Naruko -- a crack!Naruto RPG

takes place after Asuka paper-tests Hinaji

( Read more... )

We've pretty much reached a majority consensus that Naruko is dead and isn't going to be revived. So as of 5/23/2009, we'll no longer be accepting new applications or expecting the community to continue on the current plotline or even post at all.

HOWEVER. The majority consensus also wants to allow for the community to remain open so that existing members can do random crack, AUs, stories, etc., and post for general amusement. Many of us have done side things unrelated that may not fit into the Naruko timeline - I sure have. So, though Naruko as a whole is now closed, if anyone wants to continue posting logs, stories, pictures, or what have you, please feel free to do so. You may do so either in the main community or in the naruko_ooc community, as you prefer.

This post will remain at the top of the community as a reminder that Naruko is now CLOSED and no longer accepting applications.



October 21st, 2005 - May 23rd, 2009
RIP Naruko RP!

This took me so long to start, I'm so sorry Squeak -_-; In Naruko-time, this takes place the afternoon of the day after Meeting with Asuka






It was turning out to be a beautiful spring day. The sky a gorgeous blue, the clouds perfect for watching, the flowers coming out in bloom, birds singing merrily, etc etc..

Asuka plopped herself down on a park bench and yawned. Man, if only it had been a rainy day instead. Maybe then she could have canceled training, talked Kureno into playing hooky, and slept in late. But noooo, spring had to be all spry and give her no real excuse to avoid work. The world was out to get her.

But for all that she'd spent the day attached to a cup of coffee and vainly attempting to wake herself, she had done as promised: gotten elemental testing strips for Hinaji. And now that the morning training with her team was done, she was here to administer the test and give him his official affinities. After that, well... maybe then she could take a nap.

[Takes place before Tentsuke's return. Will figure out exact timing of this (aside from February) tomorrow. Right now Bel and I are just getting this thing frelling posted. The comment count is why. If anyone wants the Teal Deer quick summary, either poke me or wait until I get around to timelining.]

[Thread-posting still a work-in-progress. Will note when it's complete.]




Nejiko was not a consummate actress. This amongst other things thus generated severe limitations as to the kinds of undercover missions she could participate in, be they ANBU or not. Better, in her opinion, she simply undertake such straightforward missions as 'search' or 'search and destroy'. Best use of her Byakugan and her skills, and more expedient. She liked to undertake a [sufficiently challenging] mission, focus on the objective and how to reach it, and nothing more. Prancing about pretending she was something she was not left a quietly sour taste in her mouth. If she was contracted to protect a person, she would prefer to be allowed her uniform or at least something most decidedly not civilian issue.

( But for this mission, however... )

[set after Marriage? What Marriage? Also, mission log of doom should (hopefully) be up by the end of the week, if anyone's curious.]



Once Nejiko was past the lobby area of headquarters, she unrolled the mission assignment Tsurude gave to actually read and only just kept herself from stopping short when she saw her mission partner. Apparently Yuugao hadn't been exaggerating when he had said that the higher-ups were considering them to work together on missions, emphasis on the plural. Not back in the village even a week, and she was going to be assigned another mission with him slated for departure at week's end.

At least chakra wasn't banned this time.

( ~ )

backdated to before certain rumors about Kakami begin circulating


Kakami wasn't in the house she was now sharing with Rin. (Still so weird to think, that Kakami and Rin-san were living together. Because for the longest time, Kakami had been such the bachelor, and now she was living with a tattooed guy...) The place was actually empty, so that meant Rin-san was on shift or whatnot. Sachiko, now in search of her old sensei, reflected upon the fact that at least she had another chance in which to practice the tracking skills she had been honing while playing a version of 'hide and seek' with Konohako and Moegi throughout the village. (Sachiko had a strong suspicion when Asuka made up this assignment/game/thing, the elder Sarutobi did it so she could go off and take a nap or something while her students were running amok around the village.) But the practice was useful. For all of Asuka's...Asuka-ness, the woman knew her stuff.

( Dammitt. )

[[backdated to immediately after Waiting for the Storm]]






Thus far, Tsurude thought, he'd had a very productive day. No emergencies - not even of the running-out-of-coffee type - no meetings with the council (not even random encounters in the hall), and even in the few meetings he had had scheduled, they were casual affairs that weren't stressful or really even all that important. (He should talk with the minister of commerce more often; man knew his alcohol.)

This meant that, by Tsurude's standards of 'productive', he had had six cups of coffee, three cups of tea, ramen for lunch, eight saucers of sake (just to test if the minister could really name alcohol by taste alone), signed twelve documents, read four, and had two naps. His inbox had increased by twenty-three documents and four petitions, but that was just the nature of the beast. It only grew, never diminished.

So when his secretary nosed in and claimed Hyuuga Nejiko was there on clan business, it kind of soured his mood. Not that Hyuuga Nejiko was there to see him, but rather that they couldn't talk about pleasant things, like the next mission he wanted her to go on. No, if she was here on clan business then it was only going to be about unpleasant things. Well, at least it wasn't Hiashiko and her jailers.

"No," he told her when she entered the office. ( 'Does that about cover everything?' )

Many people, upon meeting Maito Gaia, would dismiss her as a lunatic - a grinning, amiable idiot, who was jounin due only to her freakish physical capabilities. Others, more paranoid, decided that no one could POSSIBLY be that eccentric and strange, and that the whole thing was an elaborate, complex facade that hid Gaia's true plans - which were much too subtle and insidious for anyone's good.

( Read more... )

Hinaji had dragged his feet long enough. Training with Sachiko was all well and good, but until he started working towards mastering his elemental jutsu he wasn't going to advance at all. He'd promised to see Asuka a long time ago; it was time he acted on that promise.

( But he had no idea how to contact her. )

Set a few days after Yuugao spots something suspicious.

Yuugao caught the rolling ball with his foot and lightly rolled it back to the awaiting toddler. Yuka was giggling in anticipation, waving her hands. She was sitting on on the far side of the kitchen, legs widespread to form something akin to a goal. As Yuugao aimed right - again - the little girl squealed in delight as the ball returned to where she had just rolled it from. Yuugao spared her only a flash of a smile before looking up at his pregnant younger sister, Kimiko. Only four months along and already ballooning. No one in the family ever commented aloud, but they all knew they were thinking alike.

The luxurious spicy aroma from Kimiko's curry wafted across the room as she stirred and Yuugao only just resisted smiling. With so many things going on in his mind, Yuugao couldn't let them all go and simply relax. As it was, he had exhausted himself with a spar from an oldtime ANBU friend and then beat up his punching bag for several hours. The result had him slump just enough to look relaxed to civilian eyes. Shinobi would see a long, rough day. ( But one that was calm now. )

[set immediately after One's Duty]

The training grounds Nejiko chose were as far away from the nearest building as she could get without traveling beyond the thick stone walls. She wasn't sure what was worse - the fact the Elders were pushing this issue, or the fact she could understand the reasoning behind it. All Hyuuga knew their duty. Duty to clan and to village came at ( the price of individuality, of self-governance. )

[takes place a few days after Nejiko & Yuugao get back from their mission, which since it's so freakin' long is still being beta'd. >.>]

march year 19


Nejiko showed nothing as she walked to Hiashiko's study. She had been summoned and that was all she knew, though it was enough to know that whatever the reason behind the summons, it could not be good. It wasn't if anything had happened. If something had, she was sure she would have been found out within the past few days that she had been home from that mission with Yuugao. So the summoning was unexpected.

The internal disquiet continued when she saw Hiashiko was not alone. Elder Hinata stood in the room also, in front of Hiashiko's desk though Nejiko felt the councilwoman probably wished to be standing behind the desk. Whether she did not out of a sense of duty to at least pretend Hiashiko still had power, or simply out of habit, Nejiko couldn't quite say.

Still, this did not bode well. Not at all.

He first bow went to her aunt. "Hiashiko-sama." The second one went to Hinata, as low as befitting an Elder. "Elder Hinata-sama."

She straightened and focused her gaze on her aunt but also kept Hinata in her peripheral vision. "How may I be of service?"

((Post-dated to Year 18, February, soon after this log.))


Some people wondered what drove Team Gaia's members to dedicate such ludicrous amounts of their lives to training. Some people maintained that they were using time-space folding jutsus in order to stuff all their training within the hours of a day; others were sure they had discovered some magical energy-giving elixir that eliminated the need for sleep. Many concluded that they were all insane.

Tentsuke couldn't explain entirely what drove him to rise at dawn and meet his teammates in some mud-churned field (churned by their own feet and weapons and movements) in order to put himself through a beating that many civilians would take as sufficient reason to lay down and die, but he could say ( that the chance to try out new shiny weapons definitely played a role. )

Sachiko wasn't looking forward to this mindwalking and it showed in how she was semi-trudging to Kureno's house. She knew this was part of the training, knew that this was another step not just to helping Naruko but also to get her own mind into some semblance of order. But the trepidation, and the fear, were not exactly something she could ignore. She was scared no matter how much she tried to pretend she wasn't. The last person, really the only person, to invade her mind was her sister, and she lived with the results of that all the time. (It wasn't so bad now; being outside the compound and having actually (finally) talked to someone had helped too.) And she did trust Kureno - she wouldn't work with him otherwise.

Still did nothing about the fear.

At least Kureno had given her warning that their next training session would involve him going into her mind. It was time, he'd said, she began learning some of the finer points of creating mental defenses. She hoped it would require only a quick look and then he would need time to decide how to accomplish the goal. Ordinarily she believed in getting as much done at a time as possible, but perhaps for this it wouldn't be such a bad thing to go as slow as possible. Yes, it would end up prolonging it, but she needed to get comfortable with him going into his mind. Which he probably already knew or guessed.

She nervously licked her lips as she mounted the steps of his porch. Outside his door she hesitated, gathering her own courage, and knocked.

Set two days after his mission with Nejiko to a fight club. ...which isn't posted yet. Whoops.

It had been weeks since Yuugao had given his mother (and father, too) a proper visit. Recently though, things had seemed more stressed than usual. And not just for him. His father - now retired from the shinobi lifestyle - was often away from home, setting up and now running his own little calligraphy shop. Making one's own explosion tags did come in handy for some. Yuugao had visited it a few times and even had helped build some of the cabinetry inside. His father knew he'd made the draperies, but never showed those off to customers or family friends. His mother, Iyona, never said anything in complaint - Yuugao only stared at them for long moments before continuing on his way. There was no way his father would be proud of his most recent venture selling custom made suits. ( There was no difference between suits and draperies to a man like his father. )

Set right after Yuugao and Hizashiko meet.

White eyes watched the man go, and waited until he was gone to continue down the hall. Shaking her head, she started to move again easily towards where her daughter was waiting. Not bothering to announced herself (Nejiko would know it was her), she didn't bother to hesitate in asking, ( 'Does your superior always drop of mission assignments to you personally? Or to every member of your team' )

He could have waited for Nejiko to come to Headquarters, but he much preferred the chance to see her again. With things still so strained - especially with the Hyuuga issues that everyone was trying not to comment on - Yuugao had been hesitant to try another social call. But with the new year - and this business-related visit - he was willing to take a chance. At least it was a legitimate reason, right? And small steps of getting comfortable around each other would be progress.

Having changed into civilian clothes, Yuugao took a deep breath before coming into view of the two female Hyuuga guards at the gate. He put on a smile even as the double glares fell on him. They let him through easily enough and he remembered enough of the directions to find Nejiko's room with only one hesitation at a turn. When he found her room unoccupied - he waited a full minute before peeking inside. And the guilt he felt was awful, too. He forced back the blush and after feeling composed, Yuugao asked the first Hyuuga he spotted where Nejiko might be found. The Hyuuga man stared at him in what Yuugao recognized as hidden surprise for a moment before suggesting the training area.

After finding only empty rooms or other Hyuuga, Yuugao finally paused at the doorway to a room reminiscent of a dojo, complete with sweat-smoothed wooden floors and Hyuuga insignia marking the walls. He smiled at the sight of Nejiko going through the very kenjutsu kata that he'd taught her. ( He waited for her to notice him and couldn't keep back all of his smile as he leaned against the doorway. )

[what's been happening with/to Tentsuke that's kept him out of Konoha]


( faces, eyes, a small secret smile - a spear, a red flame circled in gold, a swirl and two lines engraved onto a steel plate - a green-colored seal on someone's brow, an inked tree on pale skin, faces carved into a mountainside. )

[happens before This won't hurt. Really.]

Sachiko chose to spend her free time doing nothing but rarely. Today was one of those days. Another session with her team was concluded, and she had nothing scheduled save her own self-prescribed training. She'd thought she'd heard rumors of some bruhaha going on with the Hyuuga but she'd given them little attention. Whatever that bunch was up to, it certainly was their own business.

Though, it could explain why there'd no word from Hinaji for the past--she ticked off the time in her brain--wow, five months? That could be part of it. And also, maybe their first fire-jutsu lesson had gone off worse then she'd thought, and he decided that he didn't want to continue. She scowled at the sky from her prone position on a bench. Well, hell, he could've at least told her ( something. )

Leigh was not cryptic. Like her sensei and idol, Leigh was verbose and prone to metaphors along with some odd analogies. Nejiko had needed to teach her how to write a concise mission report many times, pointing out that the Hokage's office does not want paragraphs of prose describing the delicate dance of the implementation of perfect form against an opponent, or jewel-like luminescence of the fiery sun settled in a velvet cushion of purple clouds. It had been a long, painful process - paring down the report to its most basic and essential elements had been an exercise in patience and mental/intellectual endurance. It had only taken a few years. The progress had been hindered the most by Gaia-sensei herself, who saw nothing wrong at all with encouraging the unneeded and artificial inflation of unnecessary descriptions. Finally, it came down to Nejiko convincing her teammate that if she wanted to write an overly embellished report she could, and save it in case the Hokage requested it. But for the sake of brevity, the initial report should only contain the basic facts. And if it didn't look pretty enough, then if she had time she should use the reports to practice her calligraphy.

Later Nejiko decided that it was a bad reflection on her that Leigh's calligraphy was better than her own. And so calligraphy and penmanship became yet another challenge between them - as did who could write the most efficiently succinct report, and the most elaborately detailed. Tentsuke had wisely chosen to stay out of it.

( The results were easy to deduce: )