I'm so sorry about the break, I've just had a lot of stuff going on with work and school and family and all, and honestly I just had a huge writers block on top of that and I didn't have time to really sit down with my notes and figure out where I want the story to go. I'm back now, though, and I have some chapters written ahead so I shouldn't miss any updates for a while. Hope you like the chapter, please review!

Two days later, Mallory went to the Watchtower after work, wearing training clothes and carrying a bag with her suit in it. She was trying to spend as much time as possible with the team before they went on a mission so that she could settle back into fighting as part of such a big team, and so she could relearn her place in it now that there were so many new members.

She appeared on the bridge in the Watchtower and was startled to see Batman, Superman, and Black Canary talking at the other end of the room. They looked up when she appeared and she smiled, not knowing why she suddenly felt nervous.

"Hey," she said cautiously, walking over to them.

Clark crossed his arms. "I appreciated the heads up on your coming back," he said.

She winced. "Sorry," she said, "it wasn't really planned."

"It's fine," Canary said. "But you could have at least texted. It wasn't great to have to find out that you're back on the team from Impulse."

"Is that how you found out?" Clark asked, sounding jealous. "Hal's the one that told me. Sometimes I'd like to smack that smug look off his face."

"Wow, I thought you were friends," Mallory joked.

She glanced at Batman, waiting for him to chime in, but he just said, "You realize, of course, that you'll need to run some simulations with the team. You've been gone a long time, you won't be as comfortable as you were before."

"No," she said sarcastically, smiling a little. "This is my first day, I figured I'd just jump in and hope for the best."

He narrowed his eyes, and she shut up, but the smile stayed on her face. They stared at each other for a few seconds, then Bruce smiled a little and said, "Welcome back." He strode to the zeta tube without looking back, and Mallory couldn't keep the grin off her face.

"Aww, he missed me?" she asked, looking at the other two heroes.

Canary rolled her eyes. "Sure. We all did," she told her. She grew serious as she added, "congratulations, Mallory. We are all proud of you for having the strength to get back on the right path."

Mallory looked down and shifted her bag to the other arm. "Right, well, thanks, Dina. Uh, the team's probably training by now, I should join them." Dina nodded and Mallory turned on her heel and hurried to the training room. She wasn't quite ready to talk about her solo months. Not with the League, at least.

She walked into the training room in the middle of a simulation. The entire team was there in civies, Batgirl and Robin wearing sunglasses, fighting Cobra and his army. Cassie was the first one to notice her.

"Inferno!" she exclaimed. Mallory saw one of the goons running at her and she shot a fireball at the hologram, killing it so Cassie could stay in the session. "Thanks!" the girl called, and she went back to her fighting.

Mallory dropped her bag by the door and leaned against the wall, tilting her head as she studied the fighting in the room. With the other OGs, their techniques were as familiar to her as her own, and watching them fighting made her feel at home. She was also familiar with Peter and Gar, and even Tim and Barbara to a point because they were trained by the same people as Dick. It was the others that she was more interested in. Cassie's fighting was a mix of the Amazon techniques that Wonder Woman and Troia used and the martial arts that Black Canary taught the team, and though she was a little clumsy sometimes, she had excellent form and purpose behind every movement. Bart was a whirlwind, using his speed in his punching even though they weren't supposed to for this simulation. She noted that Jaime had improved a lot since the last time she'd seen him fight outside of his suit. There was hardly any delay between the attack and his reaction to it. Either he wasn't relying on the scarab as much or he was more in tune with it. Static, too, had improved. He was mostly punching, really it was almost boxing, but it got the job done and he was protecting himself well. Her eyes settled on Arrowette last. The girl was good. Really good. She almost looked like she was dancing, throwing punches and kicks with the grace of a ballerina.

Kaldur noticed her finally and made his way over to where she was standing. "I know you want to join," he said with a smile.

She shrugged. "I was just trying to get familiar with the others. You've done a good job with them."

He let the complement pass without responding to it and watched the floor for a moment. "There is an opening there," he pointed out, nodding to the spot.

She put up a hand. "Hey, I don't want to throw them off. I'll just wait for the—"

He pushed her out onto the floor before she could finish the sentence, throwing her into the fray. She immediately had to duck a punch, and she returned it with enough force to make the hologram dissolve. She took the short reprieve to glare at the leader, earning a smile from him before he went back to the fight.

She smiled to herself and put up her hands, focusing on her opponents and making herself aware of where every other member of the team was. She went into action, charging two Cobra goons. She threw one of them into the other and they went down. She backflipped, letting the one that was charging her run under her, and she brought her elbow down on its shoulder, ending it.

"Inferno, duck!" someone yelled. She responded without even thinking, dropping to the ground. A hologram flew over her and crashed into two of her opponents. She looked over her shoulder to see who had done it and Conner smiled and gave her a salute. She nodded her thanks and rolled to her feet, the smile widening. The opponents were thinning now, the simulation coming to an end, and the team grouped together. Mallory ended up between Mal and Tim and as they faced the final wave.

"Hey, girl. What's new with you?" Guardian asked, looking at her out of the corner of his eye.

"Nothing much. Went to Hell, that was something."

His concentration was broken and he dropped his hands to his side, turning to face her. "You what?"

She slammed a foot into the cobra goon that was two inches from burying a sword in Mal's chest. "Focus!" she said, but she was grinning as she said it. He gave her a look that said he knew she'd done it on purpose and punched at the last of the goons.

"It's good to have you back," he told her.

"Seconded," Karen said, coming over to her. "What are the chances we can get Nightwing to come back, too?" Mallory shook her head, not commenting on it as she greeted her friend.

"It will be nice to have another senior member on the team again," Megan mentioned. "We try to keep one of us as the squad leaders."

Mallory tilted her head. "Squad leader, huh?" She chuckled. "I don't know about that. I'm not really-"

"Wait, Inferno gets to go right back to being a senior member?" Peter interrupted.

The others looked at him, and Gar crossed his arms. "Yeah, that's not really fair. She hasn't been on the team in like a year. Why can't I be a squad leader?" The boys looked at the senior members expectantly, the other new members watching from the outside of the circle to see who would win.

"They have a point," Conner mentioned.

"So, how do we want to handle this?" Megan asked.

"Guys, it's my first day back, we don't need to do this. I've never even led a squad before. Honestly, Batgirl is probably better for it than me."

"You are sure?" Kalder asked.

"No, she's not," Artemis cut in. Mallory looked at the archer and was cut off before she could start. "First, Mal, you'll be fine as a leader, you've been on the team longer than any of them, so you know how it works."

Mallory shook her head. "I've never been on this team, with squads and side missions," she argued.

"And second," Artemis continued, ignoring the pyrokinetic's interruption, "do you really want to let your brother win?"

Mallory tilted her head and glanced at Peter, then she smiled a little. "So, trial by combat?" she suggested.

Artemis smiled. "There it is."

They turned back to the rest of the team. "Ok, if one of you can beat her in a sparring match, you can be a squad leader and she'll just be support," Megan told them.

The younger members grinned and started talking to each other, deciding who would be the challenger. After the short discussion, Peter stepped up to the older members, his smile wide and his eyes narrowed with determination. Sometimes, he looked so much like Dick, Mallory almost expected him to cackle and disappear like her friend used to do.

"Vigilante?" Megan asked, looking at the others for confirmation.

Gar slung an arm around his friend's shoulders. "He's the best fighter here." Barbara and Tim crossed their arms, and the green boy amended, "the best fighter here who wants the job, and he knows her the best, so he has the best chance of winning."

The others chuckled, and Kalder exchanged a glance with Mallory for her ok. She nodded, and so did he. "All right, clear the floor," he said. The others backed up, giving the siblings a wide berth.

Mallory tilted her head. "Hand to hand, of course," she confirmed.

"Yeah, sure, if you think you can take me without your powers, go ahead," he replied. He unsnapped his utility belt, hidden beneath his sweatshirt, and tossed it to the side of the room. They swung their arms and legs a few times to loosen them up, even though they were warmed up from the simulation, then they raised their arms, ready.

Mallory smiled and tilted her head. "You sure you want this?" she asked.

Her brother's smile widened as he shook his head. "Just shut up and fight."

"All right, then," she replied, and she made her first move.

She faked a punch and drop kicked. Peter easily jumped over her leg, lashing out while he was still in the air. She ducked and popped back up, throwing two punches and a kick back to back. He blocked them all and backflipped, catching her chin with his foot on his way over. She didn't let it phase her, and she ran towards him, aiming her kick the second before he landed. As soon as his feet hit the ground, her foot crashed into the backs of his knees and he dropped. She pushed him forward before he could react and put her forearm between his shoulder blades.

"Had enough?" she asked.

He glared at her out of the corner of his eye and pushed up with more force than she'd been expecting. They were back on their feet in a flash, their arms raised back in the starting position. Mallory heard Bart sigh dramatically and say, "this could take a while." She smiled and narrowed her eyes, taking a moment to size her brother up. His form was good, but his focus was split, and his legs were a little too close together. He moved before she could act on that, though. He came at her, spinning at the last second to avoid her punch and drop kicked. She wasn't expecting the attack from behind, and she fell onto her stomach, hard. She just barely had time to roll onto her back before he was on top of her, straddling her stomach and pinning her arms to her sides.

"This is the part where you use your powers, right?" he asked, victory in his face.

Mallory just smiled and said, "No, just my legs."

"Wha-"

The word didn't even get out of his mouth before Mallory reached her legs up and wrapped them around his neck, pulling him down to the ground. In one swift move, she was on top of him, using the same pin he'd had her in a second before. He tried to use his legs the way she had, but they weren't quite long enough to get to her neck. He managed to get them on her shoulders, but she was prepared for the pull and adjusted her weight to counter it before it happened. He shoved her forward, and the weight she'd leaned to counter being pulled backwards worked against her. She managed to catch herself with her forearm, freeing one of Peter's arms. He reached up to throw her forward, but just before he could make the motion, an alarm went off. The team reacted, jogging out the room. Mallory rolled off her brother and they popped to their feet.

"What's that mean?" she asked, her mind going to the Watchtower invasion.

"There's a mission," Conner told her. Kaldur tossed her the duffle and she unzipped it to reveal the black triangle on the red background of her shirt.

"Suit up, Inferno."

Less than ten minutes later, the team was assembled on the bridge, all in full costume. There were a lot of things that were unfamiliar to Mallory coming back, but this, the lineup while they waited to hear where they would be going, was as familiar as anything, and she fell into place beside Artemis and Conner at the end of the line while Kaldur and Megan pulled up the screen and faced the team.

"There are three missions, so we'll be splitting into squads," Megan told them, pulling up three separate screens. "Alpha squad is me, Tigress, Bumble Bee, Batgirl, Robin, and Vigilante. We'll be infiltrating an arms auction and gathering intel on the buyers. Auction's on an island in the Pacific, so we'll be in the Bioship."

Alpha squad moved out, following the Martian to the loading dock, and the rest of the team moved closer to fill the gaps of the stealthier members of the team. Mallory glanced around at who was left. Static, Blue Beetle, Arrowette, Wonder Girl, Superboy, Beast Boy, Guardian, Impulse, Aqualad, and her. Man, the team was big these days.

"Beta squad will be in Bailia investigating a plant that is suspected of housing and experimenting prisoners of the Reach and other alien origins. This could turn into a fight, so stay on your guard," Kaldur continued. "Superboy, Wonder Girl, Guardian, Beast Boy, and Static, you will be taking the Supercycle. Move out, and stay on your guard. There is no telling what safeguards are on the place."

The team nodded and started moving. The remainder of the teamstepped closer. Kaldur looked over the line and pulled up the last of the missions.

"Inferno, Arrowette, Impulse, and Blue Beetle, there is some suspicious activity in the northern area of Peru, it could be a new Cobra base setting up. Investigate and report back, but do not engage if it is Cobra. We do not want to tip them off just yet. I will coordinate the squads from here. You can take the javelin. Move out." They started to go to the docking bay, but Kaldur said, "Inferno, a word." She held back, watching as the younger members continued on to the docking bay. "You will be leading Gamma. This will be a good opportunity to get some experience."

Mallory tilted her head. "Are we just going on a wild goose chase so I can get real world experience? Because if that's what this is, then–"

Kaldur shook his head. "You know better than that. It is a real mission, but you're right about one thing. I put you on Gamma so that you would have a smooth first mission, to give you an opportunity to be the leader without the complication of a firefight."

Mallory narrowed her eyes. "Has the team's luck changed any since I left?" she asked.

Kaldur tilted his head. "What?"

She smiled a little. "You should know better than to jinx a mission, Kaldur. You invented blowing things up on missions."

He smiled, but his eyes were serious. "Be careful, Mallory."

She chuckled and started to walk to the docking bay. "I was in the League. I think I can take care of myself by now." She jogged the rest of the way and found the javelin prepped and ready to go. She took the pilot's chair and closed the doors, doing the final prep before takeoff. "I really hate planes," she muttered as she signaled the docking bay doors to open. The jets came on in the back and she gripped the controls tightly. They shot into space, towards the planet. The plane basically flew itself, but Mallory still didn't like flying in a machine that couldn't think for itself.

Impulse looked over his shoulder at her. "Ok, leader, what's the plan?"