Author's Note: Here's the new chapter for you guys. Hope you enjoy it!

Chapter 4

"Senpai?"

The voice is soft, almost weak-sounding.

I lay down the light novel and stand up. "Tsukiko?" I say. "Is that you?"

I mean, of course it would be her, because who else comes up to this roof?

I see a shadowy form near the door, but she doesn't come nearer.

"Is something wrong?" I ask.

"Ahh . . . well, it's nothing really."

I begin to move forward, but she says, "No, please stop! Don't come any closer. I just wanted to let you know that . . . um, I'm not coming up to eat lunch today, and so, um, you know, give my regards and all!"

"Don't give me that," I snap, and before she can react, I dash toward her. She lets out a squeak, but then I'm by her side. I grab her hand and drag her into the light.

I breathe out.

She ducks her face. "Is it that bad?"

There's a cut on her eyebrow, just barely missing her eye, and also one on her lip. Her left cheek is badly bruised and swollen. On the whole, I suppose it could be worse. But for Tsukiko . . .

"Who did this?" I demand.

"Ah . . ."

"Who did this?" I ask again, putting even more force into my voice.

"Senpai —"

"Tsukiko!" I nearly shout her name. I grab her shoulders and shake her. "Answer me!"

Her eyes are so large that I wonder if I'm scaring her. But then she says, "There are some people . . . here at school . . . they don't like me very much."

"Bullies, then?" I release her shoulders and step back, a cool calm flooding over me. "Have you gone to a teacher?"

"No," she mutters.

"Why not?"

"I want to handle this on my own. And I want to make friends on my own. If I tell someone about them . . . there's no chance of either of those."

There is something in her eyes, a ghost haunting her. I remember that there are things that she still doesn't want to tell me, and I wonder if this touches upon them. Even so, anger fills me. I don't know who it's toward — the bullies, her . . . myself.

"Don't be stupid," I snap. "This is more serious than that. People will respect you still if you stand up to the bullies. They won't think you're weak for going to an adult."

She just smiles. "Thanks, Senpai, but I can do this on my own."

I sigh, running a hand through my hair. "Have you gone to the nurse yet?"

"No."

"You need to. Let's go right now. I'll take you, okay?"

"No, Senpai — I appreciate that, but I don't want to. She'll ask questions, and then I'll have to tell —"

"What, are you just going to walk into class looking like this?"

"I'll say I tripped and fell," she says defensively. "I can be pretty clumsy sometimes."

"Well, I can believe that," I mutter. I glance at her, and when I see that it's clear she's not going to relent in the matter, I say, "Fine. You stay here. I'll be right back."

"Where are you going?"

"I'll be back. Just stay here, okay? If you move, I will personally go find you and kill you myself."

"Noted, Senpai."

It's a very small matter to sneak into the nurse's office and "borrow" some of her supplies for Tsukiko. In fact, I barely even have to sneak. I can pretty much just walk wherever I want to without being noticed. Most of the time, it's a real pain, but sometimes, it can come in handy, like now for instance.

As I grab some ointment, bandages, and whatever else I think looks useful, I mull over Tsukiko's predicament. While I don't particularly approve of her decision to not tell someone about the bullies, I can't say that I don't understand it. The feeling that you need to stand on your own is often engraved in everyone. Some people have an easier time of relying on others, even to the point of clinginess; others are so independent that they never even think of others. Tsukiko . . . she seems like the type with a strange balance of wanting companionship and also wanting to be independent.

Me? I'm not quite sure what I am.

I finish stuffing the equipment into my bag, and head out and back to the roof. There are only a few minutes left till class, not enough time to fix her up, but I don't mind missing my next class (Japanese, which I'm obviously fluent in), and for her, medical attention is more important right now than anything else anyway.

When I reach the roof, she's obeyed me and stayed in the exact same spot. Well, she's sat down.

"Where did you go, Senpai?" she asks.

I near her, crouch down, and empty the contents of my bag. Her eyes widen at the sight. "You . . . got these from the nurse?"

Well . . . not from the nurse. More like just from her office. I nod anyway, because it doesn't really matter. In the end, they're all going to be used on students.

"Here," I say. "Your knuckles are hurt, too, aren't they? Give me your hand."

She frowns down at the ground, and when she doesn't move, I grab her hand, a little more roughly than I'd intended. She cries out softly and I mutter an apology.

I open the tub of ointment and begin to spread some over the red scratches. She winces, but doesn't make any noise of pain. I then wrap her hands. Where the skin split, it's rough, but her palm and the rest of her hand is soft, I can't help but notice.

"Your face now," I say.

"I can do it myself," she says.

"You can't see yourself," I say, "so I'm doing it."

She fidgets, but closes her eyes, tilting her face toward me. My heart suddenly speeds up. I dip my finger into the ointment again, and rub it across the cut on her eyebrow. She shivers slightly. I then move to the one on her lip. As gently as possible, I press my finger against the smooth skin of her lips. They part ever so slightly at my touch, and it takes everything in my power not to snatch my fingers away — or keep them there longer than necessary.

"I can put a band-aid on your forehead," I say. I unwrap the band-aid and press it gently onto the cut.

She releases a sigh and opens her eyes. "Thank you, Senpai," she says. "I'm surprised, actually. That you would do something like this for me."

I frown. "Why wouldn't I?"

"Well, not too long ago, you were saying you weren't obligated to do anything for me. Right?"

"Ah . . . well, I'm sorry about that."

She laughs. "No worries. I don't mind. But . . . I have to say that I like you better when you're nice."

My cheeks flame. "Wh-what?"

"I always knew you were really quite kind inside, Mayuzumi-senpai. It's just my perseverance that uncovered this side of you, right?" She grins at me.

I continue to stammer.

"Anyway," she continues. "Thank you again, Senpai. Really. It does mean a lot. Even coming from someone like you."

"It doesn't matter," I say. "Actually. It doesn't."

"But it does. You don't understand that, but it does. To me, it does."

"I still have a request for you, Senpai."

"And what would that be?" I ask, sighing.

"What club are you in?"

"That's not a request! That's just a question!"

"Well . . . the question is preceding the request."

I scowl. "What's the request."

"I want to join the club you're in."

"No way."

"Are you in a sports club? I mean, I guess you seem to be athletic enough to be . . . and on the outside, you seem all cool and mysterious, but in reality, you're actually just a giant nerd, aren't you?"

I shoot her a look and she bursts into laughter.

"I don't think you want to join my club," I tell her.

"And why would that be?"

"It's basketball."

"Aha! So it is a sport! And, ah . . . I really am no good at sports."

"And our captain is Akashi Seijurou."

"Huh? Who's that?"

"He's a first-year like you."

"A first-year? Wait, did you say captain?"

I nod. "I don't think anyone in their right mind would want to join a team with Akashi Seijurou as captain."

"And why's that?"

"He's clearly crazy."

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"He's . . . odd, to say the least." I sigh and lean back against the edge of the roof. "In truth, I've been in the basketball club since my first year. But I've always been in the third-string. Basically, the worst. It's not that I wasn't a good player; I just wasn't as good as any of the others and I had no distinguishing talent or anything to set me apart."

"So you were normal?"

I glare at her and she quiets down.

"I was almost to the point that I was going to quit this year, but Akashi came up to me and offered me a position as a regular."

"And why would he do that?"

I glance down at my hands and stretch my fingers in and out. "Because of who I am," I say. "Because of what my aura is. It's weak. Weaker than normal. And because of that, Akashi wanted to exploit it. Because of him, I learned this technique called misdirection. Basically, it's a move that can distract your attention. I'm not too good at it, but I'm decent enough that I'm now a regular. Akashi also . . . improved my fundamentals."

"I don't understand," she says. "Shouldn't you be grateful to Akashi, then? He's made you one of the star players, right?"

"Not a star player, no," I say, and an ember of anger burns inside of me. "Really, I'm not much more than something to aid the team. I pass a lot, sometimes make a few shots when they let me. But I don't get any of the attention they do. I don't get any of that sort of glory. People . . . they never remember me. And Akashi . . . what he's asked me to do . . . it's perhaps better than I thought, and yet not what I thought it would be, either."

"But I still don't get what's wrong with Akashi."

"Look, just don't get involved with him, okay? He may seem nice at first, but he's really messed up. And he'll make fun of your light novels."

"Whoa, really?"

"Well, he won't say it out loud, but I saw it in his eyes."

"That's awful!"

I shake my head slightly, amazed by how easily her opinion can be swayed.

"But still," she says. "Basketball, huh? Our team is really strong, right? And I suppose . .. you helped in that?"

"I did my job. Nothing more, nothing less."

"Haha, that sounds like you, Senpai. I would like to see you play, though. When is your next game?"

"Not for a while," I say. "We're preparing for the Winter Cup next. It's a championship that takes place in the winter, obviously. It's gotten pretty big over the last few years. The preliminaries start in November, but those'll be a breeze. Hardly worth watching. If anything, you should come to the final."

"The final? Wait, you're so confident that you're betting you'll make it to the final?"

"Of course. You underestimate Rakuzan."

"You?"

"No," I say carefully. "Not me, exactly."

"Are you saying the rest of the team is that strong?"

"Akashi Seijurou . . . is one of the Generation of Miracles. Basically, he was in this really strong middle school basketball team that won three championships in a row. And then the other three are all Uncrowned Kings, all one level below the Generation of Miracles. Last of all, there is me. The nobody. Really, do you think I could ever compare to them?"

"Akashi must see something in you, though. He wouldn't have asked you to be on the team otherwise."

"Akashi's reasons, whatever they are, are weird. I don't really care for them, but as long as I get to play in games and do as I what, I'm fine with it."

"You really think that? Don't you value your teammates at all?"

"Not really. Being in a team . . . Rakuzan doesn't prioritize that. Sure, we'll work as a team, but we're not a team."

"That seems . . . kind of sad, actually."

"Have you ever played a sport?"

"No. Why?"

"Maybe it's just something you have to play to understand. But sometimes there are only things you can do as a group — but still as individuals."

A/N: So we get some info on the team and all. Next chapter we actually have a game, I think. Anyways, I hope you guys are enjoying so far! Thanks so much for reading and reviewing! I always love my stories being read (and reviewed for that matter, hint hint). Until next time.

~ J. Dom