When they saw who it was, everyone present went still with surprise.
The story had been that this man was in North America for rehabilitation. What was he doing here?
Takigawa Chris Yu. The former starting catcher of Seido High School Baseball Team. The man Miyuki had set as his personal standard to surpass.
Earlier in the year, Chris had pushed his body beyond what it could sustain out of pure commitment to the team's needs. The shoulder had given way under the accumulated strain of overtraining.
The doctor's assessment had been clear — at minimum six months before he could return. He had been injured in April. Five months had passed. By the calendar, he still had another month before he was supposed to be back.
And yet here he was.
"I'll be the catcher for the third-year seniors."
Miyuki moved immediately, crossing the distance to Chris with an energy he had not shown since before the Inashiro game.
"Senior, is your injury fully healed?"
"It's fine now."
The smile Chris gave back was genuine in the way that only a long absence followed by a return could produce — the specific warmth of someone who had missed something and was standing in front of it again.
The second-string players swarmed around him instantly, questions coming from every direction. The fact that they were technically about to become opponents in the upcoming game seemed to have completely escaped their attention.
Zhang Han kept his head clear and looked at the lineup the third-year seniors now presented.
He felt a headache developing.
Honestly, Inashiro Industrial probably could not match what was standing across from them right now. The pitching difference alone was in a different category. For most positions, the current first-string and the third-year seniors were close enough in ability that the comparison was interesting. But with Chris back and filling the one clear gap the seniors had carried, the equation had shifted entirely.
Meanwhile, the first-string had their own problems that had only become more visible since the Inashiro game.
Tanba's condition had dropped noticeably. His fastball had lost power and his control had developed inconsistencies that had not been there before. The extended high-pressure game against Inashiro had taken something from him that practice alone was not quickly restoring.
Kawakami was carrying something heavier. The hit-by-pitch incident had settled into his mechanics in the worst possible way. He no longer trusted his sinker enough to throw it in practice, let alone game situations. Without the sinker, roughly half of what made Kawakami effective was simply unavailable. He was pitching with one hand tied behind his back and trying to pretend otherwise.
Zhang Han was the exception. His condition had not declined. If anything, the velocity reading from the Inashiro game had confirmed a trajectory that was still going upward.
But he could not pitch an entire game by himself against these particular opponents. Against a team that did not know him well, increased velocity could create problems on its own. Against the third-year seniors, that advantage was considerably reduced. These were the people who had watched him practice for months, who had seen him develop, who understood not just his current capabilities but the specific ways in which he was still incomplete.
Nobody was going to be fooled by anything Zhang Han tried.
He lacked confidence in this matchup and he was honest with himself about it.
Coach Kataoka and the third-year seniors were in agreement on one thing — the game had to happen, and it had to be played straight. No adjustments for sentiment, no going through the motions. A real game.
The week passed.
Saturday arrived.
The Autumn Tournament semifinals were being played somewhere across the city, and not a single member of Seido's roster had given them a thought. Their entire attention was on the field in front of them. This internal game had absorbed everything.
The third-year seniors had been the ones who built the reputation that Seido currently carried. The title of National First Batting Lineup had not been earned by the current first-string — it had been earned by Azuma Kiyokuni and the players standing with him today.
The truth of that had been sitting quietly in the background for months, and the Inashiro game had pulled it into the light. The gap between what the current team was and what the previous generation had been was real, and now they were about to stand across from that previous generation directly.
Calling them not nervous would have been a lie. They were nervous. They had simply not told anyone about it.
Both sides split into their lineups and settled the batting order with rock-paper-scissors. The current first-string would bat first.
Kuramochi stepped into the box to lead off.
He was not the second-string reserve who had sat in the stands cheering for others anymore. He had become the offensive engine of the new Seido, the player whose job was to create the conditions for what came after him. As long as he reached base, the probability of Seido scoring first increased meaningfully.
Today's first-string lineup was identical to the one from the Inashiro game. They had discussed it and arrived at the same conclusion. That game had been lost, but not because of the lineup. Every player had performed at or near their ceiling. The configuration was sound. It deserved another run.
Standing across from Kuramochi was Hidezawa — the former ace, the one whose presence had defined Seido's identity before the current generation took over — and behind the plate, Chris, freshly returned and already radiating something that Kuramochi could feel without being able to name precisely.
He stepped in and felt the uncertainty move through him. He did not know what level these seniors were going to bring today.
The ball came before he had finished deciding.
He swung with a courage that was at least partly forced.
In Seido's dugout, Miyuki's frown arrived an instant before the contact did.
"Kuramochi fell for it."
The white ball had already been hit by the time the words finished forming. Kuramochi stood in the box genuinely confused. He had raised his swing, he was certain of it. And yet the ball had departed without his involvement in any meaningful way. It did not travel far — Tanaka at second base collected it cleanly.
"Out!"
Kominato Ryosuke came up second with no intention of adjusting his approach for the occasion. He settled into his patient stance, looking for the right pitch, prepared to wait.
The first pitch from Hidezawa came in right down the center.
A pitch sitting in the middle of the zone was exactly the kind of pitch Kominato had been waiting for. He swung cleanly and decisively.
The ball bounced off the bat and hit the ground not far in front of the mound. Hidezawa caught it himself and threw to first without breaking stride.
"Pop!"
"Out!"
Two outs. Nobody on base.
Chris had been back for approximately five minutes and had already demonstrated, with minimal visible effort, exactly what kind of return this was going to be. His presence behind the plate had an authority to it that communicated itself without words. The king had come home, and the declaration of that fact was being made one pitch at a time.
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