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Barry didn’t expect Wally to know the vigilante from Bludhaven.
In fact, Barry didn’t know that there was a vigilante in Bludhaven.
He learns that fact pretty quickly when he walks into the cortex one day, seeing Wally chatting with the black and blue vigilante, both suited up, standing close, and unalarmed like they let strangers walk into their base of operations all the time.
Which, well. They don’t intentionally.
Barry blinks, then speeds over to his case and puts on his suit before the man can spot his face.
Mask firmly covering him, Barry asks, “Kid Flash? How about a heads up next time or, you know, don’t bring strangers into our space?”
Both men had turned to look at Barry when he had sped throughout the room. Wally shrugs, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly. “Uh, sorry? But it’s cool! Nightwing isn’t going to share our secrets or anything — he’s a hero, too, from Bludhaven.”
Nightwing extends a hand, flashing Barry a wide smile. “Hi, I’m Nightwing.”
Barry takes the hand, shaking it. What even. Okay, I guess this is a thing now. “Hey, Nightwing, I’m the Flash. Kid Flash, a word?” He jerks his head over to the other side of the room.
Wally shrugs again, sharing an unreadable look with Nightwing before nodding his head. “Okay.”
Barry takes that as permission, and between one blink and the next, he and Wally are across the room. “Dude,” he hisses, “what the hell?”
Wally blinks. “Are you talking about N? I told you, he’s cool.”
“Why is he here?” Barry stresses, waving a hand around their space because Wally clearly isn’t getting the point.
“He was tracking some people from Blud that came into the city, reached out to ask for help, being our terf and all.”
“And you just let him into Star Labs?”
“Well, yeah. I trust him.”
Barry stares at Wally for a good, long moment. “We don’t just let people into Star Labs, Kid,” he says finally.
“Yeah, but Nightwing—” Wally cuts himself off, and takes a breath to gather his words, “I met him a few months ago. I went to Bludhaven— Anyways, I ran into Nightwing. He… helped. Taught me a trick or two. Look, the guy’s kind, and determined, and all he wants to do is catch the criminals that got into our city from his. He’s not going to cause trouble.” Wally’s voice softens as he talks about the vigilante, and it’s then that Barry realizes Nightwing’s going to be around whether he likes it or not.
Wally likes him.
Barry runs a hand down his face. “Okay. Okay. Fine, whatever, he’s here now. Just— next time, ask or something first, yeah?”
Wally grins, there and gone. “Thanks! Yeah, yeah, of course.” And then Barry blinks and he’s back over by Nightwing.
He watches the two of them chatter excitably. They lean towards each other, just a little, as if caught in each other’s orbits.
Oh, yeah. It’s totally a thing now.
—---
Barry feels like Nightwing should have mentioned that the people he was tracking had meta-human level technology.
To be fair to the kid, he seems at least as surprised about it as Barry is.
That’s not really any consolation, Barry thinks, kneeling over the bloody and groaning body of a fallen Wally.
“Shit, shit—” Nightwing ducks the round of bullets, tucking himself behind a wall of crates. “Get him back to Star Labs, I got this.”
Barry grits his teeth, and drags Wally over behind the barricade with Nightwing. “No. We don’t leave people behind.”
Nightwing kneels down besides Wally, hand hovering above the metal shards sticking out of him. He looks up, and the look the vigilante sends him is all venom. “You’re a speedster. You can come back. He needs help,” he says, voice breaking on the last word.
“Barry—” Caitlin’s voice over the comm is worried.
And. Barry hesitates. Because Wally does need help, before his powers start healing over the shrapnel, but his instincts all scream at him at the idea of leaving Nightwing alone, but—
“Flash,” Nightwing snaps. “They have meta tech. I’ve been doing this longer than you have, and you can move faster than the eye can comprehend. Run.”
“Caitlin—” he says, hand to his ear to activate his comm.
“I’m preparing the medbay now.” Her voice is calm, but Barry can hear the underlying anxiety.
He gathers Wally into his arms, and looks Nightwing in the eye, best he can. “I’ll be back,” he promises, swallowing against his instincts. And then, Barry runs.
The cityscape blurs around him, everyone he passes frozen in time. In mere seconds, he’s halfway across the city, in Star Labs, and gently laying Wally on a gurney.
He meets Caitlin’s blue eyes with his own, an understood trust passing between them before Barry leaves, making his way back to Nightwing. Barely a minute passed, but the kid’s right— Half of their assailants are down and the black and blue vigilante is making his way through the rest.
Apparently, they only had the one meta-weapon, because the rest of the men go fairly quickly. One run through the room, and they’re all tied up, guns deposited on the other end of the room for the cops to deal with as they please.
And then he grabs Nightwing, and bolts back to Star Labs.
Nightwing stumbles as Barry sets him down, but he has an impressive non-response to being dragged through the speed force.
He doesn’t think about it long, though, not with Wally groaning in pain in front of him.
“Don’t you don’t have anesthesia? Anything?” Nightwing demands, looking askingly between him and Caitlin, body still and tense.
“No,” Caitlin responds across from him, “A speedsters’s metabolism—”
“Yeah, yeah, save me the speech. Okay. Okay,” Nightwing takes a breath, and the tenseness in his body shifts. To Caitlin, “I have basic field medic training. What do you want me to do?”
“We have to get the shards out before he heals around them. Can you—” she turns to Barry.
Seeing where she’s going with this, he speeds towards where the medical tweezers are, grabbing one for each of them. He drops them off in their hands before Caitlin even finishes her sentence.
“---get. Thanks. Got it?” she asks Nightwing.
Nightwing nods. He glances at Wally. “You ready KF?”
Wally nods, the motion a little too fast, while his hands clench at his sides.
Nightwing smiles softly, obviously going for reassuring and mostly hitting the mark. The hand not holding the tweezers reaches out for Wally’s, and he squeezes it gently. “You’re going to be fine.”
Wally nods again, but his shoulders lose some of their tension and his hands come to a rest. And, well, that’s more than Barry ever could have gotten out of him.
And then Nightwing and Caitlin get to work, and that—
Barry will never get that out of his head.
—--
Barry finds the Bludhaven vigilante sometime later. It isn’t hard. The man is in the room they set aside for Wally, arms crossed on top of the bed and dozing lightly. He takes in Nightwing’s disheveled hair, the posture that’s tense even in rest, and can feel his face pull into a frown. If Barry were a betting man, he'd say there are shadows hiding underneath the domino mask as well. He looks young like this. He can’t be any older than Wally, really, and yet he, too, is a vigilante. One without any powers or any backup.
He wonders distantly who got the kid involved in this life and why that figure is no longer here to support him.
Barry clears his throat.
Nightwing startles awake, and it’s only thanks to his superspeed that Barry catches the way the vigilante tenses at first before he recognizes his surroundings.
“Oh. Flash,” he greets. Despite the faint pink flush to his cheeks, he doesn’t actually move any further away from Wally’s bedside.
“Nightwing,” Barry returns. Then he sighs, and lifts his hand up to peel off his mask. “Actually, just— Call me Barry. Is this seat taken?”
“Barry. And, no. Feel free,” Nightwing corrects, smiling faintly. He doesn’t look at all surprised that Barry took off his mask or revealed his name.
Barry sits down, saying as much.
“Barthalomew Henry Allen, CSI for CCPD,” he lists. And yes, the vigilante’s blue eyes behind the domino are definitely amused. “You’re not very good at hiding your identity to those that are looking for it, Barry.”
Barry grimaces, uncomfortable and a little bemused that the vigilante is right. Meanwhile, neither Joe nor Cisco can pull up anything more on Nightwing other than that he popped up less than a year ago and has been fighting Bludhaven’s crime since.
“So you’ve just been— What? Pretending this whole time?”
Nightwing shrugs. “Once I learned who you were, I wasn’t super worried. I figured I’d just let you reveal yourself to me in your own time, if we ever even met. But that’s not why you’re here,” he says pointedly.
Barry sighs, “No, it’s not. You like Wally,” he says plainly.
Nightwing blinks, and his cheeks tint a brilliant pink. Despite the obvious flush, Nightwing’s voice is evenly controlled, “If you mean like a friend? Sure. He’s the first in this life that I’ve met on my own. He’s my age. He gets it in a way that you and— That you never could. So, yeah, we ring each other up for advice every now and then, or whatever. Sometimes we talk. So what?”
Barry raises his eyebrows, lips curling upwards. “If you’re going to try and date him, you need to be honest. Tell him who you are. Trust me,” he grimaces, “keeping this secret doesn’t help a relationship grow any.”
“I’m not—” Nightwing cuts himself off, eyes narrowing. “Are you trying to give me the shovel talk? Cause, if so, you’re not doing a great job.”
“I’m not giving you the shovel talk,” Barry laughs, “Just a bit of friendly advice.”
“Uh-huh. Friendly advice,” he says in pulled-out, dramaticized skepticism. Then his mouth ticks, and his posture loosens and slumps downwards. He gives Barry a searching look that feels all-too analyzing and like he’s the one about to be given a shovel talk. Nightwing nods once. “You’re a good man, Barry Allen.”
His confusion must show in his face at the abruptness of the statement because Nightwing’s lips quirk up. The Bludhaven vigilante shifts his gaze from Barry to Wally. Softly, he says, “I’ll tell him. I’ll tell him first,” he clarifies. “He deserves to be the first one to know.”
Barry smiles softly and stands. He clasps the young vigilante on the shoulder, feeling abruptly like a less violent Oliver. Advice passed from one mouth to the other. He makes sure to meet the man’s blue eyes through the domino. “I think you’re a good man too, Nightwing. You’re good for him.”
Nightwing smiles, and unlike all the other ones sent this way, this one feels real. Genuine. It’s a little sad, maybe, but there’s real warmth behind it.
“Thank you, Barry.”
Barry tilts his head in acknowledgement and leaves the room feeling better about the whole situation.
Closing the door softly behind him, he hears, “N?” Wally’s voice is slow and heavy with sleep.
“KF, hey…” the vigilante’s answering voice is soft and warm.
Barry grins to himself. They are good for each other.