Middle School Heroes

Chapter 16 - Strategies, Suspicions and T-Shirts

They were up late, and so all three girls slept in. They woke with barely enough time to get dressed and make it down to breakfast. Apparently they were not the only ones who slept in, as the dining room was packed. Sam waved them over to a table that already had himself, Tony, Jemma, Bruce, Natasha and Fitz. They were all talking excitedly about the OPs competition today and that hit Skye like a ton of bricks.

It wasn't that she'd forgotten about it, it was just that with all the excitement of the party last night, she had forgotten to be nervous. Now the worry flooded over her and she suddenly wasn't hungry anymore. She stared down at her food like it was some sort of foreign substance.

Bruce, who was sitting next to her, leaned over and whispered gently. "You're going to want to eat, Skye. If you're nervous, your stomach will feel worse if it is empty."

"I'm not sure that I can," she sighed, picking at her eggs with her fork.

"Small bites, and lots of water," he suggested.

She did as she was instructed, and began to eat slowly while the rest of the table rambled on about the competition. Even Natasha, who always seemed to be unshakable, looked a little nervous, but also determined. Skye wasn't sure that she could muster anything other than fright at this point.

It didn't help that other people were stopping by their table to wish them luck. John and Bobby told them that they and the rest of the X-Men were rooting for them, especially since STRIKE had taken them out of the competition. Clark Kent stopped by to wish Skye good luck as well. Even the green haired boy, Joker, from the Suicide Squad wished them well, but added that he was rooting for them to lose horribly.

As they were finishing up, Clint came running into the room waving a piece of paper and breathing heavily. "Coach Garrett just passed out the events! Ward and I were both waiting down on the field for them, so STRIKE will know now as well. We have to be on the field at 12:30, and events start at 1:00." Skye moved over, offering to share her seat, and he took it. He winked at Skye as he sat. "Apparently I am really not Ward's favorite person right now. The guy just folded his arms and glared at me the whole time we were waiting. He looked like he wanted to tell me off, but he wisely chose to keep his mouth shut."

"Ugh. Forget about him. What are the events?"

Tony had already grabbed the paper. "Since Hawkeye is too busy making googly eyes at Skye, I'll read them."

They both protested at the same time that he was not doing that, causing Tony to roll his eyes at them. He looked over the paper for a moment. "Flying obstacle course, shooting, sparring and archery."

"Well, unless Skye has been hiding the fact that she can fly," Sam stopped talking and looked at her with mock curiosity, "I'm doing the flying."

"No. I'd love to say that I'm a girl of many secrets, but well, that's not one of them. You'll be flying, buddy." She patted him on the shoulder.

"They got Hall, and he's their only flyer, so we can assume that we'll be up against each other."

"Hey guys? I think we should move this conversation somewhere a little more private." Tony looked around the room. "We don't need to advertise the plan to everyone. What do you say we meet in the library?"

They cleared their tables and found an alcove in the library, big enough to accommodate all of them. Rhodey and Thor took up positions as guards so they could talk without anyone listening in.

Clint got right to it. "So we've got Sam taken care of, but the other three events are tricky. Obviously, I should be doing the archery, but Skye has gotten decent over the past few weeks. Their best archer is Burt Kenyon. Good with guns, and he likes to trash talk, but he isn't all that great at archery. He's certainly no match for me. Skye could at least make it interesting for him, then I could do sparring. Maybe I'll get lucky and they'll pick Ward. I would really enjoy that." He grinned at Skye, making her laugh nervously.