Chapter 10 – Sora's Latest Fancy
That following Monday, I steeled myself for Sora's temper tantrum as I stepped into the classroom. But, it was unnecessary since Sora wasn't in the classroom yet.
"What the?" I muttered to myself, looking up at the analog clock that hung over the blackboard at the front of the room. 7:59. I just barely made the morning bell and Sora's not in class? That's either a good thing or a very bad thing.
I sat down at my desk and pulled out my notebooks in preparation for the lessons of the day. All the while I waited with anxiety for Sora's appearance.
Sora never showed up for class that day.
"Hey Roxas," said Axel during break as he crouched down next to my desk with a wide grin. "Where's Sora?"
"What am I, his keeper?" I retorted. I might as well be, having been delegated the role of Sora's spokesperson since the beginning of the year. Wait a minute, did Axel just refer to Sora by his first name and not by "Kazano"?
"I just wanted to tell him that the movie was great. And I don't know if you've heard, it won the Best Student Club Exhibit."
"And that means…?" I raised an eyebrow at him.
"That means the SOS Brigade gets a pizza party," he replied. Oh joy, pizza party.
"That's boring," I replied.
"Free food, man! How can you say 'no' to that?"
"I enjoy better pizza than the ones the cafeteria sells during lunch. That stuff is nasty."
Axel shrugged. "Better than nothing," he replied. "Am I invited to the party?"
"Probably," I replied with a shrug. Sora probably wouldn't want to take part in the silly "celebratory" party, which means I get to deal with the party on my own. "Ask Sora tomorrow or something."
"Why, you not going to see him after class?"
"He doesn't always show up to the clubroom," I replied, thinking that's what he meant.
"Not at the clubroom. I meant at his house. Maybe he's down with the flu. He looked pretty exhausted on Saturday."
I stared at him like he was crazy.
"What, don't tell me Sora's merry friend doesn't know where he lives," he asked, rather taken aback by my glare.
"In fact, I don't," I replied truthfully. "I never bothered to find out." Not that I would.
"And here I thought you'd know it since you're his friend and all."
"Axel, I don't even know where you live," I replied tactlessly. And Axel doesn't know where I live either.
"Oh."
"You don't know where I live either."
He seemed embarrassed by the fact since he's scratching the back of his head now.
"I know where you live," said Demyx as he approached us. He seems to have a knack for showing up randomly.
"That's only because I've known you for two years already and you had to come over for a project," I retorted. Man, I'm really irritable today or something.
"So where do you live?" asked Axel.
"Ask me again when we have a project to do together," I replied with a grin. I love being difficult.
"Che," he scoffed, "fine, be that way."
At that moment, the bell rang, signaling the end of break.
After class, I slowly made my way over to the clubroom. I didn't need to hurry since Sora wasn't here and all.
Of course, what met my eyes was a total surprise.
It would appear that no one else in the SOS Brigade had bothered to stay back after the festival. So, the movie was still running on autoloop when I got there. Naminé sat in the corner next to the open window drawing with her pastels and not paying attention to the litter that was on the ground or the foldable chairs that were strewn all over the small clubroom. The place was a mess!
I was speechless. It would appear that I still had to clean up regardless of my desires not to. With a sigh, I stalked over to the DVD player and hit the "stop" button before folding up the chairs to be returned to the student council. I wonder if they noticed that they were missing some fifteen foldable chairs.
Meanwhile, Naminé continued to draw in her corner nonchalantly. I wonder if she had even noticed that I had come in.
I sighed every once in a while as I unplugged the DVD player, disconnected the projector from the DVD player, wound the cables up around the equipment, pulled down the projector screen, pulled down the speakers that I had to painstakingly put up the weekend before the festival, and complete the clean up that I was meant to do on Saturday. At the end of the hour that I had wasted dismantling everything, I felt like either sleeping or just sitting in my seat doing absolutely nothing.
Thankfully, Kairi had come in while I was pulling down all the equipment and offered to sweep the floor and in general tidying up the place with me. I gladly accepted her offer and the two of us eventually restored the clubroom to its original, dull, homey-looking way with a cartful of electronic equipment that I need to return sometimes this week. Lovely.
Riku came in right after we finished cleaning up. If I hadn't noticed the strain on his face as he tried to keep his usual smirk, I might've cursed him out silently for being a bastard. Yet, I noticed that he looked tired and wondered if something happened since Saturday that caused him to look so tired.
"Oh, it's nothing. Just had to deal with a Closed space early this morning," he replied nonchalantly. Somehow, I don't think that's really the case.
"Where's Sora?" he asked as he sat down. I shrugged, sitting down in my unofficially designated spot.
"Didn't show up for class. Probably felt like skipping class today," I replied rather tiredly.
"That doesn't seem like him. I would've thought he'd love to have come to school to hear that our movie was a hit."
"He's unpredictable. Might be looking for something else to entertain himself now that the festival's over. I, for one, would like some break before we start filming another movie." A sudden thought occurred to me. "Kairi, do you know what Sora's doing right now?"
"Eh?" she gaped. A faint blush appeared on her face for no apparent reason—at least not from my perspective. "That's classified information."
I frowned. "I really don't want to call Sora to ask him if anything's wrong," I muttered.
"Then don't," said Riku, stifling a yawn. "Ask him tomorrow."
"Maybe I will," I replied, keeping an eye on Riku for the rest of the afternoon.
Which, without Sora's presence, wasn't very long. An hour after classes have ended, Naminé had ceased her latest sketch and left with only these words for me.
"Sora's fine. He will be attending class tomorrow."
Then, without saying another word besides "Bye", she left the clubroom. The rest of us followed suit and I returned home on this boring, normal day.
Onward to the next day!
True to Naminé's words, Sora sat in his seat with a wide grin on his face as he faced forward. Did he finally discover that there are aliens in the world? Or that he has some wicked powers that he knows I would be jealous of? In any case, I was rather amused by his expression. Of course, my amusement was quickly replaced by anxiety upon sitting down in my own chair.
Want to know why? For the second I sat down, Sora let out a most devious chuckle softly. I slowly turned around to face him, cold sweat forming on my forehead and gulped. The devious laughter is not a good omen for me. Knowing Sora for the past few months, I can safely say that whatever's going on his mind is not going to be good for me. Yeah, that's right, it might be good for the club, but not for me.
"What are you snickering about?" I decided to inquire with a raised eyebrow. He chuckled rather sinisterly a bit more before grinning at me with a smile that told me I should be scared for my life after class.
"You'll just have to find out after class like everyone else!" Oh yeah, definitely not a good sign.
So, as Sora instructed, I didn't bother pursuing the subject matter further during the day. However, I never expected him to grab a hold of my wrist just as I had finished packing up my bookbag and dragging me all the way over to the clubroom. How long has it been since he's done that? In any case, I think we might've made it to the clubroom in record time. But! It would seem that Naminé, Kairi, and Riku all sensed something big, because they were all strangely in the clubroom already by the time Sora and I got there.
"Good afternoon, everyone!" he greeted as he slammed the clubroom door open. The heads of Riku and Kairi snapped to face us while Naminé continued working on her sketch, only turning her attention toward the boisterous teen after she had completed the part that she had been working on.
"I know you're all very eager to get working on the next movie, but I think we should take a break from the filmmaking business!"
"You know that the movie won an award, right?" I decided to interject. Sora didn't seem to hear me as usual.
"But, just sitting around doing nothing isn't productive to our mission, so!" He pulled out a folded up poster flyer from out of his bookbag and unfolded it. "I've entered the SOS Brigade in the Struggle Tournament!"
I stood there gaping at him while the others scrutinized the poster, seemingly intrigued by this sport of "Struggle".
Struggle. Oh how I wished I could actually go back and decide to continue with competitive Struggling. Maybe if I had, I wouldn't have been roped into this club and well, you know. Not have to deal with the abnormal in a very normal world. I seemed to have a distant memory of something pertaining to Struggle, but I couldn't remember it then, so I ignored the little nagging voice urging me to remember and focused on the poster.
"It's next weekend," I noted blatantly and blinked at the teen. Two weeks to train for Struggle? It will be a record if we managed to win anything at all; though I technically could use it to my advantage since I've played Struggle before. Anyways, it's a good thing it's indoors. I think we'd all catch the flu overexerting ourselves outside for no chance at winning this thing.
"Yup!" he replied. I continued to blink at him silently and he just kept grinning back.
"Um… what's Struggle?" asked Kairi as she continued to look at the poster, which showed nothing of the sport besides the two Struggle bats crossed underneath large bubble words "Struggle Tournament" and above "Twilight Town".
"I'm going to assume we're starting our practice this afternoon?" I asked, resigned to the fact that Sora's made up his mind about this entire thing.
"Nah. It's too late right now." It's only 2:30 PM, mind you. "We'll start tomorrow. Besides, we need a team of ten to get a team score and participate in the team competition."
"And just exactly who are the other five?" I asked.
The other five happened to be my brother, Hayner, Axel, Demyx, and Rikku. Speaking of Rikku, I really should ask Sora about how he knew the Gullwings. As we stood around on the field after school on Wednesday, I couldn't help but notice the lack of Struggle gear around us. Sora was pacing to and fro eying each one of us, like he was a drill sergeant and we had just been assigned into his squadron.
"Listen up people!" he exclaimed, interrupting the conversations between the rest of us. "Next weekend is the grand tournament. We need to train hard for the next couple of days so we can win the tournament, okay?"
A few scattered affirmatives from the guys responded and for the next hour, we were forced to run around the track. I never knew I had physical education after class.
"I can't wait to see you kick some butt," said Demyx with a smile. Out of the ten people who were running, only Demyx and Tidus knew that I've participated in competitive Struggle. "Why'd you quit anyways?"
"Just didn't feel like continuing on," I replied, though it sounded like an awfully weak excuse. The truth was, I had quit when my last opponent, the reigning world champion of five years—meaning he was at least five years my senior—lost to me in the semifinals and committed suicide the day after the regional finals at Midgar. Tidus had told me that it wasn't my fault that he went nuts, but I simply couldn't get over the fact that I had inadvertently caused someone to kill himself through Struggle. So, I decided to quit and forfeited my trip to the World Championship. Do I regret not participating in the championship? Now I do, but back then I was too shaken up to really care.
"If you say so," replied Demyx, knowing not to push the details.
"Hey, Roxas," said Tidus as he jogged next to us. "We should bring our Struggle gear tomorrow. I don't think Sora has any equipment for a proper Struggle practice."
I frowned at him. "You're just making an excuse to make me show off," I accused.
"Hey, you were a ranked Struggler; you're the best choice to coach your friends."
"You're older and knows the sport, why don't you coach," I retorted. Of course, I know he wouldn't. He saw Struggle as a friendly match between two people who wants to have fun. That's why he never got into the competitive arena for Struggle.
"You're better at it," he replied with a grin. If I could sigh, I would. But since I was busy huffing at the middle of our hour jog, I couldn't.
"Fine," I replied with irritation clearly in my voice.
"I'll bring the gear when I come tomorrow, how's that?"
"That's fine."
In any case, let me skip all the practicing and just jump right into the tournament. I felt embarrassed when I called the event coordinator about Struggle gear supplies and whether they would be provided or not. Unfortunately for us, they would not be. So, I ended up heading over to the Struggle store I'd been to two years ago to get my teammates Struggle bats and safety gear.
Of course, I used up the club's funds allocated by the student council for it. I'm desperate here!
So, on the day of the tournament, the ten of us got to the Radiant Garden Arena early and began suiting up. To say that I was surprised to see some faces would be an overstatement. More like, they were surprised to see me after these two years. Many of them had known that I had essentially given up my title as the Midgar Struggle Champion and while some understood why I had ceded; others, like the "champion" of that year, thought I was a coward and couldn't wait to taunt me and deride me for my action.
Taking my eyes off of the other competitors, most of whom were middle school students with a couple of elementary school and college students, I scanned over the motley crew that was to represent the SOS Brigade. Thinking back on the past days we spent training, I suddenly remembered that Kairi from the future had told me that I was the one who taught her how to Struggle. Now I know what she meant.
Okay, Kairi. I believe that you're a time traveler now.
I stretched out my limbs to loosen up my muscles in preparation for the matches. I know that some of these fights are especially grueling depending on the fighting style of your opponent, so it would be best to be prepared for exhausting fights than be underprepared. With practiced ease, I put on my protective gear and smiled with eagerness. I actually wouldn't mind getting back into competitive Struggle now.
"Roxas?" came a strangely familiar voice. I turned around and was slightly surprised by the sight.
"Yuffie!" I exclaimed.
Yuffie Kisaragi, my long time friendly rival back in the days of competitive Struggle. She and I had both trained under the same Struggle coach and probably the best out of the bunch under our coach's instructions. We often traveled together between Midgar and Wutai to participate in the amateur competitions until that faithful year when we decided to participate in the Struggle Tour. If she wasn't first, then I would be first back then. It was that way for a year until I quit.
"Never thought I'd see you here," she replied as she inspected me. "You look like you're at top form," she commented, "though a bit on the skinny side." She poked at my skinny arms. I swatted her hand away in jest.
"Yeah, yeah. I get enough of that from Tidus, I don't need it from you," I retorted with a grin on my face. "You here to compete?"
"Of course!" she replied. "It got boring after you left though. I almost quit for a while, but I figured that someone's got to teach Sebastian some manners. I swear, he got so annoying when you gave up your title and went around bragging about his skills."
"Let me guess, you floored him the following tournament?"
"Oh yeah. 200-to-0 in 30 seconds. I haven't fought him since though."
I laughed heartily. Just like Yuffie to win a match in less time than is allotted for the fight.
"So, what brings you back to the Struggle scene?" she asked. I pointed a thumb at the motley crew behind me. Naminé was back sketching in her book while Kairi looked slightly nervous about the entire tournament. Rikku was comforting her, but I don't think Kairi was listening to the blond-haired guitarist. Riku, well, was Riku. Axel was talking to Demyx and Hayner about something I didn't care to listen in on. And Sora was looking around the arena while in his Struggle gear, as if checking out the other teams. Tidus was nowhere to be found.
"My club's participating," I replied. The black-haired girl raised an eyebrow.
"It was on the whim of the club leader," I added softly.
"Radiant Garden High must be rich to allow that sort of fancy decisions." I shrugged. I didn't want her to know that this wasn't actually being sanctioned by the school.
"Are you representing?" I asked her instead.
She shook her head. "Nah. Just here for the individual awards. You should come find me after all this and we can hang out for a bit. Coach would like to see you again too."
"Maybe," I replied hesitantly, looking over to my teammates. An air horn sounded across the arena to signal the beginning of the "opening" ceremonies.
"Well, I gotta head back. Maybe I'll be Struggling against you today."
"I hope not," I replied in jest. "I'm out of practice."
She scoffed. "Yeah right. See you later."
"Later!" I called back as she ran off towards the opposite end of the arena.
"Yuffie looks well," said Tidus as he appeared out of nowhere next to me.
"Where were you?" I asked suspiciously.
"Yuna's attending," he replied.
"She's a Struggler?" I was mildly surprised.
"No, doofus. She's watching," he replied exasperatedly as he smacked the back of my head with an open palm. "Come on, they're announcing the brackets.
"Ow." I rubbed the back of my head tenderly and followed the others to the blackboards.
The entire tournament's separated into two categories: team and individual. Of course, the way they interspersed the individual Strugglers in the brackets originally meant for teams meant that not all Strugglers get to fight someone from the other team that's in the bracket.
There were two stages to this tournament: morning is the preliminary rounds where each Struggler fights against four different Strugglers from their brackets and the total point they score at the end of the prelims determine their individual placement. The scores of the team Strugglers get totaled at the end of the rounds too to determine the placement of the teams. Of course, the placement of the teams means absolutely nothing for the afternoon rounds.
After lunch, it was the double eliminations round. The top 64 Strugglers are seeded according to their individual scores from the prelims and two losses meant you're out.
As I looked at our bracket, I saw that we were being pitted against Twilight Academy, Destiny Middle School, and a Struggle club from Luca. Thankfully, Yuffie wasn't placed in our bracket. I looked down at the large poster board and found my name, taking note of the representatives who I would be Struggling against.
"Eris Benson, Noah Lincoln, and Seymour Guado," I spoke softly to myself.
"Seymour?" questioned Tidus. "The name sounds familiar."
"Yeah," I scowled. "He got suspended from Struggling for cheating in the Wutai Regional two years ago."
Since each match was only 90 seconds long, it was easy to fit in ten fights on the two Struggle stages that were allocated to each bracket. Between finishing counting the number of orbs that remained on each person at the end of the match and setting up for the next match, the way the event is set up requires precision and efficiency, both of were executed at the tournament.
Of course, I wouldn't be surprised. It was the last tournament of this sort that would take place at the Radiant Garden Arena this year. A brand new circuit starts next February.
Up first for the SOS Brigade was Riku, who took a stance that suggested that he was clearly well practiced in swordfight. Although his style wasn't exactly orthodox for Struggling, it could potentially throw off the other Struggler.
"Go Riku!" cheered Rikku.
"Show them what the SOS Brigade's all about!" shouted Sora. The silver-haired boy nodded with the smirk on his face before turning to focus his attention on his opponent, a second year Struggler by the name of William Oakley.
"Ready?" asked the referee as he held an arm in between the two Strugglers before he started the fight. Both fighters nodded affirmatively.
"Set!" The two got into their individual stances. "Struggle!"
Right off the bat, Riku leaped forward and made a powerful lunge towards Oakley's chest and pulled off five spheres with the hit. In retaliation, Oakley made a swipe at Riku's open back and the score was back at 100-100. Of course, Riku wasn't fazed by the loss. He immediately pivoted on his heel and slashed at the slighter boy. Without giving the boy any time for a counterattack, Riku essentially forced his opponent into fighting defensively while he remained on offensive the entire time, not even caring about the orbs when they fell from Oakley's gear.
A couple of times Oakley managed to interrupt Riku's attacks with his own lunges and slashes, but they always came up fruitless. Riku wasn't just powerful; he was agile on his feet too. Still, I know that his fighting style is easy to see through if you're a seasoned Struggler. Even if he did make it into the double elimination rounds, I doubt he will get past the second round.
I looked over to the timer and smiled proudly as Riku finished his first match as the victor: 147-43. Maybe we have a chance at winning the team title.
Wishful thinking? Maybe, but I like to dream too!
Disclaimer: Kingdom Hearts belong to Square Enix. The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya belongs to Tanigawa Nagaru. Yada yada yada.
A/N: Oh god. I originally had planned for this chapter to talk just about Struggle and the fights at the tournament. But somehow I digressed and ended up writing more about the stuff after the festival and more about Roxas's life prior to moving to Radiant Garden. In the end, I managed to write yet another filler chapter. Haha. That might be the norm from now on until the end. Thanks for reading.