Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts. Also, I do not own a stadium or a sport team, though the idea of possessing a group of athletes is... quite interesting.

Warnings: This fiction contains and is not limited to boy/boy moments, the use and abuse of stereotypes, hints at original pairings, very despicable people, emo-Riku, lustful teenagers, underage drinking, a mix of the last two points, questionable situations, morally ambiguous choices and a few, occasional and really shy attempts at humor.

Chapter 11: Tryouts - Part 2

The second and third trials went down relatively quickly. After the first one, Riku's attention had quickly shifted from Seifer to Sora: he was now focused exclusively on surpassing the small boy. He had managed to outdo him in the strength test -which simply consisted in throwing a weight as far as possible- but he had drawn with him in the endurance test.

And Sora...

Sora had even complimented him on his performances... which had managed to irritate him even more. 'Hypocrite' he had thought.

And now the participants in the tryouts were all lined up in two opposite rows, each of them facing someone else.

"Now that the physical tests are over, let's move to the interesting part." coach Auron had said. "You may be in great physical shape, but if you don't know how to swing a bat, you're useless to the team."

At those words, Riku had started worrying: what with him never having played Struggle before? Not even Sora telling him that Struggle was a very intuitive game had managed to reassure him.

...but the moment Auron announced the beginning of the first match, Riku realized that Sora was right and that... well, he was literally born to do that.

His first opponent was a newbie, some sophomore called Isaaru. In the span of three seconds, Riku had managed to make him drop his balls. Both literally and figuratively.

He was actually surprised at the easiness with which he could match and often defeat his opponents. He scored three quick victories before going up against an actual player of the Struggle team, whose look made him clearly understand that he didn't plan on losing.

Matches were actually more like exhibition fights, thirty seconds each, usually not giving enough time to the contenders to defeat their opponents. That's why Riku quickly decided that, against a much more skilled player, the best strategy was to play on the defensive and going for a draw until the time was out.

He managed to score a whole lot of five victories and three draws before his first defeat against Saïx, who managed to swiftly make all of his balls fall off him despite trying his best to prevent so.

And now he was getting ready to face his nemesis.

Seifer was standing in front of him, grinning malevolently. "Don't tell me you were thinking that you'd be able to make it to the team."

Riku was not surprised by those words: he knew that Seifer was just trying to get under his skin and, damn, he was dead set on not giving him that satisfaction. He strengthened his grip around the bat, his hand tingling with the desire of smashing it against him.

And then the coach whistled.

Thirty seconds. If Riku wanted to play it safe, he knew that the best option was to avoid attacking directly, especially considering that he had already seen the overly aggressive style of his opponent.

And yet, he was perfectly conscious of the fact that that was precisely what he would've done. After all, that was the moment that he was waiting for since the beginning of the tryouts. One of the two reasons he had actually entered the tryouts.

Beating Seifer. Teaching him a lesson. Humiliate him.

The tall boy was the one to open the hostilities, with a really quick and powerful horizontal slash. Fast and quite precise despite the clear lack of style that characterized him, really difficult to avoid if you were not expecting it.

But Riku was expecting it.

He had spent the previous matches trying to observe the style of the boys who considered his main rivals -namely Seifer and Sora- and he knew that Seifer always opened all of his fights with a horizontal slash, from left to right. Which meant that dodging the hit was pretty easy for him.

The tall boy was clearly surprised at Riku's fast reaction, but he quickly recovered and retaliated with a vertical slash. Unfortunately for him, he had predicted that move too, after having seen him using it against the only other opponent that had managed to avoid that first hit, Sora himself.

More than that, Riku had now a clear opening! He moved quickly on Seifer's left side and swiftly delivered a powerful hit, right to his stomach.

Despite being covered in his armor, a painful grunt could be clearly heard, making Riku experience a sadistic moment of satisfaction. Two of Seifer's red orbs fell to the ground. And, Riku was sure, Seifer's balls must have followed behind.

Unfortunately, he didn't have the time to gloat, because he found himself immediately overwhelmed by a flurry of attacks. He tried his best to block most of them: after all, if he did manage to survive for just twenty more seconds, he would've been declared as the winner of the match.

As time passed, the hits were getting stronger and more intense, until the moment Seifer finally managed to directly hit his right hand. Riku let out a cry of pain and the bat fell to the ground.

The first instinct was to throw himself on the ground to recover it. He was already midway when he suddenly realized that he had to stop. And so he did.

Half a second later, the empty space where he would have been if he had tried to recover his weapon was hit by a devastating blow from Seifer.

Riku shivered: that would have hurt for sure, armor or not. Once more, the tall boy looked honestly surprised, clearly having expected to finally land a hit on his opponent.

His weapon out of reach, Riku stepped back, putting himself at a safe distance. Seifer didn't lose time and charged forward, trying to take advantage of the lack of defenses of his adversary.

...and then Auron announced the end of the match.

Riku couldn't believe it: he had won two-to-zero! He had defeated Seifer!

He looked at the blond boy, who had just thrown his bat to the ground and was now glaring at him. "That was pure luck, you know?"

Riku knew it. Still, he didn't answer and was content with just smiling at his opponent, managing to infuriate him even more.

His happiness didn't last very long: to be more precise, it stopped the moment he realized his next opponent was none else than Sora.

'Alright, Riku. You can do it.' he told to himself. 'If you defeat him, you're bound to make it to the team.'

The small boy looked completely relaxed, smiling widely at him. For some reasons, that day Sora was irritating him more than what Seifer could have ever hoped to do. It was evident that he didn't fear him, did he really feel that much more superior?

"Good luck, Riku." Sora mouthed just a second before the beginning of the match, taking Riku by surprise. And then the game was on.

Similar to Seifer, Riku had previously tried to find a pattern in Sora's movements, a way to predict his moves. Unfortunately, he had quickly discovered that his style was way more unpredictable than Seifer's. He moved fast and he reacted even faster. He had found no blind spots in his defense. Still, he refused to give up that easily.

The better defense is a good offense he had heard, so he tried to hit immediately with a fast jab. If Sora had observed him a little, he would've noticed that he was a defensive player, so he could have caught him by surprise by starting with an attack like that.

But Sora knew better and dodged the attack with ease by quickly backing up a step. Riku didn't lose time and tried immediately another jab, only for his opponent to simply move on his left and hit him with his own bat. A swift hit, Riku barely felt it, but two of the pink orbs on his body detached from the armor.

He didn't lose time and went for another hit, but from their respective positions, it was quite hard to hit, so Sora dodged easily his swipe and shifted once more on his left, costing him another orb.

At this point, Riku backed up and took a moment to assess the situation, realizing that the alternative was keeping on losing points. Half of the time had already passed, which meant that, in order to defeat Sora, he had to at least making him lose four orbs in fifteen seconds. The question was how: the boy was way too agile and surely too smart to let himself get caught with his guard down. And if he knew what was best for him -and Sora surely knew it- he would've just stalled for time until the end of the match.

Instead, Sora charged forward.

Realizing that that was his only chance of winning the match, Riku decided to go all-in.

He aimed high, swung his bat horizontally and hoped to hit Sora's headgear before the small boy would hit him. It was a risky move, if Sora would have realized what he was going for, he could have easily dodged by lowering himself and making him lose the last of the orbs on his armor.

But, much to his surprise, that risky tactic worked.

The hit left Sora stunned and, before he could recover, Riku had managed to make him lose all of the four orbs on his headgear. And that was the end of the match.

Riku was feeling euphoric. He had managed to defeat both Seifer and Sora. He felt like Sora's loss was due retribution, what with him stealing his social status at school. He looked at him, hoping to finally see his true colors, expecting a look of disappointment, even scorn maybe.

But Sora was smiling. His usual, everlasting, impossibly infuriating smile. Before Riku could react, the small boy was already next to him and patted him on the back. "That was a good match, Riku. You really got me with that hit."

Riku didn't answer, unable to find something intelligent to say. Suddenly, he felt like an idiot for having felt the way he had towards the only person that had shown him some kind of kindness in a long time, and so he simply put up an embarrassed smile and kept rotating opponents until the trial was over.

In the end, it hadn't been that bad: he was sure to have obtained a pretty good score at the first three tests and he had managed to win a few Struggle matches while drawing the majority of the rest, with only just a couple of losses. More importantly, he had defeated two of the strongest players on the team, and that should count for something.

And then, out of the blue, he realized something vital that he had missed until that point and that angered him more than ever before.

Sora had thrown their match!

He had deliberately lost, that much was clear the moment he had stopped to observe him strike another perfect victory against one of his teammates.

Without losing time, Riku grabbed the small boy by the shoulders and confronted him. "Why the hell did you do it?"

Sora looked sincerely surprised by that reaction. "Wow, Riku, calm down, what's going on?"

"Don't play dumb: you threw our match! Why did you do something like that? You didn't think I was a worthy enough opponent? I don't want your pity, you know?"

Sora, who was quickly recovering from the surprise, gently pushed the upperclassman back. "You're a nice guy, Riku, but you totally lack self-esteem." Riku opened his mouth to object, but when he found nothing to say, he closed it again. "Why can't you believe that you simply played a nice game and beat me fair and square?"

"Bullshit." he objected. "You didn't even try, otherwise I couldn't have landed a single hit on you."

Sora sighed, yet kept the smile on his face. "Come on, let's go. Any case, nothing I could say would change your mind, right?" He started walking towards the locker room, with Riku following behind a second later. "Just know this." Sora added a second later, without looking directly at him. "If by hypothesis I had chosen to let you win, I would've never done it out of 'pity'. Instead I may have done it to help you score more points and have a better chance to make it to the team with me. Which meant that it would've been nothing more than an egoistic act."

And precisely at that moment, Seifer, that by then had dropped what little subtility and decency he had left, got closer to them. "Results will be out in two days." he murmured to Riku's ear. "Pray you're not chosen for the team, because you can be sure that I would make you regret it."

This time, though, he didn't get the chance to answer, because, much to his surprise, Sora chimed in. "Only if you will make it to the team, should I remember you that you scored a whopping zero points at the speed test? I mean, come on, ten minutes to run one-hundred meters..."

"I didn't make it in ten minutes and you know it! That was just the penalty!" Seifer screamed, managing to get the other competitors' attention.

"He's right, Sora." Riku smiled calmly. "You need to be more precise: it was ten minutes and 12.4 seconds."

Both boys laughed, while Seifer walked past them in a not really dignified way.

"Thanks, Sora." Riku finally said, when Seifer was out of earshot.

Sora simply smiled and the two of them kept walking towards the changing room. And despite not saying another word, Riku was pretty sure that Sora had perfectly understood that he had meant to thank him not only for standing for him, but especially for letting him win their match, pretty much confirming a place for him on the team.

That was the day Riku decided that he could afford to trust Sora.

On the stands, Roxas was silently observing the scene.

He had no reason not to be happy for Riku: he had managed to stage an excellent show during the tryouts and Roxas was sure he would've been picked for the team. Sora was probably the best thing that had happened to him in a long time and it looked like even Riku himself was starting to realize it.

And yet...

For some reasons, what he was experiencing surely could not be defined as 'happiness'. Since the first day he had seen Sora approaching his ex-best friend, he had felt a strange small stab at the heart. And if the two of them would have been in the same sport team -and Roxas was sure they would have- they were bound to become even more closer.

Roxas had always been a smart kid, way too smart for his own good and way too smart not to realize what he was really experiencing.

The bitter taste of jealousy.

End Notes: Whew, two long chapters focusing on building a relationship of mutual trust, but... little to zero fluff, I know. But the time will come, trust me ;).

Preview: Next time: family time for Roxas and Riku

Next Chapter: Family Matters