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AILURINE [aka AELURINE]
[adjective]
(1) of or pertaining to cats.
(2) suggestive of a cat, as in suppleness or stealthiness.
Etymology: from the Greek αἴλουρος (aílouros), “cat”.
One night, Shouyou has to grab something from the third gym during free practice, whistling as he skips along. When he rounds the corner to enter, he stops dead in his tracks at the sight that greets him.
The court is enveloped in near darkness save for the moonlight streaming through the open windows. It spotlights a giant figure, terrifyingly large with two pairs of glowing eyes. Despite the darkness, Shouyou can see each pair of eyes glaring at each other, even though they belong to the same body. He hears the monster growl, words spoken so fast and jumbling over each other he can’t make out anything it says.
Shouyou silently moves backwards, gulping. His foot steps on a creaky floorboard, and the eyes immediately flick to him.
He shrieks.
“P-p-please don’t hurt me, demon!” he screeches, turning on his heel to run away. He’s about to bolt down the lane, mouth open to cry for help, when he feels a hand on his shoulder. He sees long, pale fingers clutching his shirt, and he screams again, eyes clamping shut as he tries to break free, hoping that whatever direction he goes in someone will hear him.
“Hinata! Stop yelling!” a familiar voice says.
The hand squeezes his shoulder, and when Shouyou cracks open a single eye, his gaze follows up the arm to see Lev wincing. He has his other hand pressed against his ear.
“L-Lev?”
“Yeah?”
“What was that in there?” he asks, looking into the dark gym again.
Lev peeks over his shoulder to see whatever he’s trying to look at. “What do you mean? There’s nothing there?”
“But there was a giant monster!” Shouyou insists. “I was about to walk through the doors when I saw it! It had four eyes and was as tall as you!”
“What do you mean?” Lev quirks an eyebrow in confusion. “Me and Yaku-san were the only ones in there.”
“‘Yaku-san’?”
“Yes?” Behind Lev appears Nekoma’s third-year libero, the one that Nishinoya-senpai respects a lot. “What about me?” he asks, eyes narrowed slightly.
“Hinata’s asking what was in the gym,” Lev explains. “I said it was only the two of us in there.”
Yaku nods. “Yeah. I found this one”—and Yaku pauses to kick Lev lightly on the calf—“trying to skip receive practice by hiding here in the dark. When he wouldn’t bend down so I could smack his head, I had to climb up his torso to reach.”
Shouyou purses his lips, considering this. “So... you were the ones growling at each other?”
“I assume so,” Yaku says with a shrug. “We only stopped because we saw you at the door.”
Shouyou lets out deep breath, hand clutching his chest.
“Thank goodness!” he sighs. “I thought you two were a scary demon haunting the gym!” He chuckles self-consciously, hand scratching the back of his head.
Lev outright laughs, the hand previously clutching his shirt now slapping Shouyou repeatedly on the back.
“Hinata, that’s so dumb!” he snickers. When Yaku-san also begins to giggle, Shouyou blushes, glaring away in embarrassment.
“Well,” he tries, “you guys were just covered in the dark, you know! And all I could see were your eyes! It’s not my fault.”
“Still!” Lev hollers. “That’s pretty stupid!”
Shouyou humphs, freeing himself from Lev’s grasp to stomp into the gym. He came here to get something anyway.
Stupid, mean cats and looking stupidly terrifying in the nighttime, he thinks, leaving behind the two laughing Nekoma members behind him.
Hitoka isn’t sure what she just walked in on.
She was supposed to ask for Miyanoshita-san because Otaki-san needed something from her. Shimizu-senpai said she would be in the fourth gym with the rest of Ubugawa.
Either senpai was wrong, or Hitoka walked into the wrong gym.
She opens the doors to find one of the Nekoma boys (Fukui-san? Fukuya-san? She can’t remember) simply hanging from the catwalk, fists clamped tight to the ledge. His body is stretched taut, black shirt rising to reveal his torso, and his legs dangle in the air, slightly swinging back and forth. When Hitoka enters the gym, he casually looks over his shoulder to stare her right in the eyes.
Much to her embarrassment, she squeaks, flushing red.
Beady eyes simply blink at her.
“I-I-I-I’m so sssorry!” Hitoka yelps, turning on her heel to dash away with the doors slamming shut behind her. Her heart races, and not just because she’s running as fast as her legs will take her.
What was he doing? Why was he by himself? Why didn’t he say anything? Was she allowed to see? Did she interrupt something important? Is it a Nekoma training exercise? Should she ask Shimizu-senpai if Karasuno should start doing that? Dozens of questions rush through her head.
It’s not until she runs into Otaki-san halfway back to the first gym, out of breath and still bewildered, that she realizes she completely forgot to look for Miyanoshita-san.
Kei takes a seat at the bench when he switches out with Kinoshita. He gulps down the water that Yachi hands him before wiping the sweat off his forehead. Ubugawa isn’t quite as strong as the other teams at the camp, but even during practice matches he hates being on the back line whenever it’s their serve. He’s grateful that Ukai-san switched him out for the mean time (his fists ache at trying—and failing—to receive those serves).
When he doesn’t take his eyes off the court, he feels someone slide onto the bench to sit next to him. Kei doesn’t even have to turn his head to know who just draped an arm over his shoulders.
“Kuroo-san, please get your arm off me,” he says in a flat tone. He would express his annoyance more but he’s exhausted.
“Now, Tsukki, is that any way to greet your senpai?” Kuroo teases.
“Kuroo-san,” he tries patiently, “please take your arm off me,” but instead Kuroo’s grip around Kei tightens when Kei tries to shrug him off.
Kuroo very pointedly ignores him. “Ah, Tarako’s serves killed you, huh?” he comments, watching the court.
“‘Tarako’?” He doesn’t remember reading that name in any of the team rosters.
“Ah, Ubugawa’s captain. ‘s a nickname,” Kuroo clarifies.
Kei nods, watching Ubugawa serve again. He’d wince at how loud the impact is, but instead he snorts when the ball hits Hinata in a weird angle, and the idiot bumps it into his own face.
“Ubugawa really worked on the jump serves this year, I see,” Kuroo continues.
Kei rolls his eyes—that much is painfully obvious. He takes another swig from his water bottle.
“Look at that!”
Kuroo leans onto him more, and the weight pulls Kei down. He frowns.
“Kuroo-san, please take your arm off me,” he asks more sternly than before.
Kuroo continues to ignore him. Karasuno misses the receive, and they both groan.
“Don’t mind, don’t mind!” Kuroo yells.
Fed up, Kei begins to pry Kuroo’s arm off him, but instead the asshole doubles down his hold on Kei and grips on tighter.
“Kuroo-san, let go!”
“But, Tsukki!” he insists. “You gotta watch the game!” He groans again when they watch Nishinoya flub the pass. “They should just connect with the ball. When it comes to killer serves like that, don’t bother aiming it towards the setter. Making sure the ball is in play s’more important.”
“Yeah, I’m gathering that,” Kei deadpans.
They continue to watch the Karasuno fall behind with every serve Ubugawa hits them with until Ukai calls a time-out.
“Kuroo-san, you need to let go of me now so I can listen.”
Kei struggles pull away, Kuroo cackling at him. He begins to slap Kuroo wherever his hands can reach. Hopefully the asshole will let go when Kei starts injuring him.
In the middle of their antics, Kei just catches Ukai instructing, “Just connect! As long as the ball is in play we’ll make the set work.”
Everyone yells their agreement, and Kuroo turns to him with the smuggest expression. Kei glares at him.
“Shut up!” He starts aiming for Kuroo’s face this time.
“I didn’t even say anything!”
“Get off me!”
The match resumes as they continue to roughhouse. Luckily (or perhaps unluckily) for Kei, Ukai doesn’t call on him to switch with Narita because Kuroo stubbornly continues to hold onto him.
“Kuroo-san, let go!” he says, Kuroo’s free hand pressing into his cheek. “The game started again!”
“You weren’t even called back in!”
“Stop – !” He struggles against Kuroo’s hand. “At least quit squishing my face!”
It’s then Kuroo stops struggling against him. He immediately relaxes, settling back into the bench before returning his attention to the court. He acts as if they weren’t acting like children two seconds ago, and Kei looks at him in bewilderment.
Then he realizes that Kuroo’s arm is still draped around his shoulder. Kei looks up at the ceiling contemplating where he went wrong in his life to end up here.
“There!” Kuroo cheers, and Kei snaps his attention back to the game to catch Sawamura-san receiving the ball. He bumps it high enough in the air that Kageyama gets the chance to run for it. The King, obviously, pulls off a clean toss with Hinata as a result.
Kuroo looks at him as he points to the idiot duo. “That’s what you should do!”
“I know.” Kei rolls his eyes. “I do have eyes and a functioning brain, Kuroo-san.”
“Maybe I should take you around Tokyo to get new glasses then,” he suggests. “Looks like your current prescription isn’t helping if you only just realized.”
“My current prescription is fine.”
“What if we looked for cuter frames instead? The ones you have now make you look really mean –”
“No.”
Kuroo shrugs, returning his gaze back to the game. He makes a low humming noise once the ball is served, and Kei quirks an eyebrow at him.
“Azumane-san is a decent blocker.”
“I guess.”
“That genius setter isn’t too bad either.”
Kei only answers with a roll of his eyes.
“You’re also pretty good,” Kuroo continues, “but ‘zumane and Kageyama have the power you lack. You can’t kill block as well as they can.”
He scoffs. Kei is well aware of his own inadequacies.
“Is there a point to this?”
Kuroo looks at him with consideration. “I’m saying maybe you should figure out a way to improve yourself if you can’t handle kill blocks yet.”
“I know,” Kei drawls in a flat voice. He glares at Kuroo with a narrowed gaze. “That’s why I’m here for training camp, Kuroo-san.”
“No need to be so sarcastic, Tsukki, I’m just trying to help.”
“You would help more if you got your arm off me and stopped talking.”
“Nah, that can’t be it.”
Kei sighs, rolling his eyes to the ceiling again. Clearly there is no reasoning with Kuroo if he’s like this. He cheers when Karasuno lands another point, and Kei resigns himself to letting the idiot of a senpai keep an arm around him while they watch the rest of the match together.