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I AM NOT DEAD! This is part one of this chapter the other will be posted as soon as I finish editing it and without further ado enjoy!
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M'Gann wasn't sure how to take that comment, but she didn't' let it throw her off for long. "Well, alright. I'll just," she glanced at the assortment of food she had spent all morning making. "Leave this out in case you change your mind then."
Shadow sincerely doubted that. She was paranoid of anyone making her food.
"How about I give you a tour of the cave?" M'Gann suggested, coming over with a blinding smile on her face.
Shadow was tempted to say no, but couldn't think of anything better to do and she was feeling cramped from being in that room. Besides, She thought. It's always a good idea to get a layout of your surroundings.
With a huff Shadow replied. "Fine." Which was immediately followed by an enthusiastic "Great!" from M'Gann. She proceeded, once again, to drag Shadow by the arm and into a large cavernous area with a giant circle covering most of the floor.
Releasing Shadow's arm, which she rubbed while glaring at her, M'Gann stepped to the middle of the circle, gesturing around as it lit up at her touch. A couple of floating blue screens with the words WAITING FOR COMMAND written in white block letters appeared, along with a keyboard.
"This is where we receive our missions from Batman and our training from Black Canary." M'Gann explained, then pointed to two tubes made from a technology that Shadow didn't recognize. "Those are called Zeta-tubes, we use the, to travel to different places, but only if that area has a second tube to receive the person traveling. My uncle J'hon was the one who brought the technology to Earth." M'Gann paused, obviously taking pride in that fact, before continuing. "What they do is break apart your molecules and send them to the receiving tube with wavelengths that only the Zeta-tubes recognize. Pretty cool huh?"
She prompted while turning to see Shadow's reaction.
"Is it safe?" Shadow wondered; studying the tubes, she couldn't help but think that she had been transported to this world with similar tech.
"Of course it's safe," M'Gann tried to reassure her. "We wouldn't use something that's dangerous."
Shadow was not one hundred percent sure of that but decided to let it go.
"Now if you come this way," M'Gann once again took off, followed by Shadow who walked behind, keeping a fair distance between them as they entered through a door to the left.
"Here's our more equipped training room." "M'Gann said as she walked to the middle.
Shadow paused in the doorway, taking it in. Treadmills, ellipticals, mats, gymnast poles, punching bags, practice dummies, targets, stations equipped to the teeth with throwing knives, bow and arrows, bo staffs, and bird-a-rangs, and even a trapeze filled the rectangular area.
A flash back of when she first entered the Danger Room filled Shadow's mind and she had to shake off the nostalgic feeling.
"What do you think?" M'Gann's upbeat voice broke through Shadow's awe, picking up on the more appeasing tone she was getting that swiftly faded as Shadow fell back into her stony demeanor, "Looks expensive." Was all she had to say, but still walked to the red mats laying the in middle that had JL imprinted in blue on them.
"The Justice League funds it." M'Gann spoke from where she stood. "You can come here and use it anytime you like."
Not getting a reply, M'Gann decided to take it as the closest thing to a 'yes' she was going to get; wanting to move on she made for the exit.
"Come on, there are still a few more rooms I'd like to show you."
Shadow waited a brief moment before allowing herself to be dragged through the rest of the tour, giving one last glance at the training room before stepping out and shutting the door behind her.
"I don't know what you like to train with," M'Gann began babbling on, uncomfortable with the silence. "I'm assuming you're good with knives judging by your blades but you may also like-Conner you're up!"
The sudden shift in topic caused Shadow to look up in time to see M'Gann hug Superboy, he put one protective arm around her waist, glaring at Shadow. She ignored him, more interested in the great white wolf at his side. His fierce yellow eyes matched its owners gaze before it sat at Superboy's side.
"What are you doing?" He asked M'Gann, refusing to move his glare from Shadow.
M'Gann pulled back, somewhat defensive. "I was just giving her a tour of the place."
"Do you really think that's a good idea?" He demanded, finally looking at her. He clenched his fists, M'Gann crossed her arms.
Nothing was said for a minute and Shadow felt that annoying tickling sensation in her head again. It didn't take long for her to piece together that they were communicating telepathically. The wolf seemed to sense this too and patted off to lay by the side of the cave. Not knowing how long their conversation was going to take Shadow followed it.
She had a special affinity with the creatures; however she still kept her distance as she knelt by it. It cracked open an eye and let out a soft warning growl, but soon dismissed her as unimportant, relaxing soon after. Shadow studied the creature, clearly it was a product of more than just nature, its unusual size coupled with the muscle that was exposed on the inside of his legs.
"His name's Wolf." Superboy's dark voice came from behind her, obviously their 'private' conversation didn't last as long as she thought.
Shadow let out a slightly amused huff. "Creative."
"About as creative as Shadow?" He retorted.
Slowly she stood back up and replied. "The name wasn't my choice, it was given to me."
Before Superboy could ask 'By who?' The Zeta-tube lit up and a female robotic voice announced the arrival of Kid Flash. "Kid-Flash B-03."
The red-headed speedster entered, not in his costume but wearing but dressed in converse, jeans, a dark light shirt and brown jacket. "Hey you guys are up!" His cheeriness left him when he spotted Shadow. "What's she doing here?" He jabbed a thumb at her direction.
M'Gann answered him, coming a bit closer between Shadow and Kid Flash. "I was giving her a tour of the place, Wally."
Kid Flash, Wally, set his hands on his hips. "Hey, we don't just give out our civilian identities."
Squaring her shoulders M'Gann asked. "Why not? She's staying in the cave, has seen you out of costume, and if I recall you told me your 'civilian identity' when you barely even knew me."
He turned his head away with a huff. "Well I still don't think that it's a good idea."
M'Gann sighed in exasperation, "I've already had this argument with Conner. I'm watching her, nothing's going to happen and if it does I'll call for back up. Okay?" Irritation spiked her words.
"You know I think Artemis is rubbing off on you." Wally commented.
M'Gann relaxed and gave a sly smile. "You bet."
Throwing his hands up in defeat Wally consented. "Fine. Give her a tour of the place, what do I care. Come on Supey, lt's go watch some TV."
Both boys gave Shadow a wary look as they left, Wolf got up to follow his master out the door leaving two girls alone in the cave.
M'Gann turned to Shadow, an apologetic smile on her face. "Let's finish the tour, shall we?" She led through a separate hallway from where the guys had gone.
Wally watched while M'Gann showed their reluctant captive down the hall where the library and study were. Slouching in his seat he turned his attention back to the TV.
It was tuned into the Boomerang channel featuring Courage the Cowardly Dog, Superboy, always interested in cartoons, followed every movement on the picture, but that didn't stop Wally fro talking to him.
"Can you believe we have to keep her with us?" He began the rant, glaring into the program. "She tried to kill Rocket, she tried to kill you, practically everyone else on this team, she could be a spy, or, worse and assassin…"He had ticked off each point with a finger when he listed them out. "I mean, we don't know anything about her" Wally ended face scrunched up at the five fingers he had in front of him until he relaxed, looking at Superboy. "Yeah, sure Batman trusts her and all…but even he can't be right about everything."
He had mumbled the last part, crossing his arms, he paused ot check in with his audience. Superboy hadn't moved a muscle or uttered a reply, he sat resting his elbows on his knees as Courage befriended a giant purple tree that had grown on his yard.
"Are you even listening to me?"
Letting out a short, clearly-not-wanting-to-talk-about-this-subject, sigh Superboy finally answered. "Yes Wally, I'm listening."
Not wanting to make his friend mad, Wally decided to switch gears. "Hey, do you know where Artemis is? She hasn't been answering my texts."
"She's at the library." Superboy had responded without thinking, forgetting that when M'Gann told him about Artemis' tutoring this morning it was meant to be kept a secret from Wally.
"Why would she be at the library?" Wally sat up staring at Superboy who had frozen on the spot, trying to come up with an excuse he started saying the first things that came to mind. "Said something about…and English project-er, uh….something like that."
Wally sat there for a minute before reclining back on the couch and, to Superboy's relief, buying the lie. "Well okay. Wonder why she didn't ask me for help."
Remembering Wally's complaints about the subject Superboy asked. "I thought you hated English class?"
He let out a short laugh. "Yeah that's true. That's probably why she didn't ask me, knew that I would be bored out of my mind."
The conversation was dropped there and they continued watching Courage.
Shadow was led through a very large library/study, the girl's shower room, the bedroom wing (M'Gann let her take a peek insider her room to get the layout), she was taken through the garage where a variety of vehicles and bikes were parked, finally, ending in the hanger.
M'Gann didn't stop talking for the entire tour and Shadow's placid indifferent demeanor was beginning to fray.
"And this is my Bioship! Of course, you've already met her." M'Gann held a hand high up to the plane that Shadow did indeed remember all too well, although it did appear different than last time.
Smaller in size than last time, it was more egg shaped then the elongated pointed shape it had. Picking up on Shadow's quizzical attitude, M'Gann explained. "She's resting right now."
"It. Rests?" Shadow raised a disbelieving eyebrow, wondering if she had yet again misinterpreted an English idiom.
"Yeah," M'Gann practically sighed, gently patting her plane. "She had a rough mission."
Shadow felt that she was ceased to be surprised at anything this world had to throw at her.
Bubbling up once more, Shadow's tour guide turned toward her. "Now you've seen our home, what do you think?"
"It's big." Was Shadow's only response, in truth she was really impressed with it, but it kept giving her flashbacks to the first time she had walked through Xavier's mansion. The yearning feeling inside was something that she hadn't experienced in a long time and she had difficulty placing it; the feeling made her uncomfortable and while she was glad for seeing where they were keeping her, all Shadow wanted to do now was go back to her room and lay down.
M'Gann had gotten used to Shadow's deadpan comments and replied with as much energy as when she had started the tour, "Yes it is. It may take you some time to get used to it but don't worry, if Conner ca learn to live here so can you."
The sentence stabbed Shadow like a knife through paper; the reality of her plight hammering into her reverie. How long am I going to stay here? The despairing thought entered her mind.
Thee enthusiastic Martian instantly picked up on the shift of tone and tried madly to back track her mistake. "Not that you'll be here that long I'm sure, but-uh, just enough time for you to, uh-"
"Anything else you wanted to show me?" Shadow snapped at her, arms now crossed and eyes glowering.
M'Gann's smile faltered, feeling that she caused a major setback in making friends with Shadow, And everything had been going so well at first! "No…no, I'll take you back."
In heavy silence they began the trek back to main portion of the building, they hadn't left the garage though when the Zeta-tubes went off. Batman, A-02. Robin, B-01. Wonder Woman, A-03. Aqualad, B-02. Artemis, B-07.
"I wonder what they're here for," M'Gann commented to herself and picked up the pace.
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Again, sorry for disappearing so long. I don't know how or why you guys put up with me, but hopefully I should be back on track soon and producing chapters once more! This was going to be a longer chapter but the second part is proving to have a few difficulties and I thought I'd go ahead and throw you guys bone. I'm planning on putting the second part up next week, sorry for lame cliffhanger but be looking forward to some Wonder Woman and Shadow tension coming up! Anyways your guy's reviews keep me going and I'll be working hard to be more consistent, (April is just a terrible time for a student.){*}