Burning Ice (A Haikyuu AU)

38. Air Vent

3rd Person Pov

"Afternoon." Sawamura greeted them pleasantly, like the Flames weren't hiding in the shadow of the building with guns strapped to their waists and black gloves on their hands. It wasn't a bad look on them, Kenma thought. He may be demisexual, but he wasn't blind.

"Good afternoon." Koshi greeted back equally pleasantly, like the Ice weren't clad head to toe in black, dagger hilts glinting in hidden pockets and fake sleeves, and in Koshi's case, flipping and catching it in his hand. Show-off.

"No change to the plan?" Sawamura asked. Next to him, Osamu started unbuttoning his shirt. Simultaneously, the Ice turned to Suna, who unfortunately had enough training from Vio to look completely unbothered.

"No change at all." Koshi confirmed. His eyebrows raised as Osamu took his shirt off. "Nice abs."

"Thanks?"

Sawamura shook his head. "Osamu, get your gear on. Let's go." 

Bokuto lead the group, gun ready. Shirabu and Sakusa were next. Kenma, Suga, and Sawamura were behind them, with Osamu and Suna taking the rear. It was, overall, a very efficient team. The few guards they encountered with avoided without much trouble, and the whole process was very smooth. 

Until they came to the locked door. It brought Kenma a disconcerting sense of deja vu, as he picked that lock easily. However, a scuffle with the policemen showed them that the security was a lot tougher than they expected. A quick look inside the door showed high-tech cameras covering each other's blind spots.

"Did you plan for this?" Sawamura asked, looking to Koshi, who shook his head. A single prisoner shouldn't warrant this much security, but clearly Carter had pulled some strings.

Koshi cast his eyes up to an air vent in the ceiling. He motioned to it. "Change of plans?"

Sawamura looked at it. "That's very small."

"That's what she said." Suna said under his breath. Osamu huffed a laugh. 

"I'll attempt it." Sugawara said. "Kiyoomi, a hand?"

Sakusa hoisted him up, and Koshi screwdrived the vent open. He put his arms through and attempted to lift himself up through. "Shit. Nope."

"I can do it." Shirabu volunteered. Koshi opened his mouth to protest (most likely along the lines of 'it's not okay to risk your life like that!'), but there was no need; another failed attempt proved that he was too tall.

Kenma sighed. "Try me." 

"Absolutely not." Koshi said. 

"I'm the shortest, and the thinnest." Kenma shrugged. "Besides, I'm the best at picking locks."

Koshi still looked unsure, so Kenma just went for it. His shoulders took a bit of a struggle, but he managed to pull himself up and through. Damn, the vent tunnels were extremely small. Who knew being scrawny had its advantages? 

Even with his tiny frame, it was still very tough to move at all. Kenma twisted with some difficulty to poke his head through the hole. "I'm fine. I do need to know which direction to go in though."

A very worried-looking Koshi gave him instructions. He nodded. They weren't complex instructions, and he was confident he could pull them through.

"When you get Kuroo, call us through comms." Sawamura said to him. Taking orders from him was surprisingly easy and familiar. It didn't hurt that Koshi was nodding beside him, ready to jump in if anything seemed unfair. "We'll get you, most likely through a window."

Kenma nodded to let them know he understood. Then he pulled his head back and started crawling down the dark tunnel. Holy shit, was it narrow in here. Dust everywhere. And the thin metal creaked with his every move. 

The few spy movies Aya and Vio had forced him to watch did nothing to prepare him for the reality of one. He carefully avoided jagged pieces of metal, sticking out everywhere, and told himself to never volunteer for air vent duty ever again.

It took what seemed like forever, but eventually he found the opening Koshi told him about. Blinking dust out of his eyelashes and pausing every few seconds to minimise the creaking, he pulled out his screwdriver and started to unscrew the vent cover. 

By the end of it, his shoulders were cramping, his fingers were losing feeling, and he was swearing in his head so colourfully he could almost hear Sakusa deadpanning 'taste the rainbow'.

Despite the exhaustion, he lifted the cover carefully and silently. Looking down, he almost wish he hadn't. There were a good ten or so guards, with a single figure sitting in a chair in the middle of them. Messy black hair was all Kenma could see from this angle at the back of the room, but he assumed that it was Kuroo Tetsuro.

At least the air vent wasn't too high off the ground. Thank the universe for small mercies. Having seen all that he could, he retreated back into the darkness of the vent tunnel and tried to channel his inner Koshi. Come on, Kenma, what's the plan?

He had none. 

Just as he was about to replace the vent cover and crawl all the way back, there was a commotion beneath him. It wasn't chaotic --- no, Carter's guards were too well-trained for that --- but there was a taste of panic in the air. 

Kenma listened carefully. 

"You, stay behind and guard the prisoner with me." He heard a voice say. "The rest of you, deal with the threat."

"Yes, sir."

There were footsteps, fading into the distance, and then there was no sound at all. Kenma risked a glance down and made direct eye contact with one of the guards. 

Shit.

He retreated back immediately, brain kicking adrenaline into fight or flight mode. Slipping the dagger out from his sleeve, he waited for the tell-tale footsteps.

But there were none. Instead, he heard a quick, hard, thump.

"You can come out now." An amused voice said. It was the same one that gave the orders.

Kenma slowly slipped his head out again, dagger at the ready. The sight that greeted his eyes was completely unexpected, yet seemed to make perfect sense. A boy of around their age, wearing the guard uniform, was undoing the ropes tying Kuroo to his metal chair, and another guard was lying on the floor, out cold.

He jumped out from the vent, landing softly like Koshi always taught them to do. "Who are you?" 

"Same could be asked of you." The boy replied easily. Kenma noticed then that he wasn't really wearing the guard uniform after all. It was similar, all black, but it had none of the bulk. Like something spies would wear, his brain helpfully supplied him. Spies in a video game.

And there were no shiny badges pinned on his shirt. In fact, it was so plain he may as well just be another kid from the neighbourhood. 

Kenma shook dust from his hair, running his hands through it to get some of the grime out. "Kenma Kozume."

The boy tilted his head.

"Loki."