Chapter Text
Tobio is dying.
He’d always thought he’d die after playing in at least three summer Olympics, ending his volleyball career with nation-wide recognition, and perhaps even breaking into the international leagues to stand on par with the likes of Nicollas Romero. He’d though he’d receive the news of his imminent death alongside the confirmation of a torn ACL, or something else just as career threatening, because his life might as well be forfeit if he can’t play volleyball. In only his single-most worst-case hypothetical is he hit with a death sentence at the beginning of his first year of high school.
And, well, the gods seem to have a sadistic sense of humuor.
He first learns of his fate on an otherwise inconspicuous Saturday. It’s been exactly one week since he’d submitted his application for the Karasuno Boys’ Volleyball Team, one week since he’d been kicked from the gym by the captain himself (it wasn’t his fault, he swears), and one week since resigning himself to rely on his boisterous upperclassman to win their upcoming match.
The other team—the blond asshole, his friend, and Sawamura—are annoying to play at best. They’re no Seijoh starting lineup, but neither is Tanaka, and the point gap ends up smaller than Tobio would’ve liked. The fact they’ve managed to consistently shut Hinata down hardly helps.
But it’s still early game. They can pull through. He can pull them though. He knows he can—but it’s a difficult task to think clearly when Tsuki-what’s-his-name keeps goading him. And when Hinata asks, the absolute asshole is all too happy to fill in the missing pieces; the reason they call him a king.
Tsuki-something-or-other spares him no mercy as he recounts the infamous tale of Tobio’s humiliating benching at the end of his last junior high game, how his own teammates, fed up to the brim with his bullshit, had turned their backs on him. And still—
“What’s so wrong with him being a king?”
Hinata doesn’t seem at all fazed by the story. He doesn’t sneer and turn his back, doesn’t seem as though he’s already given up, doesn’t look at him like the tyrant he’s come to be known as. Instead, his gaze bores into Tobio with an impatient sort of longing, like he’s waiting on Tobio to reveal the full extent of his kingliness, like he’s waiting for Tobio to send him a toss that’ll win them the match.
What’s so wrong with him being a king?
Not at all the reaction Tobio has come to expect.
There’s a weighty feeling behind his chest as they continue the match. They have the ball, they have a chance to break through, but who to send it to? And then—
“Kageyama!”
His chest tightens and his breath catches in his throat and his heart stutters all at once and there’s Hinata, flying through the air. Tobio reacts before he can second guess himself, switching his stance. He hears the ball whoosh towards Hinata, hears the ball make contact with his palm, and then the floor. When he turns, Sawamura’s on the ground, his hand outstretched just a few inches away from where the ball rolls off.
A quick attack. He’d just set a quick attack, and the impossible shrimp had nailed it. The weighty feeling is back again, making itself at home in his chest. It’s difficult to breath. He pushes the feeling away in favour of dragging Hinata off to plan their next move.
The feeling in his chest is joined by an almost feverish flush after Hinata dashes to the side and nails his second quick of the game—and is surprised. The boy jumps around, showing off his reddened palm to the upperclassmen, the joy evident on his face. Tobio is just as surprised as the rest; he knows he’s just that goof, but what idiot trusts someone enough to swing blindly and expect to score?
(What idiot indiscriminately trusts the King of the court to deliver them a ball they can hit?)
They resume play. The symptoms—the unfamiliar weight in his chest, the feverishness—are easy enough to push through while he’s on the court, because he’ll be damned if he lets a little heartburn keep him from wiping the smirk off the blondie’s face. It’s a grueling match, between Tsukishima’s antics and Hinata missing about seventy-five percent of his tosses, but they manage to pull through in two sets. Tobio is sweating and exhausted and totally not impressed by the quick attack Hinata’s managed to pull from his ass.
Not impressed one bit.
Off to the side, the scoreboard reads a victorious 21-25, but he’s more occupied with catching his breath and slowing his racing heart than gloating—he’ll have plenty of time for that later.
Somewhere in front of him, Hinata’s facedown on the disgusting gym floor, trying and succeeding in resembling a puddle of exhaustion. Tobio barely has a moment to collect himself before the shrimp turns towards him, and it’s like facing the sheer, unfettered glory of the sun itself. Tobio squints, scrambling for a snarky comment to deter Hinata’s grin, but stops when something in his chest cramps.
It’s an odd feeling: constricting, like the muscles that aid his lungs have stopped working, like his heart itself has stopped pumping. It’s entirely wrong.
There’s something wrong.
Tobio’s breath hitches in his throat and he turns away. His vision blurs as he makes his way for the gym doors, though whether it’s from exhaustion or the headrush as he stands or something entire different because there’s something wrong, he can’t tell.
“—ama?”
His hands are shaking and the floor is swaying and he must be having a heart attack—oh god, he’s actually dying.
“Kageyama?”
There are hands on his shoulders that keep him from pitching forward (good, because he can’t go getting a concussion on top of everything else). The wooden floor panels beneath his feet turn briefly to stone, then to grass; the sweaty gym air becomes cool. He’s outside. The weightiness is gone from his chest. His hands have stopped shaking. The hands on his shoulders belong to one concerned upperclassman.
Sugawara’s mouth is moving, his eyes trained on something over Tobio’s shoulder. Someone passes Tobio a water bottle and he drains it eagerly, coughing when he comes up for air. The older setter searches his face, no longer frenetic, his experssion now settling into something compassionate.
“Kageyama?” The person who speaks behind him moves into his peripheral vision: Ennoshita. “Are you okay?”
(He isn’t okay. He’s dying. These are symptoms of him dying.)
Tobio nods.
Sugawara lets go of his shoulders and takes a step back. “Are you ready to go back inside? Or do you need to take a longer break?”
(Briefly, he thinks the third year setter is nothing like Oikawa—and it’s not a bad thing.)
Tobio shakes his head. He can obsessively Google his condition, whatever it may be, later. Right now, he wants to hear—he needs to hear the captain congratulate them on their win, needs to hear the confirmation that he can play setter. He wordlessly follows Ennoshita back into the gym. Sugawara’s presence at his side, albeit comforting, does little to quell his worry.
Later, he decides. He can worry later.
The second he steps foot back into the gym, the middle school-sized supernova bounds over, face contorted with distress. It might have been more comical if Tobio hadn’t just had a brush with Death itself. Hinata’s saying something that Tobio can’t quite make out, rapid questions of concern jumbling together into a spew of word vomit. Those bright eyes never leave him.
Tobio’s chest squeezes again, bringing on another wave of anxiety. He can’t die. He’s not ready. Not yet. Not when he hasn’t even played one real match of high school volleyball. Not when he still has pretentious third year setters to best and old teammates to show up.
How when he has so much left to prove.
Hinata’s still staring at him, waiting—waiting for what? What had he been going on about?
“Anyone in there?” Hinata asks, head tilting to the side a he invites himself into Tobio’s personal space. “I said you should come talk to the other first years.” It’s an innocuous remark, and yet the feeling in his chest is joined by a sudden warmth blooming over his cheeks.
Oh, he’s so screwed.
Chest tightness.
Chest pain causes include:
- Asthma
- Coronary artery disease
- Costochondritis
- Heart attack
- Lung cancer
Tobio grimaces. None of those sound pleasant. He stops scrolling and tries something else: fever.
Fever or elevated body temperature may be caused by:
- A viral infection
- A bacterial infection
- Heat exhaustion
- Certain inflammatory conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis
- A cancerous (malignant) tumour
He stops reading. That’s two cancer diagnoses. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he vaguely registers that he is going to die. It’s quite the worrisome fate.
He lives with his revelation for two weeks and first breaks the news to Miwa.
It’s one of those rare weekends that she doesn’t have any lectures or any outings or any plans and is otherwise just bored of college life and has decided to grace Miyagi with her presence. They’re at a nice-ish ramen joint, nothing too expensive, just nice enough for Tobio to break the news.
(He thinks they might have been at a similarly nice-ish restaurant when they had gotten his grandfather’s diagnosis. Might as well make it a tradition.)
“I’m dying,” he says when she pauses her story to dig into her noodles. Miwa chokes, gently thumping her fist against her chest to relieve her airways. Tobio waits, the knuckles of his one hand white around his chopsticks, the other curled into a fist in his lap. He waits, patiently, for the horrified silence, then the pitiful look, and then the smothering of affection that he’ll do his best to quell.
“Who told you that?” Miwa finally asks, tentatively sipping her glass of water as she calms the last of her coughing fit.
“I wasn’t feeling well at practice so I did some research.”
“You did some research,” Miwa repeats flatly, her brows furrowed. “Alright. What did you find?”
“I think I have cancer.”
This time, Miwa’s coughing fit attracts attention, and she has to wave away a concerned waiter. She insists she’s alright before turning back to Tobio. “You seem to be taking the news awfully well.” Her brows are still pinched together and her lips are downturned. She speaks slowly, like she’s taking great care choosing her words. “Are you certain it’s cancer?”
Tobio pauses; in all honesty, there’s a low chance it is cancer, but there’s still a chance. He doesn’t want to imagine a world in which his volleyball career is cut short because he’d ignored a tumor. He doesn’t want to risk it. Miwa tells him she can schedule something at the doctor’s, and they return to their meal in relative silence.
Three weeks later, he’s sitting on an uncomfortable cot while a nurse draws his blood. She calls it a liquid biospy. Two weeks after that, an overwearied doctor confirms that Tobio, in fact, does not have cancer. He feels his cheeks flush red while Miwa thanks the doctor, who ushers them out of her office.
Okay, so not cancer.
But Tobio is dying. After weeks of careful consideration, it’s the only logical conclusion he’s come to. It’s the only explanation for his sudden bouts of feverishness, the unexplainable clammy palms, and, most concerning, the heart palpitations. There’s not other verdict; he’s dying.
(Oh, and Hinata’s got something to do with it, too, because of course it’s connected to Hinata. Maybe he’s allergic to the little dumbass. Yeah, that’s a solid theory.)