Viridian Dreams Forum

I wanted to do a funny opening for this thread, but I figured I should just give you guys room to post already. The funny will come soon enough. That and I just sent messages to Greybane and Flux to see if they want in on this mission so I'm just going to let people come in at their own pace for now. Not sure about the thread name...

Participants:

serbii
ewuvi
Random fan
MEK
(maybe): Greybane and Flux

You're gathering at the Hokage tower (still in this thread) mid-morning to receive your assignments.

Aoko Uchiha waits quietly in the mission office, standing in a corner. Two days ago, Hokage-sama had pulled her off of her normal assignments in order to undertake a "special assignment".

The fact that her usual uniform had been replaced by a standard chunin one did nothing to alleviate her worry. And now, she hadn't been told WHAT her mission was supposed to be when she had arrived, as if Hokage-sama was waiting for someone.

She had a very, very bad feeling that today was going to be very, very long...

Matsuda Ichigo rushes into the Hokage tower. "Idiot, you just had to freeze up." He looks around and notices the Uchiha chunnin standing there, before taking a deep breath and calming himself down.

Kenta comes walking up the stairs to the hokage tower and then just stands by the stairs looking like he's waiting for someone.

Hotaru heads down the main street towards the Hokage tower, Ushio enters the road from a side street. Theye eyes meet and Ushio gives Hotaru a "I know about your last mission" grin , Hotaru turns away with a 'Humph' and stickes her nose in the air Ushio gives a little laugh at the gesture and trots ahead to reach the tower first.
She climbs the stairs, enters the mission room and greets Ichigo and Kenta and smiles at Aoko.
Hotaru follows about a minute later giving off "I'm not with these people" vibes and covertly sizing up the Uchiha she's never seen before.

The assistant at the desk takes note of the arrival of Ushio and Hotaru. “Please report to the briefing room* for your assignment.” She says to the group.

Should the six young ninja go as their told, they’ll find that the Hokage is currently there in the briefing room rather than her office. Not unusual really, she often does so several hours a day.

“Enter.” She waves them in. Hanabi looks them over in that fixed Hyuuga gaze that she is oh so very good at.

“Team 4 and chunins Uchiha Akou and Hyuuga Hotaru, all of you have been selected for a unique mission today.”

A chunin sitting next to the Hokage passes her a file. As it is passed a name at the top of the folder is visible.

Tora.


*oog: that room seen in canon where Sarutobi was sometimes assigning missions alongside some of his underlings (like Iruka for example).

Aoko tilts her head to the side. She has never heard of any "Tora". Some high-ranking Yakuza boss from Cloud? No, that would mean an assassination mission, and she had never worked on any of those with other ninja, much less these children...

And the letter had said that pending her performance, she would be elevated to the rank of Special Jounin, citing "formalities involved with the post". Not that she had any idea what that would mean.

"Hokage-sama," The chunin asks quietly, "can you please explain what this is about...?"

Upon seeing Tora on the mission report Kenta's eye's go wide and he begins looking like he's ready to run.

Ichigo follows the group and notices the name Tora on the folder. "Wait, Tora, wasn't that an infamous cat at one point or something?" Seeing his teammate's reaction, he then asks, "This mission we are going to be assigned, can we gain a promotion to chunin if successful?"

Both girls go pale.
U: "It's not a cat, it's a, a... thing"

Hotaru looks at her great Aunt in a kind of desperate hope.
"You've got it in a cage and want us to carry it to the river and drown it?"

"If so I'll gladly do this mission for free."

I suppose they do deserve some explanation…

Hanabi seems to ignore the complaints of the genin (plus one of the chunin), removing a large photo of an orange-brown tiger-striped cat from the file and raising it for them to see.

“This is the current Tora, favorite pet of the daimyo’s wife. This one is a descendant of the original. In any case, he seems to have an equal knack for escape and tormenting those who would recover him. However, it seems several frustrated genin have made attempts on Tora’s life with the last few retrieval missions and things may only get worse. The Fire Lord and his wife will be arriving in Konoha tomorrow and will be staying for a week. Of course Tora will be in their company during this time.”

Hanabi actually allows herself a sigh. She feels for these kids, truly, but playing politics and keeping the nobles happy requires performing unpleasant tasks at times.

“The daimyo was very understanding when the original was…"lost" some months ago. It brought us improved relations with the dog demon village and for that (and because he hated the damn thing as well…) he stood up to his wife. But if it happens again at the hands of our own genin, it will be much worse for him. If things are bad for the daimyo, he makes things bad for us.”

She stares down the ninja before her, daring them to object.

“That is why you’re here. You will shadow Tora during the daimyo’s visit and retrieve the cat should he escape. Protect Tora and if any leaf ninja try to kill him, subdue them. I know most of you hate Tora but I am certain you can put those feelings aside and get the job done. Any questions?”

oog: I think the dog demon killing the original Tora occurred months ago. If not then I’ll fix it.

edit: fixed up a couple sentences a bit, but that's all.

Aoko paled, and decided to ask the only thing that could come to her mind.

"Tora's a cat? And I'm not to kill him...?"

"If we were allowed to kill it I would have done so a year ago. That being said for the good of the village I'll not allow that thing to be killed."

[By original Tora, you mean the one from canon, or a later one? The "original" Tora from canon was around in ~12AK. Seeing as how it's currently ~66AK, I'm pretty sure old age would've done him in already. Unless he really was a demon cat....]

oog: as a matter of fact the original Tora was a demon cat who lived that long. But it's only now that the original is gone its descendants are becoming terrors in their own right...

"Blast it, well it looks like I'm never going to repair my friendship with Fugaku now." Ichigo blinks and then straightens again, "Sorry, Hokage-sama, but who is team leader for this mission?"

Hanabi blinks at the team accepting things as well as they did.

"Uchiha Aoko is team leader for this mission. Hotaru will act as her second. And yes to both of your questions, Aoko. Some missions require nonlethal methods, this is one of them."

Aoko blinks at the response.

"Then why are you entrusting me with this... mission, Hokage-sama? It is not within my area of specialization."

oog:hah, I just noticed that makes three blinks in a row!

ig: Hanabi's lips shift into a slight smirk as she explains. "On the contrary, it will require discipline and restraint in order to focus your efforts and avoid distraction. True, you will have to alter your methods to less lethal ones, but one must learn to adapt outside of what they are used to or never grow. Your new team has experience with retrieval missions of this sort, they will assist you quite well."

Hotaru seems to be somewhere between depressed and horrified, for about half a dozen different reasons.

Ushio is calculating under her breath how much catnip she can afford, evidently hoping to drug the creature into a stupor.

Aoko visibly deflates, not paying any real mind to the Hokage's lecture. She looks much like a puppet with their strings cut, only muttering an affirmative when the person behind the desk stops talking.

Despite her ninjas' understandable lack of enthusiasm, Hanabi speaks again.

"The daimyo, his wife, and retinue are scheduled to arrive at noon tomorrow. You will not greet them or reveal yourselves. Again, once they enter the village Tora is your responsibility if he escapes. Use the time you have to get acquainted with each other. Unless you have any essential questions, you're dismissed."

Since they make no reply, Team 4 and the two chunin are dismissed to spend the day preparing for Tora Protection Duty the following day. How much of that preparation time is spent recovering from shock is up to them.

The next day…

It’s late in the morning in Konoha, with the sun approaching its zenith, though it can’t be seen all that much with the ominous cloud cover. The humidity is particularly high today though the clouds indicate it may break at any moment with a coming storm. Of course, being surrounded by forest tends to make the humidity situation even worse.

As the hour approaches noon the daimyo, his wife, and retinue arrive at the village gates. The daimyo is a stout but hearty looking man with dark brown hair that is starting to gray at the sides. The thin blonde woman at his side, the daimyo’s wife, fusses over an orange tiger-striped cat in her purse. This is the mission objective, the cat known as Tora. And he does not seem to be having fun right now, his displeasure at being confined obvious.

The daimyo is greeted at the gate by the Hokage and pleasantries are exchanged. From a distance it isn’t clear what is being said, but as it seems things are about to move elsewhere the daimyo’s wife expresses her desire to see other parts of Konoha. Her husband acquiesces to this desire and allows her to go with a few members of the retinue to escort her. As the rest of the party heads toward the Hokage tower, the daimyo’s wife and her escort make their way towards the upscale commercial district.

Ushio follows along the street some distance behind, wearing a backpack along with her usual outfit. A special jounin smirks at her as she walks past, another gives her a thumbs up.
Damn does every ninja in the village know about this mission?
A chuunin calls out he's got 40 ryo riding on her team.
"I'm glad someone is finding this amusing...." -_-
----

Hotaru, in her usual fashion, has chosen the route with the least amount of people and is taking the roof tops to shadow the demon cat, checking on the group with the byakugan.