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Good reflex training, Ego had said as the doors opened to the training field turned warzone.
Absolute bullshit, Reo thinks. He’s seen the most recent contract with a fucking paintball sponsor–who knew they were so into football–and now they’re all paying the price. This is promotional content at best, absolutely humiliating exploitation at worst.
“These are the teams,” Ego says, displaying two rows of names on the overhead screen. “They’ve been decided based on your stats and interactions with each other.”
BLUE TEAM - Itoshi Rin, Reo Mikage, Nagi Seishiro, Raichi Jingo, Kunigami Rensuke, Tsurugi Zantetsu, Aryu Jyubei, Tokimitsu Aoshi
RED TEAM - Shidou Ryuusei, Bachira Meguru, Isagi Yoichi, Barou Shouei, Chigiri Hyoma, Niko Ikki, Igarashi Gurimu, Gagamaru Gin
Stats. Right. That’s definitely why he put Itoshi Rin and Shidou Ryuusei at the top of each of the teams. Not because their weird mating-or-murder-dance pulls in half their viewerbase and lands on the front page of Twitter every time a new episode drops.
Whatever. At least he and Nagi are on the same team. He yanks a vest off a hook and smiles when Isagi gets absolutely shut down trying to shake Rin’s hand for good luck. At least the viewers aren’t the only ones getting free entertainment out of this.
Fucking lukewarm, Rin thinks as the whistle blows. This is another one of Ego’s stupid publicity stunts masquerading as soccer training–which has honestly just become Blue Lock’s mission statement at this point.
He has little time to begin with and Ego is wasting it by making him run around a stupid field and shoot paint at his unfortunate teammates. Nii-san is probably soaring miles ahead during the time he squanders here.
Rin squints down at the rifle in his hands loaded with paint bullets. They don’t even look like they’re of good quality–the color at the base chipping.
Fucking lukewarm–
Something hard nails him in the side of the head as red explodes across his vision.
“What the fuck?!” he spits out and the speakers finally crackle to life.
“As mentioned in the rules earlier, headshots are NOT allowed and will not be counted as valid eliminations. Yellow card to Isagi Yoichi,” the voice drones as Rin wipes paint off the side of his face.
Headshots aren’t considered valid shots? Tell that to his fucking skull.
“Uh, oops,” Isagi calls out nervously from somewhere above him and he spins around in a circle to pinpoint the source. He spots a blur of blue in the tower behind him and takes off running like a banshee from hell.
Fucking lukewarm or not, he’ll wipe the whole floor with the opposing team.
Raichi hits the ground with a black eye and probably a broken nose. He hasn’t played a game of paintball since he was five fucking years old but he doesn’t remember it feeling like that.
The stupid VAR whirs to life two seconds too late.
“Again, the only viable weapon in this game is paint. Physical contact, such as kicking and punching, are not permitted.” Raichi tastes blood in his mouth as he glares up at the human definition of “this sign can’t stop me because I can’t read”. Shidou’s laughing with his full tongue on display and he’s not even holding a gun in his hands. “Another yellow card to Shidou Ryuusei.”
“ Yellow card? ” Raichi screams up at the speakers. There’s hidden cameras somewhere here because Ego loves farming them for views so he flips his middle finger up into the void. Shidou’s gotten so many yellow cards he could probably make a collage out of them at this point and yet they refuse to actually pull him out of the game because he’s a fan favorite. Because apparently the Japanese soccer fan base has just as horrendously awful taste in men as the Japanese soccer players themselves. God knows the things he’s seen in the locker rooms. He’ll be scarred for this life and maybe the next.
Raichi opens his mouth to yell again when an actual paintball pegs him in the center of his vest. He stares down at the spot spreading red on his clothes and looks up to a way-too-close view of Bachira’s face.
“Gotcha!” Bachira laughs, twirling two pistols in between his hands. There’s three more tucked into his belt. Where did he even get all those guns? Everyone only starts out with one.
“ Raichi Jingo. Eliminated.”
His ears are still ringing from Shidou’s earlier kick and Bachira’s maniacal laughter does nothing to ease the absurdity of the situation. He sits down on the ground and stares up at the painted ceiling.
This isn’t soccer. This is hell.
Barou jams the trigger of his gun again to no avail. The whole fucking rifle is broken–just like half the equipment in this facility–despite how much of the JFU’s budget Ego drains.
“FUCKING BROKEN SHIT!” Barou yells, slamming the whole thing against the ground. Aiming down the sight of a stupidly breakable gun as the other idiot peasants jump off things that are definitely not made for jumping has taught him only that he should have burned Ego’s stupid invitation when it showed up at his house and absolutely nothing about soccer.
“Maybe if you didn’t throw it into a wall when we ran into Tokimitsu, it would still work,” Chigiri says like the snarky, useless bastard he is. Barou has half a mind to punch him on the spot but the stupid VAR might actually saddle him with a red card for that one. Although it’s done an amazing job of looking the other way when it comes to Shidou’s less-than-sportsman-like antics. “I also don’t think those were insured.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Barou spits back. If Ego hasn’t started insuring all their equipment ever since the incident with Kunigami and the training room, then that’s his fucking fault for simply being unobservant.
Something like a war cry sounds in the distance as a shot comes sailing through the trees and nails him square in the chest. His emotion teeters on the balance of relief because he doesn’t have to play this stupid game any longer and anger because someone shot him. Like every day, Barou wakes up and chooses violence.
“FUCK YOU!” he spits out into the forest. His alleged “teammate” takes off running without a second glance backwards and he extends the curse to cover the both of them.
“Barou Shouei. Eliminated.”
Chigiri sighs, finding a nice rock to sit on while all hell breaks loose around him. He leans his rifle against the rock and hears screams–yes, screams –echo in the distance.
He’s not getting paid enough for this. Actually, he’s not getting paid period , which is even more reason to sit here and conserve his energy while the rest of his teammates go batshit crazy trying to kill each other. He’ll fire a couple stray shots at the end to avoid Ego’s reprimanding lecture about polishing gems but he has no desire to go sicko mode or whatever Shidou calls his cartwheeling-and-kicking charade. Actually, maybe that’s just normal mode for him.
Chigiri stretches his arms out and glances up at the ceiling. It’s painted sky-blue with a couple of clouds going across it because heaven forbid Ego be exposed to actual Vitamin D. He’d probably shrivel up in the sunlight and the thought makes Chigiri laugh.
This really is a nice view. Add a picnic basket and–
Something nails him in the back and Chigiri yelps. Not because of the impact or the action or any other dumb shit like that but because there is now very sticky and very hard-to-remove blue paint all over his hair.
“WHAT THE FUCK?!” he shouts into the distance but there’s no sign of his attacker. “DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD IT IS TO WASH PAINT OUT OF YOUR HAIR? LEARN HOW TO FUCKING AIM! ”
“Chigiri Hyoma. Eliminated.”
Niko tries to tune out the whines of the screaming chipmunk next to him as he curls his hand into a circle and puts it against his eye. He needs to calculate Nagi’s current speed and the fake trees he’s using as cover but given the angle that he’s coming at, Niko should be able to aim his gun a little to the left and–
“WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?” Igarashi yelps, apparently content with backseat shooting but having no desire to use the actual gun in his hands. “WHY ARE YOU DOING THAT LITTLE STUPID HAND-SCOPE THING WHEN HE’S LITERALLY TEN FEET IN FRONT OF US?!”
Niko spins around to face him and jams the butt of his gun into Igarashi’s chest.
“ You shoot him then!” he snarls and whips around to face the enemy again but it’s much too late. Nagi’s right in front of them this time and he has a pistol pointed at each of them.
“Oh shit.”
“Niko Ikki and Igarashi Gurimu. Eliminated.”
“Those are our opponents,” Tokimitsu says, smiling in the blissful two seconds before anxiety sets in. He has a gun in his hands but he has no clue how to use it and there’s always the chance that it’s defective or that he absolutely misses and Ego throws him out of Blue Lock because of it. “W-What if we’re next?”
He watches as Aryu ignores him and throws his hair over one shoulder, striking another pose for an unseen camera. They’re standing exposed in the open because he’d insisted the lighting was better there.
“Aryu-kun,” Tokimitsu starts again as the skin on the back of his neck prickles. His instincts are telling him something terrible and dangerous is coming their way, every fiber of his being screaming at him to run.
His worst fears are confirmed when Shidou Ryuusei appears over the crest of the hill, brandishing not one gun or two pistols but three buckets of paint.
“Run! A monster’s coming!” he calls out but it’s much too late because they’re splattered in red before he can even react.
“Aryu Jyubei and Tokimitsu Aoshi. Eliminated.”
Kunigami brushes the dirt off his pants and follows the flashing red lights out of the room. Bachira and Isagi had cornered him in a 2 v 1 and finished him off with a shot to the back. It wasn’t the most heroic ending but it wasn’t the worst way to go either.
The viewing room for the eliminated players is crowded by the time he reaches it. It’s a battlefield and the floor is littered with the remains of a cookie pile.
Kunigami finds Chigiri in a secluded corner, looking very colorful and very pissed. He’s rubbing paint out of his beloved hair, scrubbing harder at the tips like that’ll magically make the blue disappear.
Kunigami can’t help himself. He laughs and Chigiri whips around at the noise, glaring daggers.
“What?” he hisses, holding his damp patch of hair. Kunigami swallows another laugh and fights to school his expression into something remotely resembling solemnity.
“Nothing, nothing,” he replies, waving one hand to cover it up. “I just thought that you’re looking very… blue .”
Time stills. Kunigami smiles as Chigiri finally stops scrubbing at his hair, turning slowly to face him with murder in his eyes.
“You’re looking very dead. ”
Nagi’s tired. Nagi’s really fucking tired. His lungs feel like they’re about to burst inside his chest and his legs drag against the ground like lead. Just one more kill, Reo had said but that had been four people ago and now he’s running on empty.
Nagi trips on a root and lands face-first on the floor. He chooses to stay there because it’s too much effort to give up. FPS games never take into account the amount of stamina it takes to keep fighting and Nagi feels betrayed.
“Oi, Nagi!” Reo shouts, crouching by his side. He schools his expression into the most pathetic one imaginable in a pitiful attempt to garner sympathy and Reo glances down at him, eyes wide. “Nagi, wake up!”
Zantetsu shouts something and Nagi actually manages to lift one arm in response. Red explodes across his vision as Zantetsu goes down with a shot to the heart.
“Zantetsu Tsurugi. Eliminated.” Reo is the next to go, still gripping Nagi’s shoulder when the paint splatters across the back of his jacket. The color drains from his face as he drags his gaze up to meet Nagi’s.
“Reo Mikage. Eliminated.”
The ground shakes as Shidou thumps closer, pistol drawn for the finishing shot. Nagi’s tired. He’s really fucking tired and it’s much too late to move but he figures that if he’s going down, he might as well bring the insane idiot along with him. Nagi rolls over onto his back and fires his pistol off at the same time.
“Shidou Ryuusei and Nagi Seishiro. Eliminated.”
Zantetsu watches as Reo hoists Nagi onto his back and starts walking off towards the exit.
“It was just like that book you like,” he says when they make it out of the stadium. Reo stops and cranes his neck to stare at him. “Reo and Juliet.”
Reo looks somewhere between dismayed and appalled, red paint still splattered all over him.
“It’s Romeo and Juliet. ”
Bachira laughs as he counts the pistols in his belt that he’s collecting like battle scars. The 2 v 1 thing has been paying off very well for them since nobody else seems to be coordinated enough for a joint attack.
“We’re partners in crime!” Bachira laughs, wiping paint off his nose. Isagi smiles back at him.
“You can be partners in the grave too,” a new voice says and Bachira looks up to see Rin standing a few feet away. His hair is covered in red and Bachira wonders if it’s paint, blood, or ketchup. Maybe he should taste it to find out.
“Rin-chan!” Bachira calls out, even as Rin narrows his eyes and aims his gun. They’re much too close to dodge and so Bachira does the only sensible thing left. He leans right to take the brunt of the shot and pushes Isagi down the hill.
“Win for me, Isagi!” he calls out as blue splatters against his back.
“Bachira Meguru. Eliminated.”
“The game is now down to the last two participants. Each team has only one member remaining,” the overhead voice says as Isagi jumps to his feet. Some English pop song is blasting at maximum volume from the speakers and Isagi wonders how much time it’ll take for clips of this to wind up on TikTok.
Cover first. Rin already has the advantage with the high ground and he needs to find something to hide behind to give himself time to think and reload. Isagi sees Bachira’s fallen figure at the top of the hill before he disappears into the trees.
He takes a few ragged breaths, heartbeat pounding in time with the baseline of the song.
“Lukewarm,” a voice says from behind him and Isagi whips his head around to see the barrel of a gun. And then because he’s running on nothing but pure adrenaline, he reacts on instinct and kicks the rifle.
“What the fuck?” Rin spits out as he starts going for the spare pistol on his back. In the two seconds it takes him to do that, Isagi has managed to formulate the bare bones of a plan. It’s a low blow and borderline dirty but this is Blue Lock–a place where every experience becomes a weapon, every person a stepping stool in the struggle to the top.
“Sae-san!” he calls out and Rin’s head whips around instantly. Bingo. Isagi cocks the gun and shoots.
Ego flicks on the display monitor before Bachira decides to do anything more than just hug Isagi in victory. He likes his eyes not permanently scarred, thank you very much.
“Hello, diamonds in the rough,” he says, his voice carrying through the speakers. Even Rin turns to look up at him, albeit with an extremely pissed-off expression. “You have a game with the U-20 in 30 minutes. Wash up and meet them at the center field.”
The entire team squawks like a dying flock of birds and someone fires a paintball at the camera in protest. Ego rolls his eyes at the theatrics.
“30 minutes,” he repeats and cuts the broadcast.
“You call that training?” Noa asks, emerging from the hallway. Way to lurk like a creep.
“I call that multitasking,” Ego replies, halfway through editing footage of Raichi getting slammed in the face. He’s using loud explosion sound effects and slo-mo shots because apparently that’s what the kids are into these days.
“Anyways, I have a message from downstairs,” he says and Ego actually pauses his editing to look over. Officials from the stupid paintball company that caused this whole trainwreck are the only people downstairs.
“They said they’re canceling the sponsorship,” Noa says casually, like he’s delivering a weather report instead of wrecking Ego’s day. “They said they don’t want that type of image associated with their brand.”
“That type of image?” Ego echoes dully. If they didn’t want Shidou fucking Ryuusei as their poster boy, then maybe they should have watched at least one (1) soccer game before signing the contract.
“Yes, so they’re pulling out. They said you can keep the batch of current guns used in the game though. They don’t want to take them back after Gagamuru licked them.”
Noel keeps his face impressively impassive as Ego watches the past 48 hours go up in flames before his eyes. He pulled two all-nighters for this–which he would’ve done regardless–but instead of spending his time designing a fake arena and making teams, he could’ve done something actually worthwhile like watch anime.
Fuck it all. Ego opens the video editing software again and attacks the footage with a newfound passion. If it can’t get them a sponsorship, at least this damn game can get them some good PR.