9. 7: Intricacies and Justice (1/2)

chapter 7: intricacies and justice

megami was starting to regret agreeing to be a member of the justice league. don't get her wrong; she loved being a superhero since it allowed her to help more people and to use her abilities in public but there were some things that she didn't like. firstly, superman gave her some rules about not using excessive force against criminals and they still had varying opinions about how much force was excessive. for example, he was in the opinion that a kunai to the back of the leg or the ass was too much while she said that, unless it permanently maimed or killed them, it wasn't excessive. with her to heal the wounds she caused, she was in the opinion that there was very little chance for her to pass her own definition of excesive force. secondly, john was starting to get on her nerves with his inflexible attitude. true, the man had a bit of a sense of humor and had honor and reliability oozing out of his pores but it was rarely shown in a positive light because of that prickly military persona of his and the concrete pole shoved up his backside. then, there was the fact that most of their adventures meant a great deal of property damage and she, in good conscience, couldn't leave it that way so she had to use her favorite jutsu rather often to repair the damage since part of it was her fault. this time, she had to repair the streets that were torn up and the sewer system. finally, she had wanted to 'speak' with arthur's would-be assassin herself but batman took him away before she could do so. it made her pout; she wanted to 'speak' with mister floyd lawton, aka deadshot, because of his intended target and his disrespect towards herself and diana. of course, there would be less speaking and more screaming on the assassin's part.

oh... and then there's the fact that arthur had knocked green lantern out and was probably already in atlantis where there was likely more than a handful of traitors trying to kill him, to take over the city and, most likely, to wage war against the surface world. that definitely put her in a bad mood. "reckless, impatient, stubborn idiot," she mumbled.

"i hope you realize that you are also describing yourself," j'onn stated. because of his monotone and solid orange eyes, no one knew that he was highly amused despite the situation. she glared at him. the kunoichi was taking out her anger on the burning van by ripping out the door and slamming the flames out with it. sure, she might have been able to do it with a simple d-rank water jutsu but she had to vent somehow and putting out a fire/destroying an asshole's ride was a great way to vent.

"first, i can't die even if i wanted to so i'm allowed to be reckless and idiotic at times. it also keeps me from being bored and you really don't want to see me when i'm truly bored. also, i know how to be patient if the situation calls for it. i make sure no one but my targets are directly hurt, traumatized or affected by whatever incident i cause even if i'm hyped up on sugar, caffeine or alcohol or high. lastly, my stubbornness has kept me mostly sane over the centuries so i see it as one of my most beneficial qualities! what's his freaking excuse?!" megami slammed the door onto the side of the upturned van one last time, making it stick up like some crude imitation of a tombstone for the now unsalvageable and rather flat van.

deadshot was extremely glad that megami wasn't the one who dealt with him. it was rumored that she had superman's strength, flash's speed, batman's intelligence, skills anyone would be jealous of and a violence streak wider than the grand canyon is long. he could verify part of the rumor, especially that last aspect of her personality, and it scared him. she was not just a superhero or protector; megami was a soldier. it was the reason why he didn't try to run when the police took him away. deadshot knew that megami would be the one to catch him and make sure he wouldn't be doing any running for a good long time.

with deadshot in the care of the police, megami could move on to more important matters. "who's up for a little field trip? it might not be the most hospitable place at the moment but atlantis still has the best view of the sea and i have my ways of getting around without being harassed by the angry locals." the gathered heroes knew that they could choose to go or to stay. they didn't even need to think about their answer.

she then pulled out a pair of earrings identical to the ones mera wore from her pouch for the second time today while her other hand was searching for her cellphone. "mera, the justice league has arrested the man who's trying to kill arthur but the real threat is much closer to you than you realize. trust no one and keep junior with you at all times. my teammates and i are heading to atlantis and making our way to my family's private chambers. please stay safe." it was a shame that she had yet to make seals that allowed mera to talk back to her when she contacted the queen in this manner. it would save her time on gathering information but she never intended the earrings to be used in this manner. she had first made them when she was informing mera about her progress when she was searching for arthur all those years ago. superman found and freed him before she did though and they had never used them since.

with one conversation done, she moved to her phone. her call went straight to voicemail but that was fine. "aniue, i know it's late but our friends are going on a trip to the sea and i just have to go. i'll call when i need a hand, all right?" similar calls went to 'aneue' and 'sofu'.

"will they be able to understand where we're going?" diana asked. to her, the messages sounded incredibly ordinary. she knew that she was calling her family though she had no idea what to make of the things she called them by.

"i would never address ren, tsuyu or wanyudo so formally if this were a simply late night trip to the beach. the intricacies of the japanese language are something we can discuss at a later date. furthermore, the only place that concerns us when it comes to the sea at this point in time is atlantis."

batman said that he would monitor what he could from the batcave while the league boarded the javelin and lantern set a course straight for atlantis. megami made lantern leave the javelin miles away from atlantis. "we need to get in undetected so we'll have to go on foot... so to speak." she even forbade green lantern from using his ring in case the distinctive glow was picked up by the patrols. megami swam ahead of them, looking for any sign of patrols, traps or defensive measures that were sure to be activated after the attack on aquaman outside the world assembly building. she knew the palace had tv reception and internet connection despite the depth; she helped set them up after telling arthur that knowing what goes on in the surface world would help in protecting atlantis from oil spills, avoiding ships that carried weapons and the like. arthur would have told orm and the generals about going to the surface to make an alliance so they would have seen the news and known about the attack on arthur. they were the most likely people who would be heading the coup.

just as she suspected, there were patrols nearly everywhere and it was only luck that they were able to get this close to the city without being spotted. 'hmm... how to get in?' the weapons defending the city were motion-sensitive and would fire at anyone whose movements were not recognized as the local marine life or part of the patrol movements. her movements were never programmed into the system as she either used hiraishin or rode inside wanyudo when she wanted to visit. while she could use hiraishin at this point with nothing more serious than a bit of vertigo on her friends' part , she would have to depend on mera's report on what was going on in atlantis. while mera was the queen, there are some things that a king won't tell his wife in case it was too sensitive to discuss outside of a war room and even stupid people wouldn't speak about coup attempts before a queen. she needed information from someone taking part in the coup.

the kunoichi refused to have her team hurt just to gather information. but whatever she needed to know had a high chance of being time sensitive and creeping around the ridiculously large and open palace did not sit well with her. thankfully, megami had a way to do both at the same time. she made two clones for her friends. "my clones can get you into the palace... hiraishin is basically an instant teleportation jutsu so you might want to close your eyes or you'll be having a really bad case of vertigo. mera will meet you as soon as you get inside and fill you in. meanwhile, i'm going to get a bit of information from another source."

j'onn had a feeling that megami was going to do something similar to what she did when they fought the imperium. it was worrying that megami insisted on putting others before herself just because she was immortal. her injuries healed at an incredibly fast rate but that doesn't mean she doesn't feel the pain from them. he understood that the kunoichi merely wanted to protect her teammates with her abilities but it didn't sit well with him that megami often got hurt and more severely than the rest of the league. she was just so... herself that it was irritating and worrying. out of respect, he didn't read her mind. "what are you going to do?"

she transformed into green lantern and placed a plastic replica of the green lantern corps ring on her finger before answering. "the atlanteans know that gl doesn't trust them... i'm going to the submarine to get their attention. hopefully, they won't suspect a thing and whoever's in charge of this coup has a big mouth and an even bigger ego." lantern gave her a look of annoyance but agreed that it was the best way for her to meet whoever was now in charge.

"don't take unnecessary risks," batman ordered through the communicators.

"have i ever done anything unnecessarily?" three voices asked in unison. her teammates all said yes to that question. despite the cool water, megami felt her face warm up at the very true statement. seeing a pout on lantern's face was amusing and very weird for the league members present.

"i'll see you in a bit then." the clones twined their arms around the other heroes. they disappeared almost immediately. megami, disguised as john, cracked her neck. she placed a seal on herself to keep her transformation active for when she was captured just in case. megami enveloped herself in chakra, making sure that it was the same color as the green lantern's energy.

she waited until one of her clones dispersed and gave her the memories of the league with mera before she headed out. she did the bare minimum to keep out of sight since, while she wanted someone to notice her but wasn't going to make it too easy for the atlanteans. within minutes, she was at the defiant. so far, no one had spotted her. it irked her that the drills she made them do were all for naught; after all, she was glowing green and they still didn't see her!

she inspected the exterior of the defiant before entering the room where the plutonium was kept. like gl said, it was gone and she hit herself for forgetting to place security seals on the damn thing. she went to inspect the rest of the weapons onboard but found that they had also been taken. her eye twitched in irritation. whoever was behind this conspiracy was a dead man. "time to meet the natives," she said in the former marine's voice.

megami made the green chakra glow more

ightly before she swam out. she studied the single patrol unit that was guarding the submarine. she took a deep

eath and squared her shoulders. the shift from impulsive and playful kunoichi to battle-hardened marine was instantaneous. her

ow creased to mimic john's angry face to a t. the marine swam out and was immediately attacked by the patrols. she fisted her hand and aimed at one of the sea scooters. megami yelled in anger the same way john would when he was truly mad at something as she sliced through another scooter. she quickly swam up to one of the soldiers and punched him as hard as a normal human was capable of. that punch was enough to give him a bad nosebleed.

megami belatedly remembered that, for humans, punching an atlantean was the same as punching a concrete wall. she sent some of her chakra to her fist and manipulated it enough to cause the bones to snap. she grimaced as she discreetly

oke her own hand and kept her chakra from healing the damage. it was excessive but necessary to make it seem like the real lantern was the one fighting. the marine put some distance between her and the soldiers and fired a thin beam of green chakra at them, making sure it looked like it came from the ring. the beam just barely missed one of the soldiers and made a rock formation topple.

there must have been backup hidden nearby because a battleship came from behind a mountain and started shooting at her. megami twisted and dodged the shots; it was child's play for her and the chakra around her kept the de

is the fight was kicking up from hurting her. it seemed that her natural abilities to avoid long distance attacks irritated her attackers and they let loose the depth charges. the marine knew then and there that it was time to play possum, as much as she really didn't want to.

the cover the explosion gave her was the excuse she needed to dissipate the chakra around her. she made sure to make it look like she was knocked out so that the atlanteans would

ing her aboard and to their leader for interrogation. 'i just hope whoever is now in charge is taking prisoners or else people would think that gl's sleeping with the fishes... i can not believe i just thought that...' if she weren't pretending to be unconscious, she would have hit herself for the stupid pun.

even with her eyes closed, she could tell that someone was approaching her. she felt herself be dragged away. she was soon on the battleship and a scrambler headband tsuyu conceptualized years ago was forced on her head. she fought to keep from grimacing at the annoyingly high-pitched beeping that assaulted her ears. it didn't help that her communicator was giving out static that annoyed her just as much. 'we need information. we need information. we need information.' she repeated that mantra over and over to keep from ripping her restraints and the stupid headpiece. she used her chakra to plug up her ears. "is there something wrong with the scrambler?" she heard someone ask. "the lights that show it's activated are blinking erratically."

'damnit!' she released her chakra and surrendered to listening to the thing for god knows how long.

"it seems to be working fine now. it might be his weapon. take that ring of his and give it to lord orm later; he'll be nothing more than a regular surface-dweller without it." her hands were unshackled and the fake ring was taken. afterwards, the soldiers didn't bother to restrain her hands again as the enemy was supposed to be unconscious and unarmed. when this was over, she really had to retrain the soldiers on standard operating proceures when dealing with prisoners. megami was left to think.

'i knew it. if worm thinks i'm going to let him get away with this, he's got another thing coming!' if she weren't supposed to be an unconscious green lantern, she would get up and smack the soldier for underestimating their opponent. even if they didn't restrain her hands, megami knew she couldn't do anything. not yet, at least. there would be time for that when she dealt with orm and the other traitors.

soon, she was before orm and forced awake. "so you're one of kazumi's new teammates," he said smugly. "i didn't expect such a powerful being to ally herself with someone as weak as you." megami groaned deeply and acted as if the scrambler was causing more harm than it actually was. "then again, she is known for doing the most foolish of things. she could have conquered the world a thousand times over on her own and yet she chooses to restrain her awesome power and to aid worthless surface scum like yourself," he spat.

megami grit her teeth and did her best to look like she was glaring while suffering through the mother of all migraines. "where's... the plutonium?" she panted hard as if saying three words took the

eath out of her. she wanted nothing more than to rip orm's face off right now.

orm smacked her with the butt of the trident. "scum should not speak to their betters." the regent of atlantis stepped on her

oken hand while she was down and used the trident to fire magic at her. with her pain tolerance, it barely even registered. however, megami made it look like john was stubbornly keeping himself from screaming as she worried about what to do if the seal were to

eak. she worked with many magic users over the years and magic and fuinjutsu supported each other when they were used in tandem. however, she and her friends had never gotten around to experimenting on what would happen if they were used against each other. luckily, her seal held. orm left quickly but the soldiers escorting her to the execution chamber took their sweet time. being manhandled by people she helped train in front of nearly the entire city was not her idea of a good time. she let her chakra flow freely again as her hand set itself.

megami was able to slip a seal on

ak at least. of all the generals, he was the one who was the most likely to know exactly what orm was up to. they had the same ideals and the same ambitions. she knew that they were the two most irritated by her and her family's presence in atlantis despite the help they had given the city. they also wanted to take what they believed was theirs: control over atlantis and the termination of the surface world. it wasn't just a possibility that

ak would go against arthur for orm; it was a certainty.

she was shackled to the wall of the execution chamber when she received information from her last clone. she threw her head back hard, destroying the annoying beeping headband from hell. the shackles

oke with just the slightest tug from a very angry kunoichi and the guards were unconscious. all that happened in less than ten seconds. megami immediately canceled the jutsu and made her way to meet her friends, all the while muttering about how she would punish the soldiers involved with the uprising. as for orm, she had something special planned for him, one that would make him pay for everything he's done.