JLA- A normal day
Disclaimer: Not mine, all DC fellows. I think
Summary: Spend an average day with the JLA, through the eyes of Bob the technician
Status: complete (I think) and un-betaed.
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Have you ever asked what life was like with the JLA? What happens up there in the fortress floating in space?
Well, let´s imagine. Imagine you´re a technician - they need some people to keep this thing up where it belongs, apart from the people who do the cooking, cleaning, etc.
Let´s say your name is ...Bob. Yeah, you´re officially Bob now. I don´t know why Bob, it´s just a name, deal with it. No, I´m not naming you Randy. Or Susan. Bob the technician. Be grateful I didn´t make you a janitor.
It´s an average day at work. After the weekend (which you spent at home in Michigan, with your lovely wife Carmilla and your 1.4 kids..whatever) you get to the teleporter tube, dressed in your overall your suitcase in hand.
It goes Vroom (or Swash, Whoosh, Brrmm or something) and you´re up at your work station. You greet your fellow workers (Carl, Jimmy, Big Red and Carol) and get yourself a coffee before you start to work. It´s perfectly average- no serious damage, just a leaking pipe and a thermal anomaly, nothing disastrous.
Just as a homicidal megalomaniac from another dimension shows up to destroy Earth. Or rule it. Whatever. You don´t really care, you´ve been through all that...at least twice a week.
They try to negotiate. You ask yourself why. It´s not like even one has considered putting up a peaceful way to end this. You think of a book you read once at school, about medieval times when the good king wanted to negotiate, sent an ambassador and the ambassador returned...without his head. If it still was that way, the league would consist of only headless people now.
The villain (who looks like an evil twin of a hero - only with a scar in his face, a goatee (you go to Marty to collect the money from your betting pool; you said it was the goatee, Marty had his money on an eyepatch) and this time he looks like Evil!Guy Gardner.
"Look out, it´s AntiGuy!" someone shouts. It´s alway like that. There are always three options:
1) Evil- insert name of hero here-
2) Anti-insert name of hero here-
3) a sinister form of the hero´s original name.
The red alarm goes starts, whining, shrieking, red light fills the corridors. You rush to your station, look at the displays and observe if (or rather when) something will get in the critical area. And as predicted, an energy blast hits the lower shield in sector phi-gamma-7-5. Or the area next to the cafeteria, on the left side of the jukebox.
You pick your kit up and rush to fix it.
All around you there is shouting, running, fighting, panicking - you really wonder why they are still amazed or surprised when someone attacks. That happens so frequently -you could set your watch after that if you really wanted. If you would want to mark every day in calendar red when something like that happens, it would be easier to just drop your calendar in a bucket with red paint.
A hero calls for backup (Elongated Man? Or was that Plastic Man? Who cares really, you got work to do.)
As you reach your goal you see it. A small break in the hull- you can fix it in 22 seconds (you timed it).
Right as you sealed it the fight is over. The villain is sent back to his own dimension, apart from a few cuts and bruises no one has suffered damage.
In fact, Guy Gardner is impressed. His evil self kicked Supe´s ass. In his dimension he ruled the world-until he got to bored with his own world yo he set out to conquer even more. He would totally rule as a supervillain.
Well, until Blue Beetle comes up to him, pats him on the shoulder and said that an AntiBeetle and an EvilBooster not only conquered the world, they pwned Luthor and prevented the JLA from even existing...or maybe they defeated every single one of them, he can´t remember the specific details anymore.
It still amazes you a bit that even the most goofy superheroes with no powers- (Blue Beetle for example. Wildcat hasn´t any powers either. You have heard that Batman is just a normal human, too. But you´re convinced that he´s a paranormal-demonlike creature, a witch master or a ninja with secret shadow controlling powers. )- always turn out to have an evil doppelgänger who rules his own world and is able to defeat all the other heroes in his universe.
There´s another betting pool on what would happen if two doppelgänger met. Because each of them has the power to destroy all the other heroes, so technically they would wipe each other out. Or they don´t because they have the power the destroy all other heroes and not getting defeated.
1) They destroy each other. End of story.
2) They are locked in an epic battle which no one of them can actually win
3) They join forces and rule together.
4) Chaos will happen and wipe the universe out
You bet on #3 (with the exception of one of the doppelgänger being Batman, he would as an evil version kill all the other possible threats, sit on the pile of corpses and laugh unilt his head falls off)
After the incident you go have lunch. You sit in the cafeteria, eat your cheese maccaroni (pondering whether your son Mikey or your daughter Ruby will have that for lunch in school today.) You´re at the same table with Marty, Susan and Carl, later Animal Man and the Flash join you. You´ve always liked that the heroes are not seperating themselves from the normal people, they´re just like you and the whole rest of normal guys. They crack some jokes, Carl does an astonishing impersonation of J´onn which made Flash snort his soda out of his nose and just are happy to work here.
You face danger everyday, catastrophies, chaos always at the edge, a big, big risk. but hey- you do what you have to do. It´s your job. That´s exactly what the heroes here do -doing their job.
And when Flash tells you one of his Grandma Flash stories you just have to smile because it´s so great.
Later on, when you return to duty, give Jimmy and Big Red a quick nod, you slip on the oil-slicked floor and crash into your desk. A golden whoosh takes your remote control for the hangar and the next thing your hear is a "Bwahahaha" then a whoosh again and Blue Beetle and Booster Gold run out of your workstation, clutchig the remote control in their hands and a very big grin is plastered on their faces.
You get up, assure your co-workers you´re okay, plop down on your stool and wait. "4..3..2..1" and on clue an enraged "Booster!!" echoes and a loud crash is heard.
That is also part of your everday life, and you love it nontheless.
Later, when you´re in sickbay and get a pack of ice for your head (which you banged thanks to Team Blue and Gold on the floor) you see the two mischief-makers already there. Beetle has a few plasters on his face, a black eye and a split lip which he is cooling with a pack of ice. Booster looks...normal, not a single hair out of place. "I´m blaming you" Beetle bluntly says. "What?! Why me? That was your idea!""The idea was great, you blew it with your stupid improvisation." "You´re just jealous because I´m creative." "If you´re so creative, Mr. I´m-creativity-in-person, tell me why you always come to me when you need plans, because you´re too clueless to think of your own?"
They´re bitching at each other. Just like everyday. that´s just a pasrt of it. You get your pack from Nancy the doctor and as you turn to leave you see Beetle and Booster, arms slung around each other´s shoulders and busy plotting whatever prank the will pull up next.
As long as they don´t make you fall on your behind you don´t care. At least they make you laugh. Just like that time when they programmed the communicators to play "Last day of Christmas" for 7 hours in a row. Sung by a korean shop owner, karaoke style. And Superman tried to get hold of them, but Booster managed to outfly him...or Superman stopped chasing him, because he spotted Beetle hiding in the Monitor Womb and -since that guy didn´t have a flight ring he would be an easier target- charged at him instead. Needless to say, he never got hold of Beetle either. The very flexible, and much leaner built man (than Superman) crawled into the part of the vents where no one but him, Plastic Man, Elongated Man and the Atom could be comfortable inside.
Oracle fixed the communicators and J´onn announced that if they didn´t come out at once he would burn their CD collection.
You can´t belive that was just a week ago.
You´ve been in this job for years now. Everything is just the same as always, yet is always new and exciting.
You love your job.
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The AntiBeetle and EvilBooster story I mentioned is from the livejournal community called boostle. It´s cool, look at it
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