Pokemon - The Apex of Time

Chapter 3 - The Boy Who Flew

Our 'day-off' passed us by in a calm way as we stayed inside the house. My legs ached from the previous day, and it was a struggle to get out of bed anyway. But the day wasn't totally wasted, as I spent it watching videos on the internet of basic goalkeeping techniques. With each tutorial I watched, I became more and more aware of what my task was. Not only was I required to prevent goals from being conceded, I had to be a vocal point in the heart of the defence too, and it would also be my job to initiate counter-attacks, clearances and build-up plays. The levels of responsibility pushed down against me the more I learnt, but I wasn't going to be deterred. In fact, after watching several reviews of gloves, I made it my duty to go to the local sports shop and pick a brand that suited me. Bonnie, Jake and Nelly went with me, as I didn't really want to go alone. Nelly and I looked through the gloves whilst Bonnie picked some balls out of a nearby container and threw them at Jake as he cowered behind a rack of promotional boots. Eventually, a pair of gloves caught my eyes, and I got Nelly to hold my watch as I slipped them out of their packaging. “Sondiko?” She said as I felt the palms.

“Yeah, it seems ok...” I nodded. They were a pair of Sondiko Elite Finger Pro-Tect gloves, which had a blue backhand with the company's yellow and white swirls in the centre. The back of the index finger and thumb was black, and a yellow stripe ran across the wrist just before the strap. I put the left-hand glove on, pulled it down tight and strapped it up. They had 'Fingersave' protection in them, which are strips of strong plastic that run inside the back of the fingers. This would reduce the strain I took from shots, but would cause the gloves to be stiff for a while until I got used to them. After putting the other one on, I wiggled my fingers and smiled. “Bonnie!” I turned. “Hit me.”

“Got it.” My sister took another ball from the tub and kicked it at me. Using what I had learnt beforehand, I held my hands out in front of my body and kept my thumbs close together. The ball smacked into my palms and stayed there, not bouncing off or slipping. I felt hardly anything either, thanks to the 3 to 4 millimetre latex on the palms, fingers and thumbs.

“Well?” Nelly asked. “How are they?”

I threw the ball back to Bonnie and patted my hands together. “These are the ones.” I smiled.

After apologies were made to the store staff, I bought several pairs of the gloves and we left for home. I needed more than a single pair, because I knew I would rip the latex on the palms as I was still a beginner with poor diving technique.

The rest of the day was fairly routine, and night time went smoothly by. The next day, everyone made it back down to the river bank where Darragh gave his next instructions...

*

“Good morning everyone, I hope you all slept well.”

There were several nods and 'yeah's all around, except from Jake, who seemed shattered.

“Good, well, let's do a quick warm-up and I'll tell you what we're doing today.”

We went through jogging on the spot, leg stretches, arm stretches and the like. It was fairly early in the day, but still people were about on the nice sunny day. Several people whizzed past on the road overhead in cars and on bicycles, whilst lots more strolled across the bank and around the pitch. Quite a few had actually gathered to watch us.

After a few minutes, Darragh clapped and said: “Ok, now just jog around the pitch and we'll begin.”

My heart sank then. All these people were watching, and I was going to make a fool of myself. Nelly must have seen the look on my face as everyone else began to move on. “It's ok, Toby. He said jog, not run. Come on, just like we said.” She held out her hand.