more when something on his belt beeped. He took a moment to check what I was fairly certain was a communication device then glared at me one final time before turning to leave. "I'm needed elsewhere, but we are not finished with this." He declared before stepping into the cave's teleportation device.

"Overly dramatic, entitled shit. You're damn right we aren't done with this." I needed to research just what the hell was going on with this crazy planet, but so far, I was not impressed with what I was seeing. Clearly, I had my work cut out for me.