Chapter Text
There's an abandoned football field on the outskirts of Fawcett. Built for one school or another, no one really remembered, but time passed and people found a new, better place for a new, better stadium. So the field was left behind.
Infact they didn't even empty it before they left. If you knew where to look you could find everything from old jerseys to half deflated footballs. If you looked hard enough you would have even found the old broadcasting system, used to share the score with people who couldn't show up in person.
After years of sitting there empty the stadium finally received a visitor, one that wasn't there to spray graffiti. It was actually a young boy looking for a place to stay, and where better to stay then an old building full of old treasures and forgotten stories.
Setting his bag down and getting a good look at the place, Billy Batson found himself a new home. One that was better than his uncle's and devoid of uncaring foster parents.
He stayed there for years, in between the occasional foster home when he wasn't quite fast enough to escape those bothersome adults. And he, being a curious child, found every single thing that was left behind and found excitement in every little thing.
He even found that old broadcasting system, which was still functional after a bit of work. And with it he started his own station, called himself Whiz kid and recounted everything he found interesting. Quite a few people tuned in especially when superhero talk started to take over the broadcasts.
It wasn't long though, till Billy found himself with powers and with them he became one of those superheroes he always talked about. And despite his new life as a superhero and his new friends and teammates, Billy still came home to his stadium.
He made the locker room into his bedroom and the field into his backyard. He didn't have much but he was happy and slowly he filled his room with belongings. Little trinkets people have him as thanks and things he found interesting started to show up.
It was good. Not perfect but good.
He still had to worry about food and hide his life from his friends but it was good. He was good.
Do good and good will follow, that's his motto, isn't it? It's a shame fate doesn't care about mottos.
It was a normal day, well it was supposed to be a normal day. Billy woke up and went on patrol, he did his monitor duty, he even went to the library. It was as average as his days got. He went home, pretended he wasn't hungry and started his broadcast.
Billy started of with the weather, even though he just peaked outside to get his information, and then moved onto the more important news. In other words he told his listeners that it was raining then he rambled about superheroes for thirty minutes.
He had just said goodnight to his listeners when he heard the first rumble. Not long after his league communicator beeped, he picked it up but never heard an answer. The building fell to quick for him to get one.
What Billy hadn't known when he stumbled upon the stadium was that it hadn't been abandoned for just any reason. It had been abandoned due to safety reasons as the professionals didn't believe that it could survive the uncommon but not quite rare, earthquakes that might come by.
Take an already unsafe building and add years of it falling into disrepair and you have an already terrible situation. But when you take that and add an earthquake bad enough for the Justice League to send help you get -1 football field and 1 Captain missing in action.
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"It's just so unlike him. I mean him not answering a call at all is odd but one that directly affected his city? If he weren't invincible I'd be worried about him." Flash brought up a good point, it'd been a full day since anyone had heard from Marvel.
That on it's own was only a little odd but considering they had spent that day helping save citizens from an earthquake that had shaken nearly all of Fawcett made it at least a little concerning.
Not that it mattered to Batman all he could see was a coworker skipping out on an important mission. Usually he'd attempt to be understanding but they'd seen him not long before the call was sent out. And the man had never hinted at having a civilian life so Bats was inclined to believe the Captain was just being irresponsible.
And as much as Superman wanted to check on Captain, Batman had made some good points so he to was leaning on frustration towards the man.
But they didn't have long to dwell on it as they came acrossed yet another civilian asking for help. The earthquake hadn't had to many major consequences but everyone was pretty shaken so the league had been decently busy.
This civilian was decently young and was flanked by an older man so Superman could safely assume this was a father/child dou.
"Excuse me, could I talk to you for a minute Superman?" The younger of the two was almost immediately cut of by the older.
"Sam, he doesn't have time to chase geese. He's got a real job to do!"
"Don't worry, things are slowing down now. What can I help you with?" Hopefully it wouldn't be as silly as the old man made it seem.
"Well there's this guy, he goes by Whiz and usually he checks in after things like this, to like help out where he can and all, but he hasn't and I'm just worried. He sounds young y'know?" Not too silly, pretty understandable actually, but what did they mean sounds?
"Of course I can check on him. Where do you think I could find him?" The father got this 'I told you so' look on his face.
"That's the issue, sir. He's a radio host, 99.6, I don't know where he'd be." That did put out some issues.
"I'll ask around, and if I hear anything I'll get back to you, okay?" They seemed relieved at that. He didn't have long to consider his options though before he was being pulled away by Batman.
"Apparently an old stadium collapsed, I need you to check the damages." And as was typical for Bruce, that was all he said before he disappeared.
Thanks to his superspeed it didn't take long for him to find the place. It was completely gone, almost entirely rubble. The stands were gone replaced by- wait a minute, is that a heartbeat-
Before Superman could investigate a bolt of lightning, hit the exact spot the heartbeat was coming from. He rushed forward, hoping to save whatever had been there but the lightning beat him to it.
He closed his eyes, whatever had been there was definitely gone now. Well it should have been gone, why could he still hear a heart beat? This one was stronger and backed with heavy breathing. Actually it sounded a little familiar, opening his eyes he realized why.
Sitting half covered in rubble was Captain Marvel. Superman was just about to ask questions when he saw something that made him stop in his tracks. Captain had tears in his eyes.
No, surely not. Captain never cried, he was rarely not smiling. But he looked closer and saw that, sure enough, there were tears. He looked closer and saw things that almost made less sense then a crying Captain.
The rocks surrounding his legs were coated in blood, that couldn't be good, and he had a child sized backpack in one hand and his comm in the other. Both objects were covered in blood.
"Oh gods...." The man's voice was broken, tight with... something. Clark couldn't figure out whether it was fear or sadness.
Before he could say anything the man's back straightened and he started to stand up, Superman was still frozen in place. That didn't mean he was any less shocked when the man picked up his comm and started listening to the messages they had left before hitting the buttons Superman knew would call Batman.
Superman watches silently as Captain pushes the backpack into a portal and answers Batman's complaints and orders with Yes sir's and apologies devoid of whatever emotion had filled it just seconds ago.
In fact if Superman couldn't see the tears still falling down the man's face and the blood on his comm he wouldn't have had a single clue that anything was wrong with the man.
He's still frozen when the Captain wiped his tears and flew off to do whatever Batman needed him to. Superman knows that he should follow him but he chickened out, deciding to bring it up the next time he catches the man alone.
After all there were still civilians in danger.
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Billy woke up in pain. It took a second to remember what happened but when he did the pieces fit together surprisingly fast.
An earthquake, it must have been nothing else made sense. But that meant Billy's home was... No it couldn't be. The pain in his... everywhere flared and made him call out the word.
And as always the pain vanished but it left him with the thought of turning back. Would he even survive turning back? Billy could see the blood he left behind, could remember the pain. Solomon picked this time to chime in that as long as he got professional help after he would, probably, be fine.
But professional would mean hospital and hospital would mean cps and cps meant more foster homes and foster homes meant bruises and scrapes and blood and ohmygodthere'ssomuchblood.
He couldn't handle that right now, but looking around just made him cry. His home, his trinkets, and his radio gone. Just like that he was back to square one. Injured with nothing but his backpack and no where to go, just like last time.
No not like last time, he was Captain Marvel. He had an escape, he could let himself hide behind Captain's easy smile and power for right now. He could hide behind the cape and forget about this for now. Not permanently but nothing was really permanent anyways.
So he sat up, got out of what might've been his grave and called Batman. He always had something for him to do. Putting all of his focus in his work helped him forget.
And right now that was just about all he could handle, so he flew away. Flew away from what was supposed to be home. From what was supposed to be safe.
And it worked, as long as Cap had something to work on he didn't need to think about his other life. So he kept busy, kept a smile on his face and ignored how fake it felt.
He smiled through helping people, he smiled through clean ups, he even smiled through his teammates concerns. "I slept through the alarms, won't happen again, sorry!" It was easy, second nature at this point, to slip between the smiles and half truths that he used to hide, to protect himself.
It worked, it always did, and soon people had put it out of their minds and got back to work. Another day flew by but finally they were done. Everyone was more or less okay, the roads were clear, and the buildings were steady.
As everyone headed back to the tower to give reports, Cap found himself with nothing to do. He tried talking to his teammates but they still seemed frustrated that he'd taken so long to show up. So he was left with nothing but his thoughts.
He tried not to think about it, he really did but it was hard and soon he found himself lost in thought, putting most of his energy into trying to stay calm. He picked a spot on the wall and stared, he could feel his leg bouncing but couldn't manage to stop it.
Where would he go? It was fall edging on winter and Fawcett was known for rough snowy winters. He nearly froze even when he was inside his home, being outside could be deadly. But where else would he go? Most places where already full of other homeless people, people who didn't take kindly to strangers.
Thankfully he was saved from his thoughts by a tap on his shoulder.
"You good, man?" It was Victor, one of the few people Cap had a hard time lying to and the only leaguer that knew his real identity. He hadn't seemed to upset at Cap's disappearance, just worried.
"Yeah I'm fine." His smile was back but Cyborg knew him to well to be entirely fooled but Batman was starting the meeting so he couldn't ask anymore questions.
The meeting was full of statistics and suggestions from Batman that would help them act quicker and more efficiently, an unfortunate amount of those were directed at Captain Marvel. He was told to be more careful in the future and keep a better ear out.
Half of him wanted to respond with a snarky comment about nearly dying, the rest of him was terrified to admit that was what happened. He stayed silent.
He tried to focus on the meeting but his mind kept drifting. To distract himself he look around the room.
Dinah was staring at Oliver, who was balancing a pencil on his lips. Diana was completely focused on Batman. Superman was staring at him. Flash and Hal were playing rock paper scissors under the- wait Superman was doing what?
Cap looked back at Superman and sure enough the man was staring at him with a concerned gaze. He looked away when he realized he'd been caught but kept glancing back at Cap.
What? Billy didn't do anything worth concern from Superman, well he did but nothing Superman should have known. He started worrying but was soon pulled back into the conversation as his home was brought up.
"Superman you checked the football stadium, didn't you? What was the damages?" Superman did what? Oh no what if he saw-
"Yes the stadium was destroyed. Completely." Even though his voice was steady his eyes kept darting back to Billy. Which could only mean he saw something, right? How did today get worse?
Cap was sure he looked suprized, and maybe a little panicked, but thankfully Victor distracted everyone before they could ask.
"Wait, the one on north bend?" He received a nod, "Oh god."
Crap, now he had two superheroes staring at him.
"Is there an issue, Cyborg?" Batman voiced everyone's thoughts.
"Oh, uh no I just um played there! A while back, yeah, it's just weird to think that it's all gone." Batman excepted Victor's attempt to hide the truth and continued the meeting.
Great, not only is it possible that Superman has his identity but now he'd never be able to escape Cyborgs questions. Wait maybe Cyborg could help him, he'd probably insist on professional help but Billy should be able to dissuade him.