A Prince of Tennis fanfic. One-shot.
Alpha Pair a.k.a. SanaYuki

Story: Misery for 6hrs, 23 mins and 17secs

Rating: K+ - pretty mild romance...

Disclaimer: Prince of Tennis belongs to Konomi Takeshi.

Author's note: My first PoT one-shot... The title goes to BloodXBlade's credit... for telling me that this singer shouts for 17 seconds, saying misery, during a song... at the time I thought 'misery for 17 seconds' was actually the name of a song...

Please review!

February 14th - the day Saint Valentine blesses lovers with red roses and sweet confectionary. It is the day when friends exchange sweets and hints the one they admire with a delicately wrapped box of chocolate. It is usually a day that is worth looking forward to, exciting for both males and females. However, if you are a regular in the Rikkai tennis team, Valentine's Day is hell, especially when your captain is Yukimura Seiichi.

Kirihara Akaya, the baby of the team, walked onto the courts where the team was standing, talking about a new technique that Yukimura had developed. The second year ace was a genius at most things - being only the fourth to make it into the school team in his second year with the Sannin Bakemono preceding him - and today, his sharp wits had told him to get out of the locker room as quickly as possible when he saw Yukimura-buchou's expression.

A murderous aura surrounded Yukimura, who was walking towards the regulars with Sanada behind him. Everyone stared at their leaders and mentally scanned through things they could have done to offend their buchou. Yukimura crossed his arms and stared at the regulars with a glare sharper than a dagger. "Clean it up. Now." Yukimura hissed, his eyes narrowed.

The rest of the team exchanged glances and wondered what Yukimura was referring to. Finally, after an unbearable period of silence, Niou asked, "What do you mean?"

"There is to be absolutely no food in the locker room," Yukimura howled, "I reminded everyone yesterday that there was to be NO chocolate in the lockers. I don't want cockroaches or mice or whatever crawling on my clothes, playing with my racquets and stamping all over my bag!" Everyone took a step back - Sanada included - at Yukimura's fury.

"I cleaned it out before practice." Yanagi said. It was strange for Yukimura to be so agitated due to such a simple reason. He wondered if it was something else that troubled the usually calm and collected boy.

"Mine are in the plastic bags outside the clubhouse." Yagyuu offered his explanation. "Akaya's are outside as well." He added, remembering his kouhai's dilemma in the morning. Kirihara had received a ridiculous amount of chocolate, and to avoid putting it in his tennis locker - Yukimura had warned the team not to seriously the previous day - he had to borrow two plastic bags from Yagyuu as he had forgotten his senpai-tachi's advice to bring a lot of plastic bags.

"My chocolates are in my bag." Jackal said, shrugging. Even though he received gifts, storage for him was not a problem unlike the rest of the team.

"I put all of mine in the storage space behind the clubhouse." Marui grinned, popping his bubble.

"Same." Niou yawned. "I cleared mine way early."

"I..." Sanada began to say.

"I know you threw away all of yours. I can see it in the bins." Yukimura rolled his eyes, then after a deep sigh, he suddenly roared, "NIOU MASAHARU, MARUI BUNTA, GO CLEAN YOUR LOCKERS! RIGHT NOW!"

Marui and Niou looked at each other disbelieving and zoomed off, both muttering complaints that being popular was not their fault. The team stood motionless as they watched Marui and Niou disappear into the clubhouse and listened to the noise of chocolates being thrown into plastic bags carelessly.

When the two rejoined the team, instead of the defeated expression Yukimura expected them to have, a victorious one hung off their lips. "Ne, buchou..." Niou began, his lips curled into a grin.

"...so much for no chocolates in the lockers." Marui finished the sentence.

"What is it?" Yukimura frowned. It seemed to him Niou and Marui were suggesting that he broke the rules as well; but it was impossible, because he had just cleaned out the waterfall of chocolates five minutes ago.

"Your locker burst. With chocolates." Marui smirked.

Yukimura took a moment to swear and rushed off to clean up. "100 laps to begin practice!" He turned back to shout - not forgetting about the most important thing - much to the annoyance of the rest of the regulars.

The team ran together today, united by their fear of Yukimura, instead of Sanada racing on while Marui lazed behind with Niou. All of them were puzzled about Yukimura's strange behaviour over such a trivial matter. Suddenly, Kirihara seemed to have realised something and tugged on Sanada's sleeve, "fukubuchou, is it true that you threw away all of your chocolates?"

Sanada nodded and continued to run, ignoring his kouhai. "No wonder that girl was crying when she opened the bin." Yagyuu stated.

"Did you know Yukimura gave someone chocolate?" Niou spoke all of a sudden, cutting the previous topic short.

"No, he didn't.," Kirihara said, "he can't. He's not a girl and it's VALENTINE'S DAY, not white day, Niou-senpai."

"He was holding chocolate, BAKAYA." Niou taunted.

"Did you see him give it to a girl?" Kirihara retorted, his voice hinting the pride he had in this logic.

"No, but why would he be holding a box of chocolate instead of dumping it in one of his twenty something plastic bags?" Niou pulled his kouhai's ear and said, "and I saw him blushing when he was looking at the chocolate!"

"Really?" Kirihara's defiance now became interest. "So who is it?"

"He probably just received it from someone he liked. Yukimura isn't a girl, you know." Yagyuu pointed out, the most rational response to this argument so far.

Sanada was sure Niou's mouth was forming a "yes, he is", but at that moment, Yukimura had caught up to the regulars and all of them immediately concentrated on their feet. After all, watching your feet move was much more fun that doing 200 sit-ups issued by their currently aggravated buchou.

At the end of the 100 laps, Niou walked up to Yukimura bravely. And with even more courage, he asked the question that should never have been asked, "Yukimura-buchou, did you receive a box of chocolate wrapped in blue pearl paper?"

Everyone froze. Why was Niou asking about the box of chocolate he saw Yukimura holding? It was plainly suicidal and the regulars moved away from the white-haired trickster in a neat radius, not wishing to be involved when Yukimura exploded. "Don't talk to me about chocolates, Niou. But no, I did not." Yukimura said quietly, adding 100 push-ups at the end of his answer.

By the time morning practice finished, everyone felt as if they had accomplished the month's worth of training. Kirihara had to be rescued from drowning by Yanagi and Yagyuu when he fell asleep in the showers due to fatigue. Everything was almost flooded, but surprisingly, Yukimura took that quite calmly. All he did was pass Kirihara a clean towel, telling him to not catch a cold. It was almost ironic in the ways he treated the minute matter and the potentially disastrous event.

Luckily, when Yukimura was about to scream as he caught sight of a chocolate, accidentally overlooked by Marui when he was cleaning up, the melodious class bell sang. Everyone was glad they had about six hours in which they could stay away from Yukimura and the horror of his death glares as far as possible.

3-A, Sanada and Yagyuu's class, had physical education with 3-B in first period. Instead of participating actively, as they usually did, Sanada, Yagyuu, Niou and Marui talked about Yukimura's behaviour in the morning, only trying hard enough to be out of trouble with their sensei.

"Did you dirty his uniform or something?" Marui asked Niou, knowing how much Yukimura hated his uniform to be not perfectly clean. "Damn, I hate basketball... I'm never chosen to sit out." He added quietly when someone threw the ball to him.

"No," Niou answered, "I'm not stupid enough to do that. Remember when Akaya accidentally spilled juice all over buchou's shirt..."

"Ah, that time." Marui said thoughtfully, catching the ball and throwing for a three pointer.

But Sanada had jumped just on time, catching the ball in its path, and passed it to a classmate. "Maybe he's just in a bad mood." He suggested.

"I think it has something to do with today being Valentine's Day." Niou said, but failed to find any more clues.

"Can we concentrate on the game, Niou-kun?" The teacher shouted and Niou rushed off, cursing.

By the time school had finished and afternoon tennis practice began, still no one could figure out Yukimura's problem. Their buchou's patience seemed to be drained from smiling and thanking everyone who gave him chocolates, which could be counted to approximately five hundred, including freshmen and sophomores. The murderous aura became stronger than ever and when Kirihara missed a supposably easy forehand, Yukimura snapped.

He began screaming laps at everyone he saw and in the end, Sanada had to force Yukimura to calm down by dragging him to the change rooms. The team watched in fear as the door of the change rooms slammed close. They prayed that Yukimura's craziness would subside so their legs wouldn't fail from running too many laps.

"I'm going to spy on them." Niou said, already sneaking towards the change rooms.

"Why?" Marui pulled him back. "You might get killed."

"Yea, but I have to save Sanada in case buchou suddenly decides to whack him with the racquet. Who'll be there to stop Yukimura if I don't go?" Niou rolled his eyes and sprinted off.

"I'll come save Sanada with you!" Marui ran after Niou, followed by the rest of the team.

They stood outside the change rooms quietly and listened. This conversation between their leaders could potential save them from the destruction of the nerves in their legs, which were due to be annihilated if they continued to run the laps Yukimura issued every five minutes.

"Yukimura, are you all right?" The regulars could hear Sanada's voice.

"I AM FINE." Yukimura replied, his tone of voice making it clear that he was not.

"Are you sick?" Sanada asked. Yukimura seemed feverish and his mentality at the moment lacked sense.

"No."

"Then what's the problem?" Sanada said and the regulars could hear a small sigh following the question.

"Nothing."

There was no more noise, and being an impatient person, Niou crept over to the window. "They're just sitting there." He reported to the team, the window too small for six pairs of eyes.

Ten minutes passed and still absolutely nothing happened. Niou was bored and let Marui be in front of the window. "This is dull..." He began to say, but before he could finish his sentence, Marui hushed him urgently.

"Fukubuchou finally opened his mouth." Marui said, glaring intently at Sanada and Yukimura through the tiny pane of glass. "He said..." Niou pushed Marui aside and stared inside. Everyone was silent, focusing on any noise that was coming from the other side of the wall.

"Yukimura, um..." Sanada said in a quiet voice and Niou - being the only one who could see inside - wondered why their fukubuchou was blushing. "Thanks for the chocolates, they were really nice."

Yukimura was still, and so were the regulars outside who were stunned by the words. They could not believe Niou's assumption of Yukimura giving chocolates was correct. At the same time however, they were shocked because the receiver was not a girl, but none other than their fukubuchou.

"You didn't throw it away?" Yukimura finally spoke.

"I kept it in my bag." Sanada explained.

"How did you know...?" Yukimura stammered.

Niou rolled his eyes. "This is so pathetic," he whispered to Marui, "buchou gave fukubuchou chocolates, putting it among the pile, then gets depressed because he thought Sanada threw the pile away. And when Sanada says that he picked Yukimura's one up and didn't throw it away, Yukimura asks him how he knew the chocolate was his."

"It's as if he expected Sanada to eat everything," Marui sighed, then grinned, "but I wouldn't mind seeing Sanada with a tummy."

"Sanada said he just knew..." Niou continued to eavesdrop, "that's so pathetic."

Sanada and Yukimura, sat alone - or so they thought - in quietness. They looked at each other and blushed, knowing what the other boy was thinking perfectly. "So, where's mine?" Yukimura attempted to break the awkward moment.

"You can get yours on White Day." A smile appeared on Sanada's lips, much to the horror of the spying Niou.

"Are you calling me a girl?" Yukimura asked jokingly.

"Yes." Sanada said and Niou agreed with him silently.

Yukimura slapped Sanada's shoulder lightly and laughed, "Make sure you give me nice ones. I like Belgium."

Sanada smirked and pulled Yukimura in by the collars, planting a kiss on his buchou's soft lips. Yukimura pushed Sanada away, as astounded as Niou was, and stared at his fukubuchou.

"You tasted like chocolate." Yukimura commented lightly, embarrassed, avoiding Sanada's eyes.

"I just ate chocolate." Sanada pointed out, his cheeks flushing red.

Niou walked away from the window when their lips connected for the second time. He told himself firmly that it was rude to intrude on the privacy of others, trying to forget the scene that was uncurtained before him.

"Niou! What happened?" Marui asked loudly, "I can't hear anything anymore."

"They..." Niou said and unable to say the word 'kiss', he pouched his lips, slamming his face into the air and made a smooching noise.

"Is that... kissed?" Marui took a guess at the charade.

Niou nodded solemnly. Marui screamed and the rest of the team responded in similar ways. "At least that means no more laps, right?" Niou said meekly, still trying to erase the image of his fukubuchou's tongue.

Someone tapped Niou on the shoulder and asked, "ne, why is everyone screaming?"

Niou rolled his eyes, annoyed at the question being asked again, and quickly gave an overview of his fukubuchou's display of affection by a series of imitations. It was only after he finished his explanation when he realised who it was that asked the question. "Ah... Yukimura-buchou." Niou said and everyone around him stopped their chaotic commotion.

"Don't worry, Niou. I'm in a good mood now." Yukimura smiled sweetly, but Niou doubted the sincerity of that smile.

"So, what should you do?" Yukimura addressed the whole team.

"Um..." Marui said.

"Wrong answer." The smile on Yukimura's face grew wider.

"Playing against you and fukubuchou?" Niou took his pick. It was the worst sentence possible, and anyone - only two so far - who received that punishment, ended up in hospital for a week.

"Wrong answer. I'm feeling kind right now." Yukimura said, and everyone could feel the air of a sadist surrounding him. "It's something less painful."

"Run laps?" Kirihara took a guess, secretly hoping that his was wrong.

"Right answer." Yukimura nodded approvingly. "Laps until you die."

Maybe some of you have realised why the title is called "Misery for 6hrs, 23 mins and 17secs"...
but for those who haven't...
A school day is about 6 hours and so it's basically saying 6hrs, 23 mins and 17secs is how long Yukimura was depressed for
I know it's kinda exact... but that's just me having fun.

Please review!