One-Shots [Boboiboy]

Taking Back Control

"Can you tell me why you're in my room?" Thunderstorm drawled, his hair a mess and his eyes barely opened. He was sitting upright in his bed, still covered in his blankets, and facing straight at the intruder. He rubbed his eyes. "Turn the damn lights on."

Blaze glanced at the switch by the wall next to him and pressed it with a finger. The lights flared on with a hum, revealing the pyrokinetic in his nightwear: a sleeveless vest and shorts.

"What do you want?" Thunderstorm groused, scratching his head. He turned to pick up his phone by his pillow, the dim screen displaying 11pm.

"I didn't know you slept this early," Blaze admitted, crossing his arms. "No wonder you're always missing hot chocolate Fridays."

Thunderstorm glared at him. "I don't even like chocolate," he snapped. "If you have anything wrong with my sleep schedule, then you can shove your ass up a pen. Are you going to tell me what the hell you want, or should I just kick you out myself?"

"Fine!" Blaze said quickly, holding up his hands. He didn't want any trouble with the lightning elemental, especially when he was rudely awakened from his sleep. "Just don't tell anyone!"

The red-eyed teen groaned. "Yell any louder and Quake is going to hear it." He waited for Blaze to call it off as a joke, but the look in his eyes was no joke. "For the love of—you're serious, aren't you?"

"Of course I am!" Blaze shrieked almost out of instinct. He slapped his hands over his mouth when Thunderstorm glared murder at him.

Thunderstorm looked more awake now, but only because he was confused. Why come to him? Why not someone else? Thunderstorm may be the most isolated person in the family, but he wasn't the best person who secrets should be told to. He himself didn't want the drama, either.

"So?" Thunderstorm grouched after seconds of silence. "What is it that you want?"

The pyrokinetic's expression turned serious, just like the fire in his gaze. "I want to know how you train."

For another few moments of quietness, Thunderstorm stared at him in utter confusion.

"What?" Thunderstorm blurted, raising a sceptical eyebrow at him. "Did I just hear you ask me how I train?" He pointed a finger to his own chest, as if he believed he was hallucinating.

To his surprise, Blaze nodded. "Your powers are anger, and mine is stress. We're the only ones that come from negative traits!" he explained. "Quake's always hauling me to train with him, but his tactic isn't working for me. I can't control my power the way he does. So I figured... since our powers are similar, can I train with you instead?"

Thunderstorm blinked at him like he's lost his damn mind. With his wild hair and scrunched up, exhausted expression, he resembled Anna from the beginning of Frozen, who was also freshly woken up from her sleep.

Eventually, he snapped out of his stupor. He tossed the blanket off him and folded his left leg, massaging his eyes with his fingers.

"Why now?" he snapped. "Why me? Just because we have similar powers? That's not how it works."

"Because you're the only one that knows how it feels when you lose control."

Thunderstorm froze at this, like a deer being caught in headlights. Though, he kept his cool, his expression darkening to a calculating one, alert and wary of what Blaze would say next.

"I'm right, aren't I?" Blaze continued. "Both of us lost control once, and we hurt everyone around us."

"How do you know this?" Thunderstorm ran a hand through his hair, brushing his bangs out of his vision. "Did Cyclone tell you?"

"He didn't," Blaze said. "I figured it out myself."

For the first time, Thunderstorm looked like he was in denial. Out of all of them, Blaze had assumed that the electrokinetic could accept changes around him without second thoughts, but now he was revaluating the image.

He didn't look tired; now, he looked exhausted.

"Yeah," Thunderstorm said after seconds of silence, "you're right."

He sat on the side of his bed, feet touching the floor. He was looking at Blaze, but he opted to turn away any second.

"Did it happen before me and Ice joined the team?" Blaze asked, vaguely aware of their team's history. "You didn't really approach any of us much when I joined."

"Happened when we were eleven." Thunderstorm frowned. "And for your question, I don't train. I can't."

Blaze would have sworn that he was deaf at the moment. "What?" he asked, surprised.

"Why do you think you never see me training? That or you're too soaked up in wallowing in your own self-pity because Quake can't teach you how to use your powers correctly."

"I—I just thought you were somewhere else."

"Quake doesn't want me around others when they train." There was no hesitation or secrecy in his voice. It was the cold, hard truth.

In fact, he looked offended or wounded by this fact.

Blaze tried to muster his voice. How did Thunderstorm show so much control in battle if he doesn't learn?

"How do you use your powers, then?"

Thunderstorm sighed, like he couldn't bring himself to believe he was having this conversation. Compared to when he was woken up by Blaze, he looked like he hadn't slept for weeks.

Out of all the topics, Blaze really touched one that Thunderstorm didn't want it to see the light of day.

"I don't use my powers," Thunderstorm vamped, glaring at Blaze, "the powers use me. It's how I fight, and that's why I'm always heavily injured after every usage. You came to the wrong person for this conversation."

That... made a lot of sense, to be honest.

Blaze thought back to countless times where Thunderstorm fought bigger opponents without a team, where he acted like he's lost all sense of emotion and pain.

"Ah—" Blaze turned to the door, eager to end this conversation. He felt like he's threading on forbidden ground here. "Thanks for the talk—"

"Blaze."

Blaze gulped. He turned to the oldest elemental, sweating bullets. "Yeah?"

"Don't tell anyone about this." Thunderstorm's gaze was hard and cold, with no room for compassion or tolerance. "One secret for another."

The pryokinetic nodded, a relieved sigh escaping his lips.

"I won't," he promised.

He left the room, shutting the door behind him.