Note: first fanfic, will improve as I go along, I have been a gamemaster on my past RP site so the action should be good, and I do not own Ben 10 or anything that is remotely like Ben 10.

AUTHOR'S NOTE OF GLORY: Ah, I've been waiting for this chapter for quite some time…

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XLR8 cautiosly shifted her body weight from one crutch to the other, the crutch made a small groaning sound as it held more of XLR8's body. Her foot after all these weeks was still broken but the good news was that she was able to walk around the campus again. The campus's doctor said that her cast would be off in less than two weeks. She was thrilled at that but was very worried.

The thing was, she hadn't got two weeks, the Metal Trial was going to be here in less than a week and if she was picked to fight, the chances of her winning would be very slim. As each day passed, she got more and more worried and hoped all the more that her foot would heal faster.

She stood by the old tumtum tree waiting for her teammates to show up so they could do training practice. Even though XLR8 had a broken leg, XLR8 got their early which struck her as ironic. Even without her super speed, she was still the first one there.

As soon as she thought that, along came Upgrade who was holding Grey Matter and floating behind them was Ghostfreak.

"Good afternoon XLR8," said Upgrade.

XLR8 nodded to him and said, "Good afternoon."

"How is your leg?" said Grey Matter.

"Terrible."

"Ah…" inquired Upgrade, "then it must be improving; two days ago you said it was horrendous."

"Yes she did," said Grey Matter, "and last week she said it was unbearable."

"Ah, that is good news to hear," said Ghostfreak.

XLR8 had to pull back a smile at their sarcastic wit, whether she liked it or not, they were three of a kind.

"Hey!"

XLR8 turned her head and saw Four Arms waving one of his arms and flying beside him was Stinkfly. Panting behind them was Wildmutt. Four Arms smiled big as he approached XLR8.

"And how is your leg today XLR8?"

Before XLR8 could reply Upgrade said, "She said it was terrible."

Four Arms nodded and said, "That's good, the last time I heard, it was "horrifying."

XLR8 snorted and said, "Alright, enough with the ssssarcastic jokesss."

Four Arms laughed and gently patted her shoulder while saying, "aww, we're just messing around with you!"

Stinkfly got to the side of XLR8 and pulled her in close and said, "Aye! You're a good person to tease! And the way I heard it…laughter is the best medicine!"

XLR8 snorted again and said, "who told you that? Prince Four Armsss?"

Before Stinkfly could respond a new voice popped in, "Oi, are we all here?"

XLR8 twisted her head and saw Diamondhead standing near them. His grey slated eyes peered at each and everyone of them in a calculating way.

"Yep!" said Grey Matter, "…well…almost everyone…"

"Who is gone?"

"Well…as we all know," said Four Arms, "Heatblast is gone on his training mission with Cannon Bolt but I do not know about Ripjaws."

"Ripjaws…" interrupted Stinkfly, "is in bed, she was feeling a little bit tired today and so she is taking a nap."

"But where is Blizzard?"

"Here I am!"

The team members turned around and saw Blizzard running up to them as fast as she could. When she stopped in front of them, she paused to catch her breath and said, "sorry I'm late, I nearly forgot all about it! I hope I didn't miss anything important!"

XLR8 snarled at her incompetence, before she could make a sarcastic reply, Stinkfly said, "Nah, we all just got here, in fact, Diamondhead I believe was just about to make a speech."

Out of the corner of XLR8's eye she thought she saw Upgrade looking a bit discomforted with the arrival of Blizzard. Even though Upgrade has minimal facial features, she knew him long enough to know when he had certain moods displayed on his face.

Diamondhead was silent for a moment but then nodded his head, "right. Okay, now before we begin our training session, I must put emphasis that we must prepare ourselves for the Metal Trial. Unlike in the other Trials, you are fighting by yourself. Five of us will be picked to fight and that's it. We don't know who that will be so we all have to be in our best condition the day of the Trial. It is up to those five to make sure that we get to stay here at the Academy. We do not know who we are fighting yet, but we will know in about a day so when we do we must form strategies…"

The dreading sense of worthlessness came back to XLR8, she felt the heavy weight of the cast upon her leg as she thought more and more about the Trial. Diamondhead's pep talk made her feel more and more sick.

"…so now that I have said all of that, we must have a good training session. Alright?"

"Diamondhead?" said Four Arms.

"What?"

"…can we…can we be with Yang?"

Diamondhead was taken aback with this comment and said, "…why?"

"Well…after that depressing pep talk…we need something happy…or…light…to balance out the dark…"

Diamondhead gave a snarl and said, "No, if I let him out, he will be merely a distraction and we would not be able to train at our best…"

"But Yin…"

"No, and that is final, now come on…"

The team looked at each other and back at Diamondhead, after hesitating for a moment; they all began to follow Diamondhead to the training building.

XLR8 grabbed her crutches tightly and began to walk as fast as she could with them. When she first got her crutches, she was quite slow with them and that frustrated her, now however, she was able to walk at the same pace that the rest of her team walked in.

As she was walking with them she heard some interesting conversations sprout up from her team members.

"…I met that Ditto guy today and his Enigma Force…"

"…you seem to be meeting these guys a lot lately…"

"…she must be quite a player…"

"…the library has a new shipment of books in…"

"…oh superb!...I wonder what they have now…"

"…they still haven't told me why they have all of those unusual traits though…"

"…do you suppose there is a new book about psychology?"

"…bark!...bark!..."

"…I have been training lots lately with Sensei Wildvine…"

"…did they even catch those guys yet?..."

"…hopefully there is a new shipment of magic books in…"

"…bark!...bark!..."

While XLR8 was listening, she began to wonder how so much had happened while she was at the hospital, being gone for so long made XLR8 feel left out. She blinked and looked forward to see that Diamondhead was the only one not talking. Hobbling forward at a faster pace, she caught up to him and the two of them were in front of the team. Diamondhead looked down and saw her, he nodded to her and said, "how is your leg?"

XLR8 paused before saying, "it'ssss good…"

"That's good; I was hoping you would say that. I just want to tell you that I have complete faith in you weather or not you get your cast off and your leg is healed."

"You do?"

Diamondhead nodded and said, "you are, above all, an excellent fighter and you have superb wits. I'm sure that even if you still had the broken leg, you would be able to win."

XLR8 was shocked from this comment but recovered somewhat and said, "Th-thank you…Diamondhead…and I am sure that you will win too…"

Diamondhead made a face and said, "I don't know…I still am not good enough to fight at my best…"

"What do you mean? Of coursssse you are able to fight at your best!"

Diamondhead shook his head and said, "No I am not…look at me…I'm only half a personality that is in a rather large body. If I…or we…it's so confusing…if we don't pull together, I will not achieve stability with my mind and body. The body can go only so far without the mind's help…"

XLR8 was silent, her mind's gears slowly turned while processing this information. All this time, she was worried about her own self and her broken leg. She never took the time to think about other people's problems. For her, her leg will heal in due time but what about everyone else? For Grey Matter, he is small and will continue to be small for his entire life, he would have to face many problems every day that normal sized people do not even think about. Upgrade too will not be able to eat, to smell, to breathe and to enjoy characteristics that organisms get to enjoy. Looking at those two and her other teammate's bad traits, she was glad that currently she only had a broken leg.

Suddenly, the cast on her leg didn't seem so heavy.

Before XLR8 could continue the conversation, Diamondhead stopped. XLR8 also stopped and the teammates behind them suddenly stopped chattering. Wondering what had happened; XLR8 looked forward to see why everyone was quiet.

There, standing in front of the training building's door, was an odd looking fellow. The first thing that XLR8 noticed about him was the way he that he was dressed and how much it contrasted his features. He had on a slick, black colored suit that was iron down and looked spic and span. His arms were crossed with each other leaving his exposed hands that were purple. After this quick look at the suit, XLR8 got a good look at his face and was surprised by what she saw. She saw, instead of a handsome face that might have gone nicely with the suit, an ugly, deformed, purplish face that had two rather large eyeballs and a wide grin. He had no hair and no nose but he did have nicely polished shoes. It took awhile for XLR8 to then recall that this person that was standing in front of them was a Sludge only in a more humanoid form. Before anyone could say something, the Sludge spoke in a voice that sounded like his vocal chords were missing.

"Good day," he said nodding his head a bit, "it is a pleasure to meet the great Diamondhead and his team. Weheheheeeze!"

The Sludge's laugh sounded like a sick man coughing hard, it sent shivers down XLR8's spine.

"But where are my manners?" said the Sludge, "My name is Sludge "Boron" Hammer. Or, as I'm more commonly known, Sludgehammer. Weheheheeeze!"

Diamondhead had a stone expression on his face this whole time, when he did speak he said, "Good day Mr. Hammer, but if you'll excuse us, we got to do some training practice."

"Ah!" said Sludgehammer whose already long grin got even wider, "but of course! But…you'll have to wait for the rest of my team to come out before you can come in. We just got done with a little training of our own."

Diamondhead tipped his head to the side a bit and said, "and who might those be?"

"They…" said a harsh voice behind Sludgehammer, "are the members who are in the best team in this camp!"

Out from the door of the building came Cuttooth, an evil expression was upon his face as he stood by Sludgehammer.

"Oh Diamondhead!" continued Cuttooth, "why did you have to take away my dear bride? She was all so happy being with me…"

"No she wasn't!" cried Stinkfly suddenly, "she was miserable and she hated being there in the first place. I bet she hates you even more!"

Ripjaws got a red glare upon his motionless eyeballs, he then said, "how dare you speak out to me like that you…Fly…? Who gave you such right to disrespect the better species?"

"That's enough Cuttooth!" said a feminine voice.

XLR8 focused on the next person who came out of the door, the person was what appeared like a combination between an eagle and a human. She had large feathers shooting out of her arms; these feathers formed a beautiful green and yellow plumage that made her look very stunning. She had a beak like mouth and hair-like feathers sprouting from her head. She wore a purple vest and very baggy orange pants.

The girl grabbed Cuttooth and grasped his shoulder tightly, she then said, "listen now, we don't want to stir any trouble."

Cuttooth shrugged her hand off of his shoulder but did not say anything.

"Oi!" said a cheerful voice, "what seems to be the hold up?"

Coming right out of the door was Ditto and his friend Eyeguy. The two of them looked at Cuttooth in an annoyed way. Ditto then said, "what kind of trouble is Cuttooth been getting into this time?"

Ditto then spotted Stinkfly and suddenly looked embarrassed, he then smiled sheepishly and shrugged as if saying "I never wanted to be with them in the first place."

Stinkfly was also shocked but she nodded her head as if saying, "I know, I know."

Sludgehammer then said, "Oh you know Cuttooth, always wanting to bite someone's head off at any given notice! Weheheheheeeze!"

It was just then that three more things came out of from the door to join Cuttooth's team. One of them looked like a large wolf that stood on its hind legs. Another was what appeared to be a mummy that had purplish glowing eyes. The third one that prowled out of the door was a rather large Vulpimancer quite unlike the species that Wildmutt was. This Vulpinmancer had several, thick orange stripes riding down its back. It also had a longer jaw and bigger, more curved claws. When Wildmutt saw this Vulpimancer he began to growl in a threatening voice.

When the three creatures arrived Cuttooth smugged and said, "and these three monsters over here are Wolfy, Mummy and Vulpine. They are basically our muscle men and cronies. We tell them what to do and they do it, except for Vulpine though, sometimes he might disobey, but we teach him to behave. None of them have ever spoken before so we have all given them names."

"Is that all of your team?" said Diamondhead.

Before Cuttooth could say anything, Sludgehammer said, "not quite. We are missing two members."

"The robot and the new guy," said Cuttooth, "They had to do something important today so they couldn't make it to our little training practice."

"The way I see it…" interjected Stinkfly who pushed her way to the front to meet them face to face, "even if you do any training whatsoever, you will still suck!"

"Watch your mouth Fly!" said Cuttooth getting more and more angry.

"Don't call me a Fly, you Crocodile! I tell you, I have seen pretty mean guys but you take the cake!"

"At least I'm not a Fly!" said Cuttooth looking proud at that comment.

"Oh…so even though I am a…Fly…then why is it that your bride is my roommate?"

Cuttooth screamed at this comment and ran forward to Stinkfly with his hands up to strangle her. Four Arms was quick to react to this and he step in front of Stinkfly just in time. He grabbed Cuttooth's arms and held them in stark position. Cuttooth screamed and with quick like speed he slipped out of Four Arm's grasped and grabbed one of his arms. Screaming again, he picked up Four Arms and threw him over his head and slammed him hard to the ground. Cuttooth kicked him once while he was still on the ground and then he turned his head to Stinkfly. Before he could run over to her, Diamondhead quickly grabbed Cuttooth and using quick motions, he tripped Cuttooth and let go of Cuttooth. Cuttooth fell to the ground just like Four Arms though not as hard. It was just then when a mature voice spoke up.

"What's going on here?"

XLR8 looked around and saw coming towards them at a running pace Professor Victor the science teacher. He stopped right in front of them all and said, "that's enough out of all of you! You can do your fighting at the Metal Trial but not on the campus grounds! Cuttooth, how many times have I told you to control your anger?"

Cuttooth by now had stagger up and had an angry expression on his face. In response to Professor Victor's comment, he said, "sorry Professor…" though one could easily tell, that he was not sorry.

Professor Victor turned to Diamondhead and said, "I am sorry for my student's behavior, I hope he didn't give you much trouble."

Diamondhead shook his head.

Professor Victor then looked at Cuttooth's team and shook his head, "Well…come on you dopes, I got to update you on a few things and give you each brief talkings…especially you Cuttooth."

Cuttooth snarled but said nothing, together, he and his team slowly walked away with Professor Victor leaving the scene quiet again. However, not all of the team members left…

XLR8 saw that Sludgehammer was still there, he smiled and shook his head and said, "that Cuttooth can be quite a character. Weheheheheheeeze!"

"Get out of here…" said XLR8 menacingly.

"Do not fret for I am leaving!" he said, "but before I go I must tell you something. The team that you will be facing in the Metal Trial will be us."

He then began to walk off; as he was walking he suddenly stopped and said, "Oh…do you know what the students have decided to name our team?"

XLR8 and the others said nothing.

"Quite a good name actually, we are known as…Team Nightmare. Good name isn't? WEHEHEHEHEEEEZEE!"

Suddenly, the weight of the cast that XLR8 was wearing, felt heavy again.