Generation Next
Chapter Two: Villains
“Who knew that people could have so much hate for someone that they don't know?” asked Owen de Vos, as the Ironite flight landed in Valanora and the players started through the airport to the sight of both fans and protesters waiting for them. The protesters, of course, were here against Owen because of his controversial selection, and the way that he would be representing the nation while being under investigation by the police for domestic violence and after previously being arrested for involvement with a murder that hadn't happened far from his home. The talented national academy attacking midfielder had been selected regardless, and the groups that were protesting against him were diverse.
There were normal fans who didn't want to see this kind of person representing the country to the rest of the world, there were feminists who already didn't like the masculinity of the national sports that the Syndicate had invested in recently, who were here to protest both that and his selection, and who were using Owen as a living example of why they thought that sports weren't a good thing for the country to support and invest in, and there were also media members standing with the protesters and taking pictures during the whole thing, and gathering statements that would soon be published on the front pages of the news sites. It was impossible to keep a low profile, but Owen had never been the type to try.
Of all of the protesters, the few that were actually dangerous were definitely the ones associated with the Feminist League, which was linked with terrorist group Pink Front, the one that had already caused havoc for the Syndicate by kidnapping star rugby union player Shaun Draco, who had been used as a bargaining chip to attempt to convince the government to release the Pink Front prisoners that were being held in a maximum security prison. They were not just normal protesters but were dangerous and had been labeled a terror organization because of it, but it looked like they hadn't went away completely. No, the black shirts and pink jackets of the people that were gathering in the airport and waiting for the Syndicate team to head to their train identified them as either being members of that group, or sympathizes of them, and they were definitely here because of Owen.
There were others, too, including some people wearing black shirts saying ‘De Vos For Prison’ on the front in white lettering, and there were also other protesters who weren't tied to one group but who were still mad about this boy being called up and apparently given a starting role with the new youth team. “Just keep your head down and ignore them. Last thing you want to do is provoke them further, knowing how dangerous they are,” said goalkeeper Chiara Altera, keeping her own head down and pulling a hood over it as she walked next to Owen. “We don't want any repeats of the Rugby Union World Cup, and we don't want any more controversy…”
“You've known me long enough to know that I don't do that,” said Owen, and as they were walking by and the protesters were shouting at him and making themselves visible to the cameras, Owen turned to them and held up two middle fingers, staring down the person who he believed was the leader of those protests. There were heated words exchanged and the group of players stopped and watched as their teammate went back and forth with the crowd that had assembled and as things grew closer to turning into a real and physical confrontation, and some of the players got ready to step in. But then, Owen made eye contact with the Iron Sport reporter that had run the segment that condemned him before there was even a trial, Thea Daems. “Hey, Thea! You still think that I'm guilty with no trial and no process? You want to say that to my face?”
“I do think that you're guilty, because it doesn't take a court ruling to show that you did what you were accused of! The evidence is right out there for everyone to see!” claimed Thea, and that was when Owen dove towards the crowd and had to be held back by Chiara, who felt responsible for keeping her friend out of more controversy and trouble. “You can't avoid justice forever, Owen!”
“Justice isn't condemning someone based on a few pictures with no context or background!” Owen shouted back, and the war of words was going strong once again. “If it wasn't for Chiara being here and holding me back, I'd make you look way worse than Hailey did in those photos!”
“Hey, let’s calm it down over here!” shouted Alexis Valente, who would likely be the main striker of the team when it was all said and done. The small striker pushed herself in between Owen and the crowd and tried to break things up and keep them from escalating anymore, and she gestured to settle things down. “Thea, maybe you should consider that when you accuse people of crimes on national television without a solid basis, they're going to get upset and it might not be a good idea to show your face to them. Owen, hitting someone and proving them right about you is the worst thing that you can do in this situation, and you don't need any more controversy than you already have. Let's all walk away, before this gets any worse than it has to be.”
“I don't like letting someone get away with slander like this. She's not just saying this now, she said the same things on TV on a station watched by millions of people,” Owen said, even though he finally started walking away, flanked by the rest of the players that were finally heading towards their train outside. The protesters kept shouting, but the players ignored them this time and kept going towards the outside of the airport, and they didn't have to wait far to reach the train that was heading further into the city, where they would be staying for now.
“It's a lose-lose situation for you,” sighed Chiara, boarding the train behind him and sitting down next to him by the window. “Sure, you could have knocked her on her back and made a point if you really wanted to, and you could have argued back and forth with the protesters, but if they're trying to call you a violent criminal, it's going to hurt you more to prove them right than it would hurt you to let them keep talking and repeating what they keep saying, regardless of the truth. You think I like Thea Daems more than you do or something? Because the answer is hell no. She wrote a hit piece on me about a week ago because of my association with you. But giving her more ammo to work with isn't a good idea.”
“God, I hate these people,” muttered Owen, as the players finished boarding the train and the doors closed, with the vehicle beginning to move slowly and picking up speed. “Don't they realize how haunted I am every day by the past? They feel the need to keep reminding me of how things went, for some reason? I'm trying to move forward and do better, but they sure as hell aren't helping me by trying to use the past to condemn me before they even hear from a judge… I hope someday, they're in the same position, where the whole story isn't out there and everyone's set on attacking them anyway.”
~
There were many positions on the staff of the new youth national team that was arriving in Valanora for the fortieth Di Bradini Cup, but one of the most peculiar was the position of Priest. More specifically, it was the position of Iron Church Priest, because even though the nation was officially not religious, there was still a clear largest church and there was still some connection between church and state. And because of that connection, there was a Priest and his assistant accompanying the team on their travels, for the reason of making sure that the players and the staff felt at home while they were away with the team.
According to Chase Dekker, the game was more mental than it was physical and the team that had the mental advantage was usually the one that would get a result, no matter what the odds actually said. But while every manager would claim to care about the mental side of the game, most weren't willing to go to far lengths once they realized that it was harder than they had initially thought to get the mental state of their players to a good place, and they didn't want to make it their main philosophy. Chase had always been different in that he prioritized his squad harmony and mental ability over more simple things such as tactics and athleticism, and that was how he had consistently achieved better performances in Silvershire and taken them to the upper mid table.
Now, his philosophy had led to the Iron Church being linked to the team, and the arrival of two staff members. Priest Randall Zavaleta, and Junior Priestess Fenna Blok. Randall was the more experienced of the two and had formerly worked in the hills of northern Ceres and in the rich suburban branch of the church that was located there, and Fenna was a younger college student from the heights of Southwest Portus, the area near the ports that saw a very large amount of people crammed into an amount of space that wasn't that big, in high rise apartments and even some underground housing. Randall knew more of the traditions and practices of the church and Fenna was more relatable for the young players of this squad, and so it turned out that she was the first one to have a player come to her about something.
That player wasn't who she expected. She never expected the now famous villain of the team to come to her hotel room less than a day after they had arrived in this country, asking her if she had time to sit down with him and run one of the memory sessions, as they were called by the church. More commonly, however, the sessions were known as therapy, because that was what the sessions were in their purest form. Fenna Blok had never expected Owen de Vos to come to her door and ask her if she had time for that, but even though she found herself almost star struck by the star attacking midfielder, she managed to nod and wave him inside. “Are you with the Iron Church, or…?”
“No. My sister, Mia, has been with it for awhile though and she told me that you guys are good with… She called it therapy, said that it was some kind of memory session that's supposed to put me at peace with the past,” Owen replied, walking in and setting his backpack down at the door, and sitting down at one of the chairs behind Fenna’s desk by the window, where there was some kind of machine set up. That was where they did the therapy, he believed, and he was right.
The machine was pretty simple, with two metal rods that were connected to it by cables, and a screen on either side that showed the readings from the rods. It looked advanced in a way, but really, it worked with a simple method, the rods picking up an electric current when gripped that moved a needle on the screens. According to the church, the needle could read emotion, and was used to tell if someone was able to successfully move past negative thoughts and memories. “She sent you to the right place. Our specialty is self improvement through the curing of traumas. Do you need me to explain how it all works?”
“No, Mia told me the basics. I'm just going to sit down and you're going to ask me some questions and look at what that machine does, right?”
“Yes, that's the procedure. The machine is called a meter, and to put it simply, it measures the mass of your thoughts when you hold the rods,” said Fenna, and then she sat down across from Owen, smoothing her blonde hair back and looking over the boy that was in front of her. “When you're ready, just pick the rods up, and I'll start with some basic questions. Oh, and it’s standard procedure for you to close your eyes during this.”
Owen closed his eyes, and picked up the two rods. He wasn't sure about how accurate the science was, but he had promised Mia that he would have an open mind, and so he didn't say anything. “Ready.”
“Alright. Well, Owen… Let’s begin with an easy question. What bothers you the most? I know you've had a lot of trouble with different things throughout your life, but right now, what's the one thing that bothers you more than anything? You don't have to answer immediately.”
There were a few seconds of silence, and Owen kept his eyes closed as he pondered the answer. “Love. I would say that love bothers me more than anything, because I had it in the past and now I'm missing it.”
“Why do you say that you once had love and that you're missing it?”
“Because… I was sure that me and my ex, Hailey Maren, were going to be together forever. We were as close as a couple could be for a bit, and then it all blew up in our faces and we both did things that we regret. I'm not the best when it comes to keeping relationships good-”
“Wait a minute, stop. The needle just picked something up, and it looks like it wasn't because of what you just said. What did you think about just now, when you mentioned losing relationships?”
Owen paused, searching his own mind for the answer. “I just thought of my family, and not having good relationships with my parents or most of my other relatives. You might have heard, but I left home early and I hadn't returned there for a long time, not until a little while ago, in fact, when we had an off day at the Forge.”
Fenna nodded, and took a few notes. “Okay, let's talk about that. Because it looks like deep down, some of your problems lie in the past and have roots in your family. We’ll see if that's the case, and we can try to remove those memories from your reactive mind, which means that they won't come back and affect your behavior without you realizing it. A lot of our bad decisions and troubles are because of our reactive minds dredging things up from the past and letting it affect us without us knowing, but that's why we have the church. We heal people by moving those memories back from the reactive mind, the one that brings problems back up, to the analytical mind, the one that lets you think clearly. And while it will likely take multiple sessions, we can try to do that with you…”
“Right, let's get to it, then,” said Owen, finally opening his eyes and making eye contact with the girl across the desk from him for the first time since starting the session. With the Nephara match looming on the horizon, the last thing that Owen needed was to be in a bad state of mind for it, and hopefully this would have some effect… He wasn't the religious type of person and he didn't have much experience with this church, but if this was supposed to help him move on and if it was supposed to clear his mind before the match, he was willing to give it a chance. After all, it was a lot of pressure going onto the shoulders of a nineteen year old academy player, and even while being stars because of the media coverage of them, the players of the youth team and of the Generation Next team were still human.
~
While Owen was with Fenna after training, the rest of the star group of players were gathering in the room of Chiara Altera, for a late lunch and a few moments of relaxation before they would soon be thrust into the spotlight when they went out to play Nephara in their opening match. These players had formed, based on knowing each other outside of the national team, something of a clique of some of the best and most gifted, that was also made up of players who were looked up to as leaders in some means. And Chiara, she was the unofficial head of this group. “I see Silas, Jon, and Alexis, but where's Owen?” she asked, looking away from the television at her teammates that had just entered the room.
“No clue, he ducked out of training a little bit early,” shrugged Alexis Valente, setting down her backpack and pointing it out to the others. “I do know that I brought the ‘refreshments’ though. Coach doesn't want us getting turned up on game day, but he said nothing about the couple of days before the match. I have Luxus Grass, and some things that are more acidic if that's what ya’ll prefer.”
“Perfect,” said Silas de Jong, who had his own bag that had food instead of drugs and drinks. “Oh, and Chiara, I believe Owen said he was going to see that Priestess that's traveling with us, Fenna something. He said he was going to try to clear his mind because he couldn't get focused for the match, and that his sister Mia told him that the church could help.”
Chiara raised an eyebrow, looking momentarily upset before her face returned to its normal calm expression. “The Iron Church is pseudoscientific bullshit,” she stated flatly, rolling her eyes slightly. “Of course he decides to hang out with the cute blonde, too… And of course he doesn't bother to tell me that he's doing that, he acted like he was going to come here with the rest of us. What a great friend, eh?”
“Jealous much?” asked Jon Laxalt, taking this as a chance to sit down next to Chiara on her bed and caress her shoulder. “And the church isn't as bad as people say. Yeah, they have some weird theories, but I know people that genuinely feel better because of their teachings and practices-”
Chiara smacked his hand away from her shoulder, folding her arms and clenching her teeth. “Owen is just so frustrating sometimes. I stick with him through the accusations and controversy and stuff and he can't even repay me by hanging out like the rest of you are doing-”
“There's more fish in the sea, Chi,” Jon said, before Chiara elbowed him hard in the stomach and glared at him.
“Leave it, Jon. Can't you see that she's feeling betrayed right now? It doesn't seem like a big deal to you, but she's in pain,” Alexis replied, somewhat defensively of her friend, and she found a bottle of vodka in her bag and tossed it across the room to Chiara. “Catch!”
The keeper looked up just in time to see the bottle flying towards her, and snatched it out of the air with one hand before cradling it close to her body as if she had just made a big save. “Your aim is shit, Lex,” she said, before uncapping the bottle and taking it to the head, only lowering it after a few seconds and then coughing from the way that it burned her throat.
“How can you do that?” Silas asked, sounding genuinely curious. “That bottle is from Red Hill… Shit’s strong, yo. It's impressive that you lasted that long before coughing.”
“How do I do it? Well, to start off, I've had a lot of disappointments,” Chiara replied, taking a few more sips before capping the bottle and setting it down on the floor. “Yeah, it burns, but at some point the vodka will ease more pain than it causes.”
Alexis shot Chiara a sympathetic look, with an understanding that the others didn't seem to have. This, of course, was because of their history before Chiara was with the Forge and before Alexis had moved to Independent for big money, and even before Alexis was a player in the youth system of Central Portus. No, they knew each other because of growing up in the same bad neighborhood and playing for the same elite junior team, the Portus Park Harlequins, who were the junior affiliate of Academy United. “Chi, if you never get going with Owen like you obviously want to, remember that I'm always here for you and remember that I swing both ways,” she said, causing a few snickers among the others.
“Feeling thirsty, Alexis?” asked Jon, still sitting next to Chiara on her bed. “All of you from Portus need to pick a side and stick with it,” he added, referring to the way that Portus had a certain kind of urban liberalism that saw the city behave very… Libertarian. Not only was it the head of the Minarchist Party, but the city was known for being very open to a lot of different things, ranging from different sexualities to the legalization of almost every substance to freedom of speech that often went to extremes and had on some occasions in the past protected actual terrorists.
“Says the guy who had a boyfriend for a couple of years before coming to fame in Mezina. You seem interested in a Chloe Catori, and yet it's not that hard to find pictures of you with your old boyfriend… What do you know about picking a side and sticking with it?” Alexis fired back, her voice razor sharp. If a cutting tone could actually cut, Jon likely wouldn't have survived that remark.
“Pictures can be taken out of context, and at least I'm not taking advantage of my good friend feeling down about her crush so I can make moves on her-”
“Then why were you just sitting on her bed and rubbing her shoulder?”
“Oh my god, shut the fuck up!” Chiara snapped, tired of hearing her friends going back and forth. “You guys don't even know for certain if I like Owen like that or not, and it's not going to make me like you more if you go back and forth with each other over stupid shit like this and try to fight over me! Alexis, you have a nice body and you're one of the most confident people I know, but just because I'm from Portus doesn't mean I swing both ways. Jon, you're hilarious sometimes and you have a good heart if someone is willing to look past the occasionally annoying exterior, but also remember that I would be embarrassed to date someone with a body like yours. You're practically a skeleton, and a very short one at that. Anyway, the point is, I like both of you and it hurts to see you taking shots at each other, so please don't do that. Understood?”
“Crystal clear,” Alexis said, while Jon was silent and seemed insulted by the description that Chiara had given of him. “Let's talk about something else then, something that's not about Owen or about you. The match, let's talk about that. Because right now, that's the only thing we should be worrying about…”
~
The atmosphere when the Black Arrows came out to face Nephara in their opening match was much more intense than anything most of the players were used to, as youth prospects. The Iron Guard had brought about ten thousand traveling fans from the islands and the first thing the players noticed when they came out was the amount of banners hanging over the advertising boards at the closest goal, and the noise and color of the fans. There were flags being waved, copper colored smoke drifting from the stands to the pitch and giving the whole area a ghastly appearance because of the thin level of smoke on the pitch, and the fans had been banging at the drums since before the players entered the pitch.
And when they did enter, the place erupted. The stars of the Syndicate were met by applause and song, as the self proclaimed Orange Army picked up the noise levels and made it sound like it was the middle of the match, not before. When the players started their warmups, the fans went into another chant, a call and response one between two groups, and it made it feel like the stands were going to shake down. “Who are we!? Who are we!? We are the boys! WE ARE THE BOYS! We're from the Iron Guard and we’re gonna make some some noise! MAKE SOME NOISE! You're our boys! YOU’RE OUR BOYS! And you will see! AND YOU WILL SEE! We’ll sing the famous Arrows onto victory! TO VICTORY!”
As if the stand wasn't already rocking from the supporters, the whole group by the front of the stand started jumping too, making an interesting visual effect. The chant turned into a bunch of oles and jumping, and some of the players, including Chiara Altera, turned to the stand and applauded, because for them, this was all new. Soon enough, they would finish their warm up and they would line up for the anthems, before the captains shook hands and both sides returned to their ends of the pitch and got in formation for kickoff. The crowd was in full voice, the game was being broadcast on public television, and all of the friends and the families of the players would be watching.
No pressure.
When the match kicked off, it began with the Syndicate taking their game to the opponent and not letting the Nepharim team get settled at all. They chased Kubala and Aschenbach all over the midfield when they had the ball and didn't allow them to look for chances to pass to their teammates, and while Nephara was known for their strength and for their strong tackling, that was what the Ironite players used against them early on. The first real chance of the match came only five minutes after it began, when Juna Shine took on Starling prospect Evangeline Aschenbach in a one on one battle and won the ball before lobbing it over the top to Silas de Jong, who wasn't able to turn and strike the ball with the front of his boot to keep it from hitting the crossbar.
Still, the crowd applauded and acknowledged the effort that their team was putting in early, and the players fed off of the energy and doubled down as the adrenaline continued pumping early and the clock continued to tick up. It would be eight minutes into the match when Nephara finally got off a shot, but it was a far out one from Tristan Lovelock that would easily be parried out to the back line by Chiara Altera, who then pointed out where the center defender should have been and made sure that everyone knew about her disappointment. She was like a general, moving around her three defenders and making sure their spacing was perfect to make up for the lack of a fourth defender, and even during the times when Chloe Catori shifted position as a libero and left her with two true defenders, she stayed perfectly calm.
And that calm was what would get them their first goal. Tristan Lovelock had another chance after winning the ball between the midfield and defense, and he would pass a through ball behind Chloe Catori to Coppinger, taking advantage of Chloe not being able to turn her body in time to pick up another mark and block the ball. Coppinger would fire a shot off of the hands of Chiara, but as the two forwards charged in to try to pressure her as she went to collect the ball, she was able to pull off a skillful trick to get away from Lovelock before sending the ball into the midfield with a long kick.
Reinhard Li Fonti won the aerial duel with Ferenc Kubala, and then held off the box to box midfielder before passing to Ibrahim Mertens on the left flank, who went forward while the three main attackers also started to set up in and around the box, spreading out to challenge the defense. The Nepharim team was only just now getting back from their earlier attack, and Ibrahim was able to whip a low cross into the box that at least one player would get too….
And that player turned out to be Alexis Valente, who was able to keep the ball down and strike it just under the bar to go up one to nil, eleven minutes in. She looked shocked that her shot had made it into goal, and upon hearing the roar of the crowd behind them, she crossed herself and pointed to the sky, celebrating simply and walking back to the center circle as if she had been here and done this many times before. “Lex… Lex will tear you apart, again!” the fans in the Iron Guard shouted, as the celebration died down and the players returned to their positions.
“Nice goal,” remarked Owen de Vos, who had went for the cross but who hadn't been able to reach it before Alexis did. “Let's get another one before the half and put this thing on ice before they can gather themselves…”
But he didn't know that they wouldn't be the ones striking before the half. The next stretch of the match would see them reverting to their possession based style and would see them keeping the ball away from their opponent, but they wouldn't be able to break down the defense when it was in position and they would struggle to connect the midfield and forwards. Their opponents would be the ones to draw blood next, and it would be another pass from Lovelock to Brigitte Coppinger. Except this time, she would turn on her heel and shoot around Chloe Catori and into the corner of the net, where Chiara couldn't reach.
“Step it the fuck up, Chloe!” Chiara shouted, grabbing her central defender by the shoulders and shaking her as she stared into her face, glaring at her. “Enough mistakes! If we lose this match, all the blame is going on you for all of these stupid mistakes and bad positions that you keep putting yourself in. Is it that hard to stay in position and pick up the forwards on time?”
“She's trying hard, Chiara,” said Jon Laxalt, Chloe’s club teammate. “Sometimes she's practically on an island against two forwards, there's bound to be mistake-”
“Try harder!” Chiara demanded, shoving Chloe hard in the chest and stepping back between the posts as the others watched the encounter. It was this disagreement and this disunity that would allow them to concede their second goal of the game. The first for Nephara had come in the thirty eighth minute, but the second would come close to stoppage time, in the forty fourth.
Chiara would once again have a back line that wasn't in the mood to listen to all of her instructions, and Harper Smekel would charge forward far too far on the attack, allowing Kubala to win the ball and set up Aschenbach to make a pass downfield to Lovelock, who trapped the ball in space and then shot the ball from the edge of the box before anyone could close down on him, with Harper not being in position. Chiara had gotten a hand on the shot but hadn’t been able to keep it out of the back of the net, and suddenly, the Black Arrows were down for the first time in the match. “I've got no words for you all! If you three want to be the reason that we lose, so be it! Harper, you weren't in the right position, and a Chloe and Julius should have covered when they saw that you weren't there. We're never winning anything playing like this…”
And so they would go into halftime down 2-1 after their great early performance, and they would receive a team talk from Chase Dekker about none other than unity and playing like one team, not a bunch of individual players who happened to be wearing the same shirt. This wasn't street football, he had told them. Teamwork was important and if everyone continued to do their own thing, they would get torn to shreds in the second half by a higher ranked team that was now motivated well after getting two goals somewhat easily to go up at the half. When the players came back out, they were determined to apply the points from that team talk and play like they had in the early match: as one unit, one aggressive unit that never let their opponents get comfortable with the ball and that was always looking for the big chance to score.
That was how they would have to play if they were going to win, and that was how they came out in the second half, pressing again and trying to control all of the possession by cutting off angles and using their large midfield to hold the ball for long stretches before getting it upfield. Early in that half, they had a number of different chances despite their possession phase being slower and keeping them from getting the ball forward too quickly. Owen de Vos had hit the bar, Silas had put a shot wide of goal, Alexis had been brought down in the box without a penalty. But the golden chance that would result in a goal would come from a moment of brilliance from Owen.
He found himself with the ball at his feet in the area around the box, and Konrad Vornander coming after him, but he would knock the ball through the legs of the center back and surge forward, before taking advantage of the defense keying in on him to make a pass to Silas, who was just onside and who was able to rush for the ball and tap it into the goal as Rustwyth focused on coming out to stop Owen from walking the ball into goal. That was an impressive looking sequence that had gotten the crowd on their feet, and now, it looked like they had a game on their hands once again. The Arrows were making less mistakes that hurt themselves, and now, they were the side that could sense the reluctance and doubt in the opposition as the more famous nation failed to put them away.
The winner, however, would come late. It would be the seventy eighth minute, and Chase Dekker would finally send his team forward after having them control most of the possession since their goal, pressing when the other team had the ball and trying to win it back and get it back into the midfield as soon as possible. But there weren't obvious cracks in the defense to exploit, and Chase had told his team to step up the attack late and spend less time trying to possess the ball, because in this match, a win would be a much better result for them in the standings than a draw would be.
And that was how Owen de Vos once again found himself in an attacking position, after receiving a pinpoint pass from Juna Shine on the other side of the pitch that forced the defense to rapidly switch to cover the other end. He was matched up against the older Lux Vicelich, and he approached slowly, not revealing what he planned to do with the ball. And when the left back lunged in for a hard tackle, he knocked the ball to the inside and chased after it, managing to evade the tackle completely and setting himself up with a good chance to shoot or pass. But seeing that Vornander would be able to block a potential shot, he waited for the defender to commit to the block before pulling the ball to his other foot and rifling a left footed shot into the upper corner of the goal, that would once again send the crowd into a frenzy.
While the crowd went crazy and his other teammates looked for him for a celebration, he just ran to the sideline where the cameras were and posed for them, before turning and saluting the crowd. “Goal, for the Iron Syndicate!” announced the stadium addressor. “Scored by number eight… Owen de Vos!”
The Iron Guard cheered, and some of the neutral fans and a lot of the opposition fans whistled because of his reputation, and even some of the Syndicate fans that weren't there under the banner of the Guard whistled him. But he just waved his arms upwards, telling them to jeer louder. He was turning into a villain, yes, and maybe one of the biggest villain figures in the tournament, but that was fine. Because he was also a leader, and he was also a winner.