Fix You

Masked Man and What He Works For

So, it was never mentioned in the last chapter, but the scene with the Team in the cave actually took place two months after the scene with Bruce and Dick at the ice cream place.

"Ugh," Artemis heaved a sigh of relief as she finally managed to extricate herself from the heavy gym door and enter into the near-silent hallway. It was dark, the only light coming from the half-moon out the window, but Artemis didn't mind. Actually, she kind of appreciated the darkness after spending hours in the brightly lit gym listening to the screechings of stringed instruments, metal pipes, and overly confident sopranos. The silence was like cool water over her eardrums after an exhausting training session with the Team. Who were probably having way more fun than she was. Whatever they were doing.

She hadn't even been able to attend the mission briefing because she had to help set up the gym before the show so she still had no idea what the heroes were doing in Bialya. Wally would tell her when he got back, though.

Once in the hallway Artemis didn't stop walking, heading straight for the big, blue double doors leading out to the Gotham Academy courtyard. The entire fiasco was finally over and the archer had managed to sneak out before getting roped into helping take down all the equipment and she was ready to go home and sleep for a couple years.

Dick hadn't even shown up and Barbara had been invited on the mission (as her original persona, Batgirl – she was only Robin when with Batman and now only occasionally to keep up the image) so Artemis had been lonely the whole time without anyone to talk to except the boy next to her that kept sneezing snot all over the sound system. Stereotypical tech nerd. It was probably kind of a lot to expect Dick to show up; he didn't play any instrument and wasn't in choir and he'd only been going to school full-time now for two weeks (though it had been two months since he'd first come back). Still, it would have been nice; he could've helped with the tech stuff and keep Artemis's brains from melting.

Once outside, Artemis felt like tossing off her shirt and skipping around the empty courtyard singing Sound of Music, but since she didn't really feel like getting arrested, she decided against it. It was finally warm in Gotham, summer just around the corner, and, although the sky was typically cloudy, sweatshirts were becoming unnecessary. At least they hadn't made her wear her uniform; that thing was threatening to suffocate her every day.

Taking one more deep breath, Artemis made a beeline for her little white car, slipping through the gates and into the parking lot. It was empty, most of the students still in the gym at the after-party (why anyone would have a party over boring classical music was beyond Artemis), but it was peaceful and the archer was glad she didn't have to deal with any more obnoxious teenagers. She slipped her keys from her pocket, wrestling one into the lock on the door handle and jiggling it around, trying to get it to catch.

The car was a piece of junk, Artemis was the first to admit that, but it was nice having it as her own. Once she'd gotten her license her mom had somehow presented her with a car for her sixteenth birthday, something Artemis would never have asked for in a million years. She'd been planning on finding her own in some junkyard somewhere, but then she'd walked out that morning, upset about being woken up so early and seen the beauty sitting in the lot, rusty, dented, and gorgeous. Sure it was cheap, but it was from her mom and that meant something. Artemis treasured the car like it was her baby.

Except now it was being very stubborn and refusing to let her in. The lock on the thing was kind of fickle, worn down from being picked so often, Artemis figured (she had no idea where her mom had managed to find the vehicle and hadn't asked) and it sometimes took a while to open. Like now. Artemis took the key out and put it back in, muttering to it the whole time.

"Stupid," she hissed, yanking the key out again. Suddenly she felt a hand clamp over her mouth as an arm wrapped around her head. She let out a squeak, struggling to kick whoever it was in the you-know-where when a dreaded voice sounded in her ear.