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“You gonna eat any more?”
You shift your gaze up towards the yellow-green inkling standing above you after adding your dirty plate to the pile of many. You focus back on the ground below you, or your hand, or the hem of your shirt. Anywhere but Rider.
“Not right now. I prefer to eat often rather than lots at once, it’s harder to battle with a heavy stomach.”
Interactions between you two aren’t very smooth, huh? It’s not like you mind, but you can tell he’s trying to get you talking. Why is he so interested? Is it because he considers you a challenge? Has he even seen your battles? Stealth has, so it would make sense that Rider has as well.
Rider takes a deep breath in and sighs. You look over at him, wondering what’s wrong, but not saying it aloud.
“You. You’re strong, but you came outta nowhere. I need to know more about you.”
Well, that makes things plain and simple, doesn’t it? Wrong, you have no excuses to escape. This means you’re going to have to come up with some fake life stories, and keep it realistic. You’ve already spent some time coming up with your lore before, and now it’s time to test it. The most important part is confidence.
“Alright, shoot. What do you wanna know?”
He looks around, assessing the current company and deciding that here isn’t a good spot. He shoots you a side eye, hinting at wanting to go somewhere else. You slowly follow behind, looking back at the big group of people, trying to see if anyone is going to notice that you left. Tasha gets a glance of you leaving, and you give her a quick wave of your hand. She gives you a nod and you continue to follow Rider.
The two of you make your way to a hole-in-the-wall cafe. You didn’t have any drinks to wash the curry down, so this is actually kind of nice. You order something small, and Rider makes sure you’re as comfortable as you’re gonna get before he starts asking you stuff. Way to make it obvious, mr. skeptical.
“Where are you from?”
“Calamari county, just moved recently.”
“Where did all the skill come from? They don’t have turf or ranked out there.”
“Parents were big fans but were never any good, so they trained me as much as they could get from videos and live streams in hopes that I’d enjoy it. Good thing I did, or I’d have nothing else going for me.”
You take a sip of your drink. This isn’t too bad. This should be over soon, right?
“Let’s battle. I want to see your skill face-to-face”
Carp.
Rider’s supposed to go do hero mode with Goggles anytime now, and you don’t want to mess with that.
“I want more time to learn my team, and to get better with them before taking you on. You know you’re kind of a big deal, right?”
You chuckle a bit, doing your best to still make yourself seem like just a chill fan of his.
“Then a 1v1.”
It takes you no time to respond. Now that you’ve met your teammates, you don’t want to fight without them anymore.
“No. I’m not ready to battle without my team. They have my back and I have theirs, that’s how we’re strong.”
He’s about to object, but there’s nothing he can do to convince you, and he knows it. He sighs again, you can tell you’ve annoyed him. You do make a somewhat valid point, though.
“Fine. I’ll be waiting for the day your team is ready to battle. ‘Till then, focus on being able to defeat me.”
You can’t just let him end it like that, you’re not just gonna let him sound cool and leave.
“I’m not just gonna focus on winning against you, I’ll focus on getting stronger to beat everyone. I’m not a one-trickpony.”
He stands up and takes your drink to the trash along with his,
“Alright, you do that. I’ll see you around, then.”
“‘Kay then. Be safe.”
The words left you unintentionally. Your mind was preoccupied with how hero mode was coming up, and how he’ll have to fight a bunch of octarians.
“ ‘Scuse me?”
“I meant don’t hurt yourself training. I know you’re gonna work hard to try and beat me and my team, but don’t get yourself injured.”
‘Yeah, smooth. Now that makes it too personal, good job, idiot.’
“Same goes for you. You seem like the type to work your ass off if you want a new skill, even if it hurts you.”
He makes his way out the door and goes back to his team, pretending nothing ever happened.
You make your way over to your team after hearing the waitress bid you goodbye, which made you realise that Rider must have paid for the both of you. That sly-
“There you are!”
Leo was quick to notice you, and you wonder why until you see that the only people left in the plaza are yours and Goggles’ teams. ‘Why do I have to be stuck with the main character? He could become agent 3 any time now, right? Wasn’t he on his way to a team meetup, though? That means it’s probably gonna happen tomorrow. I hope I’m right about this.’
“Well, I’m ready to go home.”
It doesn’t work though, because Milo, Leo, Bobble, and Goggles standing in the same vicinity means that there’s no chance at silence. Headphones slowly makes her way over to Tasha, you assume she’s complementing her skills with her charger. Tasha offers a nod, and that’s about it. Specs comes up to you nervously, and tries to pretend to be as casual as possible. Of course he’s failing, this is Specs.
“How are you such a good team leader?” He quickly pushes his glasses up on his face, distracting himself from the scary presence he’s assumed from you, “Most squids don’t even recognise me as Team Blue’s leader. It’s almost embarrassing.”
You feel bad for the guy, but there isn’t much you can do to help. You gently put a hand on his shoulder and try to make yourself seem a bit more friendly before giving him your best answer:
“No idea, dude.”
You immediately see the way he gets all mopey, letting his glasses fall down his face a bit and you let out a small laugh.
“But seriously, Tasha’s honestly more of a leader than I probably will ever be. She’s better with schedules and organising practices, my only job is to show off and shake the opponent’s hand at the end of any official matches if and when they start comin’ my way.”
“Wait, you haven’t been a part of any official matches yet? But your team is so strong!”
He’s not wrong, you guess you never really thought to join any tournaments or anything. It’s not like you’ve been around long enough for too many to occur, anyways.
“Team just wants to focus on getting stronger for now.”
You see Leo twirl Bobble in a big hug, putting her down and finally bidding them goodbye.
“Bye bye! We should hang out again soon!”
‘Damn it Leo, why must you do this to me? The main cast, no less.’
