Chapter 11: Chapter 11: Spar

Black Canary POV:

Being the unofficial heir of Wildcat, I was hailed as the best martial artist in the League. In an actual fight I wouldn’t stand a chance against the true powerhouses like Superman and Wonder Woman, but I could put up a decent fight. Which made me the ideal choice to train the new sidekick team.

I didn’t mind the assignment, having happily jumped at it when Batman asked. Wildcat had trained me into the superhero I was today, and I considered it my duty to pass on the skills to the next generation. I had already started by training Eve, who was also on the team now.

She had made great progress, diligently putting her all into whatever training I assigned her. She was still years behind the other sidekicks, but against unpowered thugs? She’d hold her own. Without her magic, of course. Using magic, I suspected she would hold her own against any of the sidekicks in a fight. Perhaps with the exception of Troia.

It was time to find out, I suppose.

“Kaldur tells me you are all somewhat familiar with each other’s abilities,” I told the team that was gathered in the training room. “Let’s start with some spars to see where you’re at, and I’ll tell you what you need to focus on. Superboy. Troia. You’re up first.”

Troia, of course, trounced him. Superboy had the strength advantage, but Troia had years of training. His anger issues also did him no favors.

Next up was Kid Flash and Robin. Kid Flash was too fast for him to fight directly, but Robin was trained by the master of creative combat. A smoke bomb and a tripwire quickly sent the yellow speedster tumbling out of the ring. I told him to focus on his battlefield awareness.

Miss Martian and Speedy’s fight was more interesting. Speedy had far more combat experience, but Miss Martian had both telekinesis and shapeshifting. She wasn’t at the level of Martian Manhunter, so Speedy was able to put up a good fight. In the end, Miss Martian managed to let go of her hesitation and send him out of the ring with a telekinetic blast.

The final spar was between Eve and Aqualad. I’ll admit this was the one I was most interested in seeing. Aqualad had military training and combat experience. He was also familiar with and even used magic, so by all accounts he should have a massive advantage.

However, I had spent enough time with Eve to know that her creativity and determination could push her through most situations. It would be interesting to see how her creativity matched up against his military discipline.

“Begin!” I called, and Aqualad activated his water-bearers with practiced haste. Before Eve could even move a muscle, he had launched a water whip at her… which was intercepted by a barrier.

Eve cursed and reeled back in shock, but she raised a hand and actually managed to grab hold of the water whip with her magic. Aqualad quickly managed to retake control of the water, but the small distraction let Eve cast an offensive spell of her own.

Suddenly, vines erupted from the ground all around Aqualad and grabbed at him. In his surprise, it took him a second to start breaking free, which was enough for Eve to let loose more spells.

First, a burst of what looked like spiderwebs shot from her hands and flew out to cover both Aqualad and a big area around him. It extended all the way to the ceiling, and his attempts to free himself from the vines only caused him to get more entangled in the web.

Second, Eve let loose a spray of what looked like grease to cover him. Unable to keep his footing, he was now only kept upright by the webs, and his struggles became that much more difficult. Aqualad, now being completely distracted, let Eve summon her book to cast another spell. I knew she still needed to consult it for spells she didn’t cast often.

Aqualad had turned his water-bearers into sharp knives and used them to cut at the webbing and vines that held him down. He was starting to make some progress when Eve finally cast her spell and… his water-bearers deactivated. His eyes went wide in shock a second before she teleported in front of him and held what I recognized as a ‘Shadow Blade’ to his neck.

“Yield?” She asked with a smug tone. I could see that amount of spellcasting had tired her out, and I didn’t think she had much more in her. But Aqualad was thoroughly defeated, so it was her win.

“I yield,” Aqualad said after a few moments. “That was… impressive.” The audience — Including me, I must admit — was still dumbstruck at how quickly and totally the newest fighter on the team had defeated the most experienced one.

“I don’t like my chances in the rematch,” Eve admitted as she waved her hands and made the vines disappear as if they had never been there. The webs and grease remained. “I’m about to keel over. Casting that many spells that quickly is exhausting. Shock and awe is a risky strategy. Um… sorry, but the grease and webs are non-magical after the spell is cast. I can’t dispel them.”

And as the adrenaline left her body, it was clear that she could not have kept up the pace much longer. If Aqualad had managed a second wind at any point, she would have lost a battle of attrition. But still, it was an impressive showing.

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Eve POV:

I was tired. Really tired. I had experienced mana burn before, but never this bad. Mana burn happened when a magician expended too much mana in a short amount of time. Usually, this wasn’t a problem for me. My spells cost less mana the more experienced I was with them, and thus the spells I used regularly didn’t cost enough for me to get mana burn even when casting them continuously.

Mana burn wasn’t really caused by the amount of mana used, just the speed. It was the main reason I still couldn’t cast 4th-level spells. I almost got knocked out instantly from tiredness, even if I did have more than enough mana to actually cast them by now. Zatanna had explained that the limit for mana burn increased with my mana pool and experience.

In the fight with Kaldur though, most of the spells I used were high mana spells that I didn’t have much mastery in. In addition, ‘Dispel Magic’ cost more depending on the quality of the magic dispelled, and Atlantean water-bearers were apparently very high quality. My final ‘Misty Step’ and ‘Shadow Blade’ almost knocked me out right then and there.

“You okay?” Speedy asked as he and Kaldur walked into the living room where I was resting on the couch. “Kaldur says mana burn can be a bitch.”

“‘M fine,” I mumbled. “It just makes me tired. No pain or anything.”

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Which was lucky. Mana burn affected people differently. The most common symptom was a headache, but some people experienced things like temporary paralysis or blindness.

“You are fortunate,” Kaldur chimed in as they sat down in their own seats. “My mana burn makes me feel like I am drowning. It is why I have chosen to focus on martial aspects of combat rather than spellcasting.”

“I know,” I admitted. “My sister’s mana burn makes her reckless. I imagine that can be extremely dangerous in a fight.”

“Sister?”

“Sworn sister,” I explained at Speedy’s question. “No blood relation. Zatanna, Giovanni Zatara’s daughter.”

“I heard you were close,” Kaldur nodded. “And recklessness can indeed be dangerous in a fight. I have heard of more than one warrior falling prey to it.”

“Heh! Yeah,” Speedy said with an awkward smile. “I have more than a few scars that agree with you.”

“In any case,” I said. “It shouldn’t be a problem. I know how to pace myself, I just wanted to show off today and pushed it a bit too far.”

“And show off you did!” Speedy supplied enthusiastically. “The only one of us who had beaten Kaldur in a straight fight before was Donna. And you did it without any actual attacks, just crowd control.”

I smiled at the praise before I said, “I’m better suited for support though. Sure, I got some devastating spells, but my greatest strength is in utility.”

“Like tying enemies down,” Kaldur agreed. “We browsed through your spellbook— the ‘Maginomicon’ you called it? But we couldn’t really appreciate all the spells and their potential uses. We will need to discuss strategies with you to see how your magic can make an impact.”

“Yeah,” I agreed. “Something like ‘Create or Destroy Water’ can make a big difference with you on the field.”

“And this spell creates actual water? Like the grease and webs from earlier?” Kaldur’s eyes widened as I nodded. “That is incredible! According to modern arcanological theories, actually creating something from magic is supposed to be impossible!”

“I don’t know the mechanics of it,” I shook my head. “The Zataras tell me that my magic doesn’t really adhere to most of the known Laws of Magic. Then again, neither does their magic, so I’m hardly unique.”

“Bloodline magic such as that of the Zataras are very rare and very powerful,” He pointed out. “Do not undersell your abilities.”

“I’m not,” I insisted. “But I really don’t know how they work. Just that they do.”

“I see,” He nodded. “Then perhaps you would like to find out more? My Queen has extended an invitation for you to visit the Royal Conservatory in Atlantis.”

“Sure,” I agreed. “You mentioned that she might. When?”

“At your earliest convenience,” He said. “But My King said ‘the sooner the better’. I was under the impression that Queen Mera is quite keen to meet you.”

“Alright. Tomorrow should be fine,” I decided. “You coming with? I could probably use a guide.”

Kaldur looked like he was surprised at how quickly I wanted to go, but accepted readily. “I will inform My King and we shall depart on the morrow,” He said and headed towards the zeta-hub. “I will see you then.”

Speedy had picked up the Maginomicon from the table and started reading while Kaldur and I talked.

“Hey, this spell here. How does it work?” He asked and pointed to the page with ‘Conjure Barrage’.

“Cast the spell, throw something in the air, and watch as whoever’s in front of you gets pelted by duplicates of whatever you threw,” I answered.

It was one of the spells I had actually practiced enough to cast without the book. I had suspected it would have a ton of utility, and I was right. In the medieval setting of D&D, it would be used with common arrows, rocks, or something similar. In a modern setting though?

“And yes,” I continued. “From my experiments, it should work with your trick arrows as well. Or Robin’s birdarangs. I haven’t really had access to the high-tech equipment you guys use, but it worked with firecrackers so I see no reason why it wouldn’t.”

He mirrored my grin.

“Wanna test it?”

Luckily, my mana burn had passed.

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Speedy POV:

Turns out, it did work. Spectacularly at that. Eve had been worried that she would have to be the one to fire the arrow, but that turned out not to be the case. She could cast the spell on an arrow before I fired it, and a single arrow would turn into ten. For an ordinary arrow, that would be good. For something like my expanding foam arrow? It was amazing!

Both of us were cackling like mad as half the training room was now covered in hardened foam. Fortunately, I had used the type that would dissolve on its own after an hour. I didn’t have enough solvent to deal with all of this.

“What the heck are you guys doing?” Robin asked as he entered the room to investigate what the mad laughter was all about. “”Those things aren’t exactly cheap you know.”

“That, my friend, is exactly why we’re doing this,” I explained with a million dollar grin on my face. “Eve has a spell to turn a single arrow into a barrage. We were checking if it worked on trick arrows too.” I gestured at the wall of foam. “It does.”

Robin looked stupefied for a moment before his face split into a grin to mirror mine and Eve’s. He clearly realized the implied potential of this discovery.

“It works on all your arrows?” He asked.

“Bolas, stunners, flashbang,” I replied, listing off the ones we had tried. “Grapplers didn’t copy the lines so that’s useless. We haven’t tested the explosive ones, for obvious reasons.”

“Should work though,” Eve supplied. “The spell’s only limitation is that the ammo can’t be magical.” Then she frowned before continuing, “Do you have trackers? I don’t know how duplicating the signal will affect the software.”

“Only one way to find out,” I said and picked a tracking arrow from my quiver. Sending a barrage of trackers at a time would usually be pretty useless, but there might be a niche situation where it could be useful. Gathering the data now was important.

I nocked the arrow and Eve touched it briefly before I let it fly. It split into ten a moment after leaving the string, turning it into a full barrage. I would never get tired of seeing that.

“Software is getting confused at the duplicated signals,” Robin said. We decided having our trackers on the same frequency would be more convenient since we were on the same team, so he could follow them as well as I could.

“They’re still tracking though,” he added. “I’ll update the software to deal with it.”

“Man, this is insane,” I reflected. With Eve on the team, my combat power had potentially increased many-fold. “I’m not just an archer anymore, I’m a fucking Arsenal.”

Eve’s head whipped around to look at me. She was wearing an expression I had trouble reading. It looked somewhere between amused, excited and nostalgic.

“What?” I asked, a little confused at her reaction to my words. “Did I say something weird?”

“Oh, nothing,” She said in a mysterious tone. “It’s just a cool word.”

“Hey,” Robin’s words interrupted my thoughts. He was grinning. “Batman set up a zeta-tube in an old quarry in the middle of nowhere a few years ago. You wanna see if that spell works on explosives?”

“Hell, yeah!”/”No shit!”

Eve and I were in complete agreement. She struck up a conversation with Robin as we headed for the zeta-hub, telling him the spell should work on his birdarangs as well. This left me a moment with my own thoughts again.

‘Arsenal’, huh? It was kind of a cool word. I was starting to feel a little too old to be called ‘Speedy’ so… why not?