Looking for a Miracle | Kuroko no Basket

26. Downhill

Looking for a Miracle
Chapter Twenty Six
Downhill

I was shaking.

I lay on my bed, but I may as well have been lying on cold, hard rock - it would've felt the same. I was numb, I wasn't feeling anything. My heart had been incapacitated of any feeling - not after I'd just been shaken to my very core.

Sei. Sei. I wanted to sob - and I was very close to it. Hours into the night, and his cold face, harsh look, and authoritative voice was still etched deep into my mind, his words containing to repeat in my mind. I couldn't stop thinking about it. 

How had that happened? Why had that happened? He had been blurred for weeks, stress only continuing to mount upon him as he tried to keep the others together while fearing he was falling behind...

If Aomine hadn't stormed from the room, if Murasakibara hadn't provoked him, would it have happened? Would I have returned home alone, arms wrapped around my body, and pushed dinner aside just so I could reach my room for peace so I could be alone?

The horrors of the day hadn't ended at Murasakibara's defeat. As he made to leave, all of us still in shock and trying to process the calamity that had just happened (and my knees still threatening to buckle beneath me), he promised to continue to attend training.

"Wait, Murasakibara," Sei had called after him. "Do whatever you want, just keep winning our matches."

"Sei, what are you even saying?" I whispered, but my best friend didn't even hear me among the exclamations of the others.

Sei made no sign he was aware of the outcry, but continued to observe the gym coolly.

"Midorima and Kise, the same for you as well," he said. "As long as you win matches, I won't say anything. I realised it during the one on one. At our levels, it's pointless to try and get everyone to work together. I can even say it's more efficient to not work together."

I pressed a hand to my mouth as though to hold back from being sick. I felt like I was going to be.

"It sounds like you're saying we should abandon teamwork," one person I didn't know said shakily.

He raised his eyebrows coolly. "That's right. For us, the miracles, team play is only a hindrance. So yes, that's exactly what I meant."

I might as well have been stabbed in the heart. I wished I had someone to lean on, because I thought I might collapse at any moment.

This wasn't Sei. At least, this wasn't my Sei. My Sei would never had said anything like that... Where was he? In a matter of seconds, he had disappeared, and was replaced by this cold, commanding figure.

I'd always known Sei had struggled with himself, but these moments had only been temporary, lasting for seconds. But this time was different - I didn't think he was going away this time.

Discontent was high among the the members as everyone finished packing up. I stood against a wall the entire time, watching Sei, my heart breaking each time I caught the gold of his eye.

I'd wondered if I could've done more. If I should've paid more attention to him. If I should've demanded he no longer be captain of the team, if I should've at least assisted him with captain duties and helped him study, and take some of the weight off his already burdened shoulders.

Maybe if I hadn't given him my data, which had caused everyone to improve at an impossible rate...

If I'd just been a better friend...