The Moral Committee

by 5kin

"Ugh! I'm always treated like the youngest, just because I was born last...that isn't fair! We're triplets! We all have the same birthday!" — Bubble's diary. The three sister formerly known as the POWERPUFF GIRLS as a "band name" they'd created as children are now grown up and facing trouble, in the form of three, rebellious teenage boys... FULL DESCRIPTION INSIDE!

5. Chapter 3 :: Homework

THE MORAL COMMITTEE ::: CHAPTER THREE ::: HOMEWORK

Today felt like a truly, insurmountable challenge for each of the Utonium girls. After yesterday's brawl and pursuit, they're just now feeling the after effects of exerting one's body to nearly its limit. The pain in their joints and the numbness of their muscles wreaked havoc on their school performance- and to make matters worse...

Each one of them had some kind of practice today.
Wavering, yet melodic, a tone sang behind Bubbles' lips as she hummed softly to herself to escape the pain wrapping her body in its grasp. Today's practice meant conditioning for volleyball, and that meant four laps around the school's half a mile long track that wrapped around the football field. Such a task would usually pose no problem for a well rested, well adjusted woman like herself, but being that today she is neither one of these things, she requires all the preparation she can get.

Being as it is so hot outside, today's conditioning gear consisted of a simple white t-shirt and dark blue compression shorts. She knelt down on the hot black track to secure the white laces on her light blue sneakers, and extended her leg further out to stretch the tight muscles in her thighs. Afterwards, she stood straight, her back fully erect and her arms stretching high above her head to crack her creaky vertebrae. Then, she bent over to place her palms on the ground and stretch her hips.

Ready.

She would begin slowly, jogging her way into a steady quicker paced run. Running the straight a ways, and jogging the curves of the track, was her strategy to keep from tiring out too quickly during conditioning. One lap down, two laps down...

"Hey! Bubbles!"

She could hear the call of her name from a distance, on the opposite side of the track is where she zeroed in on its origins. Around the track and behind the gate, a petite young man with spikes of blonde raised atop his head cried, and waved to her in an attempt to reel her attention. This time, she ran all the way through, both the straights and the curves, to get to the other side of the field and meet him at the steel barred gate that he eagerly wrapped his hands around. "Boomer..." Bubbles said, out of breath, "what's...what's up?"

"You look tired!" He teased, his smile radiant, but mocking. Bubbles pouted, though her brows furrowed aggressively, and immediately, Boomer shrunk away from the fence waving his hands, "Hah! Sorry! I'm sorry! I didn't mean it like—"

"What do you want?" She questioned him, more assertively this time as she leaned forward to catch her breath with her hands on her knees. Boomer flung his arm back and his hand behind his head, nervously scratching the shaved portion of his hair thoughtfully.

"Sorry. For yesterday," He began meekly, "I— I didn't mean to blow smoke in your face! I didn't know you were allergic!"

"That was you!?"

"Y—yeah! But I didn't mean to- honest! I just looked over and, I- you were standing there when I exhaled. Please!" Boomer bowed his head, clapping his hands together whilst pleading for forgiveness, "I really need your help! Tomorrow, my anatomy teacher is giving this huge test, and I've been too busy to study! I don't know any of the materials...!"

"Busy, huh?" Bubbles huffed, her cheek, puffed out as she thought. She closed her eyes and leaned backwards, her hands clamped to her hips, "I have two laps left. After I finish, I'll come back to you with my answer."

Boomer's eyes lit up, back to their lustrous shine of hope and giddy, "I'll run them! I'll run them with you!" He exclaimed. Bubbles drew back in appall, racking her mind for a response that would keep him from fulfilling his statement, "Well, you can't! The gate is locked for conditioning, and you can't get insi—"

She opened her eyes to find only his scuffed white sneakers before them, squeaking against the bars of the gate as he climbed it. His left leg thrown over the top, and then his right, and leaped down to touch down safely beside her. Usually, she would protest to his action, but finding that he'd already made it inside the gates, it had made any further protest obsolete at this point. So, she'd simply go along with it. "Just— keep up! Okay?" She remarked smugly. Boomer nodded his head in response, and took off on steady foot behind her as she began her run around the track.

An easy run with Boomer keeping up with her pace, the two of them running side by side. It was brisk, the cool air hitting their warm bodies as they rushed through it. Boomer panting softly as he began to talk, "So, this...this is...conditioning? For what!?"

"Volleyball try-outs," Bubbles' response remained short and brief, as she retained most of her breath for the sake of running and only that. They made the straight, and now, slowly jogged the short curve of the track, Boomer's stride now wavering.

"So, about this test—"

"Yeah?"

"From what she told me it's...pretty long and it's...really in depth about...blood and...and blood..." He wheezed violently, coming to a halt in his run behind Bubbles and bending over to grasp his knees. She hadn't yet realized his absence until coming to the conclusion that it had been too quiet to her left side, and turned her head to find him astray. Several feet behind her, out of breath on the track. "I'll..." Boomer waved his arm high in the air and shouted with all the breath he had, "I'll catch back up with you! I mean...I'll wait...for you too...sheesh!"

Bubbles giggled, returning to her own run, tranquil and silent. Completing her final two laps, both times passing Boomer in his stationary position in the middle of the track at its halfway point, only the second time, did she stop, and take to his side...

"Okay," she said suddenly. Boomer looked up from the tar black ground and into her eyes, for they stood at about the same height, him only outgrowing her by an inch or maybe two. "O...okay?"

"I've decided," Bubbles sighed softly, dragging out her response to increase suspense, and watching the young man's face contort in nervousness was all too entertaining, "I'll help you."

"Ah!" Boomer collapsed, his welling emotions proved to be overwhelming to his fatigue. He knelt beside her and took to wrapping his long arms around her legs, pulling her into his head as he pressed his cheek into her thigh. "Thank you! Thank you! Wow, you're so much nicer than your sisters- I thought for sure you'd turn me down! I would fail this thing for sure without your help! Oh, thank you-!"

"G..." Bubbles stuttered, her speech scattered and raised in embarrassment, "get off, let me go before I change my mind...!"

At least he isn't as much of a lecher as his brother...

The whistle blew its sharp siren as cue for the girls participating in conditioning to gather up and exit the track, as it was time to leave and enter the actual gym. "Alright! All o' ya, clear the track! The cross country team is comin' in for their practice..." Their coach, a pudgy short old man probably in his early fifties, called out to all the woman on the field. His white varsity school issued t-shirt drenched in his own, dark sweat, as well as his glistening forehead. He raked his fingers through his graying locks of brunette hair, and grumbled to himself lowly about the heat, as far as anyone could hear...

"Jeez," Boomer griped as he stood to his feet and brushed the dirt from his trousers, "Who is that?"

"That's our coach," Bubbles replied flatly, "he's a total grease ball! And, sometimes we even catch him looking at some of the girl's butts. We call him the Roach Coach in the locker room and around the school."

"Locker room, huh?" He closed his eyes, cooing softly to himself as his mind brought to life the imagery of what he'd thought it'd be like to be in the girl's locker room, "I wonder what that's like..."

Breasts. Butts. Panties. Bras. Naked teenage girls showering, lathering their hands in foamy soap and caressing each other's skin with gentle touches-

Bubbles only stared silently in resent.

Maybe he is a lecher like his brother.

"Oi! Bubbles!" Buttercup called out to her sister from beyond the field, "Get yer ass outta here...hey, and take your boyfriend with ya. Cross country team's here, ya heard 'im!?" She teased. Bubbles face tore into a bright pink, hot from frustration, and Boomer's, hot pink from embarrassment, "B-boyfriend?"

"Buttercup!" Bubbles cried, "That's not funny! I...ngh! C'mon, Boomer!"

She snatched Boomer by the arm of his cobalt blue cardigan which he wore over his initial white school-issued uniform button up shirt, and escorted him and herself off the track in anger.

XXX

"Forty— forty!" The score taker resided safely on the outside of the court, where he continued to call out the progress of their practice tennis match.

"C'mon Blossom!" Her adoring tennis companions cried from the sidelines, aiding her with motivational mantras, "You can do it! You're both tied up! Stay sharp! You can win this thing!"

Focus. Ardent eyes stared down the stature of her opponent, the position in her serve— and in her mind she'd concocted a prediction of where the ball would end up. So she'd pounce for it when it did. The world moves in slow motion, reality stops and runs thick and gradually so her mind misses not a single meticulous detail. Not one.

Though as exhausted as she was, she wouldn't let a meager thing like tiredness get in the way of her crushing her competitor, even if this was only a friendly scrimmage. She would prevail, victorious over all—!

That is, she thought she would, until her eyes flicker and she misses a move in her foe's serve that may just end the game for her. She pushed off the ground on the ball of her pink tennis shoes, ripping across the court to strike her move. A split second before the ball would hit the ground a second time, and miss the palm of her racquet. With a last minute swing of her arm, she thrusted her racquet upward and caught the ball in its links, sending it just barely, over the net and onto the opponent's side of the court. A second too late, and she would've surely lost the game.

Her competitor dashed to the net further down the court from where she stood at the end. She lunged and slid to hit the ball, swinging beneath it rather than upon it, and missing her chance to retaliate before she struck the ground with her anterior body.

Blossom won, and by a single thread of hair. She crumbled to the ground in relief and sighed, as the final words of the score keeper were called out loud in announcement to the entire court— "Game point!"

"Yes!" Blossom cheered, she threw her arms up high in air and toppled backwards onto the court's hard ground. I almost thought I wouldn't make it...I felt like I was gonna die—

"Nice scrimmage!" One of Blossoms cheerful companions ran onto the court to assist her in standing back up to her gelatin consistency legs. They shared a laugh before their departure, where Blossom made her way to the net, to shake the hand of her opponent as any good gamesman would do. She glanced over her shoulder before turning, catching in her peripheral, the sight of Bubbles, at a distance, with another familiar blonde headed young man. A familiar blonde headed man who may or may not have had a hand in almost costing her her scrimmage. Blossom grit her teeth in aggravation and murmured under her breath, her sister's name in vein, "Bubbles..."

XXX

"Can you wait out here?" Bubbles turned away from Boomer and stretched her arms high, "I'm going to take a quick shower, and change. It won't take long!"

"Sure," Boomer waved for their short farewell, "I'll be waiting! I'll be right here!"

She nodded understandingly, and disappeared inside of the locker room, leaving Boomer out in the open, empty gymnasium. He tucked his hands into his deep baggy pockets, twisting and turning around on the shiny, freshly waxed gym floor. "Sports, eh?" He muttered softly, looking high up in the air at the glass backboard of a basketball hoop.

He corrected his stance, forming the perfect stature for shooting a basketball at his distance from the hoop— and leaped gently off the ground, flicking his wrist to shoot his imaginary ball into the net. Swoosh! And the crowd goes wild—!

Silent, but unmistakably, wild. Maybe, because there is no crowd. He folds his hands back into his pockets, and drags his feet along the squeaky floor, to the folded-in bleachers where he leans patiently in wait of Bubbles' return. Several minutes would pass, before a single sign of life would appear in the silent gym— two signs of life, in fact.

"Hey Boom," it was his brother, Brick, who called out to him in such a manner, that it shook the entire tranquility of the gym to its very core, causing it to shatter into millions of shards. Followed by him was his second brother, Butch, trailing silently in Brick's path, "Whatcha' doin' in here, all by yourself?"

"N—nothing!" Boomer hesitated, his hands flying out of his pockets, and his cream face gone red, "W—what are you guys doing in here!?"

"Just lookin' for our favorite brother—" Brick came to his quivering brother's side, and leaned against the exterior of the bleachers. He bowed forward, lower and lower until he'd reached the level to speak directly into Boomer's ear, and said wolfishly, "Where is she?"

Huh? Boomer exchanged with his brother, a look of bewilderment, a gesture for Brick to elaborate further on his interrogative, "Aw, c'mon Boom! We saw ya come in here with a blonde chick— who is she? She looked good from behind—"

"Wha...what do you mean?" Boomer retorted.

Brick narrowed his eyes thinly, and smirked, "You knew the gym's empty. So ya brought her in here ta...eh? Have a little, fun?"

"No!" Boomer ripped from his body, an exclamation of protest, "Wait— you watched me come in here with a girl, so you two just follow me!?"

"We're lookin' out for ya, isn't that right Butch?" Brick elbowed Butch playfully in his ribcage. The man kept still, his arms folded into one another over the bust of his carelessly thrown on school cardigan, draped over a dark green collared shirt, and unironed with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and the collar crooked. Brick neglected to show any signs of the uniform at all whatsoever, wearing everything, the cardigan, the collared shirt, everything beneath a baggy crimson red jacket which he kept zipped up only a little bit over the middle of his core. And still, although against school policy, he wore that signature red cap, only different from yesterday's. With the word "BOY" jutting out the front, which had been turned to the back, in bold white three dimensional font.

"Whew!" Bubbles exclaimed, as she departed from the locker room door, she swung her book bag's strap over her shoulder— "Oh."

Ah, her favorite brothers. All in the same place, Brick and Butch at Boomer's side, and Boomer's face beaming a bright red. She pinched her hands to her hips and sighed, puffing out her cheek, before speaking flatly, "It's you guys. Hello, Brick. Hello, Butch."

"Tch," Brick shot his glare back down at his flustered brother, "her? Aw, Boomer—"

"Hm? What about me—?"

"N—nothing!" Boomer blustered, "Come on Bubbles, we'd better go to the library now! Y'know, where it's nice, and quiet—"

"I've had it about up to here with your attitude mister!" Bubbles directed to Brick, nearing him more and more until she practically stood on the toes of his sneakers. "And you! Actually— the both of you," she pointed a stern blue-painted fingernail at both him and Butch, "you two had better start going to class, or else you'll really hurt yourselves later on..."

"Fuck no," Brick scoffed, "fuck that! I've got better things to do than sit my ass down in some boring ass classroom..."

"Yeah, and since when do you care about us going to class?" Butch finally spoke out. Bubbles leaned, drawn aback by the tone in his voice, having not heard him speak often had left her in an enigmatic haze about how he'd sounded...until today. And she had to admit, although it may not look as he appears, it had an a lot more soothing tone than his brother's, Brick's.

"Yeah!" Brick blared in agreement, "Hell yeah! I thought you and your 'committee's' goal was to knock us out of school anyway."

"It isn't my committee—" In fact, the entire committee idea was Blossom's creation alone, "—and I'm not trying to get rid of you guys!"

"Well, the crazy one sure is," Brick snorted, "she's been at our throats for the longest! About every little damn thing...say..." He leaned into her, invading Bubbles' personal space unapologetically and without hesitation, or caution, "You say you're not tryna get rid of us? Not even after what we did yesterday? Why's that, huh?"

Bubbles shrank back from Brick's body and held her ground several inches away from where she'd first positioned herself, "Because! Believe it or not..."

She inhaled hard, and exhaled softly. Dropping her head and pressing the pads of her fingers to her forehead as she shook it, her blonde twintails swaying gently in her motion, "I can't believe I'm about to actually say this..."

"Bubbles," Boomer shook his head rapidly, crossing his arms over each other in the shape of an X, a more than obvious gesture for her to cease speaking to his brothers.

"I think," She began, in spite of his heeding, "that...there's actually a chance for you guys...to change. And, well. I think that, with a little push—" and by a little, she meant a huge push, "—you guys could, actually make it through our senior year, without anymore mayhem, and you could actually come out with a diploma! Believe it or not, a diploma opens up more opportunities for things in the real world than you think—"

Brick squinted his eyes thinly, he glanced at his brothers, Butch still in his standing silence. And Boomer, with his face buried in his palms, shaking his head. Then, back to Bubbles, who stared with an expression that read, hopeful for a response from the three of them.

"This one," Brick laughed. He flicked his tongue out from its cavern in his mouth, and bit it hard between his teeth, before reeling it back in, "I thought the redhead was pretty hot— this one is cute."

She dropped the lids of her eyes, heavy with disappointment, and rolled her orbs around in their sockets before she took Boomer's hand aggressively into her own, "Let's go, Boomer. To the library!"

Boomer followed, so quickly and so ready to escape his brothers in fact, that he practically led Bubbles out the gym, until they reached the safety of the hallway, and he could breathe easy...

XXX

In the library

Where the pair sat, far in the back of the large room at a table empty except for the both of them, had been the perfect environment for Bubbles to continue her teachings.

If Boomer had been listening.

He was only watching, silently, with his cheek resting in his palm, he could see her mouth moving, and yet it was completely silent. His mind received no sound other than his own inner conscious, screaming at him and tearing at his ears from the inside. It became excruciating, unbearable—

"Y'know," Bubbles said, "this would probably stick better if you took some notes—"

"Bubbles?" Boomer spoke quietly, his hands cupped over his ears and flattened to rub them gently before releasing them again. Bubbles brought her eyes up from one of the several open textbooks on the table, and looked to Boomer, "Can I ask you something?"

"What is it?" Bubbles asked. He sat silently, his back against the back of his chair and his hands tight between his knees.

"Are we...I mean. To you," he hesitated, and then, he breathed lightly, "are we friends?"

She blinked, silent and intrigued, only staring and bewilded by the very question. To her? Are they friends? Although the idea's never crossed her mind that he was no more to her than a classmate in need of tutoring and assistance...now the question lurked her mind to it's very center. It ran through every nook and open crevice in search of an answer, an answer in which, regrettably, she may not even have. Taking her eyes off of Boomer, she looked back down to the textbook in front of her, all of it's small font became, simple splotches on paper.

Friends.

Could they be friends? With the posing threat of her sisters? And let alone, his brothers. Or at least Brick.

"Nevermind," Boomer shook his head, locks of blonde flopping wildly atop it, "it was a dumb question. Sorry. I won't ask anymore—"

"Of course," Bubbles peeped. She looked to him and smiled, closing her eyes and cocking her head slightly. Without a response, she grew curious and opened her eyes once more, to find Boomer, again, in a stage of scarlet red. He blurted out in nervous laughter, quickly shielding his mouth with his hands and bringing his volume down to an acceptable minimum for their environment, "Aha...sorry..."

"What's wrong?" She questioned, "Why'd you ask me that?"

"Well, it's just that...I've never had...a friend that's a girl before," he said. Boomer stared down at the table, not a single book, nor sheet of paper lied before him, but he looked down as if to read endlessly on a script or sheet of paper, "Or you see. Any friend really. It's always been me and those two, for as long as I can remember. Other people just kinda shut us out...and because I fall in their shadow...sometimes, people will look at me like I'm a monster. But you know! Those two aren't really as bad as people think!"

He nervously gripped the edge of his seat, his shoulders raising to cover his face, "I never had anyone to talk to about it because my brothers drove almost everyone away, except you and your sisters. Your sisters hate me, but you...I was scared to keep you around them because, you, you're really nice to me. I didn't want you to wind up hating me either, or get driven away by what they do, and how they drag me into it. Like yesterday...I'm really sorry...for blowing smoke in your face—"

"That was you!?" Bubbles shrieked. She'd nearly lunged up from her seat in her chair, but fell back down and pierced his being with her intense glare.

"Y—yes! I—I—I'm sorry! I didn't mean to," Boomer ducked into his shoulders for safety and leaned sideways, away from Bubbles, "I was just nervous, and I'd held my breath and— when I went to jump out the window, I turned my head and— you were just standing there! I got scared and I wound up, exhaling really hard...I didn't know you were asthmatic..."

"I'm not asthmatic," Bubbles ground out bitterly. Boomer perked up immediately to her response, looking over to her, and then back to the table with a soft sigh, "Oh. Thank goodness..."

"But it still hurt!" Bubbles yapped, "You nearly blinded me!"

"I'm sorry!"

"Ugh," she groaned, tapping her fingernails on the table top, "fine. Apology accepted. Whatever..."

"Hey...but...since we're...y'know," Boomer began, scattered and nervous, "since we're friends and all. Does that mean I can like, tell you stuff? Y'know, and you'd listen to me? And not just tell me to shut up, or call me annoying, or tell me that I complain or I talk too much?"

"That's what friends are for," Bubbles retorted curiously, "why? Is there something you wanna tell me? I'm here. I'm listening."

Drawn to nothing but silence, Boomer only stared at the table top in complete stiffness, motionless and wordless. He whipped his head back up and smiled, waving his hands wildly before Bubbles' face to avert her curious stare and her question elsewhere, "L—let's just study for now! Okay!?"

Bubbles blinked, she watched him with an observant eye that caught every detail of his expression and body language— a skill Blossom had helped her work on personally. How he diverted her interrogative, his silence and his gloomy face. His darkened eyes brought to nothing but hollow pots where his glistening blues once shined lustrous with life and joy.

But she wouldn't go there. That was a line for him to cross, when he was ready, and comfortable. To open up to someone who has only just announced them self as a companion to you is a task she would expect no one to fulfill, especially if the subject of what the other person is inquiring upon is sensitive. She only smiled, the warmest way she could, and slid her textbook to the center of the both of them, nodding her head in silence. But understanding.

"Sure," Bubbles laughed, and she traced the lines of the book gradually with the tip of her finger for Boomer's eyes to follow along, and his writing hand to carry his pencil carefully along the lines of college ruled binder paper that was just given to him, by a friend.