The above artwork does not belong to me.

The plan was in motion.

Mabel's heartbeat pounded in her ears. This was ridiculous. She knew that everyone was getting impatient, but this? Come on!

Dipper, who was on Ford's shoulders, finished unscrewing the grate over the air vent. The great uncle set Dipper down. "All right, let me give you a boost, Jazz."

Jazz had been the one to figure out the basis of the plan. She'd realized that the supers needed air like any normal human being, so they had to have ventilation, right? Mabel and the others had had to circle the mountain several times to spot one of the vents, and then climb halfway up the mountain to get there, but it worked. Now, they were on standing on a ledge about five feet below it.

After Jazz, Ford helped Sam and then Tucker. Mabel moved forward, expecting to be next, but Ford stopped her. "I can't have you kids breaking into a mountain full of supers, especially if they've already captured Danny."

Dipper's brows furrowed in frustration. "What? Are you kidding me? Ford, you're being ridiculous. We've done more dangerous things in the last few months than most people do in their entire lives."

"That's not a good thing, Dipper."

Mabel placed her hand on Dipper's shoulder. "Maybe it's for the best this time, Dipping Sauce."

He couldn't believe what he was hearing. "You too? Come on, I thought you'd be with me on this!"

"Just let it go, Bro-Bro," she said, trying to communicate with him silently. He looked confused for a moment.

"Hurry up, Ford!" Tucker hissed from the vent. "This is getting uncomfortable!"

"Fine," Dipper finally said. "Fine. Go."

Ford nodded. "I'm glad you and your sister are deciding to stay safe, Dipper." He then reached into the vent, Tucker and Sam grabbing his wrists to help pull him up.

"Don't do anything stupid!" Ford reminded them. "If were aren't back in an hour, get back to Gravity Falls. You've got bus money." The twins heard some shuffling and complaints as the four crawled away from them, gradually becoming quieter as the distance between the two groups increased.

Dipper turned to Mabel. "I hope you have a plan."

She grinned. "Of course I do, what did you expect?" She linked her fingers together and bent her knees a bit. "Need a boost?"

He smiled back, glad that they were a team again. As soon as he'd made it into the vent, he pulled her up, and they were on their way.

/////\\\\\\//////\\\\\

M'gann really wasn't expecting anyone to drop from the ceiling.

As Danny and Dani continued talking quietly, now sitting on the couch, Conner kept glanced upwards, looking confused. After a few minutes, he finally mentioned it. "Kaldur? I think there's something going on it the vents."

Kaldur stopped talking with Robin. "What does it sound like?"

Conner tilted his head a little. "Like . . . shuffling? I think?" He closed his eyes for a moment. "I think I hear voices too. There's people in the vents."

M'gann's adrenaline spiked. That was really creepy. "How many?" she asked.

"I can't tell, but they're getting closer, so I should be able to hear heartbeats soon."

Distantly, M'gann started to hear shuffling too. She looked up. There was a vent almost directly above the couch where Danny and his clone sat.

Superboy spoke suddenly. "There's four of them."

As soon as he said that, M'gann could hear faint voices. The entire team was tense, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw the two half ghosts looking up, too. Everyone was on edge, but there was nothing they could do about it until these people showed themselves.

Suddenly the voices stopped. Danny's eyes widened. He and Dani backed away from the couch quickly, and as soon as they did, a redheaded girl brandishing some kind of gun kicked out the vent and fell onto the couch, landing on her knees.

The gun was immediately aimed at the group of supers. "Don't move," she growled. Another girl, a boy, and a middle-aged man followed after her, the man also carrying a gun.

Danny looked like his head was about to explode. "How?"

Jazz smirked. "No worries, little brother. I've got you covered."

M'gann could not believe that four civilians had actually broken into their mountain. This was ridiculous.

Conner clenched his fists, but Kaldur placed a hand on his shoulder to calm him down. The Atlantian then showed the civilians his open palms as a gesture of peace. "Please, do not make any rash decisions."

"Says the ones who kidnapped a superhero," the girl with black hair growled. "I recognize a few of you. You're supposed to be good guys. What are you playing at?"

"We mean Danny no harm. We thought that he needed to be investigated, is all."

"So you kidnapped him?" she shot back. "Yeah, that's some great investigating. You'd think that the sidekick of the world's greatest detective and his friends would be able to figure out that Danny isn't a villain."

Robin visibly tensed, the fight with his mentor obviously still at the forefront of his mind.

Danny finally stepped in. "Jazz, Sam, Tucker, Ford . . . Thanks for rescuing me. But we have bigger problems than these guys."

Jazz and the others finally seemed to catch sight of Dani. The redhead was horrified. "What did you guys do to her?"

"That wasn't us!" M'gann protested. "That was CADMUS. She escaped their labs and came to find Danny."

"CADMUS?" Tucker asked.

"We need to wipe them off the face of the earth," Danny growled. "They hurt Dani. We can't let them get away with that."

"What about these guys?" Jazz asked, gesturing to the heroes with her gun. M'gann knew that Wally could disarm her in zero seconds flat, but she still looked plenty intimidating.

"Forget them, they're not who we're after," Danny answered, training his eyes on each hero individually.

"We won't stop you," Robin said. "Infact, we'd like to help."

The rest of the team looked at him. They hadn't discussed this. Attacking CADMUS was suicide, and he knew it.

Ford barked out a laugh. "Help us? Do you know how much trouble you've caused us?"

"Robin, I don't think that this is a good idea," Kaldur murmured. "CADMUS could wipe us out."

Wally crossed his arms. "No, we owe them this much. I do, at least. This whole thing was my idea."

Zatanna placed a hand on her hip. "Well, we all went along with it."

M'gann felt a need to reconcile with Danny. Maybe it was because he was so afraid of her, maybe it was because she wanted to prove that not all shapeshifters were bad. Either way, she was ready to do this. "I'm in."

"Me too," Artemis agreed.

Kaldur sighed. "I am not sure that going on another unauthorized mission so soon is a good idea, especially with Batman already angry at us. We will all be held accountable, so I cannot allow this unless everyone agrees."

The team turned to Conner.

The clone was looking down at his shoes, a scowl on his face. "You know how much I hate CADMUS," he murmured. "I'd like to see them gone forever, but I don't know if I can . . . If I can . . ."

M'gann linked her arm with his, leaning into him for comfort. "If you don't want to go, then you don't have too," she murmured quietly.

He shook his head, as if to clear his thoughts. "I . . . I'll go. I won't let CADMUS hurt anyone ever again."

Kaldur nodded. "We are in agreeance, then. Danny, Dani, Jazz, Sam, Tucker, and Ford, we will help you defeat CADMUS. They have done us harm as well."

Danny touched his sister's shoulder. "It's okay, Jazz. I think they're being honest."

Hesitantly, she put her gun away, Ford following suit. She put a hand on her hip. "So, where do we start?"

Figured I might as well make good use of my snow day! I planned on updating way more during break, I was just kind of . . . Creatively stumped, I guess? It wasn't writer's block, it was like I lost all desire to write or draw. Weird. I think I'm out of it now.

Question of the chapter:

Jazz Fenton vs. Barbara Gordon. Who would win?