Chương 95: Chapter 116: Blocked

I spent the whole of halftime chugging water and trying to breathe, I curved to get more oxygen-rich air to me while our away-game healer was working on me.

"Strained ligaments, windburn, exposure, abrasions, pulled muscles," she listed off.

"And about a hundred of the mildest bruises I've ever seen. How is this sport legal?" The coach was re-ordering her clipboard, still glaring at me.

"Every culture needs its gladiatorial sports, and this one is less intense than most," she said, and it sounded like she might have had this argument a few times in the past.

"Now then, Killer, you have any other strategy-defining abilities I should know about?"

"I've - recently- been - advised," I gulped out, "not- to- reveal all my- secrets." The coach stared at me with I think just a glimmer of real hate.

"Why would you not tell your own coach what you can do?" It was Egnul that answered for me while I was still resting my lungs. She shrugged.

"Have to admit, it is funnier this way." I gave her a thumbs-up. I knew we'd have a reconciliation arc sooner or later. On the other side of the field, Suthie Vanderbolt and her team from Stutin Institute were glaring daggers at us. Probably because they had been up by four points five minutes ago and now they were down by two. They had fought and worked against my teammates to get those points, and I knocked in two net-goals in a row and upset the score.

They had come to this game knowing me as a tough battler, a tackler, a blocker to be avoided at all costs. They had not known that I was also a scoring powerhouse if we needed one. I was laying out on a bench, cooling off. The coach glared down at me.

"All right Killer. First thing in the new half, you drop one more of those goals, then you're back to defending against Suthie. I imagine she'll be mad enough that she'll stay right on you anyway. Just keep her taunted so she concentrates on you, and then just don't let her break your legs or your neck or anything." I nodded. Lightning affinity was not a strong suit for me. I did not have a great capacity for levin energy, and it was really hard to work with.

I think that at a full affinity under ideal conditions with a higher Strength rating, I'd be able to use this channeling ability to move at actual lightning speed. As it is, I have a meager three-hundred-ish miles per hour. That's enough that I'm basically a blur and a lot of noise, but it's really most effective against people that don't know I can do it.

And after that, the big benefit is that people that know I can do it have to make allowances and countermeasures as if I will use it, which takes up their resources. Some day I'll build up that affinity and get some real speed. I've noticed that magical-fantasy settings have very little safeguards against super-hero super-speed. Could I be happy as the only person who has access to teleportation, singularities, pocket dimensions and shockwave explosions? Probably. But if I can have superspeed too?....

I mean come on. Someday. The Stutin team was clustered up close in a huddle discussing last-minute strategy. They periodically glared over at our sideline, but their coach was furiously discussing how they were going to win this match. For once I decided not to channel owl's essence just to listen in, I only had a couple points of mana unspent and every time I run out I instantly get hit with three life-or-death scenarios and an apocalyptic disaster too, all of which need abilities I don't have accessed.

"Take the field, whistle's in a minute," the coach said, and started prodding players towards the pitch. We stretched our legs and jogged back out to take our places. I tried to plan my moves a little better this time. It's easier to hold my breath if I'm not moving my legs, after all, and I've already curved the air to my needs. The referee whistled out and tossed the sliotar, and our midfielders battled for the control. I waited until I saw the sliotar up in the air and sailing towards Suthie, and then I acted.

First I curved air to form a low-pressure tunnel, and then I engaged the lightning in my mana channels. The world slowed, nearly to nothing, and I flew forward, using high pressure behind me and low pressure before me to send me even faster, with less energy expended. I shoved my hurley into the thick air like I was dipping an oar into water, and scooped it out of the way, and zoomed along towards the Stutin goal. I kept myself low, near the ground, so that nobody could tell I was flying when I shouldn't be.

I flicked the sliotar at the net and then dropped out of levin-channeled speed, letting out a big puff of air and panting to catch my breath. Not as bad as last time, for sure. Now we're up by five. As soon as the goalie took up the sliotar to toss in, the Stutin team started to close in around me. I guess they were tired of lightning-round scoring. They had a grim look about them, as if they were ready to take all the abuse I felt inclined to deliver.

Look, I've had teams throw triple coverage on me, but this was eight people practically linking arms to keep me contained. And if none of them was playing the sliotar or trying for it, I'd get yellow-carded again. The goalie threw the sliotar out to Suthie, who turned and started passing it to teammates to work downfield to our goal. They would pass back and forth and my team tried to slow them, stop them, but it wasn't working. Suthie was about the equal of my whole team all by herself.

Her with five of her hurlers at her side, we were outmatched. They put eight people pinning me out, and it was a good trade-off for them. And my team might try to do the same but that Suthie was already watching for it and was staying on the move. I had slowed down, let them maneuver, and didn't respond until I was trapped. And now I stood behind a fence of frowning players, all of them spreading their limbs so I would have to knock them flat unprovoked to move more than a couple of feet.

I wasn't playing camogie, I was playing Red Rover. I could only stand back, frustrated and helpless, while she trampled my teammates and charged for the goal, passing off to one of her teammates and taking a pass back to keep running. My teammates were too scattered and shattered to put up a decent defense against this, they were fresh off of a break and this was too sudden, too unexpected. Losing their Killer so easily was a shock to them, and now Stutin's Monster was rampaging unchecked.

And she was determined to knock in goal after goal- she had seen that she could not hurt me with bruises and bashes, and slamming my teammates around too much would get her carded out. So she was going to get at me the only way she could: by winning the game. She scored. Our goalie threw in, and my team tried to pass back to the goal. Suthie intercepted, and ran amok through my team to score on us again. And again. I stood, stuck, watching her thrash through my whole squad.

I'm sure they felt helpless when I engaged lightning speed, but I was feeling just as helpless now, as I stood penned by rules and regulations not to smash my way through this line of bodies. I can't muscle my way out of this and rejoin the game without being thrown out. I can't crank my speed up and juke through them before they can react, the air pressure of my passage at those speeds would hit them just as hard and I'd be just as red-carded. Pinned by the rules.

There's no concession for this maneuver, the folks who wrote the camogie rulebook never considered that there might be eight players working together to pin down one player as a valid strategy. They probably assumed that if anyone tried that, they would immediately start losing the game and the problem would become self-correcting. Our five-point lead vanished quickly, replaced by their four-point lead, and there was no sign that this was going to end any time soon.

She could keep stealing that sliotar and running it back, and my people just could not seem to bring it over. If they could get it to the twenty line where I was stuck, I would be considered close enough to play and I would bust right through. But as it was...

"DAMMIT KILLER!" I looked over at the coach. She looked just as frustrated as I felt. Time to do something drastic. I sighed. I channeled steel. I looked around at the eight girls ringing me.

"Well," I said, "if I'm getting carded out of the game, at least I can take all of you with me." I wanted to be bluffing. I wanted to heft my hurley and see one or two of them flinch, leap back out of reach, give me a breath to run through. But they were brave. And their courage got them hurt. Cowards would never have made me do it. I whipped in a circle with the hurley out, slamming into and through each hurler, flinging them back. A wave of players flew from the impact, off their feet, brave and injured.

The ref was bring up his whistle, I had seconds. Suthie was about to put one more goal in, swinging away. I channeled lightning, and I burst out of there like a bullet, past the teams, past the referee, past Suthie. I shouldered the sliotar out of the way, and turned off the lightning's channel. There was no time to activate steel. I took the hit straight to my shoulder, and the bone broke against her hurley. The whistle blew, and the referee started sorting out the casualties.

Eight of theirs to the healer, and then back to the field. I went for mending, and then red-carded to the bench. Suthie took a second yellow card. She stayed on the field. Still, at least she had a card on her. That was the only thing I could offer my team now. She could not afford to hurt or injure any of the Academy players, even as part of the play, because it might get her thrown out of the game.

My last act of the game was to prevent one scoring chance, and get one injury, so that she would have to go easier on the other hurlers for the rest of the half. So now she could not do anything but score points and destroy our morale. And I sat, miserable, watching the next half-hour as she won the game, and then beat my team. Those were separate functions: she put a W on the scoreboard, but she left my colleagues in ruins. Defeated. Despondent. For thirty minutes I sat trammeled while my time was pummeled.

"You're never going to let them surround you like that. They'll never pull that trick off again," the coach said, to cheer me up. It did not work. It was a sulking and silent team that retired to the away-team locker rooms to change out of our uniforms. Most of our jerseys were torn or bloodied in at least one place. Shorts and socks were damaged, stained, or stretched out of shape. Helmets dented, faceguards bent. Healers had been busy but the marks retained.

After a while we just stopped wiping off the dirt and grass, we just would leave the footprints visible on our chest and legs. We were filthy, sweaty, but the real stink was frustration and defeat. We could shower away everything but the melancholy and resentment. I changed back to my street clothes, and sat down on a bench, waiting for someone to call me that the carts were ready to haul us back to the Academy.

I was not in the mood for a System notification, but I got one anyway: through practice and effort, my Strength had increased. I got an upgrade point for losing a match. All season I've been undefeatable, and the only time the training actually builds me up, was the one time I lost. I had to laugh at the sick symmetry of it. Someone else caught my laugh and chuckled as well. A nervous laugh bounced around the room a few times, then stilled. Egnul leaned back, and heaved a sigh.

"Thank gods. I was really getting worried. Do you know how much pressure I've been feeling? We've had an undefeated season! That is incredibly stressful, always worried about the next game. Now we're on a winning season, but not undefeated! That's the best possible position to be in!" Wimley, the smaller girl with vibrant blonde hair, let out a hugely dramatically relieved sigh.

"I know, right? Finally we don't have everyone whispering 'there they go, undefeated, how long can they keep it up', and instead we're allowed to focus on a win!" One of our high scorers, Framkis, snorted.

"Undefeated means you're always focused on the inevitable eventual defeat. Now we can concentrate." Byfen, her friend, grinned fiercely.

"Like the fact that Stutin has had a strong winning season too. If we're lucky, we're gonna see them again in the city championships." Oh my god, is this... sportsmanship? Losing graciously? We fought so hard out there and when we lost we're... okay with it?

"Hear hear!" Egnul cheered.

"And when we do... hey Killer?"

"Yeah?" I said.

"Obviously, when we get our rematch we're gonna let you have the big one. But next time- don't let her fracture your arm just to block a point. Even I wouldn't break your arm for a point, right?"

"Yeah, Egnul," I said.

"And on the rematch? I'm not pulling my punches anymore." I ran a hand over my shoulder and winced. I have to get over this habit of getting hurt from avoidable hits. But in my defense, I had very little time to think, and I was just trying my best in the heat of the moment. Next time, it won't be like this.

"Hell yeah!" Framkis shouted, and there was laughter and cheering. We lost. We were all right. I had started to forget that it was all right to lose a game. I've been fixated for a long time, and now I'm coming back around to see that not everything is life and death, end of the world. And, my Strength upgraded. Maybe it could be true what they say, that you learn more from defeat than from victory. The door opened and our coach walked in, grinning broadly.

"I could hear you harpies laughing and cackling fifty feet through a closed door," she said, "and thank the gods for that, I was worried I'd need to come in here and console a bunch of weepy wonder-whys who were devastated by taking second place in a game. But you all seem just fine!"

"Already planning the rematch, coach," Wimley called out.

"One thing I don't understand," Frankis said.

"Why did their school put someone like her on the junior varsity? Their varsity program can't all be better than her?"

"Of course not," the coach snorted.

"She's the best there is. But she's awful. Her team hates her. Right now they're getting chewed out for winning because she carried the game. Nobody wants to work with her. She's not good enough to beat an entire varsity team by herself, and so they put her on junior league." Byfen looked interested.

"So her own team hates her, do they?...." [Quest Begun: Mutiny on the Pitch. 5XP. Advancement: The Access] Oh that's interesting. I can get closer with Thumper by... getting Stutin's team to turn against Suthie Vanderbolt? I see no downsides here.

"Now, grab your duffels and get out on the wagon! I gotta get you second-place ladies back to your campus by lights-out!" the coach hollered out and started waving people.

"C'mon! Get outta there! It's not even your bench why are you so relaxed on it! Hustle hustle! Last one over the running-board has to run home alongside the carts!" The majority of us still had bruises and aches. Not everything needs a healer's attention. I could hear fifteen-year-old girls groaning like arthritic old ladies as they hauled themselves up through the tail gate and found a spot of seating in the back of the wagon.

Its benches were unpadded and had nothing to hold onto, staying upright was a challenge and a punishment. Two large wagons stuffed full, we started riding out. I looked up at the stars- real stars, not the lying geode lights from Hearstcliff- and just enjoyed the night. Open air, headed home. The worst thing happened and it wasn't that bad.

Nobody needs to flip out or scramble to fix things, we lost a game but we're still one of the top in our division and we're almost certainly going to compete for the title of this region. We don't even owe anyone an apology. For a long time, I've equated "trying to do something" with "needing to succeed at this". As Gedes the prison butler pointed out, I tend to lose perspective. I get so caught up the grand tragedies and colossal battles that I can forget to look at what's in front of me and see it for what it is.

Sometimes a grapefruit for breakfast doesn't mean anything. It's okay to stop thinking about the future for a while. Oh crap tomorrow's the team meeting at the Final Form.