Fight Song

Chapter 3

Time skip to Friday, the first day of the competition.

Joe's PoV
Yes, everyone here was a rival when they hit the stage, but outside of competition we all actually got along quite well, all of us in this crazy little dance world. Well, all but Britain, Canada and Australia. None of us ever spoke to each other, that's how fiercely competitive we were. However, one team I did love to talk to was the South African team. Bloody legends.

"Joeeeeee!" Caspar Lee, one of my absolute best friends here ran up to me.

"Caspar!" I grinned back, and saw their team mates Josh, Byron, Oti and Johannes following him. Us and Jack and Conor all loved hanging out with each other when we could, because although we could FaceTime, we rarely saw each other outside of competition. It was just a long way to travel.

"Long time no see, buddy!" he embraced me in a hug as we both laughed. I then greeted the others, and we all went and sat down at the nearest cafe in the venue to chat more. We weren't talking for long though, when the Canadian team came strutting in like they owned the place. God knows why, we won last year, not them. And the year before, come to think of it. Before that, Australia won, so they haven't won in a while. Oh well, you do you I guess.

"Arrogant Maple Leafs, that's what we call them," Johannes laughed.

"Okay that's so accurate," Conor laughed back. "Do you have nicknames for the other teams?"

"Oh yeah, all of them!" Oti laughed. "You're Cocky Crumpets, Australia is Pretentious Kangaroos, Belgium is Chocolate Cheats after that whole cheating fiasco three years back."

"Sorry, COCKY CRUMPETS?!" Jack said, somewhat outraged. "Why cocky crumpets?!"

"Because you're not exactly the best winners," Byron laughed. "You, Canada and Australia just kinda forget everyone else exists and pretend the only competition are each other. You might not know it but you belittle the rest of us and come across as very cocky. Australia is pretentious and Canada is arrogant. You're pretty much all the same breed."

"Did we just get compared to Canada and Australia?" Conor looked at me, baffled. "I'm not being compared to the arrogant maple leafs and the pretentious kangaroos!"

"Learn to get along and we might change your name," Josh laughed.

"We do get along, just not with them," I huffed.

"Look," Caspar pointed behind me, and we all turned. He was pointing at Dianne Buswell, the Australian Dance Captain. "Go over to her and say hi and be nice and we'll change your name."

"She'll just think it's a ploy," I laughed. "She'll think we're trying to psych her out or something. I'm not risking getting on her bad side."

"Joe I swear to god if you don't do it I'm voting Amy for Dance Captain next season," Conor said. "I refuse to be called a cocky crumpet."

"Fine," I sighed, getting up. "But she won't believe me, I assure you."

Dianne's PoV
I saw them pointing and looking at me. Idiots. I can't believe they were fraternising with each other too. They're on DIFFERENT TEAMS. Do they not understand how competition works or something?! You don't win by making friends, not in this industry. Then, to my absolute bewilderment, Joe Sugg, the British Dance Captain, took it upon himself to come over and try and talk to me.

"Hey," he said, smiling. I narrowed my eyes, trying to work out his motive.

"What's your game?" I asked, looking him up and down.

"No game," Joe laughed. "Just thought I'd wish you good luck and say hi. I know we're on different teams but that doesn't mean we have to be arch enemies."

"Look, Joe," I began, "I saw you lot pointing and talking about me. You clearly have some exterior motive, or are trying to psych me out or throw me off my game. That, or you're just downright stupid. I'm not making friends with an opposing team, especially not their dance captain! Now the solo competitions start in two hours and I have a team to organise, and so do you, so I suggest you stop playing games with other teams and go sort yourselves out or you're going to lose."

"I literally have no motive, I just needed to be nice to you to get the South Africans to stop calling the British team 'cocky crumpets'," he laughed. "They call the Canadian team arrogant maple leafs, but that's accurate and I'm definitely calling them that from now on. They have names for every team actually, but because you refused my friendship, I'm not telling you yours."

My lip quirked slightly at the names the South Africans had given to the British and Canadian teams, and I did wish I knew the rest, but I wasn't going to give in that easily. It could all be part of their plan to take Australia out.

"Made you smile," Joe grinned at me. "A cocky crumpet just made a nice little redhead smile. What an intelligent crumpet I am."

I tried to purse my lips together and force a straight face, but I couldn't help but smile back. Him calling himself a crumpet was quite funny.

"I know you'll come around eventually," Joe winked at me. "Trust me Miss Buswell, by the time this competition is over, we'll be friends."

"In your dreams," I scoffed and turned away. He'd made me laugh, that was fine. But he was still competition, and I'm not putting our victory at risk by befriending the enemy.

"What was all that about?" Katie came over to me after Joe left. "I thought you said we weren't supposed to talk to the other teams. Because if that's changed, I'd love to go talk to Oti again, I miss her!"

"Absolutely not," I snapped. "He came over to me, we're most definitely not friends."

"You were laughing," Katie pointed out. "He made you laugh so clearly you didn't totally hate talking to him."

"He's trying to psych us out, Katie, they all are! We have to win, we can't trust anyone!"

"Di, you really need to loosen up a little," Katie sighed. "Wanna try the breathing exercises? Mindfulness, positive vibes. Cmon, I know you wanna win but we have to have fun too."

"Having fun is a luxury I can't afford," I looked at her. "But fine, if you want to talk to other people, go ahead."

Katie smiled at me. "I guess that's a start. Thank you. I hope you and Joe can talk again soon. You're both dance captains, you already have something in common."

I rolled my eyes and watched her skip happily over to the table Joe was sat at, embracing Oti into a hug. I bit my lip, kind of wishing I was over there too. But no, no I couldn't give in. I had friends on my team, I had my brother, I had our studio head. I didn't need other friends. I couldn't need them.

I'll update soon!