YURI SHIPPING OLYMPICS 2024 - BONUS ROUND 3

[a1c0bb]

For this bonus round, we're looking for prompts inspired by plant/flower symbolism and the language(s) of flowers!

Here are some resources on flower meanings:
Script Florist
Farmer's Almanac
Wikipedia: Hanakotoba
Wikipedia: Plant Symbolism

This round will end on July 1st.

Fills can be in any format, and you can fill your teammates prompts, but you cannot fill your own prompt.

You can post as many fills and as many prompts as you want!

for your prompt post title, please use the following format:

PROMPT: TEAM [TEAM NAME]

for your fill post title, please use the following format:

FILL: TEAM [TEAM NAME]

POINTS - BONUS ROUNDS
For prompts: 10 points each (maximum of 150 prompt points per team per round)
For fills:
First 4 fills by any member of your team: 100 points each
Fills 5-10: 50 points each
Fills 11-20: 40 points each
Fills 21-50: 30 points each
Fills 51+: 25 points each

Comments

FILL: Team Kittyuri

[missiletoe]

Ship: Kitty/Yuri
Word Count: 952
i've never actually read the story haha but it definitely sounds interesting and i hope i did the prompt justice!

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An unfamiliar woman swings into her carriage on the eve of her wedding. Yuri stares blankly at her masked face.

“Hi,” the woman says, hiking up the cloth on her face. Her eyes are bright and her lips are small and cute. Yuri has never seen unpainted lips out in public before. She’s never seen ones so adorable either. “Wow, you’re even prettier than the rumors say! How many people did you kill?”

She elbows Yuri in the ribs but Yuri just blinks back in a daze.

“Sorry, what?”

The woman–girl? She can’t be any older than Yuri but Yuri doesn’t even know what to consider herself. Betrothed at 16 and married at 17, she wonders where on the spectrum that puts her. Regardless, the person in her carriage does some weird shaking motions with her hands and laughs.

“There are dead bodies buried under the cherry trees!” she recites, putting on airs. Yuri thinks it’s supposed to be some attempt at a Western accent but no recognition crosses her face.

Pity that her father always insisted on polishing her poise rather than her prose. It’s a testament to their family business that runs on reputation more than anything else. Her mother could run the company a thousand times better if only her father would let her step out from the kitchen.

The girl frowns at her confusion.

“Seriously? You don’t know that one?” she asks and Yuri shakes her head mutely. “It’s true, I swear. How else could they flower that beautifully?”

Ah. Yuri doesn’t need to know the story to understand the sentiment. She wonders how many lives her mother has ruined to grow her, how many peoples’ blood, sweat and tears she’s been watered with over the years.

Yuri laughs bitterly at the irony. She touches her clothes made of silk and the paint layered painstakingly onto her face. And for what? All that work and for what? For a pretty face in the window and a lifetime relegation to the kitchen–forever on display but never to be touched?

Flowers are so pretty yet so fragile in the wind.

“Well,” the girl interjects cautiously, like Yuri’s entire inner turmoil is written clearly in the lines of her face. Fuck–she’d been careless. She wipes the expression off her face like she’s polishing a silver plate. “I was just trying to say that you’re pretty. Way prettier than the rumors say and way too pretty to marry an old, fat man like–ah, sorry! That’s your husband, my bad! Just forget I said anything.”

The girl in her carriage is a wreck–nothing like the slow, old man her father had her betrothed to. He’d probably die of a heart attack if that many emotions crossed his face.

“Let me try this again,” the girl says, sucking in a breath. Her lips form the numbers as she counts to three. “Hi, my name is Kitty!” A pseudonym, clearly. Yuri takes the hand she extends out to her. “And I’ve come to kidnap you.”

What the fuck. The world grinds to a halt and it takes Yuri a few moments to realize that the standstill isn’t just in her mind. The carriage has stopped moving and Kitty takes a peek out the curtain. Whatever she sees brings a smile to her face. It’s a beautiful sight.

“And that’s my cue! Chop-chop, we’ve got places to be!” She pulls a blade out easily from her belt, as natural as if she’s breathing air, and presses the tip under Yuri’s chin. “I don’t have to tell you what happens if you don’t behave, right?”

Yuri feels her heart in her throat but nods regardless. Kitty grins and hops out of the carriage. There’s an array of scuff marks on the back of her boots.

“I knew there was a reason I liked you!”

Yuri reaches out for her hand but she’s a second too slow.

“Wait!” she yells. Kitty tosses a cautious smile over her shoulder.

“Wait, what?”

“I’ll double your payment if you take me with you,” she huffs and Kitty arches an eyebrow.

“That’s the plan–you know, the whole kidnapping thing?”

“No.” Yuri’s resolution is palpable, she can feel it in her throat when she swallows. “I want to join you. Take me with you. You said I’m too pretty to marry that fat old man after all, right?”

Kitty blinks at her. She leans against the carriage and presses the tip of the blade against her lip in contemplation.

“Wow, you’re more gutsy than I thought,” she says finally. It’s not a no and Yuri clings to the knowledge like it’s a lifeline.

“My hair pin is worth more than your weight in gold,” she says, untangling it from her hair. These curls took two days to shape and Yuri pulls them loose without a second thought. “And I know where my parents will send people first. I can help keep you out of sight.”

Kitty leans in close, hands pressed behind her back as she studies her.

“You can’t back out halfway,” she says. “If you’re in with us–you’re in all the way.” Yuri nods back. The adrenaline is making her heart throb violently against the cage of her chest.

“Then, welcome to the team, Yuri!” Kitty laughs, sticking her hand out. “We’re glad to have you–or at least I am! Minho’s probably gonna be a bitch about it but he’s always a bitch so just ignore him.”

Yuri grins. Kitty’s spiraling is already amusing and it’s only been ten minutes since they’ve known each other. She wonders what a lifetime would look like.

Yuri takes her open hand and steps out of the carriage. Outside, it’s the first day of spring.