Notes: Hello, hello, hello! Thanks so much for all the reviews! Like I said before, and if I didn't say it before it must have slipped my mind, Iceland is in this chapter, seen here as Larsun. Thanks so much for reading! Happy reading!
Mathias is probably one of the coolest people on the team, Alfred decides. And it's easy to see because Mathias is made of win. And that's easy to prove because, one time after practice, Alfred asked him for a piggyback ride and he gave him one. Like, without complaining or anything! Apparently though, Matthew's thoughts on Mathias are a little different.
Mathias has crazy eating habits that are almost as weird as Alfred's. Every time Matthew sees Mathias, in school, at practice, the guy is always shoveling butter cookies into his mouth at a completely implausible speed that pretty much rivals the speed of light. It's pretty weird, actually.
That and Mathias and Alfred only get along because they're pretty much the same person in two separate bodies. They're both loud and obnoxious and they both eat enough in the span of a day to feed several impoverished developing countries for about half a year. They're both also pretty crappy at keeping secrets.
The only other thing Matthew knows about Mathias is that he has a boyfriend named Espen. And the only reason the team knows that is because Mathias. Never. Stops. Talking about him. Seriously, that's all Mathias talks about half the time. The other half of the time, he's preoccupied with shoving butter cookies into his mouth. That and Espen, for all the blunt put-downs and insults he doesn't bother to cover up, has yet to miss a game. He sits, every time, in the middle column of the bleachers, in the middle row, at the end. It's cute and sweet. Kind of.
As much as Mathias is disagreeable to Matthew, he figures they only keep him around because he's the best at body checks.
Matthew just really wants to know where the heck he gets all those butter cookies.
***
The Whitecats have two goalies: Larsun and Roderich.
There's something kind of creepy about Larsun, though. He's quiet and graceful. Like, creepily graceful on the ice. It almost doesn't make sense how well Larsun skates and blocks. Gilbert is convinced that the kid doesn't even blink. No. No, it's really creepy. People don't think it is but Gilbert is convinced the kid is just a crazed serial killer that doesn't blink. He's probably on the run for cannibalizing small babies. Or something. It doesn't change the fact that he doesn't blink. Ever.
Roderich on the other hand is very proper and has the emotional range of a retarded orange blossom. It's also weird because he is kind-of-sort-of-not-really-but-yeah dating their other centre, Vash.
But one day, Roderich asks Vash to maybe tone it down just a tad, please and thank you. Vash doesn't talk to him for the rest of the week.
Vash also punches out one of the refs that week.
***
At Berwald's final game, everything is going pretty well. Until he gets checked into the glass. Hard. And the crowd goes absolutely silent as Berwald just sort of crumples to the ground, stick skittering away on the ice. The player from the other team just keeps chasing the puck like he didn't just check a giant Swedish guy into a wall.
The crowd is still quiet as a corpse and that's when Tino takes the head off of his mascot costume. He's a bit flushed because it's really hot in that suit and his bangs are stuck to his forehead with sweat. And the look on Tino's face is pretty heartbreaking as he watches his boyfriend-future-fiancé get smashed into the wall.
Coach Kirkland's face is pinched: looking sort of like he just at a lemon or something sour. Or he just heard one of Alfred's ideas. Tino throws the Shinatty head to Katya and sort of scrambles onto the ice. The next thing the entire stadium is seeing, is this blond guy just charging toward the guy that checked Berwald. Technically, it's more of a high-speed waddle, but whatever. Tino looks at Berwald and then, like some crazy fuck, jumps on the guy that checked Berwald and knocks the poor guy's helmet off. Tino starts beating the back of this guy's head and he's screaming curse words in English and switching into Finnish. He's smashing the heel of his hand into this poor guy's head and shouting like a nut. He wrestles the guy to the ground, punching him when they get down to the ice.
Ludwig and Mathias are both trying to wrestle this tiny, screaming Finn off and Mathias manages to get an arm looped around Tino's waist. Tino kicks the other guy squarely in the chin, still cursing and pretty much bright red with. White. Boy. Rage.
"Perkele! I'll fuck your mother up, you son of a whore! Motherfucker! I'm going to rip out your throat with my fucking teeth! I'm going to eat your heart at a luncheon! You hear me? At a fucking luncheon! Fucking—fucker, motherfucking put me down! Fucking perkele! Perkele! I'm going to fucking kill you and your dog!" Tino continues to scream as Mathias and Ludwig manhandle him off the court. Tino somehow manages to grab Ludwig's helmet and throws it at the other guy's head, hitting him on the side of his head. Hard.
They finally. Finally. Manage to get Tino off the ice. The stadium is still really quiet and then a slow clap starts up. It's pretty epic, actually.
Yeah, Tino is pretty much the coolest guy on the team now. He also has awesome aim. And everyone's wondering why he isn't one of their centres or something. If anyone could be awesome at it, it's Tino. Coach Kirkland nicknames Tino the White Death. Because he's Finnish. And the mascot costume is white.
It just seems like the only logical step.
***
Raivis Galante, this cute little blond Freshman takes over as centre after Berwald leaves the team. He's the only player on the team who is pretty. Like, girl pretty. So, naturally, most of the team teases him and makes fun of him. They respect his playing skills though because he's pretty good. You know, for a Freshman and everything.
Raivis is always getting asked which girls' team he plays for by the guys from other teams, who wolf-whistle and cat-call and make weird hand gestures that Mathias doesn't get because he's got the intelligence of a bag of rocks. Raivis, who is cute and adorable and looks like he couldn't hurt a damn fly much less a person, has enough after some douchebag from another team makes fun of him and calls him 'Miss Cutie'.
Most people on the team, especially Ivan, are used to seeing a teary-eyed Raivis, shaking and sobbing, running off somewhere. But this time, Raivis flushes and just looks at the other guy. He shakes his head and skates over to the bathroom. Doesn't even say a word. At. All.
"Next person who asks me if I play for the girls' team is going to regret it." Raivis says, not a touch of stutter or anxiety to his words. Kid must be taking Prozac or something like that.
"Why?" Matthew asks, lacing up his skates for the beginning of the game.
"Because they're getting a skate to the face." Raivis says plainly. Apparently, that's the sexiest thing that Ivan has ever heard because he plays the majority of the game with a giant boner in his uniform pants.
Awkward.
***
"Hey, Ref, are you fucking blind? That guy deserves to be in the penalty box! That's called high-sticking, right there! Hey fuckstick, get the cock out of your eye socket and call some fucking penalties for once in your life! Why did I come to the fucking game if I already knew who was going to win?" Eduard Von Boch shouts from the bleachers. Raivis gets a little distracted by his brother insulting the refs and he totally misses Ludwig's pass.
Matthew knows Eduard, actually. He's in his Advanced Placement Chemistry class and Eduard is really, really smart. And Eduard is shy and quiet but set him near a hockey game? The guy goes crazy. Hockey just seems to do that to a lot of people.
Before Eduard, Matthew had no idea that fans could get kicked out of games.
***
Ivan Braginski is this giant Russian tank that plays defense best with Matthew. And, sure, Matthew might think that Ivan is unhinged and completely psychotic and out of touch with reality but they work well together. They don't do as well separately as they do together. They're a pretty deadly combination because Ivan checks like crazy and Matthew is just apt at knocking the puck right out from under your nose. They're not Ivan and Matthew when they play as much as they are Ivan-and-Matthew.
Alfred still pretty much hates Ivan, though. And any chance he gets to ask his brother why he plays so well with the Commie, Matthew just starts rambling about the order of universe and some crap about the rotation of the earth, and something about the moon and the sun being on the same level of dimensional harmony. Or something like that. Alfred stops paying attention halfway through the explanation and instead starts staring at Coach Kirkland.
Alfred wonders if there's some way he can genetically engineer some sort of man-womb made out of cotton or something. Maybe that stretchy stuff that girls' stockings are made of. Yeah, that could work. He really, really, really wants to have Coach Kirkland's babies.
***
Alfred has this theory that Ludwig and Gilbert have a kinky, torrid, German love affair.
They win their first match of the play-off tournament because Ludwig makes the final goal. And he looks more surprised than anyone else on the ice. On the sidelines Coach Kirkland and the Whitecats fans? Well, for their part they pretty much go. Bat. Shit. Insane. Especially Gilbert, who's screaming things in German and practically frothing at the mouth. Gilbert's either flushed because he's proud as hell or he's just really turned on from watching his kleiner Bruder nearly knock out someone's teeth. Knowing Gilbert, it's probably the second one. Bloody mouths just turn him on. Or maybe it's just blood in general.
Either way, the Whitecats win 7-0 and that's probably one of their best games this entire season. So, they do what every other totally victorious sports team does to celebrate. They go out for dinner at some random Sports Bar that's too smoky and will bother Raivis' asthma but he'll suck it up and not complain because he doesn't want any one Ivan's freaky. Psycho. Attention. At all.
So, they're all pretty much ready to leave except suddenly, Roderich remembers that he's left his bag in the locker room. So, he excuses himself to go get it. And because they're a team, and teams stick together, everyone else decides to go with him, just in case he needs backup to find his bag. Or something. Never mind the fact that nobody's bothered to notice that Ludwig and Gilbert are missing except Matthew. Matthew notices everything because he's pretty much just background noise himself, anyway. And Matthew just feels that this somehow isn't going to end well.
What happens next is sort of bizarre and just way too weird in so many painful ways. And it's just seven individual shades of awkward.
The entire team, the. Entire. Fucking. Team walks into the locker room and catches an eyeful of their left wing forward who's got something crammed down his brother's throat. No one says anything, not even Alfred or Mathias who never shut up. Everything stops. And everything goes quiet. And then. It happens.
Ludwig finally notices that the rest of the team is standing right. Freaking. There. And he reacts pretty violently in an embarrassed way. He pretty much punches his brother in the face to get him away so that Ludwig can cover himself up. You know, to save what little dignity he still has after the entire team and his coach have just seen his junk. Gilbert's making this weird noise because his. Nose. Just. Got. Broken. The poor guy just sort of falls to the ground and cracks his head on the tile with a loud 'crack' that sort of echoes around the room. And as if that's not enough, Ludwig turns brown, which is what happens when you try to turn green and purple at the same time. He just wants the floor to swallow him up. This is so, so terrible. And so, so embarrassing.
The team turns away, shouts of "Seriously?" and "Holy. Fucking. Fuck!" and "My eyes!" echo throughout the locker room and, by this time, the only one who's still staring at the two Germans is Alfred and he's pointing frantically at them, giant cup of Seriously Rockin' Shockin' Blue Raspberry slurpie on the floor. No one notices that the blue toxic waste is edging into Gilbert's hair and dying it bright blue pretty effectively. Alfred points and points. And points. And, just like a little kid, says,
"I. KNEW. IT. I freaking knew it!" And then Kirkland grabs him by the sleeve and drags him out of the bathroom, yelling and cursing the entire time.
Nobody really knows what to do with Gilbert, since he has a concussion, his nose is broken and a decent sized chunk of his hair is now dyed Seriously Rockin' Shockin' Blue. He gets up, one of his pupils looking blown out and glares at his little brother like he's going to bite his neck and rip out his throat. With his teeth.
"I'm going to kick your fucking teeth out." Gilbert slurs to his brother on the bus as he holds a ice pack to his head and does his best to ignore the childish band-aid on his nose. It has Big Bird on it. If he's going to have a broken nose, he's going to be as awesome as he can with it. Definition of awesome? A fucking Big Bird Band-aid.
Notes: Leave me a review maybe? Thanks for reading! Have a good day/night!