Disclaimer: Still don't own them. If I did I wouldn't be looking for work.

Sorry this took so long to get posted (Again). Don't blame me; blame college. Every time I would start to get started on this chapter I would have a paper due. I decided that my college papers were more important considering that I'm actually getting graded on those, and this is for fun.

Chapter 5

Sage walked out of the locker room in his martial arts outfit. He looked at the board and found his name and saw that he had been assigned a number; as well as everyone else competing. He saw that was fighting in the first round in arena D. He also looked to see that his new friend Shimi was fighting in the third round in arena A.

Sage looked at the clock on the wall and saw that it was 11:45 am. He had fifteen minutes before the tournament would start. He entered the stadium and headed toward Mia and the rest of the gang. "Hey guys here comes Sage." Yulie alerted.

"When do you start?" asked Ryo.

"I'm in the first round in arena D," he answered.

"Let's get our things and get over there to get the best seats," said Mia.

"It looks like they've made some changes since last year," said Cye as they all followed Sage. "I remember they still had four arenas, but two were sand and two were padded. Now they're just padded arenas."

"Maybe it's so now they won't get hurt on the barriers that keep the sand it. Plus there had to have been a lot of up keep to it," Kento added.

"I can understand the part about the barriers, but the upkeep?" Rowen questioned.

Sage and Kento looked at each other and said, "Sandbox." Kento added. My little brother's and sisters are all the time making mess with the sand. Not to mention bringing it in the house."

"It's not so bad when the box is in the yard. I always had to refill Satsuki's sandbox. There was always more sand in the yard than in the box." Sage added.

"Oooh." Kento cooed as they approached the bleachers, "ringside seats."

"Yes but there stuff in those seats so some of us will have to sit behind," Rowen said.

They all set their things down in their seats as the director of the tournament stood in one of the arenas and began to announce the beginning of the tournament. "Thank you everyone for coming! Thank you competitors as well as fans! I'd also like to thank the sponsors of this program for making this tournament possible. Now if all of the competitors for the first round would step to their arena we can get started!"

Sage waved to Mia and the rest and walked to the arena. He heard their mixed cheers of good luck, go get 'em, clapping/yelling, and Kento's kick his ass. Sage laughed and looked over his shoulder to see Cye elbow him in the ribs and point to Yulie. Everyone else was too busy cheering to notice.

Sage was now in the arena. He stepped bowed to his opponent and received one in turn. Both Sage and his opponent assumed their fighting stances waiting for the bell to ring. The bell rang and cheering and yelling filled the stadium. Sage could hear the "hyya's" of the other competitors as well as grunts and impact noises. He also heard his opponent yell as charged.

Sage stepped to the side and dodged the palm strike. He put his hands together and punched him with both fists. His opponent staggered to the side, but was able to leap to the side to dodge Sage's jumping kick. Sage charged once more with his own palm strike connecting with his opponents chin. He stood back and watched as his opponent flew through the air and landed on his back. He allowed him to get back up and to start the next attack. He charged Sage faking a punch and performing a sweep. It connected and Sage fell on his butt. He quickly rolled away and stood once more to be greeted by a diving kick. Sage jumped to the side and jumped back to dodge a horizontal chop. His opponent charged with a kick, that failed to connect, and went into another sweep. Sage jumped over it and executed two downward chops that connected with his opponent's clavicle.

"Rowen, how long are these matches?" Yulie asked.

"Unless they changed it from last year each fight has two sessions. The first session is five minutes and then a one minute break. The second session is three minutes," Rowen answered.

"But that all depends if someone gives up, gets knocked out, or for some reason they're unable to finish the match," Kento added.

"Oh, you mean like a broken arm," Yulie chimed.

"Yes, exactly," Kento finished.

Sage's opponent put his hand over his clavicle and took a couple steps back. Sage stood letting his opponent regain is composure before attacking again. He charged deciding to sweep the guy but before he reached him the break bell rang and they had to go the separate sides of the arena. Sage glanced over his shoulder and saw Mia smiling and clapping, Yulie jumping, Ryo, Cye, and Rowen throwing fists into the air, and Kento whistling between two fingers. Sage looked again at his opponent and saw that a referee was talking with him. 'I know I didn't hit him that hard,' he thought. The referee soon left his opponent and the bell rang for the three minute session.

Sage and his opponent charged each other. At the last instant Sage ducked a punch and swept the guy's feet from under him. The guy had too much momentum and fell forward. He landed on his hands and countered with a flip landing on his feet. Sage was a little surprised but continued his assault. His opponent extended his elbow out at the last minute so Sage wouldn't be able to evade and run into it. Sage, the great martial artist he is, turned and avoided his elbow and chopped his opponent in the ribs. His opponent quickly grabbed his side and took a couple steps back. Sage didn't care now; he charged and performed a flying kick. His opponent crossed his arms to block and Sage's foot connected in the center. His opponent was sent flying through the air and out of bounds.

The bell rang and the first round was over. Sage and his opponent bowed and stood beside the referee in their arena. A few moments passed while the judged totaled the scores. The winners were announced of each arena and Sage was the winner in arena D. He as he walked back to rejoin his group of friends he saw them cheering almost as much as they were during the match. "Man, Sage, that was awesome!" Exclaimed Yulie.

"What did you expect? It wouldn't be good if he lost in the first round," Ryo informed.

"Yeah, that's never good," added Cye.

"Thank you all for coming to watch me," Sage said.

"Don't mention it." Ryo answered, "Although I know you can fight better than that. Tell me, did you let him hit you?"

Sage was silent for moment. He put his hand on the back of his head and smiled. "Um… a little. I can't make him look too bad."

"What are we going to do until your next fight?" Questioned Cye.

"What ever you all want to do. I want to stay and watch round three though. I met this guy in the locker room and there's something about him, so I thought I would check him out for a bit," Sage answered.

"Don't tell me this is one of those locker room romances," Kento teased earning laughs from everyone. Sage glared at him but soon joined in the laughter.

"No, I feel like I've met him before; I'm not sure where though."

"Maybe he has a familiar face," Cye stated.

"Maybe; that's why I want to watch him compete."

"Well, what are we waiting for? Let's go to his arena's bleachers and wait for his match. That way we can get good seats for Sage to watch him," Yulie said.

"Good idea," Rowen added gathering his things.

Cye gathered a couple of his belongings and stood up. He took a couple steps behind Rowen and stumbled. "Whoa. You alright Cye?" Kento asked.

"Yeah, I must have stepped on my shoe lace or something," he lied.

"You better watch out, you never know when the floor is gonna jump up and bite ya," Kento said.

'For sure.' Cye thought, 'My head is killing me. As long as I don't pass out I'll be fine; that'd just make them worry more about me. I also would hate to ruin Sage's big day.'

"Rowen was telling me about the tournament and stuff and how people sometimes don't finish the rounds," Yulie said to Sage. "I was wondering of you ever have hurt anybody bad enough to make them quit early?"

Sage smiled a bit and sighed. He actually caused someone to break their ankle by knocking them off balance during a kick a couple tournaments past. He didn't want to be too graphic, so he decided that one of his lighter stories would suffice the inquiring nine year old. "Not really. About the most I've hurt someone is give them a bloody nose."

They were now at their seats halfway up the bleachers when the beginning bell rang. They were all getting yelled at for blocking other people's views. They quickly found their seats and sat. Rowen reached down into a small bag and pulled out a can of Pringles. "You want some Cye?" He asked offering the can to him.

"Just a couple; thanks," he answered reaching into the can.

Rowen examined Cye for a moment; he didn't look too well. He face was a little flushed and he was sweating. "Are you alright, Cye?" Rowen asked.

'Crap,' he thought. "Yeah, I'm fine. It's just a little hot in here."

Cye passed the chips down to the rest of his friends as they all began to watch the second round. None of them recognized the fighters except for Sage. He didn't know their names, but he remembered them from last year's tournament. "When is your next fight, Sage?" Yulie asked.

"I won't know until the second series of rounds starts," he answered.

"You're not bored already are you Yulie," Ryo commented.

Yulie crossed his arms and lifted his head like he was snooty. "No. It's just that I'm bored; I just want to watch Sage. None of these people are as good as him," he stated.

All of their heads snapped around to look at Yulie aghast at what he just said. "Don't say anything like that Yulie!" Mia scolded, "You'll make people mad."

"It's the truth," he mumbled.

Cye stood up and began to move to the isle. "Excuse me, I need to go the bathroom," he said trying to rush before they could say anything like 'you look bad.'

Cye made his way to the bathroom hopefully as inconspicuous as he could. He made his way to the sink and ran cool water. Luckily there were only a couple people in there. He cupped his hands under the running water and splashed it on his face. He repeated it a couple more times before cutting the water off. He looked up in the mirror at himself. His face a red from being hot, but soon his color returned a little. He didn't know how much longer he could keep his act up. At the rate he was going it didn't seem like too much longer. He splashed some more water on his face and dried it. 'Just don't think about it and you won't get sick,' he thought. 'Mind over matter. I can make it till the end of the tournament.'

He exited the bathroom and headed back to his seat. The third match had already started and was already in the second session. Shimi was in the arena and fighting pretty well. He performed several counter attacks which added to his score and ducked a palm strike. He swept his opponent knocking him on his butt, and as soon as both regained their footing Shimi executed a flying kick knocking his opponent backward. Right before the final bell rang the opponent stepped out of the ring adding additional points to Shimi's score.

"That was a pretty good fight," Rowen said.

"Tell me about it. I don't even think I saw Sage blink. That must help quite a bit; studying your opponents and all," Kento said.

"It does. By studying your opponents' moves you can learn their weaknesses and open spots; as well as their techniques," Ryo advised.

"Too bad we couldn't have done that when we fought the dynasty. We had to learn as we fought," Kento added.

Mia looked at Sage still deep in thought. It looked as if he was staring out into space, but actually he was watching Shimi closely. "If it is one thing I learned about Sage and his martial arts, he always takes it seriously. He always knows what he's getting into." Mia said, "Of course the rest of you do too."

'I could swear that I've met him before. Everything seems so familiar about him. I just wish I knew why.' Sage thought not hearing Mia's words, 'I hope we get to fight each other; it would be great if we fought each other in the finals.'

"Yo, Sage! The match is over now!" Rowen called placing a hand on Sage's shoulder.

Sage jumped a little startled from Rowen. "What?"

"That match is over. You were still staring out into space," Rowen said.

"Oh. No I was just thinking."

"That must have been some pretty intense thinking," Kento added.

"Thinking like that would give you a headache," Cye said with a cough at the end.

They all laughed a bit. "Are you alright Cye?" Mia asked, "I hope you're not getting sick."

'Crap.' "Yeah, I'm fine. I think I got a hair in my throat," Cye answered.

"Do you think you know a little bit more about him, Sage?" Ryo asked.

"Not really. All I managed to do is watch how he fought. I still have that weird feeling though."

"Don't worry Sage." Yulie spoke, "I'm sure you'll figure it out sooner or later."

"You're right I shouldn't let this distract me," Sage said.

A while later the first round was over and there was a fifteen minute intermission to decide the fighters for the next round. Ryo and everyone were still pretty much talking while all the other spectators went to the restrooms. Sage was getting a little restless now that he could be fighting at anytime; Yulie seemed to join him. He practically had his eyes glued to the automated sign looking for his next round. When he is in this state of mind all conversation to him became pretty much one-sided. For Sage it seemed like forever before they started filling in the first match fighters; in reality it was only two minutes.

One by one the fighters and the arenas were filled, but Sage was not a competitor. "It looks like you'll get a longer rest this time," Rowen said.

"I'll be right back. I'm going to go check the main board," Sage said before walking off.

"Is always this antsy, Mia?" Yulie asked.

"Yeah, most of the time. He just gets overly anxious is all. When he gets back he'll be real fidgety until his match."

A couple minutes passed and Sage returned and told them that he was fighting in the third round. "That sucks," said Kento.

"I know; tell me about it," Sage added.

"Why is the third round so bad?" Yulie asked.

"Since the total number of competitors is even after the first series of matches all of the remaining competitors will be odd. The third round takes someone from the first and they compete with the one odd one. If Sage fights in the first round after that he won't be completely up to speed," Ryo informed.

"Oh," Yulie said. "Even if that happens I'm sure that you can beat them, Sage."

"It looks like your pal Shimi is fighting in this round in the same arena," Cye pointed out. "At least you'll be able to watch him fight again."

Author's Note: This chapter is shorter than the others, but I really couldn't think of anything too much to put in it. I didn't really want to have this whole chapter have action in it because even good things get boring sometimes. I decided to hold off on the action until the next chapter where I can briefly skip some of the tournament and go directly where I need to. I promise the next chapter will have everyone on their seats.

Reviews:

Firestorm: Thanks for reviewing once again. Don't worry about not being on in so long, college is getting to me also. This is my exam week and it's killing me. I won't say much so I won't spoil my plot, but I will say that there are great things to come in my fic. I can't wait to get it all in and hear people's reactions.

Everyone else: Thanks for reading my story and I hope that you all are enjoying it so far. Keep reading…lol ;)