Challenge#4: The Art of Fishing by louiselux and emungere, Tenpou/Kenren
Title: The Art of Fishing
Authors: emungere and louiselux
Challenge: #4 - collaboration
Word count: 1000 (in Word)
Warnings: worksafe
Pairing: Tenpou/Kenren

The Art of Fishing




The boat, of traditional wooden manufacture, Tenpou noted, was very comfortable. Kenren had been thoughtful enough to bring blankets and there was a surfeit of squashy cushions.

Perhaps it wasn't the most practical fishing vessel he'd ever seen, but Kenren was probably very skilled and didn't need to consider the technical side of things, like where to keep one's boxes of maggots. He put them under one of the cushions, for later.

Kenren cast off and leaned back with a pleased sigh. He took a few lazy pulls on the oars, and they floated out, caught by the slow current.

The boat drifted to a stop, and Kenren stuck a hand under some pillows--perhaps looking for his own maggots? But no, he came out with a can of beer, which he tossed to Tenpou.

It was, of course, thoughtful of Kenren to provide refreshments, though something stronger might have been more advantageous, for Tenpou's purposes if not for the actual catching of fish.

'Shouldn't we, ah, do some fishing now?' he said, several beers later.

Kenren had his eyes closed and was sprawled back on the cushions, his face tilted at the sun.

'Nah, not yet. I don't think the fish are ready for us,' Kenren said, looking very seriously at Tenpou over the top of his can.

'How can you tell?' Tenpou asked.

'Because, um, it's river lore.' Tenpou watched him stretch his long legs and yawn. 'Comes with experience.'

'River law?' Tenpou muttered.

Kenren brightened. 'Yeah, law. S'what I said. We'll get in trouble if we start too soon. It's illegal.'

Tenpou unhooked one of his specially purchased rubber worms from the brim of his new hat. It had a large and deadly hook in one end. He eyed Kenren as he twirled it between his fingers.

'Is that so?' he asked.

Kenren sat up rather quickly, nearly overbalancing his beer. 'Y'know, I think it's been long enough, now that you mention it.'

'I'm taking these back to the shop later,' Kenren said, after long minutes of struggling with fishing line and the fancy carbon fibre rods he'd bought from the fishing shop that morning. His easy grin was gone and he was sweating in the warm sunshine.

'Are you sure you've done this before?' Tenpou said. 'I think the hook goes round the other way. Where the fish can bite it.'

'Fine,' Kenren said, not at all calmly.

'Oh, look. An enormous fish!'

'Where?' Kenren craned over the side.

'In the water.'

'Very funny.'

Kenren scowled and Tenpou gently took one of the rods from him and affixed the rubber worm to the end.

'Those are just for tourists,' Kenren said. 'You're never gonna catch anything with that.'

Tenpou found it unlikely that Kenren would catch anything either if he kept dropping his own bait like that. He chose, however, to say nothing and flicked his line into the water.

'Show off,' Kenren muttered.

They settled down, side by side. Time passed. Nothing happened. Tenpou stared hard at the water, but it was broken only by the tiny ripples of the river current. Perhaps he should have bought a book, thought Tenpou, but Kenren seemed happy-- quiet and still for once, his eyes almost shut.

Maybe it was the sunshine, or the rocking of the boat, or having something soft to lean on. Perhaps it was the incredible dullness of fishing as a sport, but at some point later Tenpou realised Kenren was calling him, and increasingly loudly.

'Marshal. Marshal! I need my shoulder back,' he was saying. 'We've got something,' and he wobbled to his feet.

'Oh, thank heavens,' Tenpou muttered.

The boat began to rock quite violently, and he turned to watch with interest as Kenren stood up and braced himself, wrestling with the furiously spinning reel.

'It must be very big,' Tenpou observed. 'Were you using a rubber worm or a real one, out of interest?'

Kenren lurched and swore. The fish was tugging the boat along now in slow, steady jerks. Kenren's rod bent in a tight arc, the tip pulling sharply down.

'A hand please, Marshal!'

Kenren was canted over at an unstable-looking angle.

'Oh, yes of course. Hang on,' he said, moving just slowly enough to allow Kenren to plunge overboard.

Tenpou worried briefly that perhaps Kenren's swimming abilities were as deficient as his fishing abilities seemed to be, but it was only seconds before his general bobbed to the surface. Together, they watched the fishing rod zig-zag across the surface of the water at high speed and finally vanish beneath the surface.

'Looks like I landed a big one after all,' Tenpou murmured, smiling.

Kenren climbed back into the boat and flopped wetly into the nest of cushions, blinking at Tenpou. 'What?'

'Nothing. You look a bit chilly.'

Kenren glared at him. Water ran down from his hair to drip steadily off the end of his nose. He was shivering. 'Gosh, I wonder why.'

'Perhaps it's because all your clothes are wet?' Tenpou suggested. 'It might help if you removed them.'

'I bet you were planning this all along,' Kenren muttered in his ear as Tenpou slid heavy wet cloth off his shoulders. Kenren's shoulders were smooth and pale and his firm skin was raised all over in goose flesh. It was cool under Tenpou's fingertips.

Tenpou pulled back a little to see his face, but he was smiling, mouth crooked up on one side. He smelled of river water.

They found a strand of green weed in his trousers, a minnow heaving its gills in his pocket and fish scales that glittered in the sun where they clung to his bare chest.

'It was a river dolphin that pulled you in,' Tenpou said afterwards, sprawled back on the cushions with Kenren's head resting on his stomach, fingers in his hair.

'How do you know?'

'They're quite unscrupulous. They'll do almost anything, given the proper motivation.'

Kenren gave him a suspicious look. 'Motivation?'

'Say, for instance, a box of maggots.'