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☽Madaraki Shiso☾

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

"Fly me to the moon, and let me play amongst the stars..."

As she strolled down the streets of the Cloud's housing units, she caught sight of a few people staring at her strange and glancing at her clothes, giggling and whispering as she walked on by; maybe her mom's clothes were a little too... 'old fashioned'. Or 'out of date'. But nonetheless, Shiso paid no mind and proudly sauntered in her mother's faded, worn-out orchid-colored kunoichi dogi and smiled beneath the mask she was wearing. She then brushed a lock of hair from her shoulder and combed her fingers through her long, wavy hair and pouted; in all honesty, she was considering wearing a braid here... But, then, that would restrict her from using her hair jutsu, and she didn't want that...

... Speaking of which, she wanted to try out a certain move with her hair and see if it would work or not... I mean, hair was hair, but she wanted to see if she could wind it into a fist and punch people with it... Maybe a foot, too, for kicking people... Ughhh... She was so behind on training... Perhaps coming here was a bad idea... Maybe she ought to train now that she was here, and free... Err, instead of being here, wandering around and doing nothing...

She then turned her back and began heading for the training fields; better time be spent wisely than not at all... Maybe she could work on her earth statues as well... Those things were hard to make...

"... You are all I longed for, all I worship and adore~!"

Tatsuya slowly made his way through the newly formed streets of the recently rebuilt Cloud Village, hearing hushed murmurs about how everything had changed, new shops, new ninja, new kage. Still though there was a aura of safety that seemed to make the thin air thick enough to relax a bit which made the entire village feel as though it was peaceful, like before the attack itself. Though, the boy had been sleeping through a lot in the last two days as he recovered and got himself back to the point he could actually walk around the village without his small muscles feeling as though they would fall off randomly. Not to mention his new 'holder' for his swords, it was more of a long box that could hold anything, they weren't even snug inside, they could easily hold upwards to fifteen more, but besides that he looked exactly the same as he did when he got to the exams, even to the point he didn't know any other maneuvers, he'd have to train a bit more later, maybe try some more moves...

Official Theme of Tatsuya Miyaki

See them running for their lives...

Ren started his search where he saw houses and shops. As he walked, he pulled out one of his boxes of pockey and munched on a stick. He peered around the streets and into shops but it wasn't like that was going to get him very far when he didn't know what he looked like. He tried finding someone who even remotely resembles Hiyo, or if he was lucky enough, maybe even Hiyo himself would know. But he had no such luck, and after wandering around Cloud's streets for quite some time, he realized that wandering aimlessly through the village was going to get him no where.

Neko-chan padded along at his side, glancing up at Ren with a 'Well? What's taking so long?' look. Ren just returned it with a deadpan stare that retorted, 'I'd like ta see you do betta.' Still, the cat had a point. He needed to get this mission wrapped up as quickly as possible. Well, maybe he could ask the Raikage. Obviously he'd know a lot more about a ninja from Cloud than Ren himself would. He let out an irritated sigh. It was the best idea he'd come up with all day. He might as well give it a shot. Anything to complete the mission, right? On that note, he headed for the Raikage's office.

Back where he'd seen all the shops, Ren quickly found the ones he was specifically looking for. Luckily, all were relatively near by each other. The first he headed for was a pet store. He calmly sauntered in, but he was still hurrying. He didn't want to take too long, lest he end up making Tatsuya wait. He looked around for the cat food and found a few kinds. Just like last time, he held them up for Neko-chan and let her decide which she wanted. For some reason, she always seemed to want to one that was more expensive. 'Damn money-suckin' cat.' he grunted to himself before giving in. He didn't buy quite as many as before, assuming that he'd be able to buy more at one point or another. He still got enough to satiate the cat's hunger for quite a while, while at the same time not weighing him down too much. He rushed over to the register and paid for the food, then stuffing them messily into his bag.

He left that store as quickly as he'd come in and hurried himself to his next stop. It was a weapons store. His kunai and shuriken were fully stocked, but he needed some stuff to clean his sword. He found that a lot more quickly than the cat food, and had paid and left in half the time. He still had plenty of pockey, so he didn't bother going to buy any more of that. His food stash was good and he had plenty of books for the time being, but he felt like there was one thing he still wanted to do. Oh, that's right. He'd meant to send a quick letter back home. Standing on the side of the streets, he pulled his bag in front of him and rummaged around for his notebook. Opening it and pulling his pencil out from the binding, he jotted down a quick letter, just saying he was ok and assured her and his father he wasn't spending his money all at once or wasting it on anything stupid. Ren tore out the page and shoved the note book back in his bag, still gripping his pen. He saw there was a post office or whatever just a bit further down the street and ran to it, Neko-chan close at his heels. He bought an envelope and stamp and quickly scribbled down the address before shoving it in the mail-slot.

Stuffing the pen back in his bag and hooking it on the notebook inside, he left back to the streets and made his way to the gate. He thought about how getting the letter would probably make his mom tear up in joy. Pft. How stupid. Such simple things made he so happy. Well, it definitely made it easy to please her that way. Sometimes, too easy. Especially when she let so much go unnoticed. 'Hmph. Dumbass.' he grunted to himself. Whatever was going on back home, somehow he knew that what ever bad thing was happening, Yukio was right in the middle of it. He always had been as far back as Ren could remember. That wasn't far, but it was most likely because of something Yukio did too. Well, his personal life didn't really matter anymore. Not that it ever really did. All that mattered now was his job, which at that moment required him to get his a** down to the gate to meet Tatsuya.

Seo walked around the housing district hoping to run into Shiso or Yukai. He figured they would have went back to their houses to rest after their travel back to the village. He didn't know where either of them lived so he couldn't just was like there.

He thought about hanging out in a weapon shop, he was in need of a weapon. It would give him something to do when he was bored.

He walked into the shop and headed to the blades section. He checked out the swords but it didn't seem to fit his style of fighting. Seo then came across what seemed like a deck of cards. As he inspected the cards he ran his finger along one of the edges and he felt a sharp pain. He stuck his finger in his mouth and tasted blood. He smiled as he though how cool these were. He bought ten decks comming up to a total of 520 cards. he placed one deck in his sleeve strapped to his arm for easy access during battle. He walked out and continued his walk aroung the housing district.

"Keeseeseesee~ I see you like what you.. Keekee... see.. keeseeseeese~"

The tall man with the annoying laugh hovered an awkwardly small distance above Yuzuki's head as she regarded the arthropod. His eyes were obscured, his hair was greasy and he was dressed like a flamboyant, homeless man. In a word, he was sketchy. However, in his left hand, he held a broom, so it could only be assumed he was working in the shop part time.

He bounced back on his heels to allow Yuzuki room to stand up straight (and breathe, as he smelled overwhelmingly of candy and... lettuce).

A muffled voice coming from the back room, perhaps this man's boss, shouted something unintelligible, but it sounded like either "Get back to work!" or "Stay away from the children!" Regardless, the man with the unsettlingly pointy grin frowned, but didn't move further than to lean against his broom. He seemed to be waiting for Yuzuki to reply.

"Seven-thousand ryo," he answered automatically. That was... an astronomical amount for a pet.

"It's an astronomical amount for a pet, isn't it?"

He managed to lean down to Yuzuki's level and slither 180-degrees so he was hovering over her shoulder again in one, fluid motion.

"But I know a seeee-creeeeet~"

And he was back facing her again; unnatural smile present and accounted for.

"You're a ninja, aren'tcha?" he didn't bother waiting for a reply, "I can tell. I can tell these things, you know. I have an eye for these things."

Was he aware of the irony in his statement? He wiggled his finger at Yuzuki in a way that made the appendage appear jointless and rubbery.

It was noteworthy that for someone working part-time to clean a small shop, this man had extremely dainty hands. They were almost pretty in their femininity--like he hadn't done much work with them. However, the pad of each finger was sliced several times with a half-healed scab. On his right pointer finger he wore a sort of ring that had a tiny blade protruding from it. If it wasn't obvious before, this guy had some strange habits.

"Ah... But then again, ninja are a dime a dozen 'round these parts. It's sort of the flaw of these ninja villages with their schools and whatnot. It kills the mystery. It kills the... appeal of ninja. You know? You do. It makes them plain and boring. Average. Run-of-the-mill."

He seemed to have many more synonyms for not-special to add to his rant, but reigned himself in.

"You're not one of those booooring, unspecial ninja are you?" he whined, leaning forward melodramatically. Despite his thin frame, it was any wonder that old broom he was supporting himself with hadn't snapped yet.

The man was silent. His eyes couldn't be seen, but the vacant blinking was damn near audible with the intensity he seemed to be soaking in the setting. His smile was perfectly inverted in thought.

Then it faded upright once more.

"Obvious answer is obvious... but you get an A+ for effort!" He tittered, rushing forward awkwardly to link arms with Yuzuki.

"Come, child! We you much have to learn! Much!" He flung his broom-hand up in excitement and accidental sent it flying to the other side of the shop with a clatter.

The voice from the back room picked up again, sounding much angrier at the crashing sound the broom made. The mystery man's smile faltered.

"Time to go! By the way, you have a name, yes? I can't keep calling you ragamuffin, can I? People call me Kishi!"

Undoubtedly, this pseudonym was just a play off his obnoxious "keeseesee" laughter, but there was very little chance "Kishi" was going to give his actual name.

"By the way..." He leaned down again to Yuzuki's ear.

"I don't actually work here~"

Momma always did say that strangers had the best candy.