Hey all, another Young Justice story, humorous of course, with interaction from the whole team since the sleepover in 'Childhood Night' went over so well! Of course, as always, I own nothing. Nada, zilch even. Please review and enjoy!
Nothing's wrong with a little friendly competition. Absolutely nothing.
In fact the Justice League had decided that friendly competition was exactly what their children needed. The Team spent so much time arguing, fighting, and belittling each other that they hardly worked as a team anymore. One might ask how competition would help such a situation?
Competition would determine drive the teens to work harder, train more, and think outside the box to beat their teammates….so maybe it wouldn't help them get along but it wa sure to help the missions get completed more efficiently and really, in the end, wasn't that what really mattered? Batman and the League decided it sure was.
The League decided on a 'set up' for these competitions that were to come. They would leave a notice on the mission board detailing what needed to occur, and then the children would follow through on the orders. It was simple. So very simple. The adults were so proud to have figured out a method of administering the challenges, now came the hard part. How to judge winners….
"Simple." Stated Batman with a smirk. "We have a scoreboard with all their names on it, we rank them one through eight in order of placement or on how we think they did. The ranking will be posted for them to see and the top four will get some sort of prize while the bottom four will have some punishment or another. Simple."
"…..he's brilliant." the Man of Steel murmured to no one in particular, and the other Leaguers had to agree with him. It was a flawless system to work with. And so It was put into action.
Robin was the first to stumble upon the instructions for the challenges as he most often was the one to check for missions. "HEY YOU GUYS- GET IN THE DEBRIEFING ROOM THERE IS A NEW ASPECT IN OUR LIVES THAT I AM SURE YOU WILL ALL FIND VERY IMPORTANT." No one came. Now when Robin called, he expected an answer. More specifically he expected eight teens to come rushing to his side to eagerly see what he needed. He was vastly disappointed. "GUUUUUUUUUUUU-UUUUUUUUUUUUUYSSSSSSSSSS…" still no reply. Not even the rush of footsteps. Robin sighed, shaking his head as he scrolled through the stereo system for the cave. "I hate to do this to them…" with the click of a button the cave was flooded with the melodious masterpiece that was 'Shots' sung by the king of song himself. Lil' Jon.
The clambering of several people could be heard along with a series of crashes that resounded through the cave. Robin grinned, hearing the pitter patter of little hero feet.
"It's not Friday why is he playing the drinking song-"
"Don't say that out loud the League doesn't know—"
"Yes because the song that starts with 'Ya'll ready to get fucked up' is gonna signal our tea time? They know-"
"I DON'T HAVE ANY PANTS ON IS THAT ALRIGHT?"
"Do we need seven or eight glasses- oh no I left the stove on!"
"….I have never understood why but this song gives me the urge to gyrate…"
"Save your gyrations for another time Kal we have some bottles to pop!—- Waaaaaaait…..Rob why do you look like you're in mission mode not party mode?" questioned Wally with the lift of his neon flashing sunglasses. "Bro, you can't abuse the signal like that…Conner's not wearing pants for god's sake we can't do a mission when he doesn't have any pants on…..not cool…"
The bird in question simply shrugged, grinning as he turned the volume off, though not turning it off all the way. "I needed you guys in here, as any fluent english speakers will see we've been issued a…a quest of sorts by the League…"
He was right of course. Projected onto the screen that usually housed mission details were the following set of instructions:
'Hey there Team! We, the Illustrious almighty and good Justice League have decided that you guys need a challenge! Several challenges in fact! And wouldn't you believe it we have a solution! Each day this week we're going to give you instructions, you will get this— follow them! We'll be watching on the security cameras to rank you, and your rankings will be revealed the next morning! Since Roy is with you this week- the top four players will be excused from training all next week, the bottom four scorers will be forced to do all the chores around the cave and also will be taunted with their failures as long as they so shall live. Fun right? We thought it'd be a blast. -Lots of Love, The Flash (and the Justice League)'
Wally grinned. "Challenges huh? Let's do this, we all know Robin, Roy, Kal and I will be the top players since we've been in the hero biz the longest, no offense Supes you're only a few months old so you get stuck in the bottom with the girls…."
"Well, you might want to read today's challenge before you get to cocky Wally, you may be at a disadvantage in today's competition. It says, we're to, 'Figure out the most intense push up and do as many as you can.' when competing with someone with super strength, a gymnast and two archers, your upper body strength may not be up to par." spoke Kaldur calmly.
"Ha- hear that kid mouth..'your upper body strength may not be up to par' weren't you just complaining the other day in training that you got tired of regular pushups after like fifty?" Artemis smirked at him, almsot skipping past him down the hall.
"To the training room!" declared Robin and soon two archers, a speedster, a martian, a kryptonian clone man-baby, a magician, a bird, and an atlantean were all out of the room…though Lil' Jon and his shots continued to play.
"First things first we have to decide upon what 'the most intense' pushup means. I vote one handed claps, maybe legs crossed as well." Spoke Roy as he casually took off his shirt, in preparation for the challenge. No self respecting man would do push ups with a shirt on, that's for sure. Kaldur and Conner followed his lead…besides, Conner never really liked shirts much. They were just…too much.
"No no no no, let's just do regular push ups. See who's really the best, no gimmicks!" chirped Megan while placing a hand on Wally's shoulder. "Then it'll be fair."
"Fair Shmair- we're doing vertical pushups on the bars!" Declaired Robin with a grin. The Archers grinned as well, but the other four looked rather confused as to what he meant. Vertical, push ups, bars, he'd lost them completely. He sighed seeing their confusion. "I'll explain, you go onto on of the bars, get into like, a handstand, then push up except your body is over your hands instead of sideways of…are you smelling what Wally's stepping in?"
"That sounds brutal-" said Zatanna with a small pout. "This is so rigged…."
"Actually if their was rigging it'd be a lot easier and falling wouldn't be an issue-" replied a smug Robin. Oh he was smug, this challenge was his. First place was his. It was all his.
"Whatever, let's just do this before Kal makes me put pants on." muttered Conner as he approached the bars. The rest followed after him, Robin stopped by the chalk box, covering his hands in it, Kaldur, Artemis and Roy followed suit, the others went straight to the bars.
"There are two bars, so we'll do four people on each bar….regular people on one bar, so that's Roy, Artemis, Robin, and for this challenge Wally, the rest of us will be on the other." instructed Kaldur as he grasped the bar and began hoisting himself up.
Megan had smiled quite happily, she would just fly, and grab onto the bar and there would be no problems. She even flew and grabbed the bar from a position already in the air, much to the exasperation of her teammates.
Conner grunted, grabbing the bar with a grunt as he sort of threw his lower body forward flinging himself into the upright position. He gritted his teeth but was settled into the handstand position, bagging on his superhuman strength.
Kaldur of course, the most honorable of men, didn't have a crafty plan and just planned on doing some intense vertical pushups…he pulled himself onto the bar flexing his toes in preparation for the balancing act he was going to have to manage.
Zatanna had gotten her idea from Megan, murmuring a hex that would flip just her gravity for the time being. She didn't know about pushups, but public school had shown she could do half assed pull-ups for days. She grabbed the bar as she almost plummeted towards the ceiling, grinning as she was able to just hang there.
"Bunch of cheaters…" said Roy with a scowl. He pulled himself up, the toned arms and rather..beefy shoulders he'd developed doing archery his entire life serving him well. He shot a glare to the 'super powered' bar. "No sense of pride in natural skill."
Robin grinned. "They're just playing the game, just playing it. Like you, like me, like Wally played your mom last night- we're all just playin'!" He flipped up onto the bars as if he'd spent his life doing it…which in fact- he had!
"My mom's dead." scowled Roy.
"Way to kill the mood…" said Wally with a gulp as he shakily managed to pull himself up onto the bar. He sat there for a second before carefully- oh so carefully pushing himself into the ready position.
Artemis rolled her eyes and hoisted herself up with little complaint from voice or body. She like Roy, had those oh so sexy archer arms, though her decision of loose crop top had left her with a sports bra doing the job of shirt and the shirt doing the job of 'blind Artemis and get tangled in hair' She slipped it off, putting her weight on one arm then the other to drop it to the ground. "Let's do this."
"Alright, to be fair, I say it's whoever can stay up the longest while still doing pushups, so find a steady pace and stick with that. This is duration of time not number of pushups. Three…two…one…GO!" Kaldur started them off, and soon the eight were pushing (or in Zatanna's case pulling) themselves.
Grunts, occasional swears, or a hiss of disapproval would escape the lips of one or all of the members( except Megan who was doing no work, and Robin who lived for this). It was a bit surprising that they'd all managed to last about five minutes. Though at that point the team did what they did best. They started cheating.
Wally was the most desperate, and the first to stoop to that level. He knew he was going down, he knew very well. And so instead of just falling he used what little arm strength he had to throw himself into Megan and Zatanna..causing them to fall up while he hit the ground with a thud.
"NOT FAIR-" shrieked the girls in tandem-
"There are no rules against it, you two are no longer doing pushups, you're out. Fair and square." Wally grinned. "besides you two started off with a Cheap shot by using powers…"
No one could really argue with that, but it did inform the other five on the bars that now it was time to pull out the big guns. How much could you fight while being on your hands on top of a bar while pushing yourself up and down? They were about to discover.
Robin leaned over to the two archers on the bar beside him, speaking in a hushed whisper. "We're taking out the supers first, they're emotionally weak where we are strong. They can't handle this kind of pressure…and if the stress doesn't get to them…your feet could like- 'accidently' sway their direction and knock their balance off but…you didn't hear that from me-!"
"No of course not we heard that from the mystical eagle spirit who guides our life…" choked out Roy through gritted teeth with a roll of his eyes. This statement caused Artemis to choke, almost losing her grip.
"You and your Native American spiritualisms…Christ Roy next thing you know you'll be in here dancing with a medicine man in no more than a deer skin pelt…" she retorted, righting her balance with a relieved sigh.
Robin found this endlessly amusing, and cackled to himself like he was being tickled by mysterious forces- he wasn't…he was simply…really amused.
"Hey Conner, don't you feel your hands starting to give?" Called a smirking Artemis.
He snorted, shooting a glare towards his hands, just in case they felt like betraying him or something. " 'Course not..super Strength, I could do this for days…"
Robin saw where she was going with this. "Yeah we get that big guy, but you skipped number one rule of working on the bars."
Roy sighed, deciding maybe working with the two other regular teens was his best option. "You forgot to chalk." and before another jab at the superboy could be made he tipped a leg forward and his Conner's foot, knocking the teen off balance. Between the oh so helpful tip of the archers foot and the sweat soaked palms Conner had he went sliding off with a string of curses that would make a sailor blush.
"Final four- woo! Sorry Kal, you're next!" Cheered Robin, he lifted one hand, easily doing the pushups with only one arm, and reached into his personal bag of chalk at his hip. He flung the handful into Kaldur's face.
The poor atlantean, the poor trusting- honorable- only one to not even help someone to cheat- atlantean, burst into a laughing fit and was easily pushed over with a swift kick from Artemis to the back of his leg. He fell, coughing and looking rather dejected. "Th-that was.." coughing fit here. "Really" cough "Cheap" cough "Don't you think…" he choked out rather sadly.
"Age before beauty~" cued Artemis with a chilling smirk, she leaned over and bit Roy's wrist, which caused the red headed Archer to shriek and flinch away with a grunt..which gave Robin on his other side the opportunity to push his torso forward.
"Oh no you don't-" Roy grabbed onto Robin's arm and Artemis's hair and dragged them both down with him. He also managed to hit his face directly on the bar and now had a bloody nose.
with the following cries of. "Not cool-" and "You bitch-" the final three were all down and the competition was over. Well, today's round at least.
"I wonder if there'll be points for strategy and tactic or just who lasted longest…." mused Zatanna with a sigh.
"we'll just have to wait and see…" said Kaldur with a nod as he finally finished wiping the last of the chalk out of his face.
Artemis helped Robin to his feet and the two grinned down at the red haired archer. "Try not to get blood on anything Roy-Joy, the eagle spirit might not be to pleased…" spoke the girl with a chuckle.
He glared up at her, rising to his feet with a huff, his hand cupped over his nose to try and staunch the flow. "I will bleed on everything you love."
Later that evening, all had retired to their own rooms. Settling in for sleep after a tiring day of cheating at doing hardcore pushups. Life was difficult.
Robin had made up his mind, and summoned Artemis and Roy into his room with a text, and soon the three no powered teens were sitting crosslegged on the Boy wonder's bed, though the younger two were still snickering at Roy's nose which was now swollen and deep purple.
"We're going to make an alliance. We're going to help each other and take the top three spots every challenge, then over all no matter what we're all free to do as we please, it's fool proof. Now leave before you open those pretty little mouths of yours and make me regret it!" and as soon as he had called him in, Robin was shoving them off his bed onto the floor. "Leave me. Unless you're looking for someone to show you a good time- but that'd be weird for Arty and illegal I think for Roy so I stand by what I said first…..LEAVE ME-" he ushered the Archers out the door with a shove.
"He's so fucking weird…" muttered Artemis. Roy could only nod and agree for once.
What's this? Alliances made? Challenges complete? Hard evidence that Wally has noodle arms? It appears that all of occurred.
And with that chapter one is done, in chapter two- the rankings will be revealed, the Mentors reactions will be given, and a new challenge issued.
Reviews are what give me life, you like it? Great- write a review please! You hate it? Great- write a review please! You want to make a suggestion about plot, pairings or anything like that? Great- write a review please!...I like reviews...
I hope you've enjoyed it, it's been a concept I've been cooking up for a while...
~GettingTraught