"Sure, with my speed I can hit someone hundreds of times in a second, and going that fast each punch has the force of being hit by a truck, but most of my fights I only punch once or twice. A thousand random punches is nothing compared to one precise one."- Interview with the Flash.

My muscles groan in pain as I fall to the ground for what seems to have been the thirtieth time in a row. I try to push myself up, but my arms give out and I flop to the ground like a boneless slug, which I realized didn't have bones usually anyway. I let out a long groan as all of my body parts, especially my legs and arms, scream at me to give up. Laying on the semi-soft karate matt that covers the floor of the "sparring room," I try to ignore the slight laughter coming from my opponent.

"Forty-five to nothing," Dick says, slowly shaking his head. "I mean I knew you were incompetent, but you haven't even been able to touch me once." Instead of his usually red-green leotard, my training partner- and I mean both training and partner very loosely- switches to a black and blue jumpsuit whenever we have mock spars.

It's been only a week since I woke up in one of the Batcave's prisons, and even though I am certainly safer here than being under the control of a psychopathic villain, my daily training sessions with Dick, combined with something simply called "conditioning,"has had me almost wishing that I never got rescued. After the third day of undergoing conditioning, I realized that the only thing it was doing was conditioning me to become obedient. While I finally got a comfortable change of clothes, my gown switched for sweatpants and t-shirt, and three meals every day, being forced to stay in the Batcave all day irritates me. My only visitor was Dick and since I had no forms of entertainment except for rotating the dials on the Omnitrix or using the workout machines, I begrudgingly used those.

What's worse, is that after the initial change at the warehouse, I have been under strict orders to not use the Omnitrix unless under "imminent danger of death." While getting beat up by the Robin is certainly painful, it would not qualify, and I am hesitant to irritate the owner og the house I’m crashing at.

"Again," I say, slowly standing up. Dick smirks, and we both get into our own stances. Him, aggravatingly standing like a regular person, and me trying to emulate the one scene I saw in Karate Kid. Suddenly rushing forward, I tried to swing at his smug face, only to feel a light touch on the back of my leg. That touch turned into a push, moving my knee forward, the sudden loss of one of the limbs I needed to stand causing me to fall to the ground once again. I twitch when I can feel a soft impact on the back of my head.

"Forty-Six to nothing." Facedown on the matt I can hear the smugness in his voice. The first two days I was stuck in my bed, my leg healing, and so Dick decided to keep me company by occasionally tossing things at my face. After I could get out of bed, he stuck around, watching as I failed to get into shape. Feeling a mini marshmallow hit the back of my head every time I struggled to run or exercise, I finally snapped at him about his overall useless nature.

"You don't like my encouragement?" I can remember him saying, tossing another marshmallow up and catching it in his mouth. Tossing the bag on the ground, he walked over to the empty arena, performing a series of stretches. "How bout this then, you get ten tries to touch me, and if you can I'll help train you, if not..." He trails off pointedly looking at the half-full bag of candy.

"You"

"Mhm," He responds.

"Help me?"

"Hey, I rescued you from being kidnapped, didn't I? Is doing a good deed to an aspiring Hero that implausible?"

I shake myself from the past as I struggle to stand back up. "Again," I groan, finally standing back up, and trying to shake feeling into my tired limbs. Ignoring the urge to just turn into a pyrokinetic alien, I slowly start walking around the makeshift arena. All of my last attempts failed miserably, which makes sense due to my inexperience with one-on-one duels, especially versus a superhero. I slowly make my way closer and closer, trying to get just in range for me, but outside his range. Even though we are both around the same height, I can tell I am just the smallest bit taller, which I hope gives me a longer range.

As I get closer, I start moving faster, walking in a deliberate circle causing Dick to keep turning around. As I see his body tense, I bring my arms up, wary of being hit in the face, and keep walking faster and faster. Seeing him lean back and bring his foot up, I move both my arms around the front of my head, hoping to block or at least soften the blow. What I don't expect, however, is for him to somehow hit the back of my head, pushing just enough with my foot that combined with the surprise, knocks me back down to the ground.

Feeling the touch of another marshmallow hitting the back of my head, along with the usual, "Forty-seven to nothing,"I think back at the three rules he had set for our engagements, trying to find a way around them. The first rule, that I have to verbally say again every time, just strikes me as a way to break down my self-esteem, as I have to verbally begin each spar.

The second was more useless as well, the limit of ten practices per day, and the fact that I could stop at any time before that. Again, no rules that I can use against him, even though his excuse that "he couldn't waste time beating me up,"seemed untrue as even after we did all ten the last couple of days, he still hung around wherever I went.

The third rule is the most restrive, the fact that I cannot use the Omnitrix to transform. And even though I understand that I have to have some competency with fighting without turning into a different species, the fact that I haven't been able to turn into anything at least once was testing my patience, even if I only had HeatBlast to turn into. Again, this rule is straightforward, and even if I knew that him pushing the dial of the watch in would turn me into Heatblast, I have no confidence that I could put him into that position.

"This is some bullshit that I can't use the Omnitrix. I am just some regular guy, getting my ass kicked by you for a week isn't suddenly going to make a martial arts genius. I don't stop you from using your training or your weird acrobatic ability to beat the shit out of me." I know my voice sounds whiny, but I am very exhausted from getting senselessly beat up over and over again. I don't want to quit, but making him quit, or at least change the rules seems like the best-case scenario.

"You’re right," he says, surprising me on how easy that was."From now on you can use your special magic watch to its fullest potential, I mean if you can't even land one hit on me by yourself."

I ignore the insult and briefly go through the motions of using the Omnitrix in my head, look up, and shout "Again." I quickly twist the dial, bringing u the only alien I have, seeing the vaguely humanoid hologram light on the watch. I glance, at Dick, noting that he still hasn't moved, and looks entirely carefree. I bring my hand over my head, quickly swinging it down when a flash of metal out of the corner of my vision. I wince as a spinning Batarang hits my wrist, the force stopping my downward movement, and when I look back up at Robin, all I see is him rushing towards me, very, very fast.

I flinch at the sudden movement, and as he's running another Batarang comes flying out, hitting my right arm again, slowing its movement that he crosses the distance between us before I can even come close to touching the watch. He jumps up, legs twisting around my neck somehow, and then I'm on the ground again, my arms locked behind me. I grimace and try to hold back tears. Not because of physical pain, the grappling move used against me strangely didn't feel painful. However, never before have I felt so useless, I easily fought and won against two dozen gang members, and I can't even touch a kid my age? Not even touch, but the fact that I couldn't even transform fast enough to get into an alien form is painful.

I don't move when Dick frees me from the pin and stands up. I also stay still when I feel the soft plop of another marshmallow on my head. And I definitely don't move I hear him start to walk away, and judging by the fact he can walk silently if he wants, to, is for my benefit alone. But I do say one word, right before Dick's footsteps disappear completely.

"Again."

I shake my head, letting out a deep breath, and look directly at Dick. I see the ghost of a smile on his face, as he slowly starts walking back to the arena. Sure, I am trash at fighting. Utter dogshit, unable to even land a punch or kick on someone without superpowers. But I shouldn't have expected to be good, I slowly grasp, since I'm facing the sidekick to the best martial artist in the world, and my only experience fighting is playing video games. But the only way to get better is to keep getting my ass beat.

Looking up one time, just to make sure Robin's ready, I swing my arm down, the dial on the watch already extended. Predicting the Batarangs, I try to move my arm sideways erratically, making it a harder target to hit. When the first Batarang barely touches my arm, I smile a little, as my hand moves closer and closer. My grin disappears, however, as my left arm gets hit this time, moving the Omnitrix far enough that my right hand barely misses it. I barely have a chance to look up before I'm tackled to the ground again.

"Nice planning, but uhh, next time try moving your feet instead of staying still, might make it a little more difficult to hit you," I hear Dick say. If I ever had a facepalm moment, forgetting to move my body, would be very high up there. I shake my head standing back up, ignoring the obvious marshmallow hitting my cheek. Without him having to say anything the score flashes through my mind. Forty-nine to zero. My last chance for the day, and I cannot waste it.

I stretch my arms above my head, trying to appear more confident, controlling my breath, slowing it. I look back up at Dick, nod once, and open my mouth. "Again," I say, but instead of standing still, I immediately turn around and start to run at a diagonal angle, immediately trying to hit the Omnitrix on my wrist. I stumble briefly, as a Batarang collides between my legs, but manage to finally push down on the Omnitrix blindly, not seeing my hand press down on the dial, but feeling it. Emitting a bright burst of green light, I can feel my body start to change, and I can relax, finally being able to be more useful.

Instead of my body getting denser and hotter, it gets lighter and stays flesh instead of plasma. I feel my feet turning from bone and muscle to a sort of a ball-shaped mass. I can feel a tail growing, balancing my weight evenly, as the bones in my head shift upwards. My hand shift from, well hands, to three tapers spikes.

As the green light dies down, I instinctively know what alien I transformed into, crying out in a raspy voice

"XLR8".

Whirling around, the three Batarangs Robin threw before I transformed hung in the air seeming to not move at all. I tried to run and grab them, but almost fell the first time I tried moving with the ball-feet I now had. However, I leaned into my instincts and just moved. I snatched each Batarang in the air and gently placed them on the ground, picked up something even more important than I decided on running behind Robin, slowing down, then tapping his shoulder.

As Robin whirled around, confusion and disbelief evident in his face, I quickly spoke my voice more robotic and synthetic than usual, before he could open his mouth. "Forty-nine to one." And then I flicked a marshmallow at his head, hitting the dead center of his forehead.

In defense of Robin, immediately after he got surprised by something he lashed out far quicker than he was earlier, but using Batarangs that were sharpened. The slashes were far faster than a regular human could have dodged, especially at the close range he was it, but then again I wasn't a human anymore, I was a Kineceleran, and moving outside of the way was child's play.

Rapidly backpedaling, I tried to frantically call him off, trying not to slip on the frictionless wheels I had for feet, that I was still not used to. "Hey chill out, man it's me, Its Beau, this is just one of my other aliens, he's just really fast" I spoke, having to dodge a flurry of thrown and swung Batarangs, some almost touching me, but after a couple of seconds, Dick calmed down and stopped trying to attack.

"What the fuck, I mean really what the fuck are you now-urh" He froze, only slightly choking as I tossed another marshmallow in his mouth.

"Tsk, Tsk, Tsk," I responded waving one of my claw-fingers, while the other hand tossed more marshmallows at his head. "Using such foul language just because you lost is unbecoming of someone of your stature" I finished clicking my tongue. Thinking back on the show, a passing thought entered my mind. I reached my hand up and tapped the Omnitrix logo on my chest, switching back to my human form, and smiled when I didn't fall down or pass out. Watching Dick's brain work frantically to understand what had happened brought great joy, and was definitely not because of petty reasons.

Gently leading him by the arm to the center of the arena, I snapped my fingers in front of his eyes a couple of times, grinning when it took a couple of repetitions for the focus to go back into his eyes.

"Now about that training you were talking about " I started, grinning as Dick's face fell.