"You. Are. Toast."

Wally's eyes were narrowed, his stare focused, teeth clenched and arm muscles flexed, ready for anything at any time. The Inhibitor bracelet emitted pulses of red light on his wrist, and he sunk his teeth into his bottom lip as his every movement depended on the screen.

"Yeah, toast with peanut butter, jelly, and cherries on top, 'cause that's what you'll end up trying to bribe me with to let you win." Robin snorted, grin stretching from one ear to the other. He was sitting on the couch with legs crossed in his lap, his hacker gloves abandoned in the corner along with Wally's infrared glasses and Kaldur's walter-bearers. And Conner's empty case of Shields, just in case.

"Please." Wally had to keep himself from sniggering. "I spend every day running faster than any race car; I think I can win a game of MarioKart Wii."

"Think again." Conner sent a blue shell his way and engaged in a wrestling match with Kaldur's motorcycle. "After I'm done, there won't be anything left of the race track."

"Uh, dude, the objective is to win the race, not blow everything up," Wally interjected, momentarily distracted by the boy's sending green shells in every possible direction regardless of other drivers, while his own motorcycle was getting carted out of the snowy pits of DK Summit.

"No reason I can't do both." Conner smirked, purposely crashing through the snowboarders with his Bowser.

Kaldur followed them, cruising along with Rosalina a little ways behind the three younger boys, expending seemingly no effort to keep his place ahead of the NPCs.

Garth was restong on his elbows on the back of the couch, watching the race intently. Atlantis had plenty of entertainment, but none of the electronic kind. This was his first time seeing an actual video game and, to be honest, it was a little too bright and blurry for his taste. But, were it slightly more muted, he thought he'd definitely want to play. The space street was particularly enticing to him.

"Rainbow Road," Wally corrected him when he expressed his interest. "And I swear; if you turn out to be one of those people who somehow drive the entire thing without falling off even once, your position in this team will be severely compromised."

"No, it won't," Kaldur corrected. "Frankly, I am not sure this competitiveness is good for our spirit. Hardly a team building exercise when we're encouraged to betray each other."

"Don't look at it as betrayal, 'laddy," Wally said, flinging an arm over his friend's shoulder with popcorn in the other hand. "Think of it as, uh... training for when we have to go undercover as enemies."

"Yeah," Robin agreed, starting up the console and plopping down on the couch, "we're practicing trayal."

Robin, Wally, and Conner were driving neck and neck, each leaning forward on the couch and using every opportunity to accidentally run into an other—both onscreen and off. All their powers were off and only pure skill was left.

"Hey, Supey," Wally said as they neared the finish line, "betcha you'd be better at this if the game were nothing but static, right?"

"You'd be better at this if we were chasing food." He squinted to navigate the snowy hills.

"I'd be better at this if I could write a cheat code." Robin leaned right with his whole body to make a turn, all the way into Wally's shoulder. "What; Kaldur never trash talks."

All three boys' hearts raced as only the last turn was left. A bead of sweat ran down Wally's temple, and Robin's eyebrows drew together above his sunglasses.

This was it. The final showdown.

Then, three precise green shells struck, and all of them were left incapacitated barely two yards from the finish line, as Rosalina drove past them and did her regal victory lap.

Two black heads and a red one turned to the left, where Kaldur was sitting on a separate chair, the corners of his mouth lifted up in the tiniest "booyah" smile anyone would ever see in the history of time and space.

"So much for 'competitiveness bad,'" Wally muttered, rolling his eyes. "Oh, wait!" He pressed gas just in time to finish fifth and stick out his tongue toward his best friend who had yet to recover from the surprise.

"You didn't win, Wally," Robin pointed out after finishing seventh. Conner's remote already lay somewhere in the couch cushions, its owner gone in search of food. Bowser looked very impatient, stuck nearly motionless in twelfth place as the timer continued running.

"Beat you, didn't I?" He smirked. "Okay, so who's up for Moonview Highway?" Wally rubbed his hands together, brushing his Inhibitor bracelet. He wasn't sure if that was the placebo or his actual metabolism, but he didn't feel quite as hungry as he usually did.

"Guys, guys!" Garfield burst in the room with a toothy grin on his face, two incisors fallen out. "Guess what I just found out!"

"That Wally sucks at video games?" Robin guessed.

"What?" Gar grimaced. "No, listen. Look at me; I'm totally green!" He held his hands out and wiggled them, spinning around in his shorts to show off his, indeed, entirely green body, including the hair. "How cool is this?"

Not quite agreeing with the kid, Wally and Kaldur exchanged a wary look. "Uh, Gar, have you told your sister?" Wally asked, scratching his neck uncomfortably.

"No, duh; she's out with the girls, remember? I only just took my shirt off; that last bit on my shoulder was still normal this morning. But that was the last one, I checked. So." He ran over to the couch, jumping into Superboy's place and practically bouncing up and down. "When do you think I'll get my new powers?"

Kaldur sighed. "Garfield; we've talked about this. It's not likely—"

"Yeah, yeah, I shouldn't get my hopes up; whatever. I can feel it. Somethin's coming." He spread his lips wide apart, revealing his miraculously still white teeth in all their glory. "Man, who would've thought I'd be green?"

The training center was filled with giggles and snickers as the six teenagers tried to stay upright in their impossible positions. Zatanna and Kaldur had already lost and were standing to the side, refereeing the rest. The girl was especially taken with watching Garfield—who had begged out a chance to play with the team—laugh and smile, and be so much more energetic than she'd ever seen him.

Almost exactly three months since his only parent had died... It had been tough on all of them, but he deserved a chance to feel like a kid again, Zatanna mused. His joy was really something, brightening up the dark halls like a shining beacon of light. Games were not commonplace in the Cave, with the general superhero crowd favoring combat training, but that didn't mean she couldn't set a few things up for him while the others were away. Out of the way, not bothering anyone. The kid really needed a laugh and, boy, she needed a hobby to take her mind off her dad when booze, boys and magic wouldn't do it.

Zee smiled, watching him collide with Raquel and leave a messy trail of color on her shirt. Puddles of paint had been poured onto their respective Twister mat areas and, the more they played, the less clean they got. Garfield, especially, was covered with bright color from head to toe.

Kaldur had gotten off easy—the only things he had to wash off were his hands—, but Zatanna's hair had suffered, and out on the battlefield an all-out war was raging between M'gann and Dick.

"You cannot hope to beat me, human!" The Martian announced, elongating her arms to wrap over Wally and reach the red spot. He squirmed slightly, glancing at Artemis right beside him with an unsure grimace. The image of a six-armed M'gann—one of them grown out from her head—was still an arm's length away in his mind, and it wasn't a pretty one.

"Talk to me when you've mastered holding yourself in one position for hours," Robin said, showing off his insane stretching capabilities. "Shape-shifting's good and all, but I'll bet you'd fall over with a tiny push." He grinned and completed the next move with an easy, but impossible-looking twist of his torso.

Her eyes narrowed as an excited smile tugged on the corners of her mouth. "Bring it on, Boy Wonder."

The game between the two of them lasted for an hour even after everyone else had given up—Wally and Artemis sneaking off to the communal showers for undisclosed activities—and, in the end, M'gann was declared the victor, but a sweaty and slightly sullen Robin demanded a rematch without her Martian abilities.

It was that night that it was decided all gadgets and powers would be turned off on Game Night—whenever that was. With the help of the Inhibitor bracelets they sometimes used for training, if need be, simulating the Inhibitor collars everyone had already been forced to wear at some point.

Nobody wanted to be utterly helpless without abilities so easily taken away during battle, but, on Game Night, everybody was equal.

Just as they were wrapping up, Garfield walked back in with a fresh towel around his shoulders, hoping to catch the very end of the match before his bedtime.

"Aw, man!" He pouted, seeing that it was already over. He pushed the pajama sleeves up to his elbows and crossed his arms, waiting for M'gann to come and read him a story.

"I'll be right there," she said, telekinetically removing all the dried paint from the plastic mat and folding it up. "Oh, Gar, you missed a spot." She pointed to a small patch of leftover green paint on his right arm, near the crevice of his elbow. He scratched it curiously and spit on his hands to clean his skin.

Garfield watched as the hall emptied, everybody wandering off in their respective home directions, and rubbed his arm absentmindedly. When he looked down several minutes later, the patch of green was still there.

"Uh, M'gann? It won't come off." He frowned, sniffing and holding his limb up to examine the paint.

She paused her winner's clean-up—another rule, but one the team had made long before that night—to come over and lay her hand gently on his head.

Gar rolled his eyes, in that phase of questioning if he was too old for that kind of thing. "No, I'm serious, sis." He felt a tug in his heart at the term, still getting used to the it being accurate, legally and everything. "Try it."

She took his arm and prepared to repeat the same process she'd performed on the Twister mat, only this time her little adopted brother winced in pain and yelled "Aw, no, stop!"

She dropped his arm immediately and her lips puckered in concern. "I don't understand," she said. "It's just paint. Why won't it come off?"

"Maybe I'm turning into a Martian, like you," Gar joked, rubbing the slightly itching little spot. She, however, drew back and considered.

Her eyes turned red as she examined his arm from within. "Those are actual skin cells." She straightened in surprise. "And my DNA. I don't—" M'gann blew out a breath as Gar's eyes grew wide. "Well, I suppose I've never actually heard of another cross-species blood transfusion. It could be a... side-effect?" She frowned and pulled him into a hug, worry pressing on her chest. "Aw, I'm sorry, Gar."

"For what? Are you telling me I might actually be turning green?" He looked up at her with the opposite reaction of hers. "'Cause that would be coooooool."

"But—" She could do nothing but look on as the boy untangled himself from her and raced to the nearest mirror to see if his skin had spontaneously changed color anywhere else. "You're supposed to stay normal," she muttered to herself, feeling the weight of guardianship crash down on her, and not for the first time since it had been made official two weeks ago, with J'onn as the primary caregiver until she turned "eighteen".

Terrified that she must have done something wrong, again, M'gann slumped down to the floor and sent out a request to the universe to ask Marie for guidance, if she was anywhere out there.

"Let me take a look at that," Conner said, coming back over to the couch and holding two large sandwiches, one of which he threw to Wally, who bit down appreciatively. He pulled the boy in his lap and examined one limb after the next in such a way that tickled and caused Garfield to giggle.

"No; don't see any whiteness here." He let go of the ribcage. "How about here?" He checked in the boy's armpit, making the boy squeal.

Wally and Robin looked at the brothers of sorts with amused expressions while Kaldur taught Garth the basics of the Wii console and gameplay. The actual game blinked the continue screen on the large TV, abandoned, and let out a reminding whine every now and then through the remotes.

For a while, the only sounds in the room were Garfield's laughter, increasing frequency with every week that passed by, and muffled conversations, which were drowned out by Wally's very loud munching.

Then, lively chatter from somewhere else in the Cave joined the casual noise in the lounge, and Gar jumped out of Conner's arms, racing towards the sound.

"M'gann, M'gann! Guess what; I'M FINALLY TOTALLY GREEN!"

Wally chuckled to himself and stuffed the last of the sandwich into his mouth, wiping his hands on the tattered jeans he was wearing, then got up and followed Gar's lead out the door and to the visitors.

Artemis, Tula, M'gann, Raquel, and Zatanna were standing by the Zeta tubes—dressed to conquer, with windblown hair and a reflective glow on their flushed skin—and huddling around Garfield with equal parts uncertainty, excitement, worry and happiness at seeing him this hyper.

He was the heart of this team and everyone would protect him with their lives.

"Hey, babe," Wally called out to Artemis as he approached, "how was the club?"

"Mmm." She smiled. "Just what I needed."

"Yeah? Meet anyone interesting?" He came closer and leaned against a wall nearby.

"Well, I did think I saw this red-headed boy with lots of freckles and an apparent Flash obsession," she teased, snaking her arms around his neck and pressing her lips to his. "I kinda wanted to dance with him, but—oh, bother—he turned out to be a hallucination. Whatcha gonna do."

"Hmm." He bit on her earlobe thoughtfully. "You know, if all redhead boys with freckles are interchangeable to you, I could be willing to volunteer to dance with you."

"Would you?" She smiled, satisfied with the response. "Well, then; my people will get in touch with your people and I just might come and whisk you away one starry night, Freckle Boy."

"As long as you don't ask me to let down my hair." He grinned, shaking his recent buzz cut, which he had a habit of getting every summer to deal with the heat.

"Nah," she bit his bottom lip. "But I would like you to let down something else right now." She leaned in and whispered into his ear, her mouth just barely brushing his skin.

Wally's eyebrows slowly shot up as he listened and he had to swallow to wet his very, very dry throat, pupils dilating considerably. "Uh, we'll be right back," he said and took her by the hand and lead her away, the two of them almost running out of the mission room.

Zatanna looked at their retreating figures with a mix of amusement and jealousy in her chest. "Gar," she said, glancing at the boy attached to M'gann's arms, "stay away from the showers tonight if you know what's good for you."

"Why?" he asked, climbing up his sister and doing a backwards flip.

"Just trust me," Zee said.

"Okay," he said easily. "Man," he muttered, "Climbing is so easy for Monkey. I wish he was here. We'd both be green. I miss Monkey." He looked at the floor with tight lips.

"You know he needs the wild," M'gann said regretfully. "But we could go visit him sometimes, if you want," she offered. "We'd just need to track him down first."

"Wolf could do that, right?" He immediately perked up. "Oh, that would be awesome, sis! Can we do that this week? Please? Pleeeeaaaase? Pretty pretty please with Wally's whole dessert collection on top?"

"Sure." She smiled and pulled him close, still unable to ease the pang of worry from her heart.

"Yaaaay! I have really missed being around anything with tails. I mean, there's Wolf, but he doesn't count 'cause he's, like, half— uh, human-like. What's the word?"

"Sentient," Tula offered.

"Yeah, that. It's not like being around most animals, you know? He almost talks back to you. But his tail is awesome. I've always wanted a tail. Have you ever wanted a tail, sis? Aren't they the best ever?"

The girl had to pause just a little to consider her thoughts on the subject of tails. Martians didn't have them—hah, could you imagine—, nor did anything else on the planet she'd grown up on. Her first encounter with them had been on Earth, when a dog almost bit her leg off on the first day. She'd heard they were pretty practical, though.

After a moment of deliberation, M'gann decided she had no particular feelings about tails one way or the other.

"The very best ever," she agreed anyway.

"I wish I could have a tail." He blew out a breath, starting to dance to some music only he could hear.

"Uh, and I wish I had a million dollars," Raquel said, staring at him with eyebrows halfway up her forehead, "'cause, boy, you're getting one."

M'gann's head snapped around at the same time Gar's did, and her ears were momentarily deafened by the startled scream he let out, staring at the foot-long, furry appendage growing out of his butt.

Then it grew back in from his shock, and he looked normal as ever, if a little motionless. But by the time M'gann's mind had unfrozen enough to process the fact that her little, green brother could... do that, he had already grown it out again, this time consciously.

The second scream he let out was more like a joyous squeal as he started to jump around, twisting his small torso to get a better look, and chased his tail. The girls were all staring at him, mouths gaping, and were soon joined by the guys, who had come running to see what the sound was, but Garfield could see nothing but the glorious thing attached to him. His grin spread wide, and he knew he was not going to bed for hours no matter how much anyone forced him to.

"TOLDJA!" he yelled to no one in particular as fur appeared on his lower arm, just to see if he could do it.

A/N: Uh, I forgot to add this in my previous update, but some people have apparently been having problems accessing the smutty part of Chapter 18. If that's you, just go to my profile and click on When We're Alone; it should be my second most-recent story at this point and that's what the link leads to. Enjoy.

Also, this is a few weeks after a dance (and April 15th for the flashback). I was gonna wait to finish Year 1 to post an actual timeline, but seeing as how we're not even halfway through at this point... let me know if you want one. (I have a feeling I'm gonna make a big mess of the continuity btw. I think I avoided it this time with what was said in Chapter 14, but still. Pretty soon it might become a big convoluted web I can't untangle.)