AUTHOR'S NOTE: YAY! Another chapter. The flashback scene in this one is high K plus.
"We had to wake Anna up," answered Zia, who was currently glaring at Anna.
Damien raised an eyebrow called Lian, Megan, and Anna over. When they were up Damien looked Anna the eye and asked, "Why did you wake up so late."
Anna opened her mouth to answer but Zia beat her to it, "She was working on her science stuff. Some about quantum time physics (AUTHOR'S NOTE: I have no idea what quantum time physics are or if they are even real but I know what a tesseract is) and tesseracts."
"Anna," sighed Damien, "You have work to do."
Lian came up beside Damien and kissed his cheek saying, "Damien's right, Anna lately you've been too focused on science and training. All that's good but too much of a good thing isn't good at all. You have other stuff like chores, and spending time with-"
"NO!" shouted Anna.
"What-"
"NO! Don't you get it? Training and science are the only things I have left of my parents! Megan has her parents memories, Zia can use magic to find out what her mother was like, Robin's parents had journals, and Miguel's Beetle thing tells him about his dad! MY DAD DIED BEFORE I WAS BORN! ALL I HAVE LEFT OF HIM ARE SOME SCIENCE FORMULAS! SCIENCE! S-C-I-E-N-C-E! AND MY MOM…" yelled Artemis, and then her voice became a shuddering whisper, "my mom…" with that Anna fled the training room at super speed leaving a very disturbed group of metas and two non-metas.
Damien started forward but Lian put a hand on his shoulder and said, "Let me handle this, you start training."
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It's not fair thought Anna. But then again how was anything in their crazy messed up world fair. She knew that soon Damien would come and started talking about how it's for 'their own good'. That was why she had to find a good hiding place. She stopped when she came to her mother's memorial stone. Her father's was right beside it. The memorial grove was a stoned paved section of ground. Other heroes who Damien and Lian had known of had memorials too. The fountain that Katara had been using earlier was in the center. The memorials surrounded the fountain. Trees surrounded the beautiful serene place. She stood absolutely still in front her parents' grav- no memorials. She fell to her knees in front her mother's memorial as she mentally relived her mother death.
FLASHBACK (SEVEN YEARS AGO)
LOCATION: JUST OUTSIDE THE ORIGINAL SAFE HOUSE WHICH WAS JUST A SHACK WITH HI-TECH SHIELDING
EXACT LOCATION: THE CANYON
EVENT: ARTEMIS' DEATH (AUTHOR'S NOTE: THIS PART IS HIGH K plus)
Anna stood at the bottom of the Canyon. She was bore. Her Auntie Jade had told her to come here. At least, she thought it was Auntie Jade. It talked like and it looked like, but it didn't act like her. It walked funny, and it told to come here… which was funny because usually Auntie Jade told her, Zia, Megan, Robin, and Katara not to leave the safe house. She absentmindedly kicked a pebble. She knelt down and looked at the small stone. It was shaking. Rattling even… Slowly she turned around. A massive amount of animal like aliens was stampeding toward her. She gasped and tried to run at super speed but tripped over the very stone she had been examining. By the time she got up it was too late to run The odd machines were running around her. They sprinted past her almost trampling her. There were too many. She couldn't run through them without running into one of them. As she stumbled through one of them hit her shoulder.
"MOM!" she shrieked as she tumbled to the ground. Why did Aunt Jade tell her to come here? She tried to get up but she couldn't. Just when she thought one of them was going to run right over her out of the fray leaped her mother. Artemis tossed Anna over shoulder and shot a grappling arrow at the canyon wall. Still running she cradled Anna and then the grappling hook tugged them up to the canyon wall. Artemis just made it to a ledge and placed Anna on it. Then her grappling arrow came undone and she fell back into crowd of alien menaces, which were still passing though the canyon.
"MOM!" Anna cried. Anna's eyes searched the canyon for her mother. Just when her mother shot another grappling arrow to another ledge a little farther along the way. Anna scrambled through a small tunnel to get a better vantage point.
Artemis hung to a small ledge. She couldn't get up. Her feet kept slipping and she couldn't reach her boy. From the shadows of the ledge emerged her sister, Jade.
"Jade! Oh, thank goodness. HELP ME! Please," Artemis shouted.
"Hmmmm… said Jade as she leaned over to the ledge and grabbed Artemis' hands, "I'm not Jade." And then it face morphed into hideous looking alien. Artemis' eyes widened as the extra-terrestrial flung her arm from her; in the process knocking her bow from her back; it clattered uselessly to the ground. Just as Anna emerged from the tunnel she saw Artemis hit the ground with a sickening thud. The animals trampled over her obscuring her from Anna's view. Another, another, and another. Then as the last one came Anna super speeded to the bottom of the canyon.
"Mom?" she called out uncertainly, "Mom?" she called again.
She walked to where she'd seen her mother landed and a horrifying sight. Her mother lay on the ground. Carefully she stepped towards her mother's listless form. Tentatively, she reached out and nudged her mother. Artemis didn't move.
"Mommy?" she whispered.
She touched her again. Nothing. She shook her mother rapidly. Nothing…
She turned away and ran a little ways from her mother's… body… and shouted, "Help! Somebody? Anybody?! HELP!"
Nobody came. Turning back to her mother she nestled under arm.
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Anna reached to her neck and took up the small chain that hung there. Carefully she fingered the engagement ring that was the pendant of the necklace. Her mother's engagement ring.
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CONTINUE FLASHBACK:
As she sobbed into her mother's arm she gripped her mother's necklace. On it was an engagement ring. Her mother had told her that she had found after Anna's father had died. She said it was back at their house along with two plane tickets to Paris. Uncertainly she unclasped the necklace. She slowly put into her pocket. Her mother's bow and arrows were miraculously undamaged. Angrily she gripped the bow in her hands and wept into her mother's shoulder again. Suddenly, she heard something behind her. She whipped her head around and saw her Auntie Jade standing there.
"AUNTIE JADE?!" she shouted as she stood up, the bow still at hand, "Something's wrong with my mommy!"
"Sweetheart," said the thing venomously, "Your mother is dead."
"WHAT?" Anna whispered.
"Why did you come here. You know better. It's your fault she's dead."
"No," Anna muttered, trembling.
"Yes," it said, "YOU did."
"But you told me come-"
"Did I?" it said as it transformed back into the monster.
Anna gasped.
"RUN little one," it screeched.
And Anna RAN.
"Hmmmm…." It said and signaled for the other creatures to come out of hiding, "Another one… take the body away. It would not do to leave evidence." And they disappeared without a trace.
END FLASH BACK (AUTHOR'S NOTE: Can anyone guess what movie inspired that scene?)
Anna felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned around expecting to see Damien but instead it was Lian. Lian sat beside her.
She was silent for a few moments before asking, "Do you want to talk about?"
Anna stopped fiddling with the ring. She turned to Lian and whispered, "I'm working on a time machine."
"WHAT?" Lian asked, startled.
"A time machine, like the one Impulse made. He stopped the Reach that way so maybe we can stop Ultron that way… "
"Anna, they- you- you can't just build a time-"
"But I have to try. I have a whole bunch of stuff, but I'm missing key components…"
"ANNA. You have to be patient , you have to stay safe.
"STAY SAFE! NOTHING EVER HAPPENS HERE. EVER. It's just training and chores and…"
"Anna, please, it's what your mother would have wanted."
Anna stopped. She glanced at the memorial stone. She sighed. "Alright…" she muttered, "I'll come train."
"And?" prodded Lian.
"And… I'll sleep at night…"
"Good," Lian said giving Anna a hug, "now come on."
AUTHOR'S NOTE: KK, got that chapter done. Yes, there will be another chapter. Probably in a week or so. Anyway, can anyone guess what movie inspired Artemis' death scene?