Chapter Five: More Trouble
Fuji was delighted. He hadn't visited his favorite ducky pond since Yuuta moved out, and he so dearly missed his feathery friends. Kirihara, on the other hand, was absolutely horrified by the quacking and honking made by the flapping beings that had swarmed around them.

And then Fuji shoved some breadcrumbs into his hands.

There was a flurry of feathers and Kirihara found himself being mobbed by even more ducks and the occasional goose as they fought for the food. In fright, the child dropped everything and made a wild dash for it, only to end up tripping over his untied shoelace and landing face first into the water, and that's when he finally reached his limit and burst into tears.

It was then that Fuji threw away all his ideals for a perfect day with the child and flared his eyes at the disaster. In a split second he was next to the child picking him up out of the murky water and to his dismay…

"Kirihara…"

Beneath the layer of mud that caked his face and curls, Kirihara had on him one plump smirk and a mad giggle as he pointed to the mud that he had thrown onto the brunette's face. Fuji had heard of mud facials, but he had a feeling that this wasn't how it was suppose to be.

"According to Yanagi, they're supposed to be around here."

When Yagyuu came to pick up the child (Niou tagging along as well), he was dismayed, but not very surprised to see Yanagi fiddling with experiments instead of amusing Kirihara. After getting Yanagi's word that he was now probably at the ducky pond with a 'very reliable and responsible' babysitter, Yagyuu (and Niou) headed there in a flash.

What they got wasn't a very pleasant scene.

"Isn't that Fuji Syusuke?" Niou asked with a delightful grin. "I wonder if Akaya bit him yet."

"Don't say things like that, Niou-kun. Kirihara doesn't bite." Yagyuu retorted as he made his way towards the duo. However, as it turned out, Niou's insight was much better than his because as he neared there was indeed a nasty scene where Kirihara had latched himself onto Fuji's finger and a noticeable wince coming from the prodigy.

"Kirihara let go!" Fuji hissed as he tried to pry his finger from the child's mouth. How it brought back memories from the time Yuuta was teething, but this was Kirihara, and when Kirihara bit him, it wasn't cute like when Yuuta bit him.

The little devil didn't even need to be told to let go. Fuji's finger tasted like breadcrumbs and duck spit, and that alone was enough to make him gag.

"Akaya!"

Fuji gave a relieved sigh as the responsibility of the toddler was taken off of his hands, both figuratively and literally. He recognized the pair to be Kirihara's teammates, and secretly wished them good luck dealing with the red-eyed monster.

"Grandpa!" Kirihara exclaimed happily as he clutched Yagyuu's shirt with his muddy hands and gave him the most innocent and sweet look ever. All of it was false no doubt, and Yagyuu cringed at the sight of his just-ironed shirt getting caked with mud.

"You have a very nice grandson," Fuji remarked sarcastically.

"Thank you for taking wonderful care of him. We'll sure to call on you in the future," Yagyuu replied with his own dryness.

First thing was first, and that was getting Kirihara a bath, which proved to be more of a hassle than winning the nationals two years running. They had went back to Yagyuu's house and was trying to put the child in the sink, but Kirihara had other ideas as he flailed around, kicking and screaming and splashing water all over.

"Yagyuu! Do something!" Niou sputtered as he spat out a mouthful of soapsuds that had been flung his way.

"I'm trying!" Yagyuu hissed as his grip on the squirming Kirihara loosened. And then there was the dreaded 'SPLASH' as Yagyuu finally dropped the child in, and then followed the banshee-like screech.

"Akaya! Be quiet!" Kirihara only crew harder at Yagyuu's request. "Please!"

Upon his request, Kirihara did become quiet, only because then he was too preoccupied with belching up a storm, otherwise known as the Inui bento. Niou immediately drew back in disgust while Yagyuu could only restrain himself from knocking Kirihara silly, seeing that he had just gotten half-digested potential poison on his shirt. This just wasn't his day, was it?

And then Marui barged in.

"Where were you two? We have Sunday practices, too, in case you forgot!" Then he saw the slimly stuff clinging to Yagyuu. "Oh… nevermind."

It turns out (wouldn't you know it?) that Kirihara was very easily bribed with sweet things with pretty colors. While one shot of a strawberry float might keep a kid his size bouncing off of the walls for hours, it promptly knocked Kirihara out with a bang, reducing him to a happily wibbling child in the corner who seemed to do nothing else than smile, burp, and sigh like an adorable angel.

"I wish somebody told me that earlier, bribing him with sweets" Yagyuu muttered as he ran a towel through his wet hair for about the twenty-eighth time. He had taken a shower not long ago, and though he might be completely clean and retch-less, he still didn't like the feeling of wet hair.

"Yagyuu, stop," Niou told him as he confiscated the towel. Marui stood by his side, happily chewing gum and occasionally shooting glances at Kirihara to make sure he wasn't going to break China.

"You two should get back to Sanada before he starts on war rampage," Marui advised, "He was pretty upset when you two didn't show up."

"What about Yanagi?" Yagyuu inquired.

"Yanagi found a cure."

"Why didn't you tell me that earlier?"

The 'cure', as stated by Yanagi, was simple: replace Kirihara's current condition with another. Of course, all things that seem simple didn't really turn out to be so simple, and this was one of such a case. Yanagi proposed that they inject Kirihara with the remaining sample of the Magical Chemical 3.8, (which supposedly changes your gender) so that 'he' might become a 'she', and then they'd just wait the week out. Naturally, the rest of the team didn't take this very well.

"Yanagi, this is ridiculous," Yukimura said, "This is not one of your specimens! This person is my teammate and I refuse to let you inject him with anything that may potentially hurt him!"

"But then what do we do, Yukimura?" Sanada muttered as he pulled down his cap.

"…"

"Well, now that everything's decided, let's proceed," Yanagi said.

"Wait! If you fed him that, wouldn't he still be a kid, but only a girl now?" Jackal asked as the sudden horrible though struck his mind. Yanagi took him by the shoulders and stared at him straight in the eye.

"Then that is a chance we shallhave to take," he said solemnly.

If you celebrate it, happy Victoria Day!