Work Text:
It was the night before training camp and all through the dorm.
Not a gymnast was sleeping, but that was the norm.
Well, the norm for a night before an encounter with Shiro High, that is. Otherwise Shichigahama was usually one of the first to knock out for the night. He was a heavy sleeper and a major snorer, though he’d never admit it and Tsukidate was too polite to complain about it. Their trusty leader needed his rest, after all. Relaxing comfortably in his bunk with the curtain drawn, the fiery haired captain stared at the ceiling and braced himself for the coming days. He was eager to show off the finally full team to their rivals, but he could tell the others were a little nervous, especially Futaba. His own confidence in his teammates wouldn’t be enough to keep them from getting discouraged if the gap between them and Shiro High was super obvious, and Shichigahama was determined to shield them from any less than constructive comments from the other side. He himself was known to lose his cool whenever Takase was involved, but he planned to be on his best behavior.
And if he was going to manage that, he couldn’t be sleep deprived and grumpy. Turning over on his side, he nestled under the covers and promptly dozed off.
What a great day for a jog! Shichigahama didn’t remember leaving the dorm, but he was glad he did. The air was fresh and cool and the sunlight glimmered through the gaps in the treetops. How strange. Had there always been a forest like this near the school? Their usual jogging route looked nothing like this. Pausing to catch his breath and give his surroundings a once over, he was fairly sure he’d never been in this part of Miyagi before. It looked like he’d stepped right into a children’s storybook and wandered into an enchanted forest. Still, it was beautiful and the terrain was flat enough to support a leisurely run. He’d have to bring the rest of the team next time. Speaking of which, why was he alone? It was rare he went out without at least one jogging buddy.
“Captain! Oh, Captain! Where could he be?”
Was that Tsukidate? His teammates must be around after all. He took off towards the sound of his friend’s voice.
“He’s lost. Go figure. Typical Ao High, losing students in the woods.”
Furrowing his brow, Shichigahama quickened his stride and emerged in a clearing with his teammates just in time to scold Onagawa for his disparaging comment. He gave him a light knock on the back of his head.
“Ow.” The blonde rubbed the spot but didn’t look surprised. “Found him.”
For a moment Shichigahama stared at his team, unsure he actually had found them. It was all five of his teammates plus the coach and manager…maybe. The captain was used to being one of the taller guys on the team, but everyone looked a lot shorter than usual. Did he have another growth spurt? He was pretty sure he was past growing age, but maybe all the sasa kamaboko he’d been eating had added a few extra inches. He’d have to report this back to the family business next time he went home!
“Thank goodness we found you, Captain Prince.” The little Coach Shida smiled and gave a bow. “We need your help.”
Shichigahama grinned and puffed out his chest. He’d jump at any opportunity to help out his idol. “Yes, sir!”
Tiny Watari grabbed him by his cape and tugged him further into the clearing. “Hurry up princey. This is the calling of a true man.”
Although he liked the sound of that, the captain was struck speechless when he finally realized what he was wearing. He assumed “captain prince” was just a new nickname (he would prefer prince of sasa kamaboko) but his current outfit made the name more literal. He was dressed like a prince out of a fairy tale, brightly colored cape and tights included. No stranger to wearing colorful outfits, Shichigahama was perfectly comfortable but thoroughly confused. Why would he have gone jogging dressed like this? It felt like there was something he couldn’t remember gnawing at his brain, but it would be on the tip of his tongue and then vanish completely.
His teammates weren’t giving him time to think. Fun sized Futaba looked nervous. “Our poor Snow. What if it doesn’t work?”
Mini Misato gave him a friendly pat on his pintsized back. “Just relax. Captain Prince won’t let us down.”
“Aw.” Onagawa threw his short arms around the pair. “That’s our sweet Reassuring Ace.”
“Don’t call me that.”
Shichigahama had more questions than answers. “Who’s Snow?”
The small manager with her equally small tablet finally spoke up. “A victim of a wicked trick. Ate too many apples and fell into a deathlike sleep.”
Now this was starting to sound familiar, although that one detail didn’t sit right. “You mean a poisoned apple, right?”
“No. I mean what I said.” She was firm but unfazed, not glancing up from her screen. “Too many apples.”
Tsukidate shrugged. “Too much of a good thing, maybe? But now that you’re here, everything will be okay.”
It wasn’t hard to figure out what they wanted him to do. He just hoped he was up for the challenge. As they led him over to where a glass coffin was decorated with flowers and hidden behind flowing silk curtains, Shichigahama still felt like something was wrong. This story was familiar to him, like a distant memory. Seven small people in an enchanted forest, a prince coming to save a damsel afflicted with an apple related curse. But that wasn’t his life, was it? Maybe once he wakes the princess up, she’ll have some answers for him.
His friends watching with hopeful smiles, he pulls back the curtains and gazes on the face of the sleeping Snow for the first time. It is immediately apparent that his memory must be warped, because this Snow is apparently a man. Upon closer inspection, he realizes it’s a familiar face!
“What?! This isn’t Snow White! It’s that dumb gorilla from Shiro High!”
“Uh, Captain.” Tsukidate joins him beside the slumbering ape. “Please don’t talk about our Snow that way. Only a prince’s kiss will break the spell.”
No way. This had to be some kind of trick. “I thought it was true love’s kiss. This slobbering beast is NOT my true love!”
“Look, Captain.” Watari’s green hair barely reached the bedside. “It’s a dirty job, but somebody’s gotta do it.”
Onagawa looked too pleased about the whole ordeal. “It’s your responsibility to take one for the team.”
The fiery haired prince cast a pleading look to the group huddled on the coffin’s other side, but was only met with Misato and Kurikoma’s vacant stares and the big supportive smiles of Futaba and Coach Shida. He guessed there was no getting out of this. One kiss to this great stupid apple swallowing gorilla and maybe breaking the curse will make things start to make sense. Lifting the lid and setting it aside, he brought his face down near his slumbering rival. Although he hated to admit it, Takase did look handsome all dressed up like a prince himself and surrounded by all these flowers. He crossed his fingers for no gorilla saliva and made the kiss quick. He tasted like a sweet red apple. It wasn’t so bad.
Breakfast in the dorm that morning was abnormally tense. Even Misato and Kurikoma, who were usually comfortable in silence, seemed put off by the lack of conversation when they eventually joined the group. Shichigahama had expected them to be a little nervous, but not to the point of eating awkwardly around the table. Looks like it’s up to their stalwart captain to save the day by breaking the ice. He felt a little embarrassed about sharing the contents of his bizarre dream, but the way it brightened everyone’s mood told him he’d made the right call.
“Wow, Captain.” Onagawa nudged him under the table. “I didn’t know you were such a romantic.”
That earned him a dark look usually reserved for any badmouthing of their club. “I’m not. I only did it because you all were asking me to.”
“So, we were like dwarves? Did we have cool beards and pickaxes?” Watari strangely seemed to like the idea.
“You probably weren’t any shorter than you already are.” Misato burst his bubble with the truth.
“Damn. You got him there, Sick Burn Ace!”
“Don’t call me that.”
Tsukidate gave the whole scenario too much thought. “If Takase was Snow White, wouldn’t it have made more sense for his team to be the dwarves?”
He was probably right, but the author felt it worked better this way. Moving on…
“None of it made sense.” Shichigahama reminded them. “That dumb ape should have been King Kong, not a sleeping prince.”
Apparently unfazed by the previous glare, Onagawa bravely pressed his luck. “I don’t know captain. Are you sure that wasn’t your repressed feelings for Takase bubbling to the surface?”
He narrowly dodged a thwack to the cranium when Tsukidate chimed in again. “Takase does always seem to keep his eyes on you, captain.”
“Yeah, right.” He crossed his arms, starting to regret not keeping this dream to himself. “That mountain barbarian keeps both eyes on the nearest apple with drool dripping all the way to the floor.”
Futaba chuckled and exchanged looks with Misato. “Wait, so the apple thing wasn’t just part of the dream?”
Suddenly, Kurikoma practically slammed her tablet onto the table. “I have pictures.”
Watari made his confused face that also resembled a sneer. “Of apples? Or his drool puddle?”
The manager wore a suspicious smile. It was just a regular smile but it was suspicious because she doesn’t usually emote at all. “Pictures of Takase watching Captain Shichigahama.”
In a flash, the entire team huddled around her little tablet screen. True to her word, she had about five pictures from previous encounters with Shiro High, all showing Takase with his eyes locked on their captain. Two of them were at the pair actually glaring at each other, but the others were of Takase watching Shichigahama performing. His stare was filled with a little scrutiny, but he mostly looked impressed, and in the final picture, maybe even a little…
“Woah, he’s totally checking you out in that one, captain.”
Nothing could save Onagawa from Shichigahama’s swing that time.
“Your costume there does show off your muscles, captain.” Kurikoma mumbled, back to being stone faced but sporting a light blush.
Before he could protest any further (or his other teammates could reach their own verdict on if he was being checked out or not) Coach Shida arrived and they started getting ready for training camp. A captain’s job is to be focused on what’s best for the team, so Shichigahama shook off the morning’s weirdness and prepared for the rival showdown of the century. He definitely was thinking only of showing off with his teammates and not about where Takase was looking in that picture. At all. So don’t ask him about it.
Well, this is awkward. Thanks to their manager and her urge to photograph everything, Shichigahama can’t relax during their group training drills. He swears every time he finishes a backflip or gets up from a handstand or even just does some freehand stuff, he’ll turn and catch that big disgusting ape glaring at him. They’d gotten into their usual insult slinging shouting match after running into each other out in public, and it felt like things were totally normal. Then practice started, and now he’s hyper aware of every glance, glower, and gape that stinky gorilla tosses his way. What’s he looking at?!
It must be all in his head. It’s like when you see a spider and then it disappears, and then you think it’s crawling on you just because you know it’s around somewhere. He knows Takase and his eyes and his big ugly brows are in the room, so he’s just imagining he’s being watched. It’s not like he cares one way or another. Maybe if he stares long enough, he’ll pick up a few pointers on what a captain is supposed to be like. Lesson number one; you don’t need to know the technical lingo to explain gymnastics to a novice.
"You just kind of, woooosh, and then when you land just like, plotz, like that. Got it, Futaba?”
“Uhh…”
Misato sighed. “Here, just watch me do it.”
“That’s our Demonstration Ace!”
“Don’t call me that.”
The whole “double it” hide and seek thing sounded like a fun idea at first, but it seemed less cool and more creepy as the sun dipped lower and lower out of sight. Worst of all, Shichigahama couldn’t shake the stupid stalker ape no matter how hard he tried. The whole point of having two seekers was to compete.
“You’re not going to beat me if you follow me around the whole time, y’know.”
Takase furrowed his brow but didn’t falter his stride. “You have the home team advantage. I’d be stupid to wander aimlessly on my own.”
“Hmph.” Shichigahama abruptly turned towards a stairwell, trying to let the door close behind him.
“Hey!” The gorilla was hot on his tail. “Don’t shut the door in my face.”
“What? Scared to be in the hall alone?”
“Just keeping my eye on you. For all I know you got your teammates to help you cheat or something.”
That phrase struck the wrong chord with Shichigahama. “Yeah, I know you’re keeping an eye on me. You’ve been watching me all day.”
Takase looked guilty. “What? I wouldn’t waste time watching you fumble with instructing your newbies if you paid me.”
“Oh really? According to several witnesses, you spent the majority of our last meet watching me perform. Trying to steal some of my moves, Aomori gorilla?” That was stretching the truth; he really only had the manager’s word on that.
“It’s not my fault you’re the only one on your team worth watching.”
A confirmation. That made him feel less crazy, but he wouldn’t stand for anyone talking down on his friends. “We’re all equally worth watching. You’ll see when we destroy you at regionals and send you packing back to the mountains.”
“You idiot! Our school isn’t-”
Their bickering was cut off by a loud thud from above them, like someone had slammed the door at the top of the stairwell. Both captains jumped and inadvertently huddled closer together. They exchanged frightened glances and silently agreed to get as far away from that side of the school as possible immediately. Their argument forgotten, the pair walked side by side and hoped to find even one of their teammates soon.
As the whole group reunited outside and Shiro High prepared to leave, Shichigahama found he’d had a great time during the camp despite it’s ups and downs, walking away with a renewed passion to take his team and their beloved coach all the way to the Inter-High championship. He would have loved to end on that note and say goodbye to their rivals with some friendly banter, but it seems his manager had other ideas. She and Tsukidate were talking cordially with Shiro’s vice captain Mutsu, and Kurikoma even handed her trademark tablet over for him to take a look. She wouldn’t be sharing any of their team’s secrets, right? He’d better go listen in.
Mutsu looked even more mischievous than usual. “I’m not surprised in the least that you have pictures like this. Our captain can be a little… obvious.”
Almost like it was a challenge to poke at their respective captain’s flaws, Tsukidate swiftly took the opportunity. “Yes, well ours can be pretty oblivious. It’s no wonder he hasn’t noticed until now.”
Shichigahama realized what they were talking about pretty quickly. Evidently, he wasn’t the only captain eavesdropping. Takase peered over Mutsu’s shoulder and saw the incriminating picture in question.
“Delete that right now!”
“Why, captain?” Mutsu pulled the tablet away. “What exactly are you looking at in the photo?”
Seeing Takase so flustered should have made him laugh, but Shichigahama actually felt like he needed to interject here. He was more than just flattered to find out Takase had been checking him out, and he can admit that lumbering gorilla wasn’t so bad to look at himself. Now he just needed to find the right way to go about saying this. Good thing he was great at explaining himself!
“Hey, gori-I mean, Takase.”
His sudden shouting interrupted the tablet tug of war. The Shiro High captain looked embarrassed, but tried to play it off. “What do you want?”
Shichigahama figured it was appropriate to flex his muscles while he said: “We could go for apple flavored ice cream sometime, if you want.”
Takase was speechless. So was everyone else. Then the two captains were in a shouting match again and everything was ok.