I seem to have Akutsu on the brain at the moment. Why do I always end up
loving the psychotic characters? O.o
Summary: Akutsu discovers that losing feels good.
Warnings: spoilers for up to ep 48, vignette, language, very very very mild violence
- the warning is only really here because when you're writing about Akutsu,
violence is never not included. ^_^
Disclaimer: Prince of Tennis belongs to Takeshi Konomi, not me. I'm just
borrowing Akutsu and Ryoma for a bit.
by Anria
He'd lost.
He'd lost.
To a fucking mouthy brat.
Anger bubbled in his veins, surging through his muscles and propelling him into action before he thought. One hand outstretched, he pulled the brat up onto the tips of his toes and stared down at him, waiting for the fear to show which would mean that on some level he'd still won, and—
"I win."
—and there was no fear in the brat's eyes.
There was no fear, because he knew.
"You did good, though."
He knew that he had won, on more levels than one.
Akutsu dropped the brat back to his feet, letting him down more gently than he would have anyone else. The brat was smiling, a cocky grin that was the first one Akutsu could remember not wanting to wipe off anyone's face.
He'd lost to a fucking mouthy brat. A fucking mouthy brat who was the first person to ever defeat him. A fucking mouthy brat who could do what all the other fucking mouthy brats couldn't.
A fucking mouthy brat who delivered just what he said he would.
A fucking mouthy brat who was exactly . . . like . . . him.
Akutsu started to laugh. It began as light chuckles, and rapidly worked its way up into full-throated streams of laughter, shaking his shoulders and loosening something inside him that had been tied in a knot for as long as he could remember.
For as long as he could remember. . . .
. . . he'd been beating people with attitudes like the brat's. For as long as he could remember, there had been nothing behind their words, nothing of substance to beat against. For as long as he could remember, he'd been searching for the one person who could show him his limits, show him that there was something he couldn't do.
And the brat had been doing exactly the same thing.
But the brat was better than him. He could admit that now, and not feel any of the anger that might have bubbled up inside him before, because the brat had proved it. It didn't matter any more that he'd lost to a fucking mouthy brat, all that mattered was that he'd finally found a person who could do what he said he could.
He'd found something of substance to beat against, and lost.
It felt good.
Unexpectedly, his mind flashed back to the scene many years before, where a bunch of older members tried to make him quit the tennis club. Fucking mouthy bastards, the lot of them.
"A bad mannered guy like you is going to hurt the dignity of tennis!"
"If you lose to me, pack your bags and resign from this club."
Akutsu stopped, and tilted his head back to stare at the sky, his racquet on his shoulder.
"If you lose to me, pack your bags and resign from this club."
This time, he laughed so hard tears ran down his face.