In which Vladimir Vladimirovich does Prince of Hockey, sort of

[petronia]

Did mention, didn't I, that I'd been afflicted all week with skating-rink!Fuji? This is the result: tonight while eating maple syrup ham at Movenpick's with Ced and talking Habs vs. Leafs and real fansites for non-existent anime series (wanted to go see RotK but there were no early showing tickets to be had, believe it or not), I had one of those brainstorms that seem like a genius idea at the first, key word being seem. To wit, why not have an AU in which all the tennis boys are actually hockey players instead? You could have Fuji on skates, and it would totally solve the odd man out problem, because they'd have to continually rotate lines within each game anyway. (Bear with me.) It wasn't until I was on the metro home that it occurred to me that you'd have to explain why there was this bantam hockey team in Ontario or whatever completely comprised of Japanese teenagers behaving as such, given which in fact it would be much easier to write an AU Tokyo that happened to be bitterly cold in winter and chock full of outdoor skating rinks and high school hockey clubs. No, really. It'd be like Nabokov's Ada, y'know, in which Russia is actually Canada / Northern United States, and always has been, so you have characters like Baroness Something-skaya whose ancestral demesnes were in Milwaukee or whatnot. It makes total sense when one's reading, and I've always considered it the most delightfully offbeat metaphor for the immigrant experience (though now that I think about it, maybe Nabokov was just lazy like me and didn't want to bother separating his plot ideas that belong to different geographical settings either XD;;;).

Which then leaves the difficult issue, namely, who gets to be goalie? ...The obvious choice would be Kikumaru, actually, and Oishi is as obvious a defenseman as Momo is an obvious wing, so he wouldn't be too far off - except Eiji has the least stamina and most fragile concentration of the Seigaku regulars, and for his sins a goaltender is the only one who needs to be out there for the full sixty minutes. (Does a bantam hockey game last for sixty minutes? That's a good question. Do I need to get a life? That's an even better one.) So not Eiji, upon which I do rather confess myself stumped, and inclined to proceed by elimination. I'd ask for help but I bet none of you people are even following my train of thought, why do I bother to post the details of my travails? XD Fine, I'll just make up my lines like Ryuzaki-sensei.

Defense (take 1) - Kikumaru [L], Oishi [R] (I'm assigning these at random because I don't know what effect being left-handed has on hockey)
Defense (take 2) - Fuji [L], Inui [R] (sort of want to put Taka, but I have trouble seeing burning!Taka on defense, and Inui would clean up in this position. "Based on current player placement and your personal data, there's a 95% chance that you'll attempt a slapshot into the top left corner of the net.")

Offense Top Line (take 1) - Echizen [L], Tezuka [C], Fuji [R] (*cackles*)
Offense Top Line (take 2) - Echizen [L], Fuji [C], Momoshiro [R] (this for when they're trying to spare Tezuka in the second period etc.; or Momo could centre, as Fuji's kinda slight, but then again Fuji's much more opportunistic)
Offense Second Line (take 1) - Kaidou [L], Inui [C], Momoshiro [R]
Offense Second Line (take 2) - Fuji [L], Inui [C], Kawamura [R]
Checking Line (if it ever comes in handy) - Kaidou [L], Momoshiro [C], Kawamura [R] (or you could put in Arai! XD)

Thought of having a fourth line with the Ichinensei, but I'm not that cruel. ...Looking at this, though, either Fuji or Inui's got to go in goal, it's not much of a choice. ^^;

Yeah, that was pretty much the weirdest post ever. (What d'you mean, people don't really watch this schtuff for the sports? Of course it's all about the sports.) The next one will be Christmas music, though.

Comments

[akatonbo.livejournal.com]

Y'know, I had the thought sometime this fall that blitzball is hockey.

No, really, it is. The teams are made up the same way, and what other sport would logically progress to the sort of tactics that blitzball players use?

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I've always thought blitzball was more like soccer. It doesn't move as fast as hockey, and the ball is too big. I guess it would be hockey if one line switch were a full game.

And hockey isn't really all that thuggish. ^^; It's just that the checking is necessarily explosive because all the players are moving so fast.