Those who do not learn from history. . . [M|O]

[Molokai]

SPOILER: Click to show

HISTORICAL TALES
Rank: D
IIC Length: Two days
Difficulty: Easy
Objective: Gather information of the past Amegakure and local current affairs.
Description: While inside Ame no Kuni, gather information from traders, farmers, local establishments, and even fellow shinobi about the past Amegakure no Sato. To do this merely find those who were around back in the time of the second Amekage up to the point of the latest and gather information of those separate time periods. Training Current Affairs and History, Local (Ame no Kuni), are allowed and in fact promoted. Return your concise reports to the Assistant in the lobby of Amekage Tower.
Reward: 3,750 Ryo +100 for every level of a skill mastered (novice to average, average to advanced, etc.)

SPOILER: Click to show

History, Local (Ame no Kuni)
Rank: "E"
Skill: Skill
Effect: The character with this skill is a storehouse of facts about the history of a region the size of a Country.
Special: ---
Drawback: ---
Description: The character with this skill is a storehouse of facts about the history of a region the size of a Country. For example, the character will know when the ruined tower on the hill was built and who built it (and what happened to him). He knows what great heroes and villains fought and fell at the old battlefield and what great treasure is supposed to be kept in a local temple. He knows how the mayor of the next town miraculously grew hair on his balding pate. A GM can provide information about local sites and events as the user requests it when pertaining to an Event. Furthermore, the user can try to retell these events as entering stories. Once the subject is chosen, they can attempt a skill check and, if successful, add that tale to their repertoire. The character can tell these stories to entertain others, however, telling stories to hostile beings is probably not going to do any good. If user has 25 or more Ranks in History, Local (Specific Country) user gains a Synergy Bonus +10 to Evidence Analysis to Profile, and gain Information on people. If user has 25 or more Ranks in Culture user gains a Synergy Bonus +10 to History pertaining to the Culture. Each time learned user gets 5 die roll to increase the skill.
Limit: ---

-00/05-
-0SP-

After leaving the Amekage tower, Turin kept his head down and listened to the drum roll of the rain splattering on his hood. With him he had his crossbow, with all of its modifications, folded up and hidden under his jacket, on the small of his back. His full quiver was on his left hip and also tucked far enough back that his jacket hid it. Hidden in various places both in his jacket and his shirt were his back-up knives, nineteen in total. His goal now was to somehow find out more about what had been going on in the village, and if he was being perfectly honest with himself he wasn't immediately flooded with ideas how. Thinking on this as he walked, he allowed the feeling of the faint chill and the sound of his splashing feet to center him so he could think more clearly.

Where to begin?
Begin at the end, he thought, what happened most recently?
How to find that out?
Just listen. People will talk about what is important to them.
If something had happened in the village recently that had an impact, there would be people talking about it in public places. That's how news spreads, people talking about it where others can overhear. Turin just needed to be in a position to overhear it. Now, where?

He knew of a park, a huge public park made mostly out of smooth, polished cement with a few covered pagodas and benches, all centered around the statue of Toshiro Mu, the man credited as being the architect who built the village. This park was frequented by the average and the mundane, the people who collectively knew everything without even realizing it. These people, their loose lips, their need to tell each other about what was happening in their lives, they are the ones to seek for information.

Upon arriving at the park, the rain had cleared temporarily. Despite Rain Country's reputation, it didn't literally always rain, and the momentary respite meant that the people who would normally be hunkered in the pagodas were out and about. As Turin walked between the different groups, listening and lip-reading, he filtered out the irrelevant nonsense about dogs or nosy neighbors, and one word caught his attention more than the others. . .

". . . execution?"

He had almost missed it. As he walked past a group of people chatting about how expensive this designer or something was, one of them changed the subject and the last word of the sentence piqued Turin's interest. Trying to nonchalantly find a reason to stop, he kept his ears tuned to the frequency of that particular conversation and sat on a nearby bench, making a big show of being relieved to have finally found a suitable seat. There he listened, and watched the mouths of those speaking to pick up on whatever his ears couldn't discern. It was a couple, presumably man and wife, park regulars by the look of them, sitting at one of the covered benches and talking at a relatively normal volume.

From the man who spoke first, Turin heard,
". . . ridiculous. . . girl. . . no threat."
Ridiculous, that girl was no threat. He filled in the blanks with his lip reading.
". . . she was!. . . traitor. . . totally deserved. . ."
Yeah she was! She was a traitor, and totally deserved it.
Came from his wife. Or, who Turin assumed was his wife.
". . .skinny. . . barely walk. . .killing. . .justice?"
She was so skinny she could barely walk. Is killing her really justice?
"Traitors. . . they deserve. . . matter. . . frail or weak. . .stronger. . . kill us all!"
Traitors don't get to live, they deserve to die. It doesn't matter if they're frail or weak, if she were stronger she'd kill us all!
"Maybe, but. . . took away her rights. . . do that to anyone. . . public execution. . . thought. . . moved past that."
Maybe, but did you hear how they took away her rights? If they could do that to her, they could do that to anyone. Besides, a public execution? I thought our society moved past that.

So, there was a public execution recently? Not only that, but apparently people were of mixed opinions about whether or not the one who died was even guilty.

". . . didn't even die!. . .came along. . . Councilman. . . pissed his pants. . . run off. . . and nobody even cared!. . . Sham." She didn't even die! Some guy came along and cut her loose, the Councilman just pissed his pants and let them run off! And nobody even cared! What a sham. As his voice raised in frustration, Turin could hear him more clearly.

What in the world even happened? Somebody was scheduled to be publicly executed, then someone else just pulled a daring rescue and nobody even gives a hoot? Whoever was supposed to die either wasn't that high of a priority, or somebody really wanted it covered up. Otherwise, wouldn't the apprehension of this pair of yahoos be on the mission board? There was clearly something up here, because why in the world would they schedule a public execution, the first one that Turin had ever heard of outside of his home town, and then just let them go in front of everyone?

He wanted to hear more, but upon seeing her husband getting all riled up the woman at the bench wisely changed the subject. With their usefulness dried up, Turin decided to relocate to the roof of a nearby building. There, he assembled his crossbow and trained the scope down on the park. It wasn't loaded, of course, he wasn't so stupid as to point a loaded weapon at a bunch of civilians, but from up there he could more quickly scan the conversations by reading lips. From his new vantage point, he quietly waited for anything out of the ordinary to catch his attention. . .

[Nira]

+5, Learned.

Nice references to Yoshi.

0 -> 32/125 sp

narutoforumrp.proboards.com/post/981065

[Molokai]

SPOILER: Click to show

History, Local (Ame no Kuni)
Rank: "E"
Skill: Skill
Effect: The character with this skill is a storehouse of facts about the history of a region the size of a Country.
Special: ---
Drawback: ---
Description: The character with this skill is a storehouse of facts about the history of a region the size of a Country. For example, the character will know when the ruined tower on the hill was built and who built it (and what happened to him). He knows what great heroes and villains fought and fell at the old battlefield and what great treasure is supposed to be kept in a local temple. He knows how the mayor of the next town miraculously grew hair on his balding pate. A GM can provide information about local sites and events as the user requests it when pertaining to an Event. Furthermore, the user can try to retell these events as entering stories. Once the subject is chosen, they can attempt a skill check and, if successful, add that tale to their repertoire. The character can tell these stories to entertain others, however, telling stories to hostile beings is probably not going to do any good. If user has 25 or more Ranks in History, Local (Specific Country) user gains a Synergy Bonus +10 to Evidence Analysis to Profile, and gain Information on people. If user has 25 or more Ranks in Culture user gains a Synergy Bonus +10 to History pertaining to the Culture. Each time learned user gets 5 die roll to increase the skill.
Limit: ---

-00/05-
-32SP-

Scanning the crowd, Turin stopped briefly on each grouping to see what they were saying. Most of it was irrelevant, as expected, but now that Turin knew he wanted to learn more about this execution, he was able to filter much more effectively. General chatter about the weather or hard days at work was the general theme, but Turin's eye was caught by a pair of men standing next to the Mu statue. As he scanned over them, one of their lips formed a familiar pattern. . .

. . .cution. . .

Just the last half of the word triggered Turin's reaction, and his eyes snapped back to the pair, aware that they had started talking about what he was looking for. From this distance, even with his skill at reading lips, most grammar particles tended to get swallowed up because people talk fast and don't enunciate. However, he was able to get the basic gist of what was being said,

I. . . there. . . happened. . . over. . .
"I was there," said the first man, gesturing to a location behind the statue, "it was right over there."
. . . happened?
"What happened?"
There. . . nouncement. . . public execution. . .other day. . . weird. . . never seen. . . thought. . . fake. . .publicity stunt. . .
"There was an announcement about a public execution just the other day. It was really weird. I've never seen anything like it, I thought it was fake, like a publicity stunt or something."
. . .yeah?
"Oh, yeah?"
. . .wasn't. . .some girl. . .dragged. . . platform. . .stage. . .official. . .took. . .rights. . .habeus corpus. . .legal council. . . that. . . really scary. . .about. . .suddenly. . .tall guy. . . samurai sword jumped. . . free. . .stopped. . .
"Except it wasn't. Some girl was dragged onto this platform or stage thing, and some official guy started reading this thing that took away all her rights. Right to habeus corpus, right to legal council, all that. It was really scary, and they were about to do it when suddenly this really tall guy with a samurai sword jumped on stage and set her free. Nobody even stopped him."
. . .girl look. . .
"What did the girl look like?"
Red hair, skinny, young. . . very threatening. . .
"Red hair, skinny, young looking. Not very threatening at all."
what. . . do. . .
"What did she even do?"
No idea. . . ever. . . feeling. . . watched?
"No idea. Hey, do you ever get the feeling you're being watched?"

Turin took that last bit as his cue to beat it. He started to disassemble his crossbow as he thought about the conversation he just witnessed. They had provided him with a description of whoever the fugitive was, but this was the second mentioning of her having her rights stripped right before being rescued. What could it mean? If she was genuinely a criminal, would making a point of publicly denouncing her rights really accomplish anything? Seems like a more effective way would have been to simply list her crimes. Unless, of course, there weren't any.

Also, that tall guy with a samurai sword that was mentioned. The first group didn't mention what he looked like, but for some reason that description rang a bell. He wasn't quite able to put his finger on it, but he got the impression that if he started looking into this he would find out sooner or later. What he knew so far was this, there was a public execution, the person who was supposed to die was a young, skinny redheaded girl, some guy with a samurai sword saved her, and so far nobody has even attempted to do anything about getting her back.

The questions were these: if she was a genuine criminal, why strip her rights before executing her? Why was this execution public when there hasn't been one in decades? Why hasn't anybody been sent to get her back? And most importantly, where was she now?

[Nira]

+5, Learned.

32/125 sp -> 50/125 sp

Rolls:
narutoforumrp.proboards.com/post/981119

[Yoshi [Lynx!]]

Learning: 0/5 tp - 0/125 SP

SPOILER: Click to show

Singing
Rank: "E"
Skill: Skill
Effect: A skill that turns a character into an accomplished singer.
Special: ---
Drawback: ---
Description: The Character with this skill is an accomplished singer and can use this ability to entertain others and perhaps earn a small living. No skill check is required to sing in most circumstances. The character can also create choral works on a successful skill check. Use Musical Instrument Task Skills to see what a user can do and the difficulty checks as Musical Instrument Task Skills are similar to Singing. Look in Task Skills thread found in the Skills and Traits Index for more information. Each time learned user gets 5 die roll to increase the skill.
Limit: ---

WORD COUNT: 360

TAGGED: @blackspire

TAGGED: LYNX

If history could be represented by a person, the one person that embodied the most recent history of Amegakure was the white haired angel currently trotting through the rain as she had been completing an enormous amount of missions and work for the village. Essentially she had singlehandedly prepared Amegakure if there was going to be a war on Yukigakure in the future. Logistics, intelligence, information, everything. The groundwork had been laid. That, and she had been reworking herself almost entirely. The hair had been bleached before she had gone out on her travels. Now it was completely white to the core, and she could prepare her own makeover. For now, the long white hair was falling over her shoulders, reaching all the way to her naval.

As she was trotting ahead, she was playing around with her voice. Intending to be capable of both playing bass and singing at the same time, she was starting the second series, as she had already learnt how to play the bass mostly proficiently. Starting deep in her register, she was going lighter with every step, muttering softly to herself. "Do, re, mi, fa, so, sol" It was the most basic of tones that she was currently stringing together. With the knowledge that she had from tones while playing the bass, she was extremely fast at picking up where her mistakes were. From there, she was just repeating the same tone continually while slightly adjusting her voice. The fact that she was still kinda raspy from the long travels she had been on recently wasn't assisting her in making a good impression.

Clearing her throat as she walked through the park, she let out a sharp whistle in a specific tone. Then afterwards she tried mimicing it with her voice. Caught up on her own thoughts, one of the most wanted criminals answered Turin's question by walking straight past him in the park. Still toying with the voice, she didn't feel quite ready to attempt any singing just yet. It would be a little while longer before she felt proficient enough to actually attempt her voice at any singing. Pushing slightly lighter, she was attempting to reach tones that a regular untrained individual couldn't hope to reach. The result was immediate. Coughing lowly, her voice cracked for a moment. Singing was definitely more difficult than she had first imagined. Looking towards the sky, she smiled to herself, allowing the rain to drench her, as her clothes was anything but what you'd expect someone to wear in a rainstorm. Merely a hooded sweatshirt alongside a small skirt... she seemed more like a schoolgirl who had borrowed her boyfriends sweatshirt, as it was also many sizes too large for her.

SPOILER: Click to show

[Molokai]

After disassembling and stashing his crossbow, Turin descended back to the street to enact the second part of what was now a personal investigation; digging deeper. He was crossing the park one last time, making a final sweep of the conversations before he planned to head over to the prison to see if he could get his hands on some records.

At least, that was the plan.

During his final sweep, however, his keen ears picked up something out of the ordinary, beyond the normal chatter. It was singing. Not particularly good singing, for that matter, and the tonality made it seem like the singer was practicing scales instead of an actual song, but nonetheless somebody was singing. He couldn't place exactly why it stood out to him so much, but it did. A broad sweep brought him around and face to face with the source of the sound: a very white-haired girl with gaunt cheeks and a significantly over-sized sweatshirt. She walked right past him without even seeming to notice his presence.

The rain had started again, the brief respite was now over and Turin put up his hood to shield himself from it. The girl was in her own little world with her scales practice and didn't appear to notice the rain at all. As she walked and sang she coughed a little. Her voice seemed raspy and tired for some reason. She stood out, and it was clear why. Her hair, for one, was white. So very cleanly white it was almost as if it were freshly dyed. The color alone was enough to draw the eye, and Turin's sharp observation skills brought to light the freshness of it. Aside from that, the fact that she was dressed like she was unprepared for the rain but wasn't running for cover struck Turin as an eyebrow raiser.

When she looked up to the crying sky, he could see her smile. All of his inner alarm bells told him that this was a person worth talking to, even if she had nothing to offer about his current investigation. Getting to within easy speaking distance, he briefly debated whether to take his hood down to make himself more approachable or to keep it up and stay dry. Deciding that staying dry was a lost cause anyway, he took down his hood and spoke to her,

"You okay?" he asked, "Judging by your coughing, this weather doesn't seem to agree with you." Solid opener, he felt. Ask a personal yet nonspecific question, then make a friendly yet astute observation. With his hood down, she could clearly see his entire face and light brown eyes, something that would increase his level of perceived trustworthiness. With his soft, well-trained voice and his youngish features he probably wouldn't come off as some sort of threat. Just a young man chivalrously concerned about a sick-sounding girl in the rain. At best, he could directly question a potential witness. At worst, she'd tell him to shove off and he'd continue on with his original plan. What could go wrong?

[Deleted]

+5

+31

[Yoshi [Lynx!]]

Learning: 0/5 tp - 31/125 SP

SPOILER: Click to show

Singing

Rank: "E"

Skill: Skill

Effect: A skill that turns a character into an accomplished singer.

Special: ---

Drawback: ---

Description: The Character with this skill is an accomplished singer and can use this ability to entertain others and perhaps earn a small living. No skill check is required to sing in most circumstances. The character can also create choral works on a successful skill check. Use Musical Instrument Task Skills to see what a user can do and the difficulty checks as Musical Instrument Task Skills are similar to Singing. Look in Task Skills thread found in the Skills and Traits Index for more information. Each time learned user gets 5 die roll to increase the skill.

Limit: ---

WORD COUNT: 360

TAGGED: @blackspire

TAGGED: LYNX

Now that the girl had cleared her throat and gotten over the beginning raspyness, she could start challenging her voice a little. Pushing slightly into lighter tones, despite the rain, despite being cold, she was making steady and consistent progress. Soon she got through the entire set of tones, about as well as a regular person would. Do, re, mi, fa so~ Perhaps she would actually be able to eventually turn from a dull and boring voice into a singer. In all the books she had been reading, in all the knowledge she had gained, not much of it was helpful when it came to singing. It was quite a refreshing thing to be worried about other things than your own survival. To have the luxury of attempting things that weren't related to seeing the sun rise tomorrow. 

Getting some air down deep, she started with a series of deep and dark tones, yet she was content. Surely she wasn't exactly reaching into the tones of a contraltro, but she was inching closer with every attempt she made. Those attempts were however cut short as she got interrupted in the middle of a couple of tones, resulting in a soft burp escaping her lips. Covering her mouth, she blushed from embarassment as she looked up to properly view the oncomer. 

You okay?

At first she wanted to explain that burping when learning to sing was probably a completely natural thing, but then she realised that he was worried about her sitting there dressed so lightly for a rainstorm. Clearly he wasn't aware of who she was, and it made her feel at ease. At least then he wouldn't be incredibly fixated on judging her from the past or what had happened. No, he was genuinely worried for her. A smile burst out on her lips. "A-actually, It's been a long time since I've felt this good, really! If you don't mind me singing a litte, you're free to sit down."

Clapping on the drenched bench besides herself, she looked forwards again, before continuing. At first, speaking to him had clearly made her nervous, as her first couple of words were stutters, but then she regained control and spoke properly, almost as if happy to speak to someone else. "Did you know that most birds who get wounded, will start singing before they will fly?" Following the question, she let out a soft few tones, before turning her head to look at him. She was quite an interesting person, and definitely nothing like most of the people that were found here in rain. Caressing her own voice, she was getting better. Even if she wasn't the same as a bird, she had a feeling that continuing her practice would push her into something new. Something where she could have some peace.

SPOILER: Click to show

[Molokai]

This girl was certainly an odd duck. She seemed a little embarrassed at first when she was cut off mid-stream on a scale, but then immediately commenced with the smiling and stammering. Good signs, these. Meant she was nervous to talk to him, but not because of anything that he had personally done. As her mouth caught up to her mind, she told him that she had never felt better, and offered him to sit down. She wasn't lying about feeling better than she had in a long time, and Turin wasn't quite sure if that was a good thing or not.

"Thanks," he said as he took her offer to sit, using his hands to make sure his jacket was between his butt and the wet seat. Once he had settled, she asked him a question about birds, then sang a few notes herself. Maybe he was reading too much into it, but he got the impression as though the injured bird she was talking about was herself, and she was the one singing before she could fly.

"No, I didn't know that," he replied genuinely, seeing as he didn't know jack about birds, "if you don't mind my asking, is that why you're singing?" Her tone suggested she would be receptive to more personal questions, and this particular question showed that he was listening to her and thinking about what she was saying. If he came off as someone who actually listened instead of waiting for his turn to speak, she would ideally be more amenable.

Now closer to her, less than a bench distance away, he could see that her eyes were very red. Not contacts, either. A natural, real red with faint green just beneath it. He was tempted to assume she was an albino or something, because red eyes and white hair were characteristics of that strange and rare condition. However, the freshness of her hair suggested that she either took extremely good care of it, or it had been recently bleached. Given how little she seemed to mind the rain, he suspected that the former wasn't likely. So, natural red eyes but bleached white hair, there must be some significance to that.

Also, now that he could see her more closely, he noticed just how dreadfully skinny she was. The sweatshirt did a good job of hiding it, but her hands and wrists were clearly skin and bones, and he could see her clavicles clearly at the base of her neck. Extremely skinny. Something familiar about such skinniness. Suddenly his alarm bells started ringing. How much of a coincidence was it that this girl almost seemed to match the description of the escapee from earlier? Sure, there were probably tons of skinny, pale girls in the village of perpetual rainfall, but how often do people return to the scene of the crime? In Turin's experience, very often. Also, he had long since stopped believing in coincidences.

It was crazy, he told himself, an utter long shot that the very first person he should talk to after conducting his surveillance would be the person he was looking for. Still, long shots were Turin's specialty, and the suspicion gnawed at him and he was unable to resist asking,

"So, did you hear about that failed execution the other day? It was quite a show, from what I've heard."

He asked this casually, as if simply bringing up what everyone was already talking about. As he did so, he watched her carefully, watching for any changes in her behavior or attitude. If she was as disconnected from it as everybody else, he didn't suspect there would be any changes at all. However, if she became more nervous, got defensive or evasive, or started lying then he might be on to something. Granted, there are plenty of reasons why somebody might be uncomfortable talking about a topic like public executions. Depending on the reaction, he would decide if this was an angle to pursue or not.

As he did this, he became aware of the time and how long he'd been at it. He'd have to leave soon to turn in this mission, whether his investigation was complete to his satisfaction or not. He decided that he was definitely going to get to the bottom of this execution business, even if he had to do it on his own time. For now, though, he just watched the girl for anything that would set off a red flag.

[Deleted]

+5

+30

narutoforumrp.proboards.com/thread/103073/skill-training-rolls?page=75&scrollTo=981170

[Yoshi [Lynx!]]

Learning: 0/5 tp - 61/125 SP

SPOILER: Click to show

Singing
Rank: "E"
Skill: Skill
Effect: A skill that turns a character into an accomplished singer.
Special: ---
Drawback: ---
Description: The Character with this skill is an accomplished singer and can use this ability to entertain others and perhaps earn a small living. No skill check is required to sing in most circumstances. The character can also create choral works on a successful skill check. Use Musical Instrument Task Skills to see what a user can do and the difficulty checks as Musical Instrument Task Skills are similar to Singing. Look in Task Skills thread found in the Skills and Traits Index for more information. Each time learned user gets 5 die roll to increase the skill.
Limit: ---

WORD COUNT: 360

TAGGED: @blackspire

TAGGED: LYNX

The girl was improving incredibly quickly as she was warming up. The cling to her voice was constantly improving, as the scaling of her voice was starting to hit the correct tones constantly. The midrange seemed to be there, as she was singing against the sky, smiling, feeling fantastic. Swinging her legs back and forth in rhythm to her own singing. It seemed as if she was prepared to get up and start dancing at any one moment. The other was talking to her, questioning her stuff, which completely broke her rhytm as she turned her head to look at him. Replying in a singing tone, she was almost vibrating how comfortable she felt out here in the rain.

"I'm not quite a bird, but it does make me feel better than if I am not singing. In fact, this is one of the first time that I do siiiing~"

In her singing, she wasn't too worried about what he was doing or saying. Focussing on her own voice, it was so comforting in many ways. It gave birth to a feeling. The feeling of being alive. As long as she could hear herself and others could hear her, it was positively true that she didn't lose her head on the execution stand. The singing was driving away the nasty thoughts, the exhaustion from the nightmares that disallowed her from sleeping. The singing was keeping her away from her own monsters. Monsters that she was going to be introduced to very quickly again.

So, did you hear about that failed execution the other day? It was quite a show, from what I've heard.

The girls voice immediately cracked, as a shiver went through her entire body. The paranoia was building so incredibly fast that every tone that left her was nothing more than a tortured squeaking. How much did this person know? Was this someone that she could even remotely trust? Perhaps he was there to finish what the elders had started out there on the field? The girl had no real way of knowing, and the completely overload of feelings and thoughts was stunning her. Breathing changing, she was panicing. It had only been a few days since she had been on that stand. Digging her head into her hands, she was gasping...

"P-please.. d-don't hurt me.."

SPOILER: Click to show

[Molokai]

Of all the reactions Turin had prepared himself for, this wasn't even close to being one of them. She instantly changed as soon as he so much as mentioned the execution, and as far as he could tell this reaction was totally and completely genuine. The song caught in her throat, her lovely voice suddenly choking her as she began to whimper and melt into her own hands. Her breath quickened, and Turin could tell that she was entering into some sort of panic attack. However, it was her words that struck him the most,

"Please. . .d-don't hurt me."

Turin felt a pang of guilt in his chest, and was at a true and genuine loss for words for the first time that he could remember. If she were putting on an act in order to distract him, his Venator training would picked up on it. No, this was real. So real that Turin felt worse for asking that simple question than he ever did for any of the people he killed in his life.

Now it was his turn to stammer, "Wh-what? No, I'm not here to hurt anybody. . . I was just curious, is all. I-I'm sorry, please. . . don't, uh. . . look, I didn't mean anything by it. I-it's just, everyone's talking about it and. . . uh, I'm sorry. . ." What I wouldn't give to just turn invisible and take off right now, he thought.

". . .are you going to be okay? Please, don't be afraid. Nobody's going to hurt you. This is a safe place, it's just a park. You're going to be okay, really. There's nobody here who's going to hurt you."

He didn't have the faintest idea if his stuttering reassurances were going to do anything at all. Clearly he had just set off a trigger of the worst kind, and for the life of him he could not backpedal fast enough. He now felt obligated to stay there with her until her panic attack passed, or until she was able to recover enough to tell him where to go shove it, but the feeling of combined awkwardness and guilt made him want to run as fast as he could.

What he couldn't stop himself from thinking was that she definitely knew something about the execution. While he did feel genuinely bad about how she reacted to the question, but the fact that she reacted this way meant that she was somehow deeply connected to it. He wanted to question her further, he wanted to disappear and never see her again, but was surprised him most was that he actually wanted more to stay and make sure she was going to be alright. Most likely, she would recover enough to tell him to buzz off, although probably not so politely, but until then he couldn't bring himself to get up and leave her.

What a weird day this was turning out to be.

[Nira]

Yoshi:
+5, Learned.

61 sp -> 77 sp

Rolls:
narutoforumrp.proboards.com/post/981432

[Yoshi [Lynx!]]

Learning: 0/5 tp - 77/125 SP

SPOILER: Click to show

Singing

Rank: "E"

Skill: Skill

Effect: A skill that turns a character into an accomplished singer.

Special: ---

Drawback: ---

Description: The Character with this skill is an accomplished singer and can use this ability to entertain others and perhaps earn a small living. No skill check is required to sing in most circumstances. The character can also create choral works on a successful skill check. Use Musical Instrument Task Skills to see what a user can do and the difficulty checks as Musical Instrument Task Skills are similar to Singing. Look in Task Skills thread found in the Skills and Traits Index for more information. Each time learned user gets 5 die roll to increase the skill.

Limit: ---

WORD COUNT: 360

TAGGED: @blackspire

TAGGED: LYNX

Rocking herself back and forth, she was struggling hard against the slithering darkness that was trying to take her over. Execution. It was a thought that had been on her mind a lot lately. It was the looming depression that constantly scratched at the back of her mind, that she had attempted to hide with her positive attitude and singing. Gasping for air, she slowly lifted her knees towards her chest, wrapping her arms around her knees.

"I don't want to go back there. No, no.. They tried to kil me. They tried to kill me.. They promised they wouldn't, but they still tried. Executing me?! .. Ryosuke... Where did he go..?"

It was pretty obvious now. The girl was anchoring her insecurity onto the one person who had saved her from the brink of destruction. Now that she was rambling, it should be obvious for Turin exactly who she was. He was sitting there with one of the most wanted criminals in the world. A girl that had been saved, and now belonged in the city again. Snapping out of her own down spiralling process, she looked up towards the sky again. It seemed that she was attempting to returning to feel her own freedom. If he had studied her circumstances, he knew that she had been isolated for almost a year. It was incredible in itself that she wasn't more broken than she was. Parting her lips again, she returned to singing... This time it was many times more beautiful than the first tones she had shared with him... He could see how she was calming down. Quickly, too. Mental strenght of a true shinobi. The scaling was extremely light this time, taking her voice to her absolute limits. The words she sang were also very saying.

"Careful what you do, since God is watching your every move:
Please take my hand in the dark night-time streets,
Even when I'm far away by myself, you always find me,
You teach me everything you know,
Even when I don't remember, you tell me over and over."

Perhaps surprisingly, she wasn't even reacting negatively to him anymore. It was as if she was well aware that he wasn't going to hurt her. It was just paranoia taking her over occasionally...

SPOILER: Click to show

[Molokai]

Turin's blathering trailed off as she tucked her knees into her chest and sunk deeper into the darkness. It wasn't until he shut himself up that he heard what she was saying. Everything she said brought up a new question. Back where? Who tried to kill her? Who's Ryosuke. . .?

Wait.

No, what? ". . . they still tried executing me. . ." That's impossible. It was so unbelievable it didn't register at first. There was no way that this girl was the girl who escaped from the execution. Of all of the unbelievable, impossible coincidences. His shock registered and it took all of his willpower to keep a straight face. If this was true, he knew what needed to be done, but he had to tread lightly. She was beginning to recover now, pulling herself together and singing a song to calm herself down, so he didn't want to send her spiraling back down before he got a chance to find out more.

"What's your name?" he asked gently, carefully, as if defusing a bomb, "My name's Turin." He needed her name to continue investigating. So far, he was unconvinced that she was guilty of whatever she was supposed to be executed for, but without her name he would find it difficult to dig deeper. He also made it a point to include his own name, both to make her more comfortable sharing hers, and to try to establish a first-name basis. Anyone who the Council wanted dead couldn't be all that bad.

The next piece of this puzzle was to find out who this Ryosuke person was. Presumably, he was either the one who rescued her or the one who organized the rescue operation. That meant he either knew why she was being executed or was somehow responsible for her. Whoever he was, and whatever his involvement, he was the next lead that needed to be pursued. Where to go to find out? Possibly the prison where she was being held. They would have records of all of her known associates, and he would probably be on there. If nothing else, he could find another lead.

However, those were all concerns for another time. Once she gave her name, if she gave her name, he would give some sort of "nice to meet you" type thing then move on to,
"I'm sorry I disturbed you. I hope the next time we run into each other it goes a little better," before abandoning his seat on the bench and heading off back toward the kage tower.

[exit]