Wings of Fate (Book 1 in the ALIFEROUS Series)

The Real Beginning

Valor POV

I put my binoculars down and sighed.

Today is going to be a long day. I grumbled to myself as I shot a line up to a window of the Hall of Justice.

I pulled myself up to the ledge, tapped my bracelet-cuff and started bypassing the security on the windows and vents. After I finished, I snickered, "Same system as the Bat-Cave." I cautiously swung the window in and peered around. Luckily there was a horizontal support beam right below the window. "It's like they want me to sneak in," I muttered. I crept my way across the beam and grappled towards a vent cover on the opposite wall. I grabbed a little throwing knife out of my utility belt and pried the grate off the vent. I put the knife back in my belt and slipped in. I crawled for about two minutes when I heard raised voices. Against all better judgement, I decided to follow them. I slunk through the vents for another few minutes before pulling up my holo-map.

I continued crawling until I realized something, "Hmm, that's funny. The map says that there's a slope somewhere along this route, but I haven't seen any--" I cut myself off as my hand slid out from under me and I fell down the steep vent. I desperately tried to stop myself from slipping. I saw light at the bottom of the shaft. Suddenly the duct leveled out and I could see the grate.

This is gonna be hard to explain to Batman.

I braced myself as I hit the vent cover and went flying across the room. I heard a smack, followed by someone yelling "Ow!" as the vent cover hit an unsuspecting hero. I rolled, shot up and almost immediately fell into a backbend as an arrow flew by my face. I popped up and dodged another arrow.

"Ree? Great, another sidekick to join the mix." Speedy commented sarcastically from the other side of the room. His orange-red hair was visible. I looked around and saw his canary-yellow Robin Hood hat on the ground in front of Green Arrow. I slowly looked between Speedy's enraged face and GA's pleading one. Speedy continued to walk towards the door.

"Well hello to you too, Crabby. No "Hey Valkyrie, How's it going?" or even a "Haven't seen you in a while Ree. What have you been up to?" I grumbled as I adjusted my dark purple utility belt. I was wearing a long sleeved, black, spandex, shirt with matte black armor covering my chest up to my neck and shoulders, and I had black metal fingerless gauntlets with dark gray gloves underneath. I was also wearing loose, dark grey cargo pants with black combat boots. My hair was covered by a large black hood and a black half-faced mask covered my face. The eyes were covered by a dark purple domino mask and the hood blocked the rest from view. My left fingerless gauntlet had my holo-computer in it.

I didn't show any of my skin and I purposely put the hood and cargo pants on to keep my identity a secret. If there is one thing I have learned from working with Batman for six months, it's that no clue is too small. He will eventually figure it out. Ever heard of the expression, "Give the devil an inch and he'll take a mile?" Well... Batman personifies this perfectly. Give or take the devil part. He will always find out. It won't take him forever to figure it out but... one can only hope.

"Ree, make him come back. He can't leave." Green Arrow whined to me. GA and I had worked together on multiple occasions and I had even hung out with him and Speedy several times out of uniform, with all the necessary precautions. I don't do that anymore though. It's extremely tiresome trying to cover every inch of you. In that time I had come to look up to Roy or Speedy as my protective older brother. Yes, Ollie or GA and Roy had their little spats from time to time, but... I had never seen Roy look so... hateful. Like he wanted to rip your head off. I had always been the mediator in those situations. Never had anything gotten this out of hand.