Behind the Mask

Chapter 7

“You won’t believe what happened, Rob!” Wally exclaimed, jumping off the couch and positioning himself in front of the younger boy.

“Considering it’s you, I probably won’t.” Robin agreed, folding his arms over his chest.

“My sock spontaneously decomposed!”

Robin blinked, taken aback by Wally’s declaration, then gave Wally a questioning look, hoping he would elaborate. He did.

“See, I left my sock on the floor-”

“Your first mistake,” Robin muttered.

“-And when I came back to get it, it was gone! I looked everywhere for it!” Robin had a hard time believing that. “But I couldn’t find it anywhere! The only truly plausible explanation is that some sort of highly acidic chemical rose up from the floor and-”

“Is this what you’re looking for?” Superboy suddenly asked, walking into the room, holding a grey sock in his hand.

“My sock!” Wally shrieked, racing over and snatching the sock from Superboy’s hand. He began turning it over, leaning in close, eyes squinted as he examined every inch of it.

“That’s wonderful Superboy.” Kaldur exclaimed, crawling out from under the couch and congratulating the clone.

“Good job!” M’gann applauded, floating out of the kitchen.

“Where was it Superboy?” Robin asked, watching as Wally sniffed his sock, a pensive look coming over his face.

“Um, on my foot,” The clone answered awkwardly, glancing down at his boot as if to check for any leftover sock residue. Robin didn’t blame him; Wally’s socks were gross.

“Well, I’m sure Wally is very happy you found it.” Kaldur told him, looking over to where the speedster stood. “Perhaps you’d like to thank him, Wally?”

“Huh?” Wally asked, looking up from where he looked like he was about to lick his sock. “Oh, oh yeah. Thanks Supey.”

The clone grunted and stalked away, looking disgruntled at the current events.

“I’m, uh, going for a walk.” He said, before disappearing around the corner. Three pairs of eyes followed his receding back, the other pair fixated on a tongue, inches away from the surface of a sock.

“Wally!” Robin exclaimed, snatching the sock away from his friend’s tongue. Once he got a closer look at it, he wished he hadn’t.

“Wha?” Wally asked, his tongue still stuck out. “I had oo tetht it to thee if it wath on the vird of decompothting.”

Robin just raised an eyebrow, pretending that he couldn’t understand what the speedster had said. It was rather disturbing that he could. The other two heroes looked equally dumbfounded.

“Ugh!” Wally exclaimed, ripping his sock out of Robin’s hand and shoving it in his pocket. “You guyth jutht don’t un’erthtand.”

“Um, I’m going to go make cookies.” M’gann announced, floating back towards the kitchen. Kaldur trailed after her, sending a glance back at his two teammates.

“I will go help her.” And then Fish-boy was gone as well.

“So,” Robin said, turning back to face Wally. “Spontaneous decomposition. Best theory you could come up with.”

“I was in the heat of the moment!” The speedster protested.  “I was really stressing out, my tongue was getting all swollen, my throat was dry-”

“Sounds like allergies.” Robin smirked, amused at Wally’s exasperation.

“You would know, wouldn’t you.” Wally shot back, digging his sock out of his pocket as he sped over to the couch and plopped down, yanking his foot up to replace the missing article or clothing.