Chapter 7: Anger

Kirihara was not a happy camper. Yanagi-sempai, apparently, could not keep promises any better than his protégé, Akaya himself, could. For one thing, Kirihara couldn't shake off the feeling that Yanagi-sempai was avoiding him; his senior always had pressing business somewhere else whenever Kirihara was looking for him, nowadays. Even now, as he walked towards Court D he noticed Yanagi change direction to head towards Court A, which was far, far away.

Unhappy was an understatement.

"Akaya-kun?"

Kirihara spun around glumly to see Yagyuu standing underneath a tree near the court. He walked over obediently; Yagyuu-sempai wasn't like his dreadful counterpart, Kirihara knew that he would be safe from any rubbish Niou could come up with.

But somehow, Niou-sempai wasn't anywhere in sight. Kirihara frowned a little at this, but as Niou's absence was for the best of his interests, he decided to just account it to good luck. He stopped a few feet away from Yagyuu, and decided to look politely confused. "Yes, Yagyuu-sempai?"

Yagyuu smiled gently at him. "Don't be so angry. Yanagi doesn't hate you, you know." Kirihara was mortified. Was he really that transparent? His lower lip stuck out in petulance even as he fought to keep a blush from rising. "But he's always avoiding me!" Well, that came out badly. Kirihara snuck a peek at Yagyuu's expression. Did Yagyuu know about his crush? Quite probably, actually.

"Renji's only having difficulty talking to you; he doesn't want to hurt you anymore, Akaya-kun." Yagyuu ruffled his hair fondly, and strolled away quietly, leaving Kirihara to think under the tree. Yagyuu-sempai confused him; he couldn't see behind those glasses, so he couldn't tell what Yagyuu was thinking, and most of the time, it was hard to notice Yagyuu noticing anything, so he didn't know how much the Gentleman knew. But apparently, quite a lot.

Kirihara sighed softly and plonked down against the tree bark. Oh well, a quick nap would do him a lot of good in these circumstances. He overworked his brain already; thinking through all of Yaguu's cryptic sentences: What did Yagyuu mean by hurting Kirihara "anymore"? Yanagi-sempai had never hurt him before, he wasn't Sanada-fukubuchou, always hitting Kirihara, but that's not really hurting either, is it? So…what on earth did that mean?

And since when did Yagyuu-sempai start calling Yanagi-sempai Renji anyway?

He dozed off in the warm afternoon sun, after making sure that his captains were nowhere near.

The rope tied firmly against his wrists tore at his skin. The pain was like needles, sharp and excruciating. His body was covered with burning slashes that cut deeply and agonizingly into him.

Kirihara had never had a nightmare like this before.

He opened his eyes to a room, dimly lit by a single lantern; its spartan furnishings were traditional. The walls and floors were covered in blood, and there was so much of it. The paper door slid open, and Kirihara saw a few men walk in. They were holding katanas, two each, and they surrounded him. Their taunting voices reached his ears, but in his dizziness, he could not understand them.

He hated their tone, however. These were the men who hurt him.

He launched himself at them, and felt the hungry desire to tear them apart. He knew that the blood in the room was his, knew that they had spilt it. Hands grabbed him roughly from behind and threw him back onto the floor. He could hear them now; their mocking voices telling him to beg, to scream. Kirihara gritted his teeth.

He would rather die then do either, and he told them so.

He wasn't ready for the pain that followed after. He did scream for awhile, and then his voice died off along with his hope. They suspended him from the ceiling, and laid slash after slash of the whip on top of the open wounds that they had left earlier.

After what seemed like eternity, the rope was cut and he collapsed onto the floor in a crumpled heap. He heard their laughter, loud, arrogant, and pleased. Defiance swelled up in him, but he was helpless against them. He had never felt helplessness before. He knew, somehow, that he didn't deserve this.

He turned his face towards the floor so they couldn't see his tears.

There were faint footsteps down the corridor, and the sound of a door sliding open, and then a familiar voice was screaming his name.

For a fleeting moment, he felt fear.

Someone was holding him tightly, and softly calling his name. Kirihara opened his eyes and came face to face with Yukimura. "Buchou?" He asked in slight confusion and also embarrassment, as his face was damp with tears. "Renji's coming, Akaya. Was it a bad dream?" Kirihara felt his throat run dry. He could only remember pain, and nothing else to it.

"I…don't remember."

Yukimura looked as though he wanted to say more, but Yanagi came running from a distance, and he stood up. He walked off, as though slightly confused, but Kirihara was distracted by other things. Yanagi knelt in front of him and reached out to brush a stray lock of hair that kept falling into Kirihara's eyes. Kirihara didn't know why, but by pure instinct, he brushed Yanagi's hand away, and then stared at his own hand in shock. He had moved without thinking, almost as if he expected Yanagi-sempai to hurt him…

Kirihara didn't miss the hurt that flashed across Yanagi's face, and guilt tugged at him, but he couldn't bring himself to apologise. It was as if there was reason for his sudden, seemingly irrational anger towards his senior. "Are you alright?" Yanagi-sempai's voice was gentle, as soothing as always, but today, it couldn't calm him.

"Don't pretend you're so concerned! You're a fucking liar!" Kirihara sprung up from his sitting position and shoved Yanagi away. He snatched up his racket from the ground where it was next to Yanagi who fell backwards when Kirihara pushed him, and he sprinted off towards the club room.

Niou looked up from his reverie when the door slammed open, to see Kirihara dash in and throw his precious tennis racket at the trophies laid out on a table. Niou's eyes widened in shock when he realised that Kirihara was on the verge of bursting into tears. His own problems were forgotten for the time being.

"Aka-chan is cryyyyingggggg?" Niou approached the matter in the only way he knew how to.

Kirihara glared furiously at Niou, but Niou looked more concerned than derisive. Kirihara looked at his senior with mixed feelings, then he threw himself towards Niou and bawled. Niou blinked in amazement. This was something he didn't see everyday. He almost wished that he could film this to show Yagyuu and maybe they could have a few good laughs over it later when Kirihara's problem was settled, but whoops, oh yes, Yagyuu wasn't talking to him. Right.

Niou didn't know what to say, but he could guess Kirihara's reasons for distraught. Yanagi was…a little too unsubtle when it came to his own behaviour. As a result, he just held Kirihara to himself and stared at the roof of the clubroom, wondering what was happening to his team.

AN: Hello! This update was faster than the last? But it's shorter. Eheh. Tell me what you think! Sorry to all the YanaKiri fans out there reading this, I love that pairing too, so don't worry about them! And Niou's mess will be fixed soon enough, but not before I start with…Marui. Just wrote out the whole plot for the past life thingy, and had to change many things in my plans to make them fit together nicely. Hope nothing goes wrong! Let's see if you all can guess what happened back then? Till next update!