Episode 16: Invocation

Note: I've taken several liberties with Japanese geography, culture, and language. For these, I hope I will be forgiven. Also, I think it's fair to warn you that this is going to discuss a very, very, very dark and disturbing topic. Approach with caution. I'm putting a lot of myself into this chapter, perhaps more than I have ever written, but I want to assure you all that I do not condone this topic nor have I indulged in it.

"Attention: Flight 23-A for Tokyo, Japan will be boarding in five minutes. Once again . . ."

"Well, I guess that's my cue," Precious sighed. She got up from her seat, and everybody stood. She first turned around and hugged Mr. Hawkins. "Bye Mr. H."

"Goodbye, Hon. You do us proud."

"I'll try." She then squeezed Virgil's shoulders. She held him extra-long. She felt a little hand grasp her finger. Precious pulled away and laughed at the little boy in Virgil's arms.

"Say bye-bye to Aunt Precious," Virgil said in a baby-talk voice as he bounced his boy up a little. Precious laughed again. As she got her finger free, she felt a tiny shock on her fingertip.

"Just like his father," she said. She gently ran her fingers though the boy's curls. "I hope I get to see him before he becomes a teen."

"You will," Virgil answered.

"Give my regards to Sharon, will you? I really wish she and Adam were here."

"Once they come back from their honeymoon, we'll tell them you said hi," Mr. Hawkins said.

"Thanks." She then turned and hugged her aunt. "Goodbye, Aunt Maggie."

"Bye, Sweetheart," Aunt Maggie replied softly.

Then Precious hugged Richie, but it was a rather quick hug. "Guess I'll see you soon."

"Uh, yeah, probably so," Richie said with a shrug.

"Don't worry, I know what I'm talking about," Precious said. "You'll see." Then she walked up to Bruce Wayne. He gave her a big bear hug. "Bruce, thank you so much for everything. I can't thank you enough."

"It's no problem at all," he replied. "Now, if you need anything, reimbursement, encouragement, or any other support, you know how to reach me." He winked.

"OK."

"Hey, that goes double for us," Virgil added. "You keep in touch with Richie and me, you hear me girl?"

"I hear ya," Precious nodded. She looked back at Bruce and sighed. "Why couldn't Eli come? Will he even know that I may never see him again?"

"I know, I know, it's unfair. I tried to talk to his parents, but they got other plans. I'll talk to him. I'm sure he'll miss you."

"I'll miss him too." She heard another announcement on the PA, and so she approached the person she wanted to leave the least. Without a word, she put her arms around her mother.

"You'll do fine, Sweetheart," Claire said in her ear. "Just do your best, and don't forget the Lord."

"Yes Mommy." She pulled apart from the hug, but then Precious hugged her again and burst into tears. "Oh, Mommy, Mommy, I love you."

Claire stroked Precious' hair, but then she pulled away. "I love you too, Honey, but you need to get on that plane. You don't want to lose your dream."

Precious nodded. She picked up her handbag full of books and CDs and joined the other passengers lined up in front of the terminal, all the while looking at her family.

Then someone else got in front of her that she recognized–a tall, young man in shades a black trench coat. "You. I need to talk to you," he said in a low voice.

"Terry?" she whispered.

"Uh, actually no. Here, this might help." He took off his shades and revealed a mask.

"Oh, Robin!"

"Shh! Not so loud. I'm not Robin anymore. I go by Nightwing now. I know this is tactless and all, but it's really important."

"What is it?"

"It's about Slade."

"I know all I need to know about Slade. He's gone forever this time."

"Yeah, you'd think that, but that's what we thought last time."

"What do you mean 'last time?'"

The PA came on again, "Attention, Flight 23-A for Tokyo, Japan is now boarding."

"Awwe!" Precious groaned. "Listen, can we talk about this later, on our communicators maybe? I don't want to miss my flight. This is my big dream."

"Alright, but sooner rather than later would be good," Nightwing told her. "In the meantime, look out for dust."

"Dust?" How could she look out for dust? Dust gave her an allergy attack first thing each morning.

"I'll explain when we talk."

"OK, I'll keep that in mind. I'll do my best." She started backing away. "Incidently, where is everybody? I told Starfire that I was going to leave today."

"I know, and they really wanted to come, but you know how things go. But Starfire did wanted me to remind you to be wary of the 'rekmas.'"

"I will. Tell everybody I said 'hi'," Precious called after him. She added softer, "Tell them I wish they could be here."

Once Precious was out of sight, Claire began to cry. "That's my little baby there. My little baby has grown up."

Mr. Hawkins consoled her. "Yeah, I know how it feels," he said softly.

All the crying made Virgil's son cry. "Awwe, now look what you guys did!" Virgil taunted.

On the plane, Precious looked hard at her ticket and the numbers on her seats. She did several double-takes, then she approached the stewardess. "Excuse me, ma'am. I can't seem to find my seat," Precious asked.

The stewardess looked at Precious' ticket. "Oh, honey, you're in First Class."

"I am? Cool. Good ole' Bruce. I gotta remember to thank him again for this. But where is First Class?"

"You just passed it. Here, follow me."

The stewardess showed Precious her seat. Precious made sure that she sat by the window. This was the first time she ever flew in an airplane, and she wanted to see everything. As the plane took off and everything looked as small as ants, Precious whispered, "Goodbye, Dakota. Goodbye, Metropolis. Goodbye, Titan Tower. Goodbye, Gotham City."

Then with a sob in her throat, she said, "Goodbye, America."

She opened a book and tried to read, but she couldn't stop thinking of all that had happened these past few years. They had been eventful, to say the least.

Precious' childhood friends have all grown up and started lives of their own. Virgil married his old friend Daisy and had a son. Everyone expected Richie to follow suit and marry Frieda, but he chose a girl he met in college.

Shenice went to college out of state. No one had heard from her since. Everyone assumed she settled down elsewhere.

No one had heard much of the Teen Titans either. Actually, a new batch of teenagers had become the Teen Titans, but Precious understood that the former group still worked as a team. Precious still kept in touch, mostly through Starfire, but it had been over a year since she had seen them in person. Starfire had warned her previously of the "rekmas," her planet's term for the drifting away of friends. That's why Precious was fighting to stay in contact with them, and she couldn't understand why she knew so little about them.

Adam had become a big star. That song he wrote about Precious turned out to be his first number one, and it got him a platinum album and a Grammy. But he wasn't a one hit wonder. His next album also went platinum. He released a rap remix of the classic disco song that bore his name and did a top notch video (doing his own stunts). It got him a Moon Man. He also did some collaborations that got him some more Grammies. He'd even been offered some movie roles. But the big news was his recent marriage to Sharon. Precious was asked to be a bridesmaid at that wedding. Several celebrities attended, and it was very cool.

Ragnarok was improving. His speech was getting a little better every time he worked with the Muse. Richie did put in the Magic Hat technology into Ragnarok's helmet so that the boy could have more power. However, he did not keep the helmet on 24/7 like the Muse, so his case was always more serious.

Raven was helping him, though. They had become close friends since the whole Trigon incident. When Batman heard of her mental bond with Eli, he sent her to be his tutor. She came to Eli's house in a disguise under the name Raven Smith. She helped him mostly with his verbal skills, but she secretly was teaching him more about the world through their mental connection. At first, she was very cautious to hide her nature, but as she became more comfortable she became careless. After being his tutor for about a year, Eli's sister caught Raven touching Eli's temples and whispering, "Azerath, Metrion, Zinthos." His parents accused Raven of teaching their son with witchcraft and fired her immediately. After that, they became more protective. Therefore, the Muse saw her partner less and less. It really made her sad.

There was a little bit of tragedy too. Uncle Sean suddenly died of a stroke. That was the first time Precious had ever gone to a funeral, and she couldn't stand it. She took one look at her uncle's body and ran out of the funeral parlor crying. She would not come back in.

Claire turned to Bruce for comfort. She often met with Bruce to discuss Precious' future, so she said. Precious wasn't sure what she meant. The school situation had been cleared up. Were they planning something she didn't know about? Was her mother looking for a cure? Did she . . . like Bruce?

What Precious didn't know was that Claire guessed that Bruce was really Batman, and she was trying to get clues about how to become a better sidekick. Alfred gave her a few hints. It seemed nobody really came out and said anything, but a lot was learned anyway. And it was clear that Bruce was somewhat interested in Claire. He took her out to dinner sometimes and took her on walks when everything was quiet and still. Claire wasn't really sure how she felt. She thought Bruce was nice and a good candidate for a new spouse, but she wasn't sure if she was ready for that yet.

In spite of all that, however, Bruce was a huge part of Precious' life. He hired Richie as an intern at the ARC (that's when they revealed identities), and Richie helped to develop a computer chip. It was designed to do the same type of things as the Magic Hat from the inside of the brain. The hypothesis was that in such a way, the process would be done more efficiently and would work quicker to get to a cure by regulating electrical and chemical impulses to the correct places. Precious was, of course, selected to be the first test subject. The surgery was about a year ago. It seemed to work. Precious was better coordinated, and her logic gradually improved. There was still a long way to go, though. Her fine motor skills still needed work, for one thing. Her social skills were better, but they still were very weak. She had to take a pill once every day that helped the chip continue to do its job. Of course, Bruce and Richie put on a secret interface on the chip to make Precious turn into the Muse at will. It was nice. Precious certainly liked just having to think of becoming the Muse and having it happen, and she didn't have to worry about juggling a couple of hats.

But this wasn't the only thing. Bruce heard about Precious' dream about going to Japan and becoming an RPG writer, and he covered all of her expenses. Precious had just completed all of her undergrad college education in the states. Now she was going to a university in Japan for two years to learn more about the Japanese language and culture as well as business management and computer programming. Then she was going to try to land a job.

Bruce kept warning her that it was very competitive up in Japan, but Precious felt very confident. She was, after all, told by some visitors from the future that she was going to be rich.

The lights dimmed for an in-flight movie, which turned out to be, no surprise, a foreign action/romance film. It had subtitles which Precious had fun reading, but she only half watched. A romance was the last thing she needed to see.

Precious couldn't exactly explain why (though she suspected it was because all her friends were marrying and having families), but she felt very lonely. She knew that going to Japan would only make her feel lonelier, being so far away from everybody. She had tried many times to get a boyfriend, but she was never successful. She remembered that Virgil had told her that she would be married someday, but Precious was starting to doubt that. Her future spouse was not at college or even high school, and he was not a fellow superhero.

Oh, she tried that crowd. Most of them were too old for her, and she knew it. She thought about asking out Virgil just to see what a date was like, but then he told her about Daisy and Precious decided against it. Precious almost did the same with Robin, until Starfire told her about the "wondrous" time when he took her out. One time in desperation, Precious hastily asked Beast Boy out. He answered that he was flattered but that he still had feelings for Terra. Often when she was alone, Precious felt a small, soft tickle on her earlobe. She'd stroke it fondly as a wave of nostalgia came over her. Then she remembered that Terry wasn't even born yet and would get after herself. She said to herself, "Even if he was around, he already had a girlfriend too–Dana, remember?"

Eli, of course, seemed to be Precious' obvious choice. He was her age, and she still remembered how captivated she was with his eyes. Yet he was a very private person, and she almost never got to see his real self. He never opened up to her like he did on the pier, and the more she thought of it, the more she wondered if he was just doing that because he knew the world would be destroyed in a few hours.

Claire tried to play matchmaker with some fine, young men at Church. She got Precious all fixed up for parties and other functions, and then the boys that Claire had instructed Precious to look out for never showed. Precious always felt stood up when that happened. She knew it was silly to feel that way since the boys never expected for her to come anyway, but it still hurt.

So, Precious started to understand what Slade meant when he said that he hated love. She was about to get to that point. She was sick and tired of infatuation and had even considered to stop trying. She tried to get Raven's advice about how to isolate her troubling emotions. Raven gave her some advice and showed her some meditation techniques. Yet it wasn't quite helpful when Precious heard that Raven also felt the same kind of bitterness that never went away. After all, the only crush she ever had turned out to be a dragon that nearly devoured her.

Precious was still partly hopeful. Perhaps her beau waited for her in Japan. She doubted it, however. How could she communicate daily with someone on a JSL or ESL basis?

She shook her head and turned away from the screen. She didn't want to watch the screen anymore. She leaned her seat back, closed her eyes, and went to sleep.

Hours later, her plane reached its final destination. Precious got off, got her luggage, and got everything taken care of. Then she walked out and saw Tokyo. Everybody told Precious that Tokyo was big, but she had no idea it was this big. Big just didn't seem like the right word. There were so many lights and displays. She saw anime everywhere, making the landscape look childlike somehow. And she saw so many technological things that she had never seen before.

She hailed a taxi and made it to the apartment assigned to her. It was a quaint little room. It didn't have paper walls, like she thought it would. It wasn't teeny tiny either. In fact, it seemed to be just the right size. It had a TV, a couch, a bed, a refrigerator, a stove, a toilet, and a sink. A welcome basket with fruit sat on the counter. Obviously, the place needed more furnishings, but Precious decided she would take care of that later. She unpacked and planned to sleep to work off her jet lag. Then she remembered her promise to talk to Nightwing. She grabbed the Titan communicator, but she dropped it on the hard floor and broke.

"Oh no!" She picked it up. "Let's see, magic!" The cracks mended. "There, now." But when she flipped it up, there was no beeping theme song, blinking lights, or picture in the screen. "Oh, it's still broken. Must be something inside. Well, there are a lot of techno-freaks in this town . . . no, wait, then I'll give away my identity. Oh well, I'll think of something."

She put the communicator in a drawer. There it gathered dust for a couple of years.

As the week progressed, Precious improved her apartment and tried to take a walk around the city. She even tried to talk to people she met with the little bit of Japanese that she knew, but they all spoke so fast. There was just so many things, so many people. Precious felt tremendously overwhelmed.

One evening she came home, tightly locked her door, and tried to catch her breath. "Somebody out there's got to empathize with me," she thought aloud. "Maybe Starfire. When she first came to Earth, she must have dealt with feelings like this–oh, wait I can't call her. That's right. Hey, I know."

She went to her room, pulled her Shock Box out of her beside table and pushed the button. Virgil's confused voice answered, "Huh? What? Oh, Gear, why are you calling so early?"

"Oh man, Virgil, I'm sorry. I forgot, it must be early morning where you are."

"It's ok, Precious. The kid kept me up for most of the night, so I was already awake. So how's Japan?"

"Um, Virgil, let me ask you again. What was it like when you went to Africa that first time?"

"Oh, it was great. I felt connected, like I was in my real home. You know, it's because in a way I was. I felt like the majority rather than the minority. It was good, like therapy. Why?"

"Man, that didn't help at all."

"Huh? Why not?"

"Because I feel exactly the opposite right now. I feel disconnected, out of place, and overwhelmed. I feel like a little bit of plankton in a large ocean. I feel . . . like a foreigner."

"Well, maybe that's because . . . you are."

"You're really not helping, Virgil," Precious said with a nervous laugh.

"It's ok. You're just experiencing a little culture shock. I had to get over a lot of that when I was in Africa. Every country is different. After you live there a few years, everything will be old hat."

"But this feels more than just culture shock. I mean, it's also because Tokyo is so . . . big. Bigger than big."

"You knew that. You've been there before."

"Yeah, but I think it got bigger. You won't believe how big it is."

"I know. I can't imagine it. Has the Muse taken a look at Tokyo yet?"

"She hasn't had time yet. I was thinking about it for tonight. It's a Friday night, by our calender anyway, and I need something fun to relax."

"I bet under a bird's eye view, it won't seem quite as overwhelming, and you'll have more control at least. And hey, one advantage about a big city for superheroes is that there's always crime."

"Hey, that's right, and if all the movies and anime shows are true, Tokyo has a lot more on its plate than just mainstream crime. This should be fun."

"There you go. You're going to make Tokyo 'Museville' in no time."

"You're right. Thanks Virgil." She signed off, fixed a quick dinner, transformed, and opened her windows. "Time to see how big this town really is," she said as she took off.

It wasn't long until she saw some strange beast harassing some young teenagers. The Muse swooped down and confronted the creature, but before she could do anything she heard a cry behind her. A girl with long, blond ponytails was pointing a wand at the creature and screaming. In a flash, the monstrosity was disintegrated.

The Muse turned around and looked at the girl. Several other girls in similar outfits stood with her. "Sailor Moon! Remember me?"

"Oh, hello Muse," Sailor Moon replied.

"Hey, uh, do you think you could use an extra hand? Because I'd be happy to help."

"Thank you, but this is our problem, and we have things under control."

"Alright, but if you change your mind, I'll see you again."

The Muse flew off again until she came upon a large, dragon-like creature. "I can take this one on."

Yet as she approached it, she heard another yell. "Dark Magician, dark magic attack!" Once again, in a flash the foe disappeared. The Muse turned around and saw a young man who looked a lot like Eli.

"Yugi, hey!" the Muse said as he approached him.

"Oh, hi Muse. Sorry, but I'm afraid I'm the only one who can fight this monster," the boy answered.

"Oh, ok. Well, just let me know if you need any additional help."

It was like this for the rest of the night. The Muse saw a problem, but it was always taken care of. Then when she tried to join forces with the heroes facing the problem, they would flat out refuse her help. The only thing good out of this was that she was meeting many Japanese heroes that she had looked up to for a long time.

After a while, the Muse, depressed, changed back and walked down the street to her apartment. Then she passed by a place with flashing lights and a large marquis. She looked inside and saw video game screens and people with heavy masks over their faces.

"It's a VR arcade," Precious thought aloud. "Well, why not? It is Friday night."

She went inside. There were several rooms made of glass, looking almost exactly like the racquetball courts at her previous college. Inside each were people hooked up to bulky virtual reality masks and gloves. One boy was dribbling an invisible basketball. One was shooting a large plastic gun. One girl looked like she was running for her life, but she was running in place. Precious came to a girl behind a counter.

"Welcome to our arcade," the girl said. "Our new releases are 'Sentries of the Last Cosmos,' 'Samurai's Revenge' and 'Pokemon Burgundy.' Would you like to play?"

"Pokemon's still around over here?" Precious thought aloud. "Uh, I mean, do you have any RPGs?"

"Yes, more than a hundred. Our latest is 'The Sixteenth Ultimate Dream.'"

"Oh, that sounds good. I'd like to try that."

"How long would you like? You can schedule up to five hours."

"I'll try one hour for right now."

"Which language would you prefer?"

"Language? What languages are available?"

"Japanese, Chinese, English, French, German, Russian, Italian, Spanish, Portugese, Hungarian--"

A voice in the back of Precious' mind told her to pick Japanese and continue to practice, but she also felt that this was her fun time and she needed to give that side of her mind a break. "I'd like English please."

"American English, Australian English, or UK English?"

"Oh, American English, please."

"Do you have a disk?"

"A disk? For what?"

"To save your progress when your hour is up."

"Oh. I think I have one in my pocket." Precious pulled out a small, round CD. "Here you go."

"What is your name?"

"Precious."

"Ok, Precious, female character, Sixteenth Ultimate Dream. All right, you are ready."

The girl told Precious the price, and Precious dug into her pocket for the money. "Not bad," she said to herself. The girl then led Precious down to an empty room and got her hooked up to the electrical equipment.

As the game started, it was awesome. Precious saw all the characters that she knew so well from playing the Ultimate Dream games on Richie's Game Station, and she was interacting and fighting with them. When she got hit, everything went red and it looked scary, but she did not feel pain. She only felt her equipment buzz, just like a video game controller. Everything else felt very real. Then suddenly a message came up telling her that her hour was up so, please save her progress. It didn't feel like an hour at all.

"I got to make this a regular thing," Precious told the girl as she was leaving. "It was fun."

"Glad you thought so," the girl replied with a bow.

So this became Precious' routine–study during the week, look in vain for things for the Muse to take care of, and play virtual RPGs on the weekends. It worked out well, except Precious felt like she wasn't making any new friends. She still felt very lonely, but whenever she played her games her loneliness seemed to melt away. But she kept that part to herself when she talked to her friends back at home.

"You guys won't believe this," she told Richie and Virgil when she talked to them next. "As big as this city is, there's not much the Muse can do. It seems like for every supervillain there's ten superheroes, and they all have everything under control. I even went to the mayor's office, but the mayor I met is not in office anymore."

"Maybe you're going for the obvious," Richie suggested. "Somewhere there's gotta be thieves stealing women's purses or kids crossing the street at the wrong time or cats caught in trees."

"You want me to shoot low?"

"You gotta start somewhere," Virgil answered.

"But in America I'm one of the best. I thought more people would be excited that I was here."

"Well, they love their heroes too. Just keep learning. You'll find your niche, whatever it is."

"Alright, I'll try."

And she did. Every so often, she helped stop some small crimes. It wasn't all that great, though. She didn't feel like she was really making a difference. Worse than that, the Japanese newspapers didn't recognize her as a hero. They did not even mistake her for an angel. They called her in English an "American Rogue"–essentially, a vigilante. From what she understood after looking it up, she was not regarded favorably.

So the Muse started to keep a lower profile. Truth be told, being a hero wasn't fun anymore. She didn't feel like she was making as much of a difference. She still flew when she felt low, and that often cheered her up a little. When she felt really pensive, she flew to the historic Tokyo radio tower, sat near the top, and looked down at the city.

Years passed on, and the most the Muse could say was that her grades were good. She still didn't make many close friends, except she was on a first name basis with the girl at the VR arcade. In fact, Yuna helped Precious get a job there. So Precious learned more about how virtual reality worked, and she could play with a discount. The more involved she became with virtual reality, the more she saw how flawed it was. The other characters didn't always respond to all that she did or said. The game invoked two out of five senses (seeing and hearing) very well, but the other three senses (touching, smelling, and tasting) felt deprived. But it didn't matter. They were still her therapy, watching the stories unfold. She even took her previous ideas for video games and restructured them to fit VR technology.

After she knew the procedures of how to submit these ideas, she started going out to the video game companies with her plans. Everywhere, all she got was a slammed door in the face. Her idea just wasn't "new" enough for them. One person even told her frankly that she was wasting his time. Precious just didn't know what she was going to do. She just knew she had to keep pushing. Somebody somewhere had to like her idea. She had to become a billionaire somehow.

Of course, she always made sure to check in at home, talking on her communicators, using e-mail. She remembered that this is what Virgil said would happen, and she also remembered he mentioned personal tragedy. She wanted to make sure everyone was doing alright. She was mostly concerned about Sharon, the only one she knew something bad would happen. So far, so good. They just adopted a little Romanian girl. Adam became even more famous for his work of good will. Now the whole family was going on an international tour, stopping by Tokyo. They made plans to see Precious down there.

The plans fell through.

"Sharon got really sick when she got to Greece," Virgil told Precious over the Shock Box. "She's somewhat better, but she hasn't really recovered. In fact . . . the doctor says her immune system isn't working right."

"What's wrong? It's not AIDS, is it?" Precious asked.

"No, not AIDS, but it's still not good. It's a condition called Lupus. For one reason or another, parts of her body are turning against it. Sharon said that she noticed it earlier, how she felt tired and uncommonly sore."

"Is she going to be ok? I mean, they got medicine for it, right?"

"They got treatment for it, but it's steroids. Sharon is not sure if she wants it. It would set a bad example."

"Is she . . . going to die?"

"It's hard to say. It's really hard to say. Lupus can be fatal, and the mortality rate for African-Americans with Lupus is three times higher than for other races. But Sharon is strong. I talked with her, and she's got a good attitude. I think she's going to be ok, but we gotta pray for her. It's gonna be rough."

"I will."

Adam cancelled the tour, and he and Sharon released a duet that donated all proceeds to Lupus research. It went gold. Precious was very sad for Sharon, and she missed her RB even more.

But the real tragedy came when she was least expecting it. Business was good at the arcade. Precious got some new ideas for her game. A cute guy was making eyes at her. After her shift was over, she played an hour and a half of her game. She took on the final boss, and she won on the first try. Her overall score was one of the highest. Precious felt on top of the world.

When she got home, her phone was ringing. She thought it was strange. She very rarely got phone calls. Everyone she knew lived too far away, and nobody wanted to be stuck with an outrageous bill.

She picked up the phone. An operator asked her if she would accept the charges for a collect call. "Would you send the charges to Bruce Wayne?" Precious asked. "Thank you." She paused for a second. "Hello? Who's there?"

"Precious, is that you?"

"Aunt Maggie! Hi! How are you?"

"Well, I'm . . . ok. And are you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm doing really good. What's going on?"

"Precious, I'm sorry I have to tell you this but–"

"Oh no! Is Richie ok?"

"Richie's fine but . . . Precious, honey, something happened to your mother."

"Oh no! She's . . ."

"Well, just listen. She was driving somewhere. We don't know where. She was probably running some errands. And a drunk driver just smashed into her car."

"Oh, Mommy! Is she . . . ?"

"No, she's alive. She was wearing her seatbelt, and she's alive. But, darling . . . she's in a coma."

Precious sat down. She didn't know what to say.

"Now, I don't know if you know this, but Richie has power of attorney."

"What? How did he become an unofficial lawyer so quick?"

"No, honey, power of attorney means he decides what he does with your mother and with you if something happened to her. She delegated that power to your uncle when your father left, and Sean gave it to Richie when he passed away. And Richie has made it clear what he wants done. He wants your mother to remain on life support for as long as it takes. He wants the doctors to do all within their power to make her wake up. There's no telling how long it will take for her to remain in this state. Some people have remained in comas for years. But it's not promising, Precious. They say her condition is not good. She's hanging between life and death, and anytime . . ."

Precious was so shocked. She barely could hear the rest of what her aunt said, and she couldn't say anything. When she finally put the phone down, she went to bed and she cried herself to sleep.

She kept crying the next day. She called the arcade and told them the situation, and they graciously gave her a few days to grieve. She lay in bed all day and cried. She never got up to make breakfast. She just didn't feel like eating. She tried to find something to help the pain. She turned on the TV, but nothing good was on. Even her favorite show didn't help her cheer up. She tried to listen to music, but every song on the radio seemed to be sad. She tried to read, but the tears in her eyes made it impossible to see. She got on the internet, she played several games of Solitaire and Sudoku, she even tried to escape through her imagination. Nothing helped. She didn't want to talk to anyone, not even herself. She couldn't sleep for several nights, she was crying so hard.

Then one day, there was a big storm. Precious was flipping through her Bible, and the power went out. She put her Bible down, sneezed a couple of times, and fell back into her bed. Suddenly, her body was itching for activity. That seemed like a good sign. She got out of bed. She wanted to express her sorrow, but how? She first went to her magnetic poetry on the refrigerator, but like always she couldn't find the words that she wanted to use. She had five sets! Why can't she ever find the right words? She hit the fridge door in frustration.

Then she found a can of red paint. She didn't even remember how it got there. She opened it. She didn't have time to look for a brush. She dipped her fingers into it and wrote messages on the wall. Some were just simple sentences conveying her pain, and others were song lyrics she didn't understand until now. She didn't care that she was ruining her apartment. She told herself it was her place that she bought with her money, and she can do what she wanted with it.

About thirty minutes in, she heard a sinister laugh. "Who's there?" she demanded. She abandoned her work, grabbed a flashlight and quickly looked in all of her rooms. She checked her door again to see that it was locked securely. "I must be hearing things," she told herself. She went back to her work.

And then she heard a deep, foreboding whisper,

"Muse."

She turned around in horror. She could not believe her eyes. Someone was there.

"Slade? What . . . how . . . ?" She was mystified. This was clearly not possible, but she knew that he would not divulge how he could be there. What question could convey her confusion adequately? "Why are you here?"

Then Slade something she had never seen him do. He slowly beckoned her with his finger. It looked so creepy. "Come here. I have something to show you."

Precious hesitated.

"Come Muse. Don't be shy. I am sure you will find it most . . . interesting."

He might have done something awful. Maybe he planted a bomb in her house. Well, maybe that won't be so bad. At any rate, she had to see what it was to make him go away.

She stepped toward Slade. He went backward, never taking his single eye off Precious for one second. The strange thing was he didn't seem to be walking as much as he was gliding. Precious looked down at his feet to see if he was touching the floor, but it was too dark to tell. The shadows were shifting in a strange way. Precious thought she saw eyes in the shadows.

Slade led Precious into her own bathroom, and she saw that he was not the only one there. "Well, if it isn't the girl of the hour?" a familiar, sarcastic voice crowed.

Precious looked in shock. "Joker?"

"In the flesh."

The door clicked shut behind her. A dark hand was locking it. "Ebon?"

Ebon replied by glaring at her.

Then Precious looked beside Slade and was amazed again. "Omnaura?"

"Hello Muse," she answered.

"This is impossible."

"Why, Muse," Slade said, "I am surprised at you. I never thought such a word would cross your naive lips." He looked into her eyes. "You of all people should know that nothing is impossible."

"But Joker, you have been missing for over a decade. And Ebon, I don't know what happened to you, but I know you're not in this state anymore. Omnaura, I've heard of a terrible accident; you drove off the road. And you . . ." She looked at Slade and said in a sad whisper, "I know what happened to you."

"Do you really?"

"Yes. They made me come see it this time. I didn't want to, but they made me. I remember how before you were injected how your lone eye turned to me and stared. Oh, I'll never forget that!"

"Pretend that this is possible for the moment. We have things to say."

"What is it?" Precious asked.

"We're worried about you, Muse," Omnaura answered.

"What do you mean?"

"You're losing your edge, girlfriend," Ebon replied. "Remember when my crew ran at the sight of you? What happened to those times?"

"Where's the challenge?" Omnaura asked. "That's what we need."

"And you know how much I dislike unhappy faces," Joker said. He pulled at the corners of Precious' mouth. "Come on, turn that frown upside-down."

"No!" Precious backed away from him. "How can I smile when there's nothing to smile about?" She started to cry again. "Daddy's still in jail, Mommy's life is hanging by a thread, Uncle Sean is gone, and everybody else is on the other side of the world sleeping in their double beds happy as clams! Sharon's sick, but she's still happy. And you know why? It's because they have everything that I can't have! I tried so hard. They don't want me down here. They don't want my ideas, no matter how good they are. They don't want my heroics. They don't want my companionship. They don't want me! And I've tried everything. All my dreams are falling apart in front of me. I just don't know what to do. There's nothing left."

"But there is something," Slade said. "You know there is."

"Alright Slade, humor me. What else is there?"

"You can join us."

"Slade, didn't you learn anything last time? That's not going to work!"

"Oh Muse, you haven't changed. You're still slow and pitiful."

"What he means is," Omnaura interjected, "you can go to where we are."

"But you're here."

"We're visiting you," the Joker replied. "This isn't where we are most of the time now-a-days. We're here to extend an invitation to you."

"And where is that?"

Slade grabbed her wrist and looked into her eyes. "Oh, I think you know."

In his one eye, Precious thought she could see the reflection of flames. She remembered voices from an old nightmare.

"Wait in the fire! Wait in the fire! Wait in the fire!"

"NO! I DON'T WANT TO GO THERE!"

"Now, Muse, it's not that bad," Omnaura replied. "Everyone's there. It's not torture, not all the time. All we do is wait."

"Wait?"

"Well, sometimes we talk."

"Sometimes we laugh," the Joker added. "And sometimes we cry."

"Sometimes we remember," Ebon said bitterly.

"But most of the time, we wait," Omnaura explained.

"For what?" Precious said.

"For whatever to happen to happen."

"But I don't like waiting. I have to do something to occupy my time."

"It's better than wasting your life, watching all of your dreams crumble," Slade said. "Is that what you want?"

"Well . . ."

"Don't tell us you haven't thought about it," Omnaura said.

"I'd be lying if I said I didn't," Precious sighed. "But there's gotta be something else. There's so much I'm missing, and I know there's a way I can get to it. I just gotta find that way."

"But you've tried everything," Slade said. "You said so yourself. There's nothing left for this world to offer you. You've done all you could. Don't you want to see something new?"

"I just don't know. I don't want it to be painful. I don't even want it to look like it's painful."

"That's not a problem," Omnaura replied. "The answer is right in front of you, my dear."

"What do you mean?"

Omnaura opened the medicine cabinet and pulled out the bottle with those pills Precious had to take to make the chip function. "Read the label, dear. Take one every 24 hours, and it does what it's supposed to. Take two, and it might make you a little nauseous. But take several at once . . . "

"Oh, good night."

"Exactly. According to this, side effects include drowsiness. So, it should knock you out no problem. I believe you always wanted to go in your sleep."

She handed Precious the bottle. Precious stared at it for the longest time. Her hand began to shake, and she cried even harder.

"Think of all the people who will be there," Joker said. "Family you didn't know you had, your uncle, and it shouldn't be long before your mother joins us."

"Static's mother is there," Ebon said. "I believe you always wanted to meet her."

"How do you know about her?"

"Oh, we know."

Precious sat down on the toilet lid and unscrewed the cap. "Oh, how did it come to this?" she cried. "I still can't believe I'm doing this. It's not cool. It's not alright."

She felt a hand stroke her knuckles. She opened her eyes and saw Slade kneeling down to her. "You'll never be alright, poor girl. I know how you feel."

"Oh, stop it. I know all about your false sympathy, Slade."

"Really, I do. Once, I tried everything. I tried hard to be good, noble, upright, respected. But my good intentions were never returned to me."

"Stop it. Stop it!"

"I had a child. I did all I was told to be a good father, but my child never returned to me the love that I gave her. She was unbridled chaos, and I couldn't hold her. I couldn't make her what I wanted her to be."

"Enough, please!"

"And so, do you know what I did? I quit. I shocked everybody. I became something different, something new. I became more like myself."

"SHUT UP SLADE!" Immediately, Precious clamped a hand on her mouth. Her mother hated that phrase, and saying it got her in as much trouble as saying a cuss word. But at least it had its effect. Slade stopped. So she glared at him and said, "It's not true! I know it's not true, so don't try to convince me that it is!"

"But it is true, Precious."

Her eyes grew wide. It wasn't until that moment that she realized that she never transformed. "How do you know me?"

Then, all of the villains laughed, and Slade laughed the loudest of all

Precious screamed. "Stop! Please! You told me you don't laugh! This isn't like you! What's happening?"

Slade reached up and put his hand over his mask. Precious turned away. She remembered that nightmare all to well, and the face still haunted her dreams, but Slade turned her head toward him.

Precious thought the face in her nightmare was the grimmest thing she ever saw, but this was worse than anything her imagination could devise.

"Daddy? No, no, you're not, you can't be. It's impossible!"

"How do you know?" he answered. "I never was in touch with you, and you knew I was involved in crime."

"No, I won't believe it! Daddy, you wouldn't make me do this!"

"Don't you know anything? Don't you know that I left because of you?"

"Because of me?"

"Your autism. I didn't know what it was, and I couldn't handle it. Don't you see, Precious? You can't function in this world! That's why you failed! The world doesn't need you!"

His hand tightened around the wrist of the hand that was still holding the pill bottle. Precious was so much in shock that she couldn't do anything. He pushed her hand to her face. Pills scattered everywhere. Evil laughter filled her ears again. Precious screamed.

Then her wrist was jerked in the other direction by a gloved hand. Her bathroom was filled with a blinding light and crackling energy. Who is this, her guardian angel?

Precious got to her feet. The enemies were gone, and the only person left was, "Static?"

He grabbed her shoulders. "Do you remember what I told you?"

"But how did you get in–?"

"Do you remember what I told you?" he said slower and louder.

"You said, you said, everything was going to be ok, and I didn't need to do anything drastic. Oh man, is this what you meant?"

"Well, this is about as drastic as they come."

Suddenly, Precious felt terribly weak. She sank to the floor, and she heard a loud banging noise. Maybe it was the wind, or maybe it was her imagination. Everything went black.

Then she heard Richie's voice. He sounded very panicky, talking loudly in Japanese. She didn't know he knew the language. "Richie?" she said weakly.

"Precious?" he said. "Oh, you're alive!" He hugged her head.

"I feel strange. My head is so . . . it's like I'm swimming."

"You're going to the hospital. I just called their version of 911. It'll be ok."

"Yeah, I hope so," she mumbled. Then she saw the shadows and heard the whispers. All of them were still here. "Richie, make them go away."

"What?"

"Make them go away, just like Static did."

"Make what go away?"

"All of them. Slade, Omnaura, everybody. Make them stop."

"You don't have to worry about them. Just go to sleep."

But as her foes whispers continued in her ears, she kept repeating, "Make them go away. Make them go away. Go away," until sleep finally came over her.

She woke in a hospital bed. Richie was by her side, as was Virgil.

"She's awake," Richie said.

"Oh, thank goodness!" Virgil said.

"How are you feeling?"

"Ok, I guess," Precious answered.

"You gave us a big scare," Virgil said.

"How'd you all get here?"

"Well, when you didn't contact us, we got worried," Richie explained. "I had a feeling you were upset because of what happened to your mom, and I wanted to comfort you. I came to your apartment and heard you screaming. I used Backpack to unlock the door, and I found you on the floor, pills scattered everywhere and blood all over the place."

"That was paint."

"Yeah, we know that now. That's why I called Virgil. Do you feel up to talking?"

Precious sat up in her bed and looked around. "Are they still here?"

"Who?"

"They were all here. Slade led me into the bathroom. The Joker brought me in. Ebon closed the door. Omnaura gave me the bottle. And Daddy tried to force the pills down my throat!" She started to cry again.

"You know that couldn't have been possible," Virgil said.

"I know, but it happened all the same."

Richie handed her a tissue and encouraged her to tell everything, back to when she heard about Claire's accident. After she was done, Richie nodded.

"Alright, I think this is what happened. All the rejection and loneliness was starting to drag you down, but when you heard about what happened to Aunt Claire, you went into a state of depression. I don't blame you for that because you have double the risk. You have a history of depression in your family, and autism tends to make people prone to depression. But the stress and chemical imbalance was too great on your mind, and it caused your chip to malfunction. Everything you experienced was in your head. They were giving a voice to your thoughts, and sad to say, suicidal thoughts are common in depression too. That's why it was so powerful."

"I still don't get it!" Virgil said. "All your greatest villains were there, and you listened to them? Didn't you have a bit of common sense? Why didn't you try to fight them?"

"Well, they had a point. My life is going nowhere," Precious answered.

"Let me tell you something Sharon told me not too long ago. See, there was this scientist, a psychologist who worked with animals. And in one experiment, he had two rats in separate cages. Each cage had a button or a lever or something like that. Now, in one cage, he would periodically shock the rat through the floor. The rat didn't like that, but then it pushed the button, and the shock stopped. The process was repeated until it seemed clear that the rat has learned that it had control over a bad situation. That rat got through fine. Now, in the other cage, the rat was shocked, and maybe it pushed the button, but the shock didn't stop. That rat had no way to predict when it would get shocked, nor did it have a way to control the shock. After a while, that rat stopped trying. It allowed itself to be shocked and just sat there in the cage. Even when it was let out of the cage, it acted like it was depressed. The psychologist called this 'learned helplessness.' That kinda might be what's happening here. Nothing's working for you like it should so far, and so you think nothing's ever going to work. So you just want to give up, right? Well, like Sharon told me, you're smarter than some old rat! You can pursue other options, until you find something that does work!"

"Well, what other options do I have?"

"For one thing, you can move."

"No, I can't! We talked about this. Tokyo is where the video game market is."

"There are other places," Richie said. "Las Vegas, for example, is big in video game production."

"I'm not moving to Las Vegas! I got principles!"

"It's not much better here."

"Look, I'm not arguing. I know I have other options. I know that eventually I'll be a big success. Don't ask me how, but I do. That's why I ended up not listening to them. I remember what I was told, and I stopped. But I genuinely want to know what my options are."

"Hang on," Richie said. "You saying you didn't OD on your medication?"

"No. I almost did, but I didn't."

"Now, that doesn't make sense. The doctors told me that they found an unknown chemical agent in your bloodstream. Have you been taking any other drugs that we don't know about?"

"No."

"You're not telling us something."

"I can help with that," a new voice said.

Precious sat up a little straighter in her bed. A man with black hair, a mask, and a tight, black outfit just came into the door. "Terry? Oh, I'm sorry Rob–I mean Winged Knight, I mean–"

"It's Nightwing. Why do you keep calling me that?" the newcomer said.

"You just remind me of someone I used to know is all. What are you doing here?"

"Static told me that you checked into the hospital, and I also wanted to find out why didn't you call me like I asked you to!"

"Oh, my communicator broke. I meant to get it fixed, but I forgot."

"Well, this is what came of it. Did you look out for dust like I told you?"

"I dusted very well about once every week. I guess maybe when I got depressed, I might have gotten a little careless. Why?"

"When this happened, was it really dark?"

"Yeah, the power was out. But why?"

"When Slade first disappeared, all we could find was his armor and his mask. The rest of the Titans thought he was gone for good, but we couldn't find any other remains. I knew he was still out there somewhere. One night I just looked at his dusty armor, trying to answers the questions in my mind. Shortly after, I had an encounter with Slade. He taunted me worse than ever and fought me. And yet, I was the only one of the Titans who could actually see him. Then I realized that Slade only appeared in the dark, and I understood that he was only in my mind. Cyborg scanned me, and he found out that I had a hallucinogen in my system that made me see, hear, and feel Slade. It also hyped my stress level and nearly killed me. And the way I came in contact with it was by inspecting Slade's mask. It was the dust. And then we found out that the dust was released by someone outside of the Tower, and we all knew Slade was still around. But it wasn't confirmed until he went after you."

"So you think he did the same to me?"

"As his final revenge for your turning on him."

"But how? We know for a fact he's gone this time!"

"It's hard to say, but he did it somehow. I tried to tell you that day because we had just found out that the same chemical was in Omnaura's bloodstream. Perhaps when she swerved off the road, she saw Slade in the middle of the street and tried to avoid hitting him."

"It still doesn't make sense. Why was everybody else there?"

"It probably interacted with the chip, or the weaker side of your mind," Richie suggested.

"Maybe it did." She looked at Richie. "You think that it's true? You think that Slade and Daddy are one and the same?"

"No. That would be impossible, and I can prove it. I don't want to go into that now, though. You won't want to hear it. Another day, maybe."

"The chemical was probably just messing with your head," Nightwing explained. "It did that because it would do a better job of convincing you to do it."

"It sounds like Slade alright." Precious sighed. "So, what now?"

"Well, now, you probably need some help to get you over this state," Richie answered. "I'm going to stay with you for a while to watch you, see if you try to do it again. You probably ought to get some counseling. We'll think of some more options for you, somehow. You might even have to change your plans, but you'll be willing to, right?"

"I'll try." She leaned back and closed her eyes. Everybody started to leave, but then she said, "Richie?"

"Yeah?" he answered.

"Did Daddy really leave because of me?"

"Your daddy left because he was a coward. Don't let anybody tell you any different."

TRANSITION

On the other side of the world, a young man wandered about his town like a little child who had lost his best friend. He held in his hand a still of him and the Muse, and he was searching for anybody who knew her whereabouts. He was getting skittish and paranoid. Several times he thought he saw her, but it turned out only to be a fountain or a monument, and sometimes it wasn't even real.

Eventually, he found Titan Tower. No one he recognized was inside. He approached the leader, who was a child-like Green Lantern. "Have you seen her?" he asked as he handed over the still.

The young Green Lantern looked at the picture closely. "She looks familiar, but I can't recall her name."

"It's the Muse!"

"Oh, is this the fabled Muse? Nobody knows what happened to her. Seems like she disappeared without a trace."

He took the picture back. "I'm not sure if I believe that."

It took some time, but the young man went down to Dakota and found an abandoned gas station. He sat down in an armchair and waited for someone to come. It took a few hours, but eventually Virgil came in.

"Ragnarok? Hey dawg, what are you doing here?"

The young man approached him. "Where's Muse?"

"She's living in Japan now. I thought you knew that."

"How can I get to her?"

"Well, it's very far, and very expensive. Going over there will be difficult."

The young man bowed his head and began to leave. "Although, if you can find a way to go," Virgil added, "please try. She really needs a friend right now."

The young man nodded and left. Part of him knew it was hopeless, but he had to try, even if it meant saving for years. He needed her too.

TRANSITION

Elsewhere, Starfire was looking through an old photo album. There were several good pictures of the Muse in there. "What has happened to our old friend? Why has she not talked to us? Perhaps she settled down with the Ragnarok. I wonder what has happened to him as well. What do you think, Raven?"

Raven pulled out one photo and surrounded it in black flames.

"Oh no, Raven!"

"There's no point in brooding over it," she answered. "As I have said before, people come, and people go. She has chosen her own path, and for whatever reason, it doesn't include us. We might as well just forget."

"We cannot! If we sever our end, then we are completing the 'rekmas!'"

"She let the 'rekmas' snare her. There's nothing we can do about that."

Just then, a door opened. Starfire flew joyously to him and threw her arms around her husband's shoulders. "Nightwing! Have you come to lend us your aid?"

He pulled away. "I just saw an old friend of ours. You ought to go talk to her. She's in trouble."

TRANSITION

Needless to say, the landlord wasn't happy with what Precious did to his walls, but he allowed Precious and Richie to paint over the damage in the same color of paint.

"What were you thinking when you did this?" Richie asked.

"I guess I wasn't."

"I guess not. So, uh, is there anything about this place that you like?"

"Well, it's cozy."

"No, I mean about the city. Is there anything you enjoy doing?"

"Oh, there's this really neat arcade. You'd like it. It's all virtual reality games."

"Sweet! I don't think I've ever played VR before. What's it like? Does it feel realistic?"

"Well . . . everybody says it does, but after playing with it for so long and working with it, I don't think it does much anymore. But I don't really care. I mean, old video games never felt realistic, and they still were awesome."

They were quiet for a little while, and then Precious said out of the blue, "Richie, what would it be like if one could play a video game inside one's mind?"

Richie stopped and looked at her. "What do you mean?"

"Well, VR technology is very bulky and doesn't allow for much free movement. What if they put a couple of nodes, maybe even a chip on the head just right around the creative, imaginative portion of the brain? You know, like the same places in my brain that are super sensitive that the doctors found during the operation? Somebody ought to make a video game system that downloaded a scenario into those nodes or chips so that it goes directly into the brain. The player would see everything in the 'mind's eye,' you know? And he'd be partly conscious to the rest of the world, and all of his actions would be reflected by the program. They might even be able to make it more realistic. They can stimulate other portions of the brain to invigorate all five senses. Wouldn't that be cool?"

"Uh, I think the word is 'schway' now."

"Oh, already? Man, it's been a long time since I've heard that word. What do you think?"

"Yeah, it sounds like something else alright. Um, don't you think it would be addictive, though? I mean, video games as they are right now are addictive enough, don't you think?"

"Yeah. I guess they'd probably have to be tested for a while. It may be a few years before the home version would be out."

"And what about when you character dies? Would that feel realistic?"

"Well, of course not! We don't want anybody to get heart attacks from a video game."

"And I'm not sure if I like the idea of downloading a whole game straight to your brain. Video games have a tendency to turn off your imagination. My parents always thought that's why I was so poor at English in school. If your putting stuff directly into the imagination, it could become dependent or shut off completely."

"So, we'd have to keep it active somehow. Say, maybe they only put in part of the scenario, and the rest of it is dependent on your emotions, your choices, and your expectations. That way the game is different every time you play it. Hey, that would really create more of an interaction with the rest of the characters. I always wanted that. Characters responded to my commands and conversations, but it seemed like they completely ignored me when I told them to watch their mouths. I would have really appreciated it if they responded more to me. What do you think?"

"Well . . . you know . . . I think you really got a good idea here."

"Next time I go down to submit my ideas to the video game people, I'll suggest that."

"Well, they're probably going to want to see a prototype. They'd want to know if it's possible."

"You're right. Hey, you're just about as inventive as Thomas Edison. Why don't you do it?"

"I got a better idea. Why don't you do it?"

"Me?"

"Sure! You got the idea clear in your head. Even if I tried, I probably couldn't make it the way you're envisioning it."

"But I've never invented anything in my life! How do I do it?"

"Don't worry, I'll help. But I want you to be the one actually doing it. If you get involved in a project like this, maybe your negative feelings will take a hike."

"Do you think that it's possible? Will it work?"

"Well, it depends on what you think. Remember what Virgil said. If you think it's going to be a failure, it will be. But if you approach it expecting it to work, who knows? It might change the world forever."

Precious' eyes lit up when he said that. She remembered for the first time in years that she was not only told she would be a success, but that she would also change the world. "You know, I think this is going to work. In fact, I think this might be my calling."

Richie looked at her and smiled. "You look better than you have in days."

"I feel better! I feel like my ship might finally come in!"

"Uh-uh!" Richie said shaking his finger at her. "Let's not get too ahead of ourselves, now. Let's work on getting it together first."

"Right," she nodded. "What do you think I should call it?"

"It's your invention."

"True. How about 'Inertia' or 'Vertigo.'"

"That suggests that it makes you sick to your stomach."

"Oh, right. Well, let's see. I guess it would be something that suggests a spark of the imagination. Hey, what is that part in epic poetry when the poet calls for the Muses' help?"

"You're asking me? I'm the science and mathematics nut. Virgil's the literature whiz."

"Oh, that's right. Wait, I remember, it's called an invocation. That works, doesn't it?"

"Invocation. Yeah, it has a ring to it. You don't think it'll give away your secret identity, do you?"

Precious sighed. "What if it did? Would anybody really care?"

"I think you'd find out pretty quick the answer to that question."

"I think the Muse is about ready to hang up her wings for good due to," she sighed again, "lack of interest."

"Precious . . ." Richie started, but then there was a knock on the door.

Precious opened the door and gasped in surprise. "Starfire!"

"Oh, Muse!" Starfire squealed as she pulled the girl into a hug. Then she pulled back. "Oh dear! What has happened to your wings?"

"Oh, no problem." Precious closed her eyes, and her wings and costume appeared. "There you go."

"Wonderful. I was worried. Oh, is this the Ragnarok?"

"Actually, this is Gear."

"Hey, Starfire," he greeted as he shook her hand. "Wow, time's been good to you." He ran his hand through his thinning hair and looked down at his plump belly. "I wish I could say the same."

"I thank you, and yet I am sad to say time has not good for our friendship."

"Oh, Starfire, I'm sorry," Precious said. "I let the 'rekmas' get me, I know. It had help."

"I know. Nightwing has told me of your communicator. May I see it, please? Cyborg can surely fix it."

"Only if you can forgive me for being a forgetful klutz. You know what that means, right?"

"I believe it means one who has fingers like plyzkapaste, yes?"

"Um, probably so."

Starfire looked down. "I am afraid I cannot forgive this."

Precious groaned and looked away.

"I have never blamed you in the first place, so there is no need for forgiveness."

"So, you're not mad?"

"It has upset me, but I know that you have chosen a new life. I can understand if you are too busy for friends."

"I'm not too busy now. I had often wondered what had happened with you and Raven and Beast Boy and everybody. I'd love to see all of you again."

"This is good, because I have come to invite you to join our new team."

"New team?"

"Yes, we are now members of the Universal League of Justice!"

"The Green Lantern guys?"

"Uh, no. Forgive me, I have gotten it backward again. It is the Justice League."

"The Justice League? The group that introduced us in the first place. Awesome! Wow, I always dreamed of joining. You think I'm ready?"

"Most assuredly. Come, I shall take you now."

"How? Are we just going to fly up there? 'Cause you know I can't breathe in space."

"Of course. I brought a plane. Gear may come as well if he wishes."

"Thanks, but I've already been up there, and I still got some painting to do."

So, Starfire took her up. The Muse was reunited with most of her old friends in the Watchtower, Raven, Cyborg, Beast Boy–

"I kinda grew out of the 'Beast Boy' thing," he told her. "Now I'm just 'Beast.'"

"Isn't one of the X-Men called that?"

"He's 'The Beast.' There's a difference."

"Well, alright."

Then she met some other Titans she had not met before: Aqualad, Speedy, and Bumblebee. Some of the original members of JL were there too, like Superman, Green Lantern, and Wonder Woman. They had a small party for the Muse welcoming her to the Justice League. The Muse had a good time, and she eventually agreed to devote a little to each week to help the League out. Yet a few worries had her confused.

"Where is Nightwing?"

"Unfortunately, our former leader has pulled away from the rest of the group," Starfire said. "He works alone and only helps us occasionally. It is not fair. I had hoped that when he asked for my hand in marriage that he would be by my side forever."

"Wait, he married you?"

"Oh yes, did I never tell you? I wished to have you as a bridesmaid, but he wished to marry in secret. He called it 'eloping.' I believe he did it to protect his identity."

"Why does he work alone?"

"He has told me, but I do not completely understand. He says he is doing it to help his 'old man.' Does he perhaps mean his 'knorfka'?"

"Yeah, that's probably what he means. Have you never met his 'knorfka'?"

"I have, but it was a long time ago when the Titans first came together. He is the Batty Man, right?"

"Batman is what he's called."

"Oh. Well, he did not seem very old when I met him."

"He is pretty old now. I hope he's ok. He's my friend. Has Nightwing told you anything?"

"He says the old man lives in a cave and never comes out. Apparently he is working on a new suit. I really don't understand it."

"Have you all ever heard from my old partner, Ragnarok?"

"No, we have not. It seems as though he has also disappeared."

"If you really want to find him, I can probably sense him with my eyes closed," Raven offered.

"Well, that's sweet of you, but I bet his parents forced him to quit," Precious groaned. "Yeah, that's probably what happened"

TRANSITION

A couple of years had gone by. The boy once known as Ragnarok had given up his power. He didn't want to, but he did not see much of a choice. He worked several small jobs for Bruce Wayne and Batman (never guessing that all of those jobs led to the same purpose), and he earned a little money. He saved every penny of it to go to Japan one day to see if he could find his only friend. It still wasn't even close.

Then one evening, his bosses, both of them, called him to a room in the local hospital. The boy came as quickly as he could.

"Mr. Wayne!" he cried as he saw one of his bosses on the hospital bed.

"Hello, Eli."

"What happened?"

"I got really sick last night. The doctors said I have something wrong with my heart."

"Are you going to be ok?"

"I'll be fine, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to give up some things. I'm just not as young as I used to be. I may need your help more."

"OK, good."

"And right now, what I need you to do is send a message to your old friend, the Muse."

"But . . . she's so far away. I've been saving to go see her, but . . . it's still going to be a long time before I can reach that goal."

"It is alright. I have a way." He reached up and patted Eli's shoulder. "I believe it's about time you meet your other boss."

TRANSITION

Richie and Precious worked on the Invocation system in secret for a couple of years. It was tough, and they had several failures. But when Precious wanted to give up, Richie kept encouraging her. Finally, they managed to get a prototype together and fixed a one minute demo. They started driving to the first game company on their list.

"All those folks are going to regret rejecting you now," Richie said. "You're going to run them out of business."

Precious laughed. "We got to be careful, though. If this technology winds up in the wrong hands, it can be used for things I don't even want to think about."

"Right. Maybe if no one will sponsor us, we can start our own business. Either way, I don't think we'd have any trouble getting Wayne Industries on our side. They'd protect us."

"That's true." They were driving by the radio tower. "I tell you what, you haven't seen anything until you see the city from the top of that thing. It's so awesome."

Richie looked closely at the tower as they were coming nearer. "There's somebody up there."

"There is?"

Richie stopped the care and stuck his head out the window. "Yeah, and it looks like someone you'd recognize. Why don't you go up there and check it out?"

"Um, ok." She quickly transformed into the Muse and flew up the tower. Eventually, she saw a caped figure standing near the top. As she flew closer, she could not believe her eyes.

"Ragnarok?"

"Muse!" he said happily. He reached out and hugged her.

"So, uh, how are you?"

"Better, now that you're here. What about you?"

"The same. How are your parents?"

"I don't know. Dad threw me out when I turned 21. He said he had enough."

"I know how that feels."

"He wanted me to live in ARC, like Noah. But I'm not Noah. I'm Elijah, and I have to wander in the wilderness. So I ran away."

"Wow, that's bold. Have you been able to make it on your own?"

"Well, Batman found me, and he brought me back to Mr. Wayne. Luckily, they both understood, and they've been giving me stuff to do. But all I've thought about lately was getting to you somehow."

"So, how'd you get here?"

He pointed up. The Batplane was hovering just above the tower.

"Oh, Batman brought you."

"Well, yes and no. He sent me here, and he let me use his plane, but he's not here."

"Is he ok?"

"No. He's in the hospital. His heart's broke."

"Oh dear! Is he going to live?"

"I think so, but he doesn't wanna to be Batman anymore."

"Oh, you knew about that?"

"He just told me a little while ago. I was working for both Batman and Mr. Wayne. I probably should have figured it out."

"Are you going to take over for him?"

"No, I don't think so. If he wants me to, and if he'll keep paying me, maybe."

"Do you know if Nightwing's going to take over?"

"I haven't heard."

"So I guess all we got to do is wait for Terry."

"Who's Terry?"

"Um, never mind."

"OK. Anyhow, he wanted me to give you this message."

He handed Precious a piece of paper. The Muse opened it and read it silently. She smiled as she came to the end. "Oh, bless his soul. I needed to hear that for a long time." She closed the note up and put it in her pocket. "So, is that it?"

"Well . . ."

"Where have you been for so long? I heard that you haven't been seen for a long time. Have you quit being a superhero?"

"Yeah."

"Why?"

"Because my powers aren't as strong as they used to be. They don't do much danger to the bad guys, and I end up getting beat. I even tried teaming up with Titans East. That didn't help much either."

"That's bad. Why do you think it's like that?"

"I think it's because I missed you so much. I didn't know where you'd gone, and I was all by myself. I had nobody to help. Part of my powers came from my wanting to protect you. Because I always liked you, even before I saw you in person. You were always my favorite."

"Wow. I didn't know you felt that way."

"I don't want to be without you anymore, so . . . will you marry me?"

"Whoa!" The Muse nearly stepped back. "Do you really know what you're asking? Do you understand what marriage is?"

"Yeah. It means being with one person forever, and becoming parents, and . . . stuff like that."

"I think you're about right, but how do you know we can do that?"

"We've worked together for so long so well."

"But we don't really know a thing about each other. We never talked much when we weren't working. The one time I tried to get to know you, you still came hidden in all of your masks. Here's an example: do you know my name?"

"Yes! It's Precious!"

"I mean the whole thing, first, middle, and last."

Ragnarok looked away to think, and then he slowly shook his head.

"See? And I don't know your favorite music, tv show, food, game, hobby, I don't even know your last name. You know, the name I'd take if we married!"

There was a long pause. "LeMaster," Ragnarok finally said.

"What?"

"Elijah Jonathan LeMaster. That's my full name."

"That's a very handsome name." Precious sighed. "I really wish I could marry you, Eli. Really, I wish you asked me a long time ago."

"So, is that a yes or no?"

"Well, it's not a 'no.' We just need some time first. We got to get to know each other as we really are first. Do you understand?"

"I think so."

"You know what would be a good start? If you take off your masks. Let me see you again."

"OK." Ragnarok slipped off the helmet and the emotionless, rubber mask. Precious turned off her disguise as well. She came closer to him.

"I always loved your eyes. It always makes me sad when you put on all those masks. I mean, I know you have to, but then I can't see those eyes."

"Thanks. I like your eyes, too. I remember seeing them at the concert. I didn't remember ever seeing green eyes like that before. I thought they were very pretty, like emeralds."

"Really? Wow."

They were silent for the longest time. They didn't kiss, hug, hold hands, or even come near each other. They just looked into each others eyes. Off in the distance, Precious heard an old love song that she remembered when it was new. It was the most romantic moment she had ever felt.

"That was good," Eli said.

"Yeah. You know, it might work. It's nice to know there's somebody I don't mind looking at."

"Yeah."

"We'll try to figure out someway to get to know each other. Maybe we can chat on the net."

"You want to come back with me?"

"No, I can't. I'm in the middle of something right now. Maybe sometime soon."

"Maybe."

"Well, I gotta go."

"OK. I'll see you."

Precious flew back down thinking that her future did look a whole lot better. She got in the car and rode off to her destiny.

Final note: I won't say this is the last episode. When I make original characters like this, I don't like the story to end too soon. But this probably is the last one I'm going to write for a while. For one thing, I don't have many more ideas (though I might get some when and if new seasons of "Static Shock" and "Teen Titans" are released). For another thing, I'm writing a thesis, and that's taking away a lot of my personal time. I want to thank all of my reviewers for your criticism and encouragement. You have made this the most successful thing I have ever written, and one of the most enjoyable. I hope you guys stick with me when I try to continue.