Kuroko never really knew what happened to Aisaka after that.

Thing just kind of washed over, and his memories of that week was simply a blur of surprises he subconsciously desired to not remember. Even though he dearly wished he could have done something more.

He heard of the incident the day after it occurred. The adults in the shopping district gossiped fervently about a robbery-gone-wrong three streets down. Rumours spilled like a bucket of botched paint, lingering like stains on school grounds.

Aisaka's name came up way too many times, but he never picked up his phone.

Then the newspapers had a field day with this tragic incident and that was all Kuroko could know about the situation therein.

There had been a funeral, but was Aisaka there? He was. Kuroko was sure that he was-- he remembered wanting to talk to him. As soon as the service was over, run over and hug him, cry on him, and tell him it'd be alright.

(But he didn't get the opportunity.)

Aisaka was gone with the wind, as soon as it ended. Kuroko couldn't find him again after that-- and simply went home, devastated.

Surely, they'd see each other in school, once Monday comes.

(They didn't.)

-

The house was barricaded. The police declined to comment. Aisaka never picked up his phone. No one knew if he had any other relatives.

(In one night, Aisaka vanished off the face of the earth.)

Kuroko finds his way up to the first string, only to realize nothing was waiting for him.

"Are you sure you have no ideas, Ogiwara-kun?"

"My last phone call with him was... I told you about that one, Kuroko. He's never talked to me since. Not even a message."

There were no signs of him anywhere.

Aisaka didn't have a home to go back to, but he wasn't in anyone else's house, either. They couldn't find anything out from the police, something about sensitive information and how his relatives would settle his whereabouts herein. If they were so worried, they could just call him. He has his phone.

(Then why isn't he fucking picking up, Aomine yelled at them.)

(The policemen simply repeated what they said, and sent them on their way.)

(Right now, they weren't Aisaka's friends-- they were simply outsiders.)

Kuroko grips the fabric of his chest. Looking up to the sky, Kuroko bites his lips and tries his hardest not to cry.

There's a void inside him. Something so deep and so scarring, every movement tugged at the tender wound and it was agonizing, so excruciating, it hurt.

"You liar," he whispered to himself, though he didn't really mean it. There was no bite in his tone, no anger-- just sorrow, "you promised you'd wait for me."

-

When Coach Sanada told them Aisaka had resigned from the basketball club, and altogether the school, Aomine was stricken.

Midorima was furious. Akashi admitted to have expected this-- but not this way, not yet. Murasakibara was irritated too if the crushed chips bag and continued sour mood was any indication.

Haizaki had no reaction--even though everyone expected him to blow up and get angry, he didn't. Aomine realized that perhaps he had already known.

(He told Haizaki? And didn't tell me?)

Aomine couldn't hide the shock in his expressions. His movements shook, every nerve in him was battered by the situation-- he couldn't focus on anything.

He dribbled the ball, and when he realized Tetsu wasn't focusing too, he sat down right there and howled into the ground.

(Because how could Aisaka just do that to him?)

He just left. Without saying a thing. Weren't they friends?

It was like something died inside of him. Curled up and rotted through like an infectious disease, and only now was he feeling the intense agony.

He was missing something. Something beside him, a presence that was always one step before him, behind him, beside him.

The light he had been chasing had flickered away like a blown-out candle. Engulfed by darkness, losing his guide, missing his path, Aomine realized something.

He realized that he was now the one in the front of the pack.

(You saw what happened to him, a cold, haunting voice-- his own-- whispered to him.)

(Now, it's your turn.)

Aomine was scared of everything.

-

Ogiwara Shigehiro nearly got kicked off the basketball team in Meiko.

All of a sudden, in the middle of a vital practice match, he declared his desire to go to Tokyo to meet a friend. You can guess how the team took it.

"Ogiwara, you have the potential to become the core of the team," the captain at that time told him, "I know how much you value your friends over in Tokyo, but if you disregard us in the process, I don't think they'd like it, would they?"

"But, Captain," Ogiwara had fought back, determined, "I'm training to fulfill a promise I once had with a friend. If I'm not there for my friend when he really needs me just because we're too far away, I'd be having my priorities backward."

Ogiwara sat out for the rest of that match to watch and learn from his seniors. Right after that, with permission from the Captain and the coach, Ogiwara caught the first train in the morning to Tokyo.

But he was too late.

When he came to that house, picking up a rock and reminiscing the times he would toss a rock at that window-- it suddenly became so clear that everything, everything has changed since then.

("Hey, Aisaka, come out and plaaaaay!!")

("It's five bloody AM you oversized fucking idiot!")

The entire apartment block was barricaded and lined with yellow tape. Police surrounded the premises. Neighbours talked up a fuss about what they think happened.

Ogiwara couldn't find Aisaka anywhere.

("Next time we meet, it'll be me against the two of you!")

He and Kuroko went out that night, to a small restaurant down the road-- and somehow, there was nothing they could talk about that day.

In silence, both of them tried their hardest not to cry.

-

To say Nijimura saw this coming was a stretch.

However, it wouldn't be a stretch to say that everyone expected Aisaka to snap one day or another. Everyone could see the mental toll everything was taking on the boy.

He had changed so much.

Most thought he was simply growing arrogant. Especially after his display in the Cultural Festival, his fame had cranked down a few inches. He became known to be an abuser of his strength.

But Nijimura could see it.

He could see Aisaka suffocating in power and strength that just didn't stop coming at him. He could see Aisaka fall apart every step of the way-- but what could Nijimura do?

Nijimura was never one to boast, but he was among the strongest power forwards in the prefecture. Yet, he stood no chance against Aisaka in a one-on-one.

He could see it.

Aisaka running forward, so far forward-- only to turn around and realize no one was following him after all.

Nijimura couldn't imagine how much that would hurt.

(Sometimes, he would think about the boy he scouted on the first day of school, and a part of him hurts so badly thinking about what basketball had done to him.)

Just why was this happening to them?

Why couldn't they just continue living their lives, peacefully enjoying the basketball they loved?

Basketball had betrayed them.

-

Aisaka Hiroto's presence blew through like a hurricane, settling as quickly and then disappeared, as if he was never there to begin with.

There was a grave. But at the front, there was no family. There was no Hiroto, nor any extended relatives to be seen.

(Hiroto didn't make it.)

The one last chance to ever see him again-- and it was null. And that spoke everything of what lay beyond.

(There was no possible way to find out where Aisaka Hiroto was now.)

They would have to live from herein, alone, and without him. Aisaka was an old, and they, they had to continue the story alone.

Is this what Aisaka meant, when he said so many times how he wasn't a Miracle? Is this why he always spoke of himself with such insignificance?

(Did he know, from the start, that all this would happen eventually?)

And so, the days turned into weeks, then months, and the new school year began.

People got over him, overcame his loss like a passing grievance... and that was frustrating. It wasn't as if he was dead. He was simply... missing.

(Or so Kuroko wanted to believe.)

Shortly after Aisaka left, their fame burst into overflow. Unofficial tournaments and prefecture-wide practice matches were held, and Teiko's prodigious five were in the center of it all.

The "Generation of Miracles", someone began to call them.

With the addition of their Phantom Sixth Man, they were almost complete. Unbeatable-- invincible.

What happened to them hereon in... that is a story for another time.

-

Could they truly be called a Generation of "Miracles"?

The word itself connotes a blessing. It is a positive word, usually an occurrence that brings joy and amazement-- often believed to be of divine origins.

Yet, they've been harbingers of nothing but misfortune, both to themselves and to the people around them.

Miracles are an event people long to see. 

But these miracles-- they were a misery no one wanted to experience.

I shall draw a conclusion from this: They were not Miracles of any sort.

Miracles are things too good to be true-- much like a utopia. They were words conjured to depict things that can never possibly exist, because everything in the world falls short of the perfection we are too imperfect to imagine.

The six of them were not the legends everyone made them out to be.

They were simply human.

And humans are machines; they were robots that worked tirelessly day after day after day, with no one acknowledging their efforts.

It would be much stranger if none of them broke down.

(Ah,)

(They were most definitely, without a doubt,)

(A mark of tragedy to come.)