"Hmm, ok now we've got something amusing." Toltiir reached in for one more tweak.
"Oh. What happened?" asked Sakura as she sat up. "Why are my clothes ripped? Why is Naruto asleep? I swear, he's so useless... why are you looking at me like that?"
Sasuke shook his head. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."
"And what happened to my clothes?" Sakura plucked at the front of her very torn and now only formerly red dress as the attention of her teammates turned to other things. Her mind froze for a second on the concept of why her favorite red dress was now the exact same shade of pink as her hair, as well as being all torn up, as she could think of no rational reason behind such a thing.
But of course! It was so obvious! Something so senseless was probably a prank, and if it was a prank it had to be Naruto's fault! And it wasn't just her dress. Her shorts, her sandals, her socks and the blue cloth tie of her headband were all pink!
"NARUTO!!" The girl sat up from where she'd been regenerated, leaving a pink stamp of most of her body behind her on the ground wherever her flesh had touched it, took two steps, leaving a pink footprint behind every time from her sandals having fallen off, then solidly kicked the blond ninja in the side, not only catapulting the exhausted boy's body off into the nearby brush but instantly transforming his orange tracksuit into the same pink as everything else in that brief moment of contact.
Now everybody was staring at her as Sakura blinked and wondered how and why Naruto had managed to change his costume from that horrid orange to that exact color of pink at the same moment she'd kicked him, all without waking up!
A brief tweak and the same genes that gave Sakura pink hair were now a bloodline struggling to emerge that Woundhealer had been able to complete, fixing those few errors in its code that had prevented its activation.
Sakura was now the first user of the soon-to-be-legendary Pink Fist! A variant of the Midas Touch, every non-living, non-animal material her flesh contacted would transform to the same pink as her hair.
Food, clothes... anything she touched, no matter how briefly, would be permanently transformed. Like Rogue of the X-Men she could limit the effect by wearing gloves most of the time, but everything that touched her body, from her own clothes to the toilet at home, to any bathtub or towel she borrowed, was going to be pink.
Five minutes had everyone convinced of the bulk of that information.
Sakura had reached for her pack to change into a set of intact clothes (not that she'd mind showing off for Sasuke, but there were others present!) only for the beige cloth of her standard issue travel pack to instantly become pure pink at her touch. Opening it, items she brushed aside to reach for the clothes within instantly became pink.
She was dressed in a fresh set of pink clothes, had a pink mess kit, and was the proud owner of a pink hand mirror. Even all of the makeup in her makeup kit had turned the exact same shade of pink when she'd touched the case. Her hairbrush was pink. Her shoes were pink. Only having replaced the broken ties and put them back on her feet, at least she wasn't leaving any pink footprints everywhere she went.
When she'd leaned against a tree, it had turned pink. When her fumbling hands had reached for her canteen, it had turned pink. She'd then drunk pink water from a pink cup trying to calm her nerves.
She was now sitting as a trembling ball of denial on a pink blanket that someone had spread out as Rin completed a field examination of her. A few stalks of pink grass, a pink kunai, and several different lengths of pink sticks, pink stones, and other experimental materials lay nearby.
Rin turned to her former teammate and crush of long ago, several items of her own equipment that had accidentally brushed Sakura having turned pink during the examination. "It's confirmed. A latent bloodline has been activated."
When Kakashi met her eyes, Rin slowly shook her head. Not all bloodlines conveyed useful or even desirable properties to those who possessed them, and all she could tell about this one was that it turned things pink.
Rin was too professional to say this, but she felt sorry for the girl. Sakura was going to have some interesting troubles shopping, as she was liable to be kicked out of any clothing store she browsed through, and a lifetime ban on all hot springs was likely in the girl's future.
Of course, if she wanted to retire she could more than likely make her living in the dye industry, as there was a pretty big market for that color in the clothing and accessories of little girls. Have her turn a plastic hairbrush pink then have someone else paint a white bunny on it? Yeah, that would work.
Heck, they'd probably come up with a new D-rank just for her.
Kakashi had already passed an appraising eye over the pink prints on all of the grass and dirt, to the pink tree and other spots of pink around their temporary camp. He used an Earth jutsu to churn the dirt and hide all of the prints left on it, then burned the pink tree to ash with a fast flash of a fire technique, using the earth jutsu once again to hide the ash, before he turned an eye-smile to the traumatized girl. "Well, congratulations."
The girls both noted that Kakashi was trying to be encouraging - and was not particularly good at it.
Kakashi noted this, and regretted momentarily that he was not the kind of smooth, charismatic individual that starred in his favorite literature, that could convince kunoichi of anything. Still, he persevered, "Lots of bloodlines have unusual or awkward side effects. A field examination is not going to be as thorough as you'll get back at Konoha Hospital. It could be you've got something as deadly as the next Sharingan here."
Noting that absolutely nobody around him believed him, Kakashi sweatdropped and scratched his head, looking away. "In the meantime, Rin? Do you have a pair of gloves that she can borrow?"
The medical kunoichi nodded, unsealing a set. That was one of the few things they'd determined during their short examinations, that things actually had to touch Sakura's body to get their color changed. A layer of cloth, like a pair of fighting gloves, should be enough to at least resume the mission.
Kakashi kept glancing from Naruto's pink jumpsuit to Sakura's pink clothes, and the pink bits of Rin's attire caused by accidental brushes during the examination, and gave an insincere eye-smile. "Everyone ready? We should go then. In the meantime, why don't we all practice our Henge as we walk?"
"Why did a stupid bloodline have to awaken now?" Sakura grumbled, as she assumed a Henge of a peasant girl.
"It's common after trauma," Rin supplied her, choosing to match the other girl's costume with her own peasant disguise.
"Trauma?" Sakura looked up, surprised. "What trauma?"
As the rest assumed peasant disguises and resumed their march, they told her about what happened.
"You're kidding me. Naruto?" Sakura screwed up her face is disbelief as she struggled with the concept of Naruto actually doing something competent. Nowhere in her current frame of beliefs was there room for her being cut apart brutally on her first C-rank mission, nor for Naruto gathering her bits together and healing them by stabbing a magic sword through her heart.
That had to be a prank, right? Everyone was just playing a joke on her?
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(Posted Fri, 06 Sep 2013 07:35)
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