Viridian Dreams Forum

(A little extra in-character knowledge would be appreciated, yeah.)

[The Shirotori's were a mercenary clan, but as of the Third Great Shinobi War, they have declined. They have no 'homeland' to speak of and stay mostly with benefactors. There are at least two branches to the family, one acting as servants and the other as warriors, but it is impossible to tell any hierarchy within the clan between the groups, and the possibility of a third is likely but unknown. The last two leaders made some poor decisions that have put the clan in a very bad position. The siblings of the last leader (deceased) are currently in charge, but do not consider themselves the rightful matriarch or patriarch of the clan. Most all clan members are distinguished by their white hair and very pale complexions.

Specializing mostly in taijutsu and kenjutsu, a few members of the clan are well versed in their own style of ninjutsu. They are almost notoriously sneaky, something that isn't entirely a learned thing, you have seen this with Yuki just disappearing when you were distracted. The clan used to have a contract with doves, but whether or not that is still the case is a mystery.]

Itsuki massages the bridge of his nose. "I don't suppose there's any way to negotiate you breaking your current contract? Maybe hiring yourselves out to Konoha with the possibility of settling permanently there? We're a little short on the kenjutsu side of things, so you'd be welcome, and I'm sure that Hanabi-sama would at least agree to negotiate in good faith, even if you decided not to settle. And if you're wary of working with Konoha itself, my grandfather is a civilian merchant who's always on the lookout for good help." He keeps one eye on Kojira as he speaks.

Akihito raises an eyebrow.

"Yes, well," he says slowly, "that would be..." he trails off, thinking, his expression wistful.


"But unfortunately, impossible at this point." He says sharply, "Perhaps in a month? Maybe as little as a week we would be able to talk. However, I do not trust you or your offers. You helped my niece, for which I am grateful, but your actions do not impress me.

For now, your only options are to leave or to fight. An undesirable situation, but unavoidable at this point." he shrugs at Itsuki and Kojira.

Itsuki sighs. "Very well then. Kojira, we're returning to base, the mission is a failure."

Akihito inclines his head and a small smile comes to his face.

"My thanks," and then he sighs, "I will have to escort you back to the main road, and my daughter will show up in a moment or two, so she'll be coming with. A precaution, I hope you understand."

[Why is this not turning up in the active topic feed?]

(I dunno)

Itsuki gives a sour smile, almost a grimace. "Of course. Ugh, Hanabi-sama's gonna have my hide for this mess."

Akihito's mouth sets in a frown.

"I apologize. As I said before though, in few weeks time we won't have any more obligations to Itakura. I'm sure some of the girls would be happy to give you his head as a gift."

"Damn girl, what's taking her so long?" he mutters.

[For some reason, I don't believe that Itsuki is really giving up on the mission. Maybe he wants to avoid fighting someone like Akihito?]

(Actually, he is. One of the tenants of this mission was that Konoha's involvement not be known. Since both Kojira and Itsuki have been recognized as members of Konoha, and Yuki pretty much knew what the plan was, the entire mission is a wash so far as he's concerned.)

[Heh, well, you did actually gain something from this mission. The Shirotori will favor Konoha-nin in the future. Akihito stole a bingo book and had Yuki identify the ninja she met. So that's how they know.

You also lost the only medic-nin, but she didn't like being a ninja anyway.]

A flash of black and white whirs past Itsuki and Kojira to stop abruptly next to Akihito. A young woman with the standard Shirotori white hair in a long braid down her back and smile on her face looks at the two Konoha nin. She starts to reach for the swords strapped to her back, one long and one shorter. Akihito stops her.

"What the hell?" she looks at him questioningly.

"You would know if you bothered to show up when you were supposed to," he tells her shortly.

"Aw, come on dad, I'm not that late-"

"You'll be a disgrace to what's left of our family name if you keep up this attitude," he says sternly.

"It was all Yuki's fault. She wants to see her little sister, and you know what it's like keeping her in a room when she doesn't want to be. So I had to put her in your quarters and lock the door from the outside. You don't have any mouse-holes in your room, do you?"

Akihito rolls his eyes and sighs.

"Very well. We are to escort these two men back towards Market. It appears as though they got turned around."

the girl quirks an eyebrow but doesn't question him.

"Nice to meet you two!" she exclaims brightly and smiles at the duo.

"Oh," Akihito says, "by the way, what happened to the 'psychotic medic', the sullen girl and the cripple?"

"I ordered them to return to base. You can drop the pretense, I already know you know what our mission was. As we've failed in one of the main tenements of it, it's no longer an issue."

"The only people who know why you are here, are Yuki-chan and myself. So long as it was possible to settle this peaceably, sharing that information was unnecessary." Akihito informs them. "My daughter was to come as insurance against the other possible outcome of our discussion."

Itsuki blinks. "I see. I apologize for being so short then. It's been a trying past few days. Stealth has never been one of my strong suites, and dealing with the majority of the team I was handed only compounded the headache. Top that off with the mission failing so blatantly, and it's quite the headache I've got now."

Akihito chuckles.

"Let's go then, yes?"

"Yes, lets."

The four head off toward Market, let's just say they make it there without incident because this mission is already into 35+ pages and stuff.

Before heading off to leave back to Sodegaura, Akihito turns to Itsuki.

"In the future, should anything happen, if what you say about the Shirotori being welcome to settle in Konoha is true, then you will have our support. In the mean time, we will work to rebuild our clan in case we are needed. The Shirotori would be proud to ally themselves with Konoha," Akihito is very serious.

Itsuki nods. "Understood, and I will impress this to Hanabi-sama. Should she not be as receptive to the idea as I thought she would have, there is still contracting with my Grandfather, as I said before. The Hokage has no jurisdiction over civilian affairs, including who they hire."

Kojira was silent the entire trip, before turning to regard Itsuki with a glare as the newcomers left.

"I was going to kill him, Itsuki, acting an Otsuki agent who had encountered an impediment to his mission, but rather left me without a way to continue with that, hmm?" His expression is sour as he continues, "I would have reprimanded you for calling off the mission without consulting your superior, as in myself, first. The difficulty being is that if I were in a position to officially dress you down, I would have to be acting as a Konoha Jounin, rather than an Otsuki Se- myself. As I cannot do such when acting as an Otsuki, you rather shoehorned me."

He sniffed, "It would have been regretable to have killed the girl, though. I mean, you did expend some effort on her wellbeing, but then again..."

(The girl was Akihito's daughter. Yuki is his niece. Just in case that was vague. This is an important for any further Shirotori things that will come up later.)

"Kojira, I get the feeling that "Yuki", or whatever the hell her name actually is, was under observation. If you'd have killed her, I doubt any of us would have left Market alive, or at least not without giving away our presence, which was horrifically compromised as it was. As soon as he mentioned that he knew we were from Konoha, our mission was a failure. Had we managed to kill him and his daughter, we would have had to return anyway, because we would have lacked intel on who else knew we were inbound. I simply chose the path with the least amount of stress involved for both parties. And you heard him. It's highly likely that his clan will approach Konoha about allying with us, if not outright settling in the village. The way I see it, we may have actually strengthened the Village in the long run."

"And who are you to tell Steel from rust? Not all allies strengthen us, Itsuki. And not all missions can be compromised just because somebody knows we're there. Proof, Itsuki, if they know we were heading there, and something happened, they could easily foot the blame on us. But why would anyone believe them without proof? They are just as sure as we are that we could come out of that entire mess and still smell of roses. We are not the only force that could act within those walls."

He grinned, but there was no humour in his smile. "And perhaps my village does things differently, but I personally think that throwing open the gates to anyone who promises to be our bestest-best-friends if we let them in is the second worst thing to entering battle naked with sparklers on our head."

Itsuki purses his lips. "Believe what you want Kojira, but I know mercenaries, shinobi and otherwise. Besides, I only made the possibility of the offer. Negotiating between the clan and Konoha is up to Hanabi-sama. As for the mission itself, one of the specifics for it to be considered accomplished was that no one know it was done by a team from Konoha. So once they knew we were there, it was compromised. I made the call, and I'll deal with the fallout."

"By the blessed matriarch, you're going to get some. Did the whole concept of proof not get into your head? How about the 'only faction' point? We were there, yes, but did anyone see us kill the man? Slip a poison that anyone could get into his meals? Plant explosives in his bed? If the man has enemies enough to have one man requesting his termination, he has enough for ten, as my mother used to say." Kojira nodded, "And wouldn't you know, ten days after that she was stabbed with ten sharpened bamboo sticks coated with ten different poisons, flung by ten fingers, all belonging to one woman. Irony, huh?"

"The point I'm making, Itsuki, is that while we would be there, no-one could prove it was us who did the dirty deed done not quite so cheaply. Especially if other mercs are planning on axing him out, which is what I was attempting to ascertain before this Sarge fella and the dick-kicker interrupted me."

"Of course, you seemed to be intent on a full frontal assault, which I think is pretty awesome." A voice from in a tree calls. It's the girl who accompanied Akihito before. Apparently she hadn't left.

"Oh, uh, yeah. I didn't mean to eavesdrop, I just wanted to give you this," she tosses Itsuki's shirt down. "Yuki-chan insisted that I give it back if I was going to lock her in a room."