Chapter Text
It was soft and warm. More comfortable than any place he had ever known. This was how babies must feel in their mothers’ wombs, wrapped in a cocoon of warmth, safety, and love. Perhaps he had died, but if this is how heaven felt, he didn’t even mind.
If he opened his eyes, this sweet utopia might disappear. But he just had to know. Something that felt this godly was surely beautiful beyond comprehension.
Thus, Rin opened his eyes slowly, not knowing what to expect. His chest tightened when the aloof striker realised he was still in Blue Lock. In his bed, in fact. But why did it feel so good?
The question answered itself when he felt movement next to him. There was someone else! A sudden coldness hit his core when Rin realised he was trapped in the arms of his mystery companion.
What on Earth had he done last night?! Hooking up with a rival was certainly not a part of his after-practice routine!
The other person moved; they seemed to have woken up. Rin could feel their hands on his head, stroking it lovingly.
Part of him feared finding out who his partner was. Yet he ignored the tingling feeling in his stomach and turned around. Reo. Smiling at him.
“It’s still early. Go back to sleep; I’ll wake you up later.” Reo’s voice was soft like a summer breeze, but it couldn’t stop Rin’s heart rate from going into overdrive.
Rin jumped up as if he had been stung by a bee. Why was that purple-haired idiot of all people in his bed?! Even if Rin had entered a parallel universe where he was promiscuous, Reo was not someone he could imagine hooking up with. Something was wrong!
“What’s wrong, Nagi?” the purple-haired intruder asked, his eyebrows drawn together.
Nagi?! But Reo’s eyes were focused solely on him? Rin stared at his hands. They… weren’t his. Now that he thought about it, his whole body felt different. The fact that he was still fully clothed was little consolation. “What… what sick joke is this?”
Reo scratched his head. “You were the one who wanted to sleep together, remember? You said my bed was more comfortable. I told you it would be cramped, but you didn’t listen. So, at least I tried to make it as pleasant as possible for you. I guess that didn’t work...”
“I told you it was a bad idea,” another voice said. When Rin looked at the source, he realised it was Chigiri, his sharp tone indicating that he was unhappy about being woken up early. “Nagi, don’t make a fuss this early in the morning. Just go back to your own bed if you don’t like Reo’s.”
“Don’t put me on a level with that lukewarm idiot.” Rin still stared at his hands. It couldn’t be… This was Blue Lock, not some sci-fi adventure. But then why?
“Come on, Nagi, don’t play dumb… I wanna sleep…”
Ignoring Chigiri’s growing annoyance and not even bothering with Reo, Rin rushed to the bathroom. There, the mirror showed it with crystalline clarity: sleepy grey eyes and messy white hair. Nagi’s face. But when Rin touched his cheeks, they felt like his. And his body moved on his command. The image in the mirror was him, no doubt.
But how had this happened? And where was his real body? Perhaps he had really died…
Feeling the blood pumping through his system, Rin bolted to France’s stratum. His real body should be where he had left it, sleeping peacefully in his bed. Maybe he could still force his soul back into it if it had not been too long since his death. There was no way he’d die before becoming the best striker!
Although Rin was running faster than he ever had during a match, Blue Lock’s corridors suddenly seemed endlessly long. His breathing hard and shallow, Rin’s limbs felt heavy when he finally entered the hallway leading to his room.
Yet his desperate run ended abruptly when he crashed into something—or rather someone. Ignoring the pain from the impact, Rin cursed. “Move, dumbass.”
But the person didn’t move. And when Rin realised who it was, he, too, froze. It was his body.
“Oh, so this is how I look,” Rin’s body said in a slow and stretched manner that was uncharacteristic of him. Shortly after, Rin felt his own hands touching him—Nagi’s body. “That’s kinda cool. Like we’re in a movie.”
“Quit the nonsense.” Rin forced the hands off him. Even without asking, it was clear what had happened: Nagi’s mind was in Rin’s body. “Return my body. Whatever you did, fix it. Now.”
“Huh?” Nagi’s face was expressionless as if he had no care about being a body thief. “I haven’t done anything... Ah, I think I’m the same height as Reo now…” He casually proceeded to measure the difference between their heights with his hands.
Rin pinched his lips, trying to stay calm. There was no way such an idiot could pull off a miraculous body swap. Now that he thought about it, Blue Lock only had one person twisted enough to orchestrate a mess to this extent.
xxx
“... And this is what happened,” Rin finished his explanation. “Now fix it. I’ll give you ten seconds.” In front of him was Ego, sitting at a table and eating instant noodles like he hadn’t just turned Rin’s world upside down. It had taken Rin a while to find him in the vast corridors of Blue Lock, but he had finally made it to Ego’s room.
Yet Blue Lock’s mastermind didn’t even look up. “Huh? Are you trying to threaten me? Is that how you talk after barging in uninvited?”
“I don’t have time for your silly games.” Rin impatiently tapped his foot. “Return my body.”
“I created Blue Lock to give birth to the ultimate striker. Everything that happens here is for the sake of that goal,” Ego explained while stirring his noodles.
“So you’re the bastard who did this after all… Do you always mess with people’s bodies?”
“Nope, only yours. And it wasn’t me, strictly speaking. Anyway, if you want your body back, you have to figure this out yourself. And I recommend you do it before your next match. You better start now.” Ego waved with his hands, indicating that Rin should leave.
But Rin just balled his hands. “You psycho!”
“Talking to that guy is a pain...” Nagi stood behind him, his face expressionless. “Let’s just ask Reo.”
Was that guy really that dumb? Rin sighed. Of all the people to have his body swapped with, it had to be this idiot. Even Zantetsu would have been more helpful. “And what do you think Reo can do?”
“Reo is smart. He knows what to do for sure...”
“I can’t have that.” Ego shook his head. “If you tell anyone about this, I’ll expel you from Blue Lock. All of you. And that includes Reo Mikage.”
“Whatever.” Nagi still didn’t seem overly interested—did this guy ever show emotions? “Reo will notice right away anyway...”
Rin didn’t bother replying. Instead, he left Ego and indicated Nagi to follow him. “Let’s deal with this quickly. Tell me what you did yesterday so we can determine what caused this.”
“Eeh? Thinking is a pain…” Nagi pulled up his shirt, examining his chest with his hands—who knew what was happening in his head? “I’ll ask Reo.”
“You realise you can’t talk to Reo, right?” Rin rubbed his forehead—dealing with Nagi made his head hurt. “It has to be me because I’m Seishirou Nagi right now. You’re Rin Itoshi. And I never interact with your friend, you know that, right? We aren’t even on the same team.”
Nagi’s voice suddenly turned more serious. “But I’m Reo’s partner. We’ll be together until the end.”
“Then you better think hard,” Rin replied sharply while he opened the doors of the corridor they were in until he found a seemingly unused training room. It was best if nobody saw them. “Sit down over there, and don’t move until you know how to fix this.”
“Eeehhh…”
xxx
Yet even after a whole day of thinking, Rin and Nagi were still in the wrong bodies and no further no step closer to the solution. They had tried touching a football simultaneously, searching online for clues, and all sorts of weird poses. Nothing seemed to work...
“Rin… I’m hungry… Battery empty, brain dead… Can’t do this anymore…” Nagi looked like he was actually dying, lying on the ground like a starfish washed onto the shore.
“Fine.” Rin grimaced. Even he felt exhausted. Plus, they wouldn’t be able to explain their absences overnight. “We’ll continue tomorrow. You’ll pretend you’re me, and I’ll pretend I’m you for now.”
At least Ego wasn’t a total sadist and had given them access to Blue Lock’s camera recordings to study each other’s mannerisms. “Let’s watch the video footage so we can imitate each other. Don’t mess this up, dumbass.”
“Sounds like a pain… Ah, a lukewarm pain?”
Rin didn’t react to Nagi’s poor attempt to copy him. Instead, he took a pencil and a piece of paper. “You better look after my body. Here, I’ll write down my daily routine. Follow it closely.”
“That’s impossible,” Nagi said while he watched Rin writing. “That’s way too much; I don’t have energy for all that…”
“Do it, you lazy ass. If you don’t, I won’t look after your body either.”
“That’s fine. Reo will look after it.”
Rin put so much pressure on the pencil that it snapped. “Then I’ll tell Reo to fuck off. Seriously, why do you keep mentioning that guy all the time?” Rin hated how every time he heard the purple-haired player’s name, it evoked memories of this morning. That sweet warmth… That love he hadn’t known existed…
“I just have to follow that list, right?” All of a sudden, Nagi seemed much more alert. “You better treat Reo well. I’ll kill you if you don’t.”
“Deal.”