Starring:
Date: January 31, 2015
Summary:
Tsiro gets the task of handing out newspapers and dumps it onto a few genin/students he happens to find.
Poster's note: foul language filtered in obvious places.
"Kiri’s Delivery Service"
Kirigakure
It is before the crack of dawn and for some reason someone, somewhere thought it was acceptable to wake Tsiro up on his off day. The grouchy Kaguya makes his way to the mission office. The sound of chairs being thrown around can be heard and then soon after Tsiro exiting the building. "YOU KNOW THAT THIS IS WITCH! NEXT TIME IM GOING TO GET BLOOD!" the angry Jounin yells back as the door closes. He waves his hand dismissively and a piece of bone shoots out from his middle finger into the now closed door. His crimson eyes then turn out towards the village. "Where am I suppose to get two lackies at this hour?" he grumbles as he starts walking down the path. He decided to check the training grounds. Usually he could find a student eager to please or a genin training there.
'Early to rise…'
"I know, shut up," Kazumi speaks to himself as he finds his way toward the training grounds. He was now officially part of a team, anyway… Training was necessary. He wouldn't disappoint Yoichi.
'So admirable.'
A groan of irritation comes from the pink-haired boy as he looks around the training area, getting a little creeped out by the quiet at this hour. So few people… it was unnerving, but still he remained, just deciding what he wanted to do, precisely.
Tsubaki was looking for someone. A certain someone. Though judging by the look on her face, she wasn't finding that person she was looking for. With a small sigh, she turns to leave when she sees a certain Kaguya enter. This one seemed… More than a little angry, too. The girl decides to try and skirt around the edges to try and avoid Tsiro, eventually accidentally bumping a familiar pink-haired genin. "Kazumi-san…" she greets, startled a bit. "I'm sorry for running into you," she says, trying to continue to move away from the Jinchuuriki.
Hahaha. Meat. Tsiro looks towards the two shinobi in the area and his crimson eyes burn into their skin. Not really, but if the eyes could, they would. "You two, follow me." Tsiro points to both Tsubaki and Kazumi. He then turns and starts to walk towards the market place. He had an agenda. There was definately something he required the two of them to do. He really did not care that Tsubaki had not graduated yet. He simply needed the warm bodies to serve a higher purpose.
Kazumi wasn't paying close enough attention. He didn't feel the foreboding feeling he should have at Tsiro's presence and neither did he notice Tsubaki until he'd run into her. He starts to apologize to her before he beats her to it and then he blinks when he hears the voice of the Kaguya. Glancing over, he shrinks a little — perhaps metaphorically, perhaps literally… — and then looks back to Tsubaki with a very obvious 'oh broom' look.
'Uh… I wouldn't delay, he doesn't look very patient.'
"Good point," Kazumi mutters to himself and gently touches Tsubaki's shoulder before taking the lead and walking after Tsiro.
Spotted… The thing that Tsubaki was trying to avoid. She sighs inwardly, green eyes matching Kazumi's look even if her expression does not. She follows suit, of course, making her way over to the Kaguya about a step or two behind Kazumi. She offers a light bow in greeting the Jounin, wanting to be as respectful as possible just so he doesn't end up getting angry at her. … If it wasn't too late, that is.
The Kaguya continued to walk until he reached a hut. He placed a finger between the lock and door and pried until the lock itself busted off. He then opened the door to the hut. It was a bunch of newspapers in a shack. "We are about an hour late delivering these. You will each grab one of these and a map. After you have run the set, you will return for more. These need to be out in the next two hours or no one gets paid. Understand?" he asks as he looks between the two.
'…'
…
'All right, well you have fun with that.'
A droplet of sweat runs down Kazumi's temple as they are given their task. Oh, this is going to be so bad. He's definitely not quick, he's clumsy, and he's got to give people their newspapers… in two hours?! "H-hai," the Genin responds, straightening up a bit and glances out of the corner of his eye toward Tsubaki to see whether she'd be able to do this better than he.
Two hours…. Tsubaki doesn't care as much about payment, but she saw this as a mission. The girl grabbed as many newspapers as she could carry, adjusting her cloak so it could act like a sling of sorts. She would have to do it properly when she emptied it… Then she takes a map, looking it over and planning on which houses she would visit first. Several routes so that she wouldn't intrude on Kazumi. "Yes, Kaguya-san." she says, already moving towards the door once she makes sure everything is secure in its spot.
Tsiro lets out an evil grin as the two accept their mission. Tsiro decided he was not going to take part in the delivery. He needed to watch the hut and make sure no one took the rest of the papers. "Remember, we only have until the sun comes up to get the papers delivered. If people complain, we do not get paid. Now, chop chop." Tsiro states as the yare off. He then goes to the side of the hut and takes a seat with his head against the hut. Hopefully those two were long gone by now.
Kazumi gathered up some papers before humming and ripping some cloth from the bottom of his clothing. He take a long strip, ripping at an angle so he can wrap it around the papers twice rather than tying it. This way he can tighten it as he delivers the papers. Then he puts the map between his lips, picks up a bundle of papers in his other arm, and takes the map into his fingers so he can read it. "Good luck, Tsubaki-chan," he offers before hurrying off. He has pretty long legs, so his strides are big, but they're a little too long and he trips easily so he's careful when he runs, which is why he's not very fast… but he intends to do his best.
"You too, Kazumi-san," she replies before they start off. Tsubaki is small, thanks to her age, so she has to really rush and keep up. The girl eventually deviates from Kazumi's path, going down a street and dropping the newspapers at people's doorsteps as she dashes by. 'This is going to be a long morning…' she thinks as she passes by the houses. With her are twenty seven newspapers, which meant she could do about thirteen before looping around to return to Tsiro and doing the other half of her 'street'.
Tsiro closed his eyes and started to relax as he leaned against the shack. "I cant believe the last delivery boy let some pack of dogs take him out. What a pansy." It did not even cross his mind to let the two delivery the newspapers know that they might be attacked by a pack of savage dogs. "Of all things, they wake me up? I mean really, they dont have a chuunin who could have directed this? I swear I upset someone in that office. I wonder if they will take those chairs out of my pay… they better not." Yep, he didnt need nobody else to have a conversation with.
The teen could at least go for quite a while, thankfully, so it wasn't too big a deal that he couldn't run very fast if he could just run a long time without a break. Or at least a decent amount of time. Kazumi replaces his map in his mouth as he adjusts papers so he can toss them to houses. He is (thankfully) completely oblivious of the danger. He feels fairly confident, it would seem, about a task that seems relatively easy.
Tsubaki eventually reaches the eighth house when she realizes she should slow down a bit and conserve energy. The girl adjusts her pace enough that she'll be able to return to Tsiro in okay condition. Not completely out of breath. The girl seems determined to do a good job of this. Maybe something that didn't resemble failure, even, while a Kaguya was in charge? Nine… Only four more houses before she should turn around. A quick glance across the way to make sure she was on the right path she had calculated earlier, then back to the task at hand.
Kazumi would be the first one to run into the pack of dogs. Three of them exited an alley after he passed it. The sounds of growling can be heard as they eye the boy. One is a fairly large breed dog. Maybe the size of a large german shepard. The next one is the size of a small lab. The third is… well its a shitzu. they are obviously very dirty dogs and not house pets. They are likely diseased.
Cat… Kazumi hears the growling and, at first, attempts to just ignore it…
'Look, if you want to go out because you got nipped by a dirty animal then make sure it's after you find me a new host,' he hears. The boy grumbles faintly and hurries to stop at a house to toss the last newspaper in his arm to the door. Then he puts the bundled papers between his feet so they will stay mostly together as he forms seals and throws sticky acid at the strays, hoping to catch them so he can make some more progress, at least, before having to deal with them again. Plus, it does hurt… so maybe it'll stop them from wanting to chase after him…
COMBAT: Kazumi attacks target 1 with STICKY-ACID with a roll of: 25
COMBAT: Kazumi attacks target 1 with STICKY-ACID with a roll of: 47
Tsubaki continues on with her journey. Her breathing is starting to get labored, which isn't good. But she can't slow down… She decides to think of it as training, using the idea to push herself to the limits. She could do this… Only four houses to go. And she's likely to run into Kazumi once she finishes her row, too. So there's some help on the way for the Genin. Hopefully Tsubaki can at least face off against rabid dogs if she comes across them.
The big dog is hit by the acid and its starts to burn into his skin. He yelps and tries to scratch at it which makes it worse. It then causes him to run off. Without the alpha, the other two dogs decide to take off after him. They did not seem to want any of whatever he had gotten into, with a meal or not on the line.
Kazumi emits a sigh of relief, picking up his bundle and continuing on. He feels quite happy with the result of that. Maybe he really isn't such a lost cause… He smiles to himself before he realizes something… He stops and turns around. What path was Tsubaki taking again…? Cursing to himself underbreath, he pushes himself a bit harder in order to make a round quicker so he can, hopefully, cross paths with the Shirayuki sooner rather than later.
T minus … X time until Tsubaki runs into Kazumi again. She's done with her current path, so now she has to go back and get more papers. Whether or not this puts her on the same path with Kazumi is … uncertain, but it's likely that they'll meet when he goes back and she goes out again. Unless he's just that much faster…
Tsiro remains at the shack. He looks up towards the horizon. They were running out of time. "1 hour left. They better hurry." He then glances off to the side. He was supposed to be at home in his warm bed. Eventually he'd get over it. Probably about the time he was walking through his own door and going back to sleep for a few hours. Until then he was just going to sit and wait these two to get done with their mission.
Thanks to the student's effort to pace herself and Kazumi's intent to push himself as much as he could, he makes it back to the hut a little after her, a bit out of breath but hey… "Tsubaki-chan… B-be careful out there. Some dogs tried to chase me. I wouldn't want… to get bit by them," he explains and starts gathering up some more papers. "If you run into the same group… the big one seems to be the leader, I guess." While they get the papers, he proceeds to describe the ones that were chasing him for her.
Tsubaki grabs another giant pile of news papers. As much as she can carry again. She glances back when Kazumi returns out of breath, the girl frowning at the news. She offers a nod, though, saying, "Thank you for the warning, Kazumi-san." Then she's off after it seems his report is done. It didn't take long, but it was time that couldn't be wasted. She sprints quickly to get to where she left off, going down a different trail since her first was completed. And now going down the rows again, dropping the news paper at doorsteps like last time.
Luckily for Tsubaki the alpha dog had been wounded and went into hiding. Had Kazumi simply scared the dog off, he might have tried heading towards the smaller prey. That was not the case though. The time however was a bigger factor. Tsubaki seemed to be making fairly good time while Kazumi had noticeable been slowed down by the attacking dogs.
"Yeah," Kazumi responds. He's a little tired, but he takes up his bundle of papers again and hurries out with, presumably, the last of them, not bothering to pace himself despite the drain on him already. There was that chill in the air that told him it was getting closer to sunrise. He'd lived in the Land of Water long enough to recognize that feeling.
Tsubaki has been timing the journey. She knows that they don't have much time left. Not enough for her to keep pacing herself, at least. She quickens her steps, not going full-out quite yet. But she is going fast enough to hit more houses in less time than before. It's an obvious difference. Occasionally she'll glance around for any signs of dogs, but they don't seem to be around, which means she can focus entirely on delivering the papers on time.
Being able to focus on delivering the papers seemes to be just enough to get them back on target. The two would really need to push themselves to get the last few houses. Not that Tsiro was really worried. He figured they would be more scared of failing than anything else. The village had been known for feeding a few of the failure students to the sharks.
Kazumi was less thinking about being fed to the sharks and more focused on doing well to prove to himself that Yoichi was right… He wasn't as much of a failure as he'd made himself out to be. It was a stupidly simple mission, really… but hey, he was doing something useful for many people by doing this. So they teen was pushing himself as hard as he could, ending up wheezing for breath by the end of the delivery route.
Tsubaki was on the last eight houses when she decided to sprint as fast as she could. The girl raced to get to the last house, making sure to drop the paper at people's doorstep. Failure wasn't an option, even in the most simple tasks… At least for her. And she's already failed several times, so she'd rather not chalk another one up to her count.
The sun rises and the unlikely duo has… succeeded in delivering their newspapers. Tsiro waits for them at the hut that contained the paper. As an extra bonus, they would each get a free paper. They would then be able to collect the minimal pay for their mission that a genin or even a student might get. Tsiro on the other hand got some free reading material as well. "You can read the paper, start a fire with it or pretend to sword fight with them. You two did a good job. Now I need go finish the dream I was having when someone drew my name from a hat this morning. Thanks you two." he states as he walks off.
Kazumi made it back to the hut, still not quite having caught his breath. He took the paper and listened to Tsiro, looking really far too pleased with the praise. It was more than he had anticipated, so he was very happy about it. "Thank you," he offers, bowing to the Kaguya before glancing over at the student that had been his partner in this. "Thank you for being here with me, Tsubaki-chan. We made a good team." No stutter? But he really doesn't hold the same confidence that Saiken had when he spoke to the Shirayuki.
Tsubaki returns to the hut out of breath, but she noticed the sun had come up after the last newspaper had dropped from her makeshift bag. She straightens in her spot enough to bow to Tsiro, taking paper and payment. "Ah… Thank you too, Kazumi-san," she says. The lack of stuttering caught her off-guard, but she doesn't sense Saiken…. So it's still Kazumi? Huh… "We should… Go relax for a bit…" she says, still panting a bit.
