Summary: Seirin is about to have a practice game against Shuutoku, but their uniforms are missing. Will Riko find them in time or will her team be forced to face total humiliation?

Riko was beaming with excitement when she entered the gym at Seirin High School one fateful Monday afternoon. When the members of Seirin's basketball team saw her expression everyone froze with complete horror on their faces. Sure it was worse if she wore an angry expression, but when she was beaming like this, it usually didn't mean anything good for them.

"What are you so happy about?" Hyuga asked, feeling it would be impolite not to, seeing as she had made such a big deal out of seeming happy.

"Oh nothing," Riko said. "I've just arranged a practice game against Shuutoku on this Friday," she said, really acting like it was nothing at all.

Hyuga thought it was fine at first, but then he remembered. "But coach," he started. "That's…"

Riko kept on beaming. "The day of the second years' English test and the first years' Japanese test," she said, like that was no matter. She completely ignored the team as they all sighed heavily. Now their Friday was even more ruined than before.

Friday came way before the Seirin team had wanted it to, but thankfully nobody had to worry about their tests since they didn't count for anything but seeing their exact level in the given subject. Everyone but Kagami even made it through with no trouble at all. (But what else would one expect from him?)

Before anyone knew it, the school day was over and they were well on their way to Shuutoku High School where the practice game would be held.

"I wish she had picked another day," Hyuga mumbled.

"It could've been worse, she could have picked a day of an exam," Kiyoshi tried to lighten up the mood.

"She would never be that cruel to herself," Hyuga stated. "Besides, they don't allow practice games on exam days,"

Nobody exchanged a word after that, until they entered Shuutoku's ground and found that two were standing there, waiting for them.

"Oi, they're here," Takao said, stepping out in front of the team, Midorima followed shortly after with an unwilling expression on his face. "The coach and Otsubo-san figured you hadn't had the time to change yet so we are to show you to a place where you can change," he said.

Riko nodded. "Thank you," she said and then turned to her team. "I am not coming with you of course," she said. "I will go to the gym and wait for you there. You follow Midorima-kun and Takao-kun," she said.

The Seirin team only nodded at this and Riko left them. Takao led the way while Midorima just followed along with Seirin's team.

"How did your coach know of this?" Kagami asked Midorima.

"How would I know?" Midorima mumbled irritated while fixing his glasses.

Kagami took in a breath to continue and probably ask Midorima why he didn't know, but Kuroko interrupted him by asking Midorima a much more serious question which the green-haired would much rather answer than continue the stupid conversation with Kagami.

The changing room they were let to was pretty big. There were lockers in both sides of it and benches in the middle, there was also a shower room.

"The lockers over there belongs to the basketball club," Takao pointed them out. "Otsubo-san says you can use those five at the bottom, furthest down," he pointed them out, a slight smirk playing on his lips.

The Seirin team started changing and Kuroko had an intense conversation with Midorima. Everyone did their best to keep up with it, because the subject was interesting. Therefore nobody noticed the big issue until Midorima had to leave and the team had to pull on their uniforms.

"Strange… Tsuchida said. "I could've sworn I packed it," he looked through his bag again.

"My uniform's missing!" Koganei exclaimed.

"Mine's not here either," Kagami said, flipping his bag.

This caused a huge discussion to break out. The team was wearing nothing but boxers and now their uniforms had all gone missing.

After a while of the team discussing what could've happened to their uniforms the door opened and Takao came in again. "Oi, we're about to start," he said, "Your coach said that you should hurry up and finish,"

Hyuga nodded with determination. "If our uniforms are missing, then we will just have to play in our school uniforms," he said before turning to his locker. He found it strange that it was shut, because he certainly didn't remember closing it. He tried to pull it open but… it was locked.

Hyuga turned to Izuki, since there had only been five lockers, they had had to share and Hyuga had decided to share with Izuki so. "Izuki, did you lock this?"

"I thought you did," Izuki answered.

"Why would I?" Hyuga asked.

The others got busy trying to find out if their lockers had locked as well. Unfortunately, it seemed to be the case.

"What is this?" Kagami asked, eying the door which Takao had been standing by a second ago, but the Shuutoku point guard had disappeared completely. "Oi, Kuroko, why did you teach him your trick,"

"I didn't teach anyone any tricks," Kuroko answered. "Takao-kun has just left while we were keeping our attention focused on something else,"

"No matter how he vanished," Hyuga said. "I'd rather know where our uniforms and keys vanished,"

Just then the door opened again and Riko entered the room. "Seriously, hurry up and finish, we are all waiting for-" Then she stopped as she saw that the entire team was practically wearing nothing at all. "What's going on?" she asked.

"Our uniforms are missing, and our school uniforms are in our lockers, and our keys are missing too," Hyuga explained.

Riko looked at each team member. The mean look she had worn upon entering the room was gone and replaced by a much more serious look. "It is unlikely that all of you forgot on the same day. Are you sure you all packed them?" She looked at each member individually until they nodded. Then Riko let out a sigh. "And the keys can't just go missing like that, someone is pranking us and I am going to find that prankster before the game starts," she said.

"When is that?" Hyuga asked worriedly.

"15 minutes exactly," Riko answered. "I hope to have found them by then," she said and then left the room to search for the uniforms.

Back at the gym she started looking through each hiding spot she could find. She didn't find anything though. Behind her she could hear Shuutoku's team warming up. She looked up every now and then to see how that went. She couldn't help but think that her team could be doing the same right now if it wasn't for their uniforms going missing like that.

"What are you looking for?" Otsubo had come up to Riko, finding it suspicious that she was just walking around and looking at every hiding place the gym had to offer.

"Nothing…," Riko placed her hand behind her head in an awkward way while in the same time also sending the Shuutoku captain an awkward smile. He sent her a suspicious look in return. She knew she had to come up with an explanation. "I… I just noticed the place is a little dusty and wanted to see how bad it was,"

"That's strange, we clean it every day," Otsubo said.

"Maybe not well enough?" Riko suggested, painfully aware that time was ticking. "How long until the game starts?" she asked.

Otsubo looked around until he found a clock. "11 minutes," he said.

Riko nodded. "Thank you," she said before hurrying out of the gym. She had already checked all possible places there and needed another place to look. The problem was that due to her pride and the pride of her teammates she certainly couldn't tell the members of Shuutoku about this.

The Seirin coach passed the locker room where the team was still hiding. She went to a room where she could see there was an open door. She looked in and noticed the light coming in from another door. She could also hear the sounds from the Shuutoku team practicing in the gym a bit clearer than she had been able to in the hallway. This was their equipment room. It was dark, so it wouldn't be easy to tell if the uniforms were in here or not, but she was almost certain they weren't. She didn't know where this certainty came from, she just somehow knew the uniforms weren't in this room.

Riko walked back out and decided to check on her team to see if they were okay. Therefore she returned to the changing room and looked in, careful to not let anyone else peak.

"Have you found anything?" Hyuga sounded desperate as he saw Riko in the doorway.

"Not yet," Riko said, causing everyone to look slightly irritated. "But I have determined that they are not at the gym or in the equipment room," she answered.

"How is that gonna help us any?" Kagami grumped.

"We're running short on time," Fukuda said. "There's only 7 minutes left,"

"I'm hungry," Kagami complained.

Hyuga frowned. "Got any useful information?" he snapped while glaring at the tall first year.

"Actually," Kagami started. "I think Kuroko's missing,"

"WHAAAAAAT!" Everyone in the changing room exclaimed at Kagami's words. Riko found herself wondering how he would want to leave the room with no clothes on.

Riko sighed. "I guess I can put him on the list of things I have to search for," she mumbled before leaving the changing room again and closing the door firmly behind her but only after leaving her warning. "If anyone leave this room, I am going to make him regret it," she said.

"What about Kuroko?" Hyuga asked.

Riko smiled evilly. "He's going to regret it too," she said and then left.

She returned to the way she had been heading when she found the equipment room. She passed the room and headed further down the hallway, until she reached the next door. She looked through it, wondering where it led.

Behind the door was another equipment room and another door that led to a different hall. Judging from the slight scent of chlorine she could figure it was the pool at Shuutoku she had found now. She headed inside to see if whoever it was could have left the clothes there.

Thankfully the pool appeared to be free for the time being. Nobody was there, which was a fact Riko could only be grateful about, seeing as she now won't have to explain herself to some swim-team.

Riko took a quick look around. The area was perfectly clean for anything. There was no equipment and nothing left to just float around except… She looked to the pool and then her eyes landed on something floating in the water. A pair of shorts and a t-shirt in black, white and red colors and with a 10 on the back.

"Is that… Kagami's uniform?" Riko wondered.

"It is," The voice came from behind her and Riko jumped about 5 meters up in the air because she hadn't sensed anyone coming.

"Kuroko-kun!" she exclaimed before turning around. Only in the last minute she remembered not to look and covered her eyes.

"It's fine, coach," Kuroko said. "I found my uniform," he said.

Riko peaked from between her fingers. "You did?" she asked before realizing that he was right. He was wearing his uniform with the 11 on it. Unlike Kagami's, this one was completely dry.

"Where did you find it?" Riko asked.

"The girls' changing room," Kuroko said, pointing through the other exit of the pool area.

"Are the other uniforms there?" Riko asked.

"Yes," Kuroko answered.

Riko nodded. "Then help me gather them," she said.

Kuroko nodded and together they got Kagami's uniform out of the pool and Riko went in to collect the other uniforms from the girls' changing room. Then the two of them brought the uniforms back to the others.

The Seirin team lit up as they saw Kuroko and Riko with their uniforms. Only Kagami looked irritated because his was soaking wet.

"Well, you're gonna play in that anyway," Riko said while torturing Kuroko for going missing. "There are no excuses,"

"Now we just need to find the keys," Hyuga said.

"I know a way to find out where they are," Riko said. "We just go in and whoever look the most disappointed probably knows exactly where the keys are," she said.

Seirin's team nodded and they followed their coach into the Shuutoku gym, right on time for the game to begin. They had no time to warm up, but the point was that they were there with no need of being humiliated for not wearing anything.

Kuroko's eyes landed on Takao in an instant. It wasn't like he knew, it was just intuition, but indeed the point guard looked extremely disappointed just like Riko had said. He was hiding it well though. Kuroko decided to confront him after the game, seeing as nobody else noticed this.

Shuutoku won by three points, shot by Midorima in the very last second. Takao send Kuroko a weird look after that and the other found himself unable to interpret it.

"Why did you have to find those in time if you were going to lose anyway?" Takao asked him, still with that look on his face.

"Nobody wants to face humiliation," Kuroko answered calmly. He knew that the two of them had come to an understanding. Takao knew that Kuroko knew. "Why did you do this and how?" he asked, simply out of curiosity.

Takao let out a small laughter. "We had a test in Japanese history and I didn't feel like playing after that, but nobody would let me sit out, so this was the second best way, I simply took everything when you weren't looking,"

Kuroko nodded. "Where are the keys?" he asked.

"In my bag," Takao said. "If you direct everyone's attention away from me while I get them, you can have them," he said.

Kuroko wasn't sure if he should agree to that, but he couldn't come up with anything better at the moment and did as Takao asked of him. He soon held the keys in his hand and Seirin's team could soon get their clothes back. Nobody but Kuroko ever found out who had been behind this little incident.

Here is another honorable mention for today. This character is from one of my very favorite animes. He is sweet and super kind. Honestly, he might just be the definition of the perfect boy if it wasn't for his naivety. The one I'm talking about is Tachibana Makoto from Free! who is also voiced by the same seiyuu as Takao, Suzuki Tatsuhisa. Sadly I had to decide not to write a story for his birthday because I have a bunch of other projects, and I've got no idea of what to write. But since I had a period when I had trouble keeping Free! out of my head while writing this story you could consider it the piece of work.

I also really hope you enjoyed this story. Thanks for reading it. For the record, the next story, some of you might recognize if you have spotted me inside this fandom before. Further note on that tomorrow xD

Jackie