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Kyle looks for plates and cutlery, and sets them out on the table, casting fascinated looks at the fruit as Wally brings it. He's been adventurous enough in Oa's mess hall, but the food on Keeliai has been its own adventure. He's had trouble keeping track of what everything is called - he had a very bad memory for names.

'I know bits and pieces. We haven't really had time to sit down and compare notes.' Kyle pulls out the chair and sits down, sincerely hoping Wally hadn't seen the messages on the network hinting that there might not have been a Corps. 'Figures the League's still new. You and Robin are still teenagers. That was a long time ago in my world.'

Wally follows suit, taking a seat across from Kyle. His first shot's for something that looks vaguely like an apple, but it's got something more like peach fuzz on it. It's also pretty darn green. At least it tastes good, he muses, as he chomps into it. It should also be said that the food won't keep Wally from talking (he's yet to master that set of manners).

"Wow, I'm not even the Wally from your universe and I'm insulted by that," he says, all around a mouthful of fuzz-apple. He's not, really. He's just trying to feel out the space around Kyle, figure out what his limits are. As for the Corps... well.

"So you're Green Lantern number four, right? That means you should be showing up kinda soon, right?" The look he gives Kyle is mixed - he knows about the messages, but he's also a little hopeful; going home and meeting the Kyle from his universe... if there is one, that's some kind of candle in the dark, right?

Kyle doesn't mind the lack of table manners: it reminds him of home. He picks something that might have been a pineapple in a previous life. He doesn't stuff it into his mouth right away, he attempts to try and cut it up into bite sized pieces in case he had to eat quickly. He was really too used to wolfing down his meals, he thought to himself.

'Oh come on, we're only obliged to act our age while on duty,' he rebuffs, cheeky again. 'Actually, not even then. I should tell you about the time Green Arrow beat us both at Tetris.'

At number four he pauses (which would seem long, to a speedster, and definitely worrying to a friend), and says (considerably less enthusiastically), 'Yeah. Number four. You're... fifteen? Your world's Kyle should be getting his ring in two or three years.'

Two or three years left to stop Parallax. Kyle didn't even want to mention that he was fine not getting his ring at all.

That gets him to snort; but he's not gonna make a crack about Tetris of all things. With how old Ollie is, he's probably been playing that game since it was in arcades or something. He does stare a bit during that pause, though, but he doesn't push.

"Sixteen, actually.~" And he's proud of that fact, definitely. "Just had my birthday about a month before I got here. Even managed to save a whole country." He's yet to get a hang of the boasting, but he's heard Kyle saved a whole Corps, so- he feels he has to play the comparison game.

"So who knows? Maybe I'll get home, wait a couple of years, and I can bro it out with you all over again, haha." Really, he's trying to see the best of things here. Trying to avoid the... heavy subject. He focuses on finishing up that fuzz-apple, though.

'Showoff,' he says fondly, finishing the not-pineapple and picking the fuzz-apple Wally had been enjoying (it looked good, after all). He eats in complete silence, listening to his friend talk. The thought, it's nice, to think he could be a Lantern without anybody having to die or having to suffer—

Who was he kidding?

Still, he forces a smile, hoping Wally won't see through it. 'That sounds like a deal if I ever heard one. But keep in mind he won't be anywhere near as cool as I am.'

"I dunno, if Ollie was able to beat you at Tetris..." He just gives this look that just says, Seriously, dude. To top it off, he reaches for another one of those apples and begins digging into it.

"So-" This time he swallows, just by sheer luck. "How hard was it, at first? Being a Lantern and stuff." Open enough, he figures. This... friendship, if it's safe to call it that, is already starting to deepen as to the one he's developed with Dick from back home, or at least Wally's thinking so. He's thinking he can read Kyle, just a little bit, like he can (sort-of, because Bats) read Dick. "Maybe I can remember and give Kyle back home some pointers."

'Dude, like I'd be caught dead losing to Ollie - it's Green Arrow numero dos. The three of us are friends.' Well, to be fair, Connor and Wally were more friends with Kyle than they were with each other, but that counted anyway.

At the question, Kyle's face falls slightly. Give him pointers. Of course.

'Bumpy, but that happens with everybody.' Everybody who doesn't have a mentor. 'It was for Wally too, but he'd never admit something like that. Not after he broke the light barrier.' Kyle smiles at the memory of getting that news. 'As for other Kyle - you can start by telling him--' to take the job more seriously, to stay home and take care of Alex, to not leave when Ma got sick, to not give the spare ring to the first man you see. 'learning to fly in a populated area is the mother of all bad ideas.'

"..." He blinks. Huh, a second Green Arrow... He wants to ask more about that, and maybe if it's Roy- but then again, that might open a can of worms they don't need to deal with just yet.

He continues to listen, but he has to just stop at the moment he hears about breaking the light barrier. That- That should be impossible, shouldn't it? But why'd Kyle make something like that up? Wally's not ignoring the next bit, it's clear some backtracking needs to be done to keep his little speedster heart from bursting.

"...Faster than light?" Kyle needs to really look at this boy's face and see the wide-eyed wonder. And not see the half-eaten fuzzapple still in his hand.

Edited (what is reading comprehension? I swear I have it.) 2013-03-20 03:36 (UTC)

'I did say you were the fastest.' Kyle's gaze of course falls onto the half-eaten fuzz apple. It's his obligation as a bro to make fun of it, but there's an opportunity here too, for some honesty. He hated not telling Wally the real truth about Barry, and well - 'Has the Speed Force been discovered in your world?'

"Yeah, but I thought like maybe Mach 6 or something. I mean-" He pauses as Kyle goes on and then he just has to arch a brow.

"The Speed... Force?" He's trying to go over a list of possible theoretical concepts in his mind, and nothing is ringing a bell. "Never heard of it."

'Wow dude where do I even begin.' Kyle finishes his fruit and runs his chin thoughtfully. 'It's... a kind of energy? That gives you your speed. But it's also a place.' A lengthy pause. 'Speedsters don't die, not really. They just become part of the Speed Force. He - Flash - my Wally has gone there without dying first and come back, but it wasn't easy.'

He finishes, realising how ridiculous this all sounds. 'Sorry. I don't really know how to explain this.'

It almost sounds like magic, to him, but... Heck, why's Kyle gonna start making stuff up like that to him now? He might just have to settle on, he doesn't know what to make of it. Wally shrugs.

"Sounds kinda insane. Hah, or maybe a party, who knows?" He shrugs a little. "Something to look forward to, I guess." Realizing that he's left his fuzzapple unattended, he just goes right back to devouring it, and of course, talking with his mouth full.

"Have you met any interesting babes in the Corps?"

Kyle waves a finger at Wally almost chidingly. 'Call me when your boots can catch up with your mouth, okay?' It wasn't surprising that Wally didn't believe him just yet. Maybe after he'd actually tried running that fast.

Kyle wondered if there was a Speed Force on the turtle and decided that pondering that would probably give him a headache, so he too finishes his fruit and starts on a new one.

'Interesting - whoa dude.' He blushes, slightly. 'I don't really have time.'

Oh geeze. Wally doesn't know what's worse: Kyle's little gestures right there or Dick's knack for tacking off prefixes from words. ... It might be a very close tie, and Wally starts to wonder how he ends up with friends like these. Catching that blush, though-

Wally just leans in, resting his chin in the palm of his hand, not even bothered that's a little sticky with the juice from the fruit.

"Yeah, right. What was that Soranik called you? Torchbearer?" The redhead chuckles. "How many Lanterns do you have bearin' a torch for you, huh?"

Kyle's cheeks burn red. Well that... explained a lot of the reactions the rookies had to him during training sessions and near the Council chambers.

He's usually extremely oblivious to anyone having a crush on him, and he tosses a fruit playfully at his friend. 'Dude! I'm so not turbed by the implications of that statement.' (He'd been trying out some of Dick's prefix/suffix knockoffs, but still wasn't very good at it yet.)

That was easier than admitting the real reason he was called Torchbearer, wasn't it?

He could scream right now at the fact that Dick's habit has spread. Well, not really, but it does earn a little look after Wally bats away that assault of fruit.

"Puh-lease, don't tell me you've got space honeys all lined up and you haven't even noticed?~" Now he's just really digging at Kyle, taking to that blush like a shark at blood. He reaches for the thrown fruit and begins to nibble on it.

"Figured a big hero like Soranik made you out to be'd be all up in that."

Well crap.

Kyle's expression falls and he plays with a small, orange-like fruit in his hand. 'I don't really have the time.'

It had driven home the point that he didn't want to be with Soranik, as a lover. A colleague, fine, but not - all the way like that. That all the normalcy he wanted was never going to happen because there was no way he could do anything as effectively as he could do his job.

And that he tried to be a hero. Today was one of the days he didn't feel like one.

"..." Well, he's clearly reading Kyle a bit better now, because he got... this. It's not that hard, though, with the way his expression fell.

"Hey, dude- If I stepped over a line there..." He's thinking about the thing with Soranik. "I'm sorry-"

He recovers quickly. (A little too quickly.) 'No, the line is "I'm sorry Negative Lad, I'd like Kyle back please".'

He shouldn't be forgetting. He musn't forget that this version was so much younger, who didn't know him - part of Kyle didn't want Wally to know about him. He knew how much it would weigh on both their consciences. They were too close.

"..." There's a bit of an awkward silence after that. Wally's trying to figure out what to do here, really. He's obviously said something that's gotten to Kyle, but his little teenage brain from another universe is so out of context that it can't pick up on what, exactly. If there's one thing Wally hates, though, it's awkward silences, especially ones he's created, so that leaves him with a few options.

The one he takes, though? There's a scraping sound as he slides his chair back, and in less than a second, he's over behind Kyle, pulling this weird- half-hug, half-headlock sort of deal, and ruffling at his hair. Too gentle for a noogie, really - but hey, he's trying to shake things up a bit at least.

Admittedly speedsters have a very sense of time and pauses and silences (despite having switched powers with the guy once Kyle still thought he'd probably throw up a lot if he was that fast), so Kyle doesn't really notice how awkward everything is until Wally half-hugs him.

In normal time, his reaction is barely noticeable, but to Wally? There's a quick catch in Kyle's breath and his whole body goes tense, expecting an attack. Once he processes what is happening, he relaxes, slowly, enjoying the attention. The familiarity.

He did need it; he can't even make a joke right now.

'What do you know,' he says quietly. 'He would have hugged me too, after yelling at me about how much I was acting like an idiot.'

Edited 2013-03-22 00:46 (UTC)

"Heh," Wally chuckles a bit, but he also has to bite back the remark that was going to come thing. He could very well have called Kyle an idiot, but he knows this was different. He feels he hasn't earned that level of familiarity, like what he has with Dick. Maybe someday, though...

"Yeah, well," he says softly, "Just so you know, I'm gonna start charging for the hugs." It's funny - this comforting thing kind of does come easy to him, like when he thinks back on the day Klarion split the universe and he had to deal with all those kids. Not that this is the same.

"Every one's gonna cost you a smile, got that?" He tries to make himself sound so sure about it, as he lets go of Kyle and gives him a quick pat on the shoulder. He then zips back over to his seat and goes to eating, as if nothing had really just happened.

'A smile?' Kyle pretends to sound horrified, but he is honestly grinning widely. 'Extortion.'

He can't deny that this feels a lot easier, in a way. He didn't have to go through the initial difficulties of riffing on Wally and actually being mean about it before they'd managed to work through that phase and become friends. Here? He got straight to the part where they knew each other, without any of the hardship. Maybe it was because by now he already knew they'd be friends, no matter what. Just like he and Connor had gone together. It was all about keeping that legacy.

He misses his Flash a lot less, now. This Wally is close enough to ease the ache.

"Hey, you want quality hugs? You pay. I've made you an offer you can't refuse." Wally just waves his hand, throwing that last bit off casually like a stereotypical don in one of those old mafia movies. He's glad to have helped somewhat, definitely.

"So," he begins, changing the subject a bit. He looks up from his food and tilts his head some. "What brought you here?" Really, he doesn't say, but means. He's getting the impression that Kyle doesn't do much without thought. To some degree.

'Careful now, Zee would give me one for free.' He peels the small not-orange in his hand, putting the flesh carefully on his plate, pokes it with a fork, and tilts his own head slightly at Wally's question.

The main reason was that he'd wanted to talk, right? He didn't know how well this Wally could read him - as well as his own? Did he want to take that risk? 'To be honest? Just to get to know you. I haven't... I haven't seen or heard from my Wally in... a while. We didn't argue or anything - I got reassigned and couldn't spend that much time on Earth; he was busy with family. So... when I heard his name and a voice that sounded so much like his on the network? Well. You know what happened.' He chewed half of the serving on his plate, and swallows it, still pensive. 'And the Kyle on your world - if he even exists - he'll be lucky to have you around.'

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