Warning: Swearing (just an ickle bit), nothing major.

...

First impressions are, apparently, usually the wrong impressions.

For instance, judging a book by its cover means that you could be missing out on the best read of your life, Ugly isn't always nasty, pretty isn't always nice and the list goes on.

But occasionally, for heroes especially, judging a person within a glance could mean the difference between life and death. Now if that's moral impudence then the world was lost as far as Wally could tell. Then again, he was dangling by his ankle from the grasp of a being that smelt of cologne, wore a torn tuxedo and displayed teeth bigger than the ones that gleamed from the inflated Bollywood posters of India as he had passed in search of a cheap meal. So from his position, just about everything looked pretty dismal and hopeless.

He tried to focus on the ground as it swayed beneath him rather than the pungent tang of fish breath that harassed his nostrils and reminded him of the small problem whose talon he dangled from. At least he wasn't sure whether it was a talon but it certainly wasn't a hand and he wasn't committed enough to pursue the subject beyond this pointer.

"I'd expected some defiance from you, after all red-heads do have more fun, apparently. I'm not entirely convinced."

Wally glanced at him, fear gone and replaced by curiosity. Was he questioning the advantages of being a red-head?! His curiosity drained as a furious determination had his jaw set firmly and his knuckles cracking.

"I'd rather be a red-head than fuck-ugly!" he blurted.

The thing grinned again curling its lip and, to Wally's relief, concealed the majority of its yellowed teeth.

"I did not expect such foul lanuage from a so called 'hero'. Luckily, I take no offense from a comment so hypocritical."

Wally guessed that was meant to be offensive, "It's not hypocritical."

"You could have fooled me."

Flash screwed his face in what would have been determination but quickly twisted into a grimace when he caught a wiff of the monster's breath.

It snarled, "Don't worry Wally, what you can't provide in your acts of comedy, you will make up for in your suffering."

A shimmering rod of metal was brought to Wally's attention at this point. It reflected a lethal silver of light that seemed to reinforce the threat that still rang in Flash's ears.

Gears creaked and springs coiled and tensed as he looked for an escape route whilst Wally stared dumbly at the instrument.

"Dude, if that's going up my ass then you will regret this." He exclaimed with more courage than he had.


John liked to think that he had a sixth sense for the outcome of danger. His suspicion had been proven when he had bought Wally a first aid kit on whim just before the idiot had broken his mirror and fallen on the shards. It had saved him from a telephone call at 4 in the morning telling him that his friend was at the hospital and the nurse there wanted to know if Wally had any motives that could drive him to suicidal measures.

Though Wally had informed John that he thought Bats had been spying on him more frequently after he'd had a medical exam at the Watch Tower just after the incident.

John had shrugged it off as a natural inclination to keep tabs on a potential load on the heavy bundle of stress issues that still sat on the League's shoulders.

Then again Wally had always been a stress issue, one that Batman should know required 24 hour monitoring (most of which had been loaded onto him) and shouldn't need to be added to. Stupid detective.

John reconsidered that statement.

Note to self: Never admit you're wrong but never say that to Bruce's face.

...Speaking of detectives John wondered if Question had found anything since sending him to find some heavily scented caffeine.


Vic glared at the screen with a look that, even behind his faceless mask, could send a bat running back to his mom.

Except for Bruce who didn't have any parents.

That was insensitive Vic...but strangely satisfying.

He needed to see someone about that.

Referring himself to the task at hand, Vic continued to do nothing useful. He glared, willing the computer to do anything except explode in what some would call his face.

He had it worked out, he knew he had. The formula was right there, he just needed to double-check his findings.

Come on Sage, this is for the lives of all of the people of this world. I can't fail because of some distant relation to my girlfriend.

But a heroe's greatest nemesis is their fear of death and, though Vic had discovered this early on in his career, it was the only probem he had attempted and failed to cure himself of, apart from his rumoured insanity though he did not consider this as much of a problem as those around him did.

His gloved hand moved towards the key board, their tips skimming the surface it sat on, he just needed to check, to make sure this was all correct then he and John, and perhaps other members close to Wally could set out to pry him from the clutches of whoever's fists he was caged within.

Things are never that simple.

He was just touching those lettered keys now, images of Huntress's raised fists pounding into his prized coffee table blurred his vision but he continued though his palms were slick with sweat beneath the gloves.

"QUESTION, I'VE FOUND YOUR DAMN COFFEE! DON'T EVER MAKE ME VISIT THAT COFFEE SHOP AGAIN! THAT WAITRESS WAS CREEPY AS HELL AND THAT WAS BEFORE I FOUND OUT SHE WAS A MA-"

Question would have been a mile away at a speed that would have amazed Flash if the room was a little more spacious, though if the walls weren't reinforced with the thickest steel by the best of Batman's technicians it probably wouldn't have phased him.

But they were...the word ergo is reinforced heavily in this sentence.

As long as he was alive, Wally could wait.

Med bay couldn't.


Question sat up in his bed, he had gone unexamined due to his stubborn refusal to remove any item of clothing, even his shoes.

Despite the liquid he could feel, trailing from his nose and sticking his mask to his "face" and the fact that he had knocked himself out, Vic was sure that his pride was better off than John's who sat in the bed next to him. He had been admitted with minor burns that went from his chin to his abdomen. The doctors had believed they were from the electrical equipment tht had back fired until they had discovered a liquid staining his clothing which after many tests turned out to be traces of coffee. Question hadn't stopped snickering since the diagnosis.

John failed to see the funny side of the matter.

"How the hell did I get burns from coffee!? I took at least half an hour to get here."

The volume and pitch of Question's snickering increased until he had to clutch his chest in an attempt to force himself to breathe.

John through him a glare, "It's not that funny!" he snapped.

"Wow, extra hot coffee," Question managed after pressing an oxygen mask to his face, "Gladys must have like you."

"Gladys, what kind of name is that for a man?"

"They like to keep their services as feminine as possible over there in order to keep the men happy and emptying their pockets."

"How does naming a man Gladys and dressing her up as a woman keep the customers happy?!"

"Well, it obviously fooled you, you keep referring to him as her and he only does coffee that good for those who are extra nice to him."

"W-what!" John stuttered, "I was not 'extra nice' to him, her I mean him."

QUestion sniffed the air, making the sniff as audible as possible because John couldn't see his face mould into an expression of pure bliss, "He didn't seem to think so."

John looked like he was about to protest but when he couldn't find any retaliation, slumped into the matress and began to sulk, unable to see the smirk on Vic's face which once again morphed again into one of bliss as he fed on the scent of a beautifully made coffee.


To know when the Dark Knight was mildly amused or in one of his, not better but less foul moods you had to know him really well. To know when he was happy you had to know him to the point where you coud read him like a book. To know how to make him happy you had to get inside his mind, sometimes literally.

But you didn't have to know him much, if at all, to know what pissed him off and to know when he was pissed off.

So it didn't take a genius to figure out his mood today and how it had been for the past few days.

The founders had wisely left him to stew and the greater percentage of the League were keeping their distance, whether they had abilities or not.

Sometimes cowering wasn't such a cowardly option.

He had been frantically typing for the past few days, tracking Question and John's research and doing his own in order to keep his findings fruitful and varying, though Question had essentially been keeping on the same train tracksas he add, occasionally steering off into the weird and wonderful worlds of "the poision that is fizzy yoghurt" or "junk food's weighty issues; how over consumption it causes rips in space" and other food related issues.

The point was that, like Question he wasclose but, too like Question for his liking, hehad hit a wall. Though not quite as literally as fortune would have had it if he were the Question.

He needed help.

Sane help.


Don't ask, just don't ask, I am simply overjoyed because my cousin was born this weekend and if I want to include some humour into a plot that is spiralling out of control then I will, even if it is my own species of humour that most people don't seem to understand, but i'm not easily understandable. Reviews are juicy and statistically innacurate but generally correct, unless you're a flamer, i can take criticism but not stuff that screams "Die Bitch, you and your famliy should burn in the pits of hell!" Constructive reviews also boost my so far disturbingly unmotivating motivation to write. Ahem, about the coffee and Gladys thing, I imagined everything about Question to be as strange as humanly possible, again mind thing.