School soon settled into a comfortable pattern, with lessons in the morning, naps during lunch, practice in the afternoon, and outings to the beach when the sun started setting. The regulars had been selected after a round of ranking matches, and Amane got his wooden racket. When he first emerged from Ojii's workshop with it, the team had stopped their games to stare.

"Why's it so long?" To nobody's surprise, Itsuki was the first to ask.

Amane's expression never changed. "It didn't take that long to make, did it, Ojii?" Then, "Pfft."

Bane smacked him. "That's not even funny, stupid!"

"I thought it was," Amane replied calmly. "But isn't it cool?" He hefted his racket in one hand and plucked at the strings a little. "Ojii said something about wanting to make full use of my arm power."

Their coach, who had tottered out of his workshop with huge goggles perched on his head and a bunched-up apron in his hands, nodded. "Go try it out," he instructed. "Kurobane, play doubles with him. Saeki, Itsuki, on the other side."

If the sudden arrangement startled anyone, they didn't let it show. Bane took his place at the baseline and got momentarily distracted by Amane stretching, all that sinewy muscle moving against the thin material of his jersey. "The hell, Bane," he muttered to himself, then prepared to serve.

After two games, it was pretty obvious that the Bane-Amane pair would never win. While each of them clearly had more power than Saeki and Itsuki combined, they had no experience as a doubles pair. Plus, Amane was still getting used to his new racket, and kept missing shots.

"Now you know what you have to work on," Ojii said sagely from his perch on his usual bench, and, to all appearances, fell asleep.

Bane looked at his junior. "Does this mean I'm going to have to partner him?" he grumbled to nobody in particular. "I'd kill him before we get used to each other."

Amane had walked over, and Bane realised that the redhead had shrunk. Or that Bane himself had grown taller at last – they were at each other's eye level now. "Are we doubles partners now, Kurobane-nii-chan?" he asked, so earnestly that Bane couldn't help but soften a little.

"Yeah, I suppose we are," he reached up and cuffed Amane on the head a little. "Come on, let's go get you used to this racket."

Working with Amane wasn't as bad as Bane thought it would be – as long as there was tennis to distract the kid, he didn't make any stupid puns. Also, in between the bad jokes, Amane was rather enjoyable to talk to.

One day over lunch, Itsuki decided that Amane needed a nickname. Everyone in the team had one, anyway. And so they all tried to think of one, but to no avail – there wasn't a way of shortening Amane's name without it becoming indecipherable, and Hikaru was just too common a name to play with. They all ignored Amane's own suggestions, because there was no way they were going to call him Mr Puntastic, no matter how true it was.

The answer came during class one day. Atsushi, from two rows back, flung a crushed ball of paper at Bane's head. "Don't you think that statue looks like your little puppy?" the note said. Bane turned to glare at Atsushi, who sparkled innocently at him, then considered the first part of the sentence. History class normally covered Japanese history, but they had a weird teacher with a fetish for European art, and thus they occasionally spent lessons listening to her deviate off topic and enthuse about Leonardo da Vinci's paintings and Michelangelo's sculptures.

Today, she was talking about a statue called David, who was apparently a character in the Christian bible. Or so Bane thought; he hadn't exactly been listening. He did pay a bit of attention to the slides that she was flashing on the screen, though – and realised that Atsushi was right, in a rather… general… sort of way. After all, Amane wasn't exactly unclothed and posing in a way that basically showed off his body to everyone, and Bane really wasn't thinking of Amane naked. At all. Really.

"You might have something," Bane grudgingly wrote on the abused piece of paper, and tossed it back over his shoulder, not really caring where it landed – it would find its way back to Atsushi.

That evening after practice, as the team trooped to shower and change, Atsushi grabbed Amane by the elbow and told him to take off his shirt and pose.

"Pose?" Amane repeated in confusion. "How?"

"Er, kind of like… strike a powerful yet not too overbearing pose." Atsushi scratched his head as he tried to remember what was said in class. Bane kept silent – he had a horrible feeling that if he spoke, he'd ask Amane to take off all his clothes to make things accurate. Atsushi, in the meantime, was busy attempting to recreate the statue's pose in an extremely comical way.

Amane blinked. "Do you have a reference, uh, besides yourself?"

"That statue by Michael something," Atsushi said absently, arms akimbo, still trying to get the pose right. Saeki, Ryou and Itsuki were doubled up with laughter at him. "It looks like you."

"The statue of David?" Amane tugged his shirt over his head and slung it over his shoulder in a perfect imitation of the statue. "Does it look like me?" He lowered his head and looked intense for a bit, then snorted and ruined the effect. "I guess you have your nickname, then."

"Davide," Saeki tried. "Yeah, it works. Welcome to the club of uselessly suitable nicknames!"

"I happen to like mine," Ryou argued. "Right, B2?"

"Right, B1," Atsushi said automatically.

Amane laughed. "Are those your nicknames?"

The twins grinned at him. "Yep," they chorused, and Ryou added, "American TV is strange."

"Well, now that we've decided on a name for him, can we go shower?" Bane bounced his racket on his shoulder and looked at everyone but Amane, who had tied his jersey around his neck and was currently amusing Saeki with Superman imitations. "I have to get home early today."

"Oh," Amane said, untying his 'cape' and looking at Bane with those clear green eyes. "I was going to ask you if you wanted to try that ice cream place down by the beach, actually."

Now Bane felt like an idiot. "Uh, tomorrow?" he suggested lamely. "I'll treat."

"Ok!" Amane flashed him a quick grin, and walked off into the clubroom.

Saeki sidled up to Bane. "Kurobane-nii-chan… do I get a treat too?" He twined his arm around Bane's. "I'll be good, really."

"Die," Bane told him, laughing. "And why are only calling me that now, huh? You're two days younger than me. Start acknowledging my seniority."

"Ok, Kurobane-nii-chan. But I get ice cream out of it." Laughing and arms still linked, they headed into the clubroom.