Disclaimer: I don't own the characters. Konomi Takeshi does. I'm merely playing with them for the moment.

A/N: A friend asked for SanaNiou and gave no other specifications. It turned out rather... twisted.

Wrongness

There was something wrong with Niou.

Of course, most people could have told this to Sanada rather easily, not that he needed to be told. Practically everyone who had ever crossed paths with the trickster was quite aware Niou was far from normal. However, most of those who had to deal with Niou on a regular basis learnt to either live with such peculiarities or simply ignore their existence altogether.

Sanada didn't find it possible to fall on such simple solutions, because nothing about Niou was ever simple. the smirks, the disguises, the words and acts all designed solely to deceive spun a clever net that was sometimes impossible to break through, by cunning or by force. Not that Sanada ever truly even considered using cunning to resolve such a matter.

Even beyond all the layers of trickery, though, Sanada was convinced there was more to the wrongness that was Niou Masaharu. It wasn't something he could easily put a finger on, but he couldn't help but sense there was something off about Niou that nobody else seemed to notice. There was something in those smirks, in the mole that moved just a bit when those lips curved in amusement or triumph, something in the way those eyes sparked with each 'puri' and the messy hair and the way those slim fingers curled in a grip around the handle of a racquet.

There was some trick Niou was playing on him, he was sure, some sort of manipulation that the trickster employed to make Sanada think about him whether he wanted or not. Nothing else could explain just how often his thoughts returned to Niou. At first he had tried to explain it as his concern for what havoc Niou might wreak unattended, but later he had come to notice that not all of those thoughts involved Niou doing anything wrong. The fear of catastrophe certainly couldn't explain that particularly disconcerting dream about Niou taking a shower, not that Sanada particularly cared to think about that dream. It always made him feel strangely unsettled, in a slightly different way than the usual unsettled feeling Niou's tricks gave him, and he did not like it one bit. Nothing that came out of Niou could possibly be a good thing. Thus it was only natural that it was a bad thing for him to be thinking of Niou any more than was absolutely necessary.

He had mentioned the problem to Renji once, and only once. Renji had suggested that he was… interested… in Niou, but Sanada had obviously immediately discarded such an idiotic notion as impossible. Obviously he could not stoop low enough to actually develop an interest for another man, least of all for someone like Niou. The mere thought was simply unbearable. As Renji seemed to find it worth consideration, though, Sanada decided it best not to approach Renji about the subject again. Who knew what he'd get into his head next. Granted, Renji was very intelligent, but sometimes he allowed his intelligence to get in the way of basic common sense.

Sanada had not told Yukimura, and had also told Renji not to inform him. He didn't want to even imagine what Yukimura might think if Renji actually got him convinced that Sanada was interested in Niou in such an unnatural manner. That was simply not something he could allow to happen, ever.

To Sanada's dismay, however, he was yet to find the true reason, beyond the obvious conclusion that Niou was playing tricks on him. He tried to discourage Niou, mostly by being even more stern than usual at him, but if anything, this seemed to increase the amount of time Niou spent dominating his thoughts. Just about all of his dreams were dominated by the sharp eyes and fluffy hair and a soft 'puri' rolling off those deceptively smiling lips in tones that made him shiver even in his dreams. It was certainly merely disgust, he told himself. Nothing else was in any manner imaginable, after all.

If his dreams were already invaded by the trickster, his current predicament was certainly the worst during tennis practice. Somehow, he found his eyes drifting towards Niou even when his attention should have been somewhere entirely else. He was afraid someone else might notice and wonder about it, or that Renji would get some more of those ridiculous notions into his head. Yelling at Niou for whatever reason he could come up with did nothing to chase all those thoughts out of his head, but at least it certainly seemed to work to disallow any such idiotic thoughts, as Sanada concluded after hearing Marui mutter something about him having something against Niou. It was not as good as simply being able to ignore the trickster, but it was at least better than anyone else mistakenly thinking he was some kind of a sick pervert who actually took an interest in other men.

It was all Niou's fault, just like it was all Niou's fault that they were once the last ones still left in the club room after the others had already gone home. Yukimura had gone already, leaving Sanada to do the locking-up; Niou was the only one lingering, having gone overtime due to the laps Sanada had assigned him towards the end of the practice and he had failed to finish in time. Right now Sanada was sitting in the locker room proper, rather moodily staring down at the paper work he had already finished, waiting for Niou to get out of the shower and changed so Sanada could chase him out and lock up and go home. This urgency was the only reason why he was thinking of Niou standing in the shower, of course. Niou standing in the shower, naked, water running down his body as he walked the shampoo lather into his perpetually wild hair, dyed darker by the water that rushed down the pale arc of his back in thick rivulets of glimmering shine…

Sanada swallowed, cursing under his breath. Damn Niou and his damned tricks. Since when had the idiot been capable of such disturbing manipulations, anyway? It was only natural and healthy to take a shower after practice. He shouldn't have felt so bothered by those thoughts.

At some point, he wasn't sure when, he had made his way to the door of the shower room. It was merely to tell Niou to hurry up and get out, of course. What other motive could he have for such an action?

Niou frowned as he saw him, indeed busy washing his hair at the moment. "What now?" the trickster snapped. "Haven't you already ordered me around enough today?"

"Hurry up," Sanada said, his eyes staying very firmly on Niou's face. Why were his eyes trying to stray, anyway? "I don't have all day."

"Well, if you hadn't given me those laps, we could have both already left," Niou said sharply. Obviously he didn't know how to quit while he was ahead. "What'd I do to get them, anyway?"

"You annoy me." Sanada frowned. "Obviously, you had to be doing something."

"You're delusional." Niou huffed. "What, did you just want an excuse to shower me alone in the showers after everyone else has left?"

Sanada was momentarily startled, then growled deep in his throat. "I have no such interests." Reaching forward, he took a firm grip of one of Niou's wrists. It was slippery with water in his grasp, causing him to just tighten his grip until he was sure Niou couldn't escape.

"Well, I could be fooled." Niou glared at him. "What is it? Can't keep your hands off such a nice bit of ass?"

Niou's comment made his eyes flicker down to the mentioned part of Niou's body, not that he could see much of it given their current positions. Only Niou's comment, of course. The shower was still on, spraying its water over Niou with quite a lot bouncing off to bury itself in Sanada's clothes, too, but he couldn't exactly bring himself to care. Not when Niou was making such ridiculous claims. "I'm not that much of a freak," he growled, his grip tightening.

"Could have been fooled." Niou's eyes were icy and sharp and as soon as Sanada looked at them he found himself unable to look away. "There's a word for guys who try to get their hands on other guys in shower, you know."

Those were filthy lies, so very obviously they were filthy lies, and really Sanada couldn't be blamed for losing his temper. He let go of Niou at last, pushing the trickster violently away. There was little resistance as Niou's feet slipped on the wet tiles of the shower, falling backwards. The wet hair clung to itself in wet tangles whipping about Niou's face as his head hit the wall of the shower room with a rather satisfying crack.

For a moment Sanada merely stared, Niou was there splayed openly on the floor in front of him yet for once his eyes didn't stray, that strange spell Niou had put on him was obviously gone now and certainly this proved he had no perverse motives in his interest at all. Then he turned and walked hastily away, forcing himself not to run, running would have been undignified and certainly he wasn't quite that upset over Niou's words now was he.

There was something wrong with Niou, Sanada reminded himself as he stormed right out of the club house, the front of his clothes still damp from the spray of the shower; there was something wrong with Niou that drew his eyes and attention and it was certainly not anything in Sanada's own mind, it was all tricks and manipulation because something was wrong with Niou and the water running down to the drain from its caresses of Niou's body had not been dyed pink with blood.