Totally Not A Date

[Kid Flash]

Damn it. Damn damn damn damn damn.

It sounded like a flurry of blows against a punching bag as Wally's leather-wrapped knuckles whammed into the mugger's pressure points, causing the purse he'd snatched to tumble from his fingers. Wally was rushing things, forgoing his usual wit and banter - mostly; some of that stuff was just natural and irresistible, so he couldn't always help it - to get this criminal dealt with fast. An arm swept out and snatched the purse from the air as it tumbled, hitching it over his shoulder as he delivered a few more punches: not breaking any bones, but definitely enough to give the guy a nasty pair of dead arms and discourage him from trying to fight back. A grab of the guy's clothes and a little burst of speed force brought them racing towards a street lamp; a flurry of blurred motion, and Wally whipped one of the cable ties from a craftily concealed compartment in his costume, and secured the thief's wrists behind him, anchoring him to the pole.

He shouldn't have done this. It was stupid to do this. He had somewhere to be - somewhere important. Okay, so him and Linda meeting up was absolutely not in any conceivable way any sort of date or even date-adjacent encounter, but it still mattered, y'know? Besides, he was a speedster. Being late shouldn't even have been possible. But it had, because he'd got distracted. He'd heard the shout for help from the alley, seen the guy - not even bothering to conceal the piddly little gun he'd threatened some poor woman with - slinking out carrying a purse that absolutely did not match his outfit; and he'd just had to act. Superspeed made it easy to change into his costume. Superspeed made it easy to chase the guy down. But it was going to make him late, and if that meant Linda was going to be upset with him -

Damn you, Percy the Purse-Thief. I will never forgive you if you make her mad at me.

Abandoning the thief to his fate with law enforcement, Wally sped back to the victim, returning the purse to it's rightful owner. But there wasn't time to bask in her gratitude, or deliver his usual suave style of response. "Don't mention it, ma'am," was all he managed to say before he zoomed off down the alley in search of some sort of covert route to where he and Linda had agreed to meet. "Just happy to help."

[Supergirl]

"Oh, come on!" Kara protested as the thug currently perched in the back of the stolen money van lifted up a long cylindrical object. "Where did you guys even get a rocket launcher!?" She complained. This was not her day! What was supposed to be a peaceful little not-date with Wally West, a chance to see the city and make a friend, had turned in to a full blown extended chase through the city as a group of thugs had hijacked a security van, complete with who-knew-how-much-cash inside and enough heavy weapons to hold off the entire Gotham City Police Force.

So how could she no? She'd been chasing it down two city blocks dodging machine gun fire (which stung!) when apparently they had finally decided to go for the big guns. In this case, a literal big gun. Kara had never been shot by a rocket before, but she had no intention of finding out if she could survive it, and dodging it would only mean that it would hit some innocent civilian. She glared at the rocket launcher angrily, and when Kara glared, she really could glare.

Two intense rays of red energy shot from her eyes, hitting the rocket launcher before he could fire it, and with a yelp the thug dropped it, it clattering to the ground and smashing past her. She was getting annoyed now, and it was time to finish this. She shot forwards, soaring over the top of the truck, and knowing that this was going to be difficult, landing in front of it. Standing strong, the truck ran straight towards her, and then at the very last moment, she grabbed the front of it and lifted, throwing it up over her head and then promptly catching the bottom.

And so, there she stood, in the middle of the street, holding the truck over her head as its wheels span vainly. The thing was really heavy, she was probably pushing the limits of her physical strength a little, but she had done it. She noticed the odd camera flash going off, after all, who wouldn't photograph Supergirl holding an entire truck over her her, and she hoped that it wasn't too obvious that she was straining to hold it. She chucked it aside, allowing it land with a heavy thump on its side, and then she shot around to the back as the thugs tried to climb out.
"Sorry boys, but you wanted in that thing, you can stay." She slammed the twin doors on the truck closed, and flew back several feet, before exhaling, blowing out ice cold air that froze the doors solidly shut. She allowed herself a breath of relief as she landed, sirens in the distance as people cheered. She could get used to this!

And then suddenly she remembered how late she was. Crud! Crud! Crud! She hoped that he was still there. The last thing she wanted to do was offend her only friend in this city! She rocketed in the air, shooting down Gotham streets as fast as she could, a simple blur of blue and red...

...until out of an alley trotted Linda Danvers, just running her hands through her hair, in one of her usual revealing, teenagerish school outfits, heels, pulling out her compact to check her make-up. And frowning at the big black smear. She shot back in to the alley for a moment, and thanked herself for her super speed at applying make-up (the one skill she didn't learn from Kal), before re-emerging from the alley.

....and she sighed. Wally wasn't there. He must have gotten fed up with waiting. Her shoulders slumped. Stupid thieves! They'd ruined everything. Ugh. When she'd dreamt of being like Kal, she'd never intended this...

[Wally West]

Wally exploded out of the men's room, stumbling slightly as the door had proven a little harder to open than expected. Glancing down at himself slightly, he stuffed a stray corner of shirt back into his pants as he dodged through the crowd to where -

Oh thank god, Linda was still there.

Okay, so the fact that she was there first wasn't ideal. He'd spent ages that morning in front of the mirror in his dorm room, practising the best way to casually say hey and make it seem like, yes, I have totally just been waiting here for you because I respect you and take this super seriously, but totally not in a romantical sort of way, and if you want to be totally casual about this that is totally fine with me. He'd more or less got it worked out, and there was even a little smile thing that he was pretty proud of. Now that was all for naught.

"Heeey," he said sheepishly, jamming his hands nervously into his pockets. "Sorry I'm late, I -"

He glanced behind him, realising where he'd just come from, and the somewhat limited options for excuses that he had now left himself with.

"- had a really bad breakfast burrito this morning."

Really? Really? That was his opening line? Nice one, Wally. At least he'd ensured that there wasn't any risk of this being mistaken for an actual date-date. If it had been, that would've been one hell of a mood killer.

[Supergirl]

Kara sighed with relief as Wally approached, glad that he was also running late, until he opened his mouth and spoke. For a moment, Kara gazed at him in disbelief. She had just been about to tell him how it didn't matter, but after a line like that? She just gave him a disbelieving look for a moment, before shaking her head.
"I might not know much about living here..." She paused, before realising that didn't quite make sense in her disguise. "...uh, in the city I mean, but... if that's the reason you're late, I think it's one of the occasions it's okay to lie." She told him with a teasing smile. "Make up something heroic. Say you were stopping a purse snatcher or something."

"I was pretty late anyway." She shrugged. "I..." Then she paused, and realised she should have come up with an excuse before she started speaking. "...lost my lip gloss." She finished, and realised it was considerably less gross than Wally's reason, but just made her look like a vain ditz. "Shut up, it's important." She said quickly before he could point out the absurdity of it. Well, it was. Kara did like to look good, after all.

"So, uh... are you still good to... you know, show me around?" She asked with a sceptical glance at his stomach. "I don't want you... you know..." She waved a hand and cringed at the thought.

[Wally West]

Crestfallen was one of those words that you read in English class, but that you didn't really get. Sure, you knew that it meant dejected or deflated or whatever, but you didn't really get what the word meant, where it came from, that et-something-ology word that sounded a lot like the word for bug studies but was something totally different.

Now though? Now Wally got it. He felt like one of those birds, all puffed up and showy-offy, trying to impress a potential mate - which Linda totally was not, by the way - and then suddenly it was all for naught. He could feel the little tuft of imaginary feathers on his head slowly beginning to droop, his expression faltering, body slumping just a little.

But I was doing something heroic.

So much for honesty being the best policy. Okay, so technically it was a lie, but it was the kind of lie that actually seemed like it was too much honesty. He had read enough girly magazines to know that girls like Linda - young women, the magazines were very big on that term - were supposed to like guys who were honest, guys who would try to hide anything, or hold anything back. And okay, so maybe his imaginary fake burrito bowels were something that he should be holding back in more ways than one, but even the kind of guy he was pretending to be, the kind of guy he was trying to be, just wasn't the kind of thing she was into. Wally suddenly found himself feeling all cold, realising that if he couldn't even pull off being the perfect guy, what hope did he ever have of finding someone who would actually like him as more than just a dorky friend if he went around actually being himself.

"Nah, I'm -"

He patted his stomach, not really feeling the full conviction to play up to the lie any more.

"I'm good. Walking around always makes me feel better, and besides, I... I could probably use some fluids, if you wanna, I dunno, grab a drink or something?"

Oh, Wally. Man. Buddy. Me. What the hell are you trying to do? Time to call it, bro. Patient is dead. Let it die with dignity.

[Supergirl]

Kara noticed Wally seemed a little upset at her joke, and she felt pretty bad. She didn't want Wally to be too upset. Well, it was pretty gross, and definitely not what you should say to a person when you were late, but he was being honest and she supposed she shouldn't be too harsh on him for that. Besides, if he hadn't been sick, he'd of caught her being late too, and her excuses were just as lame, if considerably less disgusting. And that would have been a lie from her. At least he was honest.

"Aw, c'mon, smile. I was only joking." She teased. "I think it's cute that you're honest, although, for future reference, definitely file stuff like that under 'TMI'." Kara explained with a slight smile, although secretly she was smiling at the fact that she felt what she just said used Earth slang pretty much perfectly. She had taken a while to get her head around that. She didn't want to wound her pride by telling Wally she didn't actually know what a burrito was. She was doing so well at blending in!

"Yeah, sure, a drink sounds good." Kara said chirply, although she frowned a little when he said he needed fluids. "Seriously, you're sure you're okay, right?" She asked. It seemed despite Wally putting his foot in it and Kara being a little grossed out, she did at least actually care. It was hard not to when you had spent the last year living with the Kents. They had a way of living they just ingrained in to you.

[Wally West]

"I'm fine, honest."

Under normal circumstances, Wally would probably have read way too much into that concern about his well being. Would've imagined it as some secret clue of a kind of affection that Linda was reluctant to admit to. Now though, it barely even registered.

He managed to muster a small smile as he gestured in the direction that they needed to go and started ambling in that direction, hands defensively shoved into his pockets as e walked. You would think that by now he'd be used to it: used to having to deceive people, to make up a story to cover for his superhero antics. You'd think that by now he'd have learned to justify the lying to himself - after all, it was for the greater good and all that - and you'd think that for someone who could think about as fast as he could run, he'd be way better at making them plausible. Problem was, lying had never come easy to Wally West: not unless it was the lying to yourself kind. He was the sort of guy who would blurt out honesty even when it was a bad idea. Not throwing out some smartass comment about his powers or his hero antics was a constant struggle, but at least back in Keystone and Central he'd Barry and his parents to vent those sorts of things at. Here he was keeping it all bottled up inside, and it made him feel like a shaken-up soda can.

Okay so sure, even if he and Linda somehow managed to become super best friends, his secret identity wasn't something that he was just gonna casually reveal to anyone and everyone. Aside from the fact that doing it was dumb, it put people in danger, and Wally was pretty sure that was crappy friend conduct. But everything else? Having someone to talk to, at all? A release valve for all of the other junk rattling around in his head seemed awful nice. Assuming he hadn't managed to ruin everything with such a terrible lie that he was now going to need to maintain the illusion of for the rest of the day.

"So -" He started, his mouth deciding that something needed to be said before his brain had finished coming up with what that was. "I know you've been to Central, and you've been to Gotham, obviously. Where else in our great nation has Miss Smalllville managed to visit? You done much travelling, or is this your first time outside the Midwest?"

[Supergirl]

Kara felt awful. She could tell that she had upset Wally, even if she didn't really think it was fair that she had. She'd only made a joke, and she'd been pretty nice about it, and checked he was okay. Maybe he really wasn't feeling very well? She wasn't sure, but somehow she felt it was her fault. Her and her big mouth. She shouldn't have teased him so early. She forgot they hadn't been friends for long. She supposed because she didn't have any other friends, she forgot her only one was quite new.

Luckily, Wally picked up the conversation again, and Kara hoped they could move on and at least find a new topic of conversation.
"Uh, no, not really." She answered, blatantly lying of course. She'd travelled across the entire galaxy in a rocket ship. The 'Midwest' wasn't much of a concern to her. "I spent some time in Metropolis though. My cousin has an apartment there. I even got to apartment sit once!" She explained cheerily. That was a fun time, especially since Kal was away and Kara got to step in to the role as the city's defender for a short time. But she figured she couldn't mention that.

"What about you? Do you-" She began to say, before she suddenly paused. The two were cutting through a small alley and she could hear something coming with her super hearing. Before she could react however, a black van came squealing around the corner, stopping in front of the pair, its back doors flinging open and several men lowering guns at them. Kara almost reacted immediately, about to tear the guns from their hands, but stopped herself, realising that she couldn't show her powers in front of Wally. Instead, she threw herself in front of him, and grabbed him, as if hugging him scared, but making sure her body was in the path of any potential bullets.

"In the van kids! NOW!" Growled the lead kidnapper, and before Kara and Wally could do anything (well, without using powers...) two of the men grabbed them, and threw them in to the back of the truck,.
"Rich kids from that fancy school of yours shouldn't go out alone, y'know?" Another laughed as Kara felt handcuffs slapped over her wrists from behind, looking at all the guns lowered at them. These guys were serious. And she couldn't use her powers in front of Wally either.

She started to think madly. There had to be something she could do, before Wally got hurt. Ohh, she was going to make these guys pay so ​bad... Just as soon as she worked out how...

[Wally West]

Wally's mind started racing at a thousand miles per hour. Linda was right there, but he was fast. Faster than the human eye, maybe. He'd used his superspeed in public before, lightning fast reflexes, things speedily hidden and shuffled around while people were looking the other way. If Linda was distracted focusing on their would-be abductors, then maybe -

Or maybe not. Next thing Wally knew, he was getting hugged - a surprisingly strong hug at that; Linda must work out or something - and then manhandled into the back of a van. He heard them blabbing about rich kids - really? Okay, so Linda looked pretty fancy with her fashion sense and her pretty looks and all that, but what the hell about Wally West and his cobbled together outfit made anyone even remotely suspect he had more than a few bucks to his name? - but was only half paying attention, eyes already sweeping the van for possible escape routes. If he vibrated his hand against the door, then maybe he could get the right resonance to trigger the latch and open it; and the thugs weren't even worth worrying about, he could subdue them before the nerve impulse to pull the trigger even finished travelling down their arm. Maybe he could even be super-cool and dismantle their guns while they were still holding them, a superspeed version of that thing that everyone tried to do real fast in action movie training montages.

But not with Linda right there. Not with her watching. Would that be so bad? Wally hated that voice in his head, the voice that told him to ignore everything that Barry had taught him about why protecting his identity was important. It wasn't about showing off or anything else that people assumed it was - he just hated lying. Especially burrito lies. I mean, good god Wally, what the hell? It's one thing to use your bowels as an excuse, but sullying the good name of breakfast burritos? That was uncalled for.

Okay, so no superspeed. Not yet. Not until it became the only way to keep Linda safe. For now, he'd just have to do everything he could as stupid dorky Wally West.

He reached out and placed a hand on Linda's shoulder, mustering the most reassuring voice he possibly could. "It's gonna be okay, Linda. I won't let them hurt you."

Next thing Wally knew, the butt of a gun smacked him upside the head, and a spintering pain exploded into existence just above his eyebrow. Oh come on! What the hell was it with criminals and hitting him in the head lately? He glared up angrily at the man holding the gun. The man glared back just the same.

"Keep your mouth shut, kid."

[Supergirl]

Kara watched everything unfold, clenching her wrists as Wally tried to play the manly man and make sure that she was okay, only to get hit in the back of the head. Kara winced and reached over to try and comfort him, but her restrained hands were now coupled against a bar in the van, and if she leaned any further, she'd snap the cuffs. She had to try and resist the urge to do so as it was, it would be so easy.
"Wally..." She whispered, sounding frightened, but only because she feared for him. "Just... do what they say. It's going to be okay." She said, realising of course this was the stereotypical victim thing to say. 'Do what they say'. 'Hope we get rescued'. Ugh, if only she could just tell Wally. 'I'm Supergirl'. And then take them apart. But she couldn't.

"You too kid! Don't think I won't hit a girl!" Threatened the same one that had clocked Wally. Kara looked up so angrily for a moment it took all of her self control to not set off her heat vision, but she didn't dare answer back. Not because she was afraid of getting hit, but because she was aware of the result. If the guy hit her like he'd hit Wally with the gun, the gun would possibly break before Kara's head took any damage, and then they'd know something was wrong.
"You know we don't have any money, right?" Kara tried to argue instead. If Supergirl couldn't get them out of this, maybe Linda Danvers could.
"Yeah, that's what they all say." Insisted the thug as the van came to a halt ."Split 'em up! Seperate rooms!" He ordered as the van door opened, and Kara was uncuffed, being led out.

"Wally! Don't panic! It's going to be okay! I promise!" She yelled as they began to drag her away, only pausing for a moment as it seemed incrediblydifficult to move this tiny blonde girl just for a split second as she spoke, and then everything was normal again...

[Wally West]

Wally don't panic? What about Linda don't panic?

Wally didn't get any opportunity to offer reassurance as the thug who'd cracked him one in the head began to lead him away, taking a certain amount of enjoyment in excessive force. Wally was used to pain; his body was a little more resilient as part of the whole not getting his skin peeled off by the friction of running so fast thing, and everything to do with his metabolism, immune system, and his ability to heal happened at the same faster-than-normal speed as everything else about him. Well not everything. Certain things didn't happen super fast, but now wasn't exactly the time to dwell on that little biological function.

Even so, Wally played along, faked at being a little groggy and compliant the way that his kidnapper would expect him to be. The quicker they got out of sight the better; the sooner he'd be able to bust loose and then... what? Rescue Linda, convince her that he just happened to have been in the neighbourhood at the time, and that he'd already rescued Wally so they absolutely did not have to go find him before they could get the hell out of there? Or did he just superspeed her outside before she had the chance to protest, and then say he was going to go back and get Wally; then take out the thugs and... change back into his normal clothes and jog out of the building as if Kid Flash had told him to just run? Rig up an... I dunno, time delayed explosion somehow so it sounded like their superheroic savior was still in there doing stuff?

Wait no, he couldn't do any of that. If he tried anything at all, the guy restraining him would see. They might not know he was Wally West, but they'd have seen his face, they knew where he went to school, and it'd only take a few minutes and a web search to identify the juvenile speedster. Even if he kept his speed in check and took the guy down with the martial arts techniques he had learned - which would be easy, by the way; this guy didn't look so tough, especially when you had experience fighting giant psychic gorillas - that wouldn't help him, not in Gotham City. Young kids with martial arts skills was kind of a thing here, it wasn't like Central City where no one gave a crap about vigilantes unless they could run real fast.

Anxiety started to take over, Wally's thoughts running backwards and forwards in his head like a speedster whirlwind. He needed to get free and save Linda. Had to. But he needed to do it without seeming super-powered, or super-skilled. Needed to do it seeming like hapless dorky Wally West, the least impressive specimen of masculinity on the planet. There was only one way to do that as far as his lightning fast thoughts could currently comprehend.

His shoulders slumped.

"I had a really bad breakfast burrito this morning," he said quietly, the shame in his voice not entirely false. "Can I use the bathroom, before I -" He grimaced. "- y'know."

[Supergirl]

Kara let them drag her forcefully in to a small side room, her eyes locked on the walls in a way that her captors found odd, but totally ignored. Of course, the reason was that Kara was keeping a careful eye on Wally with her X-Ray vision. She was hoping he wasn't doing something stupid, and she strained with her super-hearing in time to hear his excuse. She had to hide a chuckle. Who would have thought Wally's breakfast burritos would save the day? Or at least, give him enough of a delay for Kara to do her own thing.

Speaking of which, she was forced down in to a chair, one of the thugs leering in front of her as another began to look through her bag.
"Lemme tell you how this works. You tell us your name, your parents, we give 'em a ring on your phone, demand a ransom. Nice and easy." He said threatening, before cocking the gun. "You refuse, you even stutter, an' we have some fun with your pretty lil' hide. Understand?" Kara's eyes flickered to the thug looking through her bag. Well, too late to stop him now, so...
"S-sure. M-my phone is in my bag. I-it has their details..." She stammered, as fake-scared as she could manage.
"Get her phone!" The thug close to her ordered.
"There ain't no phone in here! Just this stupid outfit!" The second thug complained.
"What outfit?" The first asked, snatching it off of him and unfolding it.

The two thugs saw that familiar 'S' at the same time, and both of their eyes went wide.
"Why's a teenage girl got a Supergirl outfit in her-" The second began to ask just before they heard a sound that seemed peculiarly like somebody snapping handcuffs like they were made out of paper. "Oh shi-"

A few crashes later, and the door to the side room flung off its hinges and so far across the corridor it embedded in to the other wall, and out strode Supergirl, in full outfit, a determined look on her face. One of the guards turned, ready to fire his gun, only to find it snatched away before he could even pull the trigger and himself thrown in to a wall with enough force to leave him barely able to stand.
"If he's been hurt, I'm coming back for you." She stated firmly, and headed down the corridor, cape swirling behind her...

[Wally West]

The guy with the gun hadn't been particularly helpful. Whatever building they'd brought them to was apparently undergoing renovations - smart; people would expect a certain amount of banging and crashing; and well, this was Gotham, who was gonna flinch at a couple of extra gunshots if it came down to it? - and that apparently meant no bathrooms. None working, anyway. The gun guy had been so smug when he'd kicked over an empty bucket of plaster, but Wally had simply shrugged, and turned to brandish his restrained wrists in the guy's direction.

"Unless pulling down the pants of a teenage boy floats your boat," he'd added for extra effect, "In which case be my guest."

The man had glowered - Wally decided it was definitely worthy of that adjective - and had cut through the cable ties binding Wally's wrists. Sure, Wally could have just vibrated his way out or whatever, but plausible deniability and all that. Wally had waited until the instant the gun guy had turned away to give him a little privacy, and then he'd booked it, running as fast as a gangly-armed teenager would have been expecting to.

That was when the crashing had come from the other room, enough to snap the guy's attention around. Wally was half way to his backpack by the time the guy had clocked on to him; he swerved at just the right moment, a bullet whistling past his head and ricochetting off a concrete pillar as he dove behind the nearest cover. He peered across at where his bag, and more importantly his suit, lay waiting. The kidnapper unleashed a string of profanities and threats. Language, dude. Wally took a deep breath, counted to three, and then ran.

[Kid Flash]

A burst of golden lightning surged towards the distant wall too fast for the kidnapper to possibly see, pinballing off surfaces until he was certain that the thug had no idea where he had originated from. A few frantic aims, two desperate shots; Wally dodged them with ease, scooping up his backpack, changing into his costume in a whirlwind of superspeed motion.

When it finally came to a halt, Kid Flash stood there, offering the kidnapper his most taunting grin.

"Kidnapping school kids in the middle of the day? Really?"

He sighed and shook his head, tongue clicking out a few disappointed tuts.

"I knew the criminals in Gotham were stupid, but dude, you and your buddy are really dragging down the average."

[Supergirl]

And at that moment, from behind said kidnapper, the door burst quite literally off its hinges, and fell to the ground with a thud. Framed by the light from the corridor outside, cape swirling behind her, in strode Kara, full of heroism, ready to rescue Wally, only to stop, and frown. Wally wasn't here any more, and instead it was the Flash. Or a Flash-like guy. She had never met him so wasn't sure, but the outfit sure looked Flashy.

...Not that kind of Flashy, as in- Wow, was Kara glad she wasn't saying this out loud.

The kidnapper span, surprised to see her standing there, and unloaded several shots in her direction. Unlike Wally, she didn't even bother dodging, and they just bounced off of her. She gritted her teeth and hid the pain on her face, bullets still stung her, but she was determined to not let it show. Not when the kidnappers had made her this angry, and not when there was a whole new hero there to impress. As the last shot went off, her hand snapped out, and closed in to a fist. She then slowly walked towards the rapidly backing away kidnapper, who was looking over his shoulder in terror at Kid Flash who was just behind him. Kara calmly opened her hand, the bullet inside it.
"I believe this is yours." She said calmly. The kidnapper looked down at the bullet, up at Kara, at the S on her chest, span around, at Kid Flash, the lightning bolt, back to Kara, and fainted clean to the ground.

Kara looked down calmly for a moment, checking the threat was over. Good.
"OWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!" She shrieked, as soon as she was sure he was unconscious, and began hopping around, clutching her hand. She'd never caught a bullet before, and she certainly wasn't going to again. "OW! OW! OW! OW! THAT REALLY HURT!" She whined, holding her hand in pain. Bullets stung her (as she had spent nowhere near as much time on Earth as Kal), hands were traditionally more sensitive, so of course stopping one like that would really sting. "OW! OW! OOO-" And then she paused, realising the other hero was there watching her.

She very self consciously lowered her hand, and stood still, before placing them behind her back and looking entirely calm.
"I-I mean, uh, I'm good. You okay?" She asked with her best attempted Superman-style heroic expression on her face. "There's another victim here somewhere. We have to-" She was just about to change the subject from her little display to rescuing Wally as she peered under his mask out of idle curosity, thoughtlessly really, it was just something to do as she spoke. But of course, then she froze.

"WALLY!?" She suddenly exclaimed. "You're the FLASH!?"

[Kid Flash]

Wally's first instinct was to deny it. Try to pull a weird face, or put on an accent to seem less like himself. Maybe he was a French speedster.

Ah am sorree madamoiselle, I know not zis Wally you speak of.

Okay, so maybe not French. But something. Some desperate attempt to prove the integrity of his costume, a vain effort to not discover that all of his awesome design modifications had made it super-easy for Supergirl to work out who he was. Did it show too much of his eyes? Did he need to start doing the superhero panda eyes make-up thing? Was it his goofy grin that she had picked up on, or was it -

Maybe it's because she's got a Superman logo on her chest, and Kryptonians have x-ray vision, dumbass.

Wally let out a sigh. "This is why Batman's cowl is lined with lead," he muttered.

But hang on. He didn't know Supergirl. He'd never met the Big Man's space cousin - which was exactly the same as a regular cousin, except also from space. He squinted in momentary confusion, wondering why some hyper-powered alien space blonde was familiar with him at all. Had they met? Maybe she had a secret identity? Maybe someone with different hair, or glasses, or -

"Linda?"

As soon as the realisation dawned, he felt so stupid. Of course it was Linda Danvers. Maybe there was something different about her hair, and that S symbol and the skirt was dragging his attention to places that were already hard enough not to look at; but it was undeniably her. His new friend was a superhero. His new friend was from space. She was related to Superman, she was - was she even called Linda? That didn't sound like a very space sort of name. Wally had so many questions, so many thoughts tripping over themselves to be asked. But there was something more important that needed to come first.

Wally's face adjusted into a lopsided, apologetic smile. "I may have lied about the burrito."

[Supergirl]

"You can tell it's me?" Kara replied almost instantly, a little surprised, although as soon as she began to think about it, she realised that a) she had no mask on and b) she had just called Wally by name, so of course he could tell. As Supergirl, Kara slightly altered her make-up, her hair and so on, but in no meaningful way that made her look different. Then again, Kara was the type of person who thought changing your lip gloss was the most dramatic appearance alteration in the world, so it wasn't entirely a surprise she was shocked. "Uh, I mean, yeah, it's me..."

"Oh, thank god." She said, even as she couldn't hold back a smile and a giggle at the fact he admitted he'd lied about the burrito. She smiled and laughed gently, even if it was tinged with a little nervousness at being found out. "You really need to think of less gross excuses." She teased, wondering whether she should feel guilty that all she was really feeling was relief that somebody local now knew her secret, even if she was terrified he'd shun her now for learning she had lied so much. Even if he had lied too. Heck they had both lied.

"I'm... sorry I lied to you." She said, looking at the floor, slightly ashamed. "My name's not even Linda." She admitted shamefully, before looking back up at him and trying not to look too shame faced as she introduced herself properly. "My real name is Kara Zor-El. When I told you I lived in a city before moving to Smallville, I didn't lie, but that city wasn't exactly in the Mid-West..." She admitted with an ashamed shrug. "It's called Argo City, on the planet Krypton. But our world was doomed. I was sent here when I was fifteen, I was supposed to help my cousin, Kal-El, grow up. I was going to be his babysitter..." She laughed at the absurdity. She didn't know if Wally knew Superman by his original name, but she was sure he'd figure it out. The ridiculousness of being Superman's babysitter seemed so stupid now even Kara found it funny. "Only, my ship got lost in a wormhole, and I arrived decades too late." She told him. "I did actually spend a year in Smallville though, that's true. It's where I've been learning about human civilisation." She told him.

"You lot are weird." She added, trying to at least make a joke of the hugeness of what she had just told him.

[Kid Flash]

Kara Zor-El? So, what, was El the surname or something, like Kal-El and Jor-El? Was that why Superman kept telling people that his whole S symbol thing wasn't an S? Because it was actually an L? But then why did Kara have so many syllables before her name, when Superman just had the one? Was it like calling him by his surname, the way the teachers at school called him 'West' all the time, especially when he was in trouble? Or as it like those crinkle nose people in Star Trek who had their names all backwards, so Kara was actually the surname thing? That didn't seem likely though; Kara sounded too much like a first name, to his human ears at least - but what if Superman was really Kara Kal-El or something.

What if Superman had a girl's name? How cool would that be?

Wally struggled to get a handle on his thoughts, stopping the tirade of lightning thoughts that wanted to springboard off his tongue at a thousand miles an hour. He could ask for answers later, and if he was lucky and stayed on Linda's - Kara's - good side, maybe she'd even give him some. Oh god, if she was from space, did that mean she had a space ship? Did she know about cool space things? It was all too much, all too exciting, and the effort of keeping it in almost had Wally vibrating at hyperspeed.

Still, later. Definitely later. For now, he needed to say something. He knew how agonising the thought of people finding out your secret could be, and if people discovering you were a metahuman was scary, the prospect of people discovering you were an alien and freaking out and treating you differently must have been terrifying. Wally needed to say something so that Linda, Kara, Supergirl, all of the above, knew that he wasn't freaked out. That this was the coolest thing ever. But also in a way that totally came off suave and mature, because he was totally the spokesperson for the entire human race right now and it was his diplomatic duty to make a good impression.

"I want to know everything."

He said it as if it was the most serious, honest, important sentence he could possibly have uttered.

"But maybe standing here talking about it over Captain Kidnap's unconscious body probably isn't the best idea."

Wally pondered for a moment, before unleashing a surge of superspeed, rummaging through his backpack for a scrap of paper and a pen. Sure, he could have just looked normally, it would only have taken a few seconds, but come on. His friend was Supergirl. All of his attempts to impress her had been woefully mediocre; he needed to up his game. A few flurries and flourishes - not at his full speed; he'd learned the hard way that writing too fast could cause enough friction to set people's birthday cards on fire, and that wasn't so good - and he'd produced a note, one that he carefully slipped into the kidnapper's hand.

Crime is bad. Abducting people is very bad.
If you do it again, we will know. We will find you.
- Kid Flash & Supergirl xx

Okay, so the kisses were maybe a little too much, but it was a reflex. And damn it, he'd written Kid Flash instead of Impulse. Even his subconscious wasn't buying this whole rebranding thing. He sighed, and took a step back. Being the Kid Flash wasn't so bad, he supposed. Maybe he should have taken a cue from Green Arrow's sidekicks - gone for a different coloured costume and called himself Black Flash or something. That seemed edgy and cool, and if Black Canary was anything to go by, it was a secret codeword for super-hotness.

His eyes turned to Kara, thoughts rushing through their options. They needed to get out of here, and if they were going to talk and be themselves - their real selves - they probably needed to find somewhere to talk where they wouldn't be overheard. Preferably somewhere less creepy and more comfortable than an abandoned building full of unconscious people.

"You know where Robinson Park is, right?"

An eager grin painted itself across his features.

"I'll race you."

[Supergirl]

Kara smiled a little at Wally's honesty. He wanted to know about her. He wanted to know about Krypton. It was sweet. Most people would freak out to find their friend was quite literally a space alien, but Wally was taking it with his general sweet and good nature. She felt a wave of total relief, but had to agree with his suggestion at getting out of there. She wasn't sure a sternly worded letter was the best way of dealing with them though, even if looking at it she smiled.
"Oh, you're Kid Flash. Not even the real Flash. Well, now I'm just disappointed." She teased, although her smile and the way she playfully prodded him (making sure she did it lightly!) made it clear that she was very much joking. Truthfully, Kara hadn't even known there was a Kid Flash, but well, you learned something new every day. "But I think we'd better tell the cops their here as well. I'll ring them once we get to the park." She said, smirking at his challenge.

"Oh, you are so on, buster." She smirked, as they headed out of the building. "Good luck though. Didn't anybody ever tell you I'm faster than a speeding bullet?" She joked, of course making fun of the old catch phrases they used to say about Kal. Not that it was entirely true in Kara's case of course. Kal might have been faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound and all that, but Kara wasn't quite as powerful. Not without spending a lot more time on Earth. But she was still pretty fast.

And of course, she could fly, which meant she didn't have to zig zag around the buildings.
"Try not to leave me waiting." She teased. "Again." She added playfully, sticking her tongue out at him as she floated in to the air, and then shot off in to the sky.

[Kid Flash]

Faster than a speeding bullet? Pssh. Please.

Everyone knew that the Flash was the fastest man alive - Kryptonians included. They'd done charity races to prove it and everything. Sure, so Wally wasn't actually the Flash, and his lab experiment gone wrong on purpose powers hadn't imbued him with the speed force to quite the same extent as the real deal, but Supergirl was new to Earth, right? Superman was solar powered, and Supergirl hadn't been here as long, so surely that balanced things out. Besides, look at those boots. There was no way that anyone could expect to run super-fast in anything that -

Oh right, the flying thing.

"Whatever you say, Lip Gloss," he quipped back, guessing that her own iffy excuse probably wasn't entirely genuine either, and then shot off in pursuit, the speed force crackling like lightning around him.

The thing about super speed was that how fast you went wasn't because of anything physical. It was all mental focus, channelling your determination, opening yourself up as a conduit to an extradimensional source of energy that absolutely was not magic, even though it was sufficiently advanced to sure as heck feel like magic a lot of the time. Your muscles didn't pump your arms and legs super fast all on their own - if they did, you'd burn through all your fat reserves in about three seconds, and would collapse into some sort of scrawny, skeletal, mummy-like heap on the ground - they just sorta took the first step and then the speed force kicked in, catapulting you forward and powering some weird form of hypercharged anaerobic respiration that sorta helped your body to keep up. Sure, it got achy and tired like regular running after a while, but in order for a speedster to feel like they'd run a marathon? Forget twenty-six miles, try twenty-six laps around the whole planet.

Right now, Wally thrust all of his will into going faster. It wasn't that he was competitive, it wasn't that he wanted to win; it was that he needed to. That Kid Flash comment might have just been a joke, but that kinda thing still stung a little; not in an upset way, but in a need to prove yourself sort of way. He needed Kara to know that he wasn't just some knock off imitation, some sidekick, some kid version. Much as he wanted to distance himself from the Kid part, he was proud to have Flash as part of his name, and now he needed to prove that he deserved it.

As he hurtled forward, he felt a familiar vibration in the air; a familiar pressure against his body as he surged forward. 340 meters per second. 767 miles per hour. The speed of sound: the point at which the fluid dynamics of air began to change, interacting weirdly with the aerodynamics of his speed force encased body. Any second now he'd punch through the resistance, and the sonic boom would be cool as hell. But, as Wally had learned back in Central City one day when he'd got a little too carried away, the resulting shockwave wasn't all that great for any windows that happened to be nearby. Holding himself on the cusp, he took a sharp left and then a right, steering onto the broadest Gotham street he could think of. Feet springing him from a car to a van to a full blown truck, Wally triple-jumped his way into the air, launching himself as far off the ground as he could get, grin plastered across his face as the air exploded around him - enough to still rattle the cars on the ground beneath, but nothing that'd cost anyone's insurance any unfortunate window repairs.

Running on air for a few seconds, Wally hit the ground again mid-stride, and pressed himself to go faster still.