Mara sits on the floor opposite to Bennie, both stretching and cooling off after a team training exercise. Most of the others have already retired for the night. The Lantern points to Ella, who leans against the wall, phone clutched in her hand with an eager grin. "Mwah, mwah," Bennie says, mockingly making kissy faces.

"Cut it out," Mara scolds, elbowing the older girl in the ribs. The damage does nothing. Bennie chuckles mischievously and drifts over. Mara follows, but her movement feels forced. It's still tense between her and Ella, despite nothing further happening.

"Ooh la la," Bennie hums, taking an obvious peek over Ella's shoulder to see her phone. "Who ya' textin'?"

Ella yanks her phone away. "No one," she says, but her cheeks taint pink. The sight makes Mara smile.

"It's totally Kace, isn't it?"

"Uhm, no . . ."

"It is!" Mara exclaims. "You only smile like that when it's about Kace!"

Ella rolls her eyes, but a new side of her has awoken. A giggly and enthusiastic teenager. For once, Mara sees a spark behind the girl's eyes, something she'd never had before.

But then she pulls the screen back to her face and a small piece dulls. "Oh."

"What's wrong?"

"Hm?" Ella perks up, not meeting Mara's gaze. "Nothing, nothing. He, uhm, wants me to come over. And he invited you."

"Why's that bad?"

"I just . . . well, y'know," Ella murmurs, sounding like she's reaching into the deepest pits of her brain to find words, "don't want to force something on you. You don't have to be friends with him just because I am."

"No, it's fine. You know me," Mara laughs. "I don't pretend to like people."

"Aw, man," Bennie pouts, her bottom lip exaggeratingly jutted out. "No fair. Why wasn't I invited?"

Ella says nothing. She chews on her bottom lip.

"Womp womp, whatever. I hate all men, anyways."

Mara raises a humorous brow. "Since when?"

"Since I met Wally." The Lantern takes flight, throwing up a peace sign while heading towards the hangar. "I'm gonna go take a nap before my ring inevitably rings and I have to see the bald and ugly space guardians. Peace out, earthlings!"

Her absence leaves the room in silence. Mara and Ella stare at each other, secretly challenging the other to leave first. Mara doesn't want to walk away and she also doesn't want Ella to leave, so she does something she's not entirely good at―small talk.

"Soooo, how long have you and Kace known each other?"

"A while."

"Oh, okay. Cool, cool. That's . . . cool."

"Yeah."

Mara awkwardly clears her throat. "Uhm, so, does he want us over now or . . . ?"

"He didn't specify."

"Well, uhm. I guess that means we can go now."

"Okay, sure," Ella finally says after a long pause. "I'm gonna go get dressed, and you should probably change."

Confused, Mara looks her Wonder Girl suit up and down. "Why? He already knows you're Batgirl and that Bennie's a lantern, so why does it matter?"

"Just . . ." Ella's eyes slowly wander. "You should be more careful."

"But―"

"Change now." The bite in her tone makes Mara roll her eyes but nonetheless nod.

"Fine."

.

.

.

The one-story house Mara arrives at is rather rough with chipped paint and rugged edges. When no one answers the door, Mara questions if she's at the right house. Taking a step back, she double-checks the address only to confirm that this is, in fact, the address Kace texted her. Knocking again and still no reply, Mara checks her surroundings and scans the sketchy neighborhood where upon her arrival, the children put an end to their play session and headed inside with fearful expressions. There's a rather bulky tree that's fallen over and stretches across a few yards.

"Hey, you came!"

Mara's head shoots up to where the voice is coming from. On top of the roof, Kace sits with his legs dangling off.

"Uhm, hey?" Mara gives him a slight wave, wondering why he's on the roof. She levitates upwards, landing beside him. He looks up at her with a smile. His face falters when he looks over Mara's shoulder.

"I thought Ella was coming?"

The demigod checks her phone, noticing that there's no new texts from Ella or anything. "Yeah, me too."

Kace frowns. "We were gonna have a movie marathon. I was gonna show her all of my favorite movies. Can you believe that she's never seen The Lion King? I mean, what does she say when things go wrong besides 'Hakuna Matata'?"

"Hakuna ma-what?"

The Wilson boy's mouth drops all the way to the floor. "No way!" he guffaws, excitedly jumping to his feet. "You haven't seen it either?! That's gotta be some degree of illegal."

"Then what's it about?"

"Uhm . . . a lion who's a king?"

"Sounds very on the nose."

"No, no, it's good," Kace chuckles. "I just explained it wrong, but it's a classic." His brows knit together, obviously thinking hard. "It's about betrayal and power, but with lions instead of people. I promise it's good."

Mara raises an eyebrow. "I'll take your word for it."

"Trust me, my movie taste is impeccable."

A movie marathon sounds like fun. She's had a couple with Artemis, Bennie, and M'gann, but it'll be fun to watch it with someone new. Peoples' reactions to movies give away major parts of their personality. For example, Dick can't sit through a mystery movie without figuring everything out within ten seconds and spoiling the end.

Thinking of him makes Mara frown. Was he right? Should she even be here right now socializing with the enemy's son? She left her group of superhero friends to talk with the villain's son. The son of Robin's archnemesis.

"Welp, I guess we can get some popcorn and snacks ready while we wait for Ella," Kace says, snapping Mara back into focus. He squints an eye in her direction. "You wouldn't happen to have, like, heat vision to make hot chocolate, would you?"

"No, but I'm pretty sure the microwave does."

"So . . . flight, but no heat vision? Interesting. So definitely not Superman's long lost cousin or something," Kace murmurs, circling around Mara and nearly falling from the roof. "How do your powers work? Are they genetic, or a freak lab accident gone wrong?"

Mara narrows her eyes, Dick's warning echoing in her mind. "Why do you wanna know so bad?"

Kace goofily smiles over at her, his expression lopsided like an excited dog. "I don't know. I guess I wanna get to know you."

"Alright, fair enough," Mara hums, trying to drop her suspicious gaze. "But why do you get to know everything about me and I get nothing in return?"

"Oh, uh . . ." Kace scratches behind his ear. "Well, what do you want? Money? I've got, uhm, maybe five dollars to my name. And maybe a penny, too."

Playfully, Mara nudges Kace. "No, dummy, you tell me about yourself. An exchange of information."

Kace freezes. His eyes widen ever-so-slightly as his eyes light up. "Wait, really? What do you wanna know about me?" he asks, talking fast. Mara's noticed that it's a habit of his when he's excited. "There's not much, you might end up disappointed."

Not much? Mara almost bursts out. Not like your dad is the number one hitman in the world or anything.

Still, she knows better than to say anything. She'd hate for someone to compare her to Ares just because of a shared genetic pool. Kace will tell her when he's ready.

"Okay, so I ask you a question and then you ask me one," Kace says. "Like ping pong but with words. So maybe more of a debate? But a debate is an argument and we're not arguing―"

"What's your favorite color?" Mara asks, knowing it's a basic question but it gets the boy to stop rambling.

"I don't have one, what's yours?"

Mara's eyes pop from her head. "You don't have one? How do you not have a favorite color?"

"Uhh, dunno." Kace shrugs, suddenly tensing up. "Guess I've never had the opportunity to stop and smell the roses, or whatever the saying is. I mean, what even is a favorite color? They're all the same to me. A color is a color."

"But I bet you have a favorite movie?"

"Hey, that's not fair―"

Their voices carry throughout the streets, livening the damp and glum neighborhood. 

From afar, an excited Ella flattens down her dress. She'd spent a long time ironing it. As she rounds the corner, two silhouettes move around on the pavement. Kace and Mara happily bicker and giggle like they've known each other their whole lives. Like Ella came for nothing. Like she'd only get in their way.

Like she was never welcome at all.