Welcome to Gaia! ::

Artemis slowly backed away when Keiko let her hand go. Judging from past experiences, this was not a good thing... She slowly lowered her hand first, taking a simultaneous step backwards. When adults began talking like that... Her eyes were widened, in fear, probably...

And she was pretty sure they might be better than her... Gig, at least, scared her... Wires began unrolling around her arms, even finer than the ones on her legs. Razor sharp wires. How the hell she managed to hide spools of these things every was beyond most people. As it was, she had several hundred feet of wire, and several poisons in vials on a garter beneath her dress. She had wires pre-poisoned with anemone poison, but she wasn't sure that would get her out of a fight in this area... If she hit a civilian, it might not kill them, but it would waste a whole dose...

How strange. A scared child was inventorying both her fight and her flight responses... As it was, though... She glanced to the rafters above them. She seemed so nice, though.... A razor-fine wire began to climb its near-invisible way to the rafters above their heads, wrapping once around the support. Just in case...

Artemis sat down, her hands playing with the skirt of her dress. She accepted the apple with a small "Thank you."from Giglamesh, even though she didn't particularly like food... She held it in both hands, though, and bit into it while she waited for the grown-ups to finish their discussion. She was busy occupying herself with the fruit, so she wasn't consciously listening to their conversation.

Giglamesh seemed to have had a change of heart... She noticed that herself... And scattered memories came back to her once he spoke of the mission... She could hear five voices screaming. One was taunting the others, and four were screaming in pain... It didn't particularly bother her. She had grown accustomed to hearing things that she hadn't done... It was just like some sixth sense or something. Oh, well. I couldn't help them if I tried. She was a very good actor... But that centered around the fact that she didn't have to act to be a child. Her innocence played the largest role of all, in any of her productions. Seduction, intimidation, trickery, and every underhanded means of espionage... But she didn't really remember them... Foggy memories...

And since time didn't pass for her, she would never notice when she was gone for even years on missions. It would be just like it had been when she had left, and she accepted as a matter-of-fact that people changed, and they did so quickly. She didn't have any experiences with death, so she couldn't know that soon --by her standards, at least...-- They would all be dead... And They would tell her it was just another fact of life that when people disappeared, they did it for the good of the village... They were protecting us, and they were never going to come back. They were going to spend the rest of time fighting against the Bad Ones. Somewhere she knew this. But whether or not that would ever factor into the equation then was a question for someone else...

(come on proto for fun rp them out flashing shin for some laughs )

Rush followed Shadow and Karnage, who he knew of, just never on a really personal level. He'd like to take this opprotunity to enjoy the company of his cousin and Shadow's good friend. If he were more concerned about the exam, which perhaps he shouls be, he'd be more persistent in studing the competion, but this was a much more pleasurable time. It would be worth it. When they sat down, there was alcohol present . . .Booze, porn, things were pretty different in Iwa. He wasn't sure laws or anything here, but he did want to live a little the day before he very well may die a little. He sat kicking his feet, staring the bottle down, watching small bubblesappear and dissapate later after rising to the top. His fixation was interupted by Shadow's statement of a powerful attitude. He made a point, Rush went into the ninja buisness clueless about it except for what Shadow told him, so he based a lot of his skills off of what Shadow was good at, so really Shadow is just a much better Rush. Although Rush did have his Kekkai Genkai, but Shadow could probably evade the tendrils with ease. Well, Rush knew what he was getting into when he accepted to go. The whole going in the name of Suna was a little intimidating, but still, not much more than it already was. Rush just decided to focus on the other part of Shadow's question,

"Haha, I've been mastering my candy jutsu! It's awesome! And someone called me the candyman once and it was great! And I made caramel traps, and someone was like 'that's stupid' and then they were all 'oh no, im in caramel!' and I'm like hell yeah! And now I'm training under Lokail in Suna and-you know Lokail- and he's all 'I hate you' but then we kill some guys and they explode, and he's like 'I hate you, but you don't completely suck, except YOU DO' and im all 'cool, i think' and it's AWESOME!"

Rush would have continued in incomprehensible banter, but found himself turning blue with a need to breathe. He gasped and then kinda turned away. When he was around his family, the kid in him came out a lot, because Shadow is the only one that he was memories of from his childhood. He clammered up, looked at the bubbles in the drink, still tempted to sip, but at the moment felt the maturity required to drink, and that which he had didn't match . . .

Shadow laughed as his cousin talked, enjoying his tail. The one named Lokail seemed interesting, he was pretty sure he had heard stories about him, but didn't know for sure. Shadow noticed his cousin eying the bottle and he grinned, sliding it over to him.

Come on! You both should drink up it'll make you feel better! And don't think i've forgotten about you, Karn! I'm still wondering what the hell YOU plan on doing! He munched at the food that arrived and nodded at Karn's question in agreement. Yeah, that would be fun! Want me to go collect a super sexy mission for us? He finished his food and took one last shot of the sake. He was starting to feel more than a little tipsy, however he was good enough for a simple mission. He poured a cup for the three of them and then said However first, here's to the Chuunins! And... I want you to both do me a favor, if you run into to much trouble, or things get really heated, get out of there fast, alright? Don't try to go in over your head...

Karnage stopped mid-panel on the page when he heard Shadow's favor. This was the type of nonsense that made Karnage flustered to be on the same team as Shadow.

He returned to reading, but stated very matter-of-factly to shadow, "I believe now it is most pertinent to say that the paradigm between us isn't as great as you think. Perhaps between your cousin and us, yes. But between us and the more elite..." he turned his attention to Rush for a brief second. "No offense." He turned back, "There is little we couldn't handle besides perhaps a full scale invasion from about two different nations at the same time... But that would never happen..." he closed his eyes for a moment, he was getting off topic. "Simply put, heed your own advice as well or I'll kill you myself, ok Shadow?"

These words were said in the same matter as Shadow's warning; And perhaps in hindsight, Karnage was just over reacting. He just didn't like the idea of Shadow believing he could defend everyone, it would just lead to his own self-destruction when he couldn't save someone. But this was just Shadow's way of being like that man...

"And I don't drink..." Karnage said turning the page on his 'basically porn' manga. "It's a terrible habit..."

((Now Cannabis, THAT's a habit for winners!))

Karnage was officially flustered by his friend's brash interpretation of his words. But then again, perhaps he too interpreted his friend's warning too harshly; But never the less, two wrongs did not make a right. He grabbed his friend's hand firmly. And with a stern push he forced his hand forward into Shadow's chest against the will of Shadow's hand.
"No, I believe you are the man!" he said with somewhat of a grunt.

Karnage I felt Shadow's footing giving way, an unfavorable side effect of the booze. This was a perfect example why he didn't drink, if he got in a child's game of strength with a ninja he would be totally screwed. He gave a mighty push forward, and with vigor he called out, "No you are the man you drunken scoundrel!"

((Ironic Humor... Cause you only want it to be funny to you...)