Stranger from the Sky, chapter 6

Deceptions

High in the Andes, well above the point past where humans found the climate even remotely survivable, Athena sat, knees drawn up to her chin, thinking. Obviously, she had a lot to learn.

She'd deliberately absented herself from the rehearsal today. These feelings that she was just now having to deal with on her own made it actually painful to be around the others, especially Raven, Beast Boy, and Haywire. The looks they'd given her…. well, she guessed she could understand why they'd feel the way they did.

Back in the Empire, her Lord could simply "turn off" the emotion, make it so she no longer felt it. But things were not done that way here, and perhaps that was for the better. The pain she was feeling was a way of reminding her not to do that sort of thing again.

And hadn't she hated the Lords who'd forced her to undergo the mind-link with the one now called Omega? It had been so humiliating, and so public…. But the problem there was, she hadn't been allowed to hate them. But, on some level, she had, anyway.

She found herself wishing she didn't hate the traitor so. He had found a way to fit in, to make friends, even. Why couldn't she? For that matter, why did she hate him so?

"Well, well," said an unfamiliar voice to her right. Standing there, apparently unaffected by the extreme cold (Even though it was far below the freezing point of water) was a humanoid figure, a female. The speaker was an attractive young humanoid, if Athena was any judge of such things, with straight dark hair and somewhat dark-skinned features, which seemed to be set in a rather mischievous expression, at least to Athena, and wearing what looked like some kind of light armor. She looked familiar, somehow. Then it came to her. "You are the one called Blackfire, sister to Starfire. "

The girl gave a lopsided smile. "Guilty as charged." She had to have some knowledge of Athena, for her next words were, "I heard you were a recent addition to the Titans."

"I do not know if I am a Titan or not. I seem to keep making socially oriented and unacceptable mistakes. Of….considerable magnitude"

Blackfire sat down beside her in the snow. "Sounds like you don't fit in well with the group."

"No, I do not." To put it mildly.

"How about I introduce you to a group you may fit in with better?"

"That would be most pleasing to me." But even as she said this, in the back of her mind, she wondered: why was this humanoid female doing this?

Osiran warriors, with a few exceptions, are not very well trained in what humans call the arts of deception. At least, not as humans understand it.

Flying back to Jump City, Blackfire had the chance to appraise her new…friend. She knew Osiran warriors were extremely powerful…basically Superman-level (there was even some thought that the Osirans might be the "parent" race of the Kryptonians, Daxamites, and other, similar races)…if she could get this one on her side…..well, the sky would literally be the limit. And maybe not even that.

They flew to the HIVE's temporary headquarters, a basement in an abandoned warehouse building. As she entered the building, the members were gathered around a table, planning their next move. They all started upon seeing the unfamiliar woman with Blackfire.

"What's this, another pit-sniffer?" snorted Gizmo, readying some no doubt lethal device.

"No," said Blackfire, moving in front of Athena. "Guys, I'd like to introduce you to Athena. She's an Osiran warrior only recently arrived, and unaccustomed to Earth ways." Wink, wink. "I'd like to propose her for membership."

"She's shore got mah vote," said Billy Numerous, his tongue practically hanging out at the sight of the breathtakingly beautiful alien girl. Kyd Wykkyd nodded wordlessly.

"Mine, too," said Johnny Rancid, looking her up and down. The others indicated their approval, with Gizmo, as usual, deferring. He felt women in general were stupid, anyway.

"Okay. So we're agreed. Now what's the plan?" Blackfire asked.

See-more indicated the map on the table. "First National Bank of Jump City. Gizmo neutralizes their electronics, You and Mammoth take out the guards, Kyd Wykkyd gets us through the vault, Billy Numerous loads up as many bags as he can, and we're outta there. The whole operation shouldn't take more than twenty minutes, and that's if we go slow. How's that sound to you?"

Athena spoke up for the first time. "Excuse me, but is this not considered a crime on your world? And are you not considered criminals?" She remembered this from the books Robin had given her to study.

Blackfire shot the rest of them a look: let me handle this. "Okay, let's take it from the top. First, yes, we were considered criminals, but we've all spent time in what's called jail, a place of confinement for criminals. When you get out of jail, you are no longer considered a criminal." She deliberately neglected to mention how they'd gotten out of jail. "You're considered to have paid your debt to society, as the term goes, and therefore, you are no longer a criminal. Understand, now? Your information was simply outdated, that's all. Now about the bank: You see, crime, really, as such, is where people get hurt. In this case, nobody gets hurt. We're planning this whole operation especially so that nobody gets hurt. So if we don't hurt anybody, it's not a crime. We just tie up the guards, run everyone out of the building, and take the money. See," she pointed out to the alien woman, "the money in the bank's insured. That means that even though we take the money, everybody that has any money in the bank gets it all back regardless. So, nobody really loses anything. We just get a whole lot of money. For free."

"I am still having trouble grasping this concept of money. What is it used for? And why is it in such high demand?" Johnny Rancid rolled his eyes, but turned away before he did it. He definitely had plans for getting on the good side of this nova hot young thing, oh, yes.

"Well," Blackfire explained, glaring at him for reasons she really wasn't too sure of, herself, "money is a medium of exchange. You use it to get things. To buy things you want. Plus, it's kind of a status symbol. Someone with a lot of money is usually highly respected by others."

That last caught Athena's attention, intriguing her greatly. She knew she would like to be highly respected here on this new world. Perhaps her friends in the Titans would respect her more if she had more of this money thing. "Very well. I will to assist you in this endeavor. But I must point out some serious flaws in your plan."

"Oh? What sort of flaws?"

"You have not taken into consideration that I am with you now. That alters the equation significantly. I can retrieve this money for you in a much more efficient manner than the one you've described."

"I take it you've a better plan?" Gizmo snorted.

"Yes. I do."