A/N I did promise someone I would finish this.

Chapter 6

"Hello class I'm filling in for my colleague today he's recovering in hospital after fainting yesterday." Ms. Hanamura smiled at all of us. Turning her back to us she picked up a blue dry erase marker and started scribbling on the board.

She turned back around quickly her tight ponytail whipping her shoulder. We all read the board as she moved away. SHOWCASE. Capitalized and underlined. I think we all got the point; it was important.

"Now I'm sure you all know that participating in the showcase is required for all dual enrollment students. Your performance is 30% of your grade this quarter. That being said I hope you have all been figuring out who you want to perform with. There is a minimum of two and no more than nine people. I don't know why but ten students we learned has always been a mess on stage. If you have any questions now would be the time to ask."

She propped herself against the desk up at the front of the classroom waiting for hands. A guy sitting a few desks away from me, I hadn't learned his name yet, raised his hand. Ms. Hanamura motioned for him to speak.

"Why can't we do solo performances?"

The woman chuckled to herself as if that was the silliest thing she had ever heard. Adjusting her glasses with a smirk she said "None of you are good enough to be solo artist yet that's why you're here"

The mood in the room dropped fairly quickly. It's not like it was much before but now it was just dead. Some of the frowns might have also been attributed to the pleasant smirk the woman was still wearing.

"Why the long faces? Look you guys being a solo artist can be great fun but it's smart to learn how to play off other's strengths and weaknesses now. Anymore questions? I know there has to be something else besides solos" she rolled her eyes.

This time Midorima was the one to raise his hand and again made a motion for him to speak.

"Being that a few of us had our showcase privileges taken away how will that affect our grade?"

Crap, how did I not think of that?

started dismissing all the other students to go to the practice rooms. The only people left were all of us "trouble-makers" from yesterday.

"So" the woman started sitting upon the desk she had leaned on, folding one slim leg over the other.

"After yesterday the boss came up with some special plans for you all"

I didn't like the sound of where this was going.

"To earn the showcase chunk of your grade for this quarter you will all be working together as one group. Your song theme has been pre-selected to be Control. You may interpret it how you will"

Oh, she could not be serious! Control. Were they all sitting in a room laughing at us in their heads when they came up with that?

"Generally our showcase board always puts aside enough slots in the showcase for our dual students but your slots will have to be earned this time. If you all really want a slot then you're going to have to prove it together. You will be auditioning as one group and we want to see a clean performance with a piece that reflects the theme given."

"It's my duty to inform you all" Mrs. Hanamura glared pointedly at Aomine and I, "That you don't have a choice in the matter. Flunking a class will not be tolerated. If you do fail then I'll see you all for remedial lessons over this coming break. We hold all of our students to this high standard"

I didn't want to lose my vacation time but would it matter if I spent most breaks working on my music anyway? No, that didn't mean I wanted to be stuck at school with this bunch.

It wasn't long before she skipped out the room jovially heading out to go check on and assist students in the practice rooms. Sitting in silence with the GOM always seemed to be how we operated so I didn't give it much thought.

"So what's the plan?" Kise spoke tipping back in his chair.

"I'm not performing" Kuroko piped up forcing even me to turn and give him a shocked look. What did he mean he wasn't performing said we all had to participate.

"Of course not" Akashi stood up from his seat cutting into the conversation before we could all jump in and interrogate Kuroko.

"Kuroko will be finding the song to fit the theme or writing one himself; his choice, either way it's still participating. Even if it is minimal" Akashi added "Plus I think we can all agree that Kuroko knows the most about control"

Everyone paused silently agreeing with Akashi. If anyone knew about control it was Kuroko I had been around the guy for only a short period time and he wasn't rattled by anything. Who knows, perhaps the GOM had an entirely different take on what Kuroko's control was.

Not afraid of taking the lead again Akashi continued with the plan he had already seemingly pre-established in his mind.

"Midorima, Murasakibara and I all will perform on our regular instruments as usual but right now I'm thinking Aomine lead vocals and lead guitar. Kise you take over Kuroko's usual bass part and sing backup vocals with Kagami"

"Really backup vocals?" I said astounded that's what I was reduced to "Is Aomine even a better singer than I am?"

"yes" Akashi addressed me "His singing is about level with his guitar skill"

Akashi had no reason to lie to me since his ass was on the line for this audition too.

"Can he handle playing and singing both lead parts at the same time?"

I swore I saw Akashi falter a little but Aomine spoke up before he could really maul it over.

"Worry about yourself, I can handle anything"

"Listen I believe in you but he might be right. I'm not even sure I can handle Kurokochi's part while singing back up." Kise admitted.

"You're not me though" Aomine sung implying it wsa because Kise wasn't as skilled as him. The hurt was obvious on Kise's face and he swiftly turned his attention to his shoe laces.

"Yeah you're right what was I thinking?" Kise looked up at us with a plastered false smile that was bound to crack any moment? It was no surprise when he moved to the door and retreated from the room.

Nobody said anything and I hadn't known them long enough to really know what to do. Maybe Kise was the type that needed alone time and would just return. Unlike, I had learned, Aomine needed some sort of coaxing to be brought back. This somehow didn't feel right. Kise was there for Aomine when he was upset but who was supposed to be there for Kise when Aomine got under his skin. At the moment Aomine seemed far from the type of person that would just outright apologize for making someone feel down.

Either way I followed the blonde out since no one seemed to care. I caught up with him right as he turned into one of the private dance rooms. Full length mirrors lined one wall along with smooth wooden railing.

"What do you want?" He glared and I started to regret my decision. I raised my hands in surrender.

"White flag. I didn't follow you to argue; I just wanted to see if you were alright."

"Alright? I'm more than alright thanks. I'm spectacular"

"I know I saw your audition"

"…that was sarcasm" he looked at me skeptically deciding whether or not I was too dense to pick up on it.

"I know, but you're not wrong" I walked over to the computer in the room and pulled my ipod from my pocket connecting it to the system. I scrolled to my dance playlist and put it on shuffle.

"What are you doing?" he asked but I didn't bother to answer.

"Is this song okay?" I asked him stretching my arms over my head. It was best to stretch before and after physical exercise obviously.

"What do you mean? I wasn't planning to dance" he crossed his arms over his chest defiantly.

"Right you just stormed down here and took up an empty dance room… to not dance"

Who was he kidding? If not for the obvious being, he could have picked any other place to mope; his body also gave him away. He was built like a dancer looking lean but at the same time having strong muscles and his posture was almost too perfect. Possibly, from learning to dance at a young age.

In response he just frowned not moving an inch. Whatever, if he wasn't going to dance I was. I did a few warm up glides and arm movements before widening my stance into one of many basic dance starting positions. The song that was playing was sort of modern and jazzy. A soulful woman's voice sang in the vintage-y chorus with remixed heavy beats that eventually led into rapping. Counting in my head and tapping my right foot in time I waited for the song to drop into the beat I liked again. I hadn't made choreography for this song so I just sort of winged it going freestyle. I moved my body in whatever way I saw fit as long as I matched and kept with the fast pace of the song.

I could feel Kise's eyes on me and also see him in the mirror staring. It didn't bother me but instead gave me an idea. I danced circles around the guy. Literally, spinning, shaking, stepping in and out of his space bubble it felt like he was some glorified prop I was supposed to use in my routine. His facial expression remained in pout mode and I could tell he was close to giving in or at least I hoped that was the case. I knew the song was ending soon so I grabbed Kise's hand surprising him. I spun him into me and placed another hand on the small of his back as I dipped him. His caramel eyes looked a mix of shock and analysis. I felt my hairs stand up on the back of my neck at that look. Pulling him back up, I let go of his hand and walked back to the computer pausing the playlist as the next song was starting.

I turned around to find the boy blushing furiously my face felt heated up as well but it could have been possible it was just because I was a bit breathless. I did just drop him into a dip seconds ago, that did happen.

"Sorry I went too far"

"Can you replay that song?" He cut me off turning serious.

"Sure but why?"

"Do it on my cue okay?" he ignored my question.

"Fine" I agreed. I was a bit curious after all.

He stretched and did some warm-up moves albeit his were a bit more complicated than mine had been. When he was done he turned to me. I pressed the back button and the same song that had just been filling the room returned. Facing back to him, Kise began approaching me slowly for some strange reason. He grabbed my arm and dragged me over to a spot and told me not to move.

"Why can't I?"

"You'll find out"

"but-"

"Just stop talking and stay still"

I did as told. He walked a few paces away from me and he widened his stance much like I had done. No freakin way! Was he going to do what I thought he was? Listening to the song playing I counted the beats in my head and when Kise looked over at me with that shit-eating grin I just knew.

At the same place I had started dancing Kise came in. He mirrored the moves I had done effortlessly. It was like watching me if I had blonde hair, a handsomer face, and ear piercings. His body was lithe as he maneuvered around the hardwood dance floors. My eyes never strayed from his figure. It was exciting to watch. Shifting his arms and doing a glide I knew what was coming.

He danced around me and I smirked watching as he did. I laughed as he raised an eyebrow at me as if to say this is what you did to me; how does it feel? Sighing I put my hand out waiting. Just 30 or so seconds before the song ended he took my hand spun me in and dipped me. I had never been dipped before it was the strangest feeling in the world. We locked eyes and his faced moved closer to mine. What was he doing? If I didn't know any better I would say it looked like he was going to ki…

I hit the floor with a small thump. Did he just drop me? I heard laughter as he walked over to cut off the music.

"Checkmate" he said sitting down beside me.

"That was incredible." I turned to him "You're incredible…and a jerk"

"Ooh resorting to name calling…that isn't very becoming of someone who wants to be a lead singer"

"Neither is dropping someone when you place them in a dip" I countered but I was happy to see he was at least gaining back some snark.

"You know" I sprawled out on the floor placing my hand behind my head.

"What?" he asked laying down the same way.

"Aomine was right. You're not him Kise but in my eyes that's not necessarily a bad thing"

I thought I heard a muffled thanks. I rolled backwards into a standing up position and went over to my ipod and let the next song play then I walked back to Kise and offered him my hand to get up.

He took it and when he was barely off the floor I let go.

"Stalemate" I said before adjusting to the song and dancing more. Kise frowned but quickly got up to dance along with me. At some point we entered into some sort of dance battle. Where I performed a move and Kise copied it. I tried and tried to raise the bar with each move but the guy was good. He matched them all so after the seventh song I stopped completely exhausted. My legs ached and I felt I could hurl at any minute.

We ended with stretches and he showed me a few cool down breathing exercises. Then I grabbed my ipod and shut off the computer.

"It's lunchtime" I observed the time on my ipod before pocketing it.

"You think they came to a decision?" Kise wondered.

"We didn't" I jumped at Kuroko's voice still not used to him popping up on me. Kise seemed immune to Kuroko's sneak attack shouting "Kurokocchi" and ruffling the shorter boy's hair.

"Please don't do that Kise-kun" Kuroko said with that same emotionless look. Kise latched onto Kuroko chattering as we left from the practice room. I turned off the lights and shut the door.

They were already a few steps ahead of me but I easily caught up and stayed out of their convo not fairly interested in Kise's new diet he was trying. I did however interject a couple times when he was talking about how I danced.

After retrieving our lunches we made it back to the classroom to see the other students had returned from their practice. Thanks to the GOM I didn't know very many of them and I hated to admit it but they were avoiding us all anyway after hearing of that dumb what could barely even be considered a violent fight. We weaved through people getting to our normal seats. Kuroko and I pushed our desk together and Kise pulled up a chair joining us. I started munching on my first sandwich so hungry after dancing. I stopped noticing Kise and Kuroko staring.

"What?" I mumbled swallowing my food and taking swig of water.

"3 subs, is it really necessary?" Kise questioned.

"Yeah it is and it's not my fault you chose to eat a crappy fruit salad thing and a protein drink"

"Fruit has plenty of great vitamins and it's not just a protein dr-"

"Kise Ryouta where are you?" a booming voiced called from the front of the room.

Our heads swiftly all turned to the person talking and Kise stood up slowly. It was a third year going by the uniform with spikey black hair with his friends right behind him.

"Kasamatsu" the blonde said nervously.

Suddenly the shorter third year boy came forward nailing Kise square in the shoulder making my jaw drop.

"That's Senpai to you idiot" the boy scolded gesturing wildly with his hands "my parent's said your parents told them you got into a fight. What are you doing causing trouble?"

Wait, were they friends?

"It was a misunderstanding, I mean I did get into trouble but I didn't fight or start anything"

"Oh" the older boy unclenched his fist "You should have said so. I better not hear about anymore incidents or I'll be back"

The guy marched back out of the room his posse following and Kise sat back down. Everyone resumed talking albeit the noise seemed a bit lighter.

"A friend of yours?" I asked.

"Yeah we met at an advanced music camp over the summer. Despite being underage my parents convinced them to let me audition and I was accepted. Kasamatsu acts tough but he really is a good guy and takes music very seriously"

"Oh that's good. Music camp sounds fun, what did you do over the summer Kuroko?"

The light blue haired boy started to say something then held back.

"Well I don't know if it's true" Kise started turning to him "but I heard rumors that you were commissioned to help compose a song for someone famous overseas"

"That is half true" Kuroko acknowledged but he never told us what parts. Was he commissioned? Did he sing with someone famous? Had it even been an overseas trip?

Either way what an enormous waste my summer was in comparison to these two. I wrote a few songs moved to Japan and that was about it.

Maybe I needed to start digging in, so I'll get all that I could from this place.

"Why are you smiling so creepily Kagami-kun?" Kuroko asked.

"it's nothing. I'm just excited for the rest of the school year"

fin

See y'all soon-ish hopefully if any of you are still alive. I might also go back and do some minor editing of earlier chapters.