This is a plot-bunny I received from Mazula. It was their idea, I just adopted it. So don't give me all the credit people.
Anyway, HUMANIZED Bionicle. It just fit this story better to me.
Pairings: Hmmm… mild Tahu/Gali, nothing beyond a few blushes and competing for attention.
Disclaimer: I don't own crap. It hurts.
The Newspaper
One day, on the island of Mata Nui, Tahu Mata opened the door to his hut. He reached down and reached for the newspaper he thought would be there, but it turns out that Kongu, the mailman, had once again thrown it way off course.
Tahu quickly located the newspaper, on top of his hut, and quickly retrieved it. Tahu then started walking to Le-Koro.
Tahu was the only one who bothered to subscribe to Mata-News Weekly, and of course the rest of the Toa wanted to mooch it off of him. So they agreed to always meet in Le-Koro and let Tahu basically read it to them.
Tahu finally reached Le-Koro and quickly found Lewa's hut. The Fire Toa knocked on the door. He waited. No-one answered. He knocked again, and no-one answered.
Finally, Tahu burned down the door and walked inside. And there was Lewa, still asleep, half-way hanging off of the bed. Tahu hit Lewa with his rolled up newspaper and watched with glee as Lewa half-yelled-half-shrieked and fell onto the floor.
"Lewa!" exclaimed Tahu. "You're still asleep?"
"I was," replied Lewa. "At least until you hit-smacked me out of my sleep-dreams!" Tahu rolled his eyes. "Whatever. Gali and the others will be here soon, so, do whatever-it-is-you-do; you've already embarrassed yourself enough."
Lewa scrambled out of bed and threw on his green armor and ran into the kitchen. He yanked a box of Cheerios out of the cupboard and poured a bowl of cereal. He started eating it, but in Tahu's eyes, he was taking his sweet-little-time.
But before Tahu could start yelling at Lewa for being slow, Kopaka and Onua walked in. "Hey Onua," said Tahu. "And hello Kopaka."
"It's great to see you to flame-for-brains." Again, Tahu was about to explode, but Gali and Pohatu walked in through the hole-used-to-be-door. Tahu quickly composed himself and greeted them. "Hey Gali, Pohatu. You ready or what?"
With A nod, he opened the paper and began to read. "Okay, on the front page, it says… Toa Mata rankings? What in Mata Nui's name?" Kopaka looked his way. "Rankings? What does that mean?"
"According to this, each of us were rated on a scale of 1-10, 1 being the worst, 10 being the best, on different attributes and skills. Then an 'anonymous writer' commented on the results. Hm. Wanna check it out?"
"Sure," said Gali with a shrug. "What have we got to lose?" Tahu took a deep breath and mustered up all of his super-macho-manliness and began to read what would later be known as 'the worst thing in the history of the Universe'.
"Okay, this first one is on Strength. Lewa has a 4, Onua a 10, Pohatu an 8, I have a 9, Kopaka has a 7, and Gali has a 6."
Lewa did a spit take; his cheerios landing in Kopaka's bleach blond hair. "It says I have less strength than… than… HER!" Lewa spat. "That's not possible! Just because an Onu-Matoran can lift a Muaka cub and I can't does NOT MEAN I'm WEAKER THAN GALI!"
By then Tahu was on the floor laughing his head off. So far, this was pretty good. Lewa had a rant, Kopaka got Cheerios in his hair, and he had gotten the second highest strength rating, which was sure to earn points in Gali's eyes.
"I'm not finished," stated Tahu after Lewa was done ranting. "This 'anonymous writer' says, and I quote, 'Most of these ratings are correct, except that Tahu's rating is a little low in my eyes.
"And Gali's could have been a little higher, but Lewa's was completely accurate. Lewa once complained of being worn-out after carrying his mail about 10 steps from his house.'"
The expression on Lewa's face was nothing short of classic. It was a mixture of horror, anger, and disbelief. Pohatu, seeing a future blackmail opportunity, took a picture.
"B—bu-habba-habba-tooka-takka-wha?" Lewa stuttered.
"Okay," said Tahu. "Next up is… Speed. Is this a trick question? Anyway, Lewa has a 9, Pohatu has a 10, Onua has a 3, Kopaka has a 6, Gali has a 6, and I have a 7." Tahu looked for a reaction from Onua, but, sadly for this story, the Earth Toa had no reaction.
Tahu cleared his throat and began again. "The AW says, 'Why is Tahu ranked so high? He's pretty slow compared to Kopaka. They once had a race. They started. In the end, Tahu owed Kopaka 100 widgets. Long story short: he lost. By about 65 feet.'"
At this, Kopaka actually smiled, Pohatu broke out in laughter, Onua just grabbed an ice pop out of the freezer, Gali giggled, Tahu blushed to about the same shade of his hair, and Lewa shouted, "HURTS, DOESN'T IT!"
"I slipped on a questionable substance!"
"23 ½ times?"
"Let's move on, shall we?" growled Tahu. "Next up… oh god. Next up is… 'Attractiveness'." Lewa blinked. "What's Attratedacness?"
Tahu sighed. "Not, Attratedacness Lewa, its Attractiveness. It means… um… hmm… it means, how… 'pretty' you are."
Lewa smiled, happy he knew another big word. That made a total of 19! Tahu cleared his throat after that extremely awkward conversation and began to read. "Gali has a 10, I have a 7, Kopaka has a 9, Lewa has an 8.5, Pohatu has an 8, and Onua has a 2."
Onua spit out his ice pop. "WHAT! I'm not THAT ugly, am I?"
Pohatu cleared his throat. "Um, actually, Onua, I hate to break it to you, but…" A horrible scream was heard as the sound of a saw started up.
18 minutes later…
"Okay… since Pohatu is going to be in the hospital for the foreseeable future, let's read what the Anonymous Writer said. 'This isn't surprising at all. I mean, 5 sixths of our island is MALE, and like a fifth of them ALL CHASE AFTER Gali. And the Onua one is true, he is UGLY. Good thing he doesn't know who I am, heheheh.'"
Onua growled. He didn't mind the whole slow thing, but he wasn't THAT ugly, right? "Last one," said Tahu. "This one is on 'people skills'. Kopaka has a 1, I have a 6, Gali has an 8.6, Lewa has a 9, Onua has a 7, and Pohatu has a 10."
Kopaka looked up from his seat. "I'm not anti-social," he said. "Right guys?"
"Um… Kopaka… you kind of are." The next thing heard was a smack and a slash, along with a scream of pain from the resident Toa of Fire.
8 minutes later…
"Now that Tahu-friend's face is all bandaged-wrapped up, I say we make a play-game out of this."
"And just how would we do that Lewa?"
"We can all prove that we're better-good than what the ratings say! I would have to work on strength, Onua-friend on being-"
BZZZZ.
"-not good looking according to some, Kopaka-friend needs to work on his people-friend skills, Tahu will have to work on speed, and I'm sure Gali and Pohatu can find SOMETHING to work on! Well?"
"… Why not? What've we got to lose?"
"I'm up for a challenge."
"Mphh grrg tak-to."
"Tahu, don't try to talk. It's disturbing."
"Yay! Let's go!"
Ah, so optimistic. If only they knew…
X x X
Done! And next time we will start with Lewa. What chaos will ensue? Well, please review people!