Back To School (Part Four)

God, I missed hanging out with my team. We didn't even have to train or anything, but sometimes it was good to try and get some important work done when we were together. And there was something very important that we needed to see to before the next term got well underway.

Laura needed an f'ing codename. The rest of us had one, even if we didn't want it (I still hated being called Solaris). It was a requirement to have another title to go by in the field... which made sense back when mutants were a secret. It didn't make as much sense now. Tradition, perhaps?

Either way, we were all gathered at an arcade to just hang out for a while. The lot of us were gathered in a balcony dining area outside. Inside was full of annoying noises for Laura, which she didn't need when Eddie and I were doing well enough at annoying her on our own.

"So come on. What do you think?" I insisted, crumpling up straw wrappers to throw at her one-by-one. I was just trying to get some kind of reaction out of her, "You've got to give us some input here. It's about you."

Laura sat impassively. Her arms were crossed and she hardly blinked as harmless little paper balls bounced off of her head. To be fair, all she had to do was wait out five of them, "I don't care about any of this. I don't want to come up with something new to call myself. I don't want any of you to do it either."

Once I was out of ammunition, she kicked me in the shin under the table – hard. The girl knew how to kick. I knew this already, but she was wearing boots too. I dropped my head onto the table to grab my leg and let out a silent yell. Ruth rubbed my back to soothe my pain like the sweetheart she was. I'm pretty sure Hisako tried to high-five Laura.

Eddie was all business though. Focused on the matter at hand, he rejected Laura's rejection, "You need a codename, and you're not even trying. So that leaves it to us to help you out and come up with one," Laura just gave Eddie the blankest deadpan stare she could muster, which was pretty impressive, "I'm not kidding. Why doesn't she believe us?"

Hisako, big stick in the mud that she was, didn't miss a beat in responding, "Because it's you two saying it, and all of the codenames you've come up with so far are stupid."

I rested with my cheek in my hand, bored with being shot down. Every name we tried had been denied, "If you have such a problem with our ideas for names, which in my unbiased opinion are amazing, by the way-," I felt the need to add, "-You could always help us brainstorm. We are a team."

Despite my offer, there was no response from the peanut gallery. Hisako and Laura both either couldn't or wouldn't bother humoring us with helping us name our most recent addition to the Paladins. It wasn't any skin off of Eddie's nose or mine. It just meant that when we inevitably came up with a surefire, can't miss name for Laura, there would be no objections allowed from anyone. After all, I didn't get to pick my codename. Why should she?

Eddie huffed at the lack of help from our two female teammates, "Fine. Guess we're doing this the cheap way," He said before turning to Ruth, "Blindfold, what do we end up calling her? You've got to know."

Ruth was basically a cheat sheet to the future. The problem with that was, changing one thing changed a bunch of other things. If she told you anything, something she may have called out a year down the line might never happen, or might get moved up a few months. Working with her, you had to pick and choose, because stopping one bad thing might open up the door to something worse that you couldn't stop.

Ruth bid Eddie an apologetic smile, "Yes. No. Sorry. Bellamy says she should not tell him everything," She said, passing the buck of blame to me. Fair enough. I had told her to do that, "He says she should use her judgment and only tell him what's important."

Eddie could not wrap his head around this line of reasoning. Being who he was, of course, that meant he then gave out about his displeasure over this, "What? Bel, why would you do that? Come to think of it, why haven't we hit the lottery yet?" He asked, "...Other than the fact that we can't legally buy tickets?"

I reached over and flicked Eddie in the forehead to get him to sit down properly, "Because Ruthie can't choose what she sees. She just gets visions," I explained. We were working on having her hone in on more particular things, but despite her improvements, the chaos of life oftentimes made this difficult, "Besides, who wants to know everything? That's boring."

Hisako wasn't always against me for the sake of being a contrarian. This was made clear when she actually backed me up, doubling up on my point to Eddie, "Didn't you have a problem with her talking about everything she found out when you first met her? You thought she was creepy until Bel showed up and dropped that mandate on her."

"Stop. Bringing up. Old stuff," Eddie said, "I already apologized for that."

Hisako raised an eyebrow in interest, "Oh really? I don't remember an apology ever coming out of your mouth."

Ruth nodded, demurely raising her hand, "Yes. Pardon, you did not apologize to her," She said, speaking of herself.

"Yeah, you definitely didn't," I piled on in agreement, "But then again, I'm of the mindset that you shouldn't have to apologize just for how you feel about stuff."

Red-faced, Eddie finally put an end to the team ganging up on him, good-natured as it was in spirit, "We-we-we are getting sidetracked here. We need to come up with a codename for Laura before sessions start up again, otherwise we're gonna catch crap. If she goes too long without one, they'll probably dock us points."

That dog wouldn't hunt, as far as I was concerned, "The fuck they are," I knew they absolutely would though. I wouldn't put it past Mister Summers or Miss Frost for an instant. I slapped my hands on the table and pointed across at Laura, "You're getting a name by the end of the first week of classes, goddamn it. Eddie, go through the list again and see if anything works for her."

Eddie pulled up his phone that we'd been recording codenames onto and began reading them off, "Alright, try these on for size. Talon, Wolverette, Scratchy, Shredder, Super Shredder-."

Hisako could only take so much before interrupting, "Those are terrible. You should both feel bad," She turned to Laura and gestured her head toward Eddie and I, "If I were you, and I got one of those names, I would stab one of them," Laura seriously seemed as though she were considering it.

One could not criticize a method of approach if better solutions weren't being presented. Otherwise, it was just bellyaching, and nothing productive came of that.

"Girls..." I said calmly and smoothly, "The last time I checked, my hearing worked. And English is the language that we're all speaking right now, so I can understand what you say," I gave a wide sweeping gesture to the table we were sitting around, "By all means, please, contribute."

Eddie, not wanting to be stabbed, defended himself with words, "This is how we did it for Bellamy. Hell, he didn't even get a choice, remember? We picked for him."

Hisako could admit that much, "Right. It was funny when it was him. Now that it's happening to her? Not so much."

No respect for me, ever. No matter what. I hate my friends sometimes.

"I can still go by X-23 during missions," Laura finally chimed in, "I do not see why I need a new designation. This one still identifies me, and distinguishes me individually."

She was being so stubborn about this. The truth was, she did need a name. The fact that half the names Eddie and I had been coming up had been jokes wasn't the point. We weren't trying to legitimately name her ourselves. We were just trying to jog a decent one out of her brain while shooting the breeze.

She could not go by that name. It just wasn't going to happen. There was so much wrong with it, especially given everything I knew.

I let out an exasperated sigh, "It's a letter and a number. We can't call you that. It makes it seem like you're not a person, Laura. Like you're a project," I said, focusing all of my attention directly on her, "Why do you want to go by your clone ID? That's the name shitty people called you when shitty things were happening to you. Come on! Fresh start, woman! You can be what you want to be, not what you were made to be!"

After hearing that, Laura did seem like she was honestly considering going by something other than X-23. That was great. Finally, we were making some progress around here!

Even Hisako, my harshest critic on the team, seemed impressed by my stirring words, "I've gotta admit, that was almost inspiring."

As backhanded as it was, it still counted as a compliment, and I took it as one, "It's part of my job description to at least try to motivate you jerks. I may be a half-assed leader, but hey, that just means half the time I actually get it right."

Eddie gave us all a nugget of wisdom, "Dude, in some countries, 50% is a passing grade."

Truer words had rarely been spoken. And they were also equally inspiring in their own way. You just had to look a little beyond the surface to find the wise message hidden within.

Speaking of things being hidden, with my back to the balcony we were seated on, I didn't notice a flying figure approach until it had come to a rest, arms wrapping around me from behind and stealing my hat. Yet, I couldn't feel mad for a moment as it was obvious to me who it was, "Bellamy! Did you miss me? Ooh, did you get bigger while you were gone?"

I laughed to myself at the energetic greeting from my girlfriend, "How you been, Pix?" I ask, turning my head to give her a big kiss on the cheek, "You should have told me when you were flying in! You know I've been here for a while already. I would have done some lame shit like wait for you at the airport with a sign."

Megan looked at me, stunned that I had come up with such an idea and that she hadn't told me so I could actually do it, "Oh my God! That would have been so romantic! I would have loved that!"

Well, we could just call that a missed opportunity, "You say that, until you get a look at my grumpy mug posted up for you outside of security," I remarked, "I don't think emotional reunions are my thing."

Megan waited for me to scoot back and give her some space to sit down on my lap. She still had my hat on, "Don't be that way. You've got a soft spot in there somewhere," She said, poking me directly in the chest, "...Not here though. You are solid."

What could I say? When you never slept and had lots of empty time to fill, working out was a great way to do it. It stood to reason that there were some benefits that came with it.

"Boo," Eddie openly jeered, "Quit showing off. You big, glowing dickhead."

Before I could unleash a scathing rebuttal, Megan spoke up, "Can you really do that?" She asked me audaciously, her unique eyes shining mischievously, "I might like to see it if you could."

"Do what?" It took me a moment to realize what she was alluding to – which was Eddie's aforementioned remark, taking it literally, "Oh! Uh... I... don't know. I've never even thought to try."

I tried it later that night. I can make my dick glow and shoot light blasts out of it. It's awesome. Don't ask what kind of use I would actually have for that aspect of my powers. Just know that it exists, that yes, some girls do like it, and be jealous that you can't do it.

"So what brings you over here?" Hisako pleasantly asked Megan, "I really hope you didn't come all the way to Salem Center just to look for this guy."

Megan smiled brightly, "I was out with Hope and Jessie and we just came across you guys. I told them I was just going to fly up and say hey. So, hey!"

Going shopping with a group of other ladies sounded good to Hisako, "Our teams really need to hang out more. I need to expand my circle," She said, gesturing to Eddie and myself. To be fair, we weren't exactly good for girly things, "I love those two idiots, but spending so much time with them has to kill brain cells. I felt like a fog had lifted when I went home for the summer."

I'd been taking a sip of my drink the entire time Hisako had been talking and only stopped to respond, "All I heard out of that sentence was that you love me. I knew you did," I said smugly.

"See? Idiot."

Megan was completely enraptured by the idea of both her team and mine being tight, "We should do that! We can do that! I'll talk to the others about it," She promised Hisako. As she did, she bounced excitedly on my lap. It was a fantastic experience for me, "I'm already thinking of stuff. I'm talking group activities," She finished determinedly.

Eddie slapped his hand down on the table. Uh-oh. I felt a tirade coming and braced myself, "Right. That sounds like a good, sensible plan. OR, Bel can stop being an asshole and throw me a bone. Get me a date with Hope or Jessica!"

And there it was. To be fair, it took him a lot longer to work that angle with me than I thought it would, "How am I supposed to get you a date with one of them? Man up and ask."

Eddie scoffed and rolled his eyes, "You didn't."

That one hurt my ego, because he had a point. Then again, I didn't really have the opportunity before Megan asked me out of the blue, "To be fair, I operate on the assumption that everyone hates me until proven otherwise," I made it a point to give Megan a squeeze when I looked her way, "For the record, I would have totally asked you out first if I knew you liked me."

Megan hummed in wordless agreement, "Mmm. You kind of didn't figure it out until I hit you over the head with it, did you?" Another sharp jab to the ego, lack of intent aside, "I just wanted to stop in and say hi. I shouldn't leave the girls for too long."

"That's fine. I'll call you tonight," I said, allowing her to stand up, "Bye, Pix," Before she could depart, I remembered something and gave a quick tug around her waist, "Ah-ah. Hat."

With a big grin, Megan took my hat off of her head and put it back on mine, leaning down to give me a kiss when she did, "Bye, Bel," She whispered before flying off with her wings.

Eddie made sure to provide one last parting shout before she got too far away, "I was serious about that date by the way! Make it happen!" He looked at the rest of us and shook his head, "She's not gonna make it happen."

Laura had been quiet the entire time Megan had been there, which admittedly wasn't much different from how she usually was. Only after Megan left did she say anything again. Her arms crossed, she stared at me impassively, "Bellamy, I am upset with you again," She directed my way.

"I am too," Eddie said before I could get exasperated and ask Laura why, "Bellamy, you fucking clown. You have a girlfriend who has cute friends. Share the wealth."

Hisako scowled in Eddie's direction, and I slowly pushed away from the table, feeling tensions rise, "Share the wealth. Implying that girls are like booty or something," She said.

Eddie wasn't fazed by possibly upsetting the member of our team with impenetrable psionic armor, "Hmm. That's an interesting turn of phrase, given the topic at hand. Booty," He made the unfortunate mistake of lingering within Hisako's arm's reach. He got a cup of slowly melting ice poured on his head. The shit-eating grin never left his face.

I rolled my eyes and got up from the table, chewing on the ice from my own empty cup.

"Where are you going?" Eddie asked, whipping his wet hair around like a dog drying itself.

I waved the entire situation off, "I'm checking out of playing peacekeeper for the rest of the day. Instead, I'm gonna go downstairs and play some crappy arcade games," Ruth was quick to leave her seat to accompany me, "Come on, Ruthie. Let's go win some tickets for a lame prize."

It was the tail end of summer. The last dregs of the holiday. School was starting up in a matter of days. If at the time I had any delusions that it would be a more chill time than the year that came before it, I was out of my mind.