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In Billy’s experience adults never took the time to understand why kids like him did the things they did.
They didn't care that he was trying to help other people; they just wanted him to sit down and shut up. They didn't care about what he wanted; they just wanted him to quit complaining. They didn't care that he was unhappy or scared of his foster families; they just wanted him out of the way.
Adults were always acting like they were better than him, convinced that they were smarter, that their needs were more important than his. They thought he was nothing more than a troublemaker, a problem to be solved.
Sometimes he thought that he would be better off if there were no adults at all. Then maybe he wouldn't be pushed aside or told he was too young to help. Maybe then he could be a hero without having to hide who he really was. Maybe then he could feel like Billy Batson was even half as important as Captain Marvel was.
He'd been a hero for a few years now, a genuine member of the Justice League before he’d even hit double digits, but he knew they wouldn't want him either if they knew he was a kid. He'd always had his suspicions, but after the debacle with the sidekicks and the constant debates on what to do with them, now he knew for sure. He’d be kicked out faster than he could say Shazam.
Especially since even everyone on the Team was older than him.
Everyone on the Team was so cool. They went on top secret covert ops missions and communicated with each other almost completely through telepathy. And they were all amazing heroes. It was weird that they thought Captain Marvel was an adult–the adult in charge no less. But it was so nice to get to spend time with people closer to his age, other kids who knew what he was going through even if he couldn’t actually talk to them about any of it.
He knew they were more capable than the rest of the Justice League gave them credit for, they'd proved that plenty of time. He tried to give them the freedom and respect he had as a hero, the acceptance that other members of the Justice League seemed reluctant to show them. Because if anyone knew how much it meant for a young hero to be treated as an equal to the grown ups, it was Billy.
They were going to great things, they just needed someone to believe in them.
Billy just wished that someone would believe in him.
Some days he didn’t even think that the people believed in him when he was Captain Marvel, so what chance did plain old Billy Batson have?
But the hardest part about secretly being a child superhero was the fact that he couldn’t ask for help balancing being a kid and being a hero. He couldn't trust anyone to both help him and keep his identity a secret. It certainly made it hard to make friends with other heroes at work.
On top of that, being a foster kid made it even harder. His latest foster home was one of the worst ones yet--he'd bee walking on eggshells around his new family for weeks. Part of it was because Billy kept skipping school and missing his curfew to work with the Team and keep up on his Justice League duties, but mostly they just didn't like kids, him in particular. Or at least that was the impression Billy got.
He'd been planning on cutting his losses and running away again, all he needed to do was gather some supplies–he didn't want to be caught out on the streets unprepared. If he was quick—if he was smart—he could be out of there and find a nice place to hole up before it even got dark.
With his backpack swung over his shoulder and his foster mom busy in the kitchen, Billy was ready to make a break for it.
“Where do you think you're going?”
Billy jumped at his foster dad's voice, one leg swung out the window of his bedroom, eyes wide like a deer in the headlights. He hadn’t even heard the door open. Oh no. He wasn’t supposed to be home for another hour. And if he was home early that meant that he was already in a bad mood.
Billy spluttered. He couldn’t tell the truth but he was a terrible liar, everyone told him so. “I was just–”
He reached out and grabbed Billy's arm, harshly pulling him back inside. Billy's foot got caught on the windowsill, twisting painfully as he stumbled inside and landed heavily on the ground.
“I know what you were doing!” he snapped. “The social worker warned us about you. She said you'd run, and that you'd probably rob us on the way out!”
“I wasn't going to rob you–”
“I don’t appreciate being lied to,” he spat. “You’ve done nothing but cause trouble since you got here, sneaking out, talking back, disobeying us at every turn.”
“I’m sorry—“
“Don’t start with me,” he said, towering over Billy and getting in his face. “I'm going to teach you a lesson about respecting your elders. Maybe then you'll learn that your actions have consequences.”
Billy watched his hand reach for his belt and flinched, screwing his eyes shut in anticipation of being struck.
But the hit never came.
Billy slowly opened one eye and then the other.
The room was empty except for him.
If his ankle wasn't throbbing, he would have assumed he'd imagined his foster dad’s appearance completely.
He climbed to his feet, cautiously looking around his room. He hadn't heard the man's heavy footsteps or the creak of the door's hinges, so where had he gone? He crept out into the hallway, a strange twisting in his gut in the sudden silence. He wandered through the silent apartment, down the hall and into the kitchen. A pot was boiling on the stove, but his foster mom was nowhere to be found.
He switched off the gas certain now that something was wrong.
Then he heard a crash outside, followed by a young girl's scream.
He rushed to the window, already on high alert. When he pulled back the curtain he was met with growing chaos outside. A car had crashed into a light pole down the street. The men who usually sat on the stoop of the building in front of it smoking and playing cards were gone even though Billy had seen them only a few minutes ago. A couple kids about Billy's age sat on their bikes talking in high panicked voices.
Billy rushed out the door and down the steps to the street below.
Everyone was screaming.
He rushed to the car that had crashed, doing his best to avoid everyone else. There was no one in the driver's seat, but through the cracked glass he could see a little girl was strapped into a car seat in the back, her cries louder than even the car alarm.
“Hey, hey. It's okay,” he said, trying to get her attention from the other side of the glass. “I'm gonna get you out of there okay? Just sit tight.”
The door was locked when he tried it so he looked around for another way in. For some reason no one else was coming to help-not even whoever had been driving the car. The only people he could see on the street were other kids and they all seemed too scared to get too close.
He spotted a twisted metal hanger sticking out of a trash bag a few doors down.
He'd seen guys jack cars with less.
He jogged over and grabbed it. It took him a few minutes of jimmying but eventually the lock clicked and he was able to pull open the door. He scooped the little girl out of the car and looked around for an adult to take care of her. Usually an ambulance would be on the way by now, but he couldn't hear any sirens.
“Hey, you!” Billy called out, pointing with his free hand at a teenager who was frantically knocking on doors. “Call 911.”
“I've tried! But no one's picking up!”
“What?”
“No one’s answering!” he repeated. “I've tried three times. My mom is gone!”
Billy’s gut dropped, the same way it did whenever he entered free fall, though this time he didn’t enjoy the sensation. “What do you mean gone?”
“One second she was telling me to do my homework and the next she was gone. It was like she just vanished into thin air!”
“Mr. Johnson too!” one of the kids on bikes piped up. “I blinked and he vanished! He didn't even finish his story!”
Billy thought of his foster dad, one hand already on his belt. There one second and gone the next. It couldn’t just be a coincidence.
“Here, take her inside,” he said, shoving the little girl into the teenager's arms. “I don't think she needs any bandages but look her over just in case. I'm going to ask around to see what's going on.”
The teen nodded, so relieved to have some direction that he didn't even protest being ordered around by a kid several years younger than him.
As soon as he'd ushered the other kids inside, Billy started running down the street. Everywhere he looked it was the same–missing adults, terrified kids, the aftermath of countless accidents–it was mass panic. Each kid he talked to had some variation of the same story, some even told him that they'd heard from family outside of town that the same thing happened to them. Mei, whose parents ran the corner store, even said that she'd been on the phone with her grandparents in Hong Kong and they'd disappeared at the same time her parents had.
Which meant this wasn’t just a Fawcett City problem—this was a global one.
He did what he could to help, but it didn't feel like enough, not when everyone was so terrified. It was times like these that he would usually turn into Captain Marvel, because Captain Marvel was brave and always knew what to do, even if he still had Billy's brain. But he couldn't. Billy may have been a kid, but Cap wasn't. Or at least not physically–Billy really didn’t want test whether that counted or not.
Because this was clearly magic, and the rules of magic were complicated. Nothing else could do something like this, especially not this widespread. Problems this big and this complicated weren't supposed to be handled by one person—even if that person was Captain Marvel. This was the sort of threat that the Justice League was created to handle—together.
But the Justice League was gone. He was the only kid on the League which meant he was the only one left. Probably. But that didn't mean he was the only hero left.
He just had to figure out how to get in contact with the Team before things got too bad.
Billy slowly made his way to the familiar disused photo booth that served as the Fawcett City zeta tube. Checking his surroundings one last time, he got inside, his fingers hitting the necessary buttons on autopilot. There was the soft tell tale whir of the scanner and then a harsh beeping sound.
“Access denied.”
Billy groaned. “Captain Marvel 015. Manual override HOJ/Watchtower.” He was so happy he had actually bothered to memorize his unique code because otherwise–
“Manual override request denied.”
Billy kicked the zeta tube, grumbling about stupid codes and secret identities. He'd have to find another way.
He ducked out of the photo booth and raced down the street. He had to get a car or something so he could get to Happy Harbor. But he couldn’t drive. He couldn’t even reach the pedals.
And he couldn’t just leave the kids of Fawcett City defenseless. He had to figured something out, anything to help as many kids as possible.
A few minutes later, as he wandered down the street almost as terrified as anyone else, he found himself pulling open the door to WHIZ Radio station. Not everyone listened to the radio, but it was popular enough in Fawcett that he could feel confident that someone would be listening in. After all, they were always playing emergency broadcasts on the radio, so he figured it'd be a good place to start. They even had resources to broadcast on TV and livestream on the internet. If he could figure out how to get those things up and running he might be able to get the word out about what happened.
With renewed determination he had gathered a group of kids he knew from the neighborhood, relaying his plan and his need for help. None of them knew much about technology except for Dexter, so he was in charge of getting everything set up—and telling everyone else what to do to get everything working. Luckily the station had had everything running smoothly for what was supposed to another run of the mill day. They had even been transmitting dead air since all the adults disappeared.
They sent others out to spread the word and set up things elsewhere—Scott took the path to the local middle school while Julie took charge of a group of kids at the high school. Kayla was spreading the word on social media and via text for everyone to tune in while DJ drove around in his busted up car to find other pockets of kids to herd to safety.
Freddy manned the camera and Cissie handled the streaming. And soon there was only one thing left to do—something that everyone agreed Billy should do.
Above his head a red sign saying ON AIR flicked on.
“Hello everyone. This is Billy Batson reporting live from Station WHIZ. This is an emergency broadcast for all the kids out there. I know this is scary. I know it's hard to imagine that something like this could happen, but we need to be strong and we need to help each other. If you have younger siblings, please take care of them. If you know there are young kids in your neighborhood please go find them. Contact friends, family, anyone you know who is under 18 and check on them. And if you want to help us organize, come to station WHIZ and we’ll figure out where you’d be most helpful. We'll be setting up safe havens in local schools and community centers. Think libraries and parks and shelters. We are working to make sure there will be food, blankets, and medical supplies available. If you have anything you can contribute to help us stockpile supplies, please bring it with you. ”
He read out a list of places where he’d sent people to set up camp. He read out lists of basic first aid tips he’d collected over the years. He even gave out the station’s phone number so that people could call in with questions or concerns on air. Most of the kids in Fawcett didn't know how to take care of themselves, didn't know how to survive on their own. They needed help. His help. It was over an hour before he signed off and started the second phase of his plan.
“Stay safe. Stay strong. And help each other because we’re all we have left. I promise we’ll get through this together.”
Billy flicked off the live broadcast and instructed Dexter to set the recording on a loop so his message would be sent out over and over again for anyone who missed hearing it live. With any luck it would be able help people organize, help them stay safe.
The station was a hub of activity as more and more kids showed up eager to help, or at the very least eager to be with people who knew what they were doing. Billy slipped between them and flagged down one of the older girls.
“Kayla!” he called out. He had known her for years and they’d even shared a foster home once upon a time, so he knew that she could be trusted. And more importantly he knew that she could get him a car. “I need your help with something important.”
“Sure thing Billy, what is it?” she asked, shoving her phone in her pocket and giving him her full attention.
“I need a ride.”
“Where to?” She was already grabbing her keys from her purse, jingling them enthusiastically.
“Happy Harbor.”
“Wha—“ She stared at him in shock. “But Billy that’s hours away! What the hell do you need to go there for? I mean aren’t we kind of busy right here in Fawcett?”
“I know, but I have some…friends up that way. And I really think they can help. We can’t only be thinking about Fawcett City, Kayla. This is bigger than that. Bigger than us.” He bit his lip hard and reached for her hand. “Please. It is really, really important.”
She glanced around at the rush of activity around them before sighing loudly and dragging him toward the door by their joined hands. “Fine,” she relented. “But you owe me big time. And you can’t complain about how the car smells—it’s Travis’s.”
Billy wrinkled his nose at just the thought, but all he asked was, “Won’t he get mad?”
“He turned 18 last month,” she said softly. “He disappeared while I was kissing him.”
Billy felt his stomach drop. As much as he didn’t like Travis and thought Kayla could do better, it was still hard to accept that so many people he knew were gone.
The two of them climbed into the car, Kayla in the driver’s seat and Billy riding shotgun. It was already late at night, late enough that Billy knew that he should have been in bed. They rode in silence for a long while, slowly weaving through the cars that were abandoned all over the road. It reminded Billy a bit of a movie he'd seen commercials for--one where the world had ended and all that was left were the rusted cars and crumbling buildings.
“So your friends in Happy Harbor,” Kayla eventually broke the silence as they exited the city, “how old are they?”
“Older than me, but not 18,” he said carefully. He hoped she didn’t ask too many questions. He didn’t want to have to try to lie to her and get caught in a tough spot. She’d turn the car around if she felt something fishy was going on.
She looked at him out of the corner of her eye, definitely not happy with his answers so far. “How do you know them? You didn’t meet them online did you?”
“No Kayla,” he huffed. “I know them in real life, I promise. I’m not dumb.”
“Are they foster kids?”
“No…” Billy mumbled. “We met through this, uh, program. It’s kind of complicated.”
“Uh-huh,” she said, eyeing him skeptically. “And you’re sure you’ll be safe with them?”
“Definitely.”
She looked over at him, opened her mouth to speak--and then she was gone.
Kayla had vanished right before his eyes, leaving the driver's seat empty as the car careened down the road at over 50 miles per hour. The wheel curved to the right without her guide it, sending the car barrelling toward the edge of the bridge they were on. In less than a second the car crashed into guardrail and sailed over the edge. For a moment he hung in the air–there was no time to think about the consequences, no time to second guess himself–
“SHAZAM!”
Lightning arced down and hit him in the chest as he transformed.
Suddenly he was floating in the air, no car in sight. A scream came from the bridge. Captain Marvel spun around and there was Kayla, sitting on the pavement in the middle of the road. Her hands and legs were bloody from road rash and she was screaming, but she was alive.
“Billy!” she cried out. “Billy where are you?”
Her voice broke his heart.
“Miss,” he said, in his best, most comforting voice. “Are you alright?”
“Captain Marvel!” Kayla scrambled to her feet, throwing himself into his arms the second he touched down in front of her. “I was driving and then suddenly the car was gone! And Billy! He was in the passenger seat and he's–”
“Shh, it’s okay. I'm sure Billy is fine.” That's when he saw other cars on the road that weren’t there before. Other people. Adults.
That's when it clicked.
“Kayla? How old are you?”
“What? I'm seventeen. Or wait,” she frowned and then pulled her out her phone from her pocket. “It’s midnight.” She sniffled. “I just turned eighteen.”
Of course! The adults hadn’t gone anywhere–and neither had the kids. Somehow the world was split into two–one version for kids and one for grown ups.
And he was able to go between them!
Captain Marvel scooped Kayla into his arms. “Alright, I'm going to take you to the hospital to get those cuts checked out, alright?” And then he was going to find the Justice League and fix this whole mess!
In the blink of an eye he had dropped her off and raced towards the Watchtower. As he flew he was disturbed to find that the adults’ world had been thrown into even more chaos than the kids’ one—people were rioting in the streets, fights were breaking out everywhere, things were on fire--the whole place almost looked apocalyptic.
When he reached the Watchtower he found several heroes gathered together, Batman was watching large screens that showed disasters all over the world, speaking rapidly into his comms as he dispatched other heroes to quell the chaos. Zatara was wringing his hands, eyes flicking towards where Dr. Fate's helmet was stored as if he was getting ideas. When the smooth female voice of the Watchtower’s system announced his presence, all eyes were on him.
“Captain!” Batman barked. “Where have you been? No one has been able to get a hold of you since this whole mess began.”
“I know, I know,” he said, holding his hands up in surrender. “But I think I’ve figured out what’s going on—at least partially.”
Now that got everyone’s attention. Heroes swarmed him, all eager for an explanation, a solution. “The kids didn’t just disappear—the world was split in two. One world for the adults and one world for the kids. And when kids turn 18 they are transported to the adult world. No one is gone—we just have to figure out how to merge the two worlds back together!”
“But how did this happen?” Black Canary asked. She didn't question his explanation, just accepted that his explanation was possible.
“Magic,” he said simply, the Wisdom of Solomon helping him piece together the puzzle. “But there would have to be a magic user in both worlds to hold it together—which means there needs to be a kid in on it.”
“Klarion the Witch Boy,” Zatara growled. “He’s the only magic user powerful enough to do this who is still a child. Though there are a few others he could be working with on the adults side of things.”
“But to what end?" Superman mused. "Why would they do this?”
“We can figure out the why later," Batman grunted. "Right now we need to figure out how to contact the other world the kids are on. If I could get a hold of Robin--”
“I think I can help with that,” Captain Marvel said. It was hard to get the words out, knowing what it would mean for his secret identity, for his future as a hero. But what kind of hero would he be if he didn’t put the rest of the world ahead of himself? “I can move between the two worlds—that’s where I’d been before. It’s why you couldn’t find me. But I can go back and I can gather the Team. I can communicate between you guys so we can make a plan.”
“How sure are you that you can do that?” Batman asked, the whites of his cowl boring into him.
“100 percent,” he said. “I just have to go to Mt Justice. Hopefully the Team will be there.”
“Good, get to work.”
“Shazam!” he called out. In an instant the room full of Justice League members was replaced with the same room, now filled with just the Team who turned to look at him as one.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Wally said racing to his side. Billy had never noticed just how much bigger Wally was than him. He was used to being bigger and taller than him, being the adult, so this was new. And new was scary. “How did you get in here kid? This is—this is a secure place! You shouldn’t—“
“I’m Captain Marvel!” Billy blurted out. “I have a message from the Justice League!”
“Yeah and I’m Speedy Gonzales,” Wally snorted.
He turned to M’gann. “Quick read my mind!”
She looked at him skeptically, but did as he instructed. He thought about his time as Captain Marvel as hard as he could. He thought about his transformation and the Wizard granting him his powers and every mission he'd ever gone on with the Team. With a gasp she whipped her head around to look at her teammates. He could see them exchanging long glances that typically meant a psychic conversation was happening that he wasn't privy to. Eventually they seemed to come to some kind of consensus that he was telling the truth.
“So,” Robin began. “What’s the plan?”
Hours later—after the villains had been defeated and everyone was left reeling at the loss of Zatara to Dr. Fate—Billy sat in the living room of Mt Justice feeling even more lost than he had all day. At least before there had been a problem to focus on, something he could do to help. There hadn't been time to worry about after. But as the dust settled and he had to reckon with the consequences of his actions, he didn’t know what to do with himself.
He didn’t have a home to go back to—at least not one he wanted to go back to. His friends werre probably all already scattering to the winds, either to go back to their families or to make a break for it before social services could catch up to them. His backpack that held all of his belongings was at the bottom of some river with Travis’s car--unless it wasn't; he still wasn't sure how things slotted back into place after they joined the worlds back together. Either way he was pretty sure looking for it was a lost cause.
He had hoped he'd be allowed to stay, if only for the night, but he was afraid to ask in case they started digging into why he didn't want to go home. Though with his luck Batman was probably already gathering everything there was to find on him and would confront him about it by morning.
Billy kicked his feet back and forth. His toes just barely scraped the floor, making him feel even smaller than he usually did as Billy. Everything was just so…big. Made for people who were larger than life, people like Captain Marvel.
It didn’t help that everyone was avoiding his eyes. At least when they were staring at him he knew they wanted something from him. He had a feeling that none of them knew what to do with him either.
He'd hoped the Team would be different. They were kids just like him! Surely they understood why he'd lied, why he'd done everything in his considerable power to stay on the Justice League once he'd been granted a spot there. But if anything they were even more weirded out by his age than the Justice League.
“Sooo…you're really only eleven?”
Billy glanced up to see Wally standing over him, a large bowl of chips in his hands.
“Yeah,” he said. “I know it’s kind of weird.”
Wally plopped down beside him, shoveling chips in his mouth. “It’s crazy is what it is. I mean you’ve been a hero for like…a long time. You’ve been on the Justice League for a long time.”
“Since I was seven,”
“Seven. Jesus Christ.”
Billy chewed his lip, terrified to ask the one question that had been plaguing him since the moment he’d revealed himself to all the other heroes, the question that had kept him up at night for years. “Are you…mad at me?”
Wally paused, handful of chips halfway back to his mouth. His brows furrowed together as he turned to look at Billy properly. “Why would I be mad?”
Billy ducked his head, shrugging his shoulders slightly. “I don't know. I guess I just keep thinking people are gonna be mad that I'm a kid.”
“Oh,” Wally's face dropped. “I guess some people will be. But not me! I mean we gotta stick together. That's the whole point of the Team you know.”
“But I'm not on the Team,” Billy reminded him. “I'm just occasionally your den mother.”
Wally made a face at that. He probably didn't want to be reminded of the fact that he'd been babysat by a ten year old.
“Well that's true I guess, but you're like, an honorary member.”
“Really?”
“Yeah!”
“Don't you guys have to like vote on that or something?” The Justice League had to vote on just about everything and he knew that the Team did too. It was supposed to make things more fair, but sometimes it was a bit tedious.
“Who says we didn't?” Wally winked at him. “Chips?” He held out the bowl to him and when Billy gingerly picked one up and popped it in his mouth, Wally grinned brightly and ruffled his hair.
“That's the spirit!” he laughed, it was softer than his usual laugh, not quite as boisterous. But Billy supposed that it had been a really tough day for everyone, not just him. “But seriously, don't worry so much kiddo. We saved the day, and it's all thanks to you. That's something to celebrate.”
Billy felt a smile tug at his lips as he settled back into the couch. Wally was right–they had saved the day. No matter what happened next with the League and his foster family and the Team, no one could take that victory away from him.