Mythia: Hey guys! Does Mitobe have a seiyuu? XD Maybe not. He doesn't talk, after all... hehehe, what a random thought, no?

Please, enjoy the final segment of Episode 01! :) I'd say Happy Belated New Year, but meh. People might see this in like, March and go, 'It was New Year a long time ago...' People might see this next year. Who knows.


01

I Am Kuroko

Boku wa Kuroko desu

[continued]

"You know, your friend should just quit basketball."

"W-What? No, he shouldn't! His strength is entirely different, you see."

Kagami gave me a bored look.

After the basketball game, which I sorely lost, Kagami came with me to see my parents. They were glad that he moved to Japan, asking a little about Himuro. But those conversation ties were always cut off and moved to a different conversation. I wondered why he'd do that.

Did something happen after I left?

Kagami left the house to head home, and it wasn't far, so we found out that we used the same route to school next morning. Well, more like Kagami showed me his route. I took the car the first day, and immediately traffic formed, so I was late to school that time.

Walking to school didn't take long. And the day went by so quickly. The teachers didn't expect too much from the students, so some of them were late that day, and the learning was basic.

Doing biology was disgusting because of how blunt the teacher was at addressing parts of animals or the human body. Geometry class gave me a headache. All of these formulas, with lots of algebra mixed in were just terrible. But after that, English class was like a jump for joy, with a breeze of fresh air on a warm, sunny day.

Soon, I entered gym class for a second time for an actual class. Kimiko was visibly down because of this. She was asking me the class before to break a part of my body again, but that'd look like it was purposely done.

In the end, it was shown that I was above average at P.E. I was better than some of the boys, to my surprise.

Of course, there was Kagami. He was in my gym class, and he had more of the spotlight when it was his turn to do whatever the coach instructed him to do.

After my last class, which was history, I got lost again trying to find the gym, and had Hyuga help me find it like I was blind. "Haven't you been here for gym class?" he inquired, exasperated. "Twice?"

"W-Well..." Should I have answered?

I laughed nervously. "S-Sorry, Hyuga-senpai."

"Your job today is to find the stats of our recruits with Aida," he spoke, probably being on okay terms with me.

"Oh, that's n-no problem," I waved off.

"You better get used to no stutters though. Aida would easily get annoyed."

I blinked. "And you're not?"

He stared at me through his round glasses dryly. "I could care less, since you're just a timid freshman to me. But if this continues in the middle of the year, I'll get pissed."

"G-Got it. Oh, sorry about that!"

"Enough apologies too. That'll get old fast."

"A-Alright. Oh, s—"

A hand was smacked onto my mouth. "What did I just say?"

"I was about to say, 'Oh, sheet,'" I said sensibly. "You know, like the cuss word that my mom had taught me not to say. 'Shikushou!' Eh, that sounded lame!"

Hyuga snorted. "Do you think I'd buy that crap? Don't treat me like I'm dumb."

"I wasn't intending to," I said.

We entered the gym. "Hey, you all!" Hyuga shouted for attention. "Our manager's here. Her name is Yukishiro Mitsu."

"Aha, nice to meet you all," I greeted with a small wave. My eyes met Kagami's, who looked at me with a silent sigh, looking away. My smile vanished.

Kuroko watched me with emotionless eyes as I stepped to where Aida was. "You guys have seen her before," affirmed Aida. "Yukishiro will watch how you play and note your stats. If she notices what you can't do, we'll have a special training for you. Maybe you'd be a regular if this keeps up."

While the other first years were surprised at my presense, Kagami suddenly blurted out, "Wait, we're not in the regulars yet?"

Aida's eyes narrowed promptly. "What? Did you expect that we'd welcome you with open arms? We're not stupid," she snarled. "You recruits are going to go against your senpais."

A second-year I haven't properly met yet stood behind me in complete silence. It felt a little awkward, so I smiled at him. "H-Hello."

I was met with a smile and no words.

Koganei whispered to me, "Mitobe doesn't talk."

"Oh."

"Did I tell you my name yet?" he asked me, with his cat-like eyes on mine.

"Well, it's Koganei-senpai... right?"

Even his smile was like a cat's. "Right-o! Koganei Shinji. And that's Mitobe Rinnosuke. He's really nice, so don't worry about him," he assured me.

"Ah, I wasn't worried." Did I look worried to him? Maybe it was because I had to rate them and work on a bunch of personal schedules for each of them. There may be only a handful of players, but I didn't like the idea of having to go through all of them individually.

"Now, the ones that you'd have to be careful around are Hyuga Junpei and Aida Riko. They're total hotheads—"

Aida was standing behind Koganei as he said this. Koganei froze, and slowly rotated. "Did you say something?" Aida's lips were twitching in several places.

"N-No!" Koganei quickly lied. Before I knew it, he was behind me with his hands on my shoulders. I squeaked at the pressure on my shoulders and the glaring senpai before me.

That was soon taken care of though. We had to begin the practice match, with the senpai-tachi versus the kouhai-tachi.

My left leg shook as I jotted down my thoughts and scores on each player. Though, I was constantly distracted by Kagami's play. He was mercilessly dominating the court, with one dunk after the other. He was no ordinary beast, I knew.

But he's nothing compared to the Miracles, I reminded myself. He's far from their level.

Continuing writing things down, I checked on Kuroko. I was truly concerned with him. Whenever the ball landed in his hands, it always got stolen easily, without hesitation. What are you doing Kuro-kun? I know you're better than this.

Kuroko glanced up where I was. His eyes trailed to my clipboard, and then for a moment he just stood there, while everyone else moved around. "Kuroko! Move your ass this instant!" Aida roared.

He resumed playing after that echoed around the gym. And soon after, the senpai-tachi triple-teamed as defense against Kagami, preventing him from any more dunks. Because of that, the second-years quickly had their lead.

My hand ran through white locks. "Kuroko," I muttered, "what are you doing just standing there idly?"

Kagami was getting irritated at the point gap. Fired up, he tried more ruthlessly, but the attempts were futile because of the strong defense focused on him.

Kuroko looked up at me a second time, and nodded. I jerked inwardly at this. "Huh?"

Before I knew it, I began to see it once more: Kuroko's flash passes. Because I haven't seen it in such a while, my eyes hurt quickly at the speed. Shaking my head, my eyes drew back to the clipboard on my lap.

"Where do they keep coming from?" Aida questioned beside me. I felt her brown eyes scanning around and squinting. She finally went ahead and eyed me, expecting an answer.

I looked up at her and smiled a little. "Kuroko's the rumored Phantom Sixth Man," I simply explained. "His abilities are different than what you expected, no? When I played against him, I found out about his abilities."

"But how does he keep doing that?"

I hesitated. "I-It's hard to explain, but Kuroko's weak presence gives him an advantage to passing, you see."

Kuroko passed to one of the first-years, Furihata Kouki, and they scored a point. Aida's eyes widened. "That's really..."

"I was surprised too when I first knew. I had no words to describe his play either. But I'd say now that it's cunning."

Aida crossed her arms, impressed. "Shrewd."

"Sneaky."

"Sly."

"Nifty."

"I'll say," agreed Aida. "I can't underestimate this guy anymore. He's wimpy, but he might be useful. Hey, write in more detail about Kagami and Kuroko."

I nodded, writing things I knew about them down. The task given was pretty easy for me, since I was already familiar with their habits and play style. The way Kagami played wasn't very different from before.

I heard him dunk again. "He never changed," I said with a smile, writing several more things about that particular first-year.

"Can you write some observations on the second-years a little?" asked Aida.

"Ah, that's fine." I almost stuttered. Thank goodness I didn't. So I just wrote and wrote, until my hand was sore.

When I sensed the game was almost over, I dropped my pencil down and laid the clipboard beside me. Then, I began to watch, and I noticed how Kuroko seemed to use all of the players during the passing. But as I concentrated more on his moves and roughly calculated whom he was passing to the most, it was Kagami.

Was Kuroko trying to impress him? Oh, that couldn't be right; Kuroko wasn't the kind of person who'd do that.

It was the match point. The first-year team was only a point behind the opposing team. If they could get at least a two-pointer, they'd win...

My leg shook in anticipation again. Aida noticed this and deadpanned, saying, "You're too excited. This is nothing, Yukishiro."

"I know. But this might be a very important match," I replied sensibly. "This shows if Kuroko and Kagami are good players to your team or not, right?"

Aida blinked once. She looked away. "I knew that!"

We both looked up simultaneously, and saw the final pass and shot. Kuroko lightning passed to Kagami, who dunked and scored two points. The match was over.

The freshman team won.

Both Aida and I stared for a minute, just forcing ourselves to think. Then, I stood up and walked to Kuroko, holding out a towel for him to take. "Great job impressing them!" I said.

"Thank you."

Tentatively, I moved to Kagami too. He took the towel in my hands and wiped his sweaty face. "You're really sweaty for a small game," I commented.

He glared at me, but I just held a teasing smile. "You play against them. They all teamed up on me."

"But you could've taken them all on Tai-kun," I pressed on. "I thought you said back then you, and I quote, 'have the power of ten men.' Don't you remember that?"

I knew Kagami was still mad at me, seeing me again. We both never saw this coming. We probably thought the same thing: we were once the best of friends, it didn't last, and we moved on with our lives. Though, I suppose what made Kagami mad the most was the realization that he missed me.

Well, I missed him too. Nothing was the same without the trio, Kagami, Himuro, and I together.

"I was ten," he growled.

Shrugging, I patted his forearm. "You're really big. You've grown."

"Well, you don't stutter anymore," he retorted. "And you barely grew. And you look like glass."

I furrowed my brows. "'Glass'? What's that supposed to mean?"

He looked at me with a 'seriously?' face. "Tsu, you look so fragile, like a newborn baby or something. You look like you can't hurt a fly. And you don't look like you've ever touched a basketball before." He turned around to pack. "Just saying."

I huffed. "I do not."

Kuroko had to agree with Kagami, "You do."

I frowned. "I wasn't talking to you."

Later on, I headed home. But before that, I had to get Kagami's contact information. His cell phone was different, but he did live near.

While I did my homework, I got a call. "Moshi, moshi?"

"Your friend is creepy!" That was the first thing I heard from the other line.

"Tai-kun, I have no idea what you're talking about." I deadpanned, clicking my pen.

"I meant that Phantom Miracle. I'm at Maji Burger, and I order my food, then I sit down."

"What's so creepy about that?" I asked, thinking about that small little restaurant that sells burgers and milkshakes. Oh, and those fries are pretty good too... oh wait, Kagami is still talking to me... oops.

"—I mumble to myself, and bam! He's right in front of me, and I actually believe him when he says that he's been here the entire time!" he exclaimed. Okay, so I don't think I've missed that much. Man, I must be hungry. I'll get some fries later—wait, what did he say?

"Ah, 'here'? You mean he's in front of you as you speak?" I spoke incredulously. "Tai-kun, you're being rude."

Kagami scoffed. "It's not like he cares."

"He does too. Be considerate for once, Tai-kun," I began to shout.

"How would you know that? You just met him yesterday."

"No I haven't!" I opposed. "Kuro-kun has been a friend of mine since I came to Japan. Of course you wouldn't know, but don't say such carelessly rude things in front of people Taiga!"

Back then, whenever I said his first name angrily, he'd run silent. At least that didn't change about him.

I sighed, "Tai-kun, how would you feel if I said to Kuroko insolent things about you while you're around?"

"I wouldn't care."

"Really now?" I raised a brow. "That's unbelievable."

"Stop talking like that."

Now that caught me off guard. "W-What?"

"It doesn't sound right," Kagami continued while chowing down a burger. At least, his mouth was shamelessly full while he was speaking. "I mean you try to sound like you're sure of yourself, but I know you Tsu. You always think before you speak, so stop forcing yourself to sound smart."

"I'm no-not trying to!" I stammered.

Kagami chewed and swallowed two more burgers. "I know the Tsu that stutters. She's fiery, but she's cooler than that."

"W-Well, I just don't want Aida-senpai or Hyuga-senpai to be mad at me, that's all," I said honestly, stroking my hair and wrapping a finger around a lock. "They're pretty scary. They told me to be more affirmative and to stop st... stuttering."

I could hear him on another burger.

"How many did you get?" I questioned.

"I think fifteen or so," was his reply. "I'm dieting."

Ah. Wait... Kagami only bought that much? He really must be dieting to only get fifteen.

"Your stuttering is really annoying," he suddenly said. "Though, I got used to it. It's no big deal anymore for me. But I can imagine those two getting pissed at you."

I pouted. "No need to remind." Then, I had a thought and asked, "Can you hand the phone to Kuro-kun?"

The phone was silent for a little bit. Then Kagami answered, "Here's not here anymore."

"Just tell him to talk, and you'll see him Tai-kun," I suggested.

A few voices and noise was heard over the line, and then I heard the phone drop. When it was picked up, Kagami barked, "It's official! This guy's either a ghost or he's magical!"

My eyes narrowed. "Tai-kun, you know I don't believe in either of those things. It's not rational."

He moaned, "Here comes practical Tsu."

"People are way too superstitious these days! Ghosts are ridiculously unreasonable. And don't even get me started on the concept of magic—"

"No one cares, Tsu."

I huffed and moved on. "Tai-kun, is Kuro-kun still there?"

"Speaking of him, how did you know him anyway? How come he knows basketball?"

I paused to think for a few seconds. The other line was noisy, but Kagami was silent. So I responded, "I wanted to see if the Generation of Miracles were better than you, or my basketball friends in America. And, in all honesty, they were. Kuroko was the only one that I really liked though."

"You really liked him?"

I smiled. "He was a nice person," I said, as if that answered everything. "His play style, I admit, was strange. But I liked it; there was something to it that I didn't even see coming until it happened."

Kagami was quiet for a moment. "Are you doing your work?" he asked.

"Yeah, why?"

He grumbled, "Just do it, I'm done eating. See you tomorrow."

I blinked at the flat line. "T-Tai-kun?" I then hung up.

I began to wonder what Kagami was doing. What was Kuroko doing? How did he feel about what Kagami said?

A sigh escaped my lips. I wondered something though, Kuro-kun... is Tai-kun the one?

Was Tai-kun the one who'd be... the light?

"Ehh? My pen—"


Mythia: Haha. Well.

Kagami: What?

Mythia: I don't know. It's 3 AM over here. I'm just tired, so I'll just go to bed already.

Kise: It says on your New Year's Resolution that you'd be sleeping earlier from now on! What happened to that?

Mythia: Idk. Maybe it went AWOL? *yawns*

Kise: You should sleep. I'll entertain the readers!

Kagami: When did you get here?

Mythia: Ah, ok... here, Kise, you can have my author powers for a minute...

Kagami: Wait, what? You give your author powers to Kise of all people!?

Kise: Hehe, thanks~!

Kagami: You're going to regret doing that, Mia!

Mythia: Don't care... *snoozes*

Kise: Alright, first things first! Take away the one who's annoying me right now!

Kagami: What the f— *disappears*

Kise: Hahaha, what next~?