A/N: Happy New Year's and all that

Hangover

He breathed in.

He breathed out.

His arms were heavy. Legs tired and shaky. And yet as he stood behind the free-throw line Natsu was still able to hoist up that ball and force his shot through the net. He was exhausted, but something drove him forward. No, something was an inaccurate description.

As the ref passed him the ball so he could work to push in the second free-throw, he pondered over his current state of mind. He was angry. Absolutely furious. And as he stood on the court his sneakers had touched so many times, encompassed by the seemingly never-ending roars and cheers of the team's fans, he felt himself begin to sink into a state of superlative consciousness. He could see through himself as though he were swimming in the water of the Maldives.

It was ironic, in fact. He had a completely clear state of mind which was spurred on by a seamlessly uncontrollable rage. And as he looked at himself through a proverbial mirror he realized that it was this same fury that was pushing him forward towards greatness.

It was toxic, but it was working.

Add another, Natsu thought as he watched the ball go through the net, scoring his thirty-fifth point of the match.

The pinket pushed out an explosive gust of a breath as he turned on his heel and jogged towards their side of the court, his face showing nothing but a stoic expression. No anger, no joy – nothing. He was in the highest state of competition which he wouldn't give away for any amount of money.

This state was his serenity – it was the phenomenon that gave him a foothold on reality and at the same time was keeping his fragile pieces together. It was like the soft embrace of sanity's very welcome arms that he had been missing these past few weeks.

"Whoa." Jellal breathed out as he wrote down Natsu's points on his clipboard, feeling himself delve into astonishment as he realized that he had never before seen such a game from the pinket. Hell, he'd never seen such a performance in a college player altogether. "Thirty-five points, twelve rebounds, five blocks and nine steals."

"One steal shy of a triple-double and there's still half a quarter to go." Gildarts confirmed yet showed absolutely no emotion through neither his facial expressions nor his tone of voice.

That hadn't escaped the former head coach, "Is something wrong?"

The orange haired man hummed to himself, watching as Dragneel got his sixth block straight on D, "How many assists does he have?"

"Uh…" Jellal quickly checked the score count, "Only two. That's…"

"Let me guess… he got them before I benched him."

"Yeah." The bluenet confirmed with a harsh breath. Natsu was indeed performing phenomenally, however his lack of team-play was alarming. He had taken the reigns of a team that had been underperforming and steamrolled into an equalizer through his own skills and sheer willpower. Yet after getting them back into the game their Power Forward looked as though he wouldn't trust anyone besides himself with the ball – something which may cost them not only the game.

"We should bench him." Jellal suddenly concluded, turning to the larger coach for confirmation.

Gildarts hummed before shaking his head, "No." He answered, "Taking him out now may damage the rhythm he's developed for himself and the team. When nobody believed in him, Dragneel spat in their faces and took everything into his own hands. To me it feels like he's trying to prove himself capable. When you put things into perspective, I take it you can imagine what would happen if we took him out now, right?"

A likely destroyed morale for the remainder of the season, Fernandez concluded mentally, realizing that it was in fact detrimental to take out their star forward who was on fire, "But he's got four very nasty fouls. He might just make things worse for himself."

And as though to reinforce that hypothesis the referees blew their whistle when Natsu smashed his shoulder into an opposing defender – hard – when attempting to get past him, effectively getting charged with his fifth foul. Natsu clicked his tongue in annoyance as he raised his hand, admitting to the foul and at the same time keeping a few particularly dirty remarks for both the opponent and the referee to himself.

"That shouldn't be a problem." Gildarts commented, drawing some surprise from the tattooed coach.

"Are you-"

"Look at him." He suddenly interrupted, "Does he look worried to you?"

"No… but-"

"When you get your fifth and are one away from fouling out – I don't care how confident or good you are, you always get worried. That's because you're never sure how the game is going to go, what direction it might take. Especially in the situation we're in. We're almost at the end of the game, and the way everything is looking we're likely to reach overtime – no one wants that. Thus we foul to set the stage for a play that's gonna get us ahead. You never know when that'll happen. On D, on offence – it doesn't matter. It's a spur of the moment decision that you know you have to make when you make it in order to win."

Jellal scratched the back of his head, feeling confused, "And that makes sure Natsu doesn't foul out how exactly?"

"That's exactly it. Somewhere inside him he knows how this game is going to end, that's why he's not worried." Gildarts smiled at Jellal, "You know better than I do when to trust Dragneel. So, what do you think? Is this that moment?"

"You're thinking he'll choose overtime?"

Gildarts snorted, "Really, I feel like I know him better than you do. Tell me, has Dragneel ever been someone to buy himself more time? Or has he pushed himself to the brink of losing consciousness in order to take it all?"

Taking a few moments to ponder over what Gildarts said, Jellal let his head hang in defeat as he chuckled, "Yeah, I suppose you're right."

FTU was on defense, finding themselves glued to the enemy players. It had become an unspoken tactic to keep their defense super tight as they were still several points behind with the game-clock slowly heading towards the final buzzer. If they wanted to emerge victorious they needed to place a twenty-inch steel-plated wall between the enemy team and their hoop.

The opponents tried to scatter them, trying to find any ripples or cracks in their defenses to exploit through quick dribbles and unreadable passing. That was exactly what they were waiting for. As soon as Natsu saw the opposing Point Guard's eyes drift to Erik's mark, he made his move. Just as he had thought, he passed, and Natsu was in the right place at the right time to push his hand in front of the ball's trajectory.

Dragneel managed to deflect the ball towards the enemy basket and made a beeline towards it. Regardless of the fact that the pinket held the ball and thus had to bounce it against the wooden tiles of the court in order to avoid a travelling foul, his top speed never wavered. He had gotten ahead of the enemy D before they even had the time to take up positions and jumped, roaring as he scored yet another dunk, almost ripping the rim off in the process.

The stands came alive once again, and through a split-second ripple in his focus Natsu's eyes darted to Lucy. A smile came over him when he realized that she was there, cheering them on too. He had no idea whether it was because he scored or the team did but frankly he didn't even care. Just knowing that she wasn't being petty was enough.

"A trip-dub. Nice." Laxus commented when Natsu got back to their side of the court – a comment to which the reply was a simple nod.

Erik's eyes, however, were focused on something else. He was looking specifically at Natsu's right ankle, which he had noticed a very subtle limp to. This had the redhead worried and he would have likely pried if the opponents hadn't suddenly rushed them. Having been overwhelmed at the split-second counter, FTU found themselves being dunked on fiercely.

Feeling as though he had to repay them, Natsu raised his hand for a pass before he even got to center court, already hightailing it with his top speed. Gajeel had noticed this and as much as he didn't like the fact that Natsu was being a ball hog he knew he didn't have much room to argue. Neither Jellal nor Gildarts said anything about it during the few timeouts they took nor the break between quarters. And as bad as he hated to admit it, if Natsu was on fire FTU's PG knew better than to rely on anyone else.

Cocking his arm back, the red-eyed PG chucked the orange ball along the entire court in the form of a long-pass. Natsu jumped to his feet to catch it near the three-point line. As soon as he caught it, he landed, and jumped right back up. A total of three defenders leaped up to meet him and raise their arms in the form of a block that completely surrounded the player. The fiery haired PF, however, didn't hesitate in the slightest as he chucked the ball over the rising defense and scoffed when it buzzed right through the net.

They were down by two with the shot-clock evening out with the game-clock.

FTU didn't have any timeouts to give and the opponents could very well let the clock run its course. The home team were at a massive disadvantage as they once again tried to pry the ball out of their opponents' hands, only this time it was made that much more arduous simply based on the fact that their enemy didn't need to score – all they needed to do was hold on to the ball until the few remaining seconds ran out.

Nobody fouled. They decided they didn't need the foul as each and every single FTU player stuck to their mark as though they were their shadow. As the shot clock ran, so did their patience. Eventually Gray joined in a double-team with Gajeel in an attempt to steal the ball – something which successfully prompted a difficult pass from the opponents. Laxus had seen through this and managed to get his hand in the way for a steal.

The observing fans came alive as Erik caught the ball and began a full-speed sprint towards the opponents' side of the court. His eyes scanned the perimeter – the opposing players had already gotten back on D, running as though their life depended on it. Natsu was calling for a pass behind the three-point arc and Gajeel was sprinting towards the hoop.

Cubellios had two choices: pass to Natsu for a risky three that could win or lose them the match or lob it to Gajeel for an alley-oop dunk which could either earn them an and one and hopefully the match or it would push them to overtime, which is assuming their PG could make the dunk. Natsu was being guarded by two defenders, making the shot that he would undoubtedly attempt crazy risky.

Using his better judgment, Erik tossed it to Gajeel.

The pass, however, never found its mark.

Erik's eyes widened in shock when Natsu flew by him in a blur and stole his pass. Bouncing the ball, Natsu faked a pump, took a lightning-fast step back, and jumped backwards. Angling himself in the air into a fadeaway, he used the last of his strength as he threw the ball.

Time seemingly slowed as everyone watched the ball enclose on the hoop. The buzzer sounded before the ball had the chance to hit its goal. And yet when the successful buzzer beater set FTU's victory in stone Clive Center erupted in maddeningly loud chants of victory.

The players on the court, however, weren't. While the opponents were understandably devastated, feelings of pure shock enveloped FTU's players. Wide-eyed and bewildered, all four of them stared at Natsu with disbelief, trying to understand what the hell had just happened. Erik grit his teeth and begun angrily stomping towards the pinket when Laxus stopped him with his arm on the redhead's shoulder.

"Not here." He said calmly as he made his way towards their bench, "Come on."

It took no time at all for the players to return to their locker rooms. Gildarts and Jellal had decided to have the debrief later as both of them knew what was on their players' minds. Jellal had wanted to stay and perhaps mediate the damage but after the head coach stated that everything must run its course the bluenet unwillingly relented.

"What the hell, Natsu?!" Erik growled as soon as the coaches were gone.

"What? We won, didn't we?" Natsu answered with a question of his own, turning to meet his roommate's glare with one of his own.

"You damn well know that's not the fucking problem here!"

A sigh left Dragneel's throat, "What do you want me to say? You want me to apologize?"

"Damn straight I want you to apologize."

"Too bad." Natsu shot back, his eyes narrowing, "Cause I sure as hell won't apologize for your lack of proper judgment."

"You stole my pass!" The redhead yelled as he smashed a locker in with the side of his fist, feeling his blood boiling.

"Oi…" Gray exhaled, feeling the situation gradually getting out of hand. And yet before he could say anything further he was stopped by their red eyed captain who shook his head a negative.

"Because your pass wasn't the right call." The pinket reasoned calmly, turning back to fold his things properly into his bag.

Feeling outraged due to Dragneel's purposeful ignorance, Erik felt his anger overspill as he took three large and angry steps forward, forcefully turned his roommate around and pushed him against a locker hard enough that it bent.

"I was the one making the call. You had no right to overrule that!"

"I was free. Gajeel wasn't. Sure, he probably would've scored that dunk. But there was absolutely no way the enemy team would've fouled and given him a game-winning and one. We would've head into overtime and none of us have any fucking idea how that would've gone considering how bad we sucked ass tonight. I was free. I would've sunken the shot. But because of your fucking indecisiveness I had to do what I did. And let's completely ignore the fact that it made things ten times more difficult for me and I still sunk it."

"I don't need your goddamn excuses. You didn't trust my call!"

"You didn't trust me!" Natsu suddenly roared out, pushing Erik away forcefully when he felt his anger reach its boiling point, "You saw that I was free but you still chose the supposed safer route because you thought I'd buckle under the pressure and wouldn't be able to score! What? Was it because you thought my fuck-up with Lucy would screw my game up? Is that it?"

Erik's eyes widened, "Natsu, I-"

"Save it." The pinket stated, grabbing his stuff after he quickly got dressed, "I'm done."

After Natsu left Erik was left in a daze. He was both angry with himself and his roommate. Indeed he did hesitate because he was worried for Natsu but that didn't give him the right to completely overrule his decision. He was pissed and rationally so. With this one play they managed to break each other's on-court trust and it was driving the redhead mad.

"Damn it!" He roared, smashing his fist into a random locker, completely destroying the small metal door.

Natsu, on the other hand, tried his best to push his thoughts away from that previous situation and simply took the bus home. Letting his phone blare music into his ears through his Skullcandy headphones he breathed out a harsh breath as he felt a sharp sting in his right ankle.

As soon as he got through the door Natsu let his bag drop to the floor and leaned back against a wall, sliding down against it until his behind was on the ground. Breathing rather heavily as he stared at his apartment's ceiling, he let a silent prayer cross through his mind before he took off his shoes and socks.

"Fuck." Dragneel cursed out with a sigh when he noticed how swollen his ankle was. Turning, he opened his mouth and was about to call out when he realized Erik still hadn't come back – and likely wouldn't seeing as how they almost slit each other's throats half an hour ago.

Groaning, Natsu did his best to stand on his feet before slowly limping towards the kitchen, feeling his ankle hurt more and more with each inhibited step. A myriad of thoughts ran through his mind as he fished out a bag of ice from their freezer, however he didn't linger for too long on any of them. He was still experiencing his game-high, feeling himself inside a zone which kept any foreign thoughts at bay strongly enough that it made his anxiety feel like a simple prickle in his chest. It was a reprieve he hadn't felt in a while and he sure as hell wasn't going to let it go now.

Sitting down near the kitchen counter, Natsu gently touched the cold ice to his bloated foot, hissing at the contact and the pain it caused. He had been feeling his ankle acting up ever since that night with Lucy. He could only imagine what he'd done during his black-out and frankly he dreaded the memory. He told himself he didn't need to know.

And yet what actually bothered him was the fact that it begun acting up so bad as soon as he amped his game up. This didn't bode well, neither for him nor his team, especially if they were going to continue with their lackluster performance they displayed tonight.

He was no exception to this and that was perhaps what he hated the most. He needed to improve. Taking it slow wasn't going to cut it anymore.

But at the same time he knew that if he pushed himself too hard he could very well kiss the season goodbye due to the reoccurrence of his past injury.

"A rock and a hard place… again. That's just fucking great."