Miscommunications
Golden Girl- Miscommunications
AN- I've been working on this on and off since before the reboot was announced. Heck, since before Rani disappeared from Booster’s comics. And may I just say- that was irritating. The last mention of Rani could have become a really intriguing plot point- namely, her missing poster in the 31st century. Also- all the wiki’s say she’s a native Daxamite, when she isn’t. Proof? She wasn’t being mind-controlled in the genocide- and she doesn’t have the powers.
Rani was cold, scared and bored. It’d been two days since the lab had blown apart, and Michelle and Rip were still lost in the timestream. With her two way translator blown to pieces, her grasp on English was too shaky for her to feel comfortable with any of her usual baby sitters, and as her being from the thirty first century was to remain a secret, she couldn’t be left with any of the few heroes who did speak interlac, as all three still had periodic visits to the Legion of Superheroes.
The last thing anyone wanted was for Rani to be taken back to foster care.
Still, this meant Mikey had no choice but to take her with him when he spoke with the league. He was in the conference room, having left her at the door. Her Booster-Bear was clutched tight to her chest while she waited. She didn’t like this place. It was cold and too-clean, and it wasn’t the lab.
She looked up at the sound of footsteps, and blinked. In front of her was a tall woman, taller than Michelle, with dark hair. Her clothes were strange, but apparently that was normal for superheroes.
She looked surprised to see Rani. It wasn’t that much a shock, surely. Mikey said that Red Arrow’s daughter had been to the Watchtower, so there was precedence for having a kid there.
Maybe it was her clothes, Rani hazarded a guess. They hadn’t been able to salvage much from the lab, just what had been placed in special boxes. Their wardrobes had not been, although to her surprise many of the drawings she had done were. The ones on the refrigerator had been copies apparently.
As she was too tall for Milagro’s clothes, Jaime Reyes had offered up some of his. His shorts nearly reached her ankles, and were held up with a makeshift belt of rope, and his T-shirt reached passed her knees, and billowed every time she moved. Booster was taking her shopping after the meeting, but that didn’t make her look any less ridiculous now.
The woman smiled, leaning down so she was face to face with Rani. “Hey there. What’s your name?”
The time traveller blinked at the taller woman, and tried to smile back. “Rani. Yours?” She wished her English was better, but she’d never really had reason to study the dead language.
Now? It was very much not dead.
“Call me Diana.” The blue eyed woman said, frowning slightly. Rani guessed that she didn’t need to introduce herself often. “Are you here alone?”
“No. Rani just…” Here, she struggled to remember the correct words. “Ate?”
“Eight?” Diana repeated.
Rani remembered the word with a rush of relief. “Wait.” She corrected herself, smiling at the woman.Diana didn’t seem inclined to smile back. “What’s your full name, Rani?”
How could a name be full? It was a word. Words couldn’t be filled up. Except that she remembered Rip saying words could be full of meaning, once. Was that what Diana meant? It seemed a strange thing to ask, but the twenty-first century was a very strange place in general.
“Rani- Song, queen.” She answered, remembering Mikey helping her look it up on the internet. He’d ruffled her hair and made a joke about her being the Queen of Songs- so it explained her singing voice. He’d looked pleased when she told him that her father had been a singer. She didn’t know why.
“Rani Queen?” Another voice broke in. Diana looked shocked. The blonde woman behind her looked as if she was going to be ill. Rani wondered if she was cold, but the dark haired woman was okay, and she wasn’t wearing nearly as much clothes.
“Song queen.” Rani corrected firmly. The queen part didn’t matter so much, even if it was funny when Mikey bowed to her, calling her the little Queen of Songs.
“Dinah…” Diana said, her voice half scared, half warning.
‘Dinah’ snapped at Diana, too quickly for Rani to understand. She turned to Rani, her eyes…. She reminded Rani of far too many foster parents. The calculating distain, as if Rani was unpleasant to look at.
“How old are you?” Dinah asked, finally.
Rani opened her mouth to answer, but Diana beat her to it.
“She’s eight.” The black haired woman answered, almost apologetically.
Dinah closed her eyes, as if in pain; then stormed past the other two, into the conference room.
Rani clutched Booster-Bear tightly. Somehow, she’d messed up. Judging by the grimacing pity on Diana’s face, she’d messed up very badly.
There was a lot of yelling in the meeting room- most of it from the blonde woman in the netting. It was odd hearing someone who wasn’t Michelle yelling. Rip and Mikey yelled sometimes, but they were a bit more careful about it. Whenever they saw her nearby, they’d get very politely angry at each other.
She supposed it was part of the good example they were trying to set. Michelle was more interested in making sure Mikey knew when he wasn’t doing it right than setting a good one herself.
Maybe blond women in this century liked yelling? No, that couldn’t be right. Michelle was from next century.
Diana cleared her throat. Rani looked up, questioningly.
“So, Rani.” She smiled, a big fake one like some of the people on holovids, all shine and no warmth. “Why’d your daddy bring you here?”
Rani blinked. Mikey as her daddy? She’d never had one before. She didn’t know how to deal with a daddy- and foster fathers didn’t count. Not the ones she’d had anyway.
Wait… “How’d you know?” She asked suspiciously. “I didn’t say who bringed me.”
Diana’s lips twitched, as if amused. The yelling got louder. “I know your daddy out of costume too.” She confided.
…….Mikey didn’t like the League very much. He didn’t have many people he liked anymore, but the League was most definitely not included.
Except for Batman, who’d promised to help. Either her English was way worse than she’d thought- or this wasn’t Batman. And something was definitely up.
Test time. “You know Booster?” Rani asked, eyes narrowed. If this woman twitched wrong, she was going to scream. Mikey would save her.
The woman blinked. “Booster?” She echoed, hollowly.
Rani’s arms tightened around her Booster Bear, her uneasy feeling quadrupled. She screamed. “Booster!”
The man in question appeared at the door to the conference room in a second, his ring already glowing as he soared over to Rani. He looked around, nodding distractedly at Diana.
He relaxed slightly, and leaned down to pick up Rani. “You okay kiddo?” He murmured, one hand clenched in her shirt. His arms were trembling minutely, and his grip was tight enough to be uncomfortable- but Rani didn’t care. He was here- and he could fix whatever she’d done.
Not trusting her English enough for this conversation, she just tucked her head into the crook of his neck.
“Booster? You’re her father?” Diana said, her voice dark. Disapproving, almost.
Mikey shrugged slightly, but didn’t answer her, one way or the other. “What’s up?”
“I think I messy.” Rani said quietly, her voice muffled by the Booster suit.
She could feel Mikey leaning his head back to try and get a better look at her.
“Word messy.” She repeated, belatedly realizing how her words could be taken, especially with what had happened the day they’d met.
His head came forward again, to a more natural position. He adjusted his hold slightly, so Rani could hide more comfortably in the crook of his neck.
“So, I take it there’s been some kind of misunderstanding?” He said, grinning at the very un-amused Amazon.
Diana’s sigh was heavy with frustration- but nothing compared to her voice when she answered him. “Booster.”
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