Watchtower|

February 14th, 2016|

10:10 PM, GMT|

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~=YJ=~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Koriand'r."

Krystallo smiled when Koriand'r spoke. She was clearly a quick study. The woman was exhausted. Nevertheless, she was excited to finally have people actively trying to communicate with her. Krystallo turned to Nightwing.

"Alright, now that we all know each other's names, let's get her out of that thing."

"Uhhh, are you sure that's a good idea?" Nightwing asked.

"She's been wanting to get out of those for a while. We'll be fine," Raven said.

Krystallo smiled at Raven, brimming with pride. Nightwing seemed to gauge what she said before plaintively agreeing. Krystallo looked at Koriand'r again before speaking.

"We are going to free you," she said, slowly and carefully making the motions of putting her arms together and pulling them apart.

Koriand'r nodded eagerly and offered up her hands. Krystallo examined the equipment and put her hands on the surface, expecting the metal to bend under her touch. Nothing happened. Krystallo tried again and the metal did not budge. Krystallo turned in confusion to the others.

"It won't bend."

"Isn't it metal?" Nightwing asked.

"It is… at least, I think so?"

This was strange. Krystallo's ferrokinesis worked on nearly every metal, whether from Earth or space. They tested it when she joined the League. The only metal that her powers did not work on was Nth metal. Krystallo examined the cuffs again. There were not any sort of keyholes and Krystallo had to imagine that the contraption was remote-controlled. She idly wondered who could have forced her into Nth metal cuffs when she remembered: Nth metal had been abundant on Thanagar and the Gordanians had conquered Thanagar.

Moreover, she had been their prisoner.

Krystallo read the files the Hawks had submitted to the Justice League concerning everything they knew about Gordanians. They had abducted, abused, and killed Thanagarians. Even experimented on them, according to Shayera. Krystallo could only imagine what horrors this poor young woman had been made to suffer at their hands. Krystallo looked back at the cuffs and sighed.

"I can't break them."

"I have an idea."

Nightwing and Krystallo turned at the soft voice. Raven hardly said a word since introducing herself. Krystallo could not help but smile. She had been silently worried about Raven not wanting to help for fear of making things worse, if nothing else this was a small step.

"Alright, let's hear it," Nightwing said.

Raven quickly explained. She thought an EMP might be able to short-circuit the cuffs, only for a few seconds. In that time, the cuffs would have to be removed. Following Raven's instructions, Nightwing placed a small EMP device on the cuffs and Krystallo gripped them, ready to pull. Nightwing stood behind the girl, his hands on her upper arms.

"On the count of three, turn the EMP on."

"Uh, Rae, are you sure this is gonna work?" Nightwing asked.

"Hey, do you have any better ideas, Chicken-wing?" Krystallo asked, thoroughly annoyed and as ready as their guest was to get the cuffs off.

"Nevermind, let's do it."

Raven stood back and paused before starting her count.

"One… two… three."

The device came to life with a 'beep' and Krystallo pulled with all her might. After a few seconds, the cuff slid free and Krystallo tumbled to the floor, the confinement device going flying somewhere behind her. Nightwing went backwards and managed to avoid falling by twisting into a handstand before righting himself. The three heroes watched in rapt attention as Koriand'r's waist-length red curls seemingly burst into flames. The ends of her hair burning orange and languidly lashing back and forth like a cat's tail. Krystallo was shocked. She was even more shocked to realize that Raven was not stunned at all. Before she had time to question anything, Koriand'r flew over and helped her to her feet, speaking very quickly and turning to Nightwing to thank him as well. She paused mid-sentence then said something else.

Then she kissed him.

Krystallo was again stunned into silence. Raven seemed mildly surprised, but also very quietly amused. Krystallo simply could not take her eyes off the two, stunned as she was. Koriand'r's hand was on his face, her other hand cupping the back of his head, meanwhile Nightwing froze for a split second, unsure of what to do with his hands, but settled for instinctively putting them around her waist. Their kiss lasted perhaps less than a minute before they pulled apart. Nightwing hid his breathlessness very well. Meanwhile, Koriand'r was lolling her head in thought. Eventually, she opened her mouth again and spoke.

"Hello."

Krystallo looked at her in wide-eyed shock. For the third time in less than five minutes, Krystallo was stunned into silence.

"Hi?" Nightwing said.

Koriand'r could not help but laugh.

"Uh, I'm sorry, what was that?" Krystallo asked, pointing at Nightwing.

The Bat in question was still silently processing the previous event, not quite catatonic but still unresponsive to the sound. Koriand'r cleared her throat and spoke again.

"There was a communication issue previously, which has been solved," she said.

"My people can assimilate language through physical contact. Personally, I find lip-contact works the quickest," she turned to Nightwing with an apologetic smile, her hands folded behind her back. "I hope you do not mind. I understand that some cultures consider certain kinds of physical contact… unseemly in public. However, I had no way of knowing what is and is not accepted here."

Nightwing wordlessly flubbed for a second before finding his voice.

"No! No problem at all! Happy to help."

Krystallo smiled conspiratorially.

"Oh, you were elated to help," Krystallo accused, her eyes and mask lenses narrowing.

"Shut up," Nightwing ordered

"No," Krystallo said.

The two shared a look, Krystallo grinning impishly and Nightwing looking annoyed. Raven, on the other hand, was absolutely done with the both of them. Krystallo noticed it and turned to Koriand'r once more.

"So, Koriand'r, how did you wind up here?"

Koriand'r sat back down and Krystallo made a chair to sit next to her, making one for Nightwing on Koriand'r's right.

"It is… A very long story."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~=YJ=~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tamarus, Tamaran|

October 8th, 2010|

9:16 PM|

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~=YJ=~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Koriand'r had just completed her transmission for Ryand'r and prepared to send it. She was worried about her little brother, he was a decent warrior, but battle was not for him. Not like Komand'r. No, Ryand'r was science-minded, and every new piece of technology that came to be, he studied. He analyzed and engineered until he understood, then found ways to improve upon it. He worried he would not be very happy on Okaara without the chance to hone those skills as well. She sighed. It would only last a year. She paused to wonder how different he would be then. When Komand'r had returned, she became the top warrior, as expected. However, she was also taller, her face seemed to have matured, looking much like their mother, and her inner flame seemed to be even brighter.

Koriand'r had changed as well, according to her family. She seemed prettier, if her brother was to be believed, and she even tied with Komand'r for her position amongst Tamaran's warriors as well. Koriand'r was not quite sure how serious those changes were. She still felt like herself. She was nearly finished when she felt an arm around her face.

Without thinking, she put her hand on her attacker and blasted them. Koriand'r felt woozy, but took to the air, firing another blast at her attacker. The beam collided with the floor and the room seemed to spin. She spun and fired a barrage, and only stopped when her vision began to blur. She descended, flying lower in an effort to regain some sense of clarity. If only she had known that it was exactly what they wanted. Koriand'r felt a jolt and suddenly her world was darkness.

When next she woke, she was in an unfamiliar room. One too clean, too sterile, and too bright. She blinked and sat upright. She missed the familiar weight of her armbands and jeweled cuirass. She looked down and found she was wearing a dirty white shift rather than the purples she remembered donning.

"You're awake. Wonderful! It would be a shame if our subject died before our experiments started."

That was the beginning of the torment. She could not be sure how it happened, but whoever had captured her had given her over to the Citadel. The torments were brutal. They tested her body to see if she was a sturdy as Tamaraneans were rumored to be. She withstood each and every test; refusing to give up, even when it should have killed her. It went on for years. The final test had been the cruelest. A sick reenactment of the ones they had conducted on her ancestors. Testing her to see how much ultraviolet energy she could absorb before her body destroyed itself.

It had been the worst.

It did not hurt. Not at first. It felt good, after being out of the sunlight for years, it actually felt good for her body to absorb ultraviolet rays again. However, the soothing feeling did not last for very long. Soon, she felt her body… burning… She never knew that this would be what it felt like. She screamed, she could only scream. Every part of her stung, the pain leaving no part of her body untouched. When the pain became so much that her body began to go numb, she felt her own spirit falter. She felt herself giving in… Until she remembered X'Hal. She remembered her twice-great grandparents. Every tale she had learned in the temples, and every story she learned in the palace, she remembered… And she felt her strength being restored.

What she did next she only ever recalled in bits and pieces, but the aftermath told her everything. Koriand'r broke free from the contraption she had been bound to and destroyed it. Ripping it to pieces with her bare hands. And when it was nothing more than scraps in a heap, she turned her rage to her captors. She destroyed them, burning every last one of them until little if anything remained. Then she laid waste to the station until it was unrecognizable as a vessel. When it was finally over and she calmed down, she realized… She was nowhere near the Vega System. Koriand'r was adrift, lost in a region of which she had no knowledge. She wandered for a days on end, taking no time to revel in her newfound freedom.

She blamed her lack of knowledge for what happened next.

Gordanians captured her. They were at first enamored by her beauty… Until she killed the first master she had been given to for trying to bed her. They made her slave in an arena after that, and forced her to kill for their sport. This went on for years as well. There had been no escape, not without too great a chance of being killed. So she bided her time, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. Her chance arrived when she was transferred from the planet she had been one to another, larger arena on a different planet. She had anticipated lackluster and foolhardy guard. She had not anticipated the suppression cuffs.

However, neither had she anticipated the rebels.

Three Thanagarians, two Rannians, and an Okaaran. Koriand'r was lucky she already spoke Okaaran; she had been in no state to assimilate any new languages then. The seven of them together killed what they had thought was most of the Gordanian slavers before destroying the cruiser and escaping in two scout ships. Unfortunately, four lived and she had been forced to irreparably damage the ship and escape out the airlock.

Which led her to a new planet…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~=YJ=~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Watchtower|

February 14th, 2016|

10:42 PM, GMT|

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~=YJ=~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"I was abducted from my home on Tamaran," Koriand'r explained. "I was knocked unconscious and stolen brought to the Citadel. I was kept a prisoner there and experimented on before I escaped."

"So, how did you wind up in the hands of the Gordanians?" Nightwing asked.

"They captured me not long after I destroyed the Citadel outpost. I was kept as a gladiator in their arena until I managed to escape here."

Krystallo could feel her sorrow, her pain, her guilt, her fears, her worries… She could only imagine precisely what she had been through, but it had been absolutely awful. She glanced at Raven and saw that she was also overcome by the waves of emotion from their new friend, though it did not show on her face. And Nightwing? Well, he had been smitten at first, and now he was overcome with sympathy for the poor young woman.

However, before any one could say anything else, the door opened.