A/N: Major spoilers for Justice League #10. It's basically the whole comic. Not that it should matter anyways, considering how poor the series is anyway. I always liked the idea of Shayera as Diana's confidant, so I added her into the story. She'll play a role later on. Nevertheless, I hope you enjoy. Please review. Any constructive criticism is, like always, welcome.

Disclaimer: All characters belong to their rightful owners. I own nothing.

Chapter 3:

Interruptions

After my particles reconfigured on the teleporter pad at the watchtower, I made my way down the hall to the conference room. On my way there, I wondered what the situation would be this time. There haven't been many big attacks against Earth lately.

Once the door to the conference room opened, I stepped in to see the rest of the League excluding Aquaman. Of course, if anyone were to be late, it would be him.

He always acts as if he is too good to work with us, as if he is above us. He may be the King of Atlantis, but he needs to learn that his position under the seas does not reflect how we view him here. Here, we are all equals, fighting to keep the planet safe.

On my way to my seat, I see Batman near the monitor, no doubt preparing for his debrief. Feeling spontaneous, I decided to redirect my trajectory to try and strike up a conversation with him.

Well, as much of a conversation you could have with a person like Batman.

As my boots resonate a loud clacking sound off the floor, I heard Green Lantern and Flash bickering. Again. At least they'll be preoccupied, and hopefully won't pay any attention to Batman and I.

"Princess." He acknowledged me without even turning around. I've always liked it when he calls me that, even if it is just my title. It's different when it comes from him.

"Batman," I returned, "What is the problem this time?"

Talking business with him usually gets him to open up more. I guess it's easier for him.

"I'll explain everything once everyone is here. That way I don't have to repeat myself."

"Ok," I began, a little disappointed that he didn't give me any information. Steeling myself, I continued, "Listen, I just discovered this concoction called an ice mocha at a place called Starbucks today, and I was wondering if you-"

"This better be important." Aquaman bellowed as he entered the room. Hades, he has to pick right now to arrive.

Begrudgingly, I made my way to my seat, realizing that I lost my chance to speak to Batman. From now, until the end of the mission, his mind will only be focused on one thing. Making sure we get the job done.

Ignoring Aquaman's remark, Batman brought up six of our villains on the monitor as we all gather around the conference table.

"The Weapons Master. The Key. The Scarecrow, The Scavenger, Captain Cold, The Cheetah…" He listed the six figures before us. "There've been over a dozen reports of our enemies being attacked, tortured and interrogated by someone named Graves."

What would anyone want to obtain by attacking our enemies?

Oblivious to the severity of the situation, as always, Hal blurted out, "And a guy kicking our enemies' collective asses is a problem, why?"

"Because now Graves knows everything about us," Cyborg explained.

"Everything like what?" Hal asked.

"Our weaknesses, Lantern." Cyborg responded, a little exasperated.

"What weaknesses?" Hal replied cheekily as he folds his arms behind his back.

His cocky attitude is really starting to get on my nerves. We may be a strong team, but everyone has weaknesses. No one is perfect. Many warriors often fall due to their overbearing sense of pride. They don't realize that they can be defeated and It makes them arrogant and that leads to mistakes. Lantern doesn't realize that this is not a game. We have a responsibility to the world. To protect them from danger. We have no time to get overconfident.

Deciding to spell it out for him, Cyborg begans his analysis, "Graves knows the Flash doesn't like working outside of the law because he's a police officer," On a more personal level, "He even knows about his relationship with Patty Spivot."

"Who's Patty Sivot?" Hal inquired.

Sighing, Flash responded, "Someone I work with in the crime lab."

"You never told me you were seeing anyone."

"Because you hit on my last date five minutes after we sat down for dinner." Flash said, annoyed, sending a glare at Hal, who at least has the decency to look sheepish about it.

Ignoring the two, Cyborg continued, "Graves knows about the woman on the Apache Reservation who Wonder Woman visits every month."

How could anyone know that?

On one of my explorations, I stumbled across the Apache Reservation and was immediately welcomed with opened arms. They taught me about their way of life. I learned a lot from them. One of the women there, Shayera, has become a good friend of mine. She teaches me a lot about Man's World and has become a sister. It's nice to have a woman to talk to considering how far away I am from home, and the fact that I am the only woman on the team. I usually visit once a month to catch up and tell her of what I've learned.

Before I can respond, Aquaman asked me, "I thought your mother lived on Paradise island?"

"She does," I replied, turning to him, "It's someone else. A friend." And before I can stop myself, "Like Steve," comes tumbling out of my mouth.

Hera, so stupid. Why did I even say that? No one even asked about him.

I guess I got so used to denying the notion that Steve and I were involved that it's just become an automatic response.

I see Batman's jaw tighten ever so slightly at my outburst. Now, I have to explain this to him later. I definitely don't want him getting the wrong idea.

I am not attracted to Steve. I never was. He is just a friend, my first and probably closest friend. But just a friend. Nothing more.

"Steve is just a friend?" Aquaman asked me, mockingly.

Before I get the chance to explain myself, Cyborg intervened, "Graves also knows Batman doesn't trust anyone on this team."

That hurt a little bit. I know we don't speak much, and that he is a very secretive person, but after five years of battling beside each other I would expect him to have at least some faith in us. In me.

Batman didn't even respond, his face as expressionless as ever.

"I'm sure we're all in shock." Hal quipped.

"Graves doesn't know everything." Superman corrected with a smirk. "Batman trusts me." That stung a bit.

We all turned to Superman, his cape flowing freely while looks at us. We all wait to hear his explanation.

It never comes though, because Hal decided that it would be a good idea to construct stage lights all around Superman.

"And I'd like to say I trust you, Superman, but I don't know a thing about you," Lantern said. "You seem like a nice guy. You say the right things when you do talk, but you're always floating behind us."

"He's observing. That's what a reporter does." Cyborg stated, revealing to us Superman's day-time occupation.

Immediately alarms went off in everybody's head. no one likes a nosy reporter. Especially in our line of work.

"Superman's a reporter?" Flash asked worriedly.

"I don't like reporters." Aquaman added, his face set grimly.

"You don't write about us, do you?"

Lantern turned onto Batman, who hasn't said anything, with a scowl on his face. "Batman's got that look on his face again. You already knew all this, didn't you?"

Batman only narrowed his eyes as he spoke, "Superman and I work together outside of the team."

"Except I don't steal his girlfriends." Superman replied cheekily.

He's never asked me to help him…at all. Not even once. Superman and I have similar powers. If he needed some muscle he could've come to me. I would have gladly provided him the assistance.

And girlfriends? I hope Superman was just trying to annoy Hal with that statement.

Apparently Hal wasn't amused. "That's funny, Superman, but you still haven't answered the question. Do you write about us?"

The bickering went on for a while since Hal couldn't let go of the fact that Superman was a reporter. As Cyborg defended Superman by letting us know that Superman never wrote about us, Hal turned on him. The two argued for a while, Lantern still upset while Cyborg took on a solemn expression. Looking at Hal with his human eye, he reminds us that we were lucky. He couldn't do anything about his condition. This is who he is. A young man with a bright future turned into a living machine, with no chance at normality.

Our team certainly doesn't act like we've been doing this for five years. Right now, it seems like we just started. Everybody's been keeping secrets. We're lucky there hasn't been any major problems since Darkseid. We would probably fall apart at this rate.

Suddenly, a chill descended upon the room.

As Flash spoke, I could see his breath in the air. "Is something wrong with the heat in here? It's getting cold."

Cyborg then tapped into the watchtower's systems, trying to figure out what the problem was.

"What is it Cyborg?" Batman asked him.

"Someone just used Steve Trevor's access code to the satellite."

Steve? Why would Steve be here? No one other than us has ever been aboard the watchtower.

"He's never been here. Why would Colonel Trevor have an access code?" Flash echoed my thoughts.

"In case someone tried to force one out of him. I designed it to trigger a silent alarm. Trevor's trying to warn us." Cyborg answered.

"A warning? I should've suspected he wouldn't give up. But no warnings will help you," An eerie voice threatened us.

Startled that somebody could get aboard the watchtower, we all turned to face our enemy. We saw a figure looking out the window, eyes searching the Earth as if he was trying to find something.

With his back turned to us, he spoke condescendingly, "It's no wonder you're oblivious to the tragedies that befall us. You can't see anything bad happening from way up here." He smirked, "At least, not yet."

With everyone getting battle ready, Batman inquired, "Graves?"

Ignoring him, Graves continued, "The world thinks you are gods watching over them. But you're not gods." He moved his hand up to the glass. "I've met gods."

Wait a minute. If he got the code from Steve, that means that Steve is in real danger. I need to protect him. He was my first friend here at Man's World. I will not fail him now.

In the most threatening voice I can produce, I asked, "What have you done with Steve?" I have no time for games if Steve's life is on the line.

With his back still facing us, we see a blue aura form at his feet. Whoever this man is, he seemed to be confident that he can take us down.

"Even after the hell his life has become, he still won't betray you. I suppose it's out of some misguided sense of loyalty. Or love." He added mockingly.

Finally turning to face us, he revealed his pale gray skin and blood red eyes. And on his gauntlets, there appear to be sculptures of children, each emitting the blue energy around him.

Unable to hold myself back, and infuriated by his tone, I charged at him, pulling my blade from the side of my leg in the process.

"What have you done with Steve?" I yelled, fully intent on beating the answer out of him.

Mid-air, he hit me with something.

Suddenly, I see grey illusions, monsters, pass through me. Then an overwhelming sense of cold envelops my body. I also feel my muscles deteriorate as my skin gets paler and I no longer have the energy to keep my eyes open. My strength fades away in seconds.

"You will never know, Wonder Woman."

Then, as everything goes black, the illusions spoke.

"Feed me your loss!" They screamed.

Forcing myself to open my eyes, I realized I'm no longer at the watchtower. I'm on Themyscira. And there keeling in front of me is…Oh Hera. It's my mother. Set in stone with her arms reaching out, pleading for salvation. And then I see myself, walking over to her. I collapsed, embracing her.

Why am I here? Why do I have to watch this all over again? Was losing my mother once not enough?

This was my worst nightmare. My own mother, lost to me. With all my strength, with all my powers, I couldn't even save the woman that raised me. I'm lost in my own nightmare.

Batman

I watched as Wonder Woman charged at Graves. She has always been a headstrong woman. It's one of the things I admire about her.

Then she gets hit.

And as Superman catches her, I looked into her eyes to see her stare into nothingness. Her mouth is gaping and her body is deteriorating by the second. My blood boils at the sight of her like this, as if her mind is lost to us. She's always been strong, beaming with energy. Now seeing her so frail, so weak, so lost.It's just so wrong. But I force my anger down. I need to stay calm. I need to stay level headed. Getting angry will do nothing to help her now.

"Take him." I ordered, jumping into the air to launch my batarangs at our enemy.

Lantern reached him first. He tried to blast him with his energy ring, but nothing comes out.

Graves' grin only grew wider. "What pain do you carry, green Lantern?" He unleashed his grey apparitions. "What loss rests within your soul?"

And then Hal is doubling over in pain as he screams. Flash, then, rushed to Graves and climbs on his back. He started to hit him across his face with a flurry of quick punches, but they have no effect. It seems that his "skin" acts as an incredibly dense type of armor.

"What did you do to him?" Flash yelled in between punches. "What are those things?"

Then Flash gets hit by the apparitions as well. He is sent flying across the room, screaming in horror.

I don't know what effect these things have on us, but I need to find a way to counteract it.

And before Cyborg, or Aquaman can do anything they get hit as well. As the ghosts pass through them, they spoke, "We hunger."

That means these things are feeding off us somehow. Whatever they are doing to us only strengthens Graves.

I tried to distract Graves for a while so Superman can get a chance to attack. Rolling to the side to avoid those ghosts, I launched some more batarangs at Graves. He looked at me for a second, then refocused on Superman.

As Superman approached Graves, he tried to blast him with his heat vision. It has no effect. Graves is just blocking it with his left hand.

Who is this guy? He certainly has done his homework. He just took out the whole League, without even moving from his position. Superman can only yell out as the apparitions pass through him. He fell to the floor in considerable pain. He slammed his fists into the floor before arching backward.

"Pa." Is the only thing that escapes his mouth as he faded into unconsciousness.

Pa? What is he seeing? these ghosts must be doing something with our memories. From my research, it's not paranoia, I know that Clark Kent's father passed away some years ago. The loss of a loved one is always painful. I would know.

As I realized that these ghosts must be feeding off our misery, our sense of loss, I get struck by them. The cold that envelops me is surreal. I have never felt anything like it. Sparing one last glance at Wonder Woman's limp and frail body, I steel myself for what may come. I will not fail her, or anyone else.

Then, everything goes black.

As my eyes opened, I took in my surroundings. This is...

I'm at crime alley. The place where it all started. This is where Batman was born.

A/N: Review Please!