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lysapadinAomine, vampire hunter, and his vampire friend
The problem with Aomine is not that he isn't good at what he does. He's quite good in fact, possibly the best. He's still breathing, after all, even though he's been hunting vampires since he was big enough to wrap his fist around a stake and drive it through muscle and bone. Hunting vampires is not a profession for those with plans for growing old or even for those who plan on seeing their thirties, but Aomine Daiki just turned thirty-one and is still going strong. There are plenty of bloodsuckers who hear his name—hear whispers that he's on his way into town—and promptly decide that they have business on the other side of the globe.
Not that it does 'em much good to up stakes—hah, up stakes—in the long run. Once Aomine takes a job, he finishes it.
Therein lies the problem. Getting him to take a job is a job in itself, because Aomine is so good at killing vampires that it honestly bores him. Left to his own devices, he'd probably ignore the fangy bastards altogether and get on with his life. (Killing vampires is not itself a particularly lucrative business, but there are fees to be had, and what's more, hunters traditionally get the first crack at the earthly goods of the ex-bloodsuckers. Most hunters blow through their loot in short order, but most hunters don't have Momoi Satsuki handling their investments for them. Aomine could conceivably never lift his finger in an honest day's—or night's—work ever again and live to a comfortable old age anyway.)
Fortunately for those who would like their nights to be relatively free of fangèd menace, Aomine Daiki doesn't work alone.
It's not common knowledge; Aomine's partner is the retiring sort. Reclusive, after a fashion, not prone to mingling. Certainly most of the folks who track Aomine down and apply to him for aid never even know that when they're asking, or begging, or demanding that Aomine come and rid them of some vampiric infestation or another, the lanky figure slouched at his desk is not their only audience. They cajole or plead or negotiate with Aomine, much good that it will do them—Aomine usually ignores them and surfs the internet for porn until he gets bored and tells them to go away, he'll think about it—and they leave again, wondering why a bum like that has such an outstanding reputation for getting things done.
And after they leave, that's when Kuroko steps out of the shadows. He's not much to look at on first glance—slightly built and pale, with so little presence that he can go unnoticed by all but the most acute observers—but that's the way he prefers it. He doesn't say anything, usually. At most he might come to stand near Aomine's desk and look at him, silent and waiting, until Aomine breaks. "Aw, come on," he protests—it's a sad thing to say of a man his age, but sometimes he whines—"Come on, Tetsu, do we have to, really?"
Kuroko rarely does anything so unsubtle as frowning, but his disapproval is palpable nonetheless. "Don't you think we should?"
"They should be able to handle it themselves," Aomine generally tries to argue, despite the fact that vampires are stronger than most humans, certainly faster, with keener senses and a certain aura that turns all but the most strong-minded of humans into pudding before them. (Aomine is nothing if not strong-minded; most assholes are, to an extent.) "Aw, c'mon, someone else can do it, can't they?"
But, as Kuroko points out, that hypothetical someone else rarely seems to show up. "They didn't ask someone else," he adds, sometimes. "They asked you."
Aomine never has pretended to be modest, after all.
He gives in eventually, because Kuroko is stubborn and because vampires are boring, but not killing vampires is even more boring. "Fine, fine," he says when he gives in to the inevitable. "I'll do it, fine, stop nagging me already."
"I think you must have me confused with someone else," Kuroko tells him, severe even when he's pleased, and begins to melt away into the shadows to go begin their preparations.
Sometimes Aomine stops him before he goes. "Hey, Tetsu," he says to Kuroko's retreating back. "How come you hate them so much?"
Kuroko never answers, not properly. "Because," he tells Aomine.
"Because what?" Aomine presses, though that only earns him the quick subtle show of a slip of fang (Aomine stopped being impressed by that years ago).
"Because," Kuroko says and goes, and Aomine has to be content with that.
Midorima and Kagami, shopping
"This is not fair," Midorima pointed out, loping along the sand next to Taiga. The plastic bags he carried rattled and clanked with every long stride; Taiga hoped that he didn't end up with any of the drinks that guy was carrying. "It really isn't."
Taiga grunted; it wasn't as though Midorima actually needed encouragement to keep talking, because the guy had not shut up once since Riko-kantoku had interrupted their impromptu one-on-one and told them to go fetch refreshments if they still had that much energy. At least this time she'd thrown some money at them and the cost of sports drinks for two teams wasn't going to be coming out of his pocket.
"I don't even go to your school!" Midorima continued. "I don't see why your coach feels like she can order me around however she pleases."
Taiga rolled his eyes. "Kuroko," he pointed out, which earned him a sidelong, baffled look from Midorima. "Generation of Miracles. Pretty much adopted all you assholes last year, didn't we?"
He counted a full ten long strides before Midorima found his voice again; the resulting tirade lasted all the way back to the inn where their teams were waiting.
Taiga didn't have the heart to tell him that all the protests in the world didn't make it any less true. After all, Nakatani-san had let Riko-kantoku deliver that order, hadn't he?
Ordinary People, Kuroko fussing over Kagami's injuries
It all sounded a lot worse than it really was, though Taiga was having a hard time convincing anyone of that fact. The admitting doctor used a lot of long, complicated words on his chart like contusions and first and second-degree burns and potential fracture of the scapula—whatever. Sounded horrible compared to the reality, which was that he gotten bruised up but good, his shoulder ached like hell, and he was a little scorched at the edges. He'd made it out under his own power, hadn't he? On his own two feet and everything, and there hadn't been anyone left inside, either. (Turned out the kids had been playing over at a neighbor's house, or so Alex had said when she came by the ambulance to check on him. So hey, that was good.)
At any rate, there wasn't any point in keeping him overnight for observations that Taiga could see. They'd slapped some dressings on the burns and put his arm in a sling and fed him just enough painkillers that the ache of his bruises and shoulder had receded to a sort of dull throb in the background of his awareness. Far as he was concerned, he could sit on his own couch and watch shitty television just as well as he could from a hospital bed. More comfortably, too.
Much good it did to point that out, though. The doctor—Midorima Shintarou, according to his nametag—frowned down at him. "We haven't ruled out head trauma yet."
"I didn't get hit on the head," Taiga pointed out, exasperated. "I think I would have noticed that, and besides, I had my gear on and everything."
The doctor didn't seem convinced—he pursed his lips together and looked a lot like he was trying to figure out where to begin, in fact—but they were interrupted before he could get started. "It could have happened before you went back into the burning building on purpose," Tetsuya said.
Taiga had gotten pretty used to how Tetsuya could just sneak up on people like some kind of ninja and only yelped a little bit. In a just world, the doctor would have been just as startled, but the only thing he did was push the glasses up his nose and transfer his frown from Taiga to Tetsuya. "Kuroko," he said. "You're not supposed to be in here yet."
"I was tired of waiting," Tetsuya said, calm and definitely not in the mood to be flexible if Taiga was any judge. Also, hello, did Tetsuya know this guy?
Apparently so, because Midorima huffed but did not try to eject him from the room. "As I was saying," he said, returning his attention to Taiga. "We have not ruled out the possibility of head trauma and will be keeping you overnight for observation." And that was that, apparently.
"I don't have any head trauma," Taiga muttered, slouching against his pillow, annoyed.
Midorima sniffed. "That remains to be seen." He nodded at Kuroko and swept out of the room.
Taiga made a face at his retreating back and slouched some more, at least until it made his shoulder ache and he had to sit up again. "I don't think I like that guy," he told Tetsuya. "Do you think I can request another doctor?"
Tetsuya didn't answer that. He came away from the door and pulled the visitor's chair over to the bed. He sat on the edge of it, bolt-upright, and there was a pinched, tight look on his face that Taiga didn't much like the looks of. "Midorima is very good at his job."
"Can't say much for his bedside manner," Taiga tried, but that didn't do much good. Tetsuya didn't even look tempted to smile. "So, hey, that guy a friend of yours?"
"We went to school together."
Taiga leaned his head back against his pillow, studying Tetsuya and the flat line of his mouth. Tetsuya looked back, eyes darker than usual, hands folded together on his knee, definitely unhappy. Taiga shifted himself, trying to find a more comfortable position, and said, "It's my job, Tetsuya."
"I know that." Tetsuya's mouth flattened out even more, if it were possible, and he glanced aside. "I know."
"If it hadn't been me, it would have been one of the other guys," Taiga told him, watching the slight flutter of the muscles of Tetsuya's jaw as he set it. "It had to be done." Wasn't as though anyone liked taking risks—well, okay, it wasn't as though he liked taking stupid risks—but when it came right down to it, sometimes there wasn't a choice. Not a choice he could live with making.
Tetsuya's throat bobbed like he was swallowing something. "I know that. Now."
The good thing, if there was a good thing about taking a falling wall to the shoulder, was that Tetsuya was sitting on his good side. "Hey," Taiga said, stretching his hand out to him. "C'mere." He didn't move, not until Tetsuya finally reached back, and then he pulled Tetsuya the rest of the way closer. There wasn't a whole lot of room to spare in his hospital bed, but that didn't matter. Tetsuya was on the slight side, and anyway, Taiga had determination on his side.
Tetsuya settled against him gingerly, like he was afraid that leaning against Taiga was going to hurt him more. Well, it did make his bruises ache a little. So what? Taiga wrapped his arm around Tetsuya anyway. After a moment, Tetsuya began to relax by increments, leaning against his shoulder and sighing very softly.
Taiga squeezed him. "I do my best," he said against Tetsuya's hair, which smelled clean and not like smoke or sweat or the hospital. "I promise, I always do my best. You think you can live with that?" Sometimes, people couldn't. And then, well.
Tetsuya stayed quiet for so long that Taiga was beginning to worry that this time it was going to be his turn to be the guest of honor for a sorry-you-got-dumped bar crawl with the guys. Then Tetsuya sighed again, soft, and reached across him to grip the hand resting in Taiga's sling. "I guess I can," he said. "As long as you don't make a habit of this, okay?"
It hurt to squeeze Tetsuya's fingers, but Taiga didn't let that stop him. "Yeah," he said. "I guess I can do that."
Merman Kuroko
"I want you to know that I hate each and every one of you," Kuroko said, voice throbbing with sincerity. "I hate you so very much."
"Stop talking," Riko scolded him. "You're going to ruin your makeup."
"Do I look like I care about my makeup?" Kuroko asked her, which was a fair enough point. His was not the face of a man who cared.
Riko poked him in the shoulder anyway. "I care," she said, and went back to painting the glitter along Kuroko's eyelids, outlining them in the sweeps of pale blue glitter, just the color of shallow water while Kuroko set his lips into a distinctly annoyed frown.
"I think he needs more sequins on his tail," Kiyoshi, ever helpful, suggested. "And maybe on his chest, to carry the theme through."
"I don't think we have time to add any more sequins to his tail," Hyuuga pointed out. "The float has to be ready in..." He checked his watch "Half an hour."
"Well, maybe some glitter on his chest, then?" Kiyoshi said. "Something sort of swirly and artistic?"
Riko finished painting the glitter along Kuroko's eyelids and stepped back to study the effect; the sweep of the glitter around his eyes, blending into the seafoam-colored glitter on his cheekbones did lend a certain alien cast to Kuroko's features. "I don't know," she said, tapping her chin, looking at Kuroko's thin, pale chest and the sweep of the lamé tail folded around his hips. "I think less may be more, here."
Kiyoshi had no shame about sulking and scuffed his feet. "Awww..."
Riko handed him the glitter and the brush. "Here, you can play with this yourself later to your heart's content," she said, and clapped her hands. "Okay, where's our drowning sailor?"
Kagami stood up, moving gingerly in his tight breeches and flowing poet's shirt. "I hate all of you," he said, glowering.
"Yes, yes," Riko said, impatiently, pointing at the float. "But we are going to win this pageant. Now get into place."
Kagami shuffled into place on the float and gingerly leaned against Kuroko, who just as gingerly put an arm around him.
Riko sighed. "Can you at least try to make it look natural?" she asked them, which got her identical resentful glares. "Remember, think of the training camps we can pay for with the prize money."
They shuffled a little closer; at least they were trying (even if they were failing miserably).
Riko sighed again and checked the time; there wasn't much left before the floats went live, but—there was an awful lot of prize money on the line. She cracked her knuckles and advanced on the float, smiling.
At least Kuroko and Kagami had the good sense to look properly frightened of her as she did, because it was time to put everything she'd ever learned from reading doujinshi into practice.
That prize money was theirs, and not a one of Kuroko or Kagami's qualms was going to stand in the way of that.
Aomine/Kise, run
Mostly they run laps when it comes to it—endless laps around the gym or around the Teikou sports fields, if the weather is nice, sometimes stadiums when Akashi-kun and Coach are feeling particularly sadistic. It's cardio, Kurokocchi tells Ryouta when he falls over and complains with what little breath he has left. Cardio to support the endless amounts of running up and down the court that happens during a game.
Not that Ryouta has been tagged to play any games yet. Not real games. Playing support for the second string doesn't count, to his way of thinking.
He gets the logic behind it, but it's so boring. There's nothing interesting about pounding around in great big circles until his calves and thighs burn, until his shirt sticks to his chest and his hair drips sweat, until his lips and throat are dry with panting. It's hard work, nothing he can skip past the way he normally does—his gift for mimicry can't substitute stamina or endurance, and up to the point he wandered past the gym and got clocked with a basketball and his destiny, Ryouta hadn't bothered much with physical conditioning past what was necessary to keep him sleek and streamlined for modeling jobs.
Ryouta still doesn't know what he thinks about that. Wonders, every time Coach blows his whistle and hollers at them to start running, whether he isn't crazy to have decided that this is what he wants. What he's been missing all along. Surely there must be some other way out of his ennui, something that doesn't involve quite so much physical suffering?
There almost has to be, he reasons: surely in a world so wide and varied as this one, basketball cannot be the only answer.
And yet.
Every time he makes up his mind that really, this is ridiculous, that there is no call to be putting himself through this—every time he verges on the edge of calling it quits and finding something better to do with himself (as he's done so many times before), Ryouta stops himself before he can follow through.
Because, yes, running laps and conditioning training are boring, painful, the antithesis of fun—yes, all that is true, but even so, it cannot outweigh the reality of Aomine running a few strides ahead of him, loping along at a casual pace, shoulders broad and straight and his head high.
Midorima and Takao, treat
If Takao knows the meaning of the word shame, it is only as an abstract concept. That's why he's currently leaning against Shintarou's shoulder, wheedling with all his might. "C'mon," he coaxes, "just one bite." He's holding out a bit of chocolate broken off the bar that he's been making indecent noises over for approximately half an hour (and the bar is only a third gone). "You know you wanna."
Shintarou does not know any such thing. On the other hand, Takao is perfectly capable of badgering him until he gives in. He might as well surrender while one of them still retains his dignity. "Fine—" he begins.
Takao pushes the chocolate into his mouth almost before he finishes acquiescing; it's already begun to melt in his fingers and smears against Shintarou's lips, body-warm and bittersweet. It finishes melting on his tongue while Takao watches him attentively. "Well?"
Shintarou licks the chocolate from his lips and thinks that he can taste the salt of Takao's skin beneath the velvet richness of the chocolate. "Not bad," he says. "More?"
And Takao obliges him.
The problem with Aomine is not that he isn't good at what he does. He's quite good in fact, possibly the best. He's still breathing, after all, even though he's been hunting vampires since he was big enough to wrap his fist around a stake and drive it through muscle and bone. Hunting vampires is not a profession for those with plans for growing old or even for those who plan on seeing their thirties, but Aomine Daiki just turned thirty-one and is still going strong. There are plenty of bloodsuckers who hear his name—hear whispers that he's on his way into town—and promptly decide that they have business on the other side of the globe.
Not that it does 'em much good to up stakes—hah, up stakes—in the long run. Once Aomine takes a job, he finishes it.
Therein lies the problem. Getting him to take a job is a job in itself, because Aomine is so good at killing vampires that it honestly bores him. Left to his own devices, he'd probably ignore the fangy bastards altogether and get on with his life. (Killing vampires is not itself a particularly lucrative business, but there are fees to be had, and what's more, hunters traditionally get the first crack at the earthly goods of the ex-bloodsuckers. Most hunters blow through their loot in short order, but most hunters don't have Momoi Satsuki handling their investments for them. Aomine could conceivably never lift his finger in an honest day's—or night's—work ever again and live to a comfortable old age anyway.)
Fortunately for those who would like their nights to be relatively free of fangèd menace, Aomine Daiki doesn't work alone.
It's not common knowledge; Aomine's partner is the retiring sort. Reclusive, after a fashion, not prone to mingling. Certainly most of the folks who track Aomine down and apply to him for aid never even know that when they're asking, or begging, or demanding that Aomine come and rid them of some vampiric infestation or another, the lanky figure slouched at his desk is not their only audience. They cajole or plead or negotiate with Aomine, much good that it will do them—Aomine usually ignores them and surfs the internet for porn until he gets bored and tells them to go away, he'll think about it—and they leave again, wondering why a bum like that has such an outstanding reputation for getting things done.
And after they leave, that's when Kuroko steps out of the shadows. He's not much to look at on first glance—slightly built and pale, with so little presence that he can go unnoticed by all but the most acute observers—but that's the way he prefers it. He doesn't say anything, usually. At most he might come to stand near Aomine's desk and look at him, silent and waiting, until Aomine breaks. "Aw, come on," he protests—it's a sad thing to say of a man his age, but sometimes he whines—"Come on, Tetsu, do we have to, really?"
Kuroko rarely does anything so unsubtle as frowning, but his disapproval is palpable nonetheless. "Don't you think we should?"
"They should be able to handle it themselves," Aomine generally tries to argue, despite the fact that vampires are stronger than most humans, certainly faster, with keener senses and a certain aura that turns all but the most strong-minded of humans into pudding before them. (Aomine is nothing if not strong-minded; most assholes are, to an extent.) "Aw, c'mon, someone else can do it, can't they?"
But, as Kuroko points out, that hypothetical someone else rarely seems to show up. "They didn't ask someone else," he adds, sometimes. "They asked you."
Aomine never has pretended to be modest, after all.
He gives in eventually, because Kuroko is stubborn and because vampires are boring, but not killing vampires is even more boring. "Fine, fine," he says when he gives in to the inevitable. "I'll do it, fine, stop nagging me already."
"I think you must have me confused with someone else," Kuroko tells him, severe even when he's pleased, and begins to melt away into the shadows to go begin their preparations.
Sometimes Aomine stops him before he goes. "Hey, Tetsu," he says to Kuroko's retreating back. "How come you hate them so much?"
Kuroko never answers, not properly. "Because," he tells Aomine.
"Because what?" Aomine presses, though that only earns him the quick subtle show of a slip of fang (Aomine stopped being impressed by that years ago).
"Because," Kuroko says and goes, and Aomine has to be content with that.
Midorima and Kagami, shopping
"This is not fair," Midorima pointed out, loping along the sand next to Taiga. The plastic bags he carried rattled and clanked with every long stride; Taiga hoped that he didn't end up with any of the drinks that guy was carrying. "It really isn't."
Taiga grunted; it wasn't as though Midorima actually needed encouragement to keep talking, because the guy had not shut up once since Riko-kantoku had interrupted their impromptu one-on-one and told them to go fetch refreshments if they still had that much energy. At least this time she'd thrown some money at them and the cost of sports drinks for two teams wasn't going to be coming out of his pocket.
"I don't even go to your school!" Midorima continued. "I don't see why your coach feels like she can order me around however she pleases."
Taiga rolled his eyes. "Kuroko," he pointed out, which earned him a sidelong, baffled look from Midorima. "Generation of Miracles. Pretty much adopted all you assholes last year, didn't we?"
He counted a full ten long strides before Midorima found his voice again; the resulting tirade lasted all the way back to the inn where their teams were waiting.
Taiga didn't have the heart to tell him that all the protests in the world didn't make it any less true. After all, Nakatani-san had let Riko-kantoku deliver that order, hadn't he?
Ordinary People, Kuroko fussing over Kagami's injuries
It all sounded a lot worse than it really was, though Taiga was having a hard time convincing anyone of that fact. The admitting doctor used a lot of long, complicated words on his chart like contusions and first and second-degree burns and potential fracture of the scapula—whatever. Sounded horrible compared to the reality, which was that he gotten bruised up but good, his shoulder ached like hell, and he was a little scorched at the edges. He'd made it out under his own power, hadn't he? On his own two feet and everything, and there hadn't been anyone left inside, either. (Turned out the kids had been playing over at a neighbor's house, or so Alex had said when she came by the ambulance to check on him. So hey, that was good.)
At any rate, there wasn't any point in keeping him overnight for observations that Taiga could see. They'd slapped some dressings on the burns and put his arm in a sling and fed him just enough painkillers that the ache of his bruises and shoulder had receded to a sort of dull throb in the background of his awareness. Far as he was concerned, he could sit on his own couch and watch shitty television just as well as he could from a hospital bed. More comfortably, too.
Much good it did to point that out, though. The doctor—Midorima Shintarou, according to his nametag—frowned down at him. "We haven't ruled out head trauma yet."
"I didn't get hit on the head," Taiga pointed out, exasperated. "I think I would have noticed that, and besides, I had my gear on and everything."
The doctor didn't seem convinced—he pursed his lips together and looked a lot like he was trying to figure out where to begin, in fact—but they were interrupted before he could get started. "It could have happened before you went back into the burning building on purpose," Tetsuya said.
Taiga had gotten pretty used to how Tetsuya could just sneak up on people like some kind of ninja and only yelped a little bit. In a just world, the doctor would have been just as startled, but the only thing he did was push the glasses up his nose and transfer his frown from Taiga to Tetsuya. "Kuroko," he said. "You're not supposed to be in here yet."
"I was tired of waiting," Tetsuya said, calm and definitely not in the mood to be flexible if Taiga was any judge. Also, hello, did Tetsuya know this guy?
Apparently so, because Midorima huffed but did not try to eject him from the room. "As I was saying," he said, returning his attention to Taiga. "We have not ruled out the possibility of head trauma and will be keeping you overnight for observation." And that was that, apparently.
"I don't have any head trauma," Taiga muttered, slouching against his pillow, annoyed.
Midorima sniffed. "That remains to be seen." He nodded at Kuroko and swept out of the room.
Taiga made a face at his retreating back and slouched some more, at least until it made his shoulder ache and he had to sit up again. "I don't think I like that guy," he told Tetsuya. "Do you think I can request another doctor?"
Tetsuya didn't answer that. He came away from the door and pulled the visitor's chair over to the bed. He sat on the edge of it, bolt-upright, and there was a pinched, tight look on his face that Taiga didn't much like the looks of. "Midorima is very good at his job."
"Can't say much for his bedside manner," Taiga tried, but that didn't do much good. Tetsuya didn't even look tempted to smile. "So, hey, that guy a friend of yours?"
"We went to school together."
Taiga leaned his head back against his pillow, studying Tetsuya and the flat line of his mouth. Tetsuya looked back, eyes darker than usual, hands folded together on his knee, definitely unhappy. Taiga shifted himself, trying to find a more comfortable position, and said, "It's my job, Tetsuya."
"I know that." Tetsuya's mouth flattened out even more, if it were possible, and he glanced aside. "I know."
"If it hadn't been me, it would have been one of the other guys," Taiga told him, watching the slight flutter of the muscles of Tetsuya's jaw as he set it. "It had to be done." Wasn't as though anyone liked taking risks—well, okay, it wasn't as though he liked taking stupid risks—but when it came right down to it, sometimes there wasn't a choice. Not a choice he could live with making.
Tetsuya's throat bobbed like he was swallowing something. "I know that. Now."
The good thing, if there was a good thing about taking a falling wall to the shoulder, was that Tetsuya was sitting on his good side. "Hey," Taiga said, stretching his hand out to him. "C'mere." He didn't move, not until Tetsuya finally reached back, and then he pulled Tetsuya the rest of the way closer. There wasn't a whole lot of room to spare in his hospital bed, but that didn't matter. Tetsuya was on the slight side, and anyway, Taiga had determination on his side.
Tetsuya settled against him gingerly, like he was afraid that leaning against Taiga was going to hurt him more. Well, it did make his bruises ache a little. So what? Taiga wrapped his arm around Tetsuya anyway. After a moment, Tetsuya began to relax by increments, leaning against his shoulder and sighing very softly.
Taiga squeezed him. "I do my best," he said against Tetsuya's hair, which smelled clean and not like smoke or sweat or the hospital. "I promise, I always do my best. You think you can live with that?" Sometimes, people couldn't. And then, well.
Tetsuya stayed quiet for so long that Taiga was beginning to worry that this time it was going to be his turn to be the guest of honor for a sorry-you-got-dumped bar crawl with the guys. Then Tetsuya sighed again, soft, and reached across him to grip the hand resting in Taiga's sling. "I guess I can," he said. "As long as you don't make a habit of this, okay?"
It hurt to squeeze Tetsuya's fingers, but Taiga didn't let that stop him. "Yeah," he said. "I guess I can do that."
Merman Kuroko
"I want you to know that I hate each and every one of you," Kuroko said, voice throbbing with sincerity. "I hate you so very much."
"Stop talking," Riko scolded him. "You're going to ruin your makeup."
"Do I look like I care about my makeup?" Kuroko asked her, which was a fair enough point. His was not the face of a man who cared.
Riko poked him in the shoulder anyway. "I care," she said, and went back to painting the glitter along Kuroko's eyelids, outlining them in the sweeps of pale blue glitter, just the color of shallow water while Kuroko set his lips into a distinctly annoyed frown.
"I think he needs more sequins on his tail," Kiyoshi, ever helpful, suggested. "And maybe on his chest, to carry the theme through."
"I don't think we have time to add any more sequins to his tail," Hyuuga pointed out. "The float has to be ready in..." He checked his watch "Half an hour."
"Well, maybe some glitter on his chest, then?" Kiyoshi said. "Something sort of swirly and artistic?"
Riko finished painting the glitter along Kuroko's eyelids and stepped back to study the effect; the sweep of the glitter around his eyes, blending into the seafoam-colored glitter on his cheekbones did lend a certain alien cast to Kuroko's features. "I don't know," she said, tapping her chin, looking at Kuroko's thin, pale chest and the sweep of the lamé tail folded around his hips. "I think less may be more, here."
Kiyoshi had no shame about sulking and scuffed his feet. "Awww..."
Riko handed him the glitter and the brush. "Here, you can play with this yourself later to your heart's content," she said, and clapped her hands. "Okay, where's our drowning sailor?"
Kagami stood up, moving gingerly in his tight breeches and flowing poet's shirt. "I hate all of you," he said, glowering.
"Yes, yes," Riko said, impatiently, pointing at the float. "But we are going to win this pageant. Now get into place."
Kagami shuffled into place on the float and gingerly leaned against Kuroko, who just as gingerly put an arm around him.
Riko sighed. "Can you at least try to make it look natural?" she asked them, which got her identical resentful glares. "Remember, think of the training camps we can pay for with the prize money."
They shuffled a little closer; at least they were trying (even if they were failing miserably).
Riko sighed again and checked the time; there wasn't much left before the floats went live, but—there was an awful lot of prize money on the line. She cracked her knuckles and advanced on the float, smiling.
At least Kuroko and Kagami had the good sense to look properly frightened of her as she did, because it was time to put everything she'd ever learned from reading doujinshi into practice.
That prize money was theirs, and not a one of Kuroko or Kagami's qualms was going to stand in the way of that.
Aomine/Kise, run
Mostly they run laps when it comes to it—endless laps around the gym or around the Teikou sports fields, if the weather is nice, sometimes stadiums when Akashi-kun and Coach are feeling particularly sadistic. It's cardio, Kurokocchi tells Ryouta when he falls over and complains with what little breath he has left. Cardio to support the endless amounts of running up and down the court that happens during a game.
Not that Ryouta has been tagged to play any games yet. Not real games. Playing support for the second string doesn't count, to his way of thinking.
He gets the logic behind it, but it's so boring. There's nothing interesting about pounding around in great big circles until his calves and thighs burn, until his shirt sticks to his chest and his hair drips sweat, until his lips and throat are dry with panting. It's hard work, nothing he can skip past the way he normally does—his gift for mimicry can't substitute stamina or endurance, and up to the point he wandered past the gym and got clocked with a basketball and his destiny, Ryouta hadn't bothered much with physical conditioning past what was necessary to keep him sleek and streamlined for modeling jobs.
Ryouta still doesn't know what he thinks about that. Wonders, every time Coach blows his whistle and hollers at them to start running, whether he isn't crazy to have decided that this is what he wants. What he's been missing all along. Surely there must be some other way out of his ennui, something that doesn't involve quite so much physical suffering?
There almost has to be, he reasons: surely in a world so wide and varied as this one, basketball cannot be the only answer.
And yet.
Every time he makes up his mind that really, this is ridiculous, that there is no call to be putting himself through this—every time he verges on the edge of calling it quits and finding something better to do with himself (as he's done so many times before), Ryouta stops himself before he can follow through.
Because, yes, running laps and conditioning training are boring, painful, the antithesis of fun—yes, all that is true, but even so, it cannot outweigh the reality of Aomine running a few strides ahead of him, loping along at a casual pace, shoulders broad and straight and his head high.
Midorima and Takao, treat
If Takao knows the meaning of the word shame, it is only as an abstract concept. That's why he's currently leaning against Shintarou's shoulder, wheedling with all his might. "C'mon," he coaxes, "just one bite." He's holding out a bit of chocolate broken off the bar that he's been making indecent noises over for approximately half an hour (and the bar is only a third gone). "You know you wanna."
Shintarou does not know any such thing. On the other hand, Takao is perfectly capable of badgering him until he gives in. He might as well surrender while one of them still retains his dignity. "Fine—" he begins.
Takao pushes the chocolate into his mouth almost before he finishes acquiescing; it's already begun to melt in his fingers and smears against Shintarou's lips, body-warm and bittersweet. It finishes melting on his tongue while Takao watches him attentively. "Well?"
Shintarou licks the chocolate from his lips and thinks that he can taste the salt of Takao's skin beneath the velvet richness of the chocolate. "Not bad," he says. "More?"
And Takao obliges him.