Starring:
Date: September 7, 2014
Summary:
Pleasant weather has attracted many people to Konoha's lake. As Kenta and Yasuki make each others' acquaintance as distant family, Takeo watches over them to make certain there aren't any problems. At the same time, he allows himself a rare bit of contact with the locals by entertaining some children with his jutsu.
Poster's note: foul language filtered in obvious places.
"A Day At The Lake"
Unknown location
It's a nice calm day with mild weather and gentle sunlight coming down from clear blue skies. It's not deep enough into spring that everything around the lake is lush with greenery and the trees support a healthy canopy to provide generous shade. Children with their parents run laughing around the shores of the lake while their parents watch on. Others are swimming deeper in the waters or taking picnics on the emerald grass. A single figure is under an enormous tree, away from direct sunlight. A closer look reveals the person to be Kenta. But wait, there's something unnatural about his posture… He's lying down on the ground and not moving at all except for the gentle rising of his chest! In fact, it looks like the hardest (or arguably top 10) hardest working medic-nin in Konoha is taking a nap.
The weather and in fact the day itself leading up to now was a perfect mixture of exactly what Yasuki needed after what he had been through. The only thing that remained was the right spot to enjoy such. Typically any where for the boy would do, but it had been some time since he had simply relaxed near the lake, listened to the laughter and enjoyment of others nearby, and stared up at the sky to take it all in. That was the plan at least. However, as the boy entered the scene he spotted another that was doing what he had intended. On top of that, it was a member of the rival team of his Sensei's. Making the dozing teen a rival to himself as well. Slowly the boy would approach, not wanting to wake the other and assuming all went well, he'd offer a few gentle kickes to Kenta's side. "Hey. Wake up."
Takeo has this old trick he loves to do. He's done it to his family on more than one occasion, and oh, how Kenta presents an opportunity. "Surely, that's not my lieutenant dozing under a tree rather than working out," he can be heard to say. "Or, is he unconscious? Does he need mouth to mouth?!"
All of this is asked as Takeo stands horizontally upon the tree trunk, about a foot or so above Kenta, using chakra or very long toe claws to keep himself anchored. His reputation as being something of an eccentric since his brief disappearance a year ago is, perhaps, not unwarranted. The young man waits with a grin, prominent canines brandished, hair let loose from a topknot and typical attire exchanged for loose pants and an open robe.
"Aw. You ruined it," Takeo says, groaning disappointedly at Yasuki.
Kenta doesn't move when he's kicked -or- when Takeo speaks up with his usual eccentricity. He just keeps sleeping through the whole thing without even a twitch to register that he knows what's going on around him. The poor medic-nin must be extremely tired!
BAM! A little sparrow flies directly into the back of Yasuki's head. It bounces off his skull and lands in the grass to flap around in its daze. After flopping its entire body over twice, it's regains the smoothness of its motor skills and flies off while chirping in agitation. Kenta suddenly start moving around on the ground. He flops his own arms around like a fish on land for several long seconds before sitting straight up. "Ow!" the young medic-nin exclaims and clasps a hand to his face, which is starting to develop some bruises. "Need more practice flying…" he starts to groan. Kenta stops midsentence when he realizes that there are people around him. "Umm… konichiwa…"
A voice from above would catch Yasuki's attention, but not stop the kicks to Kenta's side. "Huh, what I do?" BAM! The sparrow careening with Yasuki's head, surprisingly not getting tangled in his long, Yamanaka required pony tail and sending the boy stumbling forward. Were it not for a few lucky steps, he manages to avoid falling on Kenta as well. "What the…" Rubbing at the back of his head as he turns to spot the culprit. A bird. His eyes would dart to Kenta curious why he would be grasping his face. A few thoughts crossed his mind, but he didn't want to accept it. Didn't want to believe it, but it was the only explanation. The bird, the back of his head, Kenta's face. When Yasuki finds time to himself, manipulation animals were things he'd do as well. "What's your story?" Asking at Kenta before turning to Takeo, leader of his sensei's rival team.
"Nevermind," Takeo says to Yasuki. After offering a wink down at Kenta, he says to the pair, "I guess I'll leave you two to get acquainted. Play nice or I'll … Well, I won't get warped, but someone'll go home wet. Speaking of, part of me wants in the lake, so I'll be heading that way." For a moment, one might swear that his eyes had turned black and red, but it's gone literally in a blink.
Pushing off from the tree, Takeo does a neat flip in the air and lands with clawed feet planted upon soft grass. Might be crazy, but he certainly has athleticism to go along with it. The young fellow sheds his robe casually upon the ground as his feet dip into the water and he forges further onward, up to his knees. "So many people today. Can't have too much fun, I guess." Leaning forward, he digs a rock up from the shallows and tosses it into the air, hurling a projectile of water after it. When the stone is struck and explodes with a little pop, he smiles in a satisfied fashion.
Then, with a leap like a dolphin, Takeo dives into the deep and seems to disappear. He's … sort of down there a while.
Kenta is still blinking and rubbing at his face. He slowly gets to his feet as if his body aches. That's not a surprise after lying on the ground for a while and if Yasuki's suspicions are correct. Kenta gives his bruised face a final rub. Then, he drops his hands to his sides and bows. "Konichiwa," the young medic-nin repeats in his naturally soft, grave voice. "Takeo and…" Kenta eyes Yasuki's blond ponytail and facial structure. "…Yamanaka-san. I was doing some training and didn't notice people approaching. I hope you weren't trying to get my attention for too long."
Yasuki is forgotten for a while as Takeo jumps off the tree and starts heading towards the water. Kenta watches his team leader's display of athleticism and water manipulation with a hint of admiration in his eyes. "Don't stay down there too long. You might frighten the kids!" he calls out to Takeo. "And remember not to expose yourself too much!" By now, Kenta knows just how casually Takeo treats full frontal nudity, even in public.
Yasuki eyed Takeo, unsure of what he was getting at, but didn't have any time to question the behavior as the elder had already taken off to play in the water and even display a bit of his mastery over water. Something Yasuki has learned he too has an affinity toward. Unfortunately that is, as it's more involving of an element then he'd like it to be. "Yes and no." Turning to Kenta, studying the other while taking note of their features. Medium black hair and dark brown eyes giving little as to who Kenta actually is. "What were you training exactly?" Trying to keep his mind away from Takeo and just exactly what he might expose….
Kenta bows slightly at Yasuki again. "I should introduce myself first. I'm Akiyama Kenta and we're probably related. I'm the grandson of…" Did the corners of Kenta's lips suddenly dip down slightly before returning to their normal position? "… Yamanaka Masaru…" A prominent member of the Yamanaka clan, but not one of its elders. "…and Akiyama Mai." A retired medic-nin of some renown to the older generations, but probably not recognized by the younger. "Umm… not in that combination. Mother's side and father's side respectively. We're probably related somehow." Kenta rubs at the back of his neck with his right hand. Things always get a little complicated when explaining his familial connections now. Oh, for the good old days.
Yasuki kept his gaze upon Kenta, studying the others expressions and catching something on the others face. Something he's spotted once before from another when speaking about family members. A sensitive subject for most it would seem. "Oh, I see." Understanding the situation with the sparrow and his head now, "A fellow Yamanaka. A pleasure. So which kind are you? I get that you're also a member of another clan, but a Yamanaka is still a Yamanaka." Yasuki was the lazy kind, a rare breed amongst the clan that would rather lounge around and day dream, though when forced into situations like Nobunaga has been making him do lately, he can be a bit…reliant. Though still relatively weak thanks to his behavior.
"Why kind?" Kenta repeats. He blinks at Yasuki. "Um, if you mean why my area of expertise is, I'm a Chuunin medic-nin. I work at Konoha's hospital under the tutelage of Taiki-sama. I'm also a member of Team Phoenix." The last bit is something that Kenta's not aware that Yasuki already knows. "I only met my Yamanaka family members a few months ago, so I'm not very good at the Yamanaka hidenjutsu yet. How about you? You look familiar, but I can't remember where I saw you from before. Maybe I passed you while walking through the Yamanaka section of the village."
Takeo's being very modest, he'd have Kenta know. He kept those loose pants on when he delved into the deepest waters, after all! Speaking of, he really is down there for a while. The sun strikes the center of the lake, though the keen of eye would realize that it might well have been a flash from /below/ the surface rather than above. In any case, the young man suddenly surfaces, springing straight out of the water and descending to stand upon its surface.
For a moment, Takeo casts a wary eye over in Kenta and Yasuki's direction before he decides to have a rare bit of fun. "That's all I have to say about that," he declares to what seems to be the water underfoot before diving forward again, this time toward some of the young children playing in shallower waters. Gliding in for a landing, the youth comes to sit within the very same shallows.
It's rare to see Takeo outgoing, at least with strangers, which implies that he must be in a good mood. He entertains the children by carefully lifting his hands, causing a large globe of water to rise in turn from the lake. Fish swim about within, sunlight glimmering against their scales. "Pretty cool, eh? I'll bet they think so, too. You see their world about as often as they see yours," Takeo banters to the young ones. "Still, their world's their world. We all have our differences we have to live with and respect - usually, anyway." He relaxes his hands, and so too does the sphere relax back down into the broader lake. The children proceed to jump on him, exploring everything from his claws and tattoos to his many scars with praise of coolness. He tolerates this with what is /surely/ difficult restraint. Surely.
Yasuki nodded in response to Kenta's replies. They weren't what he was expecting, but he can grasp enough to get the answer he was looking for. "Well, I'm the opposite of that. Genin, not a medic nor much of anything, but I do know a little bit about the Yamanka hidenjutsu. If I spent more time training instead of relaxing, I might be a chuunin myself or at least better skilled." He'd shrug, not regretting one second of how he spent his free time. The display of Takeo catches the boys attention and he'd turn to look, watching for a moment with interest and curiousity. Unique team leader that. Turning back to Kenta, "Possibly. Though I'm sure we all look a like." Smiling jokingly.
"Actually, I still can't tell some of my cousins apart. There are so -many- of them now. I used to have no cousins at all and now I have almost a dozen. They're second cousins, but still cousins…" They all look like big, blond giants too, a rather short Kenta thinks inside his own head. He watches Takeo play around with water to entertain the children at the edge of the lake. A slightly worried expression appears on his face. "I hope you don't mind if we move closer to where Takeo is. Children can be a little rowdy. I hope that they don't yank something off of him that they shouldn't be yanking on." Kenta starts walking towards his team leader with the assumption that Yasuki's going to follow along.
Takeo lets the children explore as they will. The tattoos and the claws are easily enough explained, though he glosses over the question of where his nin-ken is. Scars, those take a bit longer, but he's happy to regale the little ones with tales of his past adventures and battles. Their parents, however, are obviously just a little bit uneasy to have the children near him. He realizes it, too, and the unspoken reason.
"Alright, you little guppies. It's time to go swimming with those fish," he says. "Everyone get ready!" Takeo keeps his eyes closed for some reason as he taps the water in front of him with his index finger. Exercising great restraint, what should've been a tidal wave is instead a much smaller rolling of the waters for the young ones to ride out into swimming depths. Satisfied, Takeo stands up and ventures out of the lake, removing the water from his body and clothes with a light flick of his hand. He hooks a foot under his discarded robe and kicks it up into the air, catching it in time to slip around his body.
Takeo appears pleased when he sees that Kenta and Yasuki are, to some extent, getting along. "Well, this is a nice sight. I thought a fight was going to break out," he says to the pair, though one wonders why he wouldn't have stayed to intervene in that case. Always a mystery, this one. "We're all introduced and friends now, right?" Takeo brings his hands around to clasp claws against the small of his back, once again baring enlarged canines in a subdued grin. Everyone's friends, riiight?
Isura has disconnected.
Isura has connected.
Yasuki nodded in understanding, "Well, welcome to the family." He smiled in response then shrugged as he followed behind Kenta, "That…sounds wrong." Hopefully it wasn't meant the way it sounded. Eh…Now closer toward the lake, Yasuki got a better look at Takeo. He'd have questions himself, but was lucky enough to hear the tail end of the mans explanations. "A fight sounds like a lot of work. That's not my style." Looking toward Kenta, having a feeling he was going to give a different response considering every thing the elder halfie had their hands in. "I guess…So long as more birds or other animals don't start flying into the back of my head."
"Oh! That was your head? I thought I hit the tree. I was very hard to orient myself inside a bird's mind. Everything looked so different." Kenta's face flushes with a hint of embarrassment. The pink tinge gives away his feelings even as he evokes calm somberness on his facial features. "Takeo, this is Yasuki. He's a member of the Yamanaka clan and probably a distant relative of mine. I don't know why you would think that we'll start fighting. I really only met him today and he seems like a nice, respectable type of person."
Kenta shifts to look at Yasuki. "On the other hand, if you want to spar or practice jutsu together sometime, I'll be completely open to it. Atsuro-senpai told me that I must get more sparring experience if I ever want to take on the role of a combat medic or at least a field medic. And the latter will be very useful for both of us. I practice with my cousins now, but they can get a little boisterous. There's so -many- of them…" The last bit comes out with a loud sigh.
Takeo listens to Kenta for a moment before looking to Yasuki. He leans a bit to the left, a bit to the right, assessing his lieutenant's family apparent. "I don't see the resemblence, but then, I'm not exactly great with grasping parentage. As for what Kenta says, I'll have to take his word for it. People think I'm respectable until … about five minutes after they meet me, usually." As an afterthought, he says, "I know /exactly/ what you mean about having an annoying animal in the back of your head. Best advice I can give you is to learn to ignore it." Whatever he means by that.
"I'll leave you two to get better acquainted, then. By the way, Atsuro-niisan must've never seen you fight if he thinks you're not a combat medic. I seem to recall a certain someone handing me my tail in Kumogakure," Takeo says as he starts to pass the pair, grinning. "Then again, I was holding back. Very nice, by the way, learning that new trick." He pats Kenta upon the shoulder and continues along.
"If you'll excuse me, I hear sake calling. I'm getting some of my friends together for a little ryokan vacation before we get into action," Takeo says to Kenta over his shoulder, before giving Yasuki the rest. "Kenta's family is as much my family. You're welcome to come along, my treat. Saves a lot of money when you live out in the wilds."
