The fall of the prince
Disclaimer: Takeshi Konomi's
Pairing: Well… actually none… but I guess I'll put some Tezuryo teasers in the upcoming chapters
Summary: Life will never be easy for the whole time. There are times when we have to face something that seems like the end of everything. And what will our prince do when he faced the fact that his life won't be easy anymore?
Note: Beta-ed by Windy Hurrice!!! Give her applause!!!
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Chapter 1
Ryoma opened his eyes slowly as the dim light of his bedroom appeared before his tired eyes. Slowly, he got up and even though he realized still how tired he was, he had just woken up from a good sleep.
He turned his head to the alarm clock he placed on the bedside desk and sighed. The time had shown the exact hour for him to get up. And since he really didn't want to arrive late at today's morning practice, he forced himself to get out of the bed.
He brushed his teeth, washed his face with the cold morning water and changed from his pajamas to his uniform. For some reason he didn't know why, but he could tell that he wasn't in a good mood today.
As he stepped down the stairs and headed to the dining room, he found some American food served on the table, one of the things that started his day with annoyance. Suddenly, he found himself yelling out loud. "OKAASAN!!"
Nanako's face came out from the kitchen. Her face looked tired and anxious while her long straight hair looked a bit swiveled. "Ryoma-san. Gomen. Obaasan was taken to the hospital this dawn. And I'm sorry if I couldn't cook a Japanese breakfast for you today."
Ryoma's forehead wrinkled slightly before he took his seat in front of his meal. "What happened?" He asked with not much expression on his face.
"She collapsed again this morning. And Ojiisan decided to take her back to the hospital. It's the third time this week." Nanako answered.
Seconds before, Ryoma had no appetite. But when he heard Nanako's explanation, he felt like something was really moving in his stomach and made him suddenly want to throw up. He moved the plate where the croissant was placed a little bit away from him and he turned to look at a glass of milk beside it. He really didn't feel like taking in anything into his mouth, but Inui's command about having at least a glass of milk per day echoed in his mind.
"Are you going there now?" Ryoma asked while he put his hand around the glass unwillingly.
"Yes. After everything are settled here." Nanako answered with a nervous smile, "and after you go to school, of course."
Ryoma lifted the glass from the table and finally drank its content soundlessly. He didn't dare to finish it all, since he really didn't want to throw up here in front of his cousin and make her worry even more.
"I'm leaving." Ryoma said, standing up from his chair.
"Ryoma-san!" Nanako called. "Ojiisan reminded me to once again remind you to tell any one of us if you feel something is wrong within your body. Incase you inherit Obaasan's illness." She said. It seemed hard for her to say those words to Ryoma.
Ryoma felt himself shivered from what Nanako told him. No matter how many times he heard those words from his father, mother or Nanako, he never stopped to fear the reality it held. "Yeah…"
And he pulled the tennis racket bag he put on the floor early this morning and headed to the entrance before he could hear any other words from his cousin's mouth.
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"You're late, Echizen!" Momo greeted the smaller boy with his cheerful smile as usual as he saw Ryoma came to the afternoon practice after school.
"I know!" Ryoma snapped. He didn't mean to be harsh. But his bad mood made his brain translated everything around him to be a disturbance.
Momo seemed a bit taken back from Ryoma's sudden behavior. Ryoma was indeed not a friendly person, but he wasn't the grumpy type either.
Ryoma strolled away from Momo to join the other regular members on the court without saying any other words. And as Ryoma stepped away, Momo realized how pale Ryoma's face looked like.
"Hello, ochibi!!!" Eiji greeted with a smile. "How's your class?" He stepped closer to Ryoma, ready to give the usual big hug when Ryoma held his hand up, making a sign that he really didn't want to be disturbed at the moment.
He walked to the couch that was nearby and sat down silently. Fuji came closer to him. "You look so pale, Echizen. Are you okay?"
Ryoma looked up to Fuji's face before turning away again. "Just tired."
"Tired?" Fuji continued his investigation. "You didn't look well too at the morning practice before. Are you sick?"
"No." Ryoma snapped without looking.
"Are you sure?"
"YES! I"
"Gather around here, minna!" Tezuka's voice abruptly stopped Ryoma for snapping at Fuji.
Inhaling deeply, Ryoma stood up and walked to where Tezuka told them to stand. "Sorry…" He whispered as he passed Fuji.
Fuji frowned as Eiji placed himself beside him. "He sure is grumpy today." Eiji commented.
"Yeah." Fuji answered. "Looks like something is really disturbing him right now." And both of them walked pursuing Ryoma.
Tezuka eyed the entire tennis club members, especially the regular ones as they made lines in front of him. He was checking who was absent since another tournament will be held soon and today was the beginning of the intensive training.
"Today's training contains running and physical practice. Regulars and non-regulars will do the training separately." He started. Beside him, Inui was ready to take the speech since he was the one who made the training menu. So Tezuka gave one last glance to the regulars before mentioning Inui to explain the training.
"The special training menu started with a 15 km marathon without time limit. I expect the regulars to pass this one easily since we usually got just 30 minutes for this." Inui started.
Eiji's shiver could be heard as he remembered about the punishment they'll have if they didn't surpass the time limit.
"Unfortunately, I won't use my juices today." Inui added. A slight of disappointment showed upon his face. "But it'll surely come up soon, since I've made a lot of upgrades in both quality and taste."
Eiji shivered even more and this time nearly the whole of the regulars made a pale face. But Ryoma didn't seem to pay any attention on what his senior have said. His face looked just as white as a wall.
And with only one swift of Tezuka's hand, all tennis members started to do the laps. As usual, Ryoma ran along with the regulars while the other freshmen and sophomores were likely to have their own crowd.
Without time limit and Inui's juice as a punishment for not surpassing the limit, a marathon like this would be just a warm up for the regulars. Of course they have done a lot more hard trainings before in the past. But for Ryoma, the strange tiredness he had since this morning somehow had overcome him and had suddenly made him lost his balance at the fifth lap.
Ryoma fell directly to the ground with a loud thud. The abrupt losing of Ryoma's presence and the horrible sound made the regulars stopped immediately. Some of the others who ran at the front also stopped and rebounded to see what happened.
"ECHIZEN!" They all shouted in unison.
Fuji, who was the fastest and the one which was closest to Ryoma, was first to reach the smaller boy and knelt beside him. "Echizen, are you alright?" Carefully, he helped him to sit on the ground. The others quickly made a circle around them.
"I'm okay." Ryoma forced an answer. His whole body felt like stinging.
Tezuka abruptly spread the crowd and kneeled beside Ryoma as well. Though his expression didn't fully change, his eyes clearly showed his anxiety. "What happened?" He asked Ryoma.
Ryoma looked up and faced Tezuka's eyes. He knew that answering 'I'm fine' or anything like that would be impossible to stop Tezuka from questioning. So, he made the simplest answer that popped up in his mind. "I'm fatigued."
Actually, Tezuka didn't exactly expect Ryoma to answer so directly. The usual Ryoma never shows things that burdened him, even when he was seriously troubled. Even when he knows that he couldn't lie to Tezuka, he never gave up so easily like this. "It's better for you to go home then." Tezuka said slowly. "You should take a good rest."
He waited for Ryoma to respond until he finally nodded. Then he turned to Momo who stood across his spot with a worried face too. "Momo, can you accompany him home?"
"I can go by my own." Ryoma said abruptly. With the help from Fuji, he stood up with a lot of effort. He really didn't want to become a burden for the others.
"Can you walk?" Oishi asked anxiously.
"I'm fine." Ryoma said as he freed himself from Fuji's grip of support and walked to the clubroom, leaving the other members in worry.
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"Tadaima." Ryoma said faintly. He stepped inside the front entrance and strolled up to his bedroom after tucking off his shoes. As he ascended the wooden stairs, Nanako showed up from the dining room.
"Okaerinasai." She greeted Ryoma with her usual smile though her face showed tiredness for staying in the hospital since morning. "You came so early. Didn't you have a practice today?"
"It only took a while." Ryoma answered shortly and headed upstairs, straight to his bedroom.
His room greeted him with its usual smell when he opened the door and stepped inside. He directly headed to the wardrobe and changed his sport outfit into a navy-blue T-shirt and a pair of shorts. Then he lay down on his bed, facing the ceiling for a while before finally closing his eyes and tried going to sleep.
But there were lots of thoughts echoing in his mind, keeping himself staying awake even though he had his eyes closed. Some voices were battling, shouting inside his brain, but he still tried to sleep, hoping if he ignored them, those matters will vanish eventually.
Ryoma sighed slowly. The soft bed beneath him felt really comforting. But the voices were somehow growing louder that finally Ryoma gave up and sat up on his bed. The tiredness has then slightly gone and he finally decided to stand up and left his bedroom.
"Nanako-san…" Ryoma called as he headed downstairs. He found his cousin was cooking in the kitchen. "Where does okaasan stay?" He asked. "I'd like to visit her."
"Oh… Ryoma-san… it's on the third floor, room VIP number 2B." She answered, paying her attention completely to Ryoma. "She'll be glad to see you."
"Doumo." Ryoma said and headed to the entrance. His face was expressionless as usual. "Ittekimasu," he said before he went out and walked to the hospital where his mother always had her treatment.
He had finally come up with a decision. And inside his heart, he hoped he was doing the right thing.
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To be continued
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A/N: Okay… this is still very confusing… not much revealed in this very start. What happened to Ryoma's mother, what disturbed Ryoma the whole time… everything are still a secret… but each of them will be revealed soon in the next one or two chapters… So be there!! Hehehe…
12/09/2004