A/N: Here's something I did for YJAM that I decided to drop into a separate place. Just so all my long term followers know, I will be posting all my works from Tumblr's Young Justice Appreciation Month into basically one huge dump fic where all the shorter, less noticable fics will show up. But the bigger pieces like this will be posted separately.
Disclaimer: I do not own Young Justice or any affiliated material.
Prompt: Shipwreck. (I interpreted this very loosely and turned it into trainwreck.
Note: This is actually the introduction of my idea for Wally and Artemis's daughter, Riley. She will be used in the future in another fic.
Trainwreck
"Oh, well this is a trainwreck," uttered Wally as his eyes widened at the sight of his three year old daughter wielding his wife's bow and arrow.
And that was when the aforementioned wife walked in. "Oh my god, Wally, what happened?"
"I looked away for like a minute-"
"Wally, we said she wasn't going to play with weapons!"
"Why was your gear out anyways?" he retaliated, arms thrown up partially in protest but also in surrender because it felt like they were at a standoff against their daughter right now because she kept pointing the damn arrow at them.
Artemis groaned. "I was going to go out to the range after I took Brucely out for his shit."
Wally's scowl turned scolding. "We said we weren't going to swear in front of her!"
"Fucking Christ, Wally, she's not going to remember. Memories don't start until you're like six or something." Artemis had let the dog's leash go, and Brucely was now settled in nicely on the couch, completely accustomed to the usual shouting of "Oh god what is our parenting style again?!"
"I remember my third birthday."
Artemis's eyes widened. "Shit."
"Artemis!"
She revised: "Fudge monkeys!"
Meanwhile, Riley, their sweet little daughter, just giggled her stupidly adorable ass off.
"Why do we even keep weapons in the house?" asked Wally, an accusatory look definitely pointed in his wife's direction.
"I'm actually kind of proud she knows how to use it."
"Artemis! Seriously?!"
She half-shrugged. "I don't think she'll shoot us, she doesn't have the upper body strength for that."
The sass was palpable when Wally responded, "Oh yes, that's why. Not because she doesn't have fantastic coordination nor the mental capacity to understand exactly what she's doing, but it's because she doesn't have the upper body strength!"
Artemis's glared could've pierced steel.
"Are you even mildly concerned for her safety?" shouted an exasperated Wally who'd now been the target of his daughter's possible homicidal tendencies for a bit over a minute now.
"Arrow's pointed the wrong way. She's fine. I should make her an arm guard."
"We're not teaching our daughter archery."
"We don't have to teach her, she's already getting the hang of it!"
Wally swore he'd married the best woman in the world on their wedding day, and especially on their wedding night, but he had probably, no, not probably, most certainly married the worst woman to ever become a mother because this was just one fucking mess after another.
"Get the bow away from her please!"
Artemis moved slowly to the little bairn she'd carried for nine grueling months. "Hey, Riles. C'mere, baby girl. Riley, Riley." The woman's smile was sincere, and she managed to gently wrangle the weaponry from her daughter's chubby little fingers with a little prying.
"Put the bow and arrows away please," asked Wally, finally feeling like his life was safe again. He moved towards the couch and slumped down beside their pit, who barely flinched, only opened an eye to see who'd be petting him.
Artemis hung her gear back up on the wall before scooping up Riley and holding her tight against her chest, stroking her baby girl's soft red hair.
"Why were you even going out to the range?" asked Wally, giving a tired look to his wife. "You don't need to go out there anymore. You're a mother. You've got a job. We have a family. What more do you need?"
Her eyes grew distant. "A sense of purpose." She buried her hand in her baby girl's hair. "I just wanted to go out again, Wally. It feels good. It's a rush, a thrill." She held Riley tighter. "I'm having a hard time giving it up."
"Artemis, it's almost been four years."
She pressed her daughter's face against her neck, feeling sick to her stomach. "Aurielle Bích," she murmured under her breath, holding her daughter tight. "My little Aurielle Bích..."
"You do realize you gave our daughter a middle name that sounds exactly like a cuss, right?"
She glared before refocusing her attention on Riley. "It's for Jade. You know that."
"Yes, I do know that." Wally breathed heavily, one hand patting Brucely's barrel chest. "But I get to name the next one. If you want to have another one."
They'd been through this. Dozens of times. Wally wanted a huge family, and Artemis was fine with that, but right now, what she really wanted? She wanted the wind in her hair and gunfire as her halo and the moonlight as her backdrop as she fired arrows into the night. That was what she wanted. Not to think about another kid right now. Especially not right now. "Wally, can we not?" She played with her daughter's soft red hair. "Please."
"Artemis, I found the pregnancy test."
Her throat closed up. If she could've clutched her daughter tighter, she would have, but she held Riley to her chest and tucked her little baby away and wanted to keep her safe forever, keep that little girl in her arms and never let her go...
"You don't have to have it if you don't want to."
Her gaze stayed on Riley. "I know." She swung her daughter from side to side, watching that smile light up her face...
Wally watched his wife's face. "If you want to go back to the life, I can't stop you. But I just want you to be safe about this. It's not just about you and I anymore."
Artemis clutched that baby girl. "I know."
Wally stayed quiet for a while, still watching Artemis with analytical eyes, his hand on Brucely's fur.
"I want to have it. Him. Her. Them." Artemis swallowed hard, choking back tears. "I just don't want to miss my window for the rest of my life. Job. House. Kids. That's your thing. I didn't even think I wanted kids until I met you. Until I had her." She touched her baby girl's little fingertips and kissed them so sweetly. "And I miss living. Because to me, doing what we did... It kept me alive. It was what kept me from doing bad things to myself because I had nothing else to do and nowhere else to go. And losing that crutch has had me seriously messed up in the head, Wally. I just wanted to get out today and shoot a little bit and get my mind off of all this."
He felt that guilt in the pit of his stomach. He took her away from what she loved most of all. Wally knew he took a backseat to a lot of things in her life, but he never expected to be taking her away from the one thing she truly loved. For the longest time, he thought giving her a family would wake her up, but it'd never occurred to him that he'd be making a rift between her and her real family. He'd ripped her away from her life.
"I can do this, Wally. I want to do this," she said slowly. And her eyes finally fell to his. "But you're going to have to be patient with me."
He offered a sad smile, knowing exactly what position he'd put her in and wishing he could make it easier. He'd married a woman who was meant to be independent. And he hadn't tried to take that away from her, but in retrospect, he realized that he did. By taking the one thing away that kept her alive.
With a quick motion, Artemis wiped at her eyes. "So," she started, voice still cracking as she sauntered with her daughter towards her gear where it was now hung up on the wall, "what were you thinking name-wise? Since you do have dibs this time."
"We're going to go a bit more good ol' American-"
"We've shortened her name to Riley, how much more American do you want, West? I mean, her full name is Aurielle Bích West, and we just call her Riley West, like we've basically obliterated the entire reason for giving her a cultured, meaningful name."
Wally held up a hand, indicating that her level of sass needed to tone down. And he knew that she knew it. (Besides, they both knew that their sweet little Riley would want to be called Aurielle some day in the future. It was just a matter of time.) And then he proceeded to say, "For a girl, Caitlin Jane."
Artemis nodded her approval, comfortable with that. Considering what she was expecting, that wasn't half ba-
"And for a boy, Darwin Rudolph."
"Oh my god, not the Rudolph thing."
"Yes, the Rudolph thing!"
She put her fingers to her temple. "Nope. I'm retracting your dibs."
"That's not how dibs works!"
Looking her husband very seriously in the eyes, she corrected, "Yes. Yes it is."
"What would you go with?"
"Archer Hunter."
"What is wrong with you?" he coughed out.
She looked into the distance. "Many things that therapy can't fix."
Their life was a trainwreck, but they were the survivors that would walk out of the wreckage each time, scarred forever but too proud to acknowledge it.
A/N: Leave a review, thanks for reading.
~Sky
P.S. The translation for Bích is "Jade".