➪ 𝙩𝙧𝙖𝙨𝙝 𝙢𝙚𝙚𝙩𝙨 𝙗𝙖𝙨𝙠𝙚𝙩𝙗𝙖𝙡𝙡 ᵏⁿᵇ ˣ ᵗᶜᶠ

4. Bye Bye Slacker-chan

If you think about it, there really was no reason for Cale to be surprised that the God of Death was a meddlesome f**ker. He should have known from the start that nothing would go as planned so long as some divine entity had a hand in whatever was going on. And frankly speaking, Cale was rather foolish to believe his long-desired slacker life would come without some sort of side-effect.

Sure he fought a war and barely survived all for the sake of his slacker life dream but apparently, that wasn't enough for the universe who seemed to love giving him endless troubles.

Okay, maybe he was exaggerating a bit.

Cale blames the insufferable heat that's probably getting to his head making him more irritable than usual. That, combined with being surrounded by basketball-crazed idiots and endless shouts was enough to make Cale sigh in endless sadness for his slacker life that just seemed to be getting further and further out of reach.

'I seem to be getting more negative as the days go by.'

Cale sat listlessly on the bench as the team ran drills on the indoor court. His job as a manager was, admittedly, not as troublesome as he'd speculated but still troublesome nevertheless.

At least for him, he felt as though he was half-assing things and often bore a somewhat grumpy and bored look on his handsome face.

From an outsider's perspective, the boy's actions over the past couple of weeks were a stark contrast to what Cale's thoughts were.

The team could vouch for this.

Not long after the redhead joined the team as its designated manager, many assumed he'd be inexperienced and unwilling to do his job. Considering the temperament he bore and the face he wore, it wasn't really wrong of them to assume such a thing.

They were soon proven very wrong when Cale began his work.

During training, the water bottles were never empty unless training had ended. The towels were always fresh and ready on hand, and the equipment and basketballs were always ready on time.

Cale often voiced his complaints about having to be a manager but the team figured he was just embarrassed for having a caring heart. A tsundere if you will. The Cale fam would definitely agree with them.

Speaking of, there hadn't been a word about their whereabouts from the God of Death nor their conditions. Cale could only hope they were alright – which they would be but one could never know for sure.

'I hope they haven't destroyed anything or killed people. That would be troublesome to cover up.'

Cale's way of thinking was a little bent.

----------

It was Tuesday afternoon.

The Seirin basketball team had begun their practice and today, Riko decided to hold a mini-game. After dividing the team into two groups, she called out the first number of players and muttered a couple of orders before blowing her whistle.

One team had Kagami, Izuki, Koganei, Kawahara, and Mitobe. The other team had Kuroko, Hyuga, Fukuda, Kiyoshi (who finally returned after receiving treatment for his injury), and finally, Furihata.

"Begin!" shouted Riko.

The ball was tossed up and Kagami took off from the ground almost immediately winning the tip-off. Dribbling the ball, he did a crossover and passed around Fukuda before coming face-to-face with Kiyoshi – the only one on the other team who had a chance to stop him.

Unfortunately for Kiyoshi, Kagami's speed enabled him to bypass the taller male and score dunk taking off from the two-pointer line.

On the side, Cale watched the game with apathetic eyes. At least, they seemed apathetic. In reality, Cale was recording and carefully watching each of the players on the court.

"Kagami seems to have gotten faster," he commented. Next to him, Riko stuck out her flat chest proudly.

"Naturally. Who do you think worked their ass off preparing his training regimen?"

"..." Cale averted his eyes while Riko clicked her tongue.

"Which reminds me, have you been following the nutritional plan I gave you? You haven't, have you?"

Cale coughed awkwardly. He was honestly too lazy to cook any of the food she stated on the plan. None of the things seemed delicious anyway.

'Haa, I miss Beaucrox's cooking.'

"Oi."

Cale suddenly flinched at the dark aura gathering next to him. He turned his head to see Riko smiling at him with closed eyes.

'Scary.'

"Listen, you weakling—"

'Weakling?!'

"You better take care of that health of yours unless you want me to personally take care of it."

As an added effect, the girl cracked her knuckles. Cale paled.

'Shit, why's this girl so scary?! She's just as bad as Ron!'

"Y-Yes, ma'am."

----------

Somewhere in Japan, an old butler sneezed.

'Hm? I wonder if my puppy young master is thinking about me...'

----------

"So...you don't know anything about basketball? Like, at all?"

Cale sighed for the hundredth time. It seemed this basketball idiot just couldn't wrap his head around the fact that there are people out there who were not interested in his sacred sport.

"Yes. At least I didn't until I joined. I know the basics now," Cale answered.

"Have you been living under a rock?"

Cale ignored the loud yelp from the six-foot teen who rubbed his side and glared at his shadow.

"The world doesn't revolve around basketball Kagami-kun."

'Thank you Kuroko. At least you have common sense.'

"Tsk. You should learn more about it."

Cale didn't answer but took a long sip of his vanilla milkshake and stared out the window. It seemed his taste buds were very much in line with Kuroko's.

"Anyway, I can't believe it's already time for the Inter-high. Just wait till I see that tanned jerk. I'll definitely beat that damn smirk off his face."

Kagami's face lit up at the thought of going against his rival again.

"Are you talking about that Aomine guy?" Cale asked.

"Yeah. He's crazy strong and stupidly fast."

The basketball prodigy. Or at least one of them.

Cale had heard rumors of the so-called 'Generation of Miracles'. Apparently, they were a group of prodigious basketball players who dominated the sport since Junior-high. Kuroko was their sixth-man but didn't get much recognition considering the fact he lacked presence. After some falling out in the last year of their Junior-high, the prodigies went their separate ways to battle each other since they were too strong together. And Seirin beat each of their teams.

Cale didn't know the full story of what went down the year prior but he got the gist of it.

'Maybe I should view the games from last year.'

Cale wasn't all that interested in getting involved with the team other than being their manager but he was quite curious about the games they played.

'It's not like I've got anything better to do.'

Unknowingly, Cale had just signed away his last hope of a slacker life during this vacation.