"How's operation Freak Out going?" Scarlet asked. They'd just left Bruce downstairs, and were both happy with how shocked he'd been...
"Good. I just hope don't have to be a cheerleader for too long." Dick said, studying his uniform.
"Yeah. And I hoe you an teach me how to play football before the game next week. I still don't understand it, Dickey." Scarlet said, looking downcast.
"You'll get it eventually. All you need to know is the guy throws you the ball and you run with it- you run all the way to the end zone, and if anyone gets in your way, you smash 'em."
"Like with the bad guys?" Scarlet asked.
"No, like, shove them out of the way and keep running. I'll show you tomorrow, before dinner."
Scarlet nodded. "I hope this works, Dickey." she said, looking uncertain.
"Yeah- me too." Dick admitted.
"How was practice?" Bruce asked as Dick entered in his cheerleading uniform.
"Good." Dick said, smiling. "The girls all love me, and the coach says I'm the best acrobat they have, They want me to go on during the mini half-time show at the first football game next week."
Bruce nodded. "Great. Dick, do you... like the girls?" Bruce asked.
Dick blushed slightly. He realized Bruce as wondering if he was gay or not. He shrugged, "I could live without them." he said, because he knew that would freak Bruce out, And in truth, he COULD live without girls...
Bruce was freaking out. What if his son was gay? How would he explain this toi the justice league? What if his son wasn't gay, or what if... It was already awkward letting Dick be a cheer leader, but he was officially scared.
Dick saw the thoughts racing around in his father's head and grinned. Operation Freak Out was, so far, a success.
Scarlet limped in. "Hey Dad." she said. She was still wearing her football pads, but it was clear she was hurt by her purple, swelling eye and split lip...
"Scarlet, what happened?" Bruce demanded, running over to her.
"Practice. The coach said I must have a high pain tolerance." Scarlet said, tossing her helmet onto a chair. She was covered in mud and blood...
"That's it. I'm calling the coach." Bruce said firmly.
"Dad- no! I finally started to get some respect once I started bleeding- if you tell the coach to make it easy on me, all the guys will think I'm a ninny! I mean, the coach offered me ice and everything. I just wanted to keep playing. I mean, I have to be good- the first game is NEXT WEEK."
Bruce looked at his pleading daughter and sighed, putting his phone back into his pocket.
"Fine. But if you get seriously hurt, I'm taking you out of the game."
Scarlet nodded, heading upstairs to get cleaned up for dinner.
"Scarlet! Wait! All the cheerleaders are excited there's a girl on the football team. We even made a new cheer for you! Fight girl fight, catch that ball, kick some butt and win it all!" Dick punctuated it with a backflip and shook his pom-poms, and Bruce resisted the urge to blush, His son WANTED this, he reminded himself, he had to allow his son to grow up...
"Great. Let's just hope I can get through the game." Scarlet said, flashing a grin before heading upstairs.
Bruce was on pins and needles the whole week. Press wanted interviews with his children, and the security at Gotham Academy had to be upped to keep the paparazzi out.
Ever afternoon Scarlet came home covered in mud, sopping wet, and sometimes, blood.
Dick would be mumbling cheers under his breath and practicing his routine in the front yard, and Bruce... Bruce was wondering if the sports thing as a good idea. But he'd promised his children he'd come to the first game, because he wanted to be sure that a) Scarlet wasn't injured and b) Dick knew he was... (shudder) supporting him.
But finally, the big night came.
"Helloooo Gotham! Tonight we have our visiting team, the Blackgate Devils, VS our home boys- err... home team, the Gotham Knights!"
Cheers rang out. GothamAcademy was a wealthy school, they had a football field with bleachers for their middle school...
The lights all around flicked on as both teams ran onto the field, waving, excited, chomping at the bit, with their helmets off.
Bruce watched the hulking forms of the Blackgate Devils as they came out- the kids were like wrecking balls, huge, and Blackgate was a rough town, known for Blackgate prison... He was contemplating pulling Scarlet out right here...
He watched the forms of the boys all emerge, most with short cropped brown hair, until a very small form with a raven ponytail came out, grinning and waving along with the others.
"You excited?" a redhead with freckles named Jaxon asked her.
She nodded. "You know it, Jax." she'd become friends with Jaxon during the first practice, since he respected her determination...
She waved to Bruce, flashing another smile, before she pulled her helmet on.
"Scarlet Scarlet she's our girl, watch her give that ball a whirl! Wooo!" the cheerleaders yelled, and Dick waved with his pom-pom.
"You understand the game at all?" Jaxon asked. He'd been trying all week t teach t to her.
"I get that I'm supposed to catch the ball and run into the end zone." Scarlet said.
"Close enough." Jaxon said, patting her helmet as they each popped in mouth guards.
The coach called them over. Coach Mcguther was a nice man, understanding of his players and calm and caring, always there to listen when they needed it.
"Alright. Starting lineup has Murry as QB, Johnson as halfback..." he read off the list, and when he got to receivers, Scarlet was disappointed.
"Grayson, you're backup duty. We might need you if someone gets hurt. Run a hitch, and let's do this. Go!"
Scarlet sighed, taking to the bench with the other players. Jaxon was halfback and he grinned at her. She knew he didn't mean to make her feel bad and was only happy she was starting, but it hurt anyways...
Bruce breathed a sigh of relief from the bleachers. Scarlet wasn't starting. She probably wouldn't play in this game at all, he reasoned...
Until halftime. Right before it, Bobby Crest, the wide receiver, went down. He yelped, Scarlet had seen his ankle twist, and the second quarter ended.
Bobby's father carried him off the felid and a nurse from the audience came to examine him. He was crying, and Scarlet felt slightly bad, but she hoped he was hurt so she could play...
The cheerleaders filed out for their routine, and she forced herself to watch Dick. He'd been working hard, and the girls all swooned over him. Besides, she wanted to see what he'd been working on.
"K-N-I-G-H-T-S! What's that spell? Knights!" the girls let their arms fall to their sides and chanted as they walked into their places. "Knights knights knights! We will fight fight fight!" The girls went up into three mounts, and Dick came on then, doing back handspring after back handspring in front of them, ending it with a double backflip and an American split. The crowd roared, and she smiled. Her brother was THE BEST cheerleader.
Just then, coach Mcguther came and sat beside her. "Scarlet- you're wide receiver."
She jumped to her feet. "Really?" she asked, hoping it wasn't a joke.
Mcguther sighed. "Yes, really. But honey, those boys are big... Be careful."
"Sure things, coach! I won't disappoint you!" she popped in her mouth guard and pulled on her helmet before she was out on the field.
From there, she was pared up with a mammoth boy who loved to hit her as hard as he possibly could while she was trying to get open. She knew the basic plays, but the boy loved to simply fall forward on her, taking her to the ground, when she wasn't looking.
Bruce wanted to pull her out of the game, and every time the boy hit her with a tackle, he prayed she'd stay down. But she'd just stagger to her feet and get back to the line...
"Oh! And Grayson takes another hit! Wow, she's taking a beating tonight..." the announcer said, and Bruce winced. Why had he let her ever join the team?
At the third quarter, though, it got personal.
He tackled her once again, making sure to lean close to her ear while he was on top of her. "Circus peanut." he scoffed. He stood up then, stepping on her back with his cleat and walking across her like a rug to get back to the line.
"Did you see that!?" Coach Mcguther demanded, staring at the ref. "Did you see that!? Call a penalty!"
The ref looked at him like he was stupid. "Maybe little girls shouldn't play football." he said. He left coach Mcguther standing there in disbelief.
"TIME OUT!" Dick yelled. He and the cheerleaders had seen it all, and he was ticked...
"Cheerleaders can't call timeouts, stupid!" Said the boy who'd been thrashing Scarlet throughout the game.
"Well I just did. Scarlet, come here." Dick ordered.
Scarlet painfully got up and dragged herself over. They were losing, it was twenty eight to sixteen, and it seemed like there was no hope...
"Look at me." Dick pulled her helmet off. She was soaking wet from the damp field and covered in dirt. "That jerk is just wants to make yo quick. I want you to tackle him- no, not tackle- I want you to totally throw yourself at his face if he intercepts the ball, understood? And I want you to outrun that jerk, and win! Now do it for the cheerleaders." Dick put her helmet back on and nodded to her. "I know you can do it."
"Hey! Get back on the field, kid!" someone yelled. She strode on with newfound energy, facing the boy who was supposed to be blocking her.
He'd backed off slightly, but only because the ball was headed for a nearby receiver...
"And the devils intercept! He's going for it, folks..."
Scarlet remembered what Dick had said. Tackle if he intercepted. He was ten feet away, and she threw herself at the running boy from behind, slamming herself into his back and throwing him off balance, dragging him down like he wildebeest he was...
"I don't believe it, folks! Scarlet Grayson stops him at the forty yard line! Scarlet Grayson just took down that mountain of a boy from Blackgate! The kid can't weigh more than seventy pounds and she did it!"
She stood up and smiled at the roaring crowd, looking for one face... Bruce was cheering. That was all she needed to see, and she trotted back to the line.
From there they held off Blackgate for four more plays, forcing them to turn over.
While the defensive boys from Blackgate were running after Kevin, another receiver, Scarlet brought down one, jumping to her feet and racing after he other, bringing him down, too, and freeing Kevin up to run for the touchdown.
They kicked the extra point, making it twenty three to twenty eight. They were only down by 5. They had a shot. They forced Blackgate to turn over again with less than a minute left in the game. They were at the forty yard line. Scarlet showed her teeth to the boy who'd been trying to drag her down the whole time and hissed, and he growled...
"Hut!"
She took off at a speed Flash would envy, running...
All the other receivers were covered, and Jaxon saw her a pointed.
"Throw to Scarlet!"
And the quarterback did. She caught it and ran, the nasty boy on her tail the whole time. But she had three strides ahead of him and she ran hard, hitting the thirty yard line, the twenty, the ten...
"Touchdown for the knights!"
She still didn't stop running, she was in the heat of the moment...
"Scarlet! Scarlet, you can stop running now!" she made it another twenty yards before Dick chased her down and managed to grab her...
"Dick? What...?"
"You can stop running, Scarlet. You got the touchdown." Dick chuckled, bringing her back to the field. The crowd laughed slightly at her mistake, but were more reverent that she'd managed to get the touchdown...
"There's eleven second left in the game. You did it, Scarlet- you practically won the whole thing."
She hurried over to her teammates, who were dead set slapping her on the back...
They held them off for the last eleven seconds, keeping them from field goal range. "Knights win, folks, twenty nine to twenty eight!"
And everyone was cheering, then.
Scarlet grinned and staggered off the field to where Bruce was waiting.
He enveloped her in a hug. "I am so proud of you..."
She nodded. "Carry me?" she asked, eyes imploring him. She was EXHAUSTED, and Bruce obliged. The last thing she remembered was falling asleep in his arms.