Extra Basket-Chapter 127 - 114: Set your heart ablaze

Scoreboard: Vorpal Basket 102 – Portsmouth Vultures 54

Time Remaining: 1:38 | 4th Quarter

The air was thick with tension.

Not from uncertainty

But from certainty.

The crowd didn’t cheer. Didn’t shout.

They just watched, silent, holding their breath.

All eyes locked on the court.

On him.

Ethan Albarado.

He stood still, near half-court, like a conductor before the final note.

The ball rested against his right hip, fingers loose on the leather, head bowed slightly.

Sweat traced clean lines down his face. His yellow hair stuck to his brow, glinting under the stadium lights.

His chest rose and fell with calm, even rhythm.

Too calm.

No one scores twelve straight in under two minutes and breathes like this.

But Ethan wasn’t anyone.

Across from him, Jamie Lin took slow steps forward, arms low, body tense, eyes never leaving Ethan’s.

The scoreboard loomed above them like a monument.

The Vultures had already been buried.

This was the eulogy.

"You’re not normal," Jamie muttered, voice barely above a whisper, eyes narrowed.

Ethan’s eyes gleamed. He tilted his head, the faintest smirk tugging at the corner of his lips.

"Neither are you," he replied, voice steady.

"But I didn’t come here to be normal."

He looked up, gaze like steel.

"I came here to change my destiny."

...

On the sidelines, Coach Fred Mason stood with a towel slung across his shoulder, arms crossed.

He didn’t shout.

Didn’t motion for a play.

He just watched.

Even he knew.

This wasn’t his team anymore.

It was Ethan’s.

..

Ethan’s fingers curled over the ball. Then—

Dribble.

A single bounce, echoing like a starting gun.

The court rippled like paper being turned, a page revealing its next line.

Darnell shifted at the wing, prepping to hedge.

Rico hesitated, caught between switching and staying. His weight betrayed him — left foot slightly too deep.

Anwar braced beneath the basket, hands up, eyes darting between lanes.

But Ethan?

He didn’t even blink.

"(Another Clarity Card — activate,)" he whispered in his mind.

(System: Clarity Active. 60 seconds. Perception Enhanced. Decision-Making Elevated.)

...

Everything slowed.

The ball spun like a wheel in molasses.

Every breath, every heartbeat, a drumbeat in his ears.

He saw the faint tremor in Darnell’s knee, favoring his right side.

He saw the twitch in Rico’s fingers about to gamble for a steal.

He saw Jamie blink a heartbeat too long. A delay. A crack in the defense.

There it is.

...

Ethan moved.

No hesitation.

A sharp jab-step to the left, Jamie twitched.

Then Ethan was gone.

Gone.

A blur of yellow and shadow slicing through the heart of the defense like a whisper.

Jamie spun too late.

Darnell lunged too high.

Anwar shifted too slow.

But Ethan didn’t go up.

He kicked out.

A one-handed, no-look whip-pass to the right corner — like he knew who was there before he even moved.

Lucas Graves.

Feet set.

Eyes locked.

Catch. Rise. Release.

The ball soared.

The net hissed.

SPLASH.

...

Scoreboard: 105–54.

And the silence?

It broke.

Not in cheers.

Not in noise.

But in awe.

Ethan backpedaled, expression unreadable, eyes never leaving the arc of the ball as it fell.

Then

Just the faintest nod.

As if to say:

"This is how it was always supposed to be."

..

On the Vultures’ bench, Marcos slumped into his seat, towel draped over his head.

His voice cracked as he muttered:

"He’s not fighting us anymore..."

"He’s fighting history."

...

Back on Court — 1:00 Remaining | 4th Quarter

Score: Vorpal Basket 105 – Portsmouth Vultures 54

The game was no longer about basketball.

It was something deeper now a war between belief and memory, a quiet rebellion against fate.

Ethan Albarado stood near the arc, walking backward toward the half-court line. His jersey clung to him, drenched. His legs trembled slightly not from fatigue, but from something heavier.

The weight of knowing this was never supposed to happen.

He raised one hand slowly, pointing a single finger toward the ceiling.

"One minute," he said, barely above a whisper.

"Let’s finish this."

It wasn’t a command. It was a prayer.

A moment later, Lucas Graves jogged up beside him, chest heaving, eyes burning with adrenaline and something far older.

He looked at Ethan not the boy from their bench-warming days, not the quiet student but the warrior who had chosen to rewrite a destiny already carved in stone.

Lucas smirked faintly, his voice rough from shouting and heartache.

"Yeah..." he said, nodding once.

"Let’s win this. For real this time."

He glanced at the scoreboard, then back at Ethan.

And for just a flicker of a second, his expression faltered.

Just a little.

Because beneath all the fire in his veins, Lucas remembered too.

They bumped fists quietly. Without showmanship. Without words.

Because they didn’t need them.

(This is no longer about what they expected from us.)

(This is about who we’ve become.)

(And how we refused to stay forgotten.)

...

On the bench, Louie Gee sat with a towel around his shoulders, tears drying at the corners of his eyes. His chest rose and fell slowly, the kind of breath you take when everything inside you is cracking open and being rebuilt.

Coonie Smith wiped his nose with his sleeve, trying and failing to look unaffected.

Kai leaned forward, eyes locked on the court, voice low and trembling.

"They changed it... the loser Vorpal Basket before is no more."

Coonie smiled through his teeth, gripping the edge of the bench like it was the only thing keeping him grounded

.

"Nah..." he muttered.

"They didn’t just change it."

He paused, the moment sinking in.

"They made a new story."

Aiden White, arms folded tight across his chest, stared out at the court like he was witnessing something sacred. Something mythic.

"They’re not just winning the game..." he whispered.

"...They’re proving we belong."

(All of us. The benchwarmers. The afterthoughts. The ones no one look over.)

(This isn’t just about a scoreboard. It’s about legacy. It’s about finally being seen.)

And for the first time in what felt like forever...

They didn’t feel like background characters.

They felt like a team.

They were Vorpal Basket reborn.

....

Back to Ethan.

Jamie Lin walked the ball up for the Vultures shoulders stiff, face blank. He wasn’t even looking at the basket anymore.

Just at Ethan.

They locked eyes and something in Jamie broke quietly.

Ethan nodded once.

A silent respect between two kids trying to be more than what life allowed them to be.

(This... is what conviction means,) Ethan thought, his golden eyes locked on Jamie Lin across the court. Sweat trailed down his cheek, but he didn’t blink.

Jamie stood with the ball in his hands, chest rising and falling with exhaustion, but his grip never wavered.

(Even if the scoreboard says they never stood a chance. Yet... they still won’t give up.)

The crowd had stopped chanting for points.

They weren’t looking at the time anymore.

They were watching something far rarer.

Heart.

Pride.

Conviction.

From both sides.

From the so-called underdogs who refused to bend to fate...

And from the broken kings, trying desperately to reclaim their crown.

The final minute began to bleed away.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

A silence blanketed the arena. Not the absence of sound but a reverent, breathless stillness. As if the gods of the game had paused, too, watching what these kids were doing with time that wasn’t supposed to be theirs.

Ethan stepped forward, knees aching, heart pounding like a war drum.

He looked again at Jamie, who didn’t retreat.

Jamie stood there, knees bent slightly, ready.

And that’s when Ethan allowed himself a small, tired smile.

(It looks like we’re the villain... and they’re the protagonist, huh?)

He took a slow breath in and dribbled once.

One echo. One heartbeat.

Then he spoke, not with cockiness... but with respect.

"Come on, Jamie."

"Show me why you’re still standing."

Because the miracle wasn’t just winning.

The miracle was not folding.

The miracle was being here, together rewriting the story.

One breath.

One second.

One play left.

[Then Jamie shouted]

"ARGHHH!!! ETHAN!!!" Jamie’s voice cracked as he roared from the depths of his lungs — not in hatred, but in desperation.

Not in defeat...

But in defiance.

His shoes scraped against the floor as he exploded off the dribble, charging at Ethan like a man chasing something that had already been taken from him. Sweat flung off his face. His eyes bloodshot and wild were locked onto the boy in front of him.

Lucas, standing near the three-point line, heard the cry echo across the gym.

He turned, startled, eyes widening as he saw Jamie tear toward Ethan.

(He’s still fighting...) Lucas thought, the ball resting in his hands. (Even now...)

A wave of something twisted in his chest — admiration, guilt, maybe even sympathy.

Because in that moment, Jamie wasn’t the point guard of the Portsmouth Vultures.

He wasn’t the rival.

He was just a boy.

A boy screaming into the wind, trying to grab something fate had long stolen.

And Ethan standing at the top of the key didn’t flinch.

His eyes remained steady. His stance solid.

"I hear you," Ethan whispered. "But can you still reach me?"

Jamie drove in crossing once, then spinning right.

But Ethan was already there.

Their shoes collided. Their shoulders brushed. Their breaths clashed like swords.

And in that one collision...

There were no teams.

No audience.

Just two souls with something to prove.

The gym felt smaller.

The lights felt dimmer.

The moment stretched into something sacred.

Lucas tightened his grip on the ball, watching.

(This... is basketball.)

(Not for fame. Not for victory. But for pride. For meaning.)

He stepped up, ready to move. Ready to play. Ready to carry that fire.

Because when one heart burns it spreads.

And right now, Jamie Lin’s heart was setting the whole court ablaze.

To be continue