FYI I'm a volleyball player, and it physically pains me to write the word spike, but to write the word hit over and over again is annoying and repetitive, so I have to write spike every once in a while even though it hurts me to my very soul.
We practiced for another three hours together. I had really underestimated Aihara. She was a total badass with her hits and her serves. It made me wonder why Michimiya was Captain over her, because there was nothing that I saw that was insanely special about her. Since I didn't know her that well yet, I became sure that it was the bond she created that earned her that captain spot.
I know Nanami was only captain of Fukurodani for skill and skill only. She was a bitch, but she was the best player we had, so they voted her captain. And her attitude affected the whole team, enough to the point that it became a permanent change.
Everyone was doing spiking practice and Noya and I were on the other side of the net digging and working on footwork. He and I switched off on the left back after each good touch, both of us giving each other advice whenever a bad touch happened. I may not have ever been a libero, but I knew what I was doing when it came to defense. I was incredibly short afterall, and I was often mistaken for a defensive player.
Kenji was still having an amazing time shagging balls for us, giggling and laughing the whole time. I was surprised how he still had energy since I knew he had been doing this the whole time I wasn't there either.
After we all packed up, I thanked Nishinoya again for helping me transition into a libero, and he scoffed.
"Pfft, it's no problem. And you should come practice with us all the time, every day even!"
All the boys that overheard were on board with that idea.
"Yeah!" Hinata exclaimed. "You should bring Kenji too!"
And Kenji had absolutely no problem with that.
"YES! CAN I CAN I CAN I CAN I CAN I PLEEEEEEEEEASE?" He jumped on me and hung on my arm, even though he was only a couple inches shorter than me.
"If the boys say it's okay then you can come."
Daichi walked over to us and pried Kenji off of me.
"Of course you can come little man," he said with a smile on his face.
I dragged Kenji out of the gym and walked him home with Aihara. She lived a little farther than I did so we left her to keep walking.
"Hey sorry for keeping you-" I glanced at my phone "- three hours late."
"No, no. I really need the practice. We all do, I think." Aihara looked to the sky with a weary gaze. " I'm going to actually ask Michimiya if she can arrange more practice games with the boys teams. It'd be good game play and it would definitely make us all better. What do you think?"
I nodded and watched the small clouds move across the sky with her. "Do you want to win?" I asked.
"Of course I do."
"Then I think it's a great idea, but we need to do a couple other things too."
"Like what?"
I smiled. "Follow me."
3rd Person POV
"Before we start, I want to call a team meeting." Michimiya said after everyone had arrived to practice the next day.
Everyone gathered around the whiteboard as Michimiya addressed the team. Standing next to her was Aihara, who was looking only at (Y/N) with a reassuring smile.
"We all know that we only barely made it into the tournament," she raised her voice so the whole team could hear her. "But we have a new player from Fukurodani that could take us really far. With her help, I believe we can win, but we all have to be willing to work hard too. Are we willing to work hard?"
Everyone nodded, determination radiating from them. The team didn't have this drive during the training camp, but only because they didn't believe they could win. With (Y/N) on the roster though, they believed for the first time in a long time that they could go far.
"Alright then," Michimiya smirked. "One of the good things that comes with transfer players is that they come with gifts from the previous school. We all know Fukurodani is the powerhouse of Tokyo, so we're gonna kinda steal their training methods. (Y/N) knows those methods inside and out. They'll help us become stronger, and to put these new weapons in play, we will schedule practice games with the boys team regularly."
Everyone silently cheered at that. They all loved playing games, and they never really got a chance to play practice matches unless they were at training camps, and those only came along so often.
"So what are we gonna do?" Sasaki asked, flicking her head to get her bangs out of her eyes.
Aihara waved for (Y/N) to come to the front of the group and she did, but not before going to her backpack and grabbing some papers.
"(Y/N) showed me some very interesting things the other day after practice, and I think that they could improve our game exponentially," Aihara said as (Y/N) passed the papers out to everyone. "Each person gets a different workout and specific drills tailored to their respective positions."
After (Y/N) passed out all the papers, she went back up to the front so that she could further explain them.
"At Fukurodani, every single girl went to the gym almost every day and did a workout that was given to them from our coach. Their strength was given to them by the things they did outside of practice, and it worked, so we'll use them here too."
Everyone took a closer glance at their papers, and looked at other papers to compare.
"I know I am by no means your captain, and you've only known me for a couple weeks, but if we want to win, you all need to trust me on this."
At this point, the team was ready to try. It was coming from the strongest team in Tokyo, and obviously it worked, because it produced easily the best player on this one, so it has to work.
"What about actually practicing?" Kikuchi asked. "What did Fukurodani do?"
"Good question," (Y/N) said. "I think that to start, we should work on some ball control and communication drills, and then as we improve on that, we could work on combo plays and quick attacks. Our defense is a little lacking as well, so we can sprinkle in a bit of defense drills along with those combo drills as well."
Michimiya spoke up. "I've seen and approved of all of the plans that (Y/N) gave me, so if you guys are up for it, we can start today."
Looking at their workout regimens, everyone else agreed that if this was the way to win, then they were willing to try. With this they could win. With (Y/N) they could win.
So they practiced as hard as they could when they could. They all worked their asses off every day. (Y/N) would always practice with the boys, occasionally being joined by some of her other teammates. The boys always welcomed the extra players, and they were starting to see the improvement in the practice games they were playing.
Daichi often congratulated Michimiya on the amazing progress that was taking place.
"All the credit goes to (Y/N)," she said. "Her experience at Fukurodani is invaluable, and she's being so scared about it."
They looked over to where she and Nishinoya were goofing off and setting to each other.
"She's so worried that she's being too assertive for a second year, that she has no idea that we're all looking at her."
Daichi shook his head. "I think she knows."
"Really?"
"I've gotten to know her very well over the past couple weeks with her practicing with us everyday. She's the kind of player that will blame herself for everything, and I see it too. She knows you all look at her and it scares her. She doesn't want to be the reason that you lose ever."
"Hey (Y/N)!" Hinata screamed. She turned around to look at him, catching the ball she was setting back and forth with Noya.
"Yeah?"
"Do liberos serve in girls volleyball?"
"Yes, the liberos serve."
Hinata must have gotten into an argument with Kageyama because he turned to him and screamed, "I TOLD YOU!"
(Y/N) rolled her eyes and turned back to Noya.
"Wanna do some receiving?" she asked him.
Noya nodded and went to the other side of the court as she bounced the ball over to the service line. As she served, the two captains kept up their conversation.
"I think she'll do really well for you when you actually play," Daichi said. "She has a lot of experience, and if you have her as your libero, the play won't be over until you put it down on the other side."
"You think so?"
"Definitely."
"What if we go against Date Tech?" Michimiya asked, a slight tremble in her voice. "Defense isn't going to help us there."
"Then work on some awareness drills with Aihara and Kikuchi," he encouraged her. "I have no doubt that you can hang with and beat Date Tech."
Michimiya looked back to (Y/N) who fired a bullet over the net.
"Yeah."
Sup y'all?! It's been a good day today! I finally got my brother to start watching Haikyu and play volleyball with me! He sucks at it but ya know it's part of the process of starting. It's a good day y'all and I hope you had a good day too! Let me know if there are any typos so I can fix it!
YOU ARE READING
Haikyuu X reader
Fanfiction(Y/N) is a second year at Fukurodani High school, and on their girls volleyball team. She's very good at what she does, she can play almost every position perfectly. She'd be a very well known player around the country if it weren't for one problem...
