Chapter Text
Johnny wonders how he'd gotten himself into all of this. Most of the students attending were chosen, and Johnny wasn't one of them. Johnny wasn't the smartest student by any means, but his cousin, Lucy, managed to somehow force him to tag along to join a debate competition. Johnny obliges since he thinks it's just like arguing, but he was so, so wrong. His schedule was PACKED because of some random competition he had never heard of before. Apparently, it's hosted by Yale University every single year, so it's important or something. Seriously, who decides on 3 days of practice every single week? It's all in order too: Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Now, he's sitting in a room filled with ambitious students - probably sticking out like a sore thumb - fiddling with his pen. He watched the clock ticking since it was the most amusing thing in the whole room. He was so over it despite the fact that he hadn't even started practicing. That was until he heard his cousin call his name.
"Johnny!" Lucy called. Lucy had always been a smart student, which was very different from Johnny, who hadn't been focused on education at any point in his life. The only real reason he joined Lucy was not because she said that it was a great chance for Johnny to get some experience in debating, something she thinks suited Johnny's stubborn self, but instead because Johnny wanted to make Lucy happy and give her company.
"We managed to get into the same team!" Lucy said enthusiastically.
"Thank God, wait, aren't the teams made of three people?"
Suddenly, loud footsteps came from the hallway. The door slammed open. Johnny looked in horror as he watched an eccentric-looking person waltz right in. He had long blond hair that was tied into a loose ponytail, and oh god, Johnny rubbed his eyes just to make sure he wasn't seeing things, are those side burns? Weirdly shaped sideburns too? Is this guy from a comedy rom-com show or what? Johnny held the urge to just wheel out of the room, the door seemed pretty exitable. If that was even a word. Surprisingly, Lucy didn't seem bothered by this. Instead, she smiled at the man.
"Oh, I forgot to tell you, Johnny, this is Gyro, our third teammate! He's a friend of mine from English club." Lucy casually mentioned, not noticing the fact that Johnny is almost cumbosting in his seat.
"Johnny, noted, it's good to meet you." Is that an Italian accent to top it off? Johnny just nodded.
Gyro gave Johnny a wide, toothy grin. Good. Another thing to regret about all of this.
Johnny wonders again. But this time, he wonders how he'll stay sane during practice.
The trio gathered around a table at the back of the class and started discussing how they'll go through with the competition (Well, at least, Gyro and Lucy were the ones talking; Johnny just nodded at every sentence.)
Of course, Lucy was the group captain; it is a well-deserved title, and she is basically the glue holding the team together in the first place. In the World Scholars Cup, there was a curriculum. And in said curriculum, there were 9 different topics. Lucy suggested they all divide the work since she suspects there will be some more additional topics later on. Johnny looked at his right side. Lucy was writing intensely in her Google document, her book was filled with highlighted sentences and sticky notes. Then Johnny looked to his left. Gyro was doodling and vaguely writing the topics in his binder while humming a tune to himself, his binder seemed to have a lot of loose paper filled with notes in it. What about Johnny? Well, Johnny had been making prolonged eye contact with the homepage of the World Scholars Cup website. Johnny doesn't understand anything. He doesn't understand what the scholar's bowl is, he doesn't understand collaborative writing, he doesn't understand the scholar's challenge, and most importantly, he doesn't understand what this competition's deal is with alpacas and who Jerry even is. What exactly do these things even have to do with the actual debate? Johnny didn't understand. Johnny sighed as he opened his empty Google document that had been clean for the past 30 minutes. Every topic had so many links that it was almost overwhelming. Johnny sees that everybody seemed to get it, except for him.
"Earth to Johnny," Gyro mumbled as he scribbled in his notes. Lucy chuckled. Johnny shot him a glare.
Johnny was slightly hunched over the screen. The first topic he got was 'In futurity, somebody prophetic sees'. The topic seemed interesting, but to Johnny's dismay, the number of terms, songs, articles, poems, and paintings was making him want to rip his hair out. He doesn't understand how all of this would be implemented in the whole competition. Johnny was no stranger to procrastinating, of course. He could just rush out a poorly-written essay when Lucy asks him for his summary of the topics, he thought. The more Johnny thought about it, the more he actually considered doing so. And then he felt a tap on his shoulder that interrupted his intense thinking episode.
"Pshh- Johnny, do you need help?" Johnny looked over his shoulder, Gyro smiled at him.
"No, I'm fine," That was a 'yes- please help me I'm literally gonna explode' in Johnny's language. "You should just.. focus on your own notes-" Johnny mumbled.
Gyro then handed over to Johnny a sheet of paper. It had the topic's title written on the top. Of course, the notes had many little doodles, and the notes only served as an outline of what to write. However, Johnny was thankful for this. He looked at his screen, then at the notes, back to the screen, then at Gyro. Hey, this Gyro dude isn't so bad after all, Johnny thinks to himself, subconsciously smiling to himself. Johnny was just about to thank him when Gyro gave Johnny a wink that had caught Johnny so off-guard he forgot to even say it. Never mind, Gyro was that bad after all. Johnny had to repress laughing out loud after that. Still, Johnny was thankful for the help.
Johnny opened Microsoft Word and started typing. As soon as Johnny typed along every analysis of the poems written on the curriculum website, Johnny found out that writing isn't actually so bad. Gyro's simple notes really helped Johnny summarize the details of the topic, and he found himself slightly getting it. Only slightly, though, he was nowhere near as intense as all the other kids are at writing like it's the very last thing they'll ever write in their own lives, but at the very least, he actually is doing something productive for once in his life, and he liked the feeling of it. Maybe Lucy was right, this could become a place for Johnny to get more experience. He managed to write quite a decent amount for somebody who hated school essay assignments. Of course, it was not as detailed and in-depth as Lucy's is, nor is it as tidy and as cool as Gyro's. But it's a start. Maybe surviving this wouldn't be as hard as Johnny expected.
.
Johnny is now left questioning his conclusion yesterday. Yeah, survival is not gonna be simple either. This was the second day of practice, and every team from their school decided to try and have a sparring match on the third they, so this day served as a form of preparation. They'd go against random teams, and they'd be given feedback individually. Sounds simple enough, unless you don't know how to debate.
"Johnny, you won't be able to just interrupt the speaker while they are talking," Lucy stated. She had spent the last 15 minutes explaining to Johnny how debating works in competition.
"Then what's the point of debating if we don't argue?" Johnny questioned, tilting his head to the side, with an obviously confused expression.
"Johnny- we do argue.. as I said before, it'd be implemented our debate speech as a rebuttal," Lucy explained as she made hand gestures as if she didn't really know how to say what she was trying to get at. She let out a loud sigh and lowered her head. "Every person will be given a chance to make a rebuttal, but we'd still have to include more points in our argument to strengthen our motion."
"... So is debating like arguing, but fancier and more respectful?" Johnny asked. He had a lot of confusion regarding debate, but he didn't want to make Lucy too overwhelmed with Johnny's lack of understanding.
"Well, yes! it is, do you understand now?" Lucy asked, a faint smile appearing on her lips as she raised her head.
"...Is it like the presidential debate, or is it different?" Johnny asked in a whisper as if he were afraid of how Lucy would react.
Lucy drew in a long breath and opened her mouth as if she was just about to explain all over again how team debate competitions work, before she was suddenly interrupted by Gyro.
"So, Lucy, what will our orders be? Like, who will be the first, second, and third speaker?" Gyro asked, changing the topic. Lucy then scrambled in her bag, searching for her notes before showing Johnny and Gyro the notes regarding the structure of their team. Johnny noticed, for starters, the fact that Lucy even bothered to put herself through the hassle of analyzing their personalities to determine what role suited them best. The first speaker would be Lucy, the second Johnny, and the third Gyro. Gyro looked at Lucy's notes and nodded. Johnny looked at Lucy's notes and seemed even more confused.
"Don't worry, Johnny, the second speaker is the easiest role." Lucy reassured him. Johnny doubted that it would be for his inexperienced self.
"Well, Lucy how about we have a little sparring match of our own?" Gyro suggested
Lucy considered Gyro's suggestion for a bit before agreeing. "Yeah, that'd be great for practice." she stated. "Wait like right.. now" Johnny looked at Gyro and Lucy who both looked already eager to start practice.
"Alright! then we'll have to divide our team of three into two teams somehow.. hmm.." Lucy smiled her usual cheerful smile. Lucy does seem excited to practice. "Maybe we'll start of with me against you two, I'll go search up some motions." Lucy then when on to search through her bag for her book and her laptop, placing them on the table.
Johnny wasn't ready for any of this.
Lucy had already chosen a motion and already started the timer for case building and Johnny still wasn't ready for any of it. The motion was 'History books should be short.' Johnny and Gyro were the opposition team. Johnny already had the slightest- vaguest idea of an argument he could do, but when he was gonna write it, he felt as if all his critical thinking abilities had simply vanished. Was debate always like this? With this set up, Johnny was the first speaker of the negative team, which means he'll have to learn how to rebut too.
For most of the case building session, instead of actually researching for points and ideas, Gyro was giving Johnny (useful) useless advice. "Johnny, so all you've gotta do is improv the whole debate, they won't be able to tell between a truth or lie if you're confident enough." Gyro whispered to Johnny as he noticed how Johnny seemed to be uneasy about being the first speaker of the negative team even if it was just a mock debate and not the real thing. Gyro placed a hand on Johnny's shoulder in an attempt to comfort him. "Most things said in debate are just made up, you know?" Gyro added. Johnny partly paid attention to Gyros advice, it felt like information went in his right ear and left from his left. He wrote some notes in his book and fidgeted with the paper. You could tell that this was Johnny's first time doing something like this, and hell was he nervous for it.
"..Johnny, if you're feeling nervous, you know you can always trace circles across your thighs. I do that when I'm nervous and it calms me down."
"Well, would that improve my debate speech?" Johnny asked, a little bit startled by the suggestion. Geez, was his panic so obvious?
"No, but it looks like you need it."
Johnny was going to protest that statement until he heard Lucy's phone alarm. The case building session was over. Johnny already had a decent amount of arguements written, but damn, he still knew that he wasn't ready for any of this.
"Okay, so can you help me start the timer Gyro?" she asked as she stood up from her seat. If Johnny had remembered correctly, each speaker only had 4 minutes, in which he was thankful for since he didn't know how to stretch his points to more than 3-ish minutes. Makes the process a little big less embarrassing and a little less overwhelming.
Lucy cleared her throat, "Good morning ladies and gentlemen, the respected opposition team, and my beloved teammates." Wait, would I have to start like that too? Johnny noted it in his book.
Lucy made two points, the first being the fact that shorter history books could make more people want to learn, the second point was that it could prevent making learning history too overwhelming. Johnny felt himself panic attempting to write a rebuttal since it seems as if Lucy's arguement is perfect. "Don't be easily swayed Johnny, act like you believe in the motion." Gyro whispered to him. "That's the first lesson in debating." Gyro handed over Johnny a piece of paper. Did Gyro have a paper for everything? Johnny wanted to say, but he accepted the paper anyway.
It had the word rebuttal written in all capital letters at the very top. it was quite silly and comical. But, the rebuttals were decent. it rebutted both of Lucy's points. The first one was that just because history books are shorter, it doesn't guarantee that the people would read it. The second rebuttal was that removing details could make it inaccurate since every detail in history is important.
When Lucy finished talking, she gave Johnny a polite smile and pointed where she stood when she was proposing her speech. Johnny breathed in a long breath as he wheeled over. His hand gripped on his notes. Johnny could feel the sweat dripping down his forehead.
".. Good morning ladies and gentlemen, the respected... uh.. affirmative team and my beloved teammates. Today we will be discussing.. why history books should be short.." Johnny's voice was not at all convincing nor confident, but starting is better than nothing right? He could feel Gyro and Lucy looking at him. His voice was slightly shaky too, to top it off. As he read his notes, he remembered Gyro's advice. "The first speaker tried to tell you.. that shorter history books.." Johnny mumbled, slightly unsure of what he was saying. He started to trace circles on his legs as his heart thumped in his chest. He usually wasn't this shy when arguing, but for some reason, because this is a competition, he felt like he was going to explode. He felt calmer after following Gyro's advice. It didn't make him more confident, however, it made his breath less shaky.
When Johnny finished with his butchered speech, he immediately went back to his table and buried his head on the table. he could feel his cheeks flaming up from the embarrassment. He expected Gyro to laugh at him for being so bad. Gyro did chuckle, but not because of Johnny's debate speech, rather how Johnny acted after it.
"Johnny, this is your first time right? It's better than me when I started!" Gyro comforted, patting Johnny's shoulder.
Johnny grumbled.
Lucy also took the role as the second affirmative speaker. Johnny could barely make himself listen to Lucy's rebuttal because of his embarrassment. "The first opposition speaker has tried to make you believe the something relatively idealistic and far-fetched. It's confusing, since he believes that those benefits are only coming from his side of the bench. The first speaker of my team never spoke that everybody would read history books." Lucy spoke in a firm and convincing tone. "Do you really think that less overwhelming subjects would make people less smart?" Lucy raises her eyebrows. It feels as if she's tearing Johnny's arguement apart with her words shaped into a knife like a frog in biology. Lucy is a sweet girl, but she's brutal in rebuttals, Johnny thinks. Johnny knew he was going to melt. He looked over at Gyro who was writing his arguement. He didn't seem to panic like Johnny did, instead he seemed calm. When Lucy finishes her speech, Gyro gave her a smile and immediately stepped to the front.
He smiled widely before starting, causing everybody to smile subconsciously. "The second affirmative speaker has tried to convince you to make history books have less details with all her fancy wording." Johnny raised his head from the table. "Have you ever heard the song Waterloo by Abba? there's the quote 'the history book on the shelf is always repeating itself'. it's probably the catchiest song lyric of all time, but this quote has-" Oh my god, Johnny cringed to himself, is Gyro quoting an Abba song when he could've easily quoted karl max for that. Gyro then proceeded to deliver his arguements in a charasmatic way (joking with the audience, telling stories, etc). But in some weird way, his arguements were smart. Johnny realized just how different his team was on delivery. Lucy is formal and professional, Johnny is a mess, and Gyro is charming and witty. Once Gyro was finished, he sat back at his chair happily, clearly proud of himself.
"Hey Johnny, I think you're getting the hang of it!" Lucy complimented.
Johnny did not know whether she said that because she pitied him, is being sarcastic, or is actually genuine.