12. TRAITOR

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IF

you look at it from a certain way, maybe this wasn't too bad. Or maybe, you're just trying to make as many excuses as you can, to try and not think about the inevitable fate of going home and continuing to make minimum wage for high hours for the rest of your life, each day, every year, until the day of your death, you think, pulling your legs up to your chest and staring down at the floor. 

Your eyes are blank and a smile is forced on your lips. Bachira pulls a silly-looking face, sticking his tongue out and making a weird expression. "Bleh!"

Isagi points, eyes wide, "That's your can we win the next match face, right?!" Bachira shakes his head, a prideful gleam in his eye.

"It's my tummy hurts face!" Igaguri says, but Bachira makes a loud incorrect buzzer sound in response, giggling to himself.

"He's wondering how his granny's doing, clearly," Gagamaru, who is swinging his feet around and laid stomach-flat on his futon says, and Bachira says no once more before he laughs.

He makes another incorrect buzzer sound, with his arms folded into an x shape, and with blushy cheeks, he says, "You're all wrong! This is my what does rain taste like face!"

"You gave us no clues!" Isagi glares in shock, brows furrowed angrily. You pull your knees closer to your chest and stare at the floor even harder, lips trembling. So much so, it looks like you're crying without tears.

"The Wanima brothers what is this face? game is really strong!"

Iemon waves his arms around and breaks the cloud of imagination over Igaguri's head, face scrunched up and clearly not impressed, "Stop playing around you guys and start focusing on the upcoming match!"

"I know! That's a seriously pissed-off face!" Bachira places a hand on his chin thoughtfully with a cunning grin. Isagi nods in agreement, also observing Iemon's face thoughtfully. 

"Only because you're distracted!" 

"Fine then, let's have our strategy meeting already."

Raichi lets out a growl, cracking his knuckles while he walks over to Kuon—who hasn't moved from his corner the entire time he's been in the room—and squats down to look him in the eye. "Before that... We still have to address our little traitor issue."

You can visibly see Raichi grind his teeth down together, before lifting his lip in a snarl and grabbing Kuon by the throat under his elbow, getting him in a chokehold, "We saw you trying to sell us out to Team V—same as last match! Don't deny it!" He looks up at you all, "Any of you want turns punchin' the crap outta him, line up!"

You place your cheek on your knee and blankly look at Kuon, who's clawing at Raichi's arm—to get him to let go, or loosen up, or anything—his squinted eyes meet yours, and you swallow thickly, turning your head away to direct your glare to the floor. You don't dare to witness his expression after.

"Great idea, Raichi!"

"Let's teach him a lesson!"

Isagi spontaneously runs up from behind you and grabs Raichi by the shoulder, brows furrowed. He frowns as he speaks, eyes narrowed at the sharp-toothed boy, "No! We can't afford to injure one of our players!"

Raichi scoffs, turning his head to Isagi while baring his teeth aggressively, "Say what?!"

"Think about it! We need a full team if we wanna beat them!"

Kuon sucks in a deep breath, letting out a guttural, gravely groan before he throws Raichi's arm off of his neck, and scrambles back, panting heavily, "You idiot! There's no way I'm playing!" Everyone looks at him in surprise, but you keep your face turned away. Kuon coughs, grasping at his throat while he talks.

"Because of my three goals, it doesn't matter if Team Z loses—I still get to advance as our top scorer! The best course of action is for me to do absolutely nothing!" He says in a raspy voice, chest heaving with every word. Raichi reacts right after he finishes speaking, veins popping out of his forehead and yelling in frustration.

"I'm definitely gonna kill you now—!!!" Isagi, however, catches Raichi before he gets the chance to jump Kuon, holding him back with his arm and giving him a strained glare. 

"I told you to back off—"

However, Isagi and Raichi both abruptly stop at the sight of Kunigami walking soundlessly past them, fists clenched but face abnormally calm. He walks up right in front of Kuon, looking down at him with eyes devoid of anything, "What if I make three goals? All of a sudden, you'll lose your spot as top scorer. Are you still going to sit by and refuse to play if that happens?" His voice gets notably more aggressive at the end, but he remains uncharacteristically cool-headed.

Kuon visibly gulps, taking a step back, but still scowls with just as much ferocity, "What? You think you can score a hattrick playing with only ten against Team V—"

Kunigami cuts him off before he finishes speaking, brows furrowed and an undeniably determined expression on his face. "I will do it. And score more points than you, without cheating."

Kuon's bright pink eyes appeared behind his fallen bangs, and he narrowed them into a sharp glare at the hero. "If you wanna try, then knock yourself out." He crouches back down, head pathetically lowered to the floor. "You can't play soccer all by yourself. I know that better than anyone, trust me."

"Explain yourself."

Kuon shakes his head, a furious expression on his face. His jaw is clenched hard, and he barely spits out the words through his grit teeth, "Just shut up. None of you know me, or how hard I've worked. I'm going to make my dream a reality and win the World Cup." His voice drops into a low whisper afterwards, so you don't catch what he says from where you sit. You peer at him with an unreadable expression, stomach swirling with all kinds of sinking feelings that make you want to tear your eyes away, but you can't.

Raichi does catch what he says, however, and he lashes out—only getting held back weakly by poor Isagi—with as much ferocity as you've seen him, pupils dilated and screaming, "Give it a rest, scumbag! You really believe a traitor could be a World Cup winner?!"

Bachira looks up to the sky—to the heavens—and places a finger on his cheek, asking a question and awaiting an answer, "Hey, I've got a question. Picture this—two players are tied for having the most goals, so which one of them advances?"

Chigiri says, "If I remember correctly, whoever has fewer yellow cards."

"And what if they have the same?"

Suddenly, Ego's face appears on the large screen, tired eyes and bags on complete full display to you all. "Then whoever has the higher Blue Lock ranking will advance. Jinpachi Ego here to address your questions. For the moment, let's say your team loses and your goals and fair play tally are the same. Then only the highest-ranked player on the roster will survive." Within his palm, it shows the leaderboard for the rankings of each player in Team Z—Kuon at the top. 

He laughs, but it's devoid of any humour, "What do you know, guess that means me."

"Is this some kinda joke?!" Raichi points behind him, at Kuon, without breaking eye contact with the screen showing Ego, brows furrowed so grumpily you think his eyes just got smaller. "This guy betrayed us and you move him up to number 1?!

"During the first selection, scoring is the only thing that matters," you finally speak, peering up through your lashes at the screen of Ego. "I don't know why that is."

"You can speculate all you want," Ego crushes the ranking of the players in his fist, shards flying everywhere before he leans in closer, blank eyes staring into his soul, "But what he did isn't against the rules. However, let me say this, Wataru Kuon, when it comes to strikers, you are the lowest of the lowest of the low. Frankly, all of you are nothing but crap. You might feel you survived a life-or-death situation, but it was pure, dumb luck. Your playing style has no value whatsoever. The world's best strikers can reproduce their goals, well, can any of you?"

They all gasp quietly in shock at his hard words.

"The more dramatic a goal is," Ego continues. "The more impressive it is. However, there's no shortage of players that can pull off a remarkable shot. The question you should be asking yourselves is why you can't reproduce them—because they were nothing but products of luck to begin with, and if you happen to rig your goals and betray your team... well then, you're trash."

The word makes your head suddenly shoot up, and you look at Kuon, a memory flashing through your brain.

* "You shouldn't take it too personally," Blue girl says from beside you, a voice as hollow as your expression, and you stare up at her, defeated. "Because if he wants to work with such trash, then that means that he was always garbage, from the very beginning. Who would want to be teammates with somebody like that?"

You always saw her as a crazy girl who had no idea what she was saying half the time—but maybe, you were wrong. You judged too fast—and look where it led you. Your trust was shattered into minuscule shards, and unable to believe that somebody you thought was your friend, turned out to be selling you all out.

"Above all else, you need one thing," Ego holds a holographic soccer ball in his hands, where the hexagonal pattern rises and shows a miniature player kicking a ball repeatedly in the same exact way. "A formula to create scoring opportunities! Analyse the how and when the situation in which your weapon helped you score a goal. What did you feel in that moment? Internalise every detail until you can reproduce it. You must devise a formula that will make you shine the brightest. To become the world's best striker, my diamonds in the rough, you must prove your own formula again and again—executing it on the battlefield with precision. Stop relying merely on luck—win the game because you were meant to."

Ego's glasses give off a blinding sheen once more before disappearing from the screen, and there is only a timer from 24 hours counting down to replace him. A few seconds pass before any of you say anything—but Raichi is the first to speak. He turns to Kuon, a devilish grin on his lips as he cracks his knuckles, "Anyway, Kuon, don't think about making a move during the next match. Do something stupid again and I'll kill you for real."

Kuon doesn't reply this time.

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* 10 — REAL TEAM

note: this is a little under my usual base wc of 2000. sorry