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Fandom: Haikyuu (My contribution to the @ngczine) Type: Short-Story (5.1k words) / Canon-Compliant Focus: Next Generation Seijoh Ships: no explicit mentions (but feel free to imagine the classics) Rating: General/Teen Up (for occasional swearing)
Summary: Watari is starting to think something went wrong when all the new first years are coming to him instead of Yahaba - but maybe, considering that his best friend is busy taming a certain Mad Dog, the underclassmen's fear is justified.
Or: A story about how Yahaba, and with him all of Seijoh, struggles to fill out some big footprints
Preview:
“Watari-Senpai!?”
He looks up at the five first-years, presenting him with an assortment of items. The suction cup for uncovering the holes in the gym floor that harbour the net poles. The hand-full of pins used to secure the net. A whistle. An empty drink caddy. And a clipboard with nothing clipped to it.
“Yeah?”
“Where should we put this?”
Watari opens his mouth, then he stops, furrowing his brows, and looks around the gym.
Sure, he is a third-year now and technically a senpai, but still—there are other people better suited to ask such things. The captain for example. Or the vice-captain.
In retrospect, Watari should have been able to deduce the cause of their absence by simply listening.
After all, Yahaba is yelling at near peak volume, which is not nothing, but to Watari, yelling in the Aoba Johsai volleyball gym has become just another form of white noise after spending two years under the care of Iwaizumi Hajime.
His best friend has Kyotani in a headlock, shaking him viciously. The Mad Dog looks relatively unimpressed, face turned away, arms crossed over his chest, lips pursed in a silent ‘tsk’, giving short, snappy comments in response to the dressing down, which do nothing other than sprinkle oil into the fire.
Watari sighs—oh not again!
If he were a first-year, he’d not go anywhere near that either.