Submitted for the January 2025 prompt: Galactic Brackets

Long considered the fastest game on grass on planet Earth, Camogie, unbeknownst to its female players on one island country, had now reached multiple ears on an alien colony — a hop and a skip in light years from Mars.

 

Unfortunately for the Terrans, this national event’s popularity was a portent of doom.

* * *

 

Sagan01 pushed back a tendril from his twelve eyes, focusing on the monitor. The game was almost over. Strath Roamers looked set to win until the last two minutes when the Fomorian’s star player, Danu Lee, put the issue beyond doubt. She swung her camán, sending her sliotar in an arc beneath the crossbar and finding the net.

 

Goal!

 

The whistle blew, terminating play. 3-3 to 2-3.

 

Sagan01’s frame quivered as he watched players tumble over themselves in excitement, injuries, of which there were many, forgotten. Fans streamed onto the pitch.

 

This was sport!

 

“Perhaps there is some amusement to be had before the main annihilation event, Sagan01,” Cosmos02, his underling, suggested on seeing the Fleet Commander’s absorption.

 

“Yes,” Sagan01 mused, “this is the team for my hatchlings to defeat before my warships decimate the planet and the extermination protocol begins. Commence preparations.”

 

“If they refuse to participate?”

 

“I will negotiate. Their incentive: their planet’s survival,” Sagan01 said, studying Danu’s victory run. She was fast, and the soft rain appeared to rejuvenate the other players as they followed in her wake, their speed increasing in the downpour. A sliver of uncertainty entered his consciousness for a moment before ebbing away.

 

“And if they win?” Cosmos02 asked.

 

“Against my brood? Impossible.”

 

* * *

 

Danu’s piercing blue eyes scanned the vast, dry lake from the air. Not a blade of grass in sight. Not only that, but the constantly morphing spacecraft positioned on one bank were disconcerting. Still she knew once the team were in the thick of it, nothing else would matter except the game. Hopeful humans thronged the other side.

 

Her fourteen teammates, bedecked in red and white jerseys, huddled together at one corner of the flight deck. Worried expressions mingled with fear, met her as she headed towards them. Like the rest of the world, they waited for the outcome of this match, the toughest game they’d ever played, with bated breath.

 

“Remember, girls, all we need to do is win the sliotar and keep it like always. They don’t stand a chance if we do that,” Danu urged, joining the huddle. Yet her words were tinged with doubt.

 

Their transport ship descended.

 

* * *

 

President Balor greeted them. Dwarfing him was Sagan01, seven feet tall, shimmering in the late August sun. Three muscular legs clad in gold. Two long, slender arms ended in hands sporting ten fingers of equal length and shape. His opaque eyeballs floated in a viscous sublayer of darker cream-coloured fluid as he scanned the cloud-speckled sky.

 

The Fomorians warmed up, ready for battle.

 

Thunderous clapping broke out from their supporters when Danu put on her helmet, positioned her captain’s armband and took to the semblance of a field with the rest of her team.

 

Opposing black and white jerseys dotted the lakebed. The TAI (Team Alien Invaders) were already on the pitch. A couple of inches shorter than their overlord, they were equally muscular and a foreboding sight.

 

Butterflies fought for space in Danu’s belly, and her legs felt like jelly, but she planted a smile on her face and put forth her hand. The captains shook, the referee tossed a coin for a choice of ends, and all took their positions, the four centre-field players back to back, waiting for the referee’s throw-in.

The referee blew the whistle and threw the sliotar on the halfway line.

 

With a powerful strike, the All-World Camogie Championship was in motion.

 

Hand pass followed hand pass. Camáns clashed in the air as both sides fought to maintain possession. Capitalizing on their height difference, the Fomorians advanced and moved the sliotar down the field.

 

Danu performed a solo run, balancing and bouncing the sliotar. She angled westward, and an opponent followed. With a sharp pivot, she changed direction, reversed, and gained ground over her confused shadow.

 

Danu scored. Goal! First blood.

 

The watching crowd cheered. Commentators relayed the action worldwide.

 

TAI spurted forward. Their unexpected acceleration surprised the opposing team. Danger here, but the Fomorian goalkeeper made a decisive block. Danger averted.

 

Run.

 

Chase.

 

Intercept.

 

Block.

 

Fomorians scored a point, but the alien contingent pushed clear again to level and were ahead by two points at halftime: 1-3 to 1-1.

 

The halftime whistle blew. The referee gave the hand signal. Camáns stilled.

 

* * *

 

TAI gained possession at the start of the second half.

 

Fomorians blocked an attempt at a goal shot, retaking possession. TAI gave chase and recovered the sliotar, but the first touch was poor and went over the sideline.

 

Sideline cut awarded to Fomorians.

 

Danu placed the ball on the ground. She got down low, camán in under, and struck between sliotar and clay, high and long.

 

Two points!

 

Fomorians charged forward — they were neck and neck.

 

Blood trickled from eyebrow lacerations from repeated aerial contacts.

 

Explosive sprinting from Danu now as she hooked her opponent’s camán with her own. Rotating her camán, she engineered a fluid swing down the middle of the field. A teammate picked it up, ran, and readied for the strike from within the penalty area.

 

Cheers grew and then quelled.

 

Slam!

 

Cynical contact from a forbidden side-to-side charge by an opposing player.

 

The Fomorian fell.

 

Tension in the air.

 

Threatening clouds broke. The rainstorm almost drowned out the spectators’ booing. Fomorians, virtually as one, raised their faces to the falling deluge.

 

With one minute left and the crowd in despair, the referee awarded Danu’s team a penalty puck for the aggressive foul inside the penalty area.

 

The recovered player stood, camán at the ready. The sliotar lay on the 20m line closest to where the foul occurred.

 

A calculated strike.

 

Goal!

 

It was all over. Fomorians won. 2-3 to 1-3.

 

Cheers erupted.

 

Sagan01 quivered. “This was sport.”