Title: Tachibana: First Sight
Fandom: Prince of Tennis: Fudomine Chuugaku
Characters: Tachibana Kippei
Prompt: 040 - Sight
Word Count: 473
Date finished: 04/20/2007
Rating: G
Summary: Tachibana finds that sometimes, promises should be broken.
Author's Notes: They never explain why he decided to take up tennis again - at least, not difinitively (there are two different explanations given). Here's one.
Disclaimer: Characters are owned by Konomi Takeshi, and whoever did the anime. At any rate, it's not me.

It was habit, more than anything, that brought Tachibana Kippei to the tennis courts one afternoon. He wasn't going to play anymore, but sometimes his feet just took him in the direction of the cheerful pok pok of balls that had been such a huge part of his life.

Only that sound was interrupted by a cry of anger - wordless - and then groans at the snarled tone that followed.

Exiting the lane that led to the courts, he was surprised to see the first years - recognizable by their uniforms - filing out of the courts and heading for the weed-choked field behind it. One of them tugged a dark cap lower over his eyes - but it could not hide the bruise already beginning on his cheekbone. Next to him, a boy barely taller than him spoke quietly to him, his dark hair spiked - although it looked less like a hair style and more like he'd given up trying to do anything with it.

He watched them search through the field with a methodical thoroughness that spoke of long experience, and he wondered why - until a ball arced over the fence and into the field. "Oh, come on," came a soft complaint - unfortunately, if he heard it, so did the other players.

The truth of that was proved a moment later. Seven more balls arced over the fence, sent on purpose toward the first years, one of them rubbing his head with a glare in the direction of the courts.

Kippei looked around to see if the coach were there and spotted him, off to the side, smoking. He was definitely watching - but doing nothing to stop the older kids. Kippei's jaw tightened for just a moment, then he purposefully turned and walked away.

It wasn't his business. He knew better than to be near a tennis court anyway.

He found himself back by the courts the next week.

Things hadn't changed - not that he expected them too - except that this time, the first years were engaged in drills, silent but not sullen. That surprised him. They were serious, focused - more focused than the ones at Shishigaku, without question. Usually, those had looked utterly bored. These six - only six, but that really wasn't a surprise, considering the treatment they were going through - looked determined.

It was… something to be awed by, if he let himself be.

He knew better than to be there, and yet the spirit of those six - trying everything they could within the system to be allowed to play - kept drawing him back, time and again, to witness the Regulars beat them down again and again. He didn't know their names, but he knew their personalities by the time he'd figured out that the vow he'd made was stupid - and that he could do something about this. And should.

So he did.

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