This originated as a spontaneous challenge on a discord server to make a fic based on your nickname and was then further inspired by a discord conversation that almost went awry lol.
The gentle breeze blew over the school grounds as three players were about to enter the Fukurodani gym. And then one halted at the bottom of the steps and faced the courtyard.
"Akaashi, wait." Bokuto's sudden declaration brought the setter and Konoha to a halt at the entrance.
Then, out of nowhere, the wind picked up. Bokuto stood entranced peering into the gust whipping his hair back and forth. Akaashi, halfway up the gym steps, gawked at the wing spiker's sudden spelled state, curious when Bokuto would finish his statement. Konoha peered back out the door having already crossed the threshold, equally if not more curious about what the next words from Koutarou's mouth would be.
And then, the fiercest, whiplashing gust arrived. Autumn leaves whipped around in a cyclone, levitating up in a cone. Akaashi shielded his face from the sandy dirt scattered by the raging force. Even Bokuto winced but kept his eyes upon the spiraling foliage before him.
And just as spontaneously, the soft breeze returned, and the detritus settled back on the path. In its wake, the team's backup setter, Shuuichi Anahori, choked on the lingering dust cloud.
Bokuto's trance faded, and his mouth morphed into a cathartic grin, almost maniacal in nature.
"Actually, never mind," he hummed.
Keiji stared dumbfounded.
Anahori greeted the team captain, and they high-fived before strolling past Konoha into the gym. Akaashi didn't move from his spot, watching the ace head inside with full perplexity.
In the locker room, Bokuto suited up rapidly.
"Anahori! Let's do some sets!" he called, skipping past the young setter who had just finished changing, ready to drag him into the gym itself.
"Sure!" the boy called and followed the excitable ace out of the room. Only Akaashi and his seniors Sarukui, Komi, and Konoha remained, the last one eyeing the wing spiker's departure suspiciously.
"Akaashi, what was Bokuto going to say outside?" he asked. Komi and Saru turned to attention.
"Probably nothing," Keiji shrugged as he tied the knot on his sneakers.
"But Bokuto always talks like he has no filter!" Akinori Konoha gestured. "I've never seen him backtrack before saying something."
"What happened?" Saru curiously interjected.
As Konoha explained, he accompanied Bokuto's words with melodramatic arm gesturing not true-to-life at all. "When we were walking up, Bokuto was like, 'Akaashi! Wait!', and then the wind picked up and Anahori arrived, and suddenly he's like, 'Actually! Never mind!' and went inside!" Akaashi rolled his eyes and ignored the fact Komi and Sarukui were beyond intrigued.
"Yeah, that is odd," Saru pondered.
"Maybe he wanted Akaashi to give him dating advice?" Haruki Komi posed.
Konoha stuck his hands on his hips haughtily. "And he'd ask Akaashi for that? No offense, man."
"None taken," Keiji sarcastically replied.
"That does remind me," Yamato Sarukui meditated. "The other day, Bokuto kept staring at the school roof. I asked him what was up, and he said he was pondering whether if he jumped off the roof, maybe he could fly. You think he wanted Akaashi to push him over to test it?"
"Oh dear goodness, I hope not," Keiji mumbled with the ghastliest look he ever made.
"Nah, I don't think even Bokuto's that dumb," Komi opined.
"Do you remember exactly what happened?" Konoha pressed the setter. Keiji took a moment to run the entire exchange through his head again, from the breeze as they walked up, to its sudden strengthening, to Anahori's arrival. He began to summarize the exact course of events, but as soon as Shuuichi was mentioned, Konoha had a eureka moment.
"Anahori! That's it!" he shouted.
"That's what?" asked Komi.
"Bokuto grinned right after he saw Anahori. So whatever made him change his mind, it was because Anahori showed up."
Saru's eyebrows lifted in agreement, and Komi answered with an "Ah" of assent as well. Done tying his shoes, Keiji decided to head to practice, telling himself he didn't care about the conversation in the slightest.
"Maybe he wanted to discuss a new move with Akaashi but didn't want to embarrass Anahori since he's younger," Saru proposed. Akaashi floated in the doorway to listen; he was actually more interested than he'd realized.
But Konoha scowled. "Nah, cos if that's what he wanted, it would have gone like this." Suddenly Akinori bounded before Saru in an attempt to imitate their ace. "Akaashi! Tell me how you did that new set thing!" He waved in the distance. "Hey, Anahori! Get over here! Listen to this! You could learn from Akaashi here! Come and listen to this!" Yamato chuckled; Akinori was 100% right.
"Then maybe it's something not to do with volleyball," Komi mused.
"Like, maybe he wanted Akaashi to look at a rash or something? I know I wouldn't want to talk about that in front of my juniors," Saru proposed.
"I don't think Bokuto's that shy to be honest," Konoha grimly admitted.
Komi snapped his finger. "You said he kind of had this weird grin, right? Maybe he finally snapped?"
"Like how?" inquired Saru.
"Something sinister." He got an idea. "Maybe…he wanted Akaashi to help him bury a body."
Keiji peered on skeptically, but the awkward situation didn't last as Konoha quickly stomped his foot to get everyone's attention. "No, no, no! Cos if that was the case it would have gone like this."
He proceeded to imitate Bokuto again, this time beginning by slamming both palms on Saru's shoulders with his neck bent down in chagrin. "Akaashi! You gotta help me!"
"W-w-what is it, Bokuto-san?" Saru stammered, trying to play his part. Komi giggled, Keiji not the slightest amused.
"It's Kuroo!" Konoha melodramatically continued. "He's on the floor, and he won't wake up!"
"What happened to him?" Saru continued.
"I hit him on the head with a volleyball! Please, Akaashi! You gotta wake him up!"
"I-I don't think I can do that, Bokuto-san."
"But you have toooooo. Pleeeeeease—" Konoha choked and broke out cackling at his own silliness. Saru broke down immediately as well, and Komi by now had already devolved into raucous laughter.
"Oh, Saru. You gotta work on your impression of Akaashi," Komi snickered. "That was awful."
Keiji scowled fiercer than anyone had ever seen him. "This is dumb," he griped.
Konoha smirked as his giggling subsided. "So you say. But did you ever consider that maybe it was about you?"
At this, Keiji seemed to jump.
"Where is Bokuto anyway?" Saru wondered aloud. Komi peered around the threshold into the gym and spotted him practicing with Anahori.
"He's practicing with Anahori." A thought occurred to the libero. Koutarou had a routine he followed at the start of practices, but today he seemed to have forgone it. "You know, did Bokuto do his usual pre-practice ritual? He kinda just rushed out there to do sets with Anahori."
"Yeah, you're right," concurred Saru.
"He asked Anahori to set for him right off the bat!" Akinori recalled.
Keiji grunted. "And? So what? He practices with Anahori too. He has to in case I ever get pulled out for any reason."
"You know," Komi mulled, "that thing he was going to ask Akaashi—I think Bokuto's been worried about his crosses lately, so maybe he was going to do something crazy with Akaashi, you know, like sacrifice him to the volleyball gods! But then Anahori showed up, and he figured that'd be a better choice!" His thoughts grew more ominous by the second. "What if he's trying to make Anahori a better setter—fatten him up, so to speak—so he'll be a good sacrifice?"
"Nah," Konoha shook his head. "I don't think Bokuto's that much into the occult." Keiji flinched at the insinuation that, if Bokuto were into the occult, he may actually attempt such an offering.
"I mean," Yamato interceded nervously, trying to ground the conversation back in reality, "maybe he just wanted Akaashi's opinion on Anahori, but he could only get it in private."
"Or maybe," Konoha darkly began, "he was going to tell Akaashi he wants to start setting with Anahori from now on."
For the first time since the discussion began, Akaashi was given genuine pause. He felt weak, insecure, and powerless all of a sudden without a rational reason why.
"Seriously?" Saru asked skeptically. "What could Akaashi do that would make Bokuto reject him?"
"It could be a grudge."
"Grudge about what?" Akaashi irritably huffed. He regretted getting involved in the conversation the moment he spoke.
"I dunno, for somethin'. He did seem pretty upset about you telling people he failed his math test the other day."
And now even Keiji's own thoughts began to shift.
Could it be?
Konoha, Komi, and Sarukui bypassed Akaashi to peer into the gym. Bokuto spiked Anahori's toss vigorously. The young setter beamed proudly at the undivided attention from their national-level ace.
"Look at them," Konoha frowned. "Look how sappy he is, lapping up all that attention. It's disgusting. And look at Bokuto, all playful and full of energy. Nope, this is bad for sure."
"You're ridiculous," Akaashi weakly protested.
"Are we though?" Akinori challenged.
Keiji had no response.
"Hey!" the manager Yukie Shirofuku shrilly shrieked from across the gym at the sight of the third-years hiding in the locker room. "Get your lazy butts out here and start warmups!" The three third-years conspicuously flinched.
"All right. What's your plan?" Komi quickly asked Konoha.
"We'll deal with it after practice. No way we're gonna sit back and let some first-year, know-it-all, rookie chump rob our team's setter of his rightful position!"
"You realize you're talking about your teammate, right?" Saru warily voiced.
"So what are you gonna do?" Komi continued. Akaashi listened in tenuously.
"I'll ask Bokuto straight up what the deal is. You three stay in the locker room and listen as I do. And then once we know Bokuto's beef for sure, we'll work on fixing it." He smirked sinisterly.
Practice proceeded as normal, and Akaashi did fairly well setting with Bokuto, although every so often rogue thoughts crept into his head and made him miss a toss. Afterward, Keiji—with more than a hint of paranoia—took note of Bokuto's happy conversing with the first-year Anahori. The pair happened to be hovering near the locker room. Saru placed a hand on Akaashi's shoulder, startling him. He and Komi swiftly guided the second-year into the adjacent space and thereafter Konoha casually strolled to his targets.
"Hey, Anahori! I saw a loose volleyball out in the parking lot."
"Oh, OK. Where's our ball shagger?" the setter scanned.
"No, I think you should get it," Konoha not-so-subtly hinted.
"But we're talking about sets," the setter protested.
"Yeah!" Bokuto irately interjected. "What's your deal, Konoha?"
Akinori sighed and captured the setter in a one-armed hug with a devilish beam. "Well, here's the truth, see? Your mom's here. She said she brought you clean underwear cos she didn't know how long you'd be in practice and she wanted to make sure you were super comfortable. Now, unless you want me to bring her in here so she can tell everyone what a nice thing she's done for you, you better go out to the parking lot and meet her right now."
Anahori's face was redder than Konoha thought possible. Without a word, he fled Akinori's snare and sprinted through the locker room. Akaashi, Komi, and Saru pretended to act cool as Shuuichi whooshed past them and then took up position out of sight against the wall beside the threshold.
"So, Bokuto," Akinori grinned, "how's Anahori doing?"
Almost instantly, Kou groaned with exasperation. "He's not as good as Akaashi, and it's annoying. But!"—his mood lightened up instantly—"I'll whip him into shape, hey, hey, hey!"
"Yeah, Akaashi is something else, isn't he?" Konoha nudged. "How long till Anahori gets to his level you think?"
"No one will ever be as good as Akaashi," Bokuto confidently declared. Keiji's heart beat faster hearing the compliment.
"Well, if no one's as good as Akaashi, shouldn't you focus your time on setting with him while you still can? You're not going to be a third-year forever after all."
Bokuto's face contorted uncomfortably. Deep down, Konoha's logic was sound, and Bokuto wished he could spend every day and every practice running a thousand sets with Akaashi—24/7 even!
But, he also knew, that wasn't the only thing that mattered. "Yeah," Bokuto conceded, "but I'm captain!" he pumped. "It's my job to make sure everyone can pull their weight when I'm not here! That's what being captain means!"
Konoha was more surprised than he should have been by the intelligence and altruism that lay behind the answer.
Unfortunately it also meant the indirect line of questioning was going nowhere. He had to get to the bottom of things before Anahori realized he'd been duped.
Which only left the direct route.
"Yeah, I see what you mean," he yammered. "But, you know, I was real curious about something. Remember when we came into the gym and you were like, 'Akaashi, wait!' but then you were you all 'never mind'?"
Bokuto thought hard momentarily.
"No?" he vexingly said.
Konoha felt a vein bulge in his head. "You don't remember?" he said.
Bokuto shook his head.
"But you gotta!" Akinori pleaded. "Akaashi, me, and you came up together. And you stopped and looked back. And there was the breeze and—"
All of a sudden, Bokuto's face lit up like a Christmas tree. "Yes!" he suddenly shrieked. Konoha's heart pounded in surprise and relief.
"You remember? What was it?" he asked eagerly. The three eavesdroppers tuned in attentively.
"Well, when we walked up, there was that breeze…"
"Mhm," Konoha nodded.
"And I was thinking how nice the breeze was…"
"Mhm."
"And before the wind picked up, I was thinking what would you call a breeze if it had style…"
"Mhm," Konoha said with much more uncertainty where this was going.
Bokuto grinned widely. "So I was gonna ask Akaashi! But the gust came and picked up all the leaves and spun 'em around and I realized!"
"Realized what?"
"A tornado!"
"A…tornado?" Konoha disbelievingly repeated.
"Yeah! It's the snazziest breeze around!"
Konoha blinked.
"That's what you were gonna ask Akaashi?"
"Mhm! But I figured it out, so it didn't matter anymore!"
His proud voice almost seemed like a whistle. Komi and Saru gawked. Akaashi exhaled a deep sigh of relief; and at that moment, Anahori furiously stomped past the trio back into the gym.
"Konoha! My mom's not here!" he screeched.
"Oops! My bad!" Konoha teased and skipped away. Anahori seethed but marched to a different part of the gym to roll up the net. When the coast was clear, Konoha then sidled into the locker room to his cohorts.
They all stared wide-eyed at him, the man who'd started the mystery.
"So, yeah, it was nothing. Anyone want ice-cream?"
With the gym all tidied up, the volleyball team filtered out. Konoha, Komi, Saru, and Akaashi walked behind Bokuto who, upon spotting Shirofuku, dashed up to her.
"Hey, Shirofuku! Help me with my math homework tonight!"
Saru smirked peacefully. "So I guess we really were worried for nothing."
"Yup," Komi agreed.
Akaashi smiled at the ace chatting it up with Yukie.
"Who knows?" Konoha said. "Maybe Bokuto is actually getting smarter?"
The foursome stopped suddenly amidst Bokuto's painful yelp when Shirofuku slapped him on the cheek.
"I am not pushing you off the roof to see if you can fly!" she screeched and stormed ahead. Bokuto whined after her.
"You'll still help me with math, right?!"
We need more Anahori fics in my opinion!