A New Life

Chapter 32

The Watchtower

"…I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that there are extraterrestrial Genghis Khans out there, and then there's the whole 'Kryptonian Kill-order' Darkseid put out on Superman," Vixen exclaimed, her features looking strained over the Justice League's holographic communication channel. "How exactly are we supposed to think about why they came here?"

"I cannot tell you how we're supposed to do it but we must find a way all the same," Wonder Woman stated firmly. "Like Batman said, understanding why Mongul and his sister threatened our planet could help us learn how to keep them away."

"And like I already said, there's no point." The relatively new Green Lantern argued back. "Mongul's entire thing is that he wants to conquer the most powerful planets and beings in preparation for his eventual return to conquer his home galaxy."

"I'm sure Batman isn't contesting your knowledge of these unearthly details but I also get what he's saying," Green Arrow commented from his base. "Earth is… look, on a universal scale -hell, on a galactic scale, Earth isn't quite up to the level of being a blip on a guy like Mongul's radar. I mean, there's gotta be galaxy-spanning empires out there, right?" When Jessica nodded slowly, Oliver continued,"Well if that's the case then Earth isn't important enough to pull a guy like Mongul here. Not on its own at least, because if I was a galactic conqueror? I don't see myself bothering with what amounts to a dead-end planet on the ass-end of space."

"Not unless a known figure like, oh how about the deadliest bounty hunter in the known universe, went around talking about how said dead-end planet on the ass-end of space has spawned two people that fought him to a standstill? Hmm?" Jessica asked. "That sound convincing enough?"

"Sorry but two people still aren't enough to make galactic conqueror-me turn up to wipe out the planet." Oliver shrugged. "It just doesn't make sense."

"But what if Mongul knew about Darkseid's attempts to take Earth?" Superman asked, speaking for the first time in nearly fifteen minutes. "Darkseid's a conqueror -on a greater scale than Mongul, agreed, but a conqueror nonetheless. If Mongul's on some sort of 'proving himself' mission then taking Earth makes sense: he'd be showing the universe that he did something someone as powerful as Darkseid couldn't. That'd be one hell of a statement."

"Now that makes a ton of sense," The Flash nodded. "It's also quite terrifying because that means we've now beaten off three intergalactic warlords which puts us very firmly on the map."

"We need information." The Question stated decisively. "We've been focused on our little mudball for too long: we need intel on what goes on in the wider world. Having the Watchtower as a warning system won't hold up if an alien armada decides to just overpower us with greater numbers. We need eyes on the galactic streets."

"The universal streets, you mean," Shazam muttered, his normally boyish eyes taking on the hard glint that denoted the Wisdom of Solomon had taken over. "Even ignoring the steep initial costs of setting up such an information gathering network, the challenge with developing a network that spans galaxies is the distance-versus-time problem: if our contacts are too widespread, gathered information could reach us too late for it to matter; conversely, if they are too close, they may not hear anything."

"Jessica, could you help us-"

"I can't do much there Supergirl," The Green Lantern responded. "I'm stationed here, to this sector; asking for updates on other sectors is frowned upon by the Guardians and the kind of information you'd need here wouldn't even be on official channels."

"Well if the Green Lantern can't help us, how do we move forward with this?" Captain Atom asked.

"What about Maelstrom?" Cyborg asked. "He's good at the clandestine stuff and he's already got one hell of a network: it's how he learned about the hit on Queen Perdita a few months back and just about no one even heard a whisper before he did."

"That's just over a continent," Vixen argued archly. "I'll be generous and say he's covered the whole planet. You think he can work on something spanning galaxies?"

"If he's as good as Cyborg says, he can at least help us set the foundations for a network," The Question noted. "It won't be perfect and there'll be a number of hiccups but if we work together, we might be able to have something set up far faster than if we were going at it on our own."

"Funny, it sounds like we've agreed to overlook Uzumaki's murder of the Joker," The Dark Knight cut in, lasering everyone with an intense gaze. "Or am I reading the room wrongly?"

No one spoke for a few seconds, regardless of their physical location.

"You know what? No, I think I'm done with this shit," The Black Canary stated, her words simmering with long restrained anger as she pushed herself out of her seat and locked glares with the Batman. "I'm overlooking it. Is that clear enough for you, Bats? Or do I need to scream it a little louder."

"The dramatics aren't necessary, Canary; you'd made your stance clear since day one." The words were delivered with a cool dismissal that had the blonde heroine slamming her fist against the table.

"Just like you have, you stubborn jackass! You didn't have a problem with him when he was pulling our asses out of the fire when Darkseid showed up or when he fought Trigon to a standstill but he steps over the line one time-"

"One time is more than enough-"

"He killed a known madman!" Canary snapped harshly. "A homicidal piece of shit that's slaughtered thousands with a literal goddamned smile on his face! While we killed innocent people who were forced into slavery! Justify that!" Contrary to the Dark Knight's words earlier, she meant every word when she'd said that she was sick of things: sick of the rest of the League shying away from the topic of what to do about Naruto -like he was some infectious, diseased thing that needed to be handled with care!; she was sick of Batman and Superman's adamant refusal to even try to listen to anything that wasn't an extreme measure… most of all, she was sick of her own passivity. For too long, she had tried the diplomatic approach; tried to reason with both Superman and Batman without really forcing the League to come out and just take a stance on the matter. It wasn't because she didn't care about the whiskered blond and his partner: she respected Naruto and Kaguya to a much greater degree than she would have expected and considered them two of her closest friends; rather, she hadn't wanted to rock the boat. The League was relatively new, all things considered, and she knew how easily internal conflicts could tear established organizations apart, to say nothing of their constantly growing yet somewhat loose alliance with the other heroes. For more than two months, she had forced herself to put the amorphous needs of the League over those of her friends and, perhaps more importantly, the concrete needs of her Team. She was done with that: it was time the Team's needs came first.

And with that in mind, she soldiered on: "Did you ever consider that? How we killed hundreds of parademons without a moment's hesitation when they attacked? Because you didn't seem to care about using explosives on the parademons even after you'd found out that they were humans forced to undergo some kind of transformation process and then mentally chained to Darkseid's will."

The Batman's eyes narrowed and his voice, when he spoke, was glacial. "You've been in contact with him."

"Yes, yes I have," She admitted freely, her guilt at feeling like she had been skulking around when she spoke to Naruto easing off her shoulders. "And judging by that, I'll take it he's challenged you about that? I wonder what you said?"

"You're arguing with the words-"

"Even if she is," Green Arrow cut in, his tone and his emerald gaze as piercing as if he was physically present. He'd long known how his partner felt about the whole matter and while he wasn't all that chummy with the whiskered blond, he honestly felt the whole issue had been drawn out long enough. "She -and by extension- Naruto- isn't wrong: we didn't exactly hold back when we handled the parademons."

"The Joker was killed in cold-blood; we can't compare that to-"

"We can't compare that to what? Us killing those parademons in the heat of the battle?" Canary fired back heatedly. "Weren't your words 'we don't kill, ever'?!"

"Because we should never be the ones to mete out that kind of judgement! There has to be a place where we draw the line and let the law-!"

"The same way you let the law prevail when we fought the Atlanteans?! When we had to do whatever it took to deal with Orm? When we killed men whose only crime was following an insane leader? Did we let the law prevail then? Or did we-"

"That was basically the first time we fought together! All of us operated as we saw fit! And we all agreed that Arthur would have had an easier time of bringing Atlantis to his side if most of you hadn't-"

"Enough!"/"Stop!" The simultaneous orders from Superman and Wonder Woman didn't come out as angry yells; in fact, in Diana's case, it was almost conversational save for the keen sharpness to it which was a stark contrast to Superman's more stalwart decree. Whether it was the blunt force or the razor edge, the words worked, silencing the arguing duo even if it didn't halt their non-verbal battle of wills, and after a quick non-verbal exchange of their own, Diana continued, "Batman, Canary, you have made your stances abundantly clear on this matter so I would suggest that you take your seats and allow us all -those of us still here, at least- to deliberate on this matter here and now."

Though unwilling to be the first to draw back -her mother had often bemoaned the sheer stubbornness she could bring to bear when provoked- a quick glance around the room showed that the Amazon was right: at some point during their argument, every other League member who wasn't present on the Watchtower save Green Arrow had pulled out of the call.

Even among those physically present, she noted that the Flash, Jessica, Billy and Shayera had begun to fidget and were moments away from slinking out of the meeting hall. The anger drained out of her like water in a basket and, with a tired sigh, she sat back down. "Sorry, I just… I…"

"You were airing your opinion," Diana lifted a shoulder in a half-shrug. "An opinion regarding a matter that was long overdue for resolution."

"I believe the matter was resolved," The Dark Knight pointed out, his tone as emotionless as ever. "Uzumaki was to be excommunicated-"

"We never agreed to that," Cyborg remarked. "We couldn't exactly find him so claiming that we excommunicated him would be a big issue. Besides, he's never been a member of the League so how exactly do you excommunicate someone you never officially communicated with in the first place?"

"We're leaving all that to the past," Superman stated firmly. "Right now, we're going to talk this out and find a way to resolve this. I don't want us having any bad blood, whether among the few of us here or among the wider League." He stared swept his gaze around the room, making sure to receive each person's agreement before moving on. "Okay, we've got a few new faces in here that don't know anything about this issue. To keep things fair, I'd like you, J'onn, to bring us all up to speed."

The Martian nodded and launched into a quick summary of the events that led to the Joker's death.

"So… what's the problem?" Shayera asked, bewilderment clear on her face. "I mean, the guy killed a repeat homicidal maniac; why's this such a big deal?"

"I don't-"

"I don't know how things are done on Thanagar, Shayera, but I think Earth's rules are a tad… different," The Flash jumped in, intentionally cutting the Batman off. 'Sorry Bats but you've got this crazy way of sounding extremely condescending, probably without trying.' "In America, at least, you can't just grab a gun and kill a person just because they are a known killer; there's a process."

"I understand that," The winged woman raised her hands in a placating gesture, "and I'm not asking you to cheer this Maelstrom guy on but I feel like you can't deal with him killing this Joker the way the law would because you're operating outside those laws."

The meeting hall grew silent at that blunt admission. She may not have realized it but Shayera had just touched on a matter that many members of the League still skirted around when it was brought up: the legality of their actions.

In more than a few countries, the actions of 'masked vigilantes' was still heavily frowned upon: Bialya and the Rhelasias were the most outspoken examples but there were others that toed that line. In countries such as Russia, for example, only government sanctioned heroes were given leave to operate and anyone caught skulking around and playing at being a hero would likely find themselves on the receiving end of the government's wrath.

The good old US of A was something of an oddball: on a federal level, the Justice League was publicly taken as the world's defenders and were, as such, stalwart allies; at the state and municipal levels, though, things were a lot murkier and even established heroes like the Flash, Green Arrow and Vixen still experienced resistance to their actions in a number of areas.

"How does our legal status affect our ability to deal with Maelstrom?" Dinah asked, genuinely interested in what the winged woman had to say.

"The way I see it, most of you don't exactly have a problem with what he did. And if the Joker was even a quarter as bad as you said then frankly, neither do I." Shayera stated with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. "For those of you that don't really have a problem with it, you're dragging your feet on this because you don't believe that's anyway to treat someone who did something you'd wanted to do for a while but got too stuck in whatever red-tape you guys have here. For those who really do have a problem with what he did," Here, her golden brown eyes slid over to the Dark Knight, "you know you can't really do shit."

The statement had more than a few heads snapping to her in utter bewilderment -and not a few cases of clear shock.

"I mean… actually, we can-"

"Do what? Toss the guy in a federal prison cell?" Oliver asked, cutting Billy off with an almost derisive snort. "Hate to break it to ya, big guy, but any prosecutor with a halfway decent brain wouldn't touch the case with a thousand yard pole because of the public backlash."

"The general public would see Maelstrom as a true hero," The Flash explained. "After the Joker's reign of terror, I'm sure most Gotham citizens and a decent percentage of the GCPD would definitely see him in a favorable light." Though the Dark Knight remained silent, the more observant heroes saw the slight tension in his jaw and knew that the speedster was correct. "The public outcry could easily lead to more complex social problems starting from riots and spiraling downwards."

J'onn nodded gravely. "There is also the fact that publicizing something like this -and the public outcry Flash just spoke of- could embolden the more violent… heroes… and from there, all it would take is a single mistake for the governments of the world to decide that perhaps all heroes aren't worth the trouble."

"Then there's the other side of things," Jessica remarked. "We take this to the feds, it gets handled quietly and the Maelstrom gets locked up, right? Except the guy we're talking about fought Lobo to a standstill: I can't think of a single prison on the planet that could hold him. So, he breaks out of prison and -because, full disclosure, that's exactly how I'd react here- he decides the Justice League's full of hypocritical mooks and then we end up with an ultra-deadly, Lobo-level assassin thinking of ways he could get his revenge on the League."

"That's… that doesn't sound like Naruto at all," Cyborg said, torn between being terrified of what an unhinged Naruto could do and laughing his ass off at the thought of the blond ever getting to that point.

"Regardless, Shayera's point still stands," Superman sighed. "We can't take this anywhere so we need to handle this here."

"Well, Canary and now Shayera have given their opinions so I'd say we give Batman a chance to talk," The Flash suggested. "We all know he's against killing as a rule but there's gotta be a reason for that; something more that we maybe aren't seeing…?"

The Flash had let that sentence trail off as he did intentionally, giving the Dark Knight a chance to lay his opinion bare before the rest of the League and while his pride wanted to let that chance slip by so that he could make his own entrance, Bruce Wayne gratefully took the opportunity.

"I know it seems to many of you that I'm being a self-righteous hard-ass with my insistence that we strive to never take a life," He began slowly, leaning forward and looking at each person present. "I know how stupid it looks, my pushing us to potentially alienate a powerful ally over what seems like an easily overlooked offence. I know it seems absolutely insane that I'm doing all this over the Joker, a psychopath that has taken thousands of lives. And the truth is… you aren't the only ones thinking that way." His words seemed to reverberate around the room with a somber yet irresistible presence that kept everyone's attention firmly locked on him. "Flash was guessing when he said this but Commissioner Gordon told me that most of the GCPD were cheering the death of the Joker and the few veterans who could see beyond the present -including Gordon himself- would be all too willing to look the other way if the Joker's killer walked up to them and admitted his guilt. A close friend of mine-" For the first time since many of them had come to know him, they heard a slight crack in the Dark Knight's voice, a tiny hint at the vulnerable man that stood beneath the cowl. "Someone I trust implicitly asked me if the Joker's death had made Gotham safer… not necessarily as in less dangerous but perhaps just more predictable."

That had been a splash of icy water to him, when Alfred had asked him that question. Most others in the room probably wouldn't understand what the Wayne butler had meant but the older man had been, to a large degree, right: without the Joker, and not counting the turf war that was still ongoing, criminal activity had become almost… routine. The chaotic energy the Joker injected into Gotham's criminal element had petered out and the occurrence of more violent crimes had dipped to levels rarely seen in the city. It had been an eye-opening experience and it had led him to do something he didn't often do… "Hearing what they had to say and knowing that it mirrored what some of you think… it made me wonder if… maybe I was wrong. Maybe there were situations that needed to be handled by going to extremes and maybe there was some merit to what Maelstrom said about dealing with a sickness before it spread too far and couldn't be contained."

The Dark Knight sat back and threw his head backward, staring into the overhead lights. There, he'd said it: he had seriously considered Uzumaki's words from all those nights ago. After sticking to a stringent moral code that many thought was too black-and-white to handle the realities of the world, the proof that had been all but shoved into his face recently had left him reeling. The Joker's death had, in no small way, made Gotham safer. The legal enforcers of the law were willing to look the other way. Killing the Joker hadn't suddenly turned Uzumaki into a serial murderer.

Those truths had battered at his resolve relentlessly. Yet here he stood, as unwavering -no, he was even more unwavering in his belief than ever.

"So why the heck are you still pushing this?" Cyborg asked. "If you think Naruto's right-"

"I said he may have been right," He pushed himself forward again and all the smoldering intensity that had faded earlier returned with a vengeance. "And the longer I thought about it, the more I began to realize that he wasn't. Not in the long term."

"I'm guessing you have an explanation for that?" Cyborg asked. "Because, from where I'm sitting, the words you're saying aren't making any sense."

"That's because you aren't thinking about how this will play out over time," The Batman stated firmly. "Earlier, J'onn said something about how the revelation of Maelstrom's role in the Joker's death could make the more violent criminals much bolder but have you really taken that thought to its extreme? Have you wondered how easily we could slip down that slope; how easy it'll be to start justifying the death of criminals by claiming that they are psychopaths, then moving on to saying that they broke the law and then we find ourselves killing people because they displayed psychopathic tendencies."

"You're reaching pretty badly there, Bats," The Flash frowned. "I get that it's a slippery slope but I don't think we're anywhere near weak-minded enough to just take a plunge like that."

"You may be right about us, Flash, but what about those already leaning toward extreme measures? How do we stop them if they believe they're justified in their actions? And how about our legacies? Robin, Kid Flash, Artemis, Aqualad and all the other impressionable kids we have fighting with us; how do we get them to understand that there's a line between killing one type of villain and the other?"

"Now you're just making those kids sound like idiots," Oliver argued back. "There's a clear difference between the Joker and guys like Captain Cold."

"Snart may never have frozen someone to death but his actions have taken lives," The Flash rejoined quietly, the weight of his words cutting through the hall more effectively than if he had yelled. "And while we've got guys like the Golden Glider who focus on pulling heists more than anything else, those heists have cost people their jobs and things just spiral down from there." He bit his lip and swallowed some spit. "I'm pretty sure the guy meant well when he took out the Joker but I'm beginning to see Bats' point: if we don't put our foot down on this, it could easily come to haunt us later down the line."

"Damn it, Flash, this is Naruto you're talking about!" Cyborg argued heatedly. "You can't tell me Wa- Kid Flash hasn't told you about him! He's become as much of a mentor to the Team as most of you guys!"

"Cyborg's right," Canary added. "Raven and Miss Martian see him as an older brother, Aqualad only respects Aquaman and Queen Mera more than he respects Naruto, Troia, Robin and Artemis all pay a lot of attention to whatever he says, and Superboy? The only person even close to Naruto's influence on him is Supergirl." The blonde sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose, thus missing the Man of Steel's slight flinch at her last remark. "What Cyborg and I are trying to say is that alienating Naruto because of this will push the Team away from us! Can we really afford that?"

"We'll have to," J'onn said. "We are the Justice League, are we not?" The emphasis on the word 'justice' had Canary biting back a frustrated snarl even as the Martian explained, "Justice is fair, impartial; if we overlook this one event, then we must overlook any such occurrences in the future and for every time we are forced to overlook the matter because of precedence we lose our standing."

"Okay, so what about us, well, you guys?" Jessica asked. "I can sort of ignore the parademons even after you guys knew they were mutated humans but I remember watching clips of the Atlantean Surge for weeks on TV while you guys and Aquaman brokered for peace… like Black Canary said, you weren't exactly paragons of the sixth commandment and those were just soldiers doing as they were commanded."*

"That deaths of those Atlantean soldiers -and even the parademons- is something each of us will have to find ways of paying penance for," Diana admitted quietly before her tone went flinty. "However, where we fought and killed out of desperation, because our backs were against the walls, all the evidence gathered to this point indicates that Maelstrom's murder of the Joker was, if not premeditated, a choice made in spite of other available options."

"Wait a second, what-"

"You know him, Canary, far better than anyone else here," The Amazon interrupted brusquely. "Can you honestly say that he had no way whatsoever of capturing the Joker that day? Was the death of the Joker the only outcome available to him?"

The two heroines locked gazes and just when it seemed that another heated argument would break out, Canary shifted her gaze away and almost imperceptibly shook her head.

Knowing that the blonde heroine was out -at least for now- Diana continued, "I believe that's one of the pillars we should set our exemptions to the 'no kill' rule upon."

"Wait- what do you mean exemption?" The Dark Knight snapped, leaning forward with a baleful glare leveled at the Amazon. "Weren't you listening-?"

"I was listening, Batman, and while you raised many valid points, so did Canary, Cyborg and Shayera," Diana's tone grew soft now, hoping that she could get him to understand. "I agree that we cannot give ourselves room to grow lax and condone murder but you must realize that, in certain situations, we weren't given any choice. If you want us to deal with this in pure black-and-white terms then we must begin with ourselves."

Once again, it seemed as if another fight would break out, this time between the Dark Knight and the Amazon, but once again, Diana's opponent backed down. "So, what would you have us do?"

Wonder Woman inhaled deeply before replying, "To make a decision on this case, we need to go through every aspect of it. We should treat this similarly to how some law enforcement agencies operate: for every bullet fired, officers are asked to justify every move that led up to that moment." She took a moment to read the room and noted -with no small amount of relief- that many seemed interested in her suggestion. "In this case, it shouldn't be a question of what positives came out of it or vice versa, instead we need to start by asking if there was truly no other option. I won't pretend the thought of killing the Joker hadn't crossed my mind but had all other options truly been exhausted? If he was criminally insane as Arkham Asylum often declared, was there no way of healing his mind? Was there no prison whatsoever that could hold him? I believe that it is only by carefully going over each of these points and any others that might occur to us can we determine if Maelstrom truly deserves to be deemed guilty and, if so, we can decide on what to do."

"Makes a lot of sense to me," Jessica shrugged, breaking the silence that had stretched out after the Amazon had finished speaking. "Plus, if there's a clear-cut way of determining anyone's level of involvement with any given case, decisions would be fairer than if you all just jumped to a conclusion." Her words opened the floodgates for a flurry of agreements and refinements and it seemed everything was all but settled.

Then Batman spoke up, "What about, Superman? What do you think about this?"

A poignant hush fell over the room as all eyes turned to the Man of Steel and for only the second time since their first meeting, the Last Son of Krypton sincerely wanted to smack the Dark Knight to the moon…

‹‹‡››

New York

"…I mean I feel terrible now but when Canary started yelling and Batman got all icy and glaring I just-"

"You just didn't want to get on the old grouchster's bad side," Connor filled in with a small smile. "Kara, we've been pushing him to at least allow us to talk to Maelstrom so I know what it's like to be on the receiving end of the guy's 'I am Batman, hear me roar!' glare."

Kara let out a snort before devolving into full-fledged giggles. "'The old grouchster?' 'I am Batman, hear me roar?'"

"Hey, what can I say," The younger Kryptonian yawned and dropped to the concrete floor of the roof he was sitting on. "His stock has taken a bit of a hit with us recently."

"Just don't let him know you're talking about him like this," Kara cautioned amid a final set of laughs. "So, how are you guys doing? And the new girl, Starfire… uh… Kori, right?"

"Yeah, Koriand'r."

"Right! How's she doing?"

"She seemed to be doing okay when I left," He replied as he absently mapped out a few constellations in the night sky. "Dick helped her settle in so there weren't too many awkward moments."

"Too many awkward moments?" Connor heard a shuffle over the phone and guessed she was ransacking her kitchen for a snack. "Wait. Wally?"

"Wally."

"God, I almost wish I was there to see it," Kara laughed again. "Anyhow, what are you up to now?"

"Super-Cycle and I went out for a ride," He replied. "We just stopped over at Val's apartment-"

"Oh! Oh! Is he home? CanI comeseehim? Becausehewas really impressivewhen wefought Mongulandhedoesn'tactlikeanyZodIknewback onKryptonandIthinkImighthaveknownoneofhis-"

"Kara!" His sharp call stopped the onrush of words and he took a moment to laugh at the hilarity of the fact that he -the younger one- occasionally had to act like the more mature one. "Breathe." He heard her suck in a quick breath and waited for her to release it before continuing, "No, he isn't home so I don't think you can come see him right now."

"Aww! I really wanted to swap notes with him about life on Krypton," Kara's pout came across the line as clearly as if she was physically present."Clark only knows what he's learned from the data crystals his parents left for him so pretty much anything about actually living on Krypton is -"

She made a farting sound that drew another laugh from him. "I'll let Val know you wanna see him sometime. Maybe we can set up a picnic or something."

"Ooh, that would be amazing! Maybe I can finally drag Alex-" The dial tone beeped once, twice, before reconnecting. "Speak of the devil! Sorry Connor; Alex's calling and-"

"Hey, I get it," And he really did: there once was a time when he'd have thought maybe she was brushing him off because he wasn't really related to her or something else along those lines but now? "I'll talk to you later Kara."

"You too, Connor! Beware the old grouchster!" Her voice grew faint as she pulled the phone away from her ear, but he still caught her saying, "God, I can't believe they call him-" before the line went dead.

Clicking his phone off, Connor folded his hands under his head and stared at a passing plane as a storm of thoughts clouded his mind…

Clark only knows what he's learned from the data crystals… Superman's origins were still as much of a mystery to him now as they had been when he'd first opened his eyes in the Sumdac Enzyme Bath but conversations with Kara had given him a few pointers here and there, the latest of which kept worming its deeper into his head: Superman had been forced away from his home before he could make any memories there.

'He doesn't have any memories of home,' Connor reflected. 'Kinda like how I don't have any memories of growing up. Of course, technically, I'm just forming my childhood memories.' He didn't bother holding back the bitter laugh that burbled up: Naruto had often warned him of the dangers of internalizing such negativity and Canary always advised them to learn to deal with those kinds of thoughts anyway. 'Did the scientists at Cadmus know? Was that why they made me a teenager instead of starting me off as a kid?' He had no clue and since the only way to get answers to those questions was to return to his makers… 'I'll talk to Naruto and M'gann about this; maybe they'll have a clue what I should do.'

Yes, deep in his subconscious, he realized that he was doing the exact opposite of Canary's advice but then dealing with those thoughts would probably have made him empathize more with his progenitor and the honest truth was that he really wasn't ready for that. Not yet, at least; certainly not when he hadn't quite gotten over the Man of Steel's rejection.

Turning his attention away from his eyes and over to his ears, he allowed the energetic sounds of the New York night to carry his thoughts along until they settled on something else…

Lifting his left arm, he stared at the jagged reminders he had of the battle against Trigon… the reminders that he was no Superman.

He had new reminders, now; memories, not physical scars but the were reminders all the same.

Warworld: a planet-destroying war machine that had been piloted by a madman and his sister, both of whom seemed to be near -if not outright- equals to Superman.

He had taken on Mongul alongside Wonder Woman, Donna and the new Green Lantern, Jessica while Valor, Supergirl, Kori and Raven had battled Mongal. And while both teams had battled their respective marks long enough for the others to wrest control of the Warworld from the siblings, the more he analyzed his team's performance, the more certain he was that he had been the weakest link.

It wasn't that he had performed badly -indeed, both Wonder Woman and Green Lantern had praised him and Donna for how well they had handled themselves and how easily they covered each other- it was simply the fact that, compared to the others, he had dealt negligible damage to Mongul while taking the most damage. Even now his ribs still ached, reminders of the few times he had been forced to take a hit from the warlord so that another, more powerful, teammate could get a hit in.

'Naruto believes I'll grow more powerful as I get older… he says I should focus on being an all-round fighter now instead of an out and out powerhouse but…' He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to push the thoughts away (and this time he could hear Canary's voice warning him of the dangers of doing that) but they refused to leave.

What if I don't grow stronger? Maybe that's why Superman keeps staying away…

What if I'm stuck like this? The Team will soon stop needing me…

Is there something wrong with me? That's why Cadmus had no problem letting me go…

How do I get past this? I need to protect M'gann…

"Wow, do all us Kryptonians have that look on our face when we're deep in our thoughts?"

Pulling his thoughts back to his surroundings, Connor sat up and flashed a small smile at the speaker, "Took you long enough."

"There was a fire," Valor replied as he shrugged on a denim jacket to complete his wardrobe change. "I got the people out but four of them needed urgent medical attention, so I had to fly them over to the hospital."

A concerned look shone on Connor's face as Val joined him on the floor. "Are they gonna be okay?"

"They should, at least the doctors said as much when I asked them," He lifted the bag he'd brought along with him. "Hungry?"

"Thanks," Connor picked a coke and a burger. "So, how's Ms Lane?"

"Who?"

"Oh, you know who I'm talking about," Connor smirked teasingly. "Short hair, spunky radio-show host, bringing your story to the masses…"

"Leslie."

"You're already on first name terms?" Connor waggled his eyebrows suggestively. "Is there something I should know here?"

"She's just a friend, dumbass," The retort lacked any heat whatsoever and the two shared an easy laugh. "And she'd kick your ass to the moon for the Lois Lane comparison."

"Oh? Bad case of professional envy?"

"More like she's sick of the endless comparisons," Val replied between bites of the extra greasy burger he'd gotten himself. "She's a pretty good person, all things considered; a bit abrasive if you're not used to her mannerisms but then that's kinda what makes her such a good shock-jock."

"I listened to some of her non-Valor shows," Connor noted. "Abrasive's kinda underselling her. Still, if you're okay with her as your very first fangirl then who am I to judge?"

"She's not my-" The darker skinned young man broke off the sentence, conceding the point. "We'll see how many fangirls you'll get when you go public. Especially since you already have a girlfriend~!"

"And that's just one more reason for me to stay behind the shadowy curtains." The conversation stalled while they made short work of the food Val had provided. "Whoo, that definitely hit the spot." Connor said as he took a long pull of his drink.

"I know, right? I'd eaten earlier but there's just something about a Big Belly Burger that just… it just hits different, you know?" Val stuffed the wrappings into the plastic bag and flicked them into the alley below. "Plus, I needed something to commemorate what happened yesterday."

"Huh?"

"Dude, I fought with the Justice League!" The giddy, almost boyish excitement that suffused Val's face lit up the night like a halogen lamp. "I mean, holy crap! It's one thing to see them on TV and try to be like them but to fight with them?! Kon, I nearly fanboy-ed when Wonder Woman was giving those orders! And fighting with Supergirl?! Death by excess joy! I didn't even mind when Batman got all suspicious because I was being glared at by the freaking Batman!"

"Anybody ever tell you you've got a bad case of hero worship?"

"Oh no you don't! I am not letting you, Mister Cynical, take this one away from me!" The darker skinned Kryptonian clone laughed for a moment before settling down again. As much as he understood why he had to keep his brother out of the loop about his true origins and identity as yet another Superman-clone, moments like these -moments that made him feel like he was in the presence of a real sibling- made Val wish Connor had stayed in the Light. He didn't know if it was due to a secret connection born from their shared genetics but he had developed a strong, brotherly, relationship with his fellow clone over the course of their meetings and he knew Connor felt it too. It made it a bit harder for him to inject a falsely wistful tone to his next lie: "Really, Connor; you've probably gotten used to having them around and such but for me? After Mongul slunk away with his tail between his legs, you could have carted me into the Phantom Zone and I'd have gone with a silly grin on my face."

"… to be honest, I kinda felt the same way," Connor admitted, sounding just as wistful as his companion. "You might think we'd always get to see the members of the JL considering the nature of the Team but the truth is that we don't get to see most of them all that often. As for fighting with them? Well, the only time that happened was when a couple of ice-themed villains decided to send the good old US of A back into the ice-age."

"Wait; you guys helped stop that?"

"Yeah," A tiny smile curled the corner of Connor's mouth, pride welling up at the reminder of the very first 'Justice League x The Team' mission (as a certain speedster had labeled it). "Trust me, deep down inside, I was just as excited as you were, just a lot more restrained about it."

"Huh, another thing we've got in common."

"Except you don't have my restraint."

"Yaddi-yadda," Val rolled his eyes. "Still, fun as it was fighting with the League, watching you guys work was pretty awesome too."

Connor's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Us?"

"Well, yeah," Val paused and cocked his head to the side, listening to something. "Another-? No, wait, wrong code… should be simple enough…"

"Problem?"

"Yeah, sorry," the gradually-becoming-famous clone shook his head. "Caught a snippet of police chatter but it's a pretty small thing. Fight out of a bar, public misdemeanor and all that. I leave the cops to handle stuff like that."

"Ah."

"Yeah. So, what was I saying…?"

"You were saying something about us. The Team, I mean."

"Ah, right," Val paused to gather his thoughts before saying, "You guys were so… I dunno, effective? I mean, that's probably not the right word for it but every time I looked over to where you and… uh… Wonder Woman's side-"

"Troia," Connor supplied helpfully.

"Right. Every time you and Troia went on the attack, you were just so… smooth. Your attacks practically blended into each other and you were always watching each other's backs. Raven was like that too except she was always able to move around Supergirl and I to get at Mongal without getting in our way. Every time I think about it… just wow!"

"Heh, you should see Maelstrom fight," Connor smirked. "He pretty much taught us everything you saw us do out there."

"Well, that's disappointment number two then," Val remarked. "I didn't get to see him or Superman in action. Though, to be fair, they do have pretty good reasons for missing out on the team up of the year."

"What do you mean?"

Val turned a quizzical look onto his fellow clone. "Wait, you mean you haven't heard?" When Connor shook his head to indicate that he hadn't, the darker skinned clone whipped out his phone and swiftly navigated to a browser. "Huh. I thought the Justice League would have told you guys; most news outlets are still very focused on the Warworld thing so it's just been a social media thing. No one's sure of the details but it turns out Superman had his hands full in Metropolis and your friend helped him out." He turned his phone so Connor could watch grainy videos of Superman fighting three strangely garbed women followed by another video of a strange monster rampaging through the city before being attacked by a figure that closely resembled Maelstrom in his new outfit before the two disappeared in a flash of light. "The Planet's calling the creature 'Doomsday' and is asking for any information that could help flesh out…"

Whatever else Val said faded into a tinny din in the back of Connor's mind as he kept replaying the sight of his mentor battling against a creature that utterly dwarfed Blockbuster's prodigious strength. His insecurities slammed into him with such force that it was almost a physical pain and in his mind's eye, he saw M'gann, Kaldur and the rest of the team being crushed by Mongul's insane strength even as Maelstrom cursed him for being-

The sharp crack of a swiftly moving fist striking an unmoving cheek rang out like a gunshot and forced Connor out of his spiraling thoughts.

"You back?" Val asked, hand already swinging back in case a second smacking proved necessary.

"I am," Connor grimaced, more due to the fact that he'd had to be smacked out of his thoughts than any actual pain. "Sorry."

"No problem." The hand came down and Val stared worriedly at his fellow clone. "Wanna share?"

"I… I mean…" Connor sighed and shook his head. "It was-"

"Don't even think about saying 'nothing' Kon, because that was most definitely something."

"Okay, I was wondering what would've happened if I was the one fighting with Superman," Connor replied with a weak attempt at a smile. "I keep wondering how Superman would react considering how weak I am compared to you and Supergirl." He wanted it to come off as a joke or something equally trivial but, as his frustrations bled through and colored his words, all he heard from himself was envy.

"Kon, how the hell did you get to thinking you're weak?" Val gaped. "You fought off Mongul just as well Donna and Wonder Woman-"

"Don't patronize me!" Connor yelled, slamming his foot into the ceiling. "You and Supergirl were easily swapping hands with Mongal and even Raven's spells did more damage that anything I could do! While you and the others were able to stay up close and really hurt those bastards, I had to play hit-and-run because I'd have been paste on the wall if I tried to fight like Superman! Hell, my ribs still hurt from the one time I got hit!" He could feel it, the simmering anger he thought he had dealt with now that Supergirl and Naruto and the rest of the Team all seemed to believe in him, and it scared him how intensely it fought to be set free after lying dormant all these years. So, he forced himself to take a deep breath, and then sighed. "Look, Val, the fact is, no matter how you wanna cut it… I'm weak. I'm weaker than you, I'm weaker than Supergirl and I'm nowhere close to swinging in Superman's ballpark. I'm supposed to be 'Superboy' and I'm weak and I've accepted that. So just-"

"What if I could help you change that?"

"-about it and let's talk about something else, yeah?"

"Kon, what if you could change all that stuff you just said?" Val asked urgently, eyes bright with hope. "I helped someone -a scientist- sometime ago and we've been in contact ever since."

A harsh, sardonic laugh ripped its way out of Connor. "You seriously don't expect some random scientist to-"

"She works in a lab that rivals STAR Labs," Val replied immediately. "She's an experienced geneticist who's recently been involved in a big xenobiology project. Even if she can't help out herself, she's got to have a few friends who could help."

For just the briefest instant, Connor allowed himself to imagine being just like Superman: protecting M'gann with that power, helping the Team with it, flying around unaided with Supergirl… the images were crisp, almost real to his mind's eye. 'But that should be expected, considering how often I've dreamed of stuff like that. Except, after all those dreams, I'm exactly where I've always been and there's nothing that can change that. No amount of hope will help.' So thinking, Connor just sighed and shook his head. "Thanks for the offer but-"

"Okay but can I get some of your blood?"

The question sounded so ludicrous that, for a few seconds, Connor could only gape at his friend. "Wha-?"

Still seemingly giddy with hopeful excitement, Val forged on like he hadn't heard the question. "I mean, even if you don't believe she can help, I know she could at least point us in the right direction." When he noticed that Connor still didn't believe him, Val grew serious. "Listen, Kon, I'd be lying if I said I understood how you feel about this because I don't," He paused and stared at his fist, clenching it tightly. "I don't know how it feels to be as strong as I am, I don't know what it's like to have to dodge a punch because I'm afraid I'll be knocked out by the hit and I don't what I'd do if I couldn't fly because I've never not been able to. Not since I got to Earth, at least. But that's exactly why I want to do this," he looked up at Connor. "I don't want you feeling that way again. I wanna fly with you, beat up bad guys with you and heck, maybe even have an All-Star Super-Fam team-up with you. Because you're the closest thing to home I've got that isn't a chunk of metal. And even if you're doubting the possibility that this'll even work, I want to try. And I will do everything I can to make this work."

Silence.

Then, tentatively: "I… I don't want to get my hopes up."

"Hey, that's why I'm here," Val smiled supportively, tapping the red shield on Connor's chest. "If you don't have hope, I'll hope enough for both of us."

"This doctor… What's she like?"

"Trust me, Kon, you'll love her," Val said. "Doctor Banerji's a really great woman…"

‹‹‡››

Mount Justice

-Recognized: B-0-

"That's gotta be Dick," Kaldur stated, breaking off his conversation with Donna to turn toward the Zeta platform. "Let us hope he has something positive to tell us."

"Somehow, I find myself doubting that," The Amazon muttered as their youngest teammate fully materialized and stomped up to them. "Must be the scowl on his face…"

"I take it things didn't go well?" Kaldur began after a round of perfunctory greetings.

"Depends on the part you're asking about," Dick replied bitingly. "Getting Kori to Naruto was the easy part. Heck, it was fun!"

"And getting what we need…?"

"Pretty much impossible!" The younger boy all but snarled as he threw himself into the swivel chair at the Hub. "If Batman's looking into anything we've brought to him, he's done an absolutely terrific job of hiding it! I went through every last nook and cranny of the Bat-computer and I had bots trawling through every node in the network and I got zilch!"

"Perhaps he's logged all his details on the Watchtower?" Donna suggested. However, even as the words left her mouth, Dick was already shaking his head.

"The guy's secretive to a fault: there's no way in any kind of hell that he'd have only one copy of his investigations on the Watchtower without any kind of back up," Dick sighed as his rational mind began to deal with his frustrations. "And, as far as I know, the only places he could trust this kind of information to are the Bat-computer and the network."

"Well, it would appear he had a third option," Kaldur sighed. "And none of the data we've gathered points to anything?"

"Apart from Connor's trips to see Metropolis' shining knight -which he typically tells us about- no one's made any weird moves," Dick reported. "And since all 'official' communications in and out of the Mountain are routed through the Watchtower my bots would have picked up on any strange data packets leaving or coming in." The young hero sighed and slumped further into his seat. "I'm sorry, Kaldur, but we've got nothing."

"I'm not angry, Dick, it's just…" Kaldur clenched his fist in frustration. "By the abyss, we were on the verge of a breakthrough there!"

"As Kaguya would have said, we should get used to life throwing us curve-balls," Donna said. "But yes, I had hoped we would at least be closer to figuring out who our mole was by now."

"I wish it wasn't so but we simply haven't gathered enough information to look for the kind of patterns Naruto advised us to find, even with Vic's help," Kaldur sighed, the weight of this challenge beginning to tell on his young features. "Without the kind of information you believe your mentor would have gathered on Cadmus and all our… interactions with them, we simply have no way to narrow down our suspicions beyond the options of Connor, M'gann and Raven," A faintly amused smile touched his features. "And each of us has a good reason to defend al three of our friends."

Donna snorted, partly amused, partly exasperated. "Hey, at least you guys aren't defending M'gann because she is, and I quote, 'too cute to be a spy,'"

"And here we were, thinking he'd begun to settle with Artemis," Dick snickered. "That one definitely set him back a few relationship points there."

Though they shared a few moments of lighthearted laughter at their speedster friend's infamous ability to shove his foot into his own mouth, the gravity of their situation swiftly reasserted itself, soaking up all that cheeriness in seconds.

"I'm at my wits' end and I know you two are as well," Dick started with a tired sigh. "I think we'll have to go with Donna's suggestion here, Kal,"

"It's taken up a large part of my waking thoughts," Kaldur admitted. "As we encounter more and more stumbling blocks, I keep falling back on your suggestion…"

Donna, sensing the hesitance, prodded, "But…?"

"But I keep seeing the rest of our team, their expressions when they realize that we used them," Kaldur explained, tone heavy with emotion. "Whoever the mole ends up being, running an entrapment could destroy the Team's trust…"

"And we've had a taste of what could happen if we lose that trust," Dick finished.

"But inaction's just as dangerous," Donna argued back, her more warlike mentality rearing its head again. "Trust can be rebuilt, Kaldur'ahm. If we explain why we did what we had to, with Naruto backing us up, we can convince our friends to see things from our point of view! If we allow this to continue, however, we allow our enemies to stay ahead of us and, when the time comes -and it will, count on it- Cadmus and whoever else they are working with will be able to strike from our blindspot."

"And if we're wrong?" Dick rejoined just as intently, "If the mole isn't even on our Team? Because, like you and Kaldur, I've been thinking about this and as much as I hate to think about it, the mole could be someone already in one of our blindspots. I'd like to say it can't be a Leaguer but Cadmus has those genomorphs and we have no clue how powerful their telepathy is. Even if they can't do it, we saw how easy it was for Trigon's shades to overpower two of the major power players and Batman, who's arguably the toughest mind on the planet; a skilled magic user might be able to do something similar."

"And then there's Naruto and Kaguya," Kaldur added with a great deal of reluctance. "I cannot think of how either of them could be the mole -they've done too much to help us and also to hinder Cadmus- yet the possibility remains that it could be either of them."

"It doesn't help that we can't verify their origins and that Naruto already admitted that at least Kaguya could be manipulated mentally," Donna sighed. "Still… I suppose we could argue for Naruto's innocence as him killing the Joker forced him to isolate himself from the League and, to an extent, us. A mole would be more likely to ingratiate themselves, not get further away from the target." Her teammates nodded their agreement before growing silent, as did she.

"Looks like we've just gone round again and ended up at point zero." Dick muttered. "We either run an entrapment or we figure out another way to blow the mole's cover."

"And time's running out," Donna added. "Everything Cadmus has done to this point seems to be pointing to something big. If we get blindsided…"

"We're royally-"

-Recognized: B-0-

"Kaldur!" Artemis' shout rang out even before she had finished re-materializing. More than the loudness, it was the clear urgency in her voice that had the three already present moving toward the Zeta platform. "Kaldur! Is anybody-?!"

"Artemis, we're here," Donna said, doing her best to keep her voice calm so she didn't spook the blonde. "It's Kaldur, Dick and Donna."

The adrenaline rush gradually eased off, leaving Artemis blinking almost dazedly. "Donna?"

"Yeah, Artemis, it's just the three of us here," The Amazon reaffirmed. "Let's go grab a seat, yeah?"

"No!" The exclamation was out faster than she could hold it in, and Artemis had to quickly explain: "We'll sit later, I mean, it's just," She swallowed, soothing her dry throat, "I think Connor's the mole. But not intentionally! I think he's got some kind of code in his head, planted there by-" The almost deafening outbursts of laughter from her companions had the archer gaping. "What the- This isn't funny! We've been busting our asses trying to figure out who the mole is and the answer may have been-"

"Nowhere close to Connor?" Dick wheezed between breaths as another fit of laughter threatened to lay him out. "Buh- believe me, Art-"

"We've thought about that possibility," Kaldur said, his gales of laughter petering out into chuckles now. "It's not Connor, Artemis."

"Maybe not intentionally but-"

"He was created by Cadmus -under the cover of Sumdac, obviously- he was raised to be a potential replacement for Superman and he was exposed to a lot of telepathic manipulation by those genomorphs so who's to say that a few commands weren't slipped in to make him an unknowing spy?" Dick asked, counting each point off his fingers with an amused expression. "Did I miss anything?"

Artemis crossed her arms over her chest, leaned back and peered at them with a suspicious look. "No. No, that's pretty much it."

"Well if that's the case then you'll probably be a bit bummed to know that you're only the third person to have had that exact line of thought," Donna chuckled as they walked back to the Hub. "And you're looking at number one in that line."

"Number two here," Dick flashed a proud, two-fingered V. "I swear, when Wally comes charging in with this same theory, I'll print it up as our counterintelligence initiation rite."

"Okay, what the hell am I missing here?" The blonde archer demanded as the other three took their seats. "Because I think this is something we should be chasing down."

"Besides the fact that Naruto already shot down the chances that Connor was our mole, we've already looked into that possibility," Kaldur explained. "Aside from recent developments with New York's hero, he doesn't go anywhere that's out of place and he doesn't meet anyone strange. And since Donna's clone suggested that the mole had been on the Team long before Connor met Val, it is unlikely that Val is a channel of communication."

"But what about telepathic communication?" Artemis rejoined. "What if they set up a relay or something in Happy Harbour-"

"He's dating the niece of the most powerful telepath on the planet," Dick shrugged. "And M'gann's no slouch either; heck I overheard the Manhunter telling Canary that M'gann might be a more powerful telepath than himself and we all know her passive telepathy covers the entire island. If she hasn't caught anything then I think we can knock telepathy off the list."

"Not to mention the fact that her uncle stops over every once in a while to check up on her and the rest of us," Donna added. "Telepathy's completely off the list, I'd say, and between Cyborg and Dick our systems have been scoured clean so the tech side's out of it too." The Amazon shook her head as the gravity of their situation fell upon their young shoulders again. "No, Artemis, whoever our mole is, it isn't Connor."

Artemis swore softly as the logic of their counter-arguments sank in. "Dammit, I keep getting this feeling, like the answer we're looking for is right in front of us but we're just missing something."

"So what secrets are we missing?"

-Recognized: G-01: Red Arrow-

The sound of the Zeta platform's activation drew Kaldur's attention away so that he just narrowly missed Artemis subtle flinch. "Roy? What are you doing here?"

‹‹‡››

Nirvana

"Ya gonna play anytime soon, ya majesty? Because I'm getting kinda bored kicking royal booty all over the place."

"I'm thinking, Miss Quinzel," The response was hissed out with barely restrained annoyance clear in the speaker's tone. "I'd like to not get my 'royal booty' kicked again."

"Well then, I hate ta break it to ya but that's a bust."

"Just be quiet!"

"Ugh! Fi~ne!"

She didn't go completely silent -not with her humming and occasional beat-boxing- but she was at least quiet enough for Kaguya to desperately try to figure out a move that wouldn't end with her king surrounded by enemy forces.

She was just about to give up when Shiho stepped through the clear fuinjutsu barrier that limited access to the cell. "Lady Kaguya?"

"Ah, Shiho!" The white-haired ex-princess tried to stamp out her pleasure at finding an escape from the utter thrashing that was being handed to her from her voice but between Harley's tittering laugh and Shiho's amused smile, she suspected that she hadn't had much success there. "It's time already?"

"I'm afraid so," The blonde responded, her smile going mischievous. "It's sad, really; I was really looking forward to seeing who'd win this match."

"Judgin' by how happy she was to see ya, I think her majesty was just about to give up," Harley snickered. "Honestly, Lady Princess, ya should just stay away from this game 'cause you just suck at it."

"Thank you for the game," Kaguya was tempted to stick her tongue out at the older woman but just barely managed to restrain herself. "Let's go, Shiho."

"Of course, Lady Kaguya," Shiho's bow was less out of respect and more to cover the wide grin on her face. It was good to see someone else get pounded by Harley for a change.

As they walked out of Harley's room, there was an abrupt shift from the relative peace and quiet of the ten-by-five feet cell to the clatter and clang of the hallway where a battalion of clones were hard at work remodeling the ancient Nirvit platform.

"How much longer till the platform's been overhauled?" Kaguya asked as they moved to the homunculus' quarters.

"Two weeks. A month if we come up against any more… surprises." Progress on the remodeling had been stalled for more than three weeks after the commencement of the project when Shiho and her team had discovered that either the Nirvit had etched runic patterns that prevented external forces from altering their designs. Had Naruto not gotten the treasure huntress, Jade, to teach him to understand the Nirvit script, they might have been stuck there much longer. As it was, they had gotten past the runes with some creative usage of the sealing arts and were now using earth manipulation to change the more… deranged mosaics into something matching the original aesthetics. "We've already converted the lower levels into workshops and training arenas and the first floor holding cells are a few touches away from full readiness."

"Excellent work, Shiho. And the other project?"

"Their pasts are set to go: Shika and I created profiles for both Pamela and Harley so you give us the go code and they'll be injected into the system without a hitch," She paused as they stepped around a group that was etching a new set of lighting seals atop a pillar. "Their present and future, on the other hand, is up to you and the boss."

"We're working on a number of ideas. The real challenge is fixing them into a place where they won't stick out but will still be able to do good. Pamela was a genius bio-technologist even before she became Ivy and Doctor Quinzel is still the brilliant psychologist she was before the Joker got his claws into her head. We don't just want them spinning their wheels when we let them out, we want them to be able to use their strengths for good."

"Makes sense," Shiho nodded: idle minds were said to be the devil's workshops and for people that had already walked the path of villainy, boredom would likely be a greater temptation than many other reasons. "Shika must have been thinking about this when we were working on the profiles because he built in their actual pasts into four of them."

"Really?"

"Yeah."

"I'll send the profiles to you for a review."

"I'll be expecting them." They walked into the blonde's quarters and had just stepped past her 'office' toward the seal tag etched onto the floor in a corner of the room when Kaguya paused and backpedaled. "Is that-?"

"What's left of Doomsday? Yep," Shiho replied as she glanced at the partly mangled, partly burnt out carcass of the Apokoliptian weapon. "Boss' clone dropped it off not too long ago after putting on a show for our friends at Cadmus."

"Have we gotten confirmation from Kennedy?" Kaguya asked as she walked up to the corpse, morbidly fascinated by the creature. "We need to be sure that they bought the ruse."

"I don't see why they wouldn't have bought it: the clone pretty much glassed about a hundred square meters of the Nevada to make it look convincing."

"We're dealing with Cadmus here: they rarely ever take things at face value."

"True…" Shiho frowned as she stared down the creature's exposed torso. She could have sworn she'd just seen a muscle twinge… Making a mental note to bind the thing with the most powerful stasis seals she could cook up, the homunculus refocused on Kaguya. "Well, I haven't heard anything from Kenny yet but that's not too surprising considering how busy he tends to get."

"If you haven't gotten an update in twelve hours, make a request for one." Kaguya ordered. "I'll be expecting a definite answer in fifteen hours."

"You'll get it." The blonde nodded firmly. Kaguya, curiosity seemingly sated, walked over to the center of the fuinjutsu formula and began channeling her chakra into it.

"You've done a good job here, Shiho. Keep it going."

"Thank you," With mere seconds left for the translocation effect to kick in, Shiho's features twisted into her creator's infamous 'prankster grin.' "Oh, and I believe Harley may have had a point back there. You know, about how much you-"

‹‹‡››

Blüdhaven

"-suck at chess?"

"Shiho you blonde piece of-" Kaguya sucked in a deep breath before slowly letting it out as she tried to restrain herself from cussing what was arguably one of her partner's many alter egos. When the breathing exercises didn't seem to cut it, she turned her attention onto the effects of the translocation seal. Because it was technically a new seal -he'd cannibalized portions of the Hiraishin to form a base for it- the translocation tag was still something of a work in progress and they'd both agreed to keep a close eye on it. The first few trips to and from Nirvana (after a host of tests on Earth first) had been jerky and had put some strain on them as they slipped across dimensions. However, Naruto had worked many of those kinks out and this time, the only indication that she had changed locations at all was a barely detectable moment when the walls of Nirvana blended with those of the garage. Considering her own experiences with the Amenominaka, Kaguya felt that the seal was a success.

'Now we just need to monitor the effect of the seal on localized space,' the ex-princess thought as she walked into their home. 'It wouldn't do for us to accidentally weaken or -heavens forbid!- unravel the fabric of space.'

As she locked the garage door, she heard voices coming from the living room and made her way there. "Well, you two seem incredibly chatty today."

"You say that like we've ever played the silent game with each other," Naruto retorted, throwing an easy smile her way from his Lazy-Boy before returning his attention to whatever he was doing on his phone. Kori, on the other hand, had already covered more than three-quarters of the distance between them and was soon wrapping the white haired offworlder in one of her signature squeezes.

"Kaguya!"

"Hello Koriand'r," Kaguya smiled warmly, hugging the younger girl back. She couldn't quite explain it but, just like M'gann, there was something endearing about the Tamaranean. "I see your… excursion to the War World hasn't gotten you down at all."

"Like I said, Kori's a big girl," Naruto's eyes had an amused glint as he stared at her over the edge of his phone. "Heck, from what she's been telling me, our girl was pretty much the star of the show!"

The green eyed alien ducked her head as a shy blush bloomed on her cheeks. "I mean, everyone thought Valor was pretty cool too."

"Bah, the Kryptonian wannabe's nothing," Naruto waved dismissively. "Tell me, Kori, did Mister Hotshot get a personal sparring invite from Donna with Wonder Woman offering to be the guest referee?"

"I… I mean, no-"

"Of course he didn't!" Naruto cried emphatically. "Because you, imouto-chan, were the star of the show."

"Ignore him, Kori," Kaguya said between laughs as they sat on the sofa. "He's still coming down from his battle high."

"Hey! I was out of that six hours ago!" Naruto pouted as he fired off a message to Isaac just as another -from Chloe, this time- came in. "I'm on a 'Little Sis kicked major ass' high, now."

"Like I said, ignore him." Kaguya heeded her own advice by angling herself so he was out of her direct line of sight. "Now, Kori, walk me through the whole thing…"

The Tamaranean responded immediately, launching into a compact, well-detailed recap of everything that had happened to her since she'd left the house nearly forty-eight hours prior. As far as Kaguya could detect, there were no embellishments in the retelling: everything was to the point and as accurate as Kori could manage.

'A holdover from her time with the Okaaran warlords, I would imagine,' A tiny part of Kaguya mused as the girl rounded up; for the most part, the ex-princess was going over all that she had been told with a fine-toothed comb. The battles that had taken place were of little interest to her: it was expected that the League would have had to split up to fully handle the threat of the War World; that they'd needed five teams (two to handle the masters of the War World, one to destroy it from the inside, another to hack into it from the Watchtower and one more to stave off the projectiles launched against the Earth) was just semantics. No, Kaguya's primary focus was on how the Team and the League had responded to Valor's presence. "You said Wonder Woman and the others seemed impressed by Valor. Was it just his strength? Or was it-?"

"It was more than just his strength," Kori replied, brushing her hand through her hair. "I mean, he wasn't weak or anything -he seemed stronger than Donna and I but not quite as strong as Wonder Woman- but Wonder Woman seemed more impressed by how he worked with the rest of them."

"So, he blended in well enough for Wonder Woman to have noticed," Kaguya hummed thoughtfully. "That's quite impressive for a first timer." It was also quite worrisome, an opinion she knew Naruto shared after exchanging a quick glance with him.

Wonder Woman complimenting Kori for working together with the rest of the assault teams was no big surprise: the Tamaranean had extensive combat training and so it made sense that she could work around the others' fighting styles. Valor, on the other hand, had displayed no unique combat ability beyond the typical 'slam-bam' style Superman and his cousin were known for. He should, therefore, have gotten in Supergirl's way a few times -especially during the early stages of the fighting. For Kori not to have noted even one such occurrence…

"He must have bulked up on JL knowledge," Naruto quipped jokingly, though Kaguya understood what he really meant. "Eh, I was more concerned about how the Team handled themselves but it sounds like they made big brother Naruto proud."

"Of course you'd worry about how they made you look," Kaguya rolled her eyes at him. "But yes, they seem to have done very well."

"They really seem to be missing you guys," Kori pointed out.

Naruto's grin softened into a wistful smile. "Oh, I am missing them just as much. I keep thinking about how Connor and Raven are doing."

"Do you have any plans of rejoining their team?"

"Well, the choice isn't exactly in my hands right now," He shrugged before sighing. "Still, even if it was… I wouldn't."

"Why?" The Tamaranean seemed genuinely interested in his answer which didn't surprise Kaguya at all.

"Well, Kaguya and I have a number of things we're working on that might split our focus if we had to rejoin the Team," He replied. "Right now, we're chasing down a number of leads for the Team that they can't exactly deal with because of how well known most of them are… well, let's just say they aren't familiar with the more shadowy parts of the world."

"Oh."

"Kaldur, Dick and Donna already know about that, anyway, so it wouldn't really be a big surprise if it ever came up." He added. "Plus, I pop over every chance I get to see them and they know I'm always open to help them out so it's not like I've really left, more like I'm taking a super-extended sabbatical." He paused and cocked his head to the side for a moment before refocusing on Kaguya. "So, how's Nirvana looking?"

"It's looking pretty good. Shiho's back on schedule and unless anything else comes up, it should be ready within a month." Kaguya reported. "There's a couple other details but nothing pressing."

"That's good to know," He pushed himself out of his seat and stretched lazily. "Aisha's asking for a meeting later today; something about organizing a book reading sessions, so I wanna get a few hours of snooze before then."

"No problem. I'm not sleepy yet so, I dunno, I'll watch a movie or something."

"Oh! We can watch Pitch Perfect!" Kori chimed in enthusiastically, leaping out of her seat in a flash. "I'll go get the ice-cream!"

Kaguya shook her head, an amused smile dimpling her cheeks. "Well, I guess I'll see you later."

An hour -and half a tub of ice-cream- later, the two women were humming along to one of the songs in the movie when Naruto called out to her partner.

"Coming!" Handing over the tub to Kori, the ex-princess playfully pushed the younger girl's head off her lap and padded over to Naruto's room. The instant she walked in, she recognized the flinty look in her partner's eyes and the tension in his posture and knew something serious was happening. "What is it?"

"Cadmus just completed their first sale. The shipment moves out in three hours."

'Cadmus. First sale. Shipment.' Her mind ran through the possibilities and came to a conclusion: 'The metahuman children.' "Do you want to hit them now? Or…?"

"Tempted as I am to go wreck their shit, we can't afford to tip Cadmus' hand." The disgusted expression on his face showed how much he hated that. "The buyer's one of Intergang's top guns: from what Kennedy sent, she operates out of Virginia so that's where the kids will end up."

"Intergang? I thought Waller was to be the first buyer?"

"The War World thing seems to have thrown up some chaos in government circles. Sasha Verruci -the Intergang woman- was already lined up to be next buyer so she got bumped up."

Making a mental note to remind him about extending their reach into the government, she asked, "You said the kids would end up in Virginia, right?" When he nodded, she continued: "Then that's where we'll hit them." She decided. That settled, her mind began to work through whatever else they might need. "Shiho's already prepped the first floor as holding cells so repurposing them to act as temporary accommodations for these kids shouldn't be a problem. But that's just an intermediary measure: we'll need to find a way to get these kids reintegrated into the society."

"Canary!" He snapped his fingers. "Even if she can't do anything on her own, we can bring this to the League through her and allow them to be the face of the reintegration efforts."

"Which would blur our connection to the whole thing," Kaguya noted. "Good call. Though we might have to go in disguised if we really want to sell that."

"We can work that out later; right now, I need to tell Michael to reach out to some of his underground buddies. We'll need to stock up on things like food and the like and I want to avoid throwing up any monetary trails."

"Understood. When do we make our move?"

"Four hours from now," He replied immediately before explaining: "Kennedy got a tracker seal onto three of the kids: he'll activate them after the handover's done. We'll track them as they travel and move in when they arrive at the Gang's Virginia outpost."

"Got it." Kaguya nodded. "Just the two of us? Or…?"

"I think Kori should come with us. She seems to have recovered well enough over the past couple of months and she has already shown that she can handle herself well."

"I agree. I'll go tell her to get ready-"

"I'm also thinking of having Pamela come along with us."

Kaguya turned to him with a quizzical stare. "Why?"

"We need to know if she really means to change. I know she's still pissed at me for not saying much about Harley but overall she's been pretty good. Now, we need to see how she reacts in this scenario."

For a few moments, Kaguya just stood there, mentally churning this new info to spot potential weaknesses. When she found nothing, she nodded to him. "I can't think of a reason she shouldn't come along. Just make sure she's fully briefed before we begin."

"Definitely."

‹‹‡››

*- 'Thou shalt not kill' is the sixth of the Bible's Ten Commandments. Also: considering the timeline I'm using (in which the Throne of Atlantis events came before the Justice League: War event), Jessica was still a normie when ToA happened.

*- The translocation tag is NOT the Hiraishin. They are fundamentally similar but the FTG is optimized for individualized combat. The translocation tag focuses on allowing movement between two stationary points across space-time and is optimized for general movement (think of it as the difference between a jet fighter and a cargo plane: both are capable of flight but one focuses on speed and maneuverability while the other is all about bulk haulage).

Well, at long last, after much-much, the 32nd chapter of ANL is finally here.

I apologize for the long wait: the biggest challenge when writing this was dealing with the Justice League's stance on the Joker's death. I know that I had made the League seem unanimously against Naruto's action (save Canary who is firmly pro-Naruto) but all those cases had been outside perspectives. This time, I wanted to show the League actually tackling the issue up front, revealing all the cracks that the relatively new League often hides when presenting their public face. This led to decisions such as some of the more peripheral members (Vixen, Question and co.) signing out of the meeting when Canary got heated and showing how even some core members (Shazam, Flash) would have snuck away from the confrontation if they could.

Of course, that led to a new problem: how to balance both sides of the argument. You see, I absolutely hate bashing characters. I can have one character tear into another if it fits the story perspective but anything else and it just feels… wrong. So, I had to do some research into Bruce's 'no kill' principle. Somewhere along the line, I got into the Elseworlds story, Kingdom Come which helped me build a degree of logic into Batman's argument. It isn't perfect, I admit that, but it made Batman come off as less of a hardheaded die-hard pessimist who wanted the world to bend over and kiss his ass and more of a scared individual taking extreme measures to avoid what he thinks is coming.

So, both sides of the argument dealt with, Hawkgirl coming in to make a solid point on the legality of the League's actions… All that was left was finding a resolution. WARNING: if you don't like the fact that Wonder Woman -who isn't anti-Naruto- pushed for a sanction of some kind on Naruto, then I completely understand and if that's the breaking point for you then I thank you for coming along this far and I appreciate your support. For those who understand my decision, I appreciate you even more. The truth is, this matter was never going to have a smooth resolution within the League: as it stands, neither Bruce nor Dinah are satisfied with Diana and J'onn's compromise but that was -to me, at least- the most realistic way to resolve this matter.

Oh, and I cut Superman's answer off intentionally: he had long been anti-Naruto but the events of the last chapter made it difficult for him to essentially throw the guy who saved his ass under the metaphorical bus.

Alright, there's little else to say on the chapter.

I've had a few people ask me about opening a discord server or linking to my twitter page. I'm throwing the matter to the public: if you'd like to reach me via twitter or you want me to get a discord server, let me know in the reviews.

We're working on the next chapter of The Watchers but I've got exams at the moment; we should have an update to that by the end of July though.

Thanks for reading.

The Ethereal Lord.