From the Land up North

her efforts, neither the Reverend nor Mrs. Engle would change their opinion of young Tom Edison. But Mrs. Edison was equally strong in her opinion. Finally, she realized what she had to do.
“All right,” Mrs. Edison said, “I am hereby taking my son out of your school.” Tom could hardly believe his ears! “I’ll instruct him at home myself,” he heard her say.

Tom looked up at his mother, this wonderful woman who believed in him. He promised himself that he would make his mother proud of him.

Later in life, Thomas Edison said, “My mother was the making of me. She was so true, so sure of me: and I felt I had something to live for, someone I must not disappoint.”

It starts as a family thing, as most things do.

Weekly visits to his maternal grandparents’ house. Satoru loves those, because if there’s anyone who can cook better than his mother it’s his grandmother.

After mealtimes, Satoru will be curled up in his mother’s arms, full and sleepy as they watch the Giants vs the Tigers.

He falls asleep with his mother stroking his hair, to the sound of balls landing perfectly in mitts, of umpires calling strikeouts and audiences some tens of thousands strong screaming.

It’s inevitable that they seep into his dreams.

His grandfather teaches him how to pitch, because his father is busy working and only comes back too late at night, often after Satoru has gone to bed. Satoru is just this side of too shy to play with many other kids in the same kindergarten, and there are no more kids in his neighbourhood – they’re mostly his grandparents’ age. Retirees.

“Leg higher.” His grandfather says, huge palm with long fingers on his waist, straightening his stance. “Now hold it. Yes! Yes, like that. Now make a good, wide step – feel it? All that energy from the earth, the ki moving from your legs to your body to your fingertips? That’s the way to wind-up. To get a good, strong and fast straight.”

So he spends hour after hour with his grandfather in the empty park, breathing in the dirt and sun. When he goes home, it’s with dirt-stained clothes and sweat-matted hair and bright blue-grey eyes, blue more than grey.

He does have people to talk to in class in elementary, but Satoru finds it difficult to say much when all he’s thinking about all day is baseball, and it’s obvious his friends in class are more interested in other things. Bug-catching, pranks, catching the attention of the girls they like. Satoru just doesn’t understand.

It’s during a walk around a neighbourhood not his own that his grandfather ushers him ahead to talk to an old friend they came upon by chance. Satoru wanders along the bank, then picks up his pace upon hearing the unmistakable sound of batted balls.

He’s not sure how long he’s stood there, watching wistfully before his grandfather comes up to him. Tells him that being a bystander will never get him what he wants.

“I will always support you in your dreams.”

Hokkaidou, his father tells him. The land up north.

His grandmother fusses. Satoru knows he’ll miss her, miss grandfather more.

“Don’t be afraid.” His grandfather tells him.

Maybe this is it. The chance for a new start.

It’s the descent into a new kind of hell.

Satoru doesn’t know what to do, except pitch into the concrete wall of a bridge.

At least it’ll never tell him no, or call him a monster behind his back.

His mother believes in fate, his father doesn’t. Satoru’s undecided, a vaguely healthy respect for life and the unknown and chance and choice.

It might be fate, it might not be, that the day he’s thinking of dumping his mitt someplace far enough away from home that he won’t be tempted to come back and dig for it through the trash is the day someone tosses out their copy of Baseball Monthly, glossy and barely touched, headline of Seidou’s Genius Catcher splashed across the cover.

“No.” His mother is adamant, grey eyes flashing steel. It’s only after she’s gone upstairs to bed that Satoru shares a long look with his father.

“Satoru, go get your acceptance letter.”

Satoru sprints upstairs to his room, snatch the precious, precious slip of paper that had come in the mail in a snow-white envelope lying on his desk. He makes sure not to disturb his mother as he makes his way downstairs to hand it to his father, hoping, praying.

“Seidou, is it? Near grandfather’s place?”

“A few stops away. I asked already – they both said it’s fine. I can commute from there.” The words come in a desperate rush.

His father promises nothing. “Let me think about this.”

There’s an empty hollowness he feels when his father turns to him, face edged in softness, fingers curled around a steaming cup of tea.

“I’m sorry Satoru.”

He can’t – breathe –

He’s dashed out of the house before he realises it, snatching a coat out of the closet and pulling on sports shoes to the chorus of both his parents calling after him.

Satoru doesn’t think, just runs until he’s doubled over and out of breath, heaving drily into the snow. It’s only when he looks up that he realises that he’s run to his spot beneath the bridge out of habit. There’s the box he painted in, mimicking the strike zone. Nine boxes in total. His fingers are freezing, but Satoru still feels the shock of cold from the concrete as he traces it. He wishes he had taken a baseball along with him, until he remembers his parents’ refusal.

It doesn’t take long for him to sink to his knees and cry.

The tears dry quickly in Hokkaido’s frigid wind, and it’s with leaden steps that Satoru makes his way home to find his mother fidgeting outside their house door almost an hour later. His father had taken the car to drive around looking for him, and still wasn’t back yet.

He tries to brush aside his mother’s anxious fussing, but allows himself to be led into the baths.

He’s still soaking in it by the time his father’s car purrs back into the driveway.

Satoru tilts his head back. Closes his eyes.

He wishes he could hate his parents for telling him no.

“You can still play baseball in Komadai, Sacchan. They’re a good school too.” His mother tries to console him some days later, sliding him a plate of kanitama. But she doesn’t understand, because he’s never told her about Tomakomai. He knows she suspects, eyes always narrowed when he returns home late alone. When he grows even quieter. When he becomes barely able to remember a meaningful conversation he’s had with someone his age when she asks who he’s been hanging out with.

But Komadai could end up just like Tomakomai. And Satoru doesn’t think he can stand that for another three years.

Seidou’s acceptance letter is still crumpled around the edges in his top desk drawer, right above a much-read, creased version of Baseball Monthly.

Komadai is about four times the size of Tomakomai Middle School. Makes sense, considering that it’s one of a mere handful of high schools around for miles, in stark contrast to the dozens of middle schools in the area. Satoru finds his name in the class register easily enough by virtue of superior height – 1-B – and is relieved to find that there’s no one from his middle school baseball club that is with him.

The class has already started gathering into little cliques by the time he gets to his seat right next to the window. The only exception seems to be the guy right behind, deeply absorbed in a book. Satoru would have mumbled a greeting if it hadn’t felt like he would be disturbing him, so he whiles time away staring emptily out of the window until the homeroom teacher comes in for attendance.

There’s the obligatory introductory session. Standing up, reciting off their names, hobbies, interests.

“Furuya Satoru. I don’t have any interests.”

The words burn on his tongue. His classmates give the obligatory scattered applause the moment he’s done and sits down.

He’d have gone back to staring in front of him if not for the feel of a glare digging into his back. Just to be sure, Satoru repositions himself, angling just enough to catch a glimpse of the person behind him.

He flicks his eyes back to the front quickly, a light twitch at the corners of his mouth.

He’s pretty sure he hasn’t done anything to offend whoever it is sitting behind him. When the chair behind him scrapes the floor, Satoru makes sure to pay full attention to the name; maybe there’ll be a reason for the glare.

“Hongou Masamune. I’m a pitcher.”

Bitterness floods Satoru’s tongue. The back of his throat. He’s half a beat behind his classmates’ applause.

Class for the first day passes by in a breeze. New teachers, new introductions. Satoru concentrates – there’s nothing else for him to do, now that his usual and most frequent daydreams turns his stomach and makes him feel sick to his core. At least he still has his polar bears, he muses, as he scrawls one in the margins of his notes. That, and he’s trying his best to ignore Hongou’s continued fierce staring, like he’s dying to pitch baseballs into Satoru’s head.

Once, in between classes, Satoru had turned back, fully intending to ask why. The scrutinising he receives before he even opens his mouth discourages him, and Satoru returns to sketching a sleeping polar bear in the margins of his notebook.

Lunch arrives. He’s barely taken out his mother’s bento when there’s a voice from the classroom door, cheerily calling out for Hongou.

The chilling stare making his hair stand on end is finally directed elsewhere. Satoru carefully sneaks a peek towards the classroom’s door once Hongou passes him, and he sees a neatly-groomed honour student waiting there for him.

He thinks the other has caught him watching and quickly ducks his face down to the bento, picking out chunks of chicken in his curry rice to eat.

Satoru takes his time packing up when the school bell rings, jolted awake from a nap. Hongou’s lagging behind too, for what reason Satoru’s not sure.
Not until the honour student waylays him before he can get out of the class.

“Hey,” the honour student says with a smile. “Furuya Satoru?”

Unsure of where this is going, Furuya nods, warily taking note of Hongou coming to join them.

“You’re from Tomakomai right? Their baseball club?”

There’s another painful pang at the reminder. Furuya keeps quiet, unsure where this is going. Hongou’s friend takes it as a confirmation.

“I’m Enjou Renji, a catcher. Hongou’s a pitcher. We’re joining the baseball team. Wanna come with us to check out the grounds?”

There’s a flash in Enjou’s eyes that tells Furuya he won’t take no for an answer. Furuya shakes his head in a sharp jerk anyway, and makes to leave the class. Enjou stalls him, throwing an arm out.

“Great! Then let’s just head to an empty field. There’s a place Masamune and I go to often, we can play there.”

Hongou doesn’t say much, only grunting at Enjou, even when the latter digs a painful elbow into his side. Satoru can tell by the spasm across Hongou’s face that it had hurt, though he doesn’t do anything to retaliate. Satoru himself gives the briefest answers possible to Enjou’s running conversation, unsure.

It’s right when they reach the park that Satoru remembers.

“I don’t have a glove.”

Enjou doesn’t even blink. “Use Masamune’s. He has an extra one. You two can take turns batting. I don’t care for pitching.”

Hongou looks disgruntled at the offer of his glove without his permission, but still digs it out and tosses it to Satoru anyway. Satoru feels like a child finally being allowed to touch his parents’ belongings without their worry he’d hurt himself with it.

He flexes his hand. This one looks newer than the one Hongou pulls on. Strings tighter, not quite broken in yet. There’s a smell that Furuya supposes is Hongou’s musk on it, but it’s very faint.

“Some catch to warm up!” Enjou calls. They toss to each other. Furuya fumbles sometimes – it’s been so long since he had someone else to even play catch with. He has the distinct impression that Hongou’s judging him, lips curling in distaste.

“I’ll bat first.” Hongou says, the first words Satoru’s heard from him all day since the introduction in class. Enjou looks pleased, and leans in towards Satoru, already in catcher gear, Hongou going down to approximately where the batting box would be from Satoru’s position.

“What breaking balls do you have, Furuya-kun?”

Satoru shakes his head. He’s tried to learn some – watching videos, books. He’s never managed to master any, and in the end stuck to pitching fastballs with the wind-up his grandfather had taught him, focusing on pitching faster and harder, as if the faster it flew, the quicker his despair would melt like the snow come spring.

“Only fastballs?” Enjou quirks an eyebrow up. “Well. That’s fine then. Just pitch to my mitt. I know Hongou well enough to know how to strike him out.” He smirks at the last, then taps Satoru on the chest with his catcher’s mitt. “Throw where I ask you to, okay?”

He should say no. Stop this before he gets himself labelled as a monster again. But his fingers are already digging tight into the seams of the baseball Enjou had given to him, unwilling to relinquish it.
This is the last time, Satoru tells himself. The last time.

So he’ll make this pitch his last.

Hongou stands ready, Enjou squatting behind him. The faded brown of the mitt wide open just for him. If he closes his eyes, he can almost imagine he’s in an actual game, umpire right behind Enjou, spectators in the fields. Maybe his family there, watching.

Satoru reminds himself to breathe.

“First pitch, Furuya-kun! Make it a good one!”

They’re just playing. There’s no need to be serious. But Hongou is right there, agitation literally rolling off him in waves. It’s easy to imagine that he’s an opponent. And Satoru can’t help the want spreading across him – wanting to strike him out, like the actual pitchers in koshien and official games do; like how his grandfather tells him that he almost pitched four no-hitter games in a row.
He winds up, swings his arm down. Eyes wide, prepared to watch his last pitch for the rest of his life.

Hongou flinches back, stumbling. Enjou’s gotten up from his crouch to catch the ball that flies near Hongou’s head.

The sharp crack as the ball flies into Enjou’s mitt, spinning to a complete stop is a wonder, and Satoru is left standing and staring.

“Were you trying to hit me?” Hongou snarls.

Satoru’s not sure what happens after that, because all he can think of is how long it’s been. So long.

Hongou thaws towards him, somewhat, after that game, though he does slip in a comment about how he has absolutely no control at all. Enjou, who’s in the next class over insists Satoru join them. He dares say it’s the first time in his life that someone has actually willingly sought him out and dragged him into their company, which is what Enjou does.

Three sign-up forms for the baseball club passes into the captain’s hand. One in neat, honour student script, another in a heavy, slightly untidy hand and a third with a lot of deep points pressed into where the strokes end sharply.

Satoru has trouble keeping up at practice. Hongou and Enjou seem barely winded as they jog around the grounds at least a quarter-round ahead of the rest of the first years. Satoru naturally ups his pace to try and keep up with them – the end result is Hongou hauling him with an arm around his shoulder post-practice, with Enjou nagging him to drink water.

The seniors mutter. He catches Coach Nitta eyeing them thoughtfully.

At the end of the month, Hongou and Enjou are promoted to first string. Satoru is still stuck with basic training for the first years, but Coach Nitta has him stay back with another first year – Urameshi, after regular practice with Hongou and Enjou both, with the rest of the first string.

Coach Nitta has them play games with the first string – players against reserves. Pitch, bat and field – the only constant is he and Hongou are always swapped out for the other.

Satoru dares to hope, when he spies the wizened face’s lips curl into a grin.

They’re caught in a spring shower, once, after practice. Enjou groans, as he had forgotten his umbrella and Hongou always relies on him to remember. Coincidentally, Satoru has forgotten his own as well, so the trio are left behind by their seniors who were far less scatter-brained. Nishi-senpai calls out a cheery goodbye after they’ve all made it clear to him that they’d be fine.

Satoru sticks his hand out, feels the icy cold prick rather than splash at his skin. He pulls it back quickly from the dripping eaves.

“Great. We’re stuck here.”

Hongou ignores his best friend’s moaning, digging out yet another one of his books out from his bag to read. Enjou slumps against his legs, then eyes Satoru who digs through his bag too. “Don’t tell me you’re going to start reading like him.”

“Sketching.” Satoru says, showing Enjou his sketchbook.

“I wanna see that.”

Satoru passes it over without complaint. Hongou fidgets, and Enjou – doing that best friend mind-reading thing they share – holds it up high enough that Hongou can see too.

“Whoa.” Enjou whistles, impressed. “You really like animals. And those polar bears are the love of your life.” Satoru glows. Hongou goes back to reading his book once Enjou’s flipped through all of Satoru’s sketches.

Satoru peacefully sketches another polar bear while Hongou reads and Enjou makes comments and suggests additions to Satoru’s polar bear.

Enjou’s just asked Satoru to draw a top hat with a skull pattern over the polar bear’s head when a ring from Satoru’s bag shocks all of them.

He scrambles to pick it up.

“Kaa-chan?”

“Satoru? Where are you? Shouldn’t you be home already from practice?”

“What time is it?” Enjou sticks his watch out for Satoru to see. His mother’s answer is faster.

“Seven.”

“I’m still at school. With friends.” He can call them that, right? “I forgot my umbrella.”

“You didn’t think to call?”

“I forgot.”

“Sacchan.” His mother sighs. “I’ll come pick you up. Do your friends need a lift? Pass your phone to them.”

He hands it to Enjou, who looks bewildered for a moment before his face cracks into a devious grin. Satoru exchanges a furrowed look with Hongou. Hongou doesn’t look like he understands what Enjou has thought of either.

“Hi, Furuya-san. Actually, if you don’t mind…”

Enjou chimes out a cheerful greeting. Satoru thinks Hongou would have just grunted, if he didn’t want to appear rude in front of Satoru’s mother.

“I have a bath running already.” Satoru’s mother is telling Enjou, who’s somehow managed to convince her on the phone to let him and Hongou stay over besides charm her in the short car ride back to Satoru’s house. “Sacchan, go show your friends where it is and bring them some of your clothes. And prepare the guest room for them.”

Satoru gives Enjou a flat stare when the latter, upon dumping his bag in Satoru’s room – which is conjoined to the guest room by a rickety shoji screen - proceeds to eye the place like a scientist. The flash of lightning outside that makes his eyes glow behind his glasses only cements the effect.

“Rude.” Hongou calls Enjou out for Satoru. But Satoru can see the same interest mirrored in Hongou’s eyes.

Sleepovers are strange, Satoru decides.

His mother is genuinely happy, serving up some of her best dishes, then sending them up to Satoru’s room to do whatever it is they want to do after dinner. A mumbled ‘go ahead’ has barely left Satoru’s lips before Enjou’s excitedly poking around.

“The only other person’s room I’ve ever been in is Masamune’s. You’re very neat. His is a dump.”

“Like yours isn’t,” Hongou retorts, hands by his side, looking through all the titles on Satoru’s bookshelf. His brows furrow. “Don’t you have anything not animal-related?”

“There’s some on baseball.”

“I don’t want to think of baseball.” Hongou gives up and pulls out a book on wolves, plopping himself against Satoru’s bedframe.

“What’s this?” Enjou says. Satoru’s heart misses a beat when he pulls out the letter, yellow curling at the edges. “An acceptance letter for… Seidou? In Tokyo?”

Even Hongou is interested enough to look up from the book.

“What’s that?”

“Just – put it back. Please.”

The catcher’s eyes are calculating. Enjou’s shrewdness behind it all is terrifying at its finest. “Will you tell?”

Something in Satoru’s face must have given away a hint, because Enjou backtracks immediately. “Okay, okay. I won’t press. Back in its proper place.” He makes a big show of it, but then his gaze latches onto the Baseball Monthly magazine right beneath it. “Hey, you subscribe to Baseball Monthly?”

Of course he pulls it out. The one blaring MIYUKI KAZUYA, SEIDOU’S GENIUS CATCHER right across the cover.

“Furuya?”

Satoru has to tear his gaze away from the magazine. The bleeding disappointment still boring a hole in his heart. He’s – happy now, he supposes. No, he is. Hongou and Enjou are his friends, and Komadai isn’t Tomakomai. He gets to pitch, gets to play games for the team, even if he’s just a second-string member now. Still -

What if.

Satoru passes out first that night. But he’s woken up in just a few short moments to the sound of murmurings.

He keeps his eyes closed, but he can hear his drawers being opened. A rustle of paper. More murmurs between Enjou and Hongou.

He pretends to sleep. He’s gotten good at it, since Tomakomai.

Enjou cajoles Satoru to stay back after practice.

“You need a breaking ball,” Enjou says firmly, once their seniors have cleared the grounds. “To make it into the team this summer. So we’re going to teach you the splitter.”

Satoru glances at Hongou. He grunts, leaving Enjou to translate.

“Would it kill you to explain yourself?” Enjou huffs, but ploughs on. “Let’s put it this way – we could use you. Even Hongou won’t be able to pitch at every match for the summer, even if he wants to and says he can. There’s three pitchers in the first string now, but the other two… They’re good, but not great. Besides, you’re great at batting. If you can learn a breaking ball between now and the official announcement, there’s a good chance you’ll get to play.”

“…Why?”

“Why what?” Enjou looks at him oddly. “Don’t you want to play in the official matches?”

Of course he does. But why help me so much, is poised at the edge of his tongue, and he’s not sure whether to swallow it or spit it out.

“We want you on the team.” Hongou’s words are gruff, jolting. “I don’t think I’ll be able to deal it if I only have him for company.” There’s the crooked edge of a smile on his lips.

“Asshole.” Enjou glares at his best friend. “Sure, talk only when you’re disparaging me.”

Satoru forgets the after, except for the grip Enjou has him practice that Hongou corrects.

In his own room, he pitches the ball to the ceiling, in the new grip.

He only stops when his father comes in to tell him that he’ll wear a hole through the ceiling, and even if he doesn’t want to stop, his parents need their sleep.

Enjou has him use his still-developing splitter during bullpen practice, which he’s been allowed to join in. He asks Hongou to pitch to him for batting practice, in the last half-hour of practice that doubles as free training.

Coach Nitta watches without a word.

At the announcement of the team’s twenty first-string members for the final tournament pre-koshien, Satoru’s heart hammers away. Enjou had been called first amongst all the first years – number ten – a huge honour. Hongou had been immediately behind him, eleven. Then –

“Number eighteen, Furuya Satoru.”

It’s Hongou’s quick flick of his eyes to the back, meeting his, that jolts Satoru to move forward, numb fingers tightening around his jersey.

“Keep it up,” Coach Nitta tells him, and he takes his place next to his friends and his seniors – this is a dream, this is a dream, this is a dream –

But it’s not. Because he has Enjou smacking him so hard on the back that it smarts, and Hongou grunting and holding out a fist for him to bump with, a first. Urameshi looks disappointed when he isn’t chosen, two second-years rounding out the last two places.

“We’re not here just to play baseball. We’re taking the championship,” Hongou says, voice full of blazing conviction. Coach Nitta lined face rearranges itself into a proud smile, brilliant with its confidence.

“Of course we are.”

Satoru sees the underside of Hongou’s cap, sharp strokes of World’s Number One Pitcher in black marker. Enjou’s is similar – Champion.

He thinks about it for a long time, sitting curled up on his bed, polar bear plush between his legs. But he keeps on coming up with two things to write.

His own name. Satoru, given by his parents. Daybreak, the dream waiting to be realised.

I will always support you in your dreams, his grandfather’s words to him right before he follows his parents across the sea to this land of snow.

His hand shakes when he scrawls both in with his heavy handwriting, and adds a last.

For you.

Satoru gets to start in most games for practice matches, the seniors covering his back. Hongou’s disgruntled by it – he wants the mound to himself; Satoru dares say even more selfishly than he himself wants it.

It’s never too long, a couple of innings, three at the most. Enjou nags at him to remember pacing, and to not pitch all out, but he can’t help himself. He’s wearing a numbered jersey, he gets to play in official games. He’s always burning with frustration when he has to hand the ball to Hongou and is switched out to left field.

Coach Nitta is brutal in his assessments, but Satoru prefers that to kinder ways of criticism. He’s far behind Hongou and the other pitchers on the official team in terms of experience and stamina both, so he works twice, three times as hard to make up for it.

“You’re bleeding.” Hongou grabs at his hand when he returns to the dugout after the second inning of a practice match. Satoru jerks at the sudden contact, cool fingers warming under the touch.

Coach Nitta subs him out immediately, banning him from pitching for two weeks. He plasters his dripping finger clumsily, the manager tearing it off and redoing it for him the moment her eyes land on it when he gets back from the rest area.

“Idiot,” Hongou tells him once the game is over, and he’s done pitching for the day. “A pitcher’s fingers are their life. Wait a moment.” He rummages through his sports bag, before pressing a small bottle into Satoru’s hands.

“Nail polish?”

“Strengthens the nails.”

Satoru keeps the bottle in his top drawer long after it’s empty, right above the old Seidou acceptance letter, and the even older Baseball Monthly magazine.

Practice becomes tougher as the summer tournament draws nearer, and it takes a toll on his grades as he starts falling asleep in class for real, exhausted by the nonstop running, batting, fielding and pitching. Surprisingly, Enjou’s grades suffer too.

“I thought you were an honour student.”

“No he’s not.” Hongou snorts, impressively avoiding Enjou’s kick to the shin and scrawls out the right answer for the maths exercise they’re trying to get done. He’s the only one still paying attention in class, and periodically kicks Satoru’s chair while class is in session, who normally slips into short daydreams or naps when the teachers start droning.

They make up their own study group, Urameshi turning up to have them power through economics and beg for Satoru’s help in Science. Satoru takes charge of Geography too, Enjou covering English and Hongou drills them all in Japanese and the history side of Social Studies. Satoru’s still secretly amused by the last. Hongou could go into long rants about Sanada Yukimura.

When Hongou kicks the back of his chair after they get their results, Satoru shows him his marks.

“That’ll do.”

They win and win and win. It’s exhilarating. Even though Satoru gets switched in mostly in the last innings, often when there’s a wide enough score gap, he still gets to play. He’s become an official battery with Enjou in games, though most of the time he practices in the bullpen with a senior who keeps telling him to cut back on his strength when pitching and pace himself.

Coach Nitta’s criticism is as harsh as ever – walks on balls, weak control, poor stamina. There’s a whole plethora of things he lacks that Hongou already has, and there’s a burning need to improve and be able to compete with Hongou for that mound, especially when they’re up against so many, many excellent players.

The plane flight to Osaka is noisy with excitement – Enjou giddy with joy, comparing the buildings and views to backgrounds in the films he loves, and Hongou’s eyes hold more than a glimmer of interest at the unfamiliar surroundings.

Satoru all but passes out under the heat – it’s so hot – but the adrenaline rush of being here keeps him going. Hongou doesn’t seem nervous at all though, standing proudly on the mound. Satoru can almost feel Hokkaido’s chill in sweltering Osaka coming off from him, the bite of the winds when Hongou swings his arms down.

“STRIKE!”

Satoru watches the preliminary games in West Tokyo. He’s unsurprised to find that neither Enjou nor Hongou are bewildered about it. Enjou however, does give Hongou a disdainful glance when the latter digs out yet another book to read while he does.

Satoru concentrates on Seidou’s plays. There’s a first year southpaw with them, one that’s exceedingly loud, even on video through the background noise of spectators and commentators. But he pulls the team through with outstanding plays, and he recognises another talented pitcher. An up-and-coming to watch out for. Diamond in the rough.

But Seidou doesn’t make it through, their pitcher relay strategy crumbling with their ace’s sudden leg cramp, an unexpected dead ball, and their closer becoming wrecked under pressure against Inashiro’s star line-up of batters, their immovable ace as their centre which they pivot around.

5-4. Inashiro proceeds to koshien.

“That was exciting,” Enjou remarks. “Inashiro’ll make it to the finals, for sure.”

Satoru doesn’t reply, eyes fixed on the close-up of Seidou’s baseball team, zeroing in on one of the taller players in the line-up, still decked out in catcher gear.

The stadium is less crowded now. Forty-nine teams left, weeded out from almost five thousand schools. All-stars of the year, from their generation and two years above them.

The fierce hunger for glory is sweeping, palpable in the very soil and air of the stadium.

Satoru breathes it in.

“We’re going to make our mark here.” Hongou whispers behind him. Satoru doesn’t need to turn and look to know the icy gaze, the promise of a hailstorm to come.

There are tons of reporters and journalists. Satoru and Hongou both get interviews, Hongou especially going through them with bad grace until Enjou threatens to tell on him to Coach Nitta.

Satoru’s more nervous than thrilled at the attention – his 150km/h fastball is their main highlight about him - but after a while, they all start asking the same questions and he gets bored.
Hongou and Satoru have to sit through a stern rebuke from Coach Nitta, about not treating the media properly. Nishi-senpai laughs at them.

Satoru feels a little ashamed, but Hongou is outright furious at the coach.

He calls his mother to tell her about the interviews, even though he knows she’s reading, watching it with his father.

“Sacchan, I’m so glad for you.” He can imagine her smile, through the static of the phone. He wonders what she’s cooking. “Tell me which magazines will be publishing about you. I’ll buy them all.”

“… Thank you.”

Koshien finals. True to Enjou’s prediction, it’s a vicious fight for every point against Inashiro. Narumiya Mei is magnificent, even more so when he’s there in flesh and blood and not on a small screen, blond hair a gold halo beneath the sun. His seniors get struck out by him again and again, and the stands are becoming more and more frenzied for that seemingly indestructible prince of the capital.

He gets switched in during the fifth inning. His lightning crack of a pitch is an echo of the stands fervour, whipping the audience into an even greater frenzy. With Renji’s lead and countless fouls, his pitch count racks up much, much higher against Inashiro’s batters, but they still end up scoreless.

Coach Nitta calls for the final switch in the eighth, and he’s unhappily pressing the ball into Hongou’s mitt, Enjou walking up to the pair of them.

“… We’re going to win this.” Enjou declares. Hongou’s gaze is enough assurance, and Satoru walks off the mound with a light smack on the back from Renji, wiping the sweat from his brow. He distantly hears his seniors calling out praise to him.

“Good work.” Coach Nitta says to him. “Go ice your shoulder, then come back and wait for the win.”

He hurries through the icing as much as he can. He needn’t have bothered.

They’re still going at it, even in the tenth inning.

Then finally, finally. The batting line-up pulls through for the pitchers.

2-0. Komadai Fujimaki’s win.

He sprints out with the rest of the bench, as the seniors collapse on top of each other, screaming even as their clothes become stained with mud. Satoru decides to hang back a little.

Above the din from his seniors, he hears a heart-breaking howl from Narumiya Mei. Inashiro’s captain, clean-up and catcher Harada puts an arm around him, as their teammates crowd around their golden battery a little more slowly.

Satoru feels a pang when he sees that, because Narumiya Mei had pitched alone, for fourteen innings, up till the end where his stamina had forced him to bow out rather than the pressure.

A tap on his shoulder, and Satoru turns to find Enjou with a cheerful smile and Hongou with an unreadable look in his eyes.

They line-up to bow.

Narumiya Mei can’t stop sobbing. Satoru winds up shaking hands with one of the reserves, who, thankfully, isn’t crying like several others. A catcher, Satoru remembers. Helping the senior in the bullpen to warm-up. The one that didn’t get to play.

“Congratulations.” The other murmurs to him. “You’ve got a good fastball.” He blinks. Why praise him, when his senior is the one who is most deserving of it? The other follows his gaze towards Narumiya Mei. “Mei-san will bounce back. Don’t lose till we beat you next year.”

A shiver goes through Satoru, recognising the fire in the other’s eyes. “Next year,” he promises.

He decides not to join in with his seniors to take the dirt, and feels an unspoken understanding settle between him, Enjou and Hongou.

Satoru normally sleeps immediately once the bus starts, but he feels wide awake. The gentle snores from the rest of the team start picking up in volume. He tunes them out easily, focusing on Osaka’s pleasant scenery.

There’s a couple of footsteps then a slide into the empty seat beside his. Satoru glances at Hongou, who doesn’t meet his eyes, then peeks at Renji in front of him, obviously tucked into a position where he won’t bang his head against the glass, snoozing away.

“He was good.” Hongou says gruffly.

“Yeah.”

They lapse back into silence, all the way till the bus pulls up at the hotel they’re staying at.

The upcoming fall tournament means a completely new team, right behind the echoing cheers of their seniors.

To no one’s surprise, Hongou gets the ace number, and Renji becomes number two, the official catcher.

To Satoru’s surprise but nobody else’s, he receives number seven, inheriting Kaidoh-senpai’s old spot as left fielder.

“Knew you’d get that. We need your batting skills.” Urameshi pounds him on the back, ecstatic over his own upgrade into the first string as shortstop. Renji squeezes his shoulder, grinning, once they’re dismissed for the day.

Hongou grunts. “Don’t slack off on your pitching.”

“I won’t.” Satoru burns, aura blazing, eyeing the number one in Hongou’s hands.

Satoru starts practicing a slider, when Nishi-senpai – captain, now, though no one on the official roster seems willing to call him that - suggests it to him.

“Best to become a well-rounded pitcher. You’ve got a good splitter already, but it’s not a winning shot yet like Hongou’s. Try out a horizontal one! It might work out better for you.”

Satoru nods obediently. Nishi-senpai flashes him a devilish grin, then ruffles his hair.

“Steal the ace number from Hongou, you hear me? I’d much rather have you as our ace. Least you’re not so rude.” He purposely raises his voice.

Hongou promptly turns his back on Nishi-senpai.

“HEEYYY! I’M YOUR CAPTAIN! RESPECT ME!”

The fall tournament isn’t a breeze, per se, but they still take the championship. Hongou’s temper is through the roof because Coach Nitta makes him the reliever rather than starter in most games, and it’s all Renji and Satoru can do to hold him back from going after their coach with a baseball bat.

“An attitude adjustment is what you need.” Renji lectures, over Disney’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame. They’re at Satoru’s room again. It’s more convenient, Renji had said. Hongou’s room is filthy, and Renji’s place is too small for the three of them (don’t listen to that liar, it’s the other way around, Hongou says).

Satoru suspects they just like his mother’s cooking.

“Like the sadistic old fart isn’t enjoying this.” Hongou snarls, stabbing his homework so hard he punctures a hole in the paper.

Satoru carefully keeps his head down, writing out what Renji claims is a five-thousand word answer for a five-hundred word essay on arctic animals and how they keep warm. It’s not, Satoru’s keeping count – the teacher had placed a word limit of seven hundred on him after the last essay he turned in discussing grizzly bears.

“Did Seidou get through?”

He messes up the strokes for the word, and has to cross it out. “They did.”

It had been quite painful to watch, though the end was a relief. Miyuki Kazuya had obviously been hurt in the cross-play by Seikou in the semi-finals, but had toughened it out to help Seidou win the fall tournament for Tokyo. Satoru had been on edge watching him underperform the whole time, and his relief at Sawamura’s final strike-out pitch to seal their win against Yakushi was such that he had to stop and take a deep breath before the close-up of the end.

Neither Hongou nor Renji understands his fixation on them, more taken aback by Inashiro’s shock exit in the third round, but they are interested in Satoru’s own interest.

“Think we’ll meet them in Omi Jinguu and Senbatsu?”

“We will.” At least, Satoru hopes so.

It turns chillier, but practice turns harsher. Coach Nitta has Satoru focus more on batting than pitching. He’s not the only one who feels put out by that. Hongou is displeased over Satoru’s reduced pitching time too. But Renji agrees to catch for him when practice is over, if Satoru doesn’t feel too tired, and if his hands feel fine from Hongou’s all-out temper tantrum converted into viciously heavy fastballs.

Satoru promptly resolves to never feel too tired.

Omi Jinguu feels like it was over in a flash, Komadai scoring a sound win against Houmei in the finals to take home the championship. Satoru had watched the semi-finals with Renji and Hongou in the stands. He tastes disappointment as Seidou’s ace – Toujou Hideaki – loses Seidou’s ticket to the finals with a poorly placed pitch.

Miyuki Kazuya hadn’t played at all in the Omi Jinguu.

“There’s that then. The southpaw was good though.” Hongou just grunts at Renji’s comments. They’re both shuffling to leave when they notice Satoru still staring at the team down at the pitch.
“Furuya, come on! We still have a game tomorrow, remember?”

There’s so much snow that they all expect practice to be cancelled, or at least be held indoors. If so, then it’ll be basic training again, and even Renji’s so sick of it that he can’t bring himself to say aloud that it’s good for them.

Nishi-senpai stops short in front of the entrance to the grounds. They exchange confused glances, then shuffle around their second-year seniors to see what’s going on.

Coach Nitta has cleared away most of the snow.

He turns with a wrinkled grin towards them, aware of his new audience.

“Now that the snow’s all out of the way, we can practice on the field.”

Hongou’s napping on Satoru’s bed. Renji’s made his way to the street corner for drinks. Satoru himself is preoccupied with watching videos of polar bears frolicking in the snow.

It’s only when he’s aware of Hongou’s eyes on him that he tears his eyes away from the polar bear cubs, and stiffens when he realises that Hongou’s a lot closer than he had expected.
The what dies in his throat unsaid.

Satoru’s never quite noticed that Hongou’s eyes are broodingly intense. He becomes overtly aware of how quiet it is now, at his house. No hushed whirr of his father’s computers. No faint voices from his mother’s dramas playing. And he and Hongou make no sound at all, motionless, just looking at each other.

His chest is beginning to constrict.

Hongou reaches out, and Satoru feels those callused fingers on his cheek, gently turning his head to face Hongou better.

It’s a matter of course that Hongou kisses him.

Satoru’s aware of the press of Hongou’s lips on his – firm, confident, an unyielding kind of pressure – much like Hongou himself is when he’s on the mound. It’s natural that he presses back, blazing, in response. Hongou’s hand moves from his fingers to throat, and Satoru becomes even more aware of the heat that’s spreading from his cheeks down to his neck, aware of Hongou’s breath fluttering across his face as he draws back a little before kissing Satoru again -

“Well.”

Satoru jumps back, while Hongou grabs a pillow and flings it right at Enjou’s smirking face, who catches it easily mid-air.

“I guess there wasn’t any confession? How could you, Masamune, you should let Furuya-kun know you’ve been keeping an eye out for him in the middle school circuit for two whole years – “

Hongou leaps up to smother Renji.

Satoru just blinks, stunned.

Satoru doesn’t press for the whole story, but Hongou tells him anyway, ‘because Renji’ll exaggerate.’ Renji mockingly blows Hongou a kiss and heads back home first, leaving Satoru and Hongou to talk on the swings close by the school.

When he does hear the whole story though, he’s lost for words.

“Just because someone mentioned I pitched faster than you once?”

Hongou grunts, cheeks pink, pointedly not looking at Satoru.

Well, Satoru himself isn’t much better, honestly speaking. Even now, he’s still fixated on Seidou’s Miyuki Kazuya. Plus that southpaw. But still mostly Miyuki Kazuya.

“Well, you do pitch faster than me.” Hongou grudgingly acknowledges. “If only you had a better team or catcher back in middle school…”

“I’ll beat you yet for that ace number.” Satoru says calmly. His mouth twitches at the corner, a barely-there smile that he has every now and then, post Omi Jinguu.

The snow feels a lot less colder with Masamune’s lips on his.

“Fifth batter?” Satoru repeats, shovelling the snow, not sure he’s heard correctly.

“You stole my old spot.” Renji pouts.

“You were moved up to second.”

“But that’s out of the clean-ups. And now I have to make sure that I do get on base.” Renji sighs. “Time to practice sprinting, I guess.” Then with a wicked glint in his eye he proceeds to goad Masamune into a game of chase by smacking him in the face with a fistful of snow in the middle of cleaning up, the latter flinging snowballs at him in return while he cackles and dodges around other club members. In a short while, there’s a spirited war going on. Seniors against juniors. First-string against second. Infield against outfield.

Everyone stops short in horror when a snowball smacks Coach Nitta in the face. Even Nishi-senpai looks a little green.

“Coach – “

“Urameshi.” Their shortstop winces, steeling his shoulders as he walks up to Coach Nitta.

“You threw that snowball at me?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Turn around.”

A bubble of laughter starts building in Satoru when he spies the hidden glove. Urameshi yells aloud when the snowball smacks the back of his head.

“Play up, boys! Today might be the only day you get to smack your captain in the head with a snowball!”

“HEY – WAIT – COACH – “

Laughing in earnest now, Satoru pitches a snowball at Nishi-senpai’s feet together with Renji and Masamune to Nishi-senpai’s ungraceful hopping.

The short week-long spring break he spends in Tokyo, visiting his grandfather in the hospital.

“We didn’t know how to tell you, then.” His mother explains, fingers twisting in her lap. “I – we knew you were unhappy here, and we were already prepared that you’d ask to go to Tokyo, but – “

Satoru understands, and reaches across the armrest to squeeze his mother’s fingers. His fingers are cold and clammy from the cold, but his mother’s is even more so. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“We didn’t want you to worry.”

A lousy excuse. But if they had told Satoru, he’s not sure what he would have done to himself during that time.

“I’m happy.” He tells his parents, trusting them to understand. That it’s okay, not going to Seidou. Not uprooting from Hokkaido, like how he had left Tokyo that first time right before middle school. That Komadai hasn’t been as bad as he had anticipated. That Masamune and Renji are really good friends to him. That the team is fine – no, he’s fine with the team. Coach is unfailingly stern, but there’s still that hidden nice side. No one’s forgotten him carting the snow away so they can play. The senpai are nice, fuss over him a bit, and Nishi-senpai still believes that he can beat Hongou to the ace title, though Satoru can tell that it won’t be during high school.

His mother’s smile is soft, fond, and glad.

“Congratulations. National champion.” His grandfather says. He’s sitting upright in the hospital bed, an IV tube in his arm. He looks so frail now, but there’s still that brilliant intensity of the former koshien batter in the shadows of his straight back, the passion that Satoru had inherited and his grandfather had helped cultivate.

“It wasn’t because of me. It was the team.” They had saved him, so many times. Nishi-senpai, always yelling encouragement in those early games especially, where his control was sloppier than a child’s colouring.

“Mm.” His grandfather looks like he has more to say on that, but Satoru will refuse praise from him until he can prove to him that he’s lived up to his expectations.

“You brought your… tablet? Didn’t you? The Giants are against the Tigers, I hear.”

Satoru digs out his tablet, curling ever so slightly towards his grandfather as they watch the game together.

Satoru manoeuvres through Tokyo’s streets with much ease, facing difficulty only from the throngs of students taking advantage of their holidays to do as much as possible.

He’s a stranger in his old home, he finds. The dagashiya at the corner has been torn down, replaced by a cute cat café. He’s been in there once to play with them, and a kitten had stuck to him the whole while he was there. Satoru had to move the hundred or so photos he had taken of it into his laptop.

When he goes to the temples with his mother, Satoru’s attention is drawn to a head of brown hair, almost as tall as he is. He squints at it, can’t help thinking he should know it –

“Sacchan!”

He doesn’t think more about it.

“Improve yourself, you hear? Don’t let your friend have that ace number without putting up a good fight for it.”

Satoru nods obediently. His grandfather grips his hand firmly, making sure he understands, then lets go.

Satoru is flying back in an hour; he has training tomorrow.

Nishi-senpai’s excited yell attracts everyone’s attention, and he rests his head on Satoru’s shoulder to peer at the chocolate sitting on his shoes.

“Honmei chocolate!”

Everyone immediately checks their own locker, several patting him on the back in envious congratulations.

Renji looks like he’s laughing fit to burst. Masamune’s face is pointedly turned away from him.

Satoru ducks out of their class with a murmured ‘be right back’.

The girl who confesses to him is in their year, two classes over, Satoru vaguely remembers. He lets her down as gently as he knows how to, stating baseball as his excuse.

“You’ll find someone better.” He ends. She nods bravely, bows, then takes her leave. Satoru holds himself back from chasing after her to tell her sorry, again. It’s best to let her go, he thinks.
Masamune is quiet on the way home from practice. Renji had left before them.

“I turned her down, you know.”

Masamune exhales, releasing his frustration. “I know you would – did. It’s just – I didn’t like it, still.”

“You’ve got your own admirers too.” Satoru points out. He doesn’t understand the possessiveness Masamune exerts over him. Not always. Satoru’s not going to break up with him without a reason.
Masamune purses his lips. “I know. At least no one gave me honmei chocolate. Or confessed to me. Imagine if I had to turn them down.” Masamune rolls his eyes.

Satoru smiles. “You’d make them cry for sure.”

Masamune scoffs, then leans closer. Satoru understands what he wants, and meets his kiss halfway.

The mound feels much more familiar now, at senbatsu. Satoru feels less of the nervous tremor, more of the assuredness that Komadai will be here, and all his three years he’ll be coming back again and again to this place, making his memories, his name here just like thousands of others before him.

Just like his grandfather.

The interviews have increased, Masamune’s mood falling into even worse depths. Satoru’s only been able to help alleviate it a little – light brushes of fingers over the back of his palm, stolen kisses when they’re safely ensconced in their shared room with Renji disappearing into the lounge rented just for them.

He’s picked to start against Seidou. Masamune’s irritated at being forced to rest, but reins his temper in because Satoru’s so excited about it that he has to quirk a smile.

Seidou plays their ace against Satoru. Komadai’s defending first.

Renji saunters up to him in the bullpen with a smirk. “How many strikeouts do you want to get this time?”

“I want to pitch the whole game.” Satoru says seriously, one eye on Seidou who are doing their warm-ups now.

Renji raises his eyebrows. He looks towards the dugout. Satoru knows what he’s thinking. “Coach wants him to rest.”

Renji laughs. “Your funeral, but I’m sure Masamune won’t get too mad at his boyfriend.” Satoru fights the urge to punch him on the shoulder, a smile twitching at the corner of his lips as well. “Don’t mess up the course, you hear? And let’s finally see good use of that slider of yours.”

He shuts out the first three batters, feeling light. Watch their ace come out to defend.

Toujou’s first few pitches are shaky. Their leadoff gets on first base, and Renji smashes another base hit, smirking at Toujou as he takes a huge lead. Their third batter hits a grounder, but succeeds in sending the on-base players forward. Their clean-up gets walked, then it’s Satoru’s turn to bat.

“Swing all the way through, you hear me?” Coach Nitta says. Satoru nods, catching a brief glimpse of Masamune. He looks more resigned than angry now, and gives him an encouraging nod of his own.
Miyuki Kazuya has called a time-out. They catch each other’s eye as Seidou’s captain walks back to squat behind the home plate.

Satoru takes his time breathing out. Three practice swings.

Seidou’s ace looks shaky on the mound.

First pitch, an out low. Just one ball outside the strike zone. “BALL!”

Second, a low inside strike. “STRIKE!”

Third, a slider. Satoru blinks only once, when it bounces onto the ground. “BALL!”

Fourth, a high inside straight. Satoru swings – all the way through – and watches the ball fly high, fly far –

“HOMERUN! KOMADAI FUJIMAKI’S FURUYA SCORES A FOUR-RUN HOMER FOR HIS TEAM! WHAT A START FOR THE REIGNING CHAMPIONS OF LAST SUMMER’S KOSHIEN AND OMI JINGUU!”

The stands erupt into cheers. Satoru jogs, buoyed, face pink. He doesn’t miss the calculating gaze from Miyuki Kazuya, but his attention is snatched by Renji holding his hands up for a high-five and Nishi-senpai jumping onto his back, mussing up his hair.

“Nice homerun.” Coach Nitta greets him with a grin, and Satoru feels like he’s floating on air. Masamune holds out a cup of water for him, ignoring Renji’s squawk of complaint on his biasedness.

Toujou takes out their next batters cleanly with help from the fielders. Hongou’s subsequent snort confirms Satoru’s guess – he’s been crushed, completely.

“Don’t go easy on them just because you’re feeling sorry.” Renji warns him in the next inning. Seidou’s leadoff batter is practicing his swing in the batter’s box.

“I won’t.” Satoru grips the baseball firmly, fingers digging into the seam.

“See that you don’t.”

Strikeout. Strikeout. Strikeout.

Seidou’s ace lasts only three innings against them. He’s pulled out, replaced by that loud southpaw Satoru had noticed in the Omi Jinguu tournament. Komadai’s seventh-hole is up now.

“Well. That was quick. Mostly thanks to your homer, but it’s kind of disappointing.” Renji fixes his armour.

“I won’t count them out yet,” Satoru says quietly, wiping his face with a towel, one eye open to watch Seidou’s lefty pitcher getting agitated with Miyuki Kazuya on the mound. Masamune raises his eyebrows.

It’s a clean consequential strike-out. Seidou seems more invigorated by that.

“Let’s go show them how the champions play, then.” Renji says, grinning.

With his fastball and Renji’s smart leads, Seidou’s still hitless save for Miyuki Kazuya’s liner, and becoming more desperate by the inning. Satoru exhales – his pitch count is over a hundred already, but there’s still two innings to go.

A good straight, and Seidou’s relief pitcher gets taken out. Satoru ignores the latter’s glares directed towards him, jogging back to the dugout to get his bat and helmet.

“You’re okay?” Masamune passes him his bat. Coach Nitta’s listening in on both of them, head turned ever so slightly.

“Yeah.” Satoru’s fingers tighten around his batting helmet. “I want to pitch for the whole game.”

Masamune gives him a crooked smile. “And miss out on pitching tomorrow?”

“Of course not.” Though Satoru knows better than to expect Coach Nitta to let him play tomorrow. His stamina’s still not built up enough for that yet.

“Shut all their hopes down.”

Bottom of the eighth. It’s Seidou’s final defence. The southpaw – Sawamura’s - moving fastball and change-up is more dangerous than they had expected – except for Nishi-senpai who got walked (again), no one has managed to get on base. Satoru had hit a grounder his last at-bat, jammed by the moving fastball.

When he walks up to the batter’s box, he feels Miyuki Kazuya’s calculating gaze on him. Satoru ducks his head in deference out of habit, promptly turning away to face Sawamura.

The first out low strike he lets pass. The second – a cutter, he thinks – he fouls. Nishi-senpai steals to second base.

The third, he hits into left field.

Nishi-senpai sprints back home, barely missing the tag out from Miyuki Kazuya and roars to the team at the dugout. Satoru safely makes it to first.

“AN RBI FROM KOMADAI’S STARTER TODAY, FURUYA SATORU AGAIN! IS THIS THE BIRTH OF A NEW KAIBUTSU, RIGHT ON THE HEELS OF THEIR ACE?”

Seidou looks suitably upset, but none of them are crying. Not even their ace, though his eyes seem watery. Satoru shakes hands with their third-base player, a murmur of ‘good game’ on his lips. The other player nods, then leaves to put his arm around Seidou’s ace.

Satoru’s attention is drawn away by Nishi-senpai, talking to Miyuki Kazuya.

“Can’t believe we went against your reliever today, and we’re still hitless. How much of a monster is that ace of yours?”

“Furuya’s in top form today! Honestly, if he wasn’t in our school, he’d have been some other school’s ace.”

“You’re real fond of him.”

Nishi-senpai raises his voice. “That’s because someone else is a lot less respectful of his seniors.” Masamune, standing next to Satoru promptly turns his back on Nishi-senpai. “See what I mean?” He grumbles to Miyuki Kazuya, who laughs.

“CONGRATULATIONS!” Satoru’s hands are suddenly grabbed, a loud voice blaring before him. Sawamura has grabbed hold of his hands, caged fire in his eyes. “YOU BEAT US!” Satoru doesn’t miss Masamune’s sharp glare.

“Um.”

Their pink-haired third batter comes up to gently tug his friends arm. Seidou’s leadoff batter is less gentle – he aims a kick to Sawamura’s butt that pulls another yell of pain out from the latter.

“Don’t go embarrassing us, bakamura!”

“KURAMOCHI-SENP UGGHHHFUUNGHH!”

“Sorry about him. As you can see, he’s kind of an idiot.” Miyuki Kazuya wanders up to say, casting his team a dismissive glance, ignoring their antics, smile on his lips. “Great game today.”

Satoru nods, suddenly feeling tongue-tied and shy.

“Better not lose to anyone else, kaibutsu-kun ♥. We’ll beat you next time, and make your team drag out their ace to replace you on that mound then beat him too.”

“We’ll be ready to take you on anytime.” Nishi-senpai says, smile more of a smirk and arm around Satoru’s shoulders.

As Renji had predicted, Coach Nitta doesn’t let him pitch in the remaining rounds in the tournament, benched for the semi-finals and playing left field only in the finals. To make up for both his and Masamune’s absence in the semis, Renji puts up a brilliant display of batting against Mima, smirking when Satoru hands him a drink.

Masamune gets the mound all to himself in the finals, shutting out the opposing team on ‘pure frustration release’, as Renji puts it. Everyone’s beside themselves with joy, especially when Coach Nitta treats them to yakiniku with a boyish grin.

The reporters and scouts are all over them, with a new nickname for him. Kaibutsu.

The new first years are full of new talents, many dying to get into the official team. Renji snickers.

“Both of you have your own fan clubs now. Combined, you have an army.”

“Like I care.” Masamune says, doing his set of push-ups. Satoru’s reply is more polite. “Does it matter?”

“I wonder how many heartbreaks there’ll be,” Renji says, staring thoughtfully at the gaggle of girls watching right outside the fence. “If it becomes known that the both of you are dating?”

“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!”

Satoru’s sprayed by confetti, sneezing hard as stray papers tickle his nose. Masamune’s grip around his arms are tight, and Satoru gets manhandled into the empty classroom he had been lured to. Nishi-senpai is at the forefront, ruffling his hair until it resembles a crow’s nest.

“I can’t believe you didn’t tell us when your birthday was.” Masamune grumbles to him. “We found out through the managers, and only because Renji remembered.” Renji’s preoccupied with lighting the candles on the cake they had bought for him.

“I didn’t think it was important.” Masamune shoots him an are you fucking kidding me look. Urameshi flings more colourful paper streamers over both of their heads.

Satoru adds two things to his top drawer that night – a polaroid of the whole team and a pocketbook-sized picture book of animals, given to him by Renji and Masamune.

CHAMPIONSHIP REMATCH FROM LAST SUMMER, the papers blare.

Satoru had watched the replay of when Inashiro had yet again beat out Seidou for the right to participate in koshien, their pitcher relay once again losing out to Narumiya Mei. Their games drag on to ten innings, until their fourth batter pulls through for an RBI that seals the win for Inashiro.

Miyuki Kazuya had looked faintly upset, from his picture and subsequent short interview.

“He’s an even bigger monster compared to last year.”

“Good thing we have two on our team then,” Renji remarks drily.

They have a narrow miss this time in the quarter-finals. Teitou’s ace Mukai’s own arrogance had enabled Renji to hit a viciously satisfying two-run RBI in the last of an otherwise annoying game where they get in scoring position but never actually do. Coach Nitta’s gamble to switch Renji to the bottom of the line-up after Satoru, counting on the both of them to score consecutively had paid off.

Even Masamune falters though, against Inashiro’s line-up of star batters. Strengthened by the hunger for victory in their final year, they come after his pitches fiercely, getting on base several times.

Inashiro's first year pitcher Akamatsu holds strong for three innings before getting switched out, exhausted. They hit Narumiya Mei’s pitches too, but it’s a see-saw game. One run up, one run down. Two runs all that holds steady since the second inning.

In the eighth inning when his pitch count touches a hundred and sixty, Coach Nitta switches him out for Satoru.

Satoru’s unnerved to see Masamune not even raise a complaint, near collapsing on the bench when he reaches it. One of the first-years, Yukawa, runs to help him ice his shoulder.

“We’ll do it.” Renji says firmly to him. “Beat them again.”

And again, Narumiya Mei holds his own against them. The game stretches to fifteen innings. Inashiro’s fielders back him up, their ace, their Prince of the Capital. Even Satoru feels strained, breathing hard, fatigue and heat bearing down on his back. How can Narumiya Mei keep pitching like that, so tenaciously, for so long?

Renji calls for a straight against leadoff batter Carlos. Satoru winds up, pitches –

Feels the horror when his pitch slips, just a little, go a little higher than it was meant to –

“SAYONARA HOMERUN!”

Satoru

Can’t

Hear

Anything.

It’s Nishi-senpai that calls him back to earth. Nishi-senpai with tear tracks down his eyes, but still smiling, who draws him away to make Satoru line-up next to him, completely disregarding seniority.
“THANK YOU FOR THE GAME!”

Narumiya Mei’s crying, again, but with tears of happiness this time. Nishi-senpai shakes their captain’s hand, and another familiar face comes up.

Tadano Itsuki. Satoru remembers. The catcher calling the leads for Narumiya Mei, helping that incredible ace shine on the mound, hold Komadai at bay from the win. He was the one who had shook Satoru’s hand last year. Who declared that they’d beat them in their next rematch. Who said that Narumiya Mei would bounce back, stronger than ever.

“Good game today. You pitched really well.”

“Congratulations. You won.” The words feel wooden on Satoru’s mouth. Tadano smiles, then turns to his teammates. Their redheaded shortstop glances at him; Narumiya Mei is clinging to him.

“Oi, Itsuki, carry Mei.”

“Wha- but, Shirakawa-san, I’m exhausted too!”

“So are we.”

“That’s just – “

“ITSUKIII!” Narumiya Mei blubbers, and in a fit of emotion wraps arms around Tadano’s neck and starts crying snot onto his shirt. The reporters are already beginning to spill into the grounds, cameras clicking. Tadano awkwardly pats his senior on the back, murmuring indiscernible words.

“Satoru, let’s go.” He becomes aware of Renji’s hand on his arm, then Masamune’s, grim-faced.

Satoru’s fingers are trembling when he digs into the dirt outside the dugout, cameras flashing. Beside him, his seniors are crying.

He throws the pouch into the trash, making sure no one sees him do it.

The ride back to the hotel is subdued, but Satoru is too exhausted to notice, crashing into dreamless black the moment he gets into a comfortable enough position.

When he does dream eventually, it’s not pleasant.

Most of the seniors have red eyes, but all of them come down to their last breakfast at the hotel with cheery grace, making jokes and talking about how they’ll have to knuckle down for actual studying again.

Masamune’s only outward show of comfort for Satoru is to grip his knee tight, out of sight of everyone at the dining table.

His parents know something is wrong when he can’t even greet them once he reaches home.

His grandfather’s phone call –

He can’t answer it either.

Satoru turns up at practice two days later, same as everyone. Finishes the warm-ups with everyone, but –

Coach Nitta is adamant with both him and Masamune. “Either rest or go run. You’re not allowed in the bullpens till you’re completely recovered.”

Masamune grunts and starts on laps. Satoru stands there, quietly staring at the coach. “Furuya?”

“Can I – leave early?”

“You can.” Coach Nitta allows, after a pause. Satoru bows his thanks, ignores the stares as he walks out of the grounds.

He makes sure he’s out of sight when he starts running, fleeing in the direction home before doubling back to the park, because he doesn’t want his mother to know, doesn’t want his family to even though he’s not sure why.

He ignores Renji’s and Masamune’s calls that night.

He can’t escape from Renji and Masamune during breaks and class, but he’s glad that Renji’s holding Masamune back. Satoru doesn’t know how to explain this pain to the latter.

That’s his routine for the next week or so, up until Coach Nitta allows him back into the bullpens to practice with Renji. Masamune is pitching for batting practice.

Renji’s eyes narrow after the first pitch. The third. Fourth. Eleventh. At the twelfth, he stops the practice, walking up to Satoru.

“Hey, let’s stop here for today, okay? Why don’t you go run or do some batting practice? I want to practice throwing.”

Satoru starts, but agrees, putting aside his mitt. He heads off to jog laps.

He sees Renji speaking to the coach. Doesn’t ask what Renji’s told the coach. Doesn’t stop.

“Sacchan, it’s been a while since Enjou-kun and Hongou-kun have come over haven’t they?”

“Really?” Satoru swallows his mouthful of rice. “I – I haven’t noticed.”

His mother’s lips curl downwards. Satoru pretends he hasn’t seen it.

Masamune catches him by the collar. He’s shaking all over, while Satoru keeps his eyes on the floor, at their shoes. He can see scuff marks on Masamune’s.

“Damn you,” Masamune hisses in his ear. “You’re not – you’re not allowed to fucking do this. What about the team? What about coach? What about me?”

“I – I can’t.” Satoru has never hated his lack of conversational skills more, because surely, surely there’s a way to talk about this, to make Masamune understand.

Masamune punches the wall angrily with his left hand just before Renji bursts out onto the rooftop. He shrugs off Renji’s concern and storms down the stairs, ignoring Renji’s calls.

“Satoru?”

He sweeps past Renji too, lip trembling at the hurt look on his friend’s face.

He skips practice that day. And the next.

“FURUYA! CATCH!”

He manages to close his fingers around the ball just in time, stunned. Nishi-senpai bounds up to him, grinning.

“Hey, hey, leaving already? Why don’t you come and play catch with me?”

There’s no way to refuse without appearing rude, so Satoru winds up at –

The same field. The very first one he had been to with Renji and Masamune, back before he even knew who they were.

He sneaks a look at Nishi-senpai. It doesn’t look like he intentionally brought Satoru here.

“Come on. Let’s play catch.”

They toss the ball to each other. Gradually, his arm loosens up. “Not so bad, is it? Playing catch with your old captain?”

“… Nishi-senpai, what are you trying to do?”

“Make you relax, duh! So you’ll answer my questions.”

Satoru stiffens immediately, and Nishi-senpai groans. “Now we’ll have to play longer. Hey, hey! Don’t ignore your senpai!”

Satoru would like to turn and walk away right out, but Nishi-senpai is stubborn when he means to, has to be because that’s the only way he can lead the team who otherwise chooses to joke around with him. Not many seniors would laugh off Masamune’s attitude towards them.

But he really doesn’t want to… talk. The only way to stall is with the glove and ball in his hand. Satoru sighs, and tosses the ball back.

The streetlights are on when Nishi-senpai stops, then leads him to a roadside oden stall to eat.

“You know, Furuya, we’ve been really lucky to have you on our team.”

Satoru picks at his crabsticks.

“We’ve never made it to koshien, you know? Till you, Hongou and Enjou came here. You guys made history. And back-to-back champions at that. Koshien last year, Omi Jinguu, Senbatsu. We didn’t win this year, but we still got all the way to the finals. That’s something no one else has ever achieved. That’s something we’ll all be remembered for.” Nishi-senpai smiles. His eyes are bright, and there’s not a hint of sorrow over their near loss because of Furuya’s last pitch.

“And it’s all thanks to you three.”

“Thanks to them,” Satoru says. “I’m just – “

“Who’d have pushed Hongou that far, if not you? Who’d get us all those runs in the games? Who else had the guts to pitch after Hongou’s stamina got worn down? Coach didn’t put Takagi or Sasaki – he put you. And if not for you pitching, we’d just have lost that much earlier. We might not even have gotten to the finals.”

The oden vendor cuts in. “Thought I recognised ya, kid. You’re that Furuya Satoru, right?”

“You watched the games, jii-san?”

“Sure did. And I’m telling ya, Furuya-kun, you’re a proper kaibutsu. The only reason you’re not a bigger name than that ace of yours is because you didn’t start playing sooner. Damn shame.” He shakes his head, and drops another crabstick in Satoru’s dish. “Can’t wait for when you two get scouted by the pros and get to play against each other. That’ll be a match to watch.”

“See?” Nishi-senpai turns to him. Satoru falters. “That was a hell of a match. And you shouldn’t stop over that sayonara homerun. Come back. Get stronger. That’s what the whole team wants too. Then get revenge next year. Not just for yourself – for us senpai too.” Nishi-senpai smiles ruefully.

“Masamune can do it.” Satoru’s voice is barely a whisper.

“He’s getting out of control without you there. Been pitching too hard. Sloppy. Kind of… lost? It feels that way. Lots of spirit in his pitches, but they’re angry and lacking his usual edge. Coach keeps getting him to run laps or bat instead of spending time in the bullpen. Which, of course, makes him even angrier.”

“You’re more important to this team than you realise. And one major loss should only have you bouncing back stronger, kaibutsu. And besides,” Nishi-senpai grins. “I’m still betting on you to beat Hongou for that ace title.”

First things first. “I’m sorry.”

Renji folds his arms easily with a shrug, smiling. “Apology accepted. These three weeks have kind of been hell without you, you know.”

Satoru flicks his gaze downwards. “… Are you angry?”

“Not at you. At Masamune.” A huff escapes Renji’s lips. “He’s been an absolute tyrant when you were gone. And moron couldn’t be sensitive enough to – I dunno, make sure you’re okay.”

“He did. He called.” Satoru winces. “I didn’t pick up.”

“Then he should’ve gone over to your place and threw rocks at your window or something. Pull you out to talk instead of losing his temper at you.”

“… What kind of movies have you been watching recently?”

“I’m being serious here,” Renji reprimands, smacking the back of Satoru’s head lightly.

Coach has him run punishment laps for skipping practice, and he bears it without complaint, easily ignoring the whispers and eyes on him. Satoru’s more preoccupied with how to approach Masamune, so absorbed in his own thoughts that he just barely ducks a stray ball flying his way from a strong hit by one of the high-potential first years mid-jog.

After cleaning-up, Renji beckons him over to his shoe locker, then immediately disappears the minute Satoru reaches him. Satoru’s left staring after him in confusion before he realises that Masamune and him are the last ones in school.

Masamune stands up awkwardly from the steps when Satoru approaches him. “Shall we… go?”

“I’m sorry.” Satoru says bluntly, before they’re even out of the school gates. “I shouldn’t have shut you and Renji out. And the calls – “

“I was mad.” Masamune cuts in gruffly. “But I’m not, now.”

“So… we’re okay?”

Masamune stops, and so does Satoru, realising it just a couple of paces later.

“On one condition.”

Satoru exhales his relief into Masamune’s kiss, arm wrapping around the latter’s waist when Masamune buries his head into Satoru’s shoulder, lips latching onto his neck.

His heart still dips a little when Masamune’s name is called for the number one, but it’s not unexpected. There was no surprise regarding those who got the numbered jerseys – he gets his old one back. Coach Nitta proceeds to call out the batting line-up for the next game.

“- batting fourth is Furuya – “

He stops paying attention after that.

“Clean-up?” He repeats to Renji and Masamune, after Coach Nitta leaves, at a loss for other words.

“Who else?” Masamune snorts. “Me? As if.” Renji sniggers.

“That’s true.”

They sweep the Fall Tournament and Omi Jinguu again – as if anyone ever had any doubt about that. Satoru is gradually eased back into the games as their closing pitcher, pitches becoming steady and sure. There’re no third years or Nishi-senpai to shout their encouragement for him from behind, but there’s still Coach Nitta’s grim smile in the dugout, Renji’s lead before the batter’s box and Masamune’s gaze full of heat, itching for the mound and watching Satoru’s every move.

KOMADAI’S TROIKA, the newspapers call them. Masamune the ace, Renji the catcher and Satoru the ace reliever and clean-up. The rest of the team gets featured too, but the focus is all on them, the three third-years who’ve been in the line-up since their first summer tournament as high schoolers, helping Komadai take the crown again and again and again.

Hulk of the north and kaibutsu.

“They should come up with prettier names. Like Beauty and the Beast.”

“Are you re-watching Disney again?”

“Look at it this way. Furuya – “Urameshi, their now much respected captain says, after sulking over his comparatively smaller part in the article. “is obviously the Beauty. Quiet mystery man, good-looking too, the one girls will flock too. I mean, remember his chocolate stash from last year?” Satoru bites his bottom lip and flushes, while the rest of the team nods in agreement. Masamune starts to scowl before catching himself in time. “And Hongou.” Urameshi gives him a judging look. “Well. He’s not that bad looking either, but do something about the scowl, man.”

He’s going to be running around all the time whenever Masamune pitches now, Renji scrawls on his notebook in an untidy message to Satoru, who bites his lip again to stop from smiling.

During New Year, after prayers at the local shrine, Satoru meets up with Masamune and Renji. His mother’s promise of kanitama for dinner that night floats out from the kitchen as he hikes his bag higher up his shoulder.

They run into Urameshi and the other members of the baseball club while browsing the bookstore. Masamune had wandered over to the biographies section when Satoru hears Urameshi calling out a greeting to Renji.

They head to another temple together.

“We know what we’re praying for this time right, guys?” Urameshi says confidently over the tinkling bell chimes.

They clap their hands and bow.

Their new first-year pitcher is coming along well. Already playing in official games as a starter with his friend who’s also his battery partner. There’s added pressure on Satoru as fourth batter especially – he has to get runs so that Namikawa can pitch easier now, just like his seniors did when he was a first year.

Renji laughs at his hero-worship of Masamune and Satoru both, but Satoru recognises a distant gleam in Namikawa’s eyes. Namikawa’s not someone who’s willing to fall behind his seniors forever.
Of course, the gleam could also just be Namikawa falling all over himself to help the pretty second-year manager to clean-up.

“Make a wish,” Renji tells him. They’ve already had the joint party for all the summer babies. Renji insists on another one specifically for Satoru, just between the three of them. Masamune had lured him out to the park, with Satoru reaching right at the stroke of midnight.

Satoru beams at the three polar bear cupcakes.

“Masamune bought them.” Renji nudges, and Satoru decides he doesn’t care that Renji’s watching and presses a kiss to Masamune’s cheek while Renji smirks. Masamune is obviously red even in the poor lighting.

“Good look on you, the blush.”

“Shut up.”

Satoru tugs on both their arms. “Let’s make a wish together.”

Renji looks at him, surprised. “It’s your birthday.”

“I want us to.” Satoru says stubbornly. Renji and Masamune exchange a look, whereupon Masamune shrugs and inches closer to Satoru. Renji peers owlishly at the candles dripping wax onto the frosting, then grins.

“Well, I think it’s pretty clear what you want us to wish for too.”

Renji leaves first with another smirk after the candles are blown and tossed into the nearby trash can, waggling his eyebrows, his cupcake already bitten into.

Masamune tastes sweet when Satoru kisses the air out of his lungs, fingers tangling into his hair.

The summer tournament is as gruelling as ever, but being back again in Osaka sends new adrenaline pumping through the team, the third years especially, their very successful pitcher relays racking up called games. Namikawa practically glows when their second-year manager congratulates him on his good performance – only four runs lost in five games.

Inashiro had lost narrowly against Seidou, 5-6 in the West Tokyo block.

“The southpaw – “

“Sawamura.” Renji smiles at Satoru’s automatic naming.

“Sawamura’s become the new ace. Didn’t really expect that. Did you?”

“He’s a better pitcher than their old ace.” What Satoru means is that he admires him, not faltering before Satoru in that one game in the Senbatsu they had against each other. How he had altered Seidou’s initially hopeless mood for the four-run difference to a roaring want to go down fighting.

“He’s got guts, but that’s not enough to win the game.” Masamune says, resting his head against Satoru’s shoulder.

“No, it’s not.” But Satoru knows better than Masamune how important it is to have those guts in the first place, that ability to buoy one’s whole team into confidence.

He envies that spark, so eye-catching in place of his steadfast reliability in the game.

“Does this count as your fixation on them paying off?” Renji asks, amused. Finals, against Seidou, who’ve come out of one of the fiercest games in the tournament yet against Teitou. Komadai had sent Hakuryuu packing for the second time in the semi-finals since Senbatsu over a year ago, Renji endlessly pleased over his solo homerun against Mima. Namikawa had pitched well today – six full innings, before Coach Nitta had Satoru switch in. Masamune was benched – saving his strength for the finals. Satoru had squinted at Renji with the faint realisation that his friend may just be a tad too sadistically happy about that.

“He just doesn’t like his face for some reason.” Masamune tells Satoru, over Renji’s squawk.

“With a face like that? How can you?”

“Doesn’t Masamune frown more…?” Satoru asks, and gets pinched in the waist by his boyfriend.

“Let’s win, you guys, and give Seidou the thrashing that we couldn’t give Inashiro last year.” Urameshi declares, to an approving roar from the rest of the team as they leave the stands to head back to their hotel.

Satoru’s liner in the second inning has been his only hit, and he was the team’s first and only person to get on base for six innings. The stadium is in uproar – Sawamura Eijun, whose burning spirit had steadily gained him fans and supporters throughout his three years of high school is holding his own against Masamune, Komadai’s indisputable ace. Satoru’s supposed to be switched in during the sixth, but with no runs on the board the time of change is going to be up in the air for him.

“Watch him carefully boys, and keep swinging through. He’s a good pitcher, but we are the champions.” The team roars in response, and Satoru nudges Renji in the side just before he’s to go bat.
“What’s with the long face?”

“The crowd’s rooting for him. They want an upset. Hear the noise?”

Satoru does. How can he not? He inhales, steadies himself, fixes his eyes on his best friend. “Does it matter? We’re taking back our crown.”

Renji’s smile is a tad rueful. “Go show them, kaibutsu.”

Urameshi gets on base with a fight for balls. The familiar at-bat song comes up, and Satoru feels that tad bit nostalgic for Hokkaido. That winter ground. He closes his eyes, breathes.

We’re not here to play baseball. Hadn’t Masamune said that a long time ago?

We are here to seize the championship.

In high. Just out of the strike zone. Satoru doesn’t flinch, just shifts back a little. “BALL!”

Out low, right at the edge. Satoru swings, misses. “STRIKE!”

A cutter. Satoru just barely guesses that it’ll be in the zone. “FOUL!”

Another in high. “STRIKE!”

The bench, their supporters, are shouting as loudly as they can. Satoru runs his tongue over his lips. They’re dry.

A change-up, that he doesn’t bother going after. He ignores the catcher’s fierce glare of irritation at him. “BALL!”

“COME ON, FURUYA!”

“KAIBUTSU!”

“SAWAAMURAAA!”

“SEEIIDDOOOOUUUU!”

Satoru readies himself again, meets Sawamura head-on.

He swings, feels the ball cruising high, almost feather-light against his bat, and he knows with a thrill that it’s taken on wings and soars into the back screen. Satoru lets his bat fall slowly to the ground, starts jogging after Urameshi and lets his team leap onto him, full on smiling under their attention, but he seeks out Renji and Masamune, who’ve been with him the longest, who’ve been the whole reason he can even be here. The announcer’s scream about Satoru’s homerun is lost in the din that are the fans’ cheering, muffled when he buries his head into Renji and Masamune’s rib-crushing hugs.

“Come on, ace. We’ve got to give back our kaibutsu something too.”

That something is switching him in and having him close the game in the last inning, and it’s with both wonder and gratitude in his eyes that Satoru turns to the whole team.

“We decided this a long time ago. It’s in coach’s game plan too, remember? Don’t go crying on us before we’ve won the game,” Urameshi says, grinning. “Do it afterwards, once you’ve gotten us that flag and cup back.”

There’s a lump in his throat still when Renji walks up to him on the mound after a few practice throws. The latter’s smiling. “Take a look at the bench.”

Masamune is leaning against the rails. When he notices them looking at him, he holds his fist out, and smiles too. The rest of their teammates cheer him on louder. Satoru swallows.

“Three straight strikeouts today. Let’s end this with a bang, Satoru.” Renji thumps him on the chest with his catcher’s glove lightly, then jogs back to his spot behind the home plate.

Satoru looks up, pulls his cap down.

It’s not daybreak, but the sun is there, shining bright and brilliant.

I will always support you in your dreams.

For you, he thinks. The you so much broader now – not just his parents, his grandparents. Renji and Masamune. Coach Nitta. Nishi-senpai. Urameshi. Namikawa. The whole team. His team. Their team.
Renji spreads his arms wide, gives him the signal. Satoru winds up, and pitches.

Every thunderclap of a pitch has the crowd shaking, screaming. Second batter Toujou Hideaki swings and misses three times in a row, the last with his knee on the ground as he misjudges the height of Satoru’s in low fastball. The radar gun reads 158km/h.

Third batter Kominato Haruichi comes up, short pink hair showing off his sharp gaze. Satoru and Renji take him out with two fastballs and a slider.

Half the stands are on their feet.

Fourth batter Yuuki Masashi.

In high. Strike, as Yuuki swings and misses.

Slider to the outside. Ball.

Splitter right down the middle. Another swing and miss. Strike.

Satoru already knows what Renji is going to call. Satoru bounces the rosin bag in his hand. Drops it to the ground.

A fastball to the in high strike corner.

The familiar crack is made amidst silence.

The crowds roar comes back, just half a second behind the Komadai bench’s own.

Urameshi reaches him first, hugging him from the back before Renji slams into him with a bear hug that knocks all the air out of his lungs. Masamune reaches them a while later, and Satoru feels the firm press of Masamune’s lips against his throat before the other buries his face into his shoulder. The rest of their teammates keep piling on top of them until they’re too heavy, Satoru falling on top of Renji and Masamune, laughing.

Sawamura storms up to them, eyes red from crying but resolutely sticks out his hand to shake with them both. He holds tight onto Satoru’s hand, eyes blazing.

“You beat me this time, but next time, in the pro leagues, I’ll show you! Both of you!” Some of the players from Seidou hiss at their ace for his brazenness, but Satoru smiles.

“I’ll look forward to it.”

Satoru, Masamune and Renji digs their fingers in, huddled closely together, knees on the ground. Urameshi is doing some ugly-crying next to Renji, wailing protests to the other third and second-years who are teasing him.

“The last time, huh?” Renji murmurs softly to them, face sad and nostalgic already. The cameras flash around them.

“Our best years.” Satoru says stoutly. “I won’t forget it.”

Masamune smiles, filling up his pouch. The dirt spills through his fingers into it, as fleeting as the time they’ve spent here. “Yeah.”

Satoru’s parents get special permission from the school for Satoru to stay back. Coach Nitta pats him on the back when he goes to see the team off at the airport, sneaking in a hurried make-out session with Masamune in the empty restroom before they’re to enter the departure gates with an amused Renji standing guard for the both of them.

“When you come back, get to the grounds, you hear me? No disappearing act like last year. You can help those juniors of yours with their pitching and batting practice. And take Namikawa down a peg or two, in case he gets big-headed with you and Hongou gone now.”

“Yes coach.”

“Congratulations.” His grandfather rasps. Satoru toys with his baseball cap, pouch tucked securely in his jacket pocket. It’s only when they’re alone that he flips the cap over, shows his grandfather the words.

“Thank you.” he says, shy. “I never forgot those words. They – they were important to me. Masamune says its law to write something down at the cap brim for all players, to remind us why we’re playing, and I could only think of two.”

“Your name.” His grandfather traces out the strokes absent-mindedly. The breaking dawn. Turning dreams into reality. “Your parents had high hopes for you. You’ve made them – us, prouder than you can imagine.”

“Those dreams wouldn’t have come true, if not for you.” Satoru knows how important those words were to him. The precursor to everything. He might not even have joined Tomakomai, too afraid to take that first step into this game that’s now his life.

“All you needed was a little push; a little help.”

“And that got me here today.” Satoru digs out the pouch, presses it into his grandfather’s open palm. Like how his grandfather had pressed the baseball into Satoru’s palm in his toddling years, then childhood.

“For you.”

His grandfather crinkles a smile, pulls the drawstring loose and takes in a whiff of the earth.

fin.

Notes:

Hardcore FuruMiyu shipper, but my first published fic for Daiya ends up being for Furuya/Hongou. Though I'm sure people picked up on the Furuya/Miyuki undertones throughout the whole fic.
"From the Land up North" is Furuya's at-bat song in Seidou, and I guess should probably be Hokkaido representatives' team song for koshien.
Inspiration for this fic came from rewatching the scenes Furuya had with his grandfather, his part in the epilogue of Act I and of course, Act II's pitching showdown with Hongou during the spring koshien.

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