Episode 14: Tsubame Gaeshi (The Swallow Return)

The Seigaku freshmen groupees (as I would like to call Horio, Kachiro and Katsuo) were in a frenzy upon reading from the score board about the win of an unseeded team. The groupees ran towards the Seigaku regulars sans Ryoma and Inui, and told them all about it. Only Kawamura seemed to know something about the mysterious group Fudoumine and that they had widthrawn from the Regionals last year. Inui suddenly appeared and told everyone that he came from scouting about the Fudoumine's matches. He told them that this year's Fudoumine is different than that of last year.

The confusion went on and Horio started talking with his loud and obnoxious mouth. He was all about Seigaku being the definite winner of the tournament since they wouldn't surely lose to an unseeded team. Katsuo began tugging on his arm but Horio went on and on saying that kind of nonsense. Finally, Katsuo stopped Horio from talking and motioned him towards someone or some people who just arrived, none other than the Fudoumine team. The captain of Fudoumine introduced himself to Tezuka as Tachibana Kippei. He wished Tezuka that they have nice matches. The captains of both team shook hands.

After shaking hands, Tachibana motioned his team to get going which which left Horio and the freshmen groupees staring at them with awe since according to them they have such a strong "presence". As the Fudoumine team began walking, the last Fudoumine guy was walking with his eyes closed and balancing his bouncing tennis ball at the side of his racket, we will know that this guy is named, Ibu Shinji, Shinji suddenly opened his eyes when he heard the same sound of tennis ball bouncing coming from _somewhere_. The whole Fudoumine team stopped and looked at the same person who's doing the same thing Shinji's doing. Tachibana narrowed his eyes towards the small figure sitting on a bench drinking Ponta with his eyes closed. Yep, it's Ryoma alright. The Seigaku team watched from afar as Ryoma wordlessly provoked the Fudoumine team. Tachibana and the others resumed their walk and left Ryoma alone with his racket and bouncing tennis ball.

The match commences and the order of the players have been decided. Fuji and Kawamura will be playing Doubles 2, Golden Pair (Kikumaru and Oishi) will be Doubles 1, Kaidoh will be Singles 3, Ryoma will be playing Singles 2 and Tezuka as Singles 1. First to play was Doubles 2: Kawamura and Fuji against Fudoumine's Ishida and Sakurai. Unexpectedly, Fudoumine's doubles 2 were good and pushes Seigaku's doubles 2 up against the wall. At the heat of the match, Tachibana stood up and left his team members to go to only God knows where. Coach Ryuuzaki told Tezuka that he's been indirectly insulted by Tachibana by leaving. Tezuka remained motionless and emotionless.

Tachibana walked towards a fountain and sat at the side. This prompted Inoue (the journalist) to walk up to him and ask him all about what happened last year. At first, Tachibana was reluctant to say anything but after making Inoue promise that he wouldn't write about it and that he's just asking out of personal curiousity, Tachibana started telling what happened. It all started when Tachibana transferred from his school at Kyushu to Fudoumine's and joined their tennis club. He found out that the talentless juniors and seniors of the tennis club mistreat the freshmen members (those were the current team members of Fudoumine) and just make them fetch the balls endlessly. They even throw the balls outside the courts and let the freshmen find them. The thing that got to Tachibana was that the coach of the tennis team consented and doesn't care about what his regular players were doing. Suddenly, one bright tennis afternoon, Tachibana couldn't take it any more and challenged the seniors and juniors to play a game against him and that if he wins, the seniors and juniors will be the ones fetching the balls they threw outside the court and begin 20 laps around the court. The juniors and seniors just laughed it off and told Tachibana not to be too serious, they all left the court afterwards, this left Tachibana with the freshmen members and they were in awe with him They became friends after that and thought of Tachibana as their leader. After that incident, they boycotted the tennis meetings and they started to play somewhere else and to create another tennis club of Fudoumine. They enjoyed these meetings to say the least since they were able to play to their hearts' content without anyone mistreating them. But of course, happy days are over once the tennis club coach learned about this.

The entire Fudoumine team and their coach went to Tachibana's "tennis club" and made fun of them. The coach even told them that they're getting big headed and that freshmen are supposed to fetch balls and nothing else, with that, the coach threw the cigarette he's smoking unto the tennis court and stepped on it. This put Tachibana into action and proceeded to beat the shit out of the coach. The entire team of Tachibana's and Fudoumine players also went at it. After that incident, the coach and the entire team of Fudoumine left the tennis club, this prodded Tachibana and the freshmen to submit a request to create a new tennis club which was granted. That was the reason as to why Fudoumine withdrew last year.

Inoue thanked Tachibana for sharing and went their own ways. Tachibana returned to the game and found that his players were doing well enough to push Fuji into action and use one of his well-known Triple Counters, the Tsubame Gaeshi which left the Fudoumine players in awe. Tachibana anticipated this since, he thought, "Tensai (Genius) Fuji wouldn't take this game lying down".