"Matched," Persona 3/FFXII
Title: Matched Author: Laylah Fandom: Persona 3/Final Fantasy XII Characters: Minato and Ashe Rating: worksafe Prompt: 11 and 12 play a game or sport together
Matched
Dalmasca -- this is unheard of, from what Minato has overheard in the gaps between tracks, when his headphones barely muffle the gossip going on around him -- has a girl on their kendo team. The rest of Gekkoukan's team laughs about it in the van on the way to the meet, wondering who'll get matched with her, boasting about how they're gentlemanly enough not to beat her too badly.
Minato has seen the way Mitsuru handles a sword, though, and even if her saber is a lighter blade than the kendo shinai, he can draw conclusions from there. He closes his eyes, listens to the way the team's chatter rises and falls.
He's not surprised when he's the one matched against her in the draw. You got crazy luck, man, Junpei would say. This kind of shit always happens to you. Minato smiles, and tucks that side of himself a little further to the back of his head. The Magician might win girls' hearts every once in a while, but he doesn't win kendo matches. As much as Junpei would hate to hear it.
When the girl steps onto the mat and her name is announced, he is surprised for a minute. She's more like Mitsuru than he realized -- not only is she important enough that her family named the school she attends, but she has the same kind of focus in her gray eyes, the same kind of pride in the set of her shoulders. Minato bows, neither so shallowly as to be dismissive nor so deeply as to be mocking, and she does likewise, meeting him as a matched opponent. If he has the chance to speak to her after the match, he thinks, he'll need the elegance and power of the Empress.
If he wants to stand a chance against her now, though, he's going to need to make himself all Chariot.