Title: Phased Worlds
Fandom: Smallville/DCU - Characters: Wonder Woman, Chloe
Rating: PG - Words: 10,477
Type: drama, adventure, au
Warnings: none
Spoilers: none
Summary: Wonder Woman returns to Themyscira, taking Chloe with her. When she finds out that she cannot return, Chloe is not happy.

Notes:
Interlude in the Not A Villain series after Making Plans. (Really, the conclusion to a three-parter that started with Islands, but it was too long for one story from the start.) 9th in the Conner series, "Not a Villain" (10th if you count the prelude). (See the Master Post for links and summaries to all stories.) Betas by Ronda and Sue, thank you! :) Cross-posted to Archive of our Own.

Disclaimer: Only mine in my dreams. ^^ This story was written for free entertainment purposes only and may not be reproduced for profit or altered without permission.

Phased Worlds

Diana walked through the records room, running her fingers along the stones in the wall. Each one a memory, each one a life. People long gone, but their experiences remained, teachers for the future. It had been known for some Amazons to get lost in the memories, addicted to another person's life, a love they could never have, a time that was not their own. Because of the dangers, the records were carefully guarded and regulated. Everybody experienced a few when they were young, to introduce them to the Mysteries and to the reasons for their seclusion. As one advanced through the Mysteries and rose through the levels, there were certain memories that all shared, and others that were selected for each particular person. They could also choose others to experience, the weight of their own life being enough to balance out the lives they were borrowing.

But when one had no life to balance the memories, what then, were they? Kon-el and his siblings, grown artificially fast and memories forced upon them with no choice. From what Kon had said, the early children with no memories had been insane, grown into young adults and then opening their eyes to see a world they did not know. Full processing, full senses, overwhelmed with stimulus. They might have learned in time, but the evil that played with lives did not give them that time and destroyed them with no thought, reaching for the next life just as casually and cruelly.

Kon had been chosen to go out in the world because he was the best, the strongest, the fastest. Somehow, he was also a good person.

Wonder Woman didn't know how that had happened, given his life to that point. Some in the League said it was Superman's genes... but goodness was not in the DNA.

Her fingers stopped over the stone she'd been looking for. Thalestris. She who had known Alexander the Great, and by all reports had known him... very well.

Was Lex more like Ulysses or Alexander? Lex would say Alexander. Diana would say Ulysses. To be fair, she hadn't yet been through Thalestris' memories, so she didn't really know, but Lex was an explorer, an inventor, brimming over with cleverness and needing an outlet for it. The world knew Alexander as a warrior, and Ulysses as an adventurer. However, Alexander had been a scholar as well as a conqueror. Ulysses had been a king and a warrior as well as a sailor. Was there a difference between the two? Or was it in the historical view of them ages after? Would Alexander have wanted to conquer the world if his father had not been King and already at war? What would Ulysses have done if he was not already a King? Alexander had been brilliant, and had set up a system of government whereby people were happy to be under his rule once they had gotten over being conquered. Ulysses had left his wife in charge while he went soldiering. And Lex? Lex was ruler of his own fiefdom, commanding his own loyal crew, fighting his own invisible wars.

It was tempting to look into the memories and have something more than theory to see, something to discuss with Lex the next time she saw him.

Diana grinned and let her fingers drop. She wouldn't, not today. One of these days, she would, if only to tease Lex about it, but now was not the time. Especially not with her child growing inside of her. Who knew what that would do?

Moving her hand to her rounded belly, Diana closed her eyes for a moment, feeling the overwhelming joy and satisfaction at having her baby back within her. There had always been a part with her, however the Goddesses had kept most of the physical with them. This was much better. Diana felt whole and complete, with her baby with her and safely back on Paradise Island.

She turned away from the memory stacks, noting where that stone was for later reference. It was an amusing idea, but Lex would not be so easy to quantify. As much as Alexander, as much as Ulysses, Lex was a product of his time and his experiences.

Truly, Lex was a survivor. Hearing about Lionel, about what Lex had been through... Diana was sure they hadn't been told all of it, just the parts that would help them to understand Lionel, but it was more than enough for her to imagine the rest. Lex would not want her pity, yet she could give him her respect. Lex was perhaps not what Clark would call a good person, but Diana would like to have seen anybody else go through what Lex had been and come out as balanced as he was.

Now there was a scary thought... Clark in Lionel's care, a child in the upbringing. Or anybody else's other than the loving family that had found him. What would their world have been like, if Clark had been raised by a monster bent on exploiting him? Or would Clark's innate goodness have shone through no matter what? As his son's did.

From Kon to Lex to Clark back to Conner again. It was a pattern, and they were all very much tied together. Kon was learning about the world now, not just the small part of it he had been raised in, and it was a different place. Deceit, judgment, shades of interactions. Diana felt sorry for him, having escaped pure evil only to find that he still couldn't be himself, not fully. They had avoided teaching him that lesson for perhaps too long, but his complete joy in the world, in being alive and being in it... it was hard to say to that joy, "be restrained, be cautious." It was a child's joy, unfettered by responsibilities. Yet Conner was not a child, and he had responsibilities. Two years old, and fourteen, and a super hero.

Diana did not envy Hope and Mercy and Lex that job. Of them all, though, they were perhaps the best fitted for it. Heroes learned hard lessons. Those who lived on the fringes knew what the world was. Diana had seen Kon's pain when his other dad had reacted so harshly to his mistake, but what she wasn't sure that the others had seen was Lex's deep fear. Fear partially for Kon, but mostly for Mercy. He'd protected her for years, as much as Mercy had protected him, and all that was very nearly stripped away by the one person he loved more. If Diana had been thinking, she would have remembered Kon's unusual habit of silent monologs, but his accent was strange and he never talked directly to her. She hadn't put two and two together until he'd 'overheard' her and Mercy's conversation.

It was perhaps a good thing that it had happened. Kon now had somebody else to talk to... Mercy had somebody to talk to, and Kon would get that very dangerous habit of his under control. Diana shivered, though, thinking of how very wrong it could have gone. Lex's reaction was minor in the face of what could have been. They still had yet to see what other fall-out it might incur. The world was a balance.

"Princess! There you are."

The words were not loud, but in the quiet of the records room, they carried. Diana turned. "Britoymous," she acknowledged the younger Amazon.

"You're not at the celebration. People have been asking for you." It was said diffidently, not accusing, just stating the facts.

Sneaking out on her own welcome home party probably had been a bit gauche of her. Diana grimaced. Time to go back and face hundreds of people who didn't know her anymore. She had left the island, and it had changed her. They had stayed on the island... and it was perhaps not surprising how the people she had known were still much the same. They were, though, eager to hear about the outside, aware that they weren't isolated anymore and wanting to know about the people and places outside. They wanted to change, and were reaching out to her as the instrument of that learning.

"Let us go back together," Diana said, keeping her resignation out of her voice. Brit agreed and moved smoothly into place, keeping a half-step behind her Princess as they walked. It was only after they were outside that Diana wondered what had brought her to the library in the first place. Catching her mother's glance and nod at Brit as they walked out, though, Diana suspected a discreet search party had been sent out. She hadn't been in there that long, she hadn't thought.

Ignoring those around her for a moment, she lifted her face up to the sun, drinking in the pure light that shone upon Themyscira. Clark would love it here, if men were allowed. There was nowhere on Earth that had sunlight like this. She breathed in the smell; foremost was the foods they had brought out for her, along with the subtle scents people wore, and beyond that was the island itself. Jungle and beach, forest and rivers. Paradise Island had been created by the Goddesses to keep their people in health and beauty. There was no place quite like it anywhere else.

"Daughter," Queen Hippolyte approached and laid a light hand on her upper arm. "It is good to have you home."

Her mom had repeated that same sentiment no fewer than five times since Diana and Chloe had stepped off the airplane that morning.

"It is good to be home," Diana said gently, her eyes roving over the crowd there to welcome their Princess back.

There was diversity in the crowd now, as there had not been when Diana had left sixteen years ago. When she had left, nearly all her sisters had been like her and her mother – slightly darkened Caucasian skin, dark black hair, light skeletons, strong muscles, long legs. Most had rich brown eyes, with she and her mother being the only two with blue coloration. It was the phenotype of the Mediterranean where they had last left from, the Greeks and their islands.

That phenotype was not reflective of the world outside, though, and nothing spoke more of the change for their future than to see the mix of colors and shapes now present in the Amazons. Brit, the young warrior who had escorted her, was as dark as an Ethiopian warrior, and built for speed. Young Helios, playing there under the table away from her mother's watchful eye, had the aspect of an Apache child. A cousin she hadn't met yet was as bright and blonde as Chloe.

Amazons were now being born different, no matter their mother's looks. The Goddesses ruled their island, and their people, and they were preparing those peoples for a more open planet.

This time, Amazons would not go out as a tribe, all of them together, sisters under a Princess in a warrior band to fight against other warriors. This time, Amazons would be knights, sent out to separate areas, expected to interact with others and fight independent of each other.

Briefly, Diana reflected on how very like Lionel Luthor's clone brothers that sounded. Opposite sides, similar tactics. She would have put more thought into the idea, but had to turn and greet a cousin she hadn't seen in years, and then her aunt, and the procession of relations and friends went on.

As Diana wandered through the courtyard, nibbling on small sandwiches and cheeses and fruits (some things about large gatherings never changed, no matter island or mainland), for as many people as she met, she noticed a certain one missing.

With a frown, she made her way to where her younger cousins were. "Where's Chloe?"

Neeli sniffed. "That one. Off to the Sunfan Beach. Don't worry, she was gone before most of the people got here."

Diana stiffened and felt herself shifting into Wonder Woman stance despite the robes she was wearing. The younger cousins were technophiles. She'd thought she'd left Chloe with good people who would appreciate her knowledge. "You drove her off," she said flatly.

Neeli didn't seem to notice the danger, but next to her, Helen straightened up. Nervously, she cleared her throat. "M'pa and her squad followed. They have the betrayer under watch."

She shouldn't have left Chloe alone. Though she hadn't had a choice, needing to go talk to the Goddesses where Chloe could not have gone. She should have made sure that Chloe would have been safe in heart as well as body. She'd thought she had. Diana closed her eyes in a rebuke to herself, then opened them to rebuke the others. "Chloe is our guest. She will reside here in the future. It is true that not all her actions were as they should have been, but you know nothing about that! Whatever rumors have spread, whatever talk has gone around, whatever might have been in the past, this is the now and she should have been treated as an honored guest and a future sister among us."

"I don't want a sister like that!" Neeli explosively protested.

Diana raised her hands, the long sleeves of the robe falling back to reveal her bracers, which she crossed together. "Did you want an ancestress who sold herself and her sisters into slavery? Look at our history! We are women! We are not Goddesses, and we are not perfect. Even in our isolated island, we do not always do what we should. The world outside is harsh and there are many distractions everywhere. You cannot judge until you have been through the same, and even then, you would not know her." The bracers, former slave shackles, glowed with bright yellow light as the Goddesses lent their own weight to Diana's words.

Helen's voice trembled, but she braved through the wrath to seek clarification. "The original Queen Hippolyte repented and called upon the Goddesses for help. By all accounts, this one has not."

There were times when Diana felt the weight of her years. This time she felt all that and twice as much beyond. She let her hands fall and the robe cover her wrists. "And how would Chloe have known to do that? Does she know our Goddesses? Has her story been told and there are no more pages to be filled? You do not know what has been done to her, you do not know what she has suffered, and her story continues. This is a chance for her, and you would keep her from that very chance our great-great-great-great-grandmothers had; you deny her what you yourself were given – the opportunity to ask."

She looked at the now silent crowd around her, more than just her young cousins. "There is a war going on outside; there has always been a war. The Ladies kept us safe so we could grow strong and heal, but the war never stopped – it went on without us. There are people who fight on both sides, and there are people living their lives without noticing, and there are those who are caught in the middle and torn apart. In any war, there are casualties, and there are wounds, and there is blood spilled. There are those who betray and those who are betrayed, and those who are forced to do what they do not want.

"Chloe's tale is her own, and she might share it, or she may not, but she is a sister. Never doubt that. What she has been through, any of you would be hard pressed to endure with unmaimed heart and soul. She is a wounded warrior, carrying the scars and still in need of healing. I thought that she could get that healing here, among sisters who care." Her voice dropped into scorn, "Obviously, I was mistaken."

The crowd murmured lowly, but no one, not even Helen or any of the older cousins spoke to Diana. In her current mood, that suited her well enough. "Sisters have their differences, we do not always get along. But I would hope that we still love enough to care. Remember compassion, for our sanctuary is a gift, not a right."

Turning from those who had never known the conflicts that a subtle war could bring, Diana walked with steady strides down the island paths. None followed.

The Sunfan was a nice quiet cove, with a rock formation that resembled a fan and the sun usually set over it, giving it its name. Diana came through the path and paused at the top of the trail. The guards were in trees and hiding places spread out in strategic locations around the cove, giving an appearance of solitude without its actuality. Diana nodded to M'pa who had stepped out a half step to draw Diana's attention.

She has been quiet. M'pa returned the greeting, her eyes flicking out to observe both the target and to check all of her squad.

Chloe was sitting next to the fan, her back against the stone, her gaze out towards the ocean. She was dressed in mainland shorts and a tank-top, going along with the weather on the island, but not the culture.

Diana sighed, nodded to M'pa, then carefully picked her way across the rocks and sand. There was more of her to maneuver than there had been, and she was still getting used to the change in center of gravity. She settled on a rock near but not too close to Chloe, letting the other woman have her space.

"Hello, Chloe."

"Wonder Woman," Chloe acknowledged without turning to look.

Diana laughed. "No, not right now. It's just Diana. Some Wonder Woman I'd make like this."

At that, Chloe turned and made a spectacular double-take. "Oh, wow... I mean, I knew you were... but I didn't know... but... did it hurt?" She started to reach a hand out and then gathered herself back in.

"I had my child restored to me, that I should have had all along," Diana said quietly. "It was wonderful." She spread her hands on her rounded abdomen and took a moment to feel how right it was. "There was always a part of my baby in me, but not the whole, and though I knew the Goddesses were taking good care of lial, it was not enough." She'd missed the sensations of the child growing within her, not getting to learn to regulate her body through the changes. She could only hope she would have another child someday to complete the cycle more fully.

"Lial? You've named her already? Him?"

"Huh, that didn't translate." Diana thought. "There isn't a gender-neutral pronoun in English, is there?” She would have sworn she’d heard some. Then she realized that the ones she’d heard were used more in a subgroup and culture, but they were not universal English. That wouldn’t have come through with the automatic translations Chloe was getting. Then again, lial probably wouldn’t have anyhow. “Lial is a little more specific than just a general pronoun, it's used for the child within, from conception through birth. We don't know the sex of the baby and won't know until lial is born."

"Your Goddesses can't tell you?"

That was definitely sarcasm. Diana brushed it off and replied seriously. "More to the point, they won't tell us. Every child is to be loved and appreciated for who lial is, for however long we have lial. For some women, this is the only way they will ever love a male, through their children. Some women, however, are stubborn in a way that would make mules look easy, and if they knew the sex ahead of time, they could carry to term with resentment and hate festering inside of them the whole journey. No baby should go through that, and so we are monitored for the health of lial, and never told what gender they will be."

"What happens to male children?" Chloe's interest was engaged. She obviously didn't want to be, but her intelligence would not let her simply be when there were things to be learned and a story to find.

Diana looked out across the waters. "It depends on the timeframe. We have done different things over the years. Sometimes there were male tribes to match the Amazons and we would exchange children at the age of two. Always, we have the children until they are two. In other ages, we would have families, cousins and relatives of our mates and those who would not live within the tribe and they would accept the children. To be an Amazon is a choice as well as a bloodline. For the last forty years, the Goddesses have taken our boys and we have not known where they went, though we are assured they are loved or they would not be given up. Still, some women have left the island, rather than give their child up – not knowing where they will go is a very hard choice. Personally, I suspect the boys have been scattered into the world in both families and orphanages to grow up unknowing of their heritage, yet still in good hands. Sometimes with the parents knowing the adoption, sometimes thinking the child was their own, as the Goddesses can do.

"The men are not as gifted as the women, not having the full blessings and training of the Goddesses, yet they have Amazonian blood and are powerful in their own right. The Goddesses will watch over them, though not as closely as they do the females. They will grow up within the light, as much as individual choice can let it be." Diana paused, thinking about the men. There were not as many of them as there were females, and yet this was the first time in their history they had not been told where their sons were. Diana herself was not sure what she would do if her child was a boy. She hoped desperately that there would be another shift in the policy for children, for she did not think she could let her child go into the unknown without her. They had lost many mothers in the last few generations, and Diana would not say they had made the wrong choice. There had to be a reason for it, even if the Goddesses weren't telling them what it was.

Chloe sat up straight. "You think Batman is a male Amazon?!"

Diana grinned. "I didn't say that." She'd very carefully not said that. And she didn't know. It was possible for normal obsessed humans to perform the physical and agile feats that Batman regularly did, and he had the scars of the wounds that got through. However, she had her suspicions. There were many heroes out there in the world facing evil, and the Goddesses could be subtle when they wanted to be.

"I'm not going to be allowed to leave, am I?" Chloe said abruptly.

The silence rested for a minute while Diana contemplated what to say. Finally, she let it be as simple as, "No."

There was another little silence before Diana filled it in. "The Elders had wanted you to build the communication center before they told you, but I thought that would be unfair, as being rather a bad idea all the way around."

Chloe snorted. "If you let me build the communication center---"

Diana cut her off, "None of us would be safe."

She waited for Chloe to deny it, but the blonde woman didn't. Chloe seemed to have a very good idea of what was going on.

"I could kill you now," Chloe said, not moving from where she was. "I could threaten you until they let me go."

Diana shrugged. "First of all, we are not alone." She nodded up the beach where the warriors watched. Hidden for the most part, but Pethna stepped briefly out, her bow in plain sight as she interpreted what Diana wanted.

"Knew that," Chloe glanced briefly at Pethna and then returned her gaze to the ocean. "You're closer than they are. I could get to you before they react."

It didn't faze Diana. "If you kill me, they will not let you go. If you threaten me, they will not let you go. I am but one Amazon. They might value me, but not so much as to let evil have a handmaiden."

Chloe flinched. She controlled the reaction a moment later, but it had been seen.

"I might be bigger than I was, and a little more unwieldy and slower, yet I am still an Amazon born and raised a Warrior. Also," Diana slid her hand on her belly, "I have another to protect. Do not think you would get very far with threatening me. Would you truly threaten my child?"

Chloe glanced at Diana's swollen belly without meeting Diana's eyes. Then the waves on the shore recaptured her attention. "Why didn't you come back sooner?"

Diana tilted her head in question, accepting the change of subject yet wanting more clarification to the question.

"You said you missed having your... Lial growing within you. Why didn't you come back to Themyscira earlier? Why wait so long?"

It was true, Diana would not be able to enjoy the baby within her for long before lial would want out. It would be enough, though. "The Ylians."

Chloe snorted. "That was only six weeks ago. What was your excuse before then?"

She answered the question. "In all truth, I had planned to. Four months was going to be my cut-off date… and then Lex pulled his stupid stunt of trying to get to this island. It was better that I stick around and monitor from offsite at that point. Then Dr. Psycho tried to kidnap Steve, again," Wonder Woman growled at the memory. Her husband was just a little too much of a magnet for the villains. "And then there were the Ylians, and then I couldn’t leave until Superman got back."

"By that criteria, there was always going to be something." Chloe sounded almost amused.

"Tell me about it," Diana said whole-heartedly.

Shifting her weight on the rock, Diana leaned back, leaving one hand on her abdomen to feel her baby there. She had wanted to come home, she had very desperately wanted to. The excuses were only that. And it really didn’t bring them to where they needed to be. They could dance around the subject and she could lead Chloe on for a while, or she could get to the root of the issue and bring up the main point. Chloe was not going to leave this island, and despite the lecture Wonder Woman had given to her people earlier, it would be some time before they accepted Chloe. Chloe, Diana was sure, would not make it easy for them nor want to be accepted. Nonetheless, it was Diana's responsibility.

"I stayed for Kon-el. His newly-discovered father was off-world on a dangerous mission with an unknown timeframe. It would have been a horrible time to leave." Diana brought up the main point, curious if Chloe would recognize it or think it just another part.

Chloe wrinkled her nose. "There were lots of super heroes that could have covered Superman's area. It's not like you lived with Kon and tried to be his mother."

"Nor did I want to be," Diana agreed amiably, despite the poking. "Conner has his own life, and I am only a side character within it. There are other heroes who can watch over Superman's territory, and be mentors to Superboy... yet Kon mixes his lives. He was as careful as I have yet seen him, dividing his time between Smallville and Metropolis and not risking his grandmother, yet the chance was there. I was a safety net if he slipped."

"Green Arrow or Impulse or Cyborg could have done the same."

Their old band, who to this day were tightly woven with Chloe's interactions. Green Arrow most of all, but the others were still inclined to give her their first loyalty. Diana shook her head. "Bart was still covering for Flash." With her peripheral vision, she saw Chloe flinch at the reminder that Barry had only recently been released from the hospital. It was something Watchtower should not have overlooked. "And while the other two might be okay with Kon-el, I would not trust them with Lex Luthor."

Chloe left off the pretense of watching the surf and turned to face Diana. "Conner should not be trusted with Lex Luthor! Luthor is evil and I don't like him around Kon."

"Luthor is indeed evil, but it is the elder Luthor, not the younger," Diana laid that one out carefully, hinting at her knowledge without revealing more and waiting to see what Chloe would do.

Chloe's eyes flashed with anger and pain. "Lex Luthor will destroy Conner, even as he had killed his own father, even as he destroys others."

It was to be expected that Chloe would not give in this quickly. She was a formidable opponent, and she would not take the Amazons' word for it that she was now permanently on Themyscira. Diana switched tactics. "Lex says he is sorry for not having protected you against Lionel as he had promised to do."

Chloe paled and then flushed. She stood up, her whole body quivering in anger. "He couldn't even protect himself," she said, and then left the cove, striding quickly away.

Diana stayed where she was and watched the waves. That last line had been anger and resentment... yet there had also been truth in it and Diana didn't think Chloe was unaware of Lex's own problems. Reasons to forgive, if she was so inclined. Which at the moment, she obviously wasn't.

With a sigh, Diana got up and prepared to go back to the feast. This would take time. And here on Paradise Island, they now had all the time they needed.

... ... ...

Diana woke up at an inner prompting. She draped on the loose chiton that had become her easiest form of clothing and slipped her feet into sandals. Most of the women went barefoot, but her feet had lost their toughness out there in the cities, always covered in shoes. Once dressed, she headed out into the night.

A mile out and Diana was feeling the effects. It was amazing how much difference one baby could make to her stamina. The prompting directed her to an observation deck where they normally had sentries. The sentries were, however, making themselves discreetly scarce, and at the top of the deck Diana found Chloe.

She'd seen her in passing for a few days, but the other lady hadn't been in the mood for conversation. Instead, Chloe had been exploring the island and the resources available, checking the area out for a way to leave or a way to get a message off. Diana's plane had been found and attempted to be broken into, which was quite a feat for something that couldn't be seen. Unfortunately for Chloe, though, the plane's security was mystical as well as technical and Chloe hadn't been able to get in.

Diana sat down on a chair and recovered her breath. Stairs were not very fun anymore.

Chloe had watched Diana come up, but hadn't offered to help. Instead, she stayed quiet until Diana's breathing had returned to normal.

"The stars are different." Chloe's voice trembled a little, a bare hint of uncertainty underlying the statement of fact.

Diana tilted her head back and looked up. Without any electronic lights and no lanterns near the tower, the stars were brilliant and bright, showing up in all their glory, from the least speck to the brightest sun. There were the constellations of her youth – musical Arion being rescued by the dolphins, the simple Seastar, the dark gap left of the Trident, the dark red shine of the Paint Beetle. None of which were the constellations or stars on Earth. Even knowing there would be the difference, and having studied for it, it had taken Diana some time to get used to the night sky when she'd gone out in the world.

"We're not fully on Earth," Diana responded gently. "Themyscira is a phased island, existing only partly on the planet, which is how we are kept safe."

"But people land there! Your Steve... he crashed onto the island. People have been shipwrecked, you flew here."

"If the island had not been here, Steve would have drowned." Diana shivered to think of it, not wanting even the idea to be near to her husband. "There are parts of the island in the real world, but we come and go depending on need. Our need, the need of others. Next time you're at the beach, watch for a few miles out where the water shimmers in a mirage. That is the division between our land and the world. None get through that the Goddesses do not allow."

Chloe shook her head, not in denial of what Diana had said, but more at the thought that she may really not be able to get off the island. Diana didn't think that Chloe had really believed it a possibility until then. Short term, perhaps, but not permanently.

"No," Chloe said, repeating the gesture in voice as well as deed. Then she scrambled down off the tower, running away to another part of the island where the truth was not as obvious.

Diana looked at the stairs and then resettled in the chair, making herself comfortable. As long as she was here, she might as well enjoy the stars for awhile.

... ... ...

"If the island responds to the need of others, why doesn't it respond to my need."

Diana snorted, reaching for the dice and throwing them. She studied her options and then moved her piece. "There are other needs besides yours." If Chloe was to be let go, people would suffer and die. There would be people who would suffer and die anyway, as Lionel would react when he figured out what they had done, but as bad as it would be, it could still be worse if Chloe was working with him. One could not stop working against evil for fear of what evil would do.

Chloe threw the dice and moved. "What have I done, that you keep me here against my will?"

It was rather telling that Chloe hadn't asked that question until now, four days in. Diana suspected that deep inside, Chloe was not unhappy to be captured and put out of play. She would fight against it to the best of her ability, but if she was here, she could not be made to act against her friends.

"There was a mole inside the Justice League, feeding information to an enemy." Diana looked straight into Chloe's eyes as she said this.

"If you had let me investigate, I would have found that person for you." Chloe gave nothing back.

"I'm sure," Diana said dryly. She had expected nothing less. And probably there would have been one found, one of Lionel's lesser agents, of which they had already found a few. Removing Watchtower had been their main priority.

"What was it that made you mistakenly think it was me?"

There had to be admiration at such a strong will as there was in Watchtower. Diana rolled the dice inside her hand and considered. "The most obvious was Conner."

Chloe sat up straight and her eyes flashed. "I have done nothing against Kon!"

Double-pips. Diana moved her piece ahead, selecting a good location from which there could be several other moves made next. "The enemy, when seeking to disconcert, called Kon's mother Molly."

The look on Chloe's face was a study in puzzlement as she tried to look through that at every angle. Finally she said, "But his mother was Molly."

Diana shook her head. "Sally. His name, before he was adopted by Clark, was Conner Wilson."

"But..." Chloe's expression cleared up and then turned to fury. "Lex Luthor." She snarled, snapping her dice out in such a sharp throw they almost bounced out of the roll box. "Conner was registered at school with my name and SSN."

Diana took a moment to interpret that. Social Security number. She hadn't had to deal with it since she'd snuck into the world. She shrugged. "Records can be altered. Conner liked his other mother." So many odd thoughts in that sentence. She didn't even know the whole story – Clark and Conner had only told them the very bare outline of the information, with Lex staying quiet and periodically nudging Kon as a reminder to not tell that much. Diana approved. The less they knew, the less others could find out. Until the meeting, nobody had even known there was a separate identity, much less that it was the one Conner preferred. Lex, Diana was sure, would have preferred none of them to know. It was, however, a major point for their information leak.

"Anybody could have gotten into the JL records and found Conner's information."

Diana's eyebrows raised. Chloe was reaching. "Gotten in with neither Watchtower nor Oracle knowing?" She shook her head. "No, place the blame on Lionel for not resisting the chance to use what he knew, though the information gave up his connections."

Chloe reached over and moved her piece, saying nothing.

They continued the game for a little while without more conversation.

"Why do you believe Lex Luthor? He killed his father, he experimented on Cyborg, on Arthur, on others. He's done horrible things and has no conscience. What makes his word more than mine?"

Diana didn't think that explaining the differences between the hero's view and the view of the greylands would be productive. Even Lex himself was not happy with some of what he'd done, though there was some evidence his father had meddled. Lex was not all good. Neither, though, was he the evil people tried to think him. That was not the point, though.

"Lex was not the only one who has seen Lionel's hands in things. Clark believes it's Lionel Luthor, and he should know."

Chloe grimaced. "Clark has always believed it was Lex. For him to change his mind so quickly, there must be something going on. Have you looked for magic influencing him?"

There was a reason that they had kept the initial planning group small and select. Chloe's reasoning was much more logical than the truth. Diana decided to derail that one before she got too far into it. "Lionel crossed a line with Conner. When the analysis of the samples from the destroyed lab that Kon-El was grown in with his siblings was completed, Kon and they turned out to be a perfect blend of Superman's DNA and Lex Luthor's."

As Diana talked, Chloe had been looking bored, and nodding not in agreement, but in a 'get on with it because you'll not convince me' motion, but at the last, she stopped mid-nod, her eyes widening. The DNA samples had been taken care of by a group at STAR labs that Batman oversaw. Neither Watchtower nor Oracle had been involved with that research. Once the results were found, they were tightly and solidly locked away. Only the top JL council knew, and it wasn't entered into any of their records at all. Batman had made sure of that.

Watching carefully, the moment before Chloe was about to recover her balance, Diana added, "Lex Luthor didn't know."

Chloe didn't even try and protest that statement. Instead she reached for her glass, an island fruit punch, and took a long drink before she put it down and muttered under her breath something about "that idiot." She turned her attention back to the game, and Diana did the same.

... ... ...

"Princess, the Wounded One was asking about Cassandra." M'pa respectfully stood off to a side while Diana carefully made her way through the dining room with her lunch tray. She was still adjusting to her new double-wide size. It made previously wide corridors suddenly narrow straits to navigate.

The first time they had used that particular title when talking to her, Diana was partly amused and partly horrified at the title they had bestowed on Chloe. It came out of her first speech to the Amazons, of course, but that didn't mean she didn't wince when she thought about it getting back to Chloe. Well, there were worse titles to have.

Diana nodded to show she understood M'pa's information and to continue the report. There wasn't anything more notable and the soldier went back to her barracks, to get some rest before her next shift.

Sitting down, Diana and her mother looked at each other.

"That one will cause trouble if she can," the Queen observed.

Diana shrugged. Probably, Chloe was trying to figure out how they contacted each other while off the island. That part, though, was through the Goddesses, and Diana was not worried about any communication lines opening. She was a little more concerned with the befriending of the younger technophiles that Chloe had also been doing lately. The Amazons, however, were pre-warned, and not all that gullible. Well, the younger ones might be, but they would not get beyond the island's protections any more than Chloe would be.

"Better she be here than there." Diana carefully tested her sandwich with a nibble before biting into it. Her stomach wasn't as sensitive as early-pregnancy women, but there were still some things she'd learned to be cautious of.

Hippolyte looked at her with fond exasperation. She'd previously agreed with her daughter's scheme, but her responsibility was to the Amazons, not to the world at large, and she didn't like the intrusion. She allowed it, as the Goddesses did, and she raised no objections where any other Amazon could hear, but in private, she and her daughter had talked it out. Diana appreciated her mother's forbearance and her trust in Diana's judgment.

"Something should break soon," Diana said between bites. "After that, I think she will be quiet enough." Diana just hoped not too many people would suffer in the meantime. She didn't think Chloe was the type... but she also didn't know what hold Lionel had on her originally.

... ... ...

"So," Chloe asked as they walked along the path through the rainforest. "Obviously your Goddesses are much older than Roman or Greek times. Why, then, do they use the Greek names?"

Diana carefully lifted each foot and put it down as she walked. They were constantly swollen nowadays, and she had to resist the temptation to shuffle. On dirt paths, no matter how well tended, shuffling wasn't a good idea. "Just because the names are newer, doesn't make them invalid. We go through changes in our lives, and we use the names and titles that are appropriate for that time in our lives. For the Goddesses... these names work for now. They might have others later on. It does not make these names false, just names for another time."

"But if the Goddesses are truly older than the Greeks, and your Greek Gods are real... are they older too? The whole pantheon?"

Laughing, Diana denied it. "Some of them, such as some of the Titans or the natural creatures such as the dryads, are – they drifted in from other religions and found a niche in this new one. But the Pantheon of Gods, they were all as they're stated – born of Kronus and Gaia, bringing forth a new set of deities for the mortals to work with."

"Except for your Goddesses," Chloe said flatly.

Diana raised an eyebrow. "Think about it, Chloe. Athena, Goddess of Wisdom – sprung from the head of Zeus fully grown with her shield in hand. Aphrodite – riding in on a seashell and the waves. Easy enough to arrange and be accepted by the others."

"And Artemis?"

"Twin to Apollo. Who was not a twin to begin with. It was another simple matter to slip into the womb and be born next to him, as long as one doesn't mind reliving a bit of childhood. There were enough odd things going on by all of them that there were no suspicions raised. Or if there were, they were smoothed over. Hera and Demeter, after all, were women and answered to the Goddesses, though in this era they were raised above them. The Goddesses mostly did their own thing, and tended to their new personas. Close enough to their originals, or they made them so."

Chloe held a trailing vine aside for Diana as she walked through. "Close enough. Maiden, Mother, and Crone. Oldest of the old, there in all tales in some way."

Diana simply nodded. She was impressed with Chloe for figuring it out. It wasn't exactly spelled out in any of their public records. The Mysteries went into it in more detail, but those weren't accessible to a guest. Chloe had been investigating, true to her own nature.

Chloe wrapped the vine around Diana and held a knife close to her. "Will you let me go?"

"No." Diana held the warriors back with a tilt of her head and then nodded for Chloe to look down. Chloe did so and saw the dagger that Diana held against her side. Chloe grimaced and let the vine drop, returning her knife to a sheath inside her clothes.

They continued with their walk without either one talking about what had happened, conversing about Amazonian traditions.

... ... ...

"Princess! It's the Wounded One!"

Diana jerked out of her bed awake and moving. Then she paused and put a hand to her belly. The baby didn't like quick movements, not at all. "What's happening?" She reached out for her tiara and lasso.

"She's trying to swim off the island," Pethna reported.

Diana blinked. She glanced out the window. "The sun isn't even over the horizon yet." With a reduced sense of urgency, she put the lasso down and took the time to get dressed. "What boat is she using?"

"None."

"None?" Diana fumbled with the sandals, trying to maneuver her feet into them without bending over, but the one kept sliding away.

Pethna knelt down and held it for her. "She took a tube, but otherwise is swimming alone." She straightened up as Diana thanked her and asked for more information. "I believe she thinks that getting through the barrier will be easier with only mortal flesh and not else to contend with."

Apparently, Chloe had been talking with Neeli. The supposition wasn't entirely untrue, but 'easier' was a long ways from 'could be done' when the Goddesses' will was against it. There was no way Chloe was getting through the barrier. She might drown herself trying, though.

Diana nodded to Pethna, and they hurried out at as quick a pace as Diana's baby would allow them.

M'pa and the other warriors were ranged on the beach, watching without interfering. They offered Diana a quick salute, and pointed out Chloe, swimming a few miles out in the water. She'd almost reached the barrier, indicated by the very slight shimmering of the water – a mirage imposing one world over the other.

"Is anybody in the water pacing her?" Diana asked. She was disappointed, though not surprised, to receive a negative answer. Rescuing those who didn't want to be rescued was always hard, and when there were swimmers involved, even those who wanted to be rescued could be dangers to the rescuers. The warriors' duties were to keep an eye on Chloe and to prevent her from harming others. They weren't supposed to interfere with Chloe directly, and this was definitely something Chloe was doing to herself.

Out in the water, Chloe was struggling with the barrier. She was there, it was apparent that she could feel that she was there, that the worlds were both true in that spot, and Chloe was doing her best to get through to the other side. It was not a truly physical barrier, though, and metaphysics aside, there was just nothing Chloe could do except swim in place and feel the crushing weight of trying and trying to move something that was immobile. It was permeable, yet not. It was real, yet not. Chloe was beating herself up mentally as much as physically trying to phase through when she couldn't.

Chloe lost her grip on the floating tube and sank underwater.

Diana very nearly jumped in the water herself when Chloe reappeared, arms flailing in the typical drowning gestures. No warrior currently on the beach would be able to get to her in time.

"Artemis!" Diana called for her namesake, the maiden she'd followed for so many years.

There was a shimmering on the beach and a bright light coalesced into a young lady hovering just out of the teens, entering into adulthood, prime of life, fit and bursting with health. She was younger in appearance than Diana now. Diana kept forgetting how she herself had grown over the years. Artemis glanced at the ocean and then crossed her arms over her chest, turning her head away. "She chose her path."

"Oh for..." Okay, Artemis may not have been the best to call for help for Chloe. Chloe was not a maiden and had harmed others with her actions. The Goddesses were pissed.

Chloe, though, was still in trouble. Diana gritted her teeth, then loosened them to call, "Aphrodite, Athena." The Mother, whose aegis she was currently under, and the Goddess of Wisdom, who knew how to look at the big picture. The other two Goddesses appeared next to Artemis, and rested their gazes upon Diana instead of Chloe.

"Help her, please." Diana was not so proud she wouldn't beg.

"She did choose her path," Athena echoed Artemis' words, though not with the same condemning tones. More of an exploratory, lecturing note.

Diana did not have time for a lesson. Chloe did not have time. "Sometimes, there are no good choices, no matter how one turns."

"That is true." Aphrodite raised her hand and dolphins jumped, splashing in the water and swimming towards Chloe.

Diana had thought Athena would be the one to help. But there was something in Aphrodite's gaze as she watched the dolphins reach Chloe and slip under to raise her up to the surface... something sorrowing, something familiar.

The Goddesses returned their attention to Diana. "Do not leave the island, Daughter. The story you have been following is entering the next phase, but it is not yours anymore. For your child's sake, you must remain on the island."

Diana placed her hand on her swollen belly, feeling there within the life. She would do almost anything to protect that life. Almost. "There will always be something happening within the world, but if I can do some good where I am..."

Athena smiled. "Be a teacher, be a mother. The Amazons thirst, and they hunger. They shall go out in the world, but they need guidance, and that guidance shall not be from us who do not live in the world. That is your role, and it may not be as active as you are used to, but it is a vital one."

Aphrodite nodded, still watching the dolphins bringing Chloe in to shore. "You are my daughter for this while, and while you will return to a warrior's guise later," she nodded at the armor Athena wore, "Our role is important too."

Artemis echoed the other two. "Remember all you have learned from me, my daughter. You have been a delight and a true Warrior. I would like to keep you with me, as I do some of the Daughters, however that is not your path. Continue your route, and we will see you again."

The light around the three Goddesses grew so bright as to force Diana to raise a hand to shield her eyes – the ancient salute, given for very practical reasons. When the light faded, so too had the Goddesses.

With a last glance at where they had been, Diana walked into the surf and helped Chloe as she staggered ashore. The dolphins gave one last flip of their tails, and then they sped off.

"I always..." Chloe gasped for breath, holding tightly onto Diana's arm, "wanted to swim with dolphins;" they made their way to higher ground, "this just wasn't how I pictured it."

Diana acknowledged the wit with a laugh, and relief that Chloe seemed to be unscathed. She guided them to a sheltered spot under the trees where a few lounge chairs rested. She lowered Chloe into one and then settled on the next, leaning over and digging a towel out of the supply cache next to them, which she handed to a waterlogged Chloe. The warriors had again faded into the background and weren't to be seen.

They sat there while the sun slowly rose over the ocean.

Finally, Chloe spoke in a low voice. "I was fifteen. Life had been exciting and strange since Dad and I moved to Smallville a year ago. They called themselves a small town, but it was really suburbia, a place that might have once been a small town but was really a mix of the old and the new. And the strange. They had so many odd things happening... and nobody thought they were strange, or would investigate. I was one of the few who questioned. Me and Pete, poking our noses into things. I was curious, he was going along. We didn't bring in Clark at first, because Pete knew Clark's folks wouldn’t approve and by default, Clark wouldn't either. They were some of the townsfolk who didn't talk, didn't question, and glowered at you for anything you'd ask. His mom would give you a muffin instead of glowering, but it would shut you up fast enough.

"Then Lex Luthor came and changed everything." Chloe's voice broke, full of pain and misery. "At first, it was good. Clark started investigating with us, and he was good at it. Lex would talk to us and made us feel special. Not as special as Clark, but we were Clark's friends and that was good enough for him. And then Lex's dad came to town. Almost closed the plant, got hurt, Clark's mom worked for him, ... he threw everybody into a complete tizzy whenever he was around.

"Yet... he was interested in what I was doing, in my research, in my articles, in me. I did good work on my research and stories, but there was that underlying oddness to them that had 'serious' reporters looking sideways, no matter how much I could back them up with interviews and facts. Lionel... he was interested." Chloe paused and gulped.

Diana silently handed her a water bottle from the cache. Chloe accepted it thankfully and drank.

"Lionel has this way of focusing on somebody, like you're the most important person there and nobody else matters... interested and really listening to what you say, giving his full attention. It's... it's heady. Like a black hole, drawing you in, only it feels like everything is there instead of nothing." Chloe hesitated, searching for more words, then shrugged. "There's no good way of describing just how charismatic that is."

Diana chuckled, "I've met Lex Luthor, and talked with him. Whether by nurture or nature, it must be an inherited trait."

Chloe grinned briefly, then lost the grin. "Not much nurture about it. But Lex's is but a pale shadow of what his dad's is. Or was, back then. Other than for Clark, Lex didn't really turn it on much. Lionel, though..."

After the silence had lingered a little while, Diana prompted, "Did he threaten your father?" That wasn’t quite what she wanted to ask, but she had no right to directly ask. Only if Chloe offered, would that tale be told.

Chloe gave a little shrug. "Then? Then he'd sometimes threaten my dad's job, which was bad enough for a fifteen-year old to be thinking about. It was frightening, and he'd be frightening, but then he'd be right back to being friendly and fascinating again. He'd ask for information I could give freely, and he'd ask for information I couldn't give – things about Clark. Clark hadn't told me anything at that point, but I knew a lot anyhow. I wasn't giving Lionel Clark. It... it made it easier, to give him the things I didn't care about, like some of the other mutants. I was writing most of them up for articles anyhow, it didn't seem like it was that big a deal to tell Lionel the parts that weren't in the newspaper, and it made him happy. He'd back off Clark, if I gave him other things.

"He didn't do more until later." Chloe closed her eyes. "When I was sixteen... that's when the little things started. He'd be leaning over me while I'd be looking up something on the computer, and he'd brush my arm, lean against my back, rest his hand on my shoulder... He was older, but... he never did anything, not like a sixteen-year old would recognize. It started small, I didn't stop it, it made me think. I'd go away with his scent in my memory and on my clothes from his being close. I'd go to sleep and the things I wouldn't think during the day would come out in dreams that I tried to forget or wipe away. "

Chloe gulped. Diana tried to restrain her rage for things that had happened so many years ago. All they could do now was try to heal the old wounds, and leave the revenge for those opposing Lionel.

"One day, his hand slipped a little further down... I shrugged it off then. Not later. God, not later." With a shudder, Chloe wiped her hand over her face. "It wasn't... it wasn't... he was good. Better than any other before or since. He can be fun and delightful and an incredibly considerate lover. Sometimes we had angry sex and that was... incredible. There were the other slow long nights, or time stolen between things. He still asked for things, and I still gave them to him, with the exception of Clark. I couldn't give him Clark, no matter what. Even as he slid further into madness, even as he didn't hide it anymore, even as I found out more about his experiments.

"I think I thought originally I was doing some deep undercover work, to find out what he was doing and to reveal it all when I found enough." Chloe fumbled for the water again and drank. "If I'd done that... but no. He had too much on me at that point. I was working on him, but he was working on me. He had..."

Chloe went silent and the silence lasted. Diana was reluctant to break it, but finally she asked, "He threatened your dad?"

Chloe laughed, a gulping, crying laugh that was more of a sob and sounded like despair unleashed. "He had... he has my daughter."

Diana straightened up, one hand arching protectively over her belly, and the other going to her lasso tied over her robe. She let that hand drop. Too late. It had happened long ago. "When did...?"

"From the start," Chloe grinned bitterly. "Fourteen years ago. I was sixteen, and pregnant. I was still in High School. Nobody knew. Nobody knew..." She clenched her teeth over a shudder that threatened to tear her body apart.

"What about Clark?" Diana asked carefully.

Chloe shook her head. "Clark didn't know. Nobody did." She glanced at Diana's swollen belly. "Before I was showing, Lionel..." She swallowed again, and turned her head away. "He took her out of me."

Diana stiffened in outrage but held herself quiet to hear the rest.

"He'd already established the cloning chambers, even if he hadn't perfected the technique yet. He was experimenting on Emily and other former inhabitants of Smallville. His gestation chamber, though... he could make hundreds of millions of dollars if he'd just patent it and let that technology out for those mothers who have physical problems, or babies that need surgery before they're born, or hundreds of other needs. Instead, he keeps it to himself and plays around with it doing his mad scientist imitation and experimenting with horrible, horrible things.

"This time..." Chloe stopped again, the tears flowing freely down her face. "He took my baby from me. He took her, and he told me she would be okay, and I never saw her. I never saw her. I know she's alive, I know it, but I've never seen her, I've never held her, and he has her. He holds her over me, and he knows I'd do anything for her. I'd betray the world, if I could keep her safe." Her shoulders slumped. "But I can't. She's not safe, she's never been safe. She's with him, she's been raised by him, and I don't know anything about her. I don't even know for certain that she's alive, but I believe she is. He teases me about her sometimes, tells me little things, but never enough. Never a picture, never a voice, never a name."

"What is her name, your name?" Diana asked gently. There was no mother in the world that did not call their child something.

"I try not to... it won't be the name he named her, and she won't know it, so I try not to..." Chloe paused, then whispered a bare sound above the waves, "Diana. I'd named her Diana, because I wanted her to be strong and independent and be able to take care of herself, because I wasn't able to." She smiled a little wobbly, "This was a long time before we met."

Numb, Diana nodded. Now she knew why it was Aphrodite who was the most sympathetic to Chloe... a mother, torn from her child, doing all she could and it was never enough, yet still trying and still loving, as much as she could. Fourteen years, and still trying. Also, this was why Artemis was interested in the situation and gave her powers to support the war against Lionel. A girl, fourteen years with a monster, without her mother. In desperate need of a rescue. And Diana was stuck here on the island.

It was a good thing there were others out there willing to fight for her, including Kon-El. Kon would find the girl, and protect her. Diana was sure about this, and it gave her hope. She would do her best to heal Chloe, and the others would rescue the child.

END

[Poll #1908003]