#fanteam

The school logo, the school is in Tokyo kinda near Nekoma and their animal is a jaguar!

Now we have the first lot of players :D starting with the first years.

And some little meme with them

This one is dedicated to Kosmo, who chose this path /lh

"You guys were a hlockey team??" Riley says in disbelief.

It's been a few weeks since the first game of the season, and as time goes by, Riley and Haruta, the two players recruited for the active roster who weren't part of the original team, are just learning about the history of the Skates.

"Yep!" Eli smiles. "We loved playing team splorts, so after we couldn't play hlockey anymore, Nagomi made us this blaseball team!"

Haruta claps in applause, and Eli strikes a pose, but Riley frowns. "But, why couldn't you play hlockey anymore?"

Eli pauses thoughtfully, "Honestly? That's more of Aureliano’s story to tell than mine. It was after he got injured the second time so you should probably ask him.”

Riley doesn't miss the way Haruta mouths 'The second time?', but he ignores that in favour of thanking Eli and dragging Haruta over to Aureliano.

"Aurel!" Haruta waves, and Aurel waves at them with his detached prosthetic arm that he's fiddling with.

"Hey guys! How's it going?"

Aureliano Mason is always covered in some sort of mechanical oil and is constantly tinkering with stuff, though they keep trying to stop him from doing so.

The most noticeable fact about him is the two wings sticking out of his back. They're about the proper size to allow him full flight, though this means it's hard for him to fit through doorways and in enclosed spaces. 

Doesn't stop him from making attempts to fit in places he shouldn't be, however.

In the short time Riley has known him, he has gotten stuck 5 times in different places he shouldn't have even tried to fit in, having to be pulled out by an exasperated Eli and a worried Wyatt every time.

“Eli said you probably know more about why the Skates couldn’t play hlockey anymore, we’re curious.” Haruta explains. 

Aurel tilts his head curiously. "Well, I guess I could tell you a little story about that, if you want?"

They both nod, sitting down beside him on the bench.

"Hmm… Where to start… I guess it was the second time I got put in the hospital for hlockey related injuries…"

<0>

After the accident, the first person to visit Aureliano in the hospital is Nagomi, the captain of the Skates hlockey team.

He isn't sure on what he expects her to say, but "Was it worth it?" as Nagomi pulls up a chair to his bedside is definitely not anywhere close.

He zones out a bit, he is on a LOT of painkillers, as Nagomi stares expectantly. Eventually she snaps her fingers in his face to get his attention.

"Losing your other arm and both of your legs. Was it worth it." She says, and he feels more than hears the bite in her tone. 

He closes his eyes. "I don't know." He whispers, his head lolling to the side. Nagomi reaches over and brushes his bangs off to the side as he opens his eyes to gaze tiredly at her. 

"You didn't struggle when you lost the first arm nearly as much as you're going to struggle now." She mutters at him, gently fiddling with the bandages that cross his forehead from another injury sustained in the fight.

"Better me than Wyatt." He fires back, it's a weak response and they both know that. Wyatt Morse, despite his sensory issues causing him to cover his eyes a majority of the time, has never got into a life threatening hlockey fight and lost limbs before. Aurel has done it twice now and now has no more limbs to lose except his wings, which escaped both fights unscathed, somehow.  

Nagomi rolls her eyes regardless. "All you're doing is causing him more stress." This does snap Aurel's attention a bit, and he bites his lip. This was the realization in the aftermath after his first fight too, when Wyatt came into his hospital room nearly inconsolable, and spent so much of his time at the hospital in the coming months that King and Nagomi had to stage an intervention for his own well being.

"I'm going to be in here for a lot longer." Aurel sighs, and Nagomi nods. "Fuck."

Nagomi snorts at that. "Fuck is right."

Aurel sighs again and rolls his head back to a neutral position. He realizes through the haze of painkillers that the hospital staff left his prosthetic on his left arm, the one he lost in the first fight. He holds it up to his vision, flexing his fingers and listening to the sound of the metal joints clicking and whirring.

He does this for a while. Evidently Nagomi realizes how bad his focus is right now, because she doesn't comment on the flexing and unflexing, just tilts her head and waits to see if he will say anything.

"Gomi" Aurel whispers, “I really fucked it up this time, huh?”

She sighs. What do you even say in this situation? There's no going back after limb amputation if you have regular human genetics, albeit with a birdlike twist, like Aureliano does.

There's nothing she can say to make it better. Instead, she changes the subject. "The league is kicking you off the team."

"They're… What??" Nothing she's said has captured his attention as fast as this does.

"They have deemed you a hazard to the safety of the players in the league and they're kicking you off the team." Nagomi states. The tone of voice she uses is factual, she doesn't cushion the blow. 

"I never started either of those fights." Aurel whines, "Both of those assholes were using excessive force against Wyatt! What was i sposed to do? Let it slide?" 

"Why wouldn't you stop when the Zamboni got involved?" Nagomi responds patiently. "According to them, your inability to stop is the problem here."

Aurel sighs. He can't deny that, she's right. 

"Part two. I'm pulling the team out of hlockey." 

He's thrown again. "What do you mean by that?" 

"We're a team." She says. "When we became a team I swore to myself that I would protect all of you, and I'm not letting a stupid admin issue tear us apart." 

It's been a while since Aurel has seen her look this smug. "So… What?" 

"I'm making us a blaseball league." 

He blinks. "None of us have played blaseball." 

Nagomi shrugs. "If they're gonna ban us from hlockey, I'm gonna prove to them that they're gonna miss us." The smug grin persists, and Aurel knows Nagomi well enough to know she pretty much has this all planned by now.

But..

"...You know what happened in the ILB though." 

"Fuck that." She scoffs. "If I'm making my own league, I'm making my own rules. No funny business, no weird weather, nothing." She crosses her arms, leaning back in the hospital chair.

"It feels like a really dramatic move to make a whole league in a different splort just because we can't play hlockey anymore." Aurel states, looking over at Nagomi curiously, "How are you even going to find teams?"

Nagomi hums, "The market is open for a semi-pro Canadian league. I figure if I advertise well enough, we'll have people lining up to form teams."

"And what does Parker think about this?" Aurel says flatly, "You know his history with the ILB." 

"We know his supposed history with the ILB." Nagomi corrects, "Nothing we know about his involvement in anything has come from the man himself. I'm not going to force him to stick around if it hurts him, but this is literally my last option to keep us together." 

Aurel sighs, and Nagomi gently grabs his hand. "I know its not ideal, but I wanted us to play splort as a team and well, maybe I'm too stubborn to let it go but…" She looks away, gazing out the window.

"I get it." Aurel whispers, "I don't want to let you guys go either. You're all like a family to me, y'know?"

"Yeah." Nagomi squeezes his hand before letting go. "Now that the heavy stuff is out of the way, I'm gonna go tell the nurse and everyone else that you're awake."

Aurel chuckles as she leaves the room. Blaseball huh?

<0>

"And I mean, that's pretty much it." Aurel shrugs, finally reattaching his other arm. "Nagomi said 'I'm using my family's money to make a league.' And we all knew Gomi was stinkin rich but she never acts like it."

Riley nods in understanding. "She did it to keep you all together."

"Yup." Aurel gives a soft smile. "With the way she looks, sometimes it's hard to see she's got a soft side but the ol Commish is a real softie under all that gothic fashion!"

"I'll tell her you said that!" Pipes Eli from across the room, as he slings his snail shell backpack across his back. "We'll see what Gomi says when she hears you've been talking smack about her!"

Aurel gasps, vaulting himself across the room and hanging off Eli's arm. "Eliiiiiiii! don't tell her! She'll noogie me for DAYS! Have mercy!" 

Eli simply lifts his arm, his tall height and strength easily lifting Aurel, who is short and is built light for flight, even with his limbs being mostly metal. 

He walks out of the room, bickering with Aurel the whole time, who continues to cling. He waves to Haruta and Riley as they go.

"Quite a fun little group we've ended up with, huh Haruta?" Riley says, amused.

In the not-so-distant past…

Nagomi and Parker together are considered a bit of an enigma.

They’re a strange team, the woman who has enough money to start her own splorts league and has the most deadpan of stares and the colour palette to match the vibe, paired with a boy who’s family and origins are so prolific it doesn’t really matter who he is as a person and dresses like a book nerd. Everyone knows what Nagomi is like, and nobody cares about Parker past his family status.

They make a good team, in all honesty.

They're in the Commissioner's office in the Sharks stadium, filling out some paperwork for one of their newest players. The room is damp and a little cold, but Parker has enough leftover restless energy that he refuses to sit down, so he hands Nagomi papers to sign, while highlighting everything he deems important.

Parker has gradually found himself in the role as her co-commissioner by this point, because sitting still and doing nothing at home makes him antsy and herself or Eli can't always be around, what with the season starting up soon, he spends a lot of his time with her while she's doing Commissioner Business to stave off his own boredom and also he's very good at doing paperwork for some reason, hence why she now lets him help and take responsibility for half of her workload, instead of her coming home to him having done something ridiculous like organized all her spices by colour palette and somehow twisted his ankle in the process.

Today’s paperwork is just as boring as all the other paperworks. You’d think by owning her own league she would be able to decide how much paperwork she would like to do but nope, she forgot about how ‘legal people’ function, and is forced to make sure everything is in order legally. 

Paperwork is so goddamn boring that Nagomi starts Thinking. About her league, and about Parker and how he hates being called Parker.

She catches the way he flinches whenever someone refers to him, notices the way his body tenses up, the way his eyes grow distant. He is good at hiding it from ordinary people, but Nagomi isn’t ordinary people.. She doesn’t know exactly why he would have this reaction, but she can hazard a guess, with the guess relating to why the current commissioner of the ILB is ‘Parker MacMillan IIIII’

Part of the conundrum of being known for your name being ‘Parker MacMillan’, is that everyone knows about Parker MacMillan 3, 4, and 5. The naming scheme implying there was a 2 and a 1 but no information on either of them leaves a lot to the imagination.

Her Parker is not fond of this connection, so she starts making up nicknames in her head, funny or cutesy little things like 'Parks' or 'Pmac' or 'Milly'. She honestly doesn't know if he would prefer to change his name entirely, so she never actively calls him any of these, just observes.

Once they finish the paperwork, Nagomi gives a sigh of relief and stretches her arms behind her head with a yawn, the wings on her head flapping restlessly and shifting a few of the paper stacks. 

Parker finishes organizing everything, including the shifted papers. His body seems to realize that he has pushed past his limit, he lets out a small gasp before his muscles seize and his knees buckle and he falls hard to the floor, though he manages to keep himself from fully falling by catching his left arm on the edge of Nagomi's desk. 

Nagomi makes a squawking sound, quickly jumping out of her chair, kneeling beside Parker, she wraps an arm around his back, and slowly leverages him to sit on the floor, instead of trying to stand again like he was trying to do.

“Easy, Parks, easy…” Nagomi soothes, she squeezes his shoulder reassuringly as he lets out a pained noise.

But wait, she used a nickname, Fuck. Hopefully he doesn’t notice.

“I'm always good for taking a break on the floor, you know how I feel about you overdoing it.” This one is a bit of a pointed jab, Nagomi still has no idea how Parker can manage to ignore his pain til it makes him collapse, though she also tends to go into a similar hyper focused state. They're both very bad at this 'health' thing. Nagomi considers herself lucky she has no lasting injuries from carrying out the family business for so many years.

Parker lets out a shaky sigh through gritted teeth, and Nagomi can see him flexing his toes through his shoes. The little watch that he wears lets them both know that he's in a significant amount of pain, based on the fact that it starts beeping out his heart rate, which it only does when it's elevated or slowing down.

Parker swats at his watch, rolling his head across his shoulders and attempting to breathe deep and even, but it seems he's shocked his system to the point where it's not going to be as easy a fix as breathing deep.

They gradually maneuver Parker over to a couch where he can lay down. Take the pressure off his legs for a while. Nagomi flits around, grabbing a blanket, dimming the lights, fetching some water, all that good stuff. 

Parker sighs from the couch, "Stop hovering." he mutters, "I'll be good in a minute." 

“Yeah, bullshit. I’m gonna call your bluff. Take some pain meds and take a nap for a while.” Nagomi rolls her eyes, taking a small pill out of the bottle, she makes sure he takes it with water and sits on the floor next to him. 

Eventually he stops breathing so hard, the beeping of his watch quiets down and eventually he falls asleep.

Nagomi sighs, shifting up to a kneel as she looks over his sleeping form. His face is still slightly pinched even in sleep, the gray stitches on his face making him look even more pained somehow, even though he had told Nagomi that they don’t hurt him.

She gently pats his hair a few times, fondly. The sort of emotion only certain people are allowed to see her have.

“I wish I knew how to help you, but I still can’t figure you out., not really.” Nagomi mutters. After a little bit of staring wistfully at Parker, she resumes her original position sitting on the floor.

They stay there for an hour or so before Parker wakes up. He looks around dazedly for a bit until he spots Nagomi. Despite her protests, he manages to plunk himself on the floor next to her.

“How long was I out?” He asks, and Nagomi hates how often he has to ask that.

“Bout an hour or so? Not like it matters, we were done for the day anyway.” She shrugs.

“Ugh” Parker wrinkles his nose. “Now I’m not gonna be tired later.” Nagomi snorts.

“It’s fine dude, we gotta get home before we worry about something as menial as sleeping tonight.” She stands up and stretches, but when she looks back, Parker is staring at the floor and worrying his bottom lip. 

“Something wrong?” She tilts her head. 

“I don’t know if I can… Walk, right now.” Parker whispers. He’s still avoiding her gaze.

Nagomi nods. “Don’t worry about it, I’ll go get the chair.” and she promptly turns on her heel and heads out of the room.

When she gets back, wheelchair in tow, Parker has apparently been attempting to stand up, using the couch as leverage. Nagomi rushes to his side. “I thought you said you couldn’t walk, dumbass!” She uses his attempt to ease him into the wheelchair. 

Parker covers his face with his hands and lets out a huge sigh. Nagomi kneels in front of him and looks at him questioningly. “Is… something wrong?” She tries. She doesn’t want him to force him, but it seems like something else is in play here.

“...You shouldn’t have to take care of me like this.” He starts, and she is about to protest when he continues on. “If my body would work like it's supposed to, I wouldn’t have all these problems!”

Nagomi can tell he’s frustrated, that's usually the reason he covers his face in a situation like this. He doesn’t like people to see his emotions. She takes a deep breath.

“I don’t mind having to care for you, and I’ll tell you over and over until you believe it.” Nagomi says, in a very no nonsense way. Parker uncovers his face a little and looks at her, his eyes are a little teary, but she isn’t sure if it's from emotions or pain.

She rests a hand on his knee. “Both myself and Eli, we don’t mind. I promise you Parker.” and there's the tiny flinch at his name. Now is not the time to get into that can of worms however.

Nagomi stands up. “Let's go home, okay?” Parker sighs, but nods. “Ten minutes, right?”

Primed and ready. The Saskatchewan Skates stand on the field, taking in the atmosphere of the stadium.

They’re not a hugely followed league, especially for being so new, but Haruta was honestly not expecting so many people to show up. She shifts her feet nervously and Eli, who is standing next to her, extends an arm and rubs her upper back. Haruta looks at him and he beams at her, having the time of his life out here on the field.

It’s absolutely unfair how Eli’s positive attitude affects her so much. She smiles hesitantly back at him and he is about to say something when a bit of microphone feedback rings out across the stadium.

Everyone looks in the direction of the sound. It’s Nagomi and Parker. Nagomi is fiddling with the microphone a little bit before she starts her announcement.

“Greetings!’ Echoes her voice across the stadium. “I’m Nagomi Seraph, and this is my Minor Canadian Blaseball League, or CMLB for short.” There is a polite applause from the spectators.

“For further introductions, this is Parker.” She gestures to Parker, who waves at the crowd. “He serves as my co-commissioner. Now that introductions are aside, this is our first game of the season, featuring the Saskatchewan Skates vs. the Eekburg Billiards!” More applause.

A different announcer lists off all the starting rosters for the teams. The Skates have Shirai Jaylee pitching today, while the Billiards have Julio Glass on the mound. 

Haruta sits next to Riley in the dugout, looking curiously out at the game. After a few outs, Riley speaks.

“We should have put me in first.” He states, his arms crossed. “Glass is their best pitcher, I would have had the best chance.” 

“Uh, have you been… studying the other teams?” Haruta asks. “Of course I have.” Riley sniffs disdainfully. “We’ll never get anywhere without some sort of strategy.” 

Haruta stares at him for a few seconds before the sound of a bat cracking can be heard from the field. The Skates fans in the stadium boo as the Billiards batter hits a home run, scoring two. 

Riley rolls his eyes as the player showboats around the bases.

“That's Chad James.” He says. “He’s played minor leagues before. The only reason he hasn’t made it up to the major leagues is because of his bad attitude. Let’s just hope that an early home run makes him cocky and he doesn’t hit any other balls.”

Evidently, Riley knew what he was talking about. The rest of the game is pretty much small ball. Some good base hits and only runners scoring, no fancy home runs. 

As the game went on, Haruta noticed Riley getting increasingly more irritated with Shirai’s pitching ability. He never said anything to Shirai herself between the innings, but Haruta saw how much he was keeping it in.

It all comes to a head in the ninth inning. Ryuji Krueger hits a nice triple to score Chad James, tying the score at 5-5. Riley jumps out of his seat, walking briskly over to Eli.

“Put me in.” He says, arms crossed. “Let me close out the inning so they don’t get up on us.” 

Eli looks… Unconcerned, with Riley’s posturing. “Nah, it's fine. It's literally the first game, no need to be so serious about it.” 

“We could win this game. Put me in so they don’t score any more. We have enough batting power to outscore them.” 

“Riley, it’s fine.” Eli rests a hand on his shoulder. Riley aggressively shakes the hand off and stalks off to the dressing room. 

Eli tilts his head as Haruta walks over to him. “What’s his deal? Something to prove?”

It isn’t until he says that, that Haruta realizes. “Oh.. Probably? He seemed really invested in the game.” Eli clicks his tongue. “He better get that under check. I don’t want him causing a fuss, especially cuz he’s one of the newbies. ‘Gomi’ll have his ass if he causes shit.”

That’s another thing. “I’ll talk to him?” Haruta suggests, but Eli shakes his head. “Let him steam til the game is over. I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

They end up winning the game with a nice home run from King, starting off a rally in the ninth by Wyatt Morse, Tyler Marijuana, and Oli Mueller.

Final Score, 5-8 Skates.

When the rest of the team walk into the dressing room, Riley stands up immediately. He walks over to stand in front of Eli, still tense. Everyone is wary, he’s putting off a lot of aggressive energy for being on the winning team.

“I have invested interest in this team winning.” Riley starts. “I have figured out strategies that will beat out all other teams. I will be strategizing and I expect that we will use some of them.” 

Eli clicks his tongue. “And why would I listen to the newbie posturing over his team captain?” Eli’s posture is relaxed, nonchalant. Haruta has no idea how he can act that way in this kind of situation. “You know we won right? We won our first game of the season. This isn’t the time to be worried about strategy.”

“Unlike the rest of you, I have things riding on my success.” Riley sniffs. He turns away from Eli.

Something about that really sticks in Haruta’s brain, and before she realizes it, she blurts out a retort.

“What? Because you’re a stats nerd you think none of us are capable?” It's not a very Haruta statement, Eli and some of the rest of the Skates look at her in surprise. Riley looks over at her in surprise too, obviously not expecting that kind of response, but he is immediately back on the offensive. “I hold myself to a higher standard than most people, yes. If the rest of the season continues on like this first game? There's no hope here.”

Haruta can feel herself getting a bit heated. “This isn’t the ILB! It's supposed to be fun!”

Riley is quiet for a few seconds, before he walks slowly over to Haruta and looks her directly in the eyes. “That’s exactly what Jaylen said back in Season 1. Look where it got her.”

Haruta breaks eye contact, shaking her head. “This isn’t about Jaylen! It’s about you!” She pokes Riley in the chest. “This league is about those people who want to play blaseball for the love of the game! Despite what happened to the ILB.” 

“I can’t forget what happened to her!” He hisses, “She died! They incinerated her!”

“They incinerated Sebastian twice!” Haruta yells. “Since you want to make this a fucking family issue! They alternated him and then he went up in flames twice! Don’t forget the stuff that's gone on with Jess either!” 

Riley at least has the heart to look a bit apologetic, right before they’re both doused with water. 

Haruta shrieks a little, frantically wiping water out of her eyes, Riley doing the same. They both look over to see King standing with a water cooler held over xer shoulder as Parker gives them a glare.

“Are you both done?” Parker says. In the face of authority, Haruta crumbles, nodding her head frantically. Riley nods once, and Parker sighs.

“You’re both lucky I’m not gonna tell Nagomi about this.” He massages the bridge of his nose. “I wasn’t expecting this from the two of you, especially Haruta.”

Haruta looks down at her feet, avoiding the gaze of everyone. She feels so embarrassed by her outburst now that the consequences are setting in.

But, Riley steps in to defend her. “It’s my fault, I was the one who started the argument with my bad attitude. I’ll be working on it.” 

“You better.” Parker hands them both a towel. “I’m only mildly sorry about the water. Seems like you both needed to cool off.” 

Riley squints at him. “Was that a pun.” To which Parker grins. 

“Now, who’s to say?” After making sure everyone is alright, Parker leaves the room.

As the rest of the Skates filter out, Riley and Haruta end up being the last two left. Haruta’s fingers had been shaking with anxiety the whole time she was packing up.  

She’s crouching next to her bag on the floor when Riley comes down to crouch next to her. He makes sure that she realizes he is there before he speaks.

“I’m sorry, Haruta.” 

She looks at him questioningly, a little wary. “I’ve been on edge today, and I believe I ended up taking it out on you. I didn’t mean for it to turn out like this.” 

Haruta breathes out a sigh, some of her anxiety lessening when she realizes that Riley is still willing to talk to her. She stands up, shouldering her bag, and Riley rises next to her.

“I’ll forgive you, on one condition.” She says, and Riley tilts his head.

“Name your condition.”

Haruta extends her arms in a hugging motion. “Bring it in. It's hug time.” 

“I.. what?” Riley looks at her, baffled. 

“You upset me, and I like hugs so you’re gonna hug me so I feel better.” She explains wiggling her fingers a bit.

“That is a weird condition, but alright?” Riley steps into her embrace. 

In Haruta’s opinion, Riley is the perfect hugging height. She can comfortably rest her head on his shoulder as they hug, and the longer she doesn’t make a move to let go, the more he relaxes into her hold.

“If you feel bad in the future, I can hug you.” Haruta offers. “I used to have to hug someone a lot whenever things happened to Jess or Seb.” 

Riley sighs shakily. “Maybe that’s why you seem like you’ve adjusted. Better than I have, at least.”

Haruta lets him muse on that instead of making a comment, squeezing him a bit tighter.

They eventually stop hugging. “It wasn’t weird that we hugged for so long, was it?” Haruta says nervously as they start walking towards the exit for the stadium. “I’m used to long hugs.” 

Riley hums. “It's been a long time since I’ve been hugged. It’s fine, it was nice.”

They reach the entrance. The drivers are waiting for the both of them. Haruta waves goodbye to Riley and steps out into the parking lot, until she hears Riley shout her name.

She looks back questioningly, as Riley does a light jog to catch up to her.

He abruptly sticks out a hand at her. “I think we got off to a bad start so… My name is Riley Hotdogfingers, I really do like playing blaseball, it feels like it's in my blood . Can we be friends?” 

Haruta smiles at him, accepting the handshake. “I’m Haruta Telephone, I’d like to improve my pitching because I love playing this splort as well. I would be honoured to be your friend.” 

Riley Hotdogfingers exits the car.

He has finally arrived at the stadium in a timely manner, after a long drive through many many miles of grain fields.

Well, kilometres. He should get better adjusted to the Canadian measurement systems. Celcius, kilometres, centimetres. All of the ones he never learned in school. 

The drive out was boring. He would have preferred to drive himself, but the person arranging his transport assured him he wouldn't have been able to find the stadium. Weird. One minute he's looking at his phone and the next the car is pulling up to the outside of the stadium. Double weird. 

"Go on in, take a left, keep walking and go down the third staircase you see, the one with the 'Staff Only' sign on it, and keep walking straight till you see the Commissioner's office." Says the driver, closing the door behind Riley.

He drives away, and Riley is left in front of a huge stadium, surrounded by nothing but flat farmland for kilometres and kilometres, with only a small bag of equipment. He looks around. The outside is normal. Pavement is new. Doors in the front are glass. The flag of Canada and the local team fly on the flag post. Overall, a normal looking stadium. Doesn't help how liminal it feels, but he presumes that's the trade off for the amount of space.

He shrugs off the feeling. He decided this path, and he was going to sew it through. 

Riley walks into the stadium, following the directions the driver gave, and finds himself in the underside of the stadium.

He looks around, and notices it's so… clean, down there. The staff only area looks almost clinical. The walls are an offwhite in colour. The hallway stretches on and on only broken up by the occasional unlabeled door. 

He eventually makes his way to the end of the hallway, to the door labeled 'COMMISSIONERS OFFICE' in handwritten sharpie marker, the only thing Riley has seen so far that looks anything but perfect.

He knocks on the door, shifting his bag on his shoulder nervously.

"Come in!" Says a voice from inside, presumably the Commissioner.

Now, when Riley was offered a position to play in this league, this unknown Canadian Minor League Blaseball, he didn't really know what to expect.

The league has no history, and was being funded by an unknown force willing to pay him so much more money than any minor league could ever dream of offering him down in the States. 

But there was the gamble, it was advertising itself as a Blaseball league, and he knows first hand what the Internet League Blaseball can do to a family.

He took the offer though, there was nothing left for him down in Seattle, not after everything, and now here he is, meeting with his future employer and hoping that this iteration of Blaseball doesn't end up being a bloodsplort.

He opens the door, steeling himself for what he might find inside, and takes a deep breath. 

Inside is.. a regular office. Actually, scratch that, a large office. A figure sits at the desk. Gold nameplate reads 'Nagomi Seraph, She/Her.' 

The person at the desk stands up and walks over to him.

Riley's first impressions of his new boss, are mixed in nature. Her outfit isn't professional.  She wears ripped jeans and a long red shirt with a hoodie pocket on it. Her shoes are red high tops. Her hair is fairly long and straight, with little black wings on her head. Her skin is pale gray, with many small scars. The with the most noticeable one sitting across her nose. 

Nagomi's face is serious. She stands a few inches shorter than him, and she has a commanding presence. She firmly shakes Riley's hand, welcoming him to the league, and gestures for him to sit in the chair across from her desk.

"As you can tell, I am Nagomi Seraph. I'm one of the two commissioners of the league, you'll meet the other one later." She starts. "The goal of the CMLB is to have a space for Blaseball players to have a league that they can play in to earn a salary, that isn't a risk to their lives like the ILB." She slides a book binder over to Riley. It has a blue cover with CMLB on it.

"This is the Player Manual, it outlines all the rules of the game and everything you are expected to follow. Until you have read everything and understand the situation, do not sign anything. I want it to be perfectly clear what is expected out of you playing in this league." She leans back in her chair, arms crossed.

Riley picks up the manual and reads through it. He has a relatively fast reading speed, but the more he reads the more he has to double back to understand. He looks at Nagomi in disbelief. "You started a league that pays their players… For fun?" 

Nagomi smirks. "Yep, that's it." 

"What the hell for? What do you gain from spending billions of dollars to make stadiums and draft teams?"

Nagomi laughs, standing up from her chair. "What do I gain?" She smiles, "Personally, I gain nothing. No, I'm doing this out of spite, for a friend, since I have the money to do it." Nagomi turns and walks over to the bookcase behind her desk, rifling through a few books.

It's a wild reason, spite. Something this expensive being for spite breaks Riley's brain a little bit, but the rules outlined in the player manual won't be hard to follow. Everything is easy to understand. So he signs the contract on the very last page. 

"Done." He says "Everything is sound. I'll play in your league." 

"Just like that?" Nagomi questions, placing a book from her shelf in front of him. 

"Just like that." He confirms. He flips through the book she gave him and sees it's full of information about his new team. Eli Quitter. King Dracaena. Atlas Short. Ten other names. It also has a few pages of information about the stadium and the league, presumably to get him used to living here.

"You'll be on the Saskatchewan Skates." Nagomi starts. "I know that having a team bias isn't good for the commissioner of the league but screw it, the Skates are my favourite team." She shrugs nonchalantly. "They'll be good to you, there's another player on the team who has ties to a prominent ILB player and I'm hoping you two get along." 

Riley nods, standing up from his chair. Nagomi shakes his hand again. "I look forward to seeing you out there. Your schedule is in the book, first practice is on Sunday, the driver will be outside to pick you up at 8am sharp. Don't be late." She ushers him to the door, 

"He'll be outside to drive you back as well, this place isn't exactly easy to get to." She scoffs, and he figures there's more to that statement than he realizes.

He's a little bit down the hallway when he hears Nagomi call his name. 

He turns around.

"Once again, Welcome to the CMLB." She waves, and shuts the door behind her.

When Riley gets home to his little rental apartment, he goes straight to bed.

He has a nightmare again. Umpire fire. His voice screaming his sister's name. The stadium around him burns. The Skates stadium rises from the ashes. 

Haruta Telephone is a fairly anxious person.

Sure, joining the CMLB seems like something that would cause her more anxiety, but just as her older twin siblings loved Blaseball, that same adoration for the core values of the game also stuck to Haruta and her twin Fuyuto.

Despite everything.

She wakes up at 6:00 am to the sound of her phone alarm blaring. Today's ringtone is a guitar wailing out a complicated riff, almost startling her awake.

She gets up, does a few stretches, and starts getting dressed. She pulls on her uniform for the first time, despite knowing it's only a practice today.

Okay, maybe she can't help being a little bit excited despite the nervous fluttering in her stomach. 

She has a new teammate. Finally, the team has rounded out the last of the pitching roster, meaning they finally have enough players to start practicing and playing real games.

Nagomi didn't mention her new teammate's name, but the look she gave Haruta was mischievous and just a tad menacing, which is a little nerve wracking. 

(She ended up calling Eli later in a panic, wanting reassurance that Nagomi hadn't put a serial killer or a person who hates phones to be their last teammate. Eli had to stop himself from laughing throughout the whole call)

Meeting new people is hard, she never quite got the grasp of in person charisma like her siblings. She hopes that everything will go well and she wont stutter over her words in her introduction.

Once Haruta is ready to leave, she waits for over an hour for her ride to come get her, during which time she checks all her messages and social media. When the driver finally arrives, she's in a great mental state.

Of course, by the time she gets to the stadium she's nervous again. 

When she walks in the front door, she looks off to the side to see a tall figure standing there, staring down at their phone. He is holding a cane in his other hand from the phone, his brown hair looking tousled to its normal messy degree and the blaseball style stitches on his face denoting to any who are in the know who he is. 

It's Parker, known formally as Parker MacMillan.1, the other commissioner for the league.

Parker looks up to the sound of the door opening and gives Haruta a wave, she squeaks out a small "H-hello, Parker!"

"Hello, Haruta. How are you today?" He responds, 

"I'm alright!" She says perhaps a little too eagerly, or well, nervously, but Parker just smiles kindly at her. He tilts his head in the direction of the locker rooms “Walk with me?” and Haruta nods.

"You weren't… waiting for someone, were you?" Haruta asks timidly, avoiding Parker's gaze. He gives a little chuckle.

"Not anyone in particular, you just happened to be today's lucky winner." 

They keep walking in silence, Haruta is still quite terrified of Parker due to his role as co-commissioner, even though he has been nothing but kind to anyone she's ever heard mention him. Old habits die hard, as they say.

"Are you okay?" She blurts out eventually. "Y-you're uh, favouring your left leg?" 

"Ah." He scoffs, "Twinged my ankle the other day. These bones of mine really like to cause a fit, and Nagomi always pesters me until I get proper aid." He rolls his eyes. 

Finally, they make it to the locker room, Haruta jogging lightly ahead to hold the door open for Parker, who rubs the back of his neck sheepishly and thanks her. 

Now, Haruta has met her teammates before, so she greets them almost as an automatic response. She steels her courage to greet the new player, but Parker calls for attention before she can.

"Morning everyone." He starts. "As most of you know, I am Parker and I'm the co-commissioner for the league. I'm here today because Nagomi's over in Zeromere, though I honestly don't know why she wanted me to watch everyone practice anyway." He shrugs.

"So, basically you're all free to do your practicing, your captain is Eli Quitter, over there by the cooler, and your co-captain is King Dracaena, to my left here, and the both of them are going to be directing the practice. Sounds good?" There's a murmur from the room and a lot of nodding heads.

"Fantastic. I'll be in the office if you need me." He says, and he exits the room.

"Uh." Says Eli, scratching his head "Alright, I guess we'll start? Pitchers, you're with me, batters, you're with King."

Haruta has been practicing her pitches at home in her backyard since she first got accepted to be on the team. She knew despite making the team, she wasn't the strongest pitcher and she knows that her skill lies in batting, just like her siblings, but she can't bring herself to bat.

She is very nervous when Eli asks her to demonstrate some pitches, in front of all the other pitchers.

Her first three go wide, and her hands end up shaking so bad that Eli places a hand on her shoulder and reminds her to breathe. She takes a minute, and winds up again.

BAM! Right in the dead middle of the strike zone.

Eli whistles, while the rest of the pitchers give a polite clap. 

Haruta gets a few more throws before Eli rotates off to the next person.

"Haruta Telephone." A voice comes. She whips around to see who spoke. It's the new player, looking super serious with his blue flame tattoo and crossed arms

"Oh! Uh, that's me?" Haruta says, in the most unconvincing manner ever. The new player just nods, and sticks out his hand.

"Riley Hotdogfingers." 

Haruta shakes his hand. She can't stop herself from being curious about Riley, especially with his last name being Hotdogfingers. But she doesn't ask. 

"Jaylen is my older sister." Riley offers, immediately.

"... I wasn't going to ask." Haruta says  sheepishly.

"I know you weren't. But I wanted you to know." He looks at her intently. "You look far to similar to the Telephone twins to not be related to them, I wanted to offer common ground."

He's got her there. "Well um. Yeah? Yeah they're my older siblings." The way he talks throws her a little, so factual, so bold.

"Hotdogfingers! You're up!" Calls Eli. Riley inclines his head to Haruta politely before going to take his place on the mound.

He is a decent bit more accurate than Haruta, and he pitches so fast. He throws that blaseball for all that he's worth.

Riley was the last pitcher in the rotation, after they finish those warmups, they practice playing on the field as a full team, then they go back to the locker room.

Everyone is buzzing with energy as they get ready to leave. 

Haruta's driver takes her home, and she spends the rest of the evening knitting.

Just before bed, she picks up her phone and dials two familiar numbers.

Both of them ring. And ring.