Kuroko and His Siblings: Athletic Royals [1rst version]

Chapter 13- Here to Stay

Tetsuya twitched as he looked at his watch. He had skipped the latter part of practice because he promised one of his siblings to meet him in Maji Burger. A young, tall girl who looked almost just like him approached his table and placed a milkshake in front of him.

"Plain vanilla flavor. No added surprises." She said as she slid into the seat in front of Tetsuya. "It's too bad that you don't enjoy strawberries as much as I do. It would have saved me time from explaining that I wanted to order two different shakes." She took a bite.

"You could have just ordered the same shake and take my strawberries just like you use to." Tetsuya replied.  "I thought that you hate wearing female clothes in public, Tetsuko-nee-san?"

"I do, but Grandmother made Grandfather burn my entire wardrobe while she went on a shopping spree. I was lucky that I've sent out my cardigan collection to the cleaner's on Friday before they could get to it."

"What!?" Tetsuya nearly spat out his milkshake.

"Grandmother found the special editions that I had hidden in her mansion attic," sighed Tetsuko. She passed a handkerchief to her coughing brother. "She hounded Grandfather into paying, and now they've replaced all my clothes. I basically have nothing else to wear. Onto other matters-any questions you want to ask me, Kage, Duke of Darkness?"

Tetsuya set down his milkshake and sat up straight. While blank expression settled on his face, the seriousness in his eyes spoke another story.

"Why are the Athletic Royals coming back, Yuki, Prince of the Court?"

While twirling a strand of her short blue hair, Tetsuko gave her brother a good long stare. After a long silent moment, she sighed harshly and stood up.

"Please accompany me on walk," she motioned him to follow her.

Tetsuya quietly trailed after his sister. After a long while, they reached a faraway park. The pair of siblings hike the stairs to the cliff overlooking their city. There they sat upon a bench and gazed upon Tokyo in the silence of the trees.

"Tell me, what do you see, Ototo-ya?" Tetsuko required.

"Tall buildings." said Tetsuya.

Tetsuko gave Tetsuya a hard look. "What else?"

Sighing heavily, Tetsuya continued to answer, albeit in a blunt voice."Cars; buses; trains; people walking; houses and stores. Any thing else?"

His sister slightly pursed her lips. Her silver-speckled blue eyes glimmered with half-amusement.

"Close enough." she murmured. Tetsuko stood up and briskly walked to the railings.

"What you mentioned are just small pieces of a big picture," she spun around excitedly to face her brother. "Yet we are missing so much more. The way the sun rises and sets on our city; how many individuals make up one small part of our country; the animals that we live with; the farmers that grow our food; etc."

"But what does that have to do with the Athletic Royals?" Tetsuya questioned.

"Simple." Tetsuko replied in a quiet yet serious voice. "I want to leave a legacy for the future generations to come."

"You could find a different way to do that. You didn't need to bring the Athletic Royals back."

"No, Tetsuya," said Tetsuko as her left hand held the rail firmly. "In order to push Japan, if not the world, to a higher level, all of the Athletic Royals have to come back for this to work.

"The Generation of Miracles always occur around almost every decade, but what about our type of genius? Those with our rare kind of talents hardly comes every century or two if we're lucky. We happened to have six. I'm not planning to waste it-not like our ancestors did in the past, selfishly keeping their talents to theirselves. We are the starting point of a new generation. And whether you like it or not, we are going to show the world that we are here to stay."