Genma at the Crossroads Genma left Raidou with a good supply of jars for containing the more interesting butterflies once he was quite convinced that the alarming apparitions did not in fact make Raidou feel ill. He didn't even seem out of sorts particularly. He was sitting on a jar attempting to capture another of the green and pink rhinestone butterflies that played that song about liking large-assed women when Genma left him. The kiss Genma'd given him goodbye had produced a magnificent specimen that shimmered like a coating of diamonds on precious metal and smelled of fresh-baked cake.
Raidou asked Genma to go and let Kisame know he wouldn't be in to work, and to bring him back something to eat. Genma'd done the former with a very, very brief stop by the bar. He could guess how little Kisame would like the news or the bearer, which was why he'd judiciously sent in a clone to deliver the message. Then he'd headed to the market to hunt up something that Raidou'd like to eat. The first thing that caught his eye were some spectacularly plump, pinkish-red apples, with a blush of golden green on one side.
"Honey crisps!" the seller had told Genma when she saw him eying them. "Here, sweetheart, have a try." She'd held out a little basket of fat wedges, which Genma had used a senbon to spear. The apples more than deserved their names, and after a little haggling, he'd purchased a string bag full of them for a generous handful of copper coins. She'd initially asked a silver, but Genma's charm plus a plea of poverty and the story that the fruit was for his poor sick lover, laid up in bed on their vacation to the tropical paradise they'd always dreamed of visiting, won him the price reduction he craved. The coppers themselves came to his fingers on his walk to the shops, lifted a few at a time from a series of inattentive passersby who noticed how sexy that long haired man was but never felt his fingers in their purses.
He was heading down to the docks next, cutting through some back alleys, to see if he could find some fresh shrimp, when he tripped. Now it's unusual for a person walking on level ground to trip. Even more unusual for a shinobi of Genma's caliber to do so. He caught his balance with a little half-jig of a dance step, and got over his surprise at having stumbled, only to be even more shocked at the sudden change in his surroundings. He was no longer anywhere near the sea. No longer on a tropical island at all. He felt like he was back home in Fire Country, standing at the intersection of two long dusty road with fields of wheat and soybeans and cotton stretching as far as he could see in all directions. There were a few puffy white cumulus clouds in a brilliant blue sky. The air smelled autumnal, and a few trees in the distance were just starting to turn golden and red.
More surprising yet was the sharply dressed man playing a sparkling golden musical instrument. It was one of those Western Lands instruments that Ibiki had been so fond of. A baiorin, he thought he remembered the name being. After the seagull woman, the butterflies, and the strange priests, Genma was pretty much on strangeness overload. Go with it, was what Raidou had said to do, if anything weird happened. So go with it was what Genma decided to do. The music the man was playing was really, fantastically good. Genma sat himself down with his back against a wooden post of some sort, opened his sack, and ate an apple, listening to the music with a delighted expression on his face.
When the man paused, Genma grinned at him. "Hey buddy, you're phenomenal! You seriously ought to get a gig down at this bar my boyfriend's cook at. You seriously deserve to be playing where people can actually hear you." He tossed the man an apple. "You want one? These are really good. Honey somethings, the woman called em."