Words: 7,901 (ooh, almost!)
Disclaimer: Today, I watched reruns of the first season of Young Justice and shouted at my dad when he didn't understand certain parts. I think that answers things.


logarithms.


Gotham's Best Diner
May 23, 22:39 EDT

"Dorogaya, it's almost eleven! Won't mama be worried?" Artemis looks up at Ruri, short for Rurík, the only man who worked Gotham's Best's night shifts. She bites her lip and gives him this lopsided, helpless smile.

"She thinks I'm at a friend's," she tells Ruri. He looks at her skeptically and she sighs at him, gesturing at the schoolwork scattered all over her booth.

"I swear, Ruri, I'm on my last subject. Just let me study and I'll leave." Ruri sighs lightly in response and picks up her mug.

"I refill this for you. Decaf." He pauses, not yet making to leave.

"Sometimes I wonder if you get to live a life out of all the work you're always doing, Arty," Ruri tells her quietly in his dainty, almost-but-not-quite-American-and-still-partially-Russian accent before walking to the counter to refill Artemis's mug.

The archer watches him go and frowns. If anyone else had told her that to her face, she would have snapped at them and started a long, unnecessary speech about how she could take care of herself, she could probably handle more than you could, and she was a great student, thank you very much. But this is Ruri, practically her second dad. Or just a dad, if she thinks about it.

Ever since she discovered this 24-hour diner and started spending time here, Ruri's kind of become a constant in her civilian life. When she's not at school, her part-time jobs or running missions with the team for Batman, she's either here or at home. And she's always working. Working on school assignments, chores at the apartment, extra jobs to help out at home – she's just always working and she can never catch a break. Maybe that's partially why she loves the hero business so much. It takes her away from this sorry excuse of a life.

Artemis shakes the dark thoughts away from her mind and refocuses her attention back on math. She wrinkles her nose at the thought of the subject. If she weren't taking math, she would have a perfect GPA. Not that anyone would know. Though Artemis had made it into the school's Varsity softball team as well as their archery team, she still remains careful with who she befriends at Gotham Academy. The origins of her scholarship are still a mystery but she isn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth.

"Logarithms?" Ruri reappears next to Artemis with a piping hot cup of coffee. She accepts it gratefully and nods.

"Honestly, math isn't my best subject and I'm only getting decent grades because I've had help." Artemis twists a lock of her hair as she fights the blush at the thought of her redheaded "help" and sips her coffee. It's perfectly bittersweet (heavy on the sweet), just the way she likes it, and she gives a small sigh.

"And this is the last thing you have for the night?" Ruri asks. Artemis nods as she plays around with a corner of her open notebook.

"Well, maybe you should call that help of yours so you can finish up fast," Ruri suggests. Artemis nervously runs a hand through her loosened hair. She'd removed it from its usual position high atop her head a few hours ago. For Artemis, there's a calming factor in keeping her hair down as she studies instead of in its tight ponytail. She reserves that style for crime-fighting.

"I think I can do this," she gulps. Ruri gives her another dubious look and lays a hand on her shoulder.

"Dorogaya, I will throw you out of this diner with my bare hands – and you know I would – if you don't finish before one o'clock."

"One o'clock?! I need at least 'til four o'clock to feel even the slightest bit confident!"

"Then call in that tutor of yours! It's only eleven, he - she - it might still be awake."

"It is a he, Ruri." Artemis rolls her eyes at the man's immaturity.

"Even better then. When you're done studying, you can have a little fun before bed. If you're into that kind of fun."

"Ruri!" Artemis doesn't even bother trying to keep the blush from gracing her cheeks even if Ruri's face remains calm and stern.

"Hey, we tutor and pay that way when I was still in school." Ruri shrugs, removes his hand from Artemis's shoulder and turns away from her. Artemis sighs and pinches the bridge of her nose. It's bound to be a long night.

"You have until two in the morning before I throw you out," he tells her.

"Three."

"Two. Thirty. And I'm being nice." As if Artemis doesn't know that already.

"Three." Artemis pauses before adding, "And I'll work the night shift with you for two weeks. No pay." Ruri stands there for a moment and tilts his face in her direction. He seems to consider this before releasing a deep-throated chuckle and walking away from Artemis's booth.

"You drive a good bargain, Arty. Deal. Now call up that drook of yours and get studying!" Artemis sticks her tongue out at Ruri's turned back and lays her chin on her hand.

"He's not my boyfriend," she mutters, the Russian word registering in her head after a few seconds.

Artemis picks up her pencil and taps the eraser onto the table a few times as she looks at her review packet.

"Log base-ten three times log base-ten five…" she mutters, the speed of the eraser's tapping increasing as her frustration grows.

"I don't even remember doing this!" She flicks the pencil away angrily and watches with little satisfaction as it ricochets off the wall of her booth. Artemis glances at her phone. Maybe she won't call Wally just yet. She can totally do this by herself! But… a little bit of help might not hurt.

With the phone pressed into her ear and ringing, soon enough Bette answers, also wide awake and speaking far too quickly for a normal teenager at half past ten in the evening.

"Hello?"

"Hey Bette."

"Artemis! Hi! Sorry, I'm studying for the logs test tomorrow because oh, my God, I can't believe the test is actually tomorrow and I haven't even started on the word problems in the review packet and it's already 10:43 and my mom is going to have my head for this if I don't ace this test and I won't be able to go to the Star City fair next month if I fail and that would just be so uncool, wouldn't you say so, but right now, I just really need to focus on this te–"

"Jesus, Bette, how much coffee have you had?"

"…all of it?" Artemis snorts.

Honestly, the girl drinks a lot of coffee and talks a little too much sometimes but she's quirky, funny, kind of a badass, and Artemis likes her the most out of the hundreds of students in Gotham Academy. She and Bette have been inseparable since Artemis's first day at the Academy, the two blondes quickly making a habit of pranking and trolling countless freshmen and other sophomores (sometimes they fool around with the upperclassmen, too, but only on Fridays). Of course, the teachers don't know about it, lest the pranking taint Bette's prestigious reputation.

Bette laughs on the other side of the line, composing herself.

"I'm sorry, Artemis. Um, you were going to ask me something?"

"Actually, I was going to ask you… everything." Artemis almost laughs at her predicament. "Can you please explain this log thing to me? I think Mr. Norris just rushed through everything."

"Yeah… he does that when he's stressed," Bette mumbles. "Um, I can try but I've never been great at explaining math…"

"What are you talking about? You're sophomore president and student liaison. What can't you do?"

"Apparently teach math."

"C'mon, Bette," Artemis pleads. "I am running out of time here and I haven't even started the packet."

"Wow. Um, alright." Artemis hears some ruffling on the other side of the line before Bette speaks again, "Okay, I guess we can go through the very basics and re-familiarise you with that first." Artemis picks up her pencil and flips to an empty page in her notebook.

"Okay. So, logarithms. A logarithm is a quantity or a number that represents the power to which a fixed number, which is the base, must be raised to produce a given number. That being said, the answer to log base two-eight must be…" she draws out the last word, obviously expecting Artemis to finish the sentence.

"F-five?" Alright, maybe Artemis did call up the wrong person to teach her logarithms at almost eleven o'clock in the evening because none of that registered in her head. There's a beat before Bette replies.

"N-no, Artemis. The answer is three because – well, because the number three will raise the fixed number, which is two, to the eight, which is the given number!" Artemis almost feels guilty because Bette sounds so proud of herself for explaining the concept.

"…S-sorry, Bette, I'm just not following," she confesses. Bette sighs and Artemis hears her mutter a "Figures" before responding.

"Yeah, I'm not cut out for this teaching thing, am I?" Artemis laughs breathily to console her friend.

"Hey, you can always go with Plan B, right? First female president of the United States! Plus, who needs to be a teacher?"

"Yeah, I hate kids anyway," Bette agrees wholeheartedly.

"As long as they're not creepy, camera-wielding freshmen, they're okay," Artemis refers to that one unnamed black-haired boy who so randomly took a picture with her on the first day of school. Almost a whole year later, she still hasn't been able to figure out who the kid is.

Anyway.

"Sorry, Artemis. I could send you a few of the links Mr. Norris suggested! They might help." Bette offers but Artemis already has printed versions of those links scattered all over the table.

"They're, uh, they're not really helping," Artemis mumbles. Bette laughs shortly.

"They're links. Of course they won't help, what was I thinking." There's another pause between the two girls before Bette says, "You should probably call Wally now, Artemis."

Excuse me? is all Artemis thinks.

"What."

"Come on, you know there's practically no other option and you said yourself that he's not so bad in the first place!"

"Bette, this is the part where I tell you that you're talking too much," Artemis growls.

"Sorry, Arty, the truth hurts. And denial isn't just a river in Egypt, apparently," Bette replies nonchalantly.

"Excuse me!?" Artemis almost shrieks now.

"You heard me. Oh, and when you've settled things with this Wally guy, can I meet him? He sounds great from everything you've told me."

"I have told you next to nothing about Wally!" Artemis whispers through gritted teeth as she turns toward the window next to her booth and away from Ruri's unnervingly keen ears.

"That's not what I remember last Wednesday!" Bette sings teasingly. That is so not accurate. It was after P.E. and Artemis had been reasonably exhausted after basketball – she so hates basketball – and Batman had been expecting her at the cave so she'd been a little tired and dizzy and had been ranting about all things completely unimportant to her. Absolutely unimportant!

"Listen, we both have to study, I'm still running high on coffee, the test is tomorrow and Wally West, whoever this hunk is, is your only choice. Now go call him before you fail this test and degrade yourself to someone who can't meet my standards."

"Bette?"

"Yes."

"Stop talking."

"Gladly. See you tomorrow!" Bette hangs up before Artemis can snap at her friend again. She stares at the accusing screen with narrowed eyes for a few seconds. She knows that she'll end up calling the idiot in a few seconds one way or another because what other choice does she have, really? But she's not going down without a fight.

So Artemis basically waits for five seconds before giving up and holding 3 on her phone. Okay, so she has him on speed-dial, so what? Her mom (speed-dial #1) and Bette (speed-dial #2) are still more important than him.

Artemis ignores the fact that she doesn't have Zatanna's, Rocket's or even M'gann's numbers on her local Gotham phone. She has direct lines to them on the Batphone but she has the entire team's Bat-numbers on that phone. Her actual phone is different. She had it way before she even joined the team. It's kind of personal.

So, why Wally West's number is on her personal phone, she's not sure. And why he's on speed-dial and she hasn't crushed the phone with her boot yet, she'll never know.

West's Residence, Central City
May 23, 22:47 EDT

No one at school knows it, but Wally West is friggin' awesome.

Why, you ask? Well, let's see. It isn't even eleven o'clock yet (that's early for high schoolers, Wally's learned) and Wally finished all of his homework – everything: all the assigned sheets, projects, research, quiz and test prep, and he's pumped for the chemistry test tomorrow – between six-thirty and eight o'clock, before that he'd spent three rough hours training with Black Canary and working on his hand-to-hand combat at the Cave, and before that, Barry had taken him on an hour-long patrol around Central City prior to the first class bell. Personally, Wally had found it weird to be patrolling a relatively calm city at seven in the morning. There was a very, very small chance that anyone would even be awake to commit any crimes that early in the morning but he was never one to back down from a chance to hang out with his favourite uncle. Wally's had a tough day but he isn't complaining because, heck, he's been playing video games since eight o'clock. What could he possibly complain about?

So, as you can see, Wally is freaking awesome to be able to accomplish all of that junk and still have a good four hours of free time before his dear mother screams in his ear to go to bed. Now if he could just convince Robin to get that engraved plaque with the words 'Keep Calm and OMG, Wally West' to hang above his (Robin's) bed in the cave, his life would be perfect.

"Yeah, die, you rotten, no-good Russians!" Wally yells gleefully, blasting his way through Level 36 on the newest single-player installation in the Dead by Number franchise he and Rob have recently gotten into.

"Wally, we are not racist under this roof!" Wally's mom yells from the kitchen. She's baking tonight, which is a bad sign. It means there are hearts Mary hopes to mend and feelings she wishes to console through her extravagant sweets and pastries. But Wally doesn't dwell on that as he blasts through another Russian zombie's brains.

"It's okay, mom, they're zombies!" he yells back.

"We do not discriminate against the undead under this roof!" Wally rolls his eyes but chuckles.

"I'll remember that," he says to himself amusedly just as he passes the level and is given a moment to rest his thumbs. Wally's right knee jiggles in anticipation for the next level and his fingers twitch to start shooting things again when his cellphone rings from its position on the coffee table. His hand goes automatically to his pocket, where he always keeps the Batphone. Having two phones is a little confusing for Wally because it feels like real, physical proof that he's actually living and juggling two different lives.

At the same time, not a lot of people have his cellphone's number except Rob and a few people from school but it's almost eleven so he wonders who could possibly be calling a chemistry geek on a school night. Wally checks the screen and raises his eyebrows. Then he smirks, knowing immediately what a certain grey-eyed, blonde-headed harpy might be needing from him tonight.

"Evening, grasshopper," he quips into the phone, holding it between his ear and shoulder, as he starts Level 37 on the television screen.

"Will you shut up about that?" Artemis's raspy voice bites back through the line.

"Isn't it true, though?" Wally guns through a whole line of zombies and almost whoops ecstatically right into the phone.

"It so isn't."

"Then why are you calling me?" Wally grins when Artemis doesn't reply immediately.

"What unit is it?" he asks, a laugh blending in with the question.

"Logarithms." Artemis sounds pained.

"Good ol' logs? Are they really giving you problems?" he's only teasing but he likes getting under her skin. He always has.

"Wally, I'm already sucking it in enough, okay? Are you coming or what?" she snaps.

"Sorry, Miss Thing. You really think you can just summon me whenever you need a little bit of math tutoring?" Apparently Level 37 isn't as long as the previous levels. He's already reached the rooftop where the boss-battle is supposed to ensue. Zombies are crawling out of every crack on the concrete roof and some of them are even jumping onto the roof from the adjacent buildings. Wally's thumbs fly over the analog controller in a blur as he shoots, reloads, knifes, punches and impressively takes down the lot of them.

"Uhh, yeah," Artemis says as if it's a stupid question. "Especially if Miss Thing is at a 24/7 diner and is offering to buy you anything you want as long as you help her ace this stupid test." That totally gets Wally's attention.

"Anything?"

"Yes. Baywatch. Anything." Wally's character has stopped moving on the screen of the TV and within a second, his arm has been torn off by an old granny zombie. Wally blinks and now his character is being swarmed by zombies, but his stomach tunes out the sound of his soldier's aggravated cries and the zombies' guttural feasting racket. All that diner food, free of charge, for an A in a logs test?

"Where are you?"

The Alleyway, Gotham Zeta Beam Transporter
May 23, 22:56 EDT

Artemis finds herself picking up an impatient Wally West in front of the two buildings that make up the alleyway that holds the Zeta Beam transporter in Gotham. He's clad in his typical outfit, jeans topped with a white long-sleeved shirt underneath an open navy blue button-up that's a size too big. At the sight of him squirming under the flickering light of the lamppost, Artemis feels the corner of her mouth quirk into a small smile as she crosses the street to the two buildings.

"Finally! Could you walk any slower?" The smile falls from Artemis's lips and she remembers who she just called for help. She pauses right in front of the sidewalk, rolls her eyes and steps onto the sidewalk in front of Wally.

"What's wrong, West? Not used to a place like Gotham at this time of night?" she challenges. He narrows his eyes at hers and stuffs his hands into the pockets of his jeans with his thumbs sticking out.

"Oh, please. I've been in worse places. I'll have you know that –"

"Can it, Wallace," Artemis interrupts, rolling her eyes. "We've got bigger things to do than argue all night." She turns around and starts walking back the way she came. Wally glares after Artemis before jogging to catch up with her.

"Yeah, because a Logs test is so huge," he says, obviously poking fun at Artemis's situation. She whirls to face him as they stroll down the sidewalk.

"Excuse me, did you have something better to do?" she snaps.

"Yeah! I did!"

"Oh, and what could you possibly have been doing at this time of night that's more important than a test worth 25% of my grade?"

"You know what, Miss High and Mighty –"

"Come on, Wally. I know how you work. You finish everything before your mom even finishes making dinner and for the rest of the night, you play video games and surf the net like the geek you are," Artemis stops walking and puts her hands on her hips, daring him to contradict her.

Wally stands in front of her with his eyes narrowed and arms rigid. His mouth is open and stammering, trying to force out a comeback. Artemis smirks, knowing that she's called him out on his own game.

"Yeah, well, at least I finish everything before the rest of the city even turns on their lights for the night!" Wally pushes his hands further into his pockets and resumes walking in the direction they were heading.

"Whatever, Wally," Artemis laughs as she walks next to him, "I'm pretty sure you're the only teenager that actually finishes his homework before dinner."

"I'm a special kid!" he cries.

"You certainly are," Artemis agrees happily. He glares at her and walks even faster.

"There better be a lot of food for this," Artemis hears Wally mutter as they finally make it to the street where Gotham's Best is located. Artemis holds her tongue from retaliating with another biting remark as he opens the door and steps back to let her in first. She's glad to feel the air-conditioned atmosphere envelop her after being out in Gotham's humid air. Besides Ruri, she and Wally are still the only ones in the diner and she mentally groans because there's another sign that it's getting late and she really hasn't studied at all for this logs test.

Artemis thinks back to the past week, racking her brain for the reason as to why she hadn't studied even fifteen minutes for the test. Not once has she procrastinated while working on other projects and assignments, nor did she miss out on a single mission during the entire week so far (there's only been three but it is only Thursday). It's been a pretty normal week, considering who she is. Except, oh, that's right. She has that part-time job from four to six at the McDonald's on the edge of Gotham every day and that other job every Monday through Wednesday at the 24/7 café at the gas station near her apartment from four to seven in the morning. She only skips out on her part-time jobs when Batman calls her to the Cave but her bosses are strangely okay with her switching shifts with the other employees, who are all good about keeping to themselves when she doesn't give them a good reason for the shift-switch. She hasn't missed any of her shifts this week so that must have been what's taken up most of her time.

Hey, her mom's in a wheelchair and can't work. Artemis has to pull in as much money as possible from anywhere she can. If she could, she'd happily even take a third job so she can treat her mom to that dainty little French café she always mentions at dinner. Plus, it's not like all this work is taking a toll on her performances at school or with the team. In fact, the only thing the work overload is having a negative effect on is her math grade.

"This is him?" Ruri suddenly asks from behind the counter. The two teenagers stop walking and Wally looks at Artemis.

"Um, by 'him,' if you mean brilliant, life-saving, test-acing, zombie-killing, genius chick magnet, then yes, I am him." Artemis gives him a weird look when he mentions the zombies but she waves it off as another weird thing Wally's probably obsessed with. She quickly slaps him upside the head and he yelps at the abuse.

"Ruri, this is Wally, he's my, uh," she pauses and squints at the subject at hand, who looks back at her blankly, "he's my… my… uh…" she splutters, grasping for the right descriptor, and Wally realises that he doesn't really know what he is to her either.

"I'm her tutor."

"He's my tutor."

They come up with and say the same thing at the same time and Ruri starts to smile, putting all the pieces together despite the fact that he's just met the boy. He bets his salary that these two are attracted to each other like syrup on pancakes or pepper on a steak.

"She's my tutee."

"I'm his tutee."

Their voices overlap again and they're flushing and looking anywhere but at each other and Ruri fights off a laugh. Instead of responding, he reaches behind him and grabs a real plate of hot pancakes from the window that connects the kitchen to the countertop that serves customers. He slides the pancakes onto the counter and gestures for the two kids to come to him.

"Try this," he tells Wally. Wally glances at Artemis, who shrugs, and picks up the fork that's balanced neatly on the side of the plate. He cuts up a hefty slice and deposits the forkful into his mouth.

"Mm," Wally moans appreciatively. "Blueberry?"

"Only my best," Ruri replies.

"You run this joint?" Wally asks.

"Sure do. Every night of the week." Wally grins.

"Then give me everything you got, big man. Ruri, is it?"

"It is. And I'm guessing that I'll be putting it on Arty's tab?" Ruri says with a smirk, nodding at the aforementioned girl who groans and presses two fingers to her temple. Wally grins right back at the large cook and nods eagerly.

"What'll it be first, kid?" Wally purses his lips playfully and pretends to think.

"Surprise me," he says and he can just feel Artemis rolling her eyes next to him.

Artemis rolls her head to face the ceiling in distress and walks away from the counter towards her messy booth. As Wally follows her to the booth, laughing silently, he hears her mutter something along the lines of, "They were not supposed to get along, they were not supposed to get along."

Artemis's Booth, Gotham's Best Diner
May 24, 01:14 EDT

It's easy for Wally and Artemis to fall back into the pattern they quickly discovered they could both agree on a little less than a month ago. It involves a little bit of food, a little bit of patience, a few of Wally's lame math jokes here and there, and surprisingly enough, a lot of smiling on Artemis's part. Granted, there's also a lot of forehead-flicking, table-slamming, pencil throwing, and enraged growling in her part of the agreement but Wally knows that it's all part of the package deal. No one ever said that taming the dragon was going to be easy.

Ruri's been great about bringing the two teens food every now and then. Actually, he refills Artemis's mug of coffee and brings Wally extravagantly sized dishes like fresh plates of cob salad, hamburgers, french fries and club sandwiches and one time, he even dropped by with a plate of perfectly English fish and chips (Perfect fish and chips? In an American diner? In Gotham?). Ever the bottomless pit, Wally wolfs down each dish almost maliciously but he never fails to chew and swallow before speaking in order to help Artemis with a problem.

It's weird because when Artemis is studying math by herself, it always takes some time for the concepts to click in her head. The circumference of a circle equalled both what and what now? And why does y equal that after all of … that? And wait, how is angle a related to angle b when –

It takes her some time but Artemis is a smart girl. Math may not be her favourite subject but she deals with it and gets great scores, which is fitting considering all the effort she's exerting for the stupid subject. (But honestly, she can't wait 'til the upperclass program starts up next year because then she can choose all the advanced literature and history and avoid all the advanced math for the rest of her life.)

What's weird is that when Wally's studying with her, it's like some kind of mathematical mental block has suddenly disappeared. The circumference of a circle does equal two-pi-r and pi-d, of course y equals what it equals and she can see that clearly angle a and b are alternate exterior angles. Quadratic formulae are all lined up in organised little rows in her head, the identities of trigonometric functions click when they have to, and finding x is easy as ice cream.

"So because three is the number that raises four to 64, three is the answer to log base-four 64. Remember, all of this," he circles something on the piece of scratch paper they're studying, "will always equal the opposite. And that's all a logarithm is. The opposite of any exponent." Paired with his constant sketches and scribbled numbers, Wally explains everything to Artemis easily and he's just so damn patient and it's killing her because she's not yet completely used to this softer side of him.

"You're really good at this," she says to him quietly, working on the next problem in the packet.

"Good at what?" Wally asks before munching on a french fry.

"All of this," Artemis says, gesturing at all her work all spread out on the table next to his empty plates.

"If you ever think of becoming a teacher, you're not looking in the wrong place," she says, gazing at him meaningfully from her position across the table. He lets out a laugh and rubs his neck, a nervous habit she's noticed in all the time they've spent together.

"I'm more of a chemistry, stand-in-a-lab kind of guy," he tells her.

"Yeah, but, if you ever need to make money, you could make some serious dough out of tutoring."

"I make enough dough out of you, princess," he jokes, tossing a small french fry in the air and catching it with his open mouth. She raises an eyebrow and reminds herself that she does have to find a way to pay for all that food.

"Glad to know I'm special," she tosses at him with a roll of her eyes and he clears his throat, falling silent. Artemis isn't quite sure what to make of that so she looks at review question 21b and finishes it off.

At ten to three o'clock in the morning, Wally's let Artemis loose on the impromptu mini-test he's quickly written for her (again, it consists of problems from her review packet and from her textbook, and some of his own random questions) and since he's got his watch timing her, he's fallen asleep on his arm on top of the table. Artemis hasn't noticed yet because she's on the last question and it's another word problem and she so hates word problems but she's almost got it –

"Done!" she slams both hands on the table, surprising Wally and flinging the pencil into the air in the process. The pencil clacks down back onto the table and Wally jerks awake, bolting up in his seat, and fumbles with his watch.

"16 minutes, 53 seconds. That's your best time yet, Blondie." He's proud but he can't help the yawn from escaping his mouth. The wide smile from her face falls into a slight frown and she tilts her head at him.

"You're never tired after a serious feast like that," she notes, leaning back in her seat. Now that she's done studying (thank Batman), she sweeps her loose hair onto one shoulder and relaxes into the cushion of her chair.

Wally blinks his eyes owlishly and shakes his head a little to get rid of his sleepy haze. He reminds her of a puppy that's just been startled awake and she watches him with a soft look upon her eyes.

"I've had a long day," he explains, waving her off.

"What'd you do? We had no missions today. Was it school?"

"That," Wally confirms, "and other things." He starts telling her about his day, from that ridiculous seven-am patrol with Barry, to his Spanish teacher's totally unprecedented pop quiz, and ending with Dinah's ruthless three-hour training session, recalling how he couldn't even feel his knuckles afterwards.

"Not to mention when I got home, my da–" Wally stops abruptly, fearing that he'd reveal too much. He clamps his mouth shut and opts for downing his root beer instead.

"Your what?" Artemis asks, truly confused. He'd been on a roll and she'd been rolling along with him, chuckling when he recounted his multiple fails with Black Canary and scoffing at his fruitless attempts to flirt with their mentor. Now he's suddenly shut down and Artemis can discern the familiar signs of withheld secrets laced all over his behaviour.

"Nothing," Wally says, and he shoots a grin at her that's a better mask than she'll ever learn to conjure for herself. He lets out a short laugh, "It's just late."

"If you say so, Baywatch," Artemis says. She starts to pack up because she knows when to stop prying. She might show him a little (okay, a lot of) hostility here and there but she draws the line when it comes to showing him respect. Artemis holds respect for everyone, even imbecilic speedsters like Wally.

Artemis finishes her cold coffee (Ruri doesn't like it when you leave leftovers) and snatches a few of Wally's french fries before he can protest. She smirks at him and hoists her bag onto her shoulder before getting up and walking towards the counter. Ruri's sitting atop an old stool that looks like it's about to break under his weight and his feet are propped up on the counter. He's reading a small, worn book that's entitled something in Russian. Artemis digs around in her bag to get her wallet when she realises that there is no way she has enough cash to cover everything Ruri fed Wally tonight.

"Ruri, uh," she starts, "j-just add a few more weeks to that deal, would you?" Ruri looks up from his book. "I-I promise I'll work this all off for as long as you need me —"

"Wait," Wally interrupts, holding out a hand. "Did you really think I was going to let you pay for all that?" Artemis looks at him.

"W-well, yeah. It's your 'dough,' isn't it?" she says, surrounding the word 'dough' with finger quotations as if it's some kind of classified agreement they'd both approved earlier. She turns back to Ruri, who's content with placing his book down on his lap and watching their exchange.

"Artemis, I was just fooling around. You really don't have to pay," Wally insists.

"Oh, drop it, Wally, I can pay for this," Artemis claims with a wave of her hand.

"Apparently, you can't," Wally presses.

"Are you going to throw me a pity party, Wally?" she snarls, her temper rising. She doesn't need this. Not from him. "Because my fist can show you –"

"Artemis. Stop." Wally declares the two words with a tone of severity and authority that he never uses. It's enough that Artemis actually shuts her mouth.

"Ruri, start a tab for me, will you?" Ruri nods at Wally, already pulling out the necessary materials to start Wally's tab.

"I, uh, actually don't have my wallet right now so I'll pay you back next time," Wally says, scratching his head.

"I'll hold you to that, kid," Ruri says, a friendly smile on his lips. Before anyone else can say or do anything else, Wally grabs Artemis's wrist and pulls her towards the diner's front door. Calling a goodbye to Ruri, the two teens step outside into the three-am air.

Once outside, Wally can feel the the thick air between him and the archer, and it isn't because of Gotham's humidity. In fact, it's a little cooler now after a few hours of darkness. No, there's an uncomfortable tension that's taut in the air and Wally turns to Artemis, positive that he likes it better if they're constantly biting at each other instead of running headfirst into the awkward wall.

"Listen, back there, I - I wasn't patronising you or doing anything to pity you." Artemis turns to him. "I mean, I don't know what it's like for you and your mom but I'd never just let you pay for me like that, okay?" his hands gesticulate wildly under the weak lamp light as he fumbles for the right words.

"This isn't about the money, I promise," Wally says. He's looking straight at her and his gaze is so intense and sincere that she finds it hard to look away.

"I - I have to be a gentleman, I guess? It's just… it just didn't feel right, letting you pay," he finishes off, placing his right hand on the back of his neck. With that gesture, Artemis knows immediately that he's being genuine but she has the feeling that she knew it from the very beginning anyway.

She sighs, "Yeah, I – I'm sorry, too. Just, I kind of freak out sometimes when it comes to money, you know?" She bows her head but looks up at him with an apologetic look upon her face. He totally understands, though. Well, not totally, because he's actually got two parents with good, steady jobs. But he understands her position and why she reacted the way she did.

"So… we're good?" he offers. Artemis lets out a short laugh.

"We're good. You and your tab? Are not." Wally flinches.

"I'll… convince my mom. I figure she'll like this place as much as I do," he says offhandedly. That's a problem for another day. Wally yawns and stretches his arms, placing both hands behind his head.

"Man, I do not feel like going home," he says to no one in particular.

"Burnt out?" she asks. He nods. They're both aware that even with the Zeta Beam Transporter in Central City, Wally still has to run a good thirty miles before he even gets to his neighbourhood.

"Eh. Gotham's got a lot of bench rats and hobos, right? I could totally blend in and they'd never catch me in the morning." He grins at Artemis who looks at him with this exasperated and unamused look on her face.

"Wally, sleeping on a Gotham park bench has got to be the stupidest idea you've ever had," she says.

"Hey, it's only stupid if you haven't tried it," Wally retorts.

"That doesn't justify –" Artemis groans. Before Wally can say anything though, she's hit with an absurd idea.

"Do you," she falters but starts again, "do you wanna crash at my place?" she offers quietly. Wally blanches.

"Uhh, I was - I was totally kidding, I can make it back home just fine, it's only a few miles –"

"Please, Baywatch. You'll break your face running around even the safest city in the world," she says, laughing to ease the mood. He wrinkles his nose but she's right. He's way burnt.

"Come on, you're crashing at mine. Consider it a thank you for taking care of all that food." She tilts her head towards the direction they're going to have to walk and starts to make her way home. When she's sure Wally hasn't run away, collapsed or combusted and is actually following her, she lets out a small sigh.

Thank goodness Jade isn't home.

Nguyen-Crock's Apartment, Gotham City
May 24, 03:35 EDT

Paula is wide awake and reading a book about the art of Japanese tea ceremony with the TV murmuring softly in the background when the bell at the front door jingles lightly and the door creaks open slowly.

"Mom?" Artemis's slightly hesitant voice carries through the hallway and into the living room, where Paula sits. The two Crock women are used to the other being up late at night. It comes with the hero and ex-con business. Or maybe it's in their blood.

"I'm in the living room, Artemis," Paula calls. She hears some extra shuffling and leans her head to glance down the hallway. Instead of one blonde teenager walking into the living room, she's greeted with the sight of her daughter and a young red-headed man.

"Mom, this… is Wally." Wally smiles at Paula who also offers a smile back.

"Pleased to meet you," he says warmly. He looks at Artemis, who's watching him, "He's, uh, in the same extra curricular activities as I am."

"Oh, you're Kid Flash! The Wally West, am I right?" Paula asks. Wally smiles uncertainly, "Uhh, I think?"

"Artemis talks about you all the time," Paula says. Artemis's eyes widen and Wally's left eyebrow lifts high on his forehead while his lips melt into a crooked smile.

"You do, do you?" Wally teases Artemis, nudging her lightly with his elbow.

"I do not!" she hisses at her mother.

"She does," Paula assures Wally. They both laugh and Artemis lets out a frustrated groan before excusing herself to get an extra pillow and blanket for Wally. Paula gets Wally settled on the living room couch and they sit together while Artemis brushes her teeth.

"You like my daughter?" Paula asks innocently at one point. Wally's eyes snap up and he stammers before replying lamely, "She - she's very… capable." He nods as if agreeing with himself that, yes, she is indeed capable. Paula gives Wally a weird look and quietly laughs at the boy.

"Don't you worry," she says, laying her hand on his forearm. "It's never easy the first time around."

"I'm not sure what you mean, ma'am," Wally stutters, genuinely at a loss. She gives him a warm, though cryptic smile.

"You will sooner or later." Paula gives him one last smile, bids him goodnight, and rolls to her bedroom, where Artemis is getting her bed ready.

After helping her settle down in bed, Artemis brushes some stray hair from her mother's face and Paula has the nerve to talk about it right there.

"He's special, isn't he?" She holds some satisfaction in the split second that Artemis freezes in her actions.

"Who, Wally? Yeah," she snorts after recovering quickly, "about as special as a turnip." Paula rolls her eyes.

"You never bring home any boys, Artemis. And this one likes you! Can't you see it in his eyes?"

"Mom, my life is not some lame teenage drama on Disney, so please stop treating it like one," Artemis scolds lightly.

"Oh, a few more episodes and you'll see what I'm talking about," Paula teases, reaching up to pat Artemis on the cheek.

"Way too much TV, Mom. Really," Artemis speculates, but she reaches down to kiss her mother on the cheek anyway. Paula pinches Artemis on the cheek lightly before wishing her a good night.

Artemis peeks into the living room, hoping to wish Wally a good night as well, but the speedster's burnt out like a busted lightbulb. He's crashed on the couch with the extra blanket draped over his legs, one arm hanging down to scrape the floor. Artemis smiles when she hears him snoring softly and she walks to her room to get some well-deserved sleep.

She remembers about the logs test she has to take in a few hours but the numbers and floating calculators are blocked out by visions of french fries, grinning redheads and lame math jokes.

Nguyen-Crock's Apartment, Gotham City
May 24, 07:30 EDT

"Wake up, Baywatch," Artemis shakes Wally's shoulder awake and he mumbles something incoherently.

"Wally!" Artemis says loudly into his ear. Wally's eyes snap open and he jerks away from Artemis at the sight of her so close to his face.

"Wha - where - where am I? What's going on?" he splutters, all flustered.

"You're at my place. We pulled an all nighter doing logarithms, remember?"

"Oh…" It's all coming back now. "Right."

"It's 7:30. I figure that'll give you enough time to get home and get ready," Artemis says.

"Right, right." There's a beat of silence between the two of them.

"This couch is really comfortable," Wally says sleepily. Artemis snorts.

"Um… thanks?" she replies. Wally smiles at her and bends down to pull his shoes on. When he finishes tying the laces, Artemis holds a tumbler out to him.

"What's this?" he asks.

"Coffee. Creamed and sugared. 37 cubes, just the way you like it," she smiles at him. Wally grins and accepts the tumbler.

"You know me too well, Blondie," he says, nudging her again. Her side tingles at the familiar touch of his elbow. She gets up and pulls him to his feet.

"Just give it back at the Cave," she says. He nods and stretches out to prepare himself for his run home.

"Hey, tell your mom I said thanks for letting me crash."

"Yeah, of course." There's another beat of silence and just before it borders on awkward, Wally speaks up again.

"So. Test today."

"Hm," Artemis huffs, "Wish me luck. Might need it."

Wally gives her this thoughtful look and smiles at her.

"Nah, I don't think so," he says with a slight shake of his head. Artemis frowns lightly but before she can open her mouth to ask him what he means, he lays his hand on her shoulder and then he's gone. His sudden departure leaves behind the lingering scent of sweet coffee, freshly baked bread, and scattered leaves, a scent that seems to follow him around everywhere.

Artemis ignores the tingling feeling on her shoulder that his fingers caused and the fluttering butterflies that arise in her stomach. She focuses on getting through the day, acing that goddamn logs test, getting to her job at McDonald's and rushing to the Cave right afterwards.

When she arrives, Zatanna, Raquel and Kal'dur are busy taking Tula and Garth around the Cave on a tour, M'gann is chasing Garfield down on one of their little sibling tag games, and the only one Artemis finds when she steps out of the Zeta Tube is Rob, who's killing time by playing some zombie game on the den's TV. Artemis asks him where everyone else is and Rob tells her about the tour, about the scampering green-skinned siblings, and that Wally's helping Conner fix his bike in the garage.

Artemis walks into the kitchen and stops when she sees her tumbler on the counter. She walks up to it and sees that it's sitting on top of a foot-long receipt that hangs over the side of the countertop. She recognises the logo of Gotham's Best at the top of the receipt and smiles to herself. There's also a rectangular sticky note on the side of the tumbler and she peels it off to read the familiar, scratched penmanship.

A,
Ruri says hi and that my tab and I are "good" now.
Passed by your mom to compliment her couch and she told me you aced the test.
Who's the resident speedster now?
-Wally

Artemis scoffs and shakes her head. She grabs the tumbler and the receipt off of the counter and walks off to find the Cave's resident speedster, eager to share her logarithmic success with him. She throws the receipt into the trash bin as she leaves the kitchen but tucks the sticky note into her back pocket, smiling softly to herself.

Souvenir.


You don't know what I had to go through to finish this. Sure, I got to play with Wally but editing a chapter that's nearly 8k words time and time again… is not as fun as it sounds. This wasn't supposed to explode, but I guess I'm kind of glad it did. Last part's going to be outlined soon and I'll try to post it ASAP. Hope you guys liked this chapter!