Ｌｉｇｈｔ

fifteen - dad

"Before we can play Shutoku, we have to play our first game!" Hyuuga said, and everyone echoed a chorus of yeahs.

"By the way, where's the coach?"

"She went to observe our first opponent's practice game," The captain explained, and a second later Riko walked through the doors.

"I'm back," She said, looking disheartened.

"Speak of the devil," Hyuuga muttered.

"She was skipping after the Kaijo game," Kawahara remembered, "but she's not skipping today."

"Coach," Furihata spoke up, "are you gonna skip today?"

"Like hell I will!" She glowered at them, making them flinch and Sasaki whistle.

"Daho, she wouldn't act like an idiot over an official game," Hyuuga deadpanned as the female came to stand beside him. "But you do seem unhappy. Are they good?"

"We shouldn't be worrying about Shutoku," Riko said, "when our first match isn't looking good," This statement drew out a few gasps.

"What do you mean?" The captain asked, and Riko went on to explain the meaning behind her words.

"One of their players might give us trouble. You can watch the video later, take a look at this picture," She handed her phone over to Hyuuga, and everyone crowded around to get a look.

"Th-this is.." Hyuuga looked surprised.

"Chief, you saying we're playing against a cat?" Sasaki joked, "it's a good tactic, since I might just kneel over from the cuteness, but-"

"No!" Riko scowled at him, "it's the next one!"

"Oh, shoot," Sasaki's eyes widened at the picture.

"His name's Papa Mbaye Siki, two meters tall, weighs 87 kilograms. He's a foreign student from Senegal."

"Senegal? He's huge. Two meters?" Hyuuga gaped. Sasaki glanced away, one of the people I've played with was about that tall so I don't really feel all that intimidated. Maybe I should call them and ask to hang out for some pointers against really tall guys?

"Can they do this?" Koganei questioned.

"He's studying abroad?" Izuki reiterated. "Sorry but where's Senegal?"

"He's just big," Kagami said, and Sasaki hummed in agreement. After a moment of silence, Hyuuga spoke up.

"This Papa Mbaye. . . What was it?"

"Papanpa?"

"It's Papa Try-hard," Koganei said.

"Papa.." Izuki suddenly took out his notebook, "Papaya ito," A few moments past as everyone discussed his name, and then Riko had enough.

"We're not getting anywhere. Kuroko-kun, give him a nickname," She ordered.

"How about 'dad' then?"

"Where's your naming sense?" Koganei deadpanned as Izuki got another pun idea.

"Dad's company is a dud."

"That was lame," The entire team snickered as Riko continued.

"For this dad, we'll have to.."

"But, you're laughing too!"

"Hey, listen!" Riko shouted, and all of the boys immediately stood at attention. "He's not just tall, his arms and legs are long too."

That goes hand in hand with the territory, Sasaki thought, unless the torso is the part that's long, but the arms are usually long on a tall person too so why add that part? Isn't it obvious?

"Everything about him is big. More and more schools are inviting students from abroad to increase their power. Our next opponent, Shinkyo High, was only a middle tier school until last year. But with the addition of a single foreign player, they've become a completely different team. They can't reach high enough. Because of this one single reason, no one can stop him."

Kagami, you thinking what I'm thinking?

Uhhhh, what are you thinking?

That the two of us can easily take care of him since we got hops.

Well now I am, Kagami grinned at Sasaki, who returned the look but with a smirk instead. "We can't just do nothing," Kagami spoke up, and Riko smirked.

"Who said we would?" She questioned. "So, Kagami-kun, Kuroko-kun and Sasaki-kun, starting tomorrow, the three of you will have your own training regimen," Riko told the three, "The preliminaries start on May 16th, until then you won't even have time to complain!"

"Yeah!"

The days started flying past as the Seirin team got ready for the preliminaries, training and fighting to get stronger. Sasaki had something to say to Kuroko, but always forgot while they were practicing and only remembered after he closed the door coming home.

Soon, the 16th of May arrived. The team headed to the gym where their first match would be held, and started warming up.

"Dad doesn't seem to be here," Hyuuga observed.

"Now that you mention it.." Izuki trailed off when suddenly someone yelped an 'ouch' and everyone glanced to see who it was. It was dad, having hit his head on the doorframe. Sasaki wanted to snicker but held himself back because that would be mean.

Hyuuga 'accidentally' dropped his ball and had it roll over to the other side, hitting the back of a player's shoe. "Oh, sorry," He said as he went to collect it.

"By the way, did you guys really beat Kaijo?" The player asked.

"It was just a practice game," Hyuuga replied, making the other person smirk.

"I see. I guess the generation of miracles isn't as strong as we thought."

Underestimation is the best, Sasaki hummed as he listened in. I'd love to just watch them get their asses wrecked by Kise, that'd be a show.

"The generation of miracles lost?" Dad reiterated, "they brought me here to beat them. I'm disappointed they are so weak," He shrugged, sounding as patronizing as it could get.

As dad walked to start getting warmed up, he bumped into Kuroko and looked around trying to find what he had bumped into. This time, Sasaki wheezed as dad picked up Kuroko and Hyuuga punched him. "Owwww! Captain that was so mean!"

"No little boy, children shouldn't be on the court," He warned, making Sasaki wheeze harder, hard enough for sounds to stop and for him to be sort of dry heaving and just trying to breathe as he clutched his stomach.

"Good grief," Hyuuga facepalmed at the white haired male. Dad put Kuroko down after realizing he was a player and not a child.

"They lost to a child like him? Are all the generation of miracles children?"

"Guys, go on without me, I think I'm dying," Sasaki choked out with the little breath he still had in him before collapsing on the floor and rolling around while still holding his stomach.

"Stop it, it's not funny," Kuroko said, and the way he said it made the white haired male laugh even harder.

"STOP PLEASE I CAN'T TAKE ANYMORE!"

"Me neither," Kagami hit the ground beside him. Now most of the team was laughing but not as hard as Sasaki was. Kuroko continued to look unamused.

"Honestly, I'm starting to get annoyed," Kuroko muttered as he watched dad walk off, causing a few of the Seirin players to stop giggling.

"You don't like to lose, do you?" Kagami grinned before glancing beside him at the almost dead white haired boy. "Sasaki, get off the floor," He said, hauling him up.

"I LIIIIIIIVE!" [Reference?]

"Shut up, daho."

"Now then," Kagami and the others stripped off their warm up shirts to reveal their jerseys. "I guess we'd better show dad why he shouldn't piss off kids!"