A/N: I love plot bunnies sometimes; I just wanna hug them, and cuddle them, and… you get the point. But they're amazing. It's just writing out a good plot bunny that's hard. :(

Disclaimer: Don't own. Prince of Tennis © somebody-or-other. Not meeeee!

Hat of Innocence

It was all Horio's fault. Then again, he was at fault too (although he would never admit it: stupid ego and manly pride.)

He had left Horio to take care of his hat while he tried to get Karupin down from a tree nearby the school. How the cat had managed to walk close to his school was one thing, but what was most surprising was how Karupin had even climbed the freaking tree.

After all, this was Karupin: fat cat extraordinaire.

Anyway, back to how it was all. Horio's. Fault. So Ryoma had left his hat with Horio while he attempted to climb the tree and bring his cat down.

Meanwhile (while Ryoma was struggling with his cat), Horio was eating cherries and holding Ryoma's (beloved) cap. Unbeknownst to Ryoma, Horio was dripping cherry juice all over his cap.

…. which led to his current predicament. 'Seriously!' Ryoma thought. 'Could Horio have been any more childish?! Cherries?!' It was just utterly stupid.

Even if he got all the cherry juice stains out, he would never, ever be able to wear it with the same pleasureagain because his hat would shrink. Meaning that when he took his cap off his hair would get all mussed up.

And Ryoma just couldn't tolerate something like that happening! It ruined his manly image dammit!

The hat now contained splotches of pinkish red. No way in hell would that come out anytime soon, Ryoma thought.

Ryoma sighed. He had to get a new hat after all.

The next day, as Ryoma arrived at the Seigaku tennis courts, Kikamaru was first to note his new cap.

"Ehhhh?! Ochibi got a new hat!"

This caused the rest of the team to turn his and Kikamaru-sempai's way.

'Che. Is it that amazing and apocalyptic?' Ryoma thought, visibly irritated by the attention. 'It's just a hat; it's not like I sprouted 5 inches overnight (as much as that would have pleased me.)'

Ryoma pulled his new hat down, therefore covering his irritated expression from the rest of the team.

"Why does it matter if I changed hats? My other one was ruined anyway." Looking up, he saw his team's shocked expression. It annoyed him to no end!

Ignoring the latter part of Ryoma's retort (for it was just an excuse), Momo was first to reply. "We're not saying that it matters to us. We're just saying that YOU of all people decided to buy a new hat."

Ryoma was fuming. Inui spoke up.

"According to my profile data Ryoma, in the whole year that the team has known you, you have never changed hats or bought a new one."

Before Ryoma could retort and sneer at his team, Tezuka-buchou cut in.

"Everyone, ten laps around the courts! No point bickering over the minute detail of someone's new article of clothing!"

"Hai!" The team began jogging. Ryoma joined the rest of the team and gave a grateful smile to his captain.

As he passed his captain, he heard him comment, "Nice hat Ryoma."

Ryoma just growled and proceeded to take his anger out in his running.

After everyone had run their laps, they began their practice. Today was a short practice day since everyone would be going over to Taka's restaurant to have dinner together.

Tiime on the court passed by quickly, and soon, everyone was packing up.

Momo and Kikumaru-sempai grinned at each other, sharing a knowing expression. Ryoma felt uneasy.

Suddenly, the area above his head felt drafty. His hat had been stolen!

"Give it back." Ryoma tried to reach for his hat (while still attempting to act manly), but failed due to his height. Momo, who currently held ownership of the hat, threw it over to Kikumaru, who caught it with ease.

"Let's see what's hiding in this hat!" Kikumaru inspected the hat, but the only thing he could see that wasn't white were a few initials and the label.

"What?! There's nothing exciting about this hat! It's just a plain, boring white hat, almost identical to the Ochibi's last one. The only thing different are the initials 'ER' sewn in on the inside." Disappointed, Kikumaru tossed the hat back to Ryoma, who caught it, and, after giving glares to both sempai, proceeded to place his hat on the bench next to his tennis equipment.

It was not until everyone had begun to head toward the locker rooms that Ryoma breathed out a sigh of relief. He definitely needed a Ponta.

Sakuno had just come from a one-on-one conference with her English teacher. He had told her that her writing style was great, but her wordiness needed to be corrected. Sakuno could only sigh as she thought of how challenging of a job that would be.

As she arrived at the tennis courts, she found them empty, and was surprised until she remembered today was the day everyone would be leaving early to eat. She found a bench with tennis equipment and sat down next to it. Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted a white hat and, out of curiosity, picked it up.

She soon made the connection that it was Ryoma's hat, except…. newer looking. Sakuno was, like the rest of the Seigaku Team, curious as to why Ryoma would buy himself a new hat.

So she inspected it. Like Kikumaru, she was disappointed to find that there was nothing exciting about his new hat (except for his initials of course.)

'Eh? That's weird,' Sakuno thought. 'Why would I expect to think that there would be anything different about Ryoma-kun's new hat? After all, if he wanted to buy a new one, there was nothing stopping him.'

And that's how Ryoma found Sakuno: thinking to herself and holding his hat.

Ryoma almost choked on his newly bought Ponta, and his coughing brought Sakuno out of her thoughts.

"Ah, Ryoma-kun! Are you okay?" Sakuno rushed towards him, but he signaled that he was fine and raised his head to face her. Sakuno, remembering that she still had Ryoma's hat in her hand, quickly handed him his hat, a sheepish look on her face.

Ryoma became suspicious. "Sakuno, did you see anything on my hat that you found interesting?"

Now it was Sakuno's turn to feel suspicious, but answered politely nevertheless. "No…. I-I just picked it up and saw it was new so I sort of, kinda of, maybe inspected it." Upon seeing Ryoma's surprised expression and thinking that was a bad thing, she hastened to add, "But don't worry Ryoma-kun! I didn't see anything interesting or anything, nor do I think that it's weird for you to have a new hat."

Ryoma was relieved. "Is that so? Well then that's good. Come on, we should go: the others are probably already on the other side of the school heading towards the parking lot. We had better go catch up." Sakuno murmured her agreement, and set off towards the parking lot, hoping to catch up to the rest of the team.

Ryoma stayed back a few moments to collect his things. Before he ran to catch up, he looked in his cap and saw the familiar 'ER' sewn into the hat, but as his eyes travelled lower and he squinted, he made out the other rest sewn into the hat's label. He smirked.

'No one would figure it out anytime soon,' he thought.

Unknown to everyone else who had attempted to find anything in his new hat, sewn under the 'ER' on the label were these words:

'Echizen and Ryuzaki.'

A/N #2: Yes, it was rushed. I agree. I'll probably rewrite this one day. Oh, and I forgot to mention: REVIEW :D It makes the world go round. And also, this is MY idea... at least, I hope it is. I'm planning to make a sequel so look out for it.