(Back in Japan)
Yanagi Arita stared challengingly at the manager.
"I tell you we want to cut through and enter this tournament," she whispered deadly, watching with a tinge of pleasure as her victim flinched. "And you will let us."
"But-" the manager started to say but fell silent by Arita's death glare.
"It will not be unreasonable. It will be this way: once we lose to one school, we will not try to rejoin again. If any of the schools want to pick a fight, they will come straight to us and have nothing to do with you."
"It's…not fair to those who played from… And this is a boys'-only competition…"
"The girls'-only competition is no fun!" Uotani Marashi cut in, her Yankee attitude back onto the surface. "They are weak! It's hard to meet a team of decent girls who play tennis these days!"
"Still, we can't let you…the- the rules states that-"
"You play tennis, darling?" a girl with black hair held out a black rose to him. "I'll prove myself to you."
The manager stuttered, maybe partly because of her beauty and partly of her unwavering tone.
"Sakura-sempai, you'd have scared him out of his wits before you even served the ball." Tachibana Rika spoke with a bored voice.
Sakura put a hand softly on her cheek. "But of course…" her tone as scary as ever. "Poor thing, should I scare you out of your wits before I let my team into the tournament, sweetheart?"
"Well, manager?" Arita asked, putting her hands on her hips.
"You…are allowed…to join…in the tournament…" the manager stuttered before disappearing into the back room.
As the team walked out of the room, Arita turned to Sakura, "Hanajima, I think he will suffer from mental problems for at least a week."
"Ne, Yanagi-chan sweetie didn't stop me, did she?" Sakura opened her eyes widely at Arita, as a picture of innocence.
"Let's get back to school," Arita glared at Sakura with a slight guiltiness on her face and turned away.
"Ah, your famous glares never worked against me, Yanagi-chan sweetie."
---
"Ready when you are, Hanajima," Uotani Marashi announced, her hand holding tightly on to her racket. Argh, even her teammates makes her nervous sometimes.
"Then I won't hold back, my sweet Yankee," Sakura Hanajima said softly and threw the ball higher than usual.
Just as the ball reached its height limit, without waiting for the ball to start falling down, Sakura jumped lightly off the ground and hit the ball without force.
However, the ball flew fast and Uotani reached it just in time. 'Darn,' she thought, her fire lighted. "Return this, you weakling!"
"Like always, Uo-chan darling," Sakura whispered, hitting the ball swiftly.
This was what normal people would think, Sakura hits the ball without force and can still send the ball flying fast. But actually, she was trained not to show signs of any kind, letting the opponent wonder whether it would be a hard or soft ball.
Uotani chased after Sakura's ball, fire even wilder in her. "THIS!"
This time, Sakura did not reply, but hit the ball as gracefully as ever.
Uotani returned her ball and Sakura held her racket with both hands. Uotani quickly ran to the back of the court. Seeing Sakura's grip tighten, she got herself ready for one of Sakura's Black Attacks. Surprising, the ball was just over the net and landed.
"15-0!"
At the next court, Mikagami Mingzashi was playing against Hikari Kenrina. Mikagami lobbed ball and Hikari started twirling. She was in a ballet twirling position, her arms placed together above her head. Her racket was turning fast, almost impossible to see the sides. Suddenly, she jumped up just as the ball started falling down.
She was very much behind where the ball was heading, but somehow the body shoot forward and turned again when she reached the ball and was in smashing position. She smiled sweetly at Mikagami and the ball went down. The ball continued turning on the spot it landed until it slowly stopped.
"Wow! Hikari-chan! This is the first time I saw it first-hand!" an extremely short girl shouted, making herself visible. She was, however, ignored.
"Oops, I was slightly too serious, Mikagami-san, gomen," Hikari bowed, "but it's more fun that way, isn't it?"
"Old friends, Kenrina-chan, don't be so formal. Save that line for competitions."
"That would anger Yanagi buchou, you know that, Mingzashi-chan. Want to get me into trouble?"
"Hai."
A voice interrupted them, "Still playing, Hikari-sempai? My competition's over with Timika-sempai already."
Hikari turned around. "Arita buchou doesn't like people to show off, Tachibana."
"Just jealous, Hikari?" Another girl cut in.
"You're siding her, Timika-sempai?"
"Well, I won, 7-6," Timika smiled superiorly.
Hikari and Mikagami rolled their eyes.
"Four of you, 50 laps around the court!" a voice came from behind them.
"ARITA!" All of them shouted, except Rika, who put her racket down and started running.
"That's hundred laps for you three!"
Right! Now I've updated, I need your opinions. Please tell me whether it's confusing for you guys to tell apart who's who. Do you want me to write them as their surnames or names? Though Arita and Kenita will forever be written like that, course if I wrote 'Yanagi', you might not know who I was referring to.
Review replies...
KatrinaKaiba: She was crying because she missed her teammates. She's actually a very emotional person, you know, from her dazzling to genuine smile, she's mostly acting, I think.
Lady Light: Sorry to be so confusing, I'll explain how it goes. '' this sign means it's at another scene not related to the previous paragraph. '---' or a whole line across means it's still around the same place except I'm writing different people. Don't worry if I made it even more confusing now, sure you'll catch on!
Thanks to: Tsuki Mizuno, xxlemonsxx and dream-angel114.