Emma sighed and leaned back in her chair, enjoying the quiet solitude of late night monitor duty in the Metro Tower. She had the lights dimmed as she always did when working alone. Emma found it a bit surprising how easily she had fallen into some aspects of the superhero lifestyle. The most surprising to her was that she found monitor duty to be rather relaxing and a time she could be by herself for once. She had previously believed that she wouldn't have had the patience to sit around doing practically nothing for hours at a time.

Her ears picked up the faint sound of someone entering the room as the doors hissed open, indicating her time on monitor duty was unfortunately coming to a close. Emma lightly frowned as she spoke without even turning her chair around, "You're late, McGinnis."

"What like you have somehow else better to be?" Came the sarcastic reply from Terry. It had become their standard greeting, a ritual that both would have missed were it to cease. Not that either of them would ever admit it. Despite how they had met, Emma came to eventually like Terry, not that she would ever admit to that either. He reminded her of her late Uncle Wally but at the same time there was something about him that reminded her of her Uncle Bruce as well.

"Yeah, my bed," Emma retorted, trying to stifle a yawn. She didn't want to admit it but she was actually quite tired, both mentally and physically. She glanced at the Dark Knight out of the corner of her eye as she asked, "Quiet in Gotham tonight? It must have been if Uncle Bruce is letting you come here for monitor duty."

"For once there's been no freaks trying to destroy the city or robberies going on," Batman replied with a slight smirk. "Anything interesting happening here?"

"Not a thing and I hope it stays that way for the rest of the night," Emma rose and stretched her aching muscles. "I'm ready to crash and burn tonight. I've had enough brawls today to last me the rest of the week."

Batman narrowed his eyes slightly as he studied her for a few moments before asking, "You all right?"

Emma paused before tilting her head in curiosity, "Why are you asking?"

"Just seems odd that someone like you could get tired of fighting," Terry then shrugged. "If my time from working with Shayera and Warhawk is any indication. That and you're quite aggressive yourself."

Emma lightly shook her head and rolled her eyes, "Look I'm fine, okay? I'm not used to this whole superhero thing still. Honestly it's way more work than I thought it would be. Here I thought kicking some bad guy ass would be easy."

"Only a few months in and you're tired already? Grass isn't much greener on the other side, is it?" Terry rhetorically asked her with a smirk before flopping down in the vacant chair. "You might as well get some sleep then. We don't need you falling asleep in the middle of a fight."

"Yeah like that would ever happen," Emma rolled her eyes with a slight smirk.

Emma tossed and turned in a restless sleep. She gritted her teeth as her Red Lantern power ring flared to life. A minute barely passed before Emma woke with a startled scream. She sat up in her bed as she looked down at the glowing power ring. Even after what her father had told her about this power ring, she had this gut feeling that she only had a slim idea of what had been grafted onto her right middle-finger. Something that, according to her father, she'd never be able to get rid of.

The ring once again pulsated with energy. Emma would have been lying if she said that the current surge of energy flowing within her didn't make her feel powerful and unstoppable at that very moment. She felt strong enough to even...

"Annihilate them..." A voice faintly whispered within her head. "Burn them..."

Emma's eyes widened as she looked down at the ring once more and then shook her head. It all had to be in her head. The ring was an inanimate object. It couldn't speak or communicate with her. It had to be her lack of sleep.

As tired as she was, Emma found sleep to be an unpleasant prospect. Each night she found herself plagued by the same nightmares. Nightmares of her killing each member of the Justice League Unlimited one-by-one with her power ring. Then, once she woke, she would hear that same voice whispering in her ear trying to entice her into action. Entice her to act out the scenes within her nightmares.

Emma shook her head and sighed as she got out of bed.

Emma streaked through the air as fast as her ring would allow. Currently she had no main objective. She simply was just trying to clear her head and her thoughts. Traveling like this under her own power was still a newer experience for her. Emma found it was oddly liberating to be able to fly on her own. Emma was also beginning to understand just why her mother loved flying so much.

Emma then frowned when she heard the commlink in her right ear chirp. She let out a frustrated sigh as she placed a finger up to it, "What do you want?"

"Couldn't sleep?" Shayera voice came over the commlink.

Emma was silent for a moment before she responded, "Obviously."

"Want to talk about it?"

"Not really," Emma muttered as she then frowned. "How did you know that I left the Metro Tower?"

"All Justice League commlinks have trackers built in them. It's a safety precaution."

Emma rolled her eyes, "Why does Uncle Clark need me under that much surveillance? I get it that I'm not technically a real member of the Justice League but goddamn the guy can loosen up a bit. He's an idiot if he thinks I'll just run off with this stupid ring. Even I understand how dangerous it is. Dad gave me a pretty good rundown of how stupid I would be if I ever did that."

She could hear her mother let out an exasperated sigh, "Actually I was the one who was worried, not Clark. Terry said you were acting off recently. I couldn't sleep anyways so I figured I'd go talk to you. Lo and behold you're not in your room."

"So you tracked me down like some kind of criminal. Look I'm fine Mom. I just wanted some peace and quiet so that I could think." Emma was then silent for a moment before she spoke again, "Why do they still not trust me?"

"Emma," Shayera started before lightly sighing. "Look, gaining trust isn't easy once it's lost and you know I have plenty of experience with that. You could be spending the rest of your life trying to earn it back."

"But I haven't done anything wrong. I unofficially joined the Justice League like Uncle Clark wanted. Dad trains me every day on how to control this damn ring. What more do they want me to do? Save the fucking world from some kind of alien invasion? Pledge undying loyalty to the Justice League?" Emma let out a frustrated sigh. "I don't know how much longer I can do this Mom."

"You have to remember what your line of work was before you got that power ring. That's why they're hesitant on trusting you," Emma could hear the overt disapproval in Shayera's tone. Emma knew her mother had a point. Being a mercenary for hire with a penchant for assassination didn't exactly scream exceptional morals. "You weren't exactly an upstanding citizen."

"I get it that I used to kill people for money but I don't do that stuff anymore. I haven't done it in years." Emma let out another sigh, "I just don't think I'm cut out for this superhero stuff like you, Dad, and Rex are. Apparently I wasn't made for this."

Shayera lightly chuckled, "I seem to clearly remember when you were a kid and you said that you were going to join the Justice League when you were older."

"Oh come on Mom I had to be like ten when I said that," Emma rolled her eyes. "Besides that was more talk than anything else. I was just trying to act all tough."

"And just who were you trying to impress?" Shayera humorously asked. "Me and John or yourself?"

Emma rolled her eyes, "It wasn't to impress anyone. I had my reasons back then."

"Let me guess, your reasons were pertaining to being able to pick fights everyday right?" Shayera asked in an amused tone. "Or perhaps it was about being able to beat the shit out of people without repercussions."

"No you smartass, it was after-" Emma frowned as she cut herself off with an exasperated sigh. "Nevermind, it doesn't matter. Like I said before, I was a kid back then and was just talking bullshit."

Shayera was silent for a moment before she spoke again, "After what Emma?"

"Look just drop it Mom. It doesn't matter."

"It must have mattered to you if it made you want to join the Justice League for some other reason than to fight."

"I thought wanting to protect people was a good enough of a reason to join the Justice League," Emma raised an eyebrow. "Or am I wrong?"

"Just so you know, you're still horrible at lying," Shayera said to her. "I'll accept that answer for now. At least, until you decide to tell me the truth. Whatever your reason was back then I'm sure it was well-intentioned."

"I'm not lying," Emma insisted before sighing. "Can we just drop it?"

"Alright, alright we'll drop it," Shayera then sighed herself. "I'm going to let you go okay? Try to at least get some sleep tonight."

"Yeah sure whatever, I'll try to, night Mom," Emma quietly replied as she cut off the commlink's feed.

Emma scowled as she looked ahead. She could clearly remember the day when she had decided that she wanted to join the Justice League. It was after Grail's invasion of Earth. After those three long months she and Rex had went without being able to see their mother. When Emma had finally seen her mother again and saw the damage Grail had caused, she had decided then and there that she was never going to let someone do that to someone she loved ever again.

Perhaps Rex had been a bit too young and naïve back then but Emma could tell immediately that something was wrong with Shayera when their Uncle Wally had brought them to see her finally. When Emma had asked Shayera if she really had died, she could tell that her mother's answer was a blatant lie. Then the look in her eyes told Emma everything else. Behind her façade of trying to appear happy in front of them, Emma could see the lingering fear in Shayera's eyes. Her fear of Grail. Her fear of nearly dying. Emma swore to herself that she would do whatever it took to protect her mother. She would never allow her mother to go through something like that again.

Despite everything that had happened over the years, Emma still was driven by that very notion. Though she would never openly admit it in front of anyone. Emma knew she had no one else to blame but herself for how strained her relationship with her mother had become. All because she had to hold onto a petty grudge about that damned Thanagarian Invasion for years.

Emma's thoughts were abruptly interrupted when her commlink chirped in her ear once again. The Red Lantern groaned in frustration and scowled, "What do you want now?"

"Hello to you too," Terry sarcastically responded. "Good to know you're in a good mood."

Emma let out a long sigh, "Sorry, I thought you were someone else. What do you want Terry?"

"Well since you asked so nicely," Emma could just tell that Terry was rolling his eyes. "We have a little situation over at an old Cadmus site. We were wondering if you wanted to tag along."

At that Emma rose an eyebrow, "We?"

"Yeah me and Mareena," he replied. "She was about to takeover my shift when we got the alert. It's probably nothing but I figured it wouldn't hurt to go check it out. And considering it's an old Cadmus site there's no telling what we might run in to."

Emma was silent for a moment. Technically she wasn't allowed on any official Justice League missions unless her mother was with her. She then smirked. Perhaps this could be her chance to prove that she was capable of being trusted and of no need of supervision. That and Emma liked to spend time with Mareena. Particularly she liked to tease the Atlantean about Rex.

"Sure count me in."