Here's chapter six!I apologize for how long this took to post; my life has been a bit hectic lately. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this next installment in Sugawara's nightmare XD

Lunar Eclipse

Chapter Six

It was several minutes before the four of them got on the road. After Akiteru was assured that Sugawara was not being smothered under the weight of his mother's overbearing concern, Ukai alerted the officer, and Akiteru and Amaya piled into the cruiser. Suga and Ukai returned to Ukai's car and followed closely behind them.

Once they'd arrived and said both their thank-yous and farewells to Officer Hashimoto, Sugawara led them to the waiting room just outside Tsukishima's operating room.

"He's through those doors there. He's been in surgery for a while now. Hopefully they'll tell us something soon." the young man said as the group passed through the waiting room door.

They found four chairs next to each other by the information desk and sat down. A sudden fear took hold of Sugawara's mind as he sat directly in the middle of the group, Ukai to his right, Akiteru to his left, with Amaya next to him. This whole situation was insane. Was he really ready to get the story off his chest so soon? He still felt like he was teetering on his emotions' edge; one wrong move and he would fall and break into a thousand pieces. He looked around the drab waiting room for something to ground himself. It was almost completely bare, with nobody but an older man reading a newspaper in a lonely chair in a corner and a young woman half asleep on the other side of the room. A stack of out-of-date magazines lay abandoned on a side table next to the young woman. Sugawara couldn't believe how empty the place looked...how empty it felt. The emptiness was so heavy it was oppressive. He felt like it was squeezing the very life out of him, to the point that he almost couldn't breathe. He chalked that last bit up to anxiety and pushed through the mental wall.

He was shaken out of his thoughts when Akiteru yawned. Trying to lighten the mood a bit, and possibly relieve some of his own terror, Sugawara stammered,

"Somebody's tired." Amaya chimed in.

"It's almost 3am, my baby's probably just exhausted. You had to work early today, didn't you?"

"Yeah," Akiteru said, "I got up at six this morning. The officer actually had to wake me up when we got here - I'd fallen asleep in the car. Talk about embarrassing." He gave a light, but pained chuckle. The group fell quiet for a moment. Before the silence could deepen, Ukai spoke up.

"You fell asleep in the cruiser?" Akiteru turned to look at him.

"Yeah?"

"When we talked not more than fifteen minutes ago you couldn't sit still. You okay?"

Unless he was mistaken, Sugawara could almost see a faint glimmer of guilt pass over Akiteru's features before it was quickly extinguished by a firm mental defense. Akiteru's face hardened, and his exhausted features looked almost angry.

"With all due respect, Ukai, I'm sitting in a hospital at 3am waiting to see if my little brother's gonna die tonight. I'm pretty far from okay." Sugawara figured he'd better dispel this fast, before everyone's exhaustion got the better of them. He cleared his throat rather conspicuously, and the group turned to look at him.

"So, uh...since we're all here, and um...we're not supposed to know anything for a while and we've got some time to kill...I, uh...I figured there was some...information you all should know."

"Sugawara, honey, now?" Amaya asked him, incredulous. He nodded quickly.

"Yeah, now. If I don't do it now, I won't do it at all, and you're his family, so you deserve this information anyway, so here it goes." He closed his mouth before he felt it would run away forever, never to stop talking. He took a moment of silence. He breathed in. He held the air. He let the breath out.

"I need to tell you what happened to Tsukishima...the whole thing. It actually really started earlier today..."

Sugawara sat at his desk at homeroom at the end of the day. The sun shone brightly through the large open windows, the breeze blowing gently through the unsecured slats. It carried the fresh scent of newly sprouted flowers with it, putting Sugawara completely at ease. He even thought he might do his homework on his porch today, since it was so nice.

"Hey, Suga!"

Daichi was beside him. He didn't expect to see his captain here so quickly. He noticed his classmates packing up to leave, and figured he'd probably spent the last several minutes daydreaming.

"Suga, there's something I need to run by you." Suga shook himself out of his springtime haze.

"Sure, what's up?"

"I need to push today's practice back. Coach has a shift at the store, Tsukishima and Yamaguchi have a huge exam they need to study for, and Tanaka's parents are making him go to some event for his sister's college, so none of them are going to be free until later tonight. I don't wanna cancel completely, because the last time I cancelled a practice Hinata and Nishinoya refused to speak to me the rest of the week. You think that's alright?"

"I don't see why not, as long as we clean and lock up after."

"Great. I'm going to send a mass text to let everyone know." And like that he was gone. Sugawara packed up the remainder of his school books and left the classroom.

The hours had gone by more quickly than Suga had expected them to. His homework had taken him longer than he'd expected, since he kept getting distracted and sleepy because of the warm weather, but he was more relaxed than usual and didn't mind. It was already dark out by the time he had begun to pack his volleyball bag, and he noted how strange it felt to begin a practice at the same time he was used to finally getting out of one. Once he'd double-checked that he'd remembered his change of clothes, shoes, water bottle, and wallet, he zipped up his bag and took his phone out of his pocket. After swiping through a few menus, he opened the team group chat and reread his most recent string of texts.

TeamDad: Hey, guys, friendly reminder: Due to everyone's schedules, practice today won't be until 9pm. Rest up, we're gonna need all our strength for nationals!

TheTiniestofGiants: AWW YEAH!

KingofSarcasm: You do realize late practice means you can't stay an extra hour and a half after practice ends, right? I refuse to lose sleep over your overly enthusiastic idiocy.

The conversation only got worse from there. Thinking back, Sugawara thought that maybe it was a bit unusual to have a practice at nine o'clock at night, but the rest of the guys were so enthusiastic about it that he quickly pushed the thought away. Who knows? Maybe this practice will be different somehow. People always seemed to have a habit of turning into loose cannons after a certain point in the evening.

Upon arriving at the gym that night, Sugawara noticed his team seemed to have more energy than usual. Hinata and Kageyama were already racing each other around the gym for warm-ups, Nishinoya was receiving Asahi and Tananka's spikes as easily as if they had been aimed directly into the libero's waiting arms. Yamaguchi was already sitting with Tsukishima on the far end of the gym, snickering at whatever snide comment his companion had just made, and Daichi was talking to Ukai about the night's drills.

Sugawara entered the gym and made his way to the club room to change into his workout clothes. Daichi stopped him just before he got to the door.

"Suga! You aren't usually this late. Did something happen?" Sugawara smiled at the captain.

"No, I just lost track of time doing homework again. Sorry, Daichi." Daichi's expression shifted from worried to easygoing and placed a calm hand on his co-captain's shoulder.

"Don't mind, I just wanted to make sure everything was okay."

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Yamaguchi leave Tsukishima's side to talk to Coach Ukai. He was far from them, though, and they seemed to be talking in hushed voices, so Sugawara couldn't hear what they were saying. Yamaguchi's face seemed to give most of the situation away, as it bore a look of concern.

"Uh, hey, Daichi." Suga said, "Is Yamaguchi alright?"

"Yeah, I think so. He's waiting for a call from his parents, I think. So I think he's asking if he can keep his phone with his water bottle where he can hear it instead of in the club room."

"Oh okay. I hope it isn't about anything serious."

"Who knows? But hey, you should get ready. We're starting soon."

At that, he left to go round up the team, leaving Sugawara to change.

Practice that night was unusually intense. Sugawara felt like it was almost as if they were subconsciously making up for not practicing after school earlier. Ukai blew his whistle to signal that it was time for a mid-practice water break, and the team broke their formations and flocked to the collection of water bottles to take a drink. Soon the echo of teenagers shouting and volleyballs bouncing around the gym was replaced by the silence of said teenagers replenishing their exhausted muscles. It was in this silence that Yamaguchi's phone went off.

He had just set his water back on the floor next to where he was sitting when he heard the high-pitched tinkle of his set ringtone and saw the screen flash in the corner of his eye. Setting the water bottle back down beside him, he quickly reached for his phone. He looked at the caller ID and felt his heart sink. His face fell, and Tsukishima, who was sitting next to him, was the first to notice.

"Hm? What's wrong?"

Yamaguchi gave his best friend a fleeting worried look and answered his phone. When he spoke, his voice was small, as if he were trying his best to cram himself into the far corner of the gym, forcing himself into invisibility.

"Mom?" A pause.

"Yeah, they told us that could happen... Yeah, see you when you get here." Tsukishima gave him a hard stare. Yamaguchi spoke before Tsukishima could put words to his thoughts.

"Sorry, Tsukki, my mom's coming to get me. I can't walk home with you tonight." Before Tsukishima could reply, Yamaguchi stood and started to walk away. Tsukishima, however, reached out and caught his friend's arm before he could get very far.

Yamaguchi hesitantly turned to look back at Tsukishima, afraid to look his friend in the eye. He hated being so vulnerable, and he hated leaving practice. It was a quiet sort of embarrassment. He wanted someone like Tsukki to see that he was strong. When he finally looked his best friend in the eye, he couldn't deny the intensity of his gaze, his gold-brown eyes never breaking contact.

"Yamaguchi, what happened?" Yamaguchi hung his head again. At Yamaguchi's seemingly willing defeat, Tsukishima released his hand.

"Um...my dad's been sick for a while and the hospital gave him some new medicine the other day. Well, that call was my mom. My dad just had a stroke. In a way, we sort of knew it would happen, since the doctors told us that it could be a side effect of the medication. Anyway, she's picking me up to go to the hospital to see him."

Tsukishima nodded, looking down and away, as if on one hand, this was an acceptable excuse to him, but on the other he was concerned for Yamaguchi's wellbeing.

"Call me later." Yamaguchi nodded quickly and ran to Coach Ukai.

It was eleven o'clock by the time practice ended. Once coach blew the whistle, signifying that they could all relax, take a drink of water, and begin cleaning the gym, Sugawara made a beeline for his water bottle. He practically collapsed on the gym floor, his back resting against the wall knees bent and legs open in front of him, relaxing. He brought the bottle to his lips and took a long, eager swig. It was a full minute before he noticed Daichi had joined him.

"I have no idea how we're going to perfect Nishinoya's libero's toss before nationals. It's not bad, and it worked well in the game against Shiratorizawa, but he still misses more than coach would like."

"He'll get there. He just needs to stop flirting with Kiyoko long enough to get anything done." The two friends laughed as they watched their team's clean up chaos ensue. Hinata and Kageyama were bickering on the far side of the gym as a frustrated Asahi tried desperately (and miserably) to get them to stop fighting and wipe down the floor, since it was their turn and the last time coach caught them fighting everyone had to run laps. Tsukishima had his headphones on in the corner as he methodically put his gym clothes back into his duffel bag. Tanaka had his shirt off, and Nishinoya was slapping him with it as the two chased each other around the gym. Kiyoko and Yachi were talking, as were Ukai and Takeda. Sugawara had no doubt that any minute, their coach was going to turn around mid-sentence and shut up the whole gym.

In the end, it had taken them a whole forty-five minutes to settle down, clean up the gym, and put away all the equipment. Sugawara had spent the last half of practice worrying about Tsukishima. He'd watched Yamaguchi leave practice nearly in tears, and he knew that with all the time he spends around Yamaguchi, Tsukishima had to care about him to some major degree. Though the blond would never admit it aloud, Sugawara was sure his teammate was much more worried about his best friend than he was letting on. Once Ukai told the team about Yamaguchi's father's stroke at the end of practice, Sugawara made up his mind. Whether Tsukishima wanted him to or not, he would walk his teammate home from practice that night.

Okay, there's chapter six. I hope you enjoyed it, and as always, constructive criticism is greatly appreciated :)