Figment I, Part 3 - Intro
The Maison Misiriyaa, to those who had visited the place, was a mystique chronotope of confusion, dreams and feelings that coexist alongside the sportspeople of this northerly nation. Of course, when the sporting Multiverse's biggest sports agency is personally involved in housing of the athletes, so young and diversely-minded, contracted to Montreal Koreana, it is expected for the space to generate a certain atmosphere of fresh spirit no less refreshing.
Mesdames et messieurs...entering the pitch for the first time....Jean-Christophe Babin!
The debut of Jean-Christophe Babin, the first resident of the house, was the one that rang freshly into the minds of Pierre McCarthy, Jean-Christophe and the others residing at the house at the time. Standing in middle of the snow-filled turf, they could remember the very moment when Jean-Christophe, warming himself on the sidelines like how every diligent prospect would, before being given a gentle tap on the shoulder to replace slowly-aging starter in Louis Kuelvic on the 79th minute.
To many, this was just another day where a highly-talented prospect, from the most famous academy side of this country from their winningest side, was going to play for the first time. Being the club with likes of Karl Varsteeg, Zachary Fortin, and Michel Fillion (yuck!) coming out of its academies, this was nothing, but to the initial class of residents this had meant a ton for their bonds had continued well past the initial awkwardness of living together...with their agent who wasn't always around, but at least tried his best. 'Save this picture!' Pierre McCarthy remembered Mario Itsumi, then a 15-year basketball prospect from Nunavut, shouting as Pierre took a picture of him.
''And now the Grim Reapers are serving for the championship....the serve reception goes wide! MacDonald hits the chance ball...And they have done it! GRIM REAPERS HAVE DONE IT! GRIM REAPERS HAVE DONE IT! Coming into the final, Defending champions, HUElavia has been as ready as they were, having played in three out of last four championship finals, but Quebec, outstanding performance in the knockout rounds, have done it!'
Back in that Volleyball World Expo (OOC: a year before the start of season 7, so three years after season 6), everybody was watching Natalie Wesoloski-Okafor's games all tournament long at home. Pierre remembered, before and during every Grim Reapers match, there being plenty of thoughts exchanged between Matteo, Zinaida, Arabella and others over the living room table, about how daunting it must be to be compared as one of the best in the world, and to be scrutinised in every angle after each game.
The unenforced errors...they are the scariest things that only put the limits to the phrase 'sky is the limit'... Pierre recalled a thought that brushed past his head at the time, in a competition that pitted so many of the international stars who were bound to face each other every year. Some more frequent than others due to heading to a top three league in Quebec, Mytanija and Bollonich, but no less easy for rest either. Something that had not really come in the minds of any of them - but then who would? Not everybody had lived in the same world of expectations, and only so few- Kate Huitema-Omeasoo and Erin Kang, and now their OG friend Jean-Christophe- were able to say that they knew the weight of the world....
And sometimes tough choices have to be made...
Of course, this had required a bit of sacrifice on Pierre McCarthy's part as well, as he made his decision to permanently move to Montreal and the Maison Misiriyaa/McCarthy. When he had really left his home country for Ceni, only to return for his business trips, the country was still in middle of its decadelong absence from international football and was undergoing major power struggles from within re: its sporting organisations. Now, the country was gradually on its upswing and those who had spent their twenties and thirties during those troubled times were now the ones watching from the sidelines, whether as coach, administrator or just a parent to their kid(s) playing sports.
Of course, he was not the exception from this either, for he has a daughter who reps Quebec in tennis, a sports it's not really known for either. Arabella, who was brought to this world as an accident by the chance of contraceptives failing to work on one night stand back in his junior year with University of Ceni, was now twenty and have had plenty of professional record in her career. Arabella, one of the 2052 Olympians least heard of the Quebecois media, was settling into ups and downs of her tennis career, and it was hard for Pierre and everybody else to figure her heard out at times.
'But guys....no matter what, we are one. Always were, are and will be. Together we dream as one.'
But Pierre knew that, no matter how different their understanding of the world were, the fragments of dreams and the Mount Atlas in the very art deco house were always going to bring these lads and lasses together. It meant being forged around the brotherhood and the sisterhood of not only those who have served for the sports club of Montreal Koreana. It meant living together in a house that disappear into the night's veil but always come back to the wanderer as a base camp. Finally, it meant that those who leave behind their pieces of heart and soul here be able to retrieve them whenever in need on various corners of the world they lived in, and never find themselves alone.
Figment II, Part 3 (3 years ago)
The weight of it all.
The final practice of the season had just ended, and coach Hwang dismissed them for the month of June - the IFCF commitments weren't going to commence until July, and it was generally advised for the coaches not to overburden the players with unnecessary team practises that could get them injured. It had worked well for Hwang Joon-Ho's Montreal Koreana so far into his tenure, with the team once again winning a crucial Q-League title, and the reward came in the form of everybody hurrying themselves into their month of summer holidays. Coach Hwang, the assistants and the physiotherapist were going to stay longer at the team lounge on the top floor of the complex's football division building, but this was more or less to get things settled. So Zinaida was all alone, and was contemplating whether to fly back to Prince Eric tomorrow morning, or to stay a week before making a decision.
Home...is so far...where I have spent so long, had once known everybody but is it really...
Zinaida was already inside the deserted women's locker room of the Practice facility, and she was looking before her mother's clothes that aligned perfectly on the hanger. It was unusual for any player, no matter her story, to put the clothes of their deceased parents on the hanger, let alone for two years, and Zinaida kept the fact mostly to herself as a way of remembering the past life back home. The blouse was perfectly pale in colour and carefully woven in fabric, while the jeans held the shades of indigo whose age had started to reflect with how its blue hues had paled. An elaborate thunderbird necklace, doused and elegantly carved in silver, had patterns all eyes would be drawn into, and she had worn them twice on team functions, tying her heritage - her father was an indigenous man of respected status in Prince Eric society - with grace whenever its services were needed. While she, who would rarely speak to the media beyond basic answers and kept to the closest group of friends of Maison M circles, seldom spoke about her family, there were glimpses like this that would remind people now and then.
But no matter what, I stay rooted to who I am.
Of course, on top shelf, Zinaida placed her Prince Eric Athletics cap for the summer season, when baseball would be played all over the pitches - this including her hometown, where the small-town Athletics held a cult-like popularity thanks to their consistent struggle for survival. Zinaida thought to herself as a tiny teardrop came out of her left eye, and she took a step back.
Have I lost too much...I know I don't regret any bit of my decisions but all that I've lost for a lifetime given to me....of chances... Zinaida thought once again, before picking up her cap and then wearing it over her head. It was going to be a long drive back to the Maison Misiriyaa from the Complex tonight, especially with what's a 20 minute drive of flat streets and then a minor hill going to feel like a 2 hour drive over the mountains of sentiments.
All to prove...and I have done so. But there's so much more.
Perhaps it was the weight of the world, or the fact that Zinaida Woodcarver held the key to the world of her choices, but the one with massive weight of own. On the evening of signing her first professional contract with Montreal Koreana, Zinaida had found out from Pierre McCarthy, her agent who naturally became her landlord alongside other, like-minded Montreal Koreana sportspeople of her age, that Pierre had done it all out of an unfulfilled duty. The duty...the duty... Zinaida felt that word shimmer into her consciousness as she closed the locker. She remembered how Pierre's left hand, which seemed frozen and unmoving the entire week of their connaissance, shook violently. When asked about the tremor, Pierre briefly mentioned to her about his juvenile days - how tensions flew between him and her mother Elora, how he had committed a pair of mistakes that shattered everything between them as high school sophomores, and how the list of what if's had weighed on the back of his head for many years.
The leap of faith that is.
But at the end of it stood a horizon, and while she has yet to figure out when the clouds would clear and she would be able to properly see the sun rise form it, Zinaida knew it was going to happen sooner than later. This has yet to really come post-her parents' death, but there's that hope that have inched closer and closer each and every step of the way. At least on the surface this was the case - A pair of excellent seasons, a national team call-up, representing the country at the U18WC and the DBC, seeing her name marked on the big 3 of The Gaegyeong Gazette, Le Mazepa and The Taegukgi (even though she really only read Le Mazepa, much to the disappointment of more conservative readership of the intellectual circles that formed the backbone of The Koreana Society), and being invited to every function imaginable....Zinaida were slowly climbing the walls on the surface.
Brick by brick.
But there's still lot more for Zinaida, and her friends, to grow into figures bigger than their material or external selves. In this city, and the Complex they spend their countless hours for, the bricks themselves represented the very foundation required of success that would not only carry them into professional successes, but life beyond it as well. So many legends had graced these brick walls and the murals since the early 20th century, but only a few dozen were remembered past the quintessential sands of time and dust. While Zina and her friends all started off well, time would tell if they could survive the trials of it all.
