I broke my right hand (my dominant hand) between now and when we last spoke. I typed this f****ing chapter with a broken hand. Otherwise this would have been up on Tuesday, like I was hoping. Sorry guys. Updates might be sporadic for the six flipping weeks it will take this to heal.
Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer. Soccer.
So, author's note. To answer one question quick before the fic: Soccer is much like quidditch. Only no broomsticks. Just one ball. Eleven players on a side. Goalies can use their hands, and dress differently from the rest of the team, as a matter of necessity, so that the ref can always tell them apart from the other players. Otherwise people would be getting called for handballs all the time. Game is ninety minutes long. There are no interruptions to the soccer clock. Time is never paused. Time can be added for things like injury, when the ref will add the amount of time spent for players not playing (usually no more than two to three minutes per half). A tie game goes to extra time (two fifteen minute halves) and then to penalty shoot out. There's more answers at the end, but that's the only that needs to be at the beginning.
As before this is for spdfg, with sincere and incredible thanks to 1lostone, who has been kind enough to deal with my crap, also to tkeylasunset, just for being you.
And now...let's plaaaaayyyyy bbbbbaaallllllll!
Oh wait, um, wrong sport, sorry.
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Spock ran. He didn't think about covering his goal. He didn't think at all. But his teammates seemed to notice the direction he ran and they too all ran for Kirk. Except for one young defender, whom Kirk called Cupcake, of all things, who ran for the referee.
Spock slid to his knees beside his captain, wanting to desperately to roll him over, but Spock did not dare. Instead he ripped off his gloves. His fingers found his way to the other man's neck, and Spock drew breath for the first time since he'd seen Kirk.
There was a pulse. It was sluggish, but it was there.
Spock gently rolled the other man onto his back, careful to keep the head, neck and spine in a straight line. He discovered upon moving him that Kirk was breathing. Very faintly. There was blood in his hair.
Spock was only vaguely aware of the other players arriving in the grass around him. He moved Kirk's body more firmly into his own lap, and gently patted Kirk's face and chest as he tried to will his captain back to consciousness. The two of them were quickly encircled and Spock's only thought for his teammates was the hope that they would not step on Jim.
"Jim. Jim." Spock could not seem to stop calling the other man's name. But Kirk made no response and gave no indication of any awareness, as his head lolled over over Spock's lap. As if from far away, Spock hear Pike screaming at the ref, an oddly out of character behavior for their normally unflappable coach.
"Dammit, people get out of the way!" It seemed the team physician had arrived. McCoy had a gruff and belligerent manner that belied his inherent concern for all humanity. McCoy crouched beside him, but still Spock could not take his eyes from Kirk's motionless face.
"Let him go, Spock." McCoy's tone was uncharacteristically gentle as he maneuvered Spock out of his way. The doctor grumbled to himself as he checked over Kirk. "Well, he's stable enough to risk moving him," the doctor said. Spock was immediately concerned. He did not like to see risks taken with Kirk's safety, yet he was pleased that Kirk did not appear to be in imminent danger.
Two medics that had entered the field with McCoy helped the doctor move the striker's inert form onto a stretcher. Spock was dismayed at the way the captain's arm flopped off the side of the litter. He gently raised the hand and placed it beside Kirk's body.
And then, before Spock had even truly processed it, McCoy had taken Kirk away.
And the volume came back up.
Every supporter in the stadium was making his or her boos and hisses heard. Soccer fans did not always mind a good foul, but as a whole they weren't fans of serious injury.
It delayed the soccer.
Therefore, serious injuries were just not on.
No one on Spock's team seemed to know what had happened, and none of the three referees had seen anything, other than that Nero had been near Kirk. Nero was given a yellow card. Unfortunately he could not be red carded, as no one had actually seen him do anything.
Spock was seeing red. The man should have a red card, a suspension, or a ban from international play. At the very least, he'd seriously harmed three players. And Nero was the captain of his team, so he was setting them an example. The players on Spock's team all looked anxiously at one another. Some were angry over what had happened to Kirk. But all were concerned for Kirk. There was not a single player among them that wasn't thinking of the famous images of George Kirk's body, under a blanket, being removed from the stadium on a stretcher.
At some point the ref managed to force the team back into position with three extra minutes of play, to compensate for the time that Kirk had been down.
Had it only been three minutes? But it had felt like lifetimes, and Spock usually prided himself on his time-sense.
Those three minutes passed in a haze. Pike sent someone in to cover for Kirk, but Spock wasn't sure whom it had been. Spock didn't notice when the whistle blew for half time. And he really didn't notice leaving the pitch and walking to the locker room.
McCoy. Spock needed McCoy.
The doctor was in his office with Pike. Kirk lay on a table between them, still wearing his uniform and cleats. His white bandaged head was marred with a streak of red.
"-him to the hospital, just in case," McCoy was saying.
"Doctor McCoy, what is the captain's condition?" Spock interrupted. He only had ten minutes.
"Dammit, Spock, he's unconscious. I don't know anything else yet. I think he might have skull fracture, definitely a concussion. Looks to me like he was kicked in the head." There might be brain damage. I just don't know yet. I'm gonna send him to the hospital for x-rays and the like." He clucked and tutted over his friend's body.
Spock did not know what to say. He did not know what to do. Less than an hour ago, Jim had been cart-wheeling in front of him.
"Could this have happened while he was standing up?" Pike asked. Spock was pleased. He had been wondering that himself. He noticed that Sulu, Chekov and Giotto, the defender Kirk called Cupcake, had gathered in the door the room.
"I think we all want the answer to that question," McCoy said. "It could have, but I don't think it did, from the angle of the bleeding. He would have to have been down already."
Everyone in the room reacted with consternation to comment. It was not the kind of thing one wanted to hear.
"We won't know till we can actually watch replays," Pike said. He seemed to be trying to console himself.
"Do whatever you think you have to do, McCoy," Pike said briskly, "whatever the cost." Pike looked down at he at the pale, unconscious face, and gently stroked the sun-lightened hair. "Oh, Jimmy," he sighed, "what am I going to do with you?"
Both Spock and the doctor whirled to stare at Pike. His interactions with his team's captain previous to this point, had not indicated any sort of close relationship.
Pike sighed again, but continued stroking Kirk's hair. "I played with his dad. I found him slobbering drunk in a bar one day, and dared him to be better than his father. I told him he was meant for more than an ordinary life. He took me up on it, like I knew he would, because Kirk-"
"-loves a challenge," finished McCoy.
Pike nodded. "He comes over for dinner, sometimes. I keep him in line." Spock could tell from the tone of Pike's voice and the softness in his face that 'sometimes' was very often. Spock knew the older man was childless, and wondered at the depth of his relationship with Kirk.
Pike seemed to realize what he was doing and how nostalgic he was being, and he dropped his hand. "Well, you had better go with him to the hospital, Doc, and we'll meet you there after."
McCoy nodded and left the room to make the necessary arrangements.
Pike took Spock gently by the shoulder. "Come on, we've still got a game to play."
It was NOT a beautiful game. Not this time anyway. It was a very ugly game. There were 14 yellow cards, eleven of them to Nero's team, and one red card (unfortunately not to Nero) before the end of the match. Spock's team were not concentrating or retaliating with any kind of efficiency.
It was possible that Kirk could have rallied the team against such a thing, but absent his bright presence, the team wilted under the onslaught. Spock did not know, and could not fathom what to say to them.
Spock himself could not focus, and asked Pike to remove him before the period ended. The relief goalie allowed two goals, one in extra time, and Nero's team took the game two to one.
They were lucky that this was not a knock-out round, or all their dreams of world cup glory would have ended there, but as it was, the lost only counted towards standing, and not towards elimination. It knocked them down a little, but they would stay in the running.
Remembering Kirk's body splayed out on the ground, Spock could not bring himself to care.
The handshakes were very fucking awkward. Both teams were too angry to manage anything more than the most perfunctory of greetings. Spock pulled the blue shirt from over his head, almost glad despite himself that Kirk was no longer on the pitch to change jerseys with the monster that led the other team. As he accepted Spock's shirt, Nero said, "Shame about your captain. Fragile, isn't he?"
Spock's face turned to stone, as he replied, "I am certain he will make a full recovery."
Nero's smirk was leering. "I wouldn't know, Spock, an injury like that. He might never be the same again." The threat inherent in Nero's words was obvious.
Spock glared at the man. "On the contrary, Kirk is most resilient." So intent was their argument that neither man noticed the crowd starting to gather around them.
"His father certainly wasn't."
Kirk would have lunged at at the man for that. Spock restrained himself, but barely, and made do with imagining the pummeling he would like to give the other man's face. If the man was trying to provoke an emotional reaction from him, then Spock was not going to give Nero the pleasure of seeing it. He schooled his features and walked away from the other man, back toward Sulu and Chekov.
Nero, clearly annoyed, called him back. "And how is your family Spock?"
Spock whirled, "Pardon me?"
Nero affected an innocent look. "I merely wished to ask after your parents. They are well, I assume. At the embassy today, are they not?"
Spock's eyes darkened as he processed Nero's statement. His parents were indeed at the embassy. But no one should know about tha-
Spock ran as he had never run in his life.
Seconds later, he was through the locker room and belting headlong for the stadium exit. He had not even bothered to change out of his uniform, or to wait for security. He simply ran.
He hailed down a waiting cab, and jumped in.
"The embassy, as quickly as possible." The cabbie must have either recognized him or heard something in his tone, because seconds later, the car was squealing into traffic. The cabbie did not speak on the short drive over, which was odd for a cabbie.
Spock hurled himself from the car before it had even stopped moving, hissing "Wait for me here," at the driver.
We have fanart. Lost_remembrance totally kicked ass with her art. lost-rem embra iant art. com /a rt/Th e-Swe etest-Vic tory-2-17146 7399
Take the spaces out. And I'm sorry but my hand hurts too much to type any more tonight. Soon I promise. Please review.
To answer some more questions: If Nero started playing at nineteen or twenty (which is unusual, but happens), then I'm thinking that this would be his last competition. He knows it, which is part of why he may be a vicious player. Players usually play into their thirties and forties, so let's say he's forty six or seven. Players quit early due to injury or inability to deal with fame and/or loss. But you don't usually see players over fifty.
George Kirk's death, as written, is plausible. Any hard strike to the chest can be fatal if the right combination of things happen. Commotio Cordis. It's a hard strike to the front of the chest, that happens between the compressions of heart. The timing would have to be exact, and frankly, it would be difficult to do this kind of strike (and mean to kill the other person) on purpose, particularly in the absence of a heart monitor, because the timing is more important than the strength of the stike. I thought about having these answers revealed in dialogue, but frankly, this is meant to be a short fic, and I was attempting to keep it light. But the angsty crept in on me.
Just FYI, there were fourteen yellow cards and one red one issued at last week's world cup final between Spain and the Netherlands. It set a new world cup record. The previous high score as six yellows. Just so you know, I'm not basing this or any other game, on that or any other game. Just need a lot of fouls to suit my writing purpose. So I used the same number.
Margot and Jess. I love you. So Much. You know who you are.