Complications

"Complications" is the 16th episode of the second season of Young Justice, and the 42nd of the overall series. It aired on February 16, 2013.

Logline
Black Manta gives Miss Martian twenty-four hours to live, but that may be more time than Aqualad has with Sportsmaster and Cheshire on the hunt for his head!

Synopsis
In the Manta-Sub, Black Manta contacts Deathstroke for a progress report. Deathstroke replies that progress remains slow, and Kaldur'ahm is still far from whole. Getting impatient with the slow pace of his son's recovery, he storms into the room, and gives Miss Martian an ultimatum—cure Kaldur in 24 hours, or die. Unbeknownst to him, Aqualad is fully cured, and is just playing possum so they can find a way to save Miss Martian's life. Black Manta had barged in on a psychic conversation between the two of them and Tigress, whose timetable is now complicated by the ultimatum.

Nightwing travels though Doctor Fate's portal to arrive at the Warworld, demanding to know what happened to his Team. Blue Beetle is extremely apologetic, and tells him that they were assembled at the docking bay, with Mongul as their hogtied captive. Suddenly, a boom tube opened under their feet, and everyone else was whisked off to parts unknown. Blue Beetle escaped only because he immediately flew on instinct. Nightwing confirms that there were, in fact, residual traces of boom tube activity, and tells still-contrite Jaime to return home. Doctor Fate opens a portal, and both Beetles stepped through it.

Blue Beetle and Green Beetle step out from Doctor Fate's portal into the front of Jaime Reyes's home. They look at each other, and Green Beetle nods. Without another word, Blue Beetle changes back into Jaime Reyes, while Green Beetle leaves.

In the Atlantic, unknown to all parties, Sportsmaster and Cheshire intrude the Manta-Sub to fulfill their vengeance for Artemis's death. As they discussed earlier, Cheshire plans to kill Aqualad, while Sportsmaster would kill Black Manta to preserve his reputation.

M'gann, Artemis and Aqualad decide to put their plan to save Miss Martian in action. Tigress excuses herself from the room, telling Deathstroke she needs five minutes to stretch her legs and get some coffee. She races off towards the control room, planning to deactivate Miss Martian's control collar from there.

Cheshire abruptly drops into the room from a ventilation shaft, quickly taking down the Manta Trooper who was subbing for Tigress. She then attacks Aqualad, but Miss Martian blocks it. M'gann begins to telepathically communicate the situation to Cheshire, but Deathstroke turns off her powers. He notifies Black Manta about the intrusion, and the alarm is raised. Reinforcement troopers are sent to Aqualad's room.

The heightened state of emergency allows Sportsmaster to sneak through the halls undetected. Tigress, noticing the commotion, tries to contact M'gann, but fails. She heads to the control center, where she dismisses the remaining troopers. She searches for the collar controls.

As soon as Deathstroke raises the alarm, Black Manta races towards his son's room as well, but is waylaid by Sportsmaster. Black Manta is completely outclassed, and would have been killed if not for the timely arrival of four Manta Troopers. Sportsmaster quickly takes them out with a flashbang discus.

Cheshire confronts Miss Martian about her support for Aqualad, but she's interrupted by the arrival of Manta Troopers. Cheshire manages to keep them out by destroying the door's controls with her sword. Deathstroke notices Miss Martian's defense, and tells Tigress to head back to the room. Miss Martian takes a laser blaster of the fallen trooper, and in a tug with Cheshire, shoots out Deathstroke's camera. She starts to communicate the situation, but Cheshire knocks her out before she can explain anything. Aqualad drops the brain-damaged act, and tries to persuade Cheshire that Artemis is alive, and on the submarine. Cheshire does not believe him, and puts him in a choke hold.

On the Warworld, Nightwing investigates the area for clues. He notices the gouges on the floor left by Blue Beetle's stapler, and sees that the controls for the airlock were destroyed. He then notices a birdarang embedded near the airlock. Noticing it to be Robin's, Nightwing scans it, and sees nanites belonging to the Scarab on the surface. He muses that the birdarang must have scraped Blue Beetle's armor for some reason.

Tigress does not immediately head back to Kaldur's room; instead, she keeps searching for the controls. She finds them eventually, and disables them. M'gann, however, is still unconscious. Cheshire berates Kaldur for his deeds, and vows to cut him open to see if he is really heartless.

Tigress runs through the corridors and tries to contact M'gann, but she doesn't answer. She stumbles across Sprtsmaster and Black Manta's fight. Black Manta espies Tigress and orders her to take his place, while he rushes to his son's room. Tigress engages Sportsmaster, but he is too powerful for her.

Manta Troopers have fixed an explosive charge to the door, but Manta is so impatient he blows it out before his men are clear. He finds his son lodged under the door, but Cheshire charges him before he can check up on him. She keeps him down with an electrocuting disc. She moves in on Aqualad to kill him with her sai when Miss Martian regains consciousness. With all powers restored, she connects the minds of herself, Aqualad, Tigress, Cheshire, and Sportsmaster into a mindscape of Artemis's childhood room.

Cheshire is indignant at the intrusion of her childhood memories, but Tigress corrects her—the memories belong to her. Miss Martian reveals everyone for what they are—Kaldur'ahm is still an agent of the Team and Tigress is Artemis Crock. She reveals that Aqualad only pretended to kill Artemis, and is infiltrating the Light and the Reach together with Artemis, now Tigress, on a deep-cover mission. Cheshire feels Artemis's mental presence and drops her grudge against Aqualad, but Crusher is unconvinced—this was just another Martian illusion. Artemis tells Miss Martian to release them; she would convince Crusher herself, in spite of his continued skepticism.

Now released from the mindscape, Tigress rolls out of the way of Sportsmaster's javelin, and disarms him with a manuever he had taught her. Now finally convinced, Sportsmaster is exceedingly pleased that she and Aqualad are "playing Manta and the Light for chumps". No longer having a reason to pursue his vengeance, Tigress asks him for a favor.

Miss Martian telekinetically slams Cheshire and Black Manta to against the wall. While secretly communicating with Cheshire to help Artemis retain cover, she vocalizes that the enemy of her enemy is her friend. Cheshire is free to go, but she wants revenge on Black Manta all to herself. Cheshire retreats from the room, and Miss Martian moves to threaten Black Manta. Aqualad drops his human vegetable act, and slams Miss Martian away from his father. She escapes from the room by phasing out, and Black Manta is ecstatic that his son has returned to him.

Tigress and Sportsmaster keep up the charade of a fight in front of the Manta Troopers. When all are defeated, he runs off to the control room, and destroys it with a discus, ensuring nobody would know what Tigress was up to there;fulfilling the favor Tigress had asked of him.

Back at the airlock bay, Sportsmaster and Cheshire make preparations to leave. Deathstroke stops them from leaving, and Sportsmaster attacks him. Both assassins fight evenly, with Cheshire jumping to her father's defense when Deathstroke has him in a stunlock. Tigress tackles her, and the sisters banter—Artemis is extremely touched that Cheshire risked everything to avenge her, while Jade claims she was just angry Lian lost her babysitter. The sparring duos are interrupted by an arriving Miss Martian, who slams both Deathstroke and Tigress to the wall. Sportsmaster says he wants to finish the job on Deathstroke, but she insists that he and Cheshire leave.

After the assassins evacuate, Miss Martian floats towards Deathstroke, contemplating of ways to have fun with Deathstroke. Nonplussed, he drops explosive pellets on the ground, blasting Miss Martian away from him and breaking her telekinetic hold on them. As Deathstroke rushes towards her, Tigress mentally orders her to escape lest she gets captured again. Miss Martian agrees, mentally apologizing to Artemis in advance before she throws Deathstroke towards her. Assuming her mermaid form, the Martian phases out of the sub. She catches a glimpse of Sportsmaster and Cheshire, both in diving suits, swimming away, then she swims away herself.

Jade reclaims Lian from her mother, who was babysitting her granddaughter. The still-grieving Paula tells her to treasure her time together with her daughter, for the future is uncertain. Jade then informs her that she has news about Artemis—good news in fact.

Black Manta joyously presented his son before Vandal Savage and the Ambassador, and tells them he is restored. He proudly added that the shock of seeing his father in mortal danger was the catalyst necessary for Kaldur'ahm's recovery. The Ambassador congratulates him, and informs him that the day has also been very good for the Reach.

Nightwing, alone in the warehouse, watches a pre-recorded TV broadcast concerning the Reach ambassador. The Ambassador showers praises on one of Earth's heroes, who, according to him, practically saved the Earth singlehandedly from the Warworld. He calls in Blue Beetle, who proceeds to unmask himself in public and praise the Reach for empowering him. In anger, Nightwing snaps the birdarang he was idly manipulating into two.

Title
Several complications arise, hence the title. The first is M'gann having restored Kaldur's mind but now the two and Artemis having to figure out how to allow M'gann to escape. The second is Sportsmaster and Cheshire raiding the Manta-Sub and the others having to deal with their presence. The third is Nightwing deducing that Blue Beetle had become an agent of the Reach and was responsible for the Team's disappearance from the Warworld, but now needing to figure out how to resolve the situation, given that the Ambassador has since declared to the world that Blue Beetle was responsible for shutting down the Warworld.

Cast and characters
! colspan="3" | Non-speaking roles
 * Nick Chinlund
 * colspan="2" | Sportsmaster
 * rowspan="2" | Kelly Hu
 * colspan="2" | Cheshire
 * colspan="2" | Paula Crock
 * rowspan="2" | Phil LaMarr
 * colspan="2" | Ambassador
 * colspan="2" | Green Beetle
 * Stephanie Lemelin
 * colspan="2" | Tigress
 * Eric Lopez
 * colspan="2" | Blue Beetle
 * Jesse McCartney
 * colspan="2" | Nightwing
 * Danica McKellar
 * colspan="2" | Miss Martian
 * rowspan="2" | Khary Payton
 * colspan="2" | Black Manta
 * colspan="2" | Aqualad
 * Fred Tatasciore
 * colspan="2" | Deathstroke
 * Michael T. Weiss
 * colspan="2" | Captain Atom
 * Danica McKellar
 * colspan="2" | Miss Martian
 * rowspan="2" | Khary Payton
 * colspan="2" | Black Manta
 * colspan="2" | Aqualad
 * Fred Tatasciore
 * colspan="2" | Deathstroke
 * Michael T. Weiss
 * colspan="2" | Captain Atom
 * colspan="2" | Deathstroke
 * Michael T. Weiss
 * colspan="2" | Captain Atom
 * colspan="2" | Captain Atom
 * colspan="3" | Captain Marvel
 * colspan="3" | Doctor Fate
 * colspan="3" | Icicle Jr. (illusion)
 * colspan="3" | Lian Nguyen-Harper
 * colspan="3" | Rocket
 * colspan="3" | Tommy Terror (illusion)
 * colspan="3" | Tuppence Terror (illusion)
 * colspan="3" | Vandal Savage
 * colspan="3" | Wally West (illusion)
 * colspan="3" | Rocket
 * colspan="3" | Tommy Terror (illusion)
 * colspan="3" | Tuppence Terror (illusion)
 * colspan="3" | Vandal Savage
 * colspan="3" | Wally West (illusion)
 * colspan="3" | Vandal Savage
 * colspan="3" | Wally West (illusion)
 * colspan="3" | Wally West (illusion)
 * colspan="3" | Wally West (illusion)

Continuity

 * The episode continues after the events of "The Fix" and "War".
 * Cheshire and Sportsmaster attempt to consummate their vengeance on Kaldur'ahm and Black Manta, which they vowed to do in "Satisfaction". Sportsmaster also first attempted to kill Black Manta in "True Colors".
 * Miss Martian shows Sportsmaster and Cheshire events from "Depths" and "Darkest".

Trivia

 * Fred Tatasciore replaced Wentworth Miller as the voice of Deathstroke, after the latter became unavailable.

Goofs

 * When Sportsmaster and Cheshire infiltrate the Manta-Flyer, the hacking device they use to get onboard turns from red to green and in the next scene when they are boarding the vessel, it's red again.
 * In the scene where Cheshire ironically said goodbye to Deathstroke, the door to Airlock 06 was half-closed. In all other instances where the door was seen, it was fully open.
 * When Miss Martian telekinetically slammed Tigress into Deathstroke and pinned them to the wall, his right hand was open. There was no opportunity for him to secure the explosive charges he dropped after Sportsmaster left, as he was held tight by telekinesis.

Unanswered questions

 * What did the Reach do with Mongul and the Team members who were captured?
 * Where are Arsenal and Sphere?