My Goalkeeping System

Emma had just gotten up to find that Dave was missing from her side as always.

She let out a sigh before she got down from the bed and made her way to the bathroom to brush her teeth and wash her face before making her way downstairs.

She made her way straight to the kitchen after getting downstairs and just before she started doing anything, she went to the sink to wash her hands again.

She was still washing her hands when she heard the door open and a few seconds later, she turned off the tap, grabbed a wipe, and turned around to see Dave standing there with his eyes looking a bit tired.

"Oh, you're back." She said before zooming in on his hair.

"Yeah, good morning." The goalkeeper said before he began to make his way to the freezer.

"Hey, wait," Emma said before quickly moving closer to him.

"What?" He asked as he quickly stopped moving.

She stared at him for a while before slowly putting her hand on his hair.

"What happened to your hair? Why is it so messed up?" She asked.

She wasn't kidding when she said that, the goalkeeper's hair was roughed up like a cat jumped on it and gave him a makeover with its claws.

"Oh, that, I ran into a couple of people on my way back." The goalkeeper muttered.

"A couple of people? What are you talking about?" She asked. "Did someone attack you?"

"Oh, no, it's not that."

"Then what is it?" She asked.

"Some fans."

"Fans?"

"Yeah." He replied with a nod.

______ ______

Dave was sitting on the couch now as Emma helped him straighten out his hair with a comb from behind.

"You know you're becoming really popular with your recent performances and there are a lot of people who now consider themselves as your fans, walking around the street alone isn't really safe for you anymore, besides getting crowded and touched without permission by the fans, you might actually get attacked." She expressed.

"I know that now." He said before letting out a sigh. "I had never experienced something like this before so it never really occurred to me."

"You're lucky it was just a few of them, if there were a lot of them there at that time, you wouldn't be home by now and I wouldn't even be bothered because coming home late from your morning runs is something you do quite often." She articulated.

After saying that, she pulled back the brush and walked up front to sit beside him on the couch as she was done with straightening his hair.

"You wouldn't have bothered to call me to know how I was doing?" He said before turning his gaze to her.

"I would, but it turns out you forgot your phone here." She said before picking up his phone from the table.

"Oh." The goalkeeper said before placing his hand on the back of his head.

There was a little moment of silence between them until she decided to ask something.

"So, does this mean you'll stop your morning runs?" She asked.

"Stop my runs, no, never, I'll just limit my distance or take the forest route, reaching the highway today was a mistake, there was nothing like this the last time I was there before today." The goalkeeper expressed.

"Good, I don't want you to stop." She said before she leaned closer and kissed him. "I was about to do something before you came in looking like a windmill."

After saying that, she got up and made her way back to the kitchen.

As soon as she was out of sight, the goalkeeper turned his gaze to the television and sank into the couch.

'Windmill? Seriously?.'

<I think she met you looked like someone who got his head stuck in a windmill>

'I didn't ask for your interpretation.'

______ ______

There were matches on Sunday and Monday, but because of Unique FC's clash against FC Basel on Friday, they were excluded from those match days and that meant that their match against Spree City was going to be on Wednesday, that was the only Bilbeth Premier League match that was going to be played that day.

Norman had to assemble the players as early as 10:00 AM for a training session on Tuesday in preparation for the match on Wednesday.

The training lasted for two hours and just as the time hit 12:27 PM, Dave pushed the door open and slowly walked into the house before slowly closing the door.

He was heading to the couch when his phone suddenly began to vibrate in his pocket.

He dipped his hand into his pocket and brought out his phone to see that the caller was Clark.

"Oh, hey, Clark, what's up?" He asked after picking up the call and placing the phone against his ear.

"I'm okay, you?"

"Same here." He replied. "Are you here already?"

"No, I wanted it to get here first, I'm about to board my flight now." Clark expressed.

"So, it has gotten here then," Dave said.

"Yeah."

"Okay, I can't wait to see what is so special about this gadget of yours." The goalkeeper said.

"You'll see," Clark said. "Um…I have to go now, I'll call you when I get here."

"Okay," Dave said before he brought the phone down and slipped it back into his pocket.

He let out a sigh before he made his way to the couch and crashed down on it.

"Getting quests from training drills is almost impossible these days." He mumbled expecting a reaction from Catherine but she remained quiet like she didn't hear anything.

'Yeah, just keep on snubbing me.'

_____ _____

After a couple of hours, Clark finally reached his destination with the gadget which he told Dave about.

The only thing he was holding in his hand was a small white box, but that wasn't the only thing that was there with him.

He knocked on the door a couple of times before Dave finally opened it. He was rubbing his eyes with his left hand as he opened the door.

"Were you sleeping?" Clark asked.

"Yeah, we had a training session this morning, a long training session." The goalkeeper.

He was a bit drowsy having just woken up from sleep.

"Oh, I see."

"So, where's the stuff? Is it in that box you're holding? I didn't expect it to be this small."

"No, this is just part of it," Clark said before turning his gaze to the garage. "The whole thing is over here." He added before he began to make his way to the area.

Dave followed him to the garage to see that there was a large box lying in front of the door.

"How heavy is that?"

"Not too heavy, just open the door and help me carry it inside."

Dave did as he asked and now that they had gotten the large box inside, Clark opened it up to reveal a bunch of wooden parts and electrical components.

"So, how does this work?" Dave asked with a confused expression on his face.

"We'll need to set it up first," Clark said.

"Okay, where are we going to set it up?"

"Behind the treadmill."

"Behind the treadmill?"

"Yes, it's necessary to set it up behind the treadmill."

"Okay."

Dave helped him set it up and in no time, they were done.

It looked like a frame with four elastic hands on the floor and a screen just at the top of the frame.

"I still don't see how this will help me feel like I'm running outside without actually going outside." The goalkeeper said with his gaze on the whole setup.

"Calm down," Clark said before he opened the small box and brought out a virtual reality headset.

"I had a feeling that was what you had in there, but what does this whole setup have to do with it?"

"I said calm down," Clark said before handing him the headset. "Don't put that on yet but get on the treadmill and turn it to the lowest speed."

"Okay." The goalkeeper said before he got on the treadmill and did as he was told.

While he was jogging on the treadmill, Clark picked up the elastic arms.

He strapped the upper two on his wrists and the lower two on his ankles.

"So, what's this going to do?" Dave asked.

"Put on the headset and see."

"Okay." The goalkeeper said before he slowly put on the headset and turned it on.

As soon as he did that, he found himself on a street with a couple of trees around and a few people walking around.

Compared to the headsets he's used before, this felt so real to him, he could even feel the cold air on his skin.

"How does this feel so real?"

If he wasn't aware that he was in a virtual reality world, his senses might mistake this for the real world.

<Um…This looks nice>

****

​ Mass release goals.

A magic castle= one extra chapter.

Two magic castles= two extra chapters.