Hi folks, this is Mo! I started writing this… almost a year and a half ago? Holy guacamole. Not going to lie, I may have forgotten that it existed so I guess thanks for waiting and I won't make you wait any longer. Here's chapter 2.

Barry Allen had expected everything to change after Bruce's revelation; after all, the Bat was a child among gods. The fastest man alive quickly discovered that he couldn't have been more wrong.

It was Diana who he discovered was ambivalent to the Dark Knight's age first.

"Diana, don't you think it's a bit strange that 'Gotham's protector' is still in puberty?" The speedster asked one morning after a battle. She gave him a confused face, looking awkward as she stood at attention in the casual lounge area of the tower.

"No. On Themyscira we had many a noble warrior who rose to their station at a young age by proving themselves in battle. Surely our compatriot has done the same, don't you think?"

"I guess." He nodded, realizing that she wasn't going to change her mind on the issue any time soon. He took another sip of his coffee. "What about Robin though, doesn't he seem a bit young to you?"

"What I believe personally about how our shield brother has chosen to raise his charge should not change what either of them does as long as they are both safe and happy."

"So you do think that Robin is too young to fight!"

"Yes, but I believe that Bruce has his compunctions about Robin fighting as well. He has only brought his charge on one assignment and that was when he absolutely could not have succeeded without him. I'm sure that once he's older, robin will join us more but until then, he will have a normal childhood," Diana reasoned. "And besides, how I feel about Robin's age has nothing to do with how I feel about his guardian's age."

Flash grumbled, acknowledging that nothing he could say would change her mind. He tried on Clark next. After all, surely Superman, being a bastion of morality couldn't be ok with child soldiers. He cornered him one night as the two were going out for coffee after a long shift at the watchtower.

"No I'm ok with it. I mean, I got my powers around his age and I chose not to do anything to help people. I guess I respect him even more for doing something that I was too cowardly to do."

"But he was acting as a vigilante for two years before we formed the league. Surely you don't condone a fourteen year old fighting every gang banger in Gotham of all places with nothing but Kevlar protecting him!"

Clark thought on it for a moment and Barry grinned, sure that he had convinced the strongest man on earth of his perspective. "I guess if nothing else that I have to respect him more for that, not less." Barry's face dropped and he groaned.

"I honestly can't even with you dude." Sighed the speedster.

"You talk like that and it's his maturity you're concerned about?" laughed Clark.

Barry groaned again.

Maybe it was the idealism of Diana and Clark that wouldn't let them see his side. Getting a logical, unbiased point of view might be just what he needed! And when you need logical and unbiased, everybody knows that you go to J'onn.

"While his physiology may be less developed that that of our adult team mates, surely you see that he is just as mature mentally, if not more so than the rest of us."

Barry was ready to scream, maybe J'onn just didn't understand how human physiology played into this. "No he's not! His brain isn't fully developed! It won't be until he's 25!"

J'onn remained as calm and collected as ever. "And yet who do we go to for the watchtower's security? Who is our chief strategist? Who is the one member of our team who the public respects as much as superman?"

"Batman, but" Barry started. J'onn cut him off.

"Doesn't that prove enough for you?" Barry started to say something again but Martian Manhunter turned away signaling that the conversation was over. Flash slumped against the wall. Why could nobody else see how messed up this was?!

Didn't the green lanterns have some code of ethics? Surely they'd get it.

John turned to Hal. "How old is Pavel?" he asked.

"Which one?"

"Chekov? I think?"

"From Nibiru?" Hal confirmed, opening up some kind of database and reading through it.

"Yeah that guy."

"According to the databanks he'd be 14 in earth years." Hal responded.

Flash groaned knowing that if those two idiots were going to use anecdotal evidence against him that he'd never win the argument. He gave up and walked away knowing that this was going to be useless just like every other conversation he'd had with every other hero he'd asked. Then a thought struck him. Green lantern had a younger sister. Surely he'd understand Flash's sudden desire to roll the dark knight into a pile of blankets, give him enough homework to last a life time, some cookies and milk, and lock the door.

"Oliver, buddy, surely you can see how wrong it is for a sixteen year old to be fighting supervillains, right?" Flash asked desperately, hoping his friend would understand.

"Nope." Oliver laughed, popping the 'p' and shoving some more popcorn in his mouth.

Barry reached over to pause the movie. "Ok but think about it. He's the same age as Thea. Wouldn't you be scared for her if she was out fighting crime?" he reasoned.

"Nah," Oliver continued casually. "I'd be scared for her but she doesn't have his skills, ya' know?"

"No, I don't know!" Barry shot back, exasperated. "I don't see how any skillset is justification for robbing a child of… well… childhood!"

Oliver sighed. "I think he was robbed of his childhood a long time ago and I don't think that the team babying him will make anything better." Then he chuckled. "Besides, no child has his skills."

Barry was confused. "Of course other kids have his skills. All sorts of kids take martial arts classes and bunches of kids learn how to shoot guns or throw knives. Plus, unlike some of us, he doesn't kill people, showing even more how smol and precious he is." The speedster contended.

"He's far better at martial arts than kids who take commercial classes, he doesn't use guns, and he's got the kind of super human aim that you don't get from throwing knives as a hobby. He's also a brilliant detective. He's smart enough to make his own gear. He can sew himself back together after a bad fight. And hey, if you ask me, the fact that he doesn't kill people makes him even more impressive because it means that it takes more time for him to subdue people and that he's enough in control of himself that he can avoid murdering people."

Oliver's reasoning was sound but Barry had one last ace up his sleeve to convince his best friend in crime fighting. "What about the psychological toll this is taking on him. Think about the mental problems he'll have later in life. Think about the nightmares!"

Oliver laughed. "Do you remember the first time we met the bat? Before anyone had revealed their identities to anyone else? That day when he helped us defeat the lava monster." Barry nodded, of course he did. Batman had scared the shit out of both of them, popping out of the shadows like a bat out of hell and obliterating the thing they had been fighting to no avail for two hours in just minutes with the use of a grenade he'd apparently made himself. Barry was genuinely concerned that the bat was going to hospitalize him when Bruce had criticized the two hero's incompetence at not aiming for its eyes, thereby leaving civilians in danger. For months, both Green Arrow and Flash had thought that the man had teleportation powers or some sort of magic, which they only discovered to be wrong after he told them at the first league meeting. Oliver smirked at the look on his friend's face. "Don't you get it, he's giving as good as he receives in the nightmare department. Plus, at the end of the day, he knows that he's got a safety net if he needs help and that's what I think matters the most. I wouldn't be too worried about him if I were you Barry. The kid is fine, really!"

Barry sighed, unconvinced and turned the movie back on. If he couldn't get his team mates to see that it might not be healthy for Bruce to be a hero, then the least he could do was go to the man himself and convince him that it was ok to be a kid every once in a while.

"Ok so I get that you're trying to project this dark and mysterious demeanor but maybe you should take the opportunity to act your age once in a while." Argued the speedster.

"I do act my age." Retorted the bat, typing away at one of the encryptions for the watchtower's weaponry protocols with a frustrated look on his face.

"No. if you acted your age, you'd have a favorite TV show, a girlfriend, maybe you'd ask one of us for help with your homework every once in a while."

"First off, who's to say that I don't have a favorite TV show or a girlfriend? Second off, if I can be the Batman and help set up this watchtower, why would I need help with chemistry or English, or anything else for that matter?"

Flash sighed. The kid had him there. "Well, do you have any friends your age?" Bruce put away his coding project, knowing that this conversation was going to take him a while.

"I don't need any friends my age. I've got the team, Alfred, and Dick."

"You have no clue how tragic and lonely that sounds do you?"

"I'm an orphan; everything about me is tragic and lonely." Bruce retorted sarcastically, rolling his eyes. Barry, having missed the sarcasm was alarmed. "Look, if you're really that concerned, it's your turn to plan team bonding night next month, why don't you plan something teenagerish enough to satisfy yourself that I'm having fun or whatever and then you can stop irritating me." Bruce grumbled, acting like this was some sort of concession. Barry nodded enthusiastically. This was a brilliant plan. Bruce turned back to his coding and the Flash, seeing his cue sped off to make his brilliant plan.

It was two weeks later when Barry realized that this was a sucky idea and that he had no idea what teenagers did. It was time to call in the cavalry. It was time to take the only two kids he knew out to ice cream.

"So… Dick, Wally, what do you two do for fun?" He smiled, hoping that they would give some insight as to how he could manipulate the bat into having fun.

"Videogames!" They replied in tandem. Barry groaned. This was going to take a while.

Eventually, the first Saturday of the month rolled around and Barry's plan, fully formulated, went into action. The nondescript bowling alley in Des Moines, Iowa was called Plaza Lanes. The place could be best described as poorly lit, smelled like greasy food, and only catered to bored teenagers and professional bowling teams primarily filled with balding old men who were one bad fall away from using walkers. Most importantly, Plaza Lanes was the sort of place that a supervillain would never think to go looking for the team. Essentially, it was perfect.

"Hi, welcome to Plaza Lanes, home of the famous Plaza fries, how may I help you?" droned the pimply teen working the front desk.

"We'd like to rent eight pairs of shoes and a lane for 3 games please." Barry smiled.

The teenager passed them their shoes and pointed to one of the lanes. "Feel free to pick any ball you want just stick to lane 4 and have a nice afternoon!"

Barry turned to look at everybody's reactions. Clark, Hal, John, and Oliver, all of whom had gone bowling looked excited. Diana, J'onn, and Bruce looked a bit more cautious but still willing to try it out.

"What is the objective of this game Barry?" asked Diana.

"To knock over the pins at the end of the lane by rolling the ball!" Barry frowned for a moment, realizing how lame that made the game sound. "I promise it's more fun than it sounds!"

"What are the rules?" asked Bruce, eying a ball critically as he picked it up and inspected it as though it might lash out and attack him at any moment.

"You can't step past the line or walk on the lane, that's really about it," replied Barry, sitting down to put on his shoes. "Oh also, Clark and I are team captains!"

"That's definitely not a rule." Pouted Clark

"Because you're questioning my decision, I get to pick first!" Barry crowed. Clark shrugged which Barry took as acquiescence. "I'll take Ollie!"

"Diana"

"Hal"

"Bruce"

"J'onn"

"John. Also, because I got second pick, we should also get to go first."

Barry groaned. "Fineeeeeeeeeee." He sighed sarcastically, drawing out the word.

Barry thought his plan for team bonding went splendidly. He finally found something that Diana totally sucked at and his team won two of the three games. Bruce even cracked a smile when he tried the cheesy fries, which was a miracle in its own right. The team may not hang out with Bruce often enough to count as good friends but they definitely were closer than coworkers were and they may not be teens but some of them *cough* Hal *cough* Ollie *cough* were certainly immature enough to make up for it.

Barry's concerns weren't alleviated all the way, he wasn't sure they every would be but for now he had proven to the team, and more importantly to himself, that Bruce was not completely missing out on his childhood.

A/N I don't know if this is clear but so far these one shots have taken place when the league is still being formed so they don't have all of their members quite yet and Young Justice is quite a way from being formed.