"Damn! I, Agassi, miss again! Mad!"

"You know, my English might be a bit rusty," Fuji commented, "but I expected Agassi to be more articulate than that."

"I seem to recall Ryoma reducing you to a similar state more than once," Tezuka replied, shifting in the hard green chair and trying not to nail the person sitting in front of him with his knees.

"Hmm." Fuji pursed his lips for a second, then the smile crept back. "And Ryoma does look good, doesn't he? He's been working on his arm strength again, I can see the muscles from here. Just makes me want to hold him down and…saa, Tezuka, want to sneak down under the stands?"

"No."

"Oh, come on," Fuji urged, leaning against Tezuka's shoulder and running a hand lightly up his thigh. "It'll be just like high school! One ex-boyfriend sweating for you out on the court, another ex-boyfriend sweating for you down on his knees…"

"Control yourself, tensai." Tezuka plucked Fuji's hand off his leg and set it firmly back in Fuji's lap, but his voice lacked its usual command. He'd been distracted by the way that Ryoma had looked up just then and twirled his racket in his grip to point the end right at Tezuka, despite the fact that there had to be twenty thousand people in this stadium, and they hadn't told him they were coming.

Watch, his smirk said, watch this, buchou.

"He's got it," Tezuka whispered when the third return of Agassi's came over the net and Ryoma's left foot still hadn't moved, then when the fourth came over, repeated louder, "He's got it!"

"You've only used the Zone against him several thousand times," Fuji replied, but there was wonder in his voice too, and affection.

Tezuka would have grinned at the sight of those blue eyes wide open, but it would have meant tearing his gaze away from Ryoma, from the nudge of Ryoma's fingers against the brim of the cap. You're watching, right?

And maybe there was a little jealousy in Fuji's voice too when he added, "I guess it is true that if you ingest part of your opponent, you gain some of his strength."

"Which explains why the entire junior tennis circuit could do the Tsubame Gaeshi," Tezuka retorted, and Fuji's delighted laugh rang high and sharp through the stadium, like automatic rifle fire.

Ryoma's smirk got bigger and he flicked his glance up to Tezuka again, just as Fuji started tugging on his arm. Go on, said the arc of his right shoulder as he served, the tilt of his chin in Fuji's direction, I got this all wrapped up.

"Brats," Tezuka sighed, letting Fuji pull him to his feet and hook an elbow through his, his shoulder twinging with the same sort of warning that it had when he woke to find cat-slits of blue and amber blinking at him from the other side of his bed this morning.

"Mad!" Agassi yelled.