Chapter Text
“Is that–”
“Could it be–”
“Tokyo Skytree!?” Tora and Tomio exclaimed together.
Yahaba sighed gustily, looking skyward in a bid for patience. “That’s a transmission tower.”
The correction didn’t do much to subdue the pair's enthusiasm. They were probably lucky Tomio didn’t start clapping in excitement like a fucking five year old.
A guy with a mohawk and Nekoma jacket elbowed Karasuno's Baldy. “Where have I heard that one before?"
Yahaba stopped trying to kindly wrangle Tora and Tomio, and signaled to Watari with their not-so-secret hand sign to take over babysitting duty. Watari nodded and started casually corralling the two by regaling them with some tale about Iwaizumi and Oikawa.
Yahaba turned to address the two other guys of the four-man greeting squad. The two who hadn’t spoken yet: he recognized one of them as Ennoshita only cause he was wearing a Karasuno jacket and was completely forgettable looking. The other guy next to him wore a Nekoma jacket and looked eerily like Manekineko. Something about the eyes.
How the team had ended up here, he wasn’t sure. He assumed Yahaba had used his dark magic and fluffy hair secrets to talk someone on Karasuno’s management into a practice camp in some random Tokyo suburb. Irihata had thought it was a good idea and yes, let's definitely spend the week with Seijoh's greatest rival, that sounds like an excellent idea that will in no way go horribly badly... So here they were, in cat territory.
Apparently, it was a big deal, having a chance to play national-level teams or something. Which, great and all, but wouldn’t be worth much if, say, any of Seijoh’s players ended up in jail.
Yahaba bowed formally and said in his Polite Voice, “Thank you for having us, Fukunaga-san.” The stoic Manekineko bowed back wordlessly.
Ah, cat captain then.
“We’re glad Aobajohsai could join us,” Ennoshita said with a smile. “It’ll be nice to have an even number of teams this time."
Oh man, Yahaba was going to absolutely eviscerate this guy. It was fine, though. Everything was fine. Kyoutani just needed to make it through the week without anyone on the team starting a fight with the Crows. And make sure Yahaba didn’t piss off every other team at this camp. And keep the Saitos from staging a mutiny.
Yeah, he didn’t like his chances, but what else was new?
Seijoh’s appointed four-man greet team led them to the main gym and the moment they stepped inside his ears were assaulted.
A black colored mass of shrieking and squawking everywhere, and damn, how had these fuckers gotten even louder since he’d last seen the flock of freaks? Was their team cursed or something? Cause now they had some midget loudmouth chattering at light speed to Karasuno’s team manager. The poor girl looked increasingly anxious as the kid got bouncier and more animated by the microsecond. Kyoutani felt sorry for her.
Of course, there was the libero yelling about lighting and twirling or something, which only got worse when Baldy and Mohawk –seriously? He isn’t even a crow– joined forces creating a noisy tornado of hollering delinquents. Close by, Shorty and Grumpy were caught up in the «no I don’t - yes you do» cycle from hell and growing progressively louder. It was like someone was holding their finger on the volume-up button.
Jesus fucking christ.
Kunimi popped out of thin air, and the extra energy lent by the power of his contempt for hyperactive simpletons must have been significant because he looked legit annoyed. “Incoming murder,” he grumbled. “And they have another pocket-sized volleyball idiot incapable of speech at under seventy-five decibels. Just what Karasuno needed.”
“Is that a murder of crows joke or a reference to how someone will probably end up dead?” Kindaichi asked, sounding thoughtful instead of worried. He should have worried. Kyoutani was worried. Kunimi’s wrath was a cold and subtle knife you never saw coming, and he really didn’t want Kunimi stabbing people.
“Por que no los dos?” The Saitos said in horrible, noisy synchrony.
As if he didn't have enough headaches to deal with, he could feel Yahaba zeroing in on a new target. His boyfriend couldn’t pull an Aone lock-on with his hand otherwise occupied with Kyoutani’s (shout out to the benefits of hand-holding), but he still squeezed Yahaba’s hand in warning. The asshole could at least wait until after introductions to start his regularly scheduled bullshit.
Yahaba smiled down at him cheekily, eyes glinting with malicious joy. “You’re so cute when you worry about me.”
“So, Kyoutani’s cute all the time?” quipped Tetsu.
Kyoutani’s head whipped around. “Fuck off, Saito,” he snarled back. “Mind your own goddamn business!”
Yahaba pinched one of Kyoutani’s cheeks, bringing his attention back over to him again. “Cute,” he cooed, all Stevia sweetness and terror, asshole grin firmly in place. Then he switched to smooshing Kyoutani’s cheeks between his palms. “Definitely cute. All of the time.”
Kyoutani managed some kind of garbled noise. Possibly a protest, possibly his brain crashing, but definitely pathetic. This boy was out to eat his heart and Kyoutani was one hundred percent vulnerable.
“Please do not break Kyoutani before we even start,” Watari admonished. “We need our ace in working order.”
“He’s already a broken man,” Tora pointed out.
Um, fucking rude.
“Serving some serious tea,” said Kunimi not sounding annoyed at all.
???
When had Kunimi stopped wanting to vigorously drown Tora any time they got within ten feet of each other? Obviously, finding out Yahaba had Kyoutani leashed instead of the other way around had damaged his reputation with Tora, but still. Kunimi? Seriously? It was bad enough that he’d collected Tetsu, but now he was corrupting Tora, too.
(Okay, whatever, maybe Kyoutani was broken. But his asshole teammates were entirely responsible for that, so. )
“Please do not break Kyoutani any further,” Watari rephrased and gave Yahaba a stern look that would do jackshit to stop Yahaba, but Kyoutani was thankful for any scrap of sympathy people threw his way.
“Cause then we’ll be without an ace,” Watari added. “And I’m not going to find you a new one or be your substitute co-captain if you damage him. You bought him, you brake him, your problem.”
Never mind. Watari was a grade-A asshole.
But miracle of miracles: Yahaba actually toned down his flirtations, restricting himself to their old, comfortable flirt-fighting instead of this newest setting Yahaba had developed. One that involved a lot of embarrassment on Kyoutani’s part, and Yahaba channeling a very affectionate koala or, like, hello kitty on a handful of benzo’s. Aka, Setting #3: the Octopus Cling. Which basically involved melting Kyoutani's brain via shows of affection and Yahaba permanently attaching himself to Kyoutani at all available opportunities. The guy would grow six new arms and all of them would be all over him in whatever capacity Kyoutani would allow– lots of aggressive hand holding, an arm slung over Kyoutani’s shoulder, being guided along with a hand resting between his shoulder blades or lower back. And, on days Kyoutani was extra hissy, Yahaba leaning just the barest bit against his side when they sat or stood together.
Oh, it also included his teammates laughing at him; that was a thing, too. And one he could’ve done without, thanks.
(Once, when it was just them and Watari, Kyoutani let him get away with standing behind him, his pointy chin resting on his shoulder and arms wrapped around Kyoutani in a backwards hug. But that was the limit of what Yahaba could get away outside closed doors. He didn’t let Yahaba kiss him in public either, which Yahaba had whined about since Kyoutani had kissed him in public that one time. But whatever, Captain Creampuff just had to deal.)
Anyways, while the coaches were huddled up –planning the rotation for the matches or whatever– the rest of them waited for the first round of games to start and sadly Yahaba was in setting #2 again. He’d been banking hard on #1, but Kyoutani was never that lucky.
#1 Setter Mode Activated: this was the Serious Yahaba option, most commonly occurring when it came to school volleyball matches, self-improvement, running practice, and other captain duties. This was his only emotionally balanced setting. The Good Captain setting was the one thing that had kept Tomio and Tora in one piece despite how Yahaba wanted to, like, kill them real dead for a little while there. This setting also included Yahaba’s Game Face, which was fucking adorable and Kyoutani immediately wanted to set himself on fire every time for even thinking that.
#2 Drama Queen of the Court: Arguably, Kyoutani’s least favorite setting (not counting the defunct Superficial & Shallow setting) because a spotlight seeking Yahaba was a pain in the ass who did stupid shit like throwing shade so hard it could emotionally cripple someone, chronic flirting with other teams managers, tapping into the power of his resident brain demon, and getting down on one knee and asking someone Kyoutain out in front of their entire team, their coach, their opponents, the spectators in the stands, and God himself.
But at the same time, Kyoutani was kinda about it. Maybe all about it. Which was weird, but he’d made a certain amount of peace with it because the other option was obsessing about it. And that was just exhausting– why waste energy on useless shit when he could be like, playing volleyball or kissing Yahaba’s stupid, mean pouty face.
So that meant he was stuck sitting through Yahaba’s flirting routine. Always annoying as shit, but more because it was boring as fuck than any kind of jealousy. Kyoutani suspected that ninety percent of the reason Yahaba kept up the tradition was Yahaba being hungry for any and all of Kyoutani’s attention. It was just another what-the-fuck in an endless string of deeply weird ways Yahaba showed his affection. Nothing showed how much you cared about your boyfriend like hitting on the enemy, right?
Yahaba moved on from the manager in the yellow shirt suspiciously fast, though. Maybe angling for another team's lady manager, because wow, there were a lot of them here. But maybe he was...
…maybe he was '''casually''' meandering in the direction of the Karasuno flock, 'cause that sure as hell looked like he was doing.
Kyoutani followed and wasn’t that surprised to find Yahaba picking a fight with the bouncing tangerine. The guy was such an obvious choice for tormenting –with the yelling and jumping and flailing and his general everythingness– it was like Shorty was begging other teams to taunt him. He had Easy Target written across his forehead in neon lights.
Well, at least this would be more amusing to watch than Yahaba fake being a lady killer.
“Hey Chibi-chan, grown any taller since last time?”
Hinata puffed up proudly and proclaimed, “I’m over 166 centimetres now!”
Yahaba cocked an eyebrow and tilted his head to the side in a way that managed to ooze skepticism. “Is that so?”
“Yes!” Hinata said defensively. “At least two centimeters taller!”
Skepticism intensifying.
“Hm, if you say so. Honestly, it feels like you’ve gotten shorter, but I must be mistaken,” and without giving the slightest opening, Yahaba swanned off, throwing back a casual, “Careful not to snipe Kageyama-kun in the head again!” for good measure, and Shorty was left making a sound like a mangled squeaky toy.
While Shorty kept making more gwaaah noises and had a fit of minor flailing, Kyoutani caught Glasses smirking in the background. Those nerdy glasses caught the light, making them shine like this asshole was a D-grade villain straight out of a 90’s anime. He had to be doing that on purpose, right?
Glasses said something to Hinata that Kyoutani didn’t catch, but a righteous smirk played across his face and whatever the guy said elicited more sounds. Things like: hngggurrr and wuuuaghhh . Plus some bonus hollering of “Dammit Tsukishima!” and “So mean!”
That wouldn’t be the end of it, though, not by a long shot. There was no universe where Yahaba would be satisfied with making a jab at Shrimpy’s height. The evil creampuff wouldn’t be satisfied until he achieved maximum drama.
Yahaba easily interrupted Kyoutani’s brooding over the oncoming reckoning. It didn’t take anything more than Yahaba walking up to him with that little self-satisfied smirk. Because Kyoutani was a sad, weak man, who was not built to withstand this kind of thing.
“Sounds like we’re up against Ubugawa first,” Yahaba said brightly and proffered his arm in invitation. “Shall we?”
Kyoutani grudgingly held out his own arm, letting Yahaba link them together– fucking wizard-of-Oz style. He did manage to draw a hard line when Yahaba tried to get him to skip. He'd like to at least pretend he had some dignity, thanks.