[I should apologize for all posts in advance.]

[walkingballpit]

[ The camera feed turns on, and it's immediately an in-focus, decently framed shot. Robbie actually has experience with selfie feeds and took the time to learn the controls before he started shooting.

The content is being winged, though, because it's really hard to screw up hello. Robbie grins at the camera. ]

The Pledge of a Legion, so that's a thing.

[ There's just enough of a rush to his voice to slur the edges of the words into "Pledge of Allegiance". Saying hi doesn't mean he can't amuse himself for a split second while testing the waters for possible temporarily-borrowed contemporaries. ]

Never actually had to vow before. Sign things, yes. This is kind of more official than I like to work, but a team's a team. You guys can help me with the future deets, and I'll start working on that new catchphrase for you.

[ And a new pledge, and a new team name, because wow. It's all so on-the-nose that it hurts, or maybe it's the smell of raw earnestness wafting around this place. He might've written up a few theoretical oaths for the New Warriors, back in the day, but he never got around to showing them to anyone. Enacting them, though, that takes consensus. Robbie doesn't think he'd have managed it.

He throws a deuce, because he'll never have another chance to confuse future alien peoples. ]

What up, Legion? Speedball in the house.

Comments

[whyarewehere]

[ Grif squints at Speedball like he has tentacles for arms, zeroing on the most important part of that greeting. ]

Dude, did you just ask me for deets?

[ That's like what coffee shops do when they're trying to convince you they're cool. ]

[walkingballpit]

Duuuuuuuuude.

[ His normal, blandly New York meets New England accent is gone, replaced by exaggerated surfer swagger. Robbie's used to people looking at him at least like he has tentacles for arms. It's nothing. ]

Dude, you have no idea how rad it is that there's another dude who's still throwing down dudes because, dude, it's like man and bro can never hold up to the rasping oooh of the duuuude. Know what I mean, dude?

[whyarewehere]

[ Grif groans and applies his face liberally to his palm. ]

Oh great, we have another funny guy.

[ He widens the gap in his fingers so one eye can peek out, though. ]

They're gonna make fun of you though, dude. They have all kinds of weird future slang like squaj and sprock and shit. We're officially ancient.

[unrecovered]

That depends on when you're from. [There's a big difference between explaining omnicoms and explaining indoor plumbing.]

And I'm guessing you've been doing this hero thing for a while. [Because who introduces themselves by codename right off the bat?]

[walkingballpit]

[ Okay, that's a question that he doesn't hear all that often, and he's going to have to stop having an immediate "oh crap" reaction to it here. ]

Early 21st century, if they still date by Jesus in the universe. If they don't, I have no idea when I'm from. Cars needed wheels, manned space ships only went to the moon, we have perfected food preservation though. Peeps, twinkies, and MacDonald's last forever.

[ Robbie shrugs and gives him a small smile. ]

Since I was fifteen. Good guess.

[iamresponding]

[The Rich that shows up on screen smiles a warm smile. It's a "there are few other people I'd rather see right now" kind of smile.]

[He doesn't look that different than he did the last time Robbie saw him. The scar from the war is more prominent because of some the treatments to regrow the skin of his face after Sam burned it off when he was a red Lantern, but otherwise, it's the same face.]

[The robotic arm, though, that's new. He waves at Robbie with a little twiddle of metal fingers.]

Hey, Toothpick.

[He raises an eyebrow.]

You know that door to the afterlife the X-Men keep leaving open...?

[walkingballpit]

[ His face has lost some of its color, and the corners of his mouth have lost some height. The grin is still there, but his confusion is seeping through. He doesn't say anything at first, because he knows this is a time travel thing already. That means nothing's changed. Rich is dead, and this is only time-displaced Rich. Don't get attached. He can't let go of that bubble of happiness that making his throat tight and his stomach twist, because nothing's changed. This is something to get through, and it would be kinder to not say "you're supposed to be dead."

The scar - that's recent. Sort of recent. Robbie knows it was there when he last saw Rich, but he's not sure about before that. His memories get blurry between prison and the fall of Norman Osborn.

What's new is the arm, and he starts when he realizes it's metal. No one told him Rich lost - maybe it didn't matter when there were worse things to tell him. The wave makes him think like Rich is almost daring him to react to it though, like maybe he should ask him when Nova and Bucky start the One-Armed SuperBandits and will he need a buzz saw accident to join? Too soon? Probably too soon.

But then Rich calls him Toothpick, and Robbie immediately flinches. He doesn't hear that one too often anymore, and it makes him feel young. It makes Rich sound young, and Robbie struggles with keeping the emotion out of his voice, keeping it steady, and keeping the combination of young and dead out of his head. ]

Hey, Rich. I put on 20 pounds already. How much more until you let me grow out of that one?

[ Infinite, says the awful little voice at the back of his head that never has anything positive to contribute, because Rich is dead.

He can't handle thinking about the implications about that last sentence though, because all of the things it could mean - is Rich alive? does he know he's dead? is he alive? - make Robbie feel like he's going to throw up from the mix of impossible and hope. Misinterpreting it and clinging to that is more safe. ]

I'm pretty sure I asked them at least twice if I was dead.

[sir_vancelot]

...Did you seriously just ask for deets?

[Okay, so Vance is asking for very different reasons than Grif is. Because Vance isn't an asshole.]

[Still, there's a very definite twist of his mouth in dismay. But that's probably exactly what Robbie is expecting from him.]

Though...yeah. The Pledge. That's an actual thing here.

[walkingballpit]

I thought about going with dealio, but I'm not dressed for that level of awesome. Hang on, are you seriously questioning me about my slang choice? I'm the supah fly one here. You're the straight man.

[ Yes, now he's deliberately using dated terminology, because men who look like Robert Sean Leonard can't dock cool points, Vance. ]

They seem kind of protective of it. I messed up the words and had to start it over again. I don't get it. It's basic. Isn't that what we're all trying to do anyway? Rhetorical question.

[ Robbie runs a hand through his hair to try and mask massaging a temple and then the back of his neck. ]

You could've been faster with saying hi. Hi.

[sofresh]

Do we need a catchphrase? I can barely remember all the rules. I'll never remember a catchphrase.

[Unless it was cool, probably. Then maybe he could make an exception.]

[walkingballpit]

[ What on Earth are you talking about, boy... ]

Of course, we need a catchphrase! How do you make an impressive entrance without a catchphrase? Strike fear into the hearts of your enemies, impress your friends?

Gotta have the catchphrase right.

[headinjuries]

Signing things is also stupid.

[ Like making him sign a contract with his mom to obey curfew while superheroing THANKS A LOT ROBBIE AND VANCE. ]

Also, hi.

[walkingballpit]

Signing things worked, didn't it? Got you on the team, cleared up some of that parent-teenaged superhero strife?

[ Robbie knows how hard it is to get parents to okay team shenanigans, okay? He's done it before. ]

Your sister loves me, your mom loves Vance, I love your mom, everything's good.

Hi yourself. I'm apparently super late. Who else is here? Selah? Sil? Faira? ... it's Aracely, isn't it.

[ He actually looks over his shoulder, half expecting to get glomped at this point. ]

[pinball_wizard]

Little late to make up a catchphrase. We already have two. Chuck Taine, Bouncing Boy. I'm the support staff coordinator. And according to the grapevine we apparently have something in common, if my codename didn't make it obvious.

[walkingballpit]

[ Getting saddled with Speedball suddenly seems like a mercy. Because, really? ]

Your catchphrases suck. I joined, because I think you've got all the right ideas, but one's boring and the other one sounds like something the Hand would come up with.

... also I'm clearly better at it.

[kingtyrantranger]

What's a deet?

[Because that's the important thing. Not that there's a guy named after a drug cocktail hanging out here.]

[walkingballpit]

A detail.

[ The name wasn't one that he chose for himself, but he also isn't choosing to change it now.]

You're a bit short on them yourself.

[captainbuzzkill]

I don't know if a guy who calls himself "Speedball" can be trusted with making up a better catchphrase.

[The boy that shows up on screen is very...small. Small and noodly. Sure, he can pass for fourteen -- and has done so by lying constantly about being a year older than he is. It's not entirely unconvincing, given his (relative) maturity. But if he was actually fourteen, it'd be a very tiny and undersized fourteen.]

"Speedball" sounds a little too on the nose. I'm going to take a wild guess and say that you bounce and do it fast.

[walkingballpit]

I didn't call myself that. I was going for the Masked Marvel. The hack at the local paper came up with Speedball. It stuck. Press is press. I couldn't go changing my name after everybody knew what to call me.

[ He's not harsh about it, really. Robbie remembers being undersized and the attitude that goes with it. ]

That's about half of it. Want to go for double or nothing?

[deafleppard]

Why Speedball?

[walkingballpit]

Why not Speedball? It's not like Iron Man has a stunning amount of creativity behind it.

I didn't pick it. It's the name a local newspaper gave me, and it stuck.

[ So much that he willingly went back to it after an attempt at another persona. ]

[justicecoulduseanap]

Isn't...isn't speedball a type of drug? Why would you pick that as a code name?

[ARE YOU SMOKING THE DRUGS, ROBBIE?]

[walkingballpit]

Oookay, everyone is weirdly hung up on the name here, and it's starting to make me self-conscious.

[ No, seriously, it's making him nervous as hell that everyone keeps focusing in on his codename. ]

Yes, it is. You'd have to ask the editor of the Springdale rag why he picked it though. I'm just the guy who didn't bother to correct it because, hey, I made the front page.

[ Is that irony? ... it probably counts as irony, that the kid who had been so keen on being in the papers would eventually not be able to stay out of them. ]

Don't do drugs, kids! Does that help? Also - why is everybody here so well-informed about 20th and 21st century slang?

[thethinzooline]

Why is your name 'Speedball'?

...is a question I would ask if everyone here didn't have absolutely ridiculous superhero names themselves.

Have you met Great Saiyaman? We have a guy who calls himself Great Saiyaman.

[Really, Speedball is one of the least weird hero names he's ever heard. It's descriptive, only two syllables, and pretty self-explanatory. Not the worst]

[Nick lowers his voice.]

See, the thing is, everyone here forgets that we, and, in fact, our entire situation, are inherently ridiculous.

[Superpowers? Cosmic threats? That's all movie stuff.]

[walkingballpit]

[ Robbie has had a strange past few weeks. He doesn't waste time with questioning if there's a talking fox. There is obviously a talking fox, but his team's HQ back home was piloted by a talking dog named Jake Waffles so... why not roll with it? ]

Let me guess: his name is also Saiyaman?

[ There are so many superheroes at this point that naming an alterego is getting more and more complicated. Robbie has a teammate that goes by Hummingbird, who is not feathered and can barely fly. That's ridiculous.

He doesn't really see what's ridiculous in their current situation. He... actually believes that, if you're good enough at it, a superhero can make a genuine difference. ]

This isn't even the most ridiculous thing I've seen this month. Your bar's kind of low, bro.