𝑯𝒆𝒚 𝑻𝒉𝒆𝒓𝒆, 𝑫𝒆𝒍𝒊𝒍𝒂𝒉 | ᴹᴰᴳᶜ

TRACK SIXTEEN: Hurts So Good

I woke up from my dream in a panic. Well, it was more of a nightmare. It surrounded Logan and Cole's son. I still don't know his name and I want it to stay that way for as long as possible.

I sat up and Sofi and Maya were still asleep. I looked at the clock on the wall above the door and it was a minute to five. As I went to lay back down, a loud horn blared as some form of annoying alarm. I sat up again and saw Sofi cover her head with her pillow. I then heard Maya groan and her blanket rustle.

I sighed and crawled out of bed and climbed down the ladder. Since I was already awake, it might as well stay that way. Maya removed the blanket from her head and looked at me.

"How are you awake?" She asked. "Go back to bed, Delilah." She said, putting her face into her pillow. I didn't say a word and just grabbed my stuff. They wanted us to wear clothes that were the EPIC colors or had the logo on it. I had on black biker shorts, a red shirt, and the black jacket I wore yesterday. I was given a grey shirt to wear that said EPIC, but I refused. The team and I met up in the hallway.

"Alright, guys! Crack of dawn! Hitting it hard! Isn't this exciting?" Evan said as we walked.

"Yeah, totally! Uh, quick question. Who's shirt am I wearing?" Nick asked. "You know this place has trained like twenty guys who are in the NHL right now?" Evan stated. "And three woman on team USA! I would slay in the Olympic Village. How hot are bobsledders?" Maya responded.

We walked into the lounge and met Alex as she told us to check our emails for the schedule.

"We are not going with each other?" Sofi asked. Alex shook her head.

"At least we have ice drills together." I replied.

"Well, like Coach Cole said. You're no longer a team. You're just a group of kids trying to beat each other, maybe hurt each other, but also have fun!" Alex told us. The lady from yesterday named, Marni, came over to us.

"Oh, there they are! The kids I invited by mistake! I certainly did not get an earful about that." "Oh, I'll give you an earful." I mumbled to myself. I think Maya heard me because she grabbed my arm the same way she did yesterday. Marni handed Sam a wristband.

"What are these?" He asked, taking it.

"These are performance bands!" Cole answered. "They track all kinds of things, like active minutes, muscle mass, agility algorithms. Hand-eye coordination. We track that, too. Anyway, all this information goes into the system, and we develop what we call "real-time player rankings." and it all goes up there right on the big board. Pretty cool, right?" I watched as people were moving up and down the board.

"So, I'm my own avatar. I'm listening." Koob said, putting on his band as I did the same. "The first half of the summer is all about individual training, okay? Then your rankings will lock, then the coaches will draft teams for tournament play. Whoever wins that tournament will play in the summer showcase. Against our bitter rivals. Canada." Cole stated.

I smiled to myself. Logan's from Canada. Toronto, to be specific. He loved telling me what it was like. He made it sound so beautiful and nice. I would love to go someday. "The one with all the scouts?" Evan asked. "Yeah. We got a big day! Let's go!" Cole clapped his hands.

We all walked away. "Okay, these are pretty cool." Sofi said. "Right?" Evan responded. "So you're telling me those rankings are in real time?" Nick asked. We all nodded, and then Nick ran around us and shook his wrist. He got number one on the board.

I heard a kid yell, and then I saw him start to do burpees. "That's my roommate. He started clapping when the horn woke us up this morning." Koob said. Nick looked back at the board. "I'm still top twenty, thirty, seventy, eighty...aw man." Sam put his hand on Nick's shoulder. "Hey, at least you got a taste at the top."