Huzzah! So The Nehszriah is now official. I am playing for my class's girls football team and put my pen name on the back. Yup... Nehszriah #79! I picked the number myself too! Now, on to my ice hockey homage of glory.
San
Lina Inverse was feeling very testy. Her first practice as head coach of the Seiryuun Slayers was twenty minutes away and she needed to get ready and what was going on, was not helping her any.
Lina had arrived at her office at around nine, wanting to settle in and wake up before anyone wanted to disturb her. She had some coffee and afterwards smoked a cigarette. She really was not fond of her habit of smoking, but she figured that one every now and then was alright. Just as she was finishing up, a woman burst into her office unannounced. The woman was young, dressed in blue jeans and a grey hooded sweatshirt and eerily resembled one of the men from yesterday's meeting with her mousy hair and pale green eyes. She said her name was Elena Yerbinski and the stack of papers and clipboards she carried in with her were the plays and routines the previous head coach had left behind. The past few hours had been filled with Elena going on and on about the plays and lineups and every other possible thing Lina could imagine and it was driving her up the wall.
"Yerbinski-san," Lina said sleepily.
"Elena, please," Elena said, pausing her explanation of the Triple Blitz play.
"Alright. Elena-chan?"
"Yes?"
"Do I really have to know all of this?"
"Of course," Elena answered. "The Princess has named me one of your assistant coaches, so I can help you remember everything."
"Do I have any other assistant coaches?"
"Yes. There is my twin brother Frederick and then Xellos Metallium. I think that the four of us shall do well working together."
"Yeah, well we have to get going or we will be late," Lina said, getting up and walking out the door. Elena's pep had seemed to drain all life from Lina as they made their way down to the rink. There, all lined up on the ice, was the entire team ready in their practice gear and itching to get started with drills.
"Hello team," Lina said as she walked out onto the ice. It felt odd addressing these men as 'team', since the only teams she ever had to deal with were much younger than her. The athletes before her however were the same age as she was. Not a single player or coach was a day over twenty-eight, or under twenty, years old. This was a mixed blessing: plenty of youth, but little hope of professional experience.
"Now I want you all to know that I am very honored to be your new coach," she began. "It is definitely an privilege to have the trust of the manager and owner, for they believe I will be successful. I have, however, been told that you all, the team's athletes, shall give a performance review and that shall determine whether I coach you guys in the Olympics. I hope that everyone will try to see the best in me. Now, since I really am not too good at speeches... ten minutes of lines. Go!"
So the team sped off to skate up and down the rink, doubling back every once in a while, according to the painted lines on the ice. Quite pleased with herself, Lina walked over to the bench where Elena was waiting with Frederick and a man with purple hair cut in a very questionable manner.
"Inverse-san, this is Xellos Metallium, the coach in charge of defensive plays," Frederick said. Lina shook Xellos's hand, a slight bit wary about the new man's creepy smile.
"It is a pleasure to meet you Lina Inverse," Xellos smiled.
"I'm sure," Lina half-muttered. "Hey Frederick-kun, are you going to go about the offensive plays?"
"Yes. My sister gets to pretty much be your assistant and you oversee everything. You get to decide things like what plays we should and should not use, practice drills, lines and other things like that. You have to also make sure the team is in line..."
"...in line?"
"Yeah," Elena smiled. "You know, concentrating on doing their best and whatnot. It is your responsibility to make sure they give it their all." Lina smiled nervously in response. She knew she was not ready for this...
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After practice, the team was already sick of Lina. Her plays were too simplistic and childish, her drills were simply for the basics and it was clear that she had no clue to what she was doing. All practice she had the train of thought a children's coach would have, never going very complex. The team wanted a challenge and just were not getting it.
"Relax guys!" Frederick assured everyone in the locker room as they were changing. "We only have thirty-four more days of her!"
"Thirty-four more days of that idiot?" Willy Jones, a defenseman said. "That girl is positively off her rocker! I blame you three for this!" He pointed at Zelgadis, Frederick and Gourry with a mean look on his face.
"Now, now," Xellos said, cutting into the conversation. "There is no need to be hasty. I think she actually would do well, given time."
"Really?" Jones said. "So you actually do something all practice instead of smile blissfully, looking around the arena?"
"Why of course!"
"Yeah, what do you do Coach Metallium?" Goran Nerski, the team's backup goalie, asked through his Russian accent.
"Now that... is a secret!" Xellos answered. Nerski just scoffed and pulled on his sweatshirt.
"Where are your people skills?" Frederick whispered to Xellos.
"At home, under my bed. Too afraid," Xellos answered.
"Of what?" Frederick asked, knowing he was going to regret the answer.
"People."
With that, Xellos walked away and disappeared down the hallway. Frederick sighed, for he knew that with all of his strange quirks and uncanny ability to annoy, Xellos was just as bad to have around as Lina. The only problem was that there was a surprising lack of qualified people to be assistant coaches, so he knew Xellos could not be fired any time soon. He looked over at Zelgadis and Gourry, who were already dressed.
"No shower?" he asked, raising his eyebrow.
"I barely broke out a sweat," Zelgadis laughed.
"Whatever," Frederick sighed. Then he walked out of the locker room, Zelgadis and Gourry following right behind him. At first he decided to pretend they were not there, yet knew that he could not ignore them forever. He walked out to the parking structure and once he got to his jet-black car spun on his heel to face the two teammates.
"What do you want?" Zelgadis smirked. Frederick just sighed and opened the driver seat door to his car.
"Are you two coming or not?" Frederick asked as he got in and started up the engine. Happily knowing they won a bit of a victory, Gourry took the seat on the other side of Frederick and Zelgadis hopped into the back seat. Laughing a slight bit, Frederick took off and drove into the hustle and bustle of the wintery city around them.
"So, where are we going?" Gourry asked absentmindedly. This teammate and assistant coach looked at him with disdain when they stopped at a red light.
"It's past five in the afternoon. Do you know what that means?" Frederick asked.
"He doesn't," Zelgadis answered just as Gourry opened his mouth to speak.
"Yes I do! Gourry retorted as the stoplight turned green.
"What is it then?" Zelgadis asked grouchily, slouching back into his seat.
"It is past seventeen o'clock!" Gourry answered.
Now if Frederick had not been driving at the moment, he would have fell down on the floorboards. "Not that!" he cried. "The bars are open!"
"Oh," Gourry said softly as Frederick pulled into a parking lot. All three men got out of the car and entered the oddly named bar, "Claire's Bible."
"You know," Zelgadis muttered to Frederick, "this bar could be useful to us in helping to get Gourry's mind off hockey and on other things."
"Like a girl?"
"Exactly."
Frederick and Zelgadis looked over at Gourry. The blond was looking at one of the walls, examining all the framed newspaper clippings about past games involving the Seiryuun Slayers. He seemed uninterested in the rest of the room, even the group of females at one end of the bar. Gourry seemed hyper-focused on sports, and only sports.
So thus Zelgadis and Frederick devised "Operation: Get Gourry A Woman." They both went up to the prettiest girls standing at the bar and asked them if they would spend the evening with their friend, even if it was to be spent in the barroom only. Three women volunteered to do so, as long as they could be Zelgadis's date for the rest night, but the goalie only blushed and claimed to be taken and only admitted to wanting a date for his friend. Upon hearing this, the three women shooed Zelgadis and Frederick away with an excessive amount of force.
"Get away from us you jerks!" the lone brunette said, thwacking Zelgadis roughly with her large and handbag. Zelgadis did not even try to block and nearly fell backwards into Frederick and an empty table.
"What did we do?" Frederick asked defensively.
"Geek-Boy, get away from us and take your persistent friend too," she answered. Now neither Zelgadis or Frederick knew how they became jerks, let alone persistent, and grouched out the door with Gourry, intent on finding another bar.
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"So, then why are we here again?" Lina asked as the odd girl called Elena dragged her down a hallway in an apartment complex. Right after practice Elena had whisked away Lina and brought here against her will.
"You'll see Inverse-san!" Elena said happily. She stopped at a door marked with the number 321 and knocked on the door.
"I'm coming!" a voice said, hidden on the other side of the door. When it opened, Lina found it to be Princess Amelia, smiling jovially and holding a wicked-looking cooking knife in her left hand.
"Hey there Amelia-chan!" Elena said happily.
"Hello Elena-chan!"
"What's the knife for?"
Amelia thought for a moment as her guests walked into the apartment and as Lina and Elena were taking off their shoes she walked over to the counter in her kitchen, looking over the half-wall that separated it with the hallway to the living room.
"Now we're ready to make fish!" she said amongst a fit of giggles, now brandishing a larger assortment of cutlery. A wide smile crept across her face as Lina's went blank.
"I am really sorry to say this about royalty... but are you nutters?" Lina asked.
"No Inverse-san," Amelia replied as she chopped up a tasty looking halibut. "Daddy calls it 'eccentricity'."
Lina sighed with grief. She sat down on a comfy chair as Elena went to go chat it up with Amelia.
Looking around, Lina found that the apartment that was inhabited by the country's heir was no more than the average apartment, usually occupied by one in the middle class, except when it came to the presumptuous family coat-of-arms on the wall above the electric fireplace.
"Sushi?" Elena asked, popping out of nowhere. Lina was so taken aback, that she nearly fell out of the recliner chair.
"W-What?" she asked.
"Would you like some sushi?" Elena repeated. Lina just shook her head in reply and left Elena to skip off back to the kitchen.
Damn, Lina thought. I should have listened to Luna. I never should have left Manitoba for this place. Of course, I would never let anyone else know that, but she was still right...
"I am just not cut out for this..."
Lina gasped as she realized that she said the last part out loud. With feline speed and quirkiness, both Amelia and Elena popped over to see Lina.
"Not cut out for what Inverse-san?" Amelia asked.
"Yeah, what's the matter?"
"Nothing," Lina muttered.
"Really, what is the matter?" Elena persisted.
"This is the time where we are friends Inverse-san. You can talk to us."
Lina sat there with the most saturnine of looks. These were supposed to be her co-workers, not her friends. Her friends were all back in Manitoba playing in traveling tournaments and still in elementary school. The only friends she had were the kids she coached, no one more than maybe, just maybe, a parent.
"I told you, it is nothing."
"We are friends! Talk!" Amelia demanded, demonically getting into Lina's face, scaring both her guests. After Lina whimpering a "yes" did the princess back down.
"I... I just do not think that I am cut out for this coaching job," Lina admitted quietly. "I did not want to tell anyone. The team already hates me."
"Don't be silly!" Elena flat-out lied. "They are just testing your self-confidence. I think that you are just fine." She patted Lina on the shoulder. "I know what will fix this!"
"What is that Elena-chan?" Lina asked, getting up out of the chair. She turned around, only to be met by the insane blades that Amelia was wielding only minutes ago.
"Sushi!" Elena smiled. Amelia jumped for joy, explaining how Elena was a fairly good cook, particularly with sushi and things like that. Lina just agreed and accepted the food, not exactly thrilled about having her lack of self-confidence exposed, yet she made up for that as the night went on. She had a good time with Amelia and Elena, both of whom were friends in elementary school. It pleased Lina to have friends. A spot that felt a bit hollow began to fill up. Not all the way, but enough for Lina to forget the criticisms of the athletes and truly relax and have fun.
Parodies/References I Do Not Own (or Want to Point Out) So Please Do Not Eat Me
Claire's Bible: Clearly, a ploy on the "Claire Bible" of the anime.
Seventeen o'clock: That my friends, is called military time. Learn it. Love it. Live by it. Not enough people understand it, which therefore gives me basis to do this.
Elena's enthusiasm: Yeah, that's me... I just happen to be without the extensive knowledge of plays in real life.
Manitoba: Random enough place in Canada for me. Lina's from Canada. She's Canadian. I laugh at this. -laughs- BWHAHAHA! -pauses- Why am I laughing again?
Willy Jones: My teacher of English, who happens to be blessed with a highly generic name.
"Now we're ready to make fish!": So the Nehszriah went to Washington D.C. and found in one of the museums, an exhibit all about Julia Child. The woman said this, grinning, holding many knives, whilst hovering over a decapitated swordfish. All must hail the French Chef of DOOM.