Camping Trip

Chapter 3

"Saa, why not cut them some slack?" Fuji asked with a smile.

"Would you care to join them?" Tezuka adjusted his glasses. Fuji just smiled and went to warm up.

"This was the first time in a while that they were actually here when the bell rang." Taka said.

"Fsshhh... they all live closer than any of us. Why are they never here first?" Kaidou asked.

"They're just not morning people. It can't be helped." Oishi said.

"My data shows that not only are they not morning people, but they are also lazy, incomprehensive and slower than most of the people who are here." Inui said reading from his notebook.

"Mou, don't blame them. They can't help it!" Kikumaru said trying to defend them. "Plus, Ochibi's brother is here. That could have something to do with it."

Tezuka sighed and rubbed his temples. He didn't like how he had to deal with this almost every day. Most of the time, it was just him instructing everyone in the morning since Ryuzaki-sensei didn't arrive until later.

"Kikumaru." Tezuka's voice was a stern as ever.

Kikumaru froze in place and slowly turned to face Tezuka. "A-Ah?"

"Go see what's taking them so long. And tell them they now have 20 laps for making us wait."

"Hai!" Kikumaru was happy to go see why Momo and Echizen were taking long. They were the next ones he had a strong bond with beside Oishi. He happily skipped out of the gate and went towards the club room.

"O-chi-bi! Mo-mo! Tezuka says you have to run even more if you don't hurry!" he half singingly shouted as he exited the gate. "Ochibi, M-" he stopped when he heard a loud boom then saw smoke come out of the club room. "Ochibi! Momo!" he ran to the club room and opened the door to a huge cloud of smoke.

"Eiji! What was that sound?!" Oishi and the others came running towards him as he fanned the smoke from his face. "What's with all this smoke?!"

Kikumaru turned to face him and was about to answer when he heard coughing from inside the room. He turned back to the room to see Echizen and Momo coming out, coughing and fanning the smoke from their faces.

"Echizen! Momo!" everyone rushed to them. They were slumped on the ground trying to regain their breath. "What happened?! What was that explosion?!" Taka was patting Momo while Fuji was helping Echizen breath properly.

Tezuka knelt in front of them. "Echizen, Momoshiro, what happened?" his voice was less stern than it normally was.

"Phone call... box... black ball... bomb..." Momo couldn't string together a sentence.

"What do you mean?" Fuji's eyes opened at the word 'bomb'.

Momo got his breath back. "There was this... box in his locker and it... had a black tennis ball in it."

Echizen stifled his coughing. "I got a call on my phone. The person on the other line asked if I liked the gift they left."

"They? You don't know who it was?" Inui asked with his notebook to his face.

"Iya, I didn't recognize the number and they wouldn't tell me who it was. I kept asking who it was but they wouldn't answer then we heard a beep."

"A beep?" Taka asked.

"Ah." Momo continued the story. "There was a beep another and another. Pretty soon it was one right after the other then it went flat like one of those heart monitors in the hospital."

"Echizen, where you still on the phone?" Fuji asked.

"Iie, the person told me to be careful then hung up." He looked at his hand. It was full of burns and bloody.