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"Are you alright?"

Beta suddenly shook her head as if shaking away her thoughts before facing me.

"Sorry, what? I was miles away for a second there." she replied, giving a faint smile.

"I asked if you were alright. Neither you nor Alpha hadn't said anything to anyone for the past few days."

I figured it'd be safer to ask Beta about this, as I'd already asked Alpha once. Asking him again would probably have him give me the same answer. I also didn't want to annoy him and cause him to explode. Beta had been acting the same way Alpha was, so maybe she'd give a little more insight.

Before she could reply, Lazuli then interjected, shooing me away. "Oh lay off it, will you? If they say they're fine, they're fine! Stop being so nosy!"

Beta then gave a light chuckle and shook her head. "It's fine, Lazuli. I don't mind. Besides, even you asked the same questions not too long ago. Anyway, we're fine. For me, I guess I'm just a little bummed out we lost to PSG."

That was a valid reason to be sad, I guess. But there was something there that I couldn't really quite get ahold of. It was some other expression. Was she afraid?

Realizing how much I was thinking about this, I shook my head. Maybe Lazuli was right and I was worrying over nothing.

Another missed shot.

Although, that was good for me and the rest of my practice team since we were against each other, but it was still worrying, knowing Alpha had not made a single shot since that day when he started missing.

I wasn't exaggerating when I said (or thought) that either. He missed Every. Single. Shot.

It went without saying that we were worried. Alpha was our striker, and as such it was expected of him to make the shots once the opportunity came. Maybe you could've argued that we had a good goalkeeper, or maybe you could've argued that it was just practice and he'd start making shots when the game started. Thing is, if it wasn't such a problem back then, why was it a problem now? Even before the past few days he had scored without any problem. Coach noticed his poor form as well and asked if he was okay and if he needed to sit out the next game, to which Alpha adamantly refused. I'm sure the entire team could see it too, but were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

For us four, it was obvious something was wrong, but we decided not to pry. At least, not further than we already did last time.

I exhaled a deep breath as I kicked the last ball that was tossed to me, making it to the net. There was just a little less than half an hour before the game started. With that, we undressed from our warmups and donned our uniforms. From their stadium outside, we could hear Vindictus High students viciously yelling at us, telling us we were going to lose. Blocking out the sound and fishing out my phone from my bag, I tapped on the new message notification and read the texts recently sent to me.

I heard you guys have a game against Vindictus High today. Good luck. :)

I reread the messages several times until I felt my lips curve upward. I typed back a "thanks" before putting my phone back in my bag. It had only been a few days since then, but it felt like we both had just crossed a milestone. From being at each other's throats to now...while it was weird just thinking about it, it was calming as well. But whatever the case, I was glad we'd moved past our issues and were talking to each other like friends. Were we friends yet? I didn't know. We never made that decree.

"Alright everyone, time to line up!" Cristiano shouted from the entrance of the locker room. Taking in one more deep breath, I lined up behind Joe and walked out to the field along with the rest of the team. We high fived each member of the opposing team before heading to our stations to do some last-minute stretches before starting the game. Of course, as a substitute, I stayed put on the bench while the starters stretched and walked onto the field. I noticed Eun-Wol out on the field as well. Thanks to his performance in the last game, he had already earned himself a starting role.

Winning the coin toss, we were allowed to choose which side we wanted to score our goal. Therefore, Vindictus High were to start the kickoff. The whistle blew, and immediately the ball was in motion. I watched as our defenders swiftly chased after the ball. Our center-backs, Toby and Sergio, quickly tried to intervene and tackle but the forward quickly noticed as he quickly passed it to what looked like the team's winger. As expected of a winger, he stayed on the edge of the fields dribbling and slowly moving forward while drawing our defenders to him. Once they were close enough, he rapidly moved the ball between his legs, confusing our defenders and drawing them forward, allowing an easy passage for the ball between their legs.

I held my breath as the ball flew to the center, bouncing off of the forward's leg and towards the net. Luckily, David anticipated the move and quickly dived to catch the ball. The entire bench exhaled as David took control of the ball and Vindictus High moved away from the goal. As the ball moved forward towards their goal, Philipp, our right back, took control and moved forward. I observed him as he took slow steps. He was watching the field carefully, taking note of the players' current positions and making his moves accordingly.

"Let's see here…" I whispered to myself. "He has a lot of space...All of them are on our other players. He can do one of two things: One, either push forward towards the goal, or stay on the wings and either cross or score from there. Either way, it's going to draw defenders to him."

I watched as an opposing defender made his way to Phillip. Time was running out. If he were to dash to the wings, it'd be easy to guess that he was planning on passing rather than scoring as scoring from the wings was difficult to say the least. As he was a defender, even I doubted he'd try. Therefore, the majority of opposing players would stay put to protect their goal rather than run forward to try to intercept him. If he were to move forward towards the goal, the defenders would rush to surround him and try to get the ball as far away as possible from the goal box. This was a risky move, but it also had the most opportunity. Pushing towards the middle would draw nearly all defenders to him, but also free our teammates from their marks, allowing him multiple passing targets.

Unsurprisingly, Phillip did the latter and sure enough, defenders rushed to him eager to intercept the pass. However, immediately when Alpha was left open, Philipp sent the ball in his direction.

"Come on, come on…" I mumbled to myself. "Please make it in…"

The moment the ball touched his foot, Alpha sent it flying towards the goal. It was fast, and the goalie failed to anticipate its direction as he headed left while the ball headed right.

Yes!

Everything seemed like it was normal again. Alpha was back to his usual, scoring self. That is until the ball hit the side-bar and bounced away from the goal. I, and the rest of the team sighed in disappointment. I guess we were back to square one.

Not giving us a chance to try again, Vindictus defenders immediately took the ball and counterattacked. The ball flew over the halfway line, but before their midfielder could catch it, Eun-Wol jumped and headed the ball back in the offensive direction. This time, it was Joe who took possession and dribbled forward. Once again, defenders crowded the goal while others rushed toward Joe. However, while Joe pushed forward, none bothered tackling him, only focusing on intercepting. A safe move on their part. Based on what I had seen in the past, Joe was an expert dribbler just as he was a passer and scorer. If they were to try and tackle him now, it was highly likely he'd be able to maneuver his way through without any problem. It looked like they realized that too as they kept their distance. With only two players marking him, he was the bigger threat here.

Hastily moving the ball between his feet, he easily made it past them and dashed forward before taking a chance at the goal. The ball flew forward, and for a moment it looked like it was about to be a goal as the goalkeeper was a ways away from the ball, however instead of going past the line, the ball hit the crossbar and deflected back outside to the goal box. The goalkeeper then hastily grabbed the ball and surrounded it with his body to prevent anyone from knocking it away from his grasp.

Having no choice but to go back on defense, the entire team rushed to the other side of the field. Somewhere along the way I noticed Alpha running next to Joe while gesturing to himself. He seemed upset. Almost as if it was because the ball wasn't passed to him. I saw Joe nod before Alpha ran off.

I found myself juggling my feet nervously. I might not have heard their conversation, but something told me there was something wrong. It didn't take a genius to know Alpha was getting angry.

Vindictus High were more cautious with the ball now, being wary of our defenders possibly heading the ball back in our favor. They approached slowly, and so did our defenders. Some space was left for their attacking midfielder so the defenders had some time to react and intercept any passes if they were made. For a few seconds no notable moves were made, but as they approached the goal box, Philipp quickly rushed in to intercept. Taking a chance, the midfielder dashed dashed forward and attempted to shoot, only to kick Philipp's leg as he stuck it out in front of the ball. Thanks to him, our defenders scooped the ball and regained possession. However, as they moved forward, Philipp stayed on the ground, gripping his leg as he rolled in pain.

The whistle blew and the game immediately paused.

"Aaron, get yourself ready. Philipp's injured." Coach said, before rushing out onto the field.

It took me a while to process what coach had just said. It was only thanks to the pats on the back from my fellow teammates on the bench that I stood up and started stretching. I watched the scene as I stretched, seeing several players gather to see if he was okay. Soon enough the stretcher came and coach himself lifted Philipp onto it. High-fiving Philipp as he was transported back into the locker, I ran out to the field to occupy the empty role.

I felt my heart racing as I stood, getting ready for the game to resume. Just the second game of the season and already I was out on the field with the rest of the starters. The last game might've been against last season's winner and our main rival, but I had been deployed late into the game, when many players were already exhausted. Here, hardly twenty minutes had passed since the game had started. There was so much time to make mistakes. I could only hope and pray that I wouldn't let the team down.

The whistle blew and and the game restarted. The referee dropped the ball where it had last been and both captains fought for the ball. Luckily, Cristiano won the ball and we were back on the offensive. Running forward with the team, I eased up my pace to fall behind the team a bit. If the ball were to travel back and we were forced on the defensive, I'd be ready to regain possession. I watched as our captain took control of things himself and easily maneuvered through the defense without so much as a pause. With nearly all of the opposing team running forward to him, he took a quick glance back before passing it to Alpha, whom the defense had nearly abandoned thanks to his miss. Stopping the ball with his foot, he took a couple steps back before kicking the ball forward. Once again, the ball seemed to be on target and the goalkeeper was nowhere near, but just as it seemed to go in, the ball somehow curved to hit the sidebar of the goalpost.

Another miss, huh?

I looked over at everybody else and saw their perplexed, if not worried faces. Coach seemed to be in the same boat as well and it looked as if he was planning on calling a substitute for Alpha. As things were now, maybe these were minor hiccups. Hopefully things would be back to normal as the game went on.

Thanks to the ball deflecting off the goalpost, possession went back to Vindictus. This time, they wasted no time in charging forward. Their sudden dash took me by surprise and it took me a couple seconds to register that we were now back on the defensive.

The ball flew over my head as a defender kicked it forward and landed near one of the forwards. I chased after him as he approached the ends of the field, but kept my distance. Last time I marked a player, I let his dribbling skills get the ball past me. I'd like to call myself an adequate defender, but against those with high dribbling skills like Joe, I was helpless. This time, with the distance between us, there was no reason to dribble past me unless he was charging forward. His only option was to either pass or score. He seemed to realize this as well as he passed to a midfielder approaching from the side. With him off the ball, my attention was now focused on the newly approached midfielder.

Unfortunately that was a mistake because as soon as the forward was out of my sight, the ball immediately went back to him. He was fast, his speed seemingly on par with our captain. While I hastily dashed to the goal box which was where he currently was heading, I was too late as he kicked the ball past our goalkeeper before I could catch up.

The crowd cheered as their home team scored, and their chants grew louder by the second. The forward who scored slid down the grass near the crowd and roared in victory while being tackled by his teammates.

I sighed in disappointment at myself. I held up my hand and bowed my head to my teammates in apology. They then patted me on the back.

"Relax, freshman! It's nice to win, but it's no fun if you're tensed up all the time."

Relieved by their overwhelming support, I took a deep breath and jogged forward.

"Right. Sorry about that." I replied.

They then chuckled as they ran with me. As I was a right back, I sped ahead a little to offer some offensive support. As our goalkeeper threw it forward, Eun-Wol was the first to catch it and together everyone made haste forward, eager to eliminate the advantage Vindictus had over us. With one quick glance, he sent the ball flying in my general direction.

The thing about long passes is that sometimes players have a tough time determining who and where the ball is flying towards. And when they do, it's already too late as the player is already speeding ahead. Such was no different for us as there were no defenders anywhere near me while I dashed along the wings of the field chasing after the ball. Before the ball could touch the ground, I performed a cross to Joe, who then passed it to our captain on the other side of the field. He then kicked the ball towards the goal the moment it got within his vicinity. The ball flew with so much speed that I doubt even opposing defenders would even bother trying to stop it with their head. Nevertheless, it hit home and we all rushed to our captain in celebration. He jumped and performed an opening motion before letting himself get tackled by all of us. He specifically gave a hug to Joe seemingly as a thank-you for the assist.

I joined in with the celebration as well, jumping at the top of the pile. After a few seconds we dispersed, realizing the game wasn't over yet.

From the corner of my eye I could see Alpha kicking the ball back towards the net in frustration before joining the rest of us. He was definitely angry about something, but what? Did he want to score that badly? I then shook my head. It was better to focus on winning the game right now.

The whistle eventually blew, signalling halftime. All of us breathed a sigh of relief that we finally received the rest we yearned for after running back and forth for a good amount of minutes. We all jogged to our side of the field and received our much needed refreshments from coach and the rest of the team. While we rested, coach went back to the locker room for a few minutes and then gave us an injury update on Philipp.

"Alright everyone, I have some good news and bad news. The good news is, while Philipp's injury is a bit serious it's nothing that'll permanently damage his body or compromise his playstyle. He'll will be out for a while, but certainly not the whole season."

We all sighed in relief knowing one of our seniors will be returning eventually.

"The bad news is, he'll be out indefinitely. So that means for a little while, we'll have one less defender. That means from now on and until Philipp comes back, you'll be our starting right-back, Aaron."

I nodded at the confirmation. A starting role! While it was certainly something to be excited about, it was disappointing to know that it was due to a fellow teammate being ruled out and not because of my own skill. Nevertheless, I was eager to prove myself.

"That said, let's get to our game plan for the second half…"

This time, rather than deploy a 4-4-2 diamond formation like he did the first half, coach opted to go for a more balanced formation, the 4-2-3-1. While it lacked defensive support on the midfield, it offered much more offensive variety. With more midfielders positioned on the wings the offense would be better suited for a variety of attacks and defenders like me would get less offensive responsibility and be able to focus more on defending.

After laying out the strategy, coach then pulled Alpha aside for a one-on-one talk. Most likely addressing his recent misses. Eyeing them, I could see Alpha nodding his head and taking several deep breaths to calm himself down. Their conversation continued for around a minute before cach finally let him go.

Once the whistle blew again, we went back onto the field and started the second half. As we advanced forward, we noticed more Vindictus players occupying defensive positions. Based on the looks of it, they too had changed formation and had gone for a more defensive position. Things had suddenly gotten more difficult. While it didn't look like they were giving up on scoring another goal, they certainly didn't want us to score either. After what had happened earlier when we scored, they were determined not to let something like that happen again.

So we did what we could and attacked from all angles. Performing crosses for headers, corner kicks, even charging down the middle. However, nothing seemed to work. Even with the formation change, neither Alpha nor our captain had any luck scoring. Alpha especially, who missed several shots and seemed even more anxious than ever to score. And as the 80th minute approached, all of us were more eager than ever to win. There was no way we were going home exhausted with two ties in a row.

After another crossbar deflection from Alpha, we were back on the defensive. Unlike last time, I dashed back without missing a beat and marked the same guy who had made his way past me. Instead of waiting for him to stop, I instead slid down and tackled him while he ran, eager to get the ball out of his feet. Immediately as he tripped and fell, the ball threatened to go out of bounds. I hastily stood back up and kicked it to the side and ran back on the offense. I also thanked Goddess for not getting fouled. That would've been ugly.

Time was running out. As I looked around, I saw my options were limited. Nearly every offensive player on our team was heavily guarded save for two. Alpha stood near the goal box completely open and frantically waving his hands, desperate for the ball. Joe, on the other hand, had a defender marking him while running around, trying to shake him off. Another player also slowly approached me as well, silently threatening to steal the ball away. If we were to win this game, I needed to make the right choice

What should I do?

1. Pass to Alpha. He may have missed many open shots, but seeing as how he's open this might be the lucky shot that makes it through.

2. Pass to Joe. Alpha's been missing a lot lately, so he's the safer bet. Since he's able to dribble as well as pass and score, the ball is safer in his possession.

3. Take a chance and try to score it myself. Since I'm a defender, most of the defense isn't really focused on me. If I shoot it now, I might be able to score.