Archive of Our Own

No one had touched Bart Allen until he was twelve years old. Well- that wasn’t quite true. His mother had touched him, surely, and it made sense that the Dominators had since they had kidnapped him. The lab technicians had definitely touched him in the process of hooking him into the machines. But that was so long ago, and he couldn’t remember any of it. Maybe none of it was even real.

The first few moments of Bart’s rebirth were cold. The wires dropped from his head, un-inserting themselves like limp spaghetti noodles. The blinding white of the Earthgov lab blared suddenly across his vision, replacing the green countryside he’d been in just seconds before. Bart had crumpled, a marionette without his strings, curling in on himself on the floor of the tank. 

It was what he had always called it- in his head, at least. The tank. A big, glass cylinder surrounded by consoles and controls. Most times the glass was all fogged up so that he couldn’t see out, in the rare moments he wasn’t plugged in. It was big enough to run around in, but it still felt like a giant fishbowl.

Just a few seconds after the wires dropped, there was a whirring sound so loud and sharp that Bart clamped his palms over his ears. Everything was loud, buzzing, cold against his fragile skin. He didn’t like it. Why had they taken him out of the VR machine? 

Bart blinked, squinting in the offensive light, and realized that the whirring noise had been an entrance to the tank sliding open. The whole lab was in front of him, and he didn’t see anyone inside. He was alone. 

Feeling loose and slippery, like a newborn foal, Bart had tripped and stumbled his way out of the tank- leaving a clutched handprint on the pristine glass wall, hopping down the short steps, crashing straight into the cold metal floor. He was freezing.

And then there was a woman in front of him. She knelt down, bent to his level, knees pulled up under her. Bart, who was still on the floor, saw only her Earthgov uniform through his narrow window of vision.

And there were arms around him. Holding him, cradling him, gathering him to her chest. 

Bart’s arms instantly snapped around her torso, wrapping tight, like a koala. It was instinctual and necessary and required no thought at all. It was just what arms were supposed to do.

The woman was crying, he realized. She had a hand on his head, buried in his hair, pressing him to her collarbone. “Oh,” she said, voice soft and full of tears. “Oh- oh, hello, Bart, darling. It’s me, it’s your grandma.”

Bart’s lungs contracted. “Iris,” he said, throat scratchy and raw. His grandma. The only real person in the whole world. She was here , and she was touching him.

“That’s me, angel,” she answered, nodding against his cheek. “I’m here. I’m going to take you home, okay? You’re never going to come back here again.”

Her parents had run into the lab a minute later, called out warnings, ushered Iris and Bart out of the building and into the chamber with the time portal. But for sixty seconds, Iris really was the only real person in the world. She was the only person on earth that Bart loved, and the only person who loved him. 

She held onto Bart, the first person he remembered touching him. The first time it was real. It had been awful, the most terrible thing in the world, to pry his arms from around her when it was time to run. To let go.

If it was his choice, he would have never, ever let go. He would have held onto Iris with a vise-like grip forever and ever, for his whole life. 

***

“What if I don’t want to do things at normal speed?”

They had just gotten back to the house from the grocery store. Max was gathering up foodstuffs from the grocery bags and shoving them in the fridge or pantry. Bart was more occupied with standing at the kitchen counter, elaborately stacking cans into pyramids.

Max just sighed. “We have been over this, Bart. It’s not a question of want. It will be impossible for you to live in this world and keep your identity secret if you do not acclimate yourself to performing tasks without superspeed.”

Bart made a face. “That’s a stupid reason.”

Max sighed. “It is in fact, if you have paid attention, a very astute reason. Bart…most people aren’t like you. They can’t match your speed, so you’ll just have to match theirs.”

“But what does that matter?” Bart mumbled, adding another can to the pyramid. “Who cares if they know I’m faster? They’re not real.”

Max closed the refrigerator door with a grimace. “Think, Bart. Even Iris tried to explain to you. This is reality, not a video game. Everyone is real here.”

“Oh. Right, right, right.” He remembered now. Bart reached for the yogurt cups and stacked them as high as he could. Well…it made sense, really. He was still breaking the rules. If everyone else here was real, that meant…

“Bart. The yogurt, please.”

“I think I get it,” Bart mused, tossing the cups at Max one by one. “It’s the opposite. I’m in their world now.”

Max paused, arms full of yogurt. “What do you mean by that?”

“You know. It’s, like…flipped. From before. I was the only one that was real before, and everyone else was fake. They were in my world. But now it’s the other way around. It’s why I have to play by their rules.” Bart gave Max a big thumbs up. “I figured it out.”

Max was looking at him strangely. He set the yogurt back on the counter, like he had forgotten they were supposed to go in the fridge. “Bart,” he said slowly. “You are a real person.”

Bart chewed on his bottom lip. “Max?”

“You know that, right?”

“Um. Sure.”

Max paused, nodded, and started grabbing up the cans from the pyramid and taking them to the pantry. Bart rested his chin on the edge of the counter. He hated this place. Every time he thought he understood something, someone told him he was wrong. It didn’t make sense that he was a real person. He didn’t feel real, anyway. 

***

Max was slow, and this killed Bart. He understood when it was normal people. Max wasn’t normal. He was a speedster. He had the speed force in his veins, like Bart did, and yet he was just… slow. It was everything he did, reading the newspaper, eating salad, doing laundry, he did all of it slow. It was like he didn’t feel the pull inside of him, didn’t feel the sparks of speed in his blood, wasn’t driven constantly to go go go .

It made Bart so angry sometimes he wanted to scream. He wanted to jump up on the dinner table while Max was eating and point a fork and knife at his neck, grab him by the collar, scream How can you make it stop? How do you force it down? How come I can’t?

Maybe the reason he could never learn anything from Max was because Max didn’t buzz like he did.

***

“I heard that you’re the coolest kid in the middle school,” said Carol’s sister Casey, twirling spaghetti around her fork. “Is that true? Are you cool, Bart?”

Bart laughed a little, wiping tomato sauce from his cheek. “Who told you that?”

Casey shrugged. “Everybody.”

“Your informants?” Bobby asked with a smile, and that got a laugh out of the whole table. 

The Bucklens had invited him over for dinner, so the four of them were sitting at the kitchen table slurping down spaghetti. Bart was very impressed by Bobby’s cooking skills. He had always liked Carol’s brother; he was nice and smart and let them into the museum for free. Casey was kind of a brat, but she was funny.

“Bart might be the most popular kid in school, but the teachers like me better.” Carol smiled slyly at him across the table.

Bart pointed at her with his fork. “Hey! That’s just cuz you’re a teacher’s pet!”

“It’s not my fault I have more brains than the rest of you.”

Bart stroked his chin, considering. “That’s true,” he conceded. “I think you’re the smartest kid in the whole school. And, you know, I don’t even think I’m that popular. Everyone who doesn’t like you is lame and boring.”

“Bart,” Carol said, rubbing at her forehead, “It’s no fun to bicker if you’re going to ruin it by being nice.”

“Yeah, Bart,” Casey echoed. “You’re too nice. Say something mean.”

“Um,” said Bart, “I hate this spaghetti.” He stuck his tongue out at his plate, which was completely scraped clean. The Bucklens laughed in unison.

“We’d better get it out of here then,” Bobby said, chuckling. “Everyone get enough to eat? Carol, Casey, would you mind cleaning up the kitchen before dessert?”

“Why can’t you help?” Casey grumbled, even while she was already collecting everyone’s dirty plates.

“Hey, I cooked, you clean.” Bobby shrugged. “That’s the deal. It seems fair to me.”

“Whatever,” Casey sighed.

Carol and Casey cleared off the rest of the table and disappeared into the kitchen. Bart hopped up from his seat and pushed his chair in. “I can help,” he suggested.

“No, Bart, you’re a guest,” Bobby insisted.

“But I can still-”

“Don’t worry about it. I can’t let you do our dishes for us,” Bobby said. 

Bart huffed, crossing his arms. “Well, I think that’s a stupid rule. Now I just feel useless.”

Bobby laughed. “I guess if you really want to, you could help me carry some of these boxes out to the curb? I’ve been meaning to all week.” 

“On it, boss!” Bart jogged over to the living room, where a few full cardboard boxes were stacked on an armchair. He scooped one up in each arm, grinning at Bobby.

Bobby grabbed the one remaining box and led the way to the foyer, opening the front door for them. The two of them trudged across the grass of the front yard.

“How come you’ve got so many boxes anyway?” Bart asked, trying to peek inside. “Are you moving or something?”

“Nah,” Bobby answered. “This is all stuff from when I cleaned out the attic last week. There was a lot of old junk in there. Mostly Carol’s and Casey’s baby stuff that Mom and Dad never threw out.” He set his box in the grass by the mailbox, and Bart followed suit.
“Oh,” said Bart. He nudged one of the boxes with his foot. “So you’re just throwing it all away?”

Bobby shrugged. He crouched down into the grass, idly digging through a box. “Yeah. The garbage truck will pick it up tomorrow. I thought about donating some of it, but most of the stuff was old and worn-out.” He laughed to himself, holding up a bright green toy in the shape of a flat disc. “Who’d want something that had Casey’s teeth all over it, anyway?”

Bart frowned, kneeling down to see it better. “Her teeth?”

“Yeah, you know, it’s a teether.”

“Oh. Um, right.” Curious, Bart peered over Bobby’s shoulder to see into the box. He really didn’t know anything about baby’s toys. Nothing outside of commercials or what he saw in stores.

He really hadn’t been a baby for very long. Not as long as most people, anyway. The rapid aging had meant he had grown into a preteen while most kids would still have been a toddler. And anyway, most of his babyhood had been spent being kidnapped, or forced into government custody. It was just another way he was different to everyone he met in this time.

“Oh, I didn’t know this one was in here. I might have to save this.” Bobby smiled, holding up some kind of contraption with little pictures of the moon and stars hanging from strings. He was staring at it fondly, like he was far away. “Mom made this. She liked making mobiles. She had one for all three of us.”

Bart found himself mesmerized by the floating stars as well. He reached out and gently nudged a paper moon with one finger. “What’s a mobile?” he asked softly. “Like, a car?”

“Hm? Oh, no, it’s…” Bobby’s brow furrowed in confusion as he turned to Bart. “A mobile. They’re little shapes that hang from the ceiling, for babies to play with. You never had one of these over your crib when you were little?”

Bart swallowed. I never even had a crib, was what he didn’t say.

“Um. Can’t remember,” he mumbled.

Bobby was looking at him, a little sadly. And…there was no way he could know, there was no way, but Bart felt like squirming and fidgeting and turning away. He felt opened up, like Bobby could see things in him he didn’t want anyone to see.

“Oh,” was all Bobby said. “Okay. I guess that’s a silly question. I don’t remember being a baby either.”

Bart didn’t say anything. He just rocked back on his heels, staring out at the sidewalk.

“These aren’t too damaged either,” Bobby said, very lightly. He had gone back to digging through the box with the hand that wasn’t holding the mobile. “I can give them to the neighbors, they just had a baby. Could you carry this for me, Bart?”

Bart nodded, accepting the handed over rattle and toy car. They were small, in his hands. He stared down at them.

Bobby cleared his throat. “Well, they’ve probably got the dishes done by now. Ready to head back inside?”

Bart nodded. “Yeah. Sure.” The two of them stood up, Bobby with the mobile, Bart with the toys. They walked back through the yard to the front door of the house.

Bart clutched the toys tightly in his hands. He shook his fist gently, listening to the swishing sounds of the rattle. He wondered if his mom had ever bought toys for him, when she realized she was pregnant. 

***

Bart had never had to sleep in VR. Or if he did, he never remembered it. 

Max made him go to bed a eight o’clock sharp every night, and it was torture. Bart stared at the ceiling and tossed this way and turned that way and nothing ever happened. It just made him want to scream, to claw his way out of his own brain, to wack his head real hard against the wall so that he’d pass out for a little bit. 

When he did fall asleep, he dreamed about Dox. This hurt exceptionally badly because he couldn’t remember exactly what Dox looked like anymore. Dreams were like VR, he thought, except that he couldn’t control them at all. No matter how hard he tried, Dox would still scream at him for leaving him behind all alone, and the wires from the lab still yanked at his head, and the Dominators still locked him away in the cells of their spaceship, and Iris stood in the corner just watching, never coming any closer.

And he would always wake up, just minutes from the time he’d fallen asleep. Bart got used to staring at the ceiling with bloodshot eyes, just seething, hating the bed and hating the sweaty sheets and hating Max and hating this whole, stupid time. 

Bart wasn’t a loser like Wally. He could phase through objects without blowing them up, easily. Like it was nothing. It was just a little vibration, a little shake-up, an arrangement of molecules. When Bart lay awake at night on his bed in his sweaty sheets he pondered just phasing through the floor. He could do it, probably. Speed downwards, through the rug and the floorboards and the concrete foundation and into the packed soil below. Maybe if he did that it would keep him still. Surrounded, kept upright by the dirt, touched and held on all sides of him. He would suffocate right after, sure, but maybe it wouldn’t hurt so bad. It never did in VR. It wouldn’t matter anyway. Max would never find him.

***

Bart couldn’t remember ever being sick before, and he thought it might be the most awful thing in the universe. In the beginning he’d been excited- Max had never ever granted a request to stay home from school before, and a whole day without classes and teachers and tests was a triumph. But the joy didn’t last very long. He felt terrible, shivering all over even while sweat beaded on his hairline and rose from his pores. Max had been gone running errands for so long. Bart had been in one place all alone for so long he couldn’t stand it. 

The blanket was scratchy and heavy on top of his legs. The couch beneath him was so soft it felt like he was sinking into it, and the arm rest was digging into his neck at an uncomfortable angle. He felt like he hadn’t moved in a hundred years, and would never move again. He was bored .

As Bart’s stomach got queasier and queasier, his head started to go all funky. He couldn’t remember how long it had been since Max had left- minutes? Hours? All day? He was all sweaty, soaking through his shirt and dripping into his eyes. 

The room was all…it was all far away, all of a sudden, like the walls and floors had started stretching away from the couch. Bart kept blinking but it just seemed to make his vision hazier. Maybe he was falling asleep, he thought; that would make sense. Everything felt dreamlike. He let his head go limp against the arm of the couch and felt the room spin around him. Sounds echoed from some far away place. He was hearing…sirens? Those were sirens, weren’t they? It was soon accompanied by the crackling of voice modulators, the kind that the science police used, and then Bart watched as troopers marched into the room. 

There was a brief flurrying of panic in his chest, but he couldn’t force his limbs to move. How had they found him? How had the science police learned time travel? Bart could see the soldiers briefly, out of the corners of his eyes, like ghosts. They vanished just as quickly and were replaced by the giant yellow monsters of the Dominators, snapping their jaws at him and showing sharp teeth. They lunged yellow scaled arms towards the couch, trying to grab him, and that woke him up. Bart screamed.

“No!” he yelled, gathering enough strength to throw the blanket over his head. He had heard enough stories from the lab technicians about what the Dominators would have done to him, if Earthgov hadn’t saved him and taken him into their care. “No, no, get away…”

Bart’s head was throbbing. His teeth were chattering violently. It was hard to breathe, under the blanket, but he didn’t dare peek out.

“Get him,” the Dominators were growling, “The baby with the speed. We need it to power our machines.” 

The voice modulator again, “Reporting in, the Allen subject seen in Manchester, Alabama. Bringing him back to the custody of the lab.” 

The sirens and shouts and voices were mixing together in Bart’s head, loud, too loud, he didn’t know what was real and what wasn’t-

Then, above it all, a voice clear as day: “Hello, Bart. We haven’t met before. My name is Iris.”

There was a short-circuit in his brain. 

Those were the first words she had ever said to him. The very first time Earthgov had allowed her access to the lab- and access to him. The first time anyone had spoken to him who wasn’t in VR, or a nameless technician running tests. He remembered blinking wide eyes, pressing his fingers against the glass that separated the two of them. She had smiled at him. The technicians never smiled.

And just like that Bart could feel the glass on his hands, could feel the lab uniform on his skin, could feel the wires hooked into his skull. He spasmed, flailed, kicked, scrabbled frantically at his head, and- and no. The surface on his back wasn’t glass, it was the couch, and the pressure on his head was just his hair and the blanket he had just hurled across the room. No wires. No wires.

Bart sat up, planting his feet on the floor and gulping in big breaths. He needed to clear his head. It was all too much. Tapping into the speed force on instinct, Bart zoomed around the living room, running laps around the furniture. There was…there was no one here, right? No one. 

His stomach roiled. Bart sped towards the bathroom, phasing straight through the door, collapsing roughly on the white tile floor. He slumped against the toilet seat, fingers loosely gripping the white marble. 

“I’m never being sick again,” Bart moaned to himself.

Later on, when he saw the bank robbery on the news, Bart sped off like a rocket. It felt like he had been trapped in the house forever. It was a very short burst of vigilantism- Bart had really only had to throw up all over the burglars to distract them enough for the police to take control of the situation. 

While the cops were dragging off the robbers, Bart felt someone nudge his shoulder.

“Huh?” he asked, whirling around. 

“Hey, are you okay?” It was a young woman, one of the bank hostages, with bright blue eyes and a high ponytail. “You don’t look so good.”

Bart stood there like a stunned oxen, just blinking at her. 

“Hey? Kid? Do you… need anything?”

Bart swallowed, looking at the floor. 

“Do you think… maybe you could hold my hand? Just for a minute?” 

To his surprise, the girl just shrugged and held out her palm to him. “Sure, I guess.”

Bart took it like a lifeline. He threaded his fingers through hers, squeezing her hand as tightly as he could. He closed his eyes, gasping in breaths and pushing them out. The touch made him feel grounded. It made him feel like a real person again. 

After a minute he let go. He stared up at the woman’s face. “Thank you,” he whispered, and sped out of the bank back to the house.

***

He only knew Jenni for a week, but she was the brightest person he had ever met. She just sparkled, shone, sunshine glinting off her teeth when she grinned like she was an angel. She was always in his mind, buried in layers of Max’s clothes that were far too big for her, baseball cap on her head, bumping her shoulder against Bart’s and sitting cross-legged next to him playing video games and smiling at him onstage. It had just been a short time. But for those seven days, Bart wasn’t alone. 

“You can’t just leave,” he had scoffed, that last day. “Everything will be boring again.”

“Aw, Bart,” Jenni had replied with a grin. “You saying you’ll miss me?”

Bart shoved at her shoulder. “ No. I mean, yeah, duh. You should just stay.”

“You’re being silly.”

He gaped. “I’m the least silly person ever!”

Jenni snorted. “More like the silliest.”

“Hey-”

“Don’t be so sad , Bart.” Jenni reached an arm around his shoulders, resting her chin on top of his head. It fit there perfectly. “You’ll see me again. You have a time machine, remember?”

Bart squeezed his eyes shut, slumping into her. “They won’t let me use it,” he protested. “Wally hates me.”

“He does not.”

“Does too! He was only nice to you cuz you’re special and from the future.”

“Bart,” Jenni laughed, “So are you.”

“Yeah. But I don’t live there anymore.” He sniffed. “I mean…I can’t go back, even if I wanted to. They didn’t want me.”

And just like that, he was being crushed by Jenni’s two spindly arms. She was hugging him, tight, like Iris did.

“Oh, Bart,” she whispered into his hair. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry I can go back and you can’t.”

Bart swallowed. “It’s okay, Jenni-”

“It’s not. But… I want you. I wish I could take you with me.” She was crying now, just a little. “Grife, Bart, I’m- I’m sorry. I’m sorry they put you in a lab instead of me. It should have been me.”

“No! What? Don’t say that!” Bart cried in horror.

“It’s true! I’m older, it should have been…it shouldn't have been you. Oh, I’m sorry.” Jenni sniffled. “I hate that lab. I hate Earthgov. I should blow it up when I get back, for what they did to you.”

“Don’t blow it up. You’ll get in trouble.”

“Okay, okay, fine. I guess I should listen if you’re telling me to be responsible.”

She pulled away. Bart looked at her tearful face.

I’ll never see you again, he thought.

“At least I get Grandma Iris,” he said, crossing his arms.

Jenni stuck her tongue out at him. They both laughed through the tears.

At least it was me, was what Bart was thinking, when Jenni left. At least it was me and not you.

***

Bart liked Helen, because she was nice and funny and her dark hair threaded with gray reminded him of Iris. Sometimes when Bart was bored he would run over to the waiting room of her dentist’s office, waving to her at the end of the workday and walking her home. Helen always smiled when she saw him waiting, tearing through an entire rack of magazines. She’d slip him some chocolate from her purse and squeeze his shoulder and call him Bart, honey. For these things, wasting away in the waiting room was always worth it.

She also had a mischievous streak that most people didn’t know about. Helen liked imitating Max’s deep, grouchy voice whenever he wasn’t around, and it always left Bart in stitches. Sometimes she would copy his facial expressions from behind his back when he was talking. She’d wink at Bart and laugh with him and mess up his hair while he tried to run away. 

She always hugged Bart goodnight. He never even had to ask.

Every time this happened he would look up to the sky right after, and say I love you, Mom. It was a trade, of sorts. A division of loyalties.

***

“Do you hate it?” Carol had asked one day, flipping through her math notebook while they sat in the grass of the schoolyard. “The speed force, I mean.”

Bart, who had been busy fiddling with his shoelaces, looked up in surprise. “Huh?” he asked. “What do you mean?”

She shrugged, maybe a little self-conscious. “I dunno. It…makes you different, in a way. It makes everything harder. And you can’t turn it off, right? Even if you wanted to? Doesn’t that…seem like something you would resent?”

Bart stretched out his arms, folding them behind his head and lying down on the grass. He stared up at the lazy clouds, just inching across the sky. Everything inched in Manchester. 

“I don’t hate the speed force,” he answered. “I love it. I mean, I think I do. It’s a part of me, you know? I wouldn’t be anything without it.” He glanced over at Carol, laughing a little. “You probably understand it better than me anyway.”

Carol snorted. “I can’t help being curious. And you’d understand it too, if you listened to Max more.”

“I can’t believe you just said that to me, Carol. I can’t believe you just betrayed me like that.”

She bonked her notebook against his knees. “Oh, shut up, Bartholomew.”

He just smiled. It was appalling, how slow the clouds moved. Like they had nothing to do and nowhere to go. Sometimes you couldn’t even tell they were moving at all. His smile dropped, a little. It must be agonizing to be a cloud.

“I think you’ve got it backwards,” Bart found himself saying. “It’s not the speed force I hate. It’s everything else . I love the speed. I hate that everything else goes so slow. I just…I hate the real world. Maybe I could live in the speed force, ha. Build a little house in there.”

Carol looked sad, for some reason. Pensive. She rubbed the pads of her fingers on the notebook paper, not looking at Bart.

“Hey,” Bart said, pushing himself up into a sitting position and tapping at her shoulder. “What’s wrong? Why’re you so sad all of a sudden?”

Carol batted his hand away, sighing. “You’re a real dork sometimes, you know,” she lamented. “It’s…what you just said.”

“Huh? What about what I said?”

“ Bart ,” Carol emphasized, frustrated. “You just said you hate the real world. I’m in the real world.”

“Well I didn’t mean that ,” Bart protested, scratching his head. “I just meant…you know…” he sighed. “I dunno. I don’t hate you. Or anyone, I guess. I just wish everything was as fast as I was.”

Carol paused for a moment, mulling this over, and then nodded to herself. She seemed mollified. “I guess that makes sense.”

“Yeah. It’s just…it’s just all weird.”

“Yeah. You are weird.”

“Ha ha, Carol. Very funny.”

She smiled, closing her notebook and following his gaze up to the sky. 

“I think you’d be something without it,” she said, very quietly.

“What?”

Carol swallowed. She stared at the sky, not meeting his eyes. “You said you wouldn't be anything without the speed force. But I think you’re wrong.”

Bart bonked his forehead on her shoulder. “Oh. Um. Gee, Carol. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome. Impulse.”

“Shh, not so loud! Max might hear you!”

***

Bart had known she was his mom for a few reasons. First were the sharp, electric words of Interlac flitting across her tongue. A giddy wave of happiness had rolled over him- oh, it had been months and months since he had heard his native language, had heard it spoken from any mouth but his own. It was like getting a kiss from the past.

There was also the fact that she looked exactly like him. The hair, sure, but the eyes and nose too. Just like that, Bart Allen’s life was different. Flipped on its head. One moment he was an orphan, had been an orphan his whole life, and the next he was somebody’s son.

Bart had never thought about having a mom before, had never even considered it, but she was all he could have imagined. Meloni was loud and bright and she laughed with her whole chest and when she hugged him she squeezed so tight.

He thought it was maybe the most awful thing that had ever happened to him, having a mother. Because right after she’d made herself known, he had to leave her behind all over again. 

“It’s not fair,” he had shouted, choking on tears, while his mom messed with the time machine controls. “I didn’t even get a chance to know you.”

And she had said, “But I know you , Bart.”

He looked into her eyes. She was smiling at him. And Bart believed her. She did know him, maybe better than anyone else in the world. Maybe it would be okay, while they were separated: she wouldn’t forget. She would still know him.

Meloni had said, “See you…s-see you soon,” not even trying to hide her tears, and then there was only the whirling of the time machine. She was gone.

It was horrible. 

***

Bart bit into his sandwich. It was a beautiful, glorious Saturday. Him and his friends were having lunch in the park, gathered around a picnic table. The guys, as Helen made fun of him for saying: him, Preston, Rolly, Mike, and Wade.

“Um, hey, Bart,” Preston said, a bit nervously. He hadn’t touched his sandwich in at least a minute. “We wanted to ask-”

“ Shh !” Rolly elbowed Preston in the side, hard, cutting him off. “Don’t ask him that, man! We said. ”

Preston rolled his eyes but quieted down. Bart blinked, looking back and forth between the two.

“Uh. Ask me what?” he said, perplexed.

“Nothing,” Preston and Rolly chirped at the same time. Bart turned to Mike and Wade, who were both all of a sudden very interested in their shoes.

Bart narrowed his eyes. He set his half-eaten sandwich down on the napkin, dusting off his hands. “Hey,” he said, crossing his arms. “What’s going on? What’re you not telling me?”

“It’s really nothing, Bart,” Wade insisted.

“Well now I feel like an idiot,” Bart lamented. “Are you guys…keeping secrets from me, or what?”

“No!” Rolly exclaimed, vigorously shaking his head. “Of course not! We just…” he sighed, leaning his elbows on the table. “Fine, nevermind. Preston…just ask him.”

“We didn’t want to pry,” Preston said with a shrug. “But we’ve all kinda been wanting to ask you…what exactly happened with your mom?”

Four nervous faces stared at Bart.

Bart blinked.

“Oh,” he said. “Well…that makes sense, I guess.” He squinted. “You could've just asked me.”

“We didn’t want to be nosy,” Mike mumbled. “We thought you might be mad.”

Bart shook his head. “Nah. ‘Course not. It just…” he frowned. Oh. How was he supposed to explain this, again? He couldn’t remember what story Max had told to the school system. There certainly hadn’t been any mention of time travel, or evil dictators.

Bart squirmed a little. He tapped his fingers on the side of the picnic table. “It just didn’t work out, I guess,” he said, looking at the ground. “It all happened kinda fast.”

“Did she give you back?” Wade asked, and then immediately winced. “Uh, I mean, I didn’t-“

“No,” Bart insisted immediately. “No, no, she- she wanted me. She wanted to keep me. It wasn’t her fault.”

“Someone took you away?” Preston asked, very quietly. Bart thought about his mom, locked in a room.

Bart shrugged. He fiddled with a nail poking out of the picnic table. “Yeah. Sort of. So I.. have to keep living with Max.”

“Forever?” Mike asked.

Bart shrugged. He didn’t say anything.

“Well, it’s not like you’ll never see her again,” Rolly said, trying to be lighthearted. “You can write letters to her, right? And she can come visit?”

Bart’s face twisted. He avoided the eyes of all of his friends.

“Yeah,” he whispered. “Yeah, Rolly, you’re right.”

It was a lie. Bart would never see his mom again. He couldn’t even write her letters.

***

It wasn’t fair, it would never be fair. Bart was always going to be pounding on a glass wall, unable to get through. He would never reach them. There were nine hundred years between him and his mom, between him and Jenni. 

He would never see them again, and even if he did in another fluke accident it would never last forever. He would never live out his life with them. Bart tried writing letters, saving pictures- there was one envelope with MELONI written on it and one with JENNI- but a part of him knew it was useless. How would flimsy paper survive for that long? How would they find their way into the right hands?

All he could do was shout at the sky. I LOVE YOU. I MISS YOU. MAX BURNED THE CHICKEN TONIGHT. I WISH YOU COULD HAVE LAUGHED AT IT WITH ME. He knew they would never hear him. He did it anyway. 

***

Max was waiting for him after school, sitting on the edge of the sofa and nursing a mug of tea in two hands. Bart had planned to speed off to his room, but the minute he opened the front door Max turned his head with a piercing stare. It was like Bart was caught in his gaze, Max’s two eyes pinning him in place. 

“Bart,” he said slowly, intentionally. “Have a seat, please.”

Bart gulped. 

Not even bothering to do it at normal speed, he zoomed over to the living room and crashed into the armchair across from the sofa. He pulled his legs up until he was sitting criss-cross, fingers anxiously drumming on his knees.

“Um, hi Max,” Bart said, trying to keep his voice light and casual. “Where’s Helen?”

“Her office,” Max replied dismissively. He was gripping the mug like it was going to explode soon.

Bart squirmed, chewing at his lip. “Max? Is everything-”

“You want to tell me why you’ve run off four nights in a row?” Max asked, giving Bart a cold, hard stare.

Grife. So he had noticed. Bart let out a breath. “Max, you really don’t have to make a big deal out of this.”

“I gave you plenty of chances to tell me, Bart, but instead of coming clean you just kept doing it. You’ve been consistently home past four a.m. all week, and barely making it to school.”

A tiny little bit of anger bloomed in Bart’s chest, then. He screwed up his eyebrows. “You mean you knew the whole time?” he asked, a little betrayed. “And you didn’t say anything?”

“I told you,” Max said, sounding very weary, “I was trying to give you a chance to tell me yourself. Clearly I was misguided. Would you care to explain to me now?”

“I was just out superheroing,” he said nonchalantly. Maybe he could still save this. “Y’know, doing Impulse stuff. Because I was bored. It was nothing.”

Max raised one bushy eyebrow. “You’re not being truthful with me.”

Bart realized, then, that he was angry. Livid, boiling. He could feel his heartbeat pounding against his skin. “You callin’ me a liar?” he growled.

Max narrowed his eyes at Bart. “I just want an explanation,” he said coolly.

A part of Bart blanched. He didn’t need to explain himself, not to Max. Max didn’t need to know anything. It wasn’t about him, anyway; it really wasn’t his business at all.

The reason was Bart got tired of lying on his bed staring at the ceiling for hours when all he could think about was his mom under Thawne’s control. And that it was his fault. And that he would never see her again. And that he would never run fast enough to catch up with her. All that time in the dark hours of night with nothing to do but think, and it was like torture. He hated being forced to think. He hated feeling trapped. Bart had thrown his costume on, phased through the walls of his bedroom, and done laps around the globe until early morning every night this week. It made him tired, sure, but it was worth it to feel the wind on his skin, to get out of that stupid bedroom, to go fast enough to outrun his thoughts. 

If Max made him say all that out loud, he would scream. He wouldn’t do it.

“Well maybe I don’t wanna give you one!” Bart cried. “You shouldn’t care anyway! You’re my mentor, not my- not my- you should be happy if I’m out being Impulse at night!” 

“Bart, it doesn’t matter that you’re Impulse. You’re fourteen ,” Max said incredulously. “You’re still a child! That’s why you need to follow my-”

“Your rules ?” Bart cut in, seething. “Your rules have never helped me one bit! They’re just stupid things you make me do to change me!”

Heat was rising in Max’s cheeks. He put the mug of tea down on the coffee table with so much force that a bit sloshed out. “Bart Allen,” he said through gritted teeth, “One day when you are a functional human being you will look back and realize it is only because I-”

“A functional human being?” Bart was standing now, practically screeching. “I’m perfectly functional! You mean you want me to be like everyone else! And I’m not. I’m not like any other stupid person on this stupid planet because I don’t belong here! I never will!”

“ Bart! That is not true and you know it! You’re just saying anything to argue. Maybe it will be best if you go cool off and we can talk about this later.”

“No, Max, just stop! Stop acting like you care !” Bart screamed, flinging his left arm and knocking over the lamp on the end table. The lamp shade crumpled as it fell onto the carpet.

“Bart,” Max barked, standing up. “You’re behaving like a child. Pick that up. You’re grounded until further notice.”

Bart refused, just huffing and nudging the fallen lamp with his foot. “Maybe I’m behaving like a child because I never was a child!” he yelled, straight from the heart. “I was a lab experiment! I- I didn’t have baby toys and a crib like everyone else, I didn't have a mom!”

That made Max pause. He was looking at Bart with intense, thoughtful eyes. “Bart,” was all he said, more gently, as if changing his mind about something.

There was a brief moment of inward panic. No, no, Bart needed him mad. He needed Max to yell at him, to really scream, so Bart could scream back and not feel guilty. He needed to push harder.

“I bet you’re happy,” Bart snapped. “I bet you’re happy she’s gone so that you can have someone to rule under your iron fist. I bet you’re happy I had to leave her behind. I bet you like seeing me miserable.”

Max just seemed somewhat at a loss. “Bart, please, listen to yourself-”

“No!” he screamed, balling his hands into fists, squeezing his eyes shut, “No, I won’t listen to you anymore, Max! I hate you! You’re not my mom and I hate you! I wish I had stayed in the future with her instead!”

And that was it, the final insult. Bart was out of breath from yelling, face all red and hot. 

Max was looking at him from across the room, holding out one hand like Bart was an overexcited horse. “Bart,” he was saying, very evenly, “Bart, focus on me, please, you need to calm down.”

Bart froze. Wait, that was- no, no, that wasn’t what was supposed to happen. He was supposed to make Max mad enough to yell at him. That’s what he’d been aiming for. But Max wasn’t yelling, he was just- telling Bart to calm down. He rewound the conversation in his brain. I hate you. I wish I had stayed in the future with her instead.

Oh. Oh, no. 

Bart had said that he had said those words and he could never ever take them back-

Why wasn’t Max yelling at him like he was supposed to, if only he was yelling-

The blood in Bart’s veins froze over, three times in a row. He had done something bad. He had done something very, very bad. He needed to get out of there.

Bart took one last glance at Max’s strained expression before he shot out of the house like a rocket.

***

He just ran.

He was going fast, faster than usual, so fast the ground might be tearing up beneath him but he didn’t care. The landscape was a blur. He blinked and he was in a different country. Trees and buildings and mountains rose around him and fell just as quickly. He couldn’t stop. He couldn’t get a handle on himself. His limbs were just pumping up and down, sprinting, carrying him towards the horizon. It was familiar, he thought, almost to the point of disassociation. It was nearly identical to the day he had entered the time portal and been flung out alone in an unfamiliar place, racing so fast he set things on fire, trying to outrun his death sentence.

All of a sudden Bart couldn’t remember who he was. Memories kept tripping through his mind, out of order, not attached to anything. He was still twelve with poison in his veins, heart threatening to seize with every stride, thoughtless except for the ever-present wail of I want my grandma.

Some part of Bart, then, knew he wouldn’t be able to stop. He wouldn’t even be able to slow down. He would run himself ragged, lose awareness, forget he was a living being, forget how to turn it off. He would run until there was nothing left of him. And there wasn’t anything, not anything in the whole world that would be able to stop him.

Well. There was one thing he had forgotten.

“That’s enough, kiddo,” were the words that broke through the haze, and suddenly there were arms around him. They were holding tight, slowing him down, dragging him back.

He was twelve again. He was being touched for the first time. Bart did the only thing he knew how to do: he hugged back.

It slowed him down but Bart had been going so fast before that they were still zipping through the scenery and they were skidding along the ground bashing into things but Bart phased them both through on instinct and they dragged deep ruts into the ground that were spraying mud and they and they and they-

They thundered to a stop, collapsed in a heap of limbs. It was night, Bart noticed. It was raining.

Wally West was crouched in the muddy grass, arms locked around Bart’s trembling form like a vise. Bart held back just as fiercely. It was a lifeline. The only solid thing in the world. If he let go then he would start running again, and the world would just fall away like smoke. His fingers were digging into Wally’s back.

He realized, then, that Wally was talking to him- he hadn’t noticed before, hadn’t even heard. 

“Bart,” he was saying, “Bart, it’s okay, but you gotta stop, this isn’t going to help, trust me when I say it isn’t going to help-”

“How can I trust you?” Bart blubbered into the front of Wally’s suit, even as he refused to let go even a tiny bit. He was dizzy and unbalanced and shaking all over. “I don’t know you. You don’t even like me.”

Wally breathed in. “That’s not true.”

The anger and the shame roiled inside of him, a tidal wave.

“You hate me!” Bart screamed, grabbing whole fistfuls of Wally’s costume. “You’ve always hated me! So don’t try to act like you care now!”

Wally shifted Bart in his arms. He reached an arm over his shoulders, placing the other hand on his head. It was exactly the way Iris had held him, that first time.

“Aw, Bart,” he said, gently. “I do not hate you. In fact, I have never hated you.”

“You’re lying !” Bart screamed, but it came out as more of a sob. “You don’t care about me, I’m just a problem to you!”

“Who says I can’t care about my problems?” Wally said lightly, but Bart just cried into his chest.

Rain pattered at his skin. He hated Wally. The ins and outs of Wally’s breathing was the only real thing in the world. 

He shifted, just a little; arms losing just a little bit of strength, turning so that his head thumped against Wally’s chest. The panic wasn’t quite as vivid.

“Bart,” Wally said, cheek pressed against the side of Bart’s head, “Just because we don’t always get along doesn’t mean you’re not family. Just because I don’t like you all the time doesn’t mean I don’t…”

The word hung there, in between them. Bart wanted to grab for it.

Instead, he said, “Family, huh?”

“Bart. You have always been family. You’d be family even if you weren’t Barry’s grandson.”

Bart scoffed. “Now you’re just lying to make me feel better.”

“I am not!” Wally insisted. “Family doesn’t have to be just who you’re related to. I mean…look at Max. I’m not related to him at all, but he’s still family.”

All the air squeezed out of Bart’s lungs. 

Max. Oh, Max, Max, Max. He gritted his back molars together. Bart thought maybe he would never be okay again. He would never be able to take back what he’d said, or time travel so that the fight had never happened. He would never be able to push it out of his mind. He didn’t have a home anymore.

Desperate to think of anything else, Bart blinked and stared out at his surroundings- well, as much of them as he could see without letting go of Wally. They were in some kind of field, dotted with patches of overgrown grass settled in mud. There was nothing but stalks of corn and the occasional tree for as far as the eye could see.

“We’re in the middle of nowhere?” Bart mumbled.

“Yeah. We might have ruined some corn, but that’s it. I made sure there weren’t people around before I tackled you.” 

That made sense. At least Wally had made a responsible decision today. Bart recalled the panicked slow-down, frowning when he thought of exactly what had happened.

“I…didn’t we phase through things?” he asked, a bit afraid of the answer.

Wally nodded. “Uh, a few trees, I think. A barn.” 

Bart’s head snapped up to look his cousin in the face. “ Wally !” he shouted, a little horrified. You can’t phase through things without blowing them up! And I- I’m not good at taking people with me, I- What if  I messed up? You could be dead, I could have-”

“Hey, woah, woah, Bart. Slow down.” He hadn’t realized that he had started shaking again until Wally clamped two arms around him. “It was fine. I just…held on, and you took me with you on instinct. It worked out. You did good, okay?”

Bart’s face was pinched with sadness, silent tears falling from his eyelids. His face was all red and blotchy and he kept almost choking on his own saliva. Wally was rocking him, very slowly, like Bart was a baby . But he didn’t even care. It felt nice. Wally probably didn’t even realize he was doing it.

Wally breathed in. “You wanna tell me what this was all about?” he asked finally.

Bart sucked in air through his teeth. “Don’t wanna talk about it.”

“Okay.”

Wally didn’t ask again, and the misery just raged and swelled inside Bart, like there was a storm in his rib cage. What was this all about? It was…it was Bart being awful, it was Max being awful, it was Bart being awful on purpose because he missed his mom and needed something to scream at.

“My mom,” he found himself whispering against Wally’s chest. “I…I miss my mom.”

It was quiet for a minute. Wally kept opening his mouth and closing it again, like he didn’t know what to say. “I’m sorry,” were the only words he could come up with. “I bet she misses you too.”

Bart sniffled. He squeezed his eyes shut. He couldn’t say anything more about it, not if he wanted to stay sane. “What happens now ,” he said, almost afraid of the answer.

“I take you back home,” Wally said simply.

“Take me…to Manchester?”

“Yeah. Unless you’ve moved recently.”

“You can’t, ” Bart hiccuped, shaking his head back and forth. “You can’t take me back to Max, Wally, you-”

“Bart,” Wally said, “Calm down. Why not?”

“He’s gonna hate me,” Bart cried, chest heaving. “Oh my god, Wally, the things I said-”

“Bart.”

“He’s gonna kick me out and Helen will be sad and I’ll have to go back to the future with my mom but they don’t want me either and I’ll have to say goodbye to Preston and Carol and-”

“ Bart . Breathe. I talked to the esteemed Max Mercury less than two minutes ago. He isn’t mad, kiddo, just worried sick.”

“You promise?”

“I promise, Bart.”

Max didn’t hate him. Max didn’t hate him. He still had a home, maybe.

Bart shivered at the rain pooling on his skin. He curled against Wally’s chest. “A few minutes,” he pleaded. “Just a few minutes and then I’ll go back with you, okay?” He almost felt like a real person again. He was almost done shaking.

“Okay, Bart.”

They sat in silence. The rain splattered against the ground. Bart’s legs and feet were coated in mud. Wally’s arms were still firmly around his shoulders.

“How- How come-” Bart kept hiccuping in between his words. “How come you’re holding me like this?” Like Iris. How come you're holding me like Iris held me? How did you know?

“It’s…” he trailed off, like he really didn’t know what to say. “It’s what I needed, when I was your age. Whenever I got like this. Just somebody to hold me tight enough to keep me together.”

“You got like this? It’s not just me?” When had this ever happened to Wally?

“You’re not the only one who fought with the adults in his life, Bart. Except…” Wally swallowed. “Well. Let’s just say my dad didn’t like me quite as much as Max likes you.”

Bart frowned. He didn’t get it. “Your dad didn’t…like you?”

“Not one bit. Still doesn’t.”

“Oh. Um… your mom? Did she like you?”

Wally hesitated. “Let’s.. we don’t have to talk about this, Bart, it’s not important.”

“I think it’s important,” Bart said stubbornly, but fell silent.

Wally rubbed a thumb along the nape of his neck. “At least I had Aunt Iris,” he said softly. 

“You did?”

“Mmhmm. She kinda… felt more like a mom than my real mom.” He chuckled sadly to himself. “I used to say she was my whole world.”

Something cracked inside Bart Allen.

“You did?” he whispered again.

“Yes.”

He nudged his head into Wally’s neck. “She was mine too,” he mumbled, just barely audible. 

They sat there, for a minute. They listened to the rain.

“I think I’m ready to go home now,” Bart whispered. He was breathing again, normal deep breaths. He had stopped shaking.

“Okay,” said Wally. He stood up in one motion, hoisting Bart up into his arms while Bart flailed in protest.

“Let me just carry ya, bud, it’ll be easier. You’re exhausted. If you tried to run right now you’d fall over.”

“No I wouldn’t,” Bart mumbled, but he was already closing his eyes in Wally’s arms. 

They left the field and the rain behind. Wally ran him all the way back to Manchester. Bart, half-asleep, barely registered being transferred from Wally’s arms into Max’s.

***

And at the end, had anything changed?

Bart had never hated anyone as much as he hated Rival. More than Darkseid, more than Harm, more than Thawne.

Helen hadn’t even tried to hide her tears when she’d hugged him goodbye. Bart couldn't stop feeling awful.

The Garricks’ house in Denver was cozy. It was much cooler than it was in Manchester. It wasn’t- it wasn’t home. Bart felt all itchy, like he couldn't get used to the air in this place, or the carpet or the wallpaper. 

It was all so terrible. Bart didn’t know what to do with all of it. He couldn’t sleep, so at night he took to staring out the bay window at the lights of passing cars. 

He wanted to go home. He wanted Carol and Preston. He wanted to go back to the future where everything made sense. He wanted Kon. He wanted to go so fast no one would ever find him again. He wanted his mom. He wanted Max back.

It was the fourth night, or the fifth maybe, and there was a noise like the doorbell ringing but he ignored it, and the headlights sped past the window like little ghosts, and there was suddenly a strong, steady arm around him. 

“It’ll be okay,” Jay said firmly, in that deep, rumbly voice of his. “It’ll be okay, kid, don’t worry.”

Bart slumped against his shoulder. “But how do you know?”

Jay wrapped him in both arms, pulling him close. “Because I know Max would never leave you. Not forever.”

Bart’s eyes got all watery. His face twisted in sorrow. “If you say so, Jay,” he said softly.

“Mm,” Jay said, ruffling Bart’s hair. “I know how rough this has been. I think I have something to cheer you up, though.”

“What is it?”

 “Well,” Jay said mysteriously, “There’s someone here to see you.”

Bart blinked. “What? In the middle of the night?”

He chuckled. “It’s not that late, Bart, only nine. And she had a bit of a drive.”

“Max made me go to bed at eight.”

“That bastard,” Jay said. Bart laughed a little, then sniffled.

“Um,” he said, “Who is it then?”

“I’ll go get her.” Jay released him, disappearing from the kitchen into the sitting room.

Maybe it was Carol, Bart thought. Or Linda. He turned back to the window, leaning his forehead against the glass.

There was the sound of light footsteps entering the kitchen.

“Hi, sweetheart,” said a voice he knew by heart. Before he knew what he was doing Bart had whirled around and launched himself into her arms.

“You said you couldn’t-” he was crying now, hiccuping, “You said you couldn’t come see us cuz it would mess with stuff and-”

“I don’t always have to follow my own rules.” Iris was holding him tight, gently rubbing his shoulder blades. She smelled like he remembered.

“H-how come?”

She kissed his temple. “Because if it breaks the timeline to give my grandson a hug, I’ll damn well break it,” she said.

Bart stepped back, looking up at her in awe. “Really?”

She shrugged. “Guess I don’t always make the smart decision.”

“Me neither.”

“Well, maybe you get it from me.”

Bart laughed through his tears. Maybe he did. Maybe Wally did, too.

Iris swallowed. She cupped his cheeks with both hands. “Oh, honey,” she said quietly. “I’m so sorry, I’m so, so sorry, Bart. This never should have happened.”

He looked up at her, mournfully. “Do you…” he took a breath. “I mean, do you know if…”

Iris looked very sad. She laid a finger across her lips.

Bart looked at the ground. “Right, right, sorry. I should have- I should have known-” he coughed a little, swiping at his tears. “Well it’s alright, anyway. I love Jay and Joan. Denver isn’t too bad. I’ll survive.”

“I know you will.” She smiled sadly, gently pinching his cheek. “Oh, darling. The world has asked so much of you. You’ve risen to everything so beautifully.”

“You think so?” Bart asked.

“Of course I do. After all this, all you say is ‘I’ll survive.’” Iris’s eyes were all watery now. “Bart, I…”

“Yeah?”

Iris looked thoughtful for a moment. She took a deep breath, and leaned in close to Bart’s ear.

“You find him,” she whispered, only for him. “It takes a long time. But you find him. You get to be together again.” She drew back, tucking his hair behind his ear. “So don’t worry.”

Bart stared up at her with wide eyes. “Grandma!” he hissed through his teeth. “You’re- you’re not supposed to-”

“Just don’t tell on me,” she said, with a twinkle in her eye. “And I think the timeline will be alright.”

Bart’s mouth was half open. He burst into a grin, which turned quickly into tears. He reached for her hand and squeezed. “Thank you,” he said.

“Anything for you, Bart.”

“How’s that for a surprise?” Joan asked with a smile. Bart turned to the sound of her voice. She and Jay had just wandered into the kitchen.

“Like, the best ever,” Bart said, leaning over to grin at them. “Shucks. And it’s not even my birthday.”

The Garricks just smiled at him.

Bart acknowledged, then, that he loved the Garricks. That they loved him. His heart was swelling with the knowledge of it. That he was safe, even without Max and Helen, that he had a home.

And if not with the Garricks, then with Jesse. With Wally and Linda. With Iris. There was no shortage of love, not for Bart, even in this time that he was a foreigner in.

Meloni was still locked in the future. Max was lost in the speed force, out of reach, maybe gone forever. 

He was still an orphan. Or, an orphan again - twice over.

Iris’s arms were around him. Helen was a phone call away. Jay and Joan had given him a home. 

An orphan, maybe. But not alone.