Welcome to Gaia! ::

Fresh-faced, young and hopeful Scarlett would have leaped at the chance to share her knowledge with a few unfortunate souls. Now? Years of failure and mediocrity had robbed her of some of her confidence.

She left the meeting and made a beeline for a lonely tree, out of the way of everything but in sight of anything that mattered. The smell of grass was calming in a way only the country born could really understand. She shut her lime eyes and leaned back into the sturdy trunk, unconsciously running her thumbs across the silver rings on each of her pointer fingers.

Her most precious possession and the source of all of her self doubt.

You could still teach them.

She frowned slightly, wrapping her arms around her torso and pulling her coat tight around her petite frame. She wasn't sure if he was mocking her or being serious. She could never tell.

"I could teach them what not to do, maybe." It was meant to have snark, but it was lackluster in the face of memories she had faced so recently. Nothing answered her but silence and she relaxed.

She didn't think she could teach anyone because her own failure was the main focus of her life at every waking moment. She couldn't figure Konoha out, nor had she ever been able to become a good hunter. She wasn't sure why. She had never really been sure. Why had she come out of the pod at all if she still wasn't ready for this?

You are.

She opened her eyes and stared up through the leaves overhead, this time answering with her own silence.

Scarlett's eyes snapped in the direction of the new voice and she noticeably stiffened. If she had been a little less disciplined, she probably would have jumped altogether. She forced herself to relax and leaned back into the tree again, ignoring the way twigs plucked at her pale updo.

She knew him, of course. She knew every hunter she'd originally awakened with by sight, if not name, and especially the ones that had gone so far into outranking her. He looked different but the same all at once, though his name slipped her mind. He looked tough. He deserved to outrank her.

"It feels a little more real when it's not all in my head." She offered him a weak smile, but her lime eyes looked a little weary. Unlike the thoughtful man, Scarlett had very few memories of her family and even fewer of friends. There were none here for a reason. She, in turn, wished she knew how to rely on other people a little more. If she could do that, she'd have never been in her mess to begin with.

"You've done really well." Those weary eyes narrowed a little, really taking him in. She wasn't at good at hiding her curiosity as she'd been at covering her surprise. The familiar pang of guilt crept up through her chest, threatening to steal her breath away. Being a failure - or worse, a disappointment - was hard for her to swallow.