This is my theory of why Wally retired. It started out only being 2 Word pages long and grew until it was like 9... Oops. O.o

Disclaimer: I still don't own them.

It was during the middle of one of Kid Flash's patrols. Flash was off world on some League business, so Wally had decided to add an additional night patrol to make up for his absent partner. He was just checking an industrial district in Keystone, just to make sure there was no suspicious drug activity. Flash and he had made it one of their priorities, and in recent months, the amount of drug activity in both of the gem cities was seriously diminishing.

He was just speeding by when he saw some freshly painted graffiti on one of the warehouse's fronts. One of the drawings depicted the lightning bolt logo of the Flash with a large black "X" over it.

Wally entered the old warehouse with no expectations of actually finding anything noteworthy when he happened to glance up and saw him. The figure was leaning on the railing of the raised walkway that lorded over the warehouse floor. Every aspect of the figure's demeanor suggested ease.

"Hello, what are you doing here," Wally muttered to himself; then he added louder, "Hey dude! This is private property!"

The guy languidly glanced over at him and flipped him off.

Wally's first thought was that it would be no big deal; he would flash up to the random dude, disarm him if necessary, question him, and maybe scare him a bit about vandalism. Easy.

Well, it would have been easy until he noticed the guy's form-fitting suit. It was a suit that was very similar to Wally's; it was designed for a runner. Wally glanced around the warehouse and back at the guy, who was now just staring at Wally with almost wolfish eyes. The idea of contacting his team or maybe Jay Garrick (the first Flash) for help popped into his mind. Nah, he would probably regret this, but he would handle the situation without them. He didn't want to bother Jay, who was in retirement, and he didn't want his team to think that he couldn't handle his own home turf - Keystone and Central.

Wally sped to some crates and used them to decrease the distance between the walkway and the floor, jumping and grabbing onto the edge of the walkway. As he climbed up onto the walkway, the guy grinned at him and ran towards a large window against the far wall, through which he disappeared.

"Okay, that was kind of fast." Wally sped over to the window and looked down. The guy was just standing on the ground, leaning against next door warehouse and smirking up at him.

Wally ran down the side of the warehouse towards the guy. The guy waved at Wally, threw a "keep up if you can" over his shoulder, and took off running.

It became apparent that he was a speedster.

From this point forward, adrenaline took over Kid Flash as he struggled to keep up with the random stranger that was way faster than he should have been.

Kid Flash was running as fast as he could, chasing after the mysterious, black clad speedster. He wanted to yell to the guy in front of him, but he knew that the sound would get lost. When you've reached the speed of sound, sound is just too slow.

Wally didn't know how long they'd been running, but his stomach growled viscously at him, so he knew they had been running for a great while at a high speed since he already needed to refuel. He also didn't know where they were. He couldn't distinguish the scenery around them because it was all a blur from their high speeds. The only thing he could see somewhat clearly was the slightly blurring black figure in front of him, and he knew he was no match for him. The guy was so much faster than him that Wally was beginning to wear out the bottoms of his boots just to keep up with him. Since the boots had been designed by Batman, the degree of abuse he was currently subjugating them to worried Wally.

Then Wally heard the tell tale sound - a large "BOOM." He knew that he had just heard a sonic boom, an indication of the sound barrier being broken. Wally took a deep breath and increased his speed. One foot in front of the other, he repeated the mantra in his head; come on, Wall-man. Sure enough, the same noise perpetuated from around him, too, and Wally knew that he had broken the sound barrier. But the other speedster was still steadily speeding up, and Wally dutifully pushed himself in order to keep the other speedster in his vision.

Ahead of him, the speedster suddenly skidded to a stop. A spray of mud and rainwater flew up before him.

Wally kept running for several yards before sliding into a similar stop. The large amount of mud and water were courtesy of the thunderstorm currently raging around them. Their pseudo-race had led them to an old farm - probably still the Midwest if he could count on the Kent-esk vibe of the old wooden barn and the cement silo behind the other runner. As for that other runner, he wore a similar suit as Wally, only his was completely black. Also, he had similar red hair sticking out of the top of his cowl but had a more opaque, darker red set of goggles.

"Well, finally! I've been waiting for you to catch up!" The guy smirked. "It's pathetic how slow you are. Are you sure you're a Flash?"

Wally felt his face flush, and he clenched his fists. He took a couple steps back before breaking into a full sprint towards the runner. "Why don't we find out?"

The guy just stood there, staring at him. He was completely still until a millisecond before Wally reached him. At that moment, the other runner shot off to his side. Wally tried to redirect his charge, but his feet could find no traction in the slippery mud. In fact, the lack of traction coupled with his momentum carried him forward straight into the concrete silo.

Wally's left arm -in an attempt to cushion his crash- smashed into the silo first before his head smacked into it as well. Wally couldn't help but scream as the pain receptors of his brain caught up to the situation at hand. He gingerly glanced at his arm and immediately felt nauseous. He took a couple deep breathes and tried to control his panic. His forearm was bent in a completely wrong direction, and he could even see a part of the bone.

"Awe, little baby's hurt!" The other speedster was full-out smiling now.

Wally glared at him and gingerly began to find his footing to stand again.

"I'd stay down if I were you." The guy's voice lost all traces of its former humor.

Wally continued to carefully pull himself up, noticing along the way that his head didn't feel so well either. As his head leaned forward, several drops of blood fell from the crown of his head into the mud. Wally finally stood up completely, and he glared at the other speedster. "Go to hell."

The speedster charged him. Wally sidestepped and swung his good arm, aiming for the guy's face. His fist made a satisfying smack when it crunched into the guy's nose.

"Ahh, fu-" The guy snarled, covering the bleeding with his palms.

Wally grinned slightly. Black Canary would have been appalled by his form, but the end result couldn't be disputed; the speedster's nose was definitely broken. However, his grin vanished and was replaced with a look of dread when the speedster removed his hands, showing that his nose was perfectly healed. The only indication of any previous injury was some drying blood around it. Wally had a feeling that he was in trouble, especially since his arm hadn't even begun to heal. He silently cursed his accelerated metabolism.

"You'll regret that." And somehow Wally had no doubts that he would.

The speedster charged him again and threw up a whirlwind of punches and kicks. Wally blocked as many as he could, but his useless arm and weakened state of hunger afforded him no favors. As a result, the speedster landed way too many hits on Wally, including a particularly nasty hit to his gut. Wally flew backwards into the mud.

"Pathetic, dude. Why'd the Flash ever choose you?"

An arc of stomach acid painted the mud in front of him as Wally lost all of his stomach's contents. Wally used his good arm and wiped his mouth. "Screw you," Wally said, snarling at him.

"Still, this is pathetic. I bet the retired Flash would put up a better fight than you," the speedster spat at Wally.

Then he charged at Wally while Wally was still awkwardly trying to stand up. Wally flung his good arm up, but the other had the advantage. He grabbed Wally's good arm and pulled. Wally slid forward and regained his footing, but the speedster didn't let go of his arm. He then began to spin, and he swung Wally around in a circle. He started to build up speed, forming a miniature cyclone. Wally felt like a puppet swung around by its strings, and he winced when he heard an alarming popping sound that was his arm leaving its socket.

Suddenly, the speedster released Wally's arm, and Wally flew through the air before smashing into the silo - again and fell with gravity. He landed with one of his ankles baring all of his body weight. Wally couldn't stand; he remained in a crumbled heap. His eyes closed to block out the pain.

Once again, the other speedster appeared right in front of him, but this time, the speedster picked him up by his neck. Wally's eyes shot open, and he gasped in a vain attempt for some air. The guy smirked as he squeezed even harder, restricting his airway even more.

"Pathetic. I hope you realize, Kid Flash, that you're not good enough to wear this symbol."

Wally closed his eyes. That dig hurt him the most because Wally had always thought the same thing. The majority of Wally's insecurities arose from him being slower than Uncle Barry. Wally mentally shook his head and instead focused all his concentration on speeding up his molecules. His mouth gasped for air as his nose began to bleed steadily; however, his vibrations burned the other speedster, who promptly dropped him.

Wally couldn't move from where he landed in front of the speedster, sitting in the mud. He was way beyond running shape, way beyond empty. His vibration trick left him utterly immobile. All he could do was to try to calm his breathing down from an all out fight for oxygen to a lesser panting.

The other speedster glared at his burned palms and then at Wally. Wally did not like the sinister look in his goggle-covered eyes. He kicked Wally in the chest, so Wally was lying on his back, looking up at the sky.

"Kid Flash… what a joke," he said, snarling. He reached down, grabbing the fabric with the lightning bolt over his chest and pulled. The fabric ripped free.

"I'm not sure what's more funny," he said, pulling off Wally's goggles, "Kid Flash or Wally West."

He pulled Wally's cowl, too, and that soon was ripped from his uniform. He dropped the pilfered parts of Wally's uniform, which landed in mud. He spat on them as well.

He knows my name, Wally thought, panicking. He knows my name!

The guy kicked Wally's side and languidly turned away. "Wally West… you are capable of more." He turned around and saw Wally's baffled face.

"Wha- what?" Wally stuttered.

The other speedster - the faster speedster, the better fighter- smirked at him. He reached up and pulled off his cowl.

Wally's eyes widened. There was no way that this was possible. He, himself - Wally West -stood in front of him. His bright green eyes bore into his own.

"I guess it's true: I am my own worst critic." He gave a bark of laughter and turned away from the fallen Wally. "But it's also true, dude; we don't deserve that symbol."

Wally tasted the copper of blood in his mouth as he stared at his doppelganger. "I guess I must have really low self-esteem."

The other Wally laughed, but it was more bitter than the laugh Wally knew. "We," he said gesturing to the two, "deserve better than this garbage. Wake up, Wally. We're done with the hero worshipping. We deserve better."

The yellow clad Wally opened his mouth to dispute; this guy (himself?) was seriously messed up. But before he could voice his thoughts, the other Wally shook his head. "I came back in time to tell you this. You need to stop worshipping Uncle Barry. We are a god. He's just a mistake. We preformed the experiment ourselves; we created ourselves."

He bent down by Wally's side and he shook his head when Wally flinched. "I'm sorry that this had to be such a painful lesson, but trust me, it had to be this way. You'll understand later. But now I've gotta head out; get back to our future - time travel. And that's something we can control with our running. We can run through time. You know why? Because we are the fastest man; we are a god!" He got into a runner's starting position and glanced back at Wally. "Eliminate the competition, and stop living in the old man's shadow; ditch the red and yellow."

He then took off, and Wally passed out.

Intense green bruises stretched their way around his neck. The shapes of fingers were apparent, and it was obvious someone had briefly strangled him.

He was lying in the mud. His left arm was bent at an odd angle, and jagged splinters of white bone were poking out of his skin. His right arm was pulled out of the socket - dislocated and useless. Random fingers were bent wrong, too.

Blood was caked on the crown of his head and underneath his nose. His right ankle was swollen.

His cowl had been torn off, and the portion of his uniform that had the lightning bolt over his chest had been torn off as well. The pieces of fabric were forgotten, lying in a puddle a few feet away.

A man crouched down next to the fallen speedster, and a gentle hand reached down and pressed against his neck, searching for a pulse. After finding one, the man sighed in relief.

He didn't even look up at the approaching Superboy.

"Dick?"

Nightwing's eyes flickered up to Conner who hopefully didn't hear his name before landing on Wally again. The speedster had turned his head to meet his eyes.

"Yeah, I'm here, KF. We're going to get you into the Bio-Ship and take you back to the mountain. It'll be okay."

Wally turned away from his friend. "I don't think I can do this anymore."

"What Wally? Do what?"

"This. The hero thing - Kid Flash. I just can't."

Dick furrowed his brow. "You'll be fine, Wally. Don't-"

"No, Dick," Wally said, cutting him off. He thought of how happy he looked (his other self) when he advised himself to kill Uncle Barry. He was terrified when he realized that could be him some day… He would grow faster, faster than Barry. He would have too much power.

"What-" Then it clicked, and Dick paused, looking worried and almost suspicious. "Who did this to you?"

"I was too slow…"

By now, Conner reached them, and Wally was being picked up by him. The clone cradled him gently in a bridal style hold and carefully walked to the Bio-Ship. Wally's head turned again and he met Dick's masked gaze.

"Sorry"

Images of the manically laughing face as he kicked him in the ribs, or when he slowly squeezed the air from his throat bombarded his mind. But they were images of his face. Contorted and disgusting. Twisted. Evil. Wrong.

"I just…I can't."

He would never become that monster; he would remove himself from the hero world. There would be no temptation. Wally rested his head against Conner's chest and closed his eyes.

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