Chapter 4: Sakura and Heero and the Key

Tokyo, Japan

"Heero!" yelled Duo Maxwell as he ran three steps behind and ten feet to the right of Heero Yuy. Heero briefly looked over his shoulder and then made a sudden stop and flipped the soccer ball behind his back directly into the path of his fellow Gundam pilot. Duo smoothly got control of the ball and because of Heero's quick move had no defenders in his path. Once he was within shooting distance of the goal, he faked left, making the goalie dive to where he thought Duo was shooting. While his right foot was pretending to shoot to the left, his left foot swept over and he kicked the ball straight up in the air. He then ducked out of the way of a flying Li Syaoran, who jumped up and did a flip and kicked the ball while upside down straight into the right corner of the goal. "Nice shot Li," commented Duo as he came over and gave Syaoran a high five.

On the other end of the field, Saotome Ranma and Hiiragizawa Eriol were making quick work of the defense, passing and weaving between all the defenders on the field. Once they had cleared all the defenders, Eriol kicked the ball right in front of the goal, but before the goalie could reach the ball and grab it, Ranma flew in from out of nowhere and headed the ball past the goalie and into the back of the net. "Nice pass, Hiiragizawa."

"Excellent shot, Saotome. It seems we make a pretty good team," Eriol joked as they walked towards the center of the field where the coach was waiting.

"Great job you two," said the coach as Ranma and Eriol reached the rest of the team. "You guys too; Yuy, Li, and Maxwell. In all the years I have been coaching, I have never seen five guys as talented as you that hadn't been recruited. I may have to replace the starters with you five." The coach then turned to face the entire group of students who were trying to make the soccer team. "Alright everybody, that is the end of try outs. I will let you know if you make the team within the next week, and for those of you who don't make it, I am sorry and good luck again next year." The students all began to walk back to the locker room to shower and change after the exhausting workout. "Li, Yuy, Maxwell, Hiiragizawa, Saotome. Would you five stay behind for the regular practice? You will be on the team for sure, so I wanted you to meet the other players and if you aren't too worn out to play in the scrimmage with them as well." The five nodded and went to the bench for a breather and a drink.

"So do you know any of the returning players on the team?" asked Duo to no one in particular.

"Nope," answered Syaoran. "But I've heard they have a good team. The new captain, who is now a senior is supposed to be one of the best in the league."

The guys talked for the next ten minutes until the returning players started to arrive. The five freshmen introduced themselves to the rest of the team as they arrived and all the players seemed friendly enough to the newcomers. The last to arrive was the new captain of the team. When he arrived, the team introduced him as Katsaguri Tohru. The first person Tohru spotted was Heero. "You!" he screamed at Heero. "What the hell are you doing here!?"

Heero turned towards the captain, but didn't say anything. He just looked at him with his normal intense gaze. "You know this guy, Yuy?" asked Ranma.

"He's in our Modern Literature class," responded Syaoran who was staring at the guy with an intensity that was equal to that of Heero. "He's the guy that grabbed Sakura on our first day of class." That comment made the other three freshmen also look accusingly at the new captain. Each one of them had grown to like Sakura a whole lot and didn't like that this guy had hurt her before.

"Alright. That's enough," interrupted the coach. "All of you run some laps to warm up. We are going to have two half-field scrimmages."

"Hey Coach," said Tohru. "How about four of the starters and I take on these new guys in one of the scrimmages. I'd like to see if they are any good."

"Good idea, Katsaguri. It'll give me a chance to see if they are as good as I think," responded the coach. Tohru then left to warm up with a smile on his face because of the prospect of embarrassing Heero and the others in front of the coach. After a few minutes of warming up, the team was ready to play. "Alright," announced the coach. "We will have two scrimmages of five on five. Yohana will be the goalie for the game on the far side of the field, and Tanaka will be the goalie on this side of the field. The teams will be, Baizu, Junya, Koei, Miyazaki, and Suzuki versus Hideyuki, Kunio, Raijin, Tomina, and Yasuyoshi. They will be playing on the far side of the field. On this side will be Fukunaga, Hajime, Murase, Shinji, and Katsaguri. They will be playing against Yuy, Li, Hiiragizawa, Maxwell, and Saotome; our newest team members. Now let's get started."

The players all went to their assigned field and began the scrimmages. "Take ball," stated Tohru. "It is time to put you in your place and show you just how useless your feeble soccer skills really are."

All the guys just shrugged and moved to start with the ball. Eriol started with the ball and passed it in to Duo. As three defenders closed in on Duo, he popped the ball up in the air and headed it over the heads of the converging players and over to Syaoran. Syaoran dribbled up field with Ranma on his right, Heero on his left, and two defenders chasing after him. One more defender was in front of Syaoran, and Tohru was running parallel between Syaoran and Heero. As the defender in front of Syaoran reached him and made a swipe at the ball, Syaoran faked left towards Heero and then flipped the ball right in front of Ranma. Ranma made eye contact with Heero, who still had Tohru staying in front of him to keep him from touching the ball. Heero and Ranma made subtle motions to one another indicating their plan and then Ranma kicked the ball towards the goal, right above the head of Katsaguri Tohru. Tohru grinned to himself thinking he had an easy steal, when suddenly Heero jumped above his head and did a flip, kicking the ball into the back of the net past the completely unsuspecting Tanaka.

"I thought you said something about putting us in our place," said Ranma with a grin. "You guys are going to have to do better if you want to beat us." This got Tohru extremely angry. He was not going to let these freshmen embarrass him and his team. Murase started with the ball and passed it in to Tohru. Tohru then dribbled the ball up field towards the goal. Meanwhile, Heero motioned for everyone to back off so that he could take Katsaguri on, one on one. Tohru then picked up speed when he saw that only Heero was between him and the goal. Once he got to within a foot of Heero, he did his favorite fake, a move that worked every time at faking out the defender. Unfortunately, Tohru had never faced anyone like Heero before, for Heero didn't bite at all. He watched where Tohru moved the ball, and in the midst of his move to fake out Heero, he jumped in and cleanly stole the ball away. Tohru didn't even notice the ball was missing at first and continued to dribble up field. A moment later, when he noticed the ball was no longer in front of him, he turned around to see Heero standing still with the ball under one foot. Heero's taunt got Tohru even more pissed, and he motioned for Heero to come at him. Heero accepted the challenge and dribbled straight at Tohru. When he reached him, Heero held the ball with both his feet and did a flip straight over Tohru's head, landing smoothly behind him. Still with complete control of the ball, Heero flipped the ball up and jumped sideways and kicked the ball past the goalie into the corner of the goal. He then stood up and looked back at Tohru with his customary intense stare. Heero then heard clapping coming from the sideline somewhere. Unsure of who could be clapping he looked towards the sound and was surprised to find Sakura, Minako, Ami, Ukyo and Tomoyo all there clapping.

"That was amazing Heero-kun!" yelled Sakura from the sidelines. Syaoran, Eriol, Ranma, and Duo then jogged up to where Heero was standing and each gave him a pat on the back and said nice shot.

"Your turn again," chided Eriol as he looked towards the five returning stars of the soccer team. "Why don't you guys try and get a shot off this time." That comment got the other five pissed which made Eriol grin and Duo and Ranma laugh. The rest of the scrimmage went along in much the same way as the first few possessions. Heero and the others would easily steal the ball from the other players on their passes or when they were trying to dribble past them. Once on offense, the freshmen made it seem as if there were no defenders on the field. They maneuvered around with expert precision in their passing and shots, and could easily blow past any of the defenders when they chose to do so. In the end, Heero, Eriol, Syaoran, Duo and Ranma kept the upper-classmen from getting off even a single clean shot at the goal, while on the offensive end they didn't miss a single opportunity to score.

"Alright everybody," yelled the coach to get the attention of all the players. "That's the end of today's practice. Hiiragizawa, Saotome, Li, Yuy, and Maxwell are all as of now officially on the team. I will announce the starters at tomorrow night's practice. Great job today, everyone. Now get cleaned up and get some rest. I'll see you all tomorrow at 7:00 pm sharp!"

As everyone started to leave, the guys grouped up and started walking together towards the locker room. When they were halfway across the field, they noticed Sakura, Ami, Minako, Tomoyo, and Ukyo running up to greet them. "You were great, Heero-kun!" beamed Sakura as she came running up and gave Heero a tight hug. "In fact, all of you were great. I can't wait to watch you guys play in the games this year!"

"Well, hello again sweetheart," said Katsaguri Tohru as he walked up to where Heero, Sakura and the others were standing. "Don't I get a hug," he said to Sakura. "How about you forget about that loser and come with me."

Sakura hid behind Heero for protection when she saw who was addressing her. "Why don't you just leave her alone, Katsaguri," stated Heero as he kept a protective arm around Sakura's waist. "Or have you not had enough embarrassment for one day."

Tohru began to get angry at Heero's remark, but quickly calmed down and shrugged. "You're not worth my time, shrimp. And you sweetheart, you will soon see that you are much better off with me than with Yuy." Tohru then laughed and walked away.

"What a jerk," stated Minako as she watched Tohru walk away.

"Forget about him," said Duo as he walked up next to Minako. "He's not worth the effort. Besides, I've heard he is the starting forward, but after seeing how easily we made a chump out of him and his buddies, I think the coach just might be replacing him with one of us. Anyway, what do you say we go get something to eat?"

"Sounds good," responded Minako with a smile. "The rest of you want to join us?"

"I'd be delighted," answered Eriol. Ukyo, Ranma and Tomoyo also agreed to go.

"I'm sorry," said Sakura with a frown. "We can't go. We have to go work on our first Modern Literature project." Heero nodded that Sakura was right, and Ami and Syaoran informed everyone that they too had to work on their Modern Literature assignment.

"Oh well. That's too bad," said Tomoyo. "Maybe next time Sakura-chan."

"Don't forget, Sakura-san," added Minako. "We have cheerleading try-outs in two hours."

"Cheerleading try-outs?" inquired Duo.

"Hai," answered Minako. "I was a cheerleader all through high school and Sakura-san has been doing cheerleading since elementary school. Besides, we knew all of you guys would make the team so this was a perfect excuse to go with the team to the games."

"I can't wait to see you in a cheerleading outfit, Minako-san," Duo joked with a grin. He was rewarded with a playful elbow to the stomach by Minako. "Anyway, we better get going if we want to leave enough time for Kinomoto-san and Minako-san to get back for cheerleading." Everyone nodded and then Duo, Minako, Eriol, Ukyo, Ranma, and Tomoyo all left to go eat while Sakura, Ami, Heero, and Syaoran left to do their Modern Literature.

Author's Notes:

I wish I could play soccer like that! All the guys are so cool! Haha. Just kidding, but I do wish I could do those soccer moves I was trying to describe. Next up… the last installment of Chapter 4.