Part 2: Chapter 16
"Where are we going, Coach?" Hinata turned to look at Keishin with a curious look on his face.
"You'll see when we get there," Keishin replied, not taking his eyes off the road as he drove the car, taking the orange-haired male and his younger sister somewhere.
Meanwhile, you were in the back seat and was literally trembling in excitement. You heard from your brother that a close relative of yours is finally coming back after being admitted to the hospital and you couldn't wait to see him again.
You can't wait to meet your grandfather, Ukai Ikkei, the infamous 'Karasuno's Ukai'.
Hinata turned around to face the back seat, his head tilted to the side in confusion at the sight of you trembling in your seat. Oddly, you reminded Hinata of an excited puppy when the smile on your face threatened to split your face in half. The middle blocker turned his attention back to the front, asking Keishin. "Is (nickname)-chan? She's shaking in her seat."
Keishin's eyes lifted up to the front mirror, your reflection staring back at him. He smiled softly when you give him a cheery wave when you noticed that he was looking at you through the front mirror.
"Yeap, (nickname)-chan's fine. She's just excited. After all, an annoying relative is coming home." Keishin replied mysteriously, a smirk on his face as he focused back on the road.
Hinata tilted his head in confusion, not understanding what his volleyball coach. But then again, the ball of sunshine isn't the smartest cookie in the jar.
***
"JI-CHAN!!!"
Ukai turned around with arms wide opened, a huge smile broke out on his face at the sight of his precious little crow. Without hesitation, you abandoned Keishin and Hinata as you ran towards your grandfather and into his arms. You wrapped your arms around your grandfather as you buried your face into his chest, your voice muffled as you spoke. "I miss you so much, Ji-chan."
You glanced up at Ukai when you felt his hand ruffling your (h/c) hair as he replied you, a fond smile on his face. "I miss you too, Little Crow. How have you been?"
Before you could reply, your brother's voice cut in saying, "Are you sure you're supposed to be moving around like that after getting out of the hospital?"
Ukai shifted his attention from you to his other grandchild, retorting. "What? If they let you out of the hospital, it means they give you permission to move around all you want. Ain't that right, (name)?"
You nodded your head in agreement before turning to Hinata with an excited grin on your face, pointing to your grandfather. "Hinata, this man here is Kei-nii's and I's grandpa."
Upon hearing that, Hinata has a shocked look on his face as he realised who the old man standing before him really is. "H-huh?! C..coach Ukai?!"
"Yeap, this old man here is the infamous Karasuno's Ukai."
Hinata gulped as he shrinks back from Ukai's unnerving look sending his way.
"So, what are you doing here?" Ukai turned to face Keishin, waiting for an explanation.
Keishin glanced down at you who simply gave him a shrug, indicating that you wouldn't be the one to explain to your grandfather why the three of you were doing here. Karasuno's coach gave a sigh as he explained to his grandfather about the situation between Hinata and Kageyama.
As your brother was talking to your grandfather, you were deep in thought as you remembered the fight that broke out between Karasuno's power duo. Immediately after coming back from Tokyo, Hinata demanded Kageyama to toss for him, but this time round with his eyes opened instead of closed like they usually do. However, no matter how hard Hinata tried, he simply couldn't sync with Kageyama's toss with his eyes open.
It got to the point where Kageyama was done with Hinata that they began to argue which led to a fight between the duo. Yachi and you tried to break the fight up once you two realised that it was getting out of hand, only to fail until Tanaka stepped in and punched them both in the faces.
Which leads to you, Hinata and Keishin turning to your grandfather for help since your brother was quite the useless one.
"So, you couldn't figure out what to do with this weird attack and helplessly ran away, eh, Coach?" Your grandfather asked, mocking your brother with the tone of his voice.
You stood there laughing as Keishin turned to the side, letting out an annoyed "tch". Before you knew it, you watched as your grandfather tossed your idiot of a brother into the air, his slippers flying off. "That's your team, you weakling!"
You fell onto the ground as you laughed even harder at your brother's demise, delighted that he was being punished because of his useless brain. Meanwhile, Hinata cried out, worried for his coach. "Coach?!"
You tried to calm the middle blocker down who was practically trembling in his shoes as he remembered his bald senior's words about your grandfather. "There there, Hinata. Ji-san is usually not that scary if your name doesn't start with a 'Ukai' and end with a 'Keishin'. So, calm down."
However, Hinata ignored your words as he spoke to Ukai, stuttering in fear. "P-please help me!"
"With what? I don't go around smacking random people, just weaklings." Ukai replied sternly, his arms crossed.
"You shitty old man..." Keishin cursed his grandfather as he pushed himself up.
"This is why I'm Ji-san's favourite grandchild." You muttered under your breath as you shook your head in disappointment at your idiotic brother.
Keishin glared at you as you stuck your tongue out at him while pulling an eye like the Trash King of Aoba Johsai does. (You know the pose that Trashykawa always does towards Kageyama.)
Meanwhile, Hinata spoke up again. "I-I came here to learn to fight on my own!"
Ukai smirked as he teased Hinata, saying. "You want to master mid-air battles when you're only that tall?"
"It's because I'm only this tall!" Hinata replied, determination shining in his brown eyes.
You and Keishin glanced at one another with grins on both your faces at the look of surprise on grandfather's face, Hinata reminding him of one of his ex-volleyball student, the Little Giant.
Trust Hinata to never give up no matter what obstacles were thrown at his face.
"I might sound like I'm saying something weird, but..." Hinata trailed off, his head downcast.
"What's weird about it?"
Hinata lifts his head in surprise as Ukai continued, "No matter what kind of genius setter you're dealing with, in what we call a quick attack, the one that's the absolute leader is you."
Ukai points a finger towards Hinata, driving his point home as you grinned, understanding what your grandfather meant. Meanwhile, your dumbass of a brother simply tilted his head in confusion, not understanding anything at all.
You laughed once more as your brother was once again being tossed by Ukai who shouted, "Stop spacing out! You're the coach, damn it!"
"Shut up, (nickname)-chan!" Your brother screamed at you as he began chasing after you who simply just dodged every time he's about to catch you.
"Bleh! Catch me if you can, you slowpoke! Even Ji-san is faster than you and he's older than you too!"
For the next 15 minutes, Ukai explained and showed Hinata about the three different tempos. Meanwhile, you yawned in boredom, having already heard this subject many times before.
"Ne Nii-chan, I'm hungry. Let's go and get something to eat." You whinnied as you tucked on your brother's shirt, your stomach growling.
However, you didn't receive a reply from the older Ukai. Lifting your head up in annoyance to see what has caught your brother's attention only to be met with a concentrated look on Keishin's face. Your (e/c) eyes widen as you looked at Keishin in concern, saying, "Nii-chan, don't think too hard or else your tiny brain will overheat."
Ignoring the insult you directed towards him, Keishin muttered "It can't be one-sided." before turning towards Hinata, shouting "Hinata, practice here for a bit!" before running off to who knows where.
You stood there dumbfounded at your brother's retreating form before turning your head back to Ukai and Hinata, saying, "Did Nii-chan just thought of something useful?"
"The timing of the spiker's running approach is everything. One centimetre, one millimetre, one second faster to the top..."
You shift your attention to Hinata as he went on, "But that's not enough. Up until now, I was only working to get to the top, but..."
He trailed off, as Ukai answered Hinata back, finishing his sentence. "So from now on, you want to fight at the top, too."
You went on, understanding what your grandfather was saying. "In order for that to happen, Kageyama's gonna need some improvement as well. I'm sure Kei-nii will do something about that. Looks like he wasn't as useless after all."
"Kageyama's an amazing guy, so I'm sure he can do it." You grinned at Hinata's words. Even when they're not on the best of the term, Hinata still believed in Kageyama no matter what and you couldn't be any more proud of the ball of sunshine.
"I don't want to be left behind. Please teach me how to fight when I'm at the top."
Ukai and you exchanged grins with one another before you focused back onto Hinata with a giant grin. "And I'll be here to help you to fight the solo battle."
Looks like the baby crows of Karasuno are slowly begin to leave the nest one by one.
(A/N: Sorry, the front part might seem boring to some people. But I wanted to introduce Ukai as he is, after all, reader-chan's grandfather. I wanted to show the relationship that Ukai and reader-chan have as reader-chan's quite similar to Ukai and it seemed like I would have fun writing about this two. So, I apologise again to those who find this part boring! >< Thanks for all the lovely comments and hearts! Love you all and I'll see you in the next chapter! Ja ne!)