Chapter Fourteen
Batter Up
“Why are we here…?” Kiyohiko asked grumpily. He was lying spread-eagle in the soft grass, soaking in the midday sun with his eyes closed. It was warm and comfortable, yet his frown suggested otherwise.
“Are you being all extremely philosophical on me again, Little Cousin?” Masaru asked. He too was lying in the grass, only a few feet away. A light summer breeze washed over them. “You know I don’t get any of it. You should just be glad I’m extremely tired from Dad’s extreme morning boxing lessons, or you wouldn’t even have anyone to talk to out here.”
“No… I’m just asking why we’re here-here,” the younger cousin clarified. “Why are we even at the park?”
There was the distant sound of hollow metal connecting with cork-and-leather. Some shouting could be heard, but none of it was distinct enough to elicit movement from the cousins.
“Five, four, three, two, one…” Masaru counted. Immediately after one, a baseball plopped into the grass beside his head, rolling gently until it tapped against his temple. It was not too long before the sun was blocked from his face as Hans towered over his relaxed form.
“I don’t get why you’re not helping out,” the child huffed. “I can understand why Eleventh isn’t helping, since he doesn’t need to, but you’re good at sports, you idiot. Why are you just laying there instead of giving the rest of us a hand? That idiot girl likes to hit the long balls out here once I reach the infield and it would be nice to not have to run all the way out here when she does.”
“In order to keep up my extreme lifestyle, I need to allow some extreme downtime every so often. Hana-san says that it helps prevent extreme burnout.”
“Whatever…” Hans growled. He threw the baseball back towards Damiano, who was on second base, who threw the ball back to Saki on the pitchers’ mound.
“Come on Saki-chan! Bring on the heat!” Haruhi grinned from the batter’s box.
“I practice martial arts, not baseball,” Saki laughed. “Be lucky I’m doing this; we shouldn’t even be here on the middle school’s grounds.” She hurled the ball towards the plate, allowing Haruhi’s bat to connect and send the ball over to Masaru again… this time, landing on his stomach.
“Why do you say that, Saki-chan?” Haruhi asked. She chuckled as she watched Masaru roll around in the outfield and Kiyohiko panic over his cousin.
“I hear that the new head prefect is kinda scary and disciplines anyone who steps onto school property, including teachers, parents and students from other schools!”
“Oh, I wouldn’t be too worried,” Haruhi shrugged. “It’s just a middle school kid.”
“You of all people shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, Signorina Haruhi,” Damiano said. “Remember when that middle school kid attacked us when we were trespassing at night? He was frightening!”
“Oh, but that’s just Osamu-kun,” Haruhi said, waving her hand nonchalantly. “He’s been confrontational since we first met him.”
“So you do know the middle school’s new prefect,” Saki said in wonder. “The kid’s a monster, from what I’ve heard. He’s only a first-year!”
“Yup, that’s Osamu-kun!” Haruhi said. She had now walked over to the mound to join Damiano and Saki so she did not have to shout. “He always seemed to think that peoples’ limbs were for biting as a kid.”
“I don’t think that’s just a bad childhood habit…” Damiano said. Haruhi shrugged.
“Hey Yama-chan?”
“Yeah, Saki-chan?”
“Did you invite anyone else to the field?”
“No… why?”
“‘Cause there’s someone over there trying to wave us down…” Saki pointed over Haruhi’s shoulder towards the backstop. A young man about their age was standing there, jumping about and waving his arms frantically. From what the teens could see, the stranger was foreign as he was extremely tall with European features.
“Well, then let’s go see what he wants!” Haruhi grinned. She trotted over to the guy, Saki and Damiano right behind her.
“Hi there!” Haruhi said. “Did you want something?”
“Yeah…” the guy said, finally calming down. His accent was slightly choppy, but understandable and surprisingly familiar. “I wanted to know if I could play ball with you!”
“I don’t see why not!” Haruhi shrugged. “Hey, you speak Japanese pretty good for a foreigner; almost sound like you went to school around here. Where are you from?”
“Toronto, Canada, but my step-mom’s from Namimori so she’s taught me a lot of Japanese since I was little. We’re visiting her parents and sister right now. The name’s Jack, by the way—Jack Justice. Kind of a funny name, I know.”
“Not at all Jack-kun! I’m Saki!”
“I’m Haruhi!”
“I’m Damiano.”
“You’re half, aren’t you, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“Better than just getting stared at; got my dad’s height but my mom’s looks, so I kind of stand out.”
“Are those guys playing with you too?” Jack asked, pointing out towards the outfield. The others looked to see Kiyohiko restraining Masaru from attacking Hans.
“Oh, yeah. That’s just Masaru-kun, Yohi-kun and Hans-kun. Masaru-kun and Hans-kun don’t get along very well.”
“Obviously,” Jack laughed. “So is it just batting practice right now?”
“Well, we don’t have enough to have a team, so that’s all it is,” Saki sighed. “It’s bad enough Yama-chan hits all my pitches.”
“I can pitch!” Jack said cheerily. “I’ve pitched in my Little League teams since I was a kid! I want to get just as good as Halladay and Romero and pitch for the Blue Jays one day!”
“Then you’re up,” Saki smiled slyly, shoving her glove and the ball in Jack’s chest. “Just warning you: Yama-chan’s the best in the school. She even beats the senior boys.”
“Oh, I think I can handle it,” Jack chuckled. He took a step before hearing the click of a handgun. Looking down, the foreigner saw Reborn standing there, Gun-Leon pointed at him with deadly accuracy.
“Oh… uh… hi…”
“Hey there Reborn-kun!” Haruhi smiled. “We just made a new friend. He’s from Canada.”
“So he thinks he can keep up then…” Reborn mused. “I would like to see him try.”
“Reborn! No!” Kiyohiko screamed. He ran over and grabbed the infant hitman be the scruff of his neck. “Don’t point that at other people! I’m sorry, Gaijin-san! He thinks he’s playing a game…!”
“Hey, kids are kids,” Jack shrugged, noting that Reborn’s gun was still trained on him. “If your folks accidentally left out some gangster flicks one night, nothing you can do.”
“It will do you good to put me down, Yohi,” Reborn smirked. Realizing what he was doing, Kiyohiko dropped his tutor in an instant. “Now then… it is time to get into your respective teams.”
“What teams? This was batting practice for the idiot,” Hans said as he and Masaru came over to see what all the commotion was about. “Oh, a new guy! You better not be after my place as Eleventh’s right hand!”
“I’m not…?”
“Good.”
“We don’t even have enough for one team, let alone two,” Kiyohiko noticed.
“That’s where you’re wrong!” said Rosario, popping up behind Kiyohiko’s shoulder. The teen jumped at the sound of the Varia member, who had somehow assembled nine of her subordinates, Annje and herself on the infield dirt without anyone else noticing.
“Oh, so you’ve got an extra team,” Jack said cheerfully. “That solves it!”
“You would think…” Kiyohiko grumbled.
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“This sure is fun!” Jack laughed. He wound up and pitched a fast one at a baffled Annje. The poor girl was standing there with a bewildered look on her face, as if she had never even seen someone pitch before that. Kiyohiko caught the ball behind the plate, covered in special Mafia catchers’ padding that he never knew existed before one of Rosario’s men forced it on him. It looked like regular catchers’ equipment with the exception of the large Vongola crest emblazoned upon the chest protector and helmet, the latter topped off with Reborn in full umpire regalia.
The teams ended up being boys versus girls for the most part. Damiano was out on second base, Masaru was sleeping in the outfield, Hans was playing shortstop, Jack insisted on pitching and Rosario’s followers filled in the rest of the gaps. Haruhi, Saki and Rosario were in the dugout with their suit-clad teammates, having thought it would be funny to send Annje out first.
“That was too fast! Annje couldn’t even see the ball!” the little girl whined.
“You gotta keep your eyes on the ball, not on Jack-san,” Kiyohiko explained. “You were just staring at him, not at the ball.”
“Leave teaching the baby the game to her teammates, Eleventh!” Hans called. “She’ll get it eventually!”
“Annje is not a baby!” Annje shouted. She dropped her bat and ran over to Hans and tackled him into the dust, where the two proceeded to fistfight.
“Should we stop them…?” asked the Varia henchman standing on third base.
“No, just let them go at it. They’ll tucker out eventually,” Rosario said as she walked up to the plate. “I just want a shot at this North American style of baseball before Haruhi-chan hits the ball out of the district.”
“You know I will!” Haruhi laughed from the dugout. “We better let Annje-chan finish her at-bat though! It’s rude to skip over someone else’s turn!”
“That it is…” growled a voice from behind Kiyohiko. The young Vongola did not even have to turn around to know that Hibari Osamu was standing there holding his staff in an attacking position. “What are you herbivores doing here? I thought that the high school has its own ball field. There is no reason for you to use this one.”
“Oh, but I believe there is,” Reborn said. “You will let us use this field, Osamu, and you shall allow this out of your own free will.”
“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t just bite your head off and let you bleed to death.”
“This is why,” Reborn smirked. Kiyohiko glanced upwards and saw the barrel of the Ten Year Cannon pointed towards shortstop. Before he could say anything, it was fired and the target was once again Annje and Hans.
“Hey! Kids! Watch out!” Jack shouted as he watched the mass from the Cannon arc upwards into the air. The speed at which the ammunition traveled was almost comically slow. He ran towards the fighting children to move then out of the way, but he was only able to tear Annje off of Hans before he was hit with the bullet, enveloping him and Annje in the smoke that ensued.
“Not good…” Kiyohiko squeaked. Osamu stepped forward and muttered intelligibly to himself, sounding intrigued. Once the smoke cleared, an older Annje was sitting down on the ground, dressed in pajama bottoms and a camisole, with a rather bewildered look on her face. A man dressed in a baseball uniform that could have only been an older form of Jack had come mid-pitch and fell unceremoniously on his face. When he looked up, he seemed to be bewildered at his surroundings.
“Where am I?” he asked. “Wasn’t I just in Boston?”
“Hey, I was just watching a movie in Köln,” Older Annje shrugged. She glanced around and grinned. “So we’re playing baseball?”
“Yes you are,” Osamu said. He took a seat on the wooden bleachers and nodded in what was the scariest look of approval anyone there had ever seen. “Continue.”
“You heard him! Let’s go!” Haruhi shouted. “Annje-chan’s batting and Jack-kun’s pitching!”
“Annje… now that’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time…” Older Jack mused as he went to the pitcher’s mound. “Something tells me that I’m not exactly in the right time.”
“Just pitch and show me what those Americans let into their Major Leagues,” Older Annje laughed. She twitched her nose as Jack wound up and hurled the ball towards her. She hit a ground ball towards the outfield, where a Varia man scooped it up and threw it to second. Older Annje, however, was there before the ball went inside Damiano’s glove, making the teen jump at her sudden appearance.
“I forget how jumpy you used to be, Damiano-sensei,” Older Annje remarked. She giggled and looked over at Hans, who had not moved from his spot on the dirt and was still staring fearfully slack-jawed at Older Annje.
“This game isn’t quite as interesting as it should be,” Reborn said. He fired the Ten Year Cannon again and hit the in-shock Hans, replacing him with his eighteen-year-old self who was only wearing a pair of boxer shorts and appeared to have been holding someone by the scruff of their neck and giving quite the lecture.
“…und du bist—ah, great…” His rant came to a screeching halt as soon as he realized he was standing in the middle of Namimori nearly naked. “Oh, hi there… I guess I’m short?”
“Just keep on playing, Schatz,” Older Annje said. She wriggled her nose and a glove appeared on Older Hans’s hand. “Be glad that this is the only thing that you need to do.”
“I guess…” the young man grumbled. He waited patiently for Rosario to strike out and groaned when he saw that it was Saki up next to bat.
“Couldn’t you just play Haruhi-nee-san and get it over with?!” he snapped.
“Nee-san? That’s a new one,” Saki giggled. “I never knew you were capable of liking Yama-chan!”
“The one in the future… not this idiot,” Hans growled, motioning towards the Haruhi bouncing around in the dugout.
“This is not exactly what I had in mind when Haruhi-san asked if I wanted to play some baseball…” Kiyohiko groaned. He crouched down into catching position and waited for another devilishly-fast pitch from Older Jack. It was a good thing that the Ten Year Cannon only lasted five minutes… else he was sure the force at which the balls were being thrown was going to break his wrist. He looked up at Reborn and frowned. “Can’t you just leave us alone?”
“…and miss such an opportunity? Not on your life,” Reborn said. Older Jack wound up and pitched again. Just as he was releasing the ball, the telltale cloud of smoke enveloped him and Older Annje to take them back to their correct time. As soon as Older Annje had been replaced by the normal child-sized Annje, the glove over Older Hans’s hand dissipated and the baseball bouncing on the infield dirt bounced right up into his nose.
“Aaah! It’s the scary screaming man!” Annje cried, hiding behind Damiano. “Don’t let him start yelling at Annje again! She didn’t do anything wrong!”
“Come on, Annje-chan, you gotta move forward!” Saki shouted as she came to a stop right before second base. “I can’t pass you up or the runs won’t count!”
“Don’t let him near Annje! He yells mean things!” Hans was still cussing up a storm in what sounded like three different languages, blood streaming down his front as he hopped around in pain. It looked as if his nose had been out-right broken by the wayward baseball that was now sitting at his feet.
“Woah, I must have been hit on the head pretty hard…” Jack marveled from the mound. He was looking fairly wide-eyed, as if he had just come off of a major shock, while he stood there blissfully. “I was in a bullpen in Boston getting ready to warm up as a relief pitcher! That was really cool… but I know it was just a dream…”
With a puff of smoke, Child Hans came back to the timeline cowering in a comical look of fear. He blinked and looked around, making sure he was certain of his surroundings once more. The child saw the baseball at his feet and paused before remembering what he had been doing.
“Run Annje-chan!” Saki shouted, pushing the foreign child in front of her. Annje ran as fast as she could towards third, but Hans was able to grab the ball and tag her out before she could reach the base. Saki smartly stayed on second though, preventing the final out.
“Aw, man!” Annje groaned. She stomped off towards the dugout, Haruhi ruffling her hair on her way to the batter’s box.
“I’m the last out, Yohi-kun,” Haruhi smirked. “You get this and the inning’s over.”
“I know you’re gonna hit it out of the park though,” Kiyohiko replied. “You almost always do when we’re making a full game out of it.”
“Have a little faith in yourself, Yohi-kun. You’ll never become a man otherwise.”
“Haruhi-san…?” Kiyohiko stood there slack-jawed at his friend, who simply grinned and whacked the baseball as far as she could before laughing towards first.
“You heard Haruhi,” Reborn said, pointing Gun-Leon at Kiyohiko’s forehead. “If you don’t get this out, you’ll never become a man.” Reborn pulled the trigger, causing the teen to fall backwards and immediately jump up while ripping out of his clothes.
“MAKE THE OUT WITH MY DYING WILL!” he shouted. With blazing speed, he dashed off towards where the baseball was headed, causing everyone else to stand there flabbergasted.
“Uh… that’s different…” Jack said, unsure about what to say. “Is that something baseball players do in Japan that they’re experimenting with or something?”
“No… it’s just our Yohi-kun,” Haruhi smiled. In the outfield, Masaru sat up straight and rubbed the sleep from his eyes.
“What’d I miss?”
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Note: Thanks to dgrayman rocks, this story's first reviewer here on theOtaku. I appreciate the support!
