Moving On

Summary: Wally's night doesn't go as planned. He's going to need some help to get over it. Spitfire and Wally/Robin Friendship Rated T for language

AN: Another one shot/drabble. Hey guys I'm back! Please excuse any mistakes. I edited this myself. And I know I got beta offers (You guys are so awesome and thanks so much) but considering the day I finished I didn't want to bug anyone to beta this because I wanted to post this up soon. So sorry for the screw ups (because I'm sure they're there) but don't give up on the story. Anyways enjoy!

Disclaimer: As is obvious I don't own Young Justice or anything recognizable. If I did, we'd actually have YJ episodes on time.

Wally fidgeted against the plastic booth, staring across the table at the empty seat. Like most other speedsters, he was known for being impatient and having the attention span of the squirrel from Over the Hedge hopped up on energy drinks. But this was ridiculous. He checked his watch for the sixth time in three minutes 7:18 and groaned in frustration. She was late, forty-eight minutes late to be exact. The waitress kept shooting him pity glances as she tended to a nearby table.

Where the hell is she? He took his phone out of his picket, fingers hovering over the dial pad. To sound like a whiny girl wondering where her date is or sit in a crowded diner looking like a lonely loser. Neither of the options were favorable. He drummed his fingers against the plastic table when the idea hit him. Maybe she got sick and her phone died, so she couldn't come or call him. That's it. It was all a misunderstanding. He was the Wally West, a lady-killer, a bonafide Casanova. With that in mind, he opened his phone to check Facebook, the source for all teenage happenings. Whatever was keeping her away was bound to be on Facebook. The cocky grin slipped from his face, much like the phone from his fingers, as the blue and white screen loaded on his phone and an array of pictures showed up. Instead of a slew of sad faces and an apology through FB status or message, there were pictures of his date, Bethany Sheridan, dancing with various members of the football team. They were all time stamped between 6:00 and 7:15. The raven haired, hazel-eyed bombshell that was supposed to be sitting next to him so they could flirt-eat each other's food was out dancing in a short dress with stupid jocks that could barely pass class.

He felt like his heart was stomped on and thrown out a window. Anger, embarrassment, and disappointment churned inside the speedster, each fighting for dominance before anger finally rang out. She lied to him. God, was she a good actress. What's worse is that Bethany actually seemed excited for their date, and he actually thought this time would be different. Hell, even ate before he came so as to not totally freak her out by his eating habits. He almost never did that. And the thanks he gets? To get left sitting in a restaurant by himself for almost an hour, looking like an idiot. He was Kid Flash for crying out loud! Fastest boy alive! A superhero! He saved lives on an everyday basis! But now he just looks plain stupid, all because of a girl, and it wasn't even a certain archer's fault. At least when she yells at him, it makes sense; he can handle her any day of the week. Bethany, she was supposed to be nice, funny, not a she-witch.

Wally looked up, realizing he had stalked out of the restaurant. He needed to get out of here, like right now. He may have been upset, but just thinking of Bat's reaction if he blew his cover was enough to make Wally look for an escape route. His wandering eyes found the alley and he fast-walked over to it. Within seconds, the speedster had bolted towards Mount Justice, destination: the training room.

Robin sat in the living room tapping away at a laptop. Artemis was across from him working on homework. Aqualad was attempting to teach Superboy the mechanics of the TV; surely, if the boy could work on a motorcycle he could understand a TV set. Megan was pulling out a batch of brownies, having finally conquered the art of cookie making. Suddenly the computer's voice rang through the cave announcing Kid Flash's arrival.

M'gann smiled, someone to taste-test her brownies, "Wally! I just made-" She was cut off the wind tunnel created by said speedster who's entrance left the rest of the team struggling to regain their bearings.

"What's up with Kid Tornado?" Artemis huffed as she tried to organize her papers. "He get pummeled in dodge ball again?"

Rob shrugged "I'll look into it" and commenced pulling up Wally's Facebook and the Mountain's cameras. "Status says he's got a hot date."

"Maybe it was great and he's doing laps around the mountain?" Conner suggested.

Megan's lower lip pouted "But-but he always eats my cooking."

"Quite the opposite" piped up the Boy Wonder.

"What!" Megan cried, looking almost close to tears as self-doubt clouded her eyes. If Wally didn't eat her cooking, then no one did.

Superboy shot Robin a glare that made him thankful the clone didn't have heat vision. "Sorry, I meant Conner was wrong. I hacked into the base's camera and he's in the training room, trying to beat the crap out of the punching bag. I don't think the date went well at all."

The present team soaked this in. Wally was always upbeat and happy, save for extreme situations, but those occasions were so rare in themselves. For him to get this genuinely upset, over something as normal as a date was so unlike him. Normally he would just brush it off, like all other his other thwarted flirting attempts. M'gann collected herself first. "Maybe we should go talk to him."

Kaldur shook his head. "Not now, and not all together. We must let him work out his anger, then we can speak with him. While we are a team, we do not wish to overwhelm and push him away. He is entitled to his privacy and we will give it to him." Robin glanced at the computer screen as Wally gulped down a bottle of water. "I'll go try to get him whelmed. " He hopped off the couch and disappeared into the shadowy hallway. The rest of the team members returned to their activities, save the archer who now stared into space, trapped in her thoughts.

Robin found his best friend sitting on a bench, back hunched as he roughly toweled off the sweat on his face. "Good workout?"

"Bad day" the speedster responded, voice muffled by the cloth but traced by frustration.

"I'm guessing it has to do with your Facebook status."

"Well, you are "The Detective's" prodigy."

"Last time I checked" he replied with a grin. "So you going to tell me the rest of what happened? Because I really don't feel like doing all that digging." He was met with silence as Wally glared at the floor. "KF?"

Wally's green eyes met sunglasses, and even though he couldn't see his eyes, he knew his best friend was worried. And he should tell them. They were practically brothers. But Rob wouldn't get it. In fact, he'd probably cackle and tell him to get traught or whatever. But at the same time, he knew they had each other's backs, for small and big things. "I had a date with Bethany Sheridan tonight."

Robin's eyebrows furrowed. "That's the girl you were telling me about earlier this week, right?"

Wally nodded. "Anyway I asked her on a date to the diner in Central City. She said yes."

"Still not seeing the problem."

"Dude! I haven't gotten to that part yet!"

"For being the fastest kid alive, you sure do take a long time to tell a story."

"Just let me finish!" He sighed in annoyance. "So I go to the diner, right? And I'm sitting there for forty-five minutes. Forty-five freaking minutes which is freaking forever. And she doesn't show. Not at all. I figure that her phone died or she got sick or something. So I check her Facebook. Turns out she's at some party dancing with some jocks from school instead." He knocked the empty water bottle from beside him to the floor, where it clattered noisily.

"So you're pissed because you got stood up?" Robin summarized. "That's not the end of the world."

"It's more than that! You don't get it."

"What?"

"What it's like. You're freaking Dick Grayson, son of a freaking billionaire" He whisper-shouted and ignored Dick's glare. "A lot of girls like you. You're probably going to be a lady killer when you get older. You're never going to have to get stood up. This has been the sixth time this month. People love you as Robin and Dick. Me? I can be superhero Kid Flash with tons of adoring fans, but Wally West can't even get a date for a Friday night. So it's more than just a girl skipping out on me. It's girls and other people making a habit of skipping out and underestimating Wally West. It's kind of a hard blow to a guy's self esteem."

Robin stared at his friend, surprised out at his outburst. They all had issues with their double lives and he just assumed that whenever Wally got rejected by a girl he would just shrug it off and move on. Sometimes he had to remember that his best friend was more than just comic relief and a hero; Wally did get hurt when he wasn't on missions. That comment about feeling naked in his civies during that Amazo mission made more sense. His civies made him vulnerable, but when he was Kid Flash, Wally felt like he could take on anything. To continuously get run down in normal life was taking its toll. "Sorry man, I didn't realize."

"Nah, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to blow up at you. I just… needed to vent."

"That's what I'm here for." They smiled at each other and went in for a bro hug.

"Thanks Rob. I think I'm going to go pig out in my room and try to sleep before the mission tomorrow. "

Robin gave his friend a grin before he disappeared down the corridor.

Artemis sat on the couch conflicted. It wasn't surprising that Kid Dork had flopped on his date. After all, this was Wally West they were talking about. He attempted to hit on girls all the time, with no success up to date. Take a look at M'gann, Wally's crush since day one. He hit on her every freaking minute of every freaking day, and now she was in a serious relationship with Superboy. That hadn't gone very well. Despite all his attempts at suaveness, he seriously failed and she didn't blame the girl for not liking him. Artemis soon realized that her issue with the situation was that another girl had made Wally angry. Big mistake. She was the only girl that could make Wally West tear his flaming red hair out.

Someone sounds jealous…. A snide voice sounded in her head.

"Puh-lease. If Wally wants to date some girl, then that's fine with me. "

But you don't like him upset.

"Pshhh, Are you kidding? I love making him suffer."

Not when you can't control it.

"I-er-ah- Shut up inner voice!" She shoved that part deep into the recesses of her mind as their youngest team member walked into the room. " He's going to be fine. Just miffed and going to recharge for tomorrow."

M'gann smiled "Great. What happened with his date?"

"M'gann" Kaldur's calm voice warned.

"Right, sorry. Forget I mentioned it." Robin just shrugged and rejoined his team members on the couch as they watched TV. They pretended not to notice Artemis get up, grab some brownies and head down to the residential corridor. And that shared knowing smile as she left the room was just a coincidence.

It's just because he's my teammate, she assured herself, I want to make sure he'll be normal enough tomorrow to have my-I mean the team's back.

Wally had calmed himself down enough and was munching away with his bag of Doritos. For once the speedster was sitting still and watching Psych episodes on his laptop. A knock on the door snapped him out of watching Shawn's hilarious antics. "What?" he snapped annoyed. Who dare disturb his viewing of his favorite comedy duo.

"I'm coming in. So you better be dressed and not try to kick me out because one I could totally kick your ass and two I have brownies," a husky voice snapped back as the door opened and Green Arrow's current sidekick walked in.

Great, the last person I wanted to see, he thought. "You know, I'm really not in the mood to deal with you and your Miss-Know-It-All attitude." Artemis rolled her eyes to the ceiling and sat down on the edge of the desk since it was the only surface not haphazardly covered in dirty laundry. Before he could blink, a brownie was shoved in his face. See? This was hard fast proof that Artemis was driving him crazy. He had completely spaced out on the "I have brownies" comment. He took it warily, watching her face for a wicked gleam in her eyes but couldn't find it in her dark grey eyes. "Just eat it. If I wanted to poison you I would've done it before."

The speedster bit hungrily into the snack, it was still warm but gooey. Too gooey, like it hadn't been cooked all the way. "M'gann's?" he asked around the chocolaty mess. Artemis's face scrunched at the sight of the food in his mouth and nodded. When he finished, Artemis was still there, eyes searching the room before he spoke up. "So…..can I help you with anything? You're not really the type of girl I would bring to my bedroom"

Artemis's eyes flew back to him but she held back her quick retort, settling for a gentler tone, "How are you feeling?"

To say Wally was floored was an understatement; he definitely was not expecting that. Here he was thinking he was going to have another shouting match with Artemis that would be include with hair-pulling and venom-filled words. Instead, she was looking at him in a way that he never thought he'd see from her off the battlefield, with concern. For him. Wally West. Now he was really confused. "Ugh…. I just don't understand girls at all," was the thought that he couldn't stop from spewing out and Artemis smiled. "The Wall-man admits being confused about girls? Never thought I'd hear that."

Wally groaned and flopped back on his bed. "You may not live to see another day if you tell anyone I said that." Artemis's response was only to deepen her smirk. "Just, today I was supposed to go on a date with one of the hottest and nicest girl in school and she turns out to be a lying harpy who ditches me and then you come in with brownies and all worried in stuff. What is the world coming to? Why can't you girls be freaking sane?"

"So you got stood up by that girl?" Artemis's eyes narrowed.

"Yes! Okay? Will you guys stop reminding me? I don't need you being all 'Well that's not surprising' and stuff. I've had a bad day."

"Wally-"

"I don't get it. If I'm so freaking fantastic as Kid Flash, why can't that spill into Wally West. Technically speaking, if KF's so cool then all of that coolness should spill over into civilian me."

"Wally, you don't want to be popular or well-known. Think about it. If you were 'cool' it'd be hard to fly under the radar at school. When you miss a couple of days of school or show up with bruises people will start asking questions. You have to be quiet to keep your secret identity" she rationalized gently.

"Sometimes I wish we didn't have secret identities" he said exasperated. "I wish I could just tell everyone I was Kid Flash, then people would stop walking all over me. "

Her face softened as realization dawned on her and she put a hand on his shoulder. "Hey," he met her eyes, startled again at her soft tone, "Just take a breath and move on. They're not worth your time or thoughts. If they can't handle you as Wally West, they sure as hell don't deserve you as Kid Flash." They sat like that for a while each lost in their thoughts. Something was changing in their relationship. They were getting closer, but something was brewing besides just friendship. Wally never thought he'd see the day where Artemis comforted him, and Artemis never imagined helping Wally get over a bruised ego. Yet here they were, looking at each other in a calm, comfortable silence as their faces inched closer. They heard a crash and a shout from down the hall, sounding like Superboy. The two teens jumped away from each other. "I better go" Artemis mumbled and hurried to the door.

"Artemis?" Wally called out, waiting for her to turn around at the door. "Thanks."

Artemis smiled gently, "No problem Flash boy." Wally frowned. "But for the record, I liked that Wally West a lot more" and she slipped out the door, leaving the speedster confused for the third time that night.

The Monday after the failed date but successful mission weekend, Wally West was leaving school relieved that he hadn't seen Bethany all day. Then he heard it, a high-pitched giggle. There, across the quad, was the source for his sour mood standing with her posse right outside the school's entrance. He groaned, maybe he pondered the location of other exits, that was before one of the jocks from the Facebook pictures caught a glimpse of him. "Hey, isn't that the geek you ditched the other night?" Cue stares from the whole group. "Did you really think Bethany would actually date you?" Take a breath and move on Artemis had said. He followed her advice and went to move past them before the jerk roughly grabbed his shoulder. "Hey Dork! I was talking to you."

"Back off. I'm not in the mood" Wally retorted back and shrugged him off.

"Oooh. Ginger's got a temper. Well too bad, because I am in the mood," the boy said. Wally glanced at Bethany and her friends, other failed dates. They didn't do anything besides watch amused. Guess they weren't as nice as he originally thought. He turned around to tell the bully exactly what to do with his mood when he was interrupted.

"Wally!" the familiar voice rang out and everyone looked up to see the beautiful athletic girl walking up to the group in skinny jeans, her regular black boots, a green t-shirt, and her long blonde hair pulled back with a black headband waltzing up to them. "Artemis?" Wally almost choked out. What was she doing here? And since when did she look like that? He made a mental to note to tell her to wear her hair down more often. Speaking of which, she had decided to flip her golden mane over her shoulder once she reached them. She should wear her hair down a lot more often.

She cocked her head to the side, "Do you know anyone else by that name?" she looked at the muscular thug who still had his hands around Wally. "Do you mind? I need him for our date tonight."

The surrounding posse, thug included, gawked. "You've got to be joking. How does a girl like you end up with this geek?" he said shaking the now angry speedster.

"How do people let a jackass like you out in public? Now let go before you get your ass kicked" She warned him, eyes flashing.

Said moron dropped Wally off to the side and touched her chin. "Come on Arty, don't be like that." Artemis clenched her fist, but before she could deck him he was already sliding down the stairs from Wally's right-hook. "Newsflash, perp. She hates being called Arty." He grabbed her hand they walked away leaving the other jocks and girls to try to help the dazed guy up.

"What, no "Only I can call her Arty" speal?" Artemis smirked when they were far away.

"You want me to call you Arty?" he smiled as the smirk fell from her face.

"Don't you dare…." She led them to the parking lot where Wally saw a familiar motorcycle in the parking lot. "Is that my….." Artemis nodded, "Yeah it's your bike. Rob made a hologram projector that will only make it look red. It blends in without the yellow."

Now he was flustered again. "I have officially landed in a parallel universe. What's with everyone turning my world upside down? How did you get my bike here? Why are you here? How did you get here? And what the hell happened to flying under the radar?"

Artemis smiled. "One. A little birdy helped me. Two.I figured you'd want to trick them into thinking you're still a ladies man. Three. It's okay to have a little fun every once in a while. And are you honestly telling me you don't want to take your bike for a spin?" She jangled his keys in front of his face where he snatched them quickly and climbed on the bike, Artemis sitting right behind him. "Hold on," he told her so she wrapped her arms around his waist as he revved the engine and they sped out of the parking lot. As they rode down the street into the horizon, Artemis tightened her hold on him slightly and Wally smiled. He realized that he could deal with other people's ignorance if he had more moments like these. Truly, moving on wasn't so hard, especially when you had someone to walking next to you.

AN: Oh Lordy Lord this is so freaking long. Longest one shot/drabble that I've written up to date. So please review. I know it's not exactly holiday related, but that's okay. I just wanted to write it. So leave a review and tell me what you think. Now I gotta finish one more college application, and work on scholarships apps. Yayyy! (Read: Sarcasm. Major sarcasm) Also if anyone had read my other story "Where'd You Go?/Missing You." It's on and indefinite hiatus because I keep deleting it by accident which I have interpreted as fate telling me to give up. Sorry, but it's just not working out anymore. Thanks for reading either this story, MY, or any of my other works. Happy Holidays!