A/N: I noticed that I'm slowly diverging from canon. As always, comments letting me know how you took the chapter is appreciated! And you might have noticed that I've changed the old summary; just testing out a new one and waiting to see if I like it…

This chapter's shorter than planned because I decided to cut the other half out for chapter three.

Edit on 8.21.2012: Switched to past tense.

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TWO

Training for failure

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September 23, 2010

Artemis left the Main Office with a warm sheet of paper in hand, her updated schedule straight off the printer. She meandered through the long and wide corridors, occasionally glancing at the printout and comparing room numbers. She stopped at her destination and walked through the open door. Despite the pomp and austerity of Gotham Academy's outer visage, the classrooms did not appear all too different from non-private institutions.

Well, minus the high-tech equipment, the pressed uniforms, and the students working out equations.

About half of the students were already present despite class not starting until ten minutes later, and half of those were preparing sleek computer tablets that cost more than her room. Steeling herself, she opted for a window seat and pulled out her modest notebook, pencils, and textbook frayed at the corners.

A hand tapped on Artemis's shoulder. She turned and there was a friendly grin - -

"Hi, I'm - - "

"The creep who took my picture!"

Several heads swiveled to their direction and Artemis sank minutely into her chair.

"I was in it, too," he added before sweeping his arms out in a theatric manner. "Dick Grayson, at your service. Middle name's Richard but everyone calls me Dick, Grayson, twerp, the Mathlete Prince, freshman, etcetera."

Artemis eyed his proffered hand before shaking it briefly.

"I'm - - "

"Artemis Crock, I know," he cut in. "You're a Wayne Scholarship student, who doesn't know you? So how'd you get in? Athletics?"

She squirmed in her chair. 'Who doesn't know you'? The attention was wholly unwanted, in her opinion.

"You must be some kind of academic genius," he was saying. "Were you at the American Invitational Mathematics Examination?" At her shake of the head, he asked, "USAMO? ARML? You seem oddly familiar…and I'd definitely remember a pretty girl like yourself."

"No, no, I don't think so."

"Oh?" He ran a finger down her schedule. "But it says here that you're taking Geometry Honors despite being a sophomore, Biology Honors, AP English Literature, U.S. History Honors…"

"How did you - -"

"…and Advanced French." He let her snatch her schedule back. "Est-ce que tu peux me suivre si je parle comme ça?"(Can you keep up if I speak like this?)

Artemis scoffed and replied, "Ben oui, je ne serais pas dans le cours si je ne pouvais pas." (Of course, I wouldn't be in the class if I couldn't.)

His eyes gathered all of the light in the room, making them appear bluer. He leaned forward with his arms on his desk. "What's your best subject? Worst?"

"English Literature," came the immediate response. "Math."

She didn't have time to think about why she answered, about why she was even having this conversation because the teacher strolled into class.

"Whaddya know," Dick Grayson said, eyes twinkling in private amusement. "Math is my best subject and English Literature is my worst. Maybe we can help each other out this year?"

"Sure," she said vaguely, turning around for roll call. She figured she wouldn't see much of him later.

. . .

"You knew we have this class together," Artemis said by way of greeting as she slipped into the seat behind the slicked head of Dick Grayson.

He turned from the window and snickered, a sound she was quickly and unconsciously beginning to associate with the boy. It was now irrevocably tied to him, and she chased away images of a boy cackling in the shadows as he hacked motion sensors because the thought of Dick as the Boy Wonder was an asinine notion and if she continued to think on it she would burst out in unladylike, knee-slapping laughter which would forever mark her as that crazy transfer student.

"Why, Artemis, are you following me? People will start getting ideas," Dick said in lilting, insinuating tones.

She rolled her eyes. "Yes - - that we share the same class. How logical of them."

The entrance of Professor Fortner - - Gotham Academy didn't have teachers, they had professors - - prematurely ended their conversation. Dick smiled before facing forward as Fortner welcomed them all to "third period English and another year of perspicacious writing."

Artemis would be lying if she told herself that she wasn't a tad disappointed.

. . .

Lunchtime rolled in and Artemis rushed out of U.S. History to the cafeteria, breezing past students milling into the halls. The layout was spacious yet simple enough to navigate so she grabbed a tray of lunch within minutes: food that looked and smelled like food, brick oven pizza, blueberry and pine nut quinoa salad and - - her mouth watered - - a slice of apple pie that was oven-warm. She was recanting her initial reluctance at entering Gotham Academy as she made her way outside to the courtyard. After shaking her head at the classically-styled garden that included Doric columns, a central fountain, and lines of trim bushes, she sat at the fountain's edge, eating and musing about the Grecian statue holding a pot from which water issued forth.

She had never cared for the transfer student's first day rite of passage: the potentially-awkward task of finding a place to eat in the cafeteria. Until she found a small ring of friends in Gotham Academy, she was perfectly content lunching and listening to the streams of water.

The apple pie was as delicious as it smelled.

. . .

Sitting across from him, Barbara lowered her fork. "Who are you looking at?"

Dick turned away too late - - she followed his line of sight just as Artemis' blonde ponytail disappeared past the doors leading to the gardens.

"All right, spill: who's the new girl and why are you interested in her?" the red-head asked, tone brooking no room for any excuse that may come. She scrutinized him. "Hitting puberty?"

The cranberry juice he was drinking grazed the wrong pipe and he choked.

He continued to sputter longer than needed to paint himself serious. "She's on a Wayne Foundation Scholarship, Barbara. Of course I'm interested in the sole recipient… I mean, what if she's a math genius like me? It gets lonely at the top."

Barbara dug into her jello cup in a frustrated jab. He always did this, appearing to give an honest answer before sliding back to his flippant attitude. If it hadn't been for Batman and her father's shared history, she was sure she would have never believed that Dick was prowling the streets, keeping Gotham's streets clean as Robin.

Dick chuckled but his eyes strayed to the garden doors. He knew Bruce would tell him to play it safe and limit his interactions with Artemis at school.

But this was too good of an opportunity to pass up.

. . .

Artemis slammed her fists into the punching bag's sides, which coincidentally and infuriatingly shared the same red as the object she was pretending to fight.

The incident with Red Torpedo and Red Inferno was ripe in her mind, the frustration of her near-emotional collapse festering like a pus-filled wound at which she continued to pick. Sweat at her hairline flicked off with each ferocious kick or crawled down the back of her soaked shirt. She must've been at it for - - what, the past two hours or so? - - it didn't matter, there wasn't a mission for them today. Superboy and Miss Martian were out grocery-shopping (was taking the bioship really necessary?), Kaldur was daytripping to Atlantis, Kid Flash had some afterschool-fair-something-or-other (she hadn't pay attention), and Robin was - -

"Do you have a personal vendetta against punching bags?"

- - slinking around like a ninja and popping out whenever he chose, with such unnerving timing that she seriously believed he had a chip in his head that told him whenever someone was thinking about him. She should be used to it by now but her swing veered too far to the left and she had to inelegantly plant a foot down to prevent from falling face-first.

She scowled. "How do you do that?"

"Meditation," he suggested, sidestepping her query. "Deep breathing, maybe a hobby or two."

"What?"

"Alternative stress relievers to beating yourself against a punching bag." His gloved hand gestured at her bruising knuckles.

"Well, what do you expect?" she snapped, eyes flashing bitterly. He raised his palms in a placating manner and she wanted to retrieve her words but she has been a little stretched as of late: the stress of acclimating into a new school with new expectations, the shame of almost giving in to the little cajoling voice yesterday and abandoning her teammates with tail between legs, and yes, maybe she has being a touch oversensitive, but she was going to take his comment as a hint that she didn't have any hobbies aside from mauling inanimate objects.

"It's bigger. It's tougher. I'll get hurt no matter what."

She wasn't sure she was talking about the punching bag anymore. He fell silent and she realized that she hated it more than when he was filling the air with his dissected words. Artemis turned away to slow the spinning punching bag.

She heard him shuffling away and thought he would begin his personal warm-ups. Robin had developed a reputation for training solo in the Cave gym, not because he radiated don't touch me vibes like Conner, but because the flow of his acrobatic poses is unmatched and therefore intimidating. She didn't think she knew anyone who could unfurl their body after curling into a ball as smoothly as Robin could.

"Want to spar?"

She whirled around, searching for signs of pity, found him unreadable with his domino mask. Robin waited patiently, cape set aside, neatly folded on a bench.

"Come at me when you're ready," he said, lowering into a loose stance.

. . .

Robin had analyzed Artemis' weak points within minutes of their spar. Her strikes were a good combination of offensive and defensive maneuvers, hard and swift like Sportsmaster's, but a more gliding version, modified for a sleeker fighter like Artemis. He could see ghosts of Cheshire in her ducks and rolls, but whereas her older sister had her continuing stint in the League of Shadows to polish them, Artemis had not.

He caught the foot slicing down, pulled it and Artemis fell. She recovered quick enough to roll away and put distance between them.

Robin could see from the way she flowed from one move to the other that her education must have largely favored offensive and stealth strategies.

"Your defense is rough and easy to break through," he said.

Like now!

He took flight to avoid her mid-sweeping leg. As expected, she dashed forward, intending to deliver a blow where he landed, but Robin flipped away at the last second, a shade to the right. Artemis immediately jerked away but he sprung at her unexpectedly and used her momentum to push her to the ground with his knees.

The match ended, with him straddling her stomach without touching.

"And you have a habit of favoring your right arm for hooks and jabs," he finished, breath beginning to slow as the adrenaline spun away. "You might want to diversify your moves."

She stared at him for a few incredulous seconds before pushing him off. "Yeah, easy for you to say. You've got the Big Bats teaching you all you'd ever want to know. What was that, anyway?"

"Aikido. What about Green Arrow?" he asked, keeping his tone neutral.

She grabbed a towel from a rack and draped it over her face, muffling her voice. "Ah, he's - - he's pretty busy so we don't have a lot of time together."

"Why not ask anyone on the Team?"

Artemis made a small noise of agitation. "Kid Mouth's too fast - - and too annoying - - to train with, M'gann would hold back on me, Superboy's out of the question, and Kaldur…" She considered the option. "Maybe…"

Robin cleared his throat.

"You think Kaldur - - wait, you mean you?" she asked, her surprise increasing as Robin leisurely took a sip of his water. "Seriously? But…"

"But what?" He wiped his lips with a towel. "I'm the logical choice. We're both similar in stature, we're both non-metas - -" Blink and he would've missed her lip twitch. "And we made a good team. I don't have to remind you of yesterday's home front ambush, do I?" At her hesitation, he persisted with earnest. "I mean it, Artemis. We make a good team. Present tense."

Artemis, a mirror of dripping sweat, loosened hair, blood-tinged cheeks and lips, wild, conflicted eyes - - it was almost like he was looking at himself in the past, when he was without a home or a mentor, a boat casting for land in an aimless sea. He was familiar with that, the desperate wish for something you thought you would never have.

Robin thought he could understand why Bruce Wayne and Batman allowed her on the Team.

"We make a 'good' team…" she repeated, confusing him with the small smirk pulling at her lips. "Or do we make an asterous team?"

Robin laughed and felt the ache in each and every muscle.

"We make an asterous team," he agreed.

. . .

September 24-27, 2010

Over the next few days, Artemis and Robin trained in the afternoons and talked during the day, with Artemis remaining unaware about the latter.

Their first official training session began with easy warm-ups until Artemis asked, "Are you going easy on me?" and demanded that he did not.

Robin acquiesced after realizing he has been unintentionally doing exactly that. To make up for it, he introduced her to the grueling regimen he himself was subjected to by Batman, and Artemis merely bit the bullet despite waking up the morning after to a numb body. She barely had time to shovel cereal down her throat, get dressed, and bid her mother farewell.

Artemis stumbled into first period one minute after the bell, clutching her math homework in one hand and adjusting her tie with the other.

Dick watched as she plopped herself into the desk before him, a tired "Hello" sighing from her lips.

Professor Stevens called for the homework to be passed to the front. When Dick handed her a sheaf of papers, she noticed the Robin's egg blue Post-It note tagged on, and the scrawled message: You look tired. Rough night?

Her muscles quiver just by recalling it. Professor Stevens returned the previous day's homework and when Artemis held the stack behind her, the note was posted over his grade: Something like that. 'A-plus-plus'? Is that even possible?

He responded: Stevens gives extra points for legibility. Feel better.

Professor Stevens droningly lectured about complementary and supplementary angles.

She responded: Thanks.

. . .

After falling prey to Robin's entering throw for the fifth time, Artemis huffed and said, "Teach me how you do it. Teach me aikido."

He didn't question her demand and launched into a comprehensive outline of the basic philosophy behind the martial art. She was itching to dive in but the need to interrupt waned as the explanation continued; Aikido was the "Way of combining forces" using the tactic of blending with an attacker's movements for the purpose of controlling their actions with minimal effort. Foremost was to understand the rhythm and intent of the attacker to find the optimal position and timing to apply a counter-technique.

"The aim is to unify, to combine, to reciprocate," Robin said.

These were strange concepts to her.

Artemis listened.

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September 28, 2010

It was on their first mission since the Red Fiasco that she saw the budding fruits of her - - and Robin's - - labor.

The bio-ship's belly split, opening into an oval through which Artemis and Robin zipped down. Her stomach shifted as she free fell but the wind whipping around her body and through her hair, the suspense and speed of the dive, was thrilling.

The soft Indian earth rose to meet them and they touched down in mirrored crouches, whipped out their batarangs and arrows, and leapt into the jungle with only the hush of a cloud of dust.

Their easy, unconscious synchronicity made Artemis smile, made her momentarily forget the anger she was feeling at Kaldur. Her anxiety at having fallen under his suspicion was drowned out by the whistle of air, the animal sounds around her, the singing of her blood, and she thought nothing could touch her.

. . .

October 10, 2010

Black Canary turned her focus from Kaldur and M'gann's practice match to the two non-metas of the Team. She observed - - and noted with rising interest - - the seamless transitions from one pose to the next as Robin and Artemis traded punches for kicks and kicks for punches. Where Artemis pulled back, Robin pushed and where Artemis pushed, Robin pulled. They moved like water sliding around stones in a stream.

As the rare metahuman who was more selective in using her sonic screams, Black Canary had been especially concerned with Robin and Artemis' combat development. She knew Robin took after his mentor and was easily the most capable fighter in terms of hand-to-hand combat. But she was pleasantly surprised to discover that Artemis was able to keep up with him, even - -

Artemis let out a yell and hauled Robin over her shoulder. The throw had enough force to make Robin flip in the air once before tumbling onto his stomach, an audible augh knocked out of his mouth.

"Nice moves," he said. The wince evened out into a smile. "Who taught you those?"

"Hmm," she mused slyly, helping him up. "I wonder?"

. . .

October 16, 2010

Wolf disintegrated into nothing more than a cloud of smoke and even that was dissipated by the cold reality of the wind.

Superboy rose to his feet. He brushed flakes of snow that he couldn't see because his shirt was as white as the landscape around them.

Wolf, M'gann said through their telepathic link, a single-worded eulogy.

"There was no indication of feedback." Robin consulted his wrist computer for evidence. "I'm sorry," he said, the way one would for forgetting to turn off the stove.

Superboy looked at the ground: chalk-white, blank like him. "Can't do anything for him now."

He resumed tearing off the alien ship's cannon and M'gann began rerouting systems to integrate the weapon into her ship's bio-matrix. The Team fended off two incoming enemy ships without further thought about Wolf: he was just a pet after all, and this was their first mistake.

"Got you covered, get inside!" Artemis loosed three exploding arrows and whipped around towards the bio-ship. "I'm almost there!"

She didn't see that one of her arrows had missed. She didn't realize that one of the cannons were heating up.

"Artemis, behind you - - "

And then she was simply swallowed by a blaze of light and the arctic wind stole her name from M'gann's lips:

"Artemis!"

The scream shattered the sky and burrowed into them like an invisible shard of glass. The name was lost to the unforgiving wasteland and so was the girl.

Kid Flash trembled. "They're dead, every - - single - - alien, if it's the last thing I do." His face was contorted with a murderous rage that no one questioned, not even when they were safely seated in the bio-ship, not even when he was brutalizing the panel of controls with blind fists.

They overlooked it as grief. This was their second mistake.

. . .

The next few hours passed like a slow moving dream, during which Robin became someone else. But he was so removed from his surroundings - - had been removed, ever since - -

(flash of light and the freezing wind and the scream that unmade and made them all)

- - that he was cleaved into halves: the one half retreating inward, watching and waiting, the other half spreading out and over like a cool balm, running, ordering, sending his teammates-slash-friends-slash-family over the brink. Robin no longer knew the distinction. They were nameless soldiers, chess pieces to be used, weapons to be wielded. He forgot the taste of the Martian's double-chocolate cookies, the jubilant crows of the Speedster's "Souvenir!" He forgot the twitch of the Superboy's lips as he learned a new human expression, the gentle confidence with which the Atlantean infused his words as he told him that "someday, you will take over as Team leader."

There is an archer, too, said his inner half. A girl with storms for eyes.

But who? asked his outer half, with the deep dark rumble of a borrowed voice or a future voice such that the inner half was silent until his death. He woke up with a gasp raking out of his throat like he'd been drowning and the names Kaldur-Conner-M'gann-Wally-ArtemisArtemisArtemis clutched in his hands.

The simulation rippled away and they all woke up to their fear-sweat and disbelief, shaken, like a group of nervous, messed-up marionettes.

Like Artemis, Robin refused to look at anyone in the eye. Unlike Artemis, he was afraid of what he might find reflected back.

M'gann wept in Captain Marvel's arms.

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End notes: The bit about aikido was gleaned from Wikipedia. When Artemis responds in French with "Ben oui"('of course')she's using colloquial speech, kind of like she's saying, 'duh'. The more formal 'of course' would be "bien sûr".