Now, Kill Each Other

"Kya, hahaha! Noh Si-hwan is finally back!! Hwana's firepower from here on out, baby!"

The baseball gallery was burning white-hot off the back of the Kium–Hwana game, and before long that heat found its way to Lee Kang-il as well — a man in his late thirties, known across the streaming scene as the retired pro who simply never stopped loving baseball.

"Whamma— hold on, this is a real flesh-and-blood woman? Not some VR avatar?!"

Kang-il had fired up his broadcast like any other day when a video donation landed in his queue.

[Ah, a visit to the mound from the coach. Late, granted — though late is not the same as never... The pitcher comes out now, surely. Some eighty pitches in would already be near this pitcher's average, would it not...?]

It was the bottom of the fifth. Kium's starting pitcher had surrendered a leadoff single, then walked two more, loading the bases with nobody out.

Hitting was due to come around again to the heart of Hwana's order — batters who had already seen a whole meal's worth of this pitcher's offerings, their eyes now fully dialed in. And he was expected to challenge them, control wobbling, command shot?

That was, for all practical purposes, forfeiting the game.

Naturally, the fox-eared woman on screen had declared that a pitching change was inevitable. And yet—

[Wh-what? He STAYS in? Baseball of faith?!!?! Does such a thing put food on the table, I ask thee! It is not his spirit that has reached its limit, thou senseless pitching coach — it is his BODY!]

[What? We are still ahead, and it is but the bottom of the fifth, so we shall "have faith"? If thou wishest to win the game, then think on how to PROTECT the lead!]

The pitching coach trotted out, patted his pitcher on the shoulder, told him to gut it out a little longer because the bullpen wasn't ready — planting courage in him, or so he seemed to believe — while the Kium starter looked back at his coach with eyes full of dread. The camera lingered on that exchange.

[Look at him! He wants no part of walking off that mound! Where in those eyes dost thou see confidence, I ask! He is weeping to be saved! He is not writing down the answer — he is BEGGING to be told the answer, is he not!!]

The fox — no, the woman — enraged by the coach's boneheaded judgment, soon raised her voice as if half-arguing with her own viewers.

[What? A "burden on the next pitcher"? Worshippers, burden finds a pitcher at every turn, and it is overcoming that burden which makes one a professional. Is it not precisely to overcome such burdens that they are paid handsome salaries to take the field!]

[High school pitchers endure and conquer such burdens just to climb this far! If his delivery began shaking violently as early as the FOURTH inning, the bullpen should have been up and loosing long ago — yet only with nobody out and runners on first and second in the fifth do thou lazily set them loose, and then, because the bullpen isn't ready with the bases loaded, "thou shalt hold the line thyself!" How irresponsible can one be! Are the manager and coaches scarecrows? If so, go sit among the fans in the stands and eat chicken! The whole lot of the incompetent!!]

[What? He need only say with his own mouth that he wishes to come down, sayest thou? Thou wouldst have him pronounce, in his own words, the very sentence that banishes him to the minors?]

[It is the pitching coach who must carry to the manager the words the player cannot bring himself to say, and smooth the way on his behalf! And before even that, he should have checked the pitcher's condition and set the bullpen working!! What in blazes were they doing during their entire turn at bat, I ask!]

After the coach's mound visit and a brief exchange, the Kium starter resumed his windup—

And just before the first pitch, with the bases loaded and his command nowhere to be found, the catcher flashed a sign: challenge the zone with strike one.

The woman's voice stopped dead. She leaned back in her chair with the serenity of one who had achieved enlightenment, radiating an unmistakable air of I am done.

[I congratulate thee, fans of Hwana. I fear this game tips greatly, and greatly forever, from this moment on.]

Scarcely had her words — a pronouncement of doom delivered like a promise of thunder — faded when the highlight began to play.

CRACK────!!

The bat, swung without a shred of hesitation, caught the ball flush and lifted it skyward.

And then—

"It's up high! High and deep!"

The commentator's voice swelled in an instant.

"Noh Si-hwan! Noh Si-hwan has crushed it!"

The ball kept carrying, and carrying. The left fielder took a few steps back — and stopped dead.

Because he already knew. The trajectory was headed for the wall, and there was nothing left to do about it.

"It's gone!"

"It's GOOOONE! The ball just keeps sailing!"

"It clears the wall with room to spare!!!"

A colossal roar erupted from the stands.

"NOH SI-HWAN'S GRAND SLAAAAAAAAAM!!!"

"THE LEAD HAS CHANGED!!"

"Four to six! Hwana turns this game on its head in a single swing!!"

The moment Noh Si-hwan confirmed the ball had cleared the wall, he flipped his bat away, easy as anything, and began his unhurried trot toward first base.

The broadcast cut between shot after shot: fans in the stands throwing both arms to the sky the instant they felt it, and the Kium starting pitcher clutching his head as if he simply could not believe it.

"WOW!"

"THIS is Noh Si-hwan!"

"Noh Si-hwan DELIVERS!"

"Three hits in his last twenty at-bats! Noh Si-hwan had been mired in a brutal, miserable slump... BUT!"

"At the most crucial moment of the game, he produces the one swing they needed most!"

Excitement bled through even the commentator's measured tone.

"And not just any home run!"

"Bases loaded, nobody out! A go-ahead grand slam, struck with his team trailing by two!"

"This one swing shows you exactly WHY Noh Si-hwan is the face of Hwana's lineup!"

"That's right."

The color commentator caught his breath and picked up the thread.

"His timing at the plate had been off. Genuinely off."

"But a star shows what he's made of in moments exactly like this one."

"Three hits in his last twenty at-bats, the slump, the hitless night he'd been having until now —"

"One swing wipes it ALL away!"

The stands erupted yet again.

"Noh Si-hwan!"

"Noh Si-hwan!"

"Noh Si-hwan!"

And Noh Si-hwan, home run ball soaring behind him, began rounding the bases.

The voices of Hwana's fans shook the entire stadium.

"This is the moment Hwana fans have waited for and waited for!!"

"Hwana — flailing in the swamp of a thirteen-game losing streak!"

"Will today finally be the day they break it?!"

The commentator paused for breath, then shouted, unable to contain himself:

"And at the very center of it all stands Noh Si-hwan!!"

"Could this one swing be the signal flare announcing Hwana's escape from the losing streak?!"

"The game is not over yet!"

"But Hwana's home crowd is finally smiling!!"

The screen showed Noh Si-hwan sprinting for home, and the thunder of the crowd rolled on and on.

"Kium's pitching coach is heading ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠out to the mound... yes, they're finally pulling Lee Hyun-jun, who could not survive the bottom of the fifth."

After that, the woman's stream lit up with chat — viewers heaping abuse on Kium's starting pitcher and cursing the pitching coach's incompetence, the screen scrolling too fast to read.

She scrambled to walk back the more emotional things she'd blurted out, barely stitching the broadcast back together as it rolled on — and then, in the bottom of the eighth, when Kium's pitching decisions handed over twelve more runs, the look of serene, enlightened surrender on her face was a thing of beauty.

"PWahaha! That's Kium for you."

"Ahem! This broadcast is in no way, shape, or form intended to disparage any particular player? Pfft—"

Kang-il laughed himself silly for a good long while, then quietly slid the donation video into his saved files.

"WAAAH! No, wait, what is wrong with you people?! Weren't we on the same side?! And since when is this 'just a girl streamer'? Where on earth do you find a girl streamer who actually understands baseball?! With that level of analysis from the first inning on, she might be an industry insider for all we know!"

Kang-il had, more or less by accident, correctly guessed the profession Lize held before becoming a fox god — but the fallout of having been caught hoarding girl-streamer footage buried the moment instantly.

"Ahem. Well, setting that aside — if this is for real, co-streaming a pro baseball broadcast with her might actually be pretty fun?"

"As if she'd go for that! Anyway... a co-stream... haaah. I suppose I should at least ask whether she's interested."

"All of you. Out."

Banning the viewers whose brains had fully melted, Kang-il wrapped up the small talk and got his actual broadcast underway in earnest.

.

.

.

I stole a glance at the viewer counter in the bottom corner of my stream.

Two hundred and eighty.

All of this had happened in a single day. One video analyzing a single game had made the rounds online, then spread even among the major-league streamers via video donations — and now, despite my stream having no set schedule at all, people kept pouring in.

"Hmmm..."

The Fox God Lize gazed quietly at the climbing viewer count for a long moment. Then, silently, she moved her mouse.

While her viewers scrambled in confusion, Lize posted in the now-darkened chat.

In the days to come, the clip of this broadcast would live on forever as one of the precious few blemishes on Lize's otherwise spotless record.