thethirdwonder | Homplot Wake Up Post

Homplot Wake Up Post

Normally, Cassie wasn't one to spend a lot of time in bed. But lately, or really the last two days, it had taken everything she had to get out of bed in the morning. Someone people might have been excited to find out the king of the Greek gods was their father but for Cassie, it just made her miserable. The powers she'd felt she'd earned for her bravery now felt cheapened. It just...it just wasn't fair.

And because she'd spent more time in bed, she knew instantly when she woke up that she wasn't on the island. After the events in the Fire Nation the month before, Cassie woke up quickly and sat up at the ready, wanting to be prepared for wherever she'd found herself. It was with a small sigh of relief when she realized that she was asleep on the couch of Young Justice headquarters. She took a deep breath and made herself float for the first time in years. Even through her depression, she couldn't help a small smile.

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Luke really didn't understand the gravity of what he'd done and it was more then just reading a comic book. But Cassie didn't have time for this.

"Look, be an ass all you want. I don't know why your here accept as a pain in my ass but believe me when I say your safer here. But just remember, all of us have our powers back and even just a friendly tap is going to hurt." It wasn't so much a threat as a friendly warning. As much as she'd love to see Kon give Luke a broken arm by accident, they were the good guys.

Then she turned and took off out the window, heading for home.

It was late in the afternoon, more like evening, when Cassie finally returned to Young Justice headquarters. She'd had a long talk with her mother about her newly discovered father and while she didn't feel completely better about the situation, at least she'd gotten an explanation. And being curled up on the couch for an hour straight hugging her mother hadn't hurt either.

But she'd finally pulled herself away because she knew that if she didn't do it herself, it would be so much harder when she was pulled back to the island in a day or so. Her mother had given her a strange look when Cassie had said goodbye but she'd flown off before any questions were asked.

After checking in with Cissie, Bart and Kon, and making sure Luke was causing any trouble, Cassie went looking for Sam, who Cissie had been all to happy to tell her was here. She felt a little bad for dragging him into this but part of her was glad she'd get to show him her home. "Sam?" She called, not even bothering to change out of her uniform.

"I spent two days at Princeton before coming here," Sam said. Technically he had spent some time in Egypt just before coming here too, but he didn't think that was necessary to mention to everyone.

"Before that, it was in a place called Tranquility. And I didn't have any superheroes, ninjas, cyborgs, wizards, or time travelers outside of fiction."

He did have giant, alien robots, but he never said he didn't have those. Sam wasn't exactly hiding that fact from people, just from Cassie, and since Cassie was in this world right now, he was trying to keep that information to a minimum.

"Well, except time travelers in the way that everyone is a time traveler because we move forward in time. That usually doesn't count though."

"It changes the view of things. Even more than that time I was catching machine gun bullets and the one I missed grazed a friend," Bart said, not really looking at the game. "But I never really liked guns in the first place. The only reason exist is to kill people. Like swords."

After playing video games with Luke, who seemed to be persona non grata for some reason Sam couldn't fathom, he went to find the library. Specifically, he went to find history books. He wanted to learn as much as possible about Cassie's world, both because it would help him know more about Cassie in general and also because he had no idea how long he was going to be here.

It was fascinating to see how different things were and about what time they started to differ from the history of his world. Superheroes were, for the most part, a new thing to the world. Or at least they were only in the public eye in the last hundred years or so. Even so, history hadn't altered all that drastically from what Sam knew. World War II still happened in much the same general way, same with most other major events. Of course, there were a few extra major events that were superhero based, but not a different one every week.

He was so engrossed in the book, that he almost didn't hear Cassie call his name. Glancing up, as soon as he saw her he shut the book and jumped to his feet. It wasn't until a moment later that he wasn't sure exactly why he needed to stand up. Or why he needed to grin so much.

"Hey, Cassie. You're here. I mean, not just in the library but in this world. Your world."

Kon grabbed his soda and went back to stand in front of Luke, folding his arms across his chest. "So why do you have a problem with Cassie? I mean, if anything, she tends to be really supernice. Unless you piss her off. And then the bets are off."

"She caught me at a bad time?"

I shrug.

"She's not real interested in being supernice to me. I didn't like her comic, and I let out that her father is Zeus. So I guess all bets are off."

I'm listening to him and I really like that end part. Like swords. Nice. Now I know his angle here.

"You must be Bart or Kon. Look, I haven't done anything to anyone since I came to Tabula Rasa. I'm not out to hurt people just for an evil chuckle. If you don't give me a problem, I won't give you any. I'd even leave you guys alone in your headquarters here and live off the streets, but Cassie told me to stay here."

"So, do you know what's going on here? I saw people on the island sleep for a few days having dreams they were somewhere else. Are we really still back on the island sleeping?"

Even though I've had a couple encounters with the magic of Tabula Rasa, I don't claim to understand it much. Maybe Sam knows what the others are thinking.

"I really have no clue," Sam said with a shake of his head. He'd heard of the coma people, vaguely, but since it hadn't happened to him he didn't pay a whole lot of attention to it since it had happened about the time he arrived and he was still getting used to things.

"But just to play it safe, I'm treating this like I really am in another dimension and I may or may not be going back to my world or the island. I've decided that's a pretty good strategy whenever dealing with weird shit like this, accepting that it might be true. It's probably safer that way."

"I wouldn't mind at all if it was true. Granted, about everyone else in this place would've rather not have me here, but it could be worse."

I pause a bit as the action on the video game peaked a bit, but then I continue.

"But I saw a guy I know, Seifer, sleeping in his hut. When he woke up he told me he went to Zuko's world and fought in a war."

"I'm Bart," he said, looking at him. "And to be honest, I don't really know the whole of what happened between you and the girls. But Cassie's in charge of this team in this time, and she's always been a firebrand."

He shrugged a little, running his hand through his hair. "Things seemed so much more black and white, when we were just Young Justice. The good guys just were. But it's never that simple."

Firebrand? I'd agree with that. I've already paused my game to talk to Bart without messing up my mission.

"No, it's not. Good? Evil? Whatever."

I don't even think I know the difference anymore.

"So, what's this Young Justice thing all about? You guys have super powers, right?"

"Most of us, yeah. It doesn't take powers to be a hero, I mean, look at Batman, right?" Bart said, deciding not to broach the part about good and evil. His own views had changed a lot with the black ring.

"It was a place where we could be ourselves. Where the grown-ups didn't interfere, didn't judge every decision we made. We were all viewed as junior versions. My cousin, the Flash? He's a total hypocrite. Doing the exact same things he talks about hating when he was Kid Flash.

"But for me, this ended years ago. So I don't see it the same way Cassie does. She still can't imagine any other team. I remember that, I even remember exactly how it felt to be here back then, but it isn't who I am now."

"Her father is...huh. Well, that makes sense, I guess. And I can see why she'd be pissed. She didn't know. And you're not going to find a lot of friends if you keep on blabbing about things you find out in comics. Or movies. Or books. Or anything else you might see here with people you know." He, luckily, knew better.

He thought of Tim.

Sometimes.

I never really considered the fact that Batman actually didn't have powers. Now that Bart mentioned it, though, he just seems to be a really skilled guy. I had the standard share of comics and cartoons when I was a kid, but I've been living in very different worlds and never thought about that kind of stuff since. But this shows I could cut it here if this wasn't just some dream. I don't think of things I can do as 'comic-book' powers, but I think I can hold my own with them if it came to it.

And, Bart is Kid Flash, huh? The Flash is the super-fast guy in red tights. So that's what he meant about catching bullets. He meant literally picking them out of the air. Pretty good.

"So, this Young Justice group is just a bunch of young heroes doing what they want to? There's nobody lording over you, controlling or directing you? That actually sounds pretty good."

I nod my head as I think about it. Much better than Camp Half-Blood. In some ways that place is like a concentration camp.

I hold up my hands in a gesture of innocence.

"Hey, I wasn't even talking to them. They ran into me. I didn't even realize Wonder Girl even existed besides in a comic book."

I lower my hands and sip my Coke then shrug.

"I'm not really looking for friends, anyway. I'm just doing my best to leave everyone alone and bide my time until Tabula Rasa is done with me. I would've left you guys alone and hit the streets on my own, but Cassie demanded that I stay around. I'm being cooperative here."

"Well, Red Tornado's our adult supervision. He always tries to keep things from getting too far out of hand, and the League sometimes steps in. We even had a parent/mentor night once. I understand Cissie's and Cassie's moms got into some sort of fight," Bart said, trying to think how to explain things.

"The thing is that we needed a place to make mistakes. Do the things we thought were right at the time and turned out to be really stupid. The older heroes treat us like kids, which means they try to shelter us a lot. I'm not really sure how to explain it. I've never had any other life."

"Yeah," Cissie scowled at the memory. At least if he tried anything, he'd be in for a pretty rude awakening. "It's not bad enough that we have to worry about being here, but we've got to worry about him too."

"So, Bart, where do I crash later tonight? Do you guys keep a spare bed around here?"

Might as well get that out of the way so I know what I can expect. I'm not going to go knocking door to door looking for an empty room. If I don't wake up in Tabula Rasa, I might as well enjoy the few nights' sleep I get here. Sleeping in the streets isn't so comfortable.

Leaving her mom had put her in a melancholy mood but Sam jumping to his feet so eagerly to see her brought a small smile to her face. It surprised her how really glad she was to see him at this moment.

"Hi. Yeah, I'm here. I'm really sorry about leaving like I did this morning..." She paused a moment to swallow down her emotions. "I had something I needed to do."

"We have a few. Never know when you're going to have visitors. Or wounded," Bart said, remembering. "But you might not want to be in the later category."

I cock my head and grin as I slide a finger down the scar on the side of my face.

"Don't think I know that, Bart? I got this fighting a dragon. You guys aren't the only ones who've seen action. Although no ambrosia here to heal up. Too bad."

Not that Bart or most of the others could use that for healing, but it's handy when you need it.

"Healing usually isn't an issue for me. Unless there's more damage than I can set before my metabolism goes too far. S'pose most people would call that a good thing," Bart said, sighing.

"The first time Cissie was here, it was when she'd gotten shot with one of her own arrows. Guy calling himself Harm. That was really when the team formed. When the girls showed up."

At this point, I'm not all that interested to hear small pieces of their past. I've got the main points now. It's not like I want to get too close to these people, but we can hang out and maybe play some video games. In any case, I've got to do something or my ADD will kick in.

"Want to play a game or something? You can pick the game."

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Homplot Wake Up Post

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