Disclaimer: I own nothing, DC does. I am a poor college student, while DC is part of a corporate conglomerate. Life sucks doesn't it?

A/N: Reviews make me happy and give me an incentive to keep editing. Also, it might take a while between updates, since I have to do some major editing on upcoming chapters.

Chapter Five: Hard Choices

Nearly two months had passed since that first mission and Sylvia was barely holding herself together. She had been on other missions since the first one and all of them had gone off well, in her superiors' eyes. But Sylvia couldn't help doubting every set of instructions she was given; every mission she was plagued with fears about what she would do if she were ordered to act against civilians again.

To help alleviate these feelings, Sylvia had started visiting the Library of Congress to research on some of the missions she had been given and their backgrounds. She also started going through all the documents she could find about the League's missions, both past and present, in order to understand what type of organization she was working for. What she found terrified her beyond belief.

From the beginning, the League had been used to attack civilians of countries the United States wanted to intimidate. Countless civilians were killed, all in the name of national security, yet none of it reached the media. Every question Sylvia seemed to answer only raised a dozen more in her mind. Sylvia had even started to look for papers from five years ago, when superheroes started to disappear. To her annoyance, most of the relevant newspapers seemed to have "mysteriously" vanished, leaving her with very few leads to follow. Where's Lois Lane when you need her, she thought to herself one day as she left the Library in a frustrated huff.

Everything that she discovered just kept jumbling up in Sylvia's head leaving her depressed and confused. She started going on long runs and swimming laps to see if that would help sort her thoughts. So far, the only thing that helped calm her and allow here to think was going to visit her old friends, the otters. Today was Halloween and everywhere was decked out with pumpkins and cobwebs. Even the otters had their own little gourds to play with. Sylvia was watching them play when she saw Hurricane approach her.

"I thought I might find you here," Hurricane remarked as Sylvia nodded at her and sat down beside Sylvia. "I don't understand why you like it here. If I were you, I would go in the middle of a desert or something if I wanted peace. This place is too noisy for me."

"They help me put things in perspective," replied Sylvia, making sure to guard her words. "They never seem to have anything to worry about. Watching them play helps me understand my place in this whole grand scheme of things. Plus, they're pretty damn cute little creatures"

Hurricane nodded, acting as if she understood. "Well, what we're about to do might help you put things in perspective better than watching these otters ever could. We're having a special mission to formally initiate you as a member of the League."

"Is Alan coming?" Sylvia asked, tearing her eyes away from the otters and watching Hurricane's face for any sign of a lie.

"No. We do all the initiations separately. His will be later. Trust me, you won't want to have him there for the initiation. We leave in an hour. I'll see you at the Armory." With those cryptic comments, Hurricane got up and walked off, leaving Sylvia to think about what she had both said and not said.


Alan sat in his room with an envelope in his hands. He didn't know what was in it and he really didn't want to. The envelope and its mysterious contents had been slipped under his door five minutes ago. It was addressed to him, but he didn't know who had given it to him. He didn't think Sylvia slipped it to him. She hadn't really been talking with him since their disagreement on Capitol Mall.

He honestly didn't want to think about what she had brought up then, but over the last few weeks, what she had said really started to fit together with what he was seeing on his missions. It was as if they had been shielding him at first and were now taking off the blinders, except Alan didn't like what he saw without them. His missions were starting to upset him more and more. There were more attacks against civilians than before and his position on that was the same as Sylvia's when it came to harming innocents. With a sigh, he ripped open the envelope and started to read its contents.

What was in the envelope shocked him and he had to reread certain parts twice before he truly understood what was in front of him. Being a speedster, he read everything in less than a minute, but for him it seemed hours. What lay before him was all of Sylvia's research over the last few months. According to the letter she had enclosed, this was the only paper copy of her research and he was to destroy it if she returned from this mysterious mission, but if she didn't:

"Alan, I want you to give this all to my mother before you start to run. I mean it. These people will stop at nothing if they think that you know what is going on. Go get help. Try Gotham. I know that they have some people there who might be able to help you. Alan, I know we haven't really talked much these last few months, but you're still my best friend and the person I trust the most. Sylvia."

Alan stared at the page before catching the postscript. "Alan, I'm off on the mission. We leave at eight o'clock. I have a tracker on my suit. Here's the frequency so that you can find me. S."

Alan glanced at the clock. It was five past right now. Alan went and grabbed his tracer and plugged in the frequency Sylvia had given him. There it was, in the middle of the Sahara Desert. Without fully thinking things through, Alan literally changed in a second and rushed over to try and save his friend.


As Sylvia and Hurricane materialized in the desert, Sylvia's heart quailed at the sight that greeted her. There was only one other person there: Shock, with a deadly, gleeful look on his face. Things weren't looking good for her, but she had to try and talk her way out of this mess anyway.

"I thought you said that the entire League was going to be here," asked Sylvia as they approached Shock.

"I lied," replied Hurricane and the look she gave Sylvia as she turned around nearly made Sylvia turn around and fly away in terror. There was pleasure in her eyes and in Shock's, for what was about to happen. "You really didn't think that we wouldn't notice your extracurricular activities would you? Especially when there are systems everywhere to track your every move while you're researching."

"So what if I was researching?" countered Sylvia, her mind searching for an escape option desperately. At least there were only two of them, but they had so much more experience than her, they might see what tricks she could come up with. "Where's the danger in that?"

"Ah, but the question really lies in what you were researching, and that information, little greenie, is off limits. Why, if you spilled our innermost secrets to the media, it could bring down the entire government and cause chaos. Do you want that?" asked Shock in a mock-innocent voice.

"But doesn't the public have the right to know what the government has been doing these last five years? The human rights abuses, the killings, the disappearances, they all have the right to know," argued Sylvia clenching her fists and silently powering up in an effort to defend herself.

"Even if they do, you aren't the one to tell them," said Hurricane, arms crossed. "In fact, your research has been deemed inappropriate by the President himself. He decided that you should be given a chance to recant what you have discovered and you will be excused from any League activities you deem unsavory. We, however, have decided not to give you that chance."

"So you're going to directly violate an order from your superior officer? My, I never would have thought you had the initiative to do so!" exclaimed Sylvia in mock shock. Where was Alan, he should have been here by now!

"Very funny greenie," Shock spat at her. "That's the last smart comment you'll ever make." As he raised his hand threateningly, Hurricane caught and lowered it.

"Hold on a moment Shock. I think I want to tell her exactly what we're going to do with her." Her eyes shone with malicious pleasure. "The story we tell the President is that you refused, naturally, and we had to kill you. The story that the public will hear is that you cracked under pressure and ran off raving mad. The only way we could stop you was to kill you."

"And Alan, what about him?" asked Sylvia; desperately hoping that Alan was here and listening.

"Ah him," said Shock meditatively. "You know, we thought we would be having this conversation with him, not you. He seemed to be the suspicious one, the one who would do the initial questioning of the system. We thought that, due to your enthusiasm, you would fit right in to the League. Guess we were wrong about that one. No, your friend lives, for now. But if we find that he somehow is continuing your work, he goes next. And now," he said as he pointed his arms at her, his fingers sparking. "Good-bye."

Before he could shoot off a bolt of lightning at Sylvia, however, something sped into view and hit him, full force. Sylvia took advantage of Hurricane's shock and used her tornados to whirl sand into her eyes. Hurricane might control storms, but in this desert, winds were infinitely more useful. Sylvia kept buffeting her opponent with sand and debris until Hurricane was on the ground with her arms thrown over her face to protect it from Sylvia's relentless attack. Sylvia quickly knocked her out before turning to face her helper.

"What?" Alan asked as they sped towards Gotham. "Did you think I was going to leave you alone with those two? What are friends for?"