Cheers are echoing through the Staples Center.

Lights of purple, white, and gray are darting around the large arena.

Then through the booming speakers, the announcer speaks over fans: “Ladies and gentlemen, are you ready? It’s power player fightin’ time!”

With that, the power players of each team, one from the Arizona Coyotes and one from the Los Angeles Kings, step out from their own tunnel, through the benches, and hop onto the ice.

Kale glides on the ice behind the blue line. He gazes through his visor with his head craned back to taken in his surroundings. In his sight are whizzing lights, the darkened audience, and the ear-piercing cheering. The energy in the room is tangible, pulsing through himself and vibrating his inners.

Kale takes in a deep breath in order to calm himself and adapt to the electric atmosphere. He lowers his head as he halts in the middle of the ice, right behind the blue line. He takes note of the equipment he is wearing, which is almost the same as what he was wearing in the last period: his black Kings jersey, his hockey pants, his black Kings socks, his skates. The only pieces of equipment missing are his gloves and stick.

“Here are your power players!” Kale hears the announcer bellowing.

The cheers amplify.

“For the Arizona Coyotes,” the announcer continues on at the same level of noise, “he is scavenging for that W-I-N, howling from his den. It’s Clayton Keller!”

With that, a spotlight appears on the opposite end of the ice, across from Kale. It is shining down on Clayton Keller, who is wearing his white Coyotes equipment with accents of maroon, black, and cream. Behind him, the golden hockey stick gleams under the other smaller lights.

The audience immediately shifts their applauding to booing and yelling.

Clayton simply smirks ahead.

“For your Los Angeles Kings…”

Kale’s heart skips a beat the sound of his introduction.

“...he’s a King, so he reigns in any type of game with his famous purple blast that will always last. It’s Kale Clague!”

Another spotlight appears above Kale, placing the attention on his beloved crowd. With a toothy grin automatically popping up on his face, Kale spins around and waves to the audience all around him.

The fans cheer again with thrill, thickening the air with pure noise.

Dramatic music then fills the air, causing the audience to lower their cheering. Kale exhales quickly to the trepidatious shifting of atmosphere.

“Powers activate!” the announcer commands through the speakers.

Clayton cranes his head up with his tense arms out from his sides and lets out a vibrating howl: “AH-WOOO!!!”

As his howl fades, he swings his hand in front of him, plucking a sound disc from his utterance. He wields his disc to his shoulder with sharp eyes on his opponent.

Kale stares at him with large eyes at his ability. Then with a long inhale to muster confidence, he throws his right hand from his side. Instantly, his purple ergokinetic sword conjures in his grasp, pulsing in pure energy and glowing brightly. He rotates his wrist, feeling his sword vibrate in his palm as it hums with the motion.

Then the announcer continues guiding the set-up of the matchup: “Keller, ready?”

Clayton lets go of his disc, having it dissolve, before raising his hand up in response.

“Clague, ready?”

Kale takes in a sharp breath. He throws his hand in the air as he opens up his palm to dissolve his sword.

I’m ready.

Instantly, whirling sound effects wrap around the arena as lights flash and spin on all sides along with dramatic music and the crowd cheering louder.

The sound fades out as the house lights gradually turn on, brightening up the arena to an even light.

Kale’s heart begins beating hard and fast as he feels sweat prickling the pads of his fingers while the setting of his first matchup is fabricating right in front of him.

Then, the screens of the jumbotron begin to flash red to the beat of the buzzer: BRR! BRR! BRR—!

Solid green floods the screens as the buzzer lets out a loud sound, signalling the start of the matchup: BRRR!!!

Instantly, Kale launches across the blue line with sharp eyes aimed at Clayton. His hand glows white as his purple sword materializes in his right hand.

Clayton snaps a hand in front of him and tears a sound ring from the fading buzzer, letting off an off-pitch wobble in the air. He then hurls the ring horizontally at Kale.

The ring slams into Kale and lets off its potent vibrations through him, causing him to fly off his blades backward and crash against the ice on his back.

A chorus of ooos! is heard throughout the crowd.

Kale lets out a groan as blunt pain ripples through him. He peers down at his hand, noticing that his sword is gone.

He then hears the scrapes of blades approaching him. He snaps his eyes up from his lying position, spotting Clayton rushing towards his direction in pursuit to get his golden stick.

“No!” Kale reaches his right hand toward the power player and emits a blast of purple energy.

The blast strikes his legs, causing Clayton to be thrown through the air away from Kale and bang against the boards on the other side of the ice. He slumps down and lies against the kick plates.

The crowd erupts in loud cheers and clapping.

Kale slowly climbs back up to the blades of his skates. He stares down at Clayton from across the ice, eyeing his writhing movements. He snaps his eyes to his right, spotting the glinting golden stick feet away from Clayton. He then swings his head to the other end of the ice, gazing at the golden stick he is supposed to capture himself farther away.

He turns back to Clayton. Clayton is attempting to rise on his hands and feet.

He swishes his head back to the golden stick. It is shimmering peacefully on the other end of the ice.

With a huge exhale, Kale crosses his blue line and dashes down the ice, leaving his stick unprotected.

Kale speeds past the red line, entering the opponent’s zone. He glances behind his shoulder to get Clayton's status.

Clayton is now on his feet and is beginning to glide toward the unguarded stick.

“No!” Kale instantly transitions to face his opponent while skating backward and unleashes a thick ribbon of energy.

The energy flies above Clayton's right shoulder, grabbing his attention. He whirls around, anger evident in his face, and hurls a sound disc at Kale.

Kale spins around and slides onto the ice against his stomach, ducking under the disc as it whizzes above him and hits the glass boards behind him. With the momentum he built up, he slides like a penguin toward the glorious golden stick. He eagerly reaches his hand out toward the prize as he nears it and snatches it from its stand before passing it.

Glee courses through him even though he crashes his free side into the kick plates of the board with the stick in his hand.

The crowd instantly cheers, claps, and hollers as the Kings’ goal horn sounds.

Kale scrambles up to his feet and victoriously pumps the stick into the air by the glass. His large smile is on his face as he absorbs the praise from his fans.

He then lowers the stick and pushes himself to the centre ice, where Clayton is approaching him.

“Good game,” Kale tells him as he transfers the stick to his left hand to hold out his right hand toward him.

“Yeah, good game,” Clayton breathes out with a short, yet sturdy handshake.

Kale then pulls away from him and raises the stick in the air one last time, gaining another wave of ground-shaking cheers and hoots from the audience. He then glides to the benches, steps onto it, and disappears into the tunnel.

---

After the game, the Kings’ locker room has its own electric atmosphere with the four to three win they managed to take for their season opener.

“We won! We won!” Drew chants in a sing-songy tone as he prances into the locker room. “It’s my birthday! It’s my birthday! In two months! Two months!”

Jeff steps up to Kale, who is sitting in his stall. “Atta boy, Kale!” He slaps his back as a form of encouragement.

Anže walks up to the two skaters with his hands on his hips. “That is what we as the Kings like to see!” He turns around to face the rest of the room.

Kale looks ahead, spotting at all of the bright faces of his teammates aimed at him. “Thanks, guys. I just wanted to make up for what happened at our last game.”

“You very so did,” Anže tells him.

Drew slides up to him. “That’s right!”

Jeff places his hand on Kale’s padded shoulder. “If you continue giving us points like this, we’ll get the Cup every other year.”

Kale snaps his shifty eyes down at the questionable mission of the Kings Clique. “Um...well—”

“You gotta continue winning!” Drew cries out to him with his hands by his face. “It’s like scoring! We’re relyin’ on you!”

Anže throws a pointer finger in the air. “That’s why you are our key to our goal!”

Kale runs his hand through his hair to calm his uneasiness. “Yeah, yeah, of course, I’ll keep on winning!” He chuckles nervously. “I love to keep on winning!” He faces the rest of the team, gaining courage. “We will be undefeated in these matches!”

Kale then pumps a fist in the air as the rest of the team erupts in hoots and clapping.

Notes