Chapter 2: Some Basketball Practice

When I got to the gym, nobody had shown up yet except for a girl named Tianna, who is one grade above me. We exchanged "Hey"s, then just sat around in the hallway, waiting for Coach Lowe to show up. That was the rule: No student is allowed to go into the gym or change rooms unless a teacher is there in the gym to supervise.

It took another minute or two until Coach showed up, and by then, half the team had showed up already. He allowed us into the gym, and we all went into the girl's change room to change. I hung my backpack on one of the hooks and took out my gym clothes from the front pocket. I opened up the largest pocket in the back and took out my basketball shoes that were black with neon green laces and a neon green stripe through the middle. I slipped into my pink Nike t-shirt that says Going All the Way, and my favourite pair of blue and orange basketball shorts. A girl named Skylar, who is also a year older than me (everyone on the team is older than me, except for three people who are younger), walked into the change room just as I was putting on my shoes.

"S'up, Villamore." She greeted me, calling me by my last name.

"S'up, West." I replied, returning the favour.

We both know that she hates me, I think because she's jealous that I'm the best basketball player on the team and she is only the second best. But sometimes she'll act a little friendly just so she could look better than me and NOT like a jealous rat.

I never said that it worked.

"Just so you know, I love those shorts you're wearing!" she fake-gushed.

"Thanks."

"Especially since it covers your knees. That's essential for clumsy oxes such as yourself, you know, when you fall on your face and knees."

Then there are times when she decides to be her jealous self. Lucky for her, there is nobody else in the change room right now to witness her jerkiness (and the fact that she stupidly used the term oxes when the plural form of ox is oxen. Duh!).

And I don't take insults very well, even if it's not true.

I finished tying my shoelaces, then stood up, looking Skylar in the eye even though I was standing over a meter away from her. "Listen, Skylar," I said. "I am really not in the mood for a fight or argument, so I don't need your rude and pathetically false comments. Seriously, you should just get a black permanent marker and scribble I'm So Jealous on your forehead. It'd be pretty much the same thing. Besides, it's not like being number two stinks."

I turned around and headed for the door that leads into the gym.

"You better watch your back, Trin!" she threatened.

All of a sudden, I got that weird feeling again. Yes, the same tingling feeling I got that started the epic spitball incident during math class. Everything but me was in slow motion, and I could actually feel something hurling towards from behind me. With tremendous reflexes and speed, I turned around and caught what turned out to be an airborne shoe, catching it with one hand, which Skylar had thrown at me, ruining her attempt to hurt me with her shoe.

When time returned back to normal, Skylar's mouth was gaped open, shocked that I had been so fast and alert, as if I had eyes on the back of my head.

"First of all, only my friends call me Trin." I broke the shocked silence with an intense tone that made me look pretty cool. "And second, what kind of immature eighth grader throws a shoe at a seventh grader? Answer: One that acts like a second grader."

I tossed the shoe on to the ground and walked into the gym feeling triumphant. And yeah, I know I'm not good at insults and snappy comebacks, but at least I did something that was enough to make her speechless.

Later...

"OK, line up, girls! Time for scrimmage!" Coach yelled so his voice could be heard throughout the entire gym. We all put away our basketballs in the rack, then lined up so we could be placed into teams. Coach went down the line, giving everyone a number, either 1 or 2, and whatever number you get is the team you are on. I was expecting it, but Skylar went out of her way to make sure she was placed in the line specifically so she wouldn't be on my team. Jeez. You don't have to be a mind reader to know that she is thinking Revenge, revenge, REVENGE!

Scrimmages aren't supposed to be competitive, especially if it's just a team practice, but you probably know how far a rivalry can go, especially if that rivalry is with someone like Skylar.

The scrimmage was going to run until the end of practice, since there was only around ten minutes left, anyway. When the game/scrimmage started, our team won the jump ball, and the ball was passed to me so I could bring it up the court, since I was the Point Guard, after all. As I dribbled, Skylar immediately picked me up on defense. Figures. She was defending me so tightly; I knew that I could fake her out and get by her with a few well-executed dribble moves.

I'm starting to get that weird, tingly feeling again. She is going to reach and try to steal the ball, I can feel it.

She reached for the ball, ever so slowly, and I easily and quickly crossed it between my legs to my left hand, ruining her steal attempt. She stumbled over a little, leaving me a wide open lane to the basket. I dribbled up to the basket, when I got the same tingly feeling, for the fourth time today. Skylar was behind me, about to reach for the ball from behind, so I quickly picked up the ball and did a lay-up before she could do anything. It went in, and as I back-pedaled to the other side of the court, I saw the jealous and angry Skylar shoot me a death stare. I just shrugged and threw my hands in the air innocently, smirking. I usually don't act like that during games, especially scrimmages, but when another person on the other team is acting competitive for stupid reasons, it makes me competitive, too.

Skylar brought the ball up for her team, so I picked her up on defense once she crossed the half-court line. She just stood there dribbling for a while like she was trying to figure out what she should do .Everyone on her team was calling for the ball, asking or demanding her to pass to them. She ignored all of them completely.

"Your teammates are calling for the ball. Don't be a ball hog and pass!" I said to her in a lowered voice so no one else could hear.

She just smirked at me. "You wish."

She did a whole bunch of swift crossovers right in front of my face, trying to fake me out. I knew what she was going to do next; she was trying to make me think she was going to drive to the basket as well as fake me out, but take the jump shot instead. She's done it a million times. She really needs to try a different move. When she took the shot, I was ready, and immediately pounced at the ball, swatting it out of the air and blocking her shot. One of my teammates grabbed the ball after I had blocked it, and started to dribble up the court on a fastbreak, no one around to stop her. She wasn't a very fast dribbler, though, so I sprinted ahead of her and parked myself just below the basket on the left side. Before the defense could catch up to her, she passed the ball to me since I was ahead of her anyway, and I shot the ball off the backboard and in. That's another 2 points for my team.

Skylar was really starting to look mad.

After I scored, she brought the ball up again, staring at me right in the eyes, trying to creep me out, I guess, then immediately passed it to her teammate on the right wing. That's a first. She cut to the basket, but I blocked off the area between her and the ball so she couldn't be passed to. She retreated to just outside the three-point line, where she was passed to, then she stopped for a second and drove to the basket on me. I stepped back so she couldn't get by me, but then she did a spin move! Man, I'm not good at defending spin moves! She had lost me with that spin, but when she pulled up to shoot, I desperately jumped up and swatted at the ball in the air, even though I knew the chances of me blocking it now were pretty low.

Then something unbelievable happened.

The ball got thrown right off course of Skylar's shot and soared out of bounds. I had blocked her shot.

But that's not the unbelievable part. The thing is – I swear – I didn't even touch the ball! Nothing did!

I just stood there, looking quite shocked, with my mouth hanging open. Skylar looked shocked too, but her expression immediately changed to anger.

Coach blew the whistle. "Nice one, Trin! Out of bounds, team two's ball."

I snapped back into reality and got back to playing defense, trying not to think about what just happened. There is something wrong with me, I know it. It's been happening all day! I ignored these thoughts and focused on the task at hand. Someone on Skylar's team went to inbound the ball, then passed it to an open Skylar. I guarded her in my best defensive stance. She acted like she was going to pass it to someone in the post, and then…

Everything became slow motion, I got that weird tingly feeling for the fifth time today, and I both saw and sensed Skylar whip the basketball right at my face in slow motion! I ducked quickly, and watched as the ball soared to no one in particular, right out of bounds. I looked angrily at Skylar, who couldn't even hide the evil-happy expression on her face.

"What the heck was that for?!" I yelled at her.

"What are you talking about?!" she replied. "I was trying to pass it to Rachel in the post, but your face got in the way!"

"Rachel is behind the three-point line, you idiot!"

"Do you really want to go there? I'll turn you to a Villasmear on the floor!"

"That's ENOUGH, you two!" Coach interrupted our heated argument. "Or you'll BOTH be going to the office!"

We both took a step back from each other just as the other girls came to try and separate us. Then suddenly, something I didn't quite understand happened.

The worst headache of my life – probably in the HISTORY of lives – set in my head, and it was so sudden, so bad that I actually fell to my knees, grabbed my head in my hands and screamed in pain, right in the middle of the gymnasium.

I think I heard a few gasps, but it was hard to tell because I can't think or hear with this splitting headache. It felt like a bunch of tiny people in my head were playing tug-o-war, but using my brain instead of a rope. It was that bad.

I was shutting my eyes as tight as I could, when I actually saw something, like some sort of vision. It was unclear, but at the moment, all I saw was a girl being chased by robots…falling off a building…

I didn't want to see anymore. I fought the vision and the headache, opened my eyes so I wouldn't see any more images in my head, then ran out of the gym and into the change room, ignoring the people in the gym calling me. Still fighting the headache, I grabbed my backpack with all my things in it, didn't bother to change out of my basketball stuff, and ran out of the change room, then out of the school. When I got outside, no one was around, as expected. That was the whole reason I ran out like that. The headache was still killing me. I sat down, leaned against the wall, held my head in my hands and closed my eyes, allowing the vision to settle in my head.

It was clearer now, since I was letting the vision show itself instead of fighting it. I saw a girl who looked about my age with her long black hair tied in a ponytail. I could not see her face, but I could hear her panting as she was being chased by sentinels. She ran until she was cornered, standing just in front of a small, short building, her back to it. One of the sentinels shoots a repulsor ray from its hand at her, but the girl dodges it by back-flipping onto the roof of the small building. There happens to be more buildings beside the short one, each one slightly taller than the one before it, forming a stair formation. One sentinel flies up onto the top of the same building she is on so it can further pursue her. She started to run, climbing up the "stairs" as the sentinel keeps shooting at and chasing her, failing to hurt her as he expertly dodged its shots. Finally, she reached the roof of the last building, nowhere else to go. The sentinel shot at her, but she jumped backwards, off of the building, now plummeting towards the ground. She seemed like she was in control, though, like she was going to fall but land safely. But that changed. The sentinel shot at her with its repulsor ray, but the girl can't dodge in mid-air, so it hit her hard in the face, and it pushed her down towards the ground much faster, slamming her head into the ground hard.

When the smoke cleared, I could see that blood was seeping out of the girl's head, a puddle of blood formed under, and her eyes were wide open and lifeless, her body not moving. I could clearly see her face.

The vision ended, the headache stopped abruptly, and I opened my eyes, not believing what I just saw.

The girl…was me.

Stay tuned for the next chapter…