ANBU Legacy - Post a comment [entries|archive|friends|userinfo]
ANBU Legacy

[ Website | ANBU Legacy on Tumblr ]
[ Info | About ANBU Legacy ]
[ By Date | Archive ]

Links
[Links:| Thread Index || Cast of Characters || Guestbook || Legacy Tumblr || For New Readers || Pronunciation Guide || Legacy Ebooks ]

[Mar. 5th, 2014|02:21 am]

hatake_kakashi
Kakashi was starting to think Katsuko had a vendetta against plantlife.

Or she just liked setting things on fire.

A boxwood shrub incinerated with a whumph of blue-licked flame. Katsuko laughed and somersaulted down the length of the field with easy handsprings, as if there wasn’t a recent crack in her collarbone. When she reached the fence, she vaulted with gymnastic ease, spinning twice in the air, and came down on her hands.

Upside down, she grinned like a carved pumpkin. “Beat that!”

Kakashi sighed. “Seriously?”

“Hey, if you can’t do it…”

The boxwood was almost burned out. Kakashi stamped on the last sparks, dropped onto his hands, and flipped himself backwards down the field. There wasn’t anything complicated in a series of rhythmic handsprings, even across uneven ground. When he reached Katsuko, he launched up into a double layout, twisted, and came down on one hand.

“Happy?” he asked, but the space where Katsuko had been was empty.

She landed on his upturned feet a half-second later, perching like a bird. “Y’know, it’s really easy to get you to do stuff.”

“And it’s impossible to make you stop,” he said, vaguely ruffled. Did it count as being manipulated if you knew the other person was doing it, and you made a conscious decision to comply anyway in the hopes of shutting them up?

“Don’t be like that, sugarplum,” Katsuko said, wheedling. Then, like a switch, she flicked to serious. “After this mission, we’re gonna have our first lesson. We need to get you some practice swords.”

“It’s the master’s job to make sure the student is properly outfitted,” Kakashi said, ignoring sugarplum. It had been more than three weeks, but eventually she was going to get bored of pet names. At least she’d remembered her promise to teach him the Hyoho Niten. He’d worried that their agreement might have melted in the morning sunlight, forgotten in all the shades of Katsuko’s distractions, but apparently not. She’d even brought it up before he could. He bent his supporting elbow, dipping down into a one-handed push-up. Katsuko balanced easily, barely swaying—and yelped when Kakashi twisted, lashing up to grab her ankle, and hurled her.

She hit the ground twenty feet away, rebounding with rubber ball ease, and handsprung down to the opposite fence, casually setting three shrubs on fire as she went.

This time when she landed on her hands, Kakashi landed on her feet. Fire hissed as he doused it with an absent-minded jutsu, leaving charred plantlife to steam.

“Copy-cat,” Katsuko said, and laughed at her own joke.

Kakashi shrugged, settling down into a comfortable crouch. He outweighed Katsuko by at least twenty pounds, but she was rock-steady beneath him. “It’s a theme.”

Katsuko snorted and folded one arm behind her back, balancing on her other hand. The uninjured one, Kakashi noted. “Have you and Ryouma made up?” she asked. “Or is tree-flinging a male bonding ritual?”

“I’d be perfectly happy to fling you into a tree,” Kakashi said.

“Whoa there, buddy,” Katsuko said. “That’s a level of commitment this relationship isn’t ready for yet.”

Buddy was a lot better than sugarplum. Apparently the trick was to threaten bodily harm.

Why hadn’t he done that weeks ago?

“I think we’re ready for violent shrubbery,” Kakashi said, and surveyed the smoking ground. “Not that there’s much left.”

Dirt rose in a cloud to the right as Ryouma kicked the bench Genma had made for him. Kakashi arched an eyebrow, but returned his attention to Katsuko when she shifted beneath him.

“It’ll grow back,” she said comfortably, still on the shrubbery—and then tangled their feet together with an ankle-lock and a swift lick of chakra, tucking into a somersault that yanked Kakashi with it.

They rolled across the ground in a semi-graceful tangle of limbs and thwarted gymnastics, Kakashi fighting to get free and Katsuko just fighting for the hell of it. Genma’s chakra glimmered close by, sudden and distracting. Katsuko pulled back, reflexively responding to the lieutenant.

Which was when Ryouma tackled Kakashi from behind, driving all three of them—but mostly Kakashi—into a churned up channel of soggy mud.

“Whoa,” Katsuko said dizzily, after they’d skidded to a halt. “Did the earth move for you, too?”
Link Read Comments

Reply:
From:
( )Anonymous- this community only allows commenting by members. You may comment here if you are a member of anbu_legacy.
( )OpenID
(will be screened if not a friend)
Username:
Password:
Don't have an account? Create one now.
Subject:
No HTML allowed in subject
  
Message: