Author's Note: Thanks for all the positive responses to all that angst in the last chapter. Remy isn't a very emotional character so it might have seemed OOC of her, but I think she's earned herself a good cry. Lord knows I'd be balling my eyes out haha. Anyways, enjoy the next chapter!

Disclaimer: I do not own Young Justice.

Chapter Twenty Six: Lacey Vanderbilt

"Just one more minute, Mom! Dad's on the TV!" Ten year old Remington Vanderbilt, clad in her karate robes, cried from her spot on the floor.

Lacey Vanderbilt smiled at her young daughter from the couch and set the remote down. Her father, Captain of the fire station at 48th and Clinton in Gotham City, smiled onscreen as a reporter interviewed him.

"It took us awhile to get the flames under control enough so that we could enter the building," he was saying a smile on his face. "But we managed to get the family out safe and sound. Those folks are going to be just fine and we'll be getting to work right away on cleaning up the debris."

The reporter nodded, switching the microphone back to herself as she looked at the camera. "Well you heard it straight from Fire Chief John Vanderbilt himself. The fire at the Met Apartments has been contained and the injured family is going to be okay. This has been Kiki Sanders, reporting for Gotham News in the afternoon."

Remy looked up at her mother. "Does this mean Dad's coming home tonight?"

Lacey shook her head and Remy's shoulders drooped as she stood up. "Sorry babe, he's working until Friday."

"But it's Wednesday!" Remy cried indignantly.

Lacey chuckled. "Yes it is. Which means it's time for karate class."

Remy seemed to brighten at this momentarily until her mother stood up to grab the car keys from the oak coffee table. "But Mom, Dad always takes me!"

Lacey sighed, pushing her daughter towards the door. "Your father will be able to take you on Saturday, okay?"

Remy sighed heavily, her small shoulders drooping once more as the pair made their way to the family SUV. Lacey opened up and slid into the driver's seat, waiting until Remy was buckled in before she started the engine.

Looking over her shoulder, Lacey backed out of the driveway, noting her daughter's still distraught expression. She shook her head. Remy had such a strong connection to her father.

God forbid something happens to him, she thought worriedly.

"Why don't you turn that frown upside down, kiddo?" Lacey smiled.

"I don't want to go anymore. I want Dad to take me," she huffed.

Lacey laughed quietly. "I know I'm not your first choice, but how about I make you a deal?"

Remy narrowed her eyes. "What sort of a deal? I'm ten now which means I know what's what."

Lacey nodded, laughing inside. "You're right. I can't dupe you anymore with promises of a new Barbie."

"I never played with Barbies!" Remy protested. "Not since I was five!"

Lacey ignored the Barbie comment.

"How about you put a smile on that pretty face of yours and have fun at karate and then after we can get some ice cream and go visit Dad at the station tomorrow."

Remy seemed to think about this for a moment. "I want a triple scooper."

"One scoop only, you know the rules."

"Fine," Remy huffed, "but I want sprinkles."

Remy crossed the police lines at the Jasmine Springs Wellness Center and entered into the building, the team—clad in their civvies—at her back. The faces in the hallway blurred past her until a hand shot out to stop her.

John Vanderbilt smiled as he watched his wife and his seven year old daughter play at the park together.

He'd come home from work to find a note on the fridge explaining they'd gone to the park and that they'd be back soon. Unable to be separated from his family any longer, he walked down the street to the park—the only park—that Remy liked to play at.

He watched from afar for a few minutes, watching as Remy showed off her acrobatic skills on the monkey bars while Lacey clapped and cheered enthusiastically.

Smile still firmly planted on his face, John walked up behind his wife and slid his arms around her waist. With a startled yelp, she turned around to get a glance of who was holding onto her.

"Oh—John! You scared me," she put a hand to her chest and laughed lightly.

"Good thing you're—"

"Daddy!" Remy yelled, slipping off the monkey bars. She ran towards her father at full speed and flung her arms around him.

"Hey, kiddo," he grinned, ruffling her hair affectionately. "How's it hanging?" He looked pointedly at the monkey bars.

Remy giggled and glanced back at the monkey bars. "I get it. Hanging. Good one Dad." The young girl then turned her attention towards her mother, a frustrated expression on her face. "Why didn't you tell me Daddy was coming to the park with us?"

Lacey held up her hands. "Nobody clued me in. Why don't you show Daddy what you've been practicing on the monkey bars?"

"You need to see this," Remy said firmly, her childlike face completely serious. "It's my best tricks all put into one."

"I'm watching," John assured her, sliding his arm around his wife's waist. She smiled as he pulled her close to his side and together they watched as Remy jumped up to grab the monkey bars.

She swung her legs through the adjacent bar and ended up sitting on top of the monkey bars. "You're watching right?"

"Of course!" John laughed. "Show us what you got!"

Remy proceeded to start her routine—the one she had been practicing since they'd got to the park—happily swinging and flipping through the bars.

Lacey smiled happily. "She's happy to see you."

John grinned. "I hope somebody else is as well."

Lacey squeezed his hand. "Of course."

The pair watched in silence as their daughter swung and played on the jungle gym, each of her acrobatic feats more spectacular than the last.

"She really is something," John muttered.

"Of course she is. She's our daughter."

John laughed. "But she's different than all the other children, Lace, I can tell. Despite what she thinks, she's not going to end up a lowly firefighter like me. She'll do more than that, I can feel it."

"Thank God she takes after you in the athletic department," Lacey laughed.

The couple fell silent and watched as Remy slipped off the monkey bars, failing to complete her planned sequence. She fell to the ground with a grumble and met her parents' eyes as she dusted herself up.

"I'm ready to leave," she proclaimed, walking past her parents to the street that lead back to their neighborhood.

"Well alrighty then," Lacey said, watching as Remy walked off without then.

"So independent," John muttered as they followed after her. "I think she gets it from you."

Lacey nodded. "I just hope it doesn't bite her in the ass someday."

Wally's hand was on her arm. Remy stopped and stared down at his hand, then back up at the hallway. They were just a hundred feet away from her mom's room and the amount of crime scene investigators and detectives were increasing.

"Maybe this isn't a good idea," Wally said gently.

"The body's been cleared out," Remy informed him, struggling to keep her voice even. She couldn't break down here, in front of all these people.

She needed to focus.

Remy Vanderbilt was thirteen years old and now officially a teenager. With that came angst, hormones, and above all, a major attitude.

Her mother was the first to experience it.

"Remington you're—"

"My name is Remy," the young brunette snapped at her mother. "And why can't I hang out with my friends on my birthday?"

Lacey Vanderbilt sighed. "Because, as your mother, I'm telling you that the friends you now want to spend your time with aren't part of a good crowd."

"If I had asked Dad, he would have said yes."

"Well you're talking to me right now," Lacey said firmly. "So you can deal with that."

Remy rolled her eyes and looked away.

"Why don't you give Jessica a call and invite her for dinner and a movie?"

Remy scoffed. "Jessica and I aren't speaking anymore. She told Bobby Hendricks that I have a crush on him."

"Have you thought about calling her to work it out?" Lacey asked.

"There's nothing to work out," Remy sniffed, tossing her hair over her shoulder. "She betrayed me and I'm not giving her a second chance."

Lacey raised an eyebrow. "So just like that, she's out of your life?"

"Yes."

"It's that simple?" Lacey clarified.

"It is," Remy confirmed with a curt nod. "I don't need extraneous friendships that, in the end, will get me nowhere. And it's my birthday, I can do what I want."

Lacey drew in a short breath, secretly wondering when her daughter had expanded her vocabulary with a word like extraneous. It had seemed like just yesterday when Remy was learning the ABC's. "That doesn't include back talking your mother."

Remy stayed silent, staring back at her mom with defiant eyes.

Lacey sighed, getting up from her seat at the dining room table. "One day, Remy, you'll learn that you can't just throw people out of your life like a piece of trash. People don't just go disappear."

Lacey leaned her elbows on the dining room chair. "Why don't you give Jess a call? I'm sure she'd love to talk to you."

"I'm sure she would," Remy spat out coldly, feeling oddly powerful as a look of disappointment flitted across her mother's pretty features.

Remy Vanderbilt was officially a teenager.

Remy walked ahead of her teammates, wondering why on earth they had decided to come along.

Her mother was dead. End of story.

Dead, dead, and dead.

And despite what her mother had always told her, people did just disappear. Her mother had literally just been taken from this world.

There was no changing it.

But why did her teammates still hover beside her, glancing over at her every few seconds as if she might keel over?

Remy liked to think that it was because they cared.

But, in all honesty, her mother hadn't been her mom since she'd been admitted to the mental hospital. For god sake's, she couldn't even remember her own daughter's name.

Still, as Remy approached her mother's room, she wished that she would've come to visit her more often. Just like she wished she could have said something else entirely the last time she saw her Dad alive. Something meaningful.

"So that's it?" Fifteen year old Remy grinned. "I can go to the concert?"

"If you promise not to talk to anyone strange or do anything reckless, then yes, you can go," John Vanderbilt told her.

"I promise," Remy held up her right hand.

Her Dad smiled slightly. "Good. Then what time should I expect you home?"

"Lauren's Dad said we should be home by one at the latest," Remy informed him.

John nodded. "That's fine. As long as you don't tell your mother I let you stay out too late."

"Dad," Remy groaned, "she's in Chicago, there's no way she's finding out."

John snorted and stood up, ruffling his daughter's hair like he used to when she was younger. "Alright, alright, now if I'm correct, Mr. Sidney is waiting out front for you. Have fun, cool cat."

Remy smiled at her Dad and hurried towards the door. "Thanks Dad. Catch you on the flip side."

Catch you on the flip side. She'd said that to her father on the day that he died. It was the last thing she'd ever said to him, in fact. The day a terrible fire had started in their home and he had been trapped under a fallen beam. It was ironic really, a firefighter killed in a fire in his own house.

And the last thing she'd said to him were catch you on the flip side? That was worse than her saying she hated him, at least that implied an actual feeling behind the words. Catch you on the flip side was something she said to everyone.

Remy couldn't even remember the last words she said to her mother.

It didn't matter anyhow; her mother had been completely catatonic for the last two years.

"Remy Vanderbilt?"

Remy focused in on the detective that was calling out to her. "That's me."

"I'm Detective Conners," a short, stout man introduced himself. "First of all, I am very sorry for your loss."

"Thanks," Remy answered automatically.

"But I do have some questions I need answered," he said awkwardly, "about your mother."

"Do you really think that's such a good idea?" Artemis barked from beside her.

"Of course I understand this is a difficult time—"

"Its fine," Remy assured him. "I have some questions of my own, in fact."

Conners nodded. "I'm going to need you to step in here and take a look at your mother's room. There are some things we need clarification on."