12A/N: 'Nother YJ meme fill here. Here's the original prompt:
"During a sparring match (that's not really a fight at all...), a fairly annoyed Robin let's his bad mood get the better of him. "Fighting" against Wally, and hearing the usual chatter come out of the red heads mouth while trying to tune it out, Robin, expecting his friend to dodge, aims a serious punch for Wally's face, and is surprised when his blow lands. He ends up breaking the speedsters nose, and having Wally be just as, if not more, surprised for he never thought Robin would actually ever hurt him.
Cue flustered/guilty Robin with a shocked/emotionally hurt Wally (cuz we all know he heals incredibly fast but emotionally wise... Well, he's a softy)."
This is what I totally spent my morning writing instead of doing homework. Yay! Also, this is revised from the version on livejournal because that had typos like whoa. Also fixed up a couple parts to make it more coherent.
"—and-you-just-WOULD-NOT-BELIEVE-how-annoying-Artemis-was-being-I-mean-OH-MY-GOD-ROB-that-girl-needs-to-stop-PMSing-I-swear-to-God—"
To say that Robin was in a bad mood was a major understatement. Because the fact was, Robin was in a foul, extremely irritated mood that could be rivaled only by the Batman's bad moods.
The fact that Kid Flash was rambling on a hundred miles a minute about a topic (or multiple topics) Robin had lost track of about ten minutes ago was not helping. The fact that Kid Flash was doing this while they sparred wasn't helping, either.
"—but-anyways-that's-not-what-I-really-wanted-to-talk-about-what-I-REALLY-wanted-to-talk-about-was-this-thing-that-happened-at-school-today-haha-just-wait-until-you-hear-it—"
Although, Robin thought grumpily, this hardly constituted as 'sparring.' The few kicks and punches Wally sent his way were sloppy and half-hearted, easily avoided by the Boy Wonder, who blocked, parried, deflected, and dodged them all. And his friend wasn't even trying to focus on training as he dodged all of Robin's attacks without even trying to send a counterattack half the time.
"—and-then-my-teacher-looks-at-me-all-WALLACE-WEST-YOU-DID-NOT-JUST-and-then-I'm-all-like-OH-YEAH-I-SO-TOTALLY-DID-YOU-MAD-BRO?-And-then—"
It was so frustrating! Could he please just shut up? After waking up on the wrong side of bed and just having a generally stressful day, Robin had really been hoping to clear his head with some training. Needless to say, that didn't exactly go as planned.
Note to self: Never spar with KF again, he thought fiercely.
Growing increasingly annoyed as his friend continued to chatter ceaselessly (and incoherently), Robin swung out with much more power than his previous blows, even though he knew Wally would dodge it, just as with all of his other punches. Which was why his eyes stretched wide with surprise when he felt his fist connect with his friend's face. Wally's own eyes were wide as the force behind the punch actually threw him backwards.
After listening to Wally chatter for nearly half an hour nonstop, the silence that filled the room now was felt so strongly, Robin swore it was almost tangible.
Robin raced over and dropped down to his knees beside Wally as his friend sat up with his hand on his nose. "KF—Wally—I'm so sorry—I didn't mean to—are you okay?"
His friend's eyes were wet, but Robin knew that it was the result of being hit on the nose so hard, because Kid Flash wouldn't cry over something like this. But, tears or not, the hurt and shock in his green eyes was clear.
"...Think you broke my nose," he muttered, his voice muffled.
"S-sorry," stuttered Robin. By now, all of his earlier anger and frustration deflated like air from a popped balloon.
"S'okay," said Wally, waving his hand dismissively—Robin cringed when he saw the bloody nose that the hand had previously been covering. "It's already healing."
But his eyes had adopted a guarded look that made Robin's stomach twist uneasily. "Are you sure?" he asked.
There was a pause, and when Wally answered, his voice was uncharacteristically small. "I didn't think you'd ever actually hurt me."
Heart dropping to his stomach, Robin said, "I didn't mean to, I swear. I thought—I thought you were going to dodge it—"
"Yeah, but you still..." Wally trailed off, but Robin knew what he was trying to say. Even though he knew Wally should have dodged it, it didn't change the fact that he had attacked with such force, enough force to seriously hurt anyone else who didn't have the advantage of speed-healing on their side.
And Robin, feeling incredibly guilty, had no idea what to say, because it was true. For something like this, Sorry, I'm having a bad day today, just wasn't going to cut it.
"Uh," he started awkwardly. What was he supposed to say? He'd never been in a situation like this with Wally before, because they were more than just best friends, and they didn't need to talk to understand each other. They had a silent trust and agreement. But Robin had just broken that trust.
Wally stood up and said, "Well! All that training sure has made me hungry! I think I'll go to the kitchen and grab a snack."
And to anyone else, that would have sounded like the same old Wally, but Robin knew him well enough to know that the cheerfulness in his voice was forced.
"I'll go with you," Robin decided quickly, getting to his feet and following his friend out of the training room.
In the kitchen, Wally grabbed a bag of chips from the pantry and began shoveling them into his mouth, pointedly avoiding Robin's gaze.
Robin took a couple of sodas from the fridge and offered one to Wally, who accepted it without a word.
Robin didn't think it was possible to miss the obnoxious chatterbox Wally, but there was no one else he'd rather have here right now. The silence was seriously starting to unnerve him.
If he tried to lighten the mood, would Wally be even more hurt and think he was inconsiderate? Or would he go with it, like he always did whenever Robin teased him?
Robin sighed. With all the things he'd learned from Batman, why didn't he know how to deal with this?
If only it was as easy to heal emotional wounds as it was physical.
"I didn't do it on purpose," he tried again. I would never hurt you intentionally. Never, never. But the mere thought sounded hollow next to what had just happened.
"...I know," said Wally. "Look, I'm going to go home and...take a nap or something, okay?"
Robin blinked. "Okay."
His cape rustled as Wally sped off in a blur, and Robin moved to put the chips and abandoned soda can away when Wally came back, grabbed them both from Robin's hands, and zipped off again.
'Nap' my ass. He's going to go sulk in his room. What is he, a girl? Robin thought scornfully, but even that couldn't push away his guilt.
And so, somehow, Robin found himself Central City in his civilian clothes after getting tired of pacing around for hours, waiting for Wally to jump back to his regular self and come back to the Cave where they'd make up with rainbows and bunnies and happy bromances and everything would be fine and dandy again and why hadn't he come back yet?
Robin knocked on the door and nearly jumped out of his skin when it was opened a millisecond later. He couldn't tell if Flash was expecting him, or if he really could move that fast.
"Er, hi," he said. "Is...is Wally there?"
"Wait here," said Barry, and he disappeared, only to reappear again a second later. "He's not here right now."
"Okay, uh." Robin assumed that Barry was well aware that they both knew where Wally was. "Can you...tell him I'm sorry?"
Barry left and came back again. "Go to his room," he said simply.
Thanking him, Robin passed into the house and went to Wally's room. The door was closed, so he knocked on it, and there was a muffled noise that sounded vaguely like, "Come in," so Robin turned the knob and pushed the door open.
Wally glanced at him, then shot up in his bed, cursing. "I told him to tell you I wasn't here."
"I know," said Robin tightly, walking over to the bedside. "Have you been shutting yourself in here these past few hours?"
"Maybe," muttered Wally, glancing away.
"Why?" Robin, for the life of him, honestly couldn't fathom why this was affecting his friend so badly. Earlier, he understood, but this was hours after it had happened, and Wally never let anything bother him for so long.
"You're my best friend."
"Yeah? You're mine, too."
"Well," said Wally, "best friends don't going around trying to break each other's noses."
"Dude, we were sparring. We're supposed to try and hit each other."
"But not like that!" Wally protested.
"Batman never holds back when we spar," Robin felt the need to point out, because, really, Wally was being such a sissy about the whole thing.
"That's different," Wally insisted. "We're—" He waved his arms around, but no words came out of his mouth.
"What? We're what?"
"I don't know! It's not like your father-son-mentor-partner status with the Bat—and that's complicated enough as it is. It's not partner-partner, either, not even really friend-friend or brother-brother. We're..." But, again, the sentence was left unfinished.
But Robin had felt that way before, too. Not exactly friends. Not exactly family. A love for each other—not romantic, but purely platonic—that was hard to define in clear terms.
"I get it. Not exactly friends, not exactly family. I know what you mean," he said, and Wally relaxed as he got his message across.
"Right, so. I trust you. With my life."
"Yes, and?"
"And, well, I didn't expect you to ever even..."
"It. Was. An accident," Robin ground out impatiently. "What do you want me to say? I already apologized. I already said I didn't do it on purpose. What else am I supposed to do?"
Wally made a sort of coughing noise in the back of his throat. Behind his glasses, Robin narrowed his eyes.
"You don't really—is that what you've been waiting for this whole—dude, it's been years, how old do you think we are?"
"You're not that old yet," Wally retorted. "And it's only been a year since last time."
"Yeah, but twelve is still preteen. I'm a teenager now. I'm too old for this. You've been too old for this."
Wally didn't say a word, and Robin sighed loudly.
"Fine. Just one." He leaned down and put his arms around Wally, who immediately wrapped his arms around him and pulled him down in a tight, bone-crushing hug. "Gack!"
"Apology...accepted?" Robin asked after a moment, finding it difficult to breathe under the pressure of the death-embrace.
Wally waited for the ten most torturous seconds in Robin's life before finally releasing him. "Apology accepted," he affirmed.
"You are such a kid," Robin groaned, sitting down on the bed. "I think your name should be Kid Clingy. In fact, I'm going to start calling you that now."
Wally huffed. "Watch it, or else you're no longer forgiven. And then you'll have to do something else for me."
"Like what?" Robin asked, rolling his eyes. "Another hug?"
"No. Like...play Doctor."
Robin raised an eyebrow, and Wally flopped back dramatically on the bed, saying, "Oh, Doctor, I think you should carry your poor, handicapped patient to the kitchen. Or better yet, bring the refrigerator into your patient's room!"
The effect of the withering glare Robin tried to give Wally was ruined by his grin as he punched him lightly on the arm. "Don't push it, Kid Clingy."