By the second day of full-school class registration, the afternoon session of the Introduction to Ethics class had been signed up for; this was not because of students wanting to take it, but rather because it was a freshman-level class that sounded just easy enough to slide through without needing to put too much effort into it. That was how a lot of the freshman and sophomore students decided their schedules when they didn't know what they were wanting out of college, picking easy classes and skating by without having to stress too much about what it was they were doing.

This Intro to Ethics class, however, was not signed up for by random students who were all thinking the same thing—and it was certain that there had to be a student or two in it that was taking it because they were genuinely interested in the topic. But there was another motivation for a large chunk of the registered students, as they'd been planning their schedules together from the start and intended on taking the class only because of its supposedly easy nature. They didn't inform the instructor of their plan, although based on their names the instructor might have figured it out upon first glance at the roster, and so when they rolled into class on the first day of the semester as a whole group of rowdy boys, taking seats and being disruptive from the start, everyone knew that this class was going to go nowhere fast.

"Would you look at that, they managed to do it after all," one of the girls sitting in the back row of the room whispered to her friend, who was staring doe-eyed at the last boy who'd entered, admiring his blue hair and wide grin. She noticed where the attention was falling and snapped in her friend's face a couple of times, getting no reaction, before grabbing a chunk of her red hair and tugging down on it, getting her to yelp. "Come on Cordelia, you can't start getting lost on him again, you know how that turns out."

"I know, but I can't help it. You've fallen for him before, you're talking to me out of experience, but he still…wows me. Every time I see him." Retaliating by flicking her friend's cheek, Cordelia giggled when her friend shrank back in her chair and mumbled something about how she knew she'd dated the guy in question before but it had ended rather badly for her. "It's not your fault he thought he'd found someone better after you. I wouldn't consider a high school girl 'better' than you, Sumia, but that's just me."

Sumia was still mumbling things to herself, which inspired Cordelia to hug her tightly before turning properly in her seat, watching the scene in the rest of the classroom unfolding. Down the row of chairs from them sat another woman, in the middle of reading from the textbook required for the class, unaware that this large group of boys had come in even with their noisy disruption. In front of her was the only other person who'd opened the textbook so far, although he was sitting on the table rather than the chair, and his book was in his lap. "This class might be a bit more difficult than we were anticipating, boys," he said, clearing his throat before speaking to try and get everyone's attention. "Not failure difficult, but a real challenge in terms of material."

"Would you listen to that, Robin's trying to tell us that we've signed up for a hard class!" The call came from the other side of the classroom, someone else who was sitting on the table but with his feet in his chair. "Didn't we have everyone agree that this was going to be easy enough for even the dumb ones of us to pass?"

"I said it's not failure difficult, pull the sugar out of your ears and listen to me for a change, Gaius, I don't speak to be ignored." Robin flipped the page of his book, ignoring the middle-fingered gesture that Gaius shot him in return for what he'd said. "I foresee a lot of time spent in the dugout helping with studying for this class in my future, and I don't know how I feel about that."

The guy Cordelia and Sumia had been talking about walked around the front tables to get over to Robin's side, slamming his hands down onto the open pages of the book in his lap. "Hey now, any time you help with studying helps the team as a whole, we need people to not get put on academic probation this year as we make our run to the top, isn't that right, guys?" The rest of the group they'd come in with let out a loud cheer of agreement, and Robin gave a half-hearted one after them. "What's with the lack of spirit? Don't you want to see us make it as league champions this year?"

"Trust me, I have no doubt that we can win the championship if we keep our acts together, but what's the point of us all taking the same class?" Brushing his hands off of the book so he could close it, Robin set the textbook aside before locking eyes with the guy he was speaking to. "You aren't going to tell me it's so those of us who are smarter can help the less-smart guys pass a class, are you?"

He shrugged, turning his head to break the eye contact. "Can't say that's not part of why we did it, but really, Robin? You're going to take up issue with this now? What about last year, when we took that writing class together? I wouldn't have failed it without your help, but some of these guys would have, and we wouldn't have gotten so close to being champions without some of them."

"If the instructor's not here fifteen minutes after class starts, that means we can leave, right?" The question was asked by one of the guys sitting in the front row, flanked on either side by some nodding eagerly in response. "'cause it's like ten minutes after class starts and they still ain't here, and I think there's lots 'a better places for us t'be hangin' than this classroom."

"Oh joy, we have an uneducated fool in the course this semester, what a treat." The woman at the end of the back row had looked up over the edge of her glasses at the sound of the question, and had continued glaring over them as the guy had finished his thought. "I hope that you learn in due time that the fifteen minute rule is nothing more than a myth. Besides, the instructor has been here the whole time."

While people recognized that someone had been speaking, no one had bothered to pay attention to where she was, minus the only other two students in the room who weren't part of the large group. "We're already going to be out at practice once class is over, is it really necessary to think about going out to the field right now?" Sitting a couple seats over from where Robin was, the speaker was constantly looking around at the members of the group he was with, keeping mental tabs on all of them. "You can overwork yourself on training, and it would be a shame if one of our best players was—"

"You're going to call him one of our best? His statistics are atrocious, you should be giving that title to someone who's actually good at the game." That was the blue-haired man speaking again, chuckling to himself as he walked past Robin over to the other guy. "Like, yourself, for instance? People actually respect you out on the field, Frederick."

"Don't flatter me, my presence on the field is often overshadowed by the players that do things regularly." Frederick shook his head, looking back at the person he'd been speaking about before, as well as the people on either side of him. "Like the three of them, for example. Do you know how much respect our team would lose if anything happened to any of them, physically, mentally, or grade-wise? It would be a disaster for our reputation."

"I hear you on that, but…Robin!" The other man pointed a finger in Robin's direction, hoping he was paying attention (which he was). "Got any specific stats in that brain of yours right now? I need them to prove a point."

Chuckling, Robin hopped off the table and joined the two where they were, pushing the hand out of his way as he approached. "I could say that I do, but I don't know what you'd need them for. One's the best hitter on the team by a long-shot and the other two combined make a perfect player, but those are last year's statistics and given that we have a transfer student on the team this year, those might get skewed a bit."

"Transfer student, right, forgot about him." Eyes shifting around the room to do a headcount, the blue-haired man took a moment counting everyone up before returning to the conversation with a sullen tone compared to how he'd been speaking. "Did anyone inform him that he needed to take this course to be with us? Or is this one of the classes he took out there in Ferox before transferring?"

"If you're asking about Lon'qu, he won't be here today due to a mix-up with some of his transfer paperwork, I think, but he should be here next time." Tilting his head back to look at the three without having to move where he was sitting, the guy who had spoken was one of the people sitting next to the one who'd pointed out the "fifteen minute" rule. "At least, that's what he told me when we were talking about it earlier. We went to get some food before class and he wanted someone to know why he wasn't going to be here."

At the mention of food, everyone who'd come in together fell silent, all looking towards the one who'd brought it up. "Never would've guessed it'd be Stahl mentioning food in front of everyone," Cordelia sarcastically said to Sumia, who'd started doodling something on her hand in boredom. "Now watch, they're all going to snap at him for doing that, it's what happens every time with these guys."

Before anything could happen in response, even though several people had started cracking knuckles and making muttered threats because they felt they'd been left out, the door to the classroom opened and in came a woman who looked just old enough to be an instructor, but too young to be tenured in the position. "I hope that none of you think this grouping is appropriate for a classroom setting," she told everyone as she walked to the front of the room, setting her papers on the podium at the front and waiting for everyone to file back to their seats. "I get that this is apparently the class for meatheads and jocks, but we're going to at least try to get things done around here."

"Meatheads? Jocks? What gave you that idea?" the blue-haired man asked, jumping over the table to take a seat in between Frederick and Robin. "You've got to have been to one of our games, last year maybe? Recognize any of us?"

The instructor wasn't paying any attention to what he was saying, having fished out a marker and began writing a bunch of notes on the board, starting with her own name. "This class is Introduction to Ethics, or, as you'll quickly find out, your worst nightmare when it comes to how to live your lives. When I'm through with all of you, you'll be asking yourself if it's even worth it to try and live ethically, and that's just how it is. Any questions?"

For the first time since everyone had walked in, not a single person had anything to say in response to her. "Good, I like how you've all shaped up already. Now get your books out, we've got some introductory passages to read before we're all introducing ourselves to each other, because I am one of those instructors who make you work for your grade."

Robin could see out of the corner of his eye the two guys next to him exchanging glances, and when they both looked his way he faced them and shrugged. "I told you, Chrom, I'm not sure I'm down for helping everyone with their homework th—"

"Grimsley, Robin. Kind of a mysterious bookwork, doesn't do much outside of study and sports, but reliable to a fault. Don't talk in my classroom when I'm giving directions." The instructor threw her marker right at Robin's head as she was berating him, and he was lucky to have ducked at the right moment to dodge it. "Good, you are able to miss getting pelted by line drives even in the classroom. Now do me a favor and pitch it back, okay?"

Stunned at what had just happened, from the marker being thrown to his name and personality being called out by an instructor he'd never met before, Robin meekly did what he'd been asked to do, tossing the marker back at nowhere near the same velocity as it had been thrown at him. "I love this class already," Sumia and Cordelia said in tune with each other, looking to the other for validation and finding that they'd given it without realizing it. They high-fived when they were facing each other, only for the same marker to come flying towards them, the instructor calling them both out with their names and interests for everyone in the class to hear, only to ask for her marker back.

This continued every time someone said something or acted out in a way that interrupted her introductory teaching, until nearly everyone in the classroom had been spotlighted, some more than once. "Hm, I think I've gotten to most of you without trying," she remarked as the class went into its final minutes for the day. "Anyone left out?" No one was willing to raise their hand and let her know that she'd missed them, but she didn't mind their dishonesty; instead, she wound up her arm and threw the marker at the only person she saw that she knew she hadn't already done so to, hitting the book the woman in the far back corner was still reading from. It didn't faze her even slightly, and it wasn't until the instructor yelled out her name and her request for the marker back that she noticed she was being addressed.

By that point it was in the last minute of class and there was nothing more that could be done in their short amount of time, and everyone was making quick work of packing up their things and heading out to wherever they needed to go next. Some of the group was heading out to the practice field, others were going to the bookstore to get the text for that class, and then there was Chrom, who had been pelted with the marker a couple times whenever he'd started talking to Robin or Frederick, walking up to the instructor with a confused look firmly on his face. "Can I ask you something, miss…Anna?"

"Had to look at the board to see where I'd written my name, didn't you? Tsk, I tried to make sure you were paying attention but you clearly weren't. What can I do for you?" She wasn't doing anything to get out of there fast, although the room had emptied out in record time, leaving just the two of them in there. "You're not going to ask me about dropping the class, right? We barely got started on anything thanks to you talkative goons."

"No, I wasn't going to even think about dropping the class. I was just wondering how you knew all that stuff about all of us, especially if you've never been to one of our games before. Did someone warn you about us?" He was fidgeting as he spoke, not wanting to be there alone with this instructor who seemed to know too much about everyone in the class.

Sensing his discomfort, Anna turned to look at what she'd written on the board, highlighting the important takeaways everyone should get from the course they were enrolled in. "I could tell you my methods, but they aren't exactly ethical, if you understand what I'm saying. Just keep in mind that I'm everywhere at once, and I've got my eyes on each and every one of you. Eyes…and my paycheck. Don't screw with that."

Chrom felt like his question hadn't been answered, but there were so many ways that he thought her response could be taken that he didn't press further. "Okay, thank you for that. I'll see you next class then."

"You got it, don't expect me to throw that marker so lightly next time!" Right as he turned to leave he could see her wink at him, causing him to shudder as he exited the room, trying to decide where to go next. The logical place was the training field, where he knew he'd see familiar faces, but his heart was telling him to go to the bookstore to meet up with whichever of his teammates had gone there. He made it as far as crossing the campus to get to the store, but he stopped dead in his tracks when the line of students waiting to buy books was out the front door.

That made his decision all the clearer for him, and he headed back across campus to get to where the different athletic fields were located, hoping he wasn't late and that his friends were still out training. Finding them didn't happen, as he was passing by the last building of classrooms before getting to the fields and forced himself to stop when he saw someone that looked just like Anna, except wearing something completely different and dragging behind her a rolling file case of some sort. "What's she doing over here now?" he asked himself, watching her enter the building—before noticing that someone was holding the door open and when they exited, they also looked the same as his instructor and that woman he'd just seen. Rubbing his eyes, he made sure that he wasn't hallucinating before deciding that maybe it'd be best if he went home for the day, shooting his teammates a message that he wasn't feeling well before leaving.

There was always the next day for training, or the next one, and given their team's performance the previous year Chrom was fairly confident that skipping one early-season practice to clear his head wouldn't affect the team too badly.

The next session of the class was more of the same that they'd experienced in the first session, with markers being thrown whenever Anna deemed someone being disruptive, telling everyone in the room some information about the person she was attempting to hit as she made her toss. There was one person present that she couldn't do that to, something she discovered at the end of the class when she did her "have I left anyone out?" schtick and found herself greeted with a firm raised hand from someone who hadn't been there on the first day.

Her complete inability to even properly name the guy as she stared him down, trying to get a read on who he was and where he came from, made her swear off her little game for the rest of the semester. "Maybe it would've been better for you to have been here on the first day, Lon'qu," Robin said after they'd left the classroom, all walking towards the practice field together. "You could have stopped her from hitting us with markers today if you had been."

"Papers needed to be properly filed, it was that or don't come to classes here at all. Now are we going to get to practice today or should we just turn around now?" Lon'qu spoke gruffly, a hint of an accent to his voice that no one else in the group had; as he made clear when Anna tried to get an introduction out of him, he'd only transferred to the University of Ylisse's campus in Ylisstol to be on a region-winning sports team, rather than the one that they always seemed to beat up in Regna Ferox.

"We're going to practice, it's two weeks until the first game this season and we're not going to lose to anyone this year, especially not any team from Plegia." Getting a cheer from some of the others at what he'd said, Chrom was too busy paying attention to whatever Lon'qu's reaction was going to be that he temporarily stopped watching where he was walking. As he was surrounded by his teammates there was no harm in losing track of his position but when someone loudly called out his name to get him to focus on walking again, he couldn't help but awkwardly laugh. "Thanks for that, I don't know what we'd do if I hurt myself somehow just going to practice."

"By all means, I think we'd lose every game this season, because without you on the field I don't think we can function as a cohesive unit." Robin's praise usually came with a second comment, but when he didn't add anything to what he'd said he also got a cheer from anyone who'd heard him, all of them agreeing on the point that Chrom's position on the team was too valuable to lose. "So let's try our best to not get hurt, shall we?"

Those words and the reaction to them weighed on Chrom's mind for the rest of the walk, to the point that he started to slow down with every step, eventually lagging behind everyone else as he thought about what he'd heard. Yes, he was the team captain and was overall loved and respected by his team, but to be cheered for like that because everyone believed they wouldn't perform on the field without him? It was giving him a sense of accomplishment he hadn't really felt before, and that was with taking the team to the league championship game as a bunch of freshmen. Robin had noticed that he'd slowed down and had told everyone to go start warming up without them, just to make sure everything was okay, but when Chrom saw him approaching he motioned for him to leave him be. "I'll just take a moment to join everyone, go and make sure none of them are slacking off."

"No way, Frederick can handle that without either of us there. I want to make sure you're okay, if that's fine by you." Grabbing one of Chrom's wrists and pulling his hand close to him, Robin smiled at his friend. "You're acting kind of weird right now, is something bothering you? Thinking too much about what we're going to accomplish this year as a team? What's going on?"

"It's nothing, just the pressure of getting all of this headed in the right direction. We've got a killer team this year, I think, especially since it's most of the same guys from last year. Sucks we failed those older guys in their last season but we'll make up for it." Not minding that his hand was being taken hostage, Chrom tilted his head back and looked up at the cloudless sky, taking in deep breaths as he did. "You and I, we make a great pair when we're on the field together, it's hard to imagine getting where we did last season without you there with me."

Robin's smile grew slightly, him moving where he was holding Chrom's hand to closer to his heart. "It was like we'd known each other all our lives, even though we'd first met at tryouts for the team. Crazy how some people just mesh together when they get the chance."

Finding the words to respond to that was difficult, especially as Chrom closed his eyes and started thinking back to what they'd done together over the past year, taking the teams in the region by storm and winning that championship by miles, only to make it to the league championship game and lose it in a complete sweep. He could remember all the encouraging words Robin had given him at every turn, the support of him and the team behind him as he stepped into the team captain role halfway through the season because the older players recognized that he had the best control over everyone and could usually make the best calls for the team. He could remember the looks on everyone's faces as they won game after game, their only losses coming in overtime after close matches that they knew they could have won if they'd tried just a bit harder, and it was all inspiring him to press forward and keep leading these guys to the championship win they so badly wanted.

He was snapped out of his memories not by anything Robin did, but by a feminine voice calling out at someone. "Hello? Are you even paying attention to me? I asked you if you could help me out and you're still ignoring me!" His head quickly snapped back to straight on his shoulders, while Robin stiffened up as he let go of Chrom's hand, noticing where the woman was calling at them from. Her steps could be heard against the pavement, before Chrom knew she was standing right behind him. "Wait a second, I know who you are…"

"How in Naga's name have you found me here?" Robin asked, disgust evident in his voice. "Chrom, whatever you do, don't acknowledge this girl, she's only here to cause a scene and make everything much more difficult for you and me both."

"I'm here to make things difficult? Last I checked, I'm older than you so it's always been you making things more difficult for—oh, hello there." As she'd been berating Robin, Chrom had turned around to look at her, causing her to stop mid-sentence and greet him instead. "You look awfully familiar to me, just like Grimsley here. Have you done anything notable with your time?"

Unsure of how he was supposed to take what she was saying, Chrom instead made a mental note of everything about this woman that he could remember, from her silvery high ponytail to her reddish-purple eyes to the way she was standing there with an armful of books, top one being the text required for Introduction to Ethics. "Ignore her, please, she's nothing more than a pest that we don't need in our lives. Leave us alone, we're heading to practice."

"Practice? Little Grimsley does practice-worthy things?" She laughed, tilting her head to the side to cause her bangs to fall onto her face, obscuring her eyes that Chrom had been losing himself in. "Now stop staring at me, I may recognize you from something but I don't know you like I know him, either introduce yourself properly or let me and him talk."

"It's rude to demand an introduction without first giving one yourself."

"Sheesh, you're going to enforce a 'ladies first' rule on me? Whatever, I guess. Name's Robyn—that's with a y, not an i—Grimmel, and you're one of little Grimsley's friends so I'm going to guess you're almost as lame as he is." As she went through with his one request, Chrom found that her voice was softening, that she wasn't sounding as demanding as she had been initially, but then her last bit of what she had to say erased every bit of progress she'd been making. "Come on, now this is the part where you return the favor and say who you are so I know for next time."

He looked over to Robin, who was shaking his head at what she'd said. "I'm not going to warn you again, you can't give in to what she says because she will not leave you alone if you do. Let her not know your name and leave it at that."

"I don't get why you want me to do that, she's a bit brash but what's new about that? We've got ruder people on the team and we treat them with kindness." Giving her his attention again, Chrom went through the standard introduction fare, telling her his name and what he had done that she might have recognized him from, that being the younger brother of one of the more socially influential ladies in Ylisstol.

Robyn's eyes gave him a once-over before she snorted, nearly dropping her books in the process. "That'd definitely be where I know you from, but I don't really know you, just that you exist and that your sister's some kind of peacekeeping socialite."

"Then shall we get to know each other?" The words tumbled out of Chrom's mouth before he realized that what he'd said directly contradicted exactly what Robin had been warning him about. "Er, I mean, we could maybe do that over studying or something? I see that book you've got there, I was just in that class earlier today. That's where we came from before this, right, Robin? Ethics class?"

"You aren't supposed to tell her that," he grumbled, noticing that Robyn was looking at him with a smirk on her face, "but yes, that is where we just came from. What are the odds that she's managed to get in there with us as well, we caused registration for it to fill up right away back when it first opened."

"Aw, you act like getting into a filled class is hard or something, you really should get better at living your life." Robyn's rebuttal was given as she shifted her attention back towards Chrom, who was awkwardly smiling at Robin because he'd dug them both a giant hole much too big to get out of on their own. "I'm a late addition to the course, I spoke with the instructor about it and she said there's enough open seats that she could use someone else who actually wants to be there being there."

Her victory over Robin came with Chrom trying to make things a bit better for them. "Did you hear that, she's in our class with us. Maybe we'll get to know her while we're in there together, rather than—"

"Chrom, this isn't the time for you to be trying to flirt with someone." His words cut his friend off, and for that he mentally apologized, but Robin wanted nothing more than to get away from their current situation as fast as he could. "I'm really sorry, Robyn, but we don't have the time to be standing around talking to you right now, we are supposed to be at practice and our team performs rather poorly without their captain around."

She let them get a couple steps away without saying anything, but the moment she reopened her mouth to speak her entire demeanor had changed. "You're treating me like I'm bothering you, Grimsley, is that how you really feel about me? I'd think, after all those times we've crossed paths growing up, you'd at least respect me a little as a person. That makes me, you know, want to cry or something."

"We've upset her." Stopping just outside the boundaries of the practice field, just close enough to hear his teammates in the middle of warming up, Chrom looked back at the woman they'd left behind, then to Robin, who shook his head at him. "Come on, you're focused on what we need to do, sure, but what's the worst being kind to her right now can do? She's sad because of how you're treating her, we need to do better."

"No, what we need to do is ignore her, giving her any more attention than she needs just leads to horrible things happening. I've seen what she does when she gets close to someone, she's a monster once you get past her exterior." Robin tugged at Chrom's arm to try and get him to continue where they needed to be, but Chrom defiantly stepped back in the other direction, approaching Robyn once more much to his chagrin. "You're making a mistake, Chrom, choosing her over the team right now is the worst decision you could make!"

"Don't look so sad," Chrom said to Robyn, trying to talk over his friend's words. "We can't stand around and talk right now, but after next class, we can set aside a few minutes to talk and get to know each other, Robin or no Robin. Is that all right?"

Her bottom jaw trembling, Robyn gave a strong nod. "I think that'll be acceptable, I can hold myself to that agreement if you really mean it. I don't enjoy being given the runaround by guys who think they're too good for me, like ol' Grimsley over there."

"Whatever history you two have, I promise you I'm not going to let it affect how I approach you. Until next time, okay?" He gave her a smile and she returned the favor, and after letting it linger a few moments he felt it was acceptable to turn back around and rejoin Robin, who was staring at him in slack-jawed disbelief. "What's that look for, I'm making a good impression on her. She can't be deserving of how you're trying to treat her, she's just a cute college girl."

"I cannot wait until she does something to prove that impression wrong, but by the time she does you might be too deep in her web to do anything about it. Let's just…forget about her and get to practice, okay?" It was clear that Robin was not thrilled with what had just happened, but he wasn't explaining anything further to Chrom so he must not have been as bothered by anything as he was trying to pretend he was. At least, that was how Chrom saw it, and with nothing to change his mind he let himself think about that pretty woman that had forcibly introduced herself to him there on the way to practice, anticipating the next time they got to talk almost as much as he was anticipating their first game of the regional season (but not quite as much, the game meant more than anything else).

True to their agreement, they met up to speak to each other once more after class was over two days later, but that came after a class in which Robyn was sitting in Chrom's seat, unaware it had been the one he'd picked for the past three classes. No one wanted to sit next to her, not when she was a stranger to almost everyone, and so she disrupted the entire balance of the team's arrangement because there was nowhere else for them to move to while maintaining their distance and positions. She didn't seem to realize she'd done anything like that when she left class, Chrom already standing outside with Robin at his side. "I don't recall saying that he was part of our meeting," she said, pointing at Robin, who looked back at her with a scowl. "He's just going to cause nothing but trouble."

"Sorry, I just tend to need someone around to help me with specific stats once we get talking, and Robin's my right-hand guy, I'd be nowhere without him." As if to illustrate the point, Robin wrapped an arm around Chrom and held him closely for a couple moments, before letting go of him and acting like he hadn't touched him at all. "Besides, we're going to have to go to practice after this and if I lose track of time talking to you, I need someone to remind me that I need to go."

Nodding as she accepted what she was hearing, Robyn finally got around to asking something she'd clearly been meaning to ask since two days prior: "What's this 'practice' for, anyway? You two doing an outdoor concert series or something?"

"Baseball, we're on the college baseball team," Chrom replied, watching her flat reaction to the news. "What, were you expecting something more exciting than that? We're the best team in the region, second-best in the league, it's a real important program we've got going on here and it means a lot to the university and to us."

Robyn's eyes shifted towards the ground as she thought about what to say. "You're right, I was expecting something more exciting than that, outdoor concerts would've been much cooler. I can see you as being the frontman to a band or something, you've definitely got the looks for it." Sensing that she was going to fluster Chrom if she continued down that track, she went in for some deeper questions. "So…why's the baseball program important? It's just a college sport, surely this place has other teams that could be considered 'important'."

"It does, don't get me wrong, but other sports tend to get overshadowed by the one everyone's actually good at. Something about us all being naturals at swinging bats, for the most part anyway." Chrom glanced to Robin to see if he had anything to add, but he was ignored as his eyes were focused on watching how Robyn was standing. "Plus, all the other teams here want players that are older, more mature, not freshmen coming in and taking control of the program like our group did last year."

"That would explain why you think it's important, because it caters to you, I get it." Biting her lip as she considered asking something else, Robyn threw out any reservations when Chrom looked back at her, slightly offended at how she'd reacted. "So, want to tell me more about why you like the sport? I mean, you're basically raring to get to practice, aren't you?"

That brightened Chrom's attitude right up, allowing him to talk about something he was so passionate about. "It's just fun and the team's mostly people I've been playing with since I was younger, minus Robin and one of the other guys. Robin came in last year, he's an indispensable member of the team with his stats and his planning, and then Lon'qu, that quiet and kinda rude guy who was sitting right in front of you today in class, he's a transfer from Ferox that just joined this year. He's…made practices a bit more difficult than they need to be, which we're still trying to work around."

"Is it really appropriate to be telling this relative stranger about our team's current issues?" Robin asked, still having his eyes focused squarely on what Robyn was doing. "I get that I know her, but you shouldn't be informing her of all our team secrets because you don't know her, and you're still convinced she's not a bad person."

"Can it, Grimsley, you're just mad that Chrom here's paying attention to me and not to you," she muttered, glaring straight at Robin before looking to Chrom with wide eyes and a much more positive demeanor. "You can tell me all about your team's struggles right now, I won't tell a single soul about what you tell me."

"That's really the extent of the issue, that he's just difficult to play with because he's from a Feroxi team that's a lot less bonded than our team is, but we're working the kinks out on it. By the first game he'll be just as eager and excited as the rest of us, I'm sure of it." Chrom chuckled, sizing Robyn up with his eyes much like he had the first time they'd met, still finding himself getting transfixed by her hair and her eyes. "If you were into playing baseball, I'd offer you a tryout to see if you could make the team, we could always use other strong, independent women with us on the field."

"Don't college sports teams tend to usually be single-gendered?" Raising her eyebrows to the point that they were obscured by her bangs, Robyn looked to Chrom for an answer, but he seemed to be at a loss for words, sputtering and starting multiple sentences as he tried to get a solid response going.

Rather than to let Chrom continue stumbling over answering the question, Robin cleared his throat and stepped in to supply a good, solid response. "I wouldn't say 'usually', but what happens is that only guys try out for baseball around here and then it ends up being only guys on the teams. In the overall league there's several teams with ladies on them, but in the region we've got the only one."

"Cute, I wasn't asking you though."

Stunned by how she reacted to Robin helping him out, Chrom decided he was going to at least rely on her having listened to what he'd said. "He's right, even if you didn't want to hear him say it. We've got an old friend of mine on the team who happens to be the strongest, loudest, most aggressive woman I've ever had the pleasure of knowing, and while she's not our star player by any means she pulls more weight for the team than a lot of the guys do."

"If she heard you saying that about you, she'd kick your ass ten ways to next week," Robin joked, nudging Chrom's arm with his fist. "You've got to be careful with how you talk about her, she'd much rather be seen as one of the guys than called out for being the only female college baseball player in the region."

"True, if she was standing around here right now she'd be chewing me out for talking about her like this. Her gender's not a spectacle for us to point out, she's just a player on the team." Chrom's eyes flickered away from Robyn's face for a moment as he thought about getting beat up for what he'd said, but he came back to looking at her with renewed vigor. "I know, rather than keep talking about this, maybe you could come to practice sometime and see how the whole team meshes together? It'd be a bit boring for someone uninterested in baseball to watch, but—"

"She can meet everyone on the team in class, we're all there anyway."

"—you're right, but there's something about seeing the team dynamic in action that's more interesting than just meeting everyone and knowing their names because they said them." Stretching, Chrom reached over towards Robyn, but she didn't seem to pay any attention to wherever it was his hand was headed, and he quickly retracted it. "But seriously, come join us at practice sometime, we could always use a friendly face in the stands."

Under his breath, Robin added, "Even if yours isn't particularly friendly or wanted, but what Chrom wants, Chrom gets."

"I'll consider it, I do prefer to focus on my studies than on sports but I'll see what I can do about this invitation." Robyn smiled at Chrom, although with one hand she was giving Robin a rude gesture he glared at her for. "If the semester doesn't seem to be too rough I might give it a shot. You will give me more information about this, right?"

"Chrom, Robin, what are you two doing here still? We should all have been at the practice field five minutes ago." That was Frederick, walking up to the trio with several filled water bottles in his arms, stopping his approach when he didn't fully recognize the person they were talking to. "Oh, are we introducing ourselves to our new classmate? I would have just walked by if I'd known that were the case."

"We've already met her before this," Robin replied, thankful to have someone new to focus on because it meant he could turn his back on the others, even if not watching them meant not knowing how to stop whatever Chrom might try to do. "And now I'm going to give you the same warning I gave Chrom, just ignore her and don't waste your time on her, she's not a great person and you don't need to deal with her."

Frederick was not one to typically argue when someone was so adamant about someone not being a good person, but when he saw how enamored with her Chrom was he had his reservations about the truth to Robin's words. "I'll be the judge of that myself, if you don't mind," he said, adjusting how the bottles were in his arms so that he could hold out a hand for a handshake once he'd come closer. "I'm Frederick, wrangler of wayward men and pitches, pleased to make your acquaintance."

"The name's Robyn, it's a pleasure to meet someone so polite around here." She took up his offer of a handshake, her grip surprisingly strong once she got a hold on him, but when they parted she shrank back slightly. "You're not going to make my friends leave now that you're here, are you?"

"Unfortunately, they should be at practice already, the only reason I'm not there is because someone on the team decided to pour out everyone's water to create a muddy hazard in the outfield, and as hydrating is important I took it upon myself to refill the bottles." As Frederick was talking, Robin was mouthing the word "friends" to himself, shocked that she'd chosen that of all words to use to refer to them, while Chrom was listening intently about what nonsense had happened since he'd decided to be late to practice. "Come along, you two, we've got places to get to before something worse happens. Robyn, my apologize for cutting this conversation short."

"No worries, commitments are a bitch but you've got to keep them." Her smile was genuine and she didn't seem to be too bothered as the three men left her alone, two of them wishing her farewell and the third saying nothing at all as they walked away. But the moment she knew they wouldn't look back, a scowl formed on her face, disgusted at something that had just happened; with how much she'd just had to put up with, it wasn't completely clear what she wasn't thrilled to have gone through, and she wasn't going to make it obvious.

Back with the boys, they were walking in silence, Robin several steps ahead of the others because of how badly he wanted to get away from Robyn and get to doing things he enjoyed. Frederick kept looking at Chrom, trying to come up with something to say about what had happened, while Chrom was off in his own world thinking about how he'd done a friendly thing offering for her to come watch them at practice sometime. "So, when were you going to mention that you were looking at a new girlfriend?" Frederick finally asked, causing Chrom to laugh out in surprise. "No, no, none of the fake shocked behavior, I've seen you get like this before and that's where it leads."

"She's just an old friend of Robin's, I'm getting to know her because she knows him," he answered, once again causing Robin to be shocked that the word "friend" was being used. "I don't really see anything going anywhere with her, not unless she shows up to practice sometime and gets into the game."

"That's not a requirement you put on any of your other girlfriends before you dated them, why are you putting it onto this girl?" They were just outside the field's gate, the rest of the team visible out on the field throwing pitches and goofing off, but Frederick wasn't going to let Chrom enter until his question was given an adequate response, and Robin wanted to be present to hear the justification for the decision. While he was happy that someone else was trying to keep Chrom from moving too fast with Robyn, he wasn't okay with him talking to her at all and Frederick seemed to be allowing that behavior.

Chrom's way of answering this question was to look down at his feet, fidgeting by tapping his toes on the ground. "I don't know, maybe because of how all those other relationships ended? Have to make sure that they'll come to practice with me, for me. But that's…not why I invited her, I invited her because she seemed to be curious about what we do and there's no better way to learn the game than to watch."

"You're hopeless, but I'll accept that. Just don't disappoint us or the team if you don't ever see her in the stands." Robin opened the gate for himself as Frederick was talking, but the two others followed him in rather quickly—only for a pitch to come barreling their direction, tossed at them by a man who by no means should have been on the pitcher's mound.

It wasn't a hard toss, but the way it rattled the fence directly by Chrom's face as he entered made everyone involved in the shenanigans stop what they were doing to make sure no one was hurt. "I see that we have someone who can barely hit the ball attempting to throw it," he remarked, picking the ball up off the ground and tossing it back towards the mound for someone else to deal with. "Let's focus on our own positions for a change, rather than trying to learn ones that we don't need to switch up, shall we?"

"We also don't need to switch up our lives by flirting with danger, but you aren't listening to anyone on that front so why should they listen to you on this one?" Robin muttered just quietly enough for no one to hear what he'd said, even if they could tell he was talking. No one else needed to know what it was Chrom was doing that had now delayed practice from starting twice, unless it became more of a regular thing than it already was, and Robin was going to do his best to keep his lips sealed about it. Frederick was good about keeping people's personal matters quiet as well, so the only person that needed to stay silent was Chrom himself.

Unless hell froze over and Robyn did show up at practice someday, but there wasn't any real chance of that happening, not when she wouldn't be able to cause any issues if she did show up. Her way of acting was to cause damage and then act smart, like she was too good for doing anything wrong, and being sequestered up in the stands with no way to impact the players wasn't her style. Or, at any rate, it wasn't usually her style. With her, there were no guarantees on anything, but Robin was hopeful she'd stay out of this one little piece of heaven these guys had.

A/N: I started writing this AU in...June? I think? And while it isn't finished I decided to go ahead and start posting it to give me the mental motivation to finish writing it. Two Robins AU is always a great concept, haha.