Making a Miracle

A/N: Well, hi! Welcome back to another pet project of mine that will indubitably fall flat. Well, place your bets on how long this one will last, people. In the meantime, sit back and enjoy the ride, no? I'll try my best to see this one through.

Chapter 1: The Point Guard and The Power Forward

"You have to see the miracles for there to be miracles.

Jandy Nelson, I'll Give You the Sun

When Amia Lee was in The States, there was a famous group of teenage street-ballers who called themselves Team Jabberwock. After a little presence on the streets, rumours began floating around that they were indomitable, unstoppable, and unbeatable. As the internet is wont to do, people began calling for matches between pro teams and Team Jabberwock. The names Nash Gold Jr and Jason Silver became commonly known on the street. Charlotte Hornets, Orlando Magic, New York Knicks. As Team Jabberwock's fame grew, so proportionally did the number of NBA teams that their hype claimed they could beat. Over time, less people in their teams participated in street ball contests, thinking there was just no point in taking part.

Now that Amia was back in the country of her father, entering what was her second year of Japanese High School, she discovered that there was another similar group of individuals here, the so called Generation Of Miracles. 5 individuals, some said 6, who all came from the same middle school, the self-proclaimed 'Ever Victorious', completely unstoppable Teiko Junior High. Their names were legendary in the basketball community- Ryota Kise, Shintaro Midorima, Atsushi Murasakibara, Daiki Aomine, and their captain, Seijuro Akashi. While slightly less exclusive, as a select few players were mentioned in the same breath as them, there was much the same air about them. If your name was not Taiga Kagami, Tatsuya Himuro, or Shogo Haizaki, you could not even think about competing with the Generation Of Miracles, much less beating them. They too were considered on par with or greater than Japan's college teams-and maybe there was some truth in that-or pro teams.

Amia Lee treated both groups the same way.

With complete scorn and utter scepticism.

Having decided her position on the Generation Of Miracles, Amia shouldered her backpack and picked up her sports bag.

And headed off to her first day of School at Touou Academy in the Tokyo District.

"Class we have a new student enrolling this year, her name is Lee Amia, and she is a transfer student from America. Please treat her kindly. Why don't you introduce yourself?"

The tall girl stepped up and bowed, letting her ponytail whip around. "Good morning! My name is Lee Amia, but you all can call me Amia. I'm studying languages, sports and home economics!"

A whole class' eyes followed Amia to her seat. It was hardly undexpected. She was unusual, to say the least. At a solid 5'10", or 1.78m, she was well above even the US average height for a girl, let alone the Japanese one. Her brown hair was pulled into a messy ponytail and while her face wasn't exceptionally pretty, her eyes and easy smile radiated a bursting energy. She sat down in an empty seat and took out her pencilcase, drumming her fingers on her desk and tapping her feet to some tuneless melody as she did so. Her vision flitted between all her peers, as if her eyes were overwhelmed by the abundance of information to take in. She eventually settled on a couple of people. A tanned boy she noticed because of how obscenely tall he was, and also because of his very dark blue hair-seriously, she'd never even seen dye that colour. He was craned back in his seat, head lolling back and snores resonating from him throughout the classroom. Then directly behind him, there was an incredibly pretty girl with shockingly pink hair. She was frowning and prodding tall, dark and snoring with a pencil, presumably to try and wake him up. At the front a girl with dark black hair was waving at her cheerfully, and she waved back. Eventually a series of coughs brought her attention back to the front, and she began to scrawl down her notes on Japanese history.

"Amia-chan!"

The tall girl turned around to see the same dark haired girl she saw in her first class jog down the hallway to catch up with her.

"Hi! I'm Akiyama Misaki! It's good to meet you!"

There was a moment's pause before Amia responded

"Oh! Um... good to meet you too!"

"I was wondering if you wanted to sit with me and my friends for lunch today? Unless you already have somewhere to sit..."

"Oh no, it... would be a pleasure!"

The girl brightened up "Great! Come along, Amia-chan!"

And over the next half- hour, Amia became acquainted with several more people. Misaki,the one who invited her over, was friendly, kind and intelligent, but completely inept with her hands, to the point where her friends shuddered when her name and the word 'kitchen' were mentioned in the same sentence. Takako, the average height brunette with glasses and light freckles, was stern and humourless, but a nice person at heart, very diligent, and also the class president. Amia made a note never to piss her off. Suki was the short, blonde one who was very artsy and stupid good at drawing and painting if her notebook was any indication. She was quiet , but she was thoughtful too, so when she spoke, it was almost always relevant and so damn philosophical. Seriously, people would be quoting Suki in twenty years time. Finally, Kaiyo was the one who played volleyball and did athletics, and was also incredibly shy. The group were certainly a motley one, but Amia found that she enjoyed being around them very much. Finally, the lunch period ended and she returned to class, cheeks hurting from smiling and laughing.

Daiki Aomine and Satsuki Momoi were walking through the hallways of Touou Academy towards the gym for the first session of Touou Academy basketball of the year. Their casual conversation was cut off by the steady ringing sound of a basketball emanating from the gym. Considering how early it was, it was highly unusual for anyone to already be in the gym, changed and practicing. They looked in to find the new girl-Amia Lee, was it?- jumping into the air and shooting off from the three-point line with a Spalding San Antonio Spurs brand basketball. The ball rattled around the rim before rolling off the edge. Amia sighed disappointedly and looked over to where it had rolled over to the feet of someone. She looked up to see the bubblegum-haired girl and her companion, -do-not-want-to-meet-me-on-a-dark-night. The girl picked up the basketball, noticing that the leather really was quite worn on the ball. She trotted over to Amia and cheerfully handed the ball back to her.

"Good afternoon! I'm Momoi Satsuki, I'm the manager for Touou! I assume you're that girl who signed up for the basketball club, ne?"

Amia smiled back and nodded

"I'm Lee Amia, but you can call me Amia"

Satsuki nodded cheerfully and beckoned grumpiest-of-them-all into the room. Behind, more members of the Touou academy basketball team filtered into the gym, still in their school uniforms and kit bags shouldered.

"So Mia-chan, how much experience do you have?"

"Oh, I've been playing for a couple years." Satsuki nodded and motioned to her friend.

"This is Dai-chan! He's really good!"

"I can imagine, given how tall he is. Although... Dai-chan?"

Satsuki giggled in a way that probably drove the boys mad.

"Sorry. His real name is Daiki! Aomine Daiki!"Amia stopped.

"From the Generation of Miracles...?" Satsuki nodded as Aomine walked off to change.

"You've heard of them then?"

"Yeah, although there's some variance in the stories." Satsuki quirked her head sideways

"How so?"

"Well, there's some variance in the stories. Some people say they played the heel, others say they're not human, some say there're 5 of them, other say there's 6."

Satsuki's eyes began to glitter with sparkles as he took on a ridiculously dreamy look.

"Oh, that's Tetsu-kun! He's wonderful! Nobody notices him but he's so hard-working and dreamy and skilled and modest and kind and..." Satsuki continued to spout off a list of adjectives that made this Tetsu-kun seem like a god on earth. Amia zoned out and noticed the supposed living legend Daiki Aomine re-enter the main gym in a pair of basketball shorts and tank top. She jogged off towards him away from the still yammering Satsuki.

"...he's also really observant and striking and he gave me a popsicle sti- Mia-chan, where are you going?!"

Daiki walked into the gym with his basketball pinned between his arm and his hip. As he did so, he noticed the new girl run towards him away from a Satsuki who had her hands clasped together and was spinning round in circles. He saw the girl toss her Clippers ball at him which he caught, as she began to talk, and he sighed.

"Do you want to play some 1 on 1?"

Aomine sighed again then nodded wearily. After all, this chick was meant to be from the states, right? So were that Himuro guy and Kagami. And Himuro wasn't a bad shooting guard. Kagami... that was a tin of worms best left unopened.

The gym fell quiet as people stopped their warm-ups to watch as the tanned prodigy approached one of the main hoops.

"Shoot to start?" The girl asked-he couldn't remember her name. Maybe if she played not horribly he would ask again.

He tossed her the basketball and watched on as she put in a clean shot from the free throw line. He picked up the ball from where it fell and walked over to the free throw line before throwing the ball in the general direction of the hoop. Unsurprisingly, it slammed against the backboard and came bouncing back to the girl. She moved over to just beyond the three-point line and checked the ball with him before starting a slow and steady dribble by her side. Aomine squatted down and defended her side on to force her to the right. Predictable, she faked to the left, then crossed over to the right, speeding up her dribble while simultaneously lowering it. She ran past him, and as she approached the baseline for a layup, Aomine moved.

Amia frowned as she picked the ball up and raised it for the layup. Her opponent's defence was, to be quite frank, pathetic. He really didn't appear to be all that much, and to be honest, she was disappointed. Just as she tossed the ball up, however, a strong hand ripped it away and threw it up again. She looked over her shoulder, shocked, as the ball fell into the net. He had waited and stolen the ball in the instant she had jumped so she couldn't react. And because the ball hadn't hit the rim, by half court rules, that was his point. Still expressionless, Aomine tossed the ball towards her again to check.

Satsuki's eyes softened in sympathy as she watched the tall girl leap up to attempt to block yet another dunk by Daiki-in vain, of course. She watched the girl grit her teeth and return to the free throw line extended to check Daiki again. She watched as Daiki began to revert into his arrogant street ball style of playing- a crossover, between the legs, a fake charge towards her, random rapid stuttering of the feet, not actually moving, until he spun around her and with a few lanky strides, went up and under for another dunk.

The entire audience looked on with varying degrees of astonishment and wonder as Aomine rolled the ball around his body over his arms, bounced the ball behind Amia's back then pulled it back to him as she turned around in shock, even throwing the ball at her head then catching it as it bounced back off her head, before slipping through her defence and walking-literally walking now- up to the basket to throw the ball up. While five minutes ago, she had made a couple of blocks against Aomine, she was by this point completely incapable of moving-maybe because she was exhausted, maybe because she had been utterly humiliated by him in front of so many others, maybe from shock. Aomine didn't care. He had made his seven buckets, and now he walked off, leaving her in the dust like he'd done to so many others.

A/N: So how was that? I'm limiting my chapter word counts to ~2000 words a chapter so I can keep up with updates. Read, review if you want to give criticism or comment or... stuff, I guess, maybe follow for the feel good factor :P

That's all from me for now. I'm out, b*tches.