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Learning to Play by Suteishichic	By : Suteishichic Category: Prince of Tennis/Tennis no Ohjisama > General Views: 5629 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Prince of Tennis (Tennis no Ohjisama), nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 6
- 7
- 8
Learning to Play by Suteishichic. Chapter Seven ~ Niou

Warnings: Yaoi, Love, Angst, Fluff, and Lots of Sex. Some kink. You've been warned ;)

Disclaimer: Nope not mine. Still in my dreams. ;)

And in the next, Niou tackled Yagyuu and tumbled them both down into some bushes.

“W...!?” Niou covered Yagyuu's mouth with his hand before the question ever had the chance to become more than a tiny sharp sound and held him close. Niou hadn't been thinking when he tackled Yagyuu, he was just hyper-aware and reacting to some danger that was nearly on top of them. He felt Yagyuu's fury pouring off of him in waves probably thinking this was some new scheme of Niou's.

Niou though was still aware. He felt Yagyuu's body heat, his breath, his heartbeat, his soft clothes, and the slick feel of his sweat dampened skin wherever their skin touched. He smelled Yagyuu's own earthy, soapy scent beneath the musk of his shampoo and the minty toothpaste on his breath, and then Niou forced himself to rip his attention away from Yagyuu to the danger that approached them.

Without saying a word, he answered all Yagyuu's questions with a slight movement of his head. There. Just in front of them. An old, beat up van right down the street not more than twenty paces away from where they lay hidden. It was parked by the closed school gates where it should not be.

Niou felt Yagyuu tilt his head, now listening and cautious, but wary because he most likely still suspected all this was some hoax. Yagyuu squinted and tried to peer ahead. His glasses must have been knocked off because he wasn't wearing them.

(Yagyuu couldn't see well far away without squinting. Niou always thought the way he scrunched up his eyes was cute the few times he caught Yagyuu without his glasses--usually when Niou managed to break or damage them when Yagyuu walked into some would-be brilliant setup Niou meticulously designed for someone else.

The thing was, Yagyuu was not a clumsy person, but somehow he always managed to walk smack into Niou's best planned out schemes with disastrous and often more hilarious results than Niou originally intended or even was capable of conceiving. It was to the point that Niou now tried to take into account “the Yagyuu factor” whenever he thought up anything and still Yagyuu could find a way to royally stumble his way into a simple gag and turn it into a major catastrophe.

If Niou handed an exploding ink pen to Bunta because Bunta could never remember to bring a pen to class, somehow it was Yagyuu in a completely different class, who was always completely prepared that would end up borrowing it. This also happened with a water squirting calculator which Niou filled with the strongest granny floral perfume he could find. It not only squirted all over Yagyuu and soaked his tennis bag, but it also ruined a report Yagyuu was supposed to hand in that day. Niou replaced Yukimura's English dictionary with an identical fake copy that made a loud farting noise when opened. Yagyuu who was fluent in English for some reason borrowed it and opened it in the middle of a silent classroom. Hand exploding bubblegum or black staining bubblegum to Bunta, and Yagyuu, who didn't even chew gum would wind up on the receiving end.

It wasn't that it wasn't funny, it was just that Niou mainly was trying to make Yagyuu laugh and at least stop hating him. The Yagyuu factor was ending up to be no matter what Niou tried, Yagyuu just hated Niou even more.

Getting desperate, Niou would wait until after Yagyuu left practice for the day to show that none of these things were meant to happen to Yagyuu at all. But of course, even then, somehow for some bizarre reason Yagyuu would appear like magic in the middle of a perfect setup.

Niou filled Sanada's locker with about thirty thousand day-glow orange peanut butter filled cheese cracker sandwiches. It was brilliant. Sanada hated them to the extent that Sanada would lecture anyone he saw buying these things. Even strangers on the street eating them would get a lesson in nutrition from Sanada on the hazards of these snacks.

He figured Sanada would open his locker and they would pour all over him, but not only did Yagyuu end up opening it—when no one was allowed to touch or even basically look at Sanada's things, but in the wall behind the locker there was a bees nest. No one knew. Not even Niou. The pressure of all the smashed-in crackers somehow pushed open the back of the locker and when Yagyuu opened it, he got ten thousand crackers dumped on him followed by ten thousand angry stinging bees chasing after him.

If Niou didn't know better, he would swear Yagyuu was doing it all on purpose.

Yagyuu of course swore Niou was doing it all on purpose, but really Niou wasn't.

The best and worst though was a prank in the middle of class or practice that Yagyuu would waltz right into. Yagyuu's mouth would curl up into a painful snarl of a smile as he tried to pretend to condescendingly be amused at his own expense. It was the funniest expression Niou had ever seen.

(It even beat Sanada's face of ultimate fury when Sanada picked up his racket at a major match only to discover Niou kindly put brand new grip tape on all his rackets for him. Okay, so it happened to be hello pink sparkly pussycat scented like cotton candy strawberries grip tape, and sure, Niou rigged the racket so that it meowed out loud whenever Sanada hit the ball, not to mention that it randomly yelled out things like, “I'm the best kitty ever!” and “I'm such a pretty kitty!” But who doesn't like tennis better with sound effects? Sanada still won the match in record time. (Niou never ran so fast in all his life. Honestly. Cracking up laughing while trying to run for your life is exhausting.))

But then as funny and adorable as Yagyuu's snarl, Niou discovered around the fourth pair of destroyed glasses that Yagyuu had this squinting habit. He looked just like a little kid when he did it. All the way home and even sometimes the next day if there wasn't a spare pair, Yagyuu would scrunch his face up trying to see while at the same time he would try to look dignified. Day after day he wrinkled his face until his broken glasses were replaced. Niou wondered if Yagyuu's father invested in the company who made the glasses. Yagyuu must buy them now in triplicate. By Niou's last tally Yagyuu was on his fourteenth pair in the last three months.)

This was yet another pair of glasses Niou would be blamed for destroying.

When they tumbled down to the ground after his flying tackle, Niou somehow ended up skidding to a stop onto his hands and knees. Instinctively, Niou took the brunt of the impact and protected Yagyuu. Yagyuu barely touched the ground. That was much more important than how badly Niou landed. Niou tumbled in the air cradling Yagyuu on top of himself before flipping over to wind up on top of Yagyuu with his own torso between Yagyuu's legs. Yagyuu lay on his back and Niou's hands were on either side of him. Their mouths were close enough to kiss.

The bushes were enough cover at the moment, but the sun would be fully up soon and it was getting lighter outside. Yagyuu seemed to sense it too and instinctively or not, he sat up and drew Niou closer to him. Almost as if to shield Niou dressed all in white towards Yagyuu's safer shelter of black. Even if it was an impulse of self-preservation to keep Yagyuu from being spotted next to Niou, it soothed a tiny piece of Niou's soul when Yagyuu pulled him close.

Although he hated how pathetic it was, at that small movement, Niou's heart started singing in a silent shout of pure joy. There had been too many nights when Niou sobbed to himself, pitifully alone, that all he wanted in the world was to be held close and safe like this in Yagyuu's arms. Just once, he had wished. Just one time.

And here it was.

But it was like Yagyuu heard his happiness. Yagyuu's squint changed and he glared out of the corner of his eye at Niou dubiously. His eyes narrowed even more and his mouth tightened in suspicion and anger. He was probably thinking somehow Niou planned all this, and once again, Yagyuu was thinking of all the bodily violence he would punish Niou with.

Niou could readily admit there had been times when he was totally desperate and pathetic for Yagyuu's attention, but even in his worst late night frantic schemes he wouldn't put them in danger. He rolled his eyes and feeling embarrassed and betrayed and freshly wounded, Niou looked away. Niou turned and looked past Yagyuu, and as quietly as he could, Niou cursed.

In the early morning light, he could see Yagyuu look and then look back at him. Yagyuu's eyes even with his black hood up and hiding most of his face clearly asked Niou what was going on. Yagyuu without his glasses couldn't see that far.

“Bunta.” Niou whispered as softly as he could to explain. Marui was chi running down the side street. Or trying to. Marui struggled the most with this and despite Niou's best efforts to teach him even the most basic tricks to get to a beginner's level, Bunta never did well at it when running alone. So far, only Niou and Yukimura could coax Marui into conscious awareness and even then, it was a thin, tentative thread.

Unconsciously, when baking or listening to music or doing something else he loved, Bunta had the most amazing focus. Bunta reached great levels of awareness when he wasn't trying to, but going there when he wanted to was like trying to get a mule to do even simple mathematics. Bunta didn't understand it and he didn't really even want to. Half the time Bunta suspected the whole awareness thing was a joke of Niou's that even Sanada was in on to fool the entire team. As if. Sanada was about as funny as jock itch (although when Niou put itching powder in Sanada's often too-tight tennis shorts and Sanada thought he had jock itch it was hilarious), and about as likely to be in on a joke as he was to show up at school dressed in drag.

So there was Bunta, doing his ridiculous-looking version of chi running and bobbing along down the street. He was headed right towards the gate and seemed completely unaware of the danger he was in.

Niou only had moments to act. He would have to throw away something good for Marui's safety because if Niou didn't act right then, the results would be catastrophic.

Rather ironic given the levels of violence Yagyuu was still probably plotting right beside him. Bunta was probably still only a blur to Yagyuu.

Moving as cautiously as he could without letting either of them be seen, Niou urgently reached around his back and searched his backpack for the throwaway cellphone he kept stashed there for a rainy day. Today it was a typhoon.

Three guys clamored out of the van although from the way they moved, they were trying to be quiet about it. They left the doors of the van open and the engine was still running although there was no warning bell sounding on the older vehicle. They looked older and they were big guys. Maybe college age, but these guys didn't look like they were students at all. Niou had been around guys like this and knew guys like this were no good and probably up to even worse.

As the men stepped out and started walking forward, one of them tossed away a cigarette that was still burning. It landed right by where Niou and Yagyuu were hiding.

One of the men muttered something about how they were lucky it was a redhead. The other two readily agreed and the biggest one of them said, “Shii.” to get the others to hush.

The guys from the van started walking towards Bunta. They, like Yagyuu, were dressed all in black, but unlike Yagyuu, one guy was holding a length of coiled rope and another a baseball bat. Niou couldn't see what the third guy was holding up in front of his face, but the guy with the baseball bat readied it like he was waiting for a pitch. The guy with the rope stretched it between his hands and held it low, menacing.

“Get ready, here he comes...” the larger guy with the bat said quietly to the other two. He sucked up snot before spitting it out into the street. They were practically on top of Yagyuu and Niou but had their backs to them because they were so intently watching Bunta running.

One of the smaller guys holding something to his face said, "Remember, be quick and most of all keep him quiet. Don't hit him too hard. Just hard enough to shut him up. If you kill this one, I'm gonna have your ass. No permanent damage...yet. There'll be plenty of time to play after we get him back. On my count, one...."

Yagyuu helped Niou look although he didn't seem to understand what exactly it was Niou was now frantically groping around for for in one of his side pockets. Niou's damn wrist weights were in the way.

"Two...."

Yagyuu frowning in confusion finally held up the small phone and tilted it back and forth as if to ask if that was the item Niou was looking for.

"Thr...."

Niou sighed in relief while he grabbed and flipped the phone open. He hit send. There was only one chance, but there was also only one number programmed in and ready to go.

Perfectly, suddenly, all the fire alarms in the school rang out. Including the one by the gate. Screaming for all they were worth into the once peaceful morning.

In a panic that looked like a kid's anime scene, the three men looked at each other and then scrambled back to their van. One dropped the baseball bat and it echoed when it hit the street with a series of loud metal clangs that blended into the sirens. The van roared to life as the three men threw themselves in and it was moving, tires squealing, before the doors slammed shut.

As if aiming to run him over, the van suddenly veered towards Bunta who seemed to be still running along, completely clueless.

At the last second, while Yagyuu and Niou were struggling to untangle their limbs from each other to somehow rescue Marui, the redhead effortlessly dove out of the way of the van, tumbled into the bushes, and knocked all three of them back down to the ground.

The van's tires shrieked as it peeled around the corner and out of sight. It disappeared into the early dawn, leaving only the stench of burning rubber behind like a lingering reminder of danger being so near.

“Hey guys!” Bunta grinned at both of them, talking too loud over the blast of music pouring from his earphones, “What's up? What're you doin?” Bunta blew a lime scented bubble and it popped, “See that idiot? In the van? Came outta nowhere! Almost hit me....What?”

Niou lay there stunned for a moment and then reaching around Yagyuu, he pulled Bunta's earphones out of his ears. The came out with an audible pop on each side even with the alarms shrilly clanging in the background.

“Ow! Hey! That hurt....oh...hey?” Marui turned to the school finally noticing the alarms. “Is there a fire?” He looked back at Niou and pointed his finger, “What'd you do?” Bunta grinned huge, “Man are you gonna get in trouble when Sanada finds out what you....what?”

Yagyuu somehow extricated himself from out of their tangle of limbs and stood. He reached his hand out to Bunta and pulled the redhead up to standing. To Bunta he asked, “Are you all right?”

Niou knew Yagyuu wouldn't do the same for him and wouldn't even ask if Niou was okay. A fresh ache of hurt crashed over him. It was like someone squeezed the center of his chest and his breath caught more painfully in his throat than when Bunta collapsed both his weight and Yagyuu's on top of Niou to escape the van.

Niou saw both Yagyuu and Bunta turn to look at him as if they felt something was wrong with Niou even as Bunta answered he was fine. It was like Niou pathetically had some sort of tell to his pain. And that simply wasn't possible. He wouldn't allow it. Couldn't. It would be too morbidly embarrassing.

To cover for himself, just in case there had been something, even something slight, Niou stood and dusted himself off. He ached all over. He felt shaky from adrenaline still. His knees and palms and elbows were scraped up and his white clothes were dirty, but still, they all seemed to be alive and kicking and that was what mattered.

At least it seemed to be until Niou felt himself suddenly knocked back down to the ground.

The blow came out of nowhere as did Sanada standing over him ready to strike again. “What. Did. You. DO?!” Sanada roared at him and raised his hand again to get in another blow as Niou scrambled with no grace or dignity backwards like a crab on his feet and hands to scurry away.

Shockingly, it was Yagyuu who stopped an enraged Sanada. Yagyuu even went so far as to grab Sanada's arm. No one else would have dared. Well, perhaps Yukimura, but Yukimura commanded Sanada with his quiet voice so it would never have been needed.

Niou just sat on the ground and waited for either the sirens or his ears to stop clanging. Jackal caught up with them running along side Yanagi just as the first police cars and fire trucks arrived.

Niou couldn't make out exactly what was said since his damn ears were still ringing from the first punch and then on top of that, the stupid fire alarms were still wailing. Yagyuu must have told Sanada what happened. Niou watched as Yagyuu showed everyone the tire marks and the bat left on the ground. And they found something else on the ground that they picked up even though it was smashed. It must have gotten run over. It looked like shattered bits and pieces from something electronic.

Yanagi retrieved the card from the bits and pieces of smashed up camera and declared it recoverable before the police noticed. The bat he must have decided to leave alone. Yanagi then inspected the throwaway cellphone Niou used. Before it disappeared into one of the pockets on Yanagi's tennis bag along with the memory card, Yanagi asked Niou how he knew the frequency of the school's alarm system.

Niou shrugged, but didn't say anything else. Not with Sanada standing over him still looking like he needed to inflict more bodily harm.

Without another word, Yanagi removed Niou's backpack and that soon also disappeared.

More cops and firemen arrived and milled about. People came out from their houses or stopped on their way to work to gawk. Niou stayed where he was and tried to focus on the crack on the sidewalk in front of him.

None of this was his fault. He did a good thing. No one even seemed to care. He didn't expect anyone to say thank you or anything. He didn't do it for that, but someone could at least ask him if he was okay. He ached. His head hurt. His heart hurt. He was scratched up all over from the bushes and his knees were still bleeding. Now that he wasn't moving and his sweat was drying, without the weight and warmth of his backpack on his sweaty back he was chilly.

A few of their tennis club senpais and the cheerleaders showed up for their practices. Other people from other clubs began arriving. First a few trickled in, but then more and more started to arrive. Next some of the kendo club happened along jogging together. The swim club. Archery. Student council. Ping pong. Golf geeks. A few track and field guys and some of the soccer team milled about. Everyone was asking questions and excited by the drama unfolding. Several people looked at Niou or looked for him. Everyone always assumed it was him. Eventually someone at the school or the police would question him. Usually first.

Sanada and some of the other school club captains reported to the police that there were suspicious characters in the area and that the fire alarm or any fire was probably caused by them.

The police and fire departments insisted they had to check everything out. They told everyone to wait, ordered the people just watching on their way to work to disperse, and meanwhile more and more students arrived. The other tennis club members by then all arrived and suddenly when Niou looked up, there were hundreds of students everywhere. Considering there was almost five hundred members in the men's tennis club alone, it was a lot of people.

Everyone was talking about the fire alarms and the police. It was a flurry of activity and conversation and action, where everyone was excited and having a great time except Niou who was completely forgotten in the background still sitting on the ground.

He knew why he was being purposefully ignored by those closest to him. Niou would of course be blamed and here he was with bloody knees and elbows, all scratched up, and looking as guilty as could be. And he couldn't afford to get in trouble or be kicked off the team since they were already short a good player in their little group with Yukimura out, but still, Niou felt invisible.

And alone. No one saw him. No one cared. And that punch from Sanada still hurt. Almost as much as Yagyuu.

“Puri,” Niou muttered to himself.

He ran his fingers through the dew covered morning grass he was sitting on. The cigarette that had been burning earlier was trampled out by some girls who were talking about how cute Sanada was. As if. Niou felt the dampness seeping through his shorts and mixing with his sweat from running earlier. He felt cold and wet and tired and tried to keep from shivering.

Yagyuu walked over to Sanada and Yanagi. He suddenly bent and even though they were in a big crowd where girls were, with no warning Yagyuu pulled down his pants before stripping them off. Everyone who saw was sort of shocked until they realized Yagyuu was wearing long black shorts underneath. It was quickly dismissed even by Yagyuu's fangirls as yet another police car arrived with sirens blasting trying to get the crowd milling around the gate to disperse.

Niou made a little strangled noise though. The black shorts surprised him and he wondered what Yagyuu was wearing underneath. Sometimes Yagyuu wore a jockstrap. Niou liked that. A lot. It was unbelievably sexy. Most of the time though Yagyuu tended to wear regular underwear but twenty-seven days ago Niou saw Yagyuu's usual "tidy whities" were a most arousing black boxer brief.

Unless it couldn't be avoided, Yagyuu changed far away from Niou or didn't change clothes at all after practice. Instead Yagyuu would run home alone after practice still in his practice clothes if he didn't have some other committee meeting. Niou knew Yagyuu changing where he could see and wearing the sexy black underwear meant something, but Niou was at a complete loss as to what.

Bunta noticed too. Not that Yagyuu was near Niou, but he joked that the underwear confirmed the rumor that Bunta heard earlier. Yagyuu had a date with a girl. Yagyuu had a girlfriend.

Niou was too shocked and hurt to coherently think of anything to say or even do. He was tempted to follow Yagyuu, but Yukimura called and insisted he and Bunta go visit him in the hospital. Which was okay, but Niou was too distraught and distracted to be much good in the conversation. Yukimura that night forced Niou go hang out with Bunta and sleep over his house that night.

Most of the time Niou liked hanging out with Bunta. He enjoyed the fake wrestling matches he had with Bunta's two younger brothers and he and Bunta normally had a good time together. But that night everything was weird.

Eventually in a panic Niou called Yukimura from the toilet in Bunta's house, not sure what to do and hiding from his overly enthusiastic friend. Yukimura told Niou to just go with the flow. Even after Niou told Yukimura about Yagyuu's girlfriend, Yukimura demanded that Niou stay there and have a good time with Bunta. That lead to some really awkward moments between him and Bunta which was sort of where he and Bunta were now. Awkward and uncomfortable.

Bunta and Jackal were standing in front of Niou talking with some of the senior tennis club members. With an audience, Bunta excitedly told anyone who would listen all he knew about the van that tried to run him over right before the fire alarms went off.

Niou knew that his friends were sort of hiding Niou so no one asked why he was bleeding. Hell, at one point Bunta threw his jacket and bag on top of Niou to cover him up. He wondered if they all wished he would just go away and disappear like his family often did.

“Here.” Niou looked over, surprised to see Yagyuu kneeling next to him. And talking to him, “I'm sorry they've been worn, but it should cover your injuries until they can be properly tended to. Are you hurt anywhere else?”

Yagyuu brushed his hand across Niou's cheek and looked at his fingers. They were wet with a small amount of blood. His cheek must have been cut. Yagyuu handed Niou the sweat pants and the hooded jacket he had previously been wearing. Now he was in just black shorts and a black tank top. They both fit him well.

Niou tried to not be distracted by that and by Yagyuu's touch. He finally answered, “No. I don't think so.” Niou didn't argue and scrambled to pull on the pants and sweatshirt. If it kept Yagyuu actually talking to him, hell, he would have stripped and put on the guy's dirty underwear in front of everyone else. “Thank you.” Oh, they were still warm from Yagyuu's body heat.

Yagyuu almost smiled. Almost. “I should be thanking you.”

“So....” Niou was desperate, “You're not hurt?” Damn, wrong thing to ask. Think, stupid, think, “Hurt anywhere I mean? From when I knocked into you. You're okay?”

“Yes, I'm fine. And so is Bunta, thanks to you.”

“Oh good. I'm....” a complete and total idiot Niou thought, but he said, “glad. Really glad.” His throat was tight again. Niou's mouth was completely dry. He felt trembly and anxious all over again. He was bad at this and going to mess this tiny opportunity up.

“I'm sorry you got hurt.” Yagyuu said.

Niou thought of a million things to say to that, but Yagyuu went on to explain a completely different meaning, “I couldn't stop Sanada in time.”

“oh.” Niou smiled because if he didn't he felt like he would shatter. He shrugged, “I'm fine. Hard head.” He gently rapped his fist to his skull feeling a dull throbbing headache settle in from where he was hit so hard earlier. “Thanks for stopping him when you did.”

There was a moment when it looked like Yagyuu was going to say something else, but before he could, Bunta turned and grabbed both his bag and Niou's arm. He pulled them both up saying, “Come on! All clear. They're letting people in. Let's go!” They headed to the gate.

“Niou Masaharu?” They'd taken all of maybe four steps when one of the policemen stepped in front of him. “I have a few questions for you.”

“This guy? He saved my life!” Before Niou could respond, Bunta stepped between the cop and him. “I saw everything! They almost killed me!”

Students sensing something was going on stopped heading towards the gate and rushed closer to listen. Several girls gasped when Bunta mentioned almost being killed. He was quite popular and had a big fan club. Others whispered Niou's name and one said too loud how adorable Niou was. Still more responded to Marui saying Niou saved him with nothing less than gasps and squeals befitting a rock star sighting.

The older cop in response to the many students pressing closer and listening in while many girls all around them chattered and commented all at once, looked pained, “And you are?” Cell phone cameras clicked and flashed as Bunta put his arm around Niou. Fan girls squealed and shouted how they loved one of them or the other or both of them.

Niou figured the cop probably didn't like kids, and had never seen a large crowd of girls gathering around their idols. What was even worse for the cop was right then, Marui had already transformed into the hyper-chibi little kid version of himself.

This was the problem when Bunta was nervous, or in trouble, or talking about food, you absolutely, positively could not make him shut up once he got started. Especially if he had an audience. The cop had one chance to stop Marui before it began, and it was right now.

But the cop, not knowing Bunta, had no idea and suddenly it was too late.

Bouncing on the balls of his feet with wide eyes the size of saucers, Marui took a deep breath and unleashed himself on the poor cop, “I'm Marui Bunta!” He spelled out the characters for his name and pointed at the cop's notebook to write it down. He waited dramatically, warming up the crowd with a smile before the cop started writing, “I'm going to be a junior this next year. We both are.”

Bunta grabbed Niou by Yagyuu's jacket sleeve. “We're in the same class. We're in the tennis club, Niou and me. We're best friends.” Bunta smiled and posed for pictures. Girls screamed and cheered. More flashes went off.

Sanada tried to tell Bunta to back off and let the police do their job, but Bunta to Sanada's evident shock, shook him off and kept talking. And bouncing. And talking. And bouncing and talking some more.

The cop at one point even tried to pawn Bunta off on another younger-looking cop to take his statement, but Bunta was on a tirade and not going to stop. Especially not with a crowd of his own fans gathered around him listening with rapt attention to his every word. Niou almost laughed, but he knew Bunta was really only trying to keep him out of trouble. Nothing short of another fire alarm or a five-star buffet magically appearing before them could stop Bunta now. You simply had to wait until he ran out of energy.

Eventually, despite many pauses for photos, Bunta told the cops an overly-dramatic rendition of what happened. His story was that he was running along to morning practice when suddenly Niou ran up and pulled him out of the way because this huge black van came out of nowhere and tried to run him over.

Bunta showed the police the scratches he and Niou had from the bushes they had to dive into. He walked everyone over to the fresh skid marks and how they were aimed towards where he was before they veered away. A younger policeman noticed that there was the baseball bat still on the ground and when he asked Bunta where that came from, Marui had no idea. He said they were on the tennis team, not the baseball team.

But suddenly Bunta put together a new theory. He bounced and was excitedly asking if maybe the people in the van had maybe been coming to get him. There had been two attacks the week before on freshmen that would have been in their tennis club—if they hadn't been beaten up so badly. Those attacks were at night though, and the school clubs said that everyone who stayed late had to make sure to go home with a friend, but no one did anything different in the mornings.

Bouncing and looking afraid now, Bunta speculated that maybe the men in the van set the fire alarms off to cover their abducting him. Bunta demonstrated with a wide, sweeping gesture of the crowd around him, how certainly the fire alarm going off turned the school grounds into complete chaos. It would have been a while before anyone noticed one student missing.

It sounded more than plausible and Niou thought it rather remarkable that Bunta somehow aligned his story very close to the truth.

Niou barely said a word the entire time because he couldn't get one in. While the police might have wanted to drag Niou away to question him in private, no way with this crowd was that going to happen. Not without the fangirls and other tennis club members making a big ruckus and taking pictures the whole time.

Eventually Bunta exhausted himself enough to slow down his rapid-fire monologue and the cop was able to ask Niou if he had anything else to add. He was able to give the license plates, front and back, even though they didn't match as well as the possible van make and model.

Suddenly gaining a second wind, Bunta started telling the cops how Niou had excellent vision and a great memory. Several girls gushed over how cute Marui was and how wonderful Niou was to have saved Bunta, and by then the all-clear signal was given. Most of the fire department had left along with the police and the rest were packing it in.

Despite the excitement of the morning, most of the teachers and coaches in charge of various clubs began to get down to the business of directing everyone to where they needed to go so that they could start practice.

Miraculously, Niou was free to go. At least he seemed to be until Sanada growled through clenched teeth with an iron grip that clamped down on his bicep that Niou would walk with Sanada to the nurse's office to be looked at.

To Niou's astonishment, Yagyuu gently replaced Sanada's hand with his own and said he should do it since Niou saved him as well. Yagyuu mentioned that enough time had been wasted and the rest of them should resume practice. Yagyuu even offered to run laps with Niou when they returned to make up for the time they lost at the Nurse's office.

Wonder of wonders, after glaring long and hard at Yagyuu who stood there defiantly staring back, Sanada agreed.

Turning to him with an almost smile and still holding Niou's arm almost protectively, Yagyuu said, “Shall we then?”

Thanks again for reading and reviewing!
More soon and much love! XDDDDDDDD

*very excited to post next chapter!!!*

(my connection tonight is teh suck so if I can't get this up on other sites right now, I'll try again in a few hours)
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Learning to Play by Suteishichic