A/N: This is something that came to me in the middle of the night and it was ridiculously fun to write. For being such a dark, tormented story and all. Just so y'all know, it's not slash. Disclaimer: No, I do not own Young Justice. Bite me.
Now I'm Nothing
"Dude, you're so cold to me lately," said Kid Flash, crashing onto the couch beside his best friend, immediately kicking his feet up on the table and folding his arms neatly behind his head. "You act like we're not even friends anymore." His green eyes were shut and his face was turned towards the ceiling, his calm demeanor not leaving his freckled features. "What'd I do wrong?"
"Nothing." Robin slammed his laptop shut and immediately stalked off to find another place to work that was nowhere near Wally. He didn't want to deal with that moron now. He didn't want to deal with him ever again. "Just leave me alone."
It was as Robin was pacing to a darker room in the darker pits of Mount Justice when a carrot-topped blur passed him and he saw Wally standing against a wall a few yards away. "Come on, Rob, what's the problem?" asked the older teen as his shoulder pressed into the doorframe. "You can't walk away from me."
"Yes," said the Boy Wonder, laptop clutched a little tighter in one hand, "I kind of can." His ebony locks fell in his eyes for a moment before he brushed them away. "I don't have to answer you. Ever."
"Not like you can avoid me forever," pointed out the speedster. He had no idea why his best friend wasn't talking to him. He hadn't done anything wrong lately. Kaldur would've told him if he did something wrong. Kaldur was never afraid to tell people what they did wrong. "We're on the same team. I see you practically every day."
Robin snorted his annoyance as he walked right past Wally, not bothering to even acknowledge him fully. The boy's sapphire eyes didn't even shift from the shadows of the hallway ahead. He didn't want to look at Wally. He was too sick of this. Just everything.
"Come on, man," insisted Wally, following close behind Robin, "just tell me what I did wrong. Then I'll leave you alone, okay? I promise."
"You'll leave me alone no matter what," hissed Robin through gritted teeth, moving a little faster as his metal-clad boots hit the floor with each step. "I don't have to talk to you." He didn't look back. He didn't want to. He knew he was so vulnerable without having someone so close to him.
He had kept Wally as a best friend for so long that Robin had forgotten how to find any other real friends. Superboy and Kaldur had formed a close enough bond so that they could be called friends at the least, and the girls were just automatically drawn together like magnets as all girls are. And when Wally had gotten drawn to the girls like a piece of metal to those magnets, where did it leave Robin? It left him all alone. He had no one to turn to for help. He had no one to look up to as a role model and an idol. He had no one. Robin knew Wally had meant so much to him for so long that life without him was just that much more miserable. And Robin had decided to cement that separation. He was hurt too badly for the wounds to ever truly heal.
"Yeah, you kind of sort of do have to talk to me," said the speedster, once more rushing past his best friend. This time, he stood right in the middle of the hallway, ready to block any route that Robin would try to take to get around him. "I'm always going to be here, Rob. So just tell me what's on your mind. If it's about school or anything lame, I don't care. But feel free to tell me your girl drama or what's up with Batsy."
That snapped Robin's last nerve. His patience had been running low since the first day and now the sheer neglect that Wally had shown their dying friendship finally shattered the last hope that Robin had held on keeping their bond in one piece. "You don't get it, do you?" snarled Robin, his lips twisting up into a disgusted sneer. "You don't get how horrible you're being to me, do you?"
"You haven't told me what I did!" Wally's defense was weak and he knew it. He knew Robin would destroy him in this argument. "Just tell me an-"
"You're neglecting me!" spat Robin, all of his bottled up rage finally breaking the glass and breaking free of its prison. "You're supposed to be my best friend and you don't even look at me anymore!" His fists were clenched and his laptop had actually gotten a massive dent in it from where his fingers drove into the hard outer shell.
Wally had to take a step back in surprise. Never before had he seen Robin this furious and fierce about anything. Never. The kid was usually a placid little guy, almost always calm about anything and contemplating words and prefixes and suffixes, but now he was a body engulfed in pure hatred. "Dude-"
"You haven't looked at me since you started dating Artemis! It's like I mean nothing to you anymore!" The boy felt his rage growing from years and years of not crying over all the pain of every hit, every witnessed death, every moment he thought of vengeance, everything all piled into this one explosion against the teen he had once been able to call his best friend. "You don't hang out with me anymore! You only want to be with her! It's like I'm not even here!" His piercing cerulean gaze would've cut the redhead to pieces if he had had Superman's laser vision. "You ignore me, Wally! I'm nothing to you anymore, am I?"
"Rob, man, co-" Wally couldn't even get a sentence in.
The laptop in Robin's hand had been totally smashed at this point. All the tiny chunks of technology and memory and stored data crumbled to the ground like the relationship of Wally and Robin that had been frayed by a few too many arrow points. "You don't even know my favorite color anymore, do you?" spat the ebony-haired teen, knowing that Wally would answer wrong. He just knew. Because Wally had had his head filled with Artemis lately. And that left Robin as an odd man out in the group.
"Green," offered the redhead, almost positive of his answer as he put his hands on his hips. He smirked smugly, his emerald eyes glittering with a knowing gleam in them.
The a few more pieces of the shattered laptop fell from Robin's clutching hand. "Blue," hissed the younger teen. "Blue, Wally."
The redhead's face fell as fast as he could run. "Robin," he said, almost desperate to make amends. His voice was pathetic and pleading. He didn't want to lose his failing friendship. Robin was his best friend and nothing could change that. "Rob, dude, I'm sorry. She's my-"
"I get it," said Robin, putting a hand up and turning his back on his friend. "I know that she means a lot to you. I totally get it. But when you blow me off for her weekend after weekend, a guy can only give up and move on." The ebony-haired teen looked at the final pieces that he held in his palm. He could only think that this was how their friendship was going to end for good. "I'm just done with this, Wally. I give up. I'm not even going to try anymore. Now, I'm nothing to you."
"You're my best friend," said Wally, putting a hand on Robin's shoulder in hopes of getting the younger teen to turn around and give him one last chance. Wally was prepared to do anything to get back on Robin's good sid-
The redhead's phone suddenly started buzzing, Artemis's ringtone playing loud and clear in the unusually silent hallway. He pulled his hand from Robin's shoulder and turned it off without hesitation. His girlfriend could wait. "Rob, please forgive me."
"No." Robin didn't turn around. He didn't look back. He didn't want to. He knew Wally would have a pouting face on and Robin didn't want to see Kid Flash pouting like this. "I'm done with you."
"Who's gonna be your best friend then, huh?" asked Wally, hostility rising in his voice. He folded his arms across his chest with a cold jade glare firing off in Robin's direction. "No one else around here to be your friend, Rob. Everyone else already has a best friend. I'm your only option."
"I don't have any other real friends." Robin's voice was nearly heartbroken, but he could still feel the rage blasting through his veins. He wasn't going back now. He had no reason to. He would never have to deal with Kid Flash again after today. "But I don't care. Being on my own is better than being stuck with you." Robin wasted no time in leaving. "You don't even care anymore." The sounds of his metal-plated boots resonated through the dark halls of Mount Justice's innermost caverns.
Wally had to take another step back. It was like Robin had just stabbed him through the heart with the sharpest dagger he could find. The ginger had to do a double take. Had that really just happened? Had Robin really stormed off like that?
It was at that moment that the boy's phone went off again, the ringtone he had set for Artemis once more screaming out into the silence like a hungry chick in a bird's nest that needed to be fed. And this time, while still staring after Robin and hoping for the younger boy to return, Wally answered his phone.
It was about an hour later when Wally stepped out of the dark shadows and into the living room space. He and his girlfriend had been on the phone because she was working a case with Green Arrow over in Russia with a couple of drug traffickers that could've been related to the Cadmus case. "Where's Robin?" asked the ginger, his emerald eyes searching for the smaller boy. They had to talk.
Megan was curled slightly against Superboy, the clone's arm draped across her shoulder. "He didn't tell you?" asked the girl, brown eyes watching Wally with a slight glitter of curiosity in them. She brushed a few strands of her auburn hair away from her face as her lips twisted up into a slightly worried frown.
Wally had to take a moment to breathe. For some reason, the way Megan had said that didn't sound good. The boy felt his heart speed up as panicked welled inside of his chest, nestled there with a bit of fear. "Tell me what?"
"Robin quit."
That made Wally want to keel over and die right there. His throat closed up and his eyes began to go blurry for a moment. He was hoping it was because of dust. He didn't want this to be happening. "He- He what?" asked Kid Flash, almost afraid to confirm what his mind had already assumed was the answer.
Kaldur, on the opposite end of the couch that Megan and Superboy were curled up on, said, "He left the team. He decided to go back to Batman for good. He will not be coming on anymore missions with us or coming in for training." The Atlantean shook his head sullenly. "He told us about a week ago." His arms were folded up across his chest, a sorcery book in his lap. Then his silver eyes found Wally's brokenhearted gaze. "He didn't tell you, did he?"
Wally just shook his head, the pain of his obvious oblivion making it only that much worse. He was the only one who didn't know... He was the only one... Everyone else had someone to call a best friend... except for Wally. Because he had lost Robin, his only real friend.
A/N: Heart just broke right there, didn't it? Yeah, mine too. And now, feel free to scroll a bit more and leave a cute lil' review. Bye! ~Sky