Summer Internship [Ruby Training]

[Ruby]

Location: Kusagakure

Heaven's Oath hospital was.. different from what Ruby had imagined.
It's so clean.
Since her birth she had never set foot in a hospital, never had a need to.
Her father always had a pinch of Blackroot handy for a scrape or bruise, or a little Bastit to keep the stinging bugs away.
She had honestly thought the hospital would not be much more than a giant herbalist store, but all she could see was the white of the floors and walls and the sharp scent of disinfectant in the air.
I wonder if they have a greenhouse here.. she wondered.

"Can I help you young lady?"
Ruby jumped from her thoughts and turned around widely to see a security guard standing in front of her.
He was a large man, in a blue cap and uniform with a polished baton hanging from his belt. He looked at her with a patiently sharp smile.
'Oh!' Ruby exclaimed, throwing her hand into her buttbag and withdrew a slightly crumbled piece of paper.
She held it proudly in front of her.
The security frowned and took the paper from her hand, frowning slightly as his eyes scanned the word. The frown turned into the hint of a smile.
"Is everything all right?" Ruby asked.
It was her first day and everything, the last thing she wanted was to be in trouble the moment she was in the door.

The guard chuckled
"No, no... just following procedure is all.." He handed the paper back to her.
"A six month internship with Doctor Kokorame, is that right?"

Ruby nodded hesitantly.

The guard nodded.
"I'll send a word down to the boys in security, we'll get you a temp pass for while you're here." He scratched his chin.
"Koko's office is just down the hall, second left."

Ruby beamed.
"Thank you!"

The guard barked a laugh.
"Best of luck girlie, you're going to need it."
Ruby frowned, not knowing how to respond to that.

***

A feeling of trepidation followed Ruby as she walked down the hall. What was Doctor Kokorame like?
If he was anything like her instructor in the academy... Mako Sensei was a strict man, his face tight like someone squeezed a lemon up his bum.
She hoped this doctor would be a little bit more easy going.
The second door on the left was closed, the heavy wood varnished a dark red. Ruby paused a moment and took a deep breath, trying to calm down a little.
'It'll be ok... he's just a person.' Ruby breathed out deeply.
'He bleeds and poops just like everyone else.' The thought made her smile and brought her knuckles to the door, knocking sharply.

'Get in girl!' a voice squawked.
Ruby startled and took a tiny step back but the door swung open before she had reacted at all.

Doctor Kokorame stood before her, but she was different to what Ruby had imagined.
First of all her gender. Second how she looked.
Kokorame was old, very old. She hobbled towards Ruby, her veined, claw-like hands gripping the top of her walking stick which hit the floor on each step with a click.
Her eyes were a sharp green, and her skin so pale that Ruby could see the blue of her veins peeking out under her chin and on her cheeks.
She was too shocked to shriek.
Kokorame grabbed Ruby's chin in a vice grip, turning her cheeks from side to side as if she were a prize horse to be inspect.
Kokorame grunted.

'The last girl was prettier.' Kokorame rasped.
She released Ruby's chin and hobbled back into her office. Ruby just stood there and stared.
Snorting, Kokorame turned her head and shriek.
'Don't just stand there like a dullard girl! You're letting the heat out!'
Ruby gasped and lurched forwards, slamming the door behind her.

[Ruby]

SPOILER: Click to show

First Aid: Cauterize Wound [43/125]
Rank: "E" (10 Training Points at all Times)
Skill: Skill
Effect: A character with this ability can use a hot poker, or other hot metal objects to stop the bleeding in a wound, thereby preventing additional bleeding damage.
Special: ---
Drawback: ---
Description: The process does, however, render further damage from the hot poker or piece of metal used to cauterize the wound. The process also leaves a visible, ugly scar, the person with this skill can perform it on themselves or to others.
Novice: Able to Cauterize Minor Wounds.
Average: Able to Cauterize Light Wounds.
Advanced: Able to Cauterize Moderate Wounds.
Expert: Able to Cauterize Serious Wounds.
Master: Able to Cauterize Critical Wounds.

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: ---

[0/10]

Kokorame's office was.. nice to say the least, it was wide and spacious, her desk noticeably bare save for a series of scented candles which burned
steadily along the front. Kokorame wheezed softly as she fell into her chair. Ignoring Ruby, she opened one of her drawers and pulled out a small
stainless steel bowl and a large knife. Ruby's eyes widened at the sight.

Kokorame smiled grimly, the light from the candles creating deep shadows above her eyes and around her cheeks.

She held out a piece of paper, and Ruby saw it for the letter she had wrote a few weeks ago, asking the hospital for an internship place for a couple of months.
Kokorame waved the paper and grunted, setting it down on the table beside to bowl.

"I'll accept that the shinobi taught basic chakra control, how to disinfect a wound with it, how to purify water..." Kokorame said.
She nodded at Ruby's headband.

"But until I'm positive that there's something in between those ears of yours, I'm not letting you anywhere near my patients.
She paused.
"You did read that book the hospital told you to look at... in the letter?"
That 'book' was over a thousand pages long. Ruby had started it a few weeks ago with the best of intentions, but got bogged down.
In a last ditch effort, she skimmed it the previous night, hoping against hope that they wouldn't test her on it.

So much for that.
"Yes doctor." Ruby stammered.

Kokorame grunted picking up the knife and looked at it thoughtfully. Ruby's pulse began to quicken.
Then Kokorame plunged the knife into her arm.

Ruby shriked and stood up, skittering the chair she was sitting on back, her first impulse being to run right for the door.
But Kokorame raised a placating hand to stop her. Slowly she pulled the knife out and dropped it in the steel basin, putting her arm above it.
Ruby's eyes widened as blood began to drip from her arm, creating a crimson pool in the bowl.

"Now that I have your attention." Kokorame chuckled wheezily.
"I have about three minutes before the blood loss kills me."
She shook her head.
"Although at my age, probably a lot less... diagnose me."

Ruby's eyes widened, hoping that it was a joke.
Kokorame said it so calmly, sitting back into the chair with her bowl and bleeding arm and staring at her, the shadows from the candles dancing along her face.
"Well girl?" she asked impatiently.
"The clock is ticking."

Ruby breathed heavily, trying her best to remember something... anything from the book last night.
"You're... bleeding to death." Ruby said lamely.
The old woman snorted.
"Well isn't that a brilliant observation." she squaked, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
"Now what the blazes do we do about it?!"

Ruby bit her lip, her eyes widening as she looked at the candles.
"I could cauterize the wound."

Kokorame spat in the bowl.
"Sloppy... what would that do?"

"It would seal it." Ruby said with more confidence then she felt.
She surged forward and picked the dripping knife from the bowl, ignoring the sticky warm blood in between her fingers.
"I can put the knife blade over the flame long enough for it to heat up." She nodded at the candles.
"And then leave the blade over the wound long enough to stop the bleeding, but pull away before it damages healthy tissue."
She frowned.
"I'd need something to clean the wound though... some alcohol or..."

Kokorame waved her away, although she was considerably paler than she was a few moments before.

"That sounds wonderful dearie... but what are the risks of the procedure."

Ruby held the blade over the flame of one of the candles, the blood blackening on the metal.
"It would leave a nasty scar... and without cleaning the wound an infection is likely. You'd need to douse it with alcohol to make sure it's clean.
With a grimace she pulled the blade from the flame and looked at the smoking rising from the side. She hopped around the table towards the doctor, ready to press the blade on her flesh.

The old woman's eyes widened and she pushed herself up.
"Get that thing away from me girl, you think I'd let myself be your first burn victim?"
Swearing under her breath, Kokorame put her hand over the wound, a low blue light rising from her palm over the cut.
The skin surged back together and in seconds there wasn't even a scar, only a strip of pale flesh that looked like it had never seen the sun.

Ruby gaped at her.
Doctor Kokorame grunted, snatching the bloodied knife from Ruby's hand and dumping it in the metal bowl with a small splash.
"Good enough girl. Now let's go and see some actual sick people."

[Yoshi [Lynx!]]

+10 - Overall, your post fortunately has a good amount of training of the thing you want in there, but a lot of it is also descriptions and introductions of things completely irrelevant. You were close to getting a little less, but overall the post managed to entertain me. Just a heads up to be careful with fluff for future posts.

+26sp
You go to 69/125

[Ruby]

The rest of the day passed with little of note, Kokorame maintained a shuffling pace with the use of her cane, with Ruby following studiously behind her.

It wasn't difficult to match the old woman's pace, but Kokorame was never idle, barking orders at people, reading charts and sometimes rapping the legs of interns with her cane.
Doctors and patients alike hopped when she spoke and when her attention wasn't focused on them she was constantly barking orders at Ruby to go there, fetch that, read this when you have the time... Her first day and Ruby was beginning to wonder if she'd ever have free time again.

This was usually followed by questions from the book she was obviously supposed to have memorized. Ruby struggled to keep pace, her right answers few and far between. The old woman would grunt the correct answer and tell Ruby to do something and she would, all while trying her best to ignore the exhaustion creeping up her legs, or the dull ache of hunger in her belly.

Kokorame went without rest or food for the better part of the day and if she could do it... well, Ruby refused to be outdone by someone who was practically a corpse.
She sent Ruby away at six in the evening and Ruby flew upstairs the moment she got home. Her father raised an eyebrow from his crushed herbs and then shrugged.
"Good to see you're having fun Rubes" he called.
Ruby ignored him, the book already in hand, her eyes on the front page. She wasn't going to get caught again.

The next day Ruby arrived at the old woman's office, the steel bowl and knife noticeably absent, but the candles as well. Ruby wondered if the old woman only had them there so Ruby would think about cauterising the doctors wound.
Kokorame ignored her as Ruby sat down, her spectacles at the end of her mushroom shaped nose, her rheumy eyes scanning the scroll in her hands. Ruby sat down patiently but the old woman kept reading.

Ruby cleared her her throat.

Kokorame looked up and Ruby started as the door sung open behind her. The security guard from yesterday, Matt arrived with two cups on tea in one hand and a lump of plastic in the other.

"Here's breakfast, Doctor." he said.
Kokorame grunted and turned her eyes back to the scroll.
Matt flashed Ruby a knowing smile and dropped the lump of plastic on her lap. It was a light blue, with her name scrawled on the front. 'CLEARANCE D' was labeled on the back.
"That should get you anywhere in the hospital you need to... and a couple of places besides." he chuckled.

[Ruby]

Healing Hands (Minor)
Rank: "D"
Skill: NinJutsu
Effect: A Healer gains the ability to heal Minor Wounds within an amount of time.
Special: ---
Drawback: ---
Description: When laying the hand upon a living creature, the user channels positive energy that cures Minor wounds within the amount of time performing a "D" Rank technique in handseals. While curing Minor wounds this technique brings higher wound levels down by 1 step. Since undead are powered by negative energy, this Jutsu deals damage to them instead of curing their wounds.
Limit: Must be a Medical Doctor.

[0/10]

Before Ruby could even say thank you the security guard bowed abruptly to Kokorame and turned around, closing the door sharply behind him.

"He does so hate to linger." Kokorame snorted.
Ruby's gaze fell onto the cups of steaming tea as Kokorame sighed and pushed the scroll away from her.
She looked at Ruby impatiently.

"Well girl? You been here a full day, that's more than enough time for a dozen questions... out with it."

Ruby paled and clenched her fingers around one of the cups. A dozens questions was a bit much, but there had been one that was niggling at her last night as she was trying to sleep.

"Yesterday... when you healed yourself..." Ruby began.
Kokorame slurped her tea.
"Yes girl? What of it?"
Ruby frowned and looked down into her cup, she pulled at the string of her teabag as it swirled in the hot water.

"Well... it wasn't an illusion she nodded at the old woman's exposed arm, a thin pale line still over her skin where Kokorame had cut herself.
"But you didn't make any handseal to focus the chakra, How did you..."

Kokorame chuckled breathily.
"Oh! That. It's a fair question I suppose, especially considering the terrible state of the ninja academy over the last few decades... why, when I was a girl..."
She shook her head, a pinched smile appearing on her lips.
"Any hay-brained brute can make a few handsigns and disrupt the perfectly natural order of things, Since you have that shiny lump of metal on your head, would I be right in presuming you know a few releases, girl?"
The way she asked it, it was obvious it wasn't really a question.
Ruby nodded.
"I know the release for Doton and Suiton...oh, and Mokuton." she said.
Kokorame waved her hand dismissively.
"See what I mean? Brutish. Have you ever seen water spontaneously clone into another person? Or earth transform into a hundred finger long spikes?"
The old woman didn't give her a chance to respond.
"Of course not! Because it's not the natural way of things, nature doesn't want to assume these things, so a handseal is needed to focus the chakra in order to... persuade it."

Ruby raised an eyebrow. The idea that you were 'persuading' the elements witch your chakra was frankly ridiculous and the old woman see Ruby thought that from the look on her face.
Kokorame scratched her chin and placed the empty cup back on the table.
"Take the human body, why do you think your body grows more skin when you cut your arm, why not hair, or fat or fingernails?" she grunted.
"Deep down the body knows how everything is supposed to be, with medical ninjutsu we are simply helping the body to speed it up a little.
The old woman shrugged.
"That's why I didn't need a handseal."
Ruby frowned and was clear from the look on her face that she wasn't convinced, the old woman sighed and with a flick of her wrist Kokorame produced a knife in her hand. Ruby paled.
"It's always better with a demonstration I suppose... hold out your arm girl."

Every impulse in her being told Ruby to refuse, to stand up and to leave the office, but there was something in the glint in the old woman's eyes, a look that made Ruby believe that for all the old woman's abrasive actions, she truly
wanted the best for her. Ruby bravely rolled up her sleeve.
Kokorame clicked her tongue and brought the point of the blade to Ruby's forarm and dipped the point down with a prick. Ruby winced and a tiny bead of blood welled up from her arm.
Seemingly satisfied, Kokorame put the knife back on the table and nodded at Ruby's tiny wound.

"Now I'm going to teach you how to heal yourself. Close your eyes girl, and find your center, feel your chakra.
Ruby nodded and closed them. She imagened her chakra as a great well of green that bubbled and frothed in her center. Something about the thought made her feel cold, a shiver ran down her spine.
"When you've got it in your head, try coaxing it to one of your hands. Breathe girl, one.. two.. three.."
Ruby sighed and inhaled, all while trying to keep her breathe level and easy. Gently with each breath she brought a tiny tendril of chakra from her heart and lead it downthrough her left arm.
"Keep going, one.. two.. three.."
Her elbow began to tingle and Ruby gritted her teeth. She didn't possess the most vivid imagination, but she tried anyway, the tiny blonde hairs on her arm standing up as if they had been brushed by a balloon. Her fingers began to tingle.

"There girl, now look."
Ruby opened her eyes and they widened at the sight.
Her hand was coated in a thin... film of chakra, a light blue just like Kokorame's. The colour wavered as Ruby looked at it, her heart beginning to thump louder.
"Steady girl." Kokorame warned.
"You don't want to lose it."
Ruby nodded.

This was a new experience, she had been so used to making handsigns and forcing the chakra forward through sheer will alone, the idea that she could bring her chakra to hand with just her breathing, it was exilerating.

Slowly, maddeningly so, she brought her left had to where her arm had been pricked. The wound had already begun to close, a tiny trail of blood running down the curve of her arm.
As soon as her fingers tapped the wound, she felt a great cold rush past her fingers, followed by pins and needles. The light blue on her hands vanished and the room began to wobble around her.

The teacup in her hands began to shiver and Ruby looked down at it, suddenly aware of it again.

Ruby tipped the cup back and gulped the whole thing down, the tea almost sickly sweet. She breathed and calmed down again. Suddenly she felt something close in on her arm.
All while this had happened, Kokorame had gotten up from her chair and was now looked at Ruby's now healed arm with scruntiny. With a grunt, the old woman released her vice grip.

"Good enough, for a first attempt anyway. At your level you'll only be able to heal little scrapes, and it always takes more chakra to heal yourself... but it's always better to practice on yourself first.. do you own a dog? You'll never know when you'll need a good lump of tissue to practice with."
Ruby was speechless, she looked up at the woman in shock.
For the first time, the old woman gave her a real smile, sharp and white. She revealed the knife in her hand and flipped it, offering it hilt first to Ruby.

"Now try it again."

[zarak729]

Learned!

[Ruby]

Cleanse Disease
Rank: "D" "C" "B" "A" "S"
Skill: NinJutsu
Effect: A healer gains the ability to Cleanse Disease.
Special: ---
Drawback: ---
Description: A touching technique. Cleanse Disease cures all diseases that the subject is suffering from. This Jutsu also kills parasites. Certain special diseases may not be countered by this Jutsu or may be countered only by a user of a certain Class Level or higher. Depending on the Rank the user knows depends on the rarity the user may cleanse.
"D" Rank - Common
"C" Rank - Uncommon
"B" Rank - Rare
"A" Rank - Very Rare
"S" Rank - Nearly Impossible

Limit: Must be a Medical Doctor

[0/10]

"Today I'm going to show you how to cure a disease." Kokorame said.

Ruby looked at the old woman blankly.
She wanted to ask 'Isn't that what normally happens at a hospital?'
But she didn't fancy a swat from Kokorame's cane, she rubbed her wrist absently from the last whack she got from her.

"Using... chakra?" she asked instead, hesitantly .

Doctor Kokorame sighed.

They were in her office again, her room bare save for a small cup of steaming tea on the corner of the table, as well as five petri dishes directly in front of her.

"Most of the time we help people the good old fashioned way." Kokorame explained.

"Herbs, salves, potions... even placebos if the situation calls for it." She looked at Ruby pointedly.

"But it doesn't take a genius to do it. You can take any idiot off the street and in a few years here they would be perfectly capable of pulling a brat from between a woman's legs, or crushing herbs into powder..."

The old woman scooped up one of the petri dishes with one hand, cradling it softly between her fingers as she spoke.
"But that's not why people come here for aid when instead they could see any red necked herb gatherer... they don't come for the easy cures, they come for chakra."
Ruby frowned, her father was a herb gatherer, and indeed for a long time it was her dream to be one too. To have someone so casually put it down was... hurtful, to say the least. But Ruby's feelings of shame evaporated as she saw the chakra gather in the old doctors hand, the light blue energy tingled and sparked and the brown fluff that lived in the petri dish began to blacken and shrivel. Within seconds there was nothing left of... whatever it was, that lived in the petri dish a few moments before.

"Herbs and salves are all well and good, but chakra beats them all..."
Using the edge of her thumb, Kokorame flicked the top of the dish open, pouring the crumbled black powder from inside the dish in between her fingers.
"But to get anywhere good with chakra, you'll need to practice the easy stuff first."

Rubys eyes widened as the old woman nodded at the petri dishes in front of her.
"Pick one up, let's see how you do."

Ruby looked down carefully. Each dish contained a collection spots or shapes, light colours ranging from green to yellow. Her eyes scanned them all, noting that one just held a small ball of mucous!
"Come on girl, we haven't got all morning."
Ruby shrugged and picked up the one closest to her. It was nothing exciting, an array of dark and light green dots, some as small as the head of a pin, others as large as a raindrop.
Kokorame grunted.
"Nasopharyngitis, the common cold. A good enough place to start as any I suppose..." she said

"So would do I do?" Ruby asked, looking at the dish curiously.
It was odd to think that she held an entire colony of bacteria in her hands... her own little world.

Kokorame pursed her lips.
"Do you remember how you healed your wounds with chakra?"
Ruby nodded.
"The body knows what it's supposed to do, I just have to bring my chakra to speed it up a little."
The old woman cracked a rare smile.
"Yes, well... it's a good system for healing, but not so much when it comes to destroying. You use that technique on that."
She nodded at the petri dish in Ruby's hands.
"And anything could happen, unguided chakra is unpredictable, you could make it stronger, or force the bacteria to reproduce so much that it starves out the colony. Or create something else entirely. Something that should always be avoided."
Kokorame grunted.
"Some so called 'healers' go down a different path with that, but it's not something I can either accept or encourage. To kill with germs is a... terrible thing."
The light faded from the old doctor's eyes for a moment and she just sat there for a moment. Ruby waited patiently, after more than a week at the hospital, she was used to the old woman getting lost in thought. For a moment she could have sworn that she saw a flicker of sadness in the old woman's eyes, but she shook her head of it and pointed at the dish.
"Now focus girl, bring your chakra to the boil."
Ruby did just that, shutting her eyes and blocking out all the sounds around her. She almost thought she could feel the squirming and wriggling of the bacteria inside her petri dish, but she dismissed the thought, focusing on her chakra.
She liked to imagine it as a great well of green energy, like the vines that slept in her fingertips. She inhaled slowly for five seconds and held it for another five, the five second exhale taking any thoughts from her mind with it. Soon she was alone, save for her breathing and the petri dish.
And the chakra of course, with each breath, she pulled the chakra along, like raking mowed grass in her father's garden behind the shop. The energy stretched more with each breath, running from her heart, up to her shoulder, down to her elbows and wrist. All the while she could feel the chakra tingling and spitting inside, the air around her feeling suffused with static. She doubted she would ever get used to the feeling. Ruby opened her eyes just as her chakra began to exit her fingers, a light blue that cracked and spread like shallow water over her left hand.

Careful to keep the petri dish away from her chakra, she looked up to the old woman who nodded with approval.
"This is not a healing technique girl, it's a cleansing and your chakra should reflect that. Make it sharp like a knife and... skim the top of the dish, as if you were sanding a rough piece of skin on your foot."

Ruby frowned, pretending to understand. Isn't chakra just... chakra?
She brought her hand closer to the petri dish hesitantly, as if it was going to bite her. Her hand suddenly went cold, followed by pins and needles. In response the tiny green dots began to swell, Ruby's eyes widened and squeezed her hand tighter, trying to imagine a saber, a blade... anything! Her heart began to thump and a sharp ache began to grow at her temples.
Slowly the green dots stopped growing and grew increasingly darker and darker, contracting into themselves.

Heaving a deep sigh, Ruby cut the chakra flow, her hand going numb as she slammed at the plastic tub onto the table, it's insides reduced to a blackened ash.
She breathed heavily, the ache in her temples and the thudding of her heart beginning to reduce, looking up she saw Kokorame pinching her lips and nodding slowly. She pointed a pale gnarled finger at another one of the dishes.

"Again."

[zarak729]

Learned!

[Ruby]

Detect Poison
Rank: "C"
Skill: NinJutsu
Effect: A Healer can determine whether a creature, object, or area has been poisoned or is poisonous.
Special: ---
Drawback: ---
Description: The Jutsu can penetrate barriers, but 1 foot of stone, 1 inch of common metal, a thin sheet of lead, or 3 feet of wood or dirt blocks it. User is able to tell if 1 single creature per performing is poisoned within the range of 7 meters plus 6 meters per Class Level.
Limit: Must be a Medical Doctor.

[0/30]

"We're going to spend the next few weeks teaching you about poisons, girl."

Ruby goggled at the old woman. It was a warm day in the hospital, sunlight filtering in at a steady stream into Doctor Kokorame's office. The old woman was hunched back into her chair, withered old hands knitted over her lap. As had become her schedule over the last two weeks, Ruby entered the office in the early mornings. The old medical shinobi would give her a brief lesson, followed by throwing her a sheaf of paper that Ruby would be required to memorize. This was followed by a few rounds in the hospital itself, helping the old woman treat everything from broken bones, to a rasping cough. The days were long and thankless, but as they days slowly wore by, Ruby felt herself growing stronger in her ability to discern problems. Indeed the old woman had stopped correcting her when Ruby answered her questions. Kokorame's approving grunt was worth more to Ruby than all the praise she had ever gotten in the ninja academy. Which wasn't a lot of praise,
but after feeling like a screw up for so long, resenting her choice of becoming a shinobi, unsure of her own future... having someone there to believe in her, or at the very least,
not to put her down, was a refreshing experience.

"Poison?" Ruby asked with a frown.

The old woman nodded stiffly.

"How to detect it, how to resist it and how to treat it." The old woman scowled.

"Like it or not, you'll be going into the ninja world soon, and unfortunately, ninjas use poisons."
Kokorame shook her head.
"You weren't alive during the last shinobi war, thankfully, otherwise you'd have been on my back all week to teach you.... A frown cut into the old doctors face, her eyes softened as she remembered.

"Colourless, Odourless gases which drown a man on dry land, chemicals so potent that a pinprick could kill a room full of people, powders which could make your heart explode in your chest like a superheated sponge." she looked pointedly at Ruby.
"Things aren't as bad that anymore, not by a landslide. But that knowledge is still out in the world, and likely will be used again... some day."

Ruby suppressed a shiver. She didn't like the old woman when she got like this, her eyes darkened and her tight smile deepened into a deep scowl. She couldn't imagine what it must have been like to go through that, to live that. Doctor Kokorame pretended not to see Ruby staring at the scars that crisscross her arms whenever her woolen sleeves moved. She could pretend, but she knew. The look in Kokorame's eyes told her that.

"Well!" Kokorame exclaimed, clapping her hands.
"Let's get started with the lesson!"
Her hands dived beneath the desk, opening one of her draws and pulling out a small glass box.
"I ordered these especially for today."
Ruby's eyes widened.
The box was separated into three small sections with little glass walls, with a thick mossy brown coating the bottom of it. Growing in each section were three.. mushrooms.
The first one was large and looming, a deep red and dotted with thousands of thicky warty white spots.
The second section was filled with tiny fungi the colour of toffee. They overcrowded the section of box there, stretching out to occupy as much space as possible. They looked almost... cute.
The final one was short but wide as a palm, a swarthy black and crisscrossed with faint grey stripes.

"One of these is poisoned." Kokorame said.
"With a bit of luck, by the end of today you will know which one it is."

[Ruby]

[??/30]

Kokorame grunted and leaned back, her gnarled cane leaning steadily over her lap.
"Now, do you remember how you used your chakra to heal?" The old woman asked.
Ruby clicked her tongue, thinking back on her earlier lesson.
"The human body knows what it needs to do in order to heal... the chakra is just to speed it up"
Doctor Kokorame nodded slowly.
"But what happens when you actually bring your chakra to the wound?"
Ruby frowned, considering.

"It just... absorbs it?" she said hesitantly. The pitch of her voice raised at the end, turning it into a question.
Kokorame smiles and pointed at the glass box.
"Now if you apply that principle to here, it won't do us a lick of good the mushrooms will just take the chakra greedily, using it to grow until they explode... good for destroying potentially dangerous mushrooms, but not for seeing if they're dangerous or not."
She looked at Ruby expectantly.
"So what would you suggest you should do instead?"
Ruby frowned at that and looked at the glass box. She considered what it would be like to be in the box with the mushrooms, thick glass walls around her and the warm spore filled air in every breath.

It would be so quiet in there, the sharp clear walls echoing even the slightest whisper. Her eyebrow arched forward. Echo...
Kokorame leaned forwards eagerly.
"Yes girl?"
Ruby looked away from the box, staring into the old woman's steely blue eyes.
"If the chakra bounced off the mushrooms, back to me... that would be enough to tell me pretty much everything about it, right? My chakra would come back to me with an imprint of the mushroom, it's texture, colour..."
She smiled.
"Its toxicity."
Kokorame grunted with a smile, waving her hand in the direction of the glass box.
"Close your eyes and find out."
Ruby grinned and complied, shutting her eyes quickly and opening her hands.
Like always, Ruby imagined her chakra as a great pool... no, a great river to green energy that thumped in her centre like a heart before lazily flowing through her muscles, bones and creaking tendons. Setting each cell in her body alive with power.

The trick to controlling the flow was with her breathing. Before her time in the hospital she never realized how important breathing was to controlling chakra.
But then again her experience with is was limited to her time in the academy where real lessons in chakra were few and far between. In the hospital, Kokorame had her practicing every morning and her body had responded to it, adapting to the new experience.
Even the breathing was something she had never realized was so integral to the experience. In the academy, pretty much every technique was done with one or more handseals.

The handseals drew the chakra like iron filings to a magnet, it meant that you didn't have to concentrate any more than you needed to direct the chakra. Without such seals, medical ninjutsu required to you both pull on the chakra and direct it as well. A feat that had Ruby sweating the first time she attempted it, and was still finding it difficult to manage.

She breathed in softly for six seconds, holding it in for a further six. She felt the tightness in her chest, and the relief as she let her breath go. Carefully the chakra dripped from her
centre, growing steadily as it went from her shoulder, to her elbow... to her wrist. The telltale tingle in the air began to build up around her, the hairs on her arms standing up as the familiar buzzing began to sound as it appeared on her hands. The light blue energy cracked past her palms, over her fingernails and danced along her thumbs. Opening her eyes softly, she looked at Kokorame. The old woman nodded at her, her eyes sharp.

Keeping her breathing gentle, Ruby brought her fingers close to the first mushroom, feeling a chill in her hands and a sudden cold creep up her wrists. The large red mushroom ate up the chakra hungrily and began to slowly swell, like a sponge thrown in water. Ruby gasped and the irregular breathing killed the chakra, the blue coating her hands fading almost instantly like water thrown over fire.

She looked up to her teacher in worry, fearful for a scolding but the old woman was smiling patiently.

"Think of the chakra not as an extension of yourself girl, to be thrown at anything willy nilly. It is a merely a tool that be brandished a thousand thousand different ways. Use it to look at the mushrooms... really look at them. What is wrong with them? What part of it repels you?"
The last part made a chill run up her spine. She nodded slowly and looked at the mushrooms.
What is wrong with you? she thought.

[Ruby]

[/30]

Ruby closed her eyes again, her diaphragm folding into the familiar pattern of her breathing. Rather than start drawing immediately as she usually did, She kept her breathing even and paced as she considered the problem.
She needed to know which mushrooms were poisonous and which were not, and she was going to use her chakra to do it. So what would indicate a positive, how would she know that it was poisonous....

Appearance could be a good indicator, as could taste, but both are not necessarily constant indicators... She considered what Kokorame had told her, what is wrong with them? What repels her?

She frowned.

Repels? There could be something there.

Breathing softly but steadily, she felt her center thrum with power as her chakra drifted from her core. Instead of bringing it to hands immediately though, she allowed it to float for a moment, considering the direction she wanted to take. Slowly the emerald energy began to flow softly up past her neck and chin. It curved around her cheeks and slowly began to let it settle over her eyes.

It was an odd feeling, like pins and needles, or better yet a little bit of dust had been thrown into her face by the wind, it made her wince and her cheeks redden, but small specks appeared over her vision, the tiny squiggles of white blood cells jumping randomly and vying for her attention.

She exhaled, now drawing a separate branch of chakra from her core. Much like she had done previously, she used her breathing to this new stream, creeping up to her shoulder as she keep another flow over the eyes. For this theory to work, she needed two streams, at very different parts of the body. It was more than she had ever tried, like exercising a muscle she didn't know existed and she felt herself quiver slightly from the strain. Slowly but surely she felt this new stream creep, drifting past her shoulder and over her elbow.

At this new stretch she felt the chakra over her eyes falter, almost ready to snap, but Ruby steeled herself and kept her steady breathing pace. She ignored the mad thrashing of her heart, the nausea that built up in her stomach, the subtle rebellions of her body trying to avoid doing some new. The body knew what to do in most cases, but it wasn't always right. It sensed that her chakra was being used in a new way and tried to reject it. Still Ruby just breathed in and out, ignoring herself.

The chakra dripped slowly past her elbow, towards her wrist, growing along her palm and humming against her skin. It took one last push to breath that final threshold and when she did, like a burst dam, the chakra flowed unrelentingly. Gasping, Ruby breathed again, trying to calm herself, aware of the chakra pushing her skin and leaking out in the air, drained her as if she had just lost a pint of blood. It took a few moments for her chakra. and her breathing to stabilize, two large pools of green energy around her eyes and left hand. She felt a bit light headed, and her knees shook from the strain, but elation gripped her as well and a smile came across her lips. This would be it.

What repels me?
Ruby opened her eyes.

Shock gripped her and she was taken back for a moment. Expecting to see the light coming in from the old woman's office, instead it was as if someone had flicked a switch! No... it was as if someone had put a very thin blindfold over her eyes, sapping all the colour from her vision.

Well.. not all the colour...

Ruby looked down at her hand and smiled. The chakra leaking from her hand, usually blue in the air, was instead an emerald green. It seeped from her skin like smoke, drifting and forming a thin cloud of energy around each finger. She lifted her hand to her eyes and waggled her thumb, marveling at how the chakra flowed smoothly past her thumb nail.

Biting her lip, Ruby inched her hand closer to the first mushroom. The moment her
hand drew near, the mushroom hungrily ate the her chakra, draining it quickly. Ruby breathed, the lost chakra replenishing itself near instantly, though she felt the drowsiness in her head intensify.

Rather than grow with the new chakra, the mushroom instead changed colour, going from a dull gray to a vibrant, puke coloured green.
POISON!

The thought shrieked at her and even if she had her eyes closed, there was no escaping the feeling of sickness that swept through her stomach. She whipped her hand away as if the mushroom had bit her and looked at her mentor.
Doctor Kokorame nodded at her sternly.

"Keep going."

Ruby moved her hand to the second part of the box, this filled with dozens of tiny, caramel covered mushrooms. She moved her hand quickly along it, watching as a pea sized amount of chakra was instantly absorbed. The tiny mushrooms glowed green as well, though a darker shade than the first one. Her hand was across is so quickly that no sickness came to her stomach, but her eyes confirmed her suspicion.

This one is poisoned as well.

She smiled, moving her eyes to the final mushroom, large and striped like a zebra.
She swept her hand over it quickly only allowing a drop of chakra to come in contact with it. This mushroom was the darkest of all, a green so dark it was almost black!She gagged as a wave of nausea hit her so hard that she choked. The spell over he eyes shattered and the chakra spilled away, leaving her eyes free and her hand clean. The green of the mushrooms vanished and the flash of light near startled her. Colour came to her in a rush, the dark board floorboards, the grey of Kokorames hair and the deep white of her labcoat.

Ruby looked down at her pink jacket. breathing softly and trying her best to steady herself

Kokorame looked at her expectantly.

"Well?"

Ruby took a deep breath
"They're all poisonous." Ruby paused and nodded at the box.
"Especially that last one."

Kokorame's smile cracked into a wide grin

"Well done girl." She reached to take the glass box away

Ruby grinned but it faltered when the old woman replaced it with a wicker basket, this one laden with ripe green apples.
She nodded at it
"Pick your poison"
Ruby's grin fell.

[zarak729]

+27
Medical techniques do not use handseals, they take a time to cast appropriate to their rank in handseals.

[Ruby]

Ahhh crap, sorry, I remember reading that.. but I must have blanked >_>

[27/30]

Ruby closed her eyes and inhaled gently. After over an hour of practice, her arms tingled and her fingers twitched of their own accord, as if she'd been zapped by electricity one too many times. Her head spun and she felt a little queasy... but there was a smile tugging at her lips.
I'm getting there.

Exhaling slowly, Ruby brought an image of her chakra well to her minds eye. It bubbled and frothed a vibrant green. With twitching fingers and tiny measured breaths, Ruby slowly drew. The energy snaked up gently from her chest up to her neck, leaving her skin tingled and almost raw. She knew she was going to sleep well that night. As the chakra grew and swelled beneath her skin, she allowed it to settle between her eyes and she pull for more. This chakra rose up gently to her shoulder, swirling past her elbow and ending in her fingers. With a relieved breath Ruby allowed it to exude from the tips of her fingers and opened her eyes.

No matter how many times she did it, the effect of the jutsu always made her skin crawl. The room was darkened by the glaze of chakra over her eyes, save for wherever a harmful poison lurked. Clicking her tongue gently, Ruby brought her attention to the apples in the bowl, her finger danced over each one in turn. The fourth her fingers tapped against brought with it a feeling of revulsion and a bright pulsing green in her vision. With a tired sigh, Ruby scooped up the apple and swung it at Kokorame. To her surprise the old doctor caught it easily, wriggling her fingers around it's vivid green skin.

With a small smile, the old doctor nodded.

[Celaena Kamyuja]

Awesome! Learned

[Ruby]

Thanks Sita-Chan :3

Delay Poison
Rank: "C"
Skill: NinJutsu
Effect: The subject becomes temporarily immune to poison.
Special: ---
Drawback: ---
Description: The subject becomes temporarily immune to poison. Any poison in its system or any poison to which it is exposed during the Jutsu's duration does not affect the subject until the Jutsu's duration has expired. Delay Poison does not cure any damage that poison may have already done. The duration of the Jutsu lasts for 5 hours per Class Level.
Limit: Must be a Medical Doctor. Must know Detect Poison.

 

[0/30]

"So, girl... what is this?"
They were just outside the village proper. Thick grass wafted lazily in the breeze over thick jungle roots. It was Ruby's first time outside the village in weeks, with the hospital having taken up the majority of her time. She was holding a wicker basket as Kokorame scanned the area for a familiar leaf or flower, removing it with a pluck and throwing it in Ruby's basket.
At the moment, Kokorame stood in front of her, a furry green leaf dangled from the stalk that was gripped between the old woman's strong fingers. She nodded at the leaf and stared at Ruby.

Ruby paused, sensing a trap of some kind. After two weeks in the hospital with Kokorame, questions were seldom easy or straightforward.
"It's a... nettle." she said, peering at the leaf.
Kokorame nodded, bidding her to continue.
Ruby remembered a time when she was seven, picking plants with her father, nettles are common enough in the grasslands and she skidded into a patch full of them. She rubbed her hands absently at the memory.

"It's an irritant. Creates a stinging sensation, especially when it comes in contact with sensitive parts of the body: eyes, tongue, in-between fingers and toes..."
The old woman nodded sagely.
"It's an abundant weed, and one of the most common poisons in our country... albeit a very minor one..."
She popped in into her mouth.

Ruby stared at her aghast.

Frantically her eyes scanned around her, dock leaves were a common enough treatment for nettle stings, serving as a balm for the irritated flesh until the minor swelling settled down. It usually grew quite close to nettle patches…
The old woman rolled her eyes and raised a hand to stop her.She opened her mouth to demonstrate.

The nettle leaf sat over her tongue, the tip of one of the leaf's points jutting against her gums. But despite this, she gave no sign of discomfort; there was no redness where the leaf had touched. Understanding lit up in Ruby's eyes.
Kokorame gulped, swallowing the leaf whole.

"It's like you're never going to get it, girl." The old woman chuckled wheezily, rubbing her hands together. She looked at her.
"Well? How did I do it?"

Ruby frowned, considering.
That the old woman had used chakra was obvious, but she did not see the tell-tale sign of it rising up in her hands. Which would mean that she must have concentrated it in her mouth instead.
Ruby told her as much.

Kokorame grunted, stooping down the same nettle plant and ripping away another leaf with a pluck.
She held the stalk out to Ruby expectantly.
Ruby grinned and snatched the stalk. It was easy really; it was all about just taking it easy, looking at a problem and considering possible solutions.
She closed her eyes and took some deep breaths. She would be a master medic before she knew it.
She imagined her chakra well as a great green pool that simmered just beneath her skin. Her breath pumped the energy upwards, north of her heart, past her shoulders and through her throat.
Ruby swept the chakra the evenly along her tongue, feeling her taste buds tingle in the air. Her skin beneath her jaw grew prickly and with a wide smile, she dropped the nettle into her mouth.

The chakra licked the leaf, containing it within its own walls protecting the poison from irritating her gums. She looked at Kokorame with a wide grin. The old woman nodded with a smile.
She swung her cane at Ruby.
Ruby's eyes widened, trying to move out of the sticks way, but the old woman was surprisingly fast, and the cane was moving in quicker than Ruby could dodge. Ruby felt her heart jump.

The stick stopped short of Ruby's face, making her flinch. But that was all that was needed to break Ruby's hold on her own chakra.
The thin walls around the nettle dissipated, leaving Ruby's mouth suddenly vulnerable. She spat the mottled leaf out, but it was too late, a stinging racking her gums that made her eyes water and her tongue hot like it had just been ducked into a cup of steaming tea. She glared at the old woman.
Kokorame chuckled.

"Sorry girl, but there'll be far worse than me to distract you when you're out in the big bad world, and there'll be far worse than nettle leaves threatening you... you need to work on your chakra control, it needs to be so ingrained in your consciousness that you can swallow the nettle, forget about it and the poison will be useless by the time the jutsu wears off..."

Ruby frowned as she considered the old woman's words.

[Ruby]

[/30]

It was getting late.
Ruby shivered, resisting the urge to just stand up and go home. Kokorame had left her a couple of hours ago, grunting out some private errand that she needed to accomplish.

The young intern was sitting beneath an old willow tree, the crooked, moss covered roots serving as a bench. A small patch of nettles grew lazily beside her, a couple of the leaves plucked off, a couple of fat dock leaves beside her feet. She rubbed her arms absently, running her fingers over the tiny nettle born bumps on her skin.

Realizing that she could just keeping eating nettle leaves like Kokorame had shown, she began running her arms carefully to the patch with nothing but her own chakra to protect her.

Like Kokorame had said earlier she could easily enough weave a thick band of chakra over the offending area, which would prevent the nettle from stinging say: her right arm.
But if the nettle stung her left arm, or if her attention wavered for more than a couple of seconds...
Ruby rubbed her arm with disdain.

The sky was beginning to darken, and a small part of her moaned at her to just get up and go home, to try again later. She rubbed her arms absently, finding her resolve.
Let's get this done first, at least...

She closed her eyes again, breathing in slowly but firmly, the lessons with Kokorame now engrained within her. She imagined her chakra as a great pool of energy a shimmering green.

However instead of pulling the chakra in any direction, she allowed it to pulse lazily within her chest, glowing and rounding like a large ball of energy. There was clearly something wrong with how she applied it. Creating a temporary shield with chakra wasn't a bad idea, per say... but like Kokorame said, it relied far too much on her own concentration.

A lapse in thought could potentially mean death. Maybe it's because I'm targeting the poison... rather than what it’s affecting... Ruby savored the thought as she breathed.

She pulled at her chakra again, but instead of drawing it towards a part of her body, like with other medical techniques, she settled it in a bubble shape between up lungs. With each breath, she brought more energy to the bubble, feeling it beat like a tiny heart. Inhale and exhale. The tiny bubble swelled with power, so much so that Ruby worried it might burst.

What would happen if it did? she brushed the thought away.
As each breath grew the bubble, she could sense the colour change in her mind’s eye. She normally imagined it a sea of green within her, but this bubble seemed to turn... purple.
She opened her eyes gently and opened her hand, looking at her pale
fingers.

They didn't look any different; she tried not to feel disappointed by that. No thin film of chakra coated or hands, no strange shift in the air... if she didn't feel the pulse of power within her, she would have said that her jutsu wasn't doing anything at all. Swishing her fingers experimentally she looked at the patch of nettles beside her.

Only one way to to find out...really.

Gritting her teeth softy, she brushed her fingers along the nettle patch, trying to get her fingers to get as much contact as possible. She felt the pulsing quieten for a moment, it’s powers somewhat diminished and Ruby raised her eyebrow in surprise. Closing her eyes again, she breathed in and out, the chakra bubbled softly towards her tiny poison free source.

The bubble, now a dull green again, pulsed and enlarged, turning a bright purple once more. Ruby opened her eyes and this time thrust hand directly into the pile, chakra lit up against her skin for a moment, like a tiny invisible barrier. The bubble slowly shrank as Ruby caressed the stalks, rubbed the furry leaves between her fingers.

There was only one test left...

Without hesitation, Ruby gripped the stalk of one of the nettle leaves and yanked it, much as Kokorame had done earlier. She opened her mouth and popped the furry leaf back in, chewing until there was not even a crunch. The bubble in her chest flared, and she felt the chakra swim smoothly over her tongue and taste buds, naught but the slightly bitter taste of nettle on her gums. Grinning to herself, she spat out the wad of nettle.

[Ruby]

[/30]

Kokorame nodded at Ruby as she entered the old crone's office. Like her very first time with the doctor, a tiny scented candle burned merrily on the table. Beside the candle sat a small porcelain bowl with a couple dark blue berries sitting in the bowl. Ruby sat down and Kokorame frowned impatiently.
"So? How did you do yesterday?"

She was referring of course, to when the old woman left her in the long grass to practice how to delay poisons. Ruby paused for a moment, rolling up her sleeves. The tiny bumps the nettles had left on her skin had long since vanished, but there stil la small sheen of red there, the tiniest hint of a rash.

”It was a bit slow, but I got it eventually.” She hesitated.
”…I think.”
The old woman grunted.

”It’s a tricky jutsu to learn, especially one for so green out of the academy, you need to apply your chakra in ways you had even thought of before, for uses you can’t anticipate.”

She nodded at Ruby.

”If you commit yourself, and the jutsu is successful, you’ll get about five hours delay form a poison. That’s usually enough time for your body to break it down… but it’s far from ideal.”
Ruby looked at the small bowl of berries in front of her, plucking one up with a slow hand.

”What are these?” she asked.
Kokorame clicked her tongue.
”That there is a Sweetberry, don’t let the name soften you too much, sweet it might be, but it can be quite troublesome if you aren’t careful.” she muttered.
”It’s usually found by idiots out camping who see the berries and see an easy breakfast… small doses cause nausea, but beacause of the berry’s blasted sweetness, people rarely only have a small dose…”

The old woman sighed.

”We give out little pamphlets out to people, but usually people eat enough to fill a barrel, and then get so sick that they can’t even get out of their sleeping bag.” She shook her head.
”The village usually sends a small team of medics to look for them if they go missing, 80% of the time that’s the cause… doesn’t help that it grows just about anywhere so long as the climate is good.” The old woman nodded at Ruby, then at the bowl.

”So if you can delay this one, there won’t be too many poisons that should be able to break through your jutsu, this is how I try teaching all my girls about poisons... and it hasn’t hurt anyone yet!”
Ruby nodded and smiled, closing her eyes and attempting to get a handle on the technique that was within her grasp not so long ago.

As she began her breathing exercises, she felt her chakra come to her. The great plume of green energy reacted to her quickly, swirling inside her chest, aching for a direction to be driven. She smiled. While she probably wasn’t nearly as good as she thought she was, she was a damn sight better at chakra control than she was a couple of weeks ago when she graduated. It was all because of Kokorame and her time at the hospital. She felt a flash of gratitude as she worked. The best way to show her appreciation of the old woman was to show how quickly she learned the technique.

With each breath, she drew some of the chakra into a bubble, feeling it swell in size with each inhale and its colour darken with each exhale. In theory, the bubble would send chakra to contain anything poisonous that goes inside her body. However whether or not it the bubble would not simply pop once her concentration broke was something else. As the bubble grew, Ruby opened her eyes and played with the Sweetberry between her fingers. Without a word, she popped it into her mouth.

The minute her teeth broke through the berry’s skin, she felt her bubble pulse and surround the berry, containing the poison within. True to its name, the berry juice snapped at her tongue with its sweetness, forcing Ruby to scrunch her face. She gulped, feeling the bubble in her body shrink and the berry humming with a twist of chakra. She looked at the old woman with a smile and the old woman smiled back. With an effortless movement, Kokorame pulled a large wooden bucket from behind her chair and gave it to Ruby.

”In the case the berry decides to come back up.” Kokorame said, noting Ruby’s confused expression.
”The floors were only just cleaned.”