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It was Kagami’s birthday in a few weeks and the whole Seirin team was buzzing with what they wanted to do for the hotheaded ace. Arriving earlier for the morning practice Kuroko suggested a basketball tournament, while Hyuuga thought a big meal afterwards would be the perfect way to end the evening. With a plan in mind they decided that they would keep it as a surprise since it would seem more like a gift that way. Just as they were done with their master plan, Kagami entered the gym.
He stopped while realizing the whole team was already there, double checking his watch he confirmed that he wasn’t late. He was about to ask what everyone was doing when Aida blew her whistle; signalling the start of practice. Winter Cup champions or not, they would not be skimping on practice as long as she’s here. Kagami decided he would just let it go; they could have just gotten there earlier, but when he passed Kiyoshi he overheard him whisper to the captain.
“Hey! I have a friend that would be a great challenge for Kagami, do you think we can invite him? He’s visiting for a few days.”
“As long as he isn’t half as weird as you.” Hyuuga said, already regretting his decision but with murderous intent coming from their coach he didn’t have much time to think about it.
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After practice it seemed that everyone had to leave for class right afterwards. Kagami wasn’t sure what was happening since they had half an hour before classes but Kuroko was waiting for him as well. When he asked Kuroko said he didn’t know what was happening but asked for his schedule for the up coming weeks. Kagami thought nothing of it as he really didn’t have a lot to do then. They soon went to class and the day past like it always did.
On his way home Kagami just remembered that his birthday was coming up soon and he hadn’t planned anything. He pulled out his cell phone and called Himuro first. He wasn’t sure what he wanted for his birthday just yet but he knew that whatever they planned he would definitely want his brother there. After a few rings Himuro picked up.
“Taiga? It’s been a while.” Came the sultry voice of Himuro, “How have you been?”
“Hey, Tatsuya, nothing to much,” Kagami smiled. “I wanted to ask if you could make it over for my birthday. Not sure of what’s going to happen, but I’d want you there.”
“Sure! But wait, I’m having a friend visiting for a bit, do you think I could invite him as well?”
Kagami felt his mood brighten when he agreed and Himuro agreed to come. He called the rest of the guys from basketball to tell them. They were quick to agree. Kuroko asked if he could invite the Miracles. Kagami agreed; if they came there would definitely be basketball and that would make the day perfect. Apparently the team had extra party supplies for the party that they offered for Kagami’s get together. (The poor couldn’t understand why coach called him a basketball baka or the completely uncalled for: Kagami-kun needs to balance his exceptional basketball talent with his lacking common sense, from Kuroko.)
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It was a terrible idea to invite the Miracles and their plus ones. Midorima was ranked last and he couldn’t find his lucky item, which lead to Takao trying to coax him out of his hiding spot by promised to thrash Kagami in basketball. But apparently Midorima wasn’t convinced and said that he wouldn’t risk coming near an idiot without his lucky item. It took Kagami an embarrassing amount of time to realize what he said and proceeded to try and drag Midorima out of his safe spot.
Kise and Aomine got into a fight about basketball that lead to them wrestling near the table with the food. Momoi was too late to stop them before the table tipped over and all of the food tipped over. Murasakibara joined the fight, promising to crush the two of them. The three had Momoi and most of the second years trying to pull them apart. Which proved to be useless because the only one immune to the kicks and punches was Momoi since none of the Miracles would want to lay a finger on her, but the unfortunate boys were dragged into the fight as well.
To make things even worse, some unsuspecting fool bumped in Akashi and told the redhead “Watch where ya going shorty!”. Currently there was every available person trying to pry the pair of scissorsout of Akashi’s hand while trying to get the guy to unfreeze and make a run for it. In defense, Akashi was smiling his ‘I’m insane and loving it’ smile and never breaking eye contact. The first year trio felt accomplished when Akashi didn’t immediately break through even if it could be accredited to Kasamatsu.
Oh and Haizaki crashed the party because he was around the area and he was a freaking jerk. He just went around making bad situations worse. The guy had a knack for it, it was like he lived for it and he wouldn’t stop until the worst came.
Himuro and Kiyoshi were waiting by the gates of the park waiting for their friend, as if nothing was happening behind them. Hyuuga swore he heard one of them ask about the weather. To make matters worse Kuroko went missing as soon as Kise tried to hug him in the very beginning.
Riko watched in dismay when after another fifteen minutes nothing seemed like it would stop. Midorima was still hiding God knows where with Takao and Kagami yelling, the three miracles were still wrestling, Akashi was still on rampage and Kuroko was still missing. She swore if he was just hiding to avoid the mess he made by inviting his ex-teammates. And the two that could probably fix this were still standing by the gates discussing the weather. Riko was about to put every single person present in the Boston-Crab hold.
“There he is!” Himuro called out happily.
“Wait that’s him? I invited him as well!” Kiyoshi laughed as he called their mutal over to them. It caused enough commotion for everyone to pause to know was the mysterious friend (Riko swore she saw a mob of green hair peaking out from behind something that she couldn’t make out. Huh, so that’s where he was hiding). Kiyoshi said he met in back in Canada when he went for his operation and Himuro said he met this guy back in California. But neither said much about this person except that he used to live in Japan for a while and he was a cool guy.
“Sorry, for being late,” The sound of the voice the Miracles stopped everything as their eyes grew wide in disbelief. “I had to get a stray along the way.”
“I’m not a stray, Sempai.” Kuroko’s voice followed. “I was simply buying a vanilla milkshake.”
Not long after a tall man walked into the park with jet black and sharp eyes. To say he was cool and handsome would be the understatement of the year. It actually left Riko dumbfounded as she took in the sight of the young man. He man had his arm casually arm Kuroko’s shoulders to hold him in place. But if going by the not to subtle smile that stretched on the phantom’s face, he didn’t mind in the slightest.
“Nijimuracchi-sempai!” Kise squealed as he picked himself off the ground with a not so gentle ‘get off me Aominechhi, I need to get to NIjimurachhi- sempai!’. The blond rushed over to the newcomer, but unlike how he would throw himself on everyone else he stopped and bowed to boy. “It’s good to see you again!”
Nijimura smiled fondly at his ex junior. He let go of Kuroko, who scowled in response, and ruffled Kise’s hair. “Hey Kise, no need to be so formal. It’s good to see as well. You seem to be doing well for yourself.” Whatever Kise was going to say was cut off by Momoi rushing over one of the people she respected most.
NIjimura pulled away from Kise, whose turn it was to scowl, and opened his arms to catch the practically flying girl. She said something into his shirt but he couldn’t make it out exactly what she was saying. He just patted her hair saying he missed her, too.
“Niji-chin, pat my head,” Murasakibara drawled as he got up and stalked over to his first basketball captain.
“No way, I’m next!” Aomine got up and rushed over to NIjimura with Murasakibara hot on his heels. Momoi barely made it out before the two of them came tumbling in front of their first captain. Haizaki walked over as well and Riko was sure he was genuinely smiling behind his I-hate-the-world-scum smirk.
Everyone watched in awe as how the Miracles, THE Miracles, were actually star struck when meeting an old friend. They were fighting over for his attention (Kuroko somehow got Nijimura’s arm around his shoulders again while Momoi took a hold of his other hand and refused to let go), but he seemed used to it. He gave equal attention to everyone before a moved away from the group much to their disappointment. He walked to where Riko saw a mob of emerald hair sticking out.
“Midorima, come out.” Nijimura said as he offered his hand to his particularly horoscope crazed junior. Takao and Kagami held their doubts- they have been trying to drag Midorima out for over an hour now, promising everything under the sun. But their jaw dropped when Midorima took the offered hand without missing a beat with a soft, if you insist. “Why were there you were in the first place?”
Midorima explained his dilemma to him which Nijimura responding to just stick with him because he ranked first and his lucky item was a basketball. Midorima blushed at the implication that Nijimura kept up with the horoscope for him even after almost four years. Midorima nodded his head and agreed only because it was the next best thing. He was only smiling clearly because now he didn’t need to worry so much about his lucky not because Nijimura ruffled his hair. Clearly.
As Nijimura walked over to Akashi, who suspiciously quiet, and flicked the redhead’s forehead. “Hey, Akashi.”
No one was prepared for what happened next. Nobody.
Akashi broke free from the human chains and hugged his ex captain. He buried his face as he muffled a quiet apology. Nijimura seemed to understand what he meant as he slung his arm Akashi and told him that it was fine. He dragged Akashi away from the crowd never once letting his middle school vice captain go, finally knocking Akashi’s poor victim back to motion.
Instead of running away the bystander also started to get a heavy dose of star struck. “You’re Nijimura! OH MY GOSH! YOU’ER THE NIJIMURA! THE ORIGINAL CAPTAIN OF THE MIRACLES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” The guy promptly passed out because he forgot to breath. NIjimura raised an eyebrow while he moved his so called fan to a better place.
Finally, Riko remember who this individual was. “Wait, you’re the Nijimura-san? The only one to have ever controlled all of the Miracles and have their complete respect? You’re THAT Nijimura-san?”
“Sure.” Njijmura didn’t know why that was such a big deal. They couldn’t have been that bad…could they?
“EH?!?!?!”
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Nijimura was less than pleased to know what his former teammates have been up to. For the love of God, Akashi nearly stabbed Kagami's eye out. Haizaki purposely injured Kise's foot and the rest were being difficult. He knew very well the Kuroko liked to keep sneaking up and scaring his team. He wouldn't believe he's innocent until the day he died, maybe. The brats, except for Momoi for obvious reasons and Midorima since he wasn't being difficult-he was just being himself). He made sure to scold them all well and thoroughly (keeping his two current favourites away from the crossfire). Each looked like a kicked puppy. Good. After he was done scolding them (and getting Kise and Aomine to promise to replace the food they wasted) he patted them on the head for reminding not to be brats in the future. He made sure to give Akashi an extra flick on his forehead, simply because he was upset the redhead didn't go to him when he felt cornered and ended up losing control. Akashi seemed to understand, which was good.
The other around him watched in awe at the display of complete power and control Nijimura just showed. In fact, even Himuro and Kiyoshi were are struck. Kasamatsu couldn't believe that Kise hadn't whined even once. He wasn't sure what was happening anymore, the man just travelled twelve hours and he was hungry. Apparently saying 'let's eat' was a bad choice since he was crowed by everyone else asking for his secret.
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After an hour and half of pure interviewing and verifying he was actually Akashi’s captain at some point, NIjimura finally got a break. In between the questions about how to deal with the miracles he hadn’t had a moment to himself. The party finally continued and everything went smoothly until some redhead-the birthday boy, maybe-challenged him to basketball to prove he was worth the title of being the Nijimura. Nijimura was about to argue that it wasn’t a title but his name when of course all eight of his rainbow haired surrogated little siblings came to his defense.
“Don’t underestimate him, Kagami-kun.”
“No one can be Nijimuracchi-sempai!”
“The only one that can be beat Nijimura is Nijimura!”
"According to my data, you don't stand a chance."
“Don’t be absurd, he is clearly out of your league.”
“Niji-chin would crush you.”
“Tsk, Kagami, only a complete and utter worthless loser like you would think you stand a chance against him. Not that I like him or anything.”
“You’re not even worthy of looking straight at him. Lower your head.”
Nijimura ran a through his hair, that escalated quickly. But heck, it seemed like they still had some faith him even after becoming powerhouses in their own right. Well he had a group of colourful brats that he just couldn’t let down. He loved the sport enough to keep up with it over the years, so he wasn’t too rusty, but Kagami had the same fire that Aomine has. But he was the one that mentored the ace. “Sure, let’s play.” The eight little brats all cheered for him while poor Kagami yelled at his shadow(?). Kids sure had strange way of calling their friends. He didn't mean to crash the party and completely take it over but he was glad he came.
Taking one final look at his group of cheerleaders/ support rally/ little siblings, he knew he would win this for them.