Akane Saves the Day

Akane walked through the forest heading to the training field as she sighed at how weak she had been feeling lately. She felt that it was a good day for a training session as she stretched her back and neck as she was about halfway to the village. She was walking along her normal route until she got the idea to do a little warm up before reaching the training field as she took out her kunai and decided she'd try out a new skill she learned before she continued with her day. She got about eight kunai, holding one in each of the notches in the middle of her fingers, as she looked around for targets. She could see pinecones in different portions of the wooded area, some in the trees and some along the ground around trees, as she smiled and decided they would serve as her targets as she closed her eyes and concentrated.

She focused her mind on the quietness of the forest and the position of her targets as she thought exactly how she would go about hitting them all. She then opened her eyes, revealing her crimson Sharingan, and jumped into the air as she began flipping like an acrobat. Two kunai would leave her hand followed by two more as she threw them in specific places as they'd ricochet off each other to go in completely different directions. Her eyes would watch the movement of each kunai, her keen reflexes and speed of her eyes able to keep track of their trajectories and pathways, as she'd throw two more kunai in order to correct the ones that needed it before she'd then shift one kunai from her right to her left and she'd throw her last two right where she needed to. All of her kunai hit each other, changing their trajectories and seemingly dancing to her tune, as they flew along their final lines as she landed daintily on the ground. She let out a breath she had been keeping in since her initial start of the skill before she opened her eyes and her Sharingan looked to see where all her kunai had gone.

She was ecstatic to see that each of her kunai had hit it's mark right where she needed them to. All pinecones she had targeted, some behind trees and some behind rocks, had been struck right in their centers with her kunai as she struck her fist in her hand and smiled wide. "Yes! This'll do nicely." She smirked as she deactivated her Sharingan and went over to each kunai to pull them out of their pinecones and place them back into her pouches. She heard the birds still chirping and could see and feel the sun shining through the trees as she relaxed herself upon getting her last kunai and placing it into her pouch. Her relaxation was interrupted as she heard a soft whooshing sound beside her and saw another ninja, an older one with the mask of a bear over their face and in a black hoodie, beside her carrying a piece of paper. If she didn't knw any better, however, she was certain that this ninja was a ninja of the Leaf's Anbu!

"Are you Akane Uchiha?" The ninja asked in a stern gravelly and almost emotionless voice. This helped confirm to Akane that this was a male underneath the mask.

"Yes?... I haven't caused any trouble, have I?" Usually whenever a person was confronted by a member of the Anbu, as they were a part of the Kage's special task force from the shadows, it usually meant you were to be taken in as prisoner... or as a target to be killed.

"Do not worry, young Uchiha. I come here on orders of the Hokage to give you this." He extended his hand carrying the paper he had brought as he expected her to take it. She did so, gingerly as though it was a bomb, as she opened the parcel and read that it was a mission.

"Oh! Well I'm sorry that the Hokage made you come all this way just to give me a D-rank mission. I didn't know what to expect. I thought she'd have wanted me to take in a kill order or something." She couldn't help but laugh at her own hyperbole but was quieted down almost immediately as she realized the ninja wasn't laughing with her.

"Consider this, young Uchiha, that every mission the Hokage gives us ninja is important, in it's own way, for everyone involved with them. You may not think a simple D-rank mission is of importance in your standing as a ninja, even though you must agree it's necessary since it involves a missing fellow villager, it may serve as something more than just a notch in your mission log. The Hokage may even be going so far as to test you for a possible promotion into the fold... of an Anbu perhaps." Akane blinked upon hearing him say this as usually it took a top of the line ninja to be able to be even considered to be within the Anbu's ranks as she couldn't believe her ears at that. Of course that may have just been his way of getting her psyched up for the mission but from the way he seemed to nonchalantly say it she wasn't so sure. "Just food for thought. You are to commence your mission ASAP and report back to the Hokage upon completing. Failure is not an option. Good luck and we hope to work again with you in the future." He then put his hand up as he disappeared in a puff of smoke and left her in the woods with the mission paper.
She looked back at her mission paper to see that a family's grandmother had not been keeping in contact with them after missing her morning brunch with them and they were worried something may have happened to her. Akane remembered the words of the Anbu and couldn't help but believe that they thought this may have been a case of kidnapping as she looked at the address and she couldn't help but think of the possibility they had already given her house a once over. So, in that regard and being that the mission said that she's been gone since yesterday, she felt that if she was kidnapped then they couldn't still be in the village but they would want to hide out in a place close by if the woman was to serve as ransom. Thinking this she decided to explore the woods from high up and try to find them as soon as she could. She thus jumped into the branches of the trees and began to hop along them all in random orders, trying to cover as much of the grounds as possible, as her eyes tried to keep track of all that was going on down on the ground.

She tried to find anything that could belong to the one's possibly responsible, footsteps in the mud or traces of campfire smoke in the distance or sounds of screaming or whimpering or talking, as she spent a good half hour hopping around the forest in search of anything pertaining to suspicious activity. It was here that she finally saw something suspicious as she saw in the distance a tent with a burnt out campfire beside it. She landed as quietly as possible beside it as she investigated and saw that it had just been put out recently which meant the perpetrators were still possibly nearby. She kept to the ground as she ran, her feet keeping as quietly as possible, as she noticed footprints coming from the campsite and she pursued them. She finally caught a break as she noticed two hooded and robed individuals, along with another individual roped and having a bag over their head, as she hid behind a tree and thought of her situation and of a strategy. It was clear that whoever these guys were they weren't there without bad intentions as the person they had tied up was clearly there against their will.

She closed her eyes as she decided to try and come up with a distraction that could separate the two from each other and get their attention away from their prisoner. She smiled to herself as she thus hopped up into the tree and saw that one of them was carrying the captured individual on their shoulder. This meant that, if they were strong enough to carry them, they had to be strong enough to get away with them as well. She thus nodded before pulling out a kunai and some string as she tied it in a loop around the Kunai's end and tied a tag around the other end to make it seem as though it was a paper bomb. Once she had all of her affairs in order, her Sharingan activating as she kept her focus on the two, she commenced her strategy as she threw the kunai and watched it the whole way as it landed in the dirt between the two perps. Upon seeing the kunai and the assumed bomb, even though it was just a piece of paper made to look like one, they jumped away from it in opposite directions into the woods.

She smiled as she decided to first go after the one that had their hands free so that the one who didn't wouldn't have backup as she came down upon them from the trees and brought the heel of their foot down on top of their head. The man grunted instantly as his face got slammed into the ground and fell unconscious just as she was already recovering from the attack, going back to pick up her kunai, and she decided to go after the other one. This one she'd have to be cautious with as, though she had her expectations they wanted their prisoner as ransom, he could still hurt her as she was his hostage. She jumped up into the trees and ran after the point where they had gone to see that he had already bolted as he was running along the ground with the prisoner. She hopped from branch to branch, her Sharingan keeping track of his movements and his path, before she was ahead of him by a good margin and brought her hands up. With the seals of Ram, Snake, and Tiger she was engulfed into a puff of smoke as she hopped down on the ground to land in front of her target. He stopped midway upon seeing her as he turned around to try and run away just as another form of her landed on the ground and blocked his path as well.

Though her clone was no more than an illusion the man didn't seem able to tell as he back away just as she stepped slowly up to him. He maneuvered his prisoner down to her feet as he brought a knife up to her throat as the two forms were shocked and stopped as he looked at the two and tried to back into the woods. He chuckled evilly as he did until he was suddenly stopped and fell unconscious on the ground since the real version of Akane was behind him, her hand having given the back of his neck a quick chop, as her two clone disappeared and Akane removed the hood from the prisoner's head. It was indeed an older woman who confirmed her identity as the missing grandmother of the family as she cut her hands free of her rope. Upon confirming she guided her back into the village, a smile on her face upon being thanked by the family, as she bowed to them and decided to leave them be in order for them to go about their day on a high note. With her mission completed she proceeded to go to the Hokage mansion in order to report her mission a success.

(WC 2,018)

(Claiming the completion of D-rank mission Is There a Problem, Grandma? and the skill Uchiha Advanced Weaponry)

approved