Food Emergency [Mission]

Age : 29 Posts : 3145

Mission: Food Emergency

Though the young Yuki had sustained grave injuries during his team exercise, after spending weeks in hospital, confined to a bed, limited by crutches and a body that couldn’t handle two seconds of walking before it screamed at him to stop, Masamori was unsurprisingly raring to get out of that drab, grim place that was called a hospital and start being a shinobi again. Not that his first day back was as glorious as he would have liked it to be. Far from it.

The mission was simple enough, and the youth figured that it could have been much worse. In his still, rather shaky condition, the task should be a comfortable one – something to ease him into the ninja life. Find a trader, escort him back. What could possibly go wrong?

If Masamori was less guarded and shy than he was, he would have probably skipped right out of the gate. It felt good to be walking, even if the motion did award him the odd pang of pain and from time to time, he had to stop just to get his breath back. It wasn’t so much that he had gone out of shape during his hospital stay, more so that his body wasn't quite ready to engage in prolonged physical effort; his injuries were still haunting him. Still, he walked on, past the guards, past the gate and into the wild. He had been informed of the vague location of the trader and his cart and was heading in that direction.

This was a D rank, so the youth expected little. A broken wheel at best, but surely nothing else. He made his way towards the location quickly, his feet carrying him with greater comfort than before. He still needed to stop every now and again, but the pauses became rarer and he felt increasingly more like his old self. But then, was that a good thing? The youth had much time to consider what he was – who Yuki Masamori was. His father’s son was the best answer he could come up with, and he hated his father as of late. His father would have rejected as simple a task as this, deeming it below his status, yet Masamori hadn’t. Masamori wanted to help. Didn’t he? He didn’t need the money, so that had to be it? Or was he just performing his duty?

A man was sitting down ahead, though sitting was a rather generous word. It would be more accurate to describe him as slumped over, his head drooping. His body was resting against a tree. Was he dead? The youth couldn’t see any blood or anything of the sort, but the man didn’t seem to be moving or making any noise; his neck could have been snapped? Maybe he had been strangled? Masamori decided to hurry over to the body quickly, pushing himself to run. That was however a bad idea. Almost as soon as he started to run, his legs alerted him to the fact that he was simply not ready to do so yet via the intense pain that they gave off. The youth obediently reverted to walking. He cursed himself for his weakness, yet was deeply afraid that his injuries would return and anything was better than going back to the hospital.

In what must have been a bizarre sight, the youth walked slowly over to the man in what appeared to be a calm manner, despite his facial expressions suggesting that he was deeply worried about the stranger’s state. He stopped a few steps away from the man, looking at him curiously, his eyes scanning for any sight of injuries or blood. He couldn't see any, but again, the figure didn't seem to give off any clear life signals...

Age : 29 Posts : 3145

It didn’t take any medical skill to tell just what was wrong with the man. For all the staring and straining of his ears, all Masamori had to do was just to lean in a bit closer and the intense stench of alcohol was instantly evident, assaulting his nostrils with a furious tenacity. The youth stumbled back, trying to waft the smell away, as if it was clinging to him in close gaseous proximity. His face expressed the kind of disgust he was so used to expressing in front of Suzaku most days. And sure enough, he could see a packet of cigarettes peeking out of a trouser pocket. This will be you one day friend, the youth thought to himself, grimacing.

As the boy considered what to do with the man, a sound of the clip-clapping of a horse alerted him to the presence of an incoming cart. The youth’s first instinct was to hide – an odd reaction, considering he was in the Fire Country, on a D rank mission, not a mile or two away from Konoha. Yet before he could consider just how silly the idea was, or make a definitive move to hide, the cart and the horse came into view, as did the man sitting upon it. Plump, yet clean-shaven and proper. He had nice clothes on, the kind that suggested he was affluent but hardly a member of the upper class. He wore a straw hat, as if to stress his simple background, yet his belly suggested that he had never tasted hunger. He had a winning smile, and the kind of ease that would convince a man to pay an extra coin or too for the service rendered or the item sold.

“What are you doing lad?” the man bellowed from his cart. He looked perplexed, maybe even suspicious. What he saw was an odd sight surely. A youth, standing a few feet away from a man slumped near a tree, drunk, sleeping or worse. Was the boy a thief? Though the idea passed through the trader’s mind, his clever eyes spotted the Leaf insignia. “Are you the genin that was supposed to escort me?” he asked, more loudly this time, as he had not earned a response to his previous question.

Masamori’s face expressed a profound sense of dumbness. He looked, surprised – embarrassed – his eyes darting from the slumped figure to the man, riding the cart. He saw that there were crates behind him. He heard the question, but even before then, he had just about put everything together. “YOU are the trader?” he asked dumbly, his eyes torn between the drunk and the man who was evidently the person he was supposed to find. “I-I-I thought...” the youth began, trying to explain himself. But he knew there was little to say. The merchant looked at the boy, a mixture of displeasure and amusement showing on his face.

“You thought I was that drunk?” he asked, in a tone that was jovial on the outside, but carried considerable distaste. The youth, not knowing how to respond, nodded his head, looking down on the ground where his flushed face was hidden from the man’s eyes. “Mistakes happen boy, though where did you think the drunk put the cart?” the merchant said, tutting loudly, his question - a quite good one at that - left unanswered. Masamori thought that the man might break into some didactic story, that would justify the genin’s blunder and explain how the trader mistakes in his own life, but instead, the merchant smiled politely. “Leave that miserable thing, and let’s go. I'm late” the suggestion seemed reasonable enough.

Thus the two travelled back to the village, in utter silence of course. The trader tried to spark a conversation, but Masamori did his best to entertain him with thoughtful “hmm”s, hasty “mhm”s and thought-provoking “mmm”s. It was hard to tell which of them was gladder to be rid of the other’s company when they finally made their destination.

Having arrived at Ichiraku’s, the trader briefly explained why he was delayed. The youth didn’t really care to listen, standing a few feet away, awaiting obediently for the restaurant owner to sent him away. He did, after exchanging heated words with the merchant. Something about ridiculous prices and egos. The youth couldn’t care less.

But his mission wasn’t quite over just yet. The owner asked the boy as politely as he could (and he was just putting on a show in front of his supplier) to escort the merchant back to the gates. “Sure” the boy replied, obviously disinterested. At this point, his legs were just about done. He could tell that they were going to switch off at any minute and the idea of that happening at the gates didn’t seem very appealing. Still, the boy had no choice and so he walked the horse, the cart and the cart’s plump occupant back to the village entrance. “Look lively boy” the man said, in what was supposed to be a funny goodbye. Right. Masamori waved, showing the kind of interest one shows when asked to say bye to a relative one did not know and cared little about. Bye uncle whatever-is-your-name. Hope you don’t get robbed by that drunk man.

Mission Complete.