stretching thin

[bossymarmalade]

Tx to Green Lantern Hal Jordan: know you said I knew where to find you but don’t think you meant like this. I need someone who can spray a hell of a lot more hot water than I can out of my garden hose right now. entire neighborhood covered in RAINING dart frogs, some poor people are going to die of alkaloid poisoning.

yes, that is how you get rid of frogs, spray them with hot water. just trust me on this. ks

As he got the message, Hal was wishing there was more than one of him. He messaged Kate back that he’d be there as soon as he could, and with Mia taken care of, all he had to do was charge up and head out. With a flash of green and a chant of his oath, he was ready to go.

He took off like a bolt, covering as much distance as he could in a short time without going TOO fast. Once he was in sight range of the city, he put his hand out in front of him.

“Ring, get Kate.” He waited a moment for his ring to establish a connection, which also let him pinpoint her location.

“Kate, I’m almost to your location,” he said. “Tell me what I need to do and we’ll make it happen.”

“Sorry to be a pain in the ass like this, Hal,” Kate said, which probably made it look like she was talking to herself. In the middle of a rainstorm containing poisonous frogs. “But a staff and an attitude problem wasn’t going to cut it here, if you know what I mean. I needed someone who can…well, make it rain, and rain not quite scalding hot. Fortunately most people are inside…”

Collateral damage. Damn.



She paused, trying to think of the best way to do this, then said, “Right, get around the outside of the cloud pattern, then chuck rain down against it—we’re going to do like St. Patrick and the snakes, drive all of them into the ocean. Hopefully some will get squashed on the way.”

Springing into the air herself, she headed east. “I’ll meet you there, show you.”

Hal had a moment of ‘you want me to do WHAT?’ as Kate explained the idea. She made it sound so easy…Oh well. He flew up above the unnatural storm, looking over the clouds above and trying to decide the best way to go about it.

Holding his fist out, he made a giant magnifying glass, focusing the sun onto the clouds to heat them and condense the water in them to force rain. That would only work so well, though. He needed another Lantern here, but….well he was all they had. Looking out at the ocean, he set up a large vaccume, using it to funnel up a bit more water.

“Alright Kate. We’re gonna fight biblical with biblical here,” he said. “Getting set up for a deluge, hot as I can get it.”

Working his constructs, he fed more water in the clouds watching them turn darker and darker with each passing moment.

“Little forced precip here…this is gonna be weird. Heads up.”

“This is why you guys have the rings and I just beat people up,” Kate replied, using her staff to both bat frogs away from both of them and to keep herself up in the air alongside Hal. She hadn’t really come up with a method for actually putting her plan into action, and she was entirely relieved that Hal had figured something out.

“Everyone’s inside now, or in their cars—there’s just not a better way to get the frogs completely out of the way, unless we were to set up a…I don’t know, frog specific vaporizing spray?”

She paused, finally able to catch her breath, gasping a little as they had a second or two of downtime. “I don’t know what could have caused this, Hal…” she said quietly, probably only audible through the comm link and not in person.

“I’m not that much of a miracle working, Kate,” he said. He checked his ring’s power levels, then adjusted his tactic as it started to rain. He whipped around it, hissing as one of the scalding drops hit him as he flew past. “Try to stay out of the rain, Kate. It’s pretty damn hot.”

He circled around to the ocean side of the city, adjusting the focus of the magnifying glass to better direct the frogs. Damn he needed Supes or something…SOMEONE else up here to help him.

“This’ll get them out of the way for a while, but..We’ve gotta break up this storm.” Arms folded, he surveyed the clouds the frogs had fallen from. “Doesn’t do much good if they just come right back again. Ideas?”

“No, but you’ve got…resources…that I don’t have, Hal.” Kate blasted herself backwards from the rainstorm, far enough to get some distance, as she texted a contact or two in the press to broadcast a warning to stay out of Frog Storm 2012. She hadn’t counted on the wind picking up, though maybe she should have, it being LA—and she’d heard the sound of pain that Hal had made when he’d passed the storm. Biting her lip, she hoped like hell that everyone had actually gotten out of the rain.

The frogs were making a cacophony of noise below them, an indescribable sound of chirps and croaks that Kate was certain she didn’t ever want to hear again. They did appear to be booking it for the Pacific, which was a good sign. She considered Hal’s question for a second, then dug up a few rusty memories of science class and news stories. “Leave that to me,” she said, turning up the power on her staff, then pushing herself into the middle of the clouds.

Her chest hurt a little, but the rain hurt a hell of a lot more—not enough to burn more than first degree, but leaving streaks of pain across her face. (In retrospect, she should have asked Hal for a green light umbrella or poncho.) Regardless, she blasted through the clouds with her staff, sending bolts of sheer energy up into the mass to disperse it.

Hal watched her, smiling a little at her resolve. What a woman…Pushing the thought aside for now, he made sure to keep the rain steady and keep pushing the frogs to the sea. Once he was sure it would hold itself, he headed into the cloud to check on Kate’s progress. He could see the electric arcs peek through the clouds as they broke it up.

“Thought you could use a hand,” he said. He got close enough to her to put a shield around her similar to his own. It kept the rain off, letting her focus on her work. “Kick up the voltage if you can,” he said. “You’re safe from whatever could come up, so give it all you’ve got.”

Kate’s face was streaked red from the rain, and she inhaled raggedly as Hal covered her. It felt like she hadn’t had a full breath since she’d gotten up into the cloudbank, like she’d forgotten to do so, and it was an intense, sweet relief, if a little painful. She turned a little to give him a smile, before sending through another shot. Not having to use as much energy to keep herself in the air meant she could up the ante with the power, if only a little further.

“This is seriously embarrassing, but I can’t keep it going for too much longer,” she admitted via the comm. “I’m shooting this with everything the staff can muster, and eventually it’ll go into recover mode, only running power to keep me from falling to the ground, and take eight hours or so to recharge. Hopefully this should be enough juice.”

She resisted the urge to wipe her cheeks with the back of her hand—they itched and stung, especially with the now cool water, but her gauntlets would make things worse. Instead, she adjusted the staff to pull as much energy as possible, sending a final angry blow upwards to the sky, which was already clearing. She was intensely, incredibly glad she had Hal there to help, but she had no idea how to say it.

“You just go til the staff gives up, I’ll handle the rest.” He smiled at her, adding a little more energy to the aura around her to keep her up. He let her expend her power before pulling her close to him and lowering them to the ground. Ducking under an overhang, he put a gentle arm around her.

“Well now all we can do is kind of hope,” he said, looking skyward as the storms dissipated. That was a good sign at least. The scalding rain would push the last of the frogs away, getting them out of the way and making the city somewhat safe.

“So much for a second date, hm?” he said, smiling a little. He wanted to lighten things up a little, hopefully take Kate’s mind off what looked to be kind of painful scalding on her exposed skin.

Kate, catching her breath, leaned against Hal and winced, nodding slowly as they huddled together under the roof of someone’s covered patio. She shivered, even though it was a hot day out, then seemed to get it together a little better.

“Kind of,” she turned and coughed into her shoulder, though fortunately it was a hollow sounding one, more reflex than necessary. “Kind of ad hoc superheroing, I agree. But it was the best I could come up with on the spur of the moment that wouldn’t hurt anybody any worse than things already were. A flood would have been disastrous, and I don’t know how fumigation or poisoning them would have worked quickly.”

She flushed, pulling off one gauntlet and gingerly touching her cheek with her fingertips, then turned and smirked at him. The burns were only surface deep, it seemed. “I’d have preferred dinner and a movie,” she said, “or even beers on the sofa with a DVD. Not that you don’t make a damn good partner in a fight, Hal Jordan, but there are a lot more pleasant ways to get a workout.”

She paused, then noted, “Is this the point where I say ‘we’ve gotta stop meeting like this?’”

Chuckling, he rubbed the small of her back and nodded a little. The rain was letting up now, and people were slowly sifting back out into the streets to assess the damages. A few came over to them to offer their thanks, and to Hal’s glee, a few children came up to him, excited to see Green Lantern had helped saved them. After shaking a few hands and directing the police, the two slipped to the back of the crowd.

“So..You know, I could really go for some beer and pizza,” he said, looking to her. “What do you say? They have everything pretty well in hand. Besides, I think we should probably compare notes.”

Kate greeted the crowd, though she let Hal take on most of the PR work at the moment. Smiling at the kids as they left, she reassessed her injuries—not too bad, but not exactly for extended public consumption. Her face probably looked bruised, various shades of taupe and reddish brown, and…well, beer sounded fantastic.

“That works for me,” she said, sliding her staff under one arm as they walked out of the yard. “I’ve got plenty of beer at my place, probably better than sitting around in public and deconstructing the way things seem to be falling apart. I get the feeling none of us are getting the full story here.”

She glanced at a nearby street sign, glad to realize they were only a few blocks away. “If that’s okay with you.” It’d be good to have someone over; her house was far too quiet at the moment, and she didn’t really have anywhere else to stay that would be safer.

Truth be told, Hal was getting lonely himself. With Oliver MIA, most of the others scattered, and his fellow GLs as busy as he was, getting face time with anyone else was a luxury he couldn’t really enjoy right now. Getting time with Kate well, that would definitely be good for his moral. Hers too, most likely.

Once they could duck into a side alley, he gingerly picked her up and flew to a secluded place near her house (after getting directions of course). He let his uniform dissipate for what felt like the first time in days, straightening the collar of his worn shirt.

“If I’m not imposing too much,” he said. “I was actually hoping I could stay here for a day or so.” He shrugged a bit. “If not, Guy and Kyle aren’t too far off, sure they’d have an extra bed.”

A woman could definitely grow to appreciate the Being Picked Up (And Sometimes Flown With) Thing, Kate decided, even if it was always marginally startling initially. She extracted one gauntleted hand from clutching Hal’s collar, easing to her feet and putting in a quick phone call to the local indie pizzeria so they wouldn’t have to wait long for something to eat.

She motioned Hal down the back driveway path and disarmed the gate around her yard before slipping through the back patio door. “Don’t be ridiculous, Hal,” she said with a snort, hiding that she was glad for the company. “I’ve got lots of room, of course it’s okay. Consuela’s got the week off, so…”

It wasn’t worth mentioning that it was just her, then. That she’d given Consuela the extra time off to keep her safe, even though she was only there during the day. That it seemed there wasn’t anywhere else to be. Nowhere was safe. “Not that I’m not glad to have you around, but what’s up in Star City?” she asked, stepping into the bathroom off the kitchen and stripping down the suit to camisole and undies before putting on the shorts and t-shirt she kept in there for times like this.

Kate hadn’t bothered to close the door. At this point she was too tired to give a damn about privacy, and she didn’t really mind what Hal saw.

Hal was just glad to be inside. Unbuttoning the top of his shirt, he rubbed his neck and pulled up a chair to sit in. He needed a shower before he dared mess up any of Kate’s furniture. Even with the door open, the gentleman in him made him avert his eyes.

“The Arrow house has been compromised,” he said. “I was checking in to see how things were, and there was a damned camera in one of the AC vents.” He shook his head, running a hand through his hair. “Ollie needs to invest in a house or something, something easier to fortify. Since other people live so close, its too easy for someone to get access via another tenant.”

Paranoia was a bad side effect of not being able to rest properly and he knew it. He HOPED he could get at least a few hours rest here before heading back to his current hideaway.

“I don’t know, Kate,” he said. “This whole thing’s wearing me out.”

“What?” Kate asked, head peeking around the door for a moment as she startled. “Bruce put that together, there’s no damn way that they can get past it.” Unless they could get past the Batcave as well, and that…she didn’t like the idea of that at all. Like Bruce, no, but Kate trusted him. This was not a good thing.

She sighed, then emerged entirely a few seconds later, dressed and looking less than pleased. “Though I guess you’re right, that’d possibly be way past some of the security. Not that Ollie will ever decide to up and move to the suburbs, with the overly entitled bourgeoisie jackasses who voted for Bush twice…” The last was in a pitch-perfect, if slightly higher pitched than usual, Northern Californian growl.

The doorbell rang and she went to get the pizza—as she shut the door after paying, she turned back to Hal to say something further. That was about the time that the demon appeared in the middle of the room, completely stinking the place up with brimstone:

A bright flash of hell fire and the Demon Etrigan stands in Kate’s living room.

“Lantern Green and Princess Pain / We greet you from the fire below. / Your friend, the Archer we now seek. / His location, please bestow. // We are on a simple quest / To make a deal with him, you see. / We want to help him win this war. / That is quite nice, don’t you agree?”

Etrigan’s smile hid his true intentions.

“You know, I was wondering when he’d show up,” Kate said to Hal, setting down the pizza box before looking at the demon. “Firstly? No fucking idea where GA has got his sorry güero ass. Second of all…Princess Pain? I wouldn’t tell you if I did. My abuela said never make any deals or bargains with los demonios, especially insulting ones. Thirdly, what the fuck is it with the frogs?”

She paused, then noted, eyes narrowed, “If you do run into Green Arrow? You can let him know that Kate Spencer and Hal Jordan would like to chat with him.”

Hal was on his feet in an instant, ring sparking in case he needed to defend against an attack. Great, JUST great. It was bad enough they had an invisible enemy to fight now they had DEMONS.

What have you gotten into, Ollie…

“She’s right,” he said. “We don’t know where he is, and we wouldn’t tell you anyway. See it’s kind of our plan to make sure he gets out of all of this in one piece, something I’m pretty sure you and your lot DON’T have much interest in.”

Hal’s ring sparked, a lantern symbol appearing just above his hand. He was tired, yes, and he wanted to rest. But this felt like a threat, and he had had it with that shit.

“Sides…I never trust anyone in Yellow,” he added with a sneer.

Kate made a mental note not to have Hal ever repeat that near Creeper. That was the sort of place her brain was going now, not to a fight, because she wasn’t sure how well she and Hal could take on a demonic threat now, worn out and bruised—but at the same time, she was thinking nearly the exact words that Hal was: Ollie, what the fuck have you gotten yourself into?

The demon glared at her and Hal, said something in a demonic language that was, from context, probably equivalent to ‘assholes’, then disappeared with another flare of brimstone and flash of fire.

Kate’s nose wrinkled at the stench, and she sank into another one of the chairs. “Fuck,” she muttered, then opened the pizza box and ripped off a slice, eating it from her hand. “I am going to eviscerate him. I am going to sue him. I am going to punch his self-righteous blond güero face and force feed him genetically modified Monsanto-foddered beef.”

She looked up at Hal, though, a sudden realization on her face, outside the vivid imagery of what hell she and likely he were going to give Ollie Queen, when (not if, she couldn’t think if) they next saw him. “Hal, maybe we should stop trying to pretend we’re safe anywhere. Clearly we’re not,” she said, quietly. “That’s probably their point, and isn’t that what you’re supposed to do with terrorists? Living well being the best revenge, and whatever.”

With the demon gone, Hal let himself relax, slumping back into the chair. Rubbing his temples, he groaned softly before looking over at her. She had a point, really, about running. All the same, though….

“These guys aren’t regular terrorists,” he said. “They’ve gotten into our homes, they’ve tracked down our loved ones…They’ve made sure we don’t have a safe place to go. And they’ve also…” He sat up straight a moment. “Damnit, that’s it!” He slammed his fist into his palm. “First the watchtower, then our homes…They’re trying to scatter us.”

He got up and paced, angry at himself he hadn’t realized this before. He needed to contact everyone. They needed to regroup, and fast. Scattered they couldn’t coordinate or be as effective as they could be.

“Kate, we’ve got to get in contact with everyone else. We’ve reacted enough. It’s time we find them and hit them where they live.”

Kate considered this idea for a minute, considered Hal’s elaboration on her thoughts, then dragged her teeth against her lower lip. “I think you’re right,” she agreed, “but where are we going to assemble? People keep losing it about the Watchtower being compromised or whatever might be going on. I’d say the place should be dependent on where these bastards are, but we don’t know wher—”

She paused, then got up, running into the kitchen to find her tablet, on which she’d been following internal comms. A while back she’d received a group message, a forward of a location…

“Here,” she said, pulling up Google Maps and coming back with two beers in one hand and her tablet in the other. Setting the beers down on the table, she started to compose a group message of her own on Watchtower encrypted comms. “We need to group and come up with a plan, and then crash a party in the middle of nowhere. What are we going to tell the team?”

Hal grabbed a piece of pizza and all but inhaled it, helping himself to another soon after. He hadn’t realized HOW hungry he was until there was food right in front of him. He turned his attention to her tablet when she showed it to him, brows furrowing a bit. That was a pretty remote location, ad he was curious how that had come about…but she could fill him in later.

“Tell them we need a location to meet up in, where doesn’t matter. I would suggest Guy and Kyle’s place, but..” he shrugged. “I’m biased. We need to compile all the information we have so we can connect the dots and see what we come up with. They have to have tipped their hand somewhere by now.”

Popping one of the beers open, he took a long drink, shivering at the cold of it. Licking his lips, he made a low noise before setting his drink down and pulling his shirt open.

“Start compiling, I trust you’re good at that. I’m going to shower off and give myself a once over. How long did you say your staff needed to charge? Might see if I can speed that up..” His mind was racing. He needed to get back and get his lantern and get in contact with Kyle and Guy. His stomach twisted a little. Seemed like days ago he was kicking around how to ask Kyle out…and now he hadn’t heard from him in days.

“Warriors makes sense,” Kate said, and ate a second piece of pizza with one hand while tapping out a message with the other. “And Hal my friend, I’ve written enough briefs to stuff a small library, especially now that I’ve got a limited number of clerks and paras. I can do information analysis okay. I’ll flip back through the rest of my messages and ask everyone to try and get info to me prior to our rendezvous, if at all possible.”

She wiped her hand on her shorts, too busy to get a paper towel, and took a sip of beer before looking up.

“The charge? About eight hours, more like seven now. We have four, and I’ll need to be with you if you do anything to the staff, it’s coded to my DNA profile. And Hal…save some warm water for me? I’m a mess,” she said, giving Hal a faint smile. The noise, the shirt…she swore she hadn’t been intending the comment as innuendo, but whatever. She was keeping their tension on the back burner, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t do two things at once. In fact, it actually helped her think better.

That little bit of levity helped a lot. Hal smiled and nodded before turning to head for the shower. He shut the door and stripped quickly, leaving Kyle a quick message before hopping in. He scrubbed down, just wanting to get the top layer of sweat off before they went on their way. He got Kyle’s message in the middle of his shower, and he smiled a bit to get it. Good, at least he didn’t have to worry about him for the time being.

Stepping out again, he toweled off and pulled his clothes back on, giving himself a once over in the mirror before heading back to the living room.

“All yours,” he said, gesturing over his shoulder with his thumb. “Anyone get back to you yet?”

Most of Kate’s beer was gone, compulsively sipped as she tried to put together a cohesive document with far too many pieces missing for her liking. Fortunately, she wasn’t a lightweight, and it had hit a solid bed of pizza consumption—the beer just was enough to keep her from overthinking the situation. Occam’s razor, of course, was usually the best way, and an overly complex concept would be their enemies’ downfall.

Dios, she was starting to sound like Batman or something.

“Kyle and Dick,” she said to Hal, opening the pizza box and gesturing towards him with it. It would just go to waste otherwise. “Kyle’s with Wonder Girl and Batgirl, so that’s good, even if they’re busy kicking ass and taking names right now, and Dick was…vague about who he was bringing along. Frankly, I don’t really care as long as it’s a positive situation. J’onn will likely get back to me soon. I just wish Guy and Dinah and Mia would get in touch.”

Unspoken in the sentence was someone else. Neither of them needed to mention it.

She set the tablet down, getting up and past Hal towards the stairs. Without thinking too much, she ruffled his wet hair as she went past, just to be a pain in the ass. “From looking at it, we’ve got Eden Corps, we’ve got Assassins, and we’ve got demons. The Eden Corps are just window dressing for the League of Assassins, but…if my guess is right, I’m beginning to wonder if the Assassins aren’t just a front for a greater demonic issue. Possibly a demon civil war, from our encounter? I don’t know, I need more data before I can make an educated guess, and I could just be talking out my ass.”

Hal gave his head a shake after she ruffled his hair, thick curls falling back into place. The rundown had good and bad in it, good to know that at least a few had answered. Right now, he’d take anything he could. He tried to add everything up in his head, but still couldn’t reach a useful conclusion.

“Go get a shower,” he said. “Then we’ll head over to Warriors. Maybe fresh eyes can help.”

Sitting down, he polished off the pizza, sitting back to enjoy his beer. Then, his ring pinged in with a message. He read it, reread it, then once more for good measure, all the while resisting the urge to grit his teeth and curse Oliver to kingdom come and back. He couldn’t be serious. There was no WAY he was serious. He KNEW Oliver, Oliver Queen never gave up. He was a liberal for fuck’s sake.

The comment about their fathers…that was the key. Code…Getting up, he hurried to the bathroom.

“Kate. You need to see this.” Ever the gentleman, Hal didn’t open the bathroom door, even though his voice was loud enough to carry through the sound of the water. He knocked hard on the frame, which shook a little, and Kate nearly slipped as she got out of the shower. She wrapped a towel half-assedly around her hair, pulled on a bathrobe, and pulled open the door, nearly plowing into Hal as she moved.

“What’s going on?” she asked, certain there was another attack. They hadn’t even had time to get the staff situation figured out, Hal’s ring charge was probably average at best, the last thing they needed was…

Hal simply shook his head and handed her her own tablet, message light flashing. Kate read it through, there in the hall, leaving a trail of water droplets as she kept moving, read it through again as she pulled on a new tank top and underwear and wrung out her hair onto the towel.

Dear Kate and Hal: (give my love to your fathers. Too bad we only saw them once every five years.) Send to family et al. Tired of giving a fuck; League should choose new leader, one who will better meet their needs. Anybody but me since I’ve given enough blood and I deserve calm haven. Give my love to Mia and forget about Ollie Queen. She can have the house. - Oliver

“Right. I’m guessing here, but I think Ollie’s been found by the demon crew. The question is, what’s the code?” she asked Hal, finally, stalking past him downstairs to put on her suit. Because my father is dead and prior to that he was a murdering bastard, so that part doesn’t take rocket science, she didn’t add aloud.

“Great minds,” Hal said dryly, trailing after her. “It’s not like him. Even depressed or defeated, it doesn’t read like him. And he knew we’d know.”

Kate copied the text of the message into the word processing app on the tablet. It took the two of them a while (and another slice of pizza each, eaten compulsively by Kate and thoughtfully by Hal) to figure it out, mostly because neither of them were particularly adept at codebreaking as a rule. That said, the answer was almost brutally obvious, once the message was clear.

“Right. What’s the game plan?”

Hal considered this for half a second. Kate could see in his eyes that his thoughts were probably going to the same place, worrying like hell that things would be too late for Ollie and then figuring it was a necessary risk. “We’ll charge you up, then meet up at Warriors,” he said, finally. “We’re going to need backup, and Dick’s the best guide to Blüdhaven we can get.”

“What was that about great minds,” Kate said in reply, pulling on her gauntlets with a wry smirk.