Chapter VII- "Actually, It's Entirely Your Fault…"

"This will be a one on one competition," said Ojii to the 2nd Years and the 3rd Years. "We designed it as a competition between which year is better; 2nd or 3rd."

Both teams muttered under their breath that their own year was superior.

"So this will involve four mini competitions," said Banji. "It will be composed of relay races. If your team wins a relay, then you choose one person from your team that you want to be in the contending for the captainship. The other team will then choose between all your choices who they want to be your captain."

"Wait…" said Oishi slowly. "So that means… if let's say our team wins two of the competitions so Saeki and I get chosen, then the other team has to choose between the two of us who will be the captain?"

"Very good, Oishi, you caught on quickly," complimented Ryuuzaki.

"Is it a bad sign that I can't tell whether or not that was sarcasm?" Oishi looked uneasy.

"Sure!" said Ryuuzaki ambiguously.

"So the first of the four relays is that crazy egg on the spoon game," said Sakaki. "I feel fairly confident that you all have either played this before or at least know what the game is all about."

It was more or less true, and anyone who didn't know what the game involved received an extremely long winded explanation from Shinji.

Jirou, Oishi, Saeki, Yanagisawa and Ryou all got in line with Ryou in front simply because he had gotten there first. Momo, David, Hiyoshi, Kamio and Shinji, the team of 2nd Years, lined up next to their seniors with Momo at the head.

The coaches passed out a spoon and an egg to each team.

"Remember, if your egg breaks then you automatically lose," Ojii warned.

"On your mark!" said Ryuuzaki, raising her hand. "Get set! GO!"

The two groups immediately leapt to begin, but as it turned out, Momo tripped on something or other (he must have been concentrating too hard) and fell on his face, causing the egg to go SPLAT!

There was a bit of a pause as Ryou stopped his running and returned to his team.

"WE WIN!" they cheered after their delayed reaction.

"MOMO!" yelled the 2nd Years.

"What?" demanded Momo. "It's not MY fault!"

"Actually, it's entirely your fault…" Kamio pointed out.

"All right…" said Banji. "Way to ruin my favorite relay race, guys."

"Excuse us for living," said all ten tennis players.

"So, 3rd Years, choose one person to be in the race for captainship," Sakaki said.

The 3rd Years turned into a huddle. They discussed it briefly, and then it was decided that Saeki was the choice. After all, Saeki was an assistant captain, and the others figured he must have captain-envy since a freshman got to be captain of the tennis team instead of him.

"Okay, moving onto the next relay," said Ryuuzaki. "We will require that everyone takes off their shoes and puts them on the other side of the nets."

Everyone sort of new what was coming so they tried to tie their tennis shoes together (cause realistically, what else would they be wearing?) but the coaches quickly caught on and made sure all of the sneakers were apart. And then more youthful ones (AKA Sakaki) ran around and threw the shoes around so they were all mixed up.

"It's not going to be THAT hard since there're only twenty shoes…" Banji said when he watched all the students whine.

"But it's still annoying," said Hiyoshi just as Sakaki came back.

"Okay," he said, dabbing his brow with a towel. "You have to bound over the net, put both your shoes on and then come back. When you slap the hand of the next person in line then that person goes. The first team with all the players back here with their shoes on and tied wins."

"If anyone leaves early or returns to the line without putting their shoes on completely then your team will automatically lose," Ojii warned.

Since Ryuuzaki is CLEARLY the self proclaimed 'starter' of the whole thing, she signaled for everyone to go. The teams used the same order and sprinted for the net, leaping over it with great expertise like they were paid for it. After searching around for their shoes and putting them back on, Ryou and Momo returned to their lines.

The next people in line went, and so forth. The race was relatively close. The last person from each line, Kamio and Oishi respectively, left at almost the same time. Kamio had an advantage because he was fast, but his shoes had been tossed further than Oishi's who was lucky enough to have his shoes relatively close together.

However, WE ALL KNOW HOW UNREALISTICALLY FAST KAMIO IS. And it's not like Oishi has ever been revered for his speed, so Kamio was pretty much putting his shoes on and running at the same time and not losing any time. Oishi jumped over the net at almost the same time as Kamio, but naturally Kamio was back first.

Oishi looked sad, but his team assured him it was okay, even though they were glaring at Kamio and maybe secretly blaming Oishi for not being fast enough.

"Well, if we follow the logic of the 3rd years, I am the assistant captain of my team!" said Kamio proudly.

"But the last thing we want to do is to look like we're inferior to the 3rd Years and follow their logic!" Momo pointed out.

Even though Momo had a bad idea, the other 2nd Years thought it was more important to have their individuality from their seniors. So they picked Hiyoshi, mostly because we all know how obsessed Hiyoshi is with being captain for Hyoutei NEXT YEAR. Even though it took him like four seconds to lose to Ryoma…

"All right, this next challenge starts as soon as I finish speaking," said Sakaki. "You must get yourself in age order. Then, the oldest person in your group has to run to everyone standing on the sidelines and find the person who is the next oldest and bring him back. Then, the youngest person has to go to the people in the sidelines and bring back the person who is the next youngest. Once the seven of you are in an accurate age order line then that team wins."

Sakaki stopped talking, but everyone still looked confused.

"I said it started as soon as I finished talking," Sakaki reminded them.

Everyone gasped and said OH YEAH.

They all quickly exchanged birthdates. The 3rd Years established their oldest member, Oishi, the quickest and he immediately ran off towards the large mass of people who were bored.

"Hi Oishi!" Eiji cheered.

"Hi Eiji!" said Oishi with a wave. Then he remembered he was on a mission. "Okay, who here has a birthday closest to April 30th and is a 3rd Year?"

"Wait, ignore him!" said Momo as he barreled over. "I need someone whose birthday is closest to July 23rd and is a 2nd Year!"

Oishi looked at Momo with this face that was like; "Your insolence and disrespect makes me sad!"

"In case anyone cares, MY birthday is April 20th," said Marui as if that didn't mean anything.

"All right, let's go!" said Oishi as he grabbed Marui and dragged him back to the tennis court.

Inui flipped through his data book. "Momo, I believe you are seeking out Kaidou," he said.

"Thanks!" said Momo without bothering to check to see if Inui was right. Momo had learned at that point that Inui was always right and it was silly to try and question him. Even though Kaidou was annoyed with helping Momo, he went to the tennis courts anyway because he had 2nd Year pride.

"Inui, don't you have any 3rd Year pride?" Fuji asked.

"Yes," said Inui.

"Why did you help Momo then?" Fuji questioned.

"I always jump at the chance to prove that my data is useful," Inui said.

"Wait, do you have all of our birthdays in there?" said Atobe, looking annoyed, stopping just short of exclaiming STALKER!

But they didn't have anymore time to argue because Yanagisawa had imposed his presence on them. "All right, whose birthday is next after December 9th?"

He was quickly followed by Hiyoshi who wanted to know whose birthday was after December 5th.

They both looked over Inui's shoulder as he flipped through the data book and said, "Hm…"

"Kabaji…and Dan," Inui said, pointing at said individuals.

So then it came down to a foot race. Atobe ordered Kabaji to go fast for the 3rd years because he DEFINITELY had 3rd Year pride. But then he realized that Hiyoshi was the opponent and he had even more Hyoutei pride, so he stopped himself, and Kabaji as well.

"Actually, Atobe, I don't really want my team to win anymore challenges, because if I'm the only choice then I get to be captain," Hiyoshi admitted.

"Oh," said Atobe. "Then I get the best of both worlds. All right, go on Kabaji."

And so Kabaji and Yanagisawa departed.

The 3rd Years on the tennis courts cheered and then all the extra people were booted back to the waiting area. The 3rd Year Team then had to choose the second person they wanted to represent them, and since they thought of the idea first, they went with the theory that Oishi should be the next one because he's also an assistant captain of his respective team.

Momo looked at his 2nd Year compadres. "Guys, we have to win another challenge so the 3rd Years won't think they're better than us!" he announced.

"Yeah and otherwise Hiyoshi will automatically be the captain!" Kamio pointed out.

"Is there something wrong with that?" Hiyoshi said, looking annoyed.

"Yes," said Shinji. Everyone expected him to say more but he didn't, oddly enough.

"Why is that a problem?" Hiyoshi said.

"Because we refuse to be YOUR underlings!" David announced.

"Here, here!" cheered the others.

"We refuse to do as Santa's workers do!" David continued.

The others were ABOUT to cheer HERE, HERE! But then they stared at David confusedly.

"In that sense, you can say we REFUSE to be subordinate Clauses!" David said.

Everyone decided to murder him after that one, but the coaches cleared their throats to get attention.

"The last competition is DIZZY BAT!" said Ryuuzaki.

Of course their response was a groan but they were undeterred.

"Because we're sort of running out of time and we still have another group to go through, we're going to ask each team to choose someone from their group to compete for them," said Sakaki. "But you should choose wisely. Because if this person wins, then he gets to be in the contention for captainship."

So they took the advice of their coaches and made sure to choose wisely. The 3rd Years picked Ryou because it seemed smarter than choosing either Jirou or Yanagisawa. The 2nd Years decided upon Kamio because they realized that their earlier idea was actually kind of stupid and it would make the most sense to elect someone who is in a co-captain position instead of avoiding that type of person. Besides, Kamio was so very fast.

"All right, if there's any cheating then you automatically lose," Banji warned.

"Spin around ten times and then go to the baseline on the other side of the court," Ojii said. "The first one there wins."

The entirety of Hyoutei cheered for the 3rd Years because Atobe informed them of Hiyoshi's fiendish plan to become the captain. And they really did need at least one Hyoutei member to be a captain since there were none of them yet. And, of course, the 3rd Years all cheered for the 3rd Year Team so the 2nd Years had like three people cheering for them.

Kamio's speed meant nothing when he was dizzy. And it was certainly difficult to maneuver his way even more because he has no depth perception since he styles his hair like an emo.

In short, Ryou was able to make it to the opposite side of the court before Kamio was.

"Congratulations 3rd Years!" said the coaches as almost everyone on the sidelines erupted into cheers.

Hiyoshi rubbed his hands together diabolically. Even though he hadn't contributed to the failure of Kamio, he was gad that he lost.

"So…" said Ryuuzaki. "The 3rd Years have to choose between Hiyoshi and… that's it…"

The 3rd Years paused. "We pick Hiyoshi!" they said.

And then the 2nd Years had to choose between Saeki, Oishi and Ryou. Eventually they gave in to Saeki's captain envy. Even though it probably would have been better to choose Ryou who had absolutely no authority in decision making under normal circumstances so he would be unaccustomed to it, they pitied Saeki and gave it to him.

"So the captain of the 3rd Years is Saeki, and the captain of the 2nd Years is Hiyoshi," said Sakaki, scribing the results down.

"And we only have one team left to deal with!" said Ojii.

"If we could see Oshitari, Fuji, Marui, Sengoku and Kirihara on the courts now?" said Banji. "We have to choose the captain out of the Genius Team."