Chapter Text
The steam from the shower seeped through the shared bathroom, soft footsteps approaching the shared bedroom in the dormitories. Hiori Yo rarely ever sleeps on schedule, always after midnight, always the last to close his eyes; he tosses his towel at the end of the bed and grabs his phone to play some random game he downloaded when he was bored; out of the corner of his eye he spots Isagi rewatching the match against PXG.
“Dont'cha usually sleep by now?” Hiori ponders as his eye catches Rin’s face on the screen; they’ve interacted a few times, he thinks Rin is an incredible player, determined and firece.
“Is it distracting you? Sorry, the adrenaline is still pumping I guess.” Isagi scratches the back of his head in embarrassment; Hiori doesn’t really get mad at Isagi, they did win so he supposes it’s not too embarrassing to continuously rewatch the match.
“Don’t apologize, ya should be proud.” Hiori sends him a small smile and begins to turn around so he could play his game when Rin pops again on Isagi’s screen.
Rin has his tongue out, ‘it’s crude and gross’ people say, but in between Hiori’s thoughts, it’s admirable and kind of…cute. Hiori wishes he could play more with Rin, the way he destroys opponents on the field sends electric shocks along his spine all the way to his fingertips, he wonders what it would be like being Rin’s ‘key’; the destroyer and the ultra-sadist.
“Is something wrong? You’re staring.” Isagi’s question breaks Hiori out of his trance.
“Nothin’, just wonderin’ what playing with Rin would be like.” Isagi chuckles a little, what’s so funny?
“I mean you’ll play with him in the U-20 World Cup right? We both will, we got in.” Hiori isn’t sure why his stomach churns at that, ‘we both will’, it’s not like he can dictate who Rin should play with, he’s just curious not jealous.
“Also Bachira invited us to eat together for breakfast to celebrate us playing in the U-20 World Cup.” Isagi turns the screen off and Hiori is a little disappointed he can’t see Rin destroying the field, even if they were opponents.
“‘Kay, I’ll try to wake up early enough.” Hiori turns to lays on his side and logs in to his game, he’ll try to sleep before 4 am.
Maybe he should’ve slept earlier, at least 2 am. Hiori is going to blame his sleep-deprived mind as to why he’s in this difficult predicament.
“You can’t back out now Hiorin!” Bachira laughs as Hiori’s face drains of its colour as five 4+ cards are stacked against him, he begrudgingly takes 20 cards from the deck and a flicker hope lights up at the amount of skips before Aiku puts down a reverse card and his last card down, after 30 minutes of playing it had trickled down to just him and Aiku and now he’s the loser.
“Are you sure he ain't cheatin’? I mean how could someone have five plus four cards?” Hiori tries to plead with Otoya, who set this stupid bet up at 7 in the morning.
“No chance, just admit you lost Hiori.” Otoya snickers as Hiori bangs his head down on the table.
“For a gamer you’re shit at card games.” That bastard Karasu sneers and all Hiori can do is glare at him from below his bangs.
“I’m just sleep-deprived!” He defends but Karasu laughs at him even more. Hiori looks at Otoya and hopes his big eyes are enough to convince Otoya to lessen the blow of whatever bullshit he decides to force Hiori through.
“Since you lost you have to fulfill 5 dares from us!” Otoya grins like he won the lottery and pretends to think of the worst dares to force Hiori through, he’s so gonna kick a ball at Otoya’s face during practice.
“Hiori, pick between Isagi and Shidou.” Otoya crosses his arms like some sort of haughty emperor and Hiori is some peasant begging for mercy, he probably is.
“What for?” Hiori raises his eyebrow in question.
“Just pick.”
“Then, I choose Isagi.” Otoya’s grin spreads until it reaches his ears, and a shiver or terror runs up Hiori’s skin.
“Isagi, choose a dare for Hiori.” Isagi’s eyes instantly widen and genuinely starts to think it through, why can’t he just dare Hiori to drink coffee with salt or something.
“What’s on our training agenda today?” Isagi asks and Hiori slumps into his chair even further, if he has to run ten laps around the facility…
“We’re doing partner work aren’t we?” Reo answers and Nagi silently slumps into Reo further as he continues leeching off Reo feeding him, making Hiori want to barf.
“Then, I dare you to ask Rin to be your partner.” Hiori goes rock still, before sitting up straight again to cover his face and groans, at least he won’t have to murder Isagi for this dare; he actually does want some one-on-one training session with Rin, so he’ll use this as an excuse.
“I mean weren’t you basically admiring Rin last night, your eyes wouldn’t stray from my screen when Rin was on it.” Isagi chuckles, and Hiori knows Isagi isn’t the type to embarrass Hiori like that, maybe it was just an observation Isagi made out of goodwill; but when the entire table turns silent and when Hiori opens his eyes to see everyone staring at him in disbelief…
Maybe he should drop Isagi off a cliff.
“No way! Does Hiori have a crush on Rin?” Yukimiya opens his good-for-nothing mouth while Hiori is still deciding whether he should dunk Isagi into his cereal bowl.
“It's not like that! I just want to know what playing with him would feel like!” Hiori smacks the table as he’s surrounded by disbelieving eyes and mischievous smirks, especially from one Otoya Eita, he's definitely going to kick a ball so hard to his face that-
“You should all be quiet.” Speak. of. the. devil. Hiori hesitantly turns around to see Rin Itoshi glare at the entire table with those freezing teal eyes of his.
Before Hiori could apologize, he sees the retreating back of Rin grow smaller as he exits the cafeteria. He feels someone push him and he barely has the time to readjust so he wouldn't fall face first on the floor.
“Remember the dare, lover boy~” Hiori sends a weak glare at the table full of traitors as he exits the cafeteria and gets ready to change his clothes.
Hiori is going to bang his head on every possible surface until he gets a concussion, therefore he won't remember he has to do the stupid dare and embarrass himself even further; what if Rin rejects his offer? Hiori slides down the walls of the training room just outside where Rin is currently training, hopefully Rin doesn't know Hiori is currently losing his mind just thinking of talking to him.
“Nanase stop messing around.” Hiori perks up when he hears Rin's voice, but quickly deflates when he realises Nanase beat him to asking Rin to train with him; Hiori sighs and sulks behind the entrance when he hears Rin’s voice being impossibly closer.
“...Hiori?” Hiori jolts his head up and meets eye to eye to Rin, who's currently looking at him while leaning against the doorway while sweat beads between his furrowed brows and heavily panting from training and-
“Hiori.” He wants to bang his head against the wall again, he was caught shamelessly staring at Rin’s face.
“I was gonna ask if ya wanna be partners, I guess Nanase beat me to it.” Hiori chuckles as he gets up to leave and hopefully save face from looking utterly pathetic.
“Nanase? He's not here.” Rin tilts his head in confusion and admittedly he looks cute like that.
“But yer was callin’ his name?” Hiori also tilts his head, mirroring Rin in his confusion.
“I thought you were Nanase, my bad.” Rin shakes his head and heads back into the training field, Hiori perks up again and chases after him into the training field, when Rin turns to look at Hiori there's a weird indescribable expression on his face; Hiori can't quite place the exact emotion but the slight widened eyes and parted lips makes Rin look really cute, he truly doesn't understand how people can think Rin is scary.
“So, can I be yer partner?” Hiori asks with poorly hidden anticipation and that weird expression on Rin grows more prominent.
“Sure, your passes might be one of few that aren't lukewarm.” Rin grumbles as he rattles off what he expects from Hiori, but really Rin looks adorable like this with his eyebrows furrowed in concentration.
“Don't worry, I'll be focused on bein’ yer key.” Hiori gives a thumbs up as he leans down to stretch before Ego puts them through some questionable training.
“Key?” Rin tilts his head again in that endearing way which makes Hiori let out a quiet laugh.
“I'll be the key to help ya score, since ya said my passes aren't lukewarm.” Hiori grins as he continues to explain his egoist dream, all the while Rin stares at him intently like Hiori can help unravel the whispers of the universe.
“You don't wanna score?” Rin starts stretching too, but he pauses in between to observe Hiori, or rather Hiori’s face; Is he making a weird expression?
“It'd be nice, but it's not my priority ya know? I'm here to help you score, so I'll pass ya the ball perfectly as many times as you like if ya can show me that destroyer ego of yours.” Rin's eyes go wide for a second before schooling them down into his usual steadiness; and to both their surprise Rin’s mouth curls up ever so slightly.
“Okay, I'll be waiting for your passes, ultra-sadist.” Hiori thinks time suddenly sped up, because why else would his heart start beating so wildly beneath his chest, he thinks that at any moment the fluttering organ would jump out of his skin and lunge at Rin.
“You should smile more, it’s cute.” Hiori gives a small smile towards Rin, and his mind goes berserk as he spots the tips of Rin’s ears grow crazy red.
“We should get going.” Rin mumbles under the training vest as he hands out his arm for Hiori to grab.
Currently they're against Otoya and Karasu, Ego said the pair that can score first will gain more points -rapid fire round-, meaning they can afford better items in Blue Lock, maybe steak for dinner.
Hiori dribbles the ball pass Otoya and changes to a shooting position and aims for the goal, Karasu is right in front of the ball, thankfully Hiori wasn't aiming for goal; the ball curves right during as it enters the penalty box and goes straight to-
“Rin!” Hiori yells out, the ball quickly lands in Rin's feet and with Karasu on the other end of the goal post, he takes a shot and-
GOAL!
Itoshi Rin and Hiori Yo wins.
“That pass was…incredible.” Hiori can feel his face burn up at Rin's compliment, someone pinch him.
“Since when did Mr ‘Everything is lukewarm' learn to compliment other people.” Hiori teases Rin and Otoya cringes in the distance waiting for Rin to berate Hiori, surprisingly all they hear is a scoff from Rin.
“Don't think too much of it, it just so happens you're good at passing.” Hiori lets out a big hearty laugh and leans on Rin for support, he half expects to be shoved off but it doesn’t happen.
“Hiori! pass the ball, we're up against Aiku and Sendou next.” Hiori glances back at Otoya and his mood sours a bit from earlier this morning, a little revenge won't hurt no one…
“Sure thing.” Hiori gives Otoya one of his casual smiles before kicking the ball right in the abdomen.
“Fuck! Owwww, what was that for?” Otoya is reeling on the ground as he clutches his stomach.
“My foot slipped.” Hiori shrugs before tugging Rin along to the next match with a satisfied smile on his face. As they enter he sees Isagi and Bachira, Hiori waves at them but momentarily pauses when he feels a strange murderous aura behind him; he turns around to see Rin growling and glaring daggers into Isagi.
“Rin, pass the ball.” Bachira calls out, as Rin's foot touches the ball he sends it flying all the way to Isagi’s stomach.
“What the fuck was that for?!” Isagi rages as Bachira helps him stand up.
“My foot slipped.” Hiori giggles a little when he realises Rin is copying him, and out of the corner of his eye he sees Rin's smile quirk up behind a hand; He's really adorable like this.
Dare 1 Complete
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Hiori’s getting ready for dinner when he feels an lingering presence behind him, looming like a ghost, when he turns back it’s the captain of the U-20 -maybe former captain-; Hiori furrows his eyebrows and quickly puts on his shirt as he leans on locker to silently invite him into the locker room.
“Is something wrong?” Hiori shoves his towel into the hamper and sits down on the bench to observe as Aiku comes closer with a mischievous smile, now Hiori feels rather uneased.
“Since you lost to me this morning, I’m choosing your next dare.” So this is what it’s about, he braces himself for another stupid dare as Aiku’s smile grows wider like the Cheshire Cat.
“How many points did you get from the training session?” Aiku narrows his eyes as Hiori tries to remember, since him and Rin won all five matches then…
“50? I’m not entirely sure, I don’t really remember.” Hiori stands up to head for the exit and patiently waits for Aiku to make his decision on another stupid dare.
“Buy me a steak with your points.” Aiku points his index finger at him as Hiori stretches and yawns, he rubs at his eyes and nods along to Aiku's dare, it's not too bad.
“Okay, let's go to the cafeteria.” Hiori walks through the halls and the scent of freshly cooked food and laughter of young boys invades his senses; he prefers to eat in solidarity but it's nothing he can't handle.
Hiori walks up to the machine and orders the steak, much to the drool of nearby teammates and envious looks of people nearby; he also orders a bowl of ochazuke for himself.
He sees Aiku's exaggerated hunger in his eyes and drops the tray in front of him; the other guys start whining and begging hiori to buy them steak too.
“Sorry, it was Aiku's dare.” Hiori bows slightly as an apology and finds a relatively empty space in the cafeteria, he would usually sit with Karasu but he's currently hanging out with Otoya and Yuki, probably doing some weird shit that Hiori would rather not know.
Hiori takes a seat by the end of the table and before he could even take a bite of the ochazuke a shadow looms over him, he sighs as he braces himself for another stupid dare in the span of an hour.
“What do you want-” Hiori eyes widen as he sees Rin glare at him with an indiscernible expression, it's a weird mix of confusion and annoyance; fuck, did he mess up somehow?
“Why are you eating the Ochazuke?” Hiori quirks his head as he stands by his side, holding his own tray; tense lines crease Rin's face.
“Can I not?” Hiori curls his mouth downward into a frown and picks up a mouthful of ochazuke while staring into the furrowed brows of Rin’s face. Rin glares at something beside him, following Rin's gaze he sees Aiku and Sendou laughing together and his confusion only increases.
“Why are ya glaring at’em?” Hiori sees at Rin’s eyes narrow even more before sighing and making eye contact with Hiori again; this time Hiori is able to appreciate the longer bottom lashes, the way it fans out like a kitten's whiskers.
“You gave him the beef with our points.” He says as if it's meant to explain the weird intense glaring at the U-20 captain and the star player, well the U-20 captain specifically.
“Oh, it's just a dare, I lost in a game so…” Rin scoffs and leaves quickly after, paying no mind to the short interaction; as Hiori comes to take another bite of the of his ochazuke the chair beside him moves, glancing in the direction of the newcomer the hand holding the chopsticks still as Rin sits down with his own dinner -beef, to be specific-.
“Take this.” Rin shoves the tray in his direction while evading Hiori’s eyes.
“Isn’t this yer meal?” Hiori blankly stares at the sizzling steak presented onto him, before glancing towards Rin who still refuses to meet his eyes.
“You shouldn’t give your meal to lukewarm fools like him.” Rin finally looks his way if only to glare at Oliver Aiku even in a more scalding gaze. Is Rin perhaps jealous? Hiori feels slightly giddy at the thought that Rin feels a sort of discomfort at Hiori being with someone else, is that weird?
“We earned those points, don’t waste it.” Hiori lowers his head in shame, he was silly for thinking someone like the prodigy would ever be jealous over him; it’s a nice thought though.
“Then what are you going to eat?” Hiori still hasn’t taken the steak no matter how juicy it looks, or how the melted butter flows down the beef.
Rin looks at Hiori and then looks at his ochazuke, he lifts up Hiori’s food and putting in front of him and takes a bite using the chopsticks in the bowl; and Hiori’s face flushes at the indirect kiss as he watches Rin continue eating the rice.
“Do you not like beef?” Hiori startles as Rin’s piercing eyes find his own Cyan ones, the closeness of their seats has allows them to feel the faint heat given off eachother, the lingering warmth from the showers and the whiff of the shared shampoo and body wash.
“I do, it’s just I feel bad ‘cause I don’t know if ya even like ochazuke.” Hiori tries to laugh it off and redirects his gaze on beef but the near inhuman glow emanating from Rin’s ocean eyes commands Hiori’s full attention.
“It’s one of my favourite foods, don’t worry.” Rin breaks away and focuses on finishing the meal, Hiori absently nods and takes a bite of the steak, which melts in his mouth as the juices invades his mouth; and it continues like with the pair sitting in comfortable silence, only the sounds of utensils clanking and the shuffling of food.
“Thank you for the steak, I’ll pay you back someday.” Hiori smiles at Rin, a small, quiet smile; before taking his tray and moving to go back to the dorms, oblivious to the small pout Rin has adorned on his face that pairs with the unwavering gaze on Hiori retreating back.
Unbeknownst to either of them, a rather mischievous smile has planted itself onto the back of one scheming Karasu.
Dare 2 Complete
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It’s in the early morning when Hiori is practicing his shots that the tell-tale sign of impending doom washes over him in waves of fear as he spots the familiar sharp angles of his old school football teammate.
“Karasu?” Hiori stops the ball under the toes in his cleat and wipes his sweat using the training vests provided by Blue Lock.
“Out of curiosity, What dare are you on?” Hiori starts cursing out Otoya once again, but nothing Karasu gives him will be that bad…he hopes anyway.
“That maniac, Ego gave us a week off for Christmas and New years, before our official training for the U-20 qualifiers” Hiori nods slowly and starts playing with the ball at the bottom of his sole while waiting for Karasu to finish whatever build-up justification he wants to say to do the dare he’ll eventually do anyway.
“Some of the other guys are planning to go out on New Year’s Eve and I want you to come.” Karasu starts rattling off but Hiori’s much more focused on practicing his dribbling, bounces the ball on the ground before shuffling his feet to practice step-ups.
“That my dare? To hang out with friends.” Hiori snorts as he uses his heel to fling the ball in an arch over him.
“Well, yes and no.” As the ball lands in front of his shooting leg, Hiori prepares to take the shot as the BlueLock man stands as his only adversary between him and the goal.
“You dare is to ask Rin out.”…Perhaps the BlueLock man isn’t the only adversary as he gets caught violently off-guard that the shot wasn’t even on target and zipped 5 meters left of the goal post.
Hiori whips his head so fast that Karasu briefly worries that he snapped his neck, his bright cyan eyes open impossibly as his jaw drops enough for a bug to fit itself inside and choke him.
“Repeat that?” Heat creeps up onto his cheeks that he will blame on the exhaustion from practicing and not the thought of him and Rin on a date.
“Ask Rin out.” Hiori turn even more impossibly red to match those of a shiny red apple.
“I ain’t askin’ Rin out on a date?!” He simply can’t, Rin wouldn’t even spare him more than a 10 second glance on most days, and the occasional sings of praise when they practice; just because Hiori wants to play with him on-field doesn’t mean anything personal off-field, right?
“I didn’t say anything about a date.” Karasu has the nerve to chuckle at Hiori as he walks back into the hallway he came from; Hiori stares at the dark hallway and slumps on the grass while his brain and heart is overheating just thinking of how to get Rin as his New Year’s partner.
With a new resolute determination Hiori steels himself as he prepares himself to ask out his football-crush which is totally from the fact that he looks up to him and would love to play as Rin’s midfielder, and nothing else.
He walks into the cafeteria with a slight tremble to his figure as he spots the back of the raven-haired striker’s head and takes notice that he’s sitting alone again, just like always; it’s nothing new, as far as Hiori can remember Rin has always sat alone unless someone came to sit with him, even still it was always a seemingly one-sided conversation.
But now Rin’s loneliness strikes out to him even more, he doesn’t want to pry and should probably chalk it up to the fact it might be a personal preference to sit alone, Hiori can understand; but the lone boy sitting in a field of others that all share a common interest…Hiori knows all too well.
He takes in a deep breath and approaches Rin from behind, he slides the chair out and sits himself beside Rin and settles his breakfast on the table right beside his, and already Hiori can feel the weird awkward tension between them thicken as they both continue with their breakfast.
Hiori’s mind is racing a mile a minute as he tries to think of ideas and conversation starters to trail to asking Rin out. He glances at Rin’s plate to find that there’s barely any protein, only a sad mess of a scrambled egg, Hiori lets out a small huff before taking one of his sausages and placed it upon Rin’s plate, which Rin turns his head around in a confused pout which Hiori wants to kiss away- huh?!
“Why’d you do that?” Hiori lets out a confused hum and watches how Rin picks up his utensils and pokes at the sausage.
“Why’d you give me one of your sausages?” Rin’s face copies Hiori’s confused face and his eyes glimmer and demands Hiori for an answer to something so trivial.
“Ya proteins are lackin’, as yer’ senior I hafta take care of my underclassmen.” Hiori chuckles as he observes how Rin’s eyes gaze back onto his breakfast; he picks up a fork and eats the sausage, Rin chews for a bit and looks away but Hiori can see his ears growing red again.
“I can take care of myself.” Rin mumbles as he picks up his food again while hearing Hiori chuckle again.
“I know, that’s why I wanna take care of ya’.” Hiori gives Rin a gentle smile and goes back to eating. It parallels just like yesterday when they sat next to each other in comfortable silence eating dinner, except Hiori’s hand is slightly trembling as he remembers that stupid dare.
“There’s gonna be a break next week before the training for qualifiers.” Rin suddenly starts as he puts his utensil down and lowers his head down so his bangs cover his eyes, and Hiori tries everything in his power to not tuck his bangs to the side.
“I heard some of the other guys talking about going out on New Year’s Eve, to see the fireworks near the bay.” Rin tilts his head in a way so his eye lagoon-coloured eyes peeks out to stare at Hiori’s ocean ones.
“Bachira invited me to join, I was going to decline…” Rin’s eyes flutter around in nervousness(?). He looks away and sits up straight to hold Hiori’s full attention.
“Do you wanna…come with me? It won’t be that lukewarm if you’ll be there.”Hiori’s eyes glisten in excitement like the ocean waves and his smile splits into a heart-warming sight as his cheeks become flushed.
“Of course! I’d love to come with ya!” Hiori nods aggressively and quickly pulls out his phone and slides it over.
“I have a training session with Kurona and Niko soon, punch in yer’ number and we can chat.” After Rin puts his contacts he hands back the phone and gives Hiori a small wave as he heads to the showers.
—— —— ——
“Rin! How was lunch?! Did you run here? Your face is red.”
“Shut up you bumbling bee.”
“So much hostility…”
“Don’t mind him, Bachira, and put your cleats on, we have training in 10!”
“Why the rush Yoi-kun, can’t wait to devour me huh?”
“…Go flirt somewhere else, you’re both disgusting…”
“You can’t be talking when you were literally looking at Hiori like you were in lo- Ack! Stop kicking balls to my stomach asshole!”
“How about you focus on your reflex rather than other people’s business, tepid bitch.”
—— —— ——
Dare 3 Complete(?)