Chapter Nineteen ― Disordered

"Name one hero who was happy."


Artemis was already gone by the time M'gann had cried herself to sleep; the archer hadn't said much of anything when she'd slunk off to the zeta-beam tubes except that she had to go because her mother would be waiting up for her. Conner, with only a meaningful but indescribable look in his eyes, had quietly slipped away, off into his room by the time both Hal Jordan and Guy Gardner had gotten to the Mount Justice cave. Kaldur had wandered off in the direction of the caves gymnasium by the time both Lanterns entered the Justice League's first secret sanctum.

Arley hadn't looked up from her spot on the lime green couch when the pilot and ex-gym teacher met Batman in the mouth of the cave's living room; Arley's back was to Wally's chest, the speedsters arms were tangled around her and their legs were intertwined as they huddled together, every so often the speedster would move from balancing his chin atop her head so that he could press a firm kiss to the very top of her hair.

Arley ignored Guy when the red headed Lantern loudly demanded to know just exactly what the hell had happened; her mind was firmly on the voice of her ring; her eyes were glued to her ring as Batman said something to the two other Lanterns.

Her ring was supposed to be her weapon, nothing more than an extension of herself and yet it had spoken to her as if it had a mind of its own. Arley's ring had kept her and her friends alive without her meaning to. The ring was more than just what the Guardians said it was and it terrified her because if that was so then what was on her finger?

And why was it only her ring? Hals ring had never spoken to him, neither had Kilowog's ring or Katma's or Guys ring or Johns; why was it only her ring who spoke to her and why was it only her ring who turned her green?

Was it broken? Had Arley broken it or was Arley the broken one in the equation? Had the Guardians given her a normal and standard issue Green Lantern ring only for her to ruin it?

Dick had, as if he were moving through water, gotten up from his spot on the couch and headed towards the caves kitchen by the time Hal, Guy and Batman had― with three hesitant looks over their shoulders ―started towards the Mount Justice caves Meeting Chamber where Manhunter and Captain Marvel awaited them. By the time Arley could no longer hear Guy Gardner and the two Justice League members footsteps Wally had shifted his weight.

Arley's lips tingled as the memory of his lips against hers flashed through her mind. He loved her, Wally West had loudly proclaimed that he was falling in love with her the way she was already in love with him and every time Arley had imagined that happening she always pictured smiling afterwards and while that was all she wanted to do― Arley wanted to relish in the fact that Wally loved her, she wanted to giggle and beam and blush ―she couldn't.

The Lantern turned her neck in order to face the speedster and the boy, with a soft and weighty look in his emerald green eyes was already looking down at her. Wally dipped his head forward― Arley's eyes fluttered shut ―and tenderly pressed his lips between her brows. A moment later when Wally pulled back and Arley's hazel eyes had fluttered back open, Arley's heart beat so fast in her chest she could hear her blood rushing in her ears; she was sure Conner could hear her heart from his room.

"Hey Ars?" Wally wondered, his voice soft and fragile. Dick― with his head low and both of his hands stuffed deeply into the pocket of his sweatshirt ―moved from the kitchen down the hall, off to somewhere; perhaps back to Gotham.

"Yeah?"

"Can we, I mean I need to-Hal, Guy and Bats, they're probably going to be a while," Wally paused for a second and breathed, "And I need to move."

Arley knew that while Wally hadn't actually asked her to leave with him, from the way the speedster gripped at her that Wally couldn't leave her any more than she could leave him after all that had happened. Arley also knew that she shouldn't leave; with the mystery that was on her finger Batman would want to know where she was at every moment every day and yet as she looked into Wally's desperate eyes the female Lantern found herself nodding.

"Yeah," she said and Arley moved, Wally lifted off the couch with her, his hand in hers and their fingers interlaced. "Of course, come on."

By the time John Stewart had made it to the Mount Justice cave Arley Gluck and Wally West were long gone from their spot at the end of the caves couch and instead could be found in the small and quiet town of Happy Harbor only a few miles away.

...

It was midnight in mid-October and the Rhode Island air was chilly when the sun was out and there wasn't a cloud in the sky so it came as no surprise to both Arley and Wally that― on a night where thick clouds littered the sky and wind blew through the streets ―the boardwalk where they and the others had not so long ago fought T.O Morrow's android Mr. Twister was deserted. The pair sat on a wooden bench with the back to the stores and homes that lined the other side of the wooden boardwalk, their hands clasped together tightly as they listened to the sound of the waves crashing against the sand.

Arley, as Wally looked out at the restless New England coastline, looked at the speedster. There was no moon or stars, just the light that dimly lit street lamp behind them gave off; the boy was still frightfully pale, his emerald eyes were unfocused and his mouth was slightly agape as he breathed.

Wally's shoulders shook with every breath and his eyes were a bloodshot sort of red, though Arley couldn't remember the teen crying since they had all woken up. He wasn't okay and Arley didn't know what to say to make him okay; there were no words that could make everything the speedster was feeling go away― everyone they loved had been murdered before their very eyes, their teammate had been killed only a few feet away from them, she had died and left him and he had died too ―but Arley knew she had to do something, Wally had always been there to help her piece herself back together after all.

"Wally?" Arley whispered and Wally looked at her, the tips of his lips flickered up when he saw that she was already looking at him but he didn't smile, "You can tell me what's going on in your head," she said to him, "You don't have to keep it to yourself."

Canary always said talking helped, that sometimes it didn't matter if you wanted to talk or if you didn't, you just had to.

"I just―" Wally's teeth caught his tongue, his lips closed and the speedsters' eyes fell from Arley's face to their intertwined hands that laid between them, when his eyes slowly rose once more they were filled with a kind of grief Arley knew well. Arley had been a part of the Green Lantern Corps for several years, survivors guilt was something she had to grown accustomed to seeing in the eyes of those around her; though it was something that startled the Lantern when she saw it in Wally West's eyes.

"I'm sorry," Wally said and Arley's brows knitted together,

"Sorry?" She asked, "Sorry for what?"

Wally blinked.

"I didn't argue with Dick when we were at the cave―" Wally's eyes squeezed together tightly for a moment, "―When we were in that simulation." Wally said as he corrected himself, "I let him send you and Conner off to your deaths, Arley he knew you guys were going to die, that we all were. I let you die," Wally's voice cracked and tears bubbled in the corner of his eyes, his bottom lip wobbled. "I'm sorry."

Arley felt her heart break, she took her hand from him and she cupped the boys cheeked, her thumbs ran over the curve of his cheekbones.

"Oh Wally," Arley cooed as she shook her head, "No. Wally there's nothing to be sorry for."

"Yes there is," Wally insisted, "M'gann, she said it, Dick was offering you and Conner as sacrifices and I just, I didn't say anything against it."

"Back at the cave you and I- we -thought that the aliens were teleporting people the people their beams hit, you didn't know that we were wrong. Wally you can't blame yourself when you made an educated guess based on the facts you had." Wally scoffed as he looked up at the cloudy New England night sky, and Arley frowned as the teen blinked back his tears, when he looked at her, the tears were still there.

"That doesn't change the fact I let you die, Arley you died," Wally said in a thick emotional voice, "M'gann she felt you die. I thought I lost you in there because I was stupid enough to stay quite when Dick wanted you and Conner to sacrifice yourselves, all because what? I believed that just because the canons gave off zanopens that meant the aliens were teleporting their victims, you didn't see Hal and Guy and John's rings fly off? I still let him send you off to die."

Arley moved her knees underneath her so that she could rest on her heels as she looked the speedster in the eyes.

"Listen here genius Boy because I'm sure you're not used to hearing this, but you're wrong, okay? I put together what was going on by the time Conner and I got up there, and I died because I took a hit for Conner, and I got hit knowing that there was a big chance that I would die when I did it too, okay? So that, my death? That's on me, not you, not Dick or Conner or anyone else okay? Me."

"You took that hit because you were up there with Conner, somewhere I didn't fight Dick in putting you―"

"―In case you forgot Wally," Arley raised her voice just loud enough so that Wally's own raising tone would be drowned out by her own, "I'm a doshing Green Lantern." She said that part much more quietly. "Wally being in dangerous life threatening situations, that's my job and if I get hurt or if I die because of that no one's fault, especially not yours."

"Even if I could have stopped it?" Arley's shoulders sagged at the speedsters question, her eyes shut for a second and when she opened them she took in the sad curve of the teens brow and the gut wrenching grimace on his lips.

"Wally I love you but I'm not sure even you specifically asking me to not go with Conner would have made me let him go up there alone alright?"

"I guess," Wally said quietly with a downcast kind of expression; the pair were quiet for a moment, Wally's mouth quirked up and his eyes, if only for a second, brightened.

"What?" Arley wondered, and though she wasn't truly smiling her own lips turned up, Wally Wests smile was infectious, it was what she had fallen in love with first.

"You said you love me," Wally said and Arley let out a snorted breath of hot air at his change in subject. She rolled her eyes as her hands fell from the boy's face and dropped to his shoulders.

"You said it first, back in the bio-ship," she reminded him and Wally nodded.

"Yeah but you love me," Wally said, his tone lighter then it had been since the simulation started, "When did that happen?"

The apples of Arley's cheeks heated as she thought back to Barry and Iris West-Allen's wedding and how at thirteen as she and Wally danced in the garden of the wedding venue the moon light had hit the boy just right enough to send the Lanterns budding feelings right over the edge. It was cheesy and cliché and there had been fireflies in the air as Wally spun Arley around and around under his arm.

"I-when did you start to like me?"

"I asked first!" Wally cried,

"You admitted your feelings first," Arley rebuked, "Which means you go first!"

"I'm half sure that's not how it goes," Wally told her but Arley looked at the speedster pleadingly and he sighed, his hands placed themselves on the sides of Arley's hips as he dragged the girl even closer; he had shifted so that one of his legs was bent and underneath him.

"Fine," Wally said with a blush that spread across the bridge of his nose and up to the tips of his ears. He licked his lips. "I started liking you back when Artemis joined the team, when we saved Roquette and fought the Shadows."

Arley blinked; she remembered Roquettes words and her dark brows knitted together, she couldn't imagine what part of that mission had been the spark to ignite his feelings for her.

"Why?"

"I don't know?" Wally said with a small chuckle, "I remember thinking of you right before I started drowning and how when we were kids I promised not to leave you and then the next thing I know you're over me and you looked beautiful. I mean you looked like a mess but also like an angel?" It sounded more like a question then a statement. "But I only admitted my feelings for you to myself after we got the Helmet of Fate, it's why I bought the magic tickets," the teen confessed.

"Wally I yelled at you in the tower," Arley pointed out and Wally nodded. She'd been so jealous of him flirting with M'gann and how he had called her beautiful the week before― and how, because he had been trying to impress the Martian girl the Tower of Fate had tried to kill them ―she had exploded.

"Yeah but Kent Nelson said something to me before I took the helmet off and it opened my eyes you know?" Arley straightened and her wrists slipped over the red headed teens shoulders, her fingers threaded themselves through the back of his hair. "Anyway I sort of realized I loved you back in Bialya, when M'gann gave us our memories back. Artemis made a joke about how gross and in love I acted in front of the team and how much grosser I acted when it was just us and it hit me, I didn't just like you, I was falling in love with you and then I had you in my arms and I was terrified I was going to lose you. I can't lose you."

Arley felt warmth spread through her body as Wally looked at her.

"I can't lose you either," she told him, and she leaned in just a fraction of an inch closer. She smiled softly at the speedster. "You know Hal and John made a joke in the med-bay?" Arley asked him rhetorically, "I brushed them off because I thought there was no way you'd ever see me like I saw you."

"Jokes on you," Wally said fondly and Arley laughed; it was a short bark of a laugh but it was a laugh all the same.

"Yeah," she nodded, "Joke's on me; though I do wonder, do I have to guess what Kent Nelson said?" Arley asked, "Or are you just going to tell me because I'm kind of curious what he had to get you to start liking me."

"I already liked you," Wally said, "He just made me realize it."

Arley rolled her eyes.

"Same difference Genius Boy, now come on, what'd he say?" Wally smiled and then his smile dimmed as he looked down, only to brighten once more as he looked up through his lashes into Arley's hazel eyes.

"He told me it was nice to think with my head and all but I had to find someone who would help me think with my heart and well, I didn't need to find someone because that's you Arley." Arley kissed him, her lips pressed against his as her hands moved up the back of his head and Wally's hands, as he leaned back, moved so that instead of her hips they rested on the small of her back and when they pulled away from one another and the pair moved back so that they were sitting upright their foreheads rested against one another.

Their eyes were closed but their noses brushed against one another.

"Your turn?" Wally said, "When did you fall in love with me?" Arley's face burned.

"Your aunts wedding," she said and Wally jerked back, his eyes narrowed.

"Arley that was three years ago," Wally said and Arley nodded, the boy blinked in astonishment. "I could barely keep my feelings for you a secret for four months, how'd you manage for three years?" Arley shrugged, her teeth scraped across her bottom lip.

"I don't know I just didn't think you'd be able to be around me if you ever found out so I made sure you never did." Arley couldn't lose Wally, she wasn't strong enough to handle it.

"If I hadn't told you how I felt in the bio-ship would you have ever told me?" Wally asked, Arley shrugged but she knew the answer; no she would have rather died with her feelings buried deep inside of her then have ever taken the risk of losing Wally if he hadn't felt the same. "Arley."

"You're my best friend Wally," Arley told the boy, "I wasn't going to jeopardize our friendship because my heart picked up every time you smiled in my direction; Wally I still don't want to lose that."

Relationships ended all the time; fear prickled at Arley's heart and her gut tugged painfully inside of her as she looked at the speedster as different scenarios played in her head. Jordan's weren't pessimist and pessimism wasn't allowed in the Jordan-Gluck apartment but Arley was on a boardwalk in Rhode Island so she let dread fill her veins; she could still lose Wally.

"You won't, we won't lose that," Wally swore.

"You don't―" Wally cut her off with a swift peck to the lips, when he pulled back he looked at her with determined eyes.

"Arley, you and me are always going to be you and me okay? I promised you that didn't I?" He had. They'd been children and he had finally broken through all of the walls Arley had built around herself after years of abuse and abandonment and he had grabbed her hand in his equally tiny one and he had sworn to never leave her; he'd sworn to always be there for her, to always be her best friend. "When do I break my promises to you?"

Never, even if everyone else in the universe had lied to her, Arley Gluck knew that Wally West would never. But still a thousand and one different situations flashed through Arley's mind and while she was sure she would always love him how could she be sure he would always love her, especially when most days she woke up hating herself for everything she'd done?

"You can't promise me that if this changes though," Arley said and Wally's left hand left Arley's back so that it could pinch at her chin as he smirked.

"You also said I couldn't be a sidekick, now look at me." A laugh bubbled up Arley's throat.

"That is so not the same thing," she told the boy and Wally pressed his lips together,

"Of course it is; Arley even if this doesn't work out between us that won't mean we still can't be friends, I'm always going to be here for you." Insecurity clawed at Arley's heart as she looked at the boy in front of her uncertainty.

"Promise?"

"Swear it."

He kissed her for the fourth or fifth time, Arley hadn't been counting, she just knew her breath caught in her throat as Wally pressed his lips to hers and as his hand settled against her neck and he leaned against her― his other hand braced his weight on the wood behind her ―while her tongue hesitantly poked out and swiped along his bottom lip just as M'gann and Artemis had told her about doing during their last sleepover. Some of Arley's nails scratched along the speedsters scalp while the others gently scraped along the fabric of his shirt.

Wally, as the hand that wasn't bracing his weight settled between Arley's shoulder blades, had only just begun to open his own mouth when a familiar and scandalized voice called out, loudly cutting through the mid-October night; "Are they kissing!"

Wally threw himself back and Arley almost tumbled off of the boardwalk bench they had been sitting on as she jerked away and the three other sector Lanterns landed on the boardwalk. Hal was grinning, his pearly white teeth were on display and his hands were on his hips; John smirked at the two of them, knowingly, though as he looked at Wally a single dark brow arched and the speedster dipped his head down bashfully, a hand clasped to the back of his neck.

Guy Gardner however had his arms crossed over his chest and his head jutted out as he looked between Arley and Wally, "Were you two kissing?" Guy asked, "Since when do you two kiss?"

Embarrassment flooded Arley's face.

"I-well, a few hours, I guess?"

Guy sucked in a deep breath of air and while Arley wasn't quite sure what her sector partner was going to say she braced herself, ready to be yelled at― Wally puffed up as he continued to look down at the tops of his sneakers, the speedster, as he gripped Arley's hand in his, looked ready to jump up at a moments notice ―only for Guy to shut his eyes and pinch the bridge of his nose as he let out his breath of air as he muttered something about why couldn't they have gotten together after Halloween.

Arley and Wally looked up at Guy as Guy, himself looked up; he placed his arms back over his chest; he smirked faintly at the two teens. "It's about time, though I could have gone without the visual."

"Sorry," Arley muttered, her face hot, Guy's smirk twisted into a grimace.

"Just be careful for now on, I don't want to walk into the living room one of these days and find his ha―"

"―Gardner," John barked with a scandalized look. Maybe it hadn't all been a simulation and this was hell, maybe eternal embarrassment was what Arley deserved after killing thousands, but as Arley looked at Wally she knew that couldn't be true and that she was just being an over dramatic teenager because if Wally was with she couldn't be in hell, not just because Wally was good but because how could an eternity with him be torture?

"What?" Guy blinked, "You don't remember what it's like to be sixteen?"

"One day you're going to be an old man in a nursing home and your aid is going to smother you to death," John said and Arley couldn't help herself, she laughed; Hal nodded with a laugh of his own, Wally bit his lip as Guy looked at Arley and Wally and Hal with a betrayed expression on his face.

Arley's chest was still heavy and she was still terrified of what her ring being able to talk to her actually meant but she continued to laugh because how could she not feel safe and loved with her fathers around her and Wally West at her side.

"You act like one of these days I'm not going to smother him in his sleep," Hal said with a good natured nudge to Guys elbow and Guy swatted at the pilot,

"I hate you all, you too Nightlight." Arley's mouth fell open,

"What did I do!"

"Laugh, you laughed-don't think I didn't see you laughing too string bean," Guy said with a wagged finger in Wally's direction. The speedster looked like a deer in the headlights, "First your tongue is down our kids throat―" Guy said motioning to himself, John and Hal, "―And now you're laughing at me, really I'm not sure I approve."

Wally's face dropped and Hal once more nudged Guy's elbow, "Don't be a jerk. Arley give Wally a kiss goodbye we have to get going if we want to reach Oa―"

"―No!" Arley said as she got to her feet, her ring hand curled into her chest, Hal and the others looked shocked at Arley's sudden outburst; John blinked in surprise at her loud tone, the cherry air that had surrounded the five heroes was suddenly nowhere to be found. "I mean, I just, I don't want to tell the Guardians, not yet."

Not if her ring was broken and it was her fault.

"Arley―" John said but Arley shook her head, John had always been the Guardians favorite out of the four Earthlings and the ex-Marine trusted the council of immortal beings; Arley did too but fear clawed at the inside of the girl's throat.

"―What if they take it?" She worried, "What if Ganthet takes my ring?"

"Kid," Hal said softly, he took three steps forward and he put his hand on Arley's shoulder, "Your ring spoke to you, that's not normal."

"I know," Arley said, "I know. I know it's not but if Ganthet takes my ring-please Hal, just please, give me a few days." Hal looked up at the cloudy sky and then he looked at Arley and how she still had her ring hand curled against her heart; Hal licked his lips and nodded.

"Fine."

"Hal―" Hal turned at the waist to look at John,

"―I know what Ganthet said but a few days won't hurt anyone."

"We don't know that," John said.

"Maybe not but do you really want to drag the kid back to Oa kicking and screaming? 'Sides," Hal said as he tucked Arley under his arm, "It's not like you've never kept a secret from the Guardians." John shot Hal a glare.

Guy shuffled his feet; Arley knew he didn't care for the Guardians the same way John and Kilowog did, that he saw them as his bosses who― though were all powerful and immortal ―were, at the end of the day, still beings prone to arrogance and pitifulness other mistakes everyone else in the universe was folly to fall to.

"When they ask why we didn't come to them right away?" Guy wondered. Hal bluffed a lot, he threw around his weight as someone who had saved the corps single handedly when he could and he was more about asking for forgiveness then asking for permission but Hal Jordan had also been in the air force, just as John had been in the Marines and just as John didn't, Hal didn't lie to his superior officers; he may have omitted a detail or two in a story every so often but he never lied when asked directly.

Guy was the odd one out of the three men as he had never joined up; he'd never even been a cop like his father had wanted him to be.

"We finagle the truth," Hal said. He looked at Arley, "But even if we're not going to Oa we still need to get home, you've had a long day you still need to tell us what happened."

"But didn't Bruce―"

"―Bruce told us his end, we need to hear yours too." Arley nodded, she turned to Wally who was already on his feet, his hands stuffed deep into the pockets of his jeans. Hal lifted his arm off of Arley's shoulders and the girl moved towards the speedster.

Arley's hands rested on Wally's hips and Wally's cupped both sides of Arley's face as he looked down at her, "You'll text me when you get home?" Arley asked him and he nodded.

"Of course, just call me before you go to sleep, okay?"

"Sure thing," Arley said and she looked back over her shoulder at her adoptive father and her two sector partners― at all three of her fathers who were watching her and Wally with amused expressions ―and then at Wally. "I kind of want to kiss you but it's kind of weird to do it while they're looking."

"Didn't stop you in bio-ship," Wally teased softly; Arley felt her ears burn. Her ring remained cool on the skin of her finger. Wally then, slowly, leaned down and pecked Arley Gluck lightly on her lips; Arley could feel the boys smile as he kissed her and her breath, just like it had with every other kiss, caught in her throat only to be let out once Wally began to pull away.

"I'll talk to you later," Wally promised.

"Yeah," Arley said with a nod; Wally waved at the three other Lanterns over Arley's shoulder and then suddenly, in the blink of an eye, the boy's goggles were over his head and he was gone.

...

Several hours after Arley had left Happy Harbor with Hal, John and Guy Arley had taken a zeta-tube to Gotham. When Dick Grayson had called to ask Arley to meet him at the Batburger on the corner of Jefferson and White his voice had been quiet and his tone had been heavy with guilt.

Arley could hear the still raw trauma in it and it was why― though all she wanted to do was sit on the couch and watch bad movies with Hal and John and Guy ―Arley had zipped out of her and Hals California apartment with a dead ring on her finger and it was why she sat across from Dick in the Gotham-centric restaurant watching silently as the dark haired boy tore the golden skin from his Robin-nuggets off of the fried meat.

Arley had been in the uncomfortable Batburger booth with Dick for several minutes and though the soda he had ordered for her was already flat Arley continued to drink it while she waited for Dick Grayson to say something, but as the minutes ticked by and the boy just continued to stare at the gray table top or the pile of fried skin he'd ripped from his nuggets Arley realized she was going to have to do the talking.

Canary always did say talking helped. Arley breathed. Arley had been able to hear, when Dick had called her, the guilt that had laced his voice and as she remembered the burning she'd felt in the simulation she knew exactly what the boy had been guilty over.

Conner's horrified face flashed in Arley's mind and the Lantern reached over and grabbed the younger boy's hand.

"It's not your fault," Arley said, "You did what you had to." Dick looked up, he wasn't wearing the dark glasses he usually wore at the cave.

"I still sent you and the others to their deaths. I did that thinking you were going to die," Dick hissed and Arley squeezed his hand. She didn't hate him, she wouldn't rise to his bate anymore then Dinah had risen to hers after her breakdown in India.

"We're heroes Dick, we know what we signed up for."

"That doesn't make it right," he spat and Arley felt the weight under her hand disappear as Dick tore his hand away and out from under her own. Dick folded both his hands in his lap and looked down at them. Arley placed her other arm on the table as she leaned forward; if Dick wasn't going to look at her then she was going to make him.

"Was there another way?" Arley asked, "Did you have any other plan where Conner and I didn't make the distraction and the aliens still opened the mother ship? One where and we all made it out alive?"

"No!" The Batburger employee who stood at the register didn't even look up from under their cheap five dollar batman cowl. Dick cleared his throat, "No, I thought of everything but that was the only way."

"Then it's not your fault," Arley said sternly. She remembered Dicks words in the brush of the forest just outside Smallville. "You're one of my best friends, you know that?" Dick frowned, his shoulders hunched as Dick tried to make himself smaller.

"Why aren't you mad at me?" Dick whispered harshly, "I've treated you like garbage for weeks and I sent you off to die, I got Wally killed," he sneered and though Arley flinched at the mention of the speedsters death she didn't take the boy wonders bait; instead Arley reached over the table, careful of their sodas and grabbed Dick's hands, she held them in her own and as the boy looked at her Arley looked at him in the eyes.

"Because we're family you moof-milker so yeah maybe you were a jerk to me the past few weeks but you had every reason to be―"

"―And you have every reason to be a jerk to me!" Dick stood, his lips weren't quivering and his eyes were dry but his voice was thick and the tip of his nose was red. "So why aren't you?" He asked lowly. "Why don't you hate me?"

Arley looked up at Dick and she wondered if this was what Dinah felt like in that lead lined room in the cave; Arley wondered if Dinah's heart broke for her the same way her heart broke for Dick.

"Because I can't Dick, I can't. Not after everything I've done."

"That's not the same," Dick said weakly and Arley tugged at his hands, slowly the ex-carney sat back down. There was blood on her hands, real blood; there was nothing on Dicks and Arley smiled sadly at the younger boy.

"Of course it isn't, I've actually taken lives." Dick let out a shuddering breath.

"I thought it was real, I thought I was sending my friends to die."

"But it wasn't, Dick I'm alive, Wally's alive, Artemis and Kaldur and Conner and M'gann, we're all alive. You're alive."

"It felt so real," Dick said softly.

"Yeah," Arley nodded, "It did."

It was quite for a moment. The grease on the jokerized fries Dick had ordered for Arley had gotten cold and the fires themselves had wilted like soggy cardboard. Arley could hear the fryer crackling as the Batman cashier and his coworker who had dressed as Robin laughed at something.

"Bruce wouldn't be like this, if he woke up after sending the League to their deaths, he'd still be fine," Dick whispered brokenly. "He'd be able to sleep and go to work the next morning. He wouldn't be this mess."

Dick said the word mess like it was something disgusting, something disgraceful. Arley blinked and she forced a smile on her face.

"Hal is like thirty-five percent sure Bruce isn't fully human okay, Guy is pretty sure he's secretly a robot, so maybe don't compare your reaction to the one you think he would be having," Arley instructed, "Besides Bruce wouldn't have been okay if he had to send you to your death."

"He would," Dick disagreed, "He would be fine because he'd know he made the right call."

Arley didn't buy that. Arley had watched Hal and Guy and John an Kilowog and Katma all have to break the news to one family member or another of a fallen Lantern; she had seen mothers drop to their knees with a cry that had sent her staggering back and she had seen fathers collapse into Kilowog and Hals chests and beg for them to be lying because their child couldn't be dead.

Arley knew how loving parents reacted to their children's death, and Bruce Wayne loved Dick Grayson. Bruce loved Dick the same way Hal loved her and maybe the billion heir was worse at showing it then the pilot was but that didn't mean anything, Bruce still loved Dick like his own; like Hal and Guy and John all loved her.

Arley also knew Dick Grayson was as stubborn as any Lantern out there in the universe so she smiled kindly at the boy; "Maybe I'm right or maybe you are but Dick, you did what you had to in order to save the Earth and none of us are blaming you for that, okay?"

Dick remained quiet.

"Dickard Grayson―"

"―That's not my name―"

"―I want you to say that you made the right call, that none of what happened is on you. It's not your fault."

"But it is."

"I don't think so."

"But―"

"―If you want to make up for being a moof-milking jerk to me, then you say it," Arley said sternly. Dick sucked his teeth with a breath, but he nodded after a minute.

"I did what I had to."

"Good, again."

...

Gotham City had a large building on the coroner of the grounds that belonged to the City's University Hospital; the Saint Maturinus building was where the city shipped the people who the victims the Joker had subjugated to his joker venom. It was also the building that for the past twelve years had housed and cared for Arley's mother, Maria Gomez.

Arley had visited her mother three days before but after talking to Dick in the Batburger booth and being just four short blocks away Arley had found herself in her mother's hospital room. Arley's mother was asleep, the room was dark and the door was closed to keep out the sound of the other patients manic cackling.

If Arley squinted through the darkness that shadowed the room she could see the woman from her foggy memories― she could see the woman who made chorizo and eggs for breakfast on Sundays and eggs with rice on Wednesdays; the woman who would burn the pernil she'd put in the oven because the only way she'd eat it was if the skin was extra-extra crispy ―and the Lantern's heart clenched.

The more years that past the more Arley had trouble remembering; Arley knew one day she would forget what her mother's voice sounded like and the stories her mother would tell her, Arley knew one day all that would be left of her mother was the husk of a woman before her.

"Mama," Arley whispered to her mother's sleeping form, "Wally and I, we kissed," she said, "He likes me, you know, the same way I like him." Arley didn't smile, her knees were curled up against her chest and her ring hand rested on her knee.

"My ring spoke to me, my team and I, we were in this simulation where we died, everyone kept dying and when I died I went green again, and it spoke to me. Mama if the ring could keep my friends and I alive because I willed it―" Arley cut herself off.

Hal and John and Guy had listened to her tell them what had happened once they had all gotten back to Coast City, she had told them of the never ending green and she had told them for the first time of the voice she had heard and how it had helped her and her friends.

Their rings had never done anything like that. When Hal had broken the crystal in the main power battery his ring had never spoken to him. When Guy had been stabbed on a solo mission and passed out from the pain he had never seen green, just the inside of his own eyelids until he was carted off back to Oa. When John had been up against Despario his ring had never gone green, never spoken to him.

Only Arley's. Why only hers? Was it the ring or had it been her, had she done something over the years to the ring? Had she broken it?

"―If my ring can keep me and the others alive without my knowing, then what else can it do?" Arley murmured.

Could it cure her mother? Could it have woken Guy up from his coma? Did that mean Arley hadn't wanted either of those things enough; had it meant she didn't love her mother or Guy enough? And if her ring could have woken Guy up and cured her mother, did that mean her ring could do other things like that, did that mean she could cure the world of illness?

"Mama I'm scared," Arley said and for the first time in years Arley wasn't scared of being left alone or of being beaten or locked into a hall closet but rather of the ring on her finger and the voice that'd she heard.

She was scared of what it all meant.

...

Wally West had a test in English he couldn't miss so Arley, who had taken a second day off of school, found herself in the Mount Justice cave, the ring on her finger was still dead; it had been since she let it die after the simulation.

Hal had thought it was for the best, at least, until she was ready to see Ganthet and she couldn't argue, it was only her ring that was pulling off the impossible and talking to her.

The cave was quiet; M'gann's giggle wasn't echoing through the hallways and Arley couldn't hear wolf barking as the metal pipe Conner threw crashed into something. The only thing she could hear as she walked by the caves gymnasium was Kaldur panting as he worked on the sandbag that hung from the ceiling.

Arley, as she continued to walk around the Justice League's first hidden sanctum, found Red Tornado watching the caves monitors, the android's new legs gleaming under the caves lighting.

"Is M'gann still in her room?" The Lantern asked the android and the robot didn't bother to turn to Arley, away from the monitors.

"Yes," it said, "She has not left her room since Saturday when you all awoke from the training simulation." It was Monday afternoon. "Aqualad has not left the caves gym either."

"He's been training for two days straight?"

"He has taken breaks," Red Tornado said as if that made everything better, "Though he has not left the gymnasium itself, besides," Red Tornado turned to her, "It has not been a full forty-eight hours."

Arley knew the android was trying to joke and that she should have at least smiled at the metallic League member but she couldn't, not when her friends were suffering. Arley looked at the monitors and saw Conner in the hanger with his bike― though the alien clone wasn't working on it, he was just sitting in front of it ―in front of him and Sphere and Wolf in the background.

"Conner, has-has he been leaving his room?"

Was he okay? The last thing Arley remembered of the simulation was Conner's horrified face; the fact that Arley hadn't spoken to the clone since they had woken up hit the girl in the gut hard enough for the air in her lungs to leave her.

"The Superboy has been acting as he usually would," Red Tornado said and Arley frowned; compartmentalizing was one thing, ignoring the trauma was another and Arley was an expert in both. She knew what doing both did to a person.

She needed to talk to Conner; the horror that'd been etched onto his face flashed through her mind again. Arley looked at Red Tornado, "I'll catch you later Red," Arley said before spinning on her heel and walking out of the monitor room. She turned left away from the caves commons and towards the hanger when she got to the end of the hall as she wondered just what to say to the Kryptonian clone.

She had pushed him out of the way; she had taken a hit for him knowing that there was more than just a chance she would die. And she had died, that is. She had died in front of him, only a hair's breadth away.

Arley walked into the hanger and she knew Conner heard her three hallways down so she didn't bother making a loud entrance in order not to startle him; Wolf looked up as Arley walked down the hangers steps and one ear twitched back while the other twitched forward.

Conner twisted his neck, there was no smile on his face or sparkle in his eyes; his lips were pressed tightly together and there was no emotion in his baby blues, it reminded Arley of the look he had gotten back in the underground Cadmus labs, when the gnome had taken over his mind.

"Hi," Conner said.

"Hey." Conner turned back and Arley walked so that she was on the other side of the clones bike as he looked at the unused wretch in his hands. "What's wrong with the bike?" Arley wondered.

"Nothing," Conner said, "I just thought I could tune it up."

"Have you?" Conner's face twisted for a fraction of a second; it was the kind of twist that someone would've missed if they had blinked. Arley hadn't blinked; the teen stayed quiet.

"What does it matter to you?" Conner snapped and Arley's head jerked back.

"Excuse me?" Conner looked up at Arley with an angry, bitter glint in his eyes.

"I said what does it matter if I tuned up the bike or not, it's not like you care." Arley had faced a somewhat sentient gorilla wearing a bright red beret, she had faced a purple alien with a third eyeball in the middle of its head and the ability to control other people's minds, she had faced things even weirder than that, but nothing Arley had ever faced― not even when she and the others had found Superboy in his Cadmus pod ―had ever thrown the Lantern more then the words the clone boy spat at her.

"Conner of course I care," Arley blinked at the boy, "I care about you."

"No you don't," Conner argued and he stood up, he towered over Arley, "You say you do and you act like you do but you don't!" Wolf perked up from the ball he had curled himself into and the Sphere blinked and beeped, though both Conner and Arley ignored it.

"Where the esehigi is this coming from?" Arley demanded to know, her voice rose just like Conner's had. The boy blew a hot breath of air out of his nose as he looked down his nose at Arley,

"No where."

"That's the biggest load of bantha crap I've ever heard," Arley called out, her face fell, "Conner, you seriously can't think I don't care about you." She had died for him― and she would so again ―but she wasn't about to wave that in his face, not after the horrified look Arley had died seeing.

"Why not?" Conner asked ruefully, "You left me after all."

No she hadn't; Arley blinked and he brows knitted together as she wondered when she had ever left the clone alone only to freeze. Her heart stilled in her chest.

Arley's shoulders dropped, "Conner―"

"―It's fine," the clone said roughly, "You don't need to act like you care anymore, I'm a big boy I can handle it."

"I never meant to leave you alone up there," Arley said earnestly, because she hadn't meant to leave the clone alone, she hadn't thought about the aftermath of her dying, just the aftermath of Conner dying, just of being left in a world with him. "But I wasn't going to let you die."

"So you made me let you die?" Conner scoffed, "I hate you," the clone spat, Arley felt as if the clone had reached inside her chest and tore out her beating heart; there were tears in the corner of his eyes, ones Arley hadn't even seen him shed when he'd first woken up. Ones that had been building and begging to be spilled.

"Do you really?" Arley asked in a small voice, one that cracked as she asked the clone if he really, truly hated her. The Superboy's bottom lip trembled.

"You're selfish," he said, and she was, Arley was selfish. "You died, you had me watch you die." A single tear slid down Conner's face and the clone didn't bother to whip it, "Why?"

"Because you're the little brother I've always wanted," Arley said truthfully, "And I couldn't let you die, I couldn't make it out of that fight knowing you'd never sit next to me at Sunday dinner again and I couldn't wake up knowing that you weren't alive and breathing."

"But I could?" Conner asked scathingly, "I could wake up and know that you were dead and I'd be fine?" Arley didn't have an answer for that; she hadn't thought like that when she had pushed Conner out of the way. The only thought that had been going through her head was that it couldn't be Conner, she couldn't lose him too.

"I'm-I'm sorry," Arley said shakily, "I-I just, I wanted to protect you."

"And that's the problem isn't it!" Conner shouted, Arley flinched as in a burst of anger, Conner threw his wrench over her head hard enough to dent the hanger's cement wall. "You want to protect everyone and you don't care what it coasts you, you don't care if you die as long as the people you say you care about are safe but there's the thing that learned up on the ship Arley, the thing you taught me, death doesn't happen to you, it happens to everyone around you."

There were more tears, "You were gone and Manhunter said they wouldn't be able to save you because you were dead and I was alone, Superman and Hal and Dinah and Guy and John, they were all dead and so were you Arley; you're so scared of being left alone you left me behind."

Arley lunged over Conner's bike and threw her arms around the clones shoulders; she could feel Conner's nails bite through the Flash themed sweatshirt she'd gotten the year before as he clutched her just as tightly as Arley was clutching him.

Arley let out a sob.

"I'm sorry," she told him, "I'm sorry!"

Conner nodded; Arley could feel the skin of her neck get wet as the clone continued to cry and Arley just hugged him back tighter. She was sorry, so, so sorry.

...

Conner had gone to sleep after that. Arley had walked the clone boy, Wolf and Sphere all back to his room and outside of his bedroom Conner had apologized for saying he had hated her― he didn't, the clone boy had stressed, he swore that just like Arley saw him as her brother he saw her as his sister ―not that Arley blamed him for saying what he had, he was entitled to how he had felt, and she had told him that.

Conner hugged her tighter after that.

But Conner being asleep was the whole reason why Wally West had found Arley alone in the cave's living room when he entered the cave; his dark blue backpack still slung over his shoulder.

"You were crying," Wally said worriedly before he had even set his backpack down, Arley shook her head, she knew her eyes were still bloodshot and that the rest of her face was still puffy.

"I'm fine," she promised him, as he put his bag down on the floor, next to the corner of the couch, "I-Conner and I talked, it was emotional."

Wally looked at the Lantern skeptically.

"You're okay though, cause I can totally take Conner in a fight," Wally said as he folded himself onto the cushion next to Arley; and the girl laughed at the speedsters declaration, she took in the dark bags under his eyes. "I can!"

"I'm sure you can handsome," Arley said with a smile as she threaded her fingers through Wally's.

Wally beamed at the pet name and pulled his and Arley's hands back so that she was closer to him; their noses brushed against one another.

"You know Grandpa Jay and Grandma Joan stopped by this morning and mom told them that I finally told you how I felt," Wally said as his other hand curled into the back of Arley's hair, twisting the curly dark strands around his fingers.

"How'd they react to that?" Arley knew that both Joan and Jay Garrick had already known exactly how she felt towards the speedster, the only one who hadn't known was the speedster himself.

"They were happy, though apparently they had a bet going on with my parents and uncle Barry and Aunt Iris." Arley's free hand rested on Wally's boney hip, over the fabric of the red sweatpants he was wearing.

"Seriously?"

Hal and the other sector Lanterns had had an ongoing bet as well; Hal had bet Arley and Wally would get together after her sixteenth birthday but before Halloween because Guy had bet Wally would wake up and realize he loved her and sweep her off her feet after Halloween but no later then his own sixteenth birthday and John had bet that Wally wouldn't realize he liked Arley until well into their junior year when they would be looking at colleges and he would be forced to realize they couldn't always be attached at the hip.

All in all Hal had won fifty-one dollars.

Wally hummed, "Who won?"

Arley asked.

"Grandma and aunt Iris; Grandma had that we would get together sophomore year but aunt Iris had you'd kiss me first before my sixteenth birthday. Barry says it's not fair cause he said I'd tell you how I felt first but he thought I would have done it ages ago so mom says he doesn't have a leg to stand on."

"How much did they win?"

"Sixty each, everyone had down twenty so they split it evenly."

"Nice," Arley said and Wally breathed.

"You're sure you're okay?" Arley frowned,

"I died in front of him Wally, that-it hurt him," Arley told the speedster and the red headed boy nodded understandingly; Arley hadn't just died in front of Conner but she had died on Wally, leaving him behind just as much as she had left the clone.

"Is he okay now?" Wally asked and Arley nodded with a slight shrug. No one ever just got over battle and though it had been fake it was what she and the others had gone through.

"He will be, will you?" Arley asked the speedster. He had told her that morning over the phone he hadn't slept the night before and going off how dark the bags were under his eyes Arley could only hazard a guess and say that Wally West hadn't slept since the training exercise.

Not that she had either, but still, it was Wally― and the rest if the team ―she was worried about.

"I have you by my side don't I?" He asked cheesily and Arley shot the teen a dry look. Arley Gluck had known Wally West for almost half her life and she knew when he was deflecting a question.

"Dinah says it's good to talk," Arley told him and the boy snorted,

"Babe," Wally said and electricity shot through Arley at the new pet name, "You kept your feelings for me a secret for three years, you so do not get to say that talking is good." Arley blushed and poked her tongue out at the boy.

"'T's not like I kept it a secret from everyone," Arley muttered, "Just you."

Wally blinked.

"What?" Gently the hand the speedster had in Arley's hair tugged her head back so he could look at her, "Are you saying everyone else knew?"

"Yeah," Arley told him, "Robin liked to say that I was painfully obvious at times."

"Rob knew?" Wally wondered with narrowed eyes, "Did Kaldur?"

"And Roy," Arley said as she thought back to all the times Roy Harper had teased her about her crush on the speedster. She may not have ever been as close to the archer as she was with the boy wonder but Roy Harper was Arley's friend and had her in his phone was Mrs. Kid Flash solely because he knew she wanted to strangle him every time she remembered.

"They all knew?" Wally gasped.

"Your parents too Genius Boy." Wally's mouth fell open, "If it makes you feel better I don't think the Guardians knew about the feelings I had towards my best friend."

"This is such bull," Wally pouted and Arley giggled,

"Come on, so what if everyone else knew how I felt before you did, in case you forgot you kissed me two days ago so it all worked out, didn't it?" Wally leaned forward, a calico smirk on his face,

"Guess so." And then he kissed her.

...

Wally was asleep on the couch― it was late and the tail end of James Cameron's Avatar played on the large television in the living room of the Mount Justice cave ―and his homework was open and mostly completed on the living room's dark coffee table.

Arley's stomach growled loudly.

Arley looked up at the sleeping boy― her back was to him and the two of them were laying across the lime green couch, his arms were around her waist and he had one leg haphazardly thrown over her own ―and slowly unwound his arms from her. She slowly moved out from under the speedster and replaced the space she had been with one of the couch cushions she had placed on the edge of the coffee table, out of her and Wally's way.

When Arley was sure Wally wouldn't wake up― Arley had frozen as Wally snored when she'd thrown a blanket over him ―she moved towards the caves kitchen, it was there she found Kaldur.

The Atlantean had his back to her and his shoulders hunched forward as he stood at the kitchens marble island and looked down at his bowl of leftover macaroni and cheese. The fork Kaldur had been using rested on the rim of the bowl, clean and unused.

Red Tornadoes words about Kaldur having not left the Mount Justice gym in two days rang through her ears and the Lantern moved forward, the dead ring on her finger cool against her skin.

"Hey Kaldur," Arley said and Kaldurs seafoam green eyes flickered up from his bowl of macaroni to Arley; the corners of his lips tipped up as he forced himself to smile before he looked back down at his cooling food.

Arley pressed her lips together before she sat on the corner of the kitchen island next to Kaldur, her legs hung off of the kitchen island, just a few inches above the floor. She looked at her team leader as he didn't so much as acknowledge her; more often than not he asked her and Wally and Dick to stop sitting on tables and counters because people ate there, but there she was sitting on the countertop next to him and there he was, not shooing her off of it like an unruly cat.

"You know that tastes disgusting if you eat it cold," Arley said. Kaldur blinked twice before looking up.

"Right," he murmured, "Thank you." He then dipped his fork into the food and shoved a single bite into his mouth before once more resting the curve of his fork against the rim of his bowl.

Arley narrowed her gaze at the fork; so what if it made her hypocritical, Dinah always said talking helped and Arley would be damned if she didn't help her team.

"Red Tornado says you haven't left the gym in two days," Arley said to Kaldur.

"I am out of the gym right now," Kaldur said and Arley threw a dry look at the dark skinned Atlantean.

"He said it earlier, before you left, which begs the question why," Arley said, "Why'd you lock yourself up in the gym?"

"Because I must train," Kaldur said honestly, "If I am to be this team's leader then I cannot fail you all as I did in the simulation." Arley blinked, she looked at the gilled teen like he'd grown three heads.

"Kaldur you didn't fail us in there."

"Of course I did," Kaldur rebuked, "While I understand that you are my friend I don't need you to coddle me, I failed you and the rest of the team in the simulation."

"Kaldur it was a train to fail simulation. Everything that happened in response to any decision you made was calculated to make matters worse, you didn't fail us."

"But I did," Kaldur said stubbornly, "I let Artemis die, I let myself get killed, I thought more like a soldier than a commander, ergo, I failed you all."

Arley and Kaldur were alike, she had always known that, because at the end of the day― before they were heroes or legends in the making ―they were both soldiers. But never before had that been more apparent; Arley had never looked at the Atlantean and seen a brother in arms instead of her friend, not even when they were on missions and their lives were in danger, but in that moment under the Mount Justice caves kitchen lights she did.

It was there Arley saw another young teen with the weight of the world on his shoulders because it was his duty to bare it― not because he thought it was noble and right to do so like Dick and Wally ―just as it it was her duty as a Lantern to bare the weight she carried.

"You're wrong," Arley told him, "Because you saved Manhunter and Manhunter was what shocked M'gann awake." Kaldur still hung his head and Arley put a hand on his shoulder. "Kaldur your sacrifice wasn't in vein; if you hadn't pushed Manhunter through when you had he would've started to die like the rest of us."

"You would have saved him," Kaldur said, "Like you saved Artemis and myself."

A sour taste swirled in Arley's mouth at the mention of her ring and it's voice. Arley blinked at the mention of the ring, she breathed.

"Maybe, but who's to say what would have happened if Manhunter had gotten his memory back and M'gann hadn't been shocked out of the simulation?" Arley wondered. The Jordan-Gluck household didn't allow for pessimism but sometimes pessimism was what someone needed; like sugar with their medicine. "Maybe I would have never been able to wake up myself and maybe my ring would have died and then maybe we all would have died."

"I still let Artemis die," Kaldur said after a minute.

"If you're at fault for Artemis' death then so am I," Arley said and Kaldur looked up at her with his head cocked to the side. "I'm a Green Lantern and we were fighting aliens, an alien ship I could have stopped, killed Artemis, meaning if we go by that logic her death is on me, not you, right?"

"You are not the team leader," Kaldur said lowly and Arley shrugged with a shake of her head, she ignored the clench of her heart as she thought of the flash Artemis had disappeared into. She could have stopped the ships from killing the archer if she had the chance to; or perhaps she would have died in the icy tundra of the arctic instead of in the ruins of a small American town.

"No, maybe not, but before I'm a member of the Justice League I'm a member of the Green Lantern Corps, just like before you're our leader you're a soldier to Atlantis." Kaldur blinked, "Aliens and all that weird space stuff that comes with them, they're my jurisdiction, krakens trying to sink entire islands and mutated giant squids and killer sharks, that's your judication meaning if we're playing the blame game here this one is one me."

There was a beat of silence as Kaldur slowly smiled up at Arley; his pearly white teeth peaked out from behind his lips. "A kraken would not try to sink an entire island." Arley's mouth fell open.

"I'm sorry but krakens are real?" She asked and Kaldur twirled the fork in his grip,

"Yes, though I'm afraid the only one seen in recent history is the one my King rode on, into battle when he stopped a war from breaking out between the seven kingdoms." Arley blinked at the Atlantean as the information about krakens being real and not just something from Lovecraftian fiction and dungeon and dragon games sunk in.

Arley laughed, she nodded and looked at the other teen. The other soldier. "Then what would they try to sink because I'm going off what I've seen in movies here."

"Boats mostly, ships of all sizes," Kaldur answered, "One day, the next time you visit Atlantis, if you would like I am sure I can show you the creature, my King visits it often as it does not reside near the city, I could always as him if we could join."

"You're serious?" Arley beamed excitedly and Kaldur nodded, "Kaldur you're the best-see this is why you're cooler than Robin! He's never offered me to see a before, thought to be mythical, being!"

Kaldurs deep and hardy laugh echoed off the kitchen walls; though not loud enough to wake the sleeping speedster in the next room.

...

That Wednesday following the train to fail exercise Arley had zeta-beamed to Manhattan after she had asked Artemis to meet her in the City that never slept; from the zeta-tube drop off, Arley took the train uptown to East tenth street and ninety-fifth and met the archer outside of the ice cream shop Sundaes and Cones.

The shop was tiny and there was a white bench outside of it for people to sit on; there was a music store and a steakhouse the two girls could see up the block and though they were both sure it was warmer inside of the ice cream parlor, than on the city streets in the fall, both Artemis and Arley stayed there outside of the shop with their cups of ice cream in hand.

Artemis had gotten a scoop of both taro and green tea after she had seen the parlor had both and Arley had gotten the salted caramel, the red velvet and vanilla ice creams all mushed together in one cup after she'd spent several minutes unable to choose.

"So you and Wally?" Artemis wondered slyly with a nudge. Arley with an ice cold tongue nodded as she took another bite of her ice cream, she grinned as she thought of the speedster.

"Yeah, me and Wally." She loved him, Arley Gluck loved Wally West and he felt the same for her; Arley wasn't quite sure in what universe she deserved the speedster; especially after everything she had done in the line of duty.

"How's that working out?" Arley raised a brow at the archer,

"It's been four days," Arley said, but she grinned even wider as she thought of how Wally called her babe when he'd text her good night and how when he called and woke her up in the morning he still called her Glowstick. "Four wonderful days, but four days all the same."

"So no plans to leave the team behind and elope in the Bahamas, right?" Artemis joked.

"Nortz no!" Arley cackled, "Can you imagine Hal's face if I came home one day and told him I had eloped?"

Artemis curled into herself as she began to cackle,

"I'm more focused on what John would do," the blonde said and Arley's eyes widened at the thought, she looked at Artemis, and with the hand that was holding her cup of ice cream and pointed at the archer,

"What about Guy, can you just imagine his reaction? Like, hey Guy, Wally and me, we got eloped over the weekend." Arley bit back a laugh and puffed up her chest, she deepened her voice, "What do you mean you got eloped? I called dibs on walking you down the aisle! Jordan!"

"Did he really?" Artemis asked and Arley nodded,

"Oh yeah, back when Hal told him and John I had a crush on Wally- this is after he got his powers by the way, I managed to keep having a crush on him under wraps for three months -Guy told me I wasn't allowed to even think about running off with him now that we could both be in Vegas whenever we wanted to."

Laughing, Artemis wiped a tear from the corner of her eyes.

"Oh god my dad―" Artemis froze, her eyes widened and Arley's smile fell as the archer stopped smiling and shuffled her elbows and knees in closer to herself. Artemis always got like that when she would start to mention her father or when someone else would ask about him. "―I mean," Artemis said much more quietly, "My dad would never joke like that, he doesn't really have that kind of sense of humor."

Shitty fathers were something Arley was technically an expert on; because while she had never once viewed her foster fathers as actual fathers, legally, before Hal Jordan had adopted her, she had had fifteen.

Arley leaned back in her seat. She knew Artemis wasn't actually Oliver Queen's niece, Dick, Wally and Kaldur knew it too so when she rested her hand on top of Artemis' she had a serious and intense look in her eyes, one she wanted the archer to see.

"Does your dad-Artemis, has he ever hurt you before?"

"What?" Artemis hissed out, her eyes widened and her pupils dilated and Arley knew the look in her eyes; it was a look Arley had worn more than once as a child. Artemis, though, didn't rip her hand away from Arley's. "No, my dad doesn't-he's not around anymore. Mom served him with divorce papers a couple months back and I haven't seen him since."

March; Arley hazily remembered how back in Biayala Artemis had mentioned her father and how shady the man had sounded; she couldn't remember exactly what the archer had said, just that at the time Arley had thought it to be March.

Which meant the man hadn't been out of Artemis' life for more than seven months.

Arley's jaw clenched at her friend's avoidance of the actual question, but she nodded all the same. Arley hadn't protected Artemis in the simulation; she had been honest when she yelled at Wally in the bio-ship and she had been honest again with Kaldur in the Mount Justice cave kitchen. Artemis' death was on her.

Arley had killed thousands; her hands were already covered in blood, what was one more person, especially when they deserved it?

"If-if he comes around again you'll call me to let me know right?"

"Why?" Artemis asked suspiciously. Under her look of suspect Arley noted that the blonde girl looked scared; worried.

"Because you're my friend and you didn't answer my question," Arley said, she set her ice cream on the empty spot next to her, "Artemis I have your back, no matter what okay? So the next time he shows up I'm there if you need me, the minute you do."

"Why?" Artemis asked, her voice squeaky, "You don't know me like you do the others."

Arley grinned a lopsided smile at the girl, it showed off the Lanterns pointed canine and Arley knew that the sharp glint in her eyes made her smile look less than inviting.

"Because you're my friend and that's all I need to be there for you."

"Even if everyone else hates me?"

"Then fuck everyone else," Arley said without missing a beat, Artemis blinked; it wasn't often Arley used swears she'd picked up from earth and it was even less often she swore in English when she did use Earth-swears. "Artemis if you haven't done anything wrong and someone hates you then let them say something to me, I dare them."

"What if―" Artemis paused, "―What if I didn't do something, but, what if there was something completely and totally out of my control and what if Wally hated me? Would you still have my back?"

Arley paused for a second because she couldn't just say fuck Wally like she had with everyone else but she wouldn't let Wally tell her who to talk to anymore then she would let him tell her how to dress, especially of the person he suddenly didn't want her around was their friend and teammate.

"If Wally, and I mean, if, he hated you for something completely and totally out of your control I'd have to have him checked out by Manhunter cause that doesn't sound like my Wally, but if he were fine and he still hated you for something you didn't do then I guess that's something he can suck up and deal with," Arley said, "The same way I deal with him eating Rice Crispy treats despite hating them and their smell."

"Yeah?" Artemis asked almost timidly and Arley smiled, the archer's grin was wobbly and there was a lightness in her eyes that Arley had never once witnessed before.

"Yeah," she nodded, "I promise." Artemis threw her arms over Arley's shoulders, knocking the Lanterns ice cream to the ground as the Lantern teetered backwards. Both girls laughed as they rolled off of the bench they had been on and onto the New York City sidewalk.

...

It had been five days since the simulation and Arley's ring was still dead on her finger; John was getting itchy about when they would go to the Guardians and had taken to hovering in the Jordan-Gluck apartment. It was the whole reason Arley had gone to the cave after school and found out M'gann still hadn't yet come out of her room.

"She won't open the door," Conner had said to Arley, Kaldur and Wally, "I'm worried, she hasn't eaten and every time I ask her to open up she sounds like she's been crying. I don't know what to do."

"Maybe we should give her more time," Wally suggested; Arley had her legs thrown over the speedsters lap as they sat on the couch, her history homework was open in her lap. "I mean she was the reason the whole simulation turned into the training exercise from hell."

"That's not her fault!" Conner snapped,

"I know that," Wally said with his hands up and in the air, "I didn't say that, but it was her powers that acted up. Look I know she didn't mean it but maybe she just feels guilty."

"Wally is right, perhaps we should give M'gann another day to come out on her own," Kaldur said and Arley snorted at the suggestion,

"Kaldur it's been five days."

"Exactly, thank you!" Conner said as he pointed at Arley, the clone turned to Arley, "Maybe you can get her out? She likes you," Conner said and Arley arched a brow at the clone, Bialya hadn't been the only time she had caught the two of them kissing; nor did Arley suspect finding them on the living room couch locked in a heated make out the day before― as Wally had put it ―the training exercise from hell would be the last time she caught the two aliens.

"I'm like seventy-five percent sure she likes you too Conner," Arley said slowly and the clone shot the Lantern a dry look.

"That's not what I meant."

"Then what did you mean?" Arley teased lightly, Conner growled and Arley grinned as the clone sucked in a breath; Wally hid his own grin behind a fist and Kaldur bit his lip as he watched both the Lantern and clone boy banter.

"You're a girl, maybe you can say something to M'gann and get her to come out of her room; please?" Conner asked and Arley nodded; she set her history homework on Wally's lap― the speedster moved it off of him as soon as she had set it down ―and stood up. Arley didn't think M'gann would just open up her bedroom door simply because Arley was also apart of the female species specifically because Martians didn't have a gender binary like humans did so being a girl didn't matter as much as it would to another human female; but that didn't mean Arley hadn't come up with a plan by the time she had walked to the Martian girls room.

Conner, Wally and Kaldur hovered at the end of the hall as Arley knocked on M'ganns door.

"Megs?" Arley called out, "Megs it's Arley!"

"Go away!" M'gann called out, her voice sounded thick, as if she had been in the middle of crying, "I want to be left alone!" Arley shuffled closer to the door and rested her forehead against the cool metal.

"M'gann you've been in there for almost a week, you have to come out here and join the rest of us at some point," Arley said loudly, but kindly, to the Martian girl.

"Martians can go months without food, I'm staying in here where I can't hurt anyone else, thank you!" M'gann called out and Arley narrowed her eyes at the door. She looked― for a second ―down at her powerless ring before she stepped back.

"Fine," Arley muttered, "We're playing hardball." And then she turned and walked away from the Martian girls room, in the opposite direction the boys were in, towards the Mount Justice gymnasium.

She heard the three boys mutter something to one another before Wally and the other two caught up to her; "That was it?" Conner asked.

"Uh, babe?" Wally wondered at the same time, "Where are you going, M'gann's room is back that way." Wally threw his thumb over his shoulder. Arley turned and fondly looked at the red head.

"Trust me okay?" Wally grimaced.

"I'm really starting to hate when you say that," the speedster confessed as the small group of four entered the gymnasium. Arley paused in the mouth of the room before she stormed over to the weapons closet and threw open the door.

"Babe?" Wally called out but as Arley leaned into the closet and began to rifle through the dozen of alien, Atlantean and Amazonian weapons that were in the closet, she ignored the boy, only to emerge two moments later from the closet with a large Thanagrian mace in her hands.

The three boys' eyes widened.

"Arley why do you have a mace?" Kaldur wondered and Arley smiled impishly at the gilled teen.

"Because if Megs wants to lock herself away, that's fine, but she can do it in a room with a door and only after she talks about what's on her mind."

"You know when Canary says to open up I don't think this is what she means," Conner said and Arley looked at the clone boy with a jutted out hip and query expression on her face.

"Do you want me to get M'gann out of her room?"

'Of course," Conner said.

"And do you have any qualms about random acts of violence towards pieces of furniture?" Arley wondered as she thought back to the dent that was in the hanger wall; Conner shook his head.

"No."

"Bats is going to kill you, you know that?" Wally piped up and Arley shrugged, Batman already wasn't pleased that she and the other Lanterns hadn't gone to Oa about her ring so she doubted it could get worse; Hal was right, when you didn't fear the man behind the mask all that was left of Batman was just a man, and Arley feared a lot― she feared losing her friends and she feared losing her family and her ring and she feared being alone ―but didn't fear Batman or what he would do when he found out she broke down one of the caves doors.

"And here I thought Batman doesn't kill," Arley said with a small, impish smile.

Wally gawfed at that and Arley passed by the three boys, twirling the mace in her hands as she tried to get a good grip on it.

Maces weren't like baseball bats and crowbars, you couldn't just choke up on them.

Arley stopped outside M'gann's door. "Megs you can come out here on your own or I can come in there but I'm not leaving you alone, not anymore, okay!"

"Go away!" M'gann's voice cracked as she sobbed once more and Arley breathed. Fuck Batman and the League and what they'd do to her when they found out what she'd done to the door; Arley wouldn't have cared if it were a door in the Lantern Corps barracks she had to break down because it was her friend that was on the other side of the door, bawling her eyes out.

It was her sister.

Arley swung the mace over her shoulder and the three boys that stood down the hall flinched as the Thanagrian weapon dented the door.

"Arley what are you doing!" M'gann shouted, "I said I wanted to be left alone!"

"And I said I'm not leaving you!" She swung again. "You've been locked up in this room, wallowing for five days and guess what M'gann? That's over with!" Arley swung twice more and the door shook as it began to crumble inwards.

"I'm not fit to be around people, I almost killed you and the rest of the team!" Arley could hear the tears in M'ganns weepy voice, "I'm a monster!" Arley paused mid-swing, the mace was just over her head when she stopped.

Arley knew monsters; she had known monsters far before she had gotten her ring and she knew a monster every time she looked in the mirror. She knew monsters who drowned in the blood of the lives they stole and monsters like herself who treaded the bloody waters they tried to stay aloft in, and she knew monsters who swam in it merrily as could be; she also knew M'gann was not a monster.

"You're wrong!" How many times would she have to say that to her teammates, how many times would she have to shake it into them before they got it into their heads? "You're not a monster, Megs What happened was an accident, that's not your fault."

"Yes it is! If you or Wally, Robin or Artemis or Kaldur or-or-or Conner had died that would be because I killed you!"

"But we didn't, okay, we're all alive and we're all okay so suck it up!" Arley shouted, "Yeah you almost killed us but so did Roy when he wanted to play with Green Arrows nuclear arrow last year, and so did Robin when he thought me and him could take on Black Mask alone back after he first put on the cape and I-M'gann I've killed people before and you-you don't see me as a monster, so how in Nortz name do you think I'm going to let you call yourself one!" Arley demanded to know.

She swung again.

"So get out here and hug me and then go call your uncle damnit! Train, if you're so scared of killing us all again make sure that doesn't happen!" Arley swung again and again and though M'gann didn't answer her, she didn't stop swinging― no matter how much sweat beaded her brow ―until the door caved in with a loud crash fifteen minutes later.

The lights were off but Arley could see that M'gann was on her bed, with her arms folded in her lap and tears in her eyes; the Martian girl's mouth was open and there was a stuffed bear Conner had won for her at an arcade in her lap.

Arley dropped the Thanagrian mace to the ground and she stepped over it as she walked further into the girls room. She kneeled in front of the Martian girl and she took M'gann's hands in her own.

"You are not a monster, okay? So the next time you talk about my sister like that I'm going to kick your ass, got it?"

"You mean it?"

"That I'll kick your ass? Sure," Arley said with a faux-lightness in her voice, "No one can talk about my family like that."

"That I'm not a monster?"

Arley smiled reassuringly and nodded,

"Of course I mean it, I know monsters and you're not that, Nortz Megs you're anything but." M'gann fell to her knees into Arley's arms and she squeezed the girl tightly as more tears fell down her face; Arley just clutched the girl tighter and let her cry because she would be there for the girl when she was done.

...

M'gann was out of her room, and though Batman had read her the riot act for breaking down the door he hadn't sent Arley home before the girl could manage to rope Dick into a movie night with the rest of the team.

The seven of them were piled into the Mount Justice cave living room and there were several overflowing bowls of popcorn littered around the room, a dozen different kinds of bags of candy were strewn around the coffee table amongst the half drank cups of juice and sodas.

Arley was in Wally's arms, the speedster had the Lantern tucked under his arm as the girl had her legs perched over his own; Artemis had taken one look at them and pretended to stick her finger down her throat.

"You two are gross!" The archer had said teasingly as Dick held up a movie and Kaldur, Conner and M'gann shook their heads, "You're not going to make out in front of us now right? Cause I don't think my stomach could take it."

Arley grinned at the blonde.

"Oh you mean like this?" Arley turned and pressed her lips to the speedsters; Wally readily returned the kiss― the boy nipped at Arley's bottom lip and the Lantern smiled into the kiss as she felt the boys fingertips dance across her sides, tickling her ―only to pull away when both a handful of popcorn and the DVD case for the movie Aristocrats hit him.

"I've seen the dead bodies of Joker victims and I think that has traumatized me more," Dick laughed.

"You know I think we forgot to invite Zatanna, you wouldn't happen to have her number, would you Rob?" Wally blinked innocently and the youngest member of the young team blushed

"Awe the baby bird is blushing!" Arley cackled and Dick scrunched up his nose in direction.

"Be nice," Kaldur called out, "It's his first crush, seeing as you ended up with yours I am sure you remember what that is like."

"Babe," Wally cooed with a mischievous grin, "You had a crush on me?"

"Wally we're together." They hadn't quite discussed labels but when Wally shuffled the Lantern closer to himself so that their noses were touching Arley hardly thought explicit labels were important, she was his and he was hers.

"Still…" Wally trailed off and Arley rolled her eyes at the speedster; she turned and looked to the rest of their team.

"Have we picked a movie a yet?"

"No!" Conner called out, his arms were stretched out across the back of the couch so that both M'gann and Kaldur were under them; though Conner had his arm wrapped around the Martian girl.

"What about Handcock? Do we have that?" Dick turned and riffled through the Mount Justice caves extensive DVD collection before he held up the Will Smith movie high in the air,

"Yes!" The boy wonder called out as he waved it.

"Then put it on, Megs and Conner will like it," Arley assured, she then looked to their team leader. "If you can get past the swearing you will too Kaldur."

"I will hold you to that," Kaldur smiled.

"And I will just hold you," Wally muttered in Arley's ear; though not low enough before Artemis burst out into giggles. The archer looked up from her seat on the floor and looked at the two teens.

"You two are so gross." Both Wally and Arley shrugged; their relationship had been several years in the making and neither teen was going to waste another second between each other, not when their feelings for one another were finally out in the air.

...

Arley was back in the lead lined room she had been whisked off to after India a full week after the training exercise gone wrong had happened. Dinah sat across from her with a pen and a pencil; Arley was the last of her teammates to meet with the blonde Justice League member.

"How are you?" Dinah wondered.

"Fine," Arley said, "I mean I'm not on the verge of a mental breakdown so I think I'm doing great, honestly."

Arley had learned long ago that if she talked just enough about what Dinah wanted to hear they'd never have to get to the root of her issues; it was of course a strategy that occasionally backfired due to a breakdown in space or in an Indian jungle but it was a strategy that worked for a year or two and kept Arley from having to face any demon she didn't want to.

"Your teammates have all said you helped them over the past week," Dinah said and Arley nodded, her arms curled around herself. The ring on her finger was still dead; it had been for a week and though Arley would catch Wally or Guy or the rest of her teammates looking at it while her hand was idly perched on a table or counter top, no one said anything to her about it.

No one had asked why she hadn't charged her ring, and Arley wasn't sure how she felt about that. Part of her was glad none of them had brought her ring up, but another― much smaller part Arley was hesitant to admit ―was upset; upset that no one had asked her about her ring and why it wasn't charged, why she'd been using the zeta-tube the past week.

Why she was scared.

"Yeah," Arley said, "They needed it you know; Dick and Megs, they needed to know that they weren't monsters and Kaldur needed to know he hadn't failed us and Wally needed to know he hadn't let me down, Artemis and Conner needed to know that neither of them were going to be left alone again and that they'd always at least have me in their corner, you know?"

"You broke M'gann's door down," Dinah said, her lips were turned up and Arley flashed the woman a smile,

"I mean you are always talking about how we need to know down walls and stuff," Arley said and Dinah's pen froze against the paper, the blonde woman squinted at Arley.

"You know that's not what I mean." Arley shrugged and smirked at the hero; Dinah sighed as she rubbed her fingers against her temples. Dinah uncrossed her legs before crossing them again, that time left over right instead of right over left.

"Hal's worried about you, so are Guy, John, Wally and the rest of your team," Dinah said with a jab of her pen and Arley blinked far too innocently to be believable.

"Why?"

"Why? Arley you died―"

"―It was fake," Arley said as she straightened in her chair, "A simulation. I'm a Green Lantern. It takes a little more than some training exercise run amuck to shake me. By the way we used to do those in boot camp," Arley added, "Kilowog put me and the others I was training with in virtual situations so it's not like this is something new to me."

"You almost died, you and the others―"

"―But we didn't," Arley said sharply as she cut off Dinah.

Green, everything was green for a split second and Arley cut herself off and sucked in a breath. Arley held it for a moment and when she let it go Arley rolled her shoulders back.

"We didn't die," Arley said softer, "I'm fine."

"Are you now?" Dinah leaned back in her chair. "M'gann said you called yourself a monster when you broke down her door; do you still see yourself as a monster?"

The Galra ship exploded in Arleys mind and the hair on her arm stood up on its end as she recalled the heat from the ship's explosion; Arley's stomach clenched as she thought of the warlord's head hitting the floor and for a second Arley felt green; she felt like she wasn't in her own body the same way she felt both times she'd burst into green.

"Yeah," Arley said truthfully, "But come on I've killed thousands in the very least."

"Have you been saying the mantra?" Arley nodded, but she shrugged,

"Saying how it wasn't my fault or how I had to do it, that doesn't change the fact I did it. Dinah I'm a killer and maybe my reasoning for being a killer makes me different from Count Vertigo or the Joker but it doesn't change the fact that I still have blood on my hands."

"What did you think of when you died?" Dinah asked suddenly; so suddenly that Arley seized back in the lime green chair she was sitting in.

"Excuse me?"

"When you died in the simulation what did you think of? Was it of how young you were or any regrets you had?" Arley knew the line they were treading was one that meant she'd either be able to leave at the end of the hour or one that meant Dinah would have to cancel her dinner plans with Green Arrow and Arley already knew how often that happened.

The Lantern shuffled in her seat. "I thought of Conner's face and how horrified he looked when I pushed him out of the way."

"Nothing else?"

"It was sort of instantaneous," Arley said. "I didn't really have time to think about anything else."

"You've always thought you were going to die young, we've talked about this before and every time we have you shrug off the fact you don't think you're going to live to see forty like it's no big deal."

Because it wasn't, at least it wasn't to Arley. In foster care she hadn't thought she'd make it eighteen, she'd always thought some foster parent would kill her or some foster sibling would take some prank too far, and when she had run away to live in the streets she hadn't expect to make it that long either so when she had gotten her ring and been told she probably wouldn't grow old it hadn't been a hard hit blow; it's just been something Arley already knew.

"Then I don't know why we're talking about it again?"

"Because you died Arley, you and everyone you've ever loved died; because this isn't something you can just get over and wave off like every other trauma you've been through," Dinah said strongly and Arley pressed her lips together. "Now I'm going to ask again, how are you?"

Was Dinah mad at Oliver? Was that why she was pushing because Arley knew the blonde League member was smart enough to know that it was a can of rabid worms she was opening.

"Truthfully?" Arley asked and Dinah nodded.

Truthfully, Arley thought, I want to cry.

"I rewrote my will when I went home last Saturday." Arley let out a sick and twisted laugh at her own words; "How many non-terminally ill kids do you think have a will, cause the more I think of it, the smaller the number ends up being," Arley said. "And here's the most fucked up part, that's not what's bothering me cause I rewrite that thing after every mission, you know? We're heroes and like you said I don't expect to make it past forty, which, by the way is a total lie, I don't expect to make it past forty-five cause you know that's when women start to experience menopause and I'm sot looking forward to the hot flashes."

Dinah didn't laugh at her joke. "If that's not the most fucked up part then what is?"

Arley would never admit how grateful she was Dinah had asked her; she'd never tell a soul how much she wanted to talk about it, about how much it bothered her that no one else had.

"My ring hasn't been charged in a week and usually I'd be flipping out if it was dead for more than an hour, but I just-I can't bring myself to charge it or to go the Guardians because what if the reason my ring can do what it does is because I've somehow magically managed to ruin and break one of the most powerful weapons in the universe?"

"You think you broke your ring?"

"Hals ring doesn't talk to him, my ring didn't always make me into a glowing green Super Sayian, Guy and John's rings don't work without them meaning to like mine did last week so yeah I think I broke it and I think the Guardians are going to take one look at me and chuck me out of the Corps so fast my head will spin."

"You're scared of what that would mean," Dinah said, she wrote something on her pad without even looking, "Of being alone."

Arley snorted at the blonde intuition; who ever said blondes were dumb had obviously never met Dinah Black Canary Lance.

"Yeah," Arley nodded with a hoarse voice that cracked.

"That's okay," Dinah said, "You're human, it's in our nature to be scared of things."

"Makes me feel like a failure though because deep down I know how stupid it is," Arley said. "I mean, I'm scared-I'm terrified that if the Guardians kick me out Hal will too because that'll mean the only reason he adopted me was because he was forced to, and I'm scared Dick and Wally and the others will leave me because I'm not on their level anymore and I'm scared Katma and Kilowog will only see me as some Earthling not worth their time if my ring gets taken away."

"You know that won't happen," Dinah said, "Hal and the others they love you."

"And sometimes love is conditional," Arley shot back, she swallowed the lump in her throat; "I know on one level Hal loves me and he's not going to toss me to the curb at the end of the day, ring or no ring, I get that, I do. But on another totally different level? Why? What makes Hal so different from any of my foster parents, what makes him want to love me when no one else could? Dinah I had thirty foster parents in total; and out of fifteen families three-four didn't outright beat me or lock me in a hall closet. What makes Hal and John and Guy look at me and make them want to be there for me besides the fact I have the same ring on my finger as they do theirs?"

"What makes one parent love their own child and another beat them to death with a hair brush?" Dinah asked Arley in return, "Hal, John and Guy, they love you because that's who they are and at the end of the day just because some love is conditional doesn't mean all love is. Ring or no ring I know Hal Jordan and I know you are as much his kid as you are your mothers, so that? Hal and the others leaving you, that you don't have to worry about because I know for a fact it won't happen."

"And if it does?" Arley asked.

"Then Ollie and I will give you Roy's old room just to annoy him," Dinah said and Arley giggled at the thought of the red headed archer finding her in his room only to be kicked out of it because she had claimed it as her own.

When he giggled subsided Arley breathed and she looked at Dinah; "Hal, he won't leave me?"

"I'm not even sure Superman could tear that man away from you if you needed him." Suddenly it got little easier for Arley to breath.

...

Hours later after her session with Canary Arley sat on the couch in her and Hal apartment, her Lantern battery sat on the coffee table next to Hals fishing magazine and the USWeekly Guy had bought from the grocery store because of the story about Bruce Wayne and Batmans secrete gay love affair.

Hal sat next to her on one side and Guy sat on the other, John stood behind the Lantern on the other side of the table, the television was off and the radio in the kitchen played Trains Hey Soul Sister.

Arley licked her lips and she looked at John; he nodded reassuringly at her and she breathed. She could do it; she knew the Lanterns oath better then she knew anything else, she was just scared.

Arley was scared of the Guardians taking her ring away and she was scared of Hal and Guy and John leaving her, she was scared of Wally and the others leaving her and she was scared that she had done something to break a Lantern Corps ring, because there were only two things in the universe that could do that, and if Arley could break the ring, what did that mean?

How terrible a person did she have to be to break her ring; the only other person to have ever done that had been Sinestro and even then he hadn't broken his ring, he had warped it into something else.

If Arley had broken her ring did that mean she was worse than Sinestro? Did that make her better because she hadn't warped the ring into something else?

Arley needed to know; she needed to swallow her fear and go to the council and face their judgement on why her ring had spoken to her; she needed to Lantern up and get over herself.

Arley closed her eyes. She raised her ring hand and she breathed; she needed to know why it was only her ring that spoke to her, why it was only her ring that made her go green. Arley opened her eyes and she looked at the battery.

I'm not a bad Lantern, Arley thought. Lanterns faced their fears every day and that was why they could put on their rings and defend the universe when no one else could; because they were stronger than fear. Arley had to be stronger than her own fear.

She had to know.

"In brightest day, in blackest night, no evil shall escape my sight. Let those who worship evil's might, beware my power, Green Lantern's light!"

And the world went green.