Dec 12, 2006 00:28
Title: Facets of Me
Author: Zab Jade
Rating: R (for eventual sexual situations)
Summary: Shortly after starting his first year of high school, Kaidoh is given an assignment in creative writing to explore the aspects of his personality. As he writes about himself, he shares the stories of his life with Inui.
Facets of Me
Facet Six: Sunstone
Disclaimer: I do not own Prince of Tennis or the associated characters.
~*~
The little huntress crouches, her hindquarters wiggling in excitement before she pounces. Her sharp baby teeth grip the sock mouse as she flips onto her back, the claws of her hind paws raking against the toy that had started out as one of the socks Momoshiro gave me a week ago.
I’m so focused on Kageko that I give an undignified squeak of surprise when Inui-senpai suddenly rests a hand on my shoulder.
“Playtime is over. You have homework to do.”
“Aww… just five more minutes? Please?” I turn to look at him, but he hastily puts a hand over my eyes.
“The Puppy Dog Eyes of Doom won’t work on me this time,” he says, sounding amused. “I’ve already given you an extra hour. If the kitten keeps you from completing your homework, your parents won’t let you stay here as much.”
He pulls me up off the floor and steers me into his room. I grumble, but get to work. The sooner I finish everything, the sooner I can get back to playing with my kitten. Once everything else is out of the way, I begin the next part of my creative writing assignment.
Sunstone is an orange stone that represents vitality and endurance. My tennis style has always involved outlasting my opponent, but until my first match against Echizen, it was mostly about wearing the other player down rather than counting on my own endurance.
Then Echizen used my own strategy against me, and I didn’t take it very well. I was filled with an overpowering rage and the need to just hurt someone. Luckily, there was no one other than myself within easy reach at the time, and I satisfied my need for violence by beating my own knee bloody with my racket.
After my disastrous match against Echizen, I held on to my regular spot by defeating Inui-senpai. Instead of being angry, he created a training program to enhance my endurance. I insisted on doing twice as much as he originally wrote out for me, and then ended up doing even more than that.
I pushed myself hard, jogging a total of thirty kilometers every day along with three sets of fifty shuttle runs and one-hundred and fifty push ups. At first, it left me so utterly exhausted that I could barely move at the end of the day. Gradually, though, I started to get used to it, and it became easier. When that happened, I started doing even more.
My feelings of self-worth increased along with my endurance. People like Echizen and Fuji-senpai may have been able to do incredible things due to natural talent, but they couldn’t do this. They didn’t have the burning desire to go beyond all their limits. They’d never be able to push themselves to the point where even the smallest movement was a nearly unbearable agony.
Inui-senpai made me stop doing that when he found out, telling me that it could cause a lot of damage to my body because I was still growing. But I still had the knowledge that I could push myself that hard, that I had the inner strength and dedication necessary for it.
For a while though, that was just an abstract concept in the back of my mind. It really hit home during my match with that rhythm freak, Kamio. He pissed me off, and I tried to decapitate him with my racket right before we started the match.
That’s when I pulled off the Boomerang Snake for the first time. It was a lucky accident, and I lost a few games while trying to figure it out. Then Ryuzaki-sensei reminded me of my tennis style. I outlast people. My Snake wasn’t fast enough to make Kamio lose endurance, but it didn’t matter. I had more than enough of my own to defeat him.
The incident before the match was one of the last times I was excessively violent towards anyone other than Momoshiro. It was like I no longer had to give in to the temper that coiled inside me like a savage, hungry beast. If I could push my limits so far, then I had the inner strength to deal with things without lashing out. I just hadn’t realized it until then.
“Hmm. I had noticed a decrease in your violent tendencies shortly after I started creating endurance programs for you, but I hadn’t realized there was a connection.”
I’m only vaguely aware of Inui-senpai’s words, most of my attention forced on Kageko. I’m crouched on the bedroom floor, making clicking noises at the kitten and dangling a sock mouse in front of her. Inui-senpai notices my inattention and sighs in exasperation.
“I see that I will have to dress up in a cat ear headband and a belt with a cat tail if I want any attention from now on,” he mutters, mostly sounding like he’s joking.
It immediately captures my full attention though, and I stare up at him with wide eyes as I imagine him wearing those things… and nothing else. With a low, almost feline growl, I pounce on him, knocking him off his computer stool. He hits the ground with a grunt and a thump, and I pin him down, kneading his shirt like a cat.
“K-Kaidoh?” he stutters in alarm. His glasses have fallen off, revealing his dark green eyes.
I shift slightly, positioning myself like I’m going to kiss him. I lower my face towards him, and then…
“Meow.”
He blinks and stares at me incredulously. “Did you just…?”
I smirk and start making a purring sound by vibrating the tip of my tongue against the roof of my mouth.
Inui-senpai snorts. “And you claim I’m weird?”
I stop purring and respond to that with all the maturity and dignity it deserves. I stick my tongue out at him.
fanfiction,
fic-author: vegeta_no_oujo,
fic-rating: r