Season 1, Episode 5 - The Boxtops X - "Tribute to Troy"

The next day, Friday night specifically. It felt a little chilly, so the students and alumni of West Narragansett Technical Academy bundled up in green-and-black jackets and green-and-black hats as they piled into the bleachers in the stadium behind the Academy. Even when they were down the street on the way to the stadium, they could hear the blares of trumpets and beating of the drum from the Academy’s school band.

Inside the stadium, on the bleachers, Team Red – Reed, Isaac, Audrey, Alfie, and Coleridge - sat together, bathed in the bright white flood lights positioned above the football field, providing a stark contrast to the black sky above them all. Down below, the Academy’s varsity football team – in green-and black, of course - was currently driving down the field, their running back leading the way against Russet Latin High School. People in the stands cheered while down below on the edge of the field, cheerleaders spun and twirled, joined by the band whenever there was a break in the action.

The third-years of the Academy earned the unofficial privilege of sitting in the bottom-most seats, some even standing, leaning against the fence that separated them from the field. Team Red could see Clayton and Hanai among those seniors, throwing their hands into the air to whip the student section into a frenzy. They and the rest of the seniors led the chants and the celebrations (and decent portion of them probably weren't all that sober). The first years got stuck at the top of the bleachers, which could be seen as a good thing, considering the view, but being at the top was the same as being on the outskirts of a big party, waiting for your eventual turn to make it to the center of the action.

As second-years, Team Red sat in the middle section of the bleachers, not too high up and not too low either. All five were dressed warmly, and Audrey even brought a blanket, wrapping it around herself and Reed (she gently declined Coleridge’s request to snuggle in between them). They sat in a row of five along the same bench in the bleachers.

“Can’t believe you guys dragged me here,” Reed complained, slightly shivering despite the number of layers on her.

“It’s the Homecoming game,” Isaac answered, sitting in the middle of the group. “You didn’t even go the Homecoming dance, the least you can do is go to the Homecoming game. High school football games work best when you’re in, well, high school. You at least oughta go to one.”

“And here I am,” Reed muttered. “It’s a Friday night, Isaac. Man isn’t meant to go out on Friday nights.”

“...what?”

Reed rubbed her gloved hands together. “You work all week, Friday night is the first night where it’s not a school night. Friday nights are meant to be spent in the comfort of your home.”

Isaac raised an eyebrow. “But you come by on Friday’s all the time.”

Reed crossed her arms. “And that takes a lot of energy. At least you and Audrey’s places are lowkey. But now you got me outside in the cold, in the dark, where admission is five dollars. Five whole dollars. And being with people is the most exhausting thing in the world." She raised a finger. "At a football game, I'm not just with people, I'm with a whole crowd. All this noise and such does a number of poor 'ol me."

Isaac shrugged. "Suffering builds character."

Reed rolled her eyes and slouched deeper under Audrey's blanket.

There was a timeout on the field; the tubas in the Pond band blasted the school's fight songs in time to a drum beat.

“Hey, Alfie,” Audrey asked, the usual grin on her face. “Are the games here like the ones in New York?”

The whole time, Alfie remained quiet, a serious look on his face. Though they brought him here, nobody expected him to do that much talking, and Alfie himself probably didn’t either. But Audrey liked to make sure everybody was included, especially when they're teammates.

Alfie thought of life in New York. “We never really had anything like this in the internment camps,” he explained, his voice neutral, maybe a little distant. “There were a couple of teams, though, unofficial ones made by the kids and maybe a parent or two helping out. I never played, and we didn’t have the band or cheerleaders or floodlights or even a real field, but it was fun watching.”

The four kept quiet as he talked, because it’s hard to remain chipper and upbeat when someone tells a story like that.

Alfie concluded his story. “After they transferred me to South Utica Academy, they had a setup similar to this. They had the same amount of pageantry. I never went myself, but it seems similar.”

“Maybe that means we’re not so different after all,” Audrey suggested helpfully.

Alfie looked back at the game. “Tch.”

Coleridge suddenly stood up. “Open your eyes, ref!”

A voice called out to him from a few rows up. “Ah, can it, Coleridge!”

Coleridge looked around for the source of the voice. His eyes narrowed when he found it. “I’ll kick your ass, Samuel!”

In his heavy black jacket, Samuel grinned. “Will you really?”

Coleridge said nothing for a long time.

“...no.”

He sat back down and went back to watching the game, grumbling about the injustice of it all.

Reed reached her arm out and tapped Isaac on the opposite shoulder; Isaac looked in the wrong direction, away from her.

Reed snickered at her own trick. “Hey, Isaac, get me a hot dog, would ya? Thinking mustard on it, unless they got that spicy sort of mustard. I’m much more of a mild girl.”

Isaac shook his head. “This isn’t the apartment, Reed. This is a public football game. The chances of me getting up, missing the game, all to get you a hot dog – with the wrong condiment on it, I might add – are zero. Less than zero, in fact. In the negatives.”

“You a ketchup guy?” Audrey asked, but Reed was already reaching out to Coleridge.

“Hey, Coleridge pal, grab me a hot dog,” Reed ordered.

Coleridge’s eyes started watering. “Marie...when we dated, she used to call me Coleridge pal...”

When he started sniffling, Reed groaned and rubbed her hands together to stay warm.

Coleridge pulled out of a can of beans from his pocket. “Hey, Alfie, give me a light,” he asked as he pulled out a pocket knife and started fiddling with the top.

Alfie looked at him dryly. The others looked at him in surprise.

“The hell you got a can of beans for?” Reed asked.

Coleridge shrugged. “I’m hungry. So I brought beans. And now I’ll eat them.”

Isaac clasped Coleridge on the shoulder, his firm grip representing a concerned friend. “Coleridge, we understand that you are a relatively odd guy, but who brings beans to a football game?”

Coleridge pointed at himself and spoke in his low, nasally voice. “This guy, who you might as well refer to as the brains of Team Red. Football games are long events, Isaac. Multiple hours, even. It’s only natural to get hungry, even if you eat dinner before. But have you seen the prices here? Have you, Reed? Eight dollars. Eight dollars for an entire hot dog. That’s eight more than zero. That’s terrible. For eight dollars, you could buy two packs of four hot dogs at Stop N Go. That’s a dog a dollar. A dog a dollar!”

Reed looked at Isaac and Audrey. “Is that really what I sound like?”

Coleridge popped the top off the can of beans. “This is the working man’s choice,” he proclaimed. “Ninety-nine cent beans. Hey, Alfie, can you heat the bottom of this? You can eat it right out of the can, I know, but you don’t know what sort of diseases can be found in cans these days.”

Alfie kept his eyes on the band, still playing on the field. “Heat it yourself.”

Coleridge eyed his can of beans and went back to watching the game, grumbling about today’s economy.

Alfie sighed and stuck a hand out below Coleridge’s can. A small spray of oil appeared from the top of his index finger for a brief moment, less than a second; a flame followed, forming something similar to a small fountain jet of water, except it was on fire.

“Ah, thanks Alfie.” Coleridge patted him on the back. “I’m putting you ahead of Isaac in my friendship power rankings now.”

Alfie rolled his eyes and kept the flame going.

“Alright, now that Coleridge has solved his long, national nightmare, we can talk strategy,” Reed declared. “Of course, I wanted to finish it before coming to the game, but somebody had to bring their Yokohama Homecade.”

Everybody eyed Coleridge.

“I didn’t know we were going to game!” Coleridge protested. “And I brought it to play after we finished making said strategy, but somebody had to start playing before we were done.”

Everybody eyed Audrey.

“I didn’t know we were going to the game either!” Audrey exclaimed. “And I only started playing since we needed a quick break for morale, because somebody got a little upset.”

Everybody eyed Isaac.

“Hey! What’s everyone looking at me for?” Isaac raised his hands defensively. “I had every right to get mad. I would’ve been fine if somebody hadn’t belittled my person, besmirched my good name, and begot all of our problems.”

Everybody eyed Reed.

“There’s that word-a-day calendar at work,” Reed said dryly. “I didn’t do any of that. All I said was that the mac n cheese you made was a little soggy. And it was. It you were to look up an example of objective fact in the dictionary, a picture of your soggy-ass mac n and cheese would be right below it. And besides, you wouldn’t have needed to make mac n cheese if somebody remembered to bring the food they promised to bring.”

Everybody eyed Alfie.

“Oh wait, that one was me,” Audrey realized, giggling. “What’s that thing they do in your Japanimations? When the girl messes up, she sticks her tongue out and sort of taps herself on the head, right?” Audrey did as described, grinning.

“Alright, alright, alright,” Reed interrupted. “Enough of this. If we keep arguing, there’s not a chance we’ll win. So, since we’re all gathered, let’s iron out the strategy now.”

Isaac looked impressed. “Wow, I didn’t think you cared that much.”

Reed crossed her arms. “Remember when we were in the nurse’s office, after the fight in the sewers? We promised we’d take things at an appropriate level of seriousness from now on. Hibiscus Reed keeps her promises.”

She looked away. “And besides, if I lost to Mackenzie, of all people...I’d have to off myself, Isaac. Either that, or go into a long, self-imposed exile until thirty years from now, when the hero convinces me to get off my ass and keep fighting. Do you want that, Isaac? Do you want me to either jump off a bridge or sit around in a cave for thirty years and only appear as a supporting character, that mentor who is likely killed off by the bad guy at the end of the second act to serve as the final catalyst to the hero’s character arc? Is that what you want me to become? Just a vehicle for another character’s growth?”

Isaac thought about it.

“...no.”

“That’s what I thought,” Reed concluded. “Let’s plan that strategy and let’s kick some ass.”

The football game down on the field below went back and forth. The Academy were the favorites, but their opponents were putting up a valiant effort.

In the bleachers, Reed pulled out several papers from an inner pocket of her great coat.

“Did you guys all read the handouts Mackenzie gave us?” Reed asked.

Audrey and Coleridge looked away and whistled.

Reed sighed. “Alright, fine. I’ll go over it.” She ran her finger across one of the papers. “Our Combat Simulation is going to be a capture the flag match. It’ll be in some sort of forest arena, with each team’s flag on either end. We can win by stealing their flag and bringing it back to our flag, or by incapacitating everyone on the enemy team. That means making them unable to fight, Audrey.”

Audrey put her hand down.

Reed continued. “It’ll be a five vs five. Let’s go over our powers. I’m decent with sound waves and okayish with magnetic waves and don’t look at me like that Isaac, I’m bringing the brass knuckles I found in the Bay Mart. There aren’t any rules in war. And speaking of you, you got your fists and your clones. Audrey has her plants. Alfie has his flamethrower finger gun. That leaves Coleridge.”

Coleridge ahem-ed and adjusted the collar of his jacket. “Contrary to popular belief, I’m a promising Earth user.”

The four nodded, not particularly surprised by his power, nor particular curious about it in the first place. It was seeing (lack of) reactions like that that made Coleridge shadow-box in his room at night, fighting his demons.

“What can you do with it?” Audrey asked, since she was, at least, enthusiastic about learning something new about someone. “Can you make walls and all that?”

Coleridge kept the confident tone in his voice. “I can indeed make walls.”

Reed looked back at her papers and thought about it.

“...pfft.”

“I’m gonna choose to ignore that,” Coleridge muttered.

Reed snickered and added that piece of information to her papers. “Alright, so at least we all know our powers now. We got a decent combination. But, thanks to our intelligence system - aka, me - we know a few of their powers as well.”

Reed frowned at the memory. “We know Mackenzie can emit radar waves, as she applied them on innocent me right before we went into the sewers a few months ago.”

“You spray painted Mackenzie Smells across town,” Isaac reminded her.

“Nobody found conclusive evidence of that,” Reed quickly said, then continued speaking before Isaac could object. “And, thanks to a well-placed bribe, I know Lynn’s power now.”

“Was it Samuel?” Coleridge asked. “I bet it was that bastard.”

Reed’s face remained neutral. “I have my sources,” she simply said. In the future, Samuel would show Coleridge an erotic VHS tape that once had a home in Reed's Forbidden Zone in her apartment.

“Lynn’s power is super speed,” Reed revealed. “But not like faster than light speed. Because if your power is light speed, there’s no way you can lose. You have light speed, for crying out loud. So Lynn is fast, but not crazy fast. But non-crazy fast is still dangerous.”

She rubbed her chin in thought. “If I was Mackenzie, I would position myself to defend the flag, since the waves are better suited for defense. I would send Lynn on a blitzkrieg mission to the get the flag. That just leaves Babs, Dan, and Demetrius as variables.”

Try as she might, Reed couldn’t get Samuel to give up Babs’ power, no matter how many milkshakes and tapes she offered him. Talk about loyalty.

“I bet Demetrius has an offensive power,” Isaac ventured. “Or at least, he’ll use his powers for offense. He’s aggressive and loud. And he threw a chair through a window once to kill a mosquito. I can’t see him sitting back on defense.”

Reed wrote that down. “So, you got Lynn and Demetrius rushing our flag. Mackenzie’s guarding their flag, and Mackenzie’s one of those thinker people, a little cautious, so I bet Dan and Babs would be like midfielders. That means they’ll be in between those on offense and those on defense, providing help wherever it’s needed, Audrey.”

Audrey put her hand down. But then her eyes widened.

“You mean...like a firefighter!”

“...yes, like a firefighter.” Reed raised a finger. “So, we have an idea of their gameplan. And that gives me an idea for ours.”

She drew a formation on her paper. “I hate moving fast nor can I move fast unless I really need to, so for the simulation, I’ll be our Mackenzie and guard the flag.”

She drew two dots ahead of her lone dot. “Audrey and Coleridge will be our midfielders. You guys can use your plants and...pfft...walls to block the incoming Lynn and Demetrius. Mackenzie’s cautious, but she hates to lose. If her attackers get stuck, she’ll commit Babs and Dan to back them up. And when that happens-”

She drew two more dots and arrows coming out of them. “Isaac and Alfie, you guys’ll wait on the wings until Babs and Dan commit. Then you guys swing around and trap them. I can commit forward a little, so we’ll trap all four of them in a five person box. We make quick work of them, then I can go personally kick Mackenzie’s ass and win the match.”

The other four looked at Reed’s notes. Truth be told, classes on tactics weren’t taught until senior year, and even then, they weren’t really a major course of study for most until those users destined to serve in combat attended the Presidential War College.

The plan looked good on paper, and Reed looked confident when saying it, and all of them did want to win.

“What about you, Alfie?” Reed asked. “I don’t know what kind of education they give you in New York. Do you have any suggestions, comments, and or concerns?”

Alfie studied the notes. Because he was a New Englander, they didn’t teach him tactics in New York, either.

“Looks fine to me,” he concluded.

Reed nodded at everyone’s agreement. Truth be told, she felt a little relieved. It’s not like she ever led a tactical engagement, either.

Audrey put her hand out. Isaac followed suit, and so did everyone else, even Alfie, leaving just Reed to look at the pile of four hands.

Reed realized the enormity of what those hands represented. Butterflies danced in her stomach and she felt small under the blanket, a whole lot of weight now on her shoulders.

Reed relaxed when he saw Isaac give her a thumbs up. “C’mon, Reed, you got this,” he said. “So put your hand in quick, it's freezing out."

Reed displayed a soft smile. “Call me Reed-kaicho.”

“...no.”

Reed rolled her eyes, but she smiled wider as she stuck her hand-in.

“Team Red,” she declared. “Fight-o, on!”

The other four looked at her.

“What?” Reed asked. “That’s what you do when you stick your hands together, right?”

“In Japanimation land, sure,” Isaac said. “But this is the former United States. We say stuff like, Team on Red on three, and someone counts up-”

“I can count to three!” Audrey declared. “Team Red on three!”

The five members of Team Red all grinned with ambition and determination.

“One, two, three-”

“Team Red!”

Their threw their hands in the air, conveniently blocking the view of the Ice Sister, sitting in the bleacher row behind them, as West Narragansett Technical Academy scored the game-winning touchdown as the game block struck zero.