The fastest teenager in the building had arrived late, as usual. Wally had beeped him twice. He knew no matter how good his excuse was, it wasn’t gonna be good enough for the speedmaster himself. No amount of kittens saved from cruel fates stuck in trees or grandmas helped across the street would buy him leeway. Perhaps that was why he had to rock up into the warroom to be faced with fighting his greatest foe yet. It wasn’t the half-bred kryptonian, a new-genesis god, a Venom-juiced freak to put the debate of strength vs. speed to rest. Hell, Rufus wasn’t even going to get a rematch against the pink warhead called Shattercrash.
Speaking off, he had lost Polaris’s trail a couple of days ago. Tracking the deranged doctor down to an intergang hideout was as warm as the trail got. A boomtube or something and he was gone without a trace. None of the intergoons he could get his fast little hands on would say anything worthwhile either.
His new suit itched. He wasn’t sure why, but it did. Utilizing a fabric similar to what Wally wore, Rufus now looked like a special Nightwing-edition of The Flash and he hated all of it. It had gotten worn for a few days and had already a few thousand miles in it, no worse for wear. His hat was in his hand as he pulled his hair behind his ears, listening in on who he was supposed to face before finally situating the trucker hat on his head.
Oracle. He was gonna fight the girl who had no physical abilities but only some vague quantum-mechanical ability to see the future? That’s gonna be… Interesting, for sure.
Getting into position, Accelerate as the villain, Oracle as the hero. It was a perfect setup, truly. The situation got the young speedster thinking. Just what use was the seers powers in a real combat scenario? Can she predict a foe's movements?... Can she predict his?
The thought intrigued him. Can she see the future faster than he can?
“Hey, Oracle! You cool if we goof around a little before you kick my ass?” His words came out in such a way that he somehow didn’t sound like a condescending douche.
Admittedly, it wasn’t ideal. Granted, she couldn’t think of getting paired with anyone as ideal considering she couldn’t do much in a combat scenario. But to get paired with the speedster of the group seemed even worse (though she did say a silent prayer of thanks to not be up against Shattercrash considering recent events).
Once it was time for their match, Kennedy stepped into the ring. She was to play the hero and Rufus the villain.
”Ok, how the hell am I going to do this?” she thought to herself. She glanced at the arena to get a sense of it before she heard Rufus speak up. This was another matter, she barely knew the guy. Granted, she barely knew anyone and it wasn’t like she was the social butterfly of the Titans, but it didn’t help. After all, that was what this training was supposed to do after their horrible attempt at the mission.
She really missed Lincoln.
Kennedy wasn’t sure if Rufus’ words were meant to rile her up or put her at ease. It sounded fine, but what did he mean about her kicking his ass? Did he not realize he could run circles around her before she could even blink?
“Umm, I guess so. What did you have in mind?” she asked.
Dashing across the bank, ignoring the intended objective, Rufus appeared on the railing of the floor, next to Kennedy, chewing on a powerbar.
“Oracle… From Delphi? You see the future, right? I’m curious about how that works. Are you Wonder Woman’s sidekick with the whole Apollo angle?If you see the future, is fate real?”He took a bite out of the bar and awaited a response to his bombardment of questions.
Kennedy looked over as Rufus sped over to her.
”And they want me to fight against this dude?” she thought to herself. His questions were understandable.
“I truly don’t know how they work other than the fact I can control them. Sometimes a vision I see can be altered, changing the outcome, sometimes the vision comes true no matter what I do. I am able to maneuver it but sometimes, as you said, fate intervenes.” Kennedy remembered seeing Polaris grab Rufus and throw him during their first mission. How she tried to prevent it, but couldn’t.
“Was that all?”“... So you can sort of see the future, but only sometimes? And even then, your vision can be prevented or altered, but not always?” He pondered, fiddling with an object in his hand.
“That doesn’t quite answer my question. Can you bring the visions forward at will? If not, what use are they in combat?” His demeanor turned ever so slightly more serious, reminding his partner that they were supposed to simulate a fight.
“Are your visions based on intention or ability?” he pondered further.
In truth, Kennedy didn’t know how useful it would be in a fight. She was reminded of her first mission where she royally screwed up.
“I can bring visions forward, yes.I said I can control them. I just can’t control what I see.”
“As for combat, I guess that is what we are going to find out here. Any other questions about my abilities before we get into it?” Kennedy prepared herself, though she didn’t expect to win this. There was no way she could beat the speedster in a brawl. This would only serve to show everyone else how useless she was.
“Nono, you misunderstand my question. Would a vision about me, about our fight, be called on by my intention, or my ability? I’m capable of being quite a threat, but can your powers sense if I’m serious or not?”“Dude I don’t know! I saw Polaris grab and throw you, but who’s to say that was his intention. I also saw Blitz get injured and I called to him and told him and he missed getting hurt. I wish I had the answers, but I don’t. Welcome to my life of constantly being harassed and questioned by others when I don’t prevent something bad or feared when I bring up something good. No one knows what to do about me, least of all myself. So can we get this one-sided match over with now?”Rufus nodded, it was evident that Kennedy had no interest in engaging in conversation about her powers, so he figured it was about time to get practical.
“Guess prodding will do.” Rufus brought up. He vanished, and for twenty-eight seconds the room was quiet, the hostages detained, and as far as most could tell he had vanished.
The piece didn’t last as the blur scooted up on the other end of the bank room to Oracle.
“See. I jury-rigged myself four sets of explosive handcuffs. Three for the civilians down there.” He smirked, turning his cap around to become more aerodynamic, up from the stands Wally let out a groan about the ‘stupid hat’. The explosive cuffs dangling in his hand.
“I’ve triple blinded these. They will go off in sequence. They have to be disarmed in sequence, too. You tell me which one will go off when, and I’ll disarm them. You tell me wrong, Oracle, and well… These aren’t real people down there. So…” His face grew serious as he pulled out the last pair, clasping them around his own wrists.
“The last pair is for me. They’ll blow in a minute and a half. Don’t screw around.” He urged, there was no levity in his tone, this was not a bluff. Wally and Cyborg were about to move but Arsenal halted them, wanting to see how this all plays out.
Kennedy blinked and Rufus was gone. So the fight had begun. What she expected was to maybe be punched or thrown across the room. Tripped up from the man’s intense speed. What she did not expect was within a matter of seconds, Rufus had gone up the stands after fastening homemade bomb handcuffs to the “civilians” and one for himself. The civilians were not at risk due to them being fake, but if Rufus was telling the truth, he had just latched on bombs to himself and called to her to figure out which ones to disarm. She looked over towards where the others were watching, almost imploring them to stop this. Surely this was not the point of the exercise. However Arsenal had other ideas.
“You heard the man Oracle. Save the civilians.”Kennedy felt her pulse race as panic began to set in. Surely he was lying, right? There was no way he would actually risk putting an actual bomb on his person for a fake training exercise. But how could she be sure?
She steeled herself. If this was how it was going to be, then she was going to try. She closed her eyes and brought forth a vision. In the room they were in, she saw the civilians lined up. Each one latched with the bomb handcuffs. She also saw Rufus briefly before he sped up and reached the civilian in the middle. He began to disarm the bomb as she watched. In a matter of seconds the cuffs were off and fell to the ground.
A beat.
Another beat.
No explosion.
Kennedy came back with a gasp. She faced Rufus again.
“Disarm the one in the middle first. And while you do, tell me what the hell all this is?”“I trust you.” He simply said, zooming out, reaching the civilian in the middle. His hands were a little difficult to move as the rigid metal bars of the handcuff minimized his room for movement.
“Here goes everything.” He mumbled, flicking a screwdriver in his hand and in a blur he had disarmed the first cuff. He sighed in relief.
“One down.”Kennedy waited while Rufus worked on the cuffs. She could have been wrong and wouldn’t that be hilarious. However, he managed to get the cuffs off without everyone else exploding. So she got it right.
However, she was more surprised at his words. Trust. She hadn’t felt that in…..well had she ever felt it? Trust in someone else? Or felt like she was trusted? She closed her eyes as another vision came. This time she saw the explosion after Rufus attempted to disarm the civilian on the left.
“Disarm the one on the right. Then the left. Then yours. But….” she walked forward, standing next to the civilians.
“I want to be next to you when you do. If you can trust me, I can trust you.” Rufus smiled.
“Just… Know that I can’t vibrate through material like he can.” He said, nodding to Wally who was looking on, a bead of sweat running down his forehead.
“And I’d rather die than let that smug asshole in red save me.” He focused up.
“You’re certain it’s the one on the right and then left, and me last, yeah? We don’t get a second shot at this.”Kennedy saw the vision. Her visions came true unless she altered them. And she had no intention of changing the outcome of this.
“I am sure. Show them how we do things.” She did not know where this newfound confidence came from, but she noted her pulse was calmer, her breathing at an even pace. “And after we live through this, promise me you’ll explain how you came to know how to rig up explosives.”
He nodded, the timer was running out, eleven seconds left on the clock and he got to work. Not as a blur, but certainly hard to keep your eyes on he undid them in the order Kennedy had told him, until he finally only had his own left, the timer reaching the final digit.
The cuffs were flung into the air as all four exploded, leaving a cloud of dust in its wake, clearing as it revealed the two teenage heroes and their fake civilians unharmed.
“I give up. Hero beat my little game.” Rufus states to put an end to the exercise, holding up Oracle’s hand as if she had just won the championship match against Ali.
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