Fish Out of Water [P,NK]

It was night. Many if not most ramen shops were closed by now. Ryūka was sitting in one of the open ones. His eyes were dead set on his ramen, one that he still hadn't taken a bite of. His right hand was holding onto chopsticks, trembling. His headband was lying on the table, to the left of his bowl. The old waitress approached her again. "Is it cold?". She touched the side of the bowl. It was a cold night. Food tended not to stay hot for long in such weathers. "Want a new one again?". The waitress then realized that not just his hand, but his body as a whole was trembling. Ryūka nodded lightly. The waitress, put his hand on the boy's forehead to see if he had a fewer, or if he was freezing. His body temperature seemed fine. She walked back to the kitchen.

Ryuka would hear the scraping of metal against tile as the hyuuga pulled a stool backwards so that he could rest on it. Getting himself into place he'd take a moment to collect his thoughts before he began what he had come here to do. He'd motion to the server that he'd be ordering nothing, after all Ramen was not the purpose of his visit here.

That purpose sat next to him in front of an untouched bowl.

Without looking at the boy, he'd pull his own headband bearing the symbol of kumogakure out of his weapons pouch, and place it on the countertop in front of Ryuka. "Do you know what this is?" He'd ask coldly.

WC: 113

Things were already bad. Ryūka was already feeling as if this was a dream. The man he barely recognized from their shared travel somehow made this real again by acknowledging Ryūka's existence. The Iburi fought it. He wanted to remain in this surreal fantasy he had fallen into, inside this random ramen shop in Konoha.

He couldn't look up to meet the man's gaze. He couldn't muster any words. He dropped the chopsticks onto the table and looked at the headband the man dropped. He looked back to his own. The difference between the two was clear. Ryūka's was polished. Shiny. He took good care of it so it would fit his image. Komon's was worn. The metal was clean, but there were scratches and marks. Things you couldn't just... erase.

Ryūka reached out to his headband. Kenshin's face popped up in his mind. Agitated, he quickly pulled back. His shaking intensified. A few seconds later, during which Ryūka still was in his anesthetized state, the waitress came back with another hot bowl. She started putting the bowl down, and when the bowl was close enough to the table it was apparent that she was about to put it on top of Ryūka's headband. He instinctively pulled the headband to the side. Then he just... started looking at it, still holding it on top of the table. He couldn't bring himself to answer Komon, but he suspected the man was going to talk still, and Ryūka was paying attention to what he would say next.

The boy didn't seem to have an answer for him. Not that Komon had really cared for one, anything the boy said now could only be seen as him trying to dig out of the hole he'd made for himself, and it would earn him no respect from the shinobi beside him.

"It's a legacy bought with blood" He'd say plainly. "It exists today because people have died to preserve it. God know's I've seen it first hand" He spoke as he remembered the friends he'd lost in war, and the family he'd had ripped from him at such a young age.

"One is buried in a coffin with my father"

"Another with my mother"

The words alone should have been enough to let Ryuka know how closely he held the village to his heart, and in turn how frustrated he must be with todays events, but he'd continue anyways.

"One day, I'll be buried with my own and It'll be of lesser value than that of my parents because of what you've done today" Spite coated the last few words of the sentence as Komon practically spit them out. "Today you fled from a battle before the leaders of the shinobi world like a frightened child. And in the eye's of those figures, that's what this symbol now represents"

Up until now he hadn't even bothered to look in the Ryukas direction, but that ended as his angry grey eyes turned to rest on the boy.

"You've tarnished the legacy of those that came before you, And I take offense to it"

WC: 383

Ryūka was taken out of his numb state by Komon's words. Not because of guilt, no, but because of disagreement.

"Tarnished a legacy?". Ryūka finally raised his head and looked into Komon's eyes. It was love at first sight. It confirmed what the Genin (or the ex-Genin, depending on what else he was about to hear) assumed. The two men had the same differences their headbands had. Ryūka continued. "I fucked up.".

He took a second to think. "Still, it is just that... One fuck up. I've worked every day for Kumo from dawn to dusk. I risked my life countless times. I didn't do it for glory or recognition, like I didn't come here for the glory, or recognition.". Zyxis's face popped into Ryūka's mind. A boy who in Ryūka's mind was doing both. "I earned one fuck up. Even if you think I haven't, I'll work every day for the rest of my life and make up for it a thousand times over. Not for a title. I'll do it for Kumo. This... This was not ninja work. This was sports. For spectators. For entertainment. If you think I'm not fit to protect Kumo with my blade because of today, so be it. I don't need titles or money to do the right thing.".

The boy spoke as if what he'd done had been an accident and downplayed it as if he hadn't made his village look frail. He'd handed weakness to the villages on a silver platter and implied he'd earned the right to do so. Komon's frustration only grew as the boy made what he assumed to be false promises.

"This was no mistake" He'd say plainly. "Not an accident made out of your control, but a conscious decision" A momentary pause would hang in the air as he considered his next accusation. "You chose to flee instead of fight, and that is not the decision of a soldier"

Judgement would fall upon the once shinobi of kumogakure "You speak of life without title and so you will have it" There was no mistaking the authority in his words. "You are stripped of you're titles until I've deemed you fit for them" His hand would extend outwards with the palm open and upwards. "I'll teach you what it means to be a shinobi, but until then I'll be taking your headband"

He was letting the boy off easy, had this been any of his predacessors the boy would find himself impaled on a pike, or a walking corpse. Here he lost only a rank he had no right to.

His thoughts fell back to the day he'd been given the rank of jounin. A memory that had aged fondly in his mind as the last time he'd seen the man before his death. You are the backbone of our village, her sorrow and pain and your sorrow and pain, her pleasure and happiness are yours. You are entrusted with her defenses, entrusted to protect her and the many people that call her home. Do not ever dream of failing her. The last words of a true shinobi, and a standard he'd hold to those beneath him.

WC: 698

Ryūka looked at his headband one last time before handing it over to Komon. He wasn't bluffing when he said he'd accept this life. He could have argued this had nothing to do with him being a soldier, as the exams were a game, not a real fight in Ryūka's eyes, but... Honestly, Ryūka didn't care. He knew he deserved this. As he let go of his headband, he realized how much he missed his home, but especially the zombies. 

This felt less like punishment, and more like... Change. There was aggression and anger, sure. But Ryūka, maybe because of his current state of mind, felt like this wasn't the worst day of his admittedly short life. This was a 2 year old, being scolded for doing something dumb. Ryūka was getting a chance to set things right still. "When do we start?" Ryūka simply asked.

He'd place his own headband in his left weapons pouch, and Ryuka's in his right before standing up. The boy at the very least, seemed eager to redeem himself. But that was a task for another time, now he needed to play the politician, and clean up the mess his genin had made. "Another time, go ahead and finish eating, you'll need the strength" He'd turn his back to the former genin and give a simple wave of the hand.

"Meet me at the village gates tomorrow morning. We can start from there"

--EXIT--
Claiming: 798 Words towards Raikiri (798 + 2598 from here ) = 3396/6000 (Max Stat Discount)

Oh also demoting that ryuka nerd to acad boyo

Approved for both of you