Tempest: Chapter Fifty-Six: A Father's Choice


Really the plan to oust Amanda Waller from being the warden of Belle Reve had worked beautifully, and Professor Hugo Strange had to thank Miss Martian and Superboy for their assistance, though they were rather unaware of what had transpired during their infiltration mission.

It was so much easier for the villains trapped within the walls on the penitentiary to commit crimes when it was so obviously them, yet everyone knew that they were locked up, so it couldn't have possibly been them.

It was a rather brilliant plan that Strange was proud to say that he'd thought up himself as he watched one villain in particular through the security cameras.

Mark Mardon wasn't allowed to have computer privileges, or, at least he hadn't during Waller's time concerning his cyber-stalking of his daughter, the well-known sidekick to Black Canary, Storm Chaser.

Of course, Strange didn't much care about what Mardon did online, that was his business, and if it was against the Justice League, even better.

Mardon had expressed increasing rage towards his daughter in recent sessions with Strange, honestly Strange was surprised that it'd taken so long for him to act.

The image of Mardon on the screen pulled back away from the computer with grim satisfaction, before making his way back to the mess hall.

Whatever he had planned, Strange hoped it was good.


"I don't know what I'm doing wrong!"

Amara tried not to laugh as she walked the streets of Gotham in the cloudy morning, listening to M'gann on the phone. M'gann had only just gotten the phone before Amara had left the League and she'd been having an awful lot of difficulties with using it, but evidently she'd gotten much better at it during Amara's absence.

"Well, you have been burning a lot of things, right?" she asked as she passed by a little shop advertising graphic t-shirts. "Maybe you're just being absentminded?"

M'gann was rather determined in her cooking, and it sounded like her skills hadn't much improved, much to her dismay.

"That can't be it," M'gann countered doubtfully. "Maybe I should just make another batch of cookies and see how that goes…never mind about me, what about you?"

"What about me?" Amara asked flummoxed.

"All your parents are having dinner tonight, aren't they?" M'gann queried as Amara walked deeper into the downtown of Gotham, to the more impressive buildings. "To figure out what to do about who gets to keep you?"

Amara's expression soured. 'Keep' her made it sound like Amara was a coveted object, though she supposed in this instance, it was about as good as it was going to get for her. "Something like that…it's starting to sound like there won't be dinner if none of them can come to any agreements."

Pamela and Barry were both equally stubborn, and that was going to be the hardest part about it. Harley and Iris were pretty easy-going about the whole thing, but, legally, Amara was Barry and Iris' child, but, at the same time, Pamela hadn't even known that she'd existed until she was twelve.

It was a rather uncomfortable situation, but the good thing was that Barry and Pamela had, for the most part, gotten their aggravation towards each other out of the way after Amara had left them all on their own together.

"I think Mom wants me to change my name," Amara added more as an afterthought as she weaved past a few more people.

"To what?" M'gann asked in confusion.

"Amara Isley-Allen," Amara said. "I mean, I was technically Amara Isley before I was adopted, so I wouldn't really mind it, and I think Dad's realized that there's really no negotiating that point."

"Are you calling him Dad again?"

Amara shrugged, even though M'gann couldn't see it. "I mean, I do love him, and neither he or Mom –Pamela not Iris– are perfect, and they've both done things they're not proud of for me…technically Mom was the reason I was in a wheelchair for eight months, but I'm trying to be open-minded about everything."

"I'm glad you guys are working things out," M'gann said sincerely and Amara almost laughed at how like Dinah she sounded in that moment. "Oh, hang on, Kaldur's here, want to say hi?"

"Sure," Amara couldn't silence the laugh this time.

"Hello, Amy."

"Hey, Kelpie, holding down the fort?" Amara asked with an easy smile.

"As well as I can without you here." She could practically hear his smile and it made her laugh again.

"You flatter me," Amara responded lightly.

"The Team and I are wondering when you'll be coming back," Kaldur added without preamble and Amara scratched her head thoughtfully.

"I don't know," Amara replied honestly, "maybe a few days if I'm lucky, but I'm a bit out of practice now."

"Coming from Masquerade who's been running around Gotham?" His tone was so dry that Amara couldn't stop her smile.

"SC's out of practice," Amara corrected lightly as she treaded further into the downtown, the buildings getting taller and taller around her, the stores more classy than rustic and Amara personally liked the latter than the former. "M's got a very unique skill set."

Her eyes focused on the theatre before her, pausing in her surprise. She'd heard about the Transcultural Theatre that was the home to the Gothamite Chamber Ballet. The theatre itself had fallen a bit out of prestige and use when a former dancer had bought it and fixed it up, the ballet being one that didn't cater specifically towards a certain body type or ethnicity, because the only ballet dancers Amara had ever seen in news articles had all been rather similar in appearance. But the theatre looked nothing like it used to, damaged from what appeared to be the remnants of a fire.

"Whoa."

"What is it?" Kaldur asked in confusion.

"Nothing," Amara said quickly, "look, I've got to go, but I'll let you guys know how the night goes, okay?"

She didn't even wait to hear his answer before ending the call and stuffing the phone back in her pocket as she crossed the street. Amara would like to say that she didn't make a habit of poking her nose where it didn't belong, but she'd be lying, and the Transcultural Theatre was rather interesting, as theatres went, it was all about celebrating differences and Amara could appreciate that.

As she got closer, the fire damage was more obvious. The main structure was set in stone and appeared to be the least damage, but everything else couldn't have been more burned to ash.

Amara looked around to see if anyone was watching before stepping carefully over the yellow tape, entering the theatre on light feet.

She'd never been inside it prior to the fire damage, but as she delved further in, she couldn't help but be in awe of how grand the theatre was; she'd never seen anything quite like it.

The vast number of velvet seats were blackened and charred and the drapes that would've hung in front of the stage were nonexistent. But there was still paint clear as day on the wall.

Go back to where you came from! Was easily the kindest of the messages there and Amara's frown deepened. It made her think of the bullies at Dick's school that didn't think Bruce Wayne's adoptive son should be Romani. It made her think of when some boys on the street had said Artemis couldn't be Vietnamese because she was blonde.

There was a soft sigh in front of her. "You know this is technically off limits to the public."

Amara looked up from the words to the speaker. She was pretty and about Jade's age with a hijab that was a peach color wrapped around her head to match the long-sleeved shirt she wore.

"Someone burned down the theatre?" Amara asked instead, not bothering to acknowledge the truth of her previous statement.

The young woman pursed her lips, eyes darkening as she looked to the words painted onto the walls. "A racist, xenophobic person," she finally agreed. "I guess you didn't hear about it on the news."

A sheepish expression morphed onto Amara's lips. "I'm not the greatest about keeping up to date on the news."

Unless it was anything that had to do with clients on BlackNet or the Justice League, but Amara hadn't been focusing much on the Justice League lately, since right now she wasn't technically a part of it, and she didn't think that Batman wanted her to be until Pamela and Harley and the Allens had worked everything out between them.

"You can't have it repaired?" Amara added.

The woman heaved another sigh. "Not with the money I've got, and no bank is willing to give out a loan large enough to cover the expenses, even with proving that it was arson."

Amara made a soft humming sound, a frown still on her lips. "That's too bad," she said finally, "I heard your performances were really good."

And then she made her way out of the theatre, making the young woman watch her go with a bit of bemusement, wondering why she'd even stopped inside in the first place.


Damali Faris was the name of the young woman who owned the Gothamite Chamber Ballet. She was a former dancer herself and rather renowned for her skills. Damali had built the GCB from the ground up with the dancers ranging in age from as young as twelve to as old as twenty-seven and with varying backgrounds.

The pictures of them all together were rather stunning and Amara had watched a video on youtube of one of their performances; it was all very impressive.

Oracle had been the one that set up Gratia Art, she was the patron of the arts, but maybe it wouldn't be a bad thing if Amara did something like it too…


This was the last thing that Damali needed: an estimate of how much it was going to cost to repair the theatre. Nothing could return it to its former glory, the idiots that had torched it in the first place had seen to that. She was going to have to tell her girls that they were going to have to find a new theatre to be aligned with.

She opened the creases on the papers, following the number of zeroes with growing misery until she reached the bottom, and then she was fairly certain that her heart had stopped in her chest, because, in big letters read the words: Paid in full.

It was followed by a number without a name.

Damali had whipped out her own phone to dial the number without so much of a thought. It rang once before someone answered the phone.

"Hello?" The voice was young and cautious, like they didn't take to getting unknown callers.

"Hello," Damali said, her voice calm and rather unlike her frayed nerves and frantically beating heart. "My name is Damali Faris, are you the person that just paid for the repairs for the Transcultural Theatre?"

"That was fast," the voice replied with a bit of amusement, "only took them a few hours to get it started on that estimate."

Damali was partially speechless. "This is a rather expensive investment, I hope you know!" She didn't want to completely turn off this anonymous benefactor, but it was something that even the banks she'd visited had turned down; why would some unknown person be willing to pay that much money for it?

"I'm aware," the person on the other end replied, "but it's my money and I can spend it how I like."

This was completely unreal, this had never ever happened to Damali. "Do I get to know the name of our anonymous benefactor?"

"I'm not really anonymous," the voice grumbled slightly. "My name's Amy."

The petulance showed her age and Damali smiled. "Well, Amy," she said carefully, "thank you, really, you have no idea what you've given me –given us."

"I look forward to seeing you perform," Amy responded easily, "and I'm sure it'll be well worth it."

Damali was still smiling when the call ended, her heart calming and relief warming her. She checked her watch quickly before practically skipping off to pray.


Amara drank her tea rather noisily, watching from the kitchen as she minded the noodles.

"What're the chances you'll actually get to dinner?" Roy asked with a snort where he was sitting on the counter sharpening a few arrowheads. Honestly, he didn't even need to be there, but he'd sort of popped up out of the blue and was very hard to deter, but Amara didn't mind his presence too much.

"It's still up in the air." A scowl was on Amara's lips as she stirred the gradually-softening noodles. She was trying to stay out of the way for as much as possible, mostly because she was the cause of the discontent.

On the upside, at least they all weren't yelling at each other, so that was an improvement from when they'd all been in the same room…but Dinah had also been there for that.

"How about you and Ollie?" Amara turned her eyes on her partner and Roy rolled his eyes.

"Same as always," he grunted and Amara frowned. "Don't give me that look."

"What look?" she demanded.

"The one that says you want everyone to get along," Roy said dryly, replacing the arrows in his quiver and Amara wrinkled her nose; the kitchen wasn't exactly the best place to be sharpening arrowheads, but it wasn't like he was very near the food. "Maybe Ollie and I just have really opposite personalities."

"I doubt that's it," Amara snorted, rolling her eyes. "Besides, they're bound to induct you into the JL sooner or later, you're eighteen and you're a great hero."

Roy blinked and paused, looking to her, but Amara didn't notice, nor did she notice his smile. He appreciated how offhanded that comment was, like she didn't even need to think about it.

He locked an arm around her neck and rubbed at the top of her head viciously.

"Hey!" Amara complained loudly, squirming out from under his arm, hands drawing up to fix her hair as she did so, but the curls were as wild and untamable as ever. "Roy!"

"You're way too sweet on me," Roy sniggered.

"Oh, please," Amara scoffed, her cheeks burning the faintest pink, "I'm just stating a fact."

But his next smile she didn't miss and she gave him a half one of her own. "How's Jade doing?" she asked instead, pulling the noodles off the stove in order to strain the water from them before depositing them back in the pot and mixing in the sauce.

"Pretty good, we only got to spend two days together before she ran off on another assignment."

Amara hummed in understanding. She hadn't even realized that Jade was back in the states until she'd showed up in her room, bearing a box full of cosmetics as an apology for burning her Maeve Isley alias.

"Having fun over here?"

Harley had appeared leaning her elbows against the bar counter, blue eyes gleaming. Amara's parents –both sides– had dressed casually nice for the dinner, if they ever did get to the dinner, but Amara hadn't bothered; she was just wearing a pair of worn jeans and a shirt Harley had gotten her when she'd found out Amara was demisexual, the shirt declaring Demi Goddess in the colors of the Demisexual flag, with a spade between the words. It was one of Amara's favorites.

"Boundless fun," Roy said dryly and Amara laughed.

"Hey, you're getting free dinner out of this," she pointed out and he pretended that he couldn't hear.

"I have something for you," Harley sang, skating past what could've potentially developed into another squabble and she held out her hand to Amara, something black and cylindrical.

Amara's brow furrowed as she examined it in her hand. "Um…what is it supposed to be, exactly?"

"Flick your wrist," Harley laughed and Amara's eyebrows rose high on her forehead as she did as Harley suggested, and a sturdy end of baton extended.

"Whoa, cool!" She swung it experimentally. It was very light-weight and wouldn't hold up under much strain, not like the metallic ones that Amara used as Storm Chaser.

"It's no gun, that's for sure." Harley sounded just slightly put off at that and Roy stared at the ceiling briefly. It was so easy to forget sometimes that Harley and Pamela were both villains (or, at least Harley still technically was; Pamela had practically retired from the villaining gig). "But at least you can use it in public without getting into too much trouble."

She winked and Amara rolled her eyes. "I don't get into trouble, it usually finds me," she grumbled in aggravation.

"Amy, can you come in here a minute?"

Amara quickly pocketed the collapsible baton, shoving it into the back pocket of her jeans before putting Roy in charge of the food as she came out from behind the counter to make her way to stand in the living room.

Iris smiled at the sight of the shirt Amara was practically flaunting. She'd laughed when she'd first seen it and Barry had shaken his head fondly, but it was comforting to know that they didn't care about what her sexuality was.

"So, what's the verdict?" Amara asked, her hands in her pockets, looking rather relaxed.

Pamela's eyes cut to Barry's briefly. "If you're not completely against it…I'd like you to take my name, Amara Isley-Allen."

"Or Amara Allen-Isley," Barry pointed out.

Iris made a soft sound in the back of her throat. "Isley-Allen rolls off the tongue better, babe, sorry."

Pamela and Iris shared a laugh and Amara had never been so relieved.

"I don't mind," Amara said quickly. "I mean, I'm both of yours, it kind of makes sense to."

If she made them choked up, she pretended not to notice.

"And we've decided that we'll switch off every two weeks," Iris added. "Barry and I'll get you two weeks and Harley and Pamela will get you the next two weeks…I think we can work out holidays later."

Amara scratched her cheek, trying to imagine the Allens and the Quinzel-Isleys all having Christmas together on top of the rest of the Flash Family…that would be a bit hectic.

"Okay," Amara said, a grin lighting her lips before she threw her arms around Barry and Iris, grateful for their acceptance and love, "but you've got to eat the pasta now and then I wanna show you my room!"

Barry and Iris shared a look over their daughter's head at her one track mind, but Pamela could only laugh with her girlfriend.


"You look very nice," Pamela complimented as she straightened Amara's leather jacket. She'd dressed up, but that might've been her Masquerade persona rubbing off on her, wearing a floral-patterned dress with dark red lipstick. "Are Iris and Barry taking you out when you get home?" She was careful enough to refer to both of Amara's homes for what they were.

"That's what they said," Amara grinned.

There at the train-station where Amara was going to be boarding a train that would take her back to Central City, but it was still going to take her several hours to reach the station, either way. Amara had offered to fly back, it wasn't that much of a stretch for her these days, but they'd all shot down that suggestion.

Don't out your secret identity over something like the amount of time spent on a train.

Amara had rolled her eyes, but it wasn't the worst thing; she had her laptop to keep her occupied.

She could've taken a zetatube back, but the train was a bit more legitimate, so Amara thought it best not to argue too much.

"I'll be back before you know it," Amara promised, embracing Pamela and Harley one last time, letting Pamela press a sound kiss against her brow and Harley smack one against the high of her cheekbone.

And then she had run to get to the doors in time, finding the closest empty seat and plopping herself down on it, bag and all while waving out the window to where Pamela and Harley were waving back, and Amara waved until the train pulled completely out of the station and they were left behind, with a pang tugging at her heartstrings.

Amara's phone buzzed and she looked at it quickly, only to smile at the single message there: Miss you already!


Wally had been on his phone all day, which was a bit unusual for him, and the only reason Dick could think of why that was was because of Amara.

"How's Amy?" he asked flat out when they were all having a snack that happened to be M'gann-made cookies that weren't nearly as charred as her usual batch –which meant that M'gann was positively ecstatic about it– and the others looked up immediately as Wally scowled at his best friend.

"She's fine," Wally said. "She's on a train right now."

Conner's eyes widened. "She's coming back?"

That was the best news any of them had heard since she'd shown up on their unsanctioned mission to find Red Tornado and Artemis pumped her fist excitedly.

"All right!" the archer declared. "It's about time!" Wally couldn't tell if she was excited about Amara coming back because she was her heroing partner, or because it evened the boys to girls ratio a bit more on the Team.

Wally showed them a selfie Amara had sent him with the words underneath: Leaving the station!

Dick quickly averted his eyes. Really, no one should look that cute.

"Where is she coming in?" Kaldur inquired.

"Central City Station," Wally replied before narrowing his eyes at them all. "No, no!" he declared. "You can't come along with me!"

"Don't be such a hogger, Wally." Artemis punched him good-naturedly in the arm, maybe a bit too harshly, going off of how he rubbed at it viciously. "She's our friend too!"

"She's my cousin!" Wally positively whined.

"Which means you get to see her more," Dick pointed out with a snigger and the red-head glared daggers at all of them.

"I hate you all," he decided, sounding rather like his cousin when she was aggravated.

They couldn't stifle their laughter.


Amara had put her laptop away when they'd reached the last hour of the train ride, and she'd been sticking to using her phone since then, Wally keeping her entertained after agreeing to wait for her to get off the train.

She had to stifle her laughter at the selfie he sent her of him and the rest of the Team from what appeared to be the kitchen of the Cave, everyone smiling cheerily, well, everyone except Conner, who was simply smiling. Underneath it was the next message reading: the supersquad is ready to escort!

What a nerd.

Amara was almost about to type a response when the hairs on the back of her neck stood up and someone actually screamed while the others in the train car fell frightfully silent and Amara looked up slowly to find a barrel of a gun aimed at her head.

"Amara Allen," the woman said, her face hard and her tone harsh, "the daughter of Weather Wizard…ready to die?"

Amara's mouth went dry and her heart froze in her chest. Oh, that definitely was not good.


AN: Damali Faris is a Muslim character and I will preface this by saying I am not Muslim and do not pretend to understand their religious beliefs, and if I screw up on anything to do with her or her beliefs, please let me know, because I will rectify it as soon as possible.