“DID YOU JUST SEE THAT?!” Kiyoshi shrieked, grabbing anyone and everyone within arm's reach and shaking them like maracas. “DID YOU SEE THAT INTERCEPTION?! AND THE PASS?! ACROSS THE ENTIRE COURT! NO LOOK! DUDE, THAT WAS… THAT WAS COMPLETELY BONKERS!”
Tahera was literally speechless, just shaking her head back and forth, ughing hysterically, with actual tears of pure, unadulterated joy streaming down her face. “I… I actually can’t even process what just happened!” she gasped, still trying to reboot her brain after witnessing that level of basketball wizardry.
“He’s… he’s not even human! There’s no way that’s humanly possible!” It was the kind of moment that made you question everything you thought you knew about sports, and maybe even reality itself.
Ahsan finally reached James and just straight-up tackled him in a bear hug, almost hoisting him off the ground like he weighed nothing. “James! Dude! What are you?! Seriously, spill the tea, are you an alien or something?! That was… that was hands down the most mind-blowing, insane thing I have ever seen in my entire life!”
James, nding back on his feet as lightly as a cat, just fshed that calm, cool, and collected smile of his. “Just pying basketball,” he said, his voice totally casual, like he'd just passed someone the salt at dinner.
But on the inside? Dude was buzzing. Those three-pointers were cool and all, but this? This was on another level. This was… dominance. Complete, utter, unquestionable dominance. He wasn't just winning, he was putting on a show.
Sajid, still looking like he’d just woken up from a dream but grinning so wide his face might split, joined the celebratory pile-on, spping James on the back with way too much enthusiasm. “Dude! That pass, though! I didn’t even see you look! Seriously, how did you even know I was there?! Are you, like, psychic or something?!”
James just shrugged again, leaning into the whole mysterious vibe he had going on. “Just… instinct,” he said, keeping it vague and letting everyone else's imaginations run wild. Let them think he was some kind of basketball wizard.
Meanwhile, back in the Motijheel corner, things were… a little less celebratory. Okay, a lot less celebratory. Salman nded heavily, stumbling a bit like his legs had suddenly turned to jelly, his face frozen in this mask of pure disbelief and utter humiliation.
He kept staring at his empty hands, then back at James, then back at his hands again, like he was trying to figure out some kind of optical illusion, trying to understand how the basketball had just… dematerialized.
Lut, Mr. Sarcasm himself, was completely, utterly, and totally speechless. His usual snark? Gone. Vanished. He just stood there, mouth hanging slightly open, eyes wide and vacant, like he'd just stared directly into the abyss. He looked like he’d seen a ghost. Or maybe something even more unbelievable than a ghost. Like, a basketball-stealing, cross-court-passing, superhuman teenager.
Saim, poor Saim, the meek center, actually took a nervous step backwards, like James was suddenly radiating some kind of… dangerous, radioactive energy. His usual timidity had morphed into something that looked a whole lot like fear.
