SASO Referees (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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sportsanime2016-07-21 08:53 pm
referees) wrote in sportsanime2016-07-21 08:53 pm
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Bonus Round 5: Myth & Lore
This round is CLOSED as of 7PM on August 4 EDT. Late fills may be posted, but they will not receive points.
RULES
- This round does not have prompts. Instead, we ask you to draw inspiration from the wide pool of mythology, fantasy, folklore, and fable. An urban fantasy or supernatural AU? A re-imagining of your favorite folk tale? Characters swapping ghost stories or playing D&D? As long as your fill in some way incorporates the fantastical and/or supernatural, it's welcome here.
- Your fill still has to be about a ship from one of our nominated fandoms. What ships you create work for is up to you, though.
- To submit your fill, simply leave it as a comment as a reply to this post.
- Remember to follow the general bonus round rules, outlined here.
FORMAT
Bonus round shenanigans all happen in the comments below. Brand-new works only, please.Required Work Minimums:
- 400 words (prose)
- 400px by 400px (art)
- 14 lines (poetry)
Remember, this is a NO-PROMPT round. Format your fill comment in one of the following ways:
| If FILLING: | If FILLING as a TEAM GRANDSTAND participant: |
FILL: TEAM [YOUR SHIP], [RATING]
| FILL: TEAM GRANDSTAND, [RATING]
|
Posts not using this format will be understood to be unofficial discussion posts, regardless of what they contain. They, like all comments in this community, are subject to the code of conduct.
SCORING
These numbers apply to your team as a whole, not each individual teammate. Make as many fills as you want!For fills:
First 3 fills by any member of your team: 20 points each
Fills 4-10: 10 points each
Fills 11-20: 5 points each
Fills 21+: 2 points each
All scored content must be created new for this round.
Etc.
If you're hunting through the prompts looking for what to fill, a good trick is to view top-level comments only.Have a question? Check The FAQ first. If you still need help, feel free to contact the mods. Happy fanworking!
Fill: Team Grandstand, T
Word count: 2500
Manami Sangaku/Onoda Sakamichi, essentially kara no kyoukai influenced, ghosts & alternate dead selves.
Onoda chased and Manami chose.
They didn't feel the impact, falling through concrete and fire alone.
---
"I stopped by the convenience store."
The light changed in Manami's apartment, when Onoda would visit. Blank white walls looked sunny under lamp-light. The moon hung further away in its soft blue. His jacket, hung next to theirs, and bags - some plastic. Others cloth. Weighed down in cartoonish charms and badges.
"Ooo," they answered.
Minuscule holes in a store bag, wrinkled and old. Even before how carefully he held the box inside. Manami could see through it.
"What did you buy?" They smiled. He did too. They didn't know why he lied. Making it mutual was a point of acceptance. "You can't eat out all the time, Sakamichi. That's no fun."
"It's not that!" he said, airy and overwhelming. Manami kept their hands firmly on their lap. "I thought I'd bring a treat to celebrate."
"What?" they asked - more genuine than they realized.
Chestnut candies. Soft breads. Agonizingly high quality, gently marked with strokes and signature. Toudou had something to do with this. Onoda wasn't the type to buy gourmet. He wouldn't have known the difference.
"It's been a year since you got out of the hospital." Walls shrunk in, burning their skin. He didn't look at them - couldn't, maybe. Just as well. They couldn't blink. Their stare hardly touched him. "I just thought ... it might be nice. Since I never got to celebrate with you then."
It felt like so much less time.
It felt like only yesterday that they had died.
---
"Have you seen Glasses?"
Manami glanced from their broken fingers, to Toudou, prim and unreadable before them. They looked back down and threaded metal back through a loose slot.
"No," they said. "Was Sakamichi late? That's unusual."
"So you haven't looked outside the office."
A joint came loose. Porcelain cracked between their nails.
"Hm?"
"Whenever you're done," Toudou said. "I do believe there's a job you'll be interested in tonight."
Onoda laid asleep on a couch. Wrapped up in a thousand more things than he should have ever touched. Manami could see the threads - the lines, so easy to cut, that he always managed to tie back together. They didn't know how.
"He seems to have made another friend," Toudou said. Filing through paperwork and runes they couldn't read. "If you'll handle this, I'll even fix your hand for you! No need to thank me ahead of time, though I'm sure you'd love to."
Manami laid down their arm before Toudou had a chance to finish speaking.
"Could you give it a little more flexibility this time? It keeps cracking down through the wrist joint."
---
Flowers laid in a mess on the bed.
Not their bed.
Manami wasn't sure whose anymore.
Eyes open and burning with a sparkling void, faces of doctors filled with lines to cut, Manami wasn't sure of anything anymore.
Far off, they could still feel a sleepless goodbye.
Hair clung to their shoulders. No one let them have scissors after the pillow.
---
What drew Onoda to such places, Manami didn't know.
For someone so alive, they found him lingering around death far more often than necessary. But they'd learned it was useless to run from such things, and accepted it, walking past quiet monuments and memories. No matter who he had met, they respected that much. Onoda didn't seem bothered that the only shadow left of Manami was them. He smiled when they wore their old jacket.
Flowers had frozen solid. They whistled at the gates to the apartment complex - mold and concrete and ice mixing together as a powerful shield.
"You've done quite a nice job!" they called out. Manami walked through halls and frames. Stairs led to more stairs, climbing till teeth cut along their grin. "I really appreciate your hard work!"
Open air greeted them with wind - enough to blink away, turning to face knives driven into the wall.
"Oh?" they said.
Dolls rose up.
"...Oh," they sighed. "You were doing so well before."
More came. Blades could slice through skin and hair, but it wasn't terrible, if they could avoid slicing up the jacket. Onoda would wake up once they were done here. It was unlikely they'd have time to sew it up before he insisted upon seeing them.
Floor came up like spines and they jumped to the banister, giddily balancing from heel to toe. "That's more interesting! I love what you've done with the place. I wish I could -"
Metal screeched to interrupt and throw them off. Manami reached out - and remembered their arm, sitting on Toudou's desk, feeling it twitch through what little magical connection remained. They should have counted steps, they thought, blinking at the long flight down.
---
"Th-thank you for helping me."
Manami wasn't reserved. They simply knew what they had to be.
Sangaku, though -
"It's alright! There's no need to thank me." A wide grin. Coming out in open air, taking twice the air for every breath, unfamiliar with starch and iodine. "So, did you take my advice?"
"What? Oh! Yes, I mean, I-"
"We should go out somewhere!"
So overwhelming that it was impossible to say no.
Manami observed from a distance, someone else's hand holding onto Onoda's. The two of them seemed a good match - Sakamichi. Sangaku. They liked that.
Though Sangaku feigned concern and know-how, surviving and health, it was Manami who handled putting that into action. So it felt strange when Onoda insisted on the jacket -
"You always wait for me in the cold like that," he said. "I don't want you to get sick."
Sangaku had said - "I won't get sick!" Sangaku had laughed.
Manami was grateful for that much.
No matter how much jealousy twisted up like knives.
---
Glass fell like light, glistening through closed lids. Manami couldn't sleep forever.
Shaking loose someone else's memories.
"Are you alright?"
A train thrummed beneath. Maybe if they cut off that leg - Manami brushed away the thought. It wasn't theirs to remove. They'd deal with it. Even if it meant trains over bikes.
"Yeah," they murmured. "Sakamichi."
"That's good ..."
He yawned. Their hand twitched and they kept their eyes closed. It would be easier if they didn't have to see those lines. Manami wasn't as good with him as Sangaku had been. They weren't so good at conversation.
"Will you wake up soon?" they asked.
"Maybe," he mumbled. It was tension, tightening on the ghost of an arm, that told them he was holding on. "It seems really lonely ... but it promised it would just be for a bit."
Nails like knives, they could cut it apart in an instant, if they let go. Manami forced themself to breathe. Reminded themself it was a dream.
"Some people don't keep their promises." The words were acid on their tongue.
Glasses cut through their jacket. Warmth, that far away, through ice and leather and death.
"But you try," he said.
---
They woke up.
Ghosts screamed in their ears. The cold wasn't new. Hospitals were always that way. Down the halls, through victims and unlocked doors, coming closer every day.
Every line demanding something from them, tightening around their skin.
"So here you were."
Their gaze swiveled.
A pristine face. A boundary risen around someone with a headband so gaudy - they broke into hoarse giggling.
"It appears your family has been hiding your presence here for quite some time." A voice to brush off their shaking, a hand to wave away any concept or ridicule or danger. "Though such a thing would never be a problem for one such as I."
"Mhm," they said - more unused to their voice than they realized. "Did you know it's after visiting hours?"
"Now, now, investigations do have the right to trump such silly rules sometimes. Especially when my client's troubles happen to be endangering a hospital!"
A client.
Manami - couldn't have ever met them. Laying in a hospital bed, with growing hair and ghosts to live in.
"My name is Toudou Jinpachi. One Onoda Sakamichi has been quite concerned about your whereabouts. Thankfully, it was in my best interests to search for the heir of such a deadly family."
---
Manami woke up.
"It's fortunate you left your arm with me."
Manami - tried to move their head. There was a body of some sort there. Attached to them. All that moved were distant fingers, scratching along a desk.
"It would have been completely shattered in the fall," Toudou said, never crouching, never proffering a hand. Manami preferred that. "You do realize how rare the enchantments for those are, correct?"
They managed a hum.
"If I have to build one from scratch, I'll be taking one of your eyes."
A slight nod, that time. They would have preferred that. Less lines - and they never quite enjoyed having another person's blood mixing alongside theirs, thin as it was.
"I presume you have not handled your ghost?"
A shake, now. Needles were stabbing up into their feet. The complex was so much smaller now. Whoever she was, it was an impressive show, even if some aspects were a little less than inspired.
"Hmph." Toudou spun in moonlight. "It isn't here any longer. I doubt you'll have much longer. It has been another two days."
That made Manami's blood run cold.
"But perhaps you have a better idea of where it remains, now?"
Familiar ice.
"Yeah," they said. "It'll be finished tonight."
---
"This apparition appears to be attracted to you." Toudou stared through documents, and notes, their vague recollections and messy hand-writing. Their fingers still didn't move well. "The scent of death is strong in this room. It believes it is returning home. That's common within hospitals, but not to this extent."
Sickeningly familiar.
Manami said, "I thought so."
"Hm?"
"That happened before," they said. Not to them. That wasn't them. Whoever it was, they weren't there anymore. "Someone else handled it for me."
"I see," Toudou muttered.
They'd been asleep for 20 months.
It was a little funny. If Sangaku was there, they'd have laughed.
Manami, for who they were - and weren't - huffed an attempt.
"It will have to be you," Toudou concluded.
They stared straight ahead. The lines made a little more sense now.
"Yeah," they said. "I was planning on it."
---
Getting into hospitals after-hours was more difficult than Toudou had made it seem, over a year ago. Manami was not so inconspicuous, armed with a knife to a single limb. But they knew well what a perfect place to sleep a hospital made.
So they kept their eyes open, and broke into a neighboring office building.
It was easier to keep track of people like that. The mind was a greater window when someone was that desperate to see more of the world. Embracing that made an old ache come back, settling heavy in their ribs.
But they could feel the bruise of Onoda's glasses.
There were left-overs and foods to make.
There was something to look forward to, so Manami kept forward, and used what they had.
"He'd prefer to stay like this."
Manami hummed. "I couldn't really say."
"It's better. Better than living around such death. Around such murderers."
They laughed. "That's true!"
"Then why do you insist on pushing me?"
They stopped, door to the roof, and pushed it open. Winds cut through to frame them, and Manami stared straight at the hospital - through curtains, one window, to a sleeping form.
"Because I don't care," Manami said.
"You don't care for his safety?" A voice echoing. "I could simply let him sleep forever. Just like those he insisted on investigating."
"Of course I care!" It was only a slight spark of insult, but more than they normally felt. Manami smiled at the feeling. "But I'm just too selfish otherwise."
---
Sangaku let the two of them be free.
Manami was enough of a person, when they'd share blood and blades like the breeze. Family, absolutes, and the nature they could never circumvent. It was alright.
As long as he didn't see.
"Manami?"
Sangaku smiled, even when he could see. Scarlet trickled down through stones, ruby river to Onoda's feet. His face - confused and beautiful and the most dangerous thing in the world.
Anyone who saw had to die.
The one who ran -
It took Manami years to admit it was them.
---
Toudou gave them a knife.
But they didn't need that for much.
"Hospitals aren't really for our kind, don't you think?" they asked, waving fingers and hair. The breeze burned and Sangaku would have loved it.
The apparition didn't speak, a fog of darkness, hiding its lines deep within.
"Well," Manami said. "Whenever you're ready!" Fingers winding up through their hair. Raking the knife through, uneven strands falling against their ears. The wind carried away what it could, and their hands fell empty.
It charged.
Their fingers didn't just break.
Their left hand warped in on itself, as they pushed back, skin crawling up and away, muscle splitting and - they grinned. Bone could cut. Anything could cut. Manami twined its threads around their splintering bone, and pulled.
Darkness ripped itself to nothing. Manami fell to the ground. It was hard to breathe.
But they were alive.
Letting their eyes close -
---
They wouldn't run again.
Manami could recognize the ghosts. They had the same faces as the dead attached to those flowers - the newspapers Onoda had been gathering for weeks. They could see so much, but never acted soon enough.
But maybe he'd forgive them.
Or maybe that was why he liked them.
Manami couldn't tell.
It was one line to cut to nothing. Their fixed arm cracking again. And ghosts fleeing as though they remembered who they were.
"Taking everything from others," a quiet hiss on the horizon. "What right do you have?"
"Was it yours to begin with?"
It didn't answer that.
Manami pulled out their phone. There was already a text.
Sorry about sleeping so long! Buzzing in their hand in the next moment. I hope those treats haven't gone bad since ...
we ll have them tonight ^^
They turned it off.
Its words didn't bother them too much. Manami knew they weren't taking much from anyone at all.
---
"I was so scared."
Laying on Manami's floor, stretched out to avoid the heat. They didn't bother to mention how cold they were.
"Of what?" they asked. Of me, they thought.
"That you'd die."
"I did," they thought aloud.
He stared at that. They couldn't move. Frozen in unfamiliar fear. He reached out. Across the floor, till his knuckles brushed their cheek.
"I'm sorry," he whispered.
He couldn't have believed them.
"It's okay," they said.
Sometimes, when they put on his glasses as a joke, it felt like some of the lines around died away. Looking through those lenses - it meant his eyes were always clear. Terrifying and safe to meet.
Onoda didn't ask why they stepped in front of the car. Maybe he could figure it out. As much as they could.
"I started working for Toudou to pay off that debt, haha ..."
He'd gotten better at investigating, after all. If not any better at lying.
Sangaku would have liked this. Manami closed their eyes to his warmth. Maybe it was enough that they'd given the chance to run.
"I'm glad you're still here," Onoda said.
They mumbled. "I am too."