hehe so uh

As many of you have seen from my message board I've been going through some writers block for the past year or so, and on top of that I've been busy with college applications and senior year so I haven't be able to write as much as I would have liked to

I originally had planned to be done writing book 1 of enigma by now and be well into book 2 but obviously everything's been pushed back

This chapter is shorter than my usual ones, but it's finally done! I can't make any promises, but I hope to have the next ones out soon!

(Also i highly recommend rereading the last chapter because that one, this chapter, and the next few are all part of the same story arc)

* * *

Aspen blinked a few times and rubbed her eyes, making sure she wasn't hallucinating. Nope, the snow was still there

"Ollie?" Aspen yelled through the house, still keeping her eyes on the window.

"Yeah?" he yelled back, and from the faintness of it, Aspen guessed he was in his study, aka the farthest point from her room.

"Just to double-check, there haven't been any major atmospheric changes in the past four years, correct? Such as, oh I don't know, it getting colder?" She watched as more snow fell from the sky, slowly blanketing the city more and more.

"Uh, no? Why?"

"Look out the window," she replied as she pulled out her phone, dialing Dinah's number.

"Hey, honey," Dinah said after she picked up. "What's up?"

"When was the last time you looked out the window?"
"Aspen I don't have time to really—"

"Dinah it's snowing."

"What?"

"Aspen!" Oliver yelled, his voice suddenly getting closer to her room.

"Sorry, Dinah gotta go!" Aspen hung up the phone just as Oliver came into her room.

"I just called the Watchtower," he said, breathing heavily. "Barry was on monitor duty and he had no idea what I was talking about until the alert popped up right after I called him. It must've just started."

"I just got off the phone with Dinah, and she didn't know about it either," Aspen said. She looked back out the window and saw that a few more inches had fallen. She could barely see the ground anymore. "It's coming down really fast." Aspen turned back around. "Did Barry say what it was?"

Oliver shook his head. "He was about to look into it when I came up here. He said he would call me back when—" Oliver's phone suddenly started ringing and he quickly pulled it out of his pocket and answered it. "Did you figure out what it was, Barry?" He pulled the phone away from his ear for a moment to press a button, then held the phone out in front of him.

"Scanner's picked up several machines hovering in the troposphere in California, Nevada, and Arizona that are freezing the air around them and causing the snowfall," Barry said from the other end of the line. "I contacted the rest of the League. Clark, Diana, and the Lanterns are on their way to investigate now, and the rest of the League is on their way. You should get here before the Zeta Tubes go offline. Aspen should get to the cave as well."

An alarm suddenly spread through the house as Oliver and Aspen both looked at each other.

"Sorry, Barry, I got to go. We've got an issue here in Star City." Oliver hung up the phone and the two of them went over to Aspen's computer, where she pulled up a live feed from the news.

"It's Junior," she said as she showed him. "I thought he was supposed to be in Belle Reve?"

"He is."

A thought suddenly crossed Aspen's mind. "If he got out of a prison specifically built for super-powered people, he can't be alone."

"Keep looking into it. I'm going to suit up." With that, Oliver left her room. Aspen sputtered for a moment before grabbing her laptop and running after him.

When she finally reached him down in the Arrowcave, he threw a long-sleeved shirt at her.

"What's this for?"

"Put it on," Oliver said as he pulled the strap for his quiver over his body. "It has thermo-regulating tech built into it to keep you warm without weighing you down as much as your regular cold gear will." He held up his own arms to show her that he was also wearing the gear, and had his usual full-range of motion. "Where's Junior now?"

Aspen handed him her laptop to look at as she put the new shirt on. Once on, she took her laptop back and pressed a few more keys. "He hasn't moved, so he's still in the center of the city, over by the Gardens."

The Gardens. A decent-sized park in the heart of the city, and on a day like today it would've been packed with people, even before the snow.

"Let's go then."

----

The temperature was dropping rapidly as more snow fell down from the sky. From whatever machines were currently causing it. Goosebumps spread over Aspen's purple skin even with the added warmth from the new cold-gear gave her.

Who was behind all of this? No way it was just Junior, he didn't have anywhere near the manpower or resources to do something this big.

Was it all of the ice villains that the But even if it were all of the ice villains the League has ever encountered working together, there still was no way they could pull something like this off. They would still need help and a lot of it.

And why only three states so far? Three states where the snowfall would be the most suspicious and get the fastest attention from the League.

Aspen's mind ran with the theories as she ran through the dense snow, looking for Junior. As she rounded a corner she saw him walking over to a small group of people.

"Junior!" Aspen yelled as she ran out to face the ice-powered villain as he was about to freeze a cowering family. "Stop it right there!"

The ice villain stopped inches away from the family and turned around. The family looked up at Aspen and took it as their chance to get away.

"Y'know," Icicle Jr. said as he looked at Aspen. "I didn't believe them at first when they said you were back, Enigma. But here you are."

Aspen threw a knife at him, which he blocked with a sheet of ice. "Nice try, sweetheart," he said as he walked out from behind his shield, "but I think your time off made you a little rusty."

He threw his arm out and shot another sheet of ice at Aspen. She ducked away and threw another knife at him, striking the bulky ice covering his shoulder. Junior stumbled back with a grimace and grabbed the knife's hilt. He pulled it out and looked back up at Aspen.

"Think again, sweetheart." Aspen pressed the comm in her ear and yelled, "GA now!"

A confused Junior looked around to find Oliver when an arrow flew through the air from a nearby rooftop. The arrow struck the ground and a sticky foam exploded from the impact. Aspen dived away to avoid getting stuck as Junior became encased in the foam up to his shoulders.

"Aw, c'mon," he grumbled as he tried to move free of the now hardened foam.

"What are you doing here Junior?" Aspen asked as she waited for Oliver to get down from the roof. "You're supposed to be in a cell at Belle Reve. How'd you get out?"

"Like that means anything anymore," he laughed. "I don't know if anyone's told you yet, Sweetheart, but Belle Reve isn't exactly foolproof anymore."

"What are you talking about?" Aspen questioned as she folded her arms in front of her. "Belle Reve is strong enough to hold Superman."

Junior laughed. "It might have been a few years ago, but not anymore. It took some time but we were—"

"We?"

"Oops," he shrugged. "Guess it's not so secret now."

"Who else got out, Junior?"

"I don't really want to talk about that right now, babe. I've got a special message for you—"

"Quit the flirting Junior and answer the question," Oliver said as he finally reached the two. He shouldered his bow and stood next to Aspen, arms crossed. "Who else got out?"

"Guess you'll just have to wait and see," Junior shrugged.

Aspen went to open her mouth to reply but Oliver grabbed her shoulder and pulled her back.

Suddenly another arrow flew through the air and hit Junior in the face, knocking him out. Aspen and Oliver both snapped up to look around at the surrounding buildings to see who fired the arrow.

Aspen spotted a figure standing on top of a building adjacent to the one Oliver was just on. "There!" she exclaimed, pointing to the rooftop.

"Is that Roy?" Oliver asked. Aspen suddenly thought back to earlier, when Roy had stopped by to ask for a favor. "What's he doing in Star City?"

"He was at the house not too long ago," she explained. "He needed help with his Roy thing."

"Oh," Oliver responded.

"We had it taken care of," Aspen said as Roy came into earshot of the duo. "We were about to get more information out of him, actually."

Roy raised an eyebrow from behind his mask. "So you thought." He walked over to the now unconscious ice villain and lifted his blue arm, which had somehow broken out of the foam. "While you two were chatting, he was about to freeze the both of you and try to escape."

Oliver looked at Roy, at a loss for words. Aspen knew he was still probably getting over the fact that Roy was here with them, instead of somewhere on the other side of the world.

"Thank you," Aspen said to Roy for the both of them. She turned to Oliver. "GA, Speedy and I'll take care of handing Junior over to the police, why don't you go update the League on the situation?"

"Right," Oliver suddenly said, snapping out of his daze and looking away from Roy. "Flash, more ice villains got out," Oliver said into his earpiece. "We've got Junior in custody," he continued as he walked away from Aspen and Roy.

Officers soon arrived on the scene as Aspen and Roy cleared the goo off of Icicle jr.

"It's not Speedy anymore," Roy said as he put a pair of power-dampening cuffs on the teen's hands. "It's Red Arrow."

"A bold change," Aspen replied with a smirk. "Completely original." Roy rolled his eyes and sighed. "I'm joking, mr teenage-angst."

"Yeah, whatever."

"Excuse me?" An officer suddenly appeared in front of Aspen and Roy, apparently having made his way over to the two heroes while she was teasing Roy.

Aspen nodded to him. "Officer, make sure he stays secure."

"Of course, Enigma. He'll be on his way to Belle Reve."

Belle Reve. Junior had said that it was practically a joke now, was that true? How long would the prison even hold him at that point?

"Hello? Enigma?" Roy said, poking his elbow into her side and effectively snapping Aspen out of her thoughts.

"Sorry, I got distracted," she said. "What did you say?"

The officer simply smiled and repeated himself. "I asked if there was anything else we should know or anything else we can do to help."

Aspen looked around the snow-filled park and took a deep breath. "We got the people Junior was holding hostage to safety, but we need to make sure no one else was caught off-guard by him or this weather."

"I'll send a group of officers out right now."

"Good. I'll let you know if there's anything else," Aspen said with a nod and shook the officer's hand.

"Someone's out of it today," Roy said as the officer walked away. Aspen rolled her eyes.

"I don't remember you noticing the officer either? But it's something Junior said, about Belle Reve." She watched as the officers worked on removing Junior from the hardened foam. She turned to Roy. "Do I dare even ask what happened there in the past four years?"

"Can't help you there, that's a question for the Team or the League."

"Got it," Oliver said as he walked back over to Aspen and Roy, cutting off their conversation. "I'll be there as soon as I can, and I'll tell Enigma."

"The police are getting Junior out of the foam and looking through the park to see if there's any people trapped," Aspen said, quickly bringing Oliver back up to speed.

"Good," He nodded. "I need to get to the Watchtower after Junior is secured, Canary's going to meet me there," Oliver said as he pointed at Aspen, "and Batman wants the Team to report to the Cave." She nodded.

"I guess that's my cue to leave," Roy said, turning away from the other two. Aspen reached out and grabbed his arm.

"No, stay and help us," she said to the archer. Roy stopped and turned back around. "Until we figure out what's going on, we're gonna need all the help we can get."

"Enigma's right," Oliver said in agreement. "Both the League and the Team are going to need help taking whatever this is down."

Roy looked between Aspen and Oliver before letting out a sigh. "Fine. I'll go with Enigma and help out the Team."

* * *

Yeah uh please let me know if this is bad I haven't written anything in a while and need to get back into swing with the style

Until next time!