SASO Referees (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
referees) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
sportsanime2015-07-12 12:47 pm
referees) wrote in sportsanime2015-07-12 12:47 pm
Entry tags:
Bonus Round 4: Official Art
Bonus Round 4: Official Art
This round is CLOSED. Late fills can be posted, but they won't receive points.
Memorable canon moments, bizarre omakes, tantalizing magazine spreads—this is the round to explore them all. Bring out your screencaps, promotional art, and manga pages, and let's talk about what really happened.
Please read the rules carefully before posting!
RULES
- Submit prompts in the form of a canon screencap from one of our nominated fandoms along with a ship. Screencaps can be from an anime or manga, as well as any other kind of offshoot media, e.g. official art, drama CD covers, light novel illustrations, magazine covers, and/or caps from games. Doujinshi, fan-made games or any other fan-created work should not be prompted, even if you receive permission. Only prompt screencaps that are taken from a piece of canon media.
- Keep your prompt concise. Don't prompt a whole manga chapter, for example.
- Upload the cap somewhere (imgur works well) and post here with the images themselves or a link to them.
- Your prompt MUST include some kind of relationship. Platonic relationships are indicated by an "&" between the names (e.g., Riko & Momoi). Non-platonic relationships use "/" (e.g., Riko/Momoi). Please don't say "Any pairing," either!
- Fill prompts by leaving a responding comment to the prompt with your newly-created work inspired by the cap.
- Fills can be directly connected to the cap, e.g. panel redraws or writing fic that fleshes out the moment that was capped or that fleshes out what happened directly before/after, but fills can also be more indirectly linked. As long as the work is somehow inspired by the cap, it counts.
- 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)
Format your comment in one of the following ways:
| If PROMPTING: | If FILLING: | If FILLING as a TEAM GRANDSTAND participant: |
PROMPT: TEAM [YOUR SHIP]
|
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 prompts/fills as you want!For prompts: 5 points each (maximum of 50 prompt points per team per round)
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 MATSUOKA RIN/NANASE HARUKA, T (PART 2/2)
Haruka was no skittish school of salmon, though, and he’d long since learned to read—and navigate—Rin’s hunting strategy. “As if I need an excuse; you’re the one always throwing yourself at me.”
Rin sputtered in offense. “I am not!”
“Three nights ago, when everyone else took shore leave.”
Rin clammed up for a few long moments, crossing his arms angrily over his chest and then wincing when he remembered his bite. “…Well you’re such a cold fish; it’s like trying to mate with a fucking sea turtle.”
Haruka raised a brow. “You know this from experience?”
“It’s a figure of speech! Ah—” He inhaled sharply as the last vestiges of his Siren self melted away, finally freeing him to stretch his long, muscled human legs. “Finally; I was getting tired of sitting down here.”
He swiveled around on his bench, groping for the rope ladder, but before he could begin to haul himself back up, Haruka stopped him with a hand on his arm, tugging gently. “Stay for a while longer.”
“Huh? Why? I’m gonna freeze down here if I don’t get my breeches on; these legs have no blubber!” When Haruka just tightened his grip insistently, he quickly calmed and added, “…Unless you can find some other way to warm me up?” He shifted closer, threatening to unbalance the dinghy. “Did you take issue with that ‘cold fish’ comment and want to prove me otherwise? I’m not an unreasonable Siren; I’m open to persuasion. You will, of course, have to be very convincing though…” He draped himself bodily over Haruka, and for all his protests about being chilly, his bulk burned and seared where their flesh touched.
Haruka shrugged him off, abruptly regretting his impulsive actions and grabbing for the rope ladder himself. “Never mind; you’re right, we should get you into some proper clothes.”
“What?” He reached for a handful of Haruka’s shirt. “You just asked me to stay a while longer!”
“We’ve stayed longer, technically—” Rin’s confused frown only deepened into an irritated scowl. It was somehow still quite becoming on him, though, and Haruka supposed that just showed how powerful a Siren’s charms could be. “Rei’s calculated a course for us to take advantage of the morning gales coming at sunrise; we’ll need all hands on deck, so there’s no time for…”
“Bullshit; we could go three rounds at the rate you usually finish and still get a good night’s rest,” Rin snorted derisively, but the edge was fading from his tone. “…I saw that route Ryuugazaki’s plotting for you.”
“And?”
“And it’s dangerous; there’s underwater peaks that nearly brush the surface—you’ll never see them, and they’ll tear the ship apart. Plus the current’s strong—probably stronger than these winds Ryuugazaki’s relying on. We’ll be off course in the blink of an eye and probably stranded for it.”
“We’ll manage. I have faith in my crew.”
“Not even Sirens go there—for good reason! Take the long way around, instead of risking the lives of you and your crew. It’s too dangerous.”
“You’ve said that before.”
“Because you keep insisting we take these routes we’re better off avoiding! Your crew won’t stand for it much longer.”
“They won’t have to,” was his soft, oblique response, and he could feel Rin’s ire rising—finally releasing in a snapped huff.
“…I know what you’re doing, you know.”
“Hm.” That would make one of them.
Rin leaned forward, one arm braced on either side of the dinghy, to fill Haruka’s vision. “You can’t force me to fulfill the contract.”
“Can’t I?”
Rin grit his teeth. “Don’t force me to, then!”
Ultimately, of course, Rin couldn’t stop him. He couldn’t stop Haruka from sailing headlong into danger, from placing himself in harm’s way and forcing Rin to either save him or let him die—and they’d worked themselves too firmly under each other’s skin to let the latter happen. They were like strands of kelp entangled in one another now, unable to wriggle free under their own power. Haruka’s harpoon was lodged deep within Rin, and he needed to just yank it out—the wound would bleed, and it would hurt like hell, but at least Rin could leave then if he wanted. At least they’d finally know if he wanted to leave.
He’d tried asking Rin about it once, and—shamefully—Rin had been forced to admit he didn’t really understand it all that well himself. What had started out eons ago as a mere display of pride and honor had evolved into an innate compulsion to repay a debt accrued. It was a physical yearning, a drive no Siren could resist: like for like, bound and bonded until the contract was complete. Until he finally saved Haruka’s life in recompense for Haruka saving his, he could not be freed—no, did not even want to be free.
“It’s kind of like imprinting, I guess—I don’t know you, I don’t know who you are, I just know that…I need to be with you, I need to protect you. Once I’ve done that, then maybe I’ll feel different. Maybe all of the things I found kind of charming or amusing will seem annoying or downright piss me off. I find that hard to believe—but it’s been known to happen.” He’d grinned self-deprecatingly at that. “I can’t really imagine you irritating me any more than you already do, though, so maybe it won’t work out like that for us?”
Knowing that, knowing that Rin himself wasn’t even really sure of how he felt should have given him pause, should have kept him cloistered in his captain’s quarters, far away from the strange creature unwillingly bound to him. But instead, he’d sought Rin’s counsel on routes Rei was considering, had joined him on dusk and dawn hunts when the seas were flat and calm and clear, had welcomed him eagerly—he took offense at that ‘cold fish’ remark—when he ought to have firmly turned Rin down. He’d made inappropriate, immoral choices every step of the way—and he’d enjoyed it.
Rin was like a brisk sea spray crashing against the bow as Haruka’s ship cut through, pushing against him and making the eventual journey all the sweeter for the trouble he’d endured. Rin’s presence was trying—but it was educational as well, opening Haruka’s eyes and mind to new horizons yet to explore. Without Rin, he would have been content sailing up and down the coast for the rest of his career, gazing out at the distant line between sea and sky but never racing to touch it. Rin pushed him to reach further, farther, and to reset his goals once he’d met them.
Was it any surprise he was terrified of it ending? Of realizing that, without this life debt hanging over their heads like a swinging double-edged pendulum, it had never been real to begin with?
Ending it was all he had left; he couldn’t indulge like a child any longer—he needed to free Rin and dig out this infection by the root. He’d seen enough sights; he didn’t need to be shown any more. He would have to find them on his own; relying on Rin—on a creature who didn’t even know if he wanted to be here in the first place—was no longer an option. As the one person between the both of them who could think without clouded judgment, it was his responsibility to do the right thing. Rin was a free spirit; he needed to be free in body as well.
He hauled himself up, bracing one foot against the rope rung. “We make sail at dawn; get some rest while you can—we’ll need you in the water spotting.”
“You’re scared.” Haruka paused, fists white-knuckled where they clenched the ladder. “You’re scared that when this is over, I’m gonna turn tail and swim away. So you want to hurry up and get it over with while you’ve still got whatever passes for a heart in that chest of yours intact. I’m right, aren’t I?”
After a long, tense silence, Haruka began to climb again, and Rin grabbed one leg and jerked him down hard, bringing him clattering back down into the dinghy, which rocked dangerously beneath their weights. Rin then sank to his knees, straddling Haruka—and by this point, the tarp was really sparing nothing—and grabbed him by the lapels. “Well too bad. Because that’s what life is—a constant cycle of fear and anxiety and worry, with the odd moment of comfort in between. I’ve given you three years of comfort now, three years of my life never knowing if what I feel is really what I feel or just some part of my biology telling me I feel that way to convince me to keep trying to save your ass. You hate not knowing if I really love you? Try being me. Try not even knowing it yourself. So go on—chart whatever course you feel like. You’re gonna get knocked overboard or sucked through an eddy into a sink pool or run down by a shark three body lengths from safety—and I’m gonna save your life, just like you want.” He then shoved Haruka away roughly, pulling back and readjusting the tarp around his midsection as he stood with one hand gripping the ladder. “But that’s not where it ends. I don’t know what lies on the other side of that moment—but if it turns out that none of this mattered, that I still want to leave…then you’ll just have to grow a pair and come after me. Chase me to the ends of the earth and back until you wear me down and pull me back in.”
Haruka grimaced—even after Rin had won his freedom, he still wanted to be bound again? That made no sense. No sense at all.
“I know you hate effort,” Rin added with a softer tone, a bit of humor edging his voice. “And it may be a hell of an effort—but if you don’t want me to leave so bad…then just don’t let me go. You’re a pirate, aren’t you? You take what you want, and you don’t accept defeat. Unless I’m worth less to you than a handful of doubloons?”
The dinghy rocked uncertainly, sitting higher on the water as Rin climbed up the ladder. Haruka didn’t try to stop him this time—but just before Rin disappeared over the ship’s railing after scaling the side, he stood, bracing one arm against the hull for balance, and called up, “…Then you’d better swim fast.”
Re: FILL: TEAM MATSUOKA RIN/NANASE HARUKA, T (PART 2/2)