A/N: Thank you for the reviews!

Chapter Sixteen—Summer of Love

The seven Founders sat in their usual places at the conference table, all focusing on the eighth occupant. Bruce could easily see that Michaela was uncomfortable to be under the stares of all seven of them, though she was bearing up well enough. She wasn't Lois Lane's daughter for nothing – she could stand up to a few looks.

"Supergirl," Clark spoke formally, no hint of the mild-mannered father that he was in his tone, "your contributions to the League are not in question. You have done much good for the League and this world, and we have no doubt that you will continue to do much good in the future."

"Thank you," she replied, her eyes still sweeping over the lot of them. Bruce didn't doubt that she was aware that she was here for more than just a pat on the back.

"However," Clark continued, "your other actions have caused friction among the League. It is unacceptable to attack a fellow League member under any circumstances. Your unprovoked assault on Reaper cannot stand without consequences."

Bruce watched the emotions flicker over Michaela's face. Surprise, comprehension, and anger. "Dad, that woman has made no secret that she hates–"

"Michaela," Clark cut her off, his voice quiet, "I have no choice." He cleared his throat, and then continued more loudly, "Starting this day, you are on temporary suspension from the Justice League. You will remain so until you undergo the basic training that was developed previously for the Flash twins. It will be tailored to fit your skills and the areas in which you are in need of improvement. In light of your pregnancy, it has been recommended that you wait to undergo the program until after the child is born."

The girl shot her father a betrayed look and said nothing for several seconds. Finally, Michaela took a deep breath and replied, "If this is the wish of the council, then I will of course accept." She stood up and bowed to them before taking her leave wordlessly.

Bruce didn't miss the rage boiling in her eyes.

Reaper was crouched by Lincoln's left knee, bent over the backpack that contained the bomb. She'd checked for booby-traps, but unsurprisingly didn't find any. If there had been some, the police officer would have set them off. She'd made sure he wouldn't ever do it again in future.

"What is it?" Rex asked over her shoulder.

"Nothing good would be my guess..." she muttered. Gingerly, she opened the backpack and slid the mass of wiring out. "...and I would be right."

It was a bomb. Big, complicated and – "Shit!" – with a plutonium core. And it was counting down. She took a second to run through her options. It wasn't a large nuclear bomb to be sure, but it was enough to take out the entire city. There were less than three minutes left on the clock. The people didn't have time to evacuate. She'd have to disarm it.

Okay, Sarah, you can do this...

She pulled a batarang out her belt and set about detangling the mess. First job: remove the core. If she did that, there would be no nuclear explosion. She and Rex would still die in the explosion, and maybe President Lincoln would be a little worse for wear, but millions of lives would be saved.

A hand descended on her shoulder. "Reaper?"

She didn't respond, wholly focused on her task. After a few seconds of carefully manouevring the core, the plutonium finally came away in her hand. She didn't allow herself to feel relief, and only handed it over her shoulder to Rex.

"Is this what I think it is?" he asked.

"Plutonium," she said curtly. "Don't drop it."

Thirty seconds left. The age-old question. Yellow wire, blue wire, red wire...

She bit the bullet. Cut the blue wire. The bomb beeped, then the numbers flashed down to zero. And nothing happened. Sarah blew out a sigh through her mouth. Thank Hera.

She looked around at Rex. "It's done. We're safe."

He smiled and squeezed her shoulder. "Well done."

She nodded. "Thanks." She gestured to the radioactive material in his hand. "You can give that back to me now," she grinned.

He handed it back to her, and she put all the component parts of the bomb back in the backpack. They couldn't leave it here, after all, and it would be safer in the Cave. "We should get back to the Watchtower, start investigating who put this here. Whoever they are they're long gone by now, but…" she pointed to the CCTV camera calmly sweeping its gaze over the memorial, "hopefully that'll have something we can use."

Rex's voice drew her attention, and she realised he wasn't listening. He was looking at the huge figure of Lincoln. "You know what we should do?"

She looked up at him. "What?"

"Make this our spot," he said, a little too lightly.

Sarah stilled. Was he...? "Our spot?"

He shrugged. "Yeah, you know, a spot. People have spots."

She raised an eyebrow. "Example?"

"Well your parents met in Paris, right?"

She smiled. Well, Bruce Wayne and Wonder Woman had. Sarah had often made her parents recite the story when she was a child – much to Nicky's disgust – until finally she felt like she'd been there. It must have been wonderful — the most romantic city in the world, their first dance... "More or less," she said finally.

He nodded. "Mine – it's any bar where Mom can start a fight, Superman and his wife–"

"–the roof of the Daily Planet," she finished.

"Exactly," he agreed. "So the Lincoln Memorial – that's our spot."

She smirked. "And it no longer belongs to the American people?"

"They've still got the Jefferson Memorial," he pointed out, grinning.

She couldn't help but return the smile. "Alright. But maybe we could let people in to see him when we're not using him."

He nodded thoughtfully. "For a small fee, naturally."

"Naturally," she repeated dryly.

A member of the police climbed up the steps, stopping on the third one from the top. "Are we okay to start letting people back in now, Reaper?"

She nodded calmly. "Yes, Officer." He went back down the steps, and she hefted the backpack onto her back.

Rex put his hand to his com-link. "Warhawk to Watchtower."

"Watchtower here."

"Boom tube, Arrow."

"Opening now."

A second later, the bright white tunnel appeared in midair, and they stepped into it together. Sarah smiled again at her companion. "So exactly how small is–"

She cut off – the place they had emerged was certainly not the Watchtower. Nor was it the Metrotower. It was still on Earth, but suddenly the countryside, and certainly nowhere near Washington. "–small..." She blinked, turned to her left – to find Rex was nowhere to be seen. "What the hell? Warhawk? Rex!"

She still looked to be alone, and there was no answer. "Reaper to Warhawk, come in!" Nothing. Worried something might have happened to him, she contacted the Watchtower. "Reaper to Watchtower." Nothing but static on her com-link. What in Tartarus was going on here? She tried the Batcave, and got nothing there either. Alarm rising in her, she pulled out her cell phone. No coverage. Where in the world was she?

Deciding that wherever it was, it was better to err on the side of caution, she took her costume to pieces. She didn't have her civilian clothes with her, but most of her costume was detachable. The hood came off, as did the cape and the sleeves, and the belt, gloves and gauntlets. There wasn't much she could do about the boots, but now she could pass for a biker chick rather than being immediately identified as Reaper.

Hearing the faint sound of a car, she headed toward it, and soon enough found herself standing at the edge of a road. About a hundred yards away, there was a road sign. She walked toward it, and found herself being welcomed to Roundup– "Montana?"

How in Tartarus had she ended up in Montana? And where was Rex? They'd entered the boom tube together so there shouldn't have been a way for them to get separated. And the interference on the com-links? She pursed her lips, thinking hard as she started toward town. A solar flare maybe? That could be it. It could cause the boomtube to diverge, knock out the communications with the Watchtower. It seemed likely. Anyway, there would be telephones in Roundup, so she could ring the Cave and order a teleport home.

She was in luck; there was a phone booth outside some of kind of convenience store, and it accepted her quarters with no problem. She dialled the Cave from memory. And got a mechanical female voice in her ear. "The number you have dialled has not been recognised. Please check, and try again."

More disbelief. She hadn't gotten in wrong; she'd known that number off by heart since she was seven years old, had never forgotten it. Nor had she misdialed. She gritted her teeth and fished in her belt for more quarters. Athena give me patience…

Before she could put them in, though, something else caught her attention from outside. A blonde woman in high heels and a miniskirt rushed past the phone booth, hotly pursued by four leering and jeering young men. Sarah had seen enough attempted rapes to know what would happen next. Leaving the booth, she ran after them. There wasn't time to change again.

When she came around the corner, the woman was already on the ground, surrounded. Reaper charged the man at the back of the group, running and leaping to deliver a hard kick to the back of his head. He went down with a cry, which alerted his companions. The second one had time to draw a switchblade, but no time for anything else before Sarah's fingers had hit three of his pressure points, knocking him out cold. The third grabbed her from behind, one arm around her neck and the other gripping her shoulder. She almost smirked; this was self-defence 101. A stamp on the instep, an elbow in the gut, the heel of a hand crashing the nose in and up, and finally a punch to the groin. The fourth gaped at his groaning, fallen companions and did the only smart thing he could do – he bolted.

Sarah walked over to the blonde woman on the floor and offered her a hand up. "You alright?"

She nodded breathlessly and stood. "Yeah... Man, that was so...groovy!"

Sarah raised an eyebrow. Groovy? "Um...you're welcome."

"How did you do that?"

Thankfully, this woman seemed to have no idea who she was, so the cover story was easy to come up with. "My dad was a Marine. He taught me stuff like that. Plus those guys were just asking to have their asses kicked."

The girl laughed. "Agreed. What's your name, sunshine?"

Sunshine? Oh, the blonde hair. "I'm Sarah."

Rather than shaking hands, the other woman hugged her. "Thanks, Sarah. I'm Martha."

Sarah patted her awkwardly on the back until she let go.

It wasn't until a few seconds later, when they emerged from the alley into the glow of the streetlamp, that Sarah actually saw her face in detail. Then she felt the ground fall out from underneath her. Her head swam, her vision blurred and all the blood froze in her veins.

She was looking into the face of her grandmother.

Great Hera…

Dizziness swarmed her head, and she must have swayed, since suddenly Martha grabbed her upper arms to hold her steady. "Whoa. You okay there?"

She nodded, then shook her head. Clearing her throat, she forced herself to find some composure from somewhere, and straightened. "Guess one of them must've hit me harder than I realised."

If Martha had noticed that not one of the thugs had laid so much as a finger on Sarah, she didn't say anything. Instead she only took Sarah's hand and led her out of the alley. "C'mon, my van's just around the corner. You can sit down for a second there."

"Yeah… Um, odd question – what year is it?"

"Summer of love, honey," Martha grinned. "1969."

"1969," Sarah repeated in a whisper. "Of course it is. Silly me."

A/N: I'm going on the idea that Bruce was born in 1970 rather than 1939 :P This is before his birth. Review please!