"Ashikabi-sama?" asked Katsuragi, looking sad. Not that this was unusual as she usually looked a bit sad.
"Hmmm?" asked Naruto, still thinking about how that stupid pervy-sage had gone off and left him AGAIN.
"Do you not... want me?" asked Katsuragi.
Naruto was about to reply with a negative. After all, he had not wanted to be here in the first place. Something stopped him. Maybe it was his time with Sakura. After all, it hadn't stopped him from saying things before - but he'd gotten the same feeling of impending doom immediately afterwards when he'd said the wrong thing and Sakura was just beginning to react to it. This was just a second or two earlier.
With a moment of perfect clarity, Naruto Uzumaki KNEW that if he followed his first impulse and loudly declared that the three new girls would just go away - that they would. That in this 'secret death tournament' that Pervy-sage and that Minitonka guy had talked about - all three would very likely be dead.
He wasn't the swiftest mind or one with the best memory for facts and figures, but he'd gotten that much.
"Well, nothing for it but to do it!" tried Naruto, changing tactics. "So... taijutsu first!"
"He didn't answer the question," noted Nina aloud for the benefit of the others.
"Come on, let's tai some jutsu," said Naruto.
"Our Ashikai hates us?" asked Nina.
"Uh oh," said Naruto, knowing that something was coming. He anticipated a Sakura-esque reaction, which was a hit to the head.
No, this was much much worse. Something he had no experience with and therefore no defense against.
The dreaded Puppy-Dog-Eyes-No-Jutsu.
Elsewhere:
Sakura stopped and looked off into the distance. She had a feeling. Somehow, somewhere, a balance had changed.
Unfortunately, Tsunade was still chucking boulders at her apprentice in order to teach that pupil that a medic needed to be able to avoid damage at all times.
WHAM!
"Okay, that'll do for today," Tsunade informed the boulder which had a pair of arms and legs sticking out from under it. "Shizune? You'll need to heal her up. Hopefully that'll teach her to ignore distractions during a battle."
Shizune was wincing but nodded, remembering her own studies in that particular lesson.
"And... there!" said Jiraiya, one foot coming down. Rock formed a plug over the hole.
Akitsu just watched, curious but not saying a word.
"If I need that 'phone' or the card I can come back for them," said Jiraiya. "Otherwise they can't harm anyone down there. That rock is reinforced so even if they explode it'll be contained."
Akitsu raised her eyes towards Jiraiya, still saying nothing.
"So, now I've winged another Sekirei," said Jiraiya, studying Akitsu out of the corner of his eye. "What does that mean for you?"
"Does this mean you will now discard me?" asked Akitsu.
Jiraiya frowned ever so slightly for all that he was pretending to be studying the local trees. Akitsu was normally calm and emotionless for the most part. He'd detected worry in her voice and a flash of a couple of other things on her face that were raising a few red flags. "No. I have no reason to discard a beautiful young woman whether I can 'wing' her or not."
There were visual cues that indicated relief. Nothing that Naruto would pick up, but Jiraiya was a bit more experienced and was actively looking.
"We'll have to look for that falling Sekirei later," said Jiraiya aloud. "In the meantime, I want to fully examine your crest among other things."
"Ah. Page 134?" asked Akitsu.
"134?" asked Jiraiya, puzzled for a moment. Then her reading of Icha Icha Paradise clicked. "Ah. A possibility we'll look into in the fullness of time."
"Ah," said Akitsu, a faint smile and blush appearing on her face.
"What the hell are we supposed to make out of this?" asked one of the technicians. "They're planning on leaving? They can't do that, we've tightened security on all routes out of the city."
"They managed despite our previous methods," said the supervisor.
"Half the stuff must be codewords or phrases," said another technician. "He'd already stated he knew the phone could be used for surveillance."
"I've already sent a transcript to the boss, as well as the fact that our signal was muffled before it was completely lost," said their supervisor. "Just go ahead to the next problem. We got enough of them."
"He'll send the Disciplinary Squad after 'em," said one of the techs. "Damn. Now I feel sorry for the 'ninja' team."
Minaka Hiroto considered the information he had. Clever, very clever. Perhaps too clever. And all this talk about leaving the Sekirei Plan was quite concerning.
He would have to:
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(Posted Tue, 19 Feb 2013 16:05)
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