*NOTE* Alternate Universe wherein I shamelessly borrowed/altered ideas from various media sources and even threw in some of my own. If anything is canon here, it's probably an accident. Later chapters may include corporal punishment.

Changechildren (Prince of Tennis)

Part 6

By Haruka (email: haruka at ymail dot com)

The dining room was abuzz with activity when all of the boys were gathered there together for dinner. Atobe had managed to contact his father about providing a kitchen staff in a hurry, but it was still a case of having to take one's own plate to the table.

There was no assigned seating, so the kids spread out and occasionally moved around, but the adults kept to their own table. Nanjiroh marveled at the noise level, while the other three gave him wry, 'you haven't spent any time in junior high cafeterias lately, have you?' looks.

Fuji Syuusuke tapped his brother on the shoulder. "Yuuta, would you like to eat with me?"

Before the younger Fuji brother could reply, a voice not unfamiliar to Syuusuke piped up, "He'll be eating with me – we have business to discuss."

Syuusuke turned toward Mizuki Hajime, who beamed triumphantly at him.

"Since when do you have any powers?" Syuusuke asked.

"Since last night," Mizuki replied. "And I heard about this place from Yuuta-kun, who, by the way, also told me all about YOUR power, so I'll thank you kindly to point those baby blues in another direction."

Syuusuke's eyes narrowed. "I can resist using my power, even if I'm looking at you. Believe me, the last thing I want is to have you following me around."

Mizuki snapped his fingers. "Oh, of course! You'd rather have Kawamura Takashi in that position, wouldn't you?" He put an arm around Yuuta and began steering him away. "Now if you'll excuse us, my ROOMMATE and I are busy."

Syuusuke's jaw dropped as he watched them walk away, Yuuta looking back helplessly.

"Fujiko?"

Syuusuke jumped at the sound of Kawamura's voice behind him. "Taka-san!" he said, fearing the other boy had heard Mizuki mention him, "how long have you been there?"

"I just got here. I saw Mizuki with you and thought maybe you could use some intervention." Kawamura rubbed his head and looked embarrassed. "But I guess I was too late."

Syuusuke smiled with relief. "No, Taka-san. You were just in time. Come on, let's sit down and eat."

Kajimoto Takahisa watched Mizuki head off with Yuuta. "I wonder when Mizuki got here."

Tanaka Youhei looked up and followed his gaze. "Hey, yeah, he wasn't at the meeting, was he?"

"No, but neither was Fuji Yuuta," his twin, Kouhei, pointed out. "I guess people are still developing powers."

"What's it like rooming with Tachibana, anyway?" Youhei turned to his team Captain. "You guys getting along?"

"He's nice enough. Kind of serious, but I guess I can be guilty of that myself at times. At least he isn't disruptive, like some of the others I can hear from several doors down." He shook his head. "I don't know what they were thinking with some of the room assignments."

"I'm just glad they left Youhei and I alone!" Kouhei declared, then paused. "Although it might have been interesting to room with someone as sexy as Oshitari Yuushi!"

"Or Tezuka!" Youhei agreed.

"I wonder who Mizuki ended up rooming with," Takahisa said more to himself than the others, but their sharp ears picked it up, anyway.

"Who else would HAVE him but Yuuta?" the twins chorused.

Takahisa didn't answer. His lilac gaze was focused on the black-haired St. Rudolph manager, who was sitting as close to Yuuta as he could get without being in his lap.

"Hey, Atobe, my milk is getting warm – wanna 'cold' it up for me?"

The Hyotei Captain gave his Doubles player a disparaging look. "Am I your personal appliance now, Shishido? I don't perform on demand."

"Shishido-san, you could at least say 'please'," Choutarou suggested.

Shishido rolled his eyes. "Okay, sorry. Would you please make it cold again, buchou? I hate warm milk."

Atobe held out his hand and Shishido gave him the glass. The wealthy Senior tried to focus on applying just enough of his power to make the liquid colder, but frost began forming on the outside of the glass. "Damn it, I probably overdid it." He looked at the milk. "There are milk cubes floating in it now, sorry."

"That's okay, at least it's definitely cold now." Shishido took it back and sipped it. "Thanks!"

"Every time I think I'm getting a handle on this power, something like that happens," Atobe groused.

"Don't worry about it, Atobe," Yuushi told him. "This isn't like tennis, where you're either born with natural talent or you're not. These powers were bestowed upon us all of a sudden, and we're all playing catch-up."

"How is your power going, Yuushi-senpai?" Choutarou asked. "Are you gaining more control?"

"It's limited only by my imagination, Choutarou," Yuushi replied. He spread his hands over the table, and suddenly there was a complete banquet before them, including a huge roasted turkey and candlelight.

"Looks good enough to eat!" Shishido declared and made a grab for the turkey, bumping Yuushi's arm in the process. The illusion dissipated.

"That seems to be my Achilles heel." Yuushi sighed. "I can't maintain the illusion if someone touches me."

"It's still a really cool power, though," Shishido told him. "You can make anyone think that they're seeing anything!"

"Speaking of believing what one is seeing, is Ibu Shinji talking to his fork over there?" Choutarou asked, and the other Hyotei boys turned to look.

"Yes, it would appear that he is," Atobe replied.

"Not only that, but the fork just NODDED in response!" Gakuto yelped. "Ew, that's creepy!"

"Animating inanimate objects? That's just weird," Shishido stated.

"Then it's a suitable power for Ibu-kun," Atobe remarked. He noticed Mizuki and frowned. "Now what is Mizuki doing here? Has he got powers now?"

"He must," Choutarou said.

Shishido shook his head. "That's a scary thought."

"It should be interesting, though," Atobe pointed out. "See the looks he's receiving from Fuji Syuusuke? It would appear that they're both still fighting over possession of Yuuta-kun."

Gakuto snorted. "Yuuta should grow a backbone and tell them BOTH to back off!"

"But then we wouldn't have the fun of watching this play out, Gakuto," Yuushi smiled knowingly.

"Gently, gently," Momoshiro placed his fork down and picked up his glass of milk.

"Are you still having problems with remembering your own strength, Momo-senpai?" Ryoma asked.

"Well, I broke Akira's bed earlier," he admitted. "So I guess I'm not doing as well as I thought I was, not as well."

"At this stage, I think everyone is still making progress in controlling their powers," Inui remarked. "And it's good that no one has been seriously hurt by accident yet."

"Or on purpose," Kaidoh remarked.

"Yes, it would seem that some people might be inclined to use their powers against others," Inui agreed, glancing surreptitiously toward the Hyotei players.

"At least it was all infighting," Oishi commented. "So far there hasn't been any conflict between schools."

"That's not entirely true, Oishi-senpai," Kawamura said softly, giving Fuji a worried look. The tensai was distracted enough that he didn't notice all conversation at his table had stopped until Oishi touched his arm.

"What?" he started, then saw all eyes were on him. "Did I space out? I'm sorry."

"Did something happen with Mizuki?" Oishi asked. "You were staring at him just now."

"Was I? Well, he's sitting with Yuuta, and I suppose it's no secret that I don't trust him." He sighed. "They're roommates, too, I guess."

"They were roommates at St. Rudolph, weren't they?" Momoshiro asked.

"Probably. I never asked," Fuji replied, half-heartedly taking a bite of food. "At least at St. Rudolph, I never had to watch them together."

Across the room, Mizuki made a point of waving to Fuji behind Yuuta's back.

"I see the problem, nya," Eiji said, then added brightly, "Hey, you know what? You could probably use your power to convince him to leave Yuuta alone -"

"Eiji!" Tezuka and Oishi both rebuked sharply. The acrobat cringed.

"It was just a thought ..."

Kawamura studied Fuji's reaction to the exchange. It worried him even more to see in the beautiful Senior's face that he'd already considered Eiji's idea himself.

Ryoma went back to his room after dinner and picked up his racquet. He was used to playing tennis with his father in the evenings and wondered if they were going to do so anymore. That wasn't the only thing he was wondering about, either.

"Hey, Boy!"

The twelve-year-old looked toward the doorway and saw his father there, holding his own racquet. "What's keeping you?" Nanjiroh asked.

"I'm ready." Ryoma pulled down his cap and walked toward him. "I need to ask you something," he said, sounding like he'd still rather not. "What about Karupin?"

"What about your cat?"

"If I'm going to be here a long time, he'll miss me. I want to bring him here."

"You'd better think about that some more," Nanjiroh remarked. "The cat's safer at home. With all these kids throwing their powers around, he could get caught in the crossfire."

Ryoma frowned. "So could I, but you're letting me stay."

"Yeah, well, you didn't cost as much as the cat." Nanjiroh leaned against the doorway. "You sure you want to stay here at all? Just because your teammates are here –"

"I'm staying."

Nanjiroh scratched his chin. "You haven't shown any powers."

Ryoma held his gaze. His father chuckled.

"You're that determined to stay, eh?" He shrugged. "The matter of the cat is out of our hands, anyway. Atobe's parents don't want any animals in this place besides you kids – he can't even bring his dog."

His son made a face and went around him out into the hall. "Let's get out on the court."

As the two of them were heading down the hall, Ryoma saw Mizuki come out of his room and pass by them, then turn into Fuji's room. Ryoma paused briefly to see if his teammate was in there, but it looked like neither Fuji nor Eiji were around. So why was Mizuki in their room?

"What are you staring at?" Nanjiroh asked as he took his son's shoulder and steered him away. Ryoma glanced back suspiciously, but kept his mouth shut.

Oishi wasn't sure why he felt nervous, since he was fairly sure he hadn't done anything wrong. However, when one was summoned to a meeting of three of the adults who were, in effect, his guardians at the moment, it was hard not to feel some trepidation.

His knock on the boardroom door was met with Sumire's reply inviting him in.

It was his first time in that particular room, and he had to admit, it was impressive, just like the rest of the property. He could easily see a dozen big shots having important luncheons there while they discussed their next multi-million dollar deal.

"Oishi, we have a favour to ask of you," Sumire told him. "But first we want to know a little more about your power and how it works."

"Well, about that," Oishi said, looking embarrassed. "I'm not exactly SURE how it works, or even if the whole thing wasn't coincidence. The only demonstration I've seen so far of what I THINK it is was when Kaidoh was being overloaded by his own power, and when I told him to stop, he stopped, just like that."

"But it came back later," Aoi pressed. "At the meeting."

"Yes, that was about an hour or so later, though."

"I don't think something like that could be coincidence, Oishi-kun," Tarou said seriously. "I would say you definitely have the capability to nullify the powers of others temporarily. However," he added, "it would probably be in our best interests to test the theory once more before we proceed."

"All right," Oishi said uncertainly. He wasn't even sure anymore exactly how he did what he supposedly had done. "How do you want to test it?"

"It's obvious, isn't it?" Sumire told him with a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. "We'll need a 'volunteer' from the audience."

End of Part 6

(2006)

Prince of Tennis belongs to Konomi Takeshi.

This fic is not to be re-posted.