Taking off the Training Wheels [Tori]

[Kazumi]

It was amazing! How did she have such difficulty with this before? It was all thanks to her lord of course, but those particulars didn't matter to her at this moment. Suzume was far too busy with flexing her newfound capabilities to offer proper homage to her patron, but in his current state, he likely couldn't care less about any such offerings. Standing a dozen paces from the wooden target, as the current sole resident of the elongated training room, she took aim with the kunai in hand. With a quick flick of her wrist, the blade of metal shot through the air and embedded itself deeply into the inanimate target's chest.

Cracking a grin she practically skipped forward, down the shooting range, as it were, to retrieve her weapon. Once she arrived, she was partly surprised to see how deeply it had pierced the wood, nearly splitting it in half, and she had not even put a significant effort into it. She practically squee'd with delight as she yanked it free, hurrying back down to her starting location to repeat the exercise once again. She had already repeated this particular exercise nearly a dozen times now, and while her aim was improving, that was certainly far from the reason she was partaking in it.

 

[Tori]

Tori forgot the reason for visiting the ranged training spot. He didn’t possess any such weapons yet, and standing there watching another wasn’t always the best source of inspiration. At least someone appeared to be having fun. No really, Tori couldn’t remember the last time he saw a fellow student skipping around the place. His sister’s voice rang within his skull, saying some crap about getting out more. Bewildered curiosity then swiftly surrendered to indignation, causing him to glare at Suzume.

“That…doesn’t make sense.” He blurted out, however, the stink-eye refused to let up so easily. Besides, it’s not like she’d burst into flame on whim alone. Not to mention the indoor spot offered little in ways a natural fire could even start, so abandoning that tangent worked for the best.

 

[Kazumi]

Spinning around as she reached her initial position, Suzume holstered the kunai as she readied to throw it. Her focus got the better of her as she failed to notice the entrance of the other student, and just as she reached down to grab and fling the weapon, the agitated and confused student blurted out his comment. Her attention shifted for just a moment as the kunai let her hand, soaring far off target to embed itself in the wall behind the line of targets. Her hands shot up to cover her mouth as she surveyed the damage, which was thankfully minimal. Finally, she let off an exaggerated sigh and finally turned to the newcomer, "what are you talking about?" She asked, curious and confused, still looking upbeat but now with a little frazzle to her nerves.

As he responded, she turned and held her hand out towards the kunai, as if she were trying to somehow reach it from its perch in the wall a mere twenty feet away. The shinobi's weapon stood defiantly in the face of her random gesture, much to the girl's confusion. "Huh...?" Her comment was quiet, but it left her looking even more perplexed than she had before. After attempting the gesture once more, her face scrunching up as she appeared to focus heavily upon it, she eventually relented with an exaggerated sigh. Momentarily lost in thought, she walked her way down the lane to retrieve her weapon. Once she reached the end, she once again held her hand out a foot away from the weapon in a grasping gesture. Again the blade remained perfectly still in the wall as it continued to ignore the strange girl.

Suzume looked to her hand in puzzlement before she relented and pried it from the wall, where a decently sized hole now rested. "That's... weird..." She walked her way back to her starting position near where the boy had stood, still examining the rudimentary weapon intently. "Maybe it... can't anymore?" A sinking feeling crept into her gut, pulling it down as it clawed its way up to her chest, slowly sapping that wellspring of enthusiasm that she had just moments prior. Whatever it was that was on the girl's mind, it seemed to be both extremely distressing and confusing.

 

[Tori]

“Is it suppose like you?” Tori asked while side-glancing at the kunai in question. Most weapons outside of fairy tales didn’t like anything, yet this girl reached for hers in absurd fashion. The young artist gave no sign of even hearing her previous question, a little too distracted by the ritual.

Suzume began talking to herself when Tori turned back to examine her expression. His first guess was ‘half a minute from freaking out.’ Besides playing a seconds worth of distraction, Tori couldn’t remember doing anything wrong. He then thought it'd be best not to speak, if this person had a lot on her mind, he’d just quietly excuse himself. Suzume appeared affluent enough to pay for damage done anyway.

Tori went about practicing his sideling technique. The door stood ajar and the distance wasn't far.

 

[Kazumi]

Making it back to her starting position, she quickly spun to face the line of dummies at the far side of the room once more. As she turned, she caught trace movements from the not-so-sneaky aspiring shinobi and quickly stopped and turned back to face him. Her expression lit up with a smile. "Oh, hey! Didn't see you there. How long you been there?" She moved from her spot, now spinning the kunai in a slow motion using the ring on its end to go 'round and 'round on her index finger. "Name's Oushi-Ouja Suzume by the way." She extended her left hand to shake, struggling, but only with slightly visibility, to keep spinning the kunai on her other hand's finger. It was a hunk of metal after all, and even if it was expertly made here in the village, it was still only a small slip from accidentally sliding off and impaling someone's foot.

Regardless of whether or not he accepted the greeting handshake, she'd turn and make her way back to the throwing spot. "Care to make a little wager?" The offer came straight out of the dunes, but Suzume didn't seem to be kidding about it, even if it was a friendly offer. "Betcha fifty yen that I can throw two of them at once and hit the dummy." She stopped spinning the kunai, the blade nearly falling out of her grasp completely to only barely managing to catch it with the handle at the last moment. Cracking a smile, she looked back to him with a mildly nervous and awkward grin. "Hehe, whoops." She idly commented with a soft laugh as she walked over to the weapons rack and pulled a second kunai off of the rack, weighing one and then the other between her hands ot make sure they didn't feel off.