Lex Talionis, Part Fourteen
Highgate Park
Riuwiee, Abanhfleft
It wasn’t always that Amy Pena came out to watch United of Riuwiee’s games live, but when she did, she usually watched it from the stands despite having a lifetime pass to Highgate Park’s corporate box. She liked to watch football with the regular fans, the ones who stood and sang and chanted their players’ names, because she loved the atmosphere there. She loved being with the fans as they celebrated every goal scored by their team and berated the referee for not calling a foul on one of their players because she loved doing those things as well. That was the point of being a football fan, after all, being with the team through the good times and bad.
Today, Amy was with 800 other fans who had flocked to Highgate Park to watch United of Riuwiee’s second game of the season. The park would usually be full of United of Riuwiee spectators, but because there was a Premier League fixture between Riuwiee United and Rosenpfelblatz City later tonight, many of the others were preparing for that (almost everyone in Riuwiee supported Riuwiee United, after all). But those were far from Amy’s mind right now. What she was most concerned right now was the fact that the Crows, or at least a splinter faction of it apparently called the Ravens which wanted to go to war with the Huesca Cartel, had now teamed up with the Nordskanian Maslev Cartel. Amy was concerned because she, meaning she herself and not the whole of the Huesca Cartel, did not know a great deal about the Maslevs except that they had a lot of guns, apparently more guns than the Nordskanian People’s Army, and manpower. What little contact that the Huescas had had with the Maslevs were a few turf wars between the two in the Pridnestrovian port cities of Novorossiysk, Rheinburg, and Tuzla. The Pridnestrovians had recently cracked down hard on organized crime through its Ministry of Internal Affairs, which had calmed down the situation somewhat, but Amy’s people in the pseudo-Communist country had been able to provide her a little bit more about their new potential enemy, but it still wasn’t enough for her tastes.
The Crows believed that their methods of exacting cruel and unusual punishments would supposedly strike fear in the hearts of their enemies. Amy believed that that was their fatal flaw because while the Crows would be busy crucifying their religious enemies, the Huescas will just go ahead and do their job and kill. The Crows had a flair for the dramatic while the Huescas, being plain and simple folk led by plain and simple gangsters, would just do what they were supposed to do without any fuss. Amy Pena firmly believed that simple and ruthless was a better intimidation tool than any kind of grand gesture such as crucifixion. But the Maslevs were a completely unknown quantity and quality in the equation now that they’d thrown in their lot with the Crows, and Amy had no idea how the Nordskanian cartel was going to affect the coming war between the Huescas and the Crows. And that, honestly speaking, was what was bothering her today.
“It is you!”
“Pardon me?” Amy blurted out as she returned to the present, and then she saw who had spoken and a smile parted her lips in recognition. “Matthew Cave!” she said. “What brings you here to my neck of the woods?”
“I happened to see that there was a game here so I came to watch said game,” replied Matthew Cave, youth manager and sometimes chief scout of Rosenpfelblatz City Football Club. “But seriously, though, I’m in town for the you-know-what, the Premier League. And I see that your time in the Fhulghamous has not affected your love for the beautiful game. Founding a new football club, and a mixed-gender one at that… you never cease to amaze me, Amelia Pena!”
“It’s all in a day’s work,” Amy said, waving off Cave’s compliments. “Besides, I have to find some use for my substantial inheritance, don’t I?”
“Indeed,” Cave said with a nod.
“So, why are you really here, Matt? Are you looking for the next Tristan Lee?” Amy asked breezily. Tristan Lee was a striker playing for Admiral Porcusces in the Fleftic Premier League, but before that, he had once been a non-league player. Now, he had won the Golden Boot by scoring 30 goals last season to help take the Admirals to their first ever Premier League title. He was one of the reasons why people were now paying a little bit more attention to the lower leagues in recent times, hoping to find someone just like Lee.
“Well, all I can say is that you’re not wrong,” Cave replied. “So what’s this I hear on the rumor mill that your new central attacking midfielder scored a hat-trick on the first game of the season?”
“You’re not hearing things, Matt; they’re all true,” Amy said with a smile. “Henry Blanco—I’m sure you know him—picked her up in a trial just a few weeks ago. That’s her over there, dribbling the ball at the edge of the penalty area.”
“Yes, I see her,” Cave muttered, squinting against the afternoon sun. “Hmm, that’s odd.”
“What? What’s odd?”
“She looks like one of those players that I once scouted for Rosen,” Cave said. “Yeah, I think it was over in Anglatia or somewhere. Her name was Erin or something like it. She was a decent player; she had good playmaking skills and exquisite ball control. The only problem with her was that she was a junkie and would never have made it to the Premier League even without the whole drug addiction thing.”
“That’s such a harsh thing to say, Matt,” Amy said. “I don’t remember you being that cynical before. What happened to you?”
Cave took a deep breath before replying. “Tangemen happened to me, that’s what’s happened,” he finally said.
Amy was about to ask what Cave meant by that when she finally remembered. Matt Cave had been quite angrily outspoken about the off-the-pitch antics of Isa Tangemen, the Armeian and now Anglatian international, from the moment she arrived at the Aeroflot Stadium to her ignominious exit from Rosenpfelblatz City just three years later.
“Are the rumors true?” Amy couldn’t help but ask. “Was she really difficult to deal with?”
“Not all the time, to be honest,” Cave replied. “And I admit that I was probably a little bit too hard on her back then, seeing as she’s this eighteen-year-old who’s just gone through a failed relationship and is now playing for a foreign team in a foreign league in a foreign country. But back then, I also thought that she needed to have some steel in her spine. She said that she wanted to grow up, you see, and I tried to make her do that the way that I’ve done it, by raising my chin and accepting the blows as they came. I was just trying to steer her in the right direction and help her make the mature decisions, but all she ever did was run away from her responsibilities. She had a chance to fight for her spot in the team, but instead she decided to go back to Southeastern on loan in exchange for Mia Rojo, and you know how that went for Rosen. When she came back from her loan, she had another chance to fight for her spot against the likes of Marfa Kirilenko and Blaze Chrzanowska, to become a fan favorite, but instead she announces her wanting to join Ross United on freaking social media, and on the same day that she signed her contract extension. And that’s not all. You really should’ve seen the things that she’s done to believe it.
“Lately, though,” Cave continued, “I’ve heard rumors about her. It turns out that she’s not the most mentally stable of people. The poor lass. She has problems with paranoia and panic attacks; she could even be schizophrenic. And it turns out she’s never been very good at handling rejection, especially in the love department, so my methods may have only been helping to drive her away from the club. I now feel as if I understand why she made the choices she made, but for me, they’re still inexcusable. But I have to give some credit to her. She has been trying to handle a little bit more responsibility this time around. Just last month, I think it was, she went to have a talk with Blaze about the latter’s suicide attempt.”
“So that’s true as well?” Amy asked.
“Unfortunately, yes. We would’ve been able to keep it under the lid, too, were it not for those bloody Anglatians. Their media thrives on mudslinging and the like. I’ve never seen something like them before, and I bloody hate them for it. So, as I was saying, Tangemen was finally able to take some responsibility for a player who looks up to her. That’s quite a bit of progress for Tangemen, I’m telling you. And then damned Tangemen went and tried to slit her wrists after she confessed to Karen her feelings for her only to find out that Karen’s now going out with Luke Edwards.”
“Wait, what?” Amy blurted out. “Karen Villegas and Luke Edwards are together now?”
Cave realized what he had just said and quickly raised a finger to his lips. “That’s supposed to be a secret, that is, Amy,” he told her. “And you didn’t hear it from me. That being said, though, yes, it’s true. Tangemen tried to off herself once she found out about Karen’s relationship status straight from the horse’s mouth, so poor Karen had to rush Little Miss I-Want-To-Grow-Up to the hospital to get her patched up. As a way of making amends, Karen set up Tangemen with poor little Marfa Kirilenko. Oh, I feel so sorry for poor old Marfa, trying to deal with Tangemen’s numerous problems. I’m actually surprised that Marfa hasn’t already given up on Tangemen after the shit that happened to them in Anglatia. It’s the stuff of badly written action movies, not that I’m in any position to judge. It involves gang wars, kidnappings, threats, the whole nine yards. God, even now that she’s finally left the club, she’s still giving me problems.”
“So, how about that new coach of yours, Joe Churchill?” Amy asked to change the topic. It was obvious that Cave could go on and on for hours, even days, about his grievances with Isa Tangemen.
“Oh, Joe’s a wonderful coach and manager,” Cave replied. “He’s a forward-thinking man and quite an innovator. Looks like Pep Guardiola too. Rosen’s very lucky to have him as our new manager. Everyone likes him so much that the board’s even given him control over transfers as soon as he arrived, like they did with Carlos Cuvimi but without waiting for a few years for it. The board really trusts the man to bring the club forward and even possibly create a dynasty in the Ladies’ Premier League. Speaking of transfers, do you have any idea who’s just transferred here to Abanhfleft?”
“I don’t know, to be honest,” Amy said. “Who did get transferred here to Abanhfleft?”
“Why, none other than Kat Bonner herself!” Cave boomed. “You know, Tangemen’s girlfriend, or former girlfriend if those rumors are true, and the reason why she left Rosen for Ross. Apparently, Bonner’s gone out of favor with the Ross management, maybe because she did break up with Tangemen, who was supposed to be Ross’ replacement for their old keeper. Now Bonner’s ended up in Haranguer for a paltry one and a half million bucks. If you had told me that Katarina Bonner would end up going to All-Inclusive Haranguer for 1.5 million NSD, I would’ve thought you were mad. If only Tangemen had seen out her extended contract then the two of them would’ve ended up in the same country and I probably wouldn’t be here moaning about it all to you, Amy. But Tangemen’s always been an impulsive girl. It serves her well on the pitch and between the sticks, but in real life, it’s not so good for her.
“But enough about me and players long gone from my boyhood club,” Cave said, making Amy breathe a sigh of relief. “Let’s talk about you and your club, Amelia. I hear that the bookies are already giving you good odds to get promoted this season, and there’s talk that your club could even make it to the Liga ng Abanhfleft and even the Premier League within a decade. Do you think your club could do that?”
“Do you want my honest opinion, Matt?” Amy asked in reply.
“Of course! Why shouldn’t I?”
“Okay. I think that United of Riuwiee could do it with the team that we have now, but it would be quite stupid of us to actually do it.”
“Really? Why would you think that?” Cave asked, genuinely curious.
“Look at this team, Matt. These are just a bunch of twenty- to thirty-something Sunday footballers. Tell me honestly that you don’t think that this team will get smashed by a relegation-battling team in the Premier Conference, let alone Liga Ikatlo, and I’ll change my mind. We’re simply not at that level yet.”
“The whole team, maybe,” Cave granted. “But there are a few players on your team whom I really feel could be Premier League quality. That new striker of yours, Dirk Jorgensen, for example. He reminds me of Tristan Lee in many ways. Yes, he may not have gotten the hat-trick, but he was quite influential throughout the game. He’s always involved in the attacks, even setting some up himself. He deserves the man of the match award just as much as the other girl did for the hat-trick.” Cave furrowed his brow and then inspiration seemed to strike him. “Eureka!” he called out. “I finally remember her name. I’ve been trying to recall it for quite some time now. She’s Erin Jennings, isn’t she?”
“Right-o, Cave-o,” Amy canted.
“And she really reminds me of that player I scouted in Anglatia before,” Cave continued. “Her name was Erin Jensdottir, if I remember correctly. What an amazing coincidence, isn’t it? They’ve got the same skills, same playing style, and their names even sound almost the same. Surely it can’t be all a coincidence, can it? But it has to be. Erin Jensdottir died in a hotel fire a few days ago, according to the ever-dependable Anglatian media. Apparently she fell asleep in a pool of vodka while smoking a joint. I knew that drugs was going to be the end of her, and it’s come true. Such a shame, really. She really could’ve been Premier League quality if she wasn’t such a junkie.”
“Yeah, sure, Matt, whatever you say,” Amy muttered lightly, but inside she was troubled. She really liked Matt Cave as a football player, as a football coach, and even as a friend, but not to the point that she would reveal her true occupation to him. She also didn’t want to think about what she would have to do to him if he stumbled upon one of her many secrets, one which he was so close to discovering entirely by accident.
“Ah, the game’s about to start,” Cave said, rubbing his hands in anticipation. “Sometimes, it’s good for us football professionals to remind ourselves of the roots of the game, and I find that you can find that by watching non-league,” he said to nobody in particular.
The teams were coming out of the tunnel now. It was United of Riuwiee against Energie Masloka (not the actual Nordskanian club but a Fleftic club formed by Nordskanian expats who came from Masloka and/or were fans of Energie). The Expats, having been in the Capital Islands Premier Division for the better part of a decade now, wanted to show these uppity upstarts who was boss and put them in their proper place. It was promising to be a very good match.
