Young Justice Trash

Distraction (BIRDFLASH)

The mission was a failure.

There was really no way to talk around it. The mission was one COLOSSAL mistake. the team knew it before they even crossed the threshold to find the league waiting for them.

Batman hurried over to his child, who looked like he'd had the shit kicked out of him; his hair was singed, Skin was smeared with dirt, and he had countless scrapes and cuts. The other teammates were damaged, but, of course it was him who got scraped up the most. "How did you get injured? Tell me what happened."

"Bats, I'm fine!" The boy shoved himself back, looking like he wanted to faze through the floor into another dimension. "Not in front of everybody. Please!" He pleaded quietly, blushing red.

His adopted father grabbed him by his (less injured) arm and marched him out. The boy turned back, watching his team until he was dragged through the zetabeam.

Everyone watched him go in mild concern

"Tell us what happened." Black Canary ordered.

Wally cleared his throat, humming a few bars. "...Rich set a fire and he burned down the house..."

Artemis elbowed him, hard. They Were supposed to inspect a few abandoned houses where drug activity was rampent. "It was an ACCIDENTAL fire, and no one got hurt." She hissed at him, furious.

"Except Robin, he did get hurt a bit. But he started the fire, so we can't really be held responsible." Conner reasoned.

"I hope he's okay." M'gann mused. "I hope he doesnt get in too much trouble. It WAS an accident... probably."

It was quickly decided that, as team leader, Kaldur would be the best person to explain what happened. The team said their final goodbyes, at least 98% sure that their teammate was about to be disembowelled for letting Robin get hurt.

"Would you car to explain." Batman had returned after about twenty minutes of coddling and bandaging his kid in the cave, against Dick's will, of course.

"I believe I know what went wrong on the mission."

It was no secret that Robin and Kid Flash had a weird dynamic, all you had to do was spend three minutes to see it. Despite their closeness, they both tried nonstop to impress each other. 

No one really acknowledged it. no one wanted to acknowledge it. It was a phase, spurred on by hormones. Perhaps they wanted to assert themselves as dominant over the group, and kept tripping over each other. Maybe it was a coincidence that it was always  those two seeking each other's approval.

Robin tried hardest to impress the other boy; acting cool, doing dumb things to get his attention, occasionally teasing him at full force, as if trying to replicate how normal friends act. Once or twice, he'd gotten hurt, or gotten the team in trouble by trying to show off for Wally. 

The redhead was a distraction to him, Dick couldn't do anything accurately if he was around.

This mission followed this trend.

The fire hadn't been intentional, but the younger one had been handling some  fragile materials, and the older was talking about Lacrosse, ultimate frizbee, and track and field, and the fire just... started. The black haired boy dropped it,  trying to impress the other by putting it out, but failing to do so.

In a rotting, abandoned house, a wildfire spread like, well... wildfire. M'gann had to be swiftly carried out, and the flames extinguished as quickly as possible. No one could find Artemis, and the youngest insisted on running back in to find her. The roof collapsed shortly after, scraping up Robin pretty bad. At least Artemis made it out uninjured. 

The mission was pretty fucked up, there's no denying that. They had -1 lead, no suspects, and the drug dealers would just find somewhere else. Yup, the team knew the mission was a collosal mistake before they crossed the threshold.

If you think it's hard to explain why you're late to a stern teacher, imagine explaining to the Fucking Batman that his kid almost got killed while trying to impress another boy.

"-And, I don't entirely trust myself with the decision personally..." It was a basic trick, admit that you're not sure, and maybe he won't be as severe on your decision.

"You are the teams leader, I'd like to hear how you plan to prevent this in the future." He said, planning to have a 'talk' with Robin later.

 "I think Robin and Kid Flash should be seperated on difficult missions." The team leader admitted, he hated to do it, since knew the two were close, and very fond of each other, but at some point, it becomes too dangerous to the team.

"I understand, I'll bring it up with the league." 

"Thank you sir." He hurried to leave. What the team would never know is that their leader was fucking terrified. The day had been unnecessarily intense. He didn't show any of his fear to the team, he was the level-headed one, and had to keep calm to avoid freaking them out. Most of them were very perceptive to emotions, and were emotionally immature enough that they still needed a relatively stoic person telling them how to proceed.

Wally was leaning back on the couch, Flexing and unflexing his foot lazily. "Did he eat your kneecaps?" 

The team was no longer fazed by each other's weird expressions, sometimes they would even pick them up accidentally. 'Aster', 'whelmed', 'chalant' and 'Hello Megan' was quoted on a nearly hourly basis, by everyone, not just by M'gann and Robin. A few teammates were even picking up martian and atlantian words for fun.

"Everything's being resolved." He promised. "There are still some issues that need to be worked out."

"Oh, oof." He replied solemnly, it was the only way he could think to communicate. "Are you sure its okay?"

"I hope so."

"Good, I'm glad. I've almost made bats break his 'no killing' rule several times..." He admitted.

-I only now realize how heavily I relied on requests in my last book, trying to conceptualize and write one everyday is hard as fuck-