Chapter 4

'Oh, come on! I promised not to tell!' Sendoh said in what seemed like panic. Upon closer look, he didn't seem to be taking it seriously; he was still smiling.

'Oh, you think your smile works on us too? It only works on fangirls, sorry. No tell, no gain.' Youhei said dismissively before adding, 'Come on guys, we'll figure it out by ourselves. Besides, we haven't finished 'studying' the clues yet.' And he rolled his eyes while saying so.

Sendoh's face shifted into a scandalized expression and before he could stop himself-'What the-it's-it's just a pair of filthy boxers-what clues can you gather from those?'

Guntai stopped dead.

'W-what did you just say?'

The Ryonan ace clearly did not want to repeat what he had just said. Nevertheless, as he had no other choice, he did so unwillingly and in a very low voice, 'It's just a pair of men's underwear. Why do you want to know who the owner is so badly?' Does it have something in it?' He asked with a very baffled expression drawn across his handsome face.

'A piece of underwear, you say?' Youhei asked, still not believing what he was hearing.

'Yes, boxers, like those skimpy little shorts we wear beneath our basketball shorts.' Sendoh explained patiently. 'Can I have it back?' He, again, requested.

Youhei turned his head towards the other three who looked away. It seemed that they were giving Youhei the responsibility of explaining everything to Sendoh.

'Well, there seems to be a grave misunderstanding here. What we found,' he paused, still trying to find the right words, 'is not a pair of pink boxers. It's something completely unrelated but since we have given you enough trouble by making you reveal a sick secret of one of your team mates, we'll find it for you.'

Sendoh, who was still perplexed at how seriously the Guntai were taking the situation, raised his eyebrows, 'Oh, I see. Well, thanks, I'll see you then.' And he waved his hand to say goodbye.

'What were you thinking?' Noma held Youhei's shoulders, shaking the latter after the Ryonan ace left.

'I'll tell you. Let go of me!' Youhei said coolly and continued, 'The owner of that pink underwear, as you probably have figured out, is most likely also the owner of this pink diary we have now. He's obsessed with the color pink. All we have to do is look for that underwear, show it to Sendoh and ask for ransom in the form of the owner's name.'

'The owner must be someone really close to Sendoh. Imagine mentioning it to the team captain. It's just absurd. Plus, he, we'll name him the Owner, seems to be really concerned about his pink boxers. It therefore follows it is something of value, maybe sentimental.' Noma added.

Takamiya was nodding fervently while Ookusu was silent. 'We should still not rule out Shohoku players, I mean, literally, how could this diary end up in the Shohoku rooftop?'

Everyone fell silent for a while then, 'You may be right, and you may be wrong. In any case, we have to look for that underwear; I'm itching to know who could be gay enough to actually own one.'

...

The Shohoku team had just finished practicing. Sakuragi was the last to leave because he wanted to practice his jump shots. He was about to make his 67th shot when Youhei popped out of nowhere, followed by the Guntai.

'Hanamichi, can we take a peek at the lockers? We're looking for something.' Youhei said without even looking at the redhead. His hands were already wrapped around the locker room's doorknob.

'Sure. But Ayako doesn't change there. She uses the women's toilet at the school building and if Miyagi finds out you want to-'

'Monkey. We're not gonna try and take a peek at her while she's at it. How could you even think of something like that? Moron.' Youhei snorted and the other three began snorting too as they entered the room as if they had a very important business to attend to.

At the locker room,

After a grueling search for the item, the Guntai found no luck and decided to call it a day when Sakuragi showed up at the locker room. He had just finished his foot work and was sweating all over. He had nothing on but his shorts and what seemed like a pink piece of tiny cloth hanging on his left shoulder that he used to wipe his sweat.

'HAAH!' The Guntai gasped in wild astonishment. They were all pointing at what Sakuragi was holding.

'What?' Sakuragi asked.

'Can you hold those boxers out for me to see?' Youhei asked immediately without even thinking about what he had just said.

'You pervert. Just as I thought-'

'Not the one you're wearing, moron; the one on your shoulder!' The Guntai exclaimed simultaneously

'Oh this?' Sakuragi showed it off for everyone to see, 'I found this here on the locker benches. It's really absorbent and...WHOA!' Sakuragi couldn't finish for it was indeed a pair of pink boxers, a very skimpy one for that matter. It looked almost as though it belonged to a female volleyball player.

'I'll take that. We'll explain later. See yah!' Youhei said and quickly grabbed the item, leaving Sakuragi calling for an explanation.

TBC