Salvia High School

Chapter 98: Ticking Down

After a dreadful morning, Mallix now found himself sitting alone in locker room. With his uniform on he stared down in his hands as the clock ticked down.

"Mallix?" James asked as he walked into the room looking for his brother. "Their you are. Come on man, we're starting in like ten minutes. We've got to get ready to start."

"Yeah. Um, just go on without me. I'll catch up with you guys in a few minutes."

"I would do that but Alex told me I had to come and check up on you."

"Why? What's he doing?"

"He's trying to calm Zander down."

"What happened to Z?"

"He was jumping in the bleachers with the girls, but he fell and landed on his arm. Alex is out there trying to stop him from crying right now."

"Isn't Lain and Nina out there with him?"

"Yeah, but Zander was calling for Alex specifically." Taking a look up and seeing the clock James noticed it was now extremely close to time. "Seriously Mallix lets go! Last thing I need is coach eating my head off because you won't meet up with the others."

"Just give me another minute twerp! What is so difficult about asking for just another minute?!" Mallix said annoyed.

James sighed sitting in the empty spot besides his brother. "What's wrong Mallix? We're about to play in round two and you didn't even joined us during coach's long prep talk." He said slightly irritatedly. Being captain had its perks, Mallix was able to sit out of their coach's boring hour long speech.

"It's nothing." He brushed off motioning his brother towards the door.

But James shook his head. "If I walk out of here without you, we both know coach is going to have me playing first. And I can't do that. So our only other option is to have you get your ass out there and save me!"

"I can't James!" Mallix rose out of his seat stomping as he angrily stared at his brother.

"And why not!" James followed after him. "Why are you so determined not to fight today! You've done this a hundred times before! Hell you even get praised over it! How can you not bring yourself to do one more match?!"

"Because I am going to make a fool out of myself out there!" He cried out.

His younger brother froze as Mallix began to breathe heavily in place.

"When I go out there Lain and Kaila are going to be watching me! And what they'll see isn't going to be pretty! They are going to watch me get my ass handed to me by those damn Reabell fighters!"

"Mallix-"

"Don't even James! You saw what they did to me yesterday! I fell within the first minute into the first match! I've never fallen that fast since I started wrestling!"

"Mallix-"

"Compared to their moves I don't stand a chance! Coach hasn't taught us more advanced ones like them! If I can't defend myself long enough to stay up  until the round to ends, we're bound to lose for sure!"

"Mallix!" James finally silenced his ranting brother as he grabbed hold of his shoulders shaking him out of his nervous breakdown. "If you would just shut up for one second you would let me remind you that we aren't going against Reabell today! They won round one remember! They're moving onto the finals match tomorrow! We're going up against Hill and Creek High! So quit whining already like the kids do and get out of this locker room! We've literally only got one more minute dude!"

And without another second to spare James pushed his brother out of the room into the hall where the others were all lined up ready to enter the gym.