accidental kick

Exit Wound: Center Circle, 90+3’

The stadium roars like a wild ocean. Drum sounds from every corner, so loud the ground shakes under your feet. Ninety thousand people are waves, rising and crashing together, shouting, singing, stamping. The green pitch looks like a small boat lost in the middle of that stormy sea. The players are the sailors, running, sliding, fighting for every ball in the last furious minutes of the game. And there, dead center in the maelstrom, stands the only calm soul on the deck Elena Caroline, the main referee, black shirt plastered to her skin with sweat and frost, whistle flashing between her teeth. She’s sprinting full tilt alongside the players, arms pumping, eyes everywhere, reading every lunge, every feint, every heartbeat of this war.

No one else dares share the same patch of grass with twenty-two raging men, yet she cuts through them like a blade through smoke, owning every inch of the killing ground.

High in the commentary gantry hangs the legend: Marco henry silver-haired, cigarette voice, the man who has called every big night on the continent for four decades.

His words boom across the airwaves and into every bar, every living room, every phone:

“Group D is on fire tonight, folks… Bramfort against Calren… a straight shoot-out for the last knockout spot! If Calren lose here, they’re out unless Veyron drop points tomorrow.

This is cold-blooded war between two ancient cities, centuries of hate packed into ninety minutes on frozen grass. Red against white, north against south, scars older than the floodlights themselves. Every chant is a war cry, every flare a signal fire. Ninety-plus-three.

The clock is bleeding out. Elena’s eyes lock on Davis Sander the instant the ball leaves midfield. Davis Sander is the linchpin of the Calren squad, their premier striker and most important player. Everything in their attack flows through him; he is the essential target man, relied upon to convert chances, elevate the pressure on opponents, and deliver crucial goals under high-stakes conditions.

He is, simply put, the focal point and chief weapon of the entire team. He takes the pass on the half-turn, shoulders dropped, legs already coiled. One touch to kill it dead, another to explode past the last defender.

She’s matching him stride for stride down the center channel, boots hammering frozen turf, breath white in the floodlights. Every muscle in her body is tuned to him alone: the angle of his hips, the flick of his eyes, the hungry bend in his run.

The stadium is a cauldron of ninety thousand souls, crimson flags one half, ivory the other, two cities Bramfort vs Calren that have hated each other since the first ships burned in their harbors centuries ago. Four hundred million euros in television rights meant nothing. This clash transcends money; it’s pure hatred on grass. With the teams locked in the highest form of rivalry, a loss here would be a catastrophic humiliation—one mistake away from plunging the streets into absolute chaos. They are playing for the badge, for pride, and to avoid a city-wide riot. He’s thirty yards out, twenty-five, twenty two. The keeper rushes. Davis plants his left foot, swings the right. She’s right there, two steps behind, whistle already rising, seeing everything in perfect Davis Sander’s feet, Ninety thousand throats close at once.

Every pair of eyes is a bullet aimed straight at Davis. She breathes it in, lets the pressure flood her lungs, and keeps running, calm as a blade. Elena’s world narrows to a tunnel: Davis Sander, twenty-two yards out, ball glued to his left foot. From the Calren technical area, coach Viktor Halden is purple-faced, veins like cables, screaming himself raw: “ANDREW! ANDREW! GIVE IT TO ANDREW, NOW!”

In the commentary gantry. Marco henry holding his breath to break Andrew Korr is already peeling off the last defender, free inside the box. Sander hears the shout, hesitates half a heartbeat, tries the cut-back pass. A Bramfort defender, number six, lunges in late, studs high and vicious. Metal meets ankle with a sickening crack. Sander spins in mid-air, crashes, slides, the ball trickling dead over the byline.For one frozen second the entire stadium is silent, ninety thousand lungs locked.

Then the silence detonates. Sander is on the ground, clutching his ankle, face twisted in agony, turning to Elena and roaring straight at her: “PENALTY! THAT’S A FU..KING PENALTY!” Elena’s whistle is already at her lips. She blows once, sharp and final. No penalty. Corner to Calren.

The Bramfort fans end erupts in savage joy. The Calren half explodes in pure hate.

And from every corner of the bowl the chant rises, ugly and instant: “Get back in the kitchen! Get back in the kitchen! Woman ref, get back in the kitchen!” thousands of voices, one knife, aimed straight at her heart. Elena stands alone in the center circle, eyes burning, jaw locked. She doesn’t even blink. I

n the stands: A father covers his little girl’s ears, muttering, “That’s not right… she’s tough as any of them.”A drunk knot of Bramfort ultras scream worse: “Faking it, the bitch! Always looking for attention!”An older woman in Calren white spits on the ground: “Should’ve stayed home if she can’t handle the pressure.”

A teenage boy films it all, laughing, Club TVs outside the stadium, pub screens, streaming feeds; every pundit jumps in: Bramfort TV pundit (ex-player, red scarf): “Listen, she’s made a meal of that all night. No penalty earlier, now this? She’s lost the plot. Women can’t handle this pressure, simple as that.” Calren TV co-commentator (voice dripping venom): “Disgraceful officiating all game. She wanted the spotlight; now she’s got it. Stay down, darling.” Even neutral continental broadcast cuts to the studio: “She’s tough, we know that, but tonight Elena Caroline has bottled every big call. That’s not a foul on her; that’s football.”

Then the super slow-motion hits every giant screen. Frame by frame, crystal clear: The defender’s boot clips only the ball, clean as a whistle. Sander’s ankle is never touched. He slips on the wet turf, loses balance on his own. Elena’s arm shoots out, pointing for the corner, absolutely correct.

Marco henry’s voice booms over the stunned bowl: “LOOK AT THAT! SHE IS ONE HUNDRED PERCENT RIGHT! Clean challenge, Sander slips, Elena Caroline has been flawless tonight! Flawless! This woman is taking dogs’ abuse for being perfect!”

A ripple of shame runs through parts of the crowd. Some clap, some boo louder to drown the truth. Elena stands tall in the center circle, eyes like winter steel, jaw locked so tight it could crack stone.

She raises one arm, sharp, final. Play on. Corner to Calren. The stare she pins on Sander as he drags his foot to the corner flag is arctic, ancient, and merciless.Twelve years on these killing fields, kiddo, her silence screams. I was burying calls like this before you learned to shave. Try me again and I’ll bury you.

Davis Sander wipes the rain from his eyes, places the ball, and swings the corner in hard and flat. Desperate to be the hero. He charges after his own ball, sprinting into the box like a missile, trying to get on the end of the flick-on. Bodies collide, elbows fly, the keeper dives. The ball skims across the six-yard line. Sander slides in, studs first, desperate for the winning touch. Elena is perfectly positioned, right on the edge of the chaos, tracking every boot. Sander’s momentum carries him straight into her. His trailing right leg, studs raked high from the slide, slams full force into the back of her left calf.

Crack. The ligament tears with a sickening pop you can almost hear over the roar.

Her knee buckles sideways, foot twisting at a grotesque angle. She goes down hard, shoulder hitting the turf, blood instantly blooming through her black sock. Three piercing blasts cut through the night.

Full time. 2–2. The stadium freezes. Sander scrambles up, eyes wide in horror, hands out: “I didn’t see her… I didn’t see her!” Medics rush the pitch. Players part like a curtain.

The stretcher slides in. Elena is on her back, blood already pooling beneath her calf, the lower leg bent wrong, swollen, purple creeping up the skin like spilled ink. But her eyes are open. Not glassy. Not pleading. They are steel. She grits her teeth so hard the medics hear it. No scream. No tears. Just one low, animal exhale through her nose. She lifts her own head, locks eyes with the head physio, and nods once: “Do it.” They slide the stretcher board under her.

She pushes up on her elbows herself, refusing to lie flat until the straps are on. Only when they lift her she finally let her head fall back, but even then her fists stay clenched, knuckles white, knuckles that have held a whistle through hell for twelve years. The stadium watches in total silence as the strongest person on the pitch tonight is carried away on a bed, blood dripping onto the grass she ruled, pain locked behind teeth that never once let it out. Elena Caroline doesn’t break. She just leaves the battlefield bleeding, upright, and still in charge.

Game over. War just beginning.

Bramfort and Calren stagger out of the night with one point each, bruised, bleeding, and still alive. The group table stays cruel: Calren now cling to second place by a thread; one more dropped point and they’re out. Bramfort sit third, praying tomorrow night Veyron slip against Portezza.

Everything still to fight for, everything still to burn. Tonight was only the spark. The knockout rounds will decide who bleeds out first.

Black-clad riot police poured in from every gate , shields locked, visors down, dogs snarling on short chains. Helicopters hammered overhead, spotlights slicing the stands. Mounted units blocked the tunnels. Outside, armored vans formed walls three deep. Snipers on the roof. Zero gaps.

They knew the script: a draw in this derby, a female ref carried off bleeding, social media already on fire. One spark and the whole city burns (shops smashed, buses torched, kids caught in the middle). Some in the crowd wanted exactly that. You could taste it: drunk ultras in both colors itching to turn years of hate into broken glass and blood. But tonight the police crushed the air out of chaos before it could breathe. Batons ready, pepper spray loaded, orders simple: move or be moved.

Ninety thousand walked out in silence, squeezed between rows of shields, hating every second, hating each other more. No bottles thrown. No flares lit. No one else bled. Just two cities marched out alive, forced to wait for the next war.

Davis sits right where the corner flag used to be, elbows on knees, staring at nothing. In his head, one image keeps looping: Elena on the stretcher, head turned toward him as they carried her past.

That last look (no tears, no scream, just cold, quiet fire that said, clear as words): You did this. I remember your face. He drops his head into his hands and sits there in the silence, twenty-two years old, hero of the night, and already knows he will never forget her eyes. Elena’s stare. That single, quiet look punched straight through the alpha armor and left a hole nothing can fill.

Not trophies, not headlines, not money. That hole has her eyes in it now. And they’re not leaving.

SOME UNEXPECTED ERRORS LEAD TO WITHDRAWING THE CHAPTERS. KINDLY READ THE NEW VERSION. IF LIKED KINDLY SHARE YOUR OPINION.