Hi! Hope everyone had a good Easter, and thanks for the birthday wishes :D! You guys are too sweet! STORY TIME!

The redheaded speedster sat cross-legged on the carpeted floor of his new friends basement. The friend in question sat across from him, mirroring his seated position and rubbing his hand through his blonde hair awkwardly. "Dude… I know you said you wanted to talk… but this is getting weird…" confessed Hunter. Indeed, Wally had called Hunter that morning and told him that he needed to talk to him.

Wally had gotten fed up with his secrecy. He needed to tell someone - something. Just enough to get that feeling of weight off his chest. Not all of the details of his life of course, just the basics. He needed to get it out – and he felt Hunter was the best person to ventilate to. Hunter had been nothing but nice to Wally ever since they met. They had grown really close and Wally felt like he owed it to Hunter to tell him why he was moping around on that first day of school.

But, Wally couldn't find the right words, so he and Hunter had been sitting in the basement for 10 minutes in an awkward silence. Wally glanced down at the small silver ring that bared Artemis's green fletching. He didn't take it off ever since he first put it on, for it gave him a sense of security - like she was always with him.

Taking a deep breath, Wally looked at Hunter. "Remember that deal with made the first day we met?"

The awkward smile on Hunter's face fell as he looked away from Wally's intense and serious vision. Truth is, he had a secret of his own, and wasn't himself quite ready to 'spill the beans'. Still, Wally was his friend, and if Wally was ready, he was ready. A deal's a deal after all. Hunter nodded solemnly and waited patiently to hear what Wally had to say.

"Well… I think I'm ready to tell you," said Wally. Hunter adjusted his seated position some and folded his hands across his lap. Wally gulped back what felt like a stone in his throat and blinked a few times – preparing himself for the tale he was about to tell. "The reason I was so – depressed," began Wally. "Was… well…" Wally sighed again. "I really close friend of mine died over the summer," Wally paused to blink again. "I miss her, and I can't stop thinking about her,"

A dramatic amount of weight seemed to lift right off of Wally's shoulders as he spilled his secret to Hunter. He felt somewhat relived that the secret was out.

Hunter looked at Wally with his eyes drenched with shock. "Oh…" he managed to say after a long pause.

Wally nodded, then continued. "I'm sorry for not telling you sooner. I just didn't want for you to think of me as a charity case,"

"It's okay, it's okay," said Hunter quickly; still not being able to process what Wally had told him. "Can I ask how?"

Wally look away from Hunter. He hadn't planned on telling him anything else past the fact that his friend died. Sure, possibly seeing Artemis again was eating him up inside, but he needed to take baby steps with Hunter. They may have been good friends, but they had only known each other for a few weeks. "Car accident," he mumbled.

"I see," Hunter paused, than gently placed a hand on Wally's bicep. "I'm really sorry, bro,"

Wally nodded and tried to force a smile. "Thanks. And look, you don't have to tell me your end of the deal if you don't want to,"

Hunter retracted his hand from Wally's arm slowly – contemplating weather or not he was ready. But fair was fair, and Wally had just confided in him. Time to repay the favor. Taking a deep breath himself, Hunter bit his lip some before clearing his throat and looking Wally right in the eye.

"I live with my aunt because…" Hunter paused to gently bit his quivering lip. "My dad… my dad went crazy and killed my mom. He's in jail right now, and my aunt was the closest family I had,"

Both of them simultaneously felt as though they were going to being to weep – weep for the ones they had lost to the world. Wally for Artemis, Hunter for his parent's, and both of them for each other and the losses they had experienced. But their testosterone told them to hold their tears in and only sit there quietly, so they did. Yet what a long time to sit there quietly it was. Neither moved and neither spoke for another 10 minutes. It wasn't until 10 minutes had passed that they finally reached out and gave each other the world biggest bro hug ever to be shared in human history. And to make sure it was still quite masculine, they broke by giving each other firm and tough slaps on the back to extracted the pain from their hearts and send it to their spins. It was in those slaps though were the silently promised not to ask any personal questions about their tragedies. They each sensed that the other wasn't truly ready to talk about anything yet, and felt it better to stay silent for the others sake.

"Thanks," said Wally.

"Same, bro," said Hunter.

Just as their 'bromatinc' moment came to a close, Wally's phone went off in his jacket pocket. Checking it, he saw he had a text message from his Uncle Barry.

"Come to the mountain. I need to talk with you,"

Wally sighed at the message. While he still met up with the team, he dreaded having to go back to the mountain where he knew everyone thought he was going crazy for claiming that Artemis was still alive. In all honesty, Wally did feel stupid for thinking so, but something in his heart was convinced that it was her – even though that part in question was also convinced that she was dead. Biding his friend farewell, he paced himself out of Hunter's house and promptly made his way to the mountain. Hoping that this 'talk' wasn't another mission. If it was, he knew he defiantly wasn't ready for it, not yet anyway.

Hunter watched Wally leave, but remained on his carpet for a few more minutes. Pulling a red mask out of his pocket, he scanned over it and let a few tears from his eyes drop onto the mask. Then, slowly and carefully, he placed the mask over his head and the tears stopped. For some reason, whenever he put on the mask, he felt invincible and in control. His past would evaporate from his mind and be replaced with vengeance. Behind his mask, Hunter felt free. Free enough to do whatever he wanted – weather it was joining the shadows or seeking revenge on anyone for what his father did…

Wally arrived to the cave to see that he was, once again, the last to arrive. Only this time, it wasn't just the team in the main entrance to the cave; Batman, Black Canary, Red Tornado, Captain Marvel, and Flash were all there waiting for him. And like it had been ever since Artemis' death, no one made a joke about how the fastest one of the team was always late. Instead, they got right into it.

"A few days ago, some technology went missing from a high security lab in Florida. A computer program which allows the user to track magical activity anywhere in the world," Batman paused to call up a holographic screen of a gold computer disk. "It was stolen the same night you were all at the New Your Harbor,"

The team gasped in shock and anger. They were tricked. "How…?" asked Robin. His question was base, but he, and the rest of the young team, didn't know what to say.

"It seems as though the team you were fighting were just acting as a distraction for whoever stole this disk. We've analyzed the footage from the docks' security cameras and crossed referenced them with criminal databases," Batman pushed a button and called up the images taken more than a week ago of the team fighting the group of younger criminals who had no business working together in the first place. On the screens were Mammoth, Shimmer, Terror Twins, Icicle Jr., the boy known as Zoom, and a picture of a stack of crates with only a long orange braid flying out from behind them. "We believe that these young adults were just distracting you as to let another group of criminals steal the computer program,"

"So the question is: who were they distracting us from?" concluded Kaldur.

"We have some footage from the lab in Florida of the heist. It's very small, but just enough…" Batman's voice trailed off as a video began to play. It showed an ordinary lab for about two seconds before a man with green hair jumped out from the shadows and destroyed the camera. Batman quickly played the tape back and paused it at the right moment. Smiling his crazed smile was a man whose name was known around the world, and seen in their nightmares – the Joker. "And this-" Batman pulled a small glass jar from his pocket that had a thick and jagged green-leaf in it. " - Was found at the scene of the crime. The group identified it right away. The green leaf belonged to the person who had named themselves after it - Poison Ivy.

"The Joker, Poison Ivy…" thought Robin out-loud.

"The Injustice League!" resulted M'Gann. Her voice was notably less cheery then usual, but it had been like that ever since Artemis had passed away.

"That is what we believe," confirmed Batman and he placed the glass jar back in his pocket.

"So, if the guys we were fighting were working from them… then are they like… some sort of Young Injustice League?" asked Superboy. Batman nodded and Superboy scoffed. "Wonder were they got that idea from," he mumbled.

"Nevertheless," said Batman "We've got to-"

"Who's the girl?" asked Wally loudly. He hoped that by calling attention to her, the Dark Knight would find that something was off, and possibly prove (and confirm to Wally) that his lost love was still alive.

However, Batman just shrugged. "We don't know. We don't have any clear shots of her," Batman then called up a few images from the docks, all only had a few glimpses of the orange archer; a flying arrow, a strand of hair, nothing that would provide enough evidence to Wally or the others. "Like I was saying; the League will track the movements of the Injustice League, while the seven of you will monitor this new… 'team',"

Everyone nodded to Batman's request. Wally almost found himself smiling. He couldn't help but think that if they worked on this case together his suspicions would be confirmed once and for all. He so desperately wanted to know if Artemis was alive or not. If she was, he promised himself that he would run to the ends of the earth to find her. If she wasn't… well… Wally would just worry about that later.

Batman began to exit from the cave as the team started to disperse. Wally thought he'd trudge his way to the kitchen, but the feeling of a strong hand landed on his shoulder. Turning, he saw his Uncle staring back down at him.

"So, I hear you've encounter your Reverse-Flash," he said with a smile.

Wally cocked an eyebrow at him. "My what?"

Barry looked down at his young protégé. He then walked to the holographic computers and called up three images. "When Jay Garrick was the Flash, he battled The Rival," An image of a man wearing a darker version of the original Flash costume was made larger then the two other images. "He used his super-speed for evil, much like my Reverse-Flash, Professor Zoom," an image of a man wearing the reverse colors of the Barry's uniform was made larger then the other two. "Because they use their there speed for evil, this makes them the reverse of us. Your Reverse-Flash seems to be this Zoom character," an image of the boy Wally had fought a week ago was made lager then the other two. To be honest, Wally had this kid on his mind all week. He was confused as to how and why this young villain had obtained powers like him. "But, there's something different about this one…" commented Barry as he typed into the hollow graphic keyboard. The images disappeared and were replaced by footage of the docks.

"Different?" asked Wally as he watched himself fight his appointed at super-speed.

"Jay and I were looking over this footage together, and we don't think Zoom is using super-speed per-say," explained Barry as he slowed the footage down. Wally watched and noticed the difference as well. At first, Wally could see he and Zoom fighting at normal speed (in which everyone else was fight super slowly), but then, Zoom pulled a move in which for a brief second where he moved slightly faster then Wally. "The other Reverse-Flash's could only move as fast us as – this one can move… faster,"

Wally gulped. He was nowhere near the ability of the two Flash's before him. And if this Reverse-Flash was unlike anything they had seen before, Wally became fearful that he wouldn't be able to defeat him.

"We think he's… manipulating time-," explained Barry as he closed the screen. "Making everything around him slower – even you,"

"How?"

Barry took a moment to call up a video from the Flash Museum in Central City. It had been blown up a while ago, and was in the middle of being re-built. It was from the previous year, and Barry zoomed in on what looked like an ordinary treadmill. "Remember how my museum exploded last year?" asked Barry, trying to hide the slight disappointment in his voice.

Wally nodded. "I remember you telling me that you never figured out how it happened,"

Barry rubbed the back of his neck. "Well… I did. But I thought everyone from the accident was killed, and therefore I didn't need to go to the authorities about it," Barry played the image on screen. Wally watched as a person wearing all black snuck around the museum. This person was paralyzed as they were seen to be moving around on a wheel chair. Using their hands, the person crawled unto the treadmill artifact and pressed a few buttons. The treadmill began to move, then, suddenly, it exploded. Wally gasped a little as the footage cut out. "I invented that treadmill to give the ability to move forward and backward in time-" Barry stopped for a moment as he reminisced over his lost invention. "I guess that this – person – used it poorly and caused it to self-destruct. I don't know how or why, but it happened," Barry closed the screen and approached Wally. "But now I think that – whoever that person was – tried to go back in time and get their legs back. And seeing this Reverse-Flash use time manipulation, only makes me think that he caused the accident, and got effected by the time streamed when it happened,"

Wally concluded the rest. "So you think that the person who broke into the museum last year is this Zoom guy," Barry nodded to confirm Wally's accusations - causing for Wally to have a mini panic attack. Now Wally was really scared. He was great at all forms of science, but time manipulation was something he was always confused by. And now, this Zoom character was using it against him. Barry looked at Wally's face, and rested his hand on his shoulder. He could detected when Wally was nervous or scared about something, and understood that, as a mentor, it was up to him to help him. "How do I… defeat him?" asked Wally, his voice shaking.

"You've always fought others using your speed against them," began Barry. "So I will teach you how Jay and I defeated our Reverse-Flash's. But, he's not exactly using super-speed, so that's why…" Barry paused and looked down at his feet – blowing a hefty amount of air out of his nose. Wally shot him a puzzled looked – confused at Barry's hesitation. Looking back up at his young apprentice, Barry said; "You're going to have to learn how to vibrate your molecules,"

Wally went wide-eyed and step back. Every time he tried that, it would result in a bloody nose. That skill was far from his level of training – almost to the point where he was to scared to try it. Barry sighed and took a step towards his nephew. "I know it's… difficult for you," he said, trying to comfort his terrified sidekick. "But since Zoom can manipulate time, he cannot vibrate his molecules. That's his weakness – that gives you the potential advantage," he added with a warm smile. Wally still looked worried though. It was an eerie concept; making one's self vibrate to the extent where you could even walk through walls. If one thing went wrong, Wally could literally be stuck inside the wall and crushed to death. Barry embraced Wally in a hug and patted him on the back. "We'll train every day – starting small and working our way up. You'll get it, and the next time you see Zoom, you'll be ready,"

Wally nodded and followed his mentor to the training room, being sure to pick up a box of tissues on the way for the unavoidable nose bleeds. Now adding this new training to his mental list of things to worry about, Wally tried to focus on the other task at hand – figuring out who that girl was and, possibly, getting Artemis back for good.

For those who want more fluff, it's coming, so don't give up on me yet!

That being said, I would like some REVIEWS!