To Whom it May Concern (P, Hikari Hyuuga)

A small, grey pigeon was flopping about aimlessly at the gates, a finely fashioned envelope at its side. The stamps posted neatly at its corner seemed to indicate that it was from Hoshigakure. It was a small, pale gray thing, with an elegant calligraphy printed on its front. 'To Whom it May Concern' in vivid red letters, with a simple wax seal. If one were to look at it with chakra vision or whatever, they wouldn't find anything harmful in it- because the only thing on the inside was a small, folded slip of paper with no residues of chakra. Maybe if someone, like, say, Hikari Hyuuga found it, they would be inclined to open it. But no pressure or anything. The pigeon squawked awkwardly, pecking at its foot.  Apparently, carrying letters over half a continent was tiring, or at least very itchy. Its head tilted to the side as it eyed the village gate. Any moment now...

[WC: 158]
[Total WC: 158]

It was a warm day, the sun shining high above the sky and not a single cloud in sight. The perfect day to train out in the Hyuuga district gardens, or so it would’ve been had the snowy haired kunoichi not been selected for gate guard duty. Being such was one of her least favorite duties to fulfill within the confines of the rebuilt walls. With the chuunin exams going on she could’ve gone out and met all of the shinobi, learning about the three other villages through firsthand interactions, potentially even giving her the opportunity to making some close friends along the way.

As the day dragged on, less and less people were entering through the gates which left Hikari alone to deal with the few who did decide to stay. Fortunately they were all prepared and ready to enter the gates the moment it was their turn. However, there weren’t the only creatures trying to vie for her attention, as a pigeon soon perched upon the top of the gate above her, a note attached to it to indicate it was a carrier pigeon. She had not been informed of how long or far they were able to go. After several moments of the bird pecking at its foot and looking around, Hikari decided to walk over to the winged animal and see who the note came for. Also, after checking its content with her byakugan, she opened the small note and much to her dismay, the letter only read “to whom it may concern”. There was nothing about who its recipients whereabouts were or why the bird seemed to need them to claim it as soon as possible.

The kunoichi silently sighed, but decided to reply to the note just to see if anyone would respond back. So she pulled out a pen using her storage displacement jutsu and wrote underneath the original words in clear, cursive handwriting, “Hello, are you searching for someone in particular in Konohagakure?”. Then she tied the note back to the leg of the pigeon, and watched as it flew off, delivering her message to whoever sent it in the first place.

(WC: 361)

It's possible that the recipient of the letter didn't look at it closely enough, or that the author of the first post didn't write clearly enough, because the inside of the message was a very simple word: 'hi'. Either way, should Hikari still proceed to send the letter, Suzumebachi would've been at... wherever Hoshi keeps the messenger pigeons, I guess, anxiously waiting for the bird's arrival. Once it landed, and she read the message, she scratched her head. Was she looking for anybody specific in Konoha?... Not really, she was just looking for somebody to write with. Eager to reply to her new pen pal, she sat down and got out a ballpoint pen, and began to scrawl her message out on the back of the new letter.

'Dear stranger,

No, I'm not looking for anybody specific. Are you looking for anybody specific in Hoshigakure? Oh wait, dumb question. Ignore that part. Did you know that bees can learn to recognize human faces? I thought that was cool.

Do you have bees in Konoha? I've never been there.

For reference, bees look like this:

...'

Below was a.... very interesting picture of a bee that could've been drawn by a six year old, if the person giving critique was generous. It had a goofy looking happy face drawn crudely on top of the drawing, like an afterthought.

'Anyway, thanks for talking to me. What are things like where you live? Do the summers get really hot? Do you have snow?

Sincerely, Hachi'

[WC: 251]
[Total WC: 409]

It took only a couple hours for the pigeon to find the snowy kunoichi once again, a new note attached to its foot. Hikari was honestly quite surprised to have seen the bird circling above her head so soon after having sent a reply to the strange letter. She wasn’t sure what to expect when she carefully unravelled the paper, but a messy drawing of a bee was not something she would’ve ever guessed to find.

Her lilac tinted eyes scanned the page as she leaned against the wall of the Hyuuga district, a hint of shock speckled in them at what the mysterious person had said. They weren’t looking for anyone specifically, just someone to be a penpal with them and exchange letters daily. Hikari was a bit skeptical about the idea of sending messages back and forth to a shinobi from another village, especially the village of Kotetsu and Valen, the tragic duo forever being burned into her memory. But she began to wonder if she could use this penpal to gain useful knowledge about Hoshi and what it was like, to see if everyone there had the same twisted moralities as their kage.

So with a shrug of her shoulders she pulled out a red inked pen and a pink tinted piece of paper from her house, which hadn’t been too far away from where she was stopped by the messenger, and began writing her reply,

“Hello Hachi,

I didn’t know that about bees, it’s an interesting fact to learn. How did you come across it?

Yes we have bees in Konoha, although none that look like the bees in Hoshi it seems based on your pretty drawing.

It’s very green here with lots of plant life, and very warm in both temperature and colors that make up the village. The summers do tend to get quite hot here and sadly it doesn’t snow often, although I wish it did. What is it like in Hoshi? I can’t say I know too much about your home, my apologies about that.

Sincerely,
Hikari”

With her response finished Hikari tied it neatly around the grey little bird’s leg before sending the animal back to Hoshi where Hachi was awaiting it, curious as to how this exchange between people of different worlds would develop over time. So long as Hachi didn’t request private information about the village that she was not permitted to tell, she felt their communications should run smoothly and without any problems. Until the next letter came, the Hyuuga went back to her own business which currently consisted of researching from books she got at the library about the effects reviving someone has on their body.

(WC: 810)

After days and weeks passed without any sign of Hachi’s carrier pigeon, the snow woman began to give up hope of ever getting a reply back. She didn’t necessarily mind that the person from Hoshi stopped replying, she never really anticipated that their communication would last long anyways. Pen pals was a unique and interesting idea, but it just wasn’t viable in the shinobi life. People die too quickly or are hesitant to speak freely with shinobi from villages not their own. It’s hard to trust others, even among your own village the Hyuuga was slowly beginning to understand that.

Thus, the Hyuuga stopped checking the gates for notes and went on with her life, the few messages between the two but a distant memory in the back of her mind now. Perhaps one day she would end up meeting them in person, hopefully on friendly terms. Until that day potentially came, she wouldn’t dwell on them.

(Exit)
(TWC: 967)
(Claims: All 967 words towards Rain Tiger at Will, placing it at 2800/3000, previous wc from here)

Approved.