Starring:
Date: April 11, 2011
Summary:
The Okumo were told to guard and escort a cart carrying unspecified contents to a location inside of the caverns. And leave it there.
"A Little Okumo Business"
Kirigakure's Dark Caverns
Meruin stood at the entrance of the caverns, the small boy still as stone and just as cold in the mists that wreathed the area. By the eight year old was what looked to be like an old miner's cart, it's contents hidden by a bolted tarp that appeared to be thick and durable. Resistant, of course, to the high amount of water that hung in today's air.
Daomi would make his way into the cavern entrance and upon spotting Meruin, would walk over toward the younger Okumo. Though there was a very small age gap, it would never cross Daomi's mind to think of the other as less then him. For he knew that would be suicide. "Hello Meruin." Would be said, his eyes falling upon the cart, but disregarding it.
It would take a keen sense to detect the large increase in the number of spiders around the entrance to the caverns. Either that or an Okumo who knows the Spider Perception Technique. These spiders creep and crawl and make their way, some quickly and some slowly, through the encroaching mist. The sound of footsteps arrive before their maker, coming in an irregular rhythm. The cause of their rhythm is soon apparent, and Osamu twirls and sways out of the mists in a saunter that is somehow graceful and yet not. His body is followed by a tenebrous echo formed by the many black wisps of webbing that gently trail behind his robes. His movements and gaze seem unfocused, hardly sparing a glance towards the younger two Okumo until he is beside them, at which point he comes to a stop, his feet stopping before his shoulders which sway forward and then backward, leaving his weight resting on his heels and his back and shoulders arched slightly down and back in a relaxed tilt. Only then does Osamu look down towards the other two in unexpecting silence.
"Hello, the both of you," greeted Meruin with an inclination of the head. There was nothing like surprise in the nine year old's face or bearing. Indeed, he showed very little of any emotion at all. How odd, the three Okumo seemed to be, each obvlivious in certain ways to certain extents.
"To business, then. Clan business, as a matter of fact. We have this cart filled with material that you would already have been informed of if you had been required to know of them. We are to escort this cart to a cave at the end of a tunnel system. I am to be your guide. Expect hostility from large spiders and other… creatures. You will be familiar with some of them, but I will lead you into tunnels that you should not yet have found your way into. You know how to maneuver in the caverns, what senses to use. Do not fall into security. Also, expect this difficulty to be of a higher level than the recorded C-rank. It will be more dangerous than that. Now come. We will each deploy a portion of our broods to move the cart."
That said, he turned, darkness flowing from his steps in the form of spiders. The creatures of his brood found their way to the cart, moving under it to wait until joined by others so they can bring the cart after their master.
Daomi would continue to face ahead, despite detecting several spiders entering in from behind. It wouldn't be until Meruin acknowledged another that he would turn to face who it was. It was a young man, obviously from the Okumo clan based on being here for clan business, but it isn't someone he has seen before. A slow blink and uncaring nod would be given, before turning around to listen in on the briefing. Knowing what was expected of him was all he needed to hear and cared not for how dangerous the mission may be. Were he to die, so be it. Small ripples would flow down his kimono and down his pant legs until several spiders made their way out to mix with the others to push the cart.
Osamu turns his head and gives an indifferent look to the entrance of the cave. Already spiders are beginning their creep into the entrance of the cave. More spiders swarm the cart causing a writhing blackness to engulf its lower portions, and with the blackness so does the cart start its steady flow into the cave. Osamu staggers toward one side of the cave, then staggers to the opening of it, stopping with his head leaning in over the stone threshold. He stares as if searching the darkness, then glances back towards his companions, then stands straight and begins to move into the cave with a graceful swaying gate, the tenebrous echo of his robes fading quickly into the murky silence.
Meruin entered the cavern, nodding to himself as everyone settled into position, walking ahead of them. He turned at the entrance of the cavern, hand trailing along the entrance wall until he reached the side. The nine year old then turned around, saying, "Here," though, with the echoing of the cavern the noise wasn't as much help as the slowly waving hand he brought up.
Behind him was an area that seemed no different than the rest of the cavern's wall. If one reached it, however, they would notice that it wasn't a wall at all, but an absence of it. A hole in the stone, tucked away in the shadows of the place. Meruin stepped aside from it, pressing it, gesturing there and saying, simply, "Walk in. Now would be the time for questions, if you have them."
Daomi would follow closely with the group, resting a hand in the opening of his kimono while the other was placed inside his pant pocket. Upon reaching the wall, he was a bit surprised to see that it wasn't there at all. It wouldn't have been something he would look for and he doubts he's ever been out this far in the cavern, save for his spaced off strolls. With no questions to be had, Daomi would make his way into the new opening.
Osamu comes to the hole in the wall and continues without even the slightest pause of hesitation. As he burshes past, he tilts his head and looks down to Meruin for a long moment.
Meruin hops onto the cart with a notable ease, crouching down, his gaze alert. "Your spiders shall follow my spiders' lead," he said to the pair. "Mine will guide, all will power the momentum." He gestured further into the tunnel. "We'll want to move as quickly as possible. Run if you can, but if you are not swift in motion, you must ride."
Immediately, his spiders began moving the cart further into the tunnel.
Daomi hearing the word run, would shake his head and instantly and clumsily hop into the cart next to Meruin before the momentum was to fast for him to keep up. "This mission is actually starting to catch my curiousity as to its importance." He would say, not as a question that needed to be answered but as a statement he felt like saying.
Osamu lags behind a moment, then spins around, ending in a slight crouch before rushing forward and jumping on the back of the cart, increasing its speed slightly. "There is a trap one-hundred yards ahead. A door in the floor," Osamu says lazily, though the sound carries well enough among the stone accoustics. Osamu is grinning now.
"Noted," said Meruin, both in resposne to Daomi and Osamu, though he said nothing further on the former's. "Attach yourselves to the cart. In 70 yards time, expell webbing onto the ceiling of the tunnel and pull. We'll overleap the trap."
Lifting his frail arms, Daomi would grasp onto the cart with whatever strength he could muster. The 70 yard marker would come closer and closer and when it finally came, he would expell webbing from his 'form?' and shoot it at the ceiling. The webbing would stick and land at the right time, but while he pulled, he didn't think it was something he could do on his own.
As the time marker approaches, Osamu seems distracted by something, and looks towards one of the walls. His grin wanes. "Water," he says, as Daomi shoots out his webs. "Its coming!"
The moment passed and only Daomi, it had seemed, was truly prepared for the moment. The genin's webbing hit the ceiling and clung, and the front of the cart lifted from the ground but nothing more. Meruin's eyes shifted as he looked to Osamu at his warning. There was no time to get caught. Water was fast arriving. As a matter of fact, even the spiders inthe pit further down the tunnel were abandoning their trap, fleeing from the slowly loudening sound of approaching water.
"The waterfall. A tunnel must have collapsed and redirected the water. We must be swift. Collect your spiders or have them left behind." He then began flashing through hand seals, his own spiders streaking up the cart and back into his body as he did so. A moment or two afterwards, just before the cart fell into the open trap, it suddenly lifted, a barrier of air shifting and moving so that the cart lifted, moving just over the fall of the pit.
The wheels hit the other side of the pitfall and Meruin lashed out, cutting Daomi's connection to the ceiling just in case he couldn't do so himself quickly enough. "We need to move fa —" The tunnel behind them roared as it filled, suddenly, with thrashing waters. "Faster." He leapt in front of the cart, the silk of his shirt attaching to the metal, stratching, and becoming a thick rope.
The cart suddenly jerked forward as Meruin vanished and reappeared, moving faster and bringing goods along.
Daomi had no way of helping them and had hoped that his webbing would have been enough, but it obviously wasn't as Meruin quickly cut it. The water quickly approaching, the spiders he had let out would follow with the others making their way up the cart and back into his clothing. Having nothing to offer, Daomi would sit back and just be glad his light weight wouldn't add to the problems.
Osamu looks behind them, then begins to crawl towards the front of the cart. As he does so his spiders begin to crawl into his robes. He even crawls over Daomi until he is hanging on to the front end of the cart, squatted down around Meruin's tether. Osamu stares at the wave as it comes closer and closer and his body seems to swell a little, becoming thicker and less elegant.
The nine year old shouldered the weight of the burden, leaping forward with numerous bursts of speed so great he blurred from sight, the cart jerking behind him, Daomi and Osamu's ride no doubt uncomfortable ones. But they hadn't been caught by the sweeping torrent, yet. And they wouldn't.
In one of those bursts of speed, Meruin flashed over yet another crevasse, the cart flying over the gap in the floor in it's immense speed. As the young Okumo reappeared, he was on top of the cart, webbing sprouting out from his back to be used as a parachute, slowing the cart's speed.
"Here, we should be safe," said the boy calmly. "This was the designated area we are to abandon the cart." He looked at the new waterfall created just behind them. "We'll find another way out."
As the cart came to a slow stop, Daomi would make his way out of the death ride and onto the floor. His spiders would once again flow from his clothing and scatter to search out the new area. Just abandoning the cart was odd to him, with the newly waterfall created behind them, it isn't the safest bet to just leave it here. However, he wasn't going to question clan business and let it go as he moved around, just checking out the area.
