Bonus Round 4: Quotes

[referees]

SASO 2017 is over, but this round is perpetually open to new fills (no new prompts).

An oldie but a goodie—in this round, we draw inspiration from famous words said by other people.

Please read this whole post before commenting to ensure that your team gets the most points possible.

RULES

• Submit prompts by commenting to this post with a quote attributed to a specific person or character, along with any ship/ot3/etc. from one of our nominated fandoms.
  • Example: "That which does not kill us makes us stronger." -Friedrich Nietzsche
  • The quote can come from almost anything—famous people, poetry, songs, books, movies, etc.— but please don't quote personal conversations you've had or overheard.
  • Your prompt MUST include some kind of relationship. Platonic relationships are indicated by an "&" between the names (e.g., Natsuo & Yuzuko). Non-platonic relationships use "/" (e.g., Natsuo/Yuzuko). Please don't say "Any pairing," either!
• Fill prompts by replying to the prompt with your quote-inspired fanwork.
• Remember to follow the general bonus round rules, outlined here.
• Here is a prompt/fill index for your convenience.

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)

There is no max work cap.

Format your comment in one of the following ways:

If PROMPTING:	If FILLING:	If FILLING as a TEAM GRANDSTAND participant:
PROMPT: TEAM [YOUR SHIP] Replace [YOUR SHIP] with the name of the team you belong to. Any way you format it is fine. Copy/paste/fill out the following form into your comment box. Delete the guidance text that's in parentheses. (Please delete all text in parentheses as you go. LEAVE THE HTML ALONE or the bonus round scoring program can't parse your comment. Don't forget a comment subject!) <strong>Ship:</strong> (the ship your prompt is focused on. "&" indicates a platonic relationship, "/" is non-platonic. Format the ship name any way you want, but clarity is more likely to get you fills.) <strong>Fandom:</strong> (what fandom the ship is from) <strong>Major Tags:</strong> (https://sportsanime.dreamwidth.org/1609.html, when applicable; these apply to content *in the prompt itself* and is NOT an implication of what you're looking for in a fill. If your prompt doesn't require tags, write "None" here.) <strong>Other Tags:</strong> (anything else that you feel requires tagging; can include jokey tumblr-style tags here; may also pull from the "Additional Tags" list from the URL above, if applicable; otherwise, write "None" here.) <strong>Prompt:</strong>	FILL: TEAM [YOUR SHIP], [RATING] Replace [YOUR SHIP] with the name of the team you belong to. Any way you format it is fine. Replace RATING with the rating of your fill (G - E) Copy/paste/fill out the following form into your comment box. Delete the guidance text that's in parentheses. Make sure you use tags. Here is a BR Template Creator for your convenience if the textarea is confusing. (Please delete all text in parentheses as you go. LEAVE THE HEADER HTML ALONE or the bonus round scoring program can't parse your comment. Don't forget a comment subject!) <strong>Ship:</strong> <strong>Fandom:</strong> <strong>Major Tags:</strong> (https://sportsanime.dreamwidth.org/1609.html, when applicable; otherwise write "None".) <strong>Other Tags:</strong> (anything else that you feel requires tagging; can include jokey tumblr-style tags here; may also pull from the "Additional Tags" list from the URL above, if applicable; otherwise, write "None" here.) <strong>Word Count:</strong> (if applicable; otherwise write "None") (Place any author/artist's notes BEFORE the asterisks. Leave the asterisks alone or you may not get points!) *** (Place your fill here. You can use HTML. FOR NSFW FILLS, please cross-link these fills and use clear tags. Refer to the body of the post above for more information. To place an image in your comment, use this code: <img src="LINK TO YOUR IMAGE" alt="DESCRIPTION OF YOUR IMAGE"/>. Thumbnails only, please; more info @ http://referees.dreamwidth.org/5647.html#images ) NSFW FILLS: Please cross-link these fills and tag them clearly. saso_afterhours is open to all NSFW fills. Written/text fills can be hosted on AO3 or saso_afterhours ONLY. Art/visual fills can be hosted anywhere; you may include a small safe-for-work thumbnail of the fill in your comment.	FILL: TEAM GRANDSTAND, [RATING] Replace RATING with the rating of your fill (G - E) Copy/paste/fill out the following form into your comment box. Delete the guidance text that's in parentheses. Make sure you use tags. Here is a BR Template Creator for your convenience if the textarea is confusing. (Please delete all text in parentheses as you go. LEAVE THE HEADER HTML ALONE or the bonus round scoring program can't parse your comment. Don't forget a comment subject!) <strong>Ship:</strong> <strong>Fandom:</strong> <strong>Major Tags:</strong> (https://sportsanime.dreamwidth.org/1609.html, when applicable; otherwise write "None".) <strong>Other Tags:</strong> (anything else that you feel requires tagging; can include jokey tumblr-style tags here; may also pull from the "Additional Tags" list from the URL above, if applicable; otherwise, write "None" here.) <strong>Word Count:</strong> (if applicable; otherwise write "None") (Place any author/artist's notes BEFORE the asterisks. Leave the asterisks alone or you may not get points!) *** (Place your fill here. You can use HTML. FOR NSFW FILLS, please cross-link these fills and use clear tags. Refer to the body of the post above for more information. To place an image in your comment, use this code: <img src="LINK TO YOUR IMAGE" alt="DESCRIPTION OF YOUR IMAGE"/>. Thumbnails only, please; more info @ http://referees.dreamwidth.org/5647.html#images ) NSFW FILLS: Please cross-link these fills and tag them clearly. saso_afterhours is open to all NSFW fills. Written/text fills can be hosted on AO3 or saso_afterhours ONLY. Art/visual fills can be hosted anywhere; you may include a small safe-for-work thumbnail of the fill in your comment.

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.

If you see anyone breaking the code of conduct (e.g., causing drama, being rude) anywhere (not just DW), please contact the mods immediately.

SCORING

These numbers apply to your team as a whole, not each individual teammate. Make as many prompts/fills as you want!

For prompts: 5 points each (maximum of 50 prompt points per team per round)

For fills:
First 4 fills by any member of your team: 20 points each
Fills 5-10: 15 points each
Fills 11-20: 5 points each
Fills 21-50: 2 points each
Fills 51+: 1 point 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 (see the line of links below this post).

Have a question? Check The FAQ first. If you still need help, feel free to contact the mods. Happy fanworking!

Comments

FILL: Team Kanzaki Miki/Miyahara, T

[elucidatedlucy]

Ship: Manami Sangaku/Teshima Junta
Fandom: Yowamushi Pedal
Major tags: Blood, Depictions of gore (skin punctured)
Other tags: more wingfic because sure im a joke anyway, Non-canon pronoun usage
Word count: 537



***

The thing Teshima hates most about Manami Sangaku is - the fact of wings stretching their way against the sky, translucent and elegant. Their arms rise above how the wings catch stars in their grasp. Standing easy on the railing of a mountain. He can never stop staring.

The second most thing he hates about them is the fact that they always crash.

"What kind of idiot," he spits, but not, because blood makes his heart race, so the words come out almost soft, "What kind of person," he's saying, "Even wants to jump off a mountain in a thunder storm?"

Manami hums like anything is going through their head. Their wings are skewered on a fence. Splinters jab into their arms, threatening to reach through the fabric of their shirt, and their eyes remain closed to the rain pelting the two of them. He wonders if thunder took his words to replace them with nothing. He hopes it did.

"The fun kind," Manami chooses, and -

Teshima snorts, to say, "Good thing you aren't a person."

"Mhm!" They raise an arm, and his gut churns to look at the bruised flesh. "You're pretty observant, Teshima-san."

"S'all I got going for me." He mumbles like it might cut away the nausea, or the reason.

Under the slight shelter of a bus stop roof, he digs out needles and thread. Glue and thin wire. Given electricity, he could solder Manami back together, but there was little luck of that in the wilderness. It was better to cover up the evidence outside.

When Teshima runs a needle through the feathers, it disappears into the veil of nothing. He's sure something is in his hands. But Manami doesn't flinch. Keeps smiling straight ahead. They remain as gentle as an aimless balloon, when their wings give out, and they have driven themself so far to survive. Sometimes Teshima thinks - a good person would do something.

Someone who cared wouldn't hide it.

"Don't you have a best friend," he asked, once.

"I wouldn't bother her with this," Manami had said, incredulous. "She's really busy."

"And I'm not?"

"I could do it myself."

He'd shut up with that.

There was something in the fact of knowing. In being one of the only people who knew the slipshod construction of rumored fantastical wings. That even with so much holding them up, there was only so far one could go before they crashed.

"I was thinking about going back to Fuji," Manami says, through the burn of metal between his fingertips.

"Sounds fun," he says. "Planning to break a leg, too?"

"I'm not that lucky," they laugh. "I was wondering if you wanted to come."

He could say no. He could tell them how little he needed more proof of how useless it was to have wings in the first place. That he didn't need more salt in a wound that was long-since necrotic. But -

"Isn't that just injecting pure mercury straight into my heart?"

Maybe that was why he stuck around.

Because he could say that.

"You're the one who said it sounds fun." Manami speaks, and here, it's slow - low - directly at him. The terrible truth of talent versus effort, and he smiles.

They smile back.

"I needed another souvenir."

Prompt: Team Daiya no Ace

[greenowl]

Ship: Tsukishima Kei/Tendou Satori or Oikawa Tooru/Tendou Satori or heck anyone/Tendou OR Hiyoshi Wakashi/Kirihara Akaya
Fandom: Haikyuu!!, Prince of Tennis
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: none

Prompt:
Dwight Schrute: Welcome to the Hotel Hell. Check-in time in now, check-out time is never.
Jim Halpert: Does my room have cable?
Dwight Schrute: No. And the sheets are made of fire.
Jim Halpert: Can I change rooms?
Dwight Schrute: Sorry we're all booked up. Hell convention in town.
Jim Halpert: Can I have a late check-out?
Dwight Schrute: I'll have to talk to the manager.
Jim Halpert: You're not the manager, even in your own fantasy?
Dwight Schrute: I'm the owner.. the co-owner. With Satan!
Jim Halpert: Okay, just so I understand it. In your wildest fantasy, you are in hell and you are co-running a bed and breakfast with the devil.
Dwight Schrute: But I haven't told you my salary yet.
Jim Halpert: Go.
Dwight Schrute: Eighty thousand dollars.

-- The Office

PROMPT: TEAM GRANDSTAND

[whimse]

Ship: Shizuku Hanaoka & Tatara Fujita & Kiyoharu Hyoudou, Shizuku Hanaoka & Gaju Akagi
Fandom: Ballroom e Youkoso
Major Tags: None
Other Tags: shizuku + finding a path when you're treated like an asset rather than a person, the last relationship in a negative sense of course

Prompt:

"The whole situation felt as unreal as something could while also feeling sorely, mortally dangerous. It seemed to draw strength from my speech, as in: The more I spoke within it, accepting its premises, the more I spoke into it without screaming at it, the more it made me whomever this position demanded."

-- Alexandra Kleeman, "Fairy Tale"

Prompt: Team Daiya no Ace

[greenowl]

Ship: Oikawa Tooru/Kuroo Tetsurou or Aomine Daiki/Himuro Tatsuya or Kagami Taiga/Himuro Tatsuya or Tachibana Aya/Miyahara Iinchou
Fandom: Haikyuu!!, Kuroko no Basuke, Yowamushi Pedal
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: dead

Prompt:

Prompt: Team Kanzaki Miki/Miyahara

[doxian]

Ship: Shirabu Kenjirou/Ushijima Wakatoshi, Otabek Altin/Yuri Plisetsky
Fandom: Haikyuu!!, Yuri!!! on Ice
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: none

Prompt:

"What is desire? Desire is a restaurant. Desire is watching you eat. Desire is pouring wine for you. Desire is looking at the menu and wondering what it would be like to kiss you. Desire is the surprise of your skin. Look - in between us now are the props of ordinary life - glasses, knives, cloths, Time has been here before. History has had you - and me too. My hand has brushed against yours for centuries. The props change, but not this. Not this single naked wanting you."

- The White Room by Jeannette Winterson

Prompt: Team Daiya no Ace

[greenowl]

Ship: Yamaguchi Tadashi/Hinata Shouyo(/Yachi Hitoka) or Iwaizumi Hajime/Sawamura Daichi or Murasakibara Atsushi/any of GoM or Sawamura Eijun/Kawakami Norifumi/Todoroki Raichi (any combination)
Fandom: Haikyuu!!, Kuroko no Basuke, Daiya no Ace
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: dead

Prompt:

FILL: Team The Prince of Tennis, T

[fickle]

Ship: Imayoshi/Hanamiya
Fandom: Kuroko no Basuke
Major Tags: tags omitted
Other Tags: tags omitted
Word Count: 471 words

So this was a fun excuse to write about baby-to-kid Imayoshi and Hanamiya! I borrowed from my own life a little - amongst the afterschool stuff I was signed up for was circus training where I learnt how to do trapeze tricks. Please imagine Imayoshi on a trapeze. You’re welcome.

***

“Your son has an impressive vocabulary,” the doctor says, examining Hanamiya’s little eyes. “Quite unusual for a boy his age.”

His parents smile but think it’s no more than flattery.

It’s only when Hanamiya starts picking up English from the TV that they think the doctor might have been telling the truth.

*

“It’s just that his sister was already talking at this age. And all the other babies his age are chattering away in nonsense.” Imayoshi’s mother says, her hands fluttering against her chest. “I’m worried, doctor. What if there’s something developmentally wrong with him?”

“I shouldn’t worry,” the doctor says cheerfully, taking the puzzle away from Imayoshi’s chubby hands. “Look at how he watches the world. When he starts talking, he’ll use proper words. Maybe even full sentences.”

*

It works out just as the doctor predicted and Imayoshi starts talking in short, but correct, sentences.


His parents are so relieved that they sign him up for elocution classes at the age of 3.

*

Hanamiya’s father died before he was born. His mother raises him by signing him up for every class possible so he won’t interfere with her lifestyle. She likes to show off her clever little boy to her friends, trotting him out like a prize pony at parties.

*

Imayoshi’s mother dies before he’s 5, leaving him to be looked over by an older sister and his father. Imayoshi grows used to reading on his own so he won’t be in anyone’s way. He raises himself with the help of books; from them he learns of good and evil, of villainy and heroism.

When he starts reading history books, he learns that books that claim to tell the truth can’t be trusted. Victim or villain depends on who’s writing.

He rereads his old favorites and finds himself questioning what had seemed so simple before.

*

Kindergarten is boring and everyone is stupid. Hanamiya doesn’t want to nap. He shuts his eyes and plots instead.

*

School is boring and everyone is stupid. Imayoshi’s already able to read and write but they insist on teaching him at the same pace as everyone else. He sneaks books into the classroom and reads under his desk.

*

School isn’t any better than kindergarten. Hanamiya comes up with a new game to amuse himself. Kids aren’t as unsteady as toddlers but it’s easy to trip them still and everyone knows kids are clumsy. Nobody ever pays attention to how many scraped knees and elbows abound in his grade.

Every day after school, he has a different club to attend. He rarely sees his mother anymore but she gives him far too much money for every perfect report card he brings home.

*

They meet in middle school and suddenly school is no longer boring. Now they have someone they can compete against and work with as equals.

Re: PROMPT: TEAM GRANDSTAND

[fickle]

I LOVE YOU FOR PROMPTING P.G. WODEHOUSE.

I mean, I can't write this, but I love him and this is hilarious.

Prompt: Team Kanzaki Miki/Miyahara

[doxian]

Ship: Furuya Satoru/Miyuki Kazuya
Fandom: Daiya no Ace
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: none

Prompt:

"I enjoy controlled loneliness. I like wandering around the city alone. I’m not afraid of coming back to an empty flat and lying down in an empty bed. I’m afraid of having no one to miss, of having no one to love."

- Kuba Wojewódzki

Prompt: Team Kanzaki Miki/Miyahara

[doxian]

Ship: Iwashimizu Sumiaki/Miyuki Atsushi, Gion Kenji/Iwashimizu Sumiaki, Bokuto Koutarou/Yamaguchi Tadashi
Fandom: All Out!!, Haikyuu!!
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: none

Prompt:

"Stay afraid, but do it anyway. What’s important is the action. You don’t have to wait to be confident. Just do it and eventually the confidence will follow."

- Carrie Fisher

Prompt: Team Kanzaki Miki/Miyahara

[doxian]

Ship: Iwaizumi Hajime/Kyoutani Kentarou/Oikawa Tooru, Kuroo Tetsurou/Haiba Lev/Kozume Kenma, Ebumi Masaru/Matsuo Toshinosuke/Sekizan Takuya
Fandom: Haikyuu!!, All Out!!
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: potentially petplay, animal characteristics or supernatural elements??

Prompt:

"help me walk my dog cause he is too strong for me now."

- @craigslistlove

PROMPT: TEAM GRANDSTAND

[whimse]

Ship: Sangaku Manami/Sakamichi Onoda OR Jinpachi Toudou/Yuusuke Makishima
Fandom: Yowamushi Pedal
Major Tags: None
Other Tags: None

Prompt:

Section 5.4. Imperfect Real-Time Decisions

-- Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach

Prompt: Team Kanzaki Miki/Miyahara

[doxian]

Ship: Koga Kimitaka/Teshima Junta, Imaizumi Shunsuke/Teshima Junta, Aoyagi Hajime/Kaburagi Issa, Otabek Altin/JJ LeRoy, Futakuchi Kenji/Yahaba Shigeru, Kuroo Tetsurou/Daishou Suguru
Fandom: Yowamushi Pedal, Yuri!!! on Ice, Haikyuu!!
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: none

Prompt:

"good luck at getting me to shut up"

- @craigslistlove

Prompt: Team Kanzaki Miki/Miyahara

[doxian]

Ship: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru, Ushijima Wakatoshi/Shirabu Kenjirou
Fandom: Haikyuu!!
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: unreality, animal characteristics, supernatural elements

Prompt:

"The dragon dreamt a different life, in which it was human. No matter how it tried, it couldn't wake up, and soon you forgot this is a dream."

- @MicroSFF

FILL: TEAM AKAASHI KEIJI/BOKUTO KOUTAROU, [T]

[earlgrey_milktea]

Ship: kyoutani kentarou/yahaba shigeru
Fandom: haikyuu
Major Tags: implied sexual content
Other Tags: angst, hate-fucking i guess
Word Count: 504

shoves the both of them into a huge get-along shirt that just says "it's complicated"

***

When all is said and done, they sit on opposite sides of the bed, each nursing their own wounds. Collateral damage. Kyoutani has a scratch down the side of his neck, something purple forming on his right cheek. Shigeru’s hair is a mess from where Kyoutani had his fingers buried and tangled moments before. He tastes blood on his tongue.

Somehow, they always end up here.

Shigeru has known from the first time he met that heated, hungry, and strangely hollow gaze that he was heading down a winding road without an end in sight. Kyoutani’s eyes are an endless abyss of the darkest gold, like a wolf’s stare from the shadows, preying into the dustiest and most isolated corners of Shigeru’s soul, breaking him apart over and over until Shigeru’s knees are shaking and muscles are aching and he’s left panting breathless and torn between hating the other boy and hating himself.

And it’s clear—there’s a lot of bad blood between them. They’ve squabbled like cats and dogs since they were dumb kids with egos heavier than they knew how to carry, the steady salty taste of pride resting like a blade against their tongue. Shigeru has grown used to the flames that turn his veins into electrified barbed wire whenever Kyoutani enters his orbit, but it’s the kind of burning that leaves his soul sore, the kind of wildfire that leaves something Shigeru’s too afraid to name rattling like loose change in his ribcage. There’s a lot of bad blood between them, but Shigeru’s not entirely convinced there’s love lost.

They barely even know how to be friends without tearing at each other’s throats, biting and leaving marks on bare skin, intimate places where no one like them should ever have access to. They don’t know what love is.

There’s a darkness in Kyoutani, a hunger that scares Shigeru just as much as it fascinates him. Once upon a time, Shigeru thought he could fill that hole, that he could fix the relentless need in Kyoutani. But if Shigeru is an idiot, he’s a self-aware idiot.

Once upon a time, Shigeru thought that Kyoutani could fill the throbbing emptiness in Shigeru himself.

But he can’t. Neither of them can.

So they go around like this, hurting each other until they can’t bleed anymore, slinking off to lick at their wounds, only to pull each other back, helplessly, hopelessly.

“Just go,” Shigeru says, too loud into the silence of the room, too loud to hide the waver in his voice. He doesn’t look at Kyoutani.

And of course, Kyoutani stays. There’s a shift on the bed, and then calloused palms pressing into Shigeru’s naked sides. His hands are warm. He has no fucking right to be this gentle.

“I hate you,” Shigeru says, but both of them are tired of hearing it by now.

“I know,” Kyoutani replies anyway. And when he presses his cracked lips against Shigeru’s shoulder, fingers digging into the bone at his hips and tugging, Shigeru goes with him.

PROMPT: TEAM DAIYA NO ACE

[transmiyuki]

Ship: kominato ryousuke/kuramochi youichi
Fandom: daiya no ace
Major Tags: sexual content, drugs
Other Tags: i for one love ryousan's goth boobs

Prompt:



- The cinematic masterpiece from the year 2006 known as "Evil Bong"

Prompt: Team Kanzaki Miki/Miyahara

[doxian]

Ship: Manami Sangaku/Teshima Junta
Fandom: Yowamushi Pedal
Major Tags: major character death
Other Tags: angst, possibly?

Prompt:

"What is a ghost? A tragedy condemned to repeat itself time and again? An instant of pain, perhaps. Something dead which still seems to be alive. An emotion suspended in time. Like a blurred photograph. Like an insect trapped in amber."

- The Devil’s Backbone (2001), Guillermo del Torro

PROMPT: TEAM DAIYA NO ACE

[transmiyuki]

Ship: kuramochi youichi/miyuki kazuya
Fandom: daiya no ace
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: romaaaaaaaance

Prompt:


- @NBCOUT on twitter

Prompt: Team Kanzaki Miki/Miyahara

[doxian]

Ship: Ushijima Wakatoshi/Shirabu Kenjirou
Fandom: Haikyuu!!
Major Tags: nsfw (source material)
Other Tags: none

Prompt:

"And when you finally spoke you didn’t
lift your head but simply moaned the word god
on an exhalation of breath – I knew then
I must be merciful, benevolent,
impossibly kind."

- Dorianne Laux from What We Carry, 1994

Prompt: Team Kanzaki Miki/Miyahara

[doxian]

Ship: Bokuto Koutarou/Akaashi Keiji
Fandom: Haikyuu!!
Major Tags: major character death
Other Tags: angst, possibly?

Prompt:

"What is a ghost? Something dead that seems to be / alive. Something dead that doesn’t know it’s dead."

- Richard Siken, Landscape with Fruit Rot and Millipede

Re: FILL: Team Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov, T

[foxrocksthesesocksss]

I'm glad you liked it!! I only just realised now that I miscounted and it's a 4+1 but. well. too late lmao.

Thanks for a lovely prompt! c:

PROMPT: TEAM KAGEYAMA TOBIO/OIKAWA TOORU

[intricacies]

Ship: kuroo/bokuto
Fandom: haikyuu
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: i blame hedge for introducing me to this song in the first saso

Prompt:

come be my coffee table and i'll be your sofa

— i so stunned like vegetable

PROMPT: TEAM DAIYA NO ACE

[transmiyuki]

Ship: miyuki kazuya/kuramochi youichi but also Literally Anyone
Fandom: daiya no ace
Major Tags: sexual content
Other Tags: trans character in a sexual situation, i am so fucking sorry

Prompt:


-Corinne, The Bachelor

Re: FILL: Team Otabek Altin/Yuri Plisetsky, G

[flippinflakes]

This is the cutest thing I've ever read for these two omg god bless your soul

FILL: Team The Prince of Tennis, T

[fickle]

Ship: Imayoshi/Hanamiya
Fandom: Kuroko no Basuke
Major Tags: none
Other Tags: none
Word Count: 458 words

Just some pillow talk on love and hate, nothing scary!

***

“Do you think you’re even capable of falling in love?” Imayoshi asked idly, brushing Hanamiya’s hair away from his face. Hanamiya’s eyes were half-shut, his face slack with pleasure and his mouth soft. It was a good look on him; instead of a sharpened sword, an embroidered sheath.

“Why do you ask?” Hanamiya’s eyes opened just a little wider and he smiled, lazily amused. “Are you falling for me, senpai?”

“You? I might as well put my heart in a mincer.” The very thought was enough to make Imayoshi laugh as he let his hand slide down over Hanamiya’s jaw so he could thumb at his lower lip.

“How mean.” Hanamiya pretended to sniff, his eyes shining with a glaze of tears. Imayoshi waited, unimpressed by a trick he’d seen too often to fall for, and Hanamiya laughed after a second.

He rolled over, tangling his legs with Imayoshi’s, and blinked the tears away easily.

“And true.” He kissed Imayoshi full on the mouth, hard but quick, and then let his head drop against the pillow again. “Love takes too much work. You have to learn to compromise, to tolerate, to forgive...”

Hanamiya shuddered dramatically, wrinkling his nose in distaste.

“Hate is easier. Hate takes care of itself,” he concluded.

“So are you saying you hate me, Makoto-chan?” Imayoshi smiled, sliding his hand into Hanamiya’s hair. The dark, smooth locks parted easily for his fingers, letting Imayoshi get a good grip on Hanamiya’s hair while seeming only to caress him.

“Tch. Only when you call me Makoto-chan,” Hanamiya replied, letting his eyes close.

Mistake.

Imayoshi used the hold he had on Hanamiya’s hair to jerk him up off the pillow, crashing their mouths together viciously. He bit down hard and then let go, counting on the advantage of surprise to let him get away with it before Hanamiya could bite back.

Wide-eyed and stunned, Hanamiya stared up at him for a few seconds before he started laughing.

“Are you trying to make me hate you, senpai? Because that’s not going to do the trick.”

“No,” Imayoshi said, settling down against the pillow as well. “I would never be fool enough to want you to hate me.”

But he was fool enough to want Hanamiya to feel something for him. Anything that would anchor Hanamiya, that would give Imayoshi a hold over him, would be acceptable. Hanamiya kept himself distanced even during the most intimate of moments; there was a space between them, a No Man’s Land, that was trapped with mines and waiting for one of them to make a move.

Everyone else had a weakness he could exploit. He just wanted to know Hanamiya’s.

(He wanted to be Hanamiya’s.)