[Day 5] Epee Round 4: Championship: Sol vs. Pine

tobias {♔} pine

There was a stark difference between the match of Elya and I and that of yesterday. Yesterday’s opposition had been a boy about the age of twelve, who surely looked as though a black eye wasn’t even a blow he could inflict. However, he’d held his own to some extent, though I had come out with enough of a lead to end the match in my favor, and unlike the sense of disbelief that stemmed from my match with Elya Johnwayne, this one had left me with a sense of pride that probably had more of a negative affect on my ego than it should have. I suppose that in a sense I had desperately wanted to win the match against the young boy for a couple of reasons, the first being that it would be simply embarrassing to lose to someone so—so young and not worthy of Olympic fame. Secondly, his beliefs on victory and loss were so blatantly wrong that beating him would somehow prove my lesson, and that by some strange turn of reason I was doing him a good deed.

Neither of the previous days matches meant much of anything now, as I stepped onto the epee strip a final time, content with either a loss or win to add to the repertoire of the Pine name. Regardless of how this turned out, I came home with something, and though my family might turn up their noses at the thought of silver, I most certainly would not.

Besides, no one set high expectations for me anyway.

tobias {♔} pine

I suppose my first round had been a success for me due to the name that tagged along, though I wasn’t sure if the confidence it brought about was genuine or not. I may have assumed that having a cousin that made it to around the top eight qualified you to hold some sense of pride above your head, a credential to tug around like a balloon only a child’s slip of the hand away from floating off into the afternoon sky. It was fleeting, like my sense of pride and determination that never seemed to stay for more than a few moments at most, and even then, that was a stretch.

During the championship of an event, there was a supposed adrenaline that surrounded both competitors, but I was feeling little to none lingering in the air. I would even got as far as to say that boredom hung about and filled the hearts of not only myself and the boy standing opposite me, and maybe it even extended to the crowd sitting beyond the barriers. I was not the one to bring about a change of attitude, and I doubt this boy was either.

Maybe this would be over soon enough so that neither of us would have to take charge or command, and one of us could walk out with gold and the other with silver. Personally, I’d be just fine with either.

tobias {♔} pine

This match differed from the others in the aspect that the last three had been full of conversation. None had been exactly pleasant (though the first had gained me a free drink in cost of Phenom’s wallet). Elya and I had spoken words that didn’t number too much, but the few that were spoken stuck much more prominently in my mind than those of the day before. In fact, it took a second of concentrated thought to even remember the previous day’s match with Chastman. From the kid’s vulnerable manner, it was clear to see that his stock lay in the fantasy of heroes and villains, rather in the piss poor reality in which we lived.

Whether good or bad, this match fell under none of these categories. It almost felt wrong to strike again without speaking even a single word, and somewhere between my time of realizing this and attempting to figure out what to say, he struck again, and another four points were added to his total.

“Sol, right?”

Oh, yes, Tobias Pine, the boy whose way with words was just about as graceful as that of a three-legged cat.

(I should’ve just looked at the scoreboard and kept my mouth shut.)