They step into Teiko Junior High, but not together.
Aisaka thinks his father is embarrassing. He's sobbing like his kid's won the award of the universe, and that camera screams outdated old man.
Luckily, Aisaka manages to chase him off to work before the entrance ceremony could begin. He has about a year's worth of shameless-daddy memories already, though.
He rides through the crowd of seniors. Some wear lanyards, others bombard him with offers of assistance he really doesn't need. He dodges them, searches for the map, and follows the crowd to the hall.
The seniors here were too helpful. Each time they greeted him, Aisaka felt painfully self-conscious about the black brace glove on his right hand. Their eyes always consider it for a moment before they respectfully look away.
"Your seat is at the third row, you'll find your name," the senior tells him, handing him a leaflet. It had a big bold WELCOME FRESHMEN printed on it-- as well as a map that may have come in handy two seconds ago.
"Ah, thanks," Aisaka answers automatically, the crowd easing him forward. He takes one look at the poor senior tasked with usher duty-- and freezes.
The senior sees him staring, and stills, too.
"You're pretty tall for a first year," he says, and instead of heading straight for the chairs, Aisaka steps out of the crowd to take another look, blinking once.
He looks familiar.
"You planning on joining any clubs later?" the senior asks with a crafty grin.
Immediately after, another usher whirls around to them, "hey, Nijimura, that's not fair! You can't recruit until after the ceremony!"
He then turns to Aisaka with a sort of accusatory look, "don't get lured in. He's the Captain of the Basketball Club right now, so he's looking for fresh meat."
Aisaka steps back at that, surprised. Meat?
Niji. Rainbow. He has black hair, so he wasn't one of the miracles-- but maybe he's an important character too? Damn, if only he'd actually watched that dumb show...
Captain. He's the Captain of the basketball club-- so this guy is the one that gets replaced by one of the Generations of Miracles later?
Nijimura actually laughs sheepishly at that, rubbing the back of his head. "Well, I tried. Oh well, sorry to disturb you! Have a nice first day."
"Ah-" Aisaka finds himself bowing, "then, excuse me."
Looking from the back of the hall, he could see a lot. Blacks and browns mixed in with the blinding white and pale blue of the uniforms. It made sense that they would stick out-- in fact, they were so obvious Aisaka felt self conscious about his painfully indigo hair.
"There's no orange," he observes, "but we have pink, and three shades of blue? Ah, Purple's a shade of blue too, so we have four shades of blue?"
Okay this makes zero sense. Isn't Kuroko supposed to have black hair anyways? How on earth does he not stand out with bright turquoise hair? Ah, maybe because he's the main character... and it'd be stupid if Nijimura had rainbow hair...
"Hiroto-kun."
Aisaka screams. He whirls around and whacks Kuroko on the head.
-
"Hiroto-kun, Hiroto-kun," Kuroko directs full attention to Aisaka's arm, "that's a different glove from usual."
Direct and blunt as usual.
"My usual one's just a shooting glove, after all," Aisaka says as an explanation, "Dad bought me a proper brace because I'll need one if I want to play properly. Also 'cause dress code violation."
Kuroko blinks, not having noticed there being an injury in the first place.
It had been an injury from before Aisaka even reincarnated into this world, after all-- a sprain that the real Hiroto left behind, and never let heal properly.
The bone healed badly so it was far from flexible, and excess weight in certain angles caused shooting pain. A shame, but not a very big setback.
Scouring through the wave of club recruiters, Aisaka has a significantly harder time weaving through the people than Kuroko did. All manners of sports clubs were plaguing him with interaction, while Kuroko could slip through everyone's arm without them even noticing.
That was unfair.
It takes Aisaka a few minutes to catch up to Kuroko at the end of the crowd. Now that the entrance ceremony was over, they had to split to their classes.
"I'm in Class 1-4," he slings an arm over the shorter boy's shoulders, "what about you, Tetsuya? Also, stop reading that book while you walk, it's dangerous."
"I'm in Class 1-2," Kuroko responds expertly, not lifting his eyes even once, "once you've read enough books, you have an ingrained instinct in you to be able to dodge objects coming in your direction."
"You just had to be in a class really far from mine??" Aisaka whines, "and don't lie, you're using me as a guide dog! Your free hand's been on my blazer this whole time!"
"That is precisely what I am doing."
"At least try to deny it!"
This would be Aisaka Hiroto's first official class session since his depressive strike two years back. And it would mentally be his first class in decades since he graduated last time around.
Maybe being nervous was justified.
"I'll see you after this?" he says to Kuroko, who waves in response. Aisaka is left to fend for himself. He feels absolutely torn with betrayal, but he takes a deep breath and turns toward the door.
It's open, so he follows a few others in. He searches for his name on the seating chart, and like a normal human being, he shuffles into his seat and waits.
Except-- the second after he sits down, a boy with green hair takes the spot beside him. He freezes shock still.
"Green!"
He spins and exclaims faster than he can think. Because hell, if you saw someone with that kinda hair in a school, you'd think that too. Holy crap that is an awful shade of green, who gave that to you?
Half the class has their attention on them, and Aisaka officially names himself an absolute first impression disaster. He's sure come a long way from stuttering scream-it's-a-ghost. Ogiwara might be proud.
Expertly, Midorima fixes his glasses and responds, "yes."
And lord, that was probably the best reaction possible.
So, like a genius, Aisaka gawks. He turns halfway toward the green-haired boy, points at himself, and quickly adds, "I'm indigo, nice to meet you."
Midorima takes a moment to really register the indigo-haired male. He nods with a very deeply considering hum, as if investigatively acknowledging their similarities.
"Nice to meet you, too," he says, and since he doesn't give a hand out for a handshake, Aisaka understands that he wasn't a handshake kinda person.
Or maybe he just saw Aisaka's glove brace and simply didn't want to make things kinda weird. Whatever.
In that horrifying split second, Aisaka wonders why they just bonded over their stupid hair colours, of all things.
So Aisaka turns to the boy's table, sees a potted plant, and it takes every mitochondria in him to not ask why he brought a fucking bonsai to day one of school.
-
"You two are really tall," their homeroom teacher observes after she dismissed the rest of the class, "trying out for the basketball club?"
Neither of them respond, so when Aisaka averts his eyes toward the green-haired boy (who was like, three centimeters taller than him maybe) he finds Midorima staring right back, like they're both waiting for each other to start talking first.
Aisaka does the honours.
"Yeah!" he beams, turning back to Midorima to send the boy a smile with his head tilted aside, "right?"
He's not sure why Midorima looks away and takes a cautious step back. Green-haired doesn't give more than a dismissive nod in response before bowing and excusing himself. Aisaka follows, because they're going the same way, anyways.
The tryouts aren't today, but dropping off their names to sign up was important.
"Tetsuya, you there?" Aisaka calls out to the crowded hallway.
"I am," says a monotone voice beside his ear.
"UgwaAAAHH!!!!"
Kuroko gets smacked for the second time today.
Aisaka's fist is still held tight beside him after the deed, having half a mind to pound another punch in.
"I'm just harder to notice in crowds," he whines in complaint, not happy about being hit in the head so often. "You didn't have to hit so hard..."
"It's never happened before this, so you're definitely doing that on purpose," Aisaka points out sharply. In fact, it's almost never happened to him, and it happened much less after Ogiwara left-- huh? "So the more people there are, the less you're visible?"
Kuroko tilts his head to the side, confused, "I guess?"
Deadly.
"Do that again and I'll make sure your head sinks in."
"Please don't make me shorter."
-
Aisaka finds himself trailing behind Midorima on their way to the basketball gym. The taller boy was outside the building, standing by the wall as if he had been waiting.
He doesn't turn around to acknowledge Kuroko, but he certainly begins walking once he sees Aisaka catch up.
"Huh, did you wait for me?" Aisaka trots up to ask.
"Of course not," the boy doesn't even look back while he says it.
"Oh, okay."
Kuroko eyes the boy curiously, but neither of them address each other. Aisaka abruptly realizes that he doesn't know the boy's name-- it would be too awkward to ask now, though. But for the sake of it, he points.
"Ah, he's in my class," Aisaka manages a simple introduction for Kuroko's benefit, "he's going for basketball too."
Kuroko hums, "is that so? Nice to meet you."
At the new voice, Midorima stops. He turns around-- and promptly jumps at the sight of Kuroko behind Aisaka's figure.
"How--? Wait, how long have you been there?"
"I've been here this whole time."
"No way!"
"Woah, you really are harder to notice in crowds," Aisaka splendidly observes.
"Ogiwara-kun still doesn't know how you notice me as often as you already do," Kuroko says, "ah, I'm Kuroko Tetsuya."
Like an expert, the green-haired giant composes himself with the speed of a saint-- and, once again, he fixes his glasses for no reason. He clears his throat, "I'm Midorima Shintaro."
Aisaka blinks.
"Ah, that's right-- we never introduced ourselves, did we?" he realizes, cutting into the conversation between the two who were literally staring at each other awkwardly-- "my name's Aisaka! Aisaka Hiroto. Nice to meet you too, Midorima!"
At that, Midorima tears his strangely antagonistic eyes from Kuroko, and turns back toward the gym. "I suppose we have to get along, seeing as we will be attending the same classes from now on."
Aisaka isn't sure what to make of that, so he looks at Kuroko and shrugs dismissively.
"Hey, Midorima, what's your position?" Aisaka scrambles up to ask questions, Kuroko stuck by his side, "I usually play the Point Guard, but I saw this suuuper tall guy just now during the entrance ceremony and--"
"I'm the Shooting Guard."
"Hehh, that actually kinda suits you!"
Midorima actually does a double take. No one's ever actually said that to him before they see him shoot. In fact, what kind of person do you have to be to suit the position of a shooting guard?
With that, he comes to the conclusion that Aisaka is a genuine oddball.
"I mean, you look like the kind of guy who'd be serious about the little details, having a great foundation on the basics of basketball, that kinda stuff."
He makes the motion of shooting a basketball, and Midorima is somehow flattered. Instead, he fixes his glasses, looks away, and mumbles, "nonsense."
Aisaka only gets more confused from there on.