I wrote this on a revision break what the hell I wasn't expecting to do this. I posted it on Tumblr, but I thought that I would at least decide whether I was going to commit to this or not before I posted it here. Welp. I'm committed. So I'm posting it.

Anyway, it was based off of this post on Tumblr and it was just so cute that I had to write something for it. The blog is clubakashi. For all you Akashi lovers, I recommend this blog it's my life. But yeah, I think that's about it.

Yes, there's fluff.

Yes, there's a plotline.

May God help us all.

Enjoy.

Chapter 1

Making his way through the Rakuzan campus, the redheaded captain, Akashi Seijuro was walking to the gymnasium hand-in-hand with a little boy. The boy was at least two feet shorter, bearing the exact same red hair as the older boy. The only difference was with his eyes. Instead of the identical red eyes that Seijuro had, his left eye was golden.

The younger boy looked up at Seijuro with an impossibly neutral expression. "Are we almost there yet?"

Seijuro sighed. "Almost. Just be patient."

The boy said nothing more and went back to looking ahead.

Seijuro tried rubbing the tired out of his eyes. How did he end up in this situation? He was just a normal person, trying to live a normal life. Why did he deserve this? What had he done to the universe to receive this sort of punishment? Putting aside the possibility that he had been cursed, he continued to make his way towards the modern building, still bitter over his rather rude awakening.

…

Earlier that morning, Seijuro was peacefully sleeping in his room when he suddenly felt a weight placed on his chest out of nowhere. A very heavy weight. And it was more like it fell on his chest rather than being placed there. It was so sudden that he shot up in surprise with wide eyes, so fast, in fact, that he rammed his head into whatever was on him.

Flopping quite unceremoniously back onto his mattress, he groaned in pain as he rubbed the center of his forehead and opened one eye. There, lying on his back, and also crying out in pain, was a little boy.

Right. Okay…

Seijuro knew that when he woke up he was usually dazed and confused, but this was absolutely ridiculous. Never, never did he imagine the day when he was so tired that he'd begin to hallucinate. Not only that, but the hallucination had materialized into a three-dimensional being? This must have been some type of joke.

The boy sat up and furrowed his eyebrows. "That hurt."

Oh God, it talked.

"Who are you?" Seijuro asked him. It was six-thirty in the morning and he was tired, so he was in no state of mind to be formal or polite. Regardless of whether he was a child or an adult, he wanted to know why on earth he was in his room.

The boy stared. "I'm you," he answered.

Seijuro blinked.

"I beg your pardon? I'm me."

"And so am I."

Seijuro was now transitioning from tired to irritated. Here he was, sitting on his bed, arguing with a child who claimed he was Seijuro. Who did he think he was anyway?

Well, Seijuro, apparently.

"How did you get into my room?"

The boy shrugged. "I was just… here."

It took every bit of energy that Seijuro was sure he didn't even have to hold back a sigh. What kind of answer was that? A boy stumbled into his room before seven o'clock in the morning and didn't know how? If he kept this child here any longer then he was sure that someone would press charges for kidnapping, and he had neither the time nor the alibi to—

"Why are you staring at me?"

Seijuro snapped out of his thoughts and frowned. He hadn't even realized how long he had been staring at this kid. A quick side-glance at the clock told him it was apparently a whole minute. He sat up straighter in bed.

"Where are your parents?"

"My father is on a business trip to Thailand."

Seijuro faltered. Well, that was strange. His father was on a business trip to Thailand. He decided to prod for more information.

"And which city is he in?"

"Bangkok," the boy said. That was also the city that his father said he was going.

"When is he coming back?" Seijuro questioned.

The boy thought for a minute as he looked down and began counting on his fingers.

"It should be five days from now." The boy was correct again.

Seijuro wanted to try something else. The answer to this next question would definitely not be a coincidence.

"And your mother…?"

The boy fell silent. "She's not here anymore."

Seijuro felt an unusual lurch in his chest at that. He suspected there was something wrong. There was something suspicious about this boy.

As he switched on the lamp on his table, he took a good look at the boy in front of him. Now that his vision wasn't blurred by the effects of sleep anymore, he could see him properly.

He had the exact same hair color as him. His hairstyle was even the same, his bangs cut short so his silky red strands didn't fall in his eyes.

That brought back an unpleasant memory from the Winter Cup and he immediately suppressed it. He thought of his other self, back before everything changed for the better. Before he changed for the better. But, after that game with Team Jabberwock, he, too, vanished, and Seijuro was left alone again in his subconscious.

Yet the regal air that this child brought with him, the way he could recall all this information, the way he referred to himself with a different pronoun, and the way he looked oh so similar except for his golden left eye. Just seeing that made him realize who he was.

"...Boku?"

The boy, who was now distracting himself with surveying the room, perked up and turned around, acknowledging the older Seijuro sitting on the bed.

"Yes?"

Seijuro didn't know the exact reason why his heart was beating extremely fast at that moment, and he didn't know exactly what type of emotion came over him. All he remembered doing was cupping his face in his hands and gazing at him with wide, unbelieving eyes with one question on his mind.

How did this happen?

…

"For the fifth time, I said I don't know."

Seijuro shook his head out of his thoughts and looked back down at the boy before he realized he had said that question out loud. Again.

"Sorry," he muttered.

He was just confused. It was one thing for Bokushi to come back in his subconscious, but he came back as a human. A living, breathing, tangible human. And a five-year-old, of all things. Perhaps the reasoning for that was because he had only appeared after his mother had passed away, which was a bit over five years prior.

At first, he could almost say he was excited about his other self returning to him, but after he began to be reacquainted with Bokushi's personality, well, let's just say he had never wanted to throw a child out the window so badly.

After this realization a few hours before, Seijuro realized that he was now responsible for a five-year-old boy who might as well be his younger brother. He had to watch over him now.

What was he to do with him the whole day? He couldn't possibly leave him alone, what if someone were to see him? They were in a boarding school for crying out loud, just about anyone could walk in and discover him. But he also promised Mibuchi, Hayama, and Nebuya that he'd practice basketball with them in the gymnasium that morning.

Keeping that in mind, he informed his smaller self of his decision as soon as he made a decision.

…

"You are going to come with me to the gymnasium today."

The boy, who was sitting on the chair next to his study desk, didn't even hesitate to give his reply.

"That's fine," he said, and that was it. Nothing more, nothing less. Seijuro was thankful that Bokushi retained his agreeability through all of this.

But when Seijuro crawled back into his bed and closed his eyes, that was when things began to go awry.

"What are you doing?"

Seijuro cracked his eyes open again and eyed Bokushi, who was staring at him with a disapproving face.

"What do you mean?" Seijuro said, deciding to close his eyes again. "I'm going back to sleep."

"Don't."

Seijuro didn't even bother to raise his head from the pillow.

"And why not?" he asked. His ears may have been covered by the duvet, but was it just him, or did he hear Bokushi scoff after he asked that?

"You have to entertain me, of course."

"Bokushi," he began. "I stayed up until two in the morning finishing assignments, all of which are due tomorrow. I have had only five hours of sleep and my alarm is not meant to go off for another hour. Please allow me this one hour I have left."

There was a long silence, and Seijuro thought that was that until after around thirty seconds, he heard a clack. And then another. And then another.

Reluctantly opening his eyes again, he saw Bokushi had found his shogi board in the corner of the room and he had already made three moves. Seijuro groaned.

"Bokushi, the clacking is loud. Put the shogi board away."

Bokushi looked over his way. "I'll make the clacking quieter."

"No. I said put the shogi board away."

"I'll do a different activity then. May I read a book?"

Seijuro contemplated this. Reading sounded quiet enough. After all, books didn't clack every two seconds.

"You can select a book from my shelf." He made a tired gesture to the shelf near his desk and Bokushi stood up from his spot on the floor to inspect the books. Taking a few moments to go through the choices, he finally picked up a medium-sized book and went to sit back on his study chair, flipping the thing to the first page.

Seijuro sighed and settled back into his covers again for about a minute or so before he heard it.

Bokushi turned pages exceptionally loud, in such a way that Seijuro suspected that he wanted him to hear it from his bed. He wasn't even trying to conceal the sound of the page-turning, and it didn't take long for Seijuro to be annoyed again.

"I've changed my mind, put the book back."

"Why?"

"Because the sound of you turning pages is annoying."

"I'll make it quieter."

"Put the book back."

"Hmph."

Seijuro would have opened his eyes at that had he not wanted to sleep so desperately at this moment. Was that attitude?

He heard Bokushi walk back to the shelf and slide the book back in where he found it.

"What am I to do now?"

Seijuro rolled over onto his other side to face the wall.

"I don't know," he mumbled. "Why don't you just sleep?"

The boy huffed. "I don't want to."

"Why not?"

"I'm not tired."

That sounded awfully childlike of Bokushi. In his head, Bokushi was always the same age as Seijuro. But now that he was five, it made it all the more difficult to reason with him. At first, he thought since Bokushi was well-behaved (enough) in his mind, he'd have no problem with him. But when you put his attitude and character traits into a body like this, it didn't even seem like you were speaking with a highly intelligent and intimidating person, it was just the same as speaking with a stuck-up child. That was the difference a few years could make.

"Just sleep, Bokushi," Seijuro urged as gently as he possibly could. "You'll feel more refreshed when you wake up."

"Why don't you sleep? You seem pretty grouchy."

He'd been trying to sleep for five minutes now, but look who kept interrupting.

"I—" Seijuro cut himself off and took a deep breath. There was no way he was going to start throwing snarky remarks at a child. He refused to stoop to that level, no matter how annoyed he got when he was sleep-deprived.

"Fine," he finally said. "If you'd like to join me at any time before my alarm goes off, I'll be happy to make room."

Hmm. That wasn't supposed to sound salty.

Either way, Bokushi dismissed his offer.

"I'll decline," he said. "I'd rather just stare out of the window."

"Whatever keeps you entertained for the next fifty-five minutes is fine with me as long as you're quiet."

And with that, Seijuro fell asleep and woke up slightly more refreshed less than an hour later, only for Bokushi to complain that he was tired.

…

This idea was beyond stupid. Taking the human embodiment of his subconscious to the gymnasium for a bit of basketball practice? Well, what else was he to do? If he tried to hide him it'd just look suspicious. Walking around campus with a child seemed much less questionable than keeping one in his room. Besides, he didn't even know if he could take care of a child. And even if he did, he knew that he couldn't keep him forever.

But then where would he go? He was just a kid, he'd have to stay with somebody. Seijuro was going back to Tokyo for a short visit next weekend, but that was a whole weekend away. What was he going to do with Seijuro until then?

"Isn't that it?"

Bokushi was pointing towards the gymnasium. Seijuro nodded.

"Yes," he said. "That's the gymnasium where we'll meet."

When they approached the building and stood at the door, Bokushi was expecting Seijuro to open it, but instead, he knelt down in front of him.

"Aren't we going to go in?" Bokushi asked.

"We are," said Seijuro. "But I just want to say that once we get in there, let me do all the talking. I don't know how my teammates would feel if a child introduced themselves as my other self, but I think it would be better if I explained."

"Alright."

Well, at least there was no room for argument.

Now that they were on the same page, Seijuro sighed and slowly but surely pushed the door open.

~O~

Mibuchi, Hayama, and Nebuya had been practicing shooting for ten minutes. It was after Hayama had successfully done a layup and went back over to the two after retrieving the ball when Mibuchi sighed in exasperation.

"Do you think something happened to Sei-chan? He's unusually late," he said.

"I dunno," said Nebuya. "Do you think something came up? Maybe he had to call it off."

"But then Akashi would tell us, wouldn't he?" Hayama pointed out.

"I agree. Sei-chan wouldn't just ditch out of nowhere. If he had somewhere to be, then he would have told us beforehand."

They stopped talking when they all heard the door to the gymnasium open, Hayama perking up like an excited puppy.

"Hey, Akashi's here!"

"Good morning, Sei-chan," Mibuchi greeted.

"Good morning everyone," Akashi said back to them.

The three Uncrowned Kings all stared as they looked down at the smaller boy holding his hand, his gaze boring through their very bodies and souls. The room went deadly quiet and both sides did nothing but have an unprompted staring contest. It wasn't until the ten-second mark that the young boy lifted a hand up in the form of a small wave.

"Good morning. Lovely day for exercise, isn't it?"

…What the hell was going on?

Well, I hope you liked this. Idk how many chapters this will be, I'll figure it out later. I'll try to update soon.

Read and review please!