The Flight of the Blue Beetle 12
"I am letting your mother have it when we find them," Bianca told her husband as they rushed back to the city in a cab.
"Not only you," for the first time in a long time Alberto was also furious with his mother.
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The blade pressed against the neck he had been kissing not too long ago.
"Brenda, please don't," Jaime said landing as close as he dared.
"Don't do something foolish girl," La Dama shouted worry painting her voice.
"I am not," she said before turning to Jaime, "I can't let you take her."
Then she threw a punch his way with her other hand as she held to something. However, the fist didn't even reach him. Another body got in the way.
"Wow, I can't you beat me again," he said as blood started to pour from his lips.
"Pa-Paco?" Brenda hadn't realized he was there, didn't even think so possible until she saw his dulling brown eyes. She looked at his ashen face down to where her fist had pierced his chest and crushed his heart. She couldn't move but didn't have to worry because a moment later Jaime had pulled him back and laid him on the blood covered grass.
"Save him Khaji-Da!" Jaime shouted unable to concentrate to communicate with the scarab through thought, "please!"
"There is nothing that can be done Jaime Reyes. The Damage is too great."
"Don't tell me that! Please do something!" he begged.
"Jaime I-" Brenda started.
"Shut up!" he shouted at her, his helmet falling back to reveal his furious face.
"Jaime?" La Dama said in shock from where she stood. She realized then she had messed directly with the family of a superhero. She cursed under her breath. She was lucky the League hadn't fallen on her back yard.
"Please Khaji-Da, there has to be something," he could feel his friend's grip weakening. Still, Paco was smiling at him. He had already made his peace. They pretty much had beaten La Dama. He felt sad about not seeing his mother again and the thought of his friends hating each other, but in his current state there was little he could do about this.
"Dammit!" they heard La Dama curse before they turned to see the rest of their friends arrive, but instead of attacking they saw Paco's horrifying state.
"No," Tye said with tears already forming in his eyes. Though he liked to claim he didn't get along with him, he actually did look up to him when it came to his sincerity and devotion towards his friends.
La Dama didn't waste a minute and started chanting under her breath. It was not a full moon, heck the sunset was barely getting there, but she couldn't back away. She had to place as much space between her and them. She ran to her niece, pulled her kneeling form away from Paco and Jaime before cutting her palm with the knife she had threatened to take her own life with and then her own.
"If we want to get out of this, you have to lend me your power Brenda," she said fast before finishing her incantation. Brenda almost fainted at the feeling but regained her balance in time to see the fallen guards stand again, but this time their bodies moved like those of puppets with loose strings. They picked the remaining weapons about and started shooting as La Dama started another incantation.
"Please don't die," Jaime said sorrowfully as he was surrounded by his friends and comrades. Khaji-Da was still trying to find a way to save Paco at Jaime's request.
"Get your shit together!" Kid Flash shouted at him as more Coyotes were summoned, "now!"
Jaime looked up and saw all that was going on. He knew he had to do something, but he also had to save Paco. He just got him back; he couldn't lose his friend again so soon.
"Dammit, people sometimes die Jaime," Bart told him a bit kinder, "it just happens."
Khaji-Da knew that the success on their mission depended on Jaime getting back on his feet. There was an option, but it was too risky but as the sentient intelligence realized there was no other way it started to explain, "T.A.U. optional. Side effects-"
"I don't care! Just do it!" Jaime had shouted before his hand covered the hole where Paco's heart used to be. A mass from the armor detached and covered the hole. A few moments it had healed the flesh and started working in the inside recreating a heart. A few moments later Paco gasped for air before his eyes rolled back and then fainted. Jaime made sure he would be fine before standing. The helmet of the armor pulled back up, but even so the fury in his eyes could not be hidden. A moment later he was in the air blasting, vaporizing and cutting their enemies down.
When it was all done and only La Dama remained on her knees looking weak and frightened Jaime walked towards her and Brenda's sobbing form. She hadn't seen Jaime save Paco's life, so she still blamed herself for it. She had used an amulet that she found in her aunt's witching room thinking she could use it to push Jaime and the rest back. She never imagined it as powerful as to break someone's chest cavity.
"He is alive," he said first to her and then turned to La Dama, "is over."
The woman didn't say anything but just looked down.
"Well, isn't this a sight?" Jaime knew that voice, but he couldn't believe he heard it here. He turned around to see his grandmother Conchi and his little sister Milagro walk towards them in the mess their battle had left.
"Concha!" La Dama regained some of her strength and stood up.
"Child, I told you your abuse would be your own downfall, but did you hear me? Of course not," sighed the old woman, "you went as far as to hire a gun to try to hurt my family. I might be old, but my guards are powered by the love I feel for my family while you have cut yours down. Now this girl is all that is left and even now she might be too broken to be fixed."
"Shut up old witch!" shouted La Dama. "I did what I had to do to survive!" and she took hold of Brenda's bleeding hand with so much strenghth that Brenda screamed in pain. "I will take your power too and then-"
"Poor child," Conchi said walking closer to them. Everyone parted until the old woman and child were a few paces away from them.
"Don't pity me!" La Dama had shouted before she threw a blast at them. A white barrier shone around them and the blast faded away.
"You even put a spell on your own niece, poor thing" Conchi walked even further before giving Milagro a gentle nod.
"Hi Brenda," said the little girl offering Brenda a smile, "I am going to help you." She said placing her hands on the sides of Brenda's head.
"Abuela?" Jaime asked confused at what he was seeing.
"Just watch mijo," his grandmother told him as he watched her grandchild and heir work her magic (literally).
Brenda knew she didn't have a reason to fear Jaime's little sister. There had always been something about the girl that she liked, and it wasn't just because she liked to annoy her brother. Slowly, but surely she felt part of her mind return. Memories that were not true were removed for the real ones to surface. She didn't kill her father. He had finally come around to tell her the truth about her aunt and why they had left. She had demanded they exposed her, but her father refused fearing for their safety. After a while of her insistence, he gave in and started to drive to meet with someone that might help them. That was when his car was covered by a curse and he crashed. She realized her ability to sense magic when she got to the sight of the accident, but it was too late.
Her aunt was already at the sight, and the moment she spotted her she placed a veil over her mind.
"You!" she launched at her aunt but Jaime held her back, "you made me think I killed my father!"
"You wouldn't have come with me otherwise!" La Dama said looked desperately at her niece.
"You… you…" Brenda felt weak again and fell back. Jaime helped her sit before Milagro went to sit by her side with gentle words of comfort.
"What now?" Jaime asked his grandmother.
"Something I should have done a long time ago," Conchi said giving everyone there an apologizing look. The elder woman kneeled before Amparo Cardenas before pulling her hands to connect with her own, "it won't hurt."
What followed afterward was like a dream. Everything happened so fast that it took him a few days to fully absorb it. He was thankful for his friends. Otherwise, he would still be at a loss.
The evidence that Damper, Bonita, and the rest gathered was given to Robin at a meeting point. It was given to the League before the right people were contacted and all the business tied to La Dama's operation were tied in. The proof he gathered from her office added to the fire when they saw the incriminating emails she used to contact the Meta hunters around the world. It didn't take long for La Dama to be held in custody with no chance of getting out for a long time after her trial.
"Give it back! I want my magic back!" she screeched from her cell to any who would be unfortunate enough to pass.
His grandmother had the rare skill to remove magic abilities. Not for herself, but it seemed her coven (though almost extinct) had a pack with a certain Phantom Stranger. Their magic was undetectable in exchange of helping to remove the powers of evil witches.
"Is only passed down to the women in our family," Conchi explained as Milagro laid her head on her brother's lap, glad to have him back.
"But we are Catholic!" Bianca said scandalized and then realized how silly she sounded. Their eldest had an alien armor fused to his spine, and their daughter was what was called a white witch, "I mean, is she going to be okay?"
"With the correct training she will. I will not allow my grandchild to go astray like that woman and I trust you will also mentor her Jaime. I see you are becoming as good as a man as your grandfather and father" she told her grandson with a trusting smile.
"I will," and he also had in mind to talk to other heroes who dwelled in the magic arts for advice.
"I am also going to protect Jaime," Milagro said sitting up and smiling up at her brother, "and our family." She didn't need an armor like her brother. She had her own gift and though she was young she also knew it meant she had a responsibility with it.
Paco was hospitalized at a location belonging to the League due to his peculiar situation. T.A.U stood for Transbiotic Antitrauma Unit. It was meant to be used by the hosts of the Scarabs in case of extreme cases. Khaji-Da explained to him later on the side effects he had tried to earlier and Jaime wondered if he had done the right thing. When he explained this to Paco, he got a reaction he hadn't thought he would receive even from Paco.
"If it does that, I know you will stop me and bring me back," he said with a tired smile. He was still getting used to his new heart.
"How can you be okay with this?" Jaime asked him feeling as his own heart was being strangled.
"I am okay with it because I am alive," Paco laughed, "because I am going to be able to see my mother and friends again whenever I want. I am going to get my life back Jaime."
"Dammit Paco," Jaime said with a short laugh, "I wish you had been there when I first got the armor. I could have really used your help."
"My help? Ha! A brain like you doesn't need me. I in the other hand I am going to need a lot of your help if that does happen." Though the situation was scary, Paco still smiled with that particular strength that was not Super, but was very special nonetheless.
The matter with Brenda was something else entirely. She apologized to Paco a thousand times and to Jaime too. Though he said it was all water under the bridge, she had been brainwashed after all, he knew it would take her time to forgive herself. At times when they met she would give him sad and longing looks. Both of them knew what was between them was now over. They were lucky enough that something that seemed to be friendship remained, so they didn't push their luck; at least, not anytime soon.
"This is so weird," she said one afternoon as they went to retrieve some of her things from the half destroyed mansion. "Now no one wants to talk to me at school yet you are."
"It was not your fault," he told her for the hundredth time.
"That could have been your heart I crushed," she threw him a side smile daring him to contradict him.
"Khaji-Da would have given me a new one," he told her with a smirk.
"Dammit, I liked it better when you lacked a backbone," she shook her head as they collected some of her things. "I want to learn how to use my magic," she told him as they left, "I want to undo the bad that my aunt did."
"You are not respons-," but he stopped mid sentence when he saw her eyes full of tears. She was also giving him that stubborn look with her beautiful green eyes. He knew it would be impossible to stop her. At least he would make sure She talked to the right people, "I know a few people that could help you with that, and then maybe you can join the rest."
"I- I wouldn't go that far," she said looking away from him, "I am not like you."
"You don't give yourself enough credit Brenda," Jaime told her as they walked down the street towards the small department she was staying at. One good thing La Dama did was leave Brenda a trust fund which would be enough to cover her basic living expenses and higher education.
She punched him playfully before flinching and looking at her healing hand. That cut would become a scar and she knew it would remind her of what she believed to do to amend herself and her family's blood.
The Posse and some of the Metahumans they had saved and helped them agreed to join a new project started by the League and the United Nations. Tye and Asami were among them. After that battle, they were reminded that not only the Reach was after humans but others in their planet too. They wanted to help them. The project was still in the works but with the joining of the dedicated members of the Posse and powerhouses like Red Star, Godiva, Frostbite, and his friends he could see it working.
Solstice went back home in India and not much would be known of her until later on.
Others passed on the offer for the moment like David and Daniel (later known as Mas and Menos). He didn't blame the young boys. The moment they were no longer needed they rushed back to their home in Guatemala, but said they wanted to be heroes like Jaime and his friends when they were old enough. Miguel (later known as Bunker) and his boyfriend Gabriel went to Mexico City also passing on the offer for the time being. They wanted to turn of age to get married (as it was legal in that immense city) first and then decide how they would go about it. Francisco (later known as Vibe and by his friends as Cisco), and Mickey (later known as Vulcan), Hector (later known as Powerhouse), and Anvil went back their families and took advantage of their newly clean slates to start over a new leaf. At the time, it didn't even cross their mind to go back to the other world of superheroes but later on they would see the greater good on it.
The young vampire (later known as Dagon, real name David) they found in the youth center disappeared, but it was rumored that it had a tendency to check on Probe every once in a while. It was worrying, but Probe always told them to let him be. It seemed she was curious as much as him.
A few days after the whole mess was over he found himself sitting again across from Batman in Canary's office. He went over the reports and the files before pointing out to Jaime what he did wrong and what he did right. He listened quietly and numbly. Though not exactly the same, this would not be the last time he faced a situation so dire as this.
"Are you still up to this?" Batman asked him.
"Yeah, I am just a little tired. My little sister won't shut up about what she is learning and is not letting me get enough sleep" and the fact that he still went on patrols late at night.
"What I am asking you is if you are still up to dedicating your life to this," Batman cleared before curiously seeing the shock in the teens face, "didn't even cross your mind?"
"No," he admitted, "is difficult but if I hadn't done it others would have been hurt, heck even killed. This is much greater than what I want… Everything we do is. I have to continue doing it."
"Very well," Batman said and Jaime could have sworn he saw him smile for a moment. "I can't reinstitute you to the Team because of your project with Robin, Kid Flash and Superboy but I believe you need a break. Make sure not to stay up too late. Now there are others to help you look after your city."
And that was good feeling.
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A few months passed and Jaime stuck to often patrolling and meeting with members of the Posse and his friends. The project with the U.N was still in the works so they stuck close to home in the meanwhile. His life fell into a sort of routine, one where he couldn't reach what he wanted and feared the time when it would end. Brenda had moved to another city to apprentice under someone trusted by Zatanna by the name of Madam Xanadu. They still talked to each other every once in a while, but he could feel them growing apart. He spent his free time helping Bart getting the pieces they needed for his machine. After all the planning, he was actually hoping it would happen soon.
"Hermano, you are doing it again," Bart told him as they took one night off to watch a movie at his house. The rest had insisted since Jaime was out every day and they believed he needed to relax.
"What?" He asked realizing the movie had ended and the credits were rolling.
"Getting all sad and mode," Bart tried not to roll his eyes at him.
"Is just that a lot has changed and-" he started to say.
"So what? Things always change," Bart told him and dared him to deny it.
"Well-" Jaime tried to think of something to say but gave up.
"Exactly, you lost the girl but you got a good friend back. Your sister turned into a little witch and it looks like your grandmother was one all along. You saved a lot of people and helped the start of a new team of heroes though the League won't let you back until we finish our little mission. Oh, and you transferred a piece of your alien armor to your friend, which might backfire, but at least he is alive. All in all, yes things have changed but I think it wasn't so bad."
"Damn," Jaime said leaning back and looking up at the ceiling, "when do we leave?"
"That's the spirit hermano!"