"Why did you follow us home, Aomine Daiki."
As he posed this prickly question, Midorima Shintarou stood formidably in front of the door to the room he shared with Kise. Aomine tried ducking into the room, but Midorima caught his face in a crushing grip. Yelping, Aomine bounced away.
"Geez, Midorima! It's just one night until I find somewhere cheap to stay."
"I forbid it," Midorima sternly said. "One useless person is enough!"
"Hey!" Kise pouted, poking his head out. "For that, you get this!"
With a 'hi-ya!' Kise kicked Midorima in the small of the back, sending him flying, and Aomine quickly hopped into the room. Muttering furiously, Midorima slammed the door shut and walked into the kitchen to get a glass of water.
"Intrusions aside," Kise said, plopping down on the genuine leather couch he'd bought with his own money, "it was really nice seeing everyone together again! It brought back memories…"
"Not nice ones," Aomine snorted.
"What? Did you hate us so much?"
Aomine scoffed and smacked Kise in the face by accident as he waved his hand around airily. "Middle school sucked. The first time we met after graduation, Akashi tried to stab Kagami in the face. And then, the last time we met… was the day Tetsu…"
He fell silent. He didn't need to finish the sentence, and he didn't want to.
Clearing his throat, Midorima cast an eye around the kitchen. His nose wrinkled. The dishes needed cleaning.
"But, anyways, Midorimacchi! What did you and Akashicchi talk about after we all left?"
"Nothing to worry your fluff-for-brains over."
"Mean!"
Aomine started laughing.
"Man, you two really haven't changed at all after middle school."
"You haven't either!" Kise pouted. "Well, no, that's…"
"Completely untrue," Aomine finished. He sighed and leaned back with his hands threaded behind his neck, enjoying the feel of the expensive couch. "Yeah, yeah, you don't have to be shy about saying it. I know I was a complete dick in middle school and in my first year of high school."
"You were…"
"Don't say it so frankly!" Aomine said, cuffing Kise on the back of his head.
"But you just said—"
As the two of them bickered, Midorima got ready for bed, following his usual routine that would guarantee him a good night's sleep. And knowing Aomine and Kise—he would need all the luck he could get in order to be able to sleep even a wink. Well, he would just prepare, as usual, and let fate decide the rest—
"Oha Asa does not know your future, Shintarou. You should not allow it to dictate your life. 'Leave it up to fate,' you always say. Doesn't that become unbearably restricting, not being able to create your own future? Take it into your own hands. Didn't Tetsuya teach you at least that?"
His hand paused, hovering just above his toothpaste. He shook his head. He didn't want to think about it right then. He quickly finished brushing his teeth and then shut himself in his room, inserting earplugs into his ears to muffle the crashing sounds coming from the living room where, no doubt, Kise and Aomine were romping around.
"Children…" Midorima huffed.
It was only 9; there was still quite a bit of time before Midorima's usual bedtime. He woke up his laptop and opened up a search engine though he wasn't positive what he wanted to look up. His fingers tapped absently on the desk, and then he knew—
What would you like to search?
COMA
He scrolled down the search results until he found what he was looking for.
A coma rarely lasts more than 2 to 4 weeks. The outcome for coma depends on the cause, severity, and site of the damage. People may come out of a coma with physical, intellectual, and psychological problems. Some people may remain in a coma for years or even decades. For those people, the most common cause of death is infection, such as pneumonia. [ ]
"…Decades?"
Comas are caused by an injury to the brain. Brain injury can be due to increased pressure, bleeding, loss of oxygen, or buildup of toxins. The injury can be temporary and reversible. It also can be permanent.
Trauma: Head injuries can cause the brain to swell and/or bleed. When the brain swells as a result of trauma, the fluid pushes up against the skull. The swelling may eventually cause the brain to push down on the brain stem, which can damage the RAS (Reticular Activating System) - a part of the brain that's responsible for arousal and awareness.
The chances of a person's recovery depend on the cause of the coma, whether the problem can be corrected, and the duration of the coma. If the problem can be resolved, the person can often return to his or her original level of functioning. Sometimes, though, if the brain damage is severe, a person may be permanently disabled or never regain consciousness.
… Comas that result from head injuries tend to have a higher rate of recovery than comas related to lack of oxygen. [webmd]
Comas seldom last longer than several weeks. People who are unconscious for a longer period of time may transition to a persistent vegetative state. Depending on the cause of coma, people who are in a persistent vegetative state for more than one year are extremely unlikely to awaken. [mayoclinic]
Midorima had to close his eyes and take a deep breath. So this was the situation Kuroko was in. He had been in a coma already for one year. Was he…
Was he ever going to wake up?
Unable to continue, Midorima shut his laptop and rolled into bed, carefully taking his glasses off with the correct hand and in the correct position. He tried to drown out the accusatory voices in his head—your fault, your fault—by reciting historical facts and medical terms, but somehow, his thoughts always wound up centered on Kuroko and Oha-Asa's words from that day…
It was hard falling asleep, and by the time his mind was drifting off, Kise and Aomine had long quieted down.
Beep. Beep. Beep.
Groaning, Midorima reached for his cell phone to shut it up. Thankfully, he remembered that Akashi said he would be contacting him early in the morning and checked his phone. He didn't want to think about what Akashi would do to him if he missed the appointment.
[Meet me at the hospital at 7:30. –Akashi]
Midorima carefully got out of bed after slipping on his glasses with his right hand. Nobody else was up—as expected; it was only 6:35 after all. After taking a shower, he quietly made himself breakfast. He rather enjoyed the quiet time in the wee hours of the morning, when there was no annoyingly boisterous Kise around to bother him.
When he was done, he dumped the dishes in the sink. Reconsidering, he pulled a piece of paper from the small stack they had on the counter and wrote a nice message for Kise to leave on the refrigerator.
Kise. Your fortune today says that the dishes need cleaning.
Grabbing his phone, wallet, and a few other necessary items (like today's lucky item, a camera), he left the apartment.
He plugged his headphones in time to hear Ohayo Asahi's cheerful voice saying:
"For cancers, today is not such a lucky day! You are ranked number seven; be careful! Take control of your own life today and do what you think is right or you'll be regretting it! Take a different route home; it might be good to drop by someplace on a whim! Your lucky item for today: a camera!"
Sighing, Midorima immediately began planning for a new way back as he boarded the bus headed towards the hospital. After thirty minutes, he was almost there when he got a second text message from Akashi.
[Never mind. Your presence is not needed here. Take your time in getting home; I'll be texting everyone for another meeting tonight after I extort information from the doctor. –Akashi]
Midorima stared dumbly at the message. The bus was stopping.
"Truly, Oha-Asa is always right."
He decided to get off at the next stop, not really wanting to risk seeing Akashi's face at the moment.
"Now then… where should I go?"
He wandered around a bit around the streets. None of the shops were open; it was too early. Instead, he caught sight of a few kids looking tired and mournful as they dragged their feet on the pavement. They were wearing blue and black uniforms, which hit a switch in Midorima's memory—hadn't that been Kuroko's uniform?
Suddenly, he felt an urge to visit the place where Kuroko had attended for three years of his life.
"…Oha-Asa truly knows all."
Not wanting to seem like a pervert or a suspicious person, Midorima briefly considered knocking one of the taller students out to steal their uniform before he realized what he was thinking. He huffed, pushed his glasses up his nose, and strode down the sidewalk. If he infiltrated Seirin, it would be honestly and with pride.
Inadvertently, he caught snippets of a conversation two preoccupied girls were having.
"…you hear?"
"You mean the sexual assaults? Yeah, but they're just rumors, you know… don't act so scared."
"Don't lie! You're scared too!"
Midorima frowned. He always knew Seirin was an unworthy school. He followed the girls until he saw the school gates and then turned on his heel. With eight hours to kill, he decided to take up temporary residence in a small, almost invisible bookshop that had a small coffee corner.
Finally, it was time for school to let out its small prisoners. Midorima swiftly jogged to the front gates and slipped in as the hordes of high schoolers swarmed out or to their clubs. He stayed far, far away from the gymnasium. He himself hadn't touched a basketball for a few months, not since the last Winter Cup.
"Excuse me, sir, are you a student here?"
A teacher. Midorima sighed impatiently.
"No. I used to attend this school, but am now studying at university," Midorima lied easily. "I just wanted to come back and have a look around."
"Ah! Your name?"
"…Kuroko. Kuroko Tetsuya."
"Eh… did we have a student like that?" the teacher mused.
"I've… changed a lot since I graduated."
The teacher smiled. "I see! We have a lot of students like that, so I'm not surprised. Well, take your time, Kuroko-kun. Seirin is always glad to see its former students."
With a jolly wave, the teacher skipped away. Midorima, expression stony, pushed his glasses up his nose and continued into the main building.
The halls were mostly empty as he wandered around aimlessly. A few classrooms were filled with clubs, but aside from that, it was mostly empty. He ascended the steps to the second floor, where the second-year classes were held, trying to progress sneakily since he didn't want to interact with people if he could help it.
One of the classrooms he was passing by was once Kuroko's—a strange thought. A couple years ago, Kuroko had passed down this hallway, sat down in one of the desks, was completely alive… Midorima shook his head.
He let his feet lead him to the third floor, which was, expectedly, packed with the third-year classrooms. None of the classes on this floor were being used at the moment; most of them were dark with the doors closed or locked. He guessed the teachers were in the lounge somewhere.
He found the library tucked away at the end of the hall and spent some time loitering around the Literature Club as they enthusiastically discussed pornographic novels.
About a half-hour had passed as Midorima browsed random books. Before he knew it, he was headed out the library again.
The classrooms on this floor elicited from him an even stranger reaction. Just a year ago, Kuroko was taking notes in one of them… just a year ago, Kuroko was possibly suffering alone as life around him went on in this school. On this floor, perhaps things had happened to him that accumulated and prompted him to suicide… Midorima shook his head again, trying to clear his thoughts.
One of the classroom doors was slightly ajar while the room itself was completely dark. He gravitated to it, feeling strangely drawn. His steps softened as a feeling of tension rose in him; he had a feeling he was intruding on something for some reason, but on what, he didn't know…
"Nn!"
The material of the pornographic novels the Literature Club had just been discussing still fresh in his head, Midorima's mind instantly jumped to the gutter. He jarred to a stop, breaking out into a sweat as he sternly reprimanded himself for being such a perverted boy.
"A-Ah—No—nn…"
He blinked rapidly.
"Shh…"
"Ah! P-please, stop…"
Maybe he was right for being a perverted boy.
Midorima's eyes darted wildly behind the lenses. For some reason, his body would not move. What should he do? The people inside the classroom were obviously engaging in an act that should not be done at school, and rather badly at that! If you were going to do something, at least do it where no one could hear you! Actually, just don't do it at school! Or even better, don't do it at all! The world population is growing too much anyways!
There was a sound like the blinds being hit on the window; sunlight rushed in, momentarily illuminating the two people inside. Midorima couldn't help looking. His eyes widened.
A female student.
A male teacher.
His eyebrows popped up to his hairline. Wasn't this illegal? Shouldn't the teacher get fired for this? Moreover, the girl did not look as if she were having a particularly good time… was the teacher just spectacularly bad at sex? Or was it something else…
Shaking his head, he turned and quickly made an escape. The smallest part of his mind screamed at him to use his camera to take a photo with flash to obtain incriminating evidence so that he could evict the heinous teacher from his post, but the rest of his mind told him to please, please, please walk away from the mind-scarring location with all due haste. He was almost out of the school when he finally remembered with a jolt what he had heard that morning.
"…you hear? I thought they stopped after last year…"
"You mean the sexual assaults? Yeah, but they're just rumors, you know… don't act so scared."
"Don't lie! You're scared too!"
"Crap!"
He looked down at the camera in his hands and cursed himself.
"Oha-Asa is truly always right!"
He turned and in a flash was sprinting up the stairs, three at a time. Not five minutes had passed, but when he got to the classroom and threw open the door and flung the lights on, it was completely empty. He had missed his chance.
"Damn!"
He went to the front office, but no one was there. Instead, he left a little note shouting in angry handwriting, 'ONE OF YOUR TEACHERS IS ENGAGING IN FORCED SEXUAL ACTS WITH HIS STUDENTS. CLASSROOM 3-4 WAS WHERE I SAW THEM. PLEASE DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT.'
Huffing angrily about this school—Kuroko should never have come here—Midorima took his leave and almost boarded the bus back home before he remembered Oha-Asa's advice. With that day's events in mind, he didn't care about what Akashi said. He flagged down a taxi and ordered the driver to make three loops around the school before going to his apartment, and the poor bewildered driver made three loops around the school before heading onto the main street.
At least one thing was going right today. Midorima sighed as he readjusted his glasses.
What a terrible, terrible day.
"Thank you for gathering, all of you, at the last minute notice."
This time, they were at an empty playground. Kise and Aomine had taken the swings captive, while Murasakibara took over the sandbox and tried making a sandcastle. Kagami swung on the monkey bars, and Midorima stood by Akashi, who was luckily not doing anything obscenely childish.
"This better be good," Aomine yawned.
Akashi folded his arms. "I can't tell. So far, I haven't gotten anything from it."
"Well, what is it?" Murasakibara intoned, pulling open a bag of potato chips.
Akashi sighed. "I went to see the doctor that treated Tetsuya when he got injured in the Winter Cup."
Kagami sputtered. "How'd you find out who it was?"
"I have my connections." Akashi shrugged. "And all it took was a little poking around and manipulation, and I found out quickly and with ease."
Kagami looked a little more than frightened.
"Anyways… luckily, the man didn't have any early-morning appointments, so I managed to ask him a few questions before his first patient got in. And, before you ask, Kagami Taiga," Akashi added as Kagami opened his mouth, presumably to ask how Akashi had gotten permission to barge into the doctor's office, "I have connections."
"Or more like all the women these days swoon as soon as they slap their eyes on you," Aomine muttered darkly.
"He didn't have trouble recalling Tetsuya," Akashi said, ignoring Aomine. "He told me the story as well as he could remember it…"
17
When Kuroko next opened his eyes, his arm was in a cast and his head was throbbing dully, as if the painkillers were not having a very big effect. He sat up, white lights popping in his vision as the blood rushed from his head, leaving him woozy.
"Ah, you're up? Do you remember what happened?"
Blinking a few times, Kuroko managed to get his vision to focus on the doctor smiling at him.
"…I got injured in a basketball match. Was it bad?"
The doctor's smile faltered a little. He pulled out a clipboard.
"It seemed you were flung into the base of the pole holding up the hoop. Well, the concussion wasn't too bad. Unfortunately, your arm got stuck under you, and that's where the wrist comes into play."
Kuroko's mouth was suddenly dry. He suddenly wasn't sure that he wanted to hear what the doctor had to say next.
"How is my wrist?"
"Well… it's… it could be better," the doctor said delicately. "But it could also be worse!"
Kuroko's headache and the doctor's method of beating around the bush were beginning to irritate him. "Sir, please tell me the truth."
Looking apologetic, the doctor nodded. "Alright. But first, were you using your wrist extensively? Your arm? Your body shows signs of being put under massive strain…"
Kuroko remembered the almost non-stop Ignite Pass Kais he had made. "Yes."
The doctor nodded. "Alright. Well. Your wrist is shattered at the joint and also fractured in several places. A few ligaments have… snapped, and some of the nerves were bruised as well. It… will take a while for you to recover, but even then, I'm not sure… if…"
"If I'll be able to play basketball again?"
"I—well! That's one way to put it. I think the extra stress definitely made the injury worse than it should have been. Either that, or whoever shoved you into the basketball pole was really rough. Or a mixture of both."
"A mixture of both," Kuroko muttered. "Thank you. Is that it?"
"Well, I'll probably wait until your parents come before talking about rehabilitation and recovery time. But, for the time being, just know that it'll take at least a month before you can get your cast off, and several more before you regain almost full control over it again."
"Okay."
"But, don't lose hope, Kuroko-kun," the doctor said hastily. "There are plenty of athletes who have made miraculous recoveries despite severe injuries… so don't give up on playing basketball!"
"I won't," Kuroko said with a faint smile. "I wasn't planning on it, either. Even if I can't play for a while, I'll still be able to engage in basketball."
"That's the spirit," the doctor said. "Do you have any questions?"
"…Did Seirin win the basketball match?"
The doctor looked surprised. "I'm afraid I don't know. Ah—that's right. There's a boy who's been waiting outside for the past hour or so. I shouldn't be allowing this, but if you'd like, I could let him in."
"Please," Kuroko nodded. "Ah—but, please, don't tell anyone other than my parents that I might not be able to play basketball again… I don't want to trouble them."
The doctor nodded understandingly. "Of course. Now then, if you're ready…"
He opened the door, and a few seconds later, Kagami barreled into the room, shouting obscenities and asking whether Kuroko was alright. The doctor quietly took his leave, telling nearby nurses to please let this one thing go.
"And that's all the doctor had, essentially," Akashi finished.
"Essentially?"
"There was the incident with Tetsuya's parents… but it was simply that the doctor told his parents that there was a chance Tetsuya might not recover fully. Of course, they were upset, but that was the end of the matter, it seems. Tetsuya was discharged from the hospital after a day and returned to school as normal."
"So," Kise said hesitantly, "do you think Kurokocchi, after some rehab, learned that he would be unable to play basketball again and… that that might have led to his suicide?"
"That is a possibility," Akashi said heavily. "But I feel like that this reason is too simple, don't you? In addition, the doctor said he was recovering well, and that there was a good chance of him regaining full control over his hand."
"Regardless, I don't think that's why Kuroko tried to kick the bucket," Kagami said firmly. Akashi turned ot him, question in his eyes. "It—well, whenever we had practice, he always came, all the way up to winter break, which was a month after he got hurt. And that aside… I just don't think Kuroko would let something like that deter him so… so much."
Akashi nodded. "That is what I believe, as well. There must be something else, whether it is related to his injury or not. And so, Daiki, I believe it is your turn to share your story."
Aomine looked surprised for a moment. Then, he shook his head, chuckling as though mocking himself.
"I should have known you'd figure me out."
Akashi said nothing, only fixing his mismatched eyes on Aomine, who sighed deeply, as if readying himself for a long tale.
...and the rest will be saved for next chapter. ;)
Thank you everyone for all your support, especially to those who reviewed! It is really encouraging :)
Oh, and all that information on comas was taken from random sites online. Not mine. Sites sourced after the exerts.
Note on updates: they will probably be coming out slower now because AP exams are just around the corner.
And finally, I just want to say thank you to all the heroes at the Boston Marathon.
Thanks for reading, and have a nice day!