Tempest: Chapter Thirty-Five: Arrow in the Dark


It wasn't everyday that Artemis found herself waking to the sound of someone jimmying open the window and sliding it up all the way, and it was startling, if nothing else. Artemis had barely managed to grab an arrow when an all-too-familiar voice had broke through the silence.

"Oh, good, you're awake, I need to hide some stolen stuff at your place for awhile."

Artemis froze staring at the girl maneuvering into her room, a gold mask hiding her eyes, but not the red painted lips. She was wearing what Artemis almost mistook as a loose red dress over skintight black material, but it wasn't.

"Storm Chaser?" she asked dubiously, recognizing that voice paired with that grin.

"My day job," the girl agreed, bringing her leg into the room and shutting the window behind her as she heaved a rucksack onto the bed that Jade had once occupied.

"Hero by day and notorious thief by night?" Artemis asked, flicking on the lamp by her bed. "That's a bit of a jump."

"A girl's got to make a living," the girl said, shrugging. "I hope you don't mind but it's too far for me to make it to my safe house and back before my dad notices I'm not in my bed. And he's never happy when I steal other people's property."

"You're unbelievable," Artemis groaned, flopping back onto her bed in exasperation while Masquerade hefted the rucksack to tuck it into a corner in her closet where it couldn't be seen.

"Aw, that's so flattering." Artemis could swear she was fluttering her eyelashes at her, even if she couldn't see her eyes behind that mask of hers. "You sure do know how to make a girl feel welcome."

Artemis rolled her eyes and Masquerade sat down on Jade's bed, massaging one of her heels where it was strapped into red high heels. The heels made her look taller than she was, but even then Artemis was sure she'd grown a little since their paths last crossed.

"Why do you rob people in heels?" Artemis asked the first question that came to mind.

"I have a common theme," Masquerade said, grinning as she gestured towards the mask covering a good portion of her face, then to the almost-dress, before ending at the heels. "First gig I had was at a masquerade ball and combat boots kind of stick out."

Artemis doubted she'd ever understand the girl that hid behind the mask, whether it was Masquerade's or Storm Chaser's; she was remarkably odd.

"See you around, Goddess." Masquerade gave her a red-painted smile before disappearing out of the window once more.

Being called onto Storm Chaser duty in the middle of the day wasn't all together rare, but they weren't nearly as common either. And yet Storm Chaser still found her caught off guard when she arrived in Star City by cloud to see some kind of android at odds against Black Canary and Green Arrow and they weren't faring too well.

"What the hell?" Storm Chaser demanded before leaping to action, only to have said android turn on her and say "Access Black Canary."

And a resonating scream identical to her mentor's was fired from the android's mouth, throwing Storm Chaser back and into the wall with a sharp groan.

"SC, you all right?" came Black Canary's voice over the comms.

"Only my pride, only my pride," Storm Chaser muttered, ducking with a yelp as the android's arm shot through the wall where her head had once been.

An arrow shot through the air to hit the android's shoulder, causing foam to erupt around it just long enough to give Storm Chaser the opportunity to race away, vaulting behind a stray car and ducking for cover.

"What the hell is that thing?" she demanded over the comms.

"An android," Green Arrow retorted and Storm Chaser couldn't help rolling her eyes at how blunt he'd been.

"Who sent it?"

"Right now we're more focused on shutting it down," Black Canary added and Storm Chaser peered around the car she was using as a shield in time to see Black Canary run out and release a scream that was negated by the android's.

"How'd it get BC's Canary Cry?" she asked out loud.

"It seems to have the ability to duplicate its opponents' abilities," Green Arrow remarked with annoyance. But he was more long distance with his arrows, so there wasn't much the android could take from him. Black Canary and Storm Chaser, on the other hand had superpowers that were a bit more troublesome to their enemies.

"SC, run!"

Storm Chaser yelped as the scream directed towards the car she was hiding behind, and then she gathered the air around her, shooting up into the air on a conjured cloud.

It was a serious problem if it could replicate abilities, mostly because Storm Chaser knew just how destructive hers could be.

But maybe her lightning could be shocking enough to its circuits.

"That sounds like a bad idea waiting to happen," Green Arrow's voice disagreed and Storm Chaser blinked in surprise, not realizing she had spoken out loud.

"Do you have a better idea?" she asked, just this side of aggravated.

"Not particularly," Green Arrow had to concede before firing off an explosive arrow and collided with the android's metallic chest with a hulled bang. "But if it doesn't work, then he's got your powers too."

"Maybe I don't count because I'm just a sidekick? You know, not enough juice." But it wasn't like atmo-kinetics were common in the Justice League; Storm Chaser was the first.

She could hear the sigh coming from Black Canary before Green Arrow radioed for help, just as she leapt onto the android's back, not unlike how she had when Weather Wizard had when he'd attacked Star City.

Storm Chaser clung to its back, her eyes glowing with electricity as she channeled it over her body and against the android with a shocking burst. The amount would've been particularly shocking to a human, and it should've at the very least short-circuited the android, but unfortunately, it appeared to have no effect on the android, who instead remarked, "Access Black Canary" and reached back to rip her off its back and fling her in a manner that Black Canary was famous for using.

She yelped as she went flying, stopping just short of colliding painfully with the window of a shop by a blur of red.

"Having a good day, Storm Chaser?" Flash asked dryly and Storm Chaser's cheeks burned with color.

"To be fair," she said as her darted towards where Black Canary was standing with Green Arrow while Martian Manhunter tried his hand against the android, being the closest hero to Star City to answer their distress call, "I'm not the only one getting my ass kicked."

"Language," Flash mentioned mildly as he set his daughter on her feet once more.

"You might not be able to tell, but this is me rolling my eyes."

"You didn't inherit that sharp tongue from me, which is all that I'm glad for right now," Flash responded with a grin.

"I'm adopted," Storm Chaser mentioned archly, "I didn't inherit anything from you."

Exasperation bubbled from Black Canary and Green Arrow as they watched father and daughter bicker back and forth; this was probably the reason why they didn't patrol together, more than the fact that Storm Chaser couldn't really keep up with her father.

"Be back in a flash," Flash said with a wide grin, before darting away as Storm Chaser yelled after him "That's not really funny anymore!"

Storm Chaser sulked slightly before turning back towards her mentor as Green Arrow lurched forward to assist when Martian Manhunter collided with a building. "Who else is coming? Or is it just Martian Manhunter and Flash?"

"I doubt they'll be enough," Black Canary admitted doubtfully, favoring her arm where Storm Chaser could see a rip through her jacket that was stained red. "Superman, Batman, Red Tornado, and Captain Atom are coming to assist."

It sounded a bit like over-kill to Storm Chaser, but then she saw the android using Martian Manhunter's shape-shifting abilities to elongate his arms and knock Green Arrow a few meters back while Flash quickened into a red blur, racing around the android even as the android intoned "Access Black Canary" and released another sonic scream in a circle so that at least some of it would hit the speedster.

It slowed him enough that the android could use Martain Manhunter's shape-shifting again to knock him back and disorient him before opening its mouth and uttering "Access Storm Chaser."

Storm Chaser was already rushing forward, placing herself between the android and her father before Black Canary could stop her. Her upraised arms took the brunt of the voltage before she could try to redirect it.


Four hours later when the android had finally been subdued, Amara was walking through the zeta-tube to the monitor womb with Black Canary and Martian Manhunter, exhausted and in pain. Unfortunately, the android had managed to knock her out somewhere around hour two, but it had still taken eight Leaguers two more hours to dismantle the android, so it wasn't like Amara was the only one who had gotten kicked around. Dinah had ended up dragging her over to an empty alley while she was out of it, only rousing once the fighting was done to her father hovering over her in concern.

She peeled off her mask and rolled her shoulders as they came across Wally, Superboy, Kaldur, M'gann, and Dick.

"Are you all right?" Dick asked in concern, his eyebrows rising above his sunglasses but Wally was already on her, green eyes close as he took in her bruises and the blood down the side of her face.

"Someone used you like a punching bag," he noticed, his brow furrowing with worry. "Anyone we know?"

"I doubt it," Amara said, only managing a half-smirk with how her jaw ached. "I'll be fine," she added, catching the look on his face, "but what I do need is a shower and a med-kit."

"Come back when you're done," Dinah mentioned and Amara saluted with an arm that burned from the movement, getting the feeling that Dinah wanted her to hurry.

Amara ran a hand through her hair making her way towards the showers and locking the door behind her as she pulled a stall out of the wall to circle around a showerhead before yanking her uniform off with a wince and the skin tight clothes she wore underneath it.

The skin on her arm was reddened where she'd been shocked with her own lightning, but it was much better than how it had been more than two hours ago. Now the pain was a bit more manageable, though it was still uncomfortable.

Amara stepped under the warm spray of water, wincing at the feel of the water raining down on her burns, but after a few moments, she hardly felt it at all. She rinsed the dried blood that had caked the side of her face from a cut to her temple that had bled profusely, feeling the bruises along her jaw. She gritted her teeth in aggravation, compared to the other Leaguers, she was the most beat up, but she was also the youngest and the most inexperienced.

But it was still a sore point.

She stepped out of the shower and redressed, leaving the top half of her uniform loose around her waist to expose her arms as she made her way towards the medical bay, pausing when her phone buzzed.

Ella blinked on the screen, and Amara brought it to her ear, holding it there with a grimace. "Yeah?"

"All right, I have a theoretical for you," was the first thing Amara heard and she arched an eyebrow, still rifling for some burn paste and bandages.

"What kind of theoretical?" she asked in amusement.

"Say you had a girlfriend who wasn't really a flower type of girl, what would you get her?" Ella asked her bluntly.

"Did your girl say she doesn't like flowers?" Amara asked instead. She'd never met Ella's girlfriend, but she did know that Ella spent her weekends with her, so Amara worked by herself or with Sandra on Saturday or Sunday.

"Well, no," Ella conceded and Amara bit her lip as she rubbed the burn paste gently over her skin, binding a bandage over it before working on the second. "But she'd probably like a new mallet better…"

Amara paused, a bit dubious. "What?"

"Never mind!" Ella said quickly. "See you at work on Monday!"

Then the call ended and Amara was left feeling a bit befuddled, but she shook her head, carefully placing her arms through the sleeves and making her way back to the monitor womb.


All things considered, Amara would've liked to put the whole android business behind her, but here she was with the Team, set to follow one of two trucks carrying its parts to STAR Labs for analysis. And given that it was believed that Professor Ivo, a criminal scientist who once worked against his rival T.O. Morrow, was involved, the chances there'd be an attempt to regain the android was likely.

The mission was undercover, but Amara hadn't changed into the uniform that the others had, all of which had color schemes similar to their sidekick uniforms so Amara didn't really see the point, after all, hers was largely black to begin with, so there wasn't all that much difference.

She revved her motorcycle's engine, following after the truck heading for the STAR Labs facility in New York with Dick and Superboy, while Kaldur, M'gann, and Wally took to the one heading for Boston.

Amara would have been fine passing the mission in silence, mostly because she was still a bit annoyed with herself, but Dick liked to break silences with his un-words as Amara liked to call them. Though, retrospectively, it might have been to distract Superboy who was a bit pissed for reasons Amara couldn't have guessed.

"If dislike is the opposite of like, is disaster the opposite of aster? See, instead of things going wrong, they go right."

Amara couldn't help smirking and rolling her eyes as Dick glanced towards Superboy. "Uh," he coughed, "clearly you're not feeling the aster. What's wrong?"

"Canary," Superboy snapped and Amara's spine grew tense. "I mean, what business does she have teaching combat skills to a guy with super strength?"

"Here's a thought," Amara said frostily. "You have a month of experience under your belt, she's got years."

He turned to glare at Amara through his helmet, and Amara returned its intensity. "And I really wouldn't insult Black Canary in front of her protégé, seeing as I can deliver enough shock to your central nervous system that can easily put you in a coma."

She sped ahead of them, annoyance bubbling within her. Dinah had trained her and they both had very different super-powered abilities, but they both made it work.

"Besides," Dick added, glancing to Amara's back ahead of them, "taking down stronger guys is part of the gig. Canary learned that the hard way. Same with Batman, and, well, me."

There was a moment of calm silence and then the rows of corn rustled before sleek, monkey-like robots made their way out of the corn, cackling metallically with glowing green eyes from a hidden power source.

"Robin, Storm Chaser, Superboy, our truck has been attacked!" came Kaldur's voice over their comms.

"Kind of figured," Dick uttered dryly.

"You've got to be kidding me," Amara complained, speeding up her motorcycle before leaping off of it, forcing Superboy and Dick to veer to avoid her crashing motorcycle.

"Hey!" Dick complained, while Superboy grumbled about the monkeys in distaste.

Amara latched onto the edge of the truck, kicking her legs up and knocking two monkey robots loose.

"Robot monkeys!" Dick laughed. "Totally Ivo's tweaked style."

"Maybe you shouldn't be gushing over the guy who invented them when we've got monkey robots on our ass, babe," Amara pointed out before twisting up into the air and whipping out her batons to beat on the monkey robots. Dick switched his motorcycle to battle mode before Superboy leapt up to join Amara, forcing Dick to lock his grappler onto the back of the truck.

The number of monkey robots was overwhelming and Superboy was getting gradually more and angrier. Fighting angry was never a good idea; Amara had learned that the hard way. The monkey robots were swarming on Superboy faster than he could fight them off, and Amara was having her own difficulties.

Lasers shot from the monkey robot's eyes and Amara yelped as it hit her arm where she was burned and she almost dropped her baton while another one shot at Superboy's eyes, temporarily blinding him before lifting him into the air and dropping him, and Dick tried to knock several off the back of the truck before swinging up to join Amara.

"Where're all these things coming from?" Amara demanded, kicking one back.

"I think you mean when did Ivo have the time to make these?" Dick cheeked, grinning at her behind his helmet as he pulled out Eskrima sticks

Amara rolled her eyes. "You're just asking to be thrown off a moving truck, aren't you?"

"I'm sure I'd survive."

Amara laughed briefly. "Duck!" she advised, and he only had a split second to comply as she twisted her batons into a single bo-staff and swung it horizontally, taking out five with a slight electric charge before Superboy leapt back on the truck to join them.

The monkey robots swarmed on him before the truck swayed dangerously, lurching to the side to see the robots blowing out the tires.

"Tires are out!" she yelled over the metallic cackling and Dick grabbed the driver, jerking him out and into the fields of corn while she formed a cloud under her feet, flying up into the air while the truck, and Superboy, flipped several times before crashing, the monkey robots causing a minor explosion in order to drag the container with the android parts out.

Amara drew her hands close, gritting her teeth as a lightning bolt formed into existence and she flung it towards the escaping container.

It shot through one of the monkey robots and the other was being dragged down by the weight of what it was carrying, only to be assisted a moment later.

"Damn," Amara muttered before Dick yelled Superboy's name and she turned to see the tempermental Kryptonian taking a huge leap after the monkey robots. "Well, that's not good."

"We've lost our cargo," came Kaldur's voice in her ear as she came back down to land lightly beside Dick. "Did you—"

"It's gone," Dick sighed, "and so's our partner."

"Superboy took off after it," Amara supplied.

"Aqualad to Superboy. Radio your position, we'll help you."

Superboy's voice was fuzzy, but the anger was evident. "I don't need help, don't want any!"

"Superboy?" Kaldur questioned, but there was only silence.

"He probably tossed his comm," Amara sighed a moment later and Dick hummed in agreement, pulling off his helmet, a movement that Amara replicated, running a hand through her hair, rubbing at her jaw which was still aching from her earlier collision with the android's fist.

"Su-per," Wally complained, "now we can't even track him."

"He's out of my telepathic range," M'gann admitted a moment later. "This Professor Ivo, if he is alive, seems to be two steps ahead of us…maybe we should contact Red Tornado?"

"That'll go over well," Amara snorted.

"Storm Chaser's right," Kaldur agreed. "Tornado always tells us to handle things ourselves, and the mission can still succeed if we recover the parts before they're reassembled."

"Well, that's a great plan," Wally agreed, just a bit sarcastic, "except for the part about us not knowing where to look!"

Amara snapped her fingers, grinning at Dick. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

He looked at her blankly, but then his eyes widened behind his shades. "Oh, of course!"

"What?" came three dubious voices over the comms while Dick grabbed a robotic monkey that wasn't working but not as damaged as the ones littered around them.

"We would've heard some alert if the decoy trucks had been hit," Amara theorized while Dick played around with the robot. "There's no way only the trucks with the parts were hit by coincidence."

"Got it!" Dick said, bringing up his holographic computer and Amara leaned over his shoulder as his fingers tapped over the keys. "The parts have GPS, so the monkeys can track the signal, which means I can track them with one that we've got over here…It looks like both sets of parts are converging on Gotham City!"

He shared a startled look with Amara.

"That far south? M'gann and I won't get there anytime soon, I'm sending Kid on ahead to meet you," Kaldur said instead. "Aqualad out."

Dick looped the robot over his shoulder, pressing a button on his gauntlet to bring his motorbike –now one wheeled from him activating the battle mode– to him. "Definitely a disaster, heavy on the dis."

Amara hummed in agreement, pulling out her phone. "Send me those tracking coordinates, would you?"

Dick furrowed his brow at her.

"Babe," she said dryly, pulling out her mask to place it over her eyes, fixing the goggles in place over her eye holes, not noticing how his cheeks pinked –for which he was grateful–, "you're not wearing your uniform. Between the two of us, you're the only one that needs to change. You'll need to take a detour, but I can go on ahead."

Dick grumbled under his breath before mounting the motorcycle. "Don't have too much fun before Wally and I catch you."

"I'll keep it in mind," she said with a laugh, waving as he sped off.


Artemis was not having a very good day and that was saying something, because life with her father usually led to some very bad days. Today was the day that her mother had gotten out of prison, which was great, because she loved her mother, but it was also a reminder of what happened to people around her father; her mother being confined in a wheelchair was a case in point.

Then her father had shown up and those horrible words he'd said had set her off: "She's one of us."

Artemis had grabbed her bow and dressed in her uniform and taken off through the window, spending the night beating her way through crooks, stopping criminals in their tracks, now that was the life.

She was sitting on the roof of a building when she saw a boy in dark clothing go flying through the air and through one of the main windows of Gotham Academy, and that, more than anything else she had seen that night, piqued her interest.

So Artemis crept after the mysterious crashing boy, taking up refuge in a tree, climbing to its topmost branch to look within the gymnasium through a small handheld telescope, her eyebrows rising where they were hidden behind her high-reaching mask.

Within was some kind of battle between some kind of metal man and several kids. She could easily recognize Gotham's Boy Wonder, Robin, who was dragged out of the way of a lightning strike by Storm Chaser –who was easy to make out with her shock of grey hair–, while Kid Flash rushed forward only to be thrown back, colliding painfully with the dark-haired boy that Artemis had seen go flying through the window.

Storm Chaser whipped out a bo-staff, electricity sparking off her weapon before she swung it at the metallic man, but it wasn't enough and she was sent flying into the wall, inciting a furious response from Kid Flash, who rushed forward in retaliation only to be caught in the man's arms and painfully squeezed.

Artemis could hear his yell from where she was and it only took her a moment to nock an arrow and release it through the window, forcing the man to shift his density and drop the speedster in order to allow it to pass through his body.

There was a minor distraction caused by several robotic monkeys attacking her that diverted her attention away briefly, but she managed to dispatch them without too much effort, and when she looked back, the unknown boy had somehow caused the metallic man's head to explode.

"Help me disassemble him," Robin ordered, rushing forward as a voice agreed, "Don't take any chances!"

It was from Aqualad –Artemis had seen him on TV a few times– but she wasn't familiar with the girl he arrived with, though the resemblance to Martian Manhunter was undeniable, as she flew to the boy's side with a worried call of "Superboy!"

"Oh, I need to die," Storm Chaser was moaning as Kid Flash lifted her up and there was something about the way he held her that was distinctly soft, but Artemis wasn't sure why.

Kid Flash laughed. "You can't do that, you've got work tomorrow, remember?"

Artemis couldn't hear what she said, but she was pretty sure it was a drawn out "Fuck!"

But she knew better than to overstay her welcome, it was better to leave before anyone noticed she'd been there in the first place, and so, Artemis disappeared into the night.


It was late when Artemis crept back into her room through her open window, just in time to hear her mother call: "Artemis, could you come out here, please?"

Artemis murmured a swear under her breath, quickly peeling off her mask and fingerless gloves. "Um, sure, Mom," she called back, "just a sec."

There was no way she could change her clothes that fast. She was so busted! Artemis grabbed her robe, pulling it tight around her and hoping it would be enough to hide what she was wearing as she opened her door into the apartment's cramped living room, pausing at the sight of Batman standing and Green Arrow leaning against the couch across from her mother.

Ice filled her veins.

"Artemis," Batman said diplomatically, "we have to talk."