And more
More Than Human, ch5
part 1
part 2
part 3
Title: More Than Human
Chapter 5: He Knows How to Use It, or Lonesome When You Go
Pairing: RrB/PpG
Rating: R, because they're teenagers and a good handful of them use terrible, filthy language.
Disclaimer: Pay your respect to Craig, not me.
Summary: There is no way I can make this sound original, ever. My attempt to write a believable RrB/PpG in high school fic. Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal. - Camus
Notes: For![[profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mathkid and juxtaposie, who werk that beta magic like nobody else's business and, in one case, know way more about tennis than I ever will.
More Than Human, Pt. 1 - Junior Spring Semester
May – He Knows How to Use It or Lonesome When You Go (cont.)
-sbj-
***
This was more or less Bubbles' and Boomer's first fight as friends.
The whole confrontation at lunch had happened over a week ago, and they hadn't really spoken since. Or, well, maybe Boomer kinda had. Sort of. He'd tried to, anyway, but any time Bubbles saw him coming she turned away and fled. He was persistent, but by the end of last week he'd taken to just staring and staring at her.
The one place she couldn't avoid him was rehearsal, unless she avoided rehearsal altogether. Which she'd done. She'd only made one practice for the musical last week, citing exams as an excuse, but it had gotten to the point where she absolutely could not miss today's or she'd totally fall behind.
Boomer, in the meantime, had recently taken to sitting with a different group at lunch. She'd seen him with Haley for most of last week, and had tried not to feel angry or like it was a loss, and had failed.
She realized she wanted him to apologize, but wasn't giving him the opportunity to since she kept running away or ignoring him. She then realized that she didn't think he'd really learned his lesson yet, and this whole silent treatment thing was her punishing him.
She wasn't sure what he had to do to make her feel better about the whole thing. She wasn't sure what he could do. Especially since, instead of apologizing, he'd run off to hang out with Haley, and seemed to be waiting for Bubbles to get over her anger. Which she wouldn't do. If anything, this whole miserable ordeal—and she was miserable, she could say that much beyond the shadow of a doubt—was proving that Boomer's feelings for her weren't as genuine as he'd repeatedly suggested. She had been right to hesitate in the beginning. She was right to avoid him now.
She was angry and hurt and miserable, and it was all his fault.
As she stewed in her anger and hurting and misery, Mary broke her concentration.
“I'm freaking.”
Bubbles and Kim looked at Mary as they made their way down to the music hall to rehearse, Bubbles having gotten permission to ditch Art in the interest of somewhat art-related performance.
“About finals?”
Mary nodded, her expression grim. “I've barely studied! I stupidly signed up for two AP exams—”
“But that means you don't have to take the regular finals for those classes,” Kim soothed. “Plus, you know. College.”
“But it doesn't change the fact that I have to take exams in the first place,” Mary moaned.
Kim and Bubbles exchanged a glance. “Well, maybe we should have a study session?” Kim suggested. “Bubbles, what exams are you taking?”
Bubbles' shoulders slumped; for all that she'd been skipping practice she hadn't studied enough either. She was pretty sure she'd completely bombed the History final. Blossom was totally going to get on her case about it.
“I've already done History, which, you know, don't even bother asking about. I mean, there's Choir, but that's easy. Then there's Algebra II, English...” She sighed. Listing them out was a sobering reminder of the work she had ahead of her. “And Chemistry, too. I've also got a Gym final, but I got an A in that class so I can exempt the exam. It would be easy, anyway.” After a moment, she added, “Now I'm depressed.”
“Aren't you taking two APs, too?” Kim said, her brow furrowing.
“Oh! Yeah, I am.”
“But you're not in any AP classes, I thought,” Mary said.
Bubbles hunched into herself a little sheepishly. “Um, I'm taking the APs for Spanish and French—”
Kim and Mary Aaaahed simultaneously.
“Well, that's like, barely taking a test for you,” Kim said. “Little Miss Rosetta Stone.”
“Hush,” Bubbles said, laughing. They were approaching the doors to the music hall, and Bubbles stepped ahead of them to open the doors. “I mean, I'm still out a little, since I had to pay for the tests—”
She cut off, catching sight of Boomer and Haley at the other end of the hall. They'd frozen mid-conversation and had looks on their faces akin to trapped animals.
Bubbles felt numb as she looked at him.
She felt Kim at her elbow suddenly, and her friend grasped her arm and tugged her along, Mary trailing them. They'd asked her what was going on with her and Boomer, but when she'd been unresponsive, they'd just sided with her, no questions asked. Bubbles was thankful for them. Unlike Boomer, they were good people, and better friends.
“Be strong,” Kim muttered out of the side of her mouth, then beamed at Boomer and Haley as they passed. “Hey, guys.”
Haley, who'd shuffled a little further from Boomer, held up a hand in greeting. She had an odd expression on her face as she met Bubbles' eyes.
Maybe it's guilt, Bubbles thought bitterly.
“Hey,” Boomer said, and she blinked.
She bit her lip against the instinct to respond and turned away as her friends led her into the choir room.
***
“Man,” Butch groaned, “I can't believe you can't exempt unless you've got an A in a class! I could've sworn I got an A in something!”
Buttercup snorted. “You? Are you joking? I don't think I've seen you get an A on a single paper.”
It was their free block after lunch, and per Buttercup's suggestion—she had to go sign up for next semester's athletics—they were making their way to the football field. On the way they had to pass by the gym, where a couple of teachers stood as silent sentinels to make sure nobody would interrupt the AP testing.
“What idiot would volunteer to take more exams on top of their regular finals?” Butch scoffed.
“Idiots like my sister,” Buttercup pointed out. “But some of those guys in there get to exempt regular finals because they actually make A's in class, genius. Plus, you know. College.”
“What the hell are we going out to the football field for, anyway?” Butch asked as they stepped outside. The sun flared in their eyes, and he raised an arm to shade himself. “Don't you just, like, sign up in the office or something?”
There was a smug, secretive sneer on Buttercup's face. “Generally, yeah, your average student does.”
As they approached the field, Butch could see a number of teachers—no, coaches—standing around, along with some students from the football team. No, wait, some were from baseball. And lacrosse. And basketball? And...
“What the hell is this?” he said, gawking at the people cradling tennis rackets and golf clubs. “Why aren't you just signing up in the office?!”
Buttercup's face demonstrated nothing beyond pure delight at Butch's perplexed reaction. “Because I'm not your average student.”
Butch watched, dumbfounded, as the crowd of Athletics folks caught sight of her and ordered themselves into their respective groups. He hung back at the edge of the field, watching as she strolled from group to group, talking to each coach individually for a period of time. The look on her face was a far cry from the smugness she'd sported when talking to Butch; now it was serious and intense as she listened to each coach try to sell her on which team to join. It wasn't anything like a simple sign up for next year's Athletics. This was a series of freaking interviews.
She shook her head at a few of them, and soon Butch was flanked by the football, golf, baseball, and lacrosse teams. Track and field were on their way over, leaving only volleyball, basketball, and tennis.
“Turn you down cold, huh?” he said conversationally to the football coach. “I'd have been sure she'd pick you.”
“She did football her Freshman year,” the coach said, a wistful look on his face. “She said football wasn't 'active' enough for her.”
“She did lacrosse Sophomore year,” one of the members on the lacrosse team added. “She was awesome. I was really hoping she'd pick us again.”
“Are there any teams here she hasn't been on?” Butch asked.
“She hasn't done golf,” the football coach said, and Butch turned his eyes on a dejected golf coach.
“Dude, what are you even doing here?” Butch said in disbelief.
“You never know unless you try,” he mumbled. He obviously hadn't taken the rejection well.
Butch tossed his head at the track and field coach. “What about you?”
“Freshman and Sophomore year.” The coach glanced back and frowned. “I can't believe she kicked us out before tennis.”
“She was on the baseball team her Sophomore year, too,” the baseball coach added.
Butch watched Buttercup as she wavered between the three remaining coaches. If he'd been keeping track correctly, she'd done three different athletics in her Sophomore year—lacrosse, track and field, and baseball. There was no reason she couldn't do that with the three remaining, but... tennis? Really? It didn't seem her type of thing at all...
He floated onto the field and hovered just behind her as she studied each coach, evidently internally weighing her options.
After a moment, he said, “I think I know what you're going to pick.”
She looked at him. “What?”
“Not tennis.”
“Oh, yeah?” She turned back. The tennis coach grinned hopefully at her. “I don't know. I've never done tennis before; it might be interesting.”
“I got a pretty good feeling you haven't done golf before either, and you sent that guy home in five seconds.”
She gave him a look. “Dude. Golf. I don't even know what they're doing here.”
Butch stared at the two tennis students who flanked their coach, rackets in hand. “You never done tennis before, you said?”
“I said.”
“I'll play you.”
***
Butch had never played tennis before, either. Well, not really. He'd flipped it on occasionally, on TV, and played maybe a video game version of it for five seconds before boring himself to tears, so he had a basic understanding of the rules (and how best to break them). A few of the field agents back home liked to play, too, and had tried to teach him, but he hadn't been interested.
He bounced a tennis ball with the racket he'd borrowed from one of the students. They and the coach were running through the basic rules for Buttercup on her side of the court—since neither she or Butch had touched a racket before, the coach had suggested they play for two bounces, instead of a full-fledged match. Buttercup swung the racket experimentally, then brought it close to inspect the strings.
“Come on, you pussy!” he called out, and she glared. “I don't got all day!”
“No powers, alright?”
“Yeah, yeah,” he muttered, bouncing the ball and watching the court clear for their game.
“You guys want to do a practice rally?” the coach asked.
“No,” Butch said immediately.
Buttercup waved it off, bouncing lightly on her feet just inside the service area. “It's okay. I'll get the hang of it, and then I'm gonna kick this guy's ass!”
“You done talking? Are you ready yet?”
“Hurry up and serve—”
A little yellow blur suddenly whipped by her and bounced off the court with a sickening crack. Buttercup stared at it, gaping.
“Fifteen-love!” the coach called out.
“Whoo!” Butch hollered, triumphant. “Fuck yeah! Who loves you?!” He thrust his racket in Buttercup's direction and sneered. “That loved you,” he said, pointing at the ball one of the tennis students was retrieving. He was tossed another, and he bounced it a couple of times before holding it up for Buttercup to see.”You paying attention? This is what loves you!”
“Shut the fuck up and serve!” Buttercup snapped, irritated as hell.
The tennis coach turned to the basketball and volleyball coaches and whispered, “Does she cuss like this all the time?” to which they so vigorously nodded that their shoulders practically shook with the effort.
Butch bounced the ball again. “It's gonna come by and try to give you a little kiss, alright?”
“Serve it!”
“So don't be scared, Buttercup—”
“Serve!”
The ball went flying across the court again, but this time Buttercup returned it with a vengeance. Butch was quicker, though, and within a matter of minutes the first game was his, without Buttercup having made a single point.
“Forty-love, Buttercup!” Butch jeered. “Who loves you, again?”
“You're asking for it, asshole,” she said dangerously. “My serve.”
Buttercup handled the ball much better in the second game, pulling ahead of Butch at first, but he bounced back—
“Deuce!” the coach called out.
“Not bad,” Butch said. “For a broad.”
She didn't respond, at least not verbally, and he relished the anger that flared in those green eyes.
She made to serve the fuck out of it, but then just barely tapped the thing, and Butch swore as he scrambled up and missed the opportunity to return it.
“Ad in!”
“That's right, bitch!” Buttercup cheered. “Take it!”
Things continued on in this vein, with the advantage bouncing back and forth between the both of them and an intense rally somewhere in the middle of it all, before Buttercup took the game. True to form, more trash talk immediately ensued, and with the two of them bickering in the background, the coaches turned to each other. The tennis coach looked a little concerned.
“They're... er, very... rambunctious.”
“Eat me!”
“Suck my cock!”
“That guy's leaving at the end of the semester,” one of the students hastily reassured his coach.
***
This was the only time Bubbles permitted conversation between her and Boomer: in rehearsal.
“Romero, I don't think this is a good idea,” Bubbles whispered.
“You worry too much, sis. You've always worried too much.” Boomer looked across the would-be stage, eyes gleaming. “That guy's toast.”
“You don't even know if she'll take you back!”
He looked back at her, the faintest hint of heartbreak in his eyes. “She has to.”
Bubbles slumped and reached for him, shaking her head. “Romero...”
“Of course, if it doesn't work out, I can always come back and go all twisty and marry my sister, Lynne, instead—”
The room groaned and Bubbles made a noise of disgust before turning and stalking a few feet away, fuming.
“I'm sorry, guys,” Boomer said, laughing. “Come back, Bubbles, let's keep going—”
“Do you even know your lines?” she said, forgetting that she wasn't supposed to be talking to him and making no effort to mask her anger.
He didn't pick up on it. “Of course! Really, I do—”
“Then are you going to start taking this seriously or what?” she snapped, whipping around to face him. An unsettling silence pervaded the room at the look on Bubbles' face.
Boomer blinked, but summoned a smile nonetheless. “For you, anything.”
“Then cut that out!” she said angrily, and his smile faltered. “Quit flirting and screwing around! You're wasting my time, you're wasting everyone else's time, and yet you do it at every single practice! We're performing in less than two weeks! If I'd known all you were going to do was ruin rehearsal with all your stupid comments, then I never would've encouraged you to keep the role in the first place!”
A few people shifted uncomfortably. Boomer seemed a little stung and her heart sank a bit at the sight of him, but there was too much hurt anger in her to allow for any sympathy.
“Bubbles, chill—”
“I do not need you to tell me to 'chill,' and I do not need you to apologize. Just do something right, for a change,” she said viciously.
A few gasps echoed around the room. It had sounded mean, Bubbles knew it had sounded mean, but for once in her life she didn't care about being sweet and nice.
Though at the pained look on his face, she faltered and briefly thought she'd gone too far.
A loud, sudden thump from outside, followed by some frantic yelling, interrupted the tension. Everybody looked to the door. One of the students reached for the knob—
The door was kicked open and a number of men dressed completely in black spilled into the room, grabbing the nearest students and jamming guns in their faces.
Bubbles flew into the air as the room erupted into screams, but at the sound of several safeties clicking she halted, lowering her fists.
This is so not the time, she thought to herself, rage boiling inside her.
***
The tennis match ended without the final game ever finishing play. Butch and Buttercup had suddenly resorted to using their powers—it was suspected Butch had caved first—and ruined their rackets in the process, effectively ending the game.
“Sorry about that,” Butch said in a very non-apologetic tone as he held out his borrowed racket, which was not only bent at a ninety degree angle but had a giant ball-shaped-hole in the middle of the strings.
Buttercup looked more guilty about it as she handed her busted one over. “Those probably cost a lot of money, huh?”
The numb students they'd borrowed the rackets from went pale as they assessed the damage.
After a second of consideration, Buttercup snatched at Butch's back pocket and kicked him away, where he ate the court face first.
“Here,” she said, emptying his wallet and waving the few hundreds in there at them. “This should cover it.”
“Hey!” Butch cried. His wallet smacked him in the face. Buttercup was thanking the tennis coach for their time, but no, she wouldn't be joining. The coach looked equal parts disappointed and relieved.
Butch grimaced and made to go after the tennis kids and either demand or pummel his money back—
Buttercup snatched him by the belt as he flew by and threw him back against the court.
“What the hell are you doing, giving my money away like that?”
“What the hell are you doing with six hundred dollars cash in your wallet?” Buttercup shot back.
“Honest non-evil-related work!”
She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right.”
The distress signal suddenly went off on her cell, and she snatched her phone from her pocket. “It's from Bubbles,” she said.
“What?” Butch said as he stood. “Did someone run over a squirrel or something—”
Buttercup scanned the text, suddenly looked up in horror at the school, then went tearing off towards it in a streak of green.
“Hey!” Butch cried. “Wait for me!”
***
Blossom went over her AP Chemistry test one last time, checking her watch as she flipped the pages. Forty-five minutes left to go. She darted a glance at the rest of the room hunched into their little paper cubicle walls. Kris was off at the other end of the gym, somewhere. Robin was in AP Chem, too; she was a few rows down. Blossom wondered how long they still needed. Not that it mattered; nobody could leave until the time was up anyway.
On her way in she'd seen Cindy, who was probably over with the rest of the Seniors in Kris' section. She hadn't talked to Cindy much in Dance lately, but Cindy didn't seem to want to talk to anyone much at all. Blossom hoped this whole business with Brick hadn't so shaken Cindy that she'd do poorly on her AP.
Brick wasn't here. Since he shared all his AP classes with Blossom, he'd opted out of all his APs and had chosen to take the regular finals instead.
The boy was so juvenile. He should've taken at least one.
A sudden, piercing chirp sounded, and Blossom hastily grabbed her cell as a few teachers stalked over, angry at the interruption.
“No, it's not a regular call, it's the distress signal,” she assured them, standing. “I have to go—”
She took flight and headed for the nearest doors when the other side of the gym exploded into screams. She turned to see five—no, six or seven men dressed in black and with bullet proof vests on, all wielding guns and grabbing students.
Kris was one of them.
She gasped and made to shoot forward but at the number of them spilling into the room she held back. She couldn't save all of them at once; she could maybe take out four or five but that still left a potential two or three students who would get hurt, or worse—
The students at the other end of the room were still screaming. More guys in black were filtering through the other doors, dragging the musical theater students with them. After all of them were through (Boomer strolling lazily among them, she noted, and wondered why he wasn't flying), Bubbles floated in, wary.
Blossom's heart sank. Even with Bubbles, even with Buttercup, there were too many.
Buttercup burst through the doors and looked ready to start a spree of violence—
“Buttercup, no!” Blossom shouted, and her sister stopped. The screaming ceased at the sound of Blossom's voice.
Buttercup angrily spat, “Why not?”
Blossom scanned the room, trying desperately to think up a plan as the numbers climbed in her head. Twenty-seven men. Twenty-seven armed men, each with a student—Kris, Cindy, and Robin among them. Twenty-seven divided by three, that was nine, and stopping nine wouldn't generally be a problem but they all had guns, vicious looking guns, and were pointing them at students and spreading out throughout the gym, besides.
“Because there's too many of us,” one of them said, his smug voice ringing in the air. “Right, Blossom?”
“Holy shit.” Butch had appeared at the door, his eyes sparkling as he took in the scene. “This is some fucking day, let me tell you.”
***
Brick had heard some semblance of a commotion on his way out of class—he'd finished his final early, and unlike the APs students were permitted to leave their regular finals once they finished—but didn't pay it much mind. He was in no way interested in staying to investigate. He had packing to do.
He strolled down the halls, pausing as he reached the atrium. There was a figure in the double doorway to the gym, where the AP Chem test was supposed to be going on. He frowned, recognizing that frame.
“God damn it, Butch,” he muttered under his breath, then zipped forward, reaching a hand for his idiot brother's collar—
The other door swung open, and Brick stilled, his eyes settling on the automatic weapon pointing him straight in the face.
“Oh, you are so shitting me,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Get in, both of you,” the man wielding the weapon said.
“Or what? You'll put a bullet in my brain?” Brick said in a bored tone.
Butch was giddy. “Go ahead, man, give it a shot. Ha! Get it? A shot?”
“Shut up, Butch,” Brick snarled.
“Is this seriously happening?” Buttercup's voice echoed.
“I'm with her,” Brick said, glaring at the idiot with the gun. “Are you seriously pointing that thing at me?”
“Get in or I'll blow your fucking brains out,” the man said.
Brick stared at him, dumbfounded. “You. Are a fucking idiot.”
“I like your gun,” Butch said, eyes gleaming.
“This guy's got a Spectre,” Boomer called out, pointing at the man nearest him.
“Get the fuck down!” the man barked.
Boomer pouted. “No.”
“Do you have any idea who the fuck I am?” Brick growled.
A round of shots rang out, and screams pierced the air. One of the overhead lights shattered.
“Brick!” Blossom shouted. “Just do as he says! They've got hostages, for God's sake!”
“This isn't my God damn problem! I have to pack!” he shouted back.
The man in the center of the gym who'd fired his gun into the roof now aimed his weapon at Brick, too. “Do as she says, kid. Get your ass in here.”
A deathly silence fell over the room. Brick turned a cold eye on the man who'd spoken. “Excuse me?”
“Get your ass in here,” the man said deliberately, then turned his gun on his hostage. Kris.
In the background, Blossom tensed.
“Get your ass in here or I'll blow this guy's head off.”
Like the rest of the room, Kris was shaking. Probably wasn't used to staring a gun down. Brick darted a glance at a taut, desperate Blossom, fists clenched. He dimly thought that as a superhero, by this point she should've gotten used to people she cared about being put in danger.
Brick looked past the man who was pointing a gun at him and said levelly, “So blow his head off.”
“Brick!” Blossom shrieked, horrified.
“Do I look like the type of guy who gives a shit?” Brick continued.
“You ever seen someone's brains on the outside of their body?” the guy said in a grim voice.
Butch started laughing.
Brick was unfazed. “Looks like raw chicken fat.”
“Ugh, thanks for reminding me. I planned on eating tonight,” Boomer groaned, making a face.
There was a strangled inhalation of breath, and Brick looked at her. Blossom's lower lip was trembling as her gaze flitted between him and her boyfriend.
He closed his eyes and sighed. Without a word, he carefully sidestepped Butch and began to slowly make his way to the center of the room, making sure to avoid contact with any of the other gunmen—twenty-seven, he counted—and the terrified students being held hostage. He glanced briefly at Cindy, tears running down her face as her guy pointed a gun at her neck.
Help, she mouthed at him, and he had to keep from rolling his eyes. This was why he couldn't do the fucking hero thing. Too many weepy clingers.
Within seconds he had reached the guy handling Kris.
“I take it you're the leader,” he said, voice dull.
“Gettin' a good education, aren't you?” the man said.
“Not from here,” Brick muttered. “You know you sons of bitches are probably surrounded outside by helicopters and cop cars right now?”
“The Powerpuff Girls are in the same God damn room as us,” the guy responded. “What good are the fucking police going to do?”
“You got a point, there,” Brick admitted. He smirked. “Still. High school? What the hell, man? You could've robbed a bank with the artillery you got.”
“We've got our reasons.”
Brick's eyes widened. “Oh, I see! Making a statement, huh? 'Look at us, we took on the Powerpuff Girls! A bunch of regular old folks like us. All's we got is advanced weaponry—'”
“You talk too God damn much, smartass,” the guy snapped, throwing Kris down and aiming his gun at Brick. “I could shoot you. I could shoot all your God damn friends. You'd all be dead in a matter of seconds. It's that easy.”
A knowing smile pulled onto Brick's face and he said in a low voice, “Is it, now?”
“Um, I don't mean to interrupt, but are you going to shoot him or what?” Butch groaned, anxious.
“Are you?” Brick asked. “I mean, I come in here, I don't take your orders, I insult you, I really couldn't give a fuck if you shot the entire room dead right now—and I do mean that—”
“You're askin' for it, kid—”
“Doesn't that piss you off? A little bit?” He looked around the room. “Any of you? Some hot young shithead like me, acting all fearless in the face of danger? I'm practically begging you to put a bullet in me.”
“Team A!” the man barked, and a number of men dropped their hostages and aimed their guns at Brick.
The leader stared Brick down, his gaze perfectly aligned with the barrel of his gun. “Your wish is our command,” he said quietly.
Brick glanced around the room again, meeting Blossom's eyes, still stricken with panic, but there was recognition there, she knew he was up to something—
“Twelve,” he said, deliberately, and she blinked, suddenly scanning the room.
“'Twelve,' what?” the guy snapped.
Brick wet his lips. “Twelve bullets you're about to put in me.”
“Oh, you're getting more than that, you little shit.”
Twenty-seven minus twelve leaves fifteen, Brick thought. If the girls all attacked, aiming their eyebeams and both fistbeams, that gave them each three simultaneous shots, assuming their aim was on. With his brothers, that covered the remaining gunmen, but it was a gamble. He couldn't count on Boomer and Butch having that sense...
“Boys,” Brick said, and he sensed his brothers tensing, at the ready.
“Brick?” Boomer asked.
“Help,” he said, and watched Blossom's eyes flick to his brothers.
“There you go,” the lead gunman sneered. “Show us a little fear.”
Brick rolled his eyes. “Eep. I'm stricken with terror.”
“Any last requests, shithead?”
Brick shot the guy a wide grin. “Go fuck yourse—”
They opened fire, the leader aiming right at Brick's face, and he twisted his head, catching the bullet in his teeth and instantly spitting it back out at full speed into the man's boot. It pierced leather, skin, tissue, and as the man howled in pain and stared at a humorless Brick, the room exploded into blue, green, and pink light.
Brick snatched his gun and kicked the guy clear to the other end of the gym, where he hit the wall headfirst and then slumped to the floor, stunned.
Bubbles and Buttercup were already herding heaps of screaming hostages out of the gym. His brothers and Blossom had missed three guys, and there were still the eleven others that had fired at Brick. He instantly field-stripped the gun in his hands, eyes glowing red as the pieces clattered to the floor and the gunmen gaped at him, some retaining the sense—or stupidity—to fire.
Several guys were flung across the room, into the ceiling, blasted away. A small handful of students were still caught up in the fray, and the four gunmen left each grabbed one at random.
“Oh, Christ!” Cindy cried, sobbing.
Kris merely struggled, his shoes squeaking against the floor.
“Okay, I'm getting really sick of being a hostage now,” Robin declared, irritated. “This is, what, like the fifth time in my entire life? I need to move the hell out of Townsville!”
The last guy had actually grabbed Boomer.
“Dude! Hands off!” Boomer exclaimed, striking him with his bat. “I'm saving myself for marriage!”
Brick was at Cindy's side in a flash and ripped the gun out of the guy's hands, yanking Cindy aside as he kneed the man in the gut, feeling rib after rib breaking. Boomer swung at the two men remaining, a hard crack echoing in the room with each hit.
One of the guys pulled the trigger as he went down, and a string of bullets exploded out of it, carving a trail in the hardwood to Kris.
Blossom's attention was caught by the gunfire as she maneuvered the rest of the students outside, but she was caught up in the crowd and all the way on the other side of the gym, she'd never make it in time—
Brick heard it amidst all those screams, the tiny, desperate cry that slipped her throat, and he dove, snatching Kris by the collar and jerking him away from the fire.
Cindy screamed again and clawed at Brick, tightening her arms around his shoulders and sobbing into his chest, trying to get as far away from the ground as possible.
The gunfire stopped. Blossom landed, staring at Brick as Cindy clung to him and Kris grabbed at the leg of Brick's jeans, eyes on the gun that had fired at him.
Brick stared back at her, unsure of how to read her expression. She looked as if she might burst into tears at any moment, the way her eyes were shimmering, the way her lip was shaking. She extended her arms, and without thinking, he started to lift an arm to reach for her, too—
“Kris,” she whispered, dropping to her knees and pulling her boyfriend into her arms. Brick instantly settled his arm around Cindy's shoulder.
“Thank you,” Cindy hiccuped, and kissed Brick's neck, wet with her tears. “Thank you, thank you, oh God, thank you so much—”
“Are you okay?” Blossom asked Kris, taking his face in her hands.
“I'm okay,” he said, voice wavering, and he smiled weakly at her, trying to hug her back, but he was shaking too much.
“Chill out,” Brick muttered into Cindy's ear. “It's over.” He was hoping that would comfort her enough to get her to let go, but she only sobbed harder and clung tighter.
“Brick,” Blossom whispered, and he looked at her. Her eyes were still shimmering as they met his. “Thank you.”
He held her gaze for a long moment, then broke it, assessing the extensive damage the gym had suffered.
“I was supposed to go home and pack,” he muttered. None of these God damn fucking heroics. It wasn't him. What the fuck had he been thinking?
“Nobody was shot, thank God,” Bubbles said, appearing at Blossom's side. Buttercup was helping Robin up (“No, seriously, I need to get my ass out of Townsville,” Robin hissed at her friend).
“That guy was,” Boomer said, pointing at the unconscious leader. “Does it count if the weapon was Brick's, um, mouth?”
“That sounds dirty as hell,” Butch snickered, landing. The rest of them stared at him and the two dozen guns he had slung across his back. “What?”
“You can't keep those,” Brick ordered.
“But I won them fair and square! I even used them for good, I shot some of these fuckers with their own guns—”
“Is that where all that extra gunfire was coming from?” Buttercup mused. “Come to think of it, I didn't see your green streak anywhere after the first charge—”
“How can you use something like that?” Blossom cried.
“I like toys,” Butch chirped. “They're neat!”
One of the gunmen groaned and began crawling towards the door, catching everybody's attention. Wordlessly, Butch rolled one of his weapons into his hands and fired one shot at the guy's leg.
“Butch!” Blossom and Bubbles cried as the guy screamed and clutched at his bloody leg.
“What?! That still counts as using it for good, doesn't it?!”
***
Brick left almost immediately—he wasn't keen on talking to the cops—so Blossom lingered behind to recount what had happened. Buttercup and Butch waited at the sidelines, though she was mostly staying to make sure Butch didn't get his hands on any more guns.
Bubbles felt no need to stick around. Blossom was preoccupied, and Butch and Buttercup were chatting. Despite what had just gone down, she was still in no mood to talk to Boomer.
Boomer, however, being a typical boy, absolutely would not take the hint.
“Are you okay?” He tailed her out the door and jogged to catch up to her.
“I'm fine. My skin stops bullets, remember?”
“No, I didn't mean that.” He grasped her by the arm and stopped them both, angling her towards him. She kept her expression as neutral as possible. “I'm over this silent treatment crap. Why won't you talk to me?”
She stared at his shoes, unwilling to answer, but wanting him to see how hurt and upset she was so he might have a chance at figuring it out himself.
“Are you still mad about the uniforms?”
“Are you still not sorry about them?” she retorted.
“I'm never going to be sorry about those!”
“Well, you should be!”
His arms flailed for an exasperated second, trying to make sense of it. “Why?! Why should I be? This is a stupid thing to be fighting over! I don't understand what you want me to do! Do you want me to 'fess up to it? Do you want me to say, 'I'm sorry?'”
“Even if you did apologize, it wouldn't mean anything unless you really felt sorry,” she said.
“Well, good, because I don't and I wasn't planning on it.”
Her face fell. She'd thought he wasn't a bad person anymore, once.
“Don't you care?” she said, her voice coming out softer than she meant it to. “Don't you care about other people?”
“I care about you,” he said to her.
“Then why do you keep eating lunch with Haley?!” she burst, then clapped her hands over her mouth. No, this wasn't about that! This was about him not treating other people right, about him acting like a bad guy—
A stunned Boomer sputtered, “I—I thought you didn't want to talk to me. I thought you just needed some time—”
I completely messed up, she thought desolately to herself. This whole stupid thing had been about the uniforms in the first place, but the second she'd walked into the cafeteria to find him at Haley's side instead of hers, she'd gotten even more stubborn about refusing to talk to him.
She was still angry about the uniforms. But what hurt her was him spending time with his ex.
“Look,” he was saying, “me and Haley, we're not back together—”
“So why are you hanging out with her so much?!”
“I don't—I can explain, just, not right now, just come to the End-of-Year Concert tomorrow, I swear I'll explain everything—”
A thought occurred to him, and he paused.
“Are... are you jealous?” he asked, eyes suddenly brimming with hope.
The look on his face made her want to laugh and hit him at the same time. To keep from doing either, she whipped around and stalked away.
“Bubbles!”
“Don't follow me!” she called back.
“Does this mean you're not coming tomorrow night?!”
Bubbles groaned in frustration and waved him off.
part 1
part 2
part 3
Title: More Than Human
Chapter 5: He Knows How to Use It, or Lonesome When You Go
Pairing: RrB/PpG
Rating: R, because they're teenagers and a good handful of them use terrible, filthy language.
Disclaimer: Pay your respect to Craig, not me.
Summary: There is no way I can make this sound original, ever. My attempt to write a believable RrB/PpG in high school fic. Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal. - Camus
Notes: For
mathkid and juxtaposie, who werk that beta magic like nobody else's business and, in one case, know way more about tennis than I ever will.More Than Human, Pt. 1 - Junior Spring Semester
May – He Knows How to Use It or Lonesome When You Go (cont.)
-sbj-
***
This was more or less Bubbles' and Boomer's first fight as friends.
The whole confrontation at lunch had happened over a week ago, and they hadn't really spoken since. Or, well, maybe Boomer kinda had. Sort of. He'd tried to, anyway, but any time Bubbles saw him coming she turned away and fled. He was persistent, but by the end of last week he'd taken to just staring and staring at her.
The one place she couldn't avoid him was rehearsal, unless she avoided rehearsal altogether. Which she'd done. She'd only made one practice for the musical last week, citing exams as an excuse, but it had gotten to the point where she absolutely could not miss today's or she'd totally fall behind.
Boomer, in the meantime, had recently taken to sitting with a different group at lunch. She'd seen him with Haley for most of last week, and had tried not to feel angry or like it was a loss, and had failed.
She realized she wanted him to apologize, but wasn't giving him the opportunity to since she kept running away or ignoring him. She then realized that she didn't think he'd really learned his lesson yet, and this whole silent treatment thing was her punishing him.
She wasn't sure what he had to do to make her feel better about the whole thing. She wasn't sure what he could do. Especially since, instead of apologizing, he'd run off to hang out with Haley, and seemed to be waiting for Bubbles to get over her anger. Which she wouldn't do. If anything, this whole miserable ordeal—and she was miserable, she could say that much beyond the shadow of a doubt—was proving that Boomer's feelings for her weren't as genuine as he'd repeatedly suggested. She had been right to hesitate in the beginning. She was right to avoid him now.
She was angry and hurt and miserable, and it was all his fault.
As she stewed in her anger and hurting and misery, Mary broke her concentration.
“I'm freaking.”
Bubbles and Kim looked at Mary as they made their way down to the music hall to rehearse, Bubbles having gotten permission to ditch Art in the interest of somewhat art-related performance.
“About finals?”
Mary nodded, her expression grim. “I've barely studied! I stupidly signed up for two AP exams—”
“But that means you don't have to take the regular finals for those classes,” Kim soothed. “Plus, you know. College.”
“But it doesn't change the fact that I have to take exams in the first place,” Mary moaned.
Kim and Bubbles exchanged a glance. “Well, maybe we should have a study session?” Kim suggested. “Bubbles, what exams are you taking?”
Bubbles' shoulders slumped; for all that she'd been skipping practice she hadn't studied enough either. She was pretty sure she'd completely bombed the History final. Blossom was totally going to get on her case about it.
“I've already done History, which, you know, don't even bother asking about. I mean, there's Choir, but that's easy. Then there's Algebra II, English...” She sighed. Listing them out was a sobering reminder of the work she had ahead of her. “And Chemistry, too. I've also got a Gym final, but I got an A in that class so I can exempt the exam. It would be easy, anyway.” After a moment, she added, “Now I'm depressed.”
“Aren't you taking two APs, too?” Kim said, her brow furrowing.
“Oh! Yeah, I am.”
“But you're not in any AP classes, I thought,” Mary said.
Bubbles hunched into herself a little sheepishly. “Um, I'm taking the APs for Spanish and French—”
Kim and Mary Aaaahed simultaneously.
“Well, that's like, barely taking a test for you,” Kim said. “Little Miss Rosetta Stone.”
“Hush,” Bubbles said, laughing. They were approaching the doors to the music hall, and Bubbles stepped ahead of them to open the doors. “I mean, I'm still out a little, since I had to pay for the tests—”
She cut off, catching sight of Boomer and Haley at the other end of the hall. They'd frozen mid-conversation and had looks on their faces akin to trapped animals.
Bubbles felt numb as she looked at him.
She felt Kim at her elbow suddenly, and her friend grasped her arm and tugged her along, Mary trailing them. They'd asked her what was going on with her and Boomer, but when she'd been unresponsive, they'd just sided with her, no questions asked. Bubbles was thankful for them. Unlike Boomer, they were good people, and better friends.
“Be strong,” Kim muttered out of the side of her mouth, then beamed at Boomer and Haley as they passed. “Hey, guys.”
Haley, who'd shuffled a little further from Boomer, held up a hand in greeting. She had an odd expression on her face as she met Bubbles' eyes.
Maybe it's guilt, Bubbles thought bitterly.
“Hey,” Boomer said, and she blinked.
She bit her lip against the instinct to respond and turned away as her friends led her into the choir room.
***
“Man,” Butch groaned, “I can't believe you can't exempt unless you've got an A in a class! I could've sworn I got an A in something!”
Buttercup snorted. “You? Are you joking? I don't think I've seen you get an A on a single paper.”
It was their free block after lunch, and per Buttercup's suggestion—she had to go sign up for next semester's athletics—they were making their way to the football field. On the way they had to pass by the gym, where a couple of teachers stood as silent sentinels to make sure nobody would interrupt the AP testing.
“What idiot would volunteer to take more exams on top of their regular finals?” Butch scoffed.
“Idiots like my sister,” Buttercup pointed out. “But some of those guys in there get to exempt regular finals because they actually make A's in class, genius. Plus, you know. College.”
“What the hell are we going out to the football field for, anyway?” Butch asked as they stepped outside. The sun flared in their eyes, and he raised an arm to shade himself. “Don't you just, like, sign up in the office or something?”
There was a smug, secretive sneer on Buttercup's face. “Generally, yeah, your average student does.”
As they approached the field, Butch could see a number of teachers—no, coaches—standing around, along with some students from the football team. No, wait, some were from baseball. And lacrosse. And basketball? And...
“What the hell is this?” he said, gawking at the people cradling tennis rackets and golf clubs. “Why aren't you just signing up in the office?!”
Buttercup's face demonstrated nothing beyond pure delight at Butch's perplexed reaction. “Because I'm not your average student.”
Butch watched, dumbfounded, as the crowd of Athletics folks caught sight of her and ordered themselves into their respective groups. He hung back at the edge of the field, watching as she strolled from group to group, talking to each coach individually for a period of time. The look on her face was a far cry from the smugness she'd sported when talking to Butch; now it was serious and intense as she listened to each coach try to sell her on which team to join. It wasn't anything like a simple sign up for next year's Athletics. This was a series of freaking interviews.
She shook her head at a few of them, and soon Butch was flanked by the football, golf, baseball, and lacrosse teams. Track and field were on their way over, leaving only volleyball, basketball, and tennis.
“Turn you down cold, huh?” he said conversationally to the football coach. “I'd have been sure she'd pick you.”
“She did football her Freshman year,” the coach said, a wistful look on his face. “She said football wasn't 'active' enough for her.”
“She did lacrosse Sophomore year,” one of the members on the lacrosse team added. “She was awesome. I was really hoping she'd pick us again.”
“Are there any teams here she hasn't been on?” Butch asked.
“She hasn't done golf,” the football coach said, and Butch turned his eyes on a dejected golf coach.
“Dude, what are you even doing here?” Butch said in disbelief.
“You never know unless you try,” he mumbled. He obviously hadn't taken the rejection well.
Butch tossed his head at the track and field coach. “What about you?”
“Freshman and Sophomore year.” The coach glanced back and frowned. “I can't believe she kicked us out before tennis.”
“She was on the baseball team her Sophomore year, too,” the baseball coach added.
Butch watched Buttercup as she wavered between the three remaining coaches. If he'd been keeping track correctly, she'd done three different athletics in her Sophomore year—lacrosse, track and field, and baseball. There was no reason she couldn't do that with the three remaining, but... tennis? Really? It didn't seem her type of thing at all...
He floated onto the field and hovered just behind her as she studied each coach, evidently internally weighing her options.
After a moment, he said, “I think I know what you're going to pick.”
She looked at him. “What?”
“Not tennis.”
“Oh, yeah?” She turned back. The tennis coach grinned hopefully at her. “I don't know. I've never done tennis before; it might be interesting.”
“I got a pretty good feeling you haven't done golf before either, and you sent that guy home in five seconds.”
She gave him a look. “Dude. Golf. I don't even know what they're doing here.”
Butch stared at the two tennis students who flanked their coach, rackets in hand. “You never done tennis before, you said?”
“I said.”
“I'll play you.”
***
Butch had never played tennis before, either. Well, not really. He'd flipped it on occasionally, on TV, and played maybe a video game version of it for five seconds before boring himself to tears, so he had a basic understanding of the rules (and how best to break them). A few of the field agents back home liked to play, too, and had tried to teach him, but he hadn't been interested.
He bounced a tennis ball with the racket he'd borrowed from one of the students. They and the coach were running through the basic rules for Buttercup on her side of the court—since neither she or Butch had touched a racket before, the coach had suggested they play for two bounces, instead of a full-fledged match. Buttercup swung the racket experimentally, then brought it close to inspect the strings.
“Come on, you pussy!” he called out, and she glared. “I don't got all day!”
“No powers, alright?”
“Yeah, yeah,” he muttered, bouncing the ball and watching the court clear for their game.
“You guys want to do a practice rally?” the coach asked.
“No,” Butch said immediately.
Buttercup waved it off, bouncing lightly on her feet just inside the service area. “It's okay. I'll get the hang of it, and then I'm gonna kick this guy's ass!”
“You done talking? Are you ready yet?”
“Hurry up and serve—”
A little yellow blur suddenly whipped by her and bounced off the court with a sickening crack. Buttercup stared at it, gaping.
“Fifteen-love!” the coach called out.
“Whoo!” Butch hollered, triumphant. “Fuck yeah! Who loves you?!” He thrust his racket in Buttercup's direction and sneered. “That loved you,” he said, pointing at the ball one of the tennis students was retrieving. He was tossed another, and he bounced it a couple of times before holding it up for Buttercup to see.”You paying attention? This is what loves you!”
“Shut the fuck up and serve!” Buttercup snapped, irritated as hell.
The tennis coach turned to the basketball and volleyball coaches and whispered, “Does she cuss like this all the time?” to which they so vigorously nodded that their shoulders practically shook with the effort.
Butch bounced the ball again. “It's gonna come by and try to give you a little kiss, alright?”
“Serve it!”
“So don't be scared, Buttercup—”
“Serve!”
The ball went flying across the court again, but this time Buttercup returned it with a vengeance. Butch was quicker, though, and within a matter of minutes the first game was his, without Buttercup having made a single point.
“Forty-love, Buttercup!” Butch jeered. “Who loves you, again?”
“You're asking for it, asshole,” she said dangerously. “My serve.”
Buttercup handled the ball much better in the second game, pulling ahead of Butch at first, but he bounced back—
“Deuce!” the coach called out.
“Not bad,” Butch said. “For a broad.”
She didn't respond, at least not verbally, and he relished the anger that flared in those green eyes.
She made to serve the fuck out of it, but then just barely tapped the thing, and Butch swore as he scrambled up and missed the opportunity to return it.
“Ad in!”
“That's right, bitch!” Buttercup cheered. “Take it!”
Things continued on in this vein, with the advantage bouncing back and forth between the both of them and an intense rally somewhere in the middle of it all, before Buttercup took the game. True to form, more trash talk immediately ensued, and with the two of them bickering in the background, the coaches turned to each other. The tennis coach looked a little concerned.
“They're... er, very... rambunctious.”
“Eat me!”
“Suck my cock!”
“That guy's leaving at the end of the semester,” one of the students hastily reassured his coach.
***
This was the only time Bubbles permitted conversation between her and Boomer: in rehearsal.
“Romero, I don't think this is a good idea,” Bubbles whispered.
“You worry too much, sis. You've always worried too much.” Boomer looked across the would-be stage, eyes gleaming. “That guy's toast.”
“You don't even know if she'll take you back!”
He looked back at her, the faintest hint of heartbreak in his eyes. “She has to.”
Bubbles slumped and reached for him, shaking her head. “Romero...”
“Of course, if it doesn't work out, I can always come back and go all twisty and marry my sister, Lynne, instead—”
The room groaned and Bubbles made a noise of disgust before turning and stalking a few feet away, fuming.
“I'm sorry, guys,” Boomer said, laughing. “Come back, Bubbles, let's keep going—”
“Do you even know your lines?” she said, forgetting that she wasn't supposed to be talking to him and making no effort to mask her anger.
He didn't pick up on it. “Of course! Really, I do—”
“Then are you going to start taking this seriously or what?” she snapped, whipping around to face him. An unsettling silence pervaded the room at the look on Bubbles' face.
Boomer blinked, but summoned a smile nonetheless. “For you, anything.”
“Then cut that out!” she said angrily, and his smile faltered. “Quit flirting and screwing around! You're wasting my time, you're wasting everyone else's time, and yet you do it at every single practice! We're performing in less than two weeks! If I'd known all you were going to do was ruin rehearsal with all your stupid comments, then I never would've encouraged you to keep the role in the first place!”
A few people shifted uncomfortably. Boomer seemed a little stung and her heart sank a bit at the sight of him, but there was too much hurt anger in her to allow for any sympathy.
“Bubbles, chill—”
“I do not need you to tell me to 'chill,' and I do not need you to apologize. Just do something right, for a change,” she said viciously.
A few gasps echoed around the room. It had sounded mean, Bubbles knew it had sounded mean, but for once in her life she didn't care about being sweet and nice.
Though at the pained look on his face, she faltered and briefly thought she'd gone too far.
A loud, sudden thump from outside, followed by some frantic yelling, interrupted the tension. Everybody looked to the door. One of the students reached for the knob—
The door was kicked open and a number of men dressed completely in black spilled into the room, grabbing the nearest students and jamming guns in their faces.
Bubbles flew into the air as the room erupted into screams, but at the sound of several safeties clicking she halted, lowering her fists.
This is so not the time, she thought to herself, rage boiling inside her.
***
The tennis match ended without the final game ever finishing play. Butch and Buttercup had suddenly resorted to using their powers—it was suspected Butch had caved first—and ruined their rackets in the process, effectively ending the game.
“Sorry about that,” Butch said in a very non-apologetic tone as he held out his borrowed racket, which was not only bent at a ninety degree angle but had a giant ball-shaped-hole in the middle of the strings.
Buttercup looked more guilty about it as she handed her busted one over. “Those probably cost a lot of money, huh?”
The numb students they'd borrowed the rackets from went pale as they assessed the damage.
After a second of consideration, Buttercup snatched at Butch's back pocket and kicked him away, where he ate the court face first.
“Here,” she said, emptying his wallet and waving the few hundreds in there at them. “This should cover it.”
“Hey!” Butch cried. His wallet smacked him in the face. Buttercup was thanking the tennis coach for their time, but no, she wouldn't be joining. The coach looked equal parts disappointed and relieved.
Butch grimaced and made to go after the tennis kids and either demand or pummel his money back—
Buttercup snatched him by the belt as he flew by and threw him back against the court.
“What the hell are you doing, giving my money away like that?”
“What the hell are you doing with six hundred dollars cash in your wallet?” Buttercup shot back.
“Honest non-evil-related work!”
She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right.”
The distress signal suddenly went off on her cell, and she snatched her phone from her pocket. “It's from Bubbles,” she said.
“What?” Butch said as he stood. “Did someone run over a squirrel or something—”
Buttercup scanned the text, suddenly looked up in horror at the school, then went tearing off towards it in a streak of green.
“Hey!” Butch cried. “Wait for me!”
***
Blossom went over her AP Chemistry test one last time, checking her watch as she flipped the pages. Forty-five minutes left to go. She darted a glance at the rest of the room hunched into their little paper cubicle walls. Kris was off at the other end of the gym, somewhere. Robin was in AP Chem, too; she was a few rows down. Blossom wondered how long they still needed. Not that it mattered; nobody could leave until the time was up anyway.
On her way in she'd seen Cindy, who was probably over with the rest of the Seniors in Kris' section. She hadn't talked to Cindy much in Dance lately, but Cindy didn't seem to want to talk to anyone much at all. Blossom hoped this whole business with Brick hadn't so shaken Cindy that she'd do poorly on her AP.
Brick wasn't here. Since he shared all his AP classes with Blossom, he'd opted out of all his APs and had chosen to take the regular finals instead.
The boy was so juvenile. He should've taken at least one.
A sudden, piercing chirp sounded, and Blossom hastily grabbed her cell as a few teachers stalked over, angry at the interruption.
“No, it's not a regular call, it's the distress signal,” she assured them, standing. “I have to go—”
She took flight and headed for the nearest doors when the other side of the gym exploded into screams. She turned to see five—no, six or seven men dressed in black and with bullet proof vests on, all wielding guns and grabbing students.
Kris was one of them.
She gasped and made to shoot forward but at the number of them spilling into the room she held back. She couldn't save all of them at once; she could maybe take out four or five but that still left a potential two or three students who would get hurt, or worse—
The students at the other end of the room were still screaming. More guys in black were filtering through the other doors, dragging the musical theater students with them. After all of them were through (Boomer strolling lazily among them, she noted, and wondered why he wasn't flying), Bubbles floated in, wary.
Blossom's heart sank. Even with Bubbles, even with Buttercup, there were too many.
Buttercup burst through the doors and looked ready to start a spree of violence—
“Buttercup, no!” Blossom shouted, and her sister stopped. The screaming ceased at the sound of Blossom's voice.
Buttercup angrily spat, “Why not?”
Blossom scanned the room, trying desperately to think up a plan as the numbers climbed in her head. Twenty-seven men. Twenty-seven armed men, each with a student—Kris, Cindy, and Robin among them. Twenty-seven divided by three, that was nine, and stopping nine wouldn't generally be a problem but they all had guns, vicious looking guns, and were pointing them at students and spreading out throughout the gym, besides.
“Because there's too many of us,” one of them said, his smug voice ringing in the air. “Right, Blossom?”
“Holy shit.” Butch had appeared at the door, his eyes sparkling as he took in the scene. “This is some fucking day, let me tell you.”
***
Brick had heard some semblance of a commotion on his way out of class—he'd finished his final early, and unlike the APs students were permitted to leave their regular finals once they finished—but didn't pay it much mind. He was in no way interested in staying to investigate. He had packing to do.
He strolled down the halls, pausing as he reached the atrium. There was a figure in the double doorway to the gym, where the AP Chem test was supposed to be going on. He frowned, recognizing that frame.
“God damn it, Butch,” he muttered under his breath, then zipped forward, reaching a hand for his idiot brother's collar—
The other door swung open, and Brick stilled, his eyes settling on the automatic weapon pointing him straight in the face.
“Oh, you are so shitting me,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Get in, both of you,” the man wielding the weapon said.
“Or what? You'll put a bullet in my brain?” Brick said in a bored tone.
Butch was giddy. “Go ahead, man, give it a shot. Ha! Get it? A shot?”
“Shut up, Butch,” Brick snarled.
“Is this seriously happening?” Buttercup's voice echoed.
“I'm with her,” Brick said, glaring at the idiot with the gun. “Are you seriously pointing that thing at me?”
“Get in or I'll blow your fucking brains out,” the man said.
Brick stared at him, dumbfounded. “You. Are a fucking idiot.”
“I like your gun,” Butch said, eyes gleaming.
“This guy's got a Spectre,” Boomer called out, pointing at the man nearest him.
“Get the fuck down!” the man barked.
Boomer pouted. “No.”
“Do you have any idea who the fuck I am?” Brick growled.
A round of shots rang out, and screams pierced the air. One of the overhead lights shattered.
“Brick!” Blossom shouted. “Just do as he says! They've got hostages, for God's sake!”
“This isn't my God damn problem! I have to pack!” he shouted back.
The man in the center of the gym who'd fired his gun into the roof now aimed his weapon at Brick, too. “Do as she says, kid. Get your ass in here.”
A deathly silence fell over the room. Brick turned a cold eye on the man who'd spoken. “Excuse me?”
“Get your ass in here,” the man said deliberately, then turned his gun on his hostage. Kris.
In the background, Blossom tensed.
“Get your ass in here or I'll blow this guy's head off.”
Like the rest of the room, Kris was shaking. Probably wasn't used to staring a gun down. Brick darted a glance at a taut, desperate Blossom, fists clenched. He dimly thought that as a superhero, by this point she should've gotten used to people she cared about being put in danger.
Brick looked past the man who was pointing a gun at him and said levelly, “So blow his head off.”
“Brick!” Blossom shrieked, horrified.
“Do I look like the type of guy who gives a shit?” Brick continued.
“You ever seen someone's brains on the outside of their body?” the guy said in a grim voice.
Butch started laughing.
Brick was unfazed. “Looks like raw chicken fat.”
“Ugh, thanks for reminding me. I planned on eating tonight,” Boomer groaned, making a face.
There was a strangled inhalation of breath, and Brick looked at her. Blossom's lower lip was trembling as her gaze flitted between him and her boyfriend.
He closed his eyes and sighed. Without a word, he carefully sidestepped Butch and began to slowly make his way to the center of the room, making sure to avoid contact with any of the other gunmen—twenty-seven, he counted—and the terrified students being held hostage. He glanced briefly at Cindy, tears running down her face as her guy pointed a gun at her neck.
Help, she mouthed at him, and he had to keep from rolling his eyes. This was why he couldn't do the fucking hero thing. Too many weepy clingers.
Within seconds he had reached the guy handling Kris.
“I take it you're the leader,” he said, voice dull.
“Gettin' a good education, aren't you?” the man said.
“Not from here,” Brick muttered. “You know you sons of bitches are probably surrounded outside by helicopters and cop cars right now?”
“The Powerpuff Girls are in the same God damn room as us,” the guy responded. “What good are the fucking police going to do?”
“You got a point, there,” Brick admitted. He smirked. “Still. High school? What the hell, man? You could've robbed a bank with the artillery you got.”
“We've got our reasons.”
Brick's eyes widened. “Oh, I see! Making a statement, huh? 'Look at us, we took on the Powerpuff Girls! A bunch of regular old folks like us. All's we got is advanced weaponry—'”
“You talk too God damn much, smartass,” the guy snapped, throwing Kris down and aiming his gun at Brick. “I could shoot you. I could shoot all your God damn friends. You'd all be dead in a matter of seconds. It's that easy.”
A knowing smile pulled onto Brick's face and he said in a low voice, “Is it, now?”
“Um, I don't mean to interrupt, but are you going to shoot him or what?” Butch groaned, anxious.
“Are you?” Brick asked. “I mean, I come in here, I don't take your orders, I insult you, I really couldn't give a fuck if you shot the entire room dead right now—and I do mean that—”
“You're askin' for it, kid—”
“Doesn't that piss you off? A little bit?” He looked around the room. “Any of you? Some hot young shithead like me, acting all fearless in the face of danger? I'm practically begging you to put a bullet in me.”
“Team A!” the man barked, and a number of men dropped their hostages and aimed their guns at Brick.
The leader stared Brick down, his gaze perfectly aligned with the barrel of his gun. “Your wish is our command,” he said quietly.
Brick glanced around the room again, meeting Blossom's eyes, still stricken with panic, but there was recognition there, she knew he was up to something—
“Twelve,” he said, deliberately, and she blinked, suddenly scanning the room.
“'Twelve,' what?” the guy snapped.
Brick wet his lips. “Twelve bullets you're about to put in me.”
“Oh, you're getting more than that, you little shit.”
Twenty-seven minus twelve leaves fifteen, Brick thought. If the girls all attacked, aiming their eyebeams and both fistbeams, that gave them each three simultaneous shots, assuming their aim was on. With his brothers, that covered the remaining gunmen, but it was a gamble. He couldn't count on Boomer and Butch having that sense...
“Boys,” Brick said, and he sensed his brothers tensing, at the ready.
“Brick?” Boomer asked.
“Help,” he said, and watched Blossom's eyes flick to his brothers.
“There you go,” the lead gunman sneered. “Show us a little fear.”
Brick rolled his eyes. “Eep. I'm stricken with terror.”
“Any last requests, shithead?”
Brick shot the guy a wide grin. “Go fuck yourse—”
They opened fire, the leader aiming right at Brick's face, and he twisted his head, catching the bullet in his teeth and instantly spitting it back out at full speed into the man's boot. It pierced leather, skin, tissue, and as the man howled in pain and stared at a humorless Brick, the room exploded into blue, green, and pink light.
Brick snatched his gun and kicked the guy clear to the other end of the gym, where he hit the wall headfirst and then slumped to the floor, stunned.
Bubbles and Buttercup were already herding heaps of screaming hostages out of the gym. His brothers and Blossom had missed three guys, and there were still the eleven others that had fired at Brick. He instantly field-stripped the gun in his hands, eyes glowing red as the pieces clattered to the floor and the gunmen gaped at him, some retaining the sense—or stupidity—to fire.
Several guys were flung across the room, into the ceiling, blasted away. A small handful of students were still caught up in the fray, and the four gunmen left each grabbed one at random.
“Oh, Christ!” Cindy cried, sobbing.
Kris merely struggled, his shoes squeaking against the floor.
“Okay, I'm getting really sick of being a hostage now,” Robin declared, irritated. “This is, what, like the fifth time in my entire life? I need to move the hell out of Townsville!”
The last guy had actually grabbed Boomer.
“Dude! Hands off!” Boomer exclaimed, striking him with his bat. “I'm saving myself for marriage!”
Brick was at Cindy's side in a flash and ripped the gun out of the guy's hands, yanking Cindy aside as he kneed the man in the gut, feeling rib after rib breaking. Boomer swung at the two men remaining, a hard crack echoing in the room with each hit.
One of the guys pulled the trigger as he went down, and a string of bullets exploded out of it, carving a trail in the hardwood to Kris.
Blossom's attention was caught by the gunfire as she maneuvered the rest of the students outside, but she was caught up in the crowd and all the way on the other side of the gym, she'd never make it in time—
Brick heard it amidst all those screams, the tiny, desperate cry that slipped her throat, and he dove, snatching Kris by the collar and jerking him away from the fire.
Cindy screamed again and clawed at Brick, tightening her arms around his shoulders and sobbing into his chest, trying to get as far away from the ground as possible.
The gunfire stopped. Blossom landed, staring at Brick as Cindy clung to him and Kris grabbed at the leg of Brick's jeans, eyes on the gun that had fired at him.
Brick stared back at her, unsure of how to read her expression. She looked as if she might burst into tears at any moment, the way her eyes were shimmering, the way her lip was shaking. She extended her arms, and without thinking, he started to lift an arm to reach for her, too—
“Kris,” she whispered, dropping to her knees and pulling her boyfriend into her arms. Brick instantly settled his arm around Cindy's shoulder.
“Thank you,” Cindy hiccuped, and kissed Brick's neck, wet with her tears. “Thank you, thank you, oh God, thank you so much—”
“Are you okay?” Blossom asked Kris, taking his face in her hands.
“I'm okay,” he said, voice wavering, and he smiled weakly at her, trying to hug her back, but he was shaking too much.
“Chill out,” Brick muttered into Cindy's ear. “It's over.” He was hoping that would comfort her enough to get her to let go, but she only sobbed harder and clung tighter.
“Brick,” Blossom whispered, and he looked at her. Her eyes were still shimmering as they met his. “Thank you.”
He held her gaze for a long moment, then broke it, assessing the extensive damage the gym had suffered.
“I was supposed to go home and pack,” he muttered. None of these God damn fucking heroics. It wasn't him. What the fuck had he been thinking?
“Nobody was shot, thank God,” Bubbles said, appearing at Blossom's side. Buttercup was helping Robin up (“No, seriously, I need to get my ass out of Townsville,” Robin hissed at her friend).
“That guy was,” Boomer said, pointing at the unconscious leader. “Does it count if the weapon was Brick's, um, mouth?”
“That sounds dirty as hell,” Butch snickered, landing. The rest of them stared at him and the two dozen guns he had slung across his back. “What?”
“You can't keep those,” Brick ordered.
“But I won them fair and square! I even used them for good, I shot some of these fuckers with their own guns—”
“Is that where all that extra gunfire was coming from?” Buttercup mused. “Come to think of it, I didn't see your green streak anywhere after the first charge—”
“How can you use something like that?” Blossom cried.
“I like toys,” Butch chirped. “They're neat!”
One of the gunmen groaned and began crawling towards the door, catching everybody's attention. Wordlessly, Butch rolled one of his weapons into his hands and fired one shot at the guy's leg.
“Butch!” Blossom and Bubbles cried as the guy screamed and clutched at his bloody leg.
“What?! That still counts as using it for good, doesn't it?!”
***
Brick left almost immediately—he wasn't keen on talking to the cops—so Blossom lingered behind to recount what had happened. Buttercup and Butch waited at the sidelines, though she was mostly staying to make sure Butch didn't get his hands on any more guns.
Bubbles felt no need to stick around. Blossom was preoccupied, and Butch and Buttercup were chatting. Despite what had just gone down, she was still in no mood to talk to Boomer.
Boomer, however, being a typical boy, absolutely would not take the hint.
“Are you okay?” He tailed her out the door and jogged to catch up to her.
“I'm fine. My skin stops bullets, remember?”
“No, I didn't mean that.” He grasped her by the arm and stopped them both, angling her towards him. She kept her expression as neutral as possible. “I'm over this silent treatment crap. Why won't you talk to me?”
She stared at his shoes, unwilling to answer, but wanting him to see how hurt and upset she was so he might have a chance at figuring it out himself.
“Are you still mad about the uniforms?”
“Are you still not sorry about them?” she retorted.
“I'm never going to be sorry about those!”
“Well, you should be!”
His arms flailed for an exasperated second, trying to make sense of it. “Why?! Why should I be? This is a stupid thing to be fighting over! I don't understand what you want me to do! Do you want me to 'fess up to it? Do you want me to say, 'I'm sorry?'”
“Even if you did apologize, it wouldn't mean anything unless you really felt sorry,” she said.
“Well, good, because I don't and I wasn't planning on it.”
Her face fell. She'd thought he wasn't a bad person anymore, once.
“Don't you care?” she said, her voice coming out softer than she meant it to. “Don't you care about other people?”
“I care about you,” he said to her.
“Then why do you keep eating lunch with Haley?!” she burst, then clapped her hands over her mouth. No, this wasn't about that! This was about him not treating other people right, about him acting like a bad guy—
A stunned Boomer sputtered, “I—I thought you didn't want to talk to me. I thought you just needed some time—”
I completely messed up, she thought desolately to herself. This whole stupid thing had been about the uniforms in the first place, but the second she'd walked into the cafeteria to find him at Haley's side instead of hers, she'd gotten even more stubborn about refusing to talk to him.
She was still angry about the uniforms. But what hurt her was him spending time with his ex.
“Look,” he was saying, “me and Haley, we're not back together—”
“So why are you hanging out with her so much?!”
“I don't—I can explain, just, not right now, just come to the End-of-Year Concert tomorrow, I swear I'll explain everything—”
A thought occurred to him, and he paused.
“Are... are you jealous?” he asked, eyes suddenly brimming with hope.
The look on his face made her want to laugh and hit him at the same time. To keep from doing either, she whipped around and stalked away.
“Bubbles!”
“Don't follow me!” she called back.
“Does this mean you're not coming tomorrow night?!”
Bubbles groaned in frustration and waved him off.