Hanakotaba prompt

Flower: Tiger Lily/Oniyuri, Dahlia/Tenjikubotan

Fandom: Prince of Tennis

Pairing: Royal/AtoRyo

Disclaimer: Let's be reasonable now, shall we?

Now, before this tale of flowers and sick cats begins, let's all establish a common fact. And that fact is, undoubtedly, that Echizen Ryoma is not the sentimental type.

Which was why on a beautiful Sunday evening, Echizen Ryoma, legendary 12-year old tennis pro, did not find himself amused or the least bit impressed at the prospect of his adorable cat Karupin dying because of some seemingly harmless flowers.

Shall we retrace back one horrendous afternoon to meet a scruffy-looking Exchizen answering his door sleepily at 7 in the morning?

Of course we shall, dear reader. How else would we be able to continue this silly little story otherwise?

Anyways, as we mentioned earlier, Echizen had been ever so noisily woken up when he had heard a rather loud buzzing in his ears. Due to sleeping the living room couch because of unforeseen circumstances (he had lost a bet with his perverted father), this affected him greatly.

Opening the door, he was surprised to see that no one was there. Vowing to dig out the little brats who dared to interrupt his dear sleep, he was about to slam the door shut when a strange scent engulfed his lungs. Frowning, he looked downwards.

There, lying on his doorstep gracefully; was a single flower. Echizen blinked. Once. Twice. Then he poked his head out a little further out the door and looked around. Not a single person in sight.

Frowning yet again, he tacked it off as some weird prank someone decided to play on him. Picking the flower up, he retreated back into the safety of his home.

However, his plans for sleeping in the whole morning were soon destroyed when he found that he simply could not go back to sleep no matter how hard he tried. Maybe it had to do with Karupin constantly jumping up and down on his stomach, and letting out a soft mew every few seconds. Maybe it had to with the wafting scent of that strange orange flower he had plucked into a vase on the kitchen table. Or maybe it was just his body telling him that he had slept in far too much that week that it just wasn't healthy to sleep anymore.

The important thing is, Echizen could not sleep. Rubbing his eyes tiredly, he left his place on the couch to go find some clothes. Maybe he would head down to the street courts and see if anyone was there yet.

Giving off the slightest smile, he patted Karupin. Maybe he could even coax Momo-senpai into getting him some burgers.

Later, as he was sipping his milk (recommended for boys desperately trying to grow taller); he stared strangely at his cat. Karupin was staring wide-eyed at the flower in the vase that was sitting at the table, as if mesmerized by it. Echizen realized with a frown that Karupin probably wasn't used to these kinds of things.

Finishing his toast, he grabbed his tennis bag and checked his watch. It was a little over 8. Sticking a note on the fridge on where he was going, he opened the door to go play some tennis when he stopped in his movements.

Right below where he was going to put his foot down was another of the same kind of flower he had received earlier. It was a pretty orange, with small black spots covering the petals. The petals bent backwards as if they were folded that way, and the middle stick-thing (Echizen never did pay attention in biology class) stuck outwards, almost as if it were about to fall out of the flower.

Staring at it, Echizen concluded that it really was a pretty flower, indeed. But tennis was more important.

After sticking it into the same vase as the other one, he headed out to play some tennis.

"Set, Echizen, 3-0!" Momoshiro happily shouted, rubbing his hands in mirth.

"Biased ref!" A loud and angry voice yelled back twice as loud.

"Oh shut up, Kamio!"

"…and I really don't understand how someone can evolve that much that quickly, even though the last time I played him was a long time ago and I've gotten a lot better too, Tachibana-san told me so. Despite all this, though, I can't believe he managed to get three straight games off of me. Not to mention he's probably playing with the grip tape that belongs to me since I really did see it first. I bet my grip would have been better and I could have returned the Twist Serve better if I had the right grip tape. This sucks…"

"Mada mada dane."

"OI! SEISHOUNEN!"

All their heads turned to the interruption of the usual conversation that happened on the tennis courts. Echizen, after taking one look, he wanted to run away as quickly as possible, but something in his father's voice unnerved him.

As the small black-clad figure got closer and closer, Momoshiro screamed as he pointed at the speck in the distance.

"Hey! It's the old monk!" He sounded horrified.

"Is that a… cat in his arms?" Kamio squinted.

Echizen stiffened as he saw the limp Karupin lying in his father's arms. His legs felt like lead and he did nothing but stare as his running father panted and puffed all the way to the courts. He had obviously been running a long way; otherwise he wouldn't have been sweating so hard. After all, he may have been old and perverted, but it took a lot to have someone like the great Echizen Nanjiroh to lose breath.

"…what I don't get is why that old man didn't restock on grip tape once the supplies started getting low because it's obviously such a popular product. It's only logical to constantly be ordering more and more of the most popular product since that way he could get more success and profit in his business as well as please the customers, because that's really what someone like him should be thinking of, right? Or maybe I'm wrong, since I failed Business Education…"

"Hey, Echizen…" Momoshiro furrowed his eyebrows. "You look kind of… pale."

But it was too late. Echizen's legs had miraculously come back to him, and as soon as he felt them become alive again he was sprinting to his father, eyes wide with craze.

"Is she dead? Is she dead?" Demanded Echizen as he skidded to a stop in front of his surprised dad.

"Hey, calm down…" Nanjiroh tried to calm his son, but Echizen wasn't even looking at him. He was staring worriedly at the bundle of unmoving cat fur in his arms instead.

"IS SHE DEAD?" Echizen turned with eyes as big as saucers to his father. Looking into those distressed orbs, Nanjiroh was speechless for a moment. It had been so long since the kid had even treated him with respect, let alone asked him for help. For the first time in a long time, he was reminded that Echizen was just a kid, a meagre 12-years old. Since when had he turned so mature and self-depending?

Shaking his head, he closed his eyes and thought quietly to himself. This was a chance that wouldn't be repeated in a long time. He had to act dependable, or his already unstable relationship with his son would be broken forever.

"I don't know. We need to take her to the vet." He replied, trying to sound comforting. He was shocked at how monotone he sounded instead. Was his son rubbing off on him?

"I'll go with you." Echizen's eyes retreated back into defence, as if Nanjiroh would ever go to somewhere like the vet's alone.

"Yeah, yeah. Hurry it up, okay?" His father pulled a corner of his lips upward, as if to tell him that it would be okay. And for once, Echizen wasn't annoyed by it.

"…maybe I should go talk to the manager later after we finish this match. Oh wait, now Echizen and that person holding a cat is leaving, so maybe the match has ended? Or is it postponed? I'm really confused. Why doesn't anyone ever tell me anything? There they go, hurrying off in such an undignified manner. I wonder what's the rush. Oh, I guess it might have something to do with the cat in the guy's arms, but it really isn't any of my business. Yes, maybe I should go talk to the manager of the store after-"

"SHINJI!"

"Has she been eating anything strange?" The vet stared down through his glasses at the paper he was filling out. His pencil paused mid-air, he glanced at the two people in front of him.

The boy shook his head slowly, as if trying to recall his memories.

The old man in the black robe, however, rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. "Well…"

Immediately the younger boy's head snapped up to shoot a glare of death to the man in the robe.

Ignoring his son's glare, the man shot an apologetic look to the unconscious cat that was lying on the table in between them.

"Well, I did catch her nibbling on a few flowers." The vet raised an eyebrow. Flowers? That couldn't possibly be the reason why the cat was in such a condition.

Unless…

"What kind of flowers were they?" Adjusting his frameless glasses, the vet flicked off a piece of lint from his white robe.

"Um…" The old man paused. The young boy cut in, giving a semi-detailed description of the flower. Nodding, the vet wrote it all down on his paper.

After he was done, he looked up at the two men again. "From what I have heard, the flowers might have caused the situation in which she is now in." He gestured at the cat. "I believe that she has inhaled a flower particularly toxic, but we will have to wait until the tests from the lab come back. In the meantime, I would suggest leaving her in our care for the next few days. Don't worry," He said soothingly, noticing the boy's look of despair. "We have top-notch services here and will provide a nice and safe environment for her, as well as properly treating whatever she's experiencing."

The boy looked at his father doubtfully. His father pondered it for a while, then sighed. "Yes, I guess you know best after all."

In a moment, his thoughtful look was replaced with a grin. "Now, let's go get something to eat!" He cried, walking out of the room briskly, leaving the vet and his son standing there, staring.

"Oi! Come back here, stupid father!" The boy scrambled to follow the black-clad man, after tipping his hat to the vet and giving on last sorrowful look to his cat.

Sighing, the vet just shook his head. Then, frowning, he ran right out of the room as well, waving his paper in the air.

"You haven't given me your name!"

"Echizen!" Horio shouted angrily, waving his hand frantically in front of his friend's face. He had been doing so for the past five minutes, and it really wasn't helping in any way to get the tennis player's attention.

"What's going on?" Kachirou asked, approaching Echizen's desk, with Katsuo following behind. It was ten minutes before class would begin, and already Echizen was ignoring Horio.

Making a face, Horio pointed at the unmoving character in front of him. They all bent down to look at Echizen's lowered face.

Currently, their idol and hero, Echizen Ryoma himself, was frozen, staring at something in his hand rather intensely. They all tilted their head to one side in an unanimous motion as they realized what he was holding.

A… flower?

"Echizen-kun?" Katsuo asked quietly. "What's that?"

"I don't know." Echizen muttered. Horio, aghast, frowned. "He never replied to me!" He whispered angrily at Katsuo.

"Well, why do you have it then?" Kachirou tried.

"It poisoned my cat." All at once, the Ichinen Trio took a step backwards, worried about the look on Echizen's face. They were almost positive the flower would wilt and crumple to pieces under his fierce glare any second now.

"If I could just get my hands on the bastard that sent this to me…" Echizen tightened his grip on the flower and the other three freshmen began to sweat. "I'll kill him."

A moment of silence stretched out between the four. Finally, Horio succumbed to the urge to break the heavy silence hanging down on them.

"Hey, Echizen…" His voice wavered as Echizen's eyes never left the flower in front of him. "If we find out information about it, would you teach us the Twist Serve?" He joked, laughing nervously.

"Whatever."

Echizen suddenly heard a rush of pattering footsteps, and looked up briefly.

Apparently the trio had been in such a rush to get out of the classroom they had left their books and everything on their desks.

He went back to staring at the flower.

Horio coughed, trying to get Echizen's attention. Each of the freshmen had a freshly printed page that they were holding in front of them, looking extremely professional.

Even the teacher, who had been very angry when the three rushed back into the classroom in the middle of the lesson waving paper in the air and yelling "Echizen! Echizen!", had stopped lecturing to see what they were about to announce.

Dragging his eyes up to stare silently at his classmates, Echizen nodded. Smiling, they took this as an approval to start.

"The Oniyuri." They began together, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. "The Tiger Lily. The Lilium lancifolium. They're all the same thing, and that is…" They paused for dramatic effect before all pointing at the flower in Echizen's hand. "That flower right there!"

"As you can see," Horio stepped forward, silencing the other two. "It is a very pretty flower. However, many people would agree that looks can be deceiving." He paused as an image of Fuji-senpai popped into his head.

Taking this chance, Katsuo continued on for Horio. "The pollen alone from this pretty flower is considered poisonous for humans, although it has edible bulbs that are said to be very tasty."

"However," Kachirou finally managed to get a word in. "For cats, every part of the flower is toxic to them. In fact, some cats suffer kidney failure for a few days after eating the flowers."

Giving a glare to his friends, Horio took the spotlight again. "In the language of flowers, the Oniyuri means 'wealth'. Sub-species of this flower are the flaviforum, meaning 'macho',"

"The fortunei," Katsuo smiled brightly. "Meaning 'manly', and…"

"The splendens, meaning 'monkey'." Kachirou ended. They all took a little bow as the classroom clapped confusedly at the seemingly pointless presentation. Before they took their seats, though, they did jazz hands and said in unison, "All this information was taken from Wikipedia, so don't sue us please!" This set the whole classroom laughing at the stupidity of their actions, but the trio just took it in their stride.

Echizen, however, was not impressed.

Taking the whole flower in his palm, he squished the poor sucker until it was nothing but a little weed on the ground.

"He's going to pay for this."

"1, 2, 3, 4! 1, 2, 3, 4!"

Echizen, who had gotten special permission from Tezuka to skip practice ("My cat is dying."), watched detachedly at the Hyoutei tennis club members as they practised some kind of strange aerobic training.

Not caring who saw him, he stepped past the fence that separated on-lookers and members. Smirking as all the heads in the club turned to watch him as he walked leisurely up to the clubroom; he revelled in the attention he was attracting. All the better for what he was planning.

Arriving at the clubroom, he swiftly knocked on the door twice. No one moved to stop him, since the Regulars were on the other side of the courts, and nobody else had the guts to stop the well-known freshman from Seigaku.

"Hn?" The door opened to reveal a dazzling young boy with silky silver hair and a rather irritated look on his face. When he looked down, though, his mouth curved into a smirk.

"Why, if it isn't Echizen Ryoma of Seigaku. What do you want-"

Echizen never gave him the chance to continue. Throwing a handful of little grains of something all over the mighty Atobe's beautiful jersey and face (NO! NOT THE FACE!), he smirked. "Mada mada dane, Monkey King."

Then, with narrowed eyes, he put his fingers to his lips and whistled.

Atobe, still coughing and spluttering in shock of the crime that had just been committed against him, widened his eyes as a barrage of cats suddenly poured onto the tennis courts, heading for… him?

Backing up a step, he closed his eyes as the tens of thousands of cats all leapt up to tackle him in a big mewing mess. A small scream was choked out of him as he hit the floor, with cats crawling and scratching him all over.

Oh, this brat would pay.

Shaking off a cat, he used the remainder of his strength to grab onto Echizen's leg, dragging him down to the ground along with the cats that he liked so much. Smirking as Echizen gave out a little yelp; he noticed something dropping out of his tennis bag. It seemed to be a little bag that had Crushed Catnip, ready for the road! written on top of it. So that was what he had thrown all over Atobe earlier.

Reaching out with his foot, he kicked the bag of catnip, trying to get it to drop all over Echizen. Unfortunately, he lost control due to a cat clawing his hand, which only resulted in a shower of crushed grains of catnip raining down on the both of them.

The cats couldn't have been happier at the outcome of these events.

Soon, though, after seventeen minutes and four dozen attempts at getting up, the cats were hauled away and Atobe and Echizen were left alone, lying on the cold clubroom floor.

Frustrated, Atobe commanded for his second year buddy, Kabaji. "Cancel practice. Ore-sama is in no shape to keep going today."

"Usu." And then he left.

"And you." Atobe's voice shook with anger as he glared at Echizen, who was also still lying on the floor. "You're coming with me."

"You honestly think ore-sama would sink to that level and dirty his hands with that kind of act?" Atobe demanded as he fixed another band-aid onto one of his many scratches. Scowling, he mourned for the loss of his brilliant pale, smooth skin. Now it was covered with a million claw and teeth marks, like it had gone through a war or something.

And in a way, it had.

"I didn't think that you wouldn't." Muttered Echizen, who was still a little doubtful. Hissing as he tried to disinfect a deeper scratch on his cheek, he pressed a bandage to the wound. Soon he would look like a grumpy Mummy.

"Ore-sama is offended."

The next 15 minutes passed in silence between the two. They were at Atobe's house, due to Atobe dragging Echizen with him after the practice had been cancelled, demanding an explanation. And when he got it, he had been shocked, to say the least.

While 'wealth', 'macho' and 'manly' had all been good clues to lead up to him, he was in no way connected to a 'monkey'.

Not that he did send the flowers, of course. No, if he had decided to show his feelings for the boy, he would have definitely done something more romantic.

Leaving the room to dump all the garbage and waste from the bandages he'd used to patch up his injuries, Atobe looked at himself sorrowfully in the mirror. All this misfortune had been brought on to him and for no apparent reason after all.

Sighing, he ran a hand through his tangled hair. Deciding to fix himself up a bit, he called for his servants.

After a rejuvenating face wash and a pampering skincare treatment, Atobe returned to the large living room where he had left Echizen.

His smirk growing softer, he stopped in his movements as he spotted Echizen, draped over a chair, fast asleep. In his hands was a band-aid, still unopened.

Without knowing it, Atobe moved closer to the younger boy, until he was standing before him. Reaching out slowly, he gently took the band-aid and opened it. After applying it to the small scratch on Echizen's forehead, his fingers lingered for a second before moving downwards. His lips curved into a small smile.

He knew he was going too far when he touched those soft lips, but he couldn't pull back anymore. He was entranced, like so many others by this tennis prodigy. The way he moved, the way he smirked, the way he took everything head on…

Atobe lowered his head, but then stopped.

This was so wrong on so many levels, he thought. If the word ever got out that he had feelings for Seigaku's prize rookie…

Well, let's just say Atobe was never one who really cared what people thought about him.

As his lips connected with the part of Echizen's forehead that wasn't wounded, he felt eyes on him. Before he could react, though, a small coy voice reached his ears.

"Hey. My lips are down here, Monkey King."

"Shut up, brat." And he promptly lowered his mouth to do the task himself.

The next day, one Atobe Keigo found himself sitting in his bed, eating breakfast when a servant carrying a single flower came into his room.

Placing it on his master's breakfast tray, the servant bowed. "This came for you today." And with that, he was dismissed.

Atobe, taking the flower in one (scarred) hand, smiled gently at the beautiful flower in front of him. So it was a Dahlia, eh? That could only mean one thing.

He was definitely going to be seeing more of Echizen from now on.

Omake

"So you really didn't send them?"

"How many times must you make me say it? Ore-sama did not send those flowers!"

"Then who did?"

Miles away, Fuji's smile got just a bit wider.

"Eh, aniki, why are you smiling like that?"

"It's nothing important, Yuuta. I was just marvelling at the beauty of Wikipedia and corner store flower shops. Now finish your vegetables, dear."

"Aniki! Please!"

A/N Bwahahaha, it's done! It's finally done! I really wish to jump up and cheer now. Now I guess I'll move on to what I should be explaining.

First of all, this was part of the Hanakotaba challenge at the awesome forum, PoT stands for Pointless but Original Talking. So, I picked the Tiger Lily and the Dahlia. The Tiger Lily means wealth and the Dahlia means good taste in the Japanese language of flowers.

And all that strange facts about the Tiger Lily? Yeah, those are all from a Wikipedia article I read about them. No lie; go search it up if you don't believe me. The Tiger Lily is like, the embodiment of Atobe Keigo. And the Dahlia, well, it fits into the story, right? Also, I have no idea what gender Karupin is, so let's just say that she's a girl, yes?

I'm finished rambling now. Please feel free to start shooting me now. And I guess this means that my long period of writer's block is over. Yay me?