Despite my love of sparring, it's really hard to write a sparring match, so I tried for short and sweet with that bit.

Day Three - Sports Swap

Any other day, Yahaba would let him be stupid. It's likely a pulled muscle, but he doesn't remember Kyoutani limping at the competition.

Yahaba watches from against the wall as everyone leaves. Iwaizumi is supporting most of Oikawa's weight, their captain can't even smile without wincing. Matsukawa and Hanamaki haven't spoken a word since they arrived back, not even to each other. Kunimi seems no different but the grip he has on Kindaichi's hand makes Yahaba wince.

Watari pauses at the door, a silent question for Yahaba. Usually they walk home together, but not tonight. Yahaba shakes his head and watches his friend leave before he turns around.

Kyoutani is sitting on the ground near his gear bag. He'd been stretching a few minutes ago, but now he's just staring at the floor like it it did something to personally offend him. He's not bothering to hide his anger, Kyoutani isn't one for suffering in silence, he's let them all know that on numerous occasions.

With a quiet sigh, Yahaba makes his way across the room, stopping a few footsteps from Kyoutani.

"Wanna spar?"

"Why?" Kyoutani snaps. At least he's speaking. On the bus ride back, he'd not said a word, not even a sound. Iwaizumi couldn't even get him to say anything.

Neither could Yahaba

"Because you look like shit."

Kyoutani, honest to god, growls at him before huffing and digging around in his gear bag. Yahaba hasn't been growled at in some time, not really since Kyoutani's first few months on the team. He thought they were past this.

"No head shots," Yahaba says, unzipping his own bag. Years of practice allows them to get their sparring gear on in less than two minutes.

"Then no chest guards."

Kyoutani likes headshots, his spin kicks are ridiculously accurate; he's ended matches with a single kick before. Yahaba has faith in his own ability, but he really doesn't fancy getting knocked out. But he can handle sparring without a chest guard. He'll likely end up with a bruised torso, but they both know how to control their kicks well enough that he's not worried. It was a little difficult though, the first time Kyoutani saw the bruises peppering Yahaba's skin; he'd refused to spar him for a whole week.

Until Yahaba kicked him in the chest and knocked him down.

Without the chest and head guards, their only gear is for their arms and legs, Yahaba doesn't like the feet guards and Kyoutani's gloves might as well be a fashion statement, and they're ready sooner than expected.

They've already stretched but Yahaba takes a moment to touch his toes and swing his arms, just to be safe. Kyoutani's already bouncing on the balls of his feet, clenching and unclenching his fists before bringing them up. He may be loose when he spars but he's not stupid enough to have bad form. Everyone keeps their hands up, doesn't matter if they're just hanging there, they know better. Kyoutani's never been one for the formality of bowing and shaking hands but Yahaba does the former anyways before taking up his own sparring stance.

It's easy to see a difference, even if they're just waiting to start. Yahaba's stance is light, but still the perfect picture of proper posture, angles and distance apart like he's a diagram silhouette. Kyoutani on the other hand, barely qualifies for having a proper stance. His body is way too lax, his stance hardly balanced as he bounces. He hunches his shoulders forward and arches his back just the slightest bit. Somehow though, he can fight comfortably, and he's quick. Yahaba never expected his speed the first time they sparred.

Impatient, Kyoutani acts first, slide stepping forward to kick with his front leg. Yahaba jumps back, off to the side, then darts back in, prepping a kick to Kyoutani's chest. Instead of dodging, Kyoutani blocks with his right hand, the motion lax like it's just an afterthought. Yahaba hop steps back a little and goes for a hook kick to Kyoutani's side. It just barely grazes the other boy, and Yahaba's already going back in for a round house.

They trade kicks back and forth, Kyoutani manages to spin kick Yahaba in the chest, and Yahaba returns the favor with a side kick. But then Kyoutani's leg shudders when he lands a double round house. Yahaba's ready to ignore it, call it a fluke, but then it happens again when Kyoutani moves to avoid a back kick. Kyoutani keeps moving, though, ignoring it.

Any other day, Yahaba would let him be stupid. It's likely a pulled muscle, but he doesn't remember Kyoutani limping at the competition. So it's likely he didn't stretch well enough before their personal match, and that's why his left leg is locking up.

But then it happens two more times. Yahaba draws in his fighting stance, silently ending the match, despite Kyoutani's furious expression.

"You giving up?" he asks.

"What did you do to your leg?"

"Nothing."

"It's buckling."

" I didn't do anything to it."

Yahaba takes off his gloves and throws them in the direction of his gear bag.

"Thigh, knee, shin, or ankle?"

"The hell are you talking about?"

"Where does it hurt?"

Kyoutani finally resumes a comfortable stance, slipping off his own gloves. He doesn't look very happy, but that's pretty normal when a sparring match doesn't go as planned.

"It's fine, it doesn't hurt that much."

"Don't be an idiot, it could be serious. And I know you lie about pain."

Oikawa had pushed past his own minor injury and now he can't even spar without a brace strapped to his leg. And while Kyoutani isn't to that point, he's certainly that stupid. And a torn muscle can be aggravated as easily as a knee cap. Not to mention Yahaba doesn't want to deal with the same strain Iwaizumi goes through every time Oikawa's unable to walk.

"It's not serious, and I don't like about my pain."

"Yes you do."

Kyoutani huffs and drops to the floor where he is, peeling off his arm guards. Yahaba joins him on the floor as he starts on his shin guards. Beneath his left guard is a mottled bruise, massive and spanning the length of this shin. Yahaba sucks in a breath; Kyoutani's had some bad bruises in the past, all of which he's taken care of, but none of them have been this bad.

Kyoutani folds his pant leg up properly, so it sits at his knee, and from there he pulls it back.

"Is it just the bruise?"

In response, Kyoutani stretches his leg out before bending it in so Yahaba can see behind his knee. It's not quite a bruise, but the skin is aggravated and discolored.

"What the hell happened?"

"Some asshole used their elbow to block one a' my spin kicks, caught the back of my knee."

"And your shin?"

"Same asshole, he had harder guards, liked to block with his legs."

Kyoutani sounds very bitter, but his hands are clenched. Yahaba's managed to figure out a few tells as to when Kyoutani's in pain. This just happens to be one of them. The others include being snippier than usual, bouncing his leg, or nearly crushing Yahaba's fingers when they hold hands.

"I have some Ibuprofen in my bag, hang on a sec."

Waving off Kyoutani's protest, Yahaba jumps up and heads over to his bag.

The repetitive blocking, especially in such a tender area, could certainly cause some sort of internal bruising. It's also likely that he has ruptured blood vessels. The bruising on his shin is worrisome, incredibly so. But it's not debilitating. If there's one thing Kyoutani can do perfectly, it's power through his own pain, not like that's a good trait to have or anything. But it is useful in his matches.

It just comes back to bite him later.

The bottle of painkillers is about half empty, and his water bottle is bone dry, but he shakes out two pills and brings them back to Kyoutani. Yahaba watches him swallow the pills, grimacing as he does so. Rejoining him on the floor, Yahaba gestures for Kyoutani to move closer. They've done this enough times that Kyoutani isn't so hesitant to comply.

"You need to work on backing off more," Yahaba says as he lifts Kyoutani's leg into his lap.

"What?"

"When people kick at you, you stay where you are. If you back up more you won't get bruises like this."

"That's a stupid reason," Kyoutani grumbles, hissing slightly as Yahaba starts prodding around his bruise. He twitches, nearly jerking his leg away, but Yahaba clamps his free hand around Kyoutani's ankle to keep him in place.

"I'm just checking it out, calm down," Yahaba says. This is nothing new, but Kyoutani always acts as if Yahaba's about to conduct surgery on him.

"Kinda hard to do that when it hurts."

"Deal with it. You're supposed to be Mr. Tough Guy."

Kyoutani just huffs, tipping his head back, gritting his teeth. By the time Yahaba's satisfied that nothing's horribly wrong, Kyoutani's gone lax. The pain killers probably only took the edge off, his pain threshold is ridiculous.

"You'll be fine, ice your leg when you get home," Yahaba says, unable to resist bending forward to press a kiss to Kyoutani's leg. Grumbling, Kyoutani moves his leg, letting Yahaba stand up, but he doesn't say anything.

"Right," Kyoutani rolls down his pant leg, accepting Yahaba's hand to pull him up. He stumbles a little but gets his balance back when Yahaba takes his other hand and stabilizes him. Once he's stable, Kyoutani lets go, resting most of his weight on his right leg, gently testing his left leg. Slowly, they move back towards their bags.

"Do you think you'll be okay for practice tomorrow?" Yahaba asks, sliding off the rest of his guards. Kyoutani follows suit, throwing his gear in his bag without bothering to organize them.

"I'll be fine."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah."

Yahaba watches, only partially amused as Kyoutani levers himself to stand up, wobbling when he puts his gear bag over his shoulder. However, it's a little pitiful, and Yahaba almost feels bad. He jumps up, picking up his own gear bag. He jogs the short ways to catch up with Kyoutani.

"Give me your bag."

"No-"

Yahaba takes the bag anyways, it's not ridiculously heavy, and slips it over his shoulder.

"I'm going to walk you home, no arguments, because you're off balance holding your bag."

"I can walk by myself Yahaba, I don't-"

"I said 'no arguments'. Besides, you can pretend that the reason you're holding my hand is to keep you balanced."

Fun fact, Kyoutani's bruising is based off my own from a really shitty sparring match, in which our referee apparently didn't adhere to the proper blocking rules. The bruising stayed though, like, my shin is still all multicolored. But whatever, it's not like I'm bitter or anything.