Home is Where You Manage to Fall Asleep[Momoka/Open]

[Funai Ikko]

Ikko had made it to Kumogakure and had been there for all of twenty-four hours. The Shinobi who rescued him was a nice man, but not an especially considerate one. When they had arrived in the village the man had dropped young little Ikko off at a building he called a dormitory. Ikko had not heard the word before and it was a little hard to pronounce but the quizzical look of his let him know to explain to the boy that he would be sleeping there. It was still early in the morning however that Ikko had arrived and he was nothing if not an incredibly curious child. Bored with the rather plain looking sleeping accommodations, Ikko had set out to explore what had been explained to him as his new home. He did not know how to feel yet about that news. He had enjoyed the monastery, it was the first place he had known as home, but these people were going to make him shoot lightning out of his fingers to make the people at the monastery proud, so he had to stay for now. Besides, they told him he'd love Kumogakure so he had no reason to doubt them!

So he set about exploring his new home and made his way out in to the village, determined to see the sights and explore to his heart's content. He also immediately got lost. Kumogakure was very different than anywhere he had been to before and the boy had quickly lost his orientation out in the village on his own. Never having had to ask for "directions" before had unfortunately caused the boy to not consider the option as he spent the rest of the day aimlessly wandering around the village proper. When the sun began to set and his time was running out, Ikko had no idea how to get back to the dormitory where he was told to sleep. However, not being in a designated place to sleep was not an especially new experience to him. Ikko found a nice little alcove, tucked away from foot traffic and nestled into it, finding what he imagined to be a very soft box to sleep on. He should be able to sleep a few hours there, probably. Maybe when he woke up he'd be able to find that Dormitory place the nice man had shown him.

 

[Chigokai Yuka]

It was late. Late enough for the sun to have set, the lanterns to have been lit, and the clubs to have opened up for the night. Yet Momoko’s mother was insistent on making hot pot for dinner with only half of the ingredients. So the young shinobi set out to the market stalls of the Dawnbringer’s Plaza.
With two heavy set bags hung over her forearm, she scanned and counted off each item on the list her mother had given her. Onions, pork, garlic, nori, mushrooms, tofu, and other various vegetable as well a few small pouches of spices. Everything had been checked off and purchased.

Now, Momoko was headed home, glad to get out of the bright lights of the Susukino district. As beautiful as the place was at night, it was far too crowded for Momoko’s liking. She was constantly running into people, jostling her groceries and probably crushing some of the ingredients. At first, she would stop to berate whoever it was that knocked into her, but after the first three times of her coming face to face with a person so drink they could barely stand, she had given up.

On her way out of the district, though, something unusual caught her eye. In the alleyway to her left, where a pub and an after hours noodle house met, there was boy. He sat against the wall, hunched over and body relaxed, as if he were sleeping. He didn’t seem to be very old, not nearly old enough to have been a drunkard that passed out on their way home.

Going against her better judgement, Momoko approached the boy. Crouching down next to him, she observed him silently. His clothes were not dirty like one would expect from someone without a home, and his hair and skin seemed to be clean too. Briefly, she wondered how anyone could sleep with all the noise around them. Reaching out, she roughly pushed on his shoulder, in an attempt to jostle him awake. “Oi,” she called, trying her hardest to get her voice across from the multitude sounds that surrounded them. The boy didn’t budge, so she tried again, this time tugging harshly on a piece of his snowy white hair.

 

[Funai Ikko]

Little Ikko was having a nice little dream. He had made lightning dance across the wall like an electrified sock puppet and the crowd cheered for him and Lord Raiden was happy and he was the super mega ultra super star of the day and everybody loved him and a myriad of other complimentary things that Ikko's subconscious could not really place words to, both because he did not actually know that many words and because his subconscious was a little too preoccupied with being overjoyed with itself. A serene little smile would be on Ikko's face as the newcomer hovered over the peaceful Ikko. His little pleasant reverie was disturbed for a moment, a sharp sensation on his shoulder. It didn't matter though, Lord Raiden was happy with him and a small discomfort on his shoulder was hardly relevant before the sheer immensity of that accomplishment. He was the hero. Then that reverie was completely and utterly shattered as a sharp tug on the crown of the boy's head jerked him awake with a pained squeak. The boy woke with a start, his eyes flaring open to look up at who assailed his peaceful sleep as he lashed out with his words, words of dubious accuracy.

"What are you doing!? Don't you know if you wake someone while they're sleeping by tugging on their hair Lord Raiden will turn your underwear into gravy!?"

Of course, it was difficult to be certain if Ikko even knew what he said as his hands raised to his eyes, rubbing the sleep from them as he looked up at the person who had ruined his beauty sleep. In front of him was a girl, a few years older than he, with rather attention grabbing flaming red hair. Ikko stared at it groggily for a moment, simultaneously appreciating the rather striking nature of the crimson hue and wanting to grab it and give it a strong yank in retaliation for her transgressions. Ikko's eyes tore away from that red hair to settle on the girl's, another rather disarming shade of red, with a small frown forming on his face. Why did she bother him? He was out of the way, no one was going to step on him. Why did she waste time waking him up? He looked down at his pockets. No, she hadn't tried to rob him, he didn't have anything worthwhile on his person to begin with but it didn't seem like she had gone through his pockets. So if she wasn't trying to steal from him, why was she bothering him? There was only one explanation left to Ikko and it was that line of thought that he decided to pursue with the girl.

"I'm sorry, was this your bed?"

 

[Osuteno]

[spoilername="Osu with Yukiko and Karasuko"]

[/spoilername]​

"Dadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadadada," the little black haired Karasuko giggled as she bopped her dadadadada's face with her little white stuffed bunny. She loved anything in the world remotely shiny and the streetlights were no exception. The slightly elder white haired twin Yukiko drowsily nommed on a dango ball while holding a black stuffed bunny.

Osuteno the 17 year old... *narrator squints to make sure* father of these two one-year-olds had a tired smile on his face as he walked home from another shift at the hospital. Thank goodness he had an endless stream of MiT to use as babysitters at the hospital, they needed to learn to handle children anyway. To keep up on the rent in the apartment his wife, Chiai, was now working at the only place that would take an 18 year-old young woman without job skills, education and needed to avoid background checks could work, she was a singer at a rather questionable establishment. It had always bothered him that despite the high class of the place and its apparently clean record that a lot of the customers seemed... less than model citizens. Still they treated his wife well and her pay was surprisingly good. The only problem was that while she could watch the twins in the morning when she got off work and he could look after them in the evening before they fell asleep they had to rely on using nurses and MiT at the hospital as unofficial babysitters during the afternoon while Osu worked and Chiai slept.

All that aside Osu walked along the street with his two little rabbits strapped to his chest in their carrier and noticed an odd scene in an alcove ahead of them. What is that child doing on the ground? He could have just walked on since there was another kid with them but being as prone to getting himself involved in others troubles as he was, Osu felt compelled to go and make sure everything was alright. As Osu slowed and turned himself towards the two younglings, Karasuko started making a bit of a fuss as daddy started turning from street filled with pretty and shiny lights and Yukiko was finding it easier to close her eyes and start drifting into sleep with a half eaten dango ball in her little hand. Osu approached the two kids, the younger one having apparently just woken up and asked the girl if... the spot he was laying was her bed... Any small chance of him not getting himself involved disappeared at this point.

“Excuse me, but neither of you actually calls a box next to the road your bed do you?” Standing before them clad in a flowery yukata, a rather pretty and gentle looking person with contrastingly unnatural eyes was squatting down to be more on eye level while remaining careful that the hem of their yukata never touched the ground. Eyes that had the appearance of clear globes filled with liquid swirling blood held a concerned gaze and were accented by a worried frown. In a carrier on the person’s chest they would see backs of two small head, one with black hair and the other white.

For the younger Chigokai whose telltale eyes had not yet been seen by Osu, she might happen to pick up that Osu had a much much different cardiovascular system than most people if she was proficient enough in her bloodline, the fact he had six beating hearts and enough blood flowing through him for as many people for instance. Maybe her hearing might even be advanced enough to tell that the countless veins in his body were moving quite irregularly and ere in fact holding his body’s shape and doing the work his missing muscles should have been doing.

Or she might not be proficient enough to tell that much detail yet. Regardless Osu was in concerned dad mode. “It is getting rather late and the air feels like we will be getting a heavy snow later tonight. If you are planning on camping out at least use some proper gear and sleep someplace a bit safer. If you are just trying to stay out of the house, at least go sleep at a shrine or the hospital, you kids should be more careful… Rather, do you need someone to take you home?” Most kids in the village were just that, kids. Only a very small portion of had any shinobi training and since he had yet to see a headband like the one currently hanging from his neck where Karasuko could see her reflection in it, he could only assume they were village children out playing.

Actually speaking of the twins, Karasuko was still babbling on and Yukiko was finally getting tired of having her nap disturbed and yelled out in her little voice, “Karwa too loud! Shush, nap your face!”

Karasuko was shocked by this unexpected outburst from her normally quiet sister, “Yuyu grumpy, you need nap?”

Yukiko had a bit of a flabbergasted face at this observation from her sister and began crying while covering eye face with her little hands getting some of her dango into her hair.

“Poor sissy,” Karasuko continued nodding and patting her older sister’s face, “you need nap.”

Which caused Yukiko to cry harder with tears pouring down her little face as she struggled to say, “I… I was, was tryin’ stupid Karwa!” Which after being so suddenly insulted Karwa, I mean Karasuko began crying herself and causing Osu to get a really exhausted look in his eyes despite his gentle smiling face.