"Uh…Ted? Can we talk?"
Ted Kord turned to see his buddy, Booster Gold, the hero of the 25th century (well, kind of) stand in front of him, his bright smile faded into a nervous grin. Something was up.
"Boost, what uh…what's the problem?"
Booster shook his head and shrugged his shoulders, as if to ready himself. "You know that great Blue Beetle, Jaime Reyes? The guy we took under our wing and showed the ropes to?"
Ted nodded. He, Booster and Jaime were close. Very close. Pretty much like family. It was Jaime and Booster who helped bring Ted back from the dead. It was Ted who taught Jaime everything the kid knew about superheroing. Booster and Ted would always take Jaime on one of their stupid adventures (whether Jaime wanted to or not).
"Y-yeah…what about him?"
"Good," Booster said as he placed his hands behind his back, it was almost as if he were…hiding something. "And you know how we love to get Jaime out into the field and help him with the ropes, right?"
Ted nodded again. Did this have something to do with Jaime?
"Well, you see, Ted ol' buddy, Jaime and I…we went for a little joy ride through time, you know to take a quick peek at some dinosaurs and…something happened on our way back home." Booster stepped aside.
"B-Booster. H-how…what did you do?"
There stood Jaime Reyes, the third Blue Beetle, the kid who had shown more heart than Ted could ever imagine…and…he had shrunk. Or rather, been de-aged. Jaime looked around and began to shake, his shirt (which at his normal size fit tightly around his body) draped over him like a night gown. It was far too big for him now.
"See, somehow on our way back, Jaime got de-aged and now…he's…"
"A kid?" Ted finished.
"I had Skeets do a reading on him, he's fine, and the scarab is still attached, and-"
"How did this happen?" Ted's voice was almost shrill.
"No idea, probably some kind of temporal side effect. But don't worry. It's not permanent, he'll be back to normal in a few weeks, if what Skeets says is true." Booster shrugged his shoulders.
Jaime ran back behind Booster's legs.
"Doesn't he recognize us?" Ted asked.
"No," Booster said, "He doesn't have any memory of being the Blue Beetle, but like I said, all that should change once he's back to normal."
Ted rubbed his fingers against his temples. Same old Booster, but what exactly would they do with a three year old? The JLI headquarters wasn't exactly a safe place for a kid.
"We've gotta tell the others and-"
"Woah woah woah. Hold on there. We can't tell them."
"And why not?" Ted asked. The more people who knew, the easier it would be to take care of Jaime, maybe they could even find a way to get him back to normal faster.
"Remember what they guys said they'd do if we meddled with time again? They'd put us on probation."
Oh yeah, that's right. Batman, after one too many "transgressions" as he called them, threatened to bench them for a year if anything else went awry because of them…and Ted was pretty sure turning their young protégé into a toddler counted.
"Fine. We'll keep it a secret, but what exactly are we gonna do? We can't just hide a toddler in the headquarters, sooner or later, someone's gonna find out. Especially when they realize that Jaime's disappeared."
Booster bent down and placed Jaime on his shoulders. "Don't worry." He smiled. "We'll figure something out. We always do."