Would you like to know what pisses me off? When people in movies ask someone to 'draw [them] a bath'. It's not the phrasing or how they ask it that irks me though! It's just the fact that the bath water I use is scalding! It turns my skin red in three minutes! And I have to start with cold water while I'm actually in the tub so I don't burn myself! They just hop right in the boiling water! LIKE HELL. We have some human lobsters here, or rock monsters. Or rock lobsters.
Disclaimer: ...
Artemis was frozen in the sea of freshmen, seniors, sophomores and juniors, her blonde ponytail just barely poking through the white waves, unable to breathe past the tension that pulled down on her like piranhas, circling excitedly because they had sensed a single drop of blood around her somewhere. They weren't hurting her yet, but they made her heart hammer at an unbelievable pace, her eyes wide and her stomach somewhere in-between her toes in fear. Her lips were hung open as she desperately gasped for air, her head bobbing up and down above the waves, far from any nearby land.
She couldn't swim away, the white waves gaining a navy blue tint the farther away she looked. There wasn't even a buoy around for her to grab onto to keep from drowning, the only one she could've used having drifted far off, stirring up a string of memories deep in her mind. The memories were like rocks skimming her ocean, each little delicate bounce causing hundreds of little reflections in the water to bounce back at her, the rocks sinking far down below her feet, showing her that help was there, only she had to find it for herself.
The boy that had run off, only after royally kicking the asses of the school's douchefags, was the one who had come up to her on her first day, put an arm around her shoulders and snapped a picture of them. His words still ran through her ears, but now she recognized them as words from Robin, her teammate, her fellow hero, the innocence of the freshmen boy suddenly fading.
"One day, we'll laugh about this."
She could remember how happily his dark blue eyes had shown, how wide his grin had been, compared to the terrified width of his eyes from a moment ago, his lips hung open in horror. The little freshmen boy, the one Bette had simply told her to ignore, was one of the last people she ever wanted to ignore for how close she considered herself to be to him. The friendship she had decided in her head had allowed her to notice the apparent freshmen's usual tendency to be right. For once though, the boy wasn't so wonderful, his right streak finally breaking to pieces at his fight.
'You're wrong, Robin… I'm not laughing.'
Artemis was nowhere near laughing. Fear was hardening her breath, widening her eyes, quickening her heart pace and drawing in the sharp teeth bearing fish encircling her feet. These piranhas were in short skirts, much shorter than the length required by the school rulebook, their tops way too low-cut to be okay in any school. They wore a crayon pastel of make-up, their hair so stiff that even a chainsaw couldn't hack through the hairspray abused strands. They were probably supposed to be pretty in some manner of the word, but they were far from it. In every sense.
"And you're Artemis," a Barbie look-alike stole the drama from the boys, placing it all in a metal pie tin and slamming it in the Vietnamese girl's face roughly.
"You didn't even pick a real name! You just used your own! Do you know how lazy that is? And how stupid?" her black counterpart stepped forward, looking the blonde up and down in disapproval.
Artemis sighed, face-palming lightly at the fear she had felt before. She was afraid of being bullied by sluts that she didn't even know? She didn't belong in Gotham Academy anyway, what did she care? She actually smirked at the girls, her pale lips drawn tightly off to the side in her best imitation of the expression the freshman she had just learned the name of made every day when his mask hid his features. She wasn't proud of it, unable to properly display the one that glinted brilliantly in her mind, but it would have to do for now.
"Artemis is a real name," she folded her arms over her chest, playing dumb. "Artemis was the Greek Goddess of hunting, wilderness and childbirth while she watched over kids up until their days of marriage."
From the clueless expressions that temporarily fazed their anger, she assumed this particular group of piranhas bummed notes off of the poor nerds at school who couldn't look up past their boobs. Just like with the stolen notes, the girls hid the confused emotions deep down in their book bags with convinced intelligence written cockily over the reluctancy, smirks as strong as the truest blade gleaming off their faces.
"It's also what the world calls you when you're shooting off arrows with Speedy's dad! Green Arrow? That ring a bell?"
Artemis' face contorted in anger for a second at the slip-up with Roy's name. It was beyond true that her sister had gotten far closer to the clone of the first sidekick to be admitted to the League than she ever would've been able to, but she still felt immeasurable fury when anyone slipped up on his name. He deserved more than to be called the name given to the frozen original in CADMUS, the name matched to the paralyzed immature features that would never match the friends that the clone had earned over the years. He deserved a true title that showed the innocence behind the betrayal, that demonstrated the strength behind the two worded weakness, that silently voiced the potential power with the draw of a bow.
Her own strength showed through, much stronger than Superman or Superboy could ever get even with the patches that suppress the human flaw of the genes, when she managed to keep from pinning the smart-mouthed girl to the ground and beating the granted life from her grasp so she had none left to take. It would splattered out in the ground around her porcelain skin, her fingers limply bent down over her palm in a futile attempt to grasp something other than her technical self-induced fate if Artemis had been much weaker. Instead though, she slowed her breath and kept her hands in tight fists.
"Of course it does. They were on the news a few nights ago when Green Arrow promoted Red Arrow to League rank," her voice turned to venom at the correction, but she easily transitioned it back to her regular tone, knowing she was caught even if she didn't. "Do you have a point?"
The sharp teeth glinted beneath the waves, curiously poking up in time with Artemis as she kicked her legs fiercely, heading for land at a ferocious speed. The bubbles were near as fast as she was, but she wasn't afraid of the carnivores behind her. She wasn't panicking, the blood wasn't from her, her heart refused to beat even a breath over the regular resting heartbeat for a 'hero'; she simply refused to fear the fin-flaps behind her and the faint growls that would sound as her skin was torn. She could care far less. Soon though, she realized that the piranhas were the least of her worries.
A trail of blood streaked the navy blue, easily parting the piranhas with a single propelling through the waves, these teeth far more dangerous than the tiny teeth in the swarm of fish. This fish had eyes of the coldest blue, its head marked in the bloody tint, the bloodthirsty appearance from the mass of killers that were now slowly drifting back towards the eye of the ocean where the blonde had started off, her death sentence now only farther defined as she neared safety. She didn't notice her danger until it clamped down hard on her shoulder, tearing back flesh as it did.
Steely eyes grew wide and Artemis turned fast on her heels, her ponytail cutting the air like a well trained laser, sawing a sharp slit into anything that dared cross its path. The warpath was barely half a circle, the authorities shutting it down before it even had much a chance to begin, the near-survivor in the ocean now left alone with the worst killer known to the waters.
Her figure was slim and toned, her skin extremely light in color, her scarlet hair falling light over her shoulders though her blue eyes begged for nothing short of a blood fest, blood of the beautifulest shade dripping from every available corner. For someone of a fairly short height, unbelievable power lingered behind her glare and flowed into her tight grip, nails with a European accent digging roughly into the Vietnamese girl's shoulder. Waves from the blonde's swimming must've kicked up in her eyes, blinding her slightly, giving the bottom of her eyes a faint watery lining, only adding to the fear her appearance caused.
"Let go of me!" Artemis snapped, reaching up and forcefully knocking the hand from her skin, staggering back defensively.
Her fists stayed raised at a stance, ready to defend herself when she found herself recognizing the redhead. She couldn't place a name to the younger face, but she knew that whenever she had previously seen that awkward little freshman who had wound up being one of her teammates, there had been a faint red shadow to his pace, towering nearly a foot over his head. Her name was Barbara, just another freshman that Artemis needn't bother with while she spent her time ducking her face and rushing from class-to-class to keep her grades high. Today though, it was time to show her face to those who she now needed to bother.
"Why didn't you help him?" Barbara screamed at Artemis, fuming painfully, her voice near a gaspy shriek.
Artemis jumped a bit from surprise, the confusion burrowing itself deep beneath her skin, laying to rest among her muscle tissue, getting comfy between her nerves and the delicate veins that were just daring to be broken to end the curiosity of it all.
"Help who?" she asked softly, maternal instincts kicking in, having the sudden urge to hug the stranger to her chest and mutter nonsense until everything was calm again.
Barbara didn't want the blonde's affection, judging by the way her agony danced across her features like the shadows from a flickering flame of the most magnificent height. The water in her eyes grew, trembling on the brim of pale skin and faint blue. Her teeth were clenched as tight as she could get them, only unprying to try to scream the pain from her aching wounds.
"Dick! He was your friend! Your teammate! You saw how u-upset… he was! Scared! So… afraid…" she broke, her face seizing up as she fought a war with her subconscious. Her eyebrows furrowed and a tear fell, but she held her composure strong all the same. "Why didn't you go after him? Why didn't you stop those g-guys from hurting h-him? You're a monster!"
It was as if an expert archer and a pro fisherman had combined their skills into the ultimate weapon: an arrow with jagged hooks on the edge, so when the arrow pierced her heart, there was no way for her to pull it out. A faint trail of blood lined the outside, telling her to leave the arrow and labor her breathing as she got help, but she already had both hands on the shaft of the arrow, desperately tugging at it.
"What are you talking about? Who's Dick?" she ran a hand over her hair, her forehead covered in lines, eyes wide and frown shaking.
Another tear fell roughly, dragging a line of eyeliner down the once unmarred cheek, despite the redhead's best scrubbing attempt.
"Robin? The black haired boy who ran off, his heart… b-broken because no one had the courage to step up and save him? The teammate you betrayed?" Barbara gasped out, all of the murder in her eyes directed solely at her key opponent, the one standing before her shaking lightly.
Drawing conclusions was for everyone who considered themselves to be an artist, a pencil clutched tight in their hands as they tried to make sense of the mess they were stranded in. The rougher the mess on Artemis' paper grew to be, the better things started to make sense even though not a single figure could stand out alone against the scribbles. As they clumped together throughout the clutter, little ideas broke off in her mind and she managed to play a puzzle, piecing all that she could without lifting a finger.
Everyone in Gotham Academy had known Robin's identity, as had they known her own from the way they were talking. That would suggest Robin lived in Gotham, also hinting that Batman did. Were all Gotham heroes exposed? What heroes all lived in Gotham? How did everyone know this? Someone would've had to snitch, bringing up the thought of Red Arrow, but he'd been kept from the bad guys long enough to keep from leaking what he knew to anyone… hopefully. She surely hadn't told anyone her real identity! Robin had figured it out himself, which meant no one else should've been able to.
"Like you're any better!"
Artemis seemed to forget she was a heroine, her mask off and at her feet along with every shred of respect that she had previously worn like the spandex that shaped her figure while she darted through the trees, her bow drawn back, her eyes watching hard. Before, she would've simply pinned their clothes to the trees and silently dashed off for the others to run up and cuff the bad guys, but now she had the full intention to simply beat these baddies down with the bow itself until she needed a new one; preferably black with green arrows along the arch. That way, it would still look cool while camouflaging her from any unwanted sets of eyes.
"Just because we work together doesn't mean I have to baby-sit him! We're heroes, not sidekicks! You're his friend! I'm just another mask who runs next to him when we're saving your asses from the guys with the big guns. I don't know if you ever noticed, but Robin never asks for help! If he had wanted help, he would've put on his utility belt and disappeared in a big puff of smoke! I don't know his real name, but you do and you could've saved him just as fast as I could," she refused to let a redhead show her up, let alone another ginger to Robin's quickly growing fan base, starting with Kid Mouth back 'home'.
Barbara was stubborn though, much more than the freckled face that Artemis preferred returning through the ZETAs to, her feminine emotion probably contributing to a major portion of that. She stepped forward, her height the only thing keeping her from being nose-to-nose with the older girl, her fists looking as if she was holding an earthquake in each palm.
"You shouldn't need him to ask to help him! That's what heroes do! They help all those who need it, and you know as well as I do that he needed it! You should've known-!"
All eyes in the schoolyard were now on the potential chick fight that was beginning to brew, similar in the making to a well-cooked pot of soup, the lid kept on so the heat could ever so slowly build up to make the final result much better.
"I wouldn't know! I haven't known him for very long! I haven't been on the team for even half a year yet!" Artemis cut herself short, knowing that if she kept on at this rate, her record would outweigh her mother's as she had to serve life for murder. "And how did you know I was that Artemis? That he was Robin?"
It wasn't the redhead that responded though. No, the blonde from before had grabbed the freshman by her arm and pulled her back, stepping forward to reclaim the attention of the heroine.
"It was all over the news! Every electronic that can get even the faintest internet signal was spammed with your identities," she smirked, folding her arms over her chest, "So, what about it Arrow Girl? How about you give us a show?"
Artemis gave a frustrated sigh, her book bag in the grass by her flats. She wanted to say no. She wanted to chase Robin down, take his utility belt and use everything in there on these girls, this crowd! She couldn't kill them all though, in fear of lethal injection unless heroes were pardoned which she doubted. There was something she could do though, a good replacement.
"You know what? Fine. You want a show?" she threw her hands up frustratedly, backing up a little. "You can be my stage, bitch. Brace yourself, I dance for the money."
In a second, the blonde was on the grass sobbing over her aching nose, Artemis secured on a window ledge eight feet from the ground. The height wasn't enough, so she gripped the upper rim and pulled herself up, scrambling for the greatest distance she could get herself from the ground. Wolf Whistles filled the air as everything under her skirt was flashed to the crowd below, but she brushed them off with a blush and kept climbing until she was on the roof, her feet hanging over the edge.
The whistles stopped, disappointed sighs drowning the air before the crowd rushed the girl down below who had taken a shoe to the face as Artemis dug her com. link from her bra and poked it into her ear [1]. She quickly connected to the main channel, not truly caring who she was patched over to, simply needing help of any sort.
"Anyone listening? I need help, soon as possible?" she looked out over the city, the buildings making her frown lightly to herself in thought, looking for capes or symbols in the sky.
Silence filled her ear, not necessarily guaranteeing a lack of audience, hinting stronger at rather a lack of interest. A hard sigh slipped from her lips and she got to her feet, brushing the back of her skirt off before touching that hand to her hip and cocking it out.
"Our cover's been blown. I'm at Gotham Academy and a group of girls just told me they knew I was Artemis because of some internet hack from what I can tell, so chances are the rest of you have been blown too," she added, keeping her voice steady and waiting patiently.
There still wasn't a reply, giving her cause to groan into her hand. She cursed faintly under her breath, raising her hands and adjusting her ponytail. Her mind raced, trying to think of anyone who might have their com. links in at this hour, going through everyone with the targets on their chests to the people she casually worked alongside. Eventually, she thought of one person who was always listening. It took a moment to think of him of course, but he crossed her mind and she knew the perfect way to catch his attention.
Wally always kept his com. link in during class because he was bored and listening to the teacher wasn't his favorite thing to do. He always kept an ear out, listening for an excuse to leave school, being careful to hide it with a hand as he supported his face, taking it out when anyone came too close and switching it off. He had to be listening now. His school started an hour earlier, meaning he was in the middle of Geometry, his worst subject.
"Robin was here too," she added fast, praying that those words would spark some attention her way. "Some of the jocks here confronted him and he beat the crap out of them, running off before I ever had a chance to help him. He looked like he was in tears, or something close to it. He was really-…"
"Where is he now?" a familiar voice cut the line worriedly in a hushed whisper.
Artemis smirked to herself, her lips slowly turning down again as gray scanned the streets, looking for the little ebony. Even her increased height failed to show her where the bird was hiding his face, but Wally didn't need to know how high she was, or the fact that she was completely clueless.
"He bolted from school, heading off to the alleyways with some good speed. I'm surprised you haven't seen him! I thought for sure that he'd be up in Star City with you by now!" she joked lightly, although she knew she had no room to be kidding around.
With her luck, Robin probably really was up there! She didn't know how he reacted to these situations, but she imagined he was terrified. From what she understood, he had been in the 'hero business' for nearly five years and now, it seemed all of that work was crumbling away, the ashes messily strayed at his feet.
"On my way."
After seven words, the phone went dead in Artemis' ear and she found herself alone on the roof, a frown soft on her lips. She wasn't quite sure what was going on, but she had a bad feeling that gripped her stomach hard, even before she heard the familiar engine roar. Her head was ripped up at the sound, seeing a black winged car tear down the streets with a passion, practically flying over the asphalt with its speed. The crowd hushed itself, faint mutters of the Batmobile drifting through the air, stealing Artemis' presence away with it.
[1] As a girl myself, I constantly use my lingerie as pockets for when I have none. I figure a cellphone and money are the hero equivalent to their com. links so why wouldn't they hide those in there? It's convenient… easy… Or maybe it's just me. I mean, if it went off in class and gave you a boob tumor due to the radio waves or whatever, that would be bad…
By the last paragraph, I simply meant that when blondie saw the Batmobile, she ran off. And when Artemis got from the ground to the window, knocking the blonde down with her, I simplified saying that Vietnamese chicky jumped up and kicked the stranger, using her as a stepping stool to get up. In case you didn't notice. Anyway. Sorry this is long and late. I just got really lazy… heh… So, you should review now?
Rumor has it, OOOOOOHH~!
-F.J.
