"Well this brings back memories." Mick scoffed  at Leonard's statement. The two lead the way through the courtyard of juvenile detention hall, Dez and Ray following close behind.

It was 1986, and the four Legends were dressed as guards; they had just infiltrated Mick and Leonard's old home, so to speak. It hadn't taken long for the team to find trouble upon getting back from Earth 38. Chronos had recruited one of his Time Hunter buddies, the Pilgrim. Apparently she was even more deadly than he was, so much so that Rip had even tried hiding the Legends in the Old West. (It didn't work. The two Time Hunters had found them within hours.) Now, the Hunters were going back in time to kill the Legends' younger selves: the Omega Protocol they'd called it. The Legends planned to get their young selves before the two bounty hunters. First on the list: Leonard.

"Wouldn't it make sense to pick up both of you?" Deserey wondered as they sifted through the crowd. "I mean, you're both here. It doesn't make any sense to get Mick in a different time."

Leonard didn't say anything, keeping his eyes directly in front of him. He was hyper focused on the mission, as he so often became. Ray, however, got all shifty. He kept opening his mouth, like he wanted to say something, but then Leonard would glare at him and he'd quickly close his mouth again. Dez raised an eyebrow at her. "What?"

"Nothing," Ray said a little too quickly. He remained silent for a beat, but evidently Dez was staring him down pretty hard because he went on. "Well, actually I think the reason Chronos and Pilgrim aren't going after Mick is because he is --"

"Great plan," Leonard cut him off. "We'll look for Mick. You two look for me." He stalked off, yanking Ray behind him with more force than what was necessary.

"Wait. What were you going to say, Ray?" Deserey called after them, only to receive no response. "Secrets don't make friends!" There was still no response. "Okay. Rude." She turned to Mick. "Hmph. Let's go find a Baby Leonard, I guess."

While the two set off to find a miniature Captain Cold, the adult version of Leonard was shoving Ray towards the wall, glaring at him. "What happened to not spoiling anything?"

"Uh, well, technically I never agreed not to --"

"Mick doesn't need to know."

Ray stood up a little straighter. To his credit he didn't look very afraid. Most people would have wet themselves by now. "Well, I think he does."

Leonard narrowed his eyes, but the idiot still didn't budge. "You don't get to decide that."

"What, and you do?"

"Yes."

Ray threw his hands out, as if Leonard was being a completely unreasonable asshole. "It's his future, Leonard!"

"It's a future," Leonard corrected. He'd failed to change his father's past, and he was big enough to admit he was never going to win that one. But that didn't mean he couldn't change Mick's future. He'd be damned if he was going to let something like that happen to his partner. If he had to take Mick out of the time line, risk their entire partnership, or even ruin their whole friendship... Then so be it. "He doesn't have to become Chronos if we remove him now. So, you just stay quiet." From under his coat Leonard raised his Cold Gun, an unspoken threat.

"Go ahead and shoot me," Ray said carelessly. "But I still think he has a right to know, and I'm going to tell him."

It was tempting to kill him right then and there, but before Leonard could even contemplate pulling the trigger, a fight broke out. He turned, half expecting to see the Pilgrim and Chronos or even Mick picking a fight with one of the actual guards. Instead, there was a group of bulky boys surrounding one smaller kid -- a scrawny boy with a lanky figure. He was fighting back as best he could, but he was vastly out numbered and much, much smaller than the rest of them.

Of course.

This was the day he met Mick. One of those boys had a chev, if memory served correct.

Right on cue, the leader of the group jumped on top of the younger Leonard, withdrawing the small knife from his sleeve. Leonard winced. This was definitely not one of his finest moments.

Leonard held out his arm to stop Ray. He was just itching to intervene, he could see it in his eyes. The big softy that he was, just had to try and save everyone. The younger Mick beat him to it, though. He was pretty well built for a twelve year old. Broad shoulders, taller than the others. He still had the meanest glare out of anyone Leonard had ever seen. The only real difference was his hair. He kept it a little longer back then. Not so long that it past his shoulders but long enough that it actually looked like he had hair.

It didn't take long for Mick to scare off the other boys, using only his fists as weapons, which was both impressive and frightening as he went up against the chev. The actual guards didn't do a thing to stop it (they didn't really fare what they did to each other) even as the fight got particularly ugly. Leonard hadn't remembered it being so...brutal. Then again, the only real thing he remembered about that day was the thought: Yup. I'm gonna die.

The only thing that put an end to it: the Time Hunters.

Chronos and Pilgrim appeared from nowhere, each firing those stupidly bulky weapons of theirs. Ray, somehow having managed to put his suit on without anyone noticing, jumped in front of the two teenage versions of Leonard and Mick. He blocked the hunters attack with the arm of his suit, sending his own blast of blue energy back at them, forcing them back. Ray turned to the two teens, a big, stupid grin on his face. "Come with me if you want to live."

{~}

"Awe, look how cute you two were," Dez cooed as they watched the little Len and mini Mick explore the cargo bay. She looked at the adult versions, screwing up her face. "What the hell happened?"

Cold (Dez had decided to start referring to the adult versions of the Legends by their codenames, while their younger selves were on board, the minis still being called their actual names to avoid confusion) rolled his eyes at her. "You're hilarious."

"I thought so."

"Don't take this the wrong way, but is it a good idea to leave those two unsupervised?" Jax asked from where he was leaning in the door frame.

"Good point," Heatwave nodded, taking one long swig from his bottle of beer. "Have fun." And with that, he and Cold turned, leaving Jax and Dez alone.

"You know. I would love to baby sit," Deserey grinned, moving into the cargo bay.

"Where are we?" Leonard and Mick demanded as soon as Jax and Deserey entered the cargo bay.

"We're...a secret organization," Jax lied. "Called...uh..."

"A.R.G.U.S." Dez supplied because it was really the only organization she knew of. "Spy work, that's easy. Keeping your family together, that's difficult. And that's the mission worth fighting for."

"Spy Kids doesn't come out until 2000," Jax reminded her.

"Oh, well," she shrugged and went on anyway, "we were sent assigned to protect your family, but something's gone wrong. We have to take you to a safe house."

"What?" Mick asked, looking absolutely confused.

"Actually, the line is: my parents can't be spies! They're not cool enough!" The two teen stared at her, unmoving. "Look, I know you don't understand but this is actually a fantastic reference."

"We'll take your word for it," Leonard told her.

{~}

In the next hour the Legends managed to pick up Sara (she'd been attacked after being arrested for shop lifting), Ray (they'd picked him up at his high school's science fair), Martin (he was packing up for college at just sixteen, having skipped two years of high school), and Jax (they'd got him in the middle of a foot ball game). Rip figured Chronos and Pilgrim wouldn't go after the hawks due to their reincarnation ability or himself due to the fact that erasing a Time Master from history would be... Counter productive. The only one left was Deserey.

"I'm not sure how well it would do going after you," Rip admitted once the two were alone in the library over looking the history books. "The effects could be detrimental."

"Huh?" Dez sat up from where she was leaning on the desk with her book. "I thought you said I was insignificant to the time line like everyone else?"

"Yes," Rip agreed, "you are. However, your children are not."

"Explain."

"Throughout history there are a large number of crime fighting sibling pairs. Dove and Hawk, Wendy and Marvin, The Wonder Twins..." He said those names like Deserey was supposed to recognize them, but she had never heard them before in her life. "Among these, and others, there are Quicksand and Click, or Dune."

He gestured to the screen at the front of the room as a video started to play. The picture was fuzzy but it was still clear enough to see. They were about five years older and wearing Super hero get ups, but Deserey could still tell who they were supposed to be. Her babies.

Anita wore a dark brown leotard, an hour glass symbol etched on to the front of the suit, matching boots. There was a bag slung over her shoulders, the same goggles Dez had for her own suit covering her eyes. Around her neck she wore a leather choker, a gem at the center of the necklace the same color as her outfit. She stood in the middle of the streets, Central City by the looks of it, her feet firmly planted, a firm expression over her face. As she held her hand out, her necklace glowed, a Sand Blast zipping from her bag, flying at her opponents, knocking them off their feet.

Daren's suit was well armored, all black with red linings over the arms and legs, matching boots and mask. He wasn't carrying any weapons, instead holding a camera: the same one Deserey and Darryl had bought him for his eleventh birthday a few months ago. Daren aimed the camera at an enemy, held it steady as they charged him. Then, he clicked the camera. Immediately, reality distorted. His opponent stopped mid step, their form pixelated, and suddenly they were several feet away, charging one of the other baddies.

And then the image changed again, and they were four years older. Daren had switched from red and black to a beige costume, and now he had sand powers as well. He could turn any organic object into sand it seemed (also not for nothing but Deserey noticed he still carried Click's camera on his hip anyway, so clearly he loved the thing and that made her twice as happy).

The two worked so well together, neither needing to say a word in order to understand the other. They moved in sync, as if they were reading the other's mind. Deserey had never seen her kids get on so well with each other. Was it adulthood that mellowed them out? Or was it just that they were good at what they did (or would do)?

"Holy shit..." Deserey mumbled as Rip turned the video off. "Hold up. Why'd you show me that? I thought the future was dangerous and blah, blah, blah."

Rip shrugged. "It's only dangerous if you try to change it."

Dez scoffed. "Why would I change that? My kids are fucking awesome!"

Rip gave her the slightest hint of a smile. "Precisely."

1995. That was the year Pilgrim and Chronos were going after mini Dez. She was trying to reconcile with that, hiding away in her art studio with Carter's dog. She'd been staring at the same blank canvas for half an hour. 1995. That was not a good year for her. That was the year she'd been kicked out of house and home, the same year she'd had that stupid argument with her parents. She hadn't seen them since that day. She hadn't even so much as glance at the name of her "home" town on a map.  It was the one place she told herself she'd never ever return... Yet here she was.

"Miss Dunet, I thought you should know we're about to leave."

"Kay." She didn't look up to see who it was, but she didn't really need to. The only two who called her that were Rip and Martin, and seeing as how the accent wasn't British...

"...Forgive me for prying but are you alright?" Martin (because Dez was still thinking of him as Martin, since there were technically two people called Firestorm, his younger self being Marty) asked. Luna flapped her tail against the floor as he made his way over. "I know revisiting the past can be rather daunting. Looking at ones self in your younger years --"

"That's not it."

"Oh?"

Deserey flipped her pencil in her fingers a few times, pulling her lips to the side. She had never told anyone about that argument. Well, there was Rip, but she hadn't told him what it had been about. Not even Darryl knew the truth. The reason she'd never experienced a menstrual cycle, the reason she couldn't get pregnant. It was the reason behind every little thing that had ever gone wrong in her life. Maybe she was just tired of carrying all that weight. "I, uh..." The words were stuck in her throat. "I'm not actually a real woman..."

Martin knit his brows together, his eyes widening at the absurd statement. "I beg your pardon?" Dez slouched in her seat, her gaze dropping to the floor instead. He was looking at her like she was telling him she was a robot.

She shifted in her seat, cleared her throat. Could she even explain? Would it matter? She wasn't sure why she was even telling him this, of all people. Was he even going to understand? She was risking a friendship here. "I was, um, I was born as a...a guy..."

"You're transgender?"

She nodded, the word stinging a bit. She wasn't sure why. That was, in fact, what she was.

"Well, perhaps, I'm not well educated on the matter, but why on Earth would that mean you're not a real woman?"

That was surprising. Deserey glanced up at him. Part of her expected him to call her an abomination, but he just kept staring at her with this unreadable look. Not one she got a whole lot. It was something she really only got from a handful of people in her life. "Well you know genitals and such..." Her throat hurt. "My parents didn't believe I was...you know." Even after all these years she couldn't say the word, even if she was transgender. "They said I was disgraceful." She put on a fake voice, mimicking her father, "'If you can't straighten your act up, you can no longer live under my roof.' Then, there's Mom in the background crying. 'How could you do this to us? What will people say?' Woe is me. Blah, blah, blah. So, I left. Lived on the streets. Somehow miraculously came up with enough money for the operation... You know. Normal stuff like that."

"Nothing about that experience is normal," Martin denied. "Far be it from me to cast dispersions on your parents, but it seems to me the only disgraceful thing about your situation is the way they handled it. I am not a father myself, but I should think the first rule of parenting is to support your child regardless of who they turn out to be."

"Mm. Yeah, they kind of sucked."

"Be that as it may, you, and I'm sure I can speak on behalf of the whole team when I say this, will always be a real woman in my eyes, Miss Dunet."

Her body was moving before she even registered she wanted to do anything. Deserey wrapped her arms around him, pulling him into a tight embrace. He hugged her back, albeit a little hesitantly, not like he didn't want to touch her though. "What ever is this for?"

"Uh," Dez laughed awkwardly as she pulled away, "sorry. Sometimes you just don't realize how much you need to hear something until you hear it for the first time." She didn't realize there were tears until she reached up to wipe her eyes. Embarrassing.

Martin nodded. "Understandable."

{~}

Young Dez had yet to find her real name, but there was no way she was going to be walking around the street with a name like Desmond. Fuck that. So, she chose to go by the shortened version of her name: Dez. It was much cooler anyway. As an added bonus, her girlfriend, Adriana, thought it sounded hot. All the more reason to love the name.

She was a lot angrier than her adult counter part, though, which was saying something because Sandstorm could be quite the hot head. This much was quickly made evident as the rest of the Legends happened upon her.

The young girl was in the streets, spray painting graffiti all over a brick wall -- a faceless girl in a skirt holding up a chainsaw, blood staining the metal. Her hair was shaved on one side, her curls swooped over her eye on the other side. She was dressed in all black -- thick combat boots with missing soles, a skull shirt with rips in the lace sleeves. Torn pants, netted leggings.

"There she is," Jax noted from his place across the street.

"And there's our assassins," Cold said, nodding to where Chronos and Pilgrim had just arrived on the scene.

"Then we should hurry," Martin suggested. He held his hand out to Jax, but before the boy could take it Rip stopped them.

"Perhaps, we should try for something a little more subtle?" The last few rescues had been rather ludicrous; and though it was probably just wishful thinking, the captain would have liked for at least one mission to go over smoothly without risking any sort of damage to the time line.

"We'll take care of them," Carter said through the coms. A second later he and Kendra swooped down to face the temporal hunters, the flap of their wings drawing the attention of young Dez.

"How is that more subtle than Firestorm?" Jax complained.

"Get Dez!" Kendra shouted. Pilgrim shot at her, but she maneuvered around the laser, letting it hit the wall behind her instead; Hawkgirl flew forwards, dragging Pilgrim down the alleyway. Meanwhile, Carter and Chronos were grabbling with one another, the bounty hunter having switched to a knife for close ranged fighting.

Jax ran forward, reaching out to stop Dez from running off. In turn, she glared at him, clutching her spray can at her side. "Who the hell are you people?!"

"That's...a little hard to explain," Jax told her. "But you need to come with us. We'll keep you safe."

Dez eyed him and the other Legends. There was some old white dude who was obviously on the wrong side of town, and at least one of them looked like he was more inclined to take what little she had in her pockets than to help her. "Yeah, no thanks."

"You cannot possibly hope to escape these two all on your own," Martin insisted. "They're dangerous!"

"I'll take my chances."

"Why are you trying to talk?" Cold snapped. "Just grab her and let's go!" The Hawks were holding their own against the bounty hunters, but who knew how long that would last. The Legends didn't exactly have the best track record when it came to getting lucky.

"We're trying to gain her trust!" Martin insisted. "We aren't just going to kidnap her!"

"If we don't she's going to end up dead," Leonard pointed out.

The Pilgrim held her palms out towards the hawks, freezing them in mid air. So she was a meta human. Wasn't that just their luck?
Chronos fired a few rapid shots, causing Dez to bolt in the opposite direction.

"Bullocks," Rip muttered. He ducked behind a dumpster with Cold, both shooting back at Chronos; Pilgrim sent the hawks flying back into the wall before running after the girl.

"Well, we've already scared her anyway," Jax reasoned just before he and Martin merged into Firestorm. They flew into the air, blasting fire down upon the Pilgrim. She turned, stopping the fire as she had done with the hawks moments before. "What the...?" His statement died out as Chronos fired into the air, nearly knocking Firestorm from the sky. Fortunately, Rip and Cold were able to force the bounty hunter back.

While no one was paying attention, Pilgrim snuck up on Dez, who was hiding a few blocks down the road behind a mail box as if that would do any good against these freaks. How were they doing all this anyway?

Pilgrim grabbed her from behind, holding a knife to her throat; Dez let out a yelp, slamming her elbow into the woman's side. The Pilgrim's grip loosened, allowing Dez to whirl around, spraying her can of paint in her eyes. The Pilgrim screamed, wiping at her eyes. "You brat!"

Dez took off again, only to be stopped once more by Firestorm. His eyes were glowing white, hands and head burning with orange and yellow flames. "Now will you come with us?"

"Nope." Dez chucked the spray paint can, hitting smack dab in the forehead.

"Ow!" Firestorm complained, rubbing at his head. "Seriously!?"

Dez ducked past him while he was distracted. Carter and Kendra recovered from their date with the wall and jumped back into action. Kendra had flown over to Firestorm, helping him fight the Pilgrim, Carter helping Rip keep Chronos at bay. Meanwhile, Cold went after Dez, grabbing her by the arm to keep her from running off; she turned, punching him in the chest. He wouldn't budge.

"Deserey," he snapped. "Enough."

That caught her off guard. Where had he come up with that name?

Kendra and Firestorm managed to get close enough to Pilgrim to grab her by the arms; together they lifted her off the ground and carried her up to the roof. Rip, having left Carter to deal with Chronos all on his own, made his way over to Dez and Cold. He withdrew the tool he'd used to knock out the Legends at the very beginning of this messed up little journey. With a quick flash, the girl would have been knocked unconscious, but, before Rip could so much as put his finger on the button, someone shouted, "Hey!"

A man jumped out of his car. He sprinted towards Leonard and Rip, leaving his vehicle idling in the middle of the streets. Without a thought, the man reeled back his arm and punched Leonard in the face, forcing him to let go of the girl's arm.

"GCPD!" The man withdrew a badge from his pocket and flashed it in the two Legends' faces. His name was printed on the cold plate: James Gordon "You're under arrest for attempted kidnapping!" Now, he was proceeding to cuff Leonard. "You and all your pals that just ran off!"

"There seems to be a misunderstanding ─" Rip started.

"Oh so you weren't just trying to snatch this girl off the streets against her will?" Gordon nodded at Dez who now stood behind him.

Leonard stayed quiet. He'd been arrested enough times to know when he should speak and when to keep his mouth shut. Rip seemed to struggle to find the right words too. Gordon nodded. "That's what I thought. Like I said. You're under arrest." He cuffed Rip, too.

From the rooftops, Firestorm and the hawks watched as Gordon dragged their two team mates back to his car. Jax spoke into the coms, "We might have a problem..."

-

A/N: I changed the ending to this again in case y'all were confused.

Also decided to give Daren a new hero persona because like we should stay on theme but also kinda wanted to keep Click because it works with the meta tech in Flash season five I think? And you know heroes change their names and shit all the time in the comics so yee.

It's a trash chapter but whatever lmao I'm just happy to write for Sandstorm I missed Dezzie and the Legends ngl.

Loves you byeee! 😘😘😘