Forbidden Protege

Ch. 7: Play Ball (Part 4)

Alexia sighed as she made her way toward the mound again. The other team was already jeering at her, making comments and asking if the coach wasn't sure that he should sub her out. She tuned it out and focused on kicking the dirt around the pitcher's plate. Ono and her had already agreed to use the same pitch he had originally called for right off the bat. They were both hoping to shut them up in this inning.

She shifted her gaze to homeplate and threw her couple of allotted pitches before the umpire called for the batter to step up. As she rolled her shoulders and took another deep breath, she heard the shortstop yell at her.

"Don't you dare screw up this inning, too!"

She turned to see the boy smirking and recognized him as the one who she often practiced with. He hardly ever said two words to her, but he was respectful. Her lips quirked up, seeing that he had taken her seriously. From right field she heard a similar taunt. The opposing bench was now laughing, sure that her team had turned on her. She found her smirk lingering as she turned back to homeplate, ready to pitch.

Ono made the call and she nodded. She pulled up into her stance and twisted her waist, bringing her arm through swiftly and precisely. She adjusted ever so slightly as she released the ball and it flew towards the plate. Just as the batter went to swing, it dropped towards his feet. He missed it and Alexia held her breath as Ono moved to catch it. Once the dust had settled and she saw he had indeed caught it, she felt herself relax. Her plan had worked. Strike.

The opposing bench was now quiet. Alexia was sure that they hadn't expected her to be able to throw three different breaking balls and she heard encouragement and surprise being shouted from her own dugout and field. She let out a breath she hadn't known she was holding and chuckled lightly to herself. She was taking more breaths this game than she had in the past week. Ono threw the ball back to her and shouted encouragingly. She smiled and nodded at him.

The next ball he called for was a fastball just outside of the strike zone. Alexia nodded, understanding that since the batter was visibly upset he was trying to bait him to swing. Alexia delivered the pitch directly to Ono's mitt and the batter swung again. Strike two.

Her team was now excited and shouting at her to finish him off. Alexia was relieved to hear that they were much more talkative now than they had been and she set up to deliver the next pitch: a low inside fastball. She was a bit hesitant with the call, but she nodded anyway. She pulled back and threw the pitch, again making a minor adjustment as she let it go. She watched attentively as it flew towards the inside corner and she dialed in as the batter swung for it. It was if she was watching it in slow motion as the batter managed to barely make contact with the ball. It flew high and before anyone had a chance to see where it was going, Alexia was shouting.

"Torima-san!" The name left her lips almost subconsciously as her eyes traced the ball over her right shoulder. The shortstop jerked into motion at the mention of his name and moved to catch the ball. Alexia felt a surge of satisfaction flow through her as she watched her fielder's mitt cleanly envelop the ball.

"Out!" The umpire yelled, causing a roar to rise out of Seido.

Alexia jumped excitedly and ran towards Torima. "Fuck yeah! Nice catch!" she yelled as she slapped his shoulder. He staggered forward slightly, not expecting her reaction. Alexia froze for a second, reminding herself that this was a new team and she started to apologize to him.

His smile stopped her, however, as he handed the ball back to her. "I didn't know you knew my name," he said, a light teasing tone dancing on his voice.