Mud and Suds [Open]

[Okibi]

(If you wanna join, go read the description of The Youkou Doro first! :3)

Sinking into a steaming pool, Okibi let out a loud sigh and let her head lull back against the smooth, black stone of the spring. Her hair was tied up into a messy bun at the top of her head and she wore not a stitch of clothing. Couldnt have the few clothes she did wear on a regular basis getting wet.

In the wilds of Wind Country she'd come across a few of these before, hot springs that is. Each time had been something of a treat, as they were rather hard to come by. How she'd gone so long living in the village without knowing of the Youkou Doro, she had no idea. Although she wasnt one for the sort of primping and pampering that Chiyoko was a fan of, relaxing in hot water was another thing entirely. Letting the warm water sooth away all the knots and pains that came with being a ninja. Yes, it was certainly a wonder.

"So, that was interesting." Okibi turned her head slightly to look at Seven, who was seated outside of the spring in his large, humanoid form. His seven foot tall frame sat indian style a few feet away from her, near another pool that bubbled with a different substance. He looked at it with interest as he talked. "The owner woman, I mean."

"She a big lady." The purple haired teen murmured as she sunk a little lower in the hot water. Seven snorted slightly, though he tried to give her a reproachful look. Just because it was true, didnt mean she had to go saying that.

-- Flashback to a few minutes ago --

"What's a brat doing in here!? Move it along girl!" A booming voice yelled at Okibi, who was admiring some scrolls hanging in the foyer of The Youkou Doro. She'd been attracted by the brightly painted exterior and the colorful flags, but was drawn in by the smell of food and the sound of water. Okibi turned to look at the very large woman who addressed her, and couldnt help making a face. She was very over weight, and wearing an outlandish outfit. Very out there for Okibi's taste. Seven stood beside her in his human form, she having had changed him just before entering. Establishments rarely welcomed him warmly in his normal form.

A gaggle of pretty young ladies moved to the side, murmuring quietly amongst themselves as the large woman made her way through. She glowered at the teenage shinobi, but Okibi just brushed her off and returned to admiring the painting. For a moment, it looked like the woman was about to have a hippo when one of the young women sidled up to her and whispered. "Madame, I think I've seen this girl before. She's usually found in the company of the Steward." The woman's fleshy face screwed up as she turned to look at Okibi again, this time also considering the well dressed, very large man who stood with her. Suddenly, her countenance changed and she offered a wide, very false smile.

"You are related to his Stewardship are you?" She asked, rubbing her hands together in a greedy fashion.

Seven looked at the woman with his glowing red eyes, and slowly nodded. "This is his ward." He said, motioning to Okibi, who didnt bother looking at the woman again. "I am her... guardian."

The woman's eyes bulged every so slightly for just a moment before drawing back into the corpulence of her face. She approached Seven and Okibi quickly, laughing. "Oh my my my, you honor us with your presence!" She gushed, coming around behind them to usher them further into the foyer. Okibi's eyebrows lowered and she looked to Seven, who shrugged. "Such important visitors. Please, come enjoy the amenities of The Youkou Doro, on me!" She stopped them in front of the crew of giggly young ladies, who now seemed more than happy to see them. A few of them grasped lightly onto Okibi and Seven and started to escort them in. "I am Madame Youkou, by the way. Please let me know if you need anything!" She called after them as they were paraded down the halls of the bath house.

-- Back to the present --

Okibi rolled her eyes, remembering the entire debacle. For some reason, some people just simpered when they learned that she and Sousuke were 'related'. She didnt quite understand it, honestly.

But oh well! If it got her a free soak, what did she care?

Just then, one of the young women in the skimpy outfits fluttered over to her a knelt next to her head. She smiled sweetly and offered her a tray of skewered, sweet smelling balls. "Would you care for some dango miss?" Okibi rose up out of the water and crossed her arms on the edge of the spring. She sniffed at the balls and found their scent appealing. With a pat, she asked for the young lady to leave the tray. She did so, and then left with flourish.

"Mmmm." Okibi hummed after biting one of the balls of a skewer. "If they want keep giving Okibi free food, they can be as 'interesting' as want!" She declared, biting off another ball.

[MFT]

 

[Hanone]

Eiji frequented The Youkou Doro often. Their red mud was so luxurious and while he did have a nice bath of his own at home, these were nicer. It certainly wasn't cheap to come here either, but with his increased pay from his promotion and several new missions, he felt it was about time he came and splurged on himself a little. He had a lot of things to think about as it was and generally he got a lot of time to himself here.

Entering the main building, he was surprised to not find the fat woman waiting to greet her guests. Maybe she was in the bathroom or something. No matter. One of the little floozies took his money and showed him to one of the less filled pools.

Youkou Doro didn't seem to care much about the privacy of one's gender. Eiji often found himself in a pool with both men and women and many of them severely under-dressed, if not totally nude. Eiji was hardly shy himself. He knew what he was and that was a beautiful man with very little natural flaws. What did he have to hide?

Well there was one time he came here and they brought him to a pool where there were 4 older women and all of them spent the whole time flirting with him. And they had been naked, like himself. Horrible, droopy, civilian female bodies. Ew...

Shuddering at the thought, Eiji passed through one of the wooden halls into a walled in pool area. There was a very tall male sitting on the ground and what seemed to be a purple haired girl in the bath already. Other than that it was empty. What he could see of the girl was her shoulders and those alone told him she was trained and strong; normal girls didn't have musculature like that. It meant she was shinobi, most likely. Eiji drew his eyes away from the girl, not wanting to invade her privacy and made his way to one of the benches where he began to remove his own clothing.

As usual when off duty, the jounin wore his uniquely tailored kimono which barely covered him normally. He slipped out of it with a shrug, leaving the man bared, save a single necklace and a shin decoration. Once his clothing was folded, the sculpted male removed his shin piece then made his way to the water. He felt no need to cover himself as he walked to the water edge then slipped in.

 

[Okibi]

The solitude was nice for the first ten minutes, but Okibi was starting to wish she had someone other than Seven to talk to. She loved her giant dog, but she already knew everything about him; conversations didnt usually last before they lapsed into comfortable silence. What she needed was to make a new friend! However, it was hard to make one when she was the only one in her spring. There were a few other people lounging in some springs further away, but she hardly wanted to get out of the water just to go talk to people.

If only someone would join her...

No sooner did she think this when she was joined by a young... lady? The condensation in the air was a little too thick for her to scent the person, but from where she sat, they looked like a girl. Same height as her, probably around the same weight too... surely this person had to be a fellow female!

Her hopes were dashed when the person stripped down and turned to enter her spring. That certainly wasnt female anatomy. Okibi was disappointed for a moment because she'd guessed wrong. She let out a small sigh before brushing it off. Served her right for judging by appearance! With a grin in place, she picked up her tray of dango and waded toward the newcomer, not in the least bit ashamed of her own nudity. Living the first fourteen years of her life without a shred of clothing hardly enforced a sense of shame in the girl.

"Hi small man!" She greeted once she was near enough. With a smile she held out the tray of dango. "Want share Okibi's sweet balls? Cant eat all herself."

(Bahaha xD.)

 

[Hanone]

Eiji had been hoping the girl in the bath and her big friend would ignore him and leave him to his peace (the opposite of the purple haired girl's desires). But it didn't take her a moment to come sidling over in the water with a tray of sweets. Her silly smile was welcoming and friendly and he had to try not to groan. Small man? Ughh..

At first all he could do was close his crystal blue eyes, maybe hoping when he reopened them she wouldn't be there, but to no avail. He gave in and looked at the girl. She was fairly young, rather boyish in a way and very colorful. Her hair was a little hard to look at actually. Licking his lips, he looked her in the eye and took a single dango treat. "Thank you." If she'd been a little older, he might had made a joke about her wording... but decided against it.

"Okibi, is it? I'm Motomori Eiji." he said, assumed by what she said and offered his own name. It was customary to do so. He then noticed something about her... "You smell like a dog." that came out badly.

Or maybe it wasn't coming from her? Eiji took a bite out of the treat. It was pretty good and the first thing he'd eaten that day.

Up close, Okibi could see Eiji was older, not old but at least closer to 30 than a teenager. His face was beautiful rather than handsome and his body, while lean, was much like hers; very strong and with little to no fat. What he had differently was an array of scars both new and very old. The one over his chest was just barely healed and was several inches across from right shoulder to left nipple.

 

[Okibi]

Once the lady-man took one of the skewers, Okibi set the tray aside and picked one more up for herself before taking a seat beside him. She pulled one of the doughy balls off and chewed as he introduced himself. Edgy, was it? What a neat name! Of course, Okibi realized that wasnt how his name was actually pronounced, but she'd already gotten into the habit of giving everyone a name which was not their own. She couldnt very well call this guy by his actual name when everyone else had to deal with an odd make-shift right? Absolutely not.

When Eiji made a comment about her smell, Okibi took it in stride when a normal human female probably would have balked. She couldnt honestly understand why some humans were so sensitive about such matters. If you smelled bad, wouldnt you want someone to tell you? Okibi shrugged and brushed the comment off, taking another bite of dango. "Okibi is dog. Is weird that she smell like one?" She said, half joking. After swallowing, she turned a smile that was less kind, and more playful on him. It was a grin that actually hinted at just what kind of person she was. "Edgy smell like male, but Okibi is surprised. Look like should smell like female."

Now that she looked more closely at him, Okibi could indeed see just how feminine this fellow was. His face was prettier than a lot of the women she'd seen about the village, although not as young as she might have at first though, and his hair looked soft to the touch. She didnt dare try to touch it though; Eiji didnt seem like the type to play along with her bubble invasion game. In fact, he looked like the type that would sooner shank her than humor her. All those scars... she couldnt help staring at them. There was one that looked rather new, still tender compared to the others. After cleaning her skewer of the last dango ball, she pointed at the scare with it.

"How you get that?" She couldnt help asking. It was an invasive question, but if she wasnt going to be able to invade his personal space physically, she couldnt very well keep herself from doing so verbally. The effort just might might make her explode.

 

[Hanone]

[so sorry about the delay, life's been busy lately. x.x]


He had to admit, he was surprised when the girl wasn't upset about his comment about her smell. Most women didn't take that nicely, but not her. It made him think better of her immediately. Well that was until she returned the comment in kind. The beautiful man's eyes narrowed and he resisted pitching her from the pool for her slight only because he was enjoying the heat and didn't want to be kicked out of here... again. "Hmm." was his only verbal response to that for the time being. She was a mean little one. Looking her over slightly, he was almost tempted to tell her while he looked like a girl, she didn't. Rawr.

However, Eiji was fair game. Her bluntness and snarky attitude was a refreshing alternative to the typical droolers and sluts he usually encountered. Though he was very attractive and fairly androgynous, few females automatically assumed he was just 'off limits' and tried their damnedest to get him into bed with him. And here this female was, naked and sitting way too close to him for his usual comfort and yet she showed no genuine interest in him sexually.
Yes if she was going to play mean and that was all, he would be game and not shank her.

Soon enough the girl was speaking again, being nosey. Her skewer was pointed at his newly formed scar and she was asking about it. Very nosey. "I killed a crew of pirates after they stole the apples from my apple tree." His response was a pure lie, one he sort of hoped she could figure out was a lie. He didn't give her long to reply, though, and asked his own question. "How did you get that?" he asked, breaching the distance toward them and gave her purply, curly mess a light tug. It was an unnatural color.

 

[Okibi]

"Pirates?" Okibi murmured. He'd gotten that scar by defending his apples from pirates... She'd had never heard a better reason to kill somebody! She hated the foxes that stole from her while she and Seven were still living on the surface, and wanted to murder some of the thieving creatures on more than one occasion. Having such a disposition was probably a little worrisome, but Okibi's morals werent exactly like those of the village-raised humans.

She didnt have time to make a comment on Eiji's supposed bout with the pirates however. At the drop of a hat, the topic of conversation was being turned to her hair. At first, she was confused as to why he wanted to know how she got her hair... wasnt it normal for humans to have it? He had a nice mop of his own... why wonder about hers?

And then she realized he was talking about her hair color. It wasnt exactly natural, although she did see a few people walking around the village with colors that didnt seem very normal either (Sousuke included). But, it was true that her hair definitely wasnt naturally purple. She tugged the strands that Eiji was fingering away from the man and bunched them along with the rest in front of her shoulder. It's magnificent length swirled about in the spring before her, creating patterns for her fingers to play through. She smiled fondly as she recalled how her hair came to be such a hue.

But, she was a girl of few words, and believed you should only receive as much as you put out. Eiji hadnt elaborated on his pirate story, so she would put her own into as few words as possible. "Science 'splosion." And it was as simple as that, although her grin said that there was clearly much more to it than she chose to say.

"'Bout those pirates. They steal apples you say? Okibi no blame you for killing them." And just like that the spotlight was back on her new acquaintance. She could play this game all day.

 

[Hanone]

He wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry when the girl returned to the pirate story. Most people could have figured that for the false statement it was, but this girl, no she wasn't too bright, was she? Deciding to do neither, he simply sighed and decided to elaborate on the fiction with tinges of truth. "Well these pirates, led by a woman of vast fatness, were villains of the worst kind." He leaned back, looking up at nothing in particular. WHat came to mind while he spoke was in fact the truth of the story.

Hanabi, in the basement hall. Her fiends attacking them instead of coming quietly. "She ordered her swashbucklers to attack me and my poor companion, Ikkadan." Eiji could not know that Okibi had known Ikkadan and he felt a hint of sadness tighten his chest at the mention of the boy. It had been several weeks now since his 'end', maybe no one even remembered him. Yet he pressed on with his tale. "See they wanted my apples, I sell these fancy ones at great cost. They wouldn't take no for an answer and swore death to me and my friend for the injustice of my prices. They were fair to be honest, but these were pirates. One man slashed my chest with a poisoned blade, so I broke his neck." Yes, he had killed the man, more brutally than he retold, but the injury was true.

"At the end though, they all died for trying to take my apples. It was just. Well all but the fat lady who sailed away." In fact she was sitting in one of the deep cells of the prison, her tongue and fingers removed. He felt no remorse about her or what he'd done to Hanabi; she had deserved it. But unless the girl asked him further, he would look back down and return the attention on her, the same way she had. "What kind of science explosion? Are you an escaped experiment?" he teased.

 

[Okibi]

"She ordered her swashbucklers to attack me and my poor companion, Ikkadan."

The moment that sentence left Eiji's lips, the functions of Okibi's mind came to a grinding halt. Eiji knew Ikkadan! Or, he knew someone else with the same name as Ikkadan, she couldnt be sure. But really, was Ikkadan so common a name? For a few moments, it was as though she werent in her own body. She was whisked back to that moment, the last time she saw her good friend. Okibi could almost smell the dampness of the dark cell, feel the cold of the steel bars... she could see the shuriken coming right at her.

One of her hands surged out of the water and latched onto her left bicept, almost of its own accord. It was at this time that Okibi came back to herself, and she heard the last vestiges of Eiji's story. He killed all the pirates for taking his apples, was the gist of the story. A small part of her almost felt guilty, and disappointed that she hadnt listened to the rest of it. The bigger part wanted to know if the Ikkadan he mentioned had been her Ikkadan.

She completely ignored Eiji's attempt to turn the conversation around and looked into his face with a seriousness that she didnt use often. Her hand still clutched at her bicep, not because it hurt physically, but because she could still feel the emotional pain that came from that last encounter. She'd been stubborn, and angry; she'd passed up her chance to see Ikkadan again after that, refused to go to the medical tower because she was so mad at him. Now she had no idea where he was. Okibi swallowed hard as she looked into Eiji's blue eyes. "Ikki... Ikkadan, what he look like? What happen to him?"

The way she asked, it sounded like she was just curious about Eiji's story, but her face clearly said differently. She desperately wanted to know what became of her friend. It'd been triggered by her meeting of the Buggy Sennin Woman, and with this, she wouldnt be able to let it go.

(Sorry that took me so long! I lost track of time and got caught up watching/reading a manga/anime the last few days! ><)

 

[Hanone]

He could see it the moment he had said the boy's name. Inwardly he cursed himself. It wasn't good to bring the deceased boy up because of how he's died. Right now only Eiji knew that fact though. The last time he had been seen was in the hospital. The boy had slipped out and looked for Eiji in the slums, stumbling and limping the whole way.

He attempted to quell his nerves and steel his expression as he finished his story. Trying to change to subject proved fruitless and he found himself being questioned about Ikkadan. It wasn't much, but the girl's body language spoke leagues of her worry. She had known him apparently.

He could lie.. he should lie. A different Ikkadan perhaps? No, lies on top of lies worked much worse. "He's a young guy." Yes, at least talk about him in present tense, "Brown eyes, stupid smile, really clumsy." That about summed him up outwardly. A twinge of sadness tightened the jounin's throat, something he forcefully ignored. "I haven't seen him since he was in the hospital. He had been grievously injured." Then as if to say he knew no more about him, Eiji shrugged and looked away. His eyes trained on the water surface. The slight ripples shimmered against the light of the place. Maybe it was time for him to escape here...

 

[Okibi]

Brown eyes, a stupid smile... it sounded like the Ikkadan she knew, but there was no way to be certain. Brown eyes and silly smiles werent exactly a rarity after all. But still, what were the chances... Okibi turned away from Eiji as he continued to answer her questions, and watched the water of the spring ripple away from her body. Despite the warmth that the water provided, why was it that a chill was settling in her bones?

Okibi's mood took a turn for the worst when she learned what became of the Ikkadan from Eiji's story. He ended up in the hospital again, but hadnt bothered to try contacting her. That is, assuming he was the Ikkadan she knew. A small part of her broke at the realization. If he had been the one that befriended her, would she ever see him again?

Suddenly, the warm air of the onsen was much too stifling.

Standing up swiftly, Okibi bobbed her head at Eiji, keeping her eyes downcast and her hair in front of her face so he couldnt see the turmoil there. She couldnt stand it when other people saw her in such a state. "Thank you for conversation. Hope to see you again." She said, trying her utmost to sound convincingly blithe. With a whirl of her hair she waded back across the spring, leaving her tray with the remaining dango on it behind. She could barely stomach the thought of food at that moment anyway.

With an easy grace, Okibi hopped out of the spring, not caring for her modesty (or lack thereof). She marched over to Seven with a purpose and he looked up from the pool of mud that he'd been studying. He didnt need to ask to see that she was upset, and stood up quickly. It was obvious that his human wanted to leave. The girl snatched up her few bits of clothing and started making her way towards the exit, not even bothering to put them on. Seven made as if to stop her, choking out some sounds, but couldnt bring himself to voice them. There wasnt much reasoning with her when she got herself into one of those slumps. Perhaps the best he could do would be to help her get home quickly.

With a heavy sigh, the dog-turned-human followed after his girl.

[MFT]
[Topic left unless stopped]
(Seemed like as good a time as any to wrap this up.

 

[Hanone]

The girl was clearly upset and was glad to find she took no more thought in him. In fact she turned away, obviously lost in her out thoughts before rising quickly. Eiji averted his eyes, looking away from her naked frame. This was partially for her and more so for himself. Eiji had no like of the female form, finding it ugly and unappealing to the eye. When she was farther away from him, out of the water, he leaned back and relaxed some. As cute as she had been for the most part, he really enjoyed privacy.

She was polite on her way out, something he responded to with a little wave of his fingers, then she was gone. Her large human shaped dog following her.

As soon as she was gone the place felt dull and lifeless. The water was calmer, the air smelled clear... it was nice. He was about to really get comfortable when another female walked in. This one was very overweight and lacking in modesty the same as the shinobi girl had. Eiji was not sticking around for that. He quickly got up, dressed and left.

[topic left too]