"On the spot," the massive Clayface answered.
"Actually, he thought of it two weeks ago," J'onn corrected. "The only reason he took this job was so he could say it."
"Oh, what do you know, greenskin?" Clayface insulted.
"Everything you know. And I very well could rival you as a legendary actor."
Clayface grinned. The bottom row of thick, yellow teeth hung out of his mouth. Clayface grabbed the car beside him and chucked it at J'onn. J'onn became intangible. Hawkgirl, who did not have that ability, was floating right behind J'onn. This was not a good place to be.
Hawkgirl paled. "Promiscuous Persephone," she said, real quiet-like, right before the car smashed into her. She went hurling back, far enough to be nothing more than a speck.
"SHAYERA!" Green Lantern screamed. Instead of flying after her, he took it out on Clayface. This was just as well considering had he helped her, her pride would have been bruised. Then he would have been bruised.
Hawkgirl was falling toward the ground. Right before she hit, she regained consciousness and caught herself. Upon flying back to the fight to finish off Clayface once and for all, she heard horns blaring frantically. She searched out the source and saw something very distressing below her.
Flash was caught in the middle of a one-way street. The two truckers on either side of him seemed to think that it went both one-ways at the same time. She saw him struggle to get across the street before he was squashed, but it was no use. There was no way he was going to make it.
Hawkgirl swooped down and grabbed him under the arms seconds before he was obliterated by the two trucks. His dangling legs were making his ribs hurt so bad his eyes rolled back in his head, but Hell would freeze over before he'd say anything.
Hawkgirl carried him awkwardly back toward the Javelin.
"Look what I found," she said.
"Heavens to Betsy!" Wonder Woman declared.
Hawkgirl's face scrunched in anger. "What is wrong with you, woman!" she shrieked.
"You can't carry him like that," Lantern complained. He took him from Hawkgirl, putting an arm under his knees and shoulders. "Support the head."
At this point, Flash was a little delusional from the pain and said, "No, no, Santa. Doin' fine. But a racecar'd be great."
Wonder Woman put the back of her hand on Flash's cheek. "He's burning up," she told them.
"Really?" Hawkgirl asked. "I didn't notice anything."
"I figured. It takes a woman's touch."
Hawkgirl's wings fluffed and expanded as her eyes darkened. (8)
"Making yourself look big, huh?" Wonder Woman examined Flash's ankle. "When was the last time you had your tetanus shot?"
He managed to focus on her through the haze. "B-uh . . . "
They were distracted (9) when a slab of concrete shot through their midst. The dispersed group coalesced and watched the fight end, in no way actually helping. Hawkgirl threw some punches into the air, just like she does when she watches boxing.
Superman, Batman, and Martian Manhunter were the only ones left fighting Clayface, and Superman was clearly impatient. It had gotten to the point where they were repeating the same, maybe, four moves.
"This is getting annoying."
Superman finally cooked the outside of Clayface with his heat vision, trapping the behemoth in a hardened shell of his own flesh.
Ew.
Batman looked at the police who were still standing. "Keep him this time, will you?"
Superman caught sight of Flash. "What's wrong with him now?" he asked.
"I found him about to be crushed," Hawkgirl answered. "I don't think he can run with his leg like that. He was trying to get across the street before these two trucks made a Flash sandwich. Poor thing looked like a snail on a mission. I grabbed him just in time."
Superman nodded. "Super flight - check."
"How about you, Shayera?" Lantern asked. "That car hit you pretty hard. Why don't you take off your mask and let J'onn have a look?"
Hawkgirl raised her eyebrows. "Who said this was a mask?" (10)
It was Lantern's turn to raise his eyebrows. "What are you saying?" Lantern stared at Hawkgirl.
"Go ahead and put him in the Javelin," Superman instructed. "He'll be okay on the Watch Tower."
It was all Lantern could do to tear his scrutinizing eyes away from Hawkgirl, but Flash's delusion brought him back to reality. Flash looked right up to Green Lantern and, in a jovial English accent, said, "Oh, Father, but we don't like strawb'ries."
"Oh."
"Yeah."
"He's been babbling like that for the past five minutes," J'onn said.
"Really?" Green Lantern asked. "Did I go somewhere?"
"You've been staring at my face," Hawkgirl said flatly.
"You and J'onn get him checked out," Superman told Lantern. "We'll take care of this mess down here."
"You know," Batman said, "for some of us, Lantern or the Javelin are our only means of getting back to the Watch Tower."
"Oh," Superman said. He looked around at the chaos the fight caused. "I'm not doing this by myself. Let's just go before anyone notices."
Flash was loaded onto the Javelin, and everyone snuck away before they could be cornered into cleaning up.
"I have something to help him sleep," J'onn offered. "It will allow some respite from the pain."
J'onn opened the glove compartment of the Javelin (11) and dug through all the junk that notoriously finds its way into glove boxes. (12) He threw out useless papers, old gum and candy, old gum and candy wrappers, scraps of notes, receipts, bank statements, pens, pencils, markers, a tiny sewing kit, and the manual. (13)
J'onn finally found a bottle of pills in the among all the trash. He popped a couple in Flash's mouth and rubbed his throat to make him swallow. In a matter of minutes, Flash was out. He slept hard for about ten minutes. When he awoke, he was considerably more lucid.
"Look who's up," Hawkgirl said in soft tones. She put a hand on Flash's. She glanced at Wonder Woman as if to say I can be comforting, too, you know.
Wonder Woman figured Hawkgirl could initiate comfort, but no one would run to the big scary Thanagarian for comforting. This played on her face in the smug smirk she replied. And this pissed off Shayera.
Hawkgirl squeezed Flash's hand. The tighter she squeezed, the more he was comforted, right? She made sure he was very comforted.
"Hey!" Flash yelped.
Wonder Woman chuckled. "Woman's touch," she said under her breath.
Hawkgirl then comforted Flash 'till his fingertips were purple. Flash didn't want to say anything to set off Hawkgirl any more than she was already, so he left her at it.
Hawkgirl was pleased.
· ¤§¤ ·
(8) Catfight!
(9) Drat it. No catfight.
(10) If for no other reason than I always wanted that to just be her face. In my heart of hearts, she's not wearing a mask.
(11) They never mention it, but really, what kind of high-tech, multi-million dollar space plane would it be without a glove box? Not a very good one.
(12) It's a universal constant.
(13) Everything but gloves.
· ¤§¤ ·
So, anyone been watching the weather along the Gulf Coast? That's why this chap's taken me longer to load up. We've been under tornado watches and warnings for almost a week and nothing's been happening (although it was enough to make me keep my computer off), and then suddenly, there's this thunderstorm so huge that schools actually closed. Cars pulled off to the side of the few roads that were still open. People trapped inside their homes. Flooding. Accidents. Power outages. Oy, what a mess. I'm only used to this type of chaos in the fall when the windows are boarded up 'cause we got a hurricane a-comin'. And then, my parents were up at the hospital with my brother this morning because he had these two 5 and 6 mm kidney stones that have to be removed manually because he had the lithotripsy only a couple of months ago for a kidney stone the size of a Ping-Pong ball, and they can't do it again for a year because of damage. Then he wanted pancakes, so instead of making them, they decided to schlep us all the way over to the nearest Denny's through all the flooded roads and submerged cars. And now I find out I can't even post this today because of whatever fanfiction's doing with their database, so I guess I'll post this tomorrow except whenever you read this, it'll be today.