[Right][I]Make some paper wings and learn to fly
If there's no tomorrow
Burn your paper wings and say goodbye[/I][/Right]

After making the Czarnian bleed, I took a retreat, a slight pause to reassess the situation. Little had changed, but with as many factors as were present it couldn't hurt to just know what was going on. I could've threw in another shriek, or something of the sort, but I didn't feel like upsetting our grounded Kryptonian friend, or amplify what angst I'd already nursed. He wouldn't be killing anyone. That would be sufficient for now.

Quite quickly my teammates wrapped Lobo in a jacket of sand. It was my folly to assume that Sandstorm's grip would hold. It would not.

Lobo's shotgun blast did a number on my wings. The scattershot hit us all more or less, but my arms, with the leather-esque flaps, had been outstretched. Thus I was grounded for a while. I felt energy blasts melt through my wings, thinning them out before burning like wax, a plastic bag over a match. The holes in my skin stretched out, growing like a black hole until they reached their thin, bony base at my arm.

I tried to swoop over as soon as I could feel my arms, pull Pistolera to safety. But she didn't need my help. That much was clear.

Under different circumstances, I would've took to the skies and pursued Sentinel and the bounty hunter. But he was so furious, he probably would've pushed past any agony I set before him. He's strong, physically and emotionally. We're not equals, not even close. Between the impossibility that was presently flight and my own respect for the math he'd done, saving the ten of us at the cost of one life, he's got guts. I wouldn't go that route, but who says he can't? The law someone else chose? The one we never agreed to abide by? We were born into a world carved into someone else's image.

Laws written before superheroes came out of the woodwork and alien menaces could come out of nowhere can't apply to the math that thousands of lives are greater than one.

Ducking under a table, I rolled in a puddle, ending the burn. The fire and smoldering was quenched, but would you look at me? I'm a freak, damp, cold, bruised, tired, alone really... A shapeshifting nightmare someone else made me into, the only reason anyone cares who I am is because I can fight and look cool. If I was normal, if I could be a nobody, I'd love to. This can't last forever. I promise it won't.

It's not self-pity. Just acknowledging what I've become. Nonetheless, it's enough for now.

Changing back, receding my long fingers and drawing my hands in, I see my skin for the first time in days. The burns move to under my elbow, a few on the outside of my ribcage. It hurts to move.

I asked myself what the others are doing.

[I]Who am I kidding? I don't care.[I]

Under the table, I had a moment to myself. My reflection was staring back at me from the dark waxed floor. Just seeing my face without the snout makes me want to cry. No one's coming my direction, I click my tongue for a split-second sonogram. Yep, no one's coming. Just a moment to myself.

I don't want them to come either. They all agree we're not friends. I'm not afraid of losing any of them. None of us are immortal, except possibly Evan. It's not a matter of "If they'll die," the question is "when?". One day I'll lose every one of them. They may as well die by my side. Whether we're friends or not, I'll remember them. Not sure if anyone feels the same about me that's still alive.

Running my hand through my long brown hair, I feel the thick, slick mop sogging and laying down. My green eyes are actually covered, just barely, by the bronze bangs. It was a peaceful moment.

It had to end though. So I sat up at the table and morphed back. I could hear the distant ruckus, but I couldn't really do anything about it. I'm not Superman, or Sentinel for that matter. I'm not Rufus, I can't be everywhere at once. I don't wish I was either.

I just walked in that direction.

So I listened to Sentinel's speech, Lobo's arguments, Superman's intervention, and all of it. And the silence as we rode back to Titans Tower.
[hr][/hr]
I'm hardly the social type. Not that I'm an introvert, just uncomfortable. Being kidnapped, isolated, experimented on, dropped into death matches, and forcibly deified took that from me.

Crawling off the T-Wing was the lead-in to what I knew would be a long evening. Who's fault was it? I don't care. We didn't really do that bad. If the army stepped in, I can almost guarantee they would not have been able to do better. The great and powerful Justice League was too slow to respond, so we stepped up to bat.

Rose wanted us to just "be teens," like that means anything. The term teenager was born in a marketing department not long ago. We're just people. In Sparta I'd already be a legal adult.

I watched Sentinel creep off to his room, lonely. We can talk later. I'd comfort him, but I'll give him time. I'd have stood up for him earlier, when the League was chewing him out, but I won't push him to be a killer. I'm sure that he wouldn't be able to stop at one. It wouldn't make sense to stop there either.

I moved to my room to enjoy the quiet of isolation, that and my clock ticking. Avoiding the shattered glass from my chandelier, I found myself restless. I'm not one for drinking, but I felt compelled to join in on the teenaged debauchery and maybe jumpstart some drunken revelry. Sure everyone here may be strong, but I'm scary as hell when people are drunk.

Before I went in that direction though, I remembered, I don't have a clock in my room. The ticking wasn't even in my room. So I listened more closely.

[I]Bat-Boy they call me[/I], and she thinks no one can hear her sneak away. I don't need to follow, I can track her without raising a hand, but my window helps. Call me paranoid, but I can't help but baselessly and aggressively distrust these teenaged warriors, especially the only one who has more in common with an assassin than a superhero. [I]Hot?[/I] Yeah, she's a hot girl. And I'm a boy. Now, I may be a stupid teenaged boy, but I'm not a [I]stupid[/I] teenaged boy.

When she came back she went to the kitchen with the others. Rufus was setting up for a game of Guitar Hero. Rufus is an arrogant prick, but he's also the only person here besides [I]Madam Missile[/I] who can plan ahead for tribulation without panicking. That teenaged debauchery may not be so bad with Pistolera, but I can't compete with the Greek jailbait hosting the shindig.

"I'm down for some Guitar Hero," I'm pretty good at it anyways. I have a thing for the once dead franchise. "Rufus, it'd be Kim Possible for me to get any less than four stars on the original series."