His Warrior Queen: A Haikyuu!! Novel (Tsukishima x OC)

Chapter 34: Dare

While summer break would last another two weeks, Monday still brought practice for the Karasuno boys' volleyball team.  With a little more than two months to prepare themselves to take on the top teams in their prefecture, everyone knew they needed to continue to work as hard as they could.

Nakano ran blocking drills on Mondays, and after hearing Kei's disparaging words about his ability to block opponents of greater height and power than himself, she decided it was time to raise the bar, literally, on her team's blocks.  She'd spent much of Sunday afternoon and evening on her own court, working her jumps.  She knew should could bring the power in her hit, but she wanted to get as high in the air as she possibly could.  I may not be able to reach the height of Hyakuzawa, she thought as she readied herself for the final part of the blocking drills, but I want to get as high up there as I can.  

"Kageyama," she called out to her best friend, "you're gonna set for me.  The rest of you will come up to block first singly, then in rotating twos, and finally rotating threes.  Noya, dig up anything you possibly can.  Got it?"  The boys called out that they did.  Nakano beckoned to Kags, drawing him to the far back of the court to whisper to him.  "I know we've not practiced it before, but can you give me some good, high, first tempo tosses?  I've been working to get higher above the net than before, and I really want to make these guys work for it."  

Kageyama gave her his wicked grin.  "I'd wondered why you hadn't done any hitting yet for us today.  I'll get a read on you as quick as I can.  Tell me if you need me to adjust."

"Don't let me slack," she said, pointing at him, "No going easy."

"Why?  What's up?"

"Just trust me on this.  We need to be ready.  The next really tall guys we face won't be volleyball newbies."  The best friends slapped hands and took up position.  Kageyama's eyes widened as he saw how far back Nakano stayed to make her approach as Daichi moved up to the net to block.  Nakano began her run.  Kageyama's eyes widened as he saw his best friend fly into the air.  He quickly adjusted his timing to be able to meet her.

She slammed the ball down from above Daichi's block, blowing right past him.

"What the heck?" her captain murmured, staring at her.  

"That's what you're reaching for, boys.  Let's see who can stop it.  Sugawara, you're up!"  Nakano called as she ran towards her starting position again.

By the time it was Tsukishima's turn, he was on the edge of being irritated.  Well, more like over the edge.  Dammit, Nakano, you're doing this because of what I said after the prelims, aren't you?  He'd watched her extremely carefully each time she came up for a shot, noting where her impact point seemed to be.  Two can play at this game, Naka-chan, he thought, you're not getting past me.

Sure enough, he was the first person to get a hand on one of her shots, getting himself a one-touch that Noya was able to chase down.  

Landing in front of him, he smirked intensely at the girl.

"Good job," she said, no sign of irritation in her voice, "how did you get your hand on it?"

"I've been watching you.  You're hitting at the same height, in the same place, in the same direction, every time.  You didn't exactly make it difficult." he said.

"Okay, then," she said with a smirk, "let's start changing it up."

Following Tsukki's successful one touch, Nakano began altering the speed, height and power of her hits.  She managed to get past everyone, until Tsukishima came up again.  Doing his two-man block with Hinata, Tsukki was once again able to get a one-touch.  "Got you again, Naka-chan," Tsukishima gloated.