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Sunlight.
Fine powder. The tight restraint of three fingers closing around him.
A shadow?
And... was that the smell of leather?
Sawamura’s head felt foggy from the heat. He had the persistent feeling that he had forgotten something very important.
What was it?
Whoosh—
A sharp rush of wind tore past his ears.
His entire field of vision tumbled over and over, half a second of cloudless sky followed by half a second of dry red dirt.
Sawamura instinctively wanted to throw up.
Except no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t.
What the hell is going onnnnn?!
Out of the corner of his vision, an enormous metal bat came swinging viciously toward him from the side.
It drew closer.
Slowly.
Almost frame by frame.
I’m done for.
I’m gonna get hit.
I won’t be able to pitch anymore.
Trembling, Sawamura squeezed his eyes shut, curled in on himself in midair, and continued spinning.
Soft yellow leather scraped against his body with a faint rasp.
A beat later, the umpire’s call reached his ears.
“Strike—!”
In that instant, Sawamura’s hearing seemed to come back all at once.
The roar of the entire stadium. The batter’s frustrated sigh. Even the tiny crackling sounds of the scorching sun baking moisture out of the dirt.
All of it flooded sharply into his awareness.
Before his muddled brain could process any of that information, a large hand—strangely reassuring to look at—rescued him from inside the glove.
The hand tossed him lightly up and down, each catch landing a little higher than the last.
Sawamura’s eyes widened slightly.
That sharp jawline. Those amber-orange sports glasses. That serious expression.
Who else could it possibly be but Miyuki-senpai?!
Wait.
Then what am I?
Only then did Sawamura finally realize:
He had turned into a baseball.
No, no, no, no!
Sawamura-sama still has to pitch!
How is he supposed to keep pitching if he’s turned into the baseball?!
A muffled hnnnngh rose in his throat. Unfortunately, Sawamura was a baseball.
Baseballs could not make sounds.
So all he could do was glare at Miyuki Kazuya in displeasure.
Miyuki-senpai looks scary...
The more carefully Sawamura looked, the less he understood.
Fine, whatever, he had somehow turned into a baseball.
But why did someone as strong as Miyuki Kazuya have his brows drawn together behind the catcher’s mask?
That kind of expression would make your teammates nervous!
Especially your pitcher!
Wait.
If Sawamura-sama had turned into a baseball...
then who was currently pitching to Miyuki Kazuya?
Sawamura struggled to twist himself around in midair, trying to look behind him—toward the person standing on the mound.
Unfortunately, a baseball body wasn’t particularly agile.
He had barely managed to rotate a little when Miyuki caught him firmly in one hand.
“Did this ball just change direction in midair?” Miyuki’s frown deepened. “It’s bad enough that we have one idiot pitcher insisting on playing with a fever, and that Coach actually agreed to let him. Now even the baseballs are turning against us...”
“Ump, new ball.”
Without mercy, Miyuki tossed Sawamura behind him.
He fell straight into darkness.
An idiot pitcher insisting on playing with a fever...
Who?
His vision spun.
When Sawamura opened his eyes again, even the pitching rubber beneath his feet seemed to overlap into several blurry white shapes.
Sweat ran down his forehead and into the corner of his eye, stinging faintly.
“Sawamura!”
The catcher behind home plate shouted his name.
Then a baseball came flying straight at him.
Muscle memory took over before he could think. His left hand shot upward.
Thump.
He caught the hard-thrown ball in his glove.
A white baseball.
Red stitching.
Just an ordinary baseball.
Wait.
Did this baseball have a mind of its own?
Like...
Like...
Like what?
Sawamura stared fixedly at the ball in his hand.
Again, he had the feeling that he had forgotten something incredibly important.
What was it?
“Bakamura! This is the Koshien final! If you’re standing on the mound, then pitch properly!”
Kuramochi’s voice rang out from somewhere behind him.
The words struck Sawamura like a hammer.
I... am the pitcher in the Koshien final?
Sawamura looked up blankly and instinctively turned to search for the enormous scoreboard.
Seidou — Komadai
0 : 0
Top of the 1st
A glove suddenly smacked loudly somewhere ahead of him.
Sawamura reflexively turned back toward the figure behind home plate.
The reassuring yellow mitt.
Miyuki-senpai, his expression hidden behind a catcher’s mask and amber-orange sports glasses.
And the sign:
Two-seam fastball. Low and inside.
Everything in front of him still felt hazy and unreal.
Like a dream.
Sawamura reached for the rosin bag again, dried his hand, and gripped the baseball tightly with three fingers.
His right leg rose. His glove hand covered his left.
Under the blazing sunlight, Sawamura’s right arm formed a wall in front of his body. His right foot drove straight forward.
Then the left arm hidden behind him whipped through—
and hurled the baseball toward home plate.
Whoosh—
The ball spun forward. The batter’s eyes sharpened.
He raised his bat high and brought it down hard, but the drop was greater than he had anticipated.
The ball obediently settled into Miyuki’s mitt.
“Strike—!”
The umpire’s call reached Sawamura’s ears.
The roar of the crowd. The batter’s frustrated sigh. Even the faint crackle of the sun baking the dirt beneath their feet.
He could hear all of it clearly.
And yet, for some reason, Sawamura felt that Miyuki-senpai wasn’t happy about getting the strike.
It was nothing more than intuition. There was no clear reason for it.
But watching Miyuki stand up while lightly tossing the ball up and down in one hand, Sawamura was absolutely certain.
Miyuki-senpai... why aren’t you happy?
His vision went black.
When Sawamura opened his eyes again, he found himself sitting on Seidou’s team bus. Miyuki-senpai was sitting right beside him.
He looked exhausted, eyes closed as he leaned back against the headrest.
That sharp jawline. The faint shadows beneath his eyes. The way his lips were pressed slightly together.
Suddenly, panic flooded Sawamura’s chest.
His hand trembling, he shook Miyuki awake.
“Miyuki Kazuya... Did I drag everyone down... Did we lose the game because of me...?”
“...Huh?”
Miyuki let out an enormous yawn and glanced sideways at him.
“Did you sleep yourself stupid? We just won the semifinal. Our mighty ace should be preparing properly for the final instead of putting this much pressure on himself.”
“...Semifinal?”
Sawamura’s voice was already trembling on the verge of tears.
“Wasn’t it the final?”
That woke Miyuki up immediately.
“Sawamura, what’s wrong with you? Why is your face so red?!”
The next second, a hand landed on Sawamura’s shoulder and pulled him firmly closer until their foreheads touched.
Miyuki Kazuya’s enlarged face suddenly filled Sawamura’s entire vision.
Without warning.
“Coach! I think Sawamura has a fever!”
The quiet bus erupted instantly.
Teammates in the row ahead, the row behind, and even seats farther away all craned their heads toward Sawamura.
What is he talking about?
A fever?
Why would I have a fever?
Sawamura-sama still has a game to play!
It would be the final official game he and Miyuki Kazuya ever played together in high school. It had to be perfect!
Through the dizziness, Sawamura stubbornly shouted, “I can still pitch! Coach, please let me play!”
“You’ve got a fever and you still want to pitch? Absolutely not, Bakamura!”
“I can still—”
“Furuya already threw a lot of pitches today—”
“I WANT TO PLAY!!!”
The tears brimming in Sawamura’s eyes finally spilled over, falling onto the back of Miyuki’s hand one after another like tiny blossoms.
From Miyuki’s point of view, Sawamura’s face was lit by the sunset, unusually flushed from both fever and tears.
Those enormous golden-brown eyes remained fixed on Miyuki, his lips pressed together in stubborn frustration.
“All right, all right. If your fever’s gone, you can pitch.”
Miyuki hesitated for one second.
Then he raised a hand and ruffled Sawamura’s fluffy brown hair.
Once.
Twice.
“Better hurry up and get that fever down, or your ace number might not stay yours for long.”
Someone nearby clicked their tongue in obvious disdain. Miyuki ignored them.
Sawamura visibly relaxed under the reassurance of the person in front of him.
His eyelids drooped.
Opened.
Drooped again.
“Go to sleep.”
“......Miyuki-senpai.”
“Yeah?”
“If I turned into a baseball... would you throw me to the umpire and ask for a new one?”
“? What the hell goes on inside your head...?”
————
Epilogue
Good news!
Thanks to everyone’s careful attention, the great Sawamura-sama managed to recover from his fever before the final!