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"So yes, we should..." But she stopped mid-speech and...

Yokou stared.

The chair her sensei was sitting on was empty, an outline of a silhouette the only trace remaining of the missing Senju. There was a long silence, while the restaurant seemed to quiet with bated breath. But while the Hyuuga head of family's face was calm, those who knew her would know better...as the temperature in the room all too suddenly dropped quite several considerable degrees.

And then, her right eye twitched.

I'll kill him!!!

That b*****d. He...he...the storm of destruction, the wild animal - her Sensei, Senju Zephyr - HE'S ON THE LOOSE!?!?!? She wanted to scream, she wanted to pull her hair...she wanted to weep, she wanted to swing Kusanagi cleaving through the table, or better yet, right through that jerk's iron skull...Hokage position or not be damned.

A vein throbbed, dagerously, on her cheek.

"Excuse me, Kisuke." She gritted out. And then, the flames of hell burned in her eyes. "I have a wild animal to catch..." Furiously, she reached into her pockets, slammed down the tip on the table, and activating her Byakugan her image flickered as she approached the doorway, before disappearing all together with the speed of the Shunshin.

The Juugodaime definitely made guard duty HELL.

((Zephyr will not recognize Taiju, because, well...his face isn't shown thanks to the mask. The last time Zephyr would've seen Taiju would be formally around when Taiju was 7 years old. As far as clan emblem goes, assuming Taiju wears the traditional Senju emblem outlined on the neckline of the Jounin vest...Zephyr doesn't pay too much attention to such minuscule details.

Black on darkish-green is a bit hard to notice on a single glance. xD))

Meanwhile, in another part of the marketplace, Zephyr was cheerfully skipping along the path, in his child form once more. Once a while he would stop, to smell the delicious aromas wading lazily through the air from open stands, but he would continue forth each time, not all too eager to meet Yokou's wrath early for escaping her watchful eye - yet again.

Garbed once more in not the white yukata of his adult form but a black one with golden leaf imprints on the sleeves that shimmered in the sunlight, the twelve-year old child butnottruly happily made his way through the village, his antique doll tucked safely under one arm.

He was secretly glad that the phoenix had headed off on her own back in the mountains, wanting to search for some fresh berries and have some time to herself. Meaning he could explore without Kousei perching on his head (that was, until Yokou catches up)! It has been long - too long - ten whole years since he last formally been part of this village...and besides, Kisuke's conversation was growing rather uncomfortable...

Zephyr held up the doll he carried, admiring how the sapphire-blue glass eyes of the doll gleamed in the light. Such a pretty souvenir from Iwa, and he did love how the Iwa craftsman were inspired by the Leaf village's traditional robes to add their own touch to the poppet's garb. The softly braided hair of the doll - real hair - were darkly raven like his own and the sunlight casted soft silver-gray shadows on fine strands.

The clothes of the doll had such intricately pretty embroidery, too...

The doll was crowned with a wreath of red hyacinth flowers, which still smelled fresh thanks to him feeding his chakra on occasion so that they did not wilt... At this, stopping, the Senju looked at the chakra-sapping bracelets on his wrists (he too wore a pair as anklets) and grinned. Oho. Poor Yokou - she would have a hard time finding him this time around, so accustomed she was to look for a large chakra source whenever it came to finding her oft-missing Sensei... But not this time. What's best, the chakra bracelets had been her idea in the first place to prevent the Senju lord from "further acts of destruction".

So cheered with this thought, he increased his walking pace, and his eyes widened when a pink wall seemed to suddenly appear out of nowhere before him... In vain, he tried to screech into a halt but ended up crashing anyways into the pink wall of about rather equal size. The downside in this form, in this situation, was his light weight and small size: he was thrown back from attempting so hard to pull back so suddenly from the inevitable crash, but not onto the ground fortunately... Yet, rather offended (and somewhat minorly injured), pretty, part-heterochromic green-gold eyes flashed with irritation, and he exclaimed:

"Oof! Hey, don't just stop in the middle of a crowded street! That's dangerous!!"

Shirayuki Kaede - Academy Student

LV. 2 | Experience: 44/110 | Hp: 16/16 | Cp: 6/6 | MHp: 24/24

So it was either piss off Senju-san and confront Miharo-sensei, whom she couldn't look at without thinking off... or be a burden and piss off Senju-san by telling him why she was a horrible person. Kaede grimaced. Both options were very bleak but there was no way around this one. She could try to escape, but he had caught up so easily... and the girl wasn't ready to try running again. Her legs ached from being fatigued twice this morning and her heart was still pumping hard.

"I-Iiii..."

What should she say? He didn't need to know who her father is, even though that was part of her problems. She didn't need to tell Senju-san she had a speech impediment, that was just stating the obvious. And how can she just blurt out that she envisioned her father's... when looking at Miharo-sensei's... and nonono, just think of something to say.

"I-I..."

And it was a little uncomfortable to be sitting on the same bench as Senju-san now. So Kaede stood up, pivoting so she was still facing Senju-san, but with her head bowed low.

'Come on, just a few sentences. Get this over with, you coward.' Something. Anything. With an extremely serious and deadpanned voice, Kaede told Senju-san, "I-I d-don't like being t-touched. I d-don't like... m-m-myself. C-can't do anyth-thing... right. A-and w-when I l-looked at M-miha-haro-s-sen-sensei...
...
...
I r-remembered th-that t-time... A deep breath. Isawmyfatherinthemiddleof... andsoIthoughtof-of his p-pe... M-mihar-r-ro-s-sen-seeen-sensei... i-imagined it... I c-couldn't concentrate s-so, s-sooooo... Ir-ran... away-"

'Waaah!'

Something collided into her. Her balance was disrupted and she tried to stabilize herself by shifting her weight to her right foot. Bad idea. That was the foot the previously broken sandal was on. Kaede slipped and fell against Senju-san, and ohmygodshedidNOTjustthinkhewassoftlikeateddybear. Nonononooooo! Pale arms instinctively pushed herself off of Senju-san.

'...'

She couldn't bear... bad word choice. She couldn't bring herself to look at Senju-san and so she found herself skimming the surroundings. Oh the other person. Kaede had briefly forgotten about him and it must've been so rude of her to...

"I'm s-so so s-sorryyyyyyyy..." the girl bowed her head several times profusely. It probably wasn't enough to compensate for what she just did. No, he might ask for her money, except she didn't have any. So he might ask for one of her fingers or a kidney and sell it. Or, or, or...

Shirayuki Kaede - Academy Student

LV. 2 | Experience: 44/110 | Hp: 16/16 | Cp: 6/6 | MHp: 24/24

The boy had every right to be mad at her. Yet it didn't stop her from feeling uncomfortable and fearful of him. The child was trembling uncontrollably. She didn't call him an ant did she? Or was it because he mistook her bowed head as squinting down on him? Did he have some sort of height complex she accidentally ignited? But she was short too so it didn't bother her so much... Or maybe...? Kaede didn't know what was going on but she had to apologize.

"S-s-orry... I-I'm sorryyy..." Kaede sobbed, raising her head, but still avoiding eye contact with the boy.

Perhaps she should use today's salary to buy the boy something so he could forgive her. Oh wait, but she was going to buy Miharo-sensei's apple tomorrow. There wouldn't be enough money for both. Then again, it wouldn't matter now... since she couldn't look at Miharo-sensei without remembering... but what should she get for a boy she barely knew? He seemed to like dolls so maybe...

"I-I'll-mmmf!"

!

That line of thought exploded and scattered about in her brain. Blank. All she knew was that soft lips pressed against her chapped ones. And they were eating her face off. She doesn't know what she should do. Or what she should feel. Or what is exactly happening. So Kaede tries to recall what her father told her to do in this sort of situation, but instead she remembers a time father drunk himself silly because he was stood up at yet another date. He said a lot of strange things like, 'If a guy puts the moves on you without your consent, he probably wants to rape-fkdnafnsdkf' Her brain immediately halted with a loud screech. And mentally screech she did. It sounded kind of like the noise a thousand people made when caught in an earth shattering kaboom. Except she didn't immediately die afterwords.

She merely fainted.

Saito turned in bed, moving the pillow over his face as he groaned. He had been up late last night working on his painting. It wasn't like him to sleep in late, but it also wasn't like him to leave a painting unfinished.

The boy's father slowly walked into the room, he had a rather peculiar look on his face, a look of confusion. (o.o) He moved closer to the bed and stared at his son for a second, reaching his hand out to poke him. He retracted, unsure, then finally poked him.

Saito groaned once more in reaction and nuzzled in the sheets.

"Son. Aren't you supposed to be at the academy?", questioned the father, still confused. Saito generally woke himself up for school, something his parents had forced him to make a habit of. As soon as he finished the question, Saito suddenly leaped up in bed, exasperated. the Jonin in reaction lifted his hands in instinctual defense and raised a leg, backing away.

"I'm late for school!", exclaimed the child! In his panic-mode state, he had overlooked his father's awkward reaction. The Jonin took the time to gain his composure and coughed on purpose. "Right. Son! Don't do it again, those teachers are killer.", he managed, trying to be the law in the home. A sweat drop formed as he realized Saito was ignoring him and jumping around leaping into his clothes.

"Sorry father, I must be on my way. Love you.", Saito finally replied, running out of the door. The Jonin lifted his head and sighed in relief, putting his hands in his pockets.

Saito ran across the busy streets of Konoha. 'I can't believe this..', he thought to himself, disappointed. He had lost track of time while painting. How irresponsible. It wasn't often this happened, but painting to him was his outlet. As much as he'd try to act mature, he was still a kid, a kid who missed his mother.

He ran a corner, speeding up. He smiled to himself, what reason would he give the teacher? The young child was close. He dodged some people, bowing in an apology, turning while continuing to run. He wondered if his teacher would truly get onto him. He wasn't generally late and didn't act up, hopefully they realized he wasn't perfect.

After a bit more sprinting, he made it to his destination. Panting and out-of-breath, he opened the door and ran inside.

[Exit to Academy]

Takeshi walked out of the forest, followed by Yarotai. Takeshi had his hands interlocked, held behind his head in a relaxing position. When they made past the first few houses in the Konoha Housing, Takehsi turned around, began walking backward, and asked Yarotai, "Hey Kisama, you wanna have a race? I figure a guy like you likes to have fun, so lets make going to Ichiraku Ramen interesting."

Takeshi turned around, and began running. As soon as he found an alleyway on one side of the road, he ran in, and used the same method to make it to the roofs of the Konoha Housing he had before. Takeshi jumped in a zigzag pattern, from the ground up onto a trashcan, then he jumped up to and grabbed onto a balcony, and pulled himself up. Just before he jumped up across the alleyway to the roofs of the Konoha Housing, another citizen came outside to find Takeshi crouched on their balcony railing and yelled at him, but Takeshi didn't care. Once he was on the roof, he yelled back to Yarotai, "Alright Kisama, get your old boney *** onto that roof, " Takeshi pointed at the row of housing buildings across the road they were once walking on, "and get going. You don't want to get beat by an Academy student do you?" With that last comment, Takeshi turned back towards the direction of Ichiraku Ramen, and took off, sprinting over the gaps in the buildings. Yarotai already had his work cut out for him.

"Damn you," said Takeshi, though he was probably the only one who heard it. The fact that Takeshi slowed himself to a stop on the roof, and watched the spot that Yarotai had once been in. "No one can run that fast. Son of a ***** used another of his flashy jutsu," he thought to himself. It angered him. The fact that Takeshi had wanted to do have some fun with the Chunnin and that he had simply blown him off was infuriating. In just a few seconds, the Chunnin had taken away any fun that Takeshi was trying to have.

Takeshi wanted to simply turn around and go back to the forest training grounds. Takeshi wanted to leave that dumb*** to his breakfast and to try all his cheap pick-up lines on girls passing by. But he was already at the edge of the Konoha Housing buildings, and all that stood between him and Ichiraku Ramen was the Uchiha Compound. Since he had no regard for the rest of the Uchiha Clan, he simply jumped across the roofs of the buildings and made his way to Ichiraku Ramen. He ran quickly, because he didn't want to cause any trouble, but he didn't have any problem with disturbing the mourning peace of his resentful Uchiha clan.

An almost embarassed frown slipped onto Tenma's lips as she listened to Rhiam. "A-actually," The slight stutter was unlike her, but this was the boy she had trained with and by this time she had hoped to have the wall walking down. But, alas, this was not that case as she had not seemed to find time to attempt it. "I have not completed my wall walking training as of right now. Unfortunately I simply did not find the time, though I can imagine that sounds ludicris." The slight pang in having to admit that was minor thanks to the fact that she had trained with him, maybe he would be understandable of her circumstances. "Of course, this means we will have to find an alternative method of entrance if Tairu fails." This brought images of numerous outcomes along with various strategies to combat some of the less desired consequences. "Where do you believe the statue will be hidden, I doubt it is outside the complex?"

Perform: +1
Disguise: +1
Slight of Hand: +1