Extra Basket

The arena lights were blinding, a thousand eyes shining down like celestial judgment. The atmosphere felt too dense to be just oxygen and noise. It felt sentient, watching, waiting. The first dribble echoed like a heartbeat across the polished Grand Arena floor thud… thud… thud… each bounce sending a tremor through the court like a pulse through a titan's veins.

Chicago Raptors moved with sharp, calculated discipline, each step a slash through the tension, cutting their presence into the court. Their jerseys clung to their skin, dark fabric streaked with sweat not from fatigue, but from the raw, coiled energy of warriors entering sacred combat. Across from them, The Gods stood with a posture so relaxed it bordered on mockery. They didn't stand, they existed towering presences draped in an aura that bent space around them, as if gravity itself acknowledged their superiority.

Jalen stood at the top of the arc, fingertips pressed against the ball like a king resting his hand on the pommel of a sword. The leather felt warm, alive under his touch. He didn't just hold the ball. He commanded it. Under the arena lights, his eyes glowed with a quiet inferno.

Poseidon stepped forward.

He didn't walk, he flowed. Each step rippled through the air like water responding to a silent current. His feet barely made a sound, yet every subtle shift in his stance sent invisible waves through the court. His gaze was calm, surface-smooth… but beneath that stillness, depths churned.

Jalen dribbled once.

THUD.

The sound cracked through the arena like thunder punched through a cathedral. Ethan, seated in the bleachers, felt the vibration coil up his spine. Lucas leaned back slightly, his usually sharp gaze narrowing with a spark of unease. (That bounce… what was that?) Even he, with Absolute Mimicry, felt it, Jalen didn't just dribble. He had declared war.

(This isn't a court anymore… it's someone else's domain.) Jalen's breath was slow, but inside his chest, his heartbeat hammered like war drums. (Their presence… it's rewriting the air itself.)

With a single, almost imperceptible shift of his foot just half an inch diagonally Jalen altered the entire rhythm of the court. It wasn't a move meant to advance. It was a move meant to question. A knock on the gates of Olympus.

Poseidon slid, shadowing him with liquid precision. Everything about his movement was clean, precise, infuriatingly smooth like water weaving through stone crevices, impossible to disrupt.

(He's not stepping to move… he's stepping to feel.) Poseidon's eyes half-lidded, observing without tension. (He tests. Good.)

Jalen's next dribble shattered the rhythm.

Tap… TAP… …tap… TAP TAP!

It wasn't basketball anymore. It was percussion chaotic, staccato, jagged like lightning splintering across a dark sky. The ball didn't bounce. It snapped.

The crowd didn't understand what they were seeing but they felt it. Like lightning had just struck the surface of a still ocean.

Poseidon's eyes flicked open by a fraction.

Jalen's lips pulled into the ghost of a grin. (Got you.)

He didn't accelerate. Acceleration would imply that Poseidon dictated tempo. No, Jalen stepped outside that tempo.

A Reality Slip Step.

To mortals, it looked like teleportation.

To Raptors, it looked like a blur ripping across their vision.

To Poseidon… it was lightning splitting the ocean clean in two. His aura once a calm tide rippled violently, shimmer cracking like glass struck by a hammer.

Poseidon twisted, water recoiling to strike, hand flashing out

He touched nothing. Only air.

Jalen wasn't running through Poseidon's domain. He had stepped beyond it, feet gliding over the hardwood with an eerie silence that felt wrong to the senses, like sound itself refused to acknowledge his movement.

Poseidon's aura buckled, but only for a heartbeat. He pivoted smoothly, one foot tracing a perfect defensive arc as if drawn by divine compass, cutting off Jalen's pass lane with surgical calm.

Poseidon, voice low, almost amused, "So you don't ride the river… you strike it."

Jalen didn't respond. He slammed the ball low so low it barely left the floor, a skimming shot of kinetic light. It hissed past Poseidon's leg with a precise, lethal hiss.

Zion caught it near the key, shoulders squared like a general surveying a battlefield. His eyes scanned the formation—not players, but positions in a war map.

(Two defenders static. Ares baits. Chronos… isn't even looking at the ball?)

Across the court, Zeus stood at the center of it all, posture regal, chin lifted slightly. He didn't defend. He didn't react. He observed, like lightning before deciding where to strike. His electric blue eyes flicked with a disdain so cold it burned hotter than any flame.

Zeus's thought slid through the air like a decree, (Movement as pressure? Children's

games.)

Chronos stood beside him not guarding, not tensed. He merely waited. Golden eyes half-lidded, gaze not tracking where the ball was, but where it would be. His hands hung loosely at his sides like executioner blades not yet drawn.

Zion inhaled sharply. (Then we force time to move.)

"Cut—now."

Jalen moved. Tyrese moved. Malik moved. Their formation shifted like a coiled serpent unspooling across sacred ground, each timing perfectly aligned not by sight, but by trust.

The Raptors unleashed their assault 80% output, full tactical efficiency.

The Gods gave 50%.

And yet… they didn't bend.

Poseidon slid back effortlessly, water pulling from shore after a wave strike, resetting without resistance.

Ares stepped forward, his frame eclipsing space, air tightening around him like gravity thickened under the weight of war itself. The presence of conflict dripped from him like blood from a freshly-drawn blade.

Hades didn't move. And yet his shadow stretched across the lane like a silent verdict, a reminder that some spaces on the court were claimed by death alone.

Tyrese caught a pass slipped through a gap so thin it felt like splicing dimensions. The ball sliced between Poseidon's hip and Ares's arm by a margin so impossible it made the air shudder.

He rose into a perfect shooting stance, rotation flawless, form clean as if carved into the concept of "shot" itself.

(Release—now.)

He fired.

\\SSSHHH—THUD.

Chronos raised one finger.

He didn't jump. He didn't stretch. He merely lifted his finger like one might test the wind.

The ball brushed it. Lightly. Ever so lightly.

Not enough to block.

Just enough to alter fate.

The rotation shifted by one degree.

The ball hit the rim—

CLANG.

Once.

Twice.

Roll… drop.

The arena erupted with a roar.

But on the Raptors bench, Coach Jenkins stood frozen, clipboard gripped so tight the plastic creaked.

(They… blocked without blocking.)

Tyrese landed, breath steady. Then a grin tugged at the corner of his lip, hunter's thrill igniting in his eyes. "Tch… so that's how you play?"

Chronos didn't acknowledge him. He lowered his finger. Slowly. Deliberately. Like sealing a moment in history.

Jalen turned his gaze to Zeus.

He didn't shout. He didn't bow. He simply stated his name, voice low, firm—like placing a sword at the feet of a throne.

"I am Jalen Carter."

Zeus didn't blink.

He looked at Jalen like one would regard dust that dared glimmer beneath sunlight.

"hmm..."

The whistle blew.

It didn't sound like a whistle.

It sounded like a war horn.

The real game began.

The ball slammed into the hardwood for the inbound, and the Grand Arena did not just watch it judged. Every light felt like an eye of something ancient, something vast, casting its gaze down on mortals and gods alike. The echo of the bounce wasn't just sound it was a pulse, a war drum.

Chicago Raptors spread into formation like a tactical unit—every step measured, their stances steeped in discipline honed through hardship, not divinity. On the other end, The Gods didn't take position they simply existed, and the space around them bent to accommodate.

Ares moved first a forward step that felt like a declaration. He was not a player. He was Warpath made flesh, the embodiment of collision. When his shoe hit the floor, the air itself rattled. A wave of pressure surged outward like rippling flame.

Ares (grinning, aura crackling): "Come through me… if you can, boy."

Jalen's eyes didn't flicker. He didn't even look at Ares. His gaze was fixed past him further. On Zeus. On the king who stood hands-in-pockets, posture relaxed, as if basketball itself were beneath him.

Jalen (thought, pulse steady) (You think this is a game played beneath you. Good. Keep looking down. I'll make you lift your head.)

Ares slid into position a living barricade, a fortress of muscle and wrath. His shoulders squared like castle walls, his stance screaming violence. Most would slow. Most would brace.

Jalen stepped forward.

Tap.

Tap.

TAP TAP.

The dribble was a metronome. No worse. A threat. Flash Tempo ignited, not all at once, but like a fuse catching flame. His steps did not blur they flickered, as if reality struggled to register his position.

Spectators leaned forward, subconsciously holding their breath.

Ethan, up in the stands, felt his heartbeat misalign with his body.

Ethan (eyes wide): He's not running faster. He's bending the timing of each step…

Ares leaned in to crush.

Jalen didn't dodge.

He slipped timing.

One second, Ares' arm swept down like a hammer forged for destruction.

The next Jalen was already past.

Ares' elbow cut only afterimage.

Ares (snarling, confusion flickering): "What—?!"

The Chicago bench erupted, players half-standing in disbelief.

Coach Jenkins (under his breath): "He didn't avoid contact. He made contact late…"

Poseidon's calm gaze sharpened. Chronos' golden irises shimmered like rotating clock hands. Hades' lips curled faintly, intrigued.

Zeus?

He still hadn't moved.

Jalen's sneakers skidded lightly against the polished floor as he crossed half-court. The air around him shimmered. His aura wasn't showy no lightning, no flame.

It was tempo fracture. Subtle. Lethal.

For the first time, Zeus raised his eyes a fraction.

Their auras collided silently.

No flash. No explosion.

Just pressure.

Zeus' presence rolled across the court like a king descending judgment, crushing, divine, absolute. Every player not just Raptors felt a weight settle on their shoulders as if gravity itself bowed to Zeus' authority.

Zeus (thought, bored): You force motion. You disturb rhythm. Childish. Learn to command without moving.

Jalen's aura flared not in rebellion, but in defiance.

Jalen (thought, calm, a grin barely forming): Look at me, Zeus. Look now.

Their shoulders passed without touching but the collision of will alone sent a static shiver through the court. Tyrese flinched. Malik stumbled half a step. Kobe Morales' breath hitched.

Even Ryan Taylor, watching like a soldier awaiting command, felt the clash like thunder against his ribcage.

Chronos tilted his head, golden eyes calculating.

Ares' grin slowly returned, but now tinted with excitement.

Poseidon's aura rippled like the tide withdrawing before a massive wave.

Hades simply watched like death awaiting its moment.

And then—

"PLAY!"

Zion's voice cracked like a whip.

The Raptors exploded. Malik cut baseline, feet pounding like war drums. Tyrese ghosted past Ares' aura arc, moving with liquid grace. Kobe crashed inside, his body language saying, (I'll break before I bend.)

Zion's pass came with zero telegraph. No shoulder shift. No hip twist. Just a snap—like a general issuing silent command.

Ares turned—half a beat too slow.

Malik caught.

Ares lunged, wrath bursting

but Jalen was already in the air beside him.

He hadn't run.

He hadn't jumped.

He had appeared, slipping through a seam in rhythm, Flash Tempo warping the very logic of movement.

Malik didn't even glance. He tipped the ball upward.

Jalen caught it mid-air.

Time slowed.

His body twisted in mid-air, reverse angle, one arm cocked back for a violent slam that looked like lightning descending.

Ethan gripped the railing, eyes blazing.

Ethan (thought, pulse racing) (He locked his body into a timing window before the play even began queued movement like it was pre-written!)

Jalen hung in the air. A still frame carved in divine defiance.

Zeus' nostrils flared, lightning simmering behind his eyes. He raised one finger not to block, but to declare.

Zeus (thought, quiet authority) "(Bow.)"

Jalen (thought, aura igniting like a blade unsheathed) "(MAKE ME.)"

He brought the ball down.

BOOOOOOOOM.

The dunk wasn't just a score.

It was a strike against Olympus.

Glass trembled. Air pressure shook. The rim bent like metal under a god's hammer.

Electric arcs danced across the floor not literal electricity, but the backlash of two conceptual forces colliding:

Flash Tempo: rebellion of rhythm, mortal will defying fate.

Absolute Way: sovereignty of concept, divine law stating "all that happens is by Olympus' permission."

For a heartbeat

neither side gave ground.

Players on both teams staggered. Spectators gasped, not sure what they felt but knowing it was beyond sport. It felt like someone had rung a bell older than time.

Jalen landed, eyes never looking at the rim.

Only at Zeus.

Zeus met his gaze.

For the first time

he acknowledged.

Not with words.

But with the slightest lift of his chin.

As if to say:

Very well. You have my attention.

And somewhere deep behind him, Chronos smiled.

To be continue