paixaorpg | Lost Without You [Open]

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Lost Without You [Open]

Character(s): Haku, Shuten, Xigbar, Paine, and anyone else who wants to come play.
Content: Haku arrives and tries to figure out some things, all the while feeling uncertain and lost without Zabuza.
Setting: Niflheim Gate
Time: Friday morning
Warnings: Lengthy Introduction Post

Haku stared at the orange clad ninja before him, masking his shock. That this child would claim the title shinobi and refuse to kill--It's not done. How do you prove useful? How do you protect your--And that's when it hit him, an overwhelming feeling that Zabuza was in trouble.

One last chance to be useful to Zabuza-san. "I'm sorry, Naruto-kun." With the assistance of his chakra, Haku went to go protect his precious person.

A burning pain in his chest greeted him, accompanied by a look of shock on the face of the grey-haired shinobi who had just plunged his hand through Haku's chest. "Haku..." The knowledge that he had succeeded in protecting his precious person warmed him as conciousness, and life(or so he thought), slipped from Haku's grasp.

***

Haku gasped as conciousness returned to him, sounding for all the world like some rescued drowning victim taking that first breath of air. He sat up, not seeing the people that eyed him oddly from their positions in live before some strange ice-born gate. His chest ached, and as he sought to figure out why, his mind was assaulted with the memories of what he had just done.

His hand didn't hit me, it went through me, ran Haku's thoughts. By all rights, I should be--Am I?

On impulse, Haku checked his pulse. Hmmm... Still living, I think. He looked down at his happi to find no signs that a hand had ever gone through his chest. Was it all just a dream? It felt so real?

"Zabuza-san?" There was no response, and Haku sighed. He didn't recognize his surroundings, and usually, if he woke up in some strange place, Zabuza was nearby to let him know where they were. I guess it did really happen. Did Zabuza-san die after I did? What kind of shinobi am I that I can't protect my precious person? What kind of tool am I that I wasn't there to do Zabuza-san's bidding?

He looked up at the gate and the domed city before him. I can at least figure out where I am, I guess. Perhaps Zabuza-san is here, too? Reaching up, he drew the chopsticks from his hair, and undid the bun. He then removed the bindings from his bangs and tucked the hair accessories into a pocket. The last thing removed was the hitai-ate, which was repositioned around his neck. Haku ran a hand through his now-loose hair and stood.

"Let's get this over with," he said quietly as he joined the queue before the gate. The ensuing wait provided ample opportunity for mental berating, feelings of uselessness, and utter dejection. Haku was, in fact, so entrenched in this downward spiral that his mind barely registered someone talking to him.

"Gomen nasai," Haku said with a polite bow to the stranger. "What did you say?"

This stranger, with his blonde hair and blue eyes, smiled at him cheerfully. It was kind of creepy. "I said... Welcome to Paixao! And your name is?"

"Oh," came Haku's reply. "Gomen ne. It's Haku."

"Right then, Haku!" the stranger exclaimed, writing fervently on a clipboard. He shoved a thin silver device into Haku's hands before ushering him through the gate.

Haku blinked, staring down at the silver device. He then looked around.

Okay, find some place to go, first, then figure out the silver thing and... Is it snowing? I haven't seen snow since before...

And Haku's face took on a very down-cast expression, reflecting the loss and uncertainty he felt. In this strange place, he would have to manage on his own somehow, and the thought was not comforting in the least.

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Despite the added calm the sutra chant had given him, Shuten was in no mind to wander very far from the gate he'd come in. Most of his time had been spent wandering in and out of shops (out of curiosity but mostly for the warmth), and exploring the odd contraption he'd been given on entering. He'd figured out so far that it was a sort of communication line, one of those electronic computer-things that were in the present Ningenkai. There was a map of this ungodly place on it, so that was a minor help. Shuten was contemplating heading for one of the 'hotel' things, because, damn it all, he may have been a soldier, but standing around in this miserable weather got old rather quickly.

Luckily for the residents of this place (who did not look Chinese at ALL) he had been mostly well-behaved, not counting those few times he'd lost his temper while asking questions. Shaking out a few crystals of ice that clung to his red hair, Shuten grumbled, beyond irritated. How Anubisu would be enjoying this - seeing him lost, confused, and with a calm that was completely shattered. Hissing and swearing to himself, he caught the glimpse of a dark-haired individual out of the corner of his eye. It was a blessed relief after all these golden-haired Hollander types.

Straightening out of his shivering huddle, trying to look somewhat collected, he called to the dark-haired woman. "You're not from around here, are you?"

Haku heard the comment and turned to the source, certain, given the nature of the comment, that it was directed at him, and not these blonde strangers. He had to look up in order to meet the gaze of this red-haired stranger. Seven inches is a lot of height difference when you're short.

"No," he replied softly, tucking a strand of hair behind his ear. "I just arrived."

There was uncertainty evident in how he was standing, as well as on his face. Haku was definitely not used to dealing with these kinds of things on his own.

The discomfort and confusion that practically dripped off the petite stranger like all this godforsaken rain made him quirk a brow. Well this was all fine and good. Let's decide to ask questions of the person who looks like they're about to faint at any moment. "K'so...!" he growled, rubbing the bridge of his nose with a thumb and forefinger. Tossing his head to try and find a measure of much-needed rationale, he quickly focused his sea-green eyes on the woman. "That makes two of us then, it seems."

At that moment, having been entirely fed up with the way the wind and the rain managed to find its way into every chink in his subarmor, Shuten reverted back to his plain clothes, almost sighing as the heavy material near-instantly started to warm him. Dressed respectably in a hakama, kimono, haori, tabi and zori, Shuten winced at the after-thought that perhaps it wasn't the best idea to go around transforming in front of everyone and their mothers in this Paixao. He really was loosing his mind here. Eh well.

With a brief bow, Shuten introduced himself. At the moment he didn't much care for propriety or formalities. "I am ... " he did snag himself on announcing his name, however, entirely too ready to blurt out his Armor, name, and rank as a Demon General. Regaining his composure with a shaky smile, he started again. "I am Shuten. Shuten Douji."

Haku seemed to be less than surprised with Shuten's sudden change in clothing. It probably had something to do with his mind equating what had just happened with the dropping of a rather elaborate Henge, or transformation jutsu. There was a little bit of relief to be found in the fact that he wasn't the only one who didn't belong in this strange city.

"My name is Haku," the young shinobi replied in kind, bowing as well. "Dozo yoroshiku." If he could remember his last name, he would have made mention of it, but that was something that he had buried a long time ago under better memories. He never needed it with Zabuza, anyway.

[OOC: Maa... I couldn't help the Japanese. It translates, roughly, as "Please look upon me favorably," in case you didn't know. ^_^]

Xigbar was definatley in Paixao. The scarred, one-eyed man looked around, scanning a mass of blonde, blue-eyed people with his one yellow eye. He grumbled under his breath, heading in the general direction of two very different people. Might as well get to know the, er, 'foreginers'. Walk, walk, walk-

Er.

Well.

He'd walked into the black-haired girlie. "Goddamnit!" he growled. He'd misjudged how far away something was. Again. God. Damnit. He glared at the offending female with his good eye. "What the hell're you doing, not moving when you see me coming straight at you, missy?!" he demanded.

To say that Haku was pleased to find himself being knocked to the ground would be like someone saying that mice enjoy being chased around houses by cats. In other words, no happy. Not here. The effeminate boy looked up at the scarred man that had walked right into him. And of course, being of smaller stature and size, it was no surprise that Haku found himself on the ground.

From his position, this new stranger made him kind of nervous, not that he wasn't already. Being on the ground gave this guy an advantage over Haku, and that was something that needed fixed, now. Standing, Haku took the opportunity to dust off his happi and pants before taking a step back and looking up at this stranger again.

"Gomen nasai," the shinobi said, very carefully, "But I doubt I can be expected to be aware of every person around me when there are so many."

He'd barely managed to voice a reply when his new friend Haku was knocked to the ground. Casting an irked glare at the foul-mouthed arrival, Shuten crossed his arms, sliding his hands into the sleeves of his kimono to warm his chilled fingers.

Curling his lip in distaste at him, (because as much as the eyepatch reminded him of Rajura, this one was certainly nothing like the spider-Phantom) Shuten turned cold green eyes on the fellow. "No need to apologize, Haku." A smirk appeared on his face briefly. "Our foul-mouthed cycloptic friend here is the one at fault, I believe." It'd been a long time since Shuten had thought of being even remotely chivalrous, but he wasn't about to stand by and let the seemingly-frail Haku take a verbal assault from a complete stranger.

"...You did not just call me a cyclops, fuckwit," Xigbar growled, looking at the two offworlders. "You got a problem with it, buddy? Take it up with my two little friends." These 'friends' were a pair of rather odd-looking weapons that appeared out of nowhere, in his hands.

The yellow-eyed man glared at Shuten. "Now, if I were you, I'd be shutting the fuck up before I got a new airhole or thirty. Clear?"

Paine had lost her two new friends less than half an hour after they'd met last night. They hadn't been worth the effort, anyway. Paine was about as far from happy as she could get at the moment. Her clothes were not suited for this weather, and the local shopkeepers tended to kick her out even before they knew she wasn't going to buy anything. It didn't help that the pale warrior had been forced to nap, standing up, under the overhand of a shop instead of staying somewhere. Even a Rin travel agency bed was better.

She was looking for a shop she hadn't already been kicked out of when she heard something threatening. "Now, if I were you, I'd be shutting the fuck up before I got a new airhole or thirty. Clear?" For half a second, she thought she was the one being spoken to, but she realized she hadn't even said anything to set the man off.

The voice had come from her left, and she paused to see what was going on. The speaker was a massive brute, and the two he directed his anger at seemed to be a noble and possibly his escort. Either way, they weren't locals.

She was about to walk away when she hesitated. Was that guilt she just felt? No, she stopped because helping might end up with her finding somewhere warm to be. Maybe she had spent to much time working with yuna.

Click Paine leveled her gun at the back of the big man's head. "Is that really necessary?"

Haku felt torn between two options, the first to try and protect Shuten, the second to, well, to hide behind him. His mind was having a difficult time trying to come up with a reason for wanting to protect Shuten, but all he could come up with was that this man was really the first person to be nice to him since he had arrived. Unlike this other stranger, with the eye patch.

Haku looked at Xigbar for a moment before he made up his mind. Limited range of visibility, he thought. And unlike the Copy-nin, I doubt he's covering up that other eye to keep from using up too much chakra. Right.

Haku shifted, moving slightly in front of Shuten as he reached into the sleeve of his happi for some of his senbon. All it would take is one senbon to the right spot, and he could have this guy down for the count...

"Is that really necessary?" Upon hearing another's voice, Haku stopped what he was doing. There was a woman behind this stranger, and she has some strange weapon pointed at the man's head. The effeminate boy wanted to squeak, or something, but managed to prevent himself from doing so. He eyed the stranger and the woman behind him warily and stepped back again. Well, so much for that plan.

Fortunately for the one-eyed creature, another woman had shown up with her own weapon. But unfortunately she wasn't quite as quick as Shuten's reflexes. When the threat and weapons had been brandished, Shuten, under 400 years of training, had grabbed for the yoroi sphere that was tucked safely in a fold of his kimono. A split second later, his nice comfortable clothing had been replaced by the Oni Yoroi (http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b83/peepingdoom/paixao_journal/yst_shuten3_mashou.jpg), the monstrous helmet (http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b83/peepingdoom/paixao_journal/yst_shuten8.jpg) serving to amplify his annoyed growls.

"Choose your words carefully, fool." Swinging the clawed weight on the end of the kusari-gama idly, Shuten continued to growl at the stranger, "Or face the wrath of an-already irked Ogre."

"Is that really necessary?" Xigbar raised an eyebrow. Damn, he didn't hear that one coming until too late. "Ogre? Fun." Xigbar took one step forward- and seemed to disappear into a swirling vortex. Here one minute, gone the next. ...Gone being a decent distance away.

"A change of clothes doesn't scare me much, though!" With that said, the one-eyed Nobody combined his two guns into one sniper rifle. Killing them from here would be too easy, he thought. Thankfully for the three offending parties, he was sober.

Killing these three would be a waste, after all. Much as he'd like to really get into it with them... there were reasons he couldn't, not really. Damnit. He fired a few warning shots from his sniping point, growling in irritation. Damnit all. Let them think he missed.

Haku followed Xigbar's movements and stared, wide-eyed, at him as he combined his two weapons into one big one. And when he fired it at them, well, Haku actually squeaked this time, and hid behind Shuten on instinct. This was a weapon he was unfamiliar with, though the concept of projectiles was not unfamiliar. He then thought about his options, the senbon still being in his hand.

If I can...This might just work. Haku moved until he felt that he was well enough into Xigbar's blind spot. Satisfied with his position, he threw the senbon, aiming them for the gun-wielder's arm, and hoped they'd hit. If they did, well, he'd lose the feeling in his arm for a while. And if they missed, well, Haku didn't want to think about that right now.

And here Paine had always thought teleportation was a bunch of crap.

The warrior's change of clothes didn't phase Paine much, and when the agressor vanished, she immeidately swong around to look for him. She'd heard of people being able to teleport, but they were just tales. Even that old historian didn't put much faith in them.

By the time he spoke, Pain had aimed her gun again. When he fired, so did she. A quick burst of three or four shots tore into the ground at the sniper's feet. Well, pretty close to his feet. Pain readjusted her aim, glaring at the man and knowing she wouldn't miss next time.

The clawed weight began to whir like a helicopter in miniature as Shuten went from swinging it back and forth to rapidly rotating it faster and faster. It seemed as such that if he were holding it over his head he very may have become airborne. Eyes narrowing behind the crimson Oni faceplate, Shuten laughed hollowly, white teeth flashing.

"I've spent 437 years dispensing orders to a walking Phantom. Should I be impressed with your pathetic disappearing act?" And naturally, because the stranger had spoken, finding his position was almost too easy. The claw of the kusari-gama flew, whistling as it cut the air. It cut into the ground a scant few yards from the sniper's feet with a heavy TCHUNK. Resting it there only a moment, Shuten flicked his wrist. The result was the claw tearing free of the earth with a sizable chunk of ground attatched to it. Deeply arcing to the left, it swung, the debris shattering around the claw as it met soundly with the side of a building. Shortening the chain and bringing the weapon back to him, Shuten barked a laugh. "Care to test your luck against me, my myoptic friend?" It may have been true, what Kaos said about his trait and Arago-sama's intentions, but some days it just felt so good to be so malicious.

Xigbar hissed as the senbon embedded themselves in his right arm. ...Numbness, what the fuck? Xigbar's expression changed, from mocking to annoying. The other two had missed- maybe intentionally, maybe not- but the numbness in his left arm was annoying. He scowled, teleporting away.

He had places to be, anyway. He didn't need to be playing around with the foreginers when he had things to be doing. It was an admittedly rare flash of responsibility from Xigbar, of all people, but it happened from time to time.

Plus, pissing Superior off was not a good idea. It wouldn't be great if he showed up at the meeting all beat-up.

[ooc: XD Xigbar does need to be somewhere.]

Paine got the destinct feeling that the man had gone for good. That had been a good location for him to stay at, and leaving it didn't make a whole lot of sence otherwise. Lowering her gun, she turned to the man who'd just taken out a random chuk out of a building. She simply raised an eyebrow at him as she holstered her gun. She wondered if he had really needed to do that, but she didn't ask out loud.

Instead, she watched how he would react to the one eyed man's disappearance.

Haku was pleased to note that his senbon had hit their mark, but he didn't show it. That was how you made a target out of yourself, gloating after one simple action. Of course, he knew better now.

With Xigbar gone, Haku felt more at ease. He didn't like the ill-tempered man, and there was just something about him that set the young shinobi on edge. Making sure that the senbon still in his sleeve were within easy reach, he looked at Paine, taking note of where she was in relation to him, among other things. He could feel like a broken weapon all he wanted without Zabuza, but that didn't change the fact that he was still a ninja, and these things were ingrained in his head.

"That guy was certainly odd," Haku said, finally, as he turned to Shuten. "I'd like to hope we never run across him again."

Helmet splitting down the center to reveal his head, Shuten scowled at the place where the sniper had been, looping up the chain of the kusari-gama. That too vanished, to immediately appear when he next needed it. Even though it wasn't quite as warm as his clothing, he left on the Oni Yoroi. This place seemed to have its fair share of hostiles, and wasting the seconds to summon it each time would be a delay he might not want to risk.

Somehow feeling even more calm after venting frustrations on their would-be attacker, Shuten smiled gently down at Haku as he spoke. "This whole place is odd." Looking to the place where the sniper was last seen, Shuten shook his head briefly, long hair swaying slightly. "We may never see him again, but I don't think the rest of this excursion will be peaceful." Lifting his head to look from Haku to the woman, Shuten bowed shallowly, nodding in thanks. "You are quite skilled. Thank you for the assistance." Once again, he looked to Haku, cocking his head curiously. "That senbon was intruiging. ...you are a ninja, are you not?"

"We can always hope, though, can't we?" Haku questioned. To think that there would be no peace during their stay was, well, pessimistic. He watched as Shuten cocked his head to the side and looked at him curiously, and the young shinobi shifted unconciously.

"I am," he replied, reaching into his sleeve and withdrawing another senbon to show Shuten. "Senbon are the weapon I choose to work with, and I've become adept in their use since I chose them."

Haku then looked up at the sky, to be rewarded with rain in the face. He wiped it off with a sleeve as he looked at Paine then Shuten.

"Perhaps we should move our conversation out of the weather?" he asked quietly. "Someplace warm and dry..."

"Heh. Hope is a fragile thing, Haku-chan." Blinking up at the rain, Shuten shook his head again, a frown tugging at the corners of his mouth. "I apologize. It's the weather. Makes me a fair bit more depressed than I have a right to be." Shaking his hair to shower his Yoroi further with droplets of water, Shuten smiled appreciatively. "You are indeed adept with the senbon."

Looking to the rain again, the Oni chuckled. "Indeed. Let's get moving to somewhere out of the weather. Are there teahouses or anything of the sort here, I wonder...?"

"There are some restraunts in the area." Paine offered, remembering her meal the previous night. She still wondered how she had lost the man, but there was little she could do about it now. "But I was told this was the lower class district." The walk to the center of towns didn't seem such a bad one, but she certianly wasn't going to try it unless the weather cleared up, or she ran out of options.

"But without hope, would not some lose the will to exist?" Haku asked. He blushed at the praise he recieved from Shuten. It had been so long since he had been complimented on anything, even something so simple as using senbon. Zabuza had stopped doing that forever ago...

"Many people become depressed when the rain starts, Shuten-san. There is no need to apologize for something that seems so... normal for many people."

He looked to Paine. "Should the class of the area matter? Shelter is shelter, is it not? But a restaurant sounds good. Do you know where any of them are?"

Paine nodded, turning halfway from the pair. Her head was still turned their way, waiting to see if they were ready to follow.

She ignored his words about the class of the area. She was accustomed to better, but had dealt with just as bad, if not worse, surroundings. Even beautiful Spira had its nastier parts.

When they hesitated, she spoke. "They're this way."

"I can't say for sure," he began, trailing off for a moment. Hope was a funny thing to him. Sighing briefly, he followed the woman, lost in his own thoughts.

"Well, this'll be a fine march. Come on, Haku-chan. Like any good soldier we've got a bit of unpleasantness to get done before relaxing." Shuten smiled benevolently at Haku and the woman. "The quicker we get through the rain the quicker we can get dry. Lead the way, Honored Lady."

Paine arched an eyebrow at what she feared would become her new nickname, but she turned anyway and began leading the men through the streets.

It wasn't a horribly long walk. Before she knew it, the first restraunt in the block that seemed full of them was coming into sight through the rain.

Paine wasn't much in the mood for talking.

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Lost Without You [Open]

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