[kohana]

Kohana gave the wraps around her arms one last little tug, to make sure they were firmly in place. Crouching down from the knees, making sure not to lift with her back, she hooked an arm around the large straw dummy and scooped it up onto one shoulder. Snagging her walking stick from its spot propped up against the wall, she paused briefly to make sure she had everything.

First aid kit? Check.
Notebook? Check.
Packed lunch? Check.
Water bottles? Check.

Even though it wasn’t necessary she made a mental note that she did indeed have the straw dummy and her walking stick as well, just to complete her list. Tipping her head back towards the rest of the house she called out "I’m heading out!” and stepped outside. It was cold again today, and the sky was one big cloud stretching over Kumogakure at the moment, but it didn’t look like rain was coming to interfere with training. Although, even if it did, she would be tempted to try and train anyways just to try and get used to rainy weather on the field.

Heading for the usual spot, a little clearing near the edge of the village, Kohana wondered how Yoko’s day was going so far.

Akamine Yoko

[Akamine Yoko]

‘‘All right, it’s you and me Wanimon-chan.’’ Yoko gave her puppet a pat on the snout as she finished tying his wig up into two pigtails. ‘‘I’d do preparations here, but honestly it’s just easier to do on site.’’ She said to Wanimon who naturally didn’t respond as she folded him up into backpack mode.

‘‘And then I can talk to Hana-chan while I tune you..’’

Heading out, Yoko made eye contact with her parents who were sitting in the living room. She didn’t say anything but just threw up a silent peace sign and did a mock salute with it. Her parents smiled and did it back, her dad a little too enthusiastically, before she made it out the door herself.

‘‘Cold.’’ She grumbled as she zipped up her red hoodie. She was wearing clothes more fit for a workout underneath, but you best bet Yoko packed layers of clothing when the days got cold. Yes indeed, the puppeteer was rarely caught off-guard by the weather and today wasn’t it either.

‘‘Packed… Emergency supplies in case Hana-chan destroys you, packed some rubber kunai, drinks… What else?’’ There was a moment of silence and then Yoko raised her eyebrows. ‘‘Right! A pack of pocky, thank you for reminding me Wanimon-chan.’’ She said over her shoulder, the puppet’s head gently bobbing up and down as she walked.

Yoko noticed Kohana as she approached the clearing, but didn’t shout her name. It would be too much work to get her attention that way when all Kohana had to do was turn and see her walking up. Whenever she did Yoko would raise her hand in a casual wave, the usual wave gesture they were both familiar with by now. ‘‘Hana-chan, the time has come.’’ There was an ironic seriousness to her voice, as if she was referring to their upcoming exercise as a fight with certain death.l

kohana

[kohana]

It didn’t take long for Kohana to notice Yoko’s approach - she could spot that red hoodie from a mile away, after all. Looking away from the straw dummy, she brought a hand holding a bundle of bandages up to return the casual wave. At Yoko’s tone, Kohana smiled and nodded back seriously.

"Preparations are almost complete, Yo-chan.”

She said it like she was undergoing some great and important task, but really she was just wrapping the straw dummy she had set up in the clearing with bandages to make it look like a severely injured person. A little first aid kit was set out beside it, along with water bottles, lunch packs and her walking stick. Wrapping one last bit of bandage diagonally across the straw dummy’s face, a big '' face drawn on it in black marker, she dropped the remaining bandages back in the open med kit.

Turning to Yoko, she stood in front of the straw dummy and took a relaxed stance, one hand dropping down while the other rested lightly on her hip.

"Are you ready, Wanimon?” She asked the dummy, an amused look on her face as she did - Yoko treated Wanimon like a real person often, so Kohana did too.

[Akamine Yoko]

‘‘I see.’’ Yoko lowered her head dramatically and noticed the straw dummy as Kohana finished setting it up. ‘‘Is this the Amegakure Shinobi I’m gonna gut?’’ She asked nonchalantly as she pointed at the sad face. ‘‘Cute details.’’

With a bit of effort she took Wanimon off of her back and began folding him out.

‘‘He’s just about ready,’’ Yoko replied for Wanimon as she took a tool out of her pouch and began turning on the claw arm to fasten it so that it wouldn’t loosen up and potentially fall off during the training exercise. In general, she had to do a quick check up on him since it had been a few days since she used him for any serious activities.

She glanced up at the sky as she tried to think of a way to make smalltalk.

‘‘What a wonderful day to commit a murder. Don’t you think Hana-chan?’’ She looked over at her friend, catching a glance of the bandages, the relaxed stance, the muscles. ‘‘You’ll go easy on us right?’’ She let the question linger for a moment before tilting her head to the side slightly. ‘‘Nice haircut by the way. Suits you.’’

kohana

[kohana]

Kohana gave a small smile and a shake of her head at Yoko declaring the dummy to be a Amegakure Shinobi, and let out a small ‘hah’ laugh at her handiwork being called cute. Raising one hand up to wave side to side in a lazily dismissive gesture, she chimed in with a quick "Just there to help me focus on defending.” justification. Which was true - she thought she might do better if it felt a bit more like she was defending a real person.

Although, since now it was an Amegakure person apparently, she almost wanted to let Wanimon tear it apart… but it wouldn’t help either of them if she didn’t take her part of the training exercise seriously!

Yoko needing to make last minute adjustments to Wanimon got a "No rush, Yo-chan.” from Kohana, letting out a 'snrk' a moment later at Yoko's phrasing. She left Yoko's request unanswered, putting a finger to her lips like she was debating it... and then Yoko complimented her hair, and she blinked in surprise. Hand moving away from her lips to rub at the back of her neck, she flicked her gaze to the side and replied with a tinge of red on her face. "It’s the same haircut as always, but… thanks Yo-chan.”

Then she focused on Yoko again, nodding towards her. "You too. Really captures the feisty and small vibe.” She put on a teasing tone to try and give herself time to regain her own composure, but she was being sincere too. It just kinda fit how Yoko was, and it looked great on her. After a brief pause, she dropped the teasing tone. "Seriously though, your whole look is always on point.”

[Akamine Yoko]

Yoko was glad to see that her often misunderstood attempts at humor were going over well with Kohana. It was a bit mean to the other genin, but Yoko thought it was because they were simply too stupid for things like irony and sarcasm. Kohana wasn’t. Kohana was deceptively smart for your average taijutsu user, who usually seemed to be more brawn over brains.

She smirked at the comment about how the sad face would help motivate Kohana to defend the straw dummy, but didn’t say anything about it. Yoko just quietly acknowledged the effort and cute, dorky detail.

Yoko turned and looked up at Kohana, waiting until she made eye contact with her and gently shook her head. ‘‘You can’t fool the eyes of a shinobi, Hana-chan. I bet you did something to it, a single strand of hair that’s combed differently maybe?’’

With a few more tweaks Yoko started putting Wanimon upright. In reaction to the teasing comment about her being small and feisty she turned and looked over her shoulder and let out a single.

‘‘Oi.’’

She blushed at the final compliment, but quickly tried to turn it around, ‘‘Are you sure you wanna say that right before fighting us?’’ Yoko had already attached strings to Wanimon and made his lower jaw move out of nowhere.

‘‘Master will destroy that dummy in no time with her big huge intellectual brain, Kohana-dono.’’ Yoko ‘spoke’ through Wanimon in a slightly deeper voice as she flexed her ventriloquism.

kohana

[kohana]

Kohana wondered for a moment if Yoko was just teasing her or if she really had done something a bit different with her hair. She didn’t think she did? She almost wanted to look and see, but she didn’t have a mirror. She’d just have to think about it more later, see if she could figure out what it was that Yoko liked about it more.

The ‘oi’ from Yoko prompted Kohana to raise one hand up, palm open in a half-assed ‘my bad’ sort of gesture. It was all light hearted fun though, and she just tipped her head to the side at Yoko’s question. Bringing one foot up to tap the toes of her shoes against the ground, and then doing the same with the other, Kohana gave a nod to show she was ready as she stood between Wanimon and the target dummy.

"If she doesn’t lose her nerve over a little compliment, maybe.” Kohana teased, talking to Wanimon but giving Yoko a glance out of the corner of her eye. Only for a moment though, turning her full attention back to Wanimon as she prepared to deal with whatever tricks and tactics the puppeteer might have up her sleeve today.

[Akamine Yoko]

‘‘I bet the world looks real nice from up there.’’ Yoko grumbled as Kohana shrugged back at her, putting a little bit of distance between her and her friend, just so that she could position and control Wanimon more easily. She had already attached her chakra strings to the puppet, almost as if done by sleight of hand earlier while she was fixing him up.

‘‘She’s real calm actually, her nerve is right where it needs to be.’’ She pouted back from behind Wanimon before she started assessing the situation in front of her. Thoughts were cruising through her head as she analyzed all the data she already knew to try and make the best first move. She knew Kohana was a tough opponent for her, she could handle herself in hand-to-hand combat, she was also fast and knew everything she needed to know about how Wanimon worked… That meant she probably wouldn’t be able to catch her by surprise with any tools, only how she used them. In that case,

Click!

With a click the sheathe on the wooden arm flew off as Yoko pulled one of her stringes back to reveal the hidden blade arm. ‘‘Figured there’d be no point in keeping that on.’’ she added casually before ordering Wanimon forward, the puppet flew from its spot directly towards Kohana, the blade arm propped up to the front of it, as if she was going to try to do a swift slash and run on her friend, but at the last moment she flipped the attack around, keeping the blade in its place as Wanimon instead lunged forward when he got within range of Kohana, his big claw grip aiming for her left shoulder to try and grab a hold of her.

It was a basic attack. Easy to read, easy to see coming, but Yoko needed to know how Kohana responded to it before she could try anything more complicated.

kohana

[kohana]

Kohana just smiled smugly as Yoko grumbled and pouted, waiting in her relaxed stance for Yoko - or rather, Wanimon - to make the first move. While she might have seemed relaxed and smug on the outside, on the inside she was thinking over everything she knew about Yoko, Wanimon, and the shorter girl’s own knowledge about Kohana’s combat ability. The puppet moved quickly, but its actual attacks were kind of clumsy and slow. But she needed to protect the injured dummy, so she couldn’t just dodge without worry either. Would Yoko just go right for the dummy? Or would she go right for Kohana herself?

She got her answer when the puppet shot towards her, blade arm exposed as it approached in what looked like a hit-and-run tactic. Kohana tensed, reflex telling her to try to dodge the attack before it was even properly in range to hit her.

Act slow, react fast.

Kohana forced her gut instinct aside, forced herself to stay relaxed as the puppet got within arms reach with its blade arm ready - and then its claw shot out instead. Eyes going wide, and then narrowing in focus, Kohana’s relaxed stance broke apart as she shifted the targeted shoulder back, leg pivoting behind her and bending at the knees. Smacking her fist into her palm, she shoved her elbow forward and pushed her legs straight again to thrust her body weight into a single point aimed at the puppets torso - hoping to strike between its arms and intercept it before either claw or blade could land.

[Akamine Yoko]

Yoko felt her fingers twitch as Wanimon was hit in the torso and sent flying back. That was about what she had expected, Kohana’s strength and speed was nothing to scoff at. The puppeteer was relieved that her puppet was soaking up all the blows for her.

How could she win this? She had to think. Wanimon trembled slightly, his arms falling slack against his side, but he quickly recovered and tilted his head to one side as he stared right at Kohana. Yoko grinned as she thought of a devilish plan. It almost felt like cheating.

Wanimon would start to go around the other way so that he and Yoko were flanking Kohana and putting her in the middle of them. Yoko took care when she did this too, elongating her chakra strings so that they could reach around Kohana rather than right past her. It didn’t matter if she saw this one coming, Yoko was feeling sure of her victory.

She was going to try and damage the straw doll on a technicality.

Without warning Yoko just… Released one of her handful of chakra strings from Wanimon, freeing up her right hand, making sure that Wanimon could juuuust about hobble over toward the doll and Kohana with his blade arm raised. At the same, once her right hand strings had retracted and reached her fingers she reeled her arm back, yanking Wanimon towards Kohana as she prepared a pincer attack from the other side.

"Lashing String Technique!” The strings on her right hand elongated and cracked like a whip as Yoko aimed for the doll.

In any real combat situation Kohana could have just rushed Yoko when she set Wanimon to flank, but Yoko was banking on her friend obeying their training rules while she herself totally abused this advantage. Therefore the girl thought it wouldn’t matter that the setup had been long. Was Kohana able to defend from two sides? It was time to find out.

kohana

[kohana]

Kohana straightened up her stance, dropping her arms down to her sides and letting out a deep breath as her counter attack sent Wanimon flying away. She had managed to time that correctly, and she made a mental note to point out the hole in Wanimon’s attack pattern to Yoko after the fight. She had to specifically restrain herself from offering advice in the middle of training, keeping her attention locked on the puppet as it scuttled around her side. Slowly and casually walking around the straw dummy, keeping herself between it and Wanimon, she tensed once more as the puppet started hobbling towards her strangely.

Had she broken something? Was this a ruse from Yoko, to try and trick her into underestimating Wanimon’s speed when it suddenly started acting normally again? Or was Yoko preparing for some new technique she had figured out for Wanimon that was splitting her focus? Maybe Yoko simply wasn’t feeling well for a moment?

Yoko’s voice called out the name of a technique, and Kohana’s eyes went wide as she turned her attention away from Wanimon to glance over her shoulder - the shorter girl’s chakra strings whipping through the air towards the straw doll. Twisting around, one hand snapping out to grab the straw doll, she tried to pull it away from the line of fire… but she was too late as the attack tore nasty tears across its torso and through its bandages. Kohana stood there for a moment, a blank expression on her face as she turned her attention to Yoko.

Letting go of the doll, Kohana ignored Wanimon as she walked over to her friend, one eyebrow raised and head cocked up and to one side as she put on her most intimidating thug imitation she could muster. In a flat, humorless voice she said "You broke the rules, Yo-chan.” as the only warning Yoko received before she suddenly lunged forward - aiming to capture the smaller girl in a grappling hug, intending to prevent her from moving her hands and if successful planning on scooping the girl up off her feet entirely.

[Akamine Yoko]

Yoko let out a sigh of relief as her attack successfully landed. This meant she wouldn’t have to fight for minutes and minutes and tire herself out during the training session.

"Phew! I’m happy that it worked, I was wracking my brain trying to come up with a good plan.” Yoko gently let go of her other chakra strings, sitting Wanimon down on the grass as she rubbed her hands and fingers. When she saw Kohana walk over, Yoko didn’t show any suspicion at first, instead she raised her hand towards her friend. "Good game, that was tough.”

It wasn’t until she got a good look at Kohana that Yoko furrowed her eyebrows. "Hana-chan?” She felt all her confidence fizzle out as her friend made her feel small and intimated walking up next to her.

"B-But did I, I-I mean nothing said that… Wait no! H-Hana-chan!” Yoko squirmed and wiggled her legs to no avail as she was scooped off the ground with ease.

"Wanimon!” Yoko managed to point a couple fingers at her puppet, having forgotten that she willingly relinquished control moments prior. "What are you doing Hana-chan?” Yoko pleaded through a strained voice as she started getting squished.

kohana

[kohana]

"It’s too late, Wanimon can’t save you now.”

Kohana grimly replied, and then - keeping Yoko off the ground and locked in her arms, she started poking and tickling her fingers at the cheaters sides and back and neck and any other sensitive spot she could reach without compromising her grip. If she didn’t have long arms and Yoko wasn’t so petite, she wouldn’t be able to manage it as effectively - but she did, and she was determined to relentlessly tickle Yoko until she had tears in her eyes and was begging for mercy.

Well, begging more than she already had before Kohana began The Tickling.

With a smug grin on her face, she dropped her serious act and laid out her demands. "Say "I’m a sneaky cheater, and I’m very sorry for interrupting your duel with Wanimon-chan, Kohana-senpai.””

[Akamine Yoko]

"Wh-? Hana-chan please… Wait no!”

Yoko started giggling, her squirming turning into pointless thrashing as Kohana took advantage of how ticklish she was. The giggling quickly turned to laughter, all the while Yoko was begging to be let go.

The way Kohana could make her laugh from tickling was one that she didn’t let slip often. Yoko often exhaled or let out a giggle, rarely did she ever actually laugh out loud.

"I’m… no!” Yoko shook her head, continuing to laugh as tears were forming in her eyes. She struggled for a few more seconds until she really realized that there was no way to escape her punishment. "I’m very sorry I’m-" her crying laughter interrupted her own sentence. Why did Kohana have to make the apology sentence so long?!

"Wait wait wait I wanna apologize!” Yoko pleaded for Kohana to slow her merciless tickling onslaught just a bit so that she could talk. "I’m a sneaky cheater, and I’m very sorry for interrupting your duel with Wanimon-chan, Hana-cha… Kohana-senpai..” with her face red from laughing and with tickle tears in her eyes Yoko pursed her lips in embarrassment, causing her face to somehow turn even redder. "Y-You win” she mumbled sheepishly.

kohana

[kohana]

Yoko’s thrashing honestly made it a bit difficult to keep a hold on her, especially when her laughter - a rare thing to hear - put Kohana in such a good mood she felt like laughing herself. She managed to keep herself together though, and when Yoko begged for a little lenience so she could speak properly Kohana slowed her tickling spree down. She didn’t stop entirely though, deliberately giving a few strategically timed tickles just to continue to mess with her friend as she worked her way through the apology.

Peering down at her bright red face as she admitted defeat, Kohana ceased tickling her - but continued to hold her as she pursed her lips and tilted her head back and to the side. "Hmm, I dunno… What do you think, Wanimon? Does she sound sincere?”

She directed the question back over her shoulder at where Wanimon had been left, looking over towards the puppet and giving Yoko time to recover and play along if she felt like it. While she waited for one response, either from ‘Wanimon’ or Yoko, she quietly mused to herself about how easy it was to carry Yoko around these days. Once upon a time in the academy the two girls hadn’t been that different in height, but while Kohana herself had gotten a lot taller since then Yoko was practically the same. Not that Kohana minded - if anything, it made it easier to potentially carry her away from danger if she ever got hurt.

Come to think of it, it had to suck being the medic on a team with a bunch of really tall and heavy people around.