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He had never disliked the bustle of Ahten city, but perhaps there was a first time for everything.
The former Corestrike champion sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. He had left the Ember Monarch’s headquarters to get some air, but maybe he should have just stayed in his room. At least there wouldn’t be the chaos of fighting through the summer crowds right before Corestrike season. The massive screens constantly displaying his current rivals, Frostfire, was getting old too.
He had gotten used to constantly seeing Estelle and her teammates sponsoring various products on billboards and the like. Yet, since his own team lost last season, it was all the media wanted to discuss with him. How he felt about the loss, what he thought of the impressive comeback his old enemy had accomplished. What his new strategy would be for the upcoming season.
It was all his dad could talk about too, if only to demand excellence from the Ember Monarchs this summer. Especially since the disastrous loss last year thanks to him. Behind closed doors, yelling at Kai to do better, to be better, as Kai tried to ignore the way his fists couldn’t help but clench at every mention of Estelle. Silently waiting for his father’s latest outburst to be over, to be dismissed like he was still a small child.
Hence ditching headquarters.
Grimacing, Kai adjusts his dark sunglasses as he detours to a more isolated side street to properly breathe.
He’d already been recognized by fans today despite his modest outfit; a simple t-shirt, jeans and sneakers. Even in that, he’d been bombarded by self-proclaimed well-wishers begging for an autograph. Presumably since the current champions were nowhere to be seen on this side of Ahten today. Normally he loved the attention, but today? He’d rather just be left alone.
Maybe he should just head back. Maybe he can busy himself by watching more of those Corestrike highlight reels. Draft up some strategies for their team’s game-play that he can give his teammates for their next practice. Try to ignore how he doesn’t really know what to do with the free-time he managed to squeeze in.
…Nevermind, he should probably stick it out here a little longer.
“Oh my gosh! I didn’t think I would run into you!” A girl squealed, startling him out of his spiralling thoughts.
Plastering on his best camera-ready smile, Kai turned around. “Sorry, but now is not really the best time-“
The words died in his throat, and his grin faltered when he realized who it was. The girl didn’t seem to care, blonde curls bouncing up and down as she lightly rocked on her feet. Her bunny ears twitched with interest. Despite being in a casual blue sundress, he could still recognize her too.
Finii, one of the members of Byte Breakers. One of the newest Corestrike teams, and the newest to qualify for the Pro Leagues. Their entire team lineup gives him something of a headache, if he’s being honest. Their collective weirdness puts even Dubu to shame. The tofu-eating hamster somehow taller than X.
“I mean, usually you’re in that big jacket. You’re wearing normal clothes! I almost didn’t recognize you!” Finii cheerfully continues.
“Coat.” Kai corrects, a little more defensively than he intends. Of course, it falls on deaf ears.
“Are you shopping?” Ruby eyes glimmered at him with pure excitement as she practically hops in place. The sudden topic jump would be jarring if he wasn’t so used to X’s own irregular conversation patterns.
“I was considering it.” Kai concedes, if only to stay polite for a bit longer. His reputation was already damaged enough. The young striker’s energy was a bit too much for him, but he couldn’t be rude if she was the talkative type that he suspects. He doesn’t need another thing for the media to twist into Frostfire’s favour.
He can see it now, newscasters using whatever mediocre photo of him they can find, with unflattering headlines like “Disgraced Corestrike Champion Turned Schoolyard Bully”.
If only they knew. He already had been, back in school. When he thought he’d be the best simply because his father had been. When he believed childish taunts would prove his superiority. Before he discovered that his hard-earned victories could be taken away just as easily.
Kai sighs to himself, shelving that thought for now. Unpleasant memories later. Now, Finii. He could handle a fan today, even if it’s a competitor. Whether it be an autograph or a picture she wanted, he could handle that.
The girl’s somewhat calculating look brightened when she noticed his attention redirected to her. “Can I join you?”
…He could handle anything but that.
“Uh…” Just brilliant, Kai. Charismatic as always. “Aren’t your parents close by? Or your teammates?”
Her bright expression falls, just a little.
“No.” She says simply. “They aren’t.”
Well then.
After a beat of uncomfortable silence, he taps his watch. Half past noon. A little early for lunch by his standards, and his dad would admonish him for veering off his carefully maintained schedule.
Kai instead looks back at her and smiles.
“Well kid, it’s lunchtime. Can’t go shopping on an empty stomach, right?”
Finii absolutely beams.
———
On his good days, Kai usually liked to believe he was a strategist.
After all, he was the one coming up with the plans on the field. Strategy meant adaptability, and adjusting to your opponent’s play style was just simple analysis. Knowing how and when to use it to your advantage, now that’s what separated the rookies from the pros.
Yet since his team had been dethroned, all he could notice was how off his game he was.
He hadn’t accounted for how much this girl could talk. Or eat, apparently.
They had sat down at a cafe he frequented, primarily for its good quality, cleanliness, and more famous clientele. Even today, he thinks he recognizes a movie star or two in the corner booth. Here, they wouldn’t stick out as much, or at least he initially thought.
Despite her otherwise refined manners, she practically inhales the food he buys for her as she blabs about everything. From her teammates, to pranks, to Corestrike, to him, his teammates, more pranks, and then to her butler Guillaume.
Everything except her parents, Kai notices. He obviously keeps it to himself, slowly sipping his coffee. With every dish Finii absorbs, all he can see is his card balance steadily draining.
“-So since Zentaro doesn’t really care for my pranks, I’m looking elsewhere for a partner in crime!”
“No thanks.” He immediately says. He has enough to deal with, thank you very much. He isn’t looking to be an accessory to a pre-teen’s questionable hobby of terrorizing her team captain.
Finii giggles. “No silly! I don’t mean you! You’re really cool, and nice and all, but I mean Era!”
“Huh.” Somewhat of a relief, but still unexpected. “I wish you luck,” Kai adds just to humour her. “I’m not sure it’s really her scene.”
Era used to use her magic for retaliating against her schoolyard bullies, long before she became his teammate. Until an incident at school put a stop to that, severe enough to make her reconsider using her magic at all. At least, that is what he understood when she confessed it to him once. Since then, since joining his team, she’d become marginally more confident in her abilities and in herself as well.
Though, some days she was still so jittery around him, and her dislike of the press was unlikely to go away any time soon. It was partially why he would take over for her in interviews, redirecting the conversation back towards him and X to give her time to breathe. Otherwise, besides practice sessions she usually kept to herself, scribbling in journals with glittery pens and jumping out of her skin whenever he’d ask her what she was doing.
“Do you like her?” Finii asks a bit too innocently.
“Well yeah, she’s my teammate.” He raises a brow, a little wary at her line of questioning. He picks up his coffee cup to finish it. “We’ve been friends for years."
“I mean do you like her.” The girl has the audacity to waggle her brows suggestively too.
Kai chokes on his coffee, making more than a few eyes shift in their direction as he thumps his chest. Finii barely moves, grinning in a way that makes it painfully obvious that this was the reaction she was hoping for.
“W-what?” He splutters, his eyes flickering around the cafe and desperately hoping nobody caught that on camera. Luckily, people were already losing interest.
“You know, like a boyfrien-“
“We’re leaving.” He interrupts, face rapidly reddening. Definitely because he just choked on coffee like an amateur, not from any other reason. Surely.
“Oh goodie!” Finii claps, still grinning.
This damn kid is going to be the death of him, and its barely been an hour. He flags down an apologetic waiter to pay the bill, too startled by Finii’s comment to even complain at the cost thanks to the blonde’s black hole of a stomach.
He hardly had enough coffee today for that train of thought.
She follows him out of the cafe and down the streets, humming some tune he doesn’t recognize. Apparently, despite the free food she insists on following him. Shocking, considering he hasn’t exactly been the most talkative person today. Maybe, he snidely thinks, she plans on having dessert next.
“Look…Finii. Let’s leave it at that yeah?” He starts, running a hand through his hair. “Era’s practically like my sister, it’s not fair to talk about her like that. I don’t think she’d appreciate it.”
Finii looks at him a bit dubiously, and okay, fine. He shouldn’t put words in Era’s mouth, but this girl is so damn chatty about everything and nothing that it nearly puts him to shame. How he used to be at least.
“Now, you want to tell me the real reason you’re trying to hang with me?” He finally asks, hands in his pockets as they reach an empty kid’s playground through the random path they’ve taken. He isn’t stupid. The girl has been trying to distract herself all day. His attempt at a cocky grin feels more like a grimace. “I know I’m great company, but even I can tell it’s not from that alone.”
Finii looks up at him, quiet for once. Her ears twitch when she climbs up one of the monkey bars and settles there, ruby eyes peering down at him.
“Because I’m one of your biggest fans?” She tries.
Unfazed, he raises a brow. “Thanks, try again.”
Finii’s ears droop.
“Fine…” The girl huffs. “Guillaume told me that my parents can’t make it to my matches next week. They’re too busy.”
Kai just stares blankly.
“They’re always busy.” She elaborates quietly.
He can’t say the same. Not really. Unlike her, his dad was always at his matches. Hawkishly watching his every move, afterwords giving Kai a full report on what he did wrong, where he went wrong. He always had something to say. Even when Kai performed at his best, all his father could do was sit stoically in the stands, arms crossed and his expression flat as ever.
His mom isn’t in the picture anymore. He barely remembers the time when she was there at all.
Kai can’t imagine doing anything else other than Corestrike. Even on days like this, he doesn’t want to imagine quitting. But…sometimes he wonders how he’d perform if he didn’t always have his father’s eyes burn at his back, daring him to fail. Reminding him that there will always be someone better.
A monkey could figure out that what he’s about to say isn’t what she wants to hear. However, about this, he doesn’t want to lie.
“You’re pretty lucky.” He says simply, letting the words settle in.
“Huh?” Finii squeaks out of shock, probably expecting him to pity her. Despite her rapt attention, he leans against the bars and stares down at the ground.
“Sometimes,” Kai admits tiredly, “It’s better when they don’t care. When they don’t expect anything from you, you can be anything you want.”
He looks back up at her. Finii frowns.
“You can be anything.” He repeats, more firmly this time.
To her credit, Finii stays remarkably reserved as she processes his words. Finally she sighs, giving a somewhat exaggerated pout.
Hands on her hips, she stares down at him from the monkey bars. “You’re not what I expected, you know.”
“Is that a good or bad thing?” He tries one of his famous grins, but based on her weakening pout it only appears somewhat successful. Only an hour or so into this impromptu outing, and already his street cred is spiralling down the drain.
“I’m still thinking it over.” She says. Despite her brave attempt to look haughty, there’s still a little bit of uncertainty in her tiny voice that he recognizes all too well.
“Look, your parents might not be around to see it, but your butler Guillaume will. If he’s anything like you say, he’ll jump at the chance to watch your matches. Those kinds of relationships are the ones that matter. Treasure those ones.”
It took him an embarrassingly long time to figure that out for himself. That his father would never respect him in the way he wanted. That having a team, his teammates, meant more to him than chasing a memory of someone who didn’t exist anymore.
Maybe if he can direct her in the right direction, she’d save herself the heartache in the future. It was time he did something right, for once.
“Okay.” Finii decides, jumping down from the bars. Smoothing out the invisible wrinkles in her dress, she peers up, eyes glinting with something he can’t quite discern.
Kai barely has the time to react when the blonde rushes forward and hugs him, knocking the wind out of his lungs from both her speed, and his subsequent shock.
The former champion gapes, stiff and awkward as she leaps back just as quickly, rubbing her eyes.
“Thanks.” She squeaks out. Kai can only blink, and she’s off.
Huh. That didn’t go terribly, all things considered. Recovering from his shock, Kai shakes his head, hands sliding into his pockets. That girl isn’t a striker, she’s a force of nature.
…Wait. His pockets feel slightly lighter than they had been two minutes ago.
He peers back up, dread pooling in his stomach as he stares at Finii. Further away, the girl has the audacity to grin, waving a black leather wallet in her hand.
“Did you seriously just rob me?” Kai balks, “After I paid for you? I even gave you heartfelt advice!”
“I’m keeping this as a memento!” She says cheerfully. “Just until next week, when we face off against each other on the field. Then you can have it back, safe and sound! Think of it as an incentive for winning!”
Kai was never going to be nice to anyone ever again. At least that’s what he angrily thought until he saw a glimmer of light catch on the girl’s glistening eyes.
He sighs, outrage deflating. He likely won’t live this down, but at least he can be sure that at least something he said got through to her. At least a little bit.
“Everything better be in there when I get it back.” He crosses his arms, glaring at her.
“I’m rooting for you!” She cheered, running off before he could change his mind.
Kai grimaces, rubbing the back of his neck. To say his day hadn’t turned out the way he expected would be an understatement.
But if she’s anything on the field like the chaotic force she was today, it…would be fun to play against her. Her friend Guillaume would be watching of course, he’s got to put on a show for her big debut in the Pro Leagues.
For once, he has more to look forward to than just challenging Estelle and her team.
He starts walking back to headquarters, already drafting ideas in his head. Finii’s definitely tricky, his team will have to account for her unpredictability. He’ll have to research more on her team too, review their qualifying matches to see how they work together. How his team will have to react. To adapt. Despite everything, Kai smiles to himself.
She might be new to the game, but she’ll do great.
He’s sure of it.