...I know. Shut up. (Why aren't you watching yet?)
Title: Piggyback, or: Strange Earth Customs And The Non-Humans Subject To Them
Fandom: Young Justice
Characters/Pairing: The team, and probably nine pairings get implied somehow
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1,903
Summary: Wally and Robin have an informal bet, Artemis is an appreciator of the art of trolling, and naive aliens are made to be taken advantage of.
A/N: I honestly don't even know where this came from. I think I just felt a need for size difference-related shenanigans and non-human teammates being clueless.
"I'm telling you there's no way he'll ever fall for it."
"You underestimate my powers of deception! He'll totally fall for it--"
"And on the off chance he does, Aqualad will see right through it and make you stop like immediately. Faster than immediately. Mediately."
"Aqualad? Psh, he'll fall for it too! Just watch me."
"Uh-huh. I just haven't seen a master at work yet."
"Exactly."
"Sometimes I still can't tell whether you deflect my sarcasm 'cause you're a smartass or 'cause you're a dumbass."
"Shh. The time for words is through. Now…I take action."
*
If Wally thought he was fooling anybody by untying his boots at super speed, Superboy couldn't imagine why. Still, he'd resigned himself to these 'pranks' - he didn't understand the smaller boys' explanation of the term, but he half suspected they'd been misleading him on purpose - and had gotten accustomed to taking them in stride.
However, when he knelt with a sigh to retie his shoes, Wally zipped up behind him and jumped onto his back, clambering up to his shoulders and flinging lanky arms around his neck. Like some kind of hyperactive monkey.
Superboy hated monkeys.
"What are you doing?" he snapped, rising to his feet with a burst of his own, lesser-but-not-inconsequential super speed.
"Whoa, settle down!" Wally protested, cheery as ever. "What do you mean, what am I doing? I'm just hitching a ride, is all."
"Why?" Superboy demanded. He craned his neck trying to get a look at the smaller boy and abruptly found himself with a face full of hair.
"Why not?" said Wally. "Wait - don't tell me you don't know."
Superboy bristled. He disliked not knowing things, almost as much as he disliked having to admit to not knowing something. "…I don't--"
"Dude, it's fine," said Wally, patting him on the shoulder. "It's one of those things, you know? Anyway, it's kind of a human tradition."
"…Climbing on people's backs?"
"Hitching rides! I'd offer to return the favor sometime, but you can probably see the logistical issues…"
Superboy thought he could. "You're like--" What was it that Megan had cooked the other day? "A spaghetti noodle."
"…Sure, let's go with that," said Wally, sounding dejected. He brightened. "Anyway, you don't mind, do you?"
It wasn't as though it were uncomfortable, and if it was tradition, Superboy supposed he didn't. “No."
"Sweet," said Wally. "Thanks, bro."
"You're welcome," said Superboy, like Kaldur had taught him, and after a brief pause to feel awkward, he headed off for the kitchen.
*
"Hey Kaldur," said Wally as he and Superboy entered the room.
"Hello," Superboy offered sullenly.
"Good morning," Kaldur replied. He looked up briefly to nod in greeting and then returned to his reading.
Then his eyes stuck on a word and his brain stuttered to a halt, skipped and grinded a few times, and then cycled back to power in an alarming burst of clarity. He hesitated further to prime himself for what he might see if he looked up again, and then did.
He wasn't sure why he was expecting to see something different than he had the first time, but then, witnessing things like one of his smaller teammates clinging to the back of a larger teammate like a hyperactive monkey tended to do that to a person.
"Wally…?"
"Yeah?"
Kaldur was silent. After a moment, Superboy trudged toward the kitchen, Wally hanging off of his shoulders the entire way. "He won't get off."
"Liar, I keep leaving to grab snacks."
"But you come back three seconds later and climb on again."
"Superboy," said Kaldur, dutifully maintaining his patience, "do you want Wally to get off?"
Superboy turned to look at him, stoic and unmoved, in silence. After a moment, he turned back to the refrigerator.
"Grab me a soda while you're in there, big guy," said Wally.
Kaldur told himself he didn't want to know, but unfortunately, he wanted to know too badly to pull that one over on himself. "May I ask why you are…riding Superboy?"
Wally tipped his head back to regard Kaldur upside-down, frowning. "Dude, do you not know either? Non-humans, jeez! It's a surface tradition!"
Kaldur very much doubted that, knowing what he did about human society - and, more importantly, about Wally. But he kept silent, because he supposed there was no way he could be sure.
Wally continued by giving Superboy two solid thumps on the shoulder with an open palm the way one might appreciatively indicate a car, or a horse. "And he's practically built for it! Dude's the size of a house with the strength of a hundred men."
Superboy reached back over his shoulder to hand Wally a soda and shut the door, making for the counter with his milk, and reached for the cereal. After he finished pouring himself a bowl, Wally grabbed for the cereal box until Superboy took the hint and handed it to him. Wally wrapped his legs more securely around Superboy's waist and linked an elbow around his throat in order to gain the leverage to hold the box with one hand and reach into it with the other.
The setup looked somewhat uncomfortable, to say the least, but Superboy didn't seem to notice. "You know," said Wally, words muffled by a mouthful of cereal, "if I wouldn't lose my masculine figure hitching rides all the time, I'd probably do this like, every day."
Superboy looked a little annoyed, but then, he usually did. For the most part, Kaldur would characterize it as resignation. He picked up his bowl and made for the table.
Wally dropped to the floor in order to allow Superboy to sit down. He pulled a chair out for himself and plopped into it, still munching nonchalantly away.
When Superboy finished and made to get up, Wally leapt up with him. "I'm going to the bathroom," Superboy told him. "You can't come." With that, he marched indifferently from the room.
"Aww," said Wally. He slumped back into his chair, continuing to stuff cereal into his mouth with a general air of disappointment. Suddenly, a thought seemed to occur to him, and he straightened, fixing Kaldur with an intent, glittering stare. "Hey, Kaldur--"
"No," Kaldur said. He used the firm but polite leader voice. Wally slumped again.
"Nobody's any fun around here," he groused, and Kaldur didn't even try to dignify that with a response.
*
Kaldur had assumed the incident in the kitchen would be the end of it. But no, gathered later in the briefing room, Superboy wandered in with Wally hanging off of his back once again.
"Hey Rob!" Wally called, waving to his friend and displaying what seemed like far too many teeth.
Robin glanced up from his conversation with Artemis, did a far swifter double-take than Kaldur had, and proceeded to burst out in hysterical giggles.
"What are you doing?" Artemis asked, seemingly alarmed.
"What?" said Wally. "You don't think we're good enough friends, or something? Supey's my main bro! Well, backup main bro. He's up there."
"Apparently," Kaldur interjected, a tentative edge to his voice, "it is a surface tradition."
"You have got to be--" Artemis began, but Robin made a serious of quick, mysterious gestures - he held a finger to his lips, swept the edge of his hand past his throat a few times in a slicing motion, and pressed his palms together, finishing with a hopeful smile and a little bounce on his toes. "…Having a good time with that," Artemis finished uncertainly.
"Oh yeah, totally," said Wally. He patted Superboy's shoulder. "Right?"
"Right," said Superboy, deadpan. He appeared to have accepted that this was what a 'good time' was meant to be like.
"…Perhaps it would be best that we limit this tradition to non-work-related venues," Kaldur suggested.
"Sure," said Wally. Oblivious, he rested his chin on Superboy's shoulder.
Robin cleared his throat and tipped his head in the direction of the meeting table.
"Oh," said Wally, and slid to the floor.
Superboy didn't even shift his weight.
*
Artemis, though vaguely entertained by Robin's explanation of events, figured the issue should pretty much be shelved by now.
She was quickly learning that if there were even a drop of remaining potential in a gag, Robin and Kid Flash would find a way to wring it out.
When Superboy plodded through the common area the next day, Wally was secure in his position as the resident clone's new backpack. Robin was also perched on one shoulder, an elbow resting on top of Superboy's head as he acrobatically maintained his balance unsupported. "You know," he announced, "you're right. This is actually kinda fun."
It was difficult to tell if Superboy was any more disgruntled than usual.
Kaldur sighed and closed his eyes briefly. He got up from his seat and followed the procession out into the hall. "I believe this may be getting out of hand," he was saying as he disappeared.
M'gann, sitting wide-eyed beside her, had completely forgotten her book. "What were they doing?" she asked, fascinated.
Artemis had never claimed to be a saint. "Oh, while you were visiting your uncle, the dweeb duo have been introducing a little-known Earth tradition to our resident non-humans."
"Using a teammate as a vehicle is an Earth tradition?" M'gann asked, brow furrowed. She bit the corner of her lip, considered this deeply for several seconds, and stood. She held her arms open to Artemis with a grin. "It looks like fun!"
Artemis raised an eyebrow. Faintly, she could hear Robin and Wally cackling about something that was likely taxing Kaldur's patience. Well, when life gives you gullible aliens…
She got up, leaned into one of M'gann's outstretched arms, and vaulted up to swing her legs over the other. "Where to?"
*
A week later, Kaldur was pretty sure he had the situation under control. Wally was back to speeding to and fro and Robin was content to grapple-and-swing his way around the base when walking wouldn't suffice.
He was just getting around to letting his guard down and forgetting about it when Superboy trekked nonchalantly into the gym, balancing M'gann in the crook of one arm as though she weighed about as much as a newborn kitten.
"I think it's nice," she was telling him. "It's a good team bonding exercise, don't you think? We get to spend more time together and earn each other's trust - I think Batman would approve! Oh, and maybe later we can switch; what do you think? I can take you flying!"
Kaldur watched. He wasn't going to say anything; not a thing. It was beyond his control. It was irrelevant. He was just going to go back to his training and forget--
Something - someone thumped to the ground behind him, grabbed onto his water-bearers, and used the grip to haul themselves up onto his shoulders with a precise, gymnastic flip. Kaldur regarded the green-clad legs on either side of his neck, and then looked up into Artemis's downturned face, blank and innocent.
"What?" she asked, flat. Her ponytail tickled at his gills and he wondered if he ought to just turn in his two weeks notice. "You didn't think we were just making it up, did you?"
Kaldur considered this for exactly ten seconds, gave up, and followed Superboy out for a walk.
Elsewhere in Mount Justice, Red Tornado continued not to care.
Fandom: Young Justice
Characters/Pairing: The team, and probably nine pairings get implied somehow
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1,903
Summary: Wally and Robin have an informal bet, Artemis is an appreciator of the art of trolling, and naive aliens are made to be taken advantage of.
A/N: I honestly don't even know where this came from. I think I just felt a need for size difference-related shenanigans and non-human teammates being clueless.
"I'm telling you there's no way he'll ever fall for it."
"You underestimate my powers of deception! He'll totally fall for it--"
"And on the off chance he does, Aqualad will see right through it and make you stop like immediately. Faster than immediately. Mediately."
"Aqualad? Psh, he'll fall for it too! Just watch me."
"Uh-huh. I just haven't seen a master at work yet."
"Exactly."
"Sometimes I still can't tell whether you deflect my sarcasm 'cause you're a smartass or 'cause you're a dumbass."
"Shh. The time for words is through. Now…I take action."
*
If Wally thought he was fooling anybody by untying his boots at super speed, Superboy couldn't imagine why. Still, he'd resigned himself to these 'pranks' - he didn't understand the smaller boys' explanation of the term, but he half suspected they'd been misleading him on purpose - and had gotten accustomed to taking them in stride.
However, when he knelt with a sigh to retie his shoes, Wally zipped up behind him and jumped onto his back, clambering up to his shoulders and flinging lanky arms around his neck. Like some kind of hyperactive monkey.
Superboy hated monkeys.
"What are you doing?" he snapped, rising to his feet with a burst of his own, lesser-but-not-inconsequential super speed.
"Whoa, settle down!" Wally protested, cheery as ever. "What do you mean, what am I doing? I'm just hitching a ride, is all."
"Why?" Superboy demanded. He craned his neck trying to get a look at the smaller boy and abruptly found himself with a face full of hair.
"Why not?" said Wally. "Wait - don't tell me you don't know."
Superboy bristled. He disliked not knowing things, almost as much as he disliked having to admit to not knowing something. "…I don't--"
"Dude, it's fine," said Wally, patting him on the shoulder. "It's one of those things, you know? Anyway, it's kind of a human tradition."
"…Climbing on people's backs?"
"Hitching rides! I'd offer to return the favor sometime, but you can probably see the logistical issues…"
Superboy thought he could. "You're like--" What was it that Megan had cooked the other day? "A spaghetti noodle."
"…Sure, let's go with that," said Wally, sounding dejected. He brightened. "Anyway, you don't mind, do you?"
It wasn't as though it were uncomfortable, and if it was tradition, Superboy supposed he didn't. “No."
"Sweet," said Wally. "Thanks, bro."
"You're welcome," said Superboy, like Kaldur had taught him, and after a brief pause to feel awkward, he headed off for the kitchen.
*
"Hey Kaldur," said Wally as he and Superboy entered the room.
"Hello," Superboy offered sullenly.
"Good morning," Kaldur replied. He looked up briefly to nod in greeting and then returned to his reading.
Then his eyes stuck on a word and his brain stuttered to a halt, skipped and grinded a few times, and then cycled back to power in an alarming burst of clarity. He hesitated further to prime himself for what he might see if he looked up again, and then did.
He wasn't sure why he was expecting to see something different than he had the first time, but then, witnessing things like one of his smaller teammates clinging to the back of a larger teammate like a hyperactive monkey tended to do that to a person.
"Wally…?"
"Yeah?"
Kaldur was silent. After a moment, Superboy trudged toward the kitchen, Wally hanging off of his shoulders the entire way. "He won't get off."
"Liar, I keep leaving to grab snacks."
"But you come back three seconds later and climb on again."
"Superboy," said Kaldur, dutifully maintaining his patience, "do you want Wally to get off?"
Superboy turned to look at him, stoic and unmoved, in silence. After a moment, he turned back to the refrigerator.
"Grab me a soda while you're in there, big guy," said Wally.
Kaldur told himself he didn't want to know, but unfortunately, he wanted to know too badly to pull that one over on himself. "May I ask why you are…riding Superboy?"
Wally tipped his head back to regard Kaldur upside-down, frowning. "Dude, do you not know either? Non-humans, jeez! It's a surface tradition!"
Kaldur very much doubted that, knowing what he did about human society - and, more importantly, about Wally. But he kept silent, because he supposed there was no way he could be sure.
Wally continued by giving Superboy two solid thumps on the shoulder with an open palm the way one might appreciatively indicate a car, or a horse. "And he's practically built for it! Dude's the size of a house with the strength of a hundred men."
Superboy reached back over his shoulder to hand Wally a soda and shut the door, making for the counter with his milk, and reached for the cereal. After he finished pouring himself a bowl, Wally grabbed for the cereal box until Superboy took the hint and handed it to him. Wally wrapped his legs more securely around Superboy's waist and linked an elbow around his throat in order to gain the leverage to hold the box with one hand and reach into it with the other.
The setup looked somewhat uncomfortable, to say the least, but Superboy didn't seem to notice. "You know," said Wally, words muffled by a mouthful of cereal, "if I wouldn't lose my masculine figure hitching rides all the time, I'd probably do this like, every day."
Superboy looked a little annoyed, but then, he usually did. For the most part, Kaldur would characterize it as resignation. He picked up his bowl and made for the table.
Wally dropped to the floor in order to allow Superboy to sit down. He pulled a chair out for himself and plopped into it, still munching nonchalantly away.
When Superboy finished and made to get up, Wally leapt up with him. "I'm going to the bathroom," Superboy told him. "You can't come." With that, he marched indifferently from the room.
"Aww," said Wally. He slumped back into his chair, continuing to stuff cereal into his mouth with a general air of disappointment. Suddenly, a thought seemed to occur to him, and he straightened, fixing Kaldur with an intent, glittering stare. "Hey, Kaldur--"
"No," Kaldur said. He used the firm but polite leader voice. Wally slumped again.
"Nobody's any fun around here," he groused, and Kaldur didn't even try to dignify that with a response.
*
Kaldur had assumed the incident in the kitchen would be the end of it. But no, gathered later in the briefing room, Superboy wandered in with Wally hanging off of his back once again.
"Hey Rob!" Wally called, waving to his friend and displaying what seemed like far too many teeth.
Robin glanced up from his conversation with Artemis, did a far swifter double-take than Kaldur had, and proceeded to burst out in hysterical giggles.
"What are you doing?" Artemis asked, seemingly alarmed.
"What?" said Wally. "You don't think we're good enough friends, or something? Supey's my main bro! Well, backup main bro. He's up there."
"Apparently," Kaldur interjected, a tentative edge to his voice, "it is a surface tradition."
"You have got to be--" Artemis began, but Robin made a serious of quick, mysterious gestures - he held a finger to his lips, swept the edge of his hand past his throat a few times in a slicing motion, and pressed his palms together, finishing with a hopeful smile and a little bounce on his toes. "…Having a good time with that," Artemis finished uncertainly.
"Oh yeah, totally," said Wally. He patted Superboy's shoulder. "Right?"
"Right," said Superboy, deadpan. He appeared to have accepted that this was what a 'good time' was meant to be like.
"…Perhaps it would be best that we limit this tradition to non-work-related venues," Kaldur suggested.
"Sure," said Wally. Oblivious, he rested his chin on Superboy's shoulder.
Robin cleared his throat and tipped his head in the direction of the meeting table.
"Oh," said Wally, and slid to the floor.
Superboy didn't even shift his weight.
*
Artemis, though vaguely entertained by Robin's explanation of events, figured the issue should pretty much be shelved by now.
She was quickly learning that if there were even a drop of remaining potential in a gag, Robin and Kid Flash would find a way to wring it out.
When Superboy plodded through the common area the next day, Wally was secure in his position as the resident clone's new backpack. Robin was also perched on one shoulder, an elbow resting on top of Superboy's head as he acrobatically maintained his balance unsupported. "You know," he announced, "you're right. This is actually kinda fun."
It was difficult to tell if Superboy was any more disgruntled than usual.
Kaldur sighed and closed his eyes briefly. He got up from his seat and followed the procession out into the hall. "I believe this may be getting out of hand," he was saying as he disappeared.
M'gann, sitting wide-eyed beside her, had completely forgotten her book. "What were they doing?" she asked, fascinated.
Artemis had never claimed to be a saint. "Oh, while you were visiting your uncle, the dweeb duo have been introducing a little-known Earth tradition to our resident non-humans."
"Using a teammate as a vehicle is an Earth tradition?" M'gann asked, brow furrowed. She bit the corner of her lip, considered this deeply for several seconds, and stood. She held her arms open to Artemis with a grin. "It looks like fun!"
Artemis raised an eyebrow. Faintly, she could hear Robin and Wally cackling about something that was likely taxing Kaldur's patience. Well, when life gives you gullible aliens…
She got up, leaned into one of M'gann's outstretched arms, and vaulted up to swing her legs over the other. "Where to?"
*
A week later, Kaldur was pretty sure he had the situation under control. Wally was back to speeding to and fro and Robin was content to grapple-and-swing his way around the base when walking wouldn't suffice.
He was just getting around to letting his guard down and forgetting about it when Superboy trekked nonchalantly into the gym, balancing M'gann in the crook of one arm as though she weighed about as much as a newborn kitten.
"I think it's nice," she was telling him. "It's a good team bonding exercise, don't you think? We get to spend more time together and earn each other's trust - I think Batman would approve! Oh, and maybe later we can switch; what do you think? I can take you flying!"
Kaldur watched. He wasn't going to say anything; not a thing. It was beyond his control. It was irrelevant. He was just going to go back to his training and forget--
Something - someone thumped to the ground behind him, grabbed onto his water-bearers, and used the grip to haul themselves up onto his shoulders with a precise, gymnastic flip. Kaldur regarded the green-clad legs on either side of his neck, and then looked up into Artemis's downturned face, blank and innocent.
"What?" she asked, flat. Her ponytail tickled at his gills and he wondered if he ought to just turn in his two weeks notice. "You didn't think we were just making it up, did you?"
Kaldur considered this for exactly ten seconds, gave up, and followed Superboy out for a walk.
Elsewhere in Mount Justice, Red Tornado continued not to care.