The Race

I helped Aki stretch and placed my chin against her shoulder. She smiled and held my hands. This was our four week dating now and it's been holding on pretty good. I gave her one last good stretch then got off her.

"Are you ready?" I asked.

"Yeah..~" Aki smiled.

I got up and helped her up as well. I let her climb onto my back then carried her inside the gym so I could grab her bags. I carried her out of the gym and headed towards the school gates. As I walked to the gates, I noticed Raidon leaned against a pillar and stopped. Aki got off me and held my arm.

"So you are serious about winning the race huh." Raidon asked.

"Why wouldn't I be..? I only joined the race because it was changed to a relay race. If you have plans on trying to beat us, I promise you that you won't make it very far." I said and glared at Raidon.

Raidon smirked and placed his hands in his pockets. "Cute. Girlfriend and boyfriend working together for a huge cash prize. Like they say, you rise together, you fall together."

"You honestly believe you can beat us?" I asked.

"Of course I do. After all you still can not beat my time. You only have a week to train. The race is on November 7th on next Saturday. We will see who comes out victorious. The relay race will be one lap each. One for women and one for the men. You'll see how it ends..." Raidon said and walked off.

"This guy really waited there just to say that shit?" I asked.

"We got this, baby. We aren't going to lose to that jackass. He may be the fastest right now, but we've been training our asses off. They will see the power couple of the century!" Aki said with a smile directed at me.

I looked at Aki and smiled. "Yeah. We'll beat him and show the nation how far we've come."

Aki nodded then climbed back on my back. We made our way home.

We entered Aki's room and Aki got off my back. I stretched and flopped on her bed then placed my arms behind my head. Aki crawled in bed and cuddled against me then took out her phone. She looked at her notifications and sat up quickly.

"What the hell?!" Aki yelled.

I looked at her. "What's wrong?"

"M-My parents...They are coming into town to watch the race! Why are they showing up now after abandoning me when I was a little girl?" Aki asked in shock.

I sat up and looked at Aki. "What?"

Aki and I looked at each other then she looked back at her phone. This was a problem in ways I would've never guessed. One Aki despises her parents. They abandoned her and now after all these years, they are coming back for her. Two, I felt it in my soul that they were going to try and split me and her up. Three, something was bound to happen.

"I don't want to see them. They are the last people I want to see." Aki said and looked at me again.

Days go by...I began to feel nervous and anxious because nothing will prepare me for the day Aki's parents come. Aki was much more anxious than I was. I could feel her nervousness. I could feel her anxiety...

Aki stopped running and panted then held her knees. She was faster than ever now. One lap took her around 47 seconds to run now. It used to take her a full minute but she managed to cut her time by a lot.

I walked to her and placed my hand on her back. "We're ready." I smiled.

Aki stood up straight and smiled then nodded. "Yeah..."

Although we both were nervous for tomorrow when Aki's parents show up, we remained confident in our abilities to win the race. Aki and I walked over to the sidelines and talked over our strategy on how we were going to dominate. Slow and steady for the first half then blitz the finishing moments, using that momentum from the blitz, the next person has to get a fair lead then conserve stamina until the final stretch then speed boost our way to the end.

The day of the race arrived and Rena took us all to the stadium the race was behind held in her family van.

"I hope you two win! I know you've both been putting in so many hours into your skill! This is going to be wonderful to watch!" Momoko smiled at us.

"We believe in you two~" Mitsuki smiled.

"I believe in Aki and I guess I'll cheer for Archer as well.." Suki said and crossed her arms.

"Yeah I can do without your cheers, Pastel Girl." I said and pushed her head back teasingly.

Suki blushed and scoffed. "Hmph!"

The others laughed softly and we continued our way to the stadium. Aki laid her head on my shoulder and held my hand. She was nervous and it was clear as day. I gave her soothing words to clear her mind away from the nervousness. It only worked slightly and I completely understood the reason.

We made it to the stadium then Aki and I got out and headed to the waiting rooms. As I entered the waiting room, I noticed Raidon sitting in one of the seats. He looked at me and smirked.

"I hear Aki's parents are within the crowd. It was the talk of the neighborhood. Aki's deatbeat parents returns to see their abandoned daughter." Raidon said.

"Even after all this time, you're still a pain in my ass. You're lucky there's security around." I said.

Raidon gave a nose exhale laugh and smirked. "Yeah? So they won't see you get embarrassed for a third time?"

"Hmph. I'll admit...I had no plan for the first two times. If we were to fight a third time...yeah best believe I'm fighting really dirty." I said and stretched.

"Yeah uh-huh. I can't wait to dust you again like I've been doing at school. I won't even let you get a chance to catch up." Raidon said and stood up. "After I get all that money, Aki is bound to come crawling back to me."

"Oh so you're doing this just so you can get Aki back huh? So what so you can cheat on her again? Yeah no that's not happening. Aki loves me more than some little egotistical bastard." I said.

"Why did you enter the race in the first place?" Raidon stood up.

"Because...first place gets ¥2,923,610. The reward is split in half between the two sprinters. Aki and I plan to use the money to help pay for a trip Rena has been planning. I joined this race for my girlfriend and my familia." I said.

"I can't wait to see their disappointed faces when I destroy you." Raidon smirked.

"We will see." I said.

The race was starting and all the runners were introduced. The women were running first then the men would finish the race off.

Aki looked around the stadium and heard the crowd was excited for the National Tokyo Relay Race. She couldn't see who was all in the stands so that calmed her down a bit.

It was time for the race and everyone took their positions. The starting pistol was fired and all the women took off. The crowd roared with excitement as the race started. Aki did was we planned and conserved her stamina for the first few meters. She began to speed up and as she did something caught her eye. She spotted her parents in the crowd. She grew nervous and tripped then fell onto the ground. She grunted as she rolled on her side.

"Why..? Why did they appear..?" Aki asked.

Raidon smirked and crossed his arms. "Looks like your girl has two left feet."

"Come on Aki, push through it..!" I mumbled.

Aki stood up and shook her head. She began to use the rest of her stamina to at the very least catch up to the other women. 'I'm sorry Archer...I really screwed up..'

"Look at Number 4! She's pretty fast! She's already caught up to the others in a matter of seconds!" One announcer said with excitement.

"Yeah but looks like she's burning through stamina quickly. She better hope she can make it to her partner, number 5, Archer Gray from the USA National Track Team in his Senior Year of highschool." The other announcer said.

Aki looked at me and wanted to crash but she pushed through and placed the baton in my hand. "I'm sorry.."

I smiled at her and grabbed the baton. I ran ahead and noticed Raidon in the front. I began to speed up and pass the others up. My adrenaline was rushing, my legs began to feel like they were running on air. Raidon looked back and noticed I was catching up. Even with the drawback, I still planned to use Aki's momentum to the best of my abilities.

"How is he catching up..?!" Raidon asked himself.

I leaned forward a bit and began to run as fast as I could.

"He passed Raidon! Go Archer!! Keep that up!!" Momoko cheered loudly.

"That's it Archer! Go! The final stretch!" Rena cheered and clapped her hands.

I stumbled a bit and Raidon saw this as a perfect opportunity to speed up. He smirked and began to pass me. I found my footing again and ran as fast as I could again.

"I'm not losing...I am not losing to you!!" I bellowed and passed the finish line seemingly at the same time as Raidon.

The others passed the finish line and the officials were confused on who won. The crowd was in awe on how close the race was.

I walked over to Aki and she hurried over to me and hugged me. I hugged her back and panted. We all waited for the announcement to be made on who finished in first. I made sure Aki was okay and she nodded.

"Looking at the photo finish..." The referee said on the microphone the paused. "Number 5, Archer Gray, was the first to cross the finish line in 43.01 Seconds and Number 12 was second with the time of 43.05 seconds!"

Aki's eyes widened and she screamed with excitement, completely forgetting about how fatigued she was. "We did it! We won! We actually won!"

I smiled and chuckled as I watched how excited Aki was. All of our hard work paid off.

Rena and the others cheered happily and high fived each other. They were extremely excited and happy about our shared victory.

The award ceremony took placed after everyone was rested up in the waiting room. Aki and I stood on the first place podium, holding up the first place trophy and the check for ¥2,923,610. We were so happy we couldn't stop smiling.

Later that day...

"A deal's a deal, Rena." I said and smiled. "We trained as a team and we won as one."

"I can see that and you are correct. A deal is a deal. I even have a surprise for you two." Rena smiled.

"A surprise?" Aki asked.

Rena reached in her purse and pulled out eight tickets to the vacation. "Here are the tickets to Tsukataya Island!~"

"Whoa whoa! How the hell did you pay for that?!" Aki asked in shock.

"I saved up for a month straight and got the tickets on sale! So because of that, you can keep your money and we all can go have fun on the island!~" Rena smiled.

We heard clapping and looked in the direction it came from.

"I knew you'd grow up to become someone successful." A man said and chuckled.

"Look at our daughter all grown up." A woman smiled.

We looked at the two and Aki froze up.

"Mom...Dad..." Aki said.

To be continued...