AN – My computer died a little while ago, meaning I'm on limited to any computer or internet. Fortunately I didn't loose much (the wonders of doing first drafts mostly handwritten in a notebook). It does mean that it will probably be a while before the next update, but it also means they should come a bit quicker when they start up again. As is you all probably would have had to wait a bit longer for even this, cause FF was being stupid about letting me edit things in their browser thing and I had to get creative, but it's my birthday and I feel like basking in some reviews, so I decided to take some of my free birthday do whatever I want even if I should be doing something responsible time to get things straightened out. XD
AN 2 – still not letting me put in the normal breaks, or letting me edit in my browser, but hopefully this will work for now
Warnings – This chapter probably touches the edge the rating a little bit, but it does it discreetly, and as far as I'm concerned if you can understand the implications taking them out for maturity reasons is a bit insulting, at least in a story like this, so rating stays the same.
Implied survival sex, rabbit and other furry animal killing
On with the story -
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Wally looses track of time almost right away. He's never had the best sense of it to begin with, something only exacerbated when he got his powers, but living alone on the streets time turns into a completely foreign concept. The past only a reminder of what he no longer has, and the future a never ending question moving from one moment to the next.
None of it really matter when all you have is the present.
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He hides in plain sight, in front of the eyes of a thousand passer bys. He hides in the layered clothes and dirty faces of the homeless. He hides in the overwhelming numbers of the unfortunate.
One, after all, is a tragedy; a million is a statistic.
And no one bothers a statistic.
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Wally is always hungry. He's been that way for so long, even before food became the scarce commodity it is on the streets, that he can't legitimately remember what it's like not to be. It's such a normal thing that he can forget that the hunger is even there.
And he does – forget. He forgets long enough that his stomach goes quiet, and his body weak, and he has to lay down, too tired to keep his eyes open.
When he opens them his backpack, and everything he had that he wasn't wearing, is gone.
He gets to his feet, his legs weak beneath his body.
Nothing taken is horribly irreplaceable. He can get more clothes, another bag, one way or another.
The only thing he really misses is the gaunt little sock he had nestled at the bottom of the bag.
But then, it's nothing less than what he should have expected, remembered.
He doesn't get to keep anything.
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He's out of food.
He tries to go to soup kitchens when he can, though it feels like painting a target on his back every time, but it's hard to find them while he's on the move, let alone finding them when they are open.
The first time he tries to steal food he's seen. His mind is muggy and he's light headed, too concentrated on the sirens call of food to really pay attention to his surroundings. A clerk comes up on him as he's stuffing a second sandwich in his jacket and grabs him by the wrist halting the movement.
"Filthy thief." The man's face is twisted into a horrid sneer; his already pug shaped nose wrinkling in disgust. His other hand pulls back behind his head to deliver a blow, and Wally reacts on muscle memory alone easily breaking the man's hold and pushing him to the ground. Second sandwich clenched in his hand Wally quickly shoulders his way through the store, breaking into a run when he's out of sight.
The run doesn't last long, and Wally finds himself panting on the side of a dirt road. He unwraps first one sandwich and then the other, forcing himself to eat as slowly as possible to try and trick his stomach into thinking there's more than there really is.
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The fastest paths for running are free of any obstacles. Wally knows paths across the globe that might twist and turn, but offer up as much resistance as a running track.
When he moves from city to city he doesn't take those paths.
He runs from cluttered little tow to cluttered little town. He picks through paths in forests, and over mountains. He plays hopscotch across maps from one dot of civilization to the next.
The Flashes use the paths of least resistance. The quick and easy paths free of obstacles.
And Wally isn't a Flash anymore.
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He's in a new city, and he finds himself on a street corner. There are other runaways here, all of them bundled in overused clothing against the winter cold. There are other corners like it in or other cities, and Wally has figured out that they are the best way to get acquainted with each new cities ins and outs. This is where he learns of soup kitchen and shelters, places to squat and places to steal.
A plain van parks on the street not far from where Wally is standing and a man pulls himself out and starts walking over to the small crowd. At first Wally thinks he might be some sort of social worker, one of the people that occasionally comes to spots like these to hand out sandwiches and condoms, but the man is dressed a bit too well, and his posture is too demanding; he's here to take something, not give something away.
The chatter on the street falls silent, and every eye seems to watch the new comer with distrust. The man regards them all back, an easy swagger in his step. His eyes seem to darken when they catch sight of Wally's hair, grimy bet still obviously red, and his nostrils flare out as he begins to smile. Wally is reminded vividly of animals in which smiling is a form of aggression.
Wally's stomach gives off a pitiful growl. He's so fucking hungry.
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Wally gets better at stealing. A lot better actually.
Sleight of hand it turns out is relatively easy when you have super speed. His control gets better every time, his arms reaching out quicker than the eye can see while the rest of him wanders along at normal speeds. Being caught on tape is an occasional worry, but after covert ops missions' avoiding a few grocery store security cameras proves to be no challenge.
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One day he passes a newspaper with a bright picture of The Flash on the front page. His stomach clenches on the stolen food in his gut, and he knows there's no way he can go back. He's a thief now; the kind of person heroes put in jail.
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Sometimes Wally just wants to forget everything.
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He puts everything away when he's done, the sharp grit of the asphalt and broken glass digging into his knees as he shifts. The man is leaning back against the alley wall, and his hand is still running through Wally's hair. Distantly Wally thinks he should make him stop, but his arms stay still at his side.
"You could come home with me. You'd have food, clothes, a warm place to stay."
Wally shakes his head, finally dislodging the man's hand, and getting back to his feet.
The man smiles as he pulls money out of his wallet, and it's odd because it almost looks like the smile of a man who actually cares. "Maybe next time you'll change your mind."
Wally takes the money, and decides it's time to move on to another city.
He thinks he likes stealing better.
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Wally tries to stay in cities for the most part, where the crowds are thickest and the homeless more abundant.
Sometimes though, after a detour to stay off the radar, or on a run that takes just a bit too much energy he finds himself bedding down somewhere less populated.
He comes across an empty camping cabin one day, cut off from the main roads by a flooding river, and decides to forgo the rest of his run for a nearby city, breaking the lock on the door and hurrying in out of the heavy rain. There's a fireplace and a pile of wood, and soon he manages to get a fire started, stripping out of his dampest clothes to warm himself by it.
Some of the tension seeps out of his shoulders. For at least the one night he can sleep without needing to watch his back.
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Sharing squats is warmer, although he takes a chance with the other occupants when he does it. Not so much for his safety as for his hygiene. In squats people crowd the space, sharing body heat in the small rooms. Some of them are clean enough for all that they are sleeping on the streets.
Some though.
Some smell of piss and shit, reek of week old booze and jump with lice and fleas.
He scratches at the bite marks along his arms in the morning, and finds a public bathroom to wash so he can clean up a bit in the 's warmer sharing squats, and bad hygiene takes longer to kill you than the cold.
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The thing about hiding away somewhere distant, somewhere he doesn't have to worry about the people, is that he has to worry twice as hard about the food.
He recognizes a few edible plants on sight, but to make any sort of a difference he needs to be able to catch prey. The first animal that he catches is a rabbit. He holds it at arm's length by the scruff of its neck, and takes out a knife that he found in the cabin's small kitchen. It takes him a few tries to slit its throat, and the rabbit still jerks in his grasp desperately the whole time. It takes longer to die than he expected. He has at least as much trouble butchering and cooking it, and it ends up both slightly raw and with a few clumps of fur.
He's a bit better the next time, and the time after that. He learns to break the animals' necks when he impacts with them, the force of it usually killing them instantly (though a few still gasp for breath eyes shifting wildly in their head for a few moments before passing on). And while the cuts of meat certainly aren't professional they become more manageable, and less hairy.
In the end, no matter how good he begins to get at hunting, the energy that he puts into it is just too much, the time it takes to prepare the food too long.
He leaves the cabin behind and heads into cities once more.
It's more efficient.
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Sometimes he just wants to go to sleep, and he doesn't care if he ever wakes up.
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Heroes are easy enough to find if you have the urge. Fights are loud, and easy to follow to their source; even without the news vans, police, and thrill seekers that inevitably gather at the sights for the coverage and aftermath.
One day Wally gives into temptation. He follows the sights and sounds to the battle. He shuffles along in the crowd, and for a moment he watches members of the Justice League fight for Earth. Wonder Woman, Captain Atom, Green Lantern John Stewart, and Hawkwoman.
He's one face in the crowd. Lost in anonymity.
He leaves after a few minutes, picking his way back, and then walking up and down twisted alleys.
None of them see him. No one whips their head about with a sudden sixth sense, and rushes to take him back.
Wally tries to convince himself that's a good thing.
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When Wally lived in Gotham Jake would take him down to the alley, and they would give whatever scraps they could to the cats like an offering. He still remembers the feel of a rough cat's tongue scratching across his palm as it licks away grease on his hand.
When Catwoman falls in on him, when she takes him back with her, and feeds him, he thinks for just a moment that maybe they remember too.
It's the only thing that has him agreeing the next morning when she talks about giving him a place he can come back to, where he can sleep, where he can eat. The only thing that has him willing to see what she really wants from him.
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He doesn't stay with Catwoman all the time, not even every night, but it's enough that he starts to lose some of the circles under his eyes, and his skin is back to its pasty white instead of a grimy gray.
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Catwoman leaves for a while, and for two days Wally is the only one at the apartment. He stays inside almost the whole time, basking in the ability to just be.
The first thing she says when she comes back is, "My name is Selina Kyle." The second is, "Your name is Wally."
Wally might freak out for a micro second or two. He thinks that's completely understandable.
He doesn't have very long. His thoughts are interrupted when she speaks again. "I talked to Batman, he has a few messages he'd like me to give you, if that's okay."
Wally can feel himself hovering over an event horizon in the moment; two paths, distinctly different, laid out in front of him.
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Wally never gets tired of running.
But he's so tired of running away.
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"What did he say?"
