Chapter Text
blue.
the pastel of the sky above him, the azure that colors the area behind the three point line, the cobalt of his sports bag on the bench — blue of so many different shades, surrounding him from all sides.
and blue is all kise sees — not in any of the shades currently in front of him, though.
he takes a deep breath — inhale, exhale. his amber eyes slide shut. the navy blue silhouette that he’s spent two years chasing after becomes clearer than ever now; kise continues conjuring up more of his movements, which have been imprinted on his mind down to the smallest flick of a tanned finger.
with its lightning-fast movements, aomine’s dark shadow becomes nothing but an ultramarine blur in kise’s imagination. the blond follows these movements without missing a beat, flawlessly mimicking the bluenet’s change of pace, perfectly copying the crossover to the right, smoothly executing a formless shot from behind the backboard.
even as the ball swishes through the net, kise frowns. still not fast enough.
aomine isn’t quite out of his reach anymore. no, he’s proved that after letting go of his admiration for the guy, he could keep up with the bluenet during their match an hour ago; but that’s all he was doing — keeping up.
that’s not enough. he needs to surpass aomine. faster.
disregarding the lingering ache in his ankle, he tries out one of aomine’s drives this time; still not fast enough.
losing sucks, and the feeling hasn’t gotten any better since the last time he lost against seirin in their practice game. losing to touou did suck, but more than that, it further fueled his desire to win against aomine, now that he knows the possibility is actually there.
he’s never wanted to beat aomine so badly before. not just as part of the oath he took with the rest of the miracles, not just because he wants to prove that he’s gotten stronger since middle school, not just because he doesn’t want to lose ever again — he misses the old aomine, whose face would light up with a satisfied smile brighter than the sun after sinking any average three-pointer. he misses the old aomine, who would fully indulge himself in the fun of playing his favorite sport without a care in the world.
(he misses the old aomine, who would habitually thread his warm, calloused fingers through his own as they sprinted out of the school gates together after a one-on-one session that lasted way too long, their carefree chuckles echoing into the night as the security guard struggled to catch up to them.)
kise understands how aomine feels right now, perhaps better than anyone else: the boredom of no one ever coming close to posing a challenge, the loneliness of standing at the very top, the sound of wind rustling in his ears his only company — for isn’t that how kise has felt for the first fourteen years of his life, until that basketball hit him at the back of his head on that fateful day? aomine broke him out of that monotonous life and opened the gateway to something that fired him up like never before — kise wants so desperately to personally return the favor. he wants so desperately to be the one to rekindle that passion aomine used to harbor for the sport, to be the one to relight the glow that used to sparkle in aomine’s eyes whenever he stepped onto the court.
(on a more selfish note, perhaps he still wants to hold a special place in aomine’s heart, even if it’s no longer as the sole object of the bluenet’s rarely shown affection.)
kise’s grip tightens on the ball, its orange leather worn smooth from prolonged use. he makes a mental note to swing by a sports store and get a new one soon. “just you wait,” he vows. “just you wait, aominecchi.”
i’ll become that one strong opponent you’ve been looking for all this time.
he doesn’t register the darkening of the baby blue sky above him, only having eyes for aomine’s navy blue silhouette. he pays no heed to the rain that starts to fall, doesn’t stop dribbling and shooting even as the light drizzle turns into a torrential downpour. he just keeps practicing. not fast enough. faster. even faster —