"Wwooowsers!" Karen gushed, grabbing her afro puffs in a fit of childish glee. "I don't know where to begin...!" she gasped, looking left and right. Karen's friend, Kara, raised a quizzical blonde brow at her pint-sized friend, crossing the arms of her blue leather jacket.
"Yah'know, Beecher, when you said we were going somewhere 'exciting' today, I tagged along because I kinda' thought you meant something...well...something actually exciting! I even put on this stupid blindfold!" Karen huffed, eyeing Barbra, who had insisted the location of today's mission required "top-secrecy".
Barbra's grin seemed to widen, if that was even possible, as she whipped a newspaper out of...Kara wasn't sure from where actually. Her hoodie pocket, maybe? Babs shook the article in front of Kara's nose "Are you KIDDING ME!? This science fair is for the 'best and brightest' only! And that machine over there is the main event! I've already seen it, like, six times...ok, seven- I've gone twice… in two days! Twice! And, ehem, FYI ladies…, waiting in line?…Totally worth it!" Barbra danced from one foot to the other, clutching her precious newspaper to her chest.
Kara groaned. This couldn't be happening. She stood before her pint-sized friends, betrayal mixed with the onset terror of dreaded boredom. She stabbed an accusing finger at her sneaky friends. "You said this was big news! Action-Packed. Those were your words. I wrote them down!...on a calendar! " Kara despaired.
Karen, perhaps egged on by Barbra, piped up. "Ooh, C'mon Kara- what's not exciting about this!?"
She gestured grandly around the room. Kara looked around the room skeptically. Her eyes landed on the large, black circus tent which seemed to be made of heavy cloth. Standing outside, a set of twins from Kara's geology and chemistry class, respectively, stood, waving passerby inside and pointing at the invention which required a more than ten-foot tall tent. "Weird." The Kryptonian thought.
Kara activated her x-ray vision to see inside and saw a giant ray gun sitting on a stage beneath an overhead light. Painted stylistically on the side were the words 'The Mighty Midas Ray'. According to the sign outside the tent entrance, the laser, quote, "…coated the whole cubic surface of any object it hit with a layer of gold via a proton…". Kara finished reading the overly complicated sign. Kara's brain understood "hit" "object" and "gold". Her inner athlete was intrigued. "Potentially cool..." Kara observed, drawing out the word like a piece of gum and spitting out the "ten", a little less skeptically.
Still, given the choice, she'd rather be watching a football game- competition, chicken legs, and, yes, she admitted to herself, guys…guys in uniform and chaps throwing a ball around and looking good doing it. The only chaps here were British kids with glasses and egos that stunk to high heaven. Not that she had room to judge. Karen adjusted her jean jacket over her tank top and sighed, following her friends to the first exhibit.
Barbra bounced ahead of her friends, taking the lead as both tour guide and chatty techy fan. Her green eye flashed as she skipped, red ponytail bouncing with every step, taking in every piece of information she could. Maybe she was nerdy and, admittedly, obsessively excited, but Karen was right! This was the coolest place in town!
Of course, it wasn't the only reason she was here. Batman had assigned Barbra to scout the fair for weeks. Thanks to his impressive detective skills, and an anonymous tip, Batman had found that someone was planning a heist at the science fair! All of that technology in the wrong hands- definitely a no-go on the bat-meter. And, thanks to the unknowns of the case, even though Barbra knew her friends were supers, and they knew about her, this particular mission was top secret.
As the trio turned the corner, Barbra's gaze came to a halt, resting on none other than Bruce Wayne! He was surrounded by adoring donors and citizens, smiling glibly and talking about how much money he'd donated to this 'noble cause'. He whipped his tousled black hair and laughed, throwing back his head before turning it to sweep the crowd in front of him. His passing eyes paused, only briefly, on Barbra. And it was almost unnoticeable to an untrained eye. But the minute his eyes landed on Barbra, he gave a subtle nod and, just for a second, his eyes became sharp as steel, battle-hardened.
Barbra stiffened and nodded subtly back. Her emerald eyes flicked from Bruce to her friends and back again. Bruce had gone back to talking to the crowd, addressing a "controversy" about stolen technology and what Wayne enterprises planned to do about it. Karen and Kara had, meanwhile, fallen into a one-sided "conversation" about the Mighty Midas laser show.
The more Barbra heard, the wider she smiled and nodded to herself. They were still talking about the laser…. "Perfect!" Barbra whispered.
She rushed over and popped up between her friends, interrupting her chatty friend, grabbing both the girls' attention. "Heeeeyyyy guys, how about you two go and check out the Midas Ray! I'm going to go look around aaat...uh, stuff!" Barbra giggled awkwardly and ran off toward the crowd that was swarming Mr. Wayne.
Karen, who was normally very shy and extremely perceptive, noticed none of this today. And Kara, who was normally reckless and impulsive, was not nearly as enthralled with the science fair and watched their bubbly red head friend dash off. "That was...weird. Hey, Karen, maybe we shoul-"
"Let's take a closer look!" Karen said loudly, interrupting Kara. Jumping up, Karen grabbed kara's hand and yanked her towards the spectacle in the tent with surprising strength for her very short size, causing Kara to cry out in surprise. They found a place in line and were promptly ushered in.
