"Heather, how bad can labor pains possibly be?" Alejandro asked his girlfriend as they sat next to each other on the couch. Snuggled together in a blanket during late autumn, somehow they had made their way to the subject of pregnancy, which Alejandro was excited for, while Heather detested the very thought of and gave him 20 reasons of why that was such a bad idea. "Are you kidding me? Going into labor would seriously be some of the worst pain I could go through, and I've been through plenty enough already, thank you very much."
Alejandro chuckled, "Are you telling me that it would be even more painful than what we went through on Total Drama?" Looking him dead straight in the eyes, Heather said, "Yes."
Scoffing, Alejandro asked "I just don't understand how it can be so painful, women have given birth to children for centuries, and even if the pains were that bad, why don't women just stop giving birth?" Heather only glared at him for the obvious answer to such a stupid question. "You know why!" Heather yelled annoyed, as she slapped his arm half-threateningly and half-playfully. Shielding himself, Alejandro laughed, "And besides, men can go through pain probably just as bad as childbirth," Glaring at him, Heather asked "Oh yeah and what exactly would that be?" "…perhaps getting kicked in the groin area? And I know first hand how painful that can be thanks to you." Heather slightly cringed, "Yeah… right". Alejandro wasn't exactly mad about that little fact anymore, but it made for a good way to guilt Heather sometimes, besides he actually enjoyed kissing her too much to really mind anymore.
"Well, I still think labor pains is the worst pain you can feel, despite genders." Heather retorted back. Sighing, Alejandro simply said "Fine fine, you are right…" just so they wouldn't have to fight over it. He still fully believed in his mind that what he said was true, labor pains are not that painful but unfortunately, Heather could hear the lie in his words. "You don't think I'm right! Do you? And don't even try to lie again! I can tell you know!"
"Heather please, I don't want to fight about this anymore," Alejandro said, "can't we just forget about it?" Sitting up and crossing her arms, Heather replied "No, we can't, and I'll prove how bad labor pains can be." Getting up, Heather quickly threw on a coat and boots, grabbing cellphone and purse. "Where are you going?" Alejandro asked as Heather opened the front door of their apartment, hoping to coax Heather into staying and cuddling with him for the rest of the evening. "Just going out to find a way to show you how wrong you are, nothing that should be even remotely hard to do." Heather said behind her back as she walked out, locking the door behind her.
Okay, if I was a way to show how right I am, and also a way to work as revenge too, what would I be? Unfortunately, Heather didn't exactly have an answer, but she knew someone who could. Getting cellphone out of purse, Heather scrolled to the C's on her phone and looked until she found one certain former C.I.T.
An hour later, Heather was waiting inside the Caffeine Cafe, waiting for Courtney to show up. When Heather explained her situation, Courtney was more than ready to help, apparently she and Jośe were having a similar argument at their place, and Courtney had headed out to cool down for a bit. Heather stared at her cup of coffee wondering where Courtney was. It's getting pretty late, and this is weird since Courtney is never late for anything. Heather thought to herself. Suddenly the bell on the door rang open, and she looked up to see Courtney walking in. Waving her arm up, Courtney spotted her and headed to her table with what appeared to be a laptop case.
"Hey Heather," Courtney said as she sat down with the laptop case. "so I was thinking about what you said and remembered watching this Youtube video a while back, and what I believe will be the answer to our problems." Opening her laptop out, she looked up "child labor pain simulator" and clicked the first video with two guys on the thumbnail. As the video played Heather and Courtney watched as the two men talked about how they wanted to find out if labor pains were really all that it's cracked up to be, and went to the hospital to be hooked up to the labor pain simulator machine.
The nurses explained that they will have to endure two hours of the pain simulation to really understand what labor pains feel like. As she placed the electrodes onto their bell muscles, she said that they will probably scream out loud from the pain. Already the two guys were tense from just the patches being placed on them and as the machine started up they felt little jolts of it run up the electrode patches.
Once the entire video had ended, Heather was feeling like they had their solution. "We have to do this to Alejandro and Jośe, no doubt about it." Heather said as she grinned eagerly. "But… how?" Heather asked Courtney, who obviously had something figured out.
"My mom's friend works at the hospital and she would gladly give them the labor pain simulation." Courtney explained. "Perfect, but how do we get them to come? I'm sure if they saw the video, and knew what we were planning, they wouldn't learn their lesson." Heather asked. "Hmm, that's true… " Courtney said as she began to think to herself, sipping her coffee. Suddenly, she had an idea. "Let's just trick them to come by saying we have a very special surprise for them and drive them over ourselves in blindfolds. You think they'd fall for it?" Courtney asked.
Heather only smiled as she said "Perfect"
"Heather? Where exactly are you taking me?" Alejandro asked nervously as he sat in the back seat of her car, blindfolded. He knew that she hadn't let go that certain issue they "talked" about yesterday but even if he thought he was prepared for everything, he certainly wasn't even close to understanding what on earth Heather had planned. And this terrified him. "Oh, just you wait." Heather said in a teasing matter (that was also somewhat frightening as well).
When she had come back home last night, she was in all too much of a good mood for something not to be happening, to him specifically. Alejandro could sense some sort of impending doom heading towards him so in the case of curiosity and desperately wanting to what was going on, he pulled one side of the blindfold up, revealing a large white building in front of them. He would have looked more carefully at the building if Heather hadn't suddenly stopped the car abruptly, startling him and making his hand fall down so he was completely blind again.
He heard Heather take the key out of the engine and quickly opened the back door to retrieve blind Alejandro. As he slid his way out of the seat, he was starting to really fear for his life. With the help of his ears, he heard him and Heather walking on a pavement and then sliding doors. When they entered the room, he was hit with sudden cool air and sounds of beeping. Before he could open his mouth, Heather pulled him to the left and into an elevator.
He suddenly heard whispering and two other people's footsteps enter the elevator too. Unfortunately, the whispering was too soft for him to hear but he could make out the words "I can't wait." Feeling suspicious, he tried his best to move around slightly to hopefully get a better hearing on who Heather was talking with, but the elevator rang and he heard the doors open while Heather ushered him into a room. He could hear the other two people being shuffled in as well. "Okay Alejandro," Heather said, "and Jośe." a female voice finished.
Wait, was that?— But before he could finish his thought the blindfold was taken off him and there stood Heather, Courtney, and a middle aged women with light tan skin, hair in a bun. When he turned his head to the right side, he saw his brother Jośe and the same, Jośe saw him and they both exclaimed, "What are you doing here?! Heather!? Courtney!?" They yelled at the same time.
"Well, I met up with Courtney last night, and we were thinking: How do two girl get revenge and at the same time, teach their idiot boyfriends a lesson they won't soon forget…?" Heather asked the Burromuerto brothers. "You make them take a pain labor simulator for 2 hours!" Courtney answered.
To the disappointment of both Heather and Courtney, Alejandro and Jośe were overall relieved and sighed deeply. "Is that all? ¡Gracias a dios!, I thought this was going to be something truly horrifying!" Alejandro exclaimed and to which Jośe nodded in agreement to. "What? Y-You're not scared? Like, at all?" Courtney asked the both of them. When they had fixed their composure, Jośe answered "Of course not, both myself and little brother here can agree that pain labors are not that painful, though Al might be just a little nervous." as he grinned smugly watching Alejandro grind down on his teeth and fist his hands.
While those two were arguing about who was the better "man" Courtney was about to break up their little fight when Heather got a brilliant idea. Grabbing Courtney, Heather whispered "Keep it down! You don't want them listening to us!" Courtney whispered back, "Why did you stop me?! They're going to kill themselves fighting over whose stronger or whatever" Heather only whispered in response "Exactly" grinning devilishly, Heather whispered and explained how they could use their boyfriend's HUGE egos to their advantage right now.
Whens she was done, Courtney nodded her head, agreeing with the plan and said "Yeah, you are so right Heather, those two obviously aren't ready to handle something that painful. Besides, Jośe would definitely last longer than Alejandro anyway, it's only logical." Scoffing, Heather said "Please, there's nothing logical about it, and do you even remember who punched out who in All Stars anyway? Alejandro can so be able to beat Jośe as easily as now as he could back then." as she crossed her arms and glared at Courtney. As they continued to fight, Alejandro and Jośe actually watched and paid attention, and while they continued their little rant about which brother was better, Jośe suddenly had a (stupid) idea. "Say, little brother, wouldn't it be nice to show these two wonderful women who really is the better man?" "Que? What exactly are you saying?" Alejandro asked.
"Why not? Let's try out these "pain labor" simulators and see who can go the longest before begging for mercy" Jośe said. Alejandro was very skeptical, unlike his brother, Alejandro knew exactly what Heather was doing and she had somehow persuaded Courtney to play along as well. Unfortunately his logical mind wasn't working at the moment and getting overtaken by his ego telling him to beat his brother at this for the sake of Heather.
Halfheartedly, Alejandro agreed to Jośe's idea and they laid down a few rules, 1) They can scream and kick and try to make themselves more comfortable while on the pain simulator, 2) The person who wants to back out first must call out "I Give Up!" and the machine will be turned off, 3) The loser who decides to quit first must wear a T-Shirt that says "My older/younger brother is better than me" for a week anywhere, and the other option, aka 4) If they somehow make it to the 2 hours mark and complete it, their girlfriends must give them something very special of their choosing when they get to their homes.
After laying down the rules, everyone agreed to the terms and so it began.
"Okay," Courtney's mother's friend, Clarissa said, "now we're going to apply the electrode patches to Alejandro's and Jośe's abdomens, 4 to be exact and sent jolts up and down." When Clarissa had applied the patches on both of them, she said "Now you guys are probably going to want to lie down in the beds for this, but you can move freely after the patches begin working." Which Alejandro and Jośe did, and even with the patches, they only joked of how this was going to be so painful. That was, until the first jolt hit Jośe and Alejandro as the machines were turned on. This was when they started to feel slightly nervous and jittery even though they hid it well out of sight in front of Heather and Courtney. When Clarissa had finally turned both machines on, already Alejandro and Jośe were breathing heavily, though it wasn't that bad for Alejandro since he was already burned alive by lava but even then, it only took 8 minutes more for him to really feel the pain. Discomfort began to take the both of them as Jośe was trying to laugh out the pain and Alejandro stayed as concrete as possible.
Within the first 30 minutes Clarissa explained that they were going into "Fight Mode" where they were resisting the pain but they would have to let it go in order for it to get better for the both of them. "I think it's time for them to get into some real labor pains." Clarissa said, to which Alejandro thought Real? Already what we feel now wasn't real enough?! Alejandro had to admit this was a lot more painful than he had thought and slowly but surely, he was understanding what Heather meant when she said, "Going into labor would seriously be some of the worst pain I could go through."
As the machine was turned up higher, Clarissa and her assistant were each helping them breathe and telling them how they need to try and focus on a point. It was hard but eventually manageable as Alejandro slowly breathed in and out. The pain felt so real and hit him, while his stomach felt twisted inside and being pulled, stretched, slammed together and the process going all over again. He could hear himself and Jośe yelling loudly and kicking the bed with their heels as they tried to control some of the pain.
Off to the side, Heather couldn't be enjoying herself enough, she was sitting and watching Alejandro learn his lesson in the most painful way, including his just-as-jerky older brother. Courtney on the other hand, was growing worried, "Uh Heather, maybe we should stop the machine, I think they've learned their lesson." "What? Courtney come on, if we let them off now, they'll never really learn their lesson, what they WILL know is that we can feel guilty for our actions which is something no man needs to know." As Courtney thought about that, Heather (even though she hid it well) was worried for Alejandro too.
Come on you stupid idiots, give up, just stop this. Heather thought to herself getting more worried. She heard Alejandro say something but it was too quiet to distinguish as she saw him curling up his body to one side with a pillow in between legs, a classic way for girls to relieve cramps during their periods. And Jośe just started kicking the bed again and holding on to his stomach laughing in a maniac sort of way. As another wave of pain was taken over them, they both yelled and screamed trying to not tense up and release the pain little by little. Then Clarissa tried to say "This is no laughing matt-" but Jośe yelled out "Trust me! This is not laughter!" as he curled up onto his sides and screamed into his pillow.
At about the halfway point, they both began to scream out curses in Spanish that weren't understood by anyone else in the room. As they clutched the pillows, and murmured more Spanish words, Alejandro and Jośe began to cry a little into the pillows and stand around, biting down on their shirts that they had taken off at this point, bending over and leaning against walls and chairs. Clarissa and her assistant helped them as much as they could, advising them of how to position themselves.
When the 2 hours was finally over, Clarissa and her assistant turned off the machines and took off the patches. Instant relief hit both of them and they were able to relax into the bed as they just lay there, feeling exhausted and weak.
"Oh my god! Jośe, are you okay?!" Courtney asked as she ran over to his bed. Heather walked over to Alejandro and watched him with his eyes shut. Until he suddenly stirred a little bit and opened his eyes, looking at Heather. "Hey there, how you feeling?" Heather asked in a somewhat gentle yet condescending tone. "Not so good yet not so bad either…" Alejandro murmured. He was feeling too tired to want to do anything right now even with Heather hovering over him with a pitied sort of look on her face (which he despised). Slowly gathering enough strength to get up and sit up on his bed, he rubbed his abdomen, flinching at how tender it was to a single touch right now.
"Look, I didn't think you would actually go through 2 hours of that, I was so sure you just try it for like, 30 minutes and call it off…" Heather said playing with the blankets and avoiding Alejandro's eyes. "And what would that prove? That I am a quitter? No, no I'm sure this is my punishment for doubting you about how painful labor can truly be and for that, I am sorry." Alejandro said wholeheartedly. "Well, now I feel bad" Heather said, rolling her eyes, and a blush forming on her face. "I must admit that was quite the experience, and to think, 2 hours is nothing compared to a day of that much excruciating pain as well." Alejandro said, trying to get up but feeling a little light headed at the moment. Heather carefully wrapped his arm around her shoulders, supporting him on to herself, and helping him get up.
When they had made it out into the parking lot, Alejandro suddenly remembered a certain rule they all had agreed to if they lasted the full 2 hours. "Heather?" Alejandro asked "Mmhm?" Heather replied back, still focused on helping Alejandro to the car. "Do you remember that certain rule you and Courtney agreed to if myself and Jośe made it to 2 hours…?" Alejandro asked, a smug grin forming on his face. When Heather heard Alejandro ask this, a blushing yet glaring look formed on her face. "Look, let's deal with those kinds of things after you feel better, got it?" Heather told him. Laughing, Alejandro said "Have you forgotten how fast a Burromuerto can heal? I should be feeling much better by tomorrow, at the very least and you can help fulfill your promise to me by then." grinning anxiously. "Whatever, I'm just glad you learned your lesson…" Heather muttered, mostly to herself. "Indeed I did mi amor, indeed I did."