Starring:
Maia, Kenta, Takeda, Hoiishime
Date: April 14th, 2010
Summary:
Kumogakure Team 01 are out on a mission to protect Archeologist Miyagi and his team to a dig site to find an artifact.
"Escort! Protect Mr Miyagi, Maia-son!"
Location
It's early in the morning. It's hella early in the morning. It's that time of day when only psychopaths, garbage men, and probably ninjas are awake. The rest of the village is asleep, and three 'lucky' genin have been recruited for a seemingly simple mission. It's rated D-rank, with some archaeologist wanting a bit of an escort to the mountains. It seems simple enough, right?
So at the edge of the village, underneath the arch that welcomes visitors to the village is a young woman. She's rather tall, quite tall really, as she stands at a good five feet, seven inches. Maia waits as she sighs softly, taking a sip of water from a bottle before she smiles warmly at a rather pudgey stocky man in his thirties.
"Dno't worry, Professor-san. We'll get you to the site unharmed." she smiles cheerily. "The rest of the team just needs to get here."
Kenta walks casually through the village, heading for the front gates. In one hand is a red bound book, the other, a stick of dumpling coated in what looks like maple syrup. Perfect for what a growing boy needs…riiiiight. Kenta snacks at the top most dumpling while he reads from the book. He's only a block from the gate at this point and can easily be seen by the others.
Arriving right after wiuld have been Hoiishime, who had been just finishing up another herbal run for the Unkei. Grunt work for the new med nin who had been so far happy to do his job. Unaffected seemingly from the hard labor of having to work with superior nin, experts of their field, he would arrive, with a smile and a salute, saying, "I be hopin I'm not late. Hanma Hoiishime, med-nin. reporting." He would dust himself off, waving to Taked, and then wait on orders.
Its not long after the Kenta, that Takeda arrives, practically emerging from the shadows near the other two. A silent bow of his head to Maia, then the others, towards the monk he smiles.. Like normally the masked genin is rather quiet and withdrawn
Maia is hard to surprise. She has eyes behind the back of her head or something. She smiles cheerily towards the younger boys as she gives them a friendly two fingered salute. "Hi!" she chirps merrily, motioning for Kenta to hurry up to make sure he's aware of their briefing.
"So, you three are the ones picked for this mission. It's relatively straight forward, we bring Mister Miyagi here to an archaeological dig site. Apparently there's something rather interesting there. I don't imagine anything serious will happen. Maybe bandits at the most." she says with a sage nod.
"But let's make our introductions! I'm Yamayuki Maia, and I'll be your team leader for this mission." she says with a bright smile before motioning towards the shorter man. "And that's Mister Miyagi. He's very renown amongst his field, so let's make sure we protect him to the best of our abilities, okay?!?"
Oh Gods, it's perky chirpy chuunin!
"So we are just guarding him then, while he retrieves said object? What opposition should we most likely encounter?" Takeda asks, now lookng at the old man
Kenta makes it to the ground and polishes off the last dumpling on the stick. Picking his teeth he mumbles, "Got to be better than that last mission." He gives a little two finger salute and says, "Ok, ready to go!"
Mister Miyagi just blinks for a few moments at Takeda. He chuckles and shakes his head and shrugs his shoulders. "Well, I wouldn't want you perching over my shoulder while I lead the dig. I have a team of around fifteen villagers helping me." he says as he hrmms for a few moments. "If I make the discovery that I think I will make, I will credit you all in my scientific papers!" he says quite enthusiastically before starting to head off with the horse drawn cart.
"We're guarding everyone, not just him once we get there. We will serve as security." Maia explains as she points off in the direction towards the mountain. If this were an anime, there'd be flames in her eyes as she makes her dramatic pose, smiling as she chuckles while looking back towards Kenta. "The last mission wasn't too bad." Of course it wasn't, she got a giant vole out of it! Still, when he starts to head off, she walks alongside him. They're going at a slow pace, and it takes a couple of hours to get into the thick wooded forests on the way towards the base of the mountain.
"Keep an eye out." she advises the genin as she's concentrating to making sure the client is satisfied with their performance. Even with the sun high in the air, the forests are thick, the foliage whistling in the wind. There can be bandits, ninja or anything in the woods. Oooh.
Kenta looks like he is right at home in here. All the plants, the trees, the life. Kenta breathes deeply and smiles, "No problem, Maia-senpai." He keeps an eye out for anything out of the ordinary. Quiet wildlife, broken plants. That sort of thing. Kenta even tries out some tree walking by trying to stick a hand on passing trees. Not the best practice, but there's no time to properly do it.
"See, this has been pretty uneventful thus far.."
And with that said, Maia lets down her guard just a bit. Who would want to attack an archaeologist afterall? She smiles and relaxes, rolling her shoulders a bit taking a deep breath as she's letting the genin do the scouting and recon. She hrmms for a few moments as she peers towards Kenta.
"Would you mind scouting ahead for the next kilometer or so. The old man is getting a bit tired.." she whispers softly, making a motion towards Mister Miyagi who has fallen asleep in the cart as he holds onto the reins of the horses. Since they're going at an easy pace, the horses aren't running and it's easy to control afterall.
Kenta looks up at Maia and looks surprised, "M..me? Well, ok." He trots off, before going into a quick run heading down the path with arms hanging out behind him. He's not the best scout and is hardly stealthy, but does his best, keeping slightly off the road and moving through the foliage.
Takeda looks towards Maia, and awaits commands, from the ranking shinobi, as he glances around.."Shall I accompany Kenta, or stay here, or go in another dirwection?"
"Go with him. It's safer that way." she says matter of factly, smiling brightly. They need to learn how to scout ahead for traps, ambushes, and other such things anyway. She idly runs her fingers through her head while making a dismissive wave. "I can handle things here. But you two should buddy up. Teamwork is always good, and it would be a good time to learn how to work together. That's how we're going to make this mission a success afterall!" she says with a fistpump in the air.
Kenta slows down, upon hearing that he should work with Takeda. He waits for the other ninja to catch up and says, "Well, guess we're working together." He grins, hoping that Takeda has something a bit more substatial in skills than he does. Until he notices something, he keeps ahead of the cart with Takeda since he knows that Maia can take care of herself for a little while.
Takeda runs to catch up wth Kenta, and nods to his words..A glance at the other shinobi.."Well How about I take to any treeas, and you stick to the ground eh? One high and one low?" A shrug of his shoulders, as he waits to match speed with Kenta, cautiously looking around, and moves owards some trees
The next kilometer or so is a vast expanse of foliage and shadows. The interplay of light and the leaves makes shadows that seem to move, and it's hard to distinguish for the genin whether something is a threat initially. They're new, they're inexperienced, it's to be expected. Still, there's a rustle in the bushes up ahead, and the one on the ground just finds some squirrels skittering about, chittring and chattering.
The one taking to the air finds similar things. There are so many sounds, so much rustling amongst the leaves. A few checks here and there reveal more chittering and skittering animals, various birds flying around as they make their way ahead of the little caravan.
It's only near the end of the kilometer do they both hear something. It sounds like people talking. And they're planning, but it's still a little bit out of range of the kilometer expanse that Maia asked them to check out. Will they go forward and see? Or will they follow orders? Who knows?
Kenta isn't about to disobey orders. He's a lazy ninja, but not a disobedient one. But, he needs a bit more information before he would want to report back. Kenta makes a hand sign and points in the direction of the voices for Takeda to see. He makes his way forward crouched in the foliage, so he can hear what the voices are saying. They could be harmless or they could be plotting to attack. Either way, the team needs to find out.
Takeda continues to head over and peer down, hanging from a tree, hidden in the foliage as well. It seems he agrees with Kenta, and folds his arms.. watching to see, as well as lookng to see who else might be hidden with them.
Fortunately for the pair, they don't have to disobey orders. The leaves rustle and woosh a little as the group is heading towards the trail that the caravan is following. A cloaked figure talks to several bandits. They don't seem to be nin, but they're just your average rough and tuff thugs.
"Stop the caravan. I know that these are inexperienced nin on this mission to protect Miyagi. I don't care if you kill the ninja, they're worthless, but I want Miyagi alive." says the voice. It sounds distinctly feminine, though the face of the person still cannot be seen.
"Do what you can. Take their things, but bring Miyagi to me. Is that understood?" she asks curiously.
With that, the thugs nod as they start to make their preparations. From the group of six, there's at least two archers while the others are planning on setting a trap. While they may be thugs, they have their own techniques.
"The trap is prepared. Do not worry." the lead thug, a strong muscular runette says.
With that, the cloaked figure suddenly disappears in the shadows.
Kenta has a shocked look on his face. Really, people would do this? They're just young ninja! Kenta shakes his head and will have to deal with these feelings later. Now the pair has orders and decent info to bring back. He looks up where Takeda might be and nods his head back towards the caravan. He crawls away backwards, getting scratched up in the process, but it's the best way to get out of there without making too much of a commotion. He hops back on the road once he's clear and runs back to Maia as fast as he can.
A mere nod is returned to the other genin, Takeda decides to use something to help him move a bit faster(Body-Flicker-Technique). Though for the moment, doesn't leave Kenta totally behind but does seem to disappear and reappear further down the way, as he covers their back.. should be interesting, he figures
Ignorance is bliss. Maia's singing a soft litte song, one of her solo bits from the last CD she put out with Girls' Generation. She's at the reins of the caravan now sighing softly as she's bored. She looks bored anyway. This seems like a very mundane mission, and for that she's happy. She's given Mister Miyagi a break though as he's sleeping in the caravan now along with all his archaeological supplies. Still, she blinks as she notices the two genin running back with speed towards her.
"So, find anything interesting?" she asks curiously with a bright smile.
Kenta is impressed with that technique of Takeda's. He makes a mental note to learn it later. Kenta slows to a stop, breathing heavily and nods, "Yes. There's a trap…ahead. A group is going to ambush the caravan. Six, with two archers in the group, maybe more. One might be a ninja since he disappeared when the group set up the trap, or he's just very skilled. Their goal is to capture the old man alive."
Takeda folds his arms, waiting, allowing Kenta to do the talking, though he motions for the others to take cover with one of his hands, glancing around..
"Cat got your tongue?" she asks Takeda curiously, her brows furrowed a bit before she sighs and grumbles something under her breath. She scrunches up her nose as she facepalms ad mulls things over. This was going to be annoying. That much she could tell as she chews on her bottom lip.
"Well, six thugs should be no problem for two genin, right?" she says with a cheery smile. She seems confident in their abilities even though she only has a little idea of what they're capable of.
"You're familiar with the story of Cinederella, right? Well, you're going to transform into this little caravan." she chirps with a bright smile as she jumps off the reins and heads towards the back, looking for a little wagon that they can ride on that she can henge into something else.
Kenta gives a shrug, "In the original story, the wicked step sisters died." He does a quick hop and lands in the seat Maia was just in. "I don't have any skills, but I'll do my best Maia-senpai." He makes a tiger hand sign saying, "Transform!" With a puff of smoke, he perfectly resembles a caravan driver with no effort. His ninjutsu skills are at least as good as a chuunin's.
"Their was no need for me to say anything really, Kenta had it covered" Takeda replies, as he flips onto the back of the wagon.."However the workers and such need to get inside, now are your anged or up close and personal?" this is asked of Kenta more so.."I myself for now is up close and personal, lets be on the lookout for the chick who disappeared"
Takeda adds as he watches the transformation.. then hhmms "Guess i will be myself"
And carry out the sleeping archaeologist she does before she looks towards Takeda. "I was hoping you'd turn into our sleeping beauty here." she quips, putting the archaeologist down on the smaller wagon. Fortunately, it's only the four of them on this little trip as she chuckles softly while idly running her fingers through her hair.
Kenta grumbles out in an oldish voice, "Good idea, ya young whipper snappers." He grins under the wide straw hat covering his features, "And I'm more close up fighting, for what little I can do." he says quieter. He makes a mental note to go though some heavy training regimen after this mission. Water walking, clone training, water jutsus, the works.
Takeda not all the happy, about being a target.. he decides to ride next to the fake old man.."Well they will target me first and Kenta, so we should be good" A look about, then says in a whisper to Kenta "Lets take out the leader, I believe the others are a distraction?"
