So sorry I forgot to put this up when I posted it on AO3! Anyway, this chapter is a little odd, so just bear with me! Very dream sequencey!


It's Been Awhile:

Everything around her was dark, and her ears were ringing when Mina woke up, a thick void that threatened to swallow her up again.

"So why was Red Claw after you?" A male voice asked through the darkness.

She blinked the void away, eyes focusing on a young man in an absurd outfit. "I don't know." She felt herself mutter, but the voice was all wrong, far too young.

The young man, boy really, raised a red eyebrow, "You're a pretty terrible liar."

She felt herself stand sluggishly and continue to speak in that too young voice, "So I've been told. So what's your name? I need to thank you."

"You can call me Speedy." He said curtly.

Something flickered on her face, something she was unfamiliar with, "I meant your real name, not your alias." She felt herself sigh when he didn't respond. "Well then 'Call Me Speedy', thank you for saving us."

"Well I couldn't let you drown, and I couldn't let Red Claw kidnap you." The boy continued awkwardly. "So what's your name?"

She felt herself bite her lip, an odd feeling gesture, "My name's Katherine."

No, that was wrong. Her name was Mina. Was she being hypnotized by those crazy people?

Her eyes didn't stray from the boy though, they couldn't. His every movement was riveting her to the spot. He shifted awkwardly, "Pretty name. What's his name?" He asked, looking at a sleeping child she hadn't noticed.

"That's my little brother Damian." The too young, crazy voice said, the odd feeling on her face intensifying.

"He looks like you." The boy said, and she was suddenly closer to him.

"You know, I should give you something for saving us. That's what's done, right?" The girl voice said, just a hint of some familiar tone to it.

The boy flushed, "I don't need anything."

"Of course you do!" She exclaimed, "I need to thank you for not calling the League."

"They wouldn't take anything I say seriously. I'm just a sidekick." He replied venomously.

"Well, Red, sidekicks grow up. You'll get your own place someday, I'm sure." She shivered.

"Red?" The boy scoffed. "Why do you keep calling me that?"

An uncomfortable breath of air ripped from her lips, "I can't very well call you Speedy. Everyone calls you that!" She watched her hand reach out to touch his hair, and there was no denying it, that was her hand, down to the pale birthmark just above the bone on her wrist, "Plus, you've got red hair."

The boy shifted uncomfortably, "You're cold, he must be freezing. Why don't you two get going to someplace warm and safe."

She felt a more familiar smile tug at her lips, and hopped off the dumpster to stand in front of him. "Well I guess this is goodbye then, Red. I hope we see each other again someday. Thank you."

There was a second of hesitation before she grabbed him, pressing her lips to his. While the kiss was brief and certainly a figment of her imagination, it felt right. He jerked under her touch, surprised for an instant before he kissed back, putting a warm gloved hand on her cheek. She wanted to melt into his touch, into the odd comfort of him. But she pulled away unwillingly, picking up the sleeping younger boy and leaving with a call over her shoulder, "Bye, Red!"

An unsettling wave passed over her and she was suddenly in another place, the body she was ghosting in much more mature than the last. There were dishes in her hands, the cool ceramic feeling incredibly real, the window above the sink exposing a beautiful snowscape unlike one she had seen before. It was really lovely. A glint of gold caught her eye, and she found herself staring at a wedding band on her left hand. Crane had never given her a ring. She was startled out of her inspection of the foreign object when a door slammed open. The dark haired boy, older than before, in her peripheral vision went running, and she felt compelled to follow. "Red, are you okay?" The boy asked, his voice making her gut churn.

"Roy, what's wrong?" She felt herself ask, the voice much more her own, kneeling beside him and pushing the boy behind her.

"Don't call me that!" He yelled, hitting his head against the wooden floor, "I'm not Roy."

"What?" She asked in confusion, touching his hand, where a matching gold ring dug into the skin, trying to escape the pressure he was putting on the floor.

He sobbed, and for the first time she recognized him as the redheaded boy from the first vision, "I'm a clone, Katherine. The real Roy Harper is somewhere else. For three years, I've been in his place. I'm not real."

She felt her head shake, "Red, you are real. Calm down. I..."

"I'm not real!" He flung a hand out, hitting her across the face, knocking her back. She was still, shock echoing through her body as she picked herself up off the floor and wiped a smear of blood off of her mouth.

The naive girl kept trying to soothe him, to end his pacing. The groveling went on for far too long, "Baby, we'll get through this together. It will be okay. I love you. Just stay with me. Red, please stop. You're scaring Damian." The boy was wide eyed in the corner of the room, and the redheaded man's eyes flitted to him.

He grabbed her by the shoulders, shaking her, "I have to leave, Katherine. I need to figure this out on my own, and I need you not to follow me."

Tears filled her eyes, and she did something Mina would never do, she begged, "Red, please don't leave me."

"I'm so sorry, Kat. I love you, but that's the only thing I'm sure of right now." He wiped a tear off her face, "Don't follow me. I don't want to hurt you anymore then I am right now."

The boy, Damian, threw himself at them, wrapping his arms around them both, "Please, Red, don't leave us." The boy was strong, but the man pried him off easily.

"I'm sorry." He whispered before he walked out.

The unsettling wave passed over her again, and she was back in the kitchen, "No, Lois, I'm not in the mood to go out tonight. Yes, Damian's at a friend's house, but still, I just want a night in by myself." The woman on the other end of the line protested furiously, but something outside caught her eye, something Mina didn't notice, "Lois, I've got to call you back."

The redheaded man was back at the door, face scruffy, but eyes clear. She reached a hand out to him, not saying a word as she pulled him into the house and into their bedroom. After a rather spectacular round of sex, where he worshiped every inch of her body like a dying man drinking in an ocean full of water, they finally spoke, his deep masculine voice breaking the silence, "I'm sorry."

She cuddled into him, something Mina certainly didn't do. "Hush, Red. You're here, right now. Let's just be in the now. Can you do that for me?"

He nodded, tightening his arms around her, "I love you, Kat."

Something wistful pulled at her gut, and she frowned slightly, "I know you do." Her eyes trailed to her wrists, where thin scars told her that the naive little girl was long gone. Those were cuts meant to end a life, the naive girl from before would never have considered something so immoral.

When she woke up she was alone, the only real signs that he'd ever been there the ache between her legs and note on the kitchen white board, 'I'm sorry' echoed again in black marker. A very familiar anger swept through her and she furiously erased the words, "One of these days I just need to go out with Lois and get plastered instead of putting myself through all this shit." She grumbled curses as she cleaned the house, and for once Mina felt connected to the girl.

She was lost when the vision changed again. "Holy shit, Harper. You're pregnant." She glared at the other woman, snatching a little pink stick from her.

"Screw you, Lois. I don't need your approval to get laid!" She snapped.

The woman, Lois, a creature with a beautiful yet aquiline face and eyes that missed nothing, threw her hands up, "Okay, be a bitch. See if I throw you a baby shower."

"Takes one to know one, Lois!" She yelled after the other woman, staring down at the stick in her hands, "Oh, shit." She laughed a little, "Damnit, Clark. Why'd you have to be right?"

The vision changed again, and so did the body. Her center of balance was totally wrong, and she was dizzy. "Kat? You okay?"

She blinked a few times, vision returning to normal again, "Yeah, just dizzy. Can you repeat what you just said?"

"Um.. You okay?" The boy, the brother, Damian, said nervously.

She narrowed her eyes at him, "Not that, the other thing."

He winced, "Uh, I may have failed my English test."

Frustration welled up, "Really, Dai? As if I don't have enough on my plate, now I've got to worry about your grades? Is this some absurd cry for more attention?"

Anger colored his face, "No! I just messed up, it's not a big deal."

She stood directly in front of him, arms crossed in front of her tightly, "Damian Kyle, it is too a big deal. I can't handle worrying about you right now, okay? I can barely handle myself."

"I didn't tell you to let him in and get knocked up." The kid snapped.

Knocked up? That would explain why her crossed arms were so far up, they were resting on slightly larger breasts and above a rather distended stomach. Pregnant. Yes, it was there, that same fear and trepidation she remembered from being pregnant herself, but even in the strange hallucination this pregnancy felt more real, more right. She could feel the child stretching inside of her, more than she'd ever remembered feeling Elise.

What did it all mean?

They kept telling her that she was this woman, that she wasn't Mina Crane, but a woman named Katherine Harper. How odd that those memories seemed so much more real than the ones she thought were her own. The baby gave a sharp kick and an odd sense of calm came over her. The baby. She somehow knew it was the baby calming her down.

An empath.

Just like the girl with the red curls. The girl who truly believed she was her daughter. Those red curls had haunted her for years. Why? Was it possible that they were telling her the truth? She couldn't remember ever loving Crane, but that man, Red, he was captivating, and she was endeared to him just from a string of visions where in half of them he was screwing things up.

And the girl.

There was a tremendous fire in her. She would have made a fantastic Shadow, almost better than Mina.

Lian.

That was her name, and it stirred something in her as the baby in the vision moved again. She tuned back to the woman that was possibly her speaking to the boy. "Damian, you broke into...what?"

"Kat, cool down, it's just an old hard drive, and the term is hacked, not broke into." The teenager said blithely.

"You can't do that, Damian. No hacking! It's illegal!" She yelled.

He scoffed, "Mom wouldn't have a problem with it."

The woman absolutely screeched, "Mom? Really? Mom? The same mother who would have let you starve if I hadn't been there to take care of you? The same mother who could hardly hold you for longer than two minutes? She was shit to me, but she was way worse to you."

Damian said nothing, just stared at her, a sad expression on his face, "You be a better mom to her than ours was to us, okay?"

They embraced.

Mina woke up.

Or was she Kat?

Honestly, she didn't know anymore.

"Lian, calm down." The man's voice said from somewhere outside her room.

"I can't!" The girl yelled, "I didn't mean to! I didn't mean to hurt her! I'm so sorry!"

"Raven, do something! She's going to lose it." The man growled, Red, she placed it. That's what Red sounded like now.

Another female spoke, the voice the same as the one that had chastised a young Lian the first time she had laid eyes on the girl, "I'll do what I can. Azarath Metrion Zinthos. Azarath Metrion Zinthos." The chanting continued, and Lian's panicked cries softened into whispered before fading into the background noise.

The woman opened her eyes, into the eyes of another woman. Selina Kyle. She had seen the woman a few times before during her captivity, but they'd never been so close. "Hello, Kitten." Selina whispered, touching her cheek tenderly.

"You know me?" Mina asked before she could stop herself.

Selina nodded, "Of course I do. I'm your mother after all."

Her mother?

It was a foreign concept, but looking into Selina Kyle's face was like looking into a mirror. The same thin nose and thick red lips. The same shaped eyes. The color was different though. Selina's constantly shifted from dark brown to a calm forest green, Mina knew her's were blue. The same blue as the little red haired girl and the man she'd seen standing at Selina's side so often.

"I-" She began, but stopped, unsure of what to say.

Selina touched a damp rag to her forehead, "You hit your head when you fell."

"Don't remember falling." She whispered, Selina's gentle touch making her head spin.

Selina nodded, her dark chocolate hair falling across her face, four shades lighter than Mina's, "You upset my granddaughter." She smiled thinly, "She's an empath, and she isn't always in control of herself. We weren't sure you would wake up after she zapped you."

"I'm tougher than I look." She quipped, though she felt like she'd been punched in the gut and then run over by an eighteen wheeler.

Another tender swipe to her forehead, "I know you are. My tough little Kitten."

"Where are the rest of my torturers?" She asked, trying to keep up conversation with the one person that hadn't yelled at her or tried to intimidate her.

The older woman rolled her eyes, "We aren't torturing you. Trust me, if we were, you wouldn't be in a room like this. Of course when J'onn get's back, he'll want his plush interrogation room back."

"Is she okay? The little girl?" She asked Selina.

That got her another smile, "Lian's fine. She mostly just panicked when you wouldn't wake up. I told her you'd be fine, but this has been so hard for her."

She didn't want to talk about the little girl anymore, about Lian. "Who am I?"

Selina paused, the blood tinged red rag in her hand lowering to her lap as she sighed, "That's a subject of great contention, as I'm sure you are aware. According to your DNA and my gut, you're Kat Harper. According to you, however, you're a woman named Mina Crane. Which one are you?"

She felt ill, "I'm not sure. When I got here, I was all Mina, but now...I'm remembering Kat too. Which one is the lie?"

Selina cupped her face in her hands, rag abandoned, "I don't know, Kitten. That's for you to find out." Selina kissed her forehead, more tenderly than she could ever remember anyone touching her. "Come back when you know. Don't leave an old woman hanging with such a question lingering." Selina told her, slipping to the door, and with one last easy smile, slipping out the doorway, leaving the door itself unlatched.

It took her just a few seconds to decide that she needed to get the hell off the space station. Selina had made it easy. There was a pile of new clothes, clothes she'd seen the civilian workers of the tower wearing when they'd slid food across the room at her. She changed quickly, not willing to risk being caught.

Ah, yes, Selina was very good. It was time for a shift change, so without hardly any ado, she blended in with the crowd of similarly dressed workers, her black-brown hair curled up under the standard issue cap.

"Gotham. Why does it always have to be Gotham?" She said to herself once they landed. It wasn't a bad thing though, at least she had a cache of her own things in Gotham. The sooner she shed the League clothes, the better.


"And it's been awhile
Since I can say that I wasn't addicted
And it's been awhile
Since I can say I love myself as well
And it's been awhile
Since I've gone and fucked things up just like I always do
And it's been awhile
But all that shit seems to disappear when I'm with you

And everything I can't remember
As fucked up as it all may seem
The consequences that I've rendered
I've gone and fucked things up again

Why must I feel this way?
Just make this go away
Just one more peaceful day!

And it's been awhile
Since I could look at myself straight
And it's been awhile
Since I said I'm sorry
And it's been awhile
Since I've seen the way the candles light your face
And it's been awhile
But I can still remember just the way you taste"

It's Been Awhile
By: Staind


We'll get back to Lian and everyone else next chapter. Also, a current Red/Kat scene is in the future! Exciting!

What'd you guys think?

-Jenn

P.S. The next chapter is done, it'll be up before Monday, promise, that's when I go back to school for my last year before student teaching!