Legal Crimes

"Are you sure it's reading correctly?" Flash asked, as Batman adjusted the device is his hand.

"Faint traces of speed force energy are detectable," Batman replied as he slowly moved, what Flash had dubbed a Bat-Themed PKE meter, in a circle.

"I'm just not feeli- Whoa!" Flash said, his form blurring as he looked around anxiously.

"Major surge, I've got a lock," Batman reported.

"Then let's check it out," Flash said tensing and relaxing all his muscles to limber up for a high speed battle.

"Are we sure it's not a hero?" Kid Flash asked.

"Multiple releases of speed force energy with no reported decreases in crime," Batman explained.

"So, crime has increased during those periods?" Kid Flash asked.

"None that have been reported," Batman replied. "Now tell me the possible reasons for the lack of criminal reports associated with a speedster."

"Oh, um," Kid Flash stopped and thought about it before answering as Robin had advised him earlier. "He could be committing crimes so successfully that they aren't reported as such, he could be tapped into the local justice system and altering the statistics to cover his tracks, or…"

"Or he could be preparing for a crime of massive proportions," Batman explained pausing to give Kid Flash an approving nod.

Flash gave Kid Flash a super speed high five when Batman turned back to his scanner. "It appears to have stopped for the moment, but we have the readings we need to narrow it down to… a warehouse near the docks."

"Smuggling or gun running?" Kid Flash guessed.

"Human trafficking is also possible," Batman added, "that's why we'll carefully examine the area from a distance before approaching. The last thing we need is to get into a pitched battle with easily accessible hostages nearby."

Kid Flash nodded and pretended he hadn't been just about to rush the place as soon as Batman told him where it was.

Twelve agonizingly slow minutes later

"Is it possible to look that nondescript?" Kid Flash said as the three watched an overhead view from several Bat drones.

"Not without some effort," Batman replied. "The exterior has been specifically altered to make it as bland and uninteresting as possible."

"How about the interior?" Flash asked.

"There isn't a current blueprint on file," Batman replied, "so we'll be going in blind, but I have managed to gather data on a list of purchases and deliveries to this address that paint a disturbing picture."

"How disturbing?" Flash asked.

"Games, toys, cartoons," Batman listed off and shook his head.

"Child trafficking," Flash said with a wince.

"Or worse," Batman agreed.

"Worse?" Kid Flash asked nervously.

"You may want to stay behind on this one," Flash said softly.

"No, whatever it is, I can take it," Kid Flash replied firmly.

"He's going to learn about the darker aspects of our work eventually," Batman told Flash.

"I know, I'd just hoped he'd be a bit older before it happened," Flash said with a heavy sigh.

"He has a commercial walk in freezer and refrigerator installed. They are usually used by family restaurants, not a warehouse with no commercial traffic."

"Meaning…" Kid Flash asked confused.

"Meaning they can store a lot of meat and since he's not running a restaurant," Flash said delicately, "and has stuff designed to keep children entertained…"

"Oh god!" Kid Flash said putting a hand over his mouth.

"Stay out of his kitchen," Flash said gently.

"I, yeah, ok," Kid Flash agreed, taking several deep breaths.

A machine beeped as the two speedsters stiffened, sensing the release of speed force energy nearby.

"He's in residence," Batman noted, "and there has been a slight increase in missing children over the last six months. It wasn't enough to put together, but now…"

"How are we doing this?" Flash asked intently, all signs of his usual joking persona gone.

"One in the front, one in the back, and I'll take the skylight." Batman said. "Wait for my signal."

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

John leaned back on his sofa and relaxed, setting his laptop back on its charging pad and getting the remote for the widescreen TV in front of him. He hit the power button and navigated through the menu until he found the last episode of Naruto he'd been watching. Alarms went off and glass shattered, startling him, but as this was DC he'd been prepared for something like this so he was already in motion, assuming the worst.

The red fist that hit his stomach met reinforced Kevlar before he sped up and responded by placing a hand on Flash's head and forcing him back into normal speed.

Something heavy and plastic slammed into the back of his head, but the goalie helmet just shrugged it off as John spun around and swept Kid Flash's legs out from under him.

He didn't have time to pause and figure what was going on before several objects flew towards him thrown by a caped figure dropping through the air.

John didn't waste a nanosecond as he ran across the room and picked up several heavy, lead lined, blankets, foot swept an attacking Kid Flash once more, and flung them around the objects.

He had to foot sweep Kid Flash again before attacking Batman as he slowly landed on the floor of the warehouse, bending his knees to absorb the shock,

It took him a moment and two more foot sweeps of Kid Flash, who was not fast enough to avoid them, before he managed to undo Batman's utility belt, the shock it released useless against the heavy duty rubber electrician's gloves he wore.

The muffled thump, of whatever Batman had thrown exploding, floated back at him as he foot swept Kid Flash once more and worked on removing Batman's cape and gauntlets.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

It was over in an instant, as expected when dealing with a speedster, but not the way Batman would have preferred. By the time he straightened back up, his cape, gauntlets and utility belt were gone.

"My speeds gone!" Flash exclaimed, staring at his hands in shock as a black blur foot swept the yellow clad form of Kid Flash once more.

"His isn't!" Kid Flash yelped as he hit the ground yet again.

*Ring* *Ring*

"Hold on, I have to answer this," the villain said, taking off the goalie mask he'd been wearing and picking up his cell phone off the table, Flash's attempts to grab him landing the scarlet speedster face down on the sofa.

Kid Flash was foot swept once more making him groan and Batman's attempt to pull something out of his boot ended up with his boots missing.

"Hey Kevin, how's it going? Yeah, I got the next book ready. What's it about? Vampires. Probably not going to be an instant bestseller, but it's a solid book," the villain explained. He glared at Kid Flash as he saw the state of his laptop and foot swept him once more before placing Flash and Batman on the sofa. "I can have it emailed to you tonight if you like?"

Kid Flash hit the ground yet again and Flash seemed to be concentrating really hard on something with only Batman looking calm, alternately tensing and relaxing the muscles in his legs.

"I'm looking at long term book sales Kevin, if you want a mega hit trilogy, I can give you that, but I am not taking the blame for it," the villain said firmly.

Kid Flash remained sitting, looking to Batman and Flash to see what to do. Batman flashed him a hand sign to remain where he was, so he rubbed his ankles.

There was a flash of light and Superman appeared, quickly scanning the room.

The villain groaned making Batman smirk, but he merely held up a hand gesturing for Superman to hold on for a moment and pointed at the phone. "No, see the series is female targeted like you wouldn't believe, so pick a female ghostwriter, say mid 50's and I'll simply split the profits with her and she can be the face of it."

Batman signaled Superman, but he wasn't fast enough to catch the villain who moved around the room continuing the conversation as if nothing was going on.

"It's called Twilight," the villain admitted with a heavy sigh. "It will be swimming in estrogen based fantasies," he said as Kid Flash tried to help corral the man in black.

Batman and Flash got up, prepared to assist, but Kid Flash managed to divert the villains attention long enough for Superman to get a hand on his shoulder.

The man raised one eyebrow and stepped through the man of steel, before foot sweeping everyone standing. "Give me a week and I'll have the first the book ready for you," he promised. "Ok, that's great, bye."

"Will you stop that!" Kid Flash yelled.

"Stop attacking me and I will," the man in black replied reasonably before vanishing in a blur as he returned Batman and Flash to the sofa.

"I don't want to hurt you," Superman began.

"Then don't!" he snapped out. "Why are you attacking me anyway?!"

"You're a cannibal kid eater!" Kid Flash exclaimed, actually making the villain pause for a moment.

"I'm a what?!" he exclaimed in disbelief.

"Look in his freezer," Kid Flash told Superman.

Superman scanned the building. "I'm not seeing anything that would lead to that assumption."

"There has been an increase in missing children in this area and he has procured a large amount of toys and cartoons as well as having commercial cold storage units installed," Batman explained.

"They're called collectibles and anime," the black clad man replied, "not toys and cartoons!"

"There is little difference," Batman said.

"Yeah, there is," the man growled out, "and collecting stuff is not a crime!"

"What about the kids and freezer space?" Kid Flash demanded.

"I have no idea about the kids and my freezer is full, take a look," he snapped back.

Kid Flash opened the walk-in freezer and peeked inside the curiously before frowning and checking the walk-in the fridge. "That is a lot of Junk food."

"Enough for a year or so, I don't like to go out," the man in black replied.

"What about the Super speed?"

"What about it? I have it, end of story."

"People just don't gain superpowers and do nothing with them," Batman disagreed.

"Some do," the man in black said angrily. "They live normal lives and you don't find out about them because they never do anything!"

"We got some pretty solid readings that say you were doing something with it," Flash disagreed.

"I use it for household chores, writing, and power generation," he said. "All your readings should be located to my house, which you broke into when you attacked me!"

"There's no evidence of a crime?" Superman asked Batman.

"Not yet," Batman said retrieving his equipment and putting it back on before opening the side of his left gauntlet, revealing a curved screen. Picking up the remains of the laptop that Kid Flash had used to attempt to brain the villain, he tore the case apart and extracted the hard drive.

"What did you do to me?" Flash demanded.

"I removed your connection to the speed force," the man replied.

"Why didn't you remove mine?" Kid Flash asked around a fudgesicle he'd stolen from the freezer.

"You only have a partial connection, I don't know what removing it would do to you," the man in black explained.

"Well, how about restoring mine?" Flash asked.

"Yeah, no," he said. "You broke into my house and attacked me for no reason, I am not helping you."

"John King," Batman said as he accessed the hard drive and sifted through the data.

"Good writer, writes some really spooky horrors stories," Kid Flash said. "What about him?"

"It's my name, I'm a writer," John said.

"J.K Applegate," Batman said. "Which is you?"

"The writer of Animorphs?!" Kid Flash exclaimed.

"A pseudonym I use for my young adult series," John said, glad the DC universe didn't have any of the same authors his universe had.

"B-but you're famous!" Kid Flash exclaimed.

"And?" John asked. "So are all of you."

"It's not the same," Kid Flash disagreed, "you're a celebrity."

John rolled his eyes. "I write stories some people love and others hate, you risk your lives doing for free what we pay the government to do, we're both celebrities I'm just a little less likely to be attacked by Supervillains… or at least that was what I thought."

"We aren't supervillains!" Kid Flash exclaimed offended.

"Breaking and entering, assault with a deadly weapon, attempted murder, destruction of private property-" John started listing off.

"An eight year old girl was reported missing six hours ago from a house less than a mile from here," Batman interrupted, "it's called probable cause."

"It's called having the power to break the law and ignore the constitution," John disagreed, "which means from where I sit you are all still Supervillains."

"We do our best to uphold the law and save lives," Superman said.

"Good intentions do not change the path you are on," John said bluntly.

"Our work is within the law," Superman assured him.

"It's a perversion of our constitutional rights regardless of what laws they tried to paper it over with," John disagreed. "Unless there is a constitutional amendment it is simply criminal conduct that the government has chosen not to prosecute and instead encourages because the more our rights are eroded the more power those in office have."

"Wow, you are cynical," Flash said.

"No, I'm realistic," John disagreed. "As the government expands, liberty contracts. I don't think anyone can argue with that."

"I've got nothing," Batman told Superman. "You?"

Superman scanned the converted warehouse carefully. "No, it's clean."

"I need my powers to work," Flash told John seriously.

"If you had gotten them in an accident, Kid Flash wouldn't have them as well," John pointed out. "So, get the formula and redo it."

"How did you get the formula?" Kid Flash asked. "I thought only my family had it."

"It's an old alchemical formula that certain Indian Shamans possess," John explained, "it's not something you family invented."

"You got the formula from a Native American Shaman?" Batman asked.

"I've said all I care to say on the matter," John said. "Now, where do I send the bill for property damages?"

"I'll have some repairmen sent over," Batman said.

"No," John disagreed. "I'd have to deal with whatever bugs and cameras you had installed while they were fixing things if I allowed that. I'll have my people fix it and send you the bill."

"I really need my powers," Flash said. "It would take me at least a week to redo the formula and stabilize my powers. I'm begging here. Please restore my powers, I don't want to see anyone hurt because I was unable to do my job."

"Fine," John said placing a hand on Flash's head and concentrating for a moment.

Flash got up and took a couple of cautious steps before becoming a red blur, cleaning up the mess they had made. "Thanks."

"How do you do that?" Kid Flash asked. "And what's wrong with my power?"

"No more questions," John said. "If everyone would please leave, I'd like to get back to my normal life."

"I don't know that I'd call this normal," Kid Flash said gesturing around the warehouse that looked like a game shop and media library.

"It's normal for me," John replied. "Now, isn't there a little girl you need to find?"

"Yeah," Flash agreed. "If it wasn't you then it was somebody else and it's already been six hours."

"Hard Drive," John requested holding out his hand. "I still have to email my editor my work."

Batman tossed the laptop hard drive to him and walked away.

"Why give yourself powers if this is all you're going to do with them?" Kid Flash asked.

"Why buy a gun if you aren't planning on shooting anyone? Why take CPR classes if you aren't going to become a lifeguard?" John asked rhetorically. "Now, go before I write you into my next novel just so I can have you killed off in a gruesome manner."

"Could you?" Kid Flash asked hopefully.

John chuckled. "Sure, I'll even make it heroic."

"John King novel or Animorphs?" Kid Flash asked excitedly.

"Animorphs," John replied, "they need some heroic deaths. I'll have you start off as a kid in a wheelchair who regains the use of his legs from morphing."

"So cool!"

"What do you think of Rachel?" John asked.

"She is my favorite female character," he said.

"I'll give you a one-sided crush she doesn't see until after you sacrifice yourself to save her," John promised.

Flash had to drag Kid Flash away.

"Sorry for the mixup," Superman apologized. "For all our powers, we aren't perfect, and we do make mistakes."

"I understand," John said. "Still doesn't change my argument on the legality of it, but at least your morals are solid, which is always comforting in someone with power."

"Thank you," Superman said waving before he flew out of the skylight.

Three Months Later

Kid Flash picked up the latest Animorphs book with a grin and started to read it.

"You do know those are kids books right?" Robin asked, as he dropped onto the sofa next to him.

Kid Flash was about to respond when he paused and considered something. "And how would you know that, unless you read them yourself?"

Robin shook his head and then grinned. "Tobias is awesome."

"I prefer Marco, but they are all cool," Kid Flash said. "Anyway, the author promised to give me a heroic death in the next one."

"What? But no one knows who the author is," Robin said.

"I do and you wouldn't believe it if I told you," Kid Flash said. "Also, it was on a mission, so I can't tell you."

"Dude, seriously?"

"Batman knows, ask him."

"Hard pass," Robin said.

Kid Flash started reading the book, moving faster and faster until he was a blur. It took him less time to finish the book than it took Robin's popcorn to pop in the microwave. "Dude that was awesome!" Kid Flash said with a cheer. "He even gave me some Rachel moments as promised."

"Really? Cool," Robin said. "So, you done with it?"

"Never! I love this series!"

"I mean, can I borrow it," Robin explained as the microwave beeped.

"Oh, sure," Kid Flash said handing it to him and making a run at Robin's popcorn.

"Pop me some more," Robin said, unsurprised.

Artemis, Aqualad, Superboy, and Miss Martian entered the lounge having finished their training.

"Animorphs? Isn't that a kid's book?" Artemis teased.

"Then how do you know about it?" Robin asked, not looking up.

"Don't knock it, the series is awesome," Kid Flash said.

"I like Ax," Miss Martian offered.

"I like the Dog androids," Superboy added.

"Fine," Artemis admitted, "I read it too."

"I haven't read a lot of surface novels," Aqualad said, "is it a good series?"

"It's supposed to be a kids series, but it got deep fast," Robin said. He paused. "Wally?"

"Yeah?" Kid Flash asked, stopping with a handful of popcorn halfway to his mouth.

"You are in this book," Robin said.

"Yeah, I know," Kid Flash replied

"No, I mean 'you' are in this book," Robin repeated.

"Yeah, I know," Kid Flash repeated.

"You Wally West are in this book in your civilian identity," Robin clarified.

"Yeah… How did he know?" Kid Flash asked paling.

"So, you didn't tell him your secret identity?" Robin asked.

"No, no I didn't," Kid Flash said worriedly. "I thought he was just going to make a character kinda like me, I didn't realize… The Name, the description, the jokes… it's me!"

"Someone has discovered your secret identity?" Aqualad asked intently.

"Yeah," Kid Flash agreed stunned. "How did he know?"

"Let's go ask him," Aqualad said, standing up.

Kid Flash winced. "Um… last time we 'ran' into each other he kinda took down me, my uncle, Batman and ignored Superman."

"What?" Superboy asked.

"He is a speedster and he stopped us all cold and ghosted through Superman," Kid Flash admitted.

"So, he's a supervillain?" Robin asked.

"No, he's a writer," Kid Flash said, "but we'd mistaken him for a supervillain. It ended with apologies on our side and paying for the stuff we broke."

"So, he's a hero?" Superboy asked.

"No, he's a writer with super speed," Kid Flash said. "I think he thinks what we do is immoral because we don't obey the constitution or something."

"So, a direct confrontation is not advisable?" Aqualad asked.

"I may get a better response by simply asking him," Kid Flash admitted.

"He really stopped everyone cold?" Robin asked.

"As ice," Kid Flash said with a shiver recalling his uncle having his powers removed.

"If we got close enough, Megan could read his mind," Robin noted.

"That would probably be safer," Kid Flash said relieved.

"How did he stop all of you?" Superboy asked as they head towards the Martian craft.

"He removed my Uncle's power with a touch, not sure how, and then kept sweeping my feet out from under me because he was faster than me," Kid Flash admitted. "He took away all of Batman's stuff as he landed on the ground."

"Speedsters are dangerous," Robin said, "but you'd think that Batman would have something set up to prevent this."

"He wore heavy rubber gloves, there were a lot of sparks," Kid Flash explained.

"And Superman?" Superboy asked.

"He tends to use minimal force, so he doesn't hurt someone accidentally," Kid Flash explained, recalling the after-action report. "Superman doesn't have enough speed to catch him and when I helped coral him, he did that vibrating trick of uncle erm… The Flash."

"I don't think we'd fare well against him in direct combat, so we'll have to be sneaky," Robin said with a smirk.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

John raised an eyebrow as he saw the group of teens who were delivering and setting up his pool table and new entertainment center. "You guys better have just bribed the normal delivery people and not assaulted them."

Realizing the jig was up Robin turned and called out, "Miss Martian now!"

After a few seconds in which John just looked at them and tapped his foot, everyone turned to the redhead and saw that she appeared frozen.

"What did you do?!" Superboy demanded, dropping into a fighting stance.

"I wrote a series of stories starring her as the main character," John replied. "I'm a writer, it's what I do."

"What?" Artemis asked.

"She's reading my mind, so I am feeding her a series of stories involving her and… a certain guy she knows. It's a mix of Romance and Comedy, with life lessons that explain human culture from an outside perspective," John explained. "She is too fascinated to tear herself away."

"So, she's not in any danger," Artemis realized

"Is there a reason you've all invaded my place?" John asked impatiently.

"You revealed Kid Flash's identity!" Aqualad declared.

"What? Where?" John asked confused.

"In your latest book," Robin pointed out.

Miss Martian giggled, and everyone turned to face her and saw she was blushing.

"No, I didn't," John said, dragging everything back on track, "nothing I wrote connects Wally to Kid Flash at all."

"But how did you know who I was!?" Kid Flash demanded.

"I'm a writer," John said, "and for the life of me I have no idea how it is anyone of the cape set has a secret identity. It's all blindingly obvious who everyone is… even when they aren't coming to my home to show me in person."

"We did not think this out," Aqualad realized.

Miss Martian sniffed, and a tear rolled down her face.

At Superboy's glare John quickly said, "Don't break anything, she just got to a sad part of the story."

"How did you know to prepare for her in advance?" Robin asked suspiciously.

"Speedster," he reminded then.

"And?" Superboy asked.

"The moment you all walked in the door I realized who you were and prepared my mental defense. Super speed means I had all the time in the world."

"I should have just called," Kid Flash groaned.

"Yes, you should have," John agreed, "but at least you didn't break anything this time."

"There is that," Kid Flash admitted embarrassed.

"So now what?" Superboy asked.

"That Bastard!" Miss Martian exclaimed, but everyone ignored her.

"Now you finish setting up my pool table and entertainment center," John said. "After that I sweep for any high tech bugs Robin might have accidentally dropped or scrying sigils Aqualad might have coincidentally made."

"I'm not a student of that branch of sorcery," Aqualad said.

"Still doesn't hurt to check," John replied.

"What happened?" Miss Martian asked, blinking and looking around.

"He prepared a mental defense to distract you and then he lectured us," Superboy said annoyed.

"I'm a writer, we love to hear ourselves talk as that's basically what we do all the time, just in print," John said amused.

"I.. I can't believe I fell for that," Miss Martian said with a groan.

"I can't believe you went straight for the fluffy Romance story and ignored the Hentai," John said.

"Hentai?" she asked confused.

"A more adult version of what you read," John said, "and without as many life lessons."

"You wrote a Hentai version?" Artemis asked in disbelief.

"A' no, I wrote a dozen," John answered her. "I don't know Miss Martian's taste, so I had to cover a wide variety to make sure I caught her."

"Let's just go assemble everything," Robin said with a sigh.

"She's gone again," Kid Flash repeated as Miss Martian turned bright red.

Typing by: A tortured Soul… the lost spirit of Dangasaur

TN: YOU BASTARDS WHO THE *BEEP*

AN: Someone mentioned that I don't complain about Superheroes breaking the law as much as other writers do, so I thought about what my character would be like if he had that mindset. The answer appears to be 'dull' because he wouldn't engage in heroics as he'd consider it a criminal act. He may seem a bit like a Gary-Stu but that's mainly because he already knows what is possible with the power he has, so he was able to prepare for some situations in advance not to mention how broken Super speed is in DC.