Chapter 8

The Winner

Fifth Grade

Blossom was sick of this game. Brick had disappeared into thin air somehow. For an hour she and her sisters had been combing through abandoned buildings in the old industrial district. Their x-ray vision wasn't really helping. It didn't work very well through all the concrete.

He had to be somewhere close, Blossom would have noticed if he had flown or run away. She would search all night if she had to.

How did Brick create that explosion? He wasn't supposed to be able to do that. The Rowdyruffs didn't manifest new powers every day.

The sun had already set below the horizon. They would have to get home before the light faded.

Blossom rose high into the air to do one last check before calling off the search. She saw Brick standing on the sidewalk a few blocks down, casually waiting for her to notice him, as if he wasn't on the run.

"Girls!" Blossom called to initiate the attack. While they were catching up, she couldn't help but descend to confront him, landing gracefully on the pavement.

His injuries had disappeared, his black eye had vanished. He kept his stance like nothing had happened. If he was going to act like she wasn't even there, she would have to make the first move.

Blossom charged at him with her knee poised and ready.

Brick dodged at the last moment and followed up with a punch at her head.

Blossom blocked and Buttercup charged in from the side. They finally had him, and he wasn't going to get away again.

Butch came from out of nowhere and grabbed Buttercup by the shoulder, slamming her to the ground. He had a crazed look in his eye, at least, more crazed than usual.

Buttercup broke free of his hold and they started fighting, screaming curses and savagely beating each other like wild animals.

Bubbles took a deep breath and let out a sonic scream, trying to stun Butch. She was cut off before reaching full volume when Boomer gave her a quick strike to the throat. Bubbles gasped on her own breath.

Blossom grit her teeth. Brick smirked. It was a trap, and she had fallen for it. Her overconfidence had gotten the better of her. She needed to come up with a plan.

The best way to beat Brick was to stop him in his tracks. Blossom launched into the air and blew a chilling frost.

Flames erupted out of Brick's mouth.

Ice met fire. Blossom blew harder. Steam and smoke burned her face. Brick's breath was too intense. Before Blossom could even push out all the air in her lungs, the fire overwhelmed her frost and she was engulfed.

Blossom waved her hands around to clear the air so she could take a breath without coughing.

Brick stepped through the smoke and punched her in the head. She smashed into the pavement, crumbling the street and burying her in asphalt.

Before she had the chance to defend herself, Brick slammed his knee into her chest, crushing her further into the ground.

Blossom rolled her head trying to keep moving through the pain. Something rolled in her mouth and she spat out a tooth.

Brick picked her out of the rubble by the collar of her dress and punched her in the face. A burst of pain exploded out of her cheek and then her head hit something hard.

Blossom whimpered. She could hardly move her arms, her legs gave out, and she took rapid deep breaths that did absolutely nothing.

Brick had her. He stood there, still. A passive look on his face, except for his eyes. Those eyes hated her.

"Do it," Blossom croaked. "Kill me."

"What?"

"Come on, do it." Blossom glared at him with all of her remaining strength. "Kill me."

"I'm not gonna kill you." Brick's eyes narrowed. He dropped her into the crater their fight had made.

Blossom pulled herself up so to a sitting position, though she had to lean on a pile of broken asphalt. "Then why are you beating us up?"

"Hey! You jumped me! Twice! Not so tough when you aren't fighting three-on-one."

Blossom tongued the gap in her teeth where a small replacement was already regrowing.

Brick took off his hat to smooth his hair, but all the hair on his head was gone. There were a few patches where it was not totally clean-shaven, but the rest had disappeared. Did he cut it off? Why would he do that? His hand didn't find the hair and he curled his fingers into a fist. "None of this would have happened if you had just minded your own business!"

It was quiet after Brick's outburst. Blossom couldn't hear Bubbles and Boomer, much less Butch and Buttercup. And Brick hadn't attacked, that didn't bode well.

"From now on, you leave me and my brothers alone, and we'll leave you alone."

"I'm not going to stop if you continue to commit crimes."

"Then you're gonna get your ass kicked a lot."

Blossom spit out another tooth.

"See you around, Blossom." Brick took off with his brothers following him.

Blossom let the Chemical X finish its work. The cracks in her bones mended, her arms remembered their strength, and her vision went back to normal. She climbed out of the hole and found Buttercup beaten to a pulp, barely able to move, but still awake. Bubbles was nearby, crouching in a corner with her arms crossed over her face and her head turned away.

She pulled Buttercup over to Bubbles and they sat there for a while healing. The boys had only won because they had set up an ambush. Blossom didn't know Brick was that smart. It wouldn't happen again. Blossom would only come back stronger.

Sophomore Year - September

"I think we're done here," Brick said, strutting out the door. Boomer followed behind him.

Principal Butte plopped down in his office chair, his eyes fixated on the ringing phone. It was already settled. Blossom's mom was going to fire him.

Blossom decided it was best if she removed herself from the situation. She shared a look with the receptionist on the way out of the administration office.

Brick was just outside the office door with Boomer. "Get back to class," he said and Boomer zipped away.

Blossom wanted to pass, but Brick would think that meant he had won. And Blossom wasn't okay with that. She put her hands on her hips and confronted him. "You think you're so smooth, don't you."

"What?" He said in that patronizing tone. "Justice was done, I thought you'd be happy."

"That was as far from justice as you are from being a hero."

Brick got in Blossom's face. "Do you believe everything an authority figure tells you?" he taunted. "Did you really not see Mike when you watched that video?"

Blossom shook, her fingers curled, and her lips pursed. Mike wasn't in the video when she reviewed it with Principal Butte before the boys had arrived, he had just appeared out of nowhere.

"Or did you just not want to see him?" Brick asked.

Blossom walked away, not dignifying that with an answer.

"Yeah, just walk away. Is that what a hero does?"

Blossom turned back. "As if excrement like you could ever understand what a hero does." She flipped her hair over her shoulder and didn't care what he said while he followed her back to the class they shared.

He didn't say anything and they took their seats in AP European History, Blossom in front and Brick in the back.

Blossom wouldn't let Brick's presence bother her any longer. She sat straight in her seat, ready to learn. Their second unit of the year was ancient Greece, a subject she absolutely adored, though Mr. Luzinsky was near retirement and had a habit of going on tangents.

Blossom started writing, noting every little detail. Her pen skated over the page in fluid strokes. The strokes got shorter as the instructor made a joke in Greek. Blossom wrote the phrase phonetically to translate later, she wanted to catch everything.

Brick shifted his weight in his chair, leaning back with his arms crossed. The imbecile wasn't even taking notes. He probably thought he didn't need to take notes. He was so full of himself. And Blossom had to share all of her AP classes with him. She should have been enjoying the pleasure of a rigorous education, instead her life had become a living nightmare.

While Mr. Luzinsky had his back turned, busy diagramming Plato's methodology on the whiteboard, Soyun Chen leaned toward Brick and whispered something into his ear.

Blossom's notebook ignited like a match when she crossed a 'T' a little too quickly. She hadn't realized she was using super speed to keep up with the teacher.

She sighed and iced the page before any more smoke could waft into the air. The page itself was ruined, which meant the entire notebook was ruined. That tiny burn mark would eat at her as long as she had to stare at it. Her perfect notes were no longer perfect. Brick chuckled behind her.

Blossom did the only thing that could be done. With her eyes closed because she couldn't look, she ripped the page out of the book. She crumpled the paper into a ball and tossed it into the trashcan from where she was sitting on the other side of the classroom. Everyone was watching her of course, the teacher had paused his lecture. But Blossom was accustomed to having an audience. She sat, back straight and chin up, with her pen ready for him to continue.

Mr. Luzinsky started talking again, telling a small tale from the history of the Second Persian Invasion of Greece and how the Greeks heroically defended their homeland from the barbaric Persians-

"Hold on," Brick said, not bothering to raise his hand and have the teacher call on him. "Hadn't the Persians outlawed slavery and given women equal status to men?"

"Y- y- yes," Mr. Luzinsky stammered. "It is true that Zoroastrianism forbid slavery, so it was nearly unheard of among the Achaemenids. And it is also true that women in the Persian Empire could own land and received equal pay." He adjusted his bow tie and regained his composure. "However, the Greeks gave us Sophocles, Plato, and Aristotle and formed the foundation of western civilization-"

"But not science, though, right?" Brick said. "We saw what they did to the Ionian Greeks."

The instructor's hands balled into fists as he ramped up to his point. "Brick, you must understand. Democracy might well have been strangled in its crib."

Brick snorted. "Then Alexander the Great would conquer all of Greece and they wouldn't see democracy again for two thousand years."

"Yes but-"

"Democracy kinda sucks anyway," Soyun said. "What's the mayor on, like, his tenth term?"

"Twelfth," Hanout corrected her.

"Does that even count as democracy?"

"Yes." Suzy said impassively.

Soyun turned to her. "You're going to tell me he won twelve straight mayoral races without any profiteering, backroom deals, or anything?"

"The mayor hasn't done any of that," Blossom said.

"As long as everyone gets to vote, it counts as democracy," Suzy said.

Soyun rolled her eyes.

"Children, let's return to the topic." Mr. Luzinsky said.

"My favorite takeaway from Ancient Greece is by Thucydides." Brick cracked his knuckles. "The strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must."

Mr. Luzinsky closed his eyes in exasperation. "...indeed." He sat at his desk, holding up his head by his temples.

He couldn't just hijack Blossom's lecture like that. Someone needed to take Brick down a peg.

"So why don't you?" Blossom asked, turning in her seat.

Brick squinted his eyes at her. "Why don't I what?"

"'Do what you can'? It should be easy if you actually had the power."

Brick glared at her, caught between always needing to get the last word and not having anything to say. "Because..."

Her victory in their latest gambit made Blossom smile. For someone who didn't like being called a child, he sure did act like one. She sat forward and motioned for the teacher to continue.

"Of course, we all know where real power comes from: Money!" Princess declared. "Money can buy armies. Money can buy politicians. Money is the only real power."

"French Revolution, Princess," Robin said.

"That only happened because the ruling class was bad at using money. If you do it right, it never runs out."

"It doesn't matter how much gold a person possesses when another is rich in technology," Dexter said. "One cannot transmute gold into a fusion reactor. It must be formulated, molded, and manufactured. The keeper of these skills has more power than their patron simply because they cannot create it themselves. They are forced to purchase it."

"Is there a smarter class I can transfer into?" Suzy asked, holding up her head with her hand pressed into her cheek.

"What about blackmail?" Mordecai asked. "Like if I had dirt on you that you didn't want to get out, but I didn't accept money. Knowledge is power."

"That's foolish, Morty. Everyone has their price." Princess smiled sadistically. "And, even if you don't, I'll just pay Brick to destroy the evidence."

Brick crossed his arms and rolled his eyes.

"And if the evidence is on the internet?" Mordecai asked. "Good luck trying to figure out what server it's on. You could totally hold anyone in check with the right information and a good internet connection."

"There is power in numbers," Robin said. "Especially when those people are poor. The rich rely on them for cheap labor. So even if the upper classes could eradicate the lower classes, who would work the fields? Who would scrub the toilets?"

"Robots," Dexter said.

Robin groaned. "Robots aren't that good yet. If they were, why hasn't all physical labor been replaced already?"

"It is only a matter of time," Dexter said.

The class fell silent at that. The teacher sighed with his head still in his hands.

Brick stood up. "Dex is right. It is only a matter of time." He walked to Blossom's desk, grabbed the sides of the wood, and glared down at her with that self-satisfied smirk.

Not again. How many tantrums could he throw in one day? Blossom watched him, bemused by his attitude.

"Let's do it, right now, me and you." He gave her an actual smile. "No more games. Why don't we finally have the battle that will destroy one of us and probably all of Townsville?"

Soyun laughed from her seat in the back. Dexter eyed over his glasses at the situation. Suzy groaned loudly. Princess grinned with anticipation. Robin looked off into space and smiled at no one.

It was a lie. He didn't mean any of it. He was just mad at her getting the better of him earlier, an attempt to prove that he does do what he can.

Then she felt his hand shake. It was so subtle, a normal human would have registered it as a normal flutter of muscle, but Brick wasn't a normal human. Another twitch reverberated through the desk, then another in the other hand. She could feel his fatigue, he wasn't at 100%. There must have been a monster attack in the middle of the night. He didn't get enough sleep and he was probably still down a significant amount of Chemical X.

If they were going to fight, she would beat him. She could even destroy him. He knew that, even Brick wasn't arrogant enough to think he could beat her at half-power. Yet his eyes dared her to make a move.

The bell for next period rang. "Class dismissed," Mr. Luzinsky said, still not having stirred from his desk. "Pick up your tests on the way out."

Blossom stood and slung her bag over her shoulder to go to her next class, bumping him as she passed. Brick didn't move.

There was a small table next to the door with the graded tests they had taken earlier in the week. Blossom found hers near the end. A big red 100 was written on it, a perfect score. Blossom never settled for anything less.

Brick picked up his with Soyun right behind him. There, in the same red marker, was an impossible 105.

What!? It was literally not-possible. There were no extra credit sections of the test. How could he get extra points? Whatever grading system Mr. Luzinsky used was far too loose.

Blossom kept her chin high. She was already on track for her A+ and five measly points wasn't going to stop her from earning her spot as their class valedictorian.

Her next class included most of the same students, including Brick. In fact she'd have to put up with him for most of the day, an annoyance she could not escape. She had to spend four hours a day, five days a week within twenty feet of him.

He was the reason she was always pushing herself further. As childish as he could be, he always did keep her on her toes. Brick was also on-track for becoming class valedictorian.

She sighed moving through the throngs of students. "Because, then what would the winner do tomorrow?"

AN: I got a question about powers from VoraciousSquire on AO3 about what exactly their powers are. If you want a good rundown of how the main six have evolved since kindergarten, you can read my far-longer-than-it-should-have-been answer there. It is in the comments section under chapter 5.

Soyun Chen is a character from an episode of Dexter's Lab. She created the Unified Theory of World Domination and Destruction.

Mr. Luzinsky and Douglas Mordecai are recurring Dexter's Lab characters.