[Book 2] Chapter 08: Team Trust (Part 1)
[Clock - 07:06 | 07:06 AM]
[Calendar - 18/06/2010]
[Location - Mount Justice, Happy Harbor, Rhode Island]
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3rd Person POV
Time Skip - 10 Days
Sleeping on his new room was harder than he expected. While he was not to actually live in Mount Justice, he decided to at least try and sleep on the room that was given to him... And he must say, he fucking hates this bed! After years of sleeping on literal clouds, he has definitely been spoiled rotten by the fluffy soft and cuddly touches of a cloud bed. At least he has Mr. Wiggles with him, his Flumph was adorable as ever and always ready to contact the Empress' own Flumph and then he'd be back on his own cloud bed in no time- and he has done so some times because he was tired of doing nothing around the place. Sure, being a hero was exciting, but he has yet to do his own debut and that is... underwhelming. He has been preparing himself for the missions that he would go in, but until now, nothing! Supposedly he and the team should be getting to know each other, but... well, that hasn't gone well.
Well, he did kinda start off on the wrong foot, but that was Wally's fault... Well, mostly his fault, Adam did get a bit hot headed too with Kaldur, mostly because of his own experiences with the refugees of Atlantis.
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Flashback - [08/06/2010]
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The majority Justice League had left, leaving behind only Red Tornado and Black Canary, but they soon also left, leaving only them. Adam felt a little awkward, so he decided to try and break the ice by introducing himself further: "Uhhh... Well, as I said before, I'm Adam- I'm from the Beastialis Empire." The moment he said the words "Beastialis Empire", three of the five people in the room with him narrowed their eyes and looked at him with curiosity and a little bit of apprehension: "...And I feel like I just said something bad? Well, no, you three reacted like I said something bad." The three he was talking about- Aqualad, Kid Flash, and Robin -just looked at him for a few moments. In the awkward silence of the situation at hand, Adam remembered a little about the things that Empress Atlas taught him about the outside world and how they would react to Beastialis, so he wasn't exactly caught off guard by Robin's reaction or Aqualad's reaction... Kid Flash's reaction, however, was what bothered him. He just scoffed?
"Well, I gathered as much..." Robin huffed for a moment before he tried- and failed -to look friendly. He still had that little look of mistrust in his eyes as he offered a hand to Adam: "So, uh, I'm Robin. Real name is prohibited by Batman, so I guess you can call me Rob or Robin whenever, will be a little weird, but I'll get used to that." He sounded a little sad by the fact that he had to use his hero name, which was weird to Adam- if he knew he could, he would have told everyone to only call him Electric Light at all times... that'd be cool and weird at the same time. "Well, this is Wally-" He pointed to Kid Flash, who just lifted one eyebrow at him: "-and Kaldur." He pointed to Aqualad, who did not bother to hide his hesitant but clear mistrust of him and Adam knew exactly why... He's Atlantian, and he looks human enough not to be targeted by the Pure Blood Atlantians, which means he either sees Beastialis as a threat or as an inferior place full of inferior people, and that makes Adam annoyed. "That one Superboy!" He pointed to the guy and-
"...oh fuck, he's hot."
...did he just say that out loud?
Adam felt his whole face flush as those bright blue eyes stared back at him, the confused face gave way to a cocky grin and a single lifted eyebrow: "...thank you?" He sounded confused, and that made Adam fucking embarrassed of himself. "That's... a first... I didn't know boys found other boys hot too?" Oh shit, is this what Adam thinks it is? Oh, he has only heard of such a thing before, but to find one so young in the wild! Adam has heard of them existing because the Empress said he met one a few times. The infamous Himbo!? "...why is he looking at me like that?" Superboy was a little scared of those eyes that looked at him like he was both a piece of meat and a rare specimen... It kinda reminded him of a few scientists at Cadmus.
"Oh, sorry-" Shaking his head, Adam apologized. He had to blink away the look that his Empress always called the "Oh shit I found something I want" look, the look of greed or whatever it is that his eyes seem to show when he finds something cool: "-Sorry... I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable? Okay, it's just- I never met a Kryptonian before! That's cool, the Empress has said that Krypton is one of the many planets that he knows the story of or what the fuck happened to it." That's true, the Empress did say that he knew what had happened to Krypton when he was listing the few planets he knew that had sapient life besides Earth in this universe. The Beastialis Empire has interacted with a few extraterrestrial lifeforms before, and they're cool! "Anyway, it's cool to meet you." He tried to keep calm and play it cool, but this was the very first time that he has flirted with a guy before (even if accidentally)... His eyes look blue just like Superman's eyes, and he has literally the same face as the guy, so he probably is the son of the man of steel... but with who? If not the son, then he probably is like a clone or something similar. "It must be great to have impenetrable skin to defend you from damage, I just have my armor and my shielding spell-"
There was a scoff, making Adam pause for a moment.
"-that protects me in a pinch." He finished his sentence lamely and looked towards the one and only Kid Flash, who was... narrowing his eyes? "Is something the problem, Wally?" Immediately, lessons on subtle conversation manipulation he received from the Empress jump-started his brain and he began to look over the guy. He pressed his finger on the necklace he had, ready to activate the magic within it, but he refrained from doing so at the expense that it would only help him for a few moments. "Did I say something to make you upset- oh, you're one of those, right? The weird people that cares about who other people feel boners for? The Empress did warn me that your kind of people existed, what was the name again? Homophobes?" Really, that is one of the most weird things that Adam has heard of before- marriage and romance in Beastialis is free and beautiful, with marriage not being limited only to men and women, but anyone and anything that wishes to be tied romantically and esoterically to one another, with not even a quantity limit. Polyamorous marriages happen sometimes in Beastialis, and Polyamorous divorces are always fun to witness.
"Wait- what?" Wally was immediately confused about what he was talking about, and taken aback he shouted: "No! I don't care if you think Superboy is hot!" He truly didn't care- anyone can think whoever they want is hot or whatever, he just doesn't believe in one thing! "I just don't believe in whatever magic bullcrap you're sprouting!" Wally was a little mortified that someone even thought something so horrible about him- like, who actually cares about that!? "I don't believe in that magic thing! It clearly doesn't exist- it's just advanced technology that we don't understand yet!" Now that he started rambling about it, why stop it here? "Seriously, an entire portion of Gotham, in the sky? That is blatant use of Anti-Gravity tech right there! That could revolutionize the entire realm of physics! That's just plain selfishness from those people-"
That did make Adam pause. But Wally did not... it seems like he has some opinions about Beastialis.
"-like, seriously? Whoever was that discovered and made the Anti-Gravity technology that keeps those weird islands in the sky is an awesome genius, why hide!? Seriously, the amount of improvements that could be done to so many aspects of technology with Anti-Gravity... So many things humanity could achieve!" There was this sparkle in his eyes, something that only those who love something so deeply that it becomes an obsession can have. Adam has seen such a sparkle in the eyes of many artists of Beastialis, and those people are somewhat scary to him: "Space travel, flying cars, floating bridges, clean energy! Just imagine the things we could make-" That sparkle faded away as Wally coughed on his fist: "-anyway, I can't believe that to disguise this wonderful discovery your Empress makes up this whole magic thing."
Adam had to take a deep breath. He made eye contact with the only one who he knew was also able to use magic, and here's the facial conversation that ensued. Both Adam and Kaldur just made faces to each other back and forth while the rest of the team watched.
Adam: ...is he serious?
Kaldur: sadly, yes.
Adam: Oh my gods, is he stupid?
Kaldur: sadly, yes.
Adam: ...is he smart?
Kaldur: sadly, yes.
Adam: my condolences.
Kaldur: thank you. My condolences as well.
Adam: Thank you.
"...are humans and Atlantians capable of Telepathy?" Miss Martian- Megan -asked Robin and Superboy as they watched Adam and Kaldur make faces at each other.
"Well, some of them?" Jason said- With the information Batman had available about everything, Jason knew about Atlantian Mages and Metahumans that had the capabilities of using Telepathy, but not all humans and Atlantians can do the same. "The majority can't. But I guess some can."
"...why do I feel like they're mocking me?" Wally felt like they were somehow mocking him- its that "teenage who has been severely bullied in his life" sixth sense. It is almost another super power! "They're definitely mocking me."
"Look-" Adam sighed, already fed upbwith the ignorance of one of the sidekicks that he one day admired- As they say, never meet your heroes, huh? "-I might not like Atlantis, or their King, but at least I know that like Beastialis, they're a magical empire! They use magic and technology, just like Beastialis! You're saying that the entire backbone of both of our societies is fake, and that is so fucking ignorant... Atlantis is just as magical as Beastialis, and you're basically denying the existence of both." Adam paused for a moment, his bias showing as he shrugged; "Well, except of course, that Beastialis is a thousand times better."
"...now, wait a moment." Kaldur narrowed his eyes, face going from the usual stoic mask to a new annoyed expression: "Atlantis is much better than Beastialis. We have the entirety of Earth's oceans as our territory! You? Only a few islands in the sky."
"Oh yeah?" Adam's eyes narrowed as well, a look of "oh, you're challenging me?" came over his face as he said: "We're above you- quite literally. Besides, till this day, the Beastialis Empire is yet to experience a civil war that left thousands of its citizens dead, a few nobels coming out of their bigotry closet and saying "Surprise, I'm racist!", or even the King kicking out the citizens that needed his help the most and forcing the others to seek refuge in any way they can..." Adam was good friends with many refugees of Atlantis, he knew very well of the situation that was going on when the civil war started: "And, well, while your people were doing politics mine were rescuing yours, so there's that." Huffing, Adam finally remembered where they were when he felt Wally's glaring eyes on him as Kaldur looked a little ashamed of himself. "Also-" he pointed his finger towards Wally: "-I will fuck with you until you admit that magic is real."
"Oh yeah? Challenge accepted!"
They glared at each other.