Tempest: Chapter Nine: Between Life and Death

AN: Since CupcakeofAwesomeness asked: I've read that there's actually not much of a time difference between Central City and Gotham, but Dick goes to school at an institution whereas Amara doesn't have to wake up at a particular time.


He was standing over her as Amara struggled to breathe and she choked at the feel of the arrow shoved into her stomach.

"Sadly, it's not my intention to kill you," Merlyn said, speaking over her as he pulled the arrow out of her stomach, the tip a vial filled with her own blood, and pain rolled over her. "It's a pity, but your mother wants proof of relation; it'll be my own head if you're killed, so try not to die."

Her mother? Amara was confused and her mind was going hazy from blood loss. Iris' face swam before her mind, she was the only mother that she had ever known, but she had never known the identity of the woman she shared blood with.

The air was weighted on her and she felt like there was fog before her eyes. It seemed like an age before someone came across her.

"Storm Chaser!"

Dinah's voice pierced the fog and Amara's eyes fluttered shut.


Amara was being jerked back and forth, sending a jolt of pain throughout her whole body. She had long since lost feeling in her extremities and the cold had set in.

Her eyes fluttered open as she was rolled through the Hall of Justice's medical ward, breathing in through the oxygen mask situated over her face.

Her sight wasn't working properly, no doubt because of the decreased blood flow throughout her body, but she still caught a blur of red and yellow to her side…Barry in his Flash uniform with his cowl drawn back, her memory supplied.

"Stay awake, Amy! Stay with me!"

The colors were blending together and the air was getting heavier and heavier…making it more and more difficult to breathe.

"Amy, don't you dare close your eyes!"

But it was too late.

Her eyes rolled and her heart raced in her chest.

The last thing that she heard was the sound of a nurse yelling that she was crashing, and then she knew nothing.


Amara's eyes fluttered open and she grimaced, lifting a hand to her chest where she'd been shot through with arrows, but she felt nothing, as though it never happened.

Then she jumped, her heart stuttering wildly as she looked down at herself, severely startled at the sheen of color her skin, because it had taken on a green color, a leaf-green that couldn't have been mistaken for being a simple hue that one took on when they were sick.

She rubbed furiously at her arm, but the color didn't change.

Exasperation was filling her when she looked around herself, and then she froze.

She was sitting in an area of pure blackness. She would have been drowning in it if she hadn't been so accustomed to it at one point.

And then she wasn't.

Amara was looking on a familiar scene that must have been supplied by her own memories, but it was still strange to experience it outside her body.

She remembered the apartment well, it had been her home until her little accident with her father's lightning.

Amara's younger form was trying to make herself as small as possible against the wall while her father raged about something that she couldn't recall, his words unintelligible in his anger.

Amara had been around the age of seven, she wagered, given the size and age of herself, at the time of the memory in question.

Her grey hair had been choppily cut and was frizzy around her face which was set in a blank mask that had been a default of hers when she was younger and in the presence of her father.

Her fingers were sparking as she drew her knees up to her chest, trying not to showcase her fear, which was there even if it could not be seen.

The Weather Wizard turned on her, anger in his eyes.

"You told them what I was planning!" he cried out, his wand glowing dangerously in his hands.

Young Amara shook her head frantically. "No, no, no!" she insisted. "I-I didn't!"

The lies sprang from her lips before she could stop them.

Amara remembered the day very well.

The Justice League had a hot-line of sorts that citizens of the US could use to report anything that had to do with villains of the Justice League –leaving the usual crimes to the police force– and Amara had used it to call in about a plan her father had concerning blanketing the region with extreme weather that would have required his assistance in order to make the weather dissipate.

"My own blood!" he roared. "A traitor of my own blood!"

Young Amara screamed as he shot lightning at her.


In the surgery room, Amara's heart stopped beating, much to the astonishment to the ones working on her, because, although her wounds were extensive, they were not nearly as life-threatening as they seemed.

Her heart was in no danger, but for some reason, it had suddenly stopped.

It took them three charges of the defibrillation paddles in order to get her heart working again and they all gave a sigh of relief before starting again as though nothing had happened.

But Amara knew nothing of that, trapped in the deep recesses of her own mind, where the thing to truly be afraid of was the presence of her biological father, even if he was a mere memory. There, she knew nothing of the wounds caused by the arrows that had been carefully pulled from her, nor did she know of the steady beeping of the heart monitor beside her, or even the fear of those waiting outside the room for any news.

Amara was blissfully ignorant of all those facts.


This, Wally had to admit, was the worst day ever.

(Technically, it was the next day already, but that was beside the point)

He and Uncle B had been having a rather good day actually until Black Canary came over the comm.-link to say Amara had been shot.

Shot. Several Times. With arrows.

The idea that someone had riddled his baby cousin with arrows made Wally's blood boil and he wanted nothing more than to go off and find Merlyn and show him who he was dealing with, but in the back of his mind, he knew that wouldn't end well.

Wally may have had speed, but Amara had skill, she'd been trained by Black Canary herself, and she'd been taken down as though all that training had been for nothing.

His cowl –like Uncle B's– had long since been drawn back and he knotted his fingers in the bright red locks, screwing up his eyes as he tried not to think of Amara with sightless eyes in a pool of her own blood.

But he couldn't stop himself; he was drowning in the fear already.

Aunt I was wrapped in Uncle B's arms, stifling her sobs into his shoulder as best as she could, but it was clear that her crying was loud and shaking her whole body.

Wally remembered what it had been like when Amara had disappeared in her search of Roy, but that was nothing compared to now.

Now Amara's life was hanging in the balance.

The doors swung open violently and Wally jolted where he was sitting as Roy strode into the waiting area with Oliver hot on his heels. He was still in his uniform, barring his hat and domino mask, so he must have just gotten back. And what a thing to come back to; no one wanted to end a successful mission with the knowledge that their partner was on the table fighting for their life.

Blue fire was blazing in his eyes as they flashed to Uncle B and Aunt I before landing on Wally, demanding answers without saying a word. Though Wally wasn't sure he could manage words with the tightness of his jaw.

Oliver moved to speak quietly with Wally's aunt and uncle and Wally opened his mouth to speak.

"Black Canary found her," he managed to choke out. "I think they said she was shot off the Queen Industries building—"

"Shot off?" Roy's voice was pitched strangely and his hands were clenched into tight vibrating fists.

"With –with arrows," Wally said, stumbling over the words. "Batman's got her goggles and is going over the footage with Robin now."

Amara's goggles, like Wally's, not only functioned for night vision, but also worked to record encounters with villains and criminals.

Batman had looked particularly threatening when he'd arrived and Robin had seemed to be a bit stunned at the prospect of Amara's fate hanging in the balance. He had made Wally swear to tell him if there was any change and Wally had only been so happy to comply.

Roy slumped into the seat beside Wally, bracing his elbows against his knees as he fisted his hair, his knuckles white.

"You could take a nap," Wally suggested, "I can wake you—"

"I'm not sleeping until she's out of surgery," Roy very nearly barked, giving Wally a sharp look and Wally relented, leaving them to sit in silence with a dark cloud weighing over them.


Oliver found Dinah in the observation area that overlooked the surgery room.

She was so pale that the light blue of her eyes stood out like beacons when she looked to him.

"I should've taken it," she said, and her voice did not tremble, "the disturbance at Queen Industries…I should have taken it…I just…I thought she'd like the challenge of doing something herself."

"I know," Oliver said, pulling her into an embrace that allowed Dinah to hide her face against his shoulder as her own shoulders shook with the strain of keeping her tears silent. "This isn't your fault."

A sudden beep from below jerked their attention away from each other and down to the figures moving quickly over Dinah's fallen protégé.

The heart rate monitor beside her was a straight line as Dinah pressed a hand to her mouth, terror rising inside her only to be quenched a moment later when they managed to get her stable once more.

She released a shaking breath, resting a palm against the glass and murmuring an almost silent prayer.


Merlyn was not just a run-of-the-mill villain to the Justice League, he was an assassin and an investigator; his services were for hire to the one who offered him the most money.

In the issue concerning the girl Storm Chaser, the payment was his own life.

Poison Ivy was cruel to her enemies, yes, but even her allies had reason to fear her.

Her presence made his skin tingle, and not in a good way. The poison she had given him with the incentive to do as she demanded was eating away at him internally and if he didn't get an antidote soon, he was done for.

The computer beeped and relayed the information concerning the girl's blood analysis in comparison to Poison Ivy's.

"There, fifty percent match," he said, turning the screen towards her, "the girl's yours, biologically."

A bottle was thrown to him and he took it quickly, gulping its contents down and making a fast escape out the window before she could change her mind about not killing him.

Pamela Isley, otherwise known as Poison Ivy, paid him no heed, sitting in the chair before the computer, eyes fastening on the blinking blood analysis with green eyes the same color and shape as her daughter's before pulling up the pictures Merlyn had taken for her.

Storm Chaser was in her uniform in all of them, mostly in the presence of either a young red-haired archer or a red-haired speedster, and sometimes Gotham's dark-haired Robin.

And there was one of a girl outside a small flower shop with dark hair but the same green eyes that Storm Chaser possessed.

This was her little girl.

Pamela could hardly breathe, looking at all the pictures as her heart raced in her chest.

Her little girl…and she was perfection.


When the surgeon came out of the doors they had all been barred from following through, they were all on him in a matter of seconds, but he waited until the noise had fallen from a dull roar in order to speak audibly.

"There were a few close calls," he told them all, but the words were for the most part directed towards Barry and Iris, "but she pulled through."

Iris moaned quietly into her hand, her legs trembling and Barry's arm around her waist was probably the only think that kept her standing, however, the same could not be said of Wally, who bypassed her completely to collapse onto the ground, relief flowing over him.

"She lost a lot of blood," the surgeon told them, "and her heart stopped twice during the procedure—" Roy made an indecipherable noise at that, clutching his own chest, his eyes wide. "—but she's going to be fine, all she needs is some time to heal and I'm sure she'll be as good as new."

"Thank you," Barry said throatily as he shook the man's hand fervently. "Thank you."

He inclined his head slightly. "I'll come get you when you can see her."

Wally was calling his parents in seconds to assure them their niece was going to be fine. From how quickly his mother answered, he guessed that they'd been staying up too, waiting for any information concerning Amara.

Roy ran a hand through his hair again, making it stick in several directions, but he didn't care.

Wally, Dinah, Oliver, and Roy waited when the surgeon returned to take them to see Amara, letting Barry and Iris go in on their own.

Their daughter was breathing, that was the thing Iris noticed first, and it was more than enough to pull a few tears from her eyes.

Her complexion was so fair that it was almost translucent from the blood loss she had suffered, but a blood transfusion had been set up to make up for the blood that had been lost. Then Iris' eyes fell to the thick bandages wrapped around her torso.

Iris wanted to hit something; Merlyn had used her daughter like she was a pin cushion!

But Iris didn't. She inhaled through her nose and tried to let go of that anger as she pulled a seat up close to Amara's bedside, holding the girl's hand as gently as she could, pressing a kiss to the hand.

Barry had moved around the bed in order to smooth the grey fringe from her forehead and press a soft kiss there and a murmur of "You stay with us, kiddo, alright?"

Amara did not answer, but the steady beat of her heart on the monitor was reassuring.


Dick was looking at a flower shop of all things and he couldn't help but arch an eyebrow at his best friend. "Bouquet Boutique? Is there a reason you brought me to a flower shop, 'cause I'm starting to worry about you, Walls."

Wally's cheeks flushed slightly. "Oh, shut up," he said, "Amy loves this place. She's been begging Uncle B to let her volunteer here –you know, get her a bit more used to interacting with people outside JL– but Uncle B doesn't really like her being around plants."

"Weird," Dick commented, which Wally ignored.

"But she comes here anyways when he and Aunt I are working late," Wally continued as though he hadn't been interrupted. "Trust me, she'll love that we got her some flowers from here."

Dick considered him silently, but he said nothing against it. Amara hadn't awoken since the surgery and it had been two days, something that was making Amara's family a bit anxious, though the doctors seemed to be of the mind that Amara's mind was trying to protect her from the pain her body had endured.

The door dinged as they opened it and strode inside.

There were flowers and plants as far as Dick could see. It was a kind of paradise that Poison Ivy would have appreciated.

Wally walked right up to the woman at the register who was in her late twenties with blue eyes that crinkled when she smiled, a stud in her nose, and blonde hair piled in a multitude of braids.

"Hey, Wally," she called, familiar with Amara's cousin from the several times she'd seen him with her, "how you doin' sweetheart?"

Dick sniggered at his side and Wally elbowed him.

"Hey, Sandra," he replied, "I'm fine, just here for a bouquet of chrysanthemums."

Sandra's eyebrows rose and she grinned. "Aw, did you piss off your cousin something fierce? Those are her favorite, you know."

"I know," Wally grimaced, "she's in the hospital, so I thought they might cheer her up."

The smile which had been present at the beginning of his sentence fell completely once he'd reached the end.

"Hospital?" Sandra repeated. "Is she alright?"

"She was hit by a car when she was crossing the road," Dick said quickly and Sandra's eyes moved to Wally's companion. "She'll be fine, but she has to stay in the hospital for a while."

"Oh, thank God," Sandra sighed, resting a hand against her heart. "That girl's got more spirit than anyone I know, of course a car accident is nothing."

Wally snorted and even Dick couldn't hide his amusement; well, she wasn't wrong in her thinking.

"One chrysanthemum bouquet free of charge," she noted more to herself than to the boys in front of her.

"Wait, you don't have to do that," Wally said quickly, having been ready to pay, but she waved him aside.

"I can do what I want," Sandra said, "it's my shop, so take the free flowers, Wally…I'll let the new girl set you up, hey, Pamela!"

Wally was sure he was staring when the woman came out of the back room, but he didn't really seem to notice. Her hair was a darker red than his and her eyes were as green as Amara's were on a good day.

"Yes, Sandra?"

"I need a bouquet of chrysanthemums for one Amara Allen," Sandra said absently, jotting a few notes into a notepad.

"Right away," Pamela smiled and for a moment Wally swore her fair complexion seemed faintly green, but then the moment had gone and he was left feeling very confused.


The boy with red hair she'd been able to recognize from the photos of her daughter and his proximity to a black-haired boy that fit the general description of Gotham's Boy Wonder only served to further that assumption.

Amara…her child's name was Amara.

It wasn't a name she would have chosen, but that wasn't the thing she focused on, it was the fact that she was in the hospital.

She should have known better than to trust Merlyn to find out the truth, but next time she saw him it would not end well.

Pamela collected the flowers together, turning away from the boys so they wouldn't see the flowers glowing faintly as she imbued them with her own power.

Hopefully Amara had inherited some of her mother's abilities as well, and if she had, then the flowers would help the healing the process. Even if she didn't, they would last longer than the typical flower lifespan after being cut.

"Here you go," she said, extending the flowers to the red-haired Wally with a smile that made him blush (really, it was far too easy), "I hope your friend feels better."

"Cousin," Wally corrected automatically, "but thanks."

And then they were gone, leaving Pamela to her thoughts as she went back to trim a few stalks off a new shipment of flowers that had just come in, and if, over the course of the next few weeks, Sandra noticed that her flowers had longer life expectancies since Pamela started working for her, she didn't mention it.


Roy was the one guarding Amara's body when they came back, mostly because he was the one that Barry and Iris trusted the most with their daughter, given how close the pair were, being partners, and all.

Oliver and Dinah had ducked out to grab a quick bite but Barry and Iris had to return to work, which they would have preferred to skip entirely if it hadn't already been two days since the accident (so to speak). So they relented once Star City heroes agreed to tell them if there was any change.

"Flowers?" he said. "Really? I didn't know your feelings for each other had gotten that far."

Wally squawked and Dick's face flooded with color as he leaped away from his best friend.

"These aren't for Rob, they're for Amy! Don't be a jerk!"

Roy seemed remarkably unconcerned by the twin glares thrown his way as Wally fixed the bouquet in the vase on the bedside table.

His hand, Dick noticed, was holding her limp one, fingers just brushing slightly against her pulse point. Amara, he knew, had what Bruce would call a tactile fixation. It was almost like she needed to touch something, even if it was simply the skin on skin contact from hand holding.

She did it a lot with Roy, because he'd seen them holding hands on more than one occasion, it was almost as though she did it reflexively, but Roy didn't seem to mind, or, if he did, he gave no indication.

"No change?" Dick asked quietly and Roy shook his head morosely as the scent from the flowers filled the room, it was stronger than he'd been expecting.

"No, personally I think the morphine is what's making it take so long for her to wake—"

Roy fell silent suddenly when Amara gave a sharp inhale through her nose, before exhaling smoothly.

The three boys watched her in silence, waiting for any other indication that she might be waking up, but there was nothing.

"Okay, this is just a little bit creepy," Wally muttered. "Watching my cousin while she's unconscious is not in my job description. I'm gonna take a leak."

He was barely out of the room when Roy made a surprised noise, and then he was back. "What? What happened?"

Roy had pulled himself up into a standing position, looking it his and Amara's joined hands oddly. "I-I think she squeezed my hand."

Dick frowned. "Maybe you squeezed hers?"

Roy gave him a quelling glare.

"Flowers," Amara mumbled, finally cracking an eye open slightly, "For…me?"

Her voice was raspy but she was awake, and that was more than enough reason for an explosion of noise from Wally.

"Oh, yeah, all yours, and don't you dare nearly die again, Amy!"

Amara's lips twisted upwards into a smile as her cousin blubbered over her. "I'll try not to," she said through numb lips.

"I gotta go tell Uncle B and Aunt I you're awake!" and then he was gone.

"Leave it to you to get shot full of arrows when me and GA are out of town," Roy said, shaking his head, though the grin on his face ruined the effect he was going for.

"It's one of my talents," Amara said as a straw was put between her lips and she slurped up the fluid greedily. "I've got this thing with reckless behavior, you know."

"I'm aware," he informed her dryly before ducking forward to kiss the top of her head that was nothing short of a brotherly gesture.

Amara gave him a smile that could only be described as dopey, brought on from all the drugs she was pumped with. "It only took nearly dying for Speedy to kiss Storm Chaser…wait until the press finds out."

"You are such a dork," Roy sighed before glancing up to Dick. "Can you keep an eye on her while I go and find GA and Black Canary?"

"Sure," Dick said quickly as the archer dashed out before scrutinizing Amara. "You're only saying that to wind him up, aren't you?"

Amara's glinting eyes told him everything.

"Red-haired archers aren't really my type," she said, yawning widely before grimacing in slight pain as she looked down at herself. "Exactly how bad am I?"

"Nowhere near as bad as you were two nights ago," Dick told her, settling in the seat that Roy had vacated. "You're lucky that you're a metahuman, or it would have been a lot worse."

"Thank science, I suppose," Amara muttered, blinking fuzzily up at the ceiling, considering whether or not to just go back asleep or stay awake. "Don't worry, everything'll be crash."

Dick snorted. "You always say that."

"S'my go-to phrase," Amara told him proudly.

Dick didn't say anything to that, his thoughts echoing inside his own skull rather loudly.

"Richard Grayson," he said to her and Amara blinked, turning her heavy head towards him in surprise.

"Hm?" she garbled articulately.

"My name," he said to her, "its Richard Grayson."

She gave him a smile that clearly said she was only half-there. "That's nice, Robin."

And then she closed her eyes, unaware of the significance of what he had told her, but she would remember it much later. She was, after all, the one who had known Robin the longest of the sidekicks, it was only fitting she know his real name first.